I curse myself and my big mouth for suggesting rats as the most common early enemy in video games. Big, black, beady eyes glare at me, and I see contempt reflected back at me. I raise the knife in my hand and feel a strange connection binding my hand to it.
[You have equipped a Dull Kitchen Knife. Attack + 1; Attack: 12→13]
The rat nearest me jumps directly toward Chloe. I intercept and knock it out of the way, scoring its side with my knife. The second attacks my exposed backside, raking me with claws I didn’t realize rats even had. It tears through my shirt like wet paper and attempts to grab hold of me and bite down, but I’m able to shake the bastard off before it sinks into my sides. I take four damage, but still have plenty of strength and anger left.
Chloe tries to tiptoe around me as I’m fighting, most likely to try to get to wherever her mother’s bats are. I slash again at the same rat that I hit before, but it dodges. The other rat runs into my calf, sending me toppling to the ground. I grunt as I fall to my knee.
The damnable rodents prove to be agile, and their small size makes them even more difficult to hit. Trying to hit them seems a foolish endeavor, especially with the low ceilings and clutter all about. Instead, I decide to take advantage of my size and relative durability and trade blows with the pesky rodents. Thankfully, I shouldn’t have to worry about rabies. Not sure how diseases work post-System integration. Questions for later.
I take another hit on the thigh, but in return, I jam my knife clean into the rat’s side. My follow-up strike is evaded, and I again get tackled to the ground. Gods-damned rats definitely got an intelligence boost from the System. Good to know that we can’t count on animals being dumb going forward.
The injured rat takes another lunge toward me. Another glancing blow, but my counterstrike is enough to send it slamming into the ground. A stab through the neck and a spurt of blood later and the creature is out of my misery forever. I turn my attention to the other one, and remain completely motionless.
I stare my enemy down and try to focus its attention on me. Chloe is already back with an aluminum slugger, and she is sneaking up on it from behind. I raise my weapon and make a small feint toward my target. The rat dodges directly into Chloe’s swing, and she scores a direct hit, pasting it against the wall. I move toward it to make sure it’s dead, but the System confirms it before I get a chance.
[Your Party has slain two Rats (Level 1, Level 1). You have gained 14 Experience!]
[Feat: [Touched by the Multiverse] increases Experience gain! Experience increased to 21!]
[You have gained enough Experience to reach Level 2! Please allocate stats [4 remaining]]
I decide to delay my level-up temporarily until we get out of the basement. Chloe doesn’t seem to want to be down here any longer than I do. She hands me another bat, though I will equip that later. We make it back to the living room and lock the door to the basement.
“By the way,” Chloe says as she sits back down. “You seemed really in your element when you were fighting those rats. I didn’t realize you were into martial arts.”
I shirk away. “Did I seem that way? I didn’t realize.”
“Yeah. You looked so confident, like you’d been secretly training for this your whole life.”
Did I? I think back to the encounter. I don’t think there was anything particularly noteworthy about how I fought? Maybe it’s just because I grew up in the dumps and I’m used to being on guard at all times? But, it did feel maybe a bit more fun than I would have expected from a fight for our lives.
I look down. “I think I might have to take you up on that offer to borrow some of your clothes for the day. I– I kinda got mine ruined.”
“Sure thing. And if you want to take a shower, that’s fine too.” She pauses. “Just… Just try not to be too long, okay? I don’t want anything else to pop up while you’re in there.”
“I’ll keep it short. And don’t worry. We’re in this together, all the way, no matter where things end up.”
She looks a bit uneasy, but once she looks down and sees my torn shirt and the dried blood on my back, she relents. I head up to the second floor bathroom, disrobe, and turn on the shower. Not too hot, though. More of a lukewarm temperature— we’ve never had super hot water at my place, and the scalding hot showers some people like make me feel like my skin is going to scald and flake off.
Still, the warm water feels nice, and as I wash the dirt and blood off my back, I take the opportunity to look at the level up prompt from before. The System maybe seems a bit impatient that I waited so long, but I’m probably just ascribing human emotions to it. I pull up the window about allocating stat points.
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[Current Stats: Strength: 12; Speed: 12; Vitality: 12; Mind: 17]
I try to pull up information about what each parameter does, but I find no purchase. I have to presume that [Mind] refers to magic abilities. I’m not at all sure why my [Mind] is five points higher than my other parameters, though I wonder if it has something to do with the excess knowledge from this past life that I supposedly have and can’t remember. With that said, I don’t think it’s particularly useful at surviving in the short term.
I think my strength stat is going to be the least important at the moment. I’m going to assume that mundane weapons aren’t going to be effective forever, but they will be for the first couple of levels, at least. My biggest weakness in the last fight was my poor speed and how easily the rats were able to sneak inside my defenses. At the same time, [Vitality] is probably linked to survivability, and I’m not going to learn more about who I am (or was) unless I survive long enough for the memories to come back.
I assign two points to my [Speed] and two to my [Vitality]. Satisfied, I confirm the selection, and see more information appear in my [Status].
[Level Up registered. Seraphina Mortensen is now Level 2.]
[Maximum Health increases by [Vitality] x 2 + New Level + Random[1, 3] = 32]
[Maximum Ether increases by [Mind] + New Level + Random [0, 2] = 20]
[Current Health: 107 / 132; Current Ether = 60 / 60; Experience: 21; To Next: 34]
That’s extremely useful information, and pretty much confirms that having a high starting [Mind] and [Vitality] is going to carry over more or less indefinitely, compounding as I gain additional levels. I make a note of this and plan to tell Chloe as soon as I get out of the shower. She interrupts my musing with a knock on the door, informing me that my change of clothes is waiting in front of the door.
I take a moment longer to soak in the warm water before begrudgingly turning off the faucet and drying off. After I finish getting dressed, Chloe hands me one of the two baseball bats she has as a precaution and we make our way into her room. Although there are three spare bedrooms in her house, we decide that I’m going to sleep in Chloe’s bed tonight. It’s just too dangerous to be separated when we don’t know what might await in the night. Though we agree that the situation isn’t so dangerous that we need to keep a night watch. Yet.
“How’s your back, by the way?” Chloe asks.
“Still a little sore, but I should be fine after a couple of days.”
Chloe looks down and motions toward it. I nod and lift my shirt up, revealing my injuries, still raw and not yet scabbed over, but no longer bleeding. She winces slightly, then stares out into space for a few seconds before placing her hands along my back. I blush a bit, then relax as her cool fingers trace over my injuries. The pain recedes, and a quick look at my status shows that my health has returned to maximum.
“Did you just get a healing spell?” I ask for confirmation.
“Yeah. I–” She hesitates. “I’ve been watching more videos on social media. The world is changing so much, so suddenly. It’s going to get violent just like you said. It’s already started. And I don’t think I’m ever going to be comfortable fighting the way you did. But if I can heal you and others who need my help, it’d make me really happy.”
“And when you were staring into space, that was you making up your mind, and the System then responding by giving you a healing spell?”
“It gave me a warning that it would permanently alter my abilities and parameters going forward. Apparently, it was assigning me a class, or at least, that’s what it called it. It would make me more focused on light magic and healing. But I’m sure that’s what I want for myself, so I confirmed it.”
“Then I guess I have to be your knight in shining armor, protecting you from all danger?” I giggle, but sure enough, as I say that, a notification pops up in my [Status] window.
[Choose [Divine Paladin] as your first class?]
[Divine Paladin: A [Divine Paladin] is a warrior who uses faith and prayer to bolster herself and her allies. Unlike [Warriors] and [Fighters], a [Divine Paladin] holds herself to an unshakeable code of honor and righteousness. Unlike a [Cleric], a [Divine Paladin] is not content to remain idly behind a vanguard, healing people behind walls and offering blessings from the sanctity of a temple or other sanctuary. A [Divine Paladin] serves on the front lines of combat, seeks out evil wherever it lies, and smites it with holy power. Stat Gains: Permanent +3 to [Vitality] and [Strength] upon choosing this class. +1 [Vitality], +1 [Strength], and +3 Free Stats per level.]
I dismiss the message and turn to Chloe. “Yep, it seems that the System just offered me a class as a [Divine Paladin].”
“Oh, wow, that’s a really cool class name. Did you take it?”
“No, I didn’t choose a class yet. For one, I want to see what all my options are. Also, there’s some disturbing information hinting about needing to seek out and smite evil, and I’m not sure if I’m one for the whole ‘honor and righteousness path’.”
“I think it would suit you, Sera.”
“I don’t know. It doesn’t seem like a terrible path, and I’ll definitely do everything to protect you no matter what class I end up choosing, but I just don’t see myself as being honorable and just in all situations. The whole ‘growing up poor’ and ‘seeing the injustice in the world’. Police, and other people we’re supposed to look up to for protection, aren’t always good people, Chloe. I think that’s given me some… pause about choosing a class that’s specifically about smiting evil.” Both because I don’t want to be in conflict with corrupt law enforcement, and because I don’t want to be law enforcement and be in the position where I have to enforce unjust laws, but I leave that part unstated.
Chloe looks a bit uncomfortable, but ends up sidestepping the awkwardness masterfully. “Well, Sera, what do you want?”
“I think I’d like to see my options and see what speaks to me.” And, maybe see if any of them relate to these hidden memories that the System hints that I have.