When it seemed like my actions weren't discovered, I returned to my temporary room and let out a sigh of relief. As the sense of relief washed over me, other thoughts began to come to mind.
Now that the penalty for the Adaptation skill seemed to have been lifted, I began to anticipate the growth I'd been waiting for over three years.
I got excited without realizing it and repeated several movements, praying for the skills to appear in the system window.
Of course, no new skills appeared.
If you think about it, it's obvious that if you simply repeat actions to obtain skills, wouldn't everyone be acquiring skills?
Of course, you can accumulate experience points to acquire skills by repeating actions, but it takes a very long time to acquire skills that way. There are several ways to shorten that time.
First: Intructors.
If you train under the guidance of a being with a high skill level, you can gain additional skill experience points. That's why, if you look at the labyrinth city, there are guilds that help you acquire skills such as swordsmanship or martial arts.
Of course, you have to pay to receive instruction from each guild, but since they teach you not only skill experience but also solid fundamentals, many explorers pay money to the guilds to learn skills.
Second: Labyrinth.
According to the experience accumulated by numerous explorers, there is an effect that increases the experience gained within the labyrinth.
In particular, the deeper you go into the labyrinth and the stronger the magic power of the labyrinth, the more experience gained.
"Third: Achievement."
When you accomplish something that you normally can't do, the system gives you additional skill experience for that achievement.
Just like when I fooled the senses of the Miao tribe, who have excellent senses—or rather, blocked their senses. But anyway, I fooled the Miao tribe's senses, touched their chest, and gained the skill [Stealth].
I heard that an adventurer got punched by a top adventurer to get an achievement… and after recovering about five times, he gained a tanking skill.
"And... [Adaptation]"
This is a kind of non-standard skill. I got the [Stealth] skill because of the achievement bonus, but I think it was also because of the effect of this [Adaptation] skill.
I've never heard of a skill that gives you additional experience like this.
Of course, there may be a being with such a skill who is hiding it, but at least it's not generally known.
In other words, it's inefficient for me to do repetitive actions alone in a room.
After thinking about this and that on my own, I took my wallet and left the treatment center.
I needed to try out some things.
***
For about a week, I had time to explore my abilities. The first thing I did was, of course, to go to a brothel.
There are legal and illegal brothels in this world, and of course, I chose the legal brothel. I paid a set tax but they worked with a temple or magic tower to ensure contraception and prevention of sexually transmitted diseases. The price was high, but I didn't have to worry about being ripped off or getting stabbed in the back.
I was shocked when I saw the brothel's price, but I thought it was an investment in my future, so I paid 10 silver coins and found a cheap brothel. It wasn't even a one-night stay, but a one-hour stay.
I thought I would gain experience with the [Adaptation] skill, gain numerous skills, and level up my abilities.
Of course, I wouldn't get full results on the first visit, but I thought I would gain much more experience from having proper sex for an hour than from touching someone's chest for only 10 minutes.
However, my expectations were shattered.
"You gain a small amount of experience with the [Adaptation Lv. 1] effect."
"Small amount of experience."
It's not even a message that pops up after starting the act, but a message that pops up after I've dragged on for an hour and finished everything from caressing to insertion to cleaning.
The result of an act for an hour is only "a small amount of experience."
It made no sense.
Even when Hessa drank a drop of semen, it said I gained "a small amount of experience."
The only result I got was that I checked out another effect attached to the [Adaptation] skill: that my stamina had increased a little.
I went there on the day I had already cum on Hessa once, but I came twice more. And it seems like my technique has improved?
Actually, I don't know much about this because it's my first time. I don't know why there's such a big difference between the [Adaptation] I used on Hessa and the [Adaptation] I used in the brothel. There's still too little information.
Fortunately, the penalty for the [Adaptation] skill has been reduced.
Nevertheless, the next place I looked was the [Sensory Block] skill.
It was a skill that had been at Level 1 for three years and then went up to Level 2, gifting me with two derivative skills.
I still don't know if the reason the skill leveled up was because of the latent effect of the [Adaptation] skill, or if it was originally a condition for having sex.
It seems like it was because the penalty of the [Adaptation] skill was blocked…
First of all, the skill range, which was originally about the size of a forearm, had roughly doubled. Considering that it was originally possible to slightly increase or decrease the range within a set range, I thought it would be possible to slightly increase the range.
The skill duration, which was originally limited to about 10 minutes, has also doubled. Originally, there was no cooldown, so I could just use it once more when the duration ended.
But considering that I'll be using the skill more often in the future, if I kept using it like that, I'd probably run out of magic power, so it's a good change.
Also, "increased range of sensory block" wasn't simply talking about the size of the skill's application. It was closer to the skill's effect.
[Sensory Blocking]: Blocking the sense of feeling sweetness.
I cast the skill on myself and drank the sugar water I had prepared.
I definitely didn't feel the sweetness I had felt before casting the skill, and it felt like I was just drinking plain water.
To be exact, it felt like drinking tasteless water rather than plain water.
The result was the same even if I drank the juiced water I had prepared next to me.
There must be various ingredients that produce sweetness, but if you just lump them together and say "sweetness blocking," the sweetness disappears.
Well, it's strange to ask for scientific verification in a skill.
Oh, and if I actually put in too much sugar, the skill doesn't work either. The skill's power definitely increased, but the skill's "below a certain amount" felt arbitrary.
In any case, it's encouraging that the skill has grown. If my skills keep growing like this, I might be able to dream of becoming a labyrinth explorer that I had given up on...
"Ian, come to the injection room!"
"Yes! I'm going!"
Ah, for now, let's start with work. I have to keep my job.