The Archbishop nodded as Dana confirmed Karl’s words. “A Skill for Randomization is how he described it as well. Though, he didn’t mention that the skill was designed to troll users.”
“Give them a random option from the System. It’s a thing, I swear it.” Karl corrected him quietly.
The last of the first group came out just after that, and the answers were all different, but all quite mundane. But now that they knew what was likely to happen, the Clerics were much more interested in what the others would say.
Oddly, the Commander from the final group was the next out after the last of the first group, and he looked just as confused as everyone else.
“What did you see, friend?” The Archbishop asked.
“It gave me the option to advance my class. A random Class Upgrade, it called it. I am a Paladin now, see?”
He held up his arm, showing off the mark of a glowing shield with a lightning bolt on it, the sign of a Paladin.
Nacht rapidly shifted to dragon form and picked the man up, holding him in front of one massive golden eyeball for closer inspection.
“The first advancement trial. He really did change classes at Commander Rank. How fascinating.”
Then he dropped the Paladin and began to wander away, pacing as he was lost in his thoughts.
The baffled Commander dusted himself as he got back to his feet, but nobody else was concerned about his state. The fact that the trial temple had advanced his class was much more important in the grand scheme of things than a bit of dirt on his backside, or a bruised Ego.
In fact, he was so overjoyed about the situation that he wasn’t even made about being accosted by the dragon. He had advanced from being a basic warrior to a Paladin, and he had a whole selection of new skills to choose from, on top of what he already knew.
That was the greatest thing that he could have possibly hoped for, and he got it just from showing up here to have his rank verified.
“I think that I missed something. Can someone explain what is going on and why I have such a great opportunity?” The Commander asked once it was clear that nobody intended to explain.
Karl gestured toward the temple. “It asked me for a strange thing when I was in there earlier, and because the system is so much more active for me than for others, it began to activate the old system functions within the temple.
One of the functions that these temples used to have was to allow those who had reached sufficient level to choose an advanced class, as they would have worked their way through all the skills that their starting class had.
So, you are a Commander, and you should have learned all the skills of a Warrior, which means that now you are ready to be a Paladin.
If you check your system interface, you should have at least a few Skill Points available that you can use to choose Paladin skills. It’s an instant learning function, and you will become quite the formidable combatant once you have chosen some of the new options.”
The Commander’s eyes went blank as he searched through his interface, and a smile slowly grew as he discovered all that he could potentially learn now that he had advanced.
“Alright. I have a number of new defensive abilities, plus [Holy Light] an area damage and protection type combination skill. Man, it’s good to be a Paladin. I even got [Lay on Hands] healing as a Class skill. It’s not one of the remarkable heals of the white clerics, but it’s much better than nothing.” The Commander cheered as he finished using up his points.
“Excellent. Now, when the others come out, we will be able to check if they also can now access their skill tree. We know that you can, as it upgraded your Class. But for those who were partially awakened by the Serum, we don’t have enough data yet.” Nacht explained, as he transformed back to human after his walk around the area. freewёbn૦νeɭ.com
The Archbishop nodded happily. “Yes. This is a wonderful day, and I am greatly looking forward to seeing what else the Elites will manage with a bit of assistance.
At first, the randomness appeared to be a drawback, but perhaps it’s not. If it’s just the best way to give the users an option, then the church can count it as a boon.”
Karl shushed Tessa, who was about to remind the Archbishop that Karl actually had no idea what he was doing at the time, so he could hardly be given credit for a positive outcome.
The old man was happy, and that was all that really mattered.
Slowly, the rest of the Elites who had gone into the trial began to come back out again, and the clerics on duty got to work taking their reports while Karl tried to determine just how long it was polite to remain here before they ran away once more.
Fortunately, the Clerics had that covered for him. “Monarch Karl. If you would like to return to your apartment, we can bring the Acolytes by later in the day, perhaps a few hours after lunch? That should be enough time to get to know them this afternoon, and then you can begin training them after your visit with the doctors tomorrow.
Just routine diagnosis, making sure that you are not suffering from your extended time in the field.” The Red Dragon cleric suggested as they waited for the rest of the trial takers to finish.
“Yes, that would be perfect. I will go prepare for their arrival, and then once we meet I can develop a training regimen based on their specialties. I have high hopes for our options here.” Karl agreed, then gestured for everyone to follow him back to the apartment. With some luck, they could cook a proper meal and get a nap in before they had to meet new people, and that would make the day nearly perfect. It wasn’t often that they had the time to get a proper nap during the day, and certainly not while they were travelling.
But such lofty hopes were dashed the moment that they got back to the building and realized that there were dozens of other messages waiting for them from all over the city, and not all the messages could simply be ignored.
The ones that were just looking for them to join some business venture could be put aside for now, as they had many more important things to do.
But there were also the ones that were from other Elites looking for a meet and greet, which could be anything from just saying hello to looking for team members for larger missions, resource gathering or even a rapid response team.
Those could not be set aside so easily without looking like a complete jerk. But they weren’t only for Karl. There were requests for the entire team waiting for them, and he simply got the majority of them, as this was his apartment.
Ophelia smirked as she looked at the small handful of messages she had received, compared to everyone else. “It’s good to be the low-key one. I only get a few people messaging me, and none of them are super long portfolio binders.” She joked.
Then she opened the first message that had been left, written on red paper and sealed in an envelope, showing that it was hand-delivered and not relayed to the concierge.
She read a few lines, skimmed through the rest with a disgusted look, and then handed the letter back to the receptionist.
“Kindly burn that. The words alone should be enough to have it declared a biohazard.”