Alliance Pioneer Central Stadium

  “And it looks like young lady Orcayne has received her next skill from reaching level thirty! And it’s a mental attack skill!” Isaac Caliorga exclaims as the audience watching bursts out into roaring applause at the sight of her using her skill, making an aura cover the sharks. Then everyone watches the sharks moving backwards in a comical display. “Her new skill looks like it’ll get us a lot of laughs as well.”

  Laughter fills the stadium both at his words and at the sight of the sharks flailing around, moving in the wrong direction over and over again like a newborn fish trying to learn how to swim.

  Meanwhile Aqua herself just slowly swims around the sharks, clearly testing her new skill.

  Even when the sharks begin to chomp their mouths at the water in front of them, suddenly making a pair of fangs shoot out of the backs of the sharks’ heads instead of their mouths. Just flying to hit the walls, floors, and ceilings.

  The laughter in the stadium grows even louder, and Isaac finds himself included in that as he himself laughs too.

  Everyone watches the sharks flounder around for a while before they gradually begin to gain some semblance of control over their bodies. Seemingly realizing that they can control themselves the way they want by moving in the opposite way of how they mean to move.

  But nothing can instantly adjust to making movements like that, so the audience soon watches Aqua slaughter the sharks with ease during their troubles.

  “The power of a double Bloodliner is terrifying in a way,” Isaac says, but despite his words, a smile covers his face so wide everyone can tell exactly what he’s thinking.

  That Aqua Orcayne smells like money.

  Aqua

  Dealing with the sharks after reversing their actions is rather easy. So I move on to the next room and hunt the monsters in there. Then the next. Only to find no monsters in that room.

  Then I continue on through the rooms of the underwater castle, just hunting monsters as I go to level up.

  And when I feel I’m ready, I go ahead and grab several of the higher level monster corpses and begin dragging them behind me.

  But then a thought comes to mind.

  The storage ring can hold corpses, right?

  I think it can.

  So I go ahead and begin stuffing corpses into the storage ring one after another. Not caring whatsoever if these natives learn about the storage ring.

  Knowing them they’ll just blame it on secret clan stuff like they’ve been blaming everything else on.

  After gathering up a couple hundred corpses, ignoring the ball of piranha, I move to a more secluded room in the castle to check my sponsorships now that I’m past level thirty. Having reached level thirty-three during my hunts in here.

  There were a lot of monsters after all. Which means a lot of EXP.

  Then I proceed to finally accept my new armor core. Which I crush after taking off my current armor and putting on my hoodie again, making new armor form around me.

  I smile as I feel the new armor again. Armor from the Alliance that actually fits me.

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  No more painful tightness on my chest or discomfort from the rest of it being a bit big. And I can wear my hoodie again.

  As for my new set of armor? It is pretty fancy in general.

  Unlike my last armor that was black, my new armor is more deep blue in color, with a few dimly glowing pale blue lines running through it. Making for a rather nice sight to behold.

  And just like my last set of armor core armor, it isn’t skin tight. So I’m happy about that.

  Now that I have my new armor that’s meant for level thirties, I go ahead and accept the sponsorship lined up for the new weapon core as well. The level thirty one.

  Then I crush it as well, making another trident appear in my hand.

  What is with the System and tridents?

  Anyway, this trident looks different from the other one as well. Just like the armor.

  The trident’s head glows with a pale blue light now for one. And for two, it looks sharper, and its made from a sleeker material.

  Not sure what material it’s made from though.

  I swing the trident around a few times before nodding my head in satisfaction at having a good weapon again.

  After trying out the equipment on a nearby monster and finding them both to be very satisfactory, I go ahead and finally leave the castle. Heading straight towards the Hunter’s City again before entering the city and making my way towards the Hunter’s Guild.

  Attracting more than a little attention now that I’m wearing my new armor instead of that old stuff.

  Which makes sense. This is level thirty armor. And from what the tour guide said, along with what I can see of the monsters the hunters are dragging in, the hunters didn’t seem capable of fighting monsters this deep before.

  Monsters still exist in worlds without Systems after all. They’re just weaker due to not having skills or anything like that.

  And while the System does technically enhance them too, all it really does is mark a level to determine their strength values based on the System and give them some skills. It doesn’t make them much stronger in terms of their bodies beyond those skills.

  It’s the same as humans in a way. It puts them into the System, gives them traits and skills, and lets them grow stronger.

  The only difference is that monsters are already naturally stronger than humans. By a lot in some cases.

  So they start out a lot higher level than humans.

  Which is unfair, but at the same time, humans are sapient. Monsters are not.

  Except for the Ancient Monsters.

  They were sapient.

  That’s actually one of the requirements that made them Ancient Monsters to begin with.

  Anyway, I continue ignoring all the looks sent my way before arriving at the Hunter’s Guild building. After which I walk up to Jen’s receptionist desk to find her greeting me with a smile.

  “Aqua! You’re back! And with new gear too!” Jen exclaims, only to blink when she sees me empty handed. “Did you have something to ask before hunting?”

  I guess she’s assuming I didn’t hunt and came back to ask something.

  And the gear is hard not to notice.

  My armor glows after all. Not very brightly, but still glows.

  “Do you have a storage room I could bring the monster corpses?” I ask while feeling a little awkward at not having pockets anymore. Since this armor has no pockets. Instead it has some little plates of armor going down over my hips without touching them. Blocking where pockets would normally be.

  And I feel slightly awkward not being able to do something with my hands. Whether it’s putting them in my pockets or even just messing with something in my hands.

  She looks confused, but she answers anyway, “Yes, follow me.” Then she brings me over to a counter on the other side of the receptionist hall and says, “This counter is where we deal with the bigger hauls.” She glances between me and the entrance before asking, “Are the corpses sitting outside?”

  I shake my head and place my hand over the counter before summoning so many corpses onto it that it covers the entire table within seconds. Only for the corpses to end up stacking on top of each other after that, completely blocking Jen from my view.

  Eventually the counter begins to groan a bit, and I hear Jen shouting, “Stop it! Please stop! You’ll break the counter!”

  With that I go ahead and put several of them back into the storage ring. Then Jen walks around the counter while gazing at the mountain of corpses of all kinds on the counter.

  “I have several dozen more, so are there any other counters?” I ask while scratching the back of my head, feeling a little awkward at both her stare and the stares of the couple dozen other hunters in the guild building right now.

  Jen just continues to stare blankly at me as she mutters, “N-no, this is our only major haul counter…”

  “Ah, then will someone come get these so I can put out the rest?” I ask, my hand moving to play with a lock of hair instead of scratching my head.

  Damnit, I miss my pockets.

  [Aqua’s so cute when playing with her hair amidst their shocked gazes.]

  [This is hilarious.]

  [This is absolutely being clipped.]

  I choose to ignore the chat’s comments as I often do.

  Meanwhile Jen just continues gaping like a fish for several seconds before finally breaking into action as she says, “I’m gonna need to get the Guildmaster. Could you wait here.”

  I shrug, making her instantly shoot straight towards the stairs.

  Leaving me alone amongst the stares of the other hunters.

  This is uncomfortable.

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