Luke had never been much of a runner. His somewhat thin frame and above-average height might give some the impression otherwise, but before he was even out of the city, he was huffing and puffing, feeling a side stitch coming on and cursing his decision to leave home in jeans and a hoodie. But he wasn't a quitter. No one could accuse him of that. Despite it all, he ran down the street, turned, and continued.

  Each time he passed groups of people, he sensed their injuries and illnesses. But he couldn't help them all. There just weren't enough hours in the day to make a dent of any size in the city's population. Even with magical abilities, he was just one man with one low bar of mana.

  No matter what he tried, Luke found no way of disabling the skill. If he couldn't help them, he didn't want to know. But, as far as he could tell, there was no way of turning Weaver's Eye off. He'd have to learn to live with it always on, surrounded by illness and informed of every minor ache. The entire world was now his old folks’ home.

  Instead, he kept his eyes forward, practicing turning his mind away from the information. And he did well, for the most part. Exhaustion from the running helped. When he ran past a father with a small coughing child in a stroller, he couldn't just continue past. Not this time.

  Panting, Luke hailed the man. "Excuse me," Luke said.

  The dad, younger even than himself, looked stressed and tired, like most dads.

  "Did I drop something?" the man asked.

  "No, sorry," Luke said, struggling to get his breathing under control. "It's your child. I'm sorry, but she's sick."

  The father narrowed his eyes and pulled the stroller back, blocking it with his own body.

  "That cough?" Luke asked, taking a step back to show himself as unthreatening as possible.

  Not a great look, approaching someone out of the blue like that.

  "Kids cough," the father said, glancing down at the low-energy little girl. Her lips were a little pale, even.

  "She's got late-stage pneumonia," Luke said. Pneumonia was treatable in most cases, and he was certain helping was within his ability, even if it would mean using up the last of his mana. Luke, unfortunately, regenerated little when running.

  "You stay away from us," the father said.

  "Of course," Luke said, holding up his hands in an appeasing gesture. "I won't bother you anymore. But please take her to the doctor. I'm a medical student, so I know what I'm talking about. She might not make it through without treatment and antibiotics."

  It was a small lie, that he was still in school, but it worked. The father's stance softened a little.

  "Pneumonia?" he asked.

  "Yes," Luke said. "There's a hospital nearby. You should go there. Right now."

  "Thanks, man. I will," the father said, before turning to cross the street.

  Luke resumed his damn run. It didn’t take long to get out of breath again, and the stamina bar decreased little by little until it was at 10% about half an hour outside of the city. Exhaustion had him in its grip, but Luke refused to stop. If he stopped now, it would take a good long while for him to start going again, and he wanted to get back to Milla.

  So, rather than stopping, he ran, forcing his legs to move, and breathed hard to force air down into his lungs. Each step brought renewed pain and discomfort, but Luke persevered. And after another far too long bout of running, he got what he'd been hoping for.

  System Message: Boon of Potential grants you an attribute point (+1 Endurance).

  "Fuck yeah," Luke said to himself, almost choking on the word as he staggered into the suburb.

  He crossed the road to his parents’ house and collapsed in the front yard. Luke gasped for breath. Sweat streamed down his face, chest, and back. The grass in the shade was cool against his face and smelled of, well, grass. That one point of endurance made little difference in this state, and it must have taken him twenty minutes just to get back up and into the house.

  Downing glass after glass of water by the kitchen sink before pouring it into his palms to wash off his face and hair, he listened for sounds of his family. He really needed a shower. But that would have to wait. First, Milla. He didn’t want to wait a second longer to heal his sister’s malady.

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  "Milla!" He called out into the quiet house.

  The silence hung heavy. No answer. Taking another glass of water with him into the living room, Luke found the couch empty and the TV off.

  "Hello?" Luke called up the stairs to the second floor before sighing and forcing his screaming legs to do his bidding, shuffling and grimacing with each step he climbed.

  The upstairs was empty as well.

  "Where the hell is everyone?" Luke grumbled, sending Milla a text.

  When his phone buzzed, he thought she'd replied, but found an answer from Ray instead.

  "Hey asshole," Ray texted. "I'm out. You there?"

  Luke's thumbs tapped the on-screen keyboard as he texted. "Left the Tutorial Dungeon a while ago. Home now. Why are you so slow?"

  "Wasn't my fault. Stupid Lizardmen. Good thing you're out. What class did you choose?" Ray texted. "Also, why are you home? You have to celebrate. Come back into town."

  "I'm a Healer," Luke texted.

  "LOL. Nerd!" Ray replied right away.

  "What about you?" Luke asked, grinning as he tapped out the words on his screen.

  "I'm an Assassin. The coolest class there is."

  "Of course you are," Luke typed.

  "You coming back or what?" Ray asked. "I'll even let you buy me a beer. All of Chicago is celebrating today, boy!"

  Luke chuckled. "I'll just take a shower first. See you in a bit, you edgy, tryhard assassin!"

  After that he called Milla but got no answer. Neither his father or mother answered, either. He sighed and texted them, asking where they all went.

  He sat down on the stairs and squeezed his thighs. They felt beyond overextended and fatigued. While his stamina bar was climbing, it would take a lot of time to get them back to where he could repeat the long run back to the city. His family was gone. That meant they'd taken the car. Waiting for the bus, if those were still running with everything going on, would take almost as long as running back.

  After taking a shower, he sat down on the living room couch, put his hands on his legs, closed his eyes, and quested inward with his Threads of Mana. Depending on how one looked at it, muscle strain and fatigue could be considered injuries. Micro tears throughout the muscle, when recovered, were how the muscle grew stronger. This was the basis of getting stronger.

  Healing those micro tears with Needle of Life would give him quite the edge and make Boon of Potential even more effective. Training without the exhaustion that followed. Quite the intriguing thought.

  Back in school, he'd read quite a bit about the different systems and requirements necessary for muscles to do their jobs. Muscles use ATP as an energy source, adenosine triphosphate. Without this source of energy, your muscles grow weak. Then there is the lactic acid buildup, because the muscles aren’t getting enough oxygen. So, instead, they break down other stuff, turning glucose into lactic acid for energy.

  He'd need some way to grow ATP and flush the lactic acid while creating more glucose for his muscles. Add calcium, sodium, and potassium creation to smooth out imbalances without forgetting the muscle fiber tears themselves. As if that wasn't enough, physical exercise takes focus and concentration, which means the central nervous system is taxed. And Luke did not intend to mess around with his own brain.

  So, even a simple thing like muscle fatigue was a complex thing to heal, but perhaps he didn't need to go quite that far. Instead, he activated Needle of Life and flooded his legs with healing mana, using up most of his now full stores in an instant.

  Standing, he bent his legs and jumped, and did a squat before shaking his legs out. They felt much better, not restored, but almost. If only this type of healing didn't take so much mana. With his lower body healed, the stamina recovery sped up, and the stamina bar almost filled in a matter of seconds. While he couldn't fix himself, again and again at no cost, he did have access to a shortcut.

  The clothes he wore went into a backpack after Luke changed into clothes and shoes more fit for running. After filling a water bottle, he readied himself for another bout of running. This time, the exercise came a little easier to him. Perhaps he ought to drink a mana potion since running hampered the recovery, but he didn't want to waste what little resources he had.

  Shop! That was it! He'd received 1000 credits for completing the Tutorial Dungeon. What better time to spend them? Willing the Shop window open as he ran, Luke found all sorts of potions available. Health. Mana. Stamina. Speed and strength, and even ones that raised your magic power for a couple of moments. Potions weren't the only thing available, however. Equipment was plentiful, with some incredible weapons and sets of armor, scrolls to cast spells, and jewelry to buff stats and skills. The problem was, no matter how much he looked, Luke didn't find a whole lot of usable gear for himself. Some rings were healer specific, but the stupid interface said they weren't compatible with his class. A couple of staves were available as well, at a far too high cost, and all they did was raise attack power.

  Luke sighed and purchased a few health, mana, and stamina potions. They were 100 credits each, and once he was done, his account balance was 0. A tab for selling drew his eye. The Tutorial Dungeon hadn't supplied him with much in the way of loot, but the goblin corpses he'd picked up sold for 250 credits each. Not bad. His eyes widened when he saw what the Groll Champion core sold for, 15.000 credits, but he decided not to sell it. At least not yet. With the dead goblins sold, he'd reached back up to 1000 credits. That would have to do for the moment.

  He drank a mana potion and his bar filled up with about a third. Not satisfied, he attempted to drink another, and, to his irritation, found that he could not.

  System Message: Mana potion cooldown 5 minutes.

  "Five minutes potion cooldown my ass," Luke said, sighing.

  Just to test it out, he drank a health potion and found that he could. This meant the cool down was for each type of potion. He'd need to remember that.

  It was about noon when his running took him past a long line of cars standing still and idling on the freeway next to the bike path he was running on. Frowning, he continued for a little while longer, fearing the worst. Most of the time, cars would slow down when the traffic was dense, but not stop.

  Just as he'd suspected, Luke soon arrived at an accident involving three cars that had crashed into each other. Screams and wailing rose into the air as he turned off the path, jumped over the fence to the freeway, and raced to reach the scene of the accident.