Rnd stared spaced out for a moment after hearing those notifications. He quickly brought up his status window to look at his new title, not really sure what it was all about.
’Understand my ass, I just redrew what my skill was showing me! Does this title even give me anything?’
Rnd rubbed his chin, it seemed that creating a schematic was all that he needed to do. Maybe the system mistook his understanding of circuitry andputer programming as knowledge of runes? If so, then he might have been on to something.
’Hm... that 1000 experience points though... Will I get just as much if I redraw other runes?’
That amount of experience points wasn’t small at all, he would probably jump a couple of levels instantly if he had switched sses beforehand. He knew that he would lose out on some of those points after changing sses now, but part of the xp would be carried over.
’Think I’ll be losing half of them... shame...Still, this is a great discovery!’
This was something unprecedented, his debugging skill had given him an easy way to earn more experience and do it fast. He only needed to get his hands on some magical items. He then would be able to create improved schematics which in term would give him more experience.
His skill allowed him to see every rune as a diagram, it even fixed any faulty pathways or miscedponents, shifting them into the correct ces. The biggest problem would be actually acquiring the runes, they cost a hand and a leg.
’I wonder if I could sell those schematics or create some my own...’
He knew that knowledge about crafting and creating runes was a trade secret. Other people would never disclose those as their livelihood depended on it. He now had a way of producingplete rune diagrams, which meant that he wouldn’t even need to look for a teacher or master for such things. He might even be able to sell those schematics for arge sum of moneyter on in his carrier if he ever needed the funds.
’Okay, I think I’m getting ahead of myself here. I have no idea how to even create a rune even with this schematic... still need to change my ss to Mana Scribe to be able to actually put magic to paper...’
He calmed himself down, he now felt that his future as a runesmith might be rosier than previously he expected. Still, he needed to actually get to that tier 2 ss before he could even do anything with these rune schematics. He also noticed that without having to even look to that diagram that he just made, he could probably redraw it from memory. He attributed that to his fast learning and knowledge retention traits that he had gained by possessing this youth’s body.
He continued fiddling around with the runic rapier but even after ncing at it from all sides and injecting more mana, he didn’t find any more uses for his skills.
’Maybe if I understand more about runes, there will be other things I can do with this skill?’
He looked outside and it was already dark, most people were asleep. He nced over to the crystal that allowed people to change their sses and then nodded. He had tested out the runes as he previously intended, so now was the time to change his ss and get to work.
’Well, here goes nothing...’
He activated the crystal and found himself back in his old apartment building once again. He was down on the first floor just like before.
’Time to go up...’
He walked up all those stairs to his apartment room, the inside looked as bad as it always did. He tested the windows again but they wouldn’t budge and the outside looked like the empty void as it did before.
’No changes here... time to check if I can actually change my ss, if not then I might as well go back home and be a butler.’
He was slightly worried that there might be another error. He got that strange zero elemental affinity after getting his first ss, there could be another mishap with this strange system that would keep him from advancing yet again. He waited for the windows screen to boot up, he then hovered his mouse cursor above the familiar icon that was used for ss changing.
He waited a moment before clicking the icon, scared of what he might find there. Finally, he mustered up the courage to go forward and clicked it. He was greeted to a familiar image of a tiny pixel art version of himself in a mage robe. The image had the usual three frame walking cycle as before.
’Heh, there is a lot of them this time...’
Previously there was only one arrow pointing to his mage ss, now there were a lot of them. He hovered the mouse over one of those pixel sprites as he was unsure of what sses they were. The moment he hovered over one, there was writing on top of it.
He could see the usual tier 1 sses bing avable. There was the warrior, the archer, even the cksmith ss that he was going to take on the next try. There were mostly filled with the basic of basic sses that you only needed a certain amount of stat points to reach, he finally managed to find the Mana Scribe one, but there was a nice surprise waiting for him.
"Huh? there is a Runic Mana Scribe?"
"Is it a variation of the regr Mana Scribe ss?"
He tried recalling the books that he read in the past that described the way to get him to the Runesmith ss. There was no mention of a Runic Mana Scribe ss, or of any other way of getting his desired tier 2 ss. This might have been a secret ss and he had a theory on how he was now able to select this ss.
’Runic Schr title, that must be it.’
He was quite sure that it had something to do with it, the books did describe sses that required certain titles to unlock and this was probably one of them. The only other exnation that could also be true, would be his debugging skill or his circuitry skill. The system already thought that they were rted to runes, so it wasn’t that far of a stretch.
’Maybe it’s even the threebined...’
Rnd hovered with the mouse on that Runic Mana Scribe ss, but it wasn’t giving him any info besides the name. From the way it was named he could deduce that it was focused on runes. It could also give him some bonuses to creating spell scrolls. He could also create rune schematics from other runes, which meant he could produce higher caliber spells while being at a lower ss.
’But these names... wouldn’t just Rune Scribe, or Runic Scribe be better? Why make it so unnecessarily long? ’
He shook his head at the naming sense of the person responsible for this and then steeled his resolve. The first ss was a freebie but this one had some kind of test behind it. It could be anything simple from making a horseshoe when choosing a cksmith ss, to fighting some monsters in a closed room when going with a fighter ss.
He went over the sses again before choosing, he was mostly interested in the magic-rted ones. He actually did find some interesting choices he could go with, like a mana warrior and a mana archer ss. The requirements were probably having a mage rted ss along with all the basic weapon proficiency skills that he had previously unlocked while he was training for the past five years.
His adventurer sense tingled as he wondered what it would be like to be a magic swordsman but then he remembered. He remembered that if he actually wanted to progress past a tier 2 hybrid melee and magic ss he would need an advanced magic ss as well. At most he could hope for some lesser choices that might even be worse than a regr tier 3 warrior.
He gave out a sigh after remembering that, he had to bring himself back to reality. He already found a hidden ss rted to runes, this was probably the best choice.
The mana scribe ss was also a popr choice for mages as their second tier 1 ss before going for an elemental mage at tier 2. There were other choices like a ritualist that lead to a tier 2 thaumaturge and then into a tier 3 warlock. There were other various options that gave you a wizard ss or a sorcerer ss. Each of those differed in the way they utilized their spells and some were race or bloodline specific.
’If I go by its name, this ss probably has all the bonuses of the previous one. So it is probably a better version... though that could mean that the trial for it could be harder to pass...’
He gulped before finally clicking on the Runic Mana Scribe ss sprite.
The book he read before described the process of getting the Mana Scribe version of the ss. In it, he would have to use his mana to inscribe one of his basic spells to paper. The ability to do so would be somehow given to the person taking the test. If the person had the aptitude they would pass without any problems, if you tried doing it with no talent then you would probably fail. If you failed you, the knowledge of the skill would be forgotten.
The VR headset that he previously used popped out once more and he didn’t hesitate to put it on. He was greeted by a sh of light than a quick scenery change. He was sitting in a chair in front of arge desk that was at an angle. There was arge empty parchmentid out on it, to the side a white quill resting in an ink bottle.
The room that he was in looked like the inside of a medieval castle. There were various books spread on bookshelves to the sides and right in front of him was arge hourss. It was at least two meters tall and the sand was already slowly going down.
’That’s probably the timer...’
It was one of the timed trials, he would probably fail if he didn’t manage toplete whatever he had to finish before all of that sand fell. He quickly looked at the closest things, there was a quill and arge piece of parchment there, he probably needed to write something there.
’Scribe ss... need to write something down here, but what?’
He looked around and spotted a red book right on top of the desk. The cover was quite intricate and it had a drawing of a rune on it. He took it into his hand and started reading. His eyes moving between the pages rapidly.
’This... it’s the instructions to scribing a lesser fire orb rune onto a spell scroll...’
Thanks to his high intelligence and added memory traits he was able to breeze through the entire book within a couple of minutes. He had also gained a reading proficiency skill by going through the Arden estate library, which allowed for faster reading andprehension.
The book described the basics of runic scribing, how you needed special ink, and special parchment that was made from monster skin, or other materials that could retain magic, to even be able for the process to take ce. It described the theory behind focusing your mana onto the quill’s tip and pushing it into the magical ink. The ink had certain properties that were required for the scribes mana to be transcribed to paper and make the runic symbols function.
This wasn’t the hard part, that was to actually get the runic diagram the way you were supposed to. He had seen how intricate the lesser Detonation Rune was, the whole diagram that he drew of it fit on arge sheet of paper. He had to fit a simr diagram of this lesser fire orb rune on this parchment, but it had to be much smaller to make it work.Luckily this rune was lessplex than the detonation rune.
He couldn’t just trace therge schematic in a 1 to 1 ratio, no he had to make it small. He needed to guide the magical ink with the quill making many tiny mana pathways between all of theponents. Theseponents were the rune parts, in this particr runic spell diagram, there were three main ones.
There was the basic fire rune that was the center of it all, then there was the runic part that shaped everything into an orb followed by parts that regted the mana flow and made sure that the spell didn’t copse onto itself or explode. Thest part was considered a type of control rune that was responsible for the spells ’program’
’Wait... these parts are simr to logic gates, logic circuits? Do runes use binary?’
He could tell that theponents in these runes had a striking resemnce to circuitry parts, like transistors, resistors, and moreplex chips. They differed from the ones he knew by the fact that they were made from magic ink and not from physicalponents. These chip-like sections had things simr to logic gates in them.
’Interesting, I think my circuitry skill is helping me understand these runes better. Though I don’t think I need to understand this just yet, I just need to copy the schematic onto the paper now...’
This was quite moreplicated than he had expected. Regr Mana Scribes only needed to write down the incantations from the normal spells without much worry, the only real problem was running out of space on the spell scrolls. He actually needed to redraw the schematic and make it fit into a small rune that looked like a symbol. The runes possessed a maximal size if they were too big, they wouldn’t work.
He had achieved the temporary skills that were needed to pass this test. A normal Mana Scribe would only gain the first skill, but this was an advanced version of this ss so he also achieved something rted to runes.
’I should start... time is running out...’
He had finished the book and now was the time to act. He was always better with practical things than with theory so he decided to test his skills and put quill to paper. He dipped his quill into the dark magical ink while focusing, the ck liquid stuck to the tip like glue and let itself be guided to therge yellowy parchment.
Rnd took in a long deep breath before focusing on the task at hand. The tip of his quill hovered a fraction of a millimeter above the piece ofrge parchment. He started moving his hand, but he did it very slowly. The ink started slowly pouring onto the parchment while guided by his mana. The ink split into many tiny magical pathways that inscribed themselves onto the magical paper while guided by his mana.
’Slow and steady...’
His forehead started sweating as he concentrated, it was really difficult to guide this ink in the correct way. He would only know if he managed to do it correctly at the end and his debugging skill didn’t help him either. It could only pickup mistakes on an already created diagram or schematic not during the process of inscribing.
A couple of minutes felt like an hour as he continued to pour his heart out onto the paper. This was never meant to be easy and he never tried it before but thanks to his stats he was slowly doing it. Hisrge mana pool allowed him to be frugal with it and his traits helped him keep focus.
He was slowly moving his hand while writing the runic symbols. It looked as if he was writing threerge letters but in reality, the magical ink was getting pushed into the parchment creating many tiny magical pathways and other variousponents. That would make the whole magical rune function after a person inserted their mana into them.
When the hourss was about half empty he was finished with his scribbles. This was also when finally his debugging skill was activated and also why he looked distressed. Most of it was red, the symbols and the pathways with the variousponents weren’t looking up to par.
The piece of parchment glowed after he was finished with his first attempt. It shone with crimson light, a glow of red rose up as if trying to form into a round shape. The spell fizzled out before it could bepleted and the runic pattern of the magical paper vanished, indicating that the spell didn’t form and that he had failed.
’Shit...’
He looked at the hourss again, it was now past the halfway point and he probably only had one more try to make this work.
’Okay, I can do this...the skill showed me where I went wrong... just have to remember it.’
He closed his eyes and recalled the finished product, he could see it like a photograph in his mind, covered in red, blue, and green lines. He opened his eyes wide and went back to scribing, he still had some mana to spare. The second attempt was taking him even longer, he was afraid to blunder and fail, wasting a big chunk of money in the process. He tried not to look at the sand that was falling, afraid of getting distracted but also worried that it would run out if he didn’t hurry.
With thest ounce of his mana points, he managed to finally finish. This runic spell didn’t look like much, it consisted of three symbols. One was responsible for the fire rune, the second for the shape of the orb, and thest one for its discharge and control. There were many other hiddenponents, but after the magical ink dried all of those could not be seen by the naked eye.
The piece of magical paper shone once more, it was much brighter this time around. Tiny wisps of red light moved upwards andpressed themselves into a small orb. This orb was quite small and looked more like marble but it was clearly radiating heat.
’Did I do it?’
He looked up at the hourss and saw thest grain of sand sliding down. Everything blurred afterward and he found himself back in his inn, down on the ground as he had fallen off his chair.
’Shit, did I fail? Did the time run out?’
He quickly brought up his status screen and checked his ss.
’It’s there!’
He had also gained some ss-rted skills to boot.
Rnd sprawled out on the floor, quite tired from his first-ss change. He came unprepared by managed to somehow power through it. He would remember this blunder and prepare more when the time came. For now, he just wanted to sleep.
’I’ll check everything out in the morning, too tired...’