Samantha was a girl in her early twenties. Her job was her hobby, she created art. Whether painting became her hobby normally or inclined by her high [Artistic] and [Ego] attributes, nobody knows.
She was one of the luckiest people in a way. Her job, hobby, and statistics lined up perfectly.
Yawn "Guess I'll turn in for today."
Being an artist in Teakwood means living together with uncertainties. The unfortunate 60 percenter, the lower class, couldn't care less about arts in their lives. Most of the 35 percenter, the middle class, see fine arts as nothing but lies. Only the last 5%, the rich, have enough money and interest to keep feeding the hypes.
The competition is tight. Being as popular as she was, Samantha lost the urgentness of creation. Even without rushing her projects, food still filled her fridge.
"Good night, Vit."
"Meow"
Sam petted her cat before moving him to his bed. Without looking, her hand felt about the wall until it reached the light switch. She plopped onto her bed while her room'slighting system dimmed the light slowly, lulling her into sleep.
Samantha rented two adjacent rooms on the top floor of a high-rise apartment. She lives in one. The other room was a giant empty space she used as her studio. The sheer size of that room made her sloppy, only cleaning it once every other month.
clatter
No matter how sloppy she was, there was no way the room would clatter naturally without any external touch. Yet, the clatter in her studio grew louder and louder.
The producer of the sounds was her latest work. She caught the rumors of Dusk Zele's fight with the monitor lizards' stampede and was inspired. Rather than depicting a gallant figure of warriors facing the beasts, her painting portrayed a bad ending". One where the lizards won and the stampede reached the city.
From that exact painting pulses of shockwaves shook the whole studio resulting in the clattering sounds. After five minutes passed, the pulses stopped, leaving Sam's studio worse than when it started.
---
Understanding [statistics] is hard, even experts agree.
Fully grasping someone's statistics can only be done using a high-tier statistic checker, even if that someone is yourself. Most people living in this world only know around 50% of their statistics in their lifetime.
People instinctively know their several strongest [atributes], but there is no guarantee in that. [Skills] are even harder to comprehend. Some understand parts of their skills catalog instinctively. Some, like Nina, awakened to skills. Most lived their lives not knowing what skills they might have.
Samantha was the third kind of person most of the time. Outside her [Artistics] and base attributes, she didn't understand a thing about her statistics. Even her strongest skill was something she didn't comprehend.
Samantha's works have been especially popular for its realistic view of the world. Her journey to the top of the art world was spectacular, to say the least. For decades no artists managed to reach her level of acclaim, not as young as she was.
The truth behind her painting was her unknown skill, [Colorful Realism]. Her skill has the ability to connect her painting with reality itself. In the beginning, the skill only introduced reality into her painting. As her level grew, she was able to introduce her painting into reality.
That afternoon, monitor lizards appeared inside Teakwood.
---
In the least nice part of the city, a woman was high off of her mind.
EURGH
"Whoa... Haha! I've never seen you, friend."
Most drugs circulated inside the city were based on the "Glowing Poppy", a mutated variant of the Papaver somniferum (breadseed Poppy) species. Those flowers were used for the boosted effects their opium produced.
The produced drugs, street named "Glowing Seeds", act like any opioid for the most part. The drugs attach themselves to the opioid receptors inside someone's neuron system. That boosted endorphin, dopamine, and adrenaline in the user's body. Endorphin inhibits pain while dopamine and adrenaline boost the feeling of happiness and energy level.
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"Glowing seeds" not only had a boosted effect but even more effect. For some reason, the drug affected the neural system assigned to perception regulations, creating hallucinogen-like effects.
"Lizzy~ Hehehe."
She extended her right hand, eager to pet the lizard. Her hand was met with not only rejection but straight-up aggression.
CHOMP
"WAH?" She looked at her missing right arm. "No-"
The lizard bit her chest, ripping the organs out of her body. It took her several pain-free seconds to finally die.
EARGH-
Before the monster could finish its meal, a sword skipped through its neck severing its head.
"..."
Ghost Hero stood there watching as the lizard followed his prey to the other side. Surprisingly, the body of the lizard was gone in a blinding light. Nothing was left from where the body was.
---
Raymond Cyntral is the youngest of four Cyntral children. His last name made him the young man with a chip on his shoulder he was.
Vinne Du Lax was his closest friend. Cyntral separated each of his children when they were young. Each endured a different kind of training to ensure the future of the company. The crushing loneliness of not seeing his siblings was suppressed by Vinne's companionship.
Even after more and more people joined them in college, they were still as close as ever.
"Don't be stubborn! Being all moody like that would tarnish your family's name!"
"Haha, I know. Let's get back to training."
"..."
The training session started by Rain unsurprisingly. It began with her asking Del for advice to grow her skills. She dragged the other people in the group to training closing her ears to many protests.
Outside of Rain, Ray was the only one who was enthusiastic about the whole training. In fact, even when Del couldn't make it, he suggested doing the training by themselves anyway.
EARGH!
However, before the training could truly begin, an old friend of theirs crashed the party.
"Giant Monitor Lizard!"
"How is it here? Escapee? This deep in the city? Maybe someone brought it in? Maybe its nest is here!?"
"Ms. Rain! We need to get out of here!"
"NO!" Ray put himself in front of the lizard.
Both of his hands were holding his sword. His elbows bent, pointing his sword up. The sword was slightly more to his left with its guard elevated right at his face. Posta Frontale (Frontal Guard) or Posta Corona (Crown Guard) is rarely used as a guard you actually hold, rather acting as a transition guard between moves.
"There's six of us! Only one of this beast, we can defeat it right here, right now!"
"Don't be rash, Ray!"
Out of the six, Nina, Konoe, and Ray possessed enough statistics to fight. But Nina was naturally a coward and Konoe's [Backlog] needed proper preparation, leaving Ray as the sole available fighter.
"Vinne, Kren, and Rain, get back! We will finish this quickly!"
"W-what about me!?"
"I don't have anything recorded in my backlog..."
"HIYAAA!"
slice
Ray's attack was shallow. Without abnormally high-leveled attributes or strong skills, cutting through monitor lizard's skin was plain difficult.
EARGH!
The lizard retaliated by biting at Ray's foot which barely got out of the way from its range. Pulling his right leg up, Ray hopped using his left backward for both legs to catch. He assumed the same guard, but even more shaky than before.
Even when the others ran, Ray and Nina stayed. The coward Nina was simply afraid of the consequences of leaving her friends to fend for himself alone. But Ray was different.
Ray had an inferiority complex.
By his age, his first brother, Garrick already a household name in the underworld. Even by that time, he was out of the city connecting the Cyntral with a famous eastern gang.
By his age, his second brother, Eric already entered the corporate world. As if the talent in his brain wasn't enough, Eric was also one of the students of the great elven sage.
By his age, his sister, Ellie was not only a companion, but the lover of Hero Altrius, ridding monsters from the world. Even after the Hero died, she remained a powerful existence rivaled only by their brothers.
What about him? He has no talent beyond normal people, not his brawn, not his brain, not even his experiences in life could cover for what he lacked.
Back when the bandit appeared, the lizard's stampede, even the attack that was happening. All were chances for him to prove to himself that he too worth the name Cyntral.
RRAAGH!
"RAY! NOOOO!"
All the thought disappeared from Ray's mind as the jaw of the beat jumped closer and closer to his head. If he lost a part of his body, maybe the replacement could grant him the talent he so desperately needed. If he managed to survive the attack, that is.
[X-Burn]
A flying kick saved Ray.
"That was close."
"Nina cool ver.! It's been a while!" Rain screamed.
To answer Rain's question on leveling statistics, skills are easier to raise than attributes. To raise your skills level, all you need to do is to trigger them as much as possible. Nina's [X-Burn] defeated the Arthros Queen, but it was still level 2 because the duration she used the skill was too short.
"Get back, I will not let that lizard harm my friends!"
Nina put her hands back and zoomed towards the lizard.
The lizard swiped its tail to deflect Nina's charge. Nina dodged by boosting downward, she took to the sky. She felt more confident in handling her power.
She landed right on top of the lizard, putting its head in between her feet. She placed her right hand at the beast's temple while aiming her left was reaching for the sky.
BOOM!
She fired both hands, killing the lizard without being blown away herself.