《Age of Change》Chapter 2: Don't look
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While April was staring at me my mind went blank. I wanted to say something anything, but all my mouth did was move up and down without any sound coming out. The girl that I liked just seen me in my darkest light. What else could I do in this situation.
The torturing silence lasted for a good five seconds before I gained control of my thoughts. I kept thinking "what should I say so that I don't look like a psychopath in front of her."
"I-I-I... di-didn't me-mean to go that far I ju-just lost c-control for a second there."
I could barely get out a coherent sentence out of my mouth. This showed that I was terrible when put in a difficult situation.
While I was trying to find something else to say to clear my name I heard a ding sound ring in my head. I choose to ignore what I perceived to be a notification of sort.
"Wow I'm shocked I didn't think you had anything like that in you, it was like you were possessed or something. Is the anger out of your system or are you looking for more?"
"Y-you aren't scared of what I did?"
"I can't say that I am, since I would probably do the same thing as you in that situation. Though, I don't think I would go as far as brutalizing the goblins face and why are you mumbling so much? You know we are friends so speak up."
"This was probably just a one time thing I won't let my anger get the best of me. So, what part of my madness did you see?"
"I just saw the ending where you got that lucky kick. You should be more careful next time."
I thought to myself that April must have some screws loose to still be able to talk to me after what she saw and I couldn't be any happier. I of course would never tell her that.
April than started to walk up to me like she had all the confidence in the world. I don't think I would be able to do the same in her situation. When she got close enough to me she asked, "what happened to your arm?"
I was confused about her question until I saw her eyes looking at my arm. I looked down to see that I was holding it. With all the adrenaline out of my system my body knew that I was hurt before me even noticing. I knew I was slightly hit but it didn't seem bad at the time.
"It's not a big deal it's just a small scratch" I replied so that I didn't look like a weakling. I couldn't have her thinking that I couldn't protect myself. No self-respecting man would ever want to see the girl they like see them in a vulnerable state. Then again these might be the thoughts of an insecure macho man.
"Let me see it?" she asked while already reaching for my arm. It happened so fast that I was caught unprepared. When she touched my arm, it felt like a bolt of electricity was coursing through my body. That one touch made me wince and the action didn't escape Aprils gaze.
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She smiled at me and told me to follow her. I started to follow her then I remembered why I didn't escape the goblin when I had a chance. I told her to wait for a moment so that I could get my consolation prize. I bent down to pick up the wooden club and you wouldn't believe how heavy it was. The goblin was clearly smaller than me but was swinging the club with one hand like it was nothing.
I only had one good arm, but I definitely wasn't going to leave the club behind. So, I put all the power I can muster into my right arm and pulled on the club. The club did me a great favor by letting me pull it, but it was still extremely heavy.
April saw me struggling so she came and helped me out. Usually it would take twenty seconds to get to Aprils place but with the added weight of the club it took us a good minute to get near the vicinity of her door. When we got near her place I saw five goblin corpses on the floor.
I turned to April and gave her a questioning look. "You weren't the only one who ran into those goblins" she answered. I was so shocked, it took all I had to take down one of those things and she took out five of them with time to spare. Dang she is one scary chick, she'd probably be the one protecting me.
I also saw something else that was quite funny. All five of the goblins had wooden clubs and here I was dragging this heavy ass club.
"You know you could have told me that there were some clubs by your place."
"You just looked so handsome when you were trying so hard to pick one up that I just couldn't help it" said April with a teasing smile on her face.
I tried to open my mouth to give her a reply, but nothing came out and I started to blush. When April saw my face she couldn't help but laugh. As harmless as her laugh was it made me blush more than I ever wanted so I turned my face around and let the club fall to the ground. I forgot that she was holding it with me but luckily, she had surprisingly fast reflexes.
The club fell to the ground with a bang and all we did was stare at it. The moment was so awkward that there was nothing to do but laugh. It's funny how moments like these could make one forget that they were just in a life or death situation and were still far from being safe.
After laughing I told her to help me bring all the clubs into her place just in case someone takes them from us. April agreed so for the next five minutes we dragged all six clubs into her house. I didn't know how out of shape I was until we were done, I was sweating bullets while April was just fine. "Man, this girl was out of my league" I thought. When everything was done I laid on her couch while she went to get me an icepack.
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While April was applying the icepack on my arm she asked me "what do you think is going to happen to us from now on?" I honestly didn't know what our future held so I could only tell her "It doesn't really matter as long as we can find a way to survive, we'd be okay."
I told her "usually in a 'what would happen to earth if humans went extinct' video electricity would usually run out. I don't know if it would happen a day from now, a week from now, or a month from now but it would be best for us to be prepared."
"I know but I think we should rest for a moment." She answered while walking to the back window of her apartment.
She looked outside and told me that we would probably have to wait for an hour or two before we could go get some provisions. I walked up to the window to see outside and what I saw was pure chaos. People were fighting for their lives, while the monsters were having a field day.
There was a voice in my head telling me that I should go out in help as much people as I can, but I wasn't stupid enough to follow such an idea. In a world where I couldn't protect myself how would I be able to help others. I didn't have a hero's complex and I found hero's to be overrated in everything they did. I tried to entertain the thought of going to help but I didn't know if by trying to help I could cause my own death. From these thoughts I believed that it wasn't worth it.
I turned to look at April and saw that she had the saddest look on her face. It was a facial expression that I had never seen her with. I could see it in her eyes that she wanted to help but knew that she didn't have the power to do so. Life couldn't help but feel bleak at this moment.
I couldn't take the atmosphere anymore and went to sit on the couch. That was then I remembered I heard a notification sound in my head. I thought of all that was happening around us seemed like something that came straight out of a video game. I remembered that when I saw the goblin I saw a screen that informed me about its health and level. Maybe, there was a way for me to see my stats.
I didn't want to disturb April, so I yelled status in my head. Surprisingly that actioned worked and a screen popped up.
Status window
Name: Jason King
Race: Human
Age: 20
Gender: Male
Lvl: 1
Titles: Madness
Health: 83(100)
Magic: 100(100)
Stamina: 72(110)
Strength: 13(10)
Endurance: 11(10)
Constitution: 10(10)
Mana: 10(10)
Dexterity: 11(10)
Luck: 5(5)
Skill(s): Identification
Stat points: 5
By looking at the status window I was able to see that my stats were on the normal side, I shouldn't be surprised much since I haven't been exercising much. I clicked my different stats to see if they were different from those of the games I played.
Strength
The amount of power your fleshy body exerts. Could be improved with stat points, special items or certain repetitive actions.
Endurance
How long you will be able to last doing extraneous activity. Could be improved with stat points, special items or certain repetitive actions.
Constitution
How resilient your body is to physical/magical damage and how fast your body heals itself. Could be improved with stat points, special items or certain repetitive actions.
Mana
How much magic your body is able to hold, how fast your body regenerates magic and your spell damage. Could be improved with stat points, special items or certain repetitive actions.
Dexterity
How fast your body is able to move, your reaction time and your nimbleness. Could be improved with stat points, special items or certain repetitive actions.
Luck
How often monsters will drop certain items after death. Could be improved through special items or materials. Cannot be improved with stat points.
Madness
The person with this title has psychopathic tendencies, they suppress their emotions deep down until they explode and do something out their character. The people who earn this title good for you, you are a psychopath. When your emotion come to a point where you cant control them your madness will activate. When a certain amount of blood gets on you there will be 15% increase in strength and reaction speed. There is a 99% chance of losing control of your body. (depends on the amount of blood in the enemy's body and your emotional level). Strength +1, dexterity +1 per level
From what I've seen the stats weren't too much different from RPG games and were sort of easy to understand. I looked closer at my stats and saw that I had one skill and one title. I was familiar with the identification skill which helped me understand an enemy's level and health points, which also helped me see a weapons statistic. Usually in games titles are hard to stumble by and yet I already gained one. I won't lie the title sounded very ominous, but I knew that losing control of my emotion gave me the title.
The madness title sounded OP but the ninety-nine percent chance of losing control didn't make me feel any better. I wasn't sure if when the madness title activated, and I lose control would I start going against my allies, would I lose all rationality while fighting the enemy or anything else that could possibly happen. There were to many possibilities of things going wrong and because of that I would try not to let my emotions overwhelm me or let blood get anywhere close to me.
When I was done checking everything sleepiness crept up on me, so I let all my wariness go and fell asleep. I didn't worry about my life because I trusted April enough to not let anything happen to me.
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