He took no offence at me asking his gender and was amused at my embarrassment. Iepurrans are a direct people, fond of blunt approaches and no bullshit. They have no taste for subtlety or double meanings, which was why the ones from earlier just left when I said I was fine.
By the time evening encroached, Eklil had invited me to that second cup of tea and to supper with his family. He had to step out for a time to deal with some of his work, but had assured me he wouldn’t find it amiss if I waited for him there, or if I chose to head out and explore the town.
I chose to remain and sift through the interface for a time. I was curious of the changes, and was going to try and get through the skills. Whatever this new life was, in the end I would have to engage with it on some level.
“When I made my class, it said I’d received some bonuses to my stats,” I said to Eternity’s mote. “My strength is now at a nine. Does that mean I’m almost twice as strong as I was this morning?”
“No,” Eternity said. “Your stats are an approximation of some of your attributes. They do not follow a direct linear progression. You may think of them more as guidelines for your development.”
“So, if I were to add points into strength, I wouldn’t actually get stronger?”
“You would get stronger, just not in large, linear increments. Your body needs to catch up to the stats you are building. Adding a point in anything should be viewed as laying out a blueprint for what you’d like to construct. A point in strength makes you slightly stronger physically, yes, but the underlying function is to reinforce your natural development towards muscle growth. A point in constitution will improve biological functions, optimising overall growth.”
So, not really as videogamey as I initially thought. This needed a bit more careful consideration.
I sat in the same room where I’d drank with Eklil, but I moved to a different chair, closer to a yellow-leafed plant. It let out an amazing scent of lemons that I couldn’t get enough of. If Eternity weren’t there to observe me, I’d have my nose in the thing.
Eternity was forthcoming enough with this information, though some of it was hard to wrap my head around. The stats, for one thing, did not function at all as I’d expected. I wasn’t going to be printing out neurons by pouring points into Intelligence, no more than my muscles would grow with Strength.
Which led me to the main question.
“What’s the purpose of this interface altogether?” I asked. “Why do I have it? And do others have it too?”
Eternity hesitated for a time, just floating there as if thinking.
“Most people in [REDACTED] have access to different versions of this interface. I cannot say more.”
I was getting used to the random bursts of redacted information, enough at least that I wasn’t getting annoyed anymore. Gaining more insight would open up my way to more information, which I was determined to do in due time.
“As for the purpose of the interface itself,” Eternity went on, “it is to guide development at a steady, sustainable rate.”
“And all interfaces are connected to you?” I asked.
“I cannot say.”
I groaned and shelved the question for later.
One skill point and one stat point lingered in notifications, so I was trying to understand what was what and why. When I thought through selecting my class, I had envisioned something to let me fight my way out of an uncertain situation, driven mostly by my paranoia. I had to make use of it now that I had created it.
“What about skills?” I opened up the tab for my new sword skill line. The explanation was vague.
[SWORD APTITUDE - INITIATE]
[YOU HAVE LEARNED WHICH END OF A SWORD IS MEANT FOR THE ENEMY]
[CONGRATULATIONS ON NOT CUTTING YOURSELF]
Aside the asinine cheekiness, there was nothing else, except that a number of skills had become available connected to it on the tree. They were grouped in two branches with connecting lines between them.
“What’s a heavy blow?” I asked, spying one of the names in the list.
“Seems self-evident,” Eternity answered.
I glared at it. Eternity quietly bobbed in the air.
“How is it different from an adrenaline surge? And don’t be snippy that it sounds self-evident. I’m asking why they’re on different branches and have different representation colours.”
Each of those looked like they’d open the way to even more options down the line. I couldn’t elect to give my skill point to the [HEAVY BLOW] skill, though that seemed useful. Instead, when I selected [ADRENALINE SURGE], a message popped up asking me if I wanted to spend the point to gain it. For the time being, I refused. There were still many other trees to check out.
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“The first is a skill you must train. Gaining the initiate level of the [SWORD APTITUDE] tree has given you most information you need to access any of the trainable skills, and then practice them.” Eternity’s monotone reminded me of my bored college teachers now, not even making an effort to seem excited for the subject matter. “The second is an interface skill. It cannot be trained, but can be bought with a skill point. The interface will siphon mana to generate the described effect.”
Huh, that was neat in a way.
[ADRENALINE SURGE]
[GAIN A TEMPORARY BOOST TO STRENGTH, DAMAGE MITIGATION, AND REACTION TIME]
[COST: 3 MP / activation + 1 MP / second]
“This whole interface system won’t make me superhuman, I take it?” I asked.
What Eternity had described sounded like being given training wheels on life. It was reinforced learning with some of the tedium of experimentation taken out, where rigorous training was replaced by just allocating points and getting a shortcut towards a result. I would still need to train, but growth was targeted far more easily. A kind of steroid, if my limited biology understanding served.
It did tie neatly into what it had described as the purpose of the interface itself. Which didn’t explain the core purpose, the why of it all, but it was a start.
“That is not what I said,” Eternity replied as I only half listened. “There is no limit on growth. Life is limitless.”
Right, right, the whole spiel with the life priority, the one that was so important that I couldn’t get a proper warning of danger earlier in the day. I swallowed down the remark and dug my hand into the lemon plant, rubbing the leaves. They felt waxy and soft, and just touching them flooded the entire room in the scent of citron. I was just ready to break off a leaf when the front door slammed against the wall.
“Elder Eklil!”
A grey iepurran burst into the room and I almost fell off my uncomfortable chair in surprise. The newcomer rushed into the room, yelling for Eklil, looking wildly about.
He looked terrible. Half of one ear was torn to shreds, with blood pouring down its face, matting its fur. It dragged one leg across the floor, deep red gouges showing through the fur.
I’m proud to say that I leapt to my feet and promptly slammed the crown of my head into the ceiling. Through the blooming, bursting stars, I managed to ask, “What’s happened? Eklil’s not here. He’s gone out somewhere.”
The iepurran slumped and nearly toppled over, grabbing hold of the table at the last moment before collapsing. I rushed to its side, pulling out a chair and easing the distraught iepurran down on it. The wounds looked grave and it was tracking bright red blood all over the wooden floor. I looked about for anything to bind the cuts, but the iepurran grabbed hold of my arm and squeezed painfully.
“Honoured guest, there is trouble in the vale. We need help.” Its voice rasped and it looked as if the iepurran was ready to keel over at any moment. “The guards are checking the forest. There’s noone to help my brother.”
I turned to Eternity’s mote. “Find a doctor,” I said, figuring it would be easier for it than for myself.
The mote flickered and then disappeared. I gently pried away the hand gripping my wrist and rushed from the wounded iepurran to drag one of the linen covers off a piece of furniture—Eklil explained the city was getting ready for a festival, which would kick up a lot of dust, hence the covers.
I used my sword and cut strips out of the fabric, working quickly, mind aflame.
I need to wash the cuts. I need disinfectant. First, to stem the bleeding.
On one of my first projects in a production area, barely out of college, untrained and with almost no guidance for what I was to do, I had almost cut off my left hand on a saw. I learned very quickly from the plant workers how to tie a tourniquet, how to apply pressure to the bleeding, and how not to faint in panic at the sight of my own blood. By comparison to those panic-stricken fifteen minutes of my life, binding the gashes on the iepurran was almost easy.
Eternity reappeared by my side. “Medical help is coming,” it said without preamble. “I have requested someone to call for the guards.”
“No!” the iepurran cried out, its hand grasping mine desperately. “Please, honoured guest. Go to the vale. My brother—”
Two iepurrans rushed through the door just then, skidding to a halt in front of us. They immediately took over from me and began working on the wounded, their materials and supplies carried in a neat wooden chest.
“Where’s the vale?” I asked Eternity as I took several steps back, letting them work.
“I have set a marker on your map,” I got the immediate answer.
With all the questions I still had for Eternity, I hadn’t actually checked the map yet. I clicked it open and was momentarily disorientated by the spread of terrain that filled my vision. My dot was in the village, white, with an arrow showing my orientation, next to another big dot that was the dungeon.
I didn’t have time to fiddle with the map. There was a point marked on the edge of it, and I oriented myself towards that. Almost surprising myself, I grabbed my sword, and ran out of the room and promptly missed the outside step, the map still covering too much of my sight. After picking myself and my dignity back up, I got another look at the general direction, shut the map off, and took off.
“This direction leads to the fence,” Eternity said. “Take next left turn to reach a gate.”
I obeyed, nearly collided with a group of iepurrans coming back from field work, and finally managed to exit the village through a different gate than the one I’d come in through. As the iepurran had said, there were no guards there.
Late afternoon had given way to dusk, and the shadows were long and dark. I found that it didn’t bother me as much as I knew it should’ve, my eyes picking out details in the low light much better than I’d ever managed before. This time of day, where night and day met, had been the bane of my driving experience. Now, it didn’t bother me.
I slowed, slightly huffing, when the road ended and I found myself wading through bushes. I opened the map and checked my location. I was almost on top of my destination. A gorge opened up ahead. Several torches burned in the gathering gloom. One was on one side of the wide gap, and two more were heading down, following a winding path.
For me, Eternity was providing the light. Its mote wasn’t as bright as the ones from Eklil’s home, but it served well enough that I set about descending the steep side of the ravine. It wasn’t terribly deep, but a bad step would send me rolling. I’d either break my neck, or break my legs. Either option seemed terrible, so I forced myself to maintain a slow, steady pace.
Someone screamed. The valley filled with bouncing echoes and I lost my footing for a brief moment. I tumbled down and caught a root poking out of the ground, arresting my fall for just long enough to see the torches get snuffed out. First the one overseeing the tall earth cliff, then the ones down at the bottom of the gorge.
More screams followed.
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