Glade groaned internally as he stared at the prompt. His first quest. Kedryn had talked incessantly about the importance of quests and had pointed out more times than he could count how they were the staple of any gamer’s progress.
Frustration swelled as Glade reread the notification. He wasn’t upset that he had received a quest or that he was supposed to take Riya to the surface. He had already accepted the elf as his responsibility until they could find somewhere safe to leave her.
No, what really upset him was that Kedryn had been right that quests did indeed exist. Which meant Glade would have to buckle down and learn about topics like experience, quest progression, and everything else the Kid had recommended.
He would rather breach doors with Musketeer.
With a sigh, Glade selected yes and moved on.
Riya paused her discussion with Kedryn long enough to glance his way with a troubled look. The moment was there and gone in a flash, Glade missing the momentary glance as he read the first notification after he was placed in the Magma Beetle’s cavern.
You have defeated a level 3 Magma Beetle and have been awarded 35 experience points (175 XP x .20 penalty).
Note: Using a forbidden weapon to gain experience causes the user to suffer an 80% reduction in both experience gains and skill growth.
During their long trek, Kedryn reiterated time and again the importance of earning experience points to advance in power. From what he remembered, the intangible resource was the key to leveling and growth and could be earned through combat or completing quests.
It was easy to see which was more profitable. The quest had far more earning potential. Not that he really cared about the XP. They were alive. That was good enough for him.
What truly concerned Glade was how this system of evolution had influenced the wider world. Finite resources were always controlled by those with power. What happened when XP was the finite resource and the only way you could accrue it was through the suffering of others or quests?
He shuddered at the implications.
Glade quickly ran through the remainder of his prompts from the short battle. In total, they had killed a total of 14 beetles, including the level 9 monstrosity, bringing in a total of 870 experience points.
They had been extremely lucky. If he hadn’t kept his firearms and the grenade, the beetles would have ripped them to shreds.
Congratulations! You have learned the skill Small Blades! The tools of rogues, assassins, and hunters, this skill encompasses the use of any sharpened or bladed implement under 18 inches in length. -1% stamina burn when using small blades. +1% accuracy and damage dealt.
Of all the skills he had gained since his arrival, this one made the most sense. Glade intuitively knew he had gained the skill after killing one of the beetles with his combat knife. The other skills listed on his status screen didn’t provide much in the way of an explanation, nor did he understand how to use them. But a skill in knife handling? No weird incantations or mind exercises for that one.
You have been infused with Celestial Light. Negatively aligned debuff’s are dispelled. You have been refreshed and have regained 36 stamina (1 pt per skill level per second). You have been healed for a total of 73 hit points (2 pts per skill level per second).
Glade whistled in appreciation. Of everything he had seen thus far, Riya’s ability to heal was the most incredible. He watched as the young elf interacted with Kedryn. The blue light, mixed with the Kid’s flickering fire, gave the girl an almost ethereal quality.
She seemed to be holding up well enough given their circumstances. Glade had gone through years of intensive training so he could handle highly stressful situations, and he was barely keeping himself together. If he was having a hard time, he could only imagine how she was feeling.
Still, she was slowly becoming more comfortable around them. Well, comfortable may not have been the best term to use. She sat stiffly, nodding or answering questions as Kedryn brought them up. Not for the first time, he wished he knew what they were talking about.
Knowing there wasn’t much he could do, Glade pulled up his last notification.
Congratulations! You are now level 2! Through hard work and sacrifice you have advanced along your path. Let the knowledge of who you are and what you stand for guide you throughout your journey.
As an Enlightened Human you gain 5 attribute points with an additional point auto allocated to the most used attribute. You gained +1 to Constitution.
Glade’s eyes widened as a resonance shot through him. The feeling was neither good nor bad, and it faded just as quickly as it had appeared. But as the vibration stopped, Glade could feel that some intangible energy was left behind.
“Are you okay sir?” Kedryn asked, giving him an odd look.
“I’m fine,” Glade responded, pausing just long enough to collect his thoughts. “I just read the prompt where I leveled.”
“Ha! It surprised me too when I read my level up notification. I, uh, guess I should have warned you about that earlier.”
“A heads up would have been nice, but I don’t think I would have believed you,” Glade said, still trying to process the experience “It was surprising, to say the least. But I feel… more. Does that make any sense?”
“I know what you mean. I was helping Riya remove the beetle’s carapace when I read my prompt. Scared me so much I dropped the mandible I was using as a knife. She tried to explain some things to me, but to be honest, she didn’t believe me when I told her we don’t have magic or status screens back home.”
“Growing up with something like leveling is normal to her. Makes sense she would consider us the odd ones.” Glade said.
The author's tale has been misappropriated; report any instances of this story on Amazon.
“Good point. Sorry to change topics, but have you given any thought to how you will allocate your attribute points?”
“+1 to Constitution. The rest I’m not sure about. I’ll review my status screen in greater detail later, after I deal with the other notifications.”
“I bet the increase in constitution was because of all the damage you took,” Kedryn speculated. “As for the other points, I wouldn’t worry about allocating them now. We still don’t know what build would best suit you. Besides, there don’t appear to be any time constraints. What else did you learn from your notifications?”
Knowing he was likely going to regret his choice; Glade shared his notifications about magic first.
“Choose Mana Manipulation!” Kedryn cried, knocking one of the beetle steaks to the ground as he shot to his feet in excitement.
The Corporals overreaction didn’t surprise him anymore as he had a good read on the young soldier’s personality. Still, it didn’t make it any easier to deal with him.
“Let’s assume for a moment that me having magic powers is a real thing. Why wouldn’t I choose the one that makes light? The more sources of light the better in my opinion,” Glade asked, dusting off the meat that had fallen to the ground and handing it to Kedryn who absentmindedly took it while pacing back and forth. “That one’s yours by the way. Eat up. We don’t know when we’ll have food again.”
Kedryn took the meat in hand, ignoring Glade’s comment about food.
“We should be thinking long term. The light spell has limited uses. It lights up the dark. That’s it. But the manipulation spell sounds like it could provide all sorts of options. Like you, I was given 2 spell choices. Flame and Candlelight. The choice was obvious for me. The Flame spell is more flexible and allows me to alter the size and power of the spell based on my attunement and mana channel level. It also provides light and can increase said light source and heat by pumping more mana into it.”
“How did you figure that out?”
“Easy,” Kedryn said as he shoved a baseball sized flame hovering above his right hand toward Glade.
Before Glade could react, the small flame grew three times in size and intensity, causing him to flinch back in surprise.
“In contrast, the Candlelight description stated the spell only gave off a set amount of ambient light. If I’d chosen that spell, I wouldn’t be able to produce anything larger than a candle flame. It looks like you’re being given a similar choice. Astral Light sounds like it only projects a set amount of light, but Manipulate Mana? That sounds like it could be adaptable for several uses.”
Glade blinked the spots in his vision away as he reassessed his Corporal. Maybe the Kid knew what he was doing after all.
“How long did it take you to learn how to increase your spells power?”
Kedryn beamed. “Oh, I thought it might work after reading the spell and skill descriptions. I tried it out just now, and it worked like a charm!’
Glade’s relaxed gaze hardened.
“You’re telling me that you decided to test a theory while handling literal fire less than three feet from my face?” Glade growled.
“Yes! And it worked just like I thought it would! Wasn’t it awesome?” Kedryn said animatedly moving his hands around, his massive floating ball of fire bouncing along with his movements. “I mean, I was only trying to make the flame jump to twice the height, but I guess I either pushed too much mana or underestimated my sympathetic attunement bonus. Either way, it worked!”
Glade breathed deeply, trying very hard not to yell. He only partially succeeded as his voice slowly rose in intensity. “Corporal, how about we try experimenting with our magic in a safe environment and only after we’ve notified the others around us. Especially, if said others are within striking distance of each other!”
Kedryn’s face fell as realization dawned on him of all the ways his impromptu demonstration could have gone wrong.
“Oh... Yeah… I can see how that might be a good idea.”
Glade groaned internally, seeing the Kid had once again swung to his sad puppy state. Normally, he wouldn’t care. The mistake needed to be corrected, and so he stepped in. But the issue was Glade needed Kedryn to work with him, not wallow in self-pity.
He really missed his team.
“Corporal,” Glade began. “Don’t let a small moment of admonishment kill your initiative. Correction and a bit of humility are key components of growth. You seem to be grasping our new reality rather quickly. Much faster than I am. Just remember, caution has its place. Impulsive actions, no matter the intent, often lead to accidents. We do not want any accidents. Next time, say something before you act.”
Kedryn looked up, the downtrodden look shifting to one of resolve. Glade knew this was only temporary and that he would need to reinforce the lesson several times to come, but it was a start.
With a nod, Kedryn lowered his flame output and sat down, taking a bite of his forgotten beetle steak. After chewing for a couple of moments, the Kid’s face twisted into a look of confused disgust.
“Why does my food taste like dirt?”
Glade scrutinized the Corporal’s expression. “So that’s the look people give when they’re nonplussed. Good to know.”
Without any further comment, Glade went back to his notifications and selected Mana Manipulation.
Congratulations! You have gained the spell Mana Manipulation. This spell allows the caster to interact with mana at the foundational level. At your current Astral skill level you can manipulate 1 mana source. This spell is synergistic with other spells, skills, and specializations. Spell level: 1. Cost: 10 mana. Cool down: 10 minutes. Can manipulate mana up to a 16 foot radius at current skill level (base 8 feet x 2 for Sympathetic level attunement). Up to 10 points of mana can be manipulated. Duration: 1 minute per skill level of Astral or until manipulation of mana source is complete. Additional mana may be expended to increase duration of spell.
“Well, that makes as much sense as a monkey doing a math problem,” Glade muttered. This time he didn’t wait to be asked and simply read the notification to Kedryn.
“That’s awesome, sir! I’m certain you made the right choice. Let’s see what it does!”
“I’m not so sure. I mean, the prompt says I learned the spell, but I still don’t have a clue how to use it. And to be honest, I’m a bit tired. Maybe we should tackle this when we have fresh eyes.”
“Are you crazy? Why put it off when you could try it now. Aren’t you the least bit interested? I mean, it’s magic! Real, honest to God magic!”
That was an excellent question. The better question was if he believed it would work. In Glade’s opinion there was no such thing as magic. Or at least it was. That had changed the moment he saw Kedryn create fire out of thin air and Riya heal his wounds.
“I guess it couldn’t hurt…” He began.
Kedryn whooped so loud both Riya and Glade flinched.
“So, do I say abracadabra or something?” Glade asked, regretting his choice to purposefully interact with Kedryn to this degree.
“It took me a minute to figure out how to learn the spell as well. You need to open your status page and select the spell on your spell list. From there you sort of will the knowledge of the spell to come into existence. If you’ve done it right, you’ll have a Matrix moment where the knowledge just floods into you.”
“Matrix moment?”
“You know, like the movie? Where Neo learns Kung Fu by downloading a program directly into his brain?”
“Never saw it,” Glade responded as he pulled up his status page. “Not much of a movie buff.”
“Never saw the Matrix!?!” Kedryn gasped in disbelief.
Glade ignored him and pulled up the screen. He idly wondered how difficult the process would be. He shouldn’t have worried. The words practically leapt from the screen the moment he thought of learning Mana Manipulation, submerging his subconscious into a sea of complex equations, breathing techniques, and internal energetic movements. Time lost all meaning as the world spun around him.
When the maelstrom of data finally settled, he simply knew.
As naturally as if he were breathing, Glade flexed a previously unknown muscle, accessing his mana for the first time as he whispered, “Videre.”
The blue bar in the corner of his vision dropped as a tingling wave of energy swept through him.
The world exploded in color.
Translucent royal blue ribbons emanated from the water, flowing amongst the mushrooms. Rich browns clustered in tight, geometric patterns along the ground. Even the meat they had prepared was packed with varying shades of red and brown light.
The whole grotto was filled with color, like a miniature aura borealis. But closer. More real.
“What’s happening! What do you see?” Kedryn asked excitedly.
“I… don’t know,” Glade whispered.