Pestilence: Rise Of The Pure Undead-Chapter 514: Matters Of The Heart

Standing near the edge, the sight of the emerald void was something else, bright and inviting during the day, sombre and tranquil during the night, Toby enjoyed staring into that seemingly endless horizon, unknowing of whether a limit existed or not, staring at the minuscule floating bits of earth drifting about in this expanse of green.

Glasses perched atop his nose, he would often be spending time with sun worshippers as they sometimes showed up here for sun rise, not always since their beloved sun would show up from anywhere it wanted, still, they seemed to know how to predict the seemingly random decisions their deity made.

Truthfully, Toby had been a bit doubtful about the sun having its own character and personality, although he had acclimated to life in a world of fantasy that seemed to very much enjoy breaking all rules of logic, physics, mathematics and more on every occasion, a sun being sentient had still tickled him the wrong way.

Him, Willian and Ilona remained people who had lived in worlds guided by hard sciences, so they could not help but draw constant comparisons before reminding themselves that they now lived in a place completely different than that.

From being summoned into a world of sword and magic, to having to deal with undead horrors and somehow being transported to another world again, which was actually just another realm that still counted as the same world overall, but still, within this realm the rules were also different, the people were unique, they followed their own doctrines and honestly, it only got more confusing the more one tried to make sense of it all.

’Gives me a headache…’ the number of times he had tried to string every single little thing about just mana only to feel like drowning in a word salad, and then being reminded that mana was only one of countless energy types, and also that energies were but one method of power in this world-

He looked back up at the sun, still high in the sky for the moment.

Unlike William and Ilona, he had received something a bit special when dragged into this reality, the so-called system that everyone had and that did not work at all like expected was different for him, on top of having all, or at least the majority, of the information concerning what it could grant someone, it had also been delivered with the in-built ability to get a look at the system interfaces of others, and also the oddly game-like aspect of displaying something, or someone’s name if they were powerful.

Which was definitely something unique to him as the system was not at all like a game, there was nothing miraculous about it, the number of stats was way too high and the increases when levelling up were automatic, skills were all basic, he had heard that the system could grant good boons, but it was sounding more and more like an urban legend.

This was probably why most people seemed to not give a single care for the system’s existence, because whether or not you knew of it, the result would be the same, simply focus on something else, whilst it just works on its own.

This was all deeply frustrating to Toby on a daily basis as he could not help but skim through its interface, asking questions that received no answers- Such as :

"Why are jobs and classes separated? And why does no one mention them, ever?!"

"Why sixteen stats? And why was he told that there may even be more than that? If stats value is based on someone’s own traits, how the hell is luck quantified?"

"What is the point of displaying alignments? Does it impact anything?"

And many more, back on Viridis, he always had stuff to do, distracting him from this solutionless enigma, Pierre-Ornée would always be training him, dragging him around and such, now however, Toby was left to peacefully ponder the point of it all, and he very much disliked it.

But instead of just leaving it at that, he decided to find himself occupations, helping people, being a little bit social, finding responses to other questions…

He often helped Spula to better discern the properties of whatever she would gather, thanks to being capable of analysing anything, which was due to the fact that everything possessed a system apparently, even inanimate, very much nonliving objects.

And using this ability to look like he was very knowledgeable on all creatures to beast worshippers, female beast worshippers, to be precise.

For another very important thing to work toward was getting the affection of one of them, he had missed his opportunity to connect with a famed beast girl, something that used to be only fiction to him, but like the gods of this world were still active, he had been granted another chance.

Although some of them were a bit too bestial even for him, beast followers and sorcerers tended to be rather light on their animalistic parts.

But all of those concerns had been put to the back of his mind when Toby had decided to satisfy his curiosity and use his analysis on the sun itself, discovering that not only was it definitely not a simple sun with a green dye, but that it was also very much aware as it momentarily dimmed its light, as if winking in his direction, basically saying that the analysis had not gone unnoticed.

He awkwardly waved in the sun’s direction, not knowing how to behave since learning with total certainty that the sun worshippers were absolutely correct.

’Solzmimi… What a cute name for a ball of raging fire-’ something cold suddenly pressed up against the back of his head, making Toby leap up forward like a frightened kitten, nearly throwing himself off the cliff.

"No need for all the drama, Toby"

"You could just say something you know?! Instead of poking at me!"

Ilona just laughed, halberd resting on her shoulder, she had come by with William as well.

As all three had been unexpectedly brought into this world, and had been trained together as well, they were most familiar with one another out of everyone, especially since they tended to use idioms and make references that only they could get.

Toby and William had adopted the clothing styles of this realm, but Ilona was still garbed in the equipment she had been given by Pierre-Ornée, never letting go of the halberd as well, she probably slumbered alongside it too.

The other two sat alongside Toby, observing the void.

"So… Any progress with your cat girl fetish?" spoke Ilona, a not-so subtle smile on her face.

"Please, don’t call it that… I just think they’re cute…"

"But is it progressing?"

"Well… There is Ooaluz, I think there is something there…"

"You think?" Willian chimed in.

"I just don’t want to make too many assumptions, you know?"

"Sure, that’s fine, but did she say anything in particular? How does she act with you?" Ilona sat cross legged, elbows resting upon her knees, hands joined together as she focused to analyse.

"She said that I reminded her of a Jokra and that we should test it out someday"

"What the hell is a Jokra?" the blond otherworlder asked.

"That’s the problem!, I haven’t gotten to analyse anything with that name yet, I have no idea what this might be referring to!" Toby rubbed the bridge of his nose.

Toby and William just looked at one another as Ilona remained silent, nodding her head and giving a thumbs up.

Unlike her two associates, she had taken the training they received in Tamaris to heart and was still following it even now, so she would often join in on beast hunts, talking with lots of people.

"Say Toby, what does Ooaluz look like?" asked Ilona.

"Mmh, she’s a bit smaller than me, has bright brown hair, is very energetic… And has big, floppy rabbit ears, they are just enormous and adorable" he described, spending quite a lot of time on the ears.

"That’s what I thought, Jokras are the equivalent of rabbits here, super fast, jumpy and with big ears- You are nothing like them, she is basically one in essence, she still likens you to one, that sounds like a win to me"

"Oh"

"Damn, Toby is scoring… This must be a bad timeline…" William said.

"But what did she mean by ’testing it’? How does one test if someone is like a Jokra? Is there something people know about them?" wondered Toby, but Ilona just slapped one hand onto his shoulder, a big smile on her face, some sort of mixture of pride in him and something else he could not quite decipher.

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"You’ll find out"