I rocketed down the stairs toward the kitchen. As my right hoof hit the last step, it caught on a single nail that I had conveniently forgotten about. I was sent flying past the kitchen door, and I admit to a slightly girly scream, as I flew straight into the wall next to the front door. Landing with a mighty crash, I saw stars as I crumpled into a dazed slump on the floor.

“Uuuggghhh,” I groaned as my senses come back to me.

PING!

“” What now?” I wondered, staring blearily at the popup window.

Through intense use, a new skill has been created.

Physical Endurance - Passive - Lv1 (27/100)

“There’s no gain without PAAAIIIIIN!”

Your body’s ability to endure physical attacks and injuries—

Current level negates 5 points of physical damage.

I got a distinct feeling that whatever gave me this ‘gamer’ power was mocking me… just a little bit. I was pulled out of my annoyance— literally— as someone pulled me to my hooves (gonna need to get used to saying that).

“You alright son? That was quite the tumble,” a soft, but strong and deep voice asked me. I looked up... and up... and up— till I felt like I was almost leaning back a little bit. I blinked at the first (kind of) sight of my father.

My dad— Solid Steel— was massive, and that’s putting it lightly. He stood, at least, over seven feet tall, and his hands looked like they could crush three skulls my size with a gentle squeeze. His broad chest and shoulders rippled with muscles upon muscles— grown and toughened like the metal he forged. His fur was a dark steel blue in color, and his eyes a sharp, bright, crisp grey. He would have been extremely intimidating— if he wasn’t wearing a bright pink frilly cooking apron.

“Mommy, why are you wearing that? You can’t cook.” I asked before my brain registered what I said. I was extremely confused, and so was dad as he raised an eyebrow (which was basically what amounted to a look of shock from him).

“Why the hell did I ask that?” I thought.

PING!

“The fuck is it now?”

Due to hitting your head— really hard— you’ve gained a status condition!

Dazed and Confused?

Effects:

Dizzy

Loss of balance

Chance of concussion increased to 20% due to WEAK perk.

Effect duration: 1 minute

“That’s complete Bullshit!” I yelled in my head, wobbling a bit. The only things keeping me upright are my Dad’s massive hands. Carefully and slowly, he leads me to the kitchen; gently, he sat me down in a chair at the table.

“Don’t you move— that knock to your head must’ve been bad if you confused my cooking for your mother's,” he said. I think I saw the corner of his lip twitch, but with the Dazed and Confused status effect, I couldn’t be sure.

“Hey, I can cook!” I heard my mother’s voice yell from the kitchen doorway. Dad just gave her a pointed look.

“You can’t even scoop ice cream into a bowl without us having the fire department on full alert, and outside our home,” he said with a stone face. Mom had the decency to look a bit sheepish.

“It was just one time,” she said, trotting in. She clambered into her chair, made specifically for her by one of dad's acquaintances with a wider seat so she’d be comfortable, across from me. A few seconds after she sat down, the world came back into focus, and I was told that the status effect was gone— with no side effects, much to my relief. I shook my head and subtly dismissed the windows.

“Sorry about mistaking your cooking for Mom’s, Dad— nobody could be that bad,” I smirked slightly at seeing my mom's pout.

“This is two against one; it’s not fair!” Mom said, giving me and dad a mock glare and shaking a hoof at us. We just exchanged a look, and in perfect sync, we answered with one of Mom’s favorite mottos.

“If you’re not cheating, you’re not trying,” we both said, faces completely blank. It was much harder to maintain on my part than my dad's. Mom’s eye twitched hard as she stared at us.

“How long have you two been practicing for that one?” She asked.

“We admit nothing,” We said again at the exact same time. My face split into a grin while my dad’s eyes just sparkled slightly. She just sighed with a smile and shook her head.

“What will I do with you two?” She asked with a soft smile.

“Love us?” We both said again, making mom frown slightly.

“Okay, now you’re both just being annoying.”

PING!

“Fuck you!” I yelled in my head as I read the window that appeared.

New skill created

Annoy- Lv 1 (10/100) (Passive/Active)

“I’m not touching you… I’m not touching you!”

+3-10% chance of making target become angry and lose their cool

While it could be a handy skill, it wasn’t something I should be proud of. I swiped it away as we waited for Dad to bring the pancakes to the table. A thought occurred to me as I sat there; Dad and I spoke together in near-perfect synchronization— one doesn’t get that kind of coordination with someone without years of knowing that person really well.

But I’d woken up this morning I’d never met them, or knew they existed. I looked over at mom and saw her gently swaying back and forth with her eyes closed, humming a soft tune to herself. I saw dad flipping his pancakes, like he was a professional juggler, as he glanced over his shoulder with a small smile as he listened to mom’s humming.

I hadn’t known them when I woke up, but now… It was like they’d always been there. I suddenly felt cold, like someone had ripped the blanket off of me on a winter morning. I shivered as an image of three people flashed in my mind. The image was burned into my mind, even though I’d only seen it for a second. It made my heart twinge in pain.

On the left was a woman in her early forties, with lightly tanned skin and dark brown hair. She wore simple blue jeans, with a white t-shirt that had ‘one hot momma’ written on it in red flames. Her eyes were closed as she laughed at the other two in the image.

The other two were a young boy and girl, roughly around twelve to fourteen years old. The boy had dirty blond hair that was straight, till it reached the back of his head— where it curled hard. He wore brown cargo shorts and a plain green t-shirt. His grey eyes were wide in fright as he jumped into the air.

The girl was behind the boy, her arms up in a classic, ‘I’m a monster who’s scaring you,’ pose. Her wheat blond hair was in a loose pigtail that reached past her shoulders. She wore a pair of overalls, and a pink shirt. Her skin was tanned like the woman’s, and she had bright, green eyes.

It was a happy picture of a family… I couldn’t think past that word as pain and grief slammed into me hard. It took every ounce of willpower I had to not just burst into tears, and collapse onto the table in sobs. Almost as soon as it struck, though, it was whisked away by a cool wave of calm and peace flowing over me.

I tried to get my thoughts together, but the image was fading fast, along with anything related to it. There was a voice in the back of my mind, telling me that something was wrong, that this didn’t make any sense, that I shouldn’t forget that image— but I couldn’t hold onto it, and it disappeared.

An odd feeling of anxiety started to creep into my mind. I just felt that whatever that was, I should just leave it alone— but I also felt like that was a bad idea. As I kept pondering this, I started to fidget.

Dad was still making pancakes? It seemed to take forever for dad to bring them in; damn that Impatient perk. Mom noticed my fidgeting but attributed it to something completely different.

“You still nervous for school?” she asked, a look of concern clear on her face. I could tell that because mom was like an open book and easily readable— but dad had the poker face of a granite slab— can’t read a damn thing. While I wasn’t squirming in my seat due to first day nerves, I just went with it because I was a bit nervous about school anyway.

“A little. I just hope I don’t run into Bulge and Break there; they both pick on me enough as it is,” I said.

It wasn’t a whole truth though; Bulging Break and Breaking Bulge were twin minotaur boys that took an unhealthy delight in tormenting me for a good amount of my years. Under their ’tender’ care, I’d heard it all. Half-breed, wimp, dork, duffus, sissy, weak-knees, glass boned trash, and those were just the common ones.

Mom’s face darkened at the mention of their names. She was familiar with them and had made her ‘grievances’ known to them about teasing me. Translated, that meant she pranked the hell out of them till they learned to not do it… at least when she was within a 100-meter radius, or within eye and earshot. They just learned to bide their time sadly, and I was still their favorite target. Starting to think the Weak trait was a really bad pick now.

“Don’t worry son, they tease you because they fear you, and they lack something you don’t. They want to make you not see it, so they feel better about their faults,” he said as he brought over a towering stack of pancakes to the table and set them down. I was a bit confused to pay attention to them though.

“What do you mean? They can obviously beat me to a pulp whenever they choose to… I’m not exactly the strongest around dad,” I answered. That was something I was going to remedy post-haste, though. He smiled but he shook his head. A kind of sweet, but annoying thing about Dad, was that he likes to make you figure out a problem completely on your own. His approach to swimming was to tell you the motions, then thrown you headfirst into the ocean and tell you to swim.

“You’ll figure it out, son. You’re far smarter than most kids your age, which gives you an edge they don’t have,” He said, doling out the pancakes. The conversation quickly left my mind as I watched the fluffy goodness climb higher and higher on my plate. A thought occurred to me and I decided to test it out.

“Observe,” I whispered to myself as I focused on the pancakes in front of me. A window popped up instantly after.

Dad’s Awesome Pancakes of Awesomeness!

Heals 25 HP per pancake

+5 to Vit and Str for 1 hour

I was amazed. Did they heal that much in one go? While it wouldn’t do much at higher levels, at my current level they’re awesome; that’s probably why they’re named the way they are. I couldn’t remember what my parent's stats were, and I was curious about them. I tried to observe them, but all I got was a bunch of question marks in return. I tried to think of why that was and could only deduce it was either to high a level or my Observe skill wasn’t leveled enough.

PING!

For figuring out the answer you gained +1 Wis

Nice. I swiped the screens away and dove into my pancakes. My mind nearly exploded from the deliciousness that they were made of. While I had six years' worth of memories, they were just that— memories. Here I was experiencing this for the first time in my life, and I was in heaven. I’d never had food this good, I was sure of that. I moaned slightly in pure bliss as I carved through my stack.

It didn’t take me long to finish— much to my sadness— but I did, and Mom took the dishes to the sink clean them while I ran back upstairs to change into my day clothes. From what my memories tell me, most races don’t wear much clothing— preferring to just walk around in their fur. Minotaurs however usually wore a pair of pants or shorts most of the time due to… our more exposed sex organs. Though we never wore shirts for some reason, but whatever.

I quickly pulled on a pair of grey pants and grabbed my backpack. I made my way— much more carefully this time— down the stairs and toward the door. As I descended, I started making a plan for the journey to school. I was going to grind the shit out of Observe during the trip.

I lived on the edge of the town, on the outside of Kol’s city wall. It was a massive circle of stone at the base of a large hill in an unusually flat plain area, right next to a well-sheltered bay we were in. Kol had three tiers; the ground tier, which was the market district, housing for shopkeepers and travelers, and the slums. You could find anything you wanted there— legal or otherwise. The second tier was smaller, and one rarely got to even see it unless you had friends in high places to allow you entrance.

It was supposedly made completely of marble, and had spas and fine restaurants only meant for the very rich or extremely savvy merchant. The top tier— known as the cloud scratcher by us on the third— was where the lord, his family, advisors and diplomats lived and stayed.

Kol was a powerful city-state— both martial and economically. The plain’s fertile soil was excellent for farming, and being near the ocean gave us fish for food and a trade hub. I didn’t know much else due to my age, but I hoped I’d learn more as school went on.

But back to Observe grinding. I had to pass through the market district to get to my school, which was within the city walls. The Idea of so many levels that I could gain made my face split into a massive grin.

“You look like you just made off with the cookie jar,” I heard dad’s voice call out, and I snapped back from grinding daydreams to reality. He was waiting by the door with a small sack tossed over his shoulder. Dad’s shop was further in from the where my school was— closer to the second wall. He was dropping me off on his way in. I smiled happily.

“Just excited. Come on, Dad— let’s go already!” I pulled at his pants trying to yank him toward the door faster— I had grinding to do.

PING!

“You have got to be kidding me!” I grumble in my head as I read the screen.

Annoy reaches level 2

+10-15% chance to target becoming angry and losing their cool

I stopped instantly and swiped the window away as I mentally facepalmed. Taking a deep breath, I calmed down and looked up at my dad who was nodding his head.

“Good job son— you caught yourself without me saying a thing,” he said, ruffling my hair a bit. A warm feeling bloomed in my chest hearing him, and I just smiled happily. We left the house with a goodbye to mom, and started on our way to Kol. it was a ten-minute walk to the wall— I could even see it from where we were, but it wasn’t my main focus.

My head was on a swivel, going left and right using Observe on anything or anyone I could think of. I ignored the multiple pings and windows as they popped up dismissing them and just focusing on grinding. Just as we got to the city gate a very happy me read the window that popped up.

Observe has reached level 10

Now reveals targets HP, MP, Stats, information and current thoughts

I had to restrain myself from dancing in happiness as we entered the market. I continued leveling up my Observe, but I only managed to get three more levels before we were stopped by a friend of dad’s. While they were talking, I used it on a unicorn that was passing by, and what I read nearly made my heart stop dead.

Level: 37
Name: Silent Night
Class: Assassin
Race: Unicorn
HP: 10,700
MP:10,600
STR: 36
END: 107 (+15) - 122
DEX: 106 (+10) - 116
INT:96 (+10) - 106
Wis:68 (+10) - 78
LUK:27

Silent Night is an assassin for hire. As per family tradition, he trained for most of his life— but is only so-so at his job. He may not be the best, but he’s still good. Show him a target and pay him upfront, and the target shall meet with a sudden accident. His current target is the young child of a powerful merchant family whom his employer wants to cave.

Thoughts:
Silent night is not happy about how his skills are being wasted on a kid.

“Shit shit shit shit!” I start to feel panic creeping into my mind when a cool sense of calm falls over me and I’m able to process what I’ve just read.

“What can I do? I can’t fight that guy— he’d smoosh me like I was a bug with those kinds of stats— but I can’t just let him kill someone.” I quickly try to come to a decision, as he’ll soon be lost in the crowd. I grunt in annoyance as I reach it.

“Damn me and my hero complex.” I take one step.

PING!

Quest:

“Edge of the knife”

Objectives:

Stop the assassin from killing his target.

Make it back before your dad notices you’re gone

?

?

Rewards:

2000 XP

400 GP

Random mid-level spell book

Enchanted weapon

?

Failure:

Possible death, and death of target

Do you accept?

Y/N

My eyebrow twitches as I read the quest. It may be powerful, but God, this stuff can get annoying. I press yes and dart after the assassin, hoping beyond hope I’ll survive this shitstorm to come.

Author's Note

Well that escalated quickly didn't it? Lets wait and see what happens next shall we? MAWAHAHAHA!!