“ Indeed. ” Replied John. “Let’s start with the easiest one first. On the upper part of the screen, you should see a picture of yourself. Tap on it. ”

 

Clicking on it, the picture enlarged and became a small icon of a detective on the left, and on the right side were words spread into three categories. Four, if one counted the header which displayed Daniels’s name, his race, and his alignment.

 

User Status; 

Name; Daniel West ( Age 33 )

Race; Human (Base)

Alignment;?

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Title Status; 

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Resource Status;

LEp - 33 

PP - 5

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Basic Status;

Body- 5(?) - Pending

Instinct - 5(?) - Pending

Mind - 5(?) - Pending

Will - 5(?) - Pending

Wisdom - 5(?) - Pending

Luck - 5(?) - Pending

 

“ This is? ” Speechless for a bit, Daniel laid out his first concern. “ It says, I am Human( Base). Is this implying what I think it does? ” He asked.

“ Yes. ” Replied John with a smile. “ Yes, Daniel, Humans are not the only sentient creatures in this World. As you have gained the app, you will likely meet them at some point. But if you truly want to meet them, you will need to enter the Magical World, as it’s called. ” 

“ Are we talking here about Elves or something similar? ” Asked Daniel for more confirmation. 

“ Umm, I have not been there, so I don’t know. The ones I met were; Demons and Angels. ” Said John. “You will probably meet Demons more than anything else, as I have heard that most other races are part of the Hell faction. Like I said before, while I may have traveled this road longer than you, it’s still new to me. The first time I ever met anything supernatural was 5 years ago. ”

 

Shaking his head, John left that topic. “ Let’s leave it at that, as those memories are not pleasant for me. Back to the major topic, Aside from the empty Title and Resource Status everything else should have question marks. ” Daniel nodded. “ Here, let me explain. Remember the Karma topic we had? ” Again Daniel nodded. “ There it will show you where your decisions have led you. You will be compared to others and categorized. Tap on the Alignment line. ” John said and Daniel did. Immediately a small image appeared displaying a Moral Alignment chart.

Looking at it, Daniel rubbed his chin in an unconscious action. “ This looks familiar, somehow. Ah, I remember. Is this not from D&D? I remember this as I played it as a kid? ”

“ You are right. It is the same one or one among many other versions that exist. ” Confirmed John. “ Anyway, the Alignment part of your status will display your morality to you and others. Right now it’s just a question mark as you have yet to be assessed on your starting point. That will happen the next time you take a nap. This part of the App or System, whichever one you chose to call it by, is a feature introduced into the beta version. It’s not 100% accurate to the person in question, but it’s gotten better since it was first introduced. So you can rely on it. ”

 

“Let us go with the next topic, Titles? What they are and how they function. ” Said John. “ You will need to pay heavy attention to this part in the future. The Titles are where you will gain major stat upgrades and features and they are a key feature of the Quest system. So I will leave that for that part but I will mention that it’s possible to gain Titles even without a Quest, but it's much harder. ” With some confusion, Daniel nodded and stayed quiet. “ The Resource part and the Basic stats are the core of everything. Tell me how much you have of either LEp and PP. ”

 

Taking a glance at the phone, Daniel replied. “ LEp is 33 and PP is 5. What kind of resources are they? I should mention that I imagined that something like Mana will be present? ”

 

Shaking his head, John explained. “ You neither have a bloodline nor are a part of that System. Remember what I said before. Since you gained the App from me, you will share my type of Power. ” Nodding Daniel stayed quiet. “ LEp is Life Essence points and the other one is Potential Points. I have been told that there is another one that can be acquired later but so far I do not know about it. Of the two, PP is the more important one as it is harder to gain, but Life Essence is the main resource for us. ”

“ So what are they? From the name I can guess a bit about Life Essence but Potential Points? ” Asked Daniel with intrigue in his voice.

“ PP is the reason you had that dream last night. What its true form is I have no idea, but it is through them that the Quest system functions. ” Replied John with some intrigue in his voice. “ The LEp is the main currency with which you will power your abilities. As for what it is, if you tap on it a pop-up explanation should appear. ” 

 

Hearing about that part, Daniel taped it, and a prompt appeared. 

Life Essence is the basis of all Life. Every life-form generates a small amount of it and the amount generated is measured in yearly units. The amount of generated Life Essence depends on the biomass of the life-form in question. The more biomass the life-form has, the more it generates. 

Reading it was informative but not explanatory in its functions. Next, Daniel tapped on the PP and another prompt appeared. 

Potential Points are potential that exists in one’s actions.  

 

“ Would I be wrong to say that they left the explanation about PP like that on purpose? ” Taking his gaze away from the phone and back at John, he asked him.

“ Probably. ” Replied John. “ Since you have read it, let me explain Life Essence a bit more. There are three methods of usage you will have for it. The first is by infusing your body with it. At first, it will be hard to use it but with lots of practice, it will get easier. The second way will be by using it in Ability creation and usage. That one is more automatic but since it’s part of the Power system, which you will see soon, it’s much more responsive to your thoughts, albeit with restrictions. And the last one will be through spending it in the perks shop. ”

“ Really? There is a shop where I can trade my Life for perks? ” Hearing about a function like that was not pleasant. As if I had not already sold my Soul, now I can treat my Body like a farm.

 

“ Basically, yes there is. ” Replied John. “It’s not as bad as it sounds. Right now they are more like basic things. ” With a motion of his right hand, Daniel hurried John to explain. “ Remember how I explained Life Essence usage? Basically, there is the Manual and Automatic way. With the manual way, you need to learn how the body functions and through Life Essence to influence it. So you can understand what the Automatic one does immediately. As an example, since I can’t show you what I have, I will tell you an excellent one, the No Progeny Perk. ”

 

Blinking a few times, Daniel repeated what he heard. “ No Progeny Perk? So, if I am understanding this correctly, with that perk you can no longer have children? ”

“ Yes. ” Smiled John. “ I can have sex all I want without worry about fathering babies. There is a twin to it for women, the No Babies Perk and No Period Perk. The best part, there are no side effects for either man and woman and if you decide you don’t want it anymore, you can just cancel it and activate it whenever you want. ”

“ Ok, that sounds much less nefarious than I imagined at first. Are you sure there are no side effects and how much does it cost? ” Asked Daniel again.

“ I am sure, as for the cost. ” He hesitated for a second but still said it. “ It takes 1 LEp for the initial cost and 0.1 for the maintenance cost per year, for men I mean that is. For women, it’s more expensive. The No Babies Perks is the same but the No Period Perk is 2 LEp for the initial cost and the maintenance is the same, at 0.1 per year. So overall they pay more but from the women I have recruited, all of them said that it was worth it. Now, I am not a woman so I don’t know how much better that is for them, but I can imagine it. ”

“ Right, so if I understood correctly. If I learn to control Life Essence directly and its effects on the Body I can have all that but the price is my sweat and the time to learn it? ” To that John nodded. “ Then I can already tell which one I will work on. ”

“ Haha! ” Laughed John and tried to drink more beer. Noticing it was empty, he spoke. “ Oh, the beer is gone. You want one too? ” He asked Daniel.

Looking at his bottle, which was only half empty, he shook his head. “ No. ” 

 

Nodding, John ordered for himself. Soon it came. “ We can leave the perk shop for later, let’s finish what we started. ” He said. “ I think the only thing left now is the stats. I am sure you have been wondering why it’s showing a 5 and a question mark beside it. ” Daniel nodded. “ Similar to the Alignment part, they haven’t been assessed. Unlike the Alignment though, these will depend on you. When we finish here, go to a gym and exercise the shit out of yourself, and depending on your body and its physical ability, a number will show up.  ”

“ Do the others follow the same mechanism? ” Asked Daniel.

“ Mostly, although it’s easier for the physical attributes, Body, Instinct, and Mind. ” Replied John. “ The stats are specialized because of the Power system we use in the future. Body is the overall physical fitness. It’s influenced by many things but it’s easy to get the hang of. Instinct has to do with the body’s nervous system. Better said, it’s the reflex and coordination system of your entire body, the senses included. It’s quite complex, but not as much as Mind. Mind is the specialization of the Brain and its processing power. In simple terms, the bigger the number here the more one uses one’s brain actively.”

 

“ You know I remember there is a theory that humans only use 10% of their brainpower. ” Daniel commented. “ Many have disclaimed the theory. Any chance it has to do something with that? ”

“ I have to admit that you’re not the only one asking me that. ” Said John with a frown. “ So I had looked into the idea but it’s mostly a stupid theory from the last century. The human brain works at 100% capacity all the time. The problem, however, is that that capacity is automated and cannot be accessed or repurposed. ”

“ And that is where Life Essence comes in? ” Asked Daniel.

“ Yup. With Life Essence, one can directly command one’s brain to work on something. ”  Confirmed John but then added. “Normal people can too with enough training, at least to some degree. The number that will be shown on the App embodies that. ” 

“ So the higher the number, the better I can control my brain’s processes. Interesting, what does the number 5 represent? ” Again Daniel asked.

“ Imagine a fully healthy adult Human at about the age of 30. From what I have read it is after that point that the body starts degrading somewhat. At that age the Human stats when tested will have an average number of 5. ” Explained John. “ All that relies on the fact that the body in question is used. If it’s not it degrades in performance no matter the age. ”

“ Ok, and the other 3? ” 

 

“ The other 3 are much harder to explain and affect. ” Said John. “ Umm, what did you get, Charisma or Luck? ”

“ Luck? ” Came the answer from Daniel.

“ Ah. ” Pausing there for a second, John continued. “ The other 3 depend on the personality of the individual and how their personality affects themselves and those around them. For example, if your Charisma is higher than, it’s much more likely that people will like you or there is a much greater chance that you can affect them. It doesn’t matter if it was through pure physical quality or one’s mannerism, as long as you can affect those around you, there will be a number representing that for you. Luck, on the other hand, I have no idea what it does or how it affects yourself or others. As usual the higher the number the better it is but unlike Charisma I have no idea how to increase it. ”

“ And how do the numbers work? Is there a limit I need to workaround? ”

“Yes, the magic number here is 10. ” Replied John.

“ 10? Somehow that seems very low? Can that number be exceeded? ” Asked Daniel?

“ I have been told It’s possible. How to achieve this, I do not know. ” Again a frown came to John when he answered. “ You see, the numbers that you see there on your App are the biological baseline numbers for the Human species. ”

“ Understood, and the last two stats? ” 

“ Will and Wisdom. ” Sighed John at those two and took a sip of the beer before going on. “ They are the vaguest to me. Ever since I got the App I had been pondering on everything, but those two were quite the unknown to me in the beginning. So once, when I was recruiting somebody and Makta came, I passed on that question to her. Here is what she told me. Will is the base of consciousness and Wisdom is the structure on top of it. ”

 

“ That makes no sense to me? ” Commented Daniel.

“ Neither it did to me, so I asked for a simpler explanation. ” John added. “ It goes like this. Strip everything that you are, your wants, your dislikes, even your emotions, and you get the basest of the basest, the Will. Once you can identify your own Will, then start adding back layers that represent your wants, your likes, your emotions, and whatnot. The layers represent Wisdom one has added to oneself. Hence, it is Wisdom that leads and makes decisions for one’s Life. ”

 

“ Wait! ” Daniel raised his hand. “ I remember hearing about that in college. Was there not a scientist in the 17th century I think? Umm, what was his name again? L, L, Lo. ” 

“ John Locke. ” Struggled Daniel but his friend who also had the name John smiled and finished for him. “ You are right. He was the one that created that theory, at least as far as I have read. And if I am being honest, I looked him up because we had the same name. ”

“ Right, since you had more time to think about it, tell me the result of that? ” Urged Daniel.

 

“ Here is my interpretation of it. ” Nodded John. “ If one’s Will is high, then that Will, will drive one forward no matter how one’s personality is structured. Whether one is doing Good or Evil, one will get far in life, probably. Wisdom, on the other hand, indirectly depends on Will as it determines the sheer scale of one’s personality. The higher the number, the broader your personality, and the harder it is to get shortsighted on one’s goal or goals. How that broadness is materialized depends on the person but already you can see the benefits of having both in higher numbers. ”

“ The problem with them is that it’s hard to identify those parameters. ” Added John. “ Usually it’s only perceivable by others, in the actions that we do in life. For that reason, the next time you sleep, an outside source will assess you. If it went the normal way, it would take far too long. ”

 

Hearing an outside source a suspicion came to Daniel. “ Let me guess, that source will be Makta or another of her kind? ”

Shaking and nodding at the same time, John answered. “ No, their ancestor will do it, Mobius. He is the first of their kind, as for the method itself. Well, it has to do with dreaming and anything beyond that is well beyond me. All I can tell you is that it will be a long night for you. ”

 

Great, more Eldritch getting inside me.