Chapter 2: Green Leaf Village

Green Leaf Village

Suddenly, a bright light caught my eye. While it fades, I started to see what's happening. I was teleported to a place. A place where players like me begin their adventure. The place has small houses and shops, also has walls that surround it. Houses and other buildings, even the walls, are made of rocks. A stone masonry expert should have done this.

Man... It's like I'm really inside the world. I feel everything. The feeling of softness of clothes that I wear, my dagger's handle is hard as it supposed to be, and even the smell of the place. Every sense I have is working here like it's real.

Players are everywhere asking questions. Most of us wear the same clothes so I'm pretty sure most of them are beginners as well.

The game didn't ask me about my appearance or class like any other games so, just as I expected, my appearance is the same in real life. I wear a simple shirt, pants, and boots. The equipment is probably for beginners. I have a dagger which I presume a starter weapon. I also have a small sack made of leather which has bread and herbs.

It was mentioned in the game manual that we can check our characters stats by opening a window by tapping our head. I was curious so I tried it.

2

Scythe / Rank: I

Health: 100%

Fatigue: 0%

Hunger: 0%

Stats:

-

Masteries:

-

Nothing much as I expected. So basically, to acquire stats, I need to unlock some mastery first. There's someone approaching accompanied by two girls.

"Hello fellow adventurer, we are new to this game and we want to hunt some monsters. Would you like to join us?" He asked confidently.

His aura is somewhat like a playboy, with a blond long-layered haircut. He's good looking and probably the same age as me.

"Sure, why not. I'll accept your invitation," I answered excitedly. The guy smiled at me and told her friends that I agreed to join them.

They all came to me and started introducing themselves.

"Elou's my name and this is Akko and Lili." He waved his hand introducing the others.

Akko is the taller girl with long straight black hair with a face of a girl same age as me. Lili, on the other hand, reminds me of my sis when she was younger, from the look on her face, she's a teenager. She's cute and somehow, I want to hug her for some reason. They didn't tell me much but Elou wants to be an archer while Akko and Lili are thinking of becoming a magician or a healer.

"I'm Scythe. I just started playing the game so I can't really help much. So, what's the plan?" I asked curiously.

"No worries. We're beginners as well. I asked the guys around here about the monsters and they said that the places around the beginner's area are safe. No aggressive monsters, just some low-level animals like Rabbits, Wild Cats, and the Wolves. Wolves are a bit aggressive though so we should be careful. What do you think?" Elou explained. He's done his research.

"I guess Wild Cats would be a good practice for our teamwork, I guess," I replied and so we decided to hunt Wild Cats because we are four in the party and we can easily defeat one. Wildcats are located at east side of the Beginner's area.

East of Beginner's Area

We arrived at the Wild Cat's area which is just outside. The place is filled with small grass and you can easily see some cats roaming around. After checking the place, we decided to target one Wild Cat to separate it from its friends. We basically hit one of them using a rock to catch its attention.

"KssssssSSSS!" The Wildcat made an angry sound and rushed towards me.

The Wildcat suddenly attacked me using its fierce claw. I was caught unprepared and got hit. The attack was just a scratch so it didn't do much damage. Three percent of my HP was gone.

*TIIING!*

A high-pitched sound suddenly echoed in my ears and then a window popped out of nowhere.

"Battle Mastery learned!"

"Light Armor Mastery learned!" I got these two masteries in just a hit.

I aggressively attacked the Wild Cat using my dagger.

"Light Weapon Mastery learned!"

The others also attacked the cat simultaneously. The Wildcat sometimes can avoid our attacks. It is really agile but because we outnumbered it, we managed to defeat one of the cats. It wasn't that hard. We decided to hunt more. Whenever we kill something we carve the leather and meat out of it. It's disgusting but it's supposed to be that way according to the game manual. We also saved the bones in case we need it. We also decided to share the loot evenly. The girls did well too.

Green Leaf Village

After several hours of hunting, we decided to leave the Beginner's Area and go north to a village nearby. The village is just a ten-minute walking distance.

We asked one of the guards in the village some questions. It's called Green Leaf village and the place has lots of vegetation inside, where trees are all around, flowers and other plants are also beside the walls. The leader of the village ordered people to only use rocks when building houses because, with the trees and plants all over the city, fire outbreaks would be too hard to handle. Guards also mentioned a story when the village was still made out of woods and the village was devastated because of a small fire outbreak.

There are a lot more buildings here compared to beginner's area. There are Inns where players stay when they don't own a house, armor and weaponry shops, miscellaneous shops, Trading area, Blacksmiths shops and even Schools for masteries which will be really helpful for new players. We decided to visit the blacksmith to make them craft for us.

"Do you need equipment? You have no money but have materials? Handy will help you with those!" Shouting lively, I hope he doesn't disturb other shops around him.

"How about we get new gears? Our weapons look like they're worn out from our last hunt." I suggested.

"Not a bad idea. I guess it's time to change outfits. Our gears are covered in blood too." Elou's scraping off the blood on his shirt.

"I need to wash my hands as well." Akko's hands are covered in blood as well and need to clean up.

"..." Lili's just looking at me. Should I say something to her?

"Let's go then," I said and so we went to the loud blacksmith.

The blacksmith is wearing an apron, maybe a protection for crafting. He's tall, with really masculine feature and bald. Looking at him right now I can guess that he's in his thirties, a normal looking blacksmith.

"Hello, Mr. Handy, we have some leather and bones and I heard they can be used to craft some gears. Is this enough for you to craft some weapons and armor for us? We just came here," Elou started talking to the blacksmith.

"Yes of course. I am happy helping noo- I mean beginners with their equipment. The fee is ten percent of the materials needed for my working time and I am the best blacksmith here so far so I guarantee you guys that you'll have the best gears! HAHAHA!" He sounds arrogant but doesn't matter as long as he helps us. He laughs so hard too.

He asked leather and bones so we gave almost all of our loot. I hope it's worth it. Anyway, he said we should come back around an hour because it takes the time to craft those.

"By the way, don't try to travel north of here. The monsters are stronger than those you've faced so far. Not only that, if you die, all your equipment will drop including your bag. You will also be out of the game for 4 hours. Your mastery Rank will drop by ten percent too. So, make sure to travel safely," He explained. The penalty sounds awful. This is a huge loss for those who have higher masteries.

"Thanks for the advice Mr. Handy. We will keep that in mind. Do you know what we should do next?" Elou asked. That's a good question. I don't want to just wander around and let myself get killed.

"Learning or improving masteries is what you should do next. Beating up monsters is not the only way to increase the rank of your masteries. Like myself, most of the time I'm here crafting stuff and that made my Crafting mastery to rank V which is really high. But those masteries that are not for battles like crafting mastery is not added to your Overall Rank. So, you should hunt more for a while. Also, some guilds are also looking for new members. They will assign you some quests which are collecting or killing stuff, depends on what kind of request. Many of the high-ranked players are trying their best to explore the world which is really big! But for now, increasing your rank is your top priority," That's a lot of explanation but it was really informative.

"Thanks, we'll be back later," We said our goodbyes. We'll return later for the equipment.

"WAAAAAAAH! Goblins are attacking at the East Gate!" Loud noises echoed throughout the whole village.

What fresh hell is this? Players are running away from the goblins. Goblins are slightly stronger than wolves but in a group, they can cause a large damage to the village.

Handy become so enraged that he grabbed his giant hammer and went outside of his shop.

"Hey you guys, go back to the south gate for now and go to Beginner's Area, you'll be safe there!" He shouted.

"Hey Scy, we should leave or we'll get killed here," Elou's face is filled with doubt and fear. But I may be new but I won't just stay away from an opportunity on a battle like this. I might also improve a lot of masteries if I manage to survive here.

"I'm going to help them here. A little help won't be that bad right?" I said with confidence. And of course, dying here won't matter that much because I'm just a newbie and I won't lose that much.

Elou seems to be troubled by what I said. Then the three of them decided to stay.

"I didn't expect you to be this risky Scy! But of course, you make sense, Akko and Lili decided to stay too!" He said while trying to hide his shaking knees.

"IDIOTS! You better not die!" Handy worriedly shouted at us.

"DEFEND THE VILLAGE FROM THESE FILTHY GOBLINS!" Handy shouted furiously.