In Loki's Honor

Wyxnos, God of Logic, couldn't even dedicate time to his newest and favored hobby, read the Anomaly's logs. It was infuriating. The only way to read her Status was with divine magic but divine magic was just absorbed and sent to [REDACTED] whoever that was.

No. He couldn't read the Anomaly's logs because the gods were complaining. Humans and their racial ability were too powerful. He ran simulations, checked the numbers, generated reports. What he saw painted a dreary picture of imbalance. Humans found a way to exploit their ability. They would leave perk choices undecided and hovering in their status. If they encountered a situation that was too dangerous, they wished for a perk to fight that situation.

Take the anomaly's wanton misuse of deathberry, for example. In the underground, it would be a mass extinction if the lake's guardian fairy hadn't cleaned up the poison. But up in the human camp, hundreds of them gained Poison Immunity, enough to even knock the rarity down a notch.

"Move the rarity of all {X Immunity} perks to ultra-rare. Lock it at that rarity no matter how many individuals own it," Wyxnos ordered. He would make them unique or even get rid of them, if he could.

ACKNOWLEDGED.

"Set a new rule for races with free perk and skill choices. Whenever they purchase a Perk or a Skill, there shall be a chance they get the exact perk they wanted to. It shall be a hundred percent for common, eighty percent for uncommon, forty-eight percent for rare, eighteen percent for very rare, eight percent for ultra-rare, and zero percent for unique."

ACKNOWLEDGED. FAIRNESS PROTOCOLS ACTIVATED. Perk purchase success chance shall be affected by the user's Luck Attribute as a percentile bonus. Perk purchase success chance will receive a one-time bonus of ten percent if the purchase is done within two hours of the level up.

That was as good as it gets. The system wouldn't allow him to tweak the values any further than that. For the same reason they couldn't claim the Anomaly's soul, the System had its checks and balances. The fact it accepted his modification was ratification that the issue with the humans was getting out of hand.

"Send a message with the changes to all deities. They are free to share the information with mortals. Attach a message to perk acquisition stating that the use of the perk slot within two hours has a rarity bonus."

ACKNOWLEDGED. The message suggested is misleading. Using alternative.

In days like these, Wyxnos believed he wasn't the administrator of the System. Just a conversation partner.

Everything came back to me. I was a software engineer in his thirties living in New York. I died crushed by truck-sama. I was an amoeba. I died of old age because I was too dumb to read fast. I was an earthworm. I died because a mole got too hungry. I was a rabbit. I died defending my adoptive village. I was Lily. I was used by the elves as a weapon and was beheaded by a lunatic conqueror.

I wriggled and twisted still in the womb, drowned in my memories as they were force-fed in my new body. I had no memories of being in the womb as Lily but I felt that my lifeforce was stronger now. But stronger were the memories, especially Lily's. The grief of losing Rosalinda. The despair. The denial at the elves' betrayal. I could see everything clearly now.

Then light. I was pulled out of my new mother's birth canal without finishing my reverie. I squirmed, screamed, and cried. Everyone around me talked too fast. My irritation was quickly swapped by hunger and I got a nipple shoved in my mouth. I knew the drill by then. Suck, suck, drink.

One of the worst parts of rebirth was that the way my memories returned, the feeling of a crotch without dangly bits hit me as the truck did. I had nothing against being a girl. It was the memories of my life as a male that caused that. Rebirth also reset my mindset when the memories of Earth set the base of my new being with the other lives overlaid on top. It molded my sense of identity as male and then my female body proprioception came, a distant second.

I wonder why that was done that way. was Loki just trying to squeeze a few more points? Like that mage that took a lot of mental flaws knowing he will have a high Will stat to resist them. Min-maxing was bad in roleplaying games, it was worse when done to my life. Lives.

I knew I had been born a human again. I had a hard time following people. They spoke too damn fast. My needs were cared for so I lived my life as a baby absorbed in thought. Then I remembered. Did Nenandil come with me?

I complained.

What she said took some time to sink. A damaged mind? Was my random disability mental this time? Curses! I knew most physical disabilities would vanish once I shifted into any of my were-jaguar forms. But this? I had no idea. It would either work or not.

Months passed. Controlling my body was hard. Understanding people was hard. I knew I had a lot of siblings, though. Without System activation, it was impossible to know my current Status. As more time passed, I understood that I was born to a family of farmers. My siblings smelled of manure and everyone wore threadbare patched clothes and large straw hats.

My siblings didn't play with me. They ignored me mostly, but some sent a disgusted glance my way every now and then.

Another set of months came and went. The worst moments were during the nights with a full moon. I had to fight to keep myself from shifting. Fortunately, everyone slept early to save on lighting, and the times I shifted, I quickly changed back.

Right as winter showed up, my mother's milk dried. They gave me a gruel made of mashed vegetables. A small portion, smaller than even a baby like me needed. At night, I sent pseudopods to fetch nutrients around me and supplement my needs. I could eat dirt and stone for nourishment and I fed off of insects, grubs, and the ubiquitous mites that infested the whole house.

My first winter was a harsh one. Blizzards would rock the wooden house and the chill would seep through the boards. Everyone slept together for warmth on furs laid down on the main room's floor. At night, my pseudopods went for the flakes of dead skin, the lice infesting my family members, and other things.

The siblings were getting leaner. Food was scarce and our father ordered them to ration food. Winter lasted for one-hundred-fifty days after all. I, on the other hand, was as chubby as babies get. The envy of my siblings grew. They started to fight for the right to feed me, only to pretend they did so and steal my gruel. I wouldn't complain. I even made munching sounds and slapped my lips.

Seeing that their bullying wasn't working drove my brother one day to hit me. It bruised me and I cried. Father took my brother and spanked him so hard I could swear his bones cracked. From that day onward, only the sisters were allowed to feed me. But they were as cruel as my brothers.

My hair was silky and spotless thanks to the pseudopods. My elder sister would run her fingers through my hair and pull. Envy was stamped all over her sallow face. She didn't rip my hair off or anything, but they were using me as an escape valve for their resentment.

Midwinter brought tragedy to our house. My youngest brother, a year younger than me, died. The family woke up and found his body out of the furs on the floorboards and almost frozen. A shouting contest ensued as different from me, he was loved and cared for. They forgot to feed me while the women cried and the men came to blows. Somehow the blame fell on my eldest brother. He was accused of pushing little brother out of the furs.

I feared they would draw blood. It didn't happen. They just neglected to feed me for two days. I felt hungry but I had endured worse. I drank flakes of snow through the floorboards and fed off of whatever was available. On the third day, our mother had an argument with my elder sister and they found out I was two days without food. Worried, our mother took me and examined my body. I was healthy and with no signs of malnourishment. But I got a huge serving of gruel from mother personally. I think she was onto my sisters for stealing my food.

The next day the secret was out. I saw my sisters talking to each other and they must've come to the conclusion that none of them were feeding me. It begged the question of how I wasn't dead already. The eldest sister, the most envious of them all mixed feces with my gruel. I spat at her face. She tossed me on the floor and screeched.

Mother came and scolded my sister. She yanked the bowl of gruel from her hands and tasted it. I could swear steam rose from my mother's ears. She pulled elder sister's hair and force-fed her the feces-laced gruel. She got a new bowl and tried to feed me but I refused. Big mistake. It only added to her distress.

The men had to go out every day to clear the snow to avoid burying the house and to get firewood. The stone stove was the only thing in the house that wasn't flammable. A week after the poo gruel incident, my eldest brother lost his index finger because our second-oldest brother brought the ax down before he could remove his hand from the log.

The family was about to crumble. Tensions were on the rise. Food was scarce. They were all starving. That's when the merchant came.

He had a Conestoga wagon pulled by two horses. He stopped to trade but the family had nothing of worth. The merchant, however, had medicine, clothes, and most importantly, food. Meat.

One can guess what happened, right?

Yes. They sold me.

Mother was heartbroken. Father had to physically restrain her as she shouted, cried, yelled, and broke my heart. Rosalinda, at least, never saw what got her. She never saw Lily suffer. Me? I never even learned the name of the mother that loved me. The only person, in a family of nine, that truly loved me.

I was unceremoniously dumped in a crate filled with straw. I felt the horses' hooves clopping on the road and the wagon creaked as it moved. We traveled for days. The merchant checked on me three times a day and fed me some sort of porridge or stew once a day. Any other baby would've died of neglect but my family must've told him of my uncanny ability to go without food and he was trying to make certain the pig in a poke was actually not a cat. Spoiler alert, it was.

A week on the road, I decided to commit murder. The reason was a very good one. The scum of a merchant drunk too much one night and did bad stuff. He did the unthinkable. Just like the Munchkin monsters whey they kill a hero, he did BAD STUFF to me. [1]

I might as well stop here. All that I need to say is that I decided to commit murder for a very good reason.

The next night, the moons beckoned and I answered the call. I let myself change into my hybrid form. Creeping out of my box, I found the merchant snoring in the middle of the wagon. {Vorpal Bite} made its appearance and I skipped the emergency activation messages and picked my Class. If people were such assholes, I would get good at killing people.

You became an Assassin (rare).

You gain 1 Attribute point at every even level.

You gain 1 point of Dexterity at every odd level.

You gain 1 point of Strength at every fourth level.

You gain 1 point of Endurance at every fifth level.

You gain 2 Skill points per level.

You gain 1 perk every 4 levels.

You gain 2 HP per level.

You gain 0 MP per level.

You gained the Assassinate (rare) Skill. Inflict extra damage on targets marked for assassination. if you kill them unaware of your presence.

You gained the Death Contract (rare) perk. Gain 50% more Experience from targets marked for assassination.

You gained the Death Blow (rare) perk. Spend MP to gain a damage multiplier when striking an enemy unaware of you.

You became a Cartographer (rare).

You gain 3.5 Skill points per level.

You became an Apothecary (rare).

You gain 3.5 skill points per level.

The System was kind enough to defer the Exp messages for a while to give you a chance to select a Class.

You killed level 28 creepy pedo merchant. You gained 44,100 Exp (7,840 base x 10,000 perk x 0,0001 curse x 1.25 perk x 1.5 Death Contract x 3 size bonus).

You reached Assassin level 8.

You gained 4 Attribute points.

You gained 4 points of Dexterity.

You gained 2 points of Strength.

YOu gained 1 point of Endurance.

Attribute points over the maximum. Reassigning to other Attributes.

You gained 16 Skill Points.

You gained 2 perks.

You gained 16 HP.

You gained 0 MP.

You reached human level 7.

You gained 7 Attribute points.

You gained 21 Skill Points.

You gained 3 human perks.

You gained 14 HP.

You gained 0 MP.

You reached Cartographer level 4

You gained 14 Skill points.

You reached Apothecary level 4.

You gained 14 Skill points.

WARNING: Points not spent within 2 hours will be automatically assigned.

WARNING: Human perks have a chance of granting a random perk if one wishes for too much. You gain a bonus chance if you make your selection within 2 hours.

The last message was new. I wondered for a moment but it was probably Wyxnos tweaking the system. I had to agree, the ability to pull perks out of one's asshole anytime was too imbalanced.

My HP sat at a modest maximum of 493 points. I spent all human Skill points on languages. The rarer the better. Just the first point. Cartographer had now Skills to aid with written languages. I bought them.

You gained the Decipher Script (rare) Skill. You have a chance to understand writings in unknown languages.

You gained the Break Cypher (very rare) Skill. You can decipher writing using ciphers.

You gained Linguistics (rare) Skill. You can analyze speech to understand the patterns. Improve the language acquisition rate.

You gained the Preservation (rare) Skill. You can make ingredients you treat and store last longer.

You gained the Recipe Memorization (uncommon) Skill. You can remember more alchemical recipes.

You gained the Stabilize Ingredients (rare) Skill. Ingredients you handle are Rank x Dexterity x 0.5% less prone to lose stability.

I knew where my perks were going to be spent. All of them throughout this life.

You gained the Death Contract II (rare) perk. Gain 225% more Experience from targets marked for assassination.

You gained the Death Contract III (rare) perk. Gain 337% more Experience from targets marked for assassination.

You purchased the EXP Boost II (uncommon) perk. Gain 56.3% more Experience.

You purchased the EXP Boost III (uncommon) perk. Gain 95.3% more Experience.

You purchased the EXP Boost IV (uncommon) perk. Gain 244% more Experience.

I knew I couldn't mark any joe nobody as a "target for assassination" just to gain the bonus. I either needed to have a killing grudge with him or an actual contract.

The numbers might seem high, but the freaking Exp table was exponential while the Exp gained was quadratic. Last life, I needed more than two hundred million Exp points to rank up my Class. These selections only pulled the goalpost closer by a small fraction.

I checked my full status and frowned. As usual, all my Attributes were capped but there was a significant change. My mental Attributes were all five. I scrolled down the ridiculously long list of Skills and checked my "disability" this life.

Dim-Witted: All your mental Attributes are halved. The cap for your mental Attributes is halved. Increasing mental Attributes cost triple.

Well, fuck my life. I might as well be the dumbest assassin ever. Yes, my surroundings confirmed it. I had a dilemma. I was a baby in the middle of nowhere during winter with a dead body in my hands. Don't forget the wagon and horses.

[1] - Sunday, august 30th, 2020 - We can write about murder. We can write about a shit-ton of things, but we cannot write to denounce the fight club. Because the first rule...