Ben Striker

Health: 125/125

Stamina: 100/100

Mana: 100/150

Status:

Level: 5

Experience: 1,985/2,000

Rank: None

Title: None

Class: None

Role: None

Party: Nobody

Alliances: None

Allegiances: None

Stats

Strength

10

Perception

10

Charisma

10

Endurance

10

Intelligence

20

Poise

10

Agility

10

Wisdom

20

Constitution

10

Dexterity

15

Fortitude

10

Luck

10

Skills:

Herbalist – Level 4

Herb Lore – Level 4

Hunting – Level 5

Butchering – Level 6

Animal Skinning – Level 5

Looting – Level 6

Ranged Weapons – Level 4

Archery – Level 6

Scan – Level 4

Stealth – Level 2

Abilities:

Casting – Level 2

Summoning – Level 1

Spells:

Drain – Level 1

Fireball – Level 3

Ice Shard – Level 1

Summon Undead Warrior – Level 2

Enchantments: None

Attributes: None

Ben’s mouth tasted like ass, not that he knew what ass actually tasted like, but he imagined it couldn’t be much worse than his mouth right then. He crawled out of bed, causing his head to throb from the hangover, and washed out his mouth until the taste was gone. He really missed toothpaste, might even have to create it in this world if the game allowed for inventing new things. Most games he played did, at least to a limited degree, especially since full dive games had come out.

He made his way downstairs, hit the restroom, and ordered breakfast. At least that was good, what with two eggs, a couple slices of bacon, some oatmeal he barely touched, and a couple thick slices of buttered toast.

A notification popped up halfway through, telling him that the Bandit quest had been finished, so he guessed either Dean or Ryan was already up and exploring the city. Either way, he earned enough experience points from it that he leveled up. He pulled up his status page and really wanted to throw them into Dexterity. The skill had helped with casting spells faster, but that hadn’t really been an issue so far. He was hoping it would eventually let him dual cast, but that wouldn’t be for quite a while, if it did at all.

He missed his last character in a different game. He’d been a level one hundred and twenty Warlock, that’s what the game had called wizards, and a complete badass. There’s just something satisfying about being able to throw enemies around like ragdolls, while one hit killing mobs, all with a couple hand gestures. Oh well, he’d get there eventually.

Instead, he looked between Strength, for the health bonus and Fortitude for the extra mana pool. Both provided a boost of five points per increase for their respective stats, and he’d need it, if Shiro was right about the dungeon they were about to hit. Finally, he decided to go with Fortitude, since wasn’t a front-line fighter. It meant he couldn’t take a lot of hits in battle, but wasn’t that the point of being a magic user? He didn’t want anyone to get close enough to hit him. He wanted to blast them to a billion pieces before they got anywhere near him.

Ryan and Dean returned shortly after that. Ryan asked, “Where’s Will?”

“Still asleep, probably.” Ben replied, “You may need to kick him awake.”

“How much did you two drink?” Dean asked.

Ben thought about it for a second, trying to remember everything from last night. It was a bit of a jumble, to be honest. “I can’t remember. Anyway, you two wake him up. I’m going to head over to the shop and pick up a couple more spells.”

“Why do we have to wake him up? You two were the ones that kept drinking last night.” Ryan complained.

“Because it’ll save time,” Ben said, “If I stick around to wake him up, and then go buy more spells, it’ll take longer. If you two wake him up while I go buy spells, we’ll be done faster and can meet up with Shiro.”

“That’s crap and you know it.” Dean said.

“I don’t make the rules, I just break them.” Ben grinned. It’s not that he wouldn’t wake Will up, he just didn’t have a water spell to make it fun.

He headed towards the door as he waved back at their sour faces, holding back his laughter until he was outside. He headed towards the shop, ignored the NPC shopkeeper and started browsing.

Thanks to the battle with the Orcs and looting a lot of their dead bodies before fighting, he had enough money for four more spells. He really wanted to pick up more attack spells, so that he could round out what kind of creatures he’d be effective against. But Shiro had said they’d be hitting a draughr dungeon, which were a kind of zombie that would be weak to fire, unless the developers had decided to go against the grain. He doubted it. Instead, he decided to focus on his defensive spells. He picked up Mana Shield, a defensive spell that allowed him to create a shield out of his mana. Then Mana Ward, a timed spell that reduced physical damage taken by ten percent for five minutes. And finally, Shockwave, a spell that would knock enemies away from him, and allies if he ever wanted to fuck with his friends.

All of the spells sucked at this point, but that was expected. Once he had a chance to level them up a bit, say to level ten, their mana cost would drop, effectiveness increased, and the length they were active would last longer.

He was still using the elemental staff Dean had found but decided to sell it in and replace some of his gear for something better.

Description: Magic Staff

Quality: Well-Made

Rarity: Rare

Weapon Type: Magic Staff

Range: Melee, Ranged

Damage: 18-20

Critical Hit: 1%

Durability: 10/10

Weight: 2 lb

Attributes:

-10% Mana Cost for Spells

Sorcerer’s Robes

Quality: Well-Made

Rarity: Uncommon

Damage Resist: 13-15

Durability: 15/15

Weight: 5 lbs

Attributes:

+5% Maximum Mana

+5% Magic Resist

He equipped them and headed out of the shop, where his friends waved him down.

“Shiro stopped by to tell us we’re all meeting in the square.” Ryan explained as Ben caught up.

“Did he say how many others were joining?” Ben asked. Ryan shook his head.

They found Shiro standing on one of the small stone benches in the center of the square, surrounded by a bunch of players. Ben listened at first, but realized it was mostly a recap of what he already knew, so instead he started studying the other players, assigning each group a nickname.

“I am named Shiro, and I am a developer of this game. I know that you have questions about the logout issue, but I do not have answers. Instead, we are here about a different threat, the Orc invasion led by a Shadow Wraith.”

First group Ben nicknamed were the frat asses, a bunch of college aged guys with identical haircuts and mostly wearing the clothes they had spawned in. It was really easy to figure out who the leader was, just look for the dumbest guy in the group without anything brown on his nose and he was the leader, who in this case was a tall blonde jock with a sharp nose and smug grin on his face. None of the others actually had shit on their noses, but seriously, they kept glancing at the leader to gauge his opinion before showing any kind of response themselves.

“We cannot stop them from taking over the city. It is a game event designed to force players to leave the starting point. It was not supposed to happen so soon. But it is happening, and we must act.”

Then there were the Bullet catchers. There was no way that group wasn’t a bunch of vets, not with a dozen people standing at parade rest in formation. Seven of them had buzzcuts, three others still cut short, and two women with long hair pulled back in a ponytail. They were all dressed in various types of metal armor, going for anything between a barbarian look to a full knight in armor. The leader standing in front had a buzzcut so short it was impossible to tell what his hair color was, a hooked nose, and eyes that scanned the square without resting in one place for more than a second.

“There is a dungeon east of here with a city crystal. It is a high-level dungeon, but we must make it to the boss room and collect the crystal. It is our only hope. Without it, we cannot build a new city and a new spawn point.”

Then there were the bimbos, a bunch of chicks that were paying more attention to the guys in the audience than Shiro’s speech. Like most games, the developers had included sexy female outfits that was designed to accentuate a female player’s anatomy. It usually cost more than regular armor, despite having the exact same attributes, because it was purely fashion based. All of the bimbos wore some version of it, while twirling their hair or batting their eyes at one of the frat asses or the jock straps.

“We must work together to win. If we do not, we will not make it to the boss room. We will not get the crystal. We need to work as a team.”

Maybe the name wasn’t that original, but seriously, why come up with something creative when there was already a perfectly good name available? As for them, they were all cheering a little too loudly at Shiro’s speech, kept jostling each other in their anxiousness to get going, and generally looked ready to beat the crap out of anything they encountered. They didn’t seem to have a leader, just gravitated to each other because of their common interest.

“Now, I will assign each group to work beside another group. You must help each other and try to keep your team from dying. Some will, the dungeon is too hard for us, but it is the only way to make sure we make it to the bottom.”

Finally, there were the nerds. Despite looking like the jock straps and frat asses thanks to the game, all of them stood self-consciously while staring at the bimbos, mouths hanging open. Ben wouldn’t be surprised if a couple were drooling. They’d gone full out costume for their roles, a barbarian wearing a loin cloth and not much else, a wizard completely covered in mage’s robes, and an elf-boy wannabe wearing a green tunic, long cape and turned down boots. Ben didn’t have much room to talk, since he was now wearing mage’s robes, but that was for the stat benefits and he would never be caught dead in the pointed hat the mage wore.

“SuperFreaks, you will work with the Demonslayers.” The jocks straps and the frat asses exchanged looks. “Badass Babes will work with the Fellowship.” The bimbo’s started complaining, as the nerds realized they were gaping and shut their mouths. “Rangers, you will work with nobody.” Will and Dean started laughing, which pulled Ben out of his thoughts long enough to realize the joke had worked. Shiro stopped. “And Nobody will change their name before the fight.” Several other groups figured out the joke and started laughing.

“Everyone else will work with me as the Rogues. Understood?” There were a dozen other players not associated with the groups, which Ben guessed meant they were solo players, though one of the women looked like she might know the vets, and another was pointedly ignoring the nerds.

The vet leader walked up to them and held out his hand, “Hello, my men call me Sarge and sometimes call me God if asking for mercy. Looks like we’ll be working together.”

Ben wasn’t sure what he thought of Sarge at first glance, except that he liked Sarge’s sense of humor. Ryan looked like he was about to say something, but Dean stopped him “Relax, Ryan. It’s just a military thing.”

“What’s with him?” Sarge asked.

“He’s a pastor, so the God reference has thrown him off.” Will explained.

“Ah,” Sarge smiled as he held out his hand to Ryan, “Preacher.”

“Pastor, not preacher.” Ryan corrected.

“Preacher works better as a call sign,” Sarge explained, “So we're calling you preacher.”

“You don’t go by your real names?” Dean asked.

“God no, why would we?” Sarge looked aghast at the idea. Ryan frowned, but didn't say anything.

“Well, the game didn’t let us pick different screen names.” Dean explained.

“So?” Sarge said, “why would that matter.”

“I guess it really doesn’t. I just didn’t think about it that way.”

“Well, then we’ll need to give each of you a call sign.” He said, before gesturing at the woman standing beside him, the woman Ben had wondered whether she was associated with the vets or was a solo player standing beside them.

“This is my wife, you won’t call her anything.” Sarge said as he stared daggers at them, “Not if you want to live.” He grinned suddenly, “I’m just kidding, her name’s Marie, but everyone in the party calls her Angel.” He switched back to daggers, “I’m not kidding, I can have you disappear with a phone call.”

“You realize there aren’t any phones in this game?” Dean asked.

Sarge glared at him, “I don’t need a phone to make it happen.”

Marie, stepped past him, kicking him in the shin in the process, probably on accident, but she smiled way too sweetly at him, so maybe not. “Don’t listen to him. He’s being an idiot. I wanted to be called something cool like Black Widow or Lady Death but got stuck with Angel. I’ve tried forcing them to call me something else, but so far nothing’s stuck.”

The vets introduced themselves, followed by Ben and his friends before forming a group. Ben saw the list of names and health bars appear on the side of his vision beneath his other friends, but was distracted when one of the vets, a guy that Ben thought had called himself Voodoo said, “Hey, your last name is Striker?”

“Yeah, why?” Ben asked.

“Seriously?” Voodoo shook his head in surprise, “I’m calling you Striker instead.”

Striker, formerly known as Ben, renamed the frat asses’ leader after the bear attack later that morning. Now, Ben just thought of him as plain dumbfuck. The group had come across the bear, who looked like he was probably going to ignore them, but dumbfuck decided to charge it and in the process knock over two of his buddies. The bear had effortlessly knocked dumbfuck out of the way, before immediately clawing the two downed players to death. Unfortunately, dumbfuck had gotten the killing blow, so his buddies and the bimbos thought he was a hero. Looking around at everyone else, Striker knew the rest had reached the same decision as himself, dumbfuck was, well a dumbfuck.

On the other hand, he ended up befriending Voodoo. They spent most of the morning walking together and chatting. “So, you are all vets?” Striker asked. Voodoo nodded in reply. “And you were all actually rangers?”

“Not all of us.” Voodoo explained, “Sarge was a drill sergeant, Doc was obviously a medic, and a few of us were just infantry. But the rest were all special forces of some kind, we just picked rangers because most of us are ex-army.”

“I get Doc and Sarge, but what about the other nicknames? Like Sleepy and Blue Dog?” Striker asked.

“Oh, Sleepy’s named after the Seven dwarfs because he slept through an entire mortar barrage and had to be woken up before the enemy charged us.” Voodoo explained, “As for Blue Dog, I’ll let him tell you.” Voodoo called to Blue Dog, who broke off from his conversation with Doc and joined them.

“What’s up?” Blue Dog asked.

“He’s asking about your name.” Voodoo explained.

Blue Dog groaned, “What did you tell him?”

“Nothing, I swear.” Voodoo said.

“Then why does he want to know?” Blue Dog growled. Voodoo gestured at Striker for the explanation.

“It just seems like an odd name when the others all kind of make sense.” Striker said.

“Voodoo makes sense to you?” Blue Dog asked.

Striker shrugged, “He’s some kind of witch doctor.”

Voodoo laughed, “Sort of. I kept getting in trouble at bootcamp, but I talked my way out of most of it. A few people started claiming I was using some kind of voodoo to get out of trouble.”

“See, makes sense.” Striker said, “So what about you?”

Blue Dog sighed, “I tried to pull a prank on Sarge when we were deployed. I added some blue dye to his body wash, trying to turn him blue. Instead, he washed the camp mutt with it one day and figured out it was me.”

“That doesn’t make sense,” Striker said, “Why would you get the nickname?”

“Because he told me I had to either use the stuff on myself or get shipped to Greenland. Do you know what Greenland is like?”

“Isn’t it backwards from Iceland? Where they’re named for the others climate or something.”

“Exactly,” Blue Dog said, “So I showered with the stuff and was blue, head to toe, for an entire month. Sarge made me walk the dog every day while I was blue, so everyone started calling me Blue Dog.”

“I didn’t find out from the dog,” Sarge said from behind them.

“Really?” Blue Dog asked.

Sarge shook his head, “I was just lucky and didn’t start where you could see it but realized what had happened pretty damn quick. So, I toweled off and grabbed the mutt.”

“If you didn’t start on your face…” Blue Dog thought about it for a second, “Are you saying,” He stifled a laugh, “they were blue for an entire month?”

“I never said that.” Sarge said.

“And you never said anything? Can you imagine the nickname you’d have?” Blue Dog asked.

“Yes, I can.” Sarge said, “That’s why I never said anything about it. And if you repeat this, I will make sure you get shipped to Greenland when we get out of here.”

Blue Dog laughed hysterically, “God, I wish you had said something? I’ve hated that damn name for years, but it was totally worth it if it actually worked.”

“That’s why I didn’t say anything.” Sarge replied, “Now, I need to talk to Shiro about battle plans. If you breathe a word of this, I will make you disappear.”

Blue Dog nodded through his laughter, promising not to say anything.

At one point later in the morning, Striker brought up his nicknames for the different groups. Voodoo asked him to explain, and by the end was laughing.

“I like it,” Voodoo said, “I’ve been thinking of their leader as Poser, but dumbfuck fits him perfectly. As for his cronies, I’ve been calling them dipshits.”

“Dipshits?” Striker asked.

“As in, they’ve dipped their noses so far up his ass they’ve got shit on ‘em.” Voodoo grinned.

“I like it, we’re calling them dipshits from now on.” Striker said.

“Probably shouldn’t say it to their faces though,” Blue Dog mused, “Not if we’re going to fight alongside each other for right now.”

“I don’t get what they’re doing here. They don’t exactly look like they joined the game to fight, you know?” Striker said.

“They overheard Shiro asking Sarge to help out,” Voodoo said, “And they had to look good for the girls. You called them the bimbos, right? Anyway, they insisted on coming to get laid.”

“Great,” Striker grimaced, “So we’re about to face a bunch of pumped up monsters with a bunch of show-offs?”

Blue Dog shrugged, “I wouldn’t worry about it. You’ve been paired up with us, and we know how to fight. Just stick close and we’ll make it out of this in one piece.”