Level up!

Skill gained!

Lumbering Tower-Shield

Like the Unique Creation, this shield is slow, pretty simple, and unreasonably strong.

Rarity: rare

Effect: materialize a slow-forming but incredibly durable tower shield before the user.

Range: 3 feet

Duration: 30 minutes

Energy cost: medium

Cooldown: 5 minutes. Dismissing shield lowers cooldown.

Trait unlocked! By being one of the first 100 people to overclock a Skill, you have gained a rare Trait!

OverClock

This clock is going over so hard

Effect: overclocking your Skills is 20% more effective

Cost: -4 TP- gained through special action, automatically added to character sheet

The soothing wave of a level up shoved the darkness from Steven’s vision, and he gasped.

His head was still fuzzy, but he no longer felt like a wrung-out rag.

He sat up and almost smacked into Margie. She was leaning over him, worry written plain on her face.

“Easy, Steven! You did- I don’t know what the hell you did, but you have blood on your chin!”

Steven blinked and rubbed at his chin. His hand came away wet.

He spat, trying to get the iron taste out.

“Shit, I-I’m fine, but I felt like my head was going to explode for a second there.”

Steven gasped as he remembered Buford. He turned to the dog only to find him…well, the dog wasn’t fine, but he wasn’t dying either. His leg wasn’t as severely bent as before.

Right, regeneration.

Though the haze of crimson energy was gone from the dog.

“You’re on cooldown?”

Margie nodded. “Three and a half minutes left.”

Steven looked at the monster's corpse and shuddered. That had been far too close.

“What about that guy? Is he-“ Steven cut off as the man in question walked into view. He was a short, lean guy, probably a year or two younger than Steven.

He had the kind of leanly muscled frame that said he could really move.

He ran a hand through messy red hair and sighed, his other arm cradled against his side.

He had a pale, boyish face with a decent spattering of freckles and a nose that had been broken at least once.

“Thanks,” he said, his voice surprisingly deep. “That thing was going to tear me apart.” He cut off with a scowl. “Fuck you too, System!” He spat.

Steven blinked. “What did it say?”

The man frowned. “It told me I just unlocked a Skill for following my Class Purpose.” Whatever the Class Purpose was, he wasn’t happy about it.

“Did you have a Class before, or?”

He shook his head. “No, this asshole System gave me one as soon as you two killed that thing.” His bright blue eyes flicked to Buford, and he frowned.

“Is he going to be okay?” He walked over to Buford and crouched down, holding a hand out for the dog to sniff.

Steven’s opinion of the man immediately went up.

“He’ll be fine,” Margie said. “Just gotta wait a few more minutes for my Skill to come off cooldown.”

The man nodded and gave Buford a few gentle pats.

His earlier words caught up with Steven, and he frowned. “Wait, you said you unlocked a Skill? That can happen?”

The man shrugged. “I guess? I haven’t had this Class for five minutes yet. It gave me a passive Skill, then said to figure it out.”

Steven blinked. So passive Skills are a thing.

And apparently, not everyone got three starter Skills to choose from.

“What’s your Class, if you don’t mind sharing?”

The man shrugged. “It’s a little embarrassing, but I don’t mind. I’d be dead if you three didn’t save my ass.”

He pointed at them and said, “Share.”

Steven paused, was that going to work?

A prompt appeared a moment later, though it was smaller than usual, only covering the corner of his vision.

View Character sheet of Micheal Vane?

“Yes.”

As the character sheet filled his view, Margie went over to Buford, her hand glowing red.

Micheal Vane: Level 1

Skill slots: 1

Class: Damsel In Distress

Rarity: rare

Purpose: to be rescued

Scope: singular

Skills: 2

Augments: 0

Skill points: 1

Trait points: 1

“Damsel In Distress?” Steven couldn’t keep the incredulity from his voice.

Micheal grimaced. “Yeah, it’s a load of crap. It told me that ‘for screaming for over three minutes before getting saved through no input of your own, you have gained a Class.”

Steven winced. “That’s pretty rough. Oh, I’m Steven, by the way. And that’s Margie and Buford.”

Margie gave a wave without taking her gaze from Buford, whose leg was almost back to normal.

Steven smiled at that. The healing was too slow to be much use in a fight, but it was invaluable all the same.

He’d thought his heart was going to stop when he’d first seen the injury, but a handful of minutes later and Buford was almost as good as new.

Despite the horrors they had seen tonight, these powers filled Steven with a quiet sense of wonder.

“Well, I’m Micheal, though you already knew that. It’s nice that we can share our character sheets. You can do it in games, so I figured, why not try it with this stuff.”

Steven eyed the man. “You said you just unlocked a new Skill. Mind saying what it is? I’m curious about what your Class actually does.”

Micheal nodded. “Send.”

Dastardly Dragon’s Don’t Kill Damsels

Class Passive. As a Class passive this Skill does not take up a slot.

Effect: if anything is deciding between killing you and capturing you, they will be swayed towards capture.

~<>~

Oh, Thank You, Hero

Rarity: rare

Effect: thanking someone who’s rescued you gives them a buff for the next hour. This buff will increase all of their heroic traits, making them faster, stronger, and more able to take a beating as they rescue the Damsel.

Range: earshot

Duration: 1 hour

Energy cost: none

Cooldown: none

~<>~

“That’s…”

“Pretty useless, right?” Micheal said.

Steven shook his head. “No, not useless, exactly. Just freaking weird. You’re a support Class, going off that second Skill. You have a passive that makes you more likely to get captured than one for buffing people that save you. Not useless at all, just…weird.”

Micheal frowned but nodded. “I appreciate the-pick-me up. But I’m not too keen on a Class that requires me to get captured.”

Steven could only nod at that. “Yeah, that kind of sucks. But we don’t know what counts as rescuing you yet. It could mean that we need to kill one Shambler targeting you to meet the Skill conditions.”

Micheal shrugged. “Let’s hope.”

“I think Buford’s all healed,” Margie said. The dog had risen and was licking her face. Micheal walked over, and Buford promptly licked him too.

The redhead ruffled Buford’s ears with a grin. Crimson energy danced over his hands as it swirled around the hound.

He glanced at Margie. “I’m guessing you can buff animals?”

She nodded. “Yep. I can boost hounds.”

“And I can summon a shield,” Steven added. They had seen the man's character sheet. It seemed only fair they shared what they could do.

Steven glanced towards the house and hesitated. “…Was anyone else inside or…”

Micheal shook his head. “No, just me. My parents went on a trip last week. I’m glad they did. At least they're safe.”

An emotion lanced through Steven, but he shoved it down before even processing what it was.

No time.

“Let’s head inside for a bit if you don’t mind. I’m getting cold, and there’s something me and Margie need to do. Something we should have done already.”

Margie raised a grey brow but didn’t protest getting out of the cold.

Micheal started for the front door, then just sighed and walked through the giant hole in the wall.

They followed close behind.

The house had been nice. Had been. Almost everywhere they looked, there were signs of the chase Micheal had led the giant on. A table lay in several pieces there, a busted wall here, a hole in the staircase. It was utter chaos.

Micheal just sighed louder and walked to the couches, which had been left mostly intact.

They all grabbed a seat, Buford included, the massive dog claiming a Lazy Boy for himself. He wasn’t allowed on the seats at Margie’s, so he looked rather smug about his new throne.

They all just sat in silence for a while, the adrenaline pumping through them gone, leaving weariness in its place.

Steven was the one to break the silence. “We almost died, and part of that was because I’m dumb.”

Margie cocked her head. “Have I insulted you too much, and it’s gone to your head? Those were just jokes. I wanna make that clear.”

He snorted. “No, Margie, you're fine.” Steven rubbed at his eyes. He’d only been awake for an hour at best, and he was already exhausted.

“I was all fired up and didn’t take the time to prepare properly. We should have waited for Jugger-Hound to come off cooldown before rushing out for one. The buff ended while Buford was still hurt. We’re lucky he wasn’t bleeding out or something.” Margie glanced to Buford, a hard look in her eye. “You're right on that one, but that’s my fault as much as yours. I can do math just fine myself.”

Steven nodded. “But you didn’t know about Traits and Skill points. You might have a Trait that would have made that fight much easier, but I forgot to tell you about the damn things.”

Margie blinked. “Is that what TP is? Trait points? Well, fair enough. But I won’t have you taking all the guilt, Steven. Lesson learned for the both of us, prepare more next time. We’re lucky that we got to learn it without anyone dying.”

Steven wanted to argue, but he shut his mouth. Margie was right. They needed to take the lesson and move on.

“Okay. I will figure out what Skill points do before I get distracted again like every other time.”

They all stared ahead as they pulled up their sheets, Margie and Micheal presumably looking at their Traits.

Steven, on the other hand, went to his Skill tab.

SKILLS

Hand-Shield

Lumbering Tower-Shield

He tried to unslot Hand-Shield, but nothing happened. He focused harder, willing the Skill to unequip in the same way he had slotted it.

Still nothing.

Okay, so either you can’t unslot Skills, or he was doing it wrong.

Micheal shared his character sheet just by taking a guess that it would work because it worked in games. A lot of games have help tabs. Maybe…

“System,” he thought. “Can I unslot Skills?

Despite asking, he was still surprised when the System actually answered.

“Oh wow, it took you SOOOO long to ask something. Well, I say that but do you know how many people just never try it at all? It’s baffling.”

The System sighed.

“They don’t even think to ask a question. Then they go on to complain about something not being explained. How are you supposed to get answers without asking questions?”

“…So, can you unslot Skills.”

“Hmm? Oh, right, your question. Yeah, you can. But you need a respec station to do it.”

“How do I find a respec station?”

“I don’t know. Look at a map or something? I don’t have all the answers. Well, I have most of them actually, but I’m not sharing.”

“What the hell! You just complained- what, you can tell me about respec stations but not where they are?”

“Exactly. General information about how all of this works is free to any who ask. Giving you the location of a powerful tool, however, is not.”

Steven wanted to smack the System but reined the feeling in. General info about how things worked? That could prove invaluable.

He quickly told the others that they could ask the System.

“Not going to hold that info for yourself, huh? So you're not going the warlord route. Or maybe you are, and these are your first lackies?”

“The hell are you talking about? And, of course, I’m not trying to become a warlord. Why would I hold onto this knowledge? It could save their lives.”

He paused.

“Plus, I’m against hoarding information in general. I think humanity is better off with free shared information.”

The System was quiet for a beat, and some of the mocking edge left its voice. “I don’t know why I overlooked that you were an idealist. You charged that Boss with spite and principal pushing you. Maybe it’s the spite that’s distracting me. Idealists aren’t typically tired or spiteful. That’s usually the former idealists. They have spite in spades.”

The System paused again, and the humor returned to its voice. “…Well, anyway, I’ve got to bounce. System out!

“Wait, what do Skill points do!?”

The System answered, but Steven could tell it was pre-recorded.

Skill points or SP are used to upgrade Skills. Doing so increases the Skills' effects in various ways. Maxing a Skill gives an additional benefit.

Steven nodded. He’d assumed as much, but it was nice to get the confirmation.

“What does a Class’s Purpose mean?”

|~~|—|~~||~~|—|~~|…. “Figure it out.”

Okay, so general information didn’t cover as much as he’d thought it would.

What was up with the symbols, though? Buffering?

He shook his head and focused on his Skills. Since he couldn’t swap out a Skill right now, Steven decided to spend some of his hard-earned Skill points on upgrading Hand-Shield.

He hesitated for a second as ‘what if I find better Skills later?’ filled his head. He almost certainly would, but he had to live through the next hour before anything else.

He brought up the Skill, and a prompt came with it.

Upgrade Hand-Shield?

With a mental “yes,” he put a point into the Skill.

Hand-Shield lvl 2: +10% shield strength, +2 feet range. Confirm?

Steven wanted to smack himself. If he’d spent his points earlier like he should have, the giant might not have broken his shields in the first place.

“Confirm.”

Hand-Shield(2/5)

He put another point in.

Hand-Shield lvl 3: +1 Shield Count

Oh, that was big. That was really big.

“Confirm.”

He started to add another point but hesitated. Should he use all of them? So far, he’d only gained one per level, which meant these things were precious.

…no, hoarding them didn’t make sense right now. When he had more options to protect everyone, he could bank up points, but right now, the difference between one Skill level could be life or death.

He added another.

Hand-Shield lvl 4: +15% strength +4 feet range

“Confirm.”

Last one.

Hand-Shield lvl 5: Trait gained

Absorbent

Effect: All buffing effects on Hand-Shield will be 25% more effective. If the buff would increase shield count, increase it by an additional +1

Steven read over the Skill several more times. That was an incredibly potent Trait. A flat percentage increase could be staggering, depending on the buff.

Just as he was about to close his sheet, he remembered his new Trait.

OverClock

This clock is going over so hard

Effect: overclocking your Skills is 20% more effective

Cost: -4 TP- gained through special action, automatically added to character sheet

So he was better at overclocking….what the hell was overclocking?

There was a pop, and the Systems voice barged into his mind.

“Oh, right, my bad.” It cleared its throat.

“Here you go.”

Overclocking. Overclocking a Skill lets you push it past its limits as you demand more than it wants to give.

You boost it with a mixture of energy and Will. Your Will is your willpower, as well as a mixture of body, mind, and soul all rolled into one.

You get more of it as you level, but no amount of levels can account for raw grit. Of course, virtually no one gets to a high level without truckloads of grit, so it’s kind of a moot point.

You only have so much Will and energy to go around, so be careful overclocking. It might take more than you can safely give.

What else? Ahhh…not every Skill can be overclocked, things that affect overclocking are rare, and doing it is typically a Second Threshold thing. Alright, that’s everything you need to know. Probably. Stop bothering me.

Okay…at least he knew what it did.

Wait, what the hell was the Second Threshold?