System Lost: My Own Best Friend

It's hard to describe what I sense within my...magical dimensions? Extradimensional personal space? S-soul?

I'll save the philosophy and/or theology for someone else. The sensation isn't analogous to anything else, except maybe the interface with the [World Engine]. In fact, now that I think of it, I'm pretty sure the way that interface burns itself constantly into my mind, always present the second I turn my attention to it, is actually part of the same sense.

Just like the interface isn't really visible words, I don't "see" a fractal pattern of bodies extending forever, uh, magicwards? I'm still working out the nomenclature. Instead, I just comprehend them. Like the words, I can just feel them there, and understand them without seeing. Most of them are exactly the same—five foot nothing, ginger hair, a frankly embarrassing amount of freckles, and all the wear and tear of our ordeal reflected from our physical body to the magical ones.

It's actually pretty handy, though the deeper I look the worse my head starts to throb. I can feel the wound in my leg scarring over, I can clearly see that I've lost weight from malnourishment, and sense that the blood from Nipper's bites isn't congealing properly. Little shit must have anticoagulant saliva.

I can also sense some subtle differences—and also not-so-subtle ones. The vast majority are dormant—either asleep or otherwise inert—but three stand out. One is crossing her arms and frowning in thought, another is waving her arms with a confused and panicking expression, and the last is sitting, legs folded, with her eyes closed, pinning an increasingly agitated worm to the ground. Violet, Allison, and me. My magical self is a reflection of my physical body, and I guess Allie and Vi are...what they would be doing, if they were in front.

"Hellooooo?! Earth to Maggie?" Allie calls. "You can't just say something like that and then go silent!"

"I was thinking," I reply with a shrug, unable to ignore her any longer. "We don't have magical physiology. We've got entire magical copies of ourselves—possibly infinite, but it hurts my head to try seeing it all."

"That's weird. Do you think it's from our shared class?"

"Probably, yeah. That's my best guess too."

"So we have an infinite number of alternate personalities?" Violet asks. "If [Parallel Wills] keeps scaling, that will be a huge advantage for leveling up multiple classes at once."

I roll my eyes. "Sure, until we're trying to manage a small army fighting over our one body. Anyway, I don't think they're actually other people. Most of them feel 'empty.' Like they are just waiting for a mind or soul to move in."

"That makes sense," Vi agrees. "If you're right about all of us existing before [Parallel Wills], then those magical bodies are just a representation of the skill's potential to support more of us at once."

"And it means that the skill is holding out on us," I point out. "There's no reason for it to be limited to two when there's already so many of them there."

"Are you sure you two weren't made by the skill?" Allison interjects.

I grind my teeth a bit, but I'm not going to press the issue right now. It's not that I don't want to argue with her, I just have this nagging feeling in the back of my mind that I've been through it a million times and long-since given up. It's fine—she can be weirdly inconsiderate, but I can think of much worse people to be stuck sharing my life with. Violet.

"Assuming we weren't, it would explain why looking at that class is so hard," I say. "It's an infinitely recursive list of blank slates waiting to be filled by however many of us happen to be knocking around in here."

"I wonder how many others there are, if any," Violet ponders.

Blegh, I hope none. At the very least, we probably aren't going to find out until [Unified Wanderers] gets upgraded to the next tier. Speaking of which, I need to start working on my levels. I toss Nipper aside for now, content to let him wander around as long as he's not eating any candles or toes, then stand and stretch.

"Alright, that's enough worm-watching for now. I've got plenty of interesting data to sleep on, and I'm going to need more practice with this magic-sense before I can even think about trying to create actual spells. Let's get some work done."

"What kind of work?" Allison asks. "We need to go back and refill our waterskin, but I don't know if I trust Nipper with our food supply."

"Definitely not," Vi comments.

"Eh, he'll be fine," I argue. "I'll just kick him a few times if he gets into anything he shouldn't. He picked up on things pretty quick before."

"There's no way you can train a worm, Maggie," she sighs.

"Not with that attitude," I scoff. "Now, let's see..."

I pull up the description of my class for a quick refresher.

[Tier 0 Organizer]*

Level 1/10

A place for everything, and everything in its place.

Skill - Quick Sort: Always arrange a set of objects correctly according to the desired order.

Attribute bonus: Will.

Advancement: Keep things tidy.

Still only level one. I've been using Quick Sort a ton, but tidiness hasn't ever really been one of my strengths. I didn't really think of that when I took the class, but the skill is so useful that I'm reluctant to switch now. Well, I suppose it's a good chance to test another theory.

You might be reading a stolen copy. Visit Royal Road for the authentic version.

"Alright Nipper, get ready, this one's for you too," I address the precocious little worm, already wriggling its way over towards our food supply.

I pull the somewhat ratty cloak off over my head, shivering slightly at the cool air on my now-exposed shoulders. Figures that it would be Allison who wakes up first, with her shit taste in clothes. Thousands of years of fashion history and no practical use found for anything more complicated than a hoodie and sweatpants.

Channeling all the contempt for fashion—past, present, and future—I can muster, I pull the cloak back, still laden with spare candles, dried out bits of meat, and thankfully not the knife.

"Alright boy, fetch—hwah!" I exclaim as I hurl the cloak forward.

"Maggie, what the heck are you doing?!" Allison cries as it...just sort of flutters awkwardly to the ground, scattering candles and lizard meat all over the floor.

"Oh no," I announce in a perfect monotone. "What a horrible mess I have created. I had better clean this all up."

Predictably, Nipper does not react in any way to my act of wanton but extremely limited mayhem. I don't think he's even got eyes...or ears. Hm, training him's gonna be hard, isn't it? Whatever.

"Really?" Vi asks in an exasperated tone. "If you get a level from this, I want to file a complaint with whoever designed these mechanics."

I cackle gleefully and rub my hands together. Nothing like annoying Violet to get me motivated. After a quick detour to kick Nipper away from our food, I pick the cloak up off the floor and sling it over one shoulder.

"Right, it's not enough to just pick stuff up, I need to properly organize our stuff..."

I crack my knuckles and get to work.

* * *

It's a long, tedious job, and Allison checks out at some point. Nobody told me how much work tidying stuff up is! Still, I don't half-ass things once I decide to do them, and after what must have been hours of work, I have turned our crappy makeshift camp into a crappy makeshift home.

Our cloak, which is also our only blanket, pillow, bed, and source of fresh...ish bandages, now hangs proudly upon a little "hook" made from the shard of a Rock Snail's spear painstakingly hammered between a pair of bricks on the central pillar of the labyrinth. I actually wanted to hang the sack of meat there to keep it out of Nipper's reach, but it's too heavy and unwieldy, so it's just sitting below the cloak.

I've organized all—well, most—well, some of the candles. Stacking them up into a neat little pile with our other supplies. The now refilled waterskin rests there as well, both ends tied off until we can figure out a better way to cap it. It's a bit awkward to untie it for a drink, but it beats having one hand permanently occupied holding it closed and spilling everything the moment we have to drop it.

The knife is now tucked safely into my belt. Or maybe not-so-safely—Violet yelled at me about that, but after all the abuse it's been through, the knife isn't that sharp anymore. Besides, she didn't have any better ideas and I'd rather risk cutting myself than lose track of our only weapon and tool.

I even "swept" a designated sleeping area clean of dust and debris—which mostly involved brushing ineffectually at it with the cloak. Not sure how useful that was, given that the broom is also our pillow. A truly multi-faceted garment.

Once finished, I sit back against the far wall of the pillar room to admire my handiwork, resting Nipper on my lap and petting him like a cat.

"I hate you so, so much right now," Violet grouses.

"You're just mad because you didn't think of it," I snicker, then recoil from Nipper trying to bite at my fingers. That earns him a bop on the head from a candle. "No! Bad Nipper! No nipping!"

Vi's irritation is not, as one might expect, because of the dangerous monster with anticoagulant saliva constantly trying to bite me in close proximity to a major artery...

...

I gently move Nipper off my lap and onto the ground in front of me before I resume petting.

Ahem.

No, she is in fact upset because of my sick gains.

[Level up!]

Organizer is now level 4.

+3 Will.

"Three levels!" she huffs. "Just for moving around some candles and getting our cloak dirty for no reason."

"You're just jealous."

"No, I'm baffled," she retorts. "You could have just done all that without throwing our things on the floor first! What was the point of that? It's a waste of food!"

I shrug. "Eh, [Quick Sort] says it's still edible."

I inspect one of the offending morsels and brush off a bit of dirt before popping it in my mouth, offering a second to Nipper while threatening him with a candle.

"You've got an incredible level of faith in that skill," Violet remarks. "Also, stop giving Nipper our food!"

Aww, she's using his name. I bet she's gonna end up like a reluctant dad who doesn't want to get a dog and then ends up spoiling it more than anybody else. Assuming he doesn't eat our face first.

"There are only so many ways for us to communicate with him," I explain. "It's basic operant conditioning. Nipper has to associate us with food without thinking we are food. If he does the right thing, he gets a treat, otherwise..."

I raise the candle warily as Nipper's maw of lamprey teeth get a little too close to my fingers, but he backs off without trying for a nibble. I lower the candle and frown.

"Wow, way to ruin my point, little guy," I complain. "Well, you get the idea."

"Maggie," she groans. "It's. A. Bug!"

"Yeah, well it's working, isn't it?"

I was able to hold Nipper in my lap without him trying to tear out my femoral artery, carried him all the way to the stream without incident—which is how I refilled the waterskin—and he only tries to bite my fingers on two out of three attempts to feed him little scraps of meat. Progress!

"The only reason Nipper hasn't tried to kill us is because he can't spit webs," Violet says. "The moment we go to sleep, he's just going to snack on a candle and then smother us to death. You have to kill him."

"Huh?" I mutter in confusion. "What are you talking about? Nipper's had enough juice in the tank to make silk pretty much the whole time. At least since chewing up that carrion near the exit."

"Wha—and you never told me?!"

"Didn't I mention that I wanted to see him do it?" I ask. "I thought that it was implied. Actually, I've been trying to get him to do it for the last ten minutes. I think the conditioning might be going a bit too well, because he doesn't see us as a threat, and he knows the difference between live prey and dead meat."

"You—I—argh," she groans in helpless exasperation. "I'm too tired to deal with you right now."

"Yeah," I say with a yawn. "It has been a pretty long day. We should probably get some sleep."

"I swear, Maggie, if we get killed by a bug in our sleep, I will track you down in whatever afterlife there might be and strangle you."

"Fair enough," I yawn again, rising to fetch the cloak from its hook to use as a pillow. "See you there."