"Huff... huff... huff..."
Leon sat hunched on the edge of the bed, chest heaving, dragging in great lungfuls of air.
He turned his head, gaze sweeping over the women beside him. All four ladies had been carried up to the very peak and were now sunk in a deep slumber, faces still flushed and heavy with weariness.
Watching them, he grinned, the smile spreading shamelessly from the corner of his mouth.
"Phew..."
After a few long, deep breaths, the churning in his blood and the searing heat of passion gradually settled.
He got up and walked to the table to pour himself a glass of water. The coolness slid down his dry throat, and he frowned without meaning to.
"No ice...?"
The complaint had barely surfaced when he remembered that outside the window it was the dead of winter, snow and wind howling. He shrugged in silence and, resigned, downed the whole glass of plain cool water in one go.
Sitting back down on the edge of the bed, he glanced at the magic stone clock on the wall, then let out a barely audible sigh.
"It's only this late?"
"By rights I should grab another hour of sleep..."
But the aftershocks of that fierce campaign still lingered in his body, leaving him wide awake with no trace of drowsiness.
"Tch..."
Winter days were brutally short.
It was already nearly five in the morning, yet the sky showed no sign of brightening.
Now in his "sage's afterglow," Leon sat alone in the dark, mind blank, idly zoning out for a while.
Then something stirred in his gaze, as if something had occurred to him. He tapped lightly at the empty air with one finger.
His Falna panel unfolded before him without a sound.
Ignoring the Basic Abilities section, which still hadn't changed much, he swiped his finger to drag the panel all the way down, eyes going straight to the Excelia Pool and the wallet.
...
[Assets]: Reserve Funds: 4.13 million | Cash: 277.47 → 557.47 (597.47) million
[Excelia]: 2,801 (points)
...
The Familia's total fund reserves had set a new record again, reaching 597 million, just a hair short of breaking 600 million.
Of course, the cash on hand was only about 557 million, and that extra 40 million was naturally the appraised value of the "spoils."
Still, rounding up, calling it roughly 600 million wasn't really wrong.
"This kind of money might be nothing in the eyes of the big Familias, but for a crew of fewer than ten like ours... it's already a fortune."
"Yeah, as long as we don't go messing around with that first-class adventurer equipment."
First-class equipment was top-tier gear that only adventurers at Lv.5 were even qualified to touch. Strong, sure, very strong. But the moment he thought of those terrifying price tags that started in the hundreds of millions, Leon winced.
"Haah... still, the price is fair enough, I suppose. Scarcity drives value, after all."
"Count it out on your fingers. In all of Orario, there are barely a handful of Familias that can reliably gather first-class materials and drops. Add in respawn times that drag out three months, even half a year, and those tragic drop rates that come down entirely to luck..."
Even a starving dog would shake its head and walk away.
"The road ahead is still a long one."
Having finished with the Assets, his gaze moved to the Excelia Pool.
"2,801, huh. Not bad... actually a decent amount."
The thought that half of it had been contributed by Evilus made Leon feel they weren't quite so detestable after all.
"All in!"
He didn't dawdle. He raised his hand and started madly tapping the "+" signs on his Basic Abilities. In an instant, the number in the Excelia Pool plummeted, evaporating so fast it was almost visible to the naked eye.
In mere moments, every Excelia point had been poured in.
Not a single drop left.
...
[Name]: Leon Hart
[Title]: Shadow of Sorcery
[Race]: Human
[Profession]: Mage
[Affiliation]: Demeter Familia
[Level]: Lv.4
[Floor Reached]: Floor 27
[Basic Abilities]:
Strength: D500 → SS1000 | Potential: SSS1599
Endurance: C600 → SSS1100 | Potential: SSS1599
Dexterity: D500 → SS1000 | Potential: SSS1599
Agility: D500 → SS1000 | Potential: SSS1599
Magic: B798 → SSS1599 | Potential: SSS1599
[Development Abilities]:
| Versatility G | Hunter G | Mage G | Abnormal Resistance G |
| Strong Body G | Magic Resistance G | Escape G |
| Concentrate H | Accuracy H | Strong Defense H |
[Magic]: Omitted
[Skills]: Omitted
...
[Assets]: Reserve Funds: 4.13 million | Cash: 557.47 → 529.46 million (total approx. 569.46 million)
[Excelia]: 0 (points)
...
"Tch, the Excelia points weren't even warm in my hands before they were gone again..."
Staring at that glaring "0" in the Excelia Pool, even though it wasn't his first time going through this, Leon couldn't quite shake the pang of loss.
Only now the thing that pained him had shifted from the "wallet" he'd fixated on back when he was weak, to what was far more precious these days: "Excelia points."
"Whatever. It's not like they actually vanished."
His thoughts turned, and as he considered that his own strength had genuinely taken another step forward, that even the next level was no longer out of reach, that sense of loss quickly converted into a solid satisfaction.
"Phew..."
Feeling that familiar warm current spreading slowly through his body, along with the comfortable fullness of power it brought, Leon took a deep breath, threw open the balcony door, and bare-chested, leapt straight from the second floor down into the courtyard.
The biting winter wind, swirling with bits of snow, suddenly poured into the still-warm bedroom. The women on the bed all furrowed their brows in unison, instinctively pulling the covers tighter in their sleep.
"Mn..."
Persephone groggily rolled over and buried her face in the pillow, mumbling something half-asleep:
"Freezing cold out and he's a damn lunatic..."
"..."
...
Feeling the surging power inside him, Leon naturally had no idea about the "chain reaction" his sudden whim had set off.
By now he was already standing in the "training area" in the corner of the courtyard. Looking at the few battered wooden posts and straw dummies not far off, he clenched his fists hard, expression itching to give it a go.
"Living up to the System's stat allocation..."
"The effect is so much more solid than grinding it out myself... barely any adjustment needed. The updated strength feels innate, like an extension of my own arm."
As the words left him, his thoughts stirred.
"Fireball!"
A blazing ball of flame roared out and struck the distant post dead-on, bursting into a dazzling flash of fire and a spray of splinters.
A wave of heat rolled toward him, carrying smoke and bits of snow, and Leon's eyes lit up.
"That's it, that's the feeling!"
"Crank the 'Magic' stat up and it's just busted."
He didn't stop. He raised his palm again. The moisture in the air rapidly condensed and took shape, an irregular but razor-edged block of solid ice forming bit by bit in his hand.
...
...
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