Other Adventurer Guilds had their own system, but in this one, when an Adventurer wanted to pick up a quest, they would tear off the page on the bulletin board and bring it to the Receptionist to register.
More because he wanted to approach the Receptionist again than because it particularly interested him, he had registered for another Copper-ranked quest in addition to the one he had. This one was for gathering slime crystals, a stone embedded in a slime's body that contained its source of life. Because slimes are usually killed by destroying this same crystal, the quest was considered a difficult one -- not in that it was dangerous, but that it required a lot of work for little result. To kill a slime without damaging its crystal required a persistence uncommon among the Adventuring type...
He set out early at dawn, intending to hunt at least 3 moles before the day was through.
Y O S H
The moles had given him very good experience. Out of their natural habitat, severely weakened by being above ground, it was possible for even Sora (with the expensive equipment lent to him by Ada) to defeat them. All things considered, they were not typically novice-friendly monsters. They were already the second-evolution. The ones around the Town had levels ranging from 5-15, which was equivalent to 15-20 among adult humans.
An unknown property of the geography had induced them to abandon the environment where they were strongest and most secure. And in the open air, dazed by the sun, and with their legs poorly adapted to actions above-ground, they were prey even for humans as low-leveled as Sora.
The town was in fact a very good training ground for low-leveled novices. It was even maybe the outright best training area available anywhere for levels below 10 that was also within walking distance of a town. The reason why it was not well-known for this was simply due to the fact that the first few levels are quite easy to get through, and most people leave them naturally by the time they enter their teens. A good leveling place for a person at level 30 had some value, but a leveling place for a person below 10, the progression of which was quite trivial in the first place, really did not amount to much. Furthermore, the training ground was far enough in the borderlands that just traveling there constituted a not-insignificant opportunity cost. Even for people with the means it was not worth it, especially as people with means would be able to level even more quickly in a high-density area, by hiring Adventurers to lure monsters to them.
The moles were solely beneficial for a person in such an exceptional situation as Sora-- namely, a low-leveled Adventurer, without great means, hunting by himself... For, even among townspeople, few who were not Adventurers would seek out moles intentionally, it being not only tedious but dangerous as well. In fact, it was not unknown for children to go missing, "last seen (by neighbors) playing in the fields near the town". And once, a town guard had witnessed, from his watch on a battlement, the small body of a child being dragged away by one of these same Field Moles, clutching the limp child with its hind legs, digging with its claws, and gradually receding into the burrowed ground.
Sora, erring on the side of caution, had put his skill points into battle skills and had stayed up late into the night deciding on the ones he wanted to go with. The status screen, like a hologram, seemed to glow and yet gave off no light. In the darkness, the numbers of his status window were the only thing he could make out.
He narrowed his choices down to a Guard Break and a Sword Slash skill. The Guard Break was a basic skill for melee classes, and an essential one for assassin-types, acting as either a base or a prerequisite for other similar skills. As his main problem fighting the Field Moles was overcoming the guards and parries they made with their claws, he was interested at first with the Guard Break. However, the skill was most effective with a shorter weapon (like a knife or katar). Though he did have a well-made knife, he felt wary of decreasing his range when that was one of his advantages over the Field Mole. He contemplated buying a shield to pair with his dagger, or taking another dagger on his off-hand to parry with, but this seemed to commit him to too many things...
So in the end he decided on the Sword Slash. The Adventurer Manual he consulted said it was useful for almost every class. This made sense to Sora, since even Mages might need to quickly defend themselves at close range.
Furthermore, Sora experimented with a more efficient way of hunting moles.
After a short trek, he found a large boulder in the field (one of the many remnants of battles that had transpired there centuries past, when the town battlements still served toward the glory and power of an Empire, as opposed to the pleasantness of the prospect...), and there he took a break, surveying the fields around him. His plan was to use this as a camp until a Field Mole appeared.
While he rested, he practiced with the Sword Slash skill.
Because it took mana, he was wary of using it too much. However, he was able to confirm that it worked as expected: his body seemed to move of its own accord ("Wow!"). The second time he activated it, he came to expect what would happen, and he could feel a little bit of "room" where he could interject his will and change the motion he was carrying out. It was something analogous to experiencing anger as a young child: one feels one's actions take place like the falling notes of a melody, coming up quite naturally, quite logically, yet quite without one's calculation. Seized by a fit of rage, one is able to change a particular target, insofar as the general feeling of rage is maintained. One is even able to observe oneself being angry. As long as one makes no judgment, one can watch oneself enact things that would never occur them in a state of neutrality, contentment.-- This was not to say skills were identical, or even very much like acts of passion. But this can maybe serve, for our reader's benefit, for now, as a helpful analogy.
The Sword Slash skill was exactly what he had anticipated from the sections in his Manual that dealt with skills. The Manual seemed to suggest that, in this world, it was not only possible but common for people to train themselves to "modify" their active skills. They did this by availing themselves of the little window of "command" they had during the execution of a skill, by training themselves to be sensitive to this window of time, and then by interjecting their will in a way suitable to the skill and situation. Those who were adept at this were able to produce incredible and unanticipated results, to feint enemies who were used to skills doing certain things with certain timings, to negate the weaknesses of skills -- or turn them to one's advantage, and even to overpower high-grade skills with very lowly ones. At the same time, these Skill-Alters always risk reducing the natural power and grace of the skill, of ruining the integrity of the motion. Similarly to the way an actor, suddenly growing self-conscious, forgets or botches their lines, altering a skill in the middle of its execution can cause it to misfire, leaving one or one's party vulnerable to the opponent.
As for Sora, his experiment paid off: he had not been standing for more than half an hour when he noticed a Field Mole emerge from the ground about a mile away.
One of his issues before came from running out of energy too soon. With this method, he would be able to remain relatively fresh when he came face-to-face with the monster and also be able to remain hunting longer before the tiredness of his legs forced him back to town.
This time the Field Mole was level 11, about the same level as the field moles he had faced previously. Again, as before, it did not seem to notice him until he was almost within striking distance.
There was a small window of time after the activation of a skill, during which he was able to "target" something to use it on. When he successfully targeted the Field Mole, he felt an odd sense of satisfaction, as though the Skill system was telling him he did it correctly.
He felt himself dashing forward. His sword dug through the mole's flank.
The skill had ended. He did not realize it at first, and stood there idly, waiting for the next thing to happen (a common error of novices, not used to the timing of their skills). Only when he sensed the mole preparing to strike him did he realize the importance of the moment.-- Due partly to him positioning himself badly at the beginning of his Sword Slash, he had left himself at point blank range to the monster.
Sora did not have time to think...
Now, pardon your humble author the liberty of a brief aside. Though we've not mentioned it before, one of the advantages of the Sword Slash skill was a "cumulative cooldown". This meant that it could be activated several times in a row before its refractory period kicked in. For example, an amateur would be able to use three Sword Slashes immediately after one another, and incur a 30 second cooldown. Or, they could use a single Sword Slash, wait 10 seconds for the soft cooldown to reset, and then use three Sword Slashes in a row (with the 30 second hard cooldown).
Again, Sora did not have time to think (although we obviously did), and he activated the Sword Slash again for no other reason than because it was the strongest action that came to his mind. This time, the mole's claws were in a guarded position. He could tell from his previous experiences that his slash would be defended. So, instead of targeting the mole (where he'd be blocked), he twisted his body and targeted the air behind him.
He felt his vision blur and his body dash through the air...
When he came to, he was falling onto the ground. He had lost his balance. Fearing for his life, he immediately pulled his sword up and turned at the mole. But he realized that he was again outside of attack range. He had been able to escape with the Sword Slash skill by targeting no enemy, but simply the air behind him. Though it had not been mentioned in the manual, this was in fact one of the main reasons the skill was favored. The primary use of the skill for veteran Adventurers was for added mobility on the battlefield.
The rest of the battle was easy. Though the mole could still swing its claws, its lower body was crippled by Sora's first Sword Slash. Sora took his time, circling around it and using his [Identify] skill. Finally, he killed it with a well-placed blow to the neck.
"Hopefully this won't get me scolded again." (Sora)
From experimenting with his [Identify] he was able to glean that the Sword Slash did 12 damage. His normal strikes had done in the range of 5~10, depending on where he struck.-- The skill was not as damaging as he expected. But the benefit of its range and speed were inarguable.
As he planned it beforehand, he dragged the body all the way back to the boulder he was using as a vantage.
In this way he soon managed to subjugate another Lvl 9 Field Mole. Because he had gotten up so early, it was still only morning.
He decided to subjugate at least 2 more Field Moles before he returned for the day. By now he was level 7.
