Ander awoke with purpose the next morning. He had to find a new shelter to hide his wonderful fur. He quickly scarfed down a portion of meat he had left over from the previous day and left his cave. The fur was still there, a little damp from the morning dew, but that would dry off quickly as the sun peeked over the edge of the chasm. Ander grabbed his longsword and struck out back into the chasm. Ander flew along, running with the wind at his back. Soon he was back where he had killed the boar a couple days ago. He could still see the trampled spot where he and the boar had fought, but now there was no sign of the other pigs. Apparently they had moved away now that the boar was gone. Where they had made their den was a surprisingly clean room aside from the fact that there was a dirt floor. The opening was big enough for a boar to get inside, which meant he could likely get the fur through. It was a good option, but he wanted to keep on looking. Maybe he could find a room with a stream or something.
Ander kept on moving through the caverns. He encountered a number of creatures, all of which scurried away. Eventually he did find flowing water. It came from a crack in the wall and flooded several rooms. It seemed to be a favorite location for the animals to come and drink. It even seemed to flow out of another crack into a cavern below. Unfortunately for Ander, it was in a space that would be difficult or impossible to defend. At least in the pig den he could pile up rocks to block off most of the entrance. This cavern seemed to have a half a dozen other rooms attached to it. Ander poked his head into each one in turn. Most were dead ends, squarish caves that looked completely unnatural.
Ander looked back into the main cavern and realized that this wasn’t a natural cavern at all. The walls were made of stone, sure, and there were no carvings or decorations to be seen. But still, this space looked like nothing more than a corporate office he had once had the displeasure of visiting with his mother. There was one communal workroom in the middle, with individual offices attached to the main room along the perimeter. The entire space was tilted slightly away from the chasm as though something had knocked it askew.
The caverns made a lot more sense now. The walls might have been stone, but this place was built with architecture not unlike an office building. There was no furniture that Ander could see in the rubble and dirt that covered the floor, but when he looked up he could find places in the ceiling that might have once held lights of some kind. It was an odd sort of deja vu with him seeing that old office building overlaid with this ruin. Even examination of the wall that the water was coming from revealed a circular channel for which the water to move through. Whoever built this place had a technology level at least on the level of earth, and they had it thousands of years ago as far as Ander could tell.
Satisfied that at least he would have a source of water nearby, Ander went to move his giant bear fur to the old pig den. That done, he blocked up the entrance with some rocks and set his handy dandy piece of wood from the last hideout as a door. Satisfied with this arrangement, Ander grabbed his longsword, and made his way out to find himself some more food.
Ander threw himself to the side as the giant honey badger lunged at him, a maelstrom of claws and teeth. He screamed as the badger traced lines of fire across his back, but managed to get away from the bulk of the attack. Ander spun around, trying to get his sword between him and the badger, but it was useless. The badger was too fast. Ander jumped away again, activating Way of the Wind to try to get any extra speed he could manage, and barely avoided another swipe. In desperation he hacked wildly behind him. To Ander’s very momentary relief, he heard the badger bellow in pain, and saw several 8 inch long claws spin off into a pile of rocks. Ander spun around in the moment he had, setting his feet to accept the badger’s next charge.
Everything paused for a moment as Ander stared at the honey badger. The badger started to shake, and out of nowhere it’s eyes started to glow a vivid red.
“Oh, Shiii-!” Ander screamed as the Badger lunged again twice as fast as he was before. Ander jumped to a boulder twelve feet above them as he swung wildly at the badger. His sword made contact only to bounce off the now steel hard fur that covered the entire badger. He jumped again as the badger scrambled on top of the boulder, barely making it to a new ledge without sustaining another wound. The badger screeched it’s rage and jumped after Ander who, instead of jumping away, struck at a root in the wall of the chasm. Near instantaneously a boulder and a ton of stone ripped itself from the chasm wall and smashed into the airborne badger, flattening it against the chasm floor below. Ander collapsed against the chasm wall, heaving for breath. Excitement thrummed through him as he just sat there and enjoyed the rush of dopamine from his victory.
After a minute Ander checked his notifications.
Congratulations! You have killed a Hell Badger, level 6.
XP earned.
You have leveled up! You are now level 4.
+2 Conductivity
+2 Wisdom
+2 Regeneration
+1 Beauty
+2 Presence
+20 free stats.
Ander was happy to see that he had gained another level. Each time his stats went up rather significantly, and he got a pretty big power up. He also had 40 free stats to allocate now, which would be very beneficial. The one thing that he didn’t understand was why his Way of the Wind Skill had not increased. At first it was going up for everything, but now he had gone two fights with it not going up. Ander pulled up his status.
Ander
Level 3
Race: Exodari
Subrace: Oritol
HP: 180
MP: 280
SP: 180
Strength 40
Dexterity 20
Agility 25
Toughness 20
Constitution 18
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Intelligence 10
Memory 10
Conductivity 18
Wisdom 18
Regeneration 18
Beauty 14
Presence 18
You have twenty free stat points, would you like to distribute them now?
Yes/No
Ander selected yes but then paused. Last time he had allocated points, he put them mostly into strength. He still thought that was a good idea at the time, but now he eyed Intelligence. Typically Intelligence was associated with magical power, something that would be useless to him in his current situation. However, this wasn’t the standard six stat spread like you would see in a tabletop game. The fact that Memory was a stat made it seem like intelligence might actually increase his IQ. If that was the case, then that was the only stat that really mattered on the entire list. Curious, Ander focused on the stats themselves, hoping to get more information. To his delight, a help page of sorts popped up.
HP (Hit Points): A measure of the soul body connection and instant physical regeneration.
MP (Mana Points): A measure of free soul energy that is available for immediate use.
SP (Stamina Points): A measure of short term physio-magical energy stores.
Stats
Note: Average non-magical adult human stats have been normalized to 10.
Strength: A measure of max force that can be applied by the body.
Dexterity: A measure of fine motor skills.
Agility: A measure of speed of fast twitch muscles.
Toughness: A measure of resistance to incoming damage.
Constitution: A measure of the body’s resistance to poison, disease and other effects. Increases the soul-body connection.
Intelligence: A measure of mental processing speed.
Memory: A measure of both long and short term memory retention
Conductivity: Measure of mana flow capacity and efficiency.
Wisdom: A measure of soul energy (Mana) production and storage.
Regeneration: Measure of the speed of HP, MP, and SP regeneration.
Beauty: Measure of physical attractiveness.
Presence: Measure of aura strength and physical bearing.
That explained a lot. While they didn’t give specific numbers, he at least had the answer to his original question. Intelligence would be useful, but it wouldn’t truly increase his IQ. But that begged a second question. Why wasn’t a stat like Perception on this list? It would be useful to be able to increase what he was able to perceive around him, especially with his wind sense that he got from Way of the Wind.
Would you like to add Perception to your stat list?
Yes/ No
Warning: Adding a stat may alter other stats.
Ander stopped and stared at this new prompt. He could change the stats? That didn’t seem like it should be possible. With a bit of trepidation, he chose yes.
Calculating…
Evaluating base stats…
Assigning base stats to aggregate stats…
Strength… Done
Dexterity… Done
Agility… Done
Toughness… Done
Constitution… Done
Perception… Done
Intelligence… Done
Memory… Done
Conductivity… Done
Wisdom… Done
Regeneration… Done
Beauty… Done
Presence… Done
Finalizing… Done
Ander
Race: Exodari
Subrace: Oritol
HP: 260
MP: 180
SP: 180
Strength 40
Dexterity 20
Agility 25
Toughness 20
Constitution 18
Perception 11
Intelligence 10
Memory 10
Conductivity 18
Wisdom 18
Regeneration 18
Beauty 14
Presence 18
Ander stared a moment at his new status. Perception was there, as though it had always been there. What did this mean? In most games the stats were pretty set in stone. A change in one would significantly change how the game was played, but he could tell that adding a stat here didn’t change him or even the world at all. It did say one thing that caught Ander’s attention. ‘Assigning base stats to aggregate stats…’ Did that mean that the stats he was using were some sort of aggregate of these base stats?
Would you like to view base stats?
Yes/No
Ander selected yes. A new screen popped up in his vision. This had a list of what he thought were some twenty or so different items until he saw the scroll bar on the side getting progressively smaller. He started to scroll and his shock became greater and greater with every second. There were millions of items on this list of base stats, and they were so specific. One line read; ‘Left median nerve response speed.” And right below it; “Left median nerve transmission speed.” Moreover there were like ten more lines dedicated only to the left median nerve. Each one used terminology that was far too complex for him to decipher. He kept on scrolling and they only got more and more weird. At one point he came across a large swath that seemed to relate to his soul, but using terminology that no earthling had ever seen. Eventually he got to the bottom of the list to find a message waiting for him.
You have 345,286 free points. Would you like to allocate them?
Yes/No
Ander stared dumbly before he realized what was going on. His 40 free stats that he had to allocate to his aggregate stats were actually 345,286 free points when looking at the base stats. No wonder the system used aggregate stats. There was no way that he could manage millions of different stats. He nearly laughed when the idea of a programmer trying to make a game this complex crossed his mind. The guy would be dead before he got even a millionth part of this done. That said, it didn’t seem likely a human made the system, unless they figured out immortality.
Ander closed out the window, returning to his status page. After some consideration, he decided that he would put ten points each into strength and agility. He would then put five into intelligence, memory, perception and toughness. That way he could see how each affected him. Upon adding his new stat points he felt a rush through his body as the strength and agility took affect, but the rush in his mind was what captured his attention. A wave of tingling heat swept through his brain, settling in his eyes and ears momentarily before disappearing. He barely even noticed the feeling of his skin tightening and tingling. When it was all done, Ander couldn’t exactly describe how it felt. His mind felt more clear, his eyesight too as a matter of fact. His ears picked up minute sounds he had never been aware of before. It didn’t seem like anything superhuman or anything like that, but it was markedly better. Ander got up, but before jumping down to claim his kill, he checked his status one more time.
Ander
Race: Exodari
Subrace: Oritol
HP: 260
MP: 180
SP: 180
Strength 50
Dexterity 20
Agility 35
Toughness 25
Constitution 18
Perception 16
Intelligence 15
Memory 15
Conductivity 18
Wisdom 18
Regeneration 18
Beauty 14
Presence 18