Three days passed in a strange rhythm of battle? Boredom, fishing, and terror.

  Every morning, the sun rose over calm waters. Every hour, Ludger hauled absurd sea beasts on deck. Every night, the crew ate like kings while questioning reality.

  Even the prisoners began watching him fish like monks observing a ritual. A few beastmen asked permission to try. They sted ten minutes before swearing off the ocean for life.

  Ludger, meanwhile, evolved.

  He didn’t just fish, he optimized. Mana flow adjusted. Line frequency tuned. Bullet depth calibrated.

  He refined his method until stunning prey became second nature. Until hauling ten-meter octopus monsters was considered “moderate difficulty.” Until he no longer needed stone blocks, just timing and clean mana shots.

  New Skills Acquired:

  [Enhanced Lure Lv. 1]

  Infuses fishing line or bait with mana to attract aquatic creatures. Stronger mana attracts rger or more aggressive prey. Efficiency scales with Dexterity and mp consumption.

  [Resilient Line Handling Lv. 1]

  Reduces strain on line and rod when hauling heavy prey. Decreases break chance. Allows controlled tension release and pull-in timing.

  Ludger sat near the bow that third evening, gaze on the sunset-red water. His rod y beside him, line coiled neatly, the deck around him stacked with salted fish and monster meat drying on racks.

  Kae dangled her legs off the railing. “So, fisherman Ludger. Satisfied yet?”

  Ludger nodded once. “Progress achieved.”

  Maurien smirked. “Meaning?”

  Ludger opened his status window mentally. Two new skills. Full understanding of mana-infused bait. Deep-water prey no longer a gamble.

  He closed it again.

  “Meaning I can do something else,” he said.

  Renvar, eating grilled octopus, froze. “We suffered three days for that sentence?”

  Ludger shrugged. “The results matter, not the method.”

  Kae ughed. Maurien shook his head in acceptance. Even Vorak, the chained beastman, let out a low huff that might have been amusement.

  Name: Ludger Level: 96 (2,450 / 9,600)

  Current Job: Cook (Lv 35 – 620 / 3,500) Current Css: Geomancer (Lv 113 – 1,300 / 11,300)

  Health: 3.360 / 3.360 Mana: 17.300 / 17.300 Stamina: 4.150 / 4.150

  Strength: 453 Dexterity: 575 Intelligence: 1219 Vitality: 336 Wisdom: 1713 Endurance: 415 Luck: 253

  Csses & Skills

  Wind Enchanter Lv. 11 (+3 DEX, +3 INT, +3 WIS)

  Skills: Wind Wall Lv. 11

  Wind Step Lv 11

  Wind Bde Lv 11

  Sculptor Lv 13 (+5 DEX, +5 LUK)

  Skills: Sculptor’s Touch (Lv.11)

  Sculptor’s Skill (Lv.13)

  Sculptor’s Speed (Lv.10)

  Runic Mage Lv 05 (+5 INT, +5 WIS, +5 DEX)

  Skills: Wordweave Lv.01

  Rune Echo Lv.01

  Bandit Lv. 1 (+4 DEX, + LUK)

  Skills: [Pickpocket Lv. 1]

  Sword Dancer Lv. 1 (+3 DEX, +3 STR, +3 END)

  Skills: [Unknown Stance Lv. 1]

  Fisherman Lv. 11 (+3 LUK, +3 VIT) Skills: [Basic Hooking Lv. 1]

  [Enhanced Lure Lv. 1]

  [Resilient Line Handling Lv. 1]

  He was progressing. But not like before. Not like the explosive leaps when he first unlocked Geomancer or Sage csses and gained multiple skills in a single surge. Not like when Runic Mage opened half a dozen paths at once. Now the system felt heavier, resistant, like it demanded deeper mastery before granting more shortcuts.

  Part of it was deliberate. Ludger was spreading himself wide, every new css, every unfamiliar skill, every alternate technique. He wanted to collect them like tools in a kit, each one useful in a different moment, each one a solution waiting for the correct battlefield.

  Growth through breadth instead of depth. It was costing him efficiency. If he focused purely on Geomancer and combat, he could’ve been terrifying by now. If he trained Teacher alone, he might reach a world-css support threshold in months. If he devoted everything to swordsmanship or runes, he’d achieve sharper mastery faster. But Ludger wasn’t building a narrow bde.

  He was building a weapon wheel. A library of functions. A path that could adapt to any problem or enemy. Fishing taught him something important, maybe critical.

  With mana manipution, he could cheat reality. Not in a broken way, but through loopholes the system didn’t forbid. He attracted bigger fish by mana infusion. He stunned them with mana bullets. He earned XP faster by bending rules rather than breaking them.

  That was why, for days, Ludger used every free stat point on one thing: Wisdom. Not Strength. Not Dexterity. Not Endurance. Wisdom enhanced mana pool, control, efficiency. Mana efficiency meant longer fights. Longer fights meant survival. And future runes, future overdrives, future teaching boosts, all scaled with it. But trade-offs were real. Without raw strength increases, his physical side gged behind. His muscles didn’t scale as fast as his magic. His bones could break in a csh of pure power.

  Vorak proved that brutally. Ludger repyed that fight in memory, the shock through his forearms, the damage past armor, the strain in joints each time he blocked the runic nunchaku. His body had held out, but only barely. If he had pushed physical stats harder, if he had trained brute force instead of runes and crafting and fishing…

  He wouldn’t have felt pain for days afterward. He exhaled quietly, watching sea spray catch orange sunlight. This path was slower. More complex. More dangerous. But it was his.

  A path of multi-css growth, loophole exploitation, system mechanics bending under strategy instead of raw talent. A path built on the idea that one day, knowledge and technique would let him defeat enemies far stronger than him in stat alone.

  He wasn’t a giant. He wasn’t a berserker. He was a magical engineer of progression. And every new css, every minor skill, every clever trick… Was another bde in his unseen arsenal.

  Ludger adjusted his gloves, flexing fingers still stiff from the Vorak fight. He would catch up physically. He would strengthen his body when time allowed. But for now?

  Wisdom first. Mana next. Efficiency always. Because one day, he wouldn't just fight pirates. He’d fight the hands pulling their strings.

  The fourth afternoon brought a change in the horizon, no longer endless water, but a jagged wall of dark silhouettes rising from the horizon like the spine of a sleeping giant. Mountains, sharp and proud, their peaks dusted white even under summer sun. Clouds curled around them like slow-moving serpents.

  Kae leaned on the railing, arm outstretched as she pointed.

  “There.” Her voice carried over the wind. “The mountain range. That’s the border between the Empire and the Velis League.” She gnced sideways with a grin. “Linne and Dan could get their hands on these runic toys earlier.”

  Ludger followed Kae’s finger with his gaze, mind weighing routes and risks. He rubbed his chin, expression thoughtful behind half-lidded eyes. Coria was tempting. A safe harbor. A pce to replenish supplies and let their artifacts get studied sooner. He could even drop off part of the prisoners there under Imperial supervision.

  But then he imagined the ship anchored for days. A target. Visible. Vulnerable.

  And beyond those mountains y Velis waters, where underworld agents might be listening, where fanatics or informants could easily spot the stolen fgship. Where a week-long stop might give enemies plenty of time to gather numbers and retaliate.

  He lowered his hand.

  “We don’t stop,” Ludger decided quietly.

  Kae raised a brow. “No?”

  “I’ll give Linne and Dan the runic pieces after we reach Primal Groves waters,” Ludger said, voice firm. “The fgships too recognizable, waiting in foreign seas is asking to get burned.”

  Maurien stepped beside them, wind stirring his hair like a restless spirit. “Your reasoning?” he asked, not doubting, simply verifying.

  Ludger’s eyes stayed on the distant range.

  “If we dock, we lose days,” he said. “If we lose days, word might spread. Enemies regroup. Ambush us. Or worse, warn the underworld guild we’re coming.” His fingers tapped the railing lightly. “Speed is our advantage. Surprise is our bde.”

  Rathen, listening nearby, slowly nodded as the logic settled.

  Kae smiled. “You’re thinking like a pirate.”

  “No,” Ludger corrected ftly. “Like someone who doesn’t want to be ambushed by pirates.”

  Maurien’s lips curved. “Fair distinction.”

  The mountains loomed closer, carved like ancient teeth against the sky. And under that shadow, the ship sailed on, not toward safety, but deeper into uncertainty.

  Every hour they stayed at sea was a gamble. Every choice is a step onto someone else’s board. But moving fast? Keeping momentum? Striking before the enemy prepared? That was Ludger’s game. A game built not on caution…but on initiative.

  The voyage stretched forward in long gray-blue horizons. To most aboard, the next three days dragged like a calm siege. Prisoners slept or stared at the sea with empty eyes. Sailors maintained sails and repaired pnks out of habit. Renvar compined of boredom at least twice per hour, Kae threatened to throw him to sharks once per hour, and Maurien meditated as if holding the entire world on one calm exhale.

  But for Ludger, the days passed fast, a blink of routine broken only by opportunity. He sought out the Ironhand engineers.

  Rathen’s men weren’t mages or adventurers they were craftsmen built on sweat, callouses, and problem-solving. They handled cranes, pulleys, cannons, gears, balst systems. They were used to building under pressure and repairing ships mid-battle with nothing but grit and curses.

  Ludger shadowed them. He asked questions. He memorized measurements. He studied levers, tension systems, mana-rotors, scale-gears, ball bearings cut from monster bone. And the workers found themselves teaching a mind that devoured mechanical logic like bread.

  By the second day, Ludger understood the difference between steam-coil propulsion and mana-repeater engines. By the third, he was sketching mechanisms faster than most sailors could draw rope knots.

  [New Job Unlocked: Engineer Lv. 1]

  Bonus per Level: +3 INT, +3 WIS Skill Acquired: [Simple Mechanism Assembly Lv. 1] Allows creation and repair of basic mechanical systems. Efficiency scales with Intelligence and material quality.

  Ludger didn’t stop there. He took scrap wood, bronze nails, and summoned small chunks of earth, condensed like cy. Using mana as a tether, he shaped gears, joints, and a small rotor core. The sailors watched with raised brows, whispering bets on whether it would explode or walk.

  Ludger assembled the crude mechanism into a squat, toy-sized earth golem with jointed limbs, ttice gears inside its torso. He flicked mana through it like a puppeteer’s string. It moved.

  Clumsy. Slow. Barely able to waddle six steps before falling ft with a thud. But it moved. The system rewarded the creation.

  [Simple Mechanism Assembly: +100 XP]

  Ludger rotated the broken toy in his hand, examining its fws, the bance off-center, gear ratio inefficient, core conductor weak. Fixable. Upgradeable. Expandable.

  He couldn’t help imagining: If he unlocked a Golemmancer or Automaton Crafter job…

  He could double skill growth. Engineer XP + Golemancer XP = exponential progress. Combat puppets. Runic automatons. Siege constructs. Multi-css synergy. He turned the toy over once more, lips twitching in the faint hint of a smile.

  Every day, every lesson, every tiny mechanism, another seed. Kae walked by, gnced at the waddling rock-thing, and blinked.

  “…Did you just make a baby golem?”

  Ludger nodded.

  Renvar poked the golem, yelped when it fell on his foot, and screamed betrayal. And Ludger only sat back, mana humming through the ship like threads in a loom. Time was slow for everyone else. But for him? It was efficient. Productive. Full of quiet growth. And as the ship sailed toward the Primal Groves, Ludger kept building his arsenal of skills… One css at a time.

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