"What Attack Skills does he currently have?"
"None."
Surprised over the unexpected answer, Kirito furrowed his brow in confusion as he demanded, "Wait a minute, are you telling me he doesn't have any fighting skills at all? Are you sure? How has he survived all this time, let alone reached level thirty already, if he didn't have any fighting skills?"
"All of his Equipped Skills are geared towards trapping and evading, I checked to see what Skills he had while he had his Stats Page open earlier. He completely mastered Tracking and Trapping and is close to mastering Night Vision, Sprint, and Searching; he needs less than two hundred more Skill Points in those categories to gain mastery. The other five Skills he has are Detection, Fishing, Hiding, Listening, and Acrobatics and all of them are over halfway mastered."
"Until seeing his Stats for myself, I'd thought he'd been hiding at least one Attack Skill. Even his Unequipped Skills are geared towards his chosen occupation (Escape, Navigation, Scouting, Camping, and Research) and out of those Skills he's already mastered Escape and Camping with Scouting fairly high as well. As for how he survived and managed to level up so quickly; he spent ninety percent of his time out in the Dungeons trapping Monsters. He was damn good at it too."
"I went with him on a hunt once about two weeks ago; to track a large pack of level nineteen Ravenous Wolves that had somehow made their way to the first floor. He found their den, set up a single trap, and the moment the sun had set we lured them straight to his trap. I killed two while the other five died when they fell into the Pit Trap he'd set up. That he is questioning the Skills he has diligently honed for the last six weeks bothers me greatly; especially when you take into consideration that the traps he uses are game generated based upon his actions."
"Alright, say I agree to try and teach him a few things; are you sure he'll be willing to learn? Will the standard attacks still work once he takes hold of a sword?" Kirito asked after he gave the older man's request serious consideration. "I know you saw what happened when I dealt with his injuries. I had to fight against some kind of barrier in order to treat and bandage his injuries and the fact that there was a significant delay before the Items actually did their job would spell death if that happened when he was using a sword while in a fight. Logically, based upon what we learned tonight, the same thing will happen when he picks up a sword."
"That doesn't change the fact that he's going to need a way to defend himself; I can't keep him locked up inside of my apartment indefinitely and I doubt I could force him to stay inside the town for long either," Agil pointed out tiredly as he ran a hand over his face. "I think he'd be willing enough to learn if the idea is presented to him in such a way that he won't think we're trying to take his choices away from him."
"As for the various anomalies that keep cropping up around the gaki and the chances that they'll also affect any Sword Skills he learns…? I don't know. It's just one more thing we're going to have to figure out as we go. Hopefully, if the glitch affects any weapons he picks up, it will affect them much like it affect his food tonight; making it behave more realistically rather than having the blade's attacks lag behind by ten or fifteen seconds any time he tries to use it."
"I wonder if that was part of the reason why the crows made him bleed instead of dropping his Hit Points. Could their beaks and talons have changed, like the food had, the moment they touched him?" Kirito mused as he considered what Agil had told him. "That would make far more sense than it would be for normal attacks to harm him and if that's true, then maybe just teaching him how to properly hold a sword and a few basic stances would help him against the beast Monsters. However, that wouldn't help him against Boss Monsters or humanoid Monsters that handle weapons and it also wouldn't really help him in a duel with another Player."
"James never duels; aside from the fact that he has no Sword Skills, he simply refuses to accept any challenges. If he intends to go back out into the Dungeons, then he's going to need something aside from his dagger; especially if his Trapping Skills have become corrupted like he seems to believe they did. A lightweight short sword made of something durable would be ideal; even if all he can do is stab the beast that attacks him. He's used to dodging Monsters and knows most of their weak spots, so he should be fine once he regains his confidence."
"So long as he agrees to the lessons, I don't mind helping him. I just don't want to force him into something he doesn't want to do," Kirito stated as he came to a decision. "Kid's got enough problems without us pushing him into something he doesn't want to do. Do you know where James lives in-game? The idea of sending him home to an empty house or apartment after everything that's happened to him bothers me."
"As far as I know, he doesn't own any property and I know for a fact that he prefers to camp outside in the various Dungeons most days rather than rent a room. I've been seriously considering trying to talk him into staying here with me since I found out how old he really is because I have more than enough space but I don't know if he'd see that as me trying to lock him up or not. He's just stubborn enough to snub such an offer if he believes it to be a trap."
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