“Dad, what the hell was that?” Ash asked as Floof and I reached her. She sounded tired again. Even with the added constitution, the cancer was still catching up to her. I’d known it would, but I had hoped it would keep her stronger longer than this. Had the cancer spread further than we’d been aware of already?

  “A Leviathan. We were lucky it was a young one. Let’s get inside that garage over there, and we can go over whatever new classes you gained,” I said, trying to speed her along.

  Even after the food earlier, her energy levels hadn’t improved much. She needed more rest, and we needed a safe place to go over what we’d gained by hitting level ten anyway. Not that a garage was overly safe, but it would at least keep us out of easy sight of anything.

  The door wasn’t locked, and for once, the inside looked empty. It was a turn of good luck we had been due for. I grabbed a towel and a change of clothes from the cart, and got changed behind the shelving on the other side of the room while Ash found a comfortable place to rest.

  “How are you feeling? And tell me the truth,” I said, in a firm dad voice. She had found a couple of lawn chairs and was now lying back on one of them. Her face was a lot paler than I’d have liked.

  “Bad. Not quite as bad as during chemo, but getting close.” She tore open an energy bar.

  I sat down in the other lawn chair, sighing lightly with worry before I replied. “Alright, put all your new points into constitution again. That should boost you up some. Tonight you’re going to get real rest, and some more food into you.”

  “What about these classes?” she asked.

  “What are the new ones?” I replied, hoping she had a few. The less that repeated, the better her chances were for something that would help.

  __________

  Class

  Force Mage

  Type

  Wizard

  Rarity

  Uncommon

  The Force Mage is an uncommon Wizard-based class that focuses on creating and shaping force to both protect themselves and their allies, as well as attack their foes. They are able to alter the space around them to create solid material. The stronger they grow, the greater their ability to manifest these forces.

  Key Ability

  Force Shaping

  Force Shaping allows the Force Mage to manifest an amount of force from the energy around them, and to begin to mold that energy into the shape they need. The amount they are able to manifest at once is based on their own experience and spirit. Higher perception will help to increase the speed and accuracy at which they are able to mold the force.

  Class

  Opportunist

  Type

  Rogue

  Rarity

  Uncommon

  The Opportunist is an uncommon Rogue-based class that focuses on watching the events unfold around them. They are able to discern patterns in what most see as chaos, waiting for the moment to best insert themselves. At their highest levels, even fate begins to reveal its patterns.

  Key Ability

  Observe

  The longer the Opportunist keeps observe active, the more information that is revealed to them about their surroundings. Higher perception values increase the details that may be found in the bigger picture.

  Class

  Imbuer

  Type

  Universalist

  Rarity

  Uncommon

  The Imbuer is an Uncommon Universalist-based class. They gain no abilities beyond their single key ability and the evolutions that it undergoes. Due to the unique nature of the class, Imbuers are able to draw from any power source, mana-based or not.

  Key Ability

  Investment

  Everything that exists contains energy. Investment allows the Imbuer to take that energy and place it into something else. The amount they can move, and the effects they are able to generate, depend on their own experimentations backed by all four of the primary attributes.

  __________

  She quickly rattled off the three new classes she had access to, and again, if this were any other situation, I’d have strongly recommended she consider the Force Mage or the Imbuer. It was even possible the Imbuer could have what we needed, but without other sources of healing, there was no realistic way for her to make use of it.

  Unless I had something in my options. I hadn’t looked through those yet.

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  “Don’t select anything yet. Let me take a look at my own options, because it’s entirely possible you can pick Imbuer,” I said, shifting my focus to the System messages.

  Not counting that I had also gained the Imbuer as a new class, I only had two new ones.

  __________

  Class

  Battle Dancer

  Type

  Rogue

  Rarity

  Rare

  The Battle Dancer is a rare Rogue-based class. To them, every encounter is a stage and every fight is a choreographed event. They thrive in the heat of battle, quickly dancing in, landing their blows and retreating before their foe truly understands what has happened. As they grow, their body begins to move with such grace that it transcends the limitation of solid, rigid bones in favor of a more flexible physique.

  Key Ability

  Sway with the Rhythm

  As long as the Battle Dancer is aware of the rhythm around them, they are able to slip in and out of any fight, pitting their perception directly against that of their foes. As their knowledge of combat grows, so does their ability stay within the complex dances that make up all interactions.

  Class

  Lion’s Brigade Heavy Charger

  Type

  Paladin

  Rarity

  Rare

  The Lion’s Brigade Heavy Charger is a rare Paladin-based class. Any member of this class is automatically enrolled in the Lion’s Brigade order of Paladins. They are duty-bound to answer any official call to action of their order and will gain any benefits due to them. Any growth of this class also requires the signatures of a commanding officer to properly evolve it.

  Key Ability

  Lion’s Charge

  Even when alone, a Lion’s Brigade Heavy Charger can fight like a pack. When charging down an opponent, spiritual clones are created around them. While each one is a pale reflection of the Charger themselves, they still pack a punch. That punch grows along with the charger. Higher strength and constitution empower the Charger directly, while spirit helps reinforce their clones.

  __________

  Damn. A paladin order was completely useless to me at the moment, but the fact that I had already qualified for one was interesting. Hell, if it had been one focused on any sort of healing, I’d have picked it and tried to fight my way through the integration as fast as I could. Until that was finished, there was no way for any of the paladin orders that weren’t already here to help me at all.

  Battle Dancer just wasn’t me. I understood why the System was suggesting it, but the amount of dodging in fights I was doing at the moment wasn’t the normal way I fought. It was just a necessity as my body caught back up to my fighting skills. Right now, I was just too much of a glass cannon to body the blows like I’d used to.

  I took a deep breath before breaking the bad news.

  “Sorry, Ash, looks like we are going to have to push through another five levels. Don’t take any of those classes,” I said, not happy at all about this. I knew it was the likely outcome, but I hadn’t been expecting her cancer to get so aggressive.

  She tried to smile, but I saw the pain behind it. That was the second time her hope had been dashed. But we were going to keep trying. I wasn’t anywhere near giving up. I doubted I would be, not so long as I could keep fighting.

  Instead of voicing that pain, she asked another question. “What are ‘focuses’? I have three to pick from.”

  I had nearly forgotten about our first focuses. “They’re something we choose outside of classes to help guide our growth. We will get them every ten levels for a while. They aren’t quite as powerful as classes on their own, but they can do some pretty amazing things if you stack them correctly.”

  “Can we put these off? Or do we have to pick one? Because it doesn’t look like any of them are going to help heal me either,” she said, more disappointment in her voice.

  “No, the System will lock us out of level advancement until we pick one. There’s something with how they work that increases our bodies’ ability to handle the changes the System causes. What are your options?” I wasn’t surprised she didn’t have anything useful here. Before a major focus, anything that helped her heal would have been a huge surprise.

  __________

  Focus

  Strength of the Body

  Multiply your strength by 1.05.

  Focus

  Indomitable Will

  Whenever an invading force attempts to make you do something against your will, your spirit is doubled.

  Focus

  Stem the Blood Flow

  Ongoing effects that damage your body are reduced by your current constitution.

  __________

  It wasn’t healing, but it would help. Cancer had to count as an ongoing effect. And every little thing we did to mitigate it or slow it down bought us more time. “Choose Stem the Blood Flow. I think it’s going to help.”

  In the few seconds before she spoke again, some color had returned to her face.

  “Oh, I hadn’t even thought of it like that. I was thinking it would make like a poison or something hurt me less that someone had attacked us with. But yeah, I don’t feel as bad as I did.” A smile crossed her face as she said it. Some of her hope was returning.

  “I know, and I get it completely. This is why I’ve been having you read everything to me. There are so many options that virtually no one has a good idea of where to start. This is a big part of why integrations are such a disaster for the native populations,” I said, trying not to let my anger on that topic out. We didn’t need a rant about that right now.

  She leaned back and relaxed a bit as Floof climbed onto her legs. While her body adjusted to the newest change, I took a look at my own focuses.

  __________

  Focus

  Iron Fortitude

  Multiply your constitution by 1.1.

  Focus

  Alert

  Become aware whenever an active hostile enemy is within the range of your current perception. This will not bypass all obscurement abilities.

  Focus

  Any Landing You Can Walk Away From

  As long as you aren’t outright killed from the impact of a fall, the damage is reduced by your current constitution.

  __________

  The second and third focuses were mostly useless to me at the moment. The sword’s abilities were better than Alert, and any fall that I was worried about likely would just kill me. So that left Iron Fortitude.

  In truth, it would have taken some impressive focuses to beat that one. It was almost always a good bet to get focuses that increased your attributes, especially if they weren’t the base ones.

  Ash had only gotten the base strength one, whereas this was a second-tier constitution boosting focus. It wasn’t exactly unusual to see these so early, but it was still uncommon enough to make it an easy choice.

  With that out of the way, I checked over my attributes. I brought my constitution up to twenty-five, and with the new focus, that was enhanced further to twenty-seven points. Of the remaining five points, two went to strength, bringing it up to five, and three went to perception, putting that at five as well.

  We were going to need to sleep soon. While I could last several more days without, there was no reason to push it now. Tonight we slept.

  Tomorrow we hunted.

  With the death of the frog came a new option for both of them. Something called ‘focuses’ had appeared in their vision. Adam quickly picked the only one that sounded useful.

  __________

  Focus

  Alert

  __________

  —Memories of Adam Miller before he found Earth