NOVEL NEXT Ch 6 – Returning to daily life
“Uuhhh… I’m sleepy!” I groan. I’m currently seated in class, waiting for the teacher to come and start. “I shouldn’t have watched those last ten videos before going to sleep…!”
“Hahaha, you should do as I do and live a healthy life, Andreu!” Says a familiar voice as it sits on my left side. I look there and see Ricard, my college friend. He looks way worse than me. By the way, my name’s Andreu.
“Haha, as if you are one to talk! You look almost like an undead!” I retort back. “Did you spend all night playing DMA again?”
“Do you really need to ask?”
I look at him again. He looks as if he hasn’t slept properly in the last month. “I suppose I don’t.” I answer. I’m sure he did. Ricard is a liiiiittle bit obsessed with videogames. In the future he wants to work as a game programmer. This is why he chose the Computer Science degree. You ask about me? I’m… still not sure what I would like to do, but for now I am taking the same degree.
“So, what faction did you choose? Did you take the farmer’s league?” Ricard asks. I can see his eyes are sparkling right now. This is dangerous. When he is in this state, he can keep talking about a game for hours. “Please tell me that you took the farmer’s league!”
“No, I didn’t. And what the hell is the farmer’s league? There was no faction with that name!”
“Aha! This demonstrates you are a noob! Let this sage instruct you on the most basic knowledge that all players should know! The human’s faction, the Iron Shield, at the start only has a large number of Farmers and almost no other unit. So they are called the ‘Farmer’s League’ by the players!”
“So that was all the ‘oh so high and noble sage’ had to instruct me with?” I retort. I perfectly remember yesterday’s dungeon and the absurd amount of farmers.
“You’re wrong, my friend! You still need to learn why this happens! The high number of farmers is because they only need food and Farms to create them. But since they need lots of cp and resources for training them into better units, most players build a lot of farms and get a lot of farmers before…”
“Ok, ok! I understand!” I interrupt Ricard. This was close, if I let him continue, he wouldn’t stop until the teacher came.
“Fine… I’ll stop here... So, what faction did you take? It is a shame you didn’t take the humans because you could have turned into a nice soul farm for my undead legion....”
Ricard is playing as the undead, the Eternals, and their special resource is ‘souls’. They are obtained by defeating units, one for each unit that isn’t a construct or undead. So they prefer diving into dungeons with lots of weak mobs because it doesn’t matter how strong the enemies are, only one soul per enemy killed is obtained. I’m sure Ricard was expecting me to pick the humans and turn my dungeon into his particular soul farm. How do I know all this, you ask? Ricard has made sure to drill it into my head these past few days. At least a hundred times.
“I picked the Flesh Monstrosities.”
“I knew you would pick some weird faction, but didn’t expect this one. Do you know it is the most difficult one, especially at the start? If you had asked me, I would have recommended a better faction to start with.”
I remember the troubles with the Stitched, the fact that I still don’t have a single ‘body’, the special resource of my faction, the rat transformation skill, and that the prospects to have something other than stitched any time soon aren’t very high.
“Yeah, you don’t have to tell me. I already know…”
“If you wanted something weird I would have recommended you the Abyss faction. You know, the cthulhu-style monsters! They are easier to start with, and they have very strong units later on, they are one of the few factions that compete with the top spot in pure stats. And their special resource isn’t as bad to obtain as your bodies…”
“Shh! Ricard, the teacher is here!” I whisper to Ricard while interrupting his rambling. This was close, he was starting his ‘knowledge drilling’ again. If it were in the game, it would be a unique skill special to his Champion, capable of obliterating enemies by simply opening his mouth and talking. By the way, no, unique skills don’t exist in DMA. Unique skills don’t make any sense in a game unless you want to severely discriminate against players.
“Ok, I will tell you later!” He whispers back.
The ‘Advanced Programming’ class starts. I hate this teacher. She talks to us as if we were stupid or small children. For god’s sake! There isn’t a single student here that is less than 20 years old. Do you really need to talk to us as if you were teaching nursery school children?
The class has ended. We survived another one.
“So, as I was saying, the Abyss…”
“Hey there! How are you today?” Luckily for me, Ricard is interrupted again.
“Hi there, Laura.” I say. Laura is one of the very few girls in our class. You know, about 80% or 90% of the people in the computer science degree are boys. Laura usually hangs out with Ricard and me, but today she came late to class.
“Hi, Laura!” Ricard looks like it's holding something inside. Like a bomb that is about to explode. I’m sure he still wants to expose his 'immense knowledge' of the Abyss faction.
“So, did you start playing the game?” She asks. She, too, is interested in the same kind of games as both me and Ricard.
“Yep, I did! I started on Saturday and spent a day and a half playing.”
“You are now both ahead of me, huh!” She says while pouting.
“You will surely catch up to us when you have enough money to buy the game. I will make sure you know everything needed, so that you don’t waste time, and know the best way to progress!” Says Ricard.
A mental alarm sounds in my head after Ricard says this. The alarm keeps repeating ‘Warning! Imminent attack!’ Better have some excuse prepared to leave Laura and Ricard alone when the knowledge drilling starts.
“Yes, it’s a shame you don’t have enough money to start playing. When do you think you will have enough spare money to buy the game?” I ask.
“I’m not sure, maybe in two months?”
“Oooh, shit. Two months is a very long time. By the time you start, my dungeon will be quite advanced. And Ricard started even earlier, so…”
“Yeah, I know.” She says with a sullen expression.
“I don’t really think you will, Andreu. You picked the worst faction to start with… Maybe in two months time you will have a decent dungeon for a noob, hahaha!” Ricard takes his chance to insert some more unnecessary knowledge. You jerk. “Anyway! Like I was saying, don’t worry too much, Laura! We will help you once you start, isn’t it right, Andreu?”
“Yeah, sure...” I look away. I do want to help, and will help Laura. But Ricard, spare me from the ‘training sessions’, pleeeease.
Laura starts talking again. “So, what faction did you pick? I’m sure it is one of the weirdest. Maybe the slimes?”
“Nope, you are wrong! He picked the Flesh Monstrosities! You know, the ones that use parts from other game units.” Ricard couldn’t hold himself from answering. “This is why I was saying you will be able to catch up to him easily!”
“Oho!?” Laura looks at me with a grin.
“Can you stop already, Ricard? Saying things once is enough! I picked the worst for new players, ok? It’s fine! I liked the description and the mechanics. I don't regret the decision!”
“Ok, ok! I’ll stop! But tell me, how many ‘bodies’, the special resource of your faction, did you get already?”
Aaah! Don’t look at me with that smile plastered on your face! It hurts! “None…” I say with a very low voice and look away.
“Whaaat did you say? I didn’t hear you!?” He repeats, his smile wider than before.
“I said none! Ok!? But only because I was unlucky and got distracted! You will see… in a single month, my dungeon will surpass yours in the rankings!” I defend myself.
“Sure, if you say so….”
“Yes, I do!” I try to finish the argument.
“So… this means… that I will be able to catch up easily? Nice! Then we can be at the same level soon!” Says Laura. Not you too, please… I have enough with Ricard teasing me alone! You traitor!
I raise my arms in defeat and try to change the topic. “Aaah, whatever you say! Let’s move now, or we will be late to the next class!” I say at the same time as I stand from the chair.
“Hey, Andreu. Do you mind if I sit next to you in this class?” Asks Laura.
“Sure, why not.”
While walking towards the classroom, Ricard bumps his elbow into my side. Several times. I turn to look at him to complain, but he’s making a weird face. What’s wrong with you, Ricard? Why are you looking at me with this face? You look stupid with that grin on your face!
“I’m back!” I say after closing the entrance door. My mom works from home, so she should be inside. She is a writer.
“Welcome back! How did classes go, Andreu?”
“They were fine, mom.” I answer. “Do you need me for something today? Otherwise, I’m going to spend the afternoon playing with the VR set.” She knows I won’t be able to stop easily in the middle of playing a VR game.
“No, it’s fine. Have fun! But don’t forget to come at dinner time today, ok?”
“Sure, mom!” I don’t want to eat a cold dinner either. One time this weekend was enough.
My room is upstairs. On my way to it, a figure suddenly appears and jumps at me! It’s a critical hit!
“Hello, brother!”
I answer while trying to recover the equilibrium. I almost fell to the ground. “Hello, Clara. Even if you are shorter than me, you aren’t a kid anymore. You know jumping at me like this is dangerous. Especially so close to the stairs!” I admonish her, but she ignores me.
“You didn’t play with me this weekend!” She says while pouting and with puffy cheeks. “Is the game you were playing so fun? You said it was called Dungeon Masters Aarena, right? I want to play too!”
“I’m sorry about it, but you can’t play with my game account. The game needs your body data to make the character adapt to your body shape and proportions. So even if I wanted to, you couldn’t play the game without feeling extremely sick.” I know what I’m talking about, after all. I DID turn into a rat, which has a different body structure than a human, and it was horrendous… I want to puke by only remembering the experience.
“But I want to play too!” She is on the verge of tears. I know she is faking it, but right now she looks so cute! “It’s not fair if I can’t play with you!”
“Ok, ok. Calm down!” I say while petting her head. “Your birthday is in three weeks, right? I will talk with mom and dad and try to convince them to buy you the game. But only if you study hard and get good grades in your next exams. Otherwise… I will stop playing with you. Understood?”
“Yes! Thanks brother!” She quickly scurries away into her room.
This is my little sister, Clara. She is 18 this year, but she is still very attached to me and behaves like you have just seen. I think it is because she is very shy with strangers and has few friends. But I warn you! Don’t believe her cute behavior! She behaves like this only in front of me. In front of other people she can be… quite nasty, sometimes. I want to believe she doesn’t do it on purpose, but instead that she doesn’t know how to properly interact with people.
“Well, anyway… Let’s prepare to play the game!”
I enter my room, put the VR helmet on my head, and start the game. “New and hopefully normal dungeon that I’m going to invade, here I come!”
“Game Start!” Hehe. By saying this I feel like a protagonist from a novel. Though I’m not sure why.
“... The Abyss faction uses a special resource called ‘Despair’. It is a resource obtained when a unit is killed when it reaches 0 SOU, signifying that its mind and soul have been shattered. Some units have a few innate skills to help achieve it, and they also use lots of skills that can drain or exhaust the enemy’s MP and SOU faster. When fighting against the Abyss faction, you should worry more about your MP and SOU than your HP. They are the perfect faction against brutes and…”
- The continuation of Ricard’s ‘knowledge drilling’ after classes finished. The bomb exploded, and nobody was ready for the consequences.
