Ellianor stretched his limbs a little. His eyes felt heavy and warm, he was just a little tired. 'I forgot how bad doing stuff in the middle of the night is for the body.'
His sleep schedule would never recover, it has been fractured beyond repair now. 'Who needs to sleep eight hours of sleep, anyway.' At least there was no nightmare to plague him.
"Ah, you are finally awake." For a moment, Elelianor's mind pulled him to a wagon in the middle of the forest as the foreign voice of a woman he didn't know echoed in his eardrums.
Ellianor turned around to see a woman in a suit. Her hair a great blue, red eyes and purple skin, wearing the fanciest suit he had ever seen.
Two strange objects surrounded her, almost mimicking the position of wings. She was not even close to him, so why did he feel her voice inside his ears?
"Good to see you are a light sleeper. My name is Amenura Aur, and I will be the one to guide you in your mission since Urien had a last-minute appointment."
Ellianor nodded.
'Well, by how Muriel talked, Urien must always be in a rush or close to missing deadlines.' Working like a zombie was not ideal, but sometimes it was what you needed to do.
"So, should I wake Kissenn for us to go, or we will have a pause for eating and getting ourselves ready?" His body didn't demand water or even food, so it was hard for Ellianor to gauge how healthy he was.
"If you two require food, I suggest you go over the fridge and stockpile some food. I was made aware that you have a system, don't be shy of filling it with goods."
Ellianor nodded before a memory came to his head. 'Wait, IOO have a ten card or something like that.' He opened his inventory,
[INVENTORY:
-LEATHER ARMOR [C]
-SHORT SWORD [C]
-DARK OBSIDIAN BLADE [R]
-+10 CARD (ANY)
-TEMPERATURE RESISTANT ARMOR [UC]
-HEART SOUL LOCKET [U]
…]
Ellianor clicked on the card, and another screen appeared, this time with his stats
[STATS:
()-STR (+): 22
()-END (+): 35
()-RES (+): 34
()-SUP: 15
()-SPD: 5
()-DEX: 8
()-ENU: 2
()-ENP: 2
()-INT: 10]
It was something he had to choose. 'What I should choose? Beyond the stats with… accelerated growth, everything is so far behind…' There were four obvious choices.
'Speed will make me less of a slouch in my movement, I almost got crushed by a gate by being too slow.'
Dex was the next on the line.
'I got pummeled to a bloody pulp by not reacting fast enough. It is more than enough reason for me to want that.' To avoid being placed in a life-or-death situation again.
To avoid being forced to watch as someone else fought for him, and her life. ENU and ENP were useless for him now, since he had no ability that required usage of energy.
'Can INT made make me think faster?' While quick thinking and analytical abilities could help, there would be situations where it was useless.
Against a monster that pushed all the odds in its favor and they had no chance of defeating it… it was useless. 'As is dex if I can't keep up with the speed, or speed if I can't keep up with the reaction time.'
Everything had its caveats and problems. 'I guess I should focus on my strong stats for now. Generalist builds right now where I don't even know what I want to be are… problematic.'
Meta choices were made when one knew how to use the meta, how it was advanced, the best builds, and what worked out, and what didn't.
'I have no idea what the meta is.'
No one else used systems since it was outdated by their words, and a sloppy system. 'A sloppy system that works for the Architech purposes and objectives.' She made a choice.
The system was the better tool for her plans.
'Sometimes, the better tool is not the most optimal, or advanced.' It was a lesson he learned a long time ago when making spaghetti code himself.
'If you have to use such methods, it means there is no other way of achieving what you want, or that you don't know how to achieve it.'
A problematic situation, but not one he couldn't deal with.
'It is better to focus on what grows faster right now than try and do more than what I can achieve and mess myself up in the future.' He still was a level two.
There was time.
[STATS:
(X)-STR (+): 22
STATUS GROWTH: +5 FOR ENHANCED STATS GROWTH
STR (+): 37
KNIGHT CLASS BONUS: STR, END, AND RES HAVE BEEN PUSHED PAST 30!
CHOOSE ONE!
PRO TIP: YOU MAY POSTPONE YOUR SELECTION FOR WHEN MORE STATUSES ARE AT LEAST 30. THE CHOICE WILL APPEAR AGAIN WHEN YOU ARE LEVEL 3
ONCE SELECTED, ALL UNSELECTED SKILLS WILL VANISH, ALTHOUGH THEY MAY REAPPER LATER ON.
YOUR NEXT EXCLUSIVE SKILL WILL BE UNLOCKED AT LEVEL 10
MEGA KNIGHT SLASH (EXCLUSIVE SKILL, NORMAL ATTACKS, AND CHARGED ATTACKS): YOUR NORMAL ATTACKS CAN SEND SHOCK WAVES OR RUPTURES THROUGH THE GROUND TOWARD YOUR ENEMY. YOU CAN CHARGE YOUR MOVEMENTS MORE MORE DAMAGE
KEEN DEFENSE (EXCLUSIVE SKILL, DEFENSE, AND CHARGED DEFENSE): YOU CAN PARRY ATTACKS WITH GREATER PRECISION WITH A SHIELD, LEAVING THEM OPEN FOR A COUNTERATTACK WITH A SUCCESSFUL AND TIMELY SHIELD PARRY
THE CHIVALRY (EXCLUSIVE SKILL, PASSIVE, -10% ALL STAMINA AND MAGIC USAGE): YOU ARE HARDER TO TIRE OUT, YOUR MOVEMENTS TAKE LESS ENERGY]
Ellianor sighed, his head pounded at the forced choice of skills he now had. He could only choose one, and all of them had at least something going on to justify their selection.
'I guess you will always appear at the most unexpected of times. I can feel it.' At least it was not the voice or had her presence attached to it, so Ellianor could at least rest easy about his choice there.
He just had to choose between one of the three. The worst of it all was that all three looked good.