Wanting privacy with his new apprentice, but mostly because he got annoyed after seeing the other townspeople watching them, Joseph closed the door to his shop and let down the curtains behind his windows to keep them from looking in.

Meanwhile, Tabitha explained everything to him. She explained being from another world, Runa thinking that she was a “Summoned,” choosing the Apprentice path, making the bowl and spear, helping Runa with a splint, and everything else.

“Even with my Lie Detection skill, it’s hard to believe all that,” Joseph said once her story was over.

“There’s a skill for that?” Tabitha asked while still looking through all the different items he had on display. They weren't fancy or anything, mostly just everyday tools, but what mattered to her was that they were made by an authentic blacksmith! “That sounds useful.”

“I hate being lied to more than anything else. It was one of the first skills I focused on acquiring when I was your age.”

“Huh. Interestin’. How’d’ya get it?”

“By having a high enough Charisma and then correctly figuring out when people lied to me. Think I had to call out… twenty-five lies to get the first rank of it?”

“Well, dang. That’s a lot of lies.”

“People tend to lie when they’re afraid of telling you the truth.”

“Ain’t that the truth. So, I could get skills by havin’ high enough attributes and then doin’ specific things to unlock them?”

“That’s right.”

“Which do ya think I should focus on first? I wanna be the best darn crafter there ever was. This place is like a dream come true to me. It don’t matter how many craftin’ paths there are out there, I’m gonna master every single last one of ‘em. So, what would ya say the first skill I should get is?”

“That’s a lofty goal you’ve got there. You understand how hard that’s going to be?”

“I’ll figure somethin’ out.”

“You’ve got too much confidence to say that without giving me even a tiny sense of lying.”

“How’s that skill of yours even work?”

“It’s like a gut feeling. As long as I listen carefully to somebody’s words, if they lie, I’ll get a gut feeling they’re hiding something." He patted his stomach. “Only way around it is the Liar skill as far as I know.”

“Huh… so this world has got skills like that. Interestin’. Anyways, how about that first skill I should get?”

“Disassemble and Convert Item. The first one you can get from taking apart ten items as carefully as possible with at least ten Dexterity. It’ll let ya regain the materials used in makin’ them, but you’ll lose the tags until you evolve the skill. For Convert Item, you’ll need to get Disassemble up to its third rank and have at least thirty Dexterity. Then you’ve got to take apart ten items, with tags, that you’ve made yourself. Convert Item will let you use your Expertise Points to convert items you’ve made into experience for whatever crafting path you’ve got set as your primary.”

“Ooh. Now, that sounds useful. Here I was gonna be disappointed if the only way to level up my paths for craftin’ was by goin’ around huntin’ monsters.”

“It’ll be the most efficient way until you get Convert Item.”

“Disappointin’, but understandable.”

“By the way, what’s your Dexterity up to? Wait. You know how to show somebody your status?”

“Nope.”

“Watch.” Joseph held up his right hand with his fingers curled against his palm, his thumb pressing down against the top of his pointer finger as if he was pinching an item between them. “Status Card.” Two words were all that it took for a card the same size and shape as a credit card to appear between his fingers. “This has all the information that you can see whenever you look at your status. You can give it to others to let them see it, too.” He handed his card over to Tabitha. Only, right as she was about to actually read it, he snapped his fingers and caused it to disappear. “And that’s how you get rid of it.”

“Aww, c’mon now. I didn’t even get to read it!” Tabitha protested.

“I know. No matter how much I like you, I have no interest in letting anybody else see my private information.”

“But you wanna see mine.”

“Because you want my help. If you don’t want specific help, you don’t have to show me it.”

“Fine, fine. I get ya. It ain’t like there’s anythin’ there for me to hide. Just gimme one second. Forgot I still have some attribute points to spend. Oi! Menu! You know the drill! Let’s go all—”

“Wait,” Joseph said. “I don’t know what they look like right now, but you should get your Strength up to fifteen if you want to unlock the Blacksmith path. Strength fifteen, Dexterity thirty. Those are the attribute requirements for it.”

“Oh. Thanks for lettin’ me know. Then, Menu, go ahead and put a point into Dexterity and the remainin’ four into Strength.”

System Menu

One Attribute Point has been distributed to Dexterity. Four Attribute Points have been distributed to Strength.

“Thanks. Now then,” Tabitha paused to copy what Joseph did with his hand before saying, “Status Card.”

Surely enough, her card appeared between her fingers with all of her updated information.

Status Card

Name

Tabitha

Achievements

11

Race

Human

Skills

1

Path

Apprentice

Paths

1

Level

1 (3/25)

Total Level

1

Stats

Attributes

HP

55/55

STR

5

INT

6

SP

10/10

VIT

6

MND

1

AP

10/10

END

1

WIL

1

EP

180/180

DEX

30

CHA

1

LP

60/60

AGI

1

LCK

11

“Looks like I’m doin’ pretty good, I think,” Tabitha said. “Especially considerin’ that I only just got here earlier today.” She handed the card over.

Joseph looked the card over with a raised eyebrow and a nod. “You’re right. That’s good progress. Just know that achievements will slow down. It’s easy to get a lot of them once you’ve undergone your Path Ceremony, but the rate you get them at will slow down pretty quick. Now, these Attributes… you really pumped as much into Dexterity as you could, huh?”

“Heh, heh, heh. Well, I was informed that it’s for craftin’, so I put everythin’ I could into it!”

“That’s not a bad idea… assuming you don’t mind dying to the first real threat you face. I’ve only ever put as many points into Dexterity as I needed to unlock new paths and skills. Most other crafters I know have been the same.”

“Tell me somethin’ real quick. Is it possible to add attributes to weapons?”

“Hm? Yeah. But that requires some advanced skills to actually manipulate, and you’ll need to rank up your Analyze skill to see them. Hand me that spear you’ve got.”

Tabitha handed her spear over to Joseph who looked it over the same way that she would whenever she wanted to use Analyze.

“Seven Agility, four Luck, three Strength. Those are the bonuses your attributes will have whenever you use skills with this weapon. They won’t show up on your status since they only take effect whenever you use a skill using it. Also… this is the ugliest looking spear I’ve ever seen in my entire life.”

“She’s got a look that only a mother could love, alright?” Tabitha replied. “She might be ugly to most folk, but she’s beautiful to me.”

“Hah. I know that feeling. Good work regardless, considering you made this your first day without prior experience. As for that bowl of yours, it looks like you’ve already discovered hardslime.”

“Darn straight I did!”

“An impressive material, hardslime is. Shame about its source.”

“Whatcha mean by that?”

“Hardslime is a pretty versatile material. Slimes have been hunted to use as material ever since its discovery however many years ago that was. Happened long before I was ever born. Just a few decades ago, those with the wealth to hire the most adventurers gathered up as many wild slimes as they could to try and run breeding programs. Breed them, kill the originals, wait until the young, split slimes have grown, and repeat. Slimes were already struggling as far as population goes before that. Now, well, even a non-variant slime is a rare sight.”

“So uh… does that basically mean I killed an endangered animal as soon as I got here?”

“If by ‘endangered’ you mean almost extinct in the wild, yeah.”

“Oh. Oops.”

“Don’t worry about it. Anybody would’ve done the same, and that’s without doing it out of self-defense. Not many are willing to pass up on killin’ a variant.”

“I guess I’ll take it easy on slimes. But if somethin’ ain’t endangered, it won’t get off so easy.”

“If you really want to fulfill your dream, you’re going to have to get your hands on as many different materials as you can. There are diminishing returns to things like Convert Item. You can’t just make the same thing over and over and convert it to experience. And for the advanced crafting paths, you won’t be able to get experience from killing for them.”

“I like that. Makes it all the more meaningful. I’d be disappointed if I could become the best crafter ever by killin’ my way to it. Anyways, I think I’ve learned enough for now. Mind if I borrow a pickaxe? And an axe. A backpack would be nice, too.”

“What do you plan on doing?”

“The night’s young! Gonna go gather to my heart’s fill. Then I’m gonna turn it all into items. Oh, got any idea for achievements I could go for that’ll boost Strength?”

“If you take an axe and pick out with you, you should get an achievement for mining your first rock and chopping down your first tree. Five Strength for each of those.”

“Perfect!”

“But I’m not going to let you rent my tools for free. If you want to use them, you have to bring me something back to make it worth it.”

“Heh. I wouldn’t expect to borrow them for free. Just tell me what ya want and I’ll grab it for ya.”

Joseph stroked his beard as he thought about what he could send her on an errand for. “Slitherglow fluid.”

Tabitha tilted her head. “What now?”

“They come out once it’s dark out. Fat little worms that like to slither across trees. They glow to attract predators that will eat them, and then they lay their eggs in their killer’s stomach.”

“Yeah, I won’t feel any regret about killin’ parasites like that.”

“It’s actually their eggs that glow through their skin. Kill the worms, take the eggs out from their bodies, and pop them. I’ll give you a vial to fill with their fluid.”

“Sounds good to me! Heh. I feel like I’m goin’ on my first official quest.”

“Right. Quests. Haven’t given one of those in a long time.”

“What’s that now?”

“As long as you’re offering somebody a task and a reward that System finds meaningful, it will turn it into a quest and offer a bonus reward it deems acceptable. Let’s see… I think I have to check first. System. Create a quest.”

The next moment, Joseph looked like he was reading a window and interacting with it, but Tabitha couldn’t see anything. That meant people probably couldn’t see whenever she was using the system, either. Only status cards were visible to other people, and only if she did it in the specific way that Joseph showed her.

A new window popped up once he looked done.

“There we go,” Joseph said. “You should see it now.”

Quest Offer

Name: Slitherglow Hunt

Source: Joseph Kroll, Riverbend

Objective: Acquire one vial full of Slitherglow Fluid.

Bonus Objective 1: Ensure that the vial of Slitherglow Fluid has at least 50 Quality.

Bonus Objective 2: Ensure that the vial of Slitherglow Fluid has the [Bright] Tag.

Reward: 5 Gold Pieces | 1 Attribute Point | Slitherglow Bait

[Accept]

[Deny]

“What’s with these bonus objectives?” Tabitha asked.

“System decided on them,” Joseph answered. “It likes to keep things interesting. Those other rewards you should see are for finishing the bonus objectives, too. The only reward I’m responsible for are the gold pieces.”

“I thought getting to borrow the tools is my reward?”

“System didn’t accept that as a suitable enough reward to make this a quest, so I put up the minimum amount of pieces it took to make one.”

“Heh. I’ll have to thank it later for hustlin’ you for me.”

“Hah. Funny. Just keep in mind that if you don’t return my things to me in as good condition as you took them, I’ll keep you here until you can make ten of them each in even better condition.”

“Don’t threaten me with a good time, old man!”

With her usual smirk, Tabitha reached her hand toward the window and accepted her first ever quest.