Game of Humans
Chapter 3: Starting Out
Disclaimer - Harry Potter, other characters and situations are owned by J.K. Rowling and her licensees. This is a work of fan fiction, produced solely for enjoyment. No infringement of rights is intended.
Summary – Post DH. EWE. No slash. After dying at the end of Book 7, Harry Potter is invited to play a game. A game, where he is the main character. Video Game fic. Gamer!Harry.
Pairings – This story will have pairings. All suggestions are welcome. No slash request please. Personally, I am leaning towards HP/DG/FD.
Chapter 3 – Starting Out
The pop-up/ Hint Box informed Harry, 'Welcome Harry Potter to the Game of Humans! Pause Menu may be accessed at any time by saying Pause out loud.' With that the box disappeared. 'So this is what HUD means', thought Harry. Various icons hovered in front of Harry's vision. All the icons were translucent. At the top left hand corner Harry could see his Name and image with two completely filled bars colored in Green and Blue. The Green Bar had the text 'HP: 500/500' overlaid on it while the Blue bar said 'Mana: 945/945.'
'As far as I can remember from watching Dudley play his video games, HP means Hit points i.e. my health, while Mana represents the energy used to cast spells, in this case Magic', thought Harry to himself. 'At least both the bars are full. The numbers seem okay, but I will have to look at other people to see where I stand.'
The top right corner of his vision was filled with a small circular map with a compass indicating North surrounding the map. At the bottom right corner of his HUD, there were five slots, of which, the first one had the image of his school trunk.
As soon as Harry finished this observation, another Hint appeared on the HUD. 'Certain Commands when voiced out loud enable the character to access different menus. Examples of commands are Character Sheet, Map and Inventory.'
'Let's give it a try', thought Harry and called out the first command "Character Sheet"
A new page opened in front of Harry's eyes, at the top was his name – Harry Potter. Just below it was – Level 7 Human Wizard. The rest of the page was divided into two sections. The left hand side was dominated by his image. Around his image were different slots named – Cloak, Shirt, Gloves, Belt, Pants, Shoes, Ring, Ring, Wand and Weapon. Most of these slots were empty with only the slots for shirt, pant, belt, shoes and wand being filled with the images of his present clothes. When harry tried moving his fingers over his wand slot, a pop-up appeared –
Holly and Phoenix Wand
Quality: Epic
Item Level 66
+24 Stamina
+25 Intellect
'Wow level 66! Looks like Ollivander really gave me a good wand', thought Harry. Looking at his other clothes, Harry saw that their quality was poor with levels between 1-5 and they hardly gave any extra stats, mostly zeros and ones. 'What else can I expect from my caring relatives', Harry thought sarcastically.
The right hand side of the page was filled with information on his stats –
- General
Health – 500
Mana – 945
- Attributes
Stamina – 26
Strength – 26
Agility – 26
Intellect – 38
'That's nice. But what these attributes do? How do they affect me?', Harry asked out loud, hoping to get some answer. In response, the Hint Box appeared –
Health represents the overall health of the character. Reaching a Health of 0 causes the death of the character. Health can be regained slowly when the character is not engaged in a fight. Similarly, Health can also be regained by consuming certain Potions, food, drinks as well as sleeping. Health is dependent on the Stamina Attribute. Leveling up the character also refills Health as well as increases it by small amounts.
Mana represents the Magic of the Character. Reaching a Mana of 0 causes magical exhaustion. In such a state, the character is unable to perform any more magic. Mana is regenerated continuously. Mana as well as Mana regeneration rate is dependent on the Intellect Attribute. Similar to Health, Mana can also be regained by consuming certain Potions, food, drinks as well as sleeping. Leveling up the character also refills Mana as well as increases it by small amounts.
Stamina attribute affects the overall health of the character. Higher the stamina of the character, higher will be his Hit Points. Stamina also affects physical activities like running, dodging, jumping, swimming, etc.
Strength attribute affects the physical strength and the attack power with melee weapons of the character without his magic. Activities like Unarmed Combat, Sword Fighting, etc. are dependent on the Strength attribute.
Agility attribute affects the dexterity as well as the attack power of ranged weapons of the character without his magic. Activities like Dodging, swimming as well as weapons like Bow-arrow, Guns, etc. depend on this attribute.
Intellect attribute affects the spell power and mana of the wizard. Higher the intellect more magic is available to the character. Intellect also helps in mana regeneration. The strength and power of various spells is also affected by the character's intellect.
Equipped items may provide the character with bonus attributes. Items cannot be leveled–up as characters. Item quality can be categorized as – Poor, Common, Rare, Epic and Legendary.
'Finally some useful information. Okay, so intellect seems the most important right now as it will help me with my magic. I should also increase my stamina so as to increase my health. Strength would be something to look at a bit later. Agility, I don't know, seems it's not that important for me, but then again it affects dodging, which I really need in magical duels.', mused Harry as he thought about all the information provided.
At the bottom of the page, there was another tab – Reputation. Saying it out loud, Harry's view changed.
As soon as the reputation tab opened, the Hint Box appeared again –
The Character can gain or lose favor, otherwise known as reputation, with many of the several different groups or individuals in this world by completing certain quests or killing certain creatures. Doing so will usually unlock special rewards or new quests to accomplish. Reputations may be categorized as – Hated, Hostile, Unfriendly, Neutral, Friendly, Honored, Revered, Exalted. Individuals in a romantic relationship will have different positive reputations – Friendly, Crush, In Love, Devoted.
'Well. Let's see what I have managed to do in my life till now.' Thought Harry. At the start of the page were four Groups –
Muggle World – Neutral
Wizarding World – Friendly
Ministry of Magic – Friendly
Death Eaters – Hated
'This is okay. This is what I expected. Though to classify the entire Wizarding World as friendly; must be due to the Boy-Who-Lived thing.' Pondered Harry. After the groups were individual names of the people that Harry had met till now in his life. All the reputations were as expected. There were some surprises like, the Dursleys' were Hostile instead of Hated as Harry was expecting. Hermione was Revered while Ron had a reputation of just Friendly. 'Looks like Hermione is much more comfortable with me than Ron. Maybe it's because of his jealousy. I will have to keep an eye on it', mused Harry.
With a command of Back, the Character menu disappeared. Similarly, harry also tried out the Map and the Inventory commands. The map command opened a map of his surrounding areas, it was like a Marauder's Map of his immediate vicinity. The map extended around 200 meters in all directions around Harry. The inventory command opened up a new menu. Harry was informed that he can equip up to five bags or trunks at any given time. Each trunk or Bag had different capacities according to their levels. He also found out that, once equipped he could access any item stored in any bag, irrespective of where the actual bag was stored.
'Hmm, that seems everything on the HUD at the moment', with that thought Harry got up from the bed where he was sitting and walked around his room. Everything was same as how he remembered. Looking at the mirror, Harry noticed for the first time that he was not wearing glasses, and yet he could see everything clearly. He also noticed that he was a bit taller and bulkier than he remembered being before his Fourth year, but not by much. 'Well some improvement is always better than none', smiled Harry.
Author's Note –
Reviews are greatly appreciated. Don't mind flames as well, so long as they are about the story and not the English.