Chapter 1387 - The Importance of Proper Penetration Technique

Jake had immediately recognized one of the opportunities offered by a simulated world to be the ability to upgrade skills. Even if experience gain was severely hampered, upgrading skills hadn’t been made harder in any way. In fact, it could be argued that it was easier within the simulated world.

Upgrading skills can sometimes carry risks, as forcibly attempting to circulate energy in ways a skill usually doesn’t allow could result in significant backlash. One example of this was when Jake experimented with getting a boosting skill way back in the Tutorial. The result of that was him blowing up his own arms, and it wasn’t odd to see similar occurrences when experimenting with improving other skills.

Due to his Bloodline, Jake had mostly been spared from injuring himself too much while working on skills, but he definitely knew it often happened to others. Granted, the consequences tended to be far less severe than blowing off a limb and were usually just a period of weakness or the rupture of some vessels. It was rightly considered part of skill upgrading, but it also served as a warning that one shouldn’t experiment too radically.

However, in the simulated world, one could go all out with experimentation, as even if one died, it wouldn’t be an actual death. Of course, it would result in getting thrown out of the simulation for a month, which was why Jake hadn’t done any reckless experimentation yet. The tempo of the event had simply been too fast thus far, and unless it significantly slowed down, Jake didn’t see himself using this “feature” of the simulation any time soon.

That didn’t mean he couldn’t work on upgrading his other skills, though, especially those that had been due for an upgrade for a long time. As usual, when Jake aimed for upgrades, it was to shore up some sort of weakness, and in this instance, he recognized that he still wasn’t super good at dealing with extremely durable enemies that were highly resistant to piercing and slashing damage.

Against a foe like this Silver Knight of Abundance, a blunt object would be far more effective. A hammer would definitely deal noticeable damage, and he wouldn’t be surprised if someone like Caleb would have been capable of dealing more damage than Jake with his katars by using his staff.

Carmen herself had said that the most annoying foes were those who dealt significant levels of blunt damage, and she probably knew what she was talking about when it came to being durable. Someone with a large battle hammer or even an axe would deal far more damage, as each attack would pack way more power than Jake trying to stab her with his sharp little katar. He simply can’t get the same level of force behind his blows.

That’s why Arcane Powershot, especially using a Protean Arrow, tended to be one of his best ways of still dealing damage. The attack was simply too powerful, capable of overwhelming the durability of his foe, and even if the arrow itself failed to pierce his target, the sheer level of energy infused into the attack would be enough to deal some damage.

There was one other way to add “power” into an attack without just packing in more energy, though. Rather than simply adding more power by endlessly pouring in energy, one could significantly improve a skill through concepts. Jake’s Penetrating Arrow was a great example of this. The skill allowed him to conjure a special, penetrating arrow, which, quite frankly, he never did. Instead, he used its second function, which allowed him to infuse any arrow with the concept of a penetrating arrow. This made his Protean Arrows significantly more powerful, especially against foes with high durability or heavy armor, though it did come at the cost of putting the skill on “cooldown,” which again didn’t actually matter as Jake never conjured these Penetrating Arcane Arrows.

It was a skill prime for an upgrade, but it wouldn’t be super easy, seeing as it was already at ancient rarity. Plus, it was one of those simple skills that was very straightforward in concept. It made his arrows better at penetrating defenses, and after successfully striking a foe, it even slightly lowered his target’s defenses for a little while. There were also some extra bonuses based on level disparity and all that, but that was just part of his class theme at this point, and something he felt would naturally come with every upgrade. All in all, it was a skill built on powerful yet simple concepts.

If he wanted to upgrade it, he would probably keep it simple and not add anything. In fact, he would probably prefer to remove the ability to conjure these Penetrating Arcane Arrows and focus the skill more on infusing his other arrows. That ultimately meant that the only way to improve it was to uplift the conceptual power behind the skill from epic to ancient, and while Jake had definitely made some progress in that area and gotten more familiar with the skill, he wasn’t quite there when it came to upgrading it.

Instead, he decided to focus on another skill that could really use some improvement. One that was nearly the exact opposite of Penetrating Arcane Arrow of Horizon’s Edge in many ways, though both skills had similar concepts, making him believe that upgrading this one could help him also improve Penetrating Arcane Arrow down the line.

He was naturally referring to Piercing Cursed Arcane Fang, and when considering the description, Jake really had to admit... it was a fucking mess of a skill.

[Piercing Cursed Arcane Fang (Rare)] – A fang born from darkness, now having embraced the power of curses, kept in control by the Hunter’s arcane mana. Infuse your weapon with a mixture of curse energy and arcane energy as you perform a thrusting strike, significantly increasing penetrative power and damage done. The curse energy will linger in any created wounds, the effect dependent on the nature of the curse energy applied. Arcane mana creates a powerful coating and extends the edge while keeping the curse energy contained. Significantly more powerful when used with Eternal Hunger. Damage improved further if the weapon is benefiting from Fang of Man. Adds a bonus to the effect of Agility, Strength, and Intelligence when using Piercing Cursed Arcane Fang.

Jake had learned over time that when it came to his class skills, it tended to be best to go for simplicity. Having complexity in his profession skills was totally fine, especially with the Malefic Viper Legacy ones, but when it came to his class, there was no reason to overcomplicate anything. Ideally, skills would do one thing only, working in synergy with others. Again, Penetrating Arrow was a great example. He could try to infuse that same concept into the Protean Arrow skill, but keeping them separate allowed both to grow independently and ultimately resulted in a more powerful attack. The same concept applied to his stealth skills, which was why Stealth Attack and Unseen Hunter were kept separate, even if many had merged those two into one.

Given all that, Piercing Cursed Arcane Fang really didn’t make any sense. It was a skill that incorporated curse energy, arcane energy, the penetration concept, its synergy with Eternal Hunger and Fangs of Man, and it was all wrapped around the concept of the weapon operating as a “fang” of sorts.

All of that is packed into one rare skill, leaving very little Room for any part of the skill to actually be impressive. It hadn’t even been that good when Jake created it mid-battle against Minaga in Nevermore, and after evolving and having it downgrade to rare rarity, it only seemed worse from every perspective.

As for just how bad it truly was?

Jake, who had been dancing with the Silver Knight of Abundance while contemplating how to take advantage of his opponent, moved in to strike with both his katars, having fully switched to melee now that he’d decided on upgrading Piercing Fang.

After dodging below a sword swing, he stepped forward and stabbed the knight in the side, Piercing Fang activating as the curse and arcane energy wrapped around Eternal Hunger, as well as all the other concepts applied by the skill.

The katar made impact with the knight’s body, resulting in a great release of energy as Jake’s weapon was repelled, barely leaving a small mark on the silver body of his opponent. All that was left of his attack was a bit of lingering curse energy that quickly dispersed.

As if wanting to confirm it wasn’t a fluke, Jake used Piercing Fang several more times, doing little more than proving his point further. This was ultimately the problem with the skill... it did so many things that it ended up not really doing anything at all.

Using it was stronger than just striking normally while putting full power behind the blow, but it wasn’t truly substantial. In the first place, Jake’s damage with his katars was kind of pitiful compared to specialized melee fighters. Okay, more accurately, compared to melee fighters like the Sword Saint, his damage with katars sucked.

For the longest time, the true damage had come from the venom on his katars, courtesy of Fangs of the Malefic Viper or whatever other poison he had coated his katars in. That’s why he usually only needed to leave shallow stabs or cuts, and he would still end up doing substantial damage.

However, without poison, he was essentially just poking his opponent with a toothpick. Compared to his archery, he had far fewer passive skills boosting him while using katars, making his ranged damage higher and more effective, and in the department of active skills, there really was no contest. His only active melee skill remained Piercing Fang, which he had just confirmed sucked.

Technically, he did have one other active melee skill, though it was part of a passive one. His upgrade to Fangs had given it a new active function that he knew from experience was quite powerful:

“...When baring your fangs, you can accumulate venom to unleash in a devastating Venomburst Strike, inflicting an empowered toxin upon your foe...”

Alas, this ability did have one major drawback... it was only really effective if he could first pierce his opponent and then use the skill. Like a snake having to bite down before secreting its venom, Jake also needed to actually pierce his foes before unleashing the Venomburst Strike for it to do anything.

Which brought Jake back to Piercing Fang, which would be a lot better if it could, you know, pierce things. Thus, as Jake continued to battle the Abundant Silver Knight, the two of them ravaging the room as Jake repeatedly hit his foe for zero damage, he slowly began to form what kind of skill he wanted Piercing Fang to become.

One thing was certain: it had to be cleaned up. Aspects had to be removed. If it had been higher than rare rarity, doing so would have been far more difficult, but as the skill was already such a mess, the “core” of the skill remained rather undefined outside of the entire “fang” and “piercing” concepts that he decided to fully lean into.

Curse energy was nice and good, but in truth, Jake was starting to think it didn’t truly fit his Path. Maybe he could still find a use for it with alchemy, and Eternal Hunger remained an awesome weapon he would definitely keep using, but he didn’t think he should actively try to use curse energy in his hunter skills. He was leaning further and further into the Horizon theme, and he just didn’t think curses had any place there.

Except when it came to one skill, that is. Rather than use curse energy in several places, Jake would rather condense it all into a single skill that had ultimately stemmed from a Path that wasn’t entirely Jake’s own: Eternal Shadow of the Primal Hunter.

It remained the plan for him to use concepts inherent to this virtual world in an attempt to improve the Eternal Shadow skill, and in that process, fusing it further with Eternal Hunger also made some level of sense. The two were practically already one, and Jake had a feeling that making the curse energy more “his” would be the right Path.

Throughout his “fight” with the knight, he naturally still kept releasing Pulses, primarily to see if anyone came his way. Fortunately for him, the Administrators that he had detected found themselves quite busy after Jake had awakened all those Specters of Abundance. It seemed they could possess even the random murals on the wall, creating creatures from them, and some even went as far as to fuse into floor tiles, creating large elementals to attack anyone daring to wander the halls.

Perhaps it was because the Specters of Abundance had only been triggered recently, and that the only people who had made it into this stage so far were the people Jake had helped, but no one was even attempting to come Jake’s way, giving him plenty of time to experiment with the knight.

From an outside perspective, the battle must have looked funny, as Jake perfectly dodged every strike while landing several counters, his weapons doing no damage. It was a fight that didn’t progress at all, as neither side could actually injure the other, and while it seemed to be at a standstill, a slight change was happening at a steady pace.

With every strike, the curse energy revolving around Jake’s katar slowly started dispersing as he actively tried to suppress that part of the skill. At the same time, he repurposed some of the arcane energy formerly used to simply keep the curse contained, having already determined that while he wanted to clean up the skill, arcane energy would remain a core part of it. He integrated arcane energy with all of his skills, and there was no reason why Piercing Fang would be any different.

As he used the skill and tried to refine the aspects of curse energy out of the skill, he found that there was an odd natural inclination to use dark mana instead, making him realize that there were still lingering Records of when the skill was based on dark mana. He had effectively just replaced dark mana with curse energy when he upgraded it, having done so very haphazardly, and it had only worked as the Sin Curse of Hunger was relatively similar to dark energy, in that both naturally sought to consume all other forms of energy.

Trying to incrementally change a skill like this while deliberately controlling all aspects of its activation was rather risky, but as it was only a rare skill, the energy involved in its use was manageable, only further hammering home how much it sucked. Still, sometimes the skill just failed to activate, making Jake look even dumber as he couldn’t even leave a visible scratch on the Silver Knight of Abundance without using his work-in-progress Piercing Fang.

Slowly, the change started to show. Soon, all the curse energy had dispersed, and the level of energy infused into every stab increased. From small nicks and scratches, he started peeling off small fragments, leaving minor cracks, and honestly, he was really fucking thankful he’d upgraded Fangs of Man to make his poor wrists not break after having effectively been punching a metal wall for the better part of half an hour by now.

After dodging a downward slash, Jake stepped forward and stabbed with all his force, and finally, something seemed to click into place, the arcane mana moving as the strike sped up even more than normal, and a moment later, the sound of cracking metal was heard as the tip of Jake’s katar had penetrated into the body of the knight, getting stuck.

Jake was grinning as the large B-grade spun around to attack again, rag-dolling Jake along with it as his katar had gotten stuck in the knight’s body, which in itself was a great success in his mind.

It hadn’t upgraded in rarity yet... but Jake felt it was close, and after using his feet as leverage to pull out his katar again, he held up both weapons as arcane energy started revolving around them, speeding up as Jake prepared to dive in again, not satisfied until he could pierce his katar all the way to the handle.