As the group starts to disband Decker turns back to me.

“Joel mind if we talk?” he asks.

“No sir.”

“Follow me.” He says.

He guides us off the seventh floor and down to the gym on the second floor. The room is dark but the glass wall lets in enough moonlight that we aren’t completely blind.

“What’s your strength at?” Decker asks.

I open up my stat sheet and read my strength stat.

“Fourteen.”

“Wow, that's more than I expected.” Decker says. “Have you been putting points into it?”

“Not really, but my new class did boost it a bit.”

“Well I’ve been meaning to see how much the stats actually affect us. Do you mind helping me?” Decker asks.

“Not at all. What do you want me to do?”

“Well first off I want to establish a baseline. So I want to see how much you can bench and squat.” Decker says.

I walk over to the bench press and eye the weights. Honestly I don’t know how much to put on the bar. Before all of this I never really worked out much. Only when highschool gym would demand it.

“How much?” Decker asks, standing on the opposite side of the bar.

“Umm…” I say while eying the various sized plates on a rack near the bench press “Let’s start with 25.”

We load the bar and I lay down on the bench. Decker notices my hesitance to place my hands on the bar.

“Do you know how to do a bench press?”

“I haven’t really done this since high school.” I tell him.

“No worries. Put your hands here.” He gestures to two spots on the bar. “Then flex your back abs and butt. Plant your feet and don’t forget to breathe. Breath in as you pull the bar close to you. Then out as you push the bar away.”

My stomach grows tight as I plant my feet. I feel the skin across my back stretch as the muscles beneath it bundle up. The muscles in my leg contract and stretch as I plant them.

I feel strangely powerful as I follow Decker instructions. As if I’m a spring being compressed. I’ve never felt this way while working out. Is it because of the system? If so, what part?

I un-rack the bar and hold the weight in the air. It feels light. I breath in as I guide the bar to my chest. The sensation of building pressure in me rises.

The moment the bar touches my chest Decker commands me.

“UP!” He barks.

The spring inside of me explodes. The bar flies up faster than I expected. The bar almost leaves my grip as it rockets skywards.

“Alright, you definitely need to be heavier.” Decker says.

I rack the weight and watch Decker replace the 25 with a 45 plate. I do the same and then get back under the bar.

I lift the bar again feeling as if it’s still far to light. The bar touches my chest and Decker barks again. I push the bar away with ease, finding this weight far too easy too.

I rack it and grab the 25 plate and place it on my side of the bar. Decker does the same to his side and I get back underneath the bar.

We continue adding weight to the bar until it gets too heavy for me to lift. Once we find my limit the bar has two 45 plates on each side and a 25 on each side. For a total of 275 pounds.

“So is that an increase from what you used to be able to do?” Decker asks.

“Oh yeah. Back in high school I was barely able to bench 135.”

“Interesting. Let’s try squats next.”

Decker runs me through the proper form of a squat. Then we start adding weight to the bar until I can’t lift the bar anymore. We find that my squat max is 355.

“Alright, how many free attribute points do you have?” Decker asks.

After a quick look I let him know that I have eleven points.

“Put one into strength.” He says.

I do so and then follow Decker back to the bench. He adds five pounds to each side of the bar and then stands above it gesturing for me to lift it.

I lay down on the bench and place my hands on the bar. I repeat my previous actions feeling that pressure build in me. TI unrack the wight and let it fall to my chest.

“UP!”

With all of my strength I push up against the bar. The weight is tough but I still manage to raise it high enough to rack the weight again.

“Fascinating. So strength does have a direct impact on our bodies. Let’s try squats.”

We continue to experiment with the strength stat by slowly adding more points into it and testing how much stronger it makes me. For every point I put into Strength I can lift ten to twenty more pounds.

Once done Decker sits next to me on the bench. I’m drenched in sweat and already feeling soreness set in on my muscles.

“So then this system is actively altering our bodies and minds. I don’t know how but it is.” Decker says.

His words remind me of the drops of mana that appear inside of me when I boost an attribute.

“I think it has to do with mana.” I say.

I explain the feeling I get when I boost my attributes and show him the ring. He takes it from me and places it on his left pinky. Then take it off and put it back on. He repeats the process a few times.

“Strange, I don't feel that.” He says.

“Maybe it’s because I’m a mage or something.” I say.

He hands me back the ring and I put it back on.

“How did you get that ring?” He asks.

“A raven gave it to me.” I say.

He looks at me as if he doesn’t believe me. However, he doesn’t verbally question me.

“There’s some other things I wanted your help with.” He says.

“What’s that?” I ask.

“In the Safe Zone management screen there is this section for Mana converters.” He says.

A screen appears in front of him as he points at the list of converters. The converters have names like Fire converter, Water converter, Lightning converter and more.

“I wanted to test them to see how they actually work. If the water one can give us an endless supply of water then we won’t have to worry about scavenging for that.” He says.

Another window pops up in front of him asking if he wants to confirm his purchase. It vanishes after a second and I feel the temperature in the room drop. A familiar tugging sensation pulls on me as a black orb appears a few feet from us.

It vanishes leaving a blue glass looking orb in its place. The orb is about as big as a baseball and looks as if it’s filled with water.

Decker picks it up and examines the orb for a few seconds. Then he offers me the orb.

“Could you pour some mana into this?” He asks.

I nod and take the offered orb. It’s cold to the touch and is heavier then I expected.

I command my mana out of me, causing my hand to glow blue. My mana wraps around the blue orb like it would my weapons. However, nothing happens.

Unsure if it’ll work I try to push the mana into the orb. Through my mana I feel as if there are numerous holes in the orbs that let my mana pass through. A familiar film catches my mana and I notice symbols glowing in the film.

Water gushes from the orb and spills to the ground. The liquid is cold to the touch and shocks me so much that I drop the orb and lose my concentration on my mana.

“Fantastic!” Decker says.

He grabs the orb and lifts it into the air.

“Do you know what this means?” He asks me excitedly.

“We don’t have to worry about water?” I ask.

“Not just that. But we can power this whole building with a few Lightning converters. We can make flamethrowers with the Flame converters. There are so many uses of these things. And now that I know we can choose a second class at level twenty that means all of us can eventually use these.” He says in a rush.

He admires the orb for a bit, his eyes gleaming with ideas. After a few moments he looks back to me.

“I don’t have anything else I need help with tonight. You should get some rest.” He says.

I nod and watch the tall man leave. I’m glad he’s the one in charge. I don’t know if I’d have all the ideas he does.

I lay down on the bench starting to regret lifting all of those weights. My muscles feel weak and pulse with soreness. And on top of that I feel as if fire ants are crawling through my body.

Wait, that means my mana is healing me. But what is it healing me from?

I turn my vision inward and follow the burning sensation. Through it I find mana being poured onto my muscles. The fibers look thinner than they should and as I watch the mana slowly adds thickness to the muscle fibers.

As I watch this an idea hits me. When you build muscles it’s by breaking them down through working out and then healing them back stronger, right? So can I speed this process up with my mana healing?

I flood my sore muscles with mana and heal them in a matter of minutes. When I open my eyes the soreness is gone. So I go back to the bench and lower the weight and start lifting.

I alternate the muscle groups that I work out as I imitate workouts I remember from high school. Benches, Squats, Deadlifts, Curls and more.

I stop once I feel as if my whole body is sore. I sit down and turn my vision inwards and start the healing process.

I watch as the muscle fibers grow back slightly thicker than what they were before I worked out. Once I’m all healed I open my stat screen.

Personal Stats:

Attributes:

Value

Name:

Joel Dylan

STR:

19

Level:

20

DEX:

6

To Next Level

1/2500

AGI:

6

Sex:

Male

END:

17

Age:

19

INT:

56

Class:

Earth Mage

WIS:

19

LUC:

4

HP

100/100

CHA:

5

Mana

122/122

PER:

10

WIL:

18 (+3)

Free Attribute points:

8

I feel excitement explode in me. Both my Strength and Endurance has gone up without me spending a single Attribute Point. That means that I should be able to increase the other attributes without using Attribute Points.

Maybe Intelligence can be increased by memorizing a book or something. And Agility could be increased by sprinting for as long as I can or something. Dexterity might increase by working on my hand eye coordination or something.

So that means I should stop dumping my Free Attribute Points into things and instead try to increase them myself.

At this thought the voice in the back of my mind hums with approval.

With that in mind I spend the next few hours working out and healing myself. When I increase my strength to twenty a window pops up in front of me.

Title unlocked:

Strongman

You are four times as strong as the average person.

After I get the title I find that despite my strength stat not rising my maxes on exercises have. Similar to how my Mana pool rose when I got the titles referring to my Intelligence.

Once I increase my Strength to 22 and my Endurance to 19 I leave the gym and head back to the roof. I’m out of mana and prefer replenishing it up there.