There was no immediate change after he selected the Sense of Direction skill. Fyn didn't feel more connected to the world. He wasn't overwhelmed by new concepts or abilities. He felt the same as he always had.
The only change he could find was that the balls of light at the top of the page were gone, and next to the node for Sense of Direction, there was an additional 1/5 listed. Fyn couldn't even see what the next node in the skill tree was. Presumably, he wouldn't unless he completed the Sense of Direction passive skill.
Backing out, Fyn found himself on the same class grid page, which was a positive note. With a little clicking, he discovered he could still check all class, though, without any balls of light to spend, Fyn was unable to see whether he could unlock the nodes.
It was when he tried to back out to the main page of his status that Fyn discovered the most significant change. One push should have done it, but instead of the main screen, he found himself looking at an entirely new display.
This page listed all the information from the main page on the left. The right side read, "Available Classes," at the top, and underneath had the single entry, Explorer, listed.
The bottom third of the screen was dedicated to what Fyn would call skill slots. There were sections for three active skills, and two passive ones. Clicking on a passive slot took Fyn to another page which listed all the passive skills he had available, at this moment, one, Sense of Direction. With a little experimenting, Fyn was able to drag Sense of Direction and drop it into place, which immediately took him back to the last screen.
With the skill equipped, Fyn could vaguely tell that north was behind him and that he was facing south… ish. It was by no means a hard, confident feeling, just a general impression that he would want to confirm. Given that he had already thought of the cliff side of the clearing as north, the skill didn't seem to provide much benefit, but maybe that would come later. Unless he was kidding himself and the whole idea was just his imagination. Fyn wasn't ready to rule that out.
On the left side of the screen, his class entry was still empty, so Fyn dragged the Explorer Class rectangle over and dropped it into place. He still didn't feel much different, but his status showed some changed. Fyn backed out to the main page to see if the changes were shown there as well.
Name: Fyn
Race: Human
Age:12
Class: Explorer
Level: 0
Experience: 0/100
Strength: .5
Agility: .5
Spirit: .5
(Display Skills)
Besides the new Experience slot and the word Explorer next to Class, Fyn saw not much had changed. No explosive growth in his attributes that he had been crossing his fingers for. There was a new white bubble next to each of his attributes, though.
Clicking on one, Fyn felt a buzz through his body while a message box reading, "No improvement points available." Running his hand over his lips, Fyn dismissed the message, already thinking of something he needed to test.
First he pressed on the (Display Skills) tab and watched as it unfolded.
Active Skill: (empty)
Active Skill: (empty)
Active Skill: (empty)
Passive Skill: (empty)
Passive Skill: Sense of Direction
No big surprises there, it displayed skills. Fyn thought of Lucas sitting with his back against the tree, pretending to study his skill tree seriously. Lucas's status had shown the same (Display Skills) tab. Fyn hadn't thought of it much at the time.
Lucas had behaved like he didn't want anyone to see his status, positioning himself to block the view from behind, unaware of small eyes peering at him from the side. Fyn thought of Lucas, pinned to a tree by a crossbow bolt, fired by a woman Lucas had been working with.
There was a lesson there. Just because everyone could see your status, doesn't mean you should show it off. And the Skill slots being hidden unless purposefully displayed, said most people hid this information. It was something to keep in mind.
Not that hiding his skills had helped Lucas much, Fyn thought, clearing his throat.
Closing his skills, Fyn went from his main screen to what he would call the class section screen from now on. He only gave it a brief scan to confirm something he had noticed.
Next to his Class and Passive Skill, there was a countdown that read, (23:57). As he glanced at it, the 57, dropped to 56. Fyn labeled it as a cooldown timer, telling him that he could only change his skills and class once every twenty-four hours. That didn't matter to him much, as he only had a single skill and class. Fyn made a mental note to check it later.
A couple clicks later, Fyn was back at the class grid page. He started to select Explorer, which was now listed first, when he stopped with a frown.
When he had watched Lucas checking his status, the man had pressed on his class and gone directly into his skill tree. Why was Fyn's status different? Did he have two extra pages, or had Lucas gone through the extra steps faster than Fyn could notice?
An idea, related to the snarky tutorial message, tapped at the back of Fyn's head. He tried to draw out the piece he was missing, but it wouldn't come and after struggling for a few minutes, Fyn gave up. It would come to him, for now, he brought up the Explorer skill tree.
Staring at the Sense of Direction node, Fyn tapped it. A jolt that curled his fingers shot through him from the top of his head to his boots. Fyn groaned, curling up with his knees to his chest, eyes clenched shut. The sensation was brief, the pain lingering for seconds only. The memory of the pain was slower to fade.
Taking deep breaths, Fyn opened his eyes and saw the message, "No improvement points available."
"Alright," Fyn stretched out, easing the phantom aches in his muscles, "you don't like to repeat yourself. Lesson learned."
At least, he had also learned that the balls of light were called improvement points. Fyn would take that as a win. It didn't feel like it, but you had to find a victory somewhere.
Now, how do you earn improvement points? There had to be a way. Killing monsters? Completing quests? Not things Fyn could do at the moment.
Closing his status, Fyn put his hands behind his head as he lay flat on his back. He was making progress, but there was so much left to figure out. It would be nice if a helpful but irritable hermit showed up right about now to answer all of his questions. Somehow Fyn thought it was unlikely, but it would be nice.
He drifted into a fitful sleep. Curling in on himself to preserve heat, Fyn drifted in and out, sometimes woken by the sounds of distant howling or nearby rustling. Occasionally, the wind hit him, chilling his already cold body. He managed to grab some sleep in bits and pieces.
When the sun hit his face, telling him that there was light enough for proper foraging, Fyn's exhaustion had finally coaxed him into a light dream filled sleep. A faceless god was in the middle of telling him he wasn't special, and he would die soon when Fyn remembered what he had been missing.
"I have a cheat," Fyn bolted into a sitting position, and promptly smacked his head against the stone roof. Falling back, his hands covered his face and he rolled over groaning. That groan turned into a scream as the ledge disappeared from beneath him.
He barely had time to move his hands before his face was introduced to the forest floor. The long grass, so soft under foot, hadn't cushioned him much when he fell from five feet. Falling from ten feet, the brave little stalks gave up on catching him altogether. He landed hard, his scream cutting off with a gasp.
His lungs stopped working for a moment, forestalling the stream of curses Fyn wanted to spew. When his rebellious organs consented to working again, Fyn didn't have the energy to shout. He lay, face in the dirt, whimpering.
The warm sunlight should have felt wonderful on his back after a night of shivering. Fyn couldn't work up the motivation to appreciate the small blessing. Flopping over, he glared up at the sky.
"No more ledges," he grumbled, picking himself up, "tonight, I sleep on the ground. Next to a fire. Surrounded by beautiful women and hot food."
Continuing his fantasy, Fyn built himself a palace with servants in his mind as he picked himself up. Leaning back against the cliff face, he brushed himself off. He was about to stumble to the river for a drink when he remembered his knife and pouch. They were still sitting next to the food he had gathered for breakfast… up on the ledge.
Without any serious injuries, nothing beyond a few bruises, Fyn was able to climb back up. Putting on his belt, and reattaching his knife and pouch, he crawled to the edge of the ledge. This time he leaned his head out, picking out the easiest way down before swinging his body over and making his way to the ground.
Feet firmly on the soil, Fyn walked to the river and bent down to splash his face. He drank deeply, directly from the water, more confident now that his Gatherer's knowledge told him there were plenty of plants nearby that naturally filtered out toxins and contaminates. Though, thinking about it, Fyn wasn't sure, "naturally," was the right word, since according to what he knew, the plants that cleaned the water were slightly magical in nature.
Backing away from the water, Fyn found a rock to sit on and began to crunch on a lestiherry root. He had survived a single day in this world. Not much of an accomplishment. The progress that seemed significant when Fyn has hungry and terrified seemed slight and haphazard when his stomach was full.
Standing up, Fyn moved to the edge of the water. He wanted to catch his reflection, but the water moved too fast to see any details. A not overly tall boy, thin, with hair that stuck up in all directions, might have been looking back at him, or it could have been a trick of the light.
Just in case, he bent and scooped up a handful of water to wet his hair with. He may not know what he was doing or where he should go, but he could look presentable while he did nothing, nowhere.
With a sigh, Fyn took care of a few other morning necessities, conscientiously watering a bush that he knew benefitted from a stronger type of water than normal. Finished, he hiked up his belt and set off down the river, exploring the bank and looking for anyway to cross that didn't require swimming.
His search left him confined to one side unless he wanted to get wet, but he spotted numerous shadows that could have been fish. Fish or horrible man-eating monster, he couldn't say for sure. And until he could say for sure, he wasn't leaving the bank.
On the way to the south end of the clearing, Fyn spotted tracks of various animals who had come for a drink. Deer, wolves, rabbits, and more, some of which he was unable to identify despite having filled out the Tracking node of the Scout class skill tree.
That didn't bother him much. He couldn't recognize every plant he saw, either. It would have been strange if learning the first prerequisites of a class made him an all-knowing expert. Knowing there was still something to learn was encouraging in a way, a goal to work towards.
What did bother him was the tracks of predators, some of whom were large, moving to and from the water. They had come while he slept, possibly while he was creeping about digging for food, and he had never known.
It made him want to run back to his ledge, all promises to never climb again forgotten. Clenching his fists, he kept moving south, looking up more now, rather than concentrating on the ground.
Twenty feet from the tree line, Fyn stopped. The trees were smaller and more densely packed near the river. He couldn't see far in, but he recognized a few varieties of trees that would be useful for shelter and building a fire. Eventually, he would have to enter those trees. Eventually. For now, the clearing had plenty to explore.
Separating the east side of the clearing into a grid, Fyn began to examine every inch of it, looking for anything and everything that could be of use. He was surprised by what he found.
Growing all over were bushes with long, thin branches that could be woven into a basket if you knew how. Which Fyn didn't, though he thought he might be able to figure it out if he had a need. He cut a few of the branches to play with, just in case.
Fyn harvested more lestiherry roots and vines. He picked dandelions by the fistful, partly because they were edible, mostly because they were familiar and exactly what he remembered. By the time he was done exploring the east side of the clearing, Fyn had a tidy collection of this and that, piled at the bottom of the cliff.
Sitting down next to his haul, Fyn chewed on a dandelion stem, and tried to relax. It had been a long but fruitful morning. Looking over his newly gathered supplies, he felt satisfaction bubbling in him. There were things he could use here that would improve his circumstances considerably.
He would have to venture into the woods if he wanted the wood and branches he needed for a shelter and fire. Fyn wasn't looking forward to that, but things were better now than when he woke this morning. He smiled as he swallowed the dandelion he was chewing and reached to pick another
The smile froze, and his hand hadn't reached his lips by half, when he saw it. There, floating above the base of the dandelion he had picked, was a single glowing orb. White and cleaning looking, the orb floated gently, unaffected by the breeze, bobbing according to its whims.
The dandelion fell from nerveless fingers. Fyn's empty hand stretched out to gently caress the orb, ready to yank back his hand and run at the slightest provocation. He did start, his muscles tightening, when his fingers touched the white ball, but he didn't run.
At his touch the orb vanished. There wasn't a message or a voice to tell him, Fyn simply knew. He had earned an improvement point.