When reality flickered and disappeared, replaced in an instant, I noticed in passing surprise how rushed I was to get into Dis.
I had a ton of stuff to do: see the loot from Dargo (just then, I started feeling bad that I never got to know Clayton); read all the notifications and messages I didn't delve into earlier; take a look my gear and, if anything didn't belong, try and sell it to Underweight; and take a peek at the city council bulletin board – maybe there would be some missions. I also needed to find Patrick and figure out how to get rid of his curse. I just wanted to walk around town and talk to random locals loo. Maybe they'd give me a decent mission.
As for my curse, by the way, I had an interesting idea. And if it worked, well... I could live with it for now.
I also needed to figure out how to level from here. Overall, to borrow a phrase from my Uncle Nick, I had a metric crapton to do.
In Tristad, night was also beginning to fall. Sandboxes were tied to one's physical location on the planet. All the teens I shared mine with lived somewhere nearby. Time was synchronized too, of course.
I showed up right where I left the game earlier, and a player immediately came at me – some puny level-one beginner.
"Watch where you're going!" he declared in a deep bass, totally removed from the logic of what was happening.
I watched him walk away in astonishment. To look at him he was thirteen but what a voice! Just to be safe I walked away and looked at my inventory. What dropped from Dargo the Cursed Lich?
First I saw an amulet and gasped for joy. My first green – unusual – object that gave a bonus to attributes!
Heavy Bronze Amulet
Unusual
+5 Endurance.
Requires level: 5.
Sell price: 98 silver coins, 50 copper coins.
The amulet was strung onto a pleated leather cord meant to be worn around the neck. Too bad the level requirement was too high for me to wear it yet. Still I imagined that at auction something like this could fetch at least three or four gold. Actually though, I’d better hold onto it for now.
I put the amulet back in my inventory and moved onto a scaly-textured belt. At first I couldn’t believe my eyes, but after I made sure my vision wasn’t deceiving me, I couldn't hold back a victorious yelp, jumping and shaking my fist. The leather belt was blue! Rare!
Corrupted Scale Belt
Rare
Leather armor.
Armor: 4.
+9 Strength.
+12 Endurance.
+3% critical damage chance.
Durability: 90/90.
Requires level: 10.
Sell price: 7 gold coins, 52 silver coins.
Chance of losing after death reduced by 50%.
"Dang! Where'd you get that, little noob?" turning my head, I saw a warrior I had the displeasure of knowing quite well, level-twelve Crag, aka fifteen-year-old Tobias Asser. The one who turned me in to the city guard for ripping a dress.
He bared his teeth happily through an open visor, but his gaze was glued to my belt. And his hand, in no hurry, was reaching for my loot.
"You won’t be able to find this where I got it now."
I quickly stashed the belt in my inventory, watching the warrior. He pretended he just wanted to scratch the back of his head, just with a very roundabout trajectory. Could he get a lot of scratching done through a plate armor helm I wonder? I heard metal scraping on metal. The warrior wrinkled his face in annoyance.
"Sell it to me!" Crag told me. "That thing is for strength and endurance, you have no need for those! And it’s too early. You'll have to level up for half a year to even put it on. I'll give you ten silver right now!"
"Not for sale, sorry."
I turned to walk away, but the warrior’s heavy hand landed on my shoulder. I turned around and saw him squinting.
"Twenty," Crag said affectionately.
"I can palm this off on a vendor for seven and a half gold."
"Are you an idiot? At auc you could get three or four times that..." he stumbled.
"Exactly. Exactly, my dear Crag."
"Well here’s my advice to you, uh... Scyth! Just sell it, otherwise you'll never be able to use it!"
It reached me that he wouldn't let up if I kept talking. So I stopped responding and he just kept trying to convince me he'd give me everything he had – all two gold. And the rest he'd add in the real world, just not right away. Gradually, over a year... I was just calmly reading old messages though.
"Alex, I have plans tonight, so today I'm alone in Dis for the first time. And just so you know, without you here, it's a million times more boring!" Eve wrote earlier in the day.
"Woah! Look at all those achievements!" Oh nether, I forgot that logs about important events were added to group logs. No matter, Eve is a friend. She won't tell. "What does Mark of the Destroying Plague mean? Did they give you a new skill?"
Another couple messages of congratulation followed – in her boredom she had studied all the loot I picked up. Near the end, she announced she’d had enough, then she left the game.
I didn’t know why, but I didn't want Eve to keep getting information about what was happening to me. I exited the group. And by the way, she got no experience for passing the crypt. Well, at least that made sense. Otherwise everyone would level that way.
"Knock-knock! Hey, little noob! Anyone home? Knock-knock!" I closed the chat and saw that Crag was clapping his metal-gloved hands before my nose in an effort to get my attention. "Three gold right now!"
"You're getting in the way of my gaming. That's one. You don't understand the word 'no,' and that's your problem. That's two. And three, I'm calling the guards. Any questions?"
"Well little noob, I'll remember you!" Crag threatened and walked away.
"Took you long enough to learn my face..." I answered, distracted by private messages.
Or more accurately, one message. There was just one, but it wasn't mere spam. This came straight from the developers.
Greetings, fair Scyth, from the gods of Disgardium!
Whether random or not, your recent actions have earned you a place among our most special and unique players. You have become a threat to the world!
The system of classifying players as threats to the world is an important and inalienable part of our game. It is the key factor that makes Disgardium inimitable and beloved by our many devotees the world over (the boring world you come from at any rate).
Potential class of your threat to the world: L.
Present class of your threat to the world: Z.
Threat traits: under the radar, part of a global cataclysm, Destroying Plague, pandemic, non-linear character development, hidden advantage against higher-level enemies.
Achieve your full potential and reach maximum threat level!
As your threat class goes up, more interesting events will start to generate around you and more players will come join the hunt!
But what do you stand to gain, beyond unbelievable and captivating adventure?
After the threat is eliminated you will receive:
— A new character with a unique skill!
— An in-game reward starting at level one. The higher your final threat class, the more valuable the prize!
— A monetary bonus paid to an individual account of the Global Bank of Snowstorm, which will also be determined by your final threat class.
What next? Play! Grow as a threat and always keep your special status a secret. Always, even after elimination!
That will help you hold out as a threat to the world as long as possible and allow you to develop your potential to the max. What's more, if you reveal your status at any time, even if it happens outside the game world, the Snowstorm corporation shall retain the right...
I read up to that point and spent a long time trying to recover, turning this morning's events over in my head again and again. What brought me to this point? Patrick's curse? Killing Dargo and the achievement? The Mark of the Destroying Plag
ue? Based on the threat traits, I was not far from the truth.
So then, that global notification was about me? The foothills of the Nameless Mountains... Exactly! Nether, what a hunt the preventer clans would put on for me now!
Although... First they'd have to find me and second, they had no access to our sandbox. And how could they ever know? It wasn't exactly stamped on my forehead! Or was it? I opened my profile, studied it closely: there was nothing there about me being a threat to the world.
Okay, sure. I got back to the message.
What followed was a list of possible punishments, going all the way to extrajudicial deprivation of citizenship (for citizens) and huge fines. The full text of the agreement was sent in a separate message as soon as I accepted the conditions. And why not, really? I had nothing to lose. I was not especially attached to my character, especially now that he was cursed.
The agreement was written in boring legal language, but I didn't find anything new other than that my threat status had no time limit, but I was required to spend no less than eight hours of real time in the game every day. It separately laid out that if I achieved my maximum potential, the corporation would compensate me with a pod that provided all the essentials, and if I got sick or was forced out of the game for any reason I would have to make up the time I missed.
I was not okay with the path that necromancer took. I had a fire in my belly, and I was not going to just be satisfied with class Z.
At the end of the first message, it explicitly defined "eliminating the threat." I could die as many times as I liked, but only up until I was outed as a threat. I could be identified by a brand on my wrist, visible only in the light of a True Flame, a very expensive artifact which required extremely rare ingredients to craft.
Whoever revealed the threat could eliminate it by killing the character and performing a full excarnation ritual. It was a very primitive ritual. All you had to do was stick any sharp object into the heart and solemnly declare: "I expel you from Disgardium forever!"
After exposed and positively identified, the game assigned a knowledge tag to those who have seen evidence of your status. Only after getting that tag could a player actually eliminate a threat once and for all. Then on elimination, the threat would drop a colored crystal and the higher the potential threat class, the larger it would be. And that crystal, once activated, would open a temporary portal into a treasure room that contained the preventer’s rewards.
I thoughtfully bared my wrist and saw a black brand shimmering with toxic green light. Some text popped up:
Brand of a Class-Z Threat, with Class-L potential.
"How's it going, Scyth?" came a deep velvety voice. "What you got on your wrist there, hm?"
Chapter Thirteen. The Bubbling Flagon
I SHUDDERED. Overweight, and that was who it was, started laughing. In a couple of heartbeats, I opened my inventory and put the amulet from Dargo back into my hand.
"Oh, Rita! I was just coming to see you! Look what I found..." I extended the loot to show her. "What do you think, should I keep it?"
"I mean..." she said, intrigued. "Green? Well... not bad. Five endurance at level five couldn’t hurt. For two and a half gold, buyers would rip off your arms to get it. But, if you're not in a rush, you could probably get three or four."
"That's what I thought," I said with a nod of satisfaction, stashing it in my bag. "I'll keep it then."
"Good choice. Just put it in your chest first, otherwise you might get ganked and lose it." she tossed a gaze over me. "You get some gear? A successful farm?"
"Sure. Thanks for the club, you really helped me out!"
"Yeah, it's nothing really. I just wanted to get rid of it," she shrugged.
"By the way, Rita. I wanted to drop by and see some of what Underweight had to offer, then keep leveling from there. Could you tell me where best to go at my level?"
"Definitely not Gloomwood," the girl laughed. "Not a lot of people go there, and if they do, it's with a strong coordinated group. Have you ever heard of Crusher?"
"Uh... No."
"He’s a rare mob who got announced not very long ago, a kind of local boss," Overweight explained eagerly. "A big old wolf as tall as you, a level-fifteen elite. He hunts local mobs all alone. To put it briefly, no one has been able to take him down yet. He can cast a Fear spell by howling and at half life he summons a pack. And that's when it's all over."
"I see. I won't go there alone or with a group. But what about the rest?"
"Listen, I don't remember where I even leveled. Undy and I used to comb through everything around here. We got our first few levels quick. To the west the murlocks will eat you up, so all you have left is the Mire if you don't want to do socials. Walk around – there's a hunting camp over that way. They might give you a mission to genocide local animals. Most important though, don't get near the needlers! Those are these huge flies. They lay eggs inside you, and the maggots crawl around under your skin and start burrowing... Yeesh..." she shuddered.
Rita's hand dived into the pocket of her leather jacket. She pulled out a bag of sweets and extended it to me.
"Treat yourself."
"Thanks, I don't like candy."
"What? These randomly give one to an attribute or plus ten percent to movement speed!"
"Are you serious?" I pulled a candy in a rainbow wrapper from the bag, unwrapped it and tossed it back. In a matter of seconds it dissolved on my tongue, leaving an aftertaste of strawberries and cream.
You have eaten Sweet Joy.
Positive effect received: +10% movement speed.
"And what if..."
"Doesn't stack," she interrupted. "It lasts one hour. If you eat another one, the bonus just changes."
"Thanks!"
"Bon appetite! Undy is the one of us who handles the Cooking by the way. If you get any ingredients, feel free to bring them to him. He'll buy whatever you got. You’ll get less than at auction, but all at once and fast."
"Ah, you know I just so happen to have some..." I dug in my inventory and pulled out the rat innards.
"Ick, that stuff is nasty," Overweight wrinkled her nose. "I've never seen anything like it. Where'd you even find a zombie rat?" Her eyes went the size of a gold coin. "Were you in Gloomwood or something?"
"Me? Do I look like an idiot?"
"Honestly... yes. At the very least you did all that time you spent wearing through the seat of your pants outside the tavern. It's just that a zombie rat... I have no idea where else you could happen on one of those other than Gloomwood. I never saw any rats there, but there are wraiths."
"First room in the temple crypt. There’s a wine cellar with these rats."
"Ah, I see," she nodded. "Check auction prices, because I have no idea how much that might cost or what it might be used in. Well, or ask Undy. He should know."
"Gotcha, I'll do that. Thanks!"
"Look me up sometime, Scyth. Alright, we've been talking too much. I've gotta go to the auction, then the real world. I've got stuff to do. If you require our services, you know where to find us," Overweight shoved my shoulder and left.
She really was pretty. You know how that happens? Like a person doesn't really make an impression at first, but the longer you talk the more you find them attractive. Well with Rita Overweight, that was about the size of it. I discovered that she had an infectious smile, pretty eyes and an attractive face. And I wouldn't call her fat. She still had a long way to go before Eve's level. She had a guitar-shaped body, and if... Nether, where has my mind gone?
I tore my eyes away from Rita's buttocks, wrapped tight in her leather pants. She was rushing and her thighs were shaking side to side, hypnotizing me like a pendulum...
Was Undy her brother? Or boyfriend? I never thought to compare last names.
On the announcement board, I didn't find a thing worth doing. What was more, almost all the jobs were already taken because it was evening. I wasn't high enough level to patrol the edge of Gloomwood, and now after th
e fast leveling in the ins, you'd never drag me down to weed gardens for a couple copper and a droplet of experience.
Now last night’s torments and suffering no longer seemed so horrible. I mean sure, I got wiped a couple hundred times but I passed the ins, got some gear, leveled up, earned achievements, discovered new skills and improved my character!
That reminded me, Patrick! I'd have to find him and thank him with a couple coins. But first to the tavern to toss this rare belt and unusual amulet into personal storage.
Class-A Threat (Disgardium Book #1) LitRPG Series Page 11