Defiance of the Fall

Chapter 24: Class

Zac was slowly moving through the forest. Since the demon blew himself up he had been stealthily roving around the vicinity of the camp. The illusion array blocked sound to a certain degree, but he was afraid that the explosion would have bled through the protection and alerted other demons.

However, he had been moving around the camp in expanding circles for two hours now, and had seen no sight of any more of the demons. While he had been scouting he’d also taken the time to properly bury the two other demons. It wasn’t to properly honor the dead, but rather to avoid the bodies getting discovered.

Finally satisfied that he had caught a lucky break and still wasn’t found out, he returned to the camp.

He spent some time cleaning up the camp. Some of the loot from the demons unfortunately been destroyed by the explosion. He hadn’t expected his captive to go nuclear as soon as he woke up, so Zac had simply thrown the gear down in a pile not far from him.

The bags seemed to have contained some vials which Zac supposed were either healing tinctures or poisons. The bags where still whole, but the vials hade cracked. Inside was a mess of the different mixtures glass shards, and Zac certainly didn’t want to rummage through it now.

The male’s leather armor was ruined, but the female demon’s suit underneath seemed intact. But most important was the weapon that Azzun had been carrying.

It was a one handed battle axe. It was much longer than his hatchet, reaching roughly 80cm. The head was single-headed, but with a sharp spike sticking out on the other side, perhaps for balance. The edge itself was a half-moon over 30 cm long. Zac tried the edge with his thumb, and was surprised to see that he immediately started bleeding.

It was hard for a normal kitchen knife to cut his skin now without some effort, which showed just how deadly his new weapon was.

The handle was black and it appeared that it had some fractals carved onto them. However these fractals somehow seemed far more rudimentary compared to the ones on the array flags. Finally a strip of some unknown beast hide had been used to create a handle.

This clearly was a weapon for war, rather than a tool as his hatchet. If he had this thing during his fight with the Herald he might even have been able to kill it off with the initial charge.

Zac tried using [Eye of Discernment]on the weapon as the axe seemed to be somewhat related to the system with the pattern on the handle. However, it gave no response. Either the skill couldnʼt show information about items, or items didnʼt work like that. He had a feeling it was a problem with the skill, as it was by far the cheapest skill that Nexus Coins could buy. It would be odd if it was too versatile.

Apart from this, he had scrounged up a hooked sword, a couple of knives and various bracers and shin guards. There might be something else in the bags, but he would wait until the mess dried out. He didnʼt really care for the sword and left it to the side, but was delighted with the small knives. They were small and straight with edges on both sides of the blade, giving them excellent balance. He felt they were used for throwing and battle rather than skinning animals and the like.

They would be a great addition to his arsenal, as he was sorely lacking any ranged attack. Every time he wanted to kill an imp he had to hurl his axe on it or a bunch of rocks. But this would be a deadly alternative which didnʼt force him to throw away his main weapon. He already practiced throwing rocks and the axe for some time every day, and swapping to daggers shouldnʼt be too large an adjustment.

After going through the gear he finally couldn’t wait any longer, and approached the Nexus Node. It was time for him to get a class, no matter if it was the right choice or not. He pressed his palm against the smooth surface of the crystal, and mentally tried to access the class system.

A new box appeared in his vision with multiple rows.

[Top 5 Class choices]

[Warrior – F Grade, Common. Fledgling combatant. Proficient with melee weaponry. Upgradeable.]

[Acolyte – F Grade, Common. Fledgling wielder of the elements. Initial proficiency with elemental magic. Upgradeable.]

[Marine – F Grade, Uncommon. Lowest Ranked naval combatant. Proficient with battles at sea. Upgradeable.]

[Demon Hunter – F Grade, Uncommon. Having dedicated his life for the eradication of the Demonic Race, the Demon Hunter has attained a high proficiency in locating and eradicating anything of demonic nature. Upgradeable.]

[Hatchetman – F Grade, Rare. Their army is an endless forest and I’m the lumberjack. Upgradeable.]

[Random F-Grade Class. 92.9% Common. 5.0% Uncommon. 2.0 % Rare. 0.1% Epic. Roll the dice.]

That was all the information Zac could get out of the system. He tried to get a more in depth explanation with mental commands such as “Details” and “Info”, but the short excerpt was all he could go on.

The first thing he noticed that classes did not seem equal. All five choices did have the same grade, F- Grade, so it seemed everyone started at the same grade. They did however have different rarities, ranging from common to rare in his case.

He did not know how large a difference there was between the rarities, but he could only assume that a higher rarity class would be stronger than a low rarity one.

The second thing he noticed that all the classes were upgradeable. That likely meant that he could get stronger classes in the future, but they would be based on the class he chose now. It might be secondary classes or it might be possible to change classes, but he had no information about this. He therefore had to make the choice under the assumption that his choice would influence his future trajectory to a large degree.

The third was that the available choices seemed to be at least partly based on his accomplishments.

The marine class was likely available because he was situated near an ocean. The Demon Hunter class came from killing demonic creatures non-stop since the System arrived.

He was not sure about the Hatchetman class, but he had used a lumberjack’s hatchet for almost all his kills, so he assumed it might be based on that. But it was a combat class going by the description, rather than a woodworking class.

The last choice was a gamble. Even an Epic class was available, albeit only at a 0.1% chance. His luck stat might influence those odds, but it was unclear how. If each luck point increased his chance to get the Epic class by 1 point he wouldn’t hesitate. He would roll the dice in a heartbeat. But he doubted it would be that easy, so he felt no need to use this option.

He already had a rare and two uncommon classes to choose from, so he had no reason to gamble. Besides, there might be classes that didn’t help him in combat. What if he got a Rare Painter class from gambling? While it might be nice learning a new skill, it would not help him on the island.

He would therefore definitely choose one of the available classes.

First he eliminated Warrior. It seemed quite basic, and it felt like most other choices were better. Next he eliminated both Marine and Demon Hunter. He didn’t like the prospect of limited boosts. He had no aspirations to live out the rest of the life on the high seas, so a water-centric class did not make sense to him.

He also didn’t want to spend his life hunting demons. The Demon Hunter class might very well be the strongest class for him right now, as there still were demons infesting the whole island. However, either he or the demons would be gone in two months, so it didn’t make sense to pick this class either.

Abby had told him that the Multi-verse consisted of myriad classes. This meant that it wasnʼt like hellʼs gates had opened and the universe was being invaded by demons. They were just one of many potential enemies in the vast multi-verse. So even if he survived, he did not know if there were any other demons on Earth apart from in this particular incursion. Wouldn’t that mean he essentially crippled himself by choosing a class that could only help him for the firstfew months?

Finally, it was an uncommon class. While it was better compared to the warrior and acolyte class, it was worse than the Rare class.

That left Acolyte and Hatchetman. Truth be told, he felt that Acolyte was the most intriguing. He did like the prospect of mastering the elements and firing fireballs and lightning bolts at his surroundings.

However, he felt there were drawbacks as well. For one he had no idea if he actually was able to learn spells just from getting the class. What if the basic spells normally were something you got in thetutorial? Also, he had invested most of his stats so far into physical attributes, which might be wasted on this class.

The only reason he could imagine he got this kind of class to choose was that he had gotten quite a bit of intelligence and wisdom from his titles. But he almost drooled at the aspect of upgrading the class until he became a grand magus, who could burn the sky with a sweep of his hand.

But most importantly it was only a common class. It felt like it was something that almost anyone could get in the future. Getting a common class when he had rare classes to choose from felt like wasting the advantage that his past month had provided him.

The system rewarded the brave and intrepid. The rare class seemed to be the rewards for risking his life every day against the demons.

Of course, Hatchetman sounded a bit stupid, to be honest. The connotation of the word from his professional career was anything but positive, but he felt that it had a somewhat different meaning here.

It seemed that it somehow referred to being a warrior lumberjack from the description. While not exciting, it did, however, check out a few of his boxes. The class probably would be very beneficial if he used his newly acquired axe in battle.

Out of all the choices, it also seemed to be the most tailored for his battle style. It also was the only Rare choice. He did not know how much better each rarity was compared to the one before, but perhaps the difference would be even greater compared to the conditional boost the Demon Hunter class would give against his current enemies.

The drawback was that he couldn’t quite imagine what the upgrade path would be. Next upgrade was a… stronger lumberjack? A walking sawmill? A corporate shark doing hostile takeovers and selling companies for scraps?

So one of the choices seemed to be able to help him less now. But it might end up with him becoming a great wizard. He had always played mage classes when playing games, so this was quite enticing. It was however only a common class.

The other choice seemed to be more suited to his stats and direct power, but lead into an unknown future.

After a long hesitation he finally said good bye to the dream of arcane dominance, and chose the box marked [Hatchetman].