Chapter 6: 5. Tutorial

[Welcome to the Tower of Trials. Please proceed through the hallway.]

What’s going on?

Mattias stood in a large hallway made of pure white marble. The area was well lit, but there was no visible light source—rather, it looked like the marble itself was emanating a white light.

“Hello?” Mattias said. “Is anyone there?”

Mattias heard only the faint echo of his own voice. There was a bright light at the end of the hallway, but he couldn’t tell if it led to another room or if the hallway extended without end. He turned around and saw that there was a wall behind him, made of the same glowing white marble as the rest of the hallway.

Well, there’s only one way forward.

Mattias took several steps into the hallway and heard three pumps of air fire in rapid succession.

What was that sound?

Mattias looked around, but everything looked the same.

“Agh!” Mattias gasped as three arrows pierced through his chest and neck, barely missing his spine. He felt the warm blood dripping down his torso, soaking into the white linen robe he was wearing under his fur coat. He dropped to his knees and fell to his side. The pool of blood underneath him expanded as his consciousness slowly faded away.

Mattias stood in a large hallway made of pure white marble.

Huh?

Mattias touched his neck and chest. He was sure that just moments earlier he was lying on the ground, bleeding out from his wounds. But now he was standing with no signs of injury.

[Death is impermanent in the Tower of Trials. Please proceed through the hallway.]

“Hello!” Mattias shouted. “Can you hear me?”

Mattias took several steps into the hallway and heard three pumps of air fire in rapid succession, just like before. He raised his shield in front of him and waited.

“Clink—clink—clink!” The arrows deflected off his shield and fell to the floor.

Suddenly, an archway appeared at the side of the hallway, right next to Mattias. The opening looked like it led into another room. Curious, Mattias walked through the entrance and saw that he was standing on a ledge, peering into a small room that had no floor—instead, the room was filled with a pool of steaming red plasma several feet below.

“Thunk!”

Mattias turned around and saw that the entryway was blocked by a large boulder.

[Sometimes you may get stuck. In such cases, jumping to your death will reset the instance.]

Mattias felt a forceful push that knocked him off the ledge and sent him flying into the air. In one moment, he felt a shocking burn pierce all throughout his back, and in the next—

“Aaahhh!” he yelled.

Mattias stood in a large hallway made of pure white marble.

[And sometimes, the environment will react to your actions.]

Mattias felt the ground tremble beneath him. He looked down and saw that the marble floor was shaking in a small radius around his feet. He stepped forward onto stable ground. The floor on which he stood moments earlier crumbled and fell into an empty void below. He felt the ground tremble again.

Instinct took over, and Mattias began to run down the hallway as fast as his tired legs would carry him. He heard three pumps of air coming from the end of the hallway. He held up his shield as he ran forward.

“Clink—clink—clink!”

Mattias looked behind him and saw that the collapsing marble floor was drawing closer and closer to his feet. Looking forward, he saw the light at the end of the passage grow clear, and he noticed that the hallway led into a room with a grey stone floor.

Sprinting as fast as he could, Mattias gave one final push and leapt, diving onto the stone floor. He landed on the hard ground, and the air got knocked out of his lungs. After taking a moment to catch his breath, Mattias felt the cold, stony ground beneath him—it was stable. He stood up.

“Thunk!”

Mattias saw that the passageway from which he had entered the room was now closed off with a metal gate.

[You have reached a Checkpoint. If you die, the instance will revert to this position.]

Mattias looked around and saw that he was in a large, cube-shaped room. The walls, floor, and ceiling were made of cobblestone, and there was a thirty-foot-wide square pit in the middle of the room filled with the same red plasma that Mattias had fallen into earlier. The room stretched forty feet wide, leaving a five-foot-wide stone walkway along its perimeter.

On the opposite side of the room were large metal double doors, and in the center of the room—hanging on a rope in the ceiling, high above the pit of hot plasma—was a silver key. Mattias walked over to the large metal doors.

As he approached the metal doors, Mattias noticed that there was an inscription above a small red button that was on the walls next to the doors. It read:

Magic is fickle, but it can be fun.
The keyhole and key should merge into one.

Without giving it another thought, Mattias pressed the red button.

“Clink!”

Mattias heard the sound come from behind him. He turned around and saw the silver key that hung from the ceiling fall through the air and into the pool of steaming plasma, disintegrating on contact.

Ah, darn it.

Mattias held his breath dove into the pool of plasma. Moments later, he found himself standing in the opposite side of the room, where he had entered moments earlier.

Mattias stood in silence as he began to think. Pressing the button released the silver key from the rope, sending it falling into the plasma below, where it would disintegrate. He could attempt to jump for it, but jumping over ten feet with only five feet of running room wouldn’t be possible. And even if he were to somehow reach the key, there was no way that—

Oh, I see.

Mattias unequipped the shield from his left arm and set it on the ground, leaning it on the metal gate. He walked over to other side of the room, stood in front of the metal doors, and faced the round metal shield that lay on the opposite side of the burning pit. He reached over to the side and pressed the red button.

“Clink!”

The silver key fell from the ceiling as Mattias stuck his arms out toward his shield. When the key reached the height of his eyes, Mattias focused his energy, tensed up his fingers, and tried to visualize his shield flying to him.

In under a second, Mattias’s shield came flying through the air, catching the falling key like a net. With both hands, Mattias caught the shield, which held the silver key in its disc.

Mattias re-equipped his shield, and held the key in his hand. It had a simple design. The bow of the key was a fat round circle with a large hole in the middle, and the key had a silver, metallic gloss all-around.

Mattias stuck the key into the keyhole at the center of the large metal double doors. It melded into the door, and Mattias’s surroundings faded away into the darkness. All of a sudden, he saw a bright light which blinded him.

As his eyes began to adjust to the light, Mattias saw that he was standing on an endless blue ocean with nothing but the clear blue sky above him, stretching in every direction.

[Congratulations. You have successfully completed Floor Zero of the Tower of Trials. Please collect your reward.]

A bright blue feather, about the size of Mattias’s face, materialized in front of his eyes. He held out his hands as the feather fell gracefully into his palms.

[Item Obtained: Blue Feather]

***

Mattias stood alone in the small and empty tunnel. In front of him was the white stone tablet that was engraved into the wall at the end of the short tunnel, and in his hands was the blue feather.

He heard the sound of running water behind him. He turned around to see that the entrance to the tunnel was covered with a cascade of falling water, which was glowing a bright orange due to the sun that was setting behind it.

The blue feather that was in his hands began to glow. It levitated off his palms and floated out of the tunnel, through the waterfall.

“Hey, wait!” Mattias said as he chased the feather through the water. Surprisingly, he did not get wet—the falling water turned into vapor as soon it touched his body.

Running out of the waterfall, Mattias saw that everything around him looked the same as he last remembered seeing it—except for one glaring difference. He was standing in a shallow river, and thirty feet ahead of him, this river emptied itself into a large circular pond that was about a hundred feet wide—the same one he remembered seeing in his dreams.

Mattias turned around looked up the waterfall. It was about twenty feet high, and it was wide enough to completely cover the entrance to the tunnel. Feeding into the waterfall was a stream of water that extended up the snowy mountain as far as Mattias could see.

He bent down to touch the thin layer of water that flowed at his feet. Unlike the falling water from the waterfall that vaporized as soon as it touched his body, this water remained on his skin. Although it came down from the icy slopes, the water was warm to the touch. He turned to the pond and noticed that the glowing blue feather was hovering over the water.

“Go where the hidden wind blows,” Mattias said. “Is that what he meant?”

Mattias stepped out of the stream and walked to the edge of the pond. He bent over, fell to his knees, and touched his lips to the water. Mattias could not remember the last time he was able to drink water so freely.

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The water was warm and slightly sweet. Observing closely, Mattias saw that there were tiny—almost imperceptible—red and orange sparkles of light in the water.

Having satiated his thirst, Mattias took off his shield and the rest of his clothing, laying them gently in the thin layer of snow. He dunked himself into the large but shallow pond, which was about three feet deep all around. The water was the perfect temperature to feel warm and protected under the light, snowy breeze, but not too hot to be uncomfortable.

Mattias rested his head on the bank of the pond and, almost instantly, he felt rejuvenated. It was a well deserved rest after such a hectic and eventful day. He looked up into the clear and open sky. It was only yesterday that he was staring into the dark and musty dungeon ceiling, but now—now he was free.

“I’m going to find you guys…” Mattias mumbled with a drowsy voice. “I’m gonna bring you all back…”

The sun set over the horizon as Mattias Richter drifted off to sleep.

***

[The 13th day of Diligence, 995AP]

“Happy birthday, Yohan!”

“Wow! Thank you, everyone!” Yohan says. “This is the best twelfth birthday ever!”

“This is your only twelfth birthday ever,” Leopold says.

“Leo!” Adelheid snaps at Leopold with a scowl.

There is a group of people—nine in total—gathered in a small house, sitting in a circle on the living room floor.

“Thank you all for coming today,” Yohan says, “and thank you Mats for gathering everyone.”

Mattias smiles at Yohan.

“The reason why I asked you not to bring any presents,” Yohan says, “is because you’re the present! Hahaha! I’m going to celebrate by having you all play Creatures and Caverns with me!”

“I’m too old for this, Mats,” Leopold says.

“If you’re too old, then what am I?” says a young adult man. He has a handsome face filled with small freckles, a head full of dark brown hair, and light brown eyes.

“If you don’t want to play, Liam,” Mattias says, “maybe you can help Lupin play—”

“No, no,” says a young adult woman. She has a head of thick blonde hair and bright green eyes. “Lupin is my younger brother, so I’m going to help him play.”

“You can both help!” says a young boy. He is about five years younger than Yohan and has a head full of combed-over black hair and large blue eyes. He holds a large magnifying glass to his face, making his already large eyes look even larger. “After all, three is greater than one.”

“Brilliant observation, Detective Lupin!” the young woman says. “He’s been reading detective stories,” she says to the group. “It’s the only way I can get him to read.”

“Yes, that is fine!” Yohan says. “That means we will have—” Yohan begins to count the people sitting in the circle, “One, two, three, four, five, six players. That’s the perfect number for a party!”

“So, what are we doing anyway?” Leopold says.

“Thank you for asking!” Yohan says. “Creatures and Caverns is a role-playing game. I’m the Cavernmaster who makes up the world, and you are the characters in that world. So it’ll be like we’re telling a story together! I asked Mats to bring who he thought would be the most fun to play with, since he knows the townspeople the best.”

“Oh, it does sound interesting,” Leopold says. “How do we start?”

“He’s getting to it!” Adelheid says. “Stop interrupting him!”

“Haha, it’s OK,” Yohan says. “First, we’ll start off with the scenario.” Yohan begins to read from a notebook that is filled with pages and pages of handwritten notes. “You are a group of friends from a tiny village in the magical land of Renascentia. There is a dark magic that threatens the land. You set off on your adventure to hone your skills in order to defeat the evil.”

Yohan takes out a large and worn paper-bound book and places it in the circle for everyone to see. “This is the Creatures and Caverns guidebook,” he says. “Read it starting from page seventeen in order to see all the different classes you can be. They all have different strengths and abilities, and you can’t change it later, so choose wisely. I’ll give you a few minutes to look through it.”

Everyone in the circle gets a chance to look through the guidebook. Several minutes later, Yohan begins to speak as Mattias is rummaging through the pages of the book.

“OK, is everyone ready?” Yohan asks. “Let’s start with Heidi.”

“I’m going to be a Beastmaster,” Adelheid says. “Who is also a princess.”

“I’m pretty sure there was no ‘Princess’ class,” Leopold says.

“I can be whatever I want, OK?” Adelheid yells.

“Haha!” Yohan laughs. “OK, we can make that happen. Billie, how about you?”

“U—uhm…” says a young teenage girl with brown hair large, thick rimmed glasses. “I’ll be a Bard.”

“OK!” Yohan says. “And you, Gio?”

“Illusionist,” says a young teenage boy with a head full of long black hair that covers half his face.

“I’m a Gambler,” Leopold says without being asked. “What about you, Mats?”

“Hmm…” Mattias says as he turns through the pages in the book. “Can you come back to me?”

“Sure, Mats,” Yohan says. “Lupin, what do you want to be?”

“I’m Detective Lupin!” the young boy says.

“Lupin, I told you, you can’t be a detective in this game!” the young woman says. “How about a sniper? They’re cool too! You can be safe and fight from a distance.”

“Hmm,” the handsome man says. “It is true that the party is lacking in ranged damage. How about this, Lupin? You can be a sniper, but you can put your points into the INT stat so you’ll be really smart, just like a detective.”

“OK!” the young boy says, smiling. “I also want laser vision!”

The young man and woman squint their eyes and slap their foreheads in unison.

“OK, then!” Yohan says. “Lupin, you are a Sniper. Mats, are you ready?”

“Uh, can I just be a classless woodcutter, or something?” Mattias says. “None of these classes really makes sense for me.”

“What do you mean?” Yohan says.

“Well,” Mattias says, “I don’t think I really have a thing, you know? It seems like everyone picked a class because it matches who they are. Heidi picked Beastmaster because she likes animals, Billie is a Bard because she likes to write a lot, Gio picked Illusionist because he likes art, Mattias is a Gambler because he loves to throw money away, and Lupin—”

Yohan clapped his hands. “Oh!” he says. “I know what you are!”

“Huh?” Mattias says.

“You’re a Soulseeker!”

“A Soulseeker?”

“Yeah! A Soulseeker!” Yohan says. “It’s a warrior-mage hybrid, jack-of-all-trades class. It doesn’t possess anything super special, other than the most powerful magic of all—the power of friendship!”

“Uh…” Mattias says. “Does that really suit me?”

“Yes!” Yohan says. “You’re the one who brought everyone together, right?”

“I’m pretty sure ‘Soulseeker’ wasn’t in the book either,” Leopold says.

“I know!” Yohan says. “I made it up just now.”

“What?” Leopold says. “You can do that?”

“Of course,” Yohan says. “I’m the Cavernmaster! I can do whatever I want!”

The Beastmaster, Bard, Illusionist, Gambler, Sniper, and Soulseeker begin their adventure. They fight monsters, solve mysteries, and find treasures late into the night.

***

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