Isolde pressed her fingertip against the fragment of the 【Hourglass of Dusk】, in no hurry to take it.
She looked up at Ur and asked deliberately:
“You're actually willing to part with something like this?”
The smile lines on Ur's mask curved slightly. “My esteemed lady, a merchant never mixes personal feelings with the sale of goods.”
“Translate that,” Isolde said flatly. “You believe it will be of greater value in my hands than sitting in your chest.”
Ur chuckled softly. “You always speak so directly.”
“Because I don't like listening to nonsense.”
She set the 【Hourglass of Dusk】 fragment to the side of the table, not signing the bill immediately.
Collecting all five was still a distant prospect; for now, it could only serve as a post-dated check.
Ur's willingness to produce it certainly wasn't out of generosity.
Rather, he knew that if she accepted the first fragment, it was as good as conceding that she would eventually track down the remaining four.
When that time came, maps, intelligence, introductions, and life-saving items—she would continue purchasing every single one of them from Ur.
No matter how beautiful a check was, it couldn't put food on the table, nor could it be used to bash someone's head in.
A capitalist through and through—if there is no demand, simply manufacture it.
Isolde unfurled the first skill scroll.
The moment the parchment unfurled, a wisp of platinum-gold light spilled from its surface. The small flowers secretly snapping at the air in the garden recoiled into their vines in unison, as if scalded.
【High-Tier Light-Attribute Offensive Magic: Daystar】
【Skill Type: Light-Attribute / Offensive / Penetration】
【Skill Description: Condenses high-purity light elements to inflict piercing damage on a single target. If the target's weakness is locked onto in advance, the skill will prioritize penetrating the weak area.】
【Additional Effect: Inflicts bonus damage on undead, corrupt, cursed, and Malice-attribute targets.】
【Special Note: If the caster possesses a non-pure-white holiness, they can convert “Holy Light” into “Fading Radiance” to reduce the backlash on themselves.】
【Learning Requirement: Mastery of a mid-tier or higher light-attribute spell, or possession of an alternative source of holiness.】
【Remarks: This spell originates from the ancient Astral Radiance Academy and is not a standard holy spell of the Holy Court.】
This skill was practically designed to counter her.
Her current primary attribute was Malice, and she was carrying a bunch of labels that sounded perfectly suited to be purified by Holy Light.
Under normal circumstances, learning this skill would be equivalent to heating a blade's hilt red-hot before grasping it.
Before harming the enemy, she would half-scald herself first.
But that was also where the dilemma lay.
She couldn't solely learn Malice-attribute skills.
Malice skills were indeed the best choice for her, but she wasn't just facing ordinary monsters.
The Holy Court would investigate her, players would hunt her, and she still needed to venture out to gather resources.
If she only possessed Malice power, it would be far too easy for others to counter her, and she wouldn't be able to disguise herself.
A single bottle of high-grade purifying potion, a holy rune array, and a few players overflowing with a sense of justice would be enough to pin her down into the “standard evil boss processing procedure.”
She had no desire to live as a fixed strategy in some walkthrough guide.
But she couldn't learn it right away.
At the very least, she had to use Holiness Fragments to bolster her resistance first, then use light-attribute fragments to boost the damage of her disguised light spells.
Otherwise, before Daystar could even be cast, she would burn a hole through her own soul.
Isolde closed the scroll, her voice calm:
“I'll take this one.”
Ur wasn't surprised. “I figured you would like it.”
“It's not about liking it,” Isolde said, setting the scroll aside. “It's useful.”
The second scroll was a common escape spell; she swept her eyes over it and set it aside.
When she opened the third book, there were only lines of spell structures so dense they were almost boring.
At first glance, it looked like a basic textbook.
At a second glance, it was still a basic textbook.
But Isolde slowly sat up straighter.
【Basic Universal Spell: Mana-Conducting Thread】
【Primary Attribute: Normal Type】
【Sub-Branch: Basic Spell / Skill Modification】
【Skill Description: Conducts mana through a thread-like medium, allowing low-intensity elemental, purification, paralysis, marking, and curse effects to be channeled into thread-type mediums, increasing the threads' load capacity, extension distance, and attribute conversion efficiency.】
【Additional Description: This spell cannot directly inflict damage, but it can serve as the growth core for soul-thread, puppet-thread, and stitching-thread skills.】
【Learning Requirement: Intelligence of 80 or higher, mastery of any thread-type skill.】
Isolde's fingertip paused.
This scroll appeared to be the most ordinary.
Yet to her, its value was actually the highest.
【Soul-Binding Thread】 was something she had extracted herself from an incomplete spell; it could control people, interrupt them, and catch them off guard.
【Strangle】 could slice through souls, and when paired with Mark Weakness and the fear status, it could even execute targets.
【Mastering Truth】 allowed her Soul Threads to condense into weapons, giving her a bit of confidence to go head-to-head in direct combat.
But all these skills shared a single problem.
They were like several roads heading in different directions, leading to different places, but they had not yet been woven into a proper web.
【Mana-Conducting Thread】 could patch up this exact foundation.
【Mana-Conducting Thread】 would not replace 【Soul-Binding Thread】, but rather upgrade the “conductive skeleton” of her Soul Threads.
Once she mastered it, her Soul Threads would no longer be limited to binding and slicing; they would be able to carry light, Malice, paralysis, purification, marking, and even spell structures she might extract in the future.
This was the foundation.
It was also the starting point for her personal system to truly take shape.
Isolde's heart gave a very light flutter.
In her past life, she had most envied the players who had established builds.
Others could chain skill after skill, growing stronger and more stable as they fought. Meanwhile, she could only stand at the very front of the party, using her life to test for traps on their behalf.
Back then, she didn't understand skill rotations, attribute synergies, or build construction.
She only knew that others had a path, while she had none.
Now, this scroll lay right before her.
A path of her very own seemed to finally be revealing its edge.
Isolde held down the scroll. “I want this one too.”
Ur said unhurriedly, “Your esteemed ladyship has excellent taste. Most people would look down on it for lacking offensive power.”
“That's because most people lack brains.”
What she lacked right now was never just one or two skills.
She lacked the skeleton that would allow all her skills to grow together.
When the fourth scroll was opened, the light dimmed for an instant.
It was as if a hand had gently veiled the sky above the garden.
A gray curtain of light emerged.
【Malice Universal Skill Book: Malice Substitute Marker】
【Primary Attribute: Malice】
【Skill Type: Anti-Tracking / Aura Misdirection】
【Effect: Extracts a wisp of malice, intent to kill, or corruption aura to create a substitute marker. The substitute marker can be attached to items, corpses, puppets, or specified areas.】
【Usage Effect: When the caster is subjected to a low- to medium-intensity aura tracking, divination lock-on, or faction detection, they can direct the substitute marker to bear the tracking instead.】
【Learning Requirement: Possess Malice as a primary attribute.】
【Limitations: Each substitute marker can only bear a single tracking attempt. When facing high-tier divine spells, blood contract locks, or Demigod-level judgment, it can only cause a temporary shift and cannot fully block them. If the substitute marker is forcibly decrypted, the caster may suffer a reverse lock-on.】
Isolde only read it once before deciding.
This skill was also tailor-made for her.
It wasn't meant for direct killing, but it could make others walk straight into pitfalls of their own accord.
She could leave malicious echoes at an abandoned campsite, making pursuers believe she had only just departed.
She could even leave behind a trace of Holy Court aura after killing someone, pairing it with the Condemnation Wand and holy rune materials looted from the warehouse to construct a flawless frame-up scene.
It fit her primary attribute perfectly.
However, its limitations could not be ignored either; she had to use it with caution.
Isolde tapped her fingertip gently on the scroll:
“I'll take this one too.”
The smile on Ur's mask deepened slightly as he remarked, seemingly in passing, “These skills don't seem to kill directly.”
“Directly killing is convenient, of course,” Isolde said flatly. “But sometimes, letting them doubt each other, fight amongst themselves, and plunge daggers into their own teammates' backs is much more cost-effective.”
The people in her past life had taught her one thing.
The human heart was not something she needed to dirty with her own hands.
Just give it a single opportunity, and it would rot all on its own before your eyes.
As for the fifth and sixth scrolls, she only glanced over them a few times.
One was a low-tier escape spell, and the other was a common disguise spell.
Such things could always be bought in the black market, as long as one was willing to spend the money.
She closed the scrolls, looked up at Ur, and spoke slowly:
“Mr. Ur. Surely there is more than just this in that mobile grocery shop of yours?”
Rate on N.U.
