Chapter 5

~

I woke up to a mouthful of sand.

I’ve really got to stop doing that.

Sitting up, which was a fairly awkward process with my limbs currently unresponsive, I tried to spit out the grit in my mouth. Finding little success in the endeavour, I continued to maneuver my arms in front of me. I must have flopped about for at least a minute or two before I finally managed to find the right position, but eventually I got the job done.

I felt all sorts of weird, like a dishrag wrung out and hung to dry. Everything tingled, and my brain kept sending little spurts of lighting bouncing around my skull. My eyes swam for a minute, and I just about upchucked but managed to hold everything in.

Ok, what gives? I thought getting “evaluated” would be a simple scan. Why did it knock me out?

I forcibly moved my dull fingers across the bottom part of my vision, dragging the shrunken notifications back into full view. Oh boy, lookie lookie. More colors.

The first one to pop up was that same deep red, only now it carried a hint of gold around the borders.

~NOTICE~

Evaluation Complete

Due to extenuating circumstances, your current physical, mental, and soul stats have been deemed a Priority 1 adjustment, according to Protocol Alpha1/String-03/Authorization-BDK

Adjustment Complete

You have received baseline improvements befitting a {Level 1} Norkishian citizen

Race Change Complete

You have accepted a baseline race change from {Earthborn Human} to {Quasi-Norkishian}

More information on this Change can be found via further advancements

Uh… not cool. Not cool at all! I NEVER gave permission to change my race! I was perfectly fine being a good old fashioned human from the green planet of my birth, thank you very much.

After a long sigh that didn’t really make me feel better, I proceeded to stand and shake the loose sand off my clothes...again. I needed a bath.

Like, more than usual. There was this faint layer of filth covering my entire body, and it did not smell like roses. And unless I was extremely delirious (not impossible), I had just lost about 30 pounds of fat and gained half that in muscle.

Right. Sure. No problem there.

I found my makeshift pack where it had dropped, then plopped down on the edge of a dune, while being very careful not to touch any other weapons or items in the area. Time to read up and figure out what was going on.

I shifted through the notifications and text boxes, organizing them by color first, then number second. Once they were somewhat properly placed, I returned to the screen showing, well, me.

A picture of what I looked like loomed before my eyes. Seriously, it was like peering at a full body mirror. I could even spin my avatar around in circles, and it would show the full 360 scan. To the right of my image was a small section of details, and I began inspecting them thoroughly.

~Legend Overview~

Title: Jacob Tafrin

Weapon Name: Bowdrie & Sackett (Set Item)

Level: 1

A flash of gold filled my screen, and a bit of lightning ran up and down my body. Thankfully, this was a pleasant kind of shock; one that invigorated and relaxed rather than causing any damage. In front, I could see a flashing “Level Up” message.

~Congratulations~

You have leveled up! As this is your first level since beginning The Climb, you now have access to your various attributes and skills. You currently have available: 1 stat point

Stolen novel; please report.

Below these interesting tidbits, three other words glowed with a softly repeating pattern. Attributes, Skills, Weapon Upgrades. Alright, let’s see the damage. How badly did I fare in the assessment? Attributes first.

~Primary Attributes~

Primary attributes have a base value that grows with each level, rising once every level until level 10, every even level thereafter to level 80, and every fifth level from 80 to 100.

Might: 1 (+1)

Precision: 1 (+1)

Toughness: 1 (+1)

Vitality: 1 (+1)

Willpower: 1 (+1)

Each attribute could be further expanded for a few extra details, which I naturally did.

~

Might: Increases Direct Damage

Precision: Increases Hit Chance

Toughness: Increases Armor Regeneration

Vitality: Increases Health Regeneration

Willpower: Increases Mental Capacity

~

Five attributes. Alright, fair enough. I’d played plenty of RPGs, so I thought I could get a hint of where this was going. Oh wait, there was more.

~Secondary Attributes~

In contrast to primary attributes, the four secondary attributes have a base value of 0 and do not automatically increase as one gains levels. Points in each secondary attribute must be distributed manually, and may be collected in a variety of ways. Primary attributes can also be improved in this manner, though at a default rate of 10 points to 1 stat increase.

Concentration: 0 (0%)

Defense: 0 (0%)

Expertise: 0 (0%)

Ferocity: 0 (0%)

~

Concentration: Increases tolerance of mental strain.

Defense: Increases possibility of dodging/deflecting incoming damage.

Expertise: Increases skill accuracy.

Ferocity: Increases skill damage.

~

~Derived Attributes~

The derived attributes are calculated from the primary and secondary attributes, as well as statistics from gear and Weapon Bond.

Armor: 10

Decreases incoming direct damage. Increases by 10 each level in Toughness and by (level# x #%) in Defense.

Boon Duration: 0:10

Increases the duration of all applied boons. Increases by 0:10 seconds each level in Willpower and by (level# x #%) in Concentration.

Critical Chance: 0.1%

Increases critical hit chance. Increases by 0.1% each level in Precision and by (level# x #%) in Expertise.

Critical Damage: 1

Increases critical hit damage. Increases by 1 each level in Might and by (level# x #%) in Ferocity.

Condition Duration: 0:10

Increases the duration of all inflicted conditions. Increases by 0:10 seconds each level in Willpower and by (level# x #%) in Concentration.

Health: 17

An individual's maximum health. Base value is determined by Weapon Bond (7% of level) and increases by 10 with each Vitality level.

After that wall of text flashed by me, I began to regret my sudden optimism. With a decent amount to digest, I closed the leveling screen.

Then quickly reopened it to place my available stat point into Expertise. I mean, come on, it was painfully obvious I was going to need all the accuracy I could get. I watched carefully to see what would change. To my excitement, both Expertise and Critical Chance showed improvement, though only by a little.

Expertise - 1 (10%) Critical Chance: 0.2%

Nice. Now I had a baseline for secondary attributes.

Next up… Skills!