Days as a Spiritual Mentor in American Comics

"I am a detective."

Darkness surrounded him as a slightly hoarse voice rose beside his ear, his enunciation was somewhat peculiar, carrying what sounded like a rural accent—or maybe it wasn't the English of this era.

"Three days ago, I set out from Sigeltek, and after two and a half days, I arrived at this small village called Faralines. In the town, people call this place 'the Lighthouse under the Heavy Snow.'"

"There's a Wandering in Faralines, and I'm here to investigate, but now... I'm about to die."

Suddenly, a bright light shone forth, causing Shiller a sharp pain in his eyes. The rapid change in light made everything indiscernible, shapeless forms all around.

After a while, he began to understand his current predicament.

He was in a dilapidated little wooden cabin.

The beams, the floor, the support columns were all made of pine—this place must be in a temperate or subarctic region. The carpet was woven from goat wool, the oil lamp hanging from a column used the most primitive animal oil, and there were various pieces of Beast skins on the adjacent wall.

A small village in the subarctic, living off hunting and animal husbandry—that was Shiller's immediate conclusion.

Shiller turned his head and saw the vast expanse of heavy snow outside the broken window.

"Hello, player. I am your guide for this game, and I will introduce you to the rules of this special Battleworld instance."

"Hello, Transcendent." Shiller addressed him by his name.

"Could you not call me out and just treat me as a normal AI, please? I promise I won't bother you for more than a minute."

"Okay."

"In short, this is a role-playing instance."

"Role-playing?"

"Yes, you are not yourself now; you are a clergy member from Sigeltek named Lodoff."

"I see, and this Lodoff must have a story too, right?"

"Yes, and that concerns the most basic rule of the game: you need to design an appropriate background story for your character."

"This sort of thing is suited for Greed to do."

"Coincidentally, he's here too."

Shiller frowned and confirmed, "Are you sure Greed and I are in the same instance?"

"Yes, in fact, he's right beside you now, but as the preparations are incomplete, you can't see him yet."

"What role does he play?"

"He'll tell you himself later."

"Can he lie to me about it?"

"He cannot; you must act your roles." The Transcendent stressed, "You cannot do anything that deviates from your character's traits; otherwise, you may fail the game."

Shiller sighed lightly and said, "Understood, please continue."

"Though it's role-playing, I will only provide your names and occupations. The background stories and abilities are for you to decide, as long as you don't exceed the settings of this world."

"You just mentioned 'clergy'."

"Yes."

A thought struck Shiller, and seizing the key point, he asked, "What types of clergy exist in this world?"

"That's astute of you," said the Transcendent. "If you had simply said you were a Father, I would have written it that way."

"So there are others?"

"Yes, there should have been a term in the opening speech that you might not have heard before."

"'Wandering'?"

"Yes, this is not an ordinary world. Countless peculiarities are hidden in dark corners, and they erupt periodically. The Church's clergy are almost the only ones capable of resolving these incidents."

"Is there combat personnel?"

"Yes, and there are different roles involved," the Transcendent explained. "You can choose identities like Father, nun, Prayer, Judge, Baptizer, Soul Calmer."

"Could you tell me about these occupations?"

"Not so fast, let me explain the basics first, then you decide," the Transcendent said. "This instance is unlike any before; everything depends on values."

"Values?"

"Correct. Everything here is quantified, including your abilities, others' abilities, monsters' abilities, etc. Whether your actions succeed depends on these values, not your own abilities."

"So what are my abilities?"

"You'll have a set of Basic Attributes based on your occupation, along with additional points to allocate as you see fit. Shortly, you'll have to distribute these points on your attributes to determine your final stats."

"Can these attributes influence my success in certain events?"

"Yes, there's another factor to consider: dice."

"Rolling dice?"

"Exactly, the most important prop in the game is a 20-sided dice, which, when combined with your Basic Attributes, will determine if you overcome certain challenges."

"Give me an example." Shiller requested.

"Let's say you want to pick a lock, and the attribute required for lockpicking is dexterity. Your dexterity value is 3 points, and the dice roll gives you 14 points. That means your final value is 17 points, and if the lock requires a value of 15 points to open, you'll be able to unlock it. Conversely, if your final value is less than 15 points, you can't open it."

"Some events may have special checks. If you roll the exact number needed by these events, like a 1 or a 20, it could result in a critical failure or a major success. For example, in a lockpicking event, a critical failure might mean the lock is jammed shut, while a major success could mean you can avoid some of the dangers behind the door."

Shiller understood and nodded, "Does every action require a dice roll?"

"No, only when you're investigating events or in combat do you need to use dice. Other times you can act on your own to collect clues. Whether or not you can decipher those clues also depends on your attribute values and dice results."

"So you're saying, if there's a psychology paper in front of me right now, and if I fail the dice check, I won't understand it?"

"Exactly, because you're playing a member of the clergy, not a psychiatrist."

"Can someone play as a psychiatrist?"

"In theory, yes, but unfortunately, you didn't draw that profession. And even if you had, there's no guarantee you could understand all psychological materials, even ones written by Shiller himself."

"I see. Is there someone among us who drew the psychiatrist profession?"

The Transcendent was silent for a moment before saying, "If you keep asking like this, I might start suspecting that you have the Mind Reading Technique."

"So, there really is one?"

The Transcendent didn't answer. Instead, he said, "Alright, there's another important attribute—mental health value."

"Mental health value?"

"Yes, the healthier your mind is, the higher the value. Conversely, the lower it gets."

"So it seems something can affect my mental health."

"Yes, the supernatural can affect your mental health. Not only touching and investigating the supernatural but merely facing it can decrease your mental health value."

"What happens if it drops to zero?"

"Death, which means your journey in the game is over."

"And what if it drops very low?"

"You'll go insane," the Transcendent said. "Madness will take control of your body and make you do unpredictable things."

"Can I still use my abilities then?"

"What do you mean?"

Shiller pointed to his temple and said, "Usually, the less healthy my mind is, the stronger my analytical abilities become."

"Uh... that sounds like a disease to me. That kind of illness is incurable."

Shiller felt slightly reassured.

"You need to understand that insane behavior is not under your control. So even if your mental state's unhealthiness gives you stronger analytical abilities, you can still experience madness. It's best to maintain your health."

Shiller nodded.

"Now, let me introduce you to some of the professions. Fathers and nuns can make others more trusting, Prayers can recover blood volume for themselves or others, Judges can inflict damage on attackable creatures, Baptizers can remove abnormal states, and Soul Calmers can improve their own and others' mental health values."

Shiller analyzed in his mind.

Fathers and nuns can make others more trusting, which means there are non-player characters present in this game, and those professions can obtain clues from them more easily.

That made sense; in a world with supernatural beings, clergy like Godfathers would naturally be trusted more by ordinary people.

There wasn't much to say about Prayers who restore blood volume; they're just healers in the game. Judges are able to attack, but it's stressed that they attack creatures that can be attacked, which means there must be things that cannot be attacked.

Removing abnormal states should be quite useful because their trouble now is with supernatural beings, not monsters. These beings will surely impose various negative conditions, and if they can't be removed in time, it could lead to a team wipeout.

Restoring mental health value also seems extremely important. Shiller wasn't sure if the game's mechanics allowed for a simple click of a skill icon to increase the value or if it required saying something, but he felt it would be best to choose this profession.

If restoring mental health value involves some operations, it's better to rely on oneself than to hope for other teammates to do it, especially since he's professional, and it's less likely for him to give anything away in the presence of outsiders.

"I choose Soul Calmer," Shiller said.

"All right, let's add your attribute points then. There are 10 attributes in total: Physical Strength, Body Type, Strength, Intelligence, dexterity, Appearance, inspiration, Will, education, and Luck. Do you need me to explain what each represents?"

"Since it's just about passing values, is that necessary?" Shiller asked.

"If you're not interested, let's drop it, but I must remind you, this isn't a tabletop game. You will actually feel the effects these values have on you."

"Give me another example."

"Well, if you only have 1 point in Physical Strength, you would be incredibly weak throughout the game, barely able to move. The pain of such weakness will accompany you throughout the game. If your Wisdom is too low, your thinking speed will be affected as well."

"Affect my thinking speed?" Shiller emphasized the word "my."

"Yes, even though it's role-playing, you are this character in the game. All the values you set are for yourself. If we can limit your physique, we can also limit your thinking speed."

"What about education? How is that limited?"

"You can't say anything that's not within your education level," the Transcendent explained. "Each education level has a certain range of vocabulary. If you set your education level too low and use high-level vocabulary, your speech will be muted."

"Alright, I understand," Shiller nodded, having a rough idea now.

Basically, he needed to sculpt a new body for himself again, only more strictly this time because there were point limits, not as free as he wanted to be before. Once the attribute points were set, the body would only follow these attributes for action, anything outside of that was not possible; these rules were rather strict.

"What are my starting points like?" Shiller inquired, not forgetting that the Transcendent had mentioned there would be a starting point based on the character's profession.

"Let me see for you... Physical Strength 3, Body Type 4, Strength 4, Intelligence 5, dexterity 5, Appearance 5, inspiration 7, Will 6, education 5, and Luck 3," the Transcendent listed.

Hearing it was a single-digit system, Shiller raised an eyebrow and asked, "Is this set of attributes good?"