by Pegaz
"Not bad for around an hour of work inside a building where it's safe, right guys? Thanks for the help." John waved as he was walking out the guild.
Collecting his belongings, his funds, and his composure, John left the Hall and returned to his inn.
John had promised the inn manager and the woman at the speciality shop 5% of the earnings as part of his deal. He took the 5% each from the £25 million as he counted the rest (including the charity money) as "work expenditure”. He rewarded them both with £1,250,000, each of them satisfied without question. John made sure to hand the bag back to the masked woman. Feeling he could trust her now, he asked about the runes she’d mentioned 2 years ago.
Without reservations, the old woman picked up a blank rune and showed it to him. It was then that he mentioned the buried treasure that he found while he was hunting. He had 16 of them.
They're grey circular stones, both sides flat, an inch thick and about 3 inches both length and width.
The woman’s masked face tilted at this description. John buckled down for a long explanation.
"Equipment is ranked and coloured. However, the normal human eye cannot see these colours as the equipment doesn’t shine with them. You need a skill for appraisal to see them. They are:
Normal - White,
Rare - Blue,
Epic - Purple,
Legendary - Gold, and
Mythical - Rainbow.
"Each piece of equipment has slots that we place runes in to boost the effect of the equipment. Like this small bag, it's got a rune attached to it called Durability and is a Normal bag. The big bag has two runes: Durability and Time Freeze. It’s a Rare bag.
"The higher the rank of the equipment, the more slots there are for runes. Of course, there's also shit equipment which has the stats of an Epic but no rune slots, so you have to be careful when buying them.
"There are millions of different versions of runes because, you draw whatever you can imagine using monster's blood, and it will either work or it won’t.
"You could draw a dagger, and it could give you a Bleeding effect. The strength of the monster's blood, the design of the drawing, as well as the rarity of the blank rune all help improve the efficiency of the rune. Blank runes are ranked the same as equipment too.”
The woman wrapped up her rather long string of dialogue and laid back in her chair. Seeing his opportunity to ask questions, John spoke up.
"Do you have any clothes that have rune slots? Preferably something self-mending or self-cleaning? I could also use some boots with extreme durability, too. I don't care about price, as long as it lets me walk to any hunting area without having to come back barefooted and half-naked."
"We can order you some custom-made ones if you want the same style as what you're…” As her voice trailed, John could feel the woman’s gaze looking him up and down. His trousers were completely non-existent from the knee down, he was barefooted, and bits of his shirt were disintegrating. “Go get some proper clothes from the guild hall, first. When you come back, we can set up the order."
John was surprised that she was the first person to comment on his appearance. Motivated to make this as quick a trip as possible, John rushed to the guild, repurchased the same set clothing for the 3rd time, and sprinted back to the shop.
"Right, that's better,” the woman picked up her conversation as if nothing had happened. “I can order custom-made ones for you. Depending on the runes, it could take anywhere from 12 days to 2 months to get here.
"You are still growing, however. Humans don't fully develop until the age of 21, so if you order now, then they might not fit you in a year or even six months from now. Are you sure you want to order them?"
The woman had to ask as this was going to be a big order.
"Yes, I want the same clothes, just like what I’m wearing. How much are we talking, price-wise? I want to get the best that I can afford."
"Might I suggest a rune called Self-Size, too, since you’re buying the best? This rune will make it so no matter how big you get, they will still fit. Of course, there's a limit with this rune, but it should be fine."
"Okay, I'll take that suggestion. That way if I ever get fat, I can still wear them around too,” John chuckled. “So that's Self-Mend, Self-Clean, Durability, and Self-Size. The max is five, right? How about a Rune to change their colours too? Wouldn't always want to wear black... Oh, and if possible, I want a belt to match this set, too."
"Colour Change? That's fine. If you accept then that would mean you need 4 Mythical traditional attires, which include the shirt, trousers, belt, and boots. Correct?"
John nodded, preparing for the damage.
"With the runes, materials, transportation, labour work, and monster's blood needed to make it…. You'll most likely need £20 million. £5 million for each of the Mythical with five planted runes that you've picked out.
"If this were armour, then you would be looking at £200 million per piece with five empty slots. So you’re actually saving quite a sum.”
John nodded to the deal. He signed a contract and gave her the money transfer with his Adventure Card.
Done with the town shops, he then went to Robert's to buy all the martial arts he could, including all the other martial arts he didn't want last time. John brought all the advanced, master, and even the secret skills that the Siders passed on from hundreds of years ago. It cost him £800,000 total. He estimated that it would take him about three months to complete everything, including practice time.
By that time, his custom ordered clothes would be here. Then, he could go adventuring to different towns and fight some stronger monsters for more time in the Time Pool.
Thinking about how he was a multimillionaire just a few hours ago, and now had a little more than £500,000 on his card, a saying came to mind while he silently shed a couple of tears.
"Easy come, easy go."
Chapter 23
The Con
John stayed at the inn for the three months of time, practising all the martial arts that he had purchased. It was his prerogative to master each and every one. His Mythical clothes arrived a bit later than expected, due to some error with the teleportation rune. As an apology, John received £100,000 back from the company. Even though he didn’t need the money, he wasn't stupid enough to reject a gift. He accepted the extra funds with open arms.
They fit perfectly, and the material is so nice. Maybe silk? I'm not very good with textiles.
Over the months, John had made a habit of wearing pure white during the day and black during the night. He simply did it for no other reason than to change the colours.
The inn manager would not charge John and told him he would have free stay for as long as the building stood.
After so much time, John finally asked what the name of the inn was. It was that question which stumped the manager. Bursting into a laughing fit, tears welled up in the man’s eyes. All this time, and he didn't even know the name! It was the same as the town name: Newbie Inn.
Nineteen days after arriving in the town, John’s Maximum Idlers levelled up. He used a trick to remove all the Idlers he could get out of the skills, freeing them up.
It was time to focus his efforts onto one thing: to raise his Defence. He put all Idlers he could fit into Blood Capacity’s White Cells skill and completed it after another three weeks. He then put all Idlers into Transportation and finished that in three weeks, too.
After a few levels of Blood Capacity’s Toughness, he noticed that his Defence did not go up at all. So he took them out after it had levelled up, and put them into Bones Density's Cell Production, which got completed in three weeks as well.
After that, he put them all into toughness, and when it hit level twenty, his attack points went up!
Welcome to the Idle System 1.8
Name: John
Age: 17
Idlers: 0/44
Time Pool:
Skill Points: 0
HP: 164
At
tack: C (600 Points)
Defence: N/A (30 points)
Stamina: SS (2 Hours)
Defence List:
Blood Capacity - Idlers 0/99, Cell Speed - 15/100
Bone Density - Idlers 44/99, Toughness - 20/100, Marrow - 11/100, Time - 1mo 5d 16h 23m 46s
Misc List:
Maximum Idlers - Idlers 0/99, +1 Max Idlers - 43/2159
Maximum Workers - Idlers 0/99, +1 Idler Workers - 0/2061
Completed List:
Flesh Strength - Immunity and Placement
Organ Strength - Stomach Acid
Blood Capacity - Transportation and White Cells
Bone Density - Cell Production
Senses - Time, Sight, and Hearing
And as soon as the Bone Density skill rose to level 20, he got one hundred fifty attack points, boosting him to the bare minimum requirements for Rank C. The time needed to get to level 21 was lower than what he’d needed to hit level 20 in the first place. John assumed after every ten levels, the time was reduced by some amount. The most time needed would be from levels that ended with a nine.
When White Cells completed its levelling, he had one hundred percent complete immunity to poison.
At the completion of the Blood Capacity’s Transportation skill, John noted that his muscles felt a lot more powerful. It was like his whole body was getting more nutrients, oxygen, and anything else it needed to maintain its peak of fitness.
The best one was still the Bone Density’s Cell Production skill. With that completed, his body felt absolutely invigorated—like he could wrestle a tiger with one hand behind his back! He believed this is what some athletes did, called ‘Blood doping’. It was hazardous for them, but it was undoubtedly safe for John.
Out of everything he levelled up, one of those skills had changed his fighting stamina from one hour to two. He had no idea which one it was, and that really bothered him. Maybe it was the blood, since athletes do it to win? But if it was that, then what other skill could get him to 3 hours for Rank SSS?
There was just one last thing to do before setting off dramatically into the sunset, maybe to never return to this town again.
With ill intentions, he stormed into Tom's office, playing the part of the angry Sider.
"Why didn't you tell me the truth?” John bellowed as he put on a scene for the older man. He growled his words, almost snarling. “What, did you think I couldn't handle it?"
Tom’s calm facade was almost completely shattered on impact. Stomach doing flips, he clenched up and assumed the worst.
"What are you talking about?" He was visibly shaken, but desperately trying to keep his voice as steady as he could. He placed the paper he was reading aside, giving John his full attention.
"Don't act like you don't know,” John spat, “I forced it out of him! There's a loophole in the rules—telling a Sider about it isn't a problem. We've already tested it."
Tom sat completely rigid, face losing all traces of colour.
"You tried using me!” John went on, “All your kind acts were complete bullshit!"
What Tom couldn’t possibly have known was that John was only fishing at this point. Perhaps had Tom been as clear-headed as his exterior typically suggested, he could have considered this as a possibility. Perhaps if, at that moment, the pressures of his position in his assigned chain of command hadn’t magnified tenfold… Perhaps if he hadn’t suppressed his true nature to such extreme extent, all to play his part… Perhaps…
But no, there was no ‘perhaps’ in this cold reality, which was something that Tom had come to understand all too well. His perfectly moulded coat of armour came crashing down all around him, exposing the ugly, pink, and writhing mess of a human that was left of his true self.
Brows knitting into a fearsome knot, Tom’s face reddened as he brought his fist crashing down against the desk. From the very core of his being, he released a monstrous, blood-curdling howl. John held his ground as he witnessed, for the first time, Tom’s true nature.
"So, you know why I was so nice to you then. Well, so what?!” He spat his words like daggers laced with the venom of a snake, voice somehow steady despite the rest of his form trembling with a dark rage. “It's not like it’s going to change anything. You'll still have to choose between the path of a Demon or a Saint, regardless. Simply knowing about it will not save you!"
At those words, a look of utter horror distorted Tom’s face once more, eyes bulging almost completely out of their sockets. A blood vessel burst, then another. And another. It was as if all the pressures of Tom’s tumultuous life had materialized, and were now exploding from inside of his body. Blood began to spurt from the orifices of Tom’s twisted face. It dripped from his eye sockets and the corners of his mouth, gushing from his nose with great force. Frozen in chilling terror, John witnessed as Tom clutched his chest with the last of his force of will.
As if stricken by one final blow to his heart, Tom threw his head back and collapsed onto the desk.
He died with his eyes open.
John's head was swimming in questions with no answers. He was lost in a sea of Tom’s final words, and for the first time in two years…
He panicked.
"HELP!!!" John’s voice cried out, shaky but fuelled by enough urgency to rattle the building itself, ever so slightly. The seconds that passed felt like hours. Tom’s lifeless eyes bore into John’s skull, accusations of guilt penetrating deep into the back of his retinas. John was frozen in place, standing only an arm’s width away from Tom’s ruined body.
I need to… do something…!
Primal instincts overriding any sense of fear, John watched as his body seemed to know what to do on its own. He pulled Tom’s still-warm form close against his own, checking for some kind of pulse. Efforts fruitless, he flipped Tom over and was about to begin doing compression, when other staff members started trickling into the office-- each of them freezing at the sight they beheld.
"He collapsed! He was clutching his chest, and—I think he had some kind of heart attack—get someone with medical knowledge in here NOW!" John roared, giving the staff no time to think about what was happening. Panicked though he was, John knew they wouldn't be able to recall the smaller details later if an investigation was opened about the event.
In the two minutes it took for a doctor to arrive at the scene, John had regained some of his lost composure. That was right. He had to make sure that he was not tied to this death. He couldn’t be labelled as a murderer, no matter what!
When the doctor entered the room, John was crouching over Tom’s body, trying to urgently perform CPR on the stiffening corpse. Tom’s still-fresh blood smeared across John’s face as he pressed his lips against the older man’s, doing his best to put on a show for the doctor. He had to make his desperation seem as convincing as possible. He had to be the least suspecting person if this turned out to be a crime scene!
The doctor rushed to Tom’s side, moving John aside to check for any signs of life. With a solemn shake of his head, John knew better than to reel the act in now. He cried out and once more threw himself on top of Tom’s body, trying desperately to resuscitate the dead man. Overwhelmed by such a display, the doctor didn’t know how to respond except to throw his own body onto John’s, mustering all the strength he could to wrench the man apart from the Guild Manager’s languid body. John protested, crying out that Tom could still be saved—that he just needed to try a little harder!
Moments after, the rest of the staff members streamed back into the office. Seeing John’s absolute distraught, they "forcefully" removed him from Tom’s body, foiling his attempts to bring the dead man back. Playing into the role of the emotionally devastated victim, John pretended to be angered and threw his fists around in a fit of hopelessness. He lashed out at the bookshelves and files in particular, trying to perhaps catch sight of any information that might explain Tom’s last words further.
Finding nothing, John slowly let his tantrum fade into a melancholic lull. H
e lowered his head with his hand covering his mouth, just in case a slight grin threatened to pop up. Proud of his acting skills, he felt like he could get away from a life sentence in prison, at this rate.
Head still lowered, he let his anxious mind run wild.
He was a nice guy to me for his own benefit, but he didn't deserve to die… especially not like that. What even was it that killed him!? I know I caused his death accidentally, but I could still be charged with murder if they frame it that way... The thought of getting away without being charged almost put a smile on my face at the wrong time!
After an hour in the waiting room with his head down, the doctor announced to all staff that Tom had died of a heart attack, but an investigation was still needed.
Various members of the staff came up and asked John a few questions, which he answered truthfully to some extent. He’d come to ‘say goodbye’ to Tom on his way out of town, and that’s when Tom was struck by the attack. It wasn’t a complicated story, and not far from the truth. None of the staff members seemed to suspect him in the least.
Free from the scene, John let himself wander. Once more, his head was swimming.
The path of a Saint? A Demon? What was Tom talking about? What secrets was he keeping from me…?
Running a hand through his hair, John walked up to the quest board. He recalled that, to raise to E Rank, there was a special mission that he had to complete. Trying to take his mind off of the mysteries that plagued it, John read over the different options he had on the board. His eye landed on one particular quest.
Escort a merchant from here though some dangerous E-F ranked areas.
Deciding to give one final show to any onlookers, John stepped once more into the role of ‘angry griever’ and tore the quest sheet from the board, slightly scrunching the paper up in his grip. He veered over to the nearest counter and slammed the slip onto the counter, demanding the staff-worker to give him the quest as soon as possible.
He wanted to leave the impression that he was overwhelmed by the death of a “friend”, and merely wanted to get some time away from this place.
