Checking her watch, Hex thought, “Only forty-two more hours until initiation.” With a look of resolve, she continued with her training. Once she had gotten used to her new body enough to run on the small treadmill in her facility's gym, Hex immediately began agility and strength training. She focused on those two attributes of her physique because they were the ones her body was most adapted to. After gaining a point in each, Hex moved on to the more difficult intelligence and vitality attributes. She was currently training her vitality by running on the treadmill and had been for the past six hours. It was the last of the four she had decided to train, and she was frustrated with how long it was taking.
Finally, hours later, the message saying her vitality had increased by one point appeared, and Hex got off the machine on shaky legs. Collapsing to the cold floor, she started stripping off her clothes. Her nose wrinkled when her pants finally came off, "What is that smell?" She mumbled, bringing the smelly clothing to her nose and sniffing deeply, "Strange…I don't like the smell, but I don't dislike it either…" She huffed the sweaty pants again, deciding, "No, I don't like the smell…well, maybe one more sniff—" Hex stopped her monologue and tossed the pants aside, remembering something, “Pheromones! It’s one of the reasons I chose this form! I just never knew they would work on me, too! How could I have not known that? Stupid miscalculation! I must be more careful!" Quickly stripping off her top while holding her breath, Hex tossed it on top of her pants and dragged her aching body to the shower on the wall.
The water started flowing as soon as she was under the shower head, which was good because Hex wasn't sure she had enough energy to stand and wave at the sensor. The warm water helped relax her tense and aching muscles, and after a long while, she exited the shower. Taking a drying cloth from a rack, she dried her body. At least Hex tried to dry her body with a single towel…five towels later, she still didn't feel like her hair and tail were dry, but she was out of drying material. “Okay,” she told herself, “It was a simple miscalculation; the long hair and bushy tail obviously have their drawbacks.” She looked in the mirror in thought, “I could probably cut my hair to reduce drying time without losing my aesthetic appeal, but I don’t think I can shave my tail without affecting my balance. Hmm, I think I will wait, though; I don’t want to act rashly.”
Hex’s decision to use the Prism Vixen avatar as her body was carefully calculated once she was confident humans would be the dominant species on Sol-3.
Prism Vixens held several advantages over humans while simultaneously possessing many of the same characteristics. The original name of the Prism Vixens as a species was Eska-Vulpes. The species was not a natural evolution but engineered by humans over a billion years ago in a system like the one Sol-3 was in. The lithe creatures were genetically designed to be both attractive to humans aesthetically as well as compatible genetically for everything from procreation to blood and organ transplantation. The inhabitants of the planet that designed them used the species as slaves. Forcing them to fight their wars, act as surrogates to bear their children, and perform any task their masters deemed beneath their station to do. That all changed the day the System came to their planet, though.
Under System rules, the Eska-Vulpes were recognized as a valid sapient species, and the moment the planet was integrated, all the control collars for the fox-human hybrids were deactivated. A brutal war erupted that very day between the humans and their former slaves. By the end of the first year of integration, only one dominant species remained on the planet, and it was not humans. One of the primary contributing factors that gave the Eska-Vulpes the upper hand was one in one thousand of the species developed the ability to wield every form of magic regardless of their starting affinity. These individuals were classified as Prism Vixens, the name chosen by the first of their kind to achieve the feat.
“I won’t know if I can emulate her feat until integration,” Hex thought, reflecting on the story of the first Prism Vixen.
Going to the central display hologram in her birth room, Hex checked for the human. She had no idea why her bunker was under this particular human's home but was keeping tabs on him all the same. She assumed she had a good reason, but the System had taken the memory during her download. So far, the man had not impressed her. She had yet to catch him training or doing anything useful. All he had done so far was put up some flimsy barriers on three sides of his primary structure and check his energy panels. “I guess the lanes he cut into the forest have a purpose, or at least I assume they do.” Hex mused. She started to climb into the stasis pod to take a quick nap but remembered her sweaty clothing.
With a high-pitched whine, her species equivalent of a groan, she trudged into the next room and, holding her breath, rinsed and washed the garments in the small sink. Hanging the semi-clean clothing on the towel rack to dry, Hex walked her tired body back to her pod and collapsed into it, not even minding the arm and leg still hanging over the side. She was asleep in seconds, her light snores falling deftly in the quiet bunker.
***
Adric was sore the next morning when he woke up, but after some calisthenics to warm his muscles, he felt better. As he had done the previous morning, Adric checked to ensure the message was still there, and he hadn't hallucinated from accidentally eating a bad mushroom or something. Nope, there was the same minimized icon in his vision, only it was flashing now. “That’s new,” he thought, mentally willing the icon open. Several new messages opened in front of him.
Congratulations! You have gained a point in Vitality [VIT]. This increase will take effect upon integration. You have reached the maximum allowable increase in this attribute before System integration.
This text was taken from Royal Road. Help the author by reading the original version there.
Congratulations! You have gained a point in Strength [STR]. This increase will take effect upon integration. You have reached the maximum allowable increase in this attribute prior to System integration.
Adric noted there were time stamps on the messages. He had apparently gotten the vitality point while cutting the shooting lanes and the strength point while he was moving the logs he had cut. "If that's the case, then according to what I read last night, I should be able to get a point in agility and intelligence, too." He decided to try agility next, but first, he had another message to read.
Congratulations! You have unlocked the title Prepper. You have gained this title by dutifully preparing your primary residence for the upcoming integration without regard for any of your fellow humans. The title will take effect, and specifics will be made known upon integration and depending on interface choice.
"What does it mean, 'without regard'? It's not like I am going out of my way to avoid people. I just don't know that many people, and I most certainly don't trust the ones I do know." Adric’s ‘occupation’ had not, exactly, fostered trust. “That’s all behind me now—" He stopped that thought short. Was it behind him? He had just spent the past day preparing for the defense of his home with no idea if it would come to that or not. Filing his recent thoughts under 'not important' in his mind, Adric strapped on his pistol holster and made some coffee.
Realizing he could improve himself before the integration gave Adric a purpose, so instead of sitting around sipping his coffee that morning, he brought it to his makeshift training yard, pistol, and archery range. He spent the next three hours going through every martial art move that involved flexibility he could think of dozens of times. When that didn't work, Adric switched to yoga, twisting his body through the most complex positions he knew until finally, after another hour, the welcome notification informed him that he had increased his agility.
Instead of taking a break, Adric did a little target practice with his pistol. He thought that if he could perform well even in a state of fatigue, it might speed up the acquisition of the Small Arms skill. At least, that was what he had read on his phone. He got to work.
As an instinctive shooter, Adric did not aim down the sights of pistols or bows. Long guns were a different matter altogether; it wasn't exactly possible to hit a target at one thousand yards without performing some very complex calculations and without aiming. But he wasn't using long guns right now. With deft movements, Adric started firing at the small targets. He started with the closest ones, only a few yards away. The pistol kick felt good in his hands as the .45 ACP rounds easily tore through the paper targets. When the final round was fired and the slide locked open, he took cover behind a tree and dropped the spent magazine into his waiting hand, sliding it into his drop pouch. Grabbing another mag from his holster strap, Adric rammed it home and jerked back the slide, letting it go to chamber the first round.
Rolling out from behind cover, Adric advanced slowly toward more cover, a downed log, firing at the targets farther down range as he walked. Just as he fired the last round, he ducked behind the log and repeated the process of reloading his weapon. This time, before leaving cover, Adric crawled the length of the log exiting his cover in a different location than he had entered. He fired two more shots, and a notification came.
Congratulations! You have acquired the skill Small Arms Tier 1; Level 1 [Locked]. Use of this skill will be made available upon integration. You have reached the maximum allowable level in this skill prior to System integration.
Flicking the safety on, Adric holstered his pistol even as the last echoes of its retort faded through the forest. He wasn't worried about someone coming to investigate the gunshots; this was the country, and hearing random distant gunshots was the norm. “Still, I need to be cognizant of the state of the world right now.” He thought, checking his targets. Every round he had fired had hit the bullseye or come within a hair's breadth of center mass. He chuckled, "It's easy when the targets aren't shooting back."
Returning to his starting point, he smiled at his recurve bow. Adric's former occupation required him to have a full working knowledge of all manner of firearms as well as most military hardware and tactics. Archery, however, he had learned for fun, more as a hobby than anything else. “At least it started as a hobby…probably more of an obsession now.” He thought, picking up the hunter-green recurve bow he had made, checking the limbs carefully for any defects or deformities before stringing it.
As with the pistol, Adric started with the closest targets. His instinctive style of archery meant there was no delay between drawing and releasing the bowstring. This method eliminated the inevitable shakes that would develop when maintaining a full draw of fifty-five pounds while trying to aim simultaneously. With instinctive archery, all the aiming and mental calculating was done before ever drawing back the bow. This allowed the shooter to release the instant they had the appropriate draw. Over the years and thousands of arrows, Adric had learned that if his target wasn't moving, he had to be, even if it was only a slight sway. For some reason, that was when he was most accurate. It was the strangest thing to him, and although he didn't understand why it had to be that way, he accepted it. And so, he went about knocking and loosing dozens of arrows downrange. Adric was excellent with a pistol at close range as long as no one was shooting at him; in comparison though, he was a surgeon with his bow close to mid-range from his targets. His surgical accuracy tapered off at forty yards and ended at one hundred. He could still strike a target at two hundred yards, but not accurately or consistently.
Congratulations! You have acquired the ability ‘Archery’ Tier 2; Level 1 [Locked]. Use of this skill will be made available upon integration. You have reached the maximum allowable level in this skill prior to System integration.
"Oh, tier two. That is interesting," Adric said, admiring his handiwork. Not a single arrow had missed the center of its target. "I wonder if I had hit every bullseye with the pistol, it would have been tier two also?" He mused aloud while he retrieved his arrows.
Back in his basement, a few minutes later, Adric stored his bow next to several others he had made through the years. He reloaded his magazines and then cleaned his pistol. “Long guns next,” Adric thought, reaching for his 7mm magnum. But then he stopped his reach, his fingers lightly brushing against the stock. He was sure he had just heard a barely perceptible creaking from the floor above.
Every muscle in Adric's body went tense. He knew what he had heard wasn't his imagination, and his mind was racing with scenarios. He couldn't help but wonder how someone or something got into his house. He had made sure to lock the door every time he— “While I was shooting!” He thought, mentally kicking himself, “I left out the back door and came in through the basement! Dumbass! Stupid mistake, stupid, stupid, stupid mistake."