Lus sighed as he entered his quarters. It’d been a painfully boring two weeks since the battle with the Corporates, and he was dreading having to endure even longer without a chance to get off the Argo. Repairs in the fsylan tubes were complete, which meant each day was handling general maintenance tasks and wishing something remotely interesting would happen.

After sliding his boots off, he collapsed onto the couch while Avil eagerly climbed up to curl up next to him. With one hand giving the cat the pets he demanded, Lus used the other to start flipping through system screens.

He had leveled up again already through cooking for the crew, though he no longer made the [Beginner’s Luck Soup] perfectly since giving everyone on the ship a giant boost to [Luck] might start drawing attention to a secret he was desperate to keep. Instead, he continued to make variations of the soup or used the pasta recipe to make his own dishes, all of which gained him [XP], just in a lower amount.

All [Level 4] brought, however, was another stat increase, with [Stamina], [Health], and [Strength] all increasing by 1, while [Luck] increased by 2. The home page now read:

[Stamina: 7]

[Intelligence: 8]

[Strength: 5]

[Charm: 6]

[Health: 10]

[Speed: 8]

[Common Sense: 0]

[Luck: 11]

The Beginner's Luck Soup had increased his [Luck] by 10, alongside anyone else who ate it, but no one had seemed to notice that their miraculous escape from the Corporates came back to the dinner he made. Then again, no one but Nippy even had the means to see things like stats anyway. The effects of the dish were temporary and wore off after only a few hours. He hadn’t had the chance to make it perfectly again even for himself since they ran out of kechin meat, but he was excited about the possibilities other system recipes could bring.

He tapped away from the homepage to the newest tab on the screen: [Recipe Book].

The screen then presented him with a long list of recipe names, all except a handful behind some kind of lock. [Beginner’s Luck Soup] was entirely available while two others were marked as buyable: [Tasty Buns] and [Galloping Scallops]. The problem was that all he could see about them was the price and the name, which meant he would have to buy one to get the chance to see how to actually make it.

Since he started cooking his mish-mash dishes using the single recipe he had, he found that none of them gave him any kind of boost. He figured that the whole point of the system [Recipes] but gauging what kind of power they had was hard based on names alone.

He had [1100 XP] to spend after all his hours cooking, including taking a couple of breakfast shifts since Lbrvr had gotten to go off ship for the resupply missions, but each recipe cost [500 XP] so he’d been wary about spending so much of his [XP].

Most of the other names on the screen looked more helpful than the two options he could buy, but he wasn’t sure how to unlock them. It could be leveling up, or it could be that buying one recipe unlocked the next one. He’d tried asking Leviathan, but as usual, the Demon was as unhelpful as he could possibly be.

“Well, here goes nothing,” Lus murmured as he selected [Galloping Scallops], the more interesting of the two. He hit the buy option, and the entire recipe opened up before him. He skipped past the history section to check the list of ingredients and groaned. The kitchen definitely didn’t have all the spices it called for, and now that he actually thought about it, they didn’t have scallops lying around either.

“What a waste.” He closed out of the [Recipe] to see that nothing about the recipe book had changed. The two fully available recipes were at the top while just below them waited the single buyable option, and everything else remained unattainable.

“Well, I can’t make that one, so maybe this one will be a little more manageable,” he said to himself and Avil. The cyclops cat paused to stare at Lusac as though he understood what he was saying before returning to his grooming.

Lusac spent another [500 XP] to buy the [Tasty Buns] recipe just for the sake of spending his [XP] which didn’t seem to have any other use once he leveled up. It had a much more reasonable ingredient list, but it did seem like it would take a lot more time to make than his usual cooking window, so he’d have to plan ahead when he actually wanted to cook it.

One glaring issue with all the [Recipes] Lus noticed was the lack of description of the power. He disliked that he would have to make the [Recipe] perfectly in order to figure out how it affected his stats, but he supposed that was a relatively minor problem all things considered.

He tapped over to his [Quests] tab, but there was nothing new there either, even with the additional [Recipes]. This system was becoming as mundane as the rest of his life with the lack of missions and getting off the Argo. Lus had always hated the idea of being stuck in a ship, traveling the void for weeks to months at a time. One of the things he liked best about being a Runner is that he got the benefits of seeing the galaxy while getting frequent chances to breathe regular air on planets.

Sighing again, he waved the screen away. It wasn’t going to provide anything of further interest. He contemplated turning on an old gladiatus match, but at the idea of sports, he remembered his disappointingly low [Strength]. It had finally increased at his last level up, but that was because he’d spent so much time crawling through the fsylan tubes with a backpack–something he didn’t normally take with him. He figured that if the stats were going to be based on how he spent his time between leveling up, he could game the system a bit and skew it towards giving him the stats he wanted. Unfortunately, that meant if he wanted an increased [Strength] stat, he was going to have to do something that required [Strength], which meant hitting the gym.

Lusac didn’t enjoy using the community workout space. It was always full of other crew members, and everyone who used the weights was already rather buff themselves. That meant when a skinny Human like Lus came along, he spent the entire time trying to ignore the incessant teasing. Of course, since he rarely went, he never gained the muscles to prove his worth against the others, creating an endless cycle.

He’d actually already sucked it up and gone a couple of times to work out over the past couple of weeks, but with all the time he was spending doing very non-[Strength] related things, he was worried he still wouldn’t get the boost he wanted. Even if he only got 2 or 3 more points in [Strength], that would be enough for him to stop worrying so much about it.

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“I guess I have to go,” Lusac told Avil.

The cat meowed, the strange pitchy screech already a normal sound to Lus’s ears. Becky had been kind enough to get real pet food and a real litter box for Avil during one of her chances to get off the ship since Lus was required to stay on board full time. The creature had settled into his new home happily, but even having a mutant alien for a pet didn’t deter the endless boredom of his past few days.

“Gym time,” Lus said in a vain attempt to hype himself up as he stood from the couch. Avil briefly complained before curling up around his tails and glaring up at his owner. Lusac noticed that Avil’s belly was perhaps a little bigger than it had been when he first picked up the stray, but he decided that wasn’t worth worrying about now.

He changed into his single set of exercise clothes which were smelling a little funky after a few wears, but he promised himself he’d do laundry afterwards–a promise he’d already broken four days in a row.

After he finished tying his gym shoes, Lus bid Avil farewell and exited into the corridor of the Argo. It was late enough in the evening that everyone was either off duty or on their night shift, leaving the hallways fairly barren. The gray alunitanium walls reflected back the yellow lights from above onto the dull, black floor.

Lus hoped he wasn’t going to bump into anyone on his way. Not only was he a little more aware of just how pungent his clothes were, but he feared trying to explain his sudden gym habit given that he’d shown little interest in such activities before.

Even with his 11 [Luck], he couldn’t pull that off, and to his great misfortune, out of everyone who could have run into him, it was Relf.

With so few Humans on board, Lus had expected that everyone of his species would have banded together in friendship, and for the most part, that’s how it worked out with Oaty and Becky.

Relf, however, was the glaring exception, and for good reason. Lusac didn’t think he’d ever met anyone more disagreeable in his life.

“Oi, Loser,” the man shouted from down the hall as Lus increased his pace. A set of notifications popped up in the corner of his vision.

[New Quest Unlocked!]

[Knuckle Sandwich]

[Description: teach Relf a lesson]

[Time limit: 1 hour]

[Reward: Recipe]

“I’m talking to you, Loser,” Relf replied, and Lusac was forced to stop and face him. Did his system really expect him to fight this guy?

While several years older than him, Relf was still half a foot shorter and a good amount wider around the center. His pasty complexion indicated far too much time stuck in the dark corridors of the ship but given Relf’s general lack of skills in anything but eating and directing the cargo golems, he didn’t exactly get off the ship much.

“What is it, Relf?” Lus asked.

“You reek. Where are you off to? More time whining in the kitchens?”

Lusac made a face as he tried to parse some kind of meaning out of the intended insult. “No. Just getting out of my room for a bit. Did you need something?”

“Don’t talk back to me. I’m your superior. Word on the ship is that it's your fault the Coporates nearly blew us out of the sky,” the man said.

“Yrqw is my superior. You’re just a cargo worker,” Lusac replied in a flat tone.

“I’ve been on this ship years longer than you, Loser. You can only dream of reaching my level of expertise.”

“Expertise in eating?” Lus raised his eyebrows and, in a very obvious manner, glanced at Relf’s pudgy gut.

“Watch your tongue, Loser, or I’ll take it for myself,” Relf threatened. He stepped closer, standing up on his toes to stare Lus in the eyes. “How’d you like to be deaf, Corporate scum?”

“You mean mute,” Lus corrected him. “Removing my tongue would make it so I can’t speak, which would make me mute. The inability to hear is what makes someone deaf.”

“Shut up. I didn’t say anything like that.” The man was fuming now, and it took all of Lus’s self-control to keep from grinning. Words could be just as powerful as fists.

Relf still managed to catch on to Lus’s enjoyment.

“Knock that off,” he ordered.

“Knock what off?”

“You know exactly what I mean, Loser,” Relf growled. “I’ve had enough of your insubordination.”

“Clearly you have no idea what that word means either.”

That was the final straw, and the next thing Lusac saw was a chubby fist aiming for his jaw. He managed to grab it since Relf was nowhere near as fast as him, but it distracted him enough for Relf to get a second shot in on his abdomen, knocking the air from his body.

Lus doubled over and barely avoided a kick coming towards him. Once he regained his breath, he stood and grabbed both of Relf’s hands as they came towards him, but he forgot one key thing about Relf: what the man lacked in brains, he made up for in strength. Relf used the holds to toss Lusac to the ground like a toy and was preparing to stomp on his chest when someone else interrupted.

“Relf! What’s going on here?” Wsr asked before the foot could collide.

Relf stopped and quickly turned to face her, faking innocence. “He hit me first.”

Lus scrambled to his feet. “As if. He started it, Wsr.”

The Kremel glanced between them, her orange eyes scanning the scene intently. At last, her decision was made, and she grabbed Relf’s shoulder. “Come with me to speak to Nippy about this. He won’t be happy to hear you’re starting fights.”

Another notification appeared.

[Quest Complete: Knuckle Sandwich]

Well, he supposed it worked out after all. And he got another [Recipe] out of it which would help make things at least a little more interesting.

Relf shot Lus one last glare as Wsr dragged him away, freeing Lusac to return to his original goal. His stomach didn’t really hurt all that much, and after the altercation, burning some anger off at the workout center actually sounded nice.

As expected, the workout room was about half full. A group of Nemarians and Kremel were off playing hyperball in the gym section while a few others were scattered amongst the various machines. Lus breathed in relief when he noticed the weight section oddly empty for once.

He grabbed a set of dumbbells a little heavier than he might normally have gone for, but after getting tossed around so easily by Relf, Lus was more determined than ever to gain those extra points in [Strength]. Never again would some pudgy cargo worker be able to throw him to the ground without a fight.

Lus was shocked with how quickly the time went by as he pumped the weights through various positions to work his entire upper body. Knowing himself, he wouldn’t be back anytime soon, so he went ahead and did a bunch of leg lifting too. He was going to hate himself when the morning came, but the anger from his brief fight with Relf pushed him to work harder than ever.

After he exhausted the weights, his eyes found the treadmills. While he already had a fairly high [Speed], there was no harm in working on that too while he was here. So, he spent another half an hour jogging. Even when his legs felt like jelly and he was sure he would collapse, he pushed himself a little longer. Of course, his stupid system was going to force him to actually do the work to get the stats, but he was going to do it, whatever it took.

At last Lus used the last bit of [Stamina] and had to stop or risk passing out. He slowed to a walk for a brief cooldown and then went to the drinking fountain to take a long drink of water against the pounding thirst in his throat.

As he walked out of the workout center, Lus felt good about himself for the first time in weeks. Maybe the whole gym thing wasn’t a complete waste of time after all. He wouldn’t know for sure until he leveled up again, and that was going to take at least a couple more weeks, but hopefully during that time he’d at least get the chance to make one of the new [Recipes]. Lusac walked back to his room, satisfied with his progress and hopeful about his future.