Chapter 05: The First Quest

“So, how are you feeling, Bryan?” The physiotherapist asked me as I continued to do my routine exercise; walking with crutches and letting the feet touched the floor.

“Hmm… nothing?” I answered nonchalantly. My leg was paralyzed and it was as good as useless. Being a paraplegia hit me hard when it first happened to me, but after 8-9 years, I grew accustomed to moving around in a wheelchair.

“But you did what I told you to do, right? At home?”

“Yeah. I did everything you told me and more. It’s just not working for me, Doc.” I turned and twisted my waist around but my legs just flailed like a couple of dead tentacles. The flapping sound of my legs saddened me a little.

“I see. Then perhaps your problem is just more than a broken spine.”

“Hmm… what do you mean by that? I got some other weird shit disease?” Anyone who saw me must be thinking that I was a world-class gymnast doing the ring or the pommel routines. Well, fuck them for being far off the mark. Though my upper moved like one, my legs were just like a limped penis.

“Weakness of the mind can paralyze us even though we are able.”

And perhaps the physio was right. All these while, I did nothing to rehab myself. Once I became paralyzed, I did nothing but being depressed and lashed out at others. My PTSD was a constant occurrence and I had no doubt that I had made everyone around me ran away any time I got a fit or two; including my wife and my two boys. But, that was something that I was not willing to bring it up for now. I just kept quiet and continued my exercise with the physio’s help, sweeping all the past life of me away to the far corner of my mind.

“By the way, Bryan. I have something that might interest you if you are up to it. Want to know?” He piqued my curiosity. “Yeah. Just shoot it. I’m all ears.”

“In two months from now, we will have a new resident doctor here, specializing in cases like yours. Shall I register your name to be treated by her?”

“A new doctor? What about you? Where are you going?” He helped me to the wheelchair as he pulled a seat next to me.

“Me? I’m still here but she would be the boss now. The HQ had decided to bring an expert here though I don’t know why she chose to come to this forsaken and desolate of a place.”

“Heh, you can say that again. I wonder to myself why did I ever come here in the first place.”

Both of us broke into a laugh.

“So, are you interested?” He asked. I gave out a smirk.

“Is she beautiful?” The physio nodded as he understood the reason for my question. “If she is, then sign me up. Could do me some eye-candy while she’s treating me. Hahaha!”

“You and your goddamn eye-candy. Am I not eye-candy enough?”

“I don’t swing that way and you know it, Doc.” Both of us broke into yet another fit of laughter, disturbing the other patients that were here. Feeling a little embarrassed, he immediately went to the counter and took out a piece of paper from the drawer and then handed it to me.

“Fill this in and return it to the nurse before your session end. I need to attend to some other patients, and it happened to be a she, too. And eye-candy for me as well.”

Whatever, man. I looked at the form and with a pen in hand, I filled in whatever details they needed from me. Once I was done with that, Mrs Green came over after my session was done and drove us home. But not before buying some vegetables and meat for the house stocks. And since I was paying now, she gladly accepted it without question.

*****

The first one week of game time or GT had ended with me practising on the training dummy bare-handed. I surrounded myself with no less than 6 dummies at one time and I struck each one of them with extreme accuracy and precision. If this was the real world and those were human instead of dummies, they would be dead. I was trained in the combination krav maga, muay thai and jujitsu. The Special Force combat style. Nothing fancy but it could get the work done. And by that time, my stats had increased by quite a number.

I opened my status screen as the next stat increase came into view.

*Ting!”

Your Dexterity went up +1 point! (+ 1 DEX)

STATUS INFORMATION SCREEN

HP

150

STR

15

MP

100

DEX

14

ATTACK POWER

50

INT

10

MAGIC POWER

50

CHA

10

DEFENCE RATING

25

WIS

10

STAMINA

100

LUCK

10

COMMAND POINTS

0

AGI

13

A total increase of 12 points over three stats; Strength, Dexterity and Agility. Fighting bare-handed gave me the increments into those stats, it seemed. But 12 points was a major boost for me. A 17% perma-stat increased over my initial starting base stat. Great result. But it took a long time and lots of hard work. No wonder no one really wanted to train hard like this. Levelling up would be much easier. Or buying equipment. Nonetheless, my time in Practice Hall training like a madman had resulted in some unwanted attention.

“Look at the crazy dude goes. The rumours were true.”

“Can someone really train like that? I mean, ain’t it easier to just level up?”

“He must be a freak. Or a showoff.”

“Or both. Look at him going against a training dummy, all shirtless. Fuck him!”

“He has a great body, no doubt?”

“You believe that? He might be an obese man pretending to be a good looking hunk, you know.”

Would these people shut up for once? I didn’t mind they talked while looking at me from afar. But they just gathered at my back and talked loudly. I could hear everything they said and my ears tingled uneasily. And stop showing middle fingers at my back. I could see the shadows, you know.

“If you are not training here, then go away, po! Don’t disturb those who are hard at work, po!”

“Oops, here comes the cute and angry bunny. Let’s run, people. Hahaha!”

“Run before he cutely bites your head off. Haha!”

Finally, those people scattered away. I was pretty sure that all of them were players like me and might hear some funny rumours flying around here and there. But I did not give a damn. I needed to raise my stats to the highest amount before I was set up for real. And Popo was always willing to back me up by chasing those players away if they were not here for training.

“So, how’s the progress?” Popo asked.

“It’s good. Better than what I expected, initially. But the rate is a little slower now. I need to change my training methods if I want to see any more increase.”

“I see, Good for you. But, before you do that, you could help me with something?”

Ohh? This was the first time Popo asked me to do something for him. During the whole week, we had established some good relationship. I noticed that my Affinity Link screen that had his name came up. Though it was at 1 out of 10 star that was available, it was good enough for him to be friendly with me. And did I smell a quest coming soon?

“You see; I’m supposed to buy my wife some groceries for the house. But I’m too busy here. Too much stuff to do and not enough time!” He started to talk.

“But you did nothing all day. No one is here, except me. How could you be busy?” My question was answered with a snort and dancing whiskers that spoke of his annoyance. “Shut up! Can’t a man be busy when the wife needs him? So, are you helping me or not?”

“Yeah sure. What is it that you want me to buy? Carrot?” I teased him a little. But I got more than what I deserved.

“Fuck you and your carrots! I’m a Bunnian, not a rabbit!” Whoa, a swearing Bunny. And NPC at that too.

“Looks the same to me.” I shrugged at him nonchalantly as I wore back my shirt.

“Buy me some rabbit meat, a few loaves of bread, a couple pouch of green beans and… a bunch of carrots.”

Told you he ate carrots. And what was the deal with a Bunny eating rabbit meats? Was he a cannibal or some kind? But I didn’t want to stay and asked him. I just agreed to his request when suddenly, the window popped up. So, this was really a quest after all.

You had accepted the Quest: Get me my stuff, po!(1)

Get me my stuff, po!(1)

I’m too busy to buy groceries for my wifey. Buy it for me instead, will you? This is the list of the items you need to get, po.

3 pieces of smoked rabbit meats

3 loaves of bread

2 pouch of green beans

5 sticks of rainbow carrots.

Quest Rank: F

Completion Requirements:

Buy all the items as needed and return to Instructor Popo before the day’s end. Unrepeatable quest. Automatically failed if return after Pop went back home.

Quest Reward:

To be decided by Instructor Popo. The faster you finish the quest, the better your reward is, po. Now get going!

Heh. Standard delivery quest. Nothing too fancy. And to help me purchased the items, Popo gave me 6 silvers. That was good cause I didn’t have effin’ money. In fact, when I checked my equipment and item screen for the first time, I came equipped only with the standard white shirt and black pants. And no, I had no other equipment, money, items or anything else for that matter. I was as bare naked as they came. Perhaps this was also the reason why players opted to stay out of training and did other things instead. Besides, my stamina was never depleted even once while I was training and I didn’t need to eat to replenish it. Perhaps it got to do with the learning period time of 2 months in the game.

“Po, make sure you return it to me before I go back. Don’t want my wifey to scold me when I returned empty-handed. So, I’m counting on you, po.”

Alright. The quest was easy.

A mini-map bar opened just below the weapon equipped on my HUD. And on it, was the mark of the location of the places I needed to go to get the items. Again, it was a simple quest and I want to complete it as soon as possible to get the best rewards. Though not stated what it was, the faster I was done with this, the better.

The first destination was the one furthest away, the butcher. Why not the nearest one and work through it first? Simple. If I did the furthest one first, I could complete the rest on my way back. Would save a little bit of my time by doing that.

*****

“So, Popo sent you here?”

I just nodded at the NPC who was selling the meat at the stall. An open stall type where there were only him and his worker. Though his worker seemed odd for an NPC; kept cursing and then looking at me with pitiful eyes. I thought to myself, “Hey man, don’t look at me like that. You got yourself into this mess in the first place.”

“That’s rare for Popo to ask anyone to do his groceries for him. Have you two getting along?”

“Nope. Not like that. Think he said he was busy or something.” I answered without much interest on my part.

“Popo’s busy? That’s a first I hear. Don’t believe it myself having that Bunnian saying he’s busy and whatnot.”

“You tell me. I barely know him. But a quest is a quest, though. Might as well complete this quest and look around town first.” The butcher handed me the items needed as he just laughed at my words. A laughing NPC who could understand my sarcasm. Could not be more impressed with the sense of realism in this game. I was still in what the other players called, a newbie world. Though an experienced gamer myself, I was still a newbie or a noob to most who played this game. Everything would surprise me.

I paid the butcher the 3 silver coins he needed for the item and made my way towards the next destination; the baker. But before I could take any more steps from the stall, I noticed something odd amongst the crowd. Someone was watching my back and observing my every move. A pickpocket? Hmm, better be careful now or else I would be in trouble losing the money. I kept my senses alert as I made my way.

3 loaves of bread, freshly baked. I could smell the aroma in the air and that made me hungry. Yet another aspect of the game that I needed to get used to. The sense of details was very real indeed. And the baker would say the same thing as the butcher as she commented on how much Popo would never trust someone to do his groceries for him. Well, it did not matter. I was on the last leg anyway. It was pretty much straightforward and I might finish this quest without even taking an hour of the game time.

The City of Asgardia was not that big. It was still a newly founded city after all, right after the latest Siege of Thoran campaign. One of the parties that led the siege found this city and now had been installed at its governor. A pretty neat system to reward players like that though I had no interest in governing a village, much more a city like this. My room was all I could ever hope to govern unless I risked the ire of Mrs Green.

But I did wonder why the quest gave me such an ample time to complete such an easy task. Additional to that, I could sense that the eyes that were watching my back earlier were still there. I could not shake off whoever that was. Sighing, I walked towards my final destination. I was left with a silver and 80 coppers after paying for the bread.

The last merchant was just around the corner, in the Adventurer Market Street. The scene here was hectic to say the very least when I first arrived. Not just with the NPCs that filled the roads, but also the Player Characters (PCs) that opened their shop there.

“Come on in and have a look at my item!!”

“Cheap weapons for newbies!”

“Hey, noob! Don’t die. Buy my potions!”

“Cheapest price in town. Come on in and check it.”

Most of the stalls were manned by NPCs. I think the PCs just opened the stall here, hired an NPC to sell the items for them while they did something else. Either that or they were Away From Gaming. AFG-ing for short.

“Hey you, good-looking newbie!” Suddenly, someone called me from a nearby stall. Trying to get more confirmation, I looked at the merchant and pointed to myself. He just nodded at me as he beckoned to come closer.

“New here?” Not going to waste my time by looking at things I could not buy, I just shook my head in response. But the merchant was adamant. “Aww… just come closer. You don’t have to buy anything, though.”

Really now? Or was it a sales tactic to entice a new customer? I was still hesitant.

“Aww come on, man. Just looking at it wouldn’t hurt your pocket. I’ll tell you something interesting if you come here, just for a newbie like you.”

New information, ehh? Alright. I would let you have your way. I still had lots of time on my hand. Better make it worth my every minute, though. I was looking through his wares that were displayed and it looked like standard equips; a sword, a shield and some clothing. Upon closer inspection though, it seemed to have some superior quality. My perplexed look caught the merchant in a pleasant surprise.

“Never seen premium items before?” I shook my head and asked. “What’s that?” The merchant gave a small laugh before answering.

“A high-quality items, made by yours truly.” He answered while thumping his chest. Must have been proud of his products.

“I see… never know about that.” How could I know since I spent most of my time training?

“Really? You really look like you just made your account. How long had you been playing, man?” He innocently asked.

“About a week.”

“A week?!! And you still looked like that?” He glanced at me with such wide eyes that I could not help but to grin sheepishly.

And the merchant did tell me about the difference between a normal quality and high-quality items, a premium as he said. It had better stats, longer durability and sometimes perform better than a higher level normal items. However, it must be crafted through certain crafting classes or artisans. What it took to create a high-quality one was not shared. A trade secret, he said.

“But I knew much better than anything to question their playing style. Anyway, here are the words on the street. There’s something big going on in the next few real-time weeks, you know.”

The first line alone had made me disappointed. I was thinking that there would be new areas for farming items, EXP, equips and such, but this? “Not interested. The city might be bombed for all I care. Once I’m done with my training, I’m off to do something else worthwhile.” I sneered a little. He was surprised by my words but kept his smiling face on. A business face nonetheless.

“Aww, come on, man. Don’t be such a piss-take. This information that I just gave you is privy to only certain people, alright.”

“Privy? And why did you have to tell me then? Where did you get the information anyway?” I asked.

“Well, I pieced it together from the guards that were walking around, saying something along the line with what I told you just now. I did not know the details, but that’s that.” I was hoping for more solid information than just the words on the streets. The quality of information depended on the source and the lowest, most unpredictable and often misleading was the words on the streets type. In war, wrong information could lead to casualty. In the game, it was just a massive waste of time.

“Not good enough. I just wasted my time on some tin-pot information, if there was one.”

“Hahaha. My bad. Thought you might be interested in a hearsay like us.” He said while smiling sheepishly at me.

“Well, thanks anyway. I better get going before I’m late in submitting my quest.” I bid the guy farewell and I made my way toward the final destination of my quest. It was a stall located at the end of this street. Quite inconvenient as there were many players and NPCs walking around. Not just selling and buying items; some were even looking for pick-up-group (PUG) parties.

“Need level 25 tanker for the forest quest!”

“Healer needed for 4 people party at the Lossia dungeon!”

“Come and join us in exploring new areas. Newbies are welcome!”

No one paid any attention to me as I walked past by each one of them. It was given anyway – a poor and low levelled newbie who would surely drag the team down. One request though had made me chuckle a little. It spoke volume of the guy who was looking for the party.

“Ladies only. Join if your characters had bigger boobs than 36DD.”

Planning to create his own version of a harem in the virtual world. Not bad, but I was not interested in making one for myself. What I was interested in now was the pair of eyes that were following me since the beginning of the quest. I was sure that whoever it was must be waiting for me to relax my guard and then only to strike at that moment. Tired being followed around like this, I might as well amuse myself to this would-be-thief. And the next destination seemed to be the right spot to do it.