Backlog

Handing over the power cord and retreating back to his room, before he got barraged with questions, had succeeded. Thus, John had some time available to take a look at his stack of Achievements and other notifications. Without further ado, he sat down on his bed and got to it.

Achievement Unlocked: Big Damn Hero
Pick a fight with something(s) or someone(s) much stronger than you, in order to save a complete stranger.
That kind of selfless courage deserves a reward. In fact, I’m not even going to sass you.
Reward: 500 EXP, New Skill (Enhance Muscle), +60 RP with Qhila, 1 Perk Point (pending perk system unlock), 1 Gold Star Sticker

A nested Tooltip revealed that the crossed out parts were things that had been delivered prior to opening the notification. On one hand, John would have liked to see what the other options for a new Skill were. On the other hand, Enhance Muscle had turned out to be more or less perfect for what he needed when he got it.

The 60 RP were massive as well, but they were also concerning. He had almost certainly ‘gotten’ that part by the time he first Observed her, meaning if not for that she would have been in the negatives at the start. That had a lot of uncomfortable implications, but since he could do nothing about any of that now, he pushed it out of his mind and focused on the rest of the rewards.

500 EXP was over half a level, which he took gladly. If there were normal sized EXP rewards attached to the rest of his notifications, he was going to level up for the third time today.

Aside from hoping he would get to the perk system soon, the perk point wasn’t really something he could evaluate much. How valuable such a point was fluctuated widely from game to game. If it was a 1 point to 1 perk deal, this was unquestionably awesome, but there were also games where a perk cost several points, either up front or because the thing was unlocked incrementally. If that was the case, the value of a single point could range from still pretty good to ‘meh’.

The sticker didn’t sound impressive, but given the other rewards, he would be a fool not to take a look before dismissing it. Physically, it was exactly as described, with the closest thing to something notable about it being that it was legitimately a shiny gold color and not just yellow. As with the Escape Rope, Observe was where the magic happened.

Okay, that felt a little patronizing. Given that this is how it looked when Gaia had said she wasn’t going to sass him, he suspected that if he had gotten such a sticker by any other means, it’d be drenched in enough sarcasm to deal damage to him when he read the description.

The effect itself was nice. In any game that had gear enhancers like these, using them was practically mandatory, and this one even gave a boost to what was likely going to be his main stat. All he needed was a good gear piece to put it on. Something that he would already expect to keep for a long time on its own.

In the meantime, next notification. John had a pretty good guess what that would be.

It was indeed exactly what he had expected. In the sense that he was expecting the Skill unlock for Enhance Muscle, that is. The actual skill turned out to be more versatile than he had expected. It also came with an unexpected limitation in the form of the cap of how many instances of it he could keep up at a time. It didn’t matter much right now, since one casting ate almost half his mana pool anyway, but it would most likely become a significant limitation in the future.

A quick check going part way through the casting process and then aborting revealed that he, and presumably all other humans, had 4 muscle groups for the purpose of this spell: legs, arms, torso and head/neck. He idly wondered if a tail would be a group of its own or fall under ‘torso’, but he could find out next time he met up with Qhila.

Achievement Unlocked: Wombo Combo
Combine two alchemical items to trigger a useful reaction during combat.
Setting something flammable on fire is a true testament to your intellectual superiority.
Reward: 50 EXP, +1 Skill Level to Low Alchemy.

The thing about not sassing him clearly didn’t last long. Some EXP and a free level in a Root Skill was great though, so he didn’t mind much.

Achievement Unlocked: On the Ropes
Dodge an attack that would kill you.
Try not to be the target of attacks that would kill you.
Reward: 10 EXP, Leather Jacket of Deflection

The EXP reward was kinda small, but then again the biggest benefit of earning this one was not having died from said attack. That would be true pretty much no matter what the reward was. Plus, the jacket sounded like it could be pretty good too.

Appearance wise, it looked like a black biker jacket, complete with a stylized shield where a biker gang would put gang marks. Which was not really John’s aesthetic, but he’d be willing to accept much worse looks for a piece of gear that helped him stay alive. And quite frankly, between the tough leather and the light but likely durable reinforcing plates on the back and outer arms, it would probably make decent armor even without the enchantment. Certainly better than a tshirt or his school uniform blazer. Trying it on quickly via his inventory, it was also a perfect fit. That established, he put it back in his inventory again, and took a look at the next notification.

Achievement Unlocked: MC Hammer
Dodge an attack that would kill you, 10 times in a row.
You need to try a lot harder than that.
Reward: 50 EXP, Hat of Close Calls

That comment would have made a whole lot of no sense at all if he hadn’t gotten those two achievements back to back. But given the comment on Wombo Combo and Gaia having reacted to him thinking ‘at’ her a few times, it was probably put there to fit the circumstances. In any case, EXP was still nice and the hat would need a closer look.

That was just straight up awesome, and would remain good for a long time, possibly forever. The chances of getting a better candidate for the sticker any time soon were probably very low, but John still decided to hold off until he finished with the notifications, just in case. Visually, it was an archetypal cowboy hat in light brown felt. It even came with a hole through it as if it had been shot through and off someone’s head as so often happened in the Lucky Luke comics.

Achievement Unlocked: Dead Drop
Cause an enemy to fall to their ****.
And you even managed to not fall in the same hole yourself.
Reward: 50 EXP, Sneakers of Feline Grace

That was rather niche, but when they were good they would probably be life-saving good. Plus, trying them on revealed that they were more comfortable than his old shoes. All in all, they would have had to be beyond hideous for him to not make these his go-to shoes for the time being. And while a splotchy calico-palette was a somewhat peculiar choice for sneakers, they didn’t actually look bad.

Achievement Unlocked: Pride Goes Before the Fall
Defeat an enemy with a level at least 3 times your own.
Just continue to bank on luck carrying you across the finish line, that can’t possibly backfire.
Reward: 500 EXP

Level Up

The comment rankled John a bit. Sure, he did get a few lucky breaks while fighting the rat ogre, but he hadn’t planned on luck to carry him through and he had given his everything both physically and mentally. The fat, juicy EXP reward, and it having pushed him to his 3rd level up today, did a lot to soften the blow, though. He decided that he would postpone distributing the ability points until he finished with the notifications.

Achievement Unlocked: Brain over Brawn
Defeat an enemy that is higher level than you by outsmarting them.
An intoxicated rat ogre is slightly dumber than a pebble, so good job on the low hanging achievement fruit, I guess.
Reward: 50 EXP, 2 Elixir of Clarity

That seemed to be a silver bullet sort of tool. While the description was vague on how strong the first three effects were, it being a magic consumable and Rare suggested they were probably fairly potent. The mental resistance would without a doubt be invaluable when facing an enemy that used that kind of magic, too.

On the flip side, the inhibited empathy would be a problem in a social setting or if he had allies present, and the migraine would be a serious issue if he couldn’t get out of whatever warranted using an elixir before the benefits ran out. All in all, the kind of thing that could win the day when used in the right situation or make everything worse when used in the wrong one.

Achievement Unlocked: Using Morphine as Nyquil
Heal someone for more than twice their missing HP (their missing HP must be greater than 0).
Because healing potions grow on trees.
Reward: 10 EXP, 2 Minor Healing Potion

That was odd. The only time he had healed anyone was when he gave Qhila a healing potion. It did heal more than his Max HP, but Qhila was Level 13 and had been down for the count at the time, so unless she was very squishy for her level or the rat ogre had somehow knocked her **** while dealing very little damage, John couldn’t see how this would add up.

That said, more healing potions was nice.

Achievement Unlocked: Welcome to Wonderland
Have a girl show you her room.
I am simultaneously surprised this hadn’t happened to you before and surprised it didn’t take you longer.
Reward: +1 cm base dick size, +2 LIB, +10% cum volume

‘Not that I don’t appreciate the dick boost, but what’s up with ‘rewarding’ me with increased libido and cum volume?’

Unsurprisingly, John received no answer to that.

Achievement Unlocked: Party Time
Have someone join your party.
And now for a much bigger challenge: have someone attend when you throw a party.
Reward: +1 CHA, 50 EXP, 100 EXP for your party member (pending).

Those were some nice rewards in general, but the pending EXP for Qhila was particularly interesting. It probably wasn’t all that much for someone at her Level, but this all but confirmed that the empty resource bar in her HUD, where he had his EXP bar, was indeed an EXP bar, and that she could, consequently, level up in some fashion. Now it was essentially just a question of time and grinding.

Giving it a moment’s thought, John decided to let Qhila know right away. Which led directly to him slapping his forehead, when he realized he didn’t have her number. In his hurry to get home before the fallout of having been missing grew too big, he had forgotten to get it. He had received no notification of her leaving his Party, however, nor of it disbanding. Moreover, the Party Chat was still in his HUD. That was worth a try.

[John]: Hey Qhila, it’s John. I just got an achievement that came with some EXP for you. It’s not much, but it means we could potentially level you up in time.
[SystemMessage]: Error, no party members in range

Okay, so there was a maximum range on it. Come to think of it, that was probably why the EXP was pending too. Clearly, he would have to handle that later. For now, he had one last notification

‘…’ John didn’t know what to think about that. On one hand, he had moral issues with falsehood. Sure, they could be the lesser evil, like keeping his family from losing the Veil. They could even be harmless, like when preparing a nice surprise. But he considered those exceptions, and lying to be morally wrong by default.

On the other hand, he had committed to a lesser evil kind of lie earlier today. One he would probably have to maintain for a while, and might have to tell other people than his family. That was something he would probably need every advantage he could get for. Especially considering that even when dealing with people that trusted him, everything had almost come crashing down over something as simple as his mom asking to meet Qhila.

On a mechanical view, the skill was fantastic. Sure, the bonus right now was a single point of effective CHA, but it was a multiplier that grew with Skill Level, and piling on multipliers was pretty much the holy grail of character optimization. Plus, he intended to raise the base value that was getting multiplied.

Thinking further on that was stopped by John hearing the muffled sound of his mom calling him down to dinner. So he quickly opened his sheet view to his 5 new Ability Points, tossed 2 in WIS and 1 in each of STR, END and CHA, and went downstairs.