Chapter 177: Excellent Firelink Bearer, Fearless!
The game screen turned black, followed by an uncontrollable cinematic. The scene first appeared in a dark dungeon, with a swarm of rats running. Then, the camera slowly panned, revealing the general layout of the gloomy dungeon. Finally, the view changed to a cell. Under the torch, against the wall, lay a skeletal corpse, without knowing whether it would die or not.
A deep voice-over began.
"The Ring of Darkness represents the curse of the undead. Therefore, all undead will be captured and sent north, to prison, until the end of the world."
"This is also your destiny."
The camera changed to a cell. The character Tom had previously created was hiding in a corner, enveloped in darkness.
"Wait! How did I become a zombie?".
...Tom was startled. He had spent a long time in the character creation interface, finally creating a character that was not scary, but had a lot of personality. But upon entering the game, was he instantly transformed into an unrecognizable zombie?.
'What had he been doing all this time?'.
Tom was speechless when his character in the game suddenly looked up. A ray of sunlight filtered through the skylight. With a plop, a skeletal corpse fell from the skylight, landing on the floor of the cell. A white light emanated from the corpse.
Having played Dark Souls before, Tom knew that this white light represented a lootable item. After dropping the corpse from the skylight, the knight simply walked away. Tom had seen this scene in the promotional trailer from the previous expo, although not complete. But after connecting the dots, he understood the general context well.
In the previous game, the player played as cinders, incombustible garbage that could not burn even if he tried. The undead, on the other hand, were clearly combustible garbage, and this place called the Undead Asylum could be understood, broadly, as a landfill, a specific place for them.
After briefly summarizing the information, Tom, looking at the game's interface, controlled his character to approach the corpse, caught the white light, and instantly it was shown to him that he had obtained the cell key.
After briefly familiarizing himself with the basic controls, he discovered that they were no different from those of previous Dark Souls, with no significant changes to the combat system. This gave him a wave of joy. The combat system was familiar to him; did that mean he would no longer have to suffer through it?.
After all, he had spent hundreds of hours playing the previous game. Shouldn't he be able to quickly get used to the new game?.
However, Tom's joy was short-lived, as he soon realized a crucial problem.
"Why am I overweight? And I'm a knight, right? I have armor, but why am I holding a broken sword? Where are my shield and sword?".
"What the hell? Is it because I've become a zombie that I've lost my strength?".
...Tom asked, completely bewildered. In previous Dark Souls, even those who had nothing still had a little chicken thigh. But now, he only had a little broken sword? Didn't they give him weapons at the beginning, forcing him to fend for himself?.
And then there's the weight. Although they gave me a knight's armor, it's overweight! Rolling and even walking is as slow as a turtle.
'But isn't this the starting class equipment? How can it be overweight?'.
Seeing the knight in the game fall to the ground, with such slow movements, Tom felt a pang of annoyance.
"Maybe this increases the difficulty? The knight starts overweight, but has high defense, while the normal character starts with low defense?".
"And I can temporarily take off my equipment to gain agility. Is it a compromise?".
As an excellent Firelink Bearer, Tom's greatest strength after playing Dark Souls is that when he finds something strange in the game, he does not blindly assume it is the designers' fault, but considers whether there is a deeper meaning.
Now, in his mind, he has found a perfect and convincing reason to choose a knight, but starting with no shield or sword, and considering that the armor weighs too much.
Seeing the broken sword in his hand, Tom felt a pang of annoyance. Especially looking at the weapon's attack panel, he was speechless. In the previous game, this weapon was so big that it took up too much space in the backpack.
After searching the cell, Tom was completely sure that the broken sword was his original weapon. As for his armor, after thinking about it for a bit, he decided to take off the helmet and armor.
After all, he was not a fire-breathing novice, but a battle-hardened cinder from the original game. Although he had become an undead in the prequel, his experience was still there.
Although many veteran players joked that the armor in Dark Souls was completely useless, wearing it was like folding a piece of paper, it actually gave new players a lot of margin for error. So, if there was armor with the right defense or resistance, it was a good idea to use it. However, there was a prerequisite: not to be overweight.
Being too overweight would affect the somersaults, and somersaults were undoubtedly the essence of Dark Souls. So, faced with the dilemma between defense and agility, Tom chose agility.
"But... this is another way of having nothing," Tom said, speechless, looking at his shirtless character.
He had been fixing his face in vain. What a useless class!.
Using the newly acquired cell key, he opened the iron door. With a creak, the door opened, but Tom felt a wave of nervousness. It was incredibly dark in there, which severely limited his vision. In the previous game, the Cemetery of Cinders, where he had just appeared, was at least dimly lit. This cell, however, looked like a ghost.
The scattered monsters huddled in dark corners, with no health bars, which made it easy to overlook them without careful observation. Luckily, these zombies were surprisingly easy to eliminate, even easier than the common zombies on the walls of Lothric. However, they had no desire to attack. He wondered what would happen next.
Along the way, there were some blood-stained warnings, mostly instructions for player control.
"The damage is so low! In the previous game, it was one or two hits, but now it's three or four. Could it be that the difficulty in the new game is due to the nerfs?".
Tom muttered to himself as he eliminated a few zombies along the way. However, he didn't give them much importance and continued to explore.
The first stages of the prison would not be too difficult. Along the way, he encountered some zombies. He easily eliminated them with his broken sword.
The only difference was that, true to the game's name, Dark Souls, the prison was a bit dark and gloomy. Compared to the Cemetery of Cinders where you appeared in the previous Dark Souls, this one was a little spookier.
But after the baptism of fire in Silent Hill PT, this was a minor problem. Although he had learned that baptism from other players' games, with their downloads and high-energy warnings, it was still a baptism.
The journey was not particularly challenging; Tom even felt it was easier than in the previous game. He had even lost some health at the beginning.
'But now? No damage!'.
After all, I am no longer the same as before. I am a different person now!.
With a sigh of excitement, Tom climbed the ladder from the pit and reached the first bonfire.
"Bonfire, here comes the first master who gives up!".
Seeing the bonfire before him, Tom's eyes lit up.
But he was not afraid, but was filled with excitement.
After all, he had evolved. So what if he had no shield? So what if he had no weapons?
'A good Firelink Bearer is not afraid!'.
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