The Grind Begins
Jean's eyes could not help but glisten as he listened to his father's words. Simultaneously, his mind was in a state of euphoria since his guesses were actually right. He would finally start his true journey in the World Net. But then, soon after, he realized that he had no idea where to go to start grinding experience for levels. And so, facing his father, he asked, "Is there a map? Also, where are we going to go?"
John lightly smiled as he answered in response, "Yeah, there is a map for the places in the World Net. You just have to say the word 'Map' and it'll open, but you'll have to discover the other places for later. For now, you'll be riding on a train for leveling."
"Your dad's train for leveling." Soon after, John gave a thumbs up to Jean with a proud grin on his face. Jean could not help but slightly cringe inwardly, knowing that they were in the center of a city, where many people would definitely come across them possibly seeing this sight. Nonetheless, he tried his best to not show this outside as he continued to ask, "So…where are we going to go, dad?"
"The place where every person in the World Net heads to when they start out." Pointing out towards a certain direction, his father replied. "It's possibly the only place in the World Net where a beginner could grind levels. It's known as the Azure Forest."
After that, John started to walk towards a certain direction, with Jean following behind him after seeing his father move away from where he was. While they were walking, John decided to look back at Jean and ask, "How fast can you move?"
"Uh…" Jean opened up his general stat screen for a second or two before responding back with, "4 meters per second."
"We can get to the Azure Forest at less time then," John said after hearing his son's answer. "I thought I'd have to reduce my speed by a lot just so you could catch up to me."
"How about you, dad? How fast you can move?" Since his father was bragging about how he thought he would have to slow down a bit less, he had a thought that his father could move multiple times faster than him. After hearing his father's answer, he realized that his father was just putting on false bravado.
"6 meters per second." John grinned. "Fast right?"
"Yeah…sure."
…
Since Halus City, the city where Jean spawned in, spanned tens of kilometers in diameter, it took around an hour for the two of them to reach the gate that led them to the wilderness outside the city. It was also in this hour that Jean realized that he was not moving at 4 meters per second, which was his maximum movement speed. Just as he was about to ask his father another question, his father turned back and answered the question in his mind, replying, "Any type of killing is prohibited in cities, with everyone only being able to move at 1 meter per second as a sort of way to reinforce that idea."
"Anyways, once we pass the gate, we can go and run at our maximum speed." With a serious expression on his face, John continued to walk until he passed through the gate, passing through what seemed to be a faint blue barrier surrounding the city.
Soon after, Jean passed this faint blue barrier as well, finally entering the wilderness outside Halus City.
Whoosh!
'You have left Halus City. Your movement speed has been returned to its original state.' Not long after doing so, a holographic screen appeared in front of his field of vision, telling him about the change in his movement speed. Jean could not help but look at his father, who also had a holographic screen appear in front of his field of vision.
Removing the notification screen in front of their fields of vision, John looked at Jean and said, "Open your map and set a marker to the Azure Forest so you don't lose your way. Then again, make sure to follow behind me very closely, who knows what kind of Stray Bits are out there, waiting to ambush random users."
"Alright." Jean nodded, opening up the map soon after, to which a holographic screen filled with a diagram of the world appeared in his field of vision. He could not help but notice that on the top portion of the screen, the words 'Heleora Continent' were written, leading him to think that he was currently in the Heleora Continent. He zoomed into the map, noticing that most of the locations within the continent were covered in a dark fog, save for Halus City and the Azure Forest.
'I guess the map is telling me to head to the Azure Forest first before I could head to other locations,' Jean thought to himself, before setting a marker to the Azure Forest.
Whoosh!
After closing up the holographic screen, a faint blue line started to appear on top of the view he could see, leading towards a certain direction.
"Are you done?" John asked his son, to which Jean nodded. John nodded back, before looking towards a certain direction, which coincidentally was the same direction Jean's faint blue line was pointing towards. He then thought that his father activated the map function as well, but decided to keep quiet.
"Alright, let's go and head towards the Azure Forest!" John shouted, before dashing at a speed greater than before. Not long after, Jean started to run as well, making sure to follow behind his father's back.
And just like that, the two of them were off to the Azure Forest.
…
Around ten minutes have passed since the two of them have started running, with the sight in front of them visibly changing with every few meters they moved. They could also faintly hear the wind brushing past their ears as they moved, allowing them to enjoy the sight that was in front of them.
It was also around this time that Jean decided to move beside his father before asking, "Dad, what are Stray Bits? I've heard you mention them before. Are they similar to monsters in RPGs?"
"They're exactly monsters in RPGs," John replied in a calm manner, his eyes continuing to look beyond the horizon. "But due to Omni calling them a bunch of malicious data condensed into monsters, everyone just decided to call them Stray Bits."
"I see…" Jean went silent for a bit, then nodded in understanding. Taking a few glances at the front here and there, another question popped up in his head, prompting him to ask his father one more time. "Since the Stray Bits I'm fighting against are only worth it for beginners, would I actually be able to obtain equipment from them?"
"Of course. If not, where else would you get equipment? It's not like you have any equipment on you from the start, plus there's no such thing as a marketplace in the World Net," John responded, before adding, "Then again, you'd only get the lowest rarity of equipment from them, which is Starter grade. Still better than nothing though."
Hearing the word 'rarity' from his father's answer, some sort of flame was lit inside Jean's heart, as if his goal in life was changed to a goal where he had to obtain the highest rarity of equipment possible in the World Net. He went silent for a bit, pondering as to how he would word his question.
Eventually, he asked his father, "How many rarities of equipment are there? Also, are there any differences between them?"
"Hmm…" Getting this question, John could not help but go into a daze while still focusing what was in front of him, trying to recall his memories about equipment rarities. After ten seconds or so, John responded to his son's question with an explanation.
"If I could remember correctly, there are 7 rarities of equipment in the World Net. From lowest to highest, it's Starter, Common, Uncommon, Rare, Epic, Legendary, and Mythic grade. As for the difference between equipment rarities, the amount of stats they give, and the maximum times you can enhance them stand out would be the details that stand out. Oh, there are also equipment that give you skills, with Legendary and Mythic equipment being the most common with those kinds of things."
"There are also equipment you can evolve to a higher grade, but obtaining one is quite rare," John added, before letting out a sigh while shrugging his shoulders. "Who knows if that's still the case after the update though."
"Well…what kind of equipment do you have, dad?" After obtaining an explanation about equipment rarities, he committed this explanation into memory before deciding to ask his dad as to how strong his equipment was.
"I'm proud to say that my main weapon is a Rare grade weapon, though the armor I'm wearing is only Uncommon grade." A smile was plastered onto John's face, before being replaced with a slight frown when he neared the end of his reply. Soon after, this frown worsened as he continued, "Not only that, the armor I'm wearing isn't even an Uncommon set, it's just a mishmash of equipment really. Getting an armor set is hard, very hard."
"I see…" Noticing that his father's mood had slightly worsened, he decided to not ask any more questions, remaining silent until they had reached the Azure Forest.
…
At this point in time, the amount of time the two of them had taken to travel from Halus City to the Azure Forest was now an hour. There were some instances along the way where they had encountered a lone Stray Bit, but thanks to John's high stats, they were easily settled. Eventually though, John, with his superior range of vision, was now able to see a silhouette of the Azure Forest, a silhouette filled to the brim with trees.
"We're finally here, the Azure Forest." John could not help but let out a grin as he looked at his son. Surprisingly, he could not help but feel that flames were radiating from his son's eyes, as if he was ready to fight against those Stray Bits in the Azure Forest. Then again, who wouldn't be excited to start their journey of becoming stronger?
Step. Step. Step.
"Jean, we'll stop here for a bit." Rather than head straight into the Azure Forest and start fighting against the Stray Bits inside its area, John commanded his son to stop near the barrier that separated the wilderness from the Azure Forest. Although Jean didn't know why his father stopped him, he still followed.
"Why are we stopping here, dad?" Jean could not help but ask.
"Well, the Azure Forest is an area where any allocation of stats while fighting is prohibited. In other words, go ahead and allocate your stats right now. Make sure to allocate it on a stat that would help you fight better," John replied to his question.
It was then that Jean finally understood why the two of them stopped just near the Azure Forest. Nodding in response to his father's reply, he then commanded the system to open up his specific stat screen.
Whoosh!
———————
Tenebris (Cleaner Rank)
Unused Status Points: 8
———————
Vitality: 10
Strength: 10
Endurance: 10
Agility: 10
Dexterity: 10
Intelligence: 10
Wisdom: 10
Perception: 10
———————
At first, after taking a glance at the stats he had, he could not help but wonder why his stats were distributed evenly, rather than in a way that allowed his class' specialty to stand out. He also asked this question to his father, to which his father replied, "To be honest, I don't know. I had the same stats when I started out, but up until now, I still don't know why. Anyways, go ahead and allocate the 8 stat points the World Net gave you to start with."
Nodding his head, he then focused his attention back on the holographic screen in front of him.
'Hmm…where should I put my stat points towards?' He could not help but ask himself. 'If the Stray Bits in the Azure Forest specialize in strong attacks, then it would be a good idea to put all of it on Endurance…but that would make my attack power weak. Should I split it between Vitality and Endurance evenly so I could survive more hits?'
He thought about it more and more, only to end up going nowhere. In the end, he asked his father, "What kind of Stray Bits are in the Azure Forest?"
"Hmm…" John pondered for a bit before responding, "Excluding the boss, there are only 2 types of Stray Bits in the Azure Forest. The first one is the [Rabbit] that can move very quickly, but attacks very slowly. As for the second one, it's the slightly stronger [Wolf] that has a slightly faster movement speed than the [Rabbit], but its attacks deal more damage. Not only that, it has higher HP and defense than the [Rabbit]."
"Normally, those that are starting out decide to fight against the [Rabbit] first. After they gain a few levels, they then go ahead and fight against the [Wolf] to obtain more experience. Then again, there are those that jump ahead and fight the [Wolf] at Level 1, but I've only seen a few that successfully did it," John added.
"Hmm…" Hearing the characteristics of the Stray Bits he was going to fight, a thought popped up in his mind that would allow him to possibly kill the [Rabbit] and [Wolf] easily.
'As long as I can move faster than the [Rabbit], I can block its path and hit it easily. As for the [Wolf], as long as I can move faster, then I could make sure to avoid receiving as much damage as possible.'
'Only one stat in mind could allow that, and that's Agility! Wait a second…Agility also increases attack speed…'
Soon after, a small grin appeared on his face. It seemed that he was planning to head towards a great extreme as an Assassin class.
"I'm going to allocate it all on Agility!" Jean decided then and there that he was going to build his character in a way that pursued the great extreme of movement speed and attack speed. He realized that once one became fast enough or attacked fast enough, one would become invincible.
Whoosh!
'8 points have been allocated to Agility. The Agility stat is now at 18.' Not long after, a holographic screen appeared in his field of vision, allowing him to know the changes 8 points in Agility.
'The user's Attack stat has been increased to 20 points.'
'The user's Movement Speed stat has been increased to 18 points, allowing the user to move at a maximum speed of 6 meters per second.'
'The user's Attack Speed stat has been increased to 18 points, allowing the user to attack at a maximum speed of 3 hits per second.'
'The user's Evasion Rate has been increased to 3.6 percent.'
After skimming over the increase in power increasing the Agility stat brought, he closed the holographic screen before looking at his father.
"I've finished allocating my stats," he said, to which his father nodded.
"Alright, let's head into the Azure Forest then."
Step. Step.
And with that, the two of them finally passed through the barrier, officially entering the Azure Forest.