7 Chapter Seven - Rebirth (1/2)

Waking up was a slow and painful process. The memories of my death were quite vivid, as the Curse wasn't going to pass up any method to try and suppress me, or purge my persona.

That was fine. I expected I came back at midnight, my Renewal, the point in time when my soul was strongest.

I grit my teeth at the very vivid memory of getting my head torn off, and slowly stood up from where I was sprawled on the ground.

Same basic shirt and pants outfit as last time.

But there was a difference. I had just fought above my weight, killed three creatures that would have killed me in a straight-up fight, and so I had reaped me some Karma.

”Fuck you, you damn Curse.”

I was back in the misty circle, my 'cage'.

I pushed a mental trigger for Melee/3. More MAB, Techniques, Feats-

Nothing happened. Hah?

I was sure that had gained me enough Karma. Getting to Three was supposed to be the easiest to do, especially as a no-magic Melee, where it was basically learn really fast, or die…

Nada. I stood up, took a deep breath, and considered my alternatives.

What could I do with my Karma? Refine more Health and Soak? No, I had to ”die” twice, getting wiped down to nothing and living, to spend that Karma. This being reborn shtick was going to really help me get to max Health and Soak, since I was going to die over and over again.

Grab another Feat, sans Class Levels? I'd done no training for it. Ditto a Skill point. Those were things you did after you maxed out…your…Levels…

Multi-classing?

I spun around in my head. I was building on Sama's achievements back in the game. Logically, that meant I was walking on Sama's road, which included a lot of multi-classing.

However, I hadn't taken any cross-Classes until Four, precisely because I wanted to be able to live through stuff, and had hurried and gotten beyond one-hit-noob-wonder stage.

That didn't mean I had to, or even could, progress on her road. Cross-classing followed strict rules.

One, no beginner bonuses. No weapon or armor profs, for instance, no bonus Spells Known if a Caster, or Techniques if a Chi-user.

You only got more Soak if the second Class had a higher HD then your original, and then just half the difference between them. So a d6 Caster would get +2 Soak if they took a Melee or Dragon Warrior cross-class level.

Exactly the Class's Skill Points, no Int bonus, and only from that Class's list… unless you had a Skill that was a Class skill for all classes, like a Human did.

If you gained any Feats or Stats by Level, they had to be focused and spent on that Class's primary pursuits. So, an Archer would have to spend the Stat point from Four on Dexterity, and any and all Feats from Archer Levels on Archery or subsidiary Skills that were directly relevant to it, such as Bowyer/Fletcher. In other words, you couldn't take off-class optional levels to gain stuff that was basically only good for your Primary Class.

After all, you were taking those Classes to broaden your abilities with their skills. Taking their benefits just to up your Primary Class abilities was nigh impossible from a logical mindset.

I'd had a lot of cross-Class levels in game, because that was how non-Powered diversified their skillset. We didn't get more spells or Techniques, we got more Skills, Feats, and Class abilities.

So… that wasn't a BAD thing. Did it mean I was going to be forced to pay for all those cross-classes before I could level my Primary Class of Melee?

That was definitely going to slow down my combat progress, as there wasn't going to be a lot of use for me in Artificer, Alchemist, Minstrel, or the like, as I had very little to work with here.