As the morning broke, Sis and I let out an exhausted sigh. Mom’s punishment had been to make us refill a massive hole with nothing but our hands. It had been 8 hours, and we were finally reaching the end. Mom had gone to sleep shortly after making sure we ate, but we decided it was best if we didn’t slack on this, so we worked through the night.

  One pit and a couple long showers later, we finally joined the rest of the family for dinner. With the punishment done, Mom had let us off the hook, but news of the reason was cause enough for another celebration, but this time everyone would be invited. After all, it’s not every day someone unlocks their stats early, but at the same time nobody was surprised as news spread. Our original plans for a small family and close friends plan were derailed as people from all over the town came over with food and gifts. Turns out I had made too many friends and close acquaintances.

  Rodrick, the new head carpenter; Allister, the stonemason; and several dozen farmers whose farms I helped start back up. Then there was also Eve, the best seamstress in town; Walter, the new sanitation and plumbing manager; and, of course, Crescent and Mayor Hew attended. All these people whom I had worked closely with in the reconstruction and a large number of acquaintances also wanted to show. By the end of the day Mayor Hew had decided to have a public event held in the town square. I wanted nothing to do with it, but the mayor promised to handle everything else, and all Callia and I needed to do was attend.

  It was honestly way too much, but the mood in town had been unusually high, and it seemed a lot of people were just looking for an excuse to hold another party.

  The event was scheduled for the end of the week with the public reason being to celebrate the rise of a champion. It was a term I hadn’t heard before but apparently qualified for. A champion was someone who, through outstanding contributions, managed to earn the acknowledgement of enough people to unlock their stats before typical adult age. In a small town like ours, news of people who achieve this kind of status is nearly unheard of, but the mayor got news from across the kingdom, including news of champions.

  While the mayor was busy with his work, Callia and I convened on the stats. While the mayor was off stirring up a big fuss, Dad sat me and Sis down for a discussion on how to adjust to stats. We had far more than most ever got, and dumping in all of our stats in one sitting was a recipe for an unpleasant adjustment.

  “Callen, Callia, you're both still at the peak of your growing years, so you will need to recognize that adding so many points won’t just change your capabilities but influence your growth. Vitality will make you taller and larger, strength will increase your muscle mass, and dexterity will refine your muscle mass into a more sleek form. Mental stats are also apparent but in less visible ways.

  For instance, Callen must have a serious imbalance in his mana stat because his presence is very visible but also unrestrained. It’s not spoken, but as you get older, getting a feel for someone's presence becomes natural. Will brings more restraint and control to someone's presence, and perception influences the range someone feels your presence from, typically increasing or decreasing according to whatever you prefer.

  Overinvesting in any one stat can cause crippling malformations in your growth, so no stat should be more than double any other. Callen, your mana overbalance has already affected your physical potential. You will likely never appear physically imposing, and your ability to exert strength will be less than someone with an identical strength. The stats that you need most right now are Will and Vitality. Will naturally restrains Mana, like Dexterity restrains Strength, and Vitality will always push your body towards balance. The only consequence of overdoing vitality is growing abnormally tall.

  Don’t just dump everything you need to balance. Never invest more than 10 points a week. It won’t directly hurt you, but rapid gains need time for adjustment. Just like when Callen’s mana grew and he needed over a month to adjust and stop ruining his projects.”

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  With Dad’s speech done, I started working on the stat that was clearly the most important for now, Will.

  I skipped Vitality for now because it didn’t counter mana as efficiently, and with 10 points, I will be almost in range to reach Dad’s minimum balance threshold. After adding that, I check Nightshade's enchantment.

  So stats it was, and Callia’s was still identical to mine, so counted together we could only have 721 stat points, which was more than enough for now, but adding our total free points together reached 884. We had several months to figure out what raised our bottleneck.

  Callia’s turn was after mine, but she didn’t have any of the issues I had other than perception, which was exactly double mana. Regardless, it seems shoring up our weakness was on both of our minds.

  Real life couldn’t be compared to a game where dumping everything into one stat lead created an overwhelming advantage. Instead, the imbalance would make proper functioning much harder. I hadn’t really noticed the consequences Dad had mentioned yet, but I really did heavy strength-based work. A lot of the difficulties in runework were offset by the high levels of mana sense and mana control. Maybe that was why I had been able to push both skills past 80, which even Dad had only pushed 3 skills past 80 with years more experience and time to improve.

  Nixie’s adventure

  With Callen and Callia busy trying out their airborne hunting device, Nixie felt a bit left out. For years she and Callia had practiced extensively making traps for Callen, but just as Callia lacked opportunity to ambush Callen, Nixie had also fallen into a bit of a slump. That is, until a guard from the town approached her.

  Turns out with all of Callia and Callen’s high-profile adventures, a lot of people were inspired by them to push their limits. Particularly a lot of people took interest in the kinds of livelihoods that forged them into such excellence. At some point someone had suggested to the captain of the guard to hire Nixie to set traps for the guards.

  Somehow, instead of being cancelled immediately, the idea of hiring someone to prank the town guards got traction. Now it had reached the point of no return, and Nixie found herself rather confused. Since when did pranking people become a livelihood? Regardless, she took to her new victims with zeal. At first she didn’t hold back but quickly adjusted to make the game more sporting.

  After all, if the guards have no chance to spot or dodge it, it probably wouldn’t take long for them to regret their decision. Instead Nixie set one in three traps with the intention of letting them escape. The guards quickly improved from helpless to dodging out of the way with ample experience, and the practice of spotting, dodging, and running from traps proved to be a great boon. Patrols in the woods were smoother and safer. Soon the captain and Nixie were being lauded by the recruits for a great training program. Or at least they thought so, but it turns out the recruits were sick of falling in pits and instead set an elaborate trap for them. For a group briefing over progress for the past month, a custom stage was designed to be flipped with a pit behind and a team of recruits with shovels on standby to bury them.

  After a day buried up to their necks in dirt, they eventually agreed to only one day of traps per week. However, the guards didn’t understand the concept of a prank war, which Callia had thoroughly taught Nixie. In the ‘safe days,’ Nixie spent her time making far more elaborate traps and prepping them to be armed on the day of reckoning.