It was Arik’s birthday. His eighteenth, in fact. The other children in the orphanage, as well as the Hestals in charge of keeping the place running, had all gathered around him and his teacher for the ceremony that would allow him access to Divine Essence.
The other orphans- no, his family, watched in awe. It had been a few years since any of them had stuck around until they reached adulthood. On the one hand, the orphanage had been relatively new before Arik had been brought there, and as such he was one of the oldest kids by default, and on the other many of the kids, especially those who had been brought in when they were older, had ran away, in attempt to find their families.
His teacher, Mr. Lapenbaum, shuffled uncomfortably. “You’re certain you want me to be the one doing this, Arik?”
In most families, the father would be the one awakening a child’s Divine Essence. Arik nodded with a smile. “I can’t imagine anyone else doing it in your place, sir.”
With an awkward smile and a soft warmth in his heart, the Wendowian Shaper placed his hands on the boy’s blond head and began to pray. Many of the words that left his lips were unintelligible and the Essence in the room could be felt by all those present. A few of the younger children had to be held by their caretakers, shivering from the high concentrations of energy.
Some time later, the teacher’s hands left Arik’s head, before quickly grabbing his shoulders to steady him before he dropped to the floor. “He’s out, should be back from the Waking Dream in a few hours, by my guess,” Lapenbaum informed the Hestals.
After a moment of struggle, the man coughed before asking, “Mind helping me get him to his bed?”
===
The first thing Arik noticed wasn’t the parchment hovering to his right. Rather, his eyes were immediately drawn to the massive expanse of innumerable stars stretched out before him, with his world, Olikros, nowhere to be found. He’d thought he’d been prepared for his Waking Dream, but hadn’t expected anything quite like this.
Never in his life had he ever seen anything quite so breathtaking.
Finally shifting his gaze away from the sea of celestial beauty, he then noticed the semi-translucent sheet of vellum. His slate. The naming scheme was a bit odd, but that's just what it was called.
Name: Arik
[Blessing of Celestial Skies]
Age: 18
Stats:
Physique: 12
Limit: 11
Talent: 10
Wisdom: 8
Essence: 5
Purity: 15
Free Points: 0
Primary Class:
Secondary Class:
Tertiary Class:
Skill Points: 0
He blinked, trying to take in all the information at once. After a few moments of staring, he prodded at the first entry that caught his eye.
[Blessing of Celestial Skies]: Always have you basked in the ever-present light of the heavens, and now, more than ever, you call upon them for strength.
= +25% Efficiency with Celestial Magicks.
= +15% Efficiency with Radiant Magicks.
= +5% Efficiency with Gravity Magicks.
= You can see perfectly through any darkness or illusion so long as the light of the sun, moon, or stars rests upon you.
= You will receive additional Skill offers when using relevant Classes.
Another staring match ensued. What is this? He’d heard of blessings, of course, many high-ranking officials had them, as well as some people who, like him, seemed very lucky, but what were the Celestial Skies?
He looked back to the stars, trying to find some pattern in them, and was greeted with a prompt: The first Class he’d be offered. With a brief prayer to whatever was listening, he looked it over.
[Night-Sky Archer]: Under the guidance of the night sky, your arrows will chase their targets through the stars. Bow in hand, you will prove yourself a true nocturnal predator.
= +1 Physique
A case of literary theft: this tale is not rightfully on Amazon; if you see it, report the violation.
= +2 Limit
= +1 Talent
= +1 Wisdom
= +1 Essence
= +4 Free Points
Basic Skills:
= [Keen Eye]
= [Archery]
= [Night Strike]
He frowned. The Class is alright, but I’m not much of an archer. As soon as he had a thought, the sheet of vellum burnt to a crisp, leaving only ash, which was soon swept away by a gust of wind that had no place in this locale.
Looking more closely, he noticed that the stars he’d been looking at seemed to be part of a constellation, one that resembled an archer. He went back to looking around, dismissing a few more vellum sheets that didn’t seem to fit him, before landing on one he actually rather liked.
The constellation resembled an armored man, his hands resting on the pommel of a large sword, blade pointing downwards. He briefly marveled at how distinct the constellations seemed, though he supposed it had something to do with the fact that there was a clear purpose behind them. It would be pretty hard to find a good Class if the constellations were blurry.
[Stellar Paladin]: You draw your power from the celestial bodies who have watched over you and provided you with their light for all your life. As their holy knight, you devote yourself to their goals and ideals.
= +2 Physique
= +1 Limit
= +1 Essence
= +2 Purity
= +4 Free Points
Basic Skills:
= [Heavily Armored]
= [Bladework]
= [Starlight]
He looked over the Skills with a smile on his face.
[Heavily Armored]: You ignore 0% (1n%-30%) of the weight of armor you don, and your movements ignore 1% (1n%) of any mobility restrictions caused by armor you are wearing. This ability only functions on armor that weighs at least 35 pounds.
[Bladework]: Your Talent stat acts 2% (2n%) higher while learning to wield bladed weapons. Bladed weapons you wield act 1% (1n%) sharper.
[Starlight]: You summon an ethereal orb of Magick that sheds light for 4 (3+n) feet. This light counts as starlight. Drains Essence. Reserves 7 Purity.
He nodded to himself. This is it. The piece of vellum lit up, but this time with a warm golden light, rather than the scorching flames which had incinerated his previous offers. It approached him and seemed to fold into his chest. He was met with a warning, though. A red paper folded into a bird-like form flapped up into his vision from the abyss below him before unfolding and presenting its contents.
Are you sure you would like to accept the Class: [Stellar Paladin]? This action cannot be undone. Y/N
He smiled, and assented once more. His own slate appeared as the warning vanished into thin… space?
Name: Arik
[Blessing of Celestial Skies]
Age: 18
Stats:
Physique: 14
Limit: 12
Talent: 10
Wisdom: 8
Essence: 6
Purity: 17
Free Points: 4
Primary Class: [Stellar Paladin] (1)
Skills (3/5):
￮ [Heavily Armored] (1)
￮ [Bladework] (1)
￮ [Starlight] (1)
￮
￮
Secondary Class:
Tertiary Class:
Skill Points: 2
Suddenly, Arik felt himself being pulled backwards, falling. Soon, the sky seemed more familiar, and he turned to find that he was falling back down to Olikros, towards his home country of Eyladias, and then into Jexticar, and then he spotted his orphanage. The whole time, he’d been falling faster, and faster, and faster, until he was concerned that he might break through the ceiling, or be turned into a paste across it and every building in a five mile radius. Then he passed through the ceiling, and landed with a small bounce and a creak from his well-worn bed.
Arik coughed, and felt a hand pat him on his back. “The first time’s always the roughest, you know,” Mr. Lapenbaum told him, to which he could only nod, still coughing.
When Arik had recovered, the man helped him stand. “The kids are waiting for you, and they’ll have lots of questions. We’ll go out when you’re ready.”
Arik put his shoes on, which had been removed and set to the side of the bed, and walked through the door. The first thing he heard was a dozen different voices all talking at once, trying to be heard over the others. He was about to speak over them when a Hestal shushed them and he nodded to her graciously.
“One at a time, kids, your brother has been through a lot today,” Shaper Lapenbaum instructed.
A few hands went up and Arik picked little Suzy, the youngest, first. “What’s your question, Suzy?”
“Is brutha okay?” She looked up at him with worried eyes. At only 4, she was the youngest of the lot, and didn’t know much about the Waking Dream, or the unlocking of Divine Energy, so she was understandably concerned about her big brother.
“Yeah, brother is very okay, Suzy. Thank you for worrying about me.” Arik smiled at his little sister and patted her on the head, to which she gave him a big smile.
Arik then jumped to the oldest, one of the twins. Elias was just two years younger than Arik, and had always been obsessed with all things relating to Essence and Classes. His question was predictable to those who knew him.
“What Class did you get?” The fire in Elias’ eyes was burning bright as it ever had.
Their instructor stopped Arik from answering momentarily. “While that is a good question, and Arik here can answer if he’d like, for future note it is considered rude to ask about the slate of those outside your immediate family.” He looked back to Arik.
“It’s fine, sir,” Arik told him, but turned back to Elias, and answered his question. “My Class is called Stellar Paladin.” That received a few chuckles from his captive audience.
“I guess all that time stargazing paid off, huh, Arik?” Werner spoke up, making Arik himself laugh softly.
“I suppose it really did.”
Arik had always had a habit of climbing up onto the roof at night to look at the stars. At first, his caretakers had scolded him for it, and tried everything they could think of to get him to stop, from locking up the ladder, to putting chains on the fire escape, to giving him more chores whenever they caught him. Eventually, they had come to accept the fact that he was going to find his way up there no matter what they did, and just stopped trying.
One of the Hestals had a question of her own, and asked, “A Paladin, huh? Do you know what god that’s linked to?”
Arik only shrugged. “I did get a blessing, so I assume it has something to do with that.”
“A blessing? Without any oaths? That is… very lucky,” the Hestal told him, “please, do not advertise that, Arik.”
“I know, ma’am.” While it wasn’t unheard of for someone to be granted a blessing free of charge, it was rare. The god, or alliance of gods, actually had to like you as a person, or owe a favor to someone in your family. Both of those were extremely uncommon. More often, one would get a blessing in exchange for making an oath to serve a god. For example, it was common knowledge that each of the Hestals got a blessing, though the exact details were not public.
It seemed as though Arik had gotten a blessing simply for admiring the night sky. Not that he was complaining, of course.
He’d take any advantage he could get.