Tutorial on the Beach

Continuing to stare at my new armaments, I felt a little nudge in my head, as if I could know more about the gloves if I focused on them. Directing my focus at the Gauntlets, I felt the same feedback as I did from the AR display earlier. A small AR display appeared with the name identifying the gauntlets, "Matched Gauntlets of Erudition." Having gotten used to the Primer's AR interface, I quickly pulled up the item's tooltip.

Matched Gauntlets of Erudition (Uncommon): These gauntlets were forged early in a future master weaponsmith's career. Not bearing his official crest, they were cast aside, considered to be counterfeit. These gauntlets are equipped with non-elemental mana stones as their magical focus. These gloves provide a bonus to the crafting skills of the wearer.

Looking at my surrounding, I was able to pull up and dismiss nameplates for all the items nearby. Having too many nameplates open simultaneously would start to give me a headache as well as obscure my vision. A rumble in my stomach reminded me of just how hungry I still was. I glanced over at the tree with the purple fruits, deciding to test 2 of my new abilities. I strode over to the tree and pulled up the nameplate for one of the fruit.

"Purple Fruit"

Slamming my palm into my face, I started to worry about the naming sense of this world's inhabitants. I plucked one of the fruit from the tree and took a bite, and a tart sweetness met my tongue as the juice of the fruit filled my mouth.

Lead Belly: Resisted Nausea

"Sweet!" I chuckled aloud as I chowed down on several of the fruit to fill my empty stomach. While eating the fruit, I noticed that a new notification had pooped up in the corner of my field of view. "Tutorial Ready." Finishing up the fruit, I selected the message. A line of text appeared in the middle of the right side of my vision. It listed a single task, "Equip Map."

Summoning the map from my pocket dimension, or whatever this storage thing is, I unfolded it before me. Most of the map was unfilled, with only an aerial view of my immediate surroundings being filled out. This map is rather convenient but a bit unwieldy for my tastes. Also, why has the Tutorial not marked the task as complete. "What does equip mean in this case" I rhetorically pondered. A sub-task suddenly appeared on my AR task list. "Apply directly to the forehead." I frowned at the repetitive animated graphic that appeared in my vision and demonstrated how to proceed.

I raised the map to my forehead as watched as it was drawn in through the place commonly referred to as one's third eye. I now had a map appearing in my vision before me, and I could adjust the size of the map and zoom in and out, allowing me to have it act as a minimap in the corner of my vision. I noticed there was a small waypoint marked on the map, labelled as Tutorial. Looking at the task list, I saw it updated, telling me to proceed to the beach.

I walked back through the tree line down to the water's edge. As I reached the water, I truly appreciated the beautiful sites around me. The lake reflected the lush foliage that encircled it as the waves lightly rippled in the gentle breeze, and as it buffeted me, I noticed how beautiful the weather was. It must have been around 20 Celsius, with no humidity clawing at my skin. It was a perfect day out.

Letting my eyes drift away for the gorgeous vista, I looked to my left where the map marker was indicating. It looked like another bare stretch of beach, the same as where I stood. I slowly strolled around the edge of the beach, breathing in the fresh air and enjoying the lack of endless concrete and the noise pollution of thousands of people. I finally approached the spot to which I was being led. As I got there and saw the task list start to update, I felt the ground below me start to shake and squirm. The task list now just had a single word as my task: Fight!

The sand deformed into little mounds before finally bursting apart, as crabs, roughly 60 centimetres in diameter, surrounded me. I quickly tried to dash through a gap between two of the creatures. However, the crabs impressively scuttled to close the gap at unbelievable speed. Backstepping to my original position, I held my arms up in front of me in the typical boxer's block stance as I activated Hardened Skin. Upon its activation, my MP Total dropped from 360/360 to 260/260. I guess the sustained cost from the description means that my total MP is adjusted by that amount while active. The counter-attack I was waiting for never came. I took stock of the six crabs around me. None made to move forward. They would occasionally move a step to the left or right to best block any escape routes I may have.

Wanting to test out my new Skills thoroughly, I activate Magic Vision. I watch as the world turns monochrome and as I see blue swirls of particles around each of the crab's main pincer. The nearest crab extends its foreleg as the blue cloud around its pincer condenses. Feeling concerned about what seemed likely to be an incoming magical attack, I decided that it was time to attack. Launching myself in the direction of the aforementioned crab, I raise both my clenched fists above my head before bringing them down on the ground between myself and my opponent, activating Ground Smash. The results were beyond what I was expecting. The two smaller crabs to my primary opponent's left and right were torn asunder by the first magical shockwave. When the shards of the earth came up after, all they did was send the little giblets of crab flying all across the nearby beach.

The large crab that I had been targeting was knocked back by the magical blast and was out of range of the physical follow up from the ground. I watched the crab groggily regain its balance as it continued to ready its attack. Launching myself over the earthen wall that had risen from my impact, I landed in a crouch on the crab's back. I cast Dispell into the crab as I used my arms to turn the landing into a backflip to land behind my enemy. I quickly followed up with a series of strikes to the crab from behind. Each punch landed like a meteor, cracking the shell with craters from my fists.

The crab collapsed to the ground leaking blood from its many wounds. This is a lot easier than I thought it would be. For the next opponent, I grabbed the next closest crab by a few of its legs before swinging it like a handbag into the top of one of the two remaining crabs. The two crustaceans had their shells split with a thunderous clap, and their viscera leaked across the beach. Unbeknownst to me, the other crab had sidestepped around me to my rear flank. It launched a surprised pincer strike and my unguarded back. A loud crunchy noise surprised both myself and the enemy, who definitely was expecting a different outcome. His strike caused some significant damage... to his own pincer, which now had cracks running all through it. Without even turning, I landed a single mule kick straight into the face of the crab, ending its existence immediately.

Curious to the ease with which I had dispatched these foes, I used my Beholder's Eye to inspect the largest crab's stats, which was the one that had been casting magic.

Name: Big Crab

Gender: Male

Race: Big Crab

Age: 10

Class: Big Crab

Level: 4

Stats

HP: 0/80

MP: 24/24

Strength: 10

Agility: 10

Stamina: 10

Skills

Pincer Blast

Scuttle

"Only a level 4, hmm..." I pondered the level difference between us before I looked around at the other crabs. They were all of the smaller size, and upon checking their stats, it made more sense. They were all Level 2 and female. I guess the 'King' crab over there had himself a little harem. Wonder how he was able to manage so many ladies at once. It always sounded like a headache to me. Ding-Ding! My Tutorial task was now marked as completed, and a 'Get Reward' button was showing in the task area. I selected the button, and I heard a clunk noise. Upon looking around, I could not spot my reward anywhere.

Annoyed, I opened my menu and looked towards a few icons at the bottom. One was an icon that looked like a speech bubble. So I selected it, and a window containing a log of sorts was opened. The latest line showed that my reward had been added to my inventory.

What caught my eye were the five lines above that.

"Defeated 2x Big Crab (Level 2) - 40 exp

Defeated 1x Big Crab (Level 4) - 40 exp

Defeated 2x Big Crab (Level 2) - 40 exp

Defeated 1x Big Crab (Level 2) - 20 exp

Completed Quest: Tutorial - 500 exp"

Sweet, that's a pretty generous tutorial mission. I then proceeded to check my storage, where listed under the New heading were three line items. 3 Lesser Healing Potion, 3 Lesser Mana Potion, Void Coin Pouch (50 Gold Pieces, 100 Silver Pieces, 500 Copper Pieces). Examining each item's tooltip revealed that the potions would restore up to 100 points of their respective stat and that the health potion could restore broken bones, flesh wounds and minor ailments. The coinage was explained by the tooltip as being on a 100 per next increment system, with copper at the bottom, silver above that, then gold and finally platinum pieces. Without knowing the cost of things, though, I was not sure how much this money was worth. I withdrew one of each coin to check its size. Each was about 20mm wide and 3mm thick. As I returned the coins to the dimensional pocket, I heard an explosion, it sounded quite loud, and as I looked in the direction it came from, I could see a plume of smoke above the forest, what looked to be several kilometres away.

Ding-Ding!

New Quest: Starter Quest

First Objective: Explore the disturbance.

Seeing a map marker appear to the west on my minimap, I started to stretch my leg muscles. "Time for a little jog through the forest!"