A little later in the night, after Edward had cleared everything up with the guards, he found a small alleyway in the middle of the city and finally logged off. When he opened his eyes, he found himself back in his bedroom.
Ikarus teleported onto his bed, as usual, before yawning himself. Edward slowly brought his helmet away from his face, then set it down on the desk next to him. Ikarus waltzed to Edward's side, then rested his chin on Edward's chest.
As Edward watched Ikarus slowly relent to exhaustion, he chuckled and began to slide his fingers over the dragon's snout. Ikarus looked at Edward, confused, but eventually sighed himself and plopped himself onto the pillow just next to Edward's face. The dragon rolled up like a cinnamon roll and went to sleep.
"Ikarus," Edward muttered quietly in Draconic. Ikarus didn't open his eyes, but Edward knew the dragon was listening, "Tomorrow, I have to go to work again. Now that I can communicate with you and leave clear instructions, what do you want to do? I can leave you here, so long as you don't leave the room. You can do whatever you want in here— other than raid my fridge— until I get home."
Ikarus opened his eyes and looked at Edward. Then, before Edward could even offer the second option, Ikarus suddenly took flight and soared to the other side of the room. Then, without even landing, Ikarus bit into the backpack hanging on the hook near the door. He lifted the backpack away and brought it over to Edward. His intention was clear.
'I'm coming with you,'
The next morning, Edward woke up full of energy and prepared for the day— despite only getting three hours of sleep. As soon as he opened his eyes, he put his feet down on the floor and smiled. When he gazed at the window before him he saw a glimpse of the rising sun in the east.
"As expected. My ascension didn't just transfer my avatar's appearance, but also my abilities," Edward mumbled. Edward suspected that was why he felt so energized, but a small part of him wanted to be sure. He stood up and faced the fridge. However, when he approached it he did so from the side— not the front. Then, with one hand, Edward crouched down and began to lift the fridge. As he expected, the fridge easily rose from the floor.
Edward didn't even have to put in much effort to lift something as heavy as his minifridge— even with only one hand. If he had to compare the fridge to a weight from before he ascended, he would have to say the fridge only weighed ten pounds. Of course, he knew this was false, he just didn't know the exact difference. To answer that question, he used his phone to search for the accurate weight of the minifridge before him.
"Jesus, this thing is seventy pounds?" Edward gasped in shock. He slowly lowered the fridge to the ground— to not damage it. Then, once he pushed it back against the wall, another idea came to mind. This one, however, might not have been a good idea. He took a moment to gather his resolve. Then, after walking into the motel room's kitchenette, he looked at his knife block and removed the sharpest knife he had.
He held it in his hand, his hand gripping it tight enough to damage the handle, as he lifted his other arm. Then, he took a deep breath and swung his arm. The knife traveled through the air with the same speed and power as Edward's iron sword— yet Edward wasn't afraid.
The knife's point struck Edward's arm— near where his wrist was. However, as soon as the knife's blade touched his skin, the blade shattered. The broken pieces of metal fell to the floor without even a drop of blood being drawn from his skin.
"I'm durable too? Have all of my stats transferred over?" Edward mumbled, shocked. He threw what remained of his knife into the trash before picking up the shards of metal on the ground. Once his kitchenette was clean again Edward returned to his bedroom. When he arrived he noticed Ikarus clawing at the fridge's door handle, hoping to get inside. Ikarus's claws appeared too small to latch onto anything, so he instead ended up scratching at the door over and over again. Edward grumbled in frustration as he noticed the claw marks being left behind by his pet. He stepped forward and sighed. Then, in Draconic, he told Ikarus to back away.
The dragon did as instructed and waited for Edward to open the fridge for him. Then, with a bolt, Ikarus immediately ran inside the fridge and grabbed all of his favorite foods— which mainly meant he grabbed a single container of ice cream. Edward was used to this sight by now, so he ignored it.
"You're coming to work again, yes?" Edward asked as he opened the ice cream container. Ikarus quickly nodded and looked at the backpack hanging near the door. Edward smiled, then went to get a spoon from the kitchen. He was feeling like ice cream right now.
When Edward got back from work later that day, he didn't immediately log in like he usually did. Instead, he spent a few minutes browsing through all of Avalon's forums, hoping to find some information that could be of use to him. Most of the posts he saw were of players discovering strange things about their classes and abilities. Most of the players were explaining parts of the system that Edward already knew, including the Appraisal skill and different functions of the game— like the armor class system and the XP modifiers. To his surprise, every single player he watched only had a profession-class origin.
"Either nobody else has discovered the different classifications or the others are keeping their origins secret," Edward nodded, approving of his fellow players' decisions. He didn't believe for even a single second that he was the only player with a blood-classed origin. He might've gotten his the quickest, considering he bypassed all of the visions he was supposed to experience, but he already knew there must've been somebody else with a blood-classed origin.
He spent a few more minutes browsing, eventually focusing on posts about the world itself. He found a few with maps and lore documents, so he made sure to download the images for later use. Eventually, though, he found a post describing all of the different starting zones and the advantages of all of them.
From what this player was describing, he must've already visited all of them. Edward immediately became curious and messaged the original poster.
'Hey, I saw your post about grading the different starting zones and that raised a question for me. How did you manage to travel to all of the different zones so fast? Isn't Avalon huge?' Edward asked. Luckily, the poster was online. It didn't take long for Edward to receive a reply so he waited patiently while stroking Ikarus's mane.
'I used the teleporters located in the center of the cities. Haven't you seen them?' The poster asked. Edward, confused, immediately realized his mistake. He hadn't spawned inside a city, so he hadn't gotten a proper chance to explore one, yet.
'No, I haven't. How do they work?' Edward asked, hopeful. He was originally hoping to hitchhike or take a ride with a traveling merchant caravan, but a teleporter would be much quicker.
'Through payments. Every teleport is ten gold coins,' The poster replied. Edward sighed in disappointment. He didn't have any money at all, much less ten gold coins. From what he understood about money, even a single gold coin would be hard to acquire. He was about to close the message thread when the power replied once more, this time igniting hope.
'First use is free, though.'