Explosive Growth

I was completely thrown by what had just happened. I understood that her emotions had overflowed. But I'd assumed that once we were back in the real world, she'd have the sense to stop.

Joo Ha-yeon locked her arms around my neck, twisted her head, and crushed her lips against mine.

A wet, hungry sound.

I felt her tongue pushing to slip inside and nearly let it happen before I even realized it—but Na Seoyun came charging in and shattered the attempt.

"Get off him!"

Ah. Now that I thought about it...

We were still in the Gnoll Sanctuary. The inheritance rituals weren't even finished.

A mistake unlike me. Resentment, rage, and jealousy had numbed my reason the first time around, and then Nam Eun-ju and Joo Ha-yeon had started acting completely out of character, which finished the job. My prediction that they'd snap back to normal the moment we returned to reality had been dead wrong as well, and that left me even more off-balance.

I shook my head and pulled myself together, then immediately raised a hand and wiped my mouth. In that brief span my lips were already slick with saliva. The kiss hadn't even lasted long. She'd bitten and sucked that hard in those few seconds.

"Ha-yeon! What do you think you're doing?!"

Na Seoyun charged at Joo Ha-yeon and shouted.

"What else? I kissed him."

I'd assumed she'd gotten carried away and made a mistake. Joo Ha-yeon was utterly unapologetic. That sheer audacity left Na Seoyun speechless for a beat, but she recovered instantly.

"Y-you ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠didn't even ask Oppa for permission! What kind of stunt is that?!"

"Hmm? Shin-hoo, did that bother you?"

"That's not the point! That's sexual harassment!"

Honestly, it hadn't been that bad. It had even made me forget, for a moment, the feeling of having my spoils—those skills and stats—snatched away. Of course, it was more that the shock had overwritten the earlier emotions than anything about the kiss itself. That didn't mean the kiss had been unpleasant. It wasn't as if I disliked Joo Ha-yeon. ...And since there hadn't been any consent, calling it sexual harassment wasn't exactly wrong, either...

"...It wasn't that bad. Seoyun, that's enough."

"Oppa! But—!"

Na Seoyun cried out with a look of something like betrayal. I shook my head and turned to Joo Ha-yeon as well.

"Ha-yeon, that was still a poor decision. We're still in a danger zone. Doing something like that the moment we stepped outside was inappropriate."

"...You're right. I'm sorry."

The instant I pointed out the safety issue, Joo Ha-yeon—who was always sensitive about that sort of thing—looked genuinely remorseful and apologized at once. Her emotions really had overflowed, then. Enough to make her forget about safety.

I nodded at her apology. There was no need to press further. Honestly, I hadn't handled it well either. Startled or not, I was the party leader, and I'd let myself get swept up in the moment, however briefly.

I turned to Na-yeon first.

"Did anything unusual happen after we went in?"

"...No. Nothing."

She answered with a complicated expression—somewhere between astonishment and bewilderment.

"Then let's prioritize finishing Seoyun's inheritance."

The party agreed. That had been the original plan anyway.

"All right, Seoyun."

"...Okay."

Na Seoyun still looked a little sulky, but she didn't ignore me.

"Let's go."

"Okay."

Na Seoyun and I approached the Gnoll Hero's corpse. The energy that had been maintaining the barrier had already flowed into Joo Ha-yeon and Nam Eun-ju. Nothing stood in our way. All that remained was the corpse itself and the sword buried in the Gnoll Hero's chest.

The Gnoll Hero was enormous, no question. I pointed silently at the corpse's breastbone.

"Grab that, and the inheritance should start on its own. It's going to hurt like hell, so be careful."

"Okay, Oppa."

Looking a little tense, Na Seoyun approached the sword. The instant she took hold of it, I drew my own weapon. While we were here, I intended to destroy the heart—and clear the Main Quest in the process.

Na Seoyun reached the blade and laid her hand on the hilt.

Na Seoyun bit down hard on her lip. Hard enough to draw blood. The pain was just as severe as it had been for the others, apparently. Watching her, I made a mental note to heal her once we got back to base camp.

I waited. The inheritance came first. Destroying the heart could wait; I didn't want to interfere with the succession even a little.

Ah. Right.

I had time to kill anyway, so I decided to check Nam Eun-ju and Joo Ha-yeon's status windows. Between the kneeling incident, the hug, and the kiss—that three-hit combo—I hadn't gotten around to looking at either of them.

Originally they each would have walked away with two Legendary skills and that would have been the end of it. But they'd also absorbed the energy maintaining the barrier, so their stats should have exploded. On top of that, it was supposed to raise their growth potential—their talent ceiling. At minimum they'd be high-grade; if things went well, they might even have reached Supreme potential. I was looking forward to it.

I used Administrator's Eye and opened the status windows of Joo ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠Ha-yeon and Nam Eun-ju, who were scanning the surroundings some distance away.

The numbers had gone up, yes—but they were nowhere near what I'd expected. They'd swallowed that much energy and this was all they had to show for it? Had the whole surge gone into raising their potential instead? For a moment I was genuinely thrown. I'd assumed they'd sail right past my own stats. Not even close. Every one of mine had broken forty. Between the two of them, only a single stat had done the same.

Getting jealous over a bump this small just made me look pathetic. Had the conversion rate been garbage? I almost believed it. I was wrong.

The instant I opened their skill windows, I understood exactly what I had missed.

This was insane.

Both of their classes were Legendary. Saintess and Guardian of the Saintess. The names alone told you these were no ordinary jobs. And since Administrators from other dimensions hadn't interfered with the class changes, the claim on them stayed on our side. Not that I thought anyone could steal them while I was here, even if they tried.

It wasn't just the classes that had changed. Their unique skills had transformed as well. Joo Ha-yeon's Super Rare-grade Faith had become the Legendary skill Holy Stigma. Nam Eun-ju's Normal-grade Surging Vitality had become the Rare skill Guardian's Discipline.

None of that was the real story. What jumped off the page were the skill slots.

As I remembered it, Joo Ha-yeon had five slots. Nam Eun-ju had gone from three to four. Now Joo Ha-yeon's slots had become nine, and Nam Eun-ju's had swollen to an absurd ten.

Half of them were locked behind insufficient qualifications, true. But one thing was certain: at least one of Joo Ha-yeon's sealed skills was Legendary, and at least two of Nam Eun-ju's were.

In the first cycle, the skills they'd obtained through equipment had been Saintess's Blessing and Sanctuary Declaration. Saintess's Blessing was nowhere to be seen. The paladin skills Goddess's Punishment and Iron Wall Guardian weren't showing either. Which meant at least one or two of those hidden slots were Legendary. They weren't visible now, but the moment those "qualifications" were met, they would open.

A guaranteed ticket to future stardom, if there ever was one.

And through Administrator's Eye, both of their potential ratings displayed as a dash.

I'd never seen that before. My guess was that it meant the result would depend on their own efforts. If they unlocked every one of those skills and kept training their stats, they'd reach a level that wouldn't lose to Supreme potential.

It meant they might become Rankers someday.

‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠

A chill ran down my spine. If I had tried to take all of those skills into myself, I might have burst apart the way that first man had—the one whose body ruptured and killed him.

Counting unique skills, Joo Ha-yeon had ten and Nam Eun-ju had eleven. Some of them looked like evolutions or mutations of existing skills, but most were entirely new. And that was with the two of them splitting the inheritance. If the entire flood had been poured into me alone...

I shuddered.

Even with Double Contract, I might simply have died. If I'd taken only a portion of the skills, the way I'd originally planned, it might have been fine. But once you added the power that had been holding the seal in place, my current body might not have survived it.

...Had greed blinded me?

I'd thought it would be possible with the Saintess's cooperation. But the skill slots alone ate up that many spaces. Even the extra slots I'd gained from the Mythic-grade Tower's Blessing wouldn't have been enough to hold them all.

I hadn't ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠imagined it would be this much.

Even so—if the 7th Saintess had only been willing to give the power to me, we could have negotiated and I could have taken as much as my body could handle. I still would have become a monster.

That was what stung.

That damned Saintess.

That was when the light began to fade. Na Seoyun's inheritance ritual was drawing to a close. Even without a Saintess cooperating, her vessel was simply built differently. The ceremony finished remarkably fast, and without any real danger.

Which left me wondering just how much she had grown. After watching Nam Eun-ju and Joo Ha-yeon's leaps, expecting the same from Na Seoyun was only natural.

...I'll admit it stung a little, too.

The power maintaining the seal had been thinner for her than for the other two, so I wasn't expecting a huge stat spike. But her potential was already monstrous, which meant none of that energy would leak off into raising a ceiling that was already maxed. She should have gained something.

I used Administrator's Eye at once.

I couldn't afford to get complacent. She might even catch up to me.

Unlike the other two, her qualifications had been more than sufficient, so she had inherited every skill. The count was lower than theirs, no question. Mana Circuit Operation had become Mana Circuit Specialization - Double Helix Structure, and Basic Magic Theory had risen to Rare—probably a synergy between her existing proficiency and the inheritance itself.

Beyond that: Aura Affinity, Dual Hearts, a simultaneous mana-and-aura training method called Primal Style that I'd never even heard of, and a Legendary skill named Legend Slayer...

Five Legendary skills. The quantity was a little light. The quality was anything but.

Na Seoyun's potential was still Supreme. On top of that she now held five Legendary skills, and her own unique skill was Legendary as well. The only thing that wasn't flashy was the class itself—not Hero or anything like it, just Magic Swordsman, a job she would have obtained later anyway, claimed ahead of schedule. Then again, they'd only ever picked capable people as Heroes and handed them a holy sword. Nothing strange about that.

What stunned me most was that every last one of those skills was a passive. Training skills. Self-cultivation. Well—I wasn't sure about Legend Slayer, but it was inactive for now. The condition said it would activate automatically when she fought someone of matching caliber.

...A skill for hunting the strong, then.

Good lord.

Passives might look weaker than actives in the short term, but over the long run there was no comparison. A Legendary active was a different conversation, but the consensus later on was that passives were simply more efficient—and the more talent you had, and the harder you worked, the wider that gap became.

Na Seoyun stood with both hands open, staring down at them in a daze. She didn't seem to be looking at a status window. But with talent like hers, she had to be feeling the change in her own body. She might even have been digesting the flood of knowledge the passives were pouring into her.

I stepped past her and approached the Gnoll Hero's corpse. I lined up on the chest, right where the heart sat, and drove my sword in hard.

A wet thunk—and a message window bloomed before my eyes.