The world came back into focus, Mark checked out his avatar and noted that Eztli was dressed like a young Aztec noble. He had golden wrist bands, a beautiful kilt like dress with elaborate and colorful designs, gold shin guards and hemp slippers rather then the bare feet as a child. He even had a cotton cloak around his shoulders a bare chest and a feathered headdress feathered with colorful parrot feathers.

He liked the look of this Aztec nobleman and checked the properties of the clothing, noted it was all cosmetic, so he slotted the clothing into his character’s “appearance” clothing tab. He wasn’t a big fan of showing off his items and liked displaying cosmetic clothing as his base appearance. This appearance was good, he also noted the avatar was now the adult version he had chosen before, with the magic tattoo on the arm.

Mark pulled up the character sheet to see how the game progressed him into adulthood.

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Character: Eztli

Age: 17

Social Status: Aztec Nobel

Level: 1 (0/1000)

Hit Points: 1430

Magic Points: 3260

Defense: 105

Strength: 110 (5%) = 116

Agility: 100 (5%) = 105

Constitution: 130 (10%) = 143

Wisdom: 320 (10%) = 352

Intelligence: 220 (5%) = 231

Charisma: 100 (5%) = 105

Willpower: +9

Poison/Disease Resistance: +1

Pain Resistance: +1

Reflexes: +1

Skill Trees: 0/8

Skills: 0/10

Bonus Skills: Cannibalism, Intimidation (+22)

Language: Aztec (10/10), Mayan (10/10), Inca (10/10)

Knowledge: Religion: Aztec Gods (Max)

Affinities: Blood Magic (+71), Affinity with Air Magic (+1), Affinity with Shamanic Magic (+1)

Items: Sacrificial Knife (Obsidian)

Relations:

(none)

Accolades:

Perfect Clear: 5% to all attributes

Top of the World (Tenochtitlan): 5% to Constitution

Tattoos (Magic):

Quetzalcoatl: 5% to Wisdom, +1 Affinity with Air Magic, +1 Affinity with Shamanic Magic

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He smiled, a template character would have about 800 stat points at level one, his 1052 wasn’t an amazing step forward, but it was nice, considering they wouldn’t have any of the accolades yet, nor any of the extra languages, only basic affinities and knowledge’s, if they spent some of their attributes they could come in with a noble status, something he picked up without spending or sacrificing points. Every level up you gained 10 attribute points. Better still his character creation wasn’t done yet, he had more chances to gain attributes, skills and accolades before entering the actual game.

Looking around he noted the home he was in now was a drastic step up from the slum home in the first part. It wasn’t impressive to a modern human but there were actual room divisions, and something better then a pile of hay in the corner to sleep on. He walked out of the well put together bedroom and looked around for a quest prompt. He saw a slave cleaning in a corner and since the slave had nothing interesting about his design and no specific name, he figured the chances this NPC had anything interesting to say was unlikely. So, he kept making his way through the home. Golden ornaments were everywhere.

Eventually Eztli made his way out of the front door, his parents and younger siblings were standing outside waiting for him. His father handed him a Macuahuitl, weapon which looked like a wooden cricket bat with obsidian glass edges to it. This one was rather beautiful, with the design of Quetzalcoatl on the flat side. He examined the stats of the Macuahuitl.

Ceremonial Macuahuitl – The weapon of a noble youth. This is designed to be looked at, not designed for war, though it is a real weapon which can be used to kill a human being with.

Attack Bonus: -10

Damage: 100-500

Critical Chance: 10%

Critical Damage Multiplier: x5

Durability: 50

Combat in this game was a little variable, because you could physically avoid attacks, or a martial artist could accurately hit a target. To make combat “somewhat” fair for untalented fighters, there was a type of combat assist in the form of attack skills. Attack skills varied from untargeted skills like AOE (area of effect), PBAOE (point blank area of effect/effect centered on the caster), Always Hit, and Targeted skills. AOE and PBAOE skills allow some damage mitigation based on armor and reflexes. However, anyone caught inside the range of one of those skills will take damage. Granted some AOE attacks were better then others, some differentiated between friend and foe, some didn’t. In group play the ones that differentiated were superior to those that didn’t. Always Hit skills would target a single target and it hit every time, the balance to these skills is much like AOE and PBAOE skills reflex and armor tended to mitigate the damage received, and these skills rarely triggered any sort of critical. Targeted skills however depend a great deal on your ability to move your character. These skills only landed if the attacker actually connects with the defender. However, to balance this a bit, defense and attack are compared to produce a damage modification. The math for the system was a bit complex, but once upon a time he used to have spreadsheets with the actual numbers the system used to min/max his DPS (damage per second) he produced.

The Macuahuitl was just as ridiculous a weapon as he remembered. It basically was a devastating weapon that did an insane amount of damage. However, it broke easily. It was meant to be wielded 2 handed, and was not a weapon that Mark planned to rely on once he started to open his skill trees.

Eztli accepted the Macuahuitl from his father, and his father started to speak. “Eztli has reached the age of adulthood and needs to find his path. He can become a warrior like his father, or a priest like his uncle. Eztli would like you to chose either of those paths?

SYSTEM NOTE: You may change to a specific class at this time, this is your last chance to chose a specific class, all your progress will be reset and you’ll be brought back to character creation to chose a class for your build. Do you wish to change to a specific class at this time?

Y/N

Eztli shook his head. “Father I want to find my own path not take a path chosen by others.”

The man nodded, “Then go out into the world and find your own path.”

The scene changed and Eztli found himself standing in the middle of Tenochtitlan at the base of the great pyramid. A quest note flashed in his eyes

Character Quest: Gain a skill tree

No other details were present though when he looked around the central plaza numerous NPCs had gold names over the heads. Many of these NPCs would allow him to gain life skills if he wanted to become a crafter or merchant or just wanted to chill out in the game as a level 1000 fisherman. He noted priests at the top of the pyramid also had golden names. What he was seeking was something a little more special then these.

So he started to make his way out of the city heading west with a purpose, the journey took almost a full hour in game time just to get to the western gates, which spoke to the impressive size of Tenochtitlan, people parted before him and he moved in a bubble of freedom, inside the city his status was absolute, though he knew once he left the city, unless he was near some soldiers, his status as a noble will draw more arrows then it will deflect in this play region. The Aztec had a lot of enemies in central Mexico, for good reason, they were a warrior people who raided nearby tribes for ritual sacrifices and slaves constantly, earning them the enmity of the whole region. As a result, most of the non-Aztec natives in this region were flagged as “hostile” monsters to Tenochtitlan players.

Eventually he made his way out of the city, and started to cut across the countryside taking a path he vaguely remembered. He had found this by accident almost 30 years ago, and in spite of a clear recollection of what he was looking for, where it was, was only a vague memory. The lifelike appearance of the countryside made it harder to find his way accurately, since the old game was much more cartoony in appearance. He paused in the middle of a wild grass field, the smells were so lifelike he almost forgot he was in a game, as Eztli spun about in the endless grassland trying to find a good point of reference he remembered from 30 years ago. All he could find was the 60-meter temple on the horizon, so he made his way further west looking for the stream he recalled.

It took almost 4 hours to find the stream he was looking for, and another hour to find the general area he thought he needed to be in. When he did this last time, he was on a quest from an old man offering to teach him archery skills if he used a bow to kill a wild deer. He was chasing a wounded deer in this area and fell down a hole, nearly killing himself. That hole was what he needed to find. With the sun setting Eztli finally found the hole. It was exactly as he remembered. So, he climbed his way in carefully. It wasn’t as large as he remembered, and with the controlled entry, he didn’t injure himself like he did last time.

Eztli stat down under the entrance to the small cave and ignored the sounds of snakes in the darkness. He remembered last time he was here the snakes unnerved him. He was terrified of ending up in the belly of one. Instead of fear he felt expectation. Eventually the sounds of snakes vanished, and something large made its way closer, he heard a large slithering noise, it clearly was a boss monster sized snake, a blast of hot air blew past his face and the fires of the Underworld rose deep in the cave coloring the black rock cave red, in front of Eztli was a huge snake with golden eyes, covered in feathers, with feathered wings. It was close enough Eztli could reach out and touch its nose. Hovering above the snake’s head was the golden name Quetzalcoatl

Bowing deeply, pressing his face into the rock floor Eztli called out “Great Quetzalcoatl, your servant is honored to see you”

The huge snake god simply sat there, staring at Eztli as if deciding wether he’d make a good dinner or not. Eztli kept his forehead pressed to the stone floor, the fires of the underworld raged in the distance increasing the temperature of the cave drastically. The stone floor got hotter and hotter, sweat dripped from Eztli’s forehead down his nose and onto the stone floor where it started to evaporate. Eventually Quetzalcoatl spoke in a surreal and dreamy voice “Do you wish to be my servant human?”

Eztli’s answer came quickly “Yes”

“Are you sure?”

Update Character Quest: Gain a skill tree

You have found Quetzalcoatl and have impressed him.

He wishes to make you a servant. Will you serve Quetzalcoatl?

Reward: Gain skill trees: Blood Sacrifice, Ritual Curse and Bless, Animal Shape

Will you accept? Y/N

“Yes, I’m sure.”

Quetzalcoatl’s voice melted into the night, as the light from the fires vanished and the oppressive heat disappeared as if never there “Then rise my servant”

QUEST COMPLETE: Gain a skill tree

Completion percentage: 100%

Rewards: Gained skill tree Blood Sacrifice, gained skill tree Ritual Curse and Bless, gained skill tree Animal Shape.