Eric was stunned.
“What do you mean?” He asked.
All weapons, skills, spells, armor pieces, and regalia have a stat requirement. If this requirement is not fulfilled when one of these are equipped, it will suffer the “unworthy” debuff. Which does what was previously mentioned.
“How do I raise my stats?” Eric asked, already having a feeling of what the answer was. This wasn’t a terrible difficult concept to understand, after all.
When the user reaches a certain threshold of EXP, they are able to expend it to increase a single one of their stats by a single point. However, when leveling up, a stat cannot be leveled up beyond 10x the users level at the time of leveling up. So at level 1, a stat cannot be leveled up beyond 10.
“Wait, wait wait wait…” Eric said, “Status.”
-----
* Name: Eric Reese
* Class: N/A
* Level: 1
* EXP: 0
* Base Stats:
* HP: 10
* MP: 10
* SP: 10
* Stats:
* Strength: 10
* Dexterity: 10
* Intelligence: 10
* Faith: 10
* Guile: 10
* Agility: 10
* Luck: 10
* Innate Skills:
* Passive Skills:
-----
“I’m at level 1.” Eric said.
This is correct.
“And all my stats are at 10.” Eric said.
This is correct
“And 10 is 10 times higher than 1.” Eric said.
This is correct.
“Then what happens if I can’t level up any stat on a level up?”
If, for any reason, all stats are either at or above their maximum levels appropriate for the user's level, EXP gained will be reduced to 0 until such a time as a stat is below maximal levels. Temporary stat reductions do not supplant their requirement.
“So, how can I level up?” Eric asked.
… Answer unclear…
“And THERE it is!” Eric said.
He already got the picture. Fantasy world most likely, dungeons, monsters, level ups, things like that. Of course, he wasn’t one of those lucky ones that got some of an overpowered ability that makes his life a dream, he was one of those poor assholes that got the RPG equivalent of a disability.
For some reason, in the depths of his being, he felt a welling anger rise inside of him. In all likelihood, it was the barely repressed trauma of being interdimensionally force-relocated. Add on top of that the idea that everything he ever loved and cared about no longer existing.
Actually, considering that, he wasn’t surprised why he was angry.
“Daaaaaaaaaamn iiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiit!” He screamed, his voice echoed across the forest and bounced off the mountains in the distance. With that out of his system, and a bruised knuckle from punching a nearby tree, he calmed himself down and turned inward towards the voice.
“Alright, leveling up isn’t an option. Tell me everything I can do to increase my stats without leveling up.” Eric said.
At the current moment, without raising your stats, there are various ways to increase your stats. However, they are limited in scope and functionality. The first is with potions. Potions can be brewed to increase any of your fundamental stats for a limited time. Aside from this, weapons, armor, and regalia can occasionally have beneficial passive skills that raise essential stats in specific situations.
That was a good start, even if he couldn’t level up, he could at least bridge the gap a bit with weapons and armor, but anything past that would require extra leg work. As he thought about this, an old memory crawled into his mind.
It had been a few years before, back when he was in school. There was this game that he played once or twice, he heard about a challenge that people did in that game. They got so good at the game that they stopped doing basic things for an extra challenge, some didn’t heal, others didn’t teleport, some even went the extra mile and didn’t level up. He had vague memories of this game, and he couldn’t even remember what it was called. The one thing he did remember was that it was a terribly hard and painful challenge in an already hard and difficult game.
“How far is the range of this “Local Information” thing you said I have?” Eric asked.
The range is equal to your guile stat in feet, current range: 10ft
“Wonderful…” Eric mumbled.
Eric looked back up at the moon in the sky, between assuming there was a sun, that it was indeed summer, and that it was roughly midnight, he guessed roughly where he was on the surface of the planet. Judging from the climate and season, he guessed he was roughly above the equator and in the middle of a fairly large land mass. If it was an island or something similar, he would have expected different flora.
His first and most important priority was shelter, food, and water. He could hear the sound of moving water nearby, so thirst wasn’t going to be a problem. The two problems were food, he could try to fashion a bow or spear, but he had a feeling the “system” would allow him. He also didn’t feel the need to bother about asking. Between food and shelter, he was going to focus on shelter.
When in a situation like this, people have this idea that being out in the open is somehow more risky than not, when in reality your focus should be remaining dry. This isn’t because being a sitting snack for a bear or wolf wasn’t a worry, but because all it takes is a light drizzle of rain at the wrong time to wake up dead, or worse, nearly dead.
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He wandered around the edge of the clearing he found himself in and gathered sticks, pine cones, and anything else that looked like it might burn. He even got lucky and found two pieces of rock that looked like flint. Jackpot. It didn’t take long before he had a small fire going. With this, he had hopes that anything else that might mean him harm would stay away.
While Eric sat there, he prodded at the voice, er, VOD. It wasn’t like he had anything better to do in the meantime.
“What are the chances I make it out of this forest alive?” He asked.
Stat Requirements not met.
“Fine, what can I do with my stats?” Eric asked.
While the totality of the users capability cannot be summed up briefly, a list of generic skills gained through stats can be expressed. Would you like this list to be appended to the status screen?
“Yes.” Eric said.
-----
* Name: Eric Reese
* Class: N/A
* Level: 1
* EXP: 0
* Base Stats:
* HP: 10
* MP: 10
* SP: 10
* Stats:
* Strength: 10
* Dexterity: 10
* Intelligence: 10
* Faith: 10
* Guile: 10
* Agility: 10
* Luck: 10
* Innate Skills:
* Passive Skills:
* General Skills:
* Strength: Endure
* Dexterity: Crafting
* Intelligence: Magic Casting, Attunement
* Faith: Ritual Casting, Contract Formation
* Guile: Probing, Tactical Vision
* Agility: Burst Movement
* Luck: Manipulate
-----
“Huh, that’s more than I was expecting. Can you explain what those are?” Eric asked.
In order;
* Endure is a skill that allows the user to expend all stamina in order to reduce the damage of an attack by 50%.
* Crafting allows the user to create basic items from raw materials, such as improvised weapons, tools, and armor
* Magic casting is a passive ability that denotes the users' ability to learn and perform magic.
* Attunement is an active ability that allows the user to form a connection with a natural element such as fire, water, or air, and gain bonuses and benefits when using magic involved with those elements.
* Ritual Casting is a passive ability that denotes the users' ability to perform rituals.
* Contract formation is an active ability that allows the user to form a contract with a more powerful being, with the intent of gaining benefits at the cost of doing the bidding of the more powerful being.
* Probing is the previously mentioned ability to distinguish details and facts around the users’ environment
* Tactical Vision is an active skill that allows the user to create transient illusions that only they and their allies can see for the purpose of forming tactical maneuvers.
* Burse Movement is an active skill that doubles the users’ Agility at the cost of making actions require 2x the stamina.
* Manipulate is an active skill that exhausts all the users’ MP and Stamina to manipulate the odds of an outcome. MP and Stamina must be full for this ability to be used.
Eric breathed a sigh of relief at the fact that he wasn’t totally boned in terms of abilities, some of these weren’t bad in any situation. Though that statement should be taken with a mountain of salt. Hearing the long explanation about his abilities, along with the situation general just exhausting him, he felt his eyes grow heavy, and before he knew it, he fell asleep on the ground next to the fire.
In the distance, far to the north, a group of four were themselves camped out in the forest, though in much higher spirits and better shelter than Eric.
“It’s been about three days, we’re looking at another four before we make it to the next stop. Though we’ll probably have to ration if you guys plan eating when we wake up.” One man said, this lead to an exaggerated sigh from a woman sitting to his side on a log.
“Ah come on, that’s not fair, Delvin gets a double portion and I have to ration?” The woman said.
“Katria, I’m twice your size.” Delvin said.
“You won’t starve!” Katria said.
“Both of you, slow your roll. Getting worked up won’t make you any less hungry.” Another woman said, only to be waved off by Katria.
“I don’t wanna hear it from you Faenda, all you have to do is sit in the sun and you’re set.” Katria said. The woman glared at Katria.
“I am not a plant, I am a druid. Being a healer doesn’t make you a priest now, does it?” Faenda said.
“That is not the same!” Katria said. Before they could erupt into a louder argument, the first man clapped his hands loudly and got everyone’s attention.
“Katria, you’re the one who wanted to come on this trip, don’t complain about not getting gourmet food in the middle of literally nowhere, Faenda, don’t instigate her while she’s already in a bad mood. Your attitude doesn’t help anything.” The man said, then he turned to Delvin and pointed a finger. “And you, put that damn thing down before I put a padlock on the rations.”
While everyone was arguing, Delvin managed to sneak out a small wrapped sandwich and almost started eating it before he was caught.
“Seriously, you three have done nothing but complain or whine for three days. Do you seriously think that this behavior would be acceptable anywhere else? You’d be lucky if some of the more weathered guilders didn’t leave you wingey shits in the night.” The man said, berating his teammates for their behavior. They all sat quietly, none of them lost on the fact they were just scolded like children. But to their surprise, the one to break the silence was Katria.
“I’m sorry Garret, you’re right.” Katria said, but Garret shook his head.
“No, I’m sorry, I shouldn’t be yelling at you guys. I know it doesn’t help anything, I guess I’m just tired too.” Garret said.
It was at that moment that Delvin put his hand up to get everyone’s attention.
“Hey guys, I might just be seeing things, but is that smoke?” Delvin said, when they looked, there did in fact seem to be smoke in the distance.
“That can’t be right, we’re miles away from anything even close to civilization, who could be out here?” Garret said.
“I don’t sense any distress from the forest, so it’s not a natural fire.” Faenda said.
“Yeah, white smoke too, so it’s dry.” Garret said.
“Do you think we should go check it out?” Delvin said.
“That’s miles away, and it's the dead of night.” Katria said.
“It’s not preffered, but would you rather sleep here with a chance to sleep under a roof?” Garret said.
“If it’s nothing, then it’ll be halfway to morning before we get some sleep.” Katria said.
“That’s not an answer.” Garret said. He knew he got her when she looked away and shook her head.
“Fine, but if it’s nothing then you’re giving me your breakfast in the morning.” She said.
“Deal.” Garret said, “Alright team, pack up.”