Chapter 316: Please Do Not Shake the Beer

The first new skill promised dramatic boss music that grew louder when I tried to hide, which felt like paying thirty-five IP to have Old Mate develop an additional hobby.

Complimentary Boss Music was Rank C-minus, lasted two minutes and needed fifteen minutes before another performance. It offered no fear effect, stat increase or magical control over whether anybody found my entrance impressive.

I already carried an unpaid Australian commentator in my head, and I didn’t see why I should purchase a soundtrack for disappointing him.

[System: Because I’d have standards, mate. If you’re going to crawl through a drain after getting smacked by tofu, we should at least give the moment a decent fucking chorus.]

The second choice was The Chair Has Had Enough, Rank C, fifty IP. A nonliving chair within ten meters could run on its own legs for fifteen seconds, then wait five minutes before reconsidering its career.

It gained no extra strength or balance. Putting Horass on a cheap folding chair and making it flee sounded funny until I imagined the chair collapsing immediately beneath a man who could stop a loaded trolley with one arm.

The third offer was Hold My Bloody Beer, Rank B, eighty IP, and its warning label explained why the can looked so worried.

I could select one incoming nonliving projectile I could actually see within three meters. The skill sealed that projectile and its existing energy inside a physical metal drink can for no more than ten seconds.

Opening the can released the captured projectile through the opening with its original destructive potential. Letting the timer expire released it at the can’s current location, which was an extremely important reason not to admire the packaging too long.

It handled one projectile per activation, with a six-minute cooldown. It couldn’t bottle a continuous beam, an explosion already spreading, a living attacker or my growing suspicion that this shop employed people who hated customers.

I asked whether the can could explode in my mouth, because I felt any honest sales pitch needed to address that before discussing the color scheme.

[System: Abso-bloody-lutely, champ. It’s a borrowed disaster with a ring pull, not a shield. You get ten seconds to make a useful decision or become the most expensive part of the recycling.]

Galaxy Brain could help me recognize the right moment, but the target still needed to enter range and my body still had to handle the resulting can. Being clever wouldn’t grant automatic interception if I failed to see the shot.

I told the girls I wanted to replace Red Light. The pause had helped us escape, but Horass understood its timing, and the new skill gave us a different risk to use rather than the same trick with a larger number attached.

They agreed after reading the shared description. I purchased Hold My Bloody Beer, spent eighty IP and watched Red Light disappear from all four lists at once.

Two hundred and thirty IP remained. We kept Mine Now, Galaxy Brain and Bio-Recall, and nobody retained a secret traffic-stop button simply because losing it might later become inconvenient.

The old cooldowns had already cleared during treatment and the evening’s rest. Each of us received the new skill ready, with separate six-minute timers after use and no resets available by changing the menu again.

We tested it in the empty maintenance room with a small padded practice bolt from the club’s equipment kit. Lukas launched it slowly across the clear lane while I watched from beside a thick catch mat.

When it entered range, I activated the skill. A plain metal can appeared against my coils, light enough to hold and warm with the stored energy of something that had been moving a moment earlier.

The timer began immediately. I turned the opening toward the mat and pulled the tab with a narrow tendril before the count reached halfway.

The bolt shot into the padding. It didn’t become weaker because it had spent time pretending to be a beverage, and I understood exactly how much worse the same lesson would look with a rocket.

[System: Lovely, mate. You’ve invented a drink that can return fire, which should liven up the next family barbecue without improving the food.]

I wanted a rule against anyone putting these in the fridge, especially you.

Old Mate’s own private beer wasn’t a physical supply we could use for practice. This can belonged to the skill and remained a real object in the room, dented and empty after release rather than vanishing to make cleanup somebody else’s problem.

Bridget picked it up, inspected the tab and put it in a clearly marked empty crate. She asked whether passing a loaded one to another person would reset the timer, and I answered before anybody could build a plan on wishful thinking.

It wouldn’t. Ten seconds belonged to the capture, not the current holder, and a stolen or dropped can remained just as dangerous in its new location.

Cherry suggested throwing one at an enemy. Lyra pointed out that the timer and opening direction still mattered, while I privately appreciated being in a room where practical planning sounded like the start of a criminal picnic.

We left the other three skills unused for now and let my test cooldown run while eating. Six minutes later, the icon cleared, giving me a ready ability without pretending a conversation had shortened the rule.

The club’s exterior camera then showed a collection van stopping at the empty rear loading lane. Its passenger aimed a small launcher toward the closed service door while the driver remained behind the wheel.

Horass wasn’t visible, but his message arrived a moment later asking whether I had found a better answer yet. He had no view of my System; he was guessing I would change tactics after the beating, and I hated how reasonable that guess was.

The passenger fired before I finished the thought, sending the first real test straight toward a room full of people I had absolutely no intention of letting him touch.