I

Waiting for her in the break room was yet another letter from Alexandra.

Congratulations on completing Novice Training. You have the same choices as before: stay and train, continue on to Journeyman, or finish the Training. To completely break through, you will need to complete the Journeyman Training first. You've done well in reaching this far. Keep it up!

Alexandra

Like with her previous time in the room after level 100, Eva took the opportunity to have a day of rest. When she awoke and had breakfast on her day off, she got a very welcome message.

Due to eating well over the last two weeks, Poor Diet▲ has been removed

Eva got two points in Vitality and another two in Willpower from not having that Status effect anymore.

It was nine days later that Eva found herself completing the Journeyman Training levels. It had been difficult. Though she was able to clear the first twenty levels in a day, she struggled from there on. Sometimes she would try to continue through to the next break room, but it would take more than a day to get there with her just slamming her head against a wall the entire time. She knew that completing Journeyman Training was her limit. Her struggles were not for naught, however.

With the 400 Stat Points from the levels and the 150 Stat Points from the boss achievements, she was able to break through the rest of her Stats and have thirty left over. This accomplishment gained her a completed challenge.

Up Grade✹

Upgrade your species tier by breaking through

Reward: 250 Stat Points

Another nice bonus was losing the Status Effect Weak▲. Eva gained three total points of Stats from that alone, worth thirty Stat Points at this point. Those two—despite being amazing—were not the biggest prize of all. Completing level 50 in the Journeyman Training levels granted her another opportunity to choose something. Like she had seen in the Novice training levels four times, there were several options.

Journeyman★ Skill

Status Effect Upgrade or Removal

Upgraded Item

80 Stat Points

Despite the allure of the Skill, she had chosen the item. Her boots had been an amazing boon. Getting something that wouldn't get as knocked around as some of her equipment seemed to always do was a great opportunity that she wasn't going to pass up.

Hardened Medium Armor of Mist✦

Take 20% reduced durability damage from physical attacks

Deal 10% increased Water elemental damage

Rainbow Shield of Bleaching✦

Block elemental damage as if it were physical damage

Deal 10% increased Light elemental damage

Mystic Belt of the Elements✦

Maximum mana increased by 10%

Elemental damage increased by 5%

Chosen Sword of Penetration✦

Sword skills act as if they are one level higher

Damage ignores 5% of enemy armor

Magister's Emerald Ring✹

Maximum mana increased by 20%

Maximum stamina reduced by 5%

Maximum health reduced by 5%

25% of incoming damage taken from mana instead of health

For Eva, the decision was between the sword and the ring. She chose the one with the higher apparent rarity: the ring. Sticking it on her left index finger and looking at her Status confirmed the effects. Fighting as long as she had against difficult enemies, she gained several levels in her Skills. Getting past level 10 with a Novice✦ Skill turned it into a Journeyman★ Skill, with the same sort of choices. Journeyman★ offered new choices that weren't available at the Novice✦ level. It was an insane level of customization!

Journeyman Poison Resistance★ Lv 4

Receive 24% reduced damage from poison or venom

7% chance to become immune to a poison or venom Novice rank or below

1% chance to become immune to a poison or venom Journeyman rank or below

Journeyman Air Resistance★ Lv 3

Receive 23% less damage from air elemental attacks

Deal 6.5% increased air elemental damage

Deal 1.5% more air elemental damage

Journeyman Fire Resistance★ Lv 2

Receive 22% less damage from fire elemental attacks

Deal 6.0% increased fire elemental damage

Deal 1.0% more fire elemental damage

Journeyman Water Resistance★ Lv 3

Receive 23% less damage from water elemental attacks

Deal 6.5% increased water elemental damage

Deal 1.5% more water elemental damage

Journeyman Earth Resistance★ Lv 2

This text was taken from Royal Road. Help the author by reading the original version there.

Receive 22% less damage from earth elemental attacks

Deal 6.0% increased earth elemental damage

Deal 1.0% more earth elemental damage

Journeyman Medium Armor★ Lv 1

Medium armor blocks 21% more damage

Gain 5.5 Strength while wearing medium armor

Gain 0.5 Dexterity while wearing medium armor

Journeyman Shields★ Lv 1

Shields block 21% more damage

Shields block 11% of elemental damage as if it were physical damage

0.1% of blocked damage converted to mana

Journeyman Swords★ Lv 3

Sword damage increased by 23%

13% increased damage from sword skills (Mana)

3% increased damage from sword skills (Stamina)

Journeyman Infuse Weapon★ Lv 2

Infuse a weapon with an element

Deals 22% more damage as that element [Fire/Water/Air/Earth/Light/Dark]

Reduce mana consumption by 12%

Costs 8.8 Mana per second

Basic Meditation▲ Lv 2

2% increased recovery speed of health, stamina, and mana while meditating

Novice Charge✦ Lv 2

Agility and Strength increased by 12% for up to 10m

Gain 0.2% of damage dealt as health

Costs 5 Stamina to activate

Gaining the Journeyman★ skills gained her another challenge completion.

Better Than Novice★

Upgrade a skill to Journeyman grade

Reward: 10 Stat Points

All in all, Eva felt a sense of accomplishment at reaching such a level. Her body moved in ways it couldn't have a month ago, and she could do things that shouldn't be possible. She knew this was the end of the line. She'd check out the training room after a day of rest. If the options were good for training some things she missed, she'd take the opportunity. If it didn't look too helpful or was too much of the same fighting she'd done over and over again, she'd just move on.

Eva stuck the Stat Points into her Stats and checked the final product.

Name: Eva Greene

Species: Human (II)

Health: 285

Stamina: 285

Mana: 360

Strength: 29

Dexterity: 29

Agility: 29.7

Endurance: 30

Wisdom: 29

Acuity: 29

Intelligence: 29

Willpower: 30

Vitality: 30

Perception: 30

Available Stat Points: 0

[Skills]

[Status Effects]

[Equipment]

Waiting for her on the nightstand was another letter from Alexandra.

Congratulations on completing the Journeyman Training and breaking through! Now that you have made it this far, it is a good time to give you some knowledge that should prove useful in the coming days.

The invasion is coming, and it will come hard. Every day you will have to face hordes of monsters to protect the people with you. The invaders will find ways to gain control of the situation—whether through binding contracts or through threats of force—and they will use that control to limit the power humans can attain. Some of the more despicable invaders will even go so far as to exterminate any humans they come across.

Be wary of other humans, however, as they can be swayed to side with the invaders for the right price. They will infiltrate and weaken us from within so that we are easily absorbed by their masters.

Finally, seek out the dungeons. They hold the key to power. Do not let any you find fall into invader hands. They know the rules better than we do, and they can exploit the System to their ends. Humanity must prevail.

Alexandra

II

The next day, when she checked out the training room, she was immediately hit with the intense stench of sweat. It was an open space with soft yet supportive mats on the floor and recessed lighting in the ceiling twenty feet above the floor. There were several dummies of different sizes, ranging from about dog-sized all the way through to elephant-sized. Along the walls were racks of weapons of all different types.

She made a few attacks against them with different Skills, but quickly decided that sort of training was not for her. It could have been if she had an idea of what she wanted to do, but after being under continuous stress for weeks while barely hanging on mentally, she just didn't have much left in the tank to figure those sorts of things out.

After resting and recuperating for another two days, she was ready to leave. She would miss the magical bathtub, though. Before she uttered the necessary words, she checked her Skills one last time.

Throwing▲: 3

Polearms▲: 6

Unarmed▲: 4

Swords★: 3

Shields★: 1

Charge✦: 2

Infuse Weapon★: 2

Medium Armor★: 1

Pierce✦: 3

Air Resistance★: 3

Fire Resistance★: 2

Earth Resistance★: 2

Water Resistance★: 3

Dodge✦: 8

Poison Resistance★: 4

Meditation▲: 2

“Done,” she declared.

The world around her faded quickly, replaced with a dull white nothingness. Another box appeared in her vision.

Congratulations on completing the Training. Calculating score...

For completing 300 levels, 1800

For breaking through to the next grade, 1000

For leaving early, -150

For dying 4766 times, -477

Final score: 2308

You were in the 72nd percentile of all participants

The box faded only to be replaced with one more.

You only have one life. Good luck.

Once that final box faded, Eva found herself back in her apartment. She looked around to see that she was standing in her bathroom, the light still on. Reflexively, she went to check her phone only to find that her gear was still on her—goblin lord souvenir included. Her leftover potions, however, were gone.

She exited the bathroom and searched her apartment for her phone. Eva was surprised to find it with nearly full battery on her night stand. She checked the soil of her plants only to find that it was still damp.

Thinking of her Status almost reflexively made her realize that what she'd gone through had, in fact, been real. The numbers were still there. She still felt amazing and could still do the things she could only have dreamt of before.

Eva sighed and took a glass from the cabinet in the kitchen. She drank the cool water like it was manna from heaven. Despite having all she could want in the Training, there was always something off about the food and water—no matter how good it tasted. It was likely that it hadn't been real. Or, if it had been real, it was somehow magically artificial. There were just too many things that had happened, some of which were conflicting. She couldn't make much sense of it. All she really knew was that she was many times better than she had been before she went into the Training and she had medieval combat gear equipped.

Her next thought was to change into something more comfortable, but a familiar box popped into her vision before she made it to her closet. At the same time as the box appeared, the world around her faded and was replaced by a temperate forest, much like the ones she'd fought in during the training.

Welcome to the Tutorial

Enough mana has seeped into your world that your world will now be integrated into the wider multiverse. This Tutorial will help you get acquainted with what mana will do to your world. The Tutorial will last 30 days. Your goal is simple: survive.

Say or think 'Status' to show your Status

When Eva tried to do just that, she got another message rather than the familiar Status she'd come to expect.

Error: another system in use...

Other system is semi-compatible...

Trying to override other system with System...

Operation successful