Shae
Shae went back to her bed and buried her face in her knees as she cried.
Changing her name in her Status has been one thing, but really looking at herself and not completely hating what she saw was another.
She felt like she was losing herself.
She was still going to keep the name and pronouns, it was just the grief that was hitting her again.
With a sigh, she eventually got up.
I need to talk to someone.
Of her teammates, only Melo wasn’t staying in the dorms. He did have one, but it was rarely used. It wasn’t him she wanted to find, though, but Zena. She had been nice so far, and was also the one who had offered to let her vent to her.
She knocked on Zena’s door, hoping she was inside. When Zena opened the door, she breathed out a sigh of relief.
“Shae? What’s wrong?” Zena asked.
“Is that offer to vent still open?” Shae asked.
“Yeah, of course. Come in.”
Shae entered a room that was identical to her own. The main differences were the spear leaning on the wall in the corner and the books on her desk. Shae's desk had lots of study material on it.
Zena told her, “It’s either the chair or the bed to sit on, so just pick whichever you prefer.”
She chose the bed, leaving the chair for Zena. The space between the two wasn’t even a meter.
Zena waited patiently for Shae to figure out what she wanted to say.
A couple minutes later, she spoke, “So I mentioned that I’m not from this world, but there’s another personal issue I’ve been dealing with on top of everything that that already brings…”
Shae then told the story of how she died, woke up in a new body, and then her gender identity began being erased against her will. She explained how she had mostly accepted the change by this point, but it was the sense of loss that was affecting her right now.
By the end of it, Zena was sitting next to her and rubbing her back while Shae leaned on her.
“That’s really rough, Shae. I wish there was something more I could do to help.”
“This is enough. Keeping it hidden away felt worse.”
“Are you going to get reshaped again?”
“I plan to, but it’s going to be a long time before I can afford it. A mercenary trainee doesn’t make much money, and one of the reasons I want to return to Earth is so I can bring my sister here so she can get reshaped. Which means I’ll need to save up to get her reshaping done before my own.
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“I also talked to the flesh mage currently in the city, just to try to get a sub-skill for it, but he refused and asked for an exorbitant amount of money. I’ll try again at some point.
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“Anyway, what Earth has just doesn’t compare to flesh magic. And like I said, I’m adapting to this. By the time I get the chance to change my body back, I might not want to anymore.
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“There’s also something else that’s been on my mind recently, and especially today. If I go back to Earth, to the life I had there, I’ll be stuck working crappy jobs I hate again. I’ll have to hold back significantly in everything I do.
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“Despite my circumstances, I’ve really enjoyed this world. The spars and today’s fight with the badger only emphasized just how much I would be losing.
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“I don’t know that I’ll definitely decide to stay here, but it’s a really appealing option. And stats and magic add so much to everything else.
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“I think it mostly depends on my sister. I know she’s been pretty miserable where she is, probably significantly more so after I vanished. I can tell she would be happier here even if she didn’t get reshaped.”
“It certainly does seem like you were having fun.”
Shae nodded. “Yeah. Now that the dysphoria’s gone for the most part, I’m beginning to really enjoy things.”
They sat in silence for a couple minutes, still hugging each other.
Zena asked, “Do you want to get something to eat?”
“Oh yeah, I was going to do that myself, but got distracted.”
She smiled. “Let’s go, then.”
———
Three weeks later…
Shae stepped backward with her right foot while twisting her body, avoiding Konial’s sword strike. It was a training blade, meaning it was blunt, but it would still hurt if she was hit by it.
While the sword was passing her, she punched his forearm, throwing off his current move.
From behind, Zena’s spear struck her right in the center of her back, the blunt blade pushing her forward rather than piercing her.
Konial swung at her again. Instead of moving out of the way, she moved toward it, knowing that the man had cast a lightning spell through it this time.
The unexpected maneuver caught him off guard, and he instead retreated back a step. Zena’s spear was coming for her again, but she was able to dodge this time, and Konial used that moment to finally land a hit on her, striking her side with his sword.
Abruptly, he and Zena both jumped backward away from her.
Zena called out, “Shae!? What happened!?”
They didn’t seem to be fighting anymore, so she relaxed. Tilting her head in confusion, she asked, “What do you mean? I was hit by his sword, but I don’t think I could’ve dodged it?”
“Your eyes… They were glowing red, but now they’re not.”
“Huh? Why would my eyes glow?”
Cara, who had been watching over their spar, told her, “Check your Status.”
Melo and Tria stopped their spar on the other side of the room and came over to see what was going on.
Shae did feel a notification now that Cara had pointed it out, so she checked it.
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Your [Mental] sub-skill has reached 100% adaptation, and has changed from [Mental]: 100%, to [Mental]: Level 1.
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Fucking finally! Guess that means Shay as I knew him is gone for good now, too…
She pushed those thoughts aside and checked her Status to see the change in more detail.
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NEW! [Mental Adaptation]:
[Active]: You may create an additional mind to further augment your information processing. At lower levels, it will not function to the same degree as your main mind.
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[Passive]: This sub-skill allows you to handle change as it comes, in whatever form it may take.
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Oh, that’s pretty cool! And the Active and Passive abilities switched places for some reason. I guess that means it’s a real Skill now instead of just a resistance or something?
At long last, she changed her Main sub-skill from [Mental] to [Space].
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[Mental]: Level 1
[Space]: 7.2% (Main, 50 days remaining.)
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Shae smiled. One step closer, Vicky.
Looking at her teammates and trainer, she explained, “My [Mental] sub-skill reached 100% and changed from that to level 1. And the Active ability now lets me create a temporary additional mind.
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“And since I reached that goal, I changed my main sub-skill to space. So I guess we’ll see how well mental magic works for me now.”
Shae still hadn’t told anyone but Zena the real reason for focusing on [Mental] first. She didn’t think any of them would particularly care—understanding of gender and care for trans people were much better here—but it still felt like a personal thing.
She had simply told them that it was her biggest magical edge in combat at the moment, which had been true, at least up until a moment ago. She would have to experiment.
Cara commented, “So that’s what it was. Zena, spar with her for a minute. Shae, keep your spell going the entire time if you can.”
For the first couple weeks of Shae’s training, she had been friendly with her teammates, but hadn’t exactly gotten close to them.
Her anguish over her situation and her focus on only getting home and not enjoying life in the present had been sucking the life out of her.
After having that talk with Zena, that barrier was removed, and she started spending time with her teammates beyond just what her training required of her.
Zena was the one she spent the most time with, and also the only one she had been alone with. The other times had been group outings for doing something fun together.
A side effect of Shae and Zena becoming friends was that they pushed each other more when they sparred. This was the reason Cara choose Zena without even a second thought for testing Shae’s changes in magic.
Shae activated her spell again, this time with the intention of creating an additional mind instead of only increasing her processing speed.
The sensation was odd. It felt as if another part of her mind was having thoughts separate from herself, and that both her minds were instantly sharing their information with the other, without the need to actually think it.
So basically, I can multitask now.
The caveat to using her Active ability was that she had just halved its power. The boost in processing speed that her Active ability gave her was now lessened.
Nothing else to do but get used to it.
Shae asked the room, “Are my eyes glowing now?”
Zena replied, “Yeah, they’re bright red again.”
Is the fact that I think that’s actually cool because of my [Mental] sub-skill, or is it just me? I guess it doesn’t matter. I wonder what colors my eyes will become with other fully-adapted sub-skills?
Shae and Zena’s spar began, and the changes were immediately obvious to her.
Because of changing her Main sub-skill to something else, her processing speed was slower, and she could feel it. She was still magically weak, however, so it wasn’t all that large of a difference. But it was enough to make her feel slightly sluggish.
The sluggishness was slightly made up for with her second mind, though. She put it to work manipulating what little space mana was around, trying to redirect Zena’s attacks by shrinking or increasing the amount of space in specific places. It did barely anything at all, but it was good practice.
She would’ve been able to use space magic in the middle of fighting with her body anyway, but the additional brainpower the ability afforded her allowed for slight changes in tactics and decisions on the fly.
It reminded her of her martial arts days. She would spar with someone, and sometimes, there would be another person off to the side giving advice as she fought.
When Cara ended the spar, Shae stepped back and smiled, her eyes returning to their usual dark color.
Well, this just confirmed it for me. I’ve only scratched the surface of what my Skill can really do, but I enjoy it a lot. I want to live in this world.
The team had gone on a few missions since that first one, so Shae had experienced more real fights against monsters. She had received some kind of injury in all of them.
They hadn’t been anything serious, but she had experienced what it felt like to take hits that might’ve caused her to fall had she been alone. And she was fine with that; enjoyed it, even. Not the pain itself, but the thrill. She had entertained the thought that her mental sub-skill had made her like that, but that was just what she enjoyed.
She was also enjoying her time more because no one from her team had left. More than a month had passed, meaning people were free to try another team if they wished, but everyone had stayed.
Good friends and good fights. That sounds so lame, like a cheesy motto or something.
Cara stated her observations, “It was a marginal difference, but you were slightly slower with some of your actions than when the sub-skill had been your Main one. But you also tried a couple strategies that you wouldn’t have otherwise.
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“You’ve mostly been using that ability only during moments you needed the boost it gave you to conserve mana, but with the addition of a second mind, you might be needing to use it more often.”
Shae nodded in agreement. “I was thinking the same. Once it’s at a higher level and can function more beyond just this small amount, it’ll be really useful.
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“Is there a maximum level, by the way?”
“100. Unlike your main level that can indefinitely increase your stats, Skills and sub-skills all have that hard limit. The limit just means you’re capable of bringing out its full potential. What it does not mean is that you already know how to do every possible thing the Skill is capable of."
Shae then continued sparring with everyone, including Cara. The change to her [Mental] sub-skill was exciting, and so was being able to increase her [Space] adaptation twice as fast now.
Her leveling speed had been rapid so far, even all the way up to her current level of 43, though it had been slowing down the past dozen or so.
The earliest levels were the easiest to raise, and she also had an advantage in that she already had plenty of sparring experience, meaning she didn’t just get hit and was then out of the fight, she could go for longer and get more from it.
Her bloated base Body stat had been a boon in the earliest levels, but she hadn’t been putting as many points into it, so her stats had relatively evened out.
Since becoming a mercenary, she had gotten more information about whether she should be putting most of her points into only one or two stats, and had learned that in her case, focusing on a single stat would be a disadvantage.
Her magic was weak, so it actually made sense to avoid putting points into her Flow for now, but she didn’t want to go that far, so she instead just kept things even.
Once she had more spells available and at higher levels, then focusing on Flow a little more would make more sense. Still, she needed to get her space magic up as soon as possible.
Something she had found to be a little confusing was that Body and Dexterity both contributed to Health, Stamina and Mana, but Flow only contributed to the Mana.
This was apparently because some people, monsters and Skills were much more on the physical side of things rather than the magical.
Magic needed to integrate with the body to work well, but the body didn’t inherently require magic. Worlds without magic were evidence of this.
But mana was another aspect of life itself, and it allowed for an unimaginable amount of growth and variation to occur. It prolonged lives and helped people heal faster, even if they didn't have a healing Skill.
How fast a person's natural healing rate is depends on their Body stat. The higher it is, the faster a person heals. The effect is still minimal in comparison to a healing Skill, but it is still prominent enough to be noticeable.
———
Shae Williams
Level: 43
Points: 0
Body: 69
Dexterity: 67
Flow: 64
Health: 168 / 205
Stamina: 126 / 203
Mana: 81 / 196
Skills:
[Adaptation]
[Adaptation] Sub-skills:
[Earth]: 1%
[Fire]: 4.2%
[Healing]: 48.8%
[Light]: 16.4%
[Lightning]: 11.3%
[Mental]: Level 2
[Pain]: 49.4%
[Plant]: 19.2%
[Poison]: 1.1%
[Psychic]: 7.6%
[Space]: 7.3% (Main, 50 days remaining.)
[Water]: 7.1%
[Wind]: 16.0%
———
Shae had learned that the System could be customized somewhat to the user’s wishes when she changed her name, so she separated her sub-skills by letter. It had been getting a little congested.
English was her native language, so that’s what her Status displayed in, but she could also change it to Tiirve or Spanish if she wished.
It could even be read to her in a voice that only she could hear or visually display in only her vision rather than just the words appearing in her head. The System was accessible to everyone in one way or another.
Other than Skills like Zena’s [Life Sense], which could sense the type of mana and roughly the amount of power, there was no way for anyone to get any more information than that about what a person had unless the person told them theirself. And people could hide their mana, which hid their power, so even Skills like that weren’t foolproof.