Nick closed his eyes to shut out the bewildering display. When he opened them again, he was standing somewhere else, relieved that his latest journey between worlds had been brief compared to his other experiences.

He looked around to take in his surroundings, only to discover that he was inside what appeared to be some manner of museum, gazing upon a curated collection. The floor was tiled in elegant black marble, with rich swirling patterns in bands of azure and cream. The domed ceiling was interspersed with great glass panels, revealing a vivid bronze sky, striated with wispy copper clouds.

Although it was a fascinating spectacle, Nick was too worn out to appreciate the view. All he really wanted was to claim his reward and then sleep for a week. With that goal firmly in mind, he lowered his gaze to examine the enclosure.

The first thing that leapt out at him was the sheer scale of the place, his eyes running across rows of elegant display cases that filled a space bigger than a football field. While the room was undeniably impressive, he wasn’t quite sure what he was looking at or what he was supposed to do, but it all became clear when a System message appeared before his eyes.

To claim your reward, choose one item from the vault. The items on display are the equivalent of those contained within gold exploration reward chests or higher. A description of each offering and its properties is posted near their display. You have one hour to explore the vault and make your selection, otherwise a reward will be chosen for you at random.

Gold reward chests or better? When the meaning of those words came crashing home, adrenaline poured into Nick’s bloodstream, shocking him back to full alertness as his heart began to race. It seemed that this was an even better opportunity than he had realized, and it was vital that he made the most of it. Crystalline, arctic clarity descended across his mind, honing his thoughts to a razored edge, as Nick dusted off his gaming filters to assist him in making his selection.

When he saw the countdown clock floating in the periphery of his vision, he knew that he had to work fast. He only had fifty-seven minutes to choose his prize. To sort through the contents of this gigantic space and claim the reward he had won through weeks of agony and fear, nearly losing his life along the way on numerous occasions.

Although there were thousands of displays, Nick intended to read each and every one of them before he made his decision, or at least as many as he could before time ran out. With not a second to waste, he darted over to the nearest shelf to examine its contents, a brass-rimmed box holding a sky-blue gem resting on a small pillow.

He would have enjoyed taking his time, absorbing the elegant artistry of the collection, had he the luxury of minutes to spare. But as matters stood, he barely even glanced at the item inside the case. Instead, his eyes locked onto the description mounted to the exterior and he started reading as fast as he could.

What he saw almost made Nick pick the item for his reward then and there.

Ability stone (passive)

This stone contains a random, high quality, passive ability that is compatible with your current class.

Warning: the abilities you acquire will influence your options during future class selections.

Nick was shocked to have come across such a great item right from the start. Acquiring a passive ability was something that he had desperately wanted for some time. It would fill a gap in his profile that sorely needed bridging, permanently increasing his capabilities here and now.

He already knew how useful the powers contained within such stones could be. Mana dart had saved his life more times than he could count. It had also helped him acquire his Kineticist class, which he felt was ideally suited for him, even though he hadn’t had an opportunity to take it for a test drive and see what it could do just yet.

But no matter how powerfully the sky-blue stone called to him, Nick would never be the kind of person who made such a critical choice based on impulse alone. Besides, if it was at all possible, he would prefer to choose his ability rather than having one assigned at random, although he strongly suspected that whatever he received from consuming the stone would be helpful during the trial ahead.

He realized that he was overanalyzing his options considering the constraints on his time. He’d already eaten up two minutes while contemplating the stone, so he quickly moved on, darting over to the closest display.

The tale has been taken without authorization; if you see it on Amazon, report the incident.

His next stop was a tall rack holding various weapons, each of which featured the same modification.

High quality modification: Eversharp.

This weapon is incredibly resistant to chipping or breaking. It will repair itself and return to prime condition over time as long as the weapon core remains intact.

Nick was curious to learn more about modifications, weapon cores, and item cores in general. As time was of the essence, he filed the information away in the ‘ponder later’ section of his brain and quickly moved on. While these weapons were masterfully crafted and almost certain to be better balanced than his own blade, he suspected that the foreman’s sword had a comparable modification or something even better, even though the System refused to provide him with the details.

After all, the sword had survived centuries of being locked in a chest with a magic devouring lifeform, before Trell had used it to carve his legacy into raw bedrock. Despite decades of abuse, the weapon still held its edge, and it was impervious to wear and tear as far as Nick could tell. Besides, the battered blade was starting to grow on him. He would prefer to find a way to repair or upgrade it, rather than having to adapt to using a totally new weapon.

All this passed through his mind in the blink of an eye, and he was already moving on to the next offering. He made it to the end of the row without anything catching his interest, rounded the corner, and then moved on to the next set.

He ran past shelves holding potions of antidote in bundles of five and potions of full healing in cases of three. While such consumables were incredibly useful, Nick wanted something that would aid him in the long haul. An item that he could rely on going forward as he faced the dangers that were certain to be lurking within Taltos’s challenge for the fate of the Earth.

He came to a skidding stop as a description caught his eye, pausing long enough to read the listing in full. The tokens sitting on the shelf in front of him were closer to what he was hoping to find. Of greatest interest was a pouch of three tokens that could improve the rarity of any item from basic to common, as well as a single token that would do the same for a common item, raising its rarity to uncommon. He took ten seconds considering the likely results of upgrading his existing gear, before deciding that it wasn’t quite what he was looking for.

It amused Nick to imagine upgrading his bathrobe over time, transforming the fuzzy garment into an epic magic item, but after a quick chuckle he was ready to move on. He might have taken the single token if he knew that he could use it on his sword. But since the blade had been given to him by the ratman foreman rather than being a direct System reward, he had no idea how rare it was or what its modification did. His wand was worth improving as well, but it was too rare and beyond the power of the token to enhance.

Over twenty minutes had passed since he entered the vault. He had accepted the fact that he would never make it to all the displays before the clock hit zero, even if Nick found a way to drastically increase the speed of his perusal. Fortunately, he had come up with a plan to maximize his remaining minutes.

It was time to rely on his gaming background and the thousands upon thousands of hours he had spent staring at item rewards, calculating how they would synergize with hundreds of different abilities and builds. Thus, Nick decided to spend less than five seconds scanning each description he ran past. Not even stopping to think about what the words meant unless something leapt out at him that screamed “OP.”

Nick knew himself well enough to trust his instincts. That his brain would be drawn to the best offerings the moment that he saw them. Worst case scenario, if he ran out of time, he would run back to the first display and choose the passive ability stone.

Now that he had experienced the vault firsthand, he had a better sense of the dynamics at play. He suspected that the wide range of options was both a mechanism for rewarding the quick witted and a trap for the unwary. Being faced with a deluge of choices, having to consider what was lost in passing up each, could paralyze an unprepared mind. The time limit only turned up the heat, making the decision that much harder.

Luckily for Nick, decades of gaming had caused his brain to develop an internal item filter. A process for sorting through screens full of numbers and parameters without having to sift through unimportant details. With a plan in place, he focused on maximizing his speed. He picked a long, straight lane of displays and took off at a dead sprint. He slowed down for a fraction of a second whenever he scanned a new description, bursting back into motion the instant that his eyes reached the bottom of the text.

Shields and armor streaked past in liquid blurs of treated leather and burnished steel. Books and bags, scrolls and stones, merged into an endless procession of treasure. Nick glanced at the clock as he rounded the end of the row and prepared to sprint down the next.

Eighteen minutes left, he grinned. I’m covering way more ground now. This is working. Although he had yet to find anything better than the stone, Nick could tell that his filter wasn’t passing up anything incredible. All the items it turned down were either too weak, too situational, or possessed a finite number of uses.

He needed to find something that would help him scale the power curve. An item that would serve him well here and now as well as in the future, taking the next step along his personal path to power. Something that would give him an edge over the legion of beasts and other hostile entities that were sure to cross his path.

Seven breathless minutes later, his gaze landed on something that made him stop dead in his tracks. Alerted by his subconscious, he carefully reread each word of the description placed below a short sword and round shield forged from sea-blue ore.

Nick broke into a broad grin as he considered the final words. Now we’re talking.