Berserk of Gluttony (LN)-Volume 1 Chapter 3

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Examining the skill

Once I had returnedhome, I wet a ragged cloth with some water I had drawn from the wellto wipe myself down. Tomorrow, I will be going to where Roxy lives.Would I be a little more presentable and cleaner like this? I lit upthe candle and looked into the broken mirror. As if that would havechanged anything. Wearing clothes that had been mended and patched upall over, it was fruitless to worry about appearances now.

Giving up, I laiddown on the straw bed. I looked up at the leaky ceiling stained fromthe rain, thinking back on the events that had happened today. Duringthe day, I had been assaulted by Rafal and his siblings, however, bydefeating thieves late at night with Roxy, I may end up working forthe Heart Family. This alone sounded like a fairytale story.

Suddenly, Iremembered the robotic voice that appeared after I killed the bandit.I definitely heard it mention that a status had been updated. Skillscalled Appraisal and Mind-reading… and what were the others? Icould not remember. Even so, Appraisal was an unusual skill thatallowed the user to look up information on things that existed inthis world. In having this skill, my life would probably be changedfor the better.

I casually tried tothink of <Appraisal>. And then,

・FateGraphite Lv1

HP: 121

Strength: 151

MP: 101

Spirit: 101

Agility: 131

Skills: Gluttony,Appraisal, Mind-reading, Concealment, One-handed Sword Technique

My status and skillsappeared in my mind.

"Eeeh! What isthis?!"

Calm down, me.

Firstly, status.Mine should be a clean and neat column of 1's for all theattributes. Yet, they all became three digits. With these, I would beable to fight the lowest grade demons.

Next, skills. Ishould only possess Gluttony. However, now it had increased intomultiple skills, with Appraisal, Mind-reading, Concealment, andOne-handed Sword Technique. Unbelievable…

At least, seeingthis status and those skills, I proved that I truly did haveAppraisal. Wait a minute, I could quit being a gatekeeper and becomean appraiser if I had this skill. Appraising was not a career thatanyone could easily obtain, so the pay was decent. Geez, what exactlyis going on?

Calm down, me.

I decided to examinethe other skills by using Appraisal.

Mind-reading:Reading the mind of the target you touched.

Concealment: Concealyour possessed skills from appraisals.

One-handed SwordTechnique: Increasing the attack power of the one-handed sword. Arts<Sharp Edge> can be used.

I was already awareof my Mind-reading skill. When Roxy held my hand, I heard her innervoice since this skill had been activated.

After thinking overthings, I reached a conclusion. Or more precisely, the robotic voicegave me the answer when I killed the bandit. The answer of whathappens when the Gluttony skill was activated.

The cause of thisphenomenon was the Gluttony skill that I had always considered to beuseless. With the Appraisal skill, I investigated the Gluttony skillafresh.

Gluttony: Be hungry

Yeah, I understandnow. Back then in my home village, this was what the visitingappraiser saw. In other words, this skill had hidden powers thatcould not be seen in appraisals. Namely, it hid the ability to eatthe soul of the defeated opponents and steal their status and skills.As a secondary effect, it filled and expanded the empty stomach.

This was a skillthat strengthened the more it was used. Nevertheless, I could notsimply become a murderer. Then, what should I do? It was simple.There were many demons residing outside of Seyfert Capital. I wouldkill them and take their power. And then someday, I would be strongerthan even the Holy Knights. When that time came, I could seek revengeon Rafal and the Breric Family.

As this thought, myspirits rose and I felt like going to hunt monsters immediately.However, it was dangerous to hunt in the dark so it was better tohunt in the morning after a good sleep. I actually had a gatekeepingshift in the morning as Rafal's substitute, but now I could ignorethem. I no longer had to obey their orders given that Roxy was my newemployer. Since my interview with her father was at noon tomorrow, itshould be fine if I returned to the capital before then.

Well then, goodnight! Closing my eyes, my consciousness faded away in a blink of aneye.

*

I awoke to the soundof birdsong and turning to the broken mirror, I neatened my messyhair, brushed my teeth with twigs from a tree, and tidied my outfit.

Afterwards, I tookout a small leather bag from a crack in the wall. This was all thewealth I had managed to save over the past five years; two silvercoins. One silver coin was worth a hundred copper coins. By the way,a hundred silver coins could be exchanged for a gold coin, somethingthat I had never possessed.

Even though I onlyhad two silver coins and a variety of other laughable objects, I hadsweated blood and tears to save this up. This money was originally anemergency escape fund for the time when I would be killed by Rafal.

Now, that worry nolonger existed, so this could be used to buy equipment for fightingmonsters.

Time to go. Igrabbed the two silver coins and dashed out of my run down house.

The Seyfert Capitalwas divided into four districts. With the castle placed at thecenter, the areas lay to the east, west, north, and south.

Holy Knight District(East): This was the area of the upper class in the country, wherethe Holy Knights lived.

Residential District(West): Commoners like me lived here.

Commercial District(South): Shops operated here, with stores like armories, generalmerchandise, restaurants, and many others.

Military District(North): The training grounds for the Holy Knights, and the placewhere special armor was developed.

From such adivision, it was obvious how much preferential treatment was given tothe Holy Knights.

The district that Iwas headed towards was the most lively place in the whole kingdom,the commercial area. Passing through the crowds of people in theResidential District, I entered the commercial zone where red brickbuildings bordered the road.

Now, to the backalleys. Here, street vendors packed their stalls tightly along thepathway, their vigorous voices calling out to passerbys.

Even in theCommercial District, places like this were uncommon. The reason as towhy I came here was that my war fund was a mere two silver coins.With this, I could only afford an old, battered weapon. Besides,there was no way I could even enter a luxury weapon store with mycurrent appearance. Hence, I came to the flea market where worthlessthings were on sale.

As I looked for asecond hand weapon, a friendly middle-aged man called out. He had awarm, amicable smile.

"Dear customer,are you perhaps looking for a weapon?"

"You seem toknow."

"I've beenrunning this business for many years. I saw you come from far awaylooking only at weapons without even a glance at other things."

He was a sharp man.Was he a merchant? I was a little surprised by his welcomingattitude.

"How about it?Would you like to take a look?"

On display was anarrangement of weapons, the best that I had seen so far. Perhapsthere would be a suitable weapon. I nodded silently in response.

"Then, what'syour budget?"

After hearing howmuch I had on hand, his attitude changed completely. His expressionwas no longer kind. Instead, his eyes were patronizing, just likeRafal's.

"Tsk, so you'repoor. What a waste of being nice. Look, the only weapons you can buywith two silver coins are those trashy ones in the corner there.They'll probably suit you well."

Of course, I wouldnot be able to buy a decent weapon with such little money. Even if Iwere to become angry here, the other stalls would just look at me inthe same way. Besides, there were still plenty of choices despitebeing trashy.

With the <Appraisal>skill, I looked at each of the weapons. It seemed that in any case,most of them had just about reached their endurance limit and wouldbreak after a few uses. And then, as I picked up an old, black sword,a voice sounded in my head.

(Buy me. I willnever let you lose.) (TLN: The sword refers to himself as "ore-sama"aka "my esteemed self" which has an arrogant connotation that waslost in translation)

What I heard throughthe <Mind-reading> skill was a quiet male voice.