October 19, 2022
Day 0
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The rest of the day went by uneventfully, and Rahul and his team went around exploring. Laysan was an egg-shaped island, complete with a large central lake for the yolk. It was nearly 2 km long and more than 1 km across. There were no large animals, but the island had many birds. The area around the lake was quite pleasant, and his team, and many others, settled around it.
As night approached, they built campfires, gathered fruits and berries, and went fishing. They also drank the lake water. The sensation of drinking salt water, while odd, was not unpleasant. Eventually, everyone was done with dinner and began searching for nice comfortable spots to hunker down for the night.
Rahul and his team found a good clearing with the lake in front, a boulder behind, and shrubs on either side taking the brunt of the cold wind. The boulder had smooth rock, and presently, Rahul, Charlie, and Maya were comfortably leaning on it. Their backs were against the rock and their legs toward a cozy campfire. Daniel and Matt were sitting on one side of the fire, while Ivan and Alex were on the other.
Helena, their tech lead, was lying on her back, close to the lake, looking up at the stars as if deep in thought. She has been part of Daniel's team since its inception seven years ago and commanded almost as much respect as him. All small talk ceased when she spoke up.
“If this tutorial and the world that follows is truly going to be an RPG, has anyone put any thought into which classes they will pick?”
Ivan went first.
“I think I’ll take a melee class with a focus on tanking. Someone’s got to protect all your scrawny asses.”
Ivan was a largely built Russian man who had come to the US and joined the company about three years back. Even though he looked like the last person you’d imagine being a software developer, Ivan was quite good at his job.
Moreover, Rahul had worked closely with him for the last year, and known him to be incredibly kind with a heart as big as his muscles.
We would be very lucky to have Ivan as our tank.
Rahul thought, and Daniel put those thoughts into words.
“We’ll all be quite content hiding behind you, you damn wall. In all seriousness, it’s a good choice for you. I myself am leaning towards being a mage.”
That proclamation from Daniel prompted another one of Rahul's teammates, Maya, to speak.
“A mage class would suit me too I think”.
Maya was a shy girl who didn’t talk a lot, and had moved to the US for higher education and had joined their team last year.
Rahul knew her to be an excellent problem solver with a very insightful and unique way of looking at things.
She is also very cute.
Rahul shook himself free of the distracting thoughts and forced himself back to the topic. As he thought about it, Rahul admitted that she could indeed become a very competent mage.
Helena spoke and interrupted Rahul's chain of thought.
“Magic would suit you, both of you. I for one would be happy shooting at things from a distance where they can’t reach me, not that any danger can get past Ivan.“
Everyone laughed, and Daniel clapped Ivan's back.
Alex chimed in.
“Archery or some other range class is what I will go for too.”
It turned out to be a popular choice, as Charlie and Matt too opted for a ranged class.
Charlie, Alex, and Matt all worked on the same project, and were good friends, mainly due to the long hours that they had pulled working together on the nightmare of the project that one of them had jokingly abbreviated to DREAM.
Of the three, Matt was the most experienced, one year senior to even Daniel, but was also the newest member of the team, having joined 6 months ago. Alex had been working in the team and on the project for the last four years and was the project lead. Charlie, like Maya, joined the team last year after finishing his higher studies in the US. He was an Australian.
As everyone finished announcing their preferred classes, they looked expectantly at Rahul.
"I think I'll go for a ranged class too."
He said, a bit awkwardly since he had taken so long to think only to end up picking the most popular class.
Of course, popularity is not the reason I picked the class. Rather, it's the practicality.
Rahul most certainly did not have any ambition of being in the thick of battle, risking his life. Magic appealed to him, but based on what he knew about games, archers were usually somewhat proficient at defending themselves at close range, while mage classes were sitting ducks without a proper team formation protecting them.
He did not relish the thought of being completely dependent on others.
The discussion went on for a while, and then switched to other topics, before the team slept for the first time in the post-system world.
This tale has been unlawfully lifted from Royal Road; report any instances of this story if found elsewhere.
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October 20, 2022
Day 1
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System Message The tutorial is now underway. Every bastion will now be assigned a steward who can be summoned at most once a day by using settlement points. The first summoning is free and will happen in 5 minutes. The tutorial will last 30 days and your primary goal is to survive. Your steward will explain the rest.
Rahul was already with the Laysan council, as they were now calling themselves, when the system announcement came. The next five minutes were spent deciding on the most important questions to ask the steward, until he finally arrived.
Their steward, Martin, was a tall, slender, and bald Caucasian man who surprisingly looked like a regular normal human.
He wasted no time.
“I need to see the settlement menu and all your stats. Those would have turned active as soon as the tutorial started. I've got only ten minutes for today's free summon, but even the paid summons are restricted to one hour. Given the small group here, I want to counsel you all on your classes individually, within 3 days, not counting today. That comes to a little over a minute per person. "
"I’ll quickly go over the settlement details. In the meantime, I want 10 of you standing in a straight line, and a few extras ready in case we have leftover time. Mark, please choose the best of your settlement“.
With that, he started looking at the settlement menu, while Mark instructed all managers to pick one person each from their team to get to 25. Everyone from the Laysan council was picked by default.
No more than 30 seconds later, Martin shouted.
“EVERYONE, FORM A LINE. ALL 168 OF YOU”
“NOW!”
Then he went to Mark, motioning all of us members of the council to join, and started talking speaking rapidly and without break.
“Listen very carefully and do not interrupt me. The tutorial is going to be a cakewalk, pitting humans against beasts in a lopsided fight where humans can use settlement points to get various advantages. What comes after is a nightmare where human settlements are pitted against each other in a winner takes all. I can help you every day and you’ll get out of the tutorial without a single casualty. Then you’ll be pitted against a human settlement, likely with the full strength of 1000, and get fucked. If you want to get fucked, call me again tomorrow and I will counsel 25 of you each day as originally planned. “
“Otherwise, listen carefully. You start with 20000 credits. Use them all to purchase a castle and a dock. The purchase will come with basic equipment for a settlement of 1000. Use that. Make no other purchase from the settlement store, no food, no potions, no weapons, no spells. The castle will house and protect you. The dock will give an additional 10% reduction to water-based developments. Every day you will get 1000 more credits, as well as any additional credit based on accomplishments."
He paused just for a second, making sure that everyone was paying attention to the next part.
"You've hit a lottery with that massive underwater cavern. It's a unique advantage, and you must use all your credits to enlarge the cavern using the dock menu. The Dungeon Spawn II bonus will grow in rank, but even Dungeon Spawn V, which is impossible to reach within 30 days, only has a 5% chance of dungeon spawning every year. That’s not what we are after. For a planet’s initiation, the system has a size threshold after which it automatically converts caverns within settlement domains into dungeons. It works at the time of aligning with a bastion, and it works during the tutorial. If you can't get the dungeon large enough before the tutorial ends, you're fucked. Umm, what else..”
Martin paused to think.
"Yes. Once the dock is purchased, it’ll show you the location of all notable landmarks in your settlement domain. No matter where the cavern is, expand it in the direction of your island because you will need to physically go to a cavern entrance to enter the dungeon if one gets built. "
He paused again, then added, "You’ll have to figure out the rest by yourself. Class selection is level 10, the first specialization is level 25. Beyond that can wait”
With that, Martin started running along the assembled line of people and started shouting classes at everyone.
“Melee : Rogue”
“Mage : Elemental”
“Mage : Enhancements”
“Ranged : Siege”
“Melee : Tank”
“Ranged : Archery”
“Melee : Rogue”
“Mage : Healer”
“Melee : Rogue”
That last one was for Rahul, after which he stopped paying attention to what the others got. He was quite surprised and looked at his stats.
Name Rahul Sharma Race Human (F) Class N/A Level 1 HP 70/70 MP 170/170 Stamina 80/80 Strength 7 Endurance 8 Dexterity 11 Vitality 7 Intelligence 17
Rahul smiled despite himself, the 17 in intelligence felt nice. One can never have too much validation. But his strength, endurance, and vitality felt lacking, assuming a 10 represented the average human. He was not particularly large or strong, but he kept himself fit and played a lot of sports. Maybe that was reflected by the 11 in dexterity instead.
Also, what was the (F) in the race? It wasn't gender. Rahul was quite certain of his gender, and it wasn't F. So did humans have grades? He guessed he'll find out eventually and left it at that. That was not his only concern though.
With his mana being so high, why was he recommended melee rather than a mage class?
His thoughts were interrupted by Martin shouting rapid fire to the group.
“Resistance train for strength vitality, run-swim for endurance, climb rocks jump and dance for dexterity, meditate feel mana for intelligence, hunt-kill other bastiioo..”
10 minutes were up and Martin disappeared, leaving behind a baffled Layson Council and Mark.
This did NOT go as anyone expected. Mark harbored no delusion that he was prepared for every possibility, but what happened was beyond even his wildest imagination. After all, the steward had forbidden them from summoning him again unless they spawned the dungeon first. For all Mark knew, that spawning might take the entirety of the tutorial!
In the meantime, Mark, or anyone else for that matter, had not got the chance to utter a single word. The list of questions will have to wait, Mark thought as he sighed and prepared himself for the longest month of his life.