Crab Legs

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Cassandra Ydorf - Level 13 - Saturated

Titles: Enduring Heart

Tier 1 - Formless Monk

Mind 11 - Body - 11

Memory - 10 Energy - 0/13 (5 Reserved)

Skills - 10/10

Energy Storage - Passive - 1 Energy

Memory Bank - Passive - 1 Energy

Predatory Sense - Passive - 1 Energy

Ice-Veined Strength - Passive - 2 Energy

Body Regeneration - Active - 1 Energy/ 10 minutes

Compression - Active - 1 Energy/ 5 uses

Firestarter - Active - 1 Energy

Formless Series - Passive

Formless Ice Devil's Lunge - Active - 2 Energy

Mind of Possibility - Unavailable

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A single fight took both Astrid and me to level 13. Even if the creature was at Tier 2, it gave us a considerable amount of particles. I split my two points into Mind and Body maintaining my balance build, getting to 12 on both attributes. Even if I was starting to be unsure, that was the best option.

'Sis, did we get any skills?'

[User has acquired three skills. It is possible for user to acquire more after eating Flathead Emperor. However, System is unable to confirm if new skills will be acquired through the consumption of the Tier 2 crab meat or not. That being said, according to data acquired during the fight, there is a high likelihood of that happening.]

'I'll take it. Especially since the smell is driving me nuts,' my mouth was salivating, but before I could continue my conversation, someone called us.

"Is it dead?" Michael asked while rushing towards us.

I nodded in confirmation, letting my body slump to the side and climb out of the creature's belly. The fire was still going, but it was clearly struggling to fight off against all the ice that Astrid created. Meaning that we probably wouldn't have to worry about it spreading. Even the forest that was affected by the flames was already able to fight it off.

I looked back at the giant crab with a frown. If I was being honest, among the myriad of monsters that could have appeared from the lake, a giant crab was far down my list. As a matter of fact, it didn't even make the cut. I figured it was going to be some sort of old dinosaur/lizard or maybe a large frog or some sort of amphibian. Heck, it could be just a giant tortoise or a beaver, but no, it was a crustacean. And I wasn't really sure how I felt about that.

Despite it clearly being the monster of the lake, it didn't give the feeling of 'giant creature that lived on the lake'. Pushing those thoughts aside, I turned to Astrid, who also was climbing down the beast.

"Did you get any good skills?" I asked.

"Don't know. Need to check."

"Yeah same," I cracked my neck. This fight had taken a lot out of me, but at the same time it wasn't the worst fight I ever had. We didn't even get the chance to see any of the monster's skills aside from its massive size and somewhat sturdy carapace. Maybe that was all that it had. A skill to make it big and another to make it sturdy. It could be more than enough to make others fear. But that also felt like its own skill.

Before I had a chance to check the abilities, the System was willing to give me, Michael cleared his throat.

"So, can we talk about the fact that two of you can do magic now?"

"I guess we don't have much of a choice, do we?"

Michael gave me a blank stare, "I mean you can literally make fire with your own hands. If you say no, you don't want to talk about it, I don't really have much I can do about that. I'm just going to have to take it and either pretend I never saw it or start sounding crazy to anyone who would listen.

I stared at the man for a moment, thinking that this was the first time someone was actually sensible about this. Why would you try to get into the bad side of someone who had magic powers even if they were not really magic? But still, angering anyone was not a good idea even if we didn't have the System but if someone saw what we could do, the types of monsters we could kill, it didn't really make sense for them to try to attack us or force us to do anything. The results would be pretty obvious.

"Well, yeah. We can. I mean, it's not really magic. There's another name for, this but that's pretty much it."

"Can you do it as often as you want, or are there some limits? How does it work?"

"Honestly, it's pretty complicated, but there are some limits and there are only a certain amount of things we can do. That's why we were more willing to fight the monster."

Astrid nodded, giving me a smile. I took that as confirmation that she agreed with me and continued speaking.

"Despite how strong it was, we were more or less confident we would be able to handle it, considering all the abilities we have at our disposal."

"And which abilities are that?" Michael asked.

I glanced down, seeing the few wounds that I still had in my body, and frowned. "Give me a few minutes and I show you at least one of them. I just don't have any Energy right now. Oh, and Energy is what we call the thing that we need to use in order to use those powers. I had a way to recover it quickly, but it's not here right now. Figured it wasn't the best idea to bring it to the festival, since people could ask to take a sip and that would be complicated."

"Is there anything I can do to help?" Michael asked.

"Only if you can make some food. That would speed up the process a little bit. I'm not entirely sure if I trust what the Matriarch brought." I glanced at the remains of the wooden table. Most of it had been destroyed during the fight, but there were still a couple of dishes that survived.

Michael looked back and nodded. "Yeah, I wouldn't trust that either. But we do have a giant crab here. Any chance it's poisonous?"

"I genuinely have no idea," I replied, turning to Astrid, who was already opening up a piece of its shell and taking a slice of the meat with her butter knife. She chewed for a moment.

"Seems fine."

"Is it any good?" I asked.

Her eyes sparkled in the moonlight, and she opened a big smile while taking another piece, "Yes."

Michael looked at her and said, "No, no, stop that. Please don't do it like that. Let me cook it properly." He rushed over and stopped the Frosted Lumberjack from continuing eating. He didn't say much and just started cutting and preparing the crab with pretty much no spice, just the fire that we had used to kill the monster.

Still, it was amazing. I never expected seafood to taste like this and honestly, I don't know if I would ever be able to handle regular fish again. During this impromptu crab barbecue, I managed to recover a point of Energy where I used {Body Regeneration} to recover and showed it to Michael. And as I waited for another piece, I also took a moment to check the skills the System had made available to me.

While the System had mentioned only three skills, thanks to just the few small pieces of crab meat I got, there were two extra skills that I could pick from Emperor Flathead.

The first option was called {Giganticism} and basically made it so it could be easier for my body to grow. But it was clear that it didn't have a limit to how much it would grow. And while becoming a giant woman could seem interesting, I would also be a giant target for anyone who wanted to come after me. More specifically, any Eater that wanted to attack me. And I wasn't really into the idea of being attacked by a swarm of Eaters just because I grew too much.

The second skill was a strange one, for a number of reasons. Mainly because it was the first veteran rank skill, I ever came across. This was supposed to be equivalent to Tier 5, according to the System.

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Power Of Rejection - Passive - Veteran

Energy Reserved: 20 points

Memory Required: 5 slots

You create an area around you that causes any living creature who is being influenced by the System feel aversion to the area. Creatures affected by this will instinctively wish to leave the location, and other users will perceive the area as being a wasteland, void of anything useful.

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In a way, this skill seemed amazing. It could allow people to build villages that would be completely safe from Eaters or even monsters. But, it made pretty obvious that anyone living in that village would either need to have a way to circumvent the skill or would accept that they would not be gaining any benefits from the System. Not even the effects of the particles that were given to the food and water. But it was also too expensive. No one who just got the System would be able to use it, and even at Tier 2, it would take more for me to be able to keep that skill active.

'Does this mean that a better version of this skill is possible? One that doesn't cost as much? Also, does the 5 slots mean it will take up 5 slots from my memory? What about if I put it on {Memory Bank}?' I blurted out one question after the other, considering all the potential this skill had.

[That is a correct assumption. It is theoretically possible for an improved version of the skill {Power Of Rejection} to be created either by user or another entity. Skills that require too much date might ask for more than one slot of Memory. However, that should not be a common thing. And if user wishes to place the skill {Power of Rejection} on {Memory Bank} user must also free 5 slots from {Memory Bank}]

'That's great, but I'm not going to take either of those skills. You can just drop them. It sucks but I don't see a world where I dedicate that many resources to them. I would like to get another that can protect people who lived in a village at one point. If you can keep an eye out or something, that will be much appreciated.'

[Acknowledged.] the System replied and didn't wait to show my next options. They were two skills that I gamed through leveling up.

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Formless Emperor Swipe - Active - Adept

1 Energy

Number of uses available: 0/5

An attack fit for an emperor to push all those on its path away and make sure they will never be a problem again.

Increase the power of a swiping motion by channeling the claws of a giant crustacean.

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The description was very imposing but going by the cost, it wouldn't be this all powerful skill like {Formless Ice Devil Lunge}. Instead, it should be something I could use repeatedly as a basic form of attack. Which I really needed. I didn't have many offensive options, and this felt like a very good upgrade.

The one problem was what skill would I remove to fit it. All of them looked very useful and there were a couple that I refuse to let go of. Mainly {Compression}, {Body Regeneration} and {Firestarter}. Those three were out of the argument completely. And, {Formless Series}. After all, without it, this skill wouldn't work. But honestly, {Ice Veined Strength} seemed to be the least useful skill of the bunch. Sure, it made me hit harder and it would be very useful when attacking something. But I had to focus on survival. And if I have something else that replaced the offensive capabilities, that was all I needed. Sending that skill into {Memory Bank} just in case I need it in the future, while adding {Formless Emperor Swipe} to my active slots, I turned to the next one.

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Crab Walk - Passive

Like a crab, you become able to move sideways without losing any momentum. User is able to move from one side to another with a minimum loss of speed.

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I just stared at that skill for a moment, not letting my reaction show to anyone. On one hand, yeah, I could see the value of something like this. But on the other hand, I was not about to get a skill called {Crab Walk}. I refused. Just in principle. After dismissing that second skill, I turned to the System expecting a third mention, but nothing showed up.

'Sys,' I asked. 'Didn't you say there were three skills?'

[That is correct. However, third skill is not a new skill but instead an upgraded version of a current skill user already possesses. User can choose not to increase the rank of the skill in this way and instead attempt to find a different type of evolution to the skill.]

'Oh? Which one? Which skill was I finally able to evolve?'

[User was able to increase the rank of skill {Compression}. More than one possibility has been recognized for the skill evolution. Would user like to evolve skill {Compression} to {Resize} or {Compression Echo}?]