Chapter 023 - A nonexistent Tier 10?
Cyan could not help but ask about the Tier changes from [Tier 8] and [Tier 9].
[Cyan]: “Senior, why do you go from Perfect Alien to Imperfect Being?”
Karla’s eyes shined with that question.
[Karla]: “Well, of course, the Tier list is something given by [Midas] itself, but that extra bit is my own contribution, don’t you think that it is a little weird that there is no Tier 10, and that the stats stops at 999? If there was a being that could go beyond that, wouldn’t that make it a Perfect Being, and the one before it would be the Imperfect one, right?”
Alice still could not understand the Players Tiers yet, so she asked another question.
[Alice]: “Senior, can you elaborate into this list? For example, what’s the difference between Super Humans and Normal Humans?”
[Karla]: “I am glad that you asked, first, the human body has its own physical limits, and no matter what you do your stats would cap at the Normal Human level Tier 0++, showing a MAX when you get to 99. We have already witnessed this when Boss had reached 99 with his Strength stat, after that, even Free Points can’t be used to increase that stat; this is the first factor or barrier, stats”
Alice thought for a second before she asked another question.
[Alice]: “Then Senior what it is the second factor?”
[Karla]: “It is pretty simple to make guess in fact if you think about it, there is a second barrier that separates Normal Humans from Super Humans, we can also guess it will the same for the other tiers. Super Humans, in short, are humans that have surpassed the stats barrier of Normal Humans by somehow awakening some kind of ability or power inside them that a Normal Human does not have”
Cyan could only go wide eye as the thought of “superpowers” crossed his mind and escaped his mouth.
[Cyan]: “You mean superpowers like Flying in the Sky, stopping bullets without their hands, or running faster than the speed of sound?”
[Karla]: “You got the gist of it, newbie, that’s pretty much what implies to be Super Humans, however, I don’t think an ability like flying in the sky would be possible so easily, of course, those are only my own conjectures, we are not sure of that yet”
Alice could not help to wonder how Karla managed to reach that conclusion, she felt she had to ask; maybe it will help her in the future.
[Alice]: “Senior how did you get your conjectures from?”
[Karla]: “Easy, I took Boss growth and extrapolated it into the next Tier, a Super Human is what has come out from that and from there, you can picture part of the scale, and what the next step in the evolution stairway may be”
[Boss]: “...”
[Karla]: “For example, have you notice this over here?”
Karla took out her phone and pointed to her [Status]
[Status]
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Level: 0+
Profession: None
Sub-Profession: None
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[Karla]: “This inference looks like a game and we have levels but there is no EXP bar anywhere, in games, when you kill something you would gain Experience, but in here, there is not such a thing, there are only stats, items, skills, and an inventory. So I guessed that you would gain something else from killing the monsters, probably items, but most likely, stats”
Alice expression became stiff with the idea of gaining stats from monsters.
[Alice]: “Senior, how would you gain stats from killing a monster?”
However, Karla put off the question for later.
[Karla]: “I will get into that, but first, we need to talk about Professions for moving into the next Tier, Tier 2 - Perfect Humans”
Cyan attention was brought back to the table, he already knew that there are Professions, but he did not have the time for asking to [Midas] what Professions there are for Players, and so he has thought it was a good time for asking.
[Cyan]: “Senior do you know what kind of Professions there are?”
[Karla]: “For moments like this is that should ask [Midas] instead of asking me newbie”
Even though Karla has said that, in the end, she still showed them the list of Professions that [Midas] has to offer, after all, answering to the kid’s questions was mostly her job, her dumb brother would not do it, and Boss was too hard to understand sometimes. Even so, she has to teach Cyan not to depend so much on other people.
Letting out a sigh, Karla lamented the fact she had become a babysitter.
[FAQ]
Professions (Normal)
* Fighter
* Mage
* Ranger
* …
Sub-Professions (Normal)
* Genetic
* Cook
* Weapons Maker
* Armor Maker
* Jewel Maker
* Potion Maker
* …
After Alice and Cyan had read throughout the entire list was that Karla could continue with her explanation about Tier 2 - Perfect Humans.
[Karla]: “We are guessing that a Perfect Human is someone that learned a Profession, or at least it is someone that can learn one, as for what each Profession does individually you can read it in your [Midas] app later on”
[Cyan]: “Senior, what it is the use of Professions in general?”
[Karla]: “its use is easy to understand, if we take a game as the base, there will be Professions only skills that Players could learn, making the ability to learn Skills from a specific Profession into something like Perfecting a Human, and that’s why I think it is the end of evolution for Humans”
Cyan could only feel baffled by the thought. In the other hand, Alice kept thinking about the Sub-Professions list.
[Alice]: “Senior about the Sub-Professions…”
[Karla]: “What it is Alice did you notice something?”
[Alice]: “All the Sub-Professions look somewhat normal, except this one [Genetic] that it is the first one in the list, this, it has to do with the next Tier? The Mutant Tier?”
[Karla]: “So you have noticed it, as expected of Alice!”
Karla could only show a proud smile to her favorite student.
[Alice]: “Then the things you would gain from monsters are...”
Before Alice could continue, Karla interrupted her.
[Karla]: “After Perfect Humans that can take a Profession comes Mutants, Mutants are Genetic Modified Humans, of course, after you had to climb up to the top of what is humanly possible, the only path remaining for you, is for you to change your own genetic code into something else, that way, you can keep moving up”
Karla let out a sigh as she continues.
[Karla]: “This thing it is designed to be like a stairway, and as from where we will be getting the new genes to break into Tier 3 - Normal Mutant, it should be obvious for you two now, right?”
Alice and Cyan face stiffened, they were not dumb enough for not realizing by now.
[Alice]: “…”
Even so, Alice did not want to say it.
[Cyan]: “from monsters isn’t it?”
Karla just nodded with her head.
After a few seconds of silence, Alice asked what she wanted to know the most.
[Alice]: “Senior, We will also become like those monsters?”
Deep worry could be seem reflected in Alice expression, even so, Karla could not sugar coded for them.
[Karla]: “I don’t know the answer to that, but we can’t rule that out yet, however, this is undoubtedly the truth, so it is better if you don’t turn your gazes away from it…, Boss”
Boss took out something from his inventory and put it over the table, there, Boss has left two items, one was red and the other was green, even though they were semi-transparent, it was obvious that the color came from its deep colored center.
Alice and Cyan jumped when the read the item description in their phones.
[Tier 1 Gen Orb - STR]
* Effect: +1 STR
[Tier 1 Gen Orb - STA]
* Effect: +1 STA
Even so, before they could say anything Karla stopped them for saying anything.
[Karla]: “Before you say anything, I want to say we will try it in ourselves first, we would be your test subjects, so you two don’t have to worry about turning into monsters in the future”
[Alice]: “Senior that’s…”
[Karla]: “No need Alice, this is already our path”
[Cyan]: “Senior, from where you got those two Orbs?”
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Karla let out a sigh as she remembered how they got their hands into these two Orbs.
[Karga]: “It was a reward from clearing [Round 3] in the [Fighting Arena], but still, we couldn’t use them yet”
[Cyan]: “You can’t?”
[Karla]: “First, this thing is an [Tier 1] item and not a [Tier 0], meaning, it can’t be used up by [Tier 0] Players, and before you ask, it also can’t be used for making an [Breakthrough] into the next Tier, we already have tried that”
[Cyan]: “a [Breakthrough]?”
However, before Karla could say anything else her brother interrupted her.
[Karga]: “That’s what we are calling going from one Tier into the next, pretty neat right? I came out with that name”
[Karla]: “Huh!”
[Boss]: “…”
[Karga]: “Come on Sister don’t be so mad, why don’t you explain the rest”
[Boss]: “…”
[Karla]: “Whatever… now, where was I?”
[Alice]: “Senior you were talking about the Mutants Tier”
[Karla]: “Thank you Alice, right Mutants, even though [Tier 3] is when Humans officially becomes Mutants, in actuality, the Genetic Manipulation should have started back at [Tier 1] as we already have shown you, however, it should only be completed at Tier 5 - Perfect Mutants, and after that comes…”
[Karga]: “Tier 6 – Aliens, wooooh spooky right kids?”
Karla could only look at her brother with a glare, obviously, the one that had put that name down for that Tier, was her brother and not her.
[Karla]: “As I was saying! After that, what is next it is only “Alien” to us, so we could only call it that way, as we don’t know anything about it yet”
[Alice]: “Then the next Tier 9 should be the last Tier right?”
Karla shook her head to Alice question.
[Karla]: “There is not one that can guarantee that Tier 9 – Imperfect Being is the last Tier, because, if you follow the logic you used to climb up the stairway to a nonexistent [Tier 10], then [Tier 9] could only be called an Imperfect Being, and as for the Tier 10 – Perfect Being…”
Alice thought for a second.
[Alice]: “There is only one thing that you would call something that goes beyond the scale and makes a [Breakthrough] from [Tier 9] into the nonexistent [Tier 10], right Senior?”
[Karla]: “And what would that be Alice?”
Alice paused and took a second to say what she thought of.
[Alice]: “A God”
Karla nodded indeed.
[Karla]: “That’s right and it could not be anything less than that, something moved far away of our compression and our understandings of the laws of the universe, even so, we still have a name for it anyway, God”
Karla could only let out a sigh, to think she was discussing things that were so far out her imagination, that she did not have many clues to work out what the road ahead was like, but she still could think of the end result.
[Alice]: “…”
[Cyan]: “…”
[Karga]: “…”
Even Karga that usually easy going felt that the atmosphere over the table has turned heavy, so he tried to light out the mood.
[Karga]: “Hey Sister, aren’t you being too melodic dramatic?, that’s something that’s not even in the scale [Midas] gave us, and, these are only your suppositions, and guessing games you always have used that to scared me when we were little”
Karla could only let out a sigh.
[Karla]: “Of course, there are those fools that would rather not believe in that, and would rather enjoy their bliss in ignorance, you can believe in whatever you want Brother”
Karla took her carefully drawn table and files that she had carefully created and put them away into her inventory.
Seeing that nobody else was saying anything, Cyan took the chance to ask a question he was curious about.
[Cyan]: “Senior can we go back to Professions for a bit?”
[Karla]: “What it is newbie did you found out something?”
[Cyan]: “I want to ask about this profession [Mage], does that mean magic exists in the world?”
Karla thought for a second and nodded.
[Karla]: “If you had asked me that 3 weeks ago I would have laughed at you, but now I am not that sure anymore, I can’t say there is no magic when I even considered the possibility of there being a God”
[Cyan]: “… then Senior”
[Karla]: “What it is?”
With magic as a possibility, Cyan thought of something.
[Cyan]: “Could a [Tier 9] travel back to the past using magic? Or at least send a message back to the past?”
Karla narrowed down her eyes and asked with a cold voice
[Karla]: “Why do you ask that newbie?”
[Cyan]: “that… it was just a thought”.
Karla could only shrug her shoulders as she let out her cold attitude.
[Karla]: “Whatever, it should be possible for all we know”
[Cyan]: “Thank you, Senior”
[Karla]: “There is no need for that, newbie”.
…
[Boss]: “…”
[Karla]: “You are right Boss, Boss says we have wasted enough time already and we should go back to training”
Cyan and Alice nodded and hurried up to end their breakfast, while Boss left the area putting an end to their conversation.
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As the group was heading to the elevator, someone has stopped in front of them, blocking their path.
[Unknown]: “Hello friends, are you perhaps going to Floor 5?”
Even so, the twin’s expressions hinted they knew this person.
[Karla]: “Mind your own business”
[Unknown]: “There is no need to be so aggressive I just want to talk”
[Karga]: “Then talk fast; we don’t have time for the likes of you”
[Unknown]: “This will be fast then, hello little friends, my name Aiden, care to tell me your names?”
This strange person was directing his question to Alice and Cyan; however, they did not know what to answer, after all, the twins were obviously showing signs of hostility, not to mention this person aura was sickening.
[Aiden]: “There there kids, there is no need to answer I already know your names, you should be Alice, and you should Cyan right?”
Cyan and Alice eventually nodded.
[Aiden]: “Nice to meet you, my name is Aiden; would you like to become acquaintances?”
Aiden reached his hand out asking for a handshake with a smile, but Cyan felt that stretching his hand out would be a bad idea, this person was dangerous, so he remained unmoving in the end, Alice did not move for a handshake either.
[Aiden]: “Ahye, I see you have already joined a Faction, or maybe you create your own?”
Aiden said while turning his head to look at Cyan eyes.
[Karla]: “They are in Boss Faction; now scram before I call Boss”
[Aiden]: “So it was like that after all, it is a shame, after all… no no, it is better if I don't say anything that could scare these little kids so much that they couldn’t sleep at night. Then until we meet again”
As Aide was leaving, Cyan could hear him murmuring something for him to hear.
[Aiden]: “----don’t say I didn’t warm you kid----“
…
[Alice]: “That… Senior who was that?”
[Karla]: “That one is Aiden; he is second in command from King Faction”
Cyan could not help but make comment.
[Cyan]: “The feeling I got from it…”
[Alice]: “It smelled like Blood”
Cyan could only nod to Alice description; he got the same feeling coming out from that person.
[Karla]: “You shouldn’t talk to that person… they are dangerous people”
[Karga]: “Come on we need to train or Boss will be mad with us for skipping training”
[Karla]: “Yes, you are right for once”
In the end, everyone entered the elevator.
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After they left the elevator, Karla together with Alice went into a separate track to train.
In the track field #1, where Cyan and Karga will be training.
[Karga]: “Alright newbie lets go with triple the difficulty for today”
[Cyan]: “Senior aren’t you going too far, it has been only a day since you double it, now you want to triple it?”
[Karga]: “It can’t be helped; you can only blame your bad luck, newbie, for now, let us get started”
Cyan did not want to admit it, but his “bad luck”, probably has something to do with Aiden.
[Cyan]: “Wait, Senior, I forgot to ask, I have been receiving a lot of Credits lately, and I want to ask if there was something that I could buy that could increase my stats?”
[Karga]: “Aiyah newbie, you should try to learn to control your own stats first before thinking in anything else”
[Cyan]: “Senior but it is not the purpose of training to increase more my stats?”
Karga could only go “tsk” with his mouth; after all, Cyan was not entirely wrong, it is just that Karga felt that gaining control over your own strength should be prioritized, however...
[Karga]: “Now that you mentioning it, there is a potion in the item [Shop] that could be of help for you”
Cyan took his phone and opened the [Midas] app.
[Midas App]
* [Status]
* [Inventory]
* [Skills]
* [Quest]
* [Shop]
* [Willy]
* [Map]
* [Inbox]
* [Help/FAQ]
[Shop]
* Weapon
* Armor
* Items
* ...
Cyan ignore [Weapon] and [Armor] for now and went directly into [Items], and after scrolling to the end he found something that he could use.
[Potions]
* …
* Basic Grade Grow Potion 10.000 Credits
* Medium Grade Grow Potion 50.000 Credits
* Advance Grade Grow Potion 100.000 Credits
[Basic Grow Potion]
* Effects: Player grows one additional Point.
[Medium Grow Potion]
* Effects: Player grows two additional Points.
[Advance Grow Potion]
* Effects: Player grows three additional Points.
Even though it looked very useful, it was also pretty expensive, the advance grade potion cost was the same amount he had used to unlock Floor 8, even more so, the description was also kind of incomplete, Cyan could only ask Karga what were the effects of the potion.
[Cyan]: “Senior, do you know how these potions work?”
[Karga]: “It is pretty simple, say that you train for a day, then go to sleep and on the next day you have gained 1 point of stats right? If you drink that you would gain 2 instead of 1, pretty neat right?”
[Cyan]: “What? It isn’t this a pretty amazing potion?”
[Karga]: “It is, but it has its own flaws, first, you need to unlock the [Shop] to even see it, and second, even after you drink it if you didn’t grow any stats during the night then you would have thrown 10.000 Credits into the trash, a normal Player couldn’t afford to buy it every day, not to mention…”
As Karga was talking, he has thought of something making him come to a stop.
[Cyan]: “Senior?”
[Karga]: “It is nothing… but now that I think about it, that potion is indeed perfect for you and for your training, do you have enough to buy it?”
Cyan checked his inventory, something he did not do in the morning after he had wake up.
[Inventory]
* Credits: 18.650
[Items]
* Ticket for entry to Floors 5 to 7 x19
[Equipment]
* School Uniform
His Credits had increased a lot, but he still could not afford to buy the Medium Grade, Cyan thought it was a shame.
[Cyan]: “Yes I have just enough for a Basic grade one”
[Karga]: “Good, then lets us begin after you drink it”
Cyan bought the [Basic Grade Grow Potion] and stored for later used, however, Karga has guaranteed him he would do triple the training so his 10.000 would not be wasted, making Cyan regret his actions.
In the end, he also had to buy 10 sets of [Energy] items for the training, and after all that expending he remained with just a pitiful amount of Credits.
[Inventory]
* Credits: 2.650
This amount also included the 20.000 Credits reward; he got for completing [Start your Training II].
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On track #10, Karla was carrying out another type of crazy training.
[Karla]: “Your mind is not in focus”
Alice failed to dodge again as she felt a great amount of pain in her left arm, she looked in horror how her arm went flying and hit the ground, a cloud a red mist soon started to surround her arm blocking the blood from spilling out everywhere.
Karla picked out Alice severed arm as started to wave it around, while Alice kept enduring the pain.
[Karla]: “Maybe I was too soft on you”
[Alice]: “Senior… my arm… please give it back”
Alice pain receptors screamed in her head, the longer her arm was missing the more she would have to deal with the pain in her mind.
[Karla]: “Oh you mean this? I thought you didn’t need it as you let it be cut off so easily; maybe I should also take the other one too”
[Alice]: “Senior… I really need it… please”
[Karla]: “Asking nicely wouldn’t work here you know? Why don’t come and take it for yourself”
Even though Alice mind was going blank, she still stood up using her left arm as her support and started very slowly to walk in Karla direction while holding her right arm.
Karla could only praise Alice courage in her mind because right now she could only act tough, or not.
[Karla]: “Alright, you can have it back, but don’t lose it next time”
Karla threw the arm back to Alice which painfully put it back in its place, after that, Alice went limp on the ground while having trouble to breathe. Karla could only look Alice from a distance; she could not hold herself any longer.
[Karla]: “Why don’t you tell me what it is inside your head that is bothering so much?”