Darius' former stockpile of 49 SP quickly dwindled down to 5 SP. He had wanted to increase some other skills by a grade, like Swap to level 41 so it would have the Advanced-grade standard and Spawn, so it would become Intermediate grade.

However, after having invested 39 points into Swap and not yet manually testing its utility, Darius was understandably more than a little hesitant to invest more. Anyway, that could be done later.

As for Spawn, it was the skill that spawned his two Skeletons turned Vampires, Mikey and Joneson. The fellows were still over at Thanatos' place doing whatever it was he wanted them to do, and they still had 3 more years to go on their indenture.

Darius sighed. He then checked the rest of his skills to perhaps find something to invest these 5 SP. Truthfully, now that he had hit the Adept stage, he was beginning to feel the pinch Caesar warned him about.

The Adept state was a defining one, because it was when one truly started to become recognized as a powerhouse on Faust. Even in Grandmaster-heavy areas, Adepts were treated like nobles.

Here, the kind of skills that Darius could learn and planned to learn would have such shocking power if he Transmuted them (as shown in the previous chapter), allowing him to finally enjoy the utility of his high stats.

After all, one of the greatest weaknesses of the Supreme System's method was that while Darius could have the stats of a Grandmaster and beyond, his actual skill cap forced him to remain at the level he was.

A Grandmaster using an Intermediate grade skill was naturally far stronger than a Journeyman himself using that skill, but such a skill looked like a joke compared to a bonafide Grandmaster grade skill

What saved Darius was the fact that the higher-ranked the skill, the harder it was to learn, use, and not to mention master.

It shouldn't be too surprising though.

None of them had something like the Supreme System where they could clap their hands to absorb a skill book and use it on-demand.

For others, if they weren't using someone else's skill, they would have to create their own.

Unlike Intermediate grade skills that were around like rubbish since every Tom, Dick, and Harry wanted to make some profit off their work or get rid of their practices, Advanced and above-grade spells were being kept in mage towers, academies, etc.

The former Andrato, although a trash-tier kingdom, had also had such a practice. Most of the shelves had been filled with Intermediate grade skills that were flawed. You basically bought them at your own risk, but there were no Advanced-grade and above skills.

Higher tier empires might have a few from benevolent Adepts, but that was only while they were alive or free. The moment they died or disappeared, a force would buy up the skill and prevent its circulation, forever keeping the rights to it.

What was the creator gonna do? Get up from the grave and fight them? Even if he did, could he beat them?

Most professions on Earth had done this sort of thing before the modern age. In the modern era, the Internet had largely eliminated this kind of act, but before that, information for professions had been hoarded by institutes, necessitating people to go there to learn.

Otherwise, who would still need to pay absurd university fees for information that could be learned over the Internet?

Darius had already made some Advanced-grade skills ahead of time that he was absolutely looking forward to learning and upgrading, but he didn't take them out just yet.

Rather than let them drown in his endless list of skills, he would prefer to earn some more AP and SP to empower himself during this period.

He had no plans of rushing to do the Master Quest as the next thing on his agenda was launching his two-pronged war. Once the war was stabilized and he could leave both sides under his control to themselves for more than a year, he would begin the Master Quest.

With his mind cleared, he kept his remaining SP.

For now, he would check Gunner and Xela's changes, assist them in however he could, and then head back to Safemoon to begin the next stage of his journey in Faust.

With that in mind, he opened up Gunner's Character menu.

Name: Gunner

Race: Half-Human, Half-Giant (Royal Blood)

Class: Vanguard

Stage: Adept

Subclass: Anti-mage

HP: 90,000

/90,000

MP: 3,280

/3,280

STA: 12,300

/12,300

Level: 41

Exp: 0

/4,100

Strength: 300

Agility: 100

Endurance: 300

Intellect: 80

Willpower: 2300

Charisma: 50

Luck: 100

Physical Status: Healthy

Mental Status: Indifferent.

Affection: Friendly lvl max

AP: 2

SP: 68

Active: Engage - Lv.40, Earthen Stomp - Lv. 40, Earthen Punch - Lv.40, Earthen Lariat - Lv.40, Omega Blow - Lv.40, Eraser Cannon - Lv.40, Solid Defense - Lv.1, Unbreakable Ward - Lv.1 etc

Passive: Energy Ward - Lv.100, Mageward Barrier - Lv.100, Weapons Mastery - Lv.1, Unarmed Mastery - Lv.5, Earth's Guardian - Lv.100, Extreme Speed - Lv.80, Spirit Barrier - Lv.100 etc

Abilities: Unlimited Power (Advanced), Super Instinct (Intermediate), Immortal Body (Advanced), Mind Power (Basic), Morph (Basic), Divine Favor (Intermediate).

Darius almost choked on his spit when he saw Gunner's Willpower stat. This stat didn't mean that Gunner's mental Willpower was that high - though Gunner was very resilient in that regard - but rather his natural magical defense!

It should be known that according to the Supreme System, Darius Willpower had been set to 350. 300 had come from his Dragon Ancestor bloodline which was at the fledgling state, with the other 50 from his Magus Subclass.

His human nature, his spells, nothing else gave him an advantage here. Without one or the other, he would have most likely only had 0-1 points of Willpower at best.

Of course, that was not considering the magic shield he conjured when becoming a Journeyman mage.

That was why he was unbothered that Caesar had added this stat. It wouldn't change anything because if one didn't have a physique that granted magical defense or some special attribute, they would still have 0.

So the big question was, how did Gunner have so much in the way of Willpower?!