Argo Chapter 25
Author's note: Keyboard's still broken, so this is going to take quite some time to write... -_-;
And writer's block now. *dies* This is going to take a while...
Argo leaned down to look at me. I fought to meet her eyes, panting heavily and using every bit of my strength to stay upright. "Oi, you don't look so good." She said with an curious expression. She had a pen and pad, which she scribbled in without looking.
"I... have to... get back to... my sister..." I panted out. She thought about it for a few seconds, then nodded.
"Actually, that'll probably be better. To get both of you together." Then, she grabbed my arm and threw it around her shoulders, then started half-carrying me back the way we came. Back toward Keiko. Within moments, I started feeling better. That's when it hit me. I couldn't move too far away from Keiko, or this would happen.
And that's when the other half hit me. Keiko would be feeling the same way. I planted my foot against the rooftop and kicked off with the little bit of strength I had. I clenched my teeth as it felt like I would collapse again. I forced my feet to run forward. With every step, I could feel it get easier to keep going. I judged the distance roughly. I'd been a little farther than two-hundred meters from the place we fought the boss. So, that was the largest distance I could put between us before I wouldn't even be able to stand anymore.
It was astounding how quickly I regained my strength as I rushed back toward my little sister. In moments, I'd started to leave Argo behind. I reached the edge of the roof and threw myself over without a second thought. I looked down into the swarm below, but couldn't see Keiko. That didn't matter. I could feel exactly where she was, and as I landed, knocking people down with me, I barreled through the crowd without a thought.
In a moment, I reached my sister and grabbed her, picking her up and saying how sorry I was. It took a moment to process how she looked when I first saw her. Confused, maybe slightly afraid. Argo was right behind me, speaking loudly over the commotion. "Come on, this way. I'm not one for crowds." She pulled at my elbow and I had to set Keiko down before we set off through the crowd again.
As soon as she found a good spot, Argo scaled the side of a building and we followed her up. Now with the commotion below us, it was much more quiet and Keiko asked, "Onii-chan, who is this?" I saw Argo make a strange look for a moment, but it quickly disappeared.
It took a few seconds to bring her name to my lips. "This is, uhh, Argo."
"Argo, the «Rat». Information broker. You must be the little sister then?" She put her hand out and Keiko shook it halfheartedly.
"Well, it seems that she wants a favor..." I said hesitantly.
"I'm owed a favor," she wagged her finger at me. Keiko looked back and forth between us.
"Ahh, that is... she helped me out of the way before that huge crowd ran me over back there. And without thinking, I kind of said 'I owe you one'..."
Keiko sighed dramatically. "Onii-chan, don't go promising random strangers favors!" She puffed out her cheeks and glared at me for a moment, then started giggling. "Well, a promise is a promise, what's this favor you need from us?"
Argo smiled. "I want you to tell me about the 'Blessed Twins' thing that monster talked about."
"O,oh? That?" I blinked. I'm not so sure, but I think it has to do with this skill we got..." I pulled my menu open and switched to the skills section. I tapped the button to show her and she looked closely at my skill window. Her eyes went wide as soon as she saw it. "Why are your skill levels so high already?" she muttered. I noticed that my One-handed sword skill was level 21 and my Sprint skill was level 20. That was high? Didn't Klein say they leveled up 1000 times though? I only had twenty points in each.
Then her eyes slid down to the third skill on my list. «Blessed Twins». This was still level 1. I tapped the skill and the information came up in the other window. Argo's eyes scanned the sparse information, then she asked, "Can I see your skills menu?" It took me a moment to remember there were two menus labeled «Skills». I tapped the icon with the little rectangles(1) to open my status menu and switched to the skills section. I'd never actually looked at it before, now that I thought about it.
I tapped the icon and my right-hand window changed again. It went back to a plain white, the same way as the other skill menu. The drop-down in the middle displayed a few things. The first was «Sprint». I tapped it, bells jingling as always. The skill information came up in the right window and I read,
『Type: Active』
『Run forward, in a straight line to activate. Increases maximum movement speed by 77% while active.』
The 77% was written in green, so I tapped it to see if it would do anything. The tiny window that appeared simply said, 『75+2』.
Focus returning to the drop-down, I scanned the rest of the list. The other items were «Stat Boost», «Proximity Link», and «Exp Share» I could see Argo staring at them intently, her face twitching slightly as she waited for me to pull up the info on each one. It almost made me grin at how excited she looked, but I dropped the thought because I was really curious as well.
So, I started going down the list, opening each and reading their descriptions carefully. First was «Stat Boost». It read:
『Type: Passive』
『Increases Strength and Agility by 2% of Twin's Strength and Agility』
『(Bonus is doubled if equipment is identical)』
Again, the number was green, so I tapped it and the little box had 『(1+0)x2』. We were dressed identically right now, so the 'x2' had to be the 'double' part. I watched Argo nod emphatically at the description.
"Next." She said. While she didn't say it in a very nice tone, I had finished anyway, so I obliged. I touched «Proximity Link» This one read.
『Type: Passive』
『Increases Strength and Agility by a maximum of 1% of base Strength and Agility. Bonus decreases by 1% per 25 meters of distance to Twin.』
『Caution: When bonus drops below 0% Each 25 meters further decreases Strength and Agility by 1.』
"Ah, so that's why I started getting so weak earlier. Basically, we can't go very far apart, or we'll keep getting weaker until we can't move anymore," I explained to Keiko, who was reading over my shoulder.
"Hehehe, ahh... Sorry about that earlier..." Argo laughed awkwardly. The last one was «Exp Share». It was more simple, but probably the most helpful skill of the bunch.
『Type: Passive』
『Grants Experience equal to all Experience gained by Twin.』
"Wow, doesn't that basically mean we gain double exp?" Keiko asked.
Argo nodded quickly. "That's incredible," she commented. Then, "Well, not quite." She put a finger up to her whiskered cheek. "If you were to fight together to kill a monster, you would each get about half of the exp because of how the system splits exp in parties. However, each of you, assuming you have the skill as well?" she pointed at Keiko, who quickly nodded.
"Then, each of you would also gain the other half of the exp from killing the mob. In effect, you would be gaining the same amount of exp as if you were soloing. From the sound of it, the skill would be most useful if each of you were to fight separate monsters. Then you would both gain the exp for killing two mobs while you would only need to fight one."
"Oh, that's why I gained seventy-two thousand exp from those wolves back there-"
"What?! How much exp did you get?" I saw her hand stop for a moment, before scribbling with doubly renewed effort.
"I got seventy-two thousand for killing two of those wolves. However, that means I also got some for the two Keiko killed. That means my two were only worth thirty-six thousand. That makes each wolf worth eighteen thousand." I spoke slowly as I did the math in my head.
"Eighteen thousand..." Argo spoke in a low voice. "How much Col?"
"That would be..." I thought back, then divided the number by four. "Five thousand Col." Her hand twitched through a few more lines, probably noting all the number I gave. What did she say she did again? Something about information? I'd been kind of messed up and my memory was a bit fuzzy from the weakness, so it was hard to recall.
"What about items?"
"Well..." my mouth twisted into a bit of a grimace. "I... don't think that's really... applicable..." I spoke hesitantly.
"Hehehehe..." Keiko chuckled awkwardly behind me, scratching her head. Argo's eyebrow went up. The motion made it look like her whiskers twitched as well.
"And..." she spoke slowly, eyes focused intently on our faces, "why would that be?"
"Well... How to explain..." I mumbled, thinking.
"I'm lucky." Keiko said simply. Argo's eyebrow twitched up a bit further, her whiskers following again.
"Lucky?"
"Yes, lucky."
"Ok..." She looked down at her little pad for the first time. "Lucky..." She said as she wrote it down. She then underlined it a few times and added a '?' after.
All this talk of skills and experience made me wonder about something. How much exp had we actually gotten from the boss? My menu was still open, so I switched to the status section and checked my info.
"Woah! What the hell?" The words suddenly came from Argo.
"What?" I asked immediately, eyes moving away from my menu.
"Y,y,h,w..." she kept choking off her words, so I didn't know what she was trying to say. I made a rolling sort of motion with my hands to tell her 'go on...' but her mouth just kind of flapped open and closed for a while. Finally, she shook her head and cleared her throat. "You're level 12 already?" We've only been here for three days."
"Well, yeah... I guess?" I didn't know how to answer, but when I thought about it, I went on, "actually, we've only really been playing for two days. The first day we were figuring out what this whole game," mentally including that it couldn't really be called a game anymore, "was about."
Her face went blank. "Are you telling me you think its perfectly normal, in two days," pointing at my menu, "to gain two-hundred forty-six thousand exp?!"
"Actually, I have no idea. This is the first video game we ever really played," I responded honestly, scratching my head in unison with Keiko.
"Then tell me this, about how many mobs have you killed?" I looked up, counting on my fingers as I thought back. Those wolves, that boar, the boss wolf... that was... "Seven. Err, seven between the two of us anyway."
Argo's eye twitched. "Do you know how many mobs I've killed?" Obviously I didn't so I shook my head. "Well over seven-hundred! I spent all yesterday farming! And you know what level I am? Four! Now even if you've never played a game in your life, how can you possibly tell me that that makes sense?"
I blinked a few times. "Four?" I glanced at my stats. I was level eleven right now. I couldn't quite remember what level I was the last time I distributed my stat points, but I had leveled up again since then. I had another six points now, according the the center window with my two attributes in it.
"Ah! We have to go or we'll be late!" Keiko exclaimed.
"Late? To what?" Argo asked.
"The party. When everyone rushed in to congratulate us, Diabel-san shouted that we would all meet up again at the inn at the south edge of town at 2:00. It's almost time, and we're still all the way in the northwest section of town." Keiko spoke hurriedly, already starting to pull me that way.
"W,well, we have to go now. Bye Argo!" I said as Keiko started pulling with more force. Suddenly, Argo grabbed my arm.
"Wait, one more thing. What are your names?"
"Rei."
"Rai." We answered one after the other. Argo nodded and we left, running across the roofs toward the inn where the party would be held. "What was with those whiskers?" Keiko asked as we ran.
"I wonder. If we see her again, let's ask." In a few moments, a small window popped up before each of us.
『Friend Request
『Argo wants to add you as a friend』
After a short look at each other, we hit the green button underneath.
Author's note: Finally finished. -_-; I'm really hating my keyboard now. It's making this strange sound every time I hit a key on the right side of the keyboard now...
Oh, and I decided how to do skill proficiencies. Thanks Ningyo0, I used your formula on the Aincrad Worldbuilding forum. (That is, 20 points x level to level up. 1-3 points per attack x mob level for one-handed sword.) Also, I figured 1 Point per meter sprinted.
(1)Since I found out I had the menu wrong, I changed the status menu to the icon with the rectangles. I'll have trades and duels work in some other way.