Chapter 13: A Small Break and Thoren Explains Some Things

It was coming down to the last day of Joshua's two week vacation. Throughout the time he was able to catch up with a lot of things that had been going on during his one year of physical training along with exploring a bit more of the facilities that were provided for people. His family had already settled into how things were run in the system world and were all up to their own things. His father had spent the past year gaining a tutoring license in martial arts through the system and was able to create a gym for people to come learn hand to hand combat from him. Although the system provided automated tutors that help teach the basics of combat for different jobs. They truly only get about ten to twenty percent of the potential out of a level for most people. Of course people can train on their own or get offered better tutors like most of his friends and probably all the other rankers did, but that would be expensive and they would need to go exploring earth to earn the points needed for that. Thus gyms like Joshua's dad had were popular since they went far deeper into combat than the usual tutors.

His mother was busy studying to get her license in the health field once again. She had already passed all the test required to get her license in the field of common health issues or diseases that were already known, but now she was busy learning about several knew things. She had to learn how magic effected the human body and how the spirit applied in certain illnesses that she was getting information about through the system. According to her she was only a few months away from being able to get an apprentice level license from the system where she could learn from healers that have already been put in charge of situations on their planet. Of course his mother seemed happier than ever at all the new things she was able to learn and spent plenty of time discussing the ins and outs of it with her son. Even during his training she often called him at night through the system to check up on him and discuss the things she had learn throughout the day.

Then his sister of course was her usual handful whenever Joshua came around. Now that she was seventeen she had started to undergo her level training with the system instructors. Surprisingly to Joshua he found out that Thoren had sent a specific teacher for his little sister to train with in the upcoming year. At first he thought it might be because of him, but soon he found out that Thoren saw potential in her as well. Apparently having a panther for a soul beast was a big deal sense Thoren grew excited after seeing it, not as much as when he found out that Joshua had a Fenrir as a soul beast but still a lot more than usual. One thing Joshua learned was that soul beast could evolve and grow stronger from weaker leveled soul beast to higher forms. Some soul beast evolved, some matured and grew older and stronger, while others granted more control over their element. Apparently a panther was a strong starting point for a soul beast, but even so Amy wasn't going to be able to go out and explore the world until she was eighteen sense their mother and father made a point of it.

One thing that surprised Joshua was the fact that just about everyone he knew was already on earth working in some way or form, so Joshua wasn't able to meet up with many people during his break. He did find out that Laura and Madalyn had each started their own guilds. They were leaders of a couple of the first guilds to come into existence and not soon after the system created a guild function to support the situation.

Natalie and the three Carsen brothers had decided to join the government sanctioned guild. Although it was larger than other guilds it didn't have as much power as some of the smaller guilds because of the fact several of the guild leaders had no respect for the government guild. If you were strong you were able to create your own guild yet the government guild tried to take members from other guilds without having anyone particularly strong at the head. In fact Natalie at the moment was probably the strongest person in the entire guild, but because she didn't have a high position in the guild do to her background she wasn't exactly the face of the guild. Thus the start to a divide between a guild created by people that wished to follow old government rules and the several guilds created by people that wanted to make their own future began.

Joshua's three close child hood friends were having none of that entire mess and instead decided to avoid guilds all together. Even though they weren't a part of the first wave of women that ventured out into the new world they were already fairly well regarded as a trio that could handle themselves. They were still a few levels behind people like Laura and Madalyn, but they were quickly catching up sense they didn't have to worry about managing other people. For now they stuck to themselves for the most part and occasionally helped Laura or Madalyn clear out small town bosses.

The only couple of people Joshua was able to meet up with outside of his family for the past two weeks were Nathan and Naomi. It turns out the two of them were moving right along with their training. They had both reached level eight and would soon be able to start their own business with the system. They were planning a joint business that involved Naomi's metal work skills in making weapons while Nathan would take the role of an enchanter and improve her work. Joshua wasn't even a bit surprised to find out Nathan was training to become an enchanter as his first Job. After Nathan started explaining how similar it was to programming at its roots Joshua could understand why he chose that path. They had both promised to help him with a weapon and other gear before he headed out.

With nothing much else to do in his time off Joshua ended up spending time checking out the learning center and the training facilities the system provided. They were fairly state of the art and had several tools and information for use. The only problem was the fact that they were nowhere near as productive as training with Marlow had been. In fact until people reached level one hundred the training system would remain fairly basic, but Joshua had lucked out and gained all of the equipment Marlow had left for him. The learning center was enormous and allowed people to go into individual rooms where a system program would let you search for information on anything you wanted as long as it wasn't restricted or out of your pay-grade. Joshua spent a lot of his time there to catch up on information he needed to know in order to understand how things would work when he finally got the chance to go exploring on his own.

He learned about how the planet had changed greatly from how it use to be. Outside of cities remaining the same as in the past anything that didn't have too much of a human influence surrounding it was changed completely. Any town that was too small to even create a boss class haze creature was overrun by nature and some were turned into territories of former animals that evolved into beast. Well known environmental areas such as the amazon or the Sahara desert were turned into territories filled with monster that were far more powerful than anything Joshua had thought possible. The boss class monsters in these areas were on the level of the haze monsters in cities. Then there was the fact that dungeons were also starting to pop up in such areas as well.

By the end of his vacation Joshua was incredibly eager to get back to work so he could go explore all these changes himself. It was on the day of the end of his vacation that Joshua got an invitation from Thoren to come discuss some things with him. When he arrived he once again found himself in another all white waiting room with a simple sofa, table, and a few chairs set out for people to sit in. Joshua took notice of Thoren sitting in one of the chairs as he was drinking something. Thoren waived him over and Joshua came and set down on the sofa across from him. "I'm glad you made it. There were a few things I wanted to explain to you before your training with the old hag." Thoren said getting a questioning look from Joshua in return.

"Does it have anything to do with what she plans to teach me going forward?" Joshua asked. Thoren shook his head in the negative as a response. "Then what's the rush?"

"Hmm. I wouldn't say it's paramount that you need to know it right now, but I figured you would want to know a few more things that correlate to what Marlow has been teaching you over the past year. In fact it's really only two things I wanted to point out before you head off to see your next instructor." Thoren explained while scratching his beard. Joshua simply nodded his head for him to proceed and Thoren took a swig of his drink before continuing. "The first thing is about the whole potential with levels thing Marlow explained to you. He did teach you the basics, but there are a few things you should take heed of that can affect that."

"Such as?"

"One of the most obvious things is the fact that the more you level up the harder it becomes to level up, but that's not exactly the same case for gaining the full potential of the level. A good example of that is the fact that when you reach a point like I have levels take a long time to gain. Yet within a few weeks of training or fighting monsters it is possible to completely maximize your newly gained potential. There is also the fact that some abilities gained from soul beast can make filling out potential much easier in the long run, not to mention some items although rare can actually help make training easier for a time as well." Thoren said as he thought over his own advice for a moment.

"I see, is there a particular reason you wanted to bring this up? I plan on filling out my potential at any opportunity that I can going forward so I don't really see the point in this conversation." Joshua replied a little confused.

"My point is this kid. Early on levels might be extremely different from the actual strength of a person. Right now you could probably easily beat some of the people that have already reached past level twenty just based off of your stats alone, especially if they haven't trained properly. In the future though it is much easier for people to reach the full potential of their levels sense it takes so long to level up in the first place. The amount of monster they will have to kill to reach that next level will often be enough to reach their full potential. That probably won't be the case until people around you start reaching levels nearing a thousand, but it will become slightly more noticeable when people reach around level one hundred." Thoren said gaining a simple nod from Joshua.

"What was the other thing you wanted to point out?"

"Well if you humans and other system related species can gain levels and fill out potential then don't you think the monster you shall face in the future can as well?" Thoren said with a slight smile at the look of surprise on Joshua's face. "That's right, beast can also fill out their potential from fights and leveling. There can be two beast of the same level with one of them being far stronger than the other. I just wanted you to know that the way to spot difference in small cases of this is based off of the feeling the creature gives off. In bigger cases the system will put a warning next to the creature as you observe it. These types of creatures are of a higher class than their regular breed. Luckily these cases don't happen to often in beginner areas that the system dispatches new comers at, but even now some of your people are already out there dying because they didn't take this into account."

The room was once again silent as Joshua thought these facts over in his head for a moment. During the silence a door popped up next to him and looked different from the normal ones since it was actually colored green with several depictions of plant life all over it. "Whelp looks like our times up kid." Thoren said as he stood up and waived his hand creating another door for himself. "That's the granny calling for you, so you better get going. I'm looking forward to see how much you've progressed next time we meet." Thoren turned and opened the door he had created then walked through leaving Joshua alone with the special door next to him.

Joshua took a deep breath before standing up and walking over to the shining door. "Well let's see what comes next." He said as he pulled on the handle and pushed through into a whole new place.