“It’s not folded a thousand times,” Tanisha said as she turned the weapon-to-be over, examining it, “but if I need to slice through a tank, I think I’ve clearly done something wrong.”
The next step of the craft required her to move on to creating the hilt, and Tanisha fetched a stick from her inventory. She sawed the stick in half, and then half again, as instructed. It was a delicate operation, since she really wanted to keep all her fingers attached, and since the workbench wasn’t exactly designed with safety in mind.
Once the stick had been quartered, she arranged them so that two of the pieces lay alongside the wedge-like shape of the blade, on either side, while the other two lay perpendicular to it, making a crossguard. When they were in place, she was instructed to wrap rope around the hilt to secure it. Tanisha held the stick parts with one hand while pulling the rope from around her shoulders and setting to work carefully matching the movements of the spectral version of the rope.
In just under a minute, she finished tying off the end of the rope and looked for the next step. There wasn’t one. The quest text flashed as it shifted to her next goal.
“But… I didn’t sharpen it?”
Upon inspection, she couldn’t tell. The weapon looked complete, with a blade the color of the blue crab shell across the spine, and the sharpened edge a bone-white shade. The crossguard and handle were not a hideous eyesore, and the handle was wrapped tightly in rope in a way that made it pleasant to hold.
“Alright. This will do.” She nodded at the blade. “Not bad at all, in fact. I think I’m actually proud.” Tanisha swiped the blade through the air a few times. It felt good. Oddly well-balanced for the first weapon she ever made, but she figured that was the game mechanics more than anything she did.
She didn’t have anywhere to put it, other than her inventory, but she had a feeling she’d need it sooner rather than later.
A glance at her quest log confirmed.
Her skin crawled at the sight of the quest. She didn’t even wait for the text to expand out before her heartbeat jumped into her throat and raced.
Welcome to the False Lands: Survive.
Tanisha whirled to face the grotto.
Chapter 15
There was nothing there.
Or, at least, not yet.
She thought for a moment that perhaps whatever was coming hadn’t spawned yet, but her skin crawled and tingled with the sensation of being watched. Was that Otekah observing her? Or did that mean that whatever threat the tutorial was spawning was already here?
She tried to calm the hummingbird-like thrum of her heart as she surveyed the grotto. Perhaps she could get closer to the wall to protect her flank…
The moment she started moving, however, there was a flicker of movement out of the corner of her eye. But when she looked that way, there was just a bit of grass. That waved a little in a breeze. The breeze that wasn’t there.
“Saladmanders. Again. Great.”
Tanisha knew that, in game, saladmanders weren’t targetable while their camouflage rendered them invisible. But attacks directed through their space would still connect and damage them. She didn’t need to lure it closer and wait for the perfect moment—she just had to guess where it was and take a swing.
Emboldened by her previous encounter with the crabstrosity, Tanisha moved the chair forward, leaning into her charge. She tried to keep her eyes locked on the spot where the grass had moved. Having not seen the creature herself, she could only guess at where it was. She flailed her new sword blindly into the space, hoping she was close enough. And that her reckless attack wasn’t leaving her open to attack from another angle.
The single-edged blade in her hands met a tug of resistance, and Tanisha was gratified when the angry red number that jumped up was a thirty. She didn’t have time to enjoy the feeling of having done serious damage, though. As soon as the blow landed, the creature flickered and became visible. The second thing it did, an instant later, was brace its leg and raise its tail.
Tanisha knew it was getting ready to attack. She slapped her hands to the sides of her chair and moved it away from the saladmander. It leaped, swinging its tail in an immense arc that passed just centimeters away from her knees. Just barely a miss.
She lunged back in, and, while she didn’t know how many attacks she could sneak in before the thing would attack again, she would be satisfied if it was just the one. The sword was performing so much better than her axe. She drove the blade down at the lizard, striking as quick as she could. A red thirty popped up from the beast, followed by two more before she had to retreat. The sword was faster and more agile than her axe, allowing her to control it better.
The creature flinched visibly as each strike landed, and by the time it rose up to attack with its tail, Tanisha was already moving. Just the same, the tail was nearly as long as the entire rest of the body, and despite how quickly she was able to strike, she still was just barely able to get out of reach. She was pushing her luck, but she was also doing well.
A surge of confidence flooded her as she dove back in against the creature. She had managed to avoid taking a single strike so far. It might have been that the tutorial was designed for people who didn’t know how such a game should be played. An MMO player might be more inclined to just stand toe-to-toe with these creatures, thinking that their actions wouldn’t affect the monster’s accuracy.
But no matter how good she was doing, she still had a long fight ahead of her. Her attacks might have been hitting harder than the axe, but she knew Otekah had required four strikes at more than ninety damage per hit.
Tanisha moved back in quickly, and with three more sweeps of her blade she got in another ninety damage against the creature. And then she moved out again. The saladmander looked to be in bad shape, and Tanisha lamented her choice to move away. She might have been able to get another blow or two off and maybe have killed it. But the creature’s lashing tail whooshed past the edge of her chair, just short of slapping her skirt. Risking getting hit wasn’t worth the potential time saved.
The creature was cut and bleeding—although the cuts didn’t match up to where her strikes had landed—and the lettuce-like gills on either side of its brown head were frayed and drooping.
Tanisha showed no mercy. She moved in again, determined to end this. Her blade swept down in a vertical strike, a diagonal backswing on the return, and then smashed back down the way it had come. Thirty, thirty, thirty. With a growl, she whipped the blade forward once more. The blow caught a bit more resistance than the others, and the creature flailed its tiny arms and flipped onto its back, exposing its orange belly as it lay still.
Her heart wasn’t pounding as much as it had been after the crabstrosity, even though she was winded. She had things under control. The saladmanders had seemed like a threat earlier, but now they were much more manageable.
Tanisha looked to the quest text to see what else this blasted tutorial would have her do.
Welcome to the False Lands: Survive.
The text hadn’t changed.
A twang of fear echoed through Tanisha’s chest. It wasn’t over yet. What was next? Was there something bigger and badder, or just more of the same? She wanted to know—to examine the quest text until it expanded—but she didn’t want to be blindsided. All the damage had been avoided so far, and so she didn’t know how dangerous it would be. Plus, she’d break her streak.
She scanned the area around her carefully, searching for the next threat.
Nothing immediately appeared, and while she didn’t want to jump to any conclusions, she figured it was pretty safe to assume there would be more saladmanders. It was even likely that they’d been there since the first one spawned, and they were just creeping forward while she fought off their friend. If Tanisha were able to deal with them one-by-one, she wouldn’t have to be worried about her survival at all. There could even be dozens of them and she would be fine. But if she had to deal with too many at once, though… well, saladmander
s had earned their reputation as a nuisance from how they were practically designed to complicate encounters.
“Where are the rest of you?” she asked the clearing. “And what moron decided to use invisible monsters for a tutorial quest?” Tanisha shook her head. “It’s just bad design. How am I supposed to find them all?”
Nothing responded to her—she had hoped Otekah would reappear—but there was a flicker of movement off to her left. Tanisha whirled her chair around, not just to face it, but to fully break into a charge. She even gave off a battle cry. It was a far shot from the rage-filled bellow of a barbarian, but it still made her feel scary.
It had only taken about a dozen attacks to take down the first saladmander—or was it more than that? The adrenaline in her system was making it difficult to count, so the sooner she started, the sooner she could pick the creature off before more could close around her.
The issue was that the simple flicker of movement hadn’t given her the best idea of where the next creature was hiding. Tanisha just swept her sword around herself wildly, looking for that red thirty to jump out of the air. She charged like that for about five or six yards before she encountered the faint tug of resistance and number flickering out of the empty air. In response, Tanisha immediately directed her chair away quickly, and the mechanical monstrosity almost dumped her out of the seat as it changed directions faster than she expected.
She barely dodged the amphibian’s sweeping tail, but with mechanical familiarity, Tanisha darted back in, swinging the sword in her three-strike pattern. It was odd to have this feel so familiar already, since there was a lack of phone in her hand. She was playing more of a first-person fantasy, and she was reminded of a game she’d played in her teenage years. There she’d been fighting giant blue trolls with a controller in hand, directing her character to wield a hammer against the creature’s swinging fists.
As her next set of strikes landed, Tanisha was excited to see them do thirty-one damage instead of just thirty. Apparently her sword skill was rising, even if only a little. It wouldn’t matter much in the long run because of breakpoints. She’d still need twelve attacks for quite a long amount of time. But progress was progress, and numbers going up were satisfying, even if they didn’t actually mean anything.
Tanisha darted away from the saladmander’s incoming attack, letting it pass right in front of her. But before she moved forward for her next trio of attacks, there was a sharp tug of pain in her chest, and a flicker of movement to her right. It seemed to correspond with a sudden and uncomfortable feeling of being drenched in nervous sweat.
This saladmander wasn’t alone.
A second creature was right behind her, and it had just struck her.
The little red bar at the bottom-left of her vision had lost a chunk off the end, and Tanisha felt a little stab of panic. Her other bars were also no longer full, but none of them were missing as much as the red bar, which was down by about a quarter. The purple one was close behind, and it seemed to be gradually draining. That was her stability, wasn’t it? Her sanity? Was her fear and panic affecting it, or was it just the strain of combat itself?
Tanisha directed her chair to back away, and grimaced as its response was slower than it had been just moments before. This is why saladmanders were a problem. Their attacks applied a slowing effect. It was one of the only ones in the game, and when combat depended on your ability to move and attack quickly, being even slightly slower was, at best, a huge annoyance, and at worst, a death sentence.
Focusing her attention on staying out of range was hard. Her chair barely avoided a sweeping tail, even though she hadn’t moved forward for her next attack at all. She circled around to the left, forcing the two creatures to move closer together. They bumped into one another as they jockeyed for position, both ready to be the next to strike her.
The slowing effect of the saladmander’s attack had a duration. She could just wait it out. But the idea that a third—or even fourth—creature might be lurking out there drove her to deal with the saladmanders before her. As quickly as possible. Even if that meant attacking at a disadvantage.
Her chair skittered forward under her direction, just far enough to put her within attack range. She wasn’t within reach of her sword when both saladmanders raised themselves up on their feet, readying their attacks. Tanisha darted back out of their range, letting both attacks pass before her before she moved in to strike in earnest. She was pretty sure the one on the left was the creature she’d already damaged, and so she focused her attention on it.
Tanisha wasn’t exactly sure how slow she was compared to before. She didn’t know how many strikes she could get away with, and would have to do some quick math. Sure, she could have tested it with trial and error, but she couldn’t risk too many more attacks. One was enough.
For her own safety, Tanisha struck only once, hitting the saladmander for thirty-one damage before backing off. Her chair moved away, and both tails whipped through the air only inches from her. She moved in again as fast as she could and struck again. Reversing course immediately was aggravating, and Tanisha really hated this. But at least she was safe.
Halfway through darting backwards, though, the slow wore off, and she was able to get out of range of the attack easily. She actually had to wait for the blows to sweep through the air in front of her before she confidently rushed back in, dashing her sword around three times, drawing the expected trio of thirty-ones.
Upon retreating, she noticed that the saladmander on the left was looking badly damaged. Her confidence soared. She had this! It was just a matter of waiting out the attacks… A slimy tail passed through the air before her, and Tanisha darted back in—
Directly into an attack.
The wounded saladmander’s slower attack speed had thrown her off, and a tug of pain in her chest alerted her of the mistake. She immediately felt sweaty again, which must have been the physical tell for the slow. Tanisha grimaced as the red bar in the corner of her vision took another hit. But she couldn’t spare any time now. She had to finish off the injured one, or else their attacks would remain out-of-sync, and she would struggle to close in on them again without suffering the same issue.
Her weapon zig-zagged through the injured saladmander twice before it flipped over, dead. She backed off immediately, but was just a moment too slow. The extra attack had done her in.
With a grimace, Tanisha waited patiently for the remaining creature to attack again before moving in to steal a single attack at a time. Even after the slow effect wore off, Tanisha was sure to only hit it once before backing away. She wasn’t sure if the creature would have friends lurking in the shadows again. There was no point to overextending herself, and potentially opening herself up to taking extra damage. Instead, she used the extra time between her attacks and the creature’s tail whip to watch her surroundings.
Eventually, the saladmander flopped over onto its back after a few more hits, but Tanisha felt no joy in seeing the death animation. Instead, she was worried—painfully so—about the state of her current condition. Her health bar was just below half, but her stability bar was way lower than that. And still ticking down, ever so slowly. She wondered what could be causing it.
With a glance around the grotto, Tanisha noticed it looked a bit darker. The shadows seemed thicker, and they reminded her of the spindling fingers in the trees the night before. Around the edges of her vision was a pulsing that made her think of the migraines her mother suffered from. The tutorial mentioned that darkness drained her stability—maybe night was falling? Or perhaps this is what stability did, making her surroundings seem scarier and made it harder to see?
Either that, or it was all scripted.
“And we all know how annoying scripted events in tutorials are,” she said to no one in particular. “It’s just lazy design.”
The woods whispered to her in response, sending a shock of ice down Tanisha’s spine.
She did a little mental inventory. Her armor was scratch
ed and scraped, of course not in a way that made sense with the attacks she’d taken. There had been no claws on those saladmander tails, but there were four deep gouges in the wooden cuirass that said otherwise. The ropes were slightly frayed, and Tanisha wondered just how much more it could take. Her sword was also almost worthless. The edge was horribly nicked, and there was a crack running up the side of it. She didn’t know if the thing would eventually shatter when it broke, or if it would just become unusable.
But, luckily, as her stability bar ticked down to about the quarter mark, there was a little flash in the upper right of her UI as the quest text updated. “Yep, scripted.” Tanisha groaned and focused on the text to make it expand, but only because the shortened version of the text didn’t terrify her.
Welcome to the False Lands: Restore your health and stability. Your resource bars are important, and when they start to get low, they require attention or else you risk suffering terrible side effects, or worse, death. There are a number of ways to restore bars, consuming different resources and time. Experiment and figure out the best ways for each situation. For the purposes of this tutorial, a pair of rare mushrooms have been spawned. One is red, and the other is purple. When eaten, mushrooms either greatly restore or greatly deplete the resource bar corresponding to their color, but do not affect other bars. For example, a red mushroom, when cooked, will restore 50% of your maximum HP. A purple mushroom, eaten raw, will restore 50% of your maximum stability. However, when cooked, they do the opposite as when eaten raw.
“Ugh, mushrooms? Seriously?” Tanisha wrinkled her nose up. “Gross.” She’d never minded eating the things in game, but that was because she’d never had to actually chew on them. And it wasn’t that she minded the taste—not that she was going to have butter or garlic salt to make them taste like anything other than forest mushrooms—but the texture was off putting. “Can’t you make it something else?”
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