Author’s note: this chapter has now been rewritten. It is best if you read it again. I decided to introduce some plot points earlier so as their importance was not lost. While this is a suitably long chapter, it means now it is even longer.

Episode 4: KNOW THYSELF

Arthur’s POV

>

Pain. Intense and everywhere. It felt like my whole body was set on fire, both from the inside and outside. I could scarcely move my body. Each breath resulted in a fire in my lungs. The intense pain started subsiding after what seemed like an eternity to me. But, I was still not able to do anything. I was sore and weak all over. I felt like I was trapped in the body of a newborn baby.

Somehow it didn’t feel too bad. I was laying in some kind of soft material. I quite didn’t know what it was, but it felt comfortable. I could see the azure blue sky. A cool breeze blew in from front. I could smell the salt in the air. I must be near a beach.

I was quite content to lie in the sand, but there was something troubling me. It was like an itch that grew every second. I tried to think-

And then I discovered I didn’t remember.

I couldn’t remember.

Only one thing was certain to me: My name was Arthur.

Except for that, I didn’t know anything about myself.

>

No sooner than I had exited the temple had rejoined the city I spotted another guy with a guard coming our way. I motioned to Kent that I intended to leave now and we quickly got out of there before the other guy could notice us. Kent chuckled, but accepted my request. We quickly decided to criss cross through the Temple District and soon enough we had lost the other players.

“So, did you get the blessing of the Goddess?” He asked me as I briskly walked towards the Lower District.

“Can’t you tell?” I asked him, surprised.

“No. Nobody can tell whose blessings you have without explicit permission of the one who gave you the blessing. As I was asking, is your initiation over? Will you be going outside now?” He asked, trying to keep pace with me.

“Not yet. The Goddess has decided to give me the task to know myself. I suppose that you wouldn’t have any idea about that would you?” I asked, half hoping for an answer.

“Know yourself? That seems to be the work of a scholar, or a philosopher, instead of an adventurer. No, I can’t help you.”

I had guessed that much. If this question was such easily solvable, it would just have been bad game design. And I would have hated such a solution. Lost in my thoughts, I nearly did not hear when Kent spoke to me.

“Listen here, friend. I know that I am supposed to be chaperoning you all day, but I, uh, have a date today. And I thought that this would get over quickly and then I would go meet Anna, but

it seems like your business will take some time, right? So, you know, I was wondering, if I could, you know, take a-”

“I understand completely. I can take care of myself, Kent. You don’t have to worry about me.” I put an arm around his shoulder. “Go see her. I will be waiting for you at the Prancing Pony, okay?” The Prancing Pony was a quite a reputed tavern in the Talos District where the guardsmen frequently visit. Kent was the one who had told me about it.

“Thank you friend! Thanks a lot! I owe you one now!” He rushed towards the Temple District once more. And he was shockingly fast too! Normally, you would fully plated guys to be a little slow, but this guy ran faster than someone without any armor! Hmmm, I quickly understood that Imperial Guards were not someone you wanted to trifle with.

I had decided to visit the library as soon as the Goddess had mentioned the word “know”. Libraries were my favorite place to visit. Followed closely by museums.

Yeah, safe to say, I was a nerdy kid.

To reach the Arcane academy on had to walk quite a distance from the Lower District. The road was surrounded by all different kinds of trees. I could see the top spire of the academy rising in the distance. I decide to take a shortcut.

>

The tree branches hit my arm, drawing blood. I cursed and decided to wrap another piece of my shirt around my arm. That made it five wounds within two days. I was doing a bad job of surviving so far.

I had decided to explore the island yesterday. From the looks of it, it was totally deserted. I could see other islands from the beach where I had woken up. It seemed that I was stranded on a island chain.

The jungle I was in seemed to cover the whole island. I had found a small pond from where I could get water.. Now, I was searching for something to eat.

Till now I had no such luck. Worse of all, I had no idea of I was, or how I had reached here. Just my name. It was frustrating to say the least.

I thought about it a lot, but decided to let it go. After all, I reasoned, survival came first.

The trees seemed to never end. I decided to give up for the moment and took a break.

>

I soon reached the university. It was broad, spacious and was like a giant gothic castle. There was a giant tree in the courtyard. All the roads led straight to it. The library, I figured out was directly to the left of the tree from where I stood.

I saw various mages, roaming about in different robes. The different colors must have symbolized different ranks in the mage orders. I filed it away for later investigation.

As soon I had entered the library, a chill went down my spine. There was someone behind me! I crouched down and kicked horizontally at my opponent. He went tumbling down, and soon I was on top of him and pressing my thumb on his… scaly throat?!

Agility raised by 1 point!

Skill created: Sense Presence!Governing stats: Dexterity, WillpowerClick to see details

I willed the messages away. There was a target in front of me. He had to be neutralized first.

Then I realized. He was an Argonian, the reptilian species in Tamriel. However, I still did not ease up the pressure.

“Who are you?” I growled at him. I hoped that he didn’t decide to fight me instead. This guy had got the jump on me and that was not something that anyone could do. Moreover, I reckoned that my current weak state could be easily pawned by even this…. mage guy.

“I am Keela! The librarian! The books! I look after the books! Don’t hurt me! I meant you no harm! I promise! Just-”

I let him go. The guy was suitably scared of me.

“Keela, huh. Do you try to jump on everyone who decides to come in here?” I asked, eyeing him. After that last stunt he pulled, I wasn’t going to let him out of sights anytime soon.

“Oh no, sir! That’s just a prank on the unsuspecting apprentices! I love to scare them. It’s a part of the job description! Take care of the books, clean the halls; scare the apprentices and – Ahem.” Here he stopped rambling and looked at me.

“But may I ask what you what brings you, a member of the Fighter’s Guild, here?”

“I am not from the Fighter’s Guild! I am an adventurer from another world.” Kent had taught me how to introduce myself in case I got lost in the town, and it looked liked it was going to pay off.

“An ADVENTURER! HOW GRAND! Adventurer in my library! This is unbelievable!” Kent was throwing an apoplectic fit. Then he seemed to collect himself. “Please wait here sir. I shall bring you the Goddess’s guide.”

Bingo! I had hit the nail on the head. Any quest designed by my dad had surely included a visit to the library. He knew how much I loved them. And in this quest, the first job had been to look at my stats. Now I was certain that the Goddess had asked me to determine my classes and starting skills.

While waiting, I leafed through one of the books.

It was empty. I looked at another, then another. Nearly all books were empty.

Then I got it. This world still did not exist. There were no writers, no history. The game was still under construction and until the main game started, these books would remain empty.

I decided to visit the library again once the main game started.

Meanwhile, Keela had returned with the book that I needed.

Goddess Guide for Adventurers was embossed in gold on a hardbound green cover. As soon I got the book, a message popped up!

Congratulations! You have gained an important book, necessary for all adventurers in this foreign land! As the first one to do so, you receive a great reward of 1 skill point!

It looked patronizing. Well, I wasn’t one to look a gift horse in the mouth.

“Thank you a lot, Keela. Well then, I must be off. I will come to the library later, I promise!” I got the hell out of there as fast I could.

The University had quite spacious grounds, with big trees covering a lot of space and providing shade. I decided to climb one of the trees and read the book.

The book was like the old game manuals of old. Lots of in game lore, game mechanics, with a mascot that offered different tips and ‘clarifying points’. It felt like I was reading my old physics textbook. I was so excited that I read it cover to cover twice.

The major points were as follows:

Stats: There were 6 main stats for all the different classes. Hidden stats were also available, but they had to be discovered first. These hidden stats once discovered, could only be modified by in game actions. You could not assign them stat points. Hidden stats were basically unlocked by doing special quests. They went hand in hand with hidden skills.

Each skill had a governing Stat or two, which directly influenced how fast it rose. A player therefore had to spend his stat points carefully to maximize efficiency.

The play system was basically classless. You could play however you wanted, do whatever you wanted. Your level would rise when you leveled up your skills. When a skill leveled up you would be one-tenth closer to your next level. So you could level up 10 different skills 1 time or one skill 10 times. However, leveling up a skill got progressively more difficult, so it wasn’t easy. At different levels, skills had different perks. Perks were additional bonuses and actions that a skill provided. Skill points were awarded when a quest was completed or a special action was done. Perks were bought by skill points.

And last was the cap of the skills itself. Ordinary games might offer skill leveling up till 100 but here the cap was a mind numbing 1000! It looked like this:

LevelSkillgainNovicetill 250Apprenticeafter 250 till 500Journeymanafter 500 till 750Expertafter 750Master1000

Apparently, being a master was also not the limit. The book promised that if I raised myself to master, I could find other ways to rise. Quite mysterious .

Most importantly, there was a unique quest for every player character. That was, as the book said “true way to know thyself”. The player had to choose a birthsign, which was the constellation in the sky when the person was born. This birthsign would then apparently guide us to the knowledge of the truth if we followed its path. As adventurers, we could choose any birthsign we wanted. It provided us a small boost in the beginning. However, the book warned not to choose it lightly, as it would shape our very own destiny and soul.

These were the signs: the Lady, the Steed, the Thief, the Warrior, the Apprentice, the Atronach, the Mage, the Lord, the Lover, the Ritual, the Serpent, the Shadow and the Tower.

The different signs could be in conjunction with each other, but it was rare.

Constellations that determined the fate. Interesting.

>

I was looking up towards the sky, watching the shimmering stars. They seemed so vast and countless. And I was totally calm for a moment. I didn’t know who I was; I didn’t know where I was. I had no idea about I was going to survive in this place.

But for the moment, I was at peace.

The fire next to me was about to go out. I poked it with a stick to keep it going. I was lucky today. I had to eat a roasted lizard today; but at least it was food.

I was getting drowsy. Looking at the stars, I decided to sleep.

>

Now, I had to go tell the Goddess of my discovery.

I quickly went back to the temple. However, by now I could see the crowd from over a mile away. All the beta players had arrived after their tour. There was a platoon of guards guarding the temple. Looked like it was going to be tough to gain entry now. I decided to come back later. Let the others scramble madly for their chance to get outside the city walls.

I decided to use my prepared plans to get ahead.

I opened up my Menu screen. Now this was the screen with all the options. However, there was one extra program that I possessed that no one else had.

That’s right, it was the servitor.

“Hey Doc, you got Imperial city’s data, right?”

Doc grunted.

“I am going to need a Yes or No here, Doctor….”

There were two grunts this time.

“Doctor…don’t force me to log out….”

There was silence. I swear, it’s like he does this to…

“Hey, kid! Don’t tear your head out. I was eating. You know, food? Some people actually do need to eat. So what were you saying?

“You have a list of NPCs in Imperial city, right?”

“Yeah…”

“And you can see their skill levels?”

“Yess……..”

“Don’t drag your words out, Doc. So listen, here’s what I need….”

A minute later, after Doctor had told me what I needed, I went on my way to The Prancing Pony, where I had promised to meet with Kent.

One the way, I saw how….normal everything looked. Compared to the hell I had gone through in the last five years, the innocence of the city had me on a constant edge. I kept avoiding people and stayed in the shadows.

I looked around the Talos square, a beautiful forest green, and I wondered.

How many people would play this game?

And what would be their reason?

In the years following my dad’s death, I had devolved, degenerated into a mindless beast, who had trained endlessly to kill. I thought that’s all what I needed.

Strength.

Brutality.

The intent to kill.

The Hunter.

But I have changed. I learnt from my failures.

And this time, I would keep my promises and exact revenge.

The right way.

I made my way to the Prancing Pony. I easily saw Kent, laughing and drinking with the other guards. To my relief, no one was as handsome as him.

“There’smy favorite buddy.I love you, friend!!”He got out of his chair and tried to hug me. I easily sidestepped his clumsy advance and decided to tap him on the back. He easily went down.

“I trust it went well?” I asked the other guards.

“WELL?!! HAhaahAAhAhAA” They started uproariously laughing.

“Uh, what’s wrong?” I asked.

An older guard with tears in his eyes replied to me, “It went very well!They actually held …held hands today!!!!HAhHAHAHAA”

Oh. Pure love. All the jealousy I felt for the guy turned to pity.

It took an hour to wake him up, and hour to get him back to his senses. By this time, it was already evening. Kent had been suitably embarrassed, but I had played it smooth. Kent now considered me his BFF.

“So, where are we going now, Sir Red?”

“I am not a knight, so need to call me Sir. And….we are going to my trainer.”

“The Legionnaire Barracks for the basic soldier’s training, sir? Or wait, you probably want to be a mage, so the Arcane University, sir?”

“Neither. Our man is in the Arena.”

“Ohhhhh! So a gladiator, then, sir? Training for war with real fighters and putting your life on the line. It’s so exciting. I mean-”

“No, not a gladiator. He is an indentured slave there. We need to free him somehow.”

“A slave, sir? Why are we going to a slave, sir? Theres a lot of other better teachers, for anything you could possibly need. I am sure-”

“No. He is the only one in this city whose Archery level is over 250. No one else even comes close.

I need him to show me my path again.”

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