Chương 4: Chapter 3

Thrum. A beat, a deep electrical beat in my very soul. If this is a game then I don't want to wake up, as this is so real, so vibrant. Even the unmistakable cling of moisture in the air gives layers upon layers to the one fact that this is real. Or at least my brain is interpreting it as being real. Moving forward, my feet move with deft yet solid steps. I am big enough to break branches if I should step on them, thus alerting everyone in the forest to my presence.

Fortunately, though, even in the near perfect darkness my tiny glow stone from under my clothes glows brightly enough to show my immediate surroundings. The first few hundred feet are the slowest, as these are the ones that I have to go slowly, lest I draw the attention of the town guards. Even now that I am moving off at a perpendicular angle away from the two noted exits, I still feel the noose wrapped around my neck. A noose all but set to snap and capture me at a moment's notice. Whow-whoo-whow.

An owl cries out overhead, the unofficial sound that it is officially nighttime. By all accounts I manage to leave town a good three hours before my original time of midnight. Which I mentally noted gave me about a four-hour head start. With these three extra hours I should have roughly a seven-hour head start. Looking around, I try to get a mental map of where I am and remember that this is Bandit Camp Four in the Lejuvian forest. I take the south east exit—the exit that can be used to leave but not enter.

Which places me right in the middle of dense forests with the most pressing enemy being the roaming goblins and kobolds. Yeah, the evil races are also part of this world as well. Why not, a few of the potential love interests that are made available later on were elves both male and female actually, quite a few high elves and one set of twin dark elves. Of course, you get them as slaves, as most elves that are seen by humans are considered permanent servants of long dead families.

The mentality is that elves are like giant mobile paintings that showcase one's wealth while also providing minor value like being able to clean up a house. Actually, the entire process seems rather sad now that I think about it, and I never purchased the elves as a DLC, but they were seen by many as both a must and a blatant tax on the morally destitute. That is one part of this world that I am glad I will get to avoid, as I will be a commoner when I enter the academy. Do I still want to enter the academy?

Never mind, stupid question, as most of my imbalanced knowledge about how to exploit this world comes from my going to the Magical University. Though this time, rather than being bound in servitude to the Von'Roseblades, I can be a free-range vassal capable of serving any empire. Actually, if I prove myself capable enough, I can join the Adventurers Guild as a fully licensed mage, which can all but guarantee that I can be well paid and able to shape the world in any direction I want.

I can even eventually take high paying contracts to join specific battles as a mercenary. Inhaling, I realize the possibilities are endless." What's that light?" The sounds of the mixed language used by goblins can be heard. Hearing them and their basic language causes me to smile as this is just another example of my being in the game world.

Having played the game for hours on end, I inundated myself with language immersion training, while some people took their time to teach themselves Klingon, I and others like me learned the monster race languages. There was a purpose, as a few quest lines were later introduced to those who could understand the language and communicate properly. That said, I know exactly what to do in this situation.

Realizing that the goblins are nocturnal creatures they might be drawn to a relatively low level of light generated by my covered crystal. With that thought in mind, I pull out the crystal and fwoom. An eruption of light shines out illuminating not two, but three goblins all coming from different directions and angles. Panicking, I use the moment of surprise and begin chain casting.

<UNKNOWN> Bolt <UNKNOWN> Bolt <UNKNOWN> Bolt The spell structures come to my mind almost instantly, forming and releasing with a form of practiced proficiency that is easy. Especially with all of my master casting bonuses being applied, lowering the cost, raising the chance to hit, and effectively giving me a much larger dual targeting window than my first spell had.

I swear, I can almost feel my luck playing into it, as one goblin was not but five feet away when I manage to red light, green light him in his tracks. SPLASH! The <UNKNOWN> Bolts lash out, striking at everything and everyone. I release the first one when I as I am already manifesting the baseline structures for the other spells. By this point dual casting is a must, especially for the power leveler who wants to get an early start on her power accumulation. Boosh! Boosh!

The other two blasts sail off, and I am left panting for a second looking at the three corpses that just stand up without their heads, before they all finally fall lifeless to the ground.

"Holy shit!" I exclaim. I blink as I realize I am able to curse without the moderating sensors automatically changing my foul language to something more appropriate for online play. Pausing for a moment, I am left feeling an odd sensation on my face. Reaching up I touch the spot on my face and find that there is a drop of moisture. As soon as I touch the drop, I feel it ooze out from under my finger, causing the odd sticky sensation to spread on my face.

Then pulling my finger away I look and see that there is a drop of thick dark red liquid on my finger. Chuckle. I laugh. Honestly, I don't know why I laugh at the sight of what is obviously the splatter of goblin blood on my face, but I can't help but find it odd. I'm probably going mad. In fact, I know for a fact that if anyone saw my current reaction to the scene that just unfolded, they would think I was mad.

Going from Annie Oakley with the forbidden magic death shots, to suddenly being freaked out by the sight of blood from the objects I just hit would cause anyone to think that I had something unhinged. Love this novel? Read it on Royal Road to ensure the author gets credit. Well, the fact that I apparently just killed in cold blood three goblins, who were investigating a light source in the middle of their woods, might be enough to think that I was unhinged from the start.

Pausing for a moment I find myself looking down at the nearest goblin and am shocked to see just how real they look. Thick mangy black hair covering most of their bodies, but at least have the decency to wear scraps of woven leather together to preserve their modesty. Looking closely, I can take in the intricate details of their work, they use buttons. Crude stone and bone buttons, but buttons nonetheless. Then there are their hands that look like they have long fingernails that could almost be claws but aren't.

Moving close to the one, I see that there is a sharp metal object that resembles a crude knife. Tentatively, I reach out a finger to touch the blade and am somewhat surprised at how cold the metal blade feels. Again, everything about this playthrough seems so real. Every detail is intricate. Even the dry patches of forest floor that don't actually have any foliage on them, almost like these were real trees that prevented other plants from growing in their chosen spots. Blinking.

I realize tears are falling down my face as I suddenly realize a few things. First, I realize that if this is a game then it has gotten far too real for my comfort. Standing up straight, I get to the customary position and then state the known command.

"Logout," Nothing.

"Reboot," Still nothing.

"Emergency release," Fwooo. Almost as if hearing the fear in my voice a cool breeze chooses that moment to blow through, sending a chill down my spine as I realize just how threadbare my clothes are. In the game, I could expect these clothes to last me until I got a change. However, I don't think that will happen with these, as I feel like I am almost wearing less than my normal nighttime ware would afford me back home. Then the thought hits me, that this isn't home. Or maybe it is? I don't know. Spinning.

I find myself crashing down to the ground as I let my mind process everything. It is one thing to have a simple character introduction screen, and perfect character creation, as that is the fun part. This part however is different, I can't log out. Worse, I can't see system messages letting me know that I am increasing in my different attributes, affinities, and skills. Then I realize something.

"Maybe they put in the hard mode patch. You know the one where accomplishments and rewards aren't applied until after you make it out of a scenario and are able to rest safely?" I pose to myself.

"System," Nothing.

"Yeah, hard mode settings. No indication of where I am, what I am doing, or how much further I have until I get an objective update," I say as I go through the most logical string of events." Yeah," I say, my voice trembling slightly as I don't quite believe this, but I really want to believe this. Though to be fair, everything about this world is just as I remember, so the odds that this isn't me somehow playing in an enhanced version of the virtual world I love is rather odd.

Though, now that I think about it, I am sort of missing my thoughts and memories from my real life. However, this could be part of the thought suppression of the immersion pods. Right, because thought suppression is totally a thing that exists and is not something I just came up with on my own just now.

"Okay, it's official, I am going crazy as I am now arguing with myself and I do believe I am losing," I state, shaking my head and once again going over to the goblin. There is a pool of dark black blood, similar to the spatter I found on my face that is pooling out and fortunately running slightly downhill away from both me and the rest of the body. Trembling. Reaching a tentative hand forward, I take the knife, along with its tiny scabbard.

Looking at the scabbard it is clearly made for skinny creatures, but that is fine. I can either find another leather strap that I can tie to this one or make a long enough strap that I won't need this arm strap at all. Still, I do sling the blade over my arm, and search for more things. Squish. Okay, I search until I feel the body slightly deflate at my touch and decide the one knife was enough. With that I go over to the other bodies to see that they too have tools.

One has a sickle type device likely used for harvesting some of the different plants, along with a pouch filled with already plucked items. I take the pouch, but not the sickle as the goblin had apparently been carrying that when he died. I hope it's he, well no, I don't know what I hope actually. But there is clearly blood on the sickle and I don't want to get more goblin blood on me at night.

I am not certain how hard it would be to remove goblin blood from my hands, but I am fairly certain that one harsh scrubbing would be enough to rip these clothes apart. With that, I go onto the third goblin, take one look at the fact that this one is covered in both their blood and the blood of goblin number two, and decide I am done collecting items for the time being. So far, I have a medicinal arm pouch. A crude knife with a similar arm sling and I am calling it a night. Exhale.

As I walk away, this time aided by the bright light of my unused skill crystal, I keep walking in what I think is a straight line, though I might have gotten slightly sidetracked by a degree or two while trying to loot the goblin corpses. While I walk, I give myself the pep talk.

"Come on, Lau—" I begin but then realize my name.

"—Karen. You can do this. Also, stop forgetting your own name," Only after about an hour does something hit me. Well, the tip of the blade has been tapping me slightly this entire time. But what really hits me is that my speed and multi-casting skills transferred over to this new game? Life? Something? Chuckle. I'm laughing, though it is the insanely tense nervous laughter that you either do or are forced to do to not let your mind crack under pressure.

With nothing but my thoughts and my crystal to guide me I walk. I walk until the forest floor starts giving way to moss covered fields. For some reason I feel drawn to come this way, when I realize why I am going this direction at all. My mind secretly finds the telltale markers of the path, though the actual path I need to take is far more spread out, I do find the markers.

Mentally my mind states that the reason why the known markers are so spread out is that it is nighttime and all the markers must naturally appear to be at different distances from each other. Yet they are all here, the curved stone that has a slanted check mark. The bare tree that has the one branch that looks like a hand pointing in the exact opposite direction of where I need to go.

There are so many tiny markers that I memorized as part of my navigation method for the game that I can't help but follow them now and continue following them until finally I reach the giant rock wall that shoots up vertically into the air, seemingly from out of nowhere. Pausing, I stand here in awe, watching and waiting as the morning rays of the sun finally start to poke their heads over the forest canopy, where they reveal the sight before me.

It takes a few minutes, as I can only see the faint signs of the entrance once the sun is finally up and glowing. Exhale. Seeing the crevasse just as I had hundreds of times, it still never got any less beautiful. This was the first site of the ancients, and the one that the party needed to enter first in order to begin the discovery of the Ancient questline.

A questline that was ultimately unnecessary to the primary quest of the story, but one that both fascinated players and people who loved the mythos of the world in general. Badump, badump, badump. Perhaps it is the amount of stress I have been in for the past twelve hours or so. Or perhaps it is the fact that I went from awakening, to killing a mini boss monster, to fleeing for my life. Though to be honest there wasn't much fleeing and mostly just walking.

Which I should have pains from, but I cast my beginner's Combat Support spell, Regeneration, making it so all damage I felt would be healed over time. Well, it was the Perfect Regeneration, but that didn't mean much to the world as it was apparently done giving free handouts. That said, now a few things make so much more sense. In the game, or rather in the actual game arcs, it took forever to find this place.

Not until you had the personal quest to deliver a message to Karen's home, well my old home now, did this place even become an option to visit. Now seeing it, and realizing it was close, well within a few kilometers of my home village that I now understand why it took so long to get here. Yet also it's placement also makes sense as my bloodline lets me enter these places.

"Wow," Is all I can manage to say, as I realize this nugget of fan lore will be worth so much to readers that I can't wait to post it, assuming someone hasn't already made the connection and I just missed that forum thread somehow. Regardless, this is my first chance to improve. As I begin walking towards the entrance of the lower-level dungeon of the Ancients, I pause and realize that the crystal I am holding almost seems dull in comparison to the incoming rays of the sun.

Pausing for a moment I look at the crystal, and then nodding to myself I decide to consume the crystal. Ants crawling. There is an odd sensation as if ants are crawling under my scalp. I feel them, crawling, biting, and pinching, as reptilian flashes and images of being able to hide come to my mind. Then there seems to be the transition of an art where just by staying still and becoming one with the environment I can hide from others.

For a long moment I feel like I too can do this, blend in with the environment completely. After a moment, the image slowly starts to fade, yet I can still feel the traces of the giant serpent and its will to hide in plain sight. Then finally the tingling crawling sensation in my mind stops as I realize the crystal is gone. Pausing for a moment I wonder if I am going to get a system message from this, but once again there is nothing.

No warning, no statement of my progressions thus far, just me staring off into space, before I finally decide to move forward to the entrance. While I intended to consume the crystal from the start, as I don't want to carry around such an expensive item. Being here made it so that keeping the crystal is not only unnecessary, but ultimately a risk to being robbed.

The reason is that behind these doors laid an examination and casting room where I can gain level two access to Ancient dungeons, which I can then use to get the next stage of access, to find the first of five Ancient spells. After which I can take said knowledge of those Ancient spells and cast them here. After which I can slowly unlock proficiency ratings which can increase my overall status with the Ancients, a fact that can be presented in my eyes and ultimately give me the ability to see in the dark.

At least that is what can happen with the mid-tier silver eyes. Since I know all the spells and was fairly certain I can cast them, I can cheat my way through here and go straight to silver eyes. Which is the highest level of clearance I can get on this—the east side of the Great Divide River. The exact center of the Great Divide River is of course the Magical University that links both major continents of the world together.

Due to the different difficulties and terrain types, the lush eastern continent is often considered the noob playground. While the harsher desert terrain of the western continent is considered the harder zone, at least it is desert regions until you pas the great mountain range that seems to stop all clouds from being able to enter the great desert regions. It is in these great desert regions that the greatest treasures of the ancient civilizations can be found, but that was a ways off. Trembling slightly.

I feel a sudden surge of joy and excitement at the idea that as Karen of the Ancients, carrying out an individual mission that is independent of any courtly politics, I might be able to find even more Ancient tombs and research facilities that can yield even more knowledge of the world, and most importantly show even more spells and abilities to me that I can then learn to use and finally gain the vaunted top level clearance of the Ancients.

Of course, these were all just pipe dreams at the moment, but still, they were dreams nonetheless. Almost trembling with excitement, I take my first step forward, then another as I approach the entrance to the temple of the ancients. Then I freeze as I feel a stream of energy pulse deep within me. Then pausing for a moment, I assume everything is okay, where I take a step forward, only to be stopped by the movement of one of the giant mechanical statues.

"Halt intruder," The machine lets out in the language of the ancients. Hearing the language being spoke I pause for a moment, before my body reacts on impulse. <UNKNOWN> Bolt. BOOM! The blast lands with a deafening clang. I pause hoping that was enough. Either it was powerful enough to stop the guardian, or it proved my proficiency with the ancient form of magic to let me pass. That was the intention; however, what happened next was entirely non-scripted.

"Hostile intruder detected, activating elimination features," And like that, I realize I might have miscalculated my situation.