chapter01 · 024-ep24
Episode 24: Karin Ojou-sama's Unique Skill
【????】
【Huh?】
【What did you say?】
【You MADE a magical dress with camouflage powers????】
【Wait, what do you mean you made it? Magical gear??? HOW???】
"Why, with my crafting skill, of course, desu no."
Chat fell silent.
Karin continued,
"And it isn't just the dress! The ojou-sama-style furniture behind me and my teacups are treasured things I made from monster materials too!"
"Oh, I hadn't told you, had I?" Karin took the chance to show off the ojou-sama set she'd painstakingly made, looking immensely pleased with herself.
Her viewers, meanwhile, fell into an even greater panic.
【What!?】
【Huh!?】
【What the heck is going on!?】
【Wait wait wait wait! Karin-sama, you have crafting skills TOO!?】
【So she's a barbarian thug DIY ojou-sama...!?】
【I can't make sense of this... Seriously.】
"Fweh?"
Karin tilted her head at the comments rushing by. But their reaction was perfectly natural.
Skills was the collective term for special abilities that manifested in people who were active after gaining a level.
Aside from the basic ones, even decades after the dungeons appeared, hardly anyone had systematized the conditions for acquiring skills or leveling them up. But it was clear that a person's aptitudes and activities in and out of the dungeon had a strong influence. The skills people acquired followed distinct patterns.
Individual aptitudes varied enough to produce classifications like 'combat classes,' 'magic classes,' and 'production and crafting classes.'
It was hard to believe that Karin, who could defeat a deep-layer monster without a scratch, also had a crafting skill.
【Hold on, isn't your dress made from <Venom Jelly>!? Don't you need a REALLY high crafting-skill level to process lower-layer materials because of their mana concentration!?】
【Karin ojou-sama can fight like THAT and craft lower-layer materials too!?】
"Ah, no, the dress is a special case."
Karin hastily corrected chat, which seemed to be getting extraordinarily excited.
"You see, I have a unique skill called <Divine Artisan>. Thanks to that, I could work with lower-layer materials right from the start without raising a crafting skill's level. That's how I made this dress."
Unlike ordinary skills, which were said to manifest after various conditions were met, unique skills appeared the moment a person received a level in a dungeon. They depended heavily on individual temperament and talent, and often had effects more specialized and powerful than ordinary skills.
<Divine Artisan> was a production-and-crafting unique skill that let its user turn monster materials into gear and magic items with various effects. That was how she'd managed to process lower-layer materials, Karin explained.
【Seriously!?】
【Ojou-sama has a unique skill!?】
【I was SURE it'd be combat-related, but it's a crafting unique skill...!?】
【My brain can't take this much information at once, desu no!?】
【Whoa!?】
"Thank you, desu wa! But as I'm sure you know, this unique skill isn't anything very special."
Karin was completely serious; she wasn't being modest.
"Only I can use the things <Divine Artisan> makes. And while it lets me make good gear out of lower-layer materials from the start, I can't use it on the affordable materials in the upper or middle layers. It's convenient, but rather impractical."
As Karin said, <Divine Artisan> was famous as a 'dud unique.' Unique skills, like ordinary skills, had to be used repeatedly to gain levels, yet using <Divine Artisan> required at least lower-layer materials. Training it cost a fortune.
And for some mysterious reason, only the skill's owner could use what it made. It was considered a wasted ability that almost no one made use of.
Yet the viewers' shock showed no sign of fading.
【It's a famous dud unique, sure, but with Karin-sama's combat strength it isn't a dud at all! She basically bypasses the downside, doesn't she...?】
【Wait a moment!? Does that mean not only the dress but the furniture and teacups are made from lower-layer materials!?】
【I thought she was an ojou-sama with cardboard props, but that's a genuine ultra-luxurious ojou-sama room!?】
"Hm? Oh, I phrased that poorly. I made the furniture and teacups with an ordinary crafting skill that somehow appeared while I was using <Divine Artisan>. Unlike gear, furniture and household items are better made from upper- and middle-layer materials with more moderate mana."
【So you DO have an ordinary crafting skill too!?!?!?】
【Seriously? Weren't combat skills and crafting skills practically impossible to train together, since they demand completely different aptitudes and practice?】
【Not impossible in theory. It's just like mastering baseball and shogi at the same time...】
【W-well, it's only furniture. You could make that with a low-level crafting skill you happened to pick up, unlike magical gear...】
【But the quality of that furniture...】
【Furniture nerds were trying to identify what brand it came from...】
【Isn't something already wrong with a person whose crafting aptitude is high enough to get <Divine Artisan> as a unique skill being THAT strong...?】
【Do you really, REALLY have a crafting skill!?】
【@iesuokisoyjatietiura: A-as expected of Karin ojou-sama...!】
Chat kept buzzing over Karin's outrageous revelations. The viewers couldn't immediately accept what she'd said; an air of doubt hung over them.
(Ah. This might bring back bad memories, desu wa.)
The comments reminded Karin of the merciless fake-video accusations she'd received when she used to stream all alone.
<Divine Artisan> was known as a dud, and few people had explored its possibilities. The ordinary crafting skill that had sprung from it was hard for viewers to believe in too. Of course, after everything they'd seen Karin do, none of them flatly called her a liar... But words alone might not convince them completely.
Karin decided on her next stream right then and there.
"I see. I understand what you all mean, desu wa. Then let us do this! Seeing is believing. Tomorrow, I shall show you everything from obtaining the materials to making furniture! And now that I stream from home more often, I've been wanting a new sofa!"
And so her next stream would be a little different. She ended that day's stream without anyone finding a moment, amid the shock of her announcement, to ask, "Wait, how is Karin-sama, who's supposed to be broke, going to get and process dungeon materials...?"