It took a little while before I spotted a building with the crest of a sword on top of the door. This place is directly behind the cathedral. Thinking that this is the right place I entered without hesitation.

Inside was a big, empty room with a clean wooden floor, and a row of manikins that looks like a scarecrow was placed next to the side wall.

Beside the door was full of wooden weapons such as swords, daggers, axe and others leaning in the side of the wall.

There was a chair beside the wooden weapon rack, and there was a large man polishing a sword quietly sitting. He looked at me and asked:

“What do you want young adventurer?”

“Ahm, kind sir is this the training hall?” I asked in a polite manner.

“Yes, this is the place”

“Then I presume you are the said instructor of the place?”

“Yes that is me”

“Great!” I hurriedly approached him and took out the letter I was entrusted to by the gate guard. “The guard stationed in the gate asked me to deliver this to you! it seemed quite important”

“Oh! Thank you, young adventurer!”

Ding!

Quest Complete!

Deliver the letter to the Instructor

The guard ask you to deliver the letter to the instructor. The letter seemed important so it must be deliver right away.

Reward: Take the reward from the Instructor

I felt satisfied. First time completing a quest seems very good.

“Here take this money as a reward” The instructor said, handing over two silver coins. I took the money and place it on my pocket. Originally I only have a small canteen and ten hard breads for starting gear; now that I have money I can at least eat something beside this terrible hard bread later.

Don’t ask me why I know it’s terrible, just read the description and the name of the bread it should be understandable, right?

As I was thinking about this, the instructor continued talking

“By the way young adventurer, are you free after this?”

“Hm? Yes sir, I intentionally wanted to come here to train so I decided to stay here for a while” bewildered by the instructors sudden questions I answered promptly.

“Excellent!” overjoyed by my answer, the instructor smiled and pat my shoulder “You are really different from the other reckless adventurers. How about a spar with me?” he said while taking a wooden sword from the side and handing it to me.

“Excuse me?” I ask not comprehending this sudden change of event.

“Here, entertain me for a while!” he said while laughing.

I clutched the wooden sword in my hand and was still in dazed when suddenly the instructor charged at me with incredible speed.

With who-knows-when my senses became sharper; I leap at the side to avoid his charged.

“Hoo! Superb reflexes! Very good!”

Once again he charged at me but this time he was faster. The wooden sword swung in front of my face.

No, no wait I’m just a beginner, damn it!

*Click* as if a switch deep within my body was flipped, my body responded with inhuman reflexes.

I slightly tilted my body while I clutched the wooden sword with my two hands and tried to block his sword.

Even though I successfully blocked it with my wooden sword I was still hit and flung away in a distance.

What monstrous strength he has.

Although I always fought with various delinquents from the past, this time was different. The pain surged inside my

body was doubled that of a punch I often took. Oddly enough when I glanced at the corner of my eye where a red and

blue line at, it wasn’t decreased even a little bit.

The red line represents my or and the blue line represents or

I wondered why my hasn’t decrease even though I took that hit, is it because I’m inside the City?

As I was thinking the reason for it suddenly a bell like sound echoed in my ears.

Ding!

Caution: Due to continuously moving without eating and drinking for quite some time, satiety less than 2%! Moving became arduous as you no longer had any sufficient stamina.

“Inventory window” I hurriedly called out.

Semitransparent images of all my belongings in the inventory floated in front of my eyes. Although for now, only a small canteen and ten pieces of hard bread were inside inventory.

I took out a piece of hard bread and the small canteen, and ate it. As I ate the food, it slowly appeased my hunger and the satisfaction factor rose.

“I forgot I’m supposed to have a meal every now and then or else I will die from hunger.”

As I thought, this hard bread is the worst bread I’ve eaten. It’s very hard and it feels like I was eating a rock.

Once I finished eating my meal swiftly, the instructor laughs and said,

“You are really incredible! Your battle senses is excellent for a newbie like you! I’m starting to like you even more, young adventurer!” he casually said while extending his hand to help me stand up.

“You see, our levels are like heaven and earth yet you can keep up with me to some extent! That is why you must always remember, levels are not everything. What’s important is ability, willpower and perseverance.” He pats my shoulder once again and said “Always remember, even a branch of a tree is deadly when a true expert wield it!”

Realizing what he meant, I smiled wryly and nod.

He took the wooden sword under his feet and throws it to me.

“For now my advice for you is to take any manikin in that side and strike him in any way you want. You must master the way to hold the sword before you embark in your journey!”

“Thank you very much!”

I clutched the wooden sword and expressed my gratitude towards him.

I walked towards the manikin I saw and took a stance but then I suddenly remembered. I think I have been inside of this game for almost two hours; I need to log out for now to eat something in the real world too.

I walked towards the sitting instructor and said

“Sir, I still need to do something so I need to excuse myself for now. I will be back immediately when I finished”

The instructor smiled and nod.

I stepped back a bit and called . Straight afterwards there was a ringing sound and a shining purple rectangle appeared.

I moved my hand down in a movement that had almost become a habit. At the left side of the screen, there was a long row of buttons.

But then…

My body froze.

It wasn’t there.

The very button that should be there, the button had disappeared.

I stared at the empty space for a couple of seconds, and then looked through the menu to make sure; it hadn’t just changed its position. But no matter where I looked, it wasn’t there.

My face became rigid. I felt a groundless fear send a chill down my back.

No, no, no maybe just maybe because it’s the first day it started, there might be some sort of bug or virus. I’ll just need to wait for them to resolve it. Right! That should be the case.

I tried to come up with various reasons as to relieve myself, but deep down my heart I was still feeling anxious.

Suddenly I became desperate. I started shouting as if I was denying my last statement.

“Return! Off! Log out! Escape!”

Still nothing happened. Although I don’t think there were no voice commands that let you log out as soon as you said that but still….

After sometime, fear surged up within my mind.

“Out! Escape! Log out!”

I started shouting again and even jumping while raising both my hands. Although I felt the strange stare the instructor was giving me on my side, I ignore it.

Still nothing happened, I ran towards the door of the training center to see the situation outside. As expected it became a huge turmoil.

Users like me were desperately trying to do something in order to get out of the game.

“Hey…. What the hell is this? Why can’t we get out of the game!?”

A man gave out a desperate scream.

“Wait, we can just turn the power off or just pull the out of our head, right?”

A nerdy looking young man said.

“Very smart boy, then how will you do that?”

Another man rebutted him as if making fun of him.

“Maybe like this….”

The nerd moves his hands as if he was trying to take off some-kind of invisible hat in his head. Seeing this, the party laugh while holding their stomachs, even me I was trying to suppress my urge to laugh.

After a while the party stopped laughing. They both stood speechless for a while, each lost in thought.

And then I felt the anxiety returning on me.

So all of us can’t for some reason? Just what is the GM doing at a time like this?

This was impossible; we can’t get out of the game? It was a complete non-sense. But right now, it was an indisputably the truth.

As I was thinking ‘Ding’ a chiming noise like a bell sounded loudly, making me jump in surprise.

“Ah…!?”

Suddenly I was immersed in a clear blue pillar of light. Because of how dazzling it is, the surrounding in my vision blurred steadily.

---0---

As the blue light faded, my surroundings became clear again. However, this wasn’t the outside of the training center anymore.

A large road paved with stone, a typical medieval streets if I say so. Behind me was the fountain I saw when I first came here.

Without no doubt this was my starting point or maybe this was the users starting point, the central plaza of the .

Worst is, I was at the center of a very large crowd, or maybe a sea of people is the right term? As if, no maybe all of the users in the were summoned to this place. So that blue light thing a while ago was a summoning. I thought

Looking at the bunch of people wearing Leather armor like me and have different hair colors, they were no doubt other players like me. There were about a hundred----thousand people here.

For a few seconds, everyone just looked around without saying a single word. Then a few started to mumbling and muttering something like ‘maybe we can log out now’ or something. Then it started to get louder.

Then suddenly,

Somebody raised his voice and shouted.

“Ah…look above!”

I almost automatically turned my eyes upward and looked. There, a strange and weird sight greeted not only me but all of the players in the plaza.

The sky suddenly split as if it was sliding door.

What appeared next was a beautiful young woman in a very wonderful and stylish gown-like dress.

Without a doubt she was the AI wannabe, or maybe AI cosplayer? Oh well, she was the woman I met when I make my account.

The countless players and users around me must have felt the same.

“Is that the GM?”

“No, isn’t she the AI who ask us various questions upon making an account?”

“Yeah I thought so too.”

“So she’s the GM? I thought the one who made this game is a man?”

“Maybe he’s cosplaying as a girl!”

“Maybe he wanted to be a girl!”

Numerous whispers like these could be heard.

Then her right hand moved as if to silence them. Then her left arm slowly lifted upwards too. Then with her two hands spread out in front of us; as if presenting the sky, she opened her mouth.

A beautiful feminine voice resonated from high up in the air.

----Good Morning Players I welcome you all to my world!-----

----I am the beautiful AI who controls the system of this world. The cute and adorable Pandora~ Right now, I am the only being who can control this world game system, so to speak I am the new god of the new world system! Teehee~----