BXBX NOVEL Chapter 48: Conspiracy Theory
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[User Profile (Public)]:
Name: Cedric Stormrider
Age: 21
Sex: Male
Race: Human
Class: Main - Swordsman, Sub - Scribe
Short Background -
: Cedric Stormrider was born in the fallen City of Fiore to Ravel Delacour and Derrek Stormrider. He's the oldest amongst his siblings; Fiona and Robert Stormrider. An unfortunate accident befell his family (for more details, check the article about the fall of Fiore City) which took the lives of his family, save his.
: Due to the difficulty of his Monthly Mandatory Service (Details: REDACTED!), he got admitted to the Risk Management Center of the Blue Jewel Valley branch and has stayed there for more than 6 years.
: Recently however, through a stroke of good luck, Cedric cinched a close victory on his difficult task and ran away with it, allowing him to clear his sentence on his own and be sanctioned from the RMC.
: Currently, he's on parole and receiving therapeutic help from Dr. Vega of the ReNewLife Institute. He's been diagnosed with Social Anxiety, Clinical Depression, and Mild Sociopathic Tendencies. That said, Dr. Vega claimed that he has a great chance at recovery, showing signs of willingness to receive help.
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Cedric blinked upon reading all of those. He then let out a snort and closed the window.
'Well, it's not inaccurate to say the least.' He mused to himself, 'With Acala's interference, even I wouldn't be able to tell that this Profile was heavily lacking in information.'
'Heh...that's great. At least the world itself is on my side. That's oddly comforting.'
The Acala System will never display all the details of a person without their consent. Not even their Aptitude Rating will be there if the users themselves don't want it to be seen, not to mention their skills or the details of the Monthly Mandatory Service.
For the Overall Aptitude Ratings and details of the Monthly Mandatory Service though, some people might be able to bypass the initial security measure by having a decently high level of System Authority, as Cedric has.
That being said, the Acala System tries to be fair...
If a 3rd Party tries to use their System Authority to see a user's private information, the target will receive an alert revealing who exactly did it. And since these alerts come from the System itself, they couldn't be any more legit and are enough to be used as proof for future use.
Acala forging his documents according to his tendencies was one hell of an advantage that Cedric plans to capitalize on. Cedric has never been a fan of showing off so he sees this as a huge favor.
All of this was simply because he was deigned as a Heaven Defying Genius...or ironically, a Son of Heaven. The world wanted to protect his existence so it was willing to bend the rules for him a bit through the 'Genius Protection Protocol'.
Sighing to himself, Cedric dismissed the alerts and checked his log. There, the recent alerts were recorded and it got his attention.
[Congratulations on unlocking the Profession Sub-Class!]
[You have chosen "Scribe" as your Sub-Class!]
[Sub-Class: Scribe (Lv.1/100)]
: The term for Ancient Record Keepers; Scribes are people who translate Ancient Texts and deciphers unknown languages, inscriptions, runes, etc. They also compile this information and leave it as their legacy for the next generation to use as a reference.
: By choosing this Sub-Class, you are rewarded with the skills: 『Linguist』(fused with 『Education』 skill), 『Decode』, 『Symbol Mastery』, and 『Focus』.
***
The difference between Main Classes and Sub-Classes is that the former can't level up. Once you've been assigned a main class, you'd be stuck with that until you advance to the next Tier and are given a chance to switch. Even then, users will only be given a single chance to switch their classes in their entire life. The latter on the other hand doesn't work like that.
So long as one could reach the maximum level of their Sub-Class, they'd be given a chance to choose another one. Meaning that, if someone really wanted to, they could learn all the Lifestyle Professions out there.
Leveling up a Sub-Class doesn't require Demon Souls, it's based on effort and results.
That being said, similar to Main Classes, the are tons of Sub-Class specializations out there that are almost limitless. It would be a daunting task to learn all of it, so nobody has tried to ever since.
Cedric himself had no desire to learn all the Lifestyle Professions. There are only a few that caught his attention and interest. Even then, he had to focus on his main class so at best, these would be side-projects.
With his curiosity piqued Cedric brought up the skills he received from his Sub-Class:
[Decode Lv.1]
: The ability to break down information into manageable parts, allowing for ease of overall analysis of the whole thing.
: +10% Decoding Speed
[Symbol Mastery Lv.1]
: Language, Inscriptions, Runes, etc. Everything has its own way of relaying information, 'Symbols' are the general terms for that.
: +10% Symbol Analysis, +5% Symbol Carving.
[Focus Lv.1]
: This skill represents the user's ability to dedicate their entire mind to a chosen subject, boosting the speed at which they absorb, process, and relay information.
: +50% Learning Speed Bonus when Active.
: Note! - Prolonged use might cause sharp headaches to the user. Use wisely.
//
"Damn! I'm loaded with Learning Speed Bonuses..." Cedric chuckled to himself.
And isn't that the truth? If he were to stack all of the things that gave him a Learning Speed Bonus, he might be able to have a Doctorate Degree by the end of this day. It's that absurd.
Hell, he's actually struggling to prevent himself from studying right now because his instincts told him that once he begins, not even a natural disaster would pull him away from it.
It's quite scary actually, and he trusts his instincts well enough to not ignore it.
He needed time to adjust to things, after all, he just evolved and received these skills yesterday. His physique and perception were already working overtime to adjust to it so he only needed to wait for a little more before he could safely go at it.
Cedric also couldn't level up just yet.
Well...he technically could, but it would be wiser for him to wait.
The main reason was that he wanted to refine/purify Demon Souls before using them to level up.
In truth, this is more than a conspiracy theory more than anything since he only read it online and nobody has proven it so far.
According to the post he read, leveling up using Demon Souls might prove dangerous in the future since Demon Souls were no less than a compressed ball of Demonic Corruption.
Everybody knows that using Demon Souls to level up has always been risky. Users always had the chance to go mad during their level-ups thanks to the lingering essence of Demons in the souls. But so long as someone can endure the temptation and guard their sanity, they can safely harness its power.
The post added a theory that the whispers of madness and temptations during the use of Demon Souls were only the beginning. They said that somewhere deep inside all superhumans, traces of corruption are present and that, one day, the Demons would use this hidden/slumbering corruption against humanity.
The post garnered much attention, and Cedric could vaguely recall hearing about it on TV. It's alarming, but nothing has been proven so far. Many people don't believe what's written in the post. Some refuse to even acknowledge the idea.
Cedric, being cynical at times, thought that the poster was making some sense. Then again, nothing has been proven so his judgment was reserved.
Still, though, this sparked an idea within him. What if he could discover a way to purify Demon Souls? What if he could get rid of its foul aspects and make the assimilation process painless? Wouldn't that be for the best?
Hell, this idea might make him a Pioneer and win him some awards in the future!
But his main agenda was preservation of course. If he's gonna use a foreign substance as fuel to strengthen himself, he would want the best, so it's worth researching for.
With his speed at analyzing and processing information, it wouldn't take him long before he concludes, at least a short-term one for now.
He wants to level up and advance his Tier as soon as possible since he already delayed it for too long. He just wants to see if his idea is plausible or not.
If it is, then great! He would start purifying the hell out of them Demon Souls, maybe even sell some online just for the heck of it! If it doesn't work, well at least he tried. His willpower should be strong enough to handle Tier 1 Demon Souls anyway. There's practically zero risk for him to fall into madness or temptation.
This is the reason why he chose the Scribe as his first Sub-Class. He wanted to build a purification array to help him with this task.
There were other methods he could use, but none of them were cheap, and Cedric was saving money so he chose to do it this way for now.
Now, he just needs to wait until his body completely adjusts to his recent evolution and he could start experimenting.