The next morning, James woke up earlier than Marcus. He got up from his bed and went to the kitchen to grab some breakfast.
He met Marcus's mother there. Marcus's mother was making the prep work for the Saturday lunch, when she noticed James come in.
"Come in, I'll fix you something to eat in a moment, dear." - Marcus's mother was a hard-working lady, and she was almost a second mother to James ever since his own had died. She took care of James when he had hit rock bottom and made sure he ate, bringing him homemade food. Basically, she made sure James was still a healthy boy, and James was really grateful for that.
"Thank you, but don't bother to do so. I'll just help myself to a cup of milk and a sandwich, if you have the bread. I don't want to be a burden to you." - James jokingly said, showing a rare smile.
James had to admit that having someone to care for him made him feel somewhat special. The feeling of being loved, even if it was by his friend's mother, was still a more-than-decent situation. Having someone that worried about you was a good thing, it made you feel you had somewhere you belonged.
You see, James never really felt be belonged to anywhere. His mother was always busy working, so even if she was caring, she would rarely show it. Both his brother's had quite a difference in age when compared to him, so that made it so that James never really fit anywhere. He had always been the "black sheep" of the family.
Yet, he had always found peace and comfort in Marcus's home. He felt as if it was his own second family, one that he had managed to choose, or maybe they had chosen him. Either way, James didn't really care. All that mattered was that he had an adult he could always rely on.
"Here you go, go ahead and make your sandwich, anything else you need is in the fridge, dear."
James mindlessly nodded, whilst checking the Terranova's forum once again. The new update had already been launched, and you could download the patch, but the servers wouldn't be going online 'till noon.
More changes had been revealed early in the morning. Basically, it went a bit deeper into the class system. It made clear that most players would not even be able to get a sub-class until they first cleared the first few Difficulty's of the level 10 dungeons, which had yet to be revealed in any region.
It also made a slight reference to different types of sub-classes, which eluded to sub-classes like James's. Basically, from now on, sub-classes would be ranked, from the lowest tier D to the rank SS. It also stated that SS sub-classes were unique, so they were extremely rare.
What made James a bit shocked was that the D tier sub-classes were the ones that were earned through the level 10 missions at the Adventurer's Guild. As such, those were supposed to be the base gameplay of the game.
The game was creating a huge gulf between the elite few and the "common people", which was something that was bold, yet very common in these types of games.
When James was about to finish his meal, Marcus walked in the room, still bleary-eyed. They had stayed up late, and now they were both paying the price for it.
"Good morning dear. You can have some eggs I just made, or you can wait for the lunch that I'm just finishing, it should be done in a few minutes. Go ahead and fix the table, so we can eat. Your dad is arriving soon, he went out to buy some supplies."
"I'll just wait for the lunch, I'm not even hungry." - Said Marcus, as he picked up a few plates from the dishwasher.
A few minutes later Marcus's dad came home. Marcus's dad was in his fifties and he had a bad habit of excessively smoking cigarette. We're not talking the "smoke a pack a day" type of guy. Marcus's dad was the type of person to smoke two or three packs a day, even if he knew it was pretty unhealthy.
He always kept saying he was trying to come clean, and he usually did. For a few weeks. Then he'd be back at it again. And although Marcus didn't like to admit it, he really hated the fact that his dad kept on smoking, neglecting his own life.
Soon, lunch was made and everyone ate their fill. James helped Marcus's mom clear the table afterwards, a sort of a "thank you" for allowing him to stay over for a while.
By now, the Terranova's servers were already online, so both James and Marcus's ran upstairs and logged on.
At first glance, there were no new features in the UI, but slowly James and Marcus realised one thing. Monsters no longer had the same descriptions. Usually, most monsters, especially stronger ones, had a small description of their moves.
Now, they longer provided such a thing, and that made the game a lot harder. It might not seem that way, not at first. But the first dungeons were coming around, and now Boss's mechanics would no longer be displayed for the player to see. It would make dungeons harder, as you'd have to figure out the Boss's pattern by yourself.
James was now curious about what had happened to the Key that he had delivered to the Mayor, as it had given him a S Difficulty mission. He checked the Quest log and it said:
"The Mayor of Fallen Oak Town has been missing for a few days. Maybe you should check up on the Mayor once again?"
James put that on the back of his mind and checked his Character's UI and it read as such:
Saint of War - "Blind Dreamcatcher" - level 9 Male Warrior
Experience: <14.200/120.000>
Hp: <560/560>
Mana: <65/65>
Vitality: 20*1.2
Intelligence: 1
Dexterity: 35 (+5) (+4)*1.2
Constituiton:1
Strenght: 38 (+10) (+4)*1.2
Wisdom: 1
Reputation: 0 (free citizen)
Titles: "King Slayer" --> Grants the using player and it's allies a 10% boost to every Attribute. Effective range : 50 Meters. Currently Grants the user 2 Dexterity and 3 Strenght.
Sub-Class: Saint of War - Allows the player to use any Sub-Class of his class. Grants an additional 4 Attribute points per level. Increases Experience needed for each level by 100%.
By now, James was clearly ahead of the curve. He had two very, very decent weapons, especially so for Chaos-Bringer, which was giving him a decent boost to both damage and defence.
He made way to the Mayor place of residence, which he noticed looked very run down, even more so than usual.
There wasn't even the usual Guards at the entrance. Both James and Marcus got on edge, as the scene was eerily silent. Both James and Marcus noticed that there seemed to be very fresh tracks what looked like a beast attack, as there were claw marks on the ground and blood everywhere.
"Troyande?" - James enquired to the depths of his soul.
"I'm here. There's a strong Fallen presence up ahead. Both of you should be able to handle it, especially if you use Kaos's power. Be careful, Fallen can be quite tricky. I'll do my best to try and discern what is going on whilst you explore."
James followed the blood trail, and ended up at the door of the same run down room in which he had delivered the Key to the Mayor. They heard what sounded like a beast muching on some meat, and the horryfying scream someone makes when they were being mangled by such a beast.
When they entered the room, they saw what looked like a normal person, only that his hands had claws protruding forwards, and "it"'s eyes were pitch black.
"That's a Fallen Liutenant. BE CAREFUL! He's already noticed you were here since the beginning, if he wanted to disturb you he'd already done so. It looks like it's trying to resist the corruption. This is the best time to kill such an existence."
"Is there no way to reverse such a situation?" - James still struggled to kill a person in this game. Monsters were a thing, but what was in front of them looked decent enough that James would think twice before using lethal force.
"Once you've been corrupted, it's only a matter of time until you turn completely irrational.There really is no way to undo it." - Troyande sadly stated.
"Looks like that key had sealed some remnants of a Fallen Liutenant and the Mayor should have been corrupted by it whilst trying to undo the seal on the key."
"Quest Log: Darkness Descends: You have investigated and now know that Fallen Oak's Town Mayor has been corrupted by the Fallen. Should you not dispose of him immediately, Fallen Oak Town risks facing the wrath of the Fallen. Taken caution and solve the problem at hand."