Natalie got up and stretched. She briefly considered junctioning a random spell into the magic stat, but it'd be such a minor improvement, it wouldn't make a difference. The spells were better used on monsters, as she'd get them all back later anyway.

Maybe she'd try to trade them to someone for cash, to hire a party member, to level the basic skills of Perun for her. At worst, she could party up with some people, to get less experience. The GF would still get the full experience, probably.

The woman walked out of the building while letting her mind wander. On the way, she passed a crowd growing in the hall on the bottom floor. The colourful people were arguing over which game offered the best benefits. No voice spoke up for the eight.

Natalie looked around the mostly empty plaza and smiled. Maybe, for just a couple hours beyond the Tutorial, she'd be the most powerful person on the planet. She laughed out loud. Wouldn't that be a treat?

The spiders and their desks were gone, but the massive, black crystal still stood in the middle of the plaza. The woman slowly made her way towards it, studying the people around it.

Two parties stood at opposite sides of the magical artefact, one dressed up for a LARP event and the other in military outfits. Closest to Natalie stood a lone about twelve years old girl. She had ashen blonde hair, tied in a pony-tail and wore a cheap pink t-shirt, gaudy gym pants and black and white PE sneakers. The girl's pale face seemed positively confused and afraid. The woman walked over to her and studied the child for a moment.

"Hello, I'm Natalie." She introduced herself with a calm and kind voice, smiling at the child. "Do you need some help?"

The girl turned towards the adult, frowned and waved her hands before her face. "Sorry, the screens didn't go away." The child looked Natalie up and down. "I'm Monica... and I don't know what class to pick or anything, do you know all this stuff?"

"I played quite a few games when I was a kid, so I do know a thing or two." Natalie squatted to come face to face with the kid. "What do you say we make a little exchange, you will help me level something up and I will help you get a really good System?"

"Why can't you level that thing up on your own? You won't cheat me into..." The woman interrupted the child, waving her hand.

"I just need a power of mine to level up, without levelling up myself. I've picked a rather unique System for myself." Natalie looked up in thought. "I will just need you to kill some monsters for like thirty or so minutes, then we can even start working together after you picked your own class."

The woman extended her arm for a handshake. "It's nothing difficult and if you will be locked into my System, you can just pick up that same power for yourself from a station in that villa over there." She pointed to the FF building.

"But I will have levels... so it's gonna suck." Monica squinted her blue eyes at the adult.

"Not at all, I will level up as soon as the Tutorial is over and for what I want to do, I could get as many as thirty levels without any drawbacks." Natalie chuckled and tilted her hand, palm up. "I just think I will have more fun if I will keep my level low a little while longer."

"How many levels do you want me to get?" The girl didn't let up.

Maybe she should have waited and picked a younger kid if there were any. Natalie grumbled internally but kept a warm expression. "About eleven."

"And you will help me get the best System?" Monica questioned and shook the adult's hand.

"Absolutely, bonkers busted powerful. If you will come with me after the tutorial, I will even help you get some amazing gear and a high level." The woman squeezed the kids hand and stood up. "Follow me, I will explain what I need as we walk."

"Actually... if you will be locked into my System... let's get you the super System first. We will see how you can help me after that." Natalie fixed her steps towards the villa. "Both Systems can look weak to most people, but they have massive potential for going out of control in the tutorial stages."

Monica nodded her head and followed slightly behind the adult. "If most people think they're weak... then aren't they weak?"

"The games are just a little annoying to play and the methods to break them aren't obvious. The one I picked, is rather counter-intuitive to how RPGs are played and the one for you, comes from a rather unpopular DLC of a game a lot of people were disappointed with." The woman explained. "Both games, also have rather bad magic systems... They're amazing for physical builds though... Well, the latter has some nice magic, but as I said, not that many people played it long enough to get to the cool stuff. It's DLC I mean."

"I think I want magic." The girl pouted.

"You will be able to teleport and hover in the air." At that, Monica's eyes sparkled. "You will also be able to craft amazing weapons, that will have spells attached to them."

The two reached the open doors and walked inside. "We can talk later, let's check the map and go grab your power."

The hall was still packed, so Natalie grabbed the girl's hand and squeezed through the crowd. The room marked XV was at the top floor, after a couple of minutes of squeezing between people the two got to the stairs and hurried up.

The women walked past a line of people waiting for their turn in the room marked XIV and entered a small corridor. There were a couple of doors, four marked with initials of various characters from XV and the final fifth with KG. "Alright, ours should be the KG one."

Behind the KG door, was an entire, Meditteranean-seeming town, marred with cables and trash. "We are looking for a ring, it's probably up the stairs."

"Was it some sort of zombie game?" Monica shot around worried glances.

"Nah, this DLC was set in a period of time when the bad guys ruled. You played as one of the survivors, trying to get back the main character of the game and save the world. At level thirty, my DLC character was stronger than the main character at the maximum level, by the way." Natalie chuckled and looked around the main courtyard of the hub. "Try that table over there, I will see if the 3D printer works."

The girl ran over to a small table, covered in various devices and after tapping some things, became transfixed on something in front of her face.

Natalie nodded and tried to manipulate the work-bench. A white screen popped in front of her face, but since she had no weapon to upgrade, there was nothing she could do with it. The woman sighed both disappointed and glad and after dismissing the screen, walked over to the child.

The kid noticed the adult and waved away her screen. "It says I can become a Kingsglave, is that it?"

"Yup, does it say if it will give you a ring?" Natalie leaned on the table and looked at the child, smiling warmly.

"It does, a symbol of a Kingsglave it says," Monica stated and tapped on the air. A ring appeared on her finger.

"I'd like to check something, could you try to give me the ring? I want to know if I should try to get one later." The woman asked and scratched the back of her head.

"Alright... here." The girl pulled off the ring and handed it over.

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Natalie swiftly put it on and checked her grey status. There was no equipment tab, so she waved it away and took off her left shoe. Armed with the mighty knock-off chankla, the woman threw her weapon at the crafting station. Immediately she felt a connection to her shoe and pulled on it.

The adult found herself standing in front of the 3D printer and laughed. "It works!!" She put her shoe back on and waved for the child. "Alright, take back the ring and let's see if I can give you my stuff."

Monica ran up to her, having trouble keeping her balance, because of the katana hanging off her waist. She put the ring on and trembling with excitement, threw the sword at a tent in the right corner of the courtyard. A moment later, in a streak of blue light, she teleported over to the weapon. "It feels like I'm stronger and I can totally teleport!" The girl jumped up and down in excitement.

"By the end of the tutorial, you will be at least five times stronger and coordinated." Natalie looked up in thought and studied the girl. "Try slashing your sword at the tent, then take a step back and slash again."

The kid did as instructed and her second slash sent off a magical slash, as tall as the tent. "Alright, that's how you want to fight, until you got yourself a shuriken or a crossbow. With them, you will be able to kind of fly."

Monica kept slashing at the tent until the shockwaves stopped coming out. "I think I broke it."

"You just run out of mana. Come over and let'ssss..." Natalie jumped to the side, as the katana struck the crafting station, just next to where she was standing.

"Sorry!!" The girl yelped, then yelped again, when she hit her forehead on the handle of the sword after warping.

"Yeah, I'm fairly certain real-life has friendly fire on." The woman threw out, after taking a deep breath.

"Anyway, let's party up and see if you can level up the skills for me," Natalie said, slightly shaking her head.

Monica Zajac joined your party.

The woman shrugged at the constantly changing colours of the System had to offer and navigated her status screen to junction Perun onto Monica. Then picked for it to learn the ability "Card".

Would you like to accept the Junction of Perun? Yes/No

The girl clicked yes.

Would you like for Perun to Learn "Card" Yes/No

Monica, once more chose yes.

"What now?" she asked while looking up at Natalie.

"We dissolve the party, you kill some monsters until Perun learned the ability and I watch from a distance while you do it" The woman answered and turned towards the stairs. "Then I will take the GF back and we can farm for some money, so I could get one of those rings too..." Natalie explained while the two walked, "Well, after that we can split ways, or we can continue as a party. I remember the recipes for the weapons here, so we can farm the ingredients for them and play some cards whenever we will get tired... until the end of the Tutorial."

"I can't see this... GF on my screen," the girl exclaimed confused.

"I couldn't see the ring either, I guess we can only see the equipment and abilities that are part of the System we picked first." The woman shrugged and opened the steel door in the barricade, letting the girl leave first. "It seems we can equip those things for party members though, so even if we will split, you will just have to find someone else with the eight's System... if you will want to get some other GFs in the future."

"Alright!" The girl yelled out, then sighed and shook her head. "Let's do it!"

You'd also need someone to slot in the spells and abilities, Natalie thought to herself.

Out in the main corridor, the two bumped into some very colourful people doing their best Noctis impressions. The woman nodded, glad that even people that picked XV seemed to lean towards the inferior version of it's System.

The hall downstairs emptied out to some extent, so Natalie and Monica didn't need to struggle through any crowds and swiftly found themselves back outside. "Let's go for the fields behind this villa."

The girl nodded and followed the adult towards the adventure. When they made it onto the grass, she opened her mouth and swiftly closed it, shaking her head. This adult might have only seemed nice.

You've been removed from the party.

"Alright, we can party up again, after you got Card unlocked. It should take you fourteen to thirty enemies. I'm not sure if you will get the message, so just go for twenty." Natalie explained and searched the plains for a sign of water. Off in the distance, to the right, there seemed to be some sparkling. Further, behind the sparkling stood a grey communications tower. And that's where I will find Siren. "Let's go over there, it might be water and the enemies on the beach offered the best experience to ability points ratio."

Monica took the lead, brandishing her copper katana.

The area nearest the villas was teeming with people forming lines for spawn points, kill stealing and just sitting down for picnics.

Here and there, someone got hit by a stray spell, having healers swarm around them, while the offender got swarmed by random people yelling at them to be more careful.

Both Natalie and Monica had to decline a dozen party invites from people, that didn't even introduce themselves, just sending them out randomly.

Finally, after passing all that commotion, they reached a wide beach, over a rather large pond. Here and there, orange fish-fins swam through the sand. "You want to fight those fishes in the sand if you will get hurt just run back to me and I will cast a Cure on you."

The girl threw her sword towards the nearest fish-fin, missing and teleported over to it. She withdrew the katana out of the sand, just in time to block the fish jumping out of the sand to attack her. Panicked, she took a step back and slashed blindly.

The flash of light flew out from the blade, cutting the monster in half and hitting another one behind it. The shower of gore Monica expected was nowhere to be found, as the fish dissolved into the air.

The next monster charged her without leaving the sand and cut her left inner thigh. The child yelped in pain, turned around and cut. The fish jumped out and hovered in the air, readying its next attack. Monica took a step back again and released another slash.

Seeing the second fish dissolve, she plopped to the ground and looked around for Natalie. The woman waded in the water, splashing her feet around. Before the girl could get annoyed, Natalie raised her hand, shook her head and a screen inviting Monica to a party appeared.

The girl accepted and another screen appeared, asking if she wanted to let the Party Leader take away the GF. "I need the GF to cast the healing spell!"

Monica accepted and a second later warm light spread through her body. Then, another screen asked her if she wanted to accept the Junction. Her hand trembled a little when she reached out to accept, but after a couple of deep breathes she calmed down. 

She looked down at her bloodied and torn pants and sighed. I won't come home, so mamma won't get angry I destroyed them.

The girl looked over to the adult playing around in the water and smiled slightly. She's got nice clothes, maybe she will buy me some.

Monica got up and looked around, another pair of fins swam further away from Natalie. She threw her sword again, this time hitting one of the monsters and she warped. She withdrew it, together with the fish.

She smacked a fish with a fish, took a step back and slashed. The monster stuck on the blade, dissolved, while the other one flopped out onto the ground. She cut into it, took a step back and released another shockwave.

She got hurt again, six kills later, but decided to bear through the pain. Two monsters after that a screen asking her to party up appeared before her again. She accepted, enjoyed the warmth of the healing spell and run for a trio of fins.

She threw her sword at the leftmost one, struck true and after warping, angled to cut through all three. The first fish died right away, while the others hovered in the air stunned. The girl cut, took a step back and released a slash. The two fishes dissolved.

The party invitation popped in her vision for the third time. "Alright, come over!! It's time to stop gaining experience!"

"I didn't get any levels yet!" Monica yelled out and warped towards a spot a couple of meters away from Natalie.

"Yeah, I did some calculations while playing in the water. I actually misremembered something. That level eleven wasn't what you'd gain from farming the GF experience, but rather what you needed to get ingredients for a weapon. A weapon we have absolutely no need for, since it sucks compared to the ones we will craft." The woman explained and scratched the back of her head. "Anyway, let's get some money, to hire some help and get a ring and some basic weapons for me. Then we will get my other GFs... and we will see... If you want to continue being in a party with me."

Monica looked up at the woman, nodded to herself and took a deep breath. "I'd like to go with you after the Tutorial."

The woman studied the child before her and shrugged. "I won't pry, it's fine. Let's get our stuff then... what game did you pick to get here, by the way?"

"WoW, my dad always plays it when I visit him on the weekends." The girl answered disinterestedly and followed the adult, skipping every few steps.