Wait... the God Emperor is REAL?!

The last three months before the neo-fèis, or festival of the New Year, was something akin to torture for me. I received twenty-six additional levels in the Pain Tolerance skill, which both brought me past the level thirty threshold and reduced my total sensation of pain by twenty-seven per cent. So, while it was definitely torturous, it was torture that provided benefits, at least. I also gained the Self-Discipline skill, and three levels during this time period.

The new "pain information" sense was quite weird, and at first, I didn't find it that useful because I was still feeling almost three-quarters of my normal pain at the same time. However, upon experimenting with it, there were a couple of super benefits. Although I didn't actually test this by actually hurting myself, I got the feeling that the sense would tell the difference between what is merely painful and what would actually damage my body.

I got that feeling because the most useful thing about it was that it seemed to be slightly prescient; if I considered an action that would cause damage to myself, it would alert me. I got the feeling it was like: 'Oh, you can do this, but here's what it will likely cost you.' 

I had spent some time at home mentally considering touching the red hot stove, and I got the impression that it would seriously damage my hand, not just cause pain to me. That was amazing and a little scary! Divination was the realm of witchery, for sure, but I didn't really know if this worked like that or if it was just using things I already knew, like touching the stove was bad and expanding on that in a hypothetical.

I had also increased my Running skill by eight, my Athletics by twelve, my Fatigue Resistance by nine and some of my base stats, namely Strength and Vitality, by two and Willpower by four! I needed almost an hour and a half less sleep at night now, and that was starting to pay real dividends. It reminded me of Dad's former liege, who was very canny in Merchant matters, once telling my father in my earshot that the most powerful force in the world was compound interest. 

I hadn't really known what that meant at the time, but this was a subject that both my mom and Mrs Robins agreed was vital knowledge for any girl who would grow up to manage a household, so I knew all about interest now. It might not be a direct pearapples-to-pearapples comparison, but I felt that the less I needed to sleep and still feel rested, the more this time would "compound" throughout my entire life as I would have more time to do things than the average person. 

Just the hour and a half less sleep now, over a year, was over twenty-two days of wakefulness that I would have but someone else wouldn't.

However, my skills and stats increased so fast that I started to get rather worried that I would expose myself during my daily runs, as while the agoniser-thingie on me didn't recalibrate how much sleep I needed, it could tell if I was really getting exhausted while running and by the end, my Athletics skill was giving me almost an eighty per cent increase in my stamina, combined with a sixty-eight per cent increase in both speed and endurance while Running. I was worried about this, but instead of suspicion, all I got was praise from the taciturn Sister of Battle, who was now standing in front of me to remove the accursed device.

"You've done very well these past months. Really, I didn't expect you to last two days, much less almost ninety. You had the look of a frou-frou neo-barb Noble girl," Sister Lucia told me as she deactivated the agoniser, which quickly unlocked and fell off my chest. She had the look of something akin to pride and nodded, "This has been fun, mostly this is a boring detail. Even when there is the odd witch or cult to purify, we can't even use flamers or bolters on this planet." She sighed with the last, shaking her head as if she had a very hard life.

** [QUEST] Brutal Training Montage has been successfully completed!

** [WILLPOWER has gone up a level.]

** [SELF-DISCIPLINE has gone up a level.]

** [SELF-DISCIPLINE has gone up a level.]

** You have received three (3) free points!

I grinned at both the notification and Sister Lucia. Then, I rubbed between my chest, under my tunic, where that cursed device had been affixed for the past months, and tilted my head to my side, "Why can't you use flamers?" Even I knew that purifying flame was a pretty big part of their culture.

Sister Lucia scowled, "Can't burn promethium in the atmosphere of this planet. For some reason, any combustibles that originate from off-planet have a very serious impact on the harvest of useful native flora, even if you burn them a continent away. I don't know why. It's why there are only two scheduled discretionary orbital flights per year, as the shipments exporting the processed plants use all of the remaining 'promethium-budget.'"

I didn't know very much about anything, but that seemed weird to me, so I said so, "That seems weird."

"It is. The Magos in charge of the cogboys on this planet has been claiming that he'd have it fixed, said that over a decade ago and as of yet nothing, despite huge expenditures," she shook her head, "Although, I guess I have to thank him for the vehicles. They're powered from power cells; before we had them, we had to use horses like everybody else." Horses? With their giant and heavy armour? I wanted to see the size of these alleged horses.

I was about to ask about these cogboys as it had been the second time she had mentioned them, but before I got the chance, she continued speaking, "Now, the real gains for self-discipline will be if you can continue all of this without the outside help." She got an odd look on her face before saying, "I urge you to do so. I've talked to Sister Jorus, and she is very impressed with your scholastics. If you work well, you could easily find yourself a commission in the Imperial Guard and get off this planet."

Inwardly, I winced. Rather than be discovered by Sister Lucia, the closest I had come was by the kindly Sister Jorus, who was amazed at both my ability in speed Reading, my ability to memorise rote material and especially my proficiency with the High Gothic language after just studying it on and off for several months. What she didn't know was just getting a single level of Language: High Gothic gave me a twenty per cent "fluency factor."

** Reading (LV31): An increase in your reading comprehension. Also, an increase to your base reading speed by LV*25 words per minute [775 wpm], multiplied by FLUENCY FACTOR (0.0 to 1.0) and by a hidden brevity stat for each language known, for example, ideographic languages will generally be faster to read than phonetic languages. 

** Language: High Gothic (LV7): High Gothic, also known as Tech, is the oldest known living language of Old Earth. Your fluency in speaking, understanding, reading and writing in this language is represented by: 20+LV*2.0% [Current fluency: 34%].

From what I could tell, calling High Gothic a living language was being very kind to it, as even the base twenty per cent fluency I received from just getting a single level in the language was more proficiency than most people had. It was a language rich in idiomatic and technical expressions, and without my special numbers directly giving me a lot of understanding, it would have seemed arcane or mystic. As it was, it just seemed very anachronistic compared to the "Low Gothic" we spoke every day.

Sister Jorus was pleased with my work, and while Sister Lucia was implying that I should join the Imperial Guard, I had the feeling that this opinion was coloured by her own biases in wanting to leave the planet. Sister Jorus said that I might have a future as a clerk in the Administratum or even working for the Planetary Governor on Orkney. 

That sounded a little bit better, as from what I could tell from my systematic examinations of the Church and Schola library, the quality of life of even the low-born on our planet was far and away better than what existed in so-called Hive Worlds.

Here, a peasant might be poor, but they likely had a few hens for eggs, could trade for some milk or butter, and ate fairly well. I had read a misfiled list of caloric requirements from the Hive World Krieg that the High Autocrat of Krieg supplied to a regiment that was tithed to the Imperial Guard, which made me believe that neither Imperial Guards nor people in the Hive City ate that well.

I stopped daydreaming and yelled, "Yes, ma'am! I will, ma'am!" 

That caused her to muss my hair a bit and say, "Alright, girl, get out of here; I'm sure you want to go have fun at the... what do you people call this festival?"

"The Fèis, Sister Lucia! Neo-fèis, for the New Year!" I chimed.

Sister Lucia scowled a bit, placing her hand on the hilt of her large Power Sword by habit, saying, "Can't say I like that you people have a different word for festival, smacks of heresy to me. Tell me, girl, things seem pretty mild here at Landing, but do people do weird things, like dancing around and worshipping trees out in the wilds where you used to live?"

I blinked. We didn't really live in the wild areas, although I supposed we were a little close to it. But, I immediately felt that it was probably not a good idea to mention that people out there did get sort of attached to very old and large trees in villages. I felt it was because most trees fruited here, and people liked fruit. It wasn't out of any sort of worship. Still, I said, "Uhh... people always used to say that that was how witches got their powers, they'd go into the old woods and make deals with Daemons, but I've only seen the one witch, and I don't think it would have been a good idea to ask her, even if my dad hadn't shot her."

Sister Lucia narrowed her eyes, "Chlorofiends, no doubt..." Then she shook her head slightly and smiled down at me, "No, your dad did exactly the right thing. If anything, he was far too merciful. And you have exactly the right idea. Don't listen to the heretic. An open mind and compassion for the heretic is like a castle with no soldiers to guard it. It is Folly." 

I could hear the capitalisation at the end, so I replied rotely, "Yes, Sister Lucia." Sister Lucia did have a number of these slogans and anecdotes that she would tell me, and more than half involved burning something or someone alive as the moral of the story and correct moral decision.

"Alright, get out of here," she repeated herself, and this time, I didn't stay around to see if she would have digressed again; I merely ran out of the Church garden and continued running until I got home.

---xxxxxx---

I was devastated to learn that instead of aimlessly walking through the city fèis like I wanted, we were obligated to have dinner at the Duke's palace. This was mostly because the Duke was only on the planet half of the time, and he planned to leave shortly after New Year. I stared up at the sky on the short truck ride to the palace, wondering where exactly he stayed for the rest of the time.

My big sister Alicia, though, was all excited, wearing her best dress. My mom forced me to do the same, and I merely had to sigh and wonder again why we were so different.

At least the dinner was probably going to be good.

We arrived quite early, and I took heart that, at least, I wasn't sitting at the main table. I hadn't expected to, being a child and all, but it was at least a happy confirmation. Unfortunately, one of the kids' tables that Alicia and I sat at featured a bitch of a girl that was going to make getting through dinner an ordeal.

"So, where are you and your family from?" the stuck-up girl asked Alicia and me. I was content to let my sister answer her. That got a smirk and a reply, "That would make you the very lowest of landed gentry I've heard tale of, right, Sarah?" she asked one of her hangers-on.

I was going to ignore it because I didn't care, but Alicia seemed to be getting red in the face, so I felt I needed to rescue our familial pride a little bit for her sake, "If you think that noble rank on Orkney means anything, especially to those in power here at Landing, you're a fool. Sure, Dad is merely a Knight, but you know what he also is?" I asked rhetorically, not waiting for her to answer, "The commanding officer of the second Planetary Defence Regiment, of over two thousand men-at-arms, and therefore perhaps the fourth or fifth most important person on the planet after the Planetary Governor, the Duke."

Now it was this girl's turn to get red in the face and Alicia's turn to vibrate with pride next to me, with her smiling at me and squeezing my thigh in thanks under the table. It seemed like she just needed a little help because, after that, she went back and forth verbally against the other girl, which I didn't care to listen to. 

Our table was quite a ways away from the head table, and while I was attempting to ignore the bantering of my sister and her new rival, I noticed someone getting up and excusing himself shortly after the first course was served. I tried my best to hear what was being said up there and found myself getting a new skill.

[Skill Eavesdropping gained at LV1.]

** Eavesdropping (LV1): Increase the distance by which you can intelligibly hear distant conversations by LV*2.0 meters [2m] while actively attempting to eavesdrop.

Oh, that was quite a useful one. However, all I could make out was the scratchy voice of the man, covered entirely in a red robe, say, "...if you'll excuse me, Governor." His voice sounded off. Frowning, I aimed my Observe at him and got a very interesting result.

[Zephyrion Neurosage, Post-human Male, A Genetor of Stygies VIII, and formerly an Explorator. He has survived three credible accusations of Tech-Heresy. However, the last tribunal resulted in the loss of his fleet and banishment to the planetary surface of Orkney IV by the Stygian Fabricator-General. Wants to leave the planet and regain his status as an Explorator to resume his personal Quest for Knowledge, as he believes revelation is worth any expenditure of energy or life.]

I just blinked at the information because there were a lot of terms that I had no idea about. But this was a lot different than anyone else I had Observed. This was the first person that was listed as something other than merely "Human." As I saw the red-robed individual walk past our table before leaving, I noticed that he had what appeared to be a full-face mask and what I could only describe as metal tentacles attached to something in his robes. 

One of the smallest of them even snaked out and grabbed one of the cherry tomatoes on that bitch's salad with unnatural grace and stealth, as I was the only one who noticed. I gaped as he brought the small tomato up to where his mouth would have been on his mask. He passed our table and seemed to be speaking to himself, "...hmm... twenty-first generation of admixture one seven one yields acceptable levels of carbohydrates... note to self, forward admixture one seven one to orbital hydroponics for microgravity cultivar testing..."

So fucking cool! I wanted a metal tentacle hand. Where do you get metal tentacle hands?! I could steal all of the honey-nut bread slices from my stupid brothers, and they'd never know what happened! And even if they did notice, what were they going to do against my metal tentacle hand?! Nothing!

I used my Observe on a few other people at the Head Table, including the Duke, but most were not that interesting, even him. However, I found one that made me frown.

[Sean MacGregor, Human Man, Assistant to the Deputy Planetary Governor of Orkney IV. The ninth child of his father, and your father is his ninth least favourite person. Besides hating your father, he also wants to leave the party before nine o'clock as he thinks it is a waste of time.]

[OBSERVE has gained a level.]

He hated Dad?! That automatically made him evil in my book. Also, Observe had gained a level; that was the first time in months! The first levels were gained so quickly that I couldn't quite guess what I had to do to increase it further. Observing more things or observing more interesting or rare things were two of my guesses, though.

I narrowed her eyes at the man once more before the main course was delivered to the table, which distracted me. Still, I'll have my eyes on you, Mr MacGregor.

The rest of the dinner went without much happening, although Alicia found her courage and gave as well as she got from the bitch and her friends, and it even looked like they were somehow hitting it off. I didn't really understand, weren't both of them being so catty to one another just a little while ago?

On the ride back to their home, Alicia told their parents about it and even thanked me. I scoffed and said, "That bitch had mistaken her farts for thunder."

"Piper Eversly!" my mom yelled, but my dad? He laughed.

---xxxxxx---

I spent most of the rest of the three-day break inside my Secret Place In The Hive, or rather, the fifth floor of the Orkney Auxiliary Accommodations complex. I have wanted to increase the level of both Jury-rigging and Electronics Repair skills for some time now. The latter, especially, as not only did I want to get the free knowledge at level five, but it was like my Cooking and Housework skills, which had the steepest rise of any of the ones I had plotted. That meant that these skills gave the most benefits and soonest, too.

My Cooking had already reached the realm where its efficiency and speed were over two hundred and fifty per cent of normal, which gave me a good idea about what I should expect. It wasn't a supernatural bonus, though. For example, it didn't make water boil quicker or reduce the time needed to bake a loaf of bread. That was a function of heat, and were all areas of Cooking where you just had to wait until something was done. However, it did increase the speed in all of the preparatory phases. 

I chopped vegetables with slightly uncanny speed, for example, and I had ideas about how to stage things I wanted to cook to have the least wasted time. I also wasted very little in terms of materials. I would pour just the right amount of oil into the dish we were making. I felt that was the "efficiency" part.

Although I didn't want to get pigeonholed as a Cookery Lady, I thought that I was going to offer to make the Sword Sisters lunch every day once school started again. The regular Sisters at the church really weren't set up for the needs of soldiers, I felt. They served breakfast and dinner, but the Battle Sisters led a really active life and needed more food than that, just like men who worked all day. The food was available, but there was no one to make the meals. 

I thought it would be a straightforward way to increase my Cooking skill levels while also earning a little extra money and the gratitude of the Sword Sisters, especially Sister Lucia. I didn't think I had a future in Cooking for an occupation, but everyone needed to eat, and most of all, I was getting kind of addicted to seeing my special numbers go up. I liked it a lot when they went up.

It was really difficult to avoid using my two "Unspent Points" on one of my stats right away just to get my numbers to go up, but since it seemed to be more difficult to raise the numbers the higher they got, these "points" would be a lot more value if I saved them until my stats were already pretty high.

I had gained another level in Jury-Rigging by fiddling with the broken device that opened and closed that room, which I was using as a kind of work area. I made the device only open when I tapped it with a stick instead of whenever someone walked next to it. That would serve to keep my Secret Place secret.

At first, I thought Electronics Repair would be more difficult to repair because all I had was my flashlight, the broken stunner and a few other devices. However, when I started disassembling broken lighting modules, I discovered they were filled with electronics too!

I had a table full of broken lights now, and I would carefully use both my minimal knowledge and mostly my Observe skill to determine what was wrong. Even just a single broken bit and the light wouldn't work anymore, but they still contained many other working bits, so I could carefully take working modules out of one and put them into another, and I had created a stack of working lights this way. I gained a level of Electronics Repair for every second light I fixed this way, and I was just about to test this last one.

Plugging the device into the wall, it flickered momentarily before lighting up completely!

[ELECTRONICS REPAIR has gained a level.]

Awesome! That was the third level I had gotten in two days. I was just one more away from getting free knowledge about what I was actually doing in my brain.

Pulling the working lighting module off the wall, I disturbed a layer of dust and started coughing. I cleaned around my work area fairly thoroughly, as even my limited level in Electronics Repair told me that dust inside the components was a good idea, but the room was fairly large, and I hadn't wanted to just spend days cleaning.

Sighing, I waved away the small cloud of disturbed dust away from my face, wishing devoutly that there was some much easier and simpler way to dust thousand-year-old walls.

I knew I had made a mistake instantly. I had a familiar tingly feeling in my head as soon as I made the gesture and felt my nascent Telekinesis skill activate. I had been really good at not using it a single time, but now it wiped a whole wall clear of dust, but then it didn't stop. I felt something wrong briefly before I and everything else in the room started briefly floating into the air, like gravity did not have a hold on anything here.

[Telekinesis has gained a level.]

[Warp Resistance has gained a level.]

[Warp Resistance has gained a level.]

I started swearing instantly, "Oh, feck, feck, feck, feck..." Was I going to stay stuck like this, floating in the air forever? I tried to think. What would Sister Lucia do? 

No, wait, that was a bad idea. Sister Lucia would kill me! She was death on witchery! She would be all sad about it, but she would probably think killing me was doing me a favour. Instead, I thought about what Sister Jorus would do. She would pray. I supposed that couldn't hurt. I had Memorised a lot of prayers by now, so I selected one that I thought had the most applicability to my current crisis. 

 I held my hands together and prayed. Normally, when I recited a prayer, I just recited it like a reading primer in Schola, but this time I tried really hard to believe in what I was saying in Language: High Gothic, "Oh, mighty Emperor, eternal light. Guard me from the Warp's foul blight. In darkness, shield my heart from fear. By Your grace, keep me safe, keep me near."

[Temporary effect 'Emperor's Blessing of Protection Against The Empyrean' gained. Effect: If WARP RESISTANCE is less than TWO, you gain TEN levels of WARP RESISTANCE. Otherwise, multiply the current WARP RESISTANCE skill by THREE. Maximum bonus: TWENTY-FIVE levels of WARP RESISTANCE.]

[Emperor's Blessing of Protection Against the Empyrean Duration: 05:59:59]

I would have normally read the lines right away, but instead, I, and everything else in the room, lost the floatiness, and I fell to the ground with a thud. "Owe," I said, rubbing my elbow. I had hit it right on the funny bone when I fell, and it wasn't funny at all!

I did a quick inventory of my body and mind. I didn't feel any different, and the vague sense of wrongness couldn't be detected anymore. I glanced down at the ground and saw the lighting module was probably busted again, as a couple of components had fallen out. I hadn't bothered to put any of the fixtures in place before I tested it.

Reading the text in front of my eyes, I was wide-eyed and gaped. I said the only thing that I could think of, "Wait... The God-Emperor is real?!" I shook my head. I mean, I knew he was real, sort of. But, like, a real God?! Despite what everything was said in Church and Schola, I had been running on the slightly heretical assumption that he was just a really powerful, really wise man who just wanted the best for Humanity.

I held my hands up together and looked up and said a bit more devotedly, "Sorry, God-Emperor, sir!"

** Name: Piper Eversly

** Title: Noble Daughter

** Strength: 7

** Dexterity: 6

** Vitality: 7

** Intelligence: 11

** Willpower: 12

** Psi Capability: 29 (Zeta)

** Unspent Points: 3

** Skills: Gamer's Body (MAX), Gamer's Mind (MAX), Pain Tolerance (34), Reading (31), Athletics (23), Cooking (22), Running (17), Hiding (16), Fatigue Resistance (16), Housework (15), Dissembling (13), Observe (13), Sword Mastery (8), Language: High Gothic (7), Acting (6), Embroidery (6), Memorisation (6), Sewing (6), Marksmanship - Ballistic (5), Teaching (5), Horse Riding (5), Self-Discipline (5), Etiquette (4), Electronics Repair (4), Archery (3), Warp Resistance (3), Lying (2), Jury-Rigging (2), Telekinesis (2), and Eavesdropping (1)