Replay of the Odysseys: The GTI Chronicles

When I fell into the portal and hit the ground, I landed on my head and got a concussion. I covered my head and got up after feeling the severe pain. When I looked up, everything was very dark. There were barely any light sources and all the light sources gave a weak flash of light. I activated my scanning ability and quickly swept the area. There weren’t any useful items other than a half broken shield, low level mana recovery potion, and some green crystal coins. I put on the shield on my left arm and drank the mana recovery potion since I used most of my manas after using the aura shield. And after looking at the coin carefully, I was able to notice what this item was. They were called ‘Tea Leaves’. Basically, they are the currency in this game. They were green crystal coins that had a huge ‘A’ in the middle. It was pretty big. The coin was a bit smaller than my palm. It wasn’t really described in the game how it looks so I was sort of surprised. After counting the amount of coins I had, I exchanged the coins into tea leaves. The coins evaporated from my hands and I heard clicky sound effects. When I opened my profile, it showed me how much money I had. In total, I had about 500 tea leaves which is not a lot since a wooden sword would cost 500 tea leaves. I opened the shop again and searched through multiple tabs. After going into the special effects section, I bought the ‘Potion of Night Visions (2)’. I drank the potion and now, I was able to see everything as if there was light. Right when I was about to close the tab, a new notification arrived.

[Paying your overdue money at the shop.]

I realized that I actually bought everything from the shop for free this entire time. But since I have 500 tea leaves right now and I didn’t buy anything expensive, this should be enough to repay all the debt I have. In fact, I should have at least 100 left over.

[The system calculates the amount of money you owe.]

[Your assets are subtracted.]

After checking the message, I was going to check how much money I had left. But right before I did so, a new message popped up.

[Subtracting 50,000 tea leaves from your asset.]

[You are currently 49,500 tea leaves in debt.]

I rubbed my eyes multiple times after seeing the message. There was no way that I was 49,500 tea leaves in debt. It must be an error. It’s probably 49.5 and they accidentally added 2 zeros. I denied my currency situation and collapsed onto the ground.

[Opening your purchase history:]

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1: Multiple usage of scanning ability (Times: 4, 10,000 tea leaves per use.)

2: Light power mana shield (1000 tea leaves)

3: Potion of Night Vision [Level 2] (3000 tea leaves)

4: Charging extra mana for the aura shield (100 tea leaves per second) (60 seconds after running out of mana)

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I dropped my jaws after checking my purchase history. I didn’t know that inflation in the real world is also affected here. And also, I was dumbfounded when I saw FORTY THOUSAND TEA LEAVES taken away from me for using the scanning ability. I’m assuming it takes my money away every time I bring an item to me when I use the scan ability. I think I’m starting to remember why I didn’t have any ‘A+’ items even if I used ‘S’ or ‘A’ items. And it’s not only me but also the entire server. No one used ‘A+’ items because those items were hella expensive but it also used money to use them. I was wondering why the game was giving me such an overpowered ability since the beginning but it’s probably because it has penalties like these. They had been planning to steal people’s money since the first day of the reopening. I knew that these moderators were crazy lovers of money but I didn’t think that they would be this insane. Especially the one that starts with ‘E’, he is so greedy that people thought he would be the best casting as the ‘Sin of Greed’.

[Your current debt is so high that you can’t make a recovery.]

[In order to pay your debt, one of your items or your skill will be randomly sold to the ‘night market’.]

Wait what no they can’t just steal an ability from me-

[A+ rated skill, ‘The Eye of Keystone’ is sold to ‘Recitation of Soprano Melody’]

Well there it goes, my only useful ability that I had. Looking at golden sparkles flying into the air, I stared at it dumbfounded. I opened my jaw and my body dropped to the ground. I was robbed and I now have 50,000 tea leaves in debt. Nothing could make the situation worse from here.

[Wardens are spawning in the Ancient City. They will be chasing your trace of sound and will kill you when found!]

I should probably stop talking. I looked around through the dark shadows using the night vision ability. There were many walls and pillars here. But most of them were broken or heavily damaged. This city reminded me of Pompey. The city in Italy that was destroyed after a volcanic eruption. I silently and carefully walked on the stone road. I climbed up on walls and got onto a rooftop of one of the buildings trying to get a better view of the city. Although there was no light, I was able to see the entire city with a clear vision. The city was way bigger than I thought. In the center, there was a huge rectangular portal that was not enlightened. If I open the portal and go through it, I should be able to return. There were also wardens walking around in the streets. They are around 8 feet tall with blue horns. They definitely don't look like humans but rather cursed monsters. If I make a loud sound, they will find me and shoot a sound wave which will absolutely make me evaporate. If I make a loud sound 3 times, that’s when they come chasing after me so I had to be careful.

I started to creep towards the portal. Luckily, there weren’t many wardens near me. The closer I got to the portal stage, there were more wardens nearby as if they were gatekeeping. I don’t think they noticed me yet but if I make any sudden moves, they might. I also needed to find a way to enable that portal. Here's what I know so far. If Loyd teleported me here, there must be a reason why I was brought here. There must be a way to escape and enable that portal at all cost. And when that portal is enabled, it should navigate to the town right away.

Everywhere the warden walked across, a weird goo looking blue black vine appeared. It was shining everytime a sound was detected. I tried to avoid stepping on them as much as possible but there were just so many. Even though I tried to avoid it, I accidentally stepped on one of them. It made like a bush crushing sound and a loud monstrous scream roared in the city. That is probably my first warning. I didn’t think that a small sound like this would enable them. I saw a few wardens peak at me but they just walked away.

As I got closer to the portal, I was able to see it more closely and clearly. The portal was enabled when a certain amount of mana was charged to it. Even if I bought a mana boost potion, I would still be short by a lot. There must be some sort of switch inside the building under the portal. I entered the building and tried to search for something that might enable the portal. The inside of the building looked like some sort of a laboratory that was torn down for some reason. There were broken particles of glass everywhere and debris of the wall on the ground. After going through 1 or 2 more rooms, I found a treasure room. There were a lot of useful items here. There were anvils, chests full of useful items, and some mana potions. I hurriedly drank the potion and recharged my energy. In the chest, I found some enchanted books of mending, unbreaking. It was perfect for my shield that was about to break. I approached the anvil and repaired my shield by putting those enchantments on it. I applied some mana to my shield and it was fully repaired. And after picking up a stone sword, I marched my way to the next room. The next room was the biggest one so far. It looked like the lobby of a hotel. Chandeliers were broken and lights were barely glowing. As I approached the center of the hall, a bird looking symbol started to show dark blue light. When I got to the circle, a blue screen appeared.

[Y0u h@v3 rcacEhd the cen7er of tne ‘Anc1ent City’. Unfortunately, the ‘#($ # (@#@’ spot is already taken. You will be rewarded with a different gift that will give you 30C3puemces.]

It was worded weirdly so I didn’t really understand what it was trying to say but it said that it will give me a reward so I didn’t really care about what the weird word said. Especially since I’m very poor and the system took my only skill, I was desperate for something.

[List of items available are shown below:]

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1: Omega Sniper (Celestial)

2: Totem of Undying (Mythic)

3: ‘Staff That Divided The Sea’ (Celestial)

4: ‘Thunder Hammer of Dwarfs’ (Celestial)

5: ‘The Shield of 12 Labors’

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I looked at the items provided to me and I was shocked. Those are all overpowered items that you can’t get yet. Starting with the Omega Sniper, it was a bow that was accidentally made by the moderators in this world. With that bow, you could kill anyone with 1 arrow. I’m pretty sure Peace conclusively did take the item back and removed it but I didn’t expect the system to just give it. The 2nd item was the Totem of Undying. It was basically just a totem that made you survive if you ever died. It was one of the only items that you could use against the Omega Sniper. But it was extremely hard to get. It was fascinating but compared to all the other items, it wasn’t the place to fit it. The 3rd staff was another celestial item called ‘Staff That Divided The Sea’. For someone who read every single holy and ancient book, it was easy for me to figure out what the item was. It was the staff that Moses used to divide the Red Sea. Most of the celestial items that existed in this world were never really used since it was too overpowered but assuming from the name and it’s origin, it will probably quite literally divide the ocean. But I wouldn’t be able to use the staff since I am not part of ‘Eden’ and I can’t carry a mythology like that. It’s either the staff will be completely useless to me or I will be automatically taken to ‘Eden’ and will become a part of their kingdom. The next item was an item that was more familiar to people. It was ‘Mojlnir’ used by Thor. Many people know this because of the marvel movies that were created. It will give me the power of lightning and the people of ‘Asgard’ will treat me like a thing but there is something that was stopping me from choosing it. As many people know, you need to be ‘Worthy’ in order to use that hammer and looking at how I lived my life, I definitely don’t think that the hammer will judge me as a worthy person. And the hammer actually weakens your true potential since it makes the user of the hammer extremely strong but also makes the person rely on it. So that was definitely off my list. The last option was the ‘Shield of 12 Labors’. The shield of labor is a shield that was used by a great demigod called ‘Hercules’. He had to go through 12 labors given by Zeus’s wife, Hera. If I choose the shield, it should give me a power to go against all 12 Gods of ‘Olympus’ but there is a very high chance that it will also give me 12 labors to recreate the history of this shield. Since I know what Hercules went through, I didn’t even give a look. Plus, I already had a shield. Not as good as the Hercules shield but it was still a shield. I am not planning to walk this city with 2 shields.

I had a hard time choosing what I should pick but the only one I could really use was the Omega Sniper. I needed a weapon and that was the only good choice I had.

“I choose the Omega Sniper.”

The Omega Sniper appeared in the air and landed in my hands.

[You have received the Omega Sniper!]

[The wardens of the ‘Ancient City’ detect your presence. They have set their target and will now chase you.]

[Your location is revealed to every warden in the city!]

[You are the new owner of the Omega Sniper. You are destined to shoot ‘Omega’ with the bow. The portal will open that will lead you to the world where ‘Omega’ is. If you don’t shoot ‘Omega’ with the bow, you will be killed and exiled from this world.]

As soon as the message stopped talking, the wardens in the city all cried and roared at once. The building started shaking and I heard loud footsteps outside. I ran into the closest wall with the shield and broke multiple layers of the wall. After running through 5 or 6, I finally escaped. Above the building, the portal was enlightened. But there were also 3 wardens in front of me. I ran to the other side of the aisle and tried to climb up the stage as fast as possible. Wardens started to shoot their sound waves at me. The houses and pillars were destroyed.

‘I would die if I got hit by that.’

My gut was telling me to never get hit by the wave. I ran as fast as possible and reached the stairs that led to the portal. The problem was that there were already wardens near the portal waiting for me. I tried my best to dodge them but one of their attacks reached me and my shield was shredded into pieces. I continued to run without stopping and when I finally reached the portal, a warden behind me grabbed me. The fearful face gave me a chill and I thought this is where I was going to die. But I pulled out the Omega Sniper and shot the warden. Just like the game, the warden disappeared right away. After killing the warden, I ignored all the other wardens that were chasing me and I jumped into the portal.