Chapter 27: Tent Flaps and Red hair

  The turtle died, plain and simple. There was no fanfare or hidden second phases; it simply stopped being like everything else he had previously hit with dark drain. Of course this was his first time using that specific effect of his signature skill but as far as he could tell it remained just as if not more effective than the spell matrices it came from. Sadly he wasn’t actually conscious when the boss died but he was at least right to trust in Fiona keeping him safe in the meantime. It was becoming a pattern at this point for Sam to pass out after overexerting himself and promptly waking up to messages from the system.

  [Final Tutorial Boss [Greater Guardian Turtle] has been SLAIN]

  [Final Boss Siege contribution rewards received]

  [Overall Tutorial Performance rewards received]

  [Based on your performance so far, you have been bestowed with a corresponding title]

  [You have earned the title: High Stakes Agent]

  [Because of the synergy in your actions and titles earned, you have gained the skill]

  [Lvl.1 Soul and Body Reinforcement synthesis (Unique)]

  [Class Evolution requirements met! Class Evolution pending…]

  [You have the option to combine your final boss contribution rewards and overall tutorial performance rewards to receive an enhanced item reward while foregoing all other rewards. Would you like to retain regular rewards or proceed with the combination reward?]

  Okay, that’s a lot and Sam was sure there were even more messages waiting for him that he hadn’t paid attention to yet. Still, he needed to check in with everyone, also he didn’t even know where he was. Currently he was looking up at what looked like a roof of white canvas on a standard camping cot. As he moved to get up and step outside, he realized that he wasn’t wearing the same clothes. A part of him wondered what could’ve happened that required the change and an even bigger part of him started to blush with embarrassment at the idea that regardless of the reason someone in the group had changed his clothes while he was unconscious. It was a simple linen shirt and pants without any embellishment, so it was exactly the kind of clothes he would wear in the first place. The only thing missing would be a comfy hoodie of some kind. As he stepped out from the canvas flap of the tent, Sam winced at the light difference between inside and outside. He must’ve been out for at least a little while if his eyes were this sensitive. Still, he was greeted by the sights, sounds, and smells of celebration. He thought to himself that there must’ve been some sort of enchantment on the tent that isolated it somewhat since he hadn’t been able to sense any of this festive mood from within. Getting his bearings, Sam realized that there were a lot more people here than the size of the group that he remembers participating in the subjugation of the Greater Guardian Turtle. He surmised that this must be the result of the group joining up with whatever amount of people were left behind that decided they couldn’t or shouldn’t participate in the final fight. He did remember something about Fiona mentioning that the group that ended up confronting the final boss was composed solely of those who both volunteered and were simultaneously deemed significant enough of a contributor to the fight.

  Before he could start mingling with the crowd and looking for some non-magically summoned food for once, some kid (really he was probably between seventeen and nineteen) walked up to Sam.

  “Hi sir, I’m Steven. Miss Fiona instructed me to bring you to her as soon as you woke up.”

  Sam shook the kid’s hand and followed suit. He wanted to talk to Fiona to find out what happened after he passed out anyway so this was perfect. For a moment he couldn’t help but wonder if she had been the one to change his clothes but he expediently shook that idea out of his head lest he die of embarrassment before being able to ask her his questions. Instead of continuing that train of thought, he simply started trying to organize his thoughts so that he could make sure that he could actually ask the questions he wanted to instead of getting lost in the weeds like he was sometimes prone to do in conversation. For the first time in what felt like a while– but realistically had only been at most a handful of days– Sam spent a quick moment of prayer as he walked over to wherever Fiona was. He didn’t know what would come next but he was glad to have made it out of the tutorial, well technically not yet but he was basically at that point anyway now that the final boss was dead. Asides from the gratitude Sam was praying for the hope that his friends and hopefully his dad’s friends had made it through the tutorial okay as well. He didn’t know if he would be able to find them right away but he did know that he wouldn’t want to be greeted by death by the time he got around to looking for people he knew. He did need a more tangible goal than just “seeing what the multiverse and system had to offer” though so he decided that if he was going to stay on Earth for the next little while after the tutorial actually ends that he would make looking for his sister somehow his overarching goal. To his knowledge anyway, she was the only blood family he had left and he did have a desire to get to know her so it seemed like as good a choice as any.

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  Soon enough Sam found himself standing in front of what looked like a tent the size of a small building. It had the same white canvas like material making up the walls of the tent with sturdy looking wooden stakes anchoring it in place. Actually having spent time observing the camp as he made his way over, Sam started to think about how much of the stuff in the tutorial he might have actually missed. Everyone here seemed far more equipped with modern conveniences than he had been during his time alone. The tents, the picnic tables and the like almost made it seem like they were just in an adult summer camp or some kind of medieval war reenactment group.

  “Hey Fiona, so how do you guys have all these tents and stuff?”

  “It’s nice to see you too Sam, glad you’re back on your feet.” Fiona responded with a roll of her eyes at Sam’s immediate question.

  At that response, Sam realized how he got ahead of himself and immediately lost track of the conversation he had been planning on having before Fiona was able to address him properly.

  “My bad… so the boss died, it all worked out.” Sam said, trying to salvage the burning wreck of a conversation that he just started.

  Seeing what was needed, Fiona took charge of the ensuing dialogue between them. Sam, of course, didn’t mind one bit, this way he didn't have to be so worried about losing track of the important details and he trusted Fiona enough to know what was supposed to be important anyway. Actually that trust was one thing that Sam didn’t quite understand, he had no real reason to have that much faith in the woman with the red hair but something about her put him at ease plus she didn’t slit his throat while he was unconscious so that adds a lot of bonus points in the trust department. Anyway, inner ramblings about trust and pretty privilege aside, this was how Sam came to learn that he had been out for almost an entire day and a half. At this point it was glaringly obvious to him that the improvements with his tier in order to survive his signature skill were only just barely enough. He definitely wasn’t at the point of being able to push the skill as much as he wanted to although perhaps that might have changed with that new skill he got a notification for when he woke up. It was through the very same conversation where Sam got a few of the answers he had been looking for when he was thinking of questions while walking to the tent he was currently in. Evidently, his intuition that he had gotten to experience a very different side of the tutorial from everyone else was right on the money. As for the reason behind the deviation, Sam was fairly certain that it had to do with his efforts at getting past the spatial anomaly which made getting to the mountains so difficult. Apparently everyone else had just decided that that part of the tutorial served more like background art rather than something you could actually go to once people realized that they weren’t getting closer no matter what they did. Unlike his general experience with the tutorial which remained quite vague and without structure all throughout, everyone else had experienced a much more guided framework. He was surprised to learn that most people were higher level than him and that on average they had been able to unlock class evolutions. Evidently it was something that happened once you reached the required level depending on your class requirements and previous performance. More than that, it turned out that the requirement the system had given Sam of tiering up before getting his class evolution was not particularly required of everyone else. The more structured format of the normal tutorial was also the explanation behind how everyone seemed far more well equipped with modern conveniences. People had been getting a lot of different kinds of quests, and many of those rewards were where the tents and things came from. There was a part of Sam that was kind of bummed about missing out on what seemed like an actual tutorial experience but then again he was pretty satisfied with what he was able to see and do during his time here, plus it seemed like no one else really even touched on cultivation at all. At no point in his conversation with Fiona did anything of the sort come up and when he asked about it he was met with confusion. Because of how nebulous the feelings were to him when he practiced it and the unique nature of his experiences, even when he tried to explain to Fiona what he was talking about they didn’t get very far. And so even if he missed out on some things he was pretty happy with himself that he was able to do quite a bit that no one else had even taken a step toward, in this tutorial instance anyway.

  With some of his curiosity satisfied, he turned toward some of the glaring System messages and decided to keep going with his streak of trying new things by accepting the System’s proposition of combining his rewards into something better. Hopefully he got something really nice out of it and he couldn’t wait to see what that would be.

  [Would you like to retain regular rewards or proceed with the combination reward?] [Yes or No?]