Please Note: Statements between % something in italics % are game system messages.

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The four starting islands of Long Island were Ilmentia, Dalmund, Brittanica and Khardoum. Just like Ilmentia looked like ancient roman civilization so did the other islands resemble ancient earth civilizations. Dalmund was similar to the Germanic tribes, Brittanica the English and Khardoum was similar to the Egyptians. How closely did they resemble these ancient civilizations was a matter of debate. Although it would be safe to say that the clothing was similar.

And like Gurrow village, all the villages where players started were guarded by an Age barrier. Dalmund had the earliest Age limit at 12. Ilmentia and Brittanica opened up at Age 14. Khardoum had an even higher Age limit. It opened up at 15. And it seemed that very recently it had finally opened up to a single player who had reached Age 15 in the Hebenu village, the starter village of Khardoum kingdom.

Swamy was looking at a forum post titled "Difficulty C quest" posted by someone named Thadian. The contents of the post were...

"I reached Age 15 yesterday and headed out of the village to go to the capital city of Fayyum. Not going into much detail but I just found a quest with difficulty C. Unfortunately I died, failing the quest. I have tried asking around but it seems that no one has yet encountered a quest with a higher difficulty than D+. So I was wondering whether I wasn't the first one to discover it.

Thinking back on the quest though, I think this was a quest specially for the first person to leave the village. Did the other villages also have something like this?"

Lots of people had seen this post and a few had asked questions also. But mostly there were no replies as there would only be like 4 people who could have answered that question. One of them was Swamy.

'Ah a kindred spirit.' Not very long ago Swamy had encountered a difficulty C quest. It was more luck than anything that he survived it. Lady Altia's blessing had played a major part in this. Though the difficulty was C and he had luckily survived, Swamy didn't think that it was harder than a D+ quest. Perhaps because he had survived, he could afford to think so.

'Maybe you need to have the right set of blessings or equipment or training to survive this C difficulty quest. But that would depend more on luck than anything else I suppose.'

Swamy posted his own reply. He generally avoided this but he had felt a strange camaraderie with this Thadian, whoever he/she was.

"I also encountered a difficulty C quest when I left Gurrow village. Fortunately I survived. It eventually led to the Capture the Beastmen and pirate subjugation quests, both of which were D+ difficulty. I suppose this kind of thing would have happened in the other islands as well seeing that it already happened in Ilmentia and Khardoum."

He then put his laptop to sleep and started getting ready for college. He still hadn't found any information about Sea Gods.

Lunch time...

Another exam over. Though Indian universities followed the semester system (6 months) and not the term system (4 months), examinations usually happened during the 5th month. The time afterwards was dedicated to project work or similar things with about a week to 10 day holiday between two semesters. Well education was still being experimented on by the authorities that be, in order to determine the average amount of time needed to study something. While that may be going on, it was the end of semester examinations at the University of Bangalore.

After the exam, Swamy arrived at the mess hall to a table containing three dejected bodies. Or maybe they were simply sleepy. Late night study was taking its toll on most students and half of the heads in the mess hall had started lolling as soon as they reached a seat. Swamy was no exception. He had kept his routine of playing during the night even during this period. That meant he had to do his revisions before he started playing. Fortunately during this exam period students did not have classes. They only had to appear for 3 hours for the exams and then they could go home afterwards. Which meant that Swamy had ample time to study.

Not that it helped. Late night playing was not recommended during these stressful times. Not when you wake up to a doubt filled morning and you start trying to remember if you had missed something or if that thing you read was the right thing.

But then he enjoyed the game so much and if possible, he didn't want to stop playing it.

"Hey guys...how did it go?" Swamy asked the dropped heads in front of him. Slowly they moved and lifted their heads.

"Hey Swamy" replied back Himali.

"mmmhsnhmm" said Sneha.

*snore....went Manish.

Swamy almost laughed remembering yesterday.

"By the way where is Rajan? Doesn't he not like staying in the classroom long?" Swamy asked referring to the missing person.

"He was here earlier. But then went somewhere saying he'll be back soon." replied Himali.

"Must be the toilet!ghghgh *snore" went Manish.

Both Himali and Swamy stared at him but he was really truly asleep. Then they broke out laughing. Their laughter broke the solemn sleepy silence around the mess hall, breaking off more than a few dozen fantastical or erotic dreams.

A little while later Rajan returned. Contrary to his usual exam-depressed-sleepy-mood, he was quite excited. He walked quickly up to them and in a voice which seemed louder in the relative silence of the mess hall,

"Hey hey hey....why are you guys asleep! Wake up and hear the most exciting news. Raka has posted again!"

Swamy almost fell off his seat.

The voice carried over to quite a few ears, not all familiar. Quite a few perked up after hearing this and started looking towards Rajan. Then they dived into their cellphones probably to access the forums. Who knew so many people around Swamy played Long Island.

"What? Did you say Raka? Did he post another video?" Himali quickly asked. The exclamation and the resulting noise woke up Sneha. Manish however chose to be oblivious to real world or virtual world problems and snored some more.

"Yes. It looks like the quests you guys did, the one to capture the beastmen and then the one Raka did, the one with the naval battle, both of them started from a difficulty C quest. Seems like the first person to leave the village gets some kind of difficulty C quest." Rajan continued.

"What?!" Sneha exclaimed. "Hey hey but we didn't get something like that. Does that mean it did not happen in Dalmund?"

"On the contrary. It means that the first person actually failed the quest. That's why the other quests did not happen." Rajan answered. "But that is not the only news. It seems that the first people, the 4 who were the first to leave the starting villages and got this quest, all of them replied to this post. See we have Firelord from Dalmund, Raka from Ilmentia, Raven from Brittanica and now Thadian from Khardoum. All of them have confirmed that they got this C difficulty quest. But they all died, failing it, except Raka ofcourse. Man, they all posted this morning like a few minutes from each other almost like they were waiting for this."

"Wow! I so wanna meet Raka." Sneha said.

"Oh we rushed over to Thelmova to catch him. But we didn't find any player coming from the ships. Maybe he hid himself. It would be so awesome if somehow we could convince him to join our guild, right Manish!"

*snore....what my love?" Manish woke up with a start.

"..........."

This time Swamy couldn't help laughing. And he was joined by the others.

Back home, Swamy quickly checked that post.

"Holy.....what the!" he couldn't stop from exclaiming. The forum was now full of this new thing. Where in the morning there were various posts on various things shown in prominence, it had all been replaced by new posts discussing the four players. Oh and each had a topic named after them now. Yup, there was an entire discussion going on with the subject 'Raka'.

'For something that happened due to luck, aren't they making a big fuss about it!'

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'This may be troublesome.' A thought invaded Raka. He did not mind the interest. Then again, he was no where near strong enough as they were making him out to be in the forums. Sure, he had a high Endurance and Stamina stats, but that wasn't special. Anyone with training will eventually get that number. His Strength and Agility stats were quite low. His Vitality stat was low too. He hadn't yet discovered a way to increase his Vitality so that was also a problem. His Focus and Perception stats were also low.

In fact looking at his stats, he was turning out to be kind of a jack of all trades character. Whether that made him good or bad was sort of up in the air at the moment. Most of the things he had done so far had relied overly on luck. Meeting Lady Altia and Lady Verina and asking them to train was luck. Getting blessings from them was also luck. Then those blessings helping him to survive the difficulty C quest was also luck. His meeting with Sambal and eventually getting to participate in the pirate subjugation was luck. In fact his surviving the ordeal, even when he was weak like an insect could be considered mostly luck.

Everything so far that had happened could be considered a part of his luck. His luck of meeting the right people. After all, was it really his skill that had made the Ladies train him? Was it really his merit which allowed him to meet the Queen? Was it really his survival instincts which saved his life against the wolfman?

So did he really deserve to be happy now that he was becoming famous?

Raka was depressed. In his defense though he was comparing himself with the sun or the moon.

Being depressed though, would not solve his problem. He had to become stronger. And for that he needed items, skills and ideas. It is an old game saying, a skill is worth ten items, an idea is worth ten skills.

Raka had steadfastly noted down each and every idea he had while on the voyage related to his various skills but mostly about magic. And now he was going to experiment to see whether it would work like he imagined it. For that, he needed a safe place, away from prying eyes. Also for this experiment he needed somewhere with soft ground. Or water.

Therefore Raka made his way to his old training grounds. The hill where he trained with Lady Altia. It was quite far from the capital but it had a lake. After his job ended yesterday, he started making his way to the hill. And now he was almost there. 'Now that I think about it, it has been quite a while since I fought.' His battles with the rabbits and wolves enraged with bloodlust seemed so long ago.

"Hmm...should I run up again for old times sake?" He asked monkey and parrot who had gladly decided to come along with him when he mentioned he was going to the forest. They loved the forest more than the city.

"khi khi khih khi"

"Ah so you want to race Sir Raka to the top eh," the parrot translated. "He will give 5 to 1 odds that he will win!"

"No bet!" said Raka. "I am here for training." 'I can bet that he will win though...hahaha.'

"Osh....here we go!" and Raka started climbing the hill as fast as possible.

He reached the top some time later, panting! His speed had increased which meant that his stamina was sapped more as well. Well not that much. He quickly took some deep breaths to calm down. From now on was business.

"Ok, monkey, Nobby, stay away from me. It might get dangerous. And if you do I might cook something good for you later."

That got their attention. On they went in search of their lunch.

Raka equipped his staff. He closed his eyes and started embedding his staff with air magic. He had improved his magic skill but it still took some time to embed. Atleast he couldn't use it in combat yet. Not that he had found a way to get to his colorful world without closing his eyes. Imagine doing that while fighting!

'Ok. Now to hold on to it tightly and... upright. Here we go!'

Raka measured about 10 breaths and then released the air magic. He quickly shot up about 10 feet in the air with Raka holding on as hard as possible. Just as he felt the staff beginning to slow down, he shifted his weight so that the top tip of the staff made an angle. Slowly the staff started making a parabola as it further lost speed and then lost all power and simply plummeted to the ground.

Splash! And Raka crashed into the lake. The lake was not very deep but thankfully the water cushioned him enough. For a moment Raka felt that he had lost his breath. But then he resurfaced.

"HAHAHAhahahahahahahahah! YES! YES! YES! Whoopiee!" And Raka started splashing in the water.

The Wright brothers first flight lasted 12 seconds. Raka's lasted 4 seconds. The level of excitement was the same. Though technically his was not a flight per se. More like being shot off on a rocket and then crashing because the rocket lost power.

But it proved that flight was possible to some degree.

Some time later, Raka finished his shenanigans and came out. He unequipped his clothes and hung it on a nearby rock to dry. Do you get naked after you unequip your clothes? Yep! Well, atleast his audience did not include any bipeds. Raka took out a paper and wrote on it.

Flight - possible. The mana required is high. Mana lost after ascending. But power was controlled till mana was consumed. Flight distance is an issue. Control is an issue. More experiments required after mana increases.

Accidentally being flown off towards the wolfman had put this idea in Raka's head. It was the same magic but applied appropriately it could launch Raka in the air. After that it was just controlling his flight by shifting his weight. Oh there were problems. Many many problems with this. But atleast he had proved that it was possible to do so. He did not know how much mana would be needed for a completely controlled flight, maybe a value in thousands. It was not an idea for the near future.

'As they say then, on with the next.'

Raka roamed around looking for pebbles. He was looking for 8 pebbles actually. It was another idea he was itching to try out. This one would be more practical though and if it worked, he could even use it in battle.

After finding 8 pebbles of a size and shape he liked, Raka embedded them with air magic. During naval training he had learned how to control the flight of a stone and use it to attack. Well, his control was still too weak for him to be of any use.

That's what he was trying to get around though. His control was weak but his magic power was strong.

'Ok that's done. Let's try it with one pebble first.' Raka focused on moving the pebble forward slowly. About ten seconds later he was out of mana. He then waited to recover, thinking about things. 'Moving things slowly should need more mana because it needs more control. I should try it faster and let momentum do most of the work.'

After recovering he tried it with the other pebble. But this time he made it move faster. Maybe because the speed helped, but his mana consumption reduced. 'Hmm. Let's see how fast I can make it go.'

In his third attempt he focused on releasing as much power as possible, without having it blow back on his face. The pebble zoomed ahead. In fact it was so fast and so small that Raka lost sight of it completely. 'How should I control it if I can't see it!' It was so bad that he did not even know if the stone went straight or veered of to somewhere else. 'Less speed.'

His fourth attempt proved better. The stone went straight with great speed and then dropped down after expending its magic. 'About 10 metres. Ok, this will do.' His mana was a quarter gone. This experiment was to determine at what speed to launch the pebbles. He wasn't done yet.

Raka focused hard and took deep breaths. This was the moment of truth. And then, he launched all the remaining 4 stones straight ahead. The stones flew straight and true and then at the end splashed down on the water making clean arcs.

"Yes! It works!" He was ecstatic. Oh but this experiment was still not over. 'Next test!'

Raka went out to find 8 more suitable pebbles. Then he embedded them with air. He rubbed his hands in excitement and took deep breaths to calm down. He really had to focus on this. Then he released all 8 pebbles at the same time. Raka had a look of concentration as he focused on all the flying pebbles, now flying straight and true. To help him concentrate he had eight fingers pointing straight with his thumbs tucked inside. Then, he folded three of them pointing them down. Correspondingly, three stones changed trajectories and headed straight down maintaining their speed but he lost control of the other stones.

"Hah!" Raka sighed loudly. He had almost succeeded. He had got this idea from the pawn in chess. A pawn always goes straight but then moves diagonally when taking a piece. Similarly the stone would move straight but could change direction once. Not much control required in that. And at a good speed it could be used to do damage. 'It could be used to distract if nothing else.'

As his control and mana increased, more changes in direction would be possible. And possibly greater speed and weight. Right now he could only move pebbles, even then only light smooth ones. Raka could imagine it's prospects though.

'Alright lets practice it some more.' After a few tries he became confident in being able to move them straight, no matter their number. And then change direction of any number of stones. Well he only changed them from straight to down but the principle worked.

"Alright I am going to name this magic, Switch!" Raka had not named a magic before. Well, it was not like naming it actually did something. That was supposed to be common sense however it made teaching easier. Which meant the magic system allowed naming them. It was difficult though.

Raka pulled out a piece of paper and started writing the steps of this magic in magic language. He had thought of it for days on the appropriate steps. See, when you write the steps of some magic in the magic language, you are basically constricting your magic, applying a rule on yourself. Your energy self, if that makes more sense. So that the next time you say Switch or Dragonball, it would process the steps as you had written, like a macro. 'Complex stuff.' So you had to make the rule precise but also flexible.

It was not automatic magic however. It simply created a rule. And like most rules, it only worked if you followed them. Lets leave that explanation for some other time.

After writing in the steps, he closed the paper like a magic scroll and sealed it. Then he wrote 'Switch' in Ilmentian letters outside. The final step in using the magic was committing it.

"Switch!" Raka clearly said. The scroll burst and then disappeared into thin air. A magic rule had been established for Raka. A magic had been named for Raka.

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