After drinking the water from the leaf and quenching my thirst, I gave the leaf back to Mr. 'fan'. Putting the leaf aside, he looked me in the eyes and said, "I finished my quota early and thought we could leave for dinner together, but as soon as I entered the room I found you unconscious. Would you mind explaining what is happening?"
'Why am I forgetting recent things so frequently these days? Is it because so much is happening that my brain is not able to handle them?'
His words reminded me of everything that has transpired earlier. Without wasting a second I looked around and whispered with a very low breath, "Delta." Just as I called out to the system, my head started to feel like it was burning and a painful breath escaped my throat.
"Ugh!"
"Are you alright? Do you need more water?" the fan asked with a worried look as he picked up the leaf.
"I'm alright; it's just that my head hurts a little." I said after taking in a heavy breath of the stale air. The pain vanished as soon as it came but I didn't get any response from Delta. Did Delta leave me? Was it hiding? I did not know. But one thing was certain; I was on my own for now.
Pulling me out of my thoughts, he asked me with a worried tone, "Should we go and have dinner? Everyone else must already have started! If we're late, I don't know about you but I would surely have to sleep empty stomach!"
His remark made me smiled. Although I was feeling weak and lethargic, I somehow stood up and said to him, "Guide the way." I didn't have much information about the other slaves from Alex's memory fragments. The only thing I was able to figure out was that Alex and James were the only ones with a name in this group. James was the current leader and I was the future one. This fan of mine and me were the youngest ones in the group and therefore, he always followed me like a follower does.
'Or, he just wants to build a relationship with the future leader. Who knows what's going on inside his head?'
***
Thud! Thud! Thud! Thud!
We were walking towards a tent in an open area under the stars where many slaves laden with dirt were chatting and having dinner. En route, I once again tried calling Delta but I was again hit by the burning headache!
We entered the tent and I parted ways from the boy after the server put two komitas and a dull grey colored paste on a big leaf and gave it to me. I found a secluded area and sat on the ground while eating that disgusting food. The paste was nothing but a sauce for the komita that tasted like vomit! I wanted to divert my attention from the taste of the food and instantly I was reminded of something. I swallowed my saliva and whispered with an expectant voice, "Status."
[
HOST INFO:
Name: Alex (Deniel)
Age: 15
Gender: Male
Level: 1
Fate Points (FP): 00/100
STATS:
Health Points (HP): 67/70
Mind Power (MP): 0/0 [Locked]
Strength: 0(11)
Defense: 0(9)
Senses: 0(9)
Health: 0(7)
Mind: 0(0) [Locked]
Free Stat Points: 5
SKILLS:
(Unnamed category):
(Unnamed) Level 3:
You have grown proficient in handling mining tools. Your proper form and long practice makes you able to mine various minerals with ease. As the skill level grows, the ease of mining increases.
(Unnamed) Level 1:
You have trained under a master and learned how to extract Starlight Fruit seeds, plant and harvest them. Your methods are still crude but as the skill grows, you can effortlessly grow all the varieties of the Starlight Fruit.
INVENTORY: LEVEL 1
Space 1: (1 meter cube)
Space 2: (0.25 meter cube)
]
The greenish and translucent status window appeared infront of me. I looked around to see if anyone noticed me but the window moved along with my head. I was confused and annoyed as I couldn't look properly with the window infront of me.
'I needed to get rid of the window for now.'
I looked at the screen and whispered, "Disable" but nothing happened, I said, "Close" yet no change. I tried a couple of more words and still nothing. Then I said, "Status-" I was actually about to say, 'Status vanish' but apparently just saying 'status' both activates and deactivates the screen!
Flip!
As the screen infront of me vanished, I looked around to see if anyone noticed my strange behavior but I was astonished to see the muscular guy who slapped me when I first transmigrated, sitting on a wooden log far away from me. He was looking around, probably to check on the slaves and prevent them from escaping or doing something rash. His arms were folded and resting on his chest. He had short hair, a brown complexion, and dull black eyes.
'He's probably doing his duty, monitoring the slaves. But I can see that I'm far from him and if I'm careful, I could easily avoid his attention.' I said inwardly. Somehow chewing the komita in my mouth with difficulty and disgust, swallowing every bite with the help of the wooden cup of the water, I whispered into the wind, "status." And the status screen reappeared in front of me.
I looked at it from top to bottom, noticing every detail and every word, finding any hint or clue I could on how to use it. As I was going through the screen, my eyes paused on the skills I had.
'So I have two skills, one is related to the mining and as I have been mining since a young age it's now at level 3. I don't know if level 3 is high enough. The second one is related to harvesting Starlight fruits. I hope I'm atleast somewhat good at it. I can see that the skills don't have a name but why is that?'
As I thought about the skills' names, I looked at the '(Unnamed)' mentioned infront of my first skill. As I was staring at the term, a slightly yellowish pop-up window suddenly appeared infront of the screen!
Ding!
[Would you like to set a name for skill 1? (Please say your answer)]
I was slightly taken aback by the yellow pop up window. After reading its contents, I replied, "Yes" and the contents of the yellow screen changed into another statement.
[What would be the name of the skill?]
Thinking for a bit, I simply whispered, "Mining". It suited the description of the skill so I just left it at that. After I said the word, the contents of the yellow window changed and a message of confirmation appeared.
[The name of the skill 1 is henceforth set to 'Mining'.]
The screen then disappeared after showing that last pop up message.
I did the same for the other skill and named it 'Starlight Harvesting'. The skill was pretty much about mastering the farming of a single fruit plus, it sounded cool!
I then moved my eyes from the top to the bottom of my status screen, stopping at every single word. No such screen showed when I looked at the other words until my eyes landed on the number '0' beside the strength stat and another yellow window popped up.
Ding!
[Would you like to assign stat points to the Strength stat?]
'So this is how I add the stat points to the stats! Although I want to add the points and see what's going to happen, I can't afford to do so now when so many eyes are upon me! I should do it when I'm alone and have some free time.'
Putting my thoughts aside, I replied, "No."
['0' stat points assigned to the Strength Stat.]
After giving the confirmation message, the pop-up window disappeared. I was about to look at the '[Locked]' portion and see if I could unlock it but suddenly a hand pressed onto my shoulder and I jumped with shock like a cat!