The Villainous Noble Tried His Hardest to Break the Original Storyline, and Now the Heroines Are Acting Weird - 18

Chapter 18

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I had wondered why my father called me, but in the end, it turned out to be nothing serious. Though, who would’ve thought he had such a misunderstanding.

For now, at least, he wouldn’t be worrying about me anymore, and the servants would probably stop giving me strange looks. Letting out a sigh of relief, I spoke to the goddess.

『What level am I at now?』

『You’ve reached level 13.』

So far, so good. That said, I wasn’t leveling up as quickly as I did at the beginning anymore.

My HP had risen to around 3500, and both Thunder and Heal were taking longer. Thunder had taken longer to deal damage on me and Heal had taken longer to heal me as well.

I wasn’t sure which to prioritize, but for now, I decided to focus on acquiring skill boards for lightning magic. After all, I was practicing offensive magic to fight in the first place. Leveling up should’ve granted me skill points as well, so I recalled what I knew from the game and began acquiring skills.

After picking up several passive skills and boosting my stats, I should’ve been able to unlock the next lightning spell. I wonder if it worked?

『No worries there~!』

The Goddess gave me a thumbs-up with an infuriatingly smug smile. If she weren’t a hologram, I would’ve punched her.

『Huh? You’re not going to praise me?』

『And whose fault is it that I ended up in this mess in the first place?』

『W-Who knows…』

Thinking I had used up all my skill points, I acquired the basic spell Magnet Thunder and the intermediate spell Thunder Blade… Or at least I thought I did.

Magnet Thunder was a spell that created a magnetic field. In the game, its effects were to nullify lightning magic and prevent damage from metal weapons. I didn’t think I’d have much use for it, but I needed it to progress through the skill board, so I acquired it anyway.

I tested it by casting Magnet Thunder on my right hand. As I strengthened the effect, I was able to attract a nearby sword toward me. Then, I tried casting Thunder on myself. No damage at all, though the impact was definitely there.

“…It’s way more practical than it was in the game.”

It looked like it could slow down or neutralize opponents who used weapons. Since I’d gotten a good grasp on Magnet Thunder’s capabilities, I moved on to Thunder Blade.

When activated, a blade of lightning appeared. I could swing it at an enemy, allowing for both lightning and slashing damage. It could also be thrown like a javelin to attack from a distance.

In the game, if I remembered right, its power was about five times that of Thunder. So, if Thunder dealt 100 damage, Thunder Blade would do around 500. Considering my magic attack power had also increased, I was probably dealing even more damage overall.

Its power was more than sufficient, but it consumed a lot of MP. Although I could use the skill board to boost my attribute value, I wanted to acquire magic as quickly as possible. That meant I had to make up for base status through daily training.

Unlike the world of Final Quest, leveling up here was pretty tough. Even if there was no level cap, at this rate, I might not be able to raise my level that much. Given the current situation, if I spread myself too thin across multiple skill boards, I’d end up a jack-of-all-trades, master of none.

If I weren’t planning to fight the Demon Lord, that would be fine. But if I was going to defeat the Demon Lord without the power of the Hero, I’d need to specialize my build. As for MP, I’d need to keep using magic constantly while training to build it up.

Thinking about all that, I cast Thunder Blade on myself and followed it up with multiple Heals. Still, Heal was starting to feel a bit unreliable. I needed to level up quickly and earn enough skill points to unlock High Heal.

Thunder Blade, Heal, Heal, Heal. I combined those with endurance running. Of course, I took breaks in between. My body felt absolutely wrecked, but this was the most efficient way I could think of to gain experience.

After working my body to a certain extent, I spent the afternoon heading into the dungeon to hunt monsters. The experience point efficiency was awful, but I wanted magic stones too. I hunted monsters and stored the magic stones in my item box.

These days, I explored the dungeon alone, so I had a lot of freedom to move around. Thanks to that, I could collect magic stones without anyone questioning me. It was convenient. I sliced through an appearing goblin and took it down.

Swordsmanship was something I’d been taught back in my “Rubest-kun” days, and since I could still use it, it must’ve been ingrained in my body. That said, I was aware I wasn’t particularly skilled. Right now, I was brute-forcing my way through battles using high status power to cover for my lack of technique.

There was a skill called Sword Mastery, and if I acquired it, my sword skills would probably improve. But right now, my main focus was magic.

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