New games were exciting, right? Why else would Alan be this nervous logging in for the first time. He was used to these things by now, he'd played loads of video games. However he never thought for a second that there would be one like this, not when he was growing up at least. However, with the rumors of the Japanese Death Game spreading around school, Alan found it hard to believe that being trapped in a game like that would really be a curse. Sure, you were stuck in a world away from home, unsure of what's going on around you. But on the other hand, the young Mr. Mercer was always more comfortable in the game than outside. Inside he didn't worry about things like what he was wearing, and how he walked, or what people thought when they looked at him. In the game, your gear reflected stats, and they let people show what kind of stuff you can handle. Not like in real life, where they just show how much money your parents have and feel like wasting on your stupid wardrobe. Brand name clothes were all the same looking and lame, Alan hated them. However when he wore the logos and names of his favorite games on his shirts, people always made fun of him. They referred to him as the 'Game Imp' fairly regularly, enough that he stopped caring about it altogether. It didn't bother him as much as it should, he accepted it. He loved games, they were the best part of his days. He'd get up early and stay up late just to play more, which his parents didn't mind so long as he kept his grades up. That had never been a problem. Usually, Alan would fly right through his homework after school and get on his favorite MMO games. However, with the introduction of an american VRMMO, Alan knew that he was in for something unlike he'd ever experienced before. When he got to sign in and create his avatar (which was pretty much an exact replica just a bit taller and a bit more muscly, he was ready to experience a world unlike any other. Terra Sphere appeared to be all he was looking for and more. He'd played loads of games at launch, and most of them had hiccups and issues throughout their first weeks and months of launch. However, when he got in the game this time, it was clear that was all in the past. This game was SMOOTH. Unlike anything he'd ever seen before, but he supposed it kind of had to be. They were controlling everything with their own virtual bodies after all. If the user was to have total control, their inputs had to be exact. Alan could hardly imagine how good the netcoding for this game was, because it seemed unreal! The smoothness aside, Alan, whom he'd named himself Garta, spawned in a pretty calm area. He found himself in the middle of a forest, not another soul in sight. The tweets and chirps of distant birds assured him that this game was not playing around. He was in a whole new world. Garta took his first step forward, waiting for some annoying tutorial to pop up and try to tell him what to do. Surprisingly, he had no such thing. He remembered the manual saying the user interface was limited, it only displayed necessary information, at necessary times. However gestures in the game could allow him to see more details, and more parts of the interface. He smiled wickedly as he clenched his fist and opened it quickly, making an almost cell-phone like display appear in his hand. His statuses were all healthy, and he had no new messages or anything like that. The interface was simple, but self explanatory. He nodded, feeling as though he understood what was going on so far. However, he quickly found himself in trouble as he heard a low growl in the distance. No doubt a wolf, but was it after him? He didn't know, but he instinctively grabbed for his sword and prepared to defend himself. He turned towards the origin of the sound and waited. He wasn't sure how he knew where his sword was on his hip, or how he even knew how to draw it out of it's sheath, but he was sure that had something to do with the game helping him do what he was intending to do. It was like autopilot, but for your body. It was weird, but cool. However he'd read that the game lets you take more and more control as you learn the systems, eventually having near total control over your avatar. Garta was excited to get to that level, but first he had to deal with this wolf. Snarling followed a moment later as a squirrel darted into the clearing just before Garta. His grip tightening on his sword, he prepared himself for the worst. Sure enough, crashing through the bushes, a gray wolf pounced after the squirrel. Of course, by the time the wolf made it to Garta and gave him a confused look, the squirrel was long gone. Instead, the canine rested it's eyes on it's new pray, Garta. WC: 878
The gray furred beast shot into the clearing, and a moment later a small plate appeared over it's head. It was dubbed 'Gray Prowler', and it's health bar wasn't very big. This must have been a smaller threat, something any old noob could handle, right? That made sense. Garta readied his sword and circled around the prowler, not wanting to give it too much opportunity to lunge at him. They were both sizing each other up it seemed, and Garta was sure he'd just have to rush it to figure out what this was about. This was just a game, the risk of injury was absolved, and he could risk it as much as he liked. "Alright, here goes nothing then." He said under his breath, leveling his blade to the side. He dashed at the beast, and the wolf snarled and lunge in reply. Garta raised the blade to meet the wolf's fangs. There was a clang as the fangs met steel, but as Garta pulled his sword away, he could see the blood on the blade. He'd hit the beast, and remained unharmed. He turned back to the wolf, it's health bar was halved already. He smirked and readied his blade again. It seemed his estimation was correct. This was a beginner level creature, perhaps even an encounter generated by the game to introduce him to swordplay, as he picked slashing weapons as one of his starter masteries. He waited for the wolf to make it's move, but he realized it wasn't trying to fight now, it was looking for an escape. Garta stepped forward, the wolf tensed up and barked at him, it's fangs bearing as it backed up away from him. It was barking, but could it really expect Garta to fear the bite if it missed it's first chance? Whether it did or not, he wasn't really feeling frightful. The opposite actually. The new adventurer stepped forward, dropping his blade down onto the wolf's head. With another whining howl, the wolf dropped to the earth. A small loot window popped up, showing Garta that the wolf didn't have anything. He pressed the only glowing button, the exit window button, and looked around for something else to fight. Sadly the woods seemed a bit stagnant nearby after that. Maybe the other animals heard a wolf and took off running. That, or there was just nothing nearby because he was a new player. He looked around for a moment, then remembered one of the other skills he'd chosen. Hunting. He should be able to use one of the other gestures the manual talked about to fully take advantage of the hunting skill. He pressed his pointer and middle fingers to his temple and searched the area nearby. Because he was a beginner at the skill, the trail wasn't very noticeable. All he could see was a faint glowing mist where the wolf died, and an arrow pointing where it came from. He supposed if he looked that way he might find another clue as to where there might be more things to fight. As the young warrior pressed on through the bushes, he saw a faint print on the ground, likely left when the wolf jumped through the bushes into the clearing. The arrow was pointing in the same direction. Garta had to weave through some trees, which he assumed the wolf likely was doing as well as it chased the squirrel. Finally he came up to a log on the ground. The opening was small. Big enough for a squirrel surely, maybe even a rabbit. That's when Garta pieced together that he'd actually seen a rabbit running from the wolf, not a squirrel. That made much more sense. A squirrel could easily scale a tree to get away from the wolf, while a rabbit just had to hope it outran the beast. Upon closer inspection, he found a bit of wolf hair stuck in the log, and the arrow was pointing off to the west, down a beaten path in the woods. He supposed he'd follow the path and keep a close eye out for clues. As he walked on, he started to find other clues to different creatures and perhaps tips about herbs in the area. They all had different colored mists though, so he assumed that they were not trying to help him find the wolf. Surely, the wolf had to have left another clue. Garta spent about ten or twenty minutes slowly walking the path as he scanned for clues before he finally let out a sigh. The trail had gone cold. He pressed his fingers back to his temple to exit investigation mode. It sucked, but he supposed he should have expected as much with his Hunting skill being so low. However, he had to train to get better, right? Maybe this time he didn't find anything, but it'd improve his skill enough that next time, he could find what he was looking for. Up ahead he could see the trail stretched on a fair bit, not hitting any towns or things like that. In the other direction, he knew there were clues about other things to hunt for, but he wasn't sure if he should really dabble with that just yet. Maybe he should continue on the trail till he got to town, then he could try to do some weapon crafting. With a nod he turned back the direction he was following the wolf's trail, half expecting some new clue to pop up, but his investigation mode was off, and he was ready to make it to town and test some other things. He could try his hand at some more hunting and combat later on. WC: 956 TWC: 1,834
