'Ding!'
[Quest Completed!]
[Poke the Centaur: Prank Grover and Chiron by making fun of Satyrs and, well, Chiron.]
[Reward:]
[+100 EXP]
Percy sat down, feeling incredibly pleased with himself. As the lesson resumed, he noticed Mr. Brunner was now looking at him with a weary expression. Things were going great! Sure, his best friend was a goat-man and his favorite teacher was the legendary trainer of heroes, but Gamer's Mind kept him from dwelling on it. Things happened; you move on.
He discreetly brought up his Status page and checked his progress.
[EXP: 150/400]
He was getting close to leveling up! A few more pranks like that and he'd be set. Maybe he should prank Nancy next by putting a whoopee cushion on her seat. He waited for the tell-tale 'ping' and a new quest to appear, but nothing happened.
'Strange,' Percy thought. 'Maybe I can't just make up quests for anything. Well, there goes my idea of making stuff up as I go along.'
He spent the rest of the day trying, and failing, to pay attention in class. By lunchtime, he was ready to call it a day. The lessons were just going over his head. He decided to focus on his other active quest: finding someone who knew about video games.
Percy scanned the cafeteria, observing the titles floating above everyone's heads. One of them had to be so addicted to video games that it was practically their identity. And then he found him.
[Han Jack - Game Lover]
[LVL 3]
Han Jack, a quiet student whose parents were from South Korea, was his target. He should know something that could help. Percy got up and walked over to the brown-haired boy, who was already engrossed in a game on a handheld device. Yep, definitely his guy.
"Uh, hey, Han," Percy said, standing before him.
Han looked up from his game, surprised. "Percy? What do you want?"
Percy rubbed the back of his neck nervously. "Well, I, uh… Han, I was thinking, you're pretty good at video games, right?"
Han studied him for a moment before slowly nodding. "Yeah, I'm pretty good."
"Well, I was wondering if you could help me out with a game I just started playing."
"Really? What kind of game?" Han looked genuinely interested, putting his device down to give Percy his full attention.
"Well, it's kind of like an adventure RPG. The hero wakes up and has to do quests and all that. He finds himself in…" Shit, think of something, Percy, think! "…the Greek world. He has to do quests and stuff. But I was wondering if you could give me some tips on how to get better."
'Ding!' (Oh, what now.)
[New Skill Created!]
[Lying - LVL 1 (20%): This skill governs your ability to deceive others. The higher the level, the more believable your lies become and the lower the chance of discovery!]
[- Current success chance: 2% (decreases based on the extremity of the lie)]
What?! 2%?! The fuck?! That's all the chance I have of succeeding?! This game is fucking rigged!
Luckily, it seemed Han bought it. He nodded, thinking for a minute. "Okay, so what are the hero's stats?"
Percy recalled his status screen and listed them out for Han.
"Holy shit, those are some bad stats! I've seen mudcrabs in Skyrim with better stats than that!"
Percy sighed. "Yeah, yeah, you don't have to tell me twice."
"Well, there is a plus side to this," Han said, surprising Percy. "It means you have a blank slate. You can choose to improve whatever stats you want and build your own character from scratch."
"What do you mean?"
"Well, usually in games, there are three main classes: warrior, rogue, and mage. You improve the stats that help each class. For example, a warrior focuses on Strength, Dexterity, and Vitality while mostly ignoring the rest."
Percy nodded, understanding that clearly. "But what about Intelligence, Wisdom, and Luck? Isn't that a disadvantage?"
"It can be, but most builds have to specialize. You can't be good at everything."
"So what are the best ways to improve stats?"
"The best way is to 'grind,'" Han explained. "You do things that would naturally improve them. For Strength, make the character lift heavy stuff. For Vitality, make him run a lot. Things like that."
Percy connected the dots. "So, let's say a character thought a lot about ideas and stuff, would that increase his Wisdom?"
"Well, yeah, in theory. But that's not really possible since game characters can't actually think for themselves. The best way to improve Wisdom in a game is usually through solving puzzles. Reading books would improve Intelligence, but other than that, I don't really know of any other ways."
"What about stat points? How do I get those?"
"You get those when you level up, Percy," Han said, leaning in with a serious expression. "But listen to me carefully: never use them."
"Then what am I supposed to do with them?"
"Save them for a later date," Han explained patiently. "For now, it's way easier to train each stat just by doing stuff. Since your game character has an INT of 2, if he simply reads a book or two, he should automatically gain a stat point."
Percy's eyes widened. "Wow, seriously?!"
"Yeah. But if his INT was higher, let's say 30 or something, he'd have to read a hundred books just for one extra point. You see where I'm going with this?"
Percy nodded gratefully. "Yeah, I do. You're saying it gets a lot harder to gain stats through simple tasks later on, so it's better to save the free points for when the grind gets tough. Thanks, Han, this helped a lot."
'Ding!'
[Quest Completed!]
[A Newbie's Guide to Gaming: Find someone to teach you about video games so you can master your new life!]
[Rewards:]
[+50 EXP]
[EXP: 200/400]
Han just nodded and went back to his game. As Percy walked away, Han called out over his shoulder, "Oh, and Percy! Don't forget to always save your progress and keep plenty of health potions in your inventory!"