WM – Chapter 273: Takatsuki Makoto heads to the Demonic Continent

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• Hmm. Johnny continues to show a very Otherworlder vibe. Either he's descended from some, or reincarnated, right?
  Meanwhile, Anna's love is...getting heavier. Now I kinda dread what'll happen if she follows him to the present day, because she'll probably be hella pissed at how Highland leaders have been treating him.

  So Takki's reached the level where he can casually cast spells that emulate life... Talking is actually mechanically a very complex thing, so it's pretty insane that he's casually doing it.
  According to Dia, he's getting stronger. So is it that he's already crossed the 999 mark? Or is it just that 1000 is a really crazy high benchmark so even if he gets stronger, it won't mark the change until he crosses the ceiling higher than the sky?

  ....Come to think of it, he transformed into a spirit last time, but what would happen if he tried to transform into a god as he is now? Noah is apparently crazy strong, so let's go with the apparent weakest Noah or the Eir for the best affinity.

  • The soulbook is just a measurement tool made by the holy gods with ulterior motives. They arbitrarily locked the display cap at 99 before to discourage going any higher just so people would not see spirits at 105.

    Makoto's modified soulbook display cap is stuck at 999. His water magic proficiency will still go up, but it will always display as 999. For example 2,000 or 1,5000 will display like 999 as the maximum value due to the tools limitation. Dia a great spirit even said it is going up and talked dismissively about the soulbook.

    Noah even said he needs 1,000 to even call out to Undine, so he is way above 999 at this point. Logically speaking, it has been 6+ months and and Makoto is training fanatic and he had 999 when Lucy saw his stats. If Makoto has not, then that is just poor writing.

    • Counterpoints:
      1. Noah already modified the soul book so sticking a new cap on it doesn't make sense, especially since titans value freedom.
      2. Dia talked dismissively about the Soul Book and the concept of proficiency levels. Even if he's objectively getting stronger, it doesn't mean it'll register in proficiency levels when it's being measured under this system. It's already been established that raising proficiency gets harder the higher the value is. We've hit 999 during the Spirit King incident, so maybe it's just a huge gap and it's technically more like Takki's raising his level from 999.000001 to 999.00001.
      3. Undine can be called because Takki has access to Charm magic. That's been the case since the first contact, and 1000 proficiency isn't necessary for that for him specifically. At best, he hit a threshold where his charm bonus can consistently connect him to Undine instead of it only being circumstantial. Being able to interact with Undine is hardly a marker of anything at this point.
      4. It's not bad writing to just say that the gap between 999 and 1000 is big. It's explicitly been a plot point that he seemingly hasn't hit it yet. There are plenty of other directions to go before jumping straight to "bad writing".

  • 1. So you agree deep down, but being the devils advocate?

    2. Makoto is currently not Noah's follower. In order for Makoto to call Undine in the Sun Country he needed to fulfil three conditions. 200+ proficiency, charm on, and Noah's follower and even then Undine might not respond due to being whimsical.

    999.1 to 999.2 is just plain foolhardy when it has not been used since the beginning of the series to now. Makoto went from 90 to 91 in water, while Lucy gained 1-2 levels in the single digits in fire. That point is kind of moot in the context of the beginning of the series. It is just a matter of how you train.

    In the LN, it is sort of explained that using low level magic is better to raise proficiency like 1,000 butterflies that Makoto uses.

    4. It is bad writing if he is still stuck at 999 at this point (my point 999 is simply the display cap for the measuring tool). This is not a cultivation novel set in a xanxia world where breakthroughs are important. There is already a precedent in this series of a previous example where Makoto thought he was stuck, but was not. His soulbook displayed 99, but Noah assured him that he was improving until she finally modified his book to cheer him up. The soulbook will not limit him, but his thoughts about not improving will limit his ability to improve further.

    5. 1000 is not the domain of gods. It is simply the number that Noah told Makoto he could request the aid of undine or other great spirits reliably. Makoto did not call just one undine, but several undines. It is better explained that he has 1000+ proficiency the reason why Dia refers to him as "our king affectionately" and he can use water magic on higher scale than before he arrived at the past. Fog of war over an entire forest, submerging the demon lord's castle city, ice comets, etc. These magic already surpass anything Makoto has done before and without fine control (1000+ magic proficiency) he would never have been able to control them at all. Friendly fire would have been an issue.

    • 1. Don't know where you got that, but no. Don't put words in my mouth. Maybe some ideas you offer are true, but we don't know any of that for certain, and your phrasing spoke as if it was. I just thought the logic you offered didn't track and so wanted to counter them.

      "The soulbook is just a measurement tool made by the holy gods with ulterior motives. They arbitrarily locked the display cap at 99 before to discourage going any higher just so people would not see spirits at 105."
      Factual statements, except for the ulterior motives thing which is more just basic deduction.

      "Makoto’s modified soulbook display cap is stuck at 999. His water magic proficiency will still go up, but it will always display as 999. For example 2,000 or 1,5000 will display like 999 as the maximum value due to the tools limitation. Dia a great spirit even said it is going up and talked dismissively about the soulbook."
      You don't know for sure that the display cap is stuck at 999. Maybe Takki's proficiency is still officially 999. It's one of the mysteries that only one of the gods could answer. Dia gave her impressions of his strength, but actually said nothing about proficiency level because great spirits don't work with arbitrary systems set by the holy gods.

      "Noah even said he needs 1,000 to even call out to Undine, so he is way above 999 at this point. Logically speaking, it has been 6+ months and and Makoto is training fanatic and he had 999 when Lucy saw his stats. If Makoto has not, then that is just poor writing."
      Noah's statement about calling to Undine is factual, but also it doesn't encompass the current circumstances surrounding Takki. There are plenty of explanations for Water proficiency to stay locked at 999. The logic that he has to have surpassed it by now is based on assumption.
      It might be true, but it might not and it's jumping the gun to call it bad writing when there's plenty explanations being ignored.

    • 2. I don't remember the Noah connection bit so I'll take your word for it. He still has charm magic. Maybe his proficiency is high enough to cheat the threshold with that alone.
      My point isn't that 999.1-999.9 exists. My point is that the 10th point of proficiency is not worth the same as the 100th point of proficiency. At the very least, it's much harder to acquire. Who's to say that it's not also a more demanding benchmark of increasing power? Maybe the amount of power you need to gain to go from proficiency 999 to 1000 is also the amount of mastery you need to go from 100 to 800?
      We honestly know very little about the mechanics of the proficiency system in terms of how they increase and what the differences are besides the obvious benchmarks.

      3. The fact that Noah modified the soul book in the past should be a point in favor of him actually having proficiency of 999, not a precedent of the same thing happening again. Why would it suddenly have a cap again? It happened in the past and the lock was removed. So it should indicate his level accurately now.

      4. None of what you said means it's bad writing. At best, it goes against your expectations, which isn't an indication of it's quality at all.

      5. 1000 is an unheard of proficiency as far as we know. How do you know 999 isn't enough to control a fog of war over a forest, or drown a castle? This stuff doesn't have to be in the realm of gods. As a strategic-scale magic by reputation, Spirit Magic could just do that because it gives the user access to infinite mana and the proficiency can absolutely be high enough to control it.
      As for Summoning several Undines, that was the equivalent of sacrificial magic that shaved off lifespan; while he isn't offering it up to a god, it's certainly not strange for the result to be of this scale.

  • 1. The ulterior motives is a fact though with soulbooks and not just a deduction when the gods like Eir themselves admit it, Noah even stated it as such that the holy gods passed that knowledge as truth to the inhabitants and their followers as the absolute truth. All skills are capped at 99 is the common misconception that the holy gods have purposely spread. Makoto thought his clear mind skill capped at 99, but he can go to 100. Magic proficiency can go higher than 99, but will be displayed as 99. There is already a precedent here to look back to.

    "Maybe Takki’s proficiency is still officially 999. It’s one of the mysteries that only one of the gods could answer. Dia gave her impressions of his strength, but actually said nothing about proficiency level because great spirits don’t work with arbitrary systems set by the holy gods." It means it is immeasurable then. The soulbook simply cannot measure the magic proficiency to gauge a number due to its limitations as tool. Currently, Dia's impression are more reliable than the soulbook which has stopped measuring after 999.

    2. "Maybe the amount of power you need to gain to go from proficiency 999 to 1000 is also the amount of mastery you need to go from 100 to 800?" This is already disproven in the author's own writing. The amount of time it took Lucy to gain 1-2 levels in fire proficiency in the single digits, Makoto gained 1-2 levels in water proficiency in the 90's. 999 to 1000 or higher is no different.

    3. "The fact that Noah modified the soul book in the past should be a point in favor of him actually having proficiency of 999, not a precedent of the same thing happening again. Why would it suddenly have a cap again? It happened in the past and the lock was removed. So it should indicate his level accurately now." 999 is simply the limit of the measuring tool. Cars for example can go beyond their speedometer's upper limit, but it will not be displayed except the maximum value.

    Charm, Divinity, etc do not substitute for magic proficiency requirements or expertise. Makoto is using pseudo-god rank magic here and without the corresponding level, it would all go wrong and he would fail to control it. The higher your magic proficiency, the more magic you are able to finely control.

    4. "None of what you said means it’s bad writing. At best, it goes against your expectations, which isn’t an indication of it’s quality at all." It is bad writing when the author goes against the logic in his or her own work. It is established that he needs 1000 to even get the attention of one Undine and he calls several of them at once. There is zero reason why the author would go against this notation that he or she wrote. Hence, it is more likely the soulbook is no longer functional as a measure tool for Makoto's real proficiency that is above 999.

    Author does not always need to explicitly state such obvious things, he could just as easily imply it through actions or character's reactions if he or she is good writer and storyteller. Makoto's daily training already gives insight into this aspect.

    5. "1000 is an unheard of proficiency as far as we know. How do you know 999 isn’t enough to control a fog of war over a forest, or drown a castle? This stuff doesn’t have to be in the realm of gods. As a strategic-scale magic by reputation, Spirit Magic could just do that because it gives the user access to infinite mana and the proficiency can absolutely be high enough to control it.
    As for Summoning several Undines, that was the equivalent of sacrificial magic that shaved off lifespan; while he isn’t offering it up to a god, it’s certainly not strange for the result to be of this scale."

    This part is wrong. Makoto is not the only person to reach 1000 or the very first great spirit user in history. He is the first person in a while to have Undine by his side.

    Lucy has nearly limitless mana, but she has low magic proficiency so she gets mana dizziness. The fact the Makoto does not get mana dizziness is his high magic proficiency. In the past he is using mana on such a grand scale like never before that it rivals or even surpasses demon lords and ancient dragons alike. Without a corresponding magic proficiency in response the grand scale of mana used, Makoto would not be able to handle it as adequately as he does.

    Tens of thousands should have been translated as tens of millions.

    • 2. Wrong. It has been explicitly stated on multiple occasions that Takki is a bizarre case, presumably because he trains so obsessively that it overcomes the difficulty curve. In the very example you mentioned, Lucy felt discouraged because that's not how it's supposed to be. Every time Takki showed his soul book stats early on, his proficiency was noted as bizarrely high. Even the Great Sage's proficiency from a thousand years of practice hasn't come close to 500. It's already been established that increasing proficiency gets more difficult the higher the value increases.

      My entire point with 1 is that perhaps 999 is where he hits his limit in the difficulty curve and can no longer increase it easily. He's pushing all the limits he can and still doesn't feel strained. The only reason it hit 999 so soon to begin with as because he turned himself into a Spirit King, which channeled all the water in the world. Maybe that's the scale of "practice" he needs to increase it now.
      As a metaphor, in a game it's easy to level up from 1 to 5, but harder to level up from 80 to 85. Just because he's gaining experience at level 99 doesn't mean he definitely has to be level 100 now. Maybe his fondness of grinding meant he barely felt the tougher requirements early on and it's finally caught up.

      3. ...Fair. Maybe the soul books just functionally can't measure past 1000 even if their limiters are removed because no mortal is supposed to be able to approach that level anyway. Maybe a different, special tool is needed for that.

      4. Then it's not bad writing because the logic is still intact at the moment. Calling multiple Undine was special circumstances of sacrificing lifespan. Takatsuki Makoto in his entirety is just a special circumstance with his prior transformation as a Spirit King, so Undines are worthless as proof that his proficiency is higher than 999. All we know is, "he's getting stronger" with no comment on his arbitrary proficiency level. It is perfectly in line with what we've learned so far for the 1000th level of proficiency to just be "really, really hard to reach".

      5. ...What? I don't remember any of this being stated. When has that proficiency level been mentioned to be reached by anyone other than him? Mel-san has implied that she's seen spells of crazy scale before, but yeah, his are on another level. I don't see how that's an indication of his proficiency not being enough at 999 though.

      And I just don't know what you mean by tens of millions.

  • 2. "Wrong. It has been explicitly stated on multiple occasions that Takki is a bizarre case.... Even the Great Sage’s proficiency from a thousand years of practice hasn’t come close to 500. It’s already been established that increasing proficiency gets more difficult the higher the value increases."

    You just said Makoto is a bizarre case as in a special case. In order to accurately judge Makoto's abilities, you need to think outside the norm. :P

    It is not an issue for Makoto from what we have seen so far. It is more likely that he is over 999 than not if you consider the above. Even if you use rpg terms, so far it has not been the case for Makoto where it has limited him from going up in proficiency in record speed. His issue is that he cannot see his progress like in rpg games where levels are quantified on the status screen.

    I agree being a spirit king has sped up his water magic proficiency and made him hit the max value on his soulbook. However, his growth did not stop there at 999. To Undine and gods the concept of numbers in magic proficiency is nonexistent and the fact that she said Makoto is getting stronger despite his display being 999 on his soulbook means he is also among them (not a god, but his proficiency is off the charts). He reached a point in magic proficiency that the soulbook compiling it into a numerical value is moot or impossible to quantify.

    3. 999 is simply the limit of the soulbook or Noah did not think he would surpass 999 in such a sort timespan to add four digits to the display.

    4. He needs 1,000 to attract undines and to SYNC with her successfully, otherwise he would be overwhelmed. It is much more believable that the soulbook has hit its max value to display like what happened in the past than him being stuck at 999 for 6 months. Makoto being over 1,000 would also somewhat explain why Undines call him "our king."

    5. It is how Reigokai translated a specific Japanese numerical term into English. It was translated into tens of thousands when it should have been tens of millions. It is a term used often in the past during combat or statistics, but using thousands downscales the significance. Tens of thousands of water dragons vs tens of millions of water dragon both have different impact on imagination.

    Mel is young for an ancient dragon who is not even 10,000 years old. I think Johnny also mentioned how rare it is to see Undine. Author's afterword: God > Spirit King > Demigod

    • 1. "From what we've seen so far" isn't the same as right now. Maybe this is the point he's hit the difficulty wall.
      " It is more likely that he is over 999 than not if you consider the above."
      Firstly, this is the first time you've called it a possibility instead of treating it as a certainty. Secondly, it's not more likely. There's no proof that this is how it works.

      2. The fact that he's a special case means the rules are inconsistent with him. That he's an anomaly interacting with a system we don't know a lot about isn't proof of anything concretely. Is he above 999? We don't know. Is the soul brook at it's limit? We don't know. Do this or that restriction apply to him? We don't know. This trait makes many theories possible, but only makes what it actually is more vague and hard to figure out without an expert (a god's) opinion.

      3. It's possible, but we don't know that for sure.

      4. Undine already stated that they follow him because they sense he will become a Spirit King "one day". I speculate that this means simply having been a Spirit King before is what makes the Undines so obedient. Then again, it could be as we said earlier and it's just that Takki is a weird case. Either way, his interactions with the Undines have too many variables to be proof of his proficiency.

      5. Ah. I don't remember the context, but I assume that's referring to there being Spirit users with proficiency levels comparable in the past? I'll take your word for it then.

• Thanks for the chapter

• Looks like Makoto is slowly becoming more of a titan demi-god

• It's a bit late, but thank you very much for the chapter.

• Thanks for the chapter.

• Is it possible the elementals are magics that the gods allowed speach ?The gods and titans view them as weapon so Makoto is doing the same thing.

• Did even Noa not expect Makoto to surpass 999 proficiency, so she only tweaked it for one extra digit?
  Well, looks like we're heading for the climax of this arc. Since I'm almost certain Makoto will choose to return to the present after Iblis is defeated, it's only a question of how it goes. I'm guessing he'll use the remaining divinity of Ira's after the battle to do something like stopping time for himself for a thousand years to he can return to the present. The big question is the girls. It doesn't look like Mel is joining the harem, though she should still be around somewhere in the present, likely under instructions not to show herself until Makoto returns to keep his past on track. We already know what happens to Momo, though the conversation will probably be emotional. It's also seems given that she's looking after the dormant Makoto until he wakes up. The question is Anna. It's going to be a difficult chat when he comes clean. Maybe he can request for Anna's mentor to be resurrected to reduce her grudge? Is there a time limit on how long after death it can be done? And if she can accept it, will she follow him to the present? I'm guessing she won't go immediately. She'll stay behind to defeat the other demon lords that are dead in the present, make sure history goes according to plan and then leave to "keep her promise" like in the story Noel told him. Though that does raise the question of who her ancestor is? Is the resemblence coincidental? Still a lot to wonder about.

  Thanks for the translation!

• Yep. Thanks for the chapter~

• Thanks for the chapter...

• thanks for chap
  what are the chances the gliched part of mc's status board is really important?

  and i wonder how iblis-chan looks like,as far as i can remember they have implied she's a loli