Blacksmith vs. the System

"Anything incriminating?" she asked.

"Nothing except this," I said as I showed her the bottle, not trying to hide it.

She frowned even as she opened her hand. "A lure potion," she said even as she examined it, then put it in her pocket. The pieces of glass were taken by the guard. "Follow me," she repeated.

I did. I had enough presence of mind to keep my mouth shut about the sixty gold I was supposed to get from the shells. Everything had its time and place. Eleanor had dragged me to a room and pulled some kind of gem, which radiated a soft blue glow.

Suddenly, all the voices from outside ceased. "No one can hear us," she said, her voice the most serious I had ever heard. "Now, what was that?!"

"What was what?" I asked. She looked angry, but I opened my hands in surrender. "I genuinely don\'t know. We have too many things to talk about. The death of hundreds of people, the lure potion, the fact that I managed to deal with six dangerous assassins, the fact we had to let that monster go despite it being obvious he had done it?"

"None of them," she said, her tone getting more and more serious. "It\'s about how you rejected the weight of his Charisma. Only people of higher levels can do that. So, either someone trained you for a long time to resist the effects, or you have been lying about your level —" she started, only to stop.

Probably because I looked shocked. I had no idea why it was such a big deal. But then, I knew very little about the secrets of Charisma. "Wait, can resisting Charisma be trained?" I asked before I shook my head. "Sorry, scientist reflex. To answer your question, I didn\'t resist the effect. I was scared shitless."

She didn\'t seem convinced. "What about that laugh? It was obviously not a fake. No one can really act under Charisma. It must have been genuine, or Thomas wouldn\'t have bought it!"

"Wait, can he read my mind?" I asked.

"No, but he can sense your emotions," she said, looking even more confused.

I chuckled again when I realized exactly what had happened. She was starting to look angry. "Sorry, but I promise you, you\'ll find it amusing as well," I promised.

"I doubt it," she replied frostily.

I couldn\'t help it. I started giggling. Realizing that after everything, potentially the biggest part of my problem had been solved by a misunderstanding was funny … in a hysterical sort of way. "You know how I\'m … kind of tense when flying," I asked.

"Frozen in terror," she said.

"Yeah, being under Charisma reminded me of that. With the stress of everything, I couldn\'t help but find that amusing." Eleanor looked at me as if trying to see if I was lying. I couldn\'t help it, I started to laugh even more. Absent-mindedly, I recognized it as not genuine amusement, but a hysteric release of shock. "Good … that … you … silenced …" I said, trying to speak.

I collapsed, laughing.

She watched me like I was crazy, but soon, she started giggling as well. I didn\'t know how much time we spent, laughing like a couple of crazy people. I didn\'t know how much time passed before we managed to calm down. She shrugged just as much, which was understandable. She was probably even more stressed. At least, I succeeded. She still needed to explain her failure to Maria.

Though, from what I had seen, Eleanor would have been beating herself far more than Maria would admonish her about an external sabotage.

The pressure did weird things to our minds.

"So, my involuntary giggle made him assume that I was a higher level than him," I asked once we finally managed to calm down. She nodded. "But, why did he escape?"

"Using Charisma like that is an insult. You can challenge him to a duel for it, especially if he did so publicly, and I was there as a witness."

"And his level is?"

"A hundred. It\'s a known fact that he\'s trying to pass the threshold. He just lacks the necessary resources" she said.

"People need resources for that?" I asked. "Do I need to prepare anything for level fifty?"

"No, only level hundred requires resources," She said.

"What kind of resources?"

"I don\'t know. Family secret," she said. "Apparently, it differs from class to class. But, it\'s well known that they are expensive. It\'s why we bet everything on this dungeon. Otherwise, we can\'t buy them for Maria once she reaches level one hundred."

As much as I was tempted to question her from about six different directions, most of it related to the level hundred threshold and why it required resources, but I forced myself to focus. "So, they believe that I\'m over level hundred, that\'s a problem," I said. "I doubt that I can fake it."

She pondered for a moment. "Maybe not. Thomas doesn\'t exactly have a reputation for bravery. We can probably say that you are at level hundred, but you\'re unlucky enough to have a Militia class, it\'ll be believable."

Militia was probably the weakest class that was still classified as one. It only received three stats, evenly distributed between Strength, Dexterity, and Vitality. Of course, they compensated for this somewhat by having one melee and one ranged combat skill, which they could upgrade to their preferred weapon with a Stat stone.

It gave them much better combat flexibility compared to classes like Blacksmith with higher base stat gain, making them much more preferable as guards and other roles.

As my own experience had shown, Perks mattered. A lot.

I thought about accepting it, as it would make my situation more secure. That way, I could develop safely … but would it be truly safe? It had been a close call. "No, let\'s not explain it further," I said. "Maybe even let the guards gossip how Thomas had been scared of me."

"Are you sure?" she said.

"Yes," I said. "I prefer if he doesn\'t send any more assassins. Today, I survived by sheer luck," I said.

"Good, that was about to be my next question," she replied. "How did you survive a group of assassins? I doubt they were weak."

"Luck and incompetence," I replied. "Mine, and theirs, in that order." She looked intrigued, and I gave her a long, detailed tale of my imaginary fight. It was more or less what had happened, but some details like using the lure potion had turned into an accident, which allowed me to kill the first one and take their much better weapon, followed by a tough battle where I pushed my sword skill to the limit.

Including my ability to halfway copy a vitality attack; one with a corresponding tale of how close I had come to death before inspiration struck.

"Show me," she said.

"Sure. But, I don\'t need to tell you we have to keep it a secret, right," I said. Knowing the Rare skills would come with one at twenty-five proficiency, and how combining it with a Perk helped, it felt like a good compromise.

With her bias for sword skills, she would have no trouble accepting it. Not only that, but it would also explain the rapid development I planned to show once I upgraded to Rare skill.

The best part, while it was an impressive achievement, it was nothing more than a pointless gimmick from her perspective. I even had planned a long explanation where I would reveal my Rare Nurture skill and how it had helped me to control my Health.

She didn\'t even ask that, accepting my achievement as a display of my talent. "What a waste it is that you ended up as a Blacksmith," she sighed deeply.

"And what a waste we don\'t have time to spar," I said, happy to end my story without any hard questions.

"Yes, I have a lot of things to do," she said. "Who would have guessed that bastard can get his hands on pure lure potions."

"I\'m guessing it\'s the thing in the bottle," I said. "What exactly is it?"

"A controlled substance, made from a recipe," she said. "The function is simple. It radiates a smell that draws the dungeon monsters at a certain radius to a target, depending on the dose and amount used."

"I\'m guessing it\'s not usually used as a full bottle," I said.

"No, usually, it\'s used as a diluted mix," she said.

"But it\'s not forbidden," I said.

"No. They are not really a risk to any mature dungeon operation," she said.

"Because there are not enough monsters to create a swarm in a dungeon with continued hunting," I said.

"Exactly," she said. "Of course, we were supposed to have sentries preventing exactly that, but with the family guards gone, we\'re already overextended. Still, I should have been prepared. I just didn\'t expect that bastard to be vicious enough to kill that many people just to take over the command. That\'s my mistake," she said.

She didn\'t seem particularly torn up about the deaths, and more about them representing her failure.

I didn\'t like it. I wanted to blame her, but it wouldn\'t be fair. She was fighting for a long time, and during that, she clearly saw a lot of death, to the point of losing her sensitivity to it. It was just how the human mind worked, so I couldn\'t even blame the System for it.

We got used to it in order not to go mad.

She sighed. "I need to go and visit the caravan, to talk with Maria. We have a lot of work to do to keep the guilds investing in the area. But, some of them would try to pull back. Do you mind staying here tonight to keep an eye on the dungeon? It should be over, but I\'ll feel better if you\'re here as well."

"Sure, just keep it in mind when I need a favor," I replied, acting like the ability to stay in the dungeon without raising suspicion was not something I wanted in the first place.

Especially the alternative meant staying in the town, which didn\'t feel as safe with both Maria and Eleanor gone.

"Deal," she said as she squeezed my hand.

"However, I can only promise help about the monsters. I won\'t get involved with the guards. That can get complicated if there\'s a spy among them. I need to stay aloof if I\'m to convince people I\'m really strong. Maybe I can hunt some more monsters. I\'ll be even faster with my new Perk," I said.

"Good point. But, don\'t tire yourself too much. We still have to spar once I return."

I couldn\'t help but chuckle as I followed her out.

She had only one track of mind.