RPG Life in another World

“Okay, the receptionist here is pretty cute. Shame I can't talk to girls for more than a few sentences though.”

I found a good place to stay for the night at the suggestion of one of the guards. I was glad that the people here seem to speak my language and that those I've met are at least pleasant enough for short conversation.

The guard gave me the name of Half Moon Inn and directions from there to the local adventuring guild branch. Apparently they're all connected and are known as reliable enough for basic monster extermination. But before I go there, I need some food and sleep.

When I walked in the Half Moon, I was greeted by a portly little man. I would almost call him a dwarf, but I didn't want to be racist to the guy who was about to give me a place to stay. He seemed to be the owner and directed me to the receptionist behind the front desk before walking towards a lively looking dining room on the right, with some rather ornate stairs running the length of the left wall.

The girl behind the desk looked about my age, give or take a year. And also two feet shorter than I am.

“Hello there! Welcome to Half Moon inn. How can I help you this fine evening?” She seems genuinely nice at least. Her plump cheeks spread into a smile that seemed trusting.

“I’d like a room for the night. How much would that run me?”

“One night is going to be 90 copper. That includes a meal and a drink at dinner time. We’re serving now, so if you want to pay here, I can give you a key and you can head over to find a place to sit and eat.”

“That sounds lovely, thank you.” I mentally pulled up my bag UI and materialized the money she asked for. I held my hand over the desk and 90 copper appeared. I checked my status and saw it only deducted one point for the monetary transaction. I was worried for a moment that it would cost a full 90 mana to pull out the copper. That’s good to know for future use.

“Oh, what a neat skill. I don't think I've seen that one before. Is it a storage skill?”

“Something like that. I like to keep my skills to myself when I can though, sorry.”

“Oh not a problem! Forgive me for asking! Here’s your key. You’ll be in room 18. That'll be the second floor, fourth door on the right. Thank you for your patronage, and enjoy the meal.”

“That I will, thanks.” I headed over to the dining hall and found a seat in one of the corners that I could get a good look of the room from. There seemed to be mostly humans, but the occasional dwarf was running around with a tray in their hands. It appears that most of the employees here are dwarves. Maybe it’s a family business?

A couple of minutes after I sat down, the first dwarf I saw when I walked in came over with a menu in hand.

“Sorry for the wait, we are rather busy tonight and short staffed to boot. And don’t you dare laugh at that. What can I get you started with?”

“Not a problem at all. And I wouldn't dream of it," I said with a smile. “What do you recommend? I prefer something with meat, but I assume that won't be an issue?”

“Every meal here has meat, not to worry. The stew of the night has some good orc meat and mushrooms. I haven’t heard any complaints about it yet, so I'd say it’s a safe bet. For drinks, we have various juices, beer, and straight water. If you want anything stronger than that, it’ll be extra though.”

“Stew it is then. I’ll have that with the beer please.”

“A guy who knows what he wants. I like it. I’ll be right out with that in a moment.”

He dashed off to get my order in and came back surprisingly quickly.

“Here yah go. All this comes with the room. If you need anything else, feel free to give me a holler. The names Thaggerd. Sorry I couldn't give a proper introduction earlier. Was in a bit of a rush to help. Hope you enjoy!”

To say I enjoyed it would be an understatement. The orc meat tasted like pork, but so much more tender and flavorful than the pork I knew from my old world. And the mushrooms weren’t bad either. A little more earthy than I usually like, but it worked well in the stew. The beer was also surprisingly delicious. I wasn’t much of an alcoholic drinker before, but I might just have to be here.

After I ate and drank my fill, I waved Thaggerd over to let him know I was done then headed up to my room for the night. I wanted to empty my mana pool before bed, but I doubt the guards would take me shooting off dangerous spells into the sky too kindly.

When I got to the room, I was happy to see a comfortable looking, feather filled mattress. I was half expecting a wooden slab with a blanket on top. But it looked nice, and when I sat down, it had a decent amount of give to it. I might just have to make this my new semi-permanent home.

“That being said, I only have funds for a few more weeks before I have to actually start working. Well, I’m going to the guild first thing in the morning, so i shouldn’t have too much trouble. I should get better gear first though. Maybe some leather armor would be nice.”

Thoughts of battling dragons in full plate armor lulled me to sleep, and the next thing I knew, the sunrise was shining through my window, straight onto my face. I woke up a little groggy, but fully rested. I guess having walked for so many hours yesterday really wiped me out. Despite being a little cloudy headed while still waking up, I felt incredible. All my resource pools were full and I had an exciting day ahead of me.

After I did a few stretches to loosen up for the day ahead of me, I made my way downstairs for some breakfast and later asked if Thaggerd was around. Funnily enough the little man appeared right behind me as I said his name.

“How may I be of service to you… Actually, I don't think I got your name last night?”

“Ah, my apologies. You can call me Claff. I was wondering if you had any armorer recommendations. I'm looking more for leather or cloth armor than plate or chain mail. I’ll be signing up as an adventurer later today and wanted at least something to cover up so I don’t look so green going in.”

“Oh you don't have to worry about that lad. Everyone starts somewhere yah? You must’ve just had your Choosing Day pretty recently then, huh? My daughter Theona just had hers last year.” He gestured towards the receptionist as he said the last part. So I was right in thinking she was about my age then, and that this was a family business.

“Yeah, I’m still getting used to having my skills. I’ve been trying to make sure my passives are on as often as possible, but only one is really somewhat conditional. But besides that, I work on my actives as often as I can. I think I'll be heading out pretty soon though. Thanks for the words of encouragement.” I gave him and his daughter a brief smile and waved as I left after our brief conversation.

The guild hall was only a five minute walk from the inn, which only reaffirmed my desire to make it a more permanent base for myself. The hall was pretty big, with 4 stories to it. When I walked in, it wasn't nearly as crowded as I thought it would be. There were a few guys who looked to be nursing hangovers at one of the tables in the middle though. I chuckled a bit, knowing the headache they must be dealing with.

There were 8 stalls to the left of the entrance, so I headed towards the one with only one person in line. The employee was decently fast and finished the person's business in just a few minutes. Meanwhile, I was taking a better look around. There was a board full of papers tacked on that I assumed was requests to be filled by adventurers. A few had what looked like pictures of various monsters on them. I saw one with a picture of wolves on it, and another with a circle and a smiley face in the middle. I'm guessing that's supposed to be a slime. I had a small laugh at the drawing. I looked around some more and saw a bar on the other end of the room with stairs on the wall opposite of the entrance. I turned back around as the person in front of me finished and the employee gestured me forward.

“Welcome to Silface’s adventurer's guild. My name is Luke. How can I help you today? Do you maybe have a request to be made?” The guy behind the counter looked barely as old as I was, maybe even younger.

So the city is called Silface, huh? I probably should have learned that earlier. But never too late, I guess.

“No, but I would like to sign up to be an adventurer though.” I was excited for this part. It was a struggle to keep calm with a straight face.

“I see! Well in that case, I’ll need to fill out a few papers for you. Do you have any combat skills? They'll be very important to making a living in this line of work. Emphasis on living.” He gave a look at the last part. It made me wonder how often people actually die while adventuring.

“Yeah, I have Arcane Magic and Barrier Magic. Those are my main combat abilities.”

Luke glanced down at my torn shirt. “I see. And what level would those be at?”

Okay, that felt pretty rude. But I guess I do look like a newbie with a bloodied shirt. I should have seen if I could wash it at the inn before I came here. Oh well.

“Arcane Magic is currently level 2, and Barrier Magic is still at level 1.”

“Oh, so you just went through your Choosing Day? Most people wait until they hit level 5 in at least 2 of their skills before trying to become adventurers. Well, that doesn’t matter too much. I do recommend forming a party before taking any kill quests. Though it looks like you’ve already gotten something done?” He said that last part questioningly.

“Yeah, I got two goblins on my way to the city. One dropped a claw, and they both dropped a loin cloth, but I didn't get the cloths though. I really wasn’t trying to touch that.”

Luke laughed a bit at that. “Yeah, I get that. If you can show me the claw, I can at least give you credit for killing one. In the future, you wont need to bring in anything since all kills will be counted by the quest system.”

I pulled the bag UI up and held my hand out. After a second and some mana, the claw popped into existence in my palm.

“I see you have a storage skill too. I’ll add that to the paperwork. Storage skills can be pretty handy when it comes to gathering and transportation quests. You can even be hired by companies to move products from one city to another, if you want to go public with it anyways. The guild will protect all your information, so don’t worry about any personal information getting leaked.” That was reassuring. I still think I'll keep the rest of my skills private, at least for now.

“As it stands, there is a no limit kill quest on goblins and slimes, since they’re rather annoying and potentially dangerous pests. If you can pull up your status, I'll transfer those quests to you now. Whenever you get a kill on these monsters, you can come back and let us know to check for you. You’ll receive half payment for the claw, but in the future, goblins will be worth 10 copper a kill and slimes will be 7 copper a kill.”

I called my status up to check on if the quests showed up and sure enough, a quest tab is now available on my menu.

User: Claff:

Health 120/120

Stamina 119/120

Mana 119/120

Quests [2]

SKILLS

PASSIVE

Enhanced Body Lv 1 [90%]

Increased Mental Capacity Lv1 [85%]

Regeneration Lv2 [30%]

ACTIVE

Arcane Magic Lv2 [20%]

Barrier MagicLv1 [15%]

Game-like Storage Lv1 [50%]

It’s nice to see a quantitative development of skills. I thought to myself. I like knowing how my effort doesn’t go unwasted. I guess all that walking and the fighting really helped my enhanced body. And the multiple skill uses in battle probably helped with mental capacity. I have noticed myself casting a little bit faster when I use mana bolt. I wonder how much better it’ll be when my capacity levels.

After my little self praise moment, I focused on the quest tab.

Quests

Kill Goblins 0/∞

Kill Slimes 0/∞

“Sweet, I see it!”

“Yep! So I still need to finish processing you real quick, but after that, you’ll be free to check out the quest board and pick and choose what you want to do. Before that though, can you tell me your passive skills? Just the name will work, I don't need the full numbered version. then you can go have a seat and i’ll be back in just a moment.”

I reluctantly gave him the skill names and after some short praise for smart skill choices, I went to the bar to grab a mug of water and see if any food was available. Unfortunately, they only had peanuts and pretzels, and the water tasted a little off. I guess most people here just get the alcohol.

After a bit of wasting time, Luke came back out with a necklace with a little copper plate at the end. I went and joined him at his counter.

“Here’s your official adventurer guild tag. You will be starting at the copper rank for now. I suggest either wearing it at all times or keeping it in that storage of yours. The first tag in any rank is free, but if you lose it, it's a silver to replace it. It’ll be more expensive to replace at higher tiers though. I need you to pour a little mana into it so it can be registered to you, and I need to link it to our system, which only takes a second, then you can be on your merry way.”

I did as he asked, then put the little pendant around my neck.

“Can you recommend any places to find some good but cheap armor? I don't exactly want to deal with replacing my shirt every day.”

He laughed and suggested I go to the fourth floor. He explained that the second and third floors were for silver and gold rank adventurers respectively, but the fourth served as a sort of department store, and that it was actually bigger on the inside than the outside due to some nifty enchantments

I headed upstairs to see just how good this store was. And I was not as impressed as I hoped to be.

For the most part, the store just had shelves along the walls with various swords, shields, and daggers. There were also a couple of racks of seemingly mundane clothing. One thing that caught my eye was the potion section. There were blue, red, yellow, and purple potions that all had different labels. I correctly guessed the first three were mana, health, and stamina potions respectively, but I had to read the label on the purple one. Turns out it was a type of poison. So not really my type. I might consider a few of the first 3 though.

While I was checking the potions out, an employee came over to me. “Need any help, sir?”

I turned and saw a rather beautiful lady standing beside me. I got rather nervous even looking at her.

Don’t look down. Don’t look down. Don’t look down. I had to focus on not checking her out. I wasn’t trying to get kicked out on my first day, after all I just started my fantasy adventure.

“Yes, I was looking at the potions you have available here. How much are these, exactly?” I gave myself a mental high five. I successfully talked to a cute girl without sounding like a total dumbass!

“The resource potions are a silver for the minor potions, ten silver for the regular, and a gold for the higher quality ones. The poisonous and fire potions are 3 silver each, although I see we’re out of the fire potions at the moment. If you want to place an order for those, we’ll set how ever many you decide on to the side for a later pick up date.”

Dang, she has a cute voice to go with a cute face. I’m dying over here!

“I see. I think I'll pass on that today, but thank you for letting me know.”

“No problem! Was there anything else you needed, or did you just want to browse today?”

“Yeah, could you help me pick out some armor? I’m looking for something light, but durable? I think I should do leather, but that’s as far as I've gotten.” You're doing great, bud. Just keep calm and don’t be a creep. You’ve got this!

“Sure, over here we have various sets and pieces for sale for a range of prices. What kind of budget do you have?”

“Right now I have 8 pieces of silver dedicated to buying armor. How much is a full set going to run me?”

She gave a whistle and a small smile then said, “That’s pretty good for a copper plate. You can get 2 sets of middle quality for that. That includes a vest, a pair of leather pants, and a couple of arm guards for each set. It’ll be 7 silver total, 50 copper additional copper if they need to be fitted, and if you want that to be rushed, we can do that for an extra 50 copper. Without the rush, it’ll take two to three days to finish modifications.”

“That sounds perfect actually. I’ll take it! And can I do a rush on one set, and I’ll be back in a couple of days for the second set? Also, how much would future repairs be?”

“I can absolutely do that for you. Repairs will be dependent on the extent of the damage to the armor. If a whole new piece is required, we can give a discount based on what’s salvageable from the old piece.”

“Awesome, thank you.” Okay, perfect. I got a decent set to use. I should also grab a couple of shirts too, while I'm here.

“Let’s go get you measured, and we’ll have the armor adjusted in about 30 minutes. If you want to wait downstairs while we do that, I can go get you when it’s ready.” She brought me over to a fitting room and took out a piece of string and started writing some numbers down on a pad that was already in there.

“Alright, I just need your name and adventurer number from your tag, and I'll have everything we need. Give us about half an hour, and we’ll have it ready for you. Here’s a copy of your order number and measurements. You can bring this up to the counter to pay.” I showed her my tag and she jotted down all the info while I tried not to sweat through my shirt. “I’m Sarah by the way. It’s been a pleasure meeting you!”

After Sarah gave me a copy of the paper she was writing on, she walked away. I went over to the shirts section and grabbed a few in my size. Two blue, two red, and one brown. They all felt surprisingly sturdy. I brought them up to the counter along with the paper Sarah gave me.

“That’ll be 8 silver, please.” Turns out the shirts were 5 copper each.

My heart hurt a little seeing how I only had 1 silver and 15 copper left. I needed to hurry up and go do some quests to build up my bank. I’m not trying to be broke in this life too.

I put the shirts away in my now empty second slot and was happy to see they weren’t divided by color. I then went back downstairs to wait on Sarah and look at the quest board. Luke came over since he wasn’t busy.

“Everyone’s already left for the day. It gets pretty slow around this time most days,” he explained. “So you’ve got me to yourself for now. Do you want some quest suggestions?”

I gave him my appreciation and he pointed to some gathering quests. “You should pick the Cat Ear collection quest. There’s a field of herbs a little further east of here, but the average person doesn’t risk gathering them due to the frequency of goblin spawns in the area,” he started. “If you choose this quest, you can get the money for some easy gathering and also money for any kills you get. I usually recommend going with another person, but your barrier skill should make covering your back while you pick the herbs a lot safer. They’re called Cat Ears because they look a little like cat faces. It makes it really easy to spot. They grow in a short field of flowers and other herbs, so it should make spotting goblins a lot easier too.”

“Seems like a pretty decent quest. I think I'll go for it. Thanks.” I took the quest off of the board and followed Luke over to his counter.

“Alright, let me see the quest ID and I can assign it to you. Once it’s been assigned, you should see a blue outline a few miles east on your map. That’s the area of the field I mentioned. It looks like there’s one other solo adventurer out there today doing a similar quest. I think you two should party together, but that’s up to you. He’s a chill guy, and I think the two of you would work well. His name is Grifith. Mentioning my name should get you at least a conversation about partying, if you feel so inclined.”

I considered it for a bit. If the herbs are in the middle of a field, then I shouldn't have any problem with sniping them with a mana bolt. Oh, that reminds me, I need to learn the second pattern for Arcane Magic! I’ll do that after I get my armor.

“I think I'll pass for now, Thank you though. That being said, if he approaches me, I'll definitely drop your name in our conversation.”

“Sounds reasonable to me,” Luke said. “Like I said, he’s a decent guy. He’ll probably help you out if you have any goblin troubles, and I ask that you do the same. I’d rather a couple of good people didn’t needlessly throw their lives away.”

“Oh absolutely! If it comes to that, I have no qualms about helping someone in need out of a crappy situation.” Hopefully it doesn’t come down to that, but you never know.

We kept talking for the rest of the time that I had to wait on my gear. When Sarah came down to get me, I said my goodbye to Luke while he ogled her and left to try the gear on. I get it man, but at least try not to be so damn obvious about it. Sheesh!

When we got upstairs, I went to the changing room and put everything on. I pulled the brown shirt on first so the vest doesn’t rub directly against me, and it felt like I was wearing a second skin.

“This fits perfectly, thank you.” I gave her my praise and a smile and she returned it with a perfect smile of her own.

“I’m glad you like it! Your second set will be ready in about 3 days, so stop by when you're done for the day and I'll have it packed up for you. Until then, I wish you luck on your adventures!”

I waved and started down the stairs again. I waved to a dreamy eyed Luke and went back to the inn to pay for another night and to get my second arcane magic spell before I left. I definitely wanted a quiet place to do that.

When I got to my room again, I plopped down on my bed and pulled my status up.

User: Claff:

Health 120/120

Stamina 117/120

Mana 120/120

Quests [3]

SKILLS

PASSIVE

Enhanced Body Lv 1 [93%]

Increased Mental Capacity Lv1 [90%]

Regeneration Lv2 [34%]

ACTIVE

Arcane Magic Lv2 [20%]

Barrier MagicLv1 [15%]

Game-like Storage Lv1 [50%]

Don’t tell me mental capacity got XP just from freaking out over a cute girl! Oh Hagrid, what is my life?!

After my mini meltdown, I got back on task. I focused on my Arcane Magic skill until I got that blinding headache. This time though, it only lasted for a split second.

Improved pattern for Mana Bolt has been learned.

Well, that's pretty sweet. I wonder what’s so “improved” about it? Let’s get going so I can try this out on some goblins!