“Congratz, you be a good scholar, now you be loremaster, mah prend.”

Said Jin’krak, a rakhs with broad shoulders and seemed smarter as well as more insane than the typical rakhs, though still not as insane as Ril’Dil. He was wearing rather sophisticated clothing like those of renaissance era people.

The only problem was that they were in the middle of a lush tropical jungle. To be exact, in the Darukun Village, a village filled with nature-loving brown-skinned orcs wearing leaf ornaments. The village itself was covered by trees and stuff.

For Tier, this was the most typical elvish kind of orcs he ever saw. It was just that those Darukun Tribes were mostly shamans, not some druids or some sort.

The profession’s ascension also gave Tier a tiny bit of EXP which propelled him to level 35. He then looked at his clock and it was almost 8 PM.

Tier still had some time, so he talked to Bur’ru who also congratulated him for ascending to loremaster.  Bur’ru, had repeated the line he had been saying since Tier reached level 25, recommending him to go east where he could continue facing even stronger creatures. He also recommended Tier to meet a mount seller just outside the jungle.

“Keep survivin’, my good friend,” said Bur’ru as he waved goodbye to Tier. It was rather noticeable that Bur’ru choose those words right after Tier had spent some point in Predator’s Tactics. The ‘good friend’ part also had been added from when Tier got to level 25.

It took Tier quite some time to walk past the lush tropical jungle before he finally met something that he’s supposed to expect but still put him gazing in awe.

It was the first time the true majesty of Grand Savannah unfolded before his eyes. The savannah was massive and grander than he could ever imagine. Wind grazes the grasses at such a high speed yet gentle. The map had mentioned the location of tall mountains at the northern and eastern border of the savannah, but at this moment Tier could barely see anything on the horizon. There was just a yellowish green colour that swept the whole area.

Tier wondered if this was the feeling someone felt the first time they stood on Serengeti.

“My friend, the savannah be massive, you need a ride to traverse it.”

A voice called from his right. There Tier saw a dark green skinned rakhs was squatting at the edge of the jungle. He was biting some sort of grass stalk and acted like a cowboy or some sort.

“Come, which of these rhinos would you choose?” said Bad’ak, the mount seller as Tier walked closer. He pointed out at some big rhinos grazing near them.

Without much thought, Tier pointed to the one with the darkest skin and looked similar to the Javan rhinoceros.

“Good one, my friend. Now, you be a proper rakhs, there be no better, no more majestic beast than a rhinoceros for us to ride and traverse the world with. They be a good friend.”

Bad’ak whistled to call the rhino Tier had chosen and put a saddle on it. He then turned at Tier and offered a small rhino statue to summon the mount, “First purchase, half price, my friend.”

It was three and a half gold pieces for a rhino, Tier had more than enough, thus he agreed.

“Nice be having business with you, my friend.”

Tier rode northeast towards the neared main road where a lot of characters, players and NPC, travelled. As far as Tier was aware, the road seemed to connect the entry of Cliff Labyrinth and more regions southward. Considering he saw races other than orcs and rakhs, Tier wondered if the road also connected to a pass among the northern mountains towards Elian, the capital city of the elves.

Not all the players were on the road, quite a number of them were busy fighting bandits and beasts in the savannah far from the main path. Some of them seemed to gather materials, perhaps for their profession. It wasn’t a rare sight to see someone with maxed level doing early level profession work. Most seemed to focus on levelling first before doing their professions.

The busy road was guarded by NPCs which attacked some of the approaching hostile units. Tier saw the NPC also attacking an elf that was fighting a dwarf near the road.  It didn’t seem to attack both involved parties, but focused on the elf which probably attacked first. Tier wondered if such a system could be abused, like if someone managed to provoke another player to attack near an NPC. That would be a nice trap.

Despite the protection provided by the NPC, Tier saw players were mostly travelling in groups. Some looked like they took the merchant profession which caused them to have to bring their goods manually towards a certain location without using a portal made by wizards. Which meant that the other people around those merchants were either their friends or mercenary players asked for protection service.

Tier read in wikis and forums that those mercenaries were bound by contracts made by someone with a scribbler profession, thus betrayal is not likely. Though, it still doesn’t guarantee their safety for the attacking player could be stronger than the guarding players.

Regarding player versus player thing, Tier read that attacks could only trigger if someone had a different race with the opposing side, exceptions were between orcs and rakhs as well as between human and dwarves. 

Human, elf, and undead could attack each other which will cause some sort of exile status to the attacking player for a certain amount of time. While for the remaining races, they need to have a certain bad reputation threshold before being able to freely attack or be attacked by the members of their own race. 

Such bad reputation status could be achieved by attacking a member of their own race who was in a group with another eligible race to be attacked. Such arrangement would enable an orc to attack another orc since party group allegiance is prioritised in this game. For Tier, that was a sensible approach to avoid griefing by betrayal in parties.

The most interesting part is regarding the tension between races. If enough hostility happens, the diplomatic relation of races tenses up. The more the hostility, the more it would escalate the tension which would end up with open war. 

During such conditions, players are encouraged to storm the opposing race's capital and sack it for glory. There are more PvP points given in higher escalation and war conditions. After that, it would go down to cease fire. Except the races with established alliances, players from any race could join in the war without worsening the relation between their race and the defending race.

For example, a rakhs could join a war between human and elf, choose the human side, and attack Elian without causing the tension between rakhs and elf to rise while increasing the good relation between human and rakhs.

The diplomatic relation is not just about war. If more players were working in groups instead of killing each other, diplomatic relations between two races would keep going better until a temporary alliance was made. Such conditions will give better trading discounts for players, more EXP if a group of players consists of the allied races, and it could even give bonus drop rate to items as well as money,

From what Tier had read in forums, social media discussion, and even talks among players, this system caused more active relationships between players from various races. Some would want the extra drop rate while others want the extra PvP points. And some just want to see the world burn, just like what Bingo had mentioned on Tier’s first day of playing Zurefgar.

Gladly, so far Tier hadn’t met such players.

Tier finally reached the entrance to the gigantic cliff labyrinth. The entrance itself was in the form of three massive crevices. Apparently, each crevice was connected to roads each directed towards north, east, and south - which was the one Tier journeyed on so far.

From its name, Tier knew he would be lost unless he followed the players. However, he saw an NPC having a green exclamation mark on top of his head which meant it has some profession related quest. Kallak, the NPC, was standing on guard with other NPCs. He was riding a dire brown wolf and wore equipment made from mail and leathers.

“I salute you, brother,” Kallak greeted as Tier approached him. The orc guard tapped his left chest with his right fist three times. “It seems that this is your first time visiting our capital. It will be an honour to guide you to our home… your home as well, brother. There might not be many trees here. but the warmth of our hearth and campfires will always burn bright for any rakhs.”

“Shall we move, brother?” Kallak asked.

Tier nodded. He chose the option that agreed to accept Kallak’s offer. 

The orc smiled widely, he turned his wolf around, dashed towards the Cliff Labyrinth, and shouted happily, “Do not fall behind, brother! These cliffs are treacherous,”

Just as Tier commanded his rhino to follow Kallak, he saw something that stunned him. He was quickly enraptured by the sight of a female human player who dashed out from the other northernmost entrance. She had long golden hair and was cladded in plate armour. She was riding a cute blue scaled wingless dragon that walked on its hind legs.

She passed too fast for Tier to clearly see her visage. Yet, he felt a weird familiarity about the person that disturbs his mind and memories.

Tier stopped his rhino, spun northward where the player he just saw disappeared at the corner of the entrance.

In disbelief, Tier whispered, “Could she be…”