Chapter 6 - Big Blue Box pt.2 Mental

"Intelligence refers to a combination of your ability to retain information and is also related to your speed of thought. However, everyone's thought processes are different and just because a person with an Intelligence stat of 100 can run through about twice as many mental scenarios per unit of time as someone with 50, that doesn't necessarily mean they will reach the right answer first. Add to that the biases that each individual person has and there is no guarantee that the best person to help with a given question will be the person with the highest Intelligence."

"Still, a high intelligence is usually needed to cast a non-cantrip spell in any reasonable amount of time for Mages. Lots of other classes like Administrator and many others which require sorting through large amounts of information and memorization are based primarily on this stat.

Chase spoke up, interrupting for the first time in a while. "So is 67 high then?" Given the fact that humans seemed to have around 50 in most stats so far he assumed it was but after how badly he'd done in the Physical stats then he wanted a bit of an ego boost

The Elf's eyebrows rose "yes very high for someone with no class yet, were you studying to become a scholar by any chance?"

"Not particularly" Chase replied "I was only one year through my three year computer science degree"

"Your Intelligence should not be that high from just one year of study. It takes years of practicing memorisation and logic to get it that high."

"Oh well I spent from the age of 4 until 17 in school, but everyone does that"

The elf stared at him in shock, Chase quite enjoyed the moment. It was much nicer to be on the receiving end of that expression rather than being the one with it on his face.

Unlawfully taken from Royal Road, this story should be reported if seen on Amazon.

"Y-you mean everyone on your planet gets thirteen years of education!"

"Em, well where I'm from, basically yes, though in poorer countries that's not always the case and some people do leave early but most people do around 13 years depending on the country."

"I have so many questions" Rhuyn said for the second time that day and for the second time that day Chase shut him down. This time a lot less angrily.

"Nope" he replied before Rhuyn could get too excited.

"what do you mean 'nope'"

"I mean I'm not answering your questions until you finish answering mine" he said. "Remember, you kidnapped me. I feel I'm owed my explanation first that at least" Chase conveniently 'forgot' to include the fact that the kidnapping had saved his life but he really didn't want to get too sidetracked from Rhuyn's explanation. It was definitely more important that he learnt about the world he was currently in than for Rhuyn to learn about his world.

"Fine" the elf pouted but he didn't put up too much resistance.

"Where was I… yes, Willpower. Willpower is the ability to resist negative mental effects, be it stress, exhaustion, channeling too much mana, spells and poisons that affect your perception of reality such as alcohol, hallucinogens and other drugs. Forcing yourself to do something you dislike also help increase the stat. Willpower is vital for mages as at high levels it allows for casting spells at once. Without a Willpower of over 60 you are liable to knock yourself out with the mental strain."

Chase looked at his stats. Following the theme that 50 is around average his 35 Willpower was pretty abysmal. Still it wasn't that unexpected. School wasn't particularly difficult for him, and he'd never had to try too hard to live up to his parents' expectations. As long as he made it into college they were happy. Apart from some very mild bullying in school his life had been pretty easy. He was kind of paying for that now with his low Willpower and physical stats but it was hard to feel too bad that he had been living a pleasant and easy life.

“Perception is the ability to detect slight changes in the environment around you. This is not simply your sight. It is all of your senses. In fact Perception is actually a common skill for people with impaired vision, a blind woman with 90 perception can walk down a busy street without a problem using only her sense of sound. The noise of others’ footsteps and the echo of noise off any obstacles near her would be enough. And that’s just sound, all your senses get improved.”

“Last of the Mental skills is Charisma. Now this is probably the most obscure of the skills so far. Charisma doesn’t directly make you better looking or automatically make people like you. Instead it makes you better at conveying your opinions, reading emotions, convincing others, predicting people’s emotional reactions and more.”