Mickey was on public transit, heading for the hospital that was caring for his grandmother. They had called to let him know that he could come to visit his grandmother without worry.

There was still some time before the bus ride would be over and Mickey was anxious. He went to his smartphone, and following the instructions on the blue card, tried to access the Tralasportal site. To his surprise, the site let him download the Tralas Browser. Mickey went through the motions and ended back up on a mobile version of the HiddenWorld Node.

Hmm? Was that there before?

Mickey’s curiosity had paid off. In wanting to dig through the news feed or explore the links to see if something changed, he discovered something new.

Guides.

He clicked on the link at the top of the page and was taken to a page with a list of links.

***

Beginner’s Essential Guide

Beginner’s Tralas Bridge Guide

Beginner’s Infinite Descent Guide

Beginner’s Starter Realms Guide

Beginner’s Skill and Skill Bits Guide

Beginner’s Essential Skill Bits

Beginner’s Path Guide: Non-combat

Beginner’s Path Guide: Farmer/Fisherman Focus

Beginner’s Exploration Guide

***

Mickey was excited; the presence of guides made the game feel more real. He quickly clicked through and scrolled through all of the available guides. He skimmed—he just wanted to see that they weren’t broken or low-effort pages.

They were not.

Each page was filled with pictures and diagrams, some even had maps. All of them were filled with text and headings. Someone had taken the effort to make guides. They could have left the site as-is, but they tried. That had to be worth something.

There’s still a bit of the bus ride to go… Learning the most efficient things I could be doing wouldn’t be so bad.

Mickey opened the first guide, the “Beginner’s Essential Guide.” That first guide was many screens long, but thankfully, it had all its contents summarized at the very top for quick viewing.

***

Beginner’s Essential Guide

1. Read the Tralas Bridge Guide to make sure you know the most optimal way of spending your hard-earned Excia! DO NOT SPEND ANY EXCIA WITHOUT READING THAT GUIDE.

2. In the Unlimited Realm stage, assuming you’re reading this before logging in, make sure you let your imagination run wild. Do not get stuck on how other games work. Imagine you are living a dream.

3. Explore. Explore. Explore. If you explore early on, you’ll have a sizable supply of Excia to use. Finding Landmarks and Treasure Chests will give you 1EXC. Finding an undiscovered Landmark, although difficult, will net you 5EXC. Excia is incredibly important—see the Tralas Bridge Guide.

4. Fight Boss-Level monsters. Upon your first defeating of Boss monsters, you’ll get 3EXC. Bosses can be fought safely as early as Level 3.

5. Clear the One-Go Dungeons. The starting realms each have twelve one-go dungeons. Clearing the one-go dungeons by taking out the Boss monster will get you 3EXC on top of the Boss clear prize.

6. Do the Cyclical Dungeons every week. They’re called the Infinite Descent officially. They refresh every Sunday, real-time, no matter your location. For every ten floors you clear, you get 1EXC and other currencies. They’re also the best source of extra experience most times.

7. Try not to leave the starting realm too early. Take your time! Once you leave them, you won’t be able to return unless there’s a special event, so make sure you clear your starting realm and extract all the Excia you can get. More on this later.

8. Prioritize leveling and improving your Skills by collecting Skill Bits. No matter what role you decide to take, your skills will make or break you. Check the Skill Bits guides for more.

9. Help the denizens of the realms when possible. They very rarely will give you EXC, but more importantly, they can give you the following: Gold, Crystallized Experience, Items, Skill Bits, and other beneficial stuff that I’m not allowed to describe in this guide.

10. Try to take on challenges that are within three levels of you, either way. The Starting Realm is geared to handle Trailblazers up to Level 20 but I recommend staying there until you’re sure you’ve found all known Landmarks and have taken out all the Bosses. As a guidepost, if you can clear up to Floor 50 of all three Infinite Descents on the regular, you can leave the Starting Realm.

11. DO NOT SPEAK TO OTHER TRAILBLAZERS IN-GAME UNTIL YOU’RE WELL-ESTABLISHED. Early-game, you have to be focused on building up your powers and parameters AWAY from other Trailblazers. Many of the challenges outside of the Starting Realms give the advantage to Trailblazers that aren’t well-known. Success in any play-style is directly tied to how well you can keep your abilities hidden and protect yourself. The Starting Realms will prevent PVP, but that won’t be the case once you leave. For that reason, it's best to not expose yourself. Trust no-one. Even if they’re your species.

***

How intense. I’m kind of hyped up. It’s good to know I’ll be able to find the shop’s currency quickly enough.

Mickey wanted to page through the guide slowly, but before that, he decided to take the guide’s advice and looked at the “Beginner’s Tralas Bridge Guide.”

***

Beginner’s Tralas Bridge Guide

1. If you have logged in at least once, BUY A SHELTER IMMEDIATELY AND THEN BUY EVERY MONTH. It will protect your home and your loved ones. The current meta practically requires that all humans buy shelters. DO NOT GO WITHOUT A SHELTER.

2. Do not bother spending on the EXP Bonus while in the Starting Realm. It’s a trap. The EXP Bonus isn’t that great and speed is the opposite of what you want when you’re starting out because if you somehow over-level in the Starting Realm, you WILL develop bad habits. EXP Bonuses should only be considered when you have the Excia and are leveling some new extras.

3. Be careful with converting. This guide writer won’t judge you, but you can’t convert cash back to Excia, and Excia is MUCH MORE IMPORTANT. Convert sparingly.

4. The shop has hidden tabs other than the ones you can see. After reaching Level 3, for example, a hidden tab of the shop will be revealed and unlocked. This layer's contents refresh weekly. Buy Skill Bits whenever you have more than 75EXC (three months' worth of shelters). Don’t bother with Crystalized Experience or any other item. Just buy the Skill Bits.

5. If you’re in debt, get back to zero before one month has passed on that debt. DO NOT BUY ANY MORE SPECIAL OFFERS. Get back to zero as quickly as you can and then buy a shelter.

***

Is Excia really that big of a deal? It’s a game, right? How serious is the progression in this game?

This guide was much shorter. After every listing was a simple picture showing the screen Mickey had seen before. If there was something new, it was the next hidden layer of the shop. From what Mickey could see, there were many colorful icons of weapons and items available for purchase.

Weird that this tab is hidden... What are they trying to encourage? That there are hidden elements in the interfaces?

With a few minutes left until the bus ride was over, Mickey went back to the first guide, and read through it carefully, keen on picking up any hidden bit of information.