--
TJ looked at the sub-profession badge and scroll and decided:
"Yeah, not right now..."
Initially, he'd been looking forward to using these and seeing what kind of sub-profession he'd get, but seeing how packed his schedule was, he decided to shelve this for now.
See, knowing that he's lacking in the attack department, TJ bought more offensive active skills:
[Lunging Strike] (0/100)
• Lunge with your weapon at the enemy, delivering a piercing strike that carries you forward. Can be used twice before going into cooldown.
• Duration: 3 seconds
• Cooldown: 10 seconds
Skill Perk: [Reset]
[Multi-Stab] (0/100)
• Stab multiple times in a row (max. 10)
• Duration: 5 seconds
• Cooldown: 30 seconds
Skill Perk: [Accuracy]
[Hamstringer] (0/100)
• Cut the target's hamstrings, has a 10% chance to [Immobilize], otherwise, [Slow]
• Cooldown: 30 seconds
Skill Perk: [Immobilize]/[Slow]
He even bought skills for Hotshot.
[Charged Shot] (0/100)
• Channel power into your gun, making the next shot gain more power
• Channeling Duration: min. 2 seconds, max. 10 seconds
• Cooldown: 30 seconds
Skill Perk: [Pierce]—Chance to pierce through the target or whatever's in between by 10%
[Fan the Hammer] (0/100)
• Fire 6 quick shots
• Cooldown: 30 seconds
• Skill Perk: [Accuracy]
These five skills should be more than enough to cover for his lacking offensive department.
Yet this new addition brings up a new problem. There's just too much that needed his attention and focus—mainly grinding out his old and new skills.
He already had his hands full with his old skills, and he certainly can't neglect his new skills either. With all of this combined, TJ suddenly felt overwhelmed. How could he even think about adding the sub-profession grind to this?
Even though he decided to practice his new skills first, just to get them to the same level as his old skills, that will still take time.
There's less than two months before his college life starts. That's not enough to get the rest of his skills up to the same level as his old skills, that's for sure. But he'd damn well try anyway.
So, yeah. No sub-professions for now.
Even though his college life hasn't started yet, he couldn't afford to rest; he's always training, trying to increase his mastery over his skills so that he could have an edge against other freshmen in due time.
While his chosen school hasn't demanded anything from him, TJ still worked hard out of his own volition. TJ held himself up to a certain standard, and he won't be satisfied with an 'alright' result; he wants to excel, and excelling requires solid work ethics, hard work, and effort.
TJ knows himself. If he rolled for a sub-profession right now, he'd end up obsessing over it. He will forcibly add it to his routine, which was already stretching him too thin. If he forced himself to keep up with everything, he'd crash and burn, fast. That's why he refrained from adding any more load to his already packed schedule.
What he can do, in the meantime, is to use the other items that MJ sent to him.
Mainly the equipment and weapon stubs.
These stubs, when used, will generate gear depending on the type of ticket stub used.
A combat pro's main equipment pieces were headgear, a chest piece, pants, and boots.
The name isn't strict; a headgear could be a helmet or some shades that have some enchantments. Chest pieces could either look like tank tops or full-on scale mail. Pants could be shorts, slacks, a battle skirt, etc. And boot gears could appear as slippers, heels, greaves, or whatever fits the bill.
These four (headgear, chest piece, pants, and boots) were the main set, though. As for the rest, they were considered as attachments, jewelry, accessories, etc. They are considered equipment gears too, but they're more like bonus equipment.
Using the equipment and weapon stubs, TJ was surprised that they will be randomly generated.
He thought that he could choose from a selection, but nope. For the main set, though, at least, he'd roll them as one. Meaning that he doesn't have to worry about mismatched equipment.
TJ finally used them all, generating ten equipment parts and one weapon. But to his surprise, his curse, 『???』, suddenly made its presence known and interfered again.
"Really!? Come on!" TJ groaned.
This is all he could really do: complain. He couldn't stop it. Nobody could. This abominable curse of his just loved to pounce when he least expected it.
But seriously? On the equipment too? What the hell does it want?
Eventually, the roll slowed down, but it's meaningless at this point since all he could see was all the same.
[Accursed Knight Set]—how thematic, eh? How nice of this curse to interfere/make sure that he gets equipment that fits him perfectly.
So awesome! (Notice the sarcasm here.)
Grumbling in annoyance, TJ decided to see what he got first before he continued complaining.
**
[Accursed Knight Set] (0/1000)
• Enchantment: [Protection]
: [Protection]—increases defense rating by 10%
[Accursed Needlesword] (0/1000)
• Enchantment: [Sharpness]
: [Sharpness]—increases weapon's slicing and piercing power by 10%
**
"Well, hello there!" TJ was shocked as the armor set and weapon manifested before him.
The [Accursed Knight Set] had, without surprise, dark and gloomy colors. It's a mixture of dull black, grey, and ash. Instead of armor, it looked more like a uniform.
Its chest piece had both a black inner shirt and a long-sleeved polo shirt. They're a tight fit for his body and were automatically designed to always fit him perfectly.
The pants were pair of slacks, ask in color, light and airy. The boots were black greaves, heavy, solid, but comfortable.
And the headgear was a lower-face mask connected to a metal bar that goes around his head, protecting his temples.
It looked...weird and mismatched. It doesn't even look like a proper armor set at all, but the system won't lie to him.
Other than that, it's a perfect fit for him, and he actually looks quite alright wearing it. It wasn't uncomfortable or restricting; he could move just fine with it.
As for the [Accursed Needlesword], it's a proper estoc with a really sharp tip. The blade was gorgeous; its surface had those wavy patterns, its edges were sharp, almost cutting air itself, and it was light—almost weightless, even—and TJ felt no discomfort using it.
All in all, TJ was quite satisfied with what he got.
Even better were the (0/1000) values next to their name. TJ had seen this so many times that he's familiar with it. He knows that if he fills these numbers, the equipment will be upgraded.
This was the magic of [Growth]-type gear; they grow stronger alongside their users. Hotshot, the blunderbuss, was like this too.
Right now, TJ has no idea what it would take to increase these values. Is it expensive, certain equipment, or resources?
He really doesn't know. It's the same thing for Hotshot; that's why he hasn't been able to increase the quality of the gun, either. But he had time to figure these things out. He just needs to try it out when he has time.
Of course, it didn't end here. He had a total of 10 tickets for his equipment gear. So far, the Accursed Knight Set occupied four, meaning that there were six more pieces of equipment he needed to check out.
**
[Stamina Ring] (0/100)
• Increases stamina recovery by 10%
[Ring of Healing] (0/100)
• Increases health recovery by 10%
[Mana Ring] (0/100)
• Increases mana quality and regeneration by 10%
[Null Ring] (0/100)
• Nullifies one (1) attack completely per day.
[Defiant's Locket] (0/100)
• Exempts the user from certain death once a month
[Cloak of Darkness] (0/100)
• Grants [Camouflage] after standing still in place for 10 seconds (halves in dark places or at nighttime)
**
"Awesome!!!" TJ was thrilled.
The other rings were okay, but the Null Ring? Game changer. Even more so the Defiant's Locket; this one was a genuine life-saving artifact disguised as regular equipment.
He didn't think he'd be so lucky with these things, but he's not complaining at all.
The Cloak of Darkness looked badass. Paired with the Accursed Knight Set, he looks like an edgy assassin or something. If he started roleplaying, he might actually be mistaken as one.
But in truth, with all the tendencies of the Accursed Knight's skillset, acting like an assassin was out of the question; his skills kind of turn him into a front-liner, a bruiser, or a tank.
Once again, although 『???』 interfered, it didn't turn out to be a bad thing entirely.
This mysterious curse of his was really strange. Whenever he thinks that it's sabotaging his career, it ends up helping him instead. Yet despite this, he still doesn't even know its name or what its purpose was.
It had tormented him for a long time with additional voices in his head; then, it interfered with his class transition, and now, it interfered again with his equipment and weapon pull. The voices were gone, but TJ still thinks that they'd come back one day.
"Well, no skin off my back right now. Take your time, TJ. Maybe you're not yet strong enough to know. One day, all of your questions will be answered. Right now, endure, take, and use every advantage you can get to become stronger first.