MIDNIGHT PRINCE: Empire of Sin

The rest of the day moved along pretty smoothly. The three of them were used to spending time like this together.

Though Adam had noticed a peculiar fact— Shuri seemed to be coming to their house more and more on a regular basis. He had never really paid attention to her constant visits, but despite her position, Shuri seemed to be isolated and living a rather lonely life.

She did not regularly attend the cocktail dinners of the firm. Did not spend the night out and it seemed like she had no friends outside of his mother, Cecilia.

"I need to study for a bit."

He stood up and gave an excuse to go into his room.

His bedroom had no particular features worth remembering at first glance. It was just a normal room with a bed and a nightstand not far from it.

Looking at all the study books messily stocked on the desk, he began to remember the fact that he was actually a student studying at a prestigious university.

'Hahah…'

His days as a student seemed so far away now. But, to be exact, it had only been a few days since his life entirely changed in its roots.

He wondered what he should do now. Continue to act like someone living a normal life? Get a degree and work as a lawyer? Or should he simply give up on school altogether?

In the future, it would be possible for him to open his own enterprise once he got a hang of possible new technologies with the help of the Library.

'Well… I shouldn't think too much about it now.'

Taking his eyes off those books, that once entailed the story of his life, he sat on the bed and got down to business.

"Genesis, show me a few skills I can buy right now."

[As of now I have discarded skills that can only be used by unlocking other Chakra pathways. Their current prices for those skills are not accessible to you.]

Adam nodded in understanding. Opening the appropriate Chakra was one of the prerequisites of the skills and without it, forcibly obtaining the skill would only result in a price increase. An exponential increase to the point that even thinking about buying them was a lost cause.

[According to your current stats, martial art skills are not a priority. I suggest that you should avoid any close combat as much as possible. At least until you unlock the Heart Chakra or any major Chakra pathways that can help in boosting the physical body and enhance bodily parameters.]

Adam was a peak human with his current stats. He had yet to test out the limits of his powers but they were the best one could achieve among the confines of humanity.

But since he could not go beyond D+, it would be unwise to face supernatural beings. He did not know how wide the difference could be between D+ and the Cs and higher ranks…

Thankfully, he could at the very least learn to do cladding. So he could better protect himself just in case it were to be needed.

[For now. These skills are the most optimal ones after doing a little research.]

[Parallel Thinking:

Rank – C

Description: Using the skill enables you to separate your thoughts into a maximum of ten individual and separate processes when the skill is maxed out.

Price: 1000→100 Karma]

[As always, this is a skill that you should be able to obtain in the future by yourself. The skill has been greatly discounted because of the existence of the Crown Chakra and your innate ability The World. Obtaining this skill now will be greatly useful when you enter the Library the next time and for your current Telekinetic capabilities.]

Adam's eyes twinkled at the information relayed to him by genesis. This was indeed a very useful skill that would greatly enhance his overall capabilities. Simply being able to separate his thoughts in two would help him maximize offense and defense by a great margin.

The number of actions that the brain could simultaneously do were simply too much to count but humans could generally only focus on one thing at a time so having a skill that would allow him to up that count to ten was a godsend.

[Hawk Eyes:

Rank – D

Description: Using this skill allows the user to have the same level of vision as that of a Hawk.

Price: 50→10 karma]

[This skill does not have a great synergy with The World but it will be assimilated by the Eyes of Truth. Until your domain can cover kilometers at will, it should be rather useful for you.]

Adam took his phone out and did some research. Birds of prey like hawks and eagles had a vision that was eight times sharper than that of humans. They could see perfectly clearly even if the object of their interest were a few miles away.

If he needed to observe anyone from afar, this would certainly be very useful. He was basically slowly transforming himself into a sniper rifle.

[Eyes of Empathy:

Rank – C

Description: Using the skill enables the user to observe the mood and emotions of an individual toward the user in the color spectrum.

Price: 700→70]

[I believe I do not need to explain how useful this skill will be in your line of work. Be it as a Lawyer, Gigolo, or Hunter. This will have a perfect synergy with The World when in close range of the target and an even better synergy with Hawk Eyes when observing the target from afar.]

Adam tried to imagine the implications of the skill. It would be like being able to identify hostile, neutral, or allying individuals on a mini-map. He tried imagining being in a court and being able to immediately know what people really thought about him or when flirting with clients while working for Yui.

Depending on the situation, this could indeed become one of his most useful skills.

[Eyes of Empathy is also one of the prerequisites to lower the price for the S ranked skill Mind Reading and the EX ranked skill Telepathy.]

"What would be the price if I try to acquire an S rank skill without filling the prerequisites?"

[S rank skills can cost anything between a hundred thousand to a million. The price of EX rank skills has no limit.]

"Haha…"

Indeed. It seemed like even being a pay-2-win player had a certain limit.

"Though why did Eyes of Truth cost so low then?"

[The reason EX rank skills can fall so low in price is that you need to go through trials to actually obtain them. There is also the possibility of failing or being corrupted mentally or losing your sense of self.

The Eyes of Truth is the skill with the lightest prerequisites and if your compatibility with Buddha had been higher, the trial would have been less risky.]

Adam just shrugged at this piece of information. He doubted anyone that wasn't a monk or a saint could have a great compatibility with someone like Buddha.

Thankfully at least, since the Eyes of Truth was the summit of all skills under the Third Eye, he could obtain all of them at a discount.

After this, Adam added one more skill. A D rank skill called [Owl Vision]. Which of course gave him the ability to see in the dark. There was no questioning how useful it would be when paired with [Hawk Eyes].

He wondered if he should buy more but decided to not recklessly splurge everything in one go.

He wished to buy more skills like [Future Sight] or perhaps even something like [Copy eyes]. Though he doubted a skill like the latter really existed.

In the end, he knew that he should take one step at a time. Rome was not built in one day after all.

[Karma: 300

Parallel Thinking – C rank: -100

Eyes of Empathy – C rank: -70

Hawk Eyes – D rank: -10

Owl Vision – D rank: -10

Total: -190

Karma Remaining: 110]

[Do you wish to purchase all those skills?]

[Y/N]

Adam chose yes…and immediately regretted it.

Pain shot through his brain as four skills were immediately engraved in his mind and body.

The only saving grace for him as he bent down and held his head while grimacing was that at least this time he did not die.

It was truly a sad saving grace.

(AN: Ngl. Writing this chapter made me remember why I hesitated to write a system-style story until now. Not much happened in this chapter. I will be careful to make as few as possible chapters like this one. Still, I hope you guys liked the skills he chooses.

Also if you have a proposal for skills don't hesitate. I will most likely not use them since I already have a plan for Adam. But I am only one man. It isn't like I can think of every skill possible in the world. Obtaining different suggestions would help me smarter decisions. Don't suggest op skills though since Adam has no way to obtain them.)