6 Chapter 5 - 1st World: Reality
Authors Note - Apologies for not making any chapters the past two days, I needed a break from work and my family dragged me to a reunion on the other side of the states with extended family I barely knew, so yea, fun, glad to be back and making chapters again.
Back to the story
As the school year ends, the classes wrap to a close, and for the last few days we don't really do anything, after all, we don't have finals in middle school, although I was able to raise Equations to Intermediate, while I do feel proud about it, the system does state that it is a very commonly used skill in a world like this, and about 50% of adults have it at at least Intermediate, and professionals often have it at Advanced tier by their late 40s, so while it is pretty amazing for my age, I have a lot more to do before I can start breaking any records.
After the PSSAs though, I haven't spent as much time studying because my friends have been preventing me from studying due to me "spending every waking moment working". I disagree that it's a bad thing, but I do get to hang out with them more, so all is well, besides, I already have enough qualifications for a few jobs and I am only 11. The legal working age varies from place to place but here in Pennsylvania it is 14 but the government doesn't hire anyone younger than 16 and even then it is only under very certain conditions, so I have around 6-7 years before I even have a chance to complete my mission, plenty of time to relax a bit.
Not to mention I hit a wall in Electrical Engineering, while I keep making small machines, I have yet to hit Beginner tier for about a month and a half now. I keep getting better at making small machines so that's not the problem, but there seems to be another requirement before I can reach Beginner tier. I decided to try leaving that for later.
Because of hanging out with my friends however, I did level up role-playing quite a bit, as well as tier up karate while practicing with Mike. I tried to check his karate level, but under Martial Arts, I only saw that Judo was at Beginner tier. So his karate has to be at least Intermediate tier, which is enough to beat some of the teachers at the dojo as long as they don't severely outclass him in terms of stats. His memorization ability probably helped a lot, and I am even tempted to upgrade it for him to help him and just to see what would happen when I ask the system how much it would cost it responded with 12,000 points, which is 2,000 higher than my ability, I then asked how much it would cost to upgrade Leo's ability and it responded with 5 thousand.
It seems that while we both have learning-based abilities, it seems to value Mike's a lot more than mine, probably due to it having perfect recall and not taking nearly as long to activate. While it would probably be amazing after being upgraded, the cost is just too high, I don't even have 2,000 points let alone 12,000. However, that doesn't mean it's not worth it, the system has a few memorization abilities of its own, but all of the ones that have perfect memorization are at least Intermediate tier, probably the only thing holding it back from being completely insane is the fact that it only works for mnemonics.
Currently, I am at Mikes house for a sleepover playing SSB 4 with him, while he may be better in real-world combat, my skills at video game combat are superior to his, I was even able to beat him with the Villager. Later, we changed over to Mario Kart and I felt like my worldview was changed, it seems like while he is only so-so at fighting games, his racing skills are supreme. Sadly there are no skills for gaming, or this would actually be semi-productive, I mean, there are probably skills involved if you were streaming or making videos you might be able to work on skills, however, the system doesn't seem to take gaming itself as a viable skill, however, I am not sure how that would work if I went into worlds like 'The King's Avatar' or 'God Level Summoner', both of them are available worlds and revolve highly around e-sports. Honestly, this could be attached to a lot of other skills.
I try asking the system what would happen and it responds that {skills that are always useful(such as cleaning or studying) or skills that are highly applicable to the world(such as English and Programming) are able to be unlocked, skills that are neither are not represented, however, if they ever end up following either of these requirements they will be permanently unlocked at whatever level they would be at, and the points that would have been gained if it had leveled up naturally would be given, this is to prevent the user from being able to gain lots of rewards from the system for doing nothing productive}
While it seems kind of rude, it makes sense that the system would not like to give much stuff away for free, the benefits of leveling up skills is probably to encourage skill leveling so that I would be of more use to it, after all, if I have only Simple skills then I would be pretty useless even in an F-tier world, while even a single Master skill could make me able to survive even in most C or B class worlds.
Mike and I go outside and sleep in a tent, we were originally planning to have Leo and Glenn here to, but they are both busy with there own stuff, Leo is on a trip to Niagra, Canada to see the falls and eat poutine and Glenn is at his dad's house for the rest of the month. While we weren't lucky enough for everyone to be there, we were lucky enough to sleep outside, the weather looked like it was about to storm and we could even hear the lightning. We both play a few games like word chain(English Shiritori) and 10 questions(apparently most people play 20 questions but I grew up with 10). we decide to do one last round before we go to bed, and he gets to choose the thing.
"Is it alive"
"Yes"
"Does it have more than 2 legs"
"No"
"Is it a human"
"Yes"
"Are they older than 50"
"No"
"Are they often on the news"
"No"
"Do I know them"
"Yes"
"Are they a friend of yours"
"Yes"
"Did they pass the science exams"
"Yes"
"Do they have bright hair?"
"Yes"
"Is it Leo"
"No" well, it seems like I lost
"Was I close"
"Very close, it was you, if you asked a better question then hair color it would have worked better, hair color only narrows it down to 3 at most"
"Oh well, I guess we can play a few more games in the mourning if we want to, have a good night"
"You too" he responds
Extended Authors note: THE EXPOSITION ARC IS ENDING, FINALLY I HAVE SAID ENOUGH OF HOW THINGS WORK THAT I CAN FOCUS ON THE STORY INSTEAD!!! Honestly, I was having trouble cramming it all in there, probably not amazing to read, but I am planning to go back and fix all the mistakes I can find at some point, to make it more palatable for the newer readers, also I am extremely happy with how this is going, I had 20 collections when I left, but when I returned I found I had 30 so, that's a 50% improvement so much thanks, although the way that Inkstone(webnovel's writing platform) tries to show the information and demographics is literal ****(yes I self-censor also curious, I heard that it sensors the word patreon but I am putting it down to see if the rumors are true).
Skills:
Mathematics(☆)
-Beginner Equations(LV 10)
-Beginner Geometry(LV 2)
-Simple Number Theory(LV 9)
-Simple Probability(LV 4)
Biology(☆)
-Simple Cell Theory(LV 6)
-Beginner Ecology(LV 1)
-Simple Anatomy(LV 5)
Language Arts(☆)
-Beginner English(LV 7)
Technology & Engineering(☆)
-Beginner Mechanical Engineering(LV 2)
-Simple Electrical Engineering(LV 10)
-Simple Programming(LV 5)
Life Skills(☆)
-Beginner Cleaning(LV 1)
-Simple Cooking(LV 5)
-Simple Organization(LV 7)
-Intermediate Studying(LV 1)
Entertainment Skills(☆)
-Beginner Role-Playing(LV 5)
Martial Arts(☆)
-Beginner Karate(LV 2)
Items:
Hormone Implant(+1 to any stat, can change chosen stat but will take 1 hour for the change to take effect
Upgrade: 5,000 points for an additional +4 bonus)
Status Viewer(able to see skills of up to Simple tier for their level, and able to see Beginner skills, also able to see abilities that are within the Simple tier.
Upgrade: 1,500 points for an additional tier in both effects)
Abilities:
Studying Maniac(Starter): After studying without a break for 3 hours, all studying effects shall double until the concentration is broken, and it shall be much harder for you to lose concentration once the effect starts. For best effects, set an alarm of some kind, or you could easily find yourself having no sleep or missing events
Upgrade: 10,000 to do one of the following(decrease activation time and concentration required or increase studying efficiency)
