LIGHTNOVELONLINE Chapter 33 - The True Life of the Party
Birthdays only mattered so long as people cared about them.
To the widow, the whole concept had been tiresome—as a grown woman, there was nothing more terrifying than the influx of messages from people who were acquaintances of hers at best, remembering her existence once a year. They drowned out the actual, relevant messages in her inbox!
It didn’t help that she’d rarely encountered birthdays as a source of information. The closest it got were with commemorative cards that were handed out to guests, much like they would at funerals. And even then, such things just served as confirmation for names and vital dates, rarely including familial details.
The first birthday the widow celebrated in earnest had no doubt been her grandson’s, though she failed to recall the exact age—it was strange.
Malwine had some memories of looking over her grandson as he progressed through his college years, of being there for his wedding. As the widow, anyway. But she also carried with her a strong impression of Yoyo having been someone she didn’t get to see grow up, not really. She reconnected with him at some point, but the details were muddled.
It hurt, in a distant way—tough as it might be to say, Yoyo didn’t mean as much to Malwine as he had to the widow. Oh, she’d never stop loving him—for he might have been the only person the widow loved at all in her last decades—but there was a permanent divide between them now.
Seeing Matilda’s birthmonth celebration begin as The Snow of 5801 started was thrilling, and nostalgic—it stirred that distant sadness in her, but also brought up all those kinds of fuzzy feelings Malwine hadn’t quite been ready to deal with.
Malwine sniffled—as the attempts at [Remote Reading] she performed through [Multitasking] kept leaving her empty-handed, her thoughts had strayed. And now she was nearly crying.
“Aw, don’t worry,” Thekla patted her head. That strange newcomer of hers was sitting by her side, and her aunt had rudely neglected to introduce them. “You’ll get your celebration too someday.”
Crap. I don’t want to give them the wrong idea. What would a non-jealous toddler say?
“It’s just,” Malwine didn’t even have to fake another sniffle—she was still sorting through some stuff. “I’m so happy for her!”
“…Oh?” Thekla blinked at her, hand frozen in the air mid-pat.
“Matilda’s so nice! She showed me books!” Malwine clenched her fists around the height of her cheeks and started twisting her body in what had to be quite the cartoonish display of ‘happiness’. “And now she’s growing up! I’m so happy!”
Okay, yeah, maybe that was a bit much.
Thekla at least resumed the patting. “Aw, that’s so nice of you to say.”
From where they were sitting, Malwine admittedly didn’t get that great of a view at the main celebration. There was a strange amount of people around, though she wouldn’t have been surprised if they were just the staff, taking the chance to get a good meal on Kristian’s dime.
Malwine took a moment to open her to-do list and add ‘Figure out how money works’ on it. How making a panel messy was even possible was beyond her, but she was pretty sure even she had no idea what all the contents of her oldest panel were anymore, seeing as she kept overwriting them.
“Auntie Thekla,” Malwine looked up. “Why are there so many strangers in here?”
“Because, dear, Bernadette sent out invitations far and wide so all get to celebrate Matilda’s big day. Some even brought their children, so she might even make friends her age. Finally. Most of them are admittedly just… random people, though.”
“Mending relations with the population of Beuzaheim will be key to improving the chances of finding new information, Thekla,” the bespectacled man next to them said. “About… you know?”
Malwine frowned. No one would get mad at a toddler that was a bit too honest. “Who even are you?”
It might have been somewhat rude, sure, but this was the third time she’d seen the man—either he or Thekla had plenty of chances to just introduce him, instead of acting as though Malwine didn’t need to be told anything.
“I am Abelard Lange,” the man told her.
Malwine’s frown only deepened as her curiosity grew—she really hoped she looked more annoyed than interested. “That’s a weird name.”
Thekla paled, eyes widening. “Malwine!”
“It is of no issue,” Abelard said with a smile. “My name follows Lizanąn customs, so it might seem odd to you. I bear my father’s call name as first name, and my mother’s family name.”
That wasn’t in any way related to why Malwine had found it strange—it was just wildly out of the norm. Her impressions of Grēdôcavan names so far had reminded her vaguely of some Germanic customs, but she wouldn’t go as far as to consider the country—the Principality—to have anything more than a passing similarity to the German locations she’d read about as the widow. That would be doing both a disservice.
Then this man came around and… just sounded vaguely French. Malwine decided to hold true to her previous convictions—it would probably be weird to be thinking of this… Lizaną?… as any direct parallel to her previous life. Especially considering what he just told her of how their names apparently worked.
Naturally, that meant it was time to deflect from her ruminations by asking the most normal question she could think of.
“How does it work if you’re a girl?”
Abelard tipped his head—his mannerisms were actually a bit like Thekla’s. “You’d have your mother’s call name and your father’s family name.”
“What happens if people have more than one kid?”
“That is why middle names exist.”
“And if you’re a bastard?”
Thekla just buried her face in her hands, letting out an unseemly sound.
“Well,” Abelard actually stared off into the distance as though he either didn’t know the answer, or had no idea how to explain it to a child. “There are none to speak of. Only through the known parentage only marriage can provide will it be ensured children will have the best possible inheritance in terms of power and Affinities—if any at all. Any who carry a child that would belong to no proper home have to either… not, or be cast to the sea. So people simply do not have any.”
Malwine wished she had a drink to spit out, given how her immediate reaction was to sputter. “What…” she struggled to choose how to curse, before coming to her senses slightly—she probably shouldn’t. “What?!”
At least Thekla was not far behind her. “Seriously? What sort of barbaric trench is Lizaną? Everything you tell me makes it sound worse and worse.”
“Let us say I do not plan on ever returning, and leave it at that.”
The two exchanged the type of glances people who regretted a conversation did.
But the more she thought about it, the more Malwine figured what Abelard claimed was probably unenforceable, at least on a wide scale. There were probably layers to society over there, and she didn’t believe for a second that illegitimate children could outright not exist. Either he was sharing—or had been taught—a simplified version, or he was going out of his way to leave much context out of it. Probably the latter.
Regardless, Lizaną had just been added to her list of places to never visit—or to only visit once capable of wiping the floor with anyone who could get in her way.
It was in moments like these that the widow’s ego sort of showed itself—Malwine found she shared her first life’s near-incapacity to view something as impossible. With time limits removed—or at least dampened somewhat—she struggled to not see everything as just a matter of time.
Even power.
Sighing, Malwine decided the time had come for her to sink back into herself. A part of her was slightly annoyed at missing out on the main celebration, but ‘it’s for grown-ups’ wasn’t something she could argue against without bringing trouble for herself.
Nevermind that Matilda isn’t even a grown-up… Oh, Malwine could understand the concept of it being a milestone, a formative moment, but a coming-of-age type of thing? Absolutely not.
To her, Matilda was like seven-and-a-half at most. For all Malwine had mostly gotten used to her new world’s years, the fact that it meant everyone was actually younger than the numbers sounded never left her mind.
Malwine herself should have been the least convincing two-to-three-year-old in existence, but she knew how willful ignorance could go. You were more prone to ignoring problematic behavior within your family because, well, it was your family.
She gave Thekla and Abelard another glance, torn between going right back to annoying them with questions—like when were they getting married?—and just checking back up on her progress.
Her splinters of common decency eventually won out.
Your [Multitasking] Skill has improved! 1 → 5
Your [The Plurilingual Psyche] Skill has improved! 26 → 28
Malwine smiled. The manuscript hadn’t been particularly long, and she knew she’d never be able to use what she learned for anything practical, but she’d gotten what she wanted.
You have reached Level 57!
Since she started to spend more time outside, she found some of her attributes increased—very, very slightly—on their own. It had taken her a bit to notice, seeing as she no longer got notifications for it.
[Integrity]
985 / 1017
[Toll]
0 / 4661
Strength
5001 (-99%)
Speed
2338 (-99%)
Endurance
5565 (-99%)
Dexterity
2316 (-99%)
Stamina
5473 (-99%)
Resilience
2313 (-99%)
Perception
4626 (-99%)
Charisma
2314 (-99%)
Adaptability
4628 (-99%)
Luck
2315 (-99%)
Circulation
4628 (-99%)
Presence
2313 (-99%)
Unassigned: 500
...
[Integrity]
985 / 1017
[Toll]
0 / 79
Strength
50
Speed
23
Endurance
55
Dexterity
23
Stamina
54
Resilience
23
Perception
46
Charisma
23
Adaptability
46
Luck
23
Circulation
46
Presence
23
Unassigned: 500
With both her
In the end, Malwine chose to let them sit there—she’d done so before.
[Multitasking] was far stronger than she’d have expected a ‘mere’ Rare Skill to be. Since she personally found mentally flipping through pages in search of something interesting to be a mundane, repetitive task, the Skill applied to it. Granted, the information she got was limited in turn—she could tell the past dozen books had been useless to her, and fiction, but had learned nothing about the plot and the like—but it was more than good enough.
Idling glancing at her still-open attributes panel, Malwine thought of her first moments in this world.
It’s funny how… my
And for a moment, I thought 1k on one was a lot.
Malwine shook her head—today would be a day for Skills.
Part of her did feel like she was being kind of an ass. This was Matilda's day, and wherever Bernie was setting up all those ‘skill books’, it was all for Matilda's sake.
But could she really afford to hold herself back? It was one thing to be trying to justify herself because she would have gone through with this anyway, and another thing to just… be right?
What else was she to do? While she had advantages, all of them paled in comparison to her disadvantages.
Not to mention, using [Remote Reading] on Matilda's skill books would no doubt be a victimless act—her little half-aunt would lose nothing.
Enough with the self-doubt.
Her course of action was clear enough for her, at least the beginning of it. Her priority would be to find 2 Skills she could work with. She wished she'd asked Alaric if the balance between the rarities of Skills was determined by category, or universally. She suspected it was the latter, but a part of her still wanted to hope she could aim higher with her Skills. The category was now the last for which she only had her two initial Skills.
Beyond that, she'd go for a fourth
Malwine hadn't thought that far ahead, really. Her luck with books hadn't been the best—would her luck with Skills really be any better?
And the highest I’d go would be if I can get to 5 total Skills in each… probably…
Oh—as Alaric might say—Malwine was certainly dreaming big with this.
Still, the skill books were meant for a nine-year-old—they were unlikely to be treasure trove of information. Hopefully, they would at least have Uncommon Skills.
Thinking on it even more—and still not acting—Malwine retracted her earlier idea. She’d probably only go for 4 on each. That way, she could still tell herself she stood a chance at getting her remaining three slots on each category full of Epics.
Malwine steeled herself—it would undoubtedly take her quite the while to land on the books from this distance, so she might as well start already. Gingerly, she tried to fire off a second go of it with [Multitasking] and found it did indeed work, so long as she used it to search from a different direction. Outright trying to repeat the same action would not be allowed by the Skill.
Invitations apparently counted as ‘eligible text’, delaying her efforts considerably, so she was glad for her newest Skill’s contribution.
She grinned, skipping the preface and anything she found irrelevant.
Attaining your first Skill is something to be proud of—cherish the moment.
Though it may be tempting to seek to craft your own Skills from nothing, the results of this will be flawed. You need to have a solid idea of exactly what you want as well as enough knowledge and intent to back it up.
The first is the easiest, for all create it accidentally, but the more Skills you have, the more unstable custom Skills grow.
Malwine frowned. She disagreed—in fact, she'd dare say she loved making Skills up. Sure, [Write Anywhere] had been a boon, but most of her Skills had been ‘custom’.
Do the system-made ones count? I mean, they’re already unranked and stuff.
It is widely recommended that you fill your Early Esse Skill slots with Common Skills so that you may level them quickly. Remember your Lifetime Skill Levels will be what determines how many attributes you are rewarded with. At this point in your life, you've only ever seen how a level can get you 10 attribute points, but getting to 100 Lifetime Skill Levels will make you start receiving 25 attribute points per level instead.
She felt something akin to secondhand terror—there were people out here getting 10 attribute points per level? Malwine thought of Adelheid—of Matilda, even—and had her heart go out for them.
That didn’t last long, as she found herself glaring in the direction of the next paragraph that manifested in her mind.
After 250 Lifetime Skill Levels, you will get 50 attribute points per level. This trend continues until you will find yourself gaining a full thousand per level after 1750 Lifetime Skill Levels. Nevertheless, do not get ahead of yourself—it takes everyone years to get to that point! Most adults you know are likely to still be in the 250, or 500, attributes per level phase. That's why focusing on easy-to-level Skills is so beneficial!
Not believing that for a second. Sure, it would make sense for lower-rarity Skills to be easier to level, but how could sacrificing potential by only going for weaker Skills be worth it? In her case, she wouldn't even be able to choose Commons.
Malwine brought up her status panel—she didn’t like looking at it, not really. Being perpetually bottlenecked stung.
Name: Malwine Rīsanin ⊛
Kind: Human
Inherent Aptitude: The Weight of Legacy | Inherent Flaw: The Fog of Lore
Age: 33 months (+1297)
Final Stage of the Early Esse | Level 57 (10+47+0*)
Lifetime Skill levels: 485 (+1253) (S)
Shit. I’m close.
Double attribute points per level would be huge… Far beyond her wildest expectations for the moment. Just a dozen levels or so could let her push all her attribute points over the 4k mark. So long as she remained cursed, she’d never know the true potential of that, but it thrilled her.
But wow. People start at 10 attribute points.
For her, that sealed it. She’d been wondering whether her attributes were anywhere near the norm, and now she finally had an answer—they were not.
Matilda was Level 11, presumably just from being at the start of the Mortal Esse. That meant her little half-aunt—who was closer to thrice Malwine’s age than twice it—might actually just have 110 attributes… in total?
That sounded terrifying.
Of course it made sense for children to be on the weaker side, and it would no doubt change now that Matilda could get Skills properly, but…
Wait a minute.
Didn’t Adelheid say she had several attributes past 10? And that had been back when she’d been Level 5—Adelheid was Level 9 now. She had to have more than 90 attribute points in total, even before accounting for whatever the girl kept referencing about her Presence.
What was so different between them? Malwine doubted mere talent could justify such a gap. Unless it was Affinities? But Malwine didn’t recall any particular advantages coming from hers, beyond the forging of her one Class and the Skill it brought. That should have no effect in Classless children.
Did Adelheid have Skills already?
Malwine thought back to her littlest half-aunt, almost hurt—could she have lied? But it would make sense. Adelheid was fond of remaining in the background. Even attention from her own mother seemed to annoy her at times. If she somehow knew creating a Skill would draw attention to her, would she go out of her way to keep it secret?
That was something she’d have to discuss with Adelheid. Someday.
Pushing that to the back of her mind, Malwine turned back to that which [Remote Reading] got for her, and her grin returned.
A page that seemed to speak of what had to be nearly a dozen Skills greeted her.