Mikella was having the worst day she ever had in her entire life. Not only did she have to save her little sister from potential danger in the real world, but she was also whisked away along with Clara to some strange new world with a man who was a complete stranger to her.

It all felt hopeless, almost as if the world was giving up on her and her little sister. But not only was the man that she found was kind enough to put himself in front of a dangerous knight to protect them, she found out that this place was more like a video game than anything else.

The pack that Zeke discovered was something like the inventory system in most role playing games. Just like an inventory system, it allowed him to take every item he could put his eyes on and just jam it into the pack.

After more experimentation, it was found out that the pack can not only put in anything regardless of their weight and size, but can just be easily taken out with a thought. Thanks to the weird system thing, even Mikella can peer into the pack’s contents with her mind.

It was like someone was delivering information of the bag into her mind, telling her that the axe and sword they put in were there and can be taken out. With a thought, she can pull the sword out of the bag like actual magic.

In this case, it might as well be. There was no other way to explain such a thing other than the system giving them magic powers.

There were three extra packs along with what Zeke took in, so Mikella and Clara had their own packs and tried to put the other pack into one of their own.

Apparently that won’t work. It just kept slamming into something invisible despite there being enough room inside the pack. The weird portal thing won’t show up, but only for the pack. Everything else is fair game.

So, taken over by loot lust, the three took everything they could find in the room–which was nothing. The only thing they did take in was a table, a random chair, some pads put on the chair and that was that. It would be better if they found more weapons, but she expected that was asking too much.

Still, she smiled to see Clara having fun putting the axe into the pack with Zeke’s help, the two laughing like excited children.

Clara has always been a special little girl. Unlike most other brats, Clara had more of a sense to understand her situation. In return, she was always the quiet type, never trying to stand out and make friends.

Her parents could no longer be relied upon, so it was up to her. She had always been there for Clara since she was born, and despite having only being a decade apart, she saw Clara like a daughter.

That’s why she kept Clara close. Thankfully, Zeke was okay with that. She wouldn’t be surprised if he would be upset or annoyed at how clingy she was to Clara. Honestly, despite appearing closer in age to her, he seemed more understanding than she expected.

After taking everything down like bandits, they left the room. Zeke took point while Mikella took a careful step behind him with Clara behind her.

He kept taking glances, always taking first lead no matter how shady the room looked. As they walked across the halls, they reached more doors, and each time he was the one who opened them up first. Some of the doors were as grandiose as the ones with the weapons, but there were others that looked decrepit and old. Dust and grime was everywhere, and she swore she saw cobwebs covering parts of the knob. Zeke opened them either way, figuring that there could be something more they can use thanks to this handy pack.

The more she traveled along like this with Zeke and Clara, the more she really felt like she was absorbed into a video game. Throughout the time spent walking along the large castle hallways, Zeke and Mikella talked about their experiences with video games.

The two only had played video games, though he mentioned he saw streams of those tabletop games like Dungeons and Dragons a lot. She was thankful that he was the type that was more into video games than with girls. She can’t imagine having to deal with some weirdo that would be attracted to her in this situation; or worse, her little sister.

They were currently walking along a corridor, devoid of any doors so far. While it was uneventful, this also meant that there weren’t any potential threats, so she relaxed a little since Zeke seemed to be releasing the tension of his shoulders himself. He didn’t look comfortable holding that heavy looking axe. Then again, she just realized something as she looked at her status screen.

> Name: Mikella Ashton

> Race: Human

> Novice: Level 1

> STR: 6

> DEX: 10

> INT: 5

> SPI: 5

> VIT: 7

> END: 7

> Free Points: 2

Thankfully, she could do this without saying the word ‘status’ aloud. She experimented a bit and found that she can do it with a thought alone, like bringing up a tab without moving the mouse.

She should feel ashamed for this, but she felt proud when she told this to Zeke, gaining the comment that she was, in fact, a damn genius.

This means they can keep quiet while checking up on their information… but exactly what are they looking at here?

Mikella kept staring at her screen, trying to process everything here. If she knew her video games well, then it goes like this.

Her name was obvious, as well as her race. The Novice part was a bit confusing, but she just put it off as it showed that she was Level 1.

Then came these attributes. Strength was pretty obvious, showing how strong she was. Dexterity, she thought, meant how quick or nimble she was.

Being a former gymnast, it was obvious that her Dexterity was this high. Then came Intelligence and what looked like… Spirit? Finally there was Vitality and Endurance.

She knew Intelligence meant how smart she was, but seeing it this low compared to Dexterity was just insulting.

True, but still insulting.

That left Spirit, Vitality, and Endurance. She expected Vitality to be important for Health or hit points in video games, though she can’t tell since there’s no indicator like it would be in other games. Endurance was probably showing how hardy and durable she is when lasting long treks. Then there was Spirit. Was that something for magic? She honestly can’t tell.

Now she was curious at what stats Zeke had. She turned to him who kept glancing around. He was keeping a steady pace, making her grateful that he isn’t the type to just charge in and leaving them behind.

“Zeke,” Mikella whispered, making him flinch. He turned back, a widened look in his eyes.

“Yeah?”

She didn’t notice at first, but it was clear Zeke wasn’t used to talking with other people. She figured he wasn’t comfortable talking to women. She sometimes met guys that were awkward around women, often getting shy or demure.

But Zeke didn’t seem like that. He just seemed… frightened, somehow. She wasn’t the best at social cues, but she can tell if someone had a problem with her. Thankfully, Zeke wasn’t the type to let that get into his head. If anything, he’s trying to do everything a man would do in this type of situation.

He can be manly however he wants. As long as Clara’s out of danger, she’ll reciprocate. Better yet that he seemed like a nice dude.

“Sorry,” She apologized. “I didn’t mean to scare you. I just wanted to know… what are your stats like?”

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Suddenly, his eyes seem to glow in total interest. At first she thought it was her imagination, because his face somehow seemed to glow as well as he spoke quietly but candidly.

“My physical stats are six and less, except Dexterity at seven. My intelligence and Spirit are nine and ten respectively, though.”

Mikella’s eyes widened at that. For a grown man, his physical stats being that low except for Dexterity seemed surprising. But after a closer look, she can imagine that Zeke is the type to be a nerd rather than a jock. If anything, Mikella has been the jock since she was training, so that explains her lack of mental stats but a nice even number between her physical stats.

But what surprised her the most was that his Spirit was as high as her Dexterity. She trained as a gymnast for many years, and it could only go up that high. Perhaps ten is an incredibly high number for her level.

But what does it mean to have a high Spirit stat? What did Zeke do to have that much? Is he more thoughtful or something? He certainly doesn’t seem like he was all at peace like some monk at a temple, that’s for sure.

“My mental stats are all five,” Mikella said, sounding a little embarrassed to admit that. “My Strength is six, and both Vitality and Endurance are seven. My Dexterity is the same as your Spirit at ten.”

Zeke gave a low whistle. “That’s impressive. Do you train?”

“I trained for gymnastics,” Mikella admitted. She, childishly, took pride in that. “Even competed a little.”

“Competed?” Zeke asked, shocked. “Whoa, that’s awesome. You won, like, trophies or something?”

“I-I won third place, but it really wasn’t impressive,” Mikella said, feeling her cheeks going on fire. She was proud, but suddenly being praised so earnestly blindsided her.

“But still, that’s amazing. I never won any competition before, so that’s pretty kickass,” Zeke said, but he quickly put his hand over his mouth in reaction. “S-Sorry…”

“Mmh? What for?”

“Well, I mean…” Zeke glanced over at Clara, who was still hiding behind her leg. “I-I didn’t mean to curse.”

“Oh,” Mikella nodded in understanding, then she wryly smiled. “Don’t worry. She heard worse, so you can curse. Besides, it's not like it matters since she’ll probably curse later on anyways.”

Mikella knew that cursing in front of children would be bad for child upbringing, but Clara has indeed heard a lot worse from their parents.

All it matters is that Clara grows up to be a respectable young woman. That’s all that matters, even if she might have a sailor’s mouth someday.

“She heard worse?” Zeke asked in surprise, trepidation in his voice. Then he shrugged slightly, seemingly out of instinct. “If you say so. I’ll still probably try to avoid it, though.”

“I won’t hold you to that,” Mikella shook her head. “Anything you say is fine. Still, I’ll appreciate it if you can still be careful.”

Despite the situation, she needed to remember that Zeke is still a stranger. He doesn’t need to hear their entire backstory, especially about Clara. That was too much drama even for her, and she usually has friends to gabble with.

Thankfully, Zeke didn’t probe any further as the light in his eyes returned as he asked her. “So this means that you’re more of a fighter type… what kind of weapon do you normally use in games?”

“Huh?” Mikella asked. She was dumbstruck at the sudden question. But now that she thought about it, a sense of giddiness entered her chest as she responded as honestly as she could. “Well, it depends on the game, but I guess I’m more of a hit first and ask questions later kind of gal? I don’t really like putting focus into the mechanics and all that… I didn’t have the time to go down that far, I guess.”

“That makes sense,” Zeke nodded. “Sometimes I just don’t have the energy to do even that after work, even though it’s my favorite thing to do in games.”

Zeke wryly smiled, and Mikella could only agree with a smile in return. She heard horror stories about people so tired from work that they just slept afterwards to regain as much as they could. It was even worse for people with kids to feed.

She was afraid of what to do when she took Clara in for herself and ran from her home. She knew she had to find a job at some point, but before that could even start, she was whisked away here to some far away place with knights trying to kill them.

“But whenever I do have the time, I always like optimizing for good builds whenever I can. As long as it’s fair and doesn’t use any exploitation. That just takes the fun out, I think.”

Zeke went on, entering into his own world. The way he spoke about his favorite pastime was something she expected a guy would. But despite the situation, she found it rather endearing.

“Oh, right…” Zeke noticed his rambling, his cheeks blushing like mad. “T-That doesn’t matter. What matters is that if you have a high Dexterity, you should be using lighter weapons instead.”

“So I can move faster, right?” Mikella offered, getting him to nod. Still, she cocked her head. “But won’t it be better for me to focus on more damage than speed?”

She wasn’t quite sure how this goes. She knew the faster and stronger, the better. But the thing was, which was better? Being faster means not getting caught, but being stronger puts aside the need to dodge if all you need to do is just hit them in one go.

“I’m not sure…” Zeke grimaced, going through the same problem in his head. “Unlike in video games, there’s really nothing here that’s holding us back. Usually, you follow certain rules in games since it limits what you can do outside of combat. But this is the real world… or maybe not. Either way, I don’t think we need to focus too hard on min-maxing.”

“Min-maxing…?” Mikella raised a brow.

“Uuh, not focusing too hard on increasing damage,” Zeke tried to explain. She nodded at that, understanding it.

In other words, don’t think too hard and just focus on what you can do. She can do that. In fact–that’s her specialty.

“I kinda wish I knew magic, though. With my stats, it’d probably be easier than using this stupid axe…”

Zeke held up his axe, almost with a grunt. His face creased as he gripped the shaft tightly, almost unbearably so.

“Why not use another weapon?” Mikella asked. If she remembered right, his five Strength wouldn’t really help, and as far as she knew, axes were notoriously heavy to use.

“I figured if you use a sword, it’ll be easier for you. I can just hit it hard with the axe. And who knows if magic even exist right now?” Zeke shook his head. “I’ll keep it for now.”

“Why not switch weapons with me then?” She asked, but Zeke quickly shook his head.

“Not a good idea. I don’t want you to fight with an enemy with Clara beside you. It’s better if you stay far off and strike when you can. Besides that, your high Dexterity also helps with balance, so maybe that’s why I didn’t get my head blown off from your sword.”

Mikella grimaced at the thought. She really felt bad for almost piercing his head. At the time, she could only see the knight trying to tackle Zeke from behind.

But now that he put it like that, she did feel that the sword was easy to handle. That was probably due to her high Dexterity.

It was also better that she would use the sword, a long blade capable of maneuvering everywhere. He really thought this through.

“There is something else. Do you see the free points under all those attributes?” Zeke asked, prompting her to check them out herself.

“Hey, yeah…” Mikella muttered. “Can we actually use them?”

This would mean she can actually increase her stats. It isn’t just some upgrade in a video game; it’s basically modifying her real body.

If she put more points into Strength, would she get stronger? What’s gonna happen if she keeps putting points into her already high Dexterity? She could already bend enough for her head to pop below her legs to make a bridge with her abdomen; would increasing it make it go even farther…?

She shivered at the thought. She liked being bendy, but not enough to become a freak of nature. She wasn’t exactly planning on joining a circus or something.

But then, where did they come from? Wouldn’t they normally show after leveling up? She only just got the status after defeating the knight. She didn’t level up yet–Then again, perhaps that’s what happens when the system gets them initialized?

That pain alone should definitely be worthy of way more free points than this. That pain was even worse than all her training sessions combined into a single night.

“Looks like it,” Zeke remarked, bringing her attention back to him. “If the worst happens, I’ll put points into Strength and help out. But I’m gonna keep these points for now until we know better. Or maybe it might be better to put it into Vitality or something…”

Mikella’s eyes widened at that. If she put points into that, would that make her healthier? If she had over a hundred points or something, would she be immortal?

Now that was interesting. Then again, she shivered as a horrid thought ran through her head.

“That’s probably not a good idea,” Mikella’s face blanched at the idea. “If we get hit, it’d just mean more suffering… Maybe we need to focus on just making sure not to get hit?”

Zeke understood her immediately, his face paling slightly as he nodded. “Good point. Then I’m keeping the points for later. What about you?”

“Me…?” Mikella asked, now unsure. It would perhaps be better to just increase her Strength in the end. She’s gonna need power if she needs to survive the incoming adventure.

But all she wants is to go home, to take care of Clara and give her a place to stay. She can’t stay here forever, right? If that was the case, perhaps increasing Endurance would help her stay aloft to get out as soon as possible.

In the end, she decided to take Zeke’s route and keep her points. After saying as such, the two went on, having a firmer grasp on their situation. For now, they need to get out of here. And more importantly…

“Sissy…” Clara spoke up for once, a grimacing look on her roundish face. “I’m hungry…”

The worst has come. They don't have any food to eat.