◎ Act 1

[greaterspeed]

[in the room where the Chaos Gate is situated crouches a young, blue Twin Blade. He's far enough to one side to be out of the way, but not enough to be easily ignored. See, Sonic liked to be at the center of attention, it feeds that ego of his and well... He just liked to be social whenever fancy struck him.

What he didn't like was the idea of not being able to defend himself.

The fact that he was still a low level Twin Blade certainly did not help with the whole 'independent' thing. Which has led him to the boy crouching by himself moaning about the indignity of it all]

AAAAAAAUGH! I'm not made for RPGs! I can't do this level thing, got knocked out by a goblin. A MOOK! How does that even happen?? I've taken down giant death robots, angry water Gods, gigantic lasers, more killer robots and even more angry Gods and what happens?

[he throws his hands up in the air in exasperation. A few NPCs take this as a cue to exit the stage] A stupid Goblin knocks me out for an hour!

[silence.

...

...

Then Sonic just covers his face with his hands with a whine, ears folded against his head in embarrassment. In a small, muffled voice;]

I'm sorry, I promise to never do this RPG thing again now can I please go back to being able to beat things up just by jumping on them?

Comments

[greaterspeed]

[ ヽ(≧Д≦)ノ ]

You have no appreciation for the sheer skill needed to pull off some pretty awesome and stellar platforming moves, my good friend. Nothing beats the rush of knowing you're faster than the falling debris you're using as platforms. Awwww yea.

[... is he even talking about games anymore? SONIC, WHAT DID YOU DO WITH THE FOURTH WALL!?]

[shininghero]

[Fourth wall? What fourth wall?]

Well, it wouldn't be fair if you weren't as fast as the falling debris you're using as platforms because the game would be unbeatable then. And some platformers are made too poorly to be fun.

[greaterspeed]

[...

∑(O_O；)

...]

S-Somehow, that last statement felt like a shot straight through my heart and I can't think of why.

[shininghero]

I wonder why indeed.

[There's a sort of smug smile on Shirou's face like he knows why, even though he actually doesn't. He's just trolling Sonic now.]

[greaterspeed]

Nnngh man, now it's going to bug me. [he scratches the back of his head, frown on his face. He seems to ignore the smile on Shirou's face for now (because Knuckles and Shadow do the same thing sometimes and Sonic's learned to just roll with it or pick a fight)]

So while I puzzle over that curious statement [he pulls lightly on his ear] where are you headed?

[shininghero]

Nowhere in particular, I guess. I've just been wandering around town and some fields and dungeons. Trying to understand the way this world works.

[He's almost got it all down. He might be missing information on a few classes, and still knows nothing about guilds and what they do, but for the most part he understands how things work in The World.]

[greaterspeed]

So basically, you've been exploring.

Find out anything good?

[shininghero]

Define "good".

[greaterspeed]

Hm...

Interesting. Useful. Neat. Game breaking? [he grinned at the last one] Whatever information you think is good.

[shininghero]

I don't think I have much in terms of game breaking, unfortunately. Useful though, maybe. I think I have a fair understanding of the leveling system, classes, fields and quests... Well, as good as one can have when they've been around for about a month.

[greaterspeed]

The last one was a joke. [sigh] It's no fun if I have to explain it!

But hey, what d'ya have on the leveling system? Because I got this feeling that it's different from what I'm used to.

[shininghero]

I explained it to you earlier, but I can guess I can repeat it.

There are two leveling systems, one for you, obviously, and one for your job or class, whatever you want to call it. The one for you boosts your stats, strength, magic, defense, that kind of stuff every time you level up. The leveling system for your class grants you new moves whenever you reach a certain level. Unless you're an Adept Rogue, you don't really have to worry about juggling the two though. Any experience you gain from battles are applied to both leveling systems, usually.