~‌ ‌1.06 ‌-‌ Training Dummies Fight Back ‌~‌

The Bloody Boar

2nd Lightday of The Full Moon

As Flea walked closer to The Bloody Boar inn, a Dwarf came crashing through the window; sending shards of glass everywhere. The Dwarf landed with a thud and groaned. A Goat Beastkin walked out from the front door and kicked the sprawled out Dwarf in his side.

“Learn how to pickpocket somewhere else, you sorry excuse for a street urchin. If we catch you anywhere near here again, you’re going to end up at the bottom of The Pit,” the Beastkin said to the downed Dwarf.

Flea gave a wide berth to the duo and walked into The Bloody Boar. The inn was far livelier than The Drunken Ogre had been. The insides were very clean and proper looking; this surprised him. Flea was expecting the place to be seedy and decrepit for a place that housed rouges. Making his way over to the bar, he flagged down the barkeep.

“Hello, I’m looking for Zelken. Could you point me in his direction?”

“You can find him in the basement. Stairs are back near the kitchen,” the barkeep responded as he tilted his head in the direction of the kitchen.

“Thank you.”

Flea made his way to the back towards the kitchen, spotting the stairs to his right. He walked down them, coming to a landing of hard-packed dirt with a closed-door to his right. He tried to open the door but it appeared to be locked tight. Knocking with no answer, he started to bang on the door with his fist. A small metal slit opened up two-thirds of the way up on the door. A pair of blue eyes staring down at him.

“You lost boy?” the voice sounded from behind the door.

“No, I don’t think so? I’m looking for Zelken for training.”

The slit closed with a clang. Another couple of low clacks from behind the door and it swung open. The person behind the door with the bright blue eyes was something between a Dryad and a Treant. The Dryent pointed to the back corner of the basement, where two people were kneeling in front of two doors in the middle of the room. Flea assumed they were practicing their lockpick skills. Suddenly there was a loud pop, and the guy on the right got a face full of soot and singed hair.

“You’re zero for three now, MasterSlash,” a massive round Dwarf chuckled from the corner.

The Dwarf was around five feet tall and almost the same size wide. He had bright red hair with a beard that was braided down to his belly. The Human on the right, who he now assumed was MasterSlash, had to be a player. The door on the left had a Gnome working on the lock, and the only other Gnome Flea had seen beside himself. A faint click could be heard, and the Gnome opened the door.

“WOOT! I finally did it! This is so much more satisfying when you have to do it a hundred percent yourself with no computer or AI assistance,” he said excitedly jumping up and down.

“Bugger off SnekSnek. I can’t figure this out at all. How can you tell the difference between the tumblers and the trap pressure switch? I just can’t figure it out,” MasterSlash said in a huff.

“Keep practicing, MasterSlash. You paid for the hour, let me reset the doors, and you two can keep at it,” said the Dwarf.

The Dwarf walked up to the doors from behind. You could then hear him making clinking and clanking noises for a couple of minutes, before shutting the doors.

“SnekSnek, I’ve added a second trap to your door and reset your door MasterSlash. You both may begin,” the Dwarf said as he spotted Flea.

“What can I do for you, youngster.”

“Hello, I’m here to meet Zelken and get some training done or find out how much it’s going to cost me when I return.”

“Alright. Well, I’m Zelken. I can help you train plenty of skills. What are you looking to learn?

“Dagger combat, lock picking, and stealth would be a great start.”

“Daggers are twenty copper for an hour; lock picking is ten coppers an hour. Stealth isn’t a skill you can learn without the proper type of Skill Cores. I can teach you how to slink or move silently, so you don’t alert others with your footsteps. That will cost you ten coppers an hour as well.” Zelken listed off everything as he was pointing to his fingers.

“I have enough for an hour of dagger training right now. If you can fit me in while you’re training them?” Flea pointed to the two other players.

“Oh, I can train with you right now. I just need to wind up the old training dummy. Your goal will be to hit all five of those red spots on the dummy under one pass. In your first couple of hours, I’ll be surprised if you could hit two of them. You’re going to stand in the center of this circle. I suggest facing the dummy at the start. When it comes to you, avoid being hit by those two wooden swords in its hands while striking the red spots. This training will teach you how to both dodge and strike at the same time during combat. A good rogue will be able to hit four of the spots and a Master Rogue the fifth in a single pass with a combo of strikes and dodging.”

Flea dropped the twenty coppers into Zelken’s open hand and walked over into the circle the Dwarf had indicated to stand. Flea equipped his daggers and stood ready. Zelken walked over and started to spin a large capstan in the corner. Two minutes later, Zelken asked if he was ready and Flea nodded. Zelken stepped away from the capstan, and it started slowly spinning in reverse. On the other hand, the dummy was not slow in the least, and Flea took a sword to the face and thrown onto his back. Zelken stepped up, stopping the capstan from spinning.

“Holy shit, that hurt,” Flea yelled while on his back.

“I never get tired of watching people do this training. If your vision starts turning a deep red, make sure you eat a travel ration with some water and rest till your vision clears up. Now get up and move back to the center, and we’ll start again.”

Flea got back up and moved to the center facing the Dummy. This time he was ready as the dummy spun towards him. He was able to dodge the first sword, but doing so lost sight of the red dots. The time it took him to find the first dot, the other arm’s blade spun backward and clipped him across the ear. The pain that flashed through his mind dropped him like a sack of stones, and Zelken stopped the capstan once again.

“What the fuck is wrong with the pain levels in this game? That shit is brutal, sweet mother’s biscuits,” Flea shouted into the packed dirt and straw.

By the time he got himself up to try again, he had found the other two players had stopped their training, as well as the Dryent, were watching the spectacle of his training. Getting himself up and walking over to the dummy again to memorize where the red sections were located. The groin, both kidneys, heart, and the back of the neck.

“How can anyone hit all five of those spots in one pass?”

“Masters of daggers can in many different ways. I can hit three of them.”

“Could you show me how you do that, Zelken?”

“Sure, come hold this. When I get in position, release it.”

Flea grabbed one of the handles on the capstan. The Dwarf walked into the middle, nodding to Flea. The dummy lurched forward, and Zelken ducked under the first sword strike, with his left hand stabbing the dagger into the dummy’s groin. As the other sword came around towards him, Zelken spun to the side, with his right blade hitting the right kidney spot. Rolling forward as both swords came from above in a slash, he jumped to his feet and flipped the dagger in his left hand to a reverse grab, then slammed it into the back of the dummy’s neck spot. Jumping back as a sword slashed where he had just been standing. The dummy chimed three times, reaching the other side of the circle.

Flea and both of the players stood there in silence. The entire fight took three seconds, maybe shorter. Every sword missed him by mere inches as he moved around the dummy. It was incredible.

“Holy Shit, we have to learn to do that to play as rogues? Fuck this. I’m going to play a warrior or hunter class. I can’t pick these locks, and I sure in hell aren’t going to be able to move like this fat nimble dwarf.” MasterSlash spittled.

MasterSlash then walked up to the door, the Dryent opening it for him, and he was gone from the basement.

“As unpleasant as he was, he’s got the right idea. Not every adventurer is going to be good in the first style they choose. It’s good he’s figured that out now as not to mess up his attributes. Now that you’ve seen how I did this little exercise, it's your turn, Flea.”

For the next forty minutes, Flea was repeatedly slapped down. He was able to hit one target on the body; that was his limit. He found that the second he tried to zero in on the next target, he would lose track of the swords coming at him getting hit. Thanking Zelken, he left The Bloody Boar and headed back to The Drunken Ogre. Arriving, he flagged down the barkeep and asked about dinner in his room and a bath.

“The bath is in the back. You can drop your stuff off in your room. There will be sets of robes on the back of your door; just use the one that suits you. The backset of stairs goes outside where the bathhouse is located. I’ll have my daughter Zarine bring up your dinner in an hour; you’ll have time to clean up. If you need anything else, just come down and ask. Names Dross, me, and my family run this establishment. In the morning, you’ll meet my wife Racine down here for breakfast.”

“Thanks, Dross. I’ll take my leave now.”

Flea walked up the stairs and into his room. The room was spartan, a single bed with a chest at the foot of it. A small desk with a chair under the window was next to the bed. He undressed, putting everything into the chest, found a short robe on the back of the door hanging lower than all the others, and left his room, locking it behind him. He went down the back stairs and found the bathhouse to be directly behind the inn.

The bathhouse was made entirely out of stone and had two doors at the front. Two easily recognizable symbols were dictating the male and female sides. A third symbol he didn’t recognize was under the male’s symbol. Walking into the male side, he found the insides to be like a traditional Japanese bathhouse. Sitting on one of the provided stools, he cleaned himself and got up to rinse himself off with the showers on the wall. Flea walked into the next room, getting in and relaxing in the large heated bath.

There were already a couple of people relaxing within the massive bath; he assumed them to be players. Listening to a few of the conversations, he found most were talking about how real the game felt. He overheard one player speak about the caves with iron near the lake to the northwest of town.

Spending a little longer in the bath soaking up the heat, he couldn’t get over how real it felt. Gamers are going to kill to get their hands on the next batches of implants. The Delve Implant made the game much more realistic than the FIVR capsules he had used the past couple of years. Walking up to his room and getting dressed, Flea sat on the bed and pulled out the bell schedule to study it.

Bell Schedule

Single toll every hour during daylight, except below.

Morning

Sunrise 5:00 - 8:00

5 Bells

Day Start 10:00

3 Bell

Break Start 14:00

4 Bells

Evening

Break End 1600

3 Bells

Day End 22:00

3 Bells

Sunset 26:00 - 29:00

5 Bells

So the typical workday here is twelve hours, with a two-hour break midday. Each day is thirty-two hours long, so the days here are one and a third day on Earth. From a design point, this seems wrong, it will throw off people’s nights and days.

He tossed the parchment onto the desk and took a look at the local floraa guide.

We have Hollyhock, Lavender, and Thistle on the Island. Hollyhock is used to restore health. Lavender, mana and Thistle can boost the other two’s properties.

Each plant had a picture of the flower so they could be found easily out in the wilderness. He needed to gather Hollyhock still and knew what it looked like already, thanks to Frustrated. Tossing the pamphlet onto the desk with the bell schedule, he heard a knock on the door.

“Sir, your dinner,” came a female voice from behind the door.

Flea opened the door, greeted by an adorable Fox Beastkin. Dross was Elven; he didn’t expect his daughter to be a Beastkin. She had golden hair with white splashes on her nose, neck, and ears and stood a foot and half taller than him. Flea took the tray and thanked her. Setting the tray down on the desk, he turned around to find her still in the doorway with her ears slightly pressed against her head. Kyle stopped and had an ahh moment. Taking out a copper, he handed it to her. She grinned, bowed, and thanked him as she darted down the hallway.

I wonder if she uses those puppy dog looking fox eyes to get tips often.

He sat down and ate his meal, a bowl of thick stew with tender meat and half a loaf of bread. There was also a large mug of sweet juice or wine, he couldn’t tell, but it was good nonetheless.

Finishing his dinner, he sat back on his bed, taking out the three marbles from his magic bag. Rolling them around in his fingers, Flea thought they seemed to be pretty solid. He wasn’t sure if he could crush them. Palming one and closing his fist, he could feel the marble shatter. The feeling was unreal, feeling the marble in his hand one second, then feeling it crumble into nothing. Then the oddest sensation from his closed hand as if hundreds of strings were being pulled through the skin of his palm and down his arm. After a moment, a prompt popped up.

Absorbed 1 Dull Core

+ 3 Energy

Crushing the other two gave him another prompt.

Absorbed 2 Dull Cores

+ 7 Energy

[Now that you’ve absorbed your first bits of Energy Kyle, I’ve been informed your Status Screen has been unlocked. You will now be allowed to upgrade your attributes and magic bag. Think or say Status for the window will pop up.]

Flea had the status screen come up after thinking, “Status.”

Flea

Lv. 0

17.92

Gnome

Earth

0.7

10 Energy

0

Strength

➕ [12]

0

Constitution

➕ [10]

0

Dexterity

➕ [9]

0

Intelligence

➕ [9]

0

Wisdom

➕ [10]

20

Magic Bag 🛈

➕ [25]

Now it makes sense. You farm the cores from monsters or maybe even buy them. Then you level up the attributes of your body. Now I understood why Gronky said people would kill him for his cores. It would be easy leveling.

“Could you give me a simple rundown of my status screen and attributes, Bob?”

[Sure, Kyle. Your avatar’s name and the planet you hail from, Lv.0 is your current level. Gnome is your race. I have no notes on the 0.7 or 17.92. Energy is what you absorbed from the cores and shows what you currently have to spend; 10 energy. Strength dictates how much you can carry or the power behind melee blows. Constitution is your health and how well your body can resist poisons or the elements. Dexterity is your movement speed and fine motor skills. Intelligence is your mana capacity and how strong your spells are. Wisdom helps with your mana regen and your perception of parts of the world around you. The plus buttons next to each attribute allow you to level that attribute, with the numbers in the brackets dictating how much Energy is required to level it.]

“Thank you, Bob.”

Flea added one point into Dexterity and decided to log off for a few hours.