From Player To Npc

As time passed, just a couple of hours before Annoue would wake up, a notification appeared.

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SYSTEM QUEST: BIRTHDAY GIRL

Description: Annoue Maki's birthday is today. It would be best if you made a special party for her.

Reward: ????

Comment: You are welcome

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This was something very unexpected.

Shingi never had ever encountered or heard the term SYSTEM QUEST. Also, to get a Quest, there had to be some trigger, but this appeared out of nowhere.

Also, he never had a Quest with a comment section. It probably was unique to these SYSTEM QUESTS.

But a quest with an unknown reward is always a special one. It meant that there were many possibilities of rewards, and depending on his approach, he will be rewarded differently.

Even if he thought this a weird quest, he wasn't one who didn't like challenges like that. But he knew that he needed help cause he had no idea how to make a birthday party, especially one that would be considered a special one even for him, not just a young girl NPC.

He wrote a message in Annoue letting her know that he was going to buy a few things and she should stay home and take a day off. He had done most of the orders, and there wasn't anything significant left other than to finish his hourglass, but he was still creating some permanent Mana Dust. If only he hadn't cleaned all the Mana Dust in his first day at cleaning the shop as it would be perfect for that use.

He headed outside and started looking for any of his students. They probably had a better idea of making a special party, and it wasn't like the Quest told him to do everything alone.

It was early in the morning, so not many people were outside, but that was for NPC as the Player's schedule was different, so there were quite a few ones in the streets.

He headed towards the Inn that he knew they were staying, and he found one of them outside the Inn talking with a Player.

Or, more specifically, Hineko seemed to be flirting with a female Player who seemed to ignore him while walking away. But Hineko was following her and keep trying.

Shingi decided to let him be for now as he most likely would return when he understood that she wasn't interested in him. Shingi headed into the Inn and saw sitting at one of the tables Mizuneko eating breakfast.

He joined at his table, which seemed to surprise him as he wasn't expecting to see Shingi that soon.

"Good morning. Is everything ok? Or are you here for the training you were talking about?" [Mizuneko]

Shing told him that would help him become an Ice Mage, but he still needed to make some preparations for it.

"It isn't the time yet. But it may be sooner than I thought. But I am here because I need your help." [Shingi]

Mizuneko was surprised by this request. The last time he was asked for help was to help face those Guild players that seemed to want to capture him or something the other week.

"Well, you remember my sister from the other day. Right? It is her birthday today, and I need to make something special for it." [Shingi]

"Oh, I see." [Mizuneko]

Mizuneko understood somehow how he felt since he was too a brother and knew how important are birthdays. But he didn't know that Shingi was mostly doing it cause of the Quest since he didn't mention it.

"Well, I would be glad to help you, but I think Phoenix or Tycoon would be more suited for this. As being girls themselves, they probably will know best how to organize a good party for her." [Mizuneko]

Mizuneko sent a message to them to meet him in the Inn, and it didn't take them long for all, even a beaten Hineko, to gather at the Inn.

Shingi explained the situation to them, and Pheonix, who this time was the not shy sister, was excited to help.

"We need a good place for the party to happen. What about your house or the shop?" [Little Phoenix]

Shingi gave it some thought.

"Well, I told her that she could have the day off so she won't go to the shop, so I guess we could do it there. There is some space." [Shingi]

They went more on the details, and Shingi even gave them a few coins to spend on what was needed and even gave them the key to the shop.

He went back to his house to keep Annoue busy and bring her to the shop in a few hours.

He found her in the kitchen as she seemed to play with some wooden ball with her fingers. She appeared to be quite bored for some reason.

"Hey, sis. What are you doing there?" [Shingi]

She didn't seem to change when noticing that Shingi was here but responded nonetheless.

"I am just a little bored today. I don't think I can train today." [Annoue]

"I see. That is a shame cause I thought you would be interested to learn your first Spell. But I guess we can do it some other day if you don't feel to do it today." [Shingi]

At that point, Annoue's usual excitement was once again on her face.

"A SPELL? What is it? Is it your helpers' hands, or is it like the cleaning one?" [Annoue]

MANA HAND and FILTH EATER were the two Spells Annoue had seen Shingi using mostly, so she thought she would most likely learn one like that too.

"Nothing like that. It is a basic one that is going to use your Mana Element." [Shingi]

They headed outside and at the back of the house. It was an open space, and it wasn't a place that people were usually passing through so they could use it for some training.

What he was going to teach her was her Elemental version of MANA Bolt. It would be the AIR BOLT since she had Air Element Mana Pool.

It was quite similar to how the AIR SLASH was working, or more specifically, it was even easier than that. She had to gather the Air Mana in a sphere at her hand and then pushed it forward, but this time had to keep it as a sphere, unlike with the AIR SLASH.

This didn't mean she could use it right away, as she had to learn how to aim appropriately. She had to find the balance of how much mana she needed to use between making the bolt and how much to push it. Too much in the bolt could make it explode; too little it would have no effect when it hit the target. Also, for the speed, if she used too much, the bolt could mess with her aim, and too little it would make it to be easy to be avoided.

This time he didn't use his Blessing for this training because it was still in cooldown for the day. But he gave tips as he also showed her how his ROCK THROW worked. It may have been a different Element, but the basics were similar for this Spell.

"Brother. Can I ask you something? Why is your Spell called ROCK THROW and not EARTH BOLT?" [Annoue]

Shingi thought about it, and even he wasn't sure why it was the case. The Spell didn't seem to be any different from what EARTH BOLT would be and not even a different Grade than it or being any weaker.

He thought in the past that he hadn't heard some of his Spells, but he didn't know every Spell existed.

'Could it be a different Spell?' [Shingi]

Creating a new Spell and recognized by the System wasn't that easy, even a Low Grade one. Many Arcane Practitioners had spent decades of research to do something like that, and a lot of times, they weren't successful.

But most people were trying to make at least new Base Grade ones.

Even his DOME OF SILENCE, which could be a new one, even if it is a Base Grade one, wouldn't count as a finished one yet. He understood that the Spell was most likely at the bottom of the Base Grade, but it could be increased in power with the appropriate arcane words but shouldn't be enough to make it Master Grade one.

He kept it in his mind and would know more when he had his class. Now he focused on helping Annoue.

He took a look at her status to see how things were going.

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STATUS

NAME: Annoue Maki

CLASS: Arcane Blade (Apprentice)

RACE: Blessed Human

TITLE: First Student

HP: 108/108

SP: 42/42

MP: 23/23

STR: 15

AGI: 11

END: 12

INT: 12

Mana Pool: Air Element

Skills: COOKING (Base Rank), LIFT (Master Rank), PUSH (Master Rank), MANA MANIPULATION (Base Rank), MANA SENSE (Base Rank), AIR SLASH (Base Rank), DEFLECT (Low Rank), MARTIAL ART (Low Rank), COMBAT INSIGHT (Low Rank)

Spells: AIR BOLT (Low Grade)

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The System recognized the Spell since she could cast it; she just had to make it more manageable.

Also, it seems the time with Karemon worked as they raised her COOKING skill to Base Grade.

Also, her AGI increased once more, which could have happened because of Karemon's training. He taught her how to use the knife, and her moves seemed clumsy at the start but got adjusted later.

Unfortunately, during the week, neither DEFLECT, MARTIAL ART, or COMBAT INSIGHT Ranked Up to Base Rank, but Annoue told him that she could feel that they were close to doing so, especially COMBAT INSIGHT.

Shingi made a few rocks and held them with his camouflaged Light MANA HAND, which was close to invisible if one wasn't paying attention, to create targets for Annoue. Since his MANA HAND could hover, he moved around at different speeds to give some challenge while trained at his Spells.

She was slowly adjusting to it, but it was way slower than her usual training. She seemed to be a quick learner and was sometimes limited because of her stats, but that wasn't the case now.

'Could it be because this isn't something an Arcane Blade is using?' [Shingi]

Up until now, everything he trained her only on things that one with the Arcane Blade user would do, and she was learning them in record time even if her stats were low. She finished her first Enchantment training with an INT of 10 in less than a week, which should have taken her a few weeks, and that if she had INT of 12.

She had access to training for one hour under Shingi's Blessing's effect, but she trained with just her stats most of the time. It almost seemed like she had these skills known from the beginning.

But now that she was training at a Low-Grade Spell, it was like any other person, but she had the advantage of having a tutor like Shingi, so it still sped up the progress.

After a few hours of training with a few breaks to recharge mana, she seemed to have gotten the handle of it. Of course, she had been ready some time ago, but Shingi wanted firstly to delay so that the preparations to have finished and secondly since she was learning a Spell to know it at the best of its abilities.

There was no way he would leave something half-finished if he could finish it today.

So Shingi told her that they had to head over to the shop as he had to pick up something he forgot and needed her help to carry it, which of course, she was more than happy to help. It wasn't a secret that she had more STR than her little brother.

And so they made their way to the special surprise party.