But for a Slime

* * *

After that confusing fight, Joe and Garnedell settled into an easier relationship and returned to their normal routine, although Joe began adding a half or quarter day of rest a little over every week, about once per nine or ten days. He decided that he would have to begin a stronger routine to make it easier to maintain their strength and have adequate rest, but the specter of only a year pushed him for now.

It was finally after forty days that Joe hit level twenty, fifty days since he hit fifteen with ten days spent getting the boy to level six, and the remaining forty days spent on a measly five levels from fifteen to twenty. This is really, really not good! This is taking too much time! Forty days to reach twenty, with an increase basically of five times, he was looking at almost two hundred days to make twenty five. That was it. That was pretty much his year! He had maybe a hundred days left after that, but making it to thirty would cost almost two years! If something didn’t happen soon, he would be stuck with the skills and abilities at a third what an average human was capable of. What is wrong with this planet! It’s impossible to succeed! With a morose sigh, Joe flipped open his status and took a look.

His main status page and current job page showed nothing special or unexpected. He did cautiously inspect the entire page instead of dismissing it completely but found everything normal, each stat having risen by twenty times, matching his level. His resistances, what ones he had, rose by twenty times as well, but he only had two points for wind, water and ice. Even with the excitement of seeing more 'numbers go up,' in the end, he wasn’t sure what it meant to have two points in that, but he figured he could spend time figuring it out later.

His finger hovered over the available jobs tab, but then he forced himself to take a look at his current and available skills. If he was going to keep track of the data, it was best if he checked that religiously. He had already missed when his extremely useful skill ‘cudgel’ became available. His snort of frustrated sarcasm was swallowed by a gasp of surprised disbelief when he saw that a skill had become available. But when he saw the skill name, he had already guessed what its purpose was and dismay quickly settled in. What a useless skill! What would even be the point? Although… if the calculations are as convoluted as back home, then maybe? But still! You would only need it like… once a year or something! Right? Just use it then … why … why!?

Calculate Taxes – Commoner Skill

User can calculate taxes owed your Lord for self or for immediate family only.

A second snort in less than as many minutes escaped Joe as he realized the purpose of the skill. It’s even more useless than I thought! Seriously? Why? It’s almost as if they want to make it impossible. Why limit it to the user only? This basically makes the skill a benefit only to the lords. Joe sighed and waved away the popup before looking back at his job page once again. It almost seemed like this job was meant to be about as useless as a turd. Joe sighed morosely at his stats and new skill. Well, at least I know this skill becomes available at level twenty… and it looks like the resistances are point one, which pans out perfect. I just wish that I could have seen it from the beginning… maybe two decimal places at least? The status page flickered, almost like signal loss, and the page was replaced, all numbers showing out to two decimal pages.

Status

Current Job

Available Jobs

Current Skills

Available Skills

Log

Joe McConnell

Magical Resistances

Status

Physical Resistances

Wind

2.00

HP

20.00

Physical:

Water

2.00

MP

20.00

Piercing

0.00

Ice

2.00

Attack

20.00

Crushing

0.00

Defense

20.00

Slashing

0.00

Magic

20.00

Magic Defense

20.00

Strength

20.00

Dexterity

20.00

Agility

20.00

Commoner

20

IQ

20.00

Wisdom

20.00

Learning

20.00

Luck

0.00

Joe stuttered. OK… uh… it can… I can modify it a bit? Uh… Give me three decimal plac… The status page flickered and the decimal places increased to two. OK, then… no decimal… The page flickered again, reset to no decimal places. Right… so… lots of really cool things! Uh… I want a help tab. Joe waited with baited breath, but nothing happened. He grimaced. Then I want a… um… a guide to all jobs and how they open. Again, Joe waited, but with less expectation before giving up. Joe went through a couple other tries, seeking help on all possible resistances, or on what stats meant. He then went utterly fantastical, looking for ways back home, where in the galaxy he was, and even if he could get an updating map of the area. Finally, he quit trying and moved on.

Joe’s hand then moved to the available jobs tab with a bit of fatalistic acceptance at what he would find. Joe froze, his entire body stiffening even as his posture erupted as he came to attention.

Status

Current Job

Available Jobs

Current Skills

Available Skills

Log

Citizen

Commoner

20

Villager

Farmer

Waitress

Bartender

Chief

Day Laborer

Inn Keeper

Reeve

Forester

Trapper

Fisherman

Hunter

Miner

Baker

Cook

Metropolitan

A victorious smile came to his face and he began looking through his options. Some were surprising, but given that this was essentially life, it could easily be understood. He looked for a scroll bar, but did not find any, and decided that this was the extent of his offerings. He noticed that the commoner job seemed to have the list of jobs under it indented, but the metropolitan job was not. Hmm… commoner must have unlocked all these jobs and those indented under it are considered ‘commoner’ jobs. So I guess if I level metropolitan enough, I’ll get mostly ‘city’ jobs, I’m guessing?

As he went over what was available to him, he became a bit down, as none of these jobs seemed to be very conducive towards any form of combat, which seemed to be the primary way he was going to grow. Finding a good combat job and having that as support would have been nice, but then Joe realized it would have been meaningless. I can’t level a job without BEING that job. If I’m using the combat job, I’m not going to be able to level any other job… I just need to find a good job with good stats.

Thinking carefully, he settled on the hunter job, thinking that it would give him some decent numbers across a variety of stats. Hunters have to have decent strength and dexterity as well as being pretty smart, tracking and following sign. I don’t think it’ll help much with the rest, maybe agility? Some wisdom? I can only hope. His finger brushed across the hunter job and another popup box flashed before him. It listed hunter and then gave a short blurb describing it.

Hunter – Commoner Job Set

A job that hunts.

He blinked in surprise then considered that it would be nice to study what was available to him. But when he read the brief description, he felt a bit put out.

Seriously? You don’t think I could have figured that out? Come on!! Joe fumed, a couple curses slipping from his lips as he considered the brief completely correct but utterly useless description. His frustration quickly slipped deeply into anger as he began reading the rest of the job descriptions. Then he got to the description for farmer and villager, each both saying only and exactly: “Farmer – a farmer,” and “Villager – a villager.” Joe stared in abject disbelief before complete disregarding the status screen before him and turning his ire on the innocent forest life around him, his curses bellowing through the air. He continued for a few moments until he came to an abrupt stop when he noticed Garnedell staring at him wild eyed and uncertain. Joe quickly brought his tirade under control and breathed a deep cleansing breath. He stepped up to the boy with a smile before clapping him on the shoulder.

“Sorry kid. Just blowing some steam. One of my pet peeves: a lazy help file. I didn’t expect to find poor documentation even in a fantasy world! Kind of ridiculous!”

Joe took another deep sigh and beckoned them back towards home. It had already been another eight days since there last break, and they had a good chunk of time before the sunset. They might as well head back now, there was no point killing his available time advancing the useless commoner job. Besides, it didn’t look like he could do anything here, and he didn’t want to spend so much time trying to figure out the system deep in the woods with slimes roaming around while he wasn’t being careful.

Finally, after seventy four days effort, he could put the commoner job behind him.