Hiroyuki Satoyama has reached level 2!

In the days until the official sendoff, Safrim makes it his personal duty to test and train all members of our group in weapon and magic skills. He’s not a captain for nothing. With his boundless optimism, he manages to keep spirits up, even if we sometimes fail. Shilvy shows up in the evenings, but during the day she’s occupied with taking care of the refugees. Nono’s brother appears to thank me too and promises to prepare the guest rooms for our visit. He is even less conspicuous than her, which rubs me the wrong way.

Nono turns out to be an even better fire mage than she said. I have to pretend to be surprised. If she’s been sent on this mission alone, so far into enemy territory, she must be frighteningly capable. I have no doubt she could kill me with her little finger and I have to always force myself to turn my back to her so as to not make her suspicious of me. She keeps her distance from me, mostly. Still keeps calling me her saviour, though. Who doesn’t keep her distance is Karina. She clings to me like a bee to honey.

Safrim puts me through physical training as I’ve never held a weapon before. We test out several and it turns out I am technically not half bad with a short sword, but my arms lack the muscle to keep up the fight for long. He puts me on muscle training exercises. I don’t know how much I can improve in such a short time, but doing nothing is also not an option.

It is on the second evening, as the sun just sets, when I’m practicing sword swings against a wooden dummy, that I hear a high tone ringing in my ears.

[Congratulations! Hiroyuki Satoyama has reached Level 2!
Stamina +2
Strength +1
Please distribute (5) skill points]

I stare at the text in front of me like a madman. Wait. Is this like in the famous RPG that keeps getting released on every platform? I can actually level up by repeating tasks?? I look around to see if anyone else is there before speaking.

“Distribute skill points on what?”

[Please choose from the following:
Divine Appraisal]

“That’s like… only one.”

[…]

“Come on.”

[…]

“Alright, alright. Put them all on Divine Appraisal.”

[Skill points assigned to Divine Appraisal. New subskill unlocked: Age. 45 more points required to level up skill further.]

“Age? Oh, right. I’ve only ever seen their names. So can the skill level up? Can I see what possibilities there are?”

A window opens up in front of me, larger than I can comprehend. A golden dot at the bottom is illuminated, labeled Divine Appraisal. A connected dot above it is also illuminated. Age. The rest… It’s a skill tree. Only the options further up are all scrambled. I can only clearly read the one directly after age. It says Type. Wow. Not useful. I think. We’ll see. After that it splits into three branches. I can’t see which option would be good, since I can’t read further ahead.

“Any chance I can have a look at what comes after?”

[Divine Appraisal skill not high enough.]

“Are you telling me I have to level up my skill to see what I can level my skill up to?”

[...]

“Are there any other skills I can learn?”

[…]

“My god, who designed this stupid system? Probably Erya…”

I take a break and look skywards. There is no obvious reaction, no flash of lightning, no divine retribution. Maybe she can’t hear me all the time. Mhm. I could go to the temple and ask her. But honestly, I don’t want to talk to her. I’m still a bit mad about her dropping me from the sky as a joke.

There’s still time until dinner and I pick up the sword again to get back into training. Huh. It feels lighter. Is that what a level up does? So I leveled up during training. It would be great to know which actions actually make me level up. Hm. I concentrate on the sword in my hand.

[Short Sword]
Attributes: None
Durability: 7/10
Age: 15 years

Oh! I assumed age was only meant for living beings. I don’t know how this could be important, but it’s nice to know, I guess? So the practice weapon is quite old, yet still sturdy. High quality, then. I look at the weapons on the nearby rack. By concentrating a bit harder, several weapons trigger simultaneously. All are very common practice tools with ages between only months and several years. I wonder if repeatedly using Appraisal may also lead to a level up.

I look around. Every small stone on the ground is decorated with a label. Most of them are very old. The tree, the plants, the…

[Congratulations! Hiroyuki Satoyama has reached Level 3!
Stamina +2
Intelligence +2
Please distribute (5) skill points]

I knew it! I can—

Everything goes dark.

——

“Yuki! Yuki!”

Someone is shaking me, yet the world around me is black, so I can’t see who it is. My eyes hurt as if someone threw sand at them. My arms are too tired to raise them, so I have to let the tears flow freely down my face.

“Yuki!”

It’s Karina’s voice, I realise. I’m… I’m lying on the ground. I can feel the hard stone beneath me. Did I fall? I try to blink and immediately avert my eyes as I look into a bright light.

“Put the lantern to the side,” Safrim says.

There’s shuffling around me and then I feel a cool sensation pressing down on my face. It’s like ice flowing over my skin, settling into my eye sockets like a balm. I release my cramped muscles with a sigh.

“He should be better soon,” Poru says.

“Thank you,” I reply. “What happened?”

“I found you collapsed on the training ground,” Karina explans. “You were bleeding from your eyes and unconscious.”

“Bleeding??”

I muster all my strength and sit up. So those aren’t tears? They’re blood?? The cold works well and I cautiously open my eyes. My vision is blurry still.

“What did you do?” Safrim asks.

“Wait, don’t open your eyes too quickly,” Poru interjects and I feel another wave of cold. He must be healing me.

“Thank you, Poru-in. I only tried to appraise as many items as I could at the same time. I don’t know where my limit is.”

“And do you know now?”

“I think so.”

“Well, hopefully the knowledge didn’t cost you your sight. Without it, the skill is useless.”

“Thanks, Karina.”

“Always there to help.”

Poru puts a hand on my back and murmurs a few words. As opposed to earlier, a gentle heat flows through me and the nausea in my stomach dissipates.

“Thank you.”

“Don’t mention it.”

“To answer your question, I think 10, maybe 15 objects at the same time should still be manageable.”

Safrim looks up from where he picked up the lantern, which casts a golden light in the falling night. “Your talent is truly god-given, Hero Yuki. The very few people in history, who had the Appraisal skill, could manage 3 objects at most at the same time. How many did you look at when you fainted?”

“How many pebbles are on the ground around me? Maybe a hundred?”

“Bless Lady Erya, don’t attempt this again if you want to keep your eyesight… and your sanity,” he urges me.

I agree readily. This isn’t something I want to repeat. I look up into the night sky, where a text still floats above me, unseen to everyone else.

[Please distribute (5) skill points]

It will have to wait until I’m on my own, though I already know what I’ll be spending it on. I don’t really have a choice. Yet after this, there are three choices. I’m very curious to see what they say. First, however, dinner.

Karina helps me up and we walk together to Safrim’s study, where we’ve been eating together these days. It has not even been a week since I’ve been dropped into this world, yet these people already feel like old friends to me. It has also only taken a few days for me to get addicted to Starfruit juice. Safrim already has a chilled pitcher ready, and I drink it like water, even though I know it is incredibly rare. The taste is somewhat like papaya, but with more acidity and I crave it.

Dinner is a lively affair, during which we talk about anything and everything except the demons as a last respite before the official send off and our foray into enemy territory. We will stop at Nono’s place first, though… and to be honest, I am rather curious to see it, knowing that she is a planted spy. I wonder if she will work with us or against us when we move out to sabotage the demon army’s supply chain. I know I should call her out, but for many reasons I can’t. I hope I can find something suspicious later. If not, I can always talk to Safrim in private. He is the only one I would trust with knowing my powers apart from Shilvy. The Kal family is very trustworthy.

After the dinner I find Gale at the backdoor, washing his paws with his rough tongue. I observe the cat for a while, but he gives no indication that he has seen me. I know he has. Alright. I take a good look around and make sure no one is listening in.

“I know what you are,” I whisper.

Gale doesn’t even acknowledge my words. He keeps grooming his paw, so completely disinterested in a way that only a cat can achieve.

“I don’t care if you confirm it or not. Karina is not defenseless, but there will be times she cannot save herself and all of us will be too far away to help. I trust you to keep her safe. That’s why you’re here, isn’t it? I don’t want to know how you even came to be in this form as her pet, but I trust you have her best interests in mind.”

With that I set the ground beef I acquired from the kitchen down in front of Gale and turn to leave. I don’t need him to respond or even to acknowledge his actual form. I know what he is and he has heard me say my bit. Since he came with us so far, I know he will do the right thing.