Chapter 2: Taking Inventory

Chapter 2: Taking Inventory

Congratulations. You are now a Minute Mage.

Several things happened at once. The sword in my hands immediately dropped out, as if it were too heavy to hold. I remembered something about how Magic-Type Classes couldn’t use melee weapons, but I was too shocked to really process the information. I could also feel... something... changing within me. In my mind, it was like a door was opened – a door I had never even known was there until just now. Right at the culmination of this opening...

Due to achieving Level 0 in the Minute Mage Class, you have been granted the following benefits:

-You have unlocked the Conjuration Stat.

-You have gained 1 Endurance.

-You have gained 2 Conjuration.

-You have gained 3 Stat Points.

-You have gained the Time Loop Talent.

-You may choose a Spell to learn.

I blinked, trying to understand the information I’d just learned. I’d unlocked the Conjuration Stat. Right. You needed it to properly cast Spells. All Magic-Type Classes got it. I’d get to learn a Spell. That made sense. But... Time Loop? I’d never heard of that. In fact, I’d never even heard of this ‘Minute Mage’ Class to begin with. Was there anyone else out there with it?

But just then, I felt another rising in my head. Another door being opened. It felt different, not like getting a Class. It was like–

Feat of excellence performed. You are the only person in the world with your Class.

You have gained the Trailblazer Title.

Only person in the world with my Class? What? How does that even happen?

I took a deep breath and looked at my surroundings. I was in the middle of a frontier forest. An exceptionally dangerous place that nobody should ever travel through unguarded. And my two escorts had just died.

I was alone.

I was also lost. I had no idea how far away society was, much less what direction it was in. Dorrn and Feiya had taken so many turns and detours when hunting that I not only wasn't sure where I was, but I also wasn't sure where my village was. I could easily look up to the sun and find my directions from there, but what direction was the village in? We'd left out the south entrance, sure, but I was also pretty sure we'd turned and gone east for a while, too, but then we turned again, and... Shit. Why couldn't they have just taken me in a straight line?! Why couldn't Dorrn and Feiya have–

Oh, gods. Dorrn and Feiya. I looked over at their corpses and swallowed, trying to keep myself from vomiting. The disgust at the sight, the shame of not being strong enough to save them, the stress of having my life resting entirely on my own shoulders now. Too much. It was too much.

Shaking my head and taking a breath, I tried to calm myself down. I was in a survival situation. As an aspiring adventurer, I knew how to survive in the wilderness. It happened every so often that a group of adventurers would be decimated during a job, and the lone survivor would have to make their way back home without a team or supplies, so basic information on what to do in circumstances like mine was common. Of course, that was assuming the lone adventurer was generally strong enough to survive the monster attacks in their location.

I forced that thought out of my head. Needed to focus on what I could do, not what I couldn’t.

Step one: take inventory.

What did I have at my disposal? Well, in my possession was nothing but the clothes on my back and a half-empty waterskin. In other peoples’ possessions, though...

Kneeling on the ground by the bodies of Dorrn and Feiya, I muttered to myself, "I need it more than they do. I need it more than they do. I need it more than they do," in a mantra as I rummaged through their bodies, fingering through torn and bloody pockets, removing backpacks from flayed skin, and many other disgusting things.

In the end, I didn’t have much to show for it. The Demon's claws were apparently razor-sharp, and had destroyed much of what the two of them had in the first place. Their backpacks were shredded and unusable, Feiya's waterskin had burst, and even the pouch of coins I'd paid Dorrn had been destroyed, most of the silver pieces either slashed up or lost in the mess of a battlefield. No getting those back, it seemed. There were maybe a single meal’s worth of rations between them – the trip wasn’t supposed to last more than a morning – and enough water in Dorrn's waterskin to fill mine up. Other than that, there wasn’t much of use.

Well, there were certainly lots of things that would have been of use to me had I not been stuck with a Magic-Type Class, such as the gigantic battleaxe I was no longer allowed to wield, but...The original appearance of this chapter can be found at Ñøv€lß1n.

Wait.My Class. That was definitely another tool at my disposal. It said I got some Stat Points and a Spell choice, right? And there was that weird Talent and Title...

I hurriedly opened up my Status.

Name:

Arlan Nota

Age:

20

Strength:

10

Class:

Minute Mage

Level:

0

Endurance:

11

Class Type:

Magic

XP:

0/50

Dexterity:

10

Health:

100/110

Health/Minute:

0.045

School: Alteration, Divine

Type: Activated

Cost: 15 Mana

—

Choose yourself or another being you are physically touching. For the next 10 seconds, the chosen target gains 5 additional Strength.

Firebolt

School: Fire

Type: Activated

Cost: 30 Mana

—

Shoots a small ball of fire that travels up to 30 paces, exploding when it collides with something. Deals up to 75 damage, depending on where it hits, on a direct collision with a being.

Noxious Grasp

School: Poison

Type: Toggle

Cost: 3 Mana/Second

—

While active, any being you are physically touching loses 10 Health and 5 Stamina per second.

...Hm. Upon looking at the three Spells, I suddenly realized how difficult it was to make a choice that could be the difference between life and death. I had to think short-term for this; if I chose something that didn’t do as much as I needed it to right now, I’d die. I could only have a maximum of 20 Mana, which made me immediately think that Firebolt wasn't an option. But then I remembered that I still had 3 Stat Points that I could distribute freely among any of my Stats. Each point of Conjuration increased maximum Mana by 10 – I knew that much from common knowledge – so I had potentially 50 Mana at my disposal.

Since I couldn’t immediately eliminate Firebolt, I instead looked toward Holy Strength. Without the ability to hold any sort of melee weapon, adding to my Strength was of dubious use, to say the least. I could still punch, but I felt like that wouldn’t be utilizing a Magic Class to its fullest. I wasn’t a Melee Class anymore, and I never would be. I had to keep that in mind. Even if I used 45 Mana to stack three casts of Holy Strength on myself, I would still only have 25 Strength, which still wasn’t enough to beat a high-Level monster, especially when I was without a weapon, and even more especially when that boost in Strength only lasted 10 seconds.

So, the choice was down to Firebolt versus Noxious Grasp. The latter was risky; Noxious Grasp only dealt damage to things I was touching. Not being able to deal damage at a range would make it difficult for me as a Magic Classer. But then again, most magic users had someone on the front lines to keep the monsters away from them. I didn’t have that luxury, so I would probably need some way to deal with a monster that got up-close.

I liked Firebolt. It was a Spell that Wizards and Sorcerers also got access to, and it was very popular among them for a reason. Solid damage at a decently-far range was a useful tool in any mage’s belt. That said, when looking at how it would immediately help me...

At most, I could have 50 Mana saved up at any given time. With that, I could cast Firebolt once, which would deal up to 75 damage to an enemy, depending on my accuracy. With Noxious Grasp, however, I could use 50 Mana to keep it active for 16 seconds, which – if all 16 of those seconds were spent with me in physical contact with an enemy – would deal 160 damage, plus drain away 80 Stamina. Now, holding onto a rampaging monster for 16 straight seconds without dying would be challenging, but I really didn’t like the concept of having absolutely no way of dealing with anything that had more Health than a Level 3 Deer. At least with Noxious Grasp, I’d have a chance of killing the monsters that roamed the forest. A single Firebolt wouldn’t do anything more than annoy them.

With that in mind, I selected my Spell.

You have learned the Spell Noxious Grasp.

After that, I needed to choose how to allocate my Stat Points. Judging by the whole line of thinking I’d had with myself about the Spells, I felt like that was pretty much already done for me. I needed to be able to deal damage above all else. The best way to deal damage was with more Mana, and the best way to get more Mana was more Conjuration.

You have used 3 Stat Points to increase Conjuration.

Your Conjuration value is now 5.

I opened my eyes, blinking and breathing deeply as I felt the changes course through my mind. Increasing a Stat didn’t only change the numbers on your Status; Strength, Endurance, and Dexterity – what were called the ‘physical Stats’ – changed your body, with Strength making you more physically powerful, Endurance hardening your body and increasing your constitution, and Dexterity limbering your joints and helping your reaction time. The other Stats were different. So far, I only raised Conjuration, but different Classes had different Stats, like the Crafting Classes’ Intelligence.

Conjuration helped one’s Mana control and their ability to quickly cast Spells, and I was feeling that effect now as my Conjuration more than doubled in an instant. I had never cast a Spell before, but I was suddenly pretty confident in my ability to.

I got to my feet and checked my Mana total. It was currently sitting at 6/50, so I didn’t have the Mana to spare to just cast things for the fun of it. Instead, I decided to go find something to test my newfound powers out on, and hopefully get some XP in the process. Though, really, I just needed information. If I got into a fight barely knowing how my abilities worked in practice, and suddenly had to rely on them to survive, I was sure to die. So I needed to at least get a baseline understanding of them.

It didn't take incredibly long to find a small animal in the surrounding woods – a furry, fox-like creature called a Wood Spirit. They were relatively harmless at the lower Levels, which this one seemed to be. By this point, my newly-improved Mana regeneration had helped my Mana creep up to 11/50, which I felt would probably be enough to kill the Wood Spirit. So, I snuck up behind it, careful not to alert it to my attention, and then leapt forward. I crashed into the beast in a wild tackle, quickly grabbing and restraining it while it snapped its jaws at me. But I kept away from its face, leaving it with no way to damage me.

I focused inward, finding the energy to cast Noxious Grasp. I took a moment to calm myself, trying my best to ignore the struggling animal in my arms, and slowly, methodically, drew out the magic from my mind. It was a completely instinctual process, letting myself be guided by the System, but after a few seconds, I found my body crackling with energy, awaiting my command to activate the Spell. I readied myself, and then did so.

I immediately felt my body tense as an energy – Mana, I realized – was drawn from my very being. It took a constant, concerted effort to keep pushing this Mana out while also focusing on maintaining the Spell effect. I looked down at the still-thrashing Wood Spirit and realized that I could literally watch the life drain from its body as the Spell damaged it. Its muscles atrophied, its skin sunk down and I could soon see a rib cage through its fur. A bit of smoke poured from my skin while the Spell was active, I realized. It was a small enough amount that it dissipated once it got a foot or two away from my body, but it was still strange to see it happen. The fumes seemed harmless enough, though.

After a couple seconds of mental effort, the Wood Spirit stopped moving.

You have struck Level 1 Wood Spirit for 31 damage and drained 16 Stamina over the course of 3.1 seconds using Noxious Grasp.

9.3 Mana Cost. Your Mana is 2.

You have slain Level 1 Wood Spirit.

You have earned 3 XP. Your XP is 3.

I shut off Noxious Grasp, which was thankfully much easier than turning it on, and mentally stared at my System notification. I had gotten XP! For the first time in my life, that number wasn’t 0. I steadied my breathing and looked up into the sky. It was darkening quickly – probably approaching midnight. If it was getting close to tomorrow, then I could use something else I had access to. I still had more things to test. I looked inward yet again, this time letting the System guide me toward a different power that it had given me. I took ahold of it, activated it, and–

And then I was back, creeping behind the Wood Spirit, having traveled exactly 1 minute back in time. I stared at the monster in front of me, walking around like it had never died. It worked! I did it!I could feel that my Mana was back at 11 instead of 2, but I certainly remembered casting Noxious Grasp. I’d really traveled through time. Before I got distracted, I leapt forward, grabbing the Wood Spirit and killing it once again.

You have struck Level 1 Wood Spirit for 31 damage and drained 16 Stamina over the course of 3.1 seconds using Noxious Grasp.

9.3 Mana Cost. Your Mana is 2.

You have slain Level 1 Wood Spirit.

You have earned 3 XP. Your XP is 6.

I checked my XP total. Yep, 6/50! I’d gotten double XP by killing the same monster twice. It really worked.

I stood up, brushing the dirt off my pants and relishing in the possibilities. Being able to go back in time like that was... powerful. At the very least, it would help me Level up way faster than any normal Class would, and if used to its fullest, it could turn an unwinnable battle into something trivial.

I’d have to be smart about it, though. The Talent said it could be activated once per day, and I could feel that cooldown ticking downward internally. It didn’t mean that once I activated it, it would be shut off for twenty-four hours. Rather, it meant that once I’d use it, I’d just have to wait until the next day to use it again. So that meant I only had – I checked the ability – 1 hour, 37 minutes, and 21 seconds until midnight, when I could use it again. I’d just hide out and work on making a shelter to sleep in while I waited for it to refresh.

Surviving out here would certainly be a challenge, but the Class was beginning to grow on me. I was starting to think that it might actually be possible to survive.