LEVEL UP!
Congratulations!
Your Alchemist is now Level 2!
+1 to Agility
+1 to one of the skills:
>Short Blades< Trapper - Alchemy
“Alchemy!” he nearly shouted out, and the stars in front of him swirled, then formed a constellation of Alchemist where the first skill star became a little supernova.
Short Blades - Trapper >Alchemy<
Achievement Unlocked: Complete the Game Tutorial
For successfully completing Dante’s tutorial, you earn 10 XP!
He had passed the tutorial. He was no longer a complete noob. Zack looked cool, and was even more agile now, and it felt so.
Zack left his avatar by the campfire and pulled the VR headset off.
“Hey mom!” he called. “You were right! This game is amazing! I mean the graphics alone, and the sound… you know what I did? I crafted myself a Wolfskin Armor! You hear that? A Wolfskin Armor! How cool is that?”
“Close your window please!” His mother’s voice reached him from the kitchen. “There’s a big storm coming! Your computer may attract a ball lightning.”
“They don’t exist, mom!”
“I saw one when I was a kid!” Zack’s mom shouted back. “Close the window, please!”
He sighed and closed it, the first raindrops already splashing against the airtight pane of glass. The air outside smelled of ozone, damp asphalt, and fresh summer leaves.
But Zack already felt he could smell pines. And moss. And the bonfire.
He attached his gloves to the VR headset again, and placed it back on his head.
“So,” Zack said on becoming Zack the Alchemist Lvl 2. “It’s time to shake you people up for some gold.”
Thunder rumbled behind his window like a titanic animal slowly waking up.
A lightning flashed, and he saw its purple flash through his VR glasses.
Then thunder again, louder this time.
Chapter 3: Player versus Player
The moment Zack left the campfire meadow behind, the pine woods parted and he stepped out on a rocky precipice. He stopped in his step, impressed despite his videogame experience and this game experience in particular.
The mountain he stood on was high. It felt high. Zack clearly perceived he was high above the clouds now, so clearly he even lost his breath for a moment.
The view from here was immense. The entire realm of Aetheria was laid out before him: green pastures and woods of the Empire of Man, white spires of Sanctuary, its capital, gleaming in the sun amongst the greenery. Misty yellowish Swamplands to the east; tiny specks of vultures circling above these wasted lands, the home of The Green Mob. Elven purple- and turquoise-colored woods peppering the Western reaches, the land of magic, the home of lucky players who had purchased the Elven Skyspire DLC.
And all across the view, far ahead, a wall of crooked and jagged black rock, high broken pillar-shaped cliffs reaching for the sky like evil fingers, malicious volcanic glare playing in the sky above them, shielded off by a glimmering magical barrier.
“Pandemonia,” Zack muttered. “The highest difficulty PvE and PvP zone. Once sealed off by a powerful race of mages and so on. Just like in the trailer.”
The level of detail on distant objects was incredible. Zack could see the village of Hawkspoint just below, spread before him like a map, a lopsided wooden tavern and a blacksmith stove nearby dominating the layout. He could see smoke curling above the cozy-looking medieval cottages and orange pumpkins growing in rows next to them. He could make out the river gleaming under the leaves, and the docks, and fishing boats tethered to them.
No wonder, Zack thought. This baby runs four next-gen video processors, and two CPUs for physics alone. And they used this new VR technology, the eye projectors not limited by the field of vision, their tiny colored beams shining through your iris and painting the image straight on your retina, so the game world surrounded you, erased the reality completely, and swallowed you whole. The level of immersion was beyond any possible expectations. Zack could swear he felt a gust of fresh mountain breeze on his face at least once.
Then he remembered how much the rig cost him and saddened. For what this entire view was worth, it wasn’t his party place anymore, not a recreational zone kind of virtual reality. It was the place where he had to earn, his summer work to take care of, and he had no idea if his mother’s lighthearted concept of earning back the VR rig money was nearly realistic at all.
There was only one way to find out this though.
“Okay then,” Zack said to himself. “Let’s go to this tavern, pick up some quests, and start earning gold.”
It seemed like the game finally cut him loose, leaving Zack to explore the world the way he liked and travel in pretty much any direction. This felt both wonderful and scary, because despite all the teasers, trailers, and developer interviews watched, Zack still knew little of the dangers that lay ahead – now he realized they made sure of this, revealing just as much of the game world as was needed to feed your obsession and keep you in the dark at the same time. Aetheria didn’t felt like home to him yet. It felt like terra incognita; something hiding in the bushes wherever he looked, something dangerous always near, ready to swoop down on his head and strip him off hit points and experience. There always has to be something, he thought. It’s a rule of a good open world. If there isn’t, they detect you’re bored and spawn it right on top of you.
He heard the ominous buzz behind his back before he even finished the thought.
You encountered a Swarm of Enraged Wasps!
Wasp Lvl 1 Wasp Lvl 1
Hornet Lvl 1
“Not much of a swarm,” Zack said. “Oh my. Why the wasps, why? What makes them invent all these unpleasant creatures? Why can’t it be, I don’t know, a Swarm of Enraged Bumblebees? Cute and fluffy, fun to kill.”
Zack turned around and watched. The wasps were still distant. He could have even run away, possibly, but the rocky slope was quite steep here, and Zack didn’t want to rely on his low Acrobatics skill in making him survive a long fall. He still had to find out about drop damage; it could have even been some sort of mucky invisible wall at the edge of the cliff, but he wasn’t eager to bet on it.
“Potion of Dizziness,” he said, and his left hand was instantly filled with the familiar glassy bulb, the yellow viscous light sloshing inside.
Item Equipped:
Potion of Dizziness (2/3)
He let the Wasps spread out in their basic semi-circle formation, regarding them with interest. The creatures were huge by any realistic standard; a dog of an insect buzzing away above the ground, waist-high, and two more on its sides, smaller and yellow instead of grey, yet still dangerous-looking, ready to sting you right where it hurts.
BOOM! WHOOSH! He threw the potion in their midst, glass shattering and letting out a corona of dazzling sunburst, a wave of dizziness in its wake. As it passed, Zack saw a terrible thing happen – or to be more exact, nothing at all did. The Wasps were still buzzing away, closing in for an attack, unharmed.
IMMUNE!
Wasp Lvl 1
Magical Resistance
Poison
IMMUNE!
Wasp Lvl 1
Magical Resistance
Poison
IMMUNE!
Hornet Lvl 1
Magical Resistance
Poison
Mana Burn
“No,” Zack had the time to breathe out, and then the nearest Enraged Wasp leveled with him and attacked.
The first flash of a sting went past his shoulder as Zack dived, not away from the wasp but a tiny bit below its reach. He backtracked, feeling the chilly closeness of the abysmal drop, and then sprung to his feet again.
The wasp lowered itself for the next attack, but Zack was already on top of it, first hammering it down with bare hands, then stomping on the giant insect.
Enraged Wasp Lvl 1 was CRITICALLY hit
by Zack and lost 14 hit points
Enraged Wasp Lvl 1 was hit by Zack, lost 4 hit points, and was killed!
Achievement Unlocked: Close and Personal
You earned 1 XP for using your Unarmed skill
“How… The hell… Can I know… Enemy stats… In advance!” He panted, stomping on the fallen wasp until it crunched and collapsed under his boots, its body a ragdoll now instead of a living AI-driven thing. Before its roll downslope ended, Zack was already onto another Wasp, which he slashed with his dagger to little avail, as the Wasp was covered in chitin which blew sparks underneath his slashes but held. The same couldn’t be said about his dagger.
Enraged Wasp Lvl 1 was hit by Zack and lost 1 hit point
You dropped your Copper Dagger +1 and hurt yourself with your clumsy attack!
-2 HP
ZZAP!
Achievement Unlocked: First Blood
“Ouch,” Zack said as the electricity stung his fingers, and the VR gloves pumped up, then suddenly deflated, as if he had really cut his hand and dropped his weapon. He was more surprised than hurt. It felt interesting, unpleasant but not really painful.
SLASH! The Enraged Wasp Lvl 1 stung him in the left hand, and this time he even winced from pain: the visual, the tactile, and the audio combined to create a hurtful illusion of being stung by a dagger-like stinger, glistening and dripping with green goo.
You’ve been Poisoned!
-1HP/sec
Feverish dizziness blurred the surroundings, and Zack could swear he felt the venom coursing through the veins of his arm, a burning and stinging feeling followed by numb cold. This was only his imagination perhaps, and yet it tricked his reason so viciously even Zack’s nervous system seemed to follow the lead.
His pulse pounding feverishly in his ears, Zack ran in a tight circle, trying to stay outside the attack range of both the Enraged Wasp and Enraged Hornet, which didn’t yet try to attack him, possibly waiting for the moment the most suitable to finish Zack off.
Something gleamed underfoot. It was his dagger, and Zack crouched, dashed forward and grabbed it, then realized it was actually possible to dash forward this way. So, he dashed again and slammed his Copper Dagger right into the striped grey-and-black belly of the flanked Wasp.
Enraged Wasp Lvl 1 was CRITICALLY hit by Zack
A Dash attack delivering a powerful blow
Skill Improved: Small Blades +1
BZZZT! Now the Hornet closed in, buzzing as loud as a couple of defeated Wasps, its stinger not only glistering but burning hot like the tip of an iron poker. Mana burn, Zack thought. Luckily, he had no use for mana.
Enraged Hornet Lvl 1 was CRITICALLY hit by Zack and lost 8 hit points
Enraged Hornet Lvl 1 was hit by Zack and lost 4 hit points
Enraged Hornet Lvl 1 was hit by Zack, lost 2 hit points, and was killed!
For defeating A Swarm of Enraged Wasps, you earn 4 XP
Zack finished the Hornet off with a dash and a couple of quick downwards stabs, chipping off its remaining hit points. The ugly porcupine-looking insect collapsed to the ground, its fibers bristling and its wings trembling, the stinger poking frantically through the air, still trying to sting Zack, now safely out of its reach. The edges of Zack’s vision were still blurry and greenish, the poison timer ticking off his own hit points. But Zack felt confident he’d got enough health left to outlast it.
He poked the dead Horned with his Copper Dagger until its yellow-and-black striped belly popped, and a couple of small glowing glands were left lying on the ground in a sizzling pool of greenish goo.
Item Found: Venom Sac X2 (24 gold)
The Hornet yielded two of these glands, while each of the Wasps only had one.
“Not bad,” Zack said. “At least these things are expensive, and they don’t weigh much.”
Item Found: Venom Sac (12 gold)
Item Found: Venom Sac (12 gold)
Perhaps he could just grind around here a bit, kill some Wasps and load up on these poison glands. Given the proper recipe, they could probably be crafted into an Antidote and sold for even more gold. Then he would enter the starter village rich and experienced, not a noob fresh off the altar but already an established player. Zack normally hated grinding, but the dashing move was fun enough, and he could have practiced it more.
“Ah! Craft poison!” It suddenly dawned on him. “Venom Sacs into Poison.”
Item Lost: Venom Sac X4
Item Gained: Poison X2
He still had this recipe of a Poison Dart. Needles too. Twine could be harvested from Wolves – he was nearly sure the trio he killed already had time to respawn with new hides on them, and new stomachs filled with loot. In fact, he could become a tailor for a while and craft several Wolfskin Armors for sale.
“Thank you, the anonymous game designer dude,” Zack said. “There’s always lots of stuff to do. Nothing is random.”
Indeed. Zack remembered a long interview with an AI programmer of Aetheria he had watched once, even despite it being technical and tedious. The guy had talked about this big godlike neural network, a Director AI watching you and your game surroundings every second, going through your stats and pockets, and plotting, plotting, stringing up new events for you to run into and new triggers for you to step on, analyzing the reactions of many players and devising schemes the most popular and the most devious at the same time. This Director AI could even cheat if it had to, but within limits. Its omnipresence and power could be scary to imagine, and yet its only and ultimate goal was to keep you thrilled, entertained, as low on health as you find comfortable to keep playing with, driving lovers of risk to the very edge of excitement and rewarding lovers of peaceful gaming with less action and more background detail, making sure even a fantasy pizza delivery quest would be an immersive adventure.
They also claimed this great AI orchestrated all the galaxy of NPCs of the open world, weaving a complex pattern of ecology, aggression and cooperation between them, the tectonic gradient map of dangers dictating the intricate balance of forces in the living breathing world of Aetheria.
Zack had written it off to hype: NPCs in trailers acted like nothing special, one of them in the background was actually noticed raking cobblestones he confused with hay. They were bumping into each other from time to time, patted shoulders, shook hands, exchanged a couple of inaudible cues and parted, looking as idiotic and oblivious as any idle NPC looks in any computer game. Yet now, Zack thought he could feel the Director AI’s godlike presence. Zack was already navigating the open world, unfastened and unleashed, and still his adventure bore some signs of a tutorial, leading Zack right down the path he needed to follow in order to improve as an Alchemist and no one else. The world around him was tailored for him and any other players who could be near, always something to do and to see, and not just mindless roaming, but a chain of events to follow.
He remembered the first open world games, with their worlds generated procedurally on the fly, and how players first loved, and then hated them. Too late it dawned on everyone the computer-generated random stuff always becomes white noise for a human brain. At some point, a player will always realize that exploring doesn’t mean seeing random stuff in front of you. And discovering things is only interesting when they have some intent behind them. A whole galaxy of planets to explore was pointless without some big plot stringing them all up. That was when the procedural open-world games quickly died out. That was when human level designers became a must again, this time with digital help from neural networks. That was when Director AIs went big, and Aetheria so far had the most advanced one.
Nothing is random, Zack thought, crouching to collect some Sourberries.
Item Harvested:
Sourberries X2 (2 gold)
New Side Quest: Wrong Kind of Bees
Objectives:
Destroy a Wasp Nest
Craft the Antidote
On the ground, you notice traces of strange glowing pheromone! I
t must have been left by Wasps you killed. The trail seems to lead into the woods.
Tip of the Day: Enraged Wasps mark their territory with luminous pheromones. Once smeared in their secretions, you are instantly targeted by every Wasp and lose the ability to Sneak.
Zack pulled his hand back from the smeared leaves pulsating with cyanide greenish glow. He rose and instantly noticed another smear in the distance… and another further on.
“Okay,” Zack said. “Thanks, Director. I did want to kill me some bumblebees. The Antidote recipe, here we come.”
And he followed the glowing trail of “secretions” leading back through the underbrush. Zack walked carefully, pine needles rustling under his feet to remind him the Sneaking was not enabled yet. The pheromone wasn’t sprayed randomly either; he had to crouch and jump and everything but walk the tightrope to avoid contact with it. At one point, Zack was ready to complain the trail was getting too long, and this was the moment when the obstacle course ended, and he entered the new area.
It was an isolated meadow again, strewn with cobwebs and splattered with the evil glowing goo. Open world or no open world, game designers seemed to favor enclosed spaces.
You encountered a Nest of Enraged Wasps!
Wasp Lvl 1 Wasp Lvl 2 Wasp Lvl 1
Wasp Lvl 1 Wasp Lvl 1
Wasp Nest Lvl 1
The Wasp Nest resembled an origami made of razor blades instead of paper. “It looks more like a hive, not a nest,” Zack said. “Do you guys even have a dictionary? A biology book?”
The Wasps circled above it, not yet aware of him.
Wasp Lvl 2 reveals Insect Eye!
Insect Eye: Spot Sneaking targets at any distance. Requires line of sight.
Sneaking Failed! Enemies have been alerted
“Oh crap,” Zack said, seeing all Wasps at once jerk awake, turning into a bunch of AI-driven killing drones homing in on his position. He hid behind a rock, thanking the ever-present guardian spirits of level design, and won a couple seconds.
They lost line of sight, so they would converge on his last-known location, spreading the push equally between every known route. They were all Melee class enemies, their stingers only effective up close. They could change altitude but didn’t really travel too fast. These mossy rocks like the one he was now clinging to were all over the place, some dangerously near the evil stealth-disabling goo, and yet close enough to each other to dash from one rock to the next, flanking Wasps one by one and taking them down. If not for the goo, the area would in fact make a perfect killing ground. He wished he could become immune to it somehow, but there was no way yet known to him.
The Alchemist of Aetheria: A LitRPG Adventure Page 4
