'Man, this place is huge!' Yumi thought and sat down the on the pier overlooking the ocean that straight out for as long as she could see.
She had walked from one end of Mac Anu to the other. Just looking at the map, the Root Town did not seem that big, but there were a number of alleyways and vast variety of shops were run by players in the market place which held better stuff then what they were selling at the NPC shops. Not that any of this mattered to her since this was her first time playing, she was almost flat broke and could really trade with anyone as who would want to trade with a newbie with the expectation of possible another newbie like herself.
'Well now that I have taken a look around town, I should properly go out in the arena, level up, and earn some gill and items to sell since I cannot stay as I am now if I want to explore more of THE WORLD,' Yumi thought as she got up and ran towards Chaos Gate.
Little did she know that she was being watched from distance by a duo that had smirk on their faces as they began following her.
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"………." was the only thought running through Yumi's mind as she appeared in the level three field area that she entered at the Chaos Gate.
The scenery was very realistic and she was almost certain that she could feel a breeze blowing past her. Also in the background was enormous canyon that seem also a mile long in length and something that she remembered from the game's background story. Yumi knew she should not be this taken by her surroundings as site called the THE WORLD for Newbie 101 clearly stated "do not show any clear and visible signs that you have never play the game as that makes you a prime target for Pkers."
"Ouch!" Yumi yelled as she so amazed by her surrounding that ended up walking right into a tree and releasing the Chim Chims that inside causing them to scatter around the ground before her. Though falling backwards, she ended up landing on some them which seem to serve the same purpose as kicking them as she got Chim Chim Sphere nevertheless.
"Huh? What are these things suppose to be?" she thought out loud before remembering what Chim Chims were and their role in the game at large.
Shortly after this, she realized that she had made a newbie mistake in being too caught in her surroundings and looked around to see if there was anyone that could have seen and sigh a breath of relief when she did not notice anyone.
"It's already time for me to try and fight something," the brunette Blade Brandier said to herself, almost as way to psyche herself up as she was against something in the level that was two levels beyond her own.
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'I did not think that level three field would be so hard while I was at level one!' Yumi thought while running from the three monsters that almost took her out. When they ganged up on her as one, their hits were bad enough by three of them to almost kill her and she had no way out of this dome since she did not have a smoke screen on her.
Just when she was about to beaten after tripping over the treasure chest, she saw the monster fade to black and collapse to the ground while the others were taken out quickly by a Twin Blade.
With the battle over, Yumi noticed that her level had went up to level two probably because, while she did not finish the battle, she had started it so she was included in the experience the fight yielded.
The Twin Blade that saved her offered her his hand in getting up which she kindly took though she was a little cautious. The PC before her gave her a bad feeling. That and she did not see anyone else in the nearby area as the first monster had to be taken out by Steam Gunner as there was no other way it could have been done. It was clear to her the monster was shot with bullet from a gun something. Twin Blade cannot use unless they're an Adept Rogue with Twin Blade and Steam Gunner as two of their class.
"Thank you very…" Yumi started to say before collapsing to the ground with her eyes completely vacant as the Steam Gunner killed the monster before now killed her with a shot through the stomach, seemingly taking out all her HP in single shot because the difference in their level.
"Good Job! I do not know where you got that Trick Shot Skill, but it sure works wonders in PKing newbies," the Twin Blade said to their partner as they came out of hiding.
"Don't I know it! Come. Let's go find some other newbies to PK," the Steam Gunner said after high five for what they considered a job well done.
Though if the two had cared enough to pay attention to Yumi, they would have notice that for some strange reason, despite having no HP, she was not disappearing or becoming transparent. She was just lying there with staring straight ahead at nothing with vacant eyes.
At few minutes after the PKers were gone, she simply got up as her HP restored itself on its own and she looked around wondering how it happened.
"I am still alive, but how? My HP was reduced to zero!" Yumi said shocked that this could happen to her.
Just then she received a short mail message from CC Corp.
"Sakura, if you are getting this, it's because you been PKed or defeated by a monster and are wondering why you've been revived automatically. The reason is it is another special feature I installed into your character that will randomly activate after you've been killed in the game," the message from her father under his CC Corp account name said.
'Another special feature? Just how many did dad add to my character?' Yumi thought as she continued on her way, wondering if her father was giving her special treatment because she was his daughter.
After about twenty minutes of fighting various enemies to get the required number of Symbol Fragments to gain the ability to enter the Temple where the Beast Statue was held, Yumi took a short break to her catch breath before running to the Beast Statue and kicking the chest, claiming her reward, which was turned out to be rather nice replacement for the armor she was currently wearing.
Once she had warped back to Mac Anu and saved her game, Yumi thought about selling off the stuff she did not need in order to buy some more recovery items as what was she going to do with five copies of weapon that could not be used for either of her character's classes.
Yumi was stopped from doing this as she heard her mother asking her what was she still doing up since she had a mission to go on the next day.
'Crap, she's right,' Yumi thought as she immediately logged out and got ready for bed, hoping she could get enough sleep and that she would not late for her first mission.
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Kimiko Haruno was yawned as she woke up and headed to make herself some breakfast when she happened to walk pass her daughter's room and notice that she was still in there sleeping.
"Hey, Sakura, wake up! Doesn't with your team have a mission today?" she told her child as she shook her.
"Mom, not so loud. I am tired and it's only….oh my god! Why is it so late?" Sakura yelled as she jumped out of bed and began throwing off her from the other day (which slept in because she was too tired to change) as she made her way to the bathroom.
'I wonder if getting her that game was such a good idea,' her mother thought as she had only had it for one day and already she was going to be late because of it.
Forty minutes later….
'Great went to sleep so late last night I overslept and my alarm did not wake me' Sakura thought as she rushed over to where she was supposed to meet the rest of her team.
She wanted to get there early to possible spent some time alone with Sasuke-kun but now it did not look like that would be possible as when she arrived at meeting place which was red bridge both Sasuke and Naruto were already there.
"Hey, Sakura-chan, why are you late?" Naruto asked he expected her to be the first one here though it turned out she was actually the second to last.
"I overslept and my alarm did not wake me up. Hi, Sasuke-kun," Sakura told him before focusing her attention on Sasuke
Sasuke did not respond. He simply turned his head towards her slightly acknowledge her presence there.
"Ummm, where is Kakashi-sensei?" Sakura asked as noticed that he was no where to be seen at the moment.
"He has not shown up though. That's lucky for you; otherwise, you would have been slowing us down," Sasuke told.
At this, Sakura felt a little hurt which pissed Naruto off demanding that Sasuke apologize.
An hour later, Kakashi arrived informing them what missions that they being going on today.
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A week later after completely some D-class missions, Sakura returned home, logged on to The World, and was currently coming back from a dungeon she had gone to.
'For a level four dungeon there such was a lot of stuff beyond my current level of five,' Yumi thought as she walked through Mac Anu.
Since she was not part of Guild, she did not have the storage space they did, so she had sell off whatever she did not need to make space. Sure, she had thought about joining a Guild, but she wasn't really interested in any of the guild that was available here, nor was she interested in starting up her own Guild just for the storage space. No, she would just sell or trade what she did not need and that's pretty much what she was doing now as she walked through Root Town, looking for people to trade with. She had to be careful as you never know who might be commit trade fraud and just place the blame on the person they cheated, saying that if you fell for the fraud then you got what you deserved for not knowing better.
"Hey there, are you okay?" Yumi asked as she was taking a shortcut to Alchemy District. It was while she was walking through the shortcut that she noticed that was another character lying on the ground.
The character was who was a cat girl (she looks similar to Tabby from .Hack//Roots in appearance) with pale blue hair and a one bluish purple eye and one red eye. She was dressed in a pale blue green dress that went down to her thighs and sleeves that completely covered her arms. Her hands are covered by gloves that spread out from her wrist. Around her shoulders was something that looked like the top half of a cloak and had two metal ornaments hung on the side. Also from the backside of cloak split into four separate strips which ran back to her legs (they similar to one Atoli's has that reached down to her back)
The cat girl then looked up at her with dazed expression that quickly faded and said, "I am fine…I think" after a few failed tries.
"So, what are you doing back here?" Yumi asked her as the cat girl looked her and then at herself with rather confused looked on her face.
"I cannot remember," she answered.
"So do you remember anything?" the brown hair Blade Brandier asked as it strange to find someone with amnesia within an online game.
'Then again, maybe they have amnesia in real life and playing this game is a link to their memory,' Yumi thought. However this did not explain why she was laying in alley.
"I remember a person with blue hair, they are a mage, and I like being around them and playing this game with them. It makes me happy" she said as she stood up.
"So you are looking for that person?" Yumi asked.
"I guess," was the cat girl's reply.
"Okay then, my name is Yumi and here is my member address. Maybe we could help each other," she said. This could be a trick but she did not think that this person was just acting like this in order to PK her.
"Thanks, Yumi, my name is...Ruki," she said after thinking it over for a bit and then handing over her member address shortly afterwards.
"Okay then, Ruki, you and me are going to find the people we are looking for no matter how long it takes," Yumi said and Ruki just nodded.
"So what class are you, Ruki?" Yumi asked as wonder what the dual eye color cat girl class was. This was one thing about this game that separated it from the prequel as character did not always run around with their weapons out. So for some characters, it was hard to tell just what the class they were until they got into fight as looks did not always give away their character's class; A fact that Yumi had learned during the time that she had spent playing this game.
"I am a…Shadow Warlock," Ruki respond though there was a pause for a second, which Yumi took as her checking her status to see what her character class was.
Yumi was about to say something else when she heard her mother calling her from downstairs, telling her that dinner was ready.
"Well, Ruki, I'll see you later. I have to go now, but I will be sure to contact you the next time I logged in, alright?" Yumi said, remembering that she had do some stuff around the house.
"Bye!" Ruki said as she waved while Yumi logged out as Ruki then walked out the alley that Yumi had found her in wondering off to somewhere else in the city.
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I would like to thank
King Hawke and Hana for reviewing this Story
Janneia for adding this story to their Favorite Story List.