3 The Game Begins

When his view resolves itself, he is standing in the middle of a square in a large city. Sen blinks. Isn't this supposed to be a fantasy game!? Surrounding him are towering skyscrapers built of a shinier metal than those he is used to, and he can see electric cars driving around on the roads, the only noise they're making is the sound of their wheels on the ground. He can see a few others standing around, some of whom seem to be talking to themselves. Everyone is wearing matching grey t-shirts and jeans with a belt. Looking down at himself, he notes that he also has the same ensemble.

'So what do I do now?' he thinks.

Seemingly in response, a voice sounds in his ears. "Welcome to fifth dimension, I will be your personal AI guide. You may call me Tir. If there is anything you want to know, simply ask, and I shall endeavour to guide you."

"So what do I do now?"

"You have a few options at this point in time. You could join a school to learn more techniques other than the simple body strengthening, learn a trade, or start hunting monsters. The first thing I will recommend though, is to check your status and inventory."

Blushing at having not bothered to do the first thing every gamer should do, Sen recites "status", and a very, very simple screen shows up. There are three stats, energy, strength, and speed, all of which have a disappointing "F" next to them.

"Well that's disappointing," Sen complains.

"Don't be too disappointed, the average person will get G ratings for strength and speed, and only professional athletes will have an E rating in them."

"So how do I get them higher?" Sen shakes his head again at how accurate the body they'd given him is compared to his real one.

"Energy crystals drop from every monster you kill. Eating them will grant you a fraction of the monster's strength. Do note that energy crystals from the same type of monster have an increasingly smaller effect as you continue to eat them. The first will give you the full amount, the second half of the first, the third half of the second, and so forth."

"So I basically need to hunt lots of different types of monsters to get my stats up?"

"Precisely. Now you should check your inventory. You start with a few energy crystals, as they are also the currency in this game. You can choose to spend them on consumables, or you can eat them to gain some stats."

Opening his inventory, Sen notes that he has three essence crystals: a goblin crystal, a horned rabbit crystal, and a biter crystal, whatever that is. They all have a "Rank: G" next to them, showing that they aren't exactly the best things out there. Along with the crystals, he has an energized steel dagger. While it isn't his preference in weapon, it is pretty much what he expects from starting gear, so he taps it on the screen, having it materialize before him along with a sheathe. He attaches it to the belt he is wearing, happy to actually have it feel like it will in real life, compared to most games where the weight will just feel off somehow.

"So what exactly is with the modern city? I thought this was a fantasy game?"

"In this world, technology still works correctly. Only combustive weapons simply don't work, as anything so reactive as gunpowder tends to spontaneously combust, making it a poor idea to use a gun when the ammunition may randomly explode. Cities themselves have railguns to defend against the larger monster waves, but they're unable to be miniaturized. This has led to cold weapons becoming the standard."

"What about more stable things like plastic explosives?"

"While plastic explosives do indeed work, almost everyone at C rank or above has skills that are more powerful than the explosion from it, making it practically useless."

Sen grins. Skills more powerful than plastic explosives? And that was at C rank, when the highest rank possible was SSS? He is going to have fun with this. Making his decision, he eats all three of the energy crystals he was given. It is an interesting sensation to eat them. He puts them in his mouth, and then they quickly dissolve into a sweet tasting liquid, each of them tasting slightly different. He then asks Tir where he should go to hunt, though not before opening his status screen and being disappointed that his ranks haven't gone up at all.

Tir somehow calls an automated car for him, and he is soon looking out the windows as the streets fly by.

"So what are the energy crystals used for anyway? They can't only be used to strengthen ourselves," Sen asks Tir as he waits to arrive at the edge of the city.

"Energy crystals are used to generate the electricity that powers the city, and to create energy infused weapons, armor, and other things. A G rank energy crystal is enough to run one of these automated vehicles for a month. The city shield array is powered by A rank crystals, and a single day of running it will consume five of them"

Sen nods. It makes sense that they have some sort of value that isn't purely for increasing stats. They soon arrive at the edge of the city, and he can see a road stretching out to the horizon in front of him, grasslands stretching to each side. The ride goes out maybe another half mile, at which point the grass is no longer groomed, growing up to chest height. In the distance, he can see a forest, the trees of which seem to stretch far higher than they have any right to.

"So where are all the monsters?"

"Simply go into the grasslands and they will soon find you," Tir replies.

Sen smiles, it's time to do some hunting. He starts his walk through the grassland in a cautious manner, his dagger out before him. While the stalks of bright green grass are chest high, they aren't too densely packed, so Sen can see a good ten meters or so in each direction. He walks away from the road for about ten minutes when he sees his first monster.

It looks like a rabbit, the only differences being the sharp horn in the middle of its forehead, and its shockingly sharp teeth. Sen raises his dagger and waits for it to come to him. It quickly obliges him, lunging forward with its horn to spear him. Sen steps to the side, swinging his short dagger along the path the horned rabbit is taking, not even bothering to use body strengthening.

The dagger doesn't cut through nearly as easily as he had expected, but it does cut through enough that it severs an artery, not that he can see the blood, all he gets is a bright blue line in the rabbit where it had been hit and a bleeding debuff icon above it. Sen waits as it bleeds out in a short few seconds, and then dissolves into motes of light.

"So where's my loot?" Sen asks.

"All loot is automatically placed in your inventory, as there is no inventory limit," Tir answers.

Opening his inventory, he sees he now has a horned rabbit hide and a horned rabbit energy crystal, the same rank G as the previous one. Shrugging, he throws it in his mouth. The horned rabbit core tastes the same as the previous one he had eaten, almost like cinnamon candy, but with less spiciness.

After enjoying the treat, he continues his exploration. Here and there he comes across another horned rabbit, one time running into two of them, but they are as easily dispatched as the single one had been. Figuring that it won't hurt to keep eating them, even if the effectiveness of them will decrease, he continues to eat them until the tenth one, at which point he starts to save them.

It is maybe an hour later that he runs into the first mob that isn't a horned rabbit. It is a group of what have to be goblins. Short, maybe three and a half feet tall, wrinkled green skin, and a permanent snarl etched into their horribly ugly face that is only exacerbated by their canines poking out from their mouth.

Unlike in most games, they don't have any form of weapons, but they do have very sharp looking claws on each of their three fingers. Sen considers for a moment; there are four of them, and only one of him. While he expects he can take them, even with his dinky little dagger, He isn't sure quite how strong they are, so he may end up wounded in return. Speaking very softly, he decides to get some information from Tir. "So how does health regeneration work in this game?"

"Any wound will be healed in six hours. Minor wounds one hour, moderate wounds three hours, and severe wounds six hours. Minor wounds are any cuts less than an inch deep, and cracked bones, moderate wounds are greater than an inch deep and broken bones, and severe wounds are completely shattered bones, severed limbs, and severe organ damage."

"Wait, so if you get wounded, you're out of the fight for at the minimum an entire hour?"

"Yes."

Sen grimaces. He already knows the death penalty means not playing for fifteen hours, half a day, but this game is amazingly harsh with its settings. Turning back to the goblins, which somehow still haven't noticed him, he decides to try and sneak up on them, as none of them seem to be particularly alert.

He tries to minimize the rustling of the grass as he moves forward, but is still spotted when he is about ten feet away. He sees the eyes of one of them lock on to him, and uses the body strengthening skill he had learned in the far too short tutorial to get a burst of speed.

He manages to reach the closest goblin just as the goblin which has noticed him sounds the alarm, and thrusts his dagger into the throat of one of them just as it is turning to face him. Tearing his dagger out the side of its throat, he frowns as all he gets is the blue line and bleeding debuff icon. At this point, he is really wishing he will grow up faster, as it is just weird to feel yourself cutting through a neck, and only seeing a line appear on the monster.

He leaves it to bleed out to the debuff, and turns to the next one with superhuman speed, lunging towards it and spearing it right where the heart will be. He kicks it off his blade as the last two attack from the left and right, and he dances backwards as their strikes miss. He circles around until one of them gets in between him and the other goblin, then steps forward.

Stepping into its attack range, he lops off one of its arms as it goes to swing at him, watching the arm dissolve into motes of blue light, then as it howls in pain he silences it with a stab through its eye. The last one didn't even look nervous about the fact that all of its fellows had died, and howls as it charges him.

Sen simply leans to the side to dodge its completely telegraphed swipe, and stabs it in the chest, at which point the rage in its eyes fades as it dissolves into the blue motes of light.

Opening his inventory, he puts all of the energy crystals into his mouth, and waits a few seconds for them to dissolve into a strawberry apple flavored liquid. Opening his stats, he notices that they still haven't changed, all F.

"So what do I have to do to actually get my stats up to E?"

"You will need to eat the energy crystals of twenty different G rank monsters to rank up to E in one stat. If you were hunting F ranked monsters, you will only need to hunt five to rank up a single stat to E. Two different E rank crystals will also get a stat up to E."

"So how do I choose which stat increases when I eat enough crystals?"

"The stat that raises is dependant on what monsters you get your crystals from. For example, goblins raise all of them equally, but the horned rabbits you hunted raises almost only speed."

You could practically see dark lines forming on Sen's face. "So you mean to get all my stats up to rank E, I will have to hunt sixty different kinds of G ranked monsters?"

"If you ate ten of each monster's energy crystal as you seem to be planning on, you will only require thirty three different types of monsters."

"So basically I need to kill a lot more monsters."

"In simple terms, yes."

Sen sighs, it is going to take a long time to level up in this game. Deciding to take care of the needs of his real body, he logs out.