By the sixth time that Benate died, he decided he’d had enough.

Bright light blinded him as he returned to life with a lurch of consciousness. Glowing blue-white particles floated off his body as it assembled from energy, until the familiar outline of his hands were clear.

“⛈ 😠 😤” Benate growled. If he could scream, he might have. Instead he switched his communication channel over to /yell, and cursed again into the empty logs. “🔞🔣!”

His pain was gone now, but it had been so overwhelming during his last death, right up to the end. Unsurprisingly, it was usually a fairly hefty shock to die, so he allowed himself a moment to compose himself, and then looked out to see what kind of land he’d resurrected into.

Blue, cloudless sky arched overhead. Low, rolling green hills stretched out below. Benate nodded in approval − the lush terrain wasn’t immediately impressive, but it was an improvement on some of the barren, rocky biomes which he’d had the displeasure of spawning into before.

A low level of regional wind affinity blew a slight, and welcome breeze. The sun overhead was warm, flush with fire affinity and radiant, but not enough to overcome his basic resistances and become uncomfortable. He took a moment to relax and drink it in, and then decided to risk collecting something to eat.

The overwhelmingly dominant species of plant was the standard tier 0 cereal plant he was familiar with. The fresh yellow-green grasses grew in high stalks, with the tallest of them reaching his knees. This zone didn’t have a great deal of variability in its plant-life yet, which he chose to take as a good sign. Unusual biome properties could have advantages, but usually the environmental risks that came along with the zone bonuses weren’t worth it.

“🎶🌄🔭🔍🌾🎶,” he sang to himself.

As he made his way downhill at a slow walk, Benate trailed one hand along the tips of the grass. The sharpness damage of their leaves almost always started low, so for now he simply enjoyed the tickling, itchy sensation. Slowly, his mood recovered and he resolved that he was going to have to start making some decisions. Reluctantly, he opened his Status menu.

Name: 953e35e0-b398-48be-a865-4af18340cb64

Tier: 0

Titles: (Scrounger)

Vitality: 22/22

Stamina: 20/20

“😑,” he huffed with disapproval. His starting statistics were always uncomfortably limiting. Honestly, it wasn’t so inconvenient at the start of a life, it was just boring to have to walk everywhere. With his minimal stamina pool of 20, and without any perks or action bonuses, he could start cutting into his vitality within minutes.

By habit, he decided to make some changes to his preferences for good luck. First, he focused on his name. It was too long, and frankly, felt kind of private to be showing around in public. Benate always liked his second-segment name the best, so he submitted B398 into the field like he always did, and his status updated to confirm it.

Next, he lifted his hand up to compare it to the color of the lush undergrowth. He always liked the color green for his skin, as it was generally his favorite color. But here, the shade was a little too close to the landscape, so he adjusted it until he found a decent hue of orange. It had contrast, but didn’t clash too much. He could tweak it more, but since he was alone, he decided he was satisfied enough with it.

The two things he couldn’t change were his Tier or his Titles, to his great frustration. There was nothing to be done about his Tier just yet, but he knew it was possible to increment, and he still firmly believed that he’d almost reached Tier 1 two lives ago. As for his title, Benate simply found it embarrassing. Titles appeared to be the only thing which followed him after death, and he’d acquired his own sometime during his desperate and pathetic third life.

There were some bonuses, including a small increase to his maximum Vitality, but overall it was just a reminder that every opportunity he lived so far, he had barely scraped by. It wasn’t something Benate thought he could be proud of. He wasn’t sure if Titles could be deleted or removed, but he was determined this time to at least earn a new one. That way, he could assign something better to select as his public title, and maybe take a little pride in that.

Finally, he had run out of excuses to delay. He had roamed over a fairly wide area of greenery, but aside from a few tier 0 herbs, or a single shrub with tier 0 seeds, he hadn’t found anything which would be especially helpful for his starting meal. There were a few tier 0 bugs about, sure. He saw little flashes of movement as they leaped between tufts of leaves. But their meat was better for building physical statistics instead of his general health and endurance, and more importantly they were annoying to catch unless he chose to run a bit.

Benate found a nearby cereal plant, one of the ones which was fruiting. There were three, bulbous green seeds balancing on the top of the stalk, just about the size of his thumb. Probably one in every fifty cereals were currently producing seeds, which was a generous yield for scavenging. He only hesitated for a moment, before he plucked a seed off the plant and then popped it into his mouth.

Cereal.0

Durability 6/6

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Like always, the small food item appeared in his nutrition grid, occupying one of the thirty available stomach slots. Sighing with relief and satisfaction, Benate checked to make sure that his maximum vitality had been raised, and was satisfied that it had increased to 24.2. There was always a brief feeling of discomfort when his vitality fell below maximum, but the durability of his eaten food ticked down by a small fraction and began to restore his pool of points.

His maximum stamina had also been raised, but only up to 22, as it wasn’t affected by his title. He gave that attribute less attention for now. Even though his stamina drained vitality to restore itself, the exchange rate was pretty generous when he was at rest, and his digestion outpaced the draw of it until both values were up to maximum.

Benate paused and steeled himself. This was the moment of truth which could determine if this lifetime was a nightmare or a blessing. “🤞,” he hoped.

He looked around the landscape for telltale signs of changes. For now, he only had a limited ability to [Inspect] the environment, at least without better stats. But there was one particular value he was always aware of, and he had come to loathe it more than any other.

Zone::Local Delta: 0.002 (Harvesting)

“🎉🙌🎉,” he cried out triumphantly. He hadn’t entirely worked everything out yet, but he had a guess for why the number might be lower than usual. This grasslands biome must have had such a surplus of cereal that it would largely overlook him while he collected food.

This was great news. If he managed himself carefully, it could be a long time before the land would generate any serious threats. For now, he satisfied himself with picking a few more seeds and eating them. He didn’t want to overfill his nutrition screen. Raw food at this low quality provided poor benefits per slot, and he didn’t have any pressing need to pump up any stats yet. But still, he felt better with a broader, more robust stamina bar.

Feeling alive at last, Benate ran through the grasses, laughing. He even spent a small amount of stamina to activate his social arte: [Hello]. He waved to the hills and sky happily, until he suddenly realized that it had generated a small delta. Chiding himself, he stopped.

Zone::Local Delta: 0.012 (Harvesting, Welcoming)

He mas making mistakes already. He wasn’t sure what kind of damage a [Welcoming] delta could do, but he wasn’t in the mood to find out just yet, so he resolved never to perform [Hello] again. Nevertheless, he decided he had plenty of reasons to be optimistic about his latest future. So, with the sun still high in the sky, Benate resolved to enjoy the warmth and light and wind, and maybe to see if he couldn’t find a nice source of water for a soak.

As he ran, he didn’t mind at all that he was naked as can be – no one started a life with any equipment, after all. But he had no one to impress, and nothing that needed protecting. So for the moment he was simply free.

For now at least, he chose to ignore the little field on his status screen which said: Tier 0, and the quest menu which hovered always at the back of his mind. He could hide it, he could ignore it, but it was never ever fully gone no matter what he did.

Main Quest: Pinocchio’s Journey

Objective: Reach Tier 5

Reward: Permission to leave the game. The choice to be real.