Chapter 5 – Don’t Know Why
Before Karlo could think any further on the topic, though, Mrs. Dandy came in with a plate of food. When she set it beside him, he saw that again there was no meat.
“I’ve been meaning to ask, do you just not eat meat in this world?”
“Hahaha, meat is an expensive delicacy reserved for the ultrarich. A hunter could probably get some, but it'd be far better to sell it to one of them rich folk.”
“I see,” he replied.
As she was about to leave again, Karlo quickly asked another question, “Before I came here, I asked a man for directions and after giving me a strange set of instructions he told me he didn’t know if you were on the desert or tundra side. Do you know what that was about?”
The old lady laughed, “He was just poking fun at ya. As for the part about the desert and tundra... don’t ask questions like that here. Ya see it’s a bit of a taboo. The truth is, though, he actually didn’t know. That entrance to those stairs you came down is ever-changing. Which makes me wonder, how did you find this place?
“Suppose you won’t answer that, but I’m guessing it has something to do with your lack of Qi, am I right?
“While we’re on the topic, how are you feeling now?”
Karlo tried to move around and found he was almost back to full strength. Looking at his panel, he found that his Qi had increased from 3 to 5. Since increased his Qi by 5 every hour, that meant 1 Qi every 12 minutes.
“As I thought, your recovery speed is simply something else. You’re just full of secrets, ain’t ya,” she said with a glint in her eye.
Karlo was a bit spooked.
“Haha, I was only joking. Don’t take everything so seriously. Anyway, when you’re done eating that, get up and help me with something,” then she left.
‘That woman gives me the creeps. But, my talent hasn’t told me that anything weird is going on, or that she has any malice towards me. I meant to ask how she knows about players, but when I was about to, I had a feeling that I shouldn’t.’
Eventually, he decided to post on the forum and see if anyone on there knew.
Natives/NPCs know about players? Is this true? How much do they know? Why do they know?
While he ate, he garnered a few replies. One of them actually attempted to answer his questions.
First off, yes. Nearly all natives know of players, but only some have deeper information. How much they know is impossible to tell, but they are certainly not ignorant, many of them may know more than even us. Lastly, I have some ideas about why they know, but I can’t answer as it involves game world history.
‘I guess that makes sense...’ Karlo thought to himself.
When he finished eating, he got up and went out of the room. By now, his Qi had replenished to 6, and he was feeling great, not to mention the food he just ate.
Walking out, he was greeted by a store full of clothes, only he was behind the reception desk instead of at the entrance. There wasn’t a single customer, though. Looking around, the room was bright, but he couldn't see a single light source.
“Hey, you’re up!”
Karlo turned and saw a little blue-haired girl beside him.
“You scared me. I thought you were gonna die! Oh yeah, granny said to tell you to go to that room when you came out,” she pointed to a door on the other side of the reception.
“Thank you,” he replied.
When he entered, he immediately realized this was where the clothes were made.
Standing at a large table, covered with a piece of brown fabric, was Mrs. Dandy.
“Hey there. Just in time. Grab that black thread, would ya?”
Karlo quickly handed the roll to her while a thought went through his mind. He decided to just ask.
“Why didn’t I get a mission for that?”
She scoffed, “You think any haphazard task can give a mission? That would be too easy for you and the mission giver.”
Unauthorized usage: this narrative is on Amazon without the author's consent. Report any sightings.
That gave rise to another question, “Do you have a panel too?”
“I know what you mean, and no I don’t. But something similar to that shows up every time a native gives a mission.
“Now, I’m almost finished making that coat for Old Garber, take a good look at the thread I’ve used so far.”
When Karlo took a closer look at the fabric on the table, he saw the shadow of a thick brown coat coming together. Carefully observing the thread, at first, he noticed nothing unusual, but he soon began to see it glow white. It was Qi! But, when he blinked, the glow disappeared and it returned to black.
“You’ve seen it, right? I’ve used Qi infused thread thus far. You see, Garber is a dear friend of mine, and I wanted to make the best possible coat for him that I could,” she said with a sniffle.
“I just hate to see him freezing in the cold, but alas, I have run out of Qi infused thread. If only someone could help me get some more.”
[Accept Grade (F+) Mission?]
While Karlo found her over-acting funny, he responded in turn.
“Never fear! I shall provide the Qi infused thread you seek.”
While internally, he said, ‘Accept.’
[Accepted Mission: Mrs. Dandy’s Qi Infused Thread (F+)
Mission Objective: Give Mrs. Dandy a roll of Qi infused thread (0/1)
Increased Reward: 1 Silver Coin; Technique: Qi Infusion (Lv +1)]
Karlo’s eyes brightened, but before he had even managed to get excited, Mrs. Dandy put the brakes on.
“Hahaha, boy. Even though you got secrets, you’re still a bit stupid, ain’t ya. This mission will be a lot harder than you think.
“Rolls of Qi infused thread are very expensive. With your meagre belongings, you’d be lucky to get an inch. That means you’ll have to make the stuff yourself.
“While you might have a Qi technique or two, I’m certain you don’t have Qi infusion.
“Also, I wouldn't recommend quitting the mission. Even though your panel doesn’t say anything about punishments, they certainly exist, and they ain’t pretty.”
Despite what she was saying, Karlo didn’t think he had made the wrong decision. His talent hadn’t alerted him to any problems, and it hadn’t steered him wrong thus far.
Seeing his determined look, Mrs. Dandy smiled, “Here, use this roll of thread to practice,” she handed him back the black thread he had given her.
“Cut off a few inches first and try. Also, don’t collapse with Qi deficiency again. Now get out of here. You can go to that bedroom you were in before, I gotta keep working.”
Although Karlo still had many questions, he left with the hope he could get them answered later.
Walking back through the reception, the blue-haired girl was dealing with a customer. He couldn't see the person's face under their shadowy cloak, but their large frame looked funny next to the little girl.
In the bedroom, he sat on the bed with thread in hand. His Qi was now at 7, so he thought now was as good a time as any to start.
He first checked the time by the clock on the wall, which read 3:05. Now that he thought about it, he hadn’t seen any other mechanical device in this world besides these clocks. Anyway, he’d think about that later.
He cut off a short section of thread. Observing carefully, he noticed that although no Qi flowed through it, the way it was formed had some similarities to the Qi paths in his own body.
The first step of Qi infusion, Karlo thought, was controlling the Qi in his body. Before he blacked out for the first time, he had managed to control Qi outside his body, so he concluded it could only be easier to control Qi inside. How wrong he was.
What he had failed to take into consideration was his mental state at that time. He was in a state of near-perfect focus. While his hunger and lack of sleep should have been a detriment, in that case, they proved to be an asset, putting his mind and body in a condition between awake and asleep.
Now, there was none of that. He had recovered a lot, and many distracting thoughts were flitting through his mind.
After an hour, he was sweating buckets, but he had managed to push a tiny bit of Qi into his fingertips. Now came the hardest part, to push the Qi out of his fingers out of his body and into the thread.
He couldn't lose his concentration for even a moment, or the Qi would simply go back to his Dantian.
The contribution of his talent to getting this far couldn't be discounted. Even without using the QI Sense technique, which would drain his Qi before he could even infuse it, his talent allowed him to see the Qi flowing through his body extremely clearly.
He had actually reached this point multiple times within the last hour, but whether because of losing his focus or the fact that he didn’t know how to push the Qi outside his body, he had failed every time.
He knew he was on the right track. He had seen the guard produce a ball of fire directly above his palm. The only question was how to get the Qi from the inside to the outside, and now he had an idea.
This time, instead of trying to push the Qi directly out of his fingers, once it was close enough, he transferred the Qi from its own pathways to his bloodstream. This took a long time, but once he managed it, he then pushed the Qi from his blood to his pores.
“Aha, ha, hahaha. YES!”
Unexpectedly, it worked. The small bit of Qi flowed into the thread with no issue. Suddenly, he felt like he could do it again easily.
‘Maybe...’
He opened his panel and sure enough:
[Karlo Berrio
Cultivation: F
Qi: 9/10
Life: 60yrs
Affiliations: Yellow, Blue
Talents: Truth Seeker
Techniques: True Basic Qi Gathering (5/per hour); Qi Sense (Lv. 1); Qi Infusion (Lv. 1)]
‘I knew it! Yet another technique gained. Wait, then what about the reward for this mission?’
Looking again, he saw under the reward, [1 Silver Coin; Technique: Qi Infusion (Lv +1)]. In other words, no matter what level the technique was currently at, be it 5, 10, or 0, it would gain a level.
‘This could be an opportunity, if I can level the technique up again before the end of this mission, it’ll be level 3!’
He didn’t have dreams of leveling it any higher than that for now.
It seemed his Qi had been fully replenished, but he used 1 just now.
Looking again at the spool of thread, there didn’t seem to be much, maybe 50 meters. At least the old woman has a bit of sense, Karlo thought.
He unrolled a few meters length and laid it on the ground then, grabbing the end, he activated Qi Infusion.
The sense Karlo got was ease, almost enough to make him question all his efforts beforehand.
His Qi decreased by 1 and observing the thread he saw that about 1 meter had been filled.
‘1 Qi for every meter, that’s 50 Qi for 50 meters. Looks like I’m gonna be here a few hours. Damned old woman.’
Although he thought like that, he wasn’t unhappy at all. This would give him time to increase his technique level. And another thing, he still had a bunch of questions that needed answering.