Soon, the 24 hours had passed.
Before logging in, Aelion had sent a simple message to his sister, Celestine.
She was studying at the Ehtel Foundation, one of the top-ranked institutions in the world—third globally, in fact.
Smart. Focused. Respected.
Aelion had never told her much about his time in the game.
He simply texted:
"I'm going in. If I don't text again soon… I'm still alive. Just busy."
No reply came, but he didn't expect one.
Inside the hospital's private VR suite, Aelion entered the interface hub.
All the game icons from the past lined the screen.
And then—
a new one.
The icon shimmered with soft violet and gold, depicting a wand crossed with a sword.
Beneath it, a single word:
Nytherra.
Aelion's lips twitched slightly at the corners.
'Let's see what makes this world so different.'
He tapped the icon.
A flash of radiant light swallowed his vision.
When it cleared, he stood in a wide, open city square.
Stone roads. Bronze lamps. A glowing sky with twin suns hanging above.
Players were everywhere—talking, shouting, running.
Notifications popped up across his interface.
[You have entered: Violet Village 665]
Aelion glanced at the players swarming the class buildings.
They rushed like desperate shoppers during a clearance sale—each one chasing that rare class that might give them an edge, hoping to fuse something powerful into their path.
It was noisy.
Chaotic.
But Aelion… remained still for a moment.
He didn't need to join the lines.
His class—Priest of End—was fixed.
And as for his second Main Class?
'Already chosen.'
He wasn't rushing into anything.
Instead, he turned and made his way through the quieter sections of the village.
Where others saw a "starter zone"—filled with low-level NPCs and simple errands—Aelion saw something more.
'These quests may look ordinary now… but they have depth. The system wouldn't place them here without reason.'
He began collecting quests methodically.
Each conversation he triggered, every prompt he accepted, he memorized the subtle details—the tone of the NPCs, the oddly placed lore fragments, the rare hint that only someone truly paying attention would notice.
A farmer asking for help with wolves?
Mundane on the surface.
But Aelion spotted the faint scar beneath the farmer's tunic—a military sigil, long since banned.
Another NPC wanted help repairing a broken well.
Most players skipped it.
Aelion saw the runes etched beneath the bricks—water-binding glyphs from an ancient school of elemental crafting.
He took the quest.
And the next.
And the next.
By the time most players had finished struggling with class menus and crowded tutorial explanations, Aelion had already flagged sixteen quests—each one with hidden depth or long-term potential.
'No wasted steps. Not this time.'
Aelion opened his quest tab and scanned the list.
Sixteen quests.
Most of them looked simple—tutorial-level, to the average eye.
But Aelion wasn't average.
Each entry he selected, he didn't just glance at.
He analyzed. Traced connections. Logged descriptions.
A few minutes later, he mapped out an optimal path across the village outskirts.
'Efficiency matters more than reward this early.'
His feet moved with purpose as he headed toward the village's southern edge—
to begin the Wall Survey quest.
The task? Simple on paper.
"Walk the outer perimeter of Violet Village 665 and mark the damaged sections of the wall."
But Aelion knew better.
He wasn't just marking bricks.
As he walked, he memorized the village's full layout—
streets, chokepoints, blind corners, guard posts, merchant routes.
He counted every watchtower, noted where guards lingered longer, where their gazes often strayed.
He tested the stone of the walls by hand and watched which ones echoed hollow when knocked.
And near the southeastern corner of the village, he noticed something odd.
A sealed gate. Covered in overgrowth. Almost forgotten.
The quest didn't mention it.
But a faint mark sat at the top of the arch—
an ancient sigil, half-erased by time.
Aelion noted it.
Then moved on.
'That'll be important later. Marked gates always are.'
With the wall quest completed and turned in, Aelion shifted focus to the Wolf Hunt.
Most players would charge into the forest and swing blindly at whatever moved.
Not Aelion.
He first visited the local tanner's stall and struck up a brief conversation with the leathermaster.
"You're asking about wolf pelts?" the NPC said, blinking. "Odd timing… they've been more aggressive lately. You'll find them near the Bonebrush Thicket after sundown."
'Sundown. Patterned aggression. Possible territory shifts.'
Next, Aelion visited the old hunter's cabin near the village edge.
The man was half-asleep, but one glance at Aelion's aura stirred him.
"Most go east for wolves," the hunter muttered. "You want clean pelts? Go north. The alpha doesn't let its pack scavenge. You'll find better prey… but it'll notice you."
Aelion smiled slightly.
'A side-boss. Hidden encounter? I'll take that chance.'
He ventured into the thickets alone, just as the twin suns dipped low behind the sky's gradient.
Light dimmed.
Mist crept in over the earth.
Wolf howls echoed—faint, then louder. Nearer.
Aelion activated Stealth Steps, a movement technique he developed in the Tower, and waited.
Not long after, he saw them.
Three wolves circled a clearing. Their fur dark and sleek, eyes intelligent.
He could've taken them head-on.
Instead, he circled to the higher ridge, tested the wind, then threw a rock to distract one.
As it turned, Aelion descended silently, dispatching the first with a precise blow to its neck.
The second lunged.
Too slow.
He ducked, caught its throat with a reverse grip, and ended it swiftly.
The third hesitated.
But by the time it turned to flee, Aelion's shadow had already passed over it.
Three down. Clean kills. Minimal damage.
Pelts intact. Quest progress: 3/5.
He cleaned his blade and moved deeper into the thicket, eyes sharp, his breath steady.
Then he saw it.
Larger. Broader. Smarter.
The Alpha.
It didn't growl.
It simply watched.
And then, it spoke—not in words, but through the quest system.
[Hidden Encounter: Alpha of the Dusk Pelt Pack – Level 25]
[Optional Objective: Defeat without alerting any wolves within 200 meters]
'Optional? Accepted.'
He didn't need glory.
Just momentum.
Aelion adjusted his grip on his weapon.
In the clearing between roots and moonlight, the hunter and the alpha met.