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RAW - Chapter 19

In my room, I laid everything out and tested what would turn to ash or not, to take stock of everything. The only things to survive were the ornamental Spartan sword, shield, candles, a pot, cutlery, and cloth bags. I didn’t touch my backpack or the water jugs, as the water was still good, I didn’t want to accidentally destroy them too.

[Ornamental Sword]

DMG: 1, Hardiness: 1, Durability: 1

Level: 1, All Job Classes

A replica sword meant for display only.

[Ornamental Shield]

Hardiness: 2, Durability: 1

Level: 1, All Job Classes

A replica shield meant for display only.

Now, from the strange game world I had: Ancient Temple coins, Aurem coins, and weird crystal currency, a couple of maps, Divinity Ring, Culinarian’s Ring, Master Chef’s Earring, Celestian Guard’s Ring, Obelisk, God ore, Divine log, Flesh of the Gods, I also had a couple of other items I couldn’t use, I tried to examine them, but their levels were too high, didn’t matter anyways, I knew them by sight.

I lifted a sheathed dagger, the Cerberus’s Fang. When I unsheathed it, it went ethereal and slipped through my fingers. An effect of equipment restrictions no doubt. The dagger clattered to the floor, the same with Hermes’ Ring when I tried to finger it.

Makes sense in a game way, but this isn’t a game anymore, whatever, hopefully I can just pawn them for a tonne of money, I just need to find the right NPC. What else? OH ywah, the level 5 perks?!

Quick Learner

Nothing seems impossible for you when you really put your mind to it.

You learn your chosen skill 50% faster than normal.

Educated

You’ve studied long and hard, expanding your breadth of knowledge.

You gain 10 more skill points to your total potential.

Talented

You open your mind to new possibilities, expanding upon your limitless potential.

You gain an additional skill slot.

This skill system is different to IFO, I mean there’s freakin’ Cartography and Gunsmithing to start with. It’d be nice to skill up faster, but what’s the point if the level cap is so low? And wouldn’t it be better to know more skills? But not if there’s a hard limit to the total skill points allocatable, if that’s the case, then I should definitely go with ‘Educated’, but I better make sure that’s the case.

What was more interesting was the IP addresses and the link to a physical location in this world.

If I can figure out the IP address for base camp and one more IP address, and re-locate the Temple of the Ancients, then I’ll be able to triangulate the physical base camp location in this world.

I turned my phone on and checked some of the saved webpages I had, there was a webpage I must had spammed open to an emergency portal for those who couldn’t make it to their migration centre. I checked the source and noted the IP address before it fizzled and disintegrated into dust.

I’m certain that the emergency IP address was the approximate address for the base camp, if the IP address was the major factor for cross-dimensional travel, I’m pretty sure that the government officials would have figured that out.

The tale has been illicitly lifted; should you spot it on Amazon, report the violation.

The problem remained, I would need to map the Temple of the Ancients, and also… find another refugee whom knew their IP address, though most people just used a dynamic address that changed randomly.

One thing was for sure though, I couldn’t stay in this town, it was too high a level, I would eventually run out of money and end up on the street eating scraps, or worse… stealing. I would need to travel to the capital of Divinity, that would be my best chance of meeting other refugees and also being a starter town, my best chance of changing job-class, fighting low-level monsters and getting stronger and surviving this world.

I just needed to find an NPC with enough dough to pay for these items, and my best bet was at the [Adventurer’s Guild], maybe I could find a [Holy Knight] then I could teleport out of here, hopefully with Catherine…

She probably hates my guts.

And I had already paid for three nights accommodation here, so I had another two full days to gather what I could from Dagon before possibly leaving.

This town most likely included a new unlockable class, but the developers kept the details well hidden. In the original IFO, players could select between starting jobs, and from there unlock advanced jobs and special jobs. This was most likely a new special job, they tended to be weird and obscure, and most players didn’t even bother to acquire them, I know I didn’t, but it would be a great deal better than [Commoner]. It would be a good idea to search the town for the quest, and any other doable quests.

But what about Catherine??? Well this is the only Inn in town, so I’m guessing she got a room here yesterday as well.

  

A yawn wrenched my mouth wide open as the timber stairs took me down into the cafeteria.

Still no Catherine? She must be looking for quests too I bet…

There was a roar from my stomach, and I had to suck up some drool at the corner of my mouth. My hunger was becoming more and more insistent. The thought of bacon and eggs made my mouth water.

The inn keeper came over as soon as I sat down, I knew what she was going to do, she was going to pull out some beautiful fresh bacon, some eggs, an orange juice maybe from her inventory and it would just magically appear in front of me... I slurped at a bit a drool that threatened to escape.

And something did appear like a magic trick.

"Huh, what's this? This-this-this... isn't bacon... no... why? Why this of all things?”

The bowl of grey gruel winked at me.

"... I hate porridge."

  

After I finished it I got a strange notification.

You have recovered 0 health points.

You have gained 10 EXP.

That’s interesting… Does eating food really grant experience points now???

Something to think about later. I stepped outside into the fresh morning air… the skies were beautifully blue, there was no smoky haze or grey hue.

“Excuse me Sir?!” a stray peasant cat-woman said to me. “My children, they’ve been taken…”

I knew a hard quest when I saw one, and I had a feeling this would be outside my abilities… The map indicated that this was a port side town and I walked down the street until the NPCs voice petered off behind me.

  

There was no smell of the ocean, no sound of the waves smashing against the pier, and generally no water at all, only the sound of several thousand fish slapping the new dry sandy shore. The pier stretched out over boats moored in the sand. In the distance roamed the silhouette of strange creatures, or some such. An old human fisherman sat at the pier with his legs dangling over the side and his line cast into the shrubs below.

Perhaps it was supposed to be like this, no it was ridiculous, the map says there should be an ocean here, but there wasn’t and there must have been a logical explanation for that.

A quick examination and the fisherman’s information came up easily.

Fishermen’s Friend.

“Good morning… Fishermen’s Friend?”

“Argh, a foreigner we have here? Argh, mornin’ it is, good tis not,” he said with sullen shoulders, before returning to silence and the occasional tug of his rod.

The conversation was obviously leading to a quest, I just had to take the bait, “What’s wrong?”

He looked up at me. “I’ve lost me special lure, without it I’ll never be able catch any Celes whiting.”

You have been offered the quest ‘Lured In’.

[Accept / Reject]

Yeeep.

“Sure, I can help you out.”

“Oh, thank you so much. If you find it, you will have my eternal gratitude!”

“Umm, no problems. So, hey? Do you have a name? Other than Fishermen’s Friend?”

He blinked twice at me.

“Help an old fisherman out, will you!” he replied before turning away again, and I swear I saw his eye flicker.

"Do you know you're an NPC? A computer character designed and generated specifically for role-playing games like this one? Are you aware that you are not real? That I'm not really talking to a living, breathing human being?"

He turned to me and said, “Help an old fisherman out, will you!” I swear his eye twitched for a second before he turned away again.

Maybe this really is all fake. But then the memory of a thousand waking pains washed over me, the memory of my soul being rendered to shreds, I shuddered.

No, that was real as anything. So, this too, must be real, he has to be real, even if his background description is fake, even if his character model is fake. I watched as a bead of sweat on his scalp glistened in the sunshine. Some part of this guy has to be real. Otherwise, what’s the point, what’s the point of anything, if this is some simulation then is there any point even to my existence? Okay shut up brain, shut up! focus on what's important. The quest… yes… what did I need to do again? Look for a lure or something?

Probably be like finding a needle in a hay…

“Wait, what’s that?”

There in the scrub was a shiny little object. It couldn’t be that easy, surely? There were also several of the large beached fish near the lure kicking up sand with every flick of their tails.

They were just fish out of water, flapping about harmlessly, what’s the worst that could happen?