Chapter - 2 - Investing For The Future

"Good morning, dear father."

"Good morning, father~."

In an enormous dining hall coloured in floral white and lavender, two voices, one calm and composed while the other cheerful respectively, rang out.

Unlike the teens that have just arrived, a man was sitting with two woman on both of his sides on a long rectangular table. The man turned his eyes to the call before nodding in their direction.

He was a breath-taking man with jet black hair and yellow eyes hidden behind his glasses.

On his right was an elegant looking woman with platinum-coloured short wavy hair. Her big lime green eyes would give someone an impression of innocence. She sent a loving smile to the both teens as she sipped her green tea.

On the left was an upright woman with dark blue straight hair that came down to her waist and hazel-coloured almond eyes. Her every little movement was like that of a well refined knight's. Like the man, she greeted the teens with a simple nod.

"Aaron, Ivan."

After the greetings were over, the man waited for the two to sit down.

The composed one, Aaron was well-built young man with short jet black hair and hazel coloured eyes. Meanwhile, Ivan was the complete opposite of that. He had shoulder-length platinum hair and golden eyes and unlike his brother's body that was built like that of a knight's, he had a slim body befitting of his class, a mage.

As they took their seats, the man who was sitting at the end of the table started eating the meal prepared for them. Following his lead, others also started to eat.

Given how they knew the man hated chatting during meals, the breakfast went by quickly like any other day.

/-----/

"I remember them from my memories but looking at them like this, they aren't that impressive."

Watching the family have their meal from afar, Joshua couldn't help but rub his chin.

The family he was spying on was obviously his own with the black-haired man being his father, Marquis Courtner. Seated right next to him, the knight-like woman was the First Concubine, Sandra and the child-like woman was the Second Concubine, Medea while Aaron and Ivan were his first and second brothers respectively.

For the past 4 days, Joshua had been going around and exploring the march. Thanks to that, he now knew the general outline of the building.

Right now, he was watching his so-called family have breakfast from a tall tree outside. Normally, it would have been more clever of him if he were to use a drone or something similar but just like always, the problem was money. He didn't even have a single penny, leaving him with no choice but to spy on them by himself.

Jumping off the branch he was on, he started to head to the library, where he spent the last four days in.

He didn't know if it was because of his bloodline or because the original Joshua had a special trait but he noticed that he was quick to understand and interpret things.

'Perhaps he had the [Quick Learner] trait... though I know quite a lot of things regarding NPCs and the world-setup, even I can't be fully sure.'

Similar to personalities and characteristics, traits were what defied NPCs. The only aspect that differed it from others was that the traits were permanent and couldn't be changed easily. So you could consider them as the spine of the characters.

For example, the [Quick Learner] trait was a rare one mostly given to the genius. Not only would it improve the quality of the knowledge and lessen the duration one needed to spend on learning. It would also give 10 additional points of intelligence to the said character. It may not seem like a lot at the first glance but considering that traits could improve as the owner used it constantly, those 10 points were bound to increase as the time went on.

'I still can't be so sure though, let's not get my hopes up only to watch it shatter in front of my eyes later on.'

Other than the system, he had no way of checking whatever he had the trait or not as Joshua was a character that appeared once and for all. But there was no doubt that having that trait would accelerate his progress.

While thinking so, he halted his steps. Right in front of him was a majestic looking white door. As he got closer to it, the two guards who were standing on each sides of the door looked at him for a second before stepping down. They were quite skeptical about him visiting the library at first but after watching him come to the library for the last few days, they have grown used to it.

As he entered the library swiftly, Joshua went to the books in the corner without wasting any time. It was the place where he spent most of his time in for the last few days. Taking his seat on the comfy brown coach, he glanced over the gigantic library again.

As technological devices took the place of books, this place was left to rust. One could easily see cracks and cobwebs over the walls. Even so, this library was the only place in the march where he felt comfortable.

He took a red book from his left as he leaned his back to the soft coach.

<Mana Circulation>

The amount of mana one could use could differ depending on the person because of their 'compatibility' but that didn't mean there wasn't any mana around them. Having an important role in all classes, mana was continously flowing around the living without a stop.

That being said, learning how to control it was undoubtedly necessary for Joshua to learn. He had yet to choose a profession but he could easily find out the one he was most compatible with later on. Even without the system's help, there were various ways for him to learn it and he was planning to do so after leaving the march.

But to do that, he first needed to became one of the <Awakened>.

Normally, when their children reached the age of 12, the aristocrats would do anything within their capabilities to awaken them.

...Well, it was obvious Courtner household wasn't such people, at least when it came to Joshua.

The two most used ways to awaken children were either sending them to their affiliated temple or letting them participate in the <Hunting Competition>.

In the temples, priests would aid children to awaken and check both of their 'affinities' and 'classes'. Compared to the other option, sending children to a temple was a much safer one but there were two reasons why some people didn't do so.

The first problem was the cost.

Due to the limited amount of holy power a priest can use at a time, most of the temples used an artifact to test the children instead. With dozens of priests and acolytes sending their holy power to the artifact, they could take care of multiple people at the same time. It was clearly much more efficient than doing it one by one.

And thanks to that, they nearly doubled the prior cost, which was already much more than an average family's monthly income, saying they needed at least that much to maintain the artifact. Well, it was obvious that the money they earned were actually spent for their desires but nobody could openly criticize them about it.

The second problem was the affinity test.

Since most of the temples relied on their holy power, they were doing their best to find children with the light affinity, the one affinity which was most compatible with holy power.

With that being the case, over time, people started to think of people with either light or holy affinity as 'saviours' while people with dark affinity were seen as 'villains' because of their opposite nature.

'So childish...'

When looking over it like this, Joshua started to think that it was a good thing the game wasn't released. Otherwise, he didn't know how his old self would react when faced with harsh comments about how cursory some parts of the game were.

I mean, it was hard to say they didn't have a point as more than half of the people affiliated with darkness were corrupted but that didn't mean all of them were and it's not like it was darkness itself who made them that way. Rather, it was because of the discrimination they received that they strayed off in the first place.

But just think about it for a second, how could light be 'light' if the darkness didn't exist in the first place?

Unfortunately, no matter their affinity, the people who had the brain capacity to think to that point was minuscule.

'The technology keeps advancing but it's hard to say the same for people...'

Now, let's assume a person with darkness affinity were found in a temple, what do you think would happen?

Let me tell you, the next time you ever see them, they would be set as an 'example' in the middle of the town centre with their heads ripped out of the rest of their body and hanging on a stake.

Just thinking about the brusque scene made Joshua have goosebumps. He covered the back of his head with his hand as he gave up on risking his life by going to a temple.

Unfortunately for him, the <Hunting Competition> wasn't the best place either. Even though they accepted people regardless of their affinity, the place went by the unwritten rule 'survival of the fittest'. Just like its name, the ranking results were decided on how many beasts one defeated.

In the past, it was a competition between nobility and aristocracy to show off their heirs and spares. However, for the last few years, the children who passed the test in colosseum were given the chance to participate in this competition.

Even though most of the low-ranking nobles and aristocrats were dissatisfied with it, since the host of the event was an influential person from the Nereus Empire, they had no choice but to zip their mouths shut. With the situation being as it is, they decided to make the best of it. Such as bribing some of the children to help their own.

Unlike how they do it in temples, in a <Hunting Competition>, kids would awaken by being exposed to danger from all sides for a long time. There were some cases when a child couldn't awaken even after going through hell. In such cases, the supervisors would step in and remove them from the competition as things only gets more dangerous the more you stay in. Just because they left the children by themselves in the pit of hell for a while didn't mean they would let them die.

It was just that one needed to overcome life and death situations for them to awaken.

So even if one neither had the money to go to a temple nor could pass the test in the colosseum', that person still has a roundabout way to awaken.

"Well, my situation is a bit messed up for me to risk my life though..."

Given his cursed body, Joshua couldn't afford to risk his life to fight some beasts, especially since he didn't have the required money to hire some bodyguards for himself.

"I can check my affinity after the system finishes upgrading but that still doesn't fix the money and the identification problem of going to a temple, so that's a no."

It's not like he could just go and say ' Ah yes, I'm actually the third son of Marquis Courtner and I ran away from home a bit ago but you guys can keep my secret, right?'.

...

That would definitely go in a [TOP 10 Dumbest People] compilation.

"The test in the colosseum requires one to fight against peers their age, so that's also a big no."

"Going against beasts and such is also out of the question."

"Hm... Actually, drinking poison might work but there's the issue of finding someone who I can trust with the antidote. I can't just go and ask Ruby 'Hey, I'm going to take poison, can you hold this antidote for me?'."

Feeling a bit aggrieved, Joshua put the red book back to where he took it from. Unbeknownst to him, five hours have already passed as he was practicing with his mana core.

"Wait, isn't there a very safe way for me?"

Recalling something, he murmured to himself as his tired eyes shot open. With a excited face, he snapped his fingers.

"That's right! I can just use a [Awakening Stone]."

The [Awakening Stone] was an item that forcibly sent shocks through the veins. It's only downside was that some people weren't able to stand the shock.

With that being said, most of the countries banned the usage of [Awakening Stones] but there were still some people who sold it. Since its supplies were nowhere near the demand, once a [Awakened Stone] appeared on the market, people would flock in like lions left to starve for two weeks.

It was especially so for the elderly people who wanted to reclaim their youth.

But that still didn't mean they were suicidal.

The reason why people died from the shock was because their future potential was much lower than the grade of the [Awakened Stone] used in the first place.

For example, think about two people with <C> ranked potential using <D> and <A> ranked [Awakened Stones] respectively.

The first guy would awaken as a <F>, <G> or <H> ranked with <D> ranked future potential while the second guy's veins would overload because of the power the body couldn't handle and most likely, explode on the spot.

That's why, as the people of this world still haven't found a way to measure their potentials truthfully, it all relied on the related person's luck.

But that wasn't the case for Joshua.

"System."

====================

* [Maintenance Report} *

Time Left= 13h / 43m / 22s

> The user will be notified on completion.

====================

Just like his every other problem, he would also rely on the system for this one.

'I mean, why bother going through so much trouble when you have an OP system, right?'

Smiling happily, he got up from his seat.

"This much should be enough for today."

After stretching for a few minutes, he picked up some other books with the red one he just read being on top and headed back to his room.

"Huuu..."

He couldn't help but exhale the breath he unconsciously took after closing the door behind his back.

Placing the books he barely could lift on his desk, he drew the curtains.

"Ugh, did Ruby visit again? Why is she so obsessed with the curtains, Jesus."

Once every light source in the room died did he sat down on the coach. Unlike the one in the library, this one was hard like a stone that his back hurt. Paying it no mind, he looked at the books in front of him.

There were 6 books at total with each of them being related to magic and mana. Since he didn't know what his profession was yet, he tried his best to find the books with basic knowledge for the past days and this was the result.

Normally, as a half-player and half-NPC with an OP system, he could learn the knowledge in those books with simply 'using' them but decided against so. Rather than simply controlling mana, he wanted to understand the concept behind it. Not only would doing so maximize his potential, it would also satisfy his curiosity.

Just because he knew more about this 'universe' didn't mean he was omniscient. No, he was fully aware that compared to others, his basic knowledge wasn't that different from a kid's.

That's why he wanted to learn more about everything like a newborn baby.

But that didn't mean he would waste his time on unimportant things either. Now that he understood the concept written on the books, there wasn't any need for him to dwell on the books any longer.

Taking the green book that says [Magic Resistance] with fancy black letters, he placed his right hand on its cover.

Closing his eyes, he focused on his heart, where his mana core was.

"...It's like a lump of water."

While thinking so, he concentrated hard to direct a bit of his mana to his fingetips. After a few minutes, he finally got a reaction. The mana started to flow through his arm like a liquid. Slowly, it reached his fingertips.

When his mana came in contact with the book, green particles started to appeared around his hand. After the particles enveloped the whole book, the book turned into a green gaseous orb and shot out to his chest before he could react.

The moment the gas hit his body, he felt a refreshing feeling enveloping him.

"So that's what I was doing wrong."

As the information settled in his mind, Joshua quickly inspected every little detail of it like a fish that met water.

With sparkling eyes, Joshua quickly looked back at the rest of the books as he wiped the sweat on his neck.

"I guess it will take longer than what I initially thought."

/-----/

"Haa... finally, it's over."

Exhausted by the whole process, Joshua rubbed his throbbing temples.

"It wasn't the brightest idea to learn all of them in one go. Ugh, my head..."

Even though he was saying so, there was a satisfied smile hanging on his face.

"Now, what was next in my agenda again?"

After resting for a while, he got back to his feet again. Just after a few steps, he was standing in front the desk. Taking some papers out of his drawer, he sat down on the wooden chair.

"Since I'm done with the books, it's now the time to deal with this mess."

With unwillingness, he took a pouch out of his drawer carefully.

"-Ah, are you kidding with me?"

Even though he tried his best, he still managed to get poked by the items in the pouch as a drop of blood fell down to the floor.

Quickly opening it, he slowly turned it upside down, making its contents fall out. What fell from the pouch were a hundred or so needles with various colours.

Looking at the needles like he was faced with his worst enemy, he rolled up his sleeves and slammed the desk like a detective investigating his crime subjects.

"Now, which one of you is it?"

Right now, the needles in front of Joshua were nearly all of the needles in the march.

Normally, he planned on waiting for the system to finish its update to start looking for the sealed items but this one was different.

[Acat's Needle]

Unlike normal items, there were some items one needed to fulfill a certain condition for them to use [Observation] on it if the skill level wasn't enough and Joshua knew very well about this specific item as it was used by a first-rate villain in the game. So, he knew that he needed at least level 3 [Observation} skill to find it without much trouble.

But he didn't have enough time for him to waste it on increasing his skill level.

That's why, he decided on going with the former method to save time.

Pulling out a tongs, a bowl and a fruit knife he stole from the kitchen, he used tongs to place a one-seventh of the needles in the bowl. He brought the knife closer to his left wrist as he cut it without a hint of hesitation.

"Ah--!"

Gritting his teeth to keep his scream shout, he watched as the bowl was filled with his blood. He didn't take his eyes of the bowl even for a second as he pressed a piece of cloth to the cut. After making sure the bleeding stopped, he took the bowl into his hands as he sent a bit of his mana to the bowl. But after a few minutes without anything happening, he shook his head in defeat.

Placing another piece of cloth to the side, he took the needles out of the bowl and put them on the cloth as it absorbed the blood on them.

Tying the cloth he used to press his wound to his wrist, he kept on doing the same thing with other needles.

" I'm glad I didn't choose the other option at the very least."

Looking at the needles covered in blood, Joshua shivered as he thought of the pain he would have felt if he stabbed them to himself one by one.

He may have been harassed for a long time but that didn't mean he liked it. Especially since he now had a purpose he wanted to fulfill instead of his old self who kept on living just because he didn't die yet.

Finally, after repeating the same process for four more times, he found what he was looking for.

In the middle of the bowl filled with dark red blood and dozens of needles made from different materials was a shining silver needle with a orange fog surrounding it. Few seconds later, the fog cleared out only to reveal a moist black needle shining with orange lines mixed on it.

Even though Joshua wanted to experiment on it immediately, his body was completely exhausted after all the things he did today.

Placing the black needle in the middle of the desk, he cleared the surroundings as he put the needles back in the pouch. He still had a use for them, after all.

After washing his blooded hands and changing his clothes, he slept like a log. For the first time in his life, this crooked bed felt like a cloud from heaven.