Chapter 14: Adding Skill Points

That night, Yuki barely slept. When he got up, his whole body felt sluggish and dull—he had to splash cold water on his face just to chase away the sleepiness.

As he walked toward Aegis, hands in his pockets and fingers resting on the Taiga Light Key, he allocated all three of his bond points, double-checking that he could, in fact, reset them without any special item. The process took time, though, so if he ever had to redistribute points in the heat of battle, that interval could be dangerous. He’d have to be careful.

Back when he started deciphering the Language of Light, he’d used the four options on the first two pages as samples, so those pages were the first he managed to translate. After all, there’d been an unallocated point on each page at the time—hard not to be curious about them. As he traced the patterns of the script, he was already planning how best to assign his points.

He had no intention of putting points into “Strength” or “Critical Damage”—the reason was simple. He was human, and his basic stats were far too low.

Even if he didn’t use himself as a reference—say, he picked a heavyweight boxer like Tyson, someone strong enough by human standards. The instantaneous force of Tyson’s punch, it’s said, ranges from about 500 to 800 kilograms. Take the maximum: 800 kilograms, which could stand for “critical damage.”

Now, if you take 800 kilograms as your base and max out the 50-point cap on critical damage, that’s a 50% increase. It would go from 800 to 1,200 kilograms—1.2 tons.

But if your opponent weighs tens of thousands of tons, that strength is laughable.

Don’t forget—the whole system is covered in the script of the Land of Light. That alone says it all: this system was clearly designed for Ultraman from the Land of Light.

Take Taiga, for instance. In his enhanced form, his punching power caps at 100,000 tons.

Yes, the unit is tens of thousands of tons.

If you use enhanced Taiga as your template, and apply the system’s boost, the limit goes up to 150,000 tons.

Even if you step back and use his base form—still about 60,000 tons—a full boost takes it up to 90,000.

Now look again at the human champion’s punch, measured in kilograms and tons. Doesn’t it just seem pitiful?

At last, “Yuki” could understand why Gagula was so bitter about not being chosen by the ring. Turning from human into Ultraman is like ascending to immortality—your entire being, your level of power, it all changes fundamentally. Climbing to the summit of warriors is as much a trial as surviving a thunderous tribulation; all things in the world will try to stop you, to kill those who dare assault the peak.

That’s why Gagula was so indignant. He and Kei had both been scorched inside and out by celestial lightning, both survived the ordeal—so why did Kei ascend while nothing happened to him?

Granted, the later story explained that Gagula’s fate lay elsewhere, but could you really blame him for being angry?

So, as Yuki looked through the power-up options, he felt nothing—if anything, he wanted to laugh. Even if he maxed every option, he still wouldn’t be as strong as turning into an Ultraman. Critical damage? Movement speed? You, a little runt not even two meters tall, facing off against giants over fifty meters high, dealing damage by the tens of thousands of tons and moving at Mach speeds—what a joke.

He didn’t hesitate long. Yuki put his first “core” skill point into physical endurance—a life enhancement option, subtle enough not to draw attention. If you put points into movement speed and suddenly break the world record in the hundred-meter dash, you could bet the Foreign Affairs Department would come knocking the next day. As for the other two, “Strength” he’d already ruled out, and “Mana Capacity”—well, maybe when he became a mage, he’d consider that.

As for “Offense,” he put the point into attack speed. On the one hand, in martial arts, speed trumps all. On the other, the other three options were either related to criticals—which he’d already dismissed—or reducing skill cooldowns, which he didn’t yet need; maybe he’d revisit that if he became a mage. By process of elimination, attack speed was the only sensible choice.

Last night, his evening run had earned him an extra bond point from Officer Sakura, and he’d unexpectedly finished the correspondence table between the Language of Light and kana. That meant he could finally allocate points on the “Defense” page.

The four options were: “Life,” “Armor,” “All Resistances,” and “Life Regeneration.”

Yuki didn’t hesitate—he put the point into “All Resistances.” It was a habit from his days of maximizing characters. And in this world, enemy attacks were rarely just physical; with all those sound, light, and special effects, you could tell most attacks had attributes. Putting points into “All Resistances” would never go to waste.

Half an hour later, Yuki met up with Ayu at Aegis. The two of them sat around the round table for a while before the company president sent over their non-disclosure agreements, authorization letters, and temporary passes.

“Miss Merika, do you have some time this morning?”

Hearing Yuki call her, Merika tore her eyes away from the screen. “I do. Do you need my help with something?”

“Yes,” Yuki nodded. “Could you help us access the harbor surveillance system and cross-check for those three suspicious individuals?”

Ayu looked up at that. “You think they’ll show up today?”

Yuki nodded. “Just a feeling, hard to explain.”

Don’t ask—call it a sixth sense. In a world where even magic exists, a sixth sense shouldn’t be that strange.

Seeing Yuki’s certainty, Ayu didn’t ask further. He went to the wall, opened a cupboard, took out two stun batons, clipped one to his belt and handed the other to Yuki.

Merika’s fingers flew over the keyboard for a moment, then she looked up. “We’re in. I’ve connected.”

“Thank you. If you spot any of the targets, send us the coordinates of the camera that caught them.”

“No problem. I can calculate their location directly from the camera feed.” Merika nodded and tapped a key. “Comparison starting now.”

Yuki armed himself too; both were ready. Without delay, they drove the Special Operations car to the harbor, where their day’s work would begin.