Riley puzzled by the actions of Jacob brought her right hand to his forehead, Jacobs’ cheek heated up as she got way too close. His entire body stiffened like he had been petrified and rendered a statue. Riley did not feel the abnormal heat one would feel from someone running a fever. But just to be sure she used her forehead to check too.
Feeling no abnormality, her face could only scrounge up as she stepped back and scrutinise Jacob from head to toe. Jacob asked innocently
“Did something happen to me? I only remembe- AAAHH!!” Jacob cut himself off midway with a loud scream as he felt sharp spikes of pain pounding into his head. He bent down clutching his head, however no amount of head clutching would resolve his pain.
Riley unsure of what to do as Jacob was almost on the floor again, this time instead of weeping uncontrollably he seemed to be experiencing immense pain. She squatted down beside Jacob and brought him into her embrace once again.
Jacob felt the pain slowly subside as moment pass to moment. He slowly let go of his head once it reached a bearable level, he guessed that trying to recall what happened had caused his pain. His curiosity was spiking as he wondered if he was on the right path, but he remembered the immense pain that followed that line of questioning and quickly squashed the curiosity.
His mind instead wandered to the fragrance wafting in powerful waves, he tried to look and see what smelled so nice. As he moved his head, he realised he was rubbing against something soft and squishy. A soft moan came out from Riley as Jacob rubbed against her chest, he quickly realised what was happening and backed away as fast as possible.
“S-sorry sorry sorry! I uh thank you?!” Jacob stumbled through his apologies amidst his confusion.
“Are you okay now?” Riley with her face full of concern, the moan all but forgotten asked.
“I’m fine now, I think whatever happened after I unlocked my ability is something that I should not try to recall for now at least. I felt like I was stabbed by multiple needles right into my brain when I did.”
“Why don’t you come over and have a sit here, I’ll go see if I can bring down a deer too. That practice left me starving” Riley said as she led Jacob over to the campfire and settled him by the fire.
Jacob left half confused and without much agency decided to listen to Riley. He was more than capable of going out to bag a deer for lunch. But Riley’s actions and the recent stabbing pain left his head slightly muddled so Jacob sat by the fire obediently. While Riley walked off with a hop in her step to find a deer for lunch.
Suddenly, with nothing left to do Jacob decided to look through his status and his skills.
This book was originally published on Royal Road. Check it out there for the real experience.
‘Oh...well shit’
Jacob winced a little from a small creeping pain as the thought came to his head. His Intelligence stat was doubled and the Mind stat was tripled. He looked through his unlocked ability and the reason for the double and tripling stared back at him.
[Gifted Learner(Buffed)]
Mind x3
Intelligence x2
Learning speed increased
All skills will have a faster rate of progress
‘I should definitely have went with Adept...well I can make this work. Magic swordsmen exist too, yep I can think of this as having a better base before I start working on magic. I don’t even have anything to learn the forms of power with though.’
As Jacobs’ thought ran wild at the possibility granted by [Gifted Learner] , his stomach rumbled from the lack of food. He got up and wanted to go and remembered that Riley already went to scour for food. He awkwardly sat down and organised his thoughts.
First, he would have to start practicing his blessings more. Hopefully, he can get it done by today or tomorrow. The unlocked ability should help a lot with this.
Secondly, while he might not be able to go through the major forms of power for magic and lacking a direct way to test his affinity. He would have to use [Gifted Learner] for skills like [Rousing Shout] and [Squire’s Determination] he was 9/10 for the latter so it should be a cinch to finish, Jacob still had not figure out the exact method to fulfill it. But with only one more tick out of the 10 left, it should be no trouble even if he muddled through it.
Finally, while [Gifted Learner] does learn him towards the magical sides of things. There was no harm in trying to continue with what he learnt from Brian and Aurelius, considering that he had no immediate way to utilise any magics.
Jacob looked around the camp site as he concluded what he should do going forward, practicing with drawing his essence out as he looked for Flowing Water. He found it leaning on a nearby tree, he wrapped his left hand around the grip.
He found his mind more grounded as he held onto Flowing Water, he ran through the strokes that he saw Aurelius performed while fighting with Jacob, mimicking them the best he could. The sword did not move with as much precision as it did in the hands of Aurelius, but he continued with the movements.
Slowly, all unnecessary thoughts left Jacob. As his mind only focused on one stroke to the next. If one could see Jacob now, they would be just as mesmerised as Jacob was when he fought with Aurelius against the stone statues.
While Jacob was still practicing with the sword, Riley came back deer slung over the shoulders. She looked like a huntress back with her spoil of the day, she could not see Jacob as the deer caused her to hunch. Limiting her vision, however as she sat the deer down and looked for the nearby sack of floater claws to begin skinning the deer. She finally saw Jacob still in the midst of his practice, shocked that the just recovered teenager was already pushing his body. Riley quickly shouted
“Jacob! You have to rest, you might not remember what happened but it still left some damage.” As Riley tried to move in to stop Jacob. Jacob while still in the trance and registering none of the words from Riley, swung Flowing Water through the air in a half spin.
“AREE YOU TRYING TO KILL MEE!” Jacob shocked by the shout, realised that his sword was mere inches away from the person in front of him. His eyes focused and saw that it was Riley, He quickly withdrew the sword and apologised profusely.
“Sorry! Sorry! I was too caught up in the practice. Are you hurt anywhere?” Riley huffed and replied
“If I was hurt anywhere, you would be facing the stump of a neck and the rest of my body. Instead of this complete Riley you are looking at right now. What are you doing? You should be resting right now regardless of what you remember.” Jacob gave Riley a sheepish smile, scratching the back of his head as he replied
“I know...but I did not feel anything was wrong and did not want to sit still. You understand don’t you? Especially, now with so many things happening around and to us. I can’t afford to stay still.”
“Well you aren’t wrong. Fine, put that sword down before I force you to drop it. Since you want to do something that much, you can skin the deer and I’ll help myself to the rest you need. I even went through the trouble of hunting the deer for you, figuring you would be hungry and what I got was a sword to the neck.”
“Yes! Please have a sit by the campfire and your food will be prepared forthwith milady.” Riley smiled a little at the end of Jacob’s sentence.
“At least you have some sense left in you, alright I’ll forgive you, if the deer is prepared to my liking. If not...well” Riley left the rest of the sentence unfinished as she moved to sit by the camp fire.