Iranueel was in a world of his own. Misakos lips were intoxicating and he was enjoying it very much. She smiled when seeing his dreaming eyes.

“Don’t let it go to your head! We have other problems to solve for now. So let’s walk to the next town and discuss some things on the way.”

Iranueel came back to reality and stood. Misako went north and he followed her with some fast steps to walk by her side.

“So what can you tell me of our real history?”

“If you mean the unseen world of the avatars then listen carefully. Most of history has been directed by us avatars. We act unseen and often merciless with mortal life. If there is a big war happening around the world you can be sure that is instigated by one of us. Most bigger countries are directed by a single powerful guy or a group of them. They harness the emotional and magical energy of their people to make themselves stronger. And if you now want to ask which magical energy then there will be a big surprise waiting for you. Every human produces mana but it gets sucked away by us avatars or Gaia herself to disguise our world from mortal eyes.”

Misako took a quick check of her surrounding and went now more to the west. Iranueel saw smoke rising in the direction they now went.

“We call a world with this way of handling magic an unawakened world. There are others out there that are awakened but I don’t know the exact reason for it. All I know is that somewhere in the dark past of our people something has happened that made humans forget about magic. Most visitors of earth have a healthy respect of humans and try to not upset us although most of them have really heavy artillery with them. Seems to me that humans are a force to be feared between the stars.”

“There are many gods and powerful factions on this planet and all fight for supremacy. Try to not get in their way if you want to survive. I made this mistake and you can see what happens. The bigger criminal organisations like the triads, mafia or the yakuza are governed by one or more of us. If you can offer them a bit of compension for looking the other way when you enter their turf then they will let you be. So try to keep up to date with the local power structure, pay some respect and you will live long and prosper.”

She collected for a moment her thoughts and then talked again.

“Most of the gods of history like Odin, Ra, Zeus and Shiva for example have been avatars. There are only some really old powers in the world that have existed long before any of human kind have entered the stage. Gaia is the most powerful of them and she has a short temper for everyone that angers her. I don’t know what she does with all the power she gets from the humans on this planet but nobody, even the most powerful of the avatar gods tries to piss her off. It’s a death sentence.”

“Ok, I understand this and I have no intention to get the attention of these beings. But now please tell me more about the ways to strengthen myself. I mean, I know I can use my levels to get new abilities and more muscles.”

Misako nodded and took a look at him.

“Basically this is right, but I don’t think anybody said to get that if you strength your body directly and you then die, this power will be lost, right?”

“Uh, no, the goddess who introduced me to the game didn’t say anything about it.”

“That’s always the same. No clue why they never tell anybody about this. So here is the gist of it. For every point of a body attribute like strength, dexterity and endurance you need two levels but you will lose them by dying. But if you put 6 levels into your soul to power the same attributes you will not lose them when you bite the dust. Took me 10 years to figure this one out. I lost a lot of levels this way. Rampaged for a whole day after this discovery and cursed the bastard that initiated me.”

“When you study your character screen, and invest levels in your physical attributes, the first number is your physical and the second your avatar value. So you can raise your strength beyond your avatar limits for a boost at a lower cost but will lose it with your next reincarnation. Problem is, you only see the second number when you know it’s there.”

Iranueel concentrated on his character screen and suddenly there were two numbers at strength, dexterity and endurance.

Name Iranueel Race Human Level 15 HP 200 Strenght 10/10 Intelligence 20 Energy 200 E/s 1,5 Dexterity 18/18 Wisdom 15 Stamina 200 SP/s 2,0 Endurance 20/20 Luck 14 Perception 12 Special Power Soul Catcher Aura scanning

“WTF! That’s really a bad joke of this bastards. I could have dumped a shitload of levels and lost all this power. Why do they misdirect us this way?”

Misako shrugged and went her way.

“I think, to penalize starter avatars. Most of them start to kill everything in their path to become powerful. And then realize it was all for nothing. I have also a suspicion that they absorb the energy for themselves as a kind of payment for their time to instruct you on the game. But this is only my thought so don’t take it as a fact.”

Suddenly Iranueel heard a voice in his mind that resembled Arya.

‘That’s a smart one over there!’

Iranueel wanted to give her a hard answer but her presence disappeared as fast as it arose.