First Login

by Kevin Murphy

  “A job, preferably.” Dakkon sighed and looked up from what he had determined was definitely a table. “I can’t seem to find anyone willing to give me a copper in this town.”

  “Hmm. Well, then, you should’ve come here sooner,” the barmaid said with a heartwarming smile. “And you should’ve said so before eating that oversized cracker. If you agree to do a job for me mam then I’ll go ahead and give you a bowl of stew, if you’d like. She’ll pay you on top of that of course.”

  Stew sounded pleasant compared to the dry tack he’d been eating. Dakkon eagerly nodded his head.

  [You have accepted the quest: Of Mice and Mam]

  The stew that the barmaid brought for Dakkon turned out to be tasty, if a bit tough. After he finished eating another new message appeared.

  *Bhnnn*

  [You are well fed.]

  [HP/EP/MP will be restored at double the rate.]

  [You are resting in a bar.]

  [Restoration speed is increased.]

  Now full and reinvigorated, Dakkon was directed back into the kitchen to meet the buxom barmaid’s mam. Upon entering the kitchen, he noticed a large woman with dirty gray, straw-like hair bent away from him, in a nook, chopping away at something vigorously.

  *Wham* The cleaver fell. Dakkon approached the woman and a spattering of something wet hit the walls of the nook. Just as he was about to clear his throat to catch the round woman’s attention, she turned around with cleaver raised.

  “What the crock are you doing here?” The old woman croaked with a red-spattered, boil-covered face that threatened to haunt his nightmares.

  The abrupt spin of the large woman caused a few droplets of thick liquid to launch from the cleaver in her hand and spatter Dakkon, landing on his face and shirt. Disgusted, but trying to keep his cool, he wiped away at the viscous liquid and said, “Your daughter said you could use some help.”

  “You’re here at a good time. There are rodents in the basement. I need you to go down and cull 10 of them,” the rotund woman said.

  “A classic.” Dakkon managed a smile. Rats in the basement was one of those new-adventurer quests that had been a sort of running joke among fantasy role-playing games for about as long as the games had been around. “I’d be glad to help you out.”

  The woman eyed Dakkon appraisingly. “And how do you figure you’ll manage that? By punching and stomping on them?”

  Dakkon realized she had a point. Rats scurrying away from him in full flight would probably be near impossible to catch bare-handed. The idea of killing them one vicious stomp after another didn’t really inspire him either.

  “Bah. There’s nothing for it, then,” the ogrish woman said as she held her dripping cleaver out for Dakkon to grab. “Take this, kill 10 rats, and bring everything back to me.”

  Dakkon reached a hand out, warily, and grabbed the slick handle of the cleaver. The sensations one could feel in Chronicle were impeccable. His spine tingled with apprehension. When he held the cleaver in his own, now soiled, hands he thought to ask, “Why only 10? If you’ve got a rat problem, and I’m heading down there anyways, how about I just clean out the place?”

  “No, no. That’s too much. Just kill 10 and bring them to me,” the barkeep’s mother said quickly. “The entrance to the basement is right through that door. Take that lamp on the table.”

  “Fair enough,” Dakkon said, picking up the lamp and fiddling with it until it was alight.

  Just as Dakkon took his first step downwards into the dimly lit basement, the old woman called out after him, “Remember! Only 10!”

  Half-way down the steps, Dakkon looked at the cleaver in his hand and thought, “Inspect!”

  |Name: Squeak Harvest

  |Item Type: Cleaver

  |Damage Type: Chopping

  |Durability: 16/50

  |Damage: 5

  |Attributes: +15 Damage Against Rodents.

  |Description: The right tool for killing rodents.

  “… she was using this to prepare food?” Dakkon’s stomach lurched, but he continued walking down the steps. The sounds of scampering and squeaking from ahead and below focused him on his immediate objective and helped him shake the thought that his recent meal may have attained its unusual consistency from rodent meat.

  “When I get down there, how am I going to corner them?” This prospect worried him. He certainly didn’t want to spend hours in a cellar hunting pests. At the bottom of the stairs, he set to the problem, “If I can corral them someho—”

  Half a dozen rats descended upon him from above, like a curtain of furry claws and teeth. “EEEEEEEEEEEEEEK!” Dakkon let out a shriek unbefitting of a grown man. His dignity would not be tarnished, at least, because the patrons upstairs would be unable to connect his high-pitched wail with anyone of even mild masculinity.

  [Rat has scratched you for 2 damage. Remaining HP 48/50]

  [Rat has scratched you for 2 damage. Remaining HP 46/50]

  [Rat has bitten you for 3 damage. Remaining HP 41/50]

  [Rat has bitten you for 3 damage. Remaining HP 38/50]

  [Rat has bitten you for 3 damage. Remaining HP 35/50]

  [Rat has scratched you for 2 damage. Remaining HP 33/50]

  [Rat has scratched you for 2 damage. Remaining HP 31/50]

  Dakkon dropped the lamp to the floor, which bounced once and then rolled, illuminating dozens of flickering eyes.

  The bottom of his screen was awash with the spam of combat messages, hindering their usefulness. “OVERLAY!” Dakkon screamed, stomping around and brushing away rat after rat from his torso. Three bars and a clock overlaid onto his vision. The red, HP, bar was draining quickly and he knew the flood of distracting messages wasn’t making matters any easier, “SYSTEM MESSAGES OFF!”

  Dakkon backed up onto the stairs, tearing away the last rat from his leg, flinging it to the ground, and descending upon it with all the savage fury of a mother gorilla defending her young.

  He cleaved the first rat in half. The powerful strike caused a panic amongst the swell of rats, which began to scramble away. Like a man possessed, Dakkon leapt towards the fleeing mass of rats.

  \\\

  Dakkon shoveled what amounted to approximately 10 rats’ worth of furry, wet mass into his cloth bag. He grabbed the lamp and strode upstairs with an unwavering thousand-yard stare. He kicked open the door to the kitchen, walked up next to the old woman and poured the contents of his pack onto the table.

  A tangled, gruesome mass tumbled out onto the counter top. Dakkon tossed the cleaver and lamp to the side and held out a hand to the old woman palm up, staring through her.

  “Gods you’re filthy,” The old woman said, clearly disgusted. “Weren’t you wearing tan and off-white before you went down?”

  Dakkon refocused his stare on the woman’s eyes and, reflexively, she held her tongue in favor of pulling out 20 coppers from a box stored in the nook where she worked. After the woman handed the money over to the wild-eyed rat mangler, Dakkon picked up his ruined bag, shoved his canteens back inside, and walked into the main room of the bar where he sat in a corner. Then, he summoned a media console and began to watch soothing videos of kittens at play.

  \\\

  After an hour of rehumanizing himself, Dakkon assessed what he had gained. First, and foremost, a profound and passionate hatred of rats. Second, a better understanding of what system messages needed to be configured so that his screen did not become a wall of text—Dakkon took a moment to make the necessary changes and to toggle system messages back on. Third, a paltry 20 copper coins. And, finally, the knowledge of how it feels to be covered in biting rodents.

  Well then, what had he lost? Primarily, some chunk of his sanity had been cast deep into the void. His clothes were so covered in holes and nicks that they probably wouldn’t hold together through a sprint. His bag was now an ugly, fur-matted, splotchy red mess and would likely smell foul by morning. “Anything else?” Dakkon wondered. “Right. The Traveler’s Tack. I guess that
makes acquiring more food my new number one priority.”

  Having had system messages turned off during the majority of the fight, and while turning a quest in, Dakkon had no idea what the state of his EXP looked like. “Character!” Dakkon summoned his character window and was a bit saddened to see he wouldn’t be gaining a level on his first day in the game.

  |————

  |Statistics ( ][][ )

  |————

  |Strength: 10 ( ? )

  |Stamina: 10

  |Agility: 10

  |Dexterity: 10

  |Intellect: 10

  |Luck: 0 ( X )

  |Free Stat Points: 0

  |

  |Hit Points: 50/50

  |Endurance: 50/50

  |Mana Points: 50/50

  |Level: 1

  |EXP Until Next Level: [_______200/300__ ]

  Just as he was about to close the window, Dakkon noticed something that had not been there before. A new symbol next to the word ‘Statistics.’ Dakkon selected the symbol and a new window opened before him:

  |————

  |Traits ( ][ )

  |————

  |Heroic — 1 0% [ ]

  |Hunter — 1 0% [ ]

  Selecting ‘Heroic’ pulled up a description of the effect:

  |-Heroic: Gained from battling with reckless determination. Every rank in Heroic increases critical strike chance by 1%. Current effect: +1%.

  Selecting ‘Hunter’ had a similar effect:

  |-Hunter: Gained from slaying multiple animal-class creatures in a short period of time. Every rank in Hunter increases overall damage dealt to animal-class creatures by 1%. Current effect: +1%.

  “Awesome,” Dakkon thought, legitimately pleased for the first time since he started playing. “I guess I’d better give Traits a looking into.” He turned back to his media console and through it, scoured forums and wiki sources for information on Traits:

  In Chronicle, players gain experience in multiple ways. When a character’s main experience meter is filled to 100%, their level increases by one; they gain an amount of Hit Points, Endurance Points, and Mana Points as determined by their stat distribution; and they are awarded with five free stat points which they can distribute into strength, stamina, agility, dexterity, or intellect. Increasing a character’s level is an important part of powering up that character.

  Traits are comparable to a character’s skills. For example, someone wishing to become a better fisherman can spend time fishing. Eventually they will unlock a Trait, or even multiple Traits, related to fishing. Utilizing a Trait gains experience. When a Trait’s experience meter is filled to 100%, that Trait levels up and becomes both more powerful and more difficult to level up again.

  It is important to note that when a player character dies, they are forced to log out of the game for 11 real hours, or eight hours shy of four days in game time. A killed-off character loses a random amount of gold carried on their person, but never exceeds more than half. There’s a chance that a deceased player character will drop a random valuable item on death. The chance and number of items dropped also increases if that character is marked as a player killer. Finally, there’s the ever-looming guarantee that a felled player character will lose 20-30% experience from each and every one of their EXP bars. That means spreading oneself thin is a much riskier way to play the game. When Non-Player Characters die, they remain dead no matter how important the NPC.

  Dakkon also learned that most players made their first goal finding a trainer who would unlock for them a character class. Character classes can be changed while resting, and multiclassing was even possible with some restrictions—so it didn’t matter much what a player’s original class choice was. All that mattered was getting one. From there, it was easy to have some work commissioned for the player in the form of quests from their trainer or from a guild. Upon reading how most people easily obtained a character class and started quests by simply visiting a trainer, Dakkon was jarred away from his reading by slamming his forehead into the table he sat at.

  [You have inflicted wounds upon yourself! Remaining HP 30/50]

  [Trait unlocked! Thickness of skin brought about by thickness of action. You have gained the Trait: Thick]

  Dakkon rubbed his forehead and grumbled as he read the message. “I suppose it’s apt, though.”

  Dakkon pulled up the information for his new Trait:

  |-Thick: Gained from causing oneself great, unnecessary strain or damage. Every rank in Thick increases damage resistance by 0.1% and thickens physical features. Special: Experience in thick is not lost on death.

  Dakkon’s eyes widened. “Inventory!” he demanded, and spent several minutes looking over the appearance of his miniature, posable avatar, ensuring his features had not become noticeably thickened.

  \\\

  It was 20:20 game time, and Dakkon had finally found a thread to grasp and follow. He needed to find a class trainer, any class trainer, and Correndin had a lot to choose from. There were common trainers that could be found everywhere: smiths, warriors, wizards, rangers, and the like; and then there were some less common and even region-exclusive trainers. Content, at first, to simply choose the first trainer he saw, Dakkon figured he might as well pick up something region exclusive. He poured over the rarest classes for the area and found what he was looking for: the thermomancer. There were just two problems. First, not too many players had managed to finish the thermomancer’s introductory training, and, those who did didn’t seem to think much about the power of the class. Second, the sole thermomancer trainer’s personality was the sort that wouldn’t stand taking on an apprentice who dressed like a tramp. And Dakkon looked, in his current state, far less appealing than your average tramp.

  Dakkon didn’t care too much about the class being slightly underpowered, he wanted something rare in his arsenal. So that meant, again, his priorities had shifted to getting himself cleaned up.

  “I’d better go to a clothier and see if I can buy something inexpensive but clean. I’d probably better visit a cordwainer, too, for a new pair of shoes. If I can’t afford what I need, then perhaps I can exchange my services for the goods.” Dakkon considered his options, “After I get clothes, I’d better take a dip in the river to clean off a bit.” Dakkon looked up the location of a clothier and decided that would be his first stop.

  Walking outside for the first time in hours, Dakkon realized that there wouldn’t be much more daylight to work with. He could try to continue playing at night, find a place to sleep in game, or logout for a bit. He had spent about 12 hours playing in game time, which amounted to less than 2 in the real world. “That’d make it around lunch time,” Dakkon thought. “I don’t feel hungry, though, or tired for that matter.”

  Dakkon walked in the direction of the clothier’s shop when he was suddenly approached by the very same city guardsman which he had talked to in the morning.

  “Damn! You look like week old shite, boy,” the guard said with a hint of amazement in his voice. “How’d you manage… whatever it is you’ve done? No. Forget all that. I’ve got some news that’ll perk you up. You’ll be pleased to know that we caught your attackers trying to rob a merchant.”

  “My, uhm, attackers?” Dakkon stammered. The cogs inside his head had been jammed a bit, but were in the process of righting themselves. Earlier in the day he had concocted a sub-par story about being mugged to explain his lack of manners and general knowledge of the area. “Oh, yes. Right. My attackers. You’ve apprehended them, then?”

  “That’s what I said, isn’t it? You didn’t actually go and get hit again did you?”

  Dakkon sighed. He’d gone so far as actually being mugged by hoodlums—well, sort of.

  “We’ve gotten back your belongings.” The guard handed Dakkon a larger and sturdier canvas bag than the bloody and horrible one he currently used. “We couldn’t, um, find any of your money, unfortunately. The bastards must have hidden it away somewhere.” The guard’s face
betrayed a hint of guilt.

  Dumbstruck, Dakkon took the bag from the guard’s outstretched hand. Hiding his confusion, he gathered his wits to better navigate the unexpected situation. “No, no. That’s fine. It’s no problem at all. I’m just grateful you could return my belongings. If you do find the money, feel free to keep it as a reward for finding my things.”

  The guard looked less than pleased to hear those gracious words and cursed to himself, “Ah, damn it. Right. Here, I almost forgot about this knife we found amongst the recovered goods. We were admiring it and… I had absentmindedly tucked it into my belt.”

  The guard handed over a surprisingly ornate black dagger in an equally handsome black stone scabbard. He looked greatly relieved by the conscience-clearing act, but still clearly wanted to keep the interaction as short and sweet as he could. “Well, then, stop getting mugged, all right?” The guard said before quickly scampering off.

  “What just happened?” Dakkon tried to put together the pieces of the bizarre scene he’d just been a part of. “They caught three guys matching the ludicrous description I gave, actually mugging someone?” He had trouble wrapping his head around the situation. “And besides the bag full of who knows what, I’ve been given a dagger that looks…” Dakkon trailed off while looking down at the dagger in his hands. It wasn’t black, after all, but a blue so dark the mistake could be forgiven. All of it. The handle, the pommel—Dakkon drew the blade, forgetting about the bag temporarily as it dropped with a muffled metal slink. The grooved blade appeared to be exquisite.

  Remembering himself, Dakkon grabbed the bag off the ground, slung its strap around his shoulder, and quickly paced away in search of a safe spot to examine his windfall. “How much money did that damned guard make off with to make giving me this dagger seem reasonable?” The guard had clearly been of the incredibly honest sort. Perhaps even the act of keeping all of the money—which hadn’t been Dakkon’s in the first place—had been eating away at the man. Though Dakkon’s mind was filled with deciphering the various circumstances that led to his new bounty, his feet moved onwards and away, fueled by avarice.