My Isekai Fantasy Is All Wrong!

Chapter 4: Learning Experience

“That can’t be right. 10:36? I thought I set this thing to Military Time,” I grumbled to myself as I checked the settings of my watch and confirmed it was indeed set to Military Time, meaning it should be the middle of the morning and only an hour and a half to noon.

I turned around and grinned slightly at the long stretch of cave I’d carved through to get to where I was. It was honestly very amusing to see the path I’d mined out brightly lit up by all sorts of prismatic colors. Currently, the LEDs were set to “Static Rainbow” but if I wanted I could turn the cave into an esoteric rave room. I wouldn’t though, because that would quickly grow annoying as an affront to my eyes.

I checked my Inventory and somehow, over the course of a couple hours I’d dug out a couple metric tons of rock; not just Limestone, because there was also Marble, Coal, and “Gypsum—” Whatever that was. That didn’t really make sense even if Mining Level 2 gave me another point or even two to my effective Strength with regards to mining, so there was some investigating to be done.

Later.

Right now, I had better things to do, like check out what the deal was with the Ability Points I just got or figure out what I’d be trading most of my useless supply of rocks for.

When I thought [Abilities] similar to [Status], [Shop], or [Skills], a new holographic screen appeared before me. This time, though, instead of receiving information in lists, I was shown a couple different skill tree diagrams where only the first tier of “Abilities” of which I could invest my sole Ability Point into were visible.

Abilities were grouped into four separate categories: Combat, Progression, Support, and Gamer. The options for Combat made it easier for me to pick up and improve different types of fighting Skills; unarmed, melee, ranged, etc. The options for Progression made it easier for me to get more personal Exp from various sources. The options for Support made it easier to pick up and improve non-combat Skills.

And the options for Gamer… well, there weren’t really “options” per say, as there was only one Ability for the first tier of that category. It was also the Ability I chose as I’d been trying to get it as a Skill all this time to no avail.

[New Ability Unlocked!]
[Name: Observe]
[Description: Appraises any target in sight and provides a short description with only relevant information for your convenience.]

Wanting to know how overpowered the “Ability” was, I looked at the end of my cave tunnel and cast Observe on it.

[Observe]
[Name: ??? Mountainside Cave]
[Description: A hybrid cave system that is part of the ??? Mountain in the ??? Region of the ??? Continent of Planet ??? Used to be naturally formed until the Human, John Doe, began mining it for resources. Structural Composition for the next 50 meters on the same layer is: 57% Limestone, 21% Gypsum, 15 Marble, 6% Coal, and ~1% Other Trace Materials]

Ok then. Pretty overpowered, but not hilariously so. Kind of unfortunate for me, though, since if it just told me the names for any of the unknowns, I would simply be able to look up a book or some texts in the Shop and figure out where I was and how best to prepare or proceed.

Oh well, I was doing well enough anyway. It was only day three and I was already capable of earning thousands of Shop Credits in a couple hours. That might not put even a drop in the bucket I’d need to fill to get a cool supernatural power as a Skill, but it was enough to afford modern luxuries and commodities I was used to back on Earth; or magical alternatives, same difference.

I bought myself a self-inflating air mattress, a magical stove, a suite of cookware and all the ingredients to make myself a traditional English Breakfast for nearly a thousand Shop Credits. Usually, I would go for the American Breakfast, but for whatever reason I really wanted baked beans, mushrooms, charred tomatoes, and sausages with my eggs instead of bacon and pancakes.

As I set about cooking up the sausages, I continued looking through the Shop and picked out a couple “Tutorial Texts.” According to the descriptions on the Shop, the Tutorial Texts would give insights as to how certain aspects of my Gamer power worked. They cost a pretty penny, but would be worth it if they saved me time wasted on figuring out what a World Quest was or what exactly my Luck Stat did.

Unfortunately, despite coming in book format, I couldn’t just magic them into my mind palace like I’d been hoping. All in all, I was down nearly 1,750 Shop Credits worth of rocks and only had a delectably aromatic breakfast that was still in the middle of being prepared to show for it. Oh and the air mattress too, though, I hadn’t even started inflating it.

[New Skill Unlocked!]
[Name: Cooking Lvl 1 | +10 Exp]
[Description: Adds an extra kick to meals you cook; kinda like MSG, but better.]

Now, a Cooking Skill could mean one of two things. I put my hands in prayer as I wished desperately for the superior version to be true before I cast Observe on my fully loaded plate.

[Observe]
[Name: English Breakfast (131%)]
[Description: A traditional English Breakfast. Good for staving off hunger and keeping the body hard at work. Sells for 50 Shop Credits.]
[Effects: Cures - ???, ???, Hunger | Fortify (4 Hours) - Constitution (+5), Vitality (+5) | Instant - Health (+300), Stamina (+500)]

“Yes! Yes!! Yes!!!” I chanted as I did a little happy dance around the magical cooktop in praise of my bountiful feast. I liked Cooking without all the added benefits, so I knew a ton of different recipes as well as how to cook without instructions. I could only imagine how that would play into the system that magically determined what Buffs I would get.

Wait a minute. I stopped and turned off the stove to keep its admittedly weak power source lasting as long as possible; both the stove and generator powering the lights would at best only last 20 Hours of concurrent use. I then opened up the shop and looked up that Mars candy bar I’d previously seen going for 1 Shop Credit and bought it.

When I Observed it, I nodded in understanding. Unlike the breakfast I had personally cooked, the Mars Bar didn’t have any Buff; guess that would have been unreasonable. Oh well, the candy bar would serve as a snack for later or maybe dessert if I decided to eat something for dinner.

I chucked the candy bar in my inventory and began to eat my breakfast. It wasn’t particularly good, since the only spice I’d bought to bring out the flavor came in a small salt mill. Still, it was a pleasant experience even if I wasn’t eating because my body was craving it.

[Buff Incurred!]

I stopped my fork from shoveling the next bite of food into my mouth as I looked at my Status and then what remained of my breakfast on the plate. There was almost a full quarter of the total food I’d prepared still waiting to be consumed, yet I’d already gotten the Buff? I thought back to when I Observed my breakfast and recalled the 131% next to the name.

“Hmm, that was probably telling me something about the serving size. Probably,” I shrugged before continuing until I cleaned out the plate.

When I was done with my meal, I stored the dirty plate away in my Inventory before pulling out the first of the Tutorial Texts I’d bought. I planned to go through all of them, then do my Daily Quest before anything else.

I had a Tutorial Text for the Status, Skills, Abilities, Shop and Quest Functions of my Gamer Power as well as one for each of the Skills I’d possess; even Cooking since I bought it immediately after reading through all the other Tutorial Texts.

When I was done reading, I had a lot to think about as I went through the motions of the Daily Quest. I now knew what Stats did. I knew how Skills worked and the intricacies of the Shop. The Abilities and Quests Tutorial Texts, however, were kind of a wash, but that was because their purpose was pretty self-explanatory.

The single most important thing I learned was that I could only increase my Stats with Stat Points, and that at the end of the day Stats determined which Skills I could learn and use. Stat Points only came from Leveling Up personally or completing certain Quests. So, if I wanted to eventually punch a mountain into dust, I’d have a lot of grinding to look forward to.

Or… I could gear up for a long expedition away from the cave in search of people to pick up Given Quests or encounter World Quests. Speaking of, World Quests were less “Quests” and more interpersonal dynamics between me and the World. They ranged from choices I would need to make in the heat of a tense situation to full-on political campaigns where I would try to build up rapport and reputation with the different “Factions” of the world. I could only imagine what that meant, but it didn’t sound too appealing to me.

Still, I was tempted by the promise of more Stat Points via Quests once I knew exactly how they worked. As it turns out, I was very wrong about the incremental value of them. Instead of a linear 15% increase, they pretty much doubled their effective use for every five points invested. So every five Strength would see my carrying capacity and force output double; every five Agility would see my max velocity, acceleration, and overall acrobatic ability double; every five Vitality would see my Health Regen and Max Health double; and every five Intelligence would not do anything because I didn’t have an internal magic source.

Yeah, I didn’t know why Intelligence or Wisdom were a thing for my Gamer Power if they couldn’t do anything for me; increasing them didn’t even make me literally smarter or wiser! Although, I wouldn’t count them out for now. They currently only served very niche and situational purposes, but I personally felt that they were too suspiciously useless for there to not be something else at play that I simply didn’t know of even after reading their respective Tutorial Texts.

Unfortunately, despite wanting to go out on an expedition, I was still woefully unprepared for such a task. I needed more gear, more Skills, and some more magical cooking to hopefully carry me through any tough encounters. I still had about a thousand Shop Credits worth of rocks in my inventory, but that wouldn’t be nearly enough to get everything I wanted.

I sighed, knowing there were definitely a few more days of mining ahead of me.