As I ran out of the tavern after saying goodbye to the waitress and bartender, I proceed to run down the alleyways towards the main gate, however, out of nowhere I’m being grabbed by someone causing me to fall on my butt.

“What the hell!” I shout getting to my feet and drawing my daggers, “Who grabbed me.”

“Just be careful of the other three adventurers in your group, Ethan Shadowmark,” the mysterious female says before vanishing.

“What the hell was that about,” I mutter, “Crap, I’m late.”

As I ran to the main gate I stopped to look around for Eric and James I notice that they’re not here, so I went to check some of the local shops, however, none of them had seen them apart from the last shopkeeper who tells me that they left heading north about forty minutes ago.

“Damn, I’m really late,” I curse myself as I pull up my stats to check what my AGI stat is at.

Name: Ethan Shadowmark

Titles: The Shadow’s Chosen

Age: 16

Blessing: Shadow Blessing

Species: Elf Level 1 0/100

Primary Class: Shadow Novice level 1 30/100

Secondary Class: Thief level 1 30/50

STR:15, AGI:20, WIS:20, PER:18, CHA:18, CON:25, INT:18, LUK:15

Health: 250/250

Mana: 380/380

“Okay, I can run about twenty minutes before I’m worn out,” I state readying myself to start sprinting north-wards.

As I ran along the mud and animal dung covered path, there were fields as far as the eye could see, however, they were interrupted here and there by patches of forests left for local animals and plants. Furthermore, as I ran forward nearing my limit, I catch the glimpse of a small group of goblins setting up an ambush in my path, thankfully, I was prepared for the four arrows that came flying at me from each corner of the small box they set up as the staging area for their trap, I quickly slide along the ground bringing my arms to the position a bow would be as I jump high into the air blinding the four level 5 goblins who stupidly looked up at me when the sun was right behind my head, since they’ve been blinded I quickly pull my arm back as if drawing the string of the bow I quickly state Frost Arrow as I launch two arrows at the two goblins in front of me killing them as they freeze over, then the ice and their bodies explode into crystal like bubbles that shine like rainbows that float up into the sky, It’s only then that I notice a count down in the top left corner of my vision saying “Bonus Loot Count Down Ends: Ten Seconds Remaining.”

“Strange, but first things first I need to deal with these goblins,” I say charging the still blinded goblins, “Quick Strike, Shadow Step.”

As I say my skills I reach the first goblin and kill it as its body explodes into the same strange Crystal like bubbles, before I turn to the final goblin as my Shadow Step skill activates allowing me to cross the large distance quite quickly allowing me to decapitate the goblin as the countdown hits one second remaining. However, before I have a chance to run after my friends a menu pops up saying.

Loot Obtained: Eight Goblin Ear’s, Four Goblin Totems, Twenty Five Bronze Coins, Two Rusty Knives, Two Splintered Bows, Four Goblin Hearts

Experience Gained: 40 XP

Please choose the amount of XP to be distributed to your Primary and Secondary Class

“Wow, I can pick how the XP is distributed from monster kills!” I exclaim happily, “Let’s see Thirty XP to primary and Ten to secondary.”

Primary Class XP: 80/100

Secondary Class XP: 40/50

Bonus loot: Amulet of Detection

As I click on the Amulet of Detection, a Pitch black gem with a coarse string appears, “So this must be the Amulet of Detection,” I say examining the Amulet.

Once I place the Amulet around my neck, I raced towards Eric and James finally reaching them as they finish killing the last of the goblin horde as the last remaining goblins explode into bubbles and float to the sky I run up to them.

“Where is Ethan?” Eric shouts as he brings his sword down into the last goblin’s neck, “he should have caught up with us long before now.”

“Eric,” I gasped. “I’m sorry… I’m late. Some girl… stopped me… to warn me about… the other three in our group.”

“A girl?” James says before being interrupted by Eric.

“What did this girl look like? Did she have strawberry blond hair and bright blue eyes? Did she hand you anything? What else did she tell you?” Eric asks bombarding me with questions.

“Um, Eric, I don’t know, all she said was to watch out for the other three adventurers in our group,” I state confused, “Why is it important to know Eric?”

“Never mind, if that’s all she said then let’s just be careful okay,” Eric states, “let’s get a move on, we’re late already because of this horde. Ethan, stay close to me or James okay.”

All I could do is nod due to the look on Eric’s face that was both of anger and relief. Along the grassy plane, we walk pass some farmer’ heading back to their farm so I decided to try and increase my perception by listening to what they were saying.

“Did you hear, The pastry thief is known as, Pwyll the Cookie Thief, has struck again this time hitting the bakery shop called Paradis de la Pâtisserie,” The female states shocked.

“How many is that this week five shops, how have the guards not captured this ruffian,” The older fellow grumbles, “Rumor has it that he’s only sixteen years, however, others say that he’s actually 200.”

PERCEPTION +2

I wonder how it decides how many points to increase could it be the difficulty or just the number of things I look out for who knows, I would ask Yra but she’s been hiding in her realm, I’m starting to get worried as she promised to teach me Shadow Drive. However, as the hours go by agonizingly slow with no one saying a word, and just the sounds of the wyvern's in the mountains to the west, the forest creatures to the east, along with the birds above… I decided that I had to hear someone else speak so I stopped to let James catch up with me as he was trailing along at the back while Eric and the other three walked ahead of us.

“Guessing you got bored of the silence too,” James says once he reaches me, “It’s always like this with Eric on missions, what did you wanna talk about I can see there’s something you’re confused with?”

“Hey, James, how would you increase your Agility and Willpower?” I asked thinking about how I don’t know any ways to increase my stats apart from Intelligence and Perception, “Oh also, what about Charisma and Strength?”

“Well Strength and Agility are the simplest to increase simply because your training them now, us walking is slowly filling the bar for a point of agility but you’d need to walk about 10,000 steps just to get 1 point, believe me I know I’ve tried it,” James informs me as I write all the information he gives me down, “However, a faster way to do it is by jogging or running laps. Strength, you increase by doing physical training carrying items in a backpack or on your belt increase it slowly but again it’s not a useful way to train it, as you can go your whole life without gaining a single point that way. The best way to train it is by doing push-ups, pull-ups, or simply practising your swordsmanship.”

“Okay,” I mumble as I finish writing it all down in my notebook, “So, what about Charisma and Willpower?”

“Willpower is the second hardest to train. The only surefire way I know of to train it is to study different types of magical spells and attributes relating to it. Another and more dangerous way is to try to expand your Mana pool though expanding your Mana reserves. However, the reason this is dangerous because if you expand it to much you could burst your mana pool, causing you to lose mana instead of gaining it. You would also lose points into Willpower as well,” James instructs before continuing, “With Charisma, it’s a little easier but still one of the hardest to train. Learning different languages help to increase it. There are skills that increase it too like Cuteness, but I think that skill unlocks when your aged 16 and hit 20 charisma, then when you turn 18 it becomes attractiveness, but I digress; basically learning how to communicate better is another way to increase your charisma.”

As I finish writing down all the information James gave me I end up bumping into Eric, causing me to fall onto the floor, “Right, it’s pretty late due to the horde being closer to the slums than originally estimated, so we’re gonna set up camp here now. Everyone knows their jobs apart from Ethan, so get to it,” Eric instructs, “Ethan, I want you to scout around the area for any monsters and place these runes around the camp, however, one condition you can only use the trees to move.”

“What, how do you expect me to search for monsters without looking on the ground for clues?” I exclaim, “That’s virtually impossible.”

“Are you going to quit… On your dream, on Seraph, on your family,” Eric states in an annoyed but caring voice, “If you want to throw away his death as if it never happened then turn around, leave, and never come back!”

As I lunged forward connecting my fist to his jaw I screamed, “HOW FUCKING DARE YOU! You know nothing about what my life has been like… all you adventurers are the same highborn scumbags who treat beggars like me and Seraph as if we were the dirt on their shoes."

After screaming at Eric I decided to climb up a tree and scout around for monsters after half an hour of jumping from tree branch to tree branch as I keep an eye out for monsters and creatures but all I’ve come across are deer, rabbits, and the occasional lone wolf. However as I was about to make my way back I stumbled across a cave with a shimmering blue haze over the entrance, deciding that it could be a goblin cave, I rushed over to the entrance readying my daggers, however as I raise my hand to the shimmering fluorescent blue barrier, a bright blue message pops up in my view.

DO YOU WISH TO ENTER THE REALM OF THE GOBLIN KING

YES/NO

“No, thanks,” I say unamused, “Maybe some other day I’ll return.”

As I walk towards the camp, I run across two level three wolves along the way. I quickly deal with both using Quick Strike and Frost Arrow earning myself twelve XP, which I placed completely into Thief, furthermore, I gained four Wolf Fangs, Two Wolf Hides, Ten Wolf Meat, and Two Wolf Hearts.

“Where on earth do the items go, and why would we need to carry stuff if everything just goes into the inventory?” I ponder as I walk back into camp seeing that everyone but Eric is sat around the fire, “Hey, James, I got a question about the inventory setting on the menu. What does it actually do?”

“Well, firstly, I want you to go and apologize to Eric or else you’re not having any food!” James exclaims annoyed.

“I didn’t do anything wrong,” I state, “He’s the one in the wrong.”

“Go… Now Ethan!” James yells at me, “If you don’t make it up to Eric, you can go home.”

After about two minutes of walking away from the camp. I stumble across a cave where I see Eric surrounded by a bubble of crystal clear water, however, as I approach I trip some sort of trap because the next thing I see is five throwing knives flying at me from all sides, luckily for me I able to dodge them all just barely missing the last knife as it passes by my face. After catching my breath I start to sense the same sensation coming from Eric that I felt when I was using Shadow Meditation. As I sat waiting for Eric to come out of the bubble I decided to see what Yra was doing in the Shadow Glade.

“Yra,” I say as I enter her realm, “You here Yra?”

“Ethan, what’s the matter child of shadows,” Yra asks, “You seem distracted and confused.”

“It’s just… I don’t understand anything that’s going on, Yra, with how Eric and James are acting around me and with those adventurers who attacked my family…” I pause remembering the scene, “It’s like everything I do will affect the world as we know it.”

“Ethan, you're like a pebble that has been thrown into the river of fate, creating your own ripples in fate and changing it in ways that aren't clear. Your actions will ripple into the furthest reaches of the land, altering the destinies of even the smallest of children,” Yra cryptically informs. “You, Ethan, are most likely the most important and seemingly unimportant person in the whole of the six kingdoms.”

“That was vague and unhelpful,” I state annoyed.

As I focus back on the physical realm, I sense a powerful energy coming from a few feet in front of me, however, this energy isn't one that belongs to a person it’s more refined, purer perhaps… But, there’s a second energy coming from within the first, could that be Eric. As I return to the physical realm to see Eric standing in front of me with his arms crossed.

“So, you decided to come back did you,” Eric states staring at me unimpressed.

“Ye-yeah… I’m so-sor-sorry, Eric,” I mutter barely audible.

“It’s fine, just don’t do it again, Ethan,” Eric says, “Now, what is it you wanted to ask?”

“Oh, um… well, I had a question for James, however, he told me to apologize first…” I say when suddenly we hear a loud explosion come from the campsite