Log Horizon (Tales of the West)

by The Andromeda

After being trapped in the game Elder Tale; Leonelo a Fox Tail adventurer finds himself in a series of events surrounding a mysterious young man called Adner. While travelling with him, he will find out that he is more than he appears to be. Adner is a twenty year old guy who hides a terrible secret about his past as a player. He who holds the power, the weakest of them all.

1. Chapter 1

Name: Leonelo
Age: 23
Race: Fox Tail
Gender: Male
Height: 172

Class: Guardian
Level: 85

Subclass: Woodcrafter
Level: 45

HP: 11195
MP: 6153

Affiliation: None/Single (Lived with his parents before the Catastrophe).

Friday, August 30, Year 001 AC (After the Catastrophe)
Central American Server.

There was nothing but black as the eye could see. Ashes from the great mountain covered everything from miles and miles.
The volcano of Colima, was home of one the most dangerous raids in the whole central server.
News about the "Dormant Fire Serpent" causing havoc in the villages around the area brought many adventurers to travel deep into the volcano, just to wake up back at the cathedral in the heart of Guadalajara almost instantaneously after meeting the boss at the summit.
Normally once a year, the event "The Fire hunt" will take place around May the 20th, but after the Catastrophe, the event went unnoticed for a year, until now.
In the lore, the serpent was once a king named Colima, who after being defeated by foreign invaders, fled to the mountain summit. Lusting for revenge, he made a pact with the evil mountain, also known as the "Fire Mountain", where in exchange of having revenge, he will become its eternal guardian. Thus, Quetzalcoatl, was born out of hate and bloodlust.

As I traveled in deep, the air became fouler, and thus it was harder and harder to breath by the minute.
As I kept moving forward with my raiding party, I began recalling the sweetness of my home back in our world. The fresh aroma of rain in the morning, wetting the earth and realizing the presence of a smell only known in my home country.
I was born in Mexico, but raised almost my entire adult life in the United States. When I became seventeen I began playing Elder Tale until the great Catastrophe, when I got stuck here with my best friend, whose user name is "inland Lama" by the way.
We began travelling south in an effort to see the land of our people, the Mexicans, but more specifically the state of Guadalajara, right in the west of the country. Why? No reason, we didn't have anything to do, and we always talked about visiting the land of our ancestors when we grew up.

After the great catastrophe, the country disappeared almost entirely and it became known as the land of "Aztlane", with eight main cities where adventurers spawn. One of those was the city where my parents met, in the west.
After settling there for a couple of days we heard the rumors of the Volcano of Colima and the Dormant Fire Serpent, so we joined a party raid of twenty four adventurers who settled up for "The Fire Hunt".
I am a Guardian myself, my level is 85 and I am currently trying to level up my woodcrafter subclass.
My companion and best friend, Inland Lama, he is a Pirate whose level is 86, and he usually brags about it every time he has the chance to.

We became interested by the news of the disasters in the villages of the People of the Land near the volcano. So we followed "Frederic", the level 90 Summoner, and his small guild, to the base of the volcano where one can hear the screams of the beast shake the earth.

That day I was feeling tired after travelling around the continent since the day we got stuck in this world.
But I wasn't the only one. We did not realized how close we were to the boss area, we really could not see anything, until we heard the screams of the beast right in front of us.
Frederic began shouting instructions to every one of us, I was to be one of the central tanks in the front. I held up my giant shield without compromising my visibility, but really, I could not see anything clearly with the ashes pouring down like snow.
The heat was also unbearable, but we stood our ground in silence.
A giant explosion cleaned up every trace of ashes in the atmosphere. In an instant, everything became clear, even the clouds began to fade away.
Right in front of us, was the giant serpent laying on the flour. His health was almost depleted, one more strike was everything he needed to die.
As we stood there speechless, an arrow flew right over the other side and pierced it, making him disappeared without leaving a trace.

We held our formation tight without even taking a breather.
After the Catastrophe, the lands of the west had become the most dangerous ones for adventurers, we could not just lay down our guard, especially if we were against unknown Elder Tale player veterans.

As the rest of the fog cleared away, we could see a group of adventurers in red standing in formation on the other side. An Assassin was standing there between the two groups. He held is bow tight with his right arm, but he did not seemed to be wanting a fight. He took of his helmet, which was a combination between a traditional European knight and an Eagle warrior from the Aztecs. He was either a Human or a Half-Alv, we could not identify him at that distance, but his brown hair and shape of the body told us everything about his species.
The only adventurer in black from his group approached him while putting down his giant sword. He tapped him in the shoulder and smiled to us.
The leader of the group wielded a Giant spear and was literally covered all in red. He was standing behind his men when he began walking towards us, passing by the red archer and the black swordsman. He approached Frederic and extended his right hand. Frederic pitifully smiled back and accepted the handshake with gratitude.

While the rest of our raiding party began laying down their weapons and exchanging polite conversations with the other adventurers, my eyes where fixed in the archer who was still standing there watching us in silence. He was too far away for the menu display to show me his stats, and I was dying to meet him. I knew by looks of it, that it was him who stroke the final blow.

I began walking towards him in silence, he did not make any move or expression after seeing me approach him. When I was close enough, the menu display showed me his stats.
First thing I saw was his race, he was a Half-Alv. Secondly, I saw his stats, he was level 90, which honestly did not surprise me at all. Thirdly I tried looking for his class, which I though was an Assassin, but as I focused on the name of his class, two words appeared right in front of me: "Battle Master".

I was startled at first, so I looked at him again without thinking it twice. His armor was extremely rare. He was bearing a pair of Capoerista's gauntlets, he had a bow and a quiver tied up in his belt. He had the armor of a guardian like me, and he also had a long sword, a sword which I knew very well, a Japanese sword. He had a Nagamaki in his back.

He noticed I stopped walking towards him, so he began walking towards me. I panicked and raised my shield in the spur of the moment. He took of some kind of mask that was hiding half of his face, mouth and nose. He greeted me with a smile, and stretched out his hand.

"My name is Adner, nice to meet you"
He gently said. He had a deep voice which only freaked me up, but I recover my composure, and replied:

"Nice to meet you too Adner, my name is Leonelo…"

At that time I did not knew that I was meeting the greatest villain that the Central American server had ever seen. Nor did I knew what was about to come, what role I played in, in what was about to be known as "The Great Desolation" in the archives of the People of the Land, which devastated the Northern and Central continent.

Adner of the west, also to be known as "The Habanero Villain".