We started to walk towards their house.

When going to the [Sun gazing mountain] we could see the sea on our left

Now we could see it on our right.

 

After passing through the [Barbarian woods, palm sector] we entered another forest that had dense vegetation.

A lot of animals attacked us. Lots of [Angry barbarian boar]s and [Angry barbarian monkey]s.

Thorn used his sword to cut the animals. He was quite good.  He made only a few many wasted movements.

Sometimes a monkey could get behind him. When it jumped to attack he cut it in half without even looking at it. As if he had seen through the monkey’s intention and purposely led it to his back.

But for me. It was scary. I was on the book sheath between his back and his left side.

 

Thorn kept fighting until a large group of monkeys arrived. There were at least twenty monkeys commanded by a [Prideful alpha monkey].

Rose stepped forward: “You finally show yourself!”

Thorn moved back

Rose: “I won’t let you flee this time”

The [Angry alpha monkey] made a shrill cry and the other monkeys started to throw objects at us. But it was useless. Rose moved her staff forward and a huge fire vortex ate the objects.

The vortex then transformed into fire snakes that attacked the monkeys who started to flee and killed them instantly.

Then the snakes moved towards the alpha monkey who crossed his arms to defend. The initial snakes were broken by the monkey but the monkey was still burned by the following snakes.

Rose then made a water vortex to stop the fire, sat down and closed her eyes as if she was meditating.

Thorn looked towards me: “She leveled up and received a new technique. She is learning how to use it”

 

---

Congratulations!!!

You have leveled up

You are now lv11

---

You received the skill Handcrafting lv1

---

 

 Did I level up too because I was in the vicinity ?

Last time I leveled up I received contract and The greatest swordsmanship lv1

Why am I receiving skills I can’t use?

 

Rose opened her eyes and put her hands on the ground. The earth where her hands touched became red hot.

What is she doing?

BOOM 

A 5m rose blew up where the group of monkeys was standing before. Every tree in the radius of the rose was obliterated. If she had the skill before the fight would have ended a lot sooner.

Why does she get all the useful skills while I can’t even make a small fireball?

 

She looked happy initially but after a second she frowned. After stopping the fire with another vortex she looked at her brother.

Thorn: “You should be happy. I don’t want you to stop your growth for me. You should do anything you want.”

Rose: ”But I don’t want to be like them.”

T:” You'll never be like them. Never.”

The two hugged.

 

What was that about?

After a few minutes, we arrived at [Le Roi Soleil fragment crashing site]

When we were approaching the site, I could see some azure metallic plates on the ground.

 

But when we arrived at the site I saw something so strange I thought Narrator was broken.

I couldn’t believe it. The crashing site was in the sky!

Some metal plates were floating in the sky. They were almost the same color as the sky. There were around 50 of them all of different shapes, orientations, and height from the ground.

But they all had one thing in common. They were motionless. As if they were stuck in the sky. The trees had to grow in different directions when their top touched the plates.

 

I was thinking about what I saw when Rose threw her dog on the highest plates.

What? Why did she throw the dog? How strong is she to throw the dog at something 20m in the sky?

The dog, Mike seemed even used to it.

Mike is even scarier. 

 

After a few seconds, a long ladder came down.

 

As we climbed the ladder, I could see that that plate was not a single plate, but composed of tens of plates that together formed the shape of a cup. A cup in the sky.

As we arrived at the top I was surprised.

Rose: “This is our home, I know it is not too big but it’s pretty comfortable. We made it ourselves.”

It was evening. So she put the hand on some kind of translucent stone and injected some mana into it.

The [Lightstone] lit up. There were some lines that started from the stone and covered all the rooms in the house and some that went outside, to a garden.

 

R: “This is our garden. At the left there are medicinal herbs. At the right, there are some vegetables and in the center, there is the pond.”

The mix of blue lines near the pond, green lights near the plants, yellow lights on the path that circumscribed the lake and the fireflies made the place look like an art piece.

Thorn: “We are on one of the fragments of the Le Roi Soleil. Much smaller than the core fragment near the center of the continent.”

“The [Sun gazing mountain] is to the west. In the south, there is the sea. In the east, there is more forest and then the human kingdoms.

In the north, beyond that mountain. A few hours walk from here there's the Dragon’s village”

“We are one of the watchers that protect the village from the barbarian beasts. There are outposts like ours around the village to help to reduce the number of beasts in the area.”

“Book-san, tell us if you need help with something.”

We kept talking and I finally got some answers on how the system worked.

 

They said that they never heard of a book like me. But they didn’t exclude the possibilities of something like that existing. They thought I was stronger and were surprised when I asked them some basic question on leveling systems. 

 

Here's how leveling systems work:

Basically strong individuals can give contracts to weaker individuals. The contracted can use the skills from the stronger individual that they gradually acquire when they level up.

 

The skills you receive are a mix of what you train. What you experience and what the contractor experienced where it was as strong as you.

 

Leveling up increases affinity with the skills of the contracted and it becomes easier and easier to learn more difficult skills.

Most of the people are contracted with gods and most of the demons with the devils.

The other races are contracted with their guardian spirit.

The dragonkin’s clan is contracted with a strong dragon ancestor.

Usually, there are some conditions to the contract. For example, people contracted to the gods have to send their mana to the gods weekly.

 

What if the contractor dies?

They said it doesn’t matter too much. Even if someone is dead their mana takes a lot of years to disappear. Even their ancestor is dead.

 

Can you become stronger than the contractor?

Yes, but it is almost impossible. 

 

At level 100 you have 100% of the strength of the contractor and you have already learned all the skills. To become stronger than the contractor you need to go beyond level 100.

It is almost impossible to reach level 100. Even more impossible to surpass it.

If you give a contract after going beyond your level becomes the new level 100 and the skills that you create are part of the skills that can be learned with your leveling system.

 

Rose is contracted to the dragonkin’s ancestor and Thorn is not contracted with anyone.

They said that during the annual awakening ceremony their ancestor refused to give him the contract.

 

That is why Thorn is weaker than her sister. To increase his mana he needs to eat some special medicinal herbs or go to places full of mana while her sister's mana increases when she levels up.

Learning skills or increasing your mana by yourself is a lot harder than doing it with a leveling system.

That is why Rose is a lot stronger than Thorn.

 

My leveling system is weird. My mana doesn't increase with my level but with my readers.

Even the skills I receive are strange.

 

They said that they will teach me some skills when we get to the village. I will stay with them for the time being.

 

They roasted and eat some boar brought here with the help of Rose’s bracelet.

The next day we woke up early and after a few hours, we arrived at the village.