Yakiro did not believe in his eyes.
His “Character Info” page just gave him a piece of information that couldn’t be more shocking.
He was reset to Level 1.
In addition, his character’s appearance in the page was exactly himself in the real world.
Yakiro hurriedly opened the “Inventory” page to see if there was anything there.
However, it was completely empty, other than the basic items that were given when a player started playing World of Esseka - Two small bottles of HP and MP recovery, a basic sword, and a basic ragged set of clothes.
The same thing happened when he opened the “Abilities” page. What came to Yakiro’s eyes was purely the sense of emptiness.
From hero, to zero. Yakiro lost everything he had earned in just merely a few seconds. He was pulled to World of Esseka, but as a completely new beginner. This not only hurt his pride, but also almost took away his fighting spirit.
“Is this… the price I had to pay for that negative 1000 Karma?”
Yakiro mumbled while trying to stood up on his legs.
Suddenly, he heard a rustle coming from the leaves behind him. A monster? A beast? Or a mob? Greenstel Forest was not a dangerous location if Yakiro was still Basackra. However, it was recommended that players reach level 20 before entering this area. This meant, the mobs in this forest were far too powerful for a complete beginner to handle.
Slowly dashed out of the leaves, a wolf stood in front of Yakiro. It was [Grey Wolf], a basic level 16 monster. It glared the pair of red eyes at him, while opening its mouth full of sharp fangs that were ready to give anything a deep bite.
Yakiro braced himself and held the sword tight. His first priority then was to survive, and in order to do so, he had to be able to fight and to protect himself from dangerous threat.
The Grey Wolf was 15 levels higher than Yakiro in term of strength.
But honestly speaking, Yakiro was 104 levels higher than the wolf, in term of knowledge.
Grey Wolf leaped to Yakiro with the claws in front of his face. He was the only target in its eyes, and it seemed to be extremely hungry. If Yakiro took any of the claws, his life would ended being this beast’s lunch.
“This will be a straight dash, then a roundhouse slash”
Yakiro whispered, then dodged to the left. After that, he took a big jump backwards.
As expected, the wolf could only attacked the air. Yakiro swiftly delivered a horizontal slash on its back legs, making it howled in pain.
Missed its target, Grey Wolf started to become angered. It quickly readied itself with the pointy claws, and rushed straight to Yakiro. This time, it would swipe continuously, so that he could not know where to dodge.
Yakiro responded by rolling forward on the ground. Again, the beast’s claws and fangs could only met the empty air. He stabbed the wolf to the chest from below, but unfortunately, his strength was not enough to penetrate the beast, and he ended up making a deep cut on its body.
The one sided battle kept on going for a few more rounds, where Grey Wolf was the only target taking damage. Its body was slowly filled with bleeding wounds, and its eyes became more and more white. Looked like it was reaching the limit. It launched itself again aimlessly towards Yakiro.
And he responded by a straight stab to its face.
*clank*
But the sword broke right at the moment it stabbed the beast. The momentum was not enough to stop this flying monster.
“WHAT?”
Yakiro surprisingly jumped back, but the wolf claws just straight up launched to his body.
And they penetrated his chest before stopped moving.
“Ugh…”
He fell on to the ground. Blood kept on flowing out from the holes on his body.
He had successfully defeated the Grey Wolf. However, he took a fatal attack himself in the end.
The gap between the knowledge might be large, but in term of raw strength, the beast was much tougher than Yakiro.
Light was fading away from his eyes.
“Am I… going to die here?…”
He tried his best to reach his inventory and reach for the HP recovery bottle. At least with this item, it could help him to extend sometimes to bandage the wounds.
But he could not control his body anymore…
His eyes just closed silently.
————————————————————
“Hey, heyyyyyyyyy ! Are you still alive????”
Yakiro heard those words. It was… a female voice?
He was not dead yet?
He was pretty sure that he was lying face up on the ground. At the same time, he felt the sense of leaves and tree branches under his fingers and legs. Therefore, he was certain the Greenstel Forest still surrounded him.
The pain on the chest was still there, but when he touched it, he could not feel any holes or scratches on it.
He opened his eyes.
Stood above him is a lady in her early 20s. She had a beige, long straight hair, accompanied by a pair of glazing green eyes, and a considerable breast. She wore a blue cape, and along with a skirt below. Besides, her face looked really cute.
Well… From this angle… It can be said that Yakiro could see a lot of cleavages and “things”. Her breast... was kinda large, and she was literally standing next to him, who was on the ground. Therefore, there were certain points that his eyes could not help but just kept on looking, especially underneath that skirt...
"HEYYYYYYYYYY"
"OAAAAA I'M SORRYYYYY." Yakiro startled and immediately sit up. Had she noticed his perverted eyes yet?
"Ah haha, I'm sorry for screaming. I thought you were dead."
"Just almost. Who are you?"
"Ummm before that, how about a "Thank You" for me?" The girl slightly tilted her head with her biggest smile on her face.
"Why must I..."
Yakiro stopped in the middle of his sentence to realize several empty HP recovery potions on the ground. Large Size, not the small one that he was having in his inventory.
He also felt pretty healthy, and the wounds on his chests were regenerating.
It was certain that this lady saved Yakiro from the verge of dying.
"...Thank you so much... And sorry to make you spend so many recovery bottles..." Yakiro bowed his head to the lady.
"Now now, it's good that you are all alive. I was freaked out when I saw you lying in the middle of a blood pool." The girl smiled, extending her arm to Yakiro.
"Nice to meet you. I'm Yakiro."
"Aha me too. I'm Yomina - a Level 20 Adventurer."
Yakiro grabbed her arm and got up.
When completely standing, Yakiro is a little higher than Yomina.
"What are you doing here Yakiro? Did you battle with some kind of dangerous monster? Your wounds were so serious." Yomina asked in worry.
"Ahhh... It was just a... Grey Wolf..."
"Grey Wolf???? They can cause that kind of injury?????? Yomina shocked.
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"Yeah... because I'm..."
Level 120. If he was still in control of Barsackra, he could spit that statement out without any hestitaion.
"... Level 1..." He mumbled.
"What???? Shouldn't you be at the Starting City? Why are you wandering here?" Yomina asked repeatedly.
[YEAH I REALLY WANT TO GO THERE RIGHT NOW !! ] Yakiro almost screamed, but held if back before it came out of his mouth. The Starting City is the area for all newcomers. Normally, with Teleportation, he could reach there in the blink of an eye.
But being stripped off all his powers, the only way for Yakiro to get back there was to walk on foot. It would take at least an hour and a half to reach there from Greenstel Forest, and Yakiro was sure that he would meet other kind of monsters along the way.
Unfortunately, he was not strong enough to fend them off.
"It's a long story though... I'll tell you later. And you Yomina, what are you up to?"
"Ahhh... um..."
Yomina scratched her head while expressing an awkward smile.
Did she really forgot why she was there?
After a few minutes, she cheerfully stated.
"OHHHHH I REMEMBER ! I was with my team to discover a hidden dungeon near this forest !"
"And where is your team?"
"Ahhh.... I... lost them. Hehe" Yomina couldn't stop scratching her head.
Yakiro took a glance at her attire. She only brought a backpack. However, it looked rather flattened and did not contain anything important.
"Sorry to ask but where is your inventory?"
Normally, when conquering a dungeon, especially "hidden" dungeon, proper preparation is required. Items, potions, weapons,... all of them must be calculated and be used properly.
Yakiro knew that she had used up several healing potions early on, but even if she put those into the backpack, there could still be a plenty of space left.
But Yomina looked as if she did not bring anything along with her.
"Ahhhh... I... I gave it all to my team leader."
"What did you give him?"
"Pretty much all the money I got. He said that they needed some expenses for the trip to buy equipment and items, so I gave him all 1 Gold and all the Silver I have. He promised that the hidden dungeon will bring back huge reward..."
Yomina innocently smiled.
"....then he told me to search for the way in this area. After I came back, they had already disappeared."
Yomina scratched her head again.
Yakiro slapped his own face and shook his head.
Wasn't that a scam? Yomine was indeed scammed.
There had long been a scam that went on from so long ago. It started with some strong players offered to team up with lower level players and promised to help to "conquer a hidden dungeon". They exaggerated the reward to the point of being extremely generous. All the things they asked for was all the money that the low level players had as the "fee" or "expense" for the journey.
Then in the end, these strong players disappeared without a trace, leaving the penniless low levels wailing in despair.
There was a reason why many people fell in to this trap, because the "hidden" dungeons were not easy to find. They were not like the public dungeons, where people could just go in and out naturally. Instead, hidden dungeons required specific conditions or mechanics to be located and opened, which were sometimes hard for the low level players. At the same time, no one know exactly what kind of creatures resided inside those dungeons.
And along with that, hidden dungeons normally contained huge rewards.
Additionally, the money system in World of Esseka was fairly easy to be understood. Money was divided into 6 levels: Iron, Copper, Silver, Gold, Platinum and Diamond. Iron being the lowest and Diamond being the highest. We had 10 Iron = 1 Copper, 10 Copper = 1 Silver, 10 Silver = 1 Gold,... and so on.
The most common currency was Copper. 1 Copper was kinda equivalent to 1 Dollar in the real world.
But let's get back to the scam.
"Yomina, I'm very to say this, but I think you had fallen into a scam..."
Yakiro placed one of his arm on her fragile shoulder. He processed to tell her everything.
Tears started flowing out of her beautiful green eyes.
"N... No... My all saved money... I... I have to find them !"
She sobbed, but quickly close the backpack and headed back to her own way.
But even if she searched through the whole Greenstel Forest, it would be unlikely that she encounter them again. How much time had passes since she lost them? Those scammers would probably have run out of the forest, or worse, if any of them knew how to teleport, they would probably have been far away.
Moreover, it would be more dangerous if they had higher level than her. In the worst case, she could be killed.
"Hey you are going to find them alone?" Yakiro asked.
"Of course ! Those are my hard earned money ! I will not let anyone steal them away like that !" Yomina sobbed while started running.
"Hey hey ! Wait !"
Yakiro could not let Yomina go.
One reason was that he worried about the situations that might come upon her. Being an experienced player, he knew not only the crimes that happened between the players, but also the crimes that happened between the NPCs in the game as well.
Another reason was that she was the only person that was capable of ensuring his safety then.
"What...?" Yomine turned around. Her eyes were still filled with tears.
"Money lost is lost already. I don't think you can find those bad guys easily. Plus, if they are stronger than you, it will be unlikely that they listen to you. Instead, they could just shove you away and tell you to fuck off."
"Ah Yakiro... Your language..."
"Oh shoot ! My bad !" Yakiro's emotions were rising. Thus, he lost control of his mouth in just a second.
He just could not leave a crying girl there all by herself.
"But... Those money are not small for me... 1 Gold and 8 Silver are... everything I have earned... since I started being an Adventurer... What should I do..." Yomine sniffed
Yakiro calmly asked:
"Do you remember the reason why you gave those people your money?"
"To... used as... the expenses for exploring a hidden dungeon and get good rewards... But they just got away now.."
Yakiro smiled and opened his palm.
"Well as a pay back for saving my life, I will lead you to one."
"One what?" Yomina opened her eyes widely, and looked at Yakiro like a kitten.
He just playfully grinned.
"One hidden dungeon in this area."