Chapter 102: Skills: 5 Elements Seal

Hearing his wife’s words, Julian Bishop sighed. "I know, but there’s absolutely no way she’s getting the Wood Stone and Heavenly Stone from me for a mere two large planting boxes."

The Heavenly Stone could restore incomplete items, and he had actually considered using it directly. However, when he tried to use it, the System suddenly prompted him that the other pieces of the Wood Stone were in someone else’s hands. If he wanted to forcefully complete it, he would need to provide a certain amount of compensation to those people.

If he couldn’t afford it, he could owe it first. The System would cover the cost upfront, but the Survivor would have to pay back much more later—somewhat like a bank loan.

At that time, Julian had taken one look at the loan amount he’d need and immediately gave up on using the Heavenly Stone to complete the Wood Stone. If he actually went through with it, he’d likely spend the rest of his life paying it off, and even that wouldn’t be enough. Most importantly, the System didn’t care about debts disappearing with death. If he couldn’t finish paying it off, the debt would transfer to his descendants. Besides, you could default on a bank loan in the real world and play the deadbeat, but here? Who would dare? He wasn’t foolish enough to drag himself—and even his children—down over a single item.

Julian messaged, "Since you don’t know, forget it. However, I think the price you listed in The Supreme Shop is very unreasonable. I have one Wood Stone and one Heavenly Stone, and I need twenty large planting boxes in exchange.

"These planting boxes shouldn’t be precious to you. As long as you have the blueprints and materials, you can make as many as you want."

Lily Rhodes replied, "Twenty is too many. I can give you five at most. I have costs to cover too, after all."

Lily had originally thought the deal would fall through after she refused to provide information about Silas Jennings. She had been preparing to use her own Heavenly Stone to restore the Wood Spirit Pearl, but things had unexpectedly taken a turn for the better. However, operating on the principle of ruthless haggling, she slashed his demand of twenty straight down to a mere five.

Julian countered, "Five is impossible. Both the Wood Stone and the Heavenly Stone are very important to you, otherwise, you wouldn’t have offered up good items for exchange time and time again. Fifteen, at the very least."

Lily typed back, "Eight. Like I said, I have costs too."

This time, Julian didn’t reply immediately. It was quite a while later before he finally responded. "Fine, eight it is. But I have an additional condition. I want two Food Cards—the one-month kind."

Apart from the unlimited all-you-can-eat card Lily had given Mimi Bishop, the longest meal plan card sold in The Supreme Shop was for one month. As long as you activated the card, three meals a day would be continuously provided for a month.

Lily took a bite of the cheesecake she had brought back from the event. As she ate, she typed her reply: "Deal."

Following the successful transaction, two stones appeared in front of her. One was the familiar Heavenly Stone. The other was a green, somewhat fuzzy cobblestone that looked like it was covered in a layer of moss. This was the final piece of the Wood Stone? It didn’t look like it at all.

[Enlarging Wood Stone: Proportionally enlarges all plants it comes into contact with.]

Seeing the Introduction for the Enlarging Wood Stone, Lily casually picked up a small slice of apple from the fruit platter next to her. Upon touching the stone, the diced apple rapidly expanded. It didn’t stop until it was twice the size of a whole apple. Seeing this, Lily looked at the appetizingly colored fruit and took a bite. Then, she choked.

"Pfft! What is this? The texture is like tree bark!" Her face twisted into a grimace. It still tasted like an apple, but entirely unpalatable. No wonder Julian was willing to part with it.

[Detected that the Survivor has collected all the Wood Stones. Would you like to synthesize the Wood Spirit Pearl?]

"Yes!"

As her voice fell, the Enlarging Wood Stone in her hand was enveloped by a beam of light. The next second, the other three Wood Stones materialized and began to merge with the one in front of her. The fusion process lasted for several minutes. Once it ended, a green bead appeared before her eyes.

[Detected that the Survivor has successfully collected the Five Spirit Beads. Reward acquired: One Skill Book. Special Reward: Divinity Value +5.]

She hadn’t expected to get a reward for collecting the Five Spirit Beads. A Skill Book! It had been a long time since she had seen one of those. She actually had quite a few sitting in her inventory, but she hadn’t fused any of them. After all, she rarely needed to fight. Of course, that was only a secondary reason; the main issue was that the attributes of those Skill Books didn’t match hers. Without matching attributes, she simply couldn’t use them. Over time, she had nearly given up on them. Life couldn’t be perfect, anyway. She already had so much; whether or not she could learn Skills seemed to have little impact on her.

And then there was this Divinity Value. She still hadn’t figured out how it worked. Alright, to be honest, she hadn’t studied it at all. If the Divinity Value hadn’t popped up again today, she would have completely forgotten about it.

Lily checked her body and found nothing amiss. No weird new growths had appeared, and after integrating the Divinity Value, she actually felt much lighter. However, since it was called a Divinity Value, its effects surely went beyond just feeling lighter. She just had no clues to go on.

She reintegrated the Wood Spirit Pearl into the ground, then looked up at the glowing golden book hovering in front of her.

"This Skill Book is a bit unusual." Previous Skill Books had always been dusty and gray, looking like ancient martial arts manuals. This one, however, was not only gleaming gold but also looked brand new, as if fresh off the printing press. "Whatever, let’s just see if I can learn it first. Five Elements Seal? Is that the Skill name?"

Learning it was easy enough. With the System’s help, all a Survivor had to do to learn a Skill was tear the Skill Book apart. The Skill would then dissolve into motes of light and merge into their body, allowing them to try using it right away. It was virtually unheard of for someone to be unable to activate a Skill after learning it.

But this time, after learning the Five Elements Seal, Lily surprisingly had no idea how to cast it. To confirm it wasn’t an issue on her end, she cast several of her other Skills. Each one executed smoothly and flawlessly. Yet, no matter what she tried, the Five Elements Seal simply wouldn’t activate.

After failing dozens of attempts in a row, Lily grew so frustrated that she grabbed the entire cheesecake off the table and took a massive bite, not caring that she smeared it all over her face. In a short while, she had devoured the whole cake. Her mood improved significantly after eating. Sure enough, sweets always made people feel better.

Having finished the cake, Lily didn’t resume practicing the Five Elements Seal. Since this Skill Book was so unique, its casting method was probably different from the others. She would just have to study it further later.