He was named Shin. Out of the 160 Players of the last generation, only four are still alive, after twenty years have passed. Shin was one of them.
"Let me see your weapon." Shin said. He sat with his legs folded beneath him, a sitting position one can often see in Japanese-themed movies. He told Frey it was called "seiza", and Frey found it comfortable enough that he sat facing Shin in the same posture.
"Here." Frey held out the arm guard clinging on his right hand.
"Can't you remove that thing?"
Frey shook his head, rotating his arm for Shin to see all the sides of the arm guard. "The thing's solid with no lock or opening. When I first got it, it was a large fit, but when I tried it on the metal started to melt and mold itself around my arm."
Shin held his chin with one hand and inspected the arm guard with the other. "Weapons given to each Player have magical properties. There's a tier system in this world used by smiths to determine the quality of a weapon, and some of the weapons given to Players I've known in my generation had been appraised to belong in the Artifact class, the highest classification available to magical weapons."
"Interesting. What do you think is mine's classification?"
"Can't say for sure. I'm not a smith. But I have a friend who is, and I've picked up a few things from him." Shin said. "Basically, your weapon is considered to be an Artifact if it talks, or shows any sign of self-awareness. It is a sign that your weapon can grow, and thus will have unlimited potential. This guy wouldn't happen to have talked to you, had it?" he knocked on the blue gem of the arm guard.
"No, I don't think so." Though he felt as if the weapon was talking to him when it glowed after killing the goblin hound, it may be just him looking too much into it.
"Well, it's too early to tell. It's been only a day since the game started. An Artifact grows; It may not display signs it's an Artifact in the beginning, but use it frequent enough and it may just turn out to be your biggest asset.
"As much as I want to help you get your weapon appraised, the nearest blacksmith I could trust is unfortunately three days away from here. Not only is the journey long, I don't think you're strong enough to travel alone, as you are.
"I mean, you've done a good job killing a goblin hound. Any one-day-old Player would die from such an encounter but you survived. Goblin hounds are rare, and is a monster capable of killing 10 full-grown men. I was out wandering last night tracking it, only to find it dead beside you."
"Sorry 'bout that. Didn't mean to steal your prey."
"No it's fine. Actually, you saved me the trouble of killing it. I only needed its eyes, anyway--a good magic storage, fetches quite the amount when you sell it to an alchemist."
"So," Frey glanced at the two cloth bags full of food, weapons and other equipment on one corner of the room, then back at Shin. "you sold the goblin hound."
"Yeah. Don't worry, I didn't use all the money for myself. You were the one who killed it, so it's only right I bought you equipment we're gonna use for your training."
Frey's ears perked up at his last words. "Training?"
"Yeah kid. I'm gonna train you. By your lanky build I can tell you're not physically adept. And this world has a habit of gobbling up kids like you on a daily basis. In one month of training, as long as you're a fast learner, you'll learn the sacred art of keeping your head attached to your neck. Still, this is only if you're interested."
Frey couldn't believe it. It was too good to be true, that someone he knew only minutes ago, who just happened to pick him up nearly dead in a forest, was going to do something so big for him. The offer was tempting, but he was no fool.
"Alright," Frey breathed. He looked at Shin, his eyes lightning green, face saying he meant business. The man just smiled, not pressured by the intensity of his stare. "what's the catch?"
Shin kept smiling.
---
"Again!" Shin shouted at him. Frey charged at Shin for the hundredth time that day, his katana fanned out on his right. He anchored his right foot on the ground and swung. Shin didn't bother clashing katanas with him, outright dodging his shabby strike with a sidestep. He tumbled forward from the momentum of his charge. Shin thwacked Frey's legs with the back of his katana. His fall to the ground was cushioned by a layer of dead leaves and grass.
"Still predictable! If I was your enemy, your back would be cut open by now. Stand up."
But that's the thing: Frey couldn't stand up. How long had he been training since he woke up? Five hours? Six? The sun directly above him bat down his back with scorching fury. Shin crouched down in front of his beaten body. One thing he learned about the man in the whole week they'd been training was that he was as strict as he was laid-back. Beneath the lame jokes and crude tongue, he was a demon that mistook hell for training. If Shin crouched down just to annoy him, he was doing a great job. He deployed the blade of his arm guard and swung at Shin's feet.
"Woah easy." Shin jumped back just before his ankles got severed.
Frey clicked his tongue. "I missed."
"That was a good one, but still a little too slow. Stand up, kid. You're just twenty; You can't be having back problems at your age. Come on, we'll take a break from sword training and discuss general knowledge."
"Help me up."
"Nope."