Astral Pet Store (WN)

Chapter 132 Another Skill Book

After sending Tang Lang away, Su Ping threw the trembling Wing Beast inside the Nursing Space.

There were currently many pets in the shop waiting to be handed over to their owners. Still, Su Ping had to wait for the school to end. This wasn’t a big problem since there weren’t many customers during the day anyway.

While he waited, he simply had to use Dummy Trainers to train several remaining pets still waiting inside the nursing pens to free up his schedule.

He summoned the system shop window to see what kind of items were being offered that day. To his disappointment, he didn’t find any Force Pellets or beast-catching rings.

A book at the edge of the window caught his attention. It was a skill book.

“What’s this? ‘Intermediate Pet Food Appraisal’…”

This was the first time he had seen the system shop sell a skill book. It seemed this one was not a battle pet warrior-only skill, but more of a supportive tool. It would cost him 10,000 energy points.

“Does the shop sell skills for pets?” he asked the system in his mind.

“Affirmative.”

That was some exciting news, even though the system made it sound dull and unemotional. A middle-rank pet skill book was worth quite a fortune.

He looked at the “refresh” button and decided to give it a try. Since he could earn a few dozen thousand energy points daily, spending 100 points was not that much.

Before that, however, he chose to purchase the appraisal skill first. He was still using the basic one he received from the system for free, which was far from enough if he wanted to identify better foodstuffs in cultivation planes. He did have some expensive items on the shelves, not because he knew what they were, but because he had randomly brought them back due to their colorful looks.

With this “Intermediate Pet Food Appraisal,” he would be able to scavenge for better stuff while he trained pets. Using 10,000 energy points for such a skill was completely worthwhile. As long as the description of the book was correct, he would be able to use it to identify most edibles and cooking materials he could find.

He bought the book, refreshed the store, and was glad to find a middle-rank beast-catching ring among the five new items offered. This meant the 100 energy points had been well-spent.

He decided to keep going.

The slot with the beast-catching ring presented him with another book named “Astral Telekinesis (basic).” It was a skill intended for battle pet warriors.

Su Ping paid 5,000 energy points for the book without a second thought.

As soon as he did, he felt his brain become overwhelmed by a sudden flood of knowledge that kept his full attention. He didn’t know how much time elapsed when he was “out.” By the time he came to, he had been focusing solely on the new skill he learned, and it made him feel uncontrollably excited.

It was a powerful skill, not any lesser than Killing Intent, if not better. Despite being defined as “basic” by the system, it would work wonders if used in the right situations.

Simply put, Astral Telekinesis allowed Su Ping to manipulate objects remotely by using his astral power.

He had heard about something similar before, which was how titled battle pet warriors could unleash their unparalleled astral powers to directly control or even destroy objects in their sights. This was supposed to be an exclusive ability to titled warriors, which also served as a divider, signifying their superior strength over weaker warriors. Ordinary battle pet warriors might know how to send their astral power away from their bodies to create astral runes, which in turn indirectly affected their pets. Yet they could not move or control objects in such a way.

Thrilled, Su Ping followed the instructions he had just learned and commanded his astral power to pick up an empty food bowl on the counter.

He succeeded without a problem. If anyone else would have been there to watch, they would have seen the bowl floating in midair without anyone supporting it.

The simple control was not enough to inflict damage on objects like titled warriors could. But it was a start. Su Ping knew he could steadily improve the skill until he could use it as a deadly attack in the future.

“And it’s only a basic skill… Perhaps I can use this to fool people as long as they don’t ask me to do more than moving stuff around.”

He went to the pet room and found the biggest pets he kept in the shop. Without minding their complaining looks, he used Astral Telekinesis to lift them off the floor.

He only managed to keep three of them slightly above ground, then he felt his astral power was being strained to its limit. He checked the floating pets and gauged that the heaviest object he could carry should be around 3,000 kilograms, which was pretty impressive.

After sending the startled pets back to their nursing pens, Su Ping returned to the front room, sweating.

“This is awesome…”

Such a force was not enough to penetrate the defense of hard-skinned Astral Pets if he simply used it to punch them. But… what if he applied the same force unto a needle?

He found a random stone outside the door and hurled it against a tree beside the shop. Using his enhanced eyesight, he saw a brief shadow flash leave behind the flying stone, before a small crater appeared in the middle of the tree trunk with a “pom.”

Such a result was to be expected since that stone looked pretty fragile. He might do better if he used something made of metal.

Man… If I ambushed someone with this, they would never know what hit them.

Previously, Su Ping thought he was good enough to stand against titled battle pet warriors with the help of Little Skeleton. Then he realized he was being too naive. A real titled warrior who could “ambush” him from a distance would kill him before he had a chance to react.

And it made him worry.

It wasn’t like he was being targeted by a hostile titled warrior right then, but nobody knew if some kind of misfortune would drag him into such a deadly situation someday. He had to know how to defend himself better before that happened.

“I need to work on my Solar Bulwark… As long as I get it to the second rank, a stray bullet from a titled warrior would be unable to penetrate my body that easily.”

He returned to the shop and called up the system menu again. It would be for the best if he could find several Force Pellets to buy.

“Wait, five hundred energy points?” His action froze up when he saw the number displayed beside the refresh button.

The system spoke in his head, “Only the first two refreshing attempts of each day would cost 100 points. The price will increase from there.”

“The fu—”

It’s like some kind of cheap, knockoff mobile game, isn’t it? Where did the system learn about these terrible things?

He sighed and decided to take the gamble. Five hundred didn’t sound so much as long as he could find something good

Or not. The store showed him five pieces of junk.

He checked the button again. The next refresh would cost him 1,000 points this time.

He spat and closed the menu. That was his limit.

From then on, he’d remember to refresh the shop three times each day. Or only twice, if he was short on energy. He still needed a lot of energy points to level up the shop and the Incubation Pool. He couldn’t afford to waste too many points on a game of luck.

Since there was still some time before the academy freed the students, Su Ping closed up the shop so he could spend some time inside the dragon king’s heritage ground.

While exploring, he did his best to practice his Astral Telekinesis against monsters. After many victories and inevitable deaths, he gradually perfected the accuracy of the skill until he became pretty good at shooting.

Two days had passed, during which Su Ping’s name became increasingly known at the Phoenix Peak Academy. As his customers recommended his shop to their friends, who further spread his name to the others in their community, almost the entire academy was made aware of the “expensive yet effective training services” he provided.

As soon as the school ended, crowds of students would all rush to his shop. And if it was the weekend, the outside of the shop would become packed with people in the early morning instead.

While dealing with his business at a steady pace, Su Ping used what time he could spare to train his own pets, who all grew rapidly under his care.

Soon, it was time for him to present another lesson at the academy. That day, after doing some necessary work and having lunch, he rode to the Phoenix Peak Academy at about two in the afternoon. The lesson had been scheduled at three according to Dong Mingsong’s plan.

Half an hour later, he arrived at the gate of the academy and saw eight people standing at the entrance while looking at the phoenix statue. They all looked like students, which was strange, because students should be inside the academy right then.

He didn’t care though. Heading to his class was more important.

“Hey, you, hold up,” one of the “students” saw him coming and called him to a stop, probably because he also looked like a student who arrived at the academy at a very wrong time.

Su Ping hit the brakes and looked that way.

“Dude, there’s this Ye Hao studying in your academy, right? I heard he’s pretty good. Do you know him?” a young man with a crew cut yelled at him in an unpleasant way.

Huh… these guys are not from here?

“No. Don’t know him.” Su Ping shook his head.

Ye Hao did pay him money to reserve his services, though that hardly made them acquaintances. He didn’t have much to say about Ye Hao if that was what these people wanted to ask.