Mrs Eceer seemed to be waiting for Ishita to respond, but she just stood there, mouth agape and staring at Mrs Eceer like she had two heads.

Tanya decided to ask for her. "How?"

"Sven noticed that it was in line with his Attributes lowering," Mrs Eceer said. "He said that when he lost points to resurrection, he needed to gain more than that back to return to normal."

Tanya pulled up Ishita's Attributes, looking at just the totals.

• • •

Attributes

Strength: 14

Dexterity: 8

Vitality: 37

Concentration: 10

Will: 26

• • •

Tanya didn't expect to remember exact figures, but she did. She still marvelled at her new Concentration. Will and Vitality were much higher, but Ishita's Dexerity had started on 16 and her Concentration on 18, meaning she was significantly behind where she started in both those areas.

It had gone down in both Dexterity and Concentration from helping Sebastian.

"So if Ishita train speed and thinking, then she get to be normal Ishita again?" Olena asked.

"To an extent, yes," Mrs Eceer replied.

Ishita's legs seemed to give out from under her. Both Tanya and Olena lurched forward to catch her, steadying her.

"It will take a lot of work, I would guess," Mrs Eceer said. "It's definitely not a quick fix. Sven said that it took him 2 points of strength to recover what he lost the first time he resurrected, which took 1 point, but after a particularly nasty fight where he lost 4 to Dexterity, it took him 12 points to lose the greyish skin and walk normally again."

Tanya could tell Mrs Eceer was trying to temper the news, but the news of difficulty hadn't seemed to affect Ishita at all.

Ishita laughed, planting her feet and pulling away from Tanya and Olena. "Dexterity. The greyness in my skin is Dexterity."

Mrs Eceer nodded. "He said it was related to ease of bloodflow."

Ishita touched her head. "And my hair falling out? My bones protruding?"

"I can only hypothesise, as Sven worked this out before it was as severe, but Concentration appears to be a background process as well as active memory and thought, meaning your body could be shutting down through how much it is reducing"

"An' the boniness is the simplest," Tanya added. "I'm guessin' it's Strength muscle wastage."

"All this sound like Vitality though?" Olena said.

"We don't know yet exactly what Vitality constitutes," Mrs Eceer said, "But I would be inclined to refer to it less as physical aliveness. I would call it The Holy Spirit. It seems that if it is high enough, Ishita can survive through a lot of her physical systems shutting down."

Tanya thought about it. "It's kinda like a soul, isn't it?"

"I must add that I'm sure it does have physical ramifications beyond magic," Mrs Eceer added hastily.

"Like feelin' less cold," Tanya said.

"Or make easy to keep going when tired or feel pain," Olena added.

Mrs Eceer nodded. "We just haven't studied this as extensively because it seems to be one of the first that grows in survivors, and is rarely sacrificed."

"How do I train my Attributes as efficiently as possible?" Ishita asked.

Tanya turned back to her, almost forgetting the initial conversation. At some point during their musings, Ishita had transformed. Her eyes were bright, knuckles clenched by her side, and the shocked expression had been replaced with excitement and determination.

Mrs Eceer smiled. "Well, there are three different approaches I've noticed, but they all return to the same concepts…"

As usual, Mrs Eceer knew things that Tanya didn't even know were worth knowing. The idea of categories requiring training in different areas was one she'd already considered, like Dexterity encompassing everything from fine motor skills to running. However, Mrs Eceer had already begun tracking these into subcategories and then sub-subcategories.

She told them that swimming was one of the best levellers at a low level because, for all but the most experienced swimmers, it could get Strength, Dexterity, Will and Concentration at the same time. Apparently, adding Will and Concentration to training was the easiest. Strength and Dexterity grew faster when aimed at separately. All it took to add in the more mental Attributes was making it something which required learning of form, or something that the person was naturally bad at—or even better—scared of.

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They slowly walked towards the tattoo parlour, sitting on the sofas and making cups of tea.

Then Mrs Eceer pivoted into a new topic entirely; different strategies for proportions of Attributes. Almost every combination had negatives at a high enough discrepancy. Some of those Tanya knew, like Concentration being too low making it impossible to realise they are overworking, or Vitality being so high that it could keep someone alive in a somewhat zombified state. Others, Tanya could guess, like too much Strength compared to Dexterity, slowing someone significantly, or the opposite, causing intense muscle fatigue. The third category was the most interesting. Will being too high compared to other Attributes could cause mania or even breaks in sanity. Tanya wondered if that had been happening to people like Ishita's husband. Will, Concentration, or Vitality being too low looked similar; someone doing nothing but stare into space.

"This is obviously all a massive simplification," Mrs Eceer said

"How did you even get this data?" Tanya asked.

"It isn't all conclusive. I only got information from 132 people," Mrs Eceer said, like that disregarded everything she'd previously said.

"132?!" Olena cried before Tanya could ask the same thing. "Where you meet 132 people?"

"A lot of them from the estate and networks branching out from there, so we can't be sure of any locational drift in data either."

Tanya couldn't get the thought of losing her mind or breaking her body with imbalances out of her head. "So what's the point where imbalances come up?" Tanya asked. "And have you found any perfect ratio?"

She pulled up her own, also focusing on just the total amounts in each pool.

• • •

Attributes

Strength: 21

Dexterity: 38

Vitality: 30

Concentration: 23

Will: 33

• • •

"Well, scientifically, having every number the same is optimal for human functioning. I've even heard rumour that it unlocks a good Achievement boon. However, that does massively limit most people's Class output. Even someone more like Ian, who doesn't rely as heavily on specific Attributes is still benefiting in some way by prioritising specific ones. In his case, Will and physical Attributes."

"So why are yours so far apart if close is the best method?" Tanya asked. Last she'd checked, Mrs Eceer's highest was Concentration at 45 and her lowest was Vitality at 12.

Mrs Eceer looked bashful. Tanya wasn't sure if it was because she was doing something stupid or because she was so smart it would make the rest of them feel bad "Because I found a way to optimise the double-edged sword of the imbalance."

Tanya furrowed her brow. "But wait, aren't there terrible side effects to Concentration being ridiculously high?"

"Yes. Loss of awareness of the world around you and full body shut down from overexertion on vital organs from the brain," Mrs Eceer said, without blinking.

"And you just…" Tanya waved her hand. "Fixed that?"

"Optimised through it," Mrs Eceer corrected.

Olena whistled. "She being cagey with capital C."

Mrs Eceer sighed. "Ishita is one example of unbalanced Attributes being in an undesirable space. However, if she continued onwards, expanding her Vitality upwards and letting her current ones stay the same... I don't know the specifics of them dropping through an Ability, so for simplicity's sake, they stay the same. Eventually, she would reach a point where her entire body shut down."

"So I'd be dead?" Ishita asked.

Mrs Eceer shook her head. "I don't think so. I'm not sure how much Vitality it would require, but eventually you'd truly be undead."

"Like a lich?" Tanya asked.

Mrs Eceer wrinkled her nose. "I assume that's some sort of gaming term?"

"Powerful spellcaster that becomes immortal using magic," Tanya said.

Mrs Eceer looked surprised. "Hm. That's not a bad comparison."

"Wait," Olena said. "Have you become this lich?"

Mrs Eceer laughed. "No. Concentration works differently."

"Go on?" Tanya pushed.

Mrs Eceer pursed her lips, as if physically chewing on the words she was going to say. "Concentration that high requires a large amount of calories to keep the body running."

"Like supercomputer?" Olena said.

"Yes. Some people, like this Sebastian Salvatore you told me about, likely use that method to keep their Concentration Attribute high. His main Attribute sounds like Will, but he must have the Concentration to match or he'd be even crazier than he is."

Tanya snorted.

Ishita furrowed her brow. "I haven't been making you extra portions?"

Mrs Eceer took in a breath and leaned forward slightly. "I'm aware of what my body's doing most of the time," she said evenly. "I can tell when my heartbeat changes, when my stomach starts processing something heavier, or when my breathing's off. If I focus, I can steady my pulse or warm my hands by adjusting circulation. It's not magic, it's just attention trained long enough that the parts of my brain handling those things don't run entirely on autopilot anymore."

"And this lets you eat less, how?" Tanya said, becoming impatient.

"Because I have made the process more efficient through finetuning it myself."

Ishita's mouth dropped open. "You are controlling all of your body systems manually?"

Tanya slammed her hands down on the table. "Fucking unbelievable. You know why humans are at the temperature they are? Because core temperature has to be exact—" The words built up in her head so much she struggled to expel them. "I—I— this is so fucking dangerous. You don't know what you're doing."

Mrs Eceer placed a hand on her shoulder. "Before, I'd agree with you. But making tweaks so small reduces a lot of the risk, and I've been reading extensively before changing anything."

Tanya didn't believe her.

"Tanya, I've gotten it wrong before." She let out a weak laugh; it warmed the terse atmosphere slightly. "I spent an entire week with hypoxia because I adjusted my breathing to be too low. It was uncomfortable, but the body is resilient. Vitality is very forgiving and more would make the whole process safer, so I'm working on that and my physical stats now to help it."

Tanya let out a breath and sat down again. "Okay."

After a pause, Ishita said, "So I should focus on bringing all of the Attributes affected beyond where they were, and I'll see progress as they do?"

"Yes." Mrs Eceer said. "I have a lot of information about grinding them fast. You should get a notebook."

"Eh, I out," Olena said. "I work on very big chestplate for Fifi. We want one of those fancy synergy things you have." She skipped out of the shop.

Mrs Eceer held up a finger for silence. Tanya could tell she was listening to something faraway.

They both paused.

"You can pick up on this from Ishita later," Mrs Eceer said to Tanya. "Amy and the others are about to come through the Wards, and she has some good news for you."

Tanya smiled. "Perfect. I have good news for her too."

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