Chapter 172: Walking out
"What the hell is this supposed to be?!"
Mika shouted, jumping at her feet, glaring at the message with a fury so strong that all of her skills activated at once.
Never before has she seen or heard of the system giving the player character something like options to chose from - no matter what, it would always be either a normal quest, a sorry quest, or an emergency quest.
But here she was, facing a global event story option.
She clearly had a choice so the system was respecting the free will of the player character.
...or that would be the case if not for the fact that one option came with an incredible benefit while the other was completely trash with no benefit whatsoever - at least not for Mika.
After all, everyone knew that having a unique role in the global story event meant that the person would be important for the future of the world.
And for Mika, that also meant that she had another connection with her beloved Corvus - although their roles had little in common, they were both unique roles, and that was enough to get Mika's hopes up for what the system had in store for them in the global quest.
But now that very same system had the audacity to give her an option that would sever that very special connection!
It couldn't get more insulting than that!
"Of course I pick option 1!"
The ashen-haired girl stomped clenched fists and shouted at the message hovering in front of her line of sight.
/Justice's Wrath has picked option 1
Reward granted
The story will continue following the ultimate route
"Good!"
Mika scoffed at the new message, underestimating the importance of the decision she had made - for her it only meant that she would continue being connected with her beloved Corvus and nothing else.
"...so it really was that easy...?"
When her emotions have calmed down and she deactivated her skills, Mika furrowed her brows and nervously scratched her cheek.
Her eyes ended up on the floor, where the dropped quill and notepad lied abandoned by the medic.
"..."
Mika glanced at the door and then cautiously walked over and picked up the notepad.
The piece of paper on top of it was covered with notes on top of the page - some of them were scratched out while others were circled.
It looked like before she realized who Mika was, the bespectacled woman was figuring out what would be the best class to put her into even without knowing her stats.
The recon squad was crossed out followed by the hearing impediment annotation which was then also crossed out.
Small build/nimble was circled and connected back to the recon squad.
But then the results of the appraisal were added and no more additional notes were made, just straight up information.
Name: Mika Wrath
Race: Human
Class: Berserk
Role: Justice's Wrath
Level: 39
Subclass: Thief
HP: 339
MP: 184
ATK: 1996 (1221 + 775)!
DEF: 999
MAT: 125
MDF: 172
HIT: 100
EVA: 68
AGI: 111
LUC: 76
Skills:
Close combat (level 20 [max])
Charge (level 9 [max])
Enrage (level 9)
Empower (level 8)
Ira (level 4)
Steal [item] (level 2)
Sneak (level 1)
Lockpicking (level 2)
Pickpocket (level1)
Justice's punch (level 1)
Unlocked affinities:
Focus (level 5)
Title:
Apostole of Wrath
Hardworker
Bane of rabbits
Wolf slayer
Griffin slayer
Although the skill list and the title list were about what one could expect of someone her level, the girl's status points were outrageous, especially the strength stat.
...they were incredibly unbalanced - but!
They were unbalanced on purpose, by design, by Mika's family.
All thanks to two things.
The hidden affinity - Focus - which Mika unlocked at a very young age during everyday training at the Wrath's mansion.
The properties of that affinity would allow the owner to select only a single stat to raise instead of the natural progression of all status points increasing thanks to training and the bonus received during each level up.
The other thing was Mika's title.
Apostle of Wrath.
She wasn't born with it.
But what she was born with, was the beloved child of Wrath title which got upgraded into the Apostle of Wrath title thanks to the hard work she put into raising her strength.
That title was passively giving her borderline broken amounts of bonus points to STR with each level up and coupled with the focus affinity, it allowed Mika - at level 39 - to reach the strength stat value which many of the strength-oriented adventurers from the six territories of Fruit Salad - that did not include the Sloths' territory which the ashen-haired girl was currently in - could never achieve in their entire lifetime.
"..."
Mika was staring intently at the numbers.
In particular at 1996 for the STR or rather (1221+775) STR.
It was weird, Mika has never before seen any appraiser write it in such a way - but more importantly...
"She appraised me before the reward..."
Then she glanced at the door and furrowed her brows.
The bespectacled woman has said that no one under 3000 in strength could pass it unless they were the recruits.
But after receiving the reward from choosing option 1...
"..."
Mika clenched her fists and took a deep breath.
Yes. She chose an option, so she should follow up on her decision and actually leave the room.
That should be obvious.
Yet, the ashen-haired girl was anxious about leaving.
Maybe she should chance it and go against her own choice?
But would the system allow for such blatant cheating?
Truth to be told the more Mika thought about it, the more suspicious the choice was in the first place, with one option heavily weighted on one side.
"...no way, if I'm not part of the global quest, someone might take away my Corvus!"
In the end, she nodded to herself with a newfound dedication fueled by the feelings she had for the white-haired young man, she boldly walked to the door and opened it.
"..."
Seeing an empty hallway cooled her determination just a bit and she momentarily hesitated before taking a step out of the white room.
But when she did...
/Calculating...
/Sufficient STR detected
Route f's endgame content available
/Justice's Wrath receives a title
Honorary Sloth
/Justice's Wrath receives a time-limited use skill
Acedia (level 1)
/Acedia (level 1) will be available for:
(72:00:00)
/(71:59:59)
/(71:59:58)
"What the...?"
Mika shook her head, staring wide-eyed at the system message.
In the last ten minutes, she experienced not one but two new things she had never even heard about, and it all had to do with the system.
Choosing an option instead of doing a quest to progress the story.
And now this.
Time-limited use skill.
What was it good for anyway?
It had an odd name, so maybe it was similar to Mika's skill Ira?
But if it really was similar to Ira - which was a Wrath exclusive skill - then it should have been something exclusive to Sloth...
But every teacher that Mika had, always said the same thing about the sin exclusive skills...
The system will not allow a single person to learn two different sin-exclusive skills at the same time!
The people of the past had been trying it, there were many attempts to make a single person be the avatar of two sins at the same time, but it had always failed miserably.
Not that people cannot learn from a failure.
The fact that one person can hold only one sin exclusive skill allowed for the previous avatar of pride, lord Blackberry Pride, to transfer his skill and title to his sick wife, Raspberry, with the help of the avatar of gluttony, lady Goji Gluttony.
But that was many years in the past and with lady Raspberry's death three years ago, some people blamed the erasure of the avatar of pride title on that very experiment.
Still, that wasn't exactly something that was on Mika's mind right at that moment.
She didn't care about the peculiar situation of her skills, but what she did care about was what she should do from now on?
She glanced over her shoulder at the door to the white room she closed herself.
Seriously what was she doing without any plan at all?
She gulped down her saliva and started walking down the empty hallway with her footsteps echoing louder and louder.
The further from the white room she walked, the more anxious she was.
What will happen when someone will see her walking around?
Will they get angry?
Will she get in trouble?
That bespectacled woman has told Mika quite casually that if her STR value was above 3000, she would even show her around the facility...
Well, now Mika had over 3000 points in strength, so maybe it was actually okay for her to walk around like that...?
The ashen-haired girl tried to calm herself and her beating heart, she was almost out of the empty hallway - she even started hearing some voices and the normal bustle of human activity coming from whenever the hallway lead to.
"..."
Mika took a deep breath and closed her eyes to calm herself.
/Justice's Wrath level up
Level 40
Skills level increased
Base status points increased
"KYAAAH!"
Mika screamed in a high-pitched voice when a sudden system message popped up when she least expected it.
"Damn it! What am I doing...!"
She breathed out leaning forward and started massaging her forehead.
And then she flinched...
"Wait what?! Level up?! But I haven't killed any monster, where did the experience come from?!"
She gasped in shock.