There was no more pain, at least nothing physical.

Melmarc just stared. He wasn't reading the notifications or anything like that. He was merely staring. As if knowing it had lost his interest, the notifications disappeared.

After a while, he got up from his bed and stepped out of the room. The light switch was right next to the door, and he turned it off on his way out.

In the living room he ran into uncle Dorthna watching a movie. It was almost a given at this point. Now that he thought about it, his mom did it, and so did his dad. They slept very late or not at all.

With the memory of his mother’s attack fresh in his mind, he saw it in a whole new light. They weren’t staying up late to watch their favorite shows or anything like that. Even now, uncle Dorthna was watching the news, and he knew their uncle had already watched the one showing in the afternoon.

They’re standing guard, he realized.

It was so obvious he was slightly ashamed that he hadn’t figured it out sooner. A small sound drew his attention and he found uncle Dorthna looking at him.

“You’re up early,” Dorthna said.

Melmarc nodded. He didn’t say anything, just walked up to one of the couches and sat down. He stared at the screen but couldn’t muster up anything interest in it.

He had never been a news person.

On his couch, Dorthna was looking at him.

“Had a bad dream?”

Melmarc cocked a brow at his uncle. “I’m sixteen.”

“Take it from me, Mel. No one’s too old to have nightmares. Or too powerful.”

“But I’m sure there’s an age when kids stop running to their parents and uncles when they have nightmares.”

“True.” Dorthna looked thoughtful. “Their nightmares start happening in real life at that age so they start seeing a therapist.”

That was… oddly deep.

“Speaking of powers…”

Melmarc stared at the skills in front of him and they reappeared despite having disappeared. He had been worried that he’d be forced to walk around with them in his face at a point.

He looked at them but didn’t read them.

[Fist of Thunder]

The Gifted wraps their fist in electricity at a mana cost.

[Sword of Light]

The Gifted wraps their sword in light, giving it heat properties.

[You Are Not Alone]

The Gifted communes with animals of almost every kind.

[Rings of Saturn]

The Gifted wraps a ring of pure raw mana around their body and can attack with it.

“Let me guess,” Dorthna said, adjusting on the couch so that he sat upright rather slouched. “You just got offered a selection of skills to choose from.”

Melmarc looked up. “How did you know?”

Dorthna chuckled, then twirled a finger in a circular motion at him. “It’s written all over your face. You’ve got the look of someone who’s just been offered skills he doesn’t want.”

Melmarc looked down and away. He felt mildly ashamed. Here he was, with the one thing millions of people prayed to have, and he was being picky.

The appearance of the last skill made him feel like he had to choose it if he wanted certainty that his rank would not be low. He couldn’t picture a situation where getting that skill made him weak. What it was capable of was the complete opposite of weak.

“You know you can always wait it out if you don’t like what you have right now, right?”

Melmarc nodded. “I know.”

“Unless it’s an unranked. But seeing how casual you are about it, you don’t have a timer.”

“Wait, that’s what that was?” Melmarc scratched his head then picked up the remote that was beside his chair instead of beside the person watching the television.

It was another proof that the television and what was on it were unimportant to uncle Dorthna’s position of being awake.

How did we not notice?

Rather than dwell on it, he asked, “Did you know that Ark’s class was going to be unranked?”

Dorthna nodded. “The moment I heard he got a timer it was obvious. All the unranked got a timer. They didn’t really have a say in the matter. It’s pretty much like they can’t say no. It counts down until you choose or not.”

“What happens if you don’t choose?”

It was a curiosity he had the chance to satisfy, so why not.

“If you don’t choose by the end of the timer, one will be chosen for you at random,” Dorthna answered. “There’s at least one unranked I know of that had his first skill picked for him at random. He ended up with the Monk class. And a powerful one, too.”

I guess that’s the answer.

All the Delvers really did have their own network or such. Melmarc hadn’t seen this piece of information anywhere before. There was still nobody who knew what criteria were required to get an unranked Class.

Or was it true? What if it was a secret like this one?

“It’s not really a secret,” Dorthna said. “I can already see your mind working. It’s like a hydraulic press, pounding away at theories like you’ve just uncovered a secret and are looking for other ones. The timer thing is just not talked about, that’s all.”

Maybe. But if that was true, what else about the unranked classes was simply ‘not talked about.’

Many people had already figured out which skills could give what type of classes. Some online platforms even had tried and tested combinations required to get specific classes. Classes that used swords, or guns, or mana.

You obviously couldn’t determine what skills you were offered in the beginning, but with the list of skills and combinations floating around in the internet, you could be lucky enough to see something that you recognized.

And if the right supporting skill showed up… well, at least you had an idea of what your class could be by the time you were selecting it.

“What of skill combinations?” he asked.

“What about them?”

“Do we know any skill combination that could lead to an unranked Class?”

Dorthna looked up as he thought about it for a while, then asked, “What options did you get?”

Melmarc didn’t have to look at the skill list. “[Fist of Thunder], [Sword of Light], [You Are Not Alone], and [Rings of Saturn].”

“Hmm…” Dorthna frowned lightly. “The last one sounds familiar but I don’t know it. Fist of Thunder will most definitely lead you to a Strength class. [Sword of Light] could give you Paladin, maybe. All those holy-ish classes are just really powerful light bulbs in my opinion. But some churches like to treat them as holy classes… although they do have some form of justification for it…”

Dorthna trailed off in thought.

“What does [You Are Not Alone] do?”

This content has been unlawfully taken from Royal Road; report any instances of this story if found elsewhere.

“Let’s the Gifted commune with animals,” Melmarc read out.

“Huh. I thought it would be something telepathic. It is, but just with animals.” Dorthna shook his head. “You aren’t an animal person so personally, I wouldn’t advise it. It’s always best to stick to what you’re good at. What of that last one? Rings of Saturn.”

“About that.” Melmarc raised one of his legs and tucked it under him. “I have a question.”

“Shoot.”

“Do the notifications ever have glitches? Like, are there times when it kind of does something odd?”

“Glitches do happen. For example, you could get a quest—something Delvers get inside the portals—and it could change completely before you even start acting on it.”

“What of with skills? Does it change the skills offered just after its offered them? Like maybe it gave you the wrong skill and decided to correct it.”

Dorthna took another moment to think about this one.

“It has happened a few times,” he said finally. “Definitely enough times to be called a unique case, but only to people who are getting new skills when upgrading their current skills. But it’s usually due to things like mana contamination.”

So it’s not really a special case.

It brought relief, and a little bit of disappointment. On one hand, as scary as it had been, Melmarc had toyed with the idea of having experienced a situation that was unique only to him. Now he realized it was a boyish fantasy. But everyone liked the idea of being special.

Well, if it has happened to a few people, then maybe it won’t have bad effects.

“Ah, I see.” Dorthna looked down at Melmarc’s stomach and nodded. “You got mana contamination. So which one was it? Decontamination or Assimilation?”

“Assimilation,” Melmarc answered.

Dorthna made an impressed sound. “That’s actually more impressive than you know. Most people just decontaminate, expel it from their system.”

“Well, I think my body tried to remove it but couldn’t. I think assimilation was the easier option.”

“Thus, the new skill. [Rings of Saturn]. You still haven’t told me what it does.”

And he didn’t want to. But he had the knowledge of a retired Delver with him. It would be stupid not to use it to his heart’s content.

So he told him.

Dorthna winced. “Oof. Must’ve been tough seeing that.”

Nobody ever asked, but everyone always simply assumed that Dorthna knew the details of the Player from that night. His words now confirmed it.

“A little piece of unasked advice,” Dorthna said, leaning back on his couch and slouching a bit. He was trying to affect a casual stance. “If you are torn between your personal emotions towards the owner of the skill and the power of the skill, you don’t have to be.”

His uncle had read him like a book. It was exactly what bothered him. The skill was clearly powerful, but he didn’t want to use a skill that had almost killed his mother. He didn’t want to use a Player’s skill.

“The truth about skills is that all of them scale. So they aren’t always as powerful as you see.”

“How?”

“Well, every Delver’s skill is ranked, but not at the point of choosing. What happens is that they scale to the Gifted’s class rank. So you could have someone with Fist of Thunder with a rank D, and another with the same skill but ranked A. The few people that have gotten it call them contaminated skills.”

Melmarc felt a touch of relief. “So I shouldn’t be worried about it?”

“Nope. It’s just a skill like any other. That you’ve seen it do powerful things was because you saw it in the hands of a powerful person. Not because it is powerful.”

Melmarc almost felt the tension leave his entire body. He had been scared he was about to do something foolish because of childish worries.

He would’ve done it, though. He would have refused the skill simply because of his one experience with it. It would’ve been stupid but he would’ve done it.

Rejecting something that was obviously powerful simply because you didn’t like it wasn’t very smart. Especially when your goal was to be very powerful.

He mentally eliminated it from the list. It would still be there, but as far as he was concerned, he had only three skills to pick from.

“Ha,” Dorthna laughed. “You should see your face. You look like you just took a huge dump. Must’ve really been bothering you.”

Melmarc laughed, too. It had, a lot.

“So what now? I have three skills, and you’ve already said I shouldn’t pick the one with animals.”

“No.” Dorthna raised a cautionary finger. “I didn’t say not to choose it. I said, personally, I wouldn’t advise it. Don’t let anyone tell you what skill you should or shouldn’t choose. You can take a person’s advice but don’t let them tell you what to do.”

“Why not? You were a Delver before, clearly you’ll know more about skills than I would.”

“Yes, but I can’t know more about you than you would. I’m sure you’ve already gotten the pep-talk about how each skill is based on what you already know how to do. Even if it seems like something that doesn’t make sense, I assure you that it’s not a lie. They are all based off something your body can do.”

“But why shouldn’t I let someone show me the right skills. I mean I understand it, but, like, why?”

“Because if you become a Delver, then your skills will be your most important tools you carry into life and death situations so that other people don’t have to. And, in my opinion, should they fail you—because they will from time to time—then it’s a worse feeling of regret when you blame it on someone else. When a bad thing happens, it’s easier to accept it when you know that you’re the only one responsible for it.”

Dorthna looked at the television and his eyes grew distant. “You don’t want it to be because you let someone else make an important decision for you.”

That worried him a little.

“But I can still ask you questions about the skills I get offered if I wait, right?”

Dorthna smiled at him. “Of course you can. I’m always here to help.”

“Thanks.” That was another worry gone. “So I want to wait, see if I get new skills. What do you think?”

Dorthna shrugged. “If you wait, you’ll definitely get new skills. Skills are based on the Gifted’s experiences. So unless you’re a rock locked in an air tight container, you’ll definitely get new skills. But waiting and getting new skills means losing the ones you already have.”

Melmarc had heard that somewhere before. The notifications didn’t offer new skills, they replaced already existing ones.

“You’ve got four already, so that’s quite impressive,” Dorthna continued. “Most people get only two or three. More than three is rare. More than four is a wonder of the world. Since your contaminated skill replaced one of your natural skill instead of just being a part of the group, that should say you aren’t getting more than four at a time.”

Melmarc agreed. He really didn’t think he was going to get more than four.

“I’ll wait,” he decided. “Maybe I’ll get something I like.”

“Maybe. But don’t wait too long. I know most people think you can wait forever if you want, and you can, but any reasonable Gifted wouldn’t advise it. What we will advise is to try a lot of new and cool things while you’re waiting, it increases the chances of getting more interesting skills.”

“But why shouldn’t we wait too long? And how long is too long?”

“A week, two at the most. As for the reason, well, ever heard of Bob Slater?”

Melmarc shook his head.

“Exactly. He’s a Gifted who waited for three weeks. He started out with three offered skills, but at week three, he only had one offered skill. The worst part was that by week four it was the only skill he was offered. By two months the skill hadn’t changed no matter what he did.”

Melmarc winced. “That sounds terrible.”

“It was.” Dorthna folded his arms. “But it got worse, because when he finally picked the skill, he had only one offer for his sub-skill.”

“What class did he end up with?”

“Brewer of Coffee. B-rank.”

“Sooo… he makes really good coffee?”

“He makes the best coffee I’ve ever tasted. He’s a Barista in France.”

“So he found a way to be successful?”

“Oh, gods no.” Dorthna shook his head vehemently. “He’s just an employee in some coffee shop. It’s not as easy as people think to make a living off just any class.”

“But if he’s so good at making coffee, shouldn’t he be able to start a coffee business that makes really good coffee? With enough marketing and time, he should be able to get big. Why settle for simple coffee when you can get the best?”

“And that right there is the optimistic thinking of the soon to be gifted or the naïve thinking of the not Gifted.”

“I don’t understand.”

“Alright, let me help.” Dorthna leaned forward on his chair. “Let’s use good ol’ Bob as an example. You have to make almost perfect coffee every time. It’s magical so it’s not like there’s some unique recipe you’ve come up with. You just touch a cup and some coffee beans, and voila, magic. With me so far?”

Melmarc nodded.

“Good. So you open a coffee shop, and employ a few people. Remember now, there’s no recipe. You just touch things coffee-related, and magic happens. So it’s not something you can teach your employees. It’s not something you can teach anyone. So it fails, because in the end, it’s just like any other coffee shop unless you’re working the counter at all times.”

“And even if you are,” Melmarc mused, “How many cups of coffee could you make in a day. Can’t be enough to make the money to make you big.”

“Exactly. So it’s not worth the money required to start. And if you end up working for someone. They’ll know how good your coffee is, and they’ll know that putting you at the counter ensures that there’ll always be good coffee for at least one of their customers at every point in time.”

“Which means you’ll be a front line worker forever.”

“Your pay may go up, you might even get a supervisory role, but you will always be at the counter making coffee. Because that is the one reason you were employed for.”

“Sounds bleak.”

Dorthna nodded. “It is. So here’s some advice. Don’t wait too long. Also, you can never go wrong with World skills. They are almost always unranked, almost always powerful, and they don’t scale to the Gifted’s class. You can be a C-rank Gifted with a World skill that works on par with the World skill of an S-rank. The only strain about it is that you really, really have to keep on understanding it.”

“So I shouldn’t hesitate to go for an intelligence type if I get offered a world skill.”

Dorthna paused. “What do you mean?”

“Well, World skills are rare.”

“Correct.”

“And most of them usually end up giving you the Mage class.”

“Wrong.” Dorthna ran his hand down his face in exasperation. “Who keeps giving the general public these convoluted pieces of information? World skills aren’t intelligence based skills, and they don’t mostly lead to the Mage class.”

“But—”

“There are what, five known Mages in the world? Do people think there are only like fifteen World skills? And because the Mage class is secretive and we know two Mages have World skills that all Mages have World skills?”

That was news to Melmarc. “So all the Mages don’t have World skills?”

“No, they actually do. But that’s not the point I’m making.”

“Oh.”

“My point is that World skills aren’t intelligence based. There’s a guy in Vietnam that’s got the World skill [Sword of The World]. He’s got the Samurai class. There’s a Delver in Nigeria with the [Death of The World] skill and he’s got the Reaper class. Samurai is an Agility type and so is Reaper. And there are at least eleven World skills we know of out there.”

“So… they are not intelligence based.”

“No. World skills are a bit like support skills. They do tend to nudge a Gifted in a direction, but ultimately, it’s not intelligence based. It would just nudge you in any direction.”

“So if I get offered a World skill.”

“Take it. Unless you are offered two, which has happened to nobody. Ever.”

Melmarc nodded, and they lulled into an awkward silence.

Well, it felt like an awkward silence for him. Uncle Dorthna didn’t seem to mind it.

He felt like he’d just been scolded for believing that World skills were intelligence based. He knew his uncle hadn’t been scolding him, but he felt like he’d been scolded all the same.

Not really ready to go back to bed, he sat in the living room with uncle Dorthna and stared at the television. None of them were really watching the news.

He had to make new plans now.

The school trip was in a few days, and he needed to do more things, new things, so that the skills he’ll be offered would be better than the ones in front of him.

I’ve really got to figure something out.