[IC] Wings of Ash

[Serinaty]

The world of Ashlin seeks a Hero...

So many players read those words as they entered the game...As soon as it hit shelves the game was selling faster than the shop's could restock their shelves....Millions of players all excited to explore this brand new world...And what a world it was...Ashlin, separated into 9 sectors, begged to be explored. The first thing players saw when they logged in was the City of Beginnings, Maori. A sprawling city welcoming all new adventurers, Its fountain plaza a great meeting place, people scattered about, snippets of conversation floating through the air "Wanna join my guild?" "Hey have you been to the first dungeon yet?" "Wanna trade?" "Where's the best place to level?" "Hey! How do I get this skill to work! I'm stuck! :(" ... Past the Fountain Plaza was the Market district, the walls lined with stalls selling items, armor, weapons, even a few player guild run shops offering tradeable dungeon loot. At the end of the Market district lay a fork, to the left, the Guild Halls where players could form their own guilds or join an established one, to the right...the Grand Gate to the world....and the adventure that awaited there...Its open green plains welcoming the players to Ashlin.

Each player would find in their inventory upon logging in for the first time, 3 teleport stones, an 'incomplete' map that they find would fill the more they explored, and a compass as well as their basic equipment....How would they proceed on their adventure? Would they travel alone...? Or make friends in the world? Start a guild? The world was open to them to make their own choices...their own adventure...

A watchful gaze peered over the new players..."heh...I wonder if the ones I seek are here..." Soft red lips spoke aloud to no one from one of the rooftops near where players spawned. In a burst of feathers the figure disappeared into the Aether...

(( This is what the music would sound like in the town ))

[River]

Evelyn turned the key and opened the door to her apartment. Sighing in relief, she pulled off her heels and undid the top two buttons of her shirt. It was around dinnertime, but she didn't feel like cooking just yet. Instead, she plopped down on the couch and opened her laptop, which lay beside her. A grin spread across her face when she saw the icon on her desktop: the new game had finally finished downloading. I'll just play for a little while... Evelyn reasoned, and she double clicked on the icon. The game booted up.

The world of Ashlin seeks a hero...

Evelyn named her character Hera, after the queen of the goddesses in Greek mythology. She was a woman of great grace and power, and the perfect model for her character. Hera swung her sword around to get a feel for it, and let out a laugh. It felt good to move her limbs, even if it was just a game. She placed one hand beneath the sword and examined it. It was your typical starter item: a bit rusty, low attack and a bit lightweight for her taste, but it would do for now. She looked down at her armor, which was in similar condition to the sword. Her arms and legs were plated with a dull steel-like metal, and her chest was covered by hard leather. It seems that the game had not provided her with a helmet.

Finally, Hera looked around her at the City of Beginnings, which her interface told her was known as Maori. Hera found it strange that the starter town was named after the native population of New Zealand, but figured it was just a coincidence. Looking back down at her sword, Hera decided that she needed to upgrade it as soon as possible, but her inventory reminded her that she had no gold. She wondered how she would make gold in this world. Most likely, she would be able to earn some by completing quests and killing enemies. Ready to jump right in, Hera wandered down the nearest street in search of a quest. She came upon a building with a sign hanging over it, stating that it was "The Rat Tavern". Shrugging, Hera figured this was as good a place as any to find a quest, and she wandered inside.

[Xzayler]

Jason was sitting in front of his computer. He just ate a massive lunch and made sure to drink a lot of water. He even went to the toilet after putting on the most comfortable clothes he could find. He wanted to fully enjoy this game, he didn't want anything to break his immersion for at least a couple of hours.

He put on the gear needed for the game, such as goggles and finally started the game.

"Wings of Ash"
"Loading"
"..."
"The world of Ashlin seeks a hero..."

Jason chose the beastmaster class when he saw that Grifs could be pets. He named it Blitz because of the potential agility it had.

Jason's character, Xzayler spawned in the City of Beginnings. Everything was so detailed. The buildings, the clear flow of the water, the leaves, some weed growing between the rocks. Tons of other people were spawning along with him. Another player walked to him, his name was xxXSupaBadassKillaXxx.
"Hey, you wanna join my guild?"
"I'll just look around first..."

He opened his inventory, and saw a very basic, greenish brown leather armor and a long whip equipped.
"It's not that bad, could be worse"

Suddenly, he remembered his grif. He looked around and noticed a small creature. Looked more like a kitten with wings and a beak though.

"Well hello there! You are a lot smaller than I expected, we'll grow together though"

He still didn't move from his spawning point and decided he should do something. He walked down a random alley, ignoring all the intrusive players who wanted him to join his guild, be in their team, or trade something. Meanwhile, he was on the lookout for anyone who might seem nice to team up with. He was looking for people with different classes, so they could form a balanced team. He was planning to be one of the best at this game as well. But for that, he needed total immersion. He closed his real eyes and took a couple of deep breaths. He made himself think he was sleeping, shutting the real world out. Then he opened his eyes. He was now a Xillite, a strong Xillite with a whip in his hands and a small Grif by his feet. He was now The Beastmaster.

He lifted his arm up and quickly lowered it, craking his whip. He felt good, the sound showed power, that whips could actually hurt and be useful.
He felt light but powerful, his armor only able to defend him from light damage, but not blocking him in any way.

He set out on the random street again, hoping to somehow get out of the city, into some kind of forest where he could hunt boars or whatever, so that he and Blitz could get their first kill.

[Serinaty]

River said

The Tavern was crawling with players, some laughing and sitting with friends already made, others sitting by themselves...their blank stares showing their owners to be AFK. A large group of players were circled around an NPC with an exclamation mark over its head. An obvious quest giver. The NPC, when spoken to, would say the following "Dear me! I'm in need of an adventurer to go and hunt 5 marmots for their pelts! My daughter needs a new coat!" It showed that its rewards would be 50 Gold, and 300 Exp. A player commented on the quest, "I can't wait to start the story line...being able to go into the dungeons...getting real loot...not the vendor crap." The player's friend nodded, "Yeah, but we have to be level 5 before we can enter our first dungeon...and we haven't even left town yet!" "All because you're too scared! You're a Sage! Just let me do all the fighting. You just keep me healed okay?" The pair then walked past Hera back out into the street, heading toward the Grand Gates.

[Gareth]

"Woah dude, where are you going?"

That was his friend Daren's reply to Rick suddenly leaving the new game store, they decided to check out this afternoon. Of course, they had to wait until after their high school classes were done for the day.

But Rick didn't care about leaving his pal, because it just dawned on him that the game he ordered online, two weeks ago, should be here today. "Got an appointment with a game. Sorry man," was his reply over his shoulder, as he bolted out the shop's door and sprinted home.

C'mon, c'mon, let it be there... Please... He had seen a lot of promotions on t.v. about this game-he just had to check it out. About ten minutes later he got home, nearly ran into the door, before he stopped himself and checked the mail box. And it was there. Barely containing his excitement he opened the door, and ignored his parents surprise at his early return home, then proceeded to put the game into his laptop computer.

It took a few minutes for his game to register but he waited and then it started up.

The world of Ashlin seeks a Hero...

It seemed incredible to him that the game seemed so real. He looked at the ground and it seemed to be made out of a kind of stone and it did sort of feel like rocks beneath his feet. And everything looked very detailed, which was all to the good in his opinion. So he decided to take a look at himself and saw that he had dark green leather armor, a sack on his back-which had a compass in it and a few other things. Then he grinned as he noticed that he had a large two handed sword with some serious rust on it strapped to his back beneath the sack.

Good enough for me. Now I just need to level in this game and win.

And so he looked for someone to give directions to find something to fight. Within a minute he found someone who looked like they knew what they were doing and where they were going. Just the type of person he wanted to talk to.

"Yo, guy with the green hat like thing. Can you tell me where I can start getting stronger?"

The guy raised his eyebrows at the younger player, and then took off his hat as he replied respectfully with a slight bow, "Sure thing young Sir, The Grand Gate is a short trip behind you and you'll find plenty of stuff to train on there."

"Great." was Bubba'bob's reply as he turned around and sprinted away...

Heading straight for the Grand Gate as fast as he could run, he was ready to take on anything or at least that's what he thought.

[River]

Upon entering the tavern, Hera spotted a man with an exclamation point over his head, most definitely an NPC. She approached him and listened to his spiel, rolling her eyes at how corny NPCs usually sounded. Hunting marmots seemed like an easy enough task, though, and it would give her some gold and experience, so Hera clicked accept on the quest screen that popped up in front of her.

"I guess I'm off to the Grand Gate now..."

She said to herself, walking out the door behind the two players that had just left in front of her. She wondered how newbies made friends so quickly in this world. She had assumed that she would be playing solo for awhile until she joined a guild or something, but those two new players had already begun taking on quests together. Would the game be more enjoyable if Hera found some friends to play with? Not willing to ponder on it for too long, she continued on towards the Grand Gate with a tight grip on her sword. When she arrived there, she found a large mass of new players standing at the edge between the city and the plains. Many were discussing their course of action between proceeding into an area where they could be attacked and where PvP battles could take place. Hera glanced around at all the new faces for a moment, wondering if there were any other solo players amongst them. Hera pulled up the map in her inventory and took note of a small hill about half a mile outside the gate labeled "Marmot Hill".

"These beginning quests are pretty self explanatory, aren't they?"

She mused, before proceeding through the gate in the direction of the hill.

[Xzayler]

Jason continued down random roads, there were so many things around! A tavern, a weaponsmith, an armorer, some herb shops and as tutorial area as well. He didn't really know where to go and what to check. He popped into the weaponsmith to check what kind of weapons there he could potentially have. He saw steel whips, barbed with metal spikes and all other kinds of cool junk that he would have only in a very long time. He stepped out of the shop and back on the streets. He was so amazed by all there was in the city, that he nearly missed a huge gate where players where amassed. He just walked past everyone and saw a big plain around him with a multitude of paths, he wanted something easy for now. Some prey for Blitz, some weak animal. Jason saw exactly what he was looking for, Marmot Hill.

"Marmots can't be too hard to kill. I mean, that's what baby Grifs eat for snack."
He set out and noticed that not a lot of players came this way.
"Better that way, they won't be stealing my kills"
He noticed one person though, a female knight, up ahead along the path. She was too far to speak to her and he didn't want to run ahead, kind of awkward. A knight would be a good start for a team though.
"I'll just speak to her when if I catch up, we'll just go kill Marmots together"

[River]

When the hill was directly in front of Hera, the marmots came in sight, popping out of various holes. Hera felt a little bad about attacking defenseless creatures such as these, but she reminded herself that it was just a game and that they would re-spawn in minutes. Hera dashed up the hill, making her way to the very top. When she looked down, she saw another player making his way towards the hill. He was a large, bearded fellow that somewhat resembled a bear. He must be a Xilite Hera reasoned. His armor and demeanor suggested that he, too, was a new player. Returning her focus to the hill, Hera noticed a marmot pop out of a hole right in front of her. It eyed her nervously, but didn't attack. Weak enemies such as these rarely made the first move. Drawing her sword, Hera slashed at the marmot and watched its health bar dip into the red zone. Alarmed and wounded, the marmot ran towards her, scratching her leg. This did not deal much damage, but did scratch her armor a bit. Hera raised her sword and dealt the final blow. As the marmot collapsed, it dissolved into pixels and disappeared, leaving a pelt in its place. Hera picked up the pelt and placed it in her inventory.

"One down, four to go!"

She exclaimed, dashing towards another marmot a few feet away from her, a grin on her face. Even those these were easy enemies, it was satisfying to fight, and she found that she handled her sword nicely.

[Xzayler]

Jason caught up with the Knight. He now saw her name was Hera. She didn't seem to notice him, probably too busy fighting the marmots. She was a new player too, judging from the rudimentary armor and rusty sword. However, she seemed to handle it well, not flailing around like many new players.

A marmot suddenly appeared from somewhere close to Xzayler's location, he sent Blitz to deal damage to it. He saw, pleased, that Blitz was also pretty good at handling the situation. He quickly dispatched the Marmot with a few bites and swipes of its claws. The exp bar on the display rose a bit, filling Jason with satisfaction. Blitz's kills count towards as his kills as well, good to know. He decided to talk to the other player first though.
"Hey, I'm Jason. I'm new to this game, and I guess you are too. It might be a bit sudden but you seem to be alone, and so am I. I'm planning on being part of the best team in whole of Ashlin and I figured the best way is to work together right from the start. So... do you want to team up?"

Jason hoped Hera would accept. His was a valid point after all. Working together was the key to beating everyone else. The weakest enemies were always the ones quarreling between each other and blaming the other. That is why he chose the beastmaster class. He already had his own little team from the beginning, composed of him and his beast companion.

[Gareth]

Bubba'bob continued deeper into the plains, and after a few minutes he slowed down. He didn't want to collapse from exhaustion before he even got to fight anything. Then he saw a pig in the distance and took his time approaching it.

I can't have it squealing on me and then have everything else runnin' or I'll never level up. When he was within striking distance, the pig turned to look at him and Bubba held his breath. He was lucky though because the pig simply looked up at him with eyes full of fear and remained completely still. Grinning he drew his sword and struck at its head, but instead of cutting it though-it did no visible damage to the pig, but the h.p. bar instantly vanished and it simply rolled its eyes into its head and collapsed.

First K.O. and no blood. That's alright I guess.... But my sword is like a hammer.... he sighed at his weapon and put it away quietly as a voice called over to him.

"Hey big guy, would you care to join us?" Bubba'bob turned towards the stranger and ended up turning towards two of them. It was hard to tell them apart because they were so similar. Starting with the same brown air, then to the same basic bows strapped to their sides, the same shoes, and it even seemed to Bubba that they had the same faces. Thankfully though there armour was different colors, the speaker had black leather armor while the silent one had orange leather armour.

"Why not, I don't have anything to lose and everything to gain." was Bubba's reply.

The guy in black armor smiled, "Well as you probably saw my name is Seph and my twin brother's name is Tern."

Seph turned to look expectantly at his brother who nodded as he was introduced. Then he turned back to Bubba, "Well you ready to take care of some more pigs, except this time with us?"

Bubba'bob grinned from ear to ear, "I was born ready."

And so the three of them started training together.

[River]

Hera had just finished slashing her fourth marmot and was picking up the droppings when she noticed that the player from before had approached her. She straightened her posture and looked him right in the eyes as he spoke. It may be a video game, but that doesn't mean good manners should be foregone she reminded herself. She did, however, look away for a moment to observe the man's beast, a small grif that more closely resembled a chicken at this point, but could become very powerful, no doubt. She reasoned that this player must be a beastmaster, an interesting choice of class.

Hera was slightly taken aback when he asked her to team up with him, but she understood why he would want to do such a thing. Leveling up and completing quests goes much faster in groups, especially when people of different classes join up and combine their skills. She couldn't help but chuckle when he very seriously told her he was trying to form the best team in Ashlin, but she admired his ambition, and decided to tell him so.

"I admire your ambition, I too would like to be a part of a strong team. Yes, I will team up with you. I'm Evelyn, but I prefer to go by Hera, if you don't mind."

She stated, smiling slightly at the man. She noticed another marmot approach her and it reminded her of her purpose here.

"If we are to team up, you should know that I'm currently on a quest. If you kill five marmots and collect their hides, you can bring them to a man over at the Rat Tavern and he'll give you 50 gold and 300 experience."

She explained, taking a swipe at the last marmot. This time she managed to kill it in one swipe, and she watched as her experience bar maxed out. She felt a warm glow for a moment and then heard a bing. She had managed to level up to level 2. She smiled triumphantly, but knew that she wouldn't be able to gain much more experience by killing marmots.

[Xzayler]

"Nice to meet you Hera. Just call me Jason though, I like it better"

Jason suddenly noticed how Hera rose up to level 2. He clapped calmly in an almost mocking way, which must have looked a bit weird given that his character was a bear-man.
"Congrats. Your first level. I'm still level one, that marmot was the only thing I killed in this game. Hey, did you know that if we are in a team officially, the quests you accept also become my quests? It's very awesome and allows working together to be profitable for all of us."

Jason walked back to where he killed his first marmot. Now a pelt was lying there, which he picked up.
"I guess I'll need these. I'll just quickly kill four more marmots for their pelts. I want to level up as well, and complete the quest. We can form a team later, I'll send you an invitation"
With that Jason turned his character towards a pair of marmots while checking what kind of skills he had.
"Battle Roar huh? Lets try it out." In the next moment Xzayler let out a huge roar, dealing damage to both marmots, but not totally killing them. A slash from the whip and a swipe of Blitz's claws finished the job though.
"Just two more to go, and then we can look for something cooler to do"

[River]

Hera blinked in surprise when Jason used a special skill. She realized she hadn't looked at her skills yet. She pulled down the menu and noticed two skills, but neither would be much use with a low level enemy like a marmot. She would have to give them a try later. For now, she waited patiently as Jason finished collecting pelts.

"We can walk back to the tavern once you finish. Then I'd like to head over to the market and see if I can buy anything useful with the gold I earn. You're more than welcome to join me, if you'd like."

Hera explained as she watched Jason fight. She looked over at the small grif, surprised by its strength. She'd picked up some marmot meat as well, and wondered if the grif would like some.

"What did you name your grif?"

Hera asked, curious about the strange creature.

[Xzayler]

Jason killed the last marmot, collecting the fifth pelt and seeing his level increase.
"My grif? I named him Blitz, I figured he'd be agile in the air, but it seems he still needs to grow a bit."

Jason tried to remember what was the cheapest thing he saw at the weaponsmith, he couldn't though. He was too taken by the very high tier weapons at the time.

"I'm ready to go. Just show me where the tavern was, I remember the way to a weaponsmith from there, and an armorer as well. Lets get going."

Jason was happy at how his dream-team was already on its way. He was curious about the knight class though, he didn't really check it out and he hardly knew anything about his own class either.

"What is the Knight class good at? Or more like, what kind of potential does it have?"

[River]

"Hm, Blitz, I like it. I'm sure he'll live up to his name."

Hera began walking back towards the Grand Gate, signaling for Jason to follow her. She pondered his question as they walked.

"Well, I honestly don't know much about the class myself... I've just always preferred swords, and the knight class caught my eye more-so than the swordmaster. I did read in the manual that knights have the most special skills of any of the weapon art classes and that they're high in strength. I'm interested to see what skills I gain as I level."

Returning through the gate, Hera found it was busy as ever with new players. She stopped for a second to get her bearings, and then remembered to take the second street on her left. Soon, the two of them were in front of the tavern. Hera entered, assuming Jason would follow behind her. She approached the NPC and began chatting with him.

"Thank you for your assistance! Here is your reward!"

Hera watched her experience bar go up significantly. When she checked her inventory, the pelts had been replaced by 50 gold. It didn't seem like much gold, but she would probably have to wait until she could get into the dungeons at level 5 to really gain some gold.

---

Inventory:
Raw marmot meat x5
Gold x50

[Serinaty]

As Hera and Xzayler finished their first quest a window popped up in front of their faces titled "RECOMMENDATIONS" with a list of quests to do below it. It appears you have to do at least one quest to be able to unlock the recommendation tab, it read as follows:

(!) Of Tusks and Cloves (Blacksmith) (LVL 2)
-retrieve 3 piglet tusks and 2 cloves of garlic
(Reward: 30 Gold, 100 xp Choice of 3 Potions or 3 Ethers)
(!) Where's the inn?! (Lost Adventurer Near Fountain) (LVL 2)
-guide the 'lost adventurer' to the Inn then use its facilities
(Reward: 50 xp 50 gold Free night at the Inn token)
(!) Tricks of the Trade (Armorer) (LVL 4)
-Gather the items strewn about town by the Armorer's incompetent assistant
(Reward: 600 ex 500 gold)

The last quest on the list was RED with a small warning next to it designating that you had to be lvl 4 to get it...though it was nice to know it would boost you to lvl 5...which was a requirement for another red quest below it with a strange feather like symbol next to it instead of an exclamation point.

(%) Its Dangerous to Go Alone. (Elmond) (LVL 5)
-Retrieve the first Feather of Ash from Maltos's Mine.
(Reward: 1000 exp 2000 gold.)

[Xzayler]

Jason talked to the NPC at the Tavern, accepted the marmot quest, and completed it immediately. Suddenly a recommendations tab opened. He read the quests which seemed kind of boring, except the last one, which also had quite a bit of a reward. He closed the tab and opened the teams tab instead and invited Hera to join a team with him.
"I invited you in a team, should we give it a name?"

Then he started looking at the quests again.
"Hm... lets just do both lvl2 Quests, but lets start with the pigs one and hope we can get to level 4 with just that. If not we just take the other quest as well."

With that he walked out of the Tavern and followed the guiding arrow pointibg towards the selected quest.

[River]

A screen popped up in front of Hera, urging her to accept an invitation from Jason to join a team. She clicked accept.

"Hm, do you think we need a name for a team of only two people? Why not wait until we have a few more members?"

She suggested while scanning the quest list she had pulled up. She agreed that the pig quest sounded more interesting, and had considerably better rewards. Hera followed Jason out of the tavern.

"So which do we do first, find the piglets or a place that grows garlic cloves? Man, the beginning quests are kind of mundane, aren't they?"

[Xzayler]

"Yeah, you're right, we'll wait with the name. Maybe we should just go for the pigs and see if we can find garlic on the way."
Jason moved his character. The "2" near the experience bar really bugged him, he couldn't wait until he was a level high enough to start the actual game.
"Let's just get over these and quests. The sooner we start the sooner we finish. I suggest we go to where we can kill the pigs, to see if we can find some garlic along the way." Even just saying it sounded weird. Let's go find some garlic for a quest. He was a beast master, not a kitchen-boy. What kept him going though was the Lvl5 quest, retrieving the Feather of Ash. Who knows what might be lurking in the mines, hopefully not just rats. Maybe it's one of those mines where people have "dug too deep" and awakened something. He then realised that he still didn't really fight yet. Killing marmots wasn't fighting, and it seemed Blitz was eager to fight as well, even though mines are probably not his preferred location. Jason wanted to see how he and Hera would actually do against a stronger, challenging enemy.

[Gareth]

Bubba'bob leveled up! After defeating many, many pigs he had finally reached level two. "What is the deal here, I mean its taking absolutely forever for us to level up..." He asked, frustrated at the lack of results of his training...

"That's a good point and its not as if we haven't been knocking out lots of pigs either to get the experience." said the one in the black armour, shrugging his shoulders.

The one in the orange armour then pointed beyond the Grand Gate back towards Maori. "You think the answer lies in Maori?" Bubba asked Tern politely.

Tern only nodded rigorously as the only indication that he had heard the question.

"Well lets head on down there." Seph announced for the group to hear.

"Fine by me." was Bubba's reply.

So the three trudged back towards the Grand Gate, chatting about their first day in Ashlin. Seph making many jokes about how Bubba would of been hopeless by himself and Bubba replying that he was just lucky that Bubba had joined Seph otherwise Bubba would of been the only one leveling up.

Whether either one was right, it would be hard for anyone to really know.

They then had returned to Maori and after a few minutes exploring the place, Bubba saw a group of two people exit a Tavern. One of them looked like a knight and the other looked a little like a bear.

Making his way through the crowd as one of the very few, very tall players-he then proceeded to make his way closer to the group. He wanted to get a better look at them because it seemed an interesting group to him

"Woah wait up Bubba!" was Seph's call to his pal as he hurried to catch up to him, with Tern by his side.

"Hey there you two, I'm Bubba'bob and I was wondering if I could have your names." Was his polite introduction and greeting to the interesting players before him.

He waited for their replies as Seph and Tern arrived at either side of him.