Chapter 63: Mia’s New Skill

　In front of me, there was a massive fissure so vast that I couldn’t see the bottom.

Could it be that Mia fell down here? I hope not.

I activate the “ping” skill, targeting Mia.

It seems that once I acquire information through “scan,” I can select the target with “ping” from then on.

Ugh… The time until activation feels frustrating. It’s only been about a minute.

It might be better to mass-produce “garnet stones” with the “ping” skill.

As I was thinking about all that, suddenly the gigantic fissure in front of me vanished.

“Wha, what!?”

“Fufufufu. Yay! I succeeded in surprising Takumi!”

“…………”

“Hmm? Hello? I’m sorry. Did I startle you too much?”

What just happened?

Mia suddenly appeared, probably because she was hiding.

That’s fine. But what was that massive fissure?

Illusion-based skills don’t work on me because I’m equipped with mental resistance gear.

“Mia, is this… a new skill?”

“Yes. That’s right! It’s the skill ‘Reality Painting Trick Art.'”

“Trick art? But normally, with trick art, you can easily see through it by getting closer or changing the viewing angle. However, I couldn’t see through that gigantic fissure at all, even when I approached it.”

“Trick art relies on illusions and such, but my skill ‘Reality Painting Trick Art’ creates realistic paintings that resemble photographs and adds ‘features’ like sound, scent, and presence to them. So, even though it’s a painting, it feels like the real thing. I don’t think you can tell even if you get closer. It’s fascinating, isn’t it?”

“No, no, fascinating… It’s just amazing!”

　I see, it’s not like she cast her skill on me, Mia applied the skill “Reality Painting Trick Art” to the ground.

That’s why the mental resistance accessory didn’t work, and I was deceived.

“When the trick art suddenly disappeared, was it because you deactivated the skill?”

“Yes. The painting disappears when I deactivate the skill. It also disappears if someone touches the painting.”

“This is useful! Can you draw anything?”

“I can only draw things I’ve seen before. Also, it takes a minimum of 10 minutes to activate the skill. It consumes 1 SP every 10 seconds. If the size of the painting increases, the time and SP consumption proportionally increase.”

That fissure… Is it the one I saw in the underground cave?

“To activate it, it took 30 minutes and consumed 4 SP every 10 seconds. I wonder what will happen with the ‘garnet stone.'”

I see.

Not only my skills but Mia’s skills can also greatly benefit from the ‘garnet stone.’

Nevertheless, the combination of Mia’s ‘Skill Elements’ and ‘Occupation’ is still crazily overpowered.

I asked Mia to show me her status again.

　——

Name: Yamamoto Mia

Occupation: Painter

Level: 45 (New)

HP: 450/450 (New)

SP: 414/450 (New)

Skill Elements:

• ‘Material’: Turning targets into materials.
• ‘Feature’: Effects related to features.
• ‘Expression’: Expressing the target.

skill:

Skills:

‘Deformation’: Exaggerating and simplifying features of materials to achieve a simplified and altered form.

‘Reality Painting Trick Art’: Drawing paintings that realistically depict the features of materials.

——

　Unlike ‘Deformation,’ even with ‘Expression→Realization,’ the effect doesn’t seem to change.

The paintings created with the skill ‘Reality Painting Trick Art’ were already indistinguishable from reality.

“How about Takumi’s skills? I’m interested!”

I explained my new skills, ‘Scan,’ ‘Ping,’ and ‘Router,’ to Mia.

As for the details, I’ll have to verify them myself.

“Let’s spend about two hours now to test the skills and ‘garnet stone.’ The goal is to be able to defeat the Demon King!”

“Eh!? We’re going to defeat the Demon King?”

“Ah, no,  I mean, we won’t actually defeat him. After all, we couldn’t do anything in the previous battle, so let’s show him what we’re made of.”

“Right! Let’s make him regret giving us time. Fufufufu.”

　No way…Did something dangerous get triggered in Mia by being kicked by the Demon King?

Th-That’s scary, Mia-san.

　◇

　——We proceeded to test Mia and the ‘garnet stone.’

Here’s a summary of what we found through the tests:

・The level of skill that can be put into a “garnet stone” varies depending on the size of the stone.

・The level of skill relates to SP. Skills that consume a lot of SP require a large “garnet stone”.

・Only one skill can be put into “garnet Stone”.

・’Scan’ and ‘Ping’ cannot be combined in the same stone.

・Anyone can use the skills contained in the “garnet Stone”, but the owner of the skill does not change. Even if Mia uses my skill ‘Scan’ in ‘garnet Stone’, the result of ‘Scan’ will be displayed to me.

・The content of the skill embedded in the ‘garnet stone’ cannot be changed by anyone other than the skill owner.

If Mia embeds her ‘Reality Painting Trick Art’ of a cat into a ‘garnet stone,’ anyone can use the ‘garnet stone’ to place the trick art of the cat. However, anyone other than Mia cannot change the cat’s image embedded in the ‘garnet stone’ to a different image.

“It’s quite complicated… Can’t I use ‘Ping’?”

“No, you probably can’t. I realized it through testing; there’s a loophole in how skills are embedded.”

I hand two ‘garnet stones’ containing the skill ‘Ping’ to Mia.

“Do these two ‘garnet stones’ contain different things?”

“It might be faster to try it out than to explain. Also, you don’t have to break the ‘garnet stone’ to use the embedded skill. Just imagine releasing the skill embedded in the ‘garnet stone.'”

“Alright. Then let’s start with the first one.”

　Mia concentrates her attention on the hand holding the ‘garnet stone’.

“Ah… There’s a red haze in the direction Takumi is in. I can gauge the distance from the intensity of this color. Ah, it disappeared.”

“I could only embed an amount of 1 SP, so it can only be used for 10 seconds. I also embedded ‘Ping’ in the other stone. Try using it on me as the target.”

“Sure. Let me give it a try… Huh? Nothing seems to be happening. The stone is still glowing, so the skill hasn’t been used?”

“Don’t worry. It’s working as intended. The first one was embedded with ‘Ping’ targeting me. The second one was embedded with ‘Ping’ without specifying a target. Mia, give me that ‘garnet stone’ back.”

I receive the ‘garnet stone’ from Mia and use the skill embedded in the ‘garnet stone,’ setting Mia as the target.

“Alright. It worked. Mia couldn’t use it, but as the skill owner, I could use it without any issues. In other words, as long as we resolve the parts that depend on the skill owner, other people can use it too.”

Previous chapter | TOC | Next chapter