Re; Hell Gate

Chapter 2 : Azmarin Beginners' Village

'You have been transported in 'Azmarin beginner's village'

The transportation didn't even last 10 seconds. He looked around and saw countless people, like literally endless people of various races and appearances.

He couldn't even properly move, they were shouting and yelling here and there, some asking for help. Leiu couldn't believe what's happening right now.

"Searching for a party for the beginning quest!"

"Looking for an 'experienced' player!"

"Looking for a beta tester! We'll pay real-life money, please contact us!"

Leiu inwardly mocked them, the game just opened yet they're seeking experienced players, it was just plain idiotic. There are gaming organizations that have experts in them but it isn't certain that they'll excel at Hell Gate.

Leiu tried his best to squeeze in between the crowd of people and go find some quests.

Naturally, most of the people knew that quests have a '!' symbol on top of the NPC. However, the questing system of Hell Gate was different and such icons were non-existent. Any NPC could give a quest as long as you speak the right words.

As for the beginner's village, he couldn't even contemplate it, there were just too many people to even see the gate leading outside. Which was really a shame, he knew there were a lot of beginner villages, yet despite that, the number of people here was really insane.

Thoughts of logging off and returning later at night occurred to him but he soon shrugged that idea off as he had to work tomorrow at 10:00 AM.

Yes, he quitted most of his part-time jobs as he had enough money for himself and his sister for quite a while. But that didn't mean he had to become jobless, he kept the best part-time job he had, the pay wasn't bad and it was only 6 hours a day. Furthermore, the starting time was not too late nor too early, so it suited his requirements.

...

It took Leiu roughly half an hour to arrive next to an NPC 80 meters away from his starting location. It seemed hard to believe but, unfortunately, it was the truth. The swarm of people began to lessen a bit as most of them directly went outside to level unlike Leiu, who wanted to gather as many quests as he could before departing.

He had a habit of taking all the available quests, then go and clear them at the same time. Then he would return and receive the rewards, he had always done this in the past and it proved to be a very effective method.

Actually, only newbies or idiots would directly head outside, professional gamers weren't that reckless. First of all, one had to buy equipment. Leiu noticed that he didn't have any weapon equipped, so there must be a way to get a weapon.

Going barehanded would only lead to his death, he wasn't even sure which class to pick yet, it was a bit fortunate that classes were unlocked at LVL 10. So it was early to think about that, however, that doesn't mean he's going to ignore classes till the last second. Some of the information he stumbled upon stated that classes were not chosen by players, but by the system.

For example, if you picked a shield, a one-handed sword and you played with that until LVL10, then you would automatically be a warrior. Of course, there were variables which could change the class or even allow you to obtain rare and unique classes–such as paladin, berserker and so on–but it was not easy to get on of these.

Another example was taking a staff or a wand, although you couldn't have any skills if you attacked with that, you would either get a healer class or a mage class. A staff for healers and a wand for mages.

Leiu didn't completely believe this, but he had a hunch that this was true. Moreover, since he began playing MMORPG games he always chose a DPS class. But not any DPS class, one that would be good at tanking and soloing yet at the same time could deal bursts of damage. He always enjoyed being alone and soloing everything, so such classes suited him best.

He also managed to open his status window. Apparently, each person would have unique stats, though the difference was meager and most of the people would have similar beginning stats.

TITLE : NONE
Level: 1 Class: NONE
-
Strength: 9
Intelligence: 9
Agility: 8
Wisdom: 6
Vitality: 8
Dexterity:7
- - - -
Health: 10
Mana: 12
Stamina: 13

Leiu arrived in front of the NPC who looked like an old man. He held a wooden stick in his right hand and his back was a bit hunchback. When Leiu was a couple of meters away from the old man, the latter turned his gaze toward the black-haired youth coming toward him.
Leiu named himself 'Nameless', it was a weird name but since his naming sense is quite bad, he went with that.

"Ah! What an energetic young man, may I ask what do you need from this old man?"

Leiu was never a talkative person, however, in a game such as this one, he was forced to converse with NPCs.

"Hello... Do you have anything I could help you with?"

Unlike what Leiu thought, the NPCs looked very realistic and didn't talk like robots, they spoke and behaved like normal people. He didn't have the occasion to see a lot of them yet, only a dozen or so, but every single one of them acted differently.

"Ha ha ha, I see that the new adventurers are very kind and enthusiastic. Indeed there is something that I need some help with. If you don't mind, could you get rid of the Bees causing trouble right outside of the village? Several children were hurt because of them."

Hearing that, a blue window popped up in front of Leiu, showing him the quest.

Quest : Get rid of the bees outside of the village, 0/5 Savage Bees

Difficulty : F

Would you like to accept the quest? Y/N

'Yes'

Just as he accepted the quest, the old man smiled at him and spoke yet again.

"Oh my! Thank you, thank you! I expect great things from a young adventurer like you. If you get rid of the Bees, then I'll give you good rewards, don't worry!"

Leiu didn't spoke any more and headed directly toward the next NPC to get the remaining quests. Although the number of people had lessened, moving around was still annoying and took a lot of time. Still, Leiu managed to get all the available quests after one hour of intense struggle.

Quests :

Get rid of the Savage Bees 0/5

Help the blacksmith get Savage Rabit fur : 0/6 Savage rabit fur

Gather Sun Snowberries for 'Jessica' : 0/4 Sun Slowberries

Completely destroy the home of the Savage bees : 0/1

There were 4 quests in total and they didn't seem really hard. The last one had an 'E' difficulty though, but for Leiu it seemed easy too. Well, he might change his mind later after experiencing real fighting.

Oh, and by the way, the amount of pain felt when fighting was lessened by a huge amount. You would only feel 5% of the pain, it's not a lot, but it's not little either. You could buy a more expensive headset that allowed you to feel 0% pain but that was very, very expensive. How could someone like Leiu afford it?

'It's fine as long as I don't get hit!' or so Leiu thought. He never really fought in real life, but he had a hunch that he would not screw up too much and be able to cope with the game quite easily.

He also bought a weapon. While checking his inventory he noticed it was totally empty, yet at the left corner, there was a spot which indicated the amount of money he had. Of course, he didn't have a lot, every beginner was given only 50 coppers. It wasn't a lot, but it was enough for him to buy a weapon and 1 Health Potion.

Minor Health Potion : Recovers 5 Health

One-handed bronze sword : +1 Strength

He wasn't sure which class to pick but it would definitely not be a healer or mage class. Although they were very good, especially the mage classes who were always known to be the highest damage dealers in every game, he never really liked either of those. He personally liked melee classes, because they had a much better tanking efficiency and also because their damage was not that low compared to mages classes.

Leiu bought the most basic weapon available, which was a sword because it was the easiest to wield. There were also spears, axes, and maces, but he knew he couldn't handle those, so he picked that sword. Maybe he would choose warrior, or maybe something else. Only his performance would decide.

..

Finally, it was time to check the outside and experience real fighting. It would be a lie to say he wasn't excited, in fact, his eyes were burning with excitement and eagerness. If it had not been that crowded he would have run outside with all his might.

Fortunately, it didn't take him a lot of time to squeeze out of the crowd and get out. The outside was much much broader than the village. Without the presence of lots of people, moving became much easier, the problem now was... finding monsters to kill. Everywhere you looked, there were people killing savage deers, rabbits and so on...

Without joining a party, he wouldn't be able to find a peaceful place to hunt. But for Leiu it was impossible to get in a party with strangers. It's not like MMORPG, where everything was virtual. Right now, cunning people would show up and use their tricks to scam newbies and idiots.

With that thought in mind, he headed deeper into the beginner's forest, hoping to find Bees and Rabbits so he could finish the quests.

***