Mind Magic from Azeroth! Nāma over PHY and a Small Gift

The next few weeks feel like a fever dream for Alex. Because of the contract, he can freely talk with Rishi about anything, confident that Rishi can't harm him or reveal even the tiniest detail that would be harmful to him. They meet up daily, talking and hanging out, sharing their entire lives and their experiences in the fantasy worlds. Like Alex, Rishi is extremely lucky, perhaps because he is one of the rare players with a base LUK stat of 3. He can't increase it further, but considering the average player only has a LUK of 1, he's still at an advantage.

Rishi managed to get an S ranking in his tutorial mission, which took place in the world of The Lord of the Rings. His mission mainly involved defending the Shire from invaders—a low-level prologue to the main story, similar in scope to the epilogue of the Scouring of the Shire where Saruman decides to attack the Shire to enact his revenge. A bit uninspired in Alex's opinion, but then again, his own mission was like that too. Rishi's second mission was a solo one in the World of Warcraft, much like Alex's, where he managed to temporarily learn the Mind Blast skill, allowing him to finish the mission with an A rank and earn the right to learn a rare purple skill.

During his time in Azeroth, Rishi was transformed into a Forsaken, which, according to him, felt almost like creating a new undead priest and starting a brand new journey. The two have a great time exchanging details about these worlds, sharing tips, tricks, and strategies they discovered. For Alex, it's a relief to finally have someone to talk to freely about everything, knowing it will stay private. He is genuinely happy for this opportunity. Rishi, too, seems to enjoy it, trusting his innate skill completely and showing no fear of Alex at all.

A few days later, Rishi invites Alex to join him on a small luxury vacation in Dubai. Alex is completely stunned.

The next few weeks, they travel all over the world. Rishi is the heir to a giant corporation with an annual profit margin of over 1 billion USD. Alex also discovers why Rishi has so much FC—the "whales" Roja was talking about... Rishi is exactly one of them. Even during their global travels, they continue to enter the Fantasy Realm. Alex watches in amazement as Rishi employs multiple workers to broker deals involving real-life money with many players.

Rishi spends hundreds of thousands of dollars daily to earn just a few hundred FC. Alex is flabbergasted. Rishi also turns out to be a tech genius, with investments on such a high level that he's a billionaire in his own right, even without his parents' money. At one point, Rishi casually gifts Alex $10 million as a "friendly gift," completely shattering Alex's concept of money. Within an hour, he goes from being broke to a multimillionaire.

While Alex likes to behave shamelessly, he feels guilty for accepting the 50,000 FC, the $10 million, and even the contract that only restricts Rishi from doing anything harmful to him while still allowing Alex to backstab, ignore, or lie to Rishi as much as he wants.

"Rishi... if you want, you can create another contract. I don't like that we're on uneven ground. If we want to be real teammates, I want to be on equal terms with you," Alex says after returning to his small, sad apartment following their 2 weeks of high-life vacation.

"Don't worry about it. You won't betray me! I can sense these things, remember?" Rishi laughs.

Alex nods, feeling a bit humbled. "You won't regret this, I promise you," he says seriously.

Since Rishi can't betray him, and he somehow knows they'll end up together in the next mission, Alex shares his skills and equipment with Rishi so they can develop a good combat strategy. Rishi also reveals his gear, which is unsurprisingly impressive and expensive. He only has green-quality or higher items, including a few blues—the best that FC can buy. All of his equipment is geared towards magic, with nothing focused on melee or requiring high physical stats like STR, AGI, or PHY.

After sharing his skills, Rishi surprisingly reveals that, like Alex, he also has a second innate skill. It's somewhat similar to Alex's, though Rishi thinks the downsides are smaller while the potential upsides are also a bit more limited. Essentially, it drastically improves his SPR attribute, giving him about half of what a point in PHY and MNA would provide as an added bonus. His HP and MP regeneration no longer rely on his PHY and MNA stats but instead depend solely on his maximum HP and MP, which is a definite advantage, since those values can be raised with items. Alex's HP and MP, for example, are enhanced by his armor set and ring. The downside is that this innate skill locks Rishi into a pure mage role, with his PHY remaining low, essentially barring him from ever learning many physical skills or equipping gear that requires a high PHY stat.

Innate Skill: Nāma Supreme Body

(Translated and simplified, as Player Alex Kerber cannot understand the concepts in the original name, which consists of multiple interconnected terms)

Type: Boon

Level: MAX (Level cannot be increased)

Effect: The user cannot raise his PHY stat but gains 5 HP and 5 MP for every point in SPR. Additionally, the user's HP and MP regeneration depends on his maximum HP and MP values instead of PHY and MNA. HP regenerates at 0.025 per 5 points of Max HP per minute, and MP regenerates at 0.05 per 5 points of Max MP per minute (similar to the values of PHY and MNA).

Overall Rating: S-

Rishi also has the basic skills of Basic Mana Control, Basic Meditation, and Basic Mind magic (Level 2)

Mind magic (Level 2)

World: World of Warcraft

Requirements: 7 SPR + 2 per level, 5 INT, 5 MNA + 1 per level,

Requirements: Basic Mana Control lvl 0, Basic Meditation lvl 0, Basic Concentration lvl 0 +1 per level

Leveling Requirements: 2000 Fantasy Coins + 1000 per level

Effect: Teaches the spell "Mind Blast." At level 2, unlocks "Shadow Word: Pain." At level 4, grants access to "Mind Flay." At level 6, unlocks "Psychic Scream." At level 8, unlocks "Mind Soothe & Mind Sight." At level 10, you unlock "Mind Control."

Effect: Increases the effectiveness of all the aforementioned mind spells by 5% per level and other mind-related abilities by 1% per level. Also increases resistance against mind spells by an additional 5% per level.

"DAMN! A purple-ranked skill that essentially lets you learn an entire spell school focused on mind magic? That's insane! Wait a minute... those spell names... These are all priest spells from the Shadow skill tree in World of Warcraft! Come to think of it, these are nearly all the 'mind' skills from the classic game that I can recall. You've got practically half of the Shadow skill tree, all in one skillbook—that's sick!"

"Oh, you recognize it? Yes, indeed," Rishi nods. "This skill is perfect for me since I specialize in SPR, which boosts the effectiveness and damage of these spells. It also requires INT and MNA, which I've chosen as my secondary attributes. Sadly, Mind Magic isn't effective against every enemy. Some elemental foes and various creatures have resistance to mind magic. Machines and lower life forms, like plants, can also resist it to some extent."

Alex recalls the use of those spells: Mind Blast is a powerful damaging spell that deals a significant amount of damage, but he remembers it has a cooldown and enrages the target. Shadow Word: Pain inflicts damage over time to a single target. It looks like after two more worlds, Rishi will unlock Mind Flay, which deals damage over several seconds and slows the target—a channeling spell, if Alex remembers correctly. Psychic Scream is an AOE fear ability, which seems incredibly useful. Mind Soothe and Mind Vision are utility spells that seem rather mediocre. But Mind Control is just insane.

Alex recalls his days playing a priest in World of Warcraft. He loved using Mind Control in PvP, forcing enemies to jump off cliffs and plummet to their deaths.

"Quite a diverse set of spells… perhaps this would compliment it!" Alex says.

He takes out his [Skillbook: Black Magic (Fire-Blizzard-Thunder-Series)].

"I'd ask if you're interested in this one, but the Fire-Blizzard-Thunder Series requires Basic Endurance and a few points in PHY, which you'll never be able to get with your innate skill permanently crippling your PHY stat."

He then shows him the [Skillbook: Black Magic (Fire-Series)].

"The Fire-only series has lower requirements. It might be worth learning since the prerequisites are very manageable, and you can still focus most of your points on SPR. In my opinion, it would diversify your attack options and be valuable for you."

Alex lets Rishi examine the skill he's referring to.

"I'll take it! That would fill my last skill slot with a spell that complements my abilities. I also love lighting stuff up," he says, grinning like a pyromaniac. "I'll need some time before our mission starts to gather enough FC to compensate you. I should be able to get you 30,000 FC by then. Will that be enough?" Rishi asks.

"Are you serious?" Alex responds, feeling a bit disappointed that Rishi doesn't know him better after the last few weeks. By now, his Aura Divination skill and the time they've spent together should have given him more insight into Alex's character. "You already gave me 50,000 FC, a ton of money in the real world, and you still need to level this up twice. Just take it for now. If we're teaming up in the mission like your innate skill predicts, I need you to be as strong as possible. With this, you'll have both mind and fire spells at your disposal. And if we're true comrades, don't talk to me about FC again."

Alex hands over the Skillbook without hesitation. He doesn't need it for himself, and despite his original asking price of 75,000 FC, he knows that this blue-ranked skill is realistically worth between 20,000 and 30,000 FC. He's already received twice its value, and he dislikes owing favors to allies. Besides, he's set on learning the more demanding but superior purple-ranked skill that combines three elements, so he has no problem giving away the blue-ranked skill. He's already received 50,000 FC from Rishi, and the contract Rishi signed assures him of Rishi's loyalty.

"I need permanent and reliable partners. Rishi, with his two S-ranked skills, is a huge asset. He has as much potential as I do, and he can't betray me, plus, he clearly doesn't want to."

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