Chapter 16

~ Am Irreversible Mistake ~

SW/SW/SW

“Once again, congratulations on joining Travonka,” Maria’s smile made Ace all giddy inside. His inside was practically a melting pot consisted of different emotions stirred together. Her motherly manner brought peace to his mind…

“Thank you.”

She observed his and Elvaria’s equipment and her charming smile gradually disappeared. “Wait just a second. What level are you?”

“I’m two and Elvaria’s one. As I told you before, we are total newbies.”

“Oh no,” she frowned, a hand on her cheek, “we have no good equipment to those below level four. How come I just realized this…? It’s as if I have tricked you into joining…”

Ace lifted both hands to calm her down, “Ah, no. It’s okay, really. It certainly feels safer now that we have joined a guild. It’s like we have somewhere to return to.”

…and a mother figure to talk to, Ace added inwardly.

Ace’s kindness and sincerity were reciprocated. “Thank goodness…! I’m glad you feel that way, but here you go. Take this… This is a compensation for my incompetence.”

There was a green potion with a hint of bluish color on each of her outstretched hand. Ace inclined his head to see the label.

[Mixed-colored Potion]

Of course it was unidentified.

He looked up to meet her (closed) eyes, “What’s this?”

“This is a Defense Potion, useful to bolster your defense for a period of time. You’d need this more than I do. Survival is everything in the earlier level. I do have spare equipment, but they won’t be useful to you since there are level and attributes requirements, so I think this potion is the most appropriate.”

Elvaria shifted in her seat, a bit tempted by the potion. “Are you sure? It looks expensive…”

Maria smiled in a motherly manner, “It is alright. It’s quite affordable at my level, so here you go. Don’t be shy.”

Ace gladly took the potion and stored it inside his inventory. A moment later he gave Elvaria a glance and felt a wave of relief enveloped his mind.

At least the elf knew how to open her inventory…

After a quick chat, Maria took her leave and went outside to look for DPS.

QueeN approached them. Leaning forward, she whispered, “Drink zat in an extremely dire zituation.”

She didn’t miss those confused looks. She further explained, still whispering, “Ze potion ist called Aqua Secunda, an exclusive potion only available through Alchemy. It increazes your defenz by 500 plus ze Alchemy level of ze creator.”

Ace stared at her disbelievingly. “Is that a joke?”

“Look at mein face and tell me if I’m joking.”

She wasn’t…

“Maria said it vas quite avordable, ja. Vhat she meant by zat was ze materials. Ze potion itself needz Alchemy skill level 78 to be unlocked and created, so don’t waste it on a weak enemy, okay?”

“Why would she give us something so… exclusive?” Elvaria mumbled under her breath as confusion began to spread on her beautiful face.

“To put it simply, she wanted to apologize,” QueeN answered with a wide grin, “but on a ziirious note, it vas also her tactic to build trust and rezpect. She’s not a bad person, really, just a bit vorkaholic in my opinion. There’z no one vho vorks harder than she ist. Maria really cares about us, about Travonka.”

The atmosphere turned somber by the time QueeN finished her talk. Her eyes widened a bit and she waved her hand apologetically, “Ich bitte Sie, didn’t mean to sully your mood. Vas just kinda carried away for a moment.”

“No worries,” Ace dismissed, swallowing his confusion on her language. “That reminds me… what do you know about the legendary weapons?”

QueeN sighed, “Forget about zem. No matter how hard you try, you von’t get a hand on zem. Ja, zey’re super strong, but ze chance vor ze boss to drop it ist below your patience limit.”

“So, how low is that? One percent?”

She rolled her eyes, “Below half of it, Ace. Nowadayz only Perfektionist or rich brats go after zem. Zere ist plenty of legendary equipment to be found, actually.”

QueeN continued, “It’s not just weapons. Zere are armors, helmets, and even items marked vith legendary on ze name tag, but az I told you all of zem are hard to get. Some are randomized, but some are not. One of zem ist Soul Slicer, ze last boss’ weapon.”

Ace suddenly remembered that fanart. A man dressed in all black, carrying a gigantic sword with dual colors resembling yin and yang.

“It’s ze strongest weapon in GeaOnline, but also haz ze lowest drop! 0.000 something like zat! It’z a miracle if you get it,” suddenly she laughed hard, “but you don’t hav to be so worked up like zat! After all, minimum level to tackle Azariel’s castle is 250! You still hav a looong vay to go!”

That was kind of discouraging…

“By ze vay, vhat’re you going to do now? Leveling up?” she skillfully steered the conversation away from the legendary equipment.

“I’m going to finish my quest and probably do some more questing,” Ace answered, then glanced aside to find Elvaria, “what about you?”

“Umm… I guess I’ll follow you around,” Elvaria meekly answered. “Together is better than being alone.”

“In that case, be careful,” QueeN warned, “if you spot players vith red names, don’t hesitate to use ze Scroll of Return. You’ll get six Scrolls of Return once a day, so yuz wisely. By now zey should be inside your inventory.”

“Yeah, will do. Thanks, Tongsis,” Ace stood, followed by Elvaria.

They exited Travonka guild room after adding each other in the friend list.

0000

Ace returned to the quest-giver and finished his quest. The girl was thanking him profusely that he held himself so strong not to stop her. He wasn’t alone and he didn’t want to attract unwanted attention.

His installation disc was kind of corrupted, allowing him to witness NPCs acting like humans. The NPCs laughed, cried, and fumed. Unfortunately, Ace was the only one to see such things. He considered it as a blessing and a curse. It never ceased to amaze him how real the NPCs were, how… alive, and human they were. He could talk to them easily and they responded. In the eye of other players, Ace was a weirdo who talked to NPCs. They couldn’t strike a proper conversation to them, let alone watch the change of their facial expressions.

It baffled him to no end.

Why was he the only one…?

He couldn’t understand no matter how hard he squeezed his brain. He really had no idea why he was the only one who could understand them. He should stop thinking about it for a while. This kind of technical problem should be handled by someone, a player, who understood what actually was inside the installation disc.

Ace and Elvaria took several easy quests, basically to help Elvaria level up. When they finished a hunting quest, both leveled up.

“How should I spend my points?” she asked as they enjoyed a quiet moment in the forest.

Ace stopped munching on his ration and spoke, “As a Warrior, it’s important to have high STR and VIT. DEX is also important. Strength increases your overall damage as well as your HP. Vitality determines how strong you are getting hit by poison. It also increases your HP. Higher Dexterity means more accuracy and higher agility to evade enemies’ attacks.”

In this game, agility and dexterity were merged into one.

Elvaria went quiet and crossed her arms. She looked as if she was between a life and death choices. It was kind of cute.

“Alright!” she beamed in happiness, having found enlightenment. Elvaria spent one point on STR and VIT, and the rest went to DEX.

She preferred an agility-based fighter, huh?

Ace himself distributed one point on INT, two on DEX, and one for CHA. His body felt more agile somehow…

To his surprise, there was a new notification window, telling him that he met the requirement for his first perk!

He tapped the window to let it disappear. A second later, a big window with multiple small tables appeared. Each of them contained a Perk’s name and its description. Neat!

“Whoah! So many…”

There was an interesting Perk located at the very top of the list. It read…

Ancient Force

Legendary equipment will be 5% more effective

Was this a joke? Legendary weapon itself was already so strong, but here there was a Perk that further enhanced its effectiveness! How tempting!

What’s more, it said equipment; not weapons, not armors, not items. It meant everything that was labeled as legendary would get 5% buff when equipped! Wow, talk about epic! This Perk was certainly a worthy investment!

Ace’s mind wandered to Soul Slicer, Azariel’s weapon. If he somehow got his hand on that sword, he’d be invincible!

Without hesitation, Ace chose [Ancient Force] as his first Perk.

“Ace?”

“Yeah?” he still had that stupid smile on.

Elvaria hesitated for a bit and then pointed out, “Why did you choose [Ancient Force]? Did you forget what TongsisQueeN just said a while ago? Legendary equipment is very hard to get.”

Then realization washed over him.

Forget about zem.

…also haz ze lowest drop! 0.000 something like that! It’z a miracle if you get it…

...minimum level to tackle Azariel’s castle is 250! You still hav a looong vay to go!

HOLY SHIT!!!

No! What had he done?! God, how stupid could he be?! Why the heck did he chose Ancient Force?! He should have chosen carefully, not on a mere whim!

He tried meddling with the Perk window, but there was no ‘revert button’ there! He opened the option, but found none!

It was irreversible…

Shit.

…he was doomed.

Spoiler: Status

AceKivras

EXP Chart*

Atk: 5

HP (190/190)

Level 3

20/1005

Def: 4

MP(265/265)

Human

985 to lv. 4

M.Atk: 21

Eiredrahl the Impure*

Summoner

1890 Coins

M. Def: 13

Travonka

Minimum piety

ATTRIBUTES

POTENTIAL

Equipment

Ancient Force

STR

5

Worst

Head

Circlet

VIT

7

Bad

Neck

Amulet

DEX

9

Bad

Body

Robe

PER

8

Bad

Back

-

INT

19

Superb

Arm (main)

Staff

WIS

11

Best

Arm

-

WILL

11

Best

Waist

-

CHA

17

Superb

Legs

Pants

* (tap to see)

Feet

Shoes

(Help)

Skill

Description

Level

Healing

VIT

Lets you recover your HP over time

3.109

Staff

VIT

How proficient you are swinging your staff

2.098

Running

VIT

Affects your running speed

3.453

Light Armor

DEX

How effectively you act while wearing Light Armor

8.009

Evasion

DEX

Helps you to evade attacks easily

8.544

Casting

INT

This skill helps you power up your spells

6.937

Meditation

INT

Gradually recovers your MP

6.265

Herbology

INT

Lets you identify any herb to its fullest potential

6.734

Control Magic

WIS

Prevents your ally to get hit by your spells

4.207

Memorization

WIS

This skill slows down the decay of your unused skills

3.813

Literacy

WIS

Allows you to read more difficult spellbooks

6.175

Control Beast

CHA

Lets you control higher-level Summon Beasts

7.931