Auntie toasts the VRMMORPG

"What happens when I reach level 100 in a skill?"

"Level 100 is another milestone; its name is "third wind", Milady. You got an achievement for it while sleeping. It increased your affinity + 1 OV."

"Please explain this milestone topic again, Aidan."

"The first milestone is when an attribute, affinity, skill, or ability reaches level 25. Its called 'First Improvement' and increases the LV of attributes and the OV of the rest by 10%."

"Nice!"

"The second milestone is called 'Second Luck' and gives you a lucky chance of 20% to double an effect. For example, your regeneration ticks 20% of the time for the double value."

"Lovely, I can imagine the effects on a spell and some attributes like resistance. But what about abilities like free-running or mechanics or attributes like dexterity? "

"In free-running, it could be a sudden burst of speed. I'm sure that while you ground XP, there was more than a bit of luck involved. In crafting the rating of your work will rise."

Flora nodded.

"The third milestone is called 'Third wind'. When a pool value is depleted, and only 30% of its value remains, then the effectivity of the attribute is related to increases by 30% or even triples. 

Resistances and Affinities get stronger when your health-pool is low. Concerning the other stats, 'Third wind' is related to the target of the spell or ability. A healing skill heals three times more when the target's health is below 30% some spells do 30% more damage, and some triple the damage."

"Wow, that's harsh. Now I understand why stats are so important."

"I read a guide that dissuaded from training mana-skills too soon above level 100 because the game gets too easy in the Tranches, that's the level 5-100 server, and the player isn't primed to play the Level 100+ worlds where the mobs have level 100 skills." 

"Hmm. I don't believe in 'too easy'. Let's raise Refresh above level 100 because three times more regeneration would help immensely with training and in survival situations. Warn me when another skill hits level 90, and we think about what to do then."

"'Forth cross' is the name of the next milestone. When an attribute hits the 200-mark, it gains 40% of corresponding attributes level value as modded LV and gives 40% of its value as MLV to it. For example, if physical power reaches 200, it gets 40% of your magical power and raises it by 80 LV."

To Flora, that sounded like a lot! Only her physical regeneration had an LV above 80, and to get that many points for free was amazing! 

"It is unknown what happens with affinities after at forth cross. Nobody divulged it in the bulletin boards. Skills gain a special-effect 40% of the time, and abilities gain magical components."

"Hmm, that could be useful or not. A bit too random for my taste. How can I imagine magical mechanics?"

"Mechanics might be a wrong example for you. If I didn't have access to your logs, I would have thought you already have 200 mechanics. Free running might be a better example. At 200, You can make jumps with 40% of the effect of your Power-Jump spell with paying a fraction of the mana or no mana at all. I believe Power-Jump is one of the skills integrating without using mana. I read conflictive comments." 

"Nice! That means it would bring my mechanics to the next level when I know all the spells of the book '1000 household spells."

"The next milestone is at 250. You can only level an affinity, skill, or ability to 250 if you fulfill some criteria or test. The milestone 'Ascencion' changes the calculation of the OV. 

You can raise attributes to 250 without a hurdle. But starting from there each raise costs 2 level-up points. 

Many of the meta-builts for damage-dealers and healers include three 250 attributes and three 100 attributes or one 100 and one 200."

"What about the containers?"

"Pardon, what containers?"

"The guys who contain the enemies. The word wasn't masochist. That was just what I thought when Robby told me about them."

"Do you mean tanks?"

"Yes!"

"Many go for the 'Fifth Flair' with level 400 in physical vigor or defense. This milestone offers the 'Flair' skill or variant. It increases the attribute MLV by five times for OV seconds and refills the associated pools."   

"My runtime memory is overflowing. I need to process all the information of today. And maybe take a nap. Oh! I can take a nap in the jacuzzi! I wouldn't dare this in reality, but here: no problem."

Flora donned the potion guzzler, raised the heat, and leaned back. Sometimes she mulled over the information, sometimes she let Aidan playback or clarify a specific part, and sometimes she just played with the water, meditated, or revolved her mana. Slowly, she digested the last few days.

After two hours, Flora woke up because she felt uncomfortable.

"Milady, I put the toxic plates as far back as possible, but it is getting hard to hold you alive."

Groggily, she checked her debuffs and immediately left the water. 

Hyperthermia: 3 x ~1 dmg per second. Time remaining: 25 sec.

Toxic-Aura: 3 x ~ 5 hp per minute. Time remaining: 25 sec.

Radioactive-Aura: 3 x ~ 5 hp per minute. Time remaining: 25 sec.

Metal Handicap: 14 OV - Effective: 0 OV. 

The heat had colored her skin red, and it was itching. 

Flora refused to scratch. Instead, she sat down and meditated until the Hyperthermia debuff had run its course.

After she turned down the heat of the jacuzzi and refilled the nearly depleted health-potions in the potions guzzler helmet, she was ready to prepare for the Doom Moon scenario. And of course, to hop back into the tub.

"First, we have to think about how we can keep Jake alive." Flora started. "If he weren't so drunk, he wouldn't have puked. And we would have made better time to shrine. That means more time to explore.

Next, we have to find a way to flee from the exploding moon or stop it from exploding.

I don't know if I prefer the second option. We don't know anything about the capabilities of the Doom Moon. Can it move through space? Has it a planet-destroying mega laser? Or is it just a defensive installation like Jake claimed? Are you making a list, dear?"

"No, Milady."

"Start making one. No, several. One with the preparation we need before, one with what to do when playing the scenario."

Prep before start

Todo During

• Dinner scene: Get political info and info about the Doom Moon: history, capabilities.
• Party scene: Stop Jake from getting drunk

"You asked me to remind you to send a letter to the union to complain about the work conditions, Milady. When should we schedule this?"

Flora laughed.

"We skip it; I'm sure it's futile. Back to the escape. How far was the hanger away from the quest location?"

"300 meters, but two security gates in between."

"How can we get past them? Explosives? Plasma swords? Can we get the codes somewhere?"

"They have two different kinds of locks: for the regular lock, you have the code on your datapad, and in emergency mode, only someone with higher clearance can open them. This mode got activated when the hull breach happened. Then, hacking might be the fasted way to open the door."

"You can hack, right?"

"Yes, Milady. But I need an electric lock-pick. My current hacking is level 14. I should train it up to at least level 25. If you joined me in hacking, the time would go down, as well." 

Prep before start

• Get two lock-picks for hacking
• Learn to hack
• Get something to train hacking

"So, let's say we need 30 sec to open one, that's 60 sec for two. That's optimistic! 2 minutes for passing the corridor. That leaves us with 3 minutes for the hangar. Do you know if there are any vessels left? And if we can fly them."

"I know nothing of the deployments of the ships, Milady. But flying small crafts is a skill that can be learned in the Metaworld."

"Alright, sounds like a plan for the next try. The alternative for flying away is saving the whole moon. In the movies, a simple, sturdy door between the core and the planes would have done the job. First, we have to find out if the Doom Moon exploded because of the same issue."

Flora went over the scenario in her head again to check if she had forgotten anything. 

"The spells! Please give me a list of spells that I can use during the scenario."

"Telekinesis, Magical Push, Magical Pull, Use Built-In Skill, Summon the God, In the name of the God, Rise to the occasion, and Magical Drill."

"Interesting that Use Built-In Skill is part of the list. I can work with that."

Prep before start

• Get two lock-picks for hacking
• Learn to hack
• Get something to train hacking
• Learn to fly
• Get a space capable mech suit

Todo During

• Dinner scene: Get political overview and info about the Doom Moon: history, capabilities.
• Party scene: Stop Jake from getting drunk
• Oh shit scene: Find out why the Doom Moon exploded

Next, Flora watched a video about hacking in the Cetviwos games. 

Her face fell. First, you had to buy or write scripts in a language called BreaTress. While hacking, you had to load them in the right moment or type commands to react to the behavior of the firewall.

Of course, Flora knew how to code. She wrote a few macros to ease the design process, but admittingly that was years ago. Her skills were rusty, and she never enjoyed it as much as other aspects of her work.

To make matters worse, she had shared an office with an excellent programmer and exploited the situation. 

Fortunately, the video continued to explain that another modus was available: The BreaTress-Minigame.

Flora watched defenders standing on a fortress wall and shooting down on a horde of attacking orcs. The graphics looked like an old-timey video game, which made Flora smile. 

Beyond doubt, Flora knew even less about medieval warfare than software development, but she was more motivated to learn about it.

The marketplace was bursting with scripts. Aidan advised her to buy a package, to ensure compatibility, with at least a defender and a ranged attacker. Immediately, Flora narrowed the search to S-rated Tier-1, which still left hundreds. 

She read the description of several. The programs had, how could it be any different in this world, stats. Flora didn't care about them. Instead, she looked at the animation. 

"Dinosaurs? No. Humans? Boring. Orcs? No. Soldiers? Yawn. Knights? No." Most of the animations were the same medieval humans. Probably, the developers weren't bothered to change the standard animation.

Finally, Flora sorted by price and looked at the cheapest S-rated script.

With wide eyes, she stared at the figures. All wore polka-dotted hats, shirts with flower prints, and plaid-trousers in the most horrendous color combinations. 

This was exactly like her old IT-colleague used to dress! Because she was colorblind, she didn't care about them, but she loved to mix patterns. Once, she explained to Flora that this was her way to make the grey world more enjoyable. 

Flora took it as a good omen and bought the whole package with five scripts for 337 VirDos.

Two A-rated tier-2 lock-pics and an S-rated tier-1 puzzle landed in her shopping basket, and she was another 1256 VirDos poorer.  

When Flora exited the room, she was surprised how much neater it looked. Sure, she still had to hop over a few bars and plastic parts, but no advanced acrobatic act was needed to reach the mailbox.

On her way back, she loaded the scripts in the lock-picks and connected them, the puzzle, Aidan, and herself. 

Aidan was sure that he could switch between letting her cast spells and automatic-mode hacking.

Back at her workshop, she just wanted to take a quick look if she could modify the skins of the scripts to tone down the colors a bit.  

One hour later, the clothes of her mini-army had still the same colors, but the standard weapons had changed.

Flora replaced the shield by a lid of a large pan, the slingshot by a toaster shooting toasts, the bow by an even bigger toaster, shooting bread in shuriken form, and the swords by an electric egg beater.

With a bit of regret and a lot of satisfaction, she looked over her work. 

'I got sidetracked, but it was worth it!'

Next, she tackled multiple issues at once. 

'Lair needs to be tidied up, and I need more booty ... bounty? Loot? Treasure? There was a piracy themed term for it.'

Flora constructed a 3x3x3 lightweight but sturdy frame and added a solid floor and ceiling. The real work of art went into creating the doors. 

They folded up in grapplers and legs.

Flora was tempted to construct the walls in that way too, but she was battling in holding the mana usage as low as possible, so she refrained from it.

The finished container could transform its four doors into stumps that bend down. Flora tested the movement with different weights in the box. You could call it walking, but crawling might the more apt description. Flora did not want to ride it. Seasickness could be a side effect.

When the container sat down, it could use the doors/legs as grapplers and shovel items into the box.

Name: Hungry Chest

Type: Hybrid: Vehicle/Container/Excavator

Vehicle-Mode: 7 OV mana-regeneration

Rating: C

Excavator-Mode: 5 OV mana-regeneration

Rating: A

Chest-Mode: 0 OV mana-regeneration

Rating: A

Tier: 0

Hybrid-Rating: S

Flora checked the time. It was already evening, and the Doom Moon scenario took five hours.

She decided to spend the rest of the day with crafting and leveling hacking, interjected with completing the rest of her dailies. 

After she finished the quests at Tricky Beach and the Garage, she visited the Clan Riverstones. 

She printed the Hungry Chest so that it could work through the night. Furthermore, she produced training gear and sent it to Eddie together with a user manual created by Aidan.

'Not to write those damn things myself! What bliss!' 

This reminded her that she hadn't told Robby about the training-coffin. Initially, she wanted to surprise him with her excellent stats, but now she thought it was more important, allowing her baby boy to train while asleep. Therefore she sent him the manual, a link to the design, and authorized him to print it.