Gathering Points [10]

Honestly, I feel my entire existence in the tower is a cheat itself. 

The amount of knowledge I had made me look like a big-ass history book of the past, present, and future. 

However, though I had knowledge, if I couldn't apply it to my use, it was all useless. 

This was the current situation I was facing at hand. 

It wasn't that dire. It was just irritating. 

I knew I had a skill. I knew the effect, yet even though the system made it simple for me, I still had to find a way to activate the skill to use. 

This was something even Lionel had to go through. It was a little bit easier for some of the tower residents who had a bit of experience, but even they had to spend some time, even if it was seconds, to figure out how to activate a skill given to them and not trained.

Thankfully, while it seemed I lacked a lot in some places, I wasn't lacking in comprehension. 

Soon, I found out how to activate the skill.

{Breath Control}

Suddenly, my muscles tightened, and I found it a little hard to breathe. 

At the same time, I felt a surge of power rising in me, yet a lingering sense of weakness was there as well. It caused a sense of imbalance, but there was a weird harmony between the rise of strength and the weakness I felt. 

The entire sensation was weird, and I couldn't quite describe it. 

Almost immediately, I felt the temperature of my body rising and something rushing to come out of my mouth. It was sudden, and I subconsciously opened my mouth to let it out. 

What came out was a stream of white, almost transparent gas, and the more I breathed, the more gas that came out. 

It was like how cold air rushes from one's mouth in winter. 

'What's this?'

The entire situation was weird, but I could feel a sense of new power in my body. 

My strength seemed to have increased by a fair bit. 

About 25%, I'd say. 

'I wonder if my stats will show something.'

As I thought of it, I called out my Status.

'Status' 

*

[Status]

[Strength: F2{F3}]

[Agility: F1{F2}]

[Endurance: F4{F5}]

[Mana: G8{G9}]

{Skills}

Breath Control [Basic Mastery]

{Mana Art}

None in possession.

{Special Gift}

Bind[0/1]

*

"Wow," I muttered aloud in amazement. 

Basically, the skill gave me an overall minor upgrade in all my stats. If it was a single stat, that would have been amazing, but the fact that all my stats got affected was beyond amazing. 

A minor upgrade might seem like a small increase, but I knew it was more than that. 

Aside from the fact that upgrading one's stat becomes increasingly harder the higher that stat is in exchange for more power, the fact that this skill could even do so at a basic mastery was incredible. 

One must remember that there are still four levels of mastery above basic mastery, so the increase in stats would likely be more exaggerated at higher levels. 

I was also weak. 

Using the point system for stats, an overall increase of 25% did seem little but this was because I was weak. 

If a certain stat was at 1000 points, the basic mastery of this skill would increase it along with other stats by 250 points. 

What would be the case if the skill was at intermediate mastery or even advanced mastery?

One should also remember that the stat system was mysterious. Just because our strength was represented in letters and numbers didn't dictate how strong we truly were. 

We could be way weaker than what's stated and vice versa. 

Like now, even though the status panel only showed a minor increase in all stats, I felt it was a little bit more but probably not enough to be another minor increase in stats. 

In any case, it was a pretty good skill. 

To make it more useful, I have to make my base strength stronger and increase the mastery level of the skill. 

The latter was more important. 

As I felt my stamina run down with each breath I took, I turned off the skill. 

'With my current stamina, which should be tied to my Endurance stat, I can maintain this skill for 10 minutes. If I'm in an intense situation, it would be way less than this.'

There were quite a lot of things to consider with this skill, but regardless, I was happy to have another trump card.

Crack! Crack!

Suddenly, I started to hear a loud cracking sound in my surroundings.

I hurriedly turned to look at the source of the sound and saw it was coming from Lionel's direction.

When I saw what was currently happening, I couldn't help but have a bittersweet expression on my face.

Thankfully, I had never compared myself to him, so I did not feel too down about what was currently going on in front of me.

I used to think the author just liked to exaggerate things when he said even geniuses despaired at the talent Lionel showed, but now I feel he didn't do his work justice.

Now that I could see it firsthand, it was indeed something else.

It was also because of this I could understand more of the hate the tower residents had towards outsiders.

Just the fact that one or two people like Lionel existed in every appearance of outsiders started to make the hate gathered towards us reasonable.

I was starting to see it.

The fear.

They feared us.

No.

It was too much to say they feared all outsiders.

Rather.

They feared the possibility of another Lionel.