Chapter 018

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‘ ‘ for thoughts.

“ “ for speech.

* * for actions.

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Warning: Contains crude language.

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Jack logged in and checked his in game clock, which indicated that it was 4pm in game. He quickly found Instructor Theon and showed him the boss spider’s fang. Jack then inquired where he could get it forged.

Instructor Theon: “Why do you want a sword? I thought you favored your fists? They aren’t cutting it anymore?”

Jack: “I should use the right tool for the right job. Having a sword equipped may also mislead foes into thinking I am a run of the mill melee guy. Also, a sword’s reach and ability to cause bleeding DoT is just more useful in many situations.”

Instructor Theon: “Your wish. But be careful though. Around halfway through intermediate, skill growth slows down a lot. Early on it may be fun to pick up a lot of skills, but you should decide to focus and have a clear plan on what you wish to advance first, and try to avoid having redundant skills doing the same thing.”

Instructor Theon: *sternly* “This is more so applicable in your case. Since your mastery over mana allows you to shape spells without cooldowns and largely switch elements with the same skill, it is better to avoid having multiple spells doing the same things. Whereas, a hermetic magician needs to keep redundant spells so that they can cycle them while the others are cooling down.”

Jack: “Yes Instructor Theon. My collection of spells is pretty diverse at the moment, and their utility barely overlaps. Although it seems that I need to be careful about weapons and other skills.”

Instructor Theon: *having a thoughtful expression* “Remember Initiate, our greatest strength can be our greatest weakness if we aren’t careful. Having no skill growth penalties means we can learn and utilize a diverse amount of skills and progress with our own path to personal growth. But on the flipside, we don’t automatically gain skills as our levels increase and we also don’t receive any bonuses to skill growth for any skills.”

Jack: *with a frown on his face* ‘Hmm. Looks like Bhikku has its downsides. MP potions are very inefficient for me, and neither do I automatically get skills as I levelup. Learning and raising all skills is equally hard, with no bonuses or penalties to their growth. On the flipside, I can choose and tailor my skills to have a unique playstyle.’

Jack: ‘Other classes will have a growth path charted for them. A warrior probably gets bonus to learning melee skills and gets weapon special attacks while leveling up, but suffering massive penalties to learning magic and crafting skills.’

Instructor Theon: *pauses* “As for getting that crafted. It looks like an exotic material which most won’t be able to handle. If you ever find exotic metals, dwarves are the way to go. For these kinds of bones and other monster parts for weapons, your best bet is to find a skilled elven craftsman, or perhaps a sufficiently advanced sculptor.”

Jack: ‘I think this is the longest conversation I had with him.’

Jack: “Thank you Instructor Theon. I will go to establish contact with the druids, now.”

Instructor Theon: “Good Luck. And be on your guard Jack, the monsters on the way to the druids are far stronger the ones found in the nearby woods.”

Jack: ‘So I shouldn’t keep too many redundant skills. Dagger Mastery is useful solely for the Assassination subskill. I know more about unarmed combat and its techniques both in RL and ingame than swords/daggers, so I should focus on raising that and keep the other weapons for situations where their auxiliary effect is more important than damage.’

Jack: ‘What Instructor Theon said about magic also makes sense. I should avoid having multiple spells doing the same thing. I already have a projectile magic mid-range attack, a homing ally friendly mid-range attack, a frontal cone AoE, a point blank ally friendly AoE debuff/status recovery spell and stuff like Mana Blade/Mana fists. This means I should be more creative with my future spells and not just recycle similar concepts.’

Jack: ‘And it looks like I won’t get my boss material sword for a while now. Where the fuck, am I supposed to find a skilled elven craftsmen or an advanced sculptor? I hope that the weapon I get is worth all the trouble ’

Resolving to focus on unarmed attacks and develop new innovative spells, Jack left the training center and refilled his water canteen to the brim in the fountain. Jack wanted to stock on some rabbit meat jerky, but the library wouldn’t have meals for a few hours.

Jack: ‘I have recovered my 50 gold from Timon which that asshole head enchanter took from me. I currently have 1 piece of platinum and 4 gold pieces now. Not exactly rich for my level, but not a pauper either. Guess I should buy some provisions for my journey. I don’t want to wait a few hours for some rabbit meat jerky from the library.’

Jack then went to the market square and bought some provisions. He opted for cheap yet long lasting things like some rabbit jerky and pickled fish. He also bought a kind of flatbread which was very similar to tortillas, but made of barley instead of corn. He also made sure that he had enough health potions and darts.

He then made his way towards the south exit and rechecked his MAP to confirm the direction he had to proceed. He estimated that the forests adjacent to the beginner fields would have low leveled monsters and would have tougher wildlife the farther away from the beginner fields and roads he went.

While he was travelling for the extermination quest, Jack took straight paths through the woods, but he was relatively closer to the roads and just travelled in a straight line to avoid the twists and turns. Now, however, he would be travelling deeper into the woods, away from civilization and the dirt paths which served as roads ingame.

He did some quick calculations by referring to the ingame clock and estimated that he could travel for roughly 30 hours before he had to wake up for his morning parkour circuit and office. Jack then strolled across the beginner fields, instead of running so as to avoid attention. He planned to run when he entered the woods until his PP was two thirds full, which he estimated would take around half an hour.

As Jack leisurely strolled across the beginner fields, he was noticed by many players. A couple of players recognized him from the time he returned to the city with the guards after the arachnid extermination. One of them was geared like a warrior with chainmail armor and a two-handed claymore sheathed near his thigh. The warrior was around 6 feet tall, fair skinned with a helm covering most of his head. However, if one looked carefully, it could be seen that he had blue eyebrows and golden yellow eyes.

His companion was shorter than him, but had a nice bust and ass. She had raven black hair and dark brown eyes but otherwise looked like a Barbie doll, clearly having spent hours on character creation. She was equipped in leather armor and had a longbow slung over her shoulders. She had a quiver strapped to her back and a couple of daggers sheathed near each hip, but the most notable feature about her was a hawk perched on her shoulder.

Warrior Guy: “Look at that, he isn’t with the guards this time… easy prey. Quickly set your pet on him and track him, I will PM the others to ambush him.”

Archer Girl: “He is not my pet! He is my companion and his name is Chester. That is no way to ask a favor from us!”

The hawk shrieked at the warrior as if emphasizing on her point. The warrior looked extremely irritated at the pair ganging up on him, but relented.

Warrior Guy: “Fine. Can you please mark him and instruct Chester to follow him?”

Archer Girl: *closes one of her eyes, raises her thumb and looks at Jack* “MARK!”

Archer Girl: *raises her forearm near her and Chester perches on it* “Chester, TRACK! him”

Chester launched himself from her forearm, and started stalking Jack. The archer girl then laid down on the grass, un-equipping her bow and quiver. She faced the warrior guy.

Archer Girl: “I will see him from Chester’s point of view now, don’t you dare cop a feel when I am out!”

Warrior Guy: “Why do you always act like I am some sort of sexual predator targeting you? I am not even into girls for Christ’s sake!”

Archer Girl: *sniggering* “I know. But I like teasing you and seeing you all flustered, looking so cute! Anyways, you are my bodyguard, so don’t allow others to cop a feel either. BIRD’S EYE!” *falls unconscious*

Warrior Guy: ‘She is an evil girl. Now all I have to do is wait for her to return and then PM the others. Oh, I hope I figure out how to gain my class upgrade soon. Hers is so cool.’

After a few minutes, the archer girl regains consciousness and frowns with barely suppressed rage.

Archer Girl: “That guy hurt my Chester! After a few minutes he somehow detected Chester and threw a dart at him! And it hurt Chester more than a cheap wooden dart should. The nerve of his! However he is running at a straight line towards the southeast. Quickly inform the others, I want to see him dead repeatedly for hurting my Chester!” *makes strangling motions with her hands and growls with a vicious expression on her face*

Warrior Guy: ‘Note to self. Don’t hurt or offend Chester, EVER.’

Warrior Guy: “He noticed Chester? He must have some kind of detection skill then! If he continues south east he will soon reach the kobolds. I will PM the others to ambush him and be careful as he can somehow detect hostiles.”

While Jack was running through the woods, he felt the hairs on his back tingling which he had come to recognize as a warning from Danger Sense. Jack stopped and looked back, but he couldn’t see anyone.

Jack: ‘Shit. Does my stalker have some kind of stealth or invisibility? Need to catch the asshole who means me harm fast.”

Jack then resumed running southeast, and soon he was warned by danger sense. This time instead of stopping, he quickly readied a dart. He then quickly ran at a thick tree ahead. Using his parkour skills he ran halfway up the tree trunk while imbuing the dart in his hands with force and jumped off, performing a quick backflip and shot the force imbibed dart while upside down before landing on his feet. Jack heard a screech, but his danger sense fell silent again.

Jack: ‘Oh boy that sounded like a bird. Is someone using his pet to track me? I better keep my PP topped up. There might be an ambush of players ahead. The wolves seem to instinctively avoid me here, as if they know I am too strong for them.’

Jack then paused for a short while, replenishing his PP to full. He then jogged briskly instead of running. Jack adjusted his pace until the PP consumed by running was getting quickly regenerated so that he had an almost full PP bar at all times. After almost 20 minutes of jogging, Jack was alerted to hostile presences ahead by his danger sense.

Using his spirit senses Jack could make out that there were five players hiding ahead, using the nearby flora to camouflage themselves. Judging by the intensity of the mana glow, two of them were casters of some sort. Jack slowed down and came to a standstill.

He equipped his sword in his right hand and activated force blade. He also used mana fists on both his legs. Unlike earlier, with his high PP and PP/sec maintaining these sustainable skills wasn’t enough to drain his PP as his PP regen was a lot higher than his MP regen in his Novice days!

Jack: “I know you guys are hiding ahead. Come out and fight like true men, instead of hiding like cowardly bitches!”

Four of the hidden figures emerged while the last one, who seemed to be utilizing some sort of stealth slowly crawled through the bushes, aiming to circle behind Jack. Two of the figures who emerged seemed like typical warriors. They were equipped in chainmail armor. One of them had an axe and shield equipped, while the other one was equipped with a spiked mace and a shield.

The pair of casters in contrast, lacked any form of armor. One of them had a simple staff and was dressed in robes of dark cyan. The other was equipped with a staff with a ruby on top and was dressed in khaki colored robes with a deep blue pointed hat on his head. Jack deduced that the caster in dark cyan robes was some sort of priest, while the pointy hat one looked like a hermetic mage complete with his jeweled staff as a magical focus.

Axe Warrior: “You will pay us with experience and gold for calling us cowards!”

Mace Warrior: “Don’t get riled up bro! He is outnumbered and all of us are above lv45! He has no chance at all. I hope he will drop some of the equipment he is wearing!”

The player stealthily getting behind Jack had not escaped his notice. He assumed the player was a rogue/thief of some type who specialized in stealth kills. So the player probably had low defense and was squishy. He wanted to deal with the rogue before he dealt with the other players, so he waited for the rogue to come in range of his force blade enhanced sword, while he stalled for time.

Jack: “So four of you are PKers, ambushing innocent players and killing them for xp, gold and gear? Don’t you guys have a chaotic mark or something?”

Mace Warrior: “Haha this game is awesome. We get no penalties for killing players without any witnesses other than some infamy! Isn’t it awesome bro?”

Axe Warrior: “Hehe yeah. No freaking chaotic tag to make us criminals on sight. And we simply have our low infamy friends for interaction with the town NCPs for repairs and stuff!”

Mage: *facepalming* “Will you two idiots shut up about our operation and prepare yourselves for the fight?”

Mage: *turning to the priest* “Buff us before these two idiots reveal any more will you?”

Priest: *nods and mutters a chant* “BLESSING OF BATTLE!”

All four of them glowed persistently in Jack’s perspective with spirit senses. Meanwhile the rogue was in range behind him. Jack heard the beginnings of a whisper.

Stealthed Rogue: *whisper* “Assa---“

Jack didn’t give rogue chance to execute what he supposed was the assassinate skill, as he knew firsthand how deadly it was after using it on the goblins and bandits. He quickly crouched and stabbed his force blade enhanced sword into the player behind him. He heard a high pitched scream as he rolled sideways and equipped the dagger from his boots.

He noticed that the sword was lodged in the female rogue’s guts and her HP bar indicated that the single attack had taken two thirds of her HP! Jack then activated force blade on his dagger and lunged at the wounded rouge. He had noticed that the priest had begun his chant for some sort of spell, and he wanted to kill off the rouge incase the priest was preparing a healing spell.

His dagger cut through her armor and was lodged in her shoulder. Jack took the opportunity to dislodge his sword from her guts. He then quickly activated force blade and slashed her throat with his sword finishing her. He then retrieved his dagger and sheathed it in his boots.

While this seemed impressive, it was because rogues had light leather armor and spent their stat points in Agi and Dex for the bonuses to their class skills received from them. They also invested in strength so that their sneak attack skills were usually One Hit Kills. Hence they generally kept vitality to a minimum, only enough for equipping level appropriate leather armor. That combined with Jack’s force blade enhanced critical hits, with his high magic attack, was sufficient to dispose a squishy rogue with low HP and Physical Defense in matter of seconds!

Priest: *chant completes* “ARMOR OF FAITH!”

Mage: *gesturing with his free hand, a large orb of fire formed on top of his staff* “FIERY ORB!”

After sheathing his dagger in his boots, Jack quickly sidestepped and avoided the fiery sphere that came towards him. However it had a small AOE, and Jack failed to completely avoid it and lost 10% of his health.

Jack: ‘Fuck this AoE spell. 10% of HP for an AOE graze? Luckily this shit has a cooldown. Armor fo Faith looks like it boosted everyone’s physical defense. Need to take out casters first.’

The mage meanwhile was shocked. He had used Fiery Orb, which was a massive upgrade from a standard fireball and had a cooldown time of 30 seconds. The full spell was usually enough to reduce a lv40 rogue’s HP by half! Not only did Jack manage to avoid the full brunt of the spell, the splash AoE damaged him for just 10%!

Mage: ‘How does this rogue have so much HP? I thought he was strength/ agility focused seeing how he dealt with the ambush and his equipment.’

Mage: “What are you idiots waiting for? Go intercept him before he comes in melee range!”

Mage: *addressing the priest* “Use all your buffs ASAP!”

Jack wasn’t going to let them do as they pleased. He rushed towards the casters with force blade enhanced sword in hand. The two warriors were in his path rushing ahead, while the mage and the priest began casting.

Before he could collide with the warriors, Jack used force blasts from his feet to jump over them. He landed a short distance from the priest and managed to stab him with his sword reducing the priest’s HP to 50% and causing the priest to scream, disrupting his casting.

Jack: ‘Damn that Armor of Faith….increased the entire team’s physical defense.’

Mage: “FIREBALL!”

Jack reacted quickly upon hearing the mage shout out his spell name. He grabbed the screaming priest’s arm and used him as a meat shield for the fireball, while preparing a fire breath. The impromptu meat shield priest lost another quarter of his HP, leaving him with a fourth. Jack then retrieved his sword from the priest, kicked the priest backwards and unleashed his fire breath.

The priest was dead and the mage had barely a third of his HP left. Jack lunged at the mage and stabbed him in the throat finishing him off. He noticed that the two warriors had stopped in their tracks, a little distance away from him.

Both Warriors simultaneously: “RUSH ATTACK!”

Jack: ‘Why are all these idiots yelling out their skill before executing them? The only exception was the Rogue who whispered her skill name. Is it because they depend upon system assist to execute their skills?’

Sensing danger, Jack quickly rolled sideways. He noticed that both warriors where he was standing. Rush Attack was a mobility skill of warriors, which allowed them to close distance with a target at mid-range. However, the warriors had called out their skills, and this made it easy for Jack to anticipate and avoid them.

Jack readied another fire breath and while the warriors were confused where their target was. Jack jumped backwards and unleashed his fire breath hitting them from the sides. The warriors were a lot sturdier than the other PKer’s and barely lost a third of their HP.

Axe Warrior: “To our left! Let’s get him.”

Mace Warrior: “You got it bro. We have to avenge our comrades!”

Jack was smirking while he evaded the clumsy warriors. As they were equipped in chainmail armor, they were slower than him and were consuming a lot more stamina for their movement. Whenever Jack got an opportunity, he used a soul strike on them while maintaining safe distance between them. Each soul strike damaged one of the warriors for around 15% of their HP. In this way Jack kited them, reducing the axe warrior’s HP to a third. The axe warrior stopped chasing Jack and readied a health potion from his inventory.

Jack: ‘Oh, no you don’t asshole! Take this!’

Jack precisely fired a force bolt and the health potion shattered in his hands. He then quickly prepared a fire breath and stormed towards them. As soon as they were in his AoE, he unleashed his Fire breath, leaving the axe warrior with a sliver of HP and reducing the mace warrior’s HP to around 35%. Jack finished off the axe warrior with a void bolt and taunted the mace warrior.

Jack: “Looks like everyone including your bro is dead. Come at me little piggy, I will kill you too.”

Mace Warrior: “You will pay for hurting my bro. RUSH ATTACK!”

As soon as Jack heard the warrior exclaiming his skill, Jack rolled sideways and avoided the rush attack. However, the mace warrior slammed his weapon to the ground and yelled “SHOCKWAVE!”. Jack couldn’t completely dodge the AoE and lost 5% of his HP, still leaving him with around 85% HP. The shockwave skill also seemed to have a disabling effect, as Jack seemed to be disoriented.

However, due Jack’s balance, flexibility and indomitable spirit special stats, he was barely able to resist the knockdown. Jack quickly sidestepped, preparing a fire breath. He was just in time too as the mace warrior executed another skill “BASH”. The warrior missed his target and his weapon hit the ground. There was a small crater where a few moments ago Jack was standing.

Jack: ‘Oh boy that is a deadly combo if executed successfully. Rush Attack closes distance with the target quickly; shockwave causes small AoE damage and knockdown. Then use bash to do boosted damage to the prone target. Any squishy caster hit with that combo is fucked. Hopefully these skills consume lot of stamina and/or have a cooldown.’

The warrior was somewhat out of breath, indicating that he was running low on stamina. Running around in chainmail armor and executing his warrior skills back to back had depleted a large chunk of his stamina and made him temporarily vulnerable as Jack unleashed his fire breath and the warrior was left barely with 5% of his HP.

Mace Warrior: “That hurts you bastard!”

Jack: “Then let me relieve your pain.”

Jack then quickly shot a void bolt at the last PKer killing him. He then noticed that as soon as the player was dead, his body seemed to be equipped in beginner clothes. However, there was a small pouch, a ring and a health potion next to his corpse. Jack collected the loot and identified the ring.

It was unfortunately, a plain silver ring without any enchantment. Jack slipped it on his fingers as silver was a better material than copper/iron and he could probably enchant it more. Jack then found the rest of the corpses and looted them. He collected a total of 35 gold, 3 basic health potions, 2 basic mana potions, the plain silver ring, an iron helmet and a steel dagger, which was slightly better than his fine iron dagger. Jack stored the steel dagger in his boots and he felt his Danger Sense warning him again.

Jack: ‘Oh great looks like the peeping tom is spying on me again with his birdie. Annoying’

Jack then prepared a void breath and casually walked towards the tall tree, on whose branches the hawk was hiding. Then he quickly used force blasts from his feet to make a high jump and released his void breath upwards. As he landed, he noticed the corpse of the hawk fell down near him.

Jack: ‘What is this… some kind of big brown crow? Probably a hawk or falcon… Oh well free meat for me.’

Jack then stabbed the corpse of the hawk with his sword and channeled some fire mana to evenly roast it. He then waited for the meat to cool down and used his dagger to remove the skin and feathers from the corpse of the hawk. He then smelled the aroma from the cooked lump of meat.

Jack: ‘Smells delicious! One barbecued birdie coming right up!’

Jack then took his time slowly savoring the taste of the hawk meat. It tasted like wild fowl, but with a stronger taste and gamey flavor. All in all, it was extremely delicious compared to the bitter monster meat he usually ate ingame. And it was far better than rabbit meat jerky.

Jack finished his meal, let out a satisfied burp and checked his notifications. While Jack hadn’t received any stat bonuses, or leveled up his skills, he had gained around 25% exp and some fame for killing the 5 PKer’s. He had also gained some infamy, for killing a player’s companion, but to Jack the minor gain infamy was worth the delicious meat. Meanwhile, near the beginner fields:

Archer Girl: *suddenly gets up and sits down* “That bastard!!”

Warrior Guy: “What happened?”

Archer Girl: “He single handedly killed all five of us who were ambushing him! He also killed my poor Chester with some kind of breath attack. I will kill him a hundred times, no a thousand times when I get my hands on him. My poor Chester, I already miss you.” *starts sobbing*

Warrior Guy: ‘So she doesn’t care five us were wiped out singlehandedly and is crying for her bird? Crazy woman.’

Warrior Guy: “Now there, calm down. Chester will respawn in four ingame days, since he is your ranger companion.”

Archer Girl: *looks furious* “Calm down? CALM DOWN?! Maybe I should kill you and lock you out of the game for a full day in RL. That will help me to calm---” *pauses, looks miserable and groans in pain*

Warrior Guy: “What happened?”

Archer Girl: “I just got a notification that someone is eating Chester’s corpse! It gave me some stat debuffs … and more importantly, Chester won’t respawn for eight whole days ingame. When I find that bastard, I will have Chester eat him alive bit by bit, starting with his eyes!!”

Warrior Guy: ‘Note to self. Be nice to Chester. ALWAYS.’