7. My Buff is a Drug
7. My Buff is a Drug
[ Flower's Feast ]
Cognitive Filter applied
Stamina stat +6 levels
Protection stat +3 levels
Seo Ha-yoon Exclusive
'Oh, perfect. Exactly what I needed.'
Just by making it a dedicated skill, I could raise Stamina by 3 extra levels.
That meant no one besides Seo Ha-yoon could receive this buff, but I couldn't have cared less.
A clear-cut bargain.
I turned the buff for Han Geon-hu into a dedicated skill right away, too.
It felt like I was covering my costs.
'Now the tricky one was the Power Surge skill.'
I was debating whether to make it Chae Hwa-ra's exclusive buff or not.
In this party, the only ones who relied on the Strength stat were Chae Hwa-ra and Choi Ah-young.
It was self-evident that using one unified buff was more efficient than splitting it and dividing the options.
Even with the cost offset by making it a dedicated skill, the logic held.
If I got clever and made it a skill that only applied to Choi Ah-young and Chae Hwa-ra, I could save even more stats.
'Forfeit efficiency and split the firepower to make a separate dedicated skill for Choi Ah-young?'
I took my time and thought it through carefully.
Sure, boosting efficiency and using it well would be nice.
Clearing raids would get a whole lot smoother.
'But as far as raids go, aren't we fine as we are?'
Choi Ah-young had suggested trying a more difficult place.
But there was no way we'd actually go to a truly difficult otherworld.
At worst, it'd be slightly harder than the place we went to yesterday.
I didn't have a single doubt in my mind that Choi Ah-young was a sensible person.
'For that level, the buff's firepower will be enough. The sheer force of the world I can tap into has increased, and I managed to wring more stats out of it using the dedicated skill loophole.'
Based on that judgment, I decided to craft Choi Ah-young an exclusive buff.
For starters, making an exclusive buff came with a definite perk.
Namely, earning Choi Ah-young's goodwill.
'She's decent in a lot of ways, that one. The setup says she stops being unlucky after the tutorial, so she's perfect as a party member.'
If I curried favor with Choi Ah-young through an exclusive buff, I'd earn more Power of Perception and beef up the buff's might further.
A feeling of giving up a little in the present to invest in the future, maybe?
'Alright then...'
I opened the Buff Custom window to craft Choi Ah-young's exclusive buff.
But a problem cropped up.
'As long as I'm making one, isn't just cramming in a few stats a bit lame?'
The problem was indecision.
If I knew what kind of difficulties or issues Choi Ah-young was dealing with, I'd steer the buff to compensate.
Or maybe what kind of buff she wanted?
'Hm... maybe I should talk to her a bit first.'
I pulled out my terminal.
I opened the messenger app and checked if Choi Ah-young was in my friends list.
[ Choi Ah-young ]
'Oh, she's there.'
Should I message her or not?
I spent about a minute putting the terminal down and picking it up, fidgeting in indecision, then finally sent the first text.
[ Choi Hye-yong : Hey? ]
The reply came back after another minute or so.
[ Choi Ah-young : Hey. ]
[ Choi Ah-young : What made you reach out? ]
'What's with this nervous feeling?'
Better type carefully here.
[ Choi Hye-yong : Wondering if you'd gotten the entrance ticket for tomorrow's hunting ground. ]
[ Choi Ah-young : The ticket? I got it. A cave with Ice Shell Turtles. It'll be a bit tougher than the Giant Deep Forest Elephant Shrew we handled yesterday. ]
So she had it locked down, as expected.
I didn't really have anything else to say.
I decided to force the conversation along anyway.
[ Choi Hye-yong : Is there anything in particular I should watch out for? ]
Choi Ah-young must have been mulling something over, because the next message took almost a full minute to come through.
[ Choi Ah-young : When you say things to watch out for, nothing really comes to mind. I've got way too little info. ]
Info?
[ Choi Hye-yong : Info... you mean about me? ]
[ Choi Ah-young : Yeah. Now that I think about it, we sat right next to each other in first semester, but we barely exchanged a word, right? We know absolutely nothing about each other. ]
Ah, so we took classes in adjacent seats back in first semester.
I had no memory of putting in that kind of setting.
'If she says so, then it's true. The hell do I know.'
Anyway, judging by words like that, it seemed Choi Ah-young had some interest in talking to me after all.
[ Choi Hye-yong : True. ]
[ Choi Ah-young : Honestly, I was pretty surprised by your buff today. The performance wasn't bad at all. Up till now, I thought you could only use stamina enhancement. You could've at least told me. ]
[ Choi Hye-yong : Sorry. Forgot to mention it. ]
[ Choi Ah-young : Well... you barely spoke a word until today, so. ]
Choi Ah-young seemed ready to understand and let it slide, but then she asked again, almost reproachfully.
[ Choi Ah-young : But it makes me curious, you know. The you I knew wasn't like this personality-wise. Same goes for your buff performance suddenly getting so good. Did something happen to you? ]
A more assertive and direct question than what Seo Ha-yoon had asked.
Time to give her the prepared answer.
[ Choi Hye-yong : I gained a new ability. I'm not entirely sure myself, but a so-called exclusive buff appeared that I can use on people I think of as teammates. ]
[ Choi Ah-young : A new ability? Ah... so you went through Reawakening. I never imagined there'd be someone around me who Reawakened. Congratulations. ]
Reawakening?
That was a setting detail I'd never heard before.
'I know about regular Awakening.'
According to the original novel's setting, not every new human born with a stone lodged in their heart possesses stats and can use skills.
Only after Awakening their wavelength do they realize, ah, I was a bastard with a rock in my heart.
Hence, Awakened.
The term Reawakening, as I recalled, didn't exist in the novel either.
'Or maybe I just forgot.'
I usually remembered the settings I personally added, but I'd forgotten plenty of the original novel's details.
Anyway, Reawakening, huh.
'A perfect excuse. From now on, whenever anyone asks why you changed so much, I'll just blame it all on Reawakening.'
Sounded like a wonderfully convenient thing to say.
[ Choi Hye-yong : I got lucky. After that, I started being able to find my words, too. ]
[ Choi Ah-young : Aphasia really is terrifying. It's hard to believe you're the same person. ]
'Well, that's because I'm a different person.'
[ Choi Ah-young : By the way, exclusive buff? Was the one you put on me like that too? ]
[ Choi Hye-yong : No. I cast that buff on Hwa-ra too, remember. ]
[ Choi Ah-young : Ah, right. By any chance, was Ha-yoon managing to stay fine seeing blood today because of your exclusive buff? ]
[ Choi Hye-yong : That's right. ]
[ Choi Ah-young : And Geon-hu being able to spam Wind Blast? ]
[ Choi Hye-yong : Yep. ]
After that, the conversation halted for about two minutes.
She looked like she had more to say, but no text came up.
Just as I was thinking that, a new message appeared.
[ Choi Ah-young : Hye-yong, have you eaten dinner? Want to meet up and talk? ]
Wow, she's being forward.
She wanted to meet, so I'd go meet her.
[ Choi Hye-yong : I ate, but... where should we go? ]
Choi Ah-young and I met at a cafe inside the facility.
Even at this hour, the cafe bustled with people.
Mostly women.
'It's not just that cafes draw more women... there really are more women in this facility.'
In the original novel, the male-to-female ratio of Awakened was 2:8.
No one knew the reason why.
Just a hunch that maybe female base sequences were more conducive to wavelength manifestation or something.
I hadn't paid it much mind, but since most custom characters people asked me to make were female, the game's setup aligned with the novel's setting pretty well.
Not that I minded having more women than men around.
Seated across from me at a small table, Choi Ah-young spoke.
"I asked you out, so it's on me. What do you want to drink?"
Honestly, I had no intention of sucking the marrow out of her wallet, but in atmospheres like this, the buyer's sentiment was a thing.
"Then I'll have the green grape sparkling."
To keep things light on Choi Ah-young's heart, I ordered a single 5-point drink.
What Choi Ah-young ordered was a 1.5-point iced Americano.
Had I been tactless here?
I'd kept her wallet in mind when picking too, tch.
"Of all the drinks, iced Americano is my favorite. I like it because it's clean."
As soon as I showed a slightly awkward expression, Choi Ah-young preempted me, even though I hadn't said anything.
Ah, Ah-young... you're too kind.
After a brief wait, I sucked down the green grape sparkling while Choi Ah-young began to speak.
"So, Hye-yong? Your trait — you said it casts dedicated buffs, right?"
"Yeah."
"You said Ha-yoon and Geon-hu already have their dedicated buffs."
"Right."
"And Hwa-ra too?"
"Hwa-ra's got one too."
Gulp!
The sound of Choi Ah-young swallowing dryly reached my ears.
"Then what about mine..."
"Yours doesn't exist."
Choi Ah-young's face and posture froze solid.
If there'd been a KRA-KOOM! of lightning striking as a sound effect, it would've been fitting.
Choi Ah-young stayed frozen for about five seconds, then hemmed and hawed before speaking.
"Uhm... am I really just a hanger-on in the party?"
"You, the leader? What makes you think that?"
I felt like I already knew every reason she'd think that, but I asked on purpose.
"You said your trait lets you give exclusive buffs to people you think of as comrades. Everyone else has one, and I'm the only one who doesn't, so it feels a bit... like you don't think of me as a comrade."
"Well..."
"Did I, maybe, do something wrong to you? Or to all of you? Something like unconsciously ignoring anyone..."
"No. I never felt anything like that."
"That's a relief... I just haven't had much peace of mind these days. I was worried I'd made some mistake."
"You didn't make any mistakes. And even if you did, I'd fully understand. I'd have been the same in your shoes."
"...Thank you for understanding."
Even as she thanked me, Choi Ah-young stole careful glances at me.
That look in her eyes seemed to be asking, "Then why am I the only one without an exclusive buff?"
"You're really hung up on the 'thinking of someone as a teammate' part, but that's honestly just part of my thought process — it's not a hard condition for generating an exclusive buff. Even I don't know the exact conditions."
"I-is that so?"
"Originally, Hwa-ra didn't have an exclusive buff either. But after I tried to understand Hwa-ra and get closer to her, one appeared."
"Ah... so that's why it fit Hwa-ra's concept so well. You tried to... get close to her."
"And with Ha-yoon and Geon-hu, I clearly understood what kind of issues they were facing. The exclusive buffs came about because I wanted to help solve those problems."
Choi Ah-young seemed to be deep in thought.
Wouldn't this be a good time to drive the point home?
"To be honest, Ah-young. The reason I reached out to you first today was because I wanted to know more about you."
At those words, Choi Ah-young flinched in surprise.
"About... me? You want to know?"
"Like you said, we sat next to each other in class but know nothing about each other. To me, you were always someone who studied well, had a high rank, and had no reason to need my help. Honestly, it's still that way. It's baffling to me why we're even in the same party."
"Haha..."
Choi Ah-young's laugh seemed like it would taste as bitter as the Americano she'd ordered.
"I do think of you as a comrade, Ah-young. But the reason an exclusive buff isn't appearing for you is probably because I don't know you well enough. Would you tell me about the problems you're dealing with right now, or your worries, or maybe even what you're hoping for? It might help in creating your dedicated buff."
"Hye-yong..."
The face that had been etched with anxiety since the first time I saw her now showed only relief and gratitude.
"Thank you for today, Hye-yong."
"No. All I did was listen."
"I had a lot on my mind but no one to talk to. I was stewing by myself, but letting it out makes me feel a bit better."
"Then let's talk again sometime. I'll buy the drinks next time."
"Okay, I'll be waiting for you to call. See you tomorrow."
As she smiled towards me, Choi Ah-young suddenly had a thought.
How long had it been since she'd smiled at someone like this?
Looking back, it seemed like all she'd done was sigh and wear a grim face.
'Let's do better from now on, Choi Ah-young! There's even someone who said they want to help. There's no way things could possibly get worse from here, right?'
The saying about there always being a bottom below the bottom suddenly flashed through her mind, but she forced it out of her head.
Having given herself a pep talk, Choi Ah-young turned on her heel.
The place she headed wasn't the dorms, but the training room.
"Haah."
Looking at the Buff Custom window, I laughed.
'Feedback's solid as ever.'
The power I could draw on had increased just a little bit more.
Right now, even if I crammed the buff's contents into an All Stats Buff, it'd probably hit around 10 or 11.
Just speculation, of course.
I didn't bother checking because deleting and remaking buffs was a pain.
'Making friends, forming relationships... I never knew that kind of thing could be this fun.'
It wasn't purely because it let me strengthen my buffs.
Someone showing you goodwill, saying thank you.
There was a kind of pleasure in just that, as if it filled something in my heart.
Despite a troubled family history, my personality didn't have any particularly sharp edges.
I wasn't shy and took any topic of conversation well.
Sure, a dark, insidious self lurked within me, but at least the part others could see was like that.
My image at school in the real world was that of a cheerful friend you could bring up any topic with and never kill the mood.
So I had quite a lot of friends.
'Back then, I thought friends just... materialized naturally.'
Now that I'd gone through losing them, I got it.
Ah, making friends was clearly a difficult task that required a lot of effort.
'Tomorrow's the cave with Ice Shell Turtles, was it? Let's put in the effort.'
I decided to spend the rest of the night mulling over how to craft Ah-young's exclusive buff.