9 Chapter 9 - Appraisal x Data Saver

Chapter 9 – Appraisal x Data Saver

"So, have you made your decision?" Uncle Holand asked. Glen passed his spoils of the day which were more Colored Butterfly wings. He did not have the confidence to fight other beasts at the moment, so he targeted the poor butterfly.

"I decide to accept your offer," Glen replied while Uncle Holand counted the wings that Glen had.

"Twenty wings, so it will be 100G. You did better than yesterday," Uncle Holand smiled.

"I went out earlier today," Glen replied.

"Wait for a bit, I am going to get you the skill crystal," Holand spoke and he got to the back of the shop and Glen waited. A few minutes later, Holand was back while holding a box, while smiling.

"Here you go. The Beginner Appraisal skill crystal," Holand opened the box and a transparent diamond-shaped crystal was inside it. "I only need one-time free consultation in the future. Work hard, Glen. I am going to wait for your progress in this profession."

"Okay," Glen spoke and he took the box and his money and left the shop to the inn. He greeted Aunt Bertha and got back to his room. Glen sat on his bed and opened the box. He touched the skill crystal and a notification appeared.

[Learn Beginner Appraisal? Yes or No?

Data Saver Note – Material held can be upgraded (No Data detected. Please collect more data)]

Glen was shocked. "So, skill crystal can be upgraded too?" From shock, Glen turned happy. He never thought that this was possible and he also understood what was happening.

"So, do I have to wait from learning the skill if I want to upgrade this skill crystal?" Glen wondered but he decided to learn it anyway. He needed the skill the most to identify things and added the data to the Data Saver.

Once Glen agreed to learn the skill, the transparent crystal floated in the air and suddenly, blue lines appeared in the air forming a box surrounding the skill crystal. Then, the box shrank with the skill crystal and another of the same box appeared.

The other box already contained another skill crystal and the appraisal skill crystal's box flew and positioned itself beside the other skill crystal. Glen got a notification that he successfully learned Beginner Appraisal.

Skill – Beginner Appraisal

Grade – E [0% Mastery]

Description – Can appraise a beast's species and rank only. Limited to only Colorless Stage beast. Increase the skill's grade mastery to appraise higher stage beast.

"Huh?" Glen was confused when he saw the two skill crystals in the boxes. Since one of them was the Beginner Appraisal, Glen immediately knew that the other was the Tame skill. Even so, the Data Saver skill was not there.

"So, a special skill is not among these skills," Glen understood and continued, "I never knew the game has this section too," he was referring to the boxes with the skill crystal. He knew he had the tame skill from his stats but he did not know that he could see the skill's crystal, like what he was seeing at the moment.

Glen tried touching the tame skill's box and it suddenly became big and he could take the skill crystal out. He understood what happened next. This was the method to replace or delete the players' skills. If they dislike the skill or found a better skill, they could delete them by removing the skill crystal from the boxes.

"Then, when I find the method to upgrade the skill, I can take out the skill crystal to upgrade it!" Glen was elated. He checked the Tame skill crystal too and it could be upgraded too but similar to the Beginner Appraisal, there was no method to upgrade it.

Glen turned off the skill boxes and tried appraising whatever he could see. When he used the skill, he could feel that some of his energy disappeared.

Species – Coffee Table (Wood)

Rank – None

Stage – Colorless

Glen appraised the coffee table in front of him and all he got was the table's 'species' and there was no rank. But that was not all! Due to the Data Saver skill, there was another long line of data below it. The Stage was recorded based on Data Saver's deduction.

Since the Beginner Appraisal skill could only appraise Colorless Stage beasts and material, the skill deduced that the Coffee Table was Colorless stage too because the skill was effective on the table. Not only that but there were methods of upgrading the coffee table too.

Glen had passed through and rested below a lot of trees outside the village. Due to that, the Data Saver had recorded the surface data of the trees, plants and so on and some of the data was useful for the coffee table.

The other data that was shown was the material needed and the method of upgrading the table. There was even a method using the Colored Butterfly wings as materials. From reading the method, Glen knew that using the wings was to beautify the coffee table.

"Whoa~ So, this is how Data Saver enhances the skill. As long as I have sufficient data, it will give me any useful data alongside the skill!" Glen was happy.

Still, Glen could see the limitation too. There was no mention of Tier in the appraisal because there was no sign of 'star' on the coffee table. Without the star, Data Saver would not be able to give the information about it.

So, there was a high chance that whenever he appraised the beast and the 'star' was hidden, he would not be able to see the beast's tier unless Data Saver had already collected the full information about the beast.

At the moment, the only beasts with full data he had were the Bubble beast and Thick Bubble beast. Both of these beasts were tamed by Glen which he got full access to the information. So, if he appraised these two beasts in the wild, he could see their full information.

Glen tested this by looking outside through the window. He saw players passed by and appraised their beast. Just like he thought, since he did not have the full data about the beasts, he only got what the appraisal skill could give.

Even the method of upgrading was not listed because Data Saver did not have full information about the beasts from their physiological to their elements and so on. So, Data Saver could not deduce any new information.

"I need knowledge! I need more data. Even if there is an upgrade method available, it is all crude. In this modern setting, I need to learn a more scientific method. Getting the theory of the scientific method is enough too," Glen mumbled.

"Books! I need a lot of books! Better if it is about science experiment and beast. If I can use the skill in real life, I can surf the internet to search about this," Glen was determined to collect more data.

"I wonder if Auntie Bertha has some books?" Glen mumbled and he sighed. "Let's plan my schedule. Since I need to hunt to pay back my debt, I cannot spend my whole day reading books."

Glen started planning for his everyday schedule in the game. He would hunt beasts from morning to evening and at night, he would spend time reading books… if he could get any book.

At the same time, he decided to plan the schedule for his real-life too. He decided to wake up early in the morning to jog because his stamina was worse. He could not last long in the wild and needed to rest many times. So, he needed to exercise.

"Once my stamina is increased, I can build up some muscle," Glen smiled. "Will I become a hunk if I exercise?" he snickered but shook his head because he would not be one. He was average in appearance. Even if he bulked up, he had a feeling that other than a good body, his face would not change much.

Many people turned more handsome when they started to exercise seriously but Glen had a feeling that he was not one of them. He talked like that because he wanted to dream a bit.

Other than an exercise in the morning, he would spend the whole day taking care of the internet café and would only play the game at night. Playing while taking care of the business was not good. That was irresponsible.

"Done! With this schedule, I will do better while playing this game. When I become better, I will be able to get more money!" Glen smiled and he got out of the room to meet Aunt Bertha.

He passed by the dining area and appraised all the beasts available there. Although he could not get complete data of them, he could at least collect whatever he could. It was a bit tiring using his energy but he needed to do it.

Collecting data was not the only thing he wanted to do, he also wanted to increase the skill's mastery. The higher the mastery, the lower the energy needed to use the skill.

"Auntie Bertha, may I ask something?" Glen asked.

Bertha looked at Glen and spoke, "What? Do you want to extend the debt period? Sure, but I will put interest on the debt."

"…" Glen was speechless for a bit but he still asked, "Do you have any books around? I want to study. Since I want to become an Upgrade Specialist, I need to study a lot. I cannot fully focus on hunting every day or I will not be able to increase my skill as an Upgrade Specialist."

"Books? I only have a few books about beasts and they are not that useful for an Upgrade Specialist," Bertha replied.

"Really? Then, can I have those books? I don't mind even if it is not related to beasts. As long as they are books. Even reading unrelated books may inspire me to upgrade the beasts," Glen replied.

"…Okay. How many do you want?" Bertha got up to take the books out.

"All!" Glen replied excitedly.