Over the next year, Brennan began to notice his mother acting rather… strange, to say the least.
Quick glances at him when she thought he wasn’t looking. Hugs that would last longer than usual. Reminders that she would always be there for him no matter what. Words about cherishing his time with loved ones. Individually, he wouldn’t think much of these gestures, but they added up. And he was starting to get a little bit creeped out as he began to notice her behavior was only getting more intense as time passed.
At first, he’d thought it was about his refusal to the suggestion of getting a teacher, though when asking for confirmation, she would deny it and quickly change the topic. It was odd behavior, considering she had generally been receptive to his attempts at dialogue in the past.
One evening, he had tried to corner his father in order to get the truth out of him. While George was a lot more relaxed about most things including this, he didn’t offer any explanations, content to tell Brennan to “let the worst of it pass.”
Something was going on here, he just didn’t know what.
The last few months in particular felt more tense than they should whenever he was home. On the surface, everything looked fine, but Doris just got a bit too into what they were doing at any given point. If he had Agnes over, she would treat it like some grand occasion instead of a random afternoon. During dinner, she never failed to ask him if he wanted seconds before anybody else, even when he made it clear he wasn’t that hungry to begin with.
Junia noticed the odd behavior as well, and wasn’t keeping secrets from him. Unfortunately, she didn’t know what caused Doris to act this way either. Not to mention his sister was busier with work these days after receiving her Class, giving her less time to pursue the matter of a suspiciously zany mother.
Maybe that applied to him, also, at least to a degree. He couldn’t devote that much time to his mother’s weirdness, because he had skills to grind. And on that front, multiple major milestones now decorated his status as proof of his efforts.
[Lucent Comprehension (Uncommon) Lv. 60] -> [Lucid Integration (Rare) Lv. 7]
The most straightforward upgrade was that to his first fused skill, which he’d steadily leveled by using it at every opportunity. Every. Opportunity. He had even started using it on blades of grass to try and discern how many people had recently stepped on them.
To say he was scraping the barrel was an understatement. It had taken him ten months to upgrade the skill to rare, and then four months to get six more levels, each one taking longer than the last. By now, he was pretty sure he’d bottlenecked. The ability worked excellently and improved on its previous iteration’s workings in many aspects, something that was becoming a huge problem for him because it just wasn’t advancing anymore. He’d reached the limit of what he could do with his current means, more or less.
[Multilayer Focus (Uncommon) Lv. 41] -> [Synchronic Precision (Rare) Lv. 2]
His focus skill told basically the same story. An overall upgrade to most facets of the skill, at the cost of stalling his growth hard at the next rarity. Still a success on paper, but one he would have to evaluate soon if he wanted to replicate it for the next time he leveled it all the way up—an event he hoped wouldn’t take more than a couple of years.
Synchronic Precision allowed him to concentrate harder on multiple tasks at once. Contrary to his old skill, this new one could support multiple activities of higher complexity, rather than being more rudimentary in what he could divide his attention between.
[Drawing (Common) Lv. 82] + [Mathematics (Common) Lv. 69] -> [Technical Design (Uncommon) Lv. 11]
With his lower-rarity skills, he had finally managed to secure a second fusion. This instance only took up two, yet he considered it a win all the same. It came in a moment of desperation where he stayed up late to try and draw an accurate schematic of the internal structure of his enchanted whetstone, including measurements.
The fact that he received a fusion out of it came as a shock, although he supposed his Spirit was many times higher than just about any other kid in Craswidge.
What about noble families? How easily do their children influence skill upgrades in their favor just from having a high Spirit stat? Or am I looking at it the wrong way…
Whatever the case, the work he put in made his status almost unrecognizable compared to the time of his rebirth.
Name: Brennan Kerrick
Race: Human (Lv. 0)
Class: N/A
Attributes:
STR - 10 -> 13
AGI - 14 -> 18
CON - 8 -> 10
INT - 20 -> 24
WIS - 10 -> 12
SPI - 12 -> 14
Skills:
- [Lucid Integration (Rare) Lv. 7]
The author's publication holds this chapter, whereas this copy was reproduced without permission; choosing that version supports their work.
- [Synchronic Precision (Rare) Lv. 2]
- [Calligraphy (Uncommon) Lv. 59] -> [Fluent Script (Rare) Lv. 1]
- [Sense Magic (Uncommon) Lv. 87] -> [Sense Magic (Uncommon) Lv. 99]
- [Sprinting (Common) Lv. 93] -> [Surging Dash (Uncommon) Lv. 18]
- [Technical Design (Uncommon) Lv. 11]
- [Situational Awareness (Common) Lv. 79] -> [Micro-Awareness (Uncommon) Lv. 4]
In addition to his attributes all seeing some improvement, the majority of his skills evolved to accommodate the degree of expertise he had in their respective disciplines.
Sense Magic, though, had refused to take that final leap for half a year.
He had no idea how to fix it.
The process itself wasn't even the problem, as far as acquiring magic went. Mage Classes had been known for centuries to require a mana-rich environment or direct contact with mana to unlock, and the specific methods had something to do with a mana balance. Many times now, he had tried to replicate that here, to no avail.
Another route required a specific process conducted by an established mage, the steps to which he had replicated as best he could without spotting any mistakes. The sharpening artifact should've been more than enough, so… why wasn't he getting anything?
For anyone else, the entry barrier was their missing sensory skill in order to detect mana. He didn’t suffer from that. For what reason could he have failed?
Would entering a Zone even fix him?
By technicality, his self-imposed deadline had yet to run out. Except he had no desire to play tricks on himself. He knew what the intention behind it was, and therefore he should stop holding his skill slots open. One of them became available again due to the latest fusion, meaning he had three to fill.
No. Did he have to? Maybe. Either there was something obvious he was missing, or he was lacking something important. And if he kept banking on the former, he might be pissing away his only advantage. Namely his relative skill level compared to his age group.
That led him to the choice he was unwilling to make. To shift career paths or continue chasing a dream he had slim chances of making into a reality.
Funnily enough, his first instinct told him to give himself more time. To think it over some more. Surely, someday, the answers would fall from the sky.
He listened to it. Damn him, he fucking listened to it.
There was no clean way out. Pushing it off for future Brennan to handle would be his escape, as usual. Better to distract himself with what went right.
Calligraphy marked the third and last Rare skill on his list, crossing the final hurdle late in the week prior. In terms of leveling speed, this one would likely remain the fastest. In theory, anyway. In practice, he also trained this skill the least, rendering most advantages he would've gained from a more specific skill null and void.
If he could find a worthwhile pursuit to truly dedicate it to, he would receive greater returns, but as things stood, it would stay a supplementary skill for his notations until the need arose to clear it. Outside of that, it lacked a clear purpose.
Surging Dash did not. From the moment he took Sprinting over Running, he had known he would specialize in high bursts of speed over sustained marathons. After all, his philosophy for choosing it centered around getting out of a tight spot in an emergency. A failsafe skill, first and foremost.
With the upgrade, it activated for shorter durations and with greater speed. Furthermore, he wasn’t limited to forward movement like before. He could dash to the side, backwards, diagonally, however he wanted. He'd practiced it a lot with Agnes already.
The girl had celebrated her eighth birthday with him not too long ago, and his seventh a month later. As she got older, her facial features were starting to develop more. If he looked closely, Brennan could see her nose bore a slight resemblance to her father's.
Speaking of, that man hadn’t gotten any warmer in the past year. The axe wielder still kept to himself, with the occasional appearance when he was there to pick his daughter up. Apparently, those personal appearances happened every time he was taking her out of the village; obvious environmental variety to facilitate skill development.
If Brennan had taken skills that focused more on the physical, George might have given him similar treatment, since being out in the wild would’ve had more utility for him then. Or maybe not. Since that wasn’t the case, he had no way of knowing. Besides, it wouldn’t impact his relationship with Graham Whytmere regardless.
Each time they met, he got the impression that the man was considering ripping Brennan’s head off for daring to breathe within twenty paces of his daughter or something. Then again, that could also just be how Third Strata Warriors looked in Craswidge. Slaughtering monsters for a living probably gave them that rough edge.
At the moment, Brennan guessed that entailed entering a Zone or doing things village guards did while they were in the watch post. He didn’t really care unless the situation forced them to interact. No matter what happened over there, he wanted to focus on his training for today.
Slow gains just made staying on task difficult when he knew he needed to be faster. Normally it wouldn’t have presented such a problem, but now that he felt the wall of stalled progress looming over him, levels gained much more value all of a sudden.
Micro-Awareness, the seventh skill on his list, honed in on detail as opposed to the broader situation. Contrary to the general upgrades, this one specialized in the small stuff, allowing him to leave the broader analysis to Lucid Integration. So far, the synergy hadn’t disappointed him, with this skill serving as a splendid gatherer of clues while he gained a thorough view of any given scenario when he combined them.
For instance, Agnes holding a piece of tree bark in her hand could have escaped his notice if his skill didn’t highlight that to him. What was the reason for it? Anticipation, based on what he knew of her. “What’s got you so pumped?”
Before she got the chance to answer, a rustle arrived. The wind blew in his face as a figure appeared over them. Brennan lowered the arm he’d been using to shield his head to see who it was. A village guard, and one he’d met before. It was the woman who’d recognized the runes on his drawing when he came to the watch post to report his findings from the merchant wagon years ago.
Currently, a bow hung over her shoulders, armor covering limbs and torso. No helmet, leaving her free to fix them with a stern glare. “Both of you, to the village square. Now.”
“Why?” Brennan asked, frowning.
“Royal Court Wizard visiting, all non-Classed kids need to show up. This is mandated by law,” she warned, letting him know what would happen if he resisted.
Without thinking, Brennan patted the contents of his back pocket. His newly bought knife and the whetstone felt woefully insufficient now, like trying to stop a waterfall with a handful of pebbles.
“W-what for?” His question came out despite him already knowing the answer.
The response was brief and to the point:
“Affinity testing.”