[Keen Eye]. In theory it was a simple and marvelously versatile Skill, providing “increased ability to recognize items of value in one’s environment”. Sarah had thought it would be one in a triad of powerful Skills, along with [Polyglot] and [Dimensional Storage], that would let her swiftly embed herself into the Tutorial community, becoming rich and indispensable along the way.
[Polyglot] would ensure she could – in time – communicate with anyone and everyone. [Dimensional Storage] would allow her to offer an exclusive service for transporting valuable goods, with an iron-clad guarantee that not even the world’s best [Bandit] could pilfer said goods along the way. [Keen Eye] would help her to spot valuable stuff to forage as she travelled, providing a secondary source of income, especially as she built up her reputation as a respectable courier of high-value goods.
Reality had turned out to be slightly less rosy, though [Polyglot], at least, had proven to be everything she’d hoped and more, which was good because it was a Legendary Skill and she’d hate to have wasted a full five Skill Points on a dud.
[Dimensional Storage] was only marginally less useful than she imagined; the Rare Skill was every bit as secure as the flavour text had suggested but the volume of available space was a bit more limited than she’d thought it would be. She’d probably need to rack up quite a few points in Fortitude and Mental Dexterity before it achieved the magnitude she’d envisioned. It was certainly worth the four Skill Points she spent, it was just more of a long-term investment than immediate overpowered boon. Still, it wasn’t too bad, all things considered.
[Keen Eye] though, well, she was glad she’d only spent one Skill Point on it. Actually, the fact that it was only a Basic Skill might explain why it wasn’t quite so overpoweringly useful as she’d hoped.
Sarah sighed, absent-mindedly ducking (unnecessarily it turned out) as the wagon passed beneath an overhanging branch in the latest small grove of [Valley Aspen Trees] that dotted the grassy fields through which they travelled. The children laughed at her overabundance of caution and she grinned back at them, following their excited tales of town with one part of her mind while the other parts continued producing an utterly unrelated inner monologue.
She had thought [Keen Eye] would work like some kind of advanced inspection Skill, so instead of dismissing some mangy looking plant as a weed, she’d be more likely to recognize it as the local equivalent of the truffle and make bank. Or something like that.
To be clear, she still had no idea what the local equivalent of the truffle might be – assuming it wasn’t simply a truffle – and her Skill was very much not what she’d expected. She was coming to believe that [Keen Eye] was intended to work best as part of a suite of awareness and identification-type Skills. On its own it was…limited.
For one thing, it seemed to work based on how much attention she was already paying to her environment, so if she was on high alert, as she’d been for the first few days, she noticed a lot of things and [Keen Eye] played a mental tune. If she wasn’t paying much attention, she noticed very little and [Keen Eye] only pinged occasionally.
The Skill would probably be more effective if she paired it with a Skill to increase her mental processes or something, or even just some mundane training in how to be more observant. She suspected that police officers or soldiers, or pretty much any of the people who’d needed to be highly observant of their surroundings in their lives on Earth, would get much more out of the [Keen Eye] Skill than she currently could.
She sighed again. The farmer tossed a curious look at her over his shoulder but she was too distracted by her thoughts to notice, though she did smirk a bit when the sound of her gusty sigh caused both horses to flick their ears in her direction. Then her smirk vanished and she suppressed a slight shiver as her thoughts turned to another surprising, and slightly unnerving, aspect of her Skill; it was a bit…proactive.
Unlike [Identification], which she had to consciously trigger by examining something, [Keen Eye] seemed to have a tiny bit of a will of its own. Maybe it was based on what her subconscious mind noticed, rather than her conscious mind? That would be a bit less creepy than a Skill with a mind of its own sticking its thumb into her thoughts.
However it worked, [Keen Eye] had an annoying habit of triggering on things she couldn’t otherwise see, forcing her to either go looking for the source or to mentally dismiss the alert – which she had finally figured out how to do – without ever knowing if the thing she ignored was some moderately valuable fungus or the most valuable find of the century.
To make matters worse, the Skill didn’t always trigger, not even on the same things as it had previously, which...okay, that actually made sense. The Skill didn’t guarantee she’d notice everything; it just gave her an increased chance to do so, and the strength of that chance was based on her Attributes.
Back in the pre-Tutorial, she'd put the one Attribute Point she didn't need for [Dimensional Storage] into Mental Perception. This raised the base “increase” of [Keen Eye] by a whole five percent, but once she did the math (assuming she’d done it correctly this time) that didn’t sound quite so impressive.
She was now 15 percent more likely to notice items of Basic rank, but only 7.5 percent more likely to notice Common items, 3.75 percent for Uncommon, 0.75 percent for Rare, and a whopping (note the sarcasm) 0.3 percent for Legendary stuff. Really, the frequency with which [Keen Eye] had triggered spoke more to the abundance of “valuable” natural resources in the area than to the power of the Skill.
Now that she really thought about it, she’d probably get much more use out of the Skill if she were more familiar with the local flora and fauna to begin with, plus that way the Skill wouldn’t have to be quite so overt and proactive about directing her attention.
If, for hypothetical example, she already knew that the petals of ‘Flower A’ were a key ingredient in ‘Important Medicine B’, and that ‘Flower A’ preferred to grow from the south-facing side of the dead, fallen, and rotting trunks of ‘Type C’ trees, then [Keen Eye] would need only alert her that the moss-grown hunk of dead tree half-buried in the forest floor that she was about to pass by was, in fact, from a tree of ‘Type C’ and she would immediately know to go search for ‘Flower A’.
With her current knowledge of local resources, however, all [Keen Eye] would be able to do, should she encounter said hypothetical dead tree, would be to scream at her that somewhere in the vicinity of that moss-covered and – presumably bug-infested – hunk of rotten wood was something of value and she should really go take a look. And of course, she’d likely have to wander at least a wee bit off the beaten path to even encounter such a scenario in the first place. And that was something she hadn't really done since she first arrived.
All told, she’d come to the conclusion that the Skill was annoying, and less valuable than she’d hoped it would be when she chose it; though it might prove more useful if she were wandering around on her own as she’d envisioned, rather than settling down on a farm. Maybe she needed to start thinking about branching out? The goal of the Integration Challenge was to become a “functioning, productive member of society,” right? She’d certainly made strides toward becoming a functioning member of society, what with learning Cantorian and getting the guest rite bond of Meat and Mead; however, she didn’t think her daily chores on the farm really qualified her as “productive” in the traditional sense. Maybe once she’d chosen a class she’d have a better idea what to do in that regard, and how to move forward.
Anyway, for the moment she was finding herself very distracted by the [Keen Eye]-induced certainty that, somewhere along the line, the wagon had picked up a stowaway. The thing was, [Keen Eye] was the only reason she even knew anything was there, which meant whatever 'it' was either had great camouflage and stealth skills, or it was very tiny.
She had to have noticed something, even if only subconsciously, because [Keen Eye] didn’t seem to trigger on things that would have been impossible for her to discover on her own, but it did seem to extrapolate. For example, [Keen Eye] wouldn’t need her to, hypothetically, be physically able to see the hypothetical ‘Flower A’ from her hypothetical position on the hypothetical forest path, it would have been enough for the hypothetical fallen tree to have passed within her hypothetical field of view.
Gah…hypothetical, hypothetical, hypothetical…brain, you can be such a broken record sometimes. Stop playing around and focus!
Anyways, assuming those previously stated (thought, not stated, get it right)…sigh…assuming those previously thought things were true, [Keen Eye] could then extrapolate that if she knew the significance of ‘Flower A’, and its preferred growing habits, and had the experience to identify ‘Type C’ trees, alive or dead, and it was the correct season for ‘Flower A’ to be blooming, then upon seeing the hypothetical fallen tree she would immediately be aware of the potential for blooming ‘Flower A’ plants to hypothetically be present on the south-facing side of said hypothetical dead tree.
Of course, the hypothetical Sarah within this hypothetical scenario hadn’t, in fact, happened upon, learned, or been taught any of the information required for such a discovery, but [Keen Eye] wouldn’t know that. All it would know was that the accumulation of such knowledge was feasibly possible for any adult human, even Sarah, therefore it was theoretically possible for Sarah to make this hypothetical discovery on her own, and so [Keen Eye], hypothetically, pinged.
I just…I can’t not do it, can I? Fine, I won’t fight it. Can we at least not do it when we’re actually talking to people? Brain? Please?
The gist of it all was that whatever unexpected visitor was now meandering about the wagon bed was something that Sarah could, in theory, recognize and identify. In practice, however, she had not a clue.
The odds of it being something large (or even medium-sized) with effective enough stealth skills – or even [Stealth] Skills – to wander about the wagon without anyone but [Keen Eye] noticing seemed…low. That meant it was most likely something very small, which meant…she sighed…which meant her blasted Skill was distracting her from the cheerful chattering of the children…because of a bug.
Stifling yet another frustrated sigh, Sarah turned off [Keen Eye], promising herself she’d make it a priority to level up [Identification] and maybe find some Skills to teach her about the local plants and wildlife. Or some books. She wondered if the town they were headed to had a library.
She filed that thought away and returned her full focus to Young One and the increasingly sleepy Little One. Poor kid. The early start to the day, combined with the heavy emotions of the now-resolved issue about their relative reality, had taken quite a toll on the little squirt. The initial energy of their current conversation was beginning to peter out anyway so she encouraged the little girl to curl up on a burlap sack full of something sturdy but relatively soft, and take a nap.
The exhausted child was asleep in no time, and with his sister napping, Young One seemed content to watch the passing scenery and focus on his own thoughts. Perhaps he too needed some time to recharge. Leaving him to it, Sarah climbed up to the wagon seat and took Little One’s former spot at the farmer’s side.
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The hill was strangely shaped, and oddly bare of soil…but the scent drew him.
The enormous creatures that stood at the base of the hill sought to crush him beneath their titanic feet…but the aroma called to him.
The smaller – but still gigantic – creatures who made their nest within the hollow of the unusual hill made odd and frightening noises…but the enticing odour pulled him forward, ever forward.
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He had to know from whence it came; he had to find the source of the delectable bouquet.
The hill began to move and the world shook around him but he crept ever deeper into the maze, led by his sensitive nose and the fragrance divine.
The world could end, and he with it, but first he would taste the ambrosia that even now danced upon the air.
It would be his.
There was a moment of grave danger, when one of the larger two of the enormous creatures left the nest and joined the other on the ridge at the edge of the hill. Fortunately, his whiskers were as sensitive as his nose and he felt the first tremble of movement, before the creature even rose to its feet. By the time the creature was in a position to spot where he had been, he was no longer there, and the danger passed.
The larger two of the gigantic creatures remained perched upon the ridge of the strange, moving hill, while the smaller two of the creatures – the young, he assumed – remained within the nest, but none of them gave any indication they were aware of his intrusion into their domain. This was good…for the scintillating scent still drew him.
The smallest of the four creatures had begun breathing in a slow, steady rhythm that he knew indicated sleep, having observed it many times in others of his kind in the burrow. The other young creature sat in one place and made soft, soothing noises that reminded the intruder of the sounds made by those who lived in the high-open-space.
None of these distractions lessened his commitment to his mission…for the ambrosial aroma still called to him.
He waited for a long moment, to be certain there would be no further movement from the gigantic creatures, then slowly squeezed between some more of the large, strange objects. The outer shells of the things both looked and tasted like dead-hard-plant, but the odd odours wafting from within were of something else entirely. He briefly pondered this latest strangeness before casting aside the thought. What did it matter to him what these creatures used to line their nest? He was here for one thing only…that which had pulled him to this place of dangerous oddities. To that end, he paused in the shadow of a small overhang.
The source of the scent that had drawn him here was just ahead. He could have reached out and touched its dead-soft-plant shell with his claws but first he listened, in one final moment of caution. The larger two of the creatures were still on the ridge, perhaps watching the battle in which the guardian beasts had been engaged for some time.
The creatures of the nest did not seem alarmed, so presumably they had confidence in their guardians, but whatever the opponent was it must be a thing of both power and tenacity. Power, because the conflict shook the very hill. Tenacity, because the sound of the guardians’ titanic feet crashing down upon the ground had continued in a steady rhythm since the battle began.
The intruder shivered, grateful he was small enough and stealthy enough to generally escape the notice of such forces, and both agile and speedy enough to slip past most any blow that such beings might send his way.
Meanwhile, the smallest of the two young creatures in the nest still slept soundly, while its larger sibling continued making the soothing sounds, with no sign that it had noticed the intruder. This was good. It was time. With a tremble of anticipation, the intruder reached out and applied his teeth and claws to the last barrier between him and his goal.
His claws – long, curved, and finely-pointed – could dig through the deep-dirt with ease, while his teeth could snap through the stems and roots of even the toughest of the live-soft-plants. Dead-soft-plants, even when twisted together into some kind of soft shell, proved no greater challenge for his natural weapon-tools, and the weave of dead-soft-plants resisted his efforts for only the barest moment. Excitedly, he shoved his head through the small hole, too impatient to take the time to widen it enough to fit his whole body.
The smell struck him full in the face, and for a moment it overwhelmed him entirely. He returned to his senses with a long string of drool trailing from his chin and his mouth full of something soft-but-firm. The taste was indescribable…indescribably horrid. He spat the soft mush from his mouth and glared at the remains of the offending things.
They were some kind of plant-not-plants that grew upon patches of soft, moist soil full of rotting dead-soft-plants. He had seen them before, but never had he detected that enticing smell, which was very odd since his nose was many times better than his eyes. Perhaps the ones he had seen were of a different sort? It must be, for surely if he had encountered these specific plant-not-plants before, he would have smelt their aroma and taken a bite. Then he would have known the foul things were deceivers of the worst kind – worse even than tunnels dug through the soft-bad-soil that seemed sturdy and strong when dry but collapsed when the first streams of water fell from the high-open-space – and if he had known the truth of these nasty plant-not-plants he would not have followed their scent into such a dangerous place!
At the thought of his surroundings he suddenly froze. Something was different. The nest was too quiet.
The vibrations of the guardians’ ongoing battle continued, but the sounds of it were somewhat muffled by having his head inside the dead-soft-plant shell. That was to be expected. Just as he could no longer hear the breaths of the young sleeping creature, which only highlighted how foolish he had been to shove his head inside the shell when surrounded by so much potential danger, and how much the (still enticing) smell of the plant-not-plants had overwhelmed him. But there was something else that he should have still been able to hear. What was it?
The soothing sounds! If the larger of the two young creatures had stopped making those sounds, did that mean he had been spotted? His skin prickled, his fur crawled, and his whiskers trembled. He looked with distaste at the fleshy things that still smelled so inviting, despite his knowledge of their true taste. Had these horrible things lured him to his end?
At that moment, the soothing sounds began again, but this time they were different. Somehow, he knew that these sounds were directed at him. In a way he did not understand, the sounds spoke to him. They spoke of safety, of protection, of home, of…companionship?
Slowly, the intruder in the nest pulled his head from the hole in the dead-soft-plant shell and looked up. The young creature towered over him, big enough to crush him with a single blow, but the intruder looked up into a pair of enormous eyes the colour of fresh shoots of the most tender and luscious live-soft-plants, and – inexplicably – he was not afraid.
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Sarah cast a fond smile over her shoulder at the children in the wagon bed. Little One still slept soundly, with the utter trust and relaxation of the very young, while Young One quietly sang to himself. Reassured that both children were content, Sarah turned back to the view from the front of the wagon.
It was a lovely bit of countryside that they travelled through. The forest in which she’d first arrived was to the west of the farm, but it also curled around to the north, where it flowed up the flanks of a very large hill…or perhaps it was a small mountain? Whichever one it was, the large land formation rose high into the northern sky and stretched far to the east.
South of the farm the forest quickly faded out, giving way to mixed grasslands and the shores of a large lake. Into that lake flowed a broad river, which had – over time – carved a wide valley into the land. It was eastward down that very river valley that they now travelled.
Their destination was visible in the distance, a small town – or large village? – that sprouted from the side of the river like some kind of growth. Actually, Sarah grimaced, that probably isn't the best description. It made the little community sound like something organic and nasty, like a wart on the river’s arse. Yeah, she needed a better description.
So…the large village hugged the river’s banks? Yeah, that sounds better. The village hugged the river’s banks, guarding the path to a wide stone bridge that arched across the flowing water, coming to rest at the base of a small rise on the far bank of the river. Upon that rise lay a large walled compound.
From this distance of several miles, the details of the compound were not clear, despite the village sitting at a slightly lower elevation than the packed-dirt road upon which they currently travelled. Whatever it was, the compound wasn’t a castle; that particular building rose from the lower slopes of the small mountain to the north.
The few bits that she could discern at this distance made Sarah think the structure – the compound on the south side of the river, not the castle – was somewhat reminiscent of those fancy ancient Roman villas she’d seen illustrations of in National Geographic magazines. The village, on the other hand, and the castle looming above it, both had a distinctly medieval European flair.
The whole scene was quite picturesque, with the morning sunlight sparkling on the river and laying a golden glow upon the rolling green plains of the wide valley. To the north rose the forested flanks of the mountain, with the castle jutting out as a bulwark of stolid grey stone amidst the sea of green. To the south, the rising valley edge merged into a series of low hills, each one bearing a mix of grasslands and small groves of trees.
Back behind them to the west, their little farm blended into the backdrop of a forest that showed nothing beyond it but the sky above, while to the southwest, forest met grass, which met rocky lake shore, which gave way to blue lake waters that stretched to the horizon. Ahead of them to the east lay the length of the river valley, within which was nestled that slightly odd, Roman-esque compound, the bridge, and the large village of…actually, she’d never asked the name of the village, or even if it was considered a large village or a small town. She should do that.
Anyway, between the village and the castle, beyond the village to the east, across the river to the south (excepting the compound), and between the rattling wagon and the village itself, lay…not much.
There were a few farms dotted here and there but not nearly as many as she would have expected for a medieval-era-type community. She wondered where they got enough food for everyone who lived there.
“Is this part of your planet really so sparsely populated?” she finally asked the farmer.
He chuckled. “I don’t think so, but I suppose it’s possible. I don’t actually know much about this region. I’ve heard about the lake and this valley – it’s supposed to be a very fertile and resource-rich part of the countryside, if a bit wild and untamed outside the villages – but I’ve never actually travelled to the place myself.”
Sarah shot him a look of confusion, which made him laugh again.
“You didn’t think this place was an exact copy of our real homes, did you?
Sarah shrugged, embarrassed. “Well…yeah? Sorta? I mean, I didn’t, not until I learned you are all real people, not A.I.-powered simulations of people. You’re all so confident about where everything is and how to do all the farming and stuff, so I just figured the Builders copied what you already have in the real world.”
She pointed her thumb over her shoulder to indicate the children.
“Even they act like that farm is their real home, and that family portrait above the fireplace can’t be entirely fake, right?”
At her mention of the painting, a bleak look flashed across the farmer’s face and Sarah winced, regretting so callously reminding the man of his loss. She dipped her head in that Cantorian gesture she’d learned, then breathed a silent sigh of relief when he returned it, indicating his acceptance of her apology.
Congratulations! [Language: Cantorian] is now Level 56.
Huh. She’d been getting a few levels a day in that Skill, ever since the big catch-up, but those levels had been coming first thing each morning, as if rewarding her for spending all the previous day using the alien language. She’d already gotten one this morning, when she first woke up.
The timing of this particular level-up suggested non-verbal communication was somehow considered part of the language. It would have to be only gestures that were distinctly part of Cantorian culture though, right? Otherwise there would be too much overlap and she would get experience in dozens of different languages every time she nodded.
Sarah was abruptly pulled from her thoughts as the farmer cleared his throat and answered her earlier questions.
“Some personal items, like the painting, were copied over to the simulation, to make us feel more at home,” he began. “We three are all familiar with the farming life because I was a worker on a large farm owned by someone else. I had dreamed of one day owning a farm of my own, but never thought it would be possible.
“The Builders pledged to allow those of us who participated in this Tutorial to settle in a new area and build homes, farms, and businesses of our own, with their assistance. Additionally, whatever I manage to build or acquire in this simulation will be replicated or otherwise provided for me when we return to the real world.
“It seemed an extraordinarily generous reward before, but now that we know you are a real human – and that this Tutorial is as much for you as it is for us – well…”
“It makes more sense,” Sarah concluded.
He nodded. “Just so. As for our familiarity with this place in particular, we were given two standard weeks to become accustomed to these roles before you arrived. Again, this makes much more sense knowing that you are not just another part of the simulation.”
Sarah scrunched her forehead in frustration.
“So you’ve been in this Tutorial for three weeks, and you had the whole basic introductory Tutorial before that, but from my perspective it’s been only a week and a bit since the Builders told me ‘sorry, we’ve blown up your planet, but good news, here’s a System, and if it works for you humans we might give it to everyone else too.’”
She threw both hands into the air in exasperation before slumping in her seat. “So either the Builders are time-travelling wizards or they’ve been fiddling with my perception of time. I mean, I know I took a while to figure out what Skills I wanted to start with, but I didn’t take that long…did I?”
The farmer’s deep-throated chuckle rumbled through his slim body. “I wouldn’t know. Much of what the Builders do is beyond our understanding, and yours is the first new people to be brought to our world in several generations. This is all as new to me as it is to you.”
Sarah sighed and glanced over her shoulder to check on the children. She froze, then reached out and tapped the farmer. When he gave her a questioning look, she simply pointed, and he turned and followed her gaze.
For a moment, he stared, then he brought the horses to a halt, swung around to face the back of the wagon and loudly cleared his throat.
“Son,” he said calmly, “what is that?”