A/N: Hey guys, it's me here with another chapter of Tales of the Brave. I hope you enjoy it. Oh and can I ask that you review if you read this please, it would make me feel a lot better if I knew what I could improve, then you would enjoy it more to. Thanks
Horunka town, that's what Viktor had called the next town that we were headed to, it wasn't too fair either according to our own Beta Tester,
"It's about a two hour walk away, so not really that far, well compared to getting through the labyrinths on this game, those take the piss."
"With monsters trying to kill us every step of the way…Yeah sounds like a walk in the park." I replied scathingly. Even still we pushed forward and for the first few minutes of our little journey all was quiet, the only noise came from the wind blowing leaves across our path and with the sky still tinged a deep red and the sun approaching the horizon it was easy to forget the news that would make so many lose hope .
All that ended in the blink of an eye though as sex 'frenzy boars' charged us at once, this was the first time either me or Nenru had been in a proper fight in this game. Time to measure up, was the only thought that went through my mind at this point as I unslung my axe from my back and charged in with Viktor and Nenru. Automatically the three of us split off into groups with each of us taking on two at once, more difficult that I would have liked my first fight to be but I wasn't really in a position to be picky with this.
I slowed down slightly and began to activate my only sword skill and as the boars were charging at me in unison I was able to strike both of them at the same time causing the bright red contact line to appear on their hides but their HP only dropped into the yellow this time,
"What? Are these stronger of something as I'm not doing as much damage?" I was yelling above the sounds of three small battles,
"Yeah these are a bit stronger, level two actually so be careful." The response came from Viktor and his speech was more measured as he was almost toying with his two opponents, it must be child's play for him, enemies this basic must have gotten easy a while ago. This was in sharp contrast to me and Nenru who were struggling with our stronger opponents.
The two boars I was facing managed to take advantage of my distracted state as one managed to clip my left leg and sent me into a spin with my large axe flailing wildly and the other then managed to get in close and tackle me in my now exposed left side. This sent my flying back for the second time today but I still sprang back up straight away. With no pain receptors there was no reason to stay on the ground but still the embarrassment made me grit my teeth as the first charge yet again, but this time I was ready and swung down with my axe and it dug into the skull of the first for a split second as it burst apart into the data that it was created of.
I didn't have time to celebrate as I turned to see the other beginning its basic combination of attack and yet again I activated my skills and carved through the boar as it charged toward me, bursting into a million tiny shards. Instantly I dropped to the floor panting and my health just above the yellow zone, with my axe on my lap I looked up to find that I was the first to finish but Viktor wasn't trying really and as soon as he saw that I was done he coolly batted away one with his shield and plunged his sword through the back of one before pulling out and using the same motion to perform a backhand slice on the other, taking them both down simultaneously. As he finished he sheathed his sword and walked over to me, leaving Nenru to finish off the final monster.
"How did you find that then? Easy enough for you?" his questioning was sarcastic as I could see that he looked up toward where my health bar would have been if it wasn't for empty air, I glared at him before I noticed that buried underneath the congratulations signs there was a notification saying that I had levelled up, smiling I stood up and re-slung my axe,
"Yeah it'll be easier now, levelled up!" I said absently mindedly as my fingers went to work assigning the few skill point I had been given, mainly into strength but leaving one for speed as, after that last battle it was evident it was a bad idea to be as slow as I was.
"Two things," Nenru began as he approached, "One, you move like a rock and two party exp for the win!" He exclaimed meaning he had just levelled up as well, Viktor chuckled as we began making a move, the conversation between us slipped back into the features of Sword Art Online as Viktor piped up with a running commentary again of anything that might be useful, as he moved into the multitude of skills that were available I was amazed,
"I knew about some of them like cooking and blacksmithing you know the basic ones, but listening and detection it just shows how immersive this place is," with one of my hands motioning to the scenery around us. Viktor was surprised by what I was saying,
"Can you really say that after all that's happened today?" When this topic was brought up Nenru, who had been hanging back slightly, moved up to listen to what we were saying,
"Well it's sinking in, what happened is huge and its nuts to think that something like this could happen. But just look at the game on its own and don't think about that we're trapped here. You've got to admit it's kind of impressive." Even I was shocked by my reaction, especially after my previous reaction after Kayaba delivered the news that we were trapped and involved in some sick, twisted pleasure of his.
We all carried on in some form of silence as our minds went back to what happened only a short time. I knew it was dangerous to let this situation over-ride the need for survival but it seemed to be pretty hopeless at the minute, but I would keep fighting to the end, just to get out of here as one massive up yours to Kayaba.
It wasn't long before we ran into another large group of boars and a single wolf, needless to say that Viktor went straight for the wolf leaving me and Nenru to deal with a two on one situation with boars again. This time it went more smoothly for us as we were able to see how basic their attack pattern was and as both of us were finishing Viktor came to look in on how we were doing, but all he saw was the last of them getting decapitated by my axe as I managed to side step its attack and brought the blade of my axe down and through it neck for a critical hit. All of us began to laugh now, this didn't seem so bad for a while, it just seemed like a game, with easy basic enemies and experience, this just didn't seem like something where our lives were in danger. Jokes were being thrown around between all three of us as we ambled toward the next town, the mood between us was relaxed and we soon put anything else from our minds.
The process of killing monsters continued but our mood for the time being didn't change, with Viktor taking the strongest and leaving me and Nenru to grind on the others that were left the levelling process was going well and by the time that the moon had risen the two of us were level 5 and Viktor was level 9, but he had a head start on either of us so that was kind of expected. But by the time we had noticed that the moon had risen and it was now gone twilight the mood suddenly changed with Viktor beginning to curse violently before turning to explain,
"Look we need to pick up the pace because we still have about 30 minutes to Horunka Town, we don't want to be out here now."
"So what if we get there late then we just rest longer it's that simple," came the measured response from Nenru as he kept the same pace as we had for the past hour.
"You don't understand, probably because you're new to this but Wolves and those kind of creatures get power boosts at night, we don't want to be here when that kicks in." After this little problem had been explained to us then we began to run in the direction of town not waiting to find out what these pumped up monsters would be like.
Yet apparently Kayaba had different plans as we ran into two of them, yellow eyes gleaming in the darkness, they also seemed to have grown slightly,
"Oh joy, what a pleasant surprise," sarcasm dripping off every word that I said,
"Time and a place CaleM, time and a place." Muttered Viktor under his breath as all three of us charged in, the feeling between us had now changed, the tension and trepidation was now apparent, gone was the relaxation and the fun of playing a 'game', the death game was back now. The wolves let out a bloodcurdling howl as they jumped in as me and Nenru ganged up on one of them. These wolves were much more of a challenge though and not just because of the increase in their level, their attack patterns were erratic now as the 'wolf mark two' jumped between me and Nenru snapping it jaws and swiping at us trying to catch either one of us off guard.
In a split second it turned its attention away from Nenru and jumped toward me suddenly becoming much more aggressive as it managed to bit down around my left leg, seeing my health drop down from the green and slowly into the yellow made my cry out with fear, after all the points I put into HP and strength it seemed like it meant nothing, even still that didn't stop from levelling the side of it with the pole of my axe which sent it flying back as Nenru then activated his skill and ran through the still airborne body.
I got back to my feet as we both looked at each other and smiled by the use of teamwork, but the wolf somehow got back up with its health just above the red zone. This time though it was us on the offensive with Nenru baiting it into coming into range while I raised my axe and felt the tingle of power which meant that a sword skill had become active:
Execute
As I brought the axe down the blade didn't just bite into the virtual skin it cut the head clean off with the power behind the blade. As this happened Nenru just looked at me in disbelief,
"Well that could be useful, especially if you want a job as a headsman," Nenru was joking even though both of us had taken quite serious damage during this; it was good to know that I had a new skill though. With that I pulled up my menu to look at the description:
Execute
100% chance of decapitation but requires critical hit to land.
"Seems like we got kind of lucky there Nenru it looks like it misses easily," I felt relief sweep through my body at this, if that didn't work then it could have been game over and life over for me. I needed to be careful with that skill but it did seem pretty cool.
"Was that a new skill? What was it called, seems pretty cool if you ask me. Wait how did you get one so soon?"
Viktor was bombarding me with questions about the skill so I told him all I could, but couldn't answer how I got it so soon, maybe it had something to do with my high strength, it was about the only thing I could think of so I explained as much. Viktor sighed but smiled at me and placed his hand on my shoulder,
"Well it's good to get another attack, I can't wait for mine. But if that's what you think caused it you might want to start looking at your other stats as well. No point in having all that strength if you can't take a hit, not much of a tank then are you?"
He was right, I had focused pretty much everything I had into strength at the moment, I needed to spread the points I got more evenly and then things wouldn't get as desperate as they had been getting with me but I just nodded at him in thanks for the advice before we carried on.
The rest of our journey went by without any more incidents like that and it was a good thing too, none of us seemed to be in the fighting mood anymore tonight. That last skirmish seemed to bring home how real all this was, that we couldn't just respawn in the first town anymore. After a few more minutes we started to see some lights up ahead, the first signs that Horunka town was so close, from the look of the lights it seemed to be a big place, not the sprawling metropolis that was the Town of Beginnings but still big enough to hold most of the players on this level.
Just before we made it inside the gates we were stopped by a guard who was clearly an NPC, he had his pike raised and his armour shined in the moonlight,
"Halt who goes there?"
"We are adventurers seeking a bed to sleep in," Viktor replied shortly, it seemed to be a pre-programmed answer as the guard then lowered his pike a let out a short breath,
"You can never be too careful these days what with all the trouble in town. You seem to be pretty strong, do you mind checking it out for us?"
At this response Viktor's eyes raised as a new quest popped up on all of our screens called,
'Attack of the Killer Plants'
"This is new, I've never seen this quest before," Viktor turned to the two of us almost expecting our opinion on it and both of us obliged,
"Let's just get some rest and go off to train, we can deal with it when we're stronger.
"CaleM is right both of us were kind of lucky against those wolves, I don't want to die helping feed your curiosity about this."
Viktor smiled at the responses, especially at Nenru's as it seemed like he had the same thoughts as well and he just nodded in response. We then walked into the city and before long we were in one of the cheaper Inns around as we only had the Col that we earned from killing all the monsters we encountered on the way here as all the shops were closed so we couldn't sell any of the random items they dropped.
The common room of the Inn was pretty basic with a fireplace built into one of the walls and a low roof, wooden tables and chair were packed into the space to allow as many people sit and drink as possible, the NPC innkeeper was a short a friendly old man with the basic responses programmed into him as we bought our rooms for the night and went upstairs to go straight to sleep. Just before we went into separate rooms I turned to the others,
"Let's have a lie in and we get out of here by 10, God knows after all that I need it," after we all agreed to this I went into my room, it was a comfortable to room, not big and certainly nothing special but it had a bed and that was all that mattered at the moment. There was also a small table in the left corner with a wash basin on it and a window looking onto the street outside right next to it.
I just dropped onto the bed without taking anything off for a moment, putting both hands over my face I just laid there, there were no tears or anything of the like there, nothing to be cried over. Just the stark realisation of what we all had to do, there was no time to be depressed over this, we just had to get up and carry on, carry on fighting and hopefully get out of here.
For a while I just laid there, not moving not taking my hands away from my face, I was in my own little world, one where none of this had happened, some time later a wolf howled in the distance and it brought me back to this reality, there was a part of me that was sad, sad because of all the times in the real world with my friends and family that I would miss, but there was still the people here. Viktor and Nenru were my new family and friends wouldn't be hard to find in this place, it was tacky to think of it like that but it made me feel better anyway.
I stood once more before going into my menu and taking off all the armour and clothes I had on throughout this hell of a day before I was just left wearing the pair of boxers that were automatically equipped when I started designing this avatar. I went over to the little basin that was full of water and splashed water over my face taking off all the grime that would so obviously be there and went back to my bed for the night, getting under the thin sheet and chucking the blanket on the floor I fell into a fitful sleep, dreaming of the outside world and all that must be going on out there.
A/N: So what did you think guys, I'll try to keep the posts at a good rate, but I'm going back to University soon so I don't know how frequent they will be, I'll try to keep it at one a week. Oh and one final reminder to review please, it would be greatly appreciated.
PEACE!
