“Huh?” Arthur raised an eyebrow. “What is it?”
The way Isla was speaking made him even more curious about this ‘Request’ she was talking about. After all, if it was related to the game, then it was surely something worth checking out.
‘Unless it isn’t something good for me then that’s a whole different matter.’ He squinted his eyes as he looked at the girl over his shoulder.
“I cannot tell you here. But, it is something that would benefit both of us. I believe we can work it out.” She replied.
“…” The boy continued looking at her for a few seconds before he sighed. “Ok, I will meet you there then. But, it better be something worth my time.”
“Oh, it sure would be.”
As they were talking, the waitress approached Arthur with a smile and handed him the check before she pulled the electronic device so he could pay. The process was very simple as he only had to swipe his device over it and it would automatically pay the price.
After that, he stood up to leave. But, before leaving, he looked at Isla and said. “It was a nice conversation. Have a nice day.”
“Likewise.”
Then, Arthur walked away with a calm expression as if this interaction hadn’t happened in the first place. However, deep down, his head was filled with thoughts. Mainly about what this unexpected diversion in his plan was going to lead to.
‘That girl is dangerous… Very dangerous.’ He thought to himself. ‘I must not make her an enemy even if she doesn’t become an ally.’
As weird as it was, Arthur felt like he understood Isla very well even though they barely talked. His senses told him that she was someone not to be messed with and that feeling rarely comes to Arthur even when dealing with dangerous people.
Something about that girl, or something about how she spoke and carried herself felt… Ethereal.
‘That kind of presence is all trouble. Tsk, but what can I do? I’m a greedy bastard. If there is a chance I will get something good, then I’m doing that.’
Unbeknownst to the boy, that choice he made at that moment was going to be the biggest catalyst to something that would happen in the far future. However, that was a story for another time.
***
For the next few hours, Arthur continued moving around the city, buying stuff and visiting all the interesting places he could see or find on the map. As he expected, the entire city was filled with all kinds of services, from cinemas to gyms and even sophisticated sports like Golf and Polo.
With how many things there were, Arthur couldn’t stop at one place for more than a few minutes before moving to the next one. He was having a lot of fun without realizing it and the thoughts from earlier vanished like mist.
Eventually, it was afternoon so he went to another restaurant, and had some lunch before finally heading back to the dormitory with bags in his hands.
‘I did buy some clothes, but I don’t know why. I already have clothes I brought with me and I’m going to be wearing mostly a uniform anyway. Oh well, this is my first time ever spur shopping.’ He laughed to himself as he walked into his room.
“Sigh, that was a long trip.” He muttered as he threw himself on the bed with a tired look. His muscles were still soar from the morning so it felt even more painful now to move.
But, Arthur felt quite satisfied with what he did, except for the Isla situation.
“How much time is left before I have to log in?” He looked at the clock which indicated that it was a little bit past 3 O’clock which meant that he had four hours left before the meeting.
“I need to take a shower and then log in.” He muttered as he stood up and quickly walked into the bathroom. He took a good shower before he got into the capsule.
Logging in, Arthur quickly headed toward the town’s merchant where he sold all the items he gathered from hunting the previous night. After that, he bought some debuff potions from the potion maker.
‘I don’t know if I’m going to need these. But, I won’t say no to some damage debuff cast on my enemies. Especially if there are too many of them.’
Although that was the excuse he tried to say to himself, in reality, he knew exactly why he bought those potions and he couldn’t even deny it.
After that, he headed straight toward the exit of the village. There, he took a good spot where he could hide and watch what was happening. He had an hour or two to spare before the meeting but he didn’t have any intention to go out to hunt since that would take way more time.
‘I have some meat jerky that I haven’t tried before. I actually never tried any food in this game before now that I think about it.’ Arthur thought to himself as he took a comfortable position and pulled out some of the items he bought.
[Name: Horned Rabbit Jerky
Rank: E
Description: A dried piece of meat from a horned rabbit.
Effect: Grants the user 5% extra agility for 5 seconds.]
“Wow, very useful.” He giggled as he took a bite from the jerky. Surprisingly, the taste wasn’t as bad as he expected. In fact, it had a pleasant salty taste to it that wasn’t too overpowering nor too mild.
A perfect snack to spend time idling around.
‘Well, while I’m here, I should check my profile and see what I should do.’ He thought to himself.
Opening his profile, Arthur looked at his current stats.
[Name: Arthur]
[Gender: Male]
[Level: 17]
[Main Class: Blood Monarch (Locked) 2/10]
[Rank: SSS]
[Secondary Classes: Battle Specialist]
[Main Abilities: Blood Eater (Level 2)/ Blood Claw (Level 4)]
[Secondary Abilities: Blood Arrows (Level 4)/ Soul Fear (level 1)/ Wretched Crawler’s Eye (Level 1)/ Lonesome Warrior’s Howl (Level 1)/ Mortal Slash (Level 1)]
[Stats:
Health: 27
Strength: 24
Agility: 26
Stamina: 20
Mind: 24
Presence: 25]
[Bonus Points: 24]
“Holy… I have 24 extra points?! Since when?” Arthur blurted out with shock when he saw the last number. So far, he hadn’t paid that particular thing much attention as it wasn’t something he could use permanently.
With each level he was getting, he was also getting 2 extra points and that kept stacking on its own for a while now. The result was 24 points that he hadn’t used yet.
‘These could quite literally make me ridiculously strong.’ He thought to himself. ‘I should probably use them now. Or maybe use some and leave some since I don’t know if I will ever need extra points in one particular stat.’
After thinking about it for a moment, he decided to use 15 points and leave 9 points for emergency situations.
‘Ok, how do I actually allocate them, though? What are my most important stats?’
Looking at his profile again, Arthur quickly realized that this question was way harder to answer than he expected. ‘I have a very balanced stat distribution. I don’t know what is even important anymore as I use them all.
Arthur’s battle style required speed and overwhelming strength to overpower his enemies. If he can’t overpower them, the battle becomes way harder than it could be since he has no actual fighting experience.
‘Well, that logically means I need more agility and more strength, no?’ He rubbed his chin. ‘I can definitely use some more Stamina though. Ugh! This is so annoying!’
After much contemplating and consideration, Arthur decided to go the safe way. He used 5 points on strength, 5 points on agility, and 5 points on stamina.
‘This should be good enou-‘ At that moment, he felt an overwhelming rush of strength wash over his body as if he had just absorbed an amazing amount of energy. His entire body shuddered in pleasure.
“This feels exactly like killing a strong boss.” He muttered with a small sigh. “Ok, I am prepared now. This is the best I can do for now. I don’t think I can get that stronger in the next few days.”
Arthur knew that with each level, getting stronger was becoming harder and harder in such a low-level area. If he wanted to resume his rapid progress, he had to face harder enemies and that could only happen when he left the forest.
Till that happened, he had to simply do whatever he could with what he had.
With that, time slowly passed for Arthur as he simply relaxed and enjoyed the nice weather of the village. He watched players walk in and out of the village with all kinds of funny expressions on their faces. Those who had killed some monsters looked happy, while those who died or lost something were as sad as they could be.
However, almost all of them had a passion for the game. He could see that they were having fun doing this just like he was.
“That’s nice to see. People are really getting into Divinity Online and they’re only getting more into it with each passing day.” He muttered with a smile on his face. “Hm?”
At that moment, Arthur noticed someone among the many players walking around. “There she is.”
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Isla stood right next to the gate with her back resting on the wooden wall as she seemingly waited for someone. Arthur slowly stood up and looked at her closely. “She’s alone.”
Watching her surroundings, Arthur didn’t notice anyone else with her. So, he decided to reveal himself.
However, at that moment, he heard a loud yell.
“It’s you!!”
“Huh?”