'Should I check my stats.'
The question had been sitting there for a while now, patient, waiting for him to stop arguing with himself about it.
His fingers pressed together in his lap.
'If I call it and that red screen comes up again?'
He shook his head once.
But then the other side of it arrived, equally patient. 'If I don't check, I have no idea where I actually stand. A week of training. Not knowing the number is just choosing to be ignorant about something I could know.'
He ran a hand through his hair.
"Damn it," he said quietly to the floor.
He sat there for another few seconds, stuck in the specific discomfort of a decision that felt bigger than it should. This was the system. He'd used it casually a hundred times without thinking about it, scanning enemies, checking stats after fights, letting it give him directions to a bush. It had been as natural as breathing.
And one red screen had made him afraid of it.
He straightened up.
