CHAPTER 14 — Analyze
The moon hung high over the clearing, its pale light turning the camp into a landscape of silver and soot. The air was cool and still, but Ray barely noticed the chill. He sat on a stump, a blanket draped over his shoulders and a broom leaning uselessly against his knee, vibrating with the kind of energy that usually preceded a level-up.
He had Analyze.
His vision still tingled from the digital afterimage of the system window. He grinned, the expression looking slightly manic in the flickering orange light of the firepit. This wasn't just a starter skill; it was the cornerstone of every legendary build he had ever read about.
Information was power, and Ray had just gained the ultimate cheat code.
Analyze—the god-tier utility skill, he thought, pressing his palms to his flushed cheeks. Weaknesses, stats, hidden patterns... I’m finally living it. This starts as a basic scan and evolves into a divine eye by the final arc.
He decided to run a diagnostic test. He focused his gaze on the iron pot sitting over the fire, where the servants were boiling water for tea.
The steam seemed to shimmer, and a translucent box anchored itself to the object:
━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━
ANALYZE—TARGET: Pot
━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━
Simple Pot
━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━
Ray bounced on his stump, nearly knocking over his broom. "It works! It actually works!"
Emboldened, he turned his gaze toward the most dangerous thing in the camp: Sera Lorne. She was currently gliding past the supply wagon, her jewelry chiming like a soft warning. He narrowed his eyes, focusing every ounce of his intent on the knight.
━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━
ANALYZE—TARGET: Sera Lorne
━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━
ERROR.
Power level exceeds threshold.
━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━
Ray deflated instantly, the digital box flickering and dying out before he could glean a single stat.
“…Right. I'm low level,” he muttered to himself.
He needed a more manageable target. Someone who didn't move like a blur of fire and gold. He looked over at the carriage, where the door was slightly ajar. Elaine was inside, likely reviewing her notes or organizing the "clinical" workspace Ray had stumbled into earlier.
She’s my fiancé. We’re in an alliance, Ray reasoned, his heart beginning to thud. It’s not snooping. It’s... tactical synchronization.
He took a deep breath and focused on the carriage door.
Still, even the failure message thrilled him. The skill existed. It was real. And at higher levels? He could already imagine the possibilities: weakness detection, enemy skill previews, pattern tracking, hidden object detection, and identifying boss mechanics before they killed him horribly.
Analyze was the skeletal framework of every meta build, the bread and butter of doomed geniuses, the secret sauce of protagonists who survive fights they shouldn’t.
His heart pounded. “I can’t believe it,” he whispered to himself. “I finally have a skill. My first step into actual progression. This is huge. Monumental. Historical. This will be in the textbooks of my life—”
“Ray,” Isolde called sharply, sweeping past with her arms full of medical supplies, “stop muttering to yourself like a forest hermit and help clean.”
He hugged the blanket tighter. “I’m conducting… research.”
Garret stomped nearby, dragging a beast corpse by the hind legs. “He’s useless. Throw him in with the trash.”
Ray jabbed a finger dramatically. “One day, I’ll Analyze your entire being!”
Garret blinked. “Analyze my what?”
Ray froze. “…Nothing. Ignore that.”
But the system did not ignore it.
Ping.
A glowing window snapped open, visible only to Ray, overlaying Garret’s muscular frame with a data-grid.
━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━
STATUS — TARGET ANALYZED
━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━
NAME: Garret Melborne
AGE: 20
LEVEL: 17
━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━
HP: 200/220
STM: 80/160
ATTRIBUTES
STR: 28
AGI: 22
VIT: 30
DEX: 22
INT: 15
WIS: 15
━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━
Ray paled. “This man is a miniboss.”
Garret stared at him. “What are you mumbling?”
“NOTHING!”
The system pinged again. Ray took five steps back automatically.
Garret frowned. “The hell are you doing?”
“Thermal—uh—threat management.”
Garret squinted. “What?”
Ray threw his hands up. “STOP ASKING QUESTIONS!”
Right then, Elaine walked by, elegant as always. “Honestly, Ray,” she said, “your verbal outbursts are getting stranger.”
Ray died inside. “Y-Yes… sorry…”
Sera added from behind her, “He sounds like he’s casting a spell wrong.”
Ray whimpered.
Elaine approached then, her travel coat brushed clean, her expression bright as frostbite. “Ray,” she said, “why are you sitting?”
He froze. Her eyes lowered slightly, assessing him—not his wounds, not his exhaustion—but something else. Something she intended to dissect later.
“I’m… philosophizing,” Ray said weakly.
Elaine stared. “…Stand up.”
He stood so fast his blanket flew off like a defeated flag. Analyze might help him survive the beasts, but it was clear it wouldn't save him from the social "boss fight" currently standing in front of him.
It would not save him from Elaine Avery. Not yet.
Elaine clapped her hands once, sharply, like an instructor ending a lesson. Heads turned. Servants froze mid-scrub. Even Garret stopped arguing with Isolde.
Elaine stood at the center of the camp, her posture iron-straight, her silver-blue eyes cool and deliberate. “There is a freshwater lake not far from here,” she announced. “I will be bathing.”
The words sent a physical ripple through both camps. Half the Melborne soldiers nearly choked on their rations. The Avery escorts, however, snapped into motion with the mechanical precision of a clockwork trap.
Within seconds, the escort captain barked, “Formation C! Secure the perimeter! No entry into the eastern woods!”
You might be reading a stolen copy. Visit Royal Road for the authentic version.
Avery knights fanned out, forming a wall of steel between the Melborne camp and the treeline. Shields locked with a heavy clack. Spears angled outward. The message was unmistakable: No Melborne would step foot into that forest until Elaine was finished.
Garret blinked at the wall of shields. “Is that… really necessary?”
Isolde pinched the bridge of her nose. “Considering the state of men in this world? Yes.”
Ray nearly swallowed his tongue.
Elaine didn’t break stride as she moved toward the forest path, unbothered by the stunned silence she left in her wake. Her travel coat shimmered as she stepped through a beam of sunlight. Behind her, Sera Lorne followed dutifully—bells chiming, jewelry sparkling, her expression a perfect, unreadable mask.
Ray watched them go. And then, a single suicidal thought drifted into his gamer-poisoned mind:
Lake event…? Like a heroine water scene—? This world has flags, what if—
He didn’t even finish the fantasy. Sera stopped walking.
Her head turned. Only slightly. But Ray felt the blood freeze in his veins. Her golden eyes locked onto him with surgical precision—the look of a master butcher who could bisect a thought for simply stepping out of line.
Ray snapped his gaze to the sky so fast he heard his neck pop. “S–SKY! Yes! I love… clouds!” he squeaked.
Garret stared at him as if he’d grown a second head. Isolde let out a long, deeply disappointed sigh.
Sera held Ray's eyes for one more deadly second, letting the silence do the talking. Then, she continued walking. Elaine disappeared into the forest path; Sera vanished behind her, the bells fading into an eerie silence.
Ray collapsed onto a log, his face burning hot enough to steam. “I’m dead,” he whispered. “I’m actually dead. That was my last life.”
Niva toddled over and patted his knee sympathetically.
Garret smirked. “What did you do?”
“NOTHING!” Ray hissed.
“Then fix your face,” Isolde muttered. “It betrayed you.”
Ray covered his face with both hands. Analyze couldn't save him from this. No skill could. Somewhere in the forest, Elaine Avery was probably already waist-deep in pristine water, studying the ripples as if she were dissecting the very concept of cleanliness…
Ray slapped his cheeks hard to shut his brain up.
Niva nudged him, holding a fistful of crushed wildflowers. “Ray! Look! I made a bouquet!”
Ray took the flowers with a smile, then he looked at Niva. An idea struck him. “Analyze.”
Ping.
━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━
STATUS — TARGET ANALYZED
━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━
NAME: Niva Melborne
AGE: 4
LEVEL: 1
━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━
HP: 20/20
STM: 15/15
ATTRIBUTES
STR: 2
AGI: 4
VIT: 4
DEX: 3
INT: 5
WIS: 1
━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━
Ray smiled down at her. “You’re… terrifyingly powerful.”
Niva beamed, her eyes sparkling. “Really?!”
Isolde appeared behind her, arms crossed and expression flat. “Don’t encourage her. She already believes she can duel Garret.”
Niva gasped, hopeful. “Can I?!”
“Absolutely not,” Isolde snapped.
Ray leaned in and whispered to himself, “Her Strength is only a 2. And that Wisdom stat…”
Isolde blinked, her sharp ears catching the tail end of his mumbling. “…Her what?”
Ray coughed, waving a hand dismissively. “Nothing! Nothing at all!”
Now, he thought, shifting his focus, let's see the Mage.
Ping.
━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━
STATUS — TARGET ANALYZED
━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━
NAME: Isolde Melborne
AGE: 18
LEVEL: 14
━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━
HP: 150/180
STM: 150/240
ATTRIBUTES
STR: 15
AGI: 20
VIT: 16
DEX: 14
INT: 25
WIS: 19
━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━
Isolde’s eye twitched. “Ray… what exactly are you looking at?”
Ray panicked. “Wh—what do you mean?”
“You're staring at me and muttering numbers. It’s unsettling.”
“I was… merely appreciating you!”
Isolde’s stare sharpened into something lethal. “Oh? Then appreciate this—stop looking at me like I’m a ledger.”
Niva tugged on Isolde’s sleeve, tilting her head. “What’s a ledger?”
“It’s what Ray is about to become if he keeps this up,” she muttered.
Ray gulped and went back to his soup. The camp had finally settled into a rare moment of calm. A pot of thick vegetable-and-meat soup simmered over the fire, filling the clearing with warm steam and the scent of roasted herbs. Soldiers finally relaxed their shoulders. Garret tore off chunks of bread like he was interrogating the loaf. Isolde sipped her soup carefully, pinkies raised as if high-society etiquette still mattered in a monster-infested forest. Niva hummed cheerfully, swinging her legs while blowing on her broth with exaggerated puffs.
Ray sat with them, bowl in hand, still buzzing with the menu-like glow of Analyze behind his eyelids.
This is incredible. I can see stats. Actual stats. I am officially a protagonist.
He couldn’t help but giggle to himself, kicking his feet in excitement.
Garret snapped at him, “Sit still, you creep, and eat your soup. You're embarrassing the Melborne name.”
Ray let the comment slide. He was too happy to care. He had the eyes of a god, a bowl of hot soup, and a one-way ticket to the Academy.
Ray lifted a spoonful—
Clap! Clap!
The sharp sound cut through the murmuring camp. Several heads snapped toward the forest path as Elaine Avery stepped back into the firelight. Steam still rose faintly from her hair. Her raven-black strands, usually pinned with clinical precision, now hung loose and glossy, catching the flames like spilled ink. Droplets traced down the dark lengths, glimmering in the firelight as if they carried pieces of the moon.
Her silver-blue travel coat was freshly brushed, the metallic embroidery shimmering with each controlled step. Her posture remained as sharp as a blade. When she lifted her face, her glacier-blue eyes reflected the fire in a way that made Ray’s spine twitch—bright, cold, and impossibly focused.
Fresh from the lake, her skin still chilled by mountain water, she looked less like an eleven-year-old girl and more like a winter spirit who had temporarily agreed to walk among mortals.
Behind her walked Sera Lorne—braids damp, jewelry chiming softly, her expression a dangerous, unreadable void.
Every Melborne soldier subtly sat straighter. Every Avery escort stepped closer. Elaine approached the fire, her voice as smooth as polished marble. “I trust the camp remained intact in my absence.”
Isolde coughed. Garret snorted. Niva waved enthusiastically. Ray nearly spilled his soup.
Sera moved behind Elaine like a shadow wrapped in ringing gold, and Ray—unable to resist the temptation—activated Analyze one more time.
Ping…
━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━
ANALYZE—TARGET: Sera Lorne
━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━
ERROR.
Power level exceeds threshold.
Please do not look at her again.
━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━
Ray froze. Sera’s golden eyes slid toward him. Slowly. Like a predator noticing a twitch in the grass.
“…Did you need something, young master?” she asked softly.
Ray stiffened. “N-NO! I MEAN—NOPE. NOTHING. NOTHING AT ALL!”
Sera’s stare lingered just long enough to threaten his entire bloodline before she returned to her post. Ray exhaled shakily. Okay. Never analyzing her again. Noted. Logged. Etched into my soul.
…Well. Maybe not never. Future-Ray would be strong enough.
He turned toward Elaine instead. Surely her stats would be more… normal. Human. Reasonable. He discreetly triggered the skill.
Ping.
━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━
STATUS — TARGET ANALYZED
━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━
NAME: Elaine Avery
AGE: 11
LEVEL: 2
━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━
HP: 25/25
STM: 12/12
ATTRIBUTES
STR: 5
AGI: 7
VIT: 5
DEX: 6
INT: 160
WIS: 70
━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━
Ray’s brain broke. His hand spasmed. And then, he violently spat his soup across the fire.
The entire camp froze. Garret jolted backward. “OI—WHAT THE HELL!?”
Isolde recoiled, clutching her cloak. “Ray! Control yourself!”
Niva burst into delighted laughter. “It came out like a fountain!”
Elaine blinked once. Just once. Then she tilted her head, her raven hair shifting like liquid ink. Her glacier-blue eyes narrowed ever so slightly. “Ray,” she said calmly, “did something… surprise you?”
Ray wheezed, wiping broth off his chin with shaking hands. “Y-your… INT… your—your STATS— I mean—!”
Elaine’s face remained perfectly neutral. “My what?” A pause. “What does that mean?”
Ray froze. He had slipped. He had slipped so hard he might as well have greased himself and rolled down the mountainside. Garret frowned at him like he was a malfunctioning farm tool. “Why are you talking like a drunk?”
Ray smacked both hands over his face. Oh god. Oh no.
He always knew Elaine was special—that heroines were supposed to be mysterious and brilliant. But this? This was beyond that. These were Final Boss stats. Hidden Route stats. Archmage-Queen-Who-Ends-Worlds stats.
He wasn’t eating soup next to a girl. He was sitting beside a nuclear warhead in human form.
Elaine gracefully took a seat beside him, steam rising gently from her hair as she poured herself a bowl with movements as smooth as a ritual. “Ray,” she said softly, “eat.”
He nodded automatically, his limbs trembling. “…Yes, ma’am.”
Elaine stirred her soup once, then added—so quietly that only he could hear: “Good. I need you functioning properly.”
Ray choked on thin air. Sera’s jewelry chimed behind her—a soft, musical threat—as if to punctuate the statement. Ray stared down into his bowl, his hands shaking.
How do you romance someone whose brain could probably calculate your death five moves ahead? He took a shaky sip of soup. He didn't have an answer.
