Personal traits.
A personal trait was a unique and special ability that any DDO user could possess.
Necton Up had predicted that players would only acquire personal traits after progressing through at least 15% of the main quest.
Yet, as if mocking that prediction, Rough had acquired one the moment the game opened.
“How on earth did he obtain a personal trait?”
Director Lee Dong-jun carefully reviewed Rough’s gameplay records.
The beginning had been ordinary.
Compared with other players, there had been nothing particularly noteworthy.
Though, if anything, his bickering with the system over setting his nickname had been so absurd it was almost enough to make one wonder whether he was a comedian.
The real issue came afterward.
[As a pre-registration coupon reward, you have received the personal trait: Advanced Status Window Lv. 1.]
Rough had obtained a personal trait.
And he had received it from a pre-registration coupon reward, of all things.
Using it, he had cleared the first tutorial quest with ridiculous ease.
“What difficulty was this user’s tutorial quest set to?”
“Upper-medium.”
“If it’s upper-medium, then the intended difficulty is that someone with average control skills can barely clear it, right?”
“Yes, that’s correct.”
Rough was different.
Control skills? To hell with those.
Since the enemy’s stats had been fixed at 1, there was no need for control in the first place.
‘Well, fine. The personal trait system being unlocked was included in the drop-table settings anyway. But isn’t that ability just ridiculous?!’
The personal trait Rough had acquired—Advanced Status Window—was an utterly absurd ability.
‘He can freely adjust stats without any risk whatsoever. That’s completely broken! It destroys the balance!’
As if proving the point, Rough had overwhelmingly defeated every enemy in a single strike.
Director Lee Dong-jun stared blankly at Rough’s gameplay record, as though he had lost his mind.
“...Assistant Manager Kim.”
“Yes, Director.”
“What are the odds of getting a personal trait from a pre-registration coupon?”
“I’d need to check the exact figures, but it should be extremely rare.”
“Basically lottery-level odds, then?”
“Honestly, I think it might be even harder than that.”
“Wow. He hit the jackpot. What a jackpot.”
Director Lee Dong-jun looked at Rough on the screen with envy.
“Should we add this user to the priority-monitoring list as well?”
“Yeah, do that just in case. Same as those ‘five people.’”
***
“We’ve arrived at the forward base. It should take no more than half a day on foot to reach the village from here.”
The place Renof led Rough to was heavily guarded, built in the middle of an open grassland.
With tents instead of houses and soldiers instead of residents, it strongly resembled a military base.
“However, the day is already ending, so how about you stay here tonight and leave once morning comes? Camping alone carries the risk of being attacked by monsters...”
Renof made the considerate suggestion.
There was no reason to refuse.
“All right. Thank you for your kindness.”
“Haha! This is hardly enough to repay my benefactor! This way!”
Thanks to Renof’s testimony, Rough was easily assigned lodging after being recognized for his contribution to subjugating the bandits.
‘The lodging is pretty decent.’
The sight of the bed in the corner of the quarters brought a wave of fatigue over Rough.
In reality, it was already well past nine at night.
Fortunately, he had taken leave tomorrow, so staying up all night would not have been a problem.
‘But there’s no reason to overdo it from the start. I’ll stop here for today, then grind like crazy on Friday, Saturday, and Sunday.’
Putting aside his lingering regret, Rough logged out.
And so, he welcomed the next morning.
“Uuugh!”
After a sound sleep, Rough—or rather, Namgung Jun—stretched refreshingly.
After opening his eyes, he chewed on some bread and accessed a community site.
Naturally, the popular posts were filled with DDO discussions.
The excitement was already blazing from the very start.
Namgung Jun began checking the top posts one by one.
[DDO All-Nighter Launch Review]
-No words needed. Even if you beat me to death, this is guaranteed to win the most GOTYs this year. Ah, I guess this year has already passed, so next year? Whatever.
┗ [For real, lol. There was a reason the capsule was so damn expensive.]
Posts praising DDO, along with posts showing off excellent pre-registration rewards, were receiving huge numbers of views.
[What did you guys get from the pre-registration reward?]
-I got a Rare-grade weapon. I’m going to coast on this early game, lol.
┗ [Wow... how did you manage that?]
┗ [Trash luck-based game.]
┗ [I’d buy it for 100,000.]
┗ [One hundred thousand, my ass, lol. It’d go for at least several hundred thousand. Have some shame.]
┗ [Can you reroll in this game?]
┗ [Yeah, you can.]
┗ [But you can only make one account per person. How?]
┗ [Since it uses iris and fingerprint recognition, theoretically you can if you swap out your eyeballs and fingers.]
┗ [You bastard, lol. What do you mean swap them out? You make it sound so easy.]
┗ [I only got 30 gold...T_T]
┗ [Damn, 30 gold is still something. I only got a few potions.]
┗ [I got a skill, hehe.]
┗ [? Stop bullshitting.]
┗ [No, seriously, lol. I think it was called Featherlight Movement? It was an active skill that slightly increased movement speed.]
┗ [Stop bullshitting.]
┗ [You little shit.]
“Ah, I should’ve taken some screenshots too.”
Namgung Jun smacked his lips in regret.
“But no one got anything better than me?”
Not every user used the community, so he could not be certain.
Still, at least within the community, no one had received a better reward than he had.
“Well, even I can tell it’s an insanely broken ability. I guess I was just that lucky.”
Namgung Jun continued reading the popular posts.
[That sensory synchronization rate thing?]
-What percentage did you set your pain sensitivity to? I got scared and changed mine from 5% to 3%.
┗ [What a softie.]
┗ [? What did you set yours to, then?]
┗ [1%.]
┗ [What the hell is this guy? If 3% makes him a softie, what does that make 1%?]
┗ [A coward.]
[Anyone clear the tutorial yet?]
-I got wiped out on the second quest. How many are there?
┗ [You could clear that? It was insanely hard. It’s not even a Soulslike.]
┗ [The AI fights ridiculously well, lol.]
┗ [The higher the freedom, the harder the difficulty.]
┗ [I started on top of a flying wyvern, and the moment I opened my eyes, I got beaten senseless by slavers and respawned in the beginner village, lol.]
┗ [I totally get that. I started in a sewer that reeked like a gutter and got mobbed to death by human-sized spiders.]
┗ [The second tutorial boss is the real deal.]
┗ [Second boss? There’s something like that?]
┗ [Yeah. The first one was fairly easy, but the second boss completely destroyed me. You’ll need pretty good control to beat it—or good gear.]
“Oh, the second boss is difficult? That might be useful to know.”
Since it was a newly released game, all sorts of information were flooding in.
The sources and reliability were all uncertain, but Namgung Jun carefully reviewed everything instead of dismissing it.
“All right. Shall we get started?”
After roughly filling his stomach, Namgung Jun immediately logged into DDO.
***
“Mr. Rough.”
The moment he logged in, Renof came looking for Namgung Jun.
They had already exchanged names while traveling here, so Renof called him by name without hesitation.
“I brought you a change of clothes. Ah, and a weapon as well.”
As a reward for helping subjugate the bandits, Renof provided him with equipment.
As was typical in RPGs, the equipment a character wore at the start of the game had the worst performance.
Then, as players progressed through the tutorial, there would come a moment when they acquired better equipment.
Just like now.
The clothes and weapon Renof had brought were indeed slightly better than Rough’s current equipment.
How would an ordinary player react?
Most would gladly accept the unexpected gift and throw away their old gear without hesitation.
But Rough was different.
‘The new weapon doesn’t have a hidden option. I think I’ll have to keep using this one for a while.’
It was because of the hidden option concealed within his old weapon.
‘It said the hidden option would unlock and the weapon would grow once I met the conditions. Who knows? It might become incredibly powerful.’
He did not know how it would change, so he could not casually replace the weapon.
‘The problem is, I need to know what the conditions are... Huh?’
As Rough carefully examined his old weapon, his eyes narrowed.
The conditions that had been displayed as question marks until yesterday were now properly visible.
It was a change caused by his personal trait leveling up as a reward for the first tutorial quest.
[1. Kill 200 targets, regardless of race.]
[Progress: 1/200]
[2. Clear one dungeon, regardless of type.]
[Progress: 0/1]
There was one puzzling part about the conditions.
‘I killed well over ten bandits. Why is the progress only 1? Ah, is it because I beat all of them to death bare-handed except for the boss?’
“Ugh.”
Rough let out a sigh.
‘I’ll have to kill every monster with a weapon from now on.’
That was one thing, though.
Rough decided to gladly accept Renof’s gift.
Refusing a gift would be rude.
“I’ll put them to good use. Thank you.”
“To be honest, our circumstances here are rather humble, so I was worried you might dislike them. I’m glad you accepted! Would you like to have a meal with us?”
“Sure.”
“I’ll wait outside, so please take your time changing.”
Rough replaced all his equipment with the new gear, except for his weapon, and left the tent.
When he had first arrived the previous day, it had been late at night and he had been too distracted to notice.
But looking around again in the morning, he realized this really was a military base.
Tall, sturdy wooden palisades had been erected without gaps on all sides.
Moats had been dug here and there, and sharpened wooden stakes were densely planted throughout—clearly intended to defend against attacks from something.
“What is this place?”
Rough looked around curiously.
“In truth, this is a forward base established for the war against the kobolds.”
‘Kobolds.’
Kobolds were small monsters commonly found in fantasy stories.
They lived in groups, but because they were small, they were not usually a major threat to humans.
Because of those traits, they often appeared early in games, where they were consumed as growth experience for the protagonist—or the player.
DDO was no exception.
“I see.”
Rough was about to take his first bite of the combat rations he had received when—
Bwooooooo!
A horn blast and an urgent shout rang out from one of the watchtowers within the base.
“Kobolds! The kobolds are approaching from the north!”
At those words, soldiers who had been eating—or were about to start eating—rushed north in unison.
“Damn it!”
Renof, who had just been about to take his first bite, was no exception.
At the same time—
[Tutorial Quest Activated!]
[Grade: Tutorial]
[Description: Myel Forward Base is engaged in a conflict with the monster faction known as the kobolds.]
[Objective: Help Myel Forward Base lead the war against the kobold forces to victory!]
[Success: Survival, tutorial quest completed, Advanced Status Window Lv. +1, ??? acquired.]
[Failure: Death, resurrection at the nearest Safety Zone, tutorial quest completed.]
The long-awaited second tutorial quest had appeared.