Chapter 60: Grades

Sylas was confused again before a screen suddenly appeared before him.

'You can project information like this to people?' Sylas hid his shock, but he felt that his word choice just now had let slip more of his ignorance.

[Basic Scouting (F-)]

[Requirement: 10 Intelligence; 10 Charisma; 10 Will]

[Use this Skill to reveal Basic Information on living and non-living targets. Scales with Intelligence, Charisma, and Will]

[Basic Information: Species; Grade; Level; Stats; Abilities]

'There's those weird Grades again...'

Sylas had noticed that some names given by his system had slightly different colors. It was subtle, but he just barely managed to notice them.

He wondered if those subtle changes in shade denoted this hidden system of Grades.

"Are you willing to trade for this bone ax?" Sylas asked. "Or any one of you, for that matter?"

Of them all, both Olivia's and Alex's eyes lit up.

Olivia was about to speak, but then she smiled bitterly as Alex spoke up first.

"Holy shit, Psycho Syl, are you really willing? Are you sure?"

It took everything in Olivia to not roll her eyes. Sylas had just revealed that he didn't have <Basic Scouting>, which meant he probably couldn't even see the Grade of that bone ax.

Of course, Sylas was probably smart enough to know he had found something valuable. But Olivia wasn't all that familiar with Sylas, so he had no idea about the extent of his analytical abilities. If there was a small chance to take advantage, she would have.

Unfortunately, that had just gone out of the window.

"The path of weapons is not for me," Sylas replied simply. He was sure that they had seen Vorak's weapon combust in his hands, but there was no need to bring it up so clearly.

"Honestly, this longsword doesn't really suit me," Alex said, straightforwardly. "That weapon is F+ and it's only the second of its kind that I've seen. It probably costs easily 1000 coins, and that's probably conservative. I don't have that much."

Sylas looked down at the daggers on Alex's waist. It seemed that they all had secondary weapons.

"How much can you pay?" Sylas asked.

"Probably like... 200?" Alex said sheepishly.

"Alright. Give me 200 and those two daggers on you."

Alex's brows shot up. "Really?"

"If you're alright with it," Sylas shrugged. "Those secondary weapons might save your life if you're ever painted into a corner, so they might be worth more to you than that."

"No way, I can always get a few more of these cheap daggers, but that bone ax..."

"There's another reason as well," Sylas said seriously. "This matter will be more dangerous than I thought. The more powerful everyone is, the higher our likelihood of survival.

"I don't know if your <Basic Scouting> could see or not, but this elite gnoll had 45 Physical, 30 Mental, and 44 Will."

The eyes of the other widened. They hadn't known Sylas for long, but none of them believed he would be lying in this situation. What would be the purpose? Especially since he was trying to give up such a valuable weapon.

"From my calculations, its Intelligence should be around 60 points. If I didn't take the initiative and it started using Skills, the battle could have been much more gruelling."

At this point, even the usually silent militiamen wore serious expressions.

Sylas' telekinesis tossed the bone ax at Alex, who deftly caught it.

Alex looked at Sylas with gratitude. He really didn't have the skill for a sword, but this ax... also, he had a Skill that he couldn't use properly with a sword that he could finally make use of now.

It only took a moment for Sylas to store the two daggers and take Alex's 200 coins. Then, he directly transferred 100 coins to Olivia.

[Simple Dagger (F)]

[Level: 1]

[+3 Strength]

[Ability: Restore]

[Use 1 point of Intelligence to restore 1 Durability]

[Durability: 8/10]

[Simple Dagger (F)]

[Level: 1]

[+3 Strength]

[Ability: Pierce]

[Makes applied Strength doubly as Effective]

[Durability: 10/10]

Unlike Olivia, Alex's two daggers weren't identical and only one of them had been topped off on Durability. But Sylas could imagine why.

Alex probably wasn't as topped up on funds and access as Olivia was, so he used the Restore dagger most often because he wouldn't need to repair it. He probably saved the Pierce dagger for the most dangerous of situations.

"When can I trade for the <Basic Scouting> Skill?" Sylas asked Olivia.

"We'll have to return to the village first. I think it's best we do that right now. If you're correct, we'll need more preparation than this."

Olivia spoke as she took out a bottle and began to sprinkle an odd powder everywhere. An equally odd smell was whisked into the air before it vanished entirely.

Then, she stored away the gnoll corpses and picked up the pair of daggers she had allowed Sylas to borrow.

Sylas didn't respond, looking in the direction of the gnoll village. He doubted that they'd have such an easy time with it.

And he was quickly proven right.

The first thing that came was an arrow. It came out of the foliage so suddenly that its entry into their vision sounded almost like a whip slapping against the tree's leaves.

Sylas' heart skipped a beat. He forgot about everything else and activated Madness and then <Madness Control> in a single instant of time. That mysterious flow of battle acted even without his mind acting first.

His telekinesis and his hand moved at the same time, one forming a wave of pressure that pushed against the forward pursuit of the arrow, the other grabbing at the air as his body moved violently to the side.

The arrow rotated wildly in Sylas' hand, a wild heat spreading across his palm. But for the first time, the Scorned Wraps were on his side.

Just as the arrow was about to break free and pierce into his shoulder, it burnt to ash.