Greg stood there staring into foreign eyes that had taken residence in his head for a long time. When he shambled out of the restroom, Brannoc held a glass out to him containing a deep purple liquid. He threw the glass back, expecting something harsh, but the warm, sweet berry taste stopped him mid-swallow.

  “Strong stuff, careful how quick you drink it,” Brannoc warned. “You alright?”

  Greg covered his mouth so the sudden laugh didn’t expel his drink all over his host’s carpet. No, he was not alright, but what choice did he have here? The more he learned, the less this seemed like he might just wake up suddenly.

  “I have more questions.” He said instead of answering. When Brannoc nodded, he handed the glass back to him and continued. “You said the scars are bad. Does that mean you know who summoned me?”

  “Not exactly.” Brannoc refilled his glass and handed it back to him. “Divine rituals aren’t usually that violent. So we can narrow it down pretty far from there. Most likely it was a powerful demon or a devil, but if it was a god, it’s probably Theron or one of his underlings.”

  “Cool, cool.” Greg nodded and sipped at the glass. “All these things are basically myths and stories where I come from. Generally devils and demons are bad. Same here?”

  Brannoc grimaced but nodded. “Mostly. Varying degrees, but mostly bad.”

  “So let’s say…theoretically, a god and a devil sacrificed someone…” Greg’s mind flashed back to that night, the two beings that attacked him. Then the system messages when he woke up.

  “Theoretically?” Brannoc’s eyes flicked to the handprints burned into his shoulders. “Theoretically, we would be in very new territory. Don’t find many divine and demonic beings ready to team up. If they did for some reason, my concern would be what’s coming next.”

  “I had a feeling you’d say something like that,” Greg muttered. “Are these messages I’m getting reliable?”

  “It’s there to give you the basics. I’ve seen more than a couple summoned follow exactly what their messages said straight to their deaths though.” He took another long drag, exhaling the smoke from his mouth then inhaling it through his nose again.

  Greg took a deep breath and focused on the blinking notification tab to his right as he sipped at the liquor. The first page to pop up was the character sheet. Laid out like any TTRPG sheet he’d ever seen, he examined the details.

  Strength: 4

  Dexterity: 3

  Constitution: 4

  Wisdom: 5

  Intelligence: 4

  Charisma: 2

  Luck: 1

  Not ideal, but there wasn’t any indicator as to what the cap was...so maybe it wasn’t so bad? His inventory now had a smaller section at the bottom that contained the money he’d gotten from killing the Frost Kissed, then the lines for the equipment from his starting pack.

  He eyed the candy bar. Stomach growling, he glanced up and reached into the air like he’d seen Maeve do. His hand vanished, and he yanked it back immediately, causing a smoke filling coughing fit of a laugh to burst from Brannoc.

  “It’s not funny!” Greg snapped at the man, then glanced back up. “Asshole.”

  He hesitated and then extended his arm again. After his hand vanished, he groped around blindly for a second, but couldn’t find anything. Where the fuck is the candy bar?! A thin plastic wrapper formed in his hand. Like magic. He rolled his eyes.

  Brannoc stared at the Snickers bar as Greg opened it up, and for a moment he felt like he saw recognition in the old man’s eyes. He looked away when Greg started eating, though, so Greg went back to the sheet. Banker was listed as his background and gave him no benefits as far as he could tell. The backstory section now had bullet points that mapped out his life, from birth to what it called rebirth. That felt gross, but if what Brannoc described was accurate, wasn’t far from the truth. The top of the sheet still managed to be insulting while piquing his interest.

  NAME: Greg Norwood

  LEVEL: 0

  CLASS: Pleb

  Experience: 125/100

  “Looks like I leveled up.”

  “Better read through your options. Get as much information as you can before you make a decision. No goin back once you do.” Brannoc didn’t look away from the fire.

  Greg hadn’t meant to say that out loud, but now that he had, there was the question of how the elf had any idea what he was talking about. He watched him through the blue box. If the older man was concerned he’d given something away, he wasn’t showing it.

  “Do all Gifted have this thing?”

  “Nah.” He shook his head. “The gods give it to the summoned because every other gifted has been learning how to use their abilities since they could walk. You’re getting thrown into tidebreaker waters utterly blind.”

  Greg grimaced and tilted his head, still examining the man. “You said the summoned usually come around every fifty years?”

  “Mhmm…”

  “And you’ve seen more than a few summoned?”

  Brannoc’s eyes narrowed, but he didn’t respond.

  “How old are you?” Greg asked, a brief grin tugging at the corner of his lips.

  Brannoc slowly turned his head, the black streaks in his eyes growing thicker as his brows furrowed. “Just read your damn messages.” He said around his pipe.

  Greg took a bite of the chocolate bar and brought his attention back to the sheet. When he focused on the overflowing experience, a pop-up box emerged from the numbers.

  Support the creativity of authors by visiting the original site for this novel and more.

  You have enough experience to gain your first level! Are you ready to level?

  Yes/no

  He glanced to the side where the notification bar was still blinking. Deciding to take the elf’s advice, he selected no and pulled up the rest of the notifications first.

  INVENTORY:

  You’ve been granted an extradimensional storage space. Would you like to automatically collect quest rewards in storage space?

  Yes/No

  That would have been good information to have earlier. Yes.

  Resonance:

  Resonance measures the level of divine or demonic essence you’re channeling. Using abilities will increase resonance of the indicated affinity. Increasing resonance levels will make abilities more powerful and unlock impactful effects at physical, mental, and emotional cost.

  Sample sizes for side effects are small but have included sprouting wings (both leather and feathered), cloven hooves, loss of humanity, insatiable urge for violence and/or death, zealotry, and spontaneous combustion.

  “Why would I expect anything less?” Greg met Brannoc’s eyes when he glanced over. “Don’t suppose you know what resonance is?”

  “Sure.” Brannoc gave a slight nod. “Increases when you use abilities. Every Gifted has it, we just don’t have any indicator of it. Work off feel mostly.”

  “Says it measures the level of essence I’m channeling?” Greg squinted as if the message contained a secret between the lines.

  “Mhmm.” Brannoc pulled the pipe from between his teeth and ashed it again. “Your messages tell you about going Blooded?”

  “Blooded?” Greg asked.

  “Build up too much resonance you become an avatar of the patron that gave you the gifts. Go too far and there’s no coming back.”

  “Seems bad,” Greg said, looking over the list of side effects again.

  “Takes time, but you’ll learn to control it. As you get stronger, using abilities becomes less costly. Your body can carry more resonance.” Brannoc shrugged. “Only seen a Gifted go blooded once. Not a normal situation and not very pretty.”

  “Nothing about this situation is normal.” Greg sighed as he pulled up the character sheet again. The notification popped up again, asking him if he was ready to level. How difficult could it be? He’d played Dungeons and Dragons before. He stared at the Yes for a beat, then accepted. Fanfair sounded. He guessed it was just in his head, but then again, if it had sounded out loud, would it have phased Brannoc at all?

  LEVELING UP:

  With every level you gain 2 stat points to assign to any statistic. At level 3 you will be asked to choose a class, assuming you survive that long. You may store these points indefinitely and spend them at your leisure.

  Progress to next level:

  25/500

  At the top of his stats, the circled number two now blinked. As much as he hated it, it wasn’t wrong. He needed more context to tell just how low his stats were, but his guess was not optimistic. Greg dismissed the sheet, only for another bubble to pop up.

  NEW ABILITY!

  Scan

  Tap into your inherent magic to examine a creature or object. Will provide you with basic information at lower levels, increasing as the ability progresses. [Fragment Surge—Error]…wanted conte..[Persona Suppressed]

  Greg dismissed the window and looked up at Brannoc. Using some magical ability on him without his consent felt gross, but he wanted to try it. Eh… if he said no, maybe Maeve would let him.

  “Can I use an ability on you?”

  The inside edges of his eyebrows rose slightly. “What kinda ability?”

  “Scan? I don’t know if that means anything to you. It just lets me examine something or someone and get some basic information.” Hopefully, stats were included in that.

  Brannoc’s hard glare rested on him for a moment, but he eventually gave a slight nod. “Any funny business and I put you down, kid.”

  “Understood.” Greg grinned like a giddy schoolboy as he activated the ability with a thought. A thin blue line projected from his eyes, pulsed over the man, who gave a slight shiver, then retracted. “Could you see that?” Greg asked as a box popped up on the upper right side of his vision.

  “No,” Brannoc grumbled. “Gave me a little chill though.”

  Brannoc “The Last Warden” Stroud

  Level 79 druid/medic

  Strength: 82

  Dexterity: 68

  Constitution: 114

  Wisdom: 102

  Intelligence: 84

  Charisma: 43

  Luck: 10

  “You’re level seventy-nine!” Greg blurted out. “What the hell? How are your stats so high? That math doesn’t make sense.”

  Brannoc took another puff from his pipe and shook his head, otherwise looking all together unimpressed. “I’ve been around the block a few times, kid.”

  Brannoc had allowed Maeve back into the house at Greg’s request. There were absolutely more questions that he wanted to ask, and Brannoc was probably the man to answer them, but another earth-shattering revelation might finish off what was left of his mental stability. Instead, he was going to focus on the short term. One crisis at a time.

  “So, what do the Gifted usually do? Are there a lot of them? Us, I guess?” Greg asked, looking between Maeve and Brannoc.

  “For work?” Brannoc glanced up with a look of disgust from the book he’d reopened. “Anything anybody else can do. Just because you’re gifted by the gods doesn’t make you too good for a real job.”

  “Don’t listen to him.” Maeve batted at the air in the elf’s direction. “It actually does. There are some Gifted that choose to live normal lives. Farmers, mechanics, store clerks, whatever. Most of them, though, choose something daring.” There was a reverent glint in her eyes. “Monster hunters, gladiators, adventurers, soldiers.” She jerked her head in Brannoc’s direction. “He’s done it all. Don’t let him pretend he’s not special.”

  That must have been how he’d gotten a title. His ability had called him ‘The Last Warden.’ Whatever that meant.

  “Okay, those all sound awesome, but it feels like they require years of training and…you know, skill?” Greg’s stomach made a disgruntled growl. “I’m gonna need a way to take care of myself. Do you have banks here?”

  “For you to work in?” Maeve’s eyes went wide at the implication. “You think you’re going to train while you work in a bank?”

  “No. I was going to work at the bank so I can eat, and then train when I wasn’t working.” Greg said, failing to see the lapse in his logic.

  “That’s not very efficient, is it? Especially when I’ve already guided you straight to the perfect employer.” Maeve’s grin only widened as Brannoc shook his head.

  “Not a chance.” Brannoc grunted.

  “Oh, come on. You just lost that kid who moved onto the arena, didn’t you?” Maeve whined.

  “Yeah, and I’ll replace him with somebody that has half a clue what the fuck they’re doing.”

  “Somebody wanna clue me in on what’s happening right now?” Greg piped in.

  “Brannoc runs Rhobair’s premier sewer cleanup company.” Maeve said, like he was supposed to know what that meant. His blank expression must have given away his obliviousness because she continued. “Vermin love the sewers on the count of all the guttergrubs.”

  “The what now?” Greg asked.

  “Guttergrubs.” She repeated.

  Greg squinted at her. She squinted back, then turned to Brannoc.

  “Told you, somebody with half a fucking clue.” Brannoc thumbed another page without looking over at them.

  “Guttergrubs are like big worms.” Maeve explained, then refocused on Brannoc. “Just let me take him down. I’ll make sure nothing eats him, and we’ll see if he’s up for the job. I told you he killed a Frost Kissed. None of your kids have done that, I’d bet.”

  Brannoc didn’t say anything for a beat before shrugging. “He dies, it’s on you.”

  “Excellent.” Maeve said, grinning wide. “You’re gonna love this.”

  Greg was almost certain that he was not going to love diving into shit tunnels, but if he was going to keep moving forward, he needed a job. If he could get experience at the same time, all the better.

  “Before we do any of that…” Greg rubbed the back of his neck. “I need some food, and clothes. The apron’s great, but I get the feeling in combination with the spandex its gonna raise some questions I’m not ready to answer.”

  Maeve agreed to take him back to her place so he could get some food and rest. She apparently had a roommate whose clothes would probably fit him. Before they headed out, Brannoc got his attention again.

  “Boy.”

  Greg turned just in time to be hit in the gut by a quickly spinning book. He swore he could feel the book’s spine connect with his own, and he shuddered to think what all eighty-two points of his strength would feel like.

  “Skill books won’t teach you everything,” Brannoc said gruffly, “but they’ll get you the basics faster than most.”