Davoth lead Winter through the streets of the village of Orm. The village itself wasn’t that big, most of the business happened around the village square. The outskirts of the village were made up of farm houses and fields growing crops, with a few Kalmoore guards patrolling about to keep the peace. Everything about the atmosphere screamed fantasy, from the clothing of the villagers to the construction of the buildings. Even the strange birds flying about looked unfamiliar to Winter.

“This building here is the Craftsman Guild Hall. Normally each profession has its own building, but in the small starting village of Orm, they’ve only got one and it’ll only help you train beginner skills.” Davoth explained.

“Right, how do skills and all that work in this game?” Winter asked as they approached the large brick building, it had a sign hanging over the door with an anvil and spool carved into it.

“There’s 2 types of skills. Basic skills, and class skills. You can learn any skill of any type except the class ones. They all start out as beginner skills and can only go up to level 30. If you want to upgrade them at level 30 to intermediate then you’ll need a class that allows it, or meet special conditions like completing difficult or rare quests. So for example if you wanted to go to intermediate Mining you’d need to be beginner 30 in mining and have a mining related class, or complete the intermediate mining class quest which I’ve heard is ridiculously tedious so almost no one does it.” Davoth explained.

“Okay got it so far.” Winter nodded.

“For class skills though, you only get those when you pick a class, for example if you pick the class wizard you’ll get all the beginner wizard skills. And when you reach level 30 and are able to move on to intermediate, you specialize your class a bit more and can learn new spells based on that, so like an elemental wizard will learn intermediate element-based spells. And when they go advanced, I think they learn an even more specific set. There’s not a lot of details yet on that though, no player has reached the advanced level of any class yet. For non-class skills, advanced is rumored to have ridiculous requirements. Only one player in the world so far qualified for an advanced life skill, and he said the quest will probably take him 2 months to complete in a recent interview. He didn’t say what it was making him do though.” Davoth explained as they walked inside the Craftsman Guild Hall.

“Let me do the talking.” He whispered as they made their way towards the front desk of the establishment. The interior was smokey with several crafting benches and a hot furnace in the back, giving the room an orange and red hue. There were several other players inside the building working on different tasks - some were sewing leathers together, others carefully polishing shields or hammering hot metal over an anvil.

Behind the front desk was a stout dwarf with messy black hair and a bushy black beard with soot in it. He was leaning over a parchment and scribbling on it with an ink pen. Winter could see his name and level above his head in white text, [Hoggan - Level 15] When the two walked up, he lifted his head.

“Ay there, some new faces I’m seein’ ‘ere today. What can I do for ye’s?” He spoke with a smile, giving off a scottish accent.

“We’d like to register as miners.” Davoth spoke.

“Ah, good, great, we can always use more hard workers out there gatherin’ the precious metals. It’ll be 5 silver coins each.” He smiled. Davoth nodded and pulled the coins out of his inventory, causing them to appear in his hand, then placed them on the desk in front of the dwarf. Winter went into his inventory and fidgeted around with it a bit to get the 5 coins out and did the same.

“Wonderful. I’ll handle yer mining registration papers. Ye might have a rough time startin’ out though, the Chief Miner here won’t do much to talk to ya until ye’ prove that yer’ worth his time first.”

Quest: Collect 10 copper ore and bring it back to Hoggan in the Craftsman Guildhall of Orm Village.

Objective: 0/10 Copper Ore

Quest Giver: Hoggan the Craftsman

Reward: [Skill: Beginner Mining]

Difficulty: Easy

Restrictions: None

ACCEPT DECLINE

The message popped up in front of Winter’s face. He read over the details briefly before hitting accept, and promptly got a message that the quest was added to his quest log. He looked to see that Davoth had done the same.

“Thanks Hoggan. Let’s go mine some copper.” Davoth said to Winter.

“Ye’ can find some good mines in the hills west of the village, just watch out for them Rockjaw’s lurkin’ about.” Hoggan said, they both nodded back and waved politely as they stepped out of the building.

“Was that guy a player?” Winter asked as they walked back through the streets.

“Nope, that was an NPC. You can tell by the names above their heads. NPC’s names will always be white.” Davoth said.

“Gotcha. This seems pretty easy so far… so we just go west to the hills and start mining, right?”

“Don’t get ahead of yourself, we should pick out a starting weapon first, there’s low level monsters in those areas.” Davoth said as he lead Winter back to the town square. They once again saw the countless shops and stands selling all assortments of goods imaginable. “Any idea what weapon you’ll try out?” Davoth asked excitedly.

“No idea. I’ll browse for a bit I guess.” Winter replied unenthusiastically.

“Good idea, me too. Let’s add each other to our friends list and meet up when you’re ready. Try to grab some armor too.” Davoth spoke while tapping into the air at his menu. A few seconds later, Winter got a friend request notification from Davoth and accepted it.

Winter watched as Davoth hopped excitedly into one of the nearby shops lining the town square, he’d never seen his friend this excited before, but Winter still wasn’t getting it yet. Sure, the world was immersive and well made, but it was still just a video game.

He took a moment to watch the other players around him. Rather than walking up to shops at random, he decided it best to gage which shop had the best potential based on how popular it was, while at the same time taking note on the value of different goods. He started by scouting out the various merchant stands set up to sell weapons, and it didn’t take long until he singled out the merchant with the best deals, and approached her.

The merchant he approached was a female demi-human player with big floppy dog ears, short messy brown hair, and a tail wagging behind her. Above her head he could read [Ruffily - Level 7].

“Hello there, you look like you could use some great beginner equipment, made by yours truly, woof!” She cheered excitedly at him. The woof threw him off a bit.

“R-right. What would you recommend for killing Rockjaws?” Winter asked, Ruffily eyed the Pickaxe in his hand.

“Woof! Looking to do some mining? Well any weapon here is great, woof! Rockjaw’s are nothing special. It's more about what fighting style you prefer. Do you like to stab, shoot, or smash? Woof!” Ruffily replied with enthusiasm, doing motions as she described the various ways to kill the monsters.

“Uhm… I’ve done a lot of time in Surgeon simulations, so probably stab.” Winter shrugged.

“Great! Woof! I’ve got some of the highest quality copper weapons you’ll find for beginners. Crafted myself. Short swords, daggers, longswords, axes, all of them perfect for cutting up a nasty Rockjaw! Woof!” She motioned to the various weapons on her shop stand. He looked over the axes, they looked too big and clunky for his liking. He instead focused on the short swords and daggers.

“What’s with these two here, both of them are copper short swords, but this one does more damage.” He said as he motioned to two blades on her stand.

“Woof, that’s right! Higher quality materials and a skilled blacksmith will equal better quality goods. You won’t find better quality copper shortswords from anyone else in Orm! Woof!” Ruffily smiled proudly.

“Does that make it worth more money?” Winter asked.

“Of course, woof!”

“How do you get higher quality materials?”

“Well, its different for the type of material, woof! If you want to mine high quality ore you’ll have to level up your mining skills, and mining in good spots helps improve the chances too, woof! Then you process the ore into bars to remove impurities, higher processing rank will improve the bar quality. Woof! The last step is to turn the bars into weapons like these, the more skilled the blacksmith, the better the end result.”

“I understand. I’d like to buy the higher quality shortsword, please.” Winter said, motioning to it.

“That’ll be 20 silver, woof!” She smiled. He pulled out 21 coins and handed them over, then got a message saying he’d bought the sword, while simultaneously the sword vanished in a flash of light from her shop and appeared in his inventory.

“An extra coin for the information.”

“Oh, very kind of you, woof! In that case, let me throw in a shield too. It’s not much, I just started leveling up my woodworking.” She smiled as her tail wagged furiously. He got a message saying he’d received a wooden shield as well.

“Thank you very much.”

“No problem, woof! Good luck mining, and if you get any copper ore with a 30% or higher quality, be sure to sell it to me, I’ll pay good money! Woof!” She cheered. He nodded back as he walked from her stand, going into his inventory and quickly equipping his new sword and shield.

Name: Copper Short Sword

Slot: Weapon (One Hand)

Type: Sword

Damage: 7-11

Speed: Average

Quality: 22%

Durability: 35/35

Description: A basic copper shortsword made by Ruffily.

Name: Wooden Shield

Slot: Off-hand

Type: Shield

Armor: 2

Quality: 1%

Durability: 20/20

Description: A crude wooden shield, made by Ruffily.

Once he equipped the sword, a simple sheath appeared around his waist with the hilt sticking out, and the shield appeared strapped to his left arm - it was barely bigger than a pot lid. He pulled the sword out and swung it around a bit, it felt just as he’d imagine it would, pretty darn realistic. He resheathed it and began browsing more shops while waiting for Davoth to return.

Next up was armor. He used the same methods to locate the best merchant in the town square. It took a bit longer as armor was more common, but eventually he was able to single one out as having the best prices and most traffic.

This time behind the stand was a large male orc player, [Brutus - Level 11]. He was tall and muscular with dark green skin and an imposing figure, a scar across the center of his face. But when he spoke, his voice was soft and friendly which made Winter a bit uncomfortable.

“Greetings friend. What can I help you with today?” Brutus politely asked as Winter approached.

“I’m looking for some armor to go Mine in the hills and kill Rockjaws. Got any suggestions?” Winter asked.

“Ah, a miner, great. For mining and fighting Rockjaws, I recommend leather. Let’s you move easy but will protect you a bit if they get ya.” Brutus explained.

“I’ll take leather then. What’s the highest quality stuff you’ve got?”

“Oh, looking to spend big? My best set is a mix of pieces ranging from 15 to 25% quality. Chest, legs, feet, and gloves. I’ll sell it to you at a discount for the bunch, 30 silver down from 40, how’s that sound.”

“Sounds good.” Winter shrugged. He didn’t particularly care if he got ripped off a few silver yet, he knew he’d have to take time to learn the economy of the game better. Once he bought the four armor pieces, he equipped them. None of them had special bonuses, but in total with his shield he got his base armor up to 20, reducing damage he took from monsters his level by 25%.

It took another 10 minutes or so before Winter finally saw Davoth emerge from a shop lining the town square wielding a longbow with a quiver. He practically skipped his way across the square towards Winter with a big dumb grin on his face.

“So you went with a sword and shield? Check it out, I got a bow! Pretty sick right?” Davoth squealed with excitement.

“Do you even know how to shoot a bow?” Winter asked with a raised brow.

“Nope, but once you use a weapon for a bit the game should give you the weapon mastery for it, and it’ll help you learn. I’m gonna be a badass archer like from those old fantasy movies.” Davoth replied.

“Sure you are. We ready to get started?” Winter replied.

“Y-yeah, I bought us both maps. Here.” Davoth made a rolled up scroll appear in his hand from his inventory and handed it to Winter. “It says that the popular copper mines are in the hills this way. Cmon, let's do it! Adventure time baby!” Davoth shouted, holding his hand out to Winter waiting for a high five. Winter looked at him like he was crazy for a moment, then reluctantly high fived him.

Davoth has invited you to join his Adventuring Party.

Accept Decline