-5:45 pm-
The sky was black. A soft thunder echoes through the city, and rain drops pelt the windows of a tram. the inside of the tram is dark and cramped. The lights flickered as the tram travelled from station to station. Lightning streaks across the sky as the tram pulls into station 13. The tram slows to a stop and the doors slide open. A flood of people exit a mixture of people heading to work for an overnight shift, and people headed home for the night. As the outflux of people diminishes a new group boards. Among this group is a twnenty-two-year-old man dressed in long black pants, and maroon button-up shirt. His hair is a silky midnight black. As he enters the tram his hazel-colored eyes stay glued to a message on his phone.
"Dear player, tonight at 6:00 pm tonight a very special event will take place. The purpose of this event is to entice new players and reward veteran players. This event will include multiple new quest and add some more difficulty to the game. So, gear up, prepare your skills, and challenge this event with extreme vigor."
-TRC Developers
TRC otherwise known as The Ranger's Coven, is an online survival game, published by some unknown company that had recently taken the top charts of the gaming industry. So a large scale event wouldn't be abnormal, but in the fifteen years the game has been running the developers never personally messaged any of the players. That is the reason Alex was so mesmerized by the message on his phone. He glanced at the clock as he took a seat on the tram.
-5:55 pm-
Alex tried searching for any information on the event, but he couldn't find anything, he found a few forms asking for details about the event, but no one had an answer.
-5:56-
The soft thunder begins to fade.
-5:57-
The speakers on the tram begin to make a soft almost inaudible ticking sound, like the hands of an analog clock.
-5:58-
The ticking noise begins getting louder Alex looks up from his phone to look for the source of the sound. But he is only met with other confused glances. The ticking noise begins to get faster and louder. Drowning out any remnants of the once soft thunder filling the city. Alex glance back at the clock on his phone just in time to watch it roll over to 6:00 pm. At that same moment, the ticking stopped and was replaced with the sound of a grandfather clock chiming away. The tram stopped and all of the lights turned out simultaneously. Voices begin to cry out in fear and panic. Chaos fills the tram.
As if in response to chaos smoke begins to seep up from the ground in various colors. Blue smoke to the east, red smoke to the west, white smoke to the north, and green smoke to the south. The smoke swirls and shapes the form of a small scaley beast. It was dragon like in structure but was in an upright position as if they were human. The beast with white scales spoke with a voice loud enough to pierce through the endless noise and chaos of the tram.
"Greetings players, I am what you humans would call a game master. You all have been selected to take part in a very special game. But-"
Before the beast could finish speaking a nicely dressed man with silver hair called out.
"Hey, you scaley bastard you can't hold us here that is illegal, and I will have whoever is controlling you thrown in jail."
This time the beast with green scales spoke.
"Jail? Laws? None of that matters anymore because all of that is from the simple carefree lives you lived up till now. You'd do well to listen after all it could very well save your life."
The man growing angrier yelled.
"YOU SON OF A-"
Before he could finish his sentence the beast with red scales breathed fire upon the man burning him to a crisp. More and more passengers began to panic and the chaos that had ceased temporarily resumed in full force. The scaled beast just laughed. Alex stood from where he was sitting, this was a very similar to the opening of TRC. He knew that the next thing to come out of beast's mouth, would be a challenge of strength and will. The blue scaled beast then addressed the crowd.
"We wanted to give you all a warm welcome to this game and so, we have prepared the very first [Main Quest], the goal of this quest will be to hunt the beasts that will flood the tram until reaching the next station or finding the hidden item in this car."
At that the four beasts vanished. Some people froze in fear from what they were told, others began trying to leave the tram car. only a few people including Alex were able to stay composed enough to prepare for the upcoming challenge. A GUI window appeared in front of Alex's face.
[Main Quest]
victory conditions: finding the hidden object in the car, or fight off the waves of beasts till reaching station 14
Penalty for failure: Death
Rewards: ???(additional rewards may be acquired)
Time limit: 20 minutes
Alex began looking for anything that could be used as a weapon. He pulled and pushed on everything until he finally found a pole, he could pull lose to defend himself. He then called out to the other passengers, mostly addressing those who had managed to recover from their shock and fear.
"Use whatever you can get your hands on but be ready to fight."
Unfortunately, his voice was lost in the panic from other passengers. however, two others also grabbed makeshift weapons to fight. The first was a young boy, probably around the age of thirteen, he had blonde hair and was dressed in grey shorts and a green t-shirt, but his left hand was in a brace. The other was a woman twenty-three years of age. She had brown hair and wore a long blue dress. Alex approached the two and began to plan a strategy with them.
"Currently we are the only three that have the strength and will to survive. So, no matter what we need to stay close together and watch each other's backs."
The boy spoke.
"so, we have to fight off beasts for twenty minutes?"
Alex spoke as calmly as possible.
"Don't worry if this truly is a game then the beasts we face shouldn't be to difficult. And we can always just hunt down the hidden item."
As he spoke the memories, he had of the tutorial played in his mind. The tutorial consisted of any new characters and a couple of NPCs, all fighting against waves of wolf cubs for twenty minutes. Some of the developers thought there wasn't enough of a challenge so the put a random item generator at the ten-minute mark of the tutorial. The random item generator had two special attributes; the first is it can only be acquired when one player has exceeded the fifteen kills requirement, the second is when the item is received by any player the tutorial ends. However, thanks to all the players and NPCs it is nearly impossible to get the item. But right now while there are only three of them prepared to fight, they might actually be able to achieve the fifteen kills needed to summon the item.
Alex was about to speak and address his temporary teammates when a piercing howl and the sound of glass shattering filled the car. two new windows appeared in front of Alex's eyes the first was his total kills, the second was the number of passengers remaining in the tram car.
[Main Quest]
kill total: 0
[Main Quest]
passengers left: 22
Alex readied his weapon and faced towards the source of the sound. What awaited him was gruesome sight accompanied by a constant ding. In front of him was six wolf cubs and numerous bodies of other passengers. Alex whistled to the wolves and in one fluid motion they turned and charged at Alex. Two wolves reached him at the same time, Alex managed to whack the wolf on the left with his pole, but he wasn't fast enough to strike the one on the right. It leaped at him but was cut off short by the boy who used his backpack to whack the wolf. This gave Alex the time to finish off the first wolf by crushing its head, now only four wolves remained. Alex took the initiative and charged the wolves. They tried to leap on to him, but he would block them with the pole before stopping on their heads until they finally went limp. Alex turned two see the boy whose bag was now stained with crimson streaks.
*DING*
[Main Quest]
Kill Total:5
time remaining to next wave: 2 minutes
[Main Quest]
time remaining: 17 minutes
Alex addressed the woman and the boy.
"I get the feeling that this is about to get a lot harder, so you guys weaken them and I'll deal the final blow"
The woman and the boy nod in agreement
*DING*
[Main Quest]
Wave two beginning
Once again from the already open windows wolves came pouring in. Just like the tutorial the number of wolves increased drastically. Now the number of wolves that had entered the tram car totaled twenty. They ravaged the remaining passengers, and while they were feasting the boy and the woman charged at the wolves. Hitting them down with bags and attacking their eyes with high heal shoes. Every time a wolf was knocked over Alex would kill it with a swift blow to the head. unlike the tutorial though the wolves did not stop coming. slowly the three were beginning to be over run.
*DING*
{Side Quest}
You have met the qualifications to receive a gift. Search the tram for your gift.
Requirements: the time remaining must be ten minutes or less, and the players total kills must equal fifteen or more.
[Main Quest]
Kill total: 20
[Main Quest]
Time remaining: 10 minutes.
Alex frantically looked around searching for the familiar golden glow of a hidden secret. Much to his dismay the glow came from behind the horde of wolves flooding into the tram car. Alex called out to his teammates.
"I need a path through."
The woman cried out in response.
"Are you crazy!"
The boy said nothing just charged ahead swinging to bat away any wolves in the way. The woman eventually joined in, and with Alex's help they managed to clear a path all they way to the golden glow of the hidden item. A golden yellow square lay on the ground, Alex reached out and touched the square and in a flash of light the flood of wolves stopped and the ones that were in the tram car went limp. As the light fades Alex now holds a golden chalice in his hands.
*DING*
{Side Quest}
Hidden item found
Hidden item: Golden Chalice
[Main Quest]
Time remaining has been force set to 0
Quest completed
you have qualified for a new reward
[Main Quest]
Kill total: 24
[Main Quest]
Passengers left: 3
(Rewards will be handed out upon arrival to station 14)
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