Garath’s look of disappointment caught the Lore Keeper’s attention.
“You may ask questions for the next ten minutes,” she conceded.
A timer appeared in Garath’s mind’s eye that immediately started counting down from 10:00, and Garath panicked. Completely unsure of where to start but also unwilling to waste any of his allotted ten minutes, he asked the first thing that came to mind. “What’s with the box of rubber duckies?”
Auto punched him in the shoulder. “Don’t waste our question time with shit like that, dude.” He gave Garath an incredulous look, then turned back to Alice and smiled. “Let’s start with this one: how did you become a Lore Keeper? I didn’t see that as an option when I picked my Class.”
“My Class was assigned to me,” Alice explained. “Before you ask ‘by whom?’ I will tell you that I have only very limited information concerning the Entity that altered the planet.”
Garath deflated. He was hoping to finally get some answers about that. It didn’t escape his notice that she had used the same term that Aldrasyl had when referring to the unknown being, and wondered whether or not that could be a coincidence. “Entity?”
“Yes,” Alice confirmed with a too-slow nod.
Garath stared blankly at the Lore Keeper.
“Entity,” she said again, now taking on a deadpan tone of recitation, “a thing with distinct and independent existence.”
Garath raised an eyebrow at her, silently asking if she had seriously just recited the definition of entity in response to his query. Her continued silence and vacant expression told him that she most certainly had done exactly that.
“Oh.” Garath blinked rapidly, then shrugged it off. He had a perfect question for someone who claimed to know so much. “One member of my group unlocked a non-Class Skill called Spell Design. I’ve tried replicating her process a half dozen times, but no luck. Do you know how it’s done?”
“Non-Class Skills are unlocked based on a combination of natural affinity and circumstance,” Alice told him. She then looked intensely at Garath from head to toes and back to his head. “You do not have the necessary affinity to unlock Spell Design.”
Garath slumped. “Never?”
“Unlike many aspects of this new world, affinities cannot be changed. Your affinity for Spell Design is zero percent. To unlock a non-Class Skill, your affinity toward it must be at least five percent. At that point, like your Tracking non-Class Skill, you may unlock it, but it will never progress past Rank 1.” Alice paused. “Simply put, never.”
“Can you tell me what non-Class Skills I do have a high affinity for?” Garath asked hopefully. If he couldn’t learn Spell Design, there had to be something cool he could learn.
Alice looked him up and down again, and her vacant expression showed the smallest hint of amusement. “Yes. If you conquer The Tower, I will provide you with a comprehensive list.”
Garath scrunched up his face. “Yeah, alright.”
“My turn for questions, time hog. What is a Lore Keeper, exactly?” Auto asked.
“To put it simply, a rare, non-combat Class. Apart from myself, there are only two other Lore Keepers here on Earth,” Alice told them, then shook her head. “And one in the sky.”
“Wait, sky?” Garath asked.
“She was orbiting the Earth when The Culling began. She is still in orbit now,” Alice explained.
“I have more questions about that too, but first, how did you survive The Culling with a non-combat Class?” Auto asked, punching Garath in the arm for interrupting his question time.
Alice tilted her head, somehow managing to look confused without changing her vacant expression at all. “I was an octopus,” she said, as if that explained everything. Then, seeing Garath and Auto’s expectant faces, Alice elaborated. “I hid.”
Garath nodded thoughtfully. He had wondered several times if any of the survivors across the globe had found a different way to get through the catastrophic event. Apparently hiding was an option. Who knew?
“So it’s a non-combat Class,” Auto continued. “What kind of Skills or Abilities comes with it?”
“I do not have Skills or Abilities like those of other Classes. My mind was augmented to improve memory, processing, multitasking, along with many other, less easily explained alterations. For example…” Alice closed her eyes and the timer counting down in Garath’s vision disappeared and then reappeared.
“You can mess with people’s shit?” Garath asked dumbly.
“I can interact with individual user interfaces,” Alice corrected him. “You have the Ability called Inspect, correct?”
Garath and Auto both nodded.
“Inspect has an innate, albeit rudimentary, likeness to my ability to interact with user interfaces. In short, when you ‘Inspect’ something, you are given system-provided information about it. Your Ability only grants limited information, of course, but it is similar to the manner in which I am able to glean information from the system. I am granted much more in-depth information and the ability to interface with almost anything directly.”
“Okay,” Garath said as he tried to chew through what she’d just told him. From what he was hearing, Alice had a more direct connection to the system governing the planet. “Is there anything you can do with your ability that will help us inside the Dungeon?”
“Oh, yes,” Alice confirmed seriously. “It is vital that we claim The Tower as soon as possible. I will do everything within my power toward accomplishing this task.”
“That’s great,” Auto said. “But rare Class or not, you don’t have any combat ability. How can you help us in the Dungeon?”
Garath looked at his friend out of the corner of his eye, then back at Alice. It was a legitimate question, sure, but he was surprised by Auto’s direct approach.
Alice tilted her head again before her single-word response. “Situationally.”
“Can you give us an example?” Garath prodded flat-faced.
“I know that you have made use of the forums, Garath. Auto, you have read the forums but refrained from posting a
