Chapter 138: Ranged Weapons Master
What do I need the most? William pondered as he looked through the Talent Shop.
Magic Talents were currently locked, so that was out of the question, and Passive Skills were quite expensive, currently costing 350 Potential Points to spin for one Talent.
William hadn’t bought a single Weapon Talent yet, so their cost was only ten Potential Points. Trade Talents were the same, but their starting cost was 25 Potential Points. His weapon and trade-related Talents had both been earned from the Random Talent option.
Let’s just do a bit of both for now. System, purchase 5 Trade Talents and 5 Weapon Talents.
-525 PP
-Talent Purchased: Tailoring
-Talent Purchased: Blacksmithing
-Talent Purchased: Sales
-Talent Purchased: Cartography
-Talent Purchased: Carpentry
-Talent Purchased: Glaives
-Talent Purchased: Chakram
-Talent Purchased: Greatswords
-Talent Purchased: Crossbows
-Talent Purchased: Spears
Waves of information assaulted William’s mind as ten D-Rank Talents were unlocked at the same time. Thankfully, his S-Rank Mind Talent was able to handle the information dump easily, and still seemed to have an extraordinary amount of space left before William would need to upgrade the Talent again.
The Tailoring Talent taught William about the creation of clothing in its simplest form. What materials to use, how to stitch and hem clothing, and how to use various pieces of equipment like fabric and pinking scissors, needles, and thread.
The Talent seemed quite useless, but William wasn’t too worried about it. He was bound to learn some trash Talents every now and then.
The Blacksmithing Talent taught William all about forging. It included many of the basic pieces of information like using tongs, a hammer, an anvil, a chisel, a punch. He also learned a new term, the swage, which was the tool many Blacksmiths held when striking a piece of hot metal with a hammer to shape it.
The Sales Talent was just that. He learned methods of buying and selling that would give him a better deal when negotiating with strangers. It seemed like a god-tier Talent, but when William thought about it, he realized this Talent was also somewhat trash.
This was because the local markets and businesses in the Sect never bargained and would always sell their items at a flat price. Additionally, all the best items came from the Night Market, which was an auction. At most, the Sales Talent would give William a slight advantage, but it wasn’t worth spending Potential Points on right now.
Carpentry was probably the coolest Talent among the newly earned Trade Talents. Not only did William gain information on dozens of tools that Carpenters use to do their jobs, he also learned many basic techniques on how to build certain structures to ensure he was making the best use of his space.
It was a very broad and complicated Trade Talent and would pair well with an architecture-style Talent. For now, though, William only had his focus on one of the Trade Talents.
Perfect, I got the Blacksmithing Talent on my first try. Now I just need more Weapon Talents. William had something incredible in mind, and he would need a massive number of Weapon Talents to achieve his goal.
System, spend 1500 Potential Points to purchase as many Weapon Talents as possible.
Why do math when the System can do it for you?
-Purchasing 12 Weapon Talents…
-1380 PP
-Talent Purchased: Slings
-Talent Purchased: Bows
-Detected the Host has the appropriate Talents for an Upgrade. Please raise your Bows and Crossbows Talents to the same Rank for a Talent Upgrade.
–Requirements met for a Talent Upgrade. Please wait…
-Talent Upgraded: Bows and Crossbows Talents have merged.
-Talent Lost: Bows
-Talent Lost: Crossbows
-Talent Unlocked: Archery
-Unlocked your first Rare Weapon Talent: +5 PP
-Talent Purchased: Javelins
-Talent Purchased: Maces
-Talent Purchased: Hammers
-Talent Purchased: Clubs
-Talent Purchased: Darts
-Talent Purchased: Swords
-Talent Purchased: Staves
-Talent Purchased: Shortswords
-Talent Purchased: Daggers
-Talent Purchased: Boomerangs
-Detected the Host has the appropriate Talents for an Upgrade. Please raise your Archery, Slings, Javelins, Darts, Boomerangs, and Knife Throwing Talents to the same Rank for a Talent Upgrade.
–Requirements met for a Talent Upgrade. Please wait…
-Talent Upgraded: Archery, Slings, Javelins, Darts, Boomerangs, and Knife Throwing Talents have merged.
-Talent Lost: Archery
-Talent Lost: Slings
-Talent Lost: Javelins
-Talent Lost: Darts
-Talent Lost: Boomerangs
-Talent Lost: Knife Throwing
-Talent Unlocked: Ranged Weapons Master
-Unlocked your first Epic Weapon Talent: +25 PP
William’s eyes went wide upon the flood of System messages. As he scrolled through the list of Weapon Talent unlocks, he understood why. It seemed that he had gained an Epic Weapon Talent just like that.
There was no flood of information, but when William took out the Starmetal Bow and a few arrows from his Space Ring, he nocked an arrow in an instant and pulled back the string to his face like a professional. His stance was perfect, his back and arm straight as he released an arrow towards the staircase.
The arrow embedded itself perfectly in between two tiles of the staircase, even tearing into the stone brick like it was actually a piece of wood.
I’ve never even touched a bow before, not in my entire life! William exclaimed. The power of this shot could largely be contributed to the Starmetal Bow itself, but the accuracy and form were definitely the Ranged Weapons Master Talent.
He looked at the information of the Talent, since the most recent System upgrade allowed him to do so.
*Ranged Weapons Master (D-Rank Epic Talent): You’ve collected every ranged weapon talent, earning you the ability to use all ranged weapons with complete mastery.
Ranged Weapon Accuracy: 90% (30% while moving)
Ranged Weapon Damage Boost: +20%
Upgrade Cost: 100 PP
And a damage boost? I wonder if that applies to them? William brought out 4 improved Array Puppets and all ten of the unimproved Puppets.
He gave the Puppets a weapon each, consisting of the Weapon Talents he had learned.
One improved Puppet received the Starmetal Bow and a quiver made from the Plant Element, while the other three received William’s Epic Staff, Epic Glaive, and the Twin Starmetal Shortswords.
The ten unimproved Puppets were built makeshift weapons using the Plant and Earth Elements, but they weren’t nearly as powerful or durable as the others since they didn’t contain any powerful Arrays to support them.
He applied a few durability-related Arrays to the makeshift weapons, then controlled the four improved Array Puppets to fight with six of the unimproved ones, testing out the effects of his new weapon skills.
The improved Puppet with the Epic Glaive leaped forward, thrusting its weapon forward and piercing right through one of the Array Puppets. Since William was the one controlling the Puppets, he had already maneuvered the other five Puppets to surround the Glaive Puppet from all sides.
Unfortunately for them, however, the Bow Puppet shot multiple high-speed arrows at the others, piercing through their joints with extreme precision while standing a safe distance away. Two Puppets fell to the ground, immobilized from the poison that infected their wood, while the Glaive Puppet finished off a third.
The Twin Shortsword Puppet had also dashed into the fray, using its extreme speed to launch hit and run strikes on the remaining three Puppets, slicing off an arm of one, and cutting deep into the thigh of another.
With that, the fight was pretty much over. William controlled the Puppets to stop fighting, then destroyed the damaged unimproved Puppets while storing the only undamaged one in his Space Ring for later.
These weapons are stronger than I thought! William exclaimed while evaluating the effects of the short battle. With his Blacksmithing Talent, William knew that the Epic weapons were both made of the same material, Mana-Infused Steel, while the others were made of Starmetal.
The difference was obvious. While the Glaive Puppet with a weapon designed for piercing had only stabbed into a Puppet and did heavy damage, the Shortswords made for creating many shallow wounds were able to slice clean through an arm, and almost through the thickest part of a leg!
The Starmetal Bow had also displayed its prowess once again, disabling two Puppets in a matter of seconds! Let it be known that both the improved and unimproved Puppets were both made of Arrays at the Perfect level.
The difference of power was only around thirty percent, which was enough to hold a clear advantage, but not so exaggerated to win a fight of four versus six in less than ten seconds!
William stored the rest of the Array Puppets into his Space Ring but kept the Starmetal Bow and a quiver of poison-tipped arrows to himself just in case the next trial also restricted his use of Mana.
His Iron Stomach Pill had surprisingly already worn off, so William pulled out some food from his Space Ring and ate with Atticus. It was odd, because the pill should have lasted a few more months at least.
He thought about going up the staircase at this point, but there were still a few more things to do before entering the 51st floor of the trial tower.
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