Chapter 9：Menus

"Since you now understand how to use the inventory and equipment menu, I will not elaborate more on that. But I will explain a few things about death. On death, you will drop everything in your inventory to the ground. Now… If you die to a monster, you will not need to worry about people looting your corpse. Corpse looting can only happen when you are killed by a player. This means if you die to any player, no matter who it is, the items in your inventory will drop. The dropped items will then be lootable by anyone. So even your killer can be killed by someone else, and then their loot along with your own will become the third killer's prize.

Yuki followed along with Mi's instructions and called up the trade skill menu. It wasn't much of anything except a bunch of tabs that had empty lists and progress bars that showed a person's proficiency in certain trade skills.

After taking a deep breath, Mi continued her explanation, "As you can see, your trade skill menu is basically empty besides the tabs. Trade skills are honed in game and in the real world. You will need to study up on each trade skill in order to begin working with them in game. You can find some basic information about each trade skill for a price in towns and cities. Soul Fusion Online prefers if you learn about these skills in the real world and bring them in game. But a little tip since you are so handsome. All trade skills items in game can be made however you wish and will have different results based on the player who makes them.

"As an example… Let's say Player A makes a low quality health potion using basic known ingredients. They sell their low quality potions for ten copper each. But then Player B comes along with their low quality potion, but not only does it restore more health than Player A's low quality potion, but it also has a heal over time, or HOT for short, effect. They can then go and sell their low quality potions with its extra effects for fifty copper, making much more money than Player A. This is due to the ingredients used. So do not be afraid to experiment. " Mi smiled as she finished saying this. It might not seem too big of a deal for Mi to tell Yuki this info, but to Yuki, this information was very useful.

"One last thing, for trade skills, unless you make your own tools, you have to use a trade skill room which comes with all the tools needed to make the items you want. You can rent these rooms at the trade skill guild for that profession. For more information on this, please visit the local trade skill guild. Now, moving on." Mi took another deep breath as she continued.

"The second to last important menu you will see is the skill window. You can call it up by saying the keyword 'skill'. This will show you the skill of your class. As for you who chose the No Class class, you will see each skill tree. In order to unlock a skill, you will need to spend AP, which is rewarded by a certain amount upon leveling up. There is not much more to be explained about this, so play around with your builds as you please." While Mi was explaining things, Yuki was looking at the massive list of skills for each class and was very surprised at how many there were.

"This now brings us to the last menu. The system menu. You can bring it up by simply saying System. On this screen, you will find buttons for setting alarms, reminders, and logging out. There is also a GM (Game Master) call button at the bottom if you really need to speak to one of the staff.

"This now concludes the basic knowledge section of Soul Fusion Online's menu system. Please note that in the future, things may change when patches and game expansions are introduced. So please read patch notes carefully. With all that said, it is now time for the final portion of your training! Combat! I will go over the HUD (heads up display) and leveling system. This is very important information, and I will only say it once. So please listen carefully. If you need a refresher on any of this information, please go to the Soul Fusion Online website for more information." Mi seemed to be getting bogged down by having to explain all these things. Yuki found it quite amazing for an A.I. to act so realistically. If Yuki did not know this was a game in a virtual world, she would think Mi was a real person.

"In the upper left corner, you will notice your name and below that three bars with numbers on them. This is your health, mana, and stamina. Health is pretty much self-explanatory, but to sum it up, if you reach zero, you will die. Mana is how you cast some of your skills, and stamina is the same as well. This, of course, is based on your class. If you are teamed with other players, they will also appear on your HUD with similar displays.

"Now for the leveling system. Every player starts off with no levels and no cultivation in order to reach the first stage of the fortification realm. You will need to level up to level 20. Each level will grant you 5 Status Points or SP for short. These points can be used to raise the stats you can find next to the equipment window in your inventory. The stats it can raise are Health, Mana, Stamina, Attack Power, Magic Power. Each point of SP will add 1 point to the stat you added it to. For example… If your health is 100 and you add five points of SP, then your health will become 105 for its max. If this is still confusing, please refer to the Soul Fusion Online website.

"In order to gain levels, you will need to accumulate experience points. This will come from the monsters you kill as you progress through the game. You can also gain small amounts of experience as you craft items as well. However, this method is much slower than killing monsters. Experience per monster is based on the level of the monster and type. There are many types of monsters, from normal monsters, mutants, elite, field boss, dungeon boss, to name a few. If monsters are killed within a team, the amount of experience for that monster is split up between you and your teammates.

"For teams dealing with monster loot drops, the team leader can set up three looting modes. Free for all looting where anyone can loot whatever. Round robin where looting is cycled per monster kill for each player to loot. And finally, the need and greed method where you roll for the items. The winner of the roll will then receive the item. That is it for the explanation on looting. Before we get to actual combat, I need to ask if you have any questions." Mi explained as she smiled at Yuki.

"I have one question. Where do I go to sell currency once I have gained it?" This was the most important question to Yuki. It was a question that dealt with her livelihood.

"Each town and city has a market you can access. In the market menu, you will see a button for currency. The market deals with both regular items and currency. The only difference between the two is that the market value of currency has a minimum threshold. 1 silver will never be worth less than 1 crown. But prices may rise. Any other questions?" Mi asked.

"No, that was what I was wondering about the most."