Chapter 23: Powering Up

When I had my fill of looking at my newly acquired perks and thinking of all the different uses they presented for the future, I finalized my perk selection, changing the holographic screen to display the skill distribution one.

[ Skills ]

Skill Points Left: 132

Barter: 72

Energy Weapons: 97

Explosives: 79

Guns: 106

Lockpick: 68

Medicine: 104

Melee Weapons: 90

Repair: 120

Science: 120

Sneak: 73

Speech: 74

Survival: 64

Unarmed: 81

What to choose, what to choose... Well, since I already know I will get a perk for every skill that reaches 100, I might as well start increasing the ones nearest to 100 first. So let's begin with Energy Weapons and see what I get.

Distributing three skill points into energy weapons, my total skill points left decreased to 129 before I heard a ding sound, notifying me that I've gained yet another perk.

Ding! New Perk

| Energy Weapon Fanatic | Requirements Energy Weapons 100: For every 10 skill points you possess in energy weapons beyond 100, you deal 1 additional damage when using said weapon types. On top of that, energy weapon projectile speed is raised by a similar amount, the only exceptions to this bonus are laser weapons and other similarly fast energy weapons.

Not bad, not bad, basically just the energy weapon equivalent of Bulletstorm.

Alright, the next skill I will spend skill points on will be melee weapons. That guy requires 10 skill points to reach 100. 

Following that, I distributed 10 skill points into melee weapons, bringing my total remaining skill points to spend down to 119, and right as the points were dumped into the skill, I heard that signature notification sound go off.

Ding! New Perk

| Martial Weapon Master | Requirements Melee Weapons 100: Your skill with handling all melee weapons has surpassed normal limitations, causing you to take your first step into a realm few have entered besides ancient martial masters of legends. Because of you entering this realm, you are now able to emit an energy from your melee weapons that can be used to increase their durability. And if that wasn't enough, this energy can be swung out for a ranged attack like weapon qi though it is different. The starting range is 10 meters, but it will increase by 1 meter for every 10 additional skill points you have in melee weapons beyond 100. Lastly, the higher your melee weapons skill, the stronger this ability will become.

Cool, I get to be a pseudo xianxia master now thanks to this perk. I will definitely have to give this a try when I get out of the vault in a short while. Moving onto the next skill on the list that being unarmed. This fella will need 19 skill points to bring it to 100.

Putting the points where they needed to go, I heard that signature sound ring out once again.

Ding! New Perk

| Human Weapon | Requirements Unarmed 100: Your skill in unarmed combat has gained you the ability to emit an energy that you can use to cover your body to increase its durability. Additionally, you can launch this energy from your arms and legs as a ranged attack similar to what one would call qi. The initial range is 10 meters, but this will increase by 1 meter for every 10 additional skill points you have in this skill beyond 100. Also, the higher your skill in unarmed is, the stronger this perk's abilities will become.

Well, I think I can probably pass off as a real xianxia master now that I have this perk as well, though I highly doubt there is anyone remaining on earth who knows what that is anymore. I wonder if that samurai on the Zetan mother ship knows anything...

Hmm, I wonder how much force the energy can withstand and if I can combine it with my armor. If that ends up being the case and I can layer it on top of my armor, that would be a serious game-changer for my durability. I will for sure have to test that out as well when I'm done leveling up.

Now onto explosives. It will need 21 skill points for it to reach 100, and when the points are spent, it will bring my total remaining skill points down to 79.

With my next skill to raise to 100 decided, I distributed the skill points into it, earning myself another ding a second later.

Ding! New Perk

| The Power Of Atom | Requirements Explosives 100: Your fascination with explosives has earned you the ability to increase the amount of damage of all explosives you use by 2.5% as well as an increase in the radius of the explosion by the same percentage for every additional 10 skill points you have in the skill after 100. You can also control how much damage it will do and how large the explosive radius will be.

God damn, that's a busted perk. It would be cool to see how large of a mushroom cloud I could make if I had 1,000 points in explosives and blew up a nuke of similar size to the one sitting in the center of Megaton. But if I was to blow one up of that size around here, it would probably just end up turning the capital wasteland into a smoldering crater, so I'll have to pass on doing that.

After making a 180 on the idea of setting off a nuke just for the fun of it, I went to put points into my next highest skill, which was speech. Once I placed the 26 needed skill points into the skill, it brought my total skill points left down to 53 and as I finalized the placement; I heard the usual notification I was quickly becoming accustomed to.

Ding! New Perk

| Language Master | Requirements Speech 100: You gain a complete understanding of any language when hearing it for the first time or seeing its text. Also, for every 100 additional speech gain 1 point in charisma.

Hmm, that will be an incredibly useful perk for learning any foreign languages in the future. It will also be of great help when I eventually come across something alien in origin, like that alien spacecraft that will be sitting in the north of the capital wasteland at some point. Though now that I'm thinking of it, I don't know if it's even there right now... or if I really want to mess with it, since I don't particularly want to be pulled into a Zetan mother ship with current capabilities.

Continuing on from that, we have sneak next on the list. That one will need 27 skill points to reach 100.

As soon as I decided on sneak, I placed the 27 skill points into it bringing my total skill points left down to 26 which won't be enough for a new perk so I'll just dump the remaining points into the next highest skill that being my barter skill bringing its total up to 98 just on the cusp of the needed 100.

Ding! New Perk

| Lurking In The Shadows | Requirements Sneak 100: Deal 1% more sneak attack for every 10 skill points you have in sneak. Besides that, you are also now able to emit a sort of presence hiding field with a range of 10 meters that grows by 1 meter for every 10 additional skill points in sneak.

That will be an exceptionally useful perk for my coming trip to the RobCo Facility. Hmm, I might need to pour a hundred points into it just in case I need to pass an area that may be too dangerous for my convoy.

Though I doubt I would encounter anything that could put me and my convoy in much danger since I should be able to eliminate most threats by myself, let alone with the nearly 50 robots that will be following me that are all equipped with their own weapons. My sentry bots, for example, are armed with dual gatling lasers and shoulder mounted hive missile launchers. And my worker bots have their integrated laser hands that have the equivalent firepower of a standard laser rifle shot. So, given my robot's weaponry, I should be more than prepared to deal with any possible unforeseen dangers I may come across.

After finalizing the skill distribution, the holographic screen changed again, showing my updated status that had a new quest waiting to be turned in that being the Surpass Your Human Physical Limits.

Nice, it's finally ready to turn in. Let's see those rewards.

Once I finished that thought, I gave my newly updated stats a brief glance over and turned in the Surpass Your Human Physical Limits quest. That bad boy rewarded 21,000 exp, 10 SPECIAL points, and a new perk a split second later. With the quest rewards dispensed, I checked the perk out first to see what the effects were and man, was I in for a treat.

| High Human | You've surpassed all human limits, taking the next step in human evolution. Race Changes to High Human, health formula changes from (Level# x 10) to (Level# x 20), +2 to all specials for every 10 levels, +5 DT, +1 health regeneration a minute, and five times increased stamina and stamina regeneration. Lastly, unlock the ability of multi-thought processing based on your intelligence SPECIAL. +1 Thought process for every 1 point of intelligence.

Yeah, that's a pretty busted perk, but I've earned it since I had to grind for years to get my stats to this point finally. Mmm, the multi-thought processing feels very odd. I basically have multiple me's in my head, but I believe I'll get used to it in no time.

Ding! New Perk

There's that sound again. Let's see what new perk I got this time.

| Currency Maker | Requirements Barter 100: You gained the magical ability to turn caps into gold and silver at these rates, 10,000 caps to 1 pound of gold, 1,000 caps to 1 pound of silver. Also, for every 100 additional skill points in barter, the return on conversion will increase by 1 pound.

That will come in hand when I need more gold and silver for the production of electronics, which will certainly be needed for the manufacturing of my robots. And because it works off of bottle caps, I should probably make a bottle cap press in the near future so I can have a nearly limitless supply of gold and silver. Though I could probably earn through trade but as with everything, it's better to rely on one's self.

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If you want something else to read, that's similar to this, check out my other webnovel Wasteland Conqueror. It has a lot more chapters released.