Chapter 5

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Chapter 5: Masters and Disciple
 
 
Era stared intensely at an item displayed behind the glass window of a clothing store. He had been walking home from work when the bright green item caught his eye.

“Too similar, it looks too similar…”

Era was looking at a bright green wallet in the shape of a frog. Both the color and the twinkling eyes contained a very strong resemblance to his new frog familiar Keki.

Keki was a very energetic and hyperactive frog. He spent all his time hopping around Era’s game character. The only time Keki stayed still was when he was tired. At that moment, Keki would perform a very high hop and land directly on Era’s head. That was his favorite resting spot.

“No worries Boss. I’ll be your lookout. Your eyes from up top.”

Keki had very childish excuses, but that simply emphasized his young age. Keki was barely over a year old.

Sadly due to Keki’s young age and small stature, Era discovered that his familiar wasn’t capable of attacking other monsters. The tiny frog was abnormally weak. However, he wasn’t a useless summon.

Keki wasn’t able to attack nor was he able to defend, but he did have one very unique skill. Keki could deposit any item he swallowed directly into Era’s item bag. He was essentially an automatic item collection pet that was frequently found in other games.

The wallet held a very strong resemblance to Keki. It wasn’t just the appearance. It was the fact that it was a wallet that stored cards and money inside of its mouth.

After a short period of internal debate, Era decided to purchase the wallet.

He never found a use for these expensive money carriers before, but that was before he had a job. Previously, it was enough to simply stuff bills into his pockets. However, he had a job now. Although he didn’t have high earnings, it was enough to consider using a wallet. He didn’t enjoy the unpleasant looks from cashiers each time he dug through his pockets for money.

Era had decided to buy a wallet since a few weeks ago, but had yet to purchase one. Procrastination was one of his greatest sins and it was near impossible to change.

The froggy wallet was a bit out of his budget, but he still decided to purchase it. Its strong likeness to Keki was a very big deciding factor. Era had grown to enjoy Keki’s company.

Era wasn’t used to conversations. He didn’t have friends, so his chances to converse with others were very limited. Even with Vulcan and Atlas, his conversations were both short and quick. He didn’t know what to talk about and didn’t know how to keep a conversation going.

On the other hand, Keki loved to talk. It wouldn’t be an understatement to say that Keki spent nearly every free moment talking.

Originally, Era wasn’t used to having someone to talk to. He was friends with Atlas, but even their conversations were limited. Atlas had her own group of friends and couldn’t spare every second for Era. Keki was different. Era was the only company he had.

Although Era didn’t talk much, it wasn’t because he disliked talking. He just wasn’t used to it. Years of being quiet had made him a bit socially awkward to others. But that wasn’t how he wanted himself to be. In class, he would often daydream about being brave enough to talk to his classmates. He wanted to astound them with his words and be a part of their group.

But this never happened. He tried once, but it didn’t end like what he imagined. That day, Era built up courage and walked towards a group of classmates. He listened in on their conversation and suddenly spoke up.

If he was the protagonist of a TV series or a movie, then he would be met with astounded faces and respectful eyes. After all, he said something very entertaining. But reality didn’t work that way.

Era was met with blank stares and complete silence. His peers didn’t understand him. His words killed the chat and caused a very uncomfortable silence. Era still remembered the condemning looks on their faces and remembered how he stood there like an idiot. It was a near traumatizing experience.

But he didn’t hate them for that. He knew how awkward it might have been for them to have a stranger join in to their conversation. It was always a silent wish of his to be able to chat like normal people.

Era had quickly grown use to the noisy chatter from his frog. He became accustomed to having someone talk to him and openly welcomed it.

He wouldn’t admit it, but his reason for spending five mana per minute to keep Keki summoned was mainly for his company. Although Keki’s item pickup ability was extremely fast and helpful, Era appreciated his company even more.

“Too bad this is the real world. Keki would have loved this wallet.”

Era continued to walk home and saw a delivery truck stop in front of the newly constructed house next to his home. It appears that he’ll be having new neighbors soon.

 

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“Assassin’s Eye!”

“Backstab!”

Ace quickly teleported to the back of the sword-wielding goblin and landed a heavy punch to its neck. He immediately retreated a few steps backwards, but it wasn’t enough to escape the goblin’s spinning counterattack.

Ace grimaced as he felt his health drop a considerable amount from the sword slash. He kept forgetting to guard himself. He was too slow to guard each time due to a phantom fear of using his bare hands to block an attack from a sharp sword. The game’s graphics were simply too real.

Ace threw a quick punch and then used another backstab to kill the goblin.

‘These monsters are getting stronger and stronger.’

For the past two days, Ace had no trouble fighting against the monsters on the road to Chroma City. The monsters either had low defense or a low attack. Simply put, the monsters were low in level. He was able to increase his Unarmed Combat Mastery skill to beginner rank level 8 and his Guard to beginner rank level 7. Along the way, Ace had also gotten more used to using his skills and the majority of his class skills were at least level 2 or 3. He had zero trouble fighting the increasingly strong monsters for two days.

However, the area he was in contained monsters at level 45. Ace had a strong class and had little trouble fighting monsters at level 20s and early 30s, but the gap between him and a level 45 monster was still too large. He lacked equipment and would suffer over 30% damage from each hit. He was also expending a great deal of mana by constantly using backstab and other skills. There was no way he could survive the travel to Chroma City.

Ace didn’t want to die. Death didn’t just mean a drop of a level or a drop of an item. Ace wasn’t worried about that. He had gained three levels during these two days and he knew how fast experience points would accumulate for players of his level. Ace could care less about the direct negative effects of dying. What he worried the most was his reviving location.

Each and every town or city contained a graveyard that served as the revive point for players who had their health reach zero. Theoretically, graveyard revive points weren’t restricted to being located inside a city, but could also be found among other places such as distant training areas. Ace’s greatest fear from dying was that his last selected revive point was still in Yale Village. If he died, he would revive back in Yale Village and waste an additional two days of traveling. Ace began to regret not stopping by Gremlin City. At the very least, he could set that city as his new revive point.

‘I guess its finally time to use Vulcan’s Cold Steel Greatsword…’

Vulcan had explained Fantasy Edge’s equipment system to Ace. The game’s heavy emphasis on realism threw out the traditional equipment prohibition system of past games. In other games, equipment items would often have a requirement level or stat. Players wouldn’t be able to equip the item if their level or stats didn’t reach the required amount. However, the creator of Fantasy Edge thought that this was an extremely illogical system.

Fantasy Edge offered a more free version of the equipment system. Equipment might still have a requirement for a specific level or stat, but players wouldn’t be forbidden from equipping them. This meant that a level 1 player would be able to equip equipment meant for level 100 players. However, the player would have an Equipment Penalty Status Effect until they are able to meet the requirements or until they unequip the item.

The Equipment Penalty Status Effect would harshly decrease the power granted by the equipment based on the calculated difference between the player’s current level and the item’s required level. In Ace’s case, the Cold Steel Greatsword’s attack power dropped by around 75%. However, it was still his strongest weapon and the best choice for offensive attacks.

A normal player would have immediately equipped the weapon due to its higher damage, but Ace chose not to. He delayed equipping it as long as he could, not because he was stupid, but because Vulcan didn’t tell him a very important aspect of the equipment system.

Ace discovered why the sword had a strength requirement of 1000. He had previously attempted to use it, but quickly discovered that the large oversized blade was unbelievably heavy. Ace was barely able to swing the sword. He realized that both his attack speed and movement speed received a heavy penalty while carrying the huge weapon.

The weak monsters in the beginning of the journey didn’t require him to sacrifice so much of his ability for a higher attack, after all they were weak enough for him to kill with either his fists or the light dagger.

Ace decided to forsake the tiny boost of damage from the dagger and attack solely with his fists. He wanted to increase the levels of his Unarmed Combat Mastery skill because each level up would grant him bonus stats for strength, agility, dexterity, and constitution. His decision proved to be very well made, since he gained two levels in that skill and received a permanent boost in his stats. Sadly, he discovered that the skill’s mastery speed had decreased by an unbelievable amount without Vulcan’s guidance.

Ace equipped the Cold Steel Greatsword and instantly felt the overbearing weight of the large grey sword. It was impossible to hold with one hand.

Keki hopped onto the flat blade of the sword and gave Ace a concerned look.

“Boss, you ok? Need any help?”

“H-hop off. D-don’t add to the weight!”

Ace loved how Keki was worried about him, but he hated Keki’s lack of common sense.

Thus, Ace began to drag the sword along the earthy ground and continued his travel to Chroma City.

 

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“It’s that man again.”

During his three days of travel from Yale Village to Chroma City, Ace had frequently bumped into a lone swordsman. The swordsman was a level 172 player named Lycan. Ace didn’t dare to walk too close to him. Lycan had a very menacing appearance and it wouldn’t be a surprise to say that Lycan reminded Ace of a very deadly lone wolf. Each time Lycan showed up, Ace would purposely walk slower.

However, Ace didn’t understand why he kept seeing Lycan. It was obvious that Lycan would travel faster than him since he didn’t passively attract monsters nor did he have a tough time killing monsters. Lycan easily disappeared into the distance every time he showed up from behind Ace.

Ace noticed that Lycan made very frequent rest stops. He would constantly pass by Lycan meditating at a safe campfire site. Lycan was a very confusing man.

Ace had slowly grown accustomed to using his two-handed sword. Although he couldn’t swing it quickly, he was able to deal horizontal sweeping blows. The weight of the sword dealt a very high amount of damage to monsters. Ace stopped using Assassin’s Eye and Backstab due to the maneuverability complications of the heavy sword, but he increased his use of the Guard skill. The sword’s large size made it very easy to duck behind.

Ace smashed up another goblin and watched Keki shoot out his tongue to swallow the dropped items.
 

You have obtained a new skill: Sword Mastery

 

Sword Mastery	Passive Skill Beginner 0/10
The most valuable skill for all swordsman. Due to your understanding of the uses of a sword, you will no longer have any delays after attacking with a sword. 10% attack bonus when attacking with a sword.
Each skill level up grants: +3% to skill attack power +1% to skill attack speed +2 Strength +2 Agility +2 Dexterity

 
 
Sword Mastery! Ace had started to wonder why he still didn’t receive the Sword Mastery skill after a full day’s use of the greatsword. After all, he received the Unarmed Combat Mastery skill very quickly. His only explanation was that his earlier attempts at using the sword wasn’t proficient enough to grant him the skill.
 

Strength +1

 
 
Ace smiled some more when he saw the notification. Shortly after he began using the greatsword, Ace had discovered a hidden benefit for using a weapon below the required stats. The sword was heavy because his strength wasn’t high enough, but he discovered that using such a heavy sword was essentially a weight training exercise. He was able to gain bonus stats to his strength and occasionally to his constitution and endurance. Currently, he had already gained two strength stats and one for both constitution and endurance. This hidden benefit was definitely the motivating reason for why Ace had stopped all complaints about Vulcan’s inappropriate gift.

“Boss! Duck!”

Ace widened his eyes in surprise when he heard Keki’s panicking voice above his head and immediately dropped down to a lower posture.

He felt a hot wind and saw a fireball pass through where his head had been. If it wasn’t for Keki’s warning, he would have took a considerable amount of damage!

Ace looked back and saw two players gesturing at him. They didn’t hold any goodwill.

Ace quickly inspected both players and felt his heart skip a beat in fear. Originally, when he saw the fireball, he had suspected that the attack came from Flares. But it didn’t. Instead the attack came from a level 113 magician. Next to him was a level 117 shield-wielding warrior. The Inspect Player command didn’t reveal a player’s class, but Ace was able to guess that the level 117 player was most likely a knight. But what scared Ace wasn’t simply the high levels of both players, but the additional information revealed by the inspection. Both players carried the word Immortals under their name.

Those two players were members of the Immortals guild. Due to the amount of weeks that passed, Ace had already forgotten that a player named TrueAce had previously announced that he would send his guild after him. Ace thought that it was simply an empty threat. After all, he didn’t receive any attacks for weeks. However, TrueAce was serious.

“Keki!”

Ace gave his familiar a quick glance and nodded his head towards his sword. Keki proved his worth as he instantly knew what Ace wanted. Keki shot his tongue out at the Cold Steel Greatsword and swallowed the blade. Ace had thought of this plan on a whim, since it would take too long to unequip his weapon and deposit it into his item bag. He didn’t know if his idea would work and couldn’t help but be surprised at Keki’s ability to swallow such a monstrously large item. It was at least twenty times his size.

Only a few seconds had passed since he first avoided the fireball and identified the players, but Ace knew what to do from his years of being bullied. He ran for his life.

In a game of numbers, he held no chance against opponents that were almost four times higher level than him. The lack of equipment wasn’t a very reassuring factor either.

Ace casted Haste on himself and ran as fast as he could. He knew the players were chasing after him. Keki sat backwards on Ace’s head and diligently observed their pursuers. Ace was able to dodge the magical ranged attacks from the magician thanks to the verbal warnings from his familiar.

Ace ran for a few more minutes before Keki confirmed that they had successfully escaped. Ace used the Body Swap Technique to switch places with a leaf on a nearby tree. His running had attracted a small amount of monsters to also chase after him.

Ace equipped his sword and used backstab on an enemy below him. He couldn’t risk jumping down onto a mob of monsters. At least, he couldn’t risk doing it with a heavy sword. He was too prone to accidents.

Ace used a small amount of health and mana potions to quickly kill all the monsters. This wasn’t a situation that he could afford to be conservative.
 

You have been inflicted with the Hunger status.

 
 
Ace quickly checked his satiety level and confirmed that it had dropped below a safe amount. It had definitely been awhile since he last ate a meal.

Keki jumped up onto a tree and navigated Ace to a nearby campsite. Campsites were normally void of monsters, but occasionally very strong monsters would still be able to enter. Luckily, Ace had discovered that his Monster Magnet skill didn’t appear to work while he was inside a campsite. That skill was definitely too much of a curse.

Ace opened his item bag and took out a few pieces of Rye Bread. These were the cheapest food items that he could purchase in Yale Village and was a necessity for his travel. It was too dangerous to fight the monsters in this area with a reduced amount of stats from the Hunger status.

Before leaving the village, Ace had spent a few gold coins to buy a large quantity of rye bread. There was enough to last him for at least a few weeks.

Honestly, Ace didn’t need to buy food items because he had the Cooking skill. He could always cook his own food items to restore his satiety levels. Sadly, Ace made a very distressful discovery when he tried to use the Cooking skill.

The Cooking skill involved a beautiful set of cooking equipment that was given by the NPC at the Sealed Ninja Village. It wasn’t an understatement to say that the small set of cooking equipment was enough to aid him in cooking any meal. However, the problem lied in the fact that there was no instructions to cooking.

Ace didn’t know how to cook. He tried to cook a few dishes using the cooking ingredients from his questing rewards, but he failed miserably at producing a tasty dish. No, it was more accurate to say that he failed to produce an edible dish. The few dishes that he tried to cook wasn’t considered successful enough to level up his Cooking skill once. It was still at level 0. His Cookbook also refused to add his overly burnt dishes to its catalog.

Ace decided to give up on the Cooking skill for now. The intelligence bonus he would receive from leveling the skill was very attractive, but he didn’t want to waste cooking materials for nothing. After all, he had a limited stock of them.

“Boss! Run!!”

Keki swallowed up the sword again without needing Ace’s instructions and jumped onto him. Ace had barely finished eating his bread before the two from the Immortals Guild found him.  He had no choice but to run once again.

“Haste.”

However, Ace discovered that his mana didn’t recover fast enough during his eating session. His mana didn’t recover to 100 yet. It wasn’t possible to use haste and it wasn’t possible to pull out a mana potion to drink while avoiding the attacks from behind.

There was nothing Ace could do but continue to run. His only saving grace was that his agility was considered high. At least it was definitely higher than the magician and knight. Very few players with those classes would invest stat points in agility. Ace was also very lucky he had undergone Vulcan’s jogging sessions. If he hadn’t, there was no way he could have ran for so long without stopping.

Ace ran for a few more minutes before he spotted Lycan in front of him once more. He was slightly hesitant since he held a slight fear towards such a high leveled player, but he had passed Lycan a few times without any danger. It should be safe to assume that he didn’t have any need to worry about Lycan’s intimidating appearance.

“Help! Please Help!”

Ace ran towards Lycan and quickly yelled for help. He didn’t know how Lycan would react to the three of them, but he had no choice. Ace didn’t know how much longer he could run from his pursuers. At the very least, he felt that if Lycan was annoyed enough to kill him, he might also kill the other two too.

However, Ace was happily surprised to see Lycan gave him a reassuring glance. In one swift move, Lycan leapt back a considerable amount of distance and swung his sword as he turned in midair. The timing and coordination was excellent. The sword landed directly on the magician’s neck and he died with a single attack. Ace didn’t know how Lycan had managed to land that blow, since he had never glanced backwards at the two men. Ace was dumbfounded by Lycan’s brilliant move.

The knight looked surprised to see his partner die, but he reacted fast enough to lift his shield to block Lycan’s next blow. However, Lycan wasn’t fazed by the defensive action and moved his feet to glide into the knight’s blind spot. The large shield blocked the knight from seeing his left side and gave Lycan the perfect opportunity to stab his sword into a critical spot. The knight also died with one attack.

An expert. Lycan was a true expert. In the span of a few short breaths, Lycan had killed both players. Ace was mesmerized by the scene. He knew Lycan’s victory wasn’t simply because of his advantage in levels. He didn’t know how to explain his reasoning, but he had a very strong intuition that Lycan’s victory was something based on an entirely different level. At the very least, Lycan was a player who knew the truth about the critical hit system. After all, both killing blows were critical hits.

“Why were they chasing you?”

Ace couldn’t help but stare speechlessly at Lycan. He didn’t expect that Lycan was the type of person who would strike first and ask later.

However, he quickly came back to his senses and told Lycan about the entire TrueAce and Ace issue. There was no reason to hold back any details since the forum post was already public knowledge.

Lycan’s brows furrowed in disgust at the end of Ace’s retelling. Lycan was a man who didn’t bother talking too much, but Ace could easily tell that Lycan didn’t hold much regard for the bullies in his story.

Lycan looked at Ace with his deep cold eyes. Ace couldn’t help but unintentionally shiver. He had never seen a stare that carried such an intense feeling of unease. He couldn’t tell why he was scared, after all the eyes weren’t emotionless or wicked. Rather, it was penetrating and profound. Ace didn’t know why he felt that way. It was too unscientific to have such feelings when looking at someone’s eyes.

But was this true? No, it wasn’t.

Ace was simply too inexperienced with the world. He didn’t know that the eyes he was looking at belonged to a warrior who had been through many life-threatening battles. They was a pair of battle-hardened eyes. Naturally it was capable of instilling fear into people who had never seen blood being shed.

“You’re the boy with the large two-handed blade?”

Ace nodded at the unexpected question.

“Why did you choose to use that weapon?”

“The damage was really high…”

Lycan shook his head in disgust.

“A disgrace to the sword.”

With a simple line, Lycan ended the conversation and resumed his travel. Ace stood there for a few seconds without knowing what to say. He had no idea why Lycan said what he said. It was true that Ace’s handling of the sword was inadequate. After all, his Sword Mastery had refused to go past level 1. However, he didn’t understand why Lycan was so harsh to him for it. A disgrace to the sword?

“Wait, Lycan.”

Ace ran up to Lycan and fearlessly spoke up to him. He had subconsciously decided that Lycan was non-hostile and posed no threat to his life. In a sense, Lycan was similar to a more unsympathetic version of Vulcan.

Lycan paused and stared at Ace. His expression clearly told Ace to hurry and speak.

“How am I a disgrace?”

“An amateur that blindly swings a sword without any understanding of the weapon he holds. Is that not a disgrace?”

Ace frowned at Lycan’s explanations. The man spoke in a very roundabout manner and personified a weapon. Honestly, Ace didn’t understand. He had seen action movies where swordmasters spoke similar lines, but that was movies. This was reality. However, there was no reason to question Lycan’s speaking habits. After all, Ace felt that Lycan truly had powerful sword skills.

“Can you teach me? Teach me what you just did?”

“I do not take students.”

“Why not? Don’t people like you want to pass down your skills?”

Ace didn’t understand because the only other expert he knew was Vulcan and Vulcan was very desperate to find students. He had also read many advertisements of dojos that  frantically searched for more students.

“Kids these days lack dedication. Teaching you… it is a fruitless task.”

Ace quickly denounced this claim. He knew he had countless bad habits, but he also knew he had to change them. He believed that the only quality he didn’t lack right now was dedication. After all, didn’t he persist through Vulcan’s three weeks of training?

“A bullied kid seeking to change his life? You are not the first nor will you be the last.”

“I have dedication! I met a martial arts master in this game and I went through three weeks of his training without stopping. He also told me I was his best disciple.”

“Three weeks of training?”

Lycan began to laugh.

“A simple three weeks of training? The way of the sword is a neverending path. Did you expect to learn everything in a mere three weeks of training?”

“If that’s the extent of your dedication, then I fail to see how you are any different. My disciple needs to be one who will forever follow the way of the sword. A disciple for a day, a disciple for life. Go back to your martial arts master. For kids like you… that type of training is enough.”

“How can I prove myself to you?”

Ace didn’t know what else to say. The summary of his life and his past few weeks of toiling workouts failed to convince Lycan to accept him. He didn’t think about the consequences of what Lycan meant when he said that his disciple must follow the sword for life. He just knew that at this moment, Lycan possessed a strength that was beyond any he had ever seen.

“Where is your destination?”

“Chroma City?”

“There is still around four to five days before we reach there. If you can pass the probationary training that I give you, then I’ll consider it. If you fail, never ask me again.”

Even Lycan didn’t know why he decided to give a chance to Ace. He saw only the slightest trace of dedication in Ace’s eyes. It wasn’t enough to warrant his favor. In Ace, he saw a weak and timid young man. Someone who was scared, but trying too hard to pretend that he wasn’t scared. He was the type of man that Lycan could find anywhere. A dime for a dozen.

Yet, Lycan gave him a chance. It was unclear why, but it wasn’t impossible that Lycan had secretly wanted a disciple. Perhaps somewhere deep inside his closed-off heart,  Lycan also possessed the desire to train a student.

 

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Lycan was a strange man. In age, he was around the same age as Vulcan, but the two couldn’t be more different in personality. Where Vulcan was warm and friendly, Lycan was cold and silent. Vulcan focused on physical training, whereas Lycan focused on a more spiritual type of training.

Ace realized this when he finally understood the reason for Lycan’s constant need to rest at every campfire. Originally, Ace was baffled by that mystery. After all, Lycan was a high level player who didn’t have trouble fighting monsters in the area. There was no reason for him to rest so much. However Ace now realized that Lycan didn’t stop to rest, but that he stopped to train.

Meditation. It was a concept that Ace was vaguely aware of. He knew it was practiced by a great amount of people, but he never understood why it was helpful. It wasn’t wrong to assume that he had tried to meditate before, but had failed miserably. Lycan would meditate at each campsite and use that time to delve into the secrets of swordsmanship. Lycan described it as understanding the true path of the sword. The meditation sessions were sometimes long, but also sometimes short. There was no set duration for how long Lycan meditated, but the satisfied smile on his face after each session revealed that Lycan was close to a breakthrough.

Since it was only a few short days of training, Lycan didn’t bother to make Ace practice any physical exercises. He stated that Ace’s other master had already fulfilled that aspect of basic training.

Instead, Lycan trained Ace through battles. He would personally fight against Ace and instruct Ace when he fought against monsters. It was correct to assume that Ace didn’t have a moment to rest when fighting monsters. He had been on the verge of death countless times.

Ace couldn’t fight with the Cold Steel Greatsword. Lycan laughed at Ace’s stat bonus reasoning and disregarded its usefulness. Lycan had forbidden Ace from using that sword until he was capable of using it properly. Disrespecting the sword was a taboo in front of Lycan.

Luckily, Keki was quick to point out that he had swallowed up a sword a while ago. Ace didn’t have time to go through his item bag during these past few days, so he wasn’t aware of what equipment he had. But Keki knew each and every item he swallowed into his stomach. It was an innate talent.
 

Longsword	Common One-handed Sword
Attack: 10-13 Durability: 30
A common longsword. Nothing special.

 
 
It was pathetically weaker than the heavier greatsword, but it was much lighter. Ace was able to use it comfortably.

“The other guy only taught you how to guard?”

Ace could tell that Lycan didn’t hold much regard for his other master, Vulcan. It was obvious that Lycan thought Vulcan was an inadequate martial-arts master.

Under Lycan’s tutelage, Ace learned two skills that Lycan regarded as the necessities of combat.
 

You have obtained a new skill: Parry

 

Parry	Active Skill Beginner 0/10
Skilled experts understand that the secret to surviving battles is to understand when to guard and when to parry. Never guard when you can parry, always guard when you can’t parry. A successful parry will reduce 100% of damage and give you a 10% increase to damage if you attack within 1 second. You will take full damage if a parry is unsuccessful.
Each skill level up grants: +1% damage increase +2 Agility +2 Wisdom

 

You have obtained a new skill: Counter

 

Counter	Active Skill Beginner 0/10
The difference between a common warrior and an expert lies in knowing not just how to attack, but when to attack. A successful counterattack after a successful guard or parry will deal 110% of damage. An unsuccessful counterattack might leave you in a vulnerable state.
Each skill level up grants: +1% damage increase +2 Dexterity +2 Intelligence

 
 
Guard, parry, and counter. Those three skills were the most highly regarded skills for Lycan. He stated that true masters of ancient times were capable of being unparalleled experts simply by mastering the use of those three skills.

Ace had originally started to notice something strange about the skill system. Previously, he had noticed that Guard wouldn’t activate even if he yelled out Guard, unless he was already in a protective stance. He noticed that Guard never moved his arms for him. Rather, it only helped reduce the damage using his own defensive capabilities.

Lycan confirmed Ace’s suspicions and gave a short explanation of how skills worked in Fantasy Edge. Skills like Guard, Parry, and Counter didn’t activate just by manually calling the name. Instead, they activated through the player’s actions. It wasn’t necessary to speak the name of the skill, rather it was more important to perform the proper movements.

Lifting the arms and clenching the muscles tightly is enough to activate the Guard skill.

Redirecting an enemy’s attack to completely dodge all damage was the key to activating the Parry skill.

Attacking immediately after guarding or parrying was the way to activating the Counter skill.

This was a very new system of the skill system that was only possible for a true VR game like Fantasy Edge.

“Attack that group of wolves over there. The group of five.”

Lycan wasn’t soft in his training and would often go to the extreme with his instructions. They were very near Chroma City now and were in an area with wolves around level 50. Unlike Vulcan, who made Ace fight monsters one at a time, Lycan forced him to fight a whole pack. Lycan also didn’t choose to have Ace fight against the more common group of three wolves and instead preferred the larger amount of five. Ace couldn’t help but wonder if Lycan was out to kill him.

“Assassin’s Eye.”

Originally, Lycan had forbidden Ace from using any combat skills besides Guard, Parry, and Counter. He also wasn’t allowed to use non-combat skills like Haste or Shadow Cloak. They were only false boosts to his strength and wouldn’t help convince Lycan of Ace’s worth.

However, Assassin’s Eye was the sole exception. Lycan had happily allowed him to use that skill. After all, it was a skill that only allowed him to view the weak points of monsters. To Lycan, this was an essential skill. In combat, fighters would seek to exploit the openings of the opponent while expertly guarding their own.

Lycan told Ace to start memorizing the weak points that the Assassin’s Eye showed. He wanted Ace to be able to ingrain the ability to notice weak points even without the skill’s activation.

Ace quickly ran up to the wolves and proceeded to slash the closest monster. He had to constantly keep his legs moving to avoid attacks. Lycan had immediately pointed out that one of Ace’s original combat flaws was standing still while fighting. Lycan was quick in forcing Ace to drop that habit.

Ace brought up his sword and guarded from the pounce of a wolf to his side. Immediately afterwards, he counterattacked with a quick slash at the wolf’s upper back. He had missed the critical spot.

Ace stumbled forward when he felt an attack ram him from behind. The attack pushed him into the middle of the wolf pack. This was a very dire situation. There was nothing more dangerous than being surrounded by monsters from every direction.

“Stop thinking. Find the weakest link and force yourself through!”

Lycan’s instructions were clear and direct. Ace dodged the attacks from behind him,  while he guarded the attacks from in front. He quickly found the wolf he had previously damaged and rushed to attack it. A quick chop followed by a horizontal cut opened up a gap for him to escape.

“Good. Now… kill!”

Ace stabbed his sword straight into the wolf’s neck and pierced through its flesh. One down, four to go.

The four wolves instantly changed their formation after losing one of their members and chose to attack all at once. Ace was surprised by the unexpected full-scale attack and attempted a horizontal slash. He hoped to be able to cut through each wolf, but he overestimated his ability. His sword stopped after cutting the leftmost wolf and he felt two hits strike his right side. Ace barely had enough time to pull his sword back to guard against further attacks. But it wouldn’t have mattered, Ace’s health had become too low.

Ace felt a force yank him from behind and he stumbled backwards. Instantly he saw Lycan take his place and elegantly killed a pouncing wolf. He watched as Lycan then parried every subsequent attack. Ace knew that Lycan could kill the wolves with one hit, but he was purposely parrying each attack to show Ace what it meant to avoid damage. Shortly afterwards, Lycan killed the remaining three wolves.

“You’re still too hesitant. Your panic is clouding your judgement.”

Ace nodded as he also knew the reason for his failure. He panicked when all four wolves jumped at him. It was a truly frightening scene.

It took a brief second for him to remind himself that this was only a game and that brief second was all it took for him to make a stupid move.

It took a total of six days for Ace and Lycan to finally arrive at the vicinity of Chroma City. These past six days were the most fast-paced days of Ace’s life. Each day was spent fighting monsters in terrifying conditions. Ace’s heart kept beating really fast.

Ace was now level 25 and gained a considerable amount of levels in certain skills. His Sword Mastery was now beginner rank level 8. Its mastery speed was astoundingly fast under Lycan’s instructions. Ace’s Guard skill and Counter skill both reached level 7. It was very beneficial to use counterattacks often. Sadly, Ace’s Parry skill only reached level 4. It was simply too hard to find the right timing to redirect the enemy’s attack. Ace’s Assassin’s Eye was now level 9. One more level till it reached Intermediate rank.

Ace distributed the 40 stat points from reaching level 25 equally between the stats strength, agility, constitution, and intelligence.

He sent a quick message to Atlas and Vulcan and announced that he was nearly at Chroma City.

 

•●••●••●••●••●••●••●••●••●••●••●••●••●••●••●•

 

“Ace!”

“Hahaha, how’s my best disciple? Did you keep up with your training?”

Ace discovered that both master and daughter were waiting for him at the gates of the city.

However, before he could say anything, Vulcan and Lycan had already met eyes.

“You are?”

“You’re that muscle-bound guy pretending to be a master martial artist?”

“What’s a weakling like you doing with my student?”

“Train yourself before you think about training others.”

Ace’s eyes widened in shock. He didn’t expect both of his masters to exhibit such hostility. Immediately after, both high leveled players went outside the city and initiated a duel.

“Are they… fighting over me?”

Ace couldn’t help but ask Atlas his question. However, he only received a confused headshake as his reply.

“I’ve never seen daddy act like this before.”

Ace and Atlas stood outside the gates to watch the battle at a safe distance. Lycan and Vulcan were both players at a similar level with Lycan being five levels higher. However, this was clearly a battle that had transcended elements such as levels and stats. It was a mesmerizing battle of pure skill.

Lycan attacked perfectly with his sword and knew when to counterattack. The most shocking thing was that Vulcan’s bare-handed strikes were also able to parry Lycan’s sword blows and was able to deliver accurately timed counters of his own. Lycan was pleased to discover that Vulcan’s guarding and parrying skills weren’t because of the game, but because of true skill. This was evident by the fact that Vulcan’s bare hands would only touch the flat part of his blade. Not once did Vulcan’s hands touch his blade’s sharp edge.

Vulcan was also surprised by Lycan’s masterful skills. He was a self-taught martial artist and learned through watching tv. But Lycan’s skills completely dwarfed all the practitioners he had learned from. Lycan was definitely the toughest opponent that Vulcan had ever faced.

Blow for blow, tit for tat. Both fighters attacked each other relentlessly. The battle was both fast and fierce. It was a battle of two different elements. Lycan’s sword attacks was controlled and fluid. It was the essence of flowing water. Vulcan, on the other hand, was steady and forceful. He exhibited the spirit of the solid earth.

This battle was a feast for the eyes. It wasn’t an over exaggeration to say that a battle of this caliber was considered the highest quality of battle-porn for battle addicts.

With one more clash, both fighters health dropped to zero. In terms of skill, they were equal. Both were expert fighters and their abilities were clearly seen. Neither one held an edge over the other.

A bright yellowish light glowed around both players and their health and mana values instantly restored to their original levels.

Normally, a player was dead if his health was reduced to zero. Besides the rare revive skill, a player wasn’t able to come back to life. However, this wasn’t true if it was a duel. A player was able to initiate a duel with another player for friendly combat purposes. There were no penalties to losing and the victor also wouldn’t be granted the chaotic state for winning. After all, the defeated wasn’t dead. At the conclusion of a duel, both participants would have their health and mana restore to the values they had before they initiated their duel.

“My apologies for the disrespectful words.”

Lycan was an honest man. He held a very low disregard to practitioners who pretended to be strong, but he also held a large level of respect for those who were truly strong. He was a man who displayed the true values of chivalry and heroism from ancient ages.

“It’s completely alright. It was also an honor to have this duel. You are easily the most powerful man I’ve ever fought.”

“My name is Lycan. The sole inheritor of my family’s Conquering Heaven Sword Style.”

“My name is Vulcan.”

Conquering Heaven Sword Style. The translation of the Chinese name that Lycan used. Ace finally confirmed the source of Lycan’s abilities. He was a sword expert in real life and had a family tradition of training with swords.

“Your lineage? I detect traces of multiple familiar styles in your attacks.”

“That’s because my daddy is self-taught!”

“Self-taught?”

Lycan stared at Atlas in disbelief. It was hard to believe, but not unlikely. If it was true, then Vulcan’s talent was astounding. It clearly overshadowed his own.

“I understand. I was unaware of that fact and thus misunderstood you.”

“What do you mean?”

Lycan explained that he heard about Vulcan through Ace’s description of their training. Although the training was helpful, it was inefficient. It was full of mistakes that expert masters would never make. He had assumed that Vulcan was one of the new generation of masters who prided themselves on building a muscular body and possessed near non-existent skills.

“I now understand that the misunderstanding came from this being your first time teaching. You did not learn from masters who had countless years to perfect a proper training regime.”

Vulcan nodded since Lycan’s words were accurately true.

“Do you still want to train the boy?”

“Of course, he’s my first and best student.”

“I would dislike watching your highly regarded disciple suffer from an inefficient level of training. Since I have also grown to like the boy, I also regard him as much of a disciple as you do. How about we both take part in his training?”

“Both of us? How?”

“You specialize in physical training. That part is obvious. Therefore, you’ll be in charge of the physical aspect of his training. Whereas, I will train his mentality.”

“Sounds quite interesting! Let’s see what kind of monster we’ll be able to create.”

One battle. All it took was one battle for these two hostile masters to become as close as brothers. They were filled with an unbounded level of respect towards each other.

“Ace.”

Ace walked up to both of his masters and looked at them curiously.

“We have come to the agreement that both of us will be your master. However, I currently have something to do so Vulcan will train you first. In around a month or so, I will come back to take over your training.”

Lycan gestured to Ace to follow him. Vulcan and Atlas left on their own, because Atlas was at the final step for acquiring her Beast Tamer class.

Ace followed Lycan into Chroma City and walked until they reached a large signboard that stood in the city square.

“During this month, although Vulcan will be training you, I want you to complete at least ten D ranked quests on this board.”

Lycan had brought him to an Adventuring Board. This was a large wooden board that contained a great amount of posted requests. Each request was a quest. Players were free to accept as many quests as they wanted, but they were restricted by the quest’s difficulty level. Players needed to complete at least ten E ranked requests, before they were eligible for a D ranked request.

Players were greatly attracted to the Adventuring Board. It was a quick way to find quests without conversing with NPCs. It’s popularity was so large that every sizeable city had their own Adventuring Board.

“Hey did you hear? We can get the Adventurer class if we complete a large enough amount of requests or an A ranked request.”

“Seriously? A new hidden class was revealed?”

Ace couldn’t help but overhear the discussion between two level 60 players.

‘So it was even possible to gain a hidden class this way. An Adventurer class from doing many requests at the Adventuring Board. Sounds fitting.’

Lycan left for his month long task after a short farewell and Ace went to explore the new city. He made sure to visit the graveyard to set his new revive location and to purchase a the city map for Chroma City. He also made sure to go to the item store to buy more low-leveled mana potions. He would need a lot more mana if he had to stay inside the city for at least a month. The drain from staying out of the chaotic state and keeping Keki summoned was too taxing on his mana.

Ace logged out for the rest of the day. Tomorrow would be the start of more hellish physical training. However, he was looking forward to accepting some of the requests from the Adventurer’s Board. It was a very fun concept.

 

•●••●••●••●••●••●••●••●••●••●••●••●••●••●••●•

 

“Ahhh! You’re so cute!!”

Kira tightly hugged her fiery fox summon. The petite animal had a very soft layer of red fur that shone with a gentle red luster.

Kami laughed at seeing his girlfriend behave like a little girl. It was definitely more fun to play as a side character. For the past few days, he had experienced a great amount of entertainment just by watching his girlfriend play his game. He loved to watch her fascinating astonishment as she explored the city and surrounding wilderness. He especially loved her adorably cute moments.

It had been over a week since both Kami and Kira joined the game. Although they had originally planned to gather their necessary skills quickly, they discovered that it wasn’t as easy as they had thought. It took them three days to get to level 10 and travel to Gremlin City for the class changes. Kami didn’t want to admit it, but it was a slight oversight to not grant a weapon when skipping the tutorial.

It was difficult to find monsters that they could quietly kill in the midst of all the new players. However, their weaponless predicament did help lead to a few sweet moments between Kami and Kira. With a smile on his face from the memories, he decided to let the slight oversight slide.

At the moment, Kira was playing around with her Summoning Gate skill. Summoners were able to summon monsters from other realms to aid them in battle. However, summoners were only able to obtain these summons by using the Summoning Gate. They needed to offer up a Summon Stone to summon a monster from the gate. After a summoner obtained a monster from the gate, he was able to freely summon the monster through the Summon Monster skill.

Summon stones took many shapes and sizes. Currently, Kira was only capable of using the lowest level of summon stones. She would have to raise the skill of her Summoning Gate skill before it would accept higher leveled summon stones.

The Summoning Gate was based on a random lottery system. There was no way to guarantee a specific monster nor was there any way to guarantee a strong monster. The only guarantee was that rarer summoning stones will summon more powerful monsters.

Kira had used six stones and had a small army of furry monsters to battle for her. The fire fox was her favorite.

On the other hand, Kami’s puppeteer skills were different. Kira’s summoner class granted her the ability to have more variety in attacks. But Kami’s puppeteer skills granted him more power in control. He was able to briefly attach invisible strings to monsters and control them for a short period of time. Strong monsters were capable of breaking free from his control, but it was still a very useful way of disrupting a monster’s attacks and restricting their movement.

In addition, Kami had a Puppet Creation skill that allowed him to attach strings to nearby objects and create a makeshift puppet. He could use the puppet for either attacking or defending.

Although the puppeteer class might appear to be a non-combat class, it had quite a few skills that were essential for Kami. His main class didn’t lack power, but it lacked the ability to restrict monsters. The puppeteer class was one of the best classes for controlling monsters on a battlefield. It had a great amount of skills involving the strings that it could attach to monsters. Stun strings, sleep strings, and other status inflicting string skills were only the tip of the iceberg. With Kami’s ability, the puppeteer class was unbelievably useful.

Right now, Kami was in a very good mood. He had seen the video of Lycan and Vulcan’s battle and he was entranced by it. That was his vision of the future for Fantasy Edge! Players fighting through their true skill rather than their levels and stats. He didn’t expect to see that this type of battle was already possible.

Kami was surprised to see that Ace had bumped into Lycan. Lycan was one of the more interesting players within the game.

Lycan was the discoverer of the Sword Specialist hidden class and the only player to not use any combat skills. Throughout his entire leveling career, Lycan had never used any combat skill. His class skills remained untouched. Instead, Lycan relied solely on the skills Guard, Parry, Counter, and his own knowledge of swordsmanship. He was an anomaly.

Sadly, although Lycan was interesting, he was also too powerful. It was a bit unsatisfying to watch him effortlessly kill weak players and monsters. Lycan didn’t cross paths with any of the other extremely powerful players in the game.

But the battle with Vulcan was a surprise. Kami knew Lycan was unbelievably strong, but he never suspected Vulcan was too.

The two fighters were truly equally matched. Both fighters were at the advanced rank for Guard, Parry, and Counter. Lycan had advanced Sword Mastery and Vulcan had advanced Unarmed Combat Mastery. It was simply too invigorating.

Kami was a man who preferred the intellectual method of battling, but even he felt his blood burn as he watched the fight. It was an extremely satisfying match.

He couldn’t wait to see what would become of Ace. After all, he was now going to be trained by two monsters.

He couldn’t sit still any longer. Time didn’t wait for anyone, not even for the creator.

“Ready to get our main classes?”

Kira cuddled her summon for a few more seconds before she nodded.

It had been a long week of obtaining skills, but they’ve finally acquired all they needed.

Kira finally gained the skill to heal her summons and Kami gained the mass puppet control skill. The first part of their arsenal was now complete.

“So… what classes are they?”
 
 

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