Skill-Eater: Prison World Saga-Chapter 7: Skill Merger

Now that he had toured his core, Edge was ready to continue with his day. He was planning to head into the field tomorrow on a solo run, hunting for more skills to help rank up Regeneration.

Before he left town, there were a few things that he wanted to take care of. First and foremost was using one of the Skill-Merger Tokens he’d received for completing the quest to kill the garax.

Thanks to the crew’s battles with a colossal predator, a behemoth beast, and a swarm of monsters, his first big game hunt had taken Edge all the way to the middle of stage one in record time. During his adventure, he was able to fill all eleven skill slots that Skill-Eater offered at this stage—six more than anyone else.

He would acquire another seven slots when he evolved to stage two. Reaching that milestone was going to take some time, even at his rapid rate of growth. He wasn’t willing to give up any of his skills just yet, except for Sense Fruit, which was sitting in his auxiliary slot. But he needed to make room for the epic skill he’d stolen from the garax, which would finish digesting in another ten days.

Fortunately, the System had provided him with a solution to this dilemma—a way to free up two of his slots with Skill-Merger Tokens. Although they weren’t the only way to combine skills, these tokens were the rarest and most reliable method. By activating a token, two skills could be blended into something new and potentially better than the sum of its parts, freeing up the slot for his epic power in the process.

That being said, he had to be careful how he used the tokens. There was always a risk involved in merging skills, no matter which procedure was used. The new skill could come out worse than either of its parents, or even fail if the powers were fundamentally incompatible.

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After some investigation, Edge had learned that his odds of success would be higher if the skills were still low-rank. While the new skill would keep the upgrades he had chosen for its parents, the ones offered by merged skills tended to be better. It meant that the new power would wind up stronger in the end if it started off at rank one or two. Since there wasn’t a reason to rank his skills up first, he was ready to give the process a shot.

He had been pondering his options long and hard after receiving the tokens and had eventually decided on how he wanted to use the first. A combination that he was pretty sure would create something good, with the lowest odds of failure he could come up with.

He was going to merge Slash and Double Strike. Slash was a basic skill and one of Edge’s favorites. It was a core part of his fighting style and incredibly mana efficient. The problem was, basic skills had a low ceiling on the power they could obtain, falling off well below those of higher rarities. Slash would still be useful for a while as it was. But was destined to be outclassed by rarer skills, especially when he picked up enough Generation to use expensive powers more often.

Double Strike was an Uncommon skill. It created a mana-forged mirror of his weapon and straight up doubled the effectiveness of any attack. It also spread the damage over a wider area, which made his strikes harder to dodge.

The issue was that it cost too much mana for what it did, especially when used as part of a skill combo. As a result, Edge hadn’t found many occasions to use Double Strike yet, and he had other priorities for the skill experience he acquired in the near future.

He was hoping that by combining Slash and Double Strike, he could preserve the best features of both. That the strengths of each component would enhance the other’s and compensate for their weaknesses. That the merged skill would increase Slash’s rarity and overall power, while reducing Double Strike’s mana cost to a more manageable level.

If this merger worked out the way he wanted, not only would the new skill be better than either of the originals, it would effectively let him use both of the old skills at once—without suffering the massive mana drain that unleashing skill combos required.

The downside would be losing access to his cheapest skill and the ability to double attacks that didn’t involve bladed weapons, but it was a good trade by any accounting. When you added the skill slot it would free up in the process, the Skill-Merger Token wound up being a massive windfall.

Even in a worst-case scenario where the merger failed, Edge could find replacements for Slash and Double Strike relatively easily, compared to Elemental Blade or Regeneration, which he had no means of reacquiring.

He realized that he was overanalyzing the matter because he was nervous. Alright, Edge. That’s enough stalling. Let’s get the show on the road and pray that everything works out. With that, he sent his awareness into his core once more. When he opened his eyes, he found himself standing in his central chamber.

He turned around, stepped into his skill garden, and picked up the small statue of a man holding a naginata that symbolized Slash. Then he walked over to the pair of blurry knives that represented Double Strike.

Finally, he reached into his belt pouch and pulled out a Skill-Merger Token. It was a silver disk about two inches across, with a reactor engraved on one side and Ord on the other. Figuring that it couldn’t hurt to try to get their blessing about the combination, Edge turned to address the skills waiting by his feet.

“I hope that this is ok with you, but I’m going to merge the two of you together. You have both been great, but using this token will help me get more out of Double Strike and let me keep using Slash for the long haul. If you guys don’t want to be combined, let me know and I’ll figure something out.”

Double Strike began swiping its blades at the air. The skill seemed enthusiastic, like it was excited by the prospect. Slash… well Slash was an inanimate statue, so it just sat there looking cool. But Edge thought that the skill was copacetic with the idea. Since there didn’t seem to be a problem, he held up the token and addressed the System.

“I want to use this token to merge Double Strike and Slash.” He broke into a broad grin, waiting for the show to start.

For a moment, nothing happened, which left Edge wondering if there were aspects to the skill-merger process that he wasn’t aware of. But then the token floated out of his grasp, shining with the light he had come to associate with skills advancing. The silver coin began to spin, until the metal disk was a whirling blur hovering between Slash and Double Strike.

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Both skills began glowing, growing brighter until he was forced to look away. There was a flash of heat, and after a final pulse of radiance, the intense display died down.

Edge opened his eyes… only to discover that both skills had vanished. Adrenaline surged into his veins as his heart leapt into his throat. He was convinced that the merger had failed, costing him the token and both powers in the process.

But then something poked him in the back of the leg. He spun around and looked down, to where a statue of a man was holding a naginata. As the polearm extended from the figure’s hands, it began to diverge, splitting until the blade of the dual weapon was several inches apart.

The statue looked up at Edge, waved, and then darted off to play with the other skills, swinging its doubled weapon with a flourish. Relief went flooding through his body at the sight.

“Good for you, little guy. I’m glad that you can move now.” While this was a promising sign, he wouldn’t breathe easy until he knew that the merger had created something good. His fears were alleviated a few seconds later, when a message from the System appeared before his eyes.

Edge pumped his fist when he reached the last word—filled with the rush of gaining a new power and the satisfaction of having made a solid match.

Congratulations.

The skills: Slash (Basic, Rank 2) and Double Strike (Uncommon, Rank 1) have successfully merged into a new skill.

The penetration bonus from Slash has been preserved.

Your new skill is: Double Slash (Rare, Rank 1).

Empower an attack with a bladed weapon. The weapon will have an offset double and its edge will be magically sharpened while the skill is active.

Fuck yes! While he would have to test out the skill to discover how much mana it drained, everything else was exactly what Edge had been hoping for. The core functionality of both powers was intact, including Slash’s limitation of only being useable with a bladed weapon. It had even kept the penetration bonus from Slash’s first upgrade, but not the skill’s rank.

It meant that Double Slash would still be eligible for its own rank-two upgrade. Best of all, the new skill was rare, and it would eventually become more powerful than both skills combined. They must have been highly compatible after all.

Skill-Merger Tokens were exotic enough that most combinations hadn’t been tested, so Edge had been forced to make an educated guess and hope that he got lucky. Or more likely, those that have are closely-guarded secrets. On that note, the details of my merger might be worth something to the right person.

Edge could sense Skill-Eater’s approval that he’d added another rare skill to their collection—his core’s desire to grow more powerful resonating with his own. He took another moment to savor his success, said goodbye to his skills, then returned his awareness to his own body.

While all of this was extremely promising, there was one more thing he needed to do before he called the merger an unmitigated success—take his sexy new skill out for a test drive.

Edge grabbed his naginata and his pack and then walked over to the north gate. He stopped to chat with Mel for a while, then stepped out onto the Ivory Plains. He was familiar with the area by now, and he knew where to go if he wanted to remain out of sight from curious eyes.

He hiked over to the grove where Riller had trained him in stealth by playing hide and seek—where dense trees and prolific boulders broke up the field of view. After making sure that nothing dangerous was lurking nearby, he unstrapped his polearm from his backpack, extended the shaft, and started looking for a target.

He picked out a tree that was already dead, then walked over to it and took up his stance. Filled with a rising tide of excitement, Edge brought the blade up over his shoulder, then swung it down in a diagonal arc while willing Double Slash to activate.

His reactor roared to life as it drew magicytes from his reservoir and converted them into mana. The refined magic flowed into his new skill, changing its nature, then went coursing through his arms and into the naginata, just like he had envisioned.

The weapon abruptly sped up, magnifying the power of the blow. At the same time, it began to blur, until two distinct polearms were soaring side by side. Each of the dual blades was coated in a layer of magical energy that sharpened their edges on a molecular level to increase the penetrative power.

When combined with the explosive growth to his physical attributes over the last few weeks, Edge shouldn’t have been surprised when the weapon hit the trunk and kept right on going, passing straight through the other side with only a faint sense of resistance.

Even still, he wasn’t prepared for when the tree fell apart and came crashing to the ground in a spray of shorn branches and splinters, scaring the ever-living shit out of him until he realized what he’d done. At which point, he began to laugh.

Double Slash was even better than he had imagined. It was significantly more mana efficient than Double Strike. Although it burned more than Slash, it was dramatically less draining than combining both of his old skills and just as powerful. I need to thank Ander again when I see him. This weapon really is the best.

While he waited to make sure that no one had heard the clamor and come to investigate, Edge got in some practice using the polearm as a regular weapon. He maneuvered the naginata around his body while attacking from various angles, getting used to the long pole that was attached to the blade that had originally been a shadowreaver’s claw—the monster he had met right after binding Skill-Eater and the source of his amazing Shadow Step skill.

He practiced bracing himself for a charge by extending the shaft and planting the butt into the ground, so that the beast’s momentum would impale it. Then, just for the hell of it, he shrunk the shaft to its minimum length and tried using it like a sword. Although, like Ander had warned him, the balance wasn’t quite right. Who knows? I might find myself in tight quarters and not have a better option.

Fifteen minutes later, Edge was reasonably confident that no one was coming. Before he walked back to town, there was one more thing that he wanted to test. He strapped his naginata onto his pack, then walked over to another dead tree. It was time to find out what Double Slash could do when combined with Elemental Blade.

These days, his iceblade was a proper sword compared to the tiny knife it had been when he’d stolen the skill from the convict who was trying to kill him. It was three feet long with a crystalline body that glowed with a glacial blue light, trailing fog as it froze the moisture in the air.

Combining Slash, Elemental Blade, and Double Strike without Overdrive would have drained his reservoir to the dregs in a single go, if he had been able to pull off the triple combo at all. Edge was hoping that comboing his iceblade with Double Slash would be equally powerful but wouldn’t cost nearly as much mana. There’s only one way find out.

He grinned as he brought his subzero sword whipping around in a horizontal Double Slash. The iceblade doubled in the blink of an eye, making him shiver despite the summer heat. It went screaming through the air in a blur of wintery wrath before slamming into the tree with incredible force. This time, he had picked out a big trunk, so that he could get a better sense for the power of the blow.

The iceblade lacked the weight of his naginata, but it still bit a good two feet into the tree before coming to a halt. The extra copy wavered out of existence, since it only lasted for the duration of the Slash. But his iceblade would remain manifested as long as Edge kept feeding it mana. He could see frost spreading from the point of impact, and a large patch of wood was already frozen solid.

The mana drain was significant. He wouldn’t be using this combo too many times in the same fight. But it was only a fraction of what the triple combo would have cost, and it seemed to be just as powerful.

Completely satisfied with his new skill, Edge walked back to town while humming to himself, contemplating various combination for his other token with a smile on his face.