The rest of the group eventually filled the briefing room and took a seat. Acai and Maria sat next to Arthur as the developers stood up on stage, preparing themselves for their speeches.
The first topic was about various snippets of data, such as people interacting more with NPCs, finishing more quests, and fighting more monsters. Some standout points was that the player death count from monsters for this session was lower than last session, but the total player death count had exceeded the first session due to a mass player killing spree.
"No arrests this time around, although there was a few close calls with a certain group of player killers trying to enter the village." The developer eyed over a group who seemed kind of proud of themselves that they got mentioned, even if it was for something widely considered negative.
There were a couple shout-outs for players before the top three was announced. The more notable ones were lucky item drops or an uncommon hidden quest, a couple mentions were for subduing player killers, ending their killing sprees. The developer flipped the page and started reading out the leaderboard results.
"Coming in at third place, at level two with two souls, responsible for ending seven kill streaks, Snowbunny." The developer read out Maria's results before he flipped the page, getting ready to read the next result.
"Coming in at second place, also at level two with two souls, responsible for ending eight kill streaks and dealing the killing blow to a boss, Typhoeus." The developer finished reading out Acai's results.
"I thought you said they attacked you a couple times?" Athur was surprised hearing about all the killing, he was previously informed by Maria that there were fights popping up, he didn't expect this though.
Maria and Acai both shrugged in response, turning their attention back to the stage as the first place was revealed.
"Coming in at first place, level three with one soul. The first player to leave the beginner village, and also the player who has travelled the most, entering a total of four settlements, Merlin." The developer flipped the page and continued reading, but didn't read the rest out, only leaving the group with a vague comment. "Wow, you've done so much damage, it's only the second day."
"What did you do to earn that response?", Maria and Acai both turned to Arthur with a curious look on their faces.
Arthur mimicked their previous actions and merely shrugged in response. A playful smirk formed on his face as they protested.
The surrounding group all looked at the trio with various emotions, the most prevalent being envy and jealousy, but there was also hate and anger. Arthur internally sighed, pampered children could never accept their own inadequacy. They were always blaming others for any inconvenience they faced.
The developers informed everyone that the next session would start next week, and that the briefing was over. Eventually everyone in the group left, including Arthur and his friends, and Donovan drove him home.
A week flew by with nothing of interest happening, school hadn't started yet so Arthur was lazing around the house for most of it. He still spent plenty of time working out and tending to his plants, but he spent most of the week playing games with his friends, both Holly and Quinn, as well as Acai and Maria. His room was also occasionally invaded by his big sister Anna, who sometimes played games with him on her breaks.
When the week ended Arthur was brought back to the facility for the first session of week two. There were a few groups outside, Arthur assumed that they were waiting for their friends to arrive. Due to not having any reason to converse with anyone there, he walked past and entered the briefing room. There were a few small groups scattered around, but the two he was looking for hadn't arrived yet.
He took a seat in the front row and sat quietly while waiting. A couple developers who were walking around waiting for everyone to arrive had started hovering around Arthur until they eventually struck up a conversation with him. It was mostly small talk, but a few points about his performance within the game popped up, it seemed Gaia was interested in him.
Eventually everyone arrived, Arthur's friends sat next to him and chat for a moment as everyone settled in. The morning briefing was short, covering a few minor tweaks, but nothing that caught his interest this time around.
Over the span of a couple minutes, everyone was led into the capsule room and loaded into their VR capsules. All the machines began their syncing phase, followed shortly after by the instantiating phase, until everyone was sent into the virtual world.
Arthur opened his eyes, revealing the endless white room that everyone had grown accustomed to by this point. Wasting no time, he checked the buttons hovering around his arm, and noticing that the server hadn't launched yet, decided to join the beta tester's lobby.
Clicking the join button caused his body to be enveloped in light, fading away to reveal a barren rocky floor.
When Arthur looked up from the floor, he saw the dark expanse of space, and a large planet overhead, it was earth. The map this time around was on the surface of the moon, but he could still breathe. Other players started joining in, considerably faster than the last two times, and their collective screams of both fear and excitement pierced Arthur's eardrums.
Both the transmission of sound and the ability to breathe was possible on this map, unlike the actual moon, but there was still very low gravity. Within seconds Arthur watched as a large group jumped several meters into the air, only to start screaming in panic as they weren't sure if they would come back down, they slowly floated back down to the moon's surface shortly after.
There was a variety of things to do on the map, several caves to explore, what looked to be an abandoned moon base full of weird science gadgets, a golf range, and most importantly, moon vehicles.
Arthur watched as a hoard of people fought over the collection of vehicles, with the winners quickly driving off so they couldn't be dragged off. There were a handful of moon buggies that looked familiar to the vehicles that were actually present on the moon, alongside a strange one-wheeled motorbike that looked like it was taken straight from a science-fiction movie. Arthur noticed that one of the buggies had both Acai and Maria riding it, with Maria driving.
After a brief moon buggy demolition derby, a jingle echoed out informing everyone that the server was now online. Most people jumped at that fact, so Arthur's vision was suddenly flooded with flashes of white light as the players all vanished. Various moon buggies continued their momentum as the drivers vanished, either crashing or coming to a stop naturally.
Arthur hit the play button hovering on his arm, causing his body to be enveloped in light. When the light faded, he was standing on the sidewalk within the city's market. A notification floated in front of him, welcoming him back and informing him how long his immunity lasted.
Merlin slowly walked around the market, stretching his virtual body as he did so. Being disconnected from it for five whole days was an unusual feeling.
With his current funds, there wasn't much he could buy yet that would be of use to him. Most the stores he visited were weapon stores and various tailors, but the armours he could afford were all mediocre.
While walking around the market area, he found what looked to be a cosy little magic shop on the edge of an alleyway called "Potions and Lotions".
When he entered the store, an iron bell attached to the door jingled, signalling that he had entered the store. The first thing Merlin noticed was the pungent scent of various floral perfumes. As he walked in, certain areas of the store were so strong that his eyes stung just by standing near some of them.
The inside of the store consisted mostly of large shelves, packed with vials of completed product, each properly labelled. There were also various drawers full of brewing ingredients, scrolls and books of potion recipes, as well as some other unrelated magic items. One of these unrelated products was an item Merlin was looking for, a skill book, specifically the utility spell, light.
He grabbed the book and approached the counter, there stood a friendly looking old lady who was shaking around a small test tube, she saw the book in Merlin's grasp and smiled at him.
"That'll be one gold please." The old lady spoke in a refined and respectful manner.
Merlin placed the gold piece he was given by the oracle's envoy on the counter. The old lady slid it into a small bag that was tied to her belt.
"Pleasure doing business with you." The friendly old lady said her farewells as Merlin walked out of the store.
After closing the door behind him, Merlin opened his new skill book immediately. The book lit up and faded away, giving him a notification in return that indicated that the spell was recorded into his knowledge library and added to his ability list.
「Knowledge obtained: "Utility Magic: Light"」
