33 Newfound Humanity

"Sixty-five percent oxygen, eighteen percent carbon, ten percent hydrogen, three percent nitrogen, and then we have minuscule amounts of fifty-seven other elements." Gerard looked at the dematerialised items.

Every required element was there except for uranium, which he exchanged for grains from a mana absorption crystal.

"Luckily, Transference allows me to target things specifically, so I know I have everything I need right here..." Gerard's mind wandered as he stared at the wall at the far side of the room.

"I could, in theory, transfer all of the water from someone's body if I wanted to."

[Stay on task, Gerard.]

"Yes, yes. You're quite right; this experiment comes first.."

Gerard formed a steady picture in his mind as he did with the figure of the metal warrior he built.

*Materialisation!*

All of the elements on the slab mixed together and began to form the shape of a body. Gerard concentrated, but the image failed to hold shape and the grotesque half-formed cadaver lay still on the slab.

*Dematerialisation.*

The elements returned to their original spaces on the table.

"I must be missing something."

[What's wrong?]

"It's like the image I have for the body is drowned out by the strength of the magic."

[Maybe use an image you're more familiar with, then?]

"I thought Total Recall would have been enough, but I'll try."

He focused on an image in his head. He pushed away the water and the other objects around the memory and focused on the body.

*Materialisation!*

Again, the elements swirled into action. The body began to form, and without error, a woman's bare body lay on the table.

"Wonderful!" Gerard applauded his success.

[A woman? You wanted to be a woman? You pervert.]

"It's not for me. Are you ready, Sprite?"

[Wait, me?]

"We don't know what would happen to my mana or abilities if I were human first. This way, we can both gain humanity."

[So, I'm your guinea pig? Whatever, I'm ready!]

Gerard focused his thoughts, picturing the moment in time when he moved sprite over to the mannequin. In his mind, he grasped her, and upon touching the motionless body on the slab, tensed his body and opened his eyes.

*Transference!*

The body lay still. Gerard froze. He stared at the body on the table without blinking until his eyes forced themselves closed. When he opened them, he heard a deep breath.

*What's this?* Sprite touched her chest.

"It's called breathing, Sprite, and you can talk now."

She cleared her throat and made several noises until she smiled.

"L-like t-this?"

"Well, without the stuttering, yes."

"Shut up, smartass." Sprite's mouth gaped open.

"See, would you look at that!"

"I can talk! I can talk!" She breathed in through her nose.

"And?"

"I can smell things! It doesn't smell nice, but I can smell it!"

"That would be mould, damp air, and the sweat of all the unwashed researchers here."

"There are good smells, right?"

"Of course. Foods, plants, perfumes and many other things smell amazing."

"I can't wait."

"Well, you'll have to wait for a little while. It's my turn, now."

Gerard remembered back to the later years of his military service. He vainly looked at himself often in the mirror a lot back then. He went from a scrawny country boy to a full-fledged muscular soldier.

*Materialisation!*

The elements wove through the air differently this time, taking different paths and building a larger structure. Finally, a body Gerard recognised lay there motionlessly.

"Is that you?"

"When I was a lot younger, yes. Without the scars and a full head of hair this time around. It's a body I know quite well. Eerie seeing it from the outside, though."

"Are you sure you want to do this?"

"I have this deep nagging in the back of my mind to stop and continue on the path of lichdom, eventually dominating the entire world, but I think that's just the monster in me."

"At least you realise that."

"I'm ready."

Sprite clasped her hands together and closed her eyes.

*Even now, when I'm creating human beings, you worship your gods.*

Gerard took a deep breath, touched the body on the slab, and breathed out.

*Transference!*

Gerard's body lost its illusionary appearance and fell to the ground.

---

Gerard felt a warmth soothe his mind. He felt his heartbeat.

"Finally, you have a human body."

A distant voice entered his mind, but it faded as quickly as it appeared. Gerard gasped deeply enough to make anyone think he was trying to suck all the air out of the room.

"It worked! Sprite, I'm alive!"

"Congratulations!"

He looked at Sprite, who stood naked and shivering. He quickly turned away and blushed.

"S-sprite, take the robe from my old body and put it on. You're cold."

"Are you perhaps embarrassed?"

"Shut up. As an undead, I didn't consider nakedness as anything other than the natural state of a person. Now, now, it's just-"

"Okay, but you're naked as well."

Gerard's eyes opened widely at the realisation. He leapt off the slab and sat on the other side of it, outside of Sprite's view.

"Yeah... Can you hand me the adventuring clothes from the basket when you're dressed?"

"Okay, but this is really complicated. How do humans wear all of these pieces of clothing?"

Gerard resisted the urge to look.

"Pull the robe from the bottom until it is pulled free from my old body. Flip the robe back, so it's the right way out, and place your head inside the biggest hole and use the smaller holes for your arms."

"I think I've got it."

A few moments later, Gerard's clothes tumbled over the stone slab. Hurriedly, Gerard redressed himself and stood up. The image he turned around to see made him laugh until his sides hurt. Sprite had slid one arm through the appropriate hole, but her head and other arm poked out of the neck of the robe. It was a dangerous position that almost showed her chest.

Sprite creased her brows and pouted.

"Sorry, I'm sorry. It's just funny!" Gerard walked over and pulled the robes' neck open wider, and pushed her arm back through it.

"It did seem like I was wearing it differently from other humans. Why was it funny?"

"Back when my daughter was a child, she made this mistake several times and got stuck. It's okay; I'll teach you everything you need to know about living as a human."

"Thank you. So, whose body is this?"

"Ah. My granddaughter was a competitive swimmer and practised at my mansion's pool. Her friend, Nadia, would also come along. I saw Nadia in her swimwear often enough for that memory to be engrained in my memory."

"Pervert. What about your wife?"

"By then, she'd long since passed. Anyway, it's not like I thought about Nadia that way; I just saw her a couple of times a week wearing next to nothing. It's not perverted..."

*Or maybe it is...*

"Okay, okay, I was only teasing you."

"I'm finally free of that compulsion in the back of my mind to experiment on humans and eventually destroy them. I can feel a lot more emotion than I did before..."

As Nadia's appearance sparked the memories from his previous life in his original world, everything flashed before his eyes as if reliving it a second time. Tears flowed from his eyes. He retched, and his body tried to empty his stomach contents on the floor, and only bile came up.

"All of that death. The pain. The suffering..."

Gerard steadied himself and stood upright.

"Are you okay?" Sprite's unchanging expression hid the concern shown in her tone.

"I'm fine; I just didn't expect to deal with everything all at once. Mentally, it was too much." Gerard wiped his mouth clean.

"If you're okay, may I update you on your condition?"

"Go for it." Gerard jumped backward and sat on the edge of the table while he watched Sprite speak.

"Due to being human-"

The table shattered under Gerard's weight. Gerard looked at it carefully.

"It looks like insects have eaten away at certain parts of the slab..."

"What?" Sprite inspected the missing pieces.

"What do you think?"

"I think you're an idiot. These aren't bug bites. There's residual mana around these parts." She ran her fingers over the decayed areas.

"So, I used the slab while creating our bodies?"

"It seems that way."

"What's it made from?"

"Some sort of mineral. I'm unsure."

"Well..." Gerard twisted his body and bent his limbs. "I don't feel like anything is wrong."

"We will figure that out as we go along. Shall I continue, then?"

"Of course."

"Right, as I was saying, now that you're human, your excess experience points may be used to level you beyond 20."

"I thought level 20 was the max?"

"For monsters, yes. Now that you're human, you effectively have no maximum level."

"Isn't that cheating? Why is it like that?"

"Humans have the capacity for great things, but since evolving is out of their reach and less than one in a thousand humans have the affinity for magic, most humans rarely reach beyond level 5. Adventurers are the exception here. On top of that, monsters far outnumber humans and are much stronger, so many humans die before getting the chance to level up."

"So, already being level 20 is..."

"Quite far outside of the norm, yes. Beyond that, you're one-of-a-kind."

"What do you mean?"

"We'll get to that."

"Okay, use my excess points to level me, then. But first, please upgrade the spells and skills with the lowest experience costs."

"Very well."

[1,598,017 experience has been spent. Twelve skills have been promoted. You have reached level 31. 111,983 experience until your next level.]

*Status Screen.*

[Gerard Blythe - Level 31 Human/Classless]

[HP: 95]

[MP: 0]

[Strength: 45]

[Dexterity: 41]

[Defence: 111]

[Resistance: 15]

[Mana Conductivity: 1,000]

[Skills: System Access, Class Evolution, World's Eye, Limiter Release, Acquisition, Shadow Step, Total Recall]

[Spells: Bind, Divine Ray, Fires of Hell, Water Shot, Tornado Strike, Stone Spike, Fireball, Link, Transference, Cleanse, Fire Lance, Greater Strength, Greater Defence, Greater Speed, Lightning's Embrace, Field, Turn Undead, Greater Flash]

[Resistances: Poison Resistance, Disease Resistance, Fear Resistance, Paralysis Resistance, Decay Resistance, Confusion Resistance, Blindness Resistance, Compulsion Resistance, ]

[Weaknesses: None]

[Immunities: Instant Death]

"I don't even know where to begi-"

[After becoming human, you have lost your Evolutionary Tree skill, and all of your immunities have become resistances instead.]

[You may select your starting class. What do you choose?]

*Even with a body, Sprite seems to use telepathy to relay information from the System.*

"Wait a minute! Let me soak this in! Sprite, tell me about my new skills."

[Class Evolution - Humans have the option of going to a World Totem, granted to the land by the gods, to choose their class. Most humans receive a single class of the commoner rank, but some have a couple of options. Once fulfilling specific requirements, a human may 'Rank Up' to a different, more powerful class. Class Evolution will show you the requirements for your next Rank Up and remove the need to visit a World Totem.]

[Mind's Eye has evolved into World's Eye, providing you with information about the world at a glance.]

[Limiter Release - for one minute, you release your physical and magical limits, multiplying your strength and dexterity by two. After use, you will be paralysed for an hour. For every second over one minute, you will be paralysed for an additional hour.]

"That last skill could be dangerous. Why are my stats so low?"

[Monsters are the only creatures with absurd HP and Resistance values. Humans rarely have over one hundred HP, and both dwarves and elves only occasionally reach those numbers. You have no MP due to not having a class. Usually, amour provides defence for humans, and enchanted equipment, potions, or spells provide Resistance. Whatever you infused our bodies with, though, gave us around one-hundred defence and some natural resistance to magic.]

"Ah, so that's the outcome of the slab being mixed with our bodies..." Gerard pinched his arm to test the toughness, but it felt no different than usual.

"Your strength being what it is, you won't notice the difference, but the average human would."

"I see. By the way, monsters are insane! I thought it was strange that humans could die so easily, but I could take damage until my HP reached zero. It's monsters that are the freaks."

"Indeed, and you were a freak amongst freaks." Sprite fiddled with the hem of her robe. Gerard could see Sprite's skin through the hole the demon in the swamps created when it pierced Gerard's heart.

*Maybe being undead wasn't so bad after all. Class Evolution!*

An extensive list appeared with dozens of classes.

"I'm not reading through that. Sprite, please remove any classes that would one day stop the growth of my abilities or make me immediately hunted by humans, elves, or dwarves. Also, filter out any that would eventually restrict my use of weapons, spells, or equipment."

[What if a class restricts you from the beginning but becomes more versatile than any other?]

"That sounds perfect. So, I would need to survive long enough to unlock my potential? I've been doing that from the moment I appeared in this world. What is the class?"

[Villager - Villager is the base class assigned to those who never choose a class or have no classes to choose from. You cannot use anything deemed by the WORLD as a weapon. You cannot use anything deemed by the WORLD as a skill. You cannot use anything deemed by the WORLD as magic. For every level you reach at a multiple of 5, you may choose another class to specialise in from a selection of commoner classes. After each selection, experience gained will be shared between all of your classes.]

"Villager, hey? It sounds completely worthless, to begin with. So I can't pick up weapons or learn magic or skills?"

[That's not the case. You cannot use a weapon for its primary purpose, and you cannot use magic or skills, but you can learn them.]

"Okay, does this mean I can have six classes right now?"

[No. Choosing extra classes is based only on your villager level. Remember how I said you were one-of-a-kind? This is what I meant. You are the only being in the world with two different levelling values. When someone receives a class, any experience gained before that moment is transferred into their chosen or designated class, but this does not seem to be the case with you.]

"I'll have the strength of a level 31 human, with no access to weapons, skills, or magic? Game on."

Gerard smiled.

"I choose the Villager class."

[Gerard Blythe - Level 31 Human - Level 1 Villager]

"It feels like my life in this world has only just started."

"But it hasn't."

"I know. But there's just one more thing."

"What?"

"I'm starving!" Gerard held his stomach and groaned.

"Is that what this pain is?" Sprite giggled.

"Sorry, Sprite, I forgot. I haven't eaten during this reincarnation. These bodies have nothing to fuel themselves. Come on, and I'll treat you to your first meal."

"Yay! I hope eating food is as good as you make it out to be!"

He looked at Sprite, her slender legs poking out of the robe.

"First, we'll get you some clothes."

"Do I need them?"

"Well, people will look at you if you walk around like that. You'll also get cold, and I don't know if you can get sick, but we don't have money for medicine."

"You don't have any money at all."

"Right! I can't buy you any clothes!"