Sam quickly threw sparks of fire at the foxes aiming to bite at him before he was able to aim one at the fox dragging him. Now Sam has only a drop of energy left, and he can't walk, along with 3 more foxes blocking his way to the portal. Sam doesn't have enough energy to kill the foxes or reach the portal before he is mauled.
That is when he noticed a golden portal closer to him, hidden by the trees and bushes.
'This is my closest chance at living, so I need to go. NOW!!'
Sam quickly crawls towards it and when he was almost there the foxes dived at him. Sam throws the tiniest sparks of flames at the foxes face hitting them in the eye. This briefly stunned them, giving Sam just enough time to crawl through.
'Please be somewhere with a chance for me to live.'
After opening his eyes he sees a shop??????
.....
BRIIIIIIIIIIING
Noah woke up to the sound of a bell.
"Huuuh, Oh, must be a customer."
Noah quickly wipes the saliva off his face and stretches before opening the door to find someone on the floor wounded.
"Hey, are you alive."
The person quickly looks up at Noah
"Do you have any healing items?"
Noah quickly goes into the back to grab his bag and starts to patch up the guy before giving him the energy bars in his bag.
After resting up the guy managed to stand up and looked around, marveling at the beauty of the store.
"By the way, my name is Sam," Sam says, giving a hand out to shake.
"Noah," Noah reciprocated.
"What is this place." An almost visible question mark appeared on top of his head.
"Well, it's my shop," Noah says with hands out as to welcome him.
"You can look around at what you want, but there is almost nothing to buy though."
Sam, still curious about this strange place, decided to browse around, stopping at the item aisle first.
??
Black Fox Sword
Rank: F+
Ability: Agility up (10% boost)
Price: one level for level 30 or less
'This is a great find; beast weapons are hard to come by these days. Usually, a hunter would use the weapon or trade the weapon for a weapon they can use. One is auctioned off once every blue moon and is fought over by many further reducing the chances for someone like me to buy it. The only other way is through connections or guilds.'
Guilds collect beast weapons using their many hunters to go through portals constantly and giving them guild the weapons.
'I definitely need a weapon. If I had his during the wave I would have saved more lives, but what is this price?'
Visible confusion appeared on Sam's face.
"Just pick what you want first, then go to the register to pay."
Sam looked at Noah, seeing him as an endless black hole of mystery, before grabbing the sword and going to the specialty aisle.
!!!
Ability up ticket
allows holder to get an ability one rank higher than current
Price: current ability
Sam body started to shake as Noah approached.
"C-C-Can this actually boost someone's ability up."
"It should be able to. You are my first customer, so I don't really know," Noah says nonchalantly.
Sam quickly walked to the register as Noah got behind it.
"Ok, lets trade"
TRADE
Noah hands turn green and he instinctively stretches his hands out for a handshake. After Sam grabbed it, information appeared in his mind.
Items: black fox sword and ability up ticket
Total price: one level and current ability
Confirm?
Sam thought to confirm resulting in the register to open and green world energy and a fire red strand of energy to flow out of his body and into the register.
Noah's POV
After energy flowed into the register, a panel appeared in front of Noah
[choose ability:
fire
...]
Having no choice, Noah chose fire. Soon another strand of fire red energy flowed out of the register and into Sam.
Sam felt like a cozy blanket covered him. Soon the energy disappeared. Noah then proceeded to use inspect on Sam
[Sam Hilts
Ability: Fire (G->F)
Stat: E
lvl:30 (50)-> 29(50)
Strength: 25 (45)
Agility: 41 (60
Constitution: 25 (30)
Intelligence: 30(55)
Wisdom: 39(75) ->35 (75)
"For someone with an ability mages usually use, your caps really matches your path."
??
Sam looked at Noah confused before looking at his status noticing his rank and reduced level. He immediately lost his balance resulting in him almost falling.
"Thank you, I can finally move to E rank dungeons. I finally won't be looked down on as much by people because of my friend. This-This is all thanks to you. How can I repay you?"
Noah pondered on that statement before finally saying, "Well if you could hand me all beast weapons you obtain for me to sell in shop, you can consider that a repayment. Also, don't worry I will give the weapon back with my experience in return."
"Alright, it's a deal."
Sam quickly goes for a handshake. Afterwards he went to see if he could buy another ticket, but when he went to trade with Noah, Noah got a notification.
[Can't trade....
F rank ability wants to be traded for higher ability
...
Highest ability that can be upgraded:G
Upgrade ability to unlock more features]
'Hmmm, so this ability can grow stronger.... but how?'
Noah quickly tells Sam he can't trade yet and then directs him towards the exit.
After Sam got out of the portal, he was in the same spot he was before. This was because he was in the shop for less than an hour which is the amount of time before the portal in a completed zone closes. Seeing the three foxes still near the portal, Sam quickly rushes forward and swipes his hand towards the foxes. This produced a line of fire that hit the foxes quickly burning them alive.
Sam seeing this smile, "So this is the gap between a G rank ability and a F rank one."
There are obviously gaps between abilities. They are about the same as the boost in stat gained. So, from G to F there is three times increase in ability. People remember how big of a difference the ranks are by seeing the difference in the amount of stat point gained for that rank. For example, a stat rank of G is given 1 point per level whereas a F rank stat is 3 points. Then an E rank hunter stat would be 4 points making an E rank ability about 33% stronger than a rank F one.
This is why even though Sam has E rank stats, he can't go into E-rank dungeons with his G rank ability. This is rare, as ability rank, stat, and level cap usually are the same rank.
After hours of waiting, Noah heard the bell ring, introducing a man. He is short and has a body shape that shows he is an agility focused hunter.
Noah scanned him:
[Tuck Wall
Ability: disguise(G)
Rank: F
.....]
"Welcome to my humble little shop," Noah says in his best host impression.
Tuck quickly looks around and asked.
"Was I transported to another world, or is this the afterlife?"