《A Blacksmith's Tale. A LitRPG Story》


 Chapter 1 - Acquisition

    January 3rd, 2039


    Kyle Marin set his coffee on his desk and tossed his backpack onto his office chair. The bag had set the chair slightly off balance and it swung around so the back of the chair was pointing towards him. ¡°New year, new opportunities.¡± He said to himself as he draped the jacket over the back of the chair. It had been nice of the company to give everyone a late start. It was only coming in at 10:00 instead of 8:00, but it was still nice.


    Kyle had trained to be a game designer. He¡¯d always been a gamer at heart and figured that it¡¯d be fun to do that for a living. For the most part, he had been right. Mokro is his first job out of college and it paid enough to cover rent, student loans, and some fun money for the weekends. He¡¯d even been able to start up a retirement program with Mokro where they matched the first five percent.


    The work had been harder than he had thought it was going to be though. More coding and programing than gaming. Not too surprising though. It took years to make a game and that was only the beginning. Companies needed to keep a small army of people working on the title to make sure that it worked properly. Let alone when they wanted to expand the game.


    Kyle got in with Mokro when a recruiter had come to his college during his last semester. She had talked about the room for growth at the company and all of the latest technology that they would utilize. Not that he had any doubts that he would be applying. Kyle saw the Mokro Arts logo every night when he logged onto Arella Everlasting. It had been a brand new release at the time.


    He did his internship at Mokro Arts. His department was responsible for working on bugs that had made it into the game and fixing them. To be honest, it had been a lot more tedious than he thought it was going to be. His absolute favorite bug caused the player that just opened a treasure chest to burst into flames. This would have been a great trap idea and they were actually working on saving that piece of the bug. The problem was that for about a week, Kyle and four of his co-workers had opened and looted a chest. Then, they would note if they burst into flames, the contents of the chest, the character¡¯s inventory, the character¡¯s equipped items.


    They had repeated this process so many times, Kyle actually considered passing up treasure chests when he found them playing Arella Everlasting when he was playing at home. He didn¡¯t of course, but he had considered it. It ended up being a very strange combination of players having a certain ring equipped on the left hand, having so many coins on them, and the chest containing a specific piece of armor. This resulted in one less bug in the game and a new high level trap in certain dungeons. This had also gotten him hired on after graduation.


    A few months later, people in suits started meeting with the CEO of Mokro Arts. This wasn¡¯t unusual, but there had been more meetings than normal. The people themselves didn¡¯t seem like your normal marketing or game industry types. Tension had been high at Mokro Arts ever since. Lots of rumors going around. Most people said that the company was going under. Another popular rumor said that the Mokro Arts was now the property of Russia, Japan, or some other country. Some of the more depressing rumors had the company bought up by the competition for the hardware and software rights. That would mean that everyone was looking for work and not just having someone else sign their checks.


    This was not helped when each department had done a fresh round of drug screens and background checks. Kyle had lost a few friends as a result of those. Good guys that had made a poor choice over the weekend.


    His boss had made a point of assuring him that everything was going to be alright. All he had to do was keep up with his job responsibilities and not break any laws. She had been right. They had announced that Mokro had been acquired, but there were not going to be layoffs. Heck, they had even received a Christmas bonus.


    Kyle had settled in with his coffee and turned on the computer. Once he had put in all his identification, an urgent calendar notice popped up on his screen. There was a company wide meeting starting in the conference room in twenty minutes.


    He took a long drink from his coffee. It looks like last month¡¯s mystery would be sorted out here in the next few minutes. Kyle glanced through his emails and didn¡¯t see anything pressing, so he got up and made his way to the third floor conference room.


    The conference room pretty much took up the entirety of the third floor. It was often used for whatever the company currently needed. Before Christmas break, there had been stop motion actors in this room filming their parts for a few new cutscenes


    It had been a great day. They sent out an email saying that the actors had agreed to stay to have lunch with all the employees. He had pulled down his three promotional posters and made sure that he made it to lunch early that day. Kyle has felt like a complete fanboy, but it had been worth it. On the poster for the Aspen Order, he now had King Graven¡¯s signature. On the poster for the Scaled Dynasty, he had the signature for Empress Anacara. Well, the actors that portrayed them at any rate.Stolen from its original source, this story is not meant to be on Amazon; report any sightings.


    Kyle had sat down in the middle of the conference room while daydreaming about the autographed posters back at his desk. The room was slowing filling up with programmers and testers. He straightened up and started to pay attention when he finally focused on the front of the room. The long table at the head of the room included all of the senior executives, the company¡¯s CEO, two group conference speakers, and one older man dressed in a military dress uniform.


    Kyle watched his coworkers come into the 10:30 meeting. Most were in good spirits thanks to the day¡¯s late start. It was interesting to watch their expressions as they went from a loose informality of the day to an anxious quiet as they noticed the dark blue uniform of a Space Corps General.


    As the last of the programmers were seated, the head of marketing stood and clicked on the microphone attached to his suit jacket¡¯s collar. ¡°Hello everyone, I¡¯m Charles Elm. I know that you all have heard rumors circulating last year about the company being acquired. I¡¯m also sure that the nice bonus you received for the holidays should have put you at ease about us downsizing or closing the doors. I¡¯d like you all to welcome our guest, General Colin Edwards.¡± He then sat back down and started the room in polite round of applause.


    The General stood and tapped his microphone. He then clasped his arms behind his back and stood at parade rest. Unlike the head of marketing who moved around a bit during his introduction, General Edwards could have been a statue. The dress uniform of the Space Corps was modeled after the famous Dress Blues that the Marines are known for. The main difference was the pants were completely black and the jacket was such a dark shade of blue that it may as well have been black as well. The white accents of the General¡¯s medals stood out dramatically against his chest.


    ¡°As of Midnight on December 31st, Mokro Arts is now a subsidiary of the United States Space Corps. As Charles mentioned, all of your jobs are safe. We have no desire to purchase a building full of virtual reality design equipment. We wanted the men and women with the know how that was able to create and maintain Arella Everlasting and take it to the head of the market just six months after launch. I can tell that you are all very confused as to why Mokro Arts is now a subsidiary of the USSC. I will make one thing clear. You are not enlisted, nor have you been drafted. If you have pulled your head out of a VR helmet in the last decade, you should be aware that there has been a push to establish a presence in space. We have developed the technology to create a terraforming operation on the moon and Mars. We have the ships to get us there. We have the crews that will be able to run the stations and support our troops.¡±


    ¡°The problem comes with getting our troops there. While it only takes three or four days to get to the moon, Mars is a different story. In an Explorer class ship, it will take six months to get to Mars. The fully loaded terraformer will take an estimated twelve-eighteen months to get there depending on the ending mass. Having to provide living quarters and the weight of the provisions would increase that exponentially. It will save us a lot of fuel, space, and time if the crew was in cryo during this time. Our long term goal would be to get to Saturn¡¯s moon, Titan. That would take over seven years for a space vessel to even make it there¡±


    The General took a moment to reach down and take a drink from his bottle of water. A few of the programmers shifted in their seats while the General was taking his drink. One of them towards the front raised their hand and started speaking immediately. ¡°I still don¡¯t understand. Are you wanting us to program in war bond advertisements or something into AE?¡± General Edwards set down the bottle of water. ¡°Definitely something. Cryogenic hibernation is a new technology. The developments show that the technology is viable and the initial tests have been completed. Our first volunteers went under cryo for forty eight hours. When they were woken, they were very disturbed. They told us that they were aware of every moment that they were under. It turns out that the mind is not asleep like we originally believed. forty eight hours is a very long time to be alone in your own mind. Eighteen months of that would drive most people insane. That is to say nothing of the years it would take to get to Titan.¡±


    ¡°Your goal is to continue making this game viable to the public. You will work with our scientists to develop a way to integrate the game into the cryogenic hibernation capsules. Also, you will need to make this game interesting enough to suit all manner of players. While a large number of members of the USSC will be interested in playing the game as it is, many will have very little interest in sword swinging. There will need to be other options for them as well. Remember, that these individuals will be inside the world that you are crafting for months to years at a time. ¡°


    ¡°Not too much will change from your normal work here last year. You will be getting new colleagues from the USSC that will be working with you to assist with any changes that need to be made to the game to make it compatible with the capsules. They are programmers like yourself, so they can help you make any adjustments to the game itself that have been suggested by our research on what the members of the USSC would like to have included to the game aside from the current magic and swords. Thank you for your time.¡±


    The general walked back to his spot on the desk and sat down with the directors. Charles stood back up and clicked his microphone. ¡°Thank you very much everyone. Please head back to your departments and you will have a meeting with your department heads to talk about any changes that will need to be made. This is going to be an amazing year!¡±


    The mood seemed mixed as the employees got up and made their way through the office building. Some were talking excitedly and gesturing with their hands to the heavens. Others were grumbling darkly about never wanting to be part of the military. The majority seemed to be saving their opinions on how things developed and wondering what will happen when their new colleagues arrived. Kyle just stared at the general and shook his head in amazement. He was going to be working with space marines!

 Chapter 2 - Lunch with the Lawsons

    April 10, 2039


    Aaron Lawson stared at the point of the french fry waving back and forth in front of his nose as his brother was trying to get him to join in on his latest plan. They were eating out at the local fast food chain with their wives and Aaron¡¯s youngest daughter, Valerie, after the morning service at church. Mack Lawson stabbed his fry into his chocolate milk shake before continuing.


    ¡°Seriously though, they are making big changes to the game and I think this would be a great time for you to get back into gaming. The VR has gotten so much better since you played Eventyr¡¯s Lair. I mean, they have been dropping big hints during log in that things are going to be different soon. Since the USSC has gotten involved, they completely revamped AE! Most of the quests and adventuring and all is about the same, but they made all the townsy stuff more intricate. That¡¯s where I figure that you can come in!¡±


    Aaron¡¯s wife, Marie, turned her head from her conversation with her sister-in-law and joined our conversation. ¡°Mack, what are you trying to drag my husband into this time?¡± Mack¡¯s wife, Ann answered. ¡°He¡¯s going on about Arella Everlasting. If he¡¯s not on duty, he likes to shoot critters online with his bow and arrow.¡± She pantomimed shooting a miniature bow and made a pew-pew sound effect.


    Valerie grinned at her aunt as her uncle Mack pouted. ¡°First off, it¡¯s a crossbow.¡± He balanced a french fry on finger gun to be the crossbar of his crossbow ¡°Twang! Second, this isn¡¯t going to be so much of Aaron here playing a game as getting a second job to help support his family.¡± Ann rolled her eyes, ¡°Here we go.¡± Mack continued on, completely unphased. ¡°Like I was saying before I was so rudely interrupted.¡± He said, drawing out the word rudely. ¡°AE has been completely changing the towny stuff and Aaron here was the biggest sap for the townsy stuff when we played Eventyr¡¯s Lair. They have made making crafting a huge part of the revamped game. There¡¯s actually good money in it.¡±


    Marie looked confused, ¡°How would him making game money help his family at all?¡± Valerie jumped in on this one while she was flipping through pages on her phone. ¡°Arella Everlasting has a way to convert money into the game money. One of my friends at school is actually doing it for a part time job. She said she made $200 last week collecting flowers and stuff for potions. She plays as a drop dead gorgeous elf with green hair.¡±


    Mack looked impressed, ¡°That¡¯s good money for herbs. Sure beats me working here when I was in high school,¡± he said as he pointed to the back where they were making the burgers. ¡°What I was thinking though is you can start up a blacksmith. You can make some really impressive weapons and armor in AE. With the new changes, a good smith can make gear that is better than most non-raid gear.¡± Marie sighed and looked at Aaron for clarification. ¡°A raid is when you have to get a bunch of people together to fight a really tough boss. That¡¯s when they drop the really good armor, weapons, and quest stuff.¡±


    Aaron sighed and shook his head ¡°Look Mack, I appreciate what you are doing and all, but I don¡¯t have time for games anymore. With work and the kids, I haven¡¯t been able to play much of anything since Eventyr¡¯s Lair and that was about two decades ago!¡± Mack raised his eyebrow. ¡°John is away for college. I think he¡¯s probably ok. Valerie here is 17. She has a job, a car, and a 4.0. I somehow doubt she will crumble if you plug in your old VR helmet. Before you bring it up, yes, your old VR helmet will work for AE. Marie will be more than happy to have you out of her hair for a while so she can have some peace and quiet. The only thing that you will squawk about is that the monthly fee has changed a bit since you played Eventyr¡¯s Lair a few decades ago. Since you¡¯ll be playing in a helmet, it¡¯s only a bronze level subscription which is $200 a month. That will not be a big deal though, since you are going to make all kinds of money as a blacksmith.¡±


    ¡°Like always though, the first month is free. To seal the deal, I have worked with one of the guys in my guild. You can apprentice under him as a blacksmith. You can work for him doing grunt work, learning smithing, and he¡¯ll pay you $10 an hour. Then as you get better at smithing, you can make some serious coin and more importantly, make me some of that high level gear!¡± Having put forth his ironclad argument, he nodded to Aaron and Marie and chomped into this cheeseburger.


    Marie shook her head. ¡°That just doesn¡¯t make sense. Why would your friend pay him $10 an hour and how could Val¡¯s friend make $200 picking virtual flowers? It sounds like this game would go out of business in a few months.¡± Mack nodded. ¡°You are completely right. There is a lot of money floating around. Quite a bit of it being cashed out. What you are forgetting is that everyone is paying $200 plus per month depending on their account type. Not only that, there are ways to put money back into the game. If you need the gold coins for whatever, you can transfer it directly into the game. Everything in the game requires gold. You get hurt in a fight? You need a health potion. You can heal yourself? Great, you probably need a mana potion. After that fight, your weapons and armor are beat up and you need to pay a blacksmith to fix it up for you.¡±This story has been unlawfully obtained without the author''s consent. Report any appearances on Amazon.


    ¡°As for blacksmith¡¯s like Aaron, when he is going to need materials for everything he makes.¡± Mack spilled out his fries across the table, leaned a chicken nugget next to a cup of ranch, and then pulled his plastic knife out of it¡¯s cutlery packet. ¡°When he finally gets around to forging the legendary blade, Nugget Slayer, he is going to need to get a barrel of The Lady¡¯s Blessed Ranch to quench the blade in.¡± At this, he dipped the plastic knife in the ranch cup and made a hissing sound. ¡°However, he will need a small army to get past Evil King Nugget¡¯s army of fry zombies and kill King Nugget himself! Each person in that army pays so much per month, will need so many health or mana potions, then need to have their armor repaired. Only then, can Aaron make Nugget Slayer!¡± Mack turned and offered the ranch covered plastic knife laying horizontally across his two palms.


    Valerie picked up Nugget Slayer by the handle and turned to her dad. ¡°I think it would be pretty cool if you could forge Nugget Slayer. Mom and I would be fine. You should definitely make some magic swords and take us and John to Hawaii.¡± Marie was smiling at that thought. ¡°It has been far too long since we¡¯ve been to the beach. Let alone Hawaii. If you are going to be playing though, we can¡¯t have you spending your every waking moment plugged into that helmet like you did back while we were dating. I almost killed you. A few week nights, you can have Saturday after the yard, but you are mine on Sundays.¡±


    Mack clapped his hands together loudly, drawing several glances from the other people in the restaurant. ¡°It¡¯s official! The boss approved. We¡¯re coming over and I want to help get you started. The set up will be a bit clunky with your old helmet and I want to make sure you don¡¯t make some dumb class.¡±


    Aaron finished the last few bites of his chicken sandwich. ¡°Well, I guess I have a part time job making armor for Marie and Val¡¯s trip to Hawaii and making arrowheads for Mack. Should we start this afternoon?¡± Mack reached out and snached up the evil King Nugget and tossed him in his mouth. He gave a thumbs up as he started in on the fry zombies.


    After the zombie horde had been dealt with, the families got into their cars and programmed in the route to get to Aaron¡¯s house. Then, everyone settled back to enjoy the ride and the afternoon. As the autopilot navigated them out of the parking lot, the windshield synced with Aaron¡¯s phone and displayed his search engines. He had about ten minutes after leaving the restaurant before he got home to research this game that he never paid much attention to.


    The two cars pulled up to the house and parked themselves automatically before he had a chance to do much more than confirm that Mack was correct about the game¡¯s economy and how it could be cashed out for real money. The doors swung open and everyone climbed out. Val walked straight into the house staring at her phone and typing away to her friends. Mack walked over to Aaron and tossed his arm around his shoulders. ¡°You¡¯ll love working with Brok. He will work you into the ground, but you¡¯ll really pick up the skills. Soon enough, you can make me this griffin claw crossbow that I¡¯ve had my eye on.¡±


    Aaron grinned. ¡°I¡¯m glad that you have my best interests at heart. So, I haven¡¯t looked into EA much since I didn¡¯t have time to mess with any of that. Is everything pretty standard for a fantasy MMO?¡± Mack shrugged, ¡°Pretty much, you have all your standard races. Human, elf, dwarf, orc, dragonkin, naga. There are alliances, but it¡¯s not really a team vs team or anything. Each race can be good or evil depending on how you want to play. The server I play on has safe zones in the cities and free for all out in the mid and high level areas. If you really want, all of the cities have arenas. I know you said the whole Player vs Player thing was never your scene. There are ten classes, but I think you should do a melee class. As a blacksmith, you need strength and constitution more than anything. It¡¯ll be a bit different from your necro on Eventyr¡¯s Lair, but you will make due.¡±


    Marie looked over at the guys. ¡°Do you even still have that helmet? I thought that we tossed all the junk years ago.¡± Aaron nodded, ¡°I know she moves in, your stuff moves out. You kept some of your stuff and I kept some of mine.¡± Marie looked over at Mack ¡°Can we hook this one up to one of the monitors in the man cave to his tablet? I want to have a good seat as he makes Excalibur.¡±


    They all walked into the house and Ann glanced down the stairs that lead to the man cave. ¡°I get enough of that at home. Marie, I¡¯m raiding the fridge and taking over the TV.¡± Ann walking into the kitchen as everyone else went down stairs.


    Aaron went over to a tote of old mementos. Digging around in it, he smiled as he pulled out a few of the different things. ¡°Marie. Come over here.¡± Once she arrived, he handed her an old action figure with a red cape and a faded stuffed dog. ¡°Remember the kids dragging these things everywhere? I ended up paying the receptionist at work to fix up Mr. Fluffins when Valerie accidentally tore his tail off. John was so mad when this guy lost his hammer. I¡¯m pretty sure that was the biggest tantrum that he ever had. Never did find that thing.¡± Tossing aside his high school yearbook, he pulled out his old VR helmet and control sticks. ¡°I knew I kept it in my mementos box. I had a lot of good memories with this thing stuck to my head. Not to mention, only God knows how many hours I¡¯ve been wearing it.¡± Marie bent down and picked up his class ring. She slipped it on her finger and rotated it around her finger like she did with it back in high school. ¡°It¡¯s good to have memories.¡± She gently placed the stuffed animal and action figure back in the tote. ¡°Come on. I haven¡¯t seen your brother this excited about something in a while. I¡¯m surprised he¡¯s not bouncing.¡±

 Chapter 3 - The Race to Hawaii

    April 10, 2039


    Mack had been working on the tablet in Aaron¡¯s basement rec room. He had pulled up the Arella Everlasting¡¯s website and filled out a good portion of Aaron¡¯s info to get him started. ¡°OK, come over here and finish all the personal info. Then, put in a card number. Only the first 30 days are free after all.¡± After punching in all his information, the screen shifted over and showed a fantasy scene of human warriors, elven archers, a snake person that Mack said was a naga, and an ax wielding dwarf fighting a horde of zombies. Horns played from the speakers of the tablet.


    ¡°Fire up the helmet and we can sync it up with the tablet. I¡¯ve already synced it up to that monitor. That way Marie doesn¡¯t think you¡¯ve lost it when you¡¯re swinging the control sticks around and screaming like a little girl.¡±


    ¡°You are going to want to level up some at least in order to advance very far in your trade skills, like blacksmithing. The cap is 5 skill levels per 1 character level. Most people don¡¯t actually get caught up with that, but you probably will. First however, you need to start up a character. Any thoughts on what you want to select?¡±


    Aaron pushed the begin adventure button under the battle scene and a character select option came up. There were two spaces for characters and a bank icon. Out of curiosity, he clicked on the bank icon. It opened up showing his balance in game currency. It looked like they stuck to the platinum, gold, silver, and copper that was such a classic in the fantasy genre. ¡°This is where you can transfer money into and out of the game. Each coin is made up of 10 of the lesser types. 10 copper for a silver, etc. As for taking money out of the game, a silver is $1 and there is a 10% fee to the developer. Give to Caesar what is Caesar''s¡± and all that.


    Marie glanced at Mack. ¡°Have you ever put money into the game?¡± Mack glanced up the stairs. ¡°Only once, there was quite a bit involved in my quest to get my dog Siri. At that time, my guild didn¡¯t have the manpower for a specific raid boss. I needed to hire a few mercenary players. I pulled an afternoon of special duty and figure that was enough to divert a bit of that into gold. It ended up being about $150. He¡¯s worth it though, pretty much acts like a tank and lets me solo quite a bit. Such a good dog.¡±


    ¡°I¡¯ll let you know when I pull money out and we¡¯ll talk about it before I put anything in.¡± Aaron said. Marie patted him on the cheek. ¡°Such a good husband. Unlike some I could think of.¡± She said as she punched Mack on the shoulder.


    Mack cleared his throat. ¡°So traditional character stats. Strength for melee damage. Intelligence for spell caster mana pool, how much mana you have, and the ability to create something new. Dexterity for precise movements and ranged damage. Wisdom is spirit based mana pool, how fast the mana regenerates, and general street smarts. Constitution is your endurance and your hit point total. Charisma is your charms. Obviously, black smithing is a LOT of strength and constitution.¡±


    Aaron cracked his knuckles and sat down in front of the tablet. ¡°Alright, time to make up a blacksmithing tank!¡± Aaron reached out and tapped on the icon of a wand crossed over a shield in the bottom left corner to start the game. The screen changed and showed a tall human male with a muscular chest. His shirt partially open showing off a lot of his tanned skin. Val came downstairs with a two liter of fruit punch and a stack full of plastic cups. She poured one and handed it over to her mother. Looking at the monitor connected to the tablet, she shook her head. ¡°No. No Dad. Just No. You are not going to be a boring human. Jen said that everyone is a human or an elf. If you are going to stand out in this job and get us to Hawaii, you need to have some style.¡±


    Mack looked at her with mock offense. ¡°Hey, I¡¯m playing as a human. Though, she does have a point. Making amazing armor and weapons is a big part of it, but you have to be able to sell it too. If I¡¯m out looking for a merchant to buy from, you may want to be different than all of the other human and dwarf smiths to stand out a bit.¡± Aaron tapped on the human male. A window popped up underneath the human with different bonuses that he would get.


    Strength of man: 5% one handed sword skill learning speed.


    Well balanced: 10% increase to dodge.


    Chemist¡¯s delight: 5% alchemy skill learning speed.


    Tapping the arrow to the left, the human turned on his heels and walked off the screen to the left. A short dwarf male walked in with greyish skin and a beard long enough to be tucked into his belt. Tapping on the dwarf, the window came up with the dwarf¡¯s bonuses.


    Dwarf¡¯s best friend: 5% one handed ax skill learning speed.


    Stone skin: natural armor of 5.


    One with the stone: 5% increase to crafting skills when using stone.


    ¡°So, why would a lot of people us a human or a dwarf to be a blacksmith? It doesn¡¯t seem like either one would be significantly better at it than anyone else?¡± Aaron looked over to Mack. ¡°Well, to be honest, it¡¯s mostly just looks. I think the stats that I read said that about half of the people that roll up a new character choose a human. The human starting city is really nice and it¡¯s got a good playpen.¡± Seeing the confused look on Marie¡¯s face, Mack clarified himself. ¡°All of the races start in their own city. There are a few other random outposts, but it¡¯s primarily the six major cities. A playpen is where all the baby characters first start playing like Aaron¡¯s level 1 blacksmith. As for why a lot of the smiths that are not human choose dwarf is just respect for the fantasy classics. When you think of a forge most people think of a dwarf.¡±Unlawfully taken from Royal Road, this story should be reported if seen on Amazon.


    With a tap, the dwarf tromped off to the left. From the right side, an elven male strolled in. He had the traditional pointed ears and shoulder length hair. Marie whistled, ¡°He is a pretty boy. Wouldn¡¯t it be fun be him and run your fingers through your hair when you¡¯re not fighting. Oh! You could put it up in a man bun!¡± Val started laughing as her mother teased her father. Rolling his eyes, Aaron tapped on the male elf bringing up the racial bonuses.


    Elven eyes: 5% increase to ranged damage.


    Mystic defense: 15% damage resistance against magic.


    One with nature: 5% increase to crafting skills using natural components.


    Val shrugged, ¡°An elf could be cool. A lot of the old stories have famous swords made by elves.¡± Aaron rocked his head side to side noncommittally. ¡°It¡¯s an option, but let see what else is out there.¡± With a push of a button, he sent the elf walking off to the left. A very large orc walked in next. The orc was built like a champion from the bodybuilder competitions. His dusky grey skin was covered in black tattoos. Marie glanced at Aaron. ¡°It looks like strength and endurance wouldn¡¯t be an issue with that guy. Looks like he could lug around his own anvil if you want to smith on the road.¡± Aaron nodded and tapped on the orc. The racial bonuses came up in the display window.


    Overpower: 5% increase with damage for any two handed melee weapons.


    Grit: 5% more hit points.


    Nothing is wasted: 5% increase to crafting when using components harvested from animals or monsters.


    Aaron shook his head. ¡°I can see this guy being a powerhouse, but I¡¯m going to be working on crafting more than anything. This guy will be tearing through enemies and making armor out of their bones.¡± Mack shook his head. ¡°Not necessarily. That bonus gives them a bonus on leather working as well. A third of all classes use leathers. I do.¡±


    Marie looked slyly at Mack. ¡°I had no idea that you and Ann were into that kind of thing.¡± Val¡¯s eyes widened. ¡°Mom!¡± Mack just smiled and made a sound effect like a whip as he snapped his hand forward. Aaron drank from his cup to hide his grin and pushed the button to send the orc walking after the elf.


    A dragonkin walked in next. A dragonkin was a large humanoid reptile. He was covered in green scales, head to toe. The head was elongated and kind of reminded Aaron of a turtle¡¯s head. It stood on two legs and had a long thick tail. He rotated the model around. ¡°I kind of thought it would have wings.¡± ¡°Nah.¡± Mack commented. ¡°Could you imagine how it would throw off the game balance if one of the races could fly? There are a few levitation type spells, but there is no flight yet.¡± Aaron tapped one of the other tabs on the screen and the dragonkin changed. His face and head structure seemed to sharpen. The scales changed colors from green to a red. A few more clicks changed the scale colors from red to black to silver to gold to white. ¡°It follows the old pen and paper set ups. The colors are the evil dragons and the metallic are good. The scales of the dragonkin are based off of the dragon that formed them. Game lore says that the dragons formed an egg out their blood and clay. Then out hatches the dragonkin. For everything from slaves to soldiers to simple companions.¡± A click on the white dragonkin brought up the racial bonuses.


    Dragon¡¯s breath: breath weapon based on dragon heritage type. Damage increased with quest rewards.


    Dragon scales: natural armor of 5.


    Dragon¡¯s horde: 5% increase to crafting skills when using metals.


    Pointing at the last bonus, Aaron looked back over his shoulder to Mack. ¡°Look at that! There is no way that everyone wanting to do blacksmithing isn¡¯t choosing one of these guys. It literally gives them a bonus to using metal.¡±


    Mack sighed. ¡°Ok, I guess we¡¯ll get into some of the deeper game mechanics here on the character creation page. Each tradeskill has it¡¯s main skill and a racial version of it. Since we¡¯re talking about blacksmithing, let¡¯s just go with that. All of your normal hammer and anvil stuff is the main blacksmithing skill. Then, you get a racial twist to it. You saw how the humans get bonuses to alchemy. I saw a guy¡¯s dagger in auction that has a poisoning status to it because he quenched it a specialized poisoned oil during the smithing process. Orcs can make weapons out of bones that are just as hard as steel. Same with dwarven stone and elven woods. Do you know how embarrassing it is to be beaten down by an elf with a wooden sword? Besides, you still have another one to choose from.¡±


    A tap on the computer tablet sent the Dragonkin off to left. In slithered the next choice from the right. All of the others had been humanoid. This one, not so much. He pretty much looked like an anaconda that had arms towards his head. The head itself was actually more human than the dragonkin¡¯s had been. There were very fine scales covering his face and normal snake scales covering the entire body. There were mesh nettings along the length of his body. Val looked to her uncle. ¡°Why is the snake man wearing fishnet stockings?¡±


    Mack corrected her with a grin. ¡°Stockings would be two of them. Since there is only one, I¡¯d say it¡¯s a fishnet stocking. Pretty much though they using those as a way to justify an armor slot. If I could choose a human that gets to wear pants with armor and stat and magic bonuses or this guy who can¡¯t wear anything in that slot, not many people are going to play as a Naga. So they have these nettings that are magically as strong as steel. Yes, that plays into the racial bonuses. Go ahead and bring those up.¡±


    Snake¡¯s scales: natural armor of 5


    Constrict: A crushing and stun attack. Damage increased with quest rewards.


    Serpent¡¯s weave: 5% increase to crafting when using weaves or knots.


    That means that they can weave and knot metals, ropes, and stuff into weapons and armor. So yeah, one of these guys with a net and trident are super annoying. They wrap you up with their net and tail and then poke you full of holes. Meanwhile, you are stunned and wrapped up twice.¡±


    Aaron spun his chair around to look at Mack. ¡°So, I¡¯m not allowed to be a human or dwarf. Marie will never stop teasing me if I¡¯m an elf. So, I¡¯m down to the reptiles and the orc. Snakes kind of creep me out, so I¡¯ll drop the naga. Both of other options sound pretty cool, but I don¡¯t think you can beat that bonus that the dragonkin have. I know you said bone weapons and all that, but I think the dragonkin is the winner!¡±

 Chapter 4 - Creating a Blacksmith

    April 10, 2039


    A tap on the tablet sent the Naga off to the right of the screen and brought back the Dragonkin. This time it came out with golden colored scales. Aaron tapped on the scales option on the character creation. He counted ten different varieties as he cycled through. Five shades of different colors and five types of metals. When he stopped on one the description of the breath weapon would change. The red scales that he was currently changed the breath weapon to fire and the face had a vicious looking glare. The Green Dragonkin¡¯s breath weapon was poisonous gas and his face looked cunning and cruel.


    ¡°So these are the evil dragons.¡± Aaron mentioned to Mack? ¡°Exactly. Like you saw, each one has it¡¯s own flavor of breath weapon. The metallic dragons are good and they all have a breath weapon that corresponds with the chromatic ones. Gold with Red. Silver with White. Copper with Black. Bronze with Blue. Brass with Green.¡± Aaron tapped over from the Green scales to the Brass scales. Sure enough, the breath weapon remained at a cloud of poison, but the Dragonkin seemed to lose the cruel aspect and simply looked cunning.


    The Bronze Dragonkin looked pretty interesting. He had the look of one of the ancient statues that was found from the early civilizations and the body was lean and athletic looking. The entire body seemed like it was designed for speed. The breath weapon on the screen had changed to lightning.


    The Copper Dragonkin was also on the lean side, but it seemed to be the lean of an intellectual rather than an athlete. The copper scales were that deep reddish color and looked pretty impressive. The breath weapon for this Dragonkin was a spray of acid.


    The Silver Dragonkin made Aaron pause. He was more powerfully built than the others were and had an air of authority in the way the Dragonkin swayed on the screen. He seemed like he should be in charge of a corporation or something the way he seemed to survey area. The scales shown as a freshly polished silver. The breath weapon had changed to a cone of subzero air.


    The last of the metallic Dragonkin was the Gold. The scales were the shiny yellowish color that matched the ring on Aaron¡¯s finger. This Dragonkin was built like Aaron imagined a warrior should be. It had huge muscular arms and a barrel of a chest. He also had the look of a ruler about him, but where the Silver looked like a business tycoon, the Gold looked like a Viking Chief. The breath weapon was now a blast of fire.


    Val rolled her eyes ¡°Dad. You are not thinking about being a fire-breathing dragon are you? We¡¯re going for originality remember?¡± Aaron glanced over at her. ¡°Actually, that¡¯s exactly what I¡¯m going for. This guy already looks like a great warrior. He¡¯s built like a brick house! Not to mention, I have a plan for that fire breath.¡±


    Moving down to the facial sliders, he played with options for a few minutes giving him a slight ridge of little spikes above the eyes and larger spikes along the back of the head. He played with the shading along the neck and it turned a darker shade of gold. ¡°There. Now, I¡¯ll fit in with all the bearded dwarfs at the forge.¡±


    The class select tab opened up to warrior. When the warrior icon, a sword against a shield, was present, it showed an additional attack option called kick. With a huge smile on his face, Aaron quickly switched over to the Naga race and brought up a warrior. Sure enough, it had the kick attack. He turned back to his brother. ¡°They have finally done it! They taught a snake to kick!¡± This inside joke got a laugh from Mack and a blank stare from everyone else.


    As Aaron went back to the Dragonkin and reset the parameters for the Gold Dragonkin he was working on, Mack explained that the kick is just a tail strike. ¡°It¡¯s still a kick though.¡± Aaron concluded with a shrug.


    Back at the class select tab, he went past warrior to cleric, then druid, then rogue, then wizard, then back to warrior. ¡°Five classes? I thought you said that there were ten.¡± Mack nodded. ¡°More game mechanics it is than. Everyone starts with one of the five base classes. Then at level 5, you can keep the base class and get even more advanced with that or you can branch off into another class. I play as a ranger. That¡¯s a cross between a druid and a warrior. I started off as a warrior and branched towards druid. That way, I have pretty high martial skills and some nature based magic and skills. However, I could have done it the other way around and started as a druid and branched towards warrior. That way I would have some martial skills and more nature magic.¡±


    ¡°So are they both rangers?¡± Aaron asked. ¡°Yeah, it¡¯s just a different focus. My play style is heavy on melee and ranged attacks with magic back up. Siri is essential too of course. Most of the other classes are a base class mixed with a warrior. That¡¯s how you get rangers, paladins and arcane knights. Wizards and rogues get a side class instead of a combo. That makes bards and summoners. You could go down memory lane with a summoner and focus on the undead.¡±


    Aaron shook his head. ¡°Nah. That was fun and all, but this is a new character. Plus, you said that I need to focus on strength and endurance. Not exactly helpful if you want an intelligence based caster. I know all the rest of them, but what is an arcane knight?¡±


    Mack nodded understandingly. ¡°That one is pretty cool. That is a combo of a warrior and a wizard. They are pretty much a martial class that can charge their weapons. Instead of shooting a fireball, they light their swords on fire. They also have ice, lightning, and a few other ways to charge their weapons. They can do a few other things like invisibility. Pretty neat class. A few of the people in my guild are arcane knights and they say that it¡¯s a fun class to play. Same thing, you can start as a warrior or a wizard and end up with a more or less magical version of the arcane knight.¡±


    Aaron decided to start his character as a warrior. He could always go to an arcane knight or something at level five if he wanted. He pulled up the name field and typed in his go to character name. Mack looked over his shoulder and started grumbling when the system took it on his first try. ¡°That is so not fair! I had to change mine!¡±


    Mack tapped a few more keys on the tablet and laughed. ¡°I know that I said that I researched it to be sure, but I¡¯m still surprised that they will take your old helmet. It is synced and ready to play. Just so you know though, you are about fifteen years behind with this model and you are going to be getting old graphics, lags, and sub-par sound. The control sticks should still be ok. Those things haven¡¯t changed much at all. If you like Arella Everlasting, you really should get an upgrade. At least you kept up on the tablets though. If you had a tablet to match, you wouldn¡¯t be able to run it at all.¡±This book is hosted on another platform. Read the official version and support the author''s work.


    Aaron pulled on the helmet and started adjusting the volume knob on the control sticks. ¡°Marie, talk a bit for me please.¡±Aaron, dinner is done. Stop playing with the goblins and get up here. Don¡¯t forget to pack a lunch for the dungeon.¡±


    Mack glanced from Marie to his brother. ¡°Did you get the volume up enough to tune her out?¡± Then, he dodged back as she took another swing at this shoulder. Aaron nodded. ¡°Enough to hear the game over the TV, but not loud enough to end up sleeping on the couch. Perfect. So, where do I end up when I hit start?¡±


    Mack looked a bit embarrassed. ¡°Their city is called Tarakoa, but I¡¯ve only run through it once. I was actually planning on just going home. Then, I¡¯ll log in, hook you up with some gear, and get you over to Makazi. That¡¯s the outpost on a pretty sizable island where Brok works out of.  He¡¯s not online on Sunday, but we can get you acclimated and maybe get a level or two. It¡¯s got a decent playpen are too actually. Wait till you see the first area.¡±


    Aaron shook his head. ¡°Thanks, but I think I¡¯ll check out my starting city for a bit. I always enjoyed the first few levels of starting with nothing and it being a big deal when you get anything at all to fill an empty slot. Just pumped that it has a point or two of armor, let alone stats. Besides, I¡¯m no Twink.¡±


    Mack gave him a strange look before he remembered that Aaron couldn¡¯t see it while in his helmet. ¡°Yeah, no one actually says that anymore. That¡¯s fine though. They usually have newbie armor quests now. Hit start so you can set up your stats.¡±


    After pressing the continue option, his Dragonkin came up with the statistics page. All six of his stats were showing at 5 with 10 points that he can assign to what he would like. Mack turned and started talking to Marie. ¡°Here is where Aaron can give himself a nice boost, make himse boringly flat, or shoot himself in the foot. Will he toss all 10 in strength and constitution like a good meat shield? Will he go super charismatic to charm people into buying an extra sword? How about intelligence and learn all the ins and outs of blacksmithing.¡±


    Aaron laughed to himself and put 3 points into strength and 3 points into constitution. He thought for a little bit and then put 2 points into intelligence. Mack made a mocking gasp. ¡°It looks like Aaron might be looking into the arcane knight path.¡± Finally, Aaron put 1 point each into Wisdom and Dexterity. ¡°Poor Charisma, always ignored by the tanks. Well, except for paladins. If you are sure, push the finish button and you are good.¡± Aaron pushed finish and his new Dragonkin came up.


    Name:  Lexen


    Race: Gold Dragonkin


    Class: Warrior


    Gender: Male


    Armor: 5


    Hit Points: 40


    Mana: 35


    Strength: 8


    Intelligence: 7


    Wisdom: 6


    Dexterity: 6


    Constitution: 8


    Charisma: 5


    Abilities


    Dragon¡¯s breath: breath weapon based on dragon heritage type. Damage increased with quest rewards.


    Dragon scales: natural armor of 5.


    Dragon¡¯s horde: 5% increase to crafting skills when using metals.


    Skills


    Kick: 6 damage. Chance to interrupt spells or stun.


    Equipment


    Honors


    Looking over her uncle¡¯s shoulder at the tablet, Val sighed. ¡°Dad, kicking is your only skill.¡± After a good laugh at his brother¡¯s expense, Mack shook his head. ¡°That certainly is true. AE wise however, that will all come with time. First time he starts bashing some critter over the head with that chunk of rusty metal, he will get one hand slashing. Then light armor, when it bashes back. Well, if he were wearing armor. Right now, he¡¯s pretty much going to be running around in a towel. Brok is usually off on Sundays, so you actually get to play today instead of work.I¡¯m going to head home to make sure that the yard trash doesn¡¯t give you too much trouble. Val, would you mind being copilot for your old man?¡±


    Val was texting back and forth with her friends, but she shrugged. Mack pulled up a site on the tablet and ran a quick search. ¡°Ok here you go. These eight links here are the quests for the newbie armor. Help him find the person who issues the quest, what he needs for the quest, and where to find it. I¡¯ll be on in about an hour. See you soon.¡± He grabbed her by the shoulders and kissed her head. Mack gave Marie a hug and smacked Aaron on the back. ¡°See you in there.¡± Then he ran up the stairs. A few minutes later, Ann yelled her goodbyes down the stairs. Then the door upstairs closed and Mack and Ann were on their way home.


    Marie pulled up a chair and sat down next to Val. ¡°Aaron. If you hit me with one of those control sticks, I¡¯ll beat you.¡± Aaron laughed about it, but still took a few steps back. Pushing the start option, his screen filled with a large cityscape.


    The city of the Dragonkin was filled with large and majestic buildings. Each one seemed to have different metals incorporated into the buildings. They were used for everything from structural supports to accents. What really impressed Aaron was the people. Seeing and designing a Dragonkin on the character creation screen was one thing, but to see computer controlled NPC Dragonkin standing around or walking on patrols was something else entirely. Then, there was the players. It was mostly other Dragonkin running around from shop to shop, out the front gates, and in from the front gates. Each person had their name floating above their head. A lot of them had a guild name immediately after that. There were a few Humans running around as well and even a Naga slithered by.


    The scene changed as if moved through the streets filled with Dragonkin and moved into a large building. It went down a flight of stairs and into a hatchery. There were large alcoves filled with eggs the size of watermelons and pits full of sand with the newly hatched Dragonkin children moving around. Passing this area, the scene settled on an elderly looking Silver Dragonkin.


    ¡°You have done well in your training. You are now ready to go and survive on your skills. You have the potential to make your heritage proud. Lexen, as a warrior of Tarakoa you should report to the Steelscale barracks. They will help you start your journey. Bring us honor hatchling.¡±

 Chapter 5 - Into Arella Everlasting

    April 10, 2039


    Mack walked up the stairs and into the living room. Ann was sitting on the couch drinking from a bottle of water. ¡°Ready?¡± Mack asked her. ¡°Nope, I need to see what house they choose.¡± Glancing at the tv, Mack recognized the host of Ann¡¯s favorite real estate show. This was one of the lunar editions.


    With a sigh, Mack sat down on Aaron¡¯s recliner. ¡°Why are we watching this?¡± He pointed to the tv as they extolled the virtues of the third location at the Capella Colony. Ann took another drink. ¡°I¡¯m doing research for work. You never know if one of my clients suddenly wants to sell and go lunar. I need to know the going rates and styles.¡± Defeated, Mack slumped in the recliner and propped up his feet.


    Five minutes later, Mack and Ann walked out of the house and into their car. As soon as the door closed, Ann turned to Mack. ¡°How¡¯d it go?¡± Mack opened up the navigation system and clicked on the home icon. He settled back and grinned. ¡°It went a lot better than I thought it was going to. I knew it was going to be easy to get Aaron on board. As soon as he gets a day or two in, he¡¯ll be hooked. By this time next week, he¡¯ll be researching how to make different weapons and armor. What I was worried about was Marie. She could have kabashed the entire thing. We lucked out bringing Val there. She is the one that made the difference today.¡±


    Ann gave him a look. ¡°Luck huh? Interesting that I picked her favorite fast food joint to go to for lunch and invited her. Let¡¯s get home so you can make sure he has a good time tonight. I¡¯ll call the boss. Mission complete.¡±


    * * *


    Val¡¯s voice could be heard over the background music. ¡°Alright Dad. It looks like you want to head to the barracks on the north end of town like he said. Inside, there is a Red Dragonkin named Commander Harvin. He¡¯ll have all of the armor quests for you. Next to him, Sub-commander Avel will have a quest for a cloak and sword.


    Using the directional pad on the control sticks, Aaron backed up from the Silver Dragonkin and went about figuring out how to control the character. Different buttons had him jump, duck, draw and swing his sword, sheath his sword, kick, breath fire at the wall, and open up his character sheet. Twisting a dial let him control his Dragonkin¡¯s arms by moving his own. ¡°Ok, I think I¡¯ve got the basics. How¡¯d it look to you when I breathed fire?¡± he asked his audience.


    Val spoke up. ¡°It did look pretty cool. The monitor is set for first person, so we see you duck down a bit and then the bottom part of the screen is on fire. My friend said she is playing and is going to swing by and buff you.¡±


    Marie asked Val to set the monitor from first to third person point of view. ¡°There we go. I like the idea of seeing your Dragonkin run around rather than what you are looking at. Are you done down here?¡±


    ¡°Yeah. I¡¯ll play with the fire breath later. Tell Becky thanks for me Val. Let¡¯s head out and see about getting some gear.¡± He opened the door to the room and ran up the stairs and out of the hatchery. Once he got onto the street, he looked around a bit confused. ¡°Umm, can you bring up the options page and see if there is anything for a heads up display?¡±


    Val keyed a few things on tablet and Aaron saw the traditional three colored bars appear in the upper left of his view representing his health, stamina, and mana. After another few moments, a small compass appeared in the upper right pointing to the east. ¡°There you go.¡±


    ¡°Thank you Val.¡± He turned left and ran towards the north. After a few minutes of running through the streets, he saw a large building with a crowd of Dragonkin and few Orcs entering and exiting. The building looked like an airplane hanger. The front gate was guarded by a Bronze and a Black Dragonkin. After walking in, there was an ornate wooden desk with iron clawed feet in a room to the left. Behind the desk sat a muscular Red Dragonkin. As Aaron entered the room, he saw the name Commander Harvin hovering over the Red Dragonkin¡¯s head. Commander Harvin raised his head from the stack of paperwork and looked at him.


    ¡°Well well, what do we have here. It looks like another hatchling has come trailing eggshell into my office. Avel, why do they keep sending these hatchlings to me? It¡¯s like I don¡¯t have enough to do. Well, let¡¯s take a look at you.¡± He stood up and motioned to his left. Rising up from a similar desk, a Silver Dragonkin got up carrying a small book and both of the officers walked around Aaron.


    The Silver Dragonkin opened the book and checked things off as he walked around scrutinizing Aaron. ¡°He seems fit enough. I say we put him to work. The cook is complaining about not having enough meats.¡± Sub-commander Avel said and handed the book to the Commander. This narrative has been unlawfully taken from Royal Road. If you see it on Amazon, please report it.


    ¡°Alright. You heard Sub-commander Avel. The only person that you don¡¯t want to upset in this city aside from Avel and myself is the cook. An army marches on it¡¯s stomach after all. Go and get some meat for us. Outside of the gate into the city, there is a valley full of small prey. Go there and gather 10 beetle meat and 10 dragonfly meats. Do this and I¡¯ll give you piece of armor that will protect you while I send you out for more substantial meat.¡±


    The Silver Dragonkin tapped his chin for a few moments. ¡°I could use some assistance as well. I owe my mate some more spider silk. Fetch me 20 batches of spider silk and I¡¯ll give you one of the cloaks that she makes with them.¡±


    Aaron saw an icon pop up in the lower left corner of his screen that looked like an unrolled scroll. It was flashing with a golden light. He wondered if the golden color was the same for everyone, or if it was different for him since he was a Gold Dragonkin.


    As soon as he clicked the icon, the scroll unfurled and opened up to cover the entire screen. The top of the scroll read ¡°Quests¡± in a fancy medieval style of writing. The writing was fancy enough to look special, but not so out of place as to be illegible.


    Under the title, was two different quests. The first one was marked as the active quest. The quest was the one for the Commander. It was called Feeding the Brood. The non-active quest was called Supplies for a Cloak.


    Commander Harvin nodded. ¡°Alright hatchling, be on your way. If you can keep this up, we may be able to make a soldier out of you. Head out into the valley beyond the gate. You will find plenty of the large insects that we can use to help shore up the food reserves. Be mindful of the caves though, hatchlings that go in there don¡¯t come out.¡±


    ¡°Well Dad, it sounds like you¡¯ve been dismissed. Head out of the building and make a left. Go straight until you hit the big wall. Make a right and you¡¯ll find the gates. The notes on this page says that the guards will help you out if you get in over your head as long as you stay near them.¡± Val¡¯s voice could be heard over the speakers.


    After a few minutes of running around following her directions, Aaron found the gate. When he came around the corner and went out beyond the two large wooden doors studded with metal plates, he gasped. He could hear the girls mutter among themselves. Stretched out in front of him was a large valley. This valley was a beautiful lush green spotted with patches of trees. There was a large stream passing a few hundred feet away from the gate. There was a large stone bridge that arched up over the stream. There was one rather large thick tree that was growing up close to the wall of the city.


    As he looked closer, he saw a lot of movement in the valley. Everywhere he looked, there has large insects moving around. There were beetles crawling around that were the size of manhole covers. There were dragonflies zipping about that here an easy two feet long and six inches around. He could see other things moving past the stream, but couldn¡¯t quite make them out.


    Aaron pulled out the rusty chunk of metal someone called a sword. ¡°Well, let¡¯s see how this game work.¡± He focused on the nearest beetle and took a step towards is. This beetle was about two feet wide and about three feet long. It was shaped roughly like a leaf. It was a bright green color with black legs. The beetle had two large mandibles that looked like a jagged kitchen knives.


    Aaron ran over to the slammed the sword into the back of the beetle. When his sword hit the beetle, a small splash of green and a red 5 flew from the beetle and faded away after a second. It hissed and spun around to face him. As it turned, Aaron kicked the beetle in it¡¯s head, knocking a red 3 into the air. It stumbled back for a moment and he slammed the sword back into it for 4 hit points this time. He looked up and saw that it had a red bar over it¡¯s head that was just over a quarter full.


    Then, it leapt at him and latched onto his leg. It curled it¡¯s legs around his legs and sunk it¡¯s mandibles into his leg. He saw a red number 7 flash across his eyes. Aaron flipped his sword around and drove it down point first into the beetle for a large splash of ichor and a red 5 hit points of damage. The beetle twitched once and then fell off of Aaron¡¯s leg. As Aaron watched, a pool of green ichor was forming around it¡¯s body.


    ¡°Ewww, Becky didn¡¯t tell about that part. That¡¯s pretty gross Dad.¡± Aaron looked at the green Ichor dripping off of his sword and nodded his head. ¡°Yeah, let¡¯s take a look a look at the options menu again.¡± Marie tapped a few keys on the tablet and the options menu came up. When Aaron flipped through the menus, he found the different options that he was looking for. There was a slider labeled gore. It started at -10. It had markers for every two number up to 0 and then up to 10. It was currently set at 4. He dropped the slider down to 0. Then thinking about it for a moment, pushed it down to -2. Below that, the saw another slider for language. With a grin, he pushed the slider down to -2 as well.


    Looking back down, the pool of ichor was gone. Kneeling down next to the dead beetle, he tapped the beetle and a loot window opened up. Aaron breathed a sigh of relief. He was really hoping that he would not need to hack the thing open to get the meat out. The window showed beetle meat, a beetle leg, and a beetle shell. He clicked on all of them and they ended up in his inventory. The dead beetle faded away as soon as he looted the last piece of loot.


    Aaron looked over himself and didn¡¯t see a bag or anything, but the beetle parts was nowhere visible on his person. With a shrug, he pulled up his inventory and saw that the beetle parts were filling up three of his ten slots . Looking at the red bar, he saw that he had 33/40 hit points remaining. His experience bar had increased showing 25/1000. He walked over to the wall.  Sitting down, he leaned against the wall. After a minute, he checked and his health had raised up 37/40. He leaned against the wall for another minute and watched as a Black Dragonkin ran out of the gates. This Dragonkin was wearing a mix of steel armor and leather armor with a light grey cloak. The Dragonkin glanced around and then charged after a large rat that was walking about 50 feet away over by the trees. He pulled a large double bladed battle ax from his back as he ran.

 Chapter 6 - Karion

    April 10, 2039


    After a minute or so, the rat was dead. The Dragonkin bent down and started running a large knife over the rat. He stood up and put a pelt into the bag on his back. Then, knelt back down and finished looting the rat. Aaron was puzzled as to what he just saw, so he got up and walked over to the Black Dragonkin.


    ¡°Evening!¡± Aaron said as he walked up to the Black Dragonkin. ¡°Mind if I ask you a question? I¡¯ve been in the game for about 20 minutes now and was hoping to get a bit of advice.¡± The Black Dragonkin shrugged, ¡°Sure thing. What¡¯s on your mind?¡±


    Aaron pointed at another rat sniffing at a tree. ¡°Sorry for such a newb question. The one kill I have so far just had the loot pop up in a window. It looked like you had to actually skin that rat.¡± The other Dragonkin nodded. ¡°I¡¯m guessing that you¡¯ve only fought one of the bugs. It¡¯s easier to just show you. That rat would probably take you apart if you¡¯re a level 1. Go smack that one. I¡¯ll hang back until you can get it under half and then I¡¯ll jump in. That way you can loot it and will get the xp.¡±


    Aaron nodded. ¡°That sounds great. Thanks.¡± He ran up and hit the large rat about the size of a cocker spaniel. The red 5 still flew through the air, but there was no blood this time. It spun around and went to bit at him. Just like the first fight, he kicked the rat in it¡¯s head for 2 hit points as soon as it turned towards him. This gave him the chance to score another hit for 3 hit points against the rat. Shaking it¡¯s head, the rat launched forward and bit Aaron on the leg right where the beetle had bit him. A large red 12 flashed in front of his eyes. He heard the Black Dragonkin groan in sympathy. He slashed his sword back into the rat, knocking loose another red 5 and glanced up over it¡¯s head. It¡¯s health bar was at around 70%. It lunged at him again and Aaron was able to jump back out of it¡¯s way. He slashed the rat again for 4 hit points. The rat ran up and bit him again. A large red 10 flashed. Aaron kicked the rat and slashed it, breaking loose a red 2 and 4. This brought the rat under the halfway mark.


    The Black Dragonkin ran up and kicked the rat up against the tree. He pulled the two handed ax from his back and slammed it into the rat. It managed to bite the Black Dragonkin once before a second blow from the ax finished off the rat. He turned back to Aaron and glanced above his head. ¡°Lexen, that¡¯s not bad at all for your second kill. It took a few nice chunks out of you. As you can tell, my name is Karion.¡± As he said this, he pointed up to the name floating above his head.


    ¡°Go ahead and check the loot. Don¡¯t take it all though.¡± As Aaron checked, he saw rat meat and a rat tail, but no pelt. ¡°Ok, no pelt. Is it an uncommon drop?¡± Karion tossed him the large knife that he was using earlier. ¡°Try to loot the rat holding that.¡±


    Aaron knelt down next to the dead rat while holding the large knife. Tapping the rat, he was surprised to see a window pop up appear before him.


    Welcome to skinning! Approaching a recently defeated opponent while holding a skinning knife will allow you to take it¡¯s pelt, if you have sufficient skill. Larger or more complex creatures will take longer to skin. Be aware that you can be attached while you are skinning.


    As Aaron watched, a series of dotted lines appeared across the body of the rat. The lines followed a logical path of one had wanted to skin this creature. A cuff around each of the paws, a line up the back of each leg. A long line across the belly, and around the neck. When he placed the knife on the first dotted line, he heard a sound like fabric being cut. After about 30 seconds of tracing the lines, he was rewarded with a large rat pelt.


    Tapping the rat again, he collected the rat meat and rat tail. Glancing at his experience bar, Aaron was excited to see that it had jumped up to 125/1000. Taking down rats would be a nice way to level up quickly. However, it would have killed him after another bite or two and it would only be at a bit under half health. His musings were interrupted when another box popped up.


    Skinning: level 1. Please note that skinning is a trade skill. You can only have two trade skills that are over level 20 and one trade skill that is over level 75.


    Aaron heard clapping as he stood. Karion was applauding his success. ¡°I¡¯m impressed! I turned my first two times into leather strips and scraps! Here you get the full pelt on your first go. Follow me. I want to introduce you to some people who can help you with that.¡±


    He turned and started walking over to a building off to the right of the gate. The odd thing was that it was outside the wall and a good 200 yards away. The building looked about the size of a three car garage with two stories. There was a large outside work area that was covered by an overhang


    Never being one to waste an opportunity, Aaron started up the conversation and handed Karion back the knife. ¡°Do you know much about how the breath weapons work?  I wanted to use it against that rat, but I didn¡¯t want to ruin the pelt.¡±


    Karion stopped dead in his tracks. ¡°I didn¡¯t even think of that. It would make sense that if you doused the rat in acid, that it¡¯s pelt would be damaged. We¡¯ll ask Uncle James when we get there. If anyone will know, he will.¡±


    Now that they were getting closer, Aaron saw three Black Dragonkin moving around in the outside portion of the shop. To his surprise, Karion veered towards the river that was just down the hill.


    ¡°Uncle James and Aunt Molly run this place. Their three kids work here too. They don¡¯t go out and actually play the game much, but can you believe that they make enough money to actually have Aunt Molly do this full time? She makes some amazing leather armor. She can even make it magical. Uncle James has specialized in tanning and skinning. He prepares all the pelts and she works them. My cousins Jeremy and Michael help outside and Zoe is getting pretty good at making leather armor too.¡±


    By this point, they had made it down to the river and Aaron saw that there was a post by the water¡¯s edge with a few ropes that lead up to the shop. There was a small fence that was built along the shoreline and four wooden baskets laying against the fence. There were also metal hooks hanging from the ropes. Karion took two of these and handed one to Aaron.


    Walking over to the baskets, he picked one up and handed another to Aaron. ¡°Here you go Lexen. It helps out when you bring up a refill of water.¡± Filling up his bucket by the river, he started walking up the hill carrying the heavy basket, Aaron filled up his basket and followed up the hill.


    Once they got closer, two of the Dragonkin ran up to the railing around the outdoor work area. ¡°Hey Dad! Kari is here and he brought a friend.¡± The other Dragonkin waved. ¡°Hi Kari!¡±This novel is published on a different platform. Support the original author by finding the official source.


    Both of the Dragonkin were wearing similar outfits of a shirt and leather kilt.  One of the brothers was wearing a blue rough cotton shirt and the other brother was wearing the red shirt. Both of them had a leather apron with tool handles sticking out of the pockets on the front.


    Karion growled. ¡°Come on! It¡¯s Karion. I know you guys can read the name. It¡¯s floating right above my head!¡± With that reminder, Aaron looked above the two Dragonkin¡¯s heads.


    William.Tanner was wearing the red shirt and Mark.Tanner was wearing the blue shirt. James.Tanner walked up to the group while Karion and the brothers were arguing.  ¡°Hey Craig. Good to see you. Who¡¯s your friend?¡±


    Aaron stuck out his arm to shake his  James¡¯s hand. ¡°Good evening. The name is Lexen. Sorry if I¡¯m intruding at all. Your nephew is helping me learn the ropes. I saw him skinning a rat and he showed me how. Even let me borrow his knife.¡±


    James got a huge smile full of sharp dragon teeth. ¡°Did he now? Well if he only let you borrow the knife, let me get you one of your own.¡± He walked over to a small chest and pulled out a knife with a leather sheath. Pulling the knife free of the sheath, he flipped the knife around and showed Aaron the artistic word Tanner on the side of the blade.


    ¡°This way you will think of us when you are using your new knife. I have a few propositions for you Lexen. First, I will buy any rat pelt you get for 5 silver or 15 silver for a wolf pelt. If you do find anything more interesting, let me know and we can work out a price. If you are thinking of going into crafting, I¡¯ll swap you three raw pelts for one worked leather. My wife makes the most amazing leather armor. It is better than what you will find anywhere shy of a raid. She will make a deal for you if you are a productive pelt gatherer. Finally, if you bring me a fine person like yourself that will be killing all these rats and wolves for xp and quests I¡¯ll give you a referral bonus.¡±


    With that, he reached into his the back of his leather apron and pulled out a gold coin. The coin was a little bigger and thicker than a quarter. James gave a dazzling smile then yelled for Karion. Once he had his attention, he tossed the gold coin to him.


    James clapped his hands together and rubbed them briskly, ¡°So, you said you have a pelt right? Bring it over here and I¡¯ll show you our operations. I can see from your hesitation and how you are looking at the gold coin that you¡¯ve done the conversions. Yes, a virtual rat pelt is worth five dollars to me. Let me show you why.¡±


    Aaron held up his hand in a wait gesture. ¡°I¡¯m very interested and I certainly want the guided tour. I do have a few questions though, if you don¡¯t mind.¡±


    ¡°As long as I get to ask you one back, I¡¯m fine with that.¡± Aaron pulled the pelt out of his inventory. He unrolled it and both he and James looked over it.


    ¡°I hit this rat five or six times with my sorry excuse for a sword and Karion hit it twice with his ax, but the pelt doesn¡¯t even look damaged from the weapon hits. I wanted to use fire breath on it, but I figured it would ruin the pelt.¡±


    James nodded in understanding. ¡°They made this game realistic enough to be challenging and rewarding to us crafters, but not impossible. With the low level stuff it would be doable, but imagine how it would work against a big creature like a bear or something like a dragon. A fight like that would have a lot of people hitting it and more than a few of them would be using magic. William over there is a wizard. I¡¯ve seen him kill a rat with his acid breath and a gout of fire, I went and checked the body. All the standard loot was there and when I skinned it I got a clean pelt. So feel free to kill them anyway you can.¡±


    ¡°Anyway, my turn to ask you a question. Why are you running around wearing no gear at all?¡± James asked expectantly. Aaron heard his wife make some comment to Valery about her father being a streaker in his younger years. He could swear that he could hear his daughter¡¯s eyes roll.


    Aaron just shrugged. ¡°I¡¯ve only been in the game for about 30 minutes. All I started with is a chunk of rusty iron with a handle on it.¡± James glanced at his sons. ¡°When you started in the hatchery, do they still have the guy standing there to welcome you?¡± At my nod, he continued. ¡°You didn¡¯t talk to him. Did you?¡±


    ¡°No. Well, I guess that¡¯s what I will do when I get back to town after this.¡± James shrugged. ¡°It¡¯s nothing urgent. It¡¯s just a shirt and kilt, but it beats running around in just your loin cloth.¡±


    Karion walked up and joined in on the conversation. ¡°You know what would really help him out Uncle James? I think you should take that pelt and process it into a leather for him. I can take that leather and make it into a coin purse for him. Then, I can let him bum some coins for the gemstone that Aunt Molly will need for the conversion rune.¡±


    James looked over at Karion. ¡°Well, that is an ambitious plan. Would this have anything to do with you starting up on leather working yourself?¡±


    Karion looked down and shrugged. ¡°Well, there is no reason that we all can not benefit from helping Lexen out.¡±


    Aaron looked back and forth between the two. ¡°I¡¯m sorry, but why would I need a coin purse. How much for the gemstone? Why a gemstone? What¡¯s a conversion rune?¡±


    Still eyeing his nephew, James answered. ¡°Unlike the games of old, money goes in your inventory. The problem is they only stack with like. If I gave you one of each type, you are already down four inventory slots. Molly will answer the rest of those questions. Since you are new though, I¡¯ll cut you a one time deal and do a straight one for one for the pelt. Mark! Go grab another bucket of water!¡±


    As he yelled, one of the brothers jumped up from where he was leaning against the post. He started trotting down to the river,


    ¡°Walk over here with me Lexen.¡± James walked over to a large stone vat, about six feet wide and three feet deep. Picking up one of the baskets of water that Aaron and Karion had brought up from the river and poured it into the stone vat.


    Aaron picked up the other basket of water and poured it into the stone vat as well. Mark came walking up the hill and poured his bucket into the stone vat. He pulled out the metal hook and attached it to the basket. He walked over to the rope that led down to the river. Connecting the hook to the rope, he sent the basket back down the hill to the river. Aaron pulled the metal hook out of his inventory and sent the basket down to the river. James handed Aaron the other basket and then that basket was sent down to the river as well.


    ¡°Alright Lexen. Hand me the pelt please and I¡¯ll show you what it takes to make leather out of a pelt. Boys!¡± Both Mark and William came over and stood next to the stone vat.


    The three dragonkin all breathed in as one and released their breath weapon into the stone vat full of water. Aaron could hear Marie and Val gasp as he stepped back. Steam rose from the vat as it began to bubble and hiss.


    Mark slapped Aaron on the back.  ¡±It always does that. We have to give it a bit for it to settle down, then we can use the mix to clean and prep the pelts.¡±


    William walked over to a trunk full of pelts by the wall of the house. He counted out eleven more pelts and brought them over and tossed them into the stone vat. After receiving a nudge from Mark, Aaron tossed his in as well,


    James reaches up and pulled three poles with hooks on them. Tossing one to each of the boys, James started to explain. It took us quite a while to figure it out. The first few batches didn¡¯t do anything to the pelts. Some of the later batches dissolved the pelts entirely.¡± Mark muttered ¡°and one of the hooks.¡±


    Aaron heard Val laugh in the background. As they stirred the pelts around, the water started to thicken with hairs floating to the top as they slowly dissolved.


    After five minutes of stirring, they pulled them out with the hooks and placed them in another large basket. Mark brought one of the steaming pelts over to a small rack. He quickly stretched the pelt over it and pulled out a knife and started running the blade over the pelt and scraping off the excess hairs and other materials. Setting that rack aside, he pulled another small rack forward and repeated the process.


    James picked up the rack that had the scrapped pelt on it. It had lost a lot of it¡¯s color in the process and was a pale gray,


    ¡°Let¡¯s head inside and I¡¯ll show you the next few parts of the operation. Come on Craig!¡± He placed the rack on a hook by the door. Glancing up, he saw a rope that led up to a door opening into the second floor.


    James pulled open the door into the inside portion of their work shop. ¡°Come on Craig! You may as well join us if you are going to try to bump your leather crafting. After you Lexen.¡±

 Chapter 7 - Leather and Silk

    April 10, 2039


    As Aaron walked into the workshop, he was just amazed. It was like he had walked into the clothing section at a department store, but everything was made out of leather. There were six different mannequins lined up, all of them were dressed in leather armor. There was a mannequin for each of the races.


    Lining the ceiling, there was a taxidermy trophy from the games monsters. Aaron saw the beetle that he had just fought mounted next to a dragonfly. A large rat¡¯s head was on a plaque next to it. The next plaque that he saw was the head of a bunny. The only difference between the game¡¯s creature and a standard pet bunny was the fact that it was a bit larger and it had a large boney nub sticking out of the center of its forehead.


    Glancing down towards the far right of the line of trophies. The one at the end stood out. It was almost a dragon, but not quite. It had red scales and it¡¯s head was much thinner and flatter than the Dragonkin that he had seen. It¡¯s head stuck out about two feet from the plaque that mounted it to the wall.


    Aaron would have stood there longer to look at all of the trophies, but Karion nudged him out of the doorway and into the room. In the middle of the open work area was a huge desk full of leather working tools. Seated behind the table was a female Orc wearing leathers. She had black hair tied in a ponytail with light gray skin tone. She was using a small chisel on a leather helmet.


    She glanced up from a precise pattern that she was carving into the helmet. ¡°Well, this looks like trouble. Three strong, handsome Dragonkin walking into my work shop. James, I will never get this order done if you keep interrupting me.¡±


    Karion raised his right hand. ¡°Hi Aunt Molly! You said if I found you a new gatherer, you would show me how to make the coin purse. I found Lexen here. I brought him over after his second kill!¡±


    Molly nodded, ¡°In that case, give me a few more moments to finish this rune and I¡¯ll show you. James, would you get me a low quality small leather piece and a foot long leather strip?¡± She gave Karion some instructions of how much leather to cut, where to punch holes, and how to thread the cord.


    As James started walking over to the supply cabinet, Karion spoke up again. ¡°Aunt Molly, would you mind doing a conversion rune on it once it¡¯s done? I want to make it worth while for him, also, you are the best at this!¡±


    Molly swung around from giving her husband instructions and stared at Karion for a moment. ¡°I appreciate the vote of confidence, but those are not free to make. Even the most basic one requires a gemstone.¡±


    Karion tossed the same gold coin that he got a few moments ago from James over to Molly. ¡°It¡¯s ok. I know he¡¯s good for it. I want to get good at this and I want him to be able to use it for a while.¡±


    Molly thought about it and nodded. Looking straight at Aaron. ¡°With this gemstone and other supplies, you would be looking at owing him two gold. Are you ok with that? My nephew is a good kid and I¡¯d hate for him to be mistaken about trusting everyone .¡±


    Aaron just shrugged.¡±I¡¯ve only been on for about an hour now, so I don¡¯t have any coins yet. I really only have the loot from a beetle and a rat. I kind of doubt that stuff would sell for that much. I would like to know what we are talking about first though. Would you mind explaining Molly?¡±


    ¡°First off, it¡¯s Aunt Molly. You come in my shop with my nephew and you are wearing nothing but you corpse run undies. I don¡¯t care how old you are. You call me Aunt Molly.¡±


    Aaron heard his wife¡¯s voice over the game sounds. ¡°Ok. I like her a lot.¡± Aaron nodded to Molly. ¡°Fair enough. I will certainly repay him the two gold Aunt Molly. I still want to understand exactly what we are talking about though.¡±


    Karion had the piece of leather and the strip of leather. He was busy measuring out and marking spots on the leather with a tool. He had already taken the leather cord and prepped it. He brought it up to Aunt Molly and held it out for her to look at.


    Molly looked it over and then handed it back to Karion. ¡°That looks great Craig. Go ahead and punch the holes you marked and thread the cord. Then, bring it back over here. James, grab a turquoise for me please.¡±


    James brought over the stone and in a few moments Karion brought over a leather pouch and proudly announced that he hit leather crafting 3. After a round of congratulations, Molly took the pouch and opened it up. On the inside, she started to carve a series of lines and swirls.


    As she worked, she started to explain. ¡° I have two main skills. Primarily, I do leather working. You can make some amazing things. It¡¯s mostly for the Damage Per Second crowd. Warriors can use it of course, but it focuses more on dexterity and wisdom rather than strength and endurance. This is the part where it gets interesting though. Runic Initiation can be done within thirty minutes of an items creation. There are different runes for everything from fire damage, to cold protection, to increased defense. What I am doing here is a utility rune called a conversion rune. The short answer is that this pouch will take your lesser value coins and convert them into higher value ones. This is just very useful, so you don¡¯t need to worry about having so many small coins.¡±


    She finished carving and set the small chisel aside. Picking up the piece of turquoise, she placed it on top of the rune. Looking straight into Lexen¡¯s eyes she continued. ¡°How often and what lesser coins depends on the material used. A low quality leather piece and a low value gemstone like a turquoise will limit the rune. Once completed, this one will convert only copper and only once per day. No more than three coins generated.¡± Suddenly, she pushed pushed downward with both hands like she was doing CPR. With a loud crack, the gemstone shattered. Karion and Aaron both jumped at the sudden noise.


    Marie and Val started laughing before James and Molly did. After a moment, Aaron and Karion did as well. Molly was clapping her hands. ¡°Oh, if you could see the looks on your faces!¡±


    At this point, there was a minor commotion outside. There was flashing green lights and excited talking.


    The door swung open and a beautiful Elven woman with grass green hair walked into the workshop. She was wearing leather pants and leather top  with a jacket that opened up at the waist and tailed down to her mid calves.


    Val exclaimed. ¡°Wow! Becky wasn¡¯t kidding. She looks great! Tell her that I¡¯m here watching too.¡±


    Aaron looked up and saw the name Sevona floating above her head. She runway model walked about half way across the workshop before dropped the posturing with a laugh. She froze for a moment and Aaron heard Val¡¯s cell phone chirp. Val laughed as Sevona walked forward with a normal gait. This story is posted elsewhere by the author. Help them out by reading the authentic version.


    ¡°Hey, Mr. Lawson! Val told me that you started playing AE. I think that¡¯s awesome! I wanted to come see for myself!¡±


    Aaron reached out his hand to shake. ¡°Hello Sevona, it¡¯s good to see you again.¡± Becky was Val¡¯s best friend from high school. They had been friends since fourth grade and he couldn¡¯t count how many sleepovers and birthday parties he had driven her to and from.


    She walked right past his hand and gave him a hug. ¡°I only logged onto say Hi, but I want you to add me to your friends list. I get some nice buffs and can help teleport you to the groves outside of most cities. So let me know if you need anything. Speaking of buffs.¡±  She started to glow green and a soft glow of the same color surrounded Aaron, Karion, James, and Molly.


    Aaron noticed a wooden shield icon appeared on the upper right corner of his display.  When Aaron moved the pointer to the shelf, the information popped up.


    Wooden armor: +10 to armor. No level restrictions.


    Sevona looked around and suddenly realized where she was at. ¡°Wow! Look at all the leather! How did you find a place like this so fast Mr. Lawson?¡± Sensing a sale, Molly stood up with the completed coin pouch and walked over to Aaron and Sevona. She handed the pouch to Aaron and positioned herself in front of Sevona .  ¡°I love your outfit! You have got to tell me about each piece. I want to know if you picked it for the stats or just how amazing it makes you look. I think I can certainly help you accessorize or maybe even help you upgrade!¡± With the two women started talking about Sevona¡¯s armor, Aaron knew he was completely forgotten.


    At this point, the door opened and the two brothers came running in. They came up to Karion and Aaron. ¡°Did she give you guys the armor buff too?¡± After seeing the head nods, they tuned to James. ¡°It¡¯d be a shame to waste this buff and an insult to a guest! Can we take a break to go grind some xp?¡± James laughed. ¡°We certainly can¡¯t insult our guest. Be back in an hour.¡±


    Mark ran over to one of the boxes and William grabbed Karion and Aaron by the arm and pulled them to the door. Pulling out a leather chest piece, Mark ran to catch the group. He yelled over his shoulder, ¡°Dad, Can Lexen borrow this old chest piece? Thanks!¡± As the door slammed behind them.


    Aaron caught the leather chest piece that Mark tossed to him. ¡°Here, equip this. That buff is great, but we need a little more to work with.¡±


    When he added the leather chest piece to his inventory, he clicked on the information for the armor.


    Low quality leather chest piece: 12 armor. +2 Dexterity +1 Wisdom


    Another click on the armor piece made it appear on his chest. The leather was a dull grey. It was suspiciously the same color as the rat skin coin pouch he just received. Aaron was very impressed. In all of the previous games that he had played, crafted armor did not have stat bonuses for quite a while. This one seemed to be made with starting creatures and entry level skill.


    William nodded approvingly, then addressed the group. ¡°Ok. We have an hour off and a nice armor boost. We need to kill a lot of things and fast! Lexen, you pretty much got us the buff by bringing in the druid and she is distracting Mom and Dad. You get first dibs. Anything in particular that you need to kill?¡±


    ¡°I just have two newbie quests to kill beetles, dragonflies, and spiders. The beetles seem easy, I¡¯m not sure about the other two.¡± Karion joined the conversation. ¡°If you are going for the Steelscale armor, you will need rat meat next and I could certainly use some more pelts.¡±


    Mark was suddenly in a full set of grey leather armor except for the helmet. He had a quiver of arrows and a tall bow. ¡°It¡¯s settled than. We wipe out everything in the valley on our way to the spider cave. They get big enough in there to get us some good xp and should finish your quest.


    He nocked an arrow and started running at the insects walking around near the gates. He stopped for a moment and launched an arrow at a beetle. William was now in dark brown robes and holding a long wooden staff. The robe had long slits up the sides for the legs and tail. He pointed the staff at a dragonfly and a small spike of ice flew at it. The icicle missed the insect, but the dragonfly still came flying towards William. Karion yelled as he ran to help Mark with the beetle, ¡°Stick with William!¡± Aaron stepped to intercept William¡¯s insect.


    As the dragonfly darted in, Aaron slashed down with his sword. The dragonfly darted around the blade and lashed the long tail aspect of its body against Aaron, A red 2 popped up in front of his eyes. Suddenly, a burst of flames engulfed the dragonfly and it crashed to the ground. Aaron slashed downward into the dragonfly sending a red 5 off of it. As the dragonfly started to take to the air again, an arrow pinned it to the ground.


    William cheered. ¡°That works great! We do that until we have all those bugs you need. Then, all four of us on the rats.¡±


    The next fifteen minutes brought about the death of eleven more beetles and nine more dragonflies. Aaron had looted everything as the others said that they didn¡¯t need any of the bug loot. When he picked up the last piece of dragonfly meat, a pop up filled his view.


    Feeding the brood:  You have gathered the requested meats. Return them to Commander Harvin for your reward.


    Aaron let the group know about the notification. Karion clapped Aaron on the shoulder. ¡°You will love the bracers! Let¡¯s get moving. Rats and spiders await us.¡±


    In response, Mark shot a nearby rat and brought it charging towards the group. He was able to get in another arrow before the rat got too close. When it got close enough, Aaron kicked the rat in the head, sending a red 3 into the air and stunning it for a moment. While it was stunned, it was hit with Karion¡¯s two handed ax, another arrow from Mark, and an icicle from William. Under the stress from that attack, the rat fell.


    Karion pointed his ax at the rat. ¡°Lexen, go ahead and loot the meat. Do you guys mind if I take the pelts?¡± The brothers shrugged saying they have had more than enough pelts.


    A few moments later, Karion stood and showed his new pelt to the brothers. They looked over it quickly and announced it was quality.


    On their way to the spider cave near the other side of the gate, they killed three more rats. Aaron was surprised when another pop up appeared in front of him.


    One handed slashing weapons skill has increased to level 2!


    ¡°I didn¡¯t realize that there were weapon skill levels.¡± Aaron said to himself. Karion nodded and answered anyway. ¡°That¡¯s right. As a warrior, you can level any weapon. It works the same way as trade skills. You can get 5 skill levels per character level.¡±


    Mark led them to a dark cave near the large tree that Aaron saw when he first exited the city. There were spiders the size of an adult¡¯s hand, it was a very dark brown with short, bristled hair.


    Aaron heard a chair push back. ¡°I need to go work on some homework for tomorrow. I¡¯ll see you upstairs.¡± Val¡¯s voice grew fainter as she went up the stairs. Ever since watching some old horror movies with Becky, Val had been squeamish about spiders. These were unpleasant looking examples of the species too. It sounded like they would only get nastiest the deeper into the cave that he went.


    Suddenly, Aaron heard a buzzing sound and saw the profile of a human male with the name Macksimus in green lettering arching over the picture. ¡°One moment guys.¡± Aaron said and stepped back away from the cave.


    When he clicked on the picture, the word connected appeared next to his name. ¡°Hey Aaron, are you completely lost yet?¡±


    ¡°Macksimus huh? Actually, I met a really cool family that does leather work. Then, Val¡¯s friend tracked me down and buffed the whole family and me. Now, we are getting ready to go into a spider cave.¡±


    ¡°Yeah, well, I¡¯m pretty sure the first person to play chose the right spelling. This works though. Everyone just calls me Mack. If you are already grouped, just stay with them for a bit. You said that they do leather work?¡±


    Aaron already had an idea. ¡°Yeah, I¡¯ll be done here in about 30 minutes. How about meeting me at the city gates and I¡¯ll introduce you.¡±


    Mack agreed to meet up after he finished a few things. Aaron clicked off of the conversation with Mack and found that the group had already killed two spiders at the entrance.

 Chapter 8 - Into the Spiders Lair

    April 10, 2039


    Aaron looked over at the other three Dragonkin. ¡°I guess they aren¡¯t too bad if you took out two of them in a one minute conversion.¡±


    William nodded. ¡°They are not bad at all if you can slow them. A cold spell that I have works great for that. They don¡¯t have much armor or hit points, but they are fast and poisonous. You and I will be splitting the spider silks. Leather is great and all, but I want to make stuff that I can wear.¡±


    ¡°Fair enough. Let¡¯s go kill some spiders.¡± Using the same strategy, Mark would creep into the cave until he found another spider. Then, come racing out with a spider rushing after him. This spider had an arrow sticking out of its thorax.


    As soon as it got out of the cave, William cast his cold spell on it. Aaron slashed at the spider for 4 damage. A blow from Karion¡¯s ax finished it off. This same process worked for the next three spiders as well.


    Mark came back out of the cave and waved everyone in. They all walked through the narrow cave passage until it opened up into an open room about the size of a baseball field.


    The group walked over to the right side of the tunnel to the cave entrance. As they spread out, Aaron¡¯s tail hit against the wall. As soon as it left the surface of the wall, Aaron got a pop up.


    Surface webbing disturbed. You have recovered 1 spider silk.


    Aaron opened his mouth to mention this when he heard a thump. Then, a red 2 flashed before his eyes and a green 2 as well. Over the speakers in his helmet, he heard Marie curse in surprise.


    Aaron was never one to say that he was arachnophobic. The next few moments may have changed that perception a small amount. When he whipped his head to the right, there was a softball sized black spider standing on and with it¡¯s fangs in his shoulder. A bright green skull icon appeared next to to wooden shield icon.


    Letting out a startled scream, he smacked the spider off of his shoulder with the hilt of his sword.  The larger spider flew off into the wall before bouncing off to the floor. Almost immediately, William has hit it with his cold spell. An arrow stuck it right before Karion swung his ax at the spider. Even slowed, it was able to move aside.


    Aaron managed to slash the spider for 5 points of damage before another arrow finished off the spider. A moment later, another green 2 appeared in front of Aaron¡¯s eyes before fading away.


    Karion looked up at the ceiling holding his ax at the ready ¡°What the fish was that? We have hunted here before and I¡¯ve never seen one of those.¡±


    Another green 2 flickered across Aaron¡¯s eyes as William started talking about it. ¡°Well, there was that patch the other day. They could have just added them I guess.¡±


    Aaron winced as another green 2 appeared. This dropped his hit points down to 32. ¡°It poisoned me. I bumped into the wall and got a message about disturbing the spider webs. I even got an extra spider web for it before that thing landed on me.¡±


    William had just stood up from looting it. ¡°It has spider webs too. This might be a way for us to speed up our web gathering. I want to try something. Kari, be ready if it works.¡±


    With one last green 2, the green skull faded away.Karion glared at William. ¡°You can just drop the Kari bit before I have to teach you some manners.¡± He tapped his ax to emphasize his point.


    William¡¯s hands stayed to glow a different shade of blue than when he used his cold based magic. It appeared as if a soap bubble formed around William. The bubble shimmered for a moment and then faded to near invisible.


    ¡°Have you seen these yet?¡± William turned to ask Aaron. After a shake of the head, William continued.¡±Come over and tap me on the shoulder.¡±


    When Aaron reached out to touch William, his hand stopped about six inches away from Williams shoulder. Suddenly, a rock slammed into and bounced off of the magical shield by William¡¯s head. William flinched back and almost fell backwards.


    ¡°Dark! Come on!¡± Karion laughed at his cousins and leaned on his ax. ¡° I warned you. Let¡¯s get this rolling we only have about 15 minutes left.¡±


    Walking over to the wall, William signaled Karion and swept his hand through a heavily webbed section on a rocky outcrop of the wall. Karion raised his ax high overhead. Just like last time, a softball sized black spider leapt out of a hole on the ceiling and towards William. Seeing the spider, William took a small step to the left.


    The spider had been falling towards William¡¯s shoulder, but his movement put it off course. It ended up ricocheting off the shield and down to the right.


    Karion swept his ax down as the spider bounced. The blade connected to the spider mid flight and stayed with the beast until the both crashed into the floor.


    As Aaron watched,  the ax drove the spider into the ground and cleaved the spider in two. The spider erupted in a fountain of brightly colored confetti of red, green, yellow, and purple.


    All four of the dragonkin exclaimed in surprise and excitement. Only Aaron seemed surprised. Karion shook some of the confetti off of his hands, then raised his ax above his head. ¡°Critical!¡± He yelled, drawing out the last syllable for a few breaths.


    Aaron just shook his head. ¡°I¡¯m sorry, I¡¯m so confused. Why are you talking about fish? What¡¯s with saying dark? What is with the confetti?¡±¡± He asked pointing to the dissolving piles of brightly colored paper.Reading on this site? This novel is published elsewhere. Support the author by seeking out the original.


    The other three stared at him blankly. Mark shook his head then asked for the group. ¡°Huh?¡± At a loss, Aaron tried to explain by pointing to the last pile of confetti on the ground. ¡°When you hit the spider and it burst like a pi?ata. The confetti was everywhere. You said dark when he threw the rock at your shield and when the spider..¡±


    Aaron trailed off at the blank stares he was getting. Holding up his index finger in game, he tapped the mute button on the helmet to ask Marie. ¡°You saw it to right? Why didn¡¯t they see it?


    Marie thought for a moment. ¡°It was probably the setting that you changed. It was for gore and profanity.¡±


    Nodding his head, Aaron flipped on the microphone. ¡°Sorry about that I think I figured it out. I changed the gore and profanity into the negatives. So, I guess they replaced them with something more entertaining.¡±


    Karion looked at his ax. ¡°When I got that crit, you saw confetti instead of the blood?¡± William corrected him. ¡°I¡¯m pretty sure that bugs have ichor.¡±  Mark smiled broadly. ¡°Spiders are arachnids. Not bugs.¡± Karion closed his eyes and growled softly.


    Aaron looked around the cave. There were a few more of the spiders that Mark had been pulling for them. Aaron was relieved that most of the terminology had remained the same when the other Dragonkin didn¡¯t give him more blank stares when he mentioned that phrase.


    The group had stood by the section of wall that William said made a good spot since the spiders would not respawn here. Then, Mark would go out and shoot one of the spiders and pull it towards the group.


    To save time we decided to have William be the main looter. He had announced that we were up to 35 of our 40 spider silk goal.


    After the next spider had been killed and looted, Mark came back to talk with the group. ¡°So there is what I assume is a webbed up body in that nook over there. Have either of you ever noticed that before?¡± He directed the last question to William and Karion.


    After they both shook their heads negative, he went on. ¡°There are probably a few respawns in the tunnel on the way out. We only have about 5 minutes left before we need to head back to the shop. Do you want to head out or try for the webbed up body?¡±


    Karion pointed his ax at the body in the nook. ¡°I think we need to check it out. There seems to be new things going on since the patch. First, those black spiders ambushed us and now this. Uncle James will understand if you are a few minutes late. We will all go back and report in.¡±


    ¡°I still have a bit of time before I need to log off. Let¡¯s go see what¡¯s in the corner.¡± Two more spiders were cleared away and opened the path to the webbed up body.


    Mack¡¯s image popped up on the bottom right. Clicking the icon, Aaron heard his brother¡¯s voice. ¡°Hey Aaron, I¡¯m here at the gate. Where are you at? ¡°


    ¡°We are finishing up in a spider cave. We found a webbed up body that we are going to check out before headed out.¡±


    ¡°I¡¯ll join you. I have nothing better to do for a while. Sirius and I will be there in a bit.¡± Mack¡¯s picture faded.


    Mark came running back with the last spider following him. It was immediately slowed with a cold spell. An additional blow from everyone in the group finished off this spider as well.


    ¡°That¡¯s the last of them. Let¡¯s check it out. Could be a new quest!¡± Mark ran over to the body and kneeled next to it. As the rest of the group gathered around, he started to laugh. ¡°It¡¯s like skinning!¡± He pulled out his skinning knife and started to cut along a series of lines that only he could see.


    With a startled cry, Mark jumped back from the body. He was not fast enough to avoid the two foot long leg that burst out of the cocoon and slashed him down the length of his right leg, His health plummeted down 30%.


    Mark pulled out his bow as he scrambled to his feet and William¡¯s hands were starting to glow orange. Two more of the wickedly sharp legs had pulled themselves out of the cocoon.


    An arrow thudded into the hole where Mark had sliced open the cocoon before it bounced harmlessly to the floor. Suddenly, the cocoon burst into flames as the giant spider pulled it¡¯s body loose. As it came free everyone got a look at the spider.


    It stood two and a half feet tall with a body the size of two basketballs side by side. It was dark brown in color with bright red spots on it¡¯s back. It had two three inch fangs sticking out of it¡¯s small mouth. Aaron could see the flames reflected in it¡¯s eyes.


    Suddenly remembering his breath weapon, Aaron leaned forward and breathed fire on the spider. Apparently he was not the only one and a spray of acid came from Karion. Aaron watched the fire engulf the spider. A bright red 4 hit the spider, then a 2 as the fire washed over it.


    Glancing up at it¡¯s heath bar, Aaron saw it was at 95%. Both his own and Karion¡¯s breath weapon plus a fire spell had only done 5% damage. It had, however, burned away the cocoon and freed the spider.


    Karion rushed forward with his ax raised high. An arrow whizzed past him before he got to the spider. This arrow managed to sink into the spider, but didn¡¯t seem to do much good.


    Karion was swinging his ax downward when the spider leapt at him. It stabbed it¡¯s two front legs into his waist. Then, pulled itself on top of him and sank it¡¯s fangs into his chest.


    An icicle shattered against the spider and knocked another few percent points off of it¡¯s health bar. Aaron slashed at the spider on Karion, but only did 2 damage. It stabbed Karion a few more times as it scuttled up his chest and onto his shoulder.


    It kept off of Karion¡¯s shoulder, straight at William. They had been using the same technique to get the black ambush spiders, so William still had his magical shield up, the spider struck the shield and did bounce off of it like it¡¯s smaller cousins had. However, the shield winked out of existence with a faint pop.


    The spider whirled on William and crouched down for a pounce at the wizard. As soon as it turned it¡¯s back on him, Mark jumped on it and backstabbed it with two curved daggers. With two puffs of confetti, the spider¡¯s health dropped down to 85%.


    As the spider whirled around, William finished his spell and the familiar slowing cold took effect.  Aaron ran in and hit the spider with his dull sword. A red 3 fell away from the spider.


    Ignoring Aaron entirely, the spider jumped past him and sank it¡¯s fangs into Mark¡¯s leg. Karion ran over and slammed his ax into the spider. It¡¯s health dropped to 80%.


    Karion accomplished his goal and drew the spider¡¯s attention. It lunged forward and bit Him on the leg for his troubles. His health fell to 5%.


    Aaron heard someone yell out from the cave entrance. ¡°Fass!¡± A huge black dog charged in so fast that Aaron could barely track it¡¯s motions.


    The dog grabbed the spider by the leg and shook it violently. After two seconds of shaking, the dog tossed the dog tossed the spider towards the cave entrance. It tumbled across the floor before stopping itself and standing up again.


    A crossbow bolt sprouted from the spider¡¯s side as the dog lunged at the spider. A man with short crop top hair wearing dark brown leathers and a dark grey cloak wielding a long bat with a steel cap on the end.


    He swung the bat underhand, almost like a golf swing. He connected with the spider and sent it flying into the wall. It fell to the floor and did not rise again.


    Turning towards the group, Mack pointed the bat at Aaron. ¡°That is how it¡¯s done!¡± At that point, the poison did another round of damage and Karion fell to the ground dead.

 Chapter 9 - Web Lurkers

    April 10, 2039


    Dropping all bravado, Mack quickly scanned the group. ¡°Shoot! Is anyone else poisoned?¡± Mark raised his hand and winced as his poison dropped him to 40% health.


    Mack¡¯s hands glowed green as he looked the group over again. Mark was enveloped with a green light and then Mack¡¯s hands started glowing green again. When the spell finished, Mark¡¯s health jumped up to full.


    ¡°Sorry about your friend. I didn¡¯t think about the poison. So, can anyone tell me where you all found a level 5 spider in this play pen?¡± Mack pointed his bat at the dead spider.


    William spoke up first. ¡°We all got an armor buff from a passing druid. Since she was a friend of Lexen, we decided to help him with a few of his quests while we farmed some xp and crafting materials. We found a new type of spider in this cave. We were going to head out, when we saw a body all wrapped up in webs. I thought it was a rescue quest. That is what came out of the cocoon when we cut it open.¡±


    Mark suddenly straightened up. ¡°The nook! If we lost Kari for this, we should at least check to see if there is any good loot for him.¡±


    Mack kneeled down next to the spider. ¡°Nothing much on this one. 4 spider silk and a weak spider venom.¡± He walked over and handed the drops to Aaron.


    ¡°I think I found something!¡± Mark yelled out from the nook. Everyone came over and looked at what got his attention. Most of the cocoon had burned away from the fire attacks. What they thought was the back actually was a shield about the same dimensions as a man¡¯s back. There was another spider silk underneath it. William added this to the groups collection.


    The shield was rectangular. It was roughly two feet wide and three feet tall. The shield¡¯s front was black with silver spider web patterns. When he examined it, Aaron saw the information appear in a pop up.


    Shield of the web lurker. This shield has been empowered by the essence of a web lurker by being used as a base for it¡¯s cocoon. 10 armor. +10 hit points. +2 dexterity.


    ¡°Not bad for a play pen drop, but a level 5 is pretty powerful for this area. You said that this shield and the spider are both new?¡± Mack asked the group. William pointed to his brother and Karion. ¡°We have hunted in here before and there has always only been the one type. That one makes three types of spiders in here today.¡±


    Mack seemed very interested. ¡°I know you said you need to go, but do you mind if I look around?¡± William held up his hand for a few moments, then nodded. ¡°Dad said that¡¯s fine, but we need to make it up at the end of the shift. He also said to make sure to bring Karion¡¯s stuff.¡±


    Splitting off, the Dragonkin were able to kill another spider. It was a much slower process without Karion. Aaron was able to hold most of the spider¡¯s attention and dropped to just under half health for it.


    Mack stopped over and healed the ground and cured Aaron and Mark of poison. Mack¡¯s dog, Sirius, was taking down a spider while he stopped to help. ¡°Lex, use the shield. It doesn¡¯t matter if you are still figuring out who¡¯s it is. You can always give it to the other guy if that¡¯s what you all decide.¡±


    The next spider that they fought went smoother with Aaron using the shield. He was able to block about half of the hits and got block up to level 1. Ensure your favorite authors get the support they deserve. Read this novel on Royal Road.


    Mack came back over to the group and took care of the injuries and poison. ¡°That¡¯s the last of the regular spiders. I found two more of the body shaped cocoons.


    The group walked over to another nook with a cocoon in it. ¡°All you need to do is cut it open and the spider comes out.¡±


    Mack looked a bit embarrassed. ¡°Umm, I don¡¯t do skinning or any other trade skills really.¡± Aaron laughed at his brother. ¡°That¡¯s exactly why I called you over here. I¡¯m going to introduce you to their parents and make an honest worker out of you yet. Time to turn away from your murder hobo ways. I¡¯ll open them. You and Siri take them down.¡±


    Aaron pulled out his skinning knife and knelt next to the spider. The lines that appeared on the cocoon was quite a bit more complex than the rat he had first got his skill on. He carefully and slowly followed the lines. As soon as he finished the lines, the spider¡¯s leg burst out of the cocoon and slashed into Aaron. That one hit took 30% of Aaron¡¯ hit points.


    ¡°Fass!¡± Mack pointed at the spider as Aaron pushed away. Siri lunged forward and chomped on the leg as it pulled back. With a twist of her head. There was a large crack. As the spider pulled itself out, one of its legs was limp.


    Mack shot it point blank with his crossbow as Siri grabbed another leg and shook it violently until it cracked. Mack pulled his bat free and lept at the spider. He swung the bat over his shoulder and crashed it into the spider. The spider dropped and twitched a few times.


    ¡°Why hasn¡¯t Karion come back for his stuff? My friends list shows that he¡¯s still online.¡± Aaron asked Mack as the brothers were looting the rest of the spiders.


    ¡°It¡¯s kind of a death penalty. I think it¡¯s to make it so that a big PvP match could have a winner. If you die, you end up in a library.¡± Mack laughed at Aaron¡¯s expression. ¡°Really. A library. It¡¯s a really nice library. You can¡¯t do anything violent there and you are stuck there for 30 minutes.  You also can not send or receive messages. You can access your bank. They have shops there. You can even do a few off the quieter trade skills. Most people just take off their headsets and go grab a bite to eat.¡±


    William called out to Mack as he checked out the cocoon. ¡°The cocoon had 10 spider silks in it and this dagger.¡±


    Fang of the web lurker. This dagger has been empowered by the essence of a web lurker by being used as a base for it¡¯s cocoon. 7 damage. +2 dexterity. Mild spider venom on successful strikes.


    Mack looked the dagger over. ¡°Not a bad place at all for you all to gear up. Looks like a rogue dagger if I ever saw one.¡± He tossed the dagger over to Mark.


    On the next cocoon, Aaron was able to position the shield, so that it blocked the strike when the spider lashed out. Siri and Mack made short work of the last spider. Aaron was pleased to see that this got him to level 2 in block.


    William checked the cocoon again and cheered as he pulled up a jacket. ¡°I think I¡¯m in love! This is better than the quest armor I got from the city.¡± He shared the stats on the jacket. The jacket looked like a grey winter coat. Upon closer inspection, the material was actually very dense spider webs.


    Web lurker gambeson. This armor has been empowered by the essence of a web lurker by being used as a base for it¡¯s cocoon. 4 armor. +2 intelligence. +1 wisdom.


    They finished looting the last of the spiders and killed two that had respawned on the way out of the cave. Mark had grabbed Karion¡¯s body and it turned into a large duffel bag with Karion¡¯s name on it.


    Aaron stared at the duffel bag. William answered the question before he could ask. ¡°A team member can bring your body back to what you designate as a safe location. They can¡¯t take anything from it. If they try to take it the wrong direction, it will simply fall off of them. This lets you help a friend out and not make them run into that spider cave naked to get their stuff.¡±


    As they walked, they talked about loot. William was looking through his bag at all the stuff they had looted in the last hour and a half. ¡°So, Lexen has the bug meat he needs. We didn¡¯t get all the rat meat. We all got a shiny new toy. Lex, you can keep the shield. Kari only uses two handed weapons. I¡¯ll go sell all the other stuff and we split the cash. The question I have is the silk. We ended up with sixty of them. I can use them for crafting.¡±


    ¡°I need 20 for my quest. I¡¯m ok if you keep the rest.¡± ¡°Thanks.¡± William handed him the 20 spider silks. I will run to town and sell this stuff meet me at the store. Come give me a hand Mark¡± The two brothers walked towards the city gates.


    When he got the spider silks, the pop up appeared in front of Aaron. Now both of his quests had a checkmark next to the collection piece and only needed to be turned in.


    Supplies for a cloak. You have gathered the materials requested for Sub-commander Avel. See him for your reward.

 Chapter 10 - Back to the Tanners

    April 10, 2039


    As they walked back Aaron pointed to one of the rats running around. ¡°Mind sending Siri to play with that one? I¡¯d like for you to arrive with about three rat pelts.¡±


    With a shrug, Mack pulled out his crossbow. He pointed the crossbow at a rat and yelled ¡°Fass!¡± Siri charged that rat. He swung the crossbow to another rat and shot it. The rat flew over and fell to the ground. Siri had reached her target and finished it in on bite and shake. He then sent Siri after a third rat. A few short moments later, there were three rat bodies on the ground nearby.


    Walking up to the first rat, Mack looked at Aaron. ¡°Now what?¡± Aaron handed Mack the skinning knife. ¡°Go to loot it, while holding this. Then, just follow the dotted line.¡±


    After carefully following the lines, Mack held up the rat pelt. He nodded in satisfaction. ¡°Skinning level 1. Not bad¡± He got up and walked to the next rat. Aaron finished looting the rat and followed. In a moment, Mack had his three pelts and Aaron had a tenth piece of rat meat.


    They walked past the gate and Aaron walked down the hill towards the river. He picked up one of the empty baskets and handed it to Mack. Then, he pulled off the hook from the line and filled the basket with water from the river. Mack did the same and they brought the baskets up towards the workshop .


    James was cleaning out the inside of the stone vat when they walked into the outdoor section of the workshop. ¡°Hey James. Sorry to take your help earlier.¡±


    The Black Dragonkin looked up from his task and waved his hand dismissively. ¡°It was not a problem. It¡¯s good for them to get some experience so they can keep leveling their trades. They both have capped their tanning and skinning a week or so back. We just have not really had a chance to go out and grind xp. There just always seems to be plenty of work to do.¡±


    ¡°Speaking of plenty of work, I want to introduce my brother. An impressive level 15, but he¡¯s never done any skinning until the walk over here. I figured that you could educate him and give him a job fetching some interesting pelts.¡±


    James smiled and reached out to shake hands with Mack. ¡°Your brother works fast. Ninety minutes ago, I asked him to find me some more people who wanted to make some money. Lexen here has already seen my dog and pony show, so I will not bore him with the details. Head on inside. Molly wants to talk with you.¡±


    At that moment, The other three members of the party came walking back from the city. ¡°I will in just a moment. I need to check on Karion.¡± James tossed a gold piece to Aaron. ¡°Give him this. You still owe him one more.¡±


    As Aaron walked away, he heard his brother ask about the gold piece. Then, James answered. ¡°You¡¯re smart, just like your brother. You see gold changing hands and want in. Let me show you what I do around here.¡±


    Aaron walked over and was glad to see that Karion had all his gear back on. ¡°Karion, I¡¯m sorry those spiders got you. I know they said that you never use a shield, but I wanted to check with you if you want it,¡± Karion waved the offer away. ¡°Nah, need before greed. I¡¯d just sell it. Mark tells me that you kept trying to keep the spiders off of him and William. You have the makings of a tank. A tank needs a shield.¡±


    Mark reached over and handed Aaron a gold and six silver. ¡°It¡¯s not much, but that is split four ways. Throw in the three web lurker items and we did well! We need to get you geared and up to level 4. Then, we grab a healer and go camp those things.¡±Enjoying the story? Show your support by reading it on the official site.


    ¡°Boys! Mack brought us some pelts. Come show him that you do more than just bother the spiders.¡± James yelled from the outdoor workshop, Mark and William hurried over. As they went, their clothes suddenly turned into the work outfits Aaron first saw them in.


    ¡°Why do they need to change outfits?¡± Aaron asked Karion. ¡°There are a few reasons. The main reason is the acid. If too much gets on their armor and it will start to damage the gear. Special attacks like that can be dangerous to you too. Other than that, Uncle James likes them to all look uniform. It¡¯d be odd to see a guy in wizard robes working the pelts.¡±


    Remembering what happens next, Aaron pulled up his options screen. ¡°Karion, how do you video? I want to see his face for this next part.¡± The tanners had just poured the water into the stone vat.


    ¡°It is actually always recording and will save two hours of history if you need or want it. It¡¯s under history in your menu options.¡± Mack stumbled back with a curse and tripped over the little half wall as the three Black Dragonkin breathed their acid into the stone vat.


    ¡°Thanks. That gives me an idea actually. Here¡¯s the two gold I owe you. I appreciate the coin pouch.¡± Aaron clapped Karion on the shoulder and walked into the indoor portion of the workshop.


    Molly looked up from the leather chest piece she was working on. ¡°Lexen! Good to see you again. I wanted to thank you. First off, for bringing your friend Sevona here. She made a significant purchase and commissioned another piece. Second off, Sevona¡¯s buff lasted long enough for my boys to get a good amount of xp and your friend helped them to get some better gear.¡±


    The door opened and Mack walked in.¡±Oh, I¡¯m far more than a friend. My older brother here wouldn¡¯t even know his wife if it wasn¡¯t for me. Saving him from being spider chow doesn¡¯t hold a candle to all of the other things that he owes me for.¡±


    Pointing to Mack, Aaron introduced Molly. ¡°Aunt Molly, I¡¯d like to introduce you to my younger brother Mack. Ranger extraordinaire and all around pain. If ever I got in trouble growing up, you can bet he was involved in some way.¡±


    Molly stood and walked over to Mack with her hand extended. ¡°It¡¯s a pleasure to meet you. Please call me Molly. Thank you again for helping the kids here with the spiders.¡±


    Laughing at his brother¡¯s expression, Mack looked around and let out a low whistle. ¡°This is quite the shop you have here. Mind if I look around?¡±


    Molly smiled and waved her arms to invite him to shop her wares. ¡°I can also make custom orders if you are looking for a specific piece. I can also enchant the armor with attributes that would fit you best,¡±


    Mack stopped and looked at her when she mentioned custom orders. ¡°Can you make different pieces than usual? I¡¯d love to get some armor for Siri. Yeah, I¡¯ll bring her in so we can do a fitting. Hier!¡±


    Some of the fabrics rustled and were pushed apart as Siri crept out from one of the tables that had fabric draping down to the floor. After being surprised for a moment, Molly rushed over to Siri. ¡°Oh my gosh! She is adorable!¡±


    Molly sat down in front of the dog and wrapped her arms around the dog and nuzzled the dog¡¯s neck. Mack coughed lightly. ¡°Umm, yeah. So this is my ferocious attack dog Siri. As you can tell, she is truly a terror to behold.¡±


    The ferocious attack terror had laid down and rolled over onto her back. She seemed to be thoroughly enjoying her belly rub.¡±I was thinking leather armor for her when we go against some tougher opponents. I hate it when they land a hit on her.¡±


    Molly has pulled out a tape measure and was wrapping the measure around Siri¡¯s chest. ¡°I don¡¯t blame you. It would be devastating to see this beauty get injured. I¡¯m thinking a form fitting leather coat for her. Loose enough for movement and tight enough so that nothing can get a handhold on her. Does she tank? Probably hit points, strength, and endurance if she does. Dexterity maybe?¡±


    ¡°I¡¯d like to mix it up a bit. Hit points, strength, and dexterity. Float like a butterfly and all that.¡± Mack kneeled down and started massaging Siri¡¯s ears. Molly grabbed a pad of paper that was sitting on the table. She quickly wrote down the sizes for Siri and Mack¡¯s requests.


    ¡°Lexen, this is two new gatherers and customers that you¡¯ve brought me. My husband takes care of the gatherer referrals, but I feel you deserve something from me. How about you keep that chest piece that you are borrowing?¡±


    ¡°Thank you very much. After seeing Karion¡¯s gear though, I was wondering if I could keep borrowing this chest piece and some leg armor as well? If it¡¯s not proprietary, I¡¯d love a crash course on Runic Initiation.¡±

 Chapter 11 - Lessons and Rewards

    April 10, 2039


    Molly raised an eyebrow as she looked at Aaron. ¡°Are you thinking about taking up leatherworking? Is this an application or are you competition?¡±


    ¡°Neither really. Leather is great, but most tank classes wear plate. I¡¯ve got my mind made up for blacksmithing. I think that Runic Initiation would work great with that too. Does it work with weapons as well?


    ¡°Alright. Just know that you are looking at two difficult and expensive trade skills. Each rune is a permanent bonus to something you make, but it costs money for every attempt. If you fail, it puts a damaged debuff on the item until you repair it. Good thing though, if you have blacksmithing, you should be able to repair metal items.¡±


    Molly seemed to be enjoying this deal more and more as she kept going. ¡°Lexen, you have brought me two customers. I will teach you two runes. Keep in mind, I know defensive and some utility runes. Do you know what runes you want?¡±


    Aaron thought for a few moments as he leaned against one of the chairs. ¡°I believe so. Do you have strength and endurance?¡±


    Molly nodded. ¡°I don¡¯t get much call for strength, but I made sure to get all the basic stats. Come on over here and I¡¯ll show you how they work.¡±


    She reached down into a bin and pulled out two irregular pieces of leather about the size of Aaron¡¯s palm. Sitting them down on her table, she showed Aaron a chisel with a fine edge. ¡°You need to carve the runes into your creations right away. To be effective, they need to be done within thirty minutes of when the item is created.¡± She started to carve a complicated series of lines and circles into the first piece of leather. ¡°Like I said, this gets expensive. After you carve the rune, you crush a gemstone on the rune. The more valuable the gemstone and higher quality the item that it was carved into, the more powerful the effect. Get some money together so you can buy some gemstones. Come back and I¡¯ll help you practice those. Bring another customer or two with you too! Then, I will teach you a few more runes.¡±


    Marie gave Aaron a hug from behind. ¡°I¡¯m headed upstairs to get dinner together. Don¡¯t stay on too much longer.¡± Reaching back Aaron gave her a squeeze. ¡°I¡¯ll be up in about 30 minutes. I¡¯m going to close up with these two. Then, I¡¯ll turn in those two quests and done. Love you.¡±


    Aaron focused back on Mack and Molly and found them both staring at him. Mack tapped his ear where the mute button would be on Aaron¡¯s helmet. ¡°Love you too bro. Sounds like your playtime is up. Go wrap up those quests and get upstairs before Marie gets too creative with dinner.¡±


    Molly had walked over to a shelf and pulled a pair of leather pants out of a bin. She walked over and tossed them to Aaron. The pants looked like regular pants but made of the same grey leather that he now recognized as the local rats. The similarities ended when he opened the pants.


    While the front of the pants differed very little, the back was a different story. The legs opened at the top into empty space. There was a belt that went across the waist, but the entire seat of the pants were missing. Aaron looked up at Molly in confusion.


    ¡°Your tail.¡± She let the word drag out for a few moments. ¡°Per our agreement, you can borrow the pants and chest piece until you get replacements. Come back with pelts and gemstones or more customers.¡± She put an emphasis on the word borrow.


    ¡°Be on Wednesday after work. I¡¯ll meet you over here and we¡¯ll catch a ride over to Makazi. I¡¯ll introduce you to Brok and get you working!¡±


    Aaron equipped the pants. Pulling the camera out to a third person view he rotated it around. His Gold Dragonkin was wearing grey leather pants and a leather chest piece and that was about it. The shield was on his back, since he was not in a combat area. He pulled the camera back to first person perspective and brought up the stats on the pants.


    Low quality leather greaves: 8 armor. +2 Dexterity +1 Wisdom


    ¡°On that note, I need to get going. Aunt Molly, thank you and your family for everything. Mack, a pleasure as always.¡± Aaron shook Molly¡¯s hand and ran out the door towards the city.


    He passed a few more Dragonkin fighting the bugs wearing the rough fabric clothes that Aaron missed. He ran back into the city and found his way back to the hatchery.Stolen from its rightful place, this narrative is not meant to be on Amazon; report any sightings.


    After going down the stairs and retraining his first steps in Arella Everlasting. Walking down the stairs, Aaron walked back into the first room.


    The same elder Silver Dragonkin stood in the chamber. Aaron realized with a sense of guilt that he never even glanced at the Dragonkin¡¯s name, let alone talked to him.


    He was named Elder Tavonis. Not sure exactly what to do, Aaron walked in front of the NPC. ¡°Thank you for all of the training Elder.¡±


    Elder Tavonis nodded his head in acknowledgment. ¡°You have worked hard to earn your respect Lexen. Before you go into the world, please take these clothes. They will help you in your early days of training. A warrior should also take off his armor when the need arises. You should also have a set of clothes to wear as your armor is being repaired.¡±


    Aaron received a green shirt and a dark grey kilt similar to the ones that the brothers had been wearing. Thanking Elder Tavonis, Aaron went back up the steps and turned towards the Steelscale barracks.


    A short walk later and he was at the barracks. It still has the group of warriors bustling around. There were some that were clearly other players. They would stand completely still for a few moments before breaking off in a direction at a full run. Most were Dragonkin, but there were a few Humans and an Elf in the crowd.


    Aaron walked around the other players and into the barracks. Turning to the left, he walked into their office. Commander Harvin was standing next to the wall inspecting a map of the valley. Sub-commander Avel looked up from his stack of papers. Avel clapped his hands together causing Harvin to turn and look at him.


    ¡°Look Harvin! Our Golden hatchling has returned. You owe me five silver.¡± With a sigh, Commander Harvin tossed a few coins towards Avel. ¡°It took you long enough. I figured that you were beetle chow. Did you manage to hunt down the meat for Chef?¡±


    Aaron pulled the beetle and dragonfly meat out of his inventory. The beetle meat looked similar to crab meat and the dragonfly looked like tenderloin. Avel walked over to a shelf and pulled out a rectangular serving tray and allowed Aaron to place the different meats on it.


    Aaron set the two stacks of meat on the tray. He couldn¡¯t help but smile as they appeared in two nice even rows of five of each type. Avel walked out to the door and called for an aide. A short, thin Bronze Dragonkin ran over. After a few words, the young Dragonkin was carrying the tray towards the mess hall.


    Commander Harvin reached in a crate in the corner and pulled out two steel bracers. He walked over and handed them to Aaron. ¡°These are the Recruit¡¯s Steelscale bracers. They will offer you some more protection than just the clothes on your back. This is a good first step for you. Whenever you come across anymore meat that you don¡¯t use yourself, bring it to the chef. He will make sure you are rewarded for your efforts. Come back to me when you are ready for more dangerous prey.¡± A notification popped up in front of Aaron.


    Quest completed: Feeding the brood. You have received armor as compensation.


    Recruit¡¯s Steelscale bracers: 2 armor. +1 strength. +1 constitution.


    Suddenly a loud gong sounded right behind him. Aaron stumbled forward and swung around to see what that was. He only saw a guard walking back deeper inside the barracks.


    Calming down, Aaron noticed a blinking icon of a gong in front of a blue arrow pointing upwards. Moving the down arrow on his right control stick, he opened the icon.


    Level up! Congratulations! You are now level 2. You have two ability points to distribute.


    Aaron brought up his character page and looked at his statistics. Oddly enough, his current gear bonuses made a pretty good rogue or ranger. To bad he was going for a warrior. Figuring that he couldn¡¯t go wrong with this strategy, he added one to strength and one to constitution.


    This brought both his strength and his constitution up to 9. Aaron still hadn¡¯t decided if he would stay with warrior or try out the arcane knight. Either way, more hit points and being able to hit harder would not be wasted. While he was in his character page, Aaron saw the xp bar now read 5/2,500. The xp reward from the quest put him just over.


    Aaron pulled out the spider silks and gave them to Sub-Commander Avel. The Silver Dragonkin took the pile of silk and nodded. ¡°These will go a long way to help my wife make the cloaks that she has been working on. Here, take one of the old cloaks that she made earlier.¡±


    Faded silk cloak: 2 armor. +10 hit points


    Aaron equipped the new pieces of armor. He nodded in contentment at a rather successful first day at the game and pushd the log out button. A timer from 30 counted down and the screen faded to black. Aaron pulled off the helmet and set it down onto the desk. He plugged the helmet and the control sticks onto their charger cradles.


    Walking upstairs, Aaron suddenly remembered that he had all the rat meat for the next quest. He rocked on the last step for a moment thinking about going back downstairs to get and finish that quest.


    Marie looked at him hesitating at the top of the stairs and raised her eyebrows. With a shrug, Aaron told her about the last quest. Marie smiled. ¡°Don¡¯t worry. You can get that one on Wednesday. In the meantime, I could use some help with the potatoes.¡±


    Opening up the kitchen pantry, Aaron pulled out a bag of potatoes. He opened them up and pulled out six potatoes. As he washed them, he asked Marie over his shoulder. ¡°Isn¡¯t Val taking a course on computer design this year? I found out that AE has a video function. I bet she could use some of that footage for something.¡±


    ¡°That¡¯s a good idea. I¡¯ll talk to her about it. If she¡¯s interested, I¡¯ll have her go through the footage again and see if there is anything that she can use.¡± She put the chicken that she had been prepping into the crockpot. ¡°I¡¯m glad you enjoyed it though. You could use a way to unwind from work other than pacing around here looking for something to do.¡±

 Chapter 12 - A Plan for Jo

    April 11, 2039


    Mokro Arts Policy Manual - Employee Fraternization


    Two employees of Mokro Arts that are in the same department can not be in a relationship. Should this occur, one of the employees will need to transfer to a different department. If neither employee is willing to transfer, a meeting with the department head will be scheduled that could result in the unwilling transfer or termination of one or both employees.


    Kyle sighed as he read this paragraph from the policy manual for the hundredth time. It still didn¡¯t quite answer his question. Since early in the year, the USSC had been working with Mokro Arts. Each department had a member or two of the USSC working with them.


    In February, Kyle had been promoted to zone development. This department had been working on revamping all of the zones. They had just completed all of the level 1-5 zones. They had added new monsters, new quests, and new drops. It was now time to move onto the level 5-10 zones.


    More importantly, Kyle had the chance to work with Lance Corporal Jolene McKinna. She was one of the liaisons of the USSC for the zone development team. Kyle was pretty sure that she was the very definition of perfection. As she was a member of the USSC, she wasn¡¯t technically an employee of Mokro Arts. She was in the same department though.


    For the first few months, she barely seemed to notice the Mokro Arts employees were there. Fortunately, Kyle has noticed that Jolene spent a lot of time talking to Lance Corporal Jennifer Walker. She was part of the character development team. Jolene had a thin athletic build with jet balck hair. She was deeply tanned from spending so much time outdoors. Jennifer however, was average build with light brown hair. Her skin was pale from spending most of her time behind a computer screen.


    Kyle had to work with Jennifer on many occasions while he revamped the 0-5 zones. Specifically, he needed to work with her about the new armor drops and new quests. It was important not to make any of the rewards be too powerful or not fit the appropriate class. While he did enjoy working with Jennifer, he was mostly looking for a wingman. Well, a wingwoman in this case.


    Jennifer walked up to Kyle¡¯s cubeical and looked over his screen at the employee manual. ¡°Oh Kyle, you have it bad don¡¯t you? Are you sure that you want to try for Jo? She can be a bit rough on her boyfriends.¡± The tale has been taken without authorization; if you see it on Amazon, report the incident.


    Kyle looked back over his shoulder at Jennifer. ¡°Well sure. If I come at her like some jerk from the bar, that¡¯s how I¡¯m going to be treated. What we need is a way where we can work together and really get to know each other better.¡±


    Jennifer grinned down at him. ¡°Kyle, what do you think you know about Jo?¡± Kyle started counting off on his fingers. ¡°She graduated second in her class from Quantico.¡± Jennifer muttered that she would have been second if it hadn¡¯t been for catching the flu. ¡°Second, she runs 4 miles before work each day. Normally, jogging by the fountain at about 7:30.¡± Jennifer shook her head. ¡°That explains why you have been coming into work early.¡± Kyle ticked down a third finger. ¡° She plays Arella Everlasting. She is a level 24 Summoner with a specialization in ice.¡± Jennifer laughed and pointed at Kyle. ¡°Nope, she is level 23. About time you got one wrong.¡±


    Kyle cleared his throat. ¡°She actually leveled up last night while she was in the Desert Lich¡¯s Tomb.¡± Jennifer raises her eyebrow at Kyle. ¡°OK, I may have been spamming her name in my search while I was on last night. Saying it out loud, it doesn¡¯t really help me not sound like a first rate creeper.¡±


    Jennifer blew out a long sigh. ¡°Well, if you insist on giving it a try. We need to figure out a good reason for our departments to work together. I can tell her that I want you to work with the two of us. Any ideas as to what I can suggest to make that happen?¡±


    Kyle rapped his fingers against the desk. ¡°Obviously, we need something where character development and zone development work together. Ideally, for quite a while. I¡¯ve been adding quests and mobs to to the newbie zones. Maybe we could do something fun with that. There are some zones that I worked on that didn¡¯t have much traffic. I bet the Board would like to see more players in there.¡±


    Kyle typed in a few commands and pointed to the results on his screen. ¡°At any given time, less than five percent of the players are in any of these zones. Let¡¯s use these. We could probably make a big event of it. A big summer promotion!¡±


    Jennifer nodded and sat down on the edge of his desk. She leaned in and looked closer at the list. ¡°Four of these zones have some type of NPC presence. What do you think about revamping them to be alternative starter zones?¡±


    Kyle pulled up the first of the four zones that Jennifer pointed out. The island of Rakenetta. There was a small outpost of NPCs and even a few players that constantly frequented this island. Other than that, only mobs. There were a few promising aspects that they could work with.


    Jennifer grabbed Kyle¡¯s shoulder and squeezed. ¡°I have the perfect idea! If you want to keep Jo¡¯s interest, we need to talk about her interests.¡± From there, she started laying out her ideas.