I Died on The First Day of the Tutorial

Chapter 111 - The Qualifiers (3)


Verity sighed.

"HOW MUCH LONGER DO I NEED TO DO THIS!!!" he shouted.

It had been seven hours since he'd started testing students. It wasn't that he was tired, but rather that he felt this took too much time away from demon killing.

In the brief window of time between this student and the next, Verity sat down, and took a look at his status window.

He was truly restless.

Status Window

Name: Verity

Age: 26

Level: 33

Inventory: [Whisper of Calamity], [Health potion x10], [Mana Potion x10], [Deadman's Armor], [Plain Notebook], [Mana Compass], [Mirage]

Alias: The King of Fools

Class: [Fool Lv. 41]

Traits : Favored, Goblin Slayer, Martyr, History's First I, Demon Slayer

Skills: [Lesson Learned Lv.6], [Not me! Lv.12], [Accumulate Lv.5], [Never Again Lv.16], [Advanced Aura Circulation Lv.17], [Appraisal Lv.20], [Conceal Lv.14], [Runic Eye Lv.15], [Demonic Pressure Lv.25], [Gambit Lv. 13]

Sponsor: [-Error-]

Stats

Unallocated stats points : 0

Strength : 49 (+5) (+20)

Stamina : 59 (+6) (+118)

Speed : 45 (+5)

Intelligence : 39 (+4)

Dexterity : 44 (+4)

Arcane : 40 (+4)

Agility : 40 (+4) (+16)

Foolishness : 53 (+5)

He had made tremendous progress in the past four years. Even with the mountain of experience needed to level up past level twenty, Verity had already reached level thirty-three, among the highest within humanity.

In all fairness, he would have been much higher level if he hadn't insisted on solely hunting demons this entire time.

Demons were notoriously difficult to kill, and worse still, the experience they granted was nowhere near worth the effort or danger involved. This imbalance was one of the main reasons humanity struggled to eradicate them.

There was little incentive, well, besides survival, of course. But the threat of extinction, as history had proven time and again, was never the best motivator for human action.

Verity scoffed. 'It's not by much, but I can't believe I'm even beating Ife when it comes to demons slain.'

In the past four years, Verity had come to terms with his dirt poor talent, and he had massively expanded his arsenal. The first thing he had set out to do was to expand the list of resistances and skill he received from [Never Again]

Skill : [Never Again]

Rank : A

Level : 16

Rarity : Unique

Type : Passive

Description : Fool me once? Jokes on me. Fool me twice? That won't happen.

Effect: Gain resistances or immunities once a challenge has been surmounted. Immunities are absolute, but the potency of the resistance is dependent on yours and the skill's level.

This content has been misappropriated from Royal Road; report any instances of this story if found elsewhere.

Current Effects

[Indomitable will X] - Grants a massive resistance to all fear and intimidation-based skills.

[Intermediate Poison Tolerance] - Grants a moderate resistance to all substances with debilitating properties.

[Painkiller X] - Grants a massive resistance to physical pain.

[Fireproof III] - Grants a moderate resistance to all fire based attacks

[Unimpressive II] - Grants a minor resistance to detection skills

[I Can't Hear You!] Grants a minor resistance to Other demonic Words.

[Last Pulse V] Grants a greater resistance to the side effects of blood loss.

Verity nodded with satisfaction. Not only had he elevated Indomitable Will and Painkiller to what he supposed was the maximum for a resistance, but he had even gotten two more resistances besides [Unimpressive], which was useless.

[I Can't Hear You!], which protected him somewhat against Other Words used by third-rank demons and above, as well as [Last Pulse], which simply put, allowed him to fight at maximum efficiency until his last pulse.

He had truly suffered for these achievements, but they had been worth it in the end.

If only he was also skilled with the spear. He would have been unstoppable by now.

Verity's level with the spear being where it was now, he owed, in part to his Transcendental Master, but mostly to his bottomless stamina. Verity never rested, and almost never slept. He could put in three to four times the amount of work the average Protector could on a daily basis.

If anything, he was a monster of effort.

'And yet, I still can't use Aura.'

Not in the typical sense at least. No amount of effort could bring Aura forth, only understanding and enlightenment.

Verity possessed a crumb of that, but only a crumb, and that crumb, he hadn't even awakened himself.

Still, thanks to it, Verity had manifested Aura two years ago. However, his understanding was so poor that he couldn't maintain it around the blade of his spear for more than a fleeting moment. He'd thrown himself into training, betting on mindless repetition to open a path, but he had made no progress at all no matter how hard he worked.

His Aura had been entirely unusable in battle.

Until a certain day, that is.

One day, frustrated, Verity had gathered Aura in droves to the blade of his spear. Quantity oughta beat quality, right? Well, that was not so in the case of Aura. It was a scarce resource, and Aura users knew to use it as efficiently as possible, so gathering it in large quantities only for it to disperse was nothing short of idiotic.

Verity had ignored those concepts, that and the advice of the few Aura users he was acquainted with, and he had kept gathering it to the tip of his spear until –

BOOM

The large amounts of compressed Aura had blown up in his face.

"I see…! It's foolish at best in comparison... but this is what Master tried to show me! This is the principle behind Anger...!"

Of course, Verity's version was crude, incredibly wasteful, and amateurish, but at that moment, Verity had smiled. That, he could use.

Then, there was his new Class skill, [Gambit]. The fourth class skill of the Fool class.

The fourth Class-skill was generally referred to as a Grandmaster skill. It was meant to be an especially powerful skill that separated the truly strong from the rest, like the swordman's [Sword Body Unity], or the archer's [Predator], but in all honesty, just like all of his other skills, the [Gambit] skill was rather gimmicky.

In simple terms, it allowed him to impose conditions upon himself for greater strength, or other advantages.

Skill : [Gambit]

Rank : A

Level : 13

Rarity : Unique

Type : Passive

Description : Who else but a Fool to gamble in the midst of battle? We pray that Lady Luck has not forsaken you.

Effect : Impose conditions upon yourself and gamble with your own life. The less advantageous the bet, the better the reward, and the worse the loss.

Current Gambits

[Arch-Nemesis]

Type: Semi-Permanent

Specifications : 'I will kill the Third Demon King with my very own hands'

Perk : Gain a stat boost when fighting demons for as long as the Third Demon King lives. The stat boost increases as you grow closer to him.

Failure condition: The death of the Third Demon King by any other means than your very own hands.

[Bareskinned]

Type: Temporary

Specifications: 'I will jump into battle without any armor'

Perk : Moderate boost to the Strength and Agility stats when this Gambit is active

Failure Condition: Defeat

For now, Verity was only allowed three Gambits at once, and he always kept two spots open for [Bareskinned] and [Arch-Nemesis]. His third Gambit tended to be more situational, if he ever even felt the need to use one.

As it was a passive skill, Gambit required no mana, but it did instead consume Foolishness, which was not only useful as a danger sensing ability, but possessed more hidden properties, so Verity always ensured that he was careful how those points were spent.

In terms of his skills, mastery of the Nine Hells, and equipment, Verity had also seen significant growth. However, the most important progress he had made in these last four years was with his mastery of runic sorcery.

Verity was an intelligent man. Snarky, pessimistic, and slightly insane, but not idiotic by any means. He had asked around the entire world for books on runic sorcery, but in the end, he had found nothing. All that he had relied on was his knowledge of the rune for Mana, Glow, and the nine primordials.

Thanks to his near perfect memory, he was able to recall the runes he had once seen int he book Hoshino had lent him.

Fate

Truth

Flow

Form

Death

Origin

Communion

Sacrifice

???

Even though the last one was illegible, even now, Verity had made a staggering discovery regarding these primordial runes. Every single rune in existence, or at least as far as Verity's imagination allowed, was a derivative of a primordial rune.

For example, the rune for Mana, was a composite derivative of Life, and Flow whereas the rune for Glow was a derivative of communion… for some reason.

Using [Runic Eye], toward the end of his first year back on Earth, Verity set out to quite literally re-invent the runic language. He studied these nine runes as though his life depended on it, and in the process, he used his own body as a drawing board.

The results were nothing short of extraordinary.

On his chest, of course, rested the rune of Truth, and Verity had no intention of etching another Primordial rune into his body.

On his palms, there was now a runic system that roughly translated to 'Attract Mana'. That was how he was able to retrieve his spear after throwing it. [Whisper of Calamity], his late Master's Spear, possessed an enchantment that allowed it to imprint onto its owner. It couldn't do something as fancy as being allowed to be stored int he system's inventory, but Verity used that imprint as a sort of Mana signature, and pulled on it using this rune to retrieve it.

On his neck, he had written a rune that stood for 'Repel', in case of emergencies.

Finally, on his back, there was a runic circle that could not be translated but served as coordinates to similar runic circles across Nexia. This was Verity's most complex runic system, and his greatest achievement since coming back to Earth.

Long range teleportation was considered extremely advanced spatial magic, and although Verity's range was not that large, being able to teleport out of danger had come in handy more than he could count, even when the runic system had been… incomplete.

'Well, I've got a couple more runes that I hold onto when things go sour…I wonder, maybe I should try–'

"Sir."

Verity's head whipped toward the noise.

The examiner looked at Verity. "The next student has arrived."

Verity scratched his head. "Ah, right. There was that, wasn't there?"

He had gotten lost in his thoughts.

Verity stretched, turned around, and when he laid eyes on who stood before him, he smirked slightly.

Auburn hair tied in a ponytail, green eyes that seemed full of wonder, and a stance that mirrored Verity's own.

Apatia tightened her grip around the shaft of her spear. She was trembling. 'I did okay on the written section… but this guy looks strong…!'

Verity slipped into character immediately, eager to tease his student. "Trembling before the enemy? How pathetic."

He'd intentionally changed his voice so he would not be recognized.

"S-Sorry! I'm ready whenever, Sir!"

That's what she said, but the trembling persisted.

Verity scoffed. "Steady yourself, and show me what you've learned, leaflet."

So much for not being recognized.

Apatia barely had the time to process what she'd heard before Verity lunged at her.

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