For ranged-types, it was essentially a top-tier skill.
Its performance was so overpowered that only a handful of skills could compare.
The Great Sage Crow seemed to think the same, as he said to Seo Ye-in,
“Caw, the secret among secrets! It’s not something I teach just to anyone. I’m only making an exception this time because of the Meteor Dragon.”
“Thank you.”
“Be sure to thank the young monarch as well. He gave up something he wanted.”
“Number one butler.”
Seo Ye-in gently held onto my arm.
The Great Sage then looked at me.
“Caw! It was a good trade, young monarch!”
“For us too.”
“If you get more shiny statues, bring them!”
“I will. I’m sure we’ll meet again soon.”
With that, he flapped his wings and took off.
“Caaaw—!”
After circling once in the air, he opened a rift and disappeared into another dungeon.
Immediately, a snowstorm swept in.
Whoooosh—!
The barrier had been naturally lifted when the Great Sage departed.
Seo Ye-in, now shivering, tugged on my arm.
“Let’s go inside…”
“Alright, let’s go.”
I could endure it well enough, but there was no reason to waste time here, so we headed indoors without protest.
After closing the metal door and firmly locking it by turning the hatch, I spoke to Crew Member B who had been standing around like a folding screen the entire time.
“We’re going to stop by a few more auxiliary power cores, then head to the main power core.”
“Ah, yes! I’ll take you right away!”
To boost dungeon completion and give Seo Ye-in and Hong Yeon-hwa some real combat experience, we decided to sweep through the area once.
And finally, we’d finish things off with a boss fight at the main power core.
So we began walking, guided by Crew Member B.
While walking, I casually made a request to Hong Yeon-hwa.
“For now, stick with Flame Orb.”
“Mhmm, I will.”
She nodded without hesitation.
She probably already had a good idea why.
Time for a test run of [Spatial Fold].
Most ranged-type skills can be linked with it, but since it’s the first attempt, it’s better to start with a projectile-type skill.
Flame Orb is especially suitable because it doesn’t travel very fast.
Right then, some mages in sky-blue robes appeared at the end of the corridor.
As soon as they spotted us, they started launching beams of frost and snowballs.
Naturally, it wasn’t enough to break through our barrier.
Fwoosh,
A sphere of flame formed above Hong Yeon-hwa’s palm.
She was just about to throw it but paused, glancing at us for a moment.
In a friendly teacher-like tone, I said to Seo Ye-in,
“The fireball’s about to fly, right?”
“Yes.”
“Try using it.”
“Challenge accepted.”
Taking that as the signal, Hong Yeon-hwa lightly pushed her hand forward.
At the same time, Seo Ye-in activated Spatial Fold, and the fireball which had been arcing through the air suddenly zipped forward, as if it had been folded ahead.
Boom—!
“……?”
She tilted her head with a puzzled expression. Seems like she couldn’t tell what had changed.
Well, I did tell her to just use it without explaining much.
Gotta copy it first anyway.
[Activated ‘Copy – Skill’.]
[The target’s skill ‘Spatial Fold (F)’ has been registered to a slot.]
▷ Copy – Skill [4/4]
1. Feather Step (B+)
2. Spatial Fold (F)
3. Ice Wall (B)
4. Vendetta (S)
Honestly, I could’ve asked the Great Sage to give a demonstration and copied it at S-Rank, but I didn’t see the need.
With this kind of skill, proficiency matters more than rank.
Like with Blink, once you get the feel for it, the rank tends to level up quickly.
And a genius sloth like her will pick it up in no time.
It’s actually better to learn when the rank’s similar.
If only my version performs well, it’d just confuse her while trying to follow along.
It’s better to grow together in sync. That’s more beneficial in the long run.
We’re bound to hit S-Rank anyway, so no rush.
While I was thinking that, another group of sapphire mages appeared.
I signaled to Hong Yeon-hwa to throw whenever ready and spoke to Seo Ye-in.
“Watch closely.”
“Focusing.”
Fwoosh,
As I cast Spatial Fold on the next fireball, it vanished mid-arc and reappeared right in front of the sapphire mages.
“…….!”
Before they could even react, it exploded.
Boom—!
“You saw it skip forward, right?”
“I did.”
The effect of Spatial Fold is to delete a fixed portion of the travel distance of a ranged skill.
At F-Rank, the maximum deletion is 20%.
So if a fireball normally travels a distance of 10, using Spatial Fold would reduce that total distance to 8.
Depending on how it’s used, you can make it hit the target at the 8-mark, or shift it from 5 to 7, for example.
The deletion percentage increases with rank. At S-Rank, it goes up to a whopping 50%.
Its cooldown is fixed at 3 minutes.
“That’s the basic explanation. Let’s try again.”
“Got it.”
Seo Ye-in replied with bright, eager eyes.
After walking a bit further, we started hearing gunfire and shouting getting closer.
Ratatatata!
Soon, some crew members came into view.
They seemed to have just finished fighting. Parts of their bodies were frozen over.
The moment they saw us, they opened fire with magic rifles.
Ratatatata!
Once again, Hong Yeon-hwa blocked it cleanly and hurled a fireball, while Seo Ye-in linked it with Spatial Fold to shorten the travel distance.
Boom—!
I nodded and said,
“Better than the first time. Still, not very efficient, right?”
“Mhmm.”
While I had managed to cut the full 20%, the max for F-Rank, Seo Ye-in barely managed even 5%.
Well, it is a spatial-type skill, after all.
In some ways, it’s even harder to use than Blink.
I pointed at Hong Yeon-hwa’s Flame Orb and explained,
“You need a fundamental understanding of projectiles.”
Ranged skills contain a lot of information.
Like how fast they move, what kind of arc they follow, how far they travel, and where they hit.
If you don’t know the fireball travels a distance of 10, there’s no way you can accurately cut 2 off.
Likewise, to move a fireball from position 6 to 8, you need to know exactly when it passes through point 6.
This is why we don’t start training with mana rifles right away.
Magic bullets hit their target before you can even see them, but fireballs are much slower, making it easier to gather various bits of information.
Also, third parties generally have a wider field of view than the people actually fighting.
“Observe carefully while the skill is on cooldown.”
“Got it.”
Seo Ye-in nodded.
Each time Hong Yeon-hwa threw a Flame Orb, she followed its trajectory with her eyes.
Then, whenever the cooldown ended, she cast Spatial Fold.
Boom! Boom!
She’s definitely picking it up fast.
Her efficiency, which had been under 5%, had already climbed to 10%.
At this rate, 15%, or even 20% wouldn’t be far off.
Maybe I should teach her a bit more.
Originally, I had planned to focus solely on “building projectile understanding” for the rest of the run, but at this pace, it seemed fine to move on to the next step.
So I said to Seo Ye-in,
“Now let’s start paying attention to the timing of your skill use.”
“Timing.”
If you’re moving a fireball from point 6 to 8, the most efficient moment to use the skill is right as it passes point 6.
If you’re even slightly late….say at 6.1 or 6.3, you lose that much efficiency.
“You can use Bullet Time while doing it.”
“That’s a great idea…!”
An exclamation mark practically popped up above Seo Ye-in’s head.
[Bullet Time] is a skill that speeds up the user’s perception for a very short time, making everything appear in slow motion.
Since its cooldown is similar, it would pair nicely with training [Spatial Fold].
Eventually, we reached the auxiliary power core and engaged in battle with a Sapphire Tower mage guarding the area.
Trusting in Aqua Flame, Hong Yeon-hwa kept throwing nothing but fireballs.
Then, suddenly—
Flash!
Seo Ye-in’s eyes sharpened, and in the next moment, a fireball shimmered briefly before leaping forward.
Boom—!
“Aaaargh!”
The Sapphire Tower mage, engulfed in flames, fled while screaming.
I nodded in satisfaction.
She’s putting it to use right away.
Her efficiency had surpassed 15%.
Sure, she had been practicing with the relatively simple fireball, but at this level, she’d acquired at least the minimum proficiency.
“Feels like your rank should’ve gone up by now.”
“It did.”
Seo Ye-in nodded casually.
It was spatial magic, after all. And yet she had already reached E-rank not long after learning it.
I should update mine too.
[Activated ‘Copy Skill’.]
[The target skill ‘Spatial Fold (E)’ has been registered to the slot.]
▷ Copy – Skill [4/4]
1. Feather Step (B+)
2. Spatial Fold (E)
3. Ice Wall (B)
4. Vendetta (S)
“Alright, let’s keep going.”
***
As we continued burning down everything in our path, at some point the frequency of enemy encounters dropped off sharply.
Even when we did run into them, they didn’t pick fights. Most just watched from a distance, then scurried off.
“Looks like the word got out.”
“We’re strong.”
I mean, we took down so many of them. Not being known would be the real surprise.
The mobile fortresses are probably glad, actually.
At first, they were hostile with the chaos of the situation and our unclear identity. But by now, they must’ve figured out what we’re after.
We stop by each auxiliary power core, take down the Sapphire Tower mages stationed there, and then move on immediately.
We’re not tampering with the power cores or anything.
So from their perspective, there’s no reason to fight us and spill blood.
But what about the Sapphire Tower?
They’ll probably fight to the end.
Having an unexpected disruptor like us interfere must’ve thrown a serious wrench in their plans.
Still, they’ve likely invested too much manpower to simply pull out now.
They’ll have no choice but to see this through to the end.
They’re avoiding direct conflict with us for now, but for a reason completely opposite to the mobile fortress crew.
They’re probably preparing a way to win for sure.
They must be conserving their strength in anticipation of a major battle.
As expected, preparations had been made at the site of the next auxiliary power line.
There were three elite mages from the Sapphire Tower stationed there.
Among them, I spotted the witch we had burned and driven off earlier. Her whole body was charred like black coal, and her robe was scorched in several places.
When she saw Hong Yeon-hwa, she ground her teeth.
“Despicable…!”
Hong Yeon-hwa casually brushed off the glare and looked my way.
So I asked her,
“Think you can handle them on your own?”
“…I’ll give it a try.”
The reason we didn’t kill them and only drove them off—
It’s so she could squeeze out a little more rank progress with Aqua Flame.
Fwoooosh!
Flames began to surge up around Hong Yeon-hwa.
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