Singer Sailor Merchant Mage

Chapter 8: Home is where the heart lies

Chapter 8: Home is where the heart lies

Approximately 10 cm meters above my head is where my mother's heart is and hence my home.

A mobile home to be sure but one I can't escape from.

Still here, obviously!

Think I'm having a bad day.

Fallen off the wagon, daily routine wise. Everything . . . is . . . just . . . taking . . . so . . . long . . . . to . . . level . . . up now!

The level 7 to level 8 is taking 64 hours for each skill. Now that might not seem too long. Less than 3 days really but break it down into 8 hour working days and it suddenly shoots up to 8 days.

Further hamper yourself with a baby brain and although I know I will get there eventually it is becoming impossible to work out when. Plus you can't level all the different skills at the same time although there is some overlap.

I’m not going anywhere, yet still moving back and forward somewhere, somewhen, somehow.

I think if I remember correctly babies can be born from around 20 weeks. That’s about five months. So assuming that is my start point for sufficient brain development is to be able to host consciousness, although I’ve no idea at what point of consciousness can be hosted, that means I that means I could possibly have another approximately 60 days, 8 and half weeks or 2 months in the womb still to go.

So this could be my last month and then again I don’t really know how long gestation is. Am I even human? What if I’m an elf or a dwarf? I can’t really tell like I said to myself earlier. Other than the fact that I have two hands ten fingers and maybe ten toes I don't know if I'm green, blue, pink or black.

Think positive, think positive, think positive.

Well postives are the improvements I've made with Mana Sense and echolocation. Combining the two skills I’ve now managed to get a better idea of peoples faces out there. They have progressed past simply being other blobs of sounds or mana. I can now recognise my mother and father. Father appears to be a bigger humanoid than mother and I’m fairly sure I have a sibling because they’re often here in the house and they are smaller than my mother.

Then there is one more male adult who is smaller than father so possibly a grandfather and what appear to be another pair of grandparents who visit regularly to the box that is my world outside the womb.

Anyway I’m definitely getting bigger and it's definitely getting a little bit more cramped in here.

Still comfortable, warm and content?

Not sure if that's true.

I still haven’t added any points to my stats and not because I don't want to now.

I tried to add just a single extra point to each stat to see what would happen. To see if I could notice a difference. I felt that I had grown enough that it would only be a 10 - 20 % increase and therefore manageable or at least not a harmful increase to either myself or my mother.

But I now know I can't because when I tried I recieved the following message saying.

Status locked for 160 months

Guessing this is some way to stop children or even babies allocating their status points away.

Which is a shame as I was kind of looking forward to being a superbaby.

Thinking about it by the time 160 months pass and the gestation period is over, however long that may be, won't every other child have caught up anyway. As level 12 of a skill is going to take a year and a half to reach. Which would give people enough time to get from level 1 to level 11 because of the doubling of time required.

Will there be much of a difference between a level 11 and a level 12. That's not taking into account that the experience gained for each level doesn't seem to change but the experience required for overall leveling up is also increasing exponentially. It's literally infinity squared.

Feeling a little burned out to be honest. It was fun whilst I was making progress that I could see and seemed tangible but as the gains get smaller and smaller and the costs get bigger and bigger. I find myself stalling.

How can I prepare for something when I have no idea what to expect.

I've memorised all the songs my mother sings to me.

I have a rough idea of where I am.

Anything else is pure speculation. Can I be a ranger, a warrior, a wizard, singer, merchant mage. Am I going to be a serf, peasant, lord or lady? A farmer or a mechanic?

Surprisingly, in the end, the last month was enough to get my skills an extra level. But it took nearly 16 days to get level 8 of time sense. Not a whole month but no man, I mean no baby can keep doing the same thing hour after hour for a month.

Time to take a break, time to have a daydream.

I have a new hobby world building.

The definition on my echolocation / mana sense is improving but still blurry. So yes, I’m building a world in my mind, I can imagine it in greater detail than I can see, well it is more of a room at the moment than a world. I use the Stat screen to form one wall of my mind hut, before building the other four walls off from it.

On the left wall I have a self portrait of who I was and on the right wall I have a portrait of who I will be on the right.

On the left a renaissance self portrait with items of my old life spread around me. In the portrait there is a table with various books on top, a computer, an easel with art work half completed, various other items in the background.

On the right wall I just have an embryo picture surrounded by darkness because at the moment I have absolutely no idea what I will be or what I will look like.

Thinking of this room as the core of who I was, am and will be.

I have a compass rose on the floor and the night sky constellations on the ceiling.

Going to add another room next door for my mediation. Thinking of making it a Japanese room with Tatami mats for my mediation.

But I'm tired and it's time for sleep.

Level: 5 Experience: 3300/6400 Age: 84 days

Health: 100/100 Stamina: 73/73 Mana: 120/120

Vitality: 10

Endurance: 6

Strength: 6

Dexterity: 6

Senses: 20

Mind: 65

Clarity: 12

Magic: 12

Free Points: 50

Skills: Time sense (LV 8) Listening (LV 7) Meditation (LV 7) Sense Mana (LV 7) Swimming (LV 4) Eavesdrop (LV 7) Memorisation (LV 7) Echolocation (LV 7)

Is home where the heart lies or rather where the mind rests?