Auntie toasts the VRMMORPG

"I have to admit, I feel stressed out," Flora said to her AIs while flipping over a park bench.

Today's quest in Tricky Beach demanded her to jump over obstacles.

"Furnishing the cathedral, leveling up the printer, building the class tree, giving Aitoshuri a body aka having a robot helper, preparing for the hero entrance, saving Jake, my dailies ... I want to read some books, especially on runes. There is something in the back of my mind nagging that they are important. I haven't even looked at my ToDo-list for a while because I don't have time for it!"

She kicked off a ramp, spun in the air around her vertical and horizontal axis, flying over a flower beet. Because she landed transversal to her momentum, she finished the move with a safety roll.

"Should we go over the ToDo-List now, Milady?"

"No!" Flora hopped on a rail, sloping down a flight of stairs. "Or Yes? I mean, why not? I'm already overstrained. One more toast won't short-circuit the toaster! Just rattle it down, dear."

"

• - A - Build a generator  
• - A - Leveling swimming and climbing  
• - A - Build a mech-suit with a self-destruct button 
• - B - Research the standard HUD settings.  
• - B - The advantage of having a pet and figure out if you can have machines like toasters as pets.  
• - B - Research beginner tips, especially recommendation on what you should shortly do after you enter the Metaworld and before you enter the Cradle.     
• - B - We need a robot arm for you to help out   
• - C - Find a way to hurt Flora  
• - C - Find a way to train while doing other stuff  
• - C - Test if it is really impossible to modify items from the shop  
• - C - Look into Tennis for amending the Rainbow intensity  
• - C - Sponsored activities: Coke  
• - C - Smaller chest for tunnels with essentials  
• - C - What are runes?  
• - C - Add a one-directional valve on the mouthpiece that no water can enter   
• - C - Build a Walking stick  
• - D - Bully Robby into letting Flora have a spin in a toaster.  
• - D - Figure out a way to do magic in the training-coffin  
• - E - The price of stamina potions. "

"That doesn't look bad. Most of the things were already on my mind. I forgot about the Tennis-Skin. Remind me to amend the Rainbow-Intensity-Meter and print some sacks and small boxes as soon as we come home. I'm sick of searching for stray micro parts in the large chests. In the last scenario, I gathered several plasma swords and multitools. If I had put them in separate boxes, I would have an easier time puzzling them together."

Flora vaulted over a wall and ran up a second wall as high as she could. Then she pushed off, doing a backflip, landing on the smaller fence she just had crossed. With flapping her arms, she balanced herself and looked down.

"I had aimed to jump over it, but landing on the wall is actually more awesome. I bet I wouldn't get it right if I tried, at least not on the first attempt."

Butterfly-Kicking off the edge, she arrived at the ground again and resumed running.

"Let's look at from the perspective of deadlines. I prioritized the skin because it's a business opportunity. They fly away if you don't feed them. The only hard deadline we are facing is the quest from Evailyn on Monday. I just have to arrive at her temple. I don't want to jinx it, but it seems doable with a minimum of prep."

"Take the next street on the right, Milady."

Turning sharply, Flora touched the walls of the alleyway, before reaching for a low hanging rail. First, she just hung from it, and then she started swinging gently, enjoying the motion.

 "The plan still contains to do a Hero's Entry at the Cradle on Sunday. So what do we need for that?"

"People posted lists for the Hero's Entrance in the forums, Milady. Should I read you the most popular one?"

"Yes, great idea! Aitoshuri, send him the list you think is the most useful. If they differ, read both, starting with the most popular one."

Aidan began with the introduction. The author emphasized that the Hero's Entrance was difficult, but that the only thing you could lose was the time you needed to travel to the capital for the regular experience.

Then, the recommendations started.

Attributes:

• Physical Vigor at least on Level 25, bolster it with equipment to an operative value of 20 for 200 health points. 

"Check!"

• Strength and agility on Level 25, if you use ranged weapons, dexterity as well. 

"Check!"

Skills:

• A 10 sec plus Crowd Control skill. Better two of them that don't share a cooldown.

"What's crowd control?"

"It's a gaming term for changing the combat readiness of the opponents. Examples are freezing, stunning, imprison, or transforming them into sheep."

Flora giggled, but then remembered that she was talking to an AI.

"Wait! Was that a joke, or can you really transform people into sheep?"

"The spell is called Sheep and can be learned in the scenario 'Shepherd, herd the Sheep!'. It is one of the scenarios on our list."

"We have to go over that list as well. How long does the scenario take?"

"30 minutes to complete it and get the spell. I asked Statistica: Player's need on average 15h 32min until they manage to beat it. Aitoshuri prodded me to ask how long if they have a suitable companion like an octopus with a multitool, and the average goes down to 3h 12min."

"Interesting! Does Sheep qualify as 10sec crowd control? And do I have additional spells that qualify?"

"Yes, to the first and no to the second, Milady. Magical Push and Pull count as CC, but not as 10sec ones. The article recommends using traps. You can acquire the skill at the Hunting Lodge."  

Flora nodded and swang of the bar with a backflip.  

 "Start a list with preparation for the entrance. What's next?"

• Strong single target ranged skill.

"Is Kinetic Blast strong? I haven't tried Smite yet. And I don't understand Energy-Choke! Add to the list going over the descriptions of all my skills and how cooldown works. Please, change the notifications. I want to see a short description of skills and their cooldown when I get them." 

"Kinetic Blast and Smite have the same base damage of 10. But Smite scales with magical micro-control, while Kinetic Blast scales with magical power and magical macro control. At the moment, Kinetic Blast is more effective, because your affinity is higher, but the secondary effect of faith spells is very good. Faith spells increase the damage taken by an enemy or decrease the damage received by an ally besides buffing or debuffing Intend."

"Urg, too much information, sweety. Do you mean Kinetic Blast is better now, but longterm Smite is better?"

"For pure damage, yes, but the Hero Entrance is a Solo endeavor. The secondary effect 'push back' might be better for that than a few percents more damage."

• Protection or healing skill. Both if possible, and health potions

"Check! Write putting health potions in the smaller box on the list."

• Detect Traps (available at the Hunting Lodge)

"Uh, yes, we need that, I don't want to walk into traps!"

Suddenly, Flora found herself surrounded.

"Boo!"

Flora shrieked and sprang in the air. 

The gang of teenies laughed.

"Hey, Auntie Flow!"

"How are you rollin'?" 

"Yeah! I scared a Champion!" PsySam exclaimed.

The teenies from the HoppingChoir greeted Flora.

"Hello, guys! Don't give me a heart attack!" Flora clutched at her chest. Those pesky teens who still believed that they were immortal thought she was joking and laughed again.

"Do you have the 'Second-longest Rail' as weekly too?" Morty asked.

"What? No. I think." Flora to Aidan: "I picked up another weekly, what was it?"

Quest: Climbing the Tree (Trick Beach)

Description: Get ten fruits from the Tricky Tree.

Rewards: Tricky Tree Brooch, Reputation with Trick Beach

Penalty: None

Difficulty: C

"We do! Seigen will try for the 66 achievement!"

"Go for it, Seigen!"

"What do you have to do for this achievement?" Flora asked.

"You have to do 66 Tricks on the second-longest rail!"

Gesticulating with enthusiasm, the teenies spoke over each other, trying to outshout their peers, but Flora managed to piece the situation together.

"So this rail is 666 m long, goes from this hill down to the sea, and you have to do 66 tricks while sliding down?"

"Yes! You got it!"

"A trick per 10m doesn't sound too hard, but I bet you pick up quite a bit of speed. You probably have to do a trick per second in the end. That's a challenge!"

"Yeah! But Seigen trained for it!"

"Why are you here, Auntie?"

"I'm going to learn climbing."

"Haha! We'll take the elevator."

They arrived at the foot of the cliff. 

Flora glared at the elevator. She hated it when tracking lodges had roads or gondolas attached to them. Of course, she knew that they needed supplies. But when she arrived sweating in her tracking clothes after walking up a mountain for a few hours, she didn't want to meet women in high heels. It diminished her feeling of accomplishment and replaced it with the certainty that the whole endeavor had been futile and unnecessarily hard.

The rockface looked prepared for beginner climbers. The tracks were marked according to their difficulty. Of course, Flora chose the easiest, but she wasn't sure if she should put away the Counter-Flow mech-suit. It was 200 kg of additional weight and hindered her movement! But that was its job. Flora sighed. The teenies laughed and said good-bye, and Flora wished Seigen good luck with the achievement.

Flora put her foot in a nook and grabbed on the first handhold, hoisting herself up.

"Oh, dear. Continue with the list to distract me from my stupidity."

"Please take notice that you could end up anywhere on the Cradle. Access to vendors or the marketplace might be impossible.

Equipment:

• Health potions, Regen potions
• Camping equipment
• Rope
• Food
• Flashlights and torches

Special Equipment:

• Warm Clothes for cold places
• Swimming attire / Underwater breathing items
• Protection against fire, cold, radiation, toxicity, other elements."

"Good points. We have most of the list already in the chests. Let's add the rest. Why flashlights and torches? Buy a waterproof headlight, 20 of the potions Robby mentioned, and a wetsuit now. We might need it for tomorrow."

"There are areas where magic is restricted, and areas where the use of technology is limited, Milady."

"I forgot about that! Horrible!"

Meanwhile, Flora had climbed a few meters. Her stamina bar was sinking rapidly, but she got the message she had anticipated.

-------------------

You gained the ability: Climbing

-------------------

Flora jumped down and took a break.

"The next section talks about riddles and says that there is no way to prepare for them."

"I hate riddles. We hope for the best. And buy a flamethrower! Forget about that! I'll build one!"

"I'm sorry, Milady. I already placed the order."

"No problem, dear. You can never have too many flamethrowers!" 

Flora started to climb again, while Aidan read Aitoshuri's link.

Preparation for the Hero's Entrance:

• Sheep
• Traps and Detect Traps
• Reading the spell descriptions 
• Understanding cooldowns
• Box: health potions, mana potions
• Warm clothing, wetsuit, underwater breathing 
• Torches
• Connect the classes