In regards to chess, that is not accurate at all. Someone that would have been considered a grandmaster a couple hundred years ago would probably get stomped easily by a grandmaster of modern times. Modern grandmasters have a gigantic advantage because of one thing: the advent of computers.

Computers have allowed us to analyze the game to the point that it is essentially entirely solved. Humans can force draws, but winning is very, very rare against a good chess computer. They can simply analyze too many permutations of moves, too quickly, for a human to really match.

Erin has grow up practicing and learning the game throughout the times where chess computers were basically taking the forefront. She has been able to study and play against computers that can make the most optimal moves 99.99% of the time. She has studied the games of grandmaster that have actually beaten those computers, however rarely it happens. She has also played the game for more than 5x as long as Niers had, and probably played more games in nearly any span of time than Niers has as well.

In comparison, Niers has none of that. He doesn’t even really have many good opponents to even practice against. His class and skills would probably help, but they wouldn’t give him anywhere close to the experience Erin has with the game, and they wouldn’t give him nearly as much material to study and learn from.

If you mean Terandria, then it’s the continent that is mostly humans, and has like a hundred different Kingdoms, along with a bunch of Knights.

There seems to be quite the argument going about who is “smarter,” Erin or Niers.
Well, I’ll throw my two cents in a few years late …
Niers is highly intelligent, but what he really has going for him is his [Grandmaster Strategist] class/skill and all the experience he’s gained from age. I believe he only figured out Tyrion’s plan because – as he said himself – he’d seen something very similar before.
I liken it to Rags quickly duplicating Laken’s trebuchets. She’s incredibly intelligent, but she had the advantage of seeing the siege engine in action. It would be the mark of a singular intellect if she’d invented one from whole cloth.

The narrator mentioned in this very posting that Niers has salt and pepper hair, which in our world would indicate a man advancing through his forties or fifties.
Erin is in her early twenties and (at least at chess) is regularly defeating one of Innworld’s greatest and most experienced military commanders. It’s true that it’s only at this one thing, but a man with the magically boosted abilities of [Grandmaster Strategist] should have been able to master chess and become virtually unbeatable in a year.

Wise.
Smart.
Intelligent.
In my mind these are nuanced ideas with distinct differences.
Erin is wise.
Ryoka is smart.
Niers is intelligent.
Rags is a fascinating nascent amalgamation of the three.
Teriarch is … scary.

“After all, there were only so many ways to make pasta and meatballs were meat…balls.”

There is something wrong with this sentence.

Pirate, I’d like to remind you that Venaz is explicitly said to be female in his first appearance, at https://devwandering.wpenginepowered.com/2017/06/24/interlude-3/

You decided to change her into a male Minotaur, but you still haven’t edited Interlude 3 so in that chapter Venaz is a female, while in the rest Venaz is a male.

Pirate, I’d like to remind you that Venaz is explicitly said to be female in his first appearance, at https://wanderinginn.com/2017/06/24/interlude-3/

You decided to change her into a male Minotaur, but you still haven’t edited Interlude 3 so in that chapter Venaz is a female, while in the rest Venaz is a male.

Keep it up!

Hence why I said platonicly. they don’t need romance, just companionship