Mike adjusted his seat and tried to get a little more comfortable as he swapped tabs to return to his game, his characters skills had steadily gone up due to all the combats he had put it through, there were numerous skills all with levels that went from 1 to 100 with a steady increase upon their difficulty.

He had always liked these types of games, the grind could be boring at times dependent on which game he played but there was such a satisfaction in seeing those little numbers go up and knowing for certain that there had been an improvement on his part, he so wished a thing like that could exist on earth, such magical things that proved and reinforced one to keep trying and to get better.

But life wasn't so easy, it required constant practice and progress wasn't visible, hell one couldn't even be sure they were making progress irl if they didn't invest an absurd amount of their time onto a single activity, be it learning instruments, trying to exercise, or lose weight, all such things didn't show such immediate results.

Mike had always been a bit of a perfectionist if he didn't show an improvement he would almost immediately end up giving up in whatever activity he attempted.

Mike: if I could see a definitive progress, if I could know for sure I was getting better at something? Man, I would never give up on it.

Another one of his little ramblings to himself, a desire of his, but not even he was sure if what he said would be true, would he really be motivated to keep going if he could see progress, would he keep training forever to be the best just because he had finally a metric for it? No one would ever know.

That is, until some hand tapped his shoulder.

His head turned and so did his chair as he faced away from his screen, he was greeted by a hairy face, a thick yet short beard surrounded the whole face with a squashed nose and a pair of eyes that appeared quite sunk into the skull duo to how prominent the eyebrows and forehead were.

Enjoying this book? Seek out the original to ensure the author gets credit.

He looked up and down in a flash as he tried to make sense of the thing behind him, it looked like someone had spent hours putting make up on in their best attempt to appear as an ape, only to throw away the illusion by putting on a well ironed perfect fit business suit and matching pants.

"Oh wouldn't you Mike?" The thing said in an otherwise normal voice.

"You people keep making stupid promises trying to barter with me like I'm so fucking trader going back and forth in a wagon" it said pointing a hairy finger in the air and gesturing it in a circle over his head.

'I've had it with your people's shit requests! If you want them so bad you can have them, all the skills you wanted Mike, are all at your disposal" it said in a slight annoyed undertone.

"And don't come complaining later, it was already a pain in the ass trying to decide how set them up and make sense out of you people's dumb requests, don't looked a gifted horse in the mouth, isn't that what you people say? Be grateful I gave you all a chance instead of a meteor, this won't be free of course but In due time you will all pay for pestering me, have fun!"

Mike had just sat and heard the thing till this point, for the last few bits it's voice had returned to a normal undertone, a kind tone even, and that had made Mike scared, really scared, he opened his mouth but not even his chest moved, he couldn't as much as make sound as the thing started talking again.

"You can ask questions to the guide, but they won't be free, knowledge can be power my boy and if you want it? Well you will have to earn it!"

The figures face had shrunk unevenly and so had its body until the moment it vanished, in its place all that ws left was a pile of its clothes and a dot of light floating above them.

It quickly went forward and dug into mike's chest making a list start to materialise within mike's mind.

Skills:

Strength-1

Dexterity-1

Toughness-1

Perception-1

Unarmed combat-1

Blunt weapons-1

Bladed weapons-1

Ranged combat-1

Stealth-1

Medic-1

Smithing-1

Crafting-1

Mining-1

Cooking-1

Farming-1

Scavenging-1

The words ran through his eyes in a flash,yet they all remained ingrained in his mind for the few seconds before he drifted off and went unconscious, sliding out of his chair and landing on the floor like a bag of potatoes, his head pressed against the hard and itchy carpet floor of his apartment, he would be sore tomorrow from falling asleep in such a bad position