The war mage cracked their knuckles. Kahli was more than a little impressed that they were able to perform such a feat of dexterity with all the living wood covering their hands in a hooklike fashion.
For a second Kahli felt a tinge of jealousy. Why did she have to have essentially all her living wood on her left foot? It was so frustrating. First of all, her walk was always a little lopsided because of how big her foot was, and that was just annoying. Second of all, people with living wood on their hands always looked cool. Kahli had flashbacks back to her schoolkid days.
There she was, standing in the playground surrounded by a vast expanse of muddy vines and dusty stones, dry heat and inexplicably humid downpours. There was the playset, it was a very cool playset, it was made entirely out of rocks and boulders and it mimicked the hull of a pirate ship. The Great Ship Galaxis, they'd called it. Ah, yes, if only Kahli could ride on that ship now, maybe she could escape this absolute heaping of a mess she'd found herself in.
But she really never was able to play on that playset. No, no, Kahli was relegated to watching other people play on it at a far distance, sometimes with a pair of binoculars stashed under a big rock and shared among all her friends. Why?
Because of the hand-havers.
This was a bit of a misnomer, as pretty much everyone with all of their normal tauman appendages had hands. But what hand-havers had that others didn't, was living wood on their hands.
Living wood on people's hands was described in a way that extended normal taumanity in a way more extreme than living wood in other places. On people's hands, living wood was smooth and porous, and it also allowed people what was often afforded to others as a seventh sense.
This was unattached, at least in a direct manner, from the systemic abilities some people were afforded. This was a new facet of tauman experience. It was like seeing a different color, a color that only people with living wood on their eyes could see, but that color, referred to as bildung, was not favored by many and often described as "a disappointment" by people who saw it, whereas the sense benefit people with living wood on their hands had was seen to be something truly special. Something with innate value and benefit. It was the sense of dlimger, the feeling of understanding in a physical manner the spacial orientation as it relates to the larger world. There were studies, tombs of knowledge written on this bizarre sense and the amazing benefits it afforded people. But the most interesting thing about the sense of dlimger, at least the most significant to Kahli, was the fact that dlimger made people really, really good at beating other people up.
Like, scary good.
Of course, it wasn't just the sense of dlimger. The entire structure of living wood around people's hands included all kinds of physical benefits and strengths, while affording other sacrifices.
But those hand-havers on the playground were merciless. Too many times they'd turned Kahli into a punching bag on her attempts to play on the playground. Only half of it was intentional, which made the whole ordeal even worse and more embarrassing to her.
Regardless, it was time for Kahli to put her frustration to use. She looked at the war mage and shuddered. She kept thinking the mage might suddenly walk up to her and demand her lunch money, or her lunch, or the large green pod she used to carry all of her worksheets in.
But everything was different now. Kahli was much older, and she had plaster on her face, and there was a whole sea between herself and the war mage.
And, she had a system. A system with a [skill].
Only, Kahli sensed a feeling at the end of her spine. Was she ready to level up again?
"WAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA-" squealed the war mage as they raised their woody talons.
"Wow, that's really loud," said Kahli with a smirk to Froufrou.
"AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA-"
Enjoying this book? Seek out the original to ensure the author gets credit.
Kahli decided she might as well try and level up, why not?
[Level up]
[Congratulations, you've reached level 16]
[You have 1 skill slot available, would you like to select a skill now?]
Kahli totally did. She was thrilled!
[Please select a skill:]
[Rock Summon] (increase)
[Lucky Foot]
[Seismic Sense]
Kahli groaned a little bit to see the [Lucky Foot] skill still available for her selection. However, she also noted something else. She noted a [skill] she hadn't seen, of course, that Kahli was very interested in - [Seismic Sense] - but she also additionally located an option to select her current skill - [Rock Summon] - and that there was an option to increase it. She wished Froufrou could talk, because it'd make it a lot easier for her to ask the thing how to use the system since she wasn't able to get any more tutorial time with her dad, the blue skeleton.
[Rock Summon] (increase)
[Increasing Rock Summon will allow you to summon two rocks at once instead of just one.]
[Seismic Sense]
[Seismic Sense allows you to note and sense patterns and movement with your large left foot. It allows, in a way, a sense of third sight through sense of motion. This sense is perpetual and extends to other dimensions than those normally perceived by taumans. Sometimes, this can include time, the fourth dimension, in which case you may actually be able to not only tell time with just your big left foot, but also to use it for divination and prediction.]
Kahli considered her options. She had a lot to think about. After all, it made a lot more offensive sense to just go ahead and increase [Rock Summon]. She could already see the ways in which summoning two rocks would be, in many ways, better than one. Two rocks would afford her the ability to constantly be firing rocks at the enemy. Plus, maybe she could even leverage both rocks somehow to kind of bounce off one another in a bit of a ping-pong fashion. Kahli could really see this working well. However, she really had to give pause to that new [skill] called [Seismic Sense].
Kahli really did like the sound of [Seismic Sense]. It had some alliteration going on, which was very, very cool. But, more than just that, it seemed like a very unique kind of [skill], even if it did focus much more on her big left foot than she would've ideally preferred.
[Skill Selected]
[Seismic Sense]
And so Kahli had it. The seismic sense. Or... Did she? She didn't feel any different. At least not yet.
[Froufrou is ready to level up]
[Would you like to level up Froufrou?]
Oh! Kahli hadn't considered that she'd be able to level up her [paired] creature, but it made a lot of sense when you got down to it. Them being [paired] meant they shared a system, so when she entered her leveling dialogue, it would just go ahead and check Froufrou's too.
Kahli decided that sure, why not, why shouldn't she level up Froufrou? Maybe she could get her a better [skill].
[Froufrou]
[Level 2]
[Froufrou does not have any skill slots available at this time]
Kahli sighed. Maybe next time, Froufrou.
And then time sped right back on up, and it was glorious, or at least terrifying.
Suddenly. Kahli could feel everything, and more. And all the sensation seemed to come from out of her big left foot, or at least all of the sensation that wasn't a standard bodily sensation that she would've already been able to feel with her standard, tauman body. But the living wood had done something to her.
Or, had Froufrou's system?
Maybe it was both.
Regardless, Kahli suddenly found herself in a sea of stimuli she hardly knew what to do with. Suddenly, she was overstimulated to the absolute maximum, and it felt like being ripped apart atom by atom,all of it centered around her wretched foot! This was her [skill]? This was a [skill]? It felt more like torture! It felt like agony! It felt like the true fire and brimstone of an encircling hell!
"AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA-"
"Wow, this guy is still yelling, huh, Froufrou?" Kahli asked the squelchy, sluglike creature covering her face.
Froufrou squelched.
"AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAR!" the mage finished. They then raised both of their filthy hand-haver hands into the air and black lightning shot down for the sky and struck both the mage's hands like they were dark lightning rods.
"Woah," said Kahli, genuinely impressed. "He spent all that time and energy just to yell 'CAR.' He must really be into horses and buggies, huh, Froufrou?"
Froufrou squelched.
"WAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA-"
"Oh dear," said Kahli. "Here he goes about the car again. Guess I better figure out how I'm going to fight him. Maybe I should've increased my [Rock Summon] skill. I hope I'll have enough to properly fight him."
"AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA-" The mage lowered their hands as they continued to scream at the top of their shredded vocal range. Then, they aimed their hands at Kahli, and their eyes started to glow a bright, milky white.
"AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAR!"
"The car man's trying to kill me!" yelled Kahli.
Then, she thought for a second. She'd beaten a mega dragon with her unleveled [Rock Summon] skill. Even though [Seismic Sense] seemed debilitating at the moment, Kahli was confident that she would and could beat this vile foe, regardless of their interest in four-wheeled manners of transportation. Kahli steadied herself and summoned up a rock. The fight was on!