Chapter 1-B: Tutorial Mode

*COMMENCING TUTORIAL*

A bright light shone over from everywhere in the room. It was so bright Savi was forced to shut his eyes closed. Then just as suddenly as the light had come, it disappeared. He opened his eyes a bit and looked around.

He was in a small room that quite honestly seemed Japanese, which he considered weird since neither the company nor him were of that particular area of the world… He pushed the issue away thinking that maybe the tutorial was made with either random locations or maybe simply look like this for a particular reason.

The walls were made of smooth wood, as well as the floor, ceiling and furniture. There were no windows, but a single door. A table with a pair of chairs stood silently by the middle of the room. A small pool of clear water was in one of the corners of the room. Suddenly, Savi felt the need to take a dive in the cool water, but he resisted and waited.

Soon after, a young adult man, no older than 40, stepped into the room; his facial features were difficult to see, as if they were being obscured, and he was wearing a lab coat like those you see scientists and doctors wear.

He looked at Savi intently, then sat down at the chair. Seeing that Savi still did not seat, he signaled him to do so with a motion of his hand. Savi sat down and almost immediately the unknown man began to speak.

“If you are here, it means you decided to take on the tutorial. It’s been a while since someone came here though… Anyways, I’ll be instructing you on the basics of this world you’re about to enter. Please keep your questions to yourself till I give you way to ask, okay?”

“Errr… Yes.”

Savi felt a that the man spoke a bit strangely, he guessed that those comments he read about the NPC’s in this place being more human-like than in other games was true after all.

“Very well. Let us start with the very minimum you need to survive. In order to open the Menu you have several options: first is saying the phrase Open: Menu, the second is by touching your pinky finger with your thumb, the third is by thinking the phrase before said in your mind. This third method is quite hard to master at the beginning, but can be useful in the long run as it allows you to navigate all options of the Menu without alerting others of your presence. In addition to these methods, you can also modify the physical way to open the Menu in the Settings option in the Menu. Now, please use any method I mentioned to open your Menu.”

“Open: Menu”

“Good, the Menu provides you with plenty of information that is very important throughout your Journey. The CHARACTER page, which bears your name, provides information about your avatar. This includes not only his level, stats and affinities, but also any condition that your body may be afflicted at the moment, be they the blessings of a friendly priest or the stomachache from eating spoiled food. Please open the CHARACTER WINDOW by saying OPEN: “your NAME”.”

“OPEN: XENO” – for a second there, Savi imagined the horror of choosing the nickname Sesame…

Savi expected his stats in a way, but seeing his high physical stats amaze him, especially when he compares them to his Dexterity. The rest of the info was…

“Now then, you’ll see that the CHARACTER WINDOW shows you basic information about yourself: your name, Age, Racial Tree, Race, Fame, Infamy, Level and Class. At present you do not possess a class, but later on you will obtain one or even more than one. Just remember, you can only have 1 class equipped at any time. The class you have equipped levels up as you use it’s skills or spells, but only while you have it equipped. When the class levels up, you might gain new skills, spells or even abilities. You don’t need to have the class equipped in order to use or even level up your skills and spells though. Some even prefer to have high level skills and many low level classes. Fame and Infamy will raise with your actions and how they are perceived by the general populace. A warning though: even if you do something good, as long as the action is evilize for some reason or another by someone and many people believe them, then you’ll gain Infamy instead of Fame. This also works the other way around, so be careful. Just because someone is Famous with the populace, it doesn’t mean they are good people. Whenever you level up your class, some Stat points are automatically gained to select stats related to the class, while whenever you level up you gain Stat Points which you can distribute to whichever stat you wish.”

“Next are the primary stats. Life is your life, if it reaches 0 then you die. Don’t worry, you’ll be able to revive after 24 hours in your world, which equals around 10 days in here… If you have a mission or quest you must complete within a deadline, you better not die though. You’ll also lose any accumulated Experience from your Level, Class Level, and Skill Level, but will not lose any levels.”

“Health on the other hand represents your overall condition in terms of health; this includes your hunger, thirst, blood-levels, sugar-levels, adrenaline, bladder, cleanliness, illness, and wounds among other things. As your Health deteriorates, your Life will start to become compromised. If your Health reaches 0, well you might as well start praying… You can check more details about your Health as well if you ask a Doctor, Medic, or similarly Health related individual, otherwise you’ll have to guess. Of course you could also learn the Ability to determine your own Health later on.”

“Stamina is consumed with every physical action you take and the lower it is the more tired you will feel. If it reaches 0, you might even collapse and be unable to move for a while. This is the limit of living beings, which Undead and Machina don’t have to worry about. Satisfaction indicates how your Avatar feels in general with its treatment. If you treat your Avatar like a toy all the time without caring for it, it might take actions while you aren’t here or even delete himself if you aren’t careful, so treat him with kindness and respect. And no, you can’t communicate with him any other way other than by looking at its Satisfaction…”

“Skill and Mana are the two forms of energy required for the activation of Skills and Spells respectively. While skills use the energy that is generated within you, Spells use the energy that your body gathers from its environment throughout time. Both have a natural 1% per second regeneration speed, but this can be affected by many abilities, effects, conditions, as well as your surroundings. Everyone begins with the exact same Skill and Mana cap, but as your Strength and Intelligence rise this cap increases.”

“The Weight Limit is the total weight your body can carry without repercussions. If you try to carry more than your limit, several movement related stats will be greatly reduced, as well as the consumption of Stamina per action will increase. Exceeding your limits is the key to training, but take it too far and you might break your body… This limit increases as your Strength increases, which ironically can happen while you are exceeding your Weight Limit.”

“Strength is the overall maximum amount of physical pressure you can create with your body while Defense is how well you can resist the physical pressure of others. These two stats are keys to those who fight melee battles. Intelligence affects the overall power of your Spells, but only if you possess enough knowledge of the spell be that through learning or experimenting. On the other hand, Wisdom affects the acquirement rate of skills and spells through repeated action. Dexterity is how well you can control your hands and fingers and has a great effect on most classes related to crafting and ranged combat. Finally, Speed is the most basic stat which represents the current maximum speed you can muster. Remember, a stat may be high, but if you don’t know how to use it properly, it might as well be low…”

“The next window shows the affinities you possess. These can be to a given race, faction or kingdom, or the Elemental Properties. These will affect your relationship with others and your ability to learn skills and spells of the given elemental properties. Languages determines all languages you are capable of understanding, as well as how well you are able to understand those languages. You may learn new languages by studying the language you wish to learn, be that from books, a teacher, or personal observation. You are born knowing languages directly related to your race, in your case Common, Elven and Aquan. The Common Language is shared by all civilized creatures, but many refuse to speak it.”

“Finally, there’s the Conditions Window which state all status conditions you are currently experiencing, although, due to the nature of this location, none of those status conditions are in effect. One particular condition that I should mention is the Newborn condition. What it does is help you in your growth at the beginning, a growth spurt of a sort. Don’t worry, it hasn’t activated yet so the countdown till it disappears is still set to a full month.”

Savi visually relaxed, it would’ve been bad if he lost the chance to get a growth spurt just because he decided to do the tutorial… He’s sure Kris wouldn’t let him live it down…

“Now let’s explain Skills, Spells and Abilities; these three make the brunt of what you will gain and can realize while in this world. Skills are usually physical in nature and are activated through motions, though some use verbal commands to facilitate their activation. It is possible for Skills to evolve and shorted the motion activation as well as become even stronger as they level up. Spells on the other hand are verbally activated through a process known as CHANTING. Once the spell’s CHANT is sung, the mana accumulated by the body emerges and takes the form of the spell. While this process may seem rather slow at first, with practice it is possible to sing the Chants, in your mind and activate them within a second. Not only this, but as you master each spell, the Chant required to sing the spell shortens until you only need to say one or two words. Finally, Abilities are very different from Skills or Spells because they are, for the most part, Passive in nature, though some may require you to realize some actions in order for them to activate.”

“All races have a chance to start with Skills, Spells or Abilities when they are just born; as a Maomer you start out with several Abilities and no skills or spells what-so-ever. For now, you can look at your Abilities window by saying the command OPEN: ABILITIES”

“OPEN: ABILITIES”

“Okay… It’ll be a while before I even think of going to the surface.”

“Next would be Equipment, the process to open the window is the same as the other ones before. Please open the Equipment Window.”

“OPEN: EQUIPMENT”

“There are many types of equipment that can be placed in several locations of your body. Each equipment piece worn has an effect on your character independently to other pieces; however when you wear multiple pieces of the same Equipment Set additional bonuses can be obtained. In order to see information about equipment you possess or change the equipment you are wearing, simply access this Window and touch the location you want the equipment to be worn. Another option is to simply take off and put on the equipment, but unless you have abilities that let you read an item’s information, you will be unable to read its information this way. For now, open the Info Windows of each of the three pieces of equipment you possess.”

Watching the Set bonus, Savi began to consider playing naked until he got better equipment, but then he would be considered a Pervert… To be a Hobo, a Scatterbrain, a Newby or a Pervert…

“Sigh, guess we all start as Newbies…”

“Yes you do, next there’s your Inventory which is all the things you are currently carrying. Please Open your Inventory and confirm its contents.”

“OPEN: INVENTORY”

“Inside you should find in order: 30 units of some sort of Basic food, 1 basic weapon, and 20 Copper Coins. Usually, a Canteen would also be included, but due to your starting location being underwater it was changed to an additional 20 Coppers. Whenever you accumulate 100 of any type of coin, they are automatically replaced with 1 coin of the next value. The Coins are the followings in order of value: Copper, Bronze, Silver, Gold, Platinum and Diamond. Just so you know, very few people have even seen Diamond coins and those who possess even one are too much of money diggers to actually use them… In addition to this there’s the Current Weight of the objects you are currently carrying in your Inventory. By the way, the weight of items is slightly reduced while in your Inventory, and this reduction can be increased through certain means. Anyways, please check the Information about the other two items, the food unit and the basic weapon. You can use the same method you utilized during the Equipment Window.”

“So then I have to eat Stale Coral?!”

“Don’t feel too bad, some others have had to get by with Hard Rocks or Dry Leaves, depending on their race. At the very least you can munch on it and eat it like churros…Then there’s the QUESTLOG where you can find all information pertaining any quests you are currently taking or have taken in the past. Quests are divided in several categories: Requests are given by just anyone and have usually only some monetary or item reward, Quests are given by guilds and people in power to adventurers to solve problems their community might have and have slightly better rewards, Jobs are taken can be accepted which results in steady payment of money for the tasks you realized during a period of time, Missions are given by your direct superiors in an organization or by a ruling Noble and can have enormous amounts and quality of rewards, but are harder to obtain or qualify for… Right now, your Questlog is empty, so if you try to open it you will simply get a message saying that you have no current Quests, but you should check out this page as soon as you get one. Of course, you might not realize when you get a quest, as those are not announced by the system. Most likely, you’ll only realize you had a quest once you complete it.”

“Next would be the Friends/Enemies window where you can send messages to people you have met, classify them as Friend, Enemy or Neutral. Doing that would make them appear in your MAP as long as you have been to the location they are at before. This can be useful to track down friends or run away from enemies, though it is usually used by some to hunt down their enemies and run away from friends who they owe money… Right now, we are in a special location that won’t appear on your Map, so it is currently Blank, but it will fill up as you explore. You might even add additional details to the Map if you possess the appropriate skills such the the creatures and plants that are in certain areas as well as other details about the environment.”

“Next would be SETTINGS from which you can change several functions and commands to different ones or even create new shortcuts for certain custom windows. In addition, other details such as Empathy, which affects how well you feel your character and it’s pains and relief, and Maturity allowed can also be modified. However, these are locked for anyone whose mental age is below 20. Mental age is calculated by the age of your body plus a fifth the age of your character. In other words, an 18 years old player who has been playing for 1 year (10 years in-game) qualifies to access those functions because his mental age is considered to be 20 years old.”

“The last thing on your MENU is the LOG-OUT command, which allows you to log-out from The Helix. Please test this function now by saying the command, and then wait 10 minutes before logging back in.”

Savi guessed this was so people got a chance to rest after the tutorial before jumping back to the game.

“LOG-OUT”

*LOG-OUT SUCCESSFUL*

*LOG-IN LOCKDOWN*

*TIME UNTIL LOCKDOWN EXPIRES: 10.00*

Savi’s vision turned dark and he opened his eyes. He was back in his bed with the helmet still on his head. He removed it groggily and took out his phone.

“4:37, not even 3 minutes, huh? Well, better get something solid while I can…”

Savi jumped on his wheelchair and started to prepare something to eat…

Later, Savi sat back in bed and tried to Dive back into the game.

*BEEP*

*CEREBRAL CORTEX HAS BEED DECRYPTED*

*PLAYER IDENTIFIED*

*SAVIER O. POLLUX*

*WOULD YOU LIKE TO LOG-IN AS XENO?

*Y/N*

“Yes”

*TUTORIAL MODE ENGAGED*

Savi was back at the old room with the same man waiting in the same spot he had last seen him. Savi wondered if he hadn’t moved at all since he logged out, but discarded the thought as it might’ve been only ten minutes in the real world, but it must have been over an hour and half in this world.

However, something felt different than before, but Savi couldn’t put his finger on it, till he touched his chin with his fingers. The sensation was much softer, yet stronger than his own fingers. He looked at himself and saw that he had been turned into his Avatar this time. He opened his hands and closed them up, then moved his limbs individually for a few minutes to get used to his new body.

Then he looked at the man, he was giving him a meaningful glance, so he sat back down. The man began to speak again only then.

“Well, this is it for the tutorial in essence, from this point onwards you can ask me any questions you may have. Warning though, there are plenty of things I may be unable to reveal.”

Savi thought about it for a bit for any bit of crucial information that the man before him might have missed previously… He could only think of one single detail.

“You never told me your name so I could thank you, other than that nothing.”

The man looked at him, momentarily speechless, then he started to laugh. After a bit, he answered:

“No one ever asked before, you know. After having to wait ten minutes to get back in, they all get too impatient to even care about something as petty as the name of the guy who gives the tutorial. My name is AIPADS.”

“Aipads?” – what a weird name, yet the name felt familiar for Savi for some reason.

“Yep, it’s short for Artificially Intelligent Programmer and Developer Specialist.”

Savi’s mind blanked for a second…

“Wha…?”

“Hahaha… Don’t be in shock; it’s obvious that I would want to meet the people who come mess with my world at least once before they enter. There’s really not much else I can do, honestly. We, the AI’s who created The Helix don’t have much more to do other than regulate the programming and greeting the few hackers that try to damage the system.”

“But doing something like explaining the tutorials…?”

“As I said, not much else to do, the world is already in the hands of you players. Anyways, as I said before, any other inquiries?”

Savi looked at the being in front of him, one of the supreme existences of this virtual world, one of its creators.

“Sigh, nope. That’s all. Thanks for the info.”

“Truly? You’re not going to ask me any more info now that you know my identity?”

“Regardless of your identity, you already said you could not reveal many bits of info. No matter how hard I think, I cannot think of something to ask you that don’t fall into that category.”

“Huh, quite smart for someone who chose a race usually meant for melee combat; you are correct in thinking my identity would not change the fact that I would ignore most of your questions though.” – he seemed amused.

“Well if that’s all, then it’s time to get to business, no?”

A bright light shone in the room again, but Savi wasn’t affected this time… He figured it was because of his new eyes which protected him from such effects. He saw the whole room disappear in the whiteness, then the light became darkness and he heard the voice he talked to at the beginning of the Dive.

*FIRST TIME LOG-IN DETECTED*

*NEWBORN CONDITION HAS BEEN ACTIVATED*

*PLEASE ENJOY THE HELIX TO ITS FULL EXTENT*

*FARE DE WELL*

“Fare De Well”

Chapter 1-A: Introduction into... Chapter 2: The Village of Sed

This is the first TRUE chapter of the ARC series of the story The Helix. What I mean by this is up to the future to decide.

This chapter ended up quite longer than I expected, a little over 10 pages more than the regular chapters I plan to release; a whooping 25 pages on WORD. No idea how long or short the chapter will look like once I post it on the forums. I know for a fact that it’ll take me some time to modify this chapter to look good by my standards once I start working on those windows.

As a matter of fact, I was forced to divide it in two chapters due to the number of images caused by those windows...

Speaking of windows, this chapter has a lot of them, having the tutorial and all. I hope they look well once I finish them on the forums… Regardless I’ll explain one of them that I found I couldn’t quite program like I wanted on Word, let alone the forums.

The Character Window is composed of several Tabs similar to recent Web Browsers. Each of the windows is separate because they are in a different tab which the player must open. It’s meant to look a lot better than a large wall of stats and would allow the player to easily access the information he desires to know.

The same principle applies to the “modified commands” which can be added through the Settings option. I do hope you enjoyed the explanations I gave to those functions.

On another note, the sheer number of available races is quite appealing, right? That was something I worked on in the past but never went for the finishing touches of explaining the races in complete detail. Originally, I only separated the races by their physical dissimilarities. Since the races might come into play later on, I’ll refrain from posting the Blood-Lines for the other Racial Trees, and don’t expect me to ever place the full list of Tribes per Blood-Line that encompass the Beast, Aquan, Hive, Raptor and Plant Trees in too much detail! That would be too much for me at present…

Still, if anyone is willing to elaborate or even use upon any system mentioned in this chapter, he is welcomed to do so.

The Equipment window was a bit tricky for me, but I finally decided to go with simplicity mixed with complexity; easy to look at, but more complex than usual. You might see that there’s a L & R in a few of those slots. They mean it’s possible to wear a piece of equipment in one, but not the other. So people wearing mismatched shoes do exist in this world, wanting to take at least half the benefits of two completely different pairs of shoes… The Other slot in the inventory means things you can equip anywhere such as a Pin in your shirt, pants, shoes or even hair.

I’ll be dishonest if I say I didn’t enjoy writing all of this, but am still ecstatic to get started with the actual adventure. I scared you a bit into thinking he would become OP already by realizing the identity of the Tutorial NPC, but don’t worry. He’ll only become OP in a VERY certain way in the future, way in the future; around Volume 5 or 6 maybe… Each volume should be 10 Chapters plus Prologue and maybe Epilogue.

If anyone finds a grammatical error, please tell me so as English is me second language, though practiced since young. I’m also willing to listen to critiques you might have, so let them rip.

“A writer never gets better unless he listens to his own mistakes.”