Antagonist Protection Service-Chapter 85: What To Buy

As a result of having reached Tier Two Authority, I was now able to purchase a Trait that belonged to Lucretia.

Just as with all of the other taxed abilities, it was exorbitantly priced, but before that, was it even useful?

Needless to say, that was the first thing I needed to check.

Trait - [Noble Soul]

You are a true noble; whether by blood or by will, you will inevitably find yourself in a position of utmost prestige, reverence, or irrevocable honour.

To the extent that even your soul itself could be said to demand respect.

(Your soul becomes that of a true noble)

Price : 5,000 U

I stared at the description for a while, my face blank. After some moments, a mutter slipped off my tongue.

"...What's that supposed to mean?"

I contemplated for a while, the gears in my head stuck as if restrained by muck and grime when the Librarian piped up, performing a rabbit-like hop on her stool to the side.

"Oh! Perhaps, does it mean you would become as noble as the Young Lady Archduchess? Being a person willing to do anything for the future of the Drakon-Rasa Empire, even if it meant sacrificing her own happiness and marrying the slob of a crown prince, that Antagonist was someone who fits the bill of 'true noble' quite well, I'd say! Certainly, in fact!"

Well, I couldn't deny that.

That didn't mean it was something I should use all my money to buy, though.

"Yeah... well, maybe, but how is that useful for me? It's not, right?"

Scratching my head for a moment, I glanced at her beaming face.

"Certainly! In a niche scenario, perhaps it may come unexpectedly in handy, however, if I were to give my opinion on whether it is worth paying 5,000 World Stability Units for, I would have to undoubtedly reject that sentiment!"

Agreeing wholeheartedly, I nodded.

"5k is a lot, yeah... I'd barely be able to get anything else if I bought it, so I think it's safe to leave it for now."

'I don't even know what it does in the first place, and I don't really want to risk it.'

In the end, though a bit sorry to Lucretia in my heart, I swiftly came to such a decision.

Closing the Service Charge list, I returned to the main menu of the Shop and looked over the available categories.

Traits were what I was most leaning towards right now. They're a one-and-done deal, so I wouldn't need to worry about them after purchasing them, and from my experiences with Professionalism and Charismatic so far, they seemed to be pretty damn effective.

In that case, Heightened Senses and Gifted Trainee were what I've had my eye on the most. Oh, and maybe Weapon Master, but I wasn't so sure about that one anymore; since I might not be able to use all of my weapons much, that was going on the backburner. On the other hand, the former two were both Traits I was sure would always be good.

I've been considering all of them from the beginning, but these two would fit into pretty much any build I go for, making them extremely safe bets.

As the name implied, Heightened Senses would provide a solid boost to all of my senses. However, apparently, this also included ones outside the five classics, such as balance, spatial awareness, and even natural instincts to a certain degree, which would without a doubt be useful as a parallel form of enhancing my body.

The only problem was that it costed 3,000 Units.

Of course, I could afford it and still have plenty left over, unlike any of the Service Charge abilities, but is it really going to be so immediately useful that I should jump at the chance to purchase it right away?

The answer was most certainly no.

As for Gifted Trainee, it was something that would assuredly accelerate the process of physical training, but again, it's a bit expensive for what little it immediately provides at 4,000 Units.

I was already doing fine exercising without it, and though it might become useful in the future for training myself beyond human limits, that's not really something I can use as a justification right now, anyway.

Well, I don't even know if doing that is possible in the first place, considering I don't have any mana or spiritual energy in my body. In other words, I am very well within said human limits.

As such, that will also have to be placed on hold for the moment.

So then, if we exclude Traits for now, what's left are Items and Skills.

At this point, Skills seemed to be the way... Unfortunately, they require spending additional World Stability to level up, for one, and some of them also require mana to even use―though under that category lie mostly Active Skills.

"Fret not! In fact, it should indeed be possible to endow your body with the required mana to use a Skill by supplementing your own, nonexistent mana, with the mana stored in the Illusory Mark!"

"Hm? What, really?"

Surprisingly, the Librarian provided a sort of solution to that lack of mana problem.

Though that too came at a cost.

"Certainly! Of course, doing this will mean exhausting a small portion of the mana within the Mark for every use, but it nevertheless might be a worthwhile consideration, at least temporarily!"

"Hmm..."

'I see. That could definitely be handy... If I had anything that required mana, but I don't. At least not yet.'

It did mean I'd need to be more mindful about using the Storage in the middle of a Contract just as I had done in Drakon-Rasa, but in exchange, it'd grant me the ability to cast magic or use Skills. Of course, due to the rather severe downside, I probably wouldn't be doing that if I could help it.

That leaves the cost of levelling up the Skills, but even taking that into consideration, they were still predominantly cheaper than Traits, and most of them by a significant margin.

One of the Skills I took particular notice of was Trap Fabrication, but it had a number of stipulations attached. In particular, it was something that seemed to desire a pairing with two other Skills―Trap Enhancement and Trap Augmentation―in order to make full use of it.

So, again, maybe that's something I should postpone for now...

"...This is tough..."

Why was it so hard to know what to do? At the very least, should we start with levelling up the one Skill I do have? From there, let's just take it slow.

According to the Shop, levelling up Sneak costs 1,000 World Stability.

"Is this the same price for all Skills?"

I glanced at Librarian and asked, to which she immediately responded with glee.

"Certainly, that is correct! Furthermore, regardless of what level the Skill in question is, the level up cost will always remain at 1,000 World Stability Units until the level cannot be increased any further!"

"Alright."

Let's test that out real quick.

Skill - [Sneak] (Level 2) (Passive)

That which lets you embrace the still quiet, allowing your very form to blend into its surroundings seamlessly.

Every movement of your body, every action you take, seems to be done with such finesse that people could only think of you as a ghost skulking around, if they noticed you at all.

However, you are little more than a fledgling interloper; carelessness will expose you swiftly.

(Staying undetected is easier)

Level 1 - Your noise is reduced when sneaking.

Level 2 - Your presence is harder to detect when sneaking.

Level Up Cost : 1,000 U

Librarian was right―Even after levelling it up, the cost remained at 1,000.

Incidentally, the 'when sneaking' part of the skill description didn't mean I had to necessarily be crouched or hiding for it to take effect―the skill worked automatically whenever I wanted it to, which was immensely useful.

"It can still be increased even further. Doesn't this make Skills even more expensive than Traits at max-rank?"

"Certainly! However, fret not! The effectiveness is guaranteed!"

So she said, and to be honest, I was inclined to agree. Just as with the Traits, although I hadn't needed to use it much in Drakon-Rasa, I did find my actions to be noticeably quieter when testing Sneak out for myself.

I would now have to test out just how hard my presence would be to detect, but I didn't doubt it would be impressive.

It was perfect, honestly.

All it meant was that, fundamentally, levelling up a skill would only become more worth it the higher level the skill was. It was all a future investment.

In any case, the remaining balance was 4,750 Units.

If I wanted all three of Trap Fabrication, Enhancement and Augmentation, I could afford it and have 2,450 World Stability to spare, but I'm not sure if that would be a good idea.

I'm not entirely sure what they'll entail even with the description, but traps were good, particularly if I was going to be speccing into an assassination-type build.

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That said, I still haven't fully decided on that yet.

They'd also all be level one, so I'm not sure how useful they'd be in that sense. It might be better to just focus on one skill, pouring all my World Stability into it to make it a high level.

Most of all, I was still concerned about if I would even be able to use the traps effectively due to mana constraints. Even if I could supplement my own lack of mana with the mana stored in the Mark, I didn't know if that would be enough.

After all, if I ran out of mana in the Mark, not only would I be unable to use the Storage, but I'd also be unable to reload the Black Wisp if that ever ran out of ammo.

'...Well, that's not the only thing.'

Putting Skills aside, there was also the option of purchasing some Items.