Logged off, Dmitri was a bit stunned.
He knew he would die eventually, but wow, it was intense. He was tackled by a giant rock turtle.
-What to do now?
He had an hour and a half.
He looked at himself. He didn't like it.
He remembered how he created the character, how he had abs and a mermaid line, how he was, kinda nice you know?
Then he remembers Bjarke, he was pretty big, but he was a guard, totally a power type.
Maybe….
Maybe he can do something about it?
Not gym, no no, can't go, but here, in my home…
-Browser!.... Oops
He found a personal trainer with things to do at home, he bought the plan and started right away.
After one hour he was exhausted, he couldn't even finish it all. But he chose this. He… He will try.
Taking a shower and a light meal it was time to enter the game again.
Daylight, late afternoon, in the temple.
-Maybe a bath, to take off the grime of losing.
And so he did.
-Is there something different I can do?
The main problem is the footing. I need something for that.
-Browser.
There is a catalogue of found skills, maybe I can find something for me.
-Ah, found it. Balance and Evasion. These two can help us, Axis. Now for something for you.
There aren't that many tamers, but the ones that exist really love it. There is a forum thread only for photos with your tames. Mitras wants to upload one with Axis but he is too embarrassed for that.
-There.
Apparently monsters also need Mana Manipulation, so most tamers drop their first tames when they get magical tames or really high level ones.
-But I won't do that. Right, Axis? But how am I supposed to teach you Mana Manipulation? Do I have to wait till expert?
He might do that. First he will start using some time for meditation, that will increase his mana manipulation.
Night came and with it the time he usually goes hunting.
With his new mini map feature he found the place he died pretty fast, but instead of going for revenge he instead looked around.
Hot, humid air. Trees everywhere, roots all around.
Good place to practise.
He could do that while fighting. He probably would get the skills faster, but he is more of a safe guy.
First the forms. He needs d to get Balance. He needs to be able to dance, one of his basic skills, on any footing.
And so the training started.
Dancing on vines is hard and he used his dancing set, so he wasn't wearing boots, but some footwear made from lizard skin. A gecko nonetheless.
Is this how ballet dancers feel when training? The feet hurting, toes bursting, legs burning.
But gods, the state of mind he would get some times. Like he was one of the fabled nymphs of the forest, dancing with the leaves, their only partners the trees themselves. The moon bathing their forms.
It was exhilarating.
Adquire Balance Untrained skill
It took the whole night, but he did it. He can't keep up for now, his body too hot, too wet.
Finding a place to sit, he meditated. The mana antes coming from the ground itself into him. Nourishing his body with mana.
He knows where to put his two skill points. Mana Manipulation and Balance. But he needs both at level 10. So that's his goal for now.
It's not hard to level untrained skills, it's about three days in the forest, dancing even on top of the trees by day two. Using the river to refresh himself.
He was ready for Tortles.
And ready he was. It was a tortuous battle. It took forever. But with his new balance skill he didn't need to worry about half of the problems of the fight. Footing.
At long last, he won. Taking the body as loot and a skill as a reward.
Adquire Evasion skill
----------------------------------------
Hunting, meditating, looking for mice.
Hunting, meditating, looking for mice.
That was his week.
Mitras found two other monsters. A spider-like creature, Hidessin, had four legs and it could close them on itself and look like a log or a branch.
He thought of catching it, but spiders were arachnids, not insects. So he changed his mind.
He also found a sentient mushroom Gasper, it didn't have eyes but it could and would move towards you. It clearly had some kind of toxic cloud coming out of it. This is because although Mitras stayed far away, Axis got close and he got:
Adquire Poison Resistance
-Where are they?!
Is it in the morning? Afternoon? Night? Where do you find the Miry? Daira said they weren't hard to find.
-Browser!
Let's look up mice in the wild. There should be something worthwhile.
-Hmm underground, underbrush… Vines! I gotta look for these places, they will be like the Rolling Beetles.
This time, Mitras didn't hunt anymore, he looked around trees that had undergrowth. Trees that were too close together to see if there were vines.
In his search for these things he always kept the small river close. It would increase in size little by little, almost imperceptibly. But always calm.
It was in one of the times he was relaxing in the river he saw it was now coming from in between heavily leafed trees.
He got close. He had to climb the trees a little, but just as he passed them there was a clearing.
A little glade formed here, where the water nascent was. And in it many mice, each with different textures and colours walked around.
He found it.
You might be reading a stolen copy. Visit Royal Road for the authentic version.
-Finally…
Slowly he approached, but the mice were very sensitive and quickly ran away.
-Slow is the way.
He sat near the water and meditated. He already spent his skills points so now he needed lvl 30 in Mana Manipulation. That's a lot.
He spent a whole day there, doing the same thing. But it was worth it, because it was after a couple of tens of hours that the mice got used to him.
On the second day, the mice would walk over him.
On the third some would even sleep.
His mana ants were lively too. Being in this glade. Something here was magical. He marked it on his map.
He could feel like his colony was much bigger, stronger, resistant.
But he had to leave. He can't stay here forever, he had other skills to level, quests to complete, people to meet.
Quests? Quests! Vines!
Don't alarm them!
Mitras opened his eyes and looked around. There it is, the vines. They should really be the ones Otto talked about.
Starting to move, he spooked a little, some of the mice, but they were already used to his presence and scent. Finding the right Miry's, strawberry and blackberry.
-Catch’em… Catch’em…
He didn't even look at their status. They wouldn't be his.
Looking for his handicraft kit, he took a knife and started cutting the vines. Not taking all of them, nor taking all of it. Always leaving parts and some behind. However, the glade hasn't been visited, it appears, in a long while, so he got quite a lot of them.
Time to go back .
----------------------------------------
It's been two weeks.
Two whole weeks.
It's night, he's tired, he has Axis on his head and two mice each on one of his shoulders. He needs a bath. A real one.
Mitras waves at the guard at the gate and goes directly to the common baths.
During the night it's the best because he gets to be mostly alone.
Ready, cleaned, relaxed, he goes to the guild. In the best time possible. Night time.
-Hi Ella.
-Now there's someone I haven't seen in a while. Is it the quest you brought last time?
-Yes, I finally finished.
-Wow, it did take a while huh. Didn't look that hard.
-It wasn't hard, but it was.
-Are these two on your shoulders the ones?
-Yup.
-Great, let me do some paperwork and we'll send someone to Daria.
-Thank you.
It didn't take long, maybe half an hour, maybe an hour. Mitras was just sitting on a couch, basking on the comfortableness of it all.
-Aaah!
-I see them! I see them!
-He did it!
-Calm down you two!
These are definitely the kids.
-Hello Daria, hello kids.
-You did it!
-You did it!
-Hello Mitras and thank you…
-No problem, but what now? Do they have the Tame skill? How do we do that?
-They got the Animal Handling skill in the pet store, it's the skill for pets, more than for battle tames.
-I see…
Mitras hand over each excited kid their respective Miry, and when getting close a window appears.
Bequeath Miry1
Bequeath Miry2
He accepts and imagines that this is all.
-Again, thank you, really.
-It's so cute!
-It's so fluffy!
-N-no problem, it was a quest, I did it.
They finished the paperwork, Mitras got his archeologist kit and said their goodbyes. Daria thanked him a few more times as well as the children.
The day ended, the quest ended and now he had another quest to end, but he could do so only in the morning. So he logged off. There was an idea of meditating, but just thinking of people seeing him do that made him anxious. So no.
Logging off it is.
Time for his exercising routine.
One hour later, he was ready to die, he took a shower, ate something and logged on.
-I need to log off one day and take care of the house…
Walking in the direction of Otto's place, he took the sight of the town. It seemed very bright. The sun, the people, the sea. Tairo was really a nice town.
-Otto are you there?
-Of course honey, always.
-Look what I've brought.
Taking out some of the vines to show him, he quickly got up from his workbench.
-Is this it?
He started pulling the vine and twisting it.
-This is it! Wow you did it, here let me grab some reward for you… Hmmm what would be good? Ah here.
He brought an apron. A very cute one with a little bear on it.
This is one of my works, I haven't used it because I got used to the old one, so you can have it!
Adquire Bearish Apron +2 skill points to Handicraft skill
-Thank you! I love it! I love bears.
-Then it's perfect. Uhum. Keep it and I'll buy from you some of the vines, I want to try some crochets.
Selling Otto about 20 Vines, leaving Mitras with 30, he leaves again to the guild, this time to give the bodies he had on his sack.
-26 Vinners, 14 Bories, 8 Gaspers, 9 Tortles and 12 Hidessins. That's a lot, do you want any material?
-You know what, no, I can just farm it again, and I need the money.
-Okay give an hour.
One hour later.
-Here, a total of 1 gold 5 silver.
-Thank you.
-You're welcome, do come back.
Now with 3 gold and 2 silver, Mitras feel very rich.
Invitation received for Sunstar Guild
-Hey Mitras, did you get it?
-Huh? Wha? Wait what? Fayt?
-The invitation, quick accept it.
-O-ok
-Yes! Now you're part of our guild, we just made it. Now we're trying to get money to buy a place in town.
-You can do that?
-Yes! It's gonna be our HQ!
-That's cool…
-I see you are not level 20 yet, so you're a little behind us, but you can help us anyway. While we do quests for money, do some crafting, Tasha and Beary need new robes and whatever you can do. If you can do something for me or Tagmar even better.
-O-ok, I think I have time, I just finished a quest and got some new material.
-Great it's decided then. Do the crafting, if you need a specific material tell us, we'll get it for you.
-Oh wow, thank you.
-Nah that's what guilds are for.
Mitras already had an idea of what to do, he just needed to confirm one thing.
-Browser!
How long it takes to respawn items.
-24 in game hours… Ok! I can do it, let's do some clothes.
Dmitri Mitras Guild: Sunstar Human Level 16 (PW 7) HP: 29 MP: 31 Skills: SP: 1 Health - Trained 4 Mana - Trained 6 Common Language - Untrained 10 Dance - Trained 17 Tame - Trained 11 Charm - Untrained - 10 Handicraft - Trained 5 Stealth - Untrained 10 Drawing - Untrained 5 Scribing - Untrained 3 Throw - Trained 7 Mana Manipulation - Trained 7 Scout - Untrained 7 Balance - Trained 2 Evasion - Untrained 5
Spells Catch'em (5 MP), Cheer (2 MP Sustained), Identify (0 MP), Inventory (10 MP), Cupid Blow (2 MP)
Rolling Beetle Axis Insect Level 16 (PW 2) Skills SP: 3 Health: 6 MP: 5 Health - Trained 3 Mana - Trained 0 Carapace - Trained 15 Aerodynamics - Untrained 10 Aim - Trained 10 Poison Resistance - Untrained 4