Tanuki remembered the class token he got from the gift box.

“Right, I should probably check that,” but when he reached into his pocket, he found nothing.

Tanuki wore three pieces of clothing. One was a pair of pink slippers he bought cheap at a flea market. Another was his light blue shorts. Lastly, he wore his favourite black hoodie. It was his streetwear; he would not leave the house without it. Two white laces hung from his hood-piece, and pockets decorated his belly.

Those pockets were supposed to hold his items.

They were empty.

For the next fifteen minutes, Tanuki ran around the field panicking that his items had fallen out of his pocket and now they would surely roll off the field. Then, an idea came to mind.

“Do I have a game-like inventory?” The question immediately found its answer, which made Tanuki feel all the dumber.

With clear focus, he could make an interface appear that was not bound to the Gaia Core. This was his personal stat screen, which displayed many things, such as the status of his body and information about his class, equipment, and most importantly, items. He accessed three different item slots that worked as small pocket dimensions. When Tanuki chose to grab his healing potions, a small portal appeared next to him and reaching into it revealed the desired object.

“Cool,” he said nonchalantly but secretly fanboyed over the thought of his very own pocket dimension. It was awesome. And it made him feel excited about the systems.

[ Name: Hachiro Tanuki ]

[ Race: Human ]

[ Class: --- ]

[ Level: 0 ]

[ Modifiers: --- ]

And on the other side…

[ --- Stats --- ]

[ HP: 7/7 ]

[ Strength: 6 ]

[ Agility: 4 ]

[ Intelligence: 10 ]

This was a fairly simple way of keeping track of stats and Tanuki felt somewhat disappointed. Nonetheless, he found great pride in having high intelligence, even though he knew not the human average.

With that seen, everything new had been exhausted. There were no more windows to open, nor things to observe.

Except for one.

Unauthorized duplication: this narrative has been taken without consent. Report sightings.

Tanuki opened his inventory and took the [F-Rank Class Token]. As observed before, it was a simple wooden token with three weapons carved into it. A sword, a bow, and a staff.

“Warrior, archer, and mage. Strength, agility, and intelligence. Based on the name, this token is one of many different qualities. F-Rank tokens must be the worst out there, and I’m guessing they gave me one on purpose. Starting at the bottom will make me appreciate all the more when I gain higher quality class tokens.”

He placed it in his palm and scratched his head.

“Now, how do you activate?”

He had a hunch of what to do. With the flick of his thumb, he sent the token soaring through the air, where it spun round and round… before falling back into Tanuki’s palm.

For what side was up, it did not matter. Before Tanuki could peak it, the token blew up with light and flew as dust between his fingers. As if tiny little stars, the dust particles took the form of constellations and manifested images in a mist of stardust.

Thus, three choices presented themselves.

The first constellation was that of a man with a sword.

[ Swordbearer ]

[ Quality: F ]

[ Levels: 3 ]

[ Description: A swordbearer’s duty is to carry the blade. This class hones basic weapon combat with shortswords while improving the bearer’s strength. ]

This was a familiar concept for Tanuki. Good old warrior class. Though reliable, he brushed it aside. He knew his body was weak and his opponent could easily overpower him in close combat. Furthermore, it brought him closer to the thing he feared most.

Pain.

He trembled at the thought of badly blocking an attack and in turn losing a finger. Never in his life had he experienced an injury greater than a papercut. He valued safety above all, which meant that any time he could have experienced physical trauma, be it in PE lessons or everyday life, he was too paranoid to be caught off-guard and so evaded pain.

He chose to observe the second option.

[ Bowbearer ]

[ Quality: F ]

[ Levels: 3 ]

The description of this class closely resembled that of the swordbearer’s with the slight difference that this taught archery and improved agility.

The final option caught Tanuki’s interest.

[ Staffbearer ]

[ Quality: F- ]

[ Levels: 3 ]

[ Description: A staffbearer is an inexperienced mage who works to learn the secrets of spellcasting. This class hones the user’s intelligence and grants entrance to the school of spellcasting. ]

Magic. Tanuki ignored everything but that singular word, magic. If he could choose to cast spells, he would pick that any day of the week. It was a ranged class and as such better than the swordbearer class. Also, flashy spells looked way better than regular arrows, thus it gained the upper hand over the bowbearer class.

[ Are you sure you want to choose “Staffbearer”? ]

[ Yes ] – [ No ]

“Yes,” answered Tanuki.

The constellations burned away and became one with the sky. The stars of the staffbearer constellation shone brightly and flew at Tanuki. The particles entered his body and spread through his veins. Surprisingly, when it was done, Tanuki felt no change.

[ Class unlocked: “Staffbearer” ]

[ Special Reward: “Wooden Staff” has been added to inventory ]

Tanuki summoned the staff into his hand. It was a thin piece of wood about the same size as him. It felt nice to the touch, a few swings and he already got the gist of it figured out.

“Now, how do I make it cast spells?”

His first idea was to swing the weapon and shout the name of the desired effect. Of course, the first thing he shouted was ‘Fireball’ which promptly did nothing. He continued by shouting generic spell names, sometimes adding the word minor or lesser to the beginning in case that would help produce an effect.

Ten minutes later, not even a sparkle.

Once more he sat down in the grass and held his staff against the sun. Its thing shaft cast barely any shadow.

“Come on, don’t leave me hanging,” Tanuki whined.

A thought came to him. Maybe he should check the weapon’s description?

Good idea, but his system did not let him observe the staff. Indeed, he could try to do so, but the text that appeared only showed question marks. There was some way to appraise items that he had yet to figure out.

But for now, that seemed to be it. Everything he could see or do has been seen and done. There were no more items or interfaces to discover.

He took another long look at his staff, swung it around a couple more times, and then pushed himself up from the grass.

It was time to face the first wave.