[SP-F6] Gemini

[Yamato 0]

Having finally made up his mind which quest he would be tackling first, Yamato had made his way up to the sixth floor of the Aincrad Tower. Emerging from the teleportation portal the blonde headed Irishman moved quickly down the steps and then swiped his finger in the air in front of him to pull up his player menu. Wordlessly, he tabbed and scrolled through the various menu screens until he found his quest log. He poked through the available quests on the floor, almost all of them vastly too powerful for him, until his eyes found the quest that he sought. Gemini. That quest, according to the guide book automatically scaled to the level of the player taking it. Therefore, there was minimal danger and maximum rewards from taking it right now as a level one player. Shrugging his shoulders, he tapped the accept button and then waited for the quest NPC to show itself.

[Yamato 0]

Moving to the shade of one of the few nearby storefronts in the town of Amazon, which was clearly situated deep within a sweltering jungle that had both significant heat and significant humidity, Yamato swiped his finger in the air again and scrolled through his pitifully small inventory. Tapping on one of the canteens of water, of which he had fifteen, the Irishman extracted the beverage and took a long slug from the bottle before wiping his hand across the back of his mouth and replacing the cap on the bottle. Slowly, his ice blue eyes scanned his surroundings as he kept a steady watch for the approach of the quest NPC, which would become Gemini according to the freely available guidebooks.

[Yamato 0]

The blonde man was just taking another good slug from the canteen that he held clutched in his hands when the briefest of flashes caught his eye. Turning his head in the appropriate direction, the Irishman's blue eyes narrowed as they zeroed in on the just appearing character. The yellow cursor over the head of the recently appeared indicated, quite clearly, that the new arrival was an NPC and, as the figure slowly sauntered over, Yamato drained away the last of the water in the canteen and dropped the item to the ground where it promptly dissolved into pixels. Given the quick appearance, it seemed likely that this was the quest NPC related to the Gemini quest that the axe man had been waiting for.

[Yamato 0]

"You look to be an adventuring sort," the voice of the NPC called out as it neared where Yamato was standing. The NPC laced its fingers together and cracked its knuckles before yawning loudly. "I don't suppose you'd be interested in a quick duel? I could always use the practice and your gear doesn't seem as if it's seen too much combat," the NPC continued in a tone that carried the slightly clipped notes of an English accent. Of all the things to find in a game that was developed and, largely, released only in Japan. 'Why does everyone think that an English accent automatically makes you evil?' Yamato wondered to himself as the NPC continued to talk.

[Yamato 0]

"I will duel you," Yamato replied in a low tone, his own Irish brogue mixing with the soft English accent of the NPC. As he spoke the required words of quest dialogue a window popped up in front of him again. This one informed him that the quest was proceeding correctly and directed him to follow the NPC just outside of the safe zone limits of the town of Amazon. The blonde man shrugged his shoulders and trailed his right index finger over the wickedly sharp blade of the Heart of the Forest as the silver-bladed tomahawk dangled from where it was secured to his hip. "What's in this fight for me," he asked, falling into step with the NPC.

[Yamato 0]

"Fabulous rewards my friend," the quest NPC replied, clapping one hand on Yamato's back as the other rested upon a glittering rapier at its side. "Col, armor, weapons, potions, women..." the NPC continued, trailing off on that last one to wink in a conspiratorial manner. "Even new skills. All you have to do is best Aincrad's greatest duelist in single combat. How hard could that possibly be," the man asked, continuing to lead Yamato through the town in the direction of the shabby looking gate that was the exit from the town populated by Amazons in an Amazonian environment.

[Yamato 0]

"I'll settle for the col, a shield, the skills, and the potions," Yamato muttered under his breath. In his experiences with women, nearly all of them bad, all women did was cost a man time and money. He wasn't overly thrilled with the idea of losing either of those things at the moment, given that he was already far enough behind the front liners that it was going to be a major slog just to catch up to them. Of course, to be fair, he also assume that most women viewed men in much the same way, or rather that they would if their experiences with them had been as universally poor as his own had been. "How much further?"

[Yamato 0]

"Oh, we're nearly there now friend," the NPC replied, chattering away happily and clapping the armored axe man on the back once again, even though it seemed pretty apparent that Yamato didn't want to be touched by the NPC. Of course, the NPC was only following the hundreds, or perhaps thousands, of lines of code that made up its program. Simple program, simple NPC, simple quest. No doubt this quest was only meant to be an introduction to dueling and how that worked within the world of Sword Art Online. The NPC was still yammering away happily as the duo passed through the gates of Amazon and moved off a short ways from there, perhaps fifty meters into the surrounding jungle.

[Yamato 0]

"That's far enough," Yamato declared, just before they could pass out of sight of the main gate of the town of Amazon on the sixth floor of the tower. Already the vegetation was encroaching and the sounds of the jungle were impossible to miss. Yamato was not about to allow himself to be dragged too far away from the gate. The blonde Irishman was more than smart enough to be well aware of the fact that, were he to be jumped by even a standard floor strength mob on this floor. "If we're going to have this duel, lad, then we're going to have it within sight of the gates that lead into Amazon," he declared in a flat tone, crossing his arms over his chest and waiting for the NPC to respond.

[Yamato 0]

"Fine, friend, fine," the NPC answered in an amicable manner. Stopping on the spot in the midst of the jungle environment the NPC spun to face Yamato. An instant later another quest window popped up in front of the Irishman. He squinted at it for a moment, reading the writing on the screen before nodding his head and tapping the Accept button. The first window closed and was quickly followed by a second window. This one was informing him that he had been challenged to a duel and asked if he was willing to accept. Shrugging his shoulders, the blonde man tapped the Accept button again and a time appeared in the air directly in the middle of the space that separated Yamato from the NPC.

[Yamato 0]

"Finally," Yamato muttered to himself as the NPC stopped and presented the request to duel. Once he had accepted the request and the timer had appeared in the space that separated the two of them the Irishman prepared himself for the fight that was to come. Reaching down to his right hip, he drew the Heart of the Forest from its sheath and twirled the tomahawk experimentally in his hands for a few seconds to test how it felt. This would be the first time that the weapon had seen battle, or at least that was what Yamato assumed to be the case. Next, he reached back over his right shoulder with his left hand and unslung Bramble Patch, his kite shield, before sliding it onto his arm.

[Yamato 0]

"There is just one other little catch, my fine friend," the NPC called across the space separating them. Slowly the NPC's features began to change and morph, slowly dissolving until they took on what appeared to be something akin to heated wax. Little by little the features rearranged themselves until they took on the appearance of the axe man. That was to be expected, of course, it had been mentioned in the guidebook. What hadn't been mentioned was that the NPC's gear would also change to perfectly mimic the gear that the Irishman was using. That could certainly prove to be both troubling and problematic. "Now there, boy-o, how do ye feel about the duel now," the NPC asked, perfectly mimicing Yamato's thick Irish brogue.

[Yamato 0]

Yamato shrugged his shoulders as the NPC's form changed to match his own. In truth, this was a slight departure from what the blonde man had considered was going to happen with the quest. Still, there was nothing to be done about it now. After all the duel had been offered and accepted and the Cardinal engine would not allow players to renege once a duel was accepted. If he didn't fight Gemini, then he would be killed. If he fought Gemini, then there was a chance he would still be killed. There was no way to not risk his life, that he could see. Therefore, the only logical course of action was to steer into the proverbial skid. "I'll let ye know in about fifteen seconds," the blonde man replied, his blue eyes narrowing as he focused on the task at hand.

[Yamato 0]

OOC: And... Gemini is super dead.

ID: 58358
BD: 7 (6+1)
MD: 7
LD: 17 (+Concentration Skill)
Yamato: 3/4 (2-14=1)
Gemini: -14/4 (-14 Thorns, -4 DMG)

"Indeed, boy-o," Gemini replied, his own blue eyes narrowing as he faced down with Yamato. It was slightly disconcerting, to be faced with yourself in a battle. But, there was nothing to be done for it now. As the last few seconds of the battle timer ticked down Gemini sprang into motion. The NPC landed in front of Yamato and delivered a blow to the blonde man's shield. Simultaneously, the Irishman whipped his tomahawk through the air and slammed it into the side of Gemini's head. The NPC exploded in a shower of blue pixels and left Yamato standing there, not far from the gates that led into Amazon.

Edited May 6, 2016 by Yamato

[Yamato 0]

OOC: Out of Combat, +1 HP, now at full health.

"That was anti-climactic," Yamato muttered to himself, looking around with a calm ice blue gaze as he scanned the area. He was reasonably certain that Gemini wouldn't be making another appearance, but it was always prudent to be wary. Just in case. After all, the system hadn't yet done anything to alert him that the quest was completed. As he was standing there, shield still at the ready and weapon in hand there was a soft chime, the sound of the quest log updating. Sheathing the Heart of the Forest, for the moment, the blonde man swiped his finger in the air in front of him and scrolled through his menu screens to find the quest log to see what information the update had for him.

[Yamato 0]

Sure enough, the quest log had updated to inform him that he had successfully defeated Gemini in battle. As if that hadn't already been clear. The more puzzling thing was why his own landed blow on the NPC hadn't resulted in his own death from the thorns enchantment that surely had to have been on the shield that the NPC was carrying. In the end, Yamato shrugged his shoulders and decided not to think about it. The most logical explanation was that since the NPC had hit him first in the course of combat that the Gemini had already technically been dead by the time he had hit it with his axe. Either that, or it was always possible that Gemini's gear had only been cosmetic. But that didn't seem very likely.

[Yamato 0]

Scrolling through the quest rewards screen Yamato examined the various rewards that came from the Gemini quest. It looked like he had gained the skill Concentration which was fine since, of the two skills that had been available that was the one he had wanted in the first place. The twelve turn cool down on the other skill meant that, to Yamato's way of looking at things, it was only really useful once per combat round whereas it would be possible to use Concentration more than once during combat, depending on the length of the battle. That made it the more valuable of the skills, in the blonde Irishman's opinion. There was also a good amount of experience that had come with the quest completion, which was always welcome.

[Yamato 0]

Finishing up with the Quest rewards menu, Yamato exited from the various screens and drew his tomahawk once again. The weapon couldn't exactly be called trusted, yet, but it was still a solid weapon and its silver blade would serve him well enough for the time being. Holding his shield in the ready position, the Irishman considered his various options for moving forward for a split second. It didn't exactly take a Rhodes Scholar to see that the wisest course of action would be to retreat to the town of Amazon and use the teleporter to head down to one of the lower floors of the tower. Simply put, the monsters he would be likely to encounter on the sixth floor were simply too powerful for him to attempt to tackle at this stage of the game.

[Yamato 0]

Yamato trudged back the short distance through the jungle in the direction he had originally come from. It wasn't that difficult to find his path, given that he hadn't allowed the non-player character that was in charge of running the quest to drag him off so deep into the jungle that he could no longer see the gates of the town of Amazon. Steadily, with each foot fall, the Irishman came closer and close to the heavy wooden gates that separated the safe zone of the town from the wilderness of the floor. Since it didn't seem that any of the mobs on the floor were closing in on him the blonde man felt no particular need to rush.

[Yamato 0]

Passing through the heavy wooden gates that barred, or held open, the entrance to the town of Amazon depending on the time of day within Aincrad Yamato once again moved from an area of danger to one of safety. All the towns in Aincrad, regardless of the floor represented safe zones. Within any safe zone it was impossible for a player to come to any kind of harm, unless they were to enter into a duel with another player which was, quite literally, the only way to come to any kind of real and lasting harm within any of the safe zones. Silently, the blonde Irishman passed through the gates and into the town, heading in the direction of the portal plaza.