First Encounter

[Main Quest: Succeed in the Great Game

You find yourself in an unfamiliar environment full of known and unknown dangers. It's either be the hunter or the prey, which one will you choose? Your first task is to get into the middle of this and decide for yourself.

More information will be available as you progress.

Criteria and rewards:

1. Advance to Copper rank and get rewarded a suitable class according to the outworlder's performance.

Current progress: 10%

Time limit: 30 days.]

"In the middle of what exactly?" Rin questioned. The prompts were unreliable, as always.

Well, Rin couldn't imagine how hard they have to work to make it so real. The story should be something on par with realism as well. He could be a little forgiving in some parts.

Now that he had some goals in mind, it was time to progress, but before that, he got to check out all the items he had with him.

It seemed like only the intention of checking out the items worked, although he was sure it wouldn't work on someone else's items. After a couple of seconds, transparent windows appeared in front of him with the details about the equipment one after another.

[Item: Normal short sword.

Class: Common. Quality: Poor.

Attack: 6~8. Durability: 4/4.]

[Item: Normal Shield.

Class: Common. Quality: Poor.

Defence: 6. Durability: 4/4.]

[Item: Ring of Healing.

Class: Common. Quality: Decent.

- Can heal injuries that were not too heavy or life-threatening.

- Recover 100 health points in a second.

Cooldown: twice a day.]

"These pieces of stuff are just a little better than rubbish," Rin commented. "But it's the only stuff I got."

Rin strode from there. His mind kept moving to the wonders of this world. He barely had seen anything of this world. All he knew was that this world was richer and vaster than Avalon.

Well, with how sick this feels, Rin wouldn't mind even if it was barely a single city.

That reminded him since they have adopted realism in the gameplay, he very likely needed to eat food, and all the other real things to keep on playing.

Rin clicked his tongue. "I want escapism, not another real life and its bothers."

The sun was still in the mid-sky, which reminded him he did not know the allocation of time or how long it would stay like that. Still, the light will probably stay for a few hours at the slightest. During that time, he will look out for something smaller, like rabbits, to stuff into his stomach.

Then there was water. He needed to find water, too. This place seemed like an oasis, he couldn't hope to see any inns nearby. But the organiser should have left the necessities for the game. Else, the players will die from thirst rather than from the monster.

Abruptly, he came to a pause. His eyes narrowed, and his ears picked up some noises. It seemed to be screeches of some wild animal coming from his right. Peculiar thing was that he did not recognise the screeches. It may well be from monsters.

A curve appeared on his lips as Rin deemed it an opportunity. Arching his eyebrows, he moved to the origin of the sound. Moving along the trees as stealthy as possible, he came across the thing he had only seen in movies and games. But they were all real now.

Well, they felt real.

The makers of those screeches were not any animals, but a few humanoid creatures. Zombies. There were exactly six zombies, and their opponents were four humans who were doing their best to ward them off.

The zombies were not exactly like the ones Rin had seen in the movies or games, but were a little less horrifying, and a lot more disgusting. Blue veins bulged all over their body with their eyes entirely white. They wore torn clothes, though mostly naked.

Signs of blood could be seen in their mouths, and those teeth were unlike any human. They were savage, long, and sharp enough to bite someone to death.

And above all, they reeked, a disgusting smell more awful than anything he had come across. It smelt like rotten flesh, and something even more awful.

"Alright, five stars for realism," Rin mumbled, bracing himself, "but I wouldn't mind even if it was three stars."

Squinting his nose, Rin jumped at the conflict.

Was he trying to save the four fellow humans here? Perhaps. But his true intention was to get an idea of this game. And while he was at it, he wouldn't mind helping other players, although people tend to be big a-holes online.

These zombies looked intimidating enough, and would probably be harder to deal with than the fox he killed earlier. Plus, they are really horrifying to look at.

According to pop culture, the true way to kill a zombie was to sever its head or screw its brain off. As a man of culture, Rin knew those, too. Hell, he killed hundreds of undead abominations in the other game. Let's see how well these lots fare against him.

He sneaked behind one of the zombies to pin his short sword on the back of its neck. He pulled the sword upwards with all his strength to pull out the sword. The skull of the zombie cracked as it rested in peace, screeching horrifyingly.

Filthy blood smeared in the air. Rin did his best to not get dirty with that blood, but he failed in a good portion as he was standing close to the dead zombies. The transparent notification in the corner of his eyes was the only consolation of the event.

[You have killed a Deadman (Common), a threat to the Avalon and the cosmos. You have gained 4 Avalon credits.]

Rin hardly had time to check the notifications or loot the corpses. The terrible reek was making his life miserable. He wanted to kill these zombies as soon as possible.

Rin burst forth with more strength and attacked the nearest zombie. The second one of the zombies turned out to be a tough opponent. Most likely because his prey fell to a surprise attack. Rin lost his chance of a sneak attack after that.

The shield came far more useful than he had assumed, though he was not much of a shield-bearer. With his rank being low, he had to use all his athleticism to not get hurt.

Seriously, this game would be a pain until he ranks up enough to ignore damage and grow some pain tolerance.

Rin stopped the horrifying claw of his opponent with the wooden shield when a loud yelp entered his ears. It was one of the four men, currently on the ground, struggling like a fish out of water. A zombie had eaten a good portion of his arm and was about to eat furthermore.

He certainly wasn't feeling lucky being a beta tester now.

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