《Project MICHAEL》 Chapter 1 [********] [Integrated failed] [Reinitializing] [Integrated failed] [¡­] [Please hold] ¡°What the hell?¡± Carefully opening his eyes, Tyler looked around and then immediately regretted the decision. In those few seconds several things had become disturbingly apparent. Firstly, he wasn¡¯t in his bed. That in and of itself wasn¡¯t too unusual, unless something had gone really wrong, then last night was Saturday, which meant he had been out. Looking down he saw a petite blonde he vaguely remembered from the night before. But that led to the second issue. Waking up in another persons bed would be one thing, but he wasn¡¯t in a bed, or at least not one he would recommend to friends. He was upright, supported only by what appeared to be a chipboard wall. That combined with the things he could see around his ankles led him to one very sadly un-escapable conclusion. He was in a shoe closet. ¡°Ever the romantic Tyler.¡± Carefully he extracted the blonde from his arm and shimmied out the closet. She was clearly tired if that didn¡¯t even stir her. He turned and looked around the room he now occupied. If he had to put money on it, this was a student house. Still he could see his clothes mixed in with what he guessed were his companions dotted around the floor, and quickly pulled them on. His wallet, phone and keys were all still in his jeans pocket, which was lucky. Feeling a little guilty, he folded up the outfit he guessed was his dates and left it on the chair near their chosen accommodations, then pushed out the front door as quietly as he could. Now outside he looked around the street. Thankfully it appeared he was still in his home town, which meant he didn¡¯t need to risk asking anyone for directions. It took him a few minutes for his overly tired brain to place where he was, before he pushed off and started the walk back to his own apartment. He had moved back to his home town after uni, but he still wasnt sure why. 4 years of studying marketing, finishing with pretty good grades, and he was now working as a sales associate for a telesales company, earning a total of 20p per hour more than the guy sitting next to him, who was fresh out of highschool. Definitely worth the ¡ê30k of debt he picked up. He only earned the extra 20p because he pushed for it, and Chad, his seemingly ever high colleague had just been thrilled to find a job at all. He walked for all of about 2 minutes, just turning off his starting road, when he saw them. 2 people, clearly on their own walks of shame on opposite sides of the street. The problem being both of them were completely frozen. Walking up to the closest young woman, he waved his hand in front of her face ¡°Hello? Are you okay?¡± He kept waving and asking, but it hadn¡¯t taken long for him to realise he wasn¡¯t going to get an answer. Pulling out his phone he cursed when he saw it was out of battery. Not an overly big surprise as he had been out all night, and his phone rarely lasted a full day at the best of times. He was about to turn and head to the other apparently frozen person, when a blue screen suddenly appeared in front of his face [Integration¡­..partially successful.] [Adaptive model; version NIVEN installed.] [Welcome participant to Project MICHAEL] [Please hold while NIVEN completes your initial setup.] [Error] [Error] [Species not recognized.] [Re-attempting] [Error] [Species not recognized.] [Modify body to known species?] [Yes/No] He went to push the box out of the way, but something was wrong. His arms wouldn¡¯t move. In fact, now that he had tried, his entire body was frozen. He read through the text again, but it didn¡¯t exactly answer anything. What was Project MICHAEL? And why would he change species. He was human, everyone was human. Maybe this was why the two people were stuck? If the box didn¡¯t know humans then what were they supposed to do? His mind started to panic slightly, but then he saw something out the corner of his eye. He couldn¡¯t move his head to get a better look, but there had been a blue light, like some kind of tacky disco light thing. But he couldn¡¯t see the frozen girl anymore. He racked his brain, trying to work out if he had seen her before the flash. Maybe he was just remembering their positions wrong, and she was behind him. Not like he could turn and check. Yeah that had to be it. Still it didn¡¯t solve his immediate problem. He looked back at the screen once more, modify body? Well he didn¡¯t want that so ¡­ huh. Being frozen meant he couldn¡¯t talk. This, was a problem. He tried moving, he tried screaming, but nothing seemed to work. Damn it no he didn¡¯t want to change his body. How was he supposed to tell the system. [Modification rejected.] [Species will be scanned as new option for future participants] [Error] [Species not compatible with project MICHAEL interface] [Species set as ¡°unique¡±] [Participant will be compensated for system failures] [Analysing stats] Oh. Apparently it could read his mind. That was, well it wasn¡¯t something he felt comfortable with.Royal Road is the home of this novel. Visit there to read the original and support the author. [Error] [Base stats unknown for species ¡°Unique¡±] [Physical stats assumed as base 1] [Participant will be compensated for system failures] [Activating participant mana channels] [Please hold] The pain was unbearable. If he could move his vocal chords, Tyler knew he would be screaming. The feeling was like somebody was trying to replace his blood with lava. The feeling of burning started in his stomach and then spread out until it encompassed his entire body. Tyler honestly didn¡¯t know how long he stood there, frozen in torture, but when it finally ended he felt like he might have collapsed onto the floor if he wasn¡¯t frozen in place. [Mana pool activated.] [Scanning mana capacity] [Error] [Total capacity exceeds known limitations] [Error] [Recharge rate greater than world can support in current form] [Error] [Planetary upgrade insufficient] [Tutorial increased to 7 days for enhanced planetary upgrade] [Analyzing participant status]
Character Sheet - Tyler Allen
Gender Male Race Unique*
Level 1 Class
Karma 0.00 Ranking Tutorial
Titles
Health 2500 Health Regeneration 100/s
Stamina 2500 Stamina Regeneration 100/s
Mana ++++ Mana Regeneration 500/s
Constitution 1 Vitality 1
Strength 1 Endurance 1
Intelligence 1 Wisdom 1
Spells & Abilities
Those stats were, well, crazy. Tyler thought himself something of a gamer. He wasn''t overly committed to it or anything, but like any kid who grew up in this generation, he had owned enough playstation or Xbox titles that he knew alot of the standard video game tropes. 2500 health, and 100/s recharge seemed like the kind of thing you would see at the end of the game, not the beginning. Still, he supposed he didn''t actually know what the health points meant. A papercut could cost 1000 health points for all he knew. He mentally commited himself to not taking any risks, at least until he had a better idea of what he was supposed to do. The mana pool was similar. 500 per second sounded like a huge amount, but if a simple fireball spell took 10,000 or something then it wouldn''t get him very far. Horses for courses, as his mother always said. The bit that really jumped out at him was the class box. It was empty at the moment, but his head was already tearing through the types of class he had seen in video games or books. Paladins were always a strong choice, but that usually meant fighting for truth and justice, rather than surival. Maybe a rogue, but he never enjoyed games like that. His brain was so busy running through the various classes that he nearly missed the screen changing in front of him [Participant has been awarded 2 F grade compensation packages] [Claim now?] [Yes/No] Well that was an easy one. Thinking back to earlier, when he had rejected the body change, he tried to shout no in his head. It was a strange feeling, but it seemed to work as the screen flashed again. [F grade compensation package opened] [You have been awarded F grade inventory ring] [F grade compensation package opened] [You have been awarded F grade armour] [New items will be delivered on arrival in Tutorial] [Congratulations participant, setup is complete] [You will now be transported to the 47,921,103rd tutorial interation of Project MICHAEL] [Participant configuration complete] [Transferring to tutorial, please hold¡­] [5¡­] [4¡­] [3¡­] [2¡­] [1¡­] [Transferring to planetary tutorial] Chapter 2 There was another blue flash, similar to the one he thought he had seen earlier. This time it was accompanied by the worse case of sea sickness Tyler had ever thought possible. Thankfully it lasted only a second, long as that may have felt, before he felt his legs hitting solid ground once more. The flash took another second to fade, and then Tyler found himself standing in what could pass as an office. It certainly wouldn¡¯t be one any worker he knew would want, but with the weird fashion trends going around he guessed medieval chic could be the latest feng-shui. There was no computer, no technology of any kind actually. Simply a large wooden desk & chair. There were various animal heads mounted on the walls, although none that Tyler recognised. On the floor was a genuine animal skin rug, except it was different. The fur looked like to have been from a large bear, but it was golden with spots, like an oversized cheetah. The head was snake like in its form, pointing out into elongated jaws with slit eyes. If the colouring wasn¡¯t perfect, Tyler might have assumed this had been put together as some form of art project. ¡°Welcome participant¡± Tyler spun, and found a beaming middle aged woman walking through the door to the office. ¡°Err. Hi?¡± She carried on smiling and made her way to the desk, taking the seat behind it and immediately pulling out sheets what looked like thick, aged paper. ¡°Don¡¯t worry, its disorientating for everyone at first, that¡¯s why we do this.¡± The smile she kept on her face was so genuine, and never faded for a second even as she talked ¡°Project MICHAEL does the initial introduction, activates your status screen, your mana and the like, have you done all that?¡± she waited for him to nod, before continuing to talk ¡°We like to do a more, personal introduction once you arrive here in the tutorial town. Now, please take a seat.¡± Tyler found his feet moving. He honestly wasn¡¯t sure if she had done some form of magic on him or if his brain was in such a state right now it hadn¡¯t processed what he was doing. Could easily be a mix of both now he thought about it. As soon as he sat down, a screen similar to the ones he saw earlier appeared to the right, showing his status to both of them. ¡°Great. Don¡¯t worry sir, we at the guild are obligated to keep all details confidential. Even once you leave the tutorial and return to your planet, the guild offices you find will be outside of any planetary authority. That means even if a king orders us to reveal them we will refuse, and any worker who broke that trust would be severely punished by the system itself.¡± She started busying herself, pulling out different sheets of the paper and putting them away. Finally she was left with just a few. ¡°Now, the purpose of our meeting here today, and the time you have in the tutorial, is to prepare both you and your world for your new reality. As we speak, your worlds core is being pumped full of mana in levels you or I could never hope to experience. Once this is done, your world will be capable of producing its own mana, filling the environment for its inhabitants, both man and beast, to utilise and evolve. The most important thing to highlight about this is that this process will evolve your planet, which is why you and everyone else have been transferred into a designated tutorial area for the duration. Mountains will shift, oceans give way to whole new land masses, and I am afraid any structures or buildings you have now will likely be completely destroyed. Think of this as your world being given a fresh start. When you return it will be to a planet unrecognisable to the one you left. Any questions?¡± Tyler just opened and shut his mouth like a particularly slow goldfish. Questions? He had hundreds, but wording them was a different issue. His world was being evolved? He didn¡¯t even know worlds could evolve. This was going to cause insane amounts of panic. Taking his silence for a lack of questions, the woman continued. ¡°Now normally all worlds start as rank F, which is the lowest rank, however your planet has been marked as rank E, which means you get an extra allotment of time here in the tutorial. Additionally it means there will be a much greater load of mana on your planet when you return, which is quite the reward. Normally planets can take centuries to upgrade their mana core. This also means a higher chance of higher rank monsters from the start.¡± Tylers memories quickly flashed back to the message about his own mana recharge rate. God he hoped he wasn¡¯t the only reason the world would be facing higher ranked monsters, he didn¡¯t need that guilt. ¡°All that brings us to you. The tutorial is designed to help find out how you can best serve your new world. Now looking at your stats, you obviously have a lot of potential, and therefore have been marked as a warrior. You will find a large number of your fellow new participants will not be lucky enough to achieve this, and will be assigned roles such as merchant, administrator, or even one of the many crafters that are essential to helping warriors such as yourself grow and evolve. When you return to your world, you will find the system has built guild offices such as this one in a number of locations. Everyone you meet here in the tutorial town will be assigned to the same starting location when you return, so it is in your best interest to form relationships with aspiring crafters as early as possible. Also your system allows for parties to be formed with up to 6 participants, to form a party all members will need to go to a guild office to register.¡± Her smile finally slipped ¡°As your world is starting at a higher rank I highly suggest forming a party earlier than normal if possible. This will ensure you have a better chance against any stronger monsters that appear. Now.¡± She stood up and walked to the door, before she had even reached it there was a knock and the door opened to reveal another woman, this one younger, wearing an identical outfit to his guide. She handed over something, then turned and left. A case of content theft: this narrative is not rightfully on Amazon; if you spot it, report the violation.¡°This is your guild ID. In addition to providing identification, it will also allow you to make payments from your guild bank, track quests and monster kill records, so you are automatically awarded any relevant bounties, and track your life signs for the guild office. This way if you do fall, the guild will know immediately and can assign a new warrior to complete any quests you were on.¡± Tyler was a little stunned by that. No thoughts of rescue, no promises to recover his body. Just if he failed someone else would follow up and do the job. He somehow doubted workers comp was going to be a thing in this new world. ¡°Now, as a new warrior participant you will want to use the tutorial to level up as much as you possibly can. As you have seen on your status screen, you start on level 1, which is rank F. When you reach level 25, you will qualify for a race evolution to rank E. Then the next evolutions follow every 25 levels. As you might guess, it becomes harder and harder to gain levels the higher you go, which is why each level also extends your lifespan by a small amount, to give you time to work towards the next rank. While your own race is a little hard to predict, I can tell you that the humans from your world would see their lives extend from 80 years to around 500 if they reach rank E. Rank D would see them living for nearly 2000 years. This allows time for your world to gain mana and progress alongside you yourselves.¡± She handed him his ID, which has it turned out was a sort of crystal bracelet. Not something he would have chosen, and when he put it on it suddenly compressed so it wa tight against him. ¡°My advice to you is to look for quests. As a new participant you have a total of 100 coppers in your bank, which will allow you to buy a basic weapon or a single low ranked spell. You already have armour so you are definitely in luck there. You should also look for camping supplies. Eventually you will see inns or taverns open up around guild locations, but its too early for that now which means a decent camp set will be essential.¡± She began listing out the types of quests, which were pretty much what anyone who watched an anime in their lives would expect. Herb gathering, monster hunts. She also explained there would eventually be escort quests, and bandit subjugation, but they were unlikely until his world was more established. That was apparently all. Tyler then found himself standing in the massive lobby of what he was told was a guild office, and left on his own. It was only then that he processed the fact he hadn¡¯t actually spoken in that entire time, except his awkward greeting at the start. ¡°Tyler Allen, man of the people.¡± Shaking his head Tyler starting walking through the headquarters. He was told that during the tutorial the guild supplied merchants and crafters to sell starting kit, but once the tutorial was done it would be down to the natives. Sure enough as he walked through the halls he could see people being taught everything from blacksmithing to alchemy. Tyler actually felt a little jealous, he had always found alchemy cool when he read about it in books. The idea of making some revolutionary potion that could save a life appealed to his character. Still he had been assigned as a warrior, which he liked the sound of. The problem was deciding what kind of warrior. His mana pool obviously lent itself to learning spells or even a healer type, but that wasn¡¯t Tyler. Oh spells were cool, and he would definitely learn a few at least, but in every game he ever played, Tyler went with the sword wielding warrior. Like every man, he wanted to be the hero, and that meant swords. Sure he could be powerful with magic, but heroes got up close and personal. They killed monsters in close combat, which is why the first store he entered was the blacksmith. He had no training, but again he had watched a lot of anime and other TV shows, and had long since formed his opinions on the types of sword he liked. Two hours later, he was the proud owner of an F grade Bastard sword. It had been expensive, 25 coppers, 1/4 of his total, but he hoped it would be worth it. The blacksmith had been a pro, making Tyler prove he could handle the sword before parting with it. Tyler had spent over an hour swinging the blade at a practise dummy with both 1 and 2 handed grips, with the blacksmith only signing off on the purchase when a screen flashed in front of Tyler. [Skill: Sword Mastery F-1 achieved] The most bizarre thing, at least according to Tyler , was that he wasn¡¯t tired. 2 hours of heavy exercise and he while at times he had thought he might have been starting to tire, it had only taken a few seconds to recover and the was swinging again. He soon found a rhythm where he was timing his swings to match his stamina recovery, which meant he could go for hours. That definitely felt a little cheat like, but Tyler wasn¡¯t going to complain. He was starting to get the feeling that whatever it was that caused that weird screen to think he wasn¡¯t human, was giving him a serious advantage. Now that he was armed, Tyler went about following this guides advice. The merchant selling the camping equipment was the first thing that made Tyler truly excited about his potential new world. He eventually spent a massive 30 coppers on a single person accommodation which would go in and out of his storage ring fully assembled. In it was an actual bed as well as a table and chair, a wardrobe, and what they called a bath. It was just a large wooden tub, and it wasn¡¯t like the tent had plumbing, but the merchant assured him it could be filled by an F rank water mage, although he couldn¡¯t promise the water would be warm. Tyler added to that by purchasing various sets of cookware and a knife for skinning anything he hunted. That left him with 30 coppers, and he went straight to the spell crafters, eventually spending all his remaining coin on a single F rank spell. [Spell: Water Arrow F-1 learned] Chapter 3 Now that he was fully outfitted, or at least as much as his limited finances would allow him, Tyler left the guild hall for the first time. After browsing the list of quests he had opted to go with what the desk worker had told him was a called a daily quest. Kill 15 monsters of any rank. Apparently the world would generate monsters so often that these quests were the most common, although higher ranked warriors could opt for higher number of monsters. The guild would only put out specific requests for named monsters, which were monsters that had gained enough levels and a degree of intelligence. They would also put out specific quests if a group of monsters had killed a number of other warriors, as people talked and unless without a degree of incentive low ranked warriors would avoid the more capable monsters. Stepping outside the found the sight relatively, well, meh. Surrounding the guild hall was a large open space, obviously what they would normally fill with a town. The whole area was surrounded by a stone wall, a little over 5 meters tall if he had to guess. There were people walking about, but everyone looked to be in a hurry. Sighing he pushed on, and headed out the farthest gate from the guild hall, as he hoped that would mean less people were using it. Sadly it clearly wasn¡¯t the case, as as soon as he left the safety of the walls he could see groups of people, charging towards the forest in the distance. It was like a bad cosplay convention. There were a number of people in patchwork armour, but the majority had obviously decided to preserve their funds and were still in earth clothes. There was even 2 men he could see in full business suits. Tyler was now concerned his new armour would make him stand out in a bad way. It may only be F grade, but it was obviously a complete set, and was far better quality than anything his other participants were wearing. The F grade set he had been awarded from the set was mostly leather, with boots, trousers and a button up jacket that had armoured patches in various places. Topping the outfit off was a thick fur robe that somehow didn¡¯t feel too hot. The robe was a sort of poncho, as it pulled over his head and ended just below his waist. All in all it was obviously made to a high quality, and he resolved to try and avoid attention. There was a well worn path heading straight to the forest, and everyone he could see was sticking to that path. Tyler therefore angled himself in a different direction, and headed to what he hoped would be a quieter section of the forest. Tyler cursed his luck. He had been in the forest for about 3 hours now, and unless birds were a type of monster, he hadn¡¯t seen anything. He had decided to stick to walking in a straight line, marking the occasional tree with a Z as he went. Tyler wasn¡¯t afraid to admit he knew nothing about wilderness survival. He only did the Z because he thought other people might be doing an X. Still he would rather look like a fool than get stuck wondering the forest for the rest of the tutorial. He was bust internally complaining when there was a sudden impact on the back of his shoulder. It wasn¡¯t strong, far from it, but it was enough that he Tyler missed a step. He quickly spun, and there in the trees were at least a half dozen small green, people? Maybe not people. Their eyes glowed a sort of sickly yellow, which stood out against the green skin. Their faces were almost perfectly round, with large pointed ears sticking out either side. Honestly they were perhaps the most bizarre looking forward creatures he could even had imagined. While he busy judging their appearance, another of the strange green men launched a large rock at him. He wasn¡¯t sure if the creature was weak, or if something else was going on, but the rock seemed to fly as if in slow motion. Using this to his advantage, Tyler stepped to the side and drew his blade. The creatures, whatever they were, clearly weren¡¯t intelligent, and Tyler was in front of them before they even seemed to process that the rock had missed. Using the longer range of his new sword, he slashed, cutting 2 creatures across the face and impacting another on the chest. He was slightly surprised how little resistance he felt pulling the blade through them, but he didn¡¯t have time to ponder on it however, as the first creature reacted and tried to jump towards him. Tyler stepped back and held his blade up, letting his lunging foe impale itself with little to no effort on his part. That left him a problem however, as the creature was now firmly wedged on the blade, and he still had 3 enemies looking to injure him. Dropping the sword and its passenger on the floor, Tyler began waving his hands in the air. To anyone watching he would probably have looked crazy, but the reason seem became clear. A small arrow of water appeared above him, and fired towards one of the green men, which in turn instantly fell to the ground. He immediately started waving his hands again, but was interrupted by a third rock. Something was definitely wrong, the creatures might be weak but these were still rocks, and he was brushing them off like raindrops. Tyler shifted to the side, trying to quietly edge himself closer to his abandoned sword but before he could reach it, another monster dove at him. Without any other option, Tyler swung a fist, connecting solidly with the side of the creatures head. Time seemed to almost freeze, then the creature went flying off, taking down the first tree it hit before slamming into and tipping the next one it found. The final creature finally seemed to work out that it was outclassed, and turned to run. Waving his hands once more Tyler made sure to keep his eyes on the monster and soon enough another water arrow was firing off, felling the monster. [Battle Complete] [7 x Goblin Lvl. 1 Defeated] [140xp gained] The blue screen appeared in front of him, but he had barely finished reading the screen when there was a white flash and a new screen appeared [Level Up!] [You have reached Level. 2] [3 Stat points awarded] [60xp remaining to reach Level 3] The white screen that appeared showed 6 boxes, with a plus next to each one like you would see on any number of old RPG video games. Strength, Constitution, Endurance, Intelligence, Vitality & Wisdom. He had 3 points to allocate, and honestly no idea where to put them. Those goblins, and he couldn¡¯t believe he hadn¡¯t worked that one out for himself, were all level 1, and he had beaten them soundly. Based on the impact of the one he punched, strength wasn¡¯t a huge priority. His mana pool was apparently so large it couldn¡¯t be measured, and he wasn¡¯t overly sure what all the others did. Finally he decided to use this first level as a fact finding upgrade, and stuck one point each into Intelligence, Wisdom and Constitution. As soon as he pressed accept, there was another white flash and his status screen appeared in front of him.If you discover this tale on Amazon, be aware that it has been stolen. Please report the violation.
Character Sheet - Tyler Allen
Gender Male Race Unique*
Level 2 Class Warrior
Karma 0.00 Ranking F
Titles
Health 2750 Health Regeneration 100/s
Stamina 2500 Stamina Regeneration 100/s
Mana ++++ Mana Regeneration 550/s
Constitution 2 Vitality 1
Strength 1 Endurance 1
Intelligence 2???????? Wisdom 2
Spells & Abilities
Sword Mastery: F-1 | Basic Water Arrow: F-1 |
So if he guessed correctly, then Con had added a massive 250 to his health, then either Wisdom or Intelligence had added 50 to his mana regeneration. Nothing else appeared to have changed, so he was assuming one of them added to his unreadable mana pool, which meant it was definitely a waste. Sadly he didn''t know which one did which, so would have to experiment again the next time he levelled up. Retrieving his sword, and cleaning it down on a piece of grass without blood stains, he sheathed it and looked around. 7 goblins dead meant he only had 8 more monsters to find before he could complete his quest. That plus 60xp until he hit level 3, and he was suddenly feeling very motivated. Instead of rushing off however, he settled against a nearby tree and went over the fight in his head. He had done well, but he was honest enough with himself to admit that he made a big mistake losing the sword. Additionally while his water arrow spell had been effective, it was too slow to cast and relied on at least a small distance between him and his target. He wished he had a notepad or diary, something he could record these thoughts in to make sure he practised the right things between quests. The biggest question for him was the strength he had shown in the fight. While Tyler was in decent shape, he went to the gym 3 or 4 times a week, he was what he liked to call nightclub fit. He would never be a professional athlete, but he was fit enough that in a club women would know he took care of himself. All that meant that there was no way he should be strong enough to punch monsters through solid trees, especially not at 1 strength. Sadly all his ideas on the topic required another human to test with, and unless he ran into his sister, which he figured was unlikely, then there was nobody he actually trusted. It was late that night when Tyler returned to the edge of the forest, quest complete. He had actually gone overboard, slaying a total of 22 goblins when he had gotten stuck fighting a large group. Thankfully he had also reached level 3, and chosen to upgrade the 3 stats he ignored the first time. If he had thought himself strong before, it was nothing compared to now. He was actually having to be careful to limit his strength as he walked through the forest, as a casual arm swing could easily dent a tree as he walked. He was certain this was unique to him, and not every other human, otherwise he would be hearing the crashing from the forest of trees getting casually destroyed. Sadly he wasn¡¯t sure what he could actually do about it. For now he just resolved to enjoy the perks, and the easy monster kills that came with it. So far he hadn¡¯t actually taken any damage either, or at least none he noticed. That might have been his armour, or it might have just been his health was so high, along with the regeneration rate, that level 1 goblins just weren¡¯t capable of being a threat to him. Again he decided to just enjoy the fact. Now that he was at the edge of the forest, he decided to set up camp. The guild had been open that there were no inns or places to stay within the walls yet, and staying too far into the forest would likely attract monsters. He did make sure to set up his camp fire with the tent between it and the city, so nobody would spot him. While the guild lady had said it was too early for bandits to be an issue, Tyler wasn¡¯t so sure. In his experience, humans were inherently lazy, and the idea that none of them weren¡¯t already looking for the easy way in this new world was laughable to him. People didn¡¯t want to work when that meant answering telephones, trying to sell those same people on hiking through the forest for hours on end swinging a sword just didn¡¯t seem to be a winning idea. They would probably see this as the ideal time to start, while everyone was low levelled. Tyler took a lot longer than was probably normal skinning a rabbit he had killed with a water arrow. He was not an outdoors-man, and had no idea what he was doing. He then basically burned the meat, overly cautious about eating it raw. As he tucked into the disappointing meal, he thought back to what the guild had advised. He would probably need a party, at the very least somebody who could teach him to hunt and cook meat. The problem was the same as his issue with stats however. He simply didn¡¯t trust anyone not to betray him when a better offer came along. He thought back to all the books he read over the years about similar situations. In all of them that he could remember, the main character would have somebody with them. Hell if this was a story then Tyler would probably have already stumbled into a situation where he saved the life of a princess, or some other rich noble, and had them to help him. Sadly this wasn¡¯t a story, which just left Tyler alone, chuckling to himself over a piece of burned rabbit flesh. Chapter 4 Handing in the quest the following morning had been an, educational, experience. As it turned out, he got nothing for killing the extra goblins, other than the experience of course. His quest was to kill 15, so he was paid 75 coppers. It was when the receptionist had tried to cheer him up that Tyler¡¯s bad mood had really settled however. ¡°I¡¯m sorry can you say that again?¡¯ The receptionist; the same young lady who had brought his ID to the meeting the day before smiled.¡°If you take the corpses to one of the dissector merchants you can make some more coin. Goblin blood is a common alchemy ingredient, used in a number of low tier poisons.¡± Tyler knew this wasn¡¯t her fault, but still¡°Is there a reason nobody mentioned dissectors before? If I had known that I would have collected up the bodies.¡± For the first time the receptionists smile slipped ¡°sorry sir, it should have been mentioned but when we have a new intake there¡¯s so many of those meetings back to back, it can be hard to keep track. I can only apologise.¡± Tyler sighed and shook his head, forgiving the going lady before heading back to the merchant section. After his lacklustre cooking attempts the night before he had decided to see if there were any prepared meals he could bring out with him. He knew his mother could be rolling in her grave if she saw his pathetic attempt the night before, she had tried to teach him cooking so often he had probably had as many lessons as some professional chefs. If just didn¡¯t take, much to her annoyance. After multiple stores, he finally found someone that did ration packs. Not great but at least he could eat. He brought 20 coppers worth, shoving them all in his storage ring, thinking that would at least keep him from starving if he got stuck out somewhere for longer than a few days. He also brought a water flask for another 10 copper that was apparently magic, so that it would never run dry. That all left him with 45 coppers, and he headed straight to the same spell crafter as before, and dropped another 30 coppers on a second attack spell. [Spell: Fire Arrow F-1 learned] The reason he had opted for this spell was simple. Yes it was offensive, and every video game he had ever played told him that fire spells would come in handy at some point, there were bound to be plant based monsters somewhere, but more than that. It would allow him to heat water. He had tried out the bath the night before. Sure enough the water arrow spell had let him fill the tub, although it took dozens of arrows to do so, but when he got in the water was so cold he had almost jumped right back out again. This way he could heat up the water. Both spells apparently consumed 10 mana, but he had not had the slightest problem the previous night. It was clear that whatever big had caused his mana pool to be so large, it was going to be a serious advantage. The problem was the slow casting speed. He had asked the spell crafter, and apparently it was possible to learn an ability called instant cast, but it only came to those who practised their spells religiously. Like his sword mastery ability, it was something only the system could award, and it would only do so when it felt you deserved it. There was no tricking the system. Once he knew that however, Tyler was motivated. After checking there was no time limit to quests, he took the highest ranked monster quest they had, for 1000 monster kills, and headed back to the forest. He only had 6 more days, and he resolved to spend all of them hunting with his magic. He wanted that ability. It wasn¡¯t until the 3rd day, the 4th overall, that Tyler began to regret his ambitious target. In 3 days of solid hunting, he had killed 143 goblins. Truthfully at this point, taking him to level 6. Unsure on a better strategy, he had continued to throw his points into each category 1 at a time. At this point he was so overpowered compared to the poor level 1 goblins that he thought it should probably be considered bullying. The problem was he didn¡¯t know what he could do about it. As long as the only monsters he found were level 1, then they would be the only monsters he killed. Spotting another group ahead, he pulled up his water and fire arrows. He had worked out he could fire both at the same time if he used each hand on a specific spell. It looked even crazier than before, and the first few dozen times he had made mistakes and ended up without either spell, but after 3 days he basically had it down for these 2 spells. He didn¡¯t think it would be as easy to do once he had more than the 2 to choose from. When the arrows made contact with their targets, the 2 front goblins instantly died. Tyler didn¡¯t hesitate, drawing his sword and readying himself. Once the initial confusion died out, the surviving 6 goblins shrieked with anger and charged at him. He might actually have been able to get another spell off, but he didn¡¯t ponder it for too long. He might have gotten 2 more magic kills that way, but it would have left him more vulnerable to their charging attack. With his new enhanced abilities, Tyler found it laughably easy to dance around the goblins attacks, slicing with his sword as he went. With little to no effort, he was soon standing in a circle of goblin corpses. [Battle Complete] [8 x Goblin Lvl. 1 defeated] [80xp gained] [1370xp remaining to reach Level 7] Wiping down his sword again before he put it away, Tyler walked around scooping up the various corpses, until he suddenly found he couldn¡¯t take any more. 149 corpses was apparently the limit of his storage ring, leaving 2 on the ground. Tyler frowned. He didn¡¯t like to waste them. But he wasn¡¯t going to hand carry them either. After debating for 5 minutes, he decided to leave them. He would go back to the guild and sell what he had, restock on rations, and then ask the guild receptionist for advice on good hunting areas. 151 monsters in 3 days just wasn¡¯t good enough, and he was going to need a serious boost in productivity if he wanted to hit his target. As it turned out, he was paid 2 coppers a piece for the goblins. That left him feeling pretty proud until he realised he actually had no idea what a copper was actually worth. He had been given 2 silver and 98 copper for his level 1 goblin kills. Which meant he probably should expect for it to be on the low end of the financial scale. If he got that for level 1 monsters what would the payment be for something level 5, or even higher. Still he spent another 13 coppers on another 4 days rations, bland as they were, and headed to the receptionist who immediately advised him to go out the north gate towards the mountains. Apparently because the monsters there were higher ranked, starting at level 5, most people had given up on that area after the first day. That meant it had the highest number of monsters, plus being at a higher level meant he would gain more experience. He wanted to see how his strength compared against something other than goblins. With that decided, he went straight for the gate. He could see the mountains in the distance, and sure enough the area around the gate was empty. Tyler broke into a run, wanting to get to his destination quickly. He had noticed his speed was significantly increased, although he hadn¡¯t been able to quantify it. If he had to guess the mountain range started about 2-3 miles from the town gate, and he made that in around 15 minutes, which certainly felt too fast, but didn¡¯t stand out as absurd in his head. Now that he could punch down trees, his expectations for possible were somewhat skewed. Enjoying the fact there were no other people around, Tyler looked about the area. There were several clearly defined tracks up into the mountains, all of which looked equally worn. Eventually he took the left hand track, figuring he could always come back and try another if there was a lack of monsters. Thankfully that wasn¡¯t the case. He was barely 5 minutes into his hike when he spotted something. For a brief moment he was disappointed, thinking he would be fighting goblins again. As soon as the monster turned its head however that worry faded and changed to concern. Whatever these things were, they looked like humanoid dragons. The one he had seen was green, hence why he had initially thought goblins, but now he looked they were a mix of green, red and blue. Standing at around 4 foot, so slightly taller than the tiny goblins, they all carried short spears, and their exposed bodies were covered in tough looking scales. The bigger worry however, was their numbers. There were easily 50 of them loitering around the path ahead. Tyler reasoned that at least the path was narrow, meaning they couldn¡¯t surround him, but he knew this would be a tough fight. He also knew he probably wouldn¡¯t be using his magic here. That many enemies in close quarters and he would be lucky to get off a single spell. He drew his sword, making enough noise that the monsters instantly spotted him. Unlike the goblins, they didn¡¯t mindlessly charge. Instead they all readied their weapons and approached him cautiously, growling as they did so. When they were within 5 feet, Tyler shifted his weight forward and went on the attack. He wasn¡¯t stupid. Even with his longer sword, the monsters spears gave them much longer reach. That meant his best advantage was to get in close and keep them on the back foot. Unlike the goblins, he struggled to easily slash through their scales, but stabbing attacks seemed to be no issue. This was good and bad, good in that he could kill them, bad because stabbing needed more space than simple swipes. Despite what TV had made him believe, swords were actually quite complicated to use. More than once he had gotten his angles wrong and rendered the weapon into nothing more than a pointy club. He didn¡¯t know how long he danced around the monsters, but he did know he could feel the various areas were he had been hit by a spear. Strangely he knew it wasn¡¯t a problem, almost on an instinctive level. His health regeneration meant these small wounds were healing as fast as they came, meanwhile his own attacks were at the very least crippling the monsters he hit. Despite it all, Tyler found himself laughing, and was glad there were no people around to see. If there had been, well he didn¡¯t know if mental hospitals would be a thing in the new world but he suspected someone would be pointing them his way if there were. After what could have been hours, he honestly didn¡¯t know, the small army of monsters was finally dead. Help support creative writers by finding and reading their stories on the original site. [Battle Complete] [63 x Kobolds Lvl.5 defeated] [3150xp gained] [Level Up!][ You have reached Level. 7] [3 Stat points awarded] [1420xp remaining to reach Level 8] Tyler looked around him at what could only be described as carnage. For the first time he could see damage to his armour, but the skin underneath was unblemished. ¡°Holy fuck¡± Tyler let himself fall back to sitting, leaning back and supporting himself on the mountain wall. He still didn¡¯t feel tired, he assumed due to his high stamina regeneration, but his mind was riding high on adrenaline and he knew he needed to take his time to come down. Quietly, he pulled out his flask has took a large drink, before opening up his stat screen and assigning the new points in his usual pattern.
Character Sheet - Tyler Allen
Gender Male Race Unique*
Level 7 Class Warrior
Karma 0.00 Ranking F??
Titles
Health 3250 Health Regeneration 130/s
Stamina 3250 Stamina Regeneration 130/s
Mana ++++ Mana Regeneration 650/s
Constitution 4 Vitality 4
Strength 4 Endurance 4
Intelligence 4 Wisdom 4
Spells & Abilities
Sword Mastery: F-1 | Basic Water Arrow: F-1 | Fire Arrow F-1 |
Chapter 5 After collecting the numerous Kobold bodies, Tyler carried on down the same track. While that had been a good step, he still had nearly 800 monsters to kill and less than 3 days to do it. He doubted the monsters would always be so grouped up, and while smaller groups would be easier to kill, they also would limit his progress. Additionally he was starting to notice how wide the gap between levelling up was becoming. He was happy with his progress so far, but he had realised that if he had stayed hunting goblins in the forest he probably wouldn¡¯t have reached level 7 before the end of the tutorial. While this wasn¡¯t exactly how he saw his life going, he was surprised how easily he slipped into it. It certainly beat telesales. Also he had magic. Alright he wasn¡¯t going to be wiping out hoards of monsters with it anytime soon., but still. Magic! With that thought spurring him on, he began to cast his arrows as he walked, firing them at the mountain side. He wanted to improve his casting, and practise seemed like the way to do that. When he finally saw another group of enemies, he was mid cast and took advantage of that fact. Before they even noticed him, 2 kobolds were dead. This time he kept casting, and actually managed to take out 2 more before the enemies reached him. He was drawing his sword when he found the real challenge. This group was slightly smaller than the last, although he didn¡¯t have time to count. The problem was the kobolds weren¡¯t alone. As the spear wielding lizards came towards him, a dozen of the ugliest looking creatures Tyler had even seen launched themselves down from the cliff side above. For the first time he recognised them before the fight. Harpies. Thankfully they didn¡¯t appear to have any ranged attacks, but as he engaged the first kobold, a harpy dove down and swiped a clawed hand at him, tearing into his cheek. Tyler cursed and jumped back. He hadn¡¯t fought anything in the air yet and other than his arrows, he wasn¡¯t sure on the best way of doing it. If he swung his sword upwards to deal with the flying monsters, he would leave his body exposed to the kobolds spears. On the other hand, dealing with the kobolds left the harpies with a free run to attack him. Inwardly he cursed. Switching to a one handed sword hold, he started the motions for his fire arrow with his now free left hand. He couldn¡¯t really attack like this, he wasn¡¯t anywhere near skilled enough with his sword yet, but he could defend their jabs as long as he kept the kobolds in front of him. Soon enough his arrow was ready, and the first harpy fell to the floor. To his delight it landed on a kobold in the middle of the pack, causing something akin to a road block. The joy lasted only seconds however, as a spear came jabbing towards his throat. Head back in the game, he began conjuring another arrow. As time went on, Tyler¡¯s confidence rose, and soon enough light attacks with his sword joined the arrows taking out harpies. The kobolds clearly weren¡¯t in a rush to kill him, but there were a large number waiting for the opportunity to try, and it would only take a single well placed attack to ruin his day. Based on the earlier fight, he doubted they would be able to kill him, but that didn¡¯t mean it wouldn¡¯t hurt as they tried. As soon as the last harpy fell, Tyler leapt into the same tactic he used in the first fight, getting in close and forcing the kobolds onto the back foot. Claw. ¡°Sometimes my brain doesn¡¯t even make sense to me¡± Tyler huffed as he spun a spear from the side and took out another kobold with his blade. Before long he was once again standing in a sea of monster bodies, reading through a familiar screen. [Battle Complete] [42 x Kobolds Lvl.5 defeated] [12 x Harpies Lvl. 5 defeated] [2700xp gained] [Level Up!] [You have reached Level. 8] [3 Stat points awarded] [5120xp remaining to reach Level 9] Once again, Tyler gave himself a short break to let the adrenaline leave his system, using the time to do level maths. Contrary to his own expectations, he had levelled up again in a single fight. Was that because of the large number of monsters, or was levelling up meant to be easy? 5120xp sounded like a lot, but he had made more than that in his last 2 battles alone. Unless he was mistaken, he would get that after a little over 100 kobolds, which he needed to do for the quest anyway. He started doing the mental maths, and realised that as long as all the monsters he killed were over level 5, he would manage to reach level 10 by completing the quest. That seemed, generous. For the first time Tyler questioned his own progress. He has this image of himself as leading the pack, but if a single quest would take him up to level 10, then perhaps others were already there. He had also wasted a lot of time wondering the forest to find goblins, because he had wanted to avoid the areas with lots of other people. ¡°Damn it. Okay so no more messing around. I can fit maybe another 50 monsters in my ring, then I¡¯ll head back to the guild and see if there¡¯s an area with higher ranked monsters. Even if I save that for the last day, I¡¯ll need all the help I can get.¡± Sure enough the next fight left him with a filled storage ring, forcing him to leave 18 of the 47 kobold corpses out on the mountain. As before he ran all the way back to the guild, depositing the bodies at the merchant for 5 copper a each. That left him with over 10 silver, and he decided to shop before heading out. At the moment the size of his ring was holding him back, limiting the time spent hunting. If he could buy another ring, or a bigger one, then he could increase the time between return trips. He worked out he still had just under 700 monsters to kill before his quest was complete, so if each ring took about 150 monsters then with another he would only need to make 2 more return trips before the quest was complete. When he finally found one, he was shocked at the price. 10 silver for another F grade ring. He could afford it, but that was all his money. Or at least near all of it. Ultimately it didn¡¯t matter though. This would increase his earning potential, so he had to do it. After speaking to the merchant however he learned something very interesting. Storage rings had 2 limits, the rank, and the users mana. It was only because of his insane mana pool that he could store as much as he was. Most people would never be able to support 2 storage rings, or if they did they would be useless for other things due to the high mana drain. Tyler filed that away, and slipped on the new ring cautiously. Thankfully he didn¡¯t feel any sort of strain; but he supposed that might change when the rings actually had contents. While he was there he also asked for advice on getting his armour repaired, but was told it would need specific skills I was unlikely to find until the world was more established. Looking at it, the actual leather armour was fine. In fact the places where it has been torn earlier were even fine. Tyler mentally filed that away and focussed on the robe, which was torn to shreds. Full of regret, he slid it off over his head and tucked it into his ring. With his distinct lack of funds he couldn¡¯t replace it right now, so instead he headed downstairs from the merchant section and straight to the receptionists. After the usual polite greeting, he asked his question. This book''s true home is on another platform. Check it out there for the real experience.¡°All areas have the potential to house strong monsters, but the mountains have the highest starting level. From there the more warriors they defeat, the more experience they gain and the stronger they get, much like yourself. Certain creatures, like dragons for example, will also get stronger with age, but you won¡¯t find anything like in the tutorial. For now, if you want guaranteed results then I suggest you clear the mountains. New monsters spawn every day, so you will have plenty of targets.¡± This receptionist was an older woman, although with the same customer service smile. ¡°Are the mountain monsters always the same, or is there like a boss creature if you get far enough in?¡± Her smile widened to a beam ¡°Excellent question. Each region of the tutorial has a monster ruling over it. While not guaranteed, this is something you are likely to see as your world becomes established, so it helps you prepare. There is actually a quest for each of these rulers, if you would like me to add the mountain region to your active quests?¡± Tyler immediately agreed, and held out his wrist to be updated. At least this way if he failed to kill all 1000 monsters, he would still have a quest to try and hand in. After returning to the mountains, Tyler spent the next 2 days making his way as far in as possible. As he had suspected, he had been required to make 2 trips back, selling a total of 648 monsters before returning for what he knew would be his final trip. He had checked with the guild office, and he had a little under 9 hours left before the end of the tutorial. That meant he needed to average 4 monsters an hour. If this had been earlier in the week he would have found the idea ridiculously easy, but as the guild had warned him, the high number of monsters he faced when first arriving at the mountain range was largely a result of nobody thinning their numbers. As time had gone on he had found the groups to be smaller and smaller, until the average was now what he called scouting parties of 5 or 6 kobolds at a time. Even the harpies, so annoying in the early days due to their groupings, had now become solo hunters. At most they would be in a pair. Truthfully, if he hadn¡¯t accepted the quest to kill the area boss he would probably have tried hunting somewhere else by now. He was sick of the mountains. Thankfully it was just a few hour to go, and he had estimated that he was about 90% of the way to the top. It was difficult to be sure, the route dropped and turned around the mountain a lot, but he had spent a lot more time there than he liked to think about, and basing it on his experiences nearer the base. Thankfully because he had cleared so many monsters from the trails already, catching up to where he had left off was easy. His speed had increased even more since reaching level 10, to the point where when he returned to the scene of his last fight, the monsters he had been forced to leave behind were still lying there. He quickly scooped them into his ring, before carrying on up the mountain. He was fairly well off now, at least judging by the prices here in tutorial, with 32 gold in his guild bank account. The guild had stressed to him again that after the tutorial, any kit he could buy would be made by earths own crafters, meaning it was likely to be of a low quality for the foreseeable future. He had therefore headed straight to the blacksmith, only to find out that they didn¡¯t stock anything better than his current sword during the tutorial. His armour was still in great shape, and apparently could fix itself, so Tyler had ended up just leaving the coins in his bank, something he had found a little depressing. He hadn¡¯t thought much about the world post tutorial, focusing instead on staying alive and battling monsters, but he knew the humans who had held power before, the politicians and millionaires who were used to running the world, would be severely against using a brand new currency they didn¡¯t control, and that they didn¡¯t inherit stacks of. Although now that he thought about it, there weren¡¯t many of them in great physical shape. He frowned to himself, thinking of his country¡¯s idiot prime minister. If he had been assigned as a warrior class then there was next to no chance the man was still alive. Would people even have jobs after this. The way the guild sold it, the world would be completely changed, what would that mean for peoples lives? Sighing Tyler tried to push it out his mind. He was still worried about his sister, although he expected she had been given a crafter class. At 18 she was just about to start college studying chemical engineering. If that didn¡¯t get you into alchemy Taylor had no idea what would. He dispatched 2 groups of kobolds as he let his mind wonder, bringing his remaining target to 26 more monsters to finish his quest. To his reckoning he had about 7 hours left, which should be plenty. Finally he turned round a bend in the trail, and found himself standing in a large clearing, clearly near the top of the mountain. It was boxed in on all sides and lying dead centre, fast asleep, was something straight from Tyler¡¯s nightmares. Chapter 6 With bright red scales, twin yellow horns on its head, and massive scaled wings, Tyler¡¯s initial thoughts were screaming at him that this was a dragon. Thankfully he had remembered the guild worker telling him he wouldn¡¯t see one of those legendary creatures during the tutorial. He racked his brain, and came to the conclusion this must be a wyvern. The problem was he couldn¡¯t really remember the different between the 2 monsters, other than that wyverns were smaller. He ducked back around the corner, and tried to come up with a plan. There was no doubt in his head that this was the area boss. Tyler doubted his usual luck of one hit kills would stay true here, and he seriously doubted his F-1 ranked spells would even tickle the monster. Therefore he had to keep it on the ground. His sword wasn¡¯t high quality, but Tyler was strong and could use that to great effect when needed. The question was did he try and sneak up, and make a close range attack to start the battle, or shoot an arrow from distance to see how the monster reacts. Giving it time to get in the air would be bad, but Tyler knew his own abilities. He wasn¡¯t the sneaky type. Chances are if he attempted to tip toe up to the creature, it would hear him instantly. Knowing that, he opted for the spells. As soon as he turned the corner he began the usual hand signals, one water, one fire. Soon two arrows were hovering over his head, and he aimed them both for the closed eye exposed to him. He knew it probably wouldn¡¯t do much damage, but nothing liked getting poked in the eye. If it could cause the wyvern to panic for even a second, that would buy him time to get in close with his sword. As soon as the arrows launched, Tyler drew his sword and sprinted after them. Sure enough, both arrows made contact with the creatures eye lid, and the roar that followed was surely heard in the guild hall down below. Tyler briefly hesitated, his body instinctively reacting in fear, before pushing on. Sadly that slight delay was enough for the wyvern to spot him, and soon a large tail was swinging round faster than he could react. It slammed into his side, sending him flying back to wards the mountain wall and impacting with a thud nearly as loud as the earlier roar. Tyler felt his bones groan as he fell to the floor. Thankfully his recovery rate was such that he could already feel his injuries repairing themselves, but he knew he couldn¡¯t wait for it to finish. As fast as he could force himself to, he gingerly climbed to his knees, before then raising to his feet. When he finally looked up, the wyvern was glaring at him, and was now surrounded by dozens of kobolds. Tyler cursed. Of course the boss had minions, wyverns clearly weren¡¯t challenging enough on their own. As he felt his hip suddenly pop back into place, removing a pain Tyler hadn¡¯t even realised he was feeling, he prepared himself to charge once more. At least with its helpers around, that giant tail should be more limited. At this point kobolds weren¡¯t much of a threat to him, but he knew the wyvern was capable of hurting him, and that would leave him exposed for the lesser monsters attacks. As soon as he felt strong enough, mere seconds after landing, Tyler charged towards the kobold spear men. He didn¡¯t hesitate, chopping them down as he went, his improved strength now enough to render their scales meaningless. While he killed the ones in his way, they weren¡¯t his target. Getting close enough he dodged the massive jaws that came towards him, and slashed. It didn¡¯t so much, and Tyler really didn¡¯t have time to celebrate, but at least he could see thick yellowish blood pour from the wound. He let his momentum take him back into the crowd of kobolds, and in doing so just barely dodged the tail that came furiously towards him. The wyvern clearly cared little for its helpers, as 3 of them were sent flying by its attack. It didn¡¯t hesitate to attack again, mowing down kobolds as it lunged around the clearing. Tyler knew what he wanted to do, but he needed a distraction. The guilds advice about forming a party coming back to bite him once again. As soon as he had dodged yet another swing, he took off, getting as close as he could. The tail was flexible, but thick. He reasoned if he could get as close to the creatures back legs as possible, it would be the ideal place to inflict some damage. As he got within a few feet however the tail swung back round and he was forced to jump. Sailing over it, Tyler was as surprised as anyone to find himself several feet from the ground, clinging to his sword which was now embedded in the monsters flank. Clearly in pain, the wyvern began to buck, trying to throw off the lowly human. Sadly for it, this only caused the sword to tear deeper and into a wider area, and Tyler¡¯s superhuman strength allowed him to cling on for dear life. The remaining kobolds weren¡¯t as lucky, and soon they were all dead, destroyed by the same rampaging wyvern they served in life. Tyler, who until now had really just been holding on and trying to stay alive, finally summoned all his strength, and pushed off the creature with his legs. He could see the wound, and knew that while it was serious, it wasn¡¯t fatal. He also knew that the longer this lasted the more likely it was he would die himself, he wouldn¡¯t be lucky enough to keep dodging that tail every time. The creatures attacks had become constant since Tyler had leapt off, a flurry of snapping jaws and slashing tail. Tyler found himself getting further and further back as he dodged, leaving him unable to make an attack of his own. Figuring it couldn¡¯t hurt, he shifted to a one handed sword grip, and once more began to cast with his left hand. The water arrow that hit seemed to do almost no damage, but it did at least halt the incoming jaws for this attack. This brief delay gave Tyler the opening he so desperately needed, and with every bit of strength he had, he drove the sword into the wyverns throat. Still the monster didn¡¯t die, but unlike before, this wound would at least eventually prove fatal. The wyvern, as if sensing this very fact, upped its attacks once more. Now knowing it was dead either way, it was happy getting closer to its human prey, and Tyler was once again on the back foot, forced to abandon his sword in the monsters neck. He danced around, boxed in and unable to completely escape the clearing, but doing everything he could to avoid attacks. His epic dragon slaying fight scene descending into a poorly written comedy as he was unable to do much more than play mouse to the enormous creatures cat. Finally, the furious beast could do no more, and fell to its death. Sadly for Tyler, so used to dodging the attacks from either end of the monster, he didn¡¯t see this one coming. As it finally keeled over, it¡¯s huge wing shunted out, crushing Tyler into the ground as it did so. The pain was immense, and he could feel the point in which something had penetrated skin. He collapsed back to the floor, fighting back the urge to scream as whatever had stabbed him tore into more flesh as he moved. The pain was so bad he barely noticed the screens that popped up. The author''s narrative has been misappropriated; report any instances of this story on Amazon. [Battle Complete] [33 x Kobolds Lvl.6 defeated] [1 x Lesser Wyvern Lvl. 10 defeated] [2130xp gained] [6640xp remaining to reach Level 11] Tyler assumed he had blacked out, as when he came back round he felt a fair bit better, although he noticed he still had the wing sticking into him. Pulling himself free, he saw the wound had healed around the impact point, and now that he pulled it free it was starting to try and heal once more, but he knew the damage was done. Even with his healing, the fact he had left it in for so long would leave him with one hell of a scar. He could actually see it forming as the skin knit back together. He gingerly climbed to his feet. As always with his healing, he felt fine, but knew he should be in much worse shape. As he walked over and retrieved his sword, he did the quick mental maths and cursed. He was 3 short of his quest target. 3 short and he had no idea on how much time he had after his unplanned nap. He quickly scooped up bodies, with the wyverns body taking up one ring all by itself. That done, he didn¡¯t see anything else in the area, so he took off. His best bet for fresh monsters would be another of the trails from the mountain base. If he ran, it would take him about an hour to descend the mountain, so he didn¡¯t hesitate pushing himself to give everything he had while scanning for any straggling harpies or kobolds as he did so. Tyler understood monsters spawned daily, but he had no idea what time they appeared. Or how it even worked. Sadly he wasn¡¯t in luck, with the trail back down completely clear. As soon as he touched the base he spun to ascend another, and was shocked to see other people there. They were maybe 300 feet into the trail, cautiously making their way along the rocky path. That sight filled Tyler with hope. If people were still hunting, then there had to be some time left before the end. Rather than disturb them, he took the third trail, and was instantly rewarded. A harpy swooped down, screeching as it did so. Tyler didn¡¯t hesitate, swinging his blade and impaling the monster before sticking it in his ring with 1 swift movement. He carried on his run, clearing the screen that appeared without even reading it. He was several kilometres up the mountain before another harpy descended, and he soon killed it as well. That left one more for his target, and Tyler was determined not to fall into that trope. He also wanted to get back in time to hand over the quests. Sadly as he raced along there was no sign of anything. Eventually he gave up, and stormed back down. Reaching the base once more, he knew he had a choice. Up the third path, where he would be following that other group, or to one of the other areas. But which one? Tyler had spent hours in the forest just to find a single goblin. But was that because he had gone off to the side? Eventually, still no knowing how long he had, Tyler took off towards the town. He stopped at the guild hall and asked, only to find out he still had 3 hours. Rather than waste time with anything now, he spun and headed straight to the forest, this time following the well worn path that hundreds of other people had taken over the last week. As he arrived in the forest he wasn¡¯t surprised to see dozens of what he guessed were formed parties. Some were trudging back from the deeper areas, some heading out to take their place, but most were sitting around outside camping areas, laughing and joking with their friends. It was a nice sight, and one that instantly raised the question of why so many people, like himself, had just accepted this new world? There really should have been more panic, or at least resistance. You couldn¡¯t get most people to change their lunch order without a fight, so why were they all so happy to be told their world was now a magical place filled with monsters. He once more forced the thoughts to the back of his head. They wouldn¡¯t help him now. ¡°Excuse me¡± he approached one of the parties having an campfire further in. When they looked up he continued. ¡°I need just 1 monster kill to finish a quest up, could you please offer any thoughts on the best direction to go?¡± The group all looked at each other before one man stood up. The guy was clad in a light metal armour. And when he stood Tyler saw the large wooden shield he had been sitting on. ¡°If you just need the one, then head straight from the towns path. Most people avoid it because there¡¯s only level 1 stragglers, so it¡¯s not worth their time. Unless you need them to be a certain level?¡± He waited until Tyler shook his head before continuing ¡°that¡¯s your best bet then lad, best of luck to you¡± he slapped his hand against Tyler¡¯s shoulder as he said it. Tyler thanked him and took off, determined to find his prey. Chapter 7 ¡°You think he will be alright?¡± Amber chewed her lip, a nervous habit the entire team recognised instantly. While they may not all have been friends, they had all spent enough time around each other over the years for certain traits to be obvious. Paul, the teams archer and self declared leader, snorted. ¡°On the last day of the tutorial, doesn¡¯t even know where the goblins are, and is still on the single monster quest? Nah he¡¯s dead for sure. Probably won¡¯t even live long enough to see the goblin that kills him.¡± He never even saw Davids punch coming until it hit him in the arm. ¡°What did you have to say that for? Now she will want to follow him to play guardian angel¡± Amber scowled at her team mates. Unlike them, she wasn¡¯t so comfortable with the idea of her fellow humans being killed left and right simply because they weren¡¯t lucky enough to be here with people they already knew. She had been terrified when the guild had first assigned her as a warrior, and had only started to calm down after bumping into Mark in the merchant area. He had sat with her, explained how these things worked in the video games and books he read, then suggested she spend her money on a healing spell and join him in a party. That way she could get experience but wouldn¡¯t have to fight monsters herself. It seemed ideal. They then found Laura, Amber''s twin, who was already with Paul & David. The 5 of them had all been students together in high school, and while it had been a couple of years, they knew each other enough to make partying up to survive the madness of their new world a logical decision. Now as they approached the end of the tutorial, they had each made it to level 6, completing numerous quests each day. The money they earned had gotten them each armour or weapons to suit what Mark called their combat class, and despite certain comments, she had managed to level up with the others, healing their wounds after each battle. She also healed others in the general camping area each night, charging 5 copper each time at Paul¡¯s insistence. ¡°Come on then.¡± Amber looked up and saw Mark was already looping his giant wooden shield (called a kite apparently) over his left arm. He looked over and smiled at her. ¡°He seemed like a decent enough guy, and I wouldn¡¯t want his death on my conscious either. We will keep him alive until the end of the tutorial, then he can take it slow and catch up with everyone else once everyone is out hunting for higher ranked monsters. Its only been 7 days after all, not like we have years of experience ourselves.¡± She quickly hurried to her feet, brushing off the dry mud that had collected around her armour, before joining him. To her surprise Laura also got up. ¡°What? Even if I don¡¯t overly care about some random guy, a few more kills is just extra experience at this point. I still need over 1000 experience before I get to level 7, that¡¯s a lot of goblins. Might as well kill a few now if you are heading out anyway.¡± Hearing her words, the other 2 grumbled and also climbed to their feet. Amber frowned but didn¡¯t argue. She was glad for the extra combat strength, but didn¡¯t like that her party were so happy to leave some poor man to die. He only looked a little older than them, and if she hadn¡¯t been lucky enough to find Mark then she could be in the same situation he was right now. She wasn¡¯t sure, but if he was rushing out to complete the quest this late, maybe he had been told by the guild that everybody had to complete at least one? With the entire party now geared up and ready, they set off along the main path. As they had told the stranger, hardly anybody walked this route anymore. The goblin patrols were all level 1, with no higher ranked members in the groups. If you went off to the sides you could find some level 3, or in the deeper parts they had met several level 4. Even for the parties lower levelled than her own, fighting only level 1 goblins was a waste of time. ¡°So do you guys think it will be all goblins back on earth?¡± Groans filled the group. ¡°David I swear, how many times do we need to go over this. None of us know anything. Hell, Earth could be nothing but goblins. We could go back and find all our towns and city¡¯s overrun with 3 foot tall goblins. For all we know, there could be a goblin orgy on your bed right now.¡± Laura didn¡¯t have the most patience, even back home. After a week of camping in a forest, with no cosmetics, well it was fair to say she was quick to anger. The look of horror that came onto David¡¯s face made his thoughts on that comment obvious, but before he could comment he was interrupted. ¡°Form up!¡± Mark suddenly shouted. Sure enough there was a group of 5 goblins off to the left of their path. Clearly a patrol just wondering into the area. ¡°Lets deal with them quickly. We don¡¯t want to get left too far behind.¡± The team split into their usual fight positions. Mark at the front, with David just behind him. Amber, Laura & Paul all stayed at the rear with range attacks or healing support. Using his oversized shield, Mark let the first goblin club come. His shield absorbed the weak attack, and in a move practised time and time again, David used the opportunity to stab his sword forward and end the goblins life. While this was happening, Laura had launched her own attack, wind blade, and Paul fired an arrow off. As quickly as the fight had started, the 5 goblins had dropped to 2. Not wanting to be left behind, Mark stabbed his own sword forward and ended the penultimate monster, and a second arrow from Paul ended the fight entirely. As expected, level 1 really wasn¡¯t much of a challenge. ¡°Er, is everyone okay?¡± Amber''s nervous question her first input to the fight. ¡°Yeah we are good Amber. These things are too low level to be an issue for us. Save your mana until we catch up with the newbie. He might need your best.¡± Mark smiled at her as he answered, while the others just stayed silent. Amber wasn¡¯t stupid, she knew she wasn¡¯t putting as much in as the others when it came to the fighting, but Mark had pointed out that all of them had needed her healing at some point, and that as the monsters got to higher levels, they would likely need it more and more. Still the fact that even her sister seemed to resent her for it really didn¡¯t help her confidence. ¡°Lets get back to it. Every second we waste standing around is another that poor guy could be in trouble.¡± Mark said, already on his way back to the path. Only Amber, who was at the very back, saw the glare Paul was giving him in reply. The party battled 3 more random patrol groups before they finally called a stop. ¡°This is crazy now. There¡¯s no way that guy came this deep into the forest. He must have gone off the path, otherwise we would have seen him.¡± David¡¯s caused Mark to run his hand through his hair, before turning to Amber. ¡°He¡¯s right, the guy probably saw a straggler goblin nearer the camp and went off to deal with it. Even if he didn¡¯t. We should have seen some sign of him by now. We all levelled up our strength at least twice, so our walking speed will be faster. Plus our stamina recovery means we haven¡¯t had to even pause for the last hour. I say we head back.¡± Amber bit her lip, but nodded. She knew her party was probably right. Even if they weren¡¯t, she at least knew they tried to save him. That helped. ¡°Great, well at least we all got a little more experience. It all helps.¡± Mark¡¯s eternal positivity was a true bright spark for Amber, but the scowls everyone else gave told their own thoughts. Without another word, the party turned and headed back to the camping area. They had journeyed for around half an hour when it happened. A rock came in from nowhere and impacted with the back of Marks head. ¡°Shit, attack!¡± David called, as he scrambled to pull his sword. While the others panicked and started their own combat preparations, Amber had already started running to Mark. Diving to her knees beside him, her healing spell was already ready and waiting and she didn¡¯t hesitate to cast. There was an ugly wound on his head, with blood pouring from it. ¡°Get him up, we need his shield¡± Ordered Paul, pulling back his bow and firing. ¡°Fucking hell there¡¯s dozens of them.¡± Amber reapplied her spell, grateful to see the wound knitting together as she did so. Her instincts told her without healing magic Mark would probably have died and she had to use all her willpower to force back a sob at the thought. ¡°Amber look out.¡± Laura¡¯s voice was shrill. And Amber turned just in time to see why. A rock was flying toward her. As fast as she could she moved, but sadly it wasn¡¯t enough. The rock collided with her flailing leg, instantly breaking it. She screamed from the pain, unable to focus on anything else. Desperately she tried to heal herself, only to remember she couldn¡¯t do that yet. Healing spells were limited to others until D rank. Trying not to cry, but knowing she was failing, Amber did the only thing she could. Her dive hadn¡¯t taken her far, and she could still touch Marks foot. Reaching out, she pushed her healing spell into him again and again, until finally she heard him groan. Depleted on mana, and in shock from a broken leg, that was Amber¡¯s last contribution to the fight. Exhausted on a level she didn¡¯t know possible, she fell to the floor, and blacked out. A case of literary theft: this tale is not rightfully on Amazon; if you see it, report the violation.While this was going on, her teammates were in a fight for their lives. Goblins were swarming out of the surrounding trees. They were thankfully still low level, and were so clumped together that Laura¡¯s wind blade spell was actually killing several at once, but it wasn¡¯t enough. David was dancing around his two ranged attack party members, stabbing and slashing desperately as he killed anything that got close. ¡°We need to find where those rocks are coming from¡± Paul barked as he released yet another arrow. Thankfully the quiver he brought was a type of spatial storage. It cost 5 silver, but that was paying for itself now as he took out goblin after goblin. They were so grouped together he barely even had to aim. For the first time he regretted his weapon choice, knowing that killing one at a time wouldn¡¯t cut it here. Out of the corner of his eye he saw Mark starting to stir ¡°Mark get your ass over here.¡± The tank, as he insisted on calling himself, was now on his hands and knees, clearly disorientated. ¡°Mark, theres no time for that we need you.¡± Finally he looked up and seemed to realise the shit they were in. Taking an obvious inhale, he grabbed his shield from the floor and climbed to his feet. Before he moved, he spotted Amber and fell once more, immediately taking her pulse ¡°She¡¯s alive.¡± The others weren¡¯t sure if he was talking to them or himself, but it didn¡¯t matter. ¡°That¡¯s great, but we won¡¯t be without some help Mark. We need your shield if any more of those rocks come.¡± He nodded and hurried over, joining David in shielding the two ranged fighters. ¡°I¡¯m low on mana.¡± Laura¡¯s words killed the brief optimism the group felt at having their 4th fighter back up. ¡°Here.¡± Mark pulled his short sword and handed it to her. ¡°At least it will keep you alive. Pointy end at the green things please.¡± Laura scowled at the sword, but accepted it. She clumsily swung it towards a nearby goblin, nearly slicing her own ponytail off as she did. ¡°No, Laura do like David usually does. When I block a goblin, stab them from behind me. Quick in and out okay?¡± ¡°Incoming¡± Paul shouted, the group spun to see ahead and sure enough another rock was flying in. Mark rushed to the front and braced his shield, taking the full impact as it pushed him back on his knee. When his leg was stable her turned to Paul. ¡°We need to deal with whatever is throwing those. If we don¡¯t this is going to end badly¡± Paul nodded, knowing that was true. ¡°Okay we push forward as a group, leave Amber here. If we are lucky they will think she is dead and focus on us. Either way, there¡¯s not much we can do right now.¡± He said that mainly for Mark, who he knew would be against the plan. To his surprise, there was no argument, only grim acceptance. With Marks shield at the front, ready to protect from any incoming projectiles, the team relied mainly on Daniel and Paul for their kills, with Laura trying to contribute when she could while her mana slowly recharged. Despite the massive numbers, far greater than any they had seen before, the party was making progress, leaving more and more goblin corpses in their wake. All the while Mark stayed ready, protecting his party members whenever another rock would come flying their way. Each time the part would adjust their direction, determined to take out whatever was targeting them from afar. After what felt like the thousandth rock was deflected, Paul finally spotted their foe, a goblin easily 3 times the size of its brethren. Now that it was within range, he questioned their decision to hunt it out. Maybe fleeing would have been the better solution. ¡°Laura, any mana you have left aim it for that big guy. Mark and Daniel protect us while we aim ranged attacks.¡± He didn¡¯t wait for an answer, loosing his first arrow and already preparing another. The arrow struck true, straight though the monsters oversized chest. Sadly it didn¡¯t seem to have a huge effect, the monster actually didn¡¯t even seem to notice he was hit. Laura¡¯s wind blade soon followed, and that at least left a visible mark. ¡°That¡¯s all I have left until I recharge.¡± Paul cursed and continued firing arrows. ¡°Okay let¡¯s take out all the little ones quickly, then deal with the boss as a group.¡± They agreed and started chopping down goblins, all the while the giant simply stood and watched. Like he didn¡¯t care his fellow monsters were being killed, and was just waiting for his turn to fight. Finally, the 4 party members stood panting, surrounded by piles of goblin bodies. They were exhausted, but still had the giant to kill. ¡°Okay usual style, but Mark shield both Laura and Dan. I¡¯ll hang back and do as much damage as I can. Try and target his chest area, it¡¯s already damaged so it might be weaker.¡± As soon as Mark raised his shield, the giant grinned and drew a club seemingly from nowhere. The first impact, a seemingly casual downward swing of the oversized weapon, tested every fibre of Marks now increased strength. The shield took the blow but forced its wielder down onto a knee just to stay alive. Not missing his chance, Dan drove his sword forward, leaving a wound that logic dictated should be fatal. Laura¡¯s own attack, far less polished, left a scratch along the goblins arm but did nothing else. ¡°Everyone back up.¡± Marks words were audibly strained, as he clearly struggled to right himself. The goblins next swing, a little wilder and almost like a baseball bat from the right, once again made contact with the shield. This time however Mark didn¡¯t have the ground to brace himself, and lacked the strength to absorb the blow. As the club made contact it simply kept going, and Mark found himself flying several feet away. Despite this, Daniel darted forward and stabbed again while the skin was still swinging away from him. Rather than dart back, he followed up his attack with a side step so he was behind the monster, hoping to split its focus. ¡°Laura focus on dodging. Paul aim for an eye or something.¡± Daniel focussed on his opponent, not checking to see if anyone actually listened. He knew Mark would be trying to get back up, but he doubted it would help. Whatever this monster was, it was clearly a much higher level than them. Thankfully it was slow, which meant they could dodge it¡¯s attacks rather than absorb them as they had practised. When the next club swing came down, Daniel stepped back and dodged it, letting the goblins attack throw it off balance, and once more stabbed with his sword. He was a little proud to see Laura had also attacked, clumsily swinging Marks short sword and leaving another cut along the monsters back. Before that wouldn¡¯t be anything, but they were fighting in a world with health points. Every attack at least did something to whittle them away. If they could keep dodging they might just stand a chance. Mark was now finally on his feet, but clearly not up to doing much else. He was leaning heavily on his shield, using everything he had just to do that. Sadly Dan couldn¡¯t help his friend, and instead concentrated on the fight in front of him. The goblin was strong, but evidently stupid. It swung the oversized club around with little care for accuracy, and seemed to put all its weight behind each swing, leaving it open for quick attacks from the two swords. Finally it was beginning to visibly struggle, the sheer number of wounds on its torso clearly having an effect. Laura made another slash with her borrowed blade, missing the torso and instead leaving a cut down the monsters exposed thigh. This left her off balance, and Dan honestly wasn¡¯t sure if the goblin aimed its next attack, or if it was just reacting to Laura¡¯s own sword, but it kicked out and landed a heavy blow against the young mages stomach. Laura had little to no protection, and went flying through the forest, the impact coming so quick she didn¡¯t even have time to scream. Mark roared as he saw this, finding strength from somewhere and charging the monster. Daniel tried to back him up, but any thoughts of strategy or co-ordinated attacks were gone from the tanks mind as he swung his shield as an offensive weapon over and over, pummelling the large goblin. For the first time Dan had a chance to catch his breath and realised what was missing. ¡°That useless piece of shit¡± Paul had obviously used their fight as a distraction and fled. Daniel readied his sword and joined Mark in his attack, carefully targeting already injured areas. Despite its superior strength and level, the goblin monster could not defend from two motivated attackers in its now injured state. If it had been even a little more intelligent there may well have been options, but goblins, even larger ones, were low tiered monsters, limited and incapable of higher reasoning. Before long it had died, leaving two exhausted warriors to collapse into a pile of notification screens. Sadly only one of those mattered [Party member Laura Wilson had been defeated] Chapter 8 As the seconds counted down towards the end of the tutorial, Tyler found himself joining a growing crowd behind the guild building. At first he had simply watched from afar, but as the hundreds of adventurers continued to converge, it became more and more clear that somebody was guiding them. Having killed his final monster, a simple level 1 goblin that felt rather anti-climactic given his earlier battles, Tyler had headed straight to the guild to hand in the 2 completed quests, and accept his rewards. A final rushed monster quest did hold some appeal, but he decided against it, settling instead for a final run through the merchants stores. The pay outs for each quest, not to mention selling the wyvern corpse, had been substantial to say the least, leaving Tyler with a frankly ridiculous amount of coin to spend. Given the warnings that the merchants would be restricted to what his own planet could product after the tutorial, he had splurged. The biggest purchase, costing 20 silver, was a replacement for his ruined cloak. This new one was so good, Tyler found himself surprised it still classed as F rank. In addition to its style, the all black hooded robe was something from his childhood star wars fantasy''s, it carried multiple enchantments. Temperature regulation, meaning he could wear it in the hot or cold comfortably, self-repair, meaning he shouldn¡¯t have to replace it, and best of all, concealment. This last enchantment made it so as long as he was wearing the cloak, nobody at F rank could scan his stats. His trip to the spell crafters had been, informative. Rather than loading up on combat spells, Tyler had instead gone for utility in an effort to ensure his survival [Spell: Analyse F-1 learned] [Spell: Aura Control F-1 learned] [Spell: Purify Water F-1 learned] [Spell: Cleanse F-1 learned] [Spell: Detoxify F-1 learned] [Spell: Mana Sheld F-1 learned] Despite the merchants obvious glee as Tyler handed over 3 Gold coins, he maintained that this was a good deal. The spells all had a solid benfit and would save him money in the long run. The problem was levelling them up. Despite their excessive use over the tutorial, neither fire nor water arrow had risen from F-1 rank. That wasn¡¯t a big deal in and of itself, it had only been a week after all, but cleanse and detoxify especially he wanted as high as possible. Earth was apparently going to be an E ranked planet when they were sent back. That meant both F and E ranked monsters. If any of the E ranked monsters had poisons or something similar, he wanted the ability to clear them. His bodies natural healing was so good that he didn¡¯t think injuries would be a problem, but a strong poison could still kill him. Aura control was the most unique spell in his new repertoire. Unlike the others, it did not need to be cast. Instead the second he learned it, the spell activated. Standing in the middle of the merchant floor, he was momentarily forced to his knees as he suddenly felt the presence of thousands of other beings. Every being with mana would by their very nature, project an aura. Unless you had an aura power, like his new aura control, then you would never know. His power would not only allow him to sense other people or monsters around him, but also exert a certain level of control over how his own aura was released. As it levelled up, the merchant assured him that he could retract it almost to the point of being impossible to detect. He had rounded out his shopping trip by adding a third storage ring, this one full to the brim with various food options, and finally the blacksmiths. Unlike earlier in the week, Tyler was now fairly confident with his sword. He wasn¡¯t great, not by any stretch, but he was good enough that he knew he would be sticking with it as his primary weapon. He had therefore brought several copies of his existing blade to keep in his inventory, just in case he ever damaged one. The wyvern fight had made it clear that was a real possibility. He had briefly hoped for some form of enchanted sword, or at least one that offered some form of perk, but the smith had killed that dream quickly. While magical swords did exist, they could only be made by blacksmiths and enchanters who had reached at least C rank, and even then it was difficult unless they had invested in growing their mana pool. As a result, the blades were treasured items to those that owned them, rarely available for sale. His best bet was apparently to climb the ranks and prove himself to a strong clan. Tyler had no idea what a clan was, but the smith simply smirked and ushered him out the door when he asked. That was how Tyler found himself sitting against the town wall, randomly using his analyse ability as people walked past. The results had been a little shocking, with the highest level he had so far seen being level 6. Tyler was only level 10 himself, but he knew the amount of XP needed in those 4 levels alone was huge. It took a lot of mental effort to not allow himself to get cocky. It was, he told himself, quite possible the higher levelled people were still out hunting, or relaxing somewhere else. It was as he analysed these people that he originally noticed the growing crowd. He slipped in with the final few stragglers, just in time for the increasingly familiar screen to pop up in front of everyone there. [Tutorial complete.] [Your performance will now be evaluated] As that screen minimised, an older man stepped out onto a balcony above them. Dressed in what appeared to be the male version of the guild receptionist uniform, he walked with an air of authority that defied his small height. While Tyler couldn¡¯t analyse from this distance, and suspected it would fail anyway based on levels alone, he was fairly certain the man was a dwarf. That opened up serious possibilities, and he battled the sudden elf based fantasies that popped into his mind. ¡°Good evening participants, and congratulations on surviving the tutorial¡± If you encounter this story on Amazon, note that it''s taken without permission from the author. Report it.His voice was deep and Tyler assumed he must be using some form of magic to ensure it carried so far. ¡°For those of you that have not seen me before, I am Khemel Steelblade, the guild master of this facility. This means it falls to me to give you your final briefing before returning you to your planet to begin your new lives in earnest.¡± He looked around the crowd, centuries of training allowing him to easily pick out the ones that be most likely to gain some level of success. Khemel hadn¡¯t given up reaching the pinnacle, but had taken the guildmaster job on reaching C rank at the behest of his clan. Didn¡¯t mean he liked it though. ¡°Now, you were all informed that while you were here with us in the tutorial, your planet was been activated, and forcibly ascended to E rank. This is true and has been completed, however, there was one part that was not shared. The tutorial planet is subjected to powerful temporal magics. I won¡¯t waste time with long winded stories, all that matters is that for every day you have spent here, nearly 1000 years have passed on your planet.¡± He waited while that settled through the crowd, before finally calling out for silence ¡°This does not change the job in front of you. The planet is the same, only much older in order to process the levels of mana it now produces. Now with that amount of time, obviously any structures or infrastructure that may have been there before, will be long gone. In addition, the various magical beasts have had centuries to build nests, establish hunting grounds or just breed like an incubus celebrating his ascending. Now when I signal, you will receive your rating for how you performed during the tutorial.¡± He stopped speaking, and nodded to the woman standing behind him. All of a sudden Tyler¡¯s focus was pulled as the screen appeared once more. [Evaluation complete] [Tutorial performance ranked as: D] [5000xp awarded] [Title: Tutorial:D awarded] [Tutorial:D - D rank performance during Project MICHAEL tutorial. +1 to all stats] Tyler found himself cursing a little. He had killed over 1000 monsters, including a wyvern. Risen to level 10. Still he only got a D rank. He hoped the scale was different than earth schools, as otherwise he had failed. Looking around at the other faces, he clearly wasn¡¯t the only one. Nobody looked happy. Still +1 to all stats was a decent enough reward. Wanting to see what that actually meant, he pulled up his stat screen
Character Sheet - Tyler Allen
Gender Male Race Unique*
Level 10 Class Warrior
Karma 0.00 Ranking F??
Titles
Tutorial: Rank D |
Health 4000 Health Regeneration 150/s
Stamina 4000 Stamina Regeneration 150/s
Mana ++++ Mana Regeneration 750/s
Constitution 7 Vitality 6
Strength 7 Endurance 6
Intelligence 7 Wisdom 6
Spells & Abilities
Sword mastery F-1 | Water Arrow F-1 | Fire Arrow F-1 | Analyse F-1 | Aura Control F-1 | Purify Water F-1 | Cleanse F-1 | Detoxify F-1 | Mana Sheld F-1 |
He had barely finished reading through when the guildmaster began speaking once again ¡°You have 5 minutes before the transfer back to earth happens so quiet down and let me finish.¡± He waited until everyone was silent before starting up once more. ¡°As I said, your planet is now returned to the wilderness, it is the home of beasts first and foremost. When you are transferred back, the various guild sites that have been home to your people for the last week will also be transferred. It will be up to you to locate the nearest guild. In addition to the guilds, the towns will be lightly populated by various peoples like myself, who have volunteered to serve positions while your planet establishes itself into the wider universe. These will be guildmasters, crafters, or if your planet shows promise, clan houses. Clans are a key part of the wider universe, grouping together individuals to pool resources and rise the ranks together. Typically anyone over E rank will be in a clan. Let me make this clear now, the clans are law. If a clan establishes itself on your planet and takes leadership of your town, you will expected to follow that clans rules as if you were a member. If the clan exiles you, then you will have to move. It is therefore in your best interest to not piss anyone off, lest you regret the consequences later down the line.¡± Once again the crowd broke into conversation, questioning what he had just said while not really knowing anything about it. ¡°One final warning before you return. You may think you have power now. You do not. You are children about to dive into a world many times greater than you can imagine. My advice, find a guild office, hunt monsters, craft, whatever. You must level up. One year from today, the portals will open. This will allow others to travel to your planet, or if you are strong enough, you to travel elsewhere in the universe. You do not want to be under level 25 when this happens. Best of luck.¡± He turned and walked back inside, but as soon as the crowd started shouting questions, the screen appeared once more. [Tutorial complete] [Planetary transfer: Initialising] [5¡­] [4¡­] [3¡­] [2¡­] [1¡­] [Transferring to planet: Earth] Announcement So as most will have guessed, this was my first attempt at writing something. I possibly may have rushed myself forward on to enjoy the Writathon, which i don''t regret because this has been a valuable learning experience. For now, i am putting this on hiatus, but it will be back. I''ve found myself losing a lot of sleep so i can sit up on the laptop writing out ideas on where i want this to go, so when the series returns the first few chapters will be changed, but the overal story will be the same. The idea is one that has been in my head for a few years and i''ve loved getting even the little i have written onto paper.If you encounter this story on Amazon, note that it''s taken without permission from the author. Report it. Thank you all for the feedback i''ve recieved, and for those of you who took the time to read my first attempt. i''ll be back soon enough and i hpoe you will take the time to read Tyler''s adventures when i am. Untill then Sanderling