Jeff walked over to the still spinning chainsaw and switched it off. Suddenly feeling extremely worn out, Jeff slumped to the ground beside the corpse of the NPC.
Shrugging out of his ruined jacket, Jeff examined the bite wound in his shoulder, from which blood continued to flow freely. He pulled a handkerchief from a side pocket in his pants and attempted to staunch the wound.“Jinx, I need medical treatment for this, do you have any suggestions?”
“Yes Jeff, I think now would be a good time to move on to the next stage of the tutorial. Did you notice how you received rewards when you dispatched the targets? If you look at your system interface you will see how many coins you have been awarded and you can then access the market to make purchases.”
Calling up his inventory Jeff saw that the statistics had changed since his battle with the goblins.
NAME: Jeff Nostro
RACE: Human
ALIGNMENT: Neutral Good
HEALTH POINTS (HP): 39/80
MANA POINTS (MP): 4/70
INVENTORY:ITEM: [Long Sword - Stormcaller] Legendary Rank - +12 offense - Equipped
COINS: 87
Strength: 5
Speed: 3
Vitality: 3
Endurance: 2
Cognition: 4
Offense: 3
Defense: 4
Total Attribute Points: 24/200
CLASS: Steel Mage Level 1
SKILLS: Path of Arcana & Blade. Necromancer (Unlock at Level 2)
Jeff ran his minds eye over the stats, noting a slight increase in all of the indicators. As was expected, his mana points had been reduced to near empty due to the use of his skills during the battle.
“Practice makes perfect Jeff” explained Jinx in a didactic tone. “As you grind your way through the challenges of the tournament, you will see your stats grow exponentially. The next evolution of your class will take place when you have successfully grown your stats to the required level and mastered your skills. Make sure that you grow each of your attributes at roughly the same pace, you ideally need to reach the figure of 33 for each of them, this level.”
“What happens if they don’t grow at the same speed?” Jeff questioned, noting that his Strength was more than double his Endurance.
“You will still be able to level up, but if your Attributes become more uneven over time you will have increasing difficulty progressing through your Class.
Now, turn your attention to the coins in your inventory. You may have noticed during the fight with the goblins that you were awarded coins on successful termination of a target.These rewards are dual sourced; you will automatically be allocated coins by the system as you proceed through the challenges, and you will also be able to reap rewards and patronage from viewers on the metaweb. Try to make your gameplay as exciting as possible to entice more coins from your fanbase. Now here’s how to use the coins in your inventory.”
Jeff recalled that the goblins stat display had listed their reward value as 10 coins each. That meant he had been awarded a further 47 coins from viewers of the battle.
A new option blossomed in Jeff’s mind, something like a virtual catalog appearing in his inner vision. Similar in some ways to an Earthly online shopping site, the front page was a catalog of product types, divided into two main subheadings; Magical Items and Equipment. As he drilled down through the different categories, he was bewildered by the huge variety of goods on offer. Hoping for a different way to browse the list, he mentally called up a search dialog and input the concept of health, healing and medicine.
Immediately the list shimmered and adjusted, now only displaying items fitting the search criteria.
The topmost item on the list, an [Elixir of Health], was way outside of his price range however, costing 500 coins. Jeff adjusted the display to rank the items from lowest price first.
Now he was presented with a few potential choices. The first one, a Herbalism Kit at only 5 coins was unsuitable, as the sterile environment around him had not a single plant growing in it, let alone a herb in sight. Moving on, Jeff inspected the next item on the list, a Potion of Healing for 50 coins. Still in great pain from his wound, Jeff did not hesitate and selected the potion. Instantly the coins were deducted from his balance and a new item, Potion of Healing, appeared in his inventory list.
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ITEM: [Potion of Healing] Common, +50 HP
COINS: 37
“Well done Jeff, you have made your first purchase. Now access the potion by selecting it from your inventory list.” Jinx instructed.
Jeff summoned the potion from his inventory and it appeared instantly in his hand. Jeff examined the item. He held a small glass vial containing a strange red liquid, fizzing and effervescing constantly.
ITEM: [Potion of Healing] Common, +50 HP
A single use magical potion, transferrable. Grants the user 50 Health points.
Jeff cautiously removed the stopper, which appeared to be made of some substance resembling rubber, and raised the vial to his lips.
Throwing caution to the wind, Jeff downed the strange liquid, which coursed down his throat and settled in his stomach. Instantly, a wave of warmth and wellbeing spread out from his gut to his whole body, erasing all of his aches and pains. Jeff stared down at his shoulder, noting in wonderment that blood had ceased to flow out of the wound, and the ragged gash caused by the goblin’s teeth was visibly closing before his eyes.
Jeff noted that his HP had risen back up to full, and his Mana Points were also creeping back up, still not full but they seemed to be replenishing at the rate of 1 per minute, so at this rate they wold also be back up to full capacity within another half an hour.
Jeff took a moment to reflect on the events of the day so far. He felt that he should be more shaken up, especially after receiving the serious wound that he did. It seemed that the transformation he had undergone when he selected his class had toughened him up mentally as well as physically.
Standing up, he moved over to the body of the nearest goblin, deciding to look through its possessions in the hope of finding something useful. Secured at its waist by a crude length of twine was a strange looking knife in a scabbard, the blade crafted from something like bone, or perhaps a long tooth. Setting it aside, Jeff rifled through the pockets of the goblins overalls and found little of interest, just a glass pipe which had obviously been used to smoke something, as it had a layer of nasty brown crud on the inside.
Jeff looked at the bone knife again; by concentrating he was able to summon an overlay with more information. Glowing yellow data appeared:
ITEM: [Goblin Bone Dagger] Common, +2 Offense
A goblin bone dagger is usually bestowed on a child on his or her fifth birthday. Goblins are expected to use these daggers on their first hunt as a rite of passage to goblin adulthood.
Experimenting, Jeff mentally pulled the dagger into his inventory. To his amazement it worked, and the dagger faded out of existence in front of his eyes.
Trying again, he pulled Stormcaller into his inventory too. The sword and scabbard disappeared from his back where it was hanging and his inventory was updated once again.
Jeff played around with the function a few more times, making sure that he could get access to the weapons as and when needed. He found that he could equip himself with the sword and the new goblin dagger with a simple thought, the weapons appearing straight into the palm of his left or right hand when required.
Out of curiosity, Jeff pulled one of the coins from his inventory and inspected it physically. Roughly the size of a US silver dollar, one side was stamped with the likeness of a Vogel, wearing some sort of crown, the other side showed two crossed swords in a circlet of stars.
Biting his lip, Jeff barely managed to stop himself from making a snarky comment about the Vogel’s parentage.
Moving on, Jeff continued looting the dead goblins. The next two corpses were disappointing; they had no weapons or much loot of any value, just some suspicious looking dried meat wrapped up in a dirty kerchief, and a faded monochrome photo of an old female goblin, smoking a pipe on the porch of a dilapidated shack in a forest setting. Jeff pulled the items into his inventory anyway, reasoning that storage space seemed unlimited, and there was no knowing what would or would not come in handy at a later date.
Picking up the chainsaw he mentally inspected it.
ITEM: [VogelCorp Ether Powered Chainsaw] Common, +2 Offense
Studying the machine, he saw it was equipped with a simple throttle control on the handle, and along the side was an analog dial which showed the fuel tank was three quarters full. He pulled it into his inventory and moved on to the last goblin.
A search of Leetus’s corpse revealed a crude wooden amulet hanging around his neck on a plain silver chain. Depicting a three headed god of some kind, the identify function revealed the following information:
ITEM: [Periapt of The Erstwhile Tree Gods] Uncommon, +2 Vitality, +2 Endurance.In addition to the vitality and endurance boost, will grant the wearer +10 HP
Pulling the chain over his head, Jeff noted that it did indeed increase his HP pool, as well as adding to the vitality and endurance stats.
NAME: Jeff Nostro
RACE: Human
ALIGNMENT: Neutral Good
HEALTH POINTS (HP): 80/80 +10
MANA POINTS (MP): 23/70
ITEM: [Periapt of The Erstwhile Tree Gods] Uncommon, +2 Vitality, +2 Endurance, +10 HP - Equipped
COINS: 37
Strength: 5
Speed: 3
Vitality: 3+2
Endurance: 2+2
Cognition: 4
Offense: 3
Defense: 4
Total Attribute Points: 24/200
Jeff noted that the additional Vitality and Endurance Points bestowed by the [Periapt of The Erstwhile Tree Gods] did not make it into the Total Attribute Points amount.
Calling up the marketplace interface once again, Jeff decided to spend the remaining coins on protective equipment.
His options were limited to a few basic choices, but Jeff finally settled on a coat of ring mail for 30 coins, which added 2 points to his defense attribute. The downside was the weight of the armor, at least 40 pounds of extra bulk.
“Well Jinx, what’s next?” Asked Jeff.
“At this stage it is standard procedure to continue training, and work on leveling up your stats. The first stage of the tournament is scheduled to commence 180 hours from now so I suggest spending at least half of the remaining time available to you here in the sim chamber before we move on to the lounge.”
“What’s in the lounge?” Jeff asked curiously. Visions of comfy couches and platters of delicious food passed through his mind.
“The lounge is where you will meet and interact with the other contestants in The Tournament, before proceeding to the first round.” Jinx replied.
Jeff remembered Vogel Cenk’s words in his first broadcast “vanquish all other combatants” and felt a reluctance to rush to the lounge without first improving his stats as much as possible. Who knew how friendly his fellow contestants would be?
Pulling a protein bar from a side pocket of his pants, he said to Jinx grimly “Let’s continue grinding through the training shall we?”