Chapter 125 Encounter with Mao Mei
There is a place called "Hidden Valley" in Joshua Tree National Park. It is dotted with more than a dozen rocky cliffs of varying degrees of difficulty. It is a paradise for rock climbing enthusiasts and is known as one of the top ten holy places for rock climbing.
Jack parked his car at a nearby campsite, put on his backpack filled with climbing ropes, pitons and other equipment, and climbed up to one of the rock cliffs more than ten meters high from the side.
Jack is not a rock climbing enthusiast, he is here to experiment. After the system update, the entire skill panel has changed drastically, and the three skill trees have really turned into a dense tree shape.
Under the original professional skill tree, a lot of large icons have been added, such as vehicle driving. When you click on it, you will see a bunch of small icons, namely ground vehicles, water vehicles, and air vehicles.
Then click on the ground vehicle, there are two smaller icons, small vehicles and large vehicles. His original driving skill (proficient) has now become small vehicles (proficient), while the large vehicle icon only shows ( getting Started).
Then click on the surface vehicle, which is also a small ship (entry level). The large ship icon is simply gray. I don’t know if the aircraft carrier is considered a large ship in the system.
Aerial vehicles are even more outrageous. They are simply divided into fixed-wing and rotary-wing. Although they are all gray icons, Jack does not know how to fly them, but he can turn on an electric fan with a propeller and fly a jet aircraft. This is Aren't both fixed-wing? Is the Buran space shuttle considered a fixed wing?
Fortunately, systems such as forensic science and psychology have not been branched out. Otherwise, when I think of the dozens of types of forensic science, such as trace evidence, footprint analysis, fingerprint identification, etc., as well as the micro-expression analysis of psychology, Psychological evaluation, behavioral analysis, etc., Jack was able to pass out on the spot.
However, the benefits of this upgrade are not without. For example, the skill system that was not mastered was never displayed, but now it is prompted with gray icons, and a small progress bar appears under all skill icons.
For example, Jack's rifle shooting skills have been quiet since he was upgraded to proficiency. Now all shooting skills are classified as combat skills under professional skills.
Combat skills are divided into three categories, shooting, fighting and special skills. In the shooting branch, Jack currently has pistols (proficient), rifles (proficient), and crossbows (beginner). Interestingly, the progress bar under his rifle skills has already full.
The reason why Jack came to rock climbing was because there were a bunch of gray skills under the special skills, one of which was climbing.
He read several professional books on rock climbing and rope climbing last night. Although the climbing skill is still gray, the progress bar is full.
By observing the progress bars of different skill icons, he roughly had some guesses in his mind, and he was here to verify them today.
Jack drilled three pitons on the top of the rock cliff, then tried hard to recall the figure-eight knot knotting method he learned from the book, tied a safety rope on himself, and rappelled down to the bottom of the cliff. Lay down two pitons.
Then he began to try to climb the rock with his bare hands. It was not difficult at all. When a person can easily lift himself up with only one or two fingers, the rest only requires enough patience and care.
When Jack returned to the top of the cliff, in the system skills, the climbing skill was indeed upgraded to the entry level, and the experience bar was still full. He set his sights on another stone cliff not far away that was more than 30 meters high.
This rock cliff is very big. There is a rock climbing team of five people, three men and two women, making preparations on the top of the cliff. When Jack comes up from one side, two fair-faced and fit-looking blond girls in the team come directly to him. He gave me a wink.
The daytime temperature in the Mojave Desert in May can be close to 40 degrees, so Jack only wore a pair of close-fitting over-the-knee hiking pants, and his naked upper body showed off his amazing muscle lines.
Compared with those Angsa people who work hard to get a tan despite peeling off their skin, Jack is still very satisfied with his ivory skin. Anyway, he can't get a tan now even if he wants to, so he doesn't even need sunscreen.
Smiling politely, Jack passed by the group and chose the area where the cliff bulged outwards, which should be the most difficult.
It is still the same as before to drive nails and hang safety ropes, but Jack brings some more tools such as rock plugs, mechanical plugs, and rock hooks around his waist.
After successfully descending to the bottom of the cliff, Jack started the second round of climbing. This time it was much more difficult, especially when it came to the protruding part of the rock wall. His skills were not yet proficient and he was relatively unfamiliar with the use of tools, but in the end he still managed to climb. He relied on brute force to complete the entire process.
Just as Jack struggled to climb up the rock wall, a slightly calloused hand stretched out in front of him. When he looked up, the slightly older of the two blond girls was standing in front of him.
"Thanks."
Jack held her hand and used the force to get up.
"My name is Natasha, and I am an international student at the University of California, from Moscow." The blonde girl's accent was a little thick, with a bit of a flick of the tongue.
"My name is Jack Tavole, just call me Jack."
The language tree in the system skill tree has also been updated. There are probably too many types of languages to list them all, but there are more than 60 kinds. Most of them are gray at the moment. Some time ago, someone finished mastering Italian and Latin and became proficient in it. After that, I happen to be learning Russian at the moment and have just reached the entry level.
Unable to bear it, Jack directly said hello in Russian: "Zdrastvi (Hello)."
Natasha showed a surprised smile, and then a long paragraph of Russian came out of her mouth. At this time, the awesomeness of the system was reflected. Although it was only an entry-level mastery, he could basically understand it and just answered When I was speaking, I was just like a beginner, stammering a little, and imitating the tongue-licking sounds wasn't very good.
After some conversation, Jack learned that the younger one was Natasha's sister, named Thalia. Her family was relatively wealthy and she was good at studies. She was currently studying abroad at the University of California, LA. Both of them were rock climbing enthusiasts, so they were relatively close friends. The professional kind.
Knowing that Jack was a policeman by profession and that he was taking a road trip alone on vacation this time, Natasha could not hide the envy in her eyes.
Jack didn't think much about it. The system prompted that his climbing skills had been upgraded again and he was now proficient. However, this time the experience bar was no longer full, only half of it was left.
He took the opportunity to chat and asked Natasha for some knowledge about rock climbing, and then found that the experience bar had indeed risen a little, which basically confirmed his suspicion.
There are hidden conditions for upgrading system skills. For example, climbing skills should be divided into two parts: theory and practice. In the future, you will not be able to get started just by reading books and learning theoretical knowledge. You will also need to practice enough to finally upgrade the level.