After completing a few gathering quests last night, he went offline. He slept for the night.

After walking up in the morning, he had breakfast with his family. They were surprised to see him. They thought he would be playing the game.

Drake just said that at least for a few days he still wanted to spend time with his family. After that maybe he would play the game properly.

He got a few more brownie points with his family for that, not that he needed any.

His family just gave him a big hug, and then after having breakfast, he once again logged in to the game.

After completing a few more gathering quests and a few easy kill quests, he went to the location of the appointment that he set.

He checked his status panel on the way.

Name: Drake Stone

Level: 0

Path: Eldritch Nexus

Skills: None

Mastery: None

The Eldritch Nexus path he got from the system. He did not need to consume potions. He only needed to use experience points to level up. But the experience points he needed was a hundred times the normal amount needed.

He lamented the None written in front of Mastery. It was too difficult to unlock a mastery, not to mention then leveling it up.

He killed many weak monsters in the Black Forest but still didn't unlock the Sword Mastery.

He checked the forums and it was the same for others too. Only after completing an action continuously for a few days straight, could a mastery be unlocked.

Most of the players had barely unlocked a mastery and reached the Beginner stage, level 1, and only a few reached level 2. That too mostly because they had experience from real life.

Of course, he had the shortcut of using the training room. But he wouldn't use it without testing it on a few guinea pigs.

That's why, when the twins asked to be followers, he decided to use that opportunity to test them and use them to test the training room.

The use of the training room was not free. He was only given eight hours as initial free time. Of which he spent six hours on the twins. He had only two hours remaining. To use more, he needed to buy it from the Eldritch Shop.

The Eldritch Shop was another function of the system. He checked it only superficially and found many rare knowledge sold in it. In a world, where knowledge is supreme, he did not need to ever worry about a shortage of knowledge.

To purchase anything from it, Eldritch Points were needed. They could only be earned by killing others. Yes, monsters were not limited to it. Only Drake or his followers could earn them.

The quota for the training room was sold based on per hour per room. The hour means, the hour of the real world. Multiple rooms could be opened simultaneously so that multiple individuals could buy and use them separately.

While thinking of unrelated things, Drake reached the meeting point. Both the twins were waiting for him.

‘Looks like they have guts’, thought Drake, while watching the twins.

They knelt again together when Drake reached them and said, “We have completed the mission.”

“Good. You can follow me. Now get up.”

Drake simply agreed. After all, they did help him test the training room.

Yumi got up but Ayame didn't.

“My lord, please forgive me. I shouldn't have doubted you. I shouldn't have said all those words for you. I am willing to take any punishment. I am willing to give up my life to atone for my sins.”

Ayame prostrated herself further down and begged Drake to forgive her even if she had given up her life for it.

Drake wondered if she had lost her mind after dying too many times. He didn't remember her saying anything to him.

Then he remembered that her loyalty dropped to 0 briefly. He turned off the loyalty notifications as they were too distracting.

He thought that she might have badmouthed her during then.

‘Should I forgive her, after all, she is my first follower. It was me who forced her to say those things.’

‘But it doesn't feel right to forgive her just like that.’

‘What to do?’

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While Drake was having such thoughts, Ayame was sweating profusely. She thought that Drake might be too angry with her.

Yumi was also worried about her sister.

After thinking hard enough, Drake came up with a good punishment, “You made a mistake.”

Both sisters' hearts were heavy hearing that.

“But since it's your first mistake, I will be lenient with you. As a punishment, do 100 pushups.”

Pushups?!

Both sisters’ brains short-circuited for a moment.

Then Yumi quickly came to her senses and urged Ayame, “Ayame, quickly do as the lord said. Don't keep the lord waiting.”

Ayame also came to her senses. She quickly did 100 pushups then knelt again.

‘Damn, she did it so easily. I should have asked her to do 1000.’

“Good, you are forgiven. Now get up”, said Drake.

“Thank you my lord for showing mercy and forgiving me”, said Ayame gratefully.

“Yes, my lord, thank you for forgiving Ayame”, added Yumi, equally grateful.

Both sisters thought that it was Drake being merciful by asking her to do 100 pushups. Of course, even if Drake had asked her for 1000 pushups, she would have done it easily, with just slightly more effort.

“My lord, this is for you”, said Ayame while presenting two pouches to Drake.

Drake first took the bigger one. Opened it and saw it was filled with coins.

“2 gold coins, 40 silver coins”, told Ayame.

‘Woah, pickpocketing is so lucrative?’

Then he took the second much smaller pouch and opened it. It had shiny greyish coins.

“10 Fog Coins” informed Ayame once again.

Drake thought should he keep so much money that they must have worked hard to collect?

‘Hell yeah. I will. They are my followers, of are kind enough to present me money, who am I to refuse it.’

Drake kept both the pouches. The twins smiled in relief seeing that.

They thought that Drake might look down on such a small amount of money. Especially the Fog Coins which were only 10. But Drake was big-hearted and accepted their meager offerings.

“I accept it. I have something for both of you too”, said Drake and gave them access to the Training Room and the Eldritch Shop.

By default, the Eldritch Points earned by his followers were divided 50-50 between him and the followers. But since they were his first followers, he gave them 70%.

The twins took some time to digest the information forced into their brains. They understood that the place they went to was called the Training Room and they could use it anytime as long they purchased its quota.

They then checked out the shop, of course, Drake gave them access only to part with items in Extraordinary sequence.

The dazzling arrays of different pathways’ knowledge brightened their eyes. As long as they had enough points, they could purchase potions or potion formulas for any path.

There were too many pathways to choose from as with an infinite world came infinite possibilities. But not every path might be compatible with someone.

They found themselves being attracted to pathways that were the most compatible with them.

Both were compatible with the Shadow path, so they decided to collect enough points to exchange its Extraordinary Rank 1 potion later.

Another path, Yumi found herself attracted to was the Clock path. But it was many times costly so she decided to buy it later when she was strong and had enough points.

“Thank you my lord for the opportunity”, they said simultaneously after kneeling.

“Hmm. And stop kneeling at every turn”, said Drake while getting irritated seeing them kneeling so many times.

The twins got up and said, “Yes, my lord”.

“Do you know where I can find more monsters like that pig?”

Drake changed the topic and asked another important question.

At level 0, he could record a total of five types of monsters in the training room. He did one, for rest he needed to find them to defeat them and record them for simulation.

The strength of the monster can increase in the training room to suit the trainer. But the limit was a stage above Drake’s current stage.

For every sequence, ranks 1 to 3 are called the early stage, 4 to 6 are called the mid-stage, 7 to 9 are called the late stage, and rank 10 is called the peak stage.

At level 0, the monsters in the training room can reach up to the early stage of Extraordinary, i.e., up to rank 3.

After knowing all about the training room, they knew, Drake needed other monsters to use in the training room.

“My lord, Fog Zones have various types of monsters”, informed Ayame. They didn't want Drake to take risks, but couldn't go against his order so she told him.

“Then let's leave right now. I wanted to go outside from the beginning. The money you gave me should be enough to buy a Territory Compass”, said Drake feeling excited at finally going outside to explore the fog world.

The twins wanted to dissuade him but knew it was useless. They would just protect him with their lives, even if they knew that as a chosen one he wouldn't die.

“My lord, we have a Territory Compass and an off-road vehicle for transportation”, informed Yumi.

“Awesome. Then let's go.”

Drake was excited about finally starting a real adventure.

They took him to the place where they parked their vehicle.

Drake saw it and found it looked like a Jeep. Ayame sat on the driver’s seat, Drake sat beside her and Yumi sat behind. Ayame drove them towards the border of the territory.

On the way, many players saw them. All of them were jealous of Drake seeing him sitting with two beautiful girls.

“Is he a player?”

“How can he be a player? I saw him sitting with those two girls who sold three Iron Tusk Boars and a bunch of other monsters to the restaurants. They are too strong. How can a player travel with them?”

“Maybe he seduced them?”

“You are thinking too much. Why don't you try seducing then? Maybe then they will let you travel with them.”

“Nah, I don't think they will be seduced by me.”

“Wait a minute, he is a player. I am sure.”

“What how can you be sure?”

“I saw him completing the Red Mushroom gathering quest. That shop owner called him the chosen one. And look he is wearing the starting clothes all players got.”

“You are right! How can he travel with those beauties?”

Drake felt awesome, feeling the jealous gaze of both the players and the world’s inhabitants alike. Especially the group of players talking with each other while pointing towards him and seething in jealousy.

After traveling for some time, they reached the border and finally closed it.

Drake felt he stepped into another world. The environment completely changed. There was no sun in the sky. The sky was dark. Everywhere was fog with only a few meters of visibility.

Drake smiled, ‘Let's start the real adventure’.