High Octane Literary Action

Observe has leveled up

Special Skill: Observe Lv 2
Skill XP: 53/400
Observe will show additional info at increased accuracy

Reading has leveled up
Skill XP: 0/400
Reading speed (wpm) = 3*INT*Reading Lv = 108 wpm

Lex rubbed his eyes, it had been over three hours of straight reading. Reading got 1 XP every minute of reading, he desperately wanted to blow off the book and play some videogames. The direness of its contents and lure of a level up drew him further. Maybe it was just his perpetual gamerbrain but looking up every few minutes to see the number a little bit closer to 200 had kept him going.

He'd need to stop for the night though. Lex managed to figure out how to check his status affects - why it was accessed in a dropdown by his name he would never know, but thinking 'status' also did the trick.

Current Status Effects: [Insomnia I]

Insomnia - Go the fuck to sleep
Gained by repeated lack of sleep, five total tiers with increasingly harsh effects
Tier 1: -2 to all_ stats except LIB._
Teir 2: ?__
To remove: sleep at least 8 hours uninterrupted for a week in a row

He was only a third of the way through the book and his head was already spinning. In continuation of the generally doomy and gloomy introduction the book had gone into the various immediate dangers that he would face in the Abyss. Mana slavers and regular slavers were in the low end of concerns. There was a booming industry in the Abyss for enchanted items the most 'humane' ways of creating enchanted items was still massively Mana intensive and many organisations started abducting budding mages to siphon their magic for their creation. There were also regular slaves to mine or grow rare materials in various 'barriers.' It only got worse from there. The most powerful items used the human soul, some particularly awful groups and individuals would not baulk at consigning somebody to the eternal torment of being shoved into some sword or breastplate. Human parts were also reasonably powerful crafting materials and the book went into graphic detail about how people were harvested, kept alive with powerful healing magic as their flesh was carved off day after day to be used for powerful, and thus expensive, scrolls. books, and armour. Like the old story about Prometheus whose liver was eternally eaten by birds.

He put it down and got ready for bed, mind still rolling, imagination doing the brunt of the work.

he tried to put it all out of mind as he pulled the covers up around himself.

Go to sleep?
HP and MP restore at twice the rate while asleep
Enter # Hours: _______

Finally, a fucking break.

Lex input 8 hours and passed out the second he hit the button. His sleep felt near-instantaneous to him, one second he'd pressed the button and the next he was groggily pawing at his eyes and it was Saturday morning. He stumbled down the stairs and made himself a coffee, double checking the chore list they'd pinned on the fridge. He almost spent his regenerated mana to cast observe but stopped himself, worried that any significant use of his new abilities would automatically accept his quest. He still had two-thirds of the book to finish and he was right in the middle of a really intriguing part about Illusion Barriers; pocket dimensions that even the most basic mage could make.

He just settled for some cereal and to get the cleaning out of the way.

Gen Ability: Clean Lv 1
Cleans a small area on touch, cleaned material can be put into the inventory or dumped into ?
Ability XP: 0/200
Cost: 5MP
Area cleaned: 10x10cm

Again he ignored the ability, even if it would have come _really _fucking handy with cleaning the grease stains on the stovetop. Angelina barely managed to say hi and apologise for leaving her lot of the cleaning to him before she was out on her way to work. Lex grumbled a little bit but he still did the work anyway. Once done he went back up to the room, confident that he'd have the rest of the day to himself. He itched to do literally anything else but this was important.

Gen Skill Reading
Skill XP: 235/400

Quest Completed: Hitting the Books
**Read the book, I’m serious. I’m not losing another interesting experiment because they got immediately killed or enslaved
Rewards: 100XP, Not being **** to have your Mana siphoned for the rest of your natural life (or worse)**

Level up!
Lex Frost-Moore Lv 3
XP: 50/600
+5 Stat Points

He put the book down and just stared out at the wall, drilling his fingers along the spine. Lex had a choice to make.

Red or blue pill was a very good analogy. If he took the red pill he was putting himself in grave danger, but also providing himself with the tools to defend himself against the danger. The 'safe' part of him, it wanted to throw this all away, it may even be the smart part of himself.

And yet.

He did the math, the reading skill had fucked him a little bit, but even if he never rose his INT his reading speed could rise to 1,200 words per minute at max level. That was insane, and there was no indication of any cap to his stats or level. Infinite growth. He just needed to be smart about this, heed the warnings in the book, go forwards with as much forewarning as possible.

And besides, he smirked. He had an idea.

Lex opened up the quest and chose to stay.

Branching Path: The Apple in the Garden and the Pill in the Hand
Red or Blue Lex, your choice
[X] Keep your powers, never become a truly normal human again
Consequences: [Abyssnet connection added to Menu]

Hidden Objective: Take it slow and gather information before making your choice
Good boy, here's a cookie.
Rewards: +2 Stat Points

Lex brought his hand back with a sigh. No going back now. He thought. Next he brought up his Stat sheet.

Lex Frost-Moore
Gender: M
STR: 6 (4)
END: 11 (9)
AGI: 11 (9)
INT: 20 (18)
WIS: 11 (9)
CHA: 6 (4)
LIB: 20 (20)
Stat Points: 8
HP: 50/50
MP: 111/111

The biggest threat was raising his Mana Points or Regen, those were easier to detect than changes in Health or Health Regen. Just based off his base stats he could guess that the max for a baseline human was probably somewhere between 20-30. He was intelligent, but not inhumanly so, on the low-end of smart people. Similarly with Libido. The Strength and Charisma were certainly below average. He knew he could probably get away with raising all his stats, minus WIS, to 20 without attracting any attention.

Which was the crux of his plan here. He had two characters, and now two separate lives to live. One in the real world, with his Internship and his future, and one in the Abyss with his power and a lot of danger but the potential for incredible gains in the future.

So, why not keep them fully separate, use the Male form for the real world, keep it's magical stats low to prevent discovery, focus on getting the stats to the highest possible for a baseline human. Discretely, if possible. Then the Female form could be the one he used exclusively in the Abyss, it was fitting, he thought, since he'd always played as a girl in fantasy games when given the chance.

He opened up the 'dual character' menu, selecting the name of his Female form and pressed on the name, thankfully that brought up a small keyboard. He erased the name and put in Xel instead, it was the usual name he used in games when he played as a girl, it seemed fitting.

He swapped over to Xel, waiting the few moments it took for the transformation before opening up his stats. Currently they were the exact same as Lex's, he'd specialise Xel though. Craft a character from the ground up. he'd specialise her stats but first he needed to give her some survivability. He put all eight points into END. Swapping back over to himself he put points into STR, one at a time, just in case his body changed noticeably. He stopped when after the forth point he noticed a minute change to his muscles. It had occured when he'd reached 10 base STR, good to know. The other four went into his CHA bringing the base up to 10.

Xel
Gender: F
STR: 6 (4)
END: 19 (17)
AGI: 11 (9)
INT: 20 (18)
WIS: 11 (9)
CHA: 6 (4)
LIB: 20 (20)
Stat Points: 0
HP: 82/82, 0.2 pm
MP: 111/111, 1 pm

Lex Frost-Moore
Gender: M
STR: 10 (8)
END: 11 (9)
AGI: 11 (9)
INT: 20 (18)
WIS: 11 (9)
CHA: 10 (8)
LIB: 20 (20)
Stat Points: 0
HP: 54/54, 0.2 pm
MP: 111/111, 1 pm

Now it was time to plan for the future.