After another hour or two of travel, the tip of the tallest tower of the [Rainbow Guild] finally became visible. With that in sight, though, there also came all the half-formed natural [Spell-Weaves] that coalesced from both the [Mana] and [Aether] in the atmosphere, making it hard for those with particularly sharp senses, like me with my [Demiurgic Sight], to wander around without proper protection.

With a grunt of annoyance, I tried to slip on the goggles that I had hanging on my neck, only to fail to do so with only one hand.

And I sure as fuck wasn’t removing both hands from the yoke.

“Hey Sheeno, do you mind helping me out with the goggles? I’m having some difficulties putting them on while driving, and the energies in the air are already starting to sting my eyes.”

“Ok~ Now quit your whining and just let me…” so saying she proceeded to pull the goggles over my eyes, and above my ears, and then the magical strap tightened itself at a comfortable, yet secure, degree.

Thankfully, she had the presence of mind not to obstruct my vision, so she didn’t hinder my driving, but having her hands roaming over my head in a non-teasing manner was still too distracting to simply ignore.

The quadrupedal car smashed through another tree due to my negligence and Sheeno ended up tightening an embrace on my head by reflex, squeezing me against her chest-plate.

And only by virtue of my own [Reflexes] did I manage to steer us away from further impacts.

“… wait, was that in brackets?”

You have discovered a new [Body] Statistic:

Reflex: It refers to the speed at which one’s body can respond to stimuli and commands, and it mainly impacts the responsiveness between body and mind.

“Oh, cool! Now I only need the last one and I’ll have the complete set!

…what’s that [Stat] at right now, [Buddy]?”

50, but you would be better off paying closer attention to the road.

[Buddy] reminder was unnecessary, since we were practically outside of the [Wild Area], with the number of obstacles quickly decreasing, and the [Guild] now looming over us.

The extreme speed at which we traveled, even though unwieldy, did have its advantages: for example, it made us avoid the beam of yellow energy that exploded the ground where we had just been a moment before.

“What the shit was that!?” I cordially asked.

In response, Sheeno pulled out her [Guild Card] back out, and after casting a cursory glance around she worked with the floating sheet of paper again. It only took a fraction of a minute, but before she could verbally respond to me a second beam came crashing down, this time much closer.

“It seems that an overeager [Party] is using an [Obfuscation] technique to follow us unseen, but that also has temporarily cut down their communications, so they are unaware of the order to let us be, and are now instead trying to bring us down on their own to reap all of the theoretical rewards that would have come with the original missive”, she calmly explained, as if the third beam that exploded ever closer wasn’t even there.

“[Obfuscation], uh?”

4 sentient entities detected, possession of [Guild Cards] confirmed on all 4

[Unavodable Detection] came in clutch once again, warning me that this group of idiots was traveling at a similar speed to us, but a kilometer or so to our right, and slightly in front.

I swerved hard left, putting more distance between us and making it harder for them to get a straight shot in, then I sent over to them a couple of [Flying Trappers] out the side window to hopefully slow them down.

Sheeno observed my action with a calculating expression, and after seeing my [constructs] fly out she followed where they were going with her eyes before asking “are they in a straight line from where we are and the direction those ‘net-launchers’ are going?”, to which I nodded and she apparently felt that was enough information to launch a rain of [Ice Spears] in that general direction.

A couple of smaller yellow beams took out my [Trappers] while also hitting a couple of my companion’s projectiles, but some of Sheeno’s spears still managed to reach their target, seemingly hitting solid air, at least until a ripple went through that general space, and a giant fluffy cloud became visible to the naked eye, together with the 4 people on it, whom almost looked more surprised to be visible again than we probably did when we saw them.

They were 3 [Sky Gnomes], small fellows with pointy light blue hats as big as their bodies, all of whom held their hands against the ‘cloud flooring’, and a [Tree Elf], a lithe and tall person with grass-colored long hair and peachy skin, who currently held the handles of what looked like a rotating cannon made of wood.

“Well,” Sheeno was the first to find her voice, “that is not who I expected to find as the fearless [Adventurers] that braved a fight with the unknown creature… that is actually us”.

At that moment the ‘gunner Elf’ seemed to take notice of us, evident by the finger she had extended to point right at us, through the window I had opened to let both [Tappers] and [Ice Spears] fly out; “the creature has already eaten people!”

“NO, you dimwit, we’re just riding in it!” I shouted from my seat, shaking a fist in her direction but still without looking away from the front.

“Cherry! He’s right, I just got a message from the [Guild] that states that the supposed [Monster] is just an unregistered [Mount-construct]!” One of the Gnomes exclaimed, waving his [Guild Card] in the air for emphasis.

The [Tree Elf], who we now knew was called Cherry, looked back and forth from us to her companions, who were now all nodding, with an expression of bewilderment.

That bewilderment soon became embarrassment, when she asked with a high-pitched voice “why didn’t you tell me that before!?”

Royal Road is the home of this novel. Visit there to read the original and support the author.

“We were [Obduscated]”, one Gnome responded, “as your plan required”, another continued, “and [Guild messages] can’t go through our [Enchantment] until it’s deactivated” the first one that had talked ended.

She stomped her feet in anger, which made no sound and only cause some fluffy material to come loosed around the area of impact, glared at her diminutive companion, and then pointed right back at us and exclaimed “this all your fault!”, after which the cloud moved further away from us, ignoring from then on our presence, even though we were going in the same direction.

“Man, I hope that we won’t meet them again, they looked like trouble”, I said.

“I wouldn’t count on it: they acted without authorization because we had broken the rules first. Most probably we will end up being publicly scolded together, even if it’s for different reasons”, Sheeno explained why my wishes wouldn’t get to be realized.

“Lovely”, I muttered.

* * *

Once I thought that we were close enough to the [Rainbow Guild] I tried to stop the ‘car’ as delicately as possible, which means I ended up making the legs lock up and the claws on each end dig through the ground until we halted with a lurching stop; if it wasn’t for our [System]-enhanced bodies we would have definitely broken some bones… or at least I would, I have no idea of how resilient [Heliokans] were before their introduction to the [Nexus].

“Are you ok?” I croaked out, trying to ignore the pain flaring from both my legs and arms, which I strained trying to keep steady during the stop, even though the seatbelt should have been secure enough on its own.

“I think so? But ouch, this thing isn’t capable of stopping in a reasonable manner either”, Sheeno responded.

I opened my door and stepped out of the vehicle, while Sheeno hurriedly followed my lead and jumped out of her side, and took a couple of weary steps away from it.

Through your actions, you have been awarded +1 [Dexterity] and +3 [Reflex]

After having ridden it for a while I only now noticed how the pneumatic legs I gave it this first time around dangerously resembled those of a spider.

“Ugh, gross. Did my recent confession to Sheeno affect me subconsciously?”

Besides how you already surmised that you did not make it fly because you became self-conscious about making stuff float?

Yes, your recent reminiscence of past traumas did have an impact on how this design turned out.

I unsummoned the [Mount], and it burst in sparks of [Mana], still visible through the goggles only because they were mine. In fact, this process happened every time I recalled a [construct], but none before ever really had enough infused into them to be this noticeable, or ‘sparkly’.

Following these sparks, once they were inside me I saw them dissolve into the indistinct space that seemed to house my [Mana], what the [System] calls the [Core]. Although the name makes it sound like I have an ethereal sphere inside my body that contains my ‘essence’, it feels more like I have a ‘spiritual double’ under my physical body that closely mirrors it, but that somehow feels undefined; but I have still no way to determine whether that’s normal for it to be that way, that I have a problem, or that I’m not ‘perceptive’ enough to analyze it fully…

“Hello~? Are you lost inside there again?” Sheeno asked me while waving one hand in front of my unfocused eyes.

I snapped back to reality, “yes, sorry, just thinking about the correlation between [Mana] and spirituality, and where they all fit within the body and [Body] both”.

“Oof, that’s heavy stuff. You must have a lot of [Insight] to just be able to focus on profound stuff like that”, she replied.

Insight:

75

“Yeah, it’s my third highest [Stat]. Say, is there a way to get a better look at one’s own [Core]?”

“Of course there is. There’s an entire [Statistic] dedicated to it, but the [System] discourages me to say anything else until you discover it on your own, which you should hurry up and do: Having all [Statistics] opened before [Level 10] will be incredibly beneficial to you, but we can’t talk about it in more details until it happens, the [System] makes it more rewarding for those that figure out [Information] on their own”, Sheeno explained.

That was some really important news, and made me wonder why they never explained to me at least this much, or if those that went to join the [Army] got shafted out of some good benefits for the sake of streamlining their training and efficiency.

I may have not been fully responsible for everything that has happened to me since coming to this world, but I was given choices, and now more than ever I was incredibly glad that I had listened to my inner child and became an [Adventurer].

“Inner-child”?

I assure you that you also act and look like a child on the outside too.

“Hey! Screw you, that was a low blow!”

Not as low as your height!

Shit, that was good, even though unoriginal.

Also, must I remind you that I cannot “screw” anything, since I am incorporeal?

And I want to keep it that way, thank you very much.

Anyway, the last [Stat].

It has to do with introspection… was kind of hoping to see brackets there, but it couldn’t be that easy, of course not.

“Seriously? Again?” Sheno asked exasperated.

“Shush, I want to get the last [Stat] out of the way before getting publicly shamed by Merglobth”, I waved her away.

“Please, don’t remind me that last part”, she sighed.

So it isn’t ‘introspection’, and it probably isn’t something stupid like ‘inner sight’…? No? Nothing? It was worth a shot.

Let’s ponder on this a bit more:

* The intention behind the word is important behind its unlock, so it might be a word that I already used, but that in context wasn’t significant enough for it to apply.

I tried things like ‘reflection’, ‘meditation’, and similar concepts, but nothing really clicked.

* It is part of the [Soul], so maybe I have to think more metaphysically about it.

I remembered about Socrate’s Daemon, but how could it be that when there are proper [Demons] as opponents?

Still, it felt like I was on the right track: I don’t know much about Latin, but my [cultural interpretation] still translates some things as such, from the numbering system in [Dungeons] to the names of some of the celestial bodies in the sky, so it’s weird that I haven’t yet found traces of it in my [Status].

But it’s not like I already found the answer, right? I mean, the stupidest thing it could be would be a literal translation of ‘self’, which I think is [Ego] and-

You have discovered a new [Soul] statistic:

Ego: it refers to the sense of self and it governs the precision and depth of introspections and self-analysis.

You revealed a hidden bonus from your Class: +1 [Ego], doubled to +2

You have been retroactively awarded +19 [Ego]

“Fuck yeah!” I loudly exclaimed, throwing my fists in the air.

“You discovered [Ego]? Uh, since I could freely talk about it I guess you did. Congrats!” Sheeno commented from my side, giving me a pat on the back that almost sent me sprawling.

Someone cleared their throat, or at least tried to mimic the sound of someone deliberately clearing their throats, but ended up sounding like a cluster of rubbery bubbles going down a drain in a rush.

Merglobth was behind us, somehow having gotten around us while evading my senses, poised with a couple of tentacles coming out of their ‘shoulders’ like a pair of arms and ending being rested on their ‘hips’, probably the closest expression of reproachfulness they could make with their body.

“You two younglings are in deep trouble!”