"[Demon Claaaaaw]~." - Garami

I slashed the training dummy with my dagger of darkness and left behind a claw-like mark. For one of my first proper attacking skills, it's not bad. The Darkness skills were more like weapon-creation skills, and [Web Bomb] is more for capture than attacking.

And why am I suddenly slashing like a beast even when I'm using a [Darkness Dagger]? It's part of the second Sub Class I've obtained recently. It cost only 8 AP, even if my first Sub Class only needed 7.

Oh, maybe I should start from the famous #1? Weaver was easy to obtain. It's not as different from handling my spider silk to make webs as it is to make threads for proper tailoring.

The problem is that my class level's too low! I still haven't reached the point where I can make proper clothes! I'm still at the stage where the class only gives me skills to produce threads and fabrics! Huh? Making the clothes without skills? Puh~lease~. As if a deadbeat like me would know how to make clothes from scratch~. I'm a slave to my skills~.

...now I'm feeling pathetic. But hey, I've never studied the art of weaving before. I did try making clothes, but the result only got me a bird that almost died from laughing too much. And no, I'm not part of his almost-dying experience. Not that time...

But weaving clothes and training those specific skills all the time got boring after a while, so I asked K-N if there were some other classes I could take. And boy did it find something damn cool.

Before, I could take a class called Rogue. I chose Arachnid Assailant though, but Rogue's not bad either. Except...K-N showed me something even cooler. "Demonic Rogue"!

I'll skip the details for now, but Demonic Rogue had almost everything a Rogue had, plus some more in the form of demon-type skills! The downside is that only demons can take this class, and I needed 3 demon-type skills to classify for the class, but that was taken care of easily!

Skill: Demon's Strong Muscle Skill Type: Monster Skill Tier: 1 Attribute: none Effect: Increase the user's STR status value by 5 per skill level. Skill: Demon's Spiritual Arts Skill Type: Monster Skill Tier: 1 Attribute: none Effect: Increase the user's MAG status value by 5 per skill level. Skill: Demon's Nimble Legs Skill Type: Monster Skill Tier: 1 Attribute: none Effect: Increase the user's SPD status value by 5 per skill level.

I bought these three skills at K-N's recommendation. They're like better Ability Skills, but they're restricted to certain races like demons or "Celestials", this world's solution to angels and that stuff.

But unlike Ability Skills, this race-limited stuff won't gain the ability to improve my stat growth upon a level-up. Also, these skills come in pairs. STR and VIT, MAG and RES, SPD and DEX. You can only choose 1 skill from these pairs and forget about the other.

The good thing is that the skills can evolve to include the missing partner, so if I get my [Demon's Strong Muscle] evolved, it will start improving both my STR and VIT! Pretty awesome if I say so myself.

Maybe it's skills like these that force humans onto the lower parts of the food chain? Gust says that more than 60% of the land across Terra Sol is dominated by monsters, so there has to be something.

"Garami...when are we getting out of here?" - Gust

"......no clue." - Garami

The bird's low-tension voice snapped me back to reality. The reality of being bored.

We've been here for more than a week now (way more, but I didn't bother to count), so it's obvious that we're getting sick of this place. We've gone through most of the facilities on the west wing already, and all that's left for me to kill time is practicing my skills.

That is not as bad as it seems. I mean, it gives me a chance to evolve my Magic Eye skills into Evil Eye skills. I even got this fancy new trait that's ordering me to get them.

Trait List:

Lesser Demon:

Decreased stats when exposed to sunlight: [Small] Increased stats when exposed to moonlight: [Small] Darkness-aligned attribute enhancement: [Small] Curse attribute enhancement: [Small] Received Holy- and Gold attribute damage increase: *3 Received Light-aligned attribute damage increase: *2 Received Darkness-aligned attribute damage decrease: *2 Negative Karma Value increase: [Small] Positive Karma Value decrease: [Small] Automatic MP Recovery-Type Effectiveness Increase: [Small] Nightvision.

Albino:

Reduced abilities when exposed to sunlight. Received Light-, Sun attribute damage increase: *1.1 Loss of pigments for hair, skin, and eyes. (Only when possible)

Arachnid:

Received Fire- and Ice-aligned Attribute Damage Increase: *3 Increased resistance and enhancement towards poison-related abilities: [Normal] Increased web-handling abilities: [Normal] Increased effect of Fear-inflicting abilities: [Small]

Evil Eyed:

Allows usage of Evil Eye-type skills in any eyes (not multiple abilities in the same eye at the same time). Increased secondary effects of Evil Eye-type skills: [Normal] Decreased cost of Evil Eye-type skills: [Normal]

The new trait, "Evil Eyed", is making my edgelord heart cry tears of joy. I'm kinda surprised that I kept the Arachnid trait even after graduating from being a spider, but if that's the rule, then I have nothing I could do about it.

But even with that in mind, it's boring just sitting here while waiting for adventurers to clear the rubble on the upper floors. We've already looked through all of the mansion's east wing, and the center part of the building's prolly emptied due to the rats that used to live there. *SIgh*, anything interesting would be appreciated by now. Give me a happening of some kind! I need action!

*...crash...*

...please tell me that was Gust.

"Garami? Please tell me that sound came from you." - Gust

Crud. He's not the culprit.

I sneakily left the warrior training area and started looking for the culprit of the strange noise. I searched the west wing, but there was nothing strange there, so I went to the main hall that's connecting the two wings. And I found the culprits. Yes, "culprits" as in plural. I'm not sure if that's enough to categorize them.

Down on the first floor of the main hall was a swarm of those Dread Spirits.

*CLANK!*

I closed the door with the speed of light before barricading it with all the stuff that my webbing could get a hold of, then I threw even more webbing to seal the stuff shut along with the door.

"What are you doing?" asked Gust as he finally caught up to me.

"Dread Spirits! Many!" I shouted at him while continuing to fortify the blockade.

"...dread...? ...! I'll go and get something to help!" - Gust

That blasted bird fled! Not that he's of much help here!

Despite my desperate work on the barrier, the Dread Spirits started to squeeze through. Luckily, they seem to only come one or two at a time. In that case, [Darkness Bullet]! Aura-enhanced version!

The super-charged bullets hit the Dread Spirits right in the face and disintegrated them. Ya-hoo! But now more guys are coming out of the woodwork, er, the barricade. Taste some bullets, you walking dregs!

I fired bullet after bullet as the Spirits forced themselves into the west wing. And it's tough! Both attacking and enhancing the bullets with [Aura of Darkness] is draining my MP big time! I can feel the numbers getting lower!

"Garami, use this!" - Gust

The bird returned with a...giant crystal? What's that supposed to be?

"It's a magitech core! You can use it as a replacement for your MP!" - Gust

For real!? Hand it over!

I snatched the core from Gust and felt that my MP was getting recovered just by holding it. Sweet! In that case, mister Dread Spirits, it's bullet hell time!

As I fired more aura-enhanced bullets at the Spirits, the glow of the core-thingy was gradually getting dimmer. But there's no problem their ~. Gust came back with more and more cores, so I only needed to focus on shooting bullets at the Spirits. Sometimes I even switched to [Darkness Daggers] and threw them at the Spirits.

Bwa-hahaha! You guys are no threat to me, Dread Spirits! I'm the Champion of Darkness! Come at me! But only a few at a time!

---

Some hours later:

...wheeze...wheeze...my arms...they're dead...

After waiting for a few minutes without any new Dread Spirit appearing, I could finally drop to the floor, my arms hurting from all the throwing and shooting, and my mind feeling extremely exhausted for some reason. I'm blaming the over usage of MP-consuming skills.

"I think we survived." - Gust

If the guy who was forced to act as the pet of these guys' boss' for who knows how long says so, then it's good for me.

"Garami, be careful where you step. Those black puddles over there are bad news." - Gust

Huh? Oh, those things. The strange liquid gradually started to appear while I was busting those Dread Spirits. It's starting to evaporate already, plus I'm too tired to move, so I doubt I'll get too close before they're gone.

But man, that was a tough fight. It may have been the most "proper" fight I've had my whole reincarnated life. I wonder if I'm getting a title for that. There were some notifications while I was showering the Dread Spirits with bullets and daggers, but I didn't have the time to see exactly what they were saying...

SYSTEM MESSAGE:

Title: [Dread Spirit Slayer] has advanced into the title: [Dread Spirit Slaughterer].

Acquired skill: [Massive Mana Lv.1].

Skill: [Mana Lv.18] has been integrated into skill: [Massive Mana Lv.1]

Title: [Dread Spirit Slaughterer] has advanced into the title: [Dread Spirit Genocider].

Acquired skill: [Dreadful Meanace Lv.1].

Acquired title: [Mystic Arts User]

Acquired skills: [Mana Lv.1], [Reduced Mana Consumption Lv.1].

Skill: [Mana Lv.1] has been integrated into skill: [Massive Mana Lv.1]

Skill: [Reduced Mana Consumption Lv.1] has been integrated into skill: [Reduced Mana Consumption Lv.18]

Acquired title: [Mystic Arts Master]

Acquired skills: [Massive Mana Lv.1], [Minimized Mana Consumption Lv.1].

Skill: [Massive Mana Lv.1] has been integrated into skill: [Massive Mana Lv.1]

Skill: [Reduced Mana Consumption Lv.19] has been integrated into skill: [Minimized Mana Consumption Lv.1]

...that's a lot of mana.

Okay, that my Dread Spirit-related title advanced isn't that unexpected. They were practically countless after all.

And like it said when I read up on those "hunting titles", when you kill enough creatures to obtain a "Slaughterer" title, you get the T2 variant of the skill you obtained from the original "Slayer" title. The "Genocider" titles that are obtained from killing even more creatures of the specific kind give you a skill that is somehow connected to the category the hunting title is related to. It sure sounds like the type of skill fitting for the Dread Spirits, this [Dreadful Menace] thing...

Skill: Dreadful Menace Skill Type: Active Skill Tier: 2 Attribute: none Effect: High chance to inflict Fear onto a target. Slightly increases damage inflicted to a target with the Fear status ailment.

Huh? It's just a fancy intimidation skill? Should I be happy that it's not some dangerous skill (for me) or should I be angry over not getting something more awesome for all the hard work I did to obtain it?

Anyway, what about the new titles? Let's just look at this [Mystic Arts Master] thing. I can guess what the "user" title does on what the "master" title does.

Title Name: Mystic Arts Master Acquisition condition: Title: [Mystic Arts User] In a serious life-or-death battle, use more than 500% of your total MP. Effects: Increases MP status value by: +100. Rewards: Skill: [Massive Mana Lv.1] Skill: [Minimized Mana Consumption Lv.1] Description:

A title granted to the great masters of magic and magical skills. But do remember that having 0 MP will make you faint, okay?

Geh!? I used that much MP!? No normal person could ever use that much in a real fight. Even if they were armed with way more MP potions than I have. And the rewards honestly feel weak compared to the difficulty level...

Oh! Now I get it. This title has to be designed for magic-using rear-guards in parties. If some warrior keeps on stalling the enemy, the magicians can use spells and recover MP as much as they want. The requirements don't say the battle needs to be one-on-one, so I think I'm right.

Man, parties make stuff way easier. Heck, even this victory was thanks to Gust's contribution. I wonder where he got those "cores" from?

"Hey, should you be sitting there reading?" asked Gust as he packed the final core thingy in a cloth bag.

"...?" - Garami

What? He wanna celebrate our victory? Not sure how we can do that. We do have the booze I stole from the pantry along with the other food items, but I'm not sure-

"We have to get out of here! There's no way those Spirits came here for no reason!" - Gust

......good point. Let's evacuate.