It’s Technically Not Stealing

Deeper into the city, I came panning for iron and instead struck gold. Actually, the windfall I'd just stumble upon courtesy of [Plant Identification] was probably countless times more valuable than any amount of regular old gold.

Imagine, anywhere I went, I could steal just about any piece of information as all but the most priceless pieces of knowledge were written down on some type of paper or parchment. Back on Earth, knowledge as widespread and common as it was with the proliferation of the internet was still immensely valuable.

How much more valuable could it be in a world without any of that? How much would the secrets behind all kinds of craftsman professions be? What price could a mage put behind the study of their craft, their years of dedication to uncovering the mechanisms behind Magic?

The answer?

Usually, it was worth more than just money. Anyone else would have had to apprentice themselves to a veteran of whatever they wanted to learn and spend weeks, months, years, or even longer to fully learn the subject of their fancy.

When I entered a Skill Merchant's Store, however, all I had to do was point to whatever scroll or book interested me. The owner would give me five minutes to "get a feel" for what the text had in store for me, never knowing that all it took was a moment for me to memorize even the parts of the book that I had yet to see.

21,686,450…

That was the value in Zenicopper of all the knowledge I store from just the first Skill Merchant I visited.

In just a short hour or so, I went to nearly a dozen Skill Merchants in total. Some offered generalized Skills, others specialized in a certain area of expertise. At the end of it all, it became impractical to measure the worth of the information I pilfered in Zenicopper. To make it more comprehensible to the human mind that struggled to understand and measure the true weight of numbers as large as billions and trillions, I had to move up to Aliphsilver; each of which was worth one million Zenicopper.

In total, I saved myself possibly several normal lifetimes worth of reading and somewhere along the lines of 3,481 Aliphsilver. To do the number justice, I could use some of my new knowledge to estimate the value of the farmhouse Alex, our slaves, and I shared at around 5 Aliphsilver.

Yeah, it was that ridiculous. With my so-called useless Creed, I effortlessly created a Skill that in mere hours made me one of the most knowledgeable people on the face of the Planet. Sure, I would admit that I probably didn't hold the best quality information, but I doubt anyone could dare say they had as wide a breadth as I did.

Once I was satisfied with building up that wide pool of knowledge, I immediately put it to use by entering another secluded alleyway and adding another layer to my current disguise.

[New Skills Alert!

New Branching Transcendence Path Unlocked!

Titles:

Name: Novice Alteration Mage

Grade: F

Effect: Alteration-type Spells are 5% easier to learn or improve, and 10% more cost-efficient.

Skills:

Name: Alteration Magic: Lesser Partial Shift

Grade: F

Description: Allows the user to temporarily transform the details of one's body for as long as they can feed the Skill Magic. Capable of changing skin texture and color, eye pattern and color, and hair style and color.]

After getting the notification, I casted the Skill and looked at my reflection on one of the windows in the alleyway. Looking back at me was a stranger with freckled skin, scarlet hair, and purple eyes. Matched up with my black cloak and trousers, I completed an edgelord character look that wouldn't look out of place in an anime.

It was so unapologetically blunt that I could almost shed a tear. My masterpiece…

Anyway, with that slight amusing distraction out of the way, I navigated my way out of the alleyway and into the Heisan Bazaar, the largest marketplace in the entire city, and sought out the Imperial Alchemist Guild.

…

"How old are you? You look a little too young to be taking the First Rank Examination," the receptionist at the Yverian Alchemist Guild said as he smiled condensing at me.

"I'm fifteen," I lied. "And it shouldn't really matter as long as I can prove my skills, right?"

"I certainly can't stop you if you want to schedule a Rank Examination. But you're going to have to put up 1,500 Zenicopper as a deposit in case you fail the exam," the receptionist said.

I didn't even respond verbally. Instead, I pulled out two of my ten-pill bottles filled to the brim with Waking Pills and offered them to the receptionist.

A few minutes later, the man returned with a form for me to fill out after taking my pills to be appraised. I set up my First Rank Examination to take place as soon as possible and in less than ten minutes found myself being led further into the building to take the test.

I was brought into an industrial-grade Alchemy Lab that put my workstation back home to shame. The supervisor overseeing my exam then went on to explain the rules of the exam and by the end of it all, I was having a terribly bad time trying to hold in my mania.

Seriously…

I was given three whole hours to succeed in one out of ten attempts at making a Poor Quality Lowest Grade Pill. Moreover, I wasn't given worthless scraps like the Practice Fodder I'd been using back in the farmhouse to work with. No, the materials for the exam were all decent Common Grade ingredients, each of which was probably worth dozens of Zenicopper.

After the rules were explained to me, I didn't even take ten minutes to concoct a batch of Waking Pills; the type which I'd had the most practice with. And, not only did I make a respectable batch of five pills, but they were all bordering on Good Quality at around 68 to 69% Purity.

"Y-you pass," the supervisor awkwardly said without needing anyone to appraise the pills.

Even if one disregarded the fact that my pills were relatively pure given their size and shape, the fact that pills formed at all would have been enough of a tell to anyone with the slightest pill-concocting knowledge that I'd managed to least create viable pills; anything less than 50% purity wouldn't even been able to hold onto a pill shape.

"Would you like to like to sell us your pills net of the price of the ingredients used to make them?" He asked.

"Can we pretend my exam isn't over and do that after I make as many more pills as I'm capable of with all the ingredients here?" I asked back.

"Sure?" He didn't seem too sure of himself, but since he allowed it, I got right back to work before he could take back his words.

Thus, for the next two hours or so I got absorbed in the pill-concocting process and completely cleaned house, only failing five out of the dozens of attempts I made; and that was just because during those attempts I was running low on Magic and my mental exhaustion was peaking at an all-time high.

Truly, the difference between being able to use even the most basic of "real" ingredients made a world of a difference when previously I'd been forced to work with inert garbage.