Chapter 18: 17. The Great Old Ones

Petra looked at me with a raised eyebrow, then shook her head. She got away from me and said “Insanity is contagious, I hope you’ll stay away from me from now on."

She had a smile on her face and looked amused.

Did she forget that the contract prevented me from lying? I thought. I technically died in the future due to the explosion of that mana core!

I laughed loudly and shrugged my shoulders. I heard the fairies speaking so I focused on their speech.

“Now that the final fight is over, it’s time to update the rankings,” he said “The top five rankers in this phase will get a special opportunity in the next phase.”

Suddenly, the system screen that depicted our current rankings changed a bit.

 

Those points are a lot, I thought. But I still need the most I can get from the third phase.

“The winners of this phase won’t get a direct reward,” said Phaella, “but you’ll understand your advantage soon.”

“The surrounding wilderness is just a small patch of land in the vast tutorial,” said Phillian, “the next phase depends heavily on how well you did in the past ones, you’ll use your current tutorial points to buy access to certain areas in the tutorial.”

“Naturally, some of these regions have powerful monsters to kill!” said Phaella, “Others, however, are completely deserted! You’ll have to either be very lucky or wealthy enough to spend mana stones on useful information before buying access to the locations that you desire.”

“If you’d like to buy information on locations that are guaranteed to have monsters and valuable loot, you can discuss this subject with Vulpinus.” Said Phillian. “I am sure he’ll help you even if you lack immediate funds!”

Suddenly, a large system notice appeared in front of us. It was a grid map that depicted the whole tutorial, it had some information about our current location but that was it.

Another insidious plot, I thought. They’re making this as pay-to-win as possible.

In my past life, we’d learned through trial and error that most surrounding zones didn’t have any valuable opportunities. The price of accessing a certain location was constant; twenty tutorial points for each square kilometer.

However, it was a huge gamble to buy access to areas depending on intuition alone. Vulpinus already had information on all the noteworthy locations, and he’d ask for huge sums of points to reveal anything.

My current tutorial points were enough to buy access to about half the tutorial grounds, which was a lot considering that the total area of the tutorial was about one hundred thousand square kilometers; as large as Iceland.

But I didn’t need to do that. After the tutorial ended, the areas that had the most valuable creatures and loot were revealed. People that bought information on these areas from Vulpinus mostly ended up among the top rankers, but they ended up deep in debt to that sly fox.

I had three areas in mind, each having an [Area Boss]. Their total area was about two thousand square kilometers.

The whole tutorial has three Area Bosses anyway, I thought. There are other lesser bosses in different areas, but they’re not worth my points.

I made some calculations and found that I would need to spend forty thousand tutorial points to access them.

After deciding my next moves, I approached the fairies.

“Alright, I’ve already made my decision,” I said, “These are the areas that I want to access.”

I made some motions to the large map that was in front of me. All the three areas that I wanted to access were far from our current whereabouts and were very precise.

“I don’t understand,” said Phaella while squinting her eyes, “what made you pick these locations?”

My future knowledge, dumbass! I thought. I am sure that the fairies’ higher-ups are keeping an eye on me, but this doesn’t scare me at all.

“I’ve got a feeling that these areas will have useful stuff,” I said, “Don’t you think, Phaella?” I added as I gave her a grin.

“Are you sure about your decision?” said Phillian, “Don’t you think that buying some information from Vulpinus would be the better choice.”

“Besides, these areas aren’t directly connected to our current area,” said Phaella, “You’ll have to pay for teleportation fees.”

“It’s fine,” I said, “Just accept the transaction and give me access to the locations that I want.”

I didn’t visit these locations before, so using [Zoom] from the get-go wasn’t an option. The fee for teleportation depended on the distance between the current location and the destination, but it was my least expensive option.

I could’ve bought access to all the areas that had useful stuff in them, but I had to clear this phase as soon as possible.

Titles will become available as soon as we leave the tutorial, I thought. I am aiming for a certain title that could be acquired by the first one to clear the tutorial.

The third phase of the tutorial was similar to the first. It could get automatically cleared when the countdown ended, twelve days after the start of the tutorial. Killing the three [Area Bosses] was another possible way to clear it.

“Alright,” said Phaella, “Just hand over the tutorial points, and you’ll be good to go.”

Suddenly, a system notice appeared in front of me.

 

Transaction in Process: Would you like to proceed? -This Transaction will cost you 40150 tutorial points.
[Agree]	[Decline]

I agreed to the transaction, thinking about the location that I would tackle first.

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Suddenly, I felt something touch my back. I turned around only to find Petra there.

“Hey,” she whispered, “I am sure you have some information on the locations around us.”

I turned to face her while keeping a neutral expression on my face, “And?” I said.

“I would like to buy the information from you,” she said, “That fox-man is asking for outrageous sums of mana stones!”

That’s right, I thought. His main source of income wasn’t from this stall.

Vulpinus was a greedy person, he was always looking for an opportunity to force someone to take a loan from him. Most of them ended up unable to pay their debts, and thus they were forced to sign slavery contracts.

“It depends,” I said “The tutorial points that you have aren’t that much, to begin with, and a lot of the areas in the tutorial have dangerous foes for solo hosts.”

I am pretty sure she’ll ask me to babysit her, I thought. Too bad I have more important stuff to do.

“…Okay,” she said with a scowl on her face. “I need access to an area with good loot but little to no monsters, I’d prefer for it to be easy to clear.”

“Alright,” I said. “I’ll show you some suitable locations that you could buy access to with your current tutorial points.”

After some discussions, she settled on an area she liked. It had many goblin villages and an ancient temple too. The latter was riddled with traps but had a lot of useful treasures to compensate. We agreed that she would pay me five regular mana stones outside of the tutorial, which was much less than what she would’ve had to give to the fox.

The cost of access to this area was just three thousand tutorial points, which she gladly paid to the fairies.

“I guess this is where we part ways,” she told me before asking Phillian to teleport her to the location that she wanted, “Good luck! I’ll find you outside the tutorial.”

“Sure thing,” I said with a smile on my face, I waved my hand and added, “Good luck.”

I thought about selling all the information that I had to the people from our group but decided not to.

I already have too much attention from unknown people, I thought. I can’t risk their retaliation for a couple of mana stones.

Vulpinus was a sponsored seller, he certainly had a strong entity backing him. I wasn’t strong enough to protect myself as is, and the system admin was another mystery that I’ve yet to solve.

I took a look at the large map in front of me and focused on the areas that I bought access to. They weren’t close to each other; thus, I would need at least three teleportations from the fairies to familiarize myself with the areas enough to use [Zoom]

I shook my head and stopped thinking; it was time for action.

I am coming for you, Hydra, I thought.

*

In a certain room, there was a large round table.

Around it was a great number of humanoid figures. Their physical features were somewhat blurred, but it still allowed the observer to gather enough crucial information.

Many of them were having conversations with one another. Most of them were casual, and only some of them talked about serious matters.

“This integration’s hosts were nothing out of the ordinary,” said a well-built figure with a large beard, “Humans are always average.”

He didn’t seem pleased with this; his tone of voice was somewhat scornful.

“Yet, we have some outliers too.” said a woman with a voluptuous figure that left nothing to the imagination, “There are those three special hosts. They’ve been specially nurtured to stand on top of the human race. They’re progressing nicely and they’re expected to fulfill their duties well.”

Someone clicked their tongue loudly and said, “Huh, did you forget about that person already?”

Suddenly, all the voices stopped in their tracks. A creepy silence filled the place.

Everyone looked at the one who caused this abrupt change in the room, he had a thin figure and his voice indicated his old age.

“He’s being suspected of colliding with the Glitchers,” he added, “We prepared a little gift for him, to stop his growth. Yet, he managed to effortlessly crush that obstacle.”

“He seems to have information on the third phase of the tutorial,” said the woman, “He only bought access to the most valuable locations!”

“If I remember correctly, he has a (Legendary) class, right?” said another figure.

“That’s true! His class is [The Burned Man!]” added another.

“That’s nostalgic,” said the bearded old man, “The previous owner of that class was a candidate for ascension, but the circumstances stood in the way.”

“After that candidate’s death, his sponsor mysteriously disappeared,” said the woman, “but his first appearance was as mysterious too.”

“Yeah, I got bored after he bit the dust,” said another figure, he was completely black and his silhouette shifted constantly, “It was a bit strange for that breakout to happen so early, don’t you think? I guess you’re planning to kill the new guy too?”

Suddenly, everyone felt a looming pressure from this new figure. He was sitting on a seat that was on top of the round table.

How did he appear out of nowhere? was what everyone thought as they realized that the figure appeared without alarming anyone.

“Wh…Who the hell are you?” said the bearded entity as the black-shifting silhouette stood from its seat and approached him.

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