Part 3 - Skill Leveling and Classes!
With her skills locked in for the time being, Liz made the effort to try and forcibly expand her senses while closing her eyes.
She could distantly hear movement elsewhere in the building, or church as it would seem, and she hoped the faint smells she could catch were something she might partake in eating.
Next, she took a deep breath and maintained that feeling of what she hoped would qualify as [Awareness] while composing her thoughts into a prayer.
Seira, it’s Liz. I’d be dust in the cosmos if not for you, so I plan to wholeheartedly dedicate myself to repaying your generosity. I know you spoke of a divine mission you had planned for me, and I fully intend on completing whatever you assign to me, but I hope my feelings reach you as well. I fully intend to make sure our relationship is equitable in the end. I don’t want to feel indebted to you, and the best way for me to convey my wishes to you is to ensure no ulterior motives can exist between us. As such, I know I must get stronger. I’ll weather this storm and rise to be at your side someday. I’ll find a way.
She tied the message off with a mental bow and post-marked it with eight points of mana, keeping with the metric of this world and the limits of her currently replenishing mana pool. She really needed to decide how to invest her free stats before she advanced her class to the next choice.
Liz, I love the choice of nickname. The divine mission isn’t something you can help with now, but it will be a huge relief if you can get there. I hope my gift has been assisting you with settling in so far. Don’t lose the cards when you can finally use them. They’re storing all of your excess mana over time when you’re maxed out and they’re helping with the translation adjustments, just as a treat from me. They’re locked until you have the right skills, you’ll know when you see the class choice one day! By then, they’ll have a lot of saved up mana! I look forward to where you’re going in life. It’s a shame you plan to be my equal someday, you seem like you’d make a great angel. Best of luck, and keep in mind that appearance skills can evolve into other skills, so don’t write them all off just because you’re satisfied with how you are now. I have to go, talk more soon!
Liz felt a small shiver through her spine at the gentle voice in her mind.
She had someone watching over her, which meant she would have to stay strong. She then mentally adjusted [Prayer] to offer a passive eight points of her regeneration to the goddess.
[*ding* [Awareness] has leveled up! Level 2]
She turned her head towards the doorway and smiled as she heard someone approaching her room, which sounded like it was the last one along the hallway of an upper floor.
The elderly priest entered after a few footsteps, and she took the chance to use [Identify] on him. Which didn’t activate until he’d come close enough to lower a tray of food onto her lap. The range said it would grow with levels, and half a meter was quite close.
[Priest - 306]
[*ding* [Identify] leveled up! Level 2]
She couldn’t tell without a frame of reference, but this older man seemed fairly high level.
“Ah, you took Identify, did you? I can tell when people are looking just above my head at my level.” He preempted her question with a full explanation right away.
“Y-yes, I did. I’ve chosen my first batch of skills, though Seira still recommended an appearance skill.”
“You truly are gifted if you have such an easy time speaking with her even at your low level!” The fanatical look in his eyes returned. “Now, I believe I never got your name earlier.”
“It’s Liz. Sorry, I got in the habit of not sharing my name with people back home. I was just a little well-known. It would cause problems.” She gave the man a faint smile, hiding her slight discomfort over the subject.
“I am Sylvestre, [Head Priest] at this temple. Were you the daughter of a world leader or something? Impressive to be so well known as to have that problem at your age.”
“I was like… a stage performer, I suppose. And in my world, we had methods of sharing performances with anyone anywhere at any time. So even if someone didn’t see me themselves, they might’ve heard the name from someone who did. That method of communication is why our society became so advanced in recent decades. Two people working on similar things could pass ideas back and forth.”
“That sounds marvelous. In this world, people only pass along information through [Courier] services. If you could afford to send a letter around the world, it would still take years. Most people only know folks in the next town over.” Sylvestre offered her yet another nugget about the limited advancements of this world, despite the System.
“The system here seems so advanced and powerful to me, I find it odd that things haven’t developed faster here. You said the year was 18,973 and yet, things are so limited.”
The man sat down in a chair after setting her up with her meal.
“My dear, matters between nations in this world involve those with the power to erase a city in moments. We experience periods of extreme upheaval so dire as to reset civilization regularly. The more stable society is, the easier it is for people to gain levels in classes that can cause problems, since fewer people are busy working as [Farmers]. It is the realm of Xaoc, the god of chaos, and our nation strives for peace and stability, even as that stability brings an era of further chaos. All things in balance, in an eternal cycle. Order is a goal, but also a force in equilibrium with its antithesis.”
“I understand. That’s a bit like my own world. They would often go into cycles of war and peace, each nation building up for the next big conflict. Humanity is the same no matter where they come from, I guess. My interest in Seira is largely personal, but I still plan to follow her purpose with passion.”
“Lady Seira offers her followers a goal in life to pursue. They are called [Tenets], and each devout of hers is given a singular one to fixate upon. I shall be most curious to see which [Tenet] you will be given. Now, I do find it interesting to hear of elvenoids in other worlds. Perhaps you could tell me more?”
“Elvenoids?” The term caught her completely off guard, distracting her from the subject of Seira’s [Tenets].
“Yes, the elves are the gods’ most perfect creation, and we are all considered lesser by comparison, therefore: elvenoids.”
“Huh…” she frowned slightly as she suddenly had to check herself. New world, new vocabulary, translator or no. She mad e a mental note to avoid using the term ‘humanoid’, though she was dead curious if her translation trick would fix the misstep for her. She wouldn’t risk it.
They settled into a lighter conversation about Earth and her version of modern society as she continued to hone her [Awareness], [Learning], [Imaginative] and [Prayer] skills.
Eventually, it grew dark outside and Sylvestre excused himself to take her emptied dishes back down to the lower level. She took the opportunity to level [Identify] as [Healers] and other temple staff filed in and out to check on her before the temple’s rigid curfew, which seemed like it was just a few hours after their evening mealtime. If she had to guess, it was around what she’d consider nine in the evening.
The world was a mess, according to Sylvestre’s comments. The last Immortal War was over a thousand years ago, and the mortal countries were fraught with corruption. Immortal nations were supposedly in an arms race as well, and she couldn’t help but feel like she’d been brought to a particularly dangerous era.
The Immortal Wars topic left her somewhat terrified, and she had mixed thoughts about the subject. To her new understanding, the gods had created a system to print out new deities with regular frequency, and considered elves to be their best creation, as a race that naturally lived forever with high aptitude for all manner of skills. She figured there must be a reason the five main gods needed more deities, but Sylvestre didn’t have the details. Still, a possibility for a war among people who could cross continents in seconds and erase countries in minutes or less did not sound like a fun time.
Seira hadn’t seemed too worried, or perhaps she had simply come to terms with the cycles of order and chaos in the world long ago.
Still, it was not a comforting thought for her to know that any time some overly powerful maniac with a grudge might just end the whole city she was in at the drop of a hat. She shivered at the thought of being ended before she could even have a chance to achieve her goals.
She needed power as fast as possible, so she could carry out her mission as planned.
She focused her attention back on her [Awareness] training, stretching her senses out to the world around her, trying to comprehend what might be out there beyond the confines of the temple.
~ ~ ~
Two full weeks.
Two damn weeks of working with Sylvestre to boost her skill levels without telling anyone which skills she’d taken. She was going to play it safe and embody the way this world worked. Clearly, it was dangerous to tell others what your abilities were, and it became common practice to hide the details for a reason. She could think of a few ways it could be problematic, so she healthily kept her mouth shut. She invented her own stories and told Sylvestre about them under the guise of retelling Earth stories to boost her [Imaginative] levels. Then she informed him of the game of chess to work on her [Adaptable] skill.
[Awareness] ended up being the slowpoke in the end. Skills leveled better off from new and unique uses or under stressful situations. The alternative was to be involved with important people. She had no chance of meeting anyone truly important to the system in this spare room, so she had to do things the long and slow way.
[Identify] ended up being the easiest. Just using it on a half dozen fairly high level people was more than enough to cap it.
Once all her skills were finally capped, in spite of horrible inefficiency with one of her hopefuls to merge, she finally felt ready to tackle the next two steps: her free stat allocations and her new class choice.
Stats:
[Free Stats: 30]
[Strength: 15]
[Dexterity: 17]
[Vitality: 27]
[Speed: 13]
[Mana: 4]
[Mana Regeneration: 6]
[Magic Power: 4]
[Magic Control: 12]
It seemed right to even her stats out as best she could, and the fortunate part of her circumstances was that she’d built up decent baselines as an adult, rather than approaching things as an eight year old like children of Pallos did. Glass half empty perspective, however, meant she’d lost thirteen years of skill and level boosting.
Second silver lining, the church viewed her as a special person of interest because of her background, and wouldn’t try to restrict her choices. Apparently most families would dictate exactly what their child took and what they would grow up to be. She was lucky on both fronts, because if she’d been born into this world, the families here wouldn’t have given her a chance to become a [Priestess], as they didn’t often wish to give away a possible source of family income to the church. Most members of the clergy would be orphans raised by the church staff themselves.
This story has been stolen from Royal Road. If you read it on Amazon, please report it
Her only hesitation about spending her free stats sooner was the off chance they might level off from her newfound usage of the magic stats. Her current totals in those statistics were from the baseline ability value of one, and three points she’d ignored the notifications for when she arrived. Apparently, a grand total of three humans had achieved feats worthy of recognition by the system which thereby offered her a benefit purely by sharing a race with them. Half sharing a race with them, at least.
According to Sylvestre, many other races were more fortunate, like elves who often saw the years go by to achieve divinity and ascend to the realm of gods.
Must be nice to be an elf.
She decided rounding out her stats was smart. She’d gotten nowhere trying to raise her strength by moving her body so far, and she was ready for the wait to end.
Regardless, she began assigning her free stats to prepare for the class-up process, giving her an edge in the available options.
Stats:
[Free Stats: 0]
[Strength: 15]
[Dexterity: 17]
[Vitality: 27]
[Speed: 13]
[Mana: 14]
[Mana Regeneration: 14]
[Magic Power: 13]
[Magic Control: 13]
With her investments, she finally was ready. She called for Sylvestre to inform him she was ready, and with a [Nun] of the church standing guard outside, she took a deep breath. Frankly, a lot could happen to you while classing up, but she had no choice but to trust her unconscious body to the church, after all, she’d been sleeping here for weeks anyway. The only difference was, now she wouldn’t be able to wake up until she finished making her choice.
Enough dawdling, it was time.
Begin class-up of [Child of Earth] - Wood?
[ Y / N ]
Her first impression of the manifestation of her soul was utter chaos. She heard this place was a reflection of your inner self, but she hadn’t expected such a nightmarish scene.
The room resembled a tent made up of deep violet, extremely heavy fabrics. The problem was the floors and gaps between the folds of the fabric.
The floor looked like it was a writhing mass of flesh beneath her completely non-stone feet, only barely separated from her like she was standing on a pane of glass. The tent itself looked like a mishmash of teeth were in the process of chewing through it.
She shuddered as she realized that it reflected the torturous things that had eaten away at her mind in the void.
Finally, Liz turned her attention to the table in the center of the tent. There, she could see a woman that could’ve been her mirror reflection, except she was dressed in jeans and a leather jacket. She even had the same blonde tips she’d had dyed before her mishap. This must’ve been the manifestation that was intended to help her choose her class. How she missed the jeans and leather jacket she’d worn so often on Earth. She felt the tunics and clerical robes of the church might just be a crime against fashion.
Problem was, the other version of herself looked pissed off more than Liz had ever felt in her entire life.
“You’ve finally arrived.”
“Uh, yeah, sorry?” Liz frowned at the open hostility.
“I’ve got a bone to pick with you! What the hell are you being so dense about? Thought your first skill choice was some magic cure-all or something? You thoughtless idiot.”
“Yeah, I need you to explain.”
The other her got up from her seat at the table and rounded on her like a maelstrom.
She immediately began to painfully jab her finger into Liz’s chest repeatedly.
“Think! You dumbass, when were you ever the sort of person to get hooked on a pretty face and forget yourself in such a crazy manner? Think back. What did you do with all that trauma when you first got to Pallos?”
“I had all that creepy writhing stuff on my mind again suddenly, so I prayed for something to alleviate it, and got the [Mental Partitioning] skill to split off those memories into a separate part of my brain, to clear my head.” Her voice was soft and contemplative. “What went wrong when I did that?”
The other her let out a huff of frustration. “You locked out about three-quarters of your whole personality in the process. You’ve had a one track mind and clung to the only crap you had in your head that felt safe the whole time. I can’t believe you didn’t notice all your distress at being in a new world, and your unusual enthusiasm was swallowing up your entire personality for that long. Look at this place. You need to take things slow and process it all properly, or hope you evolve [Mental Partitioning] into a selective memory skill.”
Liz was shocked. She thought about it, then thought some more. She hadn’t had any dreams for the whole two weeks. She hadn’t been in the mood to draw her ideas, either. She didn’t even miss doing her own fortune readings. She’d been relaying things to Sylvestre, but none of her hobbies were showing through her recent life. She’d been oblivious.
“No, I wasn’t oblivious to it… I was intentionally avoiding anything that might trigger an emotional breakdown. Ugh, how do I start to fix this?” She gestured to the tent, then the floor below them.
“You have a single class choice. Anything else is going to be a waste of time. One road to recovery.”
The spirit version of her returned to the seat on the other side of the table and spread her hands over what seemed to be a crystal ball that appeared from nowhere. She took the seat opposite her other self.
“This is your future. Not one I shall read for you, but one you shall make into reality. This world, while powerful, cannot glimpse the future. It can only grant you the power to make the future you seek a reality.”
The crystal ball on the table glowed faintly with visions of her walking with the stone parts of her body moving like normal skin, only ashen in color. It showed her manipulating stone and walking up rocky walls and cliffs. It even showed her coating herself in stone to protect herself from a dagger in a dark alley.
This was totally unexpected. It almost felt like a joke class.
A gift from Seira to a hopeful young new [Priestess].
[Rehabilitation Patient of Seira]
The class promised to be a true test of her ability to overcome hurdles. Learning to move again, learning to cope with her fractured mind, and getting herself to the point where she could survive this world she was in.
She could see why it was the only option. It was her only chance at recovering without spending years of her life suffering in frustration.
Most of all, it was a damn Blue Class.
Different classes had tiers by color, and Blue was unusually high on that list of scalings. Low tiers were in the white to red spectrum. Those then advanced from orange towards yellow and then to green. Most mortals would dream of getting a Green Class. She’d basically found a loophole and been offered a rare Blue Class because of her connection to Seira. Most divine class options were blue, as far as she’d heard. From there, the class qualities darkened to purple and eventually to black. Black being the most potent class quality came with such rarity that almost nobody was ever offered it without immensely daunting circumstances.
“Blue, is it? How the hell did we ever qualify for this, Gypsy?” She tested out her new nickname for her alter ego as she marveled at the luck she’d hit.
“You already know most divine options are blue, and this is the weakest tier of divine class. Sure it’s still lucky, but at the same time, your main class will never be anything better than blue either. Also, we’re twenty-one, when most children unlock at eight. Seira has you on the rails from here on out. It’s not a bad deal, given we get to live because of it, but you’ll spend our whole lives as a pawn on the chessboard unless you make your position matter. This is the opportunity. If you die in an Immortal War, it’ll be a hell of a waste. Make. This. Count.” Gypsy gave her a hard stare.
Liz could really feel the weight of things now. She needed to sort out her mental issues quickly.
“Guess it’s time to take the dive. I’ll fix things up for you by the next time I come back, I promise.” Liz placed her hand on the crystal ball and willed it to become a part of her, watching the fleeting ghost of Earth flicker out of her hand into the ball as her old class faded in a sort of final goodbye to her old life.
~ ~ ~
When Liz awoke, she heard a ton of commotion coming from outside her room.
She kept her eyes closed, then let the notifications play out before her.
[*ding* Congratulations! You’ve upgraded your first class - [Rehabilitation Patient of Seira] - Earth]
[*ding* Warning! The chosen class will apply forced skill(s) required by your goddess to maintain your faith. Required skills are core to the class, and therefore cannot be replaced.]
[*ding* Congratulations! Your class has leveled up. [Rehabilitation Patient of Seira] Level 8 has increased to Level 32. +20 Strength, +50 Dexterity, +30 Vitality, +50 Speed, +45 Mana, +45 Mana Regeneration, +40 Magic Power, +40 Magic Control from your class, +1 Free Stat for being partially human, +2 Vitality for being partially stone golem, +1 Vitality from your element per level]
Great news! She went from level cap to level cap.
Bad news? Skill grinding. Again.
Also, holy stats! Though something about the stat balance seemed horribly out of alignment. She had a small sense of dread creeping over her.
[*ding* You have gained the skill [Earth Authority] due to your race [Stone Golem]! This skill may not be replaced.]
[*ding* You have gained the skill [Earth Conjuration]!]
[*ding* You have gained the skill [Earth Manipulation]! This skill may not be replaced.]
[*ding* For attaining level 20, your skills have been merged and become a class skill! [Pain Management] and [Adaptable] have become the class skill [Tenacity of Stone]. This skill has been set to the original preferences of [Pain Management]. -3010 Mana Regeneration]
She mentally blanched at the mana cost, then ran the numbers in her head. She had plenty of mana to spare now. She sighed in relief, then decided to splurge and see what the costs were to negate all of her current pain with the new skill. Currently, she could operate pain free at a cost of -3450 Mana Regeneration.
Fair trade. She kept the change. A completely painless full body was still well out of reach, but she could see a chance for it in the future.
[*ding* Warning! The Divine Skill [Seira’s Tenet of Equivalent Exchange] will be forcibly placed in Class Skill Slot 1. This skill cannot be replaced. [Prayer] has been removed from General Skills.]
[Seira’s Tenet of Equivalent Exchange: You have been saved by the Goddess of Order and expressed interest in not owing her a debt of gratitude. This skill acts as a balancing force between you and the goddess in your partnership. What is given must be reciprocated in kind. Variable mana cost until debt is repaid.]
Liz noticed the commotion outside the room was growing in intensity, but decided she would ignore it until she was done reviewing her current status.
First thing, she tried flexing her new skills. She needed an idea of the mana costs of using her new [Earth Manipulation] skill.
By flex, she meant it literally. She first tried to move her toes on her prosthetic foot. They moved a little, but hardly in a natural manner. She’d need a lot of practice, but for now, she might be capable of getting out of bed. The skill activation was fairly intuitive, and she approved of the new ‘muscle.’
Next step, she tested her new strength, raising her hand very slowly, she moderated the speed with the utmost care. As expected, her movements were drastically different. If she’d put as much effort into lifting her hand as she’d been using before the class change, she’d have flailed right into the wall with a stone hand like a bludgeon. The stone of her prosthetics seemed to be incredibly dense, and she had to imagine concrete in her old world couldn’t compare to them at all.
Slowly, carefully, she used her [Earth Manipulation] to move each finger in sequence. Index, middle, ring and pinky, each balled up into a fist. As a bonus, she had control of them without the connected reactions of each finger adjacent to the one she was moving.
[*ding* [Earth Manipulation] leveled up! Level 1-> 5!]
The leveling rate on this one was miraculous. Something about the fine control of something necessary to live her life properly must’ve tickled the system in just the right way to pay out the experience bonus points!
There was just one side effect problem. She’d still have to rework how she used her body. Instead of moving around purely by her original instincts, she’d have to wire her brain to supply [Earth Manipulation] in place of her muscle memory and train it over from scratch. She shuddered at the thought of relearning how to dance now.
Mana cost was a harsh -540 Mana Regeneration, which hurt her old sensibilities, but in reality she could afford it now.
Lifeline established, as well as short term goals, she glanced over the skill descriptions.
[Earth Authority: You’re partially made of stone. It is part of your everyday life and livelihood in a deeper way than anyone else alive. Efficiency skill. Increased mana efficiency for Earth skills per level.]
[Earth Conjuration: Create earth from mana. Increased effectiveness per level, Warning, only conjures material. Requires [Earth Manipulation] to control conjured material.]
[Earth Manipulation: You’re partially made from stone. This skill allows you to control the stone within you. Due to your nature, the load of this skill is only able to affect earth within or very close to you. The burden of self control has a high cost.]
[Tenacity of Stone: Defensive adaptation skill. Wield the power of the earth and stone and draw on its power to protect yourself from pain and physical harm all the same. Reinforce your body with stone, and negate the pain with a thought.]
She was happy with things for the most part, but the Divine Skill seemed like a personal touch from the goddess above and beyond the literal divine class she’d been offered. She was happy with the favoritism she felt from the idea, but then wondered how heavy a burden she’d be asked to bear in exchange for the special treatment. Her [Tenet] skill seemed to imply something more when she overcame the debt it mentioned as well.
These were not kind times for the world and nation she’d been brought into. She needed to knuckle down and make every effort to prepare herself for the future.
Bracing herself, she considered what she was about to do. She grit her teeth and then mentally released the [Mental Partitioning] she’d left in place for the past two weeks of her new life.
This would not be fun, but it would be necessary.
[Name: Elizabeth Fereday]
[Race: Stone Golem/Human Hybrid]
[Age: 21]
[Mana: 10,940/10,940]
[Mana Regeneration: 3,441]
Stats
[Free Stats: 24]
[Strength: 345]
[Dexterity: 1,157]
[Vitality: 819]
[Speed: 1,213]
[Mana: 1,094]
[Mana Regeneration: 1,094]
[Magic Power: 853]
[Magic Control: 853]
Classes:
[Rehabilitation Patient of Seira] - Earth - Lvl 32
[:Seira’s Tenet of Equivalent Exchange 1]
[:Earth Authority 1]
[:Earth Conjuration 1]
[:Earth Manipulation 1]
[:Tenacity of Stone 32]
[: ]
[: ]
[: ]
[Class 2] - Locked
[Class 3] - Locked
General Skills
[:Mental Partitioning 28]
[: ]
[:Identify 12]
[:Awareness 8]
[: ]
[:Learning 20]
[: ]
[:Imaginative 15]