Before you read:
This is my first fanfic which was loosely used as a rough draft for my FF Reaper which is already submited and has 6 chapters. (or more depending on how long it has been since I uploaded this) This FF, Imperator, has 6 chapters and I will not be making any more. My reasons for uploading this is so I could get feedback on my writing to further improve. It would be great if I could get input as to whether or not there is an improvement between the two FFs. The biggest aspect of my writing I was trying to improve was characterization, which I beleive I have improved on to some degree, although I’m still not happy with it.
If you have read my FF Reaper then the begining of the first chapter will be very familiar, however, the story line changes dramatically from there on. This FF also has the character Nile which did not appear in Reaper, but will likely be getting his own FF called the Holy Archer. I already have half of the first chapter written. Any input on how to improve the storyline of The Holy Archer would be apprecieated, I plan to keep the plot similar to this FF, but with many changes to improve.
Side note: I did not know how to make table as of writing this, however, my current FFs do have tables in them.
-Do you want to connect to Royal Road?-
"Sure."
-Welcome to Royal Road. Please select an avatar name.-
"Baron."
-What gender would you like: Male, Female, or neutral?-
"Male"
-Royal Road has 49 different races. You may choose from the 29 currently available.-
"What? There are other races?" There was a moment of silence until he realized the AI didn't have a response. "Show me the other races."
Seconds later he could see a mirror image of himself standing a few feet away. It represented humans. To the right there were figures representing each race, all resembling himself. Behind each main race were subspecies. Human subspecies included barbarians and giants. To the right was a common elf, and behind it were high elves, wood elves, and dark elves. The line went on to include all 29 species. Most of the species distorted the users image to the point where they were unrecognizable.
"Barbarian." The idea of looking anything other than human didn't appeal to him. However, the barbarian looked identical to himself, only with a bigger build. The giant also looked similar, but the height of 7'6'' was questionable. The giant also had a much larger gut than the barbarian.
-Would you like to alter your appearance?-
"no"
-Which city would you like to start in? You may choose any major city or capital.-
"Random city." He didn't know the name of a city. He didn't even know this game would be so detailed as to have different races or cities.
-Randomly chosen city is The Citadel of Sai, Gradian Kingdom. Is that acceptable?-
"Sure."
-Your avatar has been created. Welcome to Royal Road.-
In a flash of white light Baron appeared in the heart of a busy city. Thousands of people could be seen shopping at stands or filling canteens in the fountain. They paid no attention to him as he began stretching and testing out the VR system. It was a common sight.
'Is this really virtual reality? I had no idea it would be so realistic.' As he stretched he could feel his muscles burn like they would in real life. 'Holy shit!'
The experience of VR left him stricken. For the next 3 hours he just wondered around the market. People could be seen doing everything from forming parties to making and selling weapons. The market was full of people at stands trying to earn a few coppers. Users and NPCs both were shouting out product names and stating they had the best prices.
"No restriction swords! cheapest you'll find! 30 coppers!"
"Custom made leather boots! 3 defense, 17 coppers! You wont find boots so cheap in all of Versailles!
" I repair weapons and armor cheap!"
"beginner copper sword! 29 coppers!"
After sitting there awhile it was easy to tell who was getting ripped off, and who were the best con artists even for someone like him who had never played video games before. Merchants would sell the same item as the person next to them at double the price and still had buyers thinking they were getting a deal. The scams around him further strengthened Baron's belief that people were naturally stupid. At first he thought the stands around him selling food were scams because what use was food in a game, but After a few hours of walking his satiety had dropped and he came to a realization about the food stands. 'They can't just make you hungry without giving you food or money for it. Can they?' Now that he was thinking about it he had overheard some people talking about selling their starter bread. After a minute of experiments he found out how to open his inventory. He had 10 pieces of barley bread and a small canteen. He quickly took out the bread and began eating to quell his hunger. The first bite revealed the flavor of the bread: old, stale, and tasteless. He quickly spat out the bite and emptied his inventory of bread onto the ground. 'Like I would ever eat tasteless shit like that.' The canteen was useful in rinsing the stale taste from his mouth. He put it back into his inventory and started to walk away. The people around him started laughing and whispering to each other.
"The fuck you looking at?" At the threat people stopped laughing and seemed slightly taken aback. They could all tell he was a beginner, his actions proved that, however his presence as a barbarian coupled with his menacing attitude gave him the image of someone not to be messed with. All of the higher level users put their hands on their weapons in anticipation. There were a few combat profession users around level 10 in the crowd. Royal Road or RR had just came out less than 2 weeks ago in real life so this was a decent level. The highest leveled players at the time were all tied at 17. Baron decided to ignore them and just walk away. In the process he glanced back at the pile of bread he had dumped. Several beginners were fighting over it. 'Pathetic.'
The sky began to turn dark as night was getting close. The market was still as loud as ever with thousands of people doing business. He had spent the entire day doing nothing and never bothered to talk to anyone. Even the NPCs that reached out to him offering quests were just ignored. Every couple of hours a system message would pop up saying his satiety levels were dropping. He couldn't care less about his stats that were falling, but his hunger was becoming unbearable. Without anything to do he had found a spot to sit by the fountain in the heart of the market. He had been sitting there for over an hour just watching the people around him. At what must have been 10 or 11 pm a man in line for one of the nearby food stalls caught his attention. The man in line looked to be in his early teens, a boy really. What caught Barons attention was the bag of coins in the boys back pocket. Unlike most sensible users the boy didn't leave his money in his inventory. It was a noob mistake that most users would pay dearly for. Baron hurried and got in line behind the boy. In the process he tripped and stumbled into the unsuspecting user. After a quick apology he quietly stood his place in line and waited for his food. The aroma was intoxicating, especially for someone who hadn't eaten in a day. After 3 minutes it was the boys turn to order.
"I'll take a half loaf of barley bread and bowl of that stew." The boy was clearly excited by the tone of his voice. He went to grab his money only to find an empty pocket.
"That'll be 5 coppers: 1 for the bread, 2 for the stew, and 2 for the bowl." The stall worker began pouring the stew into a fresh bowl. If he tried to wash the bowls after customers ate then he wouldn't get the bowls back, so instead he sold a bowl to each new customer. Users that frequented his stall would reuse the bowls and save the 2 coppers. This wasn't only practical but it gave customers a reason to come back if his cooking skills didn't. After pouring the stew and cutting the bread he looked up only to find his customer in tears. The boy frantically searched every pocket for the missing money. 'Typical.' The man thought.
"Look kid if you don't have any money you don't' get any food. This isn't some pity service." It may have been cruel but that's what it takes to stay in business. The boy went through and rechecked each pocket for the missing money. He had just sold all of the loot he got from hunting low level wolves. The hunt had taken nearly 6 hours and his profit from all the loot earned him over 200 coppers. He had planned to use the money to buy decent leather armor for his level. All of his efforts were fruitless and on top of that he was starving and had no money for food.
"Here's 5 coppers." Baron took a step forward. He opened his inventory and took out the money. There was 217 coppers in his inventory, so he thought the least he could do is buy the kid some food. The boy surprisingly had manners and referred to his savior as sir when he thanked him, all with tears in his eyes. The stall worker grabbed the 5 coppers and handed the boy his food.
"That's a nice thing you did." Said the cook as the boy walked away with his food.
"It was nothing. Can I get 2 bowls of that stew?"
For the next 4 weeks Baron did nothing but sleep, pickpocket and eat. It wasn't the most exciting lifestyle but it worked. The profits from pick-pocketing were decent. Since he usually targeted beginners it wasn't always the best payout. Most of the time it was around 20 coppers. 3 of those a day and food was paid for, however he usually stole from upwards of 20. Sometimes he would get people who only had a copper or 2. The most he was able to get was from a merchant. The middle aged man had just spent the day selling goods and was on his way to buy his next stock. He had over 500 coppers in his purse. The money could have been exchanged for silvers, but since the game was new most trades didn't surpass 100 coppers, so there was no need to switch. The third day after he arrived the amount of guards increased. Pick-pocketing was always a problem, however the amount of incidents had tripled. Most users didn't have high pick-pocketing skill so they would never risk it in a major city. Because of this crime was low even in the ghettos. The increase in guards didn't matter. Compared to cops in real life they were much less vigilant and not nearly as intelligent. Pick-pocketing became easier once he got.the skill.
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Pick-Pocketing: Beginner Level 7 (33%)
Stealing coppers is now nearly a guarantee. Large or valuable items are now easier to steal. Beware, users will be hostile if stolen from. Guards may attempt to arrest you. Guards may look the other way if you have increased familiarity or fame. _______________________________________________________
By the end of the 4 weeks Baron had gotten to pick-pocketing beginner level 7. Unknown to him it was the highest in the game. He had gotten the skill after a week and had been leveling it up ever since. Raising his skill level gave him something to relieve the boredom of doing nothing but pick-pocketing for 4 weeks. Every so often he would get a notification saying his dexterity or fame had increased. In the end he gained 42 points of dexterity and 104 points of fame. 'Fame? More like infamy.' He thought as he checked his stat window. Due to his rising skill in pick-pocketing he also managed to reach level 4. After several hundred people had their money stolen users began to put up their guard. It became much harder when users stopped being careless and started protecting their goods. Baron would often hear people discussing the recent pick-pocketing epidemic. Much to his dismay they would encourage each other to hold their coins close, often times including bystanders in the conversation. The result was an area that was unworkable for several hours. Even still he was able to make 8300 copper (83 silver) by the end of the 4 weeks. By the standards of someone who only then could leave the city he was rich.
Baron was contemplating whether or not to leave the city. He had no desire to hunt and get stronger, so he figured there was no need. He was sitting near the fountain at the heart of the market. A man walked up and sat next to Baron. The man was very shady looking. He was wearing light leather armor all died black. A black hood covered his face. Several knives and daggers of all sizes were sheathed in various places around his body. On his chest was a small crest of the thieves guild. The crest consisted of two crossed daggers behind a coin purse. The man spoke soft so that only Baron could hear him.
"To your right, 50 feet away there is a guy in light knights armor and a red shirt. He's talking to 5 others close to the alley."
Baron could find the guy easy enough. The guy was a user that looked to be around level 45. He had a decent broad sword on his back, that combined with the fact that he was in a group meant he was the worst possible mark.
"Fuck off!" Unlike the guy from the thieves guild Baron made no attempt to speak softly.
"That guy has a document I want. None of my men have the skill to pull of an advanced pickpocket like this. That's why I came here looking for a little outside help."
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STEAL THE DOCUMENT
A representative of the thieves guild has approached you asking for your help stealing a document.
Difficulty: D
Rewards: 2 Gold, increased familiarity with the thieves guild
Requirements: Recognized by the thieves guild as a good pickpocket. The quest fails if you fail to steal the document in 1 hour, are caught stealing it, or die in the process. If the quest fails you will lose reputation as a good thief. The thieves guild will be less likely to hire your services in the future.
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After reading the quest window Baron started to consider it. The reward was huge. 2 gold was 2 1/2 times what he had earned in 4 weeks of pick-pocketing regular users. In the end his greed clouded his better judgement.
The mark was the leader of a decent sized guild. The guild had 25 members and had earned a reputation in the local hunting grounds. At the moment the guild leaders were having a meeting. The had just finished hunting and had come back to the market to sell their loot and enjoy coffee while they discussed the guild financials. Baron had very little knowledge of video games. Royal Road was the first one he had ever played. Because of this he didn't know the the quest difficulty D was too much for him. No D level quests had been completed since the games release. The difficulty level was suited for users around level 100. Being only level 4 he had no chance.
The tale has been stolen; if detected on Amazon, report the violation.
"Give me 10 minutes." Baron got up from where he was sitting and blended in with the crowds. 2 minutes later he started sprinting towards the mark. He wore an expression of fear as he ran at full speed. To onlookers he appeared to be just another user late for something. He brushed past several people shouting back apologies as he continued to run. As he approached the group of users he continued to keep up the act. Running at full speed he brushed past the mark. The impact was enough to send the man to the ground. Baron shouted back an apology and continued running. However, after 2 steps a hand grabbed his shoulder throwing him onto his back.
"Show some manors punk!" One of the marks friends had stopped him.
Being thrown to the ground hurt a lot. It also dropped his HP by 25%.Baron slowly got up off his back. When he was close to his feet the user he had knocked over came and punched him in the stomach. After that the 6 users took turns hitting him. None of the blows did as much as the initial impact, but his HP was dropping fast. After about 5 minutes the group got bored and decided leave. They had only gotten a few steps when the guild leader stopped everyone.
"Wait! The guild verification papers are missing!" The group turned around and looked at Baron with renewed hatred.
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Quest Failed
Reputation as a thief has declined. Reputation with the thieves guild has declined _______________________________________________________
The 6 guild member took back the document and started the beating again. This time they hit harder and at a faster pace. Baron cursed his luck as his HP hit 0. A message popped up alerting him to the negative affects of dying. He didn't care about the skill progress or level lost, however, the 24 hour ban made him angry. As he was logged out he cursed the world, promising to get revenge on the users who killed him as well as the guy who gave him the quest.
Baron lifted the capsule lid with difficulty. It was a hard task to accomplish with his hands cuffed. A guard quickly ran over, surprised by his sudden log out. The guard quickly escorted him back to his cell.
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-Do you want to connect to Royal Road?
"Yes."
-Welcome to Royal Road. Please select an avatar name.-
"Nile." This was hid name in real life. For the purpose of the TV show, his boss had advised him to use his real name so as not to confuse his fans.
-What gender would you like: Male, Female, or neuter?-
"Male"
-Royal Road has 49 different races. You may choose from the 29 currently available.-
"Human." Due to the foreign appearance of the other races it would be hard for audiences to relate, leading to a decline in viewership for the show.
-Would you like to alter your appearance?-
"No." This was for the same reason as his name. People already knew his face and it would hurt viewership if the avatar playing wasn't him.
-Which city would you like to start in? You may choose any major city or capital.-
"Citadel of Sai, Gradian Kingdom." He had actually given this a lot of thought. Although viewers need to be able to relate to the story, there also has to be a sense of wonder. Not many players chose the Gradian kingdom which leads to some intrigue. Also the players that do chose this kingdom won't have many choices when it comes to shows on their city. As for why this small kingdom and not another, Gradian shares borders with the Kallamore, Haven, and Thor kingdoms. If his previous theory were to fail he could always just switch to a major kingdom easily.
-Your avatar has been created. Welcome to Royal Road.-
In a flash of white light Nile appeared in the heart of the city. It was surprising how many people were in the market considering the lack of popularity of this kingdom. Thousands of people could be seen in every direction conducting business. He was not new to VR so the experience didn't shock him as much as most. However, Royal Road did have a new level of realism that other VR titles didn't come close to. Other games had a slight delay in movement. It wouldn't have been noticeable in regular games, but VR simulated normal movements and so a little lag was hard to cope with. However, RR was advanced to the point of having no lag making it hard to distinguish it from reality. RR also had hyper-realistic textures and graphics perfectly formatted for 3 dimensions.
Unlike most new players Nile already had a plan of what he was going to do. He quickly closed the window telling him about the his restriction to the city and quickly headed to his first destination, the church of Lu. Him and his coworkers had already come up with a loosely scripted story line for the first month in game. Nile worked for an internet show company called FOX. The company had originally produced shows on TV but with the increase in popularity of the internet started producing content there. Most entertainment companies did this to keep with the times. As a generation of internet and gaming addicts became the target audience it became a logical switch. In recent years video games have been increasing in popularity due to Virtual Reality. Many video game related shows had become extremely popular and so most networks had preexisting plans to do shows featuring RR. FOX already had 3 weekly shows on the game. 2 of those shows were based around the idea of recording popular commentators during the game. Similar to a lets play series, these show were set to document the week by week expierences of a knight class and mage class commentators. The first episodes that were released had such great ratings that the company decided to add another. Nile had been waiting for his big break in the company and this was it. He was a small time MMORPG commentator for FOX who had a decent sized fan base. A show like this that would be advertised on the company's homepage was a big deal. After he was contacted and offered this series he immediately set up a discussion with his new staff of producers, editors, writers, etc. They were already nearly 2 weeks behind the other commentators so they had to hurry. Later that day they released the news of a new show called The Holy archer, and Nile logged into RR for the first time. Because they came up with a loose script and plot for the first episode Nile already knew what to do once he logged in.
Shortly after logging in Nile started heading to the church. His first choice of church was the church of Freya, however the church of Lu was the only church in Sai. The inconvenience wasn't much of a problem though. The churches of both Freya and Lu were the largest on the versailles continent where the game was set. They dominated the population claiming 83% of people as members of either church. The chapel was easy enough to find. It was the second largest building in the city. As he was walking there he got several stares from other users. It was strange to see someone talking to themselves in the middle of a street. Recording intros and such outside of the game would take to long, so as he was walking he was also speaking to the audience that would soon be watching.
"Whats up guys! Your favorite video game host Nile here, and guess what. WE'RE PLAYING ROYAL ROAD!!!!" He screamed the last part causing several people to start laughing around him. "Hahaha I hope you guys are as excited as I am here. There was so much hype for this game and so far I'd say that unicorn has delivered. This series is going to be amazing and I can't wait to see where it takes us. New episodes will be up every Monday at 7 so be sure to check back each week. If you miss an episode you should be able to find links to every episode in the description. Ok, so as you probably already know my fellow commentators James wright and Blare have started their series as a knight and mage, but I was thinking of doing something a little more unique. RR was advertised as a game with unlimited freedom right? So I decided to test this by coming up with my own class. Ya, you heard me, I'm going to make my own class. If their is unlimited freedom it should work so why not. My idea is to merge the two classes of archer and cleric. I know it sounds crazy but hear me out. This class, which I've dubbed Holy Archer, will be the best support class. Imagine a cleric not only healing but also dealing damage through arrows. Sounds pretty bad ass if you ask me. I've already figured out how I'm going to work towards this class. I can always gain the archery skill by going to the firing range, but the hard part will be the healing spells. Which is why we're on our way to the church right now to get the cleric profession."
After about 30 min of walking he finally arrived at the church of Lu. It was a large very expensive looking building which was more of a cathedral than a chapel. Outside the front arch way was a statue depicting Lu. The face was sculpted in such a way to make it impossible to discern the gender of the figure. In one had the statue had a coin purse and in the other was a dagger. These represented the churches ideals of wealth, power, and faith, the statue itself representing faith. 'What corrupt ideals for a church' Nile thought. 'Although I'd say it fits my ideals perfectly.' The church was full of users. Paladin was a class that many people wanted although no one had yet to achieve it in RR. After walking around for 5 minutes Nile was stopped by a priest in extravagant ropes with signs of aging on his face.
"Hello traveler is there anything I can help you with today?"
"I have recently converted to the church of Lu and was wondering if it was possible to become a cleric. Before I found god I was a lost soul but with the help of the church I was able to straighten up my life. Now I would like to try helping others through Gods gift of healing." It was an obvious lie but the priest ate it up. 'I'm lying to a priest. What has the world come to?'
"It is so wonderful to hear stories like yours. That to is why I became a priest. If only more people thought like you every church would prosper."
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Cleric
You have become a cleric for the church of Lu. Use your powers to help those in need and spread the Lu faith. Clerics are a support type class that focuses on divine magic to heal and buff allies, or weaken monster.
With the cleric class you have become vulnerable to dark magic. _______________________________________________________
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New stat has been created: Faith
An increase in the Faith stat makes divine magic stronger as well as increasing reputation among all churches. _______________________________________________________
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+25 Wisdom
+100 Faith _______________________________________________________
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2 New Skills have been unlocked for your class.
Divine Healing
Use your divine magic to heal allies in combat.
Divine Protection
Use your divine magic to raise you allies defense in combat. _______________________________________________________
After closing the windows Nile thanked the priest and left the church. He was surprised at how easy it was to get the profession. He had thought that there would be a quest involved or some training but he was wrong. He commented to his viewers a couple times and set out to learn the archery skill. As he was leaving the church he took another look at the statue of Lu only to find that this time it gave him buffs. For viewing a statue of his own faith he got a buff of 50 faith and an increase in divine magic by 5% for a day. The idea of statue being anything more than just decorations was something he believed, but RR was unlike any game he had played so far. He made a mental note to change the way he thought about this game.
The next four weeks were fairly uneventful. The show was only scheduled to be 1 hour long and the scene with the church took up at least half of it. The last 30 min were mainly comprised of archery lessons. It took a week but Nile was finally able to get the archery skill. Since it wasn't part of his class it took longer to get. He completed the basic archery course after a lot of practice. You completed the course after putting 1,000 arrows into the bulls eye at a minimum of 50 ft. At first only about 1 in 25 arrows hit the target, but by the end 9 out of 10 would hit with at least 1 in the center. He didn't do much besides that. Thanks to his grinding he was able to get his archery skill to beginner level 4 (32%) by the time the month was over. He also spent sometime in the market and doing random low level quests to add to the variety of content. He even used his money to buy some items just to show the experience to the people. He bought mostly useless stuff such as a two handed copper long sword and a red shirt. The sword was severely worn down and had almost no attack or durability but it didn't matter because he didn't plan on using it. The shirt had holes in it and could be considered a down grade from the shirt he started with. In the end a month in game had gone by and Nile was counting the hours till he could get out and start hunting monsters.
Nile opened the timer counting down to the end of his restriction on leaving the city. He had a little less than 7 in game hours left before it reached zero. Because of the games 4 to 1 time ratio he decided to log off for 2 hours IRL and be back shortly after the ban was lifted. He was in desperate need of a shower and wanted to see how the editing was coming along for the first episode. It was set to air on the FOX homepage tomorrow at 7 and he couldn't wait for the feedback. The shows success could either make or break his career as a commentator.