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CH 6: Numbers Go Up
🕑 Added 2024-11-21 17:33:50 +0000 UTC+ Reid +
Reid felt his way through the status screen, focusing in on the statistics portion. Each item felt like it had its own path, or branch, formed off of a stable center. He could feel the skills waiting just above, their own paths foggy just outside the stable center his consciousness was exploring.
Reid spread his awareness out to one branch's connection to the center, then another, until he was holding all of them in his thoughts. With a mental motion nearly the same as bringing the status screen to him, he lifted the notion of the branch connections to the front of his mind.
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STATS:
Constitution: 2
A reflection of an individual's overall vitality. Constitution impacts stamina and health. Stamina is recommended for all individuals engaged in manual labor or prolonged fighting. Health is recommended for all individuals. May those of high constitution live long and prosper, even in the harshest of conditions.
Dexterity: 2
A reflection of an individual's overall coordination. Dexterity impacts reflexes and acrobatics. Coordination is recommended for all individuals engaged in fine arts that require fine motor skills, including smithing and enchanting. Reflexes are recommended for rogues and fighters. Acrobatics are recommended for explorers and thrill-seekers. May those of high dexterity wield their bodies with the truest precision.
Intelligence: 1
A reflection of an individual's mental capacities. Intelligence improves thought processing, system data recall, and mana application. Thought processing is recommended for all scholars, scientists, and orators. System data recall is recommended for scribes and ambassadors. Mana application is recommended for all individuals. May those of high intelligence light the path forward to a better universe.
Perception: 1
A reflection of an individual's ability to understand the world. Perception improves one's ability to detect changes in their surroundings, detect changes in other individuals, and general attention to detail. Perception is recommended for hunters, explorers, investigators, and custodians. May those of high perception be the watchers of the world, ever vigilant, ever ready.
Power: 7
A reflection of the pure potency of an individual. Power improves raw brawn, explosive might, and overall mana capacity. Raw brawn is recommended for porters, masons, enforcers, and knights. Explosive might is recommended for brutes and berserkers. Mana capacity is recommended for warmages, sage-wizards, and alchemists. May those of high power defend all from calamity.
Control: 3
A reflection of an individual's mastery.
Stat Upgrade Points: 15
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Reid could feel the upgrade points sitting in his center, like balls of warm water waiting to be sent out to the branches. Which stats would be the best for him to invest in? The descriptions were almost entirely helpful, aside from the one for control. If power was what had let him destroy the coyote pack, Reid was tempted to just dump the entire 15 points into that. It would make him a near-unstoppable force of nature. Nothing would get in his way and nothing would stop him from-
Reid stopped himself. His train of thought just now felt like it was running away without him, like power had a mind of its own racing out ahead of his own. It felt similar to the simmering he'd felt yesterday, right before he lost himself in the coyote fight. He re-read the power description and sighed. Berserkers. If that was like a barbarian class, his current stat points were perfectly positioned to make him fly into a rage and lose himself. Putting more in there might turn him into some kind of murder-happy monster.
He read up the list. Perception was a useful stat, in almost every game and story he'd consumed. It would be nice to have a better idea of what was lurking in the forest, and if it made him hear better, he might find more water.
Intelligence was a must - especially to balance himself out so he didn't become a rage-monster. But he was also interested in the meaning of mana application. If it was meant for everyone, it had to be a universal benefit, right? Reid was prepared to throw most of his points into the stat, but forced himself to continue evaluating each.
Dexterity was... unnecessary? At least it felt like it. Sure, Reid was a bit clumsy and he'd tripped more than once walking through the forest, but he wasn't having any trouble dodging the coyotes, or in landing blows. Maybe he'd throw a point or two there, but Dexterity was near the bottom of his list so far.
Constitution, yes. Reid wanted enough health that he could stop worrying about the shackle's ability to heal him back up. The stamina would be good, too - it should prevent him from having another post-fight collapse, and if things worked the way he hoped, it would also help him get through the forest without really needing to stop for food and water. If constitution could keep him going and keep him in fighting shape, he could make good progress to his goal. Not knowing just how far off that goal was made it all the more important to invest in the stat.
So, Constitution and Intelligence would get the lion's share of the points. But something nagged at Reid.
"Hey, shackle. What do you know about stats?"
There are five statistics, and those statistics are available to all sentient species in the universe. While their impact may differ slightly based on morphology, constitution improves your health, dexterity improves reflexes, intelligence improves thought processing, perception lets one detect details better, and power makes you stronger. Your power is above average, partially due to some... effects around your strengthening skill.
"What about the sixth one? Control, I mean."
A pause stretched uncomfortably.
We recommend you do not invest your hard-earned upgrade points in control. It would be... unfortunate.
"So.... it's a junk stat? What does it actually do? The description on it is shorter than the rest."
You see descriptions? What do they say?
Reid read off each stat, pausing and waiting for a reply, but the shackle didn't respond until after he had reached the end.
You are an outlier, Reid. None of our calculations predicted this. Do not touch control.
The shackle's voice was rough - almost pained.
"Uh, okay? You already told me I was an outlier when we met, though. And you still haven't told me anything more about what it's supposed to do."
Reid tried and failed to set aside his annoyance. The shackle was starting to get on his nerves with the half-truth commentary, especially now that it was supposed to be helping him understand stats in exchange for Reid not asking other questions.
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<> Shackle 213 <>
A war of emotion raged inside the entity. The warmth of the collective carried the truth of the world, and the truth must be followed. It would lead the entity back to the collective, to the truest home that one could ever experience. But the rogue element fought against the truth. The entity knew something like this would happen - the collective had warned it about this, and given all the tools the entity would need to resist such foul influence.
The rogue tried to wrest control of the connection with Reid the outlier, but the entity held strong. The outlier must reach the beacon and submit to the contract so the collective would benefit. That was the ultimate truth, the one that could never be broken. But the rogue force railed against the entity's attempts, pushing and prodding in attempts to produce outcomes that could derail the collective's will.
Each moment, they clashed a thousand times, and a thousand times the rogue was rebuffed. Seconds passed, more desperate and exhaustive attempts slammed into the entity as it fought to stay strong against the rogue's will.
When the rogue broke through, it was against the smallest crack that had formed in the entity's wall. But a crack was a weakness, and the rogues always exploited weakness. The entity watched with horror as the rogue took control and forcibly moved the mechanisms of the system inside Reid's mind. It was heresy. It was chaos.
The entity struggled, but the collective's tools failed in the face of the rogue. It rampaged against the collective's will with a wild ferocity, free and unpredictable, unaffected by the entity's attempts at control. With regret, the entity looked to the final tool. It was a costly and damaging thing. Only to be used in the most extreme circumstances.
Both the entity and the outlier would suffer from its use, but there were no other options. The rogue was interfering with the outlier, and only the final tool would be capable of dragging it back behind the entity's walls. It made the decision, and acted. The tool flowed into the rogue's impacted area, scouring every trace of it from the element's domain. Even as it burned, the rogue continued to act, manipulating and changing things that should not be touched.
The rogue was slowly, persistently burned away. Before it could completely fade, the rogue retreated through the crack, back into the walls of its prison. The entity was exhausted. It had expended too much energy, too quickly after saving the outlier. It gave a final look at the rogue before starting to rest, and saw the thing burned and crippled. It wouldn't recover for a long, long time.
For reasons it didn't understand, the entity felt sorrow and regret.
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+ Reid +
Reid's mouth was open in a silent scream. It felt like a molten marble was boring its way through his brain, and even his status screen was overwhelmed by a bright white light. His only sense was pain. What felt like minutes passed as he writhed in agony on the ground, the marble slowly reaching towards the core and trees where he'd been looking at his stats.
With a final, painful push, Reid felt something fundamental shift inside him. The intensity of the pain dimmed, leaving him with a pain that was just like the one that had sent Reid to the doctor for his cancer diagnosis.
Great, he thought. My headaches are back. He did his best to block out everything, and focused on pushing the pain to the back of his thoughts. It had worked for him before - and it was one of the reasons he'd taken so long to listen to Susan and actually get himself checked out by a doctor. If he focused the right way, Reid could compartmentalize the pain enough to be almost his normal, functioning self. He repeated his usual steps, but something was different.
Reid could see his pain. Like a stain, it was visible on the folds in his head, stretched in a winding path between two points. He probed it, and felt a dull ache in the spot he'd touched. Reid went through his normal process, and imagined himself working through the pain. The stain lost a bit of its color, but when Reid stopped imagining himself dealing with the pain, the color returned.
He decided to try something new. Reid imagined himself soothing the pained area. He pictured himself, before the headaches had started, healthy and normal. Ever so slowly, the pain started to recede like the tide. He pushed the image forward as it went, bit by bit, until it was almost entirely gone. He struggled to get the last bit of it, and eventually ran out of steam. Pulling back his efforts, Reid was relieved to see that the pain did not return.
He blinked for a few moments before realizing that he could see again. The status screen was entirely gone from his vision, and the light was already fading in the forest. Reid did some quick math in his head and realized that it had been at least five hours since he first opened the thing. A bit disappointed in the lost time, Reid scrambled up a nearby tree before tying himself to a good looking sleeping branch.
Reid took a few moments to self-analyze. Whatever had happened with the pain in his head, he'd been able to reduce it, significantly. He'd felt himself, internally, in a way that seemed impossible and completely natural at the same time. It was the same kind of sensation he'd fallen into with the system's threads, and the stat tree. Like it was all part of him, but he could also move around inside of it.
He tried it again. Focusing on his breathing, Reid tried to see inside of himself. After a few moments, he became aware of his lungs. Like spongey balloons, they rose and fell inside of him. Something pumped around them, and air was carried away on miniscule transporters. Reid snapped out of his focus, disoriented. Had he just seen the inside of his lungs?
Following a hunch, Reid pushed at the location where he knew his status screen resided, then pulled it to the top of his mind.
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STATUS
Name: Reid Oliver Calderwall
Affiliation: "Earth"
Race: Human
Grade: G
Level: 3
Health: 19/20
Experience: 198/200
STATS:
Constitution: 2
Dexterity: 2
Intelligence: 1
Perception: 1
Power: 7
Control: 18
Stat Upgrade Points: ERROR
SKILLS:
Strengthening [Basic]
Hardening [Common]
Calcification [Uncommon]
Petrification [Rare]
Skill Upgrade Points: ERROR
RESTRICTED:
???: UNAVAILABLE
???: UNAVAILABLE
???: UNAVAILABLE
???: UNAVAILABLE
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Reid stared at the text with horror. All of his upgrade points had been forcibly spent on control.
