161 Surprising value of the surviviors
‘So that’s how it is,’ Mathew thought when he noticed the changes on the golden screen displayed before him.
As soon as he attempted to add one point to his vitality statistic, two things happened.
First, a new panel opened up right in the middle of the display with a single number of five on it. Then, as soon as Mathew’s eyes moved over to that new panel, a confirmation button appeared below the number.
‘Five cores for raising a single stat by one?’ Mathew thought, raising his hand to rub his chin. ‘It’s hard to say whether it’s cheap or not…’ he thought. ‘Or is it?’
The only way that Mathew knew to level up so far, or rather, the only way that he could level up, was to kill more and more zombies.
And it definitely took more than just fifty zombies to raise his level by one and be rewarded with ten statistic points to distribute to his powers.
‘So with a little bit over three thousand cores left, I should be able to get…’ the young man thought, quickly doing the calculus in his mind. ‘Sixty levels in total, huh?’
A small smile appeared on Mathew’s lips… along with his eyebrows moving up.
The cost of raising his levels like that appeared to be too damn low!
“I guess the price of leveling up increases as I use it?” he muttered under his nose, only to add a whole ten points to his vitality in total before confirming the purchase.
Mathew closed his eyes, expecting yet another flash of bright light. Yet, even after waiting for a while, no such thing happened. Yet, when he looked at the display before his eyes, he could see that the change actually took place.
[Mathew Karian]
[Level – 2/2]
[Vitality – 36] > [Vitality – 46]
[Brawn – 42]
[Agility – 42]
[Mind – 5]
[Arcane – 25]
[Total – 150+32] > [Total – 160+32]
[Accumulated Levels – 15/19] > [Accumulated Levels – 15/20]
[Avaible points: 42]
‘Oh right, I still have forty-two points to distribute,’ he thought, only for his eyebrows to move down as he squinted his eyes. ‘Wait, didn’t it increase by ten as well?’
Mathew took a deep breath.
All the possible meaning of the results of his testing swarmed his mind, making it exceedingly hard to wrap his head around all of those things at once.
‘Is it a bug in the system or did I miss a notification about leveling up?’ Mathew asked himself, only to then shake his head and ignore the question for now.
‘Rather than getting puzzled over the inner workings of all those strange features, I better do more testing,’ Mathew decided. ‘I will have the time to think about it later,’ he thought, raising his finger to bring his vitality up again.
This time, however, he only raised it by four points, bringing it up to fifty.
‘The cost went up to six,’ Mathew noticed when the number displayed on the golden screen became twenty-four. ‘Does that mean it rises by twenty percent for every ten points purchased?’ he thought, gritting his teeth as more and more possibilities appeared in his mind. ‘Well then, there is only one way to find it out,’ he thought, before slamming six points into his agility stat.
[Mathew Karian]
[Level – 2/2]
[Vitality – 46] > [Vitality – 50]
[Brawn – 42]
[Agility – 42] > [Agility – 48]
[Mind – 5]
[Arcane – 25]
[Total – 160+32] > [Total – 170+32]
[Accumulated Levels – 15/20]
[Avaible points: 42]
‘So that’s how it is,’ Mathew thought as a massive grin appeared on his face. ‘It’s nice to find the very first exploit in this system,’ he commented in his mind as the corners of his lips reached the limit of how much they could move up.
‘While the points I can use for myself do not increase, the total of my points still decides how much I can invest in my wives!’
Mathew’s entire body vibrated as he attempted to hold back his joy.
‘This is what I was fucking waiting for!’ he thought, before taking a moment to calculate the most optimal approach. Yet, without a board to write or paper to take notes on, he only managed to solve the simpler, early part of the problem.
“It will always be more worth to invest in my own points up to the moment the cost of my points is twice as high as the cost of increasing the stats of others,” he muttered under his nose. “And all of that assuming one thing…” he then added, only to raise his finger and add a single point to Nadia’s vitality.
“Jackpot,” Mathew whispered when the number on the secondary display turned into five.
That single number meant the cost of points was calculated for each member of his party separately!
“That means, I need to get fifty points for myself first to even the costs,” Mathew muttered, moving his hand over to where his own statistics were displayed after clearing the change to Nadia’s vitality. And with a short moment of spamming the plus sign on the display, his combined status increased by a total of forty points more at the total cost of a further three hundred cores.
[Mathew Karian]
[Level – 2/2]
[Vitality – 50]
[Brawn – 42]
[Agility – 48]
[Mind – 5] > [Mind – 20]
[Arcane – 25] > [Arcane – 50]
[Total – 160+32] > [Total – 200+32]
[Accumulated Levels – 15/20] > [Accumulated Levels – 15/24]
[Avaible points: 42]
“That should do it,” Mathew muttered only to press the confirmation button on the additional display before waving the entire thing away and leaving the sub realm of the merchant’s feature.
“What took you so long?” Nadia asked as soon as Mathew’s mind returned to the real world. Her face was tense and while Mathew could sense just how awkward the girl was, she clearly felt too worried about him to care about their earlier strife.
“I know it will be hard to believe, but I got stumped on a Math problem,” Mathew explained before lowering his head. “I’m sorry, even though I already knew it, I didn’t really think about how the touching grass subspace doesn’t work the same as the merchant’s one.”
Mathew was still used to the reality where entering a merchant’s shadow realm would put a stop to the time of the real world. And yet, judging by how things and people moved in the short amount of time he spent within the touching grass feature before, the same rules didn’t apply to that subspace.
“It’s okay…” Nadia replied softly, lowering her head and stepping from one leg to the other.
‘I got so consumed by the intricacies of the system that I kinda forgot about our quarrel,’ Mathew thought, unable to get out of the awkward moment himself.
“You said you were stumped by a math problem, right?” Daria suddenly asked, breaking into the space between the couple and forcing the two of them to look at her.
“That’s right. I found a way to exploit just how messy this system is. What I wanted to figure out, though, was the best way to do it.”
“I’m not good with math,” Daria quickly stated, killing all the hope that momentarily appeared in Mathew’s soul. “Same with Leila,” Daria then added, putting another nail to the coffin of Mathew’s hopes.
“Math was never my strongest subject,” Nadia chimed in, happy to talk about a topic that put a stop to the awkwardness between her and Mathew. Even if it was only a temporary measure, it still allowed her to talk with her husband just like they used to.
“And since you couldn’t solve it on the go yourself, then we are in quite a pinch, aren’t we?” Daria asked, seemingly putting everyone in a bad mood.
Yet, contrary to her words, her lips were smiling.
“We don’t really have the time for theatrics,” Mathew muttered. “I already wasted a lot of it within the touch grass subspace, so please, save them for later and just tell us already what you thought about.”
“Not a single one of us can solve this problem easily. And I can say that without even asking about the details of what you are talking about,” Daria stated only to then shrug her shoulders and open them up to the sides. “But did you guys forget where the hell we are right now?”
‘Huh?’ Mathew thought, stumped by Daria’s words.
The expression on her face made it clear that the hints she gave were so obvious she shouldn’t need to say another word to make it clear.
“We are in the…” Mathew started speaking, only to stop his words when the obvious reality dawned on him. “We are in the middle of a fucking school!” he screamed out only to hide his face in the palms of his hand, ashamed of how such an obvious connection eluded him.
Mathew didn’t waste a second after he realized Daria’s intentions. He turned around on his heel and looked at the people throwing curious glances at them from all over the area.
If not a single member of his group could solve this question on their own without wasting a considerable amount of time, then the obvious choice was to let someone else do it for them!
“We need someone great at math!” Mathew shouted and sent a prying glance all over the area. ‘
“Excuse me…” a hand appeared from beyond the doorway to one of the classrooms on the floor, quickly followed by a scrawny-looking boy.
‘A junior of ours?’ Mathew thought when he noticed the small psychique of his former schoolmate.
“I don’t mean to brag, but I’ve got the fourth spot in the national math exam,” the young man explained as he stepped forward and slowly approached the group.
He then stood up, fixed his glasses, and audibly gulped down his saliva.
“Can I maybe ask for the details of the problem?”