The captain was a tall man. He dressed like all the other guardsmen the only difference with the outfit was the medal which hung from his shirt. He slowly climbed down the stairs, a slight unseen pressure radiated out from his body. The air simmered along with his step becoming more powerful as he approached.
“Wow. What kind of power is that?” Greg straightened his stance while the captain arrived in front of him. The Captain's gaze was like a searchlight as it roamed his body. It seemed to judge his worth and he felt that the judgement was not in his favor.
“You are here to become a Guardsman?” The captain’s voice penetrated the silence.
“Yes s-sir.” Greg stuttered while his legs shook slightly.
“Oh shit! Oh shit! What the fuck is that power?”
“Hmm. Why do you want to become a guardsman?” The captain circled around him while he observed Greg’s reactions.
“Sir, The tailor recommended you to me. He said that you could teach me to defend my-myself.”
“That doesn’t answer my question. Why do you want to become a guardsman?”
“Sir, I want to become a guardsman to defend myself and to adventure.”
“Oh, to defend yourself and go adventuring?. I am in need of more guardsmen, not adventurers. I can tell that you don’t have any training what so ever, but you are in luck. I will train you, I only need you to agree to a couple of conditions. You will need to perform tasks for the village and help defend the village for at least 1 month of time. The time doesn’t need to be consecutive but a total.”
A whole month? I need to spend a whole month defending this village? I should do it. He will train me some skills to defend myself and maybe i'll learn more about other things. Heck it should raise my reputation with the townspeople. Isn’t that what normally happens in rpgs?
“I will do it. I agree to join the guardsmen for a month of time.”
“Great, but you aren't much help as you are now. Follow me.” The captain turned around while indicating for Greg to follow him.
They went around the building through a gate by the side of the building to the back. Once in the back of the building Greg saw a open area filled with wooden practice dummies.
The captain led him to the back of the building where a row of weapon stands were kept. The weapon stands held wooden swords of various length and sizes. The captain choose a smaller sword and examined it. “This one will do.”
He handed the sword over to Greg and lead him to a dummy close by. “Take off your equipment you will not be needing it. Later you will be given an outfit, but for now you will only need the wooden sword.”
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Greg equipped the sword while he stored the rest of his equipment into his inventory. He was left wearing his basic outfit the system game him.
“The first training you will perform is striking the dummy. You will perform 1000 strikes. This should help you understand how to swing the sword. You may go when rest when you are done. Begin.” He pointed at the dummy and waited for him to start.
Greg stepped forward and swung the sword and the dummy.
Thunk!
“Ow!”
The sound of the wood on wood resounded throughout the courtyard followed by Greg yelling in pain.
“Fucking shit! This fucking hurts.”
He slowly lowered the sword after realizing how much this would hurt, he took a second to collect himself and swung again.
Thunk!
Thunk!
Thunk!
“No gain without pain.”
Thunk!
Thunk!
Thunk!
“...997, 998, 999, 1000.”
Greg slowly lowered the sword to his side. He almost dropped it from exhaustion in the process. Daylight has long faded over the horizon while he trained. The darkness brought a cold breeze along with it and kept Greg cool while he had practiced.
“Well done, you may go back and rest. Training will not be included into the month of service. Take this paper with you and fill it out. It is a log of how much time you have spent here and will help keep track of your progress. The log will also determine how much time left of you service when you officially start. Now go back and rest.” The captain said while he gave him a sheet of paper.
Greg put away the paper while he slowly stumbled out of the courtyard. He was exhausted from the hours of swinging the sword.
He stumbled to the inn his muscles screamed for rest.In his room he collapsed on his bed and logged out of the system.
Disconnected from the system he opened his eyes. A he felt a slight headache as he checked the clock on the wall for the time.
“Holy shit. Only a little over an hour passed?”
He sat up and put the headset on the couch. He tried to understand that only about an hour passed when he could remember training for over 10 hours. He sat there thinking for a while just thinking about the time difference while his headache faded away.
With this much time difference how am i supposed to do any quests?
He thought about it some more before he realized why the captain gave him the sheet of paper to record his time. The game developers must of realized that with such a major difference in time they would have to have a system which let npcs ignore the absences of players for a long period of time. The solution they came up with is having the npc record the amount of time the players actually interacted with them.
“Even with the time sheets I wonder how they will explain the world events and wars. I guess i'll find out when it happens, either way this is pretty cool I’m going to learn so much shit.”
After he pondered the time mechanics he stood up and went to the kitchen for some water and a small snack. He finished his snack and returned to the couch.
“I have a long way, I want to be able to learn some techniques from the captain I wonder how the skill system work? It shouldn't take years to learn a skill right? I hope not a least.” He returned the helmet to his head while he laid back down on the couch. He entered the game.