“Well,” I said, “does anyone know how to level up?”

NIkito nodded in agreement. “Good idea comrade. I’m sure we all got this notification about levels” he said gesturing towards something only he could see in the air. “I can still see a thousand enemies that are supposed to be in the next wave but I still can’t see what they are. We need to get stronger if we want to face such numerous enemies.” Matilda nodded her voiceless agreement.

Remembering the green goblins advice, Goblin Guff, from the tutorial I said “access character status.”

Tony Delgado, Scout

Level 5

Integrity Levels: 50

Energy Levels: 50

Power: 5

Power Regeneration: 10

Health: 5

Strength: 5

Accuracy: 11

Speed: 11

Free Status Points: 8

Skills: Reticle

2 Class Skills points available

That was…. Wow. this was gonna require some thinking. “Hey guys, all you need to level up is to say access character status. I’m going into the hut to do this where I can think. Let me know if anything attacks us.”

Nikito nodded as I walked by him. “Don’t worry comrade, we’re supposed to have an hour until the next wave and so far these timers have been correct down to the second. Go ahead, I’m sure we’ll be fine until everyone is leveled up.”

Sitting down on the bed I had claimed in the hut, I pulled up my character sheet again. So my power regeneration was up pretty high, but I honestly hadn’t been using it all that much. I had noticed a drain from firing my gun but by the time I slid the bolt back in place it was already regenerated. My accuracy and speed was pretty high as well and those both seemed to be my most important stats in the fights so far.

Power and health wasn’t as important since I didn’t have the weapons for a close up fight like Nikito or Akari did though I was sure there would be times where I wouldn’t have a choice but to fight up close. Quite frankly, I needed to be better at killing multiple enemies especially with the amount of enemies we’d be facing with the next wave. I wasn’t sure if my skills would be up for it. With that in mind I turned to my class skills. Just like last time there were three paths with boxes. There was the reticle ability but the box was glowing bright blue. Behind it was another skill box with text and behind that was a series of grayed out boxes. Looking at my options my previous skills were there but the new one immediately grabbed my attention.

Camouflage

Camouflage is a passive ability that allows you to blend in with your surroundings. At low levels this skill lets your clothes blend in with your surroundings. At higher levels it allows you to turn completely invisible while masking your presence from thermal vision and radar.

Tracking

Tracking is a passive ability that helps you determine traces that have been left behind by others.

Multi-Target Lock

While using the reticle ability, you can lock onto multiple targets to a maximum of half your accuracy score. When you next fire your gun you will simultaneously fire on all locked targets. Energy use: 2 energy for each locked on enemy.

That was it! It was exactly what I needed. A usage for my energy while being able to fire on multiple enemies. Quickly selecting it, I eagerly looked at the next skill in the tree, eager to unlock an even more powerful ability.

Class Skill locked

Unlock 2 more class skills to gain access to Tier 3 class skills.

I stared at the screen before shaking my head. Of course there was a wall. There was always something to stop you from progressing wasn’t there? Still, it definitely made sense. Without a forced stop I would probably never take camouflage or tracking. Quite simply they weren’t anywhere near as good as multi-target lock and I assumed the skills would only get better. It would make me weaker in raw power but more versatile and able to fit my role as scout better.

Looking over the skills I decided to pick up camouflage. I’d love to pick up tracking but it wasn’t in the cards for me at the moment. Quite frankly, I needed skills that would help me survive in a fight while tracking seemed more suitable for hunting. At the moment, my enemies were coming to me instead of running away. After taking camouflage I took a look at the next one in the skill tree.

Active Camouflage

By expending energy you can become almost invisible but this does not hide heat, smell, or sound. This can be applied to other people but the energy cost doubles for each additional person.

Energy Use: 5 energy every ten seconds

Becoming essentially invisible for only 5 energy seemed to be very good. The steep doubling cost per person was definitely a downside but if my power regeneration was high enough, I’d be able to keep it active practically all the time on my group. Still, that was a problem for future me because I still needed to assign status points.

Tony Delgado, Scout

Level 5

Integrity Levels: 50

Energy Levels: 50

Power: 5

Power Regeneration: 10

Health: 5

Strength: 5

Accuracy: 11

Speed: 11

Free Status Points: 8

Active Skills: Multi-target Lock

Passive Skills: Reticle, Camouflage

In games, it was usually better to be specialized and I didn’t see that as a problem here. I’d picked up some active skills so increasing my energy levels was probably best. If I remember right, power regeneration was supposed to recover that amount in energy every minute. That meant currently I was regaining… one energy every six seconds? If I increased that by eight it would be…. god math was hard. Twenty into sixty three times so… roughly two energy recovered every six seconds? Or perhaps one energy every three seconds would be better. Granted I was rounding a bit for my head's sake but still that was the gist of it.

I hadn’t really seen the effects of speed yet and my accuracy wasn’t in question. I didn’t particularly need strength though health was always good. In that case…. maybe 5 in power regen and 3 in power? That would mean I’d get back an energy every four seconds and I’d have 90 power to start a fight with. I honestly was putting five into power regen just so I’d have even numbers for math. Really didn’t want to get into decimals, sheesh.

Tony Delgado, Scout

Level 5

Integrity Levels: 50

Energy Levels: 80

Power: 8

Power Regeneration: 15

Health: 5

Strength: 5

Accuracy: 11

Speed: 11

Free Status Points: 0

Active Skills: Multi-target Lock

Passive Skills: Reticle, Camouflage

With that, my leveling up was complete. Wandering out of the hut, I saw George muttering things to himself as he constantly glanced between invisible screens. Not wanting to bother him I went up to the top of the rampart and surveyed the damage. All the corpses had vanished just like with the leopards but unlike the first time, there were blue orbs everywhere.

Sighing, I climbed down and opened the front gate. They opened easily and as I walked out I realized that we hadn’t put George's shield down in front of the gate to reinforce it like we’d talked about. We’d have to remember to do that next time, it had certainly felt like a good idea at the time. I suppose we had gotten busy and simply forgotten. I wish there was some sort of autoloot function. Maybe there was, I hadn’t learned about it at least. I wasn’t sure how long I had until the new wave was here so I started towards the entrance of the valley before grabbing loot orbs. Looking in my inventory, I saw that I now had three leopard furs and a claw. Dismissing the screen I started the boring job of collecting all one hundred and fifty loot orbs.

As I got closer to the fort the orbs became more dense, showing our kill box. I wasn’t the only one collecting loot though as I saw Nick and George both collecting them. While boring, the looting also gave me the opportunity to think. This mission, quest, whatever, was only the beginning. Earth wasn’t the same as I remembered, that much was obvious from the tutorial. How much was going to be changed? How much was the same? I hadn’t gotten hungry in a while so did I need to eat? Would I even be able to have kids? I’d never even had a girlfriend before so was that option gone forever now?

So many worries of the future swirled in my head as I mechanically picked up glowing blue orbs at the whim of a psychotic AI playing games with us. It was just so… surreal. I felt like I should be overwhelmed yet I couldn’t help but also feel disconnected like it wasn’t my problem. Recalling that first time I woke up, I recalled that feeling of suffocating that had vanished. Was this feeling of disconnect because of the AI? As I picked up the last loot orb I came to the conclusion that the answers weren’t going to just reveal themselves to me. I’d have to fight and survive in order to find out for myself. I’d leveled up and become stronger. I’d face this terrifying new system and come out on top, no matter what it took.

** Matilda **

Matilda unconsciously started humming as she went over her character sheet. Despite not being able to hear, the vibrations had always been soothing and now they were no different, a small comfort that she clung onto. She was currently choosing what skills to choose after selecting her status points. She’d known after leveling up what she wanted to improve, upgrading her power and accuracy when she got the chance.

The pistol she was using to fight wasn’t very good and she’d missed far more often then she’d wanted to during the fight. Even worse, all of her abilities like Minor Healing and Protective Dome, required a large amount of power. Yes they seemed to be fairly powerful such as keeping Nikito alive so he could distract the bears. Still, it meant that she had to be smart about their usage. Increasing her power so that she could use them more often was for the best.

Looking over her options for skills, Matilda took a long time to consider what she wanted to do. Just like last time there was an ability that passively healed her, one that let her teammates not overheat their guns as much, and then there was this new one, Energy Barrier. which was similar to her Protective dome. Energy Barrier created a wall in front of her instead, helping protect her from attacks in the front. Her next option was locked so she selected the Minor Overheating Reduction to help out her teammates. When she was selecting abilities the first time, she’d been with Nikito who had an axe and shield rather than a gun for his main weapon. Now that she was with other people though, it seemed to be invaluable.

Humming as she closed out her other windows, she continued humming as she went to go find Nikito. As she walked she suddenly stopped as a thought struck her with all the force of a truck. She could hear herself humming, that buzzing sound in the background was her! Opening her mouth she tried to make a noise and a squeak came out. Jumping in excitement Matilda took off running. She could talk!!! She could finally actually talk to someone without them staring at her hands, looking confused as they tried to tell her they didn’t understand. Finally, something that she could be happy about.

A single tear fell from her eye as she ran to find Nikito, sounds coming from her mouth that brought a smile to faces around the camp as she heard herself laugh for the first time.

** George **

“So with this my average damage output is ten per bullet and I can fire at a constant rate of ten bullets every five seconds, so that means I can deal one hundred damage in five seconds. Then the energy consumption will be… hmm that doesn’t seem right. What's bringing that up? Is there a hidden cost I’m not seeing? I should have asked Guff before.” George trailed off as Tony passed him, heading towards the wall.

He ignored Tony as he continued delving into the metadata behind his upgrades. Pulling up the descriptions of his skills he expanded the descriptions to bring up more information. Any self-respecting gamer should know all their skills and weapons. Granted it wasn’t a game but real life, regardless it might as well be a game. As the thought crossed his mind, he recalled the first few hours of the game world where he’d been mauled by a bear several times. Shuddering as he remembered the pain, George delved back into his skills.

After crunching the numbers for a bit he finally chose to get the venting and claymore skill. The claymore let him put down an explosive device that would explode when anyone walked in front of it that wasn’t friendly. The explosion wasn’t supposed to hurt anyone behind it, only the ones in front of the claymore. With this he’d be able to booby trap the fort allowing them to have a more defensible position. While it was a great skill, he could only place two for now and each one cost him twenty energy.

It seemed that placing them would be next to impossible while in combat since his turret reduced his maximum energy by thirty already and he’d started off with 50 energy at level one. Now he was at 90 energy from leveling up. Investing three of his status points into his power his energy shot up into 120 energy. His other skill, venting, let him put vents on his gun. Previously, his gun had overheated and it had been one of the worst feelings he’d ever heard. Holding a weapon that's barrel was glowing red-hot and not being able to fire it. Bears just charging at you as you were unable to do anything to stop it. He shuddered but suppressed his nervousness as he started delving back into the math to figure out where to put his other five status points.

** Nick **

Nick wasn’t sure what to do. There were just way too many cool options! So many things sounded awesome, how was he supposed to pick one thing? Still, there was an obvious one to pick. Excited after he made his choice, he took out his assault rifle and watched as an underbarrel grenade launcher formed out of floating gray dust. Checking his new options, Nick couldn’t decide and left it up to chance. Spinning around with his eyes closed he pointed randomly at the screen. With his decision made, Nick grinned as he saw a scope form on his rifle. Looking out with it he could see the white forms of his friends, or rather ‘comrades’ inside one of the huts. This thermal vision scope was gonna be dope! Trying to spot the others he saw Tony collecting those glowing orb things. If he recalled correctly they were loot orbs and they’d hold their reward for the monsters. Heading out the front gate, Nick started helping out. He’d assign status points later, for now it was reward time!

** Akari **

Interesting. Akari regarded her options with a cold look, sitting on her bed facing the door. So far her fighting style did not seem to blend well with the format of fighting that needed to be done. Her bladed gauntlets were not meant for such long-range attacks that seemed to be required. She needed to compensate for them in some way, but how? She could choose dash which would let her close ranks with her enemies quickly, the option that was now available from her previous selection of fury of blows.

One of the other abilities was called adrenaline rush and it would passively increase her perception of time when in close combat seemed to be fairly useless in this regard. The only other option she had was shurikens. It would give her the ability to generate shurikens, or throwing star, that she could use. The only problem was that she already had a pistol and the throwing stars were expensive to create from the energy she had. They supposedly would be able to return to her after throwing them but regardless, it wasn’t a skill she would choose lightly.

Closing her eyes for a moment she opened them with new resolve. Her fathers fighting techniques were all that she knew. There was no point in trying to improve on a different path. Practicing one technique a thousand times would hone a blade, whereas practicing a thousand techniques one time would ruin a blade. This was the saying she had grown up to as her father trained her in the way of the sword. Selecting the dash skill she found she could not see farther down the path. Unperturbed she selected the adrenaline rush skill before increasing her speed and strength by four each.

Standing she performed a simple kata, fluidly moving from one sword stroke to the next. With a 13 in each status, she felt as though she was born anew. Perhaps an amateur wouldn’t know the difference but as an experienced martial artist she knew her body inside and out. It was minor perhaps, but she was moving faster and the power behind her blows had increased. Having more speed and strength was definitely a good thing, but she needed time to adjust to these increases. Sighing, she took up a ready stance as she started practicing.

** Nikito **

Nikito already knew exactly what he needed. Going into the middle hut he sat at the table and opened up his skills list. His choices were simple. He could choose shield wall, adrenaline rush, and then he had unlocked sunder after getting dash. The shield wall would let him project a wall of energy from his shield that would block projectiles and allow him to get closer. At the same time it could expand and protect his teammates behind him though it would take a significant 50 energy to create. Still, he selected the upgrade in order to better protect his comrades.

The second tier ability of that one was synchronized shield. If there were multiple people with the shieldwall skill he could link their shields together if he had the synchronized shield skill. It would multiply the effects of the shield making it incredibly hard to get through. Obviously he was the only one with a shield wall ability so that made no sense to get. Instead he chose to get the sunder ability which would let him make a powerful swing that had a chance of killing an enemy instantly and doubled his normal attack damage if it didn’t kill them.

Satisfied with his picks, Nikito started to distribute his points when Matilda burst into the room laughing. Upon seeing him she started making indecipherable babbling sounds as her hands were practically a blur. Confused and slightly concerned, he read the text in her sign language but all she seemed to sign was ‘I can speak, I can speak! I can finally speak!’ over and over again before she hugged him.

Realization struck Nikito as he grasped what she meant. Of course, a deaf person wouldn’t be able to speak or understand the audible language. Granted she may have also been mute beforehand but now she was finally able to hear others speak and understand herself. Laughing with her he gave her a massive bear hug. “Congratulations!”

Matilda slapped his shoulder causing Nikito to let her go. Wiping away a tear from her eye she signed ‘would you be able to teach me how to speak?’

His mouth dropped open slightly as he stared at the text. “Dear mother Russia, what am I supposed to do now!”