6 Episode 2: The Synergist (2)

[ Hunter Profile ]

Name: Jace Young

Age: 29

Level: 1

Class: Synergist

[ Titles ]

Current Hunter Points: 0

[ Status ]

HP: 120/120 | MP: 274/274

[ Stats ]

STR: 12 | INT: 17

AGI: 19 | MND: 23

END: 6 | LUCK: 15

[ Abilities ]

...

When Jace first saw his updated status window, he was in a state of shock, unable to process anything. But now, after a week since his retirement, he finally had the motivation to look through his skillsets and study his new kit.

"Let's see... With the class change, I now only have seven abilities, huh?" Hovering his eyes over the ability section, he tapped on the skill, [ Soul Linkage ] that was at the top of his list. "Four active and three passives... Sigh. It'll take some time for me to get used to it."

[ Soul Linkage (SSS) ] [ Passive ]

One's essence can be connected to another; forming an unbreakable bond.

When a connection is successfully formed between you and another person, your stats will increase by 2 and the strength of your abilities on them will grow stronger. At the same time, the more connections you successfully form, the more benefits this skill will gain.

*Soul Linkage List:

1. None. Make some friends,

-This skill will update when you form your first bond.

...

"What's this...?" At first glance at the ability's description, Jace felt unimpressed. "Form a bond with someone and gain benefits? That's..." He couldn't help but feel disappointed at the sight. "For an SSS-Ranked skill... That's all it does?"

With just a quick read through the skill, he could already tell the basic gist of how it worked. He needed to form a link with someone, thus connecting them with himself. It was essentially asking Jace to make friends.

"...no way it's just that simple, right? An SSS-Ranked skill that does... Huh?" As Jace was frowning at the skill's concept, a sudden realization hit him. "Wait... What's the rating of this skill? SSS...? What?"

He couldn't believe his eyes. Rubbing them a few times, he turned to look at the ability's ranking, realizing that it was indeed SSS. A grade that he never knew even existed. As far as he was concerned, the highest known rating was S-Ranked.

"No way. Seriously, THIS is an SSS-Ranked skill?" He was in disbelief, unable to comprehend the fact that a skill about making friends was given the highest grade. Was it a system error? He couldn't believe it. "Even Angela's S-Ranked skills are much better than this. What gives?"

In comparison to other known S-Ranked skills, [ Soul Linkage ] was extremely underwhelming. Even though the skill wasn't too shabby at its core, it definitely didn't deserve the title of highest-ranked skill. Rather, for a skill that gives uncertain benefits, uncertain conditions to link, and only two stats as a guaranteed bonus on top of it all, it was a liability.

"Maybe the benefits are godly? Or... Is there an underlying meaning behind linking with an ally?" The skill was up in the air. He knew not of how it would affect the person he would link with nor of how to link with someone in the first place. Such a skill felt risky to use. "Ugh... Let's just move on to other skills first."

Averting his attention away from the skill, he tapped on the second and third abilities in the list, [ Soul Seer's Eye ] and [ Soul Channeler ]. Unlike the previous ability's grade, the skills were SS and S respectively.

[ Soul Seer's Eyes (SS) ] [ Active Ability ] [ 70 MP ]

The weight of a soul can be seen through the eyes of the seer.

When using this ability on an applicable target (Humans, Monsters, etc), you are able to see their basic status window. Alongside the basic information, you are also able to see the "Bond Compatibility" levels between you and said target's soul.

*The higher the initial percentage of "Bond Compatibility", the easier it is to link with them.

...

[ Soul Channeler (S) ] [ Active Ability ] [ 35 MP ]

A string of fate ties one into a path that crosses with another.

When activating this ability, a small thin invisible string will be formed, connecting you and a target ally. So long as the string remains, 40% of the damage dealt by you per attack will be evenly split into healing you and connecting allies.

*You may connect yourself with any number of allies, creating new strings in the process. However, the more strings that are formed, the more mental energy is needed to maintain the strings.

*If the strings are forcibly broken, a certain amount of mental energy will be consumed.

...

As Jace pulled up the skills description, he quickly took notice of the similarities between the names of all three abilities. Soul. To add to that, each skill slowly descended down on its rank.

"An analysis-based skill and a healing skill..." Deep in thought, the young man began thoroughly reading through the skills information. "Then there's also the theme of Bond and Linking in those skills respectively..."

When it came down to analyzing the three Soul skills, it could be deduced that all three abilities are interconnected with one another. With [ Soul Linkage ] at its core, [ Soul Seer's Eyes ] was on the basis of "Seeing the connection" and [ Soul Channeler ] was on the line of "Forming the connection".

Though, despite the overall picture becoming clearer, it stopped there. The vagueness of the SSS-Ranked skill still persisted. There were still risks of using it on someone random, as the benefits and effects were unknown. Likewise, he knew not of the conditions behind the percentile of Bond Compatibility or whether using [ Soul Channeler ] to link with others would officiate the bond.

In the end, it all came down to trial and error.

"...if I want to test these abilities, I'll need to find someone trustable..." He sighed, looking over towards his phone. The first thought that came to mind was Soren. However, given his recent hermit expenditure and retirement announcement, he would rather not contact anyone right now. "Well, whatever. That can be settled with for another day."

Continuing to go down the list, he checked out the details of [ Phantom Mirage ] and [ Rendering Field ]. Unlike the three interconnected skills from before, the two A-Ranked skills were independent of each other. One was a blink skill that allowed an easy escape, while the other was a debuff nullification skill. Which, overall only complimented the Synergist class.

"Hmm..." As Jace came to the end of his skill list, he was left in deep thought, contemplating his new kit. "The Soul skills seem pretty neat as a concept, but... Without forming a bond, aren't I just completely useless as a Synergist?"

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