PERSEVERANCE!

[ERROR]

[User's Mentality is too low to learn anything more]

"Again?" Mako complained to himself in a low tone as he stared at the blue prompt in front of his eyes with a contemplative gaze.

The Mentality Attribute was considered by the system as the most important attribute as it defined the limit as to how far Mako could grow, and how much he could learn.

Mako opened his status sheet to see how many free attribute points he had, and surprisingly he had a few attribute points remaining which he intended on putting towards his energy bar and fortitude attribute.

'Open System Interface'

[User: Mako Grey]

[Health: 200/200] ⓘ

[Energy: 500/500] ⓘ

[EXP: 9000/12800] ⓘ

[Level 8] ⓘ

[Strength: 22 (+15) ] ⓘ

[Agility: 17 (+15) ] ⓘ

[Perception: 22 ] ⓘ

[Intelligence: 20] ⓘ

[Mentality: 14] ⓘ

[Stamina: 14 (+10) ] ⓘ

[Charisma: Locked] ⓘ

[Fortitude: 5] ⓘ

[Attribute Points: 11] ⓘ

"Well then, I will just have to earn more attribute points for my fortitude later," Mako spoke out loud as he came to a decision.

'Add all attribute points to Mentality.' Mako commanded the system.

[11 Attribute Points have been added to Mentality]

[Mentality: 25]

The cooling sensation that Mako was used to feeling whenever he upgraded one of his attributes through his system was more intense than ever to the point that he thought he was going to get a brain freeze.

"Now let us resume with these books," Mako said as he picked up the skill book once again.

Skill Book: [(E-Tier) Dash] ⓘ (LEVEL 1)

[Does the User want to instantly learn?]

[YES/NO]

"YES!" Mako exclaimed as the book disappeared into particles of light as another skill was added under the skills tab.

Without wasting any more time, Mako picked up the remaining two books and learned them instantly as well. Filled with so much energy, Mako was just itching to try out his new abilities when all of a sudden he heard a familiar sound.

*DING!*

Knowing that it could only mean one thing, Mako quickly opened up his notifications, and sure enough, there was an exclamation icon on the quests tab.

[Hidden Quest Complete]

[Learn 10 new power or basic skills.]

[Reward: +1000 EXP, +500 Energy]

At first glance, the rewards looked rather disappointing, but once Mako realized that along with a small EXP reward, he had now doubled the amount of energy to cast skills, Mako was beyond happy.

He had learned from the system that as he grew stronger, it would take more attribute points to upgrade his attributes and the rate at which a certain attribute would upgrade would differ. This was quite unfortunate for Mako as initially, he thought to just grind daily quests for a year or two and then become invincible, but that wasn't the case at all.

The energy bar was also an important factor as it dictated how many skills Mako could cast, so he was pleased with the fact that he had a decent amount of energy to play with now.

Seeing as the reward was tied to how many skills Mako had gained, Mako decided to review his progress thus far.

'Open Skills Tab'

[Skills] ⓘ

[Basic Skills] ⓘ

- [(E-Tier) Ten-Palm Strike] ⓘ (LEVEL 1)

- [(E-Tier) Dash] ⓘ (LEVEL 1)

- [(E-Tier) Motion Sense] ⓘ (LEVEL 1)

[Power Skills] ⓘ

- [(E-Tier) Elemental Control] ⓘ (LEVEL 2)

- [(F-Tier) Fireball] ⓘ (LEVEL 2)

- [(E-Tier) Flame wheel] ⓘ (LEVEL 1)

- [(E-Tier) Flame Pillar] ⓘ (Level 1)

- [(E-Tier) Elemental Control] ⓘ (LEVEL 1)

- [(F-Tier) Lightning Strike] ⓘ (LEVEL 1)

- [(E-Tier) Electrical Discharge] ⓘ (LEVEL 1)

[Unique Skills] ⓘ

- [(D-Tier) Analyze] ⓘ (LEVEL 2)

- [(F-Tier) Phantom Punch] ⓘ (LEVEL 3)

- [(F-Tier) Phantom Shift] ⓘ (LEVEL 3)

- [(F-Tier) Phantom Kick] ⓘ (LEVEL 2)

[Absolute Skills] ⓘ (NONE)

Still hadn't unlocked any absolute skills, but those would come in due time as well as Mako didn't want to sweat over it.

Closing the system interface, Mako walked back into the living room only to find that Bill hadn't moved an inch from where he was sitting before as he was totally absorbed in learning the wind ability.

Seeing that he couldn't do anything, Mako decided to leave him be and instead practice a bit with his new abilities for which he headed toward the forest.

Although Mako did enjoy a good sparring partner such as Bill, there were a few things that he couldn't do in his presence as he wanted to keep the system a secret.

****************

It had been two hours into training and Mako was beyond happy using his lightning skills. He could feel the electricity course through his veins and strike at the nearby tree and bringing him a great sense of joy and wonder.

He wasn't a weak pushover boy anymore as he now had an overpowered system, two abilities, and a variety of new skills that complimented them greatly.

Mako still couldn't perform the Dash and Motion Sense skills due to their high fortitude requirement. These abilities caused quite a strain on the body, so a strong body was necessary for them to be used correctly otherwise if Mako was to forcefully use these abilities now, they could cause internal bleeding and much more.

He had just unlocked the Fortitude attribute, and it wasn't very high so for the following days, Mako decided to pump all his earned attribute points directly into Fortitude.

"Come to think of it, I unlocked something else alongside Fortitude if I am not mistaken," Mako said as he recalled the reward notification he received after defeating Rhino.

'Open System Interface'

[Profile] ⓘ

[Titles] ⓘ (NEW!)

[Quests] ⓘ

[Skills] ⓘ

[Inventory] ⓘ

[Shop] ⓘ

A brand new tab had opened up in front of Mako and it had an exclamation icon next to it which indicated that there was something that Mako hadn't seen.

Mako got so involved with the Dark Raven threat and his new abilities that he had totally ignored this up till now, so now that he was more curious than ever, he commanded the system to open the Titles tab.

[Titles] ⓘ

[Titles are the achievements earned by the user as they do certain feats. Once the user has unlocked or gained a new title, it will be displayed in the Titles tab. Each title has some kind of boost attached to it that can help the user in different scenarios. Currently, the user can only keep one title active at any given time; with the possibility of increasing this number by the user leveling up.]

[Available Titles: PERSEVERANCE]

[Active Title(s): - ]

Mako was quite embarrassed by the fact that he had chosen to ignore such an important thing as the titles were similar to having perks. Perks were a type of boost that could be given to a character in the video games that Mako used to play with Gary, where a perk would increase a certain stat of the player or give them a special ability.

Mako wanted to find out what 'PERSEVERANCE' could do, so he immediately used Analyze on it.

'Analyze'

[PERSEVERANCE] ⓘ

[By doing anything so many times, a person creates a tolerance towards them. Taking a beating comes naturally to the user and now that he has had enough and taken down the foes who used to dish out these beatings, the user has unlocked this title.

PERSEVERANCE is a passive title that activates automatically. If the user receives continuous blows for more than a minute without countering, PERSEVERANCE is activated.

For the next five minutes, the user will receive 50% more damage from his opponents, but every time, the user is hit, a rage meter fills up. After the five minutes are over, PERSEVERANCE deactivates and the rage meter is unleashed.

RAGE MODE: While the rage meter is active, the user enters Rage mode. While in Rage mode, the user gains a +200% increase in Strength, Fortitude, and Agility. Blinded by the rage, the user's intelligence drops significantly as the only thing on his mind during that time is to defeat his opponent. If the Rage meter is completely full before the user enters rage mode, then the duration of Rage mode will be twice as long.

Once the rage meter is diminished, the user's stats return to normal, but with a debuff 'exhaustion'. For the next ten minutes, the energy cost for the casting of each ability is increased by 50%.

PERSEVERANCE can only be activated once every 24 hours.]

It was a very big description with a lot of detail and Mako read through it a couple of times already with only one thought in his mind.

'Overpowered!'

The boost that 'PERSEVERANCE' provided was quite balanced that he would be vulnerable for 5 minutes before Rage mode could kick in, and also there was the 'exhaustion' debuff that was quite annoying as well, but since Mako currently didn't have any heavy energy costing abilities, he didn't worry about it too much.

Mako instantly commanded the system to put 'PERSEVERANCE' as the active title.

[PERSEVERANCE is now active]

Mako wanted to try out this rage mode during his training as well, but according to the description, Mako couldn't activate it on will as it was a passive ability that would activate if he couldn't counter an enemy for more than a minute.

Thinking of how he could test out Rage mode, Mako thought about using Bill but quickly rejected that idea because the Rage mode skill stated that he would have a significant loss in intelligence when in Rage mode, and he could potentially seriously injure Bill, and he didn't want that at all.

Thinking about it a bit more, Mako didn't even realize when the sun had completely set and nighttime had begun. Mako was suddenly brought out of his train of thought by a stray cat jumping on his head from a nearby tree so that it could catch the rat that was walking past Mako.

"AHHH!" Mako screamed as the cat didn't care and instead gave chase to the rat that ran off into the darkness.

Now realizing that it was dark, Mako decided to head home and make something to eat. As Mako was making his way to his house, he observed the city that now looked very beautiful with all the different advertisement screens and lights. All these different sources of light came together to give off a green hue from the city which looked as if the city was glowing green, and this was the reason why it was named Emerald City.

Looking at the city again, Mako suddenly had a great idea.

"That could actually work!" Mako said to himself as he gave a sinister grin, and instead of making his way back home, Mako decided to head into the city.