Grey froze when he saw the last line on his notification screen.
’Free stats...’
He couldn’t have imagined that they weren’t just freezing him out of treasures, but also the Free Stats that could have come with them.
The "Instance" wasn’t considered to be over until the treasure that was left behind was successfully collected. As such, Grey never got the stat points he should have been allocated for his victories.
Fitz and May had probably taken the stat points he was owed for defeating the Goblin Warlord, and now this.
The tutorial had said that you gained stats by defeating monsters, but it hadn’t made the mechanism of exactly how clear.
Grey chuckled in the darkness, balancing there on the top of the pillar.
"I’m really going to fuck all you up now."
The tutorial had some general information about stat points and how to allocate them. It worked a lot like video games Grey was used to.
There weren’t anything as convenient as "classes" in the Genesis Games. If you wanted to mimic something, you would need the accompanying Neural Frame, treasures, and mech. But the same general logic often applied.
Mage and ranged types needed good INT and PER. Agility- or stealth-focused builds needed more SPD and DEX. Then there were the tanks and warriors who covered STR and END.
These were Intelligence, Perception, Speed, Dexterity, Strength, and finally Endurance.
The so-called "Harmonic Stats" were unique to special mechs and treasures, ones that allowed you to combine stats for higher effectiveness in both. For example, a STR-SPD Harmonic would allow you to more effectively turn how fast you were moving directly into power output.
Grey didn’t know the exact path he wanted to follow.
On the one hand, Dexterity was clearly the most important stat for Goblin Warlord Spirit—his greatest reliance. But now that he could interact with the Genesis System through his pinky ring, he didn’t have to put all his eggs in that one basket.
’Then again, Perception is probably important too. It impacts my senses and reaction speed to some extent.’
The real question was if Grey had the luxury to try and carve out another path. Because on the other hand, if all he needed to do was eat metal to improve these new Abilities of his, maybe that was worth exploring.
The problem with that was, of course, all the other trouble surrounding his Energy Reserve and Prometheus’ Spirit.
After some thought, Grey decided that going all in on Goblin Warlord Spirit for now was the smarter choice. He felt he didn’t need STR as much because he could mitigate that with the literal chainsaw he had now.
’In that case, five to Speed and Dex, then I’ll toss two into Strength and the final one into Perception.’
Honestly, Grey didn’t know what he was doing, but it felt right like this, so he kept it as such.
The top players had already had stats beyond 20 last time he was awake; who knew what they were at by now? He couldn’t try to catch up to them all in one go.
But he would catch up very soon.
If his treasures and Free Stats had been taken, he’d just cut down more.
’Time to go.’
**
"Ah, what the fuck is this."
Grey’s lip twitched.
At the moment, he looked quite the menacing character. He had a chainsaw with an endless link of black teeth hanging off his back, the Mask of the Skrill and his iron jaw hiding his features, and a pair of crimson eyes he hadn’t noticed just yet.
If he tried to get cast in a Predator vs. Alien movie right now, the director would turn him away for trying too hard.
That was why it was all so ridiculous that he was holding up a pair of pink panties.
At first, Grey thought the producers were targeting him, trying to make him out to be a pervert again. But then he read the description.
—
Name: Frilly Pair
Rarity: Uncommon
Accepted Type: Branching
Restricted Type: Linear
Description: An item for the fashionable, bold, or comfortable. Wear this item and gain a boost to PER. Feel the stares of passersby at your audacity, and experience their surface thoughts within three meters’ range.
Abilities: +10 PER. Capable of reading thoughts of targets with Linear Neural Frames so long as the item is not restricted in any way and targets are within three meters.
—
’You’ve gotta be kidding me. "So long as the item is not restricted in any way"? These bastards don’t just want me to wear these panties, they want me to not cover them up?’
Grey almost wanted to shed real tears.
This was the second ruin he passed by on the way to his original path. The one he passed through right after the Skrill Elite ruin had already been cleared. This one had had a two-headed dog creature that Grey defeated with his dagger; there hadn’t been a need to use the unwieldy chainsaw, especially since it ate up stamina.
He was beginning to see a problem with not having many stat points in STR, though. The chainsaw was heavier than his other weapons had been, so his SPD took a small hit while he carried it.
Regardless, the two-headed dog had just been a normal creature. After two more spawned after the first, he found this item waiting for him as well as a measly +2 Free Stats which he split between DEX and SPD.
So, he learned two things.
First, the number of Free Stats you gained definitely depended on difficulty.
Second, the Genesis System either had a perverted and twisted sense of humor, or the Producers had warped it to this point.
But Grey didn’t know if he could pass this up.
The two most common Neural Frames were Branching and Linear, making up about 70 to 80% of the population. Recursive and Resonant were rarer, making up only about 20 to 30% together.
This was to say that if Grey did this, he would be able to read the thoughts of a third of the people he met.
He turned the panties over and almost fainted.
Why was there a hole in the backside?