《Imagining Online: The game》V1 Chapter 3: The Law of life
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Running through the forest was exciting, seeing how colors of mostly green blur at his sides and the feeling of needing to dodge every tree truly was exciting. His paws touching the ground in a speed only a elite trained human could achieve.
Rein had never been physically fit in real life, he had taken it mostly easy with both sports and studies.
His running suddenly came to a stop when he arrived at a big open grass plain at the end of the forest. In the middle of the grass plain was a small village made up of only cottages and surrounded by a wall of trees whose crowns bent down over the village as if the trees wanted to protect it.
To avoid startling the villagers he released his transformation before he walked towards the opening in the trees. Guarding the opening was a long thin human man and a short fat dwarf man.
The human man had medium short light brown hair and was a young man in his middle twenties. He was fully armored, except the head, in a knight style armor.
The dwarf on the other hand had dark brown hair put up in a tail, a beard that reached his waist and looked like he was in his late fifties. Unlike his human colleague he mostly wore leather armor, only a few pieces of metal here and there.
When Rein arrived at the gate he was prepared to pay a small tax to enter the village, but there was none. He could just walk in while being ignored by the guards, what lousy guards this village had.
The village had a radius of about one kilometer and in the middle was a Tavern called Bear's nest. From it loud voices and shouts could be heard.
Rein entered the Bear's nest and asked the man at the counter if he had any room and what the price for a one person room was for one night with food included.
"95 copper"the man said and Rein gave him the money.
"Go right upstairs, the first room to the left is yours to take"he said and waved a hand towards the stairs. There are some advantages to getting a room in an tavern on an inn, first you get your stats enchained for a day or a week depending on what quality the in is and second, it's mostly pretty cheap.
The room Rein arrived in was a nice and tidy room with a single bed in it's left corner. At the bed's feet was a window where you could right now see the orange and red sunset. At the rooms right side was a furnace lit up with a sparkling fire. The room had a nice smell of wood, as if it had been newly built and had a nice cozy atmosphere.
Rein walked towards the bed, but not without forgetting locking the door, and sat gently down. The bed was not too soft and not too hard, perfect for Rein's taste. He felt so comfortable that he fell asleep right away.
When he woke up it was dawn in the game and 4 am in real. Oh no! He had meant to logout when he had entered the room but he accidentally fell asleep. Rein quickly logged out to walk over to his bedside, set the alarm and sleep for real.
***
Today would Rein's family come back from Stockholm by lunchtime. He had some time to play before he had to make the lasagna that he had chosen to serve with some salad and some nice drinks.
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His bedroom ceiling disappeared and before him was the room he had rented and logged out of. Rein went downstairs to get some breakfast, he had already gotten some Stat boost from renting a room at the tavern and now he wanted the boost from the food before he left to continue his journey.
When he was exiting the tavern he saw the blue sky hanging above him with the trees' crowns dangling around it. All around the village dwarfs and humans was running around minding their own business. People ran between the tree cottages holding a bunch of tools.
'I should probably leave the village as soon as possible, it will only drag me down if I stay here for too long.' Rein thought as he stretched his arms up in the sky and yawned.
The guards ignored him as he left though the north entrance.
'Not so eventful huh, this village. Well my goal isn't this village anyway.' Or that was he thought.
The next moment he was inside a cave, a damp cave full with stalagmites and stalactites growing from the ceiling and the floor. In front of him was what seemed like a dragon statue in a spot where the ground was even.
Rein was looking at this scene through an bubble like ball in awe. Suddenly the statue moved, it wasn't a statue, it was a real dragon.
The dragon had blue skin, it's claws on it's hands and feet as well it's fangs both inside and outside it's mouth was pure white. The type of white that shines through the darkness. The dragon's eyes were a red that shines through darkness in another way than the fangs. On it's forehead was a black horn, black like it was made from darkness itself. A being worth being called a end of game boss.
'Huh? Huuuuuh?! Why is there a dragon before me, I'm not a high level enough to even touch it. Where the hell am I even?! A dungeon's boss room?!' Rein thought in panic inside his own head while showing a calm appearance on his face.
"Hey, human who seeks the truth of the animal kingdom. The one who has found the great wolf kings' tomb, I am Morph, the dragon of the northern sea, if you seek out the truth you will have to offer a temporary price." Morph said in a deep loud voice that sounded through the whole cave.
"A price?"
"Your left arm for example, don't worry it will be back as soon as you find all the tombs and have gotten the title that comes with all of them" Morph said as if he knew what Rein had been thinking about.
After pondering for a while...
"Sure, why not?" Rein said holding his left arm forward, it wasn't his main one anyway and it would be a nice challenge.
He didn't join the game to play normally but to experience a new type of life with different type of challenges. Many which didn't exist in the real world.
"Hahaha, you're an interesting human indeed, there are not many in both human and beast who would accept such a price"
"I think that it is better to lose an arm than to lose my strength. If I lose my strength it will be hard for me to fight at this stage and in the future before I reach the last tomb. Yet unlike losing my stats I can take a little time to train myself in using only one arm, which would take me to another stage that others." Rein said as Morph "cut" of Rein's arm. It didn't hurt and no blood flowed.
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"Ho, that's commending. How about this, there is no rule about you having another arm so how about I give you mine?"
"Your's?"
"What's your name? Boy from another world." Morph asked as he took off his own arm and placed it at Rein's left shoulder.
"Rein" He answered and stared amazingly at Morph's arm that shrunk down to look like a humans. The arm placed itself where his own arm had been. It felt like it was his arm from the beginning.
"Amazing"
"Right, it is right? Well it is one of the secret magic arts to be able to transform something else than oneself into something other than what it is. It goes against the law of nature. The exception for oneself is to transform into another "animal", it is still against the law to transform into something nonliving.
How about I share this power with you? Mostly only dragons are trustworthy enough to have this power but I've deemed you trustworthy enough." Morph said with a bright smile and a proud face, showing his sharp fangs.
Without giving Rein a chance to react a red light orb had been created and had floated into him. A *Ding* sound was heard and before him a red transparent screen appeared.
[table]You have gotten the chance to learn [the secret art of true transformation] from Morph.
Do you want to learn it?YesNo[table]
"Yes" he answered and the in the next second he gave of the same red glow as the ball had the feeling that a thread of power surged throughout his whole body through the nerve system.
"I see that you have chosen to accept my power, Rein who seeks the truth. From now on you will be known by every dragon and upper being that exist, even the ones in the world that you come from."
"I don't think there are any dragons and upper beings in my world" Rein said in an unsure way.
"Oh, but they must surely exist, they are the beings on top of the natural power world. Tell me more about your world."
Rein started to tell Morph about the RW*, about its advancements in science and technology and that magic and dragons are believed to not exist. Morph just nodded and added some questions now and then, he was a really advanced npc. It seemed that unlike human npc who don't even want to hear about the RW*, and turn pale when you mention it, he seem to accept it. It really makes Rein wonder who made him.
"Look at the time, three hours have already gone by. I should probably send you back to where I found you." Morph said when Rain had fully told him about the RW*.
"Nah, don't drop me off there drop me off at my destination, The great city of the dwarves, Moirian."
"Ok then, off you go." Morph said and the next moment Rein's presence completely disappeared.
"Now, back to work" Morph uttered and went deeper into the cave through a hole path that Rein had missed to notice.
***
The place Rein arrived in was an active city full with people with an height of about one meter and mixed among them was some humans and beast. The city's overall color was brown and there was no sun, moon or star that brought light to it.
Instead of a sky was a cave ceiling full with luminous ores that has received the blessings of light magic. Moirian truly was a city made by dwarves.
Rein started to walk to a big building, that had a marvelous big book sign on it, with a guess that it was a library. Every city has a library with books about legends, history and monsters. The "theme" or "side" of the history and the legends depends on what race is inhabiting the city. If it is a human city the history and the legends are based on the human's side of the story etc.
Rein went through the big doorway that stood open to welcome visitors that seeks the power of knowledge. Knowledge is a powerful weapon in battle and war, you can show true power when you know everything about the enemy. That is the reason why Rein entered the library first, to get as much info as he can get about the dwarves.
At the counter talking with the dwarf librarian was a dwarf. The dwarf had a black beard with black long hair and a pair of red eyes. He was dressed in a heavy armor colored in red and black. On his back was an shield with a distressed pattern and a big axe that seemed like it could easily cut through stone.
In one of his hands was a book with an engraved text that said "The Way of a Master Blacksmith", with that Rein concluded that the dwarfs aim was to become master blacksmith or something. The dwarf noticed him and gave him a smile and a nod and then continued to discuss something with the librarian.
Rein just walked past the dwarf towards the bookshelves on the other side of the big entrance hall, the library was grand all the shelves was made from oak tree and there was all type of decorations on the white walls and marble floor.
'I kind of expected this from library made by dwarves, marble is a type of ore after all. Yet I didn't expect the ceiling being so high' Rein thought as he looked up at the ceiling a few meters above him, amazed by it's height.
The bookshelves was also tall almost reaching up to the ceiling and at every bookshelf was a moving ladder, the type that's mostly seen in movies.
'How on earth did the dwarves who are so short build this building?' he thought and took out a 2 centimeter thick book out of the nearest bookshelf titled The handy dwarfs. In the centre hidden by a couple of bookshelves Rein found some tables and some chairs. A few amount of people sat by some of those tables reading. He sat down on a empty chair and started to scan through the book.
[table]The dwarf is a race highly skilled in handicrafts and melee battle styles. They have a hard time using ranged weapons like bows and magic staffs. Handicrafts is the only area they can use magic in and it's mostly only fire magic they can use to empower their stove for making better weapons.
It's rare to find a dwarf excelling in water magic which is the opposite of fire magic. A dwarf that use water magic is able to craft things through water pressure and create even rarer and more beautiful crafts than one who uses fire. The dwarves main stat distribution is strength and dexterity to lift their heavy smithing hammers to craft beautiful details with great precision.[table]
'Seems like this book only mentions what's already know, except for how how dwarves uses magic.'
Rein arouse from his seat, put back the book where he found it and picked a new one. On the new book's cover "From handicraft to smithing" was written in a bright golden color.
Rein thought all of the books he picked were interesting and some even intriguing. He read all from the way of the dwarves to the history of the dwarves and their relation to humans.
Satisfied after reading a couple of books Rein exited the library after saying goodbye to the librarian standing behind the counter only to see...
| Hi!
This one ended before 10 pages but it managed to get about 2.5k words which Is one of my goals. Anyway sorry for the late update, been quite busy and have even made a theme song for this "book". I will be even more preoccupied at the end of this year. Thx for reading!
*RW = Real world
Here is the link to the song/melody: Imagine Online Theme: Rein's World
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