OVRMMO2: The First Day’s Rush and the Training Grounds.

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Toaru Ossan no VRMMO Katsudouki
Author: Shiina Howahowa
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A/N:  From here on please take heed.
Since this tale is told from Earth’s point of view,
There are a lot of things in the state of the world that Earth doesn’t know.
It’s a rather different form, but I hope for your best regards.

The First Day’s Rush and the Training Grounds.

Immediately after login.

“It’s splendidly packed to the gills … as expected of the first day, huh.”

I muttered absentmindedly.

And then, here and there

“Is there anyone who wants to party to help level quick~? We need vanguards!”
“LFG to go to the rocky area, let’s~ go~ before it gets crowded!”

The voices of people calling for parties to help level up (though technically it’s leveling up skills) can be heard flying about.
In particular the ones who have begun to organize are those with Beta experience, who understand how to move with this world’s avatars and what Arts exist, and who have a firm understanding of Skills.
They’ll probably be upping their skill levels like crazy.

On the other hand …

“Hey, new players, I’ve got good equipment over here~!”
“How about assembling your equipment set before you get into combat~?”

All the crafters say, their voices flying through the air; an open-air market has been set up.
The ones with stalls are probably from the Open-Beta group too.
The market is shoulder-to-shoulder packed; I can see there’s also trading going on, an MMO staple.

But even with the jam-packed crowd of people, I don’t see any other player with a bow equipped on his back other than me.
The influence of pre-game info is strong indeed! Especially info from the Beta Testers.

―――――――――――――――――――

And now another troublesome MMO staple has occurred.

“Oi, that trash with the bow, turn around.”

Yup, it’s the guys you’ll find anywhere, the kind who look down on others.
Honestly, it’s the type of people I don’t want to deal with the most, but … if you ignore them they get more annoying.

“It’s me, huh …”

I’m making an annoyed face, but I hide it and look over my shoulder.

“You getting along well with that shitty weapon? Why don’t you just quit the game already?”
“Or like, that face is totally a mob-character’s, it’s so lame. Just go off and die.”

“blah blah @#$# !@#$!”they continue their yammering.
This is such a waste of time … it’s the first day and I’ve got the worst luck.

Of course this situation would happen; it sucks, but with the first day being full of people all over the place, there’s going to be jerks screwing around.
And now, these 5 guys are still taking up my time, continuing to flame me.
“Gyahahaha, what are you, reincarnations of some mohawk gang groupies¹ from the end of the century?” is what I want to say.
But eh, either way they’ll probably get tired of it soon … finally they give the parting shot.

“Well, trash like you can be weak scaredy-cats and hide in the town forever!²”

With that the 5 member Mohawk gang (actually they didn’t have that hairstyle, just the delinquent impression) left. Thanks to them, the image of the bow being a crappy weapon has spread even further to the people around.

… but that’s convenient.

Since I chose to go the solo path, this will help with being left alone.
I don’t really want to party with anyone other than people I get to know, and there won’t be that many people who’ve heard all the badmouthing about bows and would still call out to me, so in a way this wasn’t a complete waste of time.

That said, I’m not interested in continuing to be stared at so I leave in a hurry.
My goal is the Training Arena. That is, the training grounds.

This isn’t really important, but the training grounds didn’t exist in the Beta testing.
As a result of the Beta Testers wanting a safe place to practice swinging swords or chanting magic,
It came into being as a result of sending the request to the Management.
It really makes you want to tell the Beta group, “Good Job!”
In the training grounds, for practicing archery there are shooting ranges (for the bow of course, also for throwing weapons and magic) with both unmoving targets and targets that move at random to some degree.
For the close-combat types (like swords, axes, spears, unarmed) the targets are training dummies.

In the training grounds it looks like your skill level will only increase until to level 5.
As expected from training grounds, it’s far slower to grow when compared to fighting other monster opponents.
There’s also support NPCs to show you how to handle weapons and how to chant magic arias.
Like this, even though it’s my first time participating in a VRMMO it doesn’t seem like I’ll stumble right away in the first go.
… that is if I properly listen to the NPCs, anyway.

The NPC bestowed on me all kinds of those instructions, and afterwards I immediately practiced with the bow and arrow.
I was given training-exclusive equipment in the training grounds, bow and arrow and throwing weapons ammo numbers are ∞ (infinite). These extraordinary measures are welcome.
And then the commemorative … actually not at all, first arrow.

“To shoot, well before shooting there’s a problem …”

Drawing the bowstring back was still good, but being unable to prop the arrow up it *porori* fell; it would be a fumble if I ever saw one.
That I got seriously depressed is a secret that stays here.

Regrouping, anyway I prepared to shoot I don’t know how many times, repeatedly setting up the shot.
The result; I became able to understand that the info “You don’t hit often” was correct.
There are absolutely no trajectory guide-lines; just like shooting a bow in real life, you have to properly imagine the destination and set it up or else.
Even just in practice this cost-balance is the worst; that it’s a weapon with trash handle is beginning to be a very convincing story.
Though the fact is that I shot 100 times, the arrows that barely hit their mark were 2 of them.
The ones that had problems before reaching the target, the arrows that lost power on the way there and fell, most likely numbered over 70.
Since they disappear in a moment after they fall, the number I counted is a rough estimate but it’s most likely not off by much.

Anyway, concentrating my consciousness only on the target and bow and arrow, I continue to shoot.
That the Bow skill has already reached Lv5 with the fundamental’s for player-side skills is useless, and even if I reach Lv99 like this it has absolutely no meaning.
Setup shoot, setup shoot, setup shoot … thanks to that, finally I have an 8 out of 10 chance of hitting the stationary targets and about a 6 out of 10 chance of hitting the somewhat randomly-moving targets with arrows that fly properly.
I guess I’m just, barely, ready to challenge fighting the weakest monster.

For now I return the bow and arrow to the NPC. Next is to practice Wind Magic.
Using a staff is the basic for magic, but in exchange for power and distance it seems like it’s possible to cast the Aria without holding anything.
The mediums you use for magic are; the staff is the best, then grimoir, magic hand (this is treated like a glove), and magic ring, it seems.
Fundamentally, if Magic is your main then go with the staff and grimoir; if you’re a magic warrior than go with magic hand and magic ring.
However, staff aside, they’re all quite the valuables; even with a good craftsman or seamstress it’s said you won’t be able to have them made right away. Well, it’s the NPC saying this, so who knows what it’s like in reality.

Borrowing a staff, I recite the lowest rank Wind Magic spell.

“<Wind Needle!>”

Small needles of wind appeared, and I saw that they hit the target.
In this world it looks like Wind Cutter is a spell with a decent rank, but I’m not able to use it from the start.
Anyway, with a single Cutter, when a lower-ranking elemental magician is able to use several it with several twists, it gives the feeling of graduating from being a beginner.
Magic uses MP, and it has a much better hit ration than the bow and arrow by far.
Or you could say I just don’t have much command over using the bow and arrow.
For now Wind Magic is also Lv5, so I replace the staff; next will be drilling myself in Kick.

Quite a few other warrior-type people have also come. One-handed Sword and Two-handed Sword, as well as Spear are there attacking the set-up training dummies.
For now, let’s kick in with Low Kick while learning through observation.
As the form itself is there the Kick Skill Lv also rises steadily.
Since it’s risen I also try out the Middle Kick and the Heel Drop.
In ‘Real’ I really can’t do a Heel Drop … but this really is a game; as long as I have an image while kicking, even with a pseudo-heel drop as reference, doing it is a real possibility.
Since the Heel Drop strikes from above, I can expect it to be an attack that will reach a slightly taller head.
I think there’s likely to be a weakness, so trying it out on human-shaped monsters would probably be good.

The Kick Skill became Lv5 in roughly half the time it took the bow and arrow and magic.
I bet the unarmed martial art-types level up easy.
And Physical Boost has also risen to Lv3.
I guess that training each and every other Skill influences it and it gains experience that way.

Anyway, in this world, from how to move your body to magic, there’s a lot for beginners to see and learn; thinking that way, it’s good.
Now it’s just for me to repeat the Skills in actual combat and raise my player skills.
I have a lot of excitement; in real-life 3 hours have already passed.
Deciding to log out in order to prepare dinner and the bath, I rent a room in an inn in town and log out.
At that time I found out that the currency was called [Glo] … I’m pretty slow.

A/N: The Skill Writeup is for next time.

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1. “mohikans” – Yes, while there is a Native American tribe called mohican/mahican, no that’s not what the Japanese term means. It’s referring to dudes who wear mohawks and are in aggressive delinquent gangs. Since that hairstyle and behavior is kind of old, he’s calling them guys who are super out-dated delinquents. Or wanting to call them that.
2. “weak scaredy cats” – actually the insult is to “hole yourself up in the town, shivering and shaking,” but the sfx for shivering and shaking used indicate weakness and fear, so he’s basically being called a scaredy-cat. Just letting you know I changed it because I thought the literal translation made the delinquents sound too intelligent than the original implies.

<T/N: I just translate a sentence here or there randomly for these older chapters, so it doesn’t really interfere with me translating the newer chapters. That being said, that’s why it will take me much longer to translate the early chapters. While the other translations of OVRMMO are understandable, since they are machine translations I have decided to retranslate them since some of the jokes don’t come across well.>