Powering the system on for the first time, experiencing that rather alien feeling of all you senses switching, no longer feeling your body laying there motionlessly on the bed, instead being pulled into a bright other reality. There had been a multitude of safety equipment crammed into a surprisingly small form factor, monitoring things such as pulse, breathing rate and other vitals, as well as a force shut down if your body got dehydrated or overly hungry.

Getting to a login screen and creating a new character, entering the name they had been used to forever now; Totsurugi, having it accepted and moving to another screen where a bunch of people were all stood in a perfect circle, everyone's back facing inwards and towards whoever happened to be looking at them. Cycling through the settings, Male Characters, Female Characters, Genderless Characters. Stopping on Female and moving through the staggering amount of different races, all from eight foot tall and four armed to three feet tall with tails and most everything one could imagine there between. All having names and some stats below them, "Plus Dexterity, Minus Strength" "Plus Intelligence, Minus Dexterity" 

This whole selection felt rather overwhelming, not really sure on what to pick, being a but put off by the fiendish looking creatures, but then again Totsu's bar for fiendish wasn't that particularly high, being repulsed by the likes of orcs and goblins. Scrolling round and round until something caught their eye, a Female Elf, tall and lithe, long, pointed ears.

[center][h2]Elf (Female)[/h2]
[u]Stat Bonuses:[/u]
+Intelligence
-Strength
[/center]

 Selecting it brought another wave of sensory overload as the amount of sliders and options berated their senses. Hair Length, Hair Color, Hair Style, Bangs, Hair Side (Left), Hair Side (Right). Staring at it for a few moments before steeling themselves and meticulously going through the options, leaving a surprising amount of them alone, not being one to fiddle with minor or fine detail like the shape of the point of the ears or lobes, chin structure or cheekbones but changing most of the larger options, facial type, hair color, eye color, height, build.

Getting into a state of flow as they built out, finally finishing with something they felt a remarkable sense of kinship with, almost like they could imagine this being something they would look like if they had been born in a fantasy world instead of playing an immersive video game. Long flowing golden blond hair with sideswept bangs, a single small braid going over each ear at the side with the bulk of her hair flowing just below her shoulder blades. A pair of grass green eyes and a young looking face fit for someone going on their very first adventure.

Finishing the setting before being taken into the next selection, an immense selection of classes with a tip in the top left corner saying "Recommended for Elf. Magic, Ranged, Stealth" with a display next to that reading "Show: All". Fiddling a bit with the settings, changing the filter settings to "Show: Recommended Only", their friend had not told them to worry too much about it and if they didn't like the class they started out as it wasn't the end of the world and changing it could be accomplished, although it would take a bit of doing. Scrolling through a few of the classes now, not being particularly interested in the Archers, Assassins and Druids they were coming across. Scrolling down to a class that caught their eye.

[h3][u]Class[/u][/h3]
[b]Naturalist:[/b] Harness nature's infinite bounty into your own strength.
[b]Starting Skills:[/b]
[list]
-Adaptive Bolt: Fire a magic bolt at a target, damage type is dependent upon the last thing you absorbed.
-Absorb: Leech the life force from a living, non-sentient target you are touching, gain back 20% of the hunger/thirst value it would have provided if it would have would be cooked and consumed.
[/list]
[b]Main Stat:[/b] Intelligence
[b]Weapon Type:[/b] Staff


After accepting a final confirmation messaged popped up, accepting that the selector faded away and everything became black for a moment. Light and color returning as they looked around and they were in the body of their creation, experiencing the world in first person. Situated in a small Elven hamlet. She took a timid first step forward, it felt rather strange, feeling a leg move and touch the ground as if you were really there. Looking back over herself she wasn't wearing much, from outside appearance it she was only wearing a royal azure blue robe that reached from neck to just above her ankles with long sleeves.

"Are you ready for your initiation?" came a voice from just ahead, a tall Elven woman had walked up to her, the name "Rania Mirana <NPC>" hovering above her head. Totsu froze, not knowing what to say or how to possibly respond, mostly stemming from the fact that she didn't know how what the AI would respond to. After a few seconds of silence words popped into her head as if they were ideas, embarrassingly, those were "Yes" and "No"

Answering in the Affirmative they were lead through the village, past the wooden huts and longhouse, going into the nearby forest where she was handed a long wooden staff, with a long wooden shaft, four feet long, the wood looking unprocessed yet still finely crafted indicated by the twisting spiral of the handle with the head of the staff being a perfect circle of the same twisted, spiraling wood. A brown, furry critter was pointed out to them, a text above their head saying "[color=gray][u]Squirrel Lvl.1[/u][/color]". Rania stood a bit back before speaking out, "Try taking it down with your Adaptive Bolt"

Totsu held the staff up, focusing as she saw a HUD come into focus, seeing her own health, MP bar and a short skill list, currently only indicating two. She instinctively reached her staff out before speaking "[b]Adaptive Bolt![/b]" and seeing the top of her staff glow before a translucent projectile shoot forward bending and lensing the light around it, hitting the squirrel. A bar above it's own head going down by a third as well as a larger more defined health bar appearing at the top of the HUD indicating "Target"

Shooting out two more times and the squirrel lay dead, multi-colored orbs materializing above it. She closed the short distance between them before crouching and holding a hand above it, seeing the orbs move into her hand before a small window popped up above the corpse of the rodent

[u][color=gray]Squirrel Lvl1[/color][/u]
[Color=gray]
[list]
Squirrel Pelt (Hunter)
Squirrel Tail
Rodent Eyes (Hunter)
[/list]
[/color]

Pressing "Take All" on the screen caused the squirrel to glow before seemingly exploding into particles with a screen popping up

[b]Skinning Failed (Hunter Class Required)[/b]
[u]Items gained:[/u]
[color=gray]
[list]
[Ruined Pelt]
[Squirrel Tail]
[/list]
[/color]
Pouting a bit before simply shrugging and standing up, the taller elf walked back towards her, "Well done. Adaptive Bolt also has the special effect of inheriting the damage bonus of things you use Absorb on." and as if carefully scripted, walking to a patch of moss, "Try using Absorb on this moss here for a Water Damage bonus to Adaptive Blast"

Standing up, Totsu walked over to the moss, placing her bare hand on the moss before speaking, "Absorb" and feeling a surge of energy enter through her hand, like taking a shot of espresso she felt more awake and less fatigued, watching the moss go from green to yellow to finally a brittle gray in front of her, devoid of life. A small message window popping up, "[color=cyan]+10 Water Damage.[/color]"

"Adaptive Bolt among the weakest spells a mage can learn, but harvesting nature's bounty and using it to your gain, it can be one of the strongest." Rania explained as Totsu spotted a new element next to her skills on her HUD, a blue icon with a ocean-wave like icon and four orb-like dimples below it, "Though nature's bounty is not infinite. The larger target you absorb, the more spells it will enhance but the longer it will take to absorb. Try attacking now" 

Spotting another squirrel a bit away, she raised her staff and readied another spell, "[b]Adaptive Bolt![/b]" Totsu called out, this time the glow turning blue and sending a cyan bolt of energy into the squirrel, bursting into fine droplets that shimmered like mist in the sun, this time dropping it's health bar by half instead of a third. "Adaptive Bolt!" she called out again, sending a second bolt into the squirrel which caused it to fall over, dead.

Approaching again, spotting that the four orbs on the HUD had dropped by half, now showing only two, she leaned over the corpse, absorbing the essence orb and seeing the HUD popping up again, this time only touching the listing for the Tail and closed the window, causing the squirrel to explode into particles again, a message popping up displaying her acquisition of second tail without a failure message.

Being told to repeat it, Totsu stood up and spotted another squirrel, firing two consecutive blue bolts at the furry critter and following her usual habit of picking up the essence and tail just as she saw a screen pop up. 

[center][h2][b]LEVEL UP (3)[/b][/h2][/center]

Doing a double take on her level up screen as The helpful guide came came back closer, with another explanation, "With each thing you kill, you absorb their essence, that essence in turn makes you stronger. Stronger things have stronger essences, A God won't benefit from killing rodents either, it would do you good to always seek stronger and stronger pray, not only do they impart their essence to you but might also be hoarding treasures of great value which makes you stronger than killing their previous owner ten times over."

Totsu spotted quickly an icon with a [b][color=fff79a]![/color][/b] sticking out and with her curiosity getting the best of her she decided to click it, making a popup appear.

[center][b]Spend Level up Token[/b]
[u]Race.
Class.
[/u]
[/center]

Totsu pressed on "Race" first and saw just one option, "Elf (1)" and suddenly things started to seem more clear; if she had started the game with one class level and one race level, starting at level two would be functionally the same as the game's first level. She back out of it before looking over at it again before pressong on "Class" which made a separate screen pop up, this time with only one option, her starting class of Naturalist which she promptly selected. 

[center][color=gray][u]Naturalist[/u][/color] [b]Leveled up. Skill [/b]-Utilizing Absorb (Passive)[b] learned[/b][/center]

"Not everything gives a base damage increase" Came the instructive voice of her teacher as if the level up had prompted her to teach her about her new skill, "Take this for example and absorb it" was followed by the taller elf handing a red mushroom with white spots on it out. Picking it up she saw a message pop up, "[color=gray][Amenita][/color] picked up" 

Totsu held the mushroom and focused on it, speaking out "[b]Absorb[/b]" and watching it glow a green hue before it started to shrivel up quickly before it crumbled to dust. Seeing another window popping up with the information "[color=magenta]Poison[/color] effect added." and getting the gist of it now so reached her staff towards the squirrel, chanting out "[b]Adaptive Bolt[/b]" and sending a light purplish bolt forward. Colliding with the squirrel with a impressive splash of particles. The squirrel started to run towards the pair, it's health bar now showing an icon below it of a purple drop and a timer below it. The original hit had taken just under half of it's health, solid chunks counting down every so often, the rest of the health dropping to 0 as it reached them.

When Totsu was finished collecting her spoils the teacher came back, smiling, "You did admirably, This concludes your initiation. I have something for you as a way of reward" Rania congratulated, handing out a leather bound notebook, Identified as [color=gray][Naturalist's Notebook][/color]. As she accepted it she saw another level up screen and [b]Quest Completed[/b]. Quickly opening the menu and applying her Level Up token into her class again she saw a window pop up saying:

[center][color=gray][u]Naturalist[/u][/color] [b]Leveled up. Skill [/b]-Probe[b] learned[/b][/center]

"It's good practice to note down what gives you what. You don't want to be in a situation where you are adding fire damage against a Fire Creature. Probe can be a good spell to use. It allows you to learn something's effects without consuming them so there are less mistakes. Now please follow me back, i have a mission for you"

Totsu stood up, hanging her staff up on her back before attaching the book to a metal loop on her robe and walked with her tutor out of the forest, walking back to her sleepy hamlet and back to one of the longhouses where Rania walked towards a table, a few things laying down including a simple hooded shawl, a leather satchel and a small wooden box that had been sealed with wax and a cord going around it. "There is a larger village here to the north" Rania started, packing the box into the satchel before handing it and the shawl over, "They have not only an active market but frequent carts and carriages going to the Great City further to the North-East. Gives this package over to Lizantha at the General Goods store." she explained before handing over the [color=gray][Traveler's Shawl][/color] and [color=gray][Leather Satchel][/color].

The young apprentice put the shawl over her head and strung the satchel over her shoulder before nodding and turning around, heading out of the village and walking northward, entering the forest again that seemed to encircle the entire settlement of elves. Walking through the forest but getting side tracked quickly, spotting carious forest critters like more squirrels, woodpeckers, living mushroom creatures that seemed marginally stronger than the small rodents, even having a run-in with a large tree creature identified as "[color=green][u]Ent Lvl.8[/u][/color]" which turned out to be far, far stronger than anticipated, getting hit once and... rather than pain there was a rather off sensation, there was no mistaking that they had been hit but it had a dream-like feeling towards it. The level 3 Elf quickly made a run for it after seeing her health drop by a frightening amount for only a single hit, taking more damage to her bravado.

After being confident that she lost it, she sat down and started to rest, seeing her health meter slowly starting to crawl upwards and noticing a notable dip in her Sustenance meter. Looking around herself she saw what looked not entirely unlike a head of cabbage, green in color, globular and having notable protrusions on it. She took it carefully in her hands before breathing out and focusing on it, "[b]Absorb[/b]" she chanted, seeing the customary green hue around it, the vegetable's natural green color starting to wilt and rot, going yellow before getting shades of gray and black, taking a noticeably longer time this time around, taking a full thirty seconds before it crumbled into dust and gave her a prompt "[color=#7c4700]+15 Earth Damage added.[/color] Knockback Effect added." as well as her hunger and thirst bars going up the small bit they had been missing.

Totsu grabbed her staff and pointed it at a squirrel in a tree, smiling and taking aim before chanting "[b]Adaptive Bolt![/b]" and firing out a brown projectile which looked like it had bits of debris and dust circling around it. It collided the the squirrel and sent it flying back about half a foot before it crashed into the tree, taking a majority of it's health bar before falling down from near the top, landing on the ground and the rest of it's health disappearing with the impact. The damage buff icon seemingly disappearing from that one shot.

She sat there stunned before a smile crept on her lips, ending with her bursting out laughing and leaning back, laying down flat in the patch of dirt and grass, "User was right about this game. It [i]is[/i] pretty fun to play" she spoke out into the empty void to no one in particular, taking in a deep breath and closing her eyes, listening to the sounds of the forests around her. She looked around some more, "Hmm... I wonder what else i could stuff into this..." she wondered, looking around for more things to absorb after collecting her essence and usual tail.

She tried absorbing anything she could get her hands on and trying out their effects on various rabbits, mushroom monsters and poor unlucky squirrels who's population remained remarkably steady considering the genocide faced by the dainty little magic discovering Elf. She discovered more water elements, poisons which weren't nearly as potent as the mushroom she had been given initially, more earth elements and a what looked like a pepper which fired a fiery bolt, setting the rabbit on fire but seemingly defying all known laws of fire previously known to the panicking Elf who thought she would upset a certain Public Service bear with her reckless magic use. She went on for a while until she saw a familiar message which pulled her out of her murderous rampage and back towards reality

[center][h2][b]LEVEL UP (5)[/b][/h2][/center]

[center][color=gray][u]Naturalist[/u][/color] [b]Leveled up. Skill [/b]-Essence Absorb[b] learned[/b][/center]

Getting the level-up made her snap back to reality, putting another point in her class and reading over her ability, smiling as she realized what it could do. "Hm... I wonder if..." She trailed off to herself, walking the forest and picking up a few things, some peppers, finding another one of those weird cabbage looking things, offing many small forest critters, finding it easier and easier by every level to kill them but getting less and less experience from doing so. Using the new ability, a smaller MP bar appeared under her normal one, it only went up to a small-ish normal value by now but she imagined it would increase with her own levels, so for now she set up maxing it out, finding that it didn't get spent with every spell she cast, just the spells she chose to cast with it.

Finally, finding again her foe who had scared her off last time, she walked around and positioned herself just right, standing so the [color=green]Ent[/color] was between her and a tree. She started the process of absorbing her cabbage first, gaining the [color=#7c4700]Earth Damage[/color] and Knockback effect. "Adaptive Bolt!" she called out with gusto, sending a brown projectile hurling towards the [color=green]Ent[/color] and hurling it backwards, slamming into a tree and seemingly getting stunned for a few seconds. While it was prone against the tree and getting up, she took a pepper and absorbed it, gaining a single use of a [color=red]Fire Damage[/color]. She recoiled her staff, taking a deep breath and focusing all of her energy, feeling her Temporary MP bar start to drain, draining more and more by the second as the injured treefolk started to make her way over to her.

After the anticipation of what felt like eternity, her Temp. MP bar had finished and was fully depleted, lunging her glowing staff forward she hurled a right massive red bolt of energy forward, shouting "[b]Enhanced Adaptive Bolt![/b]" with gusto. The creature caught on fire as soon as the bolt made contact, taking a great chunk of it's health as well as starting to flails around as the inferno threatened to consume it's mighty crown of leaves. Absorbing another small veggie and hurling a second bolt, the fearsome creature lay dead, granting a nice rewarding chunk of XP.

Totsu jumped with joy, running over and scavenging what she could, receiving the essence normally but looking over the corpse the didn't seem to be a lot she could scavenge, seemingly having burnt away most of her bounty but at least it lay dead now.

She started to head finally towards the village, remembering she had a package to deliver and likely some goods to sell, however some squirrel tails and rabbit feet probably didn't sell for half a kingdom. The town she arrived in was bigger than the hamlet she had come from but not by overly much, there were a variety of people walking around, all with a <NPC> tag over their head. Walking through a wide street she assumed to be the mainstreet for the village, she came across a building with a hanging placard, a picture of a coin-purse embossed and painted onto it so assuming that was the intended destination she walked inside.

After handing the package off and getting a scripted thanks in return and a short exposition dump like many others, having the cart and carriage system set up, telling her about the frequent travels between the city and here if she would want to as well as a hefty bit of XP as congrats for finishing this overeasy quest, between the foraging, treefolk murder and quest it was enough to get her to receive another popup

[center][h2][b]LEVEL UP (6)[/b][/h2][/center]

[center][color=gray][u]Naturalist[/u][/color] [b]Leveled up. Skill [/b]-Parasite[b] learned[/b][/center]

Wanting to try out her new skill but also thinking she spent way more time that she was meant to here she quickly sold off her wares she had collected, only getting about a single copper piece for each of them, mostly as expected. She made her way out of the shop before heading down the street in the direction she had received in the info dump from the shopkeeper, heading towards the cart before boarding, seeing another message pop up.

[center][h3]You are leaving the Tutorial Area, experiences beyond this point may differ from what you have experienced thus far, Dissonant Steel Online is an ever changing game influenced by player choice, are you sure you want to leave the Tutorial zone[/h3][/center]

Pressing the "Yes" that popped up on her screen, the carriage pulled off before everything faded to black. Waking up again shortly after as if waking up from a sleep, they were pulling into a large gate, the horse drawn carriage walking through the bustling thoroughfare between the gate and the drop off point. Jumping off she looked around with bewilderment before quickly shaking it off and opening a system menu, "Right... So User mentioned that you could still open the chat while logged in" she explained to herself, scrolling through a list of settings before finally seeing it and sending her friend a message.

"Hey, i just finished the tutorial area and am in the Kingdom now. You said you wanted to meet up when i get here?"