The Grand Duelist

Chapter 32: Taking Advantage

When Joseph and Ezreal arrived at the Capital City of Reinhardt, they rented a room in a traveler's inn and Joseph finally had the peace and chance to thoroughly check his Status Window.

[Name: Joseph

Level: 15 Gender: Male

Class: The Grand Duelist

Title: "The Sun that Overlooks Everything"

(You are an absolute existence.

You will acquire five stat points for every level.

You will resist all kinds of crowd control effects, debuffs, and abnormal statuses.

Your Reputation cannot go down a certain level even when you're infamous.

Once your health is at the minimum. You will acquire a shield that's equivalent to 100% of damage that you suffered within the last ten seconds. Extra damage that's more than your Health Points also counts to the strength of the shield that you'll acquire. The shield lasts for twenty seconds.

Dying as an overwhelming existence is shameful. Your death penalty for dying is doubled.)

Title: "Deemed Ungrateful by the Gods".

(You are despised by the Gods.

Whenever you are facing an enemy that is affiliated with any God, your stats will dramatically increase.

If you died under the hands of an enemy affiliated with any God, the penalty that you will receive upon death is tripled.

Probability of success in Item/Armor/Accessory Enhancement is dramatically lowered.

Devout believers of any God will instinctively feel hatred at you.)

Title: "Mythical Authority".

(You have an overwhelming presence as someone who dared to go against the gods.

No one can make you submit.

There's a certain probability of inflicting "Fear" status towards those who dare stare at you.

Your dignity can never be lower than those who dare stand before you.

Your presence alone incites fear to enemies while increasing morale to your allies.

You are a natural leader. Your Leadership can never be lower than those who dare compete against you.

As an authority, no talent can escape your eyes. Skill: "Character Scrutinize" is generated and listed as a passive skill.

[Character Scrutinize Lv 1

Talents in the rough can never escape your eyes, a single look from you and their talents will be uncovered.

Skill Usage Conditions: Mystical Authority

Skill Cost: None.

Skill Cooldown: 24 Hours ]

You can summon a Divine Avatar, through the skill "Divine Authority Summoning".

[Divine Authority Summoning Lv 1

Summon a Divine Avatar out of your own authority as a person comparable to the gods. Your Divine Avatar acts as an independent presence. It possesses half of everything that you have, but is innately unruly, arrogant, and untamed. Similar to the Divine Avatar of the previous Grand Duelist.

Your Divine Avatar lasts for half a minute, scaling by your Level and Divinity Stat.

Skill Usage Conditions: Title: "Mythical Authority", and a Mythical Class.

Skill Cost: None

Skill Cooldown Time: 72 Hours] )

Title: "My Power? It's over 9999!".

(Strength + 200)

Health: 1400/1400 Mana: 450/450

Strength: 201 Dexterity: 1

Intelligence: 1 Stamina: 1

Spirit: 5 Tenacity: 5

Reputation: 232 Divinity: 20

Charm: 5

Undistributed Stat Points: 70]

"Holy shit, I am already Level 15? And I have about 70 undistributed stat points? What is going on? Wasn't I supposed to receive 2 stat points every level?

"How did I get this much stat points when I'm just at Level 15? Wait, could it be that these are part of the rewards from that previous quest?" Joseph sucked a mouthful of cold air. He looked somewhat confused about what was going on in his Player Profile.

But when he saw the effect of every title that he had.

He finally had the answer that he was looking for. The reason why he had such a high number of stat points was because of his title, "The Sun that Overlooks Everything". The effects of this title were completely fraudulent and were something, completely unseen before.

Just the effects of the title, "The Sun that Overlooks Everything" alone was heaven-defying.

Joseph swore to himself that he would never reveal any of his titles to anyone under any circumstances.

But of course, whenever fortune was, misfortune follows.

Beneath the Sun that Overlooks Everything title was the title named as, "Deemed Ungrateful by the Gods". This title had great nerfing effects for Joseph when it comes to end game content.

It was because after all, once everyone acquired the best weapons out there. Everything would be a showdown in armor, weapon, or even accessory enhancement.

When everyone had the very best equipment, a single fine difference could be the difference between victory and defeat.

Joseph once again felt indignation against the game developers.

How vile were they that they could think about such a terrifying debuff!

But at the same time...

Joseph felt excited about the prospects of meeting a Legendary Blacksmith.

After all...

If he managed to curry the favor of that particular Blacksmith then maybe he could just hand over his equipment to that Blacksmith in the future to ask for some enhancement, instead of him enhancing everything by himself.

"Fortune really does favor those that work diligently. Even though the game developers were vile because they made such a stupid debuff against me. At least, the heavens..."

"Or should I say, the Supercomputer controlling this game is still giving me a chance."

Joseph's mind cleared up after he arranged his future plans.

For now, he decided on tackling one of the problems that he had, and that was...

Where he would distribute these stat points...

All stat points, once distributed cannot be taken back. Unless you acquired a new class and had the fortune of resetting your stat points for free due to that class.

Because of these reasons, stat points were incredibly precious and one should take extra precautions before distributing them.

If one made a single mistake of distributing more points to Intelligence than Strength. Then, that could possibly turn them into a player that would have to try far harder than those with the same class as him but with proper stats distribution. This was how crucial stat distributions were.

Back then, at the Wolf's Den. Joseph followed a cliched distribution of stat points which was 1:1 in Strength and Agility, but now that everything was reset for Joseph.

He didn't plan on taking any gamble.

After all, he had an unusual class that bestowed upon him the potential to reach the top.

If he didn't carefully take advantage of the advantages that he had, could he still call himself as Joseph.

As someone who took advantage of everything that he could just so he could live alone after his parents died.

Joseph was an expert in taking advantage.

If he didn't take advantage of the situation that he had right now to become even stronger.

Joseph himself would be disappointed at himself.

And so, Joseph stood up and walked towards the room next door.

He knocked and cried out: "Ezreal, it's me. I have something to ask of you."

"Is it about th-"

"No, it's not about the chocolate starfish. I am being serious here... Open up!" Joseph screamed once again and he heard an audible clicking of a tongue inside the room.

After a short while, the door opened. Ezreal greeted him and the two went inside the room.

"Ezreal, you're someone that's incredibly familiar with the Grand Duelist, right?" Joseph stared at Ezreal as if he doubted Ezreal's devotion to the myths. His challenging eyes invoked the fury within Ezreal's heart as the latter stood up and said.

"What are you saying, Master? Does Master still not believe in my devotion to the myths? In that case, then I'll show even more proof to master about how I deeply love them! Say the Grand Duelist for example..."

"Do you know that the previous Grand Duelist likes sweet foods? Back then, the Grand Duelist decimated an entire city due to the fact that they monopolized the production of honey and increased their prices sky-high, stating that honey was a luxury product."

Joseph was speechless about what he heard: "Uhhh, don't you know that what you are saying isn't really something to brag about, right?"

Ezreal shook his head and said: "Master really doesn't understand."

Joseph caught and noticed what he meant: "There you are again speaking about what happened three thousand years ago. If you're not going elaborate about those events back then, then don't mention them! You're needlessly making me curious!"

He scolded and Ezreal's excitement deflated like a balloon.

"Well... Master is just too weak. If you are at least as strong as me then master will finally be qualified to hear the truth about the events back then."

Joseph bitterly smiled and inwardly cried out: 'As powerful as you? You're someone that could possibly compare to a Level 300 Boss!'

'The average player base hasn't even reached the threshold of Level 200 even when Victory is online for about two years already! The speed of leveling in this game is insanely slow and in that case. Just when will I hear the truth from you?'

Joseph shook his head and erased these thoughts. He then turned to look at Ezreal before saying.

"Well, if that's the case then you should help me become stronger."

Ezreal looked confused and couldn't help but ask: "What does master mean?"

Joseph revealed a sly smile: "Hehe, I mean. You're strong, right? It would be easy for you to defeat any monster wandering around the Kingdom of Nether."

Joseph said in a challenging manner towards Ezreal.

His provocation apparently worked for Ezreal's eyes flashed with the intent to prove himself as he stood up and replied in a fierce manner: "Of course! Every monster within this Kingdom is far too weak for me, Master! A single snap of my wrist and they'll be dead!"

Joseph's evil smile intensified and the look that he had on Ezreal was that of greed...

Yes, intense greed.

"Why is master staring at me like that? Wait, could it be that it's the reason why master visited me so late at night? Oh no, I am caught unprepared by master! But still, I'm ready. Here's my chocola-"

"Shut the fuck up!" Joseph who was in the middle of his fantasies suddenly came back to reality when he heard what Ezreal was saying.

After a few moments, he didn't indulge himself with those fantasies anymore as he shook his head and asked once again.

"Since you're so powerful. Can you hunt enemies with me? I'll go lure the enemies and you kill them for me. With that method, wouldn't It be easier and faster for me to become stronger?" Joseph laid out all his cards and sincerely requested Ezreal.

But contrary to his expectations.

Ezreal shook his head and replied: "I would love to do that master, but the laws of causality decrees that one must become stronger through their own hands..."

"And also, isn't master a myth? As a myth, Master is already far stronger than others. In fact, I don't think that they can even compare to, Master. With that in thought, I think that becoming stronger using such a method isn't honorable."

Joseph paused for a moment as he thought: 'I see, so the Supercomputer Noah already knew about such a loophole, and also... The Supercomputer is called the laws of causality? Interesting... That's quite convenient...'

Joseph nodded his head. In the end, he didn't ask for Ezreal's taxi service anymore...

Instead, he changed the question.

"In that case, since you cannot help me in that department. How about you help me regarding my stat points? From your prior knowledge of the Grand Duelist..."

"How should I distribute my stat points so I could become, at least as strong as the Grand Duelist in the future..." Joseph said and Ezreal's expression changed from being serious to excitement.

As long as the topic was the Grand Duelist. Ezreal would always become excited and Joseph somewhat hated it when that happened since he was someone that wasn't really good at socializing in the first place. He always felt that Ezreal was a walking persona of peer pressure.

But now. Now, that he recognized Ezreal as a walking treasure chest. Possessing knowledge about the ancients' unknown to everyone but a few...

As a master of taking advantage.

How could Joseph not take advantage of something like that?

Of course, he would capitalize on it for the sake of becoming stronger!

In the end, the two talked for the entire night and Joseph walked out of the inn the next morning looking like he had lost his soul and entire body's worth of vitality.

In contrast to him, Ezreal looked like a fine maiden that just came out of a bath. His sapphire-like eyes glittered with radiance comparable to that of the sun.

Ezreal looked quite majestic and charming, but when everyone saw the fawning expression on Ezreal's face and his gentle tone of voice as he talked to Joseph...

Everyone on the streets instinctively avoided them, and an effect similar to how Moses parted the Red Sea occurred in the streets of Reinhardt.