by Arthur Stone
I needed to decide what changes to make to the superstructure provided to the natives by ORDER. And how to make them.
But before I could make any decisions, I needed to process today’s developments. In one day I had managed to achieve more than some people would in their entire life. Perhaps not from a quantitative standpoint, but in terms of quality? Most definitely.
For convenience’s sake, the composition of this Order superstructure could be broken down into four main blocks.
The first block was the degrees of enlightenment—Rock’s equivalent to character levels in a video game. These were simple enough to understand. They were basic vessels that were filled with chi. As soon as one was filled to the top, the overflow instantly resulted in a new degree.
The second block was the attributes. These were somewhat more complicated. Initially, each degree allowed one to obtain up to six attribute points. Each point was in itself like a chi reservoir, only instead of being filled with the universal energy, it needed attribute marks. Also, each attribute came with its own “record” of how many marks were spent on it, because all of the vessels included in the superstructure were malleable in the process of one’s development. It was possible, for instance, by eating spices and doing all the right things, to expand the initially issued ten units per attribute to as much as fifty. That was the maximum number that could be attained by standard methods, and reaching it was bloody difficult. Raising an attribute increased in difficulty the further it grew, but in return, a denizen of Rock with sky-high attributes could perform feats of wonder that would put comic book heroes to shame.
On any given degree, the attributes couldn’t be evenly distributed, so most commoners typically raised one attribute to one, another to two, and the third to three. But there were two other attributes that were rather difficult to get: Perception and Spirit. If you managed to unlock them, you faced the additional challenge of finding ways of expanding their limit as well. The only way to extract maximum value from a degree was to properly unlock all five attributes. This type of degree was called “alpha.”
The Perception attribute granted combat energy: a special type of resource required for the most effective combat talents. It was akin to mana, only for fighters. Whereas Spirit was that very same mana, utilized by mages. Both resources came with their own expendable bars. If you depleted it, you needed to wait for it to replenish before using any talents powered by the corresponding resource. Essentially, without unlocking and developing these attributes, you could never fully actualize yourself as a warrior or a mage.
Those that possessed both attributes were the elites of Rock. You couldn’t dream of a better lot. Over ninety percent of the population were simple omegas. Those with an average of four attribute points per degree were betas. The rest were alphas.
Attributes granted physical and magic power, deftness in combat and in everyday labor, and, of course, stamina, arguably the most essential element to any proper session of work or fisticuffs.
The third block was talents. Though somewhat simpler than attributes, it wasn’t without its nuances. Say you unlocked the Cold Arms talent. Developing it would make you more effective at fighting with clubs, daggers, swords and spears. The improvement was universal across all types of cold weapons—until you raised it to ten. From there, you could either stop or choose a specialization. You could, for instance, choose to specialize in the spear. But you might also earn the Spear talent in combat, without having to raise it from scratch. Such occurrences weren’t common, but not unheard of, either. And that threw the proverbial wrinkle into any planning efforts.
You could unlock any talents you wished—just as long as they met the requirements of your current attributes. And the number of talents could be anything, but no higher than the sum total of your completed attributes. In practical terms, that meant I couldn’t unlock any talents at all given that I had zero innate attributes, and the Order didn’t recognize the ones endowed by the amulet. There was no cheating the higher power of this world.
The fourth block dealt with states. These didn’t grant any direct bonuses, but acted more as modifiers of existing abilities. For most of Rock’s denizens, this block was empty on account of being bloody difficult to develop even for nobles. Acquiring even a starting state meant arranging for the completion of an achievement that would fetch a worthy reward, which was both risky and complicated. You couldn’t delay the attainment of degrees of enlightenment for too long by spending chi on unlocking available attributes and talents. Normal people didn’t have to deal with their reservoir leaking chi into the void; on the contrary, their chi gradually accumulated even when no effort was exerted. As a result, by my age you were almost guaranteed three-four degrees.
But again, that concerned normal teenagers, and I was anything but normal.
The state called Equilibrium was regarded as the most valuable. One completed point of Equilibrium allowed one to unlock an additional attribute point per degree of enlightenment. Meaning, a common peasant could develop not six, but seven points per degree. Though the values of attributes still couldn’t match—that rule was sacrosanct. So something like one to Agility, two to Strength, and four to Stamina. Seven points in all while adhering to the condition.
The Enhanced Enlightenment state was likewise highly prized. One point of the state translated to ten capacity points to your current and future chi reservoirs. The boon didn’t apply to any preceding ones, but the same was true of all other parameters. In other words, any blunder made early on would follow you to the grave, so great care should be taken to develop properly from the start.
Why bother raising one’s chi capacity to begin with? Because the total amount of accumulated primordial energy determined a great deal. For instance, the more of it you had, the better protected your mind was against mental attacks. Moreover, each person had what I would translate as “chi shadow.” It was a reflection of sorts of your current amount of chi, and this resource was used for numerous talents—primarily crafting ones, but some combat as well. Once it was partially or fully spent, you needed to wait for it to replenish, which happened automatically, albeit at a slow clip. A useful boon, all things considering. Certainly couldn’t hurt.
The Enhanced Perception state expedited the regeneration of energy used by fighters, just as mages needed Enhanced Spirit to bolster their regeneration of mana. And the Chi Shadow state accelerated the replenishment of consumed shadow chi.
And the last, most delicious state of all, was called Measure of Order. The higher the value, the more handsome the rewards, i.e. the trophies awarded by the Order. Leveling it was incredibly difficult, to the point that even the most accomplished nobles could only boast two-three points of the stat.
Such were the four blocks. One was utterly unavailable for all but a tiny fraction of Rock’s denizens, and the rest, though technically available, nearly impossible to develop properly for all but an even smaller fraction. It was no wonder that the nobles ruled this world by more than just birthright—they were orders of magnitude stronger than commoners. And their strength lay in more than just stats. It impacted their very structure, anchoring in their bodies. I suspected that, among other things, it also modified their DNA. Or influenced heredity in some other ways. That would explain a lot.
From generation to generation, the most gifted of the population gravitated toward one another, experimenting with talents and other things. They were born to powerful parents so that, when their own time came, they would give birth to just-as-powerful offspring. They did that by engaging in combat with demons and monsters so that, by defeating them, they would further modify their genetic material. Great feats were the surest way to cement great dynasties.
Such selection went on for millennia. In the end, the inner structures of noble clans differed significantly from those lacking any traces of “blue blood.” For instance, children born with four—sometimes even five—unlocked attributes were far from a rare occurrence. Moreover, right
off the bat the attributes could be filled not to the minimum capacity, but closer to medium or even max values. Thus, a year-old noble tot could easily overpower a two-year-old peasant toddler, while an unarmed teenager could demolish a couple of armed grownups.
Naturally, such gifted children weren’t a given—exceptions weren’t exceptionally rare. In most cases, such blunders of nature were remedied in one way or another. For the rest, the child grew up a noble in name only—whereas true bluebloods regarded him with either pity or scorn.
I was the prime example of the above. The son of a mother from an ancient clan and a father who, though his identity was unknown, clearly hadn’t been a commoner. Going by Treya’s hints, he might have been even more powerful than her. Speaking of mother, she was actually on the inferior end in terms of talents. A typical case of being born second-rate and the weakening clan being unable to remedy her shortcomings early enough in life.
Just as my shortcomings hadn’t been remedied. Only I wasn’t second-rate, but completely dysfunctional. And that was a rare deviation from the norm, among commoners as well as among nobles. Typically, an infant without attributes and the first degree of enlightenment died within days of birth. Some could even hold out a month or longer, but the end was always the same.
I had lasted until thirteen years of age. According to Rock’s measurement scale, at least—I didn’t quite know how long it would be in Earth time. In many ways I was still an alien, still thinking in terms of pounds and seconds in a world that operated by entirely different standards.
Why me? Why had I survived where all the others had died? That was a whole other story, of which I only knew certain details for certain. And I might not ever find out all of it.
The only thing that mattered now was that today I was given a chance to become normal. Or at least come closer to it. After deliberating for what felt like a lifetime, I finally risked it and activated two personal embodiments of the Strength attribute. One of the six stars in my structure lit up dimly and counted up to the number two—the number of points earned. Now I just had to accumulate anywhere from ten to fifty to end up with one complete attribute.
Were the accumulated points going to leak like my chi? I didn’t know. This was an experiment.
Chi was leaking at a pace of five-seven units per day. If, upon waking tomorrow, I would discover both points were still there, I would allocate the rest of the points.
Carrying such treasures on my person made me uneasy. I was starting to understand Beko.
This was mine.
And I wasn’t going to give it up. To anyone.
Chapter 19
A Very Crucial Choice
No Stat Changes
At night, my dreams were nightmares. Something dark, faceless and impossibly terrifying was trying to break into the cellar assigned to us by Ash. His greedy hands were reaching for Beko, trying to take from him his most precious and mysterious treasure, then for me with the same criminal goal. I kept tossing and turning on the hard corduroy mat, raised slightly over the dirt floor. We had brought in some straw from our former home, but it wasn’t enough to sleep comfortably. And there wasn’t anywhere to get more—this wasn’t the season for it.
Somewhere up and down and south of Blackriver, there were a sort of subsidiaries of the fort. Nearly typical villages where farmers grew fine harvests, taking advantage of the fertile soil in these untamed lands. There would be plenty of straw left over from the winter crops, but we would need to wait for it first.
In the end, I woke up groggy and tired, but my sourness instantly evaporated at the realization that, despite the insinuation of my night terror, my two Strength points hadn’t gone anywhere.
I checked the chi level. Seventy-six points. Same pace of leakage—no changes there.
Well, time to take the next step. Not right away, of course, but over breakfast. While killing the leftovers of yesterday’s feast, I would stage a veritable inner revolution. For some reason I had found that my brain worked better over food, as if my stomach stimulated the thinking process. Oh, and the lovely vistas that opened from my beloved wall had a pleasant soothing effect, helping to thwart the temptation of rushing, which was fraught with mistakes.
Let’s start with the attributes.
Thanks to my modest reserves in the invisible pouch combined with the trophies earned from yesterday’s victory over the kote, I had plenty of material to work with. Typically, the Order granted a person minor essences of attributes, provided said attributes were already unlocked. If unlocked, you could get personal embodiments of attributes instead. Either way, the drops were limited to one unit at a time, and the embodiments could then be used for unlocking an attribute for the first time. Without that first action, the minor essences couldn’t be used. Also of note was that personal embodiments could only be used by the person who had gotten them—to everyone else, they were complete and utter garbage. For this reason, even affluent commoners weren’t able to unlock for their children an alpha set of attributes from birth, as those items of prime necessity weren’t available for sale at any price, but had to be obtained on one’s own, and that wasn’t easily accomplished by any stretch.
I had collected seven of these rudimentary items for the Agility attribute, nine for Stamina, and two more for Strength. Plus one additional general attribute mark that could be used on any unlocked attribute, adding one point to it.
These belonged to the ordinary, commonplace variety of loot.
The Greater General Attribute Mark, on the other hand, was absolutely elite. It added fifty points to an already unlocked attribute, and if used on the first attribute unlocked at any given degree, it raised the chances of expanding the capacity of this and the next attribute. For instance, if, say, one Strength attribute required fifteen points to complete, it could expand the capacity by an unknown amount—up to the standard maximum of fifty.
And I had two of these. A trophy of this caliber was both rare and extraordinarily valuable. It was also transferable, meaning I could sell one or both in exchange for a small fortune.
Or I could end up on the bottom of Blackriver.
With a slit throat.
That was all theory, anyway. I was not going to sell even one, let alone both.
Additionally, I had two other items so precious, I felt almost reverential awe at the mere thought of looking at them. Now these would fetch a veritable mountain of gold—if only they were transferable. But they weren’t, so the point was moot.
Greater Personal Universal Attribute Embodiment: 2 units
With this, I could instantly become like an alpha noble, that is unlock all five attributes. The small change was enough for Agility, Stamina and Strength, and these two beauties would cover the two elite attributes—Perception and Spirit. The qualities of these items also matched the greater general attribute marks, which meant I could try and bang out the maximum fifty capacity points.
All in all, using all of these trophies should allow me to raise four attributes to one. And this was where the Order’s principal rule presented a problem: the levels of attributes on any given degree couldn’t be equal. Only the first one would be activated—the rest would remain as dead weight until I managed to bring them up to two, one at a time. And all the while, the remaining attributes wouldn’t be of any help, their status displaying zero. Besides, I wouldn’t have enough chi. Leveling up each attribute required one hundred points of chi. Even with yesterday’s haul, I would only be able to raise one attribute to the minimum threshold.
Still, what would be the point of carrying such treasures on my person? Better to put them into the safest possible vault. That is, into me.
So I did.
My primary attribute would be Stamina. Given my physical condition, Strength and Agility would be of dubious use, but having more energy to delay fatigue—that should be valuable.
I threw several lesser personal essences into Stamina, unlocking the attribute. Then I added two lesser essences and one st
andard mark. Finally, with bated breath and eyes screwed shut, I used the Greater Standard Attribute Mark on the already decently glowing star of the attribute.
The star blazed with light as the Order informed me of a new achievement.
You have unlocked a new attribute: Stamina. Attribute level: 1. Maximum capacity: 60 points. Current capacity: 50 points.
One-time incentive: +15 points to the Stamina attribute (inactive)
What? A whopping sixty points had resulted in only one bloody attribute level?!
But as I studied the result a little longer, I relaxed and even smiled. What a beautiful number. My single level of Stamina contained the blessed fifty points. The very maximum—right from the get-go. And that capacity would carry over from one degree to the next, assuming no other unforeseen developments. Which may be assuming too much given that unforeseen developments had been happening to me on a near daily basis.
Now I just needed to get the missing twenty-five points to bring my Stamina to the second level.
