Born a Monster

I was so locked on the development point award, that I missed the initial announcement about Path of the Polymath. I mean, who wouldn’t?

To have that many development points, AND the sanity to use them?

It was tempting; I’m not certain I would have survived it.

If not, it would have taken FOREVER to earn back those points.

I tried to sit down, and discovered I was already on the floor. Oh, good.

Okay.

I could handle this.

If Lifeshaper were the first class in my System...

.....

[Unlocked Truthspeaker social class, cost 82 development points, 936 development points remain.]

And that confirmed part of the problem; when my System reset, it didn’t know what classes I had. It was easy enough to fix, going through my classes one at a time, in order.

[Unlocked Telepath psionic class, cost 0 development points, 536 development points remain.]

Okay, so if I had earned a class through work, there was no cost to register it to my System. Interesting.

It was at Lumberjack, the first of my labor classes:

[Achievement Earned: Path of the Paragon]

[You have at least one level in ten different class types.]

[Your experience divisor for multiple classes now no longer includes classes from different types.]

Well, that was great ... for a human. Because my Inherent Longevity added twelve to my divisor anyway, I felt cheated. So much effort, so much TIME...

Why did I, a nonhuman, have a System that seemed tailored for human use?

It wasn’t fair. For a few instants, I felt like smashing the System and just living without it. Rakkal was doing just fine, wasn’t he?

When my breathing slowed, there was a tentative knock on my door.

“Husband? I felt that. What is wrong?”

“You felt...” The rats were all cowering in their cage, at the corner furthest from me.

Crap.

“Come inside, help me calm the rats.”

She did so; it took more time than I would have liked.

“Was that it? Are you a Lifeshaper, now?”

“I am a Lifeshaper now.”

“With what abilities?”

“The only thing unlocked is Bloodline Sense.”

“Bloodlines haven’t been entirely supplanted with Systems. You’d be amazed at how much of a person’s leanings are decided by their birth.”

“No, I’ve seen it in the rats. They do have personalities, or at least habits. Things that can’t be explained just by their mother and their father.”

She idly tossed the rat she’d been coddling back into the exercise cage. “You are an idiot. When you want to talk about how you can use Lifeshaper to bend life to your whim, let me know.”

Calming the rats helped to calm me. Well, enough of that, classes to register in my System.

Once I had registered, and in most cases paid for, my classes, next I went for the ability traits. I expected them to be no cost, but it varied between 10 (Curiosity, my birth trait) and 30 (most of the others); if anyone reading this finds out why, please find a way to tell me.

Once all of my abilities, spells, and powers were registered, I had 36 development points remaining; I guess that was partially because of the work I’d put into gaining experience, but it wasn’t even close to a tenth of the points I’d manually earned.

Oddly, most of my skills and cultivation methods seemed to be registered.

The oldest, Omnivore, didn’t have a cost. It only showed up when I specifically asked for it.

Likewise, all the evolutions and the Goblin Transformation didn’t seem to interact with development points at all. Which was just odd, because all the normal System queries worked just fine.

What else was there?

I registered all of the System modules which had a zero cost; my System level never wavered from level one.

Hadn’t I started with a Level 0 System?

System Titles was locked behind sixty development points, but clearly I could earn and swap out titles. In fact...

[System Error. Titles not unlocked. To unlock Titles for sixty development points, focus on this message.]

So, I couldn’t even list the titles I had. I could find them by looking specifically for them by name, such as [Unapongo] being inactive and unable to be selected.

Hey, shouldn’t I have one for Sobek? I looked about, but couldn’t properly find it.

In frustration, I turned my Bloodline Sense onto my own hand. I had a sense of my mother, that same titanic presence I had from the time of my birth until the time my Maternal Biomass Loan closed. Father was... smaller? Simpler, certainly. His bloodline not mixed as deeply with other bloodlines.

It was... hey, my sense of my bloodlines was fading! No, come back! What was going on?

A quick look at the ability told me that.

[0/2 Uses Per Day.]

Of all the stupid...

No, that was fine. I had other things to do than just sit on the floor pondering my origins. Possibly later, though.

I had THIRTY-SIX development points! It was...

I set it aside; Reticule cost a hundred.

It was so tempting, though. I could just purchase a new Trait, boost one of my statistics to level four. An ENTIRE statistic...

I could boost two sub-stats, if I wanted.

There were classes close enough to unlock: Dreamwalker and Naturalist.

The former was especially tempting. Look at what I could do without the class! A professional dream-walker? What would I be able to do?

And there were skills, endless hordes of skills and subskills, some of which I used daily and others whose very obscurity teased me.

Oh, and there were recipes. Not just for cooking, but for all the crafting skills in my System.

There was a knock at my door. It was the son. “Sir, it’s time to get ready for dinner.”

“On my way.” I said, regretting the break.

The days of plentiful chicken meat were gone, and we were approaching a shortage of edible eggs as well. Normally, chickens spend only three weeks in their eggs from when they are laid; for reasons obvious to anyone who understands the seasons, this time nearly doubles in the winter.

Perhaps I should explain to those of you with milder seasons. During winter, the life force of the world dwindles as it renews. It is strongest in summer, at the end of which is the best time for reaping a harvest, although most crops have a second one just before the week of snows.

So, while food isn’t ABSENT in winter, neither is it plentiful.

Winter was also the season where the storms were unleashed on the world. It was a time for being indoors, and treasuring what resources one had gathered during the previous year. So, there were more grits than omelets for breakfast, and porridge and soups were the best we could do for dinner.

Oh, and bread. Grains keeping the way they did, there was plenty for bread, which also meant plenty for noodles, which at least the crew seemed to like. These were the simple noodles; I barely had time to cook, let alone to shape pastas.

I never understand when bards write of idle winter hours. It may seem so if one just walks around, noticing that the farms are idle. But it is during winter when they write their songs, and when people make games and wagers. It is a time for gossip... and for courts.

Which, of course, I bring up because we were invited to one.

“And which we’re free to decline?” I asked Gamilla.

“Of course not. You are a manservant, among your other classes, right?”

“I sense an intense dislike of where this conversation is headed.”

“You, ambassador, need a new suit. I, as Finance Officer, need a new suit. Your wife and Kismet need new dresses.”

“Ooh, battle skirts.” Kismet said. “Properly enruned and empowered, we can have fashion AND armor.”

“If we have time for that, ambassador.” Gamilla said.

“How long do we have?” I asked.

“Two weeks.”

“Two WEEKS?” I asked.

“Rhishi and I can make four sets of clothes in two weeks.” Kismet said.

“Only if we drop nearly everything else.” I said. “And we won’t have time for gloves or hats or slippers.”

“Silly husband, you know only boots and gloves of fine leather will do.” Madonna said.

.....

“So, since we have some velvet, and some satin, and some silk,” said Gamilla, “you two can start immediately.”

“No, we need more than just sewing kits.” I said.

“We need this stuff.” Kismet said, handing Gamilla a list.

Gamilla stroked her chin. “We can do this. How much fabric do you need?”

With a sinking feeling, I realized that exploring my System, and the abilities of a Lifeshaper, were just going to have to wait.

“We’re sure we can’t skip this?” I asked.

Kismet slapped my left eye.

Simple answers are sometimes the best. I have this answer now, as well as the lack of my Traits valuing 20 points.