Min-Maxing My TRPG Build in Another World - Volume 1 - Chapter 5

Autumn of the Eighth Year

Fumble

The pinnacle of bad luck. As the counterpoint to critical hits, fumbles usually result in failure no matter how the math turns out.

Attacks will whiff; if you were to walk down the street, you’d fall into a manhole; attempting to read a book would only result in your brain exploding and dripping out of your nose.

Fumbles are represented by snake eyes when rolling 2D6, 95~100 for 1D100, and a 1 when rolling 1D20.

Some games include a dread-inducing “fumbles chart,” which is a collection of misfortunes like self-inflicted damage. In severe rulesets, the fumbles chart can cause relationships between the player characters to change. The GM can find themselves in quite a bind when one of the PCs is suddenly revealed to be evil like some sort of Saturday morning cartoon supervillain.

However, once in a blue moon, these sorts of fumbles will be a critical hit to the story and become an immortal bit of lore amongst friends.

A certain sickening Virgo and Flag pilot once called himself an “impatient man”; much as I resented the comparison, I was now left wondering if my own early autumn birthday was the reason for my lack of restraint.

After celebrating my eighth birthday (surprisingly, Rhine operated on a twelve-month solar calendar—meaning that this planet was roughly of the same scale as Earth), I took a moment to look through my stats page. The undeniable proof of my incurable habits filled me with a sense of dread.

Look, when I take the time to sort through newly unlocked skills and I find a long-term generalist skill—for pennies, no less—I can’t help myself. You understand, don’t you? You might rack your brain over a big purchase, but a quick, “Why not?” is all the resistance you can muster for a single paperback. And at the end of the month, it culminates in a credit card invoice that makes expletives leak from your mouth.

Anyway, the final result was that I’d dipped into my savings a few times in the past year to grab a handful of traits in the Body category. Feline Physique granted me significant flexibility. It made me less prone to injuries, improved my breakfalling, helped me resist grapple attacks, and gave me a bonus to acrobatics. It even came with a correction bonus when falling from heights. Flexible Skeleton empowered my bones and would let me avoid breaking them once I grew up. Cat Eyes allowed me to see clearly at night. The night vision was clear enough to read a book under the dim light of the stars. Steel Stomach was a trait that strengthened my immune system by allowing me to resist both food poisoning and some real poisons.

All of these were vitally important: after all, I didn’t want to die an embarrassing death by falling down the stairs or something. With that in mind, I felt like this lineup was perfect for maintaining a healthy everyday life. That is, so long as I ignored the circumstances in which I purchased each trait.

I had picked up Feline Physique and Flexible Skeleton to keep up with Margit and the other kids as our games grew more and more intense. Whether we were playing foxes-and-geese or roughhousing, rural children were unbelievably rowdy. The only reason I had Cat Eyes was because I’d been frustrated at how difficult my side job was at night, and Steel Stomach had been a panic purchase when I bit into a peculiar-tasting fig.

It was remarkable how little thought I’d put into this short selection of traits. Restraint was clearly not a word present in my dictionary. Still, I’d managed to draw the line somewhere, having yet to allow myself to touch the higher-level job skills.

Besides, my choices hadn’t been totally unreasonable. This was well within the scope of my initial plans. Probably. A sturdy body was evergreen, and my night vision would never—almost never—be a hindrance in an era without streetlights. I just needed to ignore the time when I caught a glimpse of my parents partaking in a friendly bout of exercise.

In truth, my original strategy of raising my basic stats was coming along swimmingly, so my detours had little to no long-term repercussions. When I fully matured, I was slated to grow to around 180 cm tall, and my muscle structure was to tighten up as opposed to swell out.

I had also had the passing thought that it would be nice to take after my mother and be a bit of a pretty boy with slender contours, but unfortunately the Beauty category was sealed away with the rest of the birthright traits. I’d mused that it was likely locked to prevent me from achieving a face so handsome that it instantly blinded anyone who gazed upon me. Feeling persistent, I had acquired Mother’s Son and Soothing Visage as a bit of a jab at the system, leaving me both excited for how I would turn out in the future and also a bit worried that I’d taken it too far...

Despite all of my spending, my lowest base stat was Strength at IV: Average, which put me ahead of schedule. My tentative goal was to have all of my stats at V: Good by the time I was ten years old, but it looked like I was going to complete my task a year early.

Speaking of base stats, I had recently found out that the amount of experience points earned correlated directly with Intelligence and Memory. I’d stumbled upon this incremental increase when I happened to level the two of them together one day. This interaction hadn’t been mentioned anywhere, so it was a hidden modifier that probably justified itself by asserting that smarter people learned faster. These sorts of things were fairly common in old video games: a certain postapocalyptic game about roaming the American nuclear wasteland employed the same tactic with its INT stat. It was all a part of the system.

This explained why Intelligence and Memory had been a bit pricier to level. If I had known that I could get anywhere close to earning back the experience I committed to these stats, I would have gone all in on them long ago.

As I sat in my regular spot lamenting my loose purse and rejoicing over my progress, a sudden chill ran down my neck. My Presence Detection skill alerted me to a third party. I hadn’t heard any footsteps or breathing, so it couldn’t have been my family; what was more, the presence was on the roof. Without sparing a moment for thought, I leapt forward. I could hear the faint sound of someone landing on the pile of firewood I’d just abandoned.

“What a shame,” Margit said with a click of her tongue. I turned to see she was disappointed that she’d failed to catch her prey.

Margit had grown ever so slightly since last year, but it remained difficult to believe that she was two years my senior. Her skill as a hunter, on the other hand, was sharper than ever. I had sunk a ton of resources into getting Presence Detection up to V: Adept, but she had slipped through my radar with ease.

“Can’t you come over normally?” I asked.

“That won’t do,” she announced in the palatial tongue. Then, with a pout, she added, “How am I meant to enjoy something so dull?”

Hmm... She definitely knows how cute that pout is. I didn’t have any complaints about her deliberate use of her charms since, well, she was cute. But that didn’t stop me from being ashamed of myself for biting my tongue and forgoing my comeback. I swear that younger girls were never in my strike zone...

Margit took a step to the side and patted my usual seat, beckoning me back. Despite her childlike appearance, her mannerisms in situations like these were curiously alluring. I obediently sat down, only for her to hop up onto my lap as if it were a matter of course—facing me. Our seating arrangement was a...lotus position, of sorts.

But being the innocent child that I most definitely was, I lacked any of the typical fantasies one might have. I could tell that trying to remedy the situation would only backfire and cause her advances to worsen tenfold, so I made the prudent decision to ignore it.

I didn’t know this at the time, but arachne are a matriarchal species, and like other species where the females overpower the males, their sense of virtue and sexuality is the reverse of mensch. As an aside, they also have a strange custom of refusing to cohabitate with their partner if they’re both arachne.

“So, what did you need?” I asked.

“Hm? I simply wished to see your face.” When paired with her bewitching smile, Margit’s statement overflowed with hidden meaning. The way she tilted her head struck a chord in my heart in spite of my many years of experience as a man. I was glad she was only a kid; I would have been in serious trouble otherwise... Wait, aren’t I in serious trouble now?

“What’s that supposed to mean...?” I asked.

“I finally finished accompanying my family with their work for the day,” she said, shifting the conversation. “And you...?”

“I’m gonna be busy soon.” I set aside the mysterious tinge of sadness I felt and turned my mind to the fact that my birthday had come and gone. That meant that the harvest season was nearly upon us.

Reaping, threshing, and shipping left little time for leisure, and even after that there was a whole host of odd jobs to be done. I couldn’t even count how many things needed to be packed up before the first winter snow. Knowing that my work was linked with my family’s success, even a cheapskate like me was willing to invest a lot of experience to raise my proficiency with farmwork.

With six workers in the family, a horse, and help from our family and friends, we were barely able to struggle through all of our fieldwork, only to then lend a hand to those who’d helped us. To top it all off, we had to go through the paperwork of selling our crops to pay our liquid taxes while maintaining enough stock to pay our crop taxes. The crashing wave of busyness felt like the freedom of summertime was being paid back with interest.

My Endurance and Stamina were at VI: Superb, but the season still managed to reduce my small body to a creaking hull. Thinking about it left a pit in my stomach, but I couldn’t complain; after all, our household was lucky enough to have a horse and four sons.

“I see,” the little arachne said. “Indeed, we will grow busier soon as well.” She giggled, but I knew huntsmen had a lot to do during the fall and winter. Margit had been handed her very own bow this year and had excitedly told me about how her parents took her on hunting trips to learn the basics. “I suppose we’ll need to have our fill of fun while we still can.”

“Just the two of us?” I pondered aloud. As soon as I asked, Margit put on a face like she was going to cry. What lively expressions you have!

“Is that a no?” she whispered into my ear. Her voice was a feather tracing my spine, sending shivers in every direction. It crawled into my ear and gave my brain a pleasant tickle.

I know you’re a girl and all, but you should not be this good at flirting, young lady! Or are all arachne like this? As it stands with most gentlemen of the world, I had a soft spot for charming women, and all I could do was shake my head from side to side.

I didn’t consider myself to be dense, per se, but I only now began questioning whether or not I’d set up some kind of relationship flag here. When, where, and how in the world did I stumble into this plot point? I wouldn’t call it unpleasant, but a man whose mental age was pushing forty and an arachne just hitting double digits was quite the questionable pairing. What kind of freak is running this game?

I desperately wanted to avoid making the situation any more complicated than it already was, so I tried to derail the conversation. Even if I wasn’t displeased with her affection, I was still technically eight. I had to protect my modesty.

“Okay, then tell me what you learned at school,” I suggested.

“You want me to teach you?” she asked. Her teary eyes vanished into thin air and she tilted her head to the opposite side from before. So cute.

“Yeah. Everyone says it’s boring, but I wanna know what you do there.”

I had initially hoped to have my brother teach me, but the only thing I could get out of him were complaints. My father was strict enough to cram his brain with the palatial tongue and written word, but history, poetry, and mathematics were all hopeless endeavors for him. I was sure he’d forget everything he’d learned by the time school resumed in the winter.

“Let me see,” Margit mused. “We learned how to speak the palatial dialect, as well as how to read and write... And there was also a simple course on law. Other than that, most of our time was spent learning history and writing poems.”

On the other hand, Margit was an exemplary student, as evidenced by her fluent speech. Her parents and teachers had obviously urged her to use the higher dialect in everyday conversation so that she wouldn’t forget what she’d learned. The beautiful, melodic pronunciation of her words was a far cry from the childish vernacular my brothers and I spoke in. A single sentence was enough to hear the effort she’d put into her studies.

“That sounds fun!” I exclaimed. “Won’t you teach me?”

“Hm? I suppose I could.”

The palatial tongue was necessary for success in this world, as my father so sincerely explained to my thickheaded brother. Naturally, that made me want to learn it too, but my father was busy and my brother wasn’t exactly going to make for a great tutor.

This was the perfect chance for me to unlock the prerequisite conditions to learn the dialect. Magic wasn’t the only specialized field that I couldn’t break into via self-study; styles of swordplay, literary knowledge, legal affairs, and such were all off the table.

My best guess was that my TRPG-esque skill system wasn’t capable of forging knowledge for me if the concept I was working with was totally and absolutely unknown. The reason a certain class of sages could learn languages so easily had to have been because finding a teacher and reading books was too complicated to convey in-game. Otherwise, there was no way they could learn an entire language for the price of a measly 1,000 exp.

“Then how about we begin with your vocabulary?”

“Yay! Thanks Margit!” I cried out in the childish tone that I was finally going to be able to rid myself of. Up until now, I sounded like a toddler as soon as I opened my mouth, no matter how maturely I organized my thoughts. I was relieved to finally have a way to talk normally.

“Then let us start with this,” Margit said.

“Huh?” My brain froze as it tried to comprehend what she was doing. Her mouth was wide open and her tongue was hanging out, as if it were on display. On top of that, an inviting finger traced her tongue. “...Margit?”

Amidst my confusion, she playfully took my hand and smiled. “Enunciation is the life and blood of the imperial palace. The way your tongue has to move is entirely different from normal speech, you know? This is a method of teaching that my teacher taught me. You use your finger to learn the shape of a fluent speaker’s tongue and then place it back in your own mouth to mimic their movements. Of course, my teacher wouldn’t let me do such things,” she concluded with a giggle. Her smug grin sent me into panic, to which she asked, “What? Do you not want to?”

“Um, well,” I stammered, “It’s just...” It was embarrassing to even admit how embarrassing it was. I felt hot as my face turned red and the boiling awkwardness sent a sweat down my back. Is she doing this on purpose? Either way, this girl is way too provocative!

“Oh, would you prefer a different method?” Margit asked. “There is another means that my mother introduced me to...”

“Really?! What is it?!”

Margit’s giggling intensified and the corners of her mouth pulled into a wonderful, showy smirk. She leaned closer until our noses touched and our breaths intertwined. Her hazel eyes faintly glimmered and felt like they were going to stare a hole through my own until they reached the back of my mind. Is this how it feels to be eaten by a spider?

“According to my mother...it would be fastest to feel my tongue with yours. Wouldn’t you agree?”

“Wha?!” I squealed. Mrs. Margit’s Mom?! What the hell are you teaching your daughter?! She’s ten!

“But I suppose we should save that for when we’re adults. What say you we continue with the method for children?”

“I-I don’t think either of them are meant for—”

Right when I attempted to make my case, a wet sensation enveloped my finger.

[Tips] Being tutored can reward experience points or lower the threshold for skill acquisition. Sometimes, this can cause the skill or trait to change its effect.

As the chaos of autumn drew to a close, Johannes and Hanna found themselves distraught over another form of chaos. Their many responsibilities had prevented them from overseeing their eldest son Heinz’s studies, and he’d forgotten all of the material he’d learned in the summer.

After a few years of attending the magistrate’s school, it was tradition for students to thank the magistrate personally during the spring festivities. There, each and every one of them would recite a poem using the formal speech they learned during their studies. This ode to spring was famous as a gateway to success. The nobles of the land were known to allow children to further their studies if they showed promise from a young age. Some lucky souls could even secure a future as a bureaucrat if the magistrate was keen on their performance. Johannes and Hanna had no such ambitions. They loved their son, but their brains were not packed full of posies.

All they could ask was for Heinz to complete his recitation without drawing the ire of anyone in the crowd. And yet, their humble hopes turned to despair when they sat down to test their son after the fields had been emptied. It was dubious as to whether or not he would improve to a respectable level in a single winter.

As the couple trembled for reasons unrelated to the growing cold, their youngest son appeared before them one night with his head held high. He announced that he had immortalized his appreciation for them in the form of a poem. Apparently, the boy had learned the palatial tongue from a friend, and wanted to cheer his exhausted parents with a song. The couple were surprised and eagerly listened to their youngest’s performance.

While rough around the edges, the poem was well made. Some of the word choices were quite childish, but that only made it feel more genuine. There was nothing out of place with his prepubescent voice as it carefully articulated every word.

The poem was perfect. The pronunciation was perfect. The lyrics perfectly followed traditional form. And just as perfect was the boy’s usage of the feminine palatial tongue.

As the concert came to a close, the boy awaited his parents’ thoughts with a beaming smile. Neither Johannes nor Hanna could open their mouths. Over the following winter, the eldest son was joined by his confused younger brother as the couple began going over the basics of imperial speech.

[Tips] There are several subdialects within palatial speech. Some are divided by gender, while some others are reserved for people of differing social stature: high class nobles will speak differently from low class nobles.