Tom watched as his carefully recorded profile appeared on the wall. This was not official in any sense of the word, and bits of it were possibly out of date, but it was the most faithful reproduction of his status sheet he could produce from the use of the ritual status artefact in the isolation rooms.
The first section was about his attributes. Biologically, he had only just turned six, and the number reflected that weakness.
Attributes – Overall Rank 0
Strength: 11 (+1)—Rank 0
Vitality: 10 (+2)—Rank 0
Agility: 9 (+2)—Rank 0
Magic: 4 —Rank 0
Mana: 8 (unattributed), 32 (Precognition, variable and requires active maintenance that can be sustained for around four hours per day)
Fate: 43
Affinities
Precognition – 95, Earth – 87, Lightning – 87 (+3), Wood Shaping – 78, Healing – 71
His base attributes had crept up slightly and were now approaching the peak of tier-zero. They would likely reach the bottom rung of tier one once he got another two points in strength. Given his age and the way children matured, he expected to hit that milestone when his next growth spurt occurred - an event which, as far as he was concerned, was long overdue. He had gone from being of average height amongst his peers to shorter than average, a fact that irrationally annoyed him. He knew it was timing, but being amongst the shortest, even if it would only be for a brief period, was annoying.
Even if the gains were modest, the two points in agility represented a significant upgrade in his combat potential. Those simple numbers on the screen signified an increase in body control of thirty percent, a boost that had allowed him to get into the Divine Champions trial. Given how uncoordinated this body still felt, he couldn’t wait to grow older and grab more improvements to his base attributes.
His eyes scrolled further down the wall.
Spells
Touch Heal (10, +1) – Tier 0
Spark (27) – Tier 0
The numbers in brackets represented the level of the spell. Touch Heal only being ten annoyed him. He was used to it being far higher, and having thankfully already achieved those heights, regaining them would be easier than it would be for someone who had acquired the spell for the first time. He had boosted Spark as high as he had by stretching his control when he had first gained it, and that, Tom realised, was something he needed to do for his healing spell as well.
Levels were not an academic measure in Existentia. They were the opposite. They mattered in the real world. Promoting Touch Heal’s level by twenty to reach where Spark’s was would increase the potency of the spell by more than eighty percent. In a life-or-death battle, that was basically an extra life. Even if he wasn’t going to receive a threshold bonus until level thirty-two, every level increased the efficiency of Touch Heal, which meant given the benefits, it was not something he could ignore. He would have to work on it. Here, in the artificial confines of the orphanage, he wasn’t battling hordes of monsters on a daily basis. Progress was not going to come from the default benefit of surviving. Instead, unless he actively sought the confrontation, he would never get hurt sufficiently to progress. That was an issue he had to address. Stagnation in something so critical was unacceptable.
The story has been illicitly taken; should you find it on Amazon, report the infringement.
He continued on to review the next section.
Skills
Spear Mastery (5, +4) – Tier 0
Instant Strike (1) – Tier 1
Magic Breaking Power Strike (1) - Tier 1
Advanced Danger Sense (10, +1) – Tier 2,
Psychic Tracking (2, +1) – Tier 1
Crafting & Miscellaneous Skills
Social Silence (1) – Tier 7
Manipulate Precognition Mana (2, +1) – Tier 1,
Store Precognition Mana (2, +1) – Tier 1,
Convert Unaspected mana to Precognition Affinity (1) – Tier 1,
Create Precognition Attuned Mana (3, +2) – Tier 1
Living Wood Growth (1) – Tier 2
There had been a slight increase in a couple of his skills, but nothing particularly noteworthy. On the other hand, he was happy his crafting related abilities were being improved by use. Eventually, those levels would plateau, unless he started using them for more variable purposes, but for now he was happy with their progress. It was not like it was worth investing dedicated time into them. None of them were critical; they were all a long way away from reaching a level where he would get a threshold benefit from raising them, and there was no way he was ever going to be a crafter.
He moved on to examining the next section.
Traits
DEUSs Chosen (Tier 0)*, Speed Matching
Titles
Hunted Reincarnated, Competition Shaker (I), Evolution Master, Complex Conspiracy Discoverer, Sage of Fate (Earth), Unique Skill Creator, Reveal Hidden Threats, Trial Speedster (IX)
Special Titles:
Underage Skill Development (II) – 15 skill points accumulated with next threshold level at 16. Current benefit is 1 free point every four levels.
???? Underage Spell Development – Current progress zero.
???? Underage Trait Development – Current Progress zero.
???? Underage Title Development – Note this probably doesn’t exist as legendary title should have triggered it if it was a thing.
*Locked until the earth age of ten and will not accumulate questions before that time
Basically, he had identified the likely presence of four underage titles based on the skill title that he knew existed, one for each of the different types of abilities. He was interested in tracking them separately from all of his base titles.
In Tom’s mind, there were two metrics of success for his childhood years. The first was how far he could raise his general combat proficiency, and the second were these special titles. If he could upgrade the first three, and he had no evidence that they didn’t exist, five times, he would be receiving six free attributes with every class level. Given skills had already been upgraded almost three times, that was not beyond the realm of possibility. That was bringing each of them to level five, but, if he could push to upgrade them six times instead, then his return would be twelve free points per level. At that point, to match someone’s rank he would only need five percent of their experience. If someone took twenty years to become powerful, he would be able to do it in two. Give him a decade, and he would be far more powerful than a human without the supporting titles even if they had seventy years in Existentia.
That type of in-built advantage was how he could make a difference in the thirty years he had.