Dragavar West Gate, September 28 2012, 2:45 pm.
A cat suddenly stood on the bank of the hot spring-like river. Unlike normal cats that stand on four legs, she stood on both legs like a human. She started walking and looking around. She also looked at her own white-haired body and wore a white uniform with a blue vest and skirt.
Her tiny body in front of her monitor indicated that she had teleported to a new place in the virtual world she had been playing after doing the tutorial at the academy. The screen changed from the first-person perspective at the academy to a third-person perspective at the unknown place.
She began to observe the top left screen on his monitor with the photo of the cat and its information.
Vestalia (Eldora)
HP 644/644
MP 200/200
Lv.5/Magician/Lv.3/Exp.17.4% (hide info)
She scanned the rest of the monitor. On the bottom left screen was a Chat Box for typing in private or public messages and selecting emoticons. On the top right screen there was a map called a Mini Map and various menu icons in the game. On the bottom right screen, there is a row of icons titled Command (Magic) which is currently only filled with one sword icon with the word Attack.
A text in front of the monitor guides her to walk according to the GPS on the mini-map. While walking by hovering with her mouse, she continued to read the series of texts that appeared alternately like a presentation. This should be called a tutorial. Somehow, even though these texts were meant to teach her how to control her character's body in this virtual world, she quickly understood the character's control. After all, she only needed to point the mouse or press the four-way button on the keypad displayed on the monitor.
The cat stopped walking at the GPS point according to the guidance. Another text appeared on the monitor indicating the next tutorial instruction in the virtual world.
A dark green-skinned dragon was sleeping under a shady banyan tree. His outfit was an unbuttoned white shirt with a vest and dark blue trousers. On the exposed centre chest, she saw several scratch marks. She was reminded of the Blacksmith Class design she had seen on the game's official website. Although, the pattern and size of the clothes were slightly different from what she had seen. The dragon sat leaning against a tree with his arms folded across its chest, with both feet bare just like the cat.
He was a dragon humanoid Tribe, called a Dragonic. Come to think of it, wasn't this the face of the dragon she saw on the game app icon? Once again, Texts had appeared on her monitor. The texts gave instructions to wake up the dragon by calling his name using her voice.
"I-I must shout?" squealed the girl who piloted the cat character. No wonder the game requires hardware specifically Headphones as ways to speak. A new technology in the game allows players to talk to each other over long distances, just like a phone.
The girl took a breath. She wasn't going to make a speech or sing but why was she so nervous about just making a sound? Especially since only one word needed to be said and no one else would be listening.
Nervously, she spelt the name written on her monitor, "Pen-dra-gon!!!" But one second later a voice similar to her own was heard and it was not just one word, but a sentence. "Ex-Excuse me, are you Pendragon?"
Did she hear her own voice? And the voice was much more straightforward than the original voice she spoke.
She was surprised to see that on her monitor, the dragon was starting to wake up. "Hmmmm? Do you call me, Miss?"
Pendragon yawned with his mouth. "Oh, are you the one named Vestalia?" The girl heard Pendragon's voice which sounded like that of a middle-aged man older than her father.
"Yes!" Vestalia replied. The girl did not make a sound but her cat character answered automatically. She heard her own voice once more. There was another text in the middle of the monitor explaining Thoughts, which is an automatic dialogue that occurs after the player chooses from the answers listed on the monitor within a limited time.
"I've been waiting for you. I apologize if I was rude for falling asleep," Pendragon said. "I'm just a little tired from—uh, never mind."
Pendragon coughed slightly, but then started to stand up, "I'm your instructor in field study today, along with one other student."
The girl tried to understand the conversation, she had just finished attending class and went straight to the field study. She cooed to herself, "Field study?" The two words were recorded and spoken to her character, startling her.
"Long story short, A series of training to become a certified Savior," Pendragon replied with folded hands. "You have been registered as a Savior under the Blue Falcon Association. You are now a Magician and undergoing the certification process."
The girl understood immediately. She already knew this information from the septionworld.com—the website as well as from the initial information when doing character design and the first time entering the game. She began to recall her character creation process. All players must choose one of three associations for Class progression and one of seven Tribes that distinguish the animal or human species of their created character. Players in the game are referred to as Saviors, who serve as mercenaries to protect and help the inhabitants of the virtual world called Survivors.
This story originates from Royal Road. Ensure the author gets the support they deserve by reading it there.
Currently, her class was Magician as per Pendragon's words. This class had fighting abilities, also called Skills related to elemental magic and other techniques called Buffs, which is magic to strengthen players. Besides Magician, players can choose Scout from the Gold Hawk Association or Fighter from the Black Raven Association. Each of these Classes will be promoted to a higher class, ranging from rank D to rank S.
"I already got a message from Maester Vanilla that you were sent with the Warp Portal, an instant transportation magic from Mjolnir city," Pendragon said. "Tribe Eldora has always been my favourite, animals like cats, dogs, and rabbits. You look so young, too, miss."
Pendragon had just given descriptions of some of the animals that belonged to Tribe Eldora, which contained mostly cute pets in the real world. Each Tribe had a variety of forms of animals that fell under a certain category. Tribe Featherman had all the variations of bird species. Tribe Morphius contained a variety of wild animals. Tribe Human, which is human itself, consists of various skin and face types. The remaining three Tribes were filled with animals and mystical creatures that did not exist in the real world such as Dragonic, Fairy, and Diabolus.
The conversation continued on the automatic dialog that she chose the topic on the monitor. "You said there was one other student?" asked Vestalia curiously.
"That's right and I checked the bio myself."
This time she was curious. There was a student other than her, meaning she would meet another person who also played the game right? The game was online, meaning she could meet and communicate with other players like her. They were waiting for this student now? Is this Pendragon who was her instructor also belongs to a player?
"Well, Miss. While waiting, would you like to warm up?" asked Pendragon excitedly. "You can get extra credit if you do this well."
"Really?" replied Vestalia with an automatic scene. What was happening now? The text appeared in front of her monitor again, seemingly continuing the tutorial.
Pendragon flicked his left hand. Four small orange-skinned four-legged dragons with the name Draco appeared. Unlike Pendragon who acted and stood like a human, these dragons were more similar to the dragon animals she had seen on the internet. The dragons also had wings, unlike Pendragon who she just realized didn't have wings to fly.
"They are low-difficulty monsters, called Scare. You should have learnt the theory at the academy," Pendragon explained, his speech and movements like a teacher. "The Saviors will hunt these Scares for the many resources of money, materials, and many other resources you will gain."
Somehow the girl understood what she had to do—to fight these monsters.
"Prepare your Mobius device and start fighting! These monsters are not classified as aggressive now, so don't be afraid!" commanded Pendragon loudly.
Vestalia's left hand was now holding something that resembled a Smartphone in the real world. The girl wondered, was she going to fight with this Smartphone called Mobius?
Pendragon gave instructions. "Open the inventory mode and speak the Keyword the weapon of your choice!"
The girl looked at the four types of weapons that appeared on her monitor consisting of Mace, Book, Racket, and Staff. She had to choose one of them and say the name of the weapon. It didn't seem to make any difference which weapon she used, at least that's what the current tutorial said.
She cooed, "Racket!!!" Vestalia's right hand suddenly held a Racket, the weapon she had chosen. The shape was more similar to a baseball bat rather than a tennis bat with its head like a balloon. Vestalia automatically put Mobius in her pocket and now both hands held the Racket.
"So, you're going to fight with magic," Pendragon said. "Aim the magic balls from the Racket at these Dracos."
There were instructions to hover over the Dracos' bodies on her monitor with the mouse to target them. After that, she had to press the Attack icon in the Command row with the F1 key on the screen. As the girl did, four tennis ball-sized balls appeared in transparent colour. The balls flew to hit on the Dracos. Some numbers appeared to each Draco indicating 200 damage points that reduced Draco's endurance level.
"The damage you inflict will reduce the Health Points, abbreviated as HP, of the Dracos," Pendragon said. "They will fall and collapse, called Knocked Out, if their HP is reduced to zero."
The Dracos fired fireballs back at Vestalia. Like Dracos, she took damage but not as much as Dracos. Her HP was reduced by a total of 100 points from 644 to 544.
"Be careful not to let your HP go to zero. Use items, which are things that you can eat and drink, one of the functions is to increase HP by saying its name as a keyword. If you are in a state of collapse and there are no other Saviors to help you, you can command Mobius to send an emergency alert for the medical association to take you to the hospital," Pendragon explained in detail.
The girl mostly understood this tutorial, she had played RPG-like games before though not in the online genre.
Pendragon continued the tutorial, "You already dealt damage to these Dracos. However, you should have learnt that they have Elemental Armour. This time, use the magic you learned from Mobius."
The tutorial continued with the introduction of the Mobius device, which stands for Mobile Orbment, Battle, Inventory, and User Storage. Mobius has various applications that are actually user interfaces on the monitor. Then, on the monitor, a different display appears labelled Battle Mode: Skill Tree. Various types of magic can be learned. She followed the instructions in the tutorial and learnt a new magic called Water Ball. The skill icon was now next to the Attack icon with the F2 button to activate it.
"Dracos have Fire element in their armor, which is weak against Water and Ice elements," Pendragon said. "Magician currently only has the water element. Water Ball magic will deal more damage. Say the keyword now."
There was another tutorial explaining the use of Skills and Commands on her monitor. The girl had the option to use the magic icon in Command with the F2 key or say the keyword. She said the keyword and this time four magic balls appeared again but they were now water bubbles and flew towards the Dracos. The four Dracos were immediately knocked down as their HP all touched zero with 500 points of damage each.
Pendragon clapped his hands. "Good job, Vestalia. Now there's a stronger monster. Try to defeat it." He flicked his left hand again. Vestalia was startled as she screamed, "Hooeeee!!!!!!!"