From Player To Npc

Chapter 3: The New Life

'Little brother?!?' [Ameanum]

Ameanum had a little brother, not a sister, and he didn't have any siblings in the game.

'If only could see my status maybe i....' [Ameanum]

As he thought of it, a white window, same as the ones in the game, appeared in front of him. Even if he was currently with eyes closed and everything was dark; this window was clear as day to see.

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STATUS

NAME: Shingi Maki

CLASS: None

RACE: Half-Human Half ????

HP: 5/5

SP: 2/2

STR: 1

AGI: 1

END: 1

INT: 10

CHA: 2

CONDITIONS: Incapacitated

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'What the heck?!?' [Shingi]

Everything in the status was not making sense. The NAME wasn't either of his character or his actual name, and it set his CLASS to none. His stat's values were less than even when he started the game. Even a level 0 NPC would have most of his stats at 8-10 value, but all except INT were lower than that. Also, he encountered no one having a CHA stat in all the years he played the game. STR (Strength), AGI (Agility), END (Endurance), and INT (Intelligence) were the main stats. They could never have access to any other except those. Some hidden stats existed, but the system never mentioned them or showed their value.

His RACE was strange. There were different races in the game, and there were Half-Elves or Half-Orcs, but that was a rare case. His one half being unknown to him or the system was something he had never heard of happening in the past.

More strangely, his HP (Hit Points) and SP (Stamina Points) were too low even for his stats. Both increased by the END stat. Each point gave at least 10 HP and 5 SP.

After a little time thinking of why his current situation was like that, Incapacitated active condition caught his attention. He focused on it to check if more information would show. As he thought about it, a new window of similar design as the other but little smaller and yellow color appeared in front of the status window.

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CONDITION EFFECT (INCAPACITATED)

Description: While under this effect, you have no access to control your body, and you can't use any Skills, Items, and Active Abilities. Passive abilities are still in effect, but some may have a lesser effect.

Source: Curse (Never-ending Sleep)

Duration: Until cured

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'Never-ending Sleep?!? Why it has to be that?' [Shingi]

Never-ending Sleep was something that players could never learn. He hasn't encountered or heard about any monster or even NPC that could use it, but he knew about it since there were quests that were mentioning it, as also there were a few quests you had to gather materials to make a cure for it. Even if the curse was a Basic Grade, its treatment was hard to make. Other than that, there was no other way to stop its effects. Some people said that it should be of Master Grade curse.

Under the curse's effects, one was in a coma kind of state. The body affected by the curse was growing in slower than the average state but, after ten years, no matter what, the user would die if not cured.

At that point, he heard more steps that were a little heavier than the previous ones of the 'sister' of his. He could tell the cause of his heightened senses and experience of all those years in the game that two people just entered the room he was in. He could hear something else hitting the floor together with one of the two steps. That person was using a walking stick or something similar, so most likely an older person.

As the two of them seemed to go, one at his left and one at his right side. He heard some lighter steps from a little distance away, probably from the girl from before. This time she stayed where he estimated the door of the room would be.

And so, as the two people's steps stopped, he started hearing some words coming from the person at his left. From the voice, he could understand that it was an old lady. The words she was saying were of the Edhergo's Kingdom's ancient dialect, the North Kingdom of Enerias. This dialect was common among the magic users.

'She seems to say some prayer to Mother Nature' [Shingi]

Even if he wasn't a magic-user, he had studied the game's story and the mechanics of mages in the degree to be considered a high-level mage. At least in theory.

He could understand enough to get the general structure of the spell she was casting. It was a ritual that has a beneficial effect on the target.

All he could think that it would be was the cure for his Never-ending Sleep, but he couldn't be entirely sure.

As time passed, after a few minutes, he felt a liquid of different tastes, some bitter, some sweet, administered to him by the person at his right. The person at the left started repeating the prayer again and again, which seemed to be of 4 phrases repeatedly and each time increasing her voice volume a little.

Shingi could feel his body being slowly surrounded by an energy that made him feel warm and comfortable.

And so after a little less than 10 minutes, the voice stopped speaking, the energy started disappearing, and then a white System window appeared for Shingi.

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Conditions for the MAIN QUEST: ROAD TO LIFE were fulfilled. Will you accept this quest?

YES / NO

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'MAIN QUEST?!? Am I this lucky this time?' [Ameanum]

While playing the game, the players could gain various quests, each having its rewards. Most of them were available to all users. Some could be obtained at specific times per user or had a cooldown until it is available again. But the rarest ones among them were the MAIN QUESTS. Those are quests that would appear at any point. Still, the reason was unknown. Once accepted by one, it's impossible for anyone else ever to receive it, even if the one failed to complete it. But the MAIN QUESTS difficulty was of a high degree, but the rewards were worthy of it. The few people who had to succeed on one had all become a great power in the game, as they had brought significant changes in the game.

Even knowing the dangers of this decision, he was never one to be a coward in the game, and without a second thought, he picked to accept the quest. Fortunately, just thinking the commands were enough for the system to work.

And so all the tiredness suddenly left his body, and his eyebrows weren't as heavy anymore. And so he slowly opened his eyes. There was some natural light coming into the room by an open window nearby. His eyes, being closed all that time, had to take some time to adjust.

"Little brother!" [Young-girl]

As he was waiting for his sight to get more precise, he felt someone hugging out of nowhere. And then his view became clear enough to see his surroundings better. He was in a small bedroom and was resting on a two-person bed, but the mattress seemed to be parts of bedrolls more than an actual mattress. He noticed the girl who was hugging him and could tell that she was a teenager, maybe around 15. An older woman of a short statue kept herself up using a quarterstaff at his left side. At his right, there was a well-built man who looked to be around his thirties and could tell being of a low-class civilian by his clothing alone.

What caught his attention was a big mirror over a desk a little more at the left of the man at his right. The mirror had nothing weird, but what he found strange was his reflection in the mirror. It was the same look he had when he was a young teenager in real life. The only difference was his eyes, which from the black color he had, they were instead dark red.

And as time passed, the girl who seemed to cry a little didn't seem to get to the end of the hug, making things a little awkward.

"Annoue, that is enough. Your brother just woke up and needs some time to adjust. Prepare some food for him. He will need it. I will stay here with your father, and the three of us will join you soon." [Old Lady]

And so, with some hesitation, the girl known as Annoue stopped hugging Shingi, cleared her tears, and hurried outside.

After seeing her leaving, the Old Lady turned towards Shingi with a joyful smile.

"Hello there, my name is Aneta Greentea, and I am the Mayor of this small village. I just helped you to wake after a long time. I am sure you have many questions; that is why I am here." [Aneta]

Speaking with Mayor, Shingi learned a few things as he could ask about what has happened while he was away, and she seemed to answer his question like reading an open book. Although there were limits to her knowledge, he could put a few things together himself.

First, he was in the game's world. His current body was under the effects of the Never-ending Sleep for the past nine years. His father came across an adventurer, who most likely was a Player that helped him to gather the materials for the cure. In return, his father, the local blacksmith, gave him a craft of his at the adventurer. Fortunately, the mayor was a capable Alchemist who had developed in her research a ritual that would have a chance to cure the curse.

Also, he learned that expeditions at the tower were uncommon events for the last ten years for the public without permission. The only people allowed to pass its entrance were people of the Dark Guild, and only they could permit others to enter.

Shingi has encountered them in the past. The Dark Guild was a group of players trying anything to profit over others, and most ways were involving hacking. Although their power in the ENERIAS TOWER game seemed to be very little, he knew these people over many other games. The system's security was of another level than usual games, so hacking it was nearly impossible.

'Could it be that Light and Dark were part of them?' [Shingi]

The way they killed him wasn't following the system's rules, so the Dark Guild being behind it sounded logical, but then why he couldn't think the reason. But they stopped players from entering the tower that only should have drawn the developers' attention long ago. Still, if even they did nothing, that is something quite frightening.

The worst piece of information that he learned was that his in-game character hadn't appeared in the last ten years. His name was quite famous in the game, so his disappearance affected others, and many discussed it. Of course, that was because his reputation was over the charge in most towns in Edhergos so that most NPC would have heard about him.

'Ten years in the game means two years have passed in real life. What happened to my body in that time?' [Shingi]

He was aware of the capsule's capabilities; after the shocks, he felt sure that his heart stopped. Before he learned of being gone for two years, he thought maybe people found him on time and got him to a hospital, but he was confident that nothing could hold him for that long. He even thought the command to the system to see if he can log out, but there was no answer in that command. He still had access to his status window. Now that he woke up, other than that the Incapacitated Condition got removed, nothing changed.

'So I somehow got trapped into the game?!?' [Shingi]

It seemed to be the case, but he remembered that he got banned by the game. However, it should be impossible since his account was of high access, a little under a moderator. Even a ban of a serious matter that would be permanent for others would be temporary for him to some degree.

'Now that I think about that, the worst my account could get other than a permanent ban in the game would be up to two years. So could it be I have been trapped two years ago but didn't have access to the system until today?' [Shingi]

Thinking like that made sense, but why he was now controlling an NPC's son was unknown. But he didn't care about it. He had a fresh start and something important to look over.

His MAIN QUEST.

And so he gave the command for his quest window to open, and he opened the info window of his MAIN QUEST.

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QUEST - ROAD TO LIFE

Task 1: Earn an NPC class

???

???

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The quest had a long list of tasks, but only the first one was available to see what it was.

Every player started with a class, and it wasn't rare for NPCs to have a class, although there were NPCs with no class but no players with no class. And that was the case cause for both to earn their class; they needed a tutor. Still, in the player's case, the system was doing most of the work, at least for the first class of the players, making it a matter of minutes or at worse few hours for one to earn his class. Meanwhile, that wasn't the case for NPCs. If the System did not design an NPC with a class, earning one wasn't easy.

A few Players who desired NPC bodyguards were helping some NPCs with the potential to earn suitable classes for their needs. Still, all of them needed many resources and time of weeks or even months. And that to learn the basics of their classes, further development needed more resources and time. It was close, as it would be to train one in actual life. Hence, few players preferred it cause as they didn't seem to be much stronger than other players. Most times seemed to be weaker unless they had crazy potential, and that was a rare case.

'So I guess I am considered an NPC now. I guess this will make things more interesting.' [Shingi]

A flame of excitement was burning in him. He felt a little bored over the game lately cause of the limits of his character. He was a Warrior-type character so that he couldn't use any magic other than the ones being part of Artifact or trinkets. They didn't seem that fun or had to be saved from being used in case of emergency. That is why he spent that much time in the tower lately to find these emergencies.

'This time, I  am going to  follow the road of Magic and become a figure stronger and more amazing than before.' [Shingi]

With his stats having INT being the highest, it was more suitable for him to become a Mage. Still, his stats were so low that even an apprentice Mage would destroy him even without using magic. But as he thought of that, he remembered something, and he reopened his status window and looked over it once more.

'My level isn't there.'

Typically, players had a level. Even when beginning the game and had no class, you started at Level 0. But NPCs don't have levels if no class. Some said that they don't have a limit of growth either that's why a few people started training them but seeing the slow rate of growth of them, they thought that even if it was the case; it wasn't worth the costs.

After he stopped gathering the information he needed, he started heading over to where his sister went., his father got him there, as his body was weak. So weak that he couldn't even walk by himself. Even if he looked to be a young teenager, his power was close to a newborn, maybe even weaker. But he could tell that this won't stay like that.

For now, even eating by himself was impossible. Fortunately, he could muster enough power at his mouth to eat but still needed some help to cut the food, which Annoue seemed to be more than happy to help. She even tried to feed him like a baby and a young mother, which made things even more awkward for Shingi. After seeing Shingi sitting at the table, Aneta left, saying her goodbyes as it seemed she had other businesses to take care of.

And so the first day of Shingi's new life begun.

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