CWD: GA ~ Three

“Yay, I’m not crazy!” Nacho was more relieved than he would ever let his friends know. That would’ve been awkward if the clock had hit twelve-oh-one and they’d just been standing in the apartment wearing their backpacks, not to mention a mountain of debt falling on him and the police ready to pack him away. “The best apocalypses are the ones you can set your clock by.”

Nacho had appeared in the Evaluation World wearing a tunic and sandals, which were basic clothes of antiquity. A belt cinched the tunic closed and had a little pouch tied to it. No underwear. “Ugh, forgot about this. People probably did so much conquering back in the day because of the chafing. They were all just looking for proper support.”

A familiar scene that he had never expected to see again was spread out in his vision. He was staring into a forest glade, having landed in front of a pool of water surrounded by tall, rough-cut stones; basically Stonehenge around a crystal-clear pond.

That water would become vital, as would the wall of blackberry bushes growing along the rocky ledges behind him. Yep, this was the Evaluation World, all right.

Right on time, a message in a grand font flashed in his vision.

Welcome to the Juxtaposition! Your world has been chosen to participate in a game of adventure, luck, and skill. The first step is to evaluate you. Right now, you’re in the Evaluation World. Relax, take a look around (wink wink wink), or kill monsters for bonus Evaluation Points! You will automatically gain EP based on the length of time you remain in this world, but some people strive to forge their destiny. Will that be you, or not? Either way, may your future be delicious!

Then, in a smaller font, there was standard legalese that made him roll his eyes, just as it had last time:

The Patrons are not responsible for your death or dismemberment. Some Patrons might give certain players boons, which may or may not be helpful. The Evaluation World is not the Starter World. ‘May your future be delicious’ is a trademarked term owned by the Dale Mountain System (DM System). All rights reserved.

Nacho remembered his first time in the Evaluation World. When that message flashed in his vision, he’d thought he’d gone completely insane. Now, reading it again, all he could think of was how nasty the Patrons had to be to make something like this.

“Time to get some EP.” He had hoped the location of various items would be the same, and so far, that was exactly the case. He hurried toward the blackberry bushes and began picking the berries off. He filled the pouch on his belt, making sure to pick the ones that were just on the verge of being ripe; they needed to be firm, rather than squishy. Food was vital—that was the hidden meaning of ‘May your future be delicious’.

He paused and focused on the deep purple berries, relaxing his mind and winking three times with his left eye to generate a System View—a very basic inspection that gave very basic information. In the next moment, he read the properties of the food.

Simple Black Berries

Tier 0

Note: Tasty on vanilla ice cream!

Again, he was struck by how this experience was so different, now that he understood how to work the system. The average player wouldn’t know that ‘relax and look around’ was required to access the System View and would likely think the system was generating innuendo with the winking. “Always so cheerful, aren’t you, system? After seeing that for six months of torment, everyone is going to look at that and see taunting. I already do.”

He ate a few of the berries, and they weren’t bad—even though he could already taste the sharply rotten flavor of Putrid Mana. The only thing keeping him from hurling was the knowledge that plant-based food of the Evaluation World had low levels of the supernatural poison, so he could eat them without getting too sick if he rationed.

The meat was a different matter altogether.

After his quick snack, he clambered up onto a ledge and pulled down a helmet, battle kilt, and cuirass that were just floating there somehow. Touching them instantly equipped them, as he only had basic gear on, replacing his tunic with the chest armor and simple kilt that wouldn’t do a thing to protect his legs. Though he tried to examine them, he was locked out of the main System interface until after the evaluation, and the System View wasn’t all that helpful.

Evaluation Armor Detected!

Slot: Armor value.

Head: 10

Body: 10

Legs: 10

Feet: 0

Note: Evaluation items are not transferable to the Starter World. Enjoy them while you can!

The sandals weren’t helping even a little, but he’d not been able to find boots last time. “Maybe if I try going north this time?”

He had food, he had some armor, and now he needed weapons. Nacho also needed a container for water, and suddenly remembered the shack in the swamp to the south. That had been vital to his survival, but it had taken a while for him to find. Heck, by the time he found the armor last time, he’d already taken damage from a variety of creatures. He’d been hungry, terrified, and thoroughly convinced he’d gone insane.

On the other side of the pond, right on time, the first monster shimmered to life. Only one appeared at first, but he knew that was going to change all too soon. Standing about two feet tall, the squirrel had a bushy tail and a cute face—all except for the inch-long fangs bursting out of its mouth. It brandished three-inch razor-claws on the ends of its weirdly muscular arms. “Why, hello there, Rocky Squirrel-boa; I see you’ve been skipping leg day.”

The Claw Squirrel chittered and began charging at him like a gorilla, seeming to understand well enough to take great offense to the taunt. Nacho darted down the trail, running south for all he was worth. He found the first weapon, a club floating in mid-air over the dirt track. He didn’t check it, but in the end, it didn’t matter. He could use it to bash the Claw Squirrel into meat paste—not that he could eat it, as all meat coming from monsters or animals was saturated with Putrid Mana.

He grabbed the club and turned just in time to intercept the Claw Squirrel, drawing back and swinging as it got in range. A single blow was enough to bash in the monster’s head, and he was struck by how much simpler the combat system was than on the Starter World. Right now, it was easy: hit target, don’t get hit by target. He didn’t need to factor in cooldowns on skills, nor manage his Hunger and Thirst matrix.

A message coincided with the kill:

Congratulations! You have murdered an adorable, fluffy little Claw Squirrel!

Level 01 Standard Monster = 10 Evaluation Points

Awesome job! Get a +1 EP for your first kill!

Nacho paused, knelt, and touched the squirrel, relaxing his mind, to see the thing’s properties.

Raw Tier 0 Meat

Note: Putrid but delicious!

Nacho rose, nodding in relief that the Evaluation World was exactly like it had been in his vision. That was useful. He hoped his information held true, and that everyone else was experiencing what he’d expected. If so, Reuben and Brie would at least get armor and whatever was in the swamp shack. They’d also know about food and water.

He never once paused, already partway to his next goal. The dirt path turned into a trail of flat stones, half-covered with dirt. They led south from the Stonehenge Pond, which he knew was the exact center of this world. Howling rose somewhere in the distance, followed by the chittering of giant insects. “Yeah, the wolves and the beetles; I haven’t forgotten losing an arm and an eye to you… let’s see if I can return the favor.”

Last time, even despite dying the second day, he’d done fairly well for himself compared to the other people he knew about. He’d been able to purchase a pretty good Body Player class from the Evaluation Mall; this time he was also going to stock up on overpowered skills right from the start. Nacho ran down the path through the pine trees until the ground started to get muddy. More ferns appeared, and there were gradually less pine trees, more cypress, and other trees covered with Spanish moss. As the ground sloped, the path’s stones were soon nearly covered in black water.

A massive snake slithered out of the murk. Yellow, black, and copper-colored scales covered the thing all the way up to its shovel-shaped head. It started to turn toward him, but Nacho was fast enough to close on the beast. His muscles didn’t respond like they had when he’d been a Tier two assassin, but he was strong, fit, and had retained the years of memories in combat—if not the actual combat experience.

He anticipated the snake’s movement and struck, whacking the club into the reptile’s head. It immediately threw coils around Nacho, trying to hide its head, but he hit again and again, until the whole thing relaxed, most of its big body lost in the black water of the swampy section of earth.

A flash of information cheered him on:

Congratulations! You have murdered a Copperopolis Anaconda that only wanted a hug!

Level 02 Standard Monster = 20 Evaluation Points

Awesome job!

Nacho bent and used the System View:

Raw Tier 0 Meat

Warning: Putrid but ssso good!

Note: A few potential recipes are anaconda dumplings, snake fricassee, and fried serpent with chili peppers. Yum!

Nacho left the snake, fully understanding that it was a trick and a test of willpower for anyone else that would have managed to take the thing down. Most people would have either died or spent days planning a way to kill something like this and would be on the verge of starvation. For him, the Putrid Mana warning was all he needed to know. The note was just an invitation for a night of nausea, diarrhea, and vomiting. “Not my idea of a good time, mmkay, thanks.”

He hurried across the stones, ducking under moss-heavy branches and keeping his eyes on the black water. There could be big alligator monsters, or even a Tier one creature, that would kill him instantly. He’d feel better once he got the knives he needed. After spending an abundance of caution, Nacho reached the shack: a dilapidated structure covered in moss, ivy, and bugs.

The floor was broken, and half the room was submerged. The other half held some shelves and a table, along with the crumbling stones of an old fireplace. There, he found flint. He’d need it for a fire; soon, the nights would be deathly cold. On the shelf sat several round clay jars, including the true prize of a full container of roasted peanuts.

Last time, he’d ignored the jars and only focused on the weapons—a rusty short sword, a long dagger in a sheath, and a bandolier of throwing knives hanging on a hook. This was where he’d discovered his love of knives, the reason he’d chosen to become an assassin. It helped that he typically liked playing stealth characters and had a certain moral flexibility; not surprising, since he’d grown up in a system that was oftentimes as cruel as this new world: foster care.

He’d been one of the luckier ones: Reuben and Brie had become his family. He prayed they’d do well in the Evaluation.

Nacho threw the bandolier of throwing daggers over his shoulder and strapped on the short sword and dagger. Thanks to the high humidity, he was sweating bullets and getting pretty hungry. The hunger brought back terrible memories, so he shook it off and kept at it.

He left the club in the shack, as well as the pottery jars and some old half-rotten cloth he could turn into sacks. There was one thing he wanted to check on. The stones of the path kept going past the shack, and his old life of battle started invading his thoughts. Nacho found that he had missed the adrenaline dump. His senses came alive: the stink of the swamp filled his nose, the swish and burble of something swimming through the black water tickled his ears, and the cries of other monsters in the Evaluation World were felt on the skin from their sheer volume.

It took some time to reach the edge of the swamp, where it drained off into nothing but wispy clouds far below. “Look at that; the world is flat. How powerful do the Patrons have to be to be able to create a flat world hanging over clouds in some unimaginable place? I guess we just add it to the mystery that is the Juxtaposition.”

The gray coloration of the leaves on the trees near the edge caught his attention, and he frowned. It seemed too fast, but the whole point of the Evaluation World was to kill him, so perhaps it was actually par for the course?

Having scouted the location and deciding that nothing was going to be coming for him from that direction, he made his way back to the shack.

*Whizzz*.

“No… I hate these things!” Nacho picked up the pace, but three goblin mosquitos had caught his scent. They were bright green, the size of pigeons, but lacking feathers. Just mottled green flesh, whirring wings, and dagger-like proboscides. They didn’t have eyes, at least none that he could see, and their six legs ended in sharp hooks.

Fighting two-handed—short sword in his right hand, dagger in his left—he chopped one out of the air. One of the insects went for his leg, but he stabbed his dagger into its pulpy body. The last one tried to hook a claw into Nacho’s cuirass, scratching a groove, but the armor held. The monster mosquito flew over his head, and Nacho hacked the thing out of the air before it could call for more of its kind.

That was the real concern with these things. When there was one, hundreds more might be right around the corner. Hurrying away from the freshly spilled blood, he glanced at a notification that he had gained ten points for each of the monsters. “Nice… up to sixty-one EP already. Awesome. Time to get settled in and get ready to go full turtle.”

He hurried to the shack and grabbed the earthenware jars, backtracking all the way to the Stonehenge Pond. Once he reached the clear pool, he filled the empty clay jars with water and ate as many roasted peanuts as he could. These legumes weren’t bad, and he didn’t taste any of the Putrid Mana, a nice surprise indeed. After gorging himself, Nacho filled the last jar by picking the blackberry bush empty.

“Some peanut bushes down the north path. I’ll haveta check out the west and east portions of the world. Gotta watch for hostels, but maybe I can grab some better armor. Need boots, for sure.”

When he started gathering the nuts, two Claw Squirrels took umbrage to his presence in their territory. Now that Nacho was equipped with his short sword and knives, they were easy to deal with. Just a quick slash here, a stab there, and he was at eighty-one EP and the territorial victor. “I am king of the peanuts! Fear me, squirrels!”

Of course, he made his jokes very quietly. Then he realized that he was smiling, and it occurred to him that being back with Reuben and Brie had really changed him for the better already. “Man, I hope they’re okay.”

Then again, even if they royally messed up the Evaluations, they could still buy classes or skills in the Juxtaposition Store on Starter World. It would just be a lot more dangerous, expensive, and put all of them at risk. Yet, they’d be together again, and Nacho had every advantage. He was going to use that to keep himself and his friends safe. What was a small issue going to matter after ten years of practice? Fifty?

As for the rest of the world, the poor people who weren’t prepared for the Evaluation going right past the frying pan and instead falling right into the fire? “Oh, well. Everyone plays real life in hard mode.”