The Calling of Wrath - Chapter 6 - The System
Added 2022-07-23 02:35:29 +0000 UTC Cassandra
Year 819 | Month 1 | Day 3
A few seconds pass in silence before I finally ask, “Who are you?”
“At least your speaking now.” He says with an amused smile on his face before he answers my question with a light nod of his head, “Just call me Leo.”
I frown.
That doesn’t answer my question.
“And what about you, young lady?” he asks, still with the same amused look on his elderly face. “It’s only polite to give your name when asking someone else for theirs.”
My eye twitches at his words.
Seriously? You didn’t even…
Whatever.
“Cass,” I tell him the nickname father and my brothers call me in private.
I don’t know if he’s able to see my name through looking into my eyes, but it’s better to keep my full name from him just in case he can’t already see it.
The man raises an eyebrow at me, but I just shrug in response.
He chuckles before crossing his arms and turning serious, “Well then Cass, before we begin this introduction, there is a question I would very much like to ask you.”
I barely stop myself from tensing up as I calmly answer, “What question would that be?”
“Have you…” he pauses here, making it even harder for me to keep from tensing up, “ever played a tabletop role playing game?”
A… what? A game?
I can’t tell if he’s being serious or just messing with me, but judging by the seriousness radiating from his face…
He’s probably serious.
But is this a trick question?
Wait, no. He doesn’t know that I’m not an invader, so he wouldn’t be making one.
“No, I haven’t,” I answer honestly in the hopes that it really wasn’t a trick question.
The old man clicks his tongue.
My eyes widen slightly, only for me to wince slightly as he shoves his face closer to mine and says with an enthusiasm bordering on reverence, “Are you kidding me?! You should! Table-top rpgs are the best thing ever! Who cares about those high tech video games when we can have the old-timy-”
The old man continues blabbering on about stuff I don’t understand for several minutes in a way that really contradicts his age before he finally clears his throat and says, “Erm, sorry about that.”
I wordlessly nod my head, unsure of how to take what just happened.
“If you don’t know what it is, then I can’t use that as a reference to teach you about the System,” he says with a frown. “Which means I’ll be doing this the old fashioned way.”
As long as you can teach me what I want to know, I don’t care how you do it.
With that thought in mind, I finally move up to a sitting position.
“I’ll go ahead and skip the things that were already explained by the System itself, so to start things oooooff…” he drags out the word while sticking his hand into a very small pouch at his waist before pulling out a freaking chair and sitting down on it, “I’ll teach you how to identify someone!”
I can’t stop my eyes from widening at the sight of a chair appearing out of a tiny little pouch, but the old man doesn’t pay it any mind as he continues speaking, “All you have to do is to look into the eyes of the one you want to identify, and you’ll see their information. But remember that the information you will be able to see might be limited due to several different reasons, such as them being a higher Tier than you, or them having a special class or skill that blocks identification.”
“Hmm?” I express my interest while leaning forward, the magical chair completely forgotten for the moment.
So that explains why I can’t identify either of the old mans.
The old man chuckles at my display of interest before moving on, “The next thing I’ll tell you about are skills. You can use your EXP to level up your skills instead of yourself, but they will always have a level limit; one that is completely dependent on the skill itself. And if you try to level up the skill through pure training, it won’t work. Regardless, even if you train the skill to the limit of its current level, it will still require EXP to break through into the next level. It’s just that it won’t require as much EXP to do it if you hadn’t trained it yourself.”
I nod my head twice with a faint feeling of excitement.
He’s actually telling me all of this without me even having to convince him to do it!
“Moving on, I’ll talk about the missions.” He continues, still chuckling slightly at my actions. “Missions generally only appear when you are facing a great challenge, such as fighting with or running away from a monster with your life on the line or attempting to create a stronger piece of armor than what you’re usually able to make for whatever reason. They generally give out a lot more EXP than killing a monster or making a sword would, along with other rewards such as items or even one time use skills, but they aren’t a very common thing to see.”
The man then seems to narrow his eyes at me as he adds, “Unless you’re constantly facing danger like an idiot.”
I avert my gaze while hiding a frown.
It’s not my fault I was tossed here.
He snorts, drawing my attention back to him again before he continues speaking, “The last thing you need to know for now is the difference between the Tiers.”
Wait a second, I feel like this stuff is probably something people from the invaders’ planes would already know… does he think I’m the sheltered daughter of a powerful family on their plane or something? Or maybe he already knows that I’m not an invader and is helping me anyways?
I stare at him for a few seconds before shaking my head very lightly.
From what I’ve seen of them so far, that’s not a likely possibility.
Unaware of my thoughts, the old man continues speaking, “The requirements to level up in every Tier are quite a bit higher than the previous Tier, both in the Tier Breacher Mission and the EXP itself. But at the same time, you get twice as many stat points in every level-up as you did in the previous Tier, along with an initial boost to your stats by 50% of your stats prior to breaking through to the Tier. Which also means that the difference in strength between the Tiers grows more and more every Tier, meaning that while it might be possible for a level 10 to kill a level 11, it would almost be impossible for a level 20 to kill a level 21.”
That’s… kind of frightening.
Suddenly, the old man gets up from the magical chair and begins walking towards the cave entrance while shouting, “Since I’ve got that out of the way, I’d like to watch you fight some direwolves. Then I can get out of your hair for good tomorrow.”
My eyes widen slightly.
He wants to watch me fight? But how am I going to fight the direwolves without him seeing my claws?
The comfortable feeling from earlier resurfaces in my mind and I’m reminded that I’m stronger now than I was before.
Yeah, I should be able to fight without using my claws this-
“And please use those fancy claws of yours,” I hear the old man shout from the mouth of the cave before I can finish my thought, “they look really interesting!”
My mouth drops open slightly from my surprise, only to close again before he turns around to look at me.
“Well?” he asks with that same damned amused look on his face. “Time’s a wastin!”
I’m not sure if I should thank him for the guidance he’s given me or kick him for becoming asshole old man number two.
Instead, I glance one last time at the magical chair – still very curious about where it came from – before following him out of the cave.
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