Surviving as a Broken Hero

After all, what would be the fun if everyone had the exact same abilities and classes?

But my options at least confirmed that the System would reward you with options based on your achievements that you accomplished on the way to the next level.

As it just so happened, the dragon had given me so much experience that I was boosted from 0 experience to almost at the end of level 6 immediately, which meant that the only contributing factor to how I had leveled up was, in fact, defeating a dragon.

[[Ability Options:

《Scaled Skin》

The scaled skin of a dragon. Renders immunity to attacks for 1 second. 30 second cooldown.

《Eye of the Dragon》

The all-seeing eye of a dragon. Perceive the imperceivable and reveal hidden paths.

《Fiery Constitution》

The fiery vengeance of a dragon. Light parts of your body aflame with a fire that grows as you do.]]

«Scaled Skin» seemed more than a little broken. Immunity to all attacks for a second? Would that mean I could take a dragon’s breath or a giant’s stomp, or even “true kill” abilities with no side effects?

One thing I did notice about the wording of the ability was that it only rendered immunity to attacks. I wouldn’t be immune to everything that could cause me damage.

For instance, I wouldn’t be immune to fall damage. Luckily, I already had something that effectively made me immune to it: my movement ability.

As for «Eye of the Dragon», I guessed that, at the very least, it would allow me to see through invisibility as a ‘true sight’ ability. Maybe it would even grant me more detailed System windows or allow me to detect lies or something? I could really only guess.

I already had the Second System that revealed additional details about things that would cause me harm or seemed to have great importance.

As for the last ability, «Fiery Constitution»… It seemed the most useless for utility purposes, but in reality, I already had another ability that I could use to control fire, albeit I hadn’t practiced using it yet.

As for my skill point allocation, I decided it was time for me to invest in my mana. Only being able to use four abilities per fight was becoming a burden and would be the death of me if I kept on like that.

The room we had been in hadn’t even been the lord’s room but just a noble’s room in the guest quarters.

The dust-filled immaculate stone hallway was as wide as three men side by side, and glowstones along the ceiling at regular intervals kept a steady light throughout the hallway.

The plush red carpet that extended down the entirety of the hallway muffled our steps, and I was able to glance outside occasionally through window enchantments that we had seen from the castle’s exterior, spying the city beyond the castle’s walls, quiet and oblivious to the lord’s death.

On our way through the hallway to the elevators, I checked what the Second System had for me.

{{Demonic Entity Exterminated!

XP + 15,000}}

{{Level Up!}}

{{Milestone Level Reached!

Ability Class Options:

《Stone Knight》

– Further embrace the durability of stone. Additional Endurance enhancement, increased area and hardness of summoned earth. Opens up new tree options.

《Shaper》

– Further enhance the malleability of the earth, shaping it like clay in your hands. Additional Magic enhancement, increased ability to shape external earth. Opens up new tree options.

《Seismic Warrior》

– Embrace the contained fury of the earth. Additional Strength enhancement. Increased ability to use the earth for attacks and explosive power.

《 $%@«S$#%w&$》

– Detected additional Awakener synergies.}}

{{Level 5

XP: 15,000/16,000}}

I guess it was too much to hope that I would get the same amount of experience in both Systems.

Interestingly enough, the Second System seemed to follow the same power breakpoints that the regular System did, with level 5 having unlocked special class options.

Of course, other than the first three options presented to me, the glitched-looking fourth class caught my eye. It would be a complete gamble to choose it, of course, but the description of it having detected additional synergies made me think that it would be a class with the abilities I had from the regular System taken into account.

Generally, the more synergy a class had, the better. That didn’t stop some from trying to collect as varied abilities as possible, but such people usually never got very far if their abilities couldn’t play off of each other.

I had already seen similar options to Stone Knight that would increase the hardness of the earth I could summon and how much I could summon, and it wasn’t really what I was going for.

It wasn’t like I had sat down and planned out how I was going to build myself, but in a world where people liked to classify things as ‘damage’, ‘tank’, ‘healer’, and ‘utility’, I was clearly more damage-oriented, and trying to veer away from that would only weaken my overall capabilities.

As such, Shaper was also easy to ignore. It would allow me to mold and control earth, but I didn’t really have any need for that. Maybe if I had gone into a utility class…

As for Seismic Warrior, though, it was exactly what I was going for. More strength to hit things harder, an increased ability to use the earth for attacks, and an increase in explosive power?

My entire kit to that point was pretty much built around explosive high-damage attacks, it would be a perfect synergy.

However, that last option tugged at my mind. It could be broken in the sense that it would drastically increase my power, but it could also be broken in the sense that it would be near-useless and as buggy as the script on the window for the class was.

I didn’t have to decide at that moment, and I had more pressing concerns—such as my arm and what the dragon had left behind—so I decided to wait until I had thought about it more.

Finally, we finished our ascent up the elevator and the interior of the tower was once again presented to my eyes.

It was no different than when I had last seen it—roof with a gaping hole, the shattered circular window behind the lord’s crumbling desk, papers and books scattered throughout the room…

The dragon’s massive body lay limp within its nest in a final, eternal slumber.

I could see the hole in its head where a thick, viscous liquid had dripped down and slid down the dragon’s curved skull, creating a pile of mushy goop below the dragon’s head—what was left of its brain, if I had to guess.

We would have to extract the dragon’s scales and gut it for all of its materials, but that was a project that would take quite a bit of time, and the dragon wasn’t going anywhere fast.

“Damn…”

I held my nose. There was a thick stench of burnt meat and a putrid odor of… blue cheese? That was what it smelled like, kind of similar to the smell of dirty wet socks.

The dragon’s crooked wing was half-wrapped around the lower half of its body.

“Well, guess there’s nothing to do but see what we can find now, right?”

At my words, we began scouring the nest for anything of value we could find.

A couple of hours later…

It took some effort to get under and sort through the distorted and useless lumps of armor and melted weapons, but we had piled up a decently sized treasure heap in front of the dragon’s nest. All in all, there were some pretty extraordinary items…

Most of which were useless to us, but at least we could sell them somewhere.

[[Chestplate of the Protector – Legendary

A heavy chest plate forged from true adamantite. A gift from races long gone that can withstand any attack. Enhances Endurance of the wearer by +5.]]

[[Lord’s Sword – Rare

A lord’s electrum sword. More intended as a decoration piece than an actual weapon, worn as a symbol of authority during the lord’s open courts. Enhances the Perception of the wielder by +5.]]

[[Crown of the Lord – Rare

A heavy crown of gold and valuable gems. Enhances the Mind of the wearer by +5.]]

[[Amulet of Protection – Very Rare

An amulet enchanted with protective magics. Grants the wearer a weak field of protection that brushes off attacks.]]

[[Vambrace of Nimbleness – Rare

The vambrace of the lord’s hunter. Worn on the arm to avoid injury from the snapping effect of a bowstring. Enhances the Agility of the wearer by +5.]]

The chest plate of the protector was heavier armor than any of us were used to wearing, and while adamantite was a legendary material that was nearly impenetrable, it was also one of the heaviest and densest metals.

Even I, with my total of 25 Strength—far above what Koise and Klein probably had—would struggle to move about unhindered with the chestpiece on.

It was much too valuable to sell, though, as such a good protective item in the wrong hands would make someone extremely difficult to kill.

As for the other items, none of us really needed the sword or crown, so we decided we would sell them and split the gold.

The Amulet of Protection was given to Klein, as he had the weakest defenses of any of us, and it would ease my worry a bit so that I had that much less to keep in mind during a fight.

Koise naturally took the vambrace, though he still needed a new bow.

While that left me with nothing in terms of new items that could increase my power, I still had the gauntlet that Krylla had made for me, and its enchanted blade could cut through most metals and armor, so it was more than sufficient as my offensive weapon.

There was still the rest of the castle to scour, but we had something more important to do before that…