Home at last

John kicked the door shut behind himself as he wrestled with his keys, the backpack he’d taken to Ashcroft, and a bag of shopping. He’d debated chucking everything in his Inventory before heading back from town; while it’d been a dry sunny day, it was still an awkward set of things to carry, but he’d opted against it. For one, he wasn’t sure how the food would react to being pushed in and out of what he was assuming was a pocket dimension, and additionally he wasn’t sure if the bags would keep their contents. What if he stored a bag and everything in it just fell to the floor? There was a time and a place for experimenting with his storage abilities, but it certainly wasn’t while walking down a busy street to the nearest bus stop.

Thankful that his mother still wasn’t back from whatever she was doing - her car hadn’t been on the drive, and she hated him kicking the door closed - John managed to get through to the kitchen and drop the shopping on the counter before setting his academy bag down. A moment later, a quick experiment revealed that, yes, he could store containers in his Inventory. A check of his Status revealed that while it was stored just fine, a number of Inventory slots were now grayed out; retrieving the bag and doing a quick count, he came to the conclusion that if he put containers in, some things inside them would require their own slots.

Experimenting more with the strange features of his storage as he finished putting away the shopping, John came to the conclusion that the rules for what needed an extra slot or not were fuzzy at best. His wallet didn’t need extra slots for his library card, but a notebook in his backpack took up a slot. He continued to try different combinations as he made up a tray with a glass of juice and a jug of water to have on hand while meditating later, and for a minute or two he debated postponing his efforts at getting a Class in favour of further capacity testing. Shaking his head as he returned everything else to his Inventory to have both hands free for the tray on the stairs, he decided against it; he needed a Class now, and he could worry about storage when it became an issue. Currently, he was barely using the space he had, and maybe he’d get more slots as he levelled up anyway.

Closing the door to his room a short while later, John looked around the space. There wasn’t any chance something here would be useful for his Quest; it was all stuff he’d gotten himself. Desktop computer - custom built before they moved to Springfield, no oddities there. Old sports equipment from the occasions his parents had tried to get him to go outside - all purchased from major stores. Shelf full of miniatures he’d assembled himself - arguably they were odd in that he’d painted them up as acolytes of a cult that wasn’t even technically canon any more, if indeed it had ever been so. Setting the tray down on the table, he picked up the nearest figure, and just in case decided to chuck an Observe onto it.

John winced at that. Inexpertly painted? That wasn’t particularly nice, even if it was true - he’d gotten the chaplain before any of the other figures on the shelf, and had painted it up the way he had because he wanted something different to the usual good or bad guys in the setting. While the paint job wasn’t the best and it was a dubious replica rather than an official figure, he’d liked the look of it so much he’d carried on the paint scheme with the rest of the models; there was a pretty reasonably sized army there now, all flying the black and white colours of the oddest of the chaos gods.

Setting the figure back down on his desk and taking a moment to drain the glass of juice, John sat down on his bed and crossed his legs. Meditation, that was his best shot at getting a Class. After all, it wasn’t as if he could start randomly trying to heal people to become a Cleric; he was no doctor, and where would he even find people that needed healing anyway? Closing his eyes, John tried to visualize his breath: inhale, hold, exhale. He felt like a bit of a fool doing it; trying to get an awareness of the Mana that his Status told him he had made him imagine himself as more of an anime character than a cleric. Still, there was something there, floating at the edge of his consciousness.

Barely breathing for fear that he’d lose the feeling, John reached out; he could feel something there in the back of his brain as he touched what he was now assuming was his Mana. Alright, so he’d got the feel of it - now what? There’d been no notification; clearly, just having access to Mana didn’t do anything - which made sense. After all, if getting a Class were as easy as touching the means to act like the holder of that Class, he’d have picked up a load of physical Classes already just by virtue of having a physical body.

What priestly things could he do with just Mana? He could heal… but no, that wouldn’t work. Gamer’s Body had long since repaired the damage from the shard in his hand, and he couldn’t just sit around and wait until someone got injured near him. Blessings might work, but those he was pretty sure required a god that was being worshiped; he’d never heard of an atheist blessing. What about an aura? That was clerical, projecting your Mana around you to heal anyone inside it. That would work - auras didn’t need to heal anyone, surely. With great care, he focused his will against that feeling of Mana and pushed.

The sensation of power rippled through him, and John opened his eyes with a gasp. As he looked around, everything seemed off; he’d definitely done something but there had been no announcement that he’d completed the Quest. And the light from outside looked… wrong somehow - as if an oil slick had covered the sun. Opening up his Status, John bit his lip in worry as he saw the pop-up that had clearly appeared while his eyes had been closed.

What the hell was a Barrier? And more importantly, how did one get out of a Barrier once one had been created? Peering outside the window revealed that the area around his house was more or less normal looking aside from the weird rainbow-coloured sky - but there were no signs of any life. No people, no birds, nothing but the plants. Lights were off in the other houses on the street - and at the end of the road, the oil-slick colours extended from the sky down to the ground; it seemed like wherever he was, it might look like his home but it wasn’t.

Turning back towards the bed, John pondered seeing if he could leave the way he had entered. A moment’s concentration later, a noise made him jump and lose focus. The sound itself was not too dissimilar to a computer’s error chime, echoing in his head the same way Quest completion noises usually did. Opening one eye and glancing at his Status, what he saw was rather concerning.

Given John was pretty sure he had no method of taking control of the Barrier - although he did momentarily think about how unfair it was that he had apparently created it but didn’t have control of it - his options were to either run or defeat enemies. Well, how bad could the enemies be? As he thought that, another sound chilled him to the bone. From somewhere downstairs, a low rumbling growl - followed a moment later by an answering call from the garden. Right, that answered his question - it sounded like enemies meant monsters or wild animals of some kind. He should have guessed that sooner or later he’d get involved in combat - he had a hp bar after all, how had he not realised the danger its presence represented? Dating sims didn’t have health bars - but RPGs and action games certainly did, and they had all kinds of things ready to take a chunk out of the player.

Trying not to panic, John propped his chair as best he could against the door and looked around for anything he could use as a weapon. Tennis racket? Hardly useful unless he wanted to bounce off whatever was out there. Rucksack? With a bunch of books in it would weigh a fair amount, but any swing would be wildly inaccurate and anyway he probably lacked the Strength. The sound of heavy footfalls on the stairs made John break out in a cold sweat. Drops of perspiration ran down his spine - and he suddenly had an idea. Yanking open the door to his wardrobe, he shoved the clothes to one side - and pulled out the stout walking stick he’d used for all of about three months when his dad had insisted they try hiking.

It was smooth and dusty where it hadn’t been touched in years, and now that he was older it barely came up to his chest - but it was made of solid wood, and felt oddly satisfying in his hand. He was just glad it was in this strange other space with him; if the closet had been empty, he wasn’t sure exactly what he would have done. With the staff now in hand, he gave it an experimental twirl. Yea, that might work. Another growl - much closer this time - and he almost dropped his improvised weapon. Who was he kidding? He’d been playing around with his powers as if he was in a simulator or some kind of hentai point-and-clicker, even after he’d learned that people had combat Classes all around him.

Leaning on the staff for support, John gave one last glance around the room for something, anything, that he might be able to use to help against whatever was practically on the other side of his door. As he turned, his eyes fell on the marine chaplain. He’d never been particularly religious himself; nominally his family were Christian, but not exactly practicing besides the occasional prayer at Thanksgiving or Easter egg hunt. But now… “I could really use a hand,” John said, looking at the roughly painted symbol of Malal the chaplain wore as a banner on its back. “I just wanted to do things in an organised way, and now I’ve got to fight some kind of monster. God, do I need help right about now.”

It was a pitiful prayer as far as prayers went. John turned back to the door and gripped his staff with both hands, ready for the beast on the far side to break through and probably eat him. The day had been going so well - not getting beaten up by Frank, a nice lunch and the realization that he might actually have people that were attracted to him - and now he was going to die. As he thought that, two more sounds reverberated around the room. The first, the triumphant chime of a Quest completing. The second - and the one that nearly made him drop his staff - was a voice in a thick accent that was not quite Chicago mobster nor Brooklyn gangster but somehow captured the essence of both. “What, ya want miracles, kid? Good fuckin’ luck.”