Not one to break a habit, the swordsman woke a couple of hours before dawn. On opening his eyes, he was greeted by several blue screens, each overlapping the last. At a glance, he couldn’t tell how many there were, just that they were plentiful.
Odd, Mom and Dad said they showed up like old scrolls... The thought sprang to mind and was immediately accounted for. I suppose the system reflects the user? Am I still so influenced by technology?
Shaking his head to clear the distractions, Alexilios refocused on his first screen. In bold lettering, it told him much of what he already knew.
CONGRATULATIONS!
WELCOME, YOUNG HUMAN, TO THE SYSTEM!
LEARN, GROW, ADAPT, AND PERSEVERE!
THE WORLD AWAITS, PREPARE TO MAKE YOUR MARK ON IT!
Well, that’s a touch ostentatious. Once he was finished reading it, it vanished, but he got the idea it could reappear with just a thought. Feeling like he had just been screamed at by a monster truck rally announcer, Lios moved on to the next page.
[You Lived!]
Oooh woooow you made it. You're ten now, so now you get me as your forever sidekick. It’s not really impressive, so all you get is this little text box. Toodles.
I’m the reward!
So snarky... The text seemed to be more personalized than Lios had expected. His initial impression of the System, or rather the Overseer of the system, was that it was meant to be a sort of impartial AI, not some cognitive personality. Perhaps the people around him simply weren’t privy to the system’s odd behavior, but if that were the case, why was he different?
[Foolish Bravery]
Without even access to the magic and skills of this world, you challenged a beast that was significantly stronger than you. Somehow you survived this encounter, be it by your skill, your luck, or the wolf's own damned incompetence. Rejoice, for foolishness is sometimes rewarded. Typically, the reward would be the retention of your life, but since you're new, you can have a little bonus treat. Don't get used to it.
You gain +3 randomly distributed stats per level
Eyes bulged with this one. From his reading, Lios knew achievements could provide a number of different benefits. The most common was a one-time stat upgrade. Some achievements granted skill upgrades or even class upgrades for the next time one classed up. Even more granted passive abilities that were rather situational but definitely useful. Passives that could allow crafters to make higher-quality goods, for example. It wasn’t unheard of, necessarily, for someone to get stat points per level, but it was rare, so Lios gasped on reading the last line.
Three stats per level? That’s insane! He was tempted to see what his level was, knowing that all of a child's previous experiences were consolidated into essence that was used to level on receiving the System. Instead, he carried on and took a look at the next pair of achievements.
[Twice Baked]
Per the whim of a capricious god, you have been reincarnated. Your soul, also known as you, has been returned to life through space and time with your memories mostly intact. Whoopdydoo. Sure, this happens very rarely, but you aren't special; get over yourself. If that god guy hadn’t been there, you'd still be dead. But you aren't, so I guess you get a reward. Next time the reward is your life, so don't die again, dumbdumb. I’ll help with that, so say Thanks System. Go on, do it.
You gain +1 to your con per level.
[InterDimensional]
Somehow, your soul has managed to travel between dimensions before reaching level one. Typically, only the most robust and powerful individuals can pass through the beyond and enter the next dimension. You managed to do so with a soul so weak that a dragon sneezing a thousand miles away would blow you away. Despite the aid in surviving such tribulations, you have been granted a reward.
You are resistant to spatial magic. You gain +1 to your intelligence per level.
An extra two stats per level was nothing to scoff at. It might not seem like much, but those bonuses tended to add up quickly, and especially from levels one through ten, where an individual typically earned five stats per level, this was a massive boon. At a minimum he had somehow ended up with double the stats for an average level ten.
He cycled to the next page, pleased to see it was his new status page. He was nervous that it’d be a list of skills he had to choose then and there. He already had an idea of the skills he wanted, but he didn’t want to have to select them at that moment. He would choose them before speaking with his parents, but for the time being he wanted to see how he was quantified by the System.
[Name]
Alexilios
[Race]
Human
[Stats]
Str 31 + 3 = 34
Con 41 + 5 + 10 = 56
Dex 71 + 1 = 72
Wis 43 + 6 = 49
Int 65 + 4 + 10 = 79
Cha 32 + 5 = 37
Luck 21 + 7 = 28
[Initial Designation]
Child of Discordance: lvl10
[Class]
Unavailable
[Class Skills]
10x unavailable
[General Skills]
10x open
Lios found it interesting that the system showed him the stats before his titles took effect before showing the final stat points. There was some disappointment at not being shown what his stats were before the ten levels were accounted for, but he would live.
He had tried to find a book in the library that told him what the standard stat breakdown was on getting the system but had come up short. After asking his parents, they said that since no adult made it to adulthood without the System providing them stats, researchers were hesitant to say. That being said, the highest a person could raise a stat naturally, through practice or training, was one hundred in each stat. It was then assumed a peak human would be at one hundred in a given stat, depending on what they spent their life working towards.
With that knowledge in his head, Lios couldn't hold back his appreciative whistle. It seemed his training in swordsmanship, spells, and dancing had done him some good considering his high dexterity and intelligence. He wasn’t sure why his charisma was as high as it was, as he was at least a bit socially inept at times, but assumed it was due to his dancing. It was a performance skill more than it was a combat one, so it must have raised both charisma and dexterity.
Taken from Royal Road, this narrative should be reported if found on Amazon.
Seeing how much of a difference his achievements made to his stat sheet was a wonder. A small part of him was grateful for them but, save for one, he hadn’t earned them. Knowing that made him feel a touch guilty, but he resolved to earn all the rest. He wasn’t a pawn of some god who had decided to save his soul, regardless of what the system said. If only I knew what that Janus wants with me...
One last thing about his status spoke out to him. Most children were given the [Child or Ravos] designation. Some were given one specific to their nation, or to their environment. Others were given a [Child of Fire] or other elemental designation. Never had he read about a [Child of Discordance]. He couldn’t help but worry about the implications, but the only answer he could come up with was that Janus had somehow manipulated what he would get. Maybe it had something to do with the boys’ request to know magic.
After that thought, he noticed all of his screens were gone. All that was left was a gently blinking tab in the top right of his vision. Selecting it, a list of available general skills rapidly appeared before him. There were thousands. Because they were general skills, they weren't overly complex. He had qualified for tons of physical skills, along with a billion skills to aid in day-to-day life. Lios ignored many of them. He already knew what he wanted to do, after all, and rapidly found the skills he wanted.
With a thought, he searched for the first skills he wanted. He needed to get his first set of skills up to level ten before he took his first class, so he focused on the ones required for the swordsman class he wanted. He quickly found nine such skills, ones that would hopefully merge into the class once he took it so he could take new skills for a smithing class later. On top of them was one skill he hadn’t thought about but took for a variety of reasons.
The first was out of obligation. This skill would help him to remember his first life better, he knew intuitively. It was a passive that increased his memory, and one that he hadn’t seen before. What he did know was that, especially for wizards who tended to live long lives, memory skills were vital. They were enhanced by intelligence, and they aided their users in recalling information based on how fast they could process it. In this case, the [Distant Recollections] skill he found would help with both remembering his past life and with pulling up minute details related to his future class. It would help him remember exactly how a rune was meant to look, among other things; thus, he took the skill, filling his last general slot.
[Name]
Alexilios
[Race]
Human
[Stats]
Str 34
Con 56
Dex 72
Wis 49
Int 79
Cha 37
Luck 28
[Initial Designation]
Child of Discordance: lvl 10
[Class]
Unavailable
[Class Skills]
10x unavailable
[General Skills]
[Long Sword Adept]
[Spear Adept]
[Short Sword Adept]
[Falchion Adept]
[Intuition]
[Dancing]
[Runic Inscribing]
[Mana Manipulation]
[Mana Sense]
[Distant Recollections]
Lios selected several weapon skills because, from his reading, he knew that one required at least four martial weapon skills to qualify for [Martial Weapon Adept], or a class for which that skill was required, on class up. They filled a solid portion of his skills, but with any luck in just a few weeks he would have a class selected and they would transfer to it, freeing up his general skill slots. The same went for basically all the skills except for [Distant Recollections]. [Intuition] was a great skill for a warrior, according to Ezekiel, and allowed fighters to register threats, clock off behavior, avoid getting swindled and a bunch of other things. Moreover, there were some excellent proprioception skills that it could be turned into at later levels, though skill evolutions after the first threshold of level one hundred were hard to find. Knowing what skills people had was a good way to find their weaknesses, after all. The last four skills all tied into the magic side of the magic swordsman class, and were all necessary if Lios wanted to be a true wizard.
With all the skills selected, at least the ones he would need for a few weeks, he quietly donned his pants and boots, foregoing his shirt as usual. He picked up the foxes, who were beginning to make noise now that he was stirring and took them out with him. For now, he only took one sword, a longsword.
With practiced efficiency, he began the first dance, keeping a small amount of his attention on the baby foxes as they rolled about in the morning dew, wrestling with each other. The first thing he noticed was how much faster he seemed to move, and how much more aware of his surroundings he was. He was able to process information at least twenty percent faster than the previous day, and his increased dexterity paired with intelligence made it easier to catch movement mistakes before he made them. He was able to correct his dance faster than ever before.
It wasn’t long before he was interrupted by a ding sound, a notification of a skill level up. Thankfully, no screens appeared at the same time, but the ding was a bother. He mentally toggled it off, but left the blinking blue triangle in the corner that indicated notifications. A number one popped up in the bottom left corner, telling him one notification awaited him.
Once free of the distraction, he began the dance again. He flitted through the clearing, keeping to a fifteen-foot circle that he had long realized was the maximum physical size for one of his circles. He could make it as small as five feet wide as well, but once it grew larger he either needed more runes or more powerful ones; he wasn’t sure which.
The rush of mana leaving his body was different from before, more visceral. It could be compared to the difference between a cool breeze and driving with the top down. Both were sensations of air brushing against someone's skin. The difference between the two was clear.
With adrenaline spiking, he carried out the dance. Each completed rune was paired with an outflowing rush of mana seeping into the world, powering the spell. He even felt the micro-adjustments his [Dancing] and [Runic Inscribing] skills provided him. Coupled with his now increased stats, he completed the first dance effortlessly. Flames engulfed his sword, tickling his hand but not harming him.
It crackled in the dawn, lighting up the surrounding field. Lios let out a laugh, escalating into a full-blown cackle much like the first time he had cast a spell. I can do magic! I can really do magic! The foxes watched him strangely before they both began to yip excitedly, forcing Lios to calm down lest they wake all of their neighbors too early. Folks typically woke early, but that didn’t mean they wanted to be woken by a mad child and his twin pets.
What would they think of me now? If they could see this? With outstretched hands, the boy petted the excitable kits, stroking their fur. Behind him, a blazing sword gently dimmed, the mana for the fire getting used up. Then they were plunged into the early dawn, the only light coming from shades of orange on the far horizon. The world around him slowly woke as he sat on the ground and petted thesmall animals.
With a start, his new memory skill came to his mind. Will this help me remember them better? Before he had the chance to play with it, to verify the lucidity of long faded memories, the door to his house cracked open. Dressed casually in a sleeveless v-neck white tunic and brown trousers, no boots or shoes, the boy's father stepped out. His hands met pockets. Casually, he sauntered forward, an easy smile on his face.
“Is Mom up yet?” Lios called out, steel in his voice. Ezekiel took it in stride and kept walking until he was just in front of Lios.
“Yeah, she is. You ready for whatever you want to talk about?” He ruffled Alexilios’s hair, the old guard’s calloused and strong hand gentle and reassuring to the young swordsman.
Lios took a deep breath and stood up, picking the kits up with him. With a nod, the pair started toward the door. Entering the house, noses sucked in the scent of cooking breakfast. Or rather, a cooked breakfast. Three plates with sliced fruit, over-easy eggs, potatoes, and braised pork belly sat on the table. Elaine was already sitting, having been waiting for them to return.
“You look so serious right now, LiLi. You aren’t about to tell us you plan to leave so soon, are you? Or maybe you like boys?” His mother playfully teased him. She waved toward his seat, motioning for him to sit down.
He didn’t give in to the banter, instead sitting down quietly and taking a forkful of food to his mouth. He closed his eyes, wondering if this would be the last time his parents cooked for him. Hell, depending on how they react, this might be my last meal.
Sensing the gravity of their boy's thoughts, the parents both grew tense. Zeek shared a look with his wife, shrugging and digging into the meal as well. With a sigh, she followed suit. They had discussed not pressuring him in whatever he was sharing, but to let him tell them on his own time. It didn’t make it any less awkward or difficult, though.
Soon, Lios was halfway done with his plate and full. He took a long drink of juice, then took the rest of his plate and set it on the ground for the foxes. If this were to be his last meal with his family, he could share it with them. Elaine shot him a concerned look. They mostly fed the kits scraps and cream, not full-size foods.
Were this his past life, Lios would have been concerned with them getting sick from the use of alliums, but with stats their constitution should prevent any reactions. He watched them contentedly as they fought first over the meat, then the potatoes, then the fruit. The eggs had been gobbled up by the ten-year-old.
It was almost shocking to the family, then, when he finally spoke. His voice was soft, as though he were speaking from a place of nostalgia. Perhaps he was. “I have thought about this conversation for so long. Considered every way it could go wrong for me, for you, for us. I would... I would appreciate your waiting until I am finished to ask questions. To make accusations...”
His voice trailed off as he mentioned the accusations. Then he raised his head, steel back in his blue grey eyes. After a deep breath, he continued, his parents both poised and concerned.
“I’ve thought a lot about not having this conversation. I hope you’ll understand why I chose to have it anyway, once all has been said. I don’t know if what I’ve settled on is the best way to tell you what I’m going to tell you, but no matter how I go about this from today onward, I expect both of you will look at me differently. Before I tell you everything, I want to make sure you understand.
“Everything I will be saying is the truth. I want you to agree to hear it, even knowing ahead of time it will alter our relationship. I am not saying this lightly. I know I already made you both take the day off, but if you don't want to hear what I’m going to say next, you have that option.”
With that, he went quiet, allowing the pair to consider it. Of course, they didn’t have all the information. What Lios had said didn’t mean anything until they knew the context, but at least now they could consent to hearing everything. They had the option of their lives changing or of their staying the same. The two exchanged heavy looks, considering everything Lios had just said, having a silent conversation.
After a few moments, mostly filled with the sound of them and the foxes eating breakfast, Ezekiel spoke up. “I, for one, want to hear what you have to say. If it’s really so... life changing I think we need to know.”
Elaine nodded in agreement.
