Assuming they were telling the truth about the safe zone.
There was an added benefit: if there were any humans in the woods, they would be attracted to the smoke. Together they would have a better shot of killing this ‘boss’.
Alright, Jeb thought, blinking. Is there anything I’m missing?
You have been Awarded with Fifteen Free Ability Points. Use them wisely. Jeb recalled the voice telling him that.
Ah yes. Is it like a game mechanic? How do I spend them?
“Character sheet?”
“Spend points?”
“Upgrade!”
“How I shoots web!?”
“...Ability points?”
Ability Points are given as a reward for outstanding achievements, gaining levels, and certain consumables. They apply to a wide range of the User’s physical and magical traits, boosting their average performance, measured by the user’s Abilities.
The available traits are:
Body
Myst
Nerve
Applying points to one of these traits will raise the average performance of hundreds of associated traits.
Body will raise a User’s strength, toughness, healing speed, resistance to poisons and so on.
Myst will boost the User’s connection to the Myst, Affecting the Draw Rate, Range, Storage and Output Capacity of Myst, as well as sensitivity to its presence, and so on.
Nerve enhances the signal clarity, speed and refractory period, etc, of the User’s nerve cells. This is associated with increased intelligence, reaction time, hand-eye coordination, emotional intelligence and mental stability, and so on.
To apply Earned Ability Points, Say or think, ‘Status’, then manually select where to spend your Ability Points. When you have achieved your Class at level 20, you may switch from manual to mental Ability point distribution, although it is not recommended.
Whoah. Jeb blinked the text out of his eyes and absorbed that information a moment.
Status.
Jebediah Trapper
Body 5 +
Myst 0 +
Nerve 8 +
Hmmm… what the hell is Myst, and why don’t I have any of it?
If Jeb’s somewhat well-maintained post-military body was a five, then dropping the extra fifteen points into Body would make him like…The Rock on steroids?
Who am I kidding, The Rock probably does steroids.
Jeb didn’t see the justification for having an 8 on Nerve. Maybe it had been the Ecstasy talkin’.
It was a fun idea to dump it all into Nerve and suddenly become some kind of brainiac who could solve all his problems with relative ease.
Work smarter, not harder. A quote his dad had quoted religiously to his eldest son.
The smart choice though was probably to put four or five points into Nerve, to get him up to hawkings levels of cognitive function, then dump the rest into his Body. He would be smarter, with the physical power to act out his plans.
The only thing scarier than a big angry slab of beef is knowing that you are also staggeringly mentally inferior to the aforementioned slab of beef.
Jeb tapped his fingers on his elbow, looking at the choices.
Myst kept calling him back.
He had no idea what it was.
He had no idea how to use it.
But given the circumstances… Magical teleportation to a magical forest by magical means with magical crates and magical status windows.
I think you would think what I think.
Yeah, Myst is definitely magic, or magic-adjacent.
Jeb, an average human, having zero aptitude for something he’d never even heard of…it stood to reason.
What if I had fifteen?
This tutorial is labelled as impossible. A Kobayashi Maru. Will simply being smarter and stronger get me a win against impossible odds?
How did Kirk win the Kobayashi Maru?
‘Change the circumstances of the test.’ Another one of his dad’s mantras.
Jeb thought back to his drug-addled brain that had decided to do the impossible test, and further back, to his PTSD that had made a bullet seem more appealing than braving low ceilings or closing his eyes for any length of time.
There were going to be hundreds, no, thousands of people who chose to attempt The Impossible, and they were mostly going to make the smart decision to balance their stats and do as well as they possible could.
You can’t beat an impossible test by following the rules of the test. You have to cheat.
Before he could talk himself out of it, Jeb jammed his finger through the plus sign to the right of Myst, tapping it fifteen times.
Jebediah Trapper
Body 5 +
Myst - 15 +
Nerve 8 +
Confirm?
Jeb covered his face with his palm and hit the confirm button.
Well, if the rate of failure is 100% either way, who wouldn’t want to blow shit up with their minds at least once before they bite the dust?
Jeb was not prepared for the headache that followed. It felt like his head was being driven into a railroad track by a pair of well-muscled track workers with sledgehammers.
They even had a rhythm set up, which was strangely similar to the panicked beating of his heart.
“Ow, OW, FUCK!” Jeb shouted, clutching his skull in the hopes that he could alleviate the pounding nail being driven through his skull through some kind of pressure or massage.
Didn’t help.
The world flickered, popping briefly into the riot of colors those people with four cones say they see, before flickering back to dull greens and browns of the forest.
Then it happened again, accompanied by a tearing sensation that went from the back of his skull to the sockets of his eyes.
“Motherfucker!” Cussing makes things hurt less, according to popular wisdom, but it didn’t seem to be helping a whole lot.
Underneath the riot of colors were moving squiggles, along with a mist-like vapor in the air that Jeb hadn’t seen before. Then he started smelling and hearing them, accompanied by similar tearing sensations in his ears and nose.
It was at this point that Jeb thankfully passed into blissful unconsciousness, his brain’s natural defense
