Weakness

Sounds of clashing metal, groans, and growls can be heard throughout the halls. We both pick up the pace and begin running towards the source of all this noise.

"I sense great fluctuations in the mana density in the room at the end of this hall!"

More blood-curling screams enter our ears as we move closer to the room.

"I can't afford to lose anymore men."

"What do you mean by that?"

As I turn to face him with a puzzled expression on my face, he says nothing and approaches me, before picking me up and beginning to break into a full sprint.

"Shit!"

"Hold tight, I can't guarantee that you won't be injured if you fall off, so just sit tight for a bit."

I can feel my cheeks reddening this very second, and my body is becoming warmer and warmer. However my pride and embarrassment doesn't mean anything when I've been slowing him down this whole time, so I just shut my mouth while being bridal carried by this hunk of a man. Luckily he isn't looking at my face right now, or else I might just die from embarrassment like those anime girls.

...

Soon enough, we enter the chamber, and witness the rest of our party fighting another pack of modified trolls. Seeing this sight, Karl immediately throws me, along with all the romantic tension I felt, to the ground, while simultaneously unsheathing his blade and charging at the trolls.

"Come at me you hideous creatures!"

He uses "Taunt" to generate an insane amount of aggro, pulling the trolls away from their original opponents towards him instead.

"The captain is here!"

"We're saved!"

I get up on my feet as fast as I can, and move in to support Karl.

"Karl, I have a theory that might help us beat these trolls."

"And what that might be?"

"I haven't confirmed my suspicions, but the scales upon their bodies should indicate the elements they possess."

"Then that means that-"

"Watch out captain!"

The trolls cut off his sentence midway, as in a real battle, nobody would wait for their enemies stop speaking would they? Once again, I am reminded by the fact that this wasn't a virtual reality game that I was playing, this was real life, and if I couldn't adapt, I wouldn't be able to live for much longer.

"Urfh, Zeph."

[Activating "Master of the Elementary"]

[Activating "Fusion"]

[You have successfully casted the tier 1 spell, "Sandstorm"]

Sand enters the eyes of the trolls, blinding them temporarily.

"We might know all of their fatal weaknesses."

"And how do you know this?"

"Remember the pack of white-scaled trolls we fought?"

Karl bashes his tower shield against a disoriented troll and drives the pommel of his blade into the head of another, after all, an ordinary steel blade wouldn't be able to cut through the scales of even the weakest dragon.

"Yeah?"

"How else would've my fire spell beaten trolls modified with dragon scales if not for them having abysmal fire resistance? And didn't you feel the cold radiated by their corpses? It's my theory that they have been modified by the high dragons with the scales of lesser wyrms, to be used as slaves that don't require any rest, as they would be able to-"

"This is good and all, but what use do I have for this information if none of us are able to cast any damaging spells?"

"Just channel all the excess mana you have into your blade. I'll handle the rest."

The blade begins to exude a dark blue light and cracks appear throughout it's edges. I snap my fingers, then press my palm against the blade.

"Igni, Igni."

[Activating "Master of the Elementary"]

[Activating "Fusion"]

[You have successfully casted the basic spell, "Ignite - Supercharged"]

The mana within the blade begins to burn, quickly glowing white.

"Zeph,Zeph."

[Activating "Fusion"]

[You have successfully casted the basic spell, "Breeze - Supercharged"]

I force more air onto the white hot blade, providing more oxygen for the burning of mana.

"How you come up with such methods on the fly baffles me." Karl says with a grin.

"I ran out of mana already, so you better finish off all those trolls!"

"Don't you worry, I'm not the captain of the town's guard for nothing." I hear him say as he cuts down the white-scaled troll blocking my path.

"Go. It is now my turn to dispose of these foul beasts."

I make a break for it, running away from the troll's range of attack.

"Bless us with your grace and protection, 'Divine Shield'!" I hear a paladin buffing Karl.

"Daed, P'ter, use your fire-based magic scrolls now!"

"Yes sire!"

The ranger and priest both unfurl parchments filled with fire mana upon hearing Karl's command, and all begin channelling and chanting together, forming an amalgamation of flames and embers, which upon the end of their incantation, bursts into an inferno, enveloping half of the white-scaled trolls, burning them to ashes.

The rest of the trolls however, suffered a worse fate from instant combustion, and that was dying to Karl's fiery blade, as their wounds were cauterised immediately after being cut open, stopping them from dying from blood loss, allowing Karl to torture them for as long as he wanted to.

It was a disgusting sight really, I had thrown up twice while watching the torment.

It seems that I wasn't as tough as I thought I was. What a surprise.

...

"Sorry you had to see that. I get caught up in my emotions sometimes."

"That's fine, we all have our own kinks"

"Then you understand."

"I might not approve of it, but yes, I do understand."

"It's just a way to raise troop morale, don't dig any further into it, I'm not so uncivilised that I take pleasure in the gruesome death screams of some trolls."

"Oh, I understand completely. I promise to stay silent about it."

"Are you daft? I just said that-"

"Just keep quiet Karl. Trying to explain it just makes it worse."

He shakes his head and gives up after seeing that I wouldn't change my mind, leaving me to my own devices. For just 5 seconds.

"By the way Zariel, how did you discern their weaknesses so quickly?"

"While you carried- ehrm, while we were travelling to this room, I just so happened to see some of the other chambers we were passing, and they had quite a lot of snow and ice, mimicking the habitat and environment in which an ice dragon would live in. My guess is these slaves were modified with ice wyrm scales to increase their resistance to the cold here, but in doing so-"

"It reduced their resistance to heat and fire. I see..."

"I did try to explain it to you earlier, but you cut me off early."

"In case you weren't paying attention, we were in a life and death battle there, and I needed information to be delivered to me as concisely as possible, so as to maximise our survivability." He delivers while rolling his eyes.

Damn, he has a point there.

In any case, I didn't receive any experience from helping my party slay all those trolls, so it seems that I would need to get the last hits to level up. Great, just have even more mechanics that prevent me from becoming stronger. I already take 10 times the experience an average person needs to level up anyway, making it this tiny bit harder won't annoy me at all, really. I even checked my status window twice to make sure that I wasn't hallucinating. And I wasn't.

Open the status window.

[You have opened the status window]

Character Information

Name: Zariel Alsa

Age: 24 Years old

Sex: Male

Class: lvl. 5 Mage

Stats:-

Strength : 3

Agility : 4

Endurance : 3

Intelligence : 11

Wisdom : 11

Perception : 6 ( 5 )

Luck : 2

Willpower : 6 ( 5 )

Skills:-

"Aura Reader" (Rare) lvl.1 - Allows you to read the aura of the person you are facing. Also increases your perception to you surroundings ( +1 )

"Mental Fortitude" (Rare) lvl. 1 - Increases resistance against illusion based spells and the effects of berserk inducing skills. Also increases your willpower ( +1 )

"Under Pressure" (Unique) lvl. 1 - Increases your basic stats when under adverse conditions up to 10%, with a minimum increase of +1 to every stat.

"Master of the Elementary" (Unique) lvl. 1 - Allows you to use the mana in your surroundings to cast basic spells. Has a cooldown of 5 seconds.

"Fusion" (Rare) lvl. 1 - Allows you to combine spells to create new spells.

Status buffs:-

"Blessed - Auewyr" - You have been blessed by the mighty Auewyr. A great power has filled your body, allowing you to tap into more of your potential, increasing the number of stat points you gain every level up by 1.

*Note: You have 4 unused stat points

Nope, no level ups here. Fucking piece of shit goddamn imbalanced system. Honestly man, how is an isekai protagonist supposed to survive in this world at all? If I didn't have the knowledge of science from my past life, I would've died so many times now. I don't plan to die either, as there is no guarantee that I'll suddenly awaken some sort of skill which would let me travel back in time after I die, I also don't plan to keep on being so weak, as the only way to survive in this world seems to be only to increase the amount of power you hold.

As I was thinking to myself, Karl had suddenly approached me once more, breaking me out of my super cool first point of view monologue as the protagonist.

"By the way Zariel..."

"What do you want Karl. This is the third time now that you have approached me. I've already said that your secret is safe with me, so what else do you want?"

"Are you ill?"

Wait, where did this come from.

"No, why are you asking?"

"Because your face was tremendously red when I carried you, and your body was rather large amount of heat."

Ah shit. He did notice.

"Uh.. I was feeling a bit sick earlier, but it's fine now."

I try to talk my way out of it, but he was going to put his hand on my forehead regardless, it would seem. No woman, scratch that, no living being has ever shown me this amount of affection before... Is this how people turn gay? Have I finally succumbed and accepted my fate of not being able to approach woman at all in any world I am in? Is that why I feel like I'm falling in love with this strong and attractive man? Fuck. Have I been suppressing my desires for men subconsciously all this time, as I have personally seen homosexuals be oppressed and mocked, and thus have decided not to embrace my true self for fear of being judged?

"It would seem that you aren't lying. But please, do tell me if you are ill, as we need to quickly cure the illness before it spreads."

Nope. He just happens to be a reliable man who shows concern for everybody, especially those currently under him. It would seem that I'm destined to never have a significant other, regardless their sex or the myriads of genders they might identify as.

I'm fucking hopeless.

...