As Locke gathered firewood he was pondering on the events that occurred during the dungeon today. The system never would give damage numbers for spells or equipment, which meant players had to figure it out for themselves. He found that the minimal mana cost ice spears and firebolts seemed to cause less damage compared to Jason and Sheila's firebolts. The most likely culprit had to be due to his lack of control of mana as well as his spell creation method. There was way too much mana being wasted during the spell creation process.

Trainer learned spells didn't have this problem as a players personal mana control didn't matter. For them allocating points into intelligence will be to only way to increase their mana control, giving slight damage increases when doing so. However, it will never come close to the damage custom spells can dish out when more mana is used to cast them.

To balance this trainer learned spells can be increased in rank at certain trainers. For example a rank 2 firebolt would cost 40 mana to deal more damage compensating for the increased cost. Once you learned a rank 2 version of a spell though you cannot go back to cast the rank 1 version. This is the biggest advantage to custom spells, the flexibility.

Now that I think about it a bit more, both trainer learned spells and custom spells share a glaring similarity. It all comes down to control whether its personal skill or the intelligence stat....but what is the most efficient way to get better at this?

While going over many options in his head to overcome his inexperience he really only had two avenues available to him. Practice and get better as he plays the game, or invest more points in intelligence. After mulling it over for a bit Locke decided he would stay on his previous course of investing more points into wisdom. There was the obvious downside that he was basically only getting 25 points of attributes to run the enhancement which required him to have 40 points of wisdom to maintain.

The draw back was blatantly obvious, but there is also the flexibility of being able assign those 25 points freely between the physical stats depending on the situation. Looking towards the future Locke believed there will be benefits if he stuck with it. If nothing else this would also make him more resistant to fear and curses which could potentially have very nasty effects.

With the firewood retrieved and placed in his inventory Locke headed back to the campsite. It wasn't the best spot, but they would be hard pressed to find anything better. They had a cliff wall at their back so nothing should be coming from behind them. Well unless whatever it was jumped off the cliff but that was roughly a thirty foot drop.

Taking the firewood out of his inventory Locke began to start the fire. Looking around the area everything else was setup and everyone was just lazing about quietly. It seemed like the party was still a bit awkward together especially after the last encounter. A couple firebolts later and the fire was lit, he sat down on a stump and begun to relax. After some time he decided to strike up a conversation and clear the air.

“Look...uhh it wasn't my intention to make you guys feel like you are not pulling your weight back there, I just needed the bear to focus on me to do what needed to be done.” Locke apologized awkwardly.

“Okay can we actually talk about this? How high are both your levels? And why is this tutorial actually this difficult?” Rae blurted out, “Fighting a bear at level 1 is pretty insane and we're not even close to the boss.”

“Well... my level is only 5 and I am sure Locke is somewhere around that, but the main reason we're stronger is due to passives which we would have gained throughout the first tutorial. You guys completely ignored the games hints stating the tutorial was important and rushed forward like idiots. Heck even some of the high rankers in Odyssey failed to complete this tutorial on their first try, mostly due to being cocky and not lack of skill.” Thomas answered very bluntly.

“Well I can't really argue that....” Rae's voice trailed off into a whisper that Locke could not hear.

“No need to be so harsh on Rae......most people who play a lot of games would do what we did.” Jason argued.

“Look we get it. Let's just say we're willing to help you grind a few levels before we head deeper, I would rather not have to start this from scratch.” Locke suggested.

Because who knows maybe there is a benefit to completing it first try. Would rather try for it then not.

“We are?” Thomas replied while looking at Locke with confusion plastered on his face, “Oh uhhhh yeah sure we can do that, no problem.” Thomas stammered on his reply.

The group continued to mingle throughout the night until they settled on two watch schedules. With Rae/Jason/Thomas heading the first watch while Locke and Sheila we're handling the second. Thomas informed them a bit more on how sleep works in the game and it was very favorable for the player. First off is was actually very easy to sleep when you focus on doing so, No tossing and turning in bed so to speak. Also you don't exactly need eight hours sleep just enough to bring your stamina to a decent level. Players can set an alarm to wake them up at a certain time or stamina level. Like mentioned when you are “sleep deprived” in the game your maximum stamina is decreased.

For Locke right now his stamina was at 42%/52%, he barely felt tired even though he has been up for in this tutorial for roughly fourteen hours. From how it was explained a player wouldn't feel exhausted due to lack of sleep until 20% or less. Though if he were to encounter a prolonged fight in this state it would be troublesome because he would only have half of his normal stamina available to him. This is why resting was important. Lastly being woken up in the middle of the night is not a big issue, the player won't feel groggy and be wide awake provided their maximum stamina was above the 20% mark.

With nothing else to do Locke went to sleep and set his alarm to wake him up at 100% stamina. He woke up several hours later without issue. Sheila was also already awake eating some rations it looked like. Rae and Jason were asleep already, Looked like Thomas was waiting for him to wake up before doing the same.

“Oh Locke you're awake, good I was hoping to get some shut eye as well,” Thomas yawned “Watch is boring as always.”

“Quiet I assume?”

“Yeah nothing bothered us at all, would have been nice for a boar or two to show up to relieve some boredom.”

Thomas was about to call it a night before Locke stopped him.

“Quick question for you, why are you playing with us and not your guild?”

Thomas stopped and looked back slowly “I am the odd man out, sadly they all went on to form their own five man parties to tackle the dungeon and there was nobody left to join me. I'd like to think that they have confidence in my skill to get through it alone, but......well enough of that what about you?”

“That sucks man, as for me......let's just say I burned all my bridges in odyssey and figured starting fresh was a good idea.”

Turns out trying to make it to the top the way I did.....leaves a lot of regrets.

After a few more minutes of chatting Thomas entered his tent to rest for the night. Locke quickly ate some rations and then found a nice spot to sit. He got into a meditative position and began to practice controlling the mana inside of his body. More specifically he was turning on and off small physical boost.

This practice was meant to hopefully lower the cast time of his enhancement spell as it was almost useless for him right now. Of course he was careful not to use too much mana in case something happened. Sheila remained quiet and studied him curiously, she of course made sure to listen for any sounds of trouble nearby while doing so. Noticing her piercing gaze Locke turned to face her.

“Am I really that handsome or is there something on my face?” He teased.

“Neither, I was just curious what you are focusing so intently on. It was almost like you were meditating, are you some kind of monk?”

“Ouch. How about this, why don't you answer a question of mine first.” Locke bartered.

“Depends on the question.”

“Sorry if this is too personal but I'm curious, I thought Jason was Rae's brother not yours? It feels like Rae is much more distant towards Jason than you.”

“Oh that.....well...it is not that complicated even if we're not related by blood I will still treat him like my little brother. I have known them both all their lives you see. Our parents are close, so naturally us children are also close. As for why Rae is distant......I won't go into much detail but they are having a disagreement. Rae doesn't want to play this game with her little brother. However, her parents would only buy the VR capsules if she agreed to let Jason join her. Obviously Rae's parents just want their children to bond more but she is taking it out on her brother.”

“Seems simple enough, is Rae somehow hoping he will quit the game if she distances herself from him?”

Sheila just shrugged in response, either she didn't know or was unwilling to answer.

“I will add an outside perspective on this, maybe it isn't so much her not wanting to play with Jason, but maybe she doesn't want Jason playing this particular game?”

“Oh....I didn't think of that. That does sound like her, she would never admit it though.”

“Well you held up your end of the bargain so I will do my share. Honestly I was not really planning on telling you much, but I figured I owe you a bit more after hearing that.” Locke spoke calmly.

She didn't give any sort of facial reaction so Locke continued to speak.

“It's easier to control the mana contained inside your body if you meditate, obviously just starting the game my control is bad hence why I am practicing. This method will be slow but I feel like doing it myself will help me understand better instead of just investing my attributes into intelligence,” Locke paused for a bit before proceeding to speak, “I am not going to say taking shortcuts is bad, but sometimes it is better to take your time you know?”

“Well I do know one thing, you really didn't intend to tell me much if that is all I got now,” She laughed.

“Hold on, that is what I was going to give you originally. Since we have time how about I give you some pointers on where to begin training to do this yourself?”

“Oh you're planning on letting me take a gander at the books you were mentioning earlier?” Sheila asked.

“Absolutely not,” Locke refused with a glare, “That is something I promised to sell. It would be bad business to share the contents without permission.”

Her face showed a bit of shock before quickly returning to normal. It looked like she was not expecting that reaction.

“Look sorry about that, but what I meant was teaching you how I learned to visualize and control mana. A word of warning though, you will most likely not understand it for a while, the tutorial had specialized conditions that helped me.”

“Sorry I didn't mean to offend you, it was careless......but I would appreciate your guidance,” Sheila bowed after speaking.

“...............please don't do that, who bows like that nowadays?” Locke frowned.

After a brief pause both had a short laugh before Locke continued to train while giving Sheila pointers. The watch was long but productive and soon it was the start of a new day. The party made the necessary preparations before heading out. The plan was to continue to kill the weaker wildlife to grind a few levels onto Jason/Rae, and Sheila to allow them to catch up. When the group is stronger they will head towards the objective to finish the dungeon.