‘Risk comes from not knowing what you are doing.’

~Warren Buffet

POV - Tad

There was something awe inspiring as I considered the interface before me. The vastness of the System resources at my fingertips. I could search for whatever I wanted. Food, goods, skills, weapons, armour I was limited only by my imagination in knowing what to search for. Hey, I wonder if I can buy Awards or Perks or Titles. I tried it out. Nope. No buying rewards. That would defeat the point of the reward of course. But you never knew. And if I didn’t look I wouldn’t find those loopholes that were surely there. Another thought struck me. Can I sell stuff here too? That would be neat.

“Yo, Nige, Can I sell stuff to the System Shop?”

I waited for him to expand on his reply. He didn’t.

“Aren’t you going to tell me what I can and can’t sell?”

He was wrong. I did have something. I had my iAPD. And it was unique. That was a better grade than rare, I was pretty sure of that. I tried to enter it. Nope again. Item unavailable. I’m not searching for it you… I reined in my annoyance; I’m selling it. The interface changed slightly with the prompt for [Submit] becoming [Sell]. And it was still unavailable. Darnit. What was I missing?

“Nige? Does the System not want Unique Items? I can’t seem to price check my iAPD.”

“So that’s why I can’t sell it.” It was good to discover I wasn’t the problem.

“Tier D, that's like three tiers higher than where I am now right? Gee to eff to eee to dee?” I counted them off on my fingers. It was good to see that my mental facilities were all working. Hmmm. No sign of improvement though. In fact that sounded a bit juvenile if I had to use my fingers to count letters. I wonder how my Mind Stats influence my cognitions. This was worrying. And all the more reason to grind up my Wisdom as fast as possible.

Heh that's 99 more than I currently have. I chuckled to myself. Good to know though. I filed that away. I was slowly building up my knowledge of the System and how I fitted in. I wonder how many reach… I was getting side tracked. Yet again. With a bit of effort I dragged my attention back to Nige’s question. “I am not attached to it. It is a reminder of my failing health and constant operations. Anyway I was just price checking. Seeing what value the System placed on it just as a point of reference.” Maybe I could use it as security. Mortgage a bit of my soul so to speak. Sounds like a plan. What could go wrong?

Returning my attention to the System Shop interface for the third time, I started a new search. Seeing I had this artefact attached to my soul I should make sure it is filled. Otherwise it was totally useless clutter. What potions could I get? I limited my search to my current Tier and Price but left Grade and Category wide open.

>SYSTEM SHOP

>EXP:

543

>SEARCH:

>Potions

[SUBMIT]

>FILTERS:

[Tier]

G

[Category]

Any

[Grade]

Any

[Price]

<500

>Body<

>Mind<

>Soul<

>Misc<

>SPECIALS<

>RANDOM<

>SPONSORED<

I picked the subcategory of Body. The Shop populated the results with healing, energy and resistance potions. It looked like the Tier G potions available were just Trash Grade. Trash Grade potions? That sounded particularly dodgy. Let's check out health potions first. Health and Stamina potions were one of the things that I had abused significantly when gaming. These were often a massive cheat, whoops I mean exploit, self correcting my own musings. Using them cleverly was not cheating. It was wise. And clever. And I would need to be both wise and clever to thrive in this new world.

I expanded one to see what it was. 50HP? That sounded pretty good for a trash potion. Oh, over two hours. That was quite long wasn’t it? So definitely not something I could chug back in the middle of a battle. I was somewhat disappointed but really what did I expect from a trash potion? Maybe higher grades would act faster? Still not bad for 1 EXP. I clicked on another trash potion, one costing 2 EXP. This gave 100HP, but over four hours, so it was still the same ratio. Not bad I suppose if you are safe and out of danger and can rest up for a bit. I turned to Nige.

“Hey Nige, Are there any restrictions on how frequently you can take a health potion?”

Ouch. I could see the need to have better quality potions with that sort of penalty. “I’m glad I've discovered this now rather than through experience.” This reaffirmed to me the need to be as prepared as possible. “Does this restriction apply to other potions as well?” I asked. “Like stamina potions?”

Fantastic. Stamina potions are totally OP. I could already see myself unflaggingly beating my opponents into the ground while chugging back on energy drinks. Nige brought my enthusiasm to a grinding halt.

Poos. I was miffed. These were a preparation buff rather than get out of jail card. I was disappointed but also somewhat relieved. After all everyone else had the same access to these potions and if it came to conflict something like tropey Stamina potions could massively unbalance the outcome. Still preparation was key. I returned to my prospective purchasing decisions.

I expanded the Tier range and found I could get both Common and Uncommon potions in Bronze Tier. Common grade was twice as expensive and worked twice as fast as the equivalent Trash grade potion. Uncommon seemed to work the same speed but provided approximately 10 times the amount of HP. Ok that's good. Rare unlocked at Silver. But the prices were staggering. There was no way I could afford these even if I could use them, so I didn’t bother researching more. Epic was obviously outside my price range so I couldn’t tell whether they unlocked at Silver Tier or Gold Tier. I translated the colours to letters just for practice. Silver was eee and Gold was dee. Hopefully this highly intellectual reasoning was grinding up my mind stats and skills.

I selected 10 EXP worth of Health and 10 Exp worth of Energy potions and added them to my basket. [Zip] - down my balance dropped to 533. Now I had something to charge my iAPD with. I decided not to explore mind or soul potions, whatever they were, for the time being. There was so much other stuff I needed. But what to get here with my limited EXP and what to get through normal street vendors? My eye caught the bottom line of the interface. Specials - Random - Sponsored. I selected Specials.

Darnitall! Trash grade potions! Buy one get one free. The System was messing with me. I sighed. And then my eye saw the ‘special conditions apply' tag along the bottom. I expanded it.

Aged stock notification Short shelf life warning No returns accepted

Ahh ha! Now I don't feel half as bad. An expired potion would hardly be a bargain at all. Especially with health and potentially your life on the line. Go me - dodged a bullet there. This was a straight-up trap for the unwary. I needed to remember that despite the System’s benevolence it wasn’t my friend. In a way this trial was a crucible, testing and refining and improving us participants under pressure. If I didn’t want to be part of the dross skimmed off, I would need to be constantly on my toes to avoid all of these traps.

I was determined not to wash out. Particularly since that was a terminal proposition.

It occurred to me that I needed to have a budget rather than impulse buy whatever caught my eye. This was danger-roo. I needed to put some thought into my shopping blitz before I blew it all on whatever caught my eye. My resources were pretty limited right now and while I could get a loan from the Bank that wouldn’t finance any System purchases. Of course my minion probably could give me some guidance there.

“Nige. What do you recommend purchasing at the System Shop versus at the standard market? Are there some rules of thumb that the Tutorial recommends?”

”Okay” I jumped in before he could continue, “that’s a no. I get it. Calm down already.”

I paused and equipped my new undies and loaded up my iapd. Heh, another perk - no issues getting changed out in the street now.

I felt snug and secure in a whole new way. This was my new life and I was making progress and feeling good about it.

I so wanted to rark Nige up tho. “Come on Nige, you must know this stuff like the back of your hand.” I sniggered, “And what’s with the chip on your shoulder?”

Juvenile humour I know.

It was wonderful.