Much much later, after a good amount of crying and sitting on the ground, Mia and Catnip both got up and finally headed out of that particular alleyway. Catnip briefly wondered if anyone could have overheard their conversation and if they did how they would react to it, but it probably wasn’t an issue. Probably. Catnip should kind of get one of those isekai silent conversation spells at some point.
Mia indicated for now that she wouldn’t say anything about her gender as of yet, nor change her current presentation. As she’d briefly noted during their conversation, her ‘stealthy rogue class’ involved things like skill-enhanced disguises which could theoretically be used to make her appear much more feminine or maybe even pass, but Mia was still figuring that out along with how she’d explain herself to the rest of the party. She planned to tell the party before they left this border town, 3 days from now, but for now she needed to prepare herself and think about things. Catnip thought that was entirely fair, as being transgender is the kind of thing that completely uproots your entire life - not that Catnip would know or anything. Either way, Catnip informed Mia that if the misgendering ever got too bad she could come to them for a bit of hugs and comfort. Hopefully Flora wouldn’t get too jealous, though Catnip would make sure to reassure her that she still had the best cuddles.
They were rather proud that they had on some level managed to connect with two out of the 3 main members of their team, even if that tragically excluded the most competent member of the party - Frank. Other than vaguely knowing him as the ‘responsible’ member of their party, Catnip knew nothing about him - and that couldn’t do at all! The power of friendship could only reach its true potential once all members of a given group had bonded after all. Though Frank likely actually was a man, so they couldn’t quite achieve true perfection as a magical-girl group connected by the bonds of questionably platonic love. Not that Catnip wasn’t already messing that possibility up by being the fake girl they were, but whatever. Their train of thought had clearly derailed dramatically ages ago, they needed to focus on befriending Frank instead of imagining theoretical reality where their party formed a magical girl group after Frank miraculously also came out as transgender. No matter how entertaining the images they’d conjured up based on said scenario were.
After randomly snickering over the nonsensical thoughts in their head, Catnip found themself walking together with Mia towards some shop that sold ‘shiny stones’ where Flora had mentioned they planned to go. Catnip had to say, as they looked from the outside in through some display windows, they did indeed see numerous stones that were shiny. Some people had looked at them weird as they walked through the town's worn stone brick roads as they both very clearly had tear stains running down their faces in a dramatic manner, having not bothered to clean them, but it wasn’t a big deal. Catnip did note that this area had slightly more sapient species than elsewhere so far, most of the people they passed were humans, but there were a few that seemed Dwarven and one person that seemed almost reptilian. There were also several motionless Gargoyles they passed by, but Mia didn’t know about them and Catnip wasn’t about to break their cover against their earlier promise. It intrigued Catnip how Mia’s gaze just slid right off of them.
“What the hell happened to you two?” Flora questioned as they both walked through into the store. She was off to the side in a section reserved for stones with magical affinities, having been looking through them before they got here. It was actually kind of amazing that she was still in the store after how long their talk had taken.
“Heartfelt conversation,” Catnip explained. “We have ascended in our friendship levels.”
“Hey wait a minute, he better not have passed my friendship levels with just one conversation!” she exclaimed, actually seeming to notice Mia’s small wince upon being misgendered.
“Na you’re good, you're my bestie Flora. They’re just my second bestie,” they explained.
“Yeah, uh, we’re um, friends now I guess,” Mia said quietly. Since the earlier conversation, Mia had been clearly avoiding speaking in lower and more masculine tones, mostly just resulting in her speaking more quietly.
“Cool! Did you guys share a blood pact yet?” she asked, “Wait a minute, why on earth haven’t we shared a blood pact yet Catnip? Come on, blood and friendship? The perfect combination. How did I not think of this before!”
“My god! You’re right? Blood sisters or something else?” Catnip said dramatically. “But wait, first we must spill each other's blood, sweat, and tears for a true pact!”
“Umm that sounds concerning….” Mia mumbled
“Ha! Clearly she means we must spar, comrade! You’re welcome to join us!” Flora replied excitedly, “Lemme just buy this shiny green stone real quick.”
“Uh, okay, um I guess I’ll join you girls in sparring then,” Mia replied quietly, looking a little nervous.
“Hmm, I really do need to do this by the way,” Catnip realized, “I uhh, have yet to really do any actual fighting, haven’t I? So um, I don’t really know how to fight at all?”
“Oh yeah, true.”
Catnip had not been completely idle during all the traveling. Occasionally they had thrown some rocks at some of the minor enemies the group defeated, and they had even tried getting close and personal a couple of times, trying an unarmed style by slashing at enemies with the retractable claws that seemed to come with their species. They looked a tad odd on their more human-like hands, but that wasn’t going to stop Catnip from using them. But none of this had earned them much since they still had yet to take a class, and the classes they did unlock weren’t much to look at so they didn’t take them yet. Randomly spamming identify at things had at least allowed that to level that quite a bit. And they did earn one health, strength, and speed point from all the walking, the endurance of it apparently translating to working on those stats.
Brawler[Rank 0]:
- 15% more damage from unarmed fighting. Congrats you have achieved the most basic method of attacking, punching things. And you’re also doing it kind of badly.
- 1 strength, health and free stat per level
Feline Fighter[Rank 0]:
- Your claws deal 5% more damage, you are 5% more flexible and 5% faster. Your balance is better as well. Fight like a cat, mostly pretty badly, but still. Cat fights can be pretty intense.
- 1 strength, speed, health, and free stat per level.
Feline fighter was interesting enough, but Catnip still felt it was pretty weak for them. Sure, it sounded a little interesting and added better stats then all the other unlocked classes, but it was still very, very basic. You only had two class slots for a very long time, and switching a class out reset all its levels, although any stats gained from leveling up that class stayed. Any class you then switched to wouldn't even grant you any more stat points until you reached whatever level you had been at previously in your other class, sucking away experience with no actual gain, and Class skills were rest as well. System ‘patch notes’ that Catnip found at one point via the ‘System Settings’ tab that could be accessed by just thinking ‘System Settings’, something Catnip did entirely on accident when thinking about their laptop back on earth, did inform them that stat points and switching classes used to work differently, only preventing new stat gains for leveling up a previously leveled class, but had been changed for good reason after a ‘user’ abused this by continually leveling and switching classes to earn stats infinitely. Catnip wondered if the system still had similar exploits these days that they could perhaps comedically abuse to become far too overpowered, but they didn’t bet on it. Or at least bet on being able to find one themself, any long enough code had weird glitches and unintended ‘features’ really, bugs were an inevitability of the coding process.
Wait a minute.
Exploits or not, they still could just switch whenever they gain a class they actually liked while only losing the skills and levels in a class they didn’t care about much. And yes, while doing so would then lead to wasting experience on leveling a new class that wouldn’t grant any new stat points until they reached their prior level, not having a class at all was currently wasting experience just as much - wait nevermind, ‘System Settings’ mentioned experience being stored until they had a class. Still, waiting for some rare class that offered them the ‘perfect’ stat growth would take who knows how long while leaving Catnip mostly powerless stats wise too, which while unimportant for their own safety due to their immortality, could lead to numerous situations where Catnip’s weakness prevented them from saving others. So…
Why the hell hadn’t they selected a class yet?
While Flora was still haggling with the shopkeep for her shiny stone, Catnip immediately put on Feline Fighter. They kept the second class slot open, although the thrower class was also nice, because they wanted to have a slot to immediately put a good class in if they unlocked one.
Ding! You have Selected Feline Fighter
Ding! Stored experience goes to Feline Fighter
Ding! Feline fighter to lvl 5!
Ding! You may select a class skill for Feline Fighter
As far as they could tell, a rank 0 class could only have one class skill in use. However, there were several to choose from.
Skill: Sharp Claws[Rank 0 Skill]:
- Your claws deal 15% more damage and can extend slightly further. You may briefly infuse your claws with mana to make them somewhat stronger. Self explanatory idiot.
Skill: Feline Instincts[Rank 0 Skill]:
- You can very vaguely detect danger. Very very vaguely. Your reaction time is slightly faster. The most basic dangersense skill in existence, but still useful. Note: You’re still an idiot.
Skill: Feline Haste[Rank 0 Skill]:
- You can move 5% faster, and you may briefly infuse your body with mana to move slightly faster, depending on the amount of mana used. Not nearly fast enough to do just about anything but fast enough to feel slightly better about yourself.
Catnip chose Feline instincts because even if it was weak, it was still a variant of dangersense. They couldn’t die, so it wasn’t going to be some super ‘barely saves you from death by noticing danger slightly sooner’ kind of skill, but it should probably be useful. After all the level ups, they also used some free stat points to make their stats more balanced.
Name: Catnip
Species: Catkin
Gender: cracking egg??
Sex: Female
Titles: Otherworlder, Death Defying.
Class: Feline Fighter[Rank 0] lvl 5/200
Class skills - Feline Instincts lvl 1/200
2nd Class: None
Class skills - None
General Skills:
Identify lvl 18/350
Undying lvl 4/100
Pain Resistance lvl 6/100
Throwing lvl 14/150
Punching lvl 2/150
Claw Slash lvl 8/300
Stats:
Health: 17/17
Mana: 18/18
Strength: 16
Speed: 17
Mana regeneration: 1.8 per minute
Health regeneration: 4 per minute
Unspent Stat points: 10
Available classes:
Thrower[Rank 0]
Brawler[Rank 0]
Feline Fighter[Rank 0] in use
Catnip was finally feeling like they were in a real litrpg isekai world. Well, not really. They didn’t know much about stats but they were pretty sure they were balanced but kind of garbage, especially for their age. And they were also pretty sure that this was a world where stats were only part of the battle, as according to the all knowing Frank your ability to utilize your skills and actual skill at fighting were equally if not more important than stats. And Catnip had never used basically any of their skills, and had no skill at fighting. Surely nothing could go wrong. The gender thing changing again was kind of odd. They still didn’t get why their gender would be anything related to eggs, and now cracking ones.
“AGH!” Catnip cried when Flora suddenly appeared in front of their face. Or rather, they actually had been there for like 5 minutes but Catnip had been so absorbed in their system that they didn’t notice.
“Finally working on your actual stats and classes Catnip? Took ya long enough!” she said, grinning.
“Ohhh” Mia said quietly in the background, having been vaguely concerned by Catnip staring into space for quite a while now. She had poked them a few times and they just didn’t react.
“Yeah, I realized that I’m stupid,” Catnip explained in full.
“Oh, yeah we know that already. You are indeed stupid.” Flora replied, nodding.
“Thanks for the glowing review. But I mean, stats from leveling up a class are kept even if you replace the class, at least the first time, and I really need stats to survive in an adventuring party, yet I somehow decided my best course of action for like 2 weeks now was to just not select a class until I got a better one,” they actually explained.
“Oh. Yeah that makes sense. I hadn’t considered that, I’ve never had to switch my classes up much at all,” Flora replied in a thoughtful manner. “I just had the classes I wanted to pick by the time my system unlocked.”
“Same” Mia said so quietly you could barely hear it.
“Why didn’t Frank tell me anything?” they complained.
“Because uhh - you like only talked to him once, then occasionally annoyed him with questions?” Mia explained in a slightly louder voice than before, searching for her ideal ‘voice that’s loud enough to be heard but not too masculine.’
“Yeah, gonna be honest blood bestie I’m pretty sure you just kind of asked him things then left immediately, and didn’t give him much chance to explain much else. He hasn’t had the chance to explain system mechanics in detail,” Flora remarked, putting her hands behind her head. “Anyway, are we gonna go beat the shit of each other or what?”
“Yeah, sounds good,” Catnip replied, Mia just fidgeting awkwardly instead of responding.
“Alright!” Flora exclaimed and immediately grabbed Catnip’s hand, dragging them off into another part of town where presumably they had an area for sparring or training or something. Her hand was still nice and warm.
___
Mia watched the two as they walked a bit, then started following. She found it astounding how much Catnip managed to hide beneath the surface. Right now, she looked perfectly fine and happy, hand in hand with a friend and joking around. But… She hadn’t forgotten what she had seen and promised in that alley. How could this light hearted girl skipping about with Flora also believe herself the worst person in existence deserving of no happiness? It was hard to fathom. Regardless, she would be the best support she could for Catnip, because my god was she in need of it. Hopefully she truly opened up to Flora someday as well. Mia didn’t know quite why, but she had a feeling that if anyone could help Catnip, it would be Flora.
__
They eventually found a small training area next to the Freelancers building. Freelancers were basically this world’s equivalent of adventurers, the building having all the classic things like requests and ranks and stuff. The group had picked up the original escort request from the Freelancers' place in one of Alvaria’s more populous cities on the eastern side, controlled by Lady Dacre’s family. Noble ranks in this world didn’t really bother with fancy classifications, everyone were just Lords and Ladies regardless of the amount of area they oversaw, though still ranked among themselves based on wealth and land. This sadly meant there was no otome isekai classicTM Duke of the North to romance, but this wasn’t an otome isekai anyway. Probably. It was entirely possible someone at the academy the Lady was heading to got reincarnated as a villainess or something and was now having their own epic isekai story, Catnip wouldn’t put it past this world to have something like that. Their own isekai adventure kind of started at random after their death, random isekai adventures were likely just a somewhat rare occurrence in this world. Perhaps some others did get here via reincarnation instead of Catnip’s very basic dropping off in the middle of nowhere start.
poke, “Catnip? Aeternus to Catnip? You there?” Flora said, poking them again.
“Wait, but what the hell is Aeternus?” Catnip responded once they were out of their stupor.
Flora looked at them like they were a total idiot. Even Mia did, though she tried to hide it to be polite.
“That’s literally the name of our planet. How the hell did you not know it?” Flora said flatly.
“Oh, cool. Uh, I just come from a very different place, so I’ve never heard the name before.”Catnip said awkwardly. With context, they now realized Flora had essentially been saying “earth to Catnip” earlier, or at least this world's equivalent of that phrase. Interesting that such a similar saying developed with only the name of the planet replaced.
“Clearly. Now, face me in the heat of battle, comrade! Fist to fist! Don’t worry, Jacob knows a bit of healing magic, so we can fight without worry!” Flora exclaimed dramatically and walked over to an area clearly reserved for fighting or duels. Mia flinched upon hearing Jacob, but then seemed to try to gloss it over and nodded to Flora, showing that yes, she would heal them if needed.
“I accept your challenge, sister of mine! Just be aware, I have no clue what I’m doing!” Catnip cried dramatically and stood across from her, not even bothering to try to fake a combat stance. “Now, on 3!”
“3” Flora replied and immediately charged at Catnip. But Catnip had anticipated her deception! It just seemed like the kind of thing Flora would do, attacking early via a technicality in wording! Catnip matrix swerved out of the way of Flora’s punch, and attempted to attack back rather feebly with claws. Flora literally just moved slightly out of the way then punched Catnip in the face before they could react and immediately knocked them down.
You have taken 5 damage!
“Uhh, Catnip, I thought it would be harder than -” Flora started before being interrupted by Catnip crawling forward and pathetically grasping at their legs, trying to pull Flora down with them. Flora reacted at the last moment, moving out of the way of the and responding with a last minute kick to Catnips stomach. Catnip tried to evade, vaguely feeling something with their new Feline Instincts skill that alerted them to the attack, but they were kind of on the ground so instead they just took another hit.
You have taken 10 damage!
This was pretty pathetic, Catnip literally had 2 health left. And they showed it. Catnip’s face was a bloody mess and the hit to the stomach had severely damaged several organs to the point that it was clear they were just about dead. Flora looked a bit concerned, and started to reach a hand down to them when they struck, swiping quickly at Flora’s legs before she could react, claws slashing through her pants and drawing a bit of blood.
“FUCK! My pants!” She cried, and went to retaliate before looking at Catnip again in concern, who was now curled into themself on the ground after managing that last slash, feeling the pain of Flora’s earlier kick. “Shouldn’t you, like, surrender? Plus I realize we forget we can’t heal clothes-”
“No,” Catnip wheezed out, pushing themself off the ground and trying not to look pathetic. “I can take it. Continue.”
“Wait!” Mia cried out from the side, “There’s no way you can! Listen to your healer!”
“Na, it’s fine. It’s really hard for me to die,” Catnip said. They were technically lying, but it didn’t really matter. They wouldn’t stay dead for very long.
“If you say so,” Flora replied doubtfully before immediately dashing forward again, sending another punch Catnips' way and following up with another punch when they dodged the first one. It was very clear Flora wasn’t much of a melee combatant, her technique lacking, but she was still far better then the utterly unprepared Catnip.
The second punch went wide however, Catnip lurching to the side on purpose, their Feline Instincts giving them a slight warning that they now knew how to properly recognize and react to. Catnip didn’t know anything about fighting, but maybe they could sort of fake this fight with the skill.
Sensing that there was no way they wouldn’t get hit if they tried to retaliate, Catnip retreated into something resembling a defensive stance as Flora pressed the attack, throwing a feint only to really attack with a low sweeping kick which Catnip barely avoided.
“Ha, now that’s the spirit my kitty comrade!” Flora exclaimed while starting to grin, throwing onslaught after onslaught of punches, Catnip barely escaping each attack with their danger sense in increasingly weird ways, eventually leaving them unbalanced. Flora saw the opening and sent a hard kick at their stomach again, Catnip’s momentum carrying them into the hit even as their danger sense warned them. They crumpled over and spat out blood, falling to the ground with a sickening thud.
Congratulations, you have died!
Undying Lvl 5!
Flora looked at Catnip, eyes wide as she swore she saw the light in Catnips eyes fade away. She stared at the body in pure disbelief.
“Ahhh… JACOB, FUCK HEAL HER!”
Mia started to run over, panicked, only for Catnip to suddenly lurch forward and slash at Flora weakly from behind. Causing her to turn around in, face full of relief despite the pain in her legs.
“FUCK, HOLY FUCK, don’t scare me like that!” She cried, “Take it my ass!”
“I… told you… I could…” Catnip managed to whisper out, despite still being dead. They had pushed the undying skill pretty hard there for that last slash, the low level of the skill not allowing much of its ‘dead movement’ option. Though they sensed they could push it more, maybe with a bit of mana…
Mia rushed to Catnip, reaching her fortunately right after Catnip managed to stop being dead via regeneration, now only mostly dead. They didn’t know how Mia would react to them literally being a body.
“Catnip, yo-you're almost dead,” Mia said with worry, “This- this…”
“Catnip.” Flora said, walking over and lifting them up and staring into their eyes with conviction unseen before “Catnip, I love you, but holy shit, yo- you can’t scare us like that. That… That was me going easy girl. With a way of fighting that wasn’t my speciality.”
Catnip stared back at her blankly.
“Are you… How the hell did you survive this long in the middle of nowhere? I… this is nothing compared to the danger our party will inevitably face…” she continued in a quiet, shaking voice. “Is it, is it really safe for you to travel with us?”
Catnip continued staring, coughing up a bit of blood a second later as they moved to stand on their own. This was an isekai, right? No matter how much it seemed to suck sometimes. So… even as pathetic as they knew they were, they had almost half believed that they’d show some vague fighting talent or something. But Catnip hadn’t at all, and they realized it had been entirely silly in the first place to think so. This world just didn’t feel real, especially since they always knew they faced no actual danger, being unable to die. It was so easy to forget in these last few weeks the harshness of everything.
Despite this being a dangerous world with stats, Catnip had spent almost no time on training theirs. They hadn’t learned to fight in the weeks they had traveled with their party, they hadn’t participated in battles any more than throwing rocks pretty much, they… simply hadn’t tried. If you discounted their simple ability to not die permanently, they had nothing to offer the party.
“I… I’m weak, I know it. But, I think I can get stronger. And I promise you, I won’t die.” they eventually said. “I don’t think I’ve taken this seriously till now in some ways. Danger doesn’t feel real to me for reasons, and it was so easy to just travel with yall as friends. But, I, I need to start trying. Will yall help me?”
Flora stopped holding their shoulders and Mia stopped trying to examine the damage, glancing at them both worryingly. Catnip could tell they were both conflicted, wanting them to stay since they were basically friends at this point, but now fully aware of just how unable to defend themself Catnip was. They needed one last push to prove they could keep going.
“Look..” the cat girl said, having finished coughing. “I know I’m weak, and this was pretty scary, but just look at me. It’s been a couple of minutes, have you noticed anything?”
They both stared at them in confused worry. “Uhh not really, no.”
“I’m already much healthier than I was before. Give me a few more minutes and I’ll be good as new,” they continued, their voice much stronger now. “That’s my strength, I always get up. Very fast. And it’ll get faster. I’m not much in a fight, but I know I can be. Just give me a chance?”
“Okay…” Flora said quietly. “But it isn’t going to be easy.”
“I didn’t expect it to be.”
