Warren

Crafting on 10/6/2020

Crafting on 10/2/2020

 

Crafting on 9/13/2020



 

Crafting on 7/23/20

Finally, a eureka moment dawned upon the smith. He grabbed a parcel from beneath a pile of metal and gingerly dusted it off. He then held it out for Warren to take. "I need you to take this to an Artisan named Hannah. You can probably find her in one of the city groves. I promised her this item a while back and now that you're here, I can get it to her," he said. Warren took the item, not at all surprised that the quest had an extra part. The last one did too. It was almost like you were expected to do a task and then a second delivery would place you in the spot you needed for the next quest. Brilliant design to be sure. It insured that no one would miss the next quest and be stuck with no way to progress the quest line. Warren nodded in acceptance and headed off to find Hannah. With any luck he wouldn't need to turn the entire city upside down to find her. 

Tusks in hand, Warren arrived at Lyle's workshop once more. The grizzled smith looked excited to see the young man. He placed the piece that he was working on down and approached Warren, wiping his soot-covered hands on an equally-sooty cloth. "That certainly didn't take you long! You seem to know what you're doing," he said, holding his hand out expectantly. Warren laid the three tusks parallel into Lyle's open palm. The man took a moment to look them over. He weighed them in his hand and held them up to the light one by one. Satisfied with what he'd been given, he placed them down on one of his many cluttered workbenches and began rummaging through another pile. He rummaged for a bit and then clicked his tongue before moving to a different pile. Warren found himself in awe of how sophisticated the system-generated NPCs were in this game. It was almost like Lyle was actually human. Almost.

Warren raised his blade over his head and sliced downward, angling his Sword Art to strike both of the boars doing their best to chip through his armor with their nubby tusks. They were dispatched in short order. Warren, now content and with his quest completed, put away his weapon and thrust his hands into his pockets. It was time to head back and report in to Lyle. He turned sharply on his heels, humming a soft melody as he trotted off down the road. He was surprised at how quickly he had managed to finish this quest. Especially in comparison to the last one. Not that he was complaining. It was rather liberating to not need to almost drown himself and be given a surprise item by Oscar in order to finish it. He owed that guy a lot at this point. It was time to earn his keep. But in order to do that, he needed to get stronger. There wasn't much he could do with such a pitiful amount of energy.

Warren found another group in short order. Like a hunter on the prowl, he descended upon them with a ferocious glint in his eye. His Claymore carved through their ranks, but only actually managed to connect with two of them. In his haste to loot them, he forgot about the other two for a moment. As he was busy celebrating the acquisition of his final quest item, Warren felt two bonks on his shins in quick succession. He looked down to see the tiny boars driving their tiny tusks into his shin-guards. He took a step back and the boars followed. Apparently, these creatures were singular in their goal of applying annoying blips of damage in lieu of anything else. He let out a sigh and readied his weapon. The most efficient way out of combat was through it. These poor piglets - though cute - were standing in between him and his goal. The punishment for that, of course, was death.

Just a little longer now until he was back at one hundred percent. All he had to do was deal with the boredom for the next few moments and he could get back in the action. While he waited, Warren made another attempt at gathering. Just like the last attempt, he failed miserably. He didn't let it get him down though. He wasn't even really here for the materials. And, even if he found himself so inclined to get some, it was a simple matter of hunting down some mobs. They were much more likely to drop materials than if one tried to gather them. For now, Warren would busy himself with finding another group of boar pups to exterminate when his energy finally ticked back up. That was far and above the most productive use of his time. Indeed, gathering was a non-issue. He just wanted to get this quest done in a timely manner so that, maybe, he could finish another one today.

There wasn't much for Warren to do other than twiddle this thumbs while he waited for his energy to replenish. Thank the Lord for housing perks though. Apparently, they lowered the amount of time one had to wait for their energy to refill. Though the First Lesson had all but ruined his enthusiasm for Gathering, given that there wasn't anything else he could do he decided to see if he could rustle up some materials. He found a flower and stooped down to pick it. It seemed, however, that there was a certain sweet spot for breaking the stem and he missed it by a mile. The entire plant shattered like glass in his hand. He huffed in annoyance and shook his head. Gathering most definitely was not enjoyable. Well, he figured that it could be. If one enjoyed experiencing consistent failures at the whims of a system that did its utmost to make it as difficult as possible to pass the check.

Two more boar pups, one more Blast. The creatures hadn't even aggroed onto him before they were glassed, leaving nothing but shimmering mist in their wake. Interacting with the dancing light, Warren didn't have much hope that he would find what he was looking for. To his surprise, however, two tusks were dropped into his inventory. The mist disappeared, leaving Warren rather shocked at this sudden development. He'd all but written this quest off as a repeat of the first one, but here he was making meaningful progress. Maybe he'd have time to knock out the other quest today too. That would be awesome. The sooner he could get this done, the better. Maybe afterwards, he'd get himself a familiar or something. That was definitely really high up on his list of goals. But he couldn't get too ahead of himself. Lady Luck had smiled upon him this time. But she was a capricious woman and could just as easily make him suffer.

Another three boars joined the lone survivor from the last group. As he launched another Blast and watched his energy bar tank as a result of it, he couldn't help but wonder whether he was a touch over-leveled for this quest. Certainly it wasn't scaled to a level 11 player. Perhaps it was built for a level 5 or so, where they would be forced to rest after every single rotation of Boars. Ultimately, he decided that it didn't really matter. He'd gained a huge amount of experience early on so the next few quests would be naturally easier than they would have otherwise been. The boars shattered like glass and he tried to loot. Much like with the last group, Warren was a bit annoyed to find that he couldn't get his hands on even one of the tusks. With the shrug, he moved on. He had enough energy to fight a couple more boars before he needed to rest. He was determined to use that resource to the fullest.

Heading out of town, Warren following the quest marker to a location where the Boar Pups were known to spawn. Right off the bat, a group of four noticed him. Instead of regarding his presence with oblivious ambivalence like so many of the other creatures on this floor, he was barely able to get his sword out before they were upon him. Warren launched a Blast - his only AoE Sword Art. The Claymore of the Sands shot through the air like a whip, the deadly edge crashing into the boars that had assembled before him and turning three of them into glass on contact. The other had remained just out of his reach and was thus spared by his attack. It tried to attack, but Warren was able to hop out of the way. With a little breathing room, he tried to loot the fallen pups but was unable to find anything even remotely interesting. 

<<The Second Lesson, Is Also Free>>

The sun was shining, birds were chirping. Even though Warren knew that they were mere artificial facsimiles of reality, the sensations still elicited a feeling of familiarity in the young man. It inspired him to get out of his shop and enjoy the fresh air instead of the noxious fumes of whatever it was he was cooking up in his lab. There were still tutorial quests he had pending. He felt like he couldn't do anything else until those were taken care of. But, before that, he decided to swing by Oscar's place and get some training in at the slime farm the man had set up for him. After a quick extermination of the ever-smiling monsters, Warren headed down to Floor 1. Once there, he made his way to Lyle Tealeaf's shop and accepted his assignment from the smith. Apparently, he needed to go farm some tusks from some special boars. At least this wasn't another gathering quest. He would probably have retreated into his shop for the duration of his stay in Aincrad if that had been the case.

Mega Slime Farm used +2 SP to Thread - Next use 8/11/2020

Making something good wasn't the priority. He just wanted to get this done. Warren haphazardly added the ingredients to the cauldron, letting them stew and simmer for a brief moment before scooping some out into a vial with trained hands and handing the potion off to Zackariah. He was about to launch into his advice when Warren cut him off. "I know what I did. Let's go." Zackariah nodded and handed a package to both him and Elora. "The Blacksmith Lyle is expecting this. Would you be so kind as to deliver it?" In his haste, Warren completely forgot social niceties and grabbed Elora by the hand, all but dragging her all the way to Lyle. Once the two of them dropped off their packages, the QUEST COMPLETE text appeared and a plethora of items were added to their inventories. It felt so good to be done with this, finally. He just wondered whether Lyle's quest would be a pain too.

Thread Summary

Elora
+5 SP [2 Quest, 2 Page, 1 Bonus]
400 Col
5 T1 Health Potions [50 HP]
1 Uncommon DMG Potion [+1 DMG]
1 T1 Overhealth Potion [+50 Overhealth]

Warren
+7 SP [2 Quest, 2 Page, 1 Bonus, 2 Mega Slime Farm]
400 Col
5 T1 Health Potions [50 HP]
1 Uncommon DMG Potion [+1 DMG]
1 T1 Overhealth Potion [+50 Overhealth]

"Oscar said something about following his location data. So if I pull up my friend list..." He worked through his menu until a map of the area came up with two blinking cursors on it. The one centered on the screen was Warren's. The other was Oscar. He wasn't too far away. "If we go this way, we'll find him." Warren led them through the forest until it finally opened up to a clearing. In the distance, Warren could make out Oscar holding some form of light. Warren quickly dashed up to him and was about to speak. Oscar merely gestured over his shoulder and started walking. The giant of a man led them back to the city and all the way to Zackariah's shop. Then he disappeared around the corner. Damn that guy was weird. For Warren's part, he was just happy to be back. He turned to Elora with a smile. "Well, you wanna go first and knock this thing out or should I?" Warren didn't really care which. It just felt like they had been on this quest for an eternity.

Warren bent over to try to pick another flower. He beamed with glee as the words appeared in his quest log.

ALL MATERIALS GATHERED. RETURN TO ZAKARIAH'S WORKSHOP TO COMPLETE THE QUEST.

He straightened up and let out a contented sigh. "I'm hoping so. Though, I'm doubting my skills as an alchemist are going to come into play. I feel like the intention was for this quest to be finished before Earning a Living." Warren looked around, trying to find his bearings. It seemed like civilization was super far away. No matter where he looked, there wasn't anything familiar in view. The darkness didn't help. "I don't know. It might be morning before we get back. That river really messed us up." Maybe a better idea was to wait it out until morning. He'd heard that night time in Aincrad was dangerous. Would they even survive the night. Then, he heard a tone. A message? Warren quickly opened it.
 

Quote

From: Oscar
Hey. I'm near the main road. Follow my location data.

"Hey, Elora. Oscar just sent me a message. I think he's gonna help us get back."

"Yeah, that's probably a good idea. If we follow the river, I think we might find some familiar terrain." Warren was a little worried about traveling at night. But, then again, the monsters here were barely threatening. Between Warren's gear and Elora's newfound combat confidence, he was pretty sure they they'd be fine until they found a familiar landmark. It wasn't as if they were completely fumbling around in the dark though. The full moon shed a ton of light on the situation. So much so that Warren was able to pluck another flower off the ground, making it that much more progress towards finishing the quest off. "Hey! I only need one more now! Let's hope it doesn't take all night. The first four took forever!" He shot Elora a playful smirk. He was in a weirdly good mood for someone who'd just been swept downriver and almost eaten by a hungry hungry plant.

Just as Warren thought, the creature that had had him in its grasp wasn't strong at all. Though, he shuddered to think what might have happened if he had been alone. After the roots released him, he dusted himself off and gave Elora a bright, sincere smile. Completely uncharacteristic of him, but she had just saved his life. In the plant's wake, there was still the red flower. Warren tried his luck at picking it and, much to his surprise, he succeeded. He was one step closer to finally being done with this quest.

His guilt for holding her up subsided somewhat. If they'd parted ways, she would have met her end at the river and Warren would have been slowly gnawed to death by the plant. Though the quest was taking longer due to his ineptitude, the two of them were safer together. "I think we make quite the team Elora. That was a pretty badass thing you did."

Armed with his newfound luck, Warren decided to try his hand at grabbing a flower again. Noticing a bright red bloom, Warren jumped to his feet and strode over to it. Stooping down to pick it up, his fingers wrapped around the stem. He had been going for a clean break, but unfortunately the plant had other plans. For you see, some predators use bright coloration to attract their prey. This was no different. The moment he tugged at the flower stem, roots shot out of the ground and bound him. Held thusly, he couldn't reach his sword to hack himself free. The ground rumbled and cracked as a massive set of fangs burst from the ground and began to close around him.

Stay calm. This is floor one. It can't be that strong, Warren reminded himself. "Hey Elora! Wanna give me a hand with this real quick? Maybe before this thing eats me?"

From out of nowhere came a tactical meat missile. Expert aim delivered the dish directly to Warren's lap. He looked to his right to see Oscar retreating into the woods. Warren couldn't even complain about the man stalking him at this point. Not if he was delivering food when he was in such a tight spot. Warren forced himself to sit upright, leaning his back against a rock. He looked down and examined the hot dog, taking note of the enhancements provided on the dish. A boost to his luck might be just what the doctor ordered.

He quickly plucked the dog from his lap and greedily devoured it. Five bites or less, as hot dog etiquette dictated. Even though it was a virtual food and Warren wasn't actually physically exhausted, just the mere act of eating reinvigorated him. He felt his energy returning. For now, however, he would wait and let the food finish its work. There was no sense in rushing things. Hopefully it would provide just the edge he needed to give this quest a final push.

"That was Oscar," Warren began, his voice just a bit less tired. "The patron I was telling you about. No clue how he found us here."

Warren consumes <<Crazy Lucky Hot Dog>> +3 Loot Die

Warren was too busy trying to catch his breath to gather anything right now. Honestly, that was way more work than he thought he would be dealing with today. At least the two of them were safe. Even after her attempt to flex on him, Elora still finished her gathering long before him. No small wonder. He barely had the energy to move. Warren truly didn't know what he would do if he didn't get some food in him soon. Adrenaline was a hell of a drug in that it left you utterly exhausted when it wore off. He didn't know if he'd be able to move his arm, much less trudge all the way back to town. His hand found purchase on a plant on the riverbank. It shattered as soon as his hand came into contact with it. Really, he needed some food. Then he heard a noise off in the distance. Something was coming. He was too tired to warn Elora of the approaching mystery thing. He really hoped it wasn't an angry tree.