The Smell of Exposition in the Morning.

Cody looked around and noticed that nobody even seemed to care about his personal light show. By this time, Ira had returned with an extra, "Here ya' go, you earned it."

He took it and took a sip, then grimaced, "I thought this was supposed to be an "acquired" taste, I have had like a hundred beers and it still tastes like piss?"

Ira shook his head, "Ya' have to have more than one at a time."

Cody just handed the beer to his Grandfather to finish off. What he needed to do right now was get his status sheet figured out.

'System, can you hear me?' he was trying to get his status sheet to come up but it wouldn't budge as he had just seen it.

[Hello, Cody, you cannot enter meditation for another 28 minutes and 40 seconds. Would you like assistance, it will cost Mana to manifest the system this way.]

'Sure?' Cody was confused, 'Had it taken mana before?'

[Higher Function Assistance Activated.]

Immediately a glowing light appeared in front of Ira's face, but it didn't seem to alert him at all.

"How may I assist you?" the small orb spoke.

Cody awkwardly spoke to the air, "I would like to distribute the Experience I have earned, please.."

The orb spun for a moment, "I understand. You require a place of substance to do so. I would personally recommend a small monster's nest for the time being."

The orb faded, as if it had used a significant amount of mana, 'What is my mana like?' He got an instinct of around 3/4th full being the answer.'

Ira just looked at him, confused, then continued drinking his beer.

"How much easier is it to use the feelings and urges over text or speech?" Cody leaned forward, "Ah. Excellent question."

The orb floated and gave him the feeling of nothingness.

'Infinitely easier, probably because you are just activating select neural pathways to generate a common experience to relate complex information?' Cody shook his head, "What the fuck was that?" he laid down and felt his head throb like he had a headache, but he felt no pain.

'Like that thought. Is this how you can help guide and induce sapience in monsters?'

The orb jingled happily.

'Heeeeyyyy, I am not dumb.'

He got a playful ignorance back from the orb.

"Wait, so, are you basically making me trip BALLS. Wait a minute, THAT IS WHY IT IS SO MUCH LIKE THAT TIME IN COLLEGE!" Cody was accidentally shouting and Ira was looking at him strangely.

The orb giggled in his mind and then vanished.

Cody sat back down, "That explained so much for me, thanks orb."

Ira was looking at him cockeyed, "Bud? You feelin' okay?"

Cody was smiling, he had just made a lot of progress in figuring out his system.

"Never better!" He was genuinely happy for the first time in a week, until Papaw leaned in, "So, what made you trip "balls" in college again? Must've missed that story."

Cody nervously laughed, "Please don't tell Grandma."

Ira winked, "You think Grandma Betty and I haven't done any drugs? HA, you know I served in Nam, don't you?"

Cody just nodded and sat there like a good boy.

'Let's hope to forget this…'

---------------

The morning passed slowly, people were on guard as some had died, but the overall situation was hopeful.

"This camping fold up chair sucks." Cody had been sitting in it for the past 40 minutes and could barely feel his toes.

They had just eaten lunch at 1 p.m. and they were going to have a meeting soon.

Betty was going to attend as a representative of their "group" as Cody and Ira were going to be going on a salvage run by themselves.

Ira had his sights set on finding a sporting goods store that he could find a bow and arrow in. He had told Cody his passive and active ability that he had received. One dealt with aiming correction and midflight correction. The other used his Mana to perform a powerful magical attack using the arrows head, basically detonating on the person or monster. The passive trait that his class gave was the Stamina Regeneration Boost.

Cody could tell that Ira was excited as he was currently jumping up and down like he was about to play football.

"Uh, gramps?" Cody gestured at his general being.

Ira smiled, "Didn't I mention the other little boost? Effective Age Reduction." He winked and Cody asked his orb to explain.

'AH, so that is how it prevents the older generation from immediately becoming useless in a life or death situation.'

The orb had given him a vague answer, it had something to do with the effect of Mana from the 6th dimension and the way the vitality stat impacted the negative effects of aging.

Basically, it just does, otherwise elvish beings would be TERRIBLY arthritic.

The people were pouring into the center of the bowling alley, and then Cody and Ira headed out.

They nodded to the standing guard and said, "Be careful, the Diseased Canines are out there and they are nasty, but we have a healer now, so if you get back here we can save you. Godspeed."

The doors opened and they saw the carnage that had unfolded yesterday, though it had clearly been picked through by something.

Shells laid empty, the large pieces taken inside for armor.

Ira looked at the sun, "Remember your tracking and positioning training for hunting?" Cody nodded, "Obviously, otherwise this would have been very stupid."

Ira smacked him and they marked their first turn with a blue sharpie.

The town was deserted looking, but nothing too bad. A window was broken here and there, nothing like the movies where the monsters seem to shatter everything in sight.

"Seems like they are smart, they don't leave many tracks." Ira just nodded and shushed him.

They heard a small amount of movement around a corner and Cody felt the orb do...something.

His heart pounded and he felt his stomach drop. The bat was tight in his hand as he came upon a Mastiff thrashing a tattered looking animal, clearly the diseased dog.

"Flank, watch for a pack." Ira said as he went left and Cody went right around the dog.

The Mastiff immediately let go and jumped to the side when it saw Ira, nearly hitting Cody who was thankfully a step slow. Ira was already swinging and cracked his aluminum bat on the diseased dog's neck, ending it immediately.

The dog noticed Cody and turned to him, "Hey, good boy!" The dog seemed to be bleeding as it had black looking flesh on its hind, as if it had been ambushed from behind.

Cody was not ready to put down a dog, he was dreading it.

Ira was a step ahead, "Kid, do these healers usually have the ability to heal animals too?"

Cody nodded, "Yeah, tamers are normally a thing so it should be possible."

They looked at the dog that had been backing up slowly in fear.

At that moment, they heard a loud snarl from behind the Mastiff, something big was coming....