Besides a rack of short swords, he found some daggers of varying sizes. Picking up one about as long as his forearm, it felt easy to swing about and hold constantly. He didn’t know much about using a dagger besides the basics for all close-range melee combat, and that should drop his skill to level 10 at most.
And then if he purposely made some mistakes there’s no way others could realise his true skill. Sabbat saw this selection but didn’t speak up, a bit surprised that he didn’t take the swords right beside this dagger.
It was amazingly common for kids to take a nicely weighted sword as their first weapon, only for a good majority to realise that they’d be better with something different. Even so, swords still held an importance in the world as a sophisticated weapon, and most of those with status carried one around purely for show!
Zack left with Kaori, being given a roughly sewn leather scabbard for the blade. With a thick string to tie it around his waist, it was better than nothing at the moment.
“I’m proud that you finally put aside your concerns and accepted the power bestowed to us all. It’s a shame you’re months behind though, many of the children are already at level 3.” Her sincerity and warning did not go unnoticed, but it took quite a bit of willpower to not scoff at that figure immediately.
Nodding meekly instead, he thanked her and set off, wondering if he should rest at home first before setting off.
He considered it, but as long as he employed any of the precautions kept in his past life this would be a breeze. Waving to his teacher while walking away, he took a sluggish path through the village until completely exiting her line of sight. From there it was just a matter of leaving.
With an unwatched side of the surprisingly large village found quickly, he just had to quietly sneak off into a small mess of trees to escape the village’s line of sight.
And from there it was all good! He had a weapon, Neuro, and everything which mattered to him. Armour is nice, certainly more so than the cheaply woven shorts and shirt he wore.
He’d ignored it as well, but walking about barefoot wasn’t comfortable, still he never rose the point as many others did so too. Very few wore actual shoes or boots, indicative of their wealth.
Still so close to the village, he could do nothing but continue walking away, occasionally breaking out into a light jog. It did not take long for the first Neuro skill to appear.
Obtained skill Walking!
Walking: Level 1
And not too much later came another.
Obtained skill Jogging!
Jogging: Level 1
Without much patience, he said aloud, “Disable all notifications regarding Walking and Jogging skills.” Today was going to involve a lot of these annoying things appearing, and as a minimal preparation he followed up with, “Minimise all notifications while in combat.”
Anyone capable of reaching his level knew every trick of Neuro; if only they knew its secrets though.
Nevertheless, walking out of the village gave some much needed time to finally read the sub-class he had. Related to being reborn in a new body, he had to go through it at some point, the sheer power involved utterly tantalised him.
As no predators seemed to be about, he continued over the gentle hills and plains, reading the screen intensely.
Reborn (sub-class)
Through some mystical or technological way, your mind has been re-awoken in a new body. However, such a process is not without defects as the incongruencies between the two remain. This process can be suppressed naturally, simply by growing to a strong enough point that the body may be re-cast, but in the meantime Neuro provides a method of slowing down such degeneration.
It wasn’t good? Well, technically the class itself is good.
He just didn’t realise that… the spell was flawed?
“IMPOSSIBLE! I USED… I used decades to perfect it, to specifically search a host perfect for the caster! And it still wasn’t perfect!” Years of work went down the drain in an instant, a supposedly perfect reincarnation ruined in a mere moment!
Sure, he saw the status earlier, but also assumed that to be a quirk of recently inhabiting this body. For someone his age it was strange to cry out, but the gut-wrenching pain he felt from admitting this failed spell was like nothing else.
His opus magnum reduced to dust, and he couldn’t even analyse the spell to see where he went so wrong.
“I won’t stand for this. How long until the degeneration reaches a critical point?” Moving on instantly, he focused on the important aspects over futile pining to fix a mistake.
44 days, 4 hours. Further precision impossible to calculate currently.
That wasn’t too bad… Best to round down to 30 days until the degeneration began impacting him physically and mentally, and with the Reborn sub-class it shouldn’t be too hard to extend it up to a year of time.
Overall, this body gave him more than enough time.
Reborn (Epic sub-class) – Skill tree
Tier 1: Forced Integration [0/5]: Forcefully combine the degenerating soul and body to last longer. +7 days of survival time per class point.
You might be reading a pirated copy. Look for the official release to support the author.
Memory harvesting [0/3]: Gather remnant memories of the original host to understand the world around you as well as their personality. Random access to memories with every point (Not guaranteed to be useful).
Soul cloaking [0/1]: Hide the aura of a degenerating soul, as well as the aura of an unmatched soul and body. Skill lasts 5 minutes, cooldown of 6 hours, only useful on those equal to or lower in Spirit than you.
Tier 2: Coaxed Integration [0/5]: ???
Life harvesting [0/3]: ???
Rapid cloaking [0/2]: ???
Tier ???:
The skills weren’t all that bad and followed the usual Neuro way of doing things. The skill tree only unlocked information on higher tier skills if enough skill points are placed in the tree as a whole.
Given that he could already see the Tier 2 skill names, around three points would be enough to unlock the next tier of descriptions. Although he had no idea about Tier 3 or higher.
And since Neuro didn’t explicitly show it, if he wanted to obtain Rapid cloaking then he absolutely needed Soul cloaking first. This progression structure is seen in practically every single class without exception. However, some unique skills which are ‘unlocked’ do exist outside of the tree and may be unlocked as long as the Tier is accessible.
He'd worry about those in the future though.
Walking with such a mediocre body meant he still had ample time even after going through his current status and wailing about the failed spell. Likely having just walked half a mile, he needed to at least triple that to begin seeing any creatures.
Even the smallest outposts could afford special alchemic products to ward off low-level beasts, like this the village is generally safe for children who have yet to access Neuro.
Before long, his first target appeared. A small red fox which couldn’t have seemed any cuter.
However, the moment it locked eyes with him the cute thing charged, not hesitating to run for his legs in a fit of madness. He quickly drew the dagger and swung it in the air a few times, grasping the timing for a swing better as the fox charged relentlessly.
Whether nature or Neuro, it was rare to find a truly passive creature in the wild. From a fluffy bunny to giga-beasts, all of them are happy to charge at an invading human without hesitation… Given the human isn’t clearly stronger. In such cases the beast runs off to save its own skin.
It makes the world frightening, admittedly, but at the same time allows for children like him to level up so much faster. The thoughts ended as the fox finally reached a melee range.
Its small claws and teeth immediately went for his ankles, trying to down him before going in for a kill, but a well timed kick smashed against the small thing and sent it flying away. It scrambled on its feet immediately and charged again.
His physical strength really needed a boost…
This time he let the thing approach before cutting it, a heavy cut slicing open its back but not killing it. The wild fox didn’t hesitate to jump for his ankle though, knowing at the tendons and muscles with gusto. The bloodstained dagger came down once more, stabbing through the fox’s head and killing it instantly.
Obtained 5 Experience Points
As he tore off its tightly shut jaws before rigor mortis set in, he noticed the bleeding rapidly increase. Rather than do anything complex, he hastily skinned the fox and used the fur as a bandage. An infection could be dealt with later.
Reaching level 10 is perhaps the single most important thing for any child, and he didn’t plan on returning until hitting level 5 at a minimum, if possible he’d rather not entering the village ever again. Checking his status for a moment, he found a rather troubling list of skills appear.
Obtained skill Dagger!
Dagger has hit level 12
Obtained skill Skinning!
Skinning has hit level 15
Obtained skill Critical Strikes!
Critical strikes: level 1
Obtained skill Medicine!
Medicine has hit level 6
Obtained skill Regeneration!
Regeneration: level 1
“Do not show messages regarding any of the five skills again,” while he’d have liked to cancel everything, sometimes he actually liked seeing where a skill sat. Especially in the cases of Skinning, where he already possessed quite a few levels in it.
This is entirely down to how a skill is measured. Some of them actually looked at how well a task is performed, like his skinning being somewhat skilled granted that level automatically.
But in other cases it required endless repetition from the moment Neuro is obtained, Critical Strikes is a perfect example as well as Walking. Of course most people have walked hundreds of miles by the age of 14, but these skills didn’t care how good you are at walking or hitting a creature’s weak point. Just that you did it hundreds or thousands of times from the moment of acquisition.
To his knowledge, a few exceptions existed but not enough to ever care about. They’re also super expensive to level up.
Overall status: Minor bleeding, minor dissociation between body and soul
Title: None
Class: None
Sub-classes: Reborn
Experience Points: 5/15
Unassigned Class points: 0
Health Points: 98/100
Magic Points: 1/1
Strength: 1
Dexterity: 1
Endurance: 1
Mind: 1
Magic: 1
Spirit: 1
Attunement: 1
Unassigned Stat Points: 0
Class Skills: None
General Skills: None
With one fight down, he had to go find more to kill.
Reality proved kind though, with some sort of bird seeing him from high above, it cried out before swooping down. The idiocy of most animals is what would reduce his injuries the most, and as it reached him the thing received a sharp point to its chest.
His arm received a few scratches from its sharp talons, but with most only drawing blood he didn’t see much point in being that weary. Not like anything here cut that deep, and constant minor wounding is the best way to level up Regeneration.
Obtained 7 Experience Points
The eagle, or falcon, or whatever the hell it actually way, died like that. With that he went on with some of the wounds quickly clotting and a couple deeper ones continue bleeding.
The effects of this blood were amazing!
Not even a minute later something jumped from the tall grass, leaping high into the air and landing right on him!
In just a second of sight he knew this was a lioness, something even he considered dangerous. For now, it was alone, but he retained the utmost vigilance for any fellow hunters alongside her. But even in a one-on-one, he didn’t feel any confidence.
Neuro assigns stats to beasts and monsters on its own… and naturally bigger beasts have better stats. In other words, if the lioness was anything above level 1 he’d be having an excessively tough time.
If above level 5 though, something practically impossible for these sorts of grasslands, he might as well lie down and die.
As the lioness pounce on him, the thick claws dug into his chest while her bloody jaws went for his neck. She didn’t hesitate to kill at an instant, but in no way could he give in so easily!
A slash to her eye forced the beast back, allowing him to slash at one of the two paws pinning him down. The blade easily slit the fur, forcing her to pull away as the leg didn’t react as she desired. Those few moments allowed him to roll away and stand up, prepared to meet the lioness’ attack and kill it.
Today… was going to be a very tiresome day. “Well come on then!” He shouted at the wounded feline, even with a slashed eye and leg the thing retained the desire to growl and flex its claws.
Oh how he missed this!