Lance found himself inside a dome of light, "Um Cletus, did the game break?"
"Nope, this is just the loading construct. If you are respawning you will do it here as well. Fifteen seconds to game entry, the threat level is six."
"Okay, I am going to guess that this threat level is out of one hundred, right," Lance asked.
"Nope, that is out of ten."
"You mean I am spawning into danger?"
"Yup, not normal, but spawn points into the game are somewhat random." Cletus offered. "Ten seconds."
Lance looked himself over and noticed that he was dressed in a leather shirt, leather pants, and some simple leather shoes. He did not see anything else, no backpack, no weapons. "Going to need weapons, Cletus!"
"Just think about equipping your daggers," Cletus instructed.
Lance did and two very normal iron daggers, a foot long each, appeared in his hands. He thought about sheathing them on his hips, and as fast as he thought it, they were there. "Nice."
"Five seconds."
"Any advice here?" Lance asked.
"I would crouch down. Entering the game... now"
As Lance squatted, he found himself behind a rock at the back of a canyon. The walls were three times as tall as he was and nearly vertical. The area was very narrow where he stood, maybe two yards wide at the most, but it widened out to be easily three times that wide as it moved downhill. Twenty yards ahead, he could see that it bent sharply to the left. The rock he was behind was a yard across and about the same hight.
The walls of the canyon were shiny black, maybe obsidian or something similar, and the floor of the canyon was littered with small chips of the same stone. Lance reached down and grabbed a small piece and almost cut himself on the small chip of rock he picked up. This is not obsidian, he realized, but an entire canyon of flint.
He looked over to the sulking pink ballerina sitting on his shoulder.
Cletus crossed his or maybe her dainty arms and glared at him. Seriously you had to pick this, this is really what you want me to look like while you get into a bloody fight with some goblins?
Lance realized that Cletus was communicating to him silently so he responded the same way, thinking thoughts at his assistant. Come on dude, I asked you what other options there were, and the only reply you had was that your current form was your natural state and the best form. So I just popped off with the first thing that came to my mind.
Why in the world would you be thinking of a ballerina a few moments before diving into an immersive fantasy world? Cletus responded with a huff.
It had been a shock to Lance as well. The only thing he could think of was Julie, his fiancée, who had studied ballet for many years. Being homeschooled, they both got to choose their physical education class. Julie had chosen dance and he had chosen Jujitsu. Earning his black belt had been one of the highlights of his young life. Homeschooling certainly had its advantages.
Looking over at Cletus again, he realized that the last thing he wanted Cletus to look like was a ballerina, too much pain in that direction still. Have you seen the movie 'Guardians of the Galaxy'?
Cletus’ eyes went out of focus for a couple of seconds, Yeah, just watched it, pretty funny.
You just watched it?
Yeah, that is what AIs do, we consume media to learn how to be more like a real person. Not really sure that movie helped, however.
Lance shook his head. Anyway, Groot or Rocket, your choice.
What do you mean by ‘my choice’?
Unless you want to be a ballerina forever then pick one of them for your shape.
Can I make some small changes?
Sure, but no horns or devil tails, okay?
Cletus disappeared in a puff of smoke, and when it cleared, a small raccoon was standing in the air near Lance’s shoulder dressed in black leather with knife handles sticking out of sheaths on both hips. How’s that? Cletus’ voice even sounded a bit like Bradley Cooper’s.
Perfect, Lance realized that he was still not moving his mouth when he was talking to Cletus. This was probably a good thing considering he was crouched behind a rock in a canyon and the threat level was six out of ten.
Lance thought about equipping his daggers, and suddenly he was holding them again. He remembered something he had read about the game and thought heads-up display.
Superimposed over his vision was an expansive interface. In the top right corner, green and red bars glowed with an internal fire, emerald and ruby with a moving light behind them. Below that were his basic stats.
Hey Cletus
What's up?
I am looking over my HUD and noticed I have a stat called willpower, what is that?
Cletus smiled over at him, Fast learner I see. In this game we simulate pain, but you can set the intensity you experience however strong or light you like. Sometimes people are fighting in such a way that one person or the other will eventually give in. We use the pain that each of them would be experiencing without the in-game dampening and use their willpower as a divisor to see who would win the battle. That sort of thing.
Oh, I get it, like a toughness scale.
Pretty much, Cletus replied.
Toughness was one of the things that Jujitsu had taught Lance. He would certainly be pushing that stat up. I have more dexterity, strength, and constitution than the other stats, what is up with that?
That is the standard loadout for Thief. You specialize in dexterity, of course, but you are also going to have a little more strength and constitution than the average starting mage or healer.
Okay, can I move one of the points of strength over to willpower? His stats immediately changed to reflect his wishes.
Yup, each time you gain a level, you get five points to distribute however you like. You can move those around any way you want until your next level up when you need to lock them in.
Lance thought about that for a moment, So you mean I could push up my dexterity to cross a tightrope, and then push all of those points into intelligence to figure something out?
Yup, it can be fairly dramatic at the early levels, but as you move up, it will affect you less. The developers wanted you to be able to play around with stats and learn about them firsthand. At level one, you get seven points to move around, so enjoy.
Lance moved all seven into dexterity. He immediately felt lighter on his feet and quicker of hand. Moving them into constitution made him feel more solid, almost an increased density to his flesh. Strength made him feel, well stronger. When he moved everything into intelligence, he did not notice any difference. So intelligence does not feel any different.
If you were standing in front of a puzzle you might be getting visual hints on how to solve it right now, Cletus said.
Lance moved all seven into Wisdom, and suddenly the world appeared in sharper detail. Whoa, wisdom is interesting.
All of the stats have two basic uses. Strength makes you stronger and increases the damage of some weapons. Dexterity is similar. Constitution increases your base hit points and allows you to heal faster. Willpower increases your stamina and allows you to win battles of will. Wisdom increases the mana of a Healer as well as perception. Intelligence increases the mana of a Mage as well as assists with puzzles and the like.
Lance was amazed at how things looked. He looked around and then looked at himself. As he was examining his shoes, he noticed a faint grey outline on the ground. He popped one of his daggers into his hand and dug around below the flint and felt the tip chunk into something wooden. He cleared away enough flint to be able to see a small wooden box. Digging it out using the dagger took a moment, but soon enough, he had the box in his hands. It looked like a solid piece of wood to him, but it was too perfectly cube-shaped. He moved all of his points back into intelligence and saw a small, barely noticeable arrow on one of the faces. He took his thumb and pushed the wood in that direction. He heard a small click, and the side he was pushing on popped open like a lid. Inside the now-opened box was a small ring that looked to be made of iron. He picked it up, and a notification popped into his HUD.
Reading on this site? This novel is published elsewhere. Support the author by seeking out the original.
Lance looked at the ring and thought, equip, and the ring was suddenly on the pointer finger of his right hand. He cleared the notification, moved a point into each to willpower and constitution and five into dexterity, and looked again at the stats on his HUD and was satisfied.
"Nice", Lance said out loud and then cringed. He had been communicating with Cletus in his mind, speaking out loud in this environment was probably a mistake.
Immediately he heard a shuffling in the stone down the canyon. As he listened, he noticed that whatever it was, it was coming closer. He peeked around the rock and saw that a green creature had just come around the corner and was heading his way. A nameplate hovered over the creature's head, identifying it as a
This was it, he had been dreaming about getting into a game fight in a fully immersive game, and here he was. His hands were clammy, and his heart was pounding, but he was excited!
Lanced peeked around the side of the rock. He watched as the goblin moved slowly up the canyon, its feet crunching through the sharp bits of rock. Maybe four feet tall, its skin was a bumpy green. In its gnarled right hand, it gripped a short sword that was not much larger than one of Lance’s daggers. While it approached, it swung its ugly head left and right, clearly using its bulbous eyes to look for him. As it neared the large rock that Lance was hidden behind, it sniffed, and a grin revealed a mouth full of cracked and yellowed teeth.
"Come out, foolish human." It hissed.
Lance was evidently supposed to kill this thing, and he had already decided that since this was a game and the goblin was not a person in any sense of the word, it would be fine to kill it. But now that it came down to it, Lance found himself a little freaked out; this all felt so real. His hair stood up on his arms, and he struggled to keep his breathing quiet.
Lance brushed aside the notification with a simple thought.
The goblin began moving to the left side of the rock, which was a little taller than the right side, so Lance quietly climbed onto the rock. The goblin suddenly leaped forward, stabbing his sword near where Lance had been. It was looking down, so it had not yet seen Lance when he dropped on top of the little green man and wrapped his arm around its neck and his feet around its waist.
"Get 'em," Cletus yelled.
One of the strongest traits of a jujitsu-ka was the ability to grapple with an opponent. This had been Lance’s specialty, and he was relieved that those abilities seemed to be transitioning over smoothly. Lance summoned a dagger into his right hand and drew it across his opponent’s neck. He felt the knife cut through the goblin's skin.
< You have gained the ambush skill>
Lance found the right place in his HUD and turned off the updates for skill and ability levels as he did not want to be distracted during a fight. Then he quickly patted down the goblin and found three copper coins and the short sword he had been carrying. As soon as he grabbed the coins they disappeared, presumably into his inventory. He sheathed his weapons and then picked up the goblin’s short sword and examined it.
Not something he would ever use but ‘beggars can’t be choosers’ he thought. He imagined inventory and his HUD shifted to show a grid of 20 slots. The first slot showed a water drop with a small 10 next to it, the second a biscuit with the same count. He imagined the sword in the bottom right slot and it disappeared from his hand and appeared in icon form where he had wanted it.
He minimized his HUD and looked at the goblin again. It was dressed in rags but his eyes settled on the small humanoid’s boots. They were made from dark leather and looked sturdy. He pulled them off the goblin’s feet and as he did they increased slightly in size. Intrigued, Lance sat down, pulled off his own leather shoes, and tried to slip the boots on his feet. As he had hoped they grew in size until they were a perfect fit for his feet.
"Hey Cletus"
"Yup"
"How does this work, do all items automatically fit like this?"
"No", Cletus responded, "Only ones with magical properties."
Lance looked harder at the boots.
"Sturdy Boots" hovered over his new shoes.
"I am not seeing any magical properties"
Cletus nodded, "You either need a high enough combined wisdom and intelligence, like you had with the ring, or you can bring the items to a blacksmith, mage, or priest who may be able to identify the item for you"
Wearing unidentified items was always a danger, so Lance decided to remove the boots.
"You may not remove these boots."
Cletus had a smug look on his face as he pulled out his tome and flipped through it. "A couple of possibilities here, but most likely, those are cursed in some way."
Lance groaned. Five minutes in, and he was already making mistakes.
Lance noticed the green bar that he assumed was stamina was significantly down from full. As he stayed in sneak mode, moving quietly down the canyon, it continued reducing. So sneak takes stamina. Makes sense, he thought.
When he got to the corner, he peeked around and saw that the canyon quickly shifted from black flint to dirt and rocks. Beyond that, there was a camp with three or four goblins visible. One of them kept looking up the canyon in his direction.
"Cletus, how does this trap thing work again?"
"Easy, you need to touch the surface you want to trap, picture an area, from one to ten square yards, then imagine the elemental damage you want to do and then what will trigger it."
Lance walked up to the bend in the canyon, reached down to touch the ground then imagined an area just inside his side of the canyon that spanned the width of the canyon about a yard wide. Next, he imagined one goblin crossing it and then imagined it exploding with fire as a second goblin crossed it. When he was done he could see an area on the ground that was deep red-brown in his interface where his trap had been set. He picked up a larger piece of flint, walked across the trap and around the corner, dropped stealth, threw the rock at the goblin who kept looking up, and hollered, "Hey you foolish green slob, come get me!", and ran back up the canyon. He heard the goblins yelp and then start yammering as they ran in his direction. Three of them came around the corner together and entered the trap at nearly the same time.
The trap exploded with heat and light just as Lance dove behind the rock at the back of the canyon. He could hear screams and confusion erupt from where the goblins had triggered the trap. Then a louder and deeper voice reached his ears, "Yous gonna pay for dis!"
Lance's body suddenly felt filled with light and pleasure. It was easily the most extreme sensation he had ever felt, but he tried to ignore it, this was a bad time for leveling up he thought.
Lance quickly moved four points into dexterity, one each into wisdom, intelligence, and willpower, then mentally chose to confirm those choices. Next, he moved all five of his new points into dexterity. The offer of a new ability was interesting but it was not a great time to think through the options as he was in the middle of a fight. Then he checked his health and stamina bars which were completely full; he figured they had been filled up by gaining the new level, a fairly standard game mechanic. He enabled stealth and hid behind the rock. He heard boots crunching up the canyon. Peeking around the corner, he saw a goblin who was much larger than the one he had killed. It was wearing armor, carrying a shield, and brandishing a very sharp-looking blade. Lance slid behind the rock and pondered his situation. First, it had been foolish to pull the entire goblin camp as he had; there could be 20 of them out there for all he knew. Second, there was no way he could go toe to toe with this strong of an opponent, but his mind was not coming up with any quick solutions to his problem. One thing was certain, however, being trapped in this corner while this beast poked him to death with its sword was not an attractive option.
Lance quickly peeked out at the approaching goblin. Much of the goblin’s armor was made up of hides, and there were many singed areas, but the goblin itself looked completely unharmed. The shield was round, made of sturdy-looking wood, bound around the edges with metal, and it had a large spike set directly in the center.
Lance made a decision, dropped stealth, and sprinted from his hiding place, trying to dart around the creature. But the goblin was much quicker than he had expected, and any hope of sprinting past it was dashed as the goblin swung its sword in a great overhand blow. Lance skidded to a stop and barely dodged the blow. The hammer-like swing smashed into the flint, throwing sparks and casting bits of shattered flint at Lance. Lance took a couple of quick steps backward and thought, "Oh well, toe to toe it is, then."
The goblin did not charge in immediately; this gave Lance a chance to examine the creature. Above its head, a nameplate floated,
Lance glanced at the walls. Until he gained a climbing skill, there was no way out except past the goblin. So Lance advanced a step. This seemed to catch his opponent by surprise because its eyes widened, and then it swung its sword in the same overhand blow as before. Lance stepped back, and the Goblin calmed. It’s waiting for backup. Lance thought, and then a plan formed in his mind. Lance again stepped forward, but when the goblin began the same overhand swing, instead of retreating, he dashed right up inside the goblin's guard. He took hold of the leather of its armor, lowered his hips below the goblin’s center of gravity, pressed them into its thigh, and gave a steady pull forward. It did not take much work as the goblin was already overbalanced with its overhand swing. As the goblin began tipping forward, Lance raised his hips to lift the goblin higher and used the side of his leg to increase the spin. The small green man’s feet were soon directly over its head, and its sword was striking directly into the ground. It wasn’t a perfect hane goshi throw, but it was not bad.
The goblin sergeant landed directly in front of Lance, having dropped its sword. Lance could not reach its neck, but he stretched out with his dagger and slashed directly across its sword arm’s wrist, cutting deep.
"Yeah!" Cletus shouted. "I love that kung fu stuff!"
"Jujitsu not kung fu, Cletus."
"Whatever"
The goblin howled and scrambled to its feet. Its wrist was bleeding profusely and completely limp; the hand was clearly unusable.
"I’m gonna smash you!" it howled as it raised its shield and charged.
Lance was again amazed at how quick his enemy was and was only able to step partly out of the way of the charge. The edge of the shield clipped Lance’s left side, and he was spun around.
Lance had no time to dodge this time, and so he grabbed the top of the shield, planted his foot just below the spike, and fell backward. The forward momentum of his opponent caused the goblin to slam into its own shield before sliding to one side and cartwheeling away. Lance tried to hang onto the shield, but his hands were just not strong enough to do so.
This time it was the goblin’s turn to look dazed. It was on its back, clearly trying to catch its breath. Lance scrambled over to the goblin and tried to stab it in the eye, but the creature used its disabled arm to swipe the blow into its shoulder instead. The goblin's health bar dipped below twenty percent. Lance knew that the goblin was stronger than he was, but he had a clear weight advantage, so he quickly moved to kneel on the goblin’s shield. It had its arm firmly strapped to the back of the shield, so doing this would take its one good arm out of the fight. He pulled his dagger out of his opponent’s shoulder and plunged it back in again, taking another ten percent of the goblin's hit points.
The goblin roared with frustration and rolled toward him in an attempt to bite his leg, but Lance simply summoned his other dagger and plunged it into the side of its neck.