[Job change successful. Current occupation: Recruit]

[Attribute bonus gained: Strength +1, Agility +1]

[Trait gained: Combat Readiness]

[Combat Readiness: Enhances training effects for combat-related skills]

"Three Strength. Still less than Sean, but a shade stronger than those boys back at the smithy..."

Feeling new strength settle into his body, Roland let out a long breath, flexed his fists, and returned to the text.

"Combat Readiness?"

He read the trait description, and his fatigue might as well have been rinsed away.

He picked the wooden sword back up and ran Basic Swordsmanship again.

The moment he recovered the final move, golden text answered.

[You have successfully completed a Basic Swordsmanship training session. Experience +2]

"Hiss..."

Two points of experience.

"I figured [Combat Readiness] would work like [Humble Apprentice]—faster skill awakening in its field. Not something this blunt and brutal..."

"This is basically a permanent double-experience card."

His blood was up now.

In this world, strength was the only real foundation.

But human energy was finite. Ordinary people who devoted themselves to a single combat skill—sword, spear, or bow—might still come up short.

The untalented could burn a lifetime and never temper even one skill to its peak.

With [Combat Readiness], though, whatever he trained—basic moves or advanced techniques—the returns were amplified.

And he'd heard this world had things called combat techniques. Presumably those counted as combat-related skills too.

"With this trait, given enough time, couldn't I..."

He was still picturing it when the golden text stirred again.

[Blacksmith Apprentice occupation detected. Occupation resonance available.]

"Occupation Resonance?"

The words sent him digging through his memories.

"That game I played... the headline feature was combat occupations and lifestyle occupations resonating with each other, wasn't it?"

"Pity I'd only just preordered it. Dropped dead at the company before I ever got to play..."

While he was ruing his luck, the text rolled on.

[Occupation Resonance]

[Blacksmith Apprentice + Recruit]

[Extra buff gained: Hundred Forgings Make Steel]

[Hundred Forgings Make Steel: Increases strength cap and improves strength growth efficiency]

As the words faded, a force he had no name for washed through him.

The clearest change: the muscle soreness from sword practice had already receded by more than half.

He rubbed his smooth chin and turned the buff description over.

"So strength training grows me faster from now on. As for the cap... wait."

Sean pushed through the door, wooden spoon in hand.

The sight of his friend's thick build snapped a key question into focus.

By ordinary logic, a person's strength ceiling was set by their birth.

Under identical training, a slight-framed man would struggle to match a broad-framed one in muscle and power.

"So raising my cap means my frame fills out? Or... denser muscle?"

Either way, for someone built like a rail, it was the transformation he'd dreamed of.

And from there his mind jumped to another possibility.

"In the original game, only combat and lifestyle occupations resonated, and each character got at most one of each."

His eyes gleamed.

"But my modifier allows unlimited occupations. Which means... I could stack resonance effects without end?"

The thought picked up speed.

"Maybe it isn't even limited to combat-plus-lifestyle. Combat with combat, lifestyle with lifestyle—those might resonate too. After all..."

His gaze fell on [Recruit], an occupation that had never existed in the original game, and his fists tightened.

"The modifier has already changed the rules once. So my guess... might actually hold. And if it does..."

"Roland?"

Sean wiped grease from the corner of his mouth, baffled by his friend's thousand-yard stare.

"Hm? What?"

Roland surfaced at last.

"That's my line."

Sean waggled the spoon.

"I've called you three times. Food's ready."

"Oh! Right, right!"

At the reminder, hunger hit him like a fist.

He propped the wooden sword against the wall, grinned, went up on his toes to hook an arm around Sean's neck, and steered them inside.

"Didn't know you could cook. This won't put anyone in a coma, will it?"

"Hey! A little respect!"

Dinner was generous: a big pot of steaming oat-and-soybean porridge, boiled cabbage, and salted meat cured from the unsold scraps of his father's stall.

Next to the estate's refined but miserly meals, Sean's cooking was filling and, frankly, tastier.

Partway through, Sean's father, Gary, came home.

He was built as thick as Peyton, but where Peyton was all edges, Gary had an honest face and a plain, warm manner.

He welcomed Roland readily—though the mere mention of Peyton soured his expression.

After dinner, a full day of sword work caught up with Roland; he was asleep the moment he lay down.

Cheerful noise pulled him from his dreams early the next morning.

The day of the celebration.

"Hey! You're finally up!"

He opened his eyes to find Sean in a brand-new outfit, fighting a losing battle to flatten his stubborn curls.

"Let's go, buddy! There's a dance at the church square at noon. Emily will be there!"

Emily was the acknowledged beauty of the village. At least, Sean believed so.

Roland had heard the name plenty of times in their chats.

But to a man from Blue Planet, even the prettiest village girl held limited appeal.

"Not going. Enjoy yourself."

"Why? It's a dance! Besides Emily there'll be so many pretty girls... Even if you don't dance, we could—"

Roland let the chatter roll past, got up, dressed, and walked straight out to the courtyard.

Next to girl-watching, sword practice and strength gains won easily.

The Recruit job change had boosted his attributes, but he was still short of the Strength that Blacksmith demanded.

"Then what are you actually doing today?"

Sean, seeing persuasion was hopeless, threw up his hands.

"Practicing swordsmanship, obviously."

Roland took up the wooden sword and began walking through yesterday's lessons.

"What?!"

Sean gawked at him.

To Sean, village life was dull enough that only the yearly festivals made it bearable.

And the Heavenly Father's birthday was the grandest festival of all.

But watching Roland already deep into his forms, he eventually gave up and said nothing.

"Hm?"

Roland finished the final move and recovered his stance—and only then noticed Sean still rooted at his side.