Becoming a Monster-Chapter 99: Pathetic

Noah wasn’t aware of the new development between Jasmine and Mark; he was more focused on his creatures.

"Why can’t you ever behave?" he asked impatiently, directing his frustration towards Fenrir, whose demeanor became downcast until he heard Noah’s following words. "You two are always creating trouble when I’m not watching you. Either start trouble when you’re around me or don’t start it at all."

Noah didn’t realize it, but there were still curious onlookers who were eavesdropping on his conversation. Their curiosity only caused them to distance themselves further as a result.

"Don’t forget me too!" Ailetta came out of nowhere before entering their circle. Fenrir remembered her from before and looked to Noah for orders, while Arachne stared her down, her gaze was intensely calculating before she dismissed her thought.

"Calm down, Fenrir," Noah said, raising a hand to keep the situation from escalating. "She’ll be with us for a while. That reminds me..." He pulled out a space bag from his inventory, quickly dumping the valuables inside into his ring before handing the bag to Ailetta.

"You can help me by sorting through these chests," he instructed. "The attribute orbs should be collected and placed next to each other for later. Skill scrolls should go in their own pile, and potions should be put in the bag. Everything else will be put into a separate pile so I can check them individually."

Ailetta nodded eagerly, taking the space bag with a determined look. "I’ll get right on it, Noah."

It didn’t take long for them to empty the contents. Fortunately, Fenrir’s frequent travels through the area had flattened the grass considerably, making their task easier. The chests yielded a modest haul: from the bronze and silver chests, they retrieved mundane weapons, which Noah deemed unworthy of collection, along with two potions—a tier 0 mana potion and a tier 0 cure for infection. One of the silver chests contained armor resembling the full-body set Noah currently wore. Though the defense and stats were meager by his standards, he decided to give it to Ailetta before they left.

Among the six orbs they found, five were attribute orbs that increased stats by 5, while the sixth orb boosted a stat by 10. Of the five orbs, two were for mana, two for strength, and one for agility. The +10 attribute orb was for spirit.

He looked toward Ailetta, who was staring at him expectantly, wondering what to do next. "What’s your level and stats?" he asked, needing to determine his next steps. If her stats were truly abysmal, he would consider distributing some of the attribute orbs to her if he was going to allow her to follow him for the time being.

"Well....I’m-"

[Player: Ailetta

Race:Human

Class: Arcanist

Gold: 320

Lvl: 7

Exp:1231/1600

Health:100%

Stamina:100%

Mana: 96/96

Attributes

Defense: 5

Strength:8

Agility:9

Constitution:10+2

Stamina:12

Magic: 45+3

Spirit:24+2

Unassigned Points: 0]

Noah winced as he heard Ailetta reveal her stats and level. At first, he thought she might be playing a bad trick on him, but the sight of her reddening cheeks and her gaze fixed firmly on the ground told him she was telling the truth.

"What the hell have you all been doing??" His voice caused everyone to turn towards them. But no one dared to go over.

"W-well...we all agreed that those orbs should go to the people who need them, so strength, constitution and stamina would go to the fighters. The magic and spirit to magic-base classes and...yeah..." Ailetta’s voice trailed off nervously as she poked her fingers together, stealing brief glances at Noah, who couldn’t believe what he was hearing.

"Wha-what are you doing?" Ailetta became startled when she saw Noah place all of the orbs in front of her. But each time he placed one, the forcefulness of his actions grew more aggressive.

"Never again." His single phrase caused her to become confused, she intently stared into his displeased demeanor, searching for an explanation.

"Not giving those orbs to yourself is essentially saying that you trust those people with your life more than you do yourself. I’ve seen the few times you could’ve been killed. Where were those people then? You can’t be so naive, not if you plan on following me. Strength comes first, because without it, you’ll only die. Use these now so we can go."

Ailetta’s cheeks flushed with embarrassment, and she nodded silently while accepting the orbs.

Defense: 5

Strength:8->18

Agility:9->14

Constitution:10+2

Stamina:8

Magic: 45->55+3

Spirit:24->34 +2

After using the orbs and feeling the rush of strength that correlated to her new stats, Ailetta turned to Noah with watery eyes, her emotions threatening to spill over.

"Sniff* I promise to get stronger soon Noah..."

Noah observed Ailetta’s emotional state, noticing her momentary pause. He wondered if something had gone wrong until she unfroze and looked at him again.

"I got something called a perk? it’s a skill for getting my mana to 50."

Noah was shocked once again, not by what she said, but how she said it.

"Don’t tell me no one in your group has received a perk yet?" Noah hoped that she would say they had, otherwise he would question how they stayed alive for so long. But his question elicited a response he wasn’t prepared for.

"I don’t know....are those things you’re supposed to talk about? No one shared their skills with me...Jas has Mark, Bailey has Ibby and Paul, Ailicia has Ishii, and Isabelle rarely talks...I...I...I don’t know.." She began to tear up when she realized that even though she was surrounded by so many people she was more alone than she had realized.

Noah didn’t know how to react to this. But he knew that he shouldn’t press her anymore.

"Sigh...well that’s in the past, I’ll help you get stronger along the way." He helped Ailetta to her feet to finish going through the rest of the items. He had her place the armor in her bag to wear later while he emptied the chest of its gold.

"Well what skill did you get from the perk?" He couldn’t help but ask, all of his perks have benefited him, he hoped it would be the same for her.

"It’s called ’Summoners conservation’. The skill lets me save 10% more mana on skills that use my summon creature." She explained, astonished at the fact she was able to get a free skill so easily.

Noah nodded in satisfaction as he examined the lone skill scroll, only to find it was a taming skill. While he appreciated the fact that the skills he obtained were based on his class, he couldn’t help but feel a twinge of disappointment. With his mage class also in mind, he longed for more mage skills. After all, his monsters were already fine without him.

Even though he felt this way, he couldn’t say no. His creatures were his greatest asset and strength, and he would always have to rely on them when he encountered something he couldn’t handle. However he just didn’t know how this skill would benefit him at the moment.

[Grant lesser magic confirmed!]

Grant lesser magic-Increase the magic stat of a tamed creature by 10 percent of its base magic for 15 seconds. Increases after the usage of the skill will still apply. Can also be stacked with the same skill, but the usage in mana will increase with each stack of use. Cost 10 mana per use. Skill is also influenced by spirit.]

He felt that he would have to search for a creature that could use magic in the future or at least find magic skills for his creatures. On the topic of skills, he looked towards Ailetta, half tempted not to ask.

"How many skills do you have? Don’t tell me you shared those too?" Though he already expected the answer, his frown deepened as he watched her silently nod her head.

"...They said that the skills should go to their required roles, it sounded right to me.." Ailetta’s voice trailed off, realizing from Noah’s expression that she somehow messed up. fгeewёbnoѵel_cσm

"I just can’t.....you guys are really treating this like a video game. And they call me crazy....wait..." His gaze shifted to his ring, his eyes seeming to enter a trance-like state. To others, it would appear as though Noah was lost in thought, but in reality, he was searching through his ring for an item.

"Here, learn this," he said, pulling out a scroll. "It’s not something I can use. However, I don’t know how your class works, so I can’t tell you if it’s good. But for now, any skill would be good for you."

He handed her the scroll, Ailetta looked towards the scroll and then to Noah, before looking towards the scroll again, more determined than before.

"The skill is called ’Mana Flow,’ and it allows me to reabsorb 20 percent of the mana that was used to summon my familiar after I end the skill," Ailetta exclaimed excitedly. But as she looked at Noah, clear shock reflected in her eyes.

"Has the system asked you if you want to integrate your custom skills into it? I’ve been meaning to ask you since you are probably the best person to ask. Jasmine decided not to, but I have two skills that I could integrate and I feel that it might be better to do so," Ailetta rambled on, oblivious to the mini explosion she caused in Noah’s head.

"Wait, wait, wait... you can create your own skills?" Noah interrupted impatiently, his realization dawning slowly. Gradually, he came to realize how foolish he sounded. ’Now who’s comparing this to a game? Of course, you should be able to make your own skills!’ he chided himself inwardly.

Ailetta felt that something wasn’t right, ’he was so strong and he never once made his own skill? Then how did he get so many skills?’ Even though she felt something was off, she was gonna answer him anyways, but Noah beat her to it.

"Nevermind, that was a dumb question. I would say if it’s a skill you feel that you can upgrade on your own, then you shouldn’t integrate it. You might not even need an upgrade stone if you do it that way. But some skills might be better to have in the system just for tha-"

"Noah? Noah? The food is waiting for you."

Noah and Ailetta soon became aware of what was going on around them when Arachne nudged his shoulders with her hands; it was the only part of her limbs that didn’t have the ominous glowing green color, which he assumed was poison.

He turned to the direction she was facing and noticed the ’food’ she was referring to.

Following Arachne’s gaze, Noah noticed the ’food’ she was referring to. To his surprise, the people nearby were looking at them with dumbstruck expressions, some even displaying jealousy and envy. Unbeknownst to Noah, they had all stopped what they were doing when they witnessed him giving Ailetta a small pile of attribute orbs and even a skill.

The worst part of it was that Ailetta was just average when compared with the appearance of the girls currently there! This was only bound to set off the women who would kill to be given resources like that.

Coughs* Jasmine became aware that Noah and Ailetta had finally noticed them, even though she was originally only calling for Ailetta, but Arachne for some reason had to say they were calling for Noah.

"We’re all planning on leaving soon after we collect some things from the dorm. Are you two coming with us?"

Silence was all that followed, everyone, including the newcomers waited while holding their breaths, all for two different reasons. One side wanted the maniac to go away while the other felt that the journey would be literal hell without him. Noah looked at her as if he was looking at an idiot.

"Of course we’re not going t-"

"Noah, wait!"

Ailetta interrupted him, her face full of concern. Hearing her voice, Noah’s shoulders slumped, and he let out a slow breath before turning around.

"Don’t tell me you want to follow them, even after they used you?" His question confused the people listening in, they weren’t sure what he meant by those words at all since all of them had also agreed to share their things.

Despite noticing the slight reluctance in her behavior, Ailetta still met his gaze and replied. "Yes, but...I just want to make sure they get there safely...after that then I don’t mind going anywhere else, with just us.." She spoke the last part almost in a whisper,a hint of embarrassment coloring her cheeks. Noah remained oblivious to her awkwardness, his focus tunneling on the recent contents she spoke of.

"Make it there safely? What are you talking about? Make it where?" He asked, Noah wasn’t privy to the information about the government making one of their many checkpoints that was nearby. Ailetta took the time to explain to him how they had bought a radio from the mystery shop that actually worked, and how they were able to find out about the location that was supposed to be safe.

The source of this c𝓸ntent is fr𝒆e(w)𝒆bnovel