Dungeons Online

"That's plain out stupid!" Claudia muttered under her nose only to avert her eyes the next moment. "Or wait, that actually makes sense," she changed her previous words. Then, she looked at Tom with a sour look in her eyes. "As much of a truth as it can be, it doesn't make it any easier to ignore how much of a dead weight I am for you here," she added, revealing the reason behind her hesitation. 

"I didn't tell you all of this to make you feel guilty," Tom replied, shaking his head. "Listen, do you know the idea of conditioning your next spells?" he asked suddenly, seemingly out of the topic. 

"The one that assumes that wishing for some kind of skill makes it more likely to actually receive it?" Claudia asked impassively. "Or the one that claims all the skills are related to the things you repeat a lot?" 

"The first one," Tom said, nodding his head. "We both have yet to reach level thirty. So I can see two things to deal with that matter," Tom said, looking deeply into Claudia's eyes.

"One is surely for me to focus on wishing for a skill like yours, right?" Claudia smiled, perfectly guessing Tom's thoughts. 

Even though the two of them didn't know each other for a long time, Claudia's empathy made it easy for her to see through people. While this kind of mental condition had its drawbacks, in terms of quickly forming a stable and efficient team, there was hardly any better type of character. 

"Yeah. But I don't think this is necessary," Tom smiled, happy that the girl both guessed the first way and that she fell right into his trap. "The other way is to get me to create a derivative of my energymancer skill," he said, leaning his head upwards. 

"Huh?" Claudia shrugged in surprise. "Aren't derivatives the hardest type of skills to get?" she asked before squinting her eyes and looking at her feet. "If I recall..." she said in a hesitant voice after a prolonged while, "you need to accomplish something great for the derivative to develop, right?" 

"Close, but not really." Tom shook his head in denial. "While this is just a theory of mine, I believe that ultimately, skills are a manifestation of the energy we obtain in the dungeons. Rather than being an additional ability of ours, I believe the skills are simply the natural ways for us to exhibit that energy," Tom said, ignoring the fact that he just divulged one of the most important pieces of information he ever obtained. 

"I'm sorry, but I don't really understand," Claudia said, leaning her head to the side in confusion.

"Do you want the full explanation or one made out of shortcuts?" Tom asked, pushing his back against the wall to stand up on his own. 

"The short one, please," Claudia chuckled. "As interesting as it is, I can see how eager you are to push deeper," she added, gracing Tom with a lovely smile. 

"How thoughtful of you," Tom laughed before shaking his head. Nevertheless, he properly grabbed his spear and started to slowly move forward. "The short version then. Just try to think about all the skills as universal and omnipotent magic," he smiled as he gave out the idea. 

"Don't fuck with me," Claudia sneered, as surprised as she was annoyed by Tom's idea. "Our skills are both limited and varied. How could they be universal? How could they be omnipotent?" she asked before shaking her head. "No, that's not possible."

Tom didn't bother to stop the girl from speaking. 'I know how stupid that sounds. I'm perfectly aware of it,' he said to himself while listening to the girl's protests. 

"Look, I'm not saying that's what the reality is all about. I just want you to think about skills like that for a moment," he explained his earlier words once Claudia was done with her rant. "Because if you consider that skills are just the natural ways of our bodies to exhibit magic, understanding how to obtain a derivative skill becomes quite easy, isn't it?" Tom asked with a small smile on his lips. 

"Well, if you put it in this way..." Claudia hesitated before finally submitting. "What are you going to do then? Shout out random words in hopes that one of them will turn into a magic spell?" she asked ironically. 

"Not really," Tom shook his head. "My energymancer skill allows me to infuse energy into my otherwise physical attacks," he said, looking at the girl with a meaningful stare. 

But even after a long moment, Claudia remained silent, clearly expecting him to explain rather than putting the burden of guessing the answer on her. 

"If I manage to learn how can I infuse the skills not only in my attacks but also in everything else, I will be able to infuse the energy into you," he explained his idea before averting his eyes. 

'Why does that sound strangely erotic?' Tom asked himself, trying to get rid of the illusory images of his imagination showcasing in detail how this energy infusion process would happen. 

"That does sound strangely erotic," Claudia said with a shy smile before sending Tom a wink. "But at the same time, it saves me the trouble of wasting an entire skill slot just to increase the pace of growing stronger," she said in a serious voice. 

In the end, there wasn't a single proof that Tom's idea about the skills was correct. After all, it was just an idea. And the number of skills one could obtain was limited. That's why, while both Tom and Claudia would be happy to save her the burden of wasting her precious skill slot to allow her to consume mana stones in an efficient manner, there was no telling whether or not it wouldn't become necessary. 

"Well, let's say I will try to get that derivative skill before reaching the next threshold," Tom said, looking up as if he wanted to somehow see through the walls all the way to the fortieth floor. "In this way, you will still have the time to wish for a proper skill if I fail!"