My Second Life Is A Heroic Power Fantasy - Chapter 180

Guards were placed on watch, and Jack and rose at and split some bread and dried meat while the rest of the group prepared for the next push. Sometime during the window they were eating, Jack felt the power given to him by Harrowbloom slowly fade away as the time window of its usage ran out. As it drifted away, he felt smaller, and slower, and it made him deeply uncomfortable. He hadn’t even realized it at the time, really, but the sword’s power had given him a sense of calm, confidence, and focus that he lacked on his own. Now that it was gone, he felt some of the same familiar anxiety and fear return.

To calm his mind, and lacking a better way to keep himself distracted from the nerves clawing their way back into his body and brain, he set about pacing the perimeter of the gnoll defensive camp, picking his way through the charred corpses of fallen gnolls and through the debris of the fallen arrow towers and torched tents. After a few minutes of doing this and find it didn’t really help, he finally found a place isolated far enough away from the rest of the group, and pulled the golden whistle out. He might as well see what this Frumpkin Ticket got him.

He blew the whistle and grit his teeth as he felt himself fold inside out, reappearing a moment later in the Repository, a short distance from the outstretched hand of the pedestal.

He walked up to the pedestal, pulled the ticket out of his pocket, and activated the Terminal. The familiar projected screen flared to life in front of him, bringing up the standard array of available commands, as well as a flashing notification alert.

He selected the notification alert. It opened, showing a brief message that said “New stat increases recorded. See them now?”. Lacking anything else to do with his time, he opened the message, and looked at the readout.

“Jack Eames

[Class: Lvl 3 Fighter/Sorcerer] (LEVEL UP!)

Prowess: 46 [+10]

Fortitude: 30 [+3]

Logic: 27 [+6]

Intuition: 25 [+5]

Persona: 20 [+11]

Composure: 20 [+5]

Spirit: 55 [+13]

Tenacity: 45 [+5]

Talents:

– [Immunity to Cold]

– [Martial Weapon Proficiency]

– [Magically Gifted (Sorcery)]

– [Magical Aptitude I]

– [Weapon Focus: Scimitar]

Recent Notable Accomplishments:

– [Bested a Gnoll Champion in one on one combat]

– [Coordinated a successful assault on a gnoll defensive position]

– [Saved the lives of multiple comrades in combat]

– [Single-handedly destroyed a gnoll camp with a firestorm]

Overall Assessment:

[Semi-Competent Nobody] (LEVEL UP!)”

Then, down at the very bottom, below everything else, was a flashing red alert that read “You have new level up rewards! Claim them now?”

Somehow, not only had every single one of his stats increased, some by quite a bit, but he’d managed to increase the Terminal’s opinion of him substantially. Had all of that really come from the last two days? It seemed almost excessive for what little he had done. Unless maybe he had a very inaccurate impression of what he’d accomplished.

Selecting the level rewards alert, he was greeted with a pop-up screen that presented him with two available options:

“[One free Talent upgrade]

or

[One free Silver Lottery Ticket]”

He contemplated for a moment, then selected the free Talent upgrade. No matter how tempting the Silver Ticket may be, he needed as many guaranteed improvements as he could get right now. While the ticket could potentially get him something better, there was also a good chance it could get him something far less valuable than a free upgrade, and now was not the time to be playing those odds.