Nez slinked in between the doors of the adventurers guild and slipped into the shadows while he waited for the commotion outside to subside. When the noise disappeared Nez scanned the Adventurer's guild.
It was empty. Not a single person aside from some working there were in the building. Nez stepped out and looked around confused before he approached the front desk wear a young man with blue hair sat comfortably. Nez stopped in front of the young man where a prompt screen suddenly appeared. the screen read " Would you like to join the ballroom Adventure Guild". Bellow the first screen two buttons, one green and one red, read yes on green and no on red.
Nez stepped back and the screen disappeared.
'Guess I don't have to make a decision now! I should ask Al.' Nez thought. Suddenly a phone emblem popped up showing he was calling Al.
'Wow this thing really is sensitive if just thinking I should call someone calls them without having to use the interface.'
"Sup cousin!" Al blurted out as he took a swig of something from a mug. A party could be heard in the background.
"Uh if you are busy I can call back later." Nez eyed the scene in the backgrounds where two individuals were making out against a support beam of what must have been a bar.
"Nonsense cousin!" the alcohol was doing its job apparently. "We are celebrating clearing a dungeon first."
"Clearing a what?" Nez was legitimately confused. He had never been a gamer even in his younger years.
"Wow Al you weren't kidding he really is a noob!" someone offscreen yelled.
"What's a noob?" Nez asked. The background erupted in laughter for a few minutes.
'Good luck newby' and 'He is gonna have a hard go of it.' were among the many comments aimed at Spencer while he waited for Al to answer his questions.
"A dungeon is like one of your combat operations." Al replied with a soft smile. The one thing Al did better than any of their family was explain in terms that Spencer could understand. He could easily pull together simple descriptions that compared his military service to whatever he was asking about. Al had played tons of military simulation games and first person shooters in his days gaming so he had a rough rudimentary knowledge of what Spencer knew well and how to describe it to him in military terms.
"AH okay that's pretty simple." Spencer easily put the scale of what they had accomplished together.
"So what's up?" Al returned to Spencer's reason for calling.
"Oh I made it to the adventurers guild in Bahldren." The room on Al's side went silent. Spencer felt like something was up but before he could ask Al saw it on his face and stopped him from asking with a raised hand.
"You got the single hardest starting city my dear cousin, everything you do in that village is worth 5x the experience points. Your city influence points are halved tho so it's hard to make the treatment better. Everything you do there will be a first time done."
"Super unlucky because you are also the only player in the game there and the nearest players are 4 or five Feifdoms away in other starting cities." The same voice before chimed in.
"Who is that?" Spencer asked.
"Oh that's my guildleader Pelion." Al swiped his hand and the camera turned to the round table Al was seated at. Seated around the table were 6 players from various classes. The one closest to the camera waved at Nez.
"Hi I'm Pelion." The athletic looking man was covered head to toe in comfortably fit armor with a shield and mace strapped across his back.
"Are you a guardian?" Nez asked curiously.
"No, not cut out to be punched in the face" the man smiled back sincerely, "I am a Cleric. I spend most my time commanding the guild, the Young lady with the white hair is our Guardian."
Nez followed the man's finger and the woman rose a glass. She was a pretty unassuming individual with light brown hair and brown eyes with tan skin. She was definitely not someone who looked all that tough to Spencer.
"Don't let her fool you, she is a triathlon and extreme distance runner so her starting endurance is higher than anyone here's stats at a wonderful 15 making her a hardy individual with her assigning some stat points to it."
"Oh hey, my endurance is 15 as well." Nez replied surprised.
"Oh man! you burnt your Unassigned Stat Points on endurance?" Another individual sitting at the table wearing robes chimed in.
"Um no, still haven't assigned my points." The table all hushed again. Everyone was now silent.
"Hey can you share your stats with us my dear?" A southern sounding blonde girl in a white robe chimed in.
"Uh sure." With a thought Nez brought up his cs and showed the group. Everyone's eyes widened. "What?" Nez asked confused.
"Hey Al this was after they did the full body scan right?" Pelion stared at Al.
"Yeah." Al's smug grin could be heard thru the call.
"What class did you decide on?" Pelion asked politely. His natural leadership qualities showed in how he spoke to people. It made Spencer feel respected and commanded a large amount of respect without demanding it.
"I chose the Scout class." Another silence accompanied by some sideways glances between the players ensued.
"What's up?" Spencer had a sinking feeling that he may have made a mistake.
"Well you chose a hard class to play with the easiest place to level it cousin." Al interrupted. The camera spun back around to him showing his trademark smirk. "You see most of Bahldren is surrounded by a feywilde that has tons of hunting grounds and farming locations for gold and experience points."
"Why the terse reaction then?" Nez was confused. It seemed he landed in a jackpot.
"Oh our guilds hunter has been having a rough go of her missions. Failed two hunts and a track today alone." Al ran his hand thru his hair and exhaled, "The realism is a boon and a curse, you have to know kind of what you are doing in the first place. You chose perfectly for yourself. Our hunter took off to do more quests to improve her tracking ability and has about a 1 in 3 success ratio."
"Glad I hunt in real life and have the training I do." Nez laughed with Al but the silence around the table continued. "Okay, What's up?"
"Our hunter is Pelions Wife so it's a sore subject, especially since in the last three games we have played she has been our main scout."
"Well if she needs real life pointers that should help her I can give her a crash course after I figure out what applies." Nez was all business when it came to what he knew and he was sure if he helped he would increase his standing with Al's unit.
"Oh we know her issue. She used her perception, wit, and judgment as dump stats. She didn't let the system set up her stats to match her physique and used the stat buy system.
"Want some advice kid?" An older gentleman wearing leather armor with a lute across his lap interrupted prompting Al to smile widely and turn the camera.
"Uh sure."
"1 don't show any other player those stats, they will be as jealous as the rest of these clowns," Everyone at the table turned to stare at the old man as if he had accused them of petty theft, "2 put 3 stats in your charm and 2 into wit, perception, and judgement, most of your best qualities as a Scout for progression in your class are based heavily around those stats."
"Thank you for the advice." Nez smiled at the old man who sent him a salute.
"Gunny!" the blonde girl stood up. "We agreed to not help anyone outside the guild! Why are you giving out free advice?!?"
"Well he may not be a marine but combat arms gotta stick together," The old man cackled while flipping off the blonde player.
Pelion just shook his head at the two as they bickered.
"I hope I didn't cause unnecessary drama." Nez spoke to the guildleader.
"No its my job as head of the guild to manage this rowdy bunch, these two always fight."
"Makes sense, so you are like the Platoon Commander." Nez stated back.
"Well I oversee around 200 guildmembers and subleadership."
"Oh so more like a Company Commander than a Platoon Commander?"
"What's the difference?"
"Platoon runs 20 to 40 guys, Company is up to around 200 guys."
"Yeah that fits the bill."
Nez spoke for another half an hour to the group and got to know the guild members of The Valiant Mercenary Corp. Apparently there were 19 total in the bar they were at only missing 1, their lead Scout who was out doing missions to level.
"Well I better get around to playing the game. I have yet to have any real combat other than some kid attacking me." The table turned to the hologram of Nez when he said this.
"Was he dainty and traveling with two guards?"
"Yeah how did you know?"
"That is the childish Duke of Bahldren. Good luck cousin you faught the monarch." Al laughed before hanging up the call.
Nez stared at the now blank call screen before it sank in what Al said.
"Well shit." Nez stepped forward from where he had been standing the entire time and clicked the yes button to join the Adventurer's guild. The boy behind the counter went thru the tutorial of how to use the facilities.
The boy explained everything from the lifestyle class perks to the Quest board that was currently full of quests of varying ranks from F rank all the way up to X rating which required a party of 20 SSS ranked adventurers to even accept the quest. Nez took a handful of F rank quests before he sat at a table in the main hall and spent his stat and skill points. He pulled up his character sheet and stared at it for a few moments.
10 :Unassigned Stat Points
15 :Might
15 :Agility
13 :Vitality
15 :Endurance
10 :Judgement
10 :Perception
10 :Wit
07 :Charm
He took the advice of the old marine and assigned 3 USP to charm and then 2 to wit, judgement and perception, leaving his USP at 0. He immediately found that things came into greater focus. As if he went from watching an old vhs and swapped mid scene to 1080HD. He looked at the stats once more.
0 :Unassigned Stat Points
15 :Might
15 :Agility
13 :Vitality
15 :Endurance
12 :Judgement
12 :Perception
12 :Wit
10 :Charm
'Well that's a new sensation.' Nez blinked a few times before he scrolled to his skill list.
Unassigned Skill points: 10
Skills
0 :Acrobatics(agi) ■
0 :Animal Control(jud)■
0 :Arcane(wit)□
0 :Athletics(mig)■
0 :Deception(cha)□
0 :Insight(jud)■
0 :Intimidation(cha)□
0 :Investigation(per)■
0 :Medical(jud)□
0 :Nature(wit)■
0 :Persuasion(cha)□
0 :Stealth(agi)■
0 :Survival(jud)■
The skills with marked boxes were his class specific lists and cost 1 skill point to improve and the unmarked cost 3 to buy then 1 past that to improve. He went up and down the list before spending his points before staring at the whole sheet again.
Unassigned Skill points: 0
Skills
1 :Acrobatics(agi) ■
1 :Animal Control(jud)■
0 :Arcane(wit)□
1 :Athletics(mig)■
0 :Deception(cha)□
0 :Insight(jud)■
0 :Intimidation(cha)□
1 :Investigation(per)■
0 :Medical(jud)□
2 :Nature(wit)■
0 :Persuasion(cha)□
2 :Stealth(agi)■
2 :Survival(jud)■
Neza closed the character sheet and opened his inventory and made sure his gear was ready. Once he left the walls he had a feeling he would be forced into a fight. He had equipped a standard 1 handed battle axe, a standard 1 handed short sword for his primary and his secondary was a recurve bow that offered the mid ground between the short bow and the long bow. It afforded a faster draw time than the long bow and more damage than the shortbow. it had a simple look to it that suited Nez just fine.
He then installed the chainmail shirt he bought and too his surprise it was an improved piece of armor giving him +1 more ac than usual and increasing the max dexterity allowed with the armor. This brought his AC from 12 with his race modifier up to 19. Armor class was calculated as the armor plus the max allowable Agility bonus which varied between peices. AC wasn't necessarily all about protection but also about how hard is it to hit your bod thru Agility and the armor worn. Nez was satisfied as he eyed the rest of his inventory before finally equipping a pack of 20 arrows and putting a boot knife in his utility slot. This allowed him to use his skinning class ability. With that all finalized he shut the character screen and faced toward the doors.
Time to move out.