The thoughts running through Maik's head were a blur.
Eighty stat points ? Are you shitting me ? How much EXP have I been missing out on my whole life ? Where does it go ? Those... Those Matrix's, the operating systems for the 5th Imperial Congregate. Mother fuckers are probably taking it all. Jesus and I though the chi tax was bad but this is even worse. So much worse.
Are there ?.. Have there been organization with access to the global system this whole time ? The Elites of Earth. The system said there was no one Left who was beholden to the 5th Imperial Congregate but neither am I right now. I'm not even a remedial citizen yet. I just have access to the operating system and BAM. Levels and a metric shit tone of stat points.
.... Why haven't I dropped into dream land yet ? Can I allocate the points now ? Should I allocate them or discuss it with the others first ? Would they even believe me ? I mean. I'm not sure I believe it. I have time regardless. I'll wait and discuss it with the others.
Once the decision was made he found himself drifting off to dream land, though he knew not what the dream was about when he reached for phone to shut off the 6:00AM alarm. Looking at the phone made him groan.
Monday's are always the worst.
This time he heard the dogs coming down the stairs but was no less happy to see them. The usual morning routine ensued, with the exception that Maik needed to insist upon doing him morning rituals first and then he would answer questions. This also involved an hour of cultivation, netting him a total of 174 chi added to his contributions total. He did, of course, tell that others that they needed to keep contributing first.
Part of how he got away with putting off their interrogation was the fact that Mitch had gained the cultivation skill and was busy practicing with it that morning.
Once Maik's cultivation session was out of the way though they sat down to breakfast and Maik told them what had transpired. He was surprised at how much trepidation he felt at the prospect of telling them, so much so that he realized that he had been putting this meeting off with his morning routine, needing the time to calm his nerves.
Maik's worries were soon proven legitimate. The looks of speculation were evident on everyone face and soon accusation and speculation started spreading through the dinning room. Michael cut through the noise with his decisive land lord tone to prevent the situation to spiraling out of control.
"Eighty stat points you said." Maik nods. "Alright then. It should be easy to tell the truth of the matter. Just dump all eighty points into strength. With that big a boost in strength we should be able to tell, without a doubt, if there is any merit to the stat screen and these chi skills."
Everyone else seemed to be placated by this choice so Maik went ahead and pulled up his stat page.
Name : Maik Alphonse Daley
Species : Human / H grade / Tier 1
Race : Celtic / Germanic
Entity level : 5
Age : 32
Gender : Male
Height : 190 centimeters
Weight : 78 Kilograms
Unused stat points : 80
Strength : 91
Flexibility : 99
Dexterity : 110
Endurance : 68 = [680 / 680]
Durability : 82
Intelligence : 134
Smarts : 157
Wisdom : 113
Perception : 43
Charisma : 106
Chi : 148 = [1480 / 148]
aura : 135
Tier 1 skills
...................
Tier 2 skills
Fundamental Chi control - Intermediate
...................
Tier 3 skills
Engineering - Advanced
Electromagnetic theory - Experienced
physics - Effective
Chemistry - Intermediate
Chi manipulation - Capable
Tier 4 skills
Chi cultivation - Beginner
Chi projection - Beginner
Maik took a deep breath and then started trying to dump all 80 points into strength but there was a notification that popped up in response.
Changes Can not be made to your stat sheet except for during a sleep cycle.
"Damn."
It was Maik's father who spoke first a hint of trepidation in his tone. "What ? What wrong."
"It says that I cant make changes to the stat sheet outside of a sleep cycle."
Michael waves the concern away. "That's fine. We can just see the result tomorrow then. Put the point into strength this evening regardless."
Maik shrugged and then made a mental note to do so. That change would leave him with a strength score of 171.
"Alright. this time tomorrow my strength should be at 171. How much is that again ?"
Neil chimed in after doing the math on his phone.
"That should make it so that you can lift Three Hundred and seventy seven pounds over your head. If were right about how the strength score is measure. That will be pretty fucking impressive.."
Maik chuckled at the thought and others joined in the mirth. Before they could get carried away though, Michael got them back on track with his boss voice.
"Alright, alright. It will just be a proof of concept. For right now, its Monday and we're still down 2 vans and 2 techs. Its going to be a rough day out there so lets get a move on."
The day was indeed a slog. Maik wound up going to nothing short of 13 calls and that was only by settling for a quick stop at the drive though at Burger king for lunch on the go. Further more he had to miss out on multiple chances to push more chi into the contribution system. This was more due to customers reactions then his fast pace, as he only needed to have one customer absolutely loose their shit when they realized what he was doing whine in the middle of fixing the guys stove.
"Are you shitting me ? Man the fuck are you doing ? Are you here ? Are you actually fixing my stove or are you just pretending to be working with your head up your ass ?"
"I assure you sir, I have the situation with your range well in hand. I've already diagnosed the problem, as I told and even showed you. The infinite switch...."
"Yeah you showed me some horse shit all right. For all I know what you called a burnt contact could just be how its supposed to look.... Just pack up your shit and get out."
"Sir, please. I already have the unit..."
"I said get your shit and get out. I don't want you here."
"...I am legally required to put the machine back together so that no one gets electrocuted."
"..... Fine."
That customer refused to pay the service call after Maik was done putting the unit back together and the tech didn't push the issue. From that point on Maik would only contribute chi while at the van, using the excuse that he was grabbing a part, some hardware, a special tool or even just checking his vans inventory. The end result was that he managed to contribute another 280 throughout the work day.
He wasn't holding everyone up for dinner this evening, thankfully but he did get an ear full from the boss man.
"You had a call in today for a Mister Simmons. Where is the ticket ?"
Maik knew this was code for 'Bring me the ticket' So Maik simply pulled the ticket from his bill book and handed it over without saying a word. His boss, Michael, continued the ass chewing.
"So what did you do to piss off Mister Simmons so bad that he just had to call up the office to chew out Becky for a half hour ?"
Now Maik could speak. "He noticed when I paused in the middle of the job to pump some chi into the contribution window and just lost his shit. Everything was..."
Maik's boss didn't care for a story. He had a point to make. "Why did the customer call us out to his house. ?"
Maik stopped trying to explain himself and adopted a humble tone. "To repair his range."
The change in Maik's tone didn't make his boss any angrier but he wasn't any calmer either as he continued to berate the tech. "To fix his range. I there any part of that which involves antagonizing the customer with our political views, our religious beliefs, badgering the customer about healthy eating or spacing out on some fucking massively controversial metaphysical display screen ?"
"No Sir."
"Did you even try to fix the situation ?"
"Yes sir."
"How ?"
"First I pointed out that I had already diagnosed the issue and had even showed him the burnt out contacts inside the infinite switch. He waved it away in a way to suggest that he couldn't believe his own eyes if I was the one presenting the evidence. Then, before I could respond to his flawed logic, he seemed to realize just how flawed it was and just told me to get out."
Maik continued in a firm but defeated tone. "I tried to reason with him. I already had the machine apart and the replacement part on the van but he just wasn't having it. I was barely able to convince him to let me put the machine back together by telling him I was legally required to do so in order to avoid anyone getting electrocuted... I didn't collect a service call."
Michael was nodding along but now spoke with a slightly less pissed boss tone, laced with an undercurrent of disapproval. "Whelp, you clearly fucked up by stopping the middle of the job to fuck with this... contributions thing, which, might I add, we don't even know if its going to be anything worth our time or not. But then you really fucked up by misreading just how badly you had offended the customer and now hes going to bad mouth my company... Our company, to everybody he know."
Michael rubbed his hand over his perfectly trimmed beard to emphasize its, and by extension his apparent perfection. "You could have offered him a discount as an apology for your misbehavior in his home. You could have distracted him from the issue with a demonstration of your ability to fix the unit, taken control of the situation rather than passively letting the customer spiral off into wild accusations that left him saying something he couldn't take back."
Now there was a hint of genuine anger in Michael's voice. "What ? You managed a few levels in this fucking video game system come to life and suddenly you've forgotten how to be a technician ?"
Maik knew there was no point in pleading his case any further. He had sinned by addressing something personal in the customers home and then failing to convince the customer to be okay with it. As much as Maik hated to admit it, His boss, his father was, as usual, right. He had been careless and he knew it. The only question now was for far to go with the apology. Maik could say that he had corrected the behavior, and that would be true. The real question was if he should explain how he corrected it.
Did you know this story is from Royal Road? Read the official version for free and support the author.
Doing so might get me in even more trouble. Then again, if I really will gain 80 strength tonight then it would be good to tell the others so that they can use the same methods to keep up their contributions.
Maik decided to be forthcoming with his answer, making sure to keep his tone respectful and duly chastised. "No sir. I have corrected the error by only pushing chi into the contribution screen while I'm at or in the van."
Maik's father rubbed over his beard again, probably to give himself time to consider the statement before responding. "And what about the alarm ? Customers aren't stupid and if your going out to the van every time your phone goes off your going to run into the same problem."
Maik had indeed considered that issue. "I stopped using the alarm. The distraction wasn't worth it. I realized that after the customers reaction. Instead I started going to the van after each diagnosis was finished to..." Maik uses air quotes. "Check my parts inventory or grab a tool or some hardware.." He dropped the air quotes. " Besides that I just contributed while in the customers drive way, before and after the job."
Maik continued more animatedly, as if he were pitching a sale. "I did get overly excited about the prospect of what gaining levels could mean. I forgot how important it was to be focused while on the job so that I don't have fuck ups like this... or injure myself. My feet are firmly on the ground again."
This seemed to finally assure Maik's father that the issue would not repeat itself and the head of the house looked around the room at all the other techs, meeting each of their eyes before addressing the room.
"Regardless if whether or not this leveling thing goes anywhere we must not forget that ours is a career of service to the customer. We leave our ego at the door when we climb into the van. We are the good old boys here to help people with prompt, professional, courteous and attentive service for all their appliance repair needs. If your heads in the clouds then your not present and focused on that task at hand there will be mistakes. At best, its a pissed of customer. At worst somebody house is going to get flooded or burnt down."
Everybody got the message. As a result the evening talk was far more work focused, almost as it they were deliberately denying themselves the act of talking about the possibilities that would come from gaining actual levels that granted stat points. Not unlike when one has to delete You-Tube off their phone to help them take a break from doom scrolling shorts, lest the addiction become overwhelming.
Maik still got in at least one more good cultivation session that evening before bed. That combined with another few contributions during the evening allowed Maik to add another 247 chi to the days contribution and despite the subdued tone of the evening he just had to check the progress before bed.
2,113 of 2,100 towards Tier 2 rewards.
He made it too Tier Two. Remedial citizenship and greater access. Maik was almost too excited to get to sleep but it had been a long, hard day. He didn't last long after hitting the pillow, even if he was sleeping on the couch.
2,113 of 2,100 towards Tier 2 rewards.
Active Quest : Avoid the apocalypse.
Type : Open
Duration : Until Calsifus 5-A, local designation Moon, impacts Calsifus 5, local designation Earth.
Estimated time until failure : 30 days 21 hours to point of no return.
Objective : Contribute a collective total of 4.6816e+13 Joules of energy in the form of Chi to the stability array aboard the Vassaroth through this interface.
Penalties for failure : Calsifus 5-A, local designation Moon, will impact Calsifus 5, local designation Earth, resulting in the extermination of all life on the surface.
Rewards : Varies - Dependent upon contribution.
Tier 1 : Contribute at least 1,400 calories of Chi. - Gain access to the newly integrated system between the digital entities of Calsifus 5 and Planer Portal management matrix. A monthly renewal fee of 1,000 calories of Chi will apply after the first month.
Tier 2 : Contribute at least 2,100 Calories of Chi - Gain access to the newly integrated system between the digital entities of Calsifus 5 and Planer Portal management matrix as a Prime member. Remedial citizenship within the Fifth Imperial congregate. Tutorials in the use of Chi skills. A monthly renewal fee of 1,400 calories of Chi will apply after the first month.
Tier 3 : Contribute at least 3,000 calories of Chi - Gain access to the newly integrated system between the digital entities of Calsifus 5 and Planer Portal management matrix as a VIP member. Remedial citizenship within the Fifth Imperial congregate. Tutorials in the use of Chi skills. Access to the Chi skill store. Access to advance citizenship status. Access to system titles withing the purview of the system. A monthly renewal fee of 1,800 calories of Chi will apply after the first month.
Access to class leveling system : Granted
Access to advanced features : Granted
Access to global information archives : Granted
Status elevated from Lost Colonist to Remedial Citizen.
Tax bracket altered
Former tax bracket : 90%
New tax bracket : 10%
Expanded Quest system added to interface.
Tier 2 skill : Fundamental Chi control : Advanced
Intermediate : level 5 : 2,429 / 3,038
XP Earned : 701
Level up
Intermediate : level 6 : 3,130 / 4,557
EXP Acquired : 303
Tier 3 skill : Chi manipulation : Advanced
Capable : level 5 : 2,338 / 3,038
XP Earned : 701
Level up
Capable : level 6 : 3,039 / 4,557
EXP Acquired : 303
Tier 4 skill : Chi cultivation : Advanced
Beginner : Level 4 : 1,299 / 1,350
XP Earned : 397
Level up
Beginner : Level 5 : 1,696 / 2,025
EXP Acquired : 135
Tier 4 skill : Chi projection : Advanced
Beginner : level 4 : 946 / 1,350
XP Earned : 701
Level up
Beginner : level 5 : 1,648 / 2,025
EXP Acquired : 135
Total EXP (Entity Experience Points) Acquired : 876
Entity Level up : Human / H grade / Tier 1 : Level 6
You now have 20 stat points to allocate.
Entity Level up : Human / H grade / Tier 1 : Level 7
You now have 40 stat points to allocate.
This... This changes... everything. If it even works.... I have to know. Know for sure. Beyond all doubt. Now. And Forever.
Maik pulled up his Character sheet and, without hesitation packed all 40 of the new stat points into strength as well.
Name : Maik Alphonse Daley
Species : Human / H grade / Tier 1
Race : Celtic / Germanic
Entity level : 7
Age : 32
Gender : Male
Height : 190 centimeters
Weight : 78 Kilograms
Unused stat points : 0
Transitioning Stat points :120
Strength : 91
Flexibility : 99
Dexterity : 110
Endurance : 68 = [680 / 680]
Durability : 82
Intelligence : 134
Smarts : 157
Wisdom : 113
Perception : 43
Charisma : 106
Chi : 148 = [1480 / 148]
aura : 135
Tier 1 skills
...................
Tier 2 skills
Fundamental Chi control : Intermediate : level 6 : 3,130 / 4,557
...................
Tier 3 skills
Engineering : Advanced : Level 6 : 18,437 / 20,503
Electromagnetic theory : Experienced : Level 4 : 6,354 / 7,593
physics : Effective : Level 8 : 27,428 / 30,754
Chemistry : Intermediate : Level 5 : 4,872 / 6,834
Chi manipulation : Capable : level 6 : 3,039 / 4,557
Tier 4 skills
Chi cultivation - Beginner : Level 5 : 1,696 / 2,025
Chi projection - Beginner : level 5 : 1,648 / 2,025
Maik noticed that his skills now showed the level as well as the XP progress.
I wander what metric is used to determine the advancement of skills that don't require chi. Something to look into later.
With that Maik released his grip on the mental conduit that connected him to the system at large.
There had been no dreams, not that Maik remembered. There had only been the faint sensation that time had passed when his morning alarm went off, pulling him out of his slumber. The fog of sleep quickly faded as the dogs came running down the stairs, eager to be let out and for attention, but more than that was the anticipation. Checking his stat sheet Maik found that his Strength stat was indeed up to 211.
It wasn't just the stat sheet either. His muscles. Maik had seriously bulked the fuck up, to full on professional body builder even. He was still marveling at himself while absent mindedly petting the dogs when Derek voiced his confusion as he turned on the lights.
"Dude.... Duuuude. What the fuck ?"
Needless to say Maik was grinning like a 10 year old who just got a motorized dirt bike for his birthday. He was inspecting himself, running his finger tips along the bulging and heavily pronounced muscles of this bicep, chest, abdomen and thighs. Then came a knock at the door.
It was Neil, Becky and their son Tucker. Maik delighted in how they all gawked at the literal anime character physique which Maik had become. Tucker was the first to voice their collective feelings. "That's just not fair."
20 minutes later the family was gathered out in the metal building, as that was where the weight set was, right beside the riding lawn mowers. Neil and Ian were all pumped to see Maik to lift 350 pounds over his head, quickly adding the weight to the bar bell but Maik interrupted them.
"Actually, go ahead and make it 400. I gained another couple levels yesterday and put another 40 points into strength, just to be sure this test was conclusive."
Maik's cousins looked at each other, shrugged and proceeded to stack up the weight to 400 pounds. No one was actually worried about if the stats did anything or not. Maik was basically now a super sized version of himself. Still there was some trepidation as Maik knelt down to grasp the barbell. He felt a little off, hungrier than usual for sure but something else as well. He was too excited though and put such thoughts aside until after the test. It was just one military press after all.
The dead lift was so easy. Then he switch his hand hold for a curl and it took some effort but Maik managed to curl the whole 400 pounds, bringing the bar bell right up under his chin.
There was pain, mainly in his arms but other joints as well. However the adrenaline and excitement from how amazing this was pushed such considerations to the back of this mind. He shifted his hand hold once more and then heaved with a mighty push sure that he had the strength to lift the immense weight over his head, only for the left shoulder to dislocate itself under the strait.
"Heee-AAAAAAHHHUhhhhhh"
Thankfully managed to step back and out of the way so that the barbell didn't land on him.
Due to squirming and groaning in pain it took a hot minute for the others to get a hold of Maik's arm and then pop the shoulder back into place. The pain had eaten up a lot of the adrenaline and Maik was feeling much drained in the aftermath. Rather hungry too. He voiced his personal diagnosis.
"Something wrong."
He had felt so powerful so full of life. Now he felt a gnawing hunger and as though he had run a mile on the track, twice. Maik decided to check his stats sheet for any answers.