Scribe Marlon was a serious-looking elderly man with half-moon spectacles and a long, triangular beard that cascaded all the way down his robes to the tips of his pointed shoes. At her approach, the straight line of his lips turned into a frown.
“A new student, are you?” he said quickly. “And that Grimhai sent you to me? Of course, he did, fool boy. The young have no respect for the proper way of doing things. And what, he expects me to teach you something? Decades! You’d need decades to learn a craft as worthy as mine!”
“Er...” Not quite sure how to handle the scribe, who seemed to become more agitated by the moment, Guin decided to press on the quest point. “Really, if you could just teach me something about your subject, I would greatly appreciate it. Certainly, the art of map-making is a respectable career that I am not worthy of following, but it is something that I admire and would like to know more about.”
Though he still disapproved of her, he ‘hmmed’ in a low tone. “An appreciation of an art is one thing, but don’t expect yourself to be capable,” he told her and waved at an empty desk. “Sit, and I shall be quick.” Guin did as she was told, and the scribe pulled out a handful of maps and placed them in front of her. “These are maps of the area that I have drawn myself. This, here.” He pointed to a complex, beautiful design in the top right corner of a map of the area around Bade. “Do you know what this is?”
“A compass rose?” she replied.
He seemed to approve and continued, “Yes. It’s a very important thing. In most cases, however, unless you buy maps of those Treasure Clan fools, the top of the page shall always be North. Moving on. What is this?” He pointed to a scribble on the bottom right.
She considered for a moment. “A scale?”
“Correct. Good,” he said, sounding like he was beginning to warm to her. Guin refrained from laughing. “Now this. What is this?”
“...A legend,” she answered. He snapped his fingers excitedly. Finding it kind of cute, Guin smiled. She supposed this game anticipated that the person playing had a child’s basic knowledge of everything and was designed to fill in those gaps.
He asked her a dozen or so other questions about the map, mostly regarding the weights of lines and the contour lines, growing increasingly excited with every answer she got correct. He happily allowed her to try drawing her own, giving her a quill and ink well.
She happily completed her map, copying one of Scribe Marlon’s maps of Bade and the forest around it down to the drawings of the motifs with which he had decorated it. As she finished, several notifications popped up:
Congratulations! You have discovered a skill!
[Geography - Cartography]Rank – Beginner
Congratulations! You have discovered a skill!
[Calligraphy]Rank – Beginner
Congratulations! You have discovered a skill!
[Fine Arts]Rank – Beginner
Congratulations! You have discovered a skill!
[Fine Arts - Drawing] Rank – Beginner
Ignoring Guin’s jaw-dropping along with her heart at the ridiculous nature of those skills, Scribe Marlon began to fawn over her work. With the quest requirements completed, she thanked the scribe for his time and returned to report to Grimhai.
Grimhai was still sitting at his desk, looking out over the classes. She sat back in the chair and said, “Teacher Grimhai, I have done as you asked.”
“Very good,” he said with a smile. “And it looks like you have made the great accomplishment of finishing the task without further upsetting our poor Scribe Marlon. A great feat indeed. Now you should have at least one Sub-Skill. Please pull up your skill window.”
Doing so, Guin wondered if she had visibly paled at the sheer number of skills she now possessed. The screen was a nice design, with each skill having its own seal-like graphic to differentiate it from the others.
SKILLS
[Animal Handling] Rank – Beginner
[Calligraphy] Rank – Beginner
[Charismatic] Rank – Beginner
This story originates from Royal Road. Ensure the author gets the support they deserve by reading it there.
[Charismatic – Beguiling] Rank – Intermediate
[Cryptozoology] Rank – Beginner
[Domestic] Rank - Beginner
[Fine Arts] Rank – Beginner
[Fine Arts – Drawing] Rank – Beginner
[Geography] Rank – Beginner
[Geography – Cartography] Rank – Beginner
[History and Lore] Rank – Beginner
[Hunting] Rank – Beginner
[Stealth] Rank – Beginner
[Stealth - Burglary] Rank – Beginner
“Well, well,” he said. “You certainly have been busy! You have a number of skills at your disposal already. I will now explain how general skills and sub-skills work. Each general skill and sub-skill has its own experience bar. When you work on a general skill, you gain experience in that skill. If you work on a sub-skill, you get the full experience in the sub-skill, and half the experience in the general skill under which it falls. General skills and sub-skills require the same amount of experience to gain a proficiency level.
“Rank - Beginner requires 1 XP to achieve. Rank - Intermediate requires 1,000 XP to achieve. Rank - Advanced, 10,000 XP, Craftsman, 100,000 XP; and so on, until the final achievable rank of Grandmaster at 1,000,000 XP. There are currently 0 Grandmasters in TheirWorld.”
Almost gagging in dismay, Guin looked at her skill window. How many people were out there trying to be a Grandmaster in one of these skills, and yet there wasn’t a single one? Even in combat skills?
“To progress in a rank,” the instructions went on, “you must also fulfill a quest given by a mentor in that skill.
“Note that to use a sub-skill to its full potential, the sub-skill and the general skill must be at the same rank. In this case, the sub-skill is a slave to the general skill. Using your skills as an example, while you have the sub-skill [Charismatic – Beguiling] at Intermediate Rank, since your [Charismatic] skill is only Beginner Rank, you can only use your [Charismatic – Beguiling] at Beginner Rank. That said, if the general skill is a higher rank than the sub-skill, the sub-skill will receive a bonus equal to half the experience points of the differential. Do you understand?”
“I think so,” Guin nodded. In theory, she did, at least. If she was correct, it was fairly logical so far — just difficult to keep track of. Essentially, you couldn’t function as a true Grandmaster of a sub-skill without broad knowledge of the general subjects involved. On the other hand, you could just power through focusing on one sub-skill to level a general skill, though that would take more time. There were a lot of angry players who had been complaining about how slow the skill progression was, but it made sense to her. One didn’t become a master craftsman overnight.
“Lastly, it can be very difficult to keep track of skills. There is a system in place that allows you to select as many skills as you wish to be filed on a separate page for quicker access. Please open your skill window again,” Grimhai instructed. “There, you will see that each skill has a small check box next to it. Choose a skill, and check that box. Next, you will see to the left that there is a tab that says ‘Saved Skills.’ Click on that box.”
Guin clicked the box on [Cryptozoology] and clicked on the ‘Saved Skills’ tab. [Cryptozoology] was listed alone.
“Ahh...” she wondered aloud. It could still get muddy, depending on how many skills a player wanted access to, but it wasn’t bad.
“Clicking on a skill will bring up information on that skill,” Grimhai went on. “Such as the benefits of having the skill, what the skill will give you if you continue leveling it, examples of what the skill affects, the experience required for the next level, and various other things. It is very beneficial to keep track of these bonuses, as they may be useful to you in the future. In the end, each skill has its own rules and quirks, but it’s best to seek advice from specific skill masters about those as they become relevant. Shall we move on?”
A quest has been updated!
It is time to start your lessons!
Accept this quest to begin a series of game tutorials.
You must fulfill the basic five lessons of the teacher Grimhai Kidalmar.
You have finished the second lesson:
UPDATE: The Third Requirement: Listen to Teacher Grimhai’s introduction to factions. Follow his instructions to gain a randomized faction quest.
This quest is REQUIRED.
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Guin nodded. This was a lot of information to take in at once. The consensus among other players had been that it was worth it to sit through the first teacher’s lessons, however. She felt like she had been a pretty docile player, but she had gotten some benefits from it, so she decided to continue.
“Excellent,” Grimhai nodded. “The next things that I will teach you about are the factions in the world and your reputation with those factions. There are many factions with whom you gain reputations and sub-reputations, though the sub-system for factions works slightly differently than that for skills. While reputations do not outright affect your character, having a high positive reputation with a faction can give you access to exclusive quests, allow you to wear faction-specific equipment, use faction-specific mounts and pets, and allow you access to higher-ranked NPCs. First, let’s talk about how you gain faction points.
“There are various ways to attain faction reputation points — though some factions have more specific requirements than others. One of the easiest ways to gain faction points is to complete quests.”
Taking a piece of paper from his desk, Grimhai began scribbling on it with a quill. He only took a moment to finish — though she couldn’t see, she assumed he was only signing it — rolled it up, sealed it with melted wax, and handed it to her. “Take this letter of introduction to Pastor Jormund in the Imperial Church of The Lady. He will ask you to perform a task for him. Once you have completed his task and gone to him for your reward, you may return to me.”
Hesitantly, Guin took the scroll from his hands, then stood, put the letter in her bag, and stretched. “All right! I will be back as soon as this quest is complete!” With that, Guin turned to leave.