Chapter - 3 - System Available

In the middle of the night, Joshua woke up to the sound of something repeatedly ringing in his mind. Slowly opening his eyes, he looked at the screen that obscured his vision.

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* [Notification] *

>>The system maintenance is over. The user can access to the system interface now.

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After staring blankly at the white letters with a crimson background for a while, Joshua woke up from his daze with joy.

"Finally!"

Raising his two small fists in the air, he exclaimed cheerfully.

'Now that I have the system, I can finally put my plans into action!'

This was the best piece of news he could ever ask for, especially since he had only a little time left.

Refusing to waste even a second, he called out to the system.

"System, can you show me my status? As detailed as possible please."

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[User<Joshua Courtner>'s statistics are as follows.]

⮞ Name: Joshua Courtner<Unawakened>

⮞ Race: Human

⮞ Age: 15

⮞ Level: 0

⮞ Titles: [Star-Crossed Child], [Third Son Of A Marquis], [Half-Entity], [First Player]

⇒●⇒ Statistics

●⮞HP(Health Points): 16/50

●⮞MP(Magic Points): 37/50

●⮞ Strength: 4

●⮞ Agility: 5

●⮞ Stamina: 2

●⮞ Endurance: 2

●⮞ Intelligence: 13

●⮞ Charm: 9

●⮞ Luck: 7

⇒●⇒ Professions

●⮞ Knowledge Of Magic <low-rank>

➢ Basic Level Progression: %27

The host can now manipulate the mana around him easier than before.

⇒●⇒ Skills

●⮞ Magic Resistance <H-rank>

Any magical interference made on the host's body will be blocked as long as the host is stronger than the caster.

●⮞ Resilient Mind <D-rank>

The user can easily adapt to unexpected changes and bounce back when things don't go as planned.

[Time Limit: 10 minutes]

●⮞ Mana Drain <G-rank>

An action that drains a target's magic points and gives it to the caster.

⇒●⇒ Bloodlines

●⮞ Noble Bloodline <Marquis-rank>

A bloodline made of the blood of it's ancestors heroic deeds.

[This bloodline shows great compatibility with the title [Third Son Of A Marquis], effects will be boosted accordingly.]

➢ Public Eye

Charm and charisma increases by a grade whenever the user receives a lot of public notice and attention.

➢ Sacrificial Mind

The user won't mind sacrificing necessary things for the greater good.

➢ Natural Elegance

The user's every movement will carry a sign of elegance and determination.

〚This body is in a weakened state due to poison and a curse casted by a <Curse Magician>.〛

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Reading it from start to finish, Joshua made sure he memorized everything correctly.

"Considering that I learned about magic and mana from the books I used yesterday, <Resilient Mind> should be my own ability."

His voice may come out as indifferent but Joshua was quite overjoyed by this fact. To tell the truth, he was actually worried about his mentality breaking down after starting his journey.

Let's be real, one side of him was a average guy from a 21st century while the other was of an abused kid's, how could one expect him to accept killing living beings easily? But now, he had a solution for that, even if it only lasts for a little time.

After dreaming happily about his future for a second, he evaluated his other stats.

"Hm.. even though my body is in such a brusque state, other than endurance and stamina, all of my stats seem to be borderline <H-> rank. I'm not even talking about how my intelligence and charm stats are exceptional compared to other ones. It's not good but not the worst situation either. This is great."

Thinking the reason for that was his bloodline, he looked back at the screen again. It wasn't such a big situation for him to dwell on it, after all.

As his eyes stopped at the last sentence, he decided to ask the system for help in this situation.

"System, can you give me more details about my weakened state?"

For a few seconds, no reaction could be seen. Just as Joshua was about to give up, the last sentence changed slightly.

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〚This body is in a weakened state due to a low-ranked poison and an intermediate-ranked curse casted by a <Curse Magician>.〛

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'Yes!'

This was the reason why Joshua was being polite with the system. Unlike normal ones, system in the game had multiple AIs that could rival humans. So, even though they would help you in what you've asked for, anything more than that would depend on the system's favorability ratings.

That's why, even though he knew the system would help him, he didn't know when.

'It seems like my demeanour is more important than I thought. Gotta take a note of that.'

Focusing back on the screen before him, his attention naturally diverted to the word 'intermediate'.

"Well, the poison can be gotten rid of immediately as long as I can sneak in the doctor's guest room since it's just a low-ranked one but the curse is a bit more complicated. Should I just buy a health potion from the system to get rid of them both?"

Just like any other, the system in [The Eternal Winter] also had a 「Player Shop」. One could buy whatever they wanted as long as they had enough <coins> either from the offline shop or online shop depending on their choice. Considering that he had the [First Player] title and the gray-ish colour the「Online Player Shop」had on it - signifying that it was unavailable-, his choice was obvious.

<Coins> were the currency used while buying things from the shop in the system. You could earn them by completing missions, killing beasts, selling items and such.

Originally, Joshua was planning on saving them to buy a weapon for himself or something like that but using a few for his health wasn't a bad idea either.

"System. Can you show me all the available health potions in the 「Player Shop」?"

This time, the screen in front of him changed without a delay. Looking at the long list of items, Joshua finally decided on one of them without much trouble.

"Let's see... this one seems okay."

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◌〔Health Potion <low-rank>〕◌ 〈200 Coins〉

A healing item that restores 50 health points when used.

Made by a ''human'' called Jasper Rhodes.

[Would the user like to buy this item?]

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Just as Joshua was about to open his mouth while nodding satisfactorily, another system message appeared right in front of his eyes even before he could say anything.

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"Displaying <Joshua Courtner>'s total amount of coins."

Coins: <1500>

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The smile on Joshua's face deepened. It seems like his first impression on the system was better than what he initially thought.

He looked back at the shop screen before purchasing the potion.

The second he did so, a small black box wrapped with a red ribbon replaced the two screens in front of him but before he could even register what happened, the box fell down to his thighs.

"-Ack!"

Caught completely off guard, Joshua couldn't help but exclaim out loud. The box was small but with the force it fell, his thighs throbbed in pain. Caressing them with his left hand, he opened the box with the other.

In the middle of the box was a potion bottle with crimson liquid in it. Opening the lid carefully, Joshua gulped it down so quickly that he choked for a second.

𝘊𝘰𝘶𝘨𝘩- 𝘤𝘰𝘶𝘨𝘩

As he wiped the corner of his mouth with the back of his hand, Joshua could feel the changes that was happening in his body as a cold and refreshing feeling enveloped his whole body.

After around 10 seconds, the feeling disappeared without a trace.

Getting up from his bed as he took off his shirt and lighted a match, Joshua stood in front of the cheval glass. From his reflection, he could clearly see that the black lines that covered half of his body were finally gone. When he checked the system, he could also see that the weakened state has disappeared completely. He was overjoyed for a second before remembering something.

"Wait... wouldn't someone notice if they see me? -Ah no wait, I was the abandoned child, forgot about that for a second."

He hit his head with his small fists as if he was ashamed about being stupid enough to think about such a thing. Yes, the Marquis and others probably knew about those 'lines' since he had them for months now but it's not like they would care to remember considering that they didn't even remember his existence for a year and a half.

"No. In the first place, a Marquis should have more than enough resources to buy a low-rank potion for his son but looking at how they left me unattended for months, they probably just chose to ignore it."

Thinking about it like that, Joshua felt his blood boiling but did his best to keep his cool. Those guys weren't worth his time. He had numerous ways to make them all suffer anyways.

'Just you guys wait...'

Firming his resolution once again, he thought about Ruby, the only person that cared about him.

"I don't want her to get hurt so I can't take her with me and I highly doubt they will fire her for my getaway like the people in most novels either. Even though I hate to admit, the march seems like the safest place for her now."

No matter how much he hated the idea of leaving his most cared one's side, he knew very well that he didn't have the power to protect his dear foster mother.

"I can still communicate with her from time to time so I should just say my goodbyes before my departure properly."

"Now, now... back to the main topic. I should have less than 72 hours till 6th October."

The day he planned on leaving the march.

6th October.

The day of his first brother, Aaron's birthday.

Yes, he planned on running away when they were celebrating his brother's birthday in the main hall with other people. Using the absence of attendants on his side of the building to his advantage, he was going to escape this hell hole. Just, before that, he planned on paying a visit to a person that will attend the birthday party.

A person that has a chance of becoming his ally and could protect Ruby if something were to go wrong.

"But before all of that..."

Putting his shirt back on as he sat on the side of his bed, Joshua murmured slowly.

"I need to get my good night sleep for fuck's sake."

Given that he either suffered from nightmares or woke up in the middle of the night because of some part of his body aching like crazy all the time, today was going to be the first night in a long time that he will get a good night's sleep and he wouldn't mind fighting the whole world for that few hours of sleep.

'No, I changed my mind. Why bother fighting when you can just sleep for a longer time? Isn't it always friendship that wins the battles in animes and such? I call this this the friendship of sleep. The whole world should just sleep together...'

As such useless and disoriented thoughts wandered in his mind, Joshua slowly drifted to sleep.

It really was the best sleep of both his lives.

/-----/

Looking at the screen in front of him as he tried to catch up with the news on the TV at the same time, Joshua was eating a sandwich made by Ruby -he wouldn't bother preparing it when he could just make a bowl of cereal- for breakfast.

Finally giving up on this multitasking, he decided to lower the voice of the TV as he looked back at the screen in front of him.

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[Viewing Joshua Courtner's Traits]

●⮞ Prodigy

●⮞ Noble Etiquette

●⮞ Instability

●⮞ Overthinker

●⮞ ■■■■■ <Locked>

●⮞ ■■■■■ <Locked>

.

.

.

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On the screen was a list of all traits, other than a few that had their names written, nearly all of them were locked.

Looking at the screen in front of him, Joshua was flabbergasted.

"[Prodigy]..?"

As far as he knew, [Quick Learner] was the trait that was given to the NPCs with a special role. However, he didn't recall hearing about a trait as [Prodigy] even when he analyzed most of the characters' backstories after the downfall. Well, his job was mostly focused on backstories and developments of characters so it wasn't that weird for him to not know about it but the trait's name was just too flashy.

"No, I am probably just overthinking about it. How am I supposed to remember everything I've ever read? Look, even the traits say so."

Trying his best to ignore those useless thoughts, he looked back at the screen and clicked on [Prodigy].

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⇒●⇒ Personality Traits

[Prodigy]

Keeps a calm and composed mind that allows one to make the best of the choices.

➢ Increases <Understanding> significantly.

➢ Increases function speed of the brain.

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Without any particular reaction, Joshua stared at the words before him blankly.

"-And that's it?"

Three simple sentences that even a kid could understand were used to describe such a grandiose title as [Prodigy]?

That was when Joshua remembered something as a smile crept onto his face.

Whatever it was a trait, skill or something else, their descriptions were both their 'usage' and their 'limits'.

For example, think about the [Basic Throwing Skill] and one of its branches, [Rock Throwing Skill].

[Basic Throwing Skill] could be used with any object as long as the specified requirement was fulfilled, which is the action of 'throwing something' in this case.

Meanwhile, [Rock Throwing Skill] could be used only if the object was a rock or one of its derivatives such as granite, diorite, andesite or more...

That being said, unlike [Quick Learner] trait which could only help one with the time it took them to learn something, Joshua knew for sure that this trait was more special which made him feel enthusiastic.

"Shall I test it out?"

To make sure about his hypothesis, he tried to recall the information he learned from 'using' the books yesterday.

Stretching his hand, he focused on following the instructions written on the book.

Even though it was his first time trying it this way, he could feel a gas-like warmth flow out from his heart smoothly. As he imagined it flowing to his palm, the warmth moved without a need for him to spend few minutes on focusing like he did before.

When he opened his eyes again, Joshua looked at the red plasma ball that was resting on his palm. It was a ball of fire that looked like it could burn everything in the room. However, it was just dancing around his hand like an excited child.

"...Wow."

He knew that this world had magic in it but seeing it with his own eyes was a totally new thrill compared to looking at it from a screen.

Waving his hand, Joshua quickly dispersed the fire.

-𝘎𝘳𝘰𝘸𝘭𝘭𝘭...

Taking the orange juice that was next to the plate fulled with sandwiches, he gulped it down in a second.

No matter how much he wanted to learn about his body, he needed to finish his breakfast first.

/-----/

"Hmm~~"

In a long hallway covered by bookshelves on both sides, a small child was looking around while murmuring what sounded like a song. From time to time, he would stop in front of a book with an interesting title and check it out but for some reason, whenever he did so, his face turned into one of a disappointment.

"Not one here either..."

This child was, in fact, Joshua. Right now, he was looking through the library to find a skill book of any types. The thing was, even after wasting a day searching, he found 3 books at most. 2 of which increased his basic magic knowledge from %27 to %48 in a single swoop while the last one was a skill book, [Stealth]. It allowed one to escape detection by others through reducing their visibility and noisiness.

It wasn't a urgent need for him but it wasn't completely useless either. Especially since he used it to sneak into the doctor's room to steal some herbs or potions that could come in handy. Normally, he wouldn't dare try any funny business but today was the last day he was going to spend in the march anyway, so it was all fine.

-And, he harvested quite a bit from that. 3 <lowest-ranked> health potions, 1 <low-ranked> mana potion, various herbs and some ointments in case he were to get injured slightly. Even if it was the <lowest-grade>, he didn't have the luxury to waste potions on small bruises. Not that he would even if he had hundreds of them.

Just as they say, once a cheapskate, always a cheapskate.

After turning for the hundredth time, he was once again greeted with the sight of books, books and books. Ah, there was also cobwebs and cracks here and there too.

Just like before, Joshua wasted no time to active [Observation], the skill he chose from the five options the systems offered. Thanks to his hard work for the past few hours, the skill was now level 2 which made it easier for him to find the treasures hidden in the march and ability books that were hard to spot in the library for some reason.

As soon as he activated his skill, Joshua's view turned black and white. Unfitting of the scene in front of him, he noticed a yellow glow in the left corner of his eye. Deactivating his skill, he pulled out the book with a brown cover that radiated a yellow glow a seconds ago.

<Basic Magic: Lightning-Series>

"Oh, finally."

The only problem was, not every book that radiated a glow was a skill book which caused in him finding only a few until now.

The moment he was about to hold the book with both his hands, a book that was next to it fell down to the floor. Before turning his attention to that, Joshua clicked on the <Use> button that appeared in front of him. Even though things were already easy for him since all he had to do was inject some mana in the book and the information would enter his brain, he learned that the system made it even easier for some reason.

As the refreshing feeling that washed his body awhole subsided, he kneeled over and picked the black book on the floor.

Out of curiosity, he wanted to check it's title but there wasn't any. Left confused, he opened the book but all he could see was some kind of drawings of a water bump made from black ink. No matter how much he turned the pages, it was the same.

"Who would publish a book like this? No, could this even be considered as a book in the first place? Or is it a children's drawing book?"

While thinking along those lines, Joshua stopped for a second.

"No wait. Why am I thinking too deeply about a children's drawing book in the first place? I swear I'm starting to become paranoid day by day..."

Shaking his head dejectedly, just as he was about to put the book back in its place a sudden idea struck him.

"Should I inject my mana in the book? I am curious about what that child was thinking when drawing the same thing for hundreds of pages. Maybe it was someone's kid in the march?"

After hesitating for a bit, he decided to take the book with him as he looked around for skill books for a while more. Just as he decided to call it a day, he heard the sound of library's door opening. The moment he raised his head to look at the person in front of him, the person called out to him first.

"Young Master Joshua!"

It was Ruby, his one and only maid. Also his foster mother, even though he probably was the only one that thought so.

Ruby had long peacock-coloured hair that was tied up to a bun and mulberry eyes.

"You know that you shouldn't call me by that title, right? What if someone hears you?"

"The guards are just shifting so nobody is around. Since when were you this talkative, huh?"

Even though her facial expressions showed that she was looking at Joshua suspiciously, Joshua knew that Ruby liked teasing with him whenever she found the chance so instead of replying, he just rolled his eyes.

Unfortunately, seeing his reaction, Ruby pinched his cheeks as she kept on teasing him. Joshua did his best to push her away while making sure he didn't touch anywhere inappropriate.

"I take my words back, I prefer being called 'young master' over to this."

Smiling slyly at the annoyed Joshua, Ruby patted his head before backing away.

"Where you just about to leave the library?"

"Uhm."

Seeing that she was back to her usual self, Joshua fixed his expression as they left the library together.

"-Oh, you're taking a book with you? That's unusual."

Joshua looked at Ruby for a second before he followed her gaze. He realized that he still had the black book with him as he raised it to make it clear for her to see. Thinking nothing of it, he replied curtly.

"It seems like a random drawing book. It's nothing special."

"...Hmm. If you say so."

What followed after that was a daily talk like any other day. While talking, Joshua made sure he didn't say anything that would make Ruby suspicious or uneasy. He was already going to drop the bombshell so no matter what, he didn't want to make her worry more than that.

As they reached Joshua's room, he invited Ruby to his room. Closing the door behind her back, he took a seat in front of the coach Ruby sat.

"What is up with this solemn atmosphere?"

"Ruby."

The moment her name left Joshua's mouth, Ruby froze in place. Until now, Joshua always refered to her as 'hey' or 'you' so this came as a great shock. Before she could come to her senses, Joshua looked at her dead in the eye and finally said the words he wanted to say after a long pause.

"I- I am going to leave the march. Tonight."

Doubting what she heard for a second, Ruby could only look dumbfoundedly at the child in front of her.

"Huh..?"