(Not so) Subtle Change

Kane had a mixture of thoughts and emotions swirling through him.

He couldn't even figure out which ones to focus on as he inched ever closer to Lanport.

The suspicious coincidences in the real world with that deleted user and the massive headache Kane had received made him almost want to drop the game.

But full-dive VR was too amazing to simply quit, being able to detect things to such a great extent was intoxicating.

Learning how to control mana and his spells manually also filled Kane with a massive sense of accomplishment.

But the reason Kane learned how to do any of that, was thanks to the guidance of a strange ancient creature.

The history of that poor country and everything that happened while he was there left a bitter taste and a lasting impression. Game or not.

But it had also undoubtedly made him stronger, both mentally and mechanically.

As scummy as it was to force players to experience such vivid feelings of pain and despair for a quest like that, he'd let it slide just this once. Next time he'd leave a bad review though.

Kane had a lot of theories as to what was actually going on, but he really didn't have enough to go off of.

The final thing that was on Kane's mind, however, was something that happened shortly after leaving the wastelands.

A cold robotic voice popped up in Kane's mind and declared something rather strange, "You will now be entering 'training mode.'"

After that, Kane's stats had vanished entirely. His mana now slowly increased in capacity through high usage, and his health and stats seemed to rise with his mana.

What this meant is that stats and skills normally increased through leveling up could now be increased through extended usage, rather than stats.

Unfortunately though, leveling up was no longer possible for him.

He couldn't even see the majority of monster stats anymore. Though player names, levels, and his party screen still appeared in his mind.

The fact that some stats still remained at least made him confident he wasn't transported into the world of the game.

The most likely explanation he could come up with was that after figuring out how to manually control mana, the game swapped over to a secondary system built to help players who've figured out this mechanic expand in a way better suited for them.

Sort of like the "turn off auto-aim" of Ember.

Although Kane was still uneasy about it, he felt a sense of freedom in being able to control his power levels more directly.

Dashing through numerous farms, fields, and small village houses, Kane followed a dusty old road leading south.

For whatever reason, he could feel his mana steadily rising on its own, without him putting any effort in, which seemed to contradict the mechanic.

Dozens of farms passed by as he continued running, the road began gradually upgrading to stone. The capital city of Lanport appearing on the horizon!

Kane slowed down as he approached a small line of people formed outside the massive city's iron gate.

The entire thing was walled off, being built on an open field wasn't exactly a secure position after all.

Kane was half expecting a moat as well, seeing as the city was near a river.

Finally arriving at the front of the line, Kane checked the guard's level.

"Only 15? I guess playing mostly solo has pretty big advantages."

"Haha, very true. I only joined the guards here yesterday and my leveling rate has already dropped by half." The guard joked.

"Why join then?" Although Kane had some answers in mind, he would rather hear it directly from the man.

"Welp, I don't really care about leveling. Being a normal citizen in a cool fantasy city is enough fun for me on its own! Anywho, I'm just gonna need to put your name, race, class, and face down on this sheet here so we can identify you if you cause trouble."

The guard began jotting down Kane's name and race, along with a surprisingly good portrait of his face that Kane wouldn't be able to see without using all of his mana and concentration.

The guard's face suddenly twisted in confusion, "That's odd, where's the rest of your info?"

Kane realized one of his suspicions was correct and asked, "What do you mean?"

"I can't see your class, or your stats for that matter."

Kane decided to tell a half-truth, "That's weird? Must be a bug, I'll have to report that later. I'm a level 20 Aporter."

The guard nodded, "I'll take your word for it, have a safe trip!" He waved Kane in through the cracked gate, receiving a grateful nod in return.

Waltzing through the main city street, a joke popped up in Kane's mind.

"That guy should be sacked, talk about incompetent. Letting a loose cannon like me out onto an impressionable city so easily, great job moron!"

Although Kane enjoyed being an insufferable asshole from time to time, after his experience in the desert, his jokes just felt selfish and hollow.

That guard in particular was rather kind. For the first time since joining the game, Kane felt like an ass.

He shook the feeling off and continued walking, maybe he'd even bump into Sun!

The odds of that happening were incredibly slim though, so Kane didn't expect anything of the sort.

As he was thinking this, a short girl ran out from a sidestreet, bumping into him and falling on her ass.

"Ow, my bad dude." A young voice spoke out.

It, of course, wasn't Sun, because as just previously stated, the odds of that are incredibly slim.

Kane helped her up and continued on his way, he didn't really have a goal in mind.

That was, until he heard a group of 20 players clad in armors ranging from silver to gold marching out towards the front gates.

Kane ran up to the group smiling wildly, "Oh, this looks fun! Where are you guys heading?"

A green-haired female soldier in the back turned to respond, "There's a horde of Y'mnites moving towards the capital, feel free to ask the guy up front if you can join. If you're interested of course."

-----------------------

Moments later, Kane was walking alongside the group, now a few hundred feet away from the cities entrance.

After painstakingly figuring out how to set up an Anchor manually, he rushed to join the group on their job.

The conditions Kane had agreed to were the following: He could keep 80% of the profits of any monster he killed, and 40% of any he notably assisted in killing, but no xp would be given to him. Purely a cash job.

This would usually be a big problem, seeing as just recently he made a very risky deal with some strangers to let him take 100% of their quests xp. But now, gold and accolades were what mattered to him, as Kane's strength would just improve through using his mana.

The Y'mnites were large furry yellow beasts seeming to be a mix of a Yeti and a Goblin, according to game lore they occasionally grouped up and looked for places to plunder. The games horde spawn mechanics didn't go into very great detail, but they did say this: 'Hordes only ever increase beyond 20 enemies in the bottom 3 ranks if the game lists a participating player as important.'

Over the last hour, Kane's mana density and overall strength had been growing rapidly, only stopping several minutes ago. He had no clue why, but he was hoping the game wouldn't take interest in him.

Half an hour later, the group arrived at the edge of the plains, facing a patch of forest.

Coming out of it were dozens of Y'mnites.

Kane's sensitivity to other sources of mana was very high at the moment, and in total, he counted... 50 Y'mnites?

"Had to jinx it," Kane frowned.

Of course, maybe some super high-level player was secretly hiding among the group of soldiers, but Kane very much doubted that.

All in all, he would probably have the third-highest level here, maybe even second after that strange mana boost from earlier.

Kane tried to push his arrogance down, refusing the little voice in his head that kept telling him he was most definitely the strongest of the group.

He eventually relinquished, for once not because of his ego, but because no one else here was a high-enough level to cause such a massive spawn. And also maybe his ego.

"This is going to be a tough one, commander." A dark-haired man said dramatically while pushing up his rectangular glasses.

'He's definitely acting cliche on purpose... I hope,' Kane mulled.

"NOT TO WORRY MEN! THEY MAY HAVE US OUTNUMBERED TWO TO ONE, BUT IF WE BELIEVE IN OUR ALLIES AND FIGHT WITH ALL OUR HEARTS, WE WILL WIN!!" The commander shouted a lot louder than necessary.

'No, no, no, no. How is the commander even worse? He seemed so normal when I first talked to him, what's wrong with this group?! This is a video game, damage points don't care about your willpower damnit!' Kane screamed internally.

Kane could feel the Y'mnites getting closer as the group's leader wasted entire minutes shouting a poorly thought-out speech. The other members being too nervous to backtalk him.

After the commander began babbling on about sushi in the middle of his speech, Kane snapped.

"For the love of- stop it, just stop. You're a toe-eyed cabbage and you should feel bad."

Kane pointed out behind the commander in the direction of the enemy, "They're almost here dude. Permission to convert the only brain cell you have left into mana so it can be used for something useful?!"

The commander just stood there with his jaw wide-open, looking back and forth between the rapidly advancing enemy that had managed to "sneak up on him," and Kane, before finally sputtering out a few words.

"Wh- yes, yes of course! TO BATTLE!!"