Matt sat on the tiled floor, knees tugged to his chest, staring at the wide open skies, trying to make sense of what Tara had told him.

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  Becoming a healer hadn’t been by choice. So, why?

  If the system was truly all knowing, then why had he received the Scepter of Life?

  Why were healing classes the only ones he was offered?

  If the system cared about the path and progression of every person, then why send him on a fool’s errand… on a dead path with no potential.

  Even if he assumed there was more to healers than what Tara had said, the main issue was the lack of said healers. No healers meant no knowledge. And no knowledge meant there was nothing and no one to learn from.

  Was he expected to reinvent the wheel?

  Not even that, he was expected to come up with the idea behind the wheel, all while apparently being hunted down, because being a healer wasn’t already hard enough.

  Getting ostracized or having no resources hadn’t worried him. He didn’t mind the solitude and he didn’t like relying on others anyway. Besides, he was sure Izzy and Jackson would support him and have his back no matter what. The problem was the lack of information.

  The lack of information had never been an issue in his mind because his plan had been to hole up in a library for a couple of months once the tutorial was over, and consume every bit of information about his class and the system he could get his hands on.

  Now, not only would he not have access to that information, but it didn’t even exist.

  It was like being told that in order to be a doctor you had to figure out everything on your own, and you only had yourself to practice on. A death sentence is what it was.

  Could Tara be wrong? Or maybe she’s lying to me? he thought, snapping his head towards the cat who seemed to be lying down next to the passed out Lara.

  “I know what you’re thinking, and whether you believe me or not is up to you,” she spoke, apparently sensing his gaze. “Just know that I have no reason to lie to you. I gain nothing from it, and it harms you in the long run,” she added.

  “You had no reason to manipulate me either, yet that didn’t seem to stop you,” Matt retorted.

  Tara sighed, getting up and walking towards him. “Be it as it may. You’re the one who asked for answers. Sulking because they weren’t to your liking won’t change them. And neither will taking your anger out on me. It will just make me less likely to answer your next question,” she scolded.

  Matt stared at the cat. She didn’t seem to be angry or bothered by his remarks, instead she appeared… worried? Hurt? Reading non-humans was definitely a challenge.

  He took a deep breath and let it out as he tried to calm his racing mind. “You’re right. I’m not over it, but there is no reason in being petty about it, nor taking it out on you,” he replied in an apologetic tone.

  Tara visibly relaxed on hearing that, nodding at him in response.

  “So,” Matt said as he went back to staring at the empty night sky. “I’m fucked, huh?” he asked rhetorically.

  “I’m afraid so,” Tara answered as she sat next to him.

  “No reroll function in the system?” he asked.

  “If only,” she chuckled.

  “I just… don’t get it. If healers are so useless, then why did I get only healers for my class selection?” Matt asked offhandedly.

  That question had been on his mind since the first day, and while it had been an offhanded remark, he had made sure to phrase it as a question in hopes of an answer from Tara. Surprisingly, the cat had gone silent.

  He shifted his gaze towards her form next to him only to see her staring at him with barely contained suspicion.

  “What were your class options?” she asked in a slow tone, her brows furrowed as if struggling with something. Not only that, but she wasn’t looking him in the eye. She seemed to be looking… straight through him.

  “Just four different healing classes. Why?” he asked with slight concern. Had he done something? He couldn’t have. There wasn’t even anything for him to do to influence any of this… was there?

  “You can’t get four of the same class. I’m guessing you probably misunderstood one of them,” she answered, seemingly still staring right through him. It was off-putting to say the least, but he was more worried about her words.

  You could be reading stolen content. Head to the original site for the genuine story.

  “I did get the Apothecary, which I’m guessing is a profession and not a class,” he corrected, remembering that there was indeed something that wasn’t strictly a healer. “When I complained about my options though, it did get removed, leaving me with three healer classes,” he added, scanning Tara’s body language for an answer to what she was doing.

  Her gaze instantly shifted to his, doubt filling her gaze and voice as she said her next words, “What do you mean it got removed.”

  “I complained about my class options not being suitable, so the system started doing a reassessment of some sort, then removed it,” Matt shrugged.

  “And you were left with three options?” she asked with narrowed eyes.

  Matt simply nodded.

  “Are you messing with me?”

  “What? Why would I? Are you gonna tell me what’s going on?” he asked, even more confused now.

  Instead of answering, Tara simply kept looking him straight in the eyes for an uncomfortably long period before lowering her gaze to his body once more.

  “Hello?” Matt said, feeling slightly impatient now.

  “How much Spirit and Willpower do you have?” she asked, her gaze not leaving his body.

  “I…” he stammered before stopping himself. “That question seems to come up a lot. Maybe you should answer some of mine first,” he put his foot down. She had been acting weird, and he deserved to know what was going on.

  “You can’t receive only one class in your selection. The system doesn’t force a path on people,” she answered, confusing Matt even more.

  “Okay, but that’s clearly wrong since I was very much forced into picking a healer,” he responded. It had felt weird at the time, but he didn’t really know enough about the system to make any assumptions. Now though…

  “And that’s where the problem lies,” she answered, before the conversation descended into a silence that lasted for mere seconds.

  “Can you recount everything that happened since the integration?” she asked. “I promise I’ll tell you what I can afterwards,” she added.

  Matt stared at the cat for a few long seconds. She didn’t promise to tell him everything, just what she could, which could very much end up being nothing. And yet, he wasn’t really in a position of power here. Tara wanted to know, that was obvious, but the knowledge was more out of curiosity than anything. To him, though, it pertained to his life. His very path through the system.

  Trusting the cat was a leap of faith on his part. Aside from the blatant manipulation, she had been helpful. And even if he wasn’t fully over it just yet, he needed answers, and he needed them yesterday.

  With his mind made he started recounting his story. How he had been on vacation with his friends right before the integration had happened. The message he had received. The escalation. His meeting with Sal. Getting kicked back out into the desert. His fight with the vulture. And finally, stumbling across the dungeon entrance.

  Throughout the entire story, Tara simply listened. She didn’t interrupt, didn’t ask questions, and her facial features never changed. He did notice a few very slight raised eyebrows, but other than that, she seemed to be entirely in control of her emotions, trying to show as little as possible, knowing how intently he was focused on her and her reactions.

  Once he was done, her gaze lingered on his for a few more breaths before shifting it towards the endless night sky.

  She was deep in thought, that much was obvious. He had done his part. Sharing knowledge that could be invaluable. He did avoid sharing anything that pertained to his stats or titles, though. He was still wary, and while information about Sal and the sequence of events that preceded him entering the trial was important, his stats and titles were intimate, and he would be keeping that information to himself… at least for now.

  After a few more minutes, she finally broke the silence.

  “Your stats influence your class offerings. For yours to be only healers, means your Spirit and Willpower are… scarily high,” she said, with Matt making sure to listen intently to every word. Committing it all to memory.

  “Then why did you want to know my story? If that’s the answer, then there was no need for all of that,” he asked, not convinced by her words.

  “Circumstances could influence class options too. For stats to be the only reason is extremely unlikely,” she responded, before asking, “You still don’t want to reveal how much you have in each?”

  Matt simply shook his head. The cat was clearly hiding something. He knew that and she knew he did. If she wasn’t gonna be entirely open with him, then he had no reason to either.

  “Smart. You shouldn’t readily reveal that kind of information,” she said as silence filled the temple once more.

  There was a lot she wasn’t telling him. The problem was that what she was hiding was probably the information that mattered the most for his situation. Sure, his Spirit and Willpower were incredibly high, but that wasn’t the entire story, especially since Willpower hadn’t been his second highest stat when picking his class, Wisdom was.

  He could call her out based on that, but that would only serve to reveal more than he was comfortable with, and at the end of the day, she could always feed him more bullshit in response. It wasn’t like he had any way to verify her words.

  In the end, he’d have to find his own answers, but at least now he had something to go on. “It’s at least a start,” he muttered to himself, continuing to look at the bright stars of the night sky. Things were bound to get worse before they got better.

  As the silence continued to wrap the stillness of the night in its cold embrace, Tara was lost in her own thoughts. While her words to the boy hadn’t been lies, they were also not the whole truth.

  Using an excuse like ‘It would only serve to hinder him’ was easy, but the truth was, she couldn’t say the words.

  Tara was a tier 6, a Guardian, and a powerful one at that, yet even she couldn’t speak certain things, for fear of what calamity that might bring. Her goddess was an ancient being, yet even her protection couldn’t stop some of the monsters out there, and many of them would definitely not be pleased on hearing those words.

  She had thought something was odd with the boy’s soul, but being someone from a new universe, skewed stats were not uncommon, which could explain things if most of them were soul stats. But with what he had been through, the system entity’s ‘gift’, his class offerings, and even going as far as having one of them forcibly removed. It was no mere coincidence. Which all pointed to one thing and one thing only.

  And he had even called them schemers. If he only knew what the system was scheming in the shadows, then that word would truly lose all meaning.

  Attempting to revive the 13th race. Diabolical truly doesn’t do you justice, she thought, the implications worrying her even more than the ones lurking in the shadows.