Max woke to light, laying on a white bench in a white room, with white walls, a white floor and a white ceiling. Noticeably absent was a white door, or any other method to leave. Nor were there any chairs or tables, or any other furnishing but the bench he lay on.
He perked up though, taking it as a very good sign. He had done it! He had undertaken isekai, and arrived in a new world. He had achieved his dreams. He was where he was meant to be. Ultimate power was now in his grasp!
The pain had gone as well, fading like a bad memory. Another added bonus.
Of course, the lack of anyone to greet him was mildly annoying. Where was the System? It was meant to be there to greet him. Even so, it couldn’t put him out of his good mood. So he waited. And waited. And waited some more. Finally, even his, admittedly limited, patience began to wear thin and, annoyed, he called out.
“Um, hello? Anyone there? I’ve arrived.”
A disembodied male voice boomed out loud throughout the room.
“Max Masters! You have been chosen….”
“Skip,” Max interrupted.
There was a pause, a silence, before the voice spoke again. “I’m sorry, what?” It sounded less sure of itself, perplexed by the interruption.
“We can skip all that part,” Max said, speaking to the empty room. “You have been chosen, yada yada, you are needed for a quest of great importance, yada yada. Look, I’ve heard it all before. Let's just skip to the juicy stuff.”
Another pause and then a figure materialised in the room, a slightly harried-looking dark-haired man with a permanent frown creased across his brow, holding a stack of papers. He was not at all what Max had expected; why he appeared uncertain and overworked. “I had a great long speech to give you,” the System said sulkily.
“Look, I’m in a bit of a hurry here,” Max told him. “I know that technically time doesn’t exist for us here, but I’d like to get a move along. You can save the speech for the next person who comes along. I’m sure they will appreciate it. Actually, come to think of it, what held you up so long? I was waiting here for ages. I must say the service was not what I was expecting.”
“I was dealing with another customer, okay?” the System told Max. “He was being reincarnated as a loaf of bread and it all was a bit tricky to arrange.”
“A loaf of bread?” Max asked, perking up. “That’s awesome! I so want to read that book when it comes out.”
Again confusion sowed on the face of the System, unsure just what to make of Max and his reaction. “Wait, you think that is a good thing? I’m not sure I get it myself. Surely they’d just get eaten?”
“What type of bread was it?” Max asked.
“Fruit loaf."
Max nodded sagely, smiling widely. “Well, there you have it then, that is cultivated bread. They are in no danger.”
The System sighed, shuffling its feet. “I’ll have to take your word for it.”
“Look,” said Max, “You aren’t entirely what I expected. You seem to be lacking certain knowledge and understanding that I would expect of the System.”
“Okay, you’ve got me,” the System replied, shoulders dropping. “It has all gotten a bit busy and crazy around here of late and I was promoted to fill in for a while. I’m making a dreadful mess of it. I normally deal with slime. They don’t expect much and are easy to deal with. Occasionally one wants to be an insect but normally they are happy to continue being slime. You wouldn’t believe some of the things I’ve had to deal with since filling in.”
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“I would. I’ve read the one about the fridge and the washing machine. Talk about an odd couple. Not to mention the one about the car that ate the bridge. I’m not going to lie; I teared up at the end of it.”
“None of this makes any sense,” the stand-in-System wailed.
Max grinned broadly, skinny chest puffing out. “Give it some time. You’ll get used to it.”
“I sincerely hope not.”
“Anyway, hand me over the manuals and I can get out of your way.”
“The manuals? What manuals?”
“The ones that go into all the options that are available to me. You know, the races, classes, feats, powers or whatever it is that is used in this system. Even the obscure options that were patched in later. I want to see everything available to me before I make any decisions.”
“It’d be easier if you just chose to be a dark elf sorcerer like everyone else,” the stand-in-System replied petulantly.
“Nope. I want to study the options first.”
“Fine,” the stand-in-System sighed. A large pile of manuals fell to the floor, a pile almost as tall as Max was, appearing out of nowhere with a loud thump. “Enjoy. Call me when you are ready. Meanwhile, I have to deal with…” he consulted a memo, “....a pigeon. Great. Just great. As if things couldn’t get worse.” With that, the stand-in-System vanished from sight.
“Thanks,” Max called out and then grinned as he looked at the pile of manuals. He rubbed his hands together, then adjusted his glasses. It was turning out better than he had expected. He had access to all of the options, even the most obscure ones, and the time to study them thoroughly. In there somewhere, there were bound to be exploits, loopholes, cheats and the like that he could make use of. There always were. It just paid to hunt for them and not just choose the first thing that came to mind. Most were too impatient to put in that much effort. No, if there was one thing that This Time I’ll Definitely Obtain Happiness had taught him, well, except for that other thing, it was that if you looked hard enough you could find a bunch of F-Tier choices that no one would normally take, but combined they turned into an S-Tier choice. And that was what he wanted to hunt down.
He picked up the top manual from the pile, opened it and started to read.
“Behold, in the aftermath of the War of the First Evening of the First Day, the gods did look down upon the emptiness, and, lo, they decided to…”
Max tossed the book aside. Background lore. A whole book of it. Unimportant. After all, who actually read the background notes or even the quests? It just got in the way of levelling up. The second manual was little better than the first, and it wasn’t until he got to the third one that he made progress.
The Races and People of the Inner Lands of the Elder World.
At first it was mere fluff, but as he flicked through the pages, it started to get into the crunch, the mechanical details of the races, their bonuses and, thankfully, their limited flaws. Flaws were bad. Bonuses were good. Had not The Eldest Teacup Brings Enlightenment taught him that?
The stand-in-Sytem had mentioned that dark elf sorcerers were a popular choice, so he checked up on them, out of curiosity, to see why people went with them.
Dark Elf
Moody and gloomy, the Dark Elves of Yvestra’al’alan’why’nynge are an indolent people, who value poetry, miniature painting, debates on the best types of tea, and the art of fencing. And blood sacrifice.
Statistical Modifiers: Agility +5, Nimbleness +5, Intellect +5, Grace +5, Prowess +5, Brawn -5
Bonus Traits; Mana: +5%, Mana Regen: +5%, Rapier Critical Chance: +5%
Racal Traits: Long-Lived, Night Vision, Disease Resistance.
Okay, he could see why they would make a good sorcerer, and one who could handle a rapier as well should the need arise, but it really wasn’t enough. And just Long-Life? Pfft, that was for those who didn't have plans and didn’t try hard enough. Let them live a few more years; he was going to achieve immortality.
Discounting the choice of Dark Elves, Max went digging into the books, to find the really interesting options.