Chapter 238
Unique skills are a type of balance breaker.
However, in the case of FBO, rather than making the game trivial, it's more like obtaining one finally allows you to fight on equal footing—a balance breaker in the sense of leveling a tilted scale.
"So, uh, Nel, Ingrit, then Claudia got their skills. Who's next?"
All of them are powerful skills, but they aren't particularly easy to use.They're trump cards, plain and simple.Skills that occupy that position can be called unique skills.
"Me or Esmeralda, I guess.""Huh? I'm last?""Amina's Last Song's drawbacks don't outweigh its benefits until she's grown a bit more. Sorry, but its priority is the lowest here.""What happens if we get more passive skills?""It's less about getting more and more that if we had the Heavenly Voice art, you'd be right after Nel. I'd have gone for it before Ingrit's."
This time, since the goal is to get all the unique skills within a month, the focus is on obtaining them efficiently and safely, hence this order.If ease of acquisition were the only focus, the order would be different, but considering revival magic hasn't been found yet, this is the order we're going with.
Amina looked surprised, as she had heard her unique skill was strong and hadn't expected to be last.
"So, which of us will go first, me or Liberta?""My unique skill is needed for dishing out single-target firepower, and Esmeralda's is an area-of-effect attack magic. In terms of priority, you could say either is fine.""Then, let's get Liberta's skill first. What kind of skill is it?"
Amina's skill is powerful too, but considering the current benefits, its priority is lower, so sorry, but it's being postponed.
"My unique skill is called 'Null Strike'."
The skill itself has no attack power, but when a certain condition is met, it significantly boosts the damage of a wide range of attacks—from normal attacks to skill attacks, even attacks using items.
"This skill can only be activated when my hate is zero—essentially, when no one holds any hostility or is paying any attention to me. It converts all attacks made after using this skill into critical damage that ignores defense, and further increases the critical damage based on the skill level."
The recast time is a short twenty minutes, and the MP cost isn't particularly high either.
"So it's a skill that requires moving around without being noticed by the enemy?""Yes. If I draw any hate at all between using the skill and the attack landing, the effect ends. It's tricky to use, but in return, the damage multiplier is quite high.""Precisely, an assassin's skill."
If I can obtain that skill, my attack power will undoubtedly increase dramatically.Our party's main strategy originally revolves around Amina drawing attention, buffing everyone while golems stall the monsters.
On top of that, with high-firepower Nel and Claudia engaging in close combat on the front lines, hate almost never comes my way.Furthermore, we plan to gradually acquire the hate-reducing skills available to the assassin class, so this skill's effectiveness will only keep growing.
"So, fifth will be my Origin Comet, sixth will be Amina's Last Song. The order is settled for now, but what are the acquisition conditions?""I'll explain those in order as well."
With that, the acquisition order for the unique skills was decided for now.Next would be the acquisition conditions for the unique skills.
"First, the conditions for obtaining Nel's 'Summon Fortune' are three in total.""Just three?""Did you think there would be more?""Yes, since it's called a unique skill, I thought it would be difficult.""Well, you can't even get it without the 'Almighty' title, right? And even though it's just three, I couldn't possibly say they're easy."
For most unique skills, the first major hurdle is that having the specific title is the key that allows the acquisition conditions to even trigger.Fulfilling the conditions without the title won't make the unique skill manifest.
"One: Within one month, make a total of twenty golden treasure chests and three rainbow treasure chests appear in a dungeon.""...So it involves luck from the very start.""It's a skill that manipulates drop rates, so it follows suit, I guess. The counter starts ticking from the moment the first golden chest appears.""We haven't gotten any golden chests lately, so that should be fine.""Exactly. Since we've been in the Spirit World, those counters should have reset.""Right. What's the second one?"
To get Summon Fortune, you absolutely have to meet conditions heavily reliant on luck.Even for Nel, it might seem like she could clear them easily, but I suspect even she won't find it straightforward.
"Second: Obtain the 'Golden Beckoning Cat' dropped by the golden-scarf-wearing Thief Cats that appear in the Thief Cat dungeon."
The moment I raised a second finger and stated the second condition, Nel's face contorted.It was a distorted expression, as if she'd heard something terrible.
Thief Cats, true to their name, are monsters with skills for stealing items.You could translate the name directly as "robber cats."As a merchant, Nel probably knows the extent of the damage they cause, enough to ruin their cute appearance.
"So we have to fight those, huh.""You look like you know about them. Did something bad happen in the past?""A merchant my father works with was once a victim. The goods stolen during that shipment were meant to be my birthday present. I had a birthday without one that year.""Ah..."
So even Nel, who I thought was lucky, had her share of misfortune.In a way, it's a fated battle.
"If we prepare countermeasures, it'll be fine. Don't stress too much about it.""I know. We just have to defeat all of them.""That's true, but... well, okay. I'll state the third condition.""Okay."
Thinking it's better not to dwell on that topic, I decide I'll support her when we challenge the dungeon and raise a third finger (ring finger).Calling treasure chests, making drops happen... in a way, you could say the third condition is the one that most tests your luck.
"Achieve the first condition, then use the Golden Beckoning Cat to access the dungeon that only appears then—the Golden Cat Palace—and complete the trial in the 'Chamber of Proof'.""Chamber of Proof? What happens there?""Out of a hundred possible trials, one is assigned completely at random. The easy ones might just require brushing the fur of a docile cat during the trial.""Huh? That's it?""That's just the easiest one. The truly difficult ones give you utterly unreasonable trials. The one silver lining is that none of the trials are life-threatening. Everything else involves an element of luck. From what I know, the one where you should just give up is winning a hundred consecutive rock-paper-scissors matches against an absurdly strong cat."
The Chamber of Proof in the Golden Cat Palace tests your luck and skill.If the trial is easy, you can clear it simply.
"Once you break through the Chamber of Proof trial, there's a treasure chest further in. A scroll is inside, and using it grants you Summon Fortune.""A scroll? Does that mean anyone can acquire it?""A merchant who properly has the 'Almighty' title can. But if it's someone of another job, the scroll just vanishes.""...They set a trap in a rather nasty place.""It's a unique skill, after all."
Lady Esmeralda made a sour face at this final trap in a system that involves luck but also allows clearing with skill even if luck is somewhat bad, but this applies to other unique skills as well.If you could obtain unique skills from other jobs, building your skill set with transferable unique skills would be overwhelmingly stronger.
It seems such cheating wasn't allowed.
"Even if you fail like that, as long as you've met the treasure chest condition, you can challenge the Golden Cat Palace multiple times by using Golden Beckoning Cats. So the key is to achieve the treasure chest condition as soon as possible and mass-procure Golden Beckoning Cats from the Thief Cats.""Luck is mixed into all the conditions, isn't it?""That's precisely why achieving it means fortune is summoned—happiness is beckoned.""I see."
By the way, this unique skill...Sometimes you can obtain it surprisingly easily.Even for the same player, probabilities converge, and sometimes you get it smoothly, just as the saying goes.But on the flip side, if you get stuck, you can be stuck for ages.
In Nel's case, I have an image of her clearing it easily, but I also have a part of me that's anxious she might fail at the last moment like this.
"The general flow for learning it is to repeatedly run the Thief Cat dungeon, aiming for golden and rainbow treasure chests while also farming for the Golden Beckoning Cat drop, and then head for the Golden Cat Palace.""I understand how to do it, but...""But? Is something bothering you, Amina?""I understand that just the way to get Nel's unique skill is incredibly tough.""Yeah."
But, all things considered, precisely because it's Nel, I also think she might get it the fastest.Contrary to my optimistic self, Amina looked at me with an anxious face.
Looking carefully, everyone was making similar faces.Only Ingrit had her usual expressionless face, but even then, I could somehow tell her mood was dark.
"By any chance... are our skills like this too?""Hmm... setting aside the luck factor, they're probably similar."
Powerful, but a pain to obtain.Some people even clear the game without getting them.
"Ingrit's is speedrun-type, Claudia's is restriction-type. Mine is stealth-type, and Esmeralda's is puzzle-solving type."
Counting on my fingers, I convey the general idea of what kind of quests await them.
"And Amina, yours is large-scale battle type."
It was content that made question marks float above everyone's heads, but it couldn't be helped.Because that's the only way to describe it.
"Speedrun... inferring from what Liberta-sama taught me, does that mean I must accomplish something quickly?""Ingrit, you need to clear five different types of special dungeons by defeating all the normal monsters first and then annihilating the boss's entourage before defeating the boss.""......"
When I explained it to Ingrit, omitting the details, she fell silent.
"What is 'restriction-type'?""It means defeating the dungeon boss, the Sky Stone Golem, which appears after defeating the rock, iron, mithril, and Damascus golems—all golem-type bosses—with your bare fists, without weapons.""...You mean shatter them with these fists?""Ah, Amina's buffs are OK, but if any of us attack, we have to start over from the beginning, so sorry about that."
Next, Claudia's is extermination-type, but it involves fighting monsters highly resistant to physical damage, making it pretty tough.
"What is 'puzzle-solving type'?""There's a series of ancient ruin-type dungeons called the Ancient Dungeon series. There's a dungeon there where a monster called the 'Phantom Sage' appears.""Phantom Sage?""Yes. There, you'll take a test.""A test?""Yes. So, Esmeralda, starting tonight, you and I will be studying.""That is not a problem! I'll have you know I had excellent grades at the academy! That much is—""It's in ancient script, so we'll have to learn the language from scratch.""......"
And Lady Esmeralda's trial truly requires winning through knowledge problems.The Phantom Dungeon can be replicated with the Ephemeral Dungeon, so that's fine, but thinking she has to start studying for a test from today, I feel sorry for Lady Esmeralda.
"And Amina.""!? Wh-what?""Yours is the toughest, but let's do our best!""What's the content?!"
And while mine is tough for me too, I thought it was probably better than Amina's, and so I patted Amina's shoulder to encourage her.