Worthless Skill Escape (WN)

Enjoy~

TL: ALT

Chapter 5 – ‘Escape,’ This Annoying Skill

“Haaaaah…”

I was sitting on a park bench in the evening, holding my head in my hands.

I don’t know how many times I’ve done this.

Next to me on the bench was a can of coffee that had gone completely cold.

People walking their dogs and a woman with a toddler looked at me weirdly as I sat there like a restructured middle-aged salaryman and was reduced to ashes.

I wonder how long it has been since it got dark and the park’s electric lights illuminated.

As I stare at the tiles illuminated by the white light, a shadow casts across my vision.

When I looked up, I saw a familiar face standing there.

“Serika…”

A childhood friend I hadn’t seen for two years.

Although she is beautifully shaped, her face still looks younger than her age.

However, the way she was dressed had changed drastically.

I’m not talking about a change in taste in clothing while I haven’t seen her.

She wears a shining silver breastplate, a navy blue skirt, and black leggings.

On her feet, she wears heavy silver greaves and a sword at her waist.

“I heard it. I heard you’re going to be an explorer?”

Serika said with a smile.

It’s been a while since I heard this slightly anime-like voice.

“An explorer, huh?”

“Eh, it wasn’t something I actually knew about. I knew it from Auntie.”

“I see.”

…I wonder if she was just being considerate and not telling me?

Maybe she told me to dive into the dungeon because she knew Serika was an explorer.

“Oh, come on, you should be a little more interested.”

“I’m sorry. I didn’t even know that dungeons existed until recently.”

“Eh… really?”

Serika was surprised.

It’s true that even though I am a shut-in, it’s surprising that I didn’t know about the dungeon until yesterday.

Considering all the fuss on TV and the Internet, it’s a miracle that I didn’t know about it.

I still can’t shake the feeling that the dungeon exists.

Serika looked at me,

“By the looks of it, I guess you didn’t have any unique skills…?”

“No, I have it.”

“Eh! You have it, huh? Congratulations!”

“…Yeah.”

“You don’t seem too happy. Why?”

I take out my phone powerlessly.

With the Dungeons Go Pro app, I can check my status on my phone as well.

Although I could have looked at it with “Status Open,” it is easier to use the app to find out detailed information, such as the conditions for using skills.

…Note that DGP seems to have a mysterious personal authentication function that prevents other people from viewing the screen without the user’s consent.

Moreover, the system is so sophisticated that “consent” obtained through threats or other means is not considered consent.

While one’s own status can be viewed via “Status Open,” the means to view the status of others is limited.

Except for difficult-to-obtain skills such as “Appraisal,” the fastest way to see the status of others is to show them the DGP screen through consent.

I was about to show her my screen without hesitation when she said,

“H-hey! An explorer should not be so careless to show their status to others!”

Serika hurriedly stopped me.

“Serika is not a stranger, though?”

“Eh, well… that may be true, but… Can I look at it?”

“Yeah.”

I handed Serika the phone.

Serika looked at my phone with uncontrollable interest.

Her face gradually becomes difficult.

“Tell me frankly what you think of it.”

“…Again, you’re being one-sided.”

Serika must be talking about the ability values.

Status──────────────────

Yuto Kurashiki

Level 1

HP 7/7

MP 64/64

Attack Power 4

Defense 3

Magic Power 65

Mental Strength 16

Agility 24

Luck 15

・Unique Skill

Escape S.Lv1

・Acquired Skill

Fire Magic 1

SP 3

────────────────────

I’m getting a 50 bonus each to MP and Magic for acquiring “Fire Magic,” but other than that, nothing has changed from the first time.

“I guess it’s a magic type… It’s very typical of Yuto.”

“I’m a real introvert, after all.”

“I-I don’t mean it like that! You’re so quick to take the worst of what people say!”

“…I’m sorry. I know.”

Serika would never say something like that.

We’ve known each other a long time, I know that much.

Serika swiped my phone again and again to check it,

“First, on the higher numbers. Excluding skill bonuses, I have 14 MP, 15 Magic Power, 16 Mental Strength, 24 Agility, and 15 Luck, which is pretty much impossible.”

“Is that right?”

“Yes. But even if you fight mainly with magic, 7 HP and 3 defense is still tough. Your high Mental Strength makes you strong against magic, but you will die if you get hit by an arrow.”

“…I guess so.”

“24 in Agility is impossibly high, but… Agility doesn’t mean much to a magician. Using magic requires concentration, which is usually not possible while moving around. The chance of agility evasion increases, but if there is another vanguard, the magician won’t be in a position to be targeted.”

Serika adds that if such a situation arises, it is better to retreat immediately.

I don’t know what’s going on with Serika, but she sounds so confident as if she’s seen it all.

She must be quite active as an explorer.

“15 in Luck is great, too, but magic doesn’t give critical hits, and… I think it’s about as easy to get lucky evasion.”

“Right.”

I know that much.

“Utilizing your high Agility and Luck, build your skills with priority on evasion… Nope, but you’re a magic type. Even if you use the high critical rate to compensate for the offensive power, the original number is 4… What should we do…?”

Serika worries about it as if it were her own.

“…I guess it’s the rear guard after all. Even if you have high evasion, you can’t avoid everything. I wouldn’t want you to be in front of me in a situation where even one hit would kill you…”

“In that case, Agility and Luck would not be useful, though.”

Then… there’s one more thing.

Perhaps out of concern, there is one thing that Serika didn’t mention.

The increase in ability value at level up is equal to the base value at level 1.

For example, if the HP is 10 at level 1, at level 2, it is 20, at level 3, it is 30, and so on, increasing by 10.

In other words, if the ability value is low at level 1, no further growth can be expected.

An attack value of only 4, a defense value of 3, or an HP of 7 at this point in time has no room to grow in the future.

Monsters’ ability values are also said to increase with their level, so explorers with low initial ability values will be forced to fight harder as their level increases.

Crucially, the more you level up, the wider the gap between you and other explorers.

A guy with a defense of 10 at level 1 will have a defense of 100 when he reaches level 10.

On the other hand, I, with 3 at level 1, will only have 30 at level 10.

As long as the growth range does not increase halfway through, it is impossible to fill this hopeless gap with effort.

The advice for beginners written in the wiki has a template like this:

“Give up if you have three or more stats below 9, two or more below 8, or even one below 7 (except for Luck).”

By “give up,” they meant, of course, to give up on the idea of becoming an explorer.

Serika probably knew this and didn’t tell me.

“And then there’s… unique skill of ‘Escape.’ What kind of skill is this?”

“Give it to me.”

I ask for my phone back and press and hold ‘Escape’ on the status screen.

Skill──────────────────

Escape

S.Lv1 Allows the user to flee from combat.

Conditions for use:

Running away toward the outside of the combat area for (30-5 x S.Lv) seconds.

The combat area is a space with a radius of (10 x S.Lv) meters from the center of the enemy’s initial position.

Special Notes:

When the player succeeds in escaping, they drop their money.

The amount of money dropped is randomly determined within the range of ({50-10×S.Lv}±20) % of the amount of money. The amount of money dropped is never negative.

Ability Value Correction:

The owner of ‘Escape’ will always receive the following corrections to each ability value.

HP -20%.

Attack Power -50%.

Defense -60

Mental Strength +20%.

Agility +200%.

Luck +400%.

────────────────────

I sighed once more, then handed the phone to Serika.

“Let’s see, the time needed to ‘escape’ is 25 seconds for… S.Lv1. The area? Is a 10-meter radius… What does that mean?”

Yeah, it’s hard to get an image with just numbers, isn’t it?

Serika is not a game lover by nature.

“There will be an invisible wall in a circle with a radius of 10 meters. I have to run toward that wall for 25 seconds.”

“You’ll be caught up in no time.”

“Yeah. Plus, I have to keep trying to escape, so I’m completely vulnerable during that time.”

“Wow…”

Earlier, I managed to escape because I was dealing with a slow Slime.

If the monster was quicker… or even if it wasn’t that quick, a monster that could move properly would be able to catch up with me in two or three seconds.

“It would be much better to just escape, wouldn’t it?”

“That’s… But it is very difficult to escape from enemies in a dungeon, you know? It’s a small space, so if you just escape, they will chase you. It’s easy to think you’re escaping, but instead, you end up being crushed.”

“‘Don’t escape, fight.'”

It’s a saying from a famous explorer on the wiki.

It is followed by “Don’t fight the ones you can’t beat.”

The ironclad rule of dungeon exploration is to fight only those monsters you can definitely beat.

“Yeah. There is a skill for escaping, but I don’t think anyone would bother to take it.”

“Right.”

I sighed and dropped my shoulders.

Serika panicked,

“B-but it’s a unique skill. I’m sure there must be some use for it…!”

“Even if you go that far to ‘escape,’ you’ll even lose money, you know? S.Lvl 1, 20-60% of the money you have… do you think you can make a living as an explorer under such conditions?”

“I-it’s not like you have to escape every time. Just save the ‘Escape’ for an emergency and form a party…”

“I can’t help it if I’m the only one who can escape. I don’t care if it’s a situation where my party is destroyed, and I’m the only one who wants to survive…”

“That’s… true.”

It is hard to believe that one could be safe with one’s back unprotected for 25 seconds in such a situation.

“If ‘Escape’ is a dead skill, then all that’s left is a useless, fast, lucky magician who’s got paper armor because of the compensation. Who would want to party with such a person?”

I definitely wouldn’t want a guy like that in my party.

And if it got dangerous, it seems that only one person would escape…

Still, it’s a hell of an annoying skill.

At least if it didn’t have a negative correction to ability values, it would have just been useless.

If I didn’t have ‘Escape,’ my stats would be,

Level 1

HP 9

MP 14

Attack Power 8

Defense 8

Magic Power 15

Mental Strength 14

Agility 8

Luck 3

…I think I had a good chance to get a job as a magician.

It is true that I have difficulty in Defense, but 15 Magic Power should be a very favorable number.

Even this falls under the wiki’s rule of “give up if you have three 9s or two 8s,” which means that it takes a certain amount of determination to become an explorer.

Even the “except luck” Luck, if it is 3, I’m not so sure about it.

Considering my life so far… it makes sense that my Luck would be 3.

I guess she recognized the reason in my words.

Serika opened and closed her mouth repeatedly, trying to say something.

“But… but!”

Serika looked at me with a face like she was about to cry.

“There is definitely a meaning to the unique skills. It was the same for me. I was weak, but my unique skills supported me. I think it’s a gift from God.”

“…I think Serika was like that.”

I don’t know the details of the situation, but Serika, who used to be a crybaby, is now a fine explorer.

I wonder where the difference came from, even though we must have been close all along.

“No! Even Yuto must be the same! You may not know it now, but there is always a meaning to the fact that Yuto was given this skill! So――!”

“…It’s because I’ve been escaping all this time, isn’t it? God says that you are a man who can only escape anyway, and this trashy skill is suitable for you.”

I couldn’t help but say a few harsh words.

“T-that’s not true! Absolutely not! I didn’t mean it that way――”

“Please stop it. You and I live in different worlds now. Being nice to me will only hurt each other…”

Tears welled up in Serika’s eyes at my words.

“Yuto… Yuu-kun idiot!”