"Speaking/speaking"
'thinking/thinking'
"Skills/skills"
items/items•
Light, too much of it, roused him from his sleep.
His closed eyes tightened, trying their hardest to block as much of the bright light as possible.
A yawn escaped his lips as he sat up and rubbed the drowsiness off his eyes.
He's in a field, strange, the game should've shut down by now. There's a strangely real numbness all around his body that usually appears when one just woke up from a long and restful sleep.
He stood up, prepared to go back inside Prontera to ask other players that might still be online what could've happened, but when he turned around, the walled city of the capital of Rune Midgards was gone. In the place where it should be standing is an empty, treeless grassland.
"What the…" he could only mutter in disbelief. Confusion quickly took over him as he frantically turned in every direction to try and see if he just accidentally teleported away.
He snapped his fingers to summon the game menu to open the map, but nothing happened.
No menu screen popped up as there should.
He tried once again, but the same thing happened.
"Storage."
He intoned. Nothing happened, but strangely, he feels as if something should've happened like normally, and he's just being prevented by something.
He tried various other vocal commands but not a single one worked.
Without the menu, he can't log out. Being trapped inside a game is unheard of, and even impossible due to features built into the headpieces by the order of the government in fear of people being trapped like what was shown in some popular media a decade or two back.
He didn't panic, there's no reason to. He just has to wait for the popup that appears every hour that asks people if they still want to continue or shut the headpiece off.
"This is really strange, the *Ragnarok* serve-" he didn't get to finish his sentence, as soon as the word "Ragnarok" left his mouth, a new window appeared.
*Notice*
*The Ragnarok is now bound to one Eremes Guile.
To access other features, The user must have the appropriate skills*
Eremes was shocked, stunned even. "Is this for real?" He could only whisper to himself.
Suddenly, it all clicked with him. The grogginess that he shouldn't have felt inside the game, the numbness of his body and just now, the shiver he felt as he re-read the notification.
His mind razed, if he's here then it's only logical that his friends are here as well.
"Friend list!" He shouted in a frenzied voice. But he only got the same feeling that something should've happened.
He clicked his tongue when he realized what he was missing.
To access the friend list, he needed to have the appropriate skills like the notice said. But to have those skills meant he has to level up his job level to use skill points.
'But how?'
He scrambled his brains. Trying to come up with a solution to this unexpected hitch.
He doesn't even know if the place he's in, since he's very clearly not Midgards, even has monsters. A field like this would never be empty. It would've been filled with either porings bouncing around or some creamy flying slowly.
But none as far as he could see.
He looked down on his getup and saw that he was wearing a plain brown shirt. A standard clothing for a novice in Ragnarok.
'Don't tell me I turned into a novice once again'
Although the clothes he was wearing has a darker shade than what a regular Novice wears, making it clear that he's a High novice, or a transcended novice, rather than a normal one
On the belt of his pants hang a sheathed knife. Another standard novice equipment.
He could only sigh and continue brainstorming.
Staying in the same place meant not leveling up his job level and gaining the necessary skill to utilize the basic functions of Ragnarok.
So he left, he chose a direction and headed there with no clear destination, just pure, thoughtless, walking.
He continued for what he presumed was more than an hour since the sun in the sky, or whatever they refer to it here, has moved by quite a lot. The field got less and less empty as he walked. Now he was in an area which has a dirt track, something that told him people lived here and are maybe nearby.
He would've continued walking if not for the sheer boredom and the monotony of his walk.
He sat under the shade of a tree which has a fruit that looks like an apple. Thoughtlessly, he plucked one that was close to the ground due to how low a branch is hanging.
A name and description appeared above the apple in his hand.
apple•
*A round, edible fruit that, when eaten once a day, keeps the doctor away.
Recovers a small amount of Health.*
He could only sweatdrop.
"The description made me feel like I'm stupid, but at least it's an apple." he plucked another one from the branch and pocketed it before he began chowing down the first one.
He ate in silence and had his short rest.
-unnamed field-
His brisk walk was hurried as the sun was beginning to set, casting a beautiful orange hue to his surroundings.
He's following the dirt path he saw earlier that led to who knows where, but he doesn't have a choice. He could either walk aimlessly or follow it.
He has a feeling that he's nowhere close to the nearest city but spending the night in an unknown field is out of the equation. He doesn't know what happens in these fields at night. It may be silent in the morning but at night it could be crawling with monsters, monsters which he doesn't know if he could take on due to how his level and jobs were reset.
He feels weak. He doesn't even have access to his status.
Normally the status window was included in the basic feature that you could access at the start of the game, but when he intoned it, he only got the same feeling he felt while trying out other features.
*growwwwwl~~* a rumble from his stomach made him slow down.
One of the new things he discovered is he now feels hunger like outside the game. Meaning this really is reality and he now has to find sustenance based on the loud grumbling of his stomach if he wants to continue his walk.
He dug into his pockets where he stashed another apple he picked earlier and began eating it as he walked.
Denial of the end -
Night has fallen and darkness has covered the fields. It was quiet, so eerily quiet. No sound could be heard aside from the occasional rush of wind beside his ears. Not even a single cricket could be heard annoyingly chirp.
He did not rest, his eyes, capable of seeing clear in the dark thanks to his physiology.
His brisk walk didn't slow down, he kept walking and only occasionally stopping every once in a while because of sheer boredom.
The part of the large field he's walking through was now nearly devoid of trees, only a scant few remained.
The sky was clear. The moon, or whatever they call it here, shone brightly with a yellowish-white sheen.
At some point of his walk he unsheathed the knife from his belt and held it. Not out of caution, but boredom.
It's been quite a while but he still hasn't found any monsters. He saw a few animals along the way, which was good, but he doubts they will give him enough experience to level up.
"Haaaaah" he sighed and slumped forward on his walk. He's used to walking long distances due to how far the entrances of the dungeons are from cities, but it's never this boring since he can play music and distract himself with the Ragnarok Online System.
' would the •headphones Costume• still work here, I wonde-' his thoughts stopped.
*Crunch* *Crunch* *Crunch*
Sounds of the ground breaking could be heard coming from behind him. He turned around and there, tiny creatures with green skin and grotesque proportions were starting to claw their way out of the ground. Goblins, he recognized them quickly due to some unsavory media he saw before being transported here.
It seems that his presence caused them to rouse from their sleep.
"These weren't monsters from Ragnarok." Eremes remarked. He didn't wait for every single one of them to finish pulling themselves off the ground though. Instead, he held his knife tightly and rushed towards the nearest one.
It didn't even get the chance to retaliate as Eremes' quick movements caught it off guard and by the time it registered his existence, a slash already separated its head from its shoulders, splashing Eremes with its thick blood that reeked of a revolting scent.
"And I don't have a change of clothes." He noted with a head shake.
The horde, finally out of their burrow, registered his presence and began charging towards him.
With a quick glance, Eremes counted the unexpected horde to be around 25 or above.
Then "Skrree!" One of them went for a grab but Eremes' longer reach allowed him to catch the goblin's wrist before tossing it towards the horde in a swing, causing some to fall backwards, slowing the others.
'surprisingly light'
Eremes followed by stomping on the tossed goblin's head, bursting it like a fruit under his boots.
The incapacitated goblins didn't get a chance to retaliate as Eremes' dagger made quick work of them, beheading each one with precision honed by years of playing Ragnarok Online.
The ones that remain became cautious, showing the bare minimum of sentience as they backed away when Eremes ended their comrade's lives
It didn't take long for Eremes to completely decimate the weak goblins.
When he was done, he noticed a small crystal of sorts sticking out from one of the goblins' open wounds. Curious, he plucked it from the corpse causing it to lose the coloration on its skin, and then limbs started to fall off before it crumbled into dust and vanished as if it was never there.
A description screen appeared above the small crystal in his hand.
Magic stone(Surface goblin)•
"A magic stone from a surface Goblin."
"Could be useful, but first,
*Base level has increased by 2*
*Job level has increased by 4*
Finally."
Eremes didn't waste any more time and put the 3 job skill points he acquired from his job level up into the *basic Skills* skill on his UI.
The first level allowed him to use basic features of the Ragnarok system such as Status and Storage.
The second one allowed him to passively recover his Mana at a faster rate.
And the last one for now gave him access to *Friendlist*
"Friend list"
The name of his friends appeared inside a new translucent UI in front of him. But their names have been greyed out. Meaning they're offline, and in this case, being offline meant they're not with him in this world.
"Of course. What did I expect?" he sighed.
He shook off his disappointment and went back to collecting the stones from the remaining goblin corpses.
At the end, he got a total of 29 magic stones from the goblins and even a fang that remained after a goblin's corpse crumbled.
He doesn't know if they're worth anything but since he now has access to his inventory, he thought he might as well keep them.
He might've survived the fight, if you could even call it that, without a scratch, but his clothes weren't as fortunate. His plain shirt and pants were smothered with goblin blood. He doesn't have a change of clothes on hand, but he might have something in his inventory.
"Inventory."
A new window appeared in his vision as the words left his mouth.
It has three segments labeled items, equips, and ETC. The 'items' tab was almost empty, only a few scrolls, potions and kafra vouchers remained.
His 'equips' tab doesn't fare much better either. It has his old weapons and gears, but none of them is usable for him because of the level requirement. His main assassin weapon
+14 Awakened Old King's Twin Blades•
required him to be level 130 or above.
There are the sets of Eden Group equipment that he couldn't get rid of.
But the most basic of them still requires him to be at least level 12.
He could look into his kafra storage but most of the items in there are just as unusable as the ones he has on hand.
'On second thought, I might as well skim through them.'
*Would you like to use the kafra storage voucher? [Y][N]*
"Yes"
A few minutes of browsing through his kafra storage yielded a good result. He found some equipment that he could use without a level requirement and some that required a little effort to use.
Including the ones that doesn't require a certain level threshold to use was the
full penetration shadow set •
A set of Shadow equipment.
But what exactly is shadow equipment?
Well, Shadow Equipment or Shadow Gear are ethereal magic items that are worn over your existing gear that give bonuses to your abilities in combat. It is completely invisible to the naked eye when being worn.
He looked at the description of each item from the set and carefully analyzed them. It's been a while since he used them after all.
Full Penetration Shadow Earring•
"Ignore defense of all race monsters by 5%.
------------------------
For every 2 refine level, ignore defense of all race monsters by additional 1%.
------------------------
When refined to +10 or higher, increase physical damage against all race monsters by 3%.
------------------------
Set Bonus:
Full Penetration Shadow Earring
Full Penetration Shadow Pendant
ATK + 2%.
------------------------
If the sum of refine rate of set is 18 or higher,
ignore defense of all race monsters by 100%.
------------------------
Class : Shadow Equipment
Location : Earring
Weight : 0
Required Level : 1"
Its combo, the •Full Penetration Shadow Pendant•
Has the same effect.
But there's a slight problem.
He checked the shadow armor to see if it is missing the same thing he's looking for.
Full Penetration Shadow Armor•
"Ignore defense of all race monsters by 5%.
------------------------
For every 2 refine level, ignore defense of all race monsters by additional 1%.
------------------------
When refined to +10 or higher, increase physical damage against all race monsters by 3%.
------------------------
Set Bonus:
Full Penetration Shadow Armor
Full Penetration Shadow Shoes
ATK + 2%.
------------------------
If the sum of refine rate of set is 18 or higher,
ignore defense of all race monsters by 100%.
------------------------
Class : Shadow Equipment
Location : Armor
Weight : 0
Required Level : 1"
He checked the shadow shoes.
Full Penetration Shadow Shoes•
"Ignore defense of all race monsters by 5%.
------------------------
For every 2 refine level, ignore defense of all race monsters (except player) by additional 1%.
------------------------
When refined to +10 or higher, increase physical damage against all race monsters by 3%.
------------------------
Class : Shadow Equipment
Location : Shoes
Weight : 0
Required Level : 1"
And it too, lacked the thing he was looking for.
It doesn't have an upgrade level.
The set he used a long time ago was fully upgraded. It cost him a little over 10 billion Zeny to fully upgrade only to replace it with a better one when he reached level 200.
'Did I sell it?' he wondered.
He wanted to upgrade them now, but not only does he lack the skills currently, he needed to level up quite a bit before he could use Smith skills once again. Meaning he has to make do with the base shadow equipment for now.
'Come to think of it, there was a time when I was out of money outside of Ragnarok. I might've sold it back then'
He also couldn't upgrade his current sets now even if he wanted to, for that, he needed the "refine" skill of a Whitesmith, which would take him a while to get. How long exactly? He doesn't know.
Really, he thought that he was going to be a lot stronger when he finally had access to his Kafra Storage but he realized that his equipment still depends on how strong he is on base.
He finished gearing up and also replaced the bloodied shirt and pants with the ones he has in his Kafra Storage.
With a simple rice hat on his head, a plain set of clothes, and the invisible shadow equipment, he began walking once again.
End
-D-O-T-E-
*A/N*
Heyyyyyyy! author here! Just wanted to let you guys know that I might not be able to update frequently because of a tight schedule. I'm busy with some school stuff. I was diagnosed with pneumonia about 2 weeks ago. I'm focusing on recovery right now so I hope you guys don't get too bored waiting for me to update. Thanks for reading.
I appreciate all of you!
Please leave a comment and continue supporting me!
Peace!
PS: you can check the item description of the items and Monsters I use in this Fic on divine-pride(dot)net. For example! The rice hat he was using right at the end was called sakkat. Check it out.
Info: Ragnarok online has a different leveling system, far different that danmachi's on the current version of the game, the max level for a character is 260. Now, how would I incorporate his other level system with the world of danmachi? Well, since only Ereme has the Ragnarok Online's level system. I decided that for every Danmachi level, Eremes would need 25 Ragnarok Online levels. Which might sound a lot if you're comparing it to danmachi levels, but it is roughly a match if we consider the max level on Danmachi to be level 10 at the moment.
The current max level on Ragnarok online could still increase, especially since the latest update on the Korea server still hasn't arrived on the International server but I guess we'll cross that bridge when we get there.
That's about it for the info dump! BuhBye!!!!!