The tutorial faded and Drew was back in the darkness of the watch floor. He turned his head from side to side, looking for any source of light and not finding any. The oppressive lack of light added weight to everything he had just heard. He was here in a world that wasn’t anything like the one he had known before. Reaching behind him to find the chair he had been sitting in, he sat down with a heavy sigh.

Citizen, please slot a xatherite node to continue.

Grateful to have at least something for his eyes to focus on in the darkness, Drew accessed his node structure with a thought and it sprang into being before him. To the right of the map was the list of xatherite he had available.

Focusing on them one by one, he pulled up the info screens on each crystal.

Xatherite Crystal Name: Fireball

Xatherite Color: Red

Xatherite Grade: Intermediate

Type: Magic

Effect: Convert mana into a high energy blast of fire that will travel in a straight line until exploding, causing major fire damage in a 1m radius around the blast.

Mana recharge time: 10.5 seconds.

Xatherite Crystal Name: Storm

Xatherite Color: Red

Xatherite Grade: Intermediate

Type: Magic

Effect: Create a localized storm around a target. The storm will have a radius of 10m and will cause significant wind, water, and lightning damage within its radius.

Mana recharge time: 1 minute, 17 seconds

Xatherite Crystal Name: Cone of Frost

Xatherite Color: Red

Xatherite Grade: Intermediate

Type: Magic

Effect: Creates a cone of cold energy which causes significant freezing damage, originating from any part of your body. Has a chance to partially enclose the target in ice, slowing them down considerably. Cone will extend 4 meters and has an arc of pi/4.

Mana recharge time: 16.8 seconds

Xatherite Crystal Name: Minor Dancing Sword

Xatherite Color: Red

Xatherite Grade: Common

Type: Magic

Effect: Creates a mana construct of a sword that lasts for 30 seconds. The sword will move on its own and attack any target designated for the duration of the attack.

Mana recharge time: 1 minute, 45 seconds

Xatherite Crystal Name: Major Spark

Xatherite Color: Red

Xatherite Grade: Basic

Type: Magic

Effect: Creates an arc of electricity, dealing minor lightning damage from any body part to a target no more than 3m away.

Mana recharge time: 4.2 seconds

Xatherite Crystal Name: Major Refresh

Xatherite Color: Orange

Xatherite Grade: Basic

Type: Magic

Effect: Infuses mana into the target to reduce fatigue and lactic acid buildup.

Mana recharge time: 22 minutes, 24 seconds

Xatherite Crystal Name: Major Mana Guard

Xatherite Color: Yellow

Xatherite Grade: Basic

Type: Magic

Effect: Creates a shield of mana around the caster. This shield will absorb moderate amounts of energy and kinetic damage.

Mana recharge time: 4 minutes, 33 seconds

Xatherite Crystal Name: Minor Acid Dart

Xatherite Color: Red

Xatherite Grade: Primitive

Type: Magic

Effect: Creates a small globule of acid from a finger that travels in a straight line until it impacts a target, dealing minor acid damage.

Mana recharge time: 16.1 seconds

He was a little confused by the damage amounts he was given, since they didn’t match up with the hierarchy he had been told to expect in the tutorial. He assumed minor was smaller than small, which was in turn smaller than moderate, but was significant higher than major? Also, Minor Dancing Sword didn’t list a damage at all. Did it not do any damage, or was it because it dealt kinetic damage while all the others dealt energy damage?

He glanced back over the units used. Meters and radians, really? He should have paid more attention in calculus. He was pretty sure pi/4 radians was approximately 45 degrees. And the meters were easy enough to convert into feet. “I guess this means the system is more interested in math than politics.”

Also, judging by the weird recharge times, his stats must play some sort of effect on how long it took before he could cast the spell again. He also realized that there was no cast time. Did that mean they were all instant effects? Or was it a hidden value that he would have to figure out for each spell?

Glancing at his node structure Drew realized that he wasn’t going to be able to insert all of his xatherite currently. Well, he could, but it would spread him out around his constellations and prevent him from fully populating any constellations. He would need to use the the yellow and orange xatherite he had to bridge the locations to the other red nodes. Which meant he needed to decide if it was more important to complete a constellation or to place all of his xatherite.

There were obvious pros and cons to both. If he placed them all, he would begin the process of upgrading all of them, and there was a clear difference in value between his intermediate quality xatherite and the lower grade ones. So getting those lower grade crystals upgraded would make him significantly more powerful. But at the same time, completing a constellation or creating linked skills would do the same thing, giving him more power and hopefully a better survival rate.

Also, where he put them was important. Did he put his good crystals in the four constellation node so he could complete it, or in the six constellation that required a blue and a purple xatherite? He had no idea how common xatherite was; the only reference he had for getting more was that apparently killing other humans would allow him to get their xatherite in 100 days after the restriction was removed.

That was a worrisome prospect. It meant that xatherite was rare enough that killing another human for their crystals was part of process. Which meant that it could be a fairly long time before he got the purple and blue xatherite he needed in order to fully complete the six node constellation. Perhaps he could trade with other people? Obviously only ones that he didn’t have slotted, which would be another reason not to slot all of his xatherite immediately.

He stared at the nodes in front of him. He simply didn’t have enough information to make the best choices. The gamer inside of him wanted to push him to make optimal choices. But what if he needed all of those high level xatherite to get away from the primary nexus? That was why he received them in the first place, because being near it was so dangerous. He didn’t think the world had suddenly given him multiple lives. So he needed to focus on the options that would give him the most immediate survivability, while still not severely hindering his future growth.

His stomach rumbled and he realized it had probably been a few hours since he last ate. He could probably crawl his way over to the snack bar, but the problem was the darkness. He couldn’t see anything, and if that continued, getting a light source was probably his highest priority.

Glancing over his options again, he looked for any options that would provide light. All of his attack spells would probably create small bursts of light, but they would also create quite a bit of damage in the area around him. Spark would probably damage considerably less than the higher quality fireball. He wasn’t even sure if cone of frost would create any light at all. Storm seemed like a bad idea in an enclosed area like the bunker he was currently in, but he really wanted it to start getting attuned. The short cooldown on spark would also be helpful, but he just wasn’t sure how much light it would produce.

On the other hand, dancing sword and mana guard could or could not create light, it all depended on the game. In some games, mana shield would create a nimbus around him, which would give him at least a small amount of light to work with, but it could just as easily be an invisible effect. Dancing sword was in a similar category; it could be made of light, or it could be like a normal sword and not help at all. The same could be said of major refresh; there could be a light effect when he cast the spell. But the nearly half an hour cooldown on major refresh made it unlikely for that to be very useful.

He decided that his best bet would probably be Dancing Sword. Most games would create an object of light for an effect like this. He didn’t anticipate it being very bright, and the gap during the spell being active to when he could recast it meant that he was going to spend about 2/3rds of the time in darkness. The question was, which slot was he going to put it into?

He looked at the other xatherite, then at the map. He decided that he needed to place cone of frost, fireball, minor dancing sword, major mana guard, and major refresh at least. That meant he could complete the easy constellation if he wanted to. He could also get four out of six in the larger one or put some in the larger one and then slot more into the six slot constellation that had two reds, two oranges, a yellow, and a white.

With a heavy sigh, convinced that he was making the wrong choice but unsure what would be better, he put dancing sword and major mana guard in the first constellation on the right. He then put fireball in the white slot and major refresh in the orange before putting cone of frost and storm in the red slots of the six slot constellation in the bottom right of the starmap. Leaving minor acid dart and major spark unslotted for now.

Satisfied that he had made the best choices available to him according to the knowledge that he possessed, Drew confirmed the changes.

Congratulations citizen, you have taken your first step on your training. Fight well, survive, and prevail.

Drew grasped his skull as information suddenly flooded his brain. The correct actions to cast six spells burned paths into the neurons in his head. Then his eyes rolled up and he slumped down into the chair, unconscious.

Spoiler: Xatherite Map

Waking up an unknown amount of time later, Drew groaned, a hand rubbing his temples as a massive headache prevented him from thinking straight for several minutes. The pain receded slowly, gradually allowing room for more coherent thought. As soon as it was at a manageable level, he cast his first spell. His fingers twisting in familiar patterns he had never made before implanting the xatherite.

There was a flash of orange light, the first color he had seen in the real world since the voice had said “Begin.” His headache reduced to a much more manageable level, the pain in his neck from his abrupt collapse earlier disappearing as well.

“Guess that answers the question on cast times.” He felt like he had just woken up from a good night’s sleep as he stood up and stretched. Looking around at the darkness, he muttered, “Well, here goes nothing.”

His fingers twisted to form a circle between his thumb and pointer finger, then made a strange jerking motion. Then there was light. A translucent gladius, made of what appeared to be glass, came into being about two feet in front of him floating in mid air and glowed with a faint red light. It wasn’t bright, but it was enough for him to see a few feet around him, which was all he needed. He turned towards the snackbar and made quick work of finding a bag of chips before the sword, following behind him over his shoulder, disappeared, plunging him into darkness yet again.

At least now it was darkness with a bag of chips. He ripped the bag open and began to stuff his face. He wasn’t sure how long it had been since last he ate, but his body certainly knew that it was hungry.

Six bags of chips, a soda, three candy bars, and two bags of peanuts later, the edge of his hunger was gone, replaced by a faint craving for something more substantial, which he had a feeling he wasn’t going to get in the near future.

Now armed with some light, his belly mostly full, and his thirst temporarily abated, his immediate issues had been solved. Now came the hard part: getting out of the bunker.