Chapter 139: Stealing From A Thief

That was a brilliant idea that Shin came up with.

Stealing the foe's 'steal' skill will ensure him that the foe wouldn't be able to steal any of Shin's skill.

But as simple it appeared, it wasn't that easy.

First of all Shin wasn't that familiar with the skill since he just gained it recently – a few seconds earlier.

Moreover, he knew that he had only one chance to use it before the beast realizes and plans to run away.

That would cause the total destruction of his plan because if the beast ran away, then Shin wouldn't be able to steal his skills back.

Shin learned two things about the skill which he gained – first, if he uses one eye, he can steal the skill and gain it for himself but its level would be reset to 1 – second, if he were to use both his eyes, then he would be able to steal the skills with their original levels and make them his own.

Though the skill applied only to those skills which were below the level of the skill or were at most 2 levels higher.

Most definitely, Shin had to use both of his eyes to steal the skills of the beast which were his own so that he would get an advantage, unfortunately, there was a condition for that too which appeared right when he was thinking about it.

[ It takes 3 seconds to activate the skill with both the eyes ]

[Cooldown timer: 00:00:03:00 ( 3 minutes ) ]

[ It takes 1 second to activate the skill with one eye ]

[Cooldown timer: 00:00:00:10 ( 10 seconds ) ]

Of course, benefits wouldn't be free always. The cooldown counter was a bit more when used with both eyes.

Whatever, Shin finally thought that he knew everything about the skill and decided to proceed with the plan, unfortunately, there was just one piece of information that he misread or was unaware of.

That wouldn't pose any threat at the moment, and it was more of a benefit so nothing was wrong not knowing it for now.

[ -> When 1 eye is used, all skills will be labeled as Lv.1 ]

This text was what Shin misread or heard wrong.

While he thought that all skills that he would steal would become level 1, that was not the case.

In fact, the notification actually meant that all the skills that he would be ready to steal would temporarily become level 1 for him.

This meant that, if the level of a skill was 10, with one eye, he could actually see the skill and it would seem to be level 1 instead of 10.

So what does this mean?

Basically, he would be able to steal that skill since the limit was a skill with at most 2 levels higher than the 'steal' skill level.

He could essentially steal any and all skills. Though, he didn't notice this at the moment.

'I need to sacrifice another skill to steal his skill…', Shin almost immediately decided on a skill to discard, for the moment that is.

'Ding'

[ You have used the skill Winter Breeze ]

[ Cool breeze will cover the entire area with a range of 30 meters ]

He used this skill for two main reasons, one – to force the beast to use the skill 'steal' and two – to stop the fire on the grasses from spreading any further.

Quite a calculative dude he was, at the moment that is.

Indeed, the cool breeze caused the fires to blow out, though, a little slowly. It chilled the area and was cold enough to cause the beast to shiver.

Of course, Shin had no problem with that, in fact, he liked it.

He was ready to sacrifice the skill which created a condition that he loved a lot – it was level 1 anyway so he could get it back right away.

And exactly as he thought, the beast used its skill to steal the winter breeze.

'Ding'

[ An attempt to steal the skill Winter Breeze was detected ]

'Ding'

[ The skill Winter Breeze has been stolen ]

The first notification was a bit weird, it was the first time 'an attempt' was mentioned before it actually got stolen.

Whatever, just as the beast was stealing Shin's skill, he did the same thing and used the same skill against him.

'Ding'

[ You have used the skill Steal ]

[ Dual Eyes confirmed ]

[ Currently, active skill used by the foe: ]

[ -> Steal Lv.3 ]

[ -> Shadow Claw Lv.2 ]

[ Which skill would you like to steal? ]

[ -> Steal Lv.3/ Shadow Claw Lv.2 ]

Yes, Shin had this doubt that if a beast was using two skills simultaneously, then which skill will be stolen by the skill 'steal'?

It seemed like the system would ask him that question before actually doing that.

'Steal Lv.3, steak that skill…', was what Shin said in a low voice.

Both his eyes were glowing with green light again while contrast to the beast whose eye was giving off a white light.

[ Command Accepted ]

'Ding'

[ You have successfully stolen the skill 'Steal' Lv.3 from the foe ]

'Ding'

[ You already have a skill named 'Steal' Lv.1 ]

[ Conflict will be created if one is not discarded ]

"Huh?"

Shin never expected it to happen this way. He thought that one skill would vanish on its own however that didn't seem to happen.

'Conflict? Does that mean both the skill will vanish?', he was confused.

Thankfully the system had good timing in giving advice.

'Ding'

[ The system advises the host to merge both the skills ]

[ The system seeks the host's permission to proceed with merging ]

[ -> Proceed/Cancel ]

'Oh God, what would I ever do without you…', Shin smiled after seeing the system display that message.

'Alright, proceed with the merging process.'

[ Command Accepted ]

And right after that, the system started merging the skills.

Shin was glad that he had the system to help him out, but he could actually think about that later.

At the moment, the beast was in front of him, standing like a statue as if something had been stolen from him.

"…"

To be continued…