I’ve not had time to resolve.

  Four levels of stats and abilities waiting to be allocated. I haven't had time to breathe, let alone think about builds.

  I pull up my character sheet.

  Intelligence at 45, solid A-grade. Agility at 29. Wisdom at 18. Then the cliff. Constitution at 17. Strength at 11. Charisma scraping the basement at 4.

  The Constitution gap almost killed me twice tonight. The Bloated Carrier took forever to bleed out. The second Brute was small enough to navigate my maze without crouching. Both fights went long. Twenty-eight points can fix that.

  But Analytical Strike scales off Wisdom. 1.8% damage increase per second of observation at my current 18. Which means I need fifty-five seconds of watching something before I hit maximum damage output. Fifty-five seconds was manageable when I was starting out but now it was also fifty-five seconds of stamina drain, positioning, risk. Multiply that across a dozen engagements and the inefficiency…

  So far with Lily, I've been running short loops. Two hours out, two hours back. Never straying far because Lily couldn't be alone that long. Every hunt, constrained by the clock in my head counting down to when I needed to be back in that room.

  Sofia changes that logic

  A real doctor. Someone who can monitor Lily's vitals, adjust dosages, respond to complications. Someone who isn't me, fumbling through medical textbooks at 3 AM.

  I can range further now. Hunt longer. Push into territory I've been avoiding because the return trip was too uncertain.

  Which means my Constitution also matters more than it did yesterday.

  Eight points to my Constitution then. The gap between D and C is bigger than it looks, endurance, stamina pool, recovery between fights. The difference between clearing one building and clearing three. Extension cost drops from 13.3 to 12.5 stamina, is a nice bonus too but it's not the point.

  Ten points to Wisdom is next. 18 to 28. D+ to C+. Analytical Strike climbs to 2.8% per second. Thirty-five seconds to maximum damage instead of fifty-five. Eight seconds off every engagement. Multiply that across a full day of hunting and the stamina savings alone justify the investment.

  Six points to Agility. 29 to 35. C+ to B. Six more millimeters of reach on Extension. Baseline improvements to reaction time, movement speed.

  Finally, four points to Strength. 11 to 15. D- to D. I almost skip it entirely. But carrying capacity likely scales with Strength and so far I’ve haven’t been able to see what system enhanced looks like. So if I'm ranging further, I like to be able to haul more back.

  Charisma stays at 4. I don't need to be liked. I need to come back with enough supplies to keep Lily alive and enough kills to keep leveling.

  I confirm the distribution.

  Strength: D (15), Agility: B (35), Constitution: C (25), Intelligence: A (45), Wisdom: C+ (28)

  The Sum of Stats tick up too. Pragmatic Hunter cooldown drops another fraction. 730 divided by 152. Roughly 4.8 hours instead of 5.9. An extra activation per day. The value of that alone is hard to overstate.

  Now the ability choice. Level 12 & 14 both offer new choices to my ever growing potential list of past abilities I had not yet selected to acquire.

  Vendetta Mark stands out immediately. Tag a target, hit it 7.2% harder for forty-five minutes at my current Intelligence. But a fight like that was the opposite of the way in which I hunted, prolonged fights were always exceedingly messy.

  Predator's Momentum catches my attention next. 3.5% damage increase per consecutive hit, stacking until I miss or switch targets. No stamina cost, nor cooldown on the combo, just compounding returns for staying focused. The trader in me appreciates the elegance. Consistent execution rewarded with exponential growth. Miss once and you're back to baseline, same as blowing a position with a panic sell.

  Efficient Predation rounds out the combat trio. 5% stamina reduction against single targets. Synergizes with everything else I do. Analytical Strike rewarding observation. Tactical Flow rewarding optimal approaches. This would layer another efficiency bonus on fights where I can isolate and execute.

  Both Predator’s Momentum and Efficient Predation would make me better at what I already do. Killing things one at a time, efficiently, before they can threaten what matters. But they didn’t diversify me in a way that I felt was helpful.

  Pressure Point is next. It requires 37.5 seconds of observation to identify a vulnerability for a single attack and that's after the spin up of Analytical Strike time already demanded. With better stats it could be viable, but for now, it was much too slow.

  Investment Return only activates after Analytical Strike hits 50% charge. At my current Wisdom, that's eighteen seconds of observation before the 2.6% stamina discount kicks in. Marginal at best.

  Contingency Protocol is insurance. Free ability activation when in a desperate pinch. Not exactly what I would want to plan for. I will pass on it.

  Opportunist's Window rewards fighting alongside others. Fifteen percent damage against distracted targets. Perhaps one day I could have a team like that. But right now, in this place, it would be an irregular choice..

  Finally Threat Hierarchy gives me a threat assessment I already do manually. Color-coded danger levels.

  Useful for someone who can't read a room. I can read a room.

  That leaves the social abilities.

  Cold Read costs five stamina to learn someone's primary motivation through touch. Cheap and direct, the same information that used to cost me hours of research and pattern analysis. Now available for the price of a handshake. Not for me, but worth remembering that others might have said ability. Worth a conversation with Sofia at least.

  Read the Spread is more subtle. Passive detection of the gap between words and belief. Deception as a quantifiable distance. The bid-ask spread of human interaction, visible to me the way it used to be visible in order flow data.

  I think about Sofia. The way she looked at Lily.

  I think about the GW. The faction power plays that are sure to start cropping up. Or the ones that already have that I’ve been ignoring and avoiding. Still they won't stay avoidable forever.

  But…