Another World Story

Day Thirteen: The System

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Day Thirteen: The System?

"...!!"

John's eyes widened as he looked at the black screen in front of him. A thought immediately surfaced from the depths of his mind.

"The System?" he said, dumbfounded. Is his gold-finger finally showing itself?

John's gaze scrutinized the black screen. It was just that—a black screen, with only the writing to focus on. There were no designs, just a plain black hologram screen.

Hologram? John raised his hand, trying to touch the screen, but his hand phased through.

As expected, he thought. He then shifted his gaze back to what was written on the black screen. The words in white color read:

~Notification~

[You have killed a Night Wolf. Experience points +20. Level difference of 10; +100 Experience points]

[You have leveled up. Congratulations for reaching level 3]

[Allocated stat points have been distributed for leveling up. You have earned an additional +5 stat points to distribute]

"...Exp points. Leveling up. Stats... Just like the classic game system," John muttered. His gaze moved over the different notification panels. There were a total of six, one for each Night Wolf he had killed. John couldn’t help but swallow. He had killed six of them, but he had only leveled up to level 5. It seemed that the moment he gained those Exp points, the Level difference additional Exp had gone down. For example, with the third notification, he had leveled up to 4, and the Level difference had changed to 6, giving only +20 Exp. This additional Exp had only pushed him to level 5. The following three notifications didn’t offer any more Level difference Exp. It seemed that for every single level difference, there would be an additional 20 Exp, but only if the level difference was above 5 levels or more.

John analyzed the system notification and nodded. It seemed straightforward. The +20 Exp seemed minimal, but there could be other factors at play. He would have to learn more over time.

"Notification panel is triggered by clicking that flickering red light... so, the system should probably appear if I say some keywords?" John wondered. He took a deep breath, closed his eyes, and tried to remember every system-related word he could use. After a few moments, John opened his eyes. There weren’t many system-related words...

"Let’s try this first!" John said as he put his left hand forward and shouted, "Status! Open!"

"...."

Chirp! Chirp!

Silence~

John’s face reddened as he looked at the spot where the rabbit had exited. Seeing that no one was around, he sighed in relief.

"...It didn’t work," he muttered.

"Abracadabra?" He tried once more. It still didn’t work.

"Open sesame!"

"Status page!"

"Heed my command! Status!"

"..."

John spent a full hour calling out various keywords, some of them unrelated to systems. No matter what words he used, it still didn’t work.

Plop!

John lay back down on the bed. What was he doing wrong? Or perhaps there was no status page, only a notification panel for his golden-finger?

That can’t be. It would be too disappointing if he only had a notification panel for his golden-finger...

"Haa..." Feeling dejected, John stared at the ceiling once more. Suddenly, a thought occurred to him.

"I haven’t tried that yet, perhaps?" Thinking so, John raised his hand once more towards the ceiling and said, "Allocate stat points."

Swoosh!

~Stat Allocation~

Strength: 9

Agility: 8

Intelligence: 6

Dexterity: 2 (Not affected by Automated Stat Allocation)

Vitality: 10

Wisdom: 7

Points Remaining: 25

"..."

John stared silently at the black screen that appeared before him. He hadn’t expected it to work... He was just trying his luck. Who would have thought it would appear?

Now that another part of the system had appeared, John scrutinized it and was surprised by what he found out. His expression turned sour.

"...I leveled up five times. Each level giving me additional stat points to distribute, which was +5 each level up. And every level up, I’d received stat points that were automatically allocated to my stats... There are 9 in my Strength. I leveled up 5 times... so, that means I only had 4 Strength before leveling up? And my Intelligence was at 6. F...!" John couldn’t help but curse at the end. Was this an insult to his intelligence? He only had 1 before leveling up?! F...!

"I know I’m not the smartest, but wow!"

John sighed. Was this the reason he made so many foolish decisions before? Shaking his head, John then looked at the Dexterity stat and concluded, "Perhaps Dexterity is a special stat? I could only increase it using stat points. I guess I’ll find out more about it in the future."

As he looked at the Stat panel, John fell into deep thought. He now had 25 points to distribute among his stats. Which should he prioritize? If it was just to satisfy his pride, he would allocate all points to Intelligence, but given his current situation, he wondered if he should prioritize Strength, Agility, or even Vitality. However, he still didn’t know how much increase a single stat point could bring. Despite leveling up 5 times and gaining +5 additional stats on all his stats except Dexterity, he hadn’t felt any significant change. The meager +25 points could only do so much...

As he pondered, he recalled a saying: "In an apocalypse, one doesn’t need to have the highest fighting ability, the smartest brains, or the toughest body. One only needs to have the fastest legs to outrun the enemies..."

Was it really like that? John wondered if he remembered it correctly. But it made sense. No matter how much he increased his Strength or Vitality, the area he was in was filled with countless monsters that could tear him to shreds with a single attack. Investing all his points in Strength wouldn’t help if he was always outmatched. And if he invested all in Vitality, he might survive a single attack but would eventually die from subsequent ones. Intelligence? Though tempting, John didn’t place much importance on it for now. He wasn’t sure if Intelligence really meant smartness in this case, and Wisdom was quite vague. He could always invest in them later if he survived and leveled up more.

"...So, Agility? But what exactly is Agility?" he asked himself.

John pondered further but decided to postpone the decision for now. He wasn’t going anywhere for a while; he needed to focus on increasing his ability to survive before allocating his points.

"Plus, that rabbit might know something," he thought.

...

"Stats? What is that?" The rabbit asked, currently cooking something in its clay pot. John didn’t know how it made fire, but given his experience with the rock fire starter, he didn’t dwell on it. He had asked the rabbit about status points—Strength, Agility, Vitality, and the like—only to receive a confused look.

"...You don’t know?" John asked again.

"I would answer if I knew, human. But the words 'Strength,' 'Agility,' 'Vitality,' and such are familiar to me," the rabbit said, shifting its gaze back to the pot.

Hearing this, John’s eyes widened as he sat up and asked, "Do you know more about them?"

"Indeed," the rabbit said. "I have heard of them before. They seem to be related to the body," it added.

"..."

"That’s all?" John asked. He wasn’t sure if the rabbit was joking or being serious.

"Yes. Isn’t that common sense?" the rabbit said, tilting its small head.

F...!

John calmed himself down and lay back on the bed. It seemed that the rabbit really didn’t know more about the system. Or perhaps the system didn’t exist in this world? That was often the case in transmigration novels.

"By the way,"

As John was thinking, the rabbit’s voice interrupted his thoughts. John looked at it as it placed the pot on the clay table, then took out two wooden bowls and looked at him.

"Let’s eat," it said, putting down two wooden spoons.

"..." John stared for a moment before nodding. "I still can’t move my legs..."

"…I’ll bring the bowl to you."