Name: N/A
Level: 2
Experience: 0/3
Health: 50/50
Stamina: 50/50
Mana: 5/5
Body: 1
Sense: 1
Mind: 1
Intuition: 1
Yin: 1
Yang: 1
Stat Total: 6
In the dark, the ceiling looms as black and endless as a void. Little lights, normally invisible, blink like satellites. The smoke detector. His charging wireless headphones. The LED alarm clock he never uses. Jonathan checks his phone.
Respawn in: 32:11
When his parents got home, Misty was turned off and he was lying on the couch looking as pale and out of it as possible. With everything that''s happened today and the edible, that second part wasn''t exactly difficult. He told them he was sick and had to leave work early. His mom fussed over him a bit and make him some soup, but he had all the excuse he needed to take his pills and go to bed early.
Respawn in: 28:21
The minutes stretch impossibly. How can time move so slow? He puts in headphones, tries to watch some videos, but even Misty Kim can’t hold his attention.
Respawn in: 21:03
Respawn in: 19:07
He’s hooked. He’s a gamer again. He promised his parents he would never go back, but here he is.
Respawn in: 15:52
And, honestly, was he ever going to keep that promise? What does he have in life besides games?
Respawn in: 11:37
But he never would have dreamed of this. Seven Gates. A game and a mystery and another life, far away from here. He knows he should feel bad about it, but it''s just so damn exciting.
Respawn in: 10:19
Ten minutes. He sets a timer for three hours, then makes sure the volume''s low so it won''t wake his parents. That should give him a good long time in the game.
Respawn in: 8:43
His mouth is dry. His palms are sweating. He wipes his hands on the sheets, picks the phone back up.
Respawn in: 7:23
He keeps the phone up now, watching the numbers drop.
6:00
God, he’s nervous. He breathes deep, let''s it out slow, a calming ritual his therapist taught him. In, out, in, out, in, out, watching the numbers go down.
5:00
4:00
3:00
2:00
1:00
0:45
0:30
0:15
0:10
Ten seconds now! Time for one last breath. In!
0:09
0:08
0:07
0:06
Out!
0:05
0:04
0:03
0:02
0:01
Silver light washes over him. He’s standing in the open, in the dark, stars glittering overhead. There are more stars out there than he''s ever seen in his life. A great shape looms up behind him in the darkness. After a moment of squinting, he recognizes the castle. Looks like Seven Gates has a day-night cycle. He''s back in.
Time to get to work.
"Can I see my stats, please?" He says to the air.
A window pops up full of numbers.
Level: 2
Experience: 0/3
Health: 50/50
Stamina: 50/50
Mana: 5/5
Body: 1
Sense: 1
Mind: 1
Intuition: 1
Yin: 1
Yang: 1
Stat Total: 6
Huh. Those are unusual stats, he was expecting strength and dexterity and stuff.
"How do I apply my stat points?"The narrative has been stolen; if detected on Amazon, report the infringement.
A window pops up.
Body: 1 +
Sense: 1 +
Mind: 1 +
Intuition: 1+
Yin: 1 +
Yang:1 +
Unspent points: 1
Leveling up gave him one point. Where should he spend it? Maybe he can get more information.
"Can you tell me anything about my stats?
Six windows pop up.
"Body: Applies power to the physical body. Increases strength, stamina, and health. Used in equipment, building, mining, and crafting checks."
"Sense: Applies power through the senses to observe the world. Enhances sensory inputs. Increases information gained through the status window. Used in crafting checks."
"Mind: Applies power through the conscious mind. Increases mana. Increases information gained through the status window. Used for casting spells."
"Intuition: Applies power through the unconscious mind. Increases mana. Used for intuitive magic. Used for taming and diplomacy checks."
"Yin: Applies power through positive emotions. Improves health and stamina. Used for crafting potions. Used for spells and magics."
"Yang: Applies power through negative emotions. Improves mana. Used for crafting poisons. Used for spells and magics."
Jonathan reads it all, then reads it again to make sure he isn''t missing anything. There''s a lot to unpack here, but it looks like his choice is pretty clear. Mind, Intuition, Yin, and Yang are all used for spellcasting, and he doesn''t have any spells yet. Sense would be useful, but doesn''t help him fight and the immediate obstacle is the monkeys guarding the dead adventurer. He needs to kill shit.
He hits the little "+" next to "Body" in the status window. The window closes. Did it work? He flexes. Jumps up and down. Everything feels the same.
"Status," he says.
Name: N/A
Level: 2
Experience: 0/3
Health: 52/52
Stamina: 52/52
Mana: 5/5
Body: 2
Sense: 1
Mind: 1
Intuition: 1
Yin: 1
Yang: 1
Stat Total: 7
Ok, so his numbers did go up. Honestly, he was hoping for more dramatic changes. Still, it''s just one level. There are plenty more where that came from.
Time for round two with the monkeys. He heads into the castle. On the way to the adventurer he combs the path for branches. It’s a lot harder to find stuff in the dark. Eventually he comes across one that’s a bit bigger than the others. He breaks it in half over his knee, throws away the skinny end, and snaps off the twigs. What’s left bears a passable resemblance to a club. He gives it a few experimental swings, feeling the weight in his hands.
“What’s this?” he says.
“Stick. Damage +2. Firewood. Possible crafting material. A makeshift weapon.”
Well, that’s twice as strong as the branch he used last time. He’s making progress.
He doesn’t stick so close to the path this time. He wanders off in both directions, seeing what’s there. He finds mostly more trees, plants, and some berries that the status window will not definitively say are not poisonous. The menu is kinda shit sometimes.
Soon enough he spots the dead adventurer through the trees. The bag is still lying next to him with, just as he expected, an animal sniffing at it. This is a scripted encounter.
What is surprising is that this particular animal doesn’t look like a monkey. It’s longer, lower to the ground, and he can see its large ears twitching back and forth.
“Status?” he whispers “What’s that?”
A window pops up.
“Miser Rat. A low-level inhabitant of Tutorial Castle. Usually found at night or in the lower levels of the castle. What do they do with the things they steal?”
He was trying to be quiet, but the rat swivels to look at him. The stars gleam in its little black eyes. Above its head appear the words “Miser Rat: Lvl 1” and a red health bar.
Nothing for it. Jonathan steps slowly towards the sack, club held at the ready. Maybe this rat has a greater sense of self-preservation than the monkey, maybe he can scare it off.
“Hey!” he says.
The rat’s ears twitch, but otherwise, it doesn’t move.
“Hey, piss off!”
Nothing. He slams his club against the nearest tree, creating a boom and a shower of twigs but no reaction from the rat. Fine. He’ll do this the hard way.
One more step and the rat is moving, a streak of fur and flying, naked tail. He steps back, swings his club, both too slow. It sinks its teeth into his ankle. Not-pain shoots up his leg, and his health bar appears at the edge of his vision.
47/52
Shit! Jonathan bellows and swings the club into the rat’s side. It lets go. A neat slice vanishes from its health bar. It scampers off a few feet, lets out a high bellow that sounds nothing like a squeak, and then it’s coming at him again.
Jonathan’s ready for it this time. His club hits it just beneath the ear before it can reach him. It reels back, blood darkening its fur.
They keep at it for a few long minutes, scrambling back and forth, crashing through the underbrush, Jonathan’s breath booming loud in his ears. His club is proving a definitive advantage, the rat just can’t get at him. It will run off a bit, keeping away from the club, then dart in to try to catch him off guard. Jonathan isn’t doing too well either though. He''s hit it a few times, but he can’t get in close enough finish it off. It’s too fast. He tries to pin it against a tree or the walls that loom up out of the darkness, but it always slips away.
He may be winning the battle in terms of health, its red bar is going down faster than his, but a green bar has appeared beneath it in the corner of his vision. Stamina. The avatar’s tiring. He can’t do this forever, while the rat seems inexhaustible. Worse, if he stumbles on a root or something in the dark, it will be on him pretty damn qu– Shit!
It''s coming. He swings the club down only just in time, clipping it on the shoulder and sending it scurrying back. It has maybe a third of its health left. It lets out a high, chirping cry, as though in pain.
The monkey screamed too, when it knew it was going to lose. That''s when the second one showed up.
Jonathan steps back, only just in time as the underbrush explodes and now there’s two of them. The rats circle him, indistinguishable save for their health bars, and he has to get away, he has to put his back to a wall before–
They attack at the same moment. He gets one of them with the club, is turning towards the other, but it leaps, hits him in the side of the knee, and he’s falling. He crashes to the ground, roots and dead leaves whirling across his vision. Sharp little teeth dig into his thigh.
42/50
He struggles to rise, but the other rat is on his back, paws scrambling against his skin, teeth biting into his shoulder.
37/52
32/52
He’s going to die again. In a panic, Jonathan lashes out blindly with his club. The rat behind him backs up a step. Its health bar is nearly full. That means the first one, the wounded one is on his back.
29/52
Planting the butt end of his club on the ground, Jonathan pushes himself to his knees. He reaches up with his other hand, sinks his fingers into something furry and squirming. With a howl he pulls it off him and slams it into the ground. The other one is back on him instantly, but no time for that now.
24/52
The rat twists and writhes, but he has his whole weight on it, holding it down.
18/52
He slams his club into its head. Once. Twice. Three times. It goes still.
“Defeated Miser Rat: Lvl 1”
“2 Experience Gained”
The other rat lets go. Acting on instinct and adrenalin, Jonathan whirls, reaching for it. It''s turned its back and is heading away from him. It''s trying to run. He throws himself flat, his fingers close on the end of a ropey tail. The rat squeals, writhing, pulling, digging its paws into the earth. He lets go of his club, lays both hands on the tail, and hauls it towards him, struggling up to elbows and knees. It digs its paws into the undergrowth, fights him for every inch, but Jonathan is too strong for it. He regains his feet, and now he has the wiggling little bastard by the tail, half suspended above the ground with its back legs kicking furiously at nothing.
The rat screams. He screams back, louder. He pivots, puts all his weight, all his momentum behind a swing that picks the rat off its feet and carries it flying through the air until it hits a tree with a loud thump. Half its health disappears.
Jonathan hauls it back around, swings it again. It’s kind of like baseball, except instead of trying to hit a little ball with a bat you’re trying to hit a huge tree with a rat. Lot easier than baseball, really. Which is just as well, because Jonathan was always shit at sports.
The rat squeals and goes limp.
“Defeated Miser Rat: Lvl 1”
“2 Experience Gained”
“Level Up!”
“Level: 3”
“Experience till next level: 1/5”
“Unspent Skill Points: 1”
He laughs, primal and alive.