The library was surprisingly big. Ambling down the narrow aisles, I reached the end of the aisle and found a collection of desks, set up for study or personal reading. Going a little further, though, I discovered a nice quiet corner at the back. While the rest of the library had the odd student sitting at a desk either reading or stealthily sleeping, the back was pretty much deserted. As I glanced around, I saw someone who I recognized sitting on one of several beanbags.
”Yo.” I greeted Kawamoto while wondering why the hell student would go to the library at their first day of school.
She gently nodded and at the same time hiding her face behind the book.
“....”
“....”
Seemed like staring at each other without saying anything had become our greeting.
“So... what was going on back there?”
I said, deciding to break the silence.
“I-it’s t-t-the te-test.”
“Yes... I get it that was the test but then why is my wound healed?” I said. “Why am I still wearing my blazer? Why’s it still noon? What’s the deal with that Kamehameha?”
Maybe because there were too many questions that I asked, her eyes started spinning around. But to simplify it she only gave me a note.
”What’s this?” I raised my eyebrow.
“T-the s-s-second p-page.”
Second page of what? That was what I wanted to say but it seemed like it would be faster to just read this.
”Okay... so... do you mind if I sit here?”
She seemed to be very uncertain whether it was okay or not for me to sit, but finally, she nodded, just a little... right, I actually forgot how awkward it was talking to her.
”O-okay.”
I took a seat next to her and she hid herself behind her book... and here I thought we would at least have some kind of bond or at least the distance between us had been narrowed a little bit, but that didn’t seem to be the case.
Anyway... I opened her notebook. ”So there’s the second page.” I facepalming my face really hard...
from what I read from my her notebook, it seemed like there was a second page... No... A Second screen, maybe on the invitation screen, and she wrote it all on her note... damn girl, you were diligent... And how the hell I could notice if there was the second page... Not to mention all the information on second page seemed to be crucial.
To sum up her notes, we would have a test once for every month. Time and physical injury wouldn’t get crossed over after the test was over, but the mental fatigue, experience and et cetera would get crosses over. To sum it up, our body when we were doing our test wasn’t exactly our real body... but an artificial body made from Force that precisely copied our current appearance and belonging.
Next was about winner and loser, the winner would get several rewards after completing their test, some of the examples was: Experience points, the right to choose when and where your next test would be, the detailed information about your next test, or the right to skip one test.
As for the loser: You must join another test each week until you won. Seemed like there was no other penalty by failing the test.
“....”
Wait... so I got worked up for nothing? I meant, it wasn’t like I was going to die... it still hurt and annoying though.
You could be reading stolen content. Head to Royal Road for the genuine story.
The rest was basically about levelling up and the status description.
Hee... she really wrote everything in here huh.
I glanced at her in amazement and our eyes met when she also glanced at me from behind her book... hm... seemed like this happened a lot.
“Don't let me interrupt your reading. I'll... just check my status if you don’t mind.”
She nodded a little and sighed a sigh of relief before continuing reading her book.
But damn... she even made the plan on how opening and managing status screen without ever getting caught or being weird.
”Status open.”
From what she wrote, for one level a person would get 1 power and 2 skill points, 5 status points, and 10 (shield/force/stamina points and the regeneration to freely spent.)
Then I clicked on the power tab and it showed me three options, just like what she wrote on the book.
The first category would be power based on your stats and skills. Mine were: shooting, hunting, arrow construction, trap construction, food enhancement, and stalking.
The second one would be a general power, which meant every member of your species could use it, the list for humans was: Inventory, Appraise, Analyze, Map, Message, and Pet.
The third one would be random power, it completely random and would change every time you levelled up. In my case, my random powers this time was: Mist and Push.
This was pretty easy actually.
First of all, the most useful power would be Inventory. At least for me, this power had the most utility both on normal life or not so normal life.
About the other point, Map seemed useful. After all, knowing your target location was the major point to determine your hunting success or not, but... if I picked this I think I wouldn’t enjoy the thrill of hunting anymore... no, I just needed to turn it off, right?
Yeah, let’s picked Inventory and Map.
[Inventory Lvl 1 has been learned.]
[Map Lvl 1 has been learned.]
Next would be skill points, first of all, regarding skill. A Lvl 1 skill would mean one had trained on the said skill, level 2 meant that one was proficient, lvl 3 and lvl 4 was first class, lvl 5 and 6 meant expert, 7 and 8 meant master, 9 and 10 meant legendary... Or that was what she wrote.
And lvl 2 skill needed two skill point, three skill point for lvl 3 and so forth.
Anyway, picking Archery seemed so wrong, considering I did that for fun. So single-mindedly I rose cooking and common language to Lvl 2.
Status point might be a little bit tricky, but in the end, status point was just enhancing your initial body power.
The last 10 points were for increasing barrier, stamina, force and their regeneration.
After thinking for some amount of time, I decided to go with this strat.
[Level 2
Shield(regen per hour): 16(2)
Force(regen per hour): 13(2)
Stamina(regen per minutes): 18(2)
Might: 4
Defense: 4
Vitality: 4
Endurance: 3
Mobility: 4
Dexterity: 7 + 3
Perception: 5 + 5
Presence: 3 + 2
Special: 3
Restoration: 2
Dominance: 3
Resistance: 4
Status condition: None
Skills: Archery Lvl 2, Technology Lvl 1, Stealth Lvl 1, Cooking Lvl 2, Fishing Lvl 1, Common Language Lvl 2.
Powers: Inventory Lvl 1, Map Lvl 1.]
By the time I finished, the chime had already rung out to signify that it was five o’clock in the afternoon.
”Ah... Crap, I forget to see her at the archery club.”
Well, it wasn’t like I needed to see her today either... Hm?
I looked to my side and found Kawamoto still looking intently at the book she was reading while twiddling with her hair. From the looks of it, the book had been halfway finished, nevertheless. I cleared my throat to get her attention, but not startled her so that her concentration wouldn’t break.
”I guess I'd better be off. Are you going to go home or what? And where should I put this book?”
I said while spinning her notebook with my finger.
”....”
5 minutes later she was still ignoring me.
”....”
10 minutes later she was still ignoring me. Hey, somehow I was patient enough to wait for her huh.
”....”
15 minutes later she finally looked up at me, and for a second I could see that she was a little bit surprised by my presence.
”So... Thanks for the book,” I said as I handing it over to her.
”Y-yes.”
”Okay then.”
I felt like I should say something more to her, but it was hard to come up with anything.
In the end, without saying more word I took off and hurried out of the library.