Alex’s heart sank as he thought of the best way to stall for time. With a bit more confidence than he felt, Alex repeated Anise’s line from earlier. “That’s personal.” It garnered another chuckle out of Anise and Alex was glad to see her lightening up. He supposed the possibility, of having to give up a year’s salary that her family depend on, or something worse, would have been a weight on her soul, now she seemed a bit more relaxed.

“Fine, I tell you mine, you tell me yours.”

“But I already told so much about myself,” Alex quickly said putting an arm over his chest.

“You had your chance, your weapon connected with my mouth before you could, move on.” They both laughed and Alex agreed to the story swap before Anise began speaking.

“So, I got off my shift and was heading to my boyfriend’s place,” A look of familiar pain crossed her face and Alex thought he knew where this story was going. “When I get there and open the door, he in the middle of the hall banging some girl. I was already tired, and the situation was just so fucked up I stood there looking at them for like a minute. They never stopped, or even acknowledged my presence, just kept going at it right in front of me.” Her voice cracked and Alex realized that it couldn’t have happened more than a few hours ago. Not knowing what to do he sat and continued to listen. “He knew I had a key, it was my fucking anniversary present, a key to a shitty house, in the worst part of town, but I was so happy when he gave it to me. He knew I was getting off work and was just in the hallway.” Tears were actively streaming off her face by this point, but her last words died off as she realized something.

“He knew. He fucking knew. He knew I would be there, knew I’d have the key, knew I’d run away, straight to that bar. He was fucking in on it.” Anise had built up a rage as she spoke, but it all faded as the crying redoubled.

Alex didn’t know what to do, if he was understanding it right, she had just realized her boyfriend, likely of some years, had set her up to claim her bounty. That was levels of fucked up Alex couldn’t even completely comprehend. He looked at Anise and considered his options. He didn't want to stop her from telling the story. Even if he wasn’t the right person, she looked like she needed someone to talk to.

Anise continued to cry, head in her hands, and Alex was beginning to feel awkward. It wasn’t the crying, Alex thought crying was great. He had done a fair amount of it himself over the last week, but that didn’t mean he wanted to sit there watching her let all the pent-up frustration out. It felt overly invasive, and Alex decided to see if he could find a kitchen.

Anise let him, not looking up from her desk as he made his way to the door. He opened it slowly, not knowing whether to let anyone see Anise in this state. Making his way through the hall, he found one of Anise’s uncles, a nice fatherly man named Jensen, who led him to the kitchen and taught him how to operate the magically powered stove. Alex wanted to marvel at the technology of the tutorial but didn’t have the time. He though back to when his friends had rotated checking on him after Haley dumped him. Dora and the other’s seemed pleasant enough, but Alex doubted the group was the best of friends. He couldn't be someone she’d known for decades, but he could be there now.

Taking the two cups of steaming water up the set of stairs was a minor test in patience, but Alex managed to make it back to the room without spilling anything. He thanked the six months he’d spent working at that Russian bistro for the training. Jensen had provided Anise’s favorite flavor along with some pastry snacks while Alex picked the first tea with raspberries in it. Opening the door with one hand while the other held the tray, Alex waked back into the office. Anise had stopped crying but still had her head down, at least until she smelled the pastries, which was almost immediately.

“Are those vanilla wafers?”

“Yea your uncle said you liked them, I got you some apple cinnamon tea as well. Whenever I cry my nose gets all stuffy and I end up sick, so I have to drink tea to fend it off, and honestly, it just makes me feel better.”

Anise smiled as she took a cookie, then another, and one more before drinking a sip of tea.

“I do not need to be eating my feelings right now, but this is so good.” She let out a little moan of pleasure at the tea, and it made Alex smile.

“Thanks, seriously. I guess I can forgive you for literally knocking my teeth out.” Alex almost choked on his tea and Anise laughed.

“So umm… right.” she said chewing and swallowing another cookie. “I left his place and went to a nearby bar. Drinking in uniform isn’t something I really do but at my level it’s not easy to get drunk, so I figured I deserve this. Oh, let me go back a little. Not sure if you know this but the main way to get drunk at the higher levels and tiers basically doesn’t involve alcohol at all. There’s a set of potions that scale up in potency and you pour them into whatever you’re drinking, they get right past your attribute points. It was originally made for poison from what I heard, but that’s not the most popular application. In theory, you could use water, or just the potion, but it tastes worse than alcohol, so few people do. Anyway, I was drinking the stuff that get you wasted from a shot at around level ten but barely buzzed after a bottle, at thirty. Except apparently, I wasn’t. I think the bartender or maybe their handler slipped me something for high E or low D grade. It gave me a debuff that lowered all my attributes by something like ninety percent.”

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“Shit,” Alex said as he thought back to his swing. “So that’s why I was able to… you know.”

“Knock me the fuck out? Yea that’s it, and we were lucky you did. The debuff would have lasted for another little while I think, and those guys were almost right behind me. Luckily it wears off after one hit, or I might’ve been fucked. I’m pretty sure they didn’t know how it worked exactly. I know I sounded sober when I spoke to them, but they still tried to attack.”

Alex considered her words and the story seemed to add up. It was clear she was a much higher level than one, and it explained how Alex had knocked her out when she’d beat the other men so easily.

“Happy. Well, not happy, but you know. Satisfied.”

Alex nodded and took a sip of tea.

Around a mouthful of cookies Anise added, “Good. Now you get to explain to me how a single person, lower than level five, managed to get all the way to the capital, let alone the worst part of town, alone and unharmed.” Unlike the spit take one might have expected, Alex just opened his mouth slightly, causing most of the warm liquid to splash over him.

Alex’s brain ground to a halt for a moment after he registered Anise’s words. He had read books like these before. Rule number one of finding yourself in on a foreign planet was to tell no one you weren’t from their world. That was a quick way to end up captured and experimented on. To solve this issue Alex had used the time Anise had spent talking to craft a semi-believable story, but he hadn’t expected her to be so openly suspicious. Then he remembered the analyze skill, she probably had it, maybe everyone in the town did. That didn’t mean she would know everything about him, but she’d likely seen enough level one’s for her analyze to ping with a general estimate.

“Look,” Anise began, “I don’t want to force you to reveal all your secrets. I just need to make sure helping you won't bring me more trouble than losing that year's salary. I’m not dragging my family into something worse than some lost coin.”

That was actually really reasonable, and Alex felt a bit more at ease about the situation. He still needed to lie, however. It wasn't only the potential of being captured, which he felt was a real possibility with the way she talked about the king, but the tutorial as a whole. Initially Alex thought the tutorial was some sort of area created by the system. It was the most reasonable way to describe the encounter with Anise, and the way people dressed, but now he doubted that was the case.

It was more likely this place existed, or at least some version of it. He didn’t know how the system worked, but it would probably be much more resource intensive to create places like these from scratch for everyone as dumb as him. If he was correct the system had probably copied this place from somewhere and changed it to fit the needs of his tutorial. If Alex told Anise that, not only would she not believe him, but she might also even report him, ending his tutorial before it really started.

Taking a deep breath Alex began, “My name is actually Alex, but I didn’t come here willingly. I was taken.”

He had learned that the best lies were mostly rooted in truth, so he told a modified story of what actually happened. He started with his recent break-up, hoping to gain a bit of sympathy in their shared pain. Explained how he did basically nothing for a week before his friends forced him to go out. After the group outing, he explained that he was so drunk he tried to go to his ex’s house but got knocked out on the way.

“I don’t know much of what happened next. I’m not sure how much time passed but they,” Alex shuttered, thinking of the dead bodies so he didn’t have to fake the emotion, “they did something to me, experimented on me maybe. At first, I couldn’t understand then I gained a skill, I know you’re not speaking my home language, but your words are fluent to me.” Alex now suspected Analyze was likely a universal skill, but his infinite inventory probably wasn’t so he added, “And they put something in my body, which changed how my storage works. I don’t know how long I was with them, but I was suddenly dropped off here, looking like the day I was taken.”

Anise was staring at him again, and Alex was really getting tired of looking into her eyes. His story was almost 100% true. He was out drinking, was looking to talk to his ex when he was suddenly taken. They weren’t speaking English, but he could understand her, and he definitely didn’t know what had been done to him, but he had these new skills. Finally, Anise began to nod, and Alex did everything he could to stay still.

“Your story checks out. My skill says you’re not lying, or at least you believe your story. It also explains your lack of knowledge though I’m surprised you told me about the storage. I didn’t see any storage devices on you, but all your items were gone. For a moment I figured you were some sort of dimensional mage, but with you being level one this makes more sense. Is it an implant? Sorry,” she shook her head, “you don't have to answer that. I am still curious about your low level, but I won’t pry. Ok then I need you to answer a question for me. Do you mean to, knowingly or unknowingly, bring the King or Kingdom harm in any way?”

Alex answered in the negative and she smiled.

“Good, I really didn’t want to harm you, but if those people who took you planned anything I would have had to stop it.”

Alex stared at her trying to parse the meaning behind those words, and it took a few seconds before the “knowingly or unknowingly” part jumped out at him. He didn’t know the extents of whatever skill Anise had, but he felt like he could have died right there if the system wanted him to kill the king. Alex thought back to the unique challenge mentioned in the tutorial’s description, by the way Anise talked about him maybe it did. Alex stopped the thoughts in case Anise asked him again. Though at the rate Alex was going, he didn’t very much care what the system wanted, he had only one goal.

“What are your plans and how do you think I can help you achieve them?”

Alex didn’t hesitate, there was no need to think about this answer. “I want to get strong enough to get back home.”