Being 'Cured'
Once I had done that, I grabbed a random person and brought them into the river to wait with me in the river, letting him hold onto the net. And eventually, as expected, another batch of fish came, and although some were able to escape from below the net, he could still kill one of them, which was apparently not good enough for the system.
So, instead of continuing, I just grabbed another person that was watching. I basically did the same thing with him, and although he was slightly better than the last guy,m being able to catch 2 fish on his first try; the system still did not give me any RP, so I just accepted that I would get none for doing this, and just called Gabriel to make his way over to me.
I had no idea whether or not it was because he had seen how to fish enough times to get a good understanding, or that he was just a natural because he was able to hold in a batch of six fish all into the net, killing three and letting the other three go the same way I had. Plus, once he was done, the system spoke.
"Congratulations, host; through your efforts, you have collected enough RP to buy the skill you were trying to get. Would you like to proceed to the shop :D?"
'What do you mean? Aren't I 10 RP off?'
"Of course not host, you did still get RP for teaching the other two people how to fish; it just that I didn't want to bother you as you were going to be getting more points once you were done."
'So you were just too lazy to do it?'
"Let's not waste time host, do you want to go to buy the skill or not?"
'Alright, alright, just take me there.'
From there things went as usual until I returned to reality, my lungs felt like they were burning, almost like they were being cooked. I endued it though, for some reason, the pain seemed familiar like I had felt it before, yet I knew for a fact that I hadn't, at least not to my knowledge.
Thankfully the pain stopped rather quickly, and I was able to breathe again, this time though it felt different, like the air sound me had become minty, not in the sense of smell but in the sense of how it felt when one smelled it, it was cold, yet I knew that the air had been humid just moments prior. Not being able to wait, I checked my stats page to see if my endurance had gone back to normal as it was supposed to.
[Name: Stevan Ciracio]
[Body age: 16]
[Lifetime left: 4 years]
[Strength: 13]
[Agility: 14]
[Endurance: 16]
[RP: 95]
[Store: Technology, Skills ]
[Tips: Teach the people how to speak]
My strength and Agility seemed to have increased slightly, which was nice, plus I noticed that my agility had finally overtaken my strength, probably because I was now doing agility training more than endurance training. The thing that really puzzled me though was my endurance.
Although I knew that improving the strength of my lungs would certainly raise my endurance, I didn't expect it to raise it by that much as I was probably still sick, meaning that either the skill made it so that I somehow managed to get cured of the disease I had, or I was still sick, and the improvement brought on by the skill was just that great.
And although I knew that in the long term wishing for the effect to be stronger and for me to be still sick, I didn't want to take any chances. Plus, long-term gains are only useful if you make it to that set time as well. So without hesitating, I just asked the system.
"Why is your endurance high? Well, it's because you are cured of your disease."
'That's good news; I am still perplexed on the how though, I mean the skill enhanced my lungs'
"What are you talking abo-, oh, I get it, host apparently there was a misunderstanding, the skills description states that it would give you better lungs, not improve the one's you already have."
'You know what, at this point, I'm not even surprised… I am going to assume you just used magic or something?'
"Sort of, while 'magic' as you like to put it, was certainly used to replace your lungs, it not like we just switched immediately, as they had to be adjusted to your body composition, meaning that the cells your lungs were made out of were destroyed and replaced by the new ones, so in a way it was like rapid regeneration."
'So, what I'm getting here is that the lungs were modeled to fit my body, they replaced the cells that my original lungs were made out of, and it was like my lungs had disappeared while being regenerated stronger, right?'
"That would be correct, host."
'So... it just enhanced my lungs'
"Host, you can call it whatever you want as long as it makes you happy; I do have to warn you though, your need to always be right can easily be used against you, so it might be better to get a hold of it, alright?"
The system's voice disappeared after that, and I was just left there in silence. What the system had just said was extremely out of character for it. But now that I thought about it, it wasn't wrong. Although I had always been aware that I was a person who always sought validation of their 'intelligence,' I had never thought of it as something that others could use against me.
Actually, why did I even seek validation? I honestly didn't know; all I knew was that I did and that it was proof that I was not as mature as I had thought. Not much that I could do about it though; it's not like I was a psychologist; for now, it was probably just best to try and keep it on a leash as tight as tho one on my ego, at least, until I could find a therapist or at least one that would actually do its job.