Chapter 5
Spending a couple of days near where he came from, Theo performed sword maneuvers during the sword drills, some with and without his chains. He also practiced his footwork in the sword drills. He focused on using the chains on his arms as makeshift gauntlets. It was not pleasant with no camping supplies and a constant melancholy feeling all around him.
“There better be supplies in the city; otherwise, this will be a deathtrap for anyone,” Theo thought
On the third day, he started walking again. Theo checked his notifications
Ding:
Sword Mastery, Common Novice 0 to 2
During the training days, Theo noticed a couple of things: the connection to Gehenna is still there; being away from the genius locorum, out of the place of power, he could tell what the system meant about the bond. It feels like an extension of himself, which is weird but comforting at the same time. That thought reminded him that Gehenna is the offspring of Tartarus, which brought him excitement and a spike of fear because all the legends of Tartarus did not portray it as a place of joy. The punishments are cruel and give false hope to the prisoners. There’s one story that a guy had to pick a fruit from a tree, and if he did, he would be free, but the closer he got to the tree, the farther away it became, and there are many more stories like that of Gods and mortal men and women who angered Olympus gods that got thrown into Tartarus. Theo is thinking of something less depressing but still aggravating. The other thing that caused him to have another tirade at the system was that the food and water began to go bad due to the poisons in the air. Theo walked half a mile. Again, on the side of the road, the ground began to shift, and a zombie started to emerge. Summoning his cane sword, he knocked its head off with the bottom end of the cane without even unsheathing it.
You killed a level-one zombie.
Ding
Class Battle Healer level 0 to 1; you have 2 free stat points to assign
Theo put 2 points in endurance and then checked the status sheet to review the changes.
Theodore Thompson
Race: Human F-Grade Lv. 0
Class: battle healer lv.1
Profession: N/A
Health: 100/100
Mana: 90/90
Stamina: 80/80
Vitality: 10
Strength: 6
Endurance: 8
Agility: 6
Intelligence: 9
Wisdom: 8
Willpower: 9
Perception: 8
Free Points: 0
Class Skills:
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Healing Touch, Common, Novice 3
cure wounds, Common, Novice 6
Sword Mastery, Common, Novice 2
General Skills:
Resistance, Common, Novice 6
Inspect, Common, Novice 0
Bonded Skills:
Respond and Chains of Gehenna
titles: warden of Gehenna
Bonds:
Galaxy Trade Store tablet, Chains of Gehenna, the prison of Gehenna, and the sword cane rare.
A thought crossed his mind.
“My brother, Daniel, is a gamer. I remember him talking about how, in some video games, you could collect the loot from your enemies.”
Then it hit him
“I have been so focused on myself and the craziness of the past two days that I haven’t spared a thought for my family. I wondered how they were doing—my two brothers, Daniel and Alexander, and our parents, Jake and Sally Thomas. I thought about Daniel, the oldest out of the three of us, in his early 50s. And the nerd of the family. Being very successful in his career, managing the prison's finances, and making lucrative business deals, Daniel was not very sociable. He didn’t have anyone special in his life. Alexander, the youngest in his mid-40s, was the prison warden—his wife, Taylor, and two daughters, Emma and Grace. Emma is the oldest and a young adult, while Grace is still a teenager. I have had little contact or a relationship with them due to the demands of my job. Daniel was always the favorite uncle, and since their parents lived close to the prison, he hoped they should all be together if they all chose the group tutorial.” Theo realized, “Well, I can do nothing about it right now. Let’s try to loot the zombie.”
He approached the zombie and touched it, thinking of the word "Loot," but nothing happened. After a few seconds, Theo removed his hand from the zombie, and it felt gross. Theo took off his backpack and grabbed a water bottle, using his left hand to take off the lid. He poured water on his right hand and, at the same time, cast the spell "Cure Wounds" on himself to feel clean.
“Well, that was a bad idea and got me nowhere,” Theo thought.
He sent images and feelings to Gehenna about looting. He got back a mental shrug and was sent a picture of GTS. That’s a good idea, but then he remembered it was on the desk in the study. Gehenna sent back images of GTS, unsummoned it, and resummoned it. He didn't think it would work, but he tried it anyway. He felt a tingling sensation in his right hand; below the cane was the tattoo image of the tablet.
“I’ll be damned,” Theo thought,
Sending a thank you to Gehenna. Summoning the tablet into his hands, he found a book on tutorials and integrations. He bought the book, which popped out of thin air and fell to the ground. He picked it up and skimmed through it, finding what he was looking for.
“No, you cannot loot a fallen enemy automatically. You have to use a skill. You’ll have to strip any valuable parts of your prey yourself. For grades E and above, the monster will have a core.
“There’s no chance that I’m going to do that,” Theo thought.
Skimming through the book, another paragraph jumped out at him:
People, places, and things can have a profound karmic connection. Because of these connections, the ideas associated with them become legends and myths in other realities or across the multiverse. This means that myths and legends from the newly integrated world can be real.
Theo put the book in the bag, threw the backpack back over his shoulder, and then walked to the city. The zombies began to come; just using the cane, he whacked the zombies using the sword forms. They were slow, so he could bash one head in and had enough time to go to the next one before they swarmed him; one by one, they fell.
Ding
You have killed multiple zombies from levels 1 to 5.
Your class level increases, 1 to 4
Your human level increases, 0 to 2
Theo decided to hold off on using the free stat points until he learned more about how to allocate them better.
“I'm only about a football length away from the city's main gate, and I still can’t see anything. The dark haze is hindering my sight,” Theo thought to himself.
Pulling out the GTS, he clicked on the food tab to select a meal. A notification popped up:
Warning
Consistent use of GTS will lower the difficulty and affect the number of points you will receive at the end of the tutorial.
“Well, that answers my question before. There are food and supplies in there, but now the question is, do I want easy or more points? Well, I’m fine now, and that's still an option if I get into a bind, so let’s do without for now,” Theo thought.
Upon reaching the city's entrance, a large gate came into view, allowing multiple wagons to pass through at once. The gate was cracked, and miasma and other poisons were seeping out. Trying to open the gate was a struggle; he had to use his chain, making the links stick together to form a makeshift crowbar so he could use it as a lever to pry the gate open. As soon as he did, a big wave of miasma and poison hit him, and at the same time, he got a whole host of notifications of the debuffs.
