Chapter 4: First Purchase at the Store

Tomoya got up from the ground.

Moving his body a bit, he felt amazing.

His body felt lighter, and his vision seemed enhanced.

However, it was strange. In a sense, everything seemed to be moving slower. But in reality, he had become faster.

He tried picking up a knife and throwing it into the air, spinning. What he saw was the knife spinning in the air in slow motion.

It wasn't to the absurd level of appearing frozen, but in his perception, the knife was moving at least five times slower than normal.

The fact that he moved and ran over 100 meters and returned and still caught the knife spinning in the air showed how absurd this was.

From what he understood, the average speed of a human is 10. With 50, he was at least five times faster than an ordinary human.

That wasn't all, his strength was 75. With his strength, he could move even faster.

Throwing the knife in the air and catching it, he sighed afterward.

'I need to get used to this speed.'

If his perception stayed like this, it would be hard for him to live.

{Solution: Time perception varies among beings. After adaptation, this difference will stop bothering you.}

A neutral, robotic voice was heard.

"Who's there?"

He became alert.

{Answering. I am your unique skill, [Super Assistant].}

Hearing that, he accepted it.

It wasn't hard to accept. After all, he recalled Rimuru's 'Great Sage'.

'Are you communicating with me telepathically?'

{Affirmative!}

'As long as I want to communicate with you, I will be able to?'

{Affirmative!}

'Analyze the skill Distortion Future for me.' He tried.

{Answering. The effects of the unique skill [Distortion Future] are…

Age Manipulation: Allows you to freely manipulate the aging process of anything, including yourself, other people, animals, and objects.

Distortion Future: You age into a possible future version.

Example: You age into a possible future version, such as fire manipulation. You will be able to manipulate fire, but it is limited by your imagination and mana. Even if you imagine something like a black hole, if you do not have enough mana, it will be impossible to use such power.

These two points are your power.}

After hearing that response, he closed his eyes.

When he tried using the skill, he saw himself shrinking in size.

However, the clothes didn't shrink with him, making him become a 10-year-old boy wearing clothes that didn't fit.

He closed his eyes and canceled the effect of the skill.

When he did that, the clothes became ill-fitting.

This was a very good skill, but he needed to learn to control it first.

From the explanation, it heavily depended on his imagination and mana.

He didn't want to abuse this skill now.

'Super Assistant, how long do I need to wait to recover my 'mana'?' He asked mentally.

{Answering. Currently, you are able to recover one third of your mana per hour.}

It wasn't little. But it still left something to be desired.

If he were in a safe area, this recovery speed would be high, but in a dangerous area like the one he was in, it wasn't very high. If he became mana exhausted and his life was in danger, he wouldn't be able to use Dimensional Jump.

That said, he didn't try using Distortion Future again.

Next.

Ice Manipulation. Tomoya opened the skill screen and clicked on the skill. Through that, he was able to use the skill like in a game.

Three options appeared. Ice Ball, Ice Spear, and Ice Shield.

He clicked on Ice Spear.

In his left hand, an ice spear began to form.

At the sound of ice manifesting and forming an ice spear, the instant it finished, he made a hand gesture and threw it toward a tree.

The ice spear that floated a few cm from his hand was thrown, but it didn't have much speed and after two meters, it fell to the ground.

The ice spear shattered on the ground.

He wasn't disappointed. It's not like he expected to hit the tree on the first try.

Although the result was more frustrating than he imagined, it didn't discourage him.

The cost of using this skill was low compared to using Distortion Future. He kept practicing.

...

Several minutes passed.

The fact that no monstrous animal had appeared made it possible to train ice manipulation.

At first, he failed miserably when trying to hit a tree with the ice spear.

The difficulty was greater than trying to throw a rock a kilometer away and hit a can.

It was something new. Something he had never done before, obviously, he needed to get used to it.

That said, he was able to create an ice arrow without depending on the system.

The three standard use options changed to 4. The ice arrow option appeared as soon as he managed to conjure an ice arrow and throw it, hitting a tree 5 meters away.

The damage was minimal, it only slightly froze the area hit, but it melted quickly.

This couldn't even be considered an attack. Even a simple rock throw would cause more damage.

But his goal was to improve his control of ice manipulation. Although the damage was minimal now, with the amount of magical attack he possessed, once he improved his ice manipulation, the damage would be even greater than his physical attack.

Besides ice, he managed to use fire, water, earth, and wind.

This was attributed to magic manipulation.

However, using other elements besides ice was weaker and harder to control.

Taking a break, he wanted to test something.

Picking up plants and flowers, he tried placing them in the store tab.

When he did that, it surprisingly worked.

But... there was no coin increase.

'That doesn't mean it had no value, it just didn't reach the value of 1 gold coin.' He thought.

He saw an herb that looked rare.

He analyzed it.

[Hipokute Herb: Valuable herb used in the creation of healing potions.]

There was only one, and he put it up for sale.

[+11 Gold Coins]

Seeing that, his eyes sparkled.

The things sold in the store were either in crates or were expensive items. A single gold coin could buy 100 bottles of well-known brand beer.

That said, if it were a book containing skill information, the cost would far exceed 1 gold coin; the minimum value of a skill book is 10 gold coins.

A common sword cost 5 gold coins. With 10, he could buy one of above-common quality, but it still didn't reach average rating.

A medium-quality sword cost 100+ gold coins. High-quality was 1,000+ gold coins.

Artifacts were even more expensive. He wanted to buy one that helped him better control his power. But even the cheapest one, a ring, cost 100 gold coins and only improved mana control by 10%.

Among the items, he found a bow and arrow. The cost was 10 gold coins and came with 5 quivers. Each quiver had 20 iron-tipped arrows.

The cost of common arrows was 5 quivers / 100 iron-tipped arrows for 1 gold coin.

══════ •『☯』• ══════

[Item: Bow and Arrow]

Item Classification: Lower Common

Attack: +10

Agility: +1

══════ •『☯』• ══════

[-10 gold coins]

First, he bought the bow and arrow.

He had the option to make it appear in the Item Box or appear in front of him. He chose the Item Box.

Taking the bow out of the Item Box, he pulled the string and saw that even though it was said to be of lower common quality, it was still a good bow.

Even when he pulled with all his strength, it didn't break in half. Considering that he now had 7 times the strength of a normal person, it was an incredible feat not to break with his pull.

Grabbing one of the quivers, he saw that it came in the form of a belt or shoulder strap.

He chose to wear it around the waist.

Taking an arrow, he placed it on the bow and pulled the string with half of his strength.

It was the first time he used a bow and arrow, so he stood only 5 meters away from a thick tree and shot.

The arrow whistled through the air and hit the tree trunk.

When it hit, the arrow's shaft shook a lot while the tip stuck into the tree.

He approached and pulled the arrow. At the sound of 'Crack' the arrow snapped in half.

'Too fragile.' He thought.

That's when he understood the reason it was so cheap. Although the bow's quality was acceptable, the quality of the arrows was just so-so.

Considering the price, it was worth buying more of these arrows if he didn't have better options—after all, 100 medium common quality arrows cost 10 gold coins.

Meanwhile, he thought of something.

'Super Assistant, can you create a sight while I use the bow and arrow?'

{Affirmative! Do you wish to do that now?} In Tomoya's mind, the emotionless mechanical voice of [Super Assistant] sounded.

'Yes.' He agreed.

{Done!}

Tomoya placed an arrow on the bow and pulled. When he did this, a '+'-shaped sight appeared.

He controlled the bow and saw that the sight in his retina moved with his motion and as he pulled the string, the sight adjusted accordingly.

He aimed at a leaf at the top of a tree and released the arrow.

At the sound of the arrow being fired, he saw the exact moment it hit the leaf.

'It really worked.'

With that, he could shoot arrows with the bow as well as someone who had trained for years with it.

The next step was to infuse ice into the arrow tip. He pulled an arrow from the quiver and placed it on the bow.

He started with a thinner layer, not wanting to overdo it.

When he saw the iron tip change color and gain a layer of ice, he fired the arrow toward a tree.

The instant the arrow hit the tree, the frozen arrowhead began freezing the impacted area, spreading.

The freezing only stopped after freezing an area the size of a watermelon.

'It's much more effective this way.' He thought.

There's no doubt the damage was beyond physical damage—part of his magical damage was used.

If he could improve his control, the actual damage would exceed 3,000.