Seven didn't feel surprised when she saw that she was the first of the team to log in. She had come in a few hours before the others had agreed to meet up with each other. She immediately eyed the trees around her and lifted her curled fist to the nearest one.

*BANG* *BANG* *BANG*

She shot magic blast after magic blast trying to hit the leaves that fell. Third wasn’t here to move them around with his rifts but she knew that she could still practice well even without him. Of course, she didn’t stand right next to the leaves, there would be no point in that.

She started from a distance of a few feet away. Something that she could reasonably consider the edge of close range. She missed leaf after leaf for various reasons and slowly became more frustrated as she did.

Mistiming the speed at which the leaves were falling.

Hitting the same general area but above or below the leaves.

Finally hitting the right spot but slightly to the left or right or the leaf.

A slight tremble causing her to miss as she tried to keep her hand steady.

She wrote every problem she encountered in the journal feature. She separated them from the monster entries she had been jotting down.

She spent the first hour trying to work out what her issues were, then she spent the second hour trying to correct them. She was still missing every shot, but she could tell that she would soon hit her targets if she kept improving at the rate she was. She was already shooting easily into an area the size of a rabbit. Right now it took her too much time to estimate the travelling speed and area the leaf would fall to. By the time she fired her first shot to hit one leaf, all the others fell to the ground immediately after.

She needed to improve on that as well.

In the third hour she finally managed to get the timing down with enough time to fire another shot at the falling leaves before they hit the ground. After the third hour she tried a different kind of practice. She concentrated and summoned the transparent, ball-shaped focus point halfway between herself and the leaves. Then she began her routine again, except that she would fire a magic blast into the focus point and then another into the air. She wasn’t trying to hit anything on purpose by firing into the focus point, she just wanted to see how she could shift the direction of the attacks. True mastery of aiming and firing with it would take much more practice, let alone summoning the focus point after she had made the attack.

The fourth hour finally brought another breakthrough as she fired five shots before the leaves fell onto the ground. It wasn’t simply that she was firing more rapidly and skipping the fundamentals, she genuinely felt that she had a good enough grasp of their timing that she could risk firing at one leaf and moving onto the next. Of course, at the moment the magic blasts that were going through the focus points were all duds that she didn’t even try to hit leaves with. But she noticed that the angle at which she could divert her attacks was growing.

She still hadn’t hit a leaf yet.

‘Damn my hand moved again.’ She cursed at herself as she misfired again.

At this point, her shots were just barely missing some leaves. If this had been the rabbit or even the gap between the flower monster’s petals she was sure that she could hit it. Okay, maybe not the petal gap, but she knew that she was improving by the hour.

*BANG*

She moved away from the tree as its leaves fell and drew her wand steadily towards the falling leaves.

Timing.

Fire. Miss.

Speed.

Fire. Miss.

Change direction.

Fire. Miss

Go for a normal shot.

Fire. Hit.

“What?” She looked at the smouldering leaf that had been lit by her magic, “I hit it? I HIT IT.”

She jumped around joy as the burnt leaf fell onto the ground. It had taken her hours and hours but she had finally hit a single leaf. It was only one, and Third hadn’t been manipulating it, but she had still hit it.

“What did you do?” TidalWave appeared near her as she was celebrating and she gave out a strangled yelp.

He had seen something embarrassing.

“Oh.” He walked down to the tree where a huge bundle of leaves had gathered.

If they didn't pick the leaves up they disappeared, but she had been practicing so much that the pile had grown rather than shrunk. He spotted the single burnt leaf and smiled, picking it up.

“Hey, congratulations.” He passed her the leaf. “Keep this as a memento of a job well done.”

[You have received the item: Leaf (damaged)]

Seven hesitated but kept the leaf.

‘It took me so long to hit one of the things.’ She looked down at the leaf with a passion.

If the leaf had been alive it would have trembled in fear at the look she gave it.

“So,” TidalWave looked at her cheekily, “Are you going to stop at one?”

“Heck no.” She pointed at the tree with her wand. “Hit that bastard up.”

*BANG*

They went through more leaves methodically. Now that she had a taste for blood she wasn’t going to let a single one of them live.

Except she still missed almost every single leaf.

It turns out that hitting something once is easy but because she moved, even if it was a slight amount, she was firing from different distances, angles and had to time every shot accurately. She hadn’t hit two leaves from the same batch yet, but her direction control was improving as she shot some shots through the focus point.

[You have picked up the item: leaf (damaged)]

She even hit the occasional leaf which was a major improvement. She felt more satisfaction hitting the second leaf than she had the first one and she began to keep every single leaf that she shot. She knew it wouldn’t be possible to keep them all later on when she started to hit them consistently but they weighed next to nothing so she could probably hold ten thousand of them and still not have any trouble with her inventory. It was more of a joke weight than anything.

She had around four.

A few minutes later Archy logged on and joined in on the fun. He began a leaf massacre and Seven sat down to bang at the trees to create more leaves for him to fire at. Now that she’d been trying the same thing for hours she realised how amazing his ability to hit the tiny targets at all distances and angles was. He didn’t miss a single leaf and she tried to watch his attacks to see if she could pick out the techniques he was using. Unfortunately, she couldn’t really gain any information because the way he fired his bow and the speed of his arrows were too different from the way her magic attacks worked.

Suddenly a figure logged in near them and flourished his robe grandly. “I arrive with good news.”

“A tank and a priest?” Seven asked hopefully as Third rushed towards them.

They had agreed that since tanks were so rare they would accept any of them, however, because priests were so prevalent they would prefer them to be over level 18 so that there wouldn’t be a big disparity between party members.

“No priest.” Third said and his smile faltered slightly, but then came back strong, “But two tanks applied for positions after seeing our stats. Both are high levelled and will meet with us in Lum in a couple of hours. They actually come as a party which is a surprise, so we’ll have to convince them both to come with us or neither will.”

He gathered them together and showed them the stats they had given him. They’d agreed to release their stats to everyone in the post because they didn’t mind others seeing their levels and equipment. After all, out of all the players in Zodiac Online, only the smallest fraction would be in their area.

In return, Third had asked all applicants to take a screenshot inside the game to prove they really had the stats they claimed to have. This was to avoid joke applicants that would claim to have interest but then never show up or would have lied about their abilities. According to Third, even if they were high level enough if their party started with a lie then it wouldn’t end well.

Spark Joy: Level 20

Health: 104 (+40)

Mana: 20

Vitality: 32

Strength: 15 (+10)

Intelligence: 10

Wisdom: 10

Defense: 42 (+28)

Iron Lizard racial trait: Gain 1 vitality and 1 defense per 5 levels.

Defense stat: Your proficiency with armour and shields increases, allowing for swifter and more fluid movements when wearing heavy armour and wielding heavy shields. Small chance to defend completely against physical attacks.

Class passive:

Iron Guardian passive: Gain 3 vitality and 2 def every 5 levels.

Iron Guardian passive 2: 5% Chance to block half the damage of a physical attack when wielding a heavy shield.

Iron Guardian passive 3: 2% Chance to block a magical attack.

Equipment:

Iron Chain Sickle: +10 STR, +2 DEF

Shield of the Iron Guardian: +20 DEF, +15HP

Heavy Steel chest armour: +15 HP, +2 DEF

Steel greaves: +10 HP

Iron gloves: +4 DEF

Skills:

Basic attack (Iron Chain sickle): Deal 5+(Strength) damage. 6-foot radius of attack.

Ground Pound: Deal 10+(Defense + Strength). Cooldown 1 minute.

Sickle Drag: Throw your sickle out towards a target. If the weapon makes contact, the target is incapacitated and dragged within one foot of your location. Cost: 5 Mana.

Shield Defense: When using your shield to defend against an attack take 50%, 30% and 10% less damage from light, medium, and heavy attacks respectively.

Roxxy: level 20

Health: 86 (+34)

Mana: 20

Vitality: 26

Strength: 23 (+8)

Intelligence: 10

Wisdom: 10

Defence: 12 (+7)

Earth elf racial trait: Gain 1 vitality per 5 levels.

Class passive:

Shield Warrior passive: Gain 1 def per 5 levels.

Defense stat: Your proficiency with armour and shields increases, allowing for swifter and more fluid movements when wearing heavy armour and wielding heavy shields. Small chance to defend completely against physical attacks.

Equipment:

Sharp sword: +8 STR

Steel buckler: +10 HP, +5 DEF

Steel chest armour: +10 HP, +2 DEF

Steel greaves: +10 HP

Steel gloves: +4 HP

Skills:

Basic Attack (Sharp Sword): 10+(Strength) damage.

Shield block: When using your shield to block an attack take 30%, 15%, and 5% less damage from light, medium, and heavy attack respectively.

Shield Throw: Throw your shield at an enemy to stun them for 1 second and interrupt their attack. The thrown shield will return upon attack completion.

“Hot damn.” Archy eyeballed their stats, “I thought it’d be harder to find tanks this early in the game?”

Third nodded, “I too am surprised. Apparently there are no priests that meet our criteria either. They are either too far below our level or in a party already. It appears that not many players have made it into lum without already joining a group.”

“With these two we might not need a priest immediately,” TidalWave looked impressed, “Especially since they’re two different types of tanks. It looks like this Roxxy person can deal damage and disable enemies from afar. Even if it’s just for a second if she can interrupt one of their deadly skills it could save us a lot of trouble.”

Seven stared at the first tank’s stats intently. “Spark Joy is insane. It’s like the opposite of you TidalWave; they can’t deal a ton of damage but look at how little damage they take and how much health they have. The sheer amount of health and defense is crazy and I don’t even know what defense does, really.”

“What do you think a medium and heavy hit is?” Archy switched to where Seven was.

“I would say that we haven’t encountered anything like a heavy hit so far.” TidalWave thought about the corrupted magica and treants, “But the treants and flower monster were probably dealing medium hits.”

“So for each hit that dealt twenty-five damage she would have taken seventeen damage or so?” Seven exclaimed, “That’s insane, I was almost dead from a single hit and this person could probably take…” She did the math in her head, “like five or six hits without dodging, healing or anything?”

“They made it to Lum with only two party members,” Both his potential teammates and the analysis of his current ones impressed Third, “they’re undoubtedly an extremely strong duo, but now it’s our job to convince them that we’d be a good fit for them.”

“I think we should be perfectly transparent about the quest once they turn up.” Seven spoke up. “If they know what kind of thing they’re in for, it might entice them enough to join us straight away.”

“Yeah,” Archy agreed with her. “And if we invite them to see us fighting in the arena, we can show them what kind of people their teammates are. I was thinking about that, actually.”

“You were thinking?” Third commented wryly.

Archy completely ignored him. “I think it should be TidalWave and I fighting against each other. We’re a lot flashier but I think we also have more obvious skills compared to Tubs and Seven.” He began to smile as he saw Third bristling at his insult, “Also this guy pisses me off and if they’re anything like me, they’d rather have Seven around. She’s pretty chill and doesn’t sound like a cat swallowed a newspaper critic. So you two can be our negotiators while we,” he pointed at TidalWave, “shoot arrows accurately and dodge each other like crazy.”

They all took a moment to marvel at the fact that Archy had somehow come up with such a delicate and thought out plan.

“We aren’t going to fake it. I want to make use of every moment.” TidalWave stated simply.

“Wouldn’t think of doing it any other way.”

“When are they coming?” Seven asked Third after seeing that everybody was up to date with the plan.

“It should be an hour and a bit. They’ll send me a private message when they arrive so we can find a suitable meeting place. I did a bit of research and every city should have an arena that can be used to duel. You can even change the environment inside the arena but it will cost money. The amount differs depending on your city and the environment you want them to change the arena into.”

“Then let’s head in and get our stuff.” Archy began to walk towards the city.

The moment they walked through the city gates they spread out and agreed to message each other if they found anything they thought the others would need. Third went immediately to find the arena and Archy and TidalWave went to find the armour and weapon shops.

Seven admired the architecture and design of the sprawling city while she searched for the magi guild. She hoped that they would have either better equipment for her or Third, or that they could teach her new skills.

The city of Lum was the very definition of luxury. Hidden inside its high walls was a myriad of colours and people of all races. It was almost mind-boggling to her that about ninety-nine percent of the population were NPCs.

Elves, lizardfolk, dwarves, and humans were spread out across the buildings and roads, arguing and bartering with each other or going about their own business. Each major section of the city she passed also had the occasional city guard that was level 100 guarding against anyone wanting to do harm. Rarely a player passed by her and eyed her. They had mostly hidden their levels which they had done by turning off the feature in the game settings that displayed their level next to their name. Seven had turned off this feature early into the game and spotted the occasional level seventeen or eighteen. Not everybody went around fighting treants and dryads non-stop, nor did they fight magical creatures far above their levels.

She had another purpose to be going slowly through the city.

She had messaged IEatTortillas in real life before logging in and asked if she was in Lum with Attracting so they could meet up.

Her friends were actually already in the city and would meet up with her when she wanted. She saw IEatTortillas was online and messaged him. They agreed to meet up in an hour in the arena. Now she just had to wait for Third to find it and everything would be perfect.

She really wanted to invite her friends to play with her but unfortunately, they couldn't allow Attracting to know about the quest or else it would cancel. She was planning to tell IEatTortillas when they were alone because she didn’t really want to leave her friend out.

She would apologise to Attracting after.

She soon noticed a startling uniform flag being displayed from every building in some form. A plain white sheet with a brown etching of an eye in the middle of it. She could see the same sign on the white uniforms of the priests and all the guards sported it on their armour. It was the symbol of Verm, the god of light.

Because Lum was one of the major cities in Zhalnor the Church of Verm completely ruled it. The church had a firm hold on the supplies, military, and politics of the city and despite the alarm this would cause in the real world, the city seemed even more peaceful because of it. The church defended the citizens from danger and in return they hung the symbol of Verm from their buildings to show their devotion and loyalty.

In the middle of the city was a gigantic cathedral belonging to the church, although she wasn’t nearby Seven could still see it arching above all the other buildings. When the team had told her that they’d get a priest she had researched the class a bit. She'd found that these cathedrals were the main reason priests were so prevalent on the continent. Normal players could purchase special armour if they did quests for the church or even earn favour, rank or title within the theocracy. But from the beginning priests could gain major blessings from these cathedrals that could last anything from a day to a week depending on how much influence they had with the church.

Strength, health and even increases in healing ability were available to the priests that followed the path of Verm. It wouldn’t take long for the cathedrals to become major hotspots for all players. Although no player had been there yet there were already whispers online that the capital of Zhalnor, Lux, could grant even greater benefits to priests.

It was truly a continent built for this class in particular.

Of course, it wasn’t completely unfair to other classes. If you joined the army of Verm then you would also gain benefits. It was also far easier for warriors to become paladins in this continent compared to Kyrgios. Paladins of Verm would also gain benefits from the church but because there were no paladins yet nobody knew what those benefits were.

It was the opposite inside the other continents. She didn’t know what classes the Underground gave benefits to but the Kyrgios continent worshipped the god of war, Varsha. Warriors could go to the warrior temples and gain benefits to their fighting abilities. It was said that there would be a wider variety of warrior and archer classes stemming from that continent as well. Unfortunately, as a result, the priests and magicians of the continent suffered from a lack of distinct advantages. But the continent didn't disadvantage them either.

Seven moved towards one of the bigger buildings in the area. She guessed that it had something to do with magic due to the giant statue of a wand and staff that formed an upside-down V-shape as they clashed with each other.

She walked in through a beautiful rose-red revolving glass door and found herself facing a smiling attendant.

“Well now, this is a new face.” The attendant moved out of the way and gave her a small bow as she walked next to him, “Welcome to the Magi Guild of Lum. May I inquire as to the purpose of your visit?”

Seven gave him a warm smile. “I’m looking to buy some equipment that might suit me. As for anything else…” She thought that it might be better to wait until she came with Third, “I believe I’ll raincheck on that for now.”

“Of course.” The attendant brought her to a counter and then moved behind it. “A skilled magi such as yourself deserves only the finest equipment.” He brought out a few items and a prompt opened up for her to shop.

Even after killing enough dryads and treants to get to level 20 she only had seven gold and sixty silver on her. She also didn’t know what else she might want to buy since she had enough red and blue mushrooms to last her a while, but something new might pop up.

‘But then again…’

There were a lot of items that caught her eye.

[Wand of the Magi: A wand that has been crafted and imbued with magic by a skilled Magi. Intermediate Magic Blast: Deal 3/4 Intelligence as magic damage. 1 gold.]

This wand alone would make her a lot stronger.

[Wand of the Fire Magi: A wand that has been crafted and imbued with magic by a Magi skilled in the art of fire manipulation: Deal your Intelligence as fire magic damage. 1 gold.]

The other elements all had similar wands, earth, wind, water, ice, and even metal.

[Advanced Wand of the Magi: A wand that has been expertly crafted and imbued with devastating magic by a skilled Magi. Advanced Magic Blast: Deal double your Intelligence as magic damage. 20 gold.]

With this, she could deal four times her damage but the price was too high. There was also an assortment of staffs and crystals that she didn’t have any use for. She perused them to send the information to Third and then switched to the armour section.

[Lum Magi Cloak: A wandering Magi would do well to carry around protection such as this. +10 HP, +4 INT, +2 WIS. 2 Gold.]

[Lum Magi Gloves: ‘A cold hand is an unhappy hand’ It was with this philosophy in mind that the Magi Guild created its line of self-warming magical gloves. +4 WIS, +3 INT, +2 HP. 1 Gold.]

[Lum Magi Boots: ‘Slip, slop, slap’ That is the sound of you dying after you slipped in forest mud when fighting a monster because you weren’t wearing the Magi Guild’s wonderfully fashionable boots. +5HP, +3 WIS. 1 Gold.]

[Lum Magical Light Armour: For defending you from those pesky sword mosquitoes that stab through your cloak. +10 HP, +1 INT. Costs 2 Gold.]

She intended to buy every single one armour if she could, but then she spotted something that took her attention away from the usual purchases.

[Focus Crystal: Hold it in your hand and try not to think of why the handsome courier is delivering to your spouse on a Sunday. +5 CON, +2 INT. 2 Gold.]

Apparently there was an item here that could improve the control stat. She honestly couldn’t afford all of the items. She could dual-wield it alongside her wand since she had a free hand. At the moment the crystal dagger was sticking to her side and was almost completely useless, but the focus crystal would replace it. She was definitely upgrading her wand so if she bought this crystal she might have to give up on one or two pieces of armour.

She checked and apparently the dagger would give her a single gold if sold. The attendant heavily valued the effect of +5% cast speed. Unfortunately, the red mushrooms were worthless, but blue mushrooms would earn her two silver each and the high-class mana potions would net her thirty.

Ultimately, she decided to sell the blue mushrooms. The potions were too valuable. Luckily the things had been growing everywhere. She sold 18 blue mushrooms and still had over 30 left.

She was officially broke.

Would she come to regret this decision? Frankly, her newly upgraded stats told her not to care too much about that.

Seven: level 20

Health: 57 (+27)

Mana: 48

Vitality: 15

Strength:10

Intelligence: 34 (+10)

Wisdom: 28 (+9)

Dodge: 8

Control: 5 (+5)

Elf racial trait: Gain 1 intelligence per 5 levels.

Class Passive:

Nimble Mage passive: Gain 1 intelligence and 2 dodge per 5 levels.

Equipment:

Wand of the Magi: Deal 3/4 Intelligence as magic damage.

Lum Magi Cloak: +10 HP, +4 INT, +2 WIS.

Lum Magi Gloves: +4 WIS, +3 INT, +2 HP.

Lum Magi Boots: +5HP, +3 WIS.

Lum Magical Light Armour: +10 HP, +1 INT.

Focus Crystal: +5 CON, +2 INT.

Each basic magic blast would now deal slightly above 25 damage. She could probably kill Archy within two hits if he hadn’t improved his gear. It was an insane amount of damage to her.

Then again because her attacks were technically ‘light’ it would take a minimum of thirteen hits to kill the tank called Spark Joy she was going to meet soon. This wasn’t even taking into account potions.

She sent a message to Third copying the contents of the entire shop for him to look through in his own time. He was extremely excited because some of the armour and weapons that hadn’t suited her would fit him perfectly. He didn’t even question her selling her mushrooms, even if they were a cheap source of mana he said he would probably sell even more if it meant he could buy a few more things. They both knew that the entire team would gain a giant power boost just from shopping in the city. She hoped that dragon treasure included a lot of gold.

Who knew what they’d be able to purchase after they’d come back from their quest.

“It is a shame.” As she closed the shop window, the attendant spoke out to her, “That such a skilled magi received such a poor path.”

“Huh?” Seven looked at the shopkeeper in confusion.

“You are clearly far more skilled than god Verm has dictated. Or perhaps you have simply improved since you chose your path, however, I can see that you are clearly beholden to strength and skill far beyond that of the nimble magi.” The shop attendant gave her a grin. “Continue on your path young magi, and I believe you will become far more powerful than you could ever imagine.”

Seven thought of all the training she had done and how she had gained not only control but also accuracy and a host of other skills. Even if she still had come nowhere near mastering any of those skills, an acknowledgement of her abilities felt nice.

“Thank you.” She beamed at him. “I’ll definitely be coming back later after such a quality service. Oh,” she wondered if the NPC would remember her words. “My wizard friend called Third will be coming in soon to shop around. He’s even more skilled than I am and he’s a master of control. Maybe if you have any items that would suit someone of his level you should bring them out.”

The attendant nodded his head and a gleam appeared in his mind when she mentioned Third’s ability to control magic.

She left the store wondering if her words would do anything to influence the attendant when Third came to visit the store. Then she put the matter to rest as she received a message from the person in question. It contained a single map coordinate.

He had found the Lum arena.