What Doesn't Kill You...
James' body jerked as the adrenaline coursing through his body caused him to tense as though he was still fleeing, only to be caught by the soft but firm cushioning of the capsule holding him in place. Coming to his senses, James slowly calmed down as the capsule's padding withdrew and the hatch slowly opened up, releasing him.
"Damn it, there was a notification just before the log-out… I must have died in-game that means a 24-hour wait… grr… I need a break anyway."
Gingerly getting out of the capsule, James flexed and stretched his muscles which felt oddly sore and fatigued.
"Guess this is something like phantom pain, all the exertion in-game led to my mind playing tricks on me..."
James went about his business sullenly as his mind fixated on his current in-game situation, his annoyance evident from the forcefulness of his actions.
James checked the clock and was shocked to realize that it was already 9.42pm, more than 30 hours after he first entered Athal, meaning he had gone without rest for more than a full day.
Whipping up yet another meal of instant noodles and finishing it within moments, James went to bed and was out of it the moment his head hit the pillow.
*RING* *RING*
"Nngghh… I don't have to work anymore. Screw waking up in the mornings."
James blindly groped around for his ringing smartphone and swiped away the call and dropped back to sleep immediately.
*RING RING RING*
"GAH."
James opened his eyes blearily and shut off his phone entirely without even checking the caller and happily continued snoozing.
*BRINGGG BRINGGG*
"… What the heck. Can't a man get some peaceful sleep."
James woke up sluggishly, yawning and stretching and slowly trudged over to get a change of clothes, yelling out as he went about dressing himself.
*BRINGGG BRINGGG BRINGGG BRINGGG*
"COMING! STOP PRESSING THE DOORBELL!"
"Hey man, I brought lunch?"
Staring at the familiar visage he seen for way too many years, James briefly contemplated shutting the door in his face in a moment of spite but finally sighed and took a step back.
"Dude. Don't you have to work?"
Kelvin looked morose and opened his mouth.
"Well.. you see after the incident, HR sai..."
"They fired you too right."
James interjected quickly to put a stop to the likely hours-long story with well-practiced ease.
"..because of this contra- Damn it dude, can't you just let me finish what I have to say?"
"Sigh... here we go again, come in bro. Let's do this over food."
Rolling his eyes, James finally stepped back and invited Kelvin in.
*A few hours later*
"So... you got placed on leave for an indefinite amount of time which basically means you got fired. Join the club I guess... at least they gave you a similar package with early access. So will Firduath Bloodhawk be making a comeback?"
James patted the downcast brother's shoulder as he quickly changed the subject to prevent another round of sorrowful monologue.
"That was an eon ago James, but... why not it's not like we are going to take another stab at starting another business anytime soon and sitting around doing nothing is not my style at all. So yeah, I guess it's time for a comeback."
Triggered by the long-forgotten name, Kelvin's eyes regained an odd gleam as he recalled the glory days. Bolstered by the nostalgic feelings, his spirits quickly lifted with a complete turnaround in his following words.
"Heh, yeah why not! You up for conquering this world with me bro? In fact, how are you doing so far, can I take a look? You are probably up to your usual min-maxing shenanigans right?"
"I can't, I just died. I got killed by the fire dragon whelps… Plus you know that each capsule is keyed to an individual, it's not like I can let you use it."
James glossed over Kelvin's invite, secretly praying he'll forget as he quickly replied the other question.
"For starters, you can still log-in and browse your account statistics in the waiting room even after dying and as usual, you ignored all the group-related functionalities… The capsule allows you to plug in another screen to project your game-play and also allows for viewing of basic stats. Although this is usually more for debugging and testing purposes since there's a video recording function in-game as well, but it'll be perfect in this case!"
Faced with Kelvin's well-versed and needlessly long explanation, James quickly capitulated and they headed over to the capsule.
'Sigh, I guess I can take stock of my progress so far while I'm at it.'
James entered the capsule, feeling the somewhat-familiar padding slowly expand and engulf his body as the lid slowly came down. His last glimpse before the lid hissed shut was that of Kelvin hooking up his laptop to the machine via a hidden port he had previously completely overlooked.
In the next instant as he opened his eyes, Feng was back in Athal… in the exact same spot before he logged out.
"Wha? I'm not dead? Oh shit."
Looking around him, he noticed the area was completely devastated by fireballs, the ground blackened and previously ruined walls were blasted away with the shattered bricks scattered all around… Leaving Feng completely out in the open!
A jolt of adrenaline shot through his veins as he noticed a few salamanders roaming the area, though thankfully no dragon whelps were in sight.
Jogging away from the blast zone to quickly duck behind some cover, Feng hid himself and carefully scanned the area for any salamanders who might have detected his presence. After a few minutes of tense observation, Feng concluded that the monsters must have thought that he had died in their assault as the normal movement patterns of the monsters seem to have resumed.
With no immediate danger, Feng heaved a sigh of relief and checked the last notification he got before his log out, curious what it had been if it wasn't indicating his death.
[Warning: Logging Out In Combat
You have lost a level due to logging out in combat. While not prohibited, players are to note that such actions will result in an indeterminate amount of experience loss. Additionally, should players die within the ten seconds countdown period prior to log-out, their experience loss due to death will be doubled. ]
'Holy-'
"Wow. That sounds really bad. But at least you aren't dead so I guess you got off lucky!"
Feng's thoughts were disrupted by a familiar voice sounding in his head and he looked around wildly, wondering how on earth Kelvin managed to enter the game.
"Dude, I'm speaking through a microphone. You really didn't pay attention to any of the multiplayer functionalities did you… Like the fact there's actually a 3-second time lag between what you experience and what I'll be able to see to prevent me from being able to help you spot enemies or give advice! Did you also know you can adjust the volume in the settings and..."
Feng rolled his eyes as Kelvin continued rambling in the background and quick turned down Kelvin's volume to a bare whisper in the settings, and immediately got back to planning his escape route around the mobs.
Successfully avoiding all the salamanders in his stealth-ed state, Feng soon reached the entrance only to find a lone salamander guarding the passageway…
Seeing no way to sneak around it considering the narrow entrance, Feng checked around to ensure the other wandering salamanders were a distance away before initiating his sneak attack.
Leaping onto it, he quickly slaughtered the salamander and dragged the corpse much further down before proceeding to skin it…
"Ew! That's disgusting… When they said it's realistic, I guess they really meant it. This is still kind of gross though. They should-"
The sudden exclamation broke Feng's concentration for a brief moment before he ignored Kelvin again. Resuming his task, Feng quickly but carefully skinned and declawed the salamander corpse and left the area.
--- Unknown Dungeon Room ---
Jogging back to the room he initially appeared in, Feng did not bother sneaking this time given the utter lack of monster encounters previously and soon returned to the room where he sat down to rest and take stock of the situation.
"Nice, safe zone! Maybe you can show me your build now bro?"
Feng silently complied. Only to be bombarded by a huge list of notifications as he tried to open his status and quickly shut them all only looking at the summary window.
[Through your efforts and killing Salamanders, you have leveled up sixteen times and gained:
+5 Strength
+1 Dexterity
+3 Perception
Stealth has leveled up to Novice 6
Skinning has leveled up to Novice 3
Anatomy has leveled up to Novice 2
Combat Instinct has leveled up to Novice 4
Sense Hostile Intent has leveled up to Novice 8
Acrobatics has leveled up to Novice 4
Running has leveled up to Novice 7
Dagger Mastery has leveled up to Apprentice 4]
"Wow, your stats look way overpowered for your level… but why do you have so much un-allocated stats?"
Feng looked flummoxed for a moment at Kelvin's words.
*BAM*
Face-palming at the realization he had a bunch of unallocated stat points from his level-ups, Feng cursed his stupidity for completely forgetting about this basic gaming principle after getting used to earning stat points from his efforts…
Feng's finger hovered over the different stats as he contemplated what he should increase in order to take out the lizard elite yet keep up with his long term goals. He really wants to save stat points for the most-OP stats likely intelligence/wisdom related for magical combos but needs to survive and get past the lizard and most of his skills are physical…
"Eh. Why are you so weak, your strength is like your lowest stat… It's probably even lower than your real-world strength, I mean I know you rely more on your skills but can you even lift anything with this bro!"
Feng's eyebrows twitched as his manly pride reacted to Kelvin's comment and held down the plus button on increasing strength… only to stop after his rational side woke up and screamed at him that he needed agility to dodge and survive and definitely extra constitution to ensure he survives.
After allocating mainly to those three stats, Feng contemplated and decided to allocate a few more points to round out some of the other stats to nice round numbers and saved the remaining point before surveying the final results.
[*Status*
Name: Feng | Gender: Male | Race: Human | Level: 28 (34%)
Health: 870 | Stamina: 1020 | Mana: 1130
Strength: 80 | Constitution: 60 | Endurance: 50
Intelligence: 44 | Wisdom: 40 | *Willpower: 14
Dexterity: 70 | Agility: 70 | *Perception: 36
*Charisma: 18 | *Luck: 41
*Fame: 110 | *Faith: 1500
*Titles*
Greenhorn Adventurer | Cougar Bait | Blasphemer
*Physical Skills*
Running (Passive): Novice 7 | Balance (Passive): Novice 4
Acrobatics (Passive): Novice 4 | Evade (Passive): Novice 4
Unarmed Mastery (Passive): Apprentice 4 | Sword Mastery (Passive): Apprentice 3
Dagger Mastery (Passive): Apprentice 4 | Dual-wielding Mastery (Passive): Apprentice 1
Throwing Mastery (Passive): Apprentice 1 | Quick Draw (Passive): Novice 7
Combat Instinct (Passive): Novice 4 | Toughness (Passive): Novice 3
Stealth (Passive): Novice 6 | Breathing Technique (Sustained): Novice 7
Chain Punching (Active): Apprentice 2
*Mental Skills*
Sense Hostile Intent (Passive): Novice 8 | Concentration (Passive): Novice 1
Anatomy (Passive): Novice 2 | Observe (Passive/Active): Apprentice 1
Meditation (Sustained): Novice 8
*Social Skills*
Oratory (Passive): Novice 5 | Negotiate (Passive): Novice 3
Magical Contracts (Passive): Novice 2
*Crafting Skills*
Alchemy(Passive): Novice 6 | Skinning (Passive): Novice 3 ]
Grinning as he realized his effective level from all his stat increases should place him on an equal level to the giant lizard monster, Feng quickly returned to the lizard cavern.
"Woohoo!! Go for it bro, massacre the boss! You can-"
Egged on by Kelvin cheering him on for an epic fight, Feng almost rushed into combat… but remembered where his lack of caution had landed him and decided that over-kill is better than dying from over-confidence.
Retrieving two vials of potion gunk from his inventory, Feng carefully slathered both his knives with the gunk and left the empty vials on the ground.
Observing the cavern for hiding spots, noting the few rocky outcrops in the circular cave, Feng planned out his approach before observing the slumber giant lizard again.
[Giant Comodon Lizard[/b]
Type: Lizard Monster (Elite)
Level: ~60
Attacks/Weapons: Claws, Bite, Tail
Traits: Tough Scales, *Hidden*
Stats: *Skill Level Too Low*
Weak Spots: Underbelly, *Hidden*
Description: A monstrous lizard with striped patterns on its back, the scales on its body looks extremely tough and the claws on its thick limbs can easily shred flesh. The scales appear to grow thinner towards its underside.]
'Damn it, fat lot of good that weak spot does for me...'
Seeing the lizard lying flat on the ground with its underbelly entirely covered, Feng seriously doubted he had any chance at that weak spot.
Hoping that the giant lizard shares a similar anatomy to the salamanders, he sneaked up close by and leapt at the large lizard monster from the shadows with both daggers out and plunging towards the monster…