Guild Wars
chapter-344

Draco entered the library of the Evergreen Manor, which looked surprisingly underwhelming. It was around the size of a standard small-scale public library, and the shelves were decorated with neatly arranged books, scrolls, and blueprints.

The shelves themselves were made of Divine-tier wood that glowed with wisps of Divine Energy - which was how Draco could tell - and its function should be to preserve the books held within against the evils of aging and wearing.

The floor was made of polished wood that was carved into slats; the perfect type of floor kids would love to 'skate' on with their socks. There were no windows, but there were many runes carved into the walls that handled airflow and temperature, keeping it a level just perfect for reading.

Naturally, there were also runes for noise cancellation and suppression, as well as fire prevention and protection. This was a library that had been carefully manufactured and was built to last the ages.

Draco had rejected Hoover's offer to guide him around and had come in alone. After all, he didn't want the butler to faint from fear due to the evil plans he had.

Of course, Draco wasn't going to steal designs or anything. There was no point in doing such a thing since he planned to take the whole Treasury away after winning the competition.

What he wanted to do right now was to use this special environment and circ.u.mstance to hone a set of Tradeskills to their highest point. This quest was built for crafters, and Draco was sure that there was a mechanic here that would allow him to gain experience and Ranks easily.

Even Vita City-State couldn't do so. The benefits of the city only increased the quality of the item made and reducing the failure rate of the craft. It had benefits to Tradeskill levels, but it was a long-term sort of thing.

Thinking like this, Draco first took out one of the Tradeskills he had acquired a good while back but never got a chance to learn.

｢Privateering - Legendary Tradeskill

Effect: Learn how to sail the monster-infested seas and build sh.i.p.s that can survive the deep waters.｣

Draco immediately learned it.

｢Congratulations on learning skill:

Privateering: 1, 0%｣

Draco smiled. Privateering was not something he had encountered in the previous timeline, only the Advanced version of the Tradeskill had been discovered by Hearty Sailor, a legendary marine-based player from the previous timeline.

He had been a notorious pirate and merchant. If you paid him to carry goods across the sea, even Poseidon could not drown him. Your goods would 100% reach the other side.

If you dared to ferry goods on the seas - his divine territory - then you couldn't blame him for being ruthless!

He had the dual Rare class and Tradeskill for marine explorations, the Sea Lord Class, and the Captain Tradeskill.

That was why he was so overpowered on the sea.

He was the one Draco had planned to recruit later using this Legendary Tradeskill book as bait, but it was no longer necessary. Oh well, if the fellow was smart enough to join Umbra in this life, then all would be fine.

However, if he followed the same trajectory as the previous timeline, then he would become a stepping stone for Draco on the accursed seven seas!

Draco refrained from activating the Tradeskill now. There would be plenty of time for that after he had ransacked- *cough* browsed the library.

First things first, Draco searched around for Tradeskill books. There was a whole aisle dedicated to them, and the first 70% of the rows were stocked with Common Tradeskills alone.

Draco slowly went through them and was shocked to find that there was seemingly one copy of every Tradeskill that was known. With the length of the aisle as well as the way the books were arranged, there should be no less than 15,000 books!

Holy shit!

Then again, it made sense. There were many different types of occupations in the real world - with far more being unknown/undesirable than many people thought - so this world which had magic, medieval tones and whatnot would have far more variety.

Somewhat uncharacteristically for Draco, he slowly and methodically went through the Tradeskill books and read their descriptions one by one. He did this not to assess their usefulness per se, but to broaden his horizons.

If he wanted to go far on the path of Tradeskills, he would need to know every single one in existence. Since the Semi-Origin Refinement God was the supreme being of Tradeskills and the only Tradeskill God to reach Semi-Origin Rank, his knowledge must be vast and profound.

Draco understood that even so, it was likely that the Semi-Origin Refinement God did not uncover all known Tradeskills. Not to mention that as time went on and society developed, new industries had been built and new interests were cropping up by the year, fueling the creation of new occupations.

As Draco identified the skills, he felt his mind expand, and his depth of knowledge regarding Tradeskills increase. Not practicing the skills did not mean that he would not gain anything from them.

Reading their descriptions alone gave him a solid idea of what they did, and as he filled his own mental library with these books, he felt a new world begin to open to him.

It took Draco 12 hours to go through all these Common Tradeskills, even though he was only reading descriptions and looking at their titles. Lord knew how long it would take if there wasn't an 'identify' mechanic for this game and he had to go through them manually.

He then crossed into the Advanced Tradeskill section. This part was not as thick as the Common Tradeskills, making up only 20% of this long aisle. This meant that there were around 4,300 of these books here!

Draco saw books like Taming, the aforementioned Captain, Engineering, Slave Trading, Scribing, Divination, Accounting, and more. These were all well-known Advanced Tradeskills that were reserved for professionals.

Their monetary yield was far above Common Tradeskills, and proportionally, so was their difficulty. Draco once again took note of each and every one, cataloging it into his mind.

This was something he never thought he'd have the chance to do. It was always estimated that there were many Tradeskills in existence, but no one could accurately list them all even if they gathered every living being and held a census.

Draco now had this privilege. His level of talent and interest in Tradeskills was at the same level as his combat talent. Unlike Subjective Magic which Draco learned to supplement his combat skill, Draco learned Tradeskills because he wanted to expand his skillset and enjoyed creating things.

With his current circ.u.mstances, he didn't even need to use his Tradeskills to earn money as the guild he had created was already self-sufficient. So, it simply came down to his own interest and the utility of the Tradeskill.

In his observation, Draco naturally identified many Advanced Tradeskill that would be useful to his cause. However, he touched none of them as he was aware that there was a strong chance that Epic or Legendary variations existed of these Tradeskills.

However, he did certainly keep them in mind. It took him a much shorter time to go through this section, only about 3 hours. After he was done with the Advanced Tradeskills, he went onto the Epic Tradeskills.

They took up 9% of the remaining aisle space, meaning that there were still a whopping 1,900 Epic Tradeskill books to go through! This was a shocking amount, enough so that Draco felt his whole body shiver in delight.

He only had 2 Epic Tradeskills right now, and one Legendary one to boot. Yet, he was suddenly presented with the option to acquire any one of these Epic Tradeskills to fill his now expanded slots.

How could he not drool? However, his greed was temporarily suppressed as he continued to slowly assess the Tradeskills before him. He found the same Tactics he had discarded here, as well as Magical Engineering which he already had.

He also saw Intelligence which Eva had, as well as interesting Tradeskills like Broker, Treasure Hunter, Exorcist, Preacher, and more. It was startling to see these fields as Epic Tradeskills, but simultaneously it told of their relative power in the Western Fantasy section.

Draco didn't touch any of the ones he saw. He wanted to assess the whole aisle before making a choice. If he prematurely selected and found that there was a limitation somewhere - of which there was a very high likelihood with this dastardly AI - tears would not be enough to wash away his regret.

With 'only' 1,900 Epic Tradeskills, it should've taken Draco a shorter time to go through this aisle, but he actually spent a bit over 6 hours there. The reason was simply because he spent more than a passing glance in studying these Tradeskills.

It was more like he was carving them into his memory. He also speculated on the functions and costs of these Tradeskills based on their names and descriptions, so that he could have some preliminary idea of what he would be getting into if he chose them.

After this came the final segment of the Tradeskill book aisle, which was the Legendary Tradeskill section. This made up only 1% of the aisle's total inventory, which was pretty reasonable.

After all, below Divine Tradeskills, Legendary Tradeskills were supreme. With enough of them, one could build a Divine Empire that spanned a continent, and this empire would be the economic and trade center of the entire main plane.

As for Divine Tradeskills, they were not meant for the main plane. They were rather meant for the World of the Gods, as that realm had its own ecosystem and society most likely.

There were slightly over 200 Legendary Tradeskills here, but Draco was still shaken by the number. He spent more than 10 minutes on each Tradeskill book, assessing it and guessing its details.

After spending almost one and a half days here, Draco was not the least bit fatigued. Apart from the system requirement to sleep, eat, and bathe once a day, he was chipper.

Since he had skipped 2 days of these activities, his debuff status bar was quite the sight. However, the debuffs meant little to him as he could still exhibit monstrous power with them on.

After perusing his choices, Draco decided on the few Tradeskills he planned to learn and reached his crummy hands out to snatch them away to pave his future. However, was the AI simply for display?

How could it allow this shameless fellow to have his way so easily? Draco may be its favorite among the playerbase, but no matter how much love a mother may have for her child, it would not allow them to eat half the cake because of preference.

｢System to Player Announcement

Skills selected from the library can only be learned once and used personally. An unlimited amount of Common Tradeskills can be selected. Alternatively, 30 Advanced Tradeskills can be chosen or 5 Epic Tradeskills or 2 Legendary Tradeskills.

One can choose only one of these types. If Advanced Tradeskills are selected, Common, Epic, and Legendary Tradeskills cannot be chosen. The same restrictions apply to the other Ranks.

Are you sure you wish to proceed?

Y/N ｣

Draco's expression cramped. He knew that the system would try to suppress him for some semblance of balancing, but this was too much! Once again, he was being bullied by this evil AI!

However, what could he do? If he wanted to make the rules, he needed to become as strong as Caelo, whose single poke could shut down the system at will.

Until then, he would have to suck it up and take it on the chin like a real gamer. After all, which gamer hadn't suffered from some sort of abuse before?

Thinking like this, Draco sighed. He then deliberated between taking 5 Epic Tradeskills or 2 Legendary Tradeskills.

There was no need to waste a single second on considering the choice of Common or Advanced Tradeskills. With the Umbra Shop in his possession, he would simply have to make it know that he sought those Tradeskills and those books were likely to flood in.

5 Epic Tradeskills might not necessarily be as wickedly amazing as 2 Legendary Tradeskills, at least not on paper.