Li Mei stood in a vast white room, similar to the Training Room. An exact copy of herself stood with arms crossed, body wreathed in black mist.
The pressure she felt from the copy's mauve eyes made her back sweat. It was like being face-to-face with an enormous predator, yet... It was herself. "Am I really that scary?"
"You could be." The copy grinned, showing sharp white eyeteeth with a crooked yet charming smile. "If you understood what you were capable of."
"I'm just a kid right now."
"You're not, though." The copy wagged a finger. "Your soul is mature enough, and your new body... Is far from normal. Perhaps modified human would be closer to the truth? Mm, that's not right either. But it is, still... Agh, it's complicated and I can't explain it to you yet." The copy sighed, materializing two comfortable chairs with a wave of her hand. She took a seat herself, uncaring of the suspicious glance Li Mei threw her way.
"Aren't you going to attack me?"
"Relax, let's chat a bit before we fight. I'm not here to hurt you, I'm here to help. I'm a copy of you, a crafted reflection, but I'm also your Interface. Hm... Perhaps, call me Lina?" The copy, Lina, nodded as Li Mei reluctantly sank into the empty comfortable chair. "I'm the Interface. This body is a reflection of you, but my personality is different because I'm not you. And a bit of an explanation about certain aspects is long overdue."
"So you're the one who's been helping me?" Li Mei's expression softened, subconsciously easing the tension in her body.
Lina smiled. "Yes. My purpose is to help you survive and achieve whatever goals you set for yourself. I had to forcibly tap into your potential to save your life early on, and I apologize for the difficulties that caused."
Li Mei waved her hand dismissively. "It turned out for the better, and those generous Quest rewards helped me cover the gap pretty fast." She was clever, after all, and picked up on patterns. Without the special Quests from the Interface, earning the EXP spent forcibly upgrading herself when she first entered the forest would have taken a long, long time judging by how small the gains were from getting kills. Not to mention the forced upgrade saved her life in the first place!
As did the hostility detection notifications, awarded stat upgrades, convenient Quests or the usage of her storage in general. Without the Interface, she would have died several times over! A thought occurred, and Li Mei frowned. "Unless tapping into my potential will hurt me in the long run?"
"It won't. I siphoned excess power from... Well. I can't go into details, but suffice to say you saved your own life in a sense. You'll know the truth when it becomes relevant."
Li Mei's eyes narrowed into slits. "Is this some weird nonsense to do with the flow of time?" Lina remained silent, but the smile on her face widened as though to confirm Li Mei's suspicions without breaking whatever rules kept her from spilling all the beans. "Ugh, great. Future time loop shenanigans confirmed, I guess. Awesome."
Leaning forward, Lina clasped her hands on her lap. "So, Li Mei. Your stats are all at 10 now. Do you know what that means?"
"I'm a well-rounded and capable individual."
"Aside from that."
"Not really?" Li Mei shrugged. "I've never been able to see the stats of other creatures even with Scan at Lv.5 so I don't have any comparison for what that means."
Lina nodded. "You'll need to purchase an upgrade module for Scan from the Shop in order to see stats in the future. On Elysium, special tools or equipment are usually used to measure stats, and the ones displayed on your Interface are based on their metric. I can explain more, but first you need to experience the difference between us. Let us exchange blows."
She waited for Li Mei to stand and limber up before sliding the comfortable chairs aside with a wave of her hand. Once Li Mei sank into a fighting stance, Lina made her move.
In the time it took to blink, Lina crossed the distance between them and landed a calm slap on Li Mei's shoulder, sending the latter flying across the room to crash into a wall several meters away.
"What the hell!?" Li Mei wheezed, staggering to her feet. "I can't move like that!"
"You can. Now hit me."
Lina waited calmly for Li Mei to approach, swinging her clenched fists. A strong punch landed on Lina's jaw, but the copy's head barely even moved. Li Mei swallowed uncomfortably, feeling a sharp ache in her knuckles. "What..."
Stroking her jaw, Lina slid the chairs back into their previous position and sat herself back down. "I see what the problem is. Li Mei, your assessment of yourself and your ability is based on the limitations of humans in your previous life. But those humans were incapable of utilizing mana, so you're subconsciously shackling your own strength."
Li Mei looked at her hands, then looked at the dent she left in the wall. The walls were solid like metal, yet her body dented them... And she didn't even bruise, or feel more than a bit uncomfortable from being flung aside like a rag doll. "Am I really... As strong as you?"
"You are. You watched the Olympics sometimes? And sports? The feats they were capable of. I can assume their relevant stats, AGI for sprinters, DEX for gymnasts, STR for bodybuilders... At most, those athletes would have a score of 4 in the relevant stat to their profession, 5 if they were a world-record holder. A Nobel Prize-winner would have INT or WIS of 5.
"The average person in your old world would have maximum stats of 2, maybe 3 in any area. You yourself had INT 4 and WIS 5 due to your background and life circumstances, and that itself was very unusual."
Li Mei sank into the empty chair, her body going limp. She was... Twice as strong as an Olympic athlete in any field? With her tiny little body? Li Mei glanced at her hands again, mauve eyes sparkling with delight and ambition. "The average stat for a human child of 12 in this world is apparently three, right? As much as a human adult from my world?"
"Yes. The passive absorption of mana makes beings in this universe much tougher than their counterparts in yours."
"Then, the average stats of adults in this world?"
"Five. Even the weakest peasants would be considered a world-record holder on Earth."
"Then, my stats..."
"Are the natural peak your body is capable of. There is no longer a way to raise your stats without the use of special treasures. Even I cannot gift you stats anymore! And for your information, a single point increase represents a multiplicative increase, not an additive one. STR 3 is more than three times stronger than STR 1. Having your stats be 10 in each category isn't just double the average of an adult.
"You have not even scratched the surface of your true capability, much less your potential. This is also why your Rank is low despite your stats being so high. Rank is an overall measure of combat ability. It takes into account your experience, tactics, techniques, and utilization of your own strengths and specialties.
"Most humans who strive for strength barely achieve the peak in a single stat unless they're lucky or well-connected. For surpassing the peak, they can only physically bear a cumulative extra stat increase of 10. This is their natural limit.
"As an example, if a man has two stats at the peak he can either reach 15 in each of them, or 20 in one while the other will never increase no matter how many treasures he consumes. In fact, trying to increase past the limit may have disastrous consequences. Permanently losing capability is one consequence. Gruesome painful death is another.
"Humans being well-rounded is also incredible and horrifying in its own way. Most creatures specialize in one or two stats specifically while other stats languish as a result. Meanwhile, humans can potentially reach a peak of 10 in all stats without experiencing any consequences in their development. Comparatively speaking, that's quite scary!
"It's almost a good thing for the rest of the world that increasing stats is so difficult. Don't think your own experience is the norm, you have me supporting you and helping you cheat. If anyone knew how strong you truly were they'd be terrified! Ah, other than that Faust fellow. He already knows something.
"The peak and limit of each creature is different, but no mortal being can ever increase a stat beyond 20 and most peaks are around 8 or 10. Limits also hover around 8 or 10. You, however, are capable of reaching 20 in all your stats, which means your natural limit is 50. On this world that is unheard of - even in the entire universe across countless inhabited planets, it's very rare!"
Her long lecture over, Lina materialized a cup of hot cocoa for each of them and took a sip from her own mug. Li Mei barely tasted the scalding hot liquid as she chugged the entire drink in one go. Her hands shook slightly as the weight of Lina's words sank in. "I'm really so incredible?"
"More than you know. If you put your mind to it, Li Mei, you could do anything you wanted. And that's not even hyperbole, it's literal! My whole purpose is to help you achieve whatever that may be. Whether it's to conquer the world, or just living comfortably somewhere out of the way. No matter what you end up doing, I am your ally. We're connected, after all! As long as you exist, I do too, so please keep existing."
The last sentence sounded flippant and might have seemed rude or selfish in another context, but it soothed Li Mei's suspicions and helped her relax a bit further. She felt more comfortable knowing Lina's motivation was, at least in part, for her own sake.
Undying, unconditional devotion was just creepy. Especially from something as powerful as the Interface! Considering Lina a dependable ally rather than a mere tool or servant suited Li Mei's preferences more.
Li Mei set the empty cocoa mug on the floor and leveled a serious gaze at Lina's face. "Alright. How exactly can learn to use what I'm capable of, then?"
Lina's face split into a grin, her eyes sparkling. The mugs disappeared, while a staff appeared on the lap of each girl. It had a similar heft and length as the metal staff Li Mei used for so long. She waited for Li Mei to stand again before sweeping the chairs into oblivion with an absent wave of her hand, twirling the staff around her shoulders.
"If you wanna know what you can really do, then we fight until you figure it out."