Chapter 3 – Let’s try bestowing a dubious skill!

At home I kept quiet about the Hidden Dungeon. Leaving father aside, mother and Alice would definitely try to stop me from going there again. ‘Don’t do anything dangerous!’ they’d say. I did share the gold slimes with them though.

“Do you two want to try these? Where I got them from is a secret, but they’re really tasty.”

“Noir, when you said ‘two’ just now you excluded me, didn’t you? Even though you looked at me you pretended not to see me, didn’t you?”

My father was starting to get melancholic so I reluctantly raised the quota from two to three. They all tried a mouthful of jelly and then exclaimed at the same time.

“””Delicious!”””

No surprise they reacted that way. It’s so good I also let out a shout when I first had a bite.

So now the left over amount is… Oi, isn’t father’s gluttony about to completely wipe them out? That’s why I left you out at first!

Well, I can always get some more so I guess it’s fine.

“Brother, this is the first time I’ve eaten something this sweet and delicious!”

“Yeah, I’ll try getting my hands on some more sometime soon. By the way, about the hero school, when was the entrance exam again?”

“My son, that would be tomorrow.”

“Just hypothetically, if I were to pass it you wouldn’t be able to pay the school fee, would you?”

“Ughh… come now, there’s this thing called a father’s dignity-…”

It was clear as day how troubled he was. I have two elder brothers, but they have both left the royal capital and moved to different cities. My oldest brother was serving knightly duties in a different region and my other brother was attending a commercial school.

Commercial schools’ fees were pretty high so our House Stalgia was in a dire situation as far as getting money was concerned. That’s also the reason I originally turned towards a job instead of continuing my education.

“Hero school alows part time jobs, doesn’t it? In that case I’ll also become an adventurer or dungeon seeker.”

“But, Noir, you…”

“Father, I, too, am at an age of growth. Do raise your expectations.”

“That’s no good, brother! Please, anything but a dangerous job-”

“Alice, I may look like this, but I’m still a man.”

With a swishing sound I exhibited a practice swing with the sword. I could tell the level ups raised my physical abilities, because it turned into quite the display. Even father turned silent in a moment.

Befitting a son of House Stalgia I shall become strong, father.

◇ ◆ ◇

The next day I decided to put the skills I received from master into practical use. First of all I wanted to get my hands on a certain convenient skill through skill creation. As I progress in the Hidden Dungeon my level should keep increasing as well, but going to the church every single time would turn into a bother quick.

My target was analyze.

I will also need it to check whether 「Skill Bestowal」 actually worked for when I use that.

『Analyze 300 LP』

Sure is expensive… If I created this right now my remaining life points would be 200. That sounds like I would collapse on the spot.

Master also told me that with low life points one’s resistance to sickness sank as well. With that in mind I guess I should replenish them first.

“Sorry for making you wait, Noir~!”

Emma arrived at our meeting place at the public park. I called her here to thank her for her help yesterday.

“Good morning Emma. Is your air different from usual?”

“Ee~, I wonder~, no way~”

The girl that was responding to me with a brimming grin dislikes clothes that show a lot of skin. To be precise, she doesn’t like clothes that tease one’s chest. However, today she wore a bare shoulder dress that was exposing all the way to her cleavage.

“It’s rare to see you in these kinds of clothes. You usually don’t wear anything too revealing.”

“Well of course, when I do wear them everyone only looks at my breasts after all. There are also people that call girl cows to harass them~”

“So won’t these clothes also get you an unnecessary amount of attention?”

“That’s why, today! Today is different. Aa, Noir, you idiot don!”

Idiot don caught me off guard, but I could see I upset her.

“Sorry, I didn’t mean to make you angry. I wanted to meet you because I’ve got a tasty dessert to share with you.”

“Ooh? I’m happy, maybe.”

“Here you go.”

I gave her what had become the last piece of jelly due to father.

“Sweeeeet?!”

Looks like it was good enough for her to stretch the sound.

“Where’d you buy this?”

“I didn’t actually buy it, but where I got it from is a secret.”

“Boo, there are no secrets between childhood friends.”

“A man with secrets is more charming, is what someone somewhere once said.”

Even without secrets, Noir is… is what Emma was about to say, but she didn’t continue. That’s when I told her about my request.

“Weird story, but I’d like to try hugging you.”

“What’s this all of a sudden!?”

“Well you look so charming today after all. So that’s a no?”

“It-It’s not like I said no though.”

“Here I go then.”

I embraced her closely. This should also fall under intimate conduct with the opposite sex, is what I was thinking.

The feeling of her lithe body and the comfort of her soft arms holding on to me was so overwhelming I accidentally put more strength into the hug. In response she did the same and for a while we remained in that position.

Spontaneously I took in the scent of her hair. It had the tinge of a refreshing soap.

You could really tell she was of a wealthier family than me. She also knew how to spend her money.

“Thanks for your help.”

“…I mean, this is more of a simple greeting really. Anytime is okay if it’s just that.”

The plan was a success.

500 LP → 800 LP.

I wonder if it’s because it was a first time experience, that’s quite the leap.

Right away I created analyze, which put me at 550 LP. With my newly gained skill I analyzed Emma.

Name: Emma Brightness

Age: 16

Race: Human

Level: 18

Occupation: Unemployed

Skills: 「Dual-wielding Daggers (C)」 「Wind Attack」

For the dagger skill there was a rank attached. The order went C, B, A, S, with S being the peak. However, even someone with rank C has remarkable technique that couldn’t be compared to someone with no skill at all.

That said… Unemployed?

“How’s your job as librarian coming along?”

“I quit yesterday~. Felt like it wasn’t for me.”

“Isn’t that some pretty hasty judgement?”

“I guess, maybe~”

With a loud ‘Uwahahaha~’ Emma laughed while copying some herculean hero.

If I were to apply right now to fill the position that just became vacant… No, I shouldn’t think about that. I’ve already decided on a different path to walk.

Having successfully acquired analyze I went on a walk with Emma, during which she frequently stretched her shoulders. I asked her if her shoulders felt stiff and she gave a deep nod.

“Is it because your chest is so heavy?”

“Well, yes, it is! But is that something you say to a woman!?”

“Childhood friends, right? I can say things to you I couldn’t say to other girls.”

“A-, yeah… ehe. Right, that’s just how good our relationship is.”

As I was thinking about how to help her out I had a good idea.

『Tiny Breasts: 30 LP』

Uwoa-, even something like that can be created… Or maybe this kind of skill had already existed. Actually, can you even call this a skill?

“If you could become flat chested, would you want to?”

“That sure sounds lovely~. It was nice back in the day as well.”

“Want me to grant that wish?”

“Ohohoho~, absolutely, please do~”

I decided to test the bestowal skill. Looks like granting her that skill had a cost of 50 LP. Combined with the skill itself that’ll be 80 LP.

Well, I’ve got 550 so it’s fine. I created 「Tiny Breasts」 and passed it on.

That same moment Emma’s huge chest shrank before our very eyes all the way to the shape of a washboard. With her breasts disappearing her cleavage also went off to who knows where.

“――Ueh? What did you dooo!?”

“Tried giving you tiny breasts.”

“Why are you even able to-!? What, what happened!?”

“I bestowed upon you a skill called tiny breasts.”

Like a fish on land Emma was flapping her mouth. Well I can see why, no way she could understand what just happened. To give her some relief I told her that she won’t have to deal with any more shoulder pain caused by her chest.

“What’s with this, flatness… It’s like I’m someone else.”

“I think your weight reduced a little as well. Also, I heard there’s a good amount of people that prefer flat chests, good for you.”

“…Is that true?”

“Yup. Although I definitely prefer bigger sizes.”

“Turn them back right now!”

“Ee…”

And here I just wanted to rid her of her shoulder problems. Doesn’t that turn it into a total LP waste? But seeing the affected person herself appealing earnestly like that I complied.

Hm, should I create 「Huge Breasts」 in this situation? But the two skills might just offset each other and turn out normal sized.

Massive breasts then? Or hyper breasts. Explosive breasts. Scary.

Might as well use this opportunity to test the edit skill.

「Tiny Breasts」

〈Turns breasts tiny.〉

Seems like it let’s me edit anything within the brackets, be it rewriting the letters or deleting them. For now I will try just removing the word tiny.

『Tiny』 Removal: 90 LP

Uwa-. It’s a shame but oh well.

Being reduced to 380 LP made me experience some dizziness, but it looks like the edit was successful and the tiny breasts skill vanished.

It probably disappeared as a whole because the remaining sentence couldn’t stand on its own.

“Yay! It’s back, my chest is back!”

“Glad that worked out. Although I’m not feeling so well… would you mind giving me a lap pillow?”

“Oh my, you’re really pale! Come here.”

On a bench nearby she made me rest on her thighs. Thanks to her lap pillow I recovered a little and returned back to 450 LP. Since there’s one more thing I want to use edit on I’ll conserve them for the time being.

“That reminds me, Emma, we still haven’t done one of those foreign country greetings today.”

“Eh~, are you still feeling unwell?”

“It’s for the sake of a quick recovery.”

“No helping it then~”

Approaching my face on her lap she slowly descended her lips onto mine.

Seems like a success. My LP went up to 500.

“If possible, one more.”

“Nh-”

Unfortunately the second time didn’t cause an increase. Looks like I need to wait for a kind of cooldown for repeated actions to have an effect. I suppose that’s to be expected, otherwise you could just raise your LP without end.

I’m also curious how doing something for the first time affects the gain.

There sure are lots of things to try out.