"I'm not complaining..." Owen said, causing everyone to sigh; they knew why it was only May who was a tad confused.
"Well, I'm happy for you all, but aren't you forgetting something?" James spoke, gathering everyone's attention.
"No...?" Levi said, perplexed.
"Didn't I say you will be going to fight me after the end of the week?" James said with a bit of anticipation in his voice. "Now come at me!" He shouted, but his words seemed to be directed toward Ellia.
Ellia took a deep breath and turned to face James. "With all due respect, instructor, but is fighting you part of the test?"
James flinched at Ellia's words but gave a slight chuckle in the end. "Of course..."
"That didn't sound so confident, and either way you said, we passed the test, so going any further than this would be unnecessary.
"Tch." James cursed as he waved at everyone to go. "Report to me at 500 the day after tomorrow. That is when the real training starts" After those words, James's figure blurred before disappearing.
Although Ellia had wanted to take on the fight James had offered, after all, she was curious about magic, but she wasn't in a well-off state to fight. She was too tired, and so was the rest of the squad members.
...
Afterward, room 32
"Tired..." Ellia grumbled as she undressed her fur coat, exposing her underwear. But she didn't mind since all she sought to do right now was laying down on her comfortable bed.
Everyone else also didn't mind, although it was more because they didn't have the energy to mind. They just simply staggered to their beds and slumped down.
Only Alex and May exchanged blank stares before taking a seat at the kitchen table. They weren't going to sleep on the hard floor, so sleeping while shitting would do. The moment May sat down, her face smacked against the kitchen table, and she was out sleeping.
It was then Issac walked up to ELlia. "Second Lieutenant. I wish to speak to you."
"Yes, First Lieutenant?" Ellia sharply spoke as she got out of bed.
"You're tired, so I'll be keeping it short," Issac said. "I just want to apologize for not taking your words into consideration."
"Huh?" Ellia mumbled in confusion.
"Back when you said we shouldn't keep May close to the team members as she might be a threat. I didn't expect her to be here to cause harm because I assumed this was a regular training exercise."
"Ah... yes," Ellia nodded while a sudden feeling of irritation grew inside of her. "There is also something I want to say about that."
"Please go ahead," Issac said.
"It's not much, so please consider it. When someone suggests an opinion and no matter how stupid it might be, take it into consideration." Ellia spoke the words entirely from her heart.
"I'll definitely consider it." Issac nodded while giving Ellia a meaningful look.
Ellia also smiled back as she watched Issac walk back to his bed. Ellia also fell back onto her bed.
'I'm not physically tired... I'm just mentally tired.' Ellia thought as she pressed her face against her pillow.
Ellia had been completely awake back in the igloo, watching May's every movement, so she hadn't gotten a wink of sleep since yesterday night.
"Just a bit tired..." Ellia softly uttered as she slowly drifted off into a different world. But right before she could cross realms, a loud familiar voice shouted in her head.
"Ian! I finally did it!" Ruth shouted in excitement. But her excitement didn't flow so well with Ellia.
'Huh? Ruth?' Ellia jolted while wiping her drool away in displeasure.
"Uhhh... was now not a good time?" Ruth asked in awkwardness.
'No, it's not... please let a man sleep in peace.' Ellia spoke as she closed her eyelids again, quickly dozing off.
"I guess we can talk about it in the morning." Ruth softly said, afraid she would wake Ellia up.
...
7:00 in the morning
Slowly regaining consciousness, Ellia felt a slight tickle on her left thigh. Looking down, she noticed she was somehow dressed in formal imperial wear. Then peeking past her skirt, she saw Aerie lifting her black stocking up her thigh.
"Private?" Ellia uttered in confusion.
"Ah... I was simply dressing you, Second Lieutenant." Aerie smiled. "You had nothing underneath..."
"Well, I appreciate it..." Ellia expressed, not knowing much to say.
"No problem!" Aeroe joyfully accepted Ellia's appreciation with a giggle.
It was then Ellia heard another cheerful voice inside her head, causing her to groan. "Ian!"
'Yes, what is it?' Ellia asked.
"I uncovered more about the system while I was training!" Ruth proudly spoke. "I even made a new blueprint!"
'About the system?'
"Yes! I was able to find some basic information during the week."
Hearing her words, Ellia nodded with approval. It seemed Ruth hadn't been stacking aff at all.
'Shoot." Ellia spoke, urging Ruth to keep going.
"Well, you noticed before you gain experience points by killing, right?"
'Yea.' Ellia nodded.
"And what did the system give you when you leveled up?" Ruth asked as if she some sort of teacher.
"Stat points," Ellia answered, recalling what had happened back then.
"Correct, and you do remember when you mindlessly added those stat points to a random category because you didn't know what they did?"
"I wasn't absolutely clueless." Ellia refuted Ruth's words. "I did have some idea of what it was."
"Well, I found out what these stat points do." Ruth continued, ignoring Ellia's words.
Ruth then started to explain each status effect.
Strength increased muscle strength and muscle tightness, so this was a way for Ellia to gain some muscles on her slim body. It also increased the number of weapons she was able to wield at the moment.
Agility increases your overall swiftness, increasing your movements. It also came to enhance your reflexes and heightened your thought process. That was most of the reasons why Ellia and Ruth were able to exchange words in such a short amount of time.
Endurance increased resistance and toughness to a lot of things. With a higher endurance stat, you could find you're skin getting harder, thus increasing its defense value. Resistance to all temperatures would grow, and some diseases wouldn't pose any problems.
Vitality increased the amount of HP, meaning the amount of damage one was allowed to take before game over. Furthermore, it enhances the natural cell division in your body, resulting in a faster recovery time. For every one stat point in the vitality, stat gave you five HP.
The intelligence stat was more on the complicated side. It was the stat that affects mana points/mp. The source of magic was mana. So the higher your intelligence stat affected how strong and more potent your spells became. And if you wanted to cast stronger and longer spells, you would need more mana points. For every stat point in intelligence, mana points would increase by ten.
Of course, the news of being able to use magic excited Ellia a bit.
Then there was mental capacity. The stat Ellia had mindlessly invested into.
Mental capacity was the amount of loud your brain could hold up from technical software, neuro links, etc. If you were to exceed this limit, your brain would simply turn into mush from the inside out. After hearing this, Ellia didn't know wheater it was a good or bad thing to put her stat points in mental capacity. And unlike the name it possesses, Mental capacity doesn't increase the amount of stress you could intake, nor did it improve the amount of time you could along without sleep.
Then finally came dexterity. The stat allowed you to handle weapons more effectively and precisely. Like reloading a gun faster or aiming the weapon more quickly, it was things like this that were crucial on the battlefield. And for a bonus, it improved passive and active skills and performances.
Also, the average adult's stats would be 5 points in each stat category, except the mental capacity stat, which would be an average of 0-0.5.
The only way people become stronger was either through training, technology, or magic. These three were your main source of power.
"That makes me about four times stronger than the average adult?" Ellia mumbled as she rubbed her chin.
"Yes, and most of your power is coming from asura's recreation."
"Hmmm, that being said, I can grow stronger not only do training but by killing people…" Ellia said with a rugged look.