Miri had left the Snot Fairy’s clearing with haste and a bad feeling about how badly she’d misjudged her chances of survival.
The road toward Helmsworth narrowed as it climbed, packed dirt giving way to stone and scrub. Trees leaned in close enough that the wind couldn’t quite get through. Quiet. Too quiet to relax, but quiet enough to think.
She flexed her fingers around the sword’s hilt.
Level 3 had promised extension.
She tested Swordsman deliberately now.
Miri slowed her pace, eyes scanning the underbrush. She didn’t have to wait long.
Something skittered across the rocks ahead—small, fast, and dumb enough not to care that she was armed. A rock rat. Dog-sized, gray-furred, with a mouth built for gnawing through roots and bone alike.
“Hey there, Mister Beastie,” she sing-songed. “Do you wanna be my friend?”
The rat growled and charged. Miri raised the sword and deliberately didn’t swing.
Instead, she focused. Mana flowed easily now, like breath. She pushed it into the blade the way Fluffkins had taught her: steady, even, no spikes. The sword drank it in.
Then she tried something new.
Go past it, she urged.
For a heartbeat, nothing happened. Then the edge blurred. The air warped along the blade’s length, like heat shimmer without heat. Miri’s stomach tightened as the sensation extended past the steel—an invisible continuation of sharp intent.
She guessed. Six inches.
The rat leapt. Miri slashed.
The sword never touched fur. The rat split anyway.
Cleanly severed, as if an invisible blade had finished the swing for her. The front half hit the ground, slid a foot, and stopped. The back half collapsed a second later.
Miri stared.
“…oh.”
Her heart kicked into her ribs, not fear but excitement. Real, dangerous excitement.
She looked down at the blade, then out at the empty space beyond it. Waved the sword experimentally. The air cut nothing. The rocks were fine. No sparks, no feedback.
She inhaled, centered herself again, and pushed more mana through.
The pressure increased immediately.
Her wrist twinged, like holding a heavier weapon than she actually was. The extension lengthened—maybe a foot now. The sensation wobbled at the far end, less precise.
She walked another hundred yards before she found the next test.
Two of them this time. Rock rats again, bigger, bolder. They came from opposite sides, trying to flank her.
Miri planted her feet. She poured mana into the blade, careful this time. Cleaner. She imagined the edge continuing forward, straight and narrow, like drawing a line with a ruler.
The extension snapped into place, steadier than before.
She turned and swung at the first rat, aiming short. The extended edge clipped it mid-leap. The cut wasn’t as clean this time. The rat tumbled, screeching, blood spraying across the stones. It tried to scramble up.
Miri adjusted without thinking.
She shortened the extension and finished it with a normal swing. The blade bit deep, steel on flesh.
The second rat lunged and Miri reacted on instinct. She overextended. Too much mana, too fast.
The invisible edge surged forward—two feet, maybe more—and tore through the rat at an angle. It was a violent, tearing slice that ripped through fur, bone, and momentum alike.
The rat hit the ground in pieces.
[ You have defeated Rock Rat Lv4! ]
Miri staggered back a step, breathing hard.
She lowered the sword and frowned.
“So it’s not free,” she said to no one. “Longer means sloppier. Sloppier means messier.”
She wiped the blade clean on a rock, even though there was barely any blood on it. Most of it hadn’t actually touched the steel.
That thought made her shiver.
She tried again on a fallen branch.
Short extension. Clean cut. The branch fell in two.
Long extension. The branch exploded into splinters.
“That,” she muttered, “is not subtle.”
The System chimed softly.
[ Skill Updated: Swordsman Level 4 ]
[ Skill Updated: Swordsman Level 5 ]
Miri laughed, breathless and a little unhinged.
“Of course it did.”
She decided to stop here for the night and moved off the path into the trees. In a small clearing, she lit a fire and set up her tent. It was as she was horking down warmed rations that she decided to take a better look at what the System had been up to.
First, her skills.
[ Skills: Cleanse Lv5; Flame Lv3; Swordsman Lv5; Auto-Loot Lv3; Threat Perception Lv4; Mana Sense Lv1 ]
Cleanse Lv5: Remove basic impurities from body, weapons, and wearables; Remove minor physical status effects; Can be applied to others at reduced effectiveness.
Passive Ability: Minor resistance to illness, toxins, and parasites.
Love this novel? Read it on Royal Road to ensure the author gets credit.
Flame Lv3: Sustain a controlled flame without focus; Shape flame intensity and temperature.
Swordsman Lv5: Improved efficiency and instinct with bladed weapons; Reduces wasted motion and stamina, enhances strike placement, and allows brief mana reinforcement during committed attacks.
Passive Ability: Successful committed attacks reduce recovery time and improve positioning for the next action.
Auto-Loot Lv3: Automatically collects credits and basic materials from defeated enemies within range; prioritizes items of higher quality or relevance.
Threat Perception Lv3: Heightened awareness of hostile intent and environmental danger; improves reaction time and reduces likelihood of ambush.
Mana Sense Lv1: Detect nearby sources of active mana.
She considered how she was upgrading her skills. Cleanse didn’t level up because she was better at mopping; it leveled up when she used it constantly. Under pressure and in motion. When it mattered.
Alternatively, Swordsman hadn’t leveled because she fought harder; it leveled when she fought smarter.
Leveling up her skills required more nuance than she expected.
On a whim she decided to open her inventory and froze.
She hadn’t really looked at it since the first few days. She just grabbed what she needed and kept moving. Fighting, camping, surviving. There hadn’t been time to be curious.
Now there was.
The familiar sensation unfolded in her mind, like stepping into a quiet room she owned but had never furnished herself.
“Whoa,” Miri breathed.
Her inventory didn’t appear in front of her as floating text anymore. It unfolded behind her eyes instead, an ordered mental space she could step into with a thought. A sense of layered awareness, each category sliding forward when she focused on it.
She could feel where things were.
It was organized. Categorized. Quietly, efficiently sorted in a way she absolutely had not done herself. As if the System had built shelves in her mind and stocked them quietly while she wasn’t looking.
Consumables hovered first.
Several healing potions—more than she remembered buying. Not the strong ones, but clean, reliable brews meant for people who expected to get hurt and keep going. There were stamina draughts too, small vials meant to be sipped, not chugged. A handful of cleansing tonics she hadn’t used because, apparently, she’d become one.
Charms drifted into view next.
Not permanent items—temporary things. One-use effects, the System’s equivalent of pocket tricks. They were the size of marbles and could be triggered by crushing them with your fingers.
A charm that hardened skin for a single hit.
Another that dampened sound for a minute.
One that caused a weapon to strike true once no matter what.
“Oh, these are sneaky,” she murmured.
She scrolled past Equipment and Food, the only parts of her inventory she was truly familiar with. Then came Materials.
She frowned slightly.
Not gore. Not carcasses. Nothing unpleasant.
Instead: neatly bundled monster components, already processed. Hardened liscamp scale plates suitable for light armor reinforcement. Powdered bone fragments used in alchemy. A vial of condensed ectoplasmic residue from the ghost already labeled and stabilized, which was mildly horrifying.
“So you are skinning things,” she said to the empty air. “You’re just doing it… politely.”
Ecto-Residue (Stable)
Fairy Mucus (a lot)
She scrolled away.
Miscellaneous. Even the System couldn’t categorize this.
Mirror Shard
She pulled out the piece of glass and looked into it, waiting.
Nothing happened.
She honestly didn’t think it would, but she read a book once where this kid kept a piece of broken mirror for years and it ended up saving his life. She didn’t think this was an enchanted mirror or anything, but hello—she was in a magical fantasy world. No way in hell was Miri getting rid of that mirror.
She continued down the list.
Skill Books.
Miri’s heart stuttered.
Most were low-tier. Common. Narrow in scope and completely foundational.
Efficient Footwork (Common): Minor stamina reduction while moving in combat
Grip Discipline (Common): Improved weapon retention under impact
Breath Control (Common): Faster recovery after exertion
Her attention snagged on the last one.
Force Surge: Small chance to amplify the force of a committed physical or magical attack.
Her mind slowly turned over. And over again.
“It’s a fucking gacha skill?” She hadn’t seen any probability skills before but it made sense.
She pulled the Skill Book out of her inventory to use it immediately. But—
A skill gem, floating apart from the rest. Clear. Faceted. Untouched. Unassigned.
Miri swallowed.
Skill books taught you something specific. You absorbed the knowledge, felt it settle into place, and that was that. You could level it up with practice, but the skill path was mostly predetermined. Anybody upgrading Cleanse to level 5 would then be able to cast the skill on other people.
Other skills were more tailored for Class: Swordsman in a Rogue’s hand would gear towards throwing daggers, a broadsword or hammer for a Warrior. Miri being a Mage meant her Swordsman skills were going to lean towards using a blade as a conduit for magic.
Only at the higher levels would Skill upgrades truly specialize to each caster.
A skill gem was different.
It didn’t give you a skill. It allowed you to combine two skills for an entirely new hybrid skill. The results were always different, but within the range of expectations. You wouldn’t combine Flame and Cleanse to make a Water Funnel skill. You’d get something like a Cleansing Flame or Flame Immunity skill.
Miri only knew the absolute basics about combining skills. But she knew enough to know she was not ready.
“Later,” she said quietly. “We’re not there yet.”
She scrolled to the end of her inventory to find she actually had a single item sitting in her Weapons.
Nice Stick (very nice)
She snorted but didn’t get rid of it.
There were no piles of gold. No dragon-hoard nonsense. Just options. Resources to sell back in town. Tools. Small advantages stacked patiently on top of one another. She just needed to remember to use them.
She closed the inventory slowly.
For the first time since waking up in that cave, Miri understood something important.
The System was rewarding engagement, not violence.
Effort. Adaptation. Survival.
“You’ve been paying attention,” she said softly.
The System, unsurprisingly, did not answer.
But the thought stayed with her as she settled in, ready to use the Force Surge skill book she snatched before being distracted by the shiny skill gem. She felt lighter now, knowing she wasn’t just scraping by.
She was being equipped.
After acquiring Force Surge, she was tired in a good way. The kind of tired that meant progress. She ate while walking, refilled her canteen from a stream she trusted, and kept going.
Helmsworth wasn’t far now. She was walking the last stretch when she saw the familiar fencing and wide pasture.
The farm.
A man straightened when he saw her and broke into a grin.
“You!” he called. “I thought that was you.”
She smiled back. “Fence still standing?”
“Better than standing,” he said proudly. “And since you’re here…”
He hesitated, then waved her over.
“The cubs were born yesterday,” he said. “Thought you might want to see them. You did help make this place safe.”
Miri slowed. A detour, she told herself. Just a short one.
“Yeah,” she said, warmth spreading in her chest. “I’d like that.”
And she followed him toward the barn, ready to make friends with a farmer and complete her quest.
