A slot machine window appeared in front of Bob. There were three visible rows and each row had a single line of text with an ability written on it. Bob perked up a little bit when he saw the kind of options they were talking about. There was some good stuff here: invisibility, fireball, sword-mastery. Bob knew straight off what he wanted. There it was smack in the center, I mean who didn’t want it really, it was the true anime classic, anybody would look badass shooting balls of fire out of their hand.
Beside the window stood an exaggerated slot arm connected to... thin air. Very considerate, got to give a man at least the illusion of choice. Well that about sums up the history of systematic oppression. Bob cranked the arm with a call of “Come on fireball.” The text span around and arcade music blared louder and louder with each rotation. The music crescendoed, dun, dun, “lightning”, “flight”, the window jerked unnaturally forward and groaned to a halt: “mud manipulation.”
Bob’s vision went red. He gritted his teeth together. "Fucking setup," he managed to hiss out. Bob closed his eyes. His head was pounding. He felt a burning in his chest. He wanted to do something. What could he do? Nothing.
He sighed out as much of that liquid fire as he could, but it still hurt, it still smoldered and smoked deep in the pit of his stomach. Why do I even try? He looked up (as far as there was an up) in this blank, white formless chamber. “Don’t ever pretend to me that that was random. It’s disgraceful. Just disgraceful.” Mud manipulation, the letters flashed red and a system message appeared:
> Skill: Mud Manipulation (Authority)
>
>
> Feel the Mud, Young Puddler.
>
>
> Effect: Grants unbounded authority over all forms of mud
Bob wanted to kill the system. Shortly followed by himself. Sometimes it's better to die than compromise your principles. He looked wildly around for his knife. It wasn't there. Some rope? No luck. Maybe he could bite through his tongue. Sounded rather painful. Raincheck maybe?
> Companion Object finalized.
Bob's body started to tingle. Oh no, maybe the system doesn't handle heresy well. "Forgive your measly slave, oh great and might system." The hardened mud shell (that Bob had been wearing in the absence of clothes) liquified and started to flow together. Death by mud, Bob thought, talk about on theme.
Except the mud floated up and above Bob, and started composing itself into a humanoid-like shape. Suddenly there was a pulse of bright, golden light. Bob shaded his eyes and missed the moment something fell lightly around him. He pulled away his hand to see a long, brown mantle. It hung all the way down to his ankles, billowing about him. There was a deep hood on the back. Bob flicked it up. "Smells like mud," he muttered to himself.
> Companion Object: The Mud Magician's Mantle
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>
> A cloak of woven, living mud.
>
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> Effect: Equipping the cloak counts as covering the entire body with mud
Bob sighed. It was a cool item, he acknowledged that. He could also see that it was obviously custom-made. An object uniquely designed for his ability and achievements. Mud monster, his first serious achievement, granted a minor percentage increase to all base stats. It required however that his body be entirely covered with mud. Without this cloak Bob would have had to go full-Rambo all the time and face difficult questions from his friends and loved ones. The cloak was easier.
Bob wasn't stupid and he could see the cloak complemented his new mud manipulation ability. The cloak could act as armor, weapon, camouflage. It would let him fight on unfriendly terrain, desert, city street, snowscape. It also looked pretty badass. Something Gandalf might have tried on at his local department store. Bob glanced himself up and down and flared out the cloak with his hand. He nodded approvingly at the effect.
But, but… I mean, why, why did everything have to be about mud? If there was one theme to Bob's system initiation, one repeated symbol, it was the distinctive, squelchy brown compound. And Bob hated mud. Surely that couldn't be an accident? The system was going out of its way to define Bob’s image as some kind of mud fetish maniac. And maddeningly it was succeeding. Was it already too late? Could Bob go back to being a normal boy?
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> Calculating Attributes...
>
> Attributes Assigned.
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> Name: Robert Brown
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> Race: Human (lesser)
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> Class: Heaven's Fool (unique)
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> Level: 1 (0%)
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> Rank: E
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> Wealth: 4,902,200 credits
>
>
> Stats:
>
> * Strength - poor
> * Dexterity - below average
> * Vitality - average
> * Constitution - below average
> * Wisdom - feeble
> * Intelligence - below average
> * Will - below average
> * Luck - godly
What was this nonsense? Bob wanted to see numbers. Numbers had a pleasing objectivity to them. 2 was bigger than 1 which was smaller than 3. Numbers communicated certainty; they invited comparisons. Bob wanted to watch his numbers go up as he trained and leveled. This? This was so wishy-washy. He didn’t really know what to take away from it all.
But he understood enough to be pretty offended at those numbers. Strength, sure, he didn’t think he’d ever quite made it inside a gym (awful, smelly places full of mirrors to make you feel bad about yourself). He had worked a desk job. It was the curse of the age. It wasn’t Bob’s fault. But feeble wisdom? Come on, system, that’s a little low isn’t it. Hell, what does wisdom even mean? I took philosophy at uni. You’d think that would have counted for something. But “feeble”, “feeble” felt cruelly low. Bob wondered what the average child scored. Hoping against hope that the answer was not average.
There were two true standouts on the sheet. One: his wealth. Congratulations, you're a millionaire. Bob was a millionaire. And not even one of those barely-scrap-into-the-bracket millionaires. He was the real deal. Just short of five million. It looked like he'd been allowed to keep any winnings in excess of the exit fee. That was a pleasant surprise.
The second standout was his luck stat. Godly luck. Bob felt this was a massive over exaggeration. If anything, he considered himself serially unlucky. The system integration had struck right as he got into the bath. He'd faced three to one odds in the third challenge and one of his adversaries could fly for heaven's sake. This was a conscious jab at his accomplishments. The system was basically undercutting him. Godly luck–read: you just lucked into everything and ought to have been pancaked. And the guy who lucks into everything, never gets any respect.
No respect. Bob rubbed his eyebrows back and shook his head. What was that? Bob had noticed the race line at the top of his status: “Race - Human (lesser).” Who are you calling a lesser human? Bob was slightly above-average height. I don’t know where you get off, calling me lesser. Lesser system, he mumbled to himself. What was it about being all-powerful that made deities so petty?
The whole process had been a shit-show. Where was the legendary power-up? He was supposed to get epic gear, a mythical class and insane magic. Instead he’d been stuck with a joke class and called a lesser human with below average intelligence and feeble wisdom.
It was also hard for Bob to see how his stats would improve over time given the vague wording of his level bonuses. How many token boosts did it take to bring "below average" to "average"? Three, five, ten? Whatever the system decided would be the most annoying. I’m going to die with feeble wisdom aren’t I? Despair fast and despair often.
> Commencing initiation shutdown protocol...
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> Final Grade Assignment complete.
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> Class Assignment complete.
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> Companion Object Assignment complete.
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> Attribute Assignment complete.
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> World Terraform complete.
>
>
> Closing simulation instance...
Guess this is it. Bob tried to prepare himself for the impending teleportation. Naturally he failed. Direction within the simulation didn’t seem to correspond with direction in the target location. So when he was blinked back, he suddenly found himself prone, face up and hovering a few generous inches above his bath. He fell awkwardly, the metal facet jamming itself into the back of his head as water (now quite cold) splashed out of the tub and onto the tiled floor.
His assortment of gathered junk rained down around him, a few remaining apples, the exercise book, pencil case, necklace, spectacles, string, stones and other rubbish. He covered his head just in time to avoid the hail of useless objects. When the onslaught had finished, he spent a minute rubbing the red spot on the back of his head and watched his mud cloak slowly soil the surviving bath water.
Bob stared up, hello, the ceiling had disappeared. Furthermore, it looked like it might be about to rain. Not a light drizzle either. There were black ominous clouds gathering on the horizon. A storm was brewing. And it wasn’t just the ceiling that had gone. The room seemed to have been ripped wholesale out of his apartment and transported somewhere far away. That last message had said something about a world terraform. Bob reached out to the tap. Maybe he still had water. He gave the handle a hopeful turn. No water came out. Yep, that sounds about right.
Bob swallowed. He'd been trying to put it out of his mind. It hadn't worked of course. He'd been telling himself everything would be alright. That he would make it right. But nothing is stronger than doubt. Time to face the inevitable. Time to crush out the last dregs of hope. Bob slowly pulled himself out of the tub. Water dripped down on the already soaking floor. He moved towards the half-open door. It won’t take a moment. Just pull the door back.