Zectas Volume I: Enigmatic Village of Nanahuatl (4 page)

 

 

Everyone in the party knew about these facts. That's why they thought that something was wrong with this guy. He could be a bait by another party and try to lure them into a trap. Tristan was extra doubtful than the rest of his party.

 

 

"I see. Well then can you perhaps tell me your name and your level?"

 

 

"Sure. My name is Smoke I'm still at level 10 at the moment. I'm currently heading to Coatl City for a job change."

 

 

Hearing this Tristan was sure that this guy was a bait. He started to look around their surroundings trying to check for any signs of this bait's party. He then suddenly thought that he could reverse the situation and use this guy as bait for their party's quest.

 

 

Tristan whispered his plans to the rest of his party.

 

 

"What good fortune then. We are heading towards Coatl City right after we finish this quick quest. Would you perhaps like to join us?"

 

 

With the keywords 'good fortune' Smoke smiled. This truly felt like his day. He agreed to join them. He was however not invited to their party since there was a huge level gap between them. A party requires the person with the highest and the lowest level to be only be 10 levels apart.

 

 

Tristan then proceeded to introduce the rest of his party. There was the Ranger Damien, The Wizard Veiz, The Priestess Aurora, The Dancer Trisha, The Assassin Bones and their leader The Royal Knight Tristan. All of them have advance jobs. Except for Tristan, he has an advance hidden job.

 

 

You can get an advance job after you fulfill the quests given by your basic job's NPC or encounter a hidden NPC or Event that would grant you an advance hidden job.

 

 

"This way Smoke. We have to enter that forest on the right of this clearing."

 

 

Smoke didn't mind that they were gonna enter the forest. After all he was with together with a party of high level players. He was sure that they knew what they were doing. As the group entered the forest. There was a system notification.

 

 

 

Further inside into the forest a huge set of antlers was heading straight for them. The Ranger Damien took out his Long Bow and the Wizard Veiz pointed his staff at the stone deer. Immediately they fired their range attacks towards the monster. The stone deer fell down dead after taking both attacks.

 

 

The Priestess Aurora started casting buffs on the whole party. Smoke wondered if she would include him with the buffs. She however did not cast any buff on Smoke at all. Smoke then guessed that since he wouldn't be involved in the attack that it would just be a waste of mana to use buffs on him.

 

 

The group moved following the point indicated in Tristan's map. They continued to encounter stone deers, iron owls, and rabid wolverines. All of them where killed instantly.

 

 

In the center of the forest was a clearing with a cave that sort of looked like a house. Huge boulders were piled on top of each other making the walls of the cave. The entrance looked like the ones found in stone henge that formed the mathematical symbol π.

 

 

"ROOOOOAAAAAARRRRARRGGGGGHHHHHHHHHHH!!!"

 

 

A deafening scream came out of the cave and in an instant it came out! The king of this forest the Maneator! It was a huge minotaur. It could easily be over 3 meters tall. Its golden mane covered the area from its head to its back. Its nostrils flared, you could see slight embers coming out of its nose as the Maneator breathed angrily.

 

 

Without delay The long range duo of Damien and Veiz started attacking the Maneator. The Maneator took the 2 shots with ease. The life bar of the Maneator displayed a colossal (295,227/300,000 HP). Both of their attacks only manage to do 0.01591% damage on this monstrosity.

 

 

The Assassin Bones leapt towards the Maneator and activated a skill that manage to make 10 hits damaging the Maneator for 1% of his total HP. However the Assassin just stood still after executing the skill. The Maneator slowly raised its right arm and slashed Bones for a damage of 45,230.

 

 

Bones' life bar immediately appeared revealing (11,974/57,204). One more hit and Bones was a goner. Tristan appeared out of nowhere and stood in between the Maneator and Bones. He swung his gigantic 2 handed sword and manage to push back the Maneator for about 10 meters and dealt 12,463 damage.

 

 

The Priestess Aurora casted High Cure on Bones but it was only for 30,000 HP. While the Dancer Trisha continued dancing making her party's attack speed to increase and casting time to decrease.

 

 

Veiz and Damien continued on their long range attacks during the melee confrontation and dealt 3 blows each.

 

The Maneator now had (223,534/300,000 HP). Tristan's high level party managed to do 25% of the Maneator's total HP.

 

 

The Maneator was 10 meters away and was being constantly bombarded with range attacks. It suddenly lifted both of it's arms in the air and screamed once more.

 

 

"ROOOOOWWWWWWWAAAAAARRRRARRGGGGGHHHHHHHHHHH!!!"

 

 

Tristan's party and Smoke included were stunned for 2 seconds after hearing the shout. In the interval of 2 seconds the Maneator's HP gradually started to increase.

 

 

"DAMN IT! THE MANEATOR HAS A REGEN ABILITY!"

 

 

The Maneator dashed for Tristan. It raised it's right arm and slash downwards. The Maneator's claws were met with a gigantic sword. Tristan somehow manage to block it's slash but less than a second later, the Maneator's left claw came and slashed Tristan from below. Tristan flew up into the air for about 7 meters.

 

 

As Tristan was about to smash into the ground he was pummelled down even faster by 2 gigantic hands clasped together. The Maneator stopped attacking Tristan as he received a gigantic earth lance that forced him to take a couple of step backwards.

 

 

Tristan took a total damage of 75,234. Tristan's life bar displayed (78,176/153,410 HP). He knew that this was a lost cause. They still weren't strong enough to handle the Maneator. He thought that after spending the last month training and levelling up that they could take it down now.

 

 

Tristan got angry at Veiz at Damien. Those two were suppose to be their Damage Dealers. They even requested to postpone this quest for a month in order for them to level up. They are both level 65 but they only manage to do that much damage. Tristan took it upon himself to execute his escape plan. Allowing everyone in the party to survive.

 

 

"EVERYONE RETREAT! HEAD FOR THE EXIT!"

 

 

Smoke stood in a daze. He still couldn't believe the high level fight that he saw. He couldn't believe how huge the gap was between him and Tristan and between Tristan and the Maneator. There really is always someone stronger...

 

 

Smoke then saw Tristan running towards him. He thought 'ahhh I guess his gonna pick me up, seeing that he has such a higher movement speed than me.'

 

 

As if on queue to his thoughts Tristan picked up Smoke. Tristan however didn't bring him to the exit with him. Instead he threw Smoke into the path of the rampaging Minotaur right behind them.

 

 

Smoke fell right in front of the Maneator. The Maneator stopped and stood still. Smoke collapsed on the ground, he craned his neck to look at the face of the Maneator. The Maneator let out another shrilling scream.

 

 

"ROOOOOAAAAAARRRRARRGGGGGHHHHHHHHHHH!!!"

 

 

The Maneator held Smoke up like a Doll. Carefully it started breaking Smoke's left hand. It was careful not to kill Smoke instantly. The Maneator is an intelligent monster. It knows just how much damage it should inflict in order to torture it's victim.

 

 

Smoke saw Tristan and the rest of his villainous party run towards the exit of the forest. Smoke was scared. How long before the Maneator kills me?!

 

 

The Maneator took great care of his new found plaything. It started breaking Smoke's right knee cap. Then his left leg. Then his left shoulder blade.

 

 

Smoke was in complete agony. How can such a sadistic monster exist in ZECTAS. The Maneator's torture continued on for more than 3 hours.

 

 

During Smoke's torture he was given plenty of time to think. He had never been this angry before in his entire life. How could he have been so naive?! What made him trust that smug looking Tristan in the first place. There was no way he can get revenge on Tristan in the near future. Similar thoughts kept running through his head over and over again.

 

 

Smoke was so frustrated. If only I can play this ZECTAS 24/7. I would grind till I'm dead. I would grind my levels and I would grind my skills until I'm strong enough to pay back Tristan and his cronies. I'd kill them till there levels are ZERO. After that I'd bring them here and throw them in front of Maneator to be a plaything. Even after all that it still wouldn't be enough to satisfy my anger.

 

 

Smoke's torture continued some more until finally Smoke's total HP was only 10%. He reached for his beginner's knife and used his last option for escape.

 

 

"SUICIDE ATTACK!"

 

 

+ You've dealt your MAXIMUM CRITICAL BLOW x 5 on the Maneator. damage 938.

 

- Using the suicide attack skill You've killed yourself.

 

- You lose 1 level!

 

- All The stats that have increased on the last level up will be rolled back!

 

- Because you have DIED You cannot log in to ZECTAS for another 24 hours!

 

 

 

 

The Birth of a Legend

 

 

Nash burst opened his pod. BAANG! His body was covered in cold sweat. Both his hands were shaking in anger. He felt like he was going insane. Why would anyone subject a human being to that kind of torture.

 

 

Nash relived the past few hours. It was his first time meeting other players in ZECTAS. They looked like a group of decent individuals. They spoke to him in a friendly manner, they even offered to take him to Coatl City using a faster route. Nash believed everything they told him. How could he have suspected that they would just use him as an escape goat?

 

 

Nash tried lying down on his bed. He tried looking for something that could take the pain, the anger, the humiliation away.

 

 

There was no way to stop the emotions that filled his heart. He wanted to kill every last one of them. He wanted to make them suffer a hundred times more than he had suffered. He would make them pay!

 

 

Originally Nash didn't want to read too much information about ZECTAS since he was hoping to explore everything by himself. However due to recent events, he decided to look at the forums.

 

 

There he found out that you can't leave a main city until you get a basic job. There were also NPCs all over the city that would give quests to guide you on how to play ZECTAS. Basically a player would be level 15 with a basic job in order to step out of the city.

 

 

As Nash continued reading the forums he noticed that there was no talk about the abilities displayed the horned rabbits. The forums even stated that the armored armadillos are used as sequential target practice. How could that be? Even when Nash hits the armored armadillo for critical damage it was still always 1.

 

 

Nash decided to upload his latest video feed from ZECTAS but decided to end it as soon as he killed his 10,000th horned rabbit. For some reason something in him decided to skip the part about acquiring the ability: Agility of the Horned Rabbit and the loot: Lucky Bunny Ears (Head Gear).

 

 

After uploading the video feed. He noticed that there was an insanely high number of hits on his video blog about ZECTAS.

 

 

The video feed on his 'first attempt of attacking a horned rabbit' but instead turned into 'trying to run for his life from a horned rabbit' had 523,365,872 views and had around 62,341,786 comments.

 

 

This discovery distracted his angry heart for the moment. With this many views there could be a bonus waiting for him from the Manager. He decided to read some of the comments.

 

 

Nash's angry heart snapped out once more! The comments continued on and on about how funny he was.

 

 

"These idiots think that I'm some kind of a joke?! I'll show them. I'll show all of them!"