Author’s corner: HELLO HELLO! Introducing new character! (obligatory fox-girl)

ANYWAY, she was originally going to be Cygnas’ avatar in the story. Even the way she meets the MC is the same (roughly). I must say that the way their relationship advanced is a bit different from what I planned originally, but I’m quite pleased with how she is now.

ALSO,*ahem* I CALL AUTHORS RIGHT ON THE WHOLE TRANSLATION SOFTWARE THINGY! Which means that whatever complain you could have about the whole two languages thing, from lost jokes to the fact that honorific and some terms do pass is null!

ALSO(2) Whoever gets cookies do say so in the comments! And did anyone discover what the MC plans to do with the element crystals he learned about on the last chapter? P.H. didn’t… He disappointed me…

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I hastily stood up and drew my weapons, reading myself for a possible attack while turning to face the figure whom I had barely missed. I wasn’t sure if it would be an aggressive enemy, so I chose the safe option. However, what I saw wasn’t a wild monster from the game.

It was a girl. A player, still wearing all her basic cloth armor and using a plain wooden staff. She was looking at me with a slight curious look. A brief moment passed before the silence was broken by the girl.

“What could you be doing?”

I blinked in surprised at her question. I was still a bit shocked to see a player in this area, but after recovering myself, I sheathed back the swords and though my answer.

[WARNING! DEAR READERS, THE FOLLOWING WORDS ARE NOT FOR THE WEAK MINDED! SOME OF YOU MAY FIND IT OFFENSIVE, UNECESSARY OR EVEN DOWNRIGHT RETARDED. THESE WORDS MAY END UP MAKING YOU QUESTION YOUR SANITY FOR READING THIS STORY, SO READ AT YOUR OWN DISCRETION OR YOU CAN JUMP TOWARDS THE SAFE AREA!]

“Isn’t it obvious? I was doing music!” I said with my best serious expression.

The girl looked surprised at me, but then frowned slightly.

“What could you mean by that?” She asked suspicious. I made a surprised face.

“You never heard of it?” She slowly shook her head, completely at loss for my words. “Then let me enlighten you!” I pointed at myself. “I was rolling stones!”

Ba dum tiss!

A cookie to everyone who saw this coming!

…

..

.

[YOU HAVE REACHED THE SAFE AREA, YOU CAN CONTINUE YOUR READING FROM HERE!]

The girl continued looking confused for a moment, then her eyes widened slightly before she looked away, her hand covering her mouth while slowly shaking her head. Although her expression didn’t change much, I had the feeling that she was holding her laugh back.

Glad to have ended with the awkward atmosphere, I smiled proudly.

I also took my time to take a look at her. Her race was a Kitsune, for those who aren’t very keen on Japanese mythology, it’s a fox demon capable of shape-shifting; appearance wise they are kind of like fox Beast-man, but lore-wise, they are usually focused more on magic.

She was fairly tall, for a girl, being only slightly shorter than me. She had long black hair, and a pale white skin. Her small face had a natural fierce look to It, due to her narrow, slightly slanted, blue eyes. From the top of her head, a pair of black fox ears popped up, with only the very tip having a white fur, this same pattern applied to the two tails swaying slowly behind her.

Her height aside, she was a perfect Japanese girl one would usually see in manga, she even had this whole, cold, but cool girl, air around her. In fact, I wouldn’t be surprised if she were to say that she practiced kendo or something.

Now that I think about it… We can create either male or female characters… Does this mean that I can’t be certain of anyone’s gender in this game? Hmm…

“Okay, bad jokes aside…” I scratched my cheek, feeling a bit awkward. The girl looked back at me expressionlessly. “I was… Actually… Kind of trying to create a skill for me…”

From here, I kind of expected a good amount of responses to my words, ranging from how to create a skill, how I am retarded to be trying, and even encouragement. Well, her answer was none of those.

“Skills?” She looked slightly confused for a moment, then her eyes widened ever so slightly. “Forgive-me, I forgot to introduce myself.” She said while bowing.

Yes, you heard that right, she bowed, like right out of a manga, a perfect 45 degrees! I was honestly shocked, to tell the least. Her overly polite speech, coupled with her looks had already set a few alarms in my head, but now with that bow I had no doubt left. An otaku! And she is actually doing it really well for a role-play!

Well… Not that I have any right to say anything… In some games I kind of end up in full personification moments, even laughing maniacally when I play the villain and crush those pesky little heroes…

Sorry, I side tracked…

“I am…” She hesitated for a moment. “Tatenaka Yuki… Or simply Yuu. It is a pleasure to meet you.” She said after some time, but if I had to say something, it sounded more like she was reading a paper than remembering her own name. Sure enough, the name floating above her head was Yuu.

Hmm… If she really takes roleplaying as far as I thought, she probably introduced herself by using first the surname, and then her given name. After that, I couldn’t simply go and introduce myself in any way, so I straightened myself and gave a slight bow.

“I am Gondorrer Dogsban…” Woops, almost made a mistake. “Gondorrer Gravelheart, with Gondorrer being my given name, but you can call me Wargon in here. It’s a pleasure to meet you, Yuu.” I tried to be as gallant as possible in here. Never hurt to give a good first impression… Although I have the feeling that I already messed that up.

She nodded slightly in approval.

“Then, Wargon-san…” San? Really? “If it were not a bother to you, could you please help me with something?” I nodded in response. “You see, I was actually supposed to meet a friend in here, but she had to cancel on the last minute, so now I am a bit at loss on what I have to do here.”

“I see… Well, I have all the night to get what I need done, so I supposed I can help you a bit…” When I said that, I could see a slight sign of relief pass on her eyes. “So, what exactly do you want to know?” I said while leaning against a nearby tree, I didn’t think that this was going to take too long.

“You see, I am new to this so…” She dropped her head slightly while thinking. “Could you please start explaining to me, what is that ‘skill’ you said earlier?”

I nodded, it was a fairly easy question, and just when I was about to open my mouth to answer, something hit me.

Isn’t this a little bit strange? I mean, if she really was an otaku, she should have played at least a few games… Rather, even if she somehow never played a game before, by seeing anime, manga or light novels, she would clearly understand what a skill in a MMORPG is.

I looked at her in surprise for a moment, but it didn’t seems like she was only playing around with that question, her eyes were saying that was a pure and sincere doubt.

But then that means that she isn’t an otaku like I thought, but that wouldn’t match up, after all, her way of expressing was a perfect…

It… Couldn’t be, could it?

“Can you give me just a minute, Yuu?” I asked, a bit anxious. She blinked once, then nodded. I turned away from her and looked at the sky. “Cygnas!”

It was something between a loud voice and a shout which seemed to surprise the girl in front of me, but I paid it no mind since I was waiting a response from another person.

“Wow, that’s fast! Missed me?” I heard Cygnas voice in my head.

“Yeah, but don’t mind it, next time it will hit.” Counter-joke! I could almost see Cygnas pouting. “Anyway… Cyg, by any chance… Do you have a translating software in this game?” I asked a bit anxious.

“Hmm? Why do you…” She suddenly trailed off, making a strange silence for a moment. After a second her voice came back “I see… So she…” For some reason she sounded a bit surprised. “Anyway, yes, I do have a real-time translation software in here.” I could hear the smugness in her voice. “Is that all?”

“No… I guess…” I said after some time, still shocked at what this meant.

“Then I’ll be going! Bye-bye!” After that I could somehow feel as she closed the connection.

I turned back to Yuu, who was looking confused and perplexed at me… If things really were what I was thinking… I cleared my throat once.

“Say, Yuu… Could you tell me from where you are playing?” I asked a bit anxious, I had to at least confirm things before making assumptions. But she frowned at my question, and even took a step back.

“… My friend told me to not reveal any personal information in the game!” She had a slightly ferocious expression that even scared me a little. Well it couldn’t be helped.

“The you have a really good friend.” I smiled at her. “Then, let me start… I am a Brazilian, and no, I don’t speak Japanese!” I said that a bit dejectedly.

At first she frowned a bit more, but when the information finally sunk in, she widened her eyes in clear surprise. She even tried to say a few things, but the words wouldn’t leave her lips, such was her shock.

“You… You aren’t lying… Are you?” She asked after some time, so I simply shook my head. “But… how… I’m hearing everything in Japanese…”

So, my suspicion was right on the spot. The only reason for her to have those perfect Japanese manners would be if she were a true Japanese. But even that wouldn’t explain why she had no idea about what a skill was, the only way would be for her to never have any contact with manga, anime, light novel or game.

Adding all that together, we get a really obvious, but interesting cliché situation…

A sheltered princess.

This would basically mean that she had almost no contact with the outside world, so she will probably be lacking some common sense, be it in the real life or in the gaming area. Basically, someone would have to teach her everything from zero.

It is a slightly troublesome situation, to say the least. But I had to look away from her, because I could feel a wicked smile forming on my face.

She was an innocent girl, who knew nothing of the world and was asking me for help! It was an incredible situation, but I couldn’t help myself, after all, things were definitively going my way…

Just think about it! How fun it would be to mess with her!

After finally managing to hold back my smile, I looked back at her, who was still lost in thoughts.

“Games sure are amazing!” She murmured distracted. I coughed once to get her attention, which made her blush for a moment, before she bowed to me once again. “Forgive-me, I got lost in my own thoughts!”

“Geez, no need to get so worried!” I said with a wry smile, this somehow managed to calm her. “Will you still want some help?” When I said that, she looked surprised at me for a moment.

“But would it not be a bother to you to teach someone from a different country like me?” She asked worried.

“Why would it bother me? This is actually really interesting!” I said laughing. Her eyes shone for a moment, then she did an even deeper bow towards me.

“Thank you very much, Gravelheart-dono!” Wait, wait, wait! I think I just heard something really incredible!

“What is it with the ‘Gravelheard-dono’ all of a sudden?”

“You, who do not even live in the same country as I do, is willing to spend your precious time with a person such as me to teach me the basics of this game! It is only in the right for me to demonstrate my appreciation to such a great person like yourself, Gravelheart-dono!”

My god! The formality! It hurts!

“Look… I do accept to teach you around and everything… But you have to tone down a bit it all that formality, you know? At least drop the ‘Gravelheard-dono’!” She blinked in surprise, then she was about to start complaining, so I interrupted her. “And if you insist in being like that, I will leave you right now.” She was looking at me with some doubt, but in the end she gave a small nod.

Convinced, I started to think on what to do, so I started by inviting her to a party. I quickly opened the menu, found the option and sent her the invite. She widened her eyes when the window appeared in front of her, then took her time to read it, getting a slightly worried look in her eyes.

“I’m sorry, Wargon-dono, but I fear that I do not have any tea for a party!”

It took me a couple of seconds for the meaning of her words to clink in my head, but when it did, I started laughing loudly, leaving her confused.

“It’s not that kind of party!” I said after a while. “Party in a game like this, mean a group of people who do thing together.”

She nodded slightly when she understood, then she accepted the window.

You have successfully created a partyYuu has joined the party.

Wanderer [lvl 1] (110/110)

“Thank you very much, Wargon-dono!” I laughed wryly at her excitement.

First, it would be a good idea to show her the basics of combat and looting, because that is the basics of any MMO, but for that I would have to explain her about status, skills and such. I started by checking something on my status screen, and when I found it, I turned back to her.

“Yuu, do you know how to open your status screen?” She shook her head. “I see… Do you see a small symbol on the upper right corner of your vision? It looks like a square with a letter inside.” When her eyes drifted to the upper right corner, I knew she had found it. “Now focus on that symbol and think ‘status’. This

should open a large window. After that, on the upper right, there are the words ‘show to party members’, focus on them.”

As she was doing this, I could see some windows appearing in front of her, but they were completely empty, at least for me. But when she got to the last part of my instruction, the large window suddenly gained content.

NAME:

Yuu (Yuki Tatenaka)TITLE:

(none)Class tree:WandererClass:NoneRace:KitsuneGender:FemaleLevel:1Experience:0%

STATUS:

Remaining points (0)Health Points:110/110HP regen (out of combat):1/secMana:400/400Mana Regen:20/sec (2/sec)STR:10TGH:10AGI:10VIT:10INT:10MND:10ATTK:Ice 6-8Extra:(none)DEF25M. Res.:25Satiety:97/100 (Satisfied)

SKILLS:

Magician’s staff Mastery [lvl 1]

-Invoke element (Active)

Cloth Mastery [lvl 1]

Racials [max]

-Illusionist (Active)

-Natural Charm

-Transformation master(Active)

-True shadow

From the looks of it, she chose to start with an ice staff. I quickly asked her to take a look on each of her skills, long story short. Invoke element is a basic magic, spends only 5 mana, deals 100% of the weapon’s magical damage, which is fairly little, but considering that it can attack from 20 meters and ignores DEF, it’s pretty good for a beginner’s attack.

Her racials were just like the ones you would expect from the race. Illusionist creates a fake copy of yourself with 1/20 of your life and makes you invisible for 5 seconds or until your copy dies, but it has a cool down of 5 minutes. Natural Charm gives a bonus discount or profit when trading with NPCs, which is divided by half when they are the same gender as your character.

Transformation Master allows them to hide their tails, ears, and change hair freely when out of combat, or copy someone else’s appearance, but change back to their normal form when they enter combat. Finally, true shadow makes it so their shadows, when coming from a fire-like source, looks like that of a normal fox with many tails.

Looking at her status, I thought that the best way to start was for her to earn a few skills for now.

And also, maybe mess a bit with her.

I straightened myself and put on an overly-serious face while looking at her. She visibly stiffened herself and straightened her back. I coughed once and then put on my best general’s voice.

“ATTENTION APPRENTICE YUUKI!” I’m not exactly sure why, but it seems that she ended up getting carried by the joke, as she suddenly stood rigid. I held a grin back and started to walk from one side to the other, with my hands behind my back. “From now on, you are going to be my one and only apprentice, so I will teach you everything I know about MMO gaming until you are more than able to climb to the very top of the scoreboard, do you hear me?”

“Y-Yes…”

“I did not hear you, apprentice! Say it clearly!”

“Yes, Shishou!” She said in a hurry, receiving my nod.

Shishou… Master? Oh, god… I’m going to have so much fun…

“Then, let us start with skills, since their meanings is a lot more literal than the rests. So tell me, apprentice, what would you think is a skill?” As I said this, I slowly start walking away, motioning her to follow me.

“I… I am not sure, Shishou…” I look back at her and frown, scaring her slightly. “Ah… Is… is it… Skills are things you earn when you train a lot!” I put on a satisfied smile.

“Very good! But here in the game, skills are a little more inside this game. They are abilities used to improve yourself, be it temporarily or permanently. And these abilities are your bread and butter of fighting, because a strong skill, can easily overpower your enemies.” I turned back to her for a moment and lift a finger in warning. “But do not become over reliant on these skills. Different from normal games, here you must also use your own abilities, from outside of the game, to compensate for the skills short comings.”

“Skills have shortcomings?”

“Yes, apprentice.” Oh god… She is going to be so much fun! I was grinning madly for a while now. “Skills have costs. For example, have you seen your invoke element? It costs mana. Mana, is the price you pay for you to use your skills. And sometimes, you can’t use the same skill for some time after using it. That, is called cool down…”

While we walked in the forest, with me three steps in front of the eager princess, who was greedily absorbing the information. I gave her a quick crash course on skills, about acquiring and using them, then I taught her about status, hp, and everything else. All the basics.

All this time I slowly took her to the middle of the wild dog area.

“Apprentice, now we will put everything you learned in practice, are you ready?”

“Yes, Shishou, I won’t disappoint you!”

“Good. Now, I will keep the dog’s attention on me, meanwhile I want you to attack it, understood?”

“Yes, Shishou!”

After that, I immediately taunted a nearby dog, which came running at me like always. A quick sides-step and a stab-slash-slash-slash.

-13 -7 -11 -6 -10 -5 -10 -6

Combo (x1.2)

-81 (109/190)

Just to be sure, I dealt a huge amount of damage, since I wasn’t sure yet how the agro system work on the game. After that I looked at Yuu and nodded for her to start.

“Invoke element!” She said in a loud voice. Although I felt that it was a bit too much, it seem that she has an easier time to use her skills like this.

She pointed her staff forward, and a small ball of icy fog shot forward, hitting the dog in the belly and making him flinch.

-6 (103/190)

For a moment I start to worry whether her damage will be enough to beat the dog, but since I could easily keep dodging the dog without any trouble, I took my time in watching her.

But her attacks, not only were fairly weak, they were slow, coming only once every few seconds. In the end, we took a couple of minutes for her to finish the dog.

Of course, the entire time I had sheathed my weapons and put my hands in my back, looking one of these martial arts master. What? I want to keep some appearances!

She stared for a moment at a window that appeared before her, then looked at me in confirmation. I nodded and let her reclaim the body. Which disappeared in a pillar of light, leaving a (surprise surprise!) normal Wild dog fang, and a pouch with coins. I point at them and tell her to pick them up.

“Now, apprentice, is there a flashing window near the border of your vision?” She nodded. “Good. Focus on it!”

She nodded and I saw two windows appear in front of her. She was focusing on them for a moment, then her eyes widened and she looked at me.

“Shishou! It is written here that I have earned a new skill and two new subskills!”

“Good, student, now tell me, what are these skills?”

“Ice mastery, frost ball and frost emission, Shishou! all at level one!”

“Hmm… Good, now, what are the details of your frost ball?” I asked raising an eyebrow.

“It deals 120% of weapon damage at the costs of 8 mana.”

“Hmm… I see, and what about the frost emission?”

She focused on the window while reading, then looked at me with some confusion on her face.

“It says… Varies, on both damage and costs… What does this mean, Shishou?”

Huh? Varies on both damage and costs? What kind of skill is that?

“Sadly, I’m no master on the arts of magic, so you shall look for it’s meaning yourself. Understood?” She nodded vigorously with the usual serious expression on her face. “I shall attack another dog, test your skill on it.”

And once again I taunted and attacked the dog.

-79 (111/190)

“Frost ball!” Firstly, she used the Frost ball, and it was much better attack than her staff’s invoke element, being a fast snowball-like attack.

-9 (102/190)

For some reason, she widened her eyes in surprise, probably surprised by the damage. But soon took back her serious face.

“Frost emission!” This skill was a bit different from the last one, as it didn’t attack immediately, instead formed a frost mist around her, which surprised both of us. After a moment she closed her eyes, as if concentrating, then the mist started to concentrated, forming a single floating icicle that flew in the direction of the dog, piercing it, before disappearing into nothingness.

-16 (86/190)

She widened her eyes once again, but this time a small smile formed on her lips, as she once again took a concentrating face.

“Frost Emission!”

If the first fight had taken a lot of time, this one was ridiculously fast. After quickly dodging the dog, I took a step back and saw as she activated the skill. But the scene was something downright an action manga.

Dozens of frost spikes formed all around the dog, smaller, but much, much, much more numerous than the previous one, and as soon as they formed, they flew towards the dog.

-70 (16/190)

She smiled proudly, then once again formed a single icicle before launching it at the dog, finishing him. It seems that the skill had just become her favorite, but there was something bothering me.

“Student!”

“Yes, Shishou!” She answered me, proud of herself, expecting a praise.

“How much mana do you have left, student?”

“Thirteen, Shishou!” Her eyes were shining with expectations.

I picked my still sheathed sword and hit her in the head.

-12 (98/110)

“Ouch!” She said while crouching and holding her head in pain. “Why… Why would you do that, Shishou?”

“You fool! What if you were alone and the enemy hadn’t been defeated?” She widened her eyes in surprise. “From now on, you are to never again drop below half your mana when we are together, unless under dire circumstances, do you understand?”

“Y-Yes Shishou… Sorry…”

Hmm… Seeing her getting sad like that isn’t good for my morale… I gently put my hand on her head and patted her.

“Still, you did well. But be careful next time, ok?”

She had widened her eyes in surprise, but then closed them gently as I patted her, and simply nodded in response, her two tails swinging happily from one side to the other.

All in all, it had passed only around fifteen minutes since I met her, so the night was still young. My mind drifted towards the quest I had received from Illwen, and it probably showed on my face, as she started to look at me worried.

“Is something the matter, Shishou?” Hmm… Now that I think about it, I might have taken this shishou and disciple joke a bit too far…

“I was just remind of what I was going to do before meeting you.” I said after a small sigh, but this seemed to have worried her.

“Then… I am troubling you, Shishou? If so, let me help you! I promise I will not disappoint you!”

I took some time to think about her proposal, if I somehow managed to keep the agro of the lynxes away from here, then she may actually be a great help… Hell, it will even help me train tanking.

I nodded.

“Very well, I’ll have you help with my quest.” I said in a self important tone.

“Quest? What is that, Shishou?”

“Follow-me, I’ll tell you on the way!”

And like that, me, level 4, and my newest student, a level 1, went on our way to hunt level 10 lynxes.