Chapter 12: Decisions

Chapter 12: Decisions

“What in the thirteenth layer of Hell were you thinking?!” The gruff voice shouted as a large man walked out of the main gates, my tired eyes only barely catching his armored outline in the dark night. Sensing that he was talking to me, I struggled to my feet, stumbling and shaking as my legs literally did not have the strength to hold me up.

The man walked up to where the woman and I were. She was much less tired, having only caught the end of the chase – and not having been lost in the woods for almost a week beforehand, presumably.

“I don’t know,” she breathed, hunched over and holding her knees for support. She pointed at me with her thumb. “I was just doing a plant-gathering job when that guy came running down the road with the Banestinger chasing him. No idea what he was doing in their territory. Wasn’t much time for Q&A.”

The man just scowled down at her, and then clanked over to me. He was tall and muscular, with a square face and a well-trimmed beard. He looked down at my gasping face as I continued to struggle to stand, and commanded in a too-loud voice, “Explain yourself!”

“I... I...” I gasped, “I... need to rest.”

And I collapsed to the ground, unconscious.

I awoke on a lumpy bed in a jail cell, and immediately panicked. Nofucking way was I going to get back to society and immediately be imprisoned. I sat up, struggling with the effort as my sore muscles screamed at me. The cell had strong stone walls that made me suspect I was underground, and iron bars on one side, through which I could see a narrow hallway that presumably connected my cell with a few others.

“Don’t worry, you ain’t stuck here.” A new voice drawled as I looked over through the jail cell’s bars to see a slovenly older man sitting in a chair by my cell. He reached over and swung the door right open. “Door’s unlocked, see? We jus’ needed to get you a place to sleep in, and this was all we had.”

“Oh.” I relaxed. “So, I can go whenever I want?”

“...Well, ya can’t leave before you talk to the captain – he’s got some questions for ya – but it’s not like we’re keepin’ you here forever.”

“Okay, I guess.” I lied back down. I definitely still couldn’t stand – or, at least, I really didn’t want to – so I’d take a few more minutes before I went. Until then...

Name:

Arlan Nota

Age:

20

Strength:

10

Class:

Minute Mage

Level:

3

Endurance:

14

Class Type:

Magic

XP:

18/200

Dexterity:

10

Health:

130/140

Health/Minute:

0.054

Conjuration:

17

Stamina:

15/72

Stamina/Minute:

0.456

Intelligence:

3

Mana:

172/185

Mana/Minute:

3.51

Stat Points:N0v3lTr0ve served as the original host for this chapter's release on N0v3l--B1n.

3

Spells:

Talents:

Titles:

[Spell Choice Available]

Time Loop 3

Trailblazer

Noxious Grasp 5 - XP 9/45

I smiled as I looked at my Status. I had a Spell Choice! If I got one at Level 0, and then another at Level 3. So, assuming it was a linear progression, I’d get another at 6, another at 9, etc. It was finally nice to have some knowledge of what I’d be getting and when!

I mentally sighed, thinking about the wealth of information that all of the other Classes had on them. Not only could you find when any other Class would get their Spells, you could also find what Spells they would get. Pretty much every Class’s first few Spell choices were very well-documented.

Now, the later Levels were much harder to document, so as you got stronger, most people would find they’d have to forge their own path. That wasn’t only because there were fewer people at higher Levels to document the choices, though. The way Spell Choices worked was that every Spell Choice was dependent on the Spells you’d chosen previously. So, since I chose Noxious Grasp during my first choice, I’d get a certain set of three Spells to choose from now. However, if I’d chosen, say, Firebolt, I would be offered a completely different set of three Spells at this Level.

And every layer of Spell Choices was like this, depending on every Spell Choice in the past. So, for example, Wizards got a Spell Choice every Level. To document every single Spell offered to Wizards up to Level 5, it would take three to the power of five people choosing all of the different ‘branches’ they could walk down on the ‘Spell tree’ of different choices, which was 243 people. However, to document all of the Spells offered to Wizards up to Level 10, which was twice as far along, it wouldn’t be twice that number of people. Instead, since it was an exponential growth equation, it would be three to the power of ten people, or 59,049.

So, of course, Wizards had not yet been reliably documented up to that point. Now, there were certain paths up the Spell tree that were documented even past Level 20, but those were single branches written about by individual people, not the entire tree of choices. Also, Wizards were the most extreme example; since they got Spells more often than any other Class, their Spell tree was much more dense with choices, and grew much faster. Sorcerers only got Spells every ten Levels, so their Spell Choices were incredibly well-documented.

Class:

Minute Mage

Level:

3

Endurance:

14

Class Type:

Magic

XP:

18/200

Dexterity:

10

Health:

130/140

Health/Minute:

0.054

Conjuration:

20

Stamina:

18/72

Stamina/Minute:

0.456

Intelligence:

3

Mana:

186/215

Mana/Minute:

4.05

Spells:

Talents:

Titles:

Crippling Chill - XP 0/10

Time Loop 3

Trailblazer

Noxious Grasp 5 - XP 9/45

At 4.05 Mana/Minute, I was officially making more Mana per minute than Noxious Grasp cost to cast per second, which felt nice. That meant I could cast a second of it every sixty seconds when practicing! I was also excited to start Ranking up Crippling Chill – I’d almost forgotten that I was doing something weird by pushing Noxious Grasp so far past the Soft Cap. At Level 3, my cap was at Rank 2, so I'd be able to get two full Ranks in Crippling Chill without having to worry about it! In fact...

I pushed Mana into Crippling Chill, deliberately choosing to target it at nothing in particular. It felt incredibly strange to cast a different Spell after focusing on Noxious Grasp for so long, and I could tell I’d need quite a bit of practice with this one, too, before I got to the level of proficiency with it that I had with Noxious Grasp. After a few seconds of mentally feeling around and getting a sense for it, I finished casting the Spell.

Threshold reached. Crippling Chill XP has reached 10.

Crippling Chill Rank has increased to 1.

Due to Crippling Chill Rank reaching 1, it has undergone the following changes:

Mana Cost: From 45 to 46.1

Health Drain: From 5 to 5.25

Stamina Drain: From 4 to 4.20

Dexterity Debuff: From 10 to 10.5

Threshold reached. Crippling Chill XP has reached 11.

Crippling Chill Rank has increased to 2.

Due to Crippling Chill Rank reaching 2, it has undergone the following changes:

Mana Cost: From 46.1 to 47.3

Health Drain: From 5.25 to 5.51

Stamina Drain: From 4.20 to 4.41

Dexterity Debuff: From 10.5 to 11

Due to Crippling Chill Rank increasing to Rank 2, Crippling Chill has reached a Soft Cap.

Spell XP gain for Crippling Chill is 50 times slower until your Level increases past the Soft Cap.

Increase your Level to 4 to increase your Soft Cap.

“Haha!” I laughed aloud. In a single cast, the Spell already Ranked up twice! It cost 45 Mana to cast, and before hitting the Soft Cap, I’d get 1 XP per 2 Mana spent. Since the first two Ranks needed a combined 21 XP to reach, that meant I’d need to spend 42 Mana, which was less than the 45 Mana required for a single cast of the Spell.

Completely ridiculous... I shook my head and smiled.

“What’re you laughing about?” The older man frowned and looked at me.

“Nothing, nothing,” I sighed. “It’s just... I remembered how easy it’s supposed to be.”

He gave me a weird look for a moment, but eventually just shrugged and looked away.

I looked up at the ceiling. I’d rest a bit more before going to try and clear things up with this ‘captain’ guy. Hopefully it’d all turn out well.