Starting from Zero

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Two people are coming towards us, each carrying a giant backpack. They are from the unknown woman\'s team because they all rushed over.

"I gave your staff to the auction house, ma\'am. I\'m sure you\'ll fetch a sum." The errand Elven Archer began to report his duty.

Another two people came back, which means everyone\'s here. I waited several minutes for them to assign the items before we departed towards the far end of the grassland.

I\'ve been saying "grassland", but the vegetation around us are taller than average grass.

They began to grow in size as we marched further in. After an hour the plants almost reached our heads. Thank goodness they\'re not really dense, or we\'ll have serious trouble walking forward.

A female Archer pushed on my back. "Did you hear something?"

"Em?"

I stopped and listened carefully. No, nothing.

"I don\'t think so."

The White Mage came over. "But Elves hear better than us."

The three male Archers raised their hands. "Confirmed. We heard something too."

"Really? So you got that kind of advantage."

I looked around us but still can\'t see anything.

The Archer lady readied her bow. "There!"

All other Archers followed her action. I can also hear it at this point, something is stepping over the grasses.

"I saw it!" A male Archer looked to one side.

"It\'s coming to us. Careful, it\'s big!" Another Elf alerted.

Something suddenly jumped and landed in front of us. The four Archers released their arrows in shock, and every shot missed. One of them even released his arrow straight upwards, which almost hit my head when it came down!

They began to stumble around in front of the sudden monster. I watched in silence as they bump into each other while trying to get into position.

Sigh. So much for teamwork.

They faced the monster solemnly. Warrior stayed in front, trembling; Archers behind them to provide cover, while wizards hid in the back of course. Although from the monster\'s jumping ability I\'m not sure the back line is absolutely safe.

"What the hell is that??" The Priest looked at our enemy, puzzled.

"Is it a...rabbit?" One of the girls responded. I don\'t know which one since I can\'t look back now.

"But it\'s too big!"

"I know right!"

"Anyone can use [Identify]?"

Finally, a solid suggestion.

"I\'ll do it." I proposed myself.

I used my skill and--

"Grassland Lepus. Common animal. Non-aggressive."

What the fuc?

"Huhhhh." Everyone lowered their weapons but they still kept distance.

The unknown woman puffed up her courage and touched the rabbit\'s side. It simply stared at us with those football-sized eyes.

People finally dropped their caution. The Priest asked me: "So it\'s just an ordinary white rabbit you would find everywhere?"

"That\'s what the skill said."

"But, but, the size of it--"

That\'s my question as well. I glanced at the rhino-sized creature again.

"The rabbit at least weighs a ton! Why would they put something like this in the game? A bug maybe?"

"Bug? Maybe you\'re right." Yup. Even a rabbit can be pretty scary if it grows so big.

When we\'re discussing about the anomaly, the rabbit jumped up and hopped away at extreme speed.

"GET DOWN!! AIR STRIKE INCOMING!"

I don\'t know which bastard shouted beside my ears but I still complied out of instinct. The remaining people either followed the warning or got pressed down by someone else.

A giant shadow swept past our heads. I twisted my neck as best as I could to saw a...golden eagle, above us. The problem is the bird is no smaller than Lucky!

I used my [Identify] again and showed the result to everyone.

"Yellow Savanna Hawk. Common animal."

"Is this some kind of joke?" They climbed up while dusting their clothes.

"Ok something is not right." I said while watching the hawk going after the rabbit.

The unknown woman nodded. "Yes. I know that bird. There are a lot of them among these parts but I never seen such a big one."

"No kidding! That thing is like a bomber plane!" The Priest yelled.

"Monster behind us!!" Someone screamed.

"What now??"

I immediately turned around and saw another giant creature that looks like a centipede. I said "looks like" because I don\'t think there are centipedes as thick as water barrels. The insect is at least three meters long, and I\'m yet to see the end of it!

"Get away! That\'s a monster, level 200 [Toxic Centipede]!"

I identified it without trouble but I still can\'t understand why a level 200 lesser monster can grow so big!

It crawled towards me. I stepped back and threw a [Compressed Fireball]. The spell hit its mark but isn\'t really effective.

The Archers used their shooting skills, which failed to penetrate the insect\'s shell.

The White Mage used a simple binding skill and locked the monster in place. But it struggled free in the next second, causing the girl to scream and run away.

"Are you sure your [Identify] isn\'t broke?? That feels like at least level 500!" An Archer came standing beside me. "It completely resisted my level 400 [Pierce Shot]. It can\'t be--watch out it\'s coming again!"

He pushed me aside and rolled away to the other direction. The terrible bug charged past between us.

"[Fusion Bomb]!!"

The two Black Mages released the skill they have been preparing for some time. A magic missile almost as big as the centipede flew towards the monster. Black Mages have some of the most powerful skills in the whole game, and this skill needs time to cast which means it should be very deadly.

The missile landed right on the insect\'s body and produced some bright electric shocks before it exploded into a miniature mushroom cloud.

When the dust cleared out, we saw the centipede trembling on the ground with its body broken in half. That attack finally worked.

The two mages wiped their sweat. "Again, are you sure this thing\'s 200? We only use that spell to damage level 600 monsters. And our MP is only enough to use it once!"

"Well I don\'t know!"

I\'ve no idea what\'s happening. I decided to summon Dart to help us find a path. He\'s pretty tiny and no one would notice his actual level.

"Come out Dart!" I raised my hand.

Boomsh! A monster several times bigger than the rabbit appeared near me, causing everyone including me to dash away in horror.

The monster followed me and caught up in a blink of an eye. I stepped back, and it kept following but isn\'t doing anything else.

Wait a second. It looks familiar. I saw a golden collar on its neck.

"...Collar of Protection...Dart."

This massive creature is Dart??

I took another good look at its entire body and yes, this is no other than my supposedly smallest companion.

The Priest moved closer. "Another common animal?"

Well, Dart does look like a harmless animal.

"It\'s my companion. Maybe."

The Priest stared at me. "What do you mean man? You don\'t know your own pet?"

"I...know, but, he is, way smaller than this."

"Now wait a second,"

Yup, we realized the same thing.

"WE became smaller!!" We cried out at the same time.

"What did you say??" People panicked.

"We are the ones that are smaller than before." I explained. "You saw the grass growing taller? They didn\'t! That was because we were turning smaller as we walked! The enlarged rabbit and such, they are just ordinary critters. The thing is we became tiny so they looked really big. And this is my companion. He should be puppy size before, I can put him on my shoulder. Now this is what we see!"

"I can\'t believe it!" They failed to accept the reality.

The unknown woman said to her friend. "Your servant, you know, that little furred ball. Let it out."

"Oh. Come, Meowy."

The Priestess summoned her pet servant...a giant fluffy round creature.

The creature lunged at the Priestess, who screamed and ran away.

"No! Don\'t--"

Ok, now we can only see her hands, as the rest of her body is buried under all that fur.

The Taoist girl explained to me. "Well she would ask her pet to come into her arms every time. It\'s a routine."

"So it\'s true." The Priest slumped down while looking at his team trying to remove the three-meter tall furball from the poor lady.

"We didn\'t turn small all of a sudden. It happened slowly, so the culprit followed us from behind all the time." The unknown woman tried to analyze the situation.

Ok, I can\'t hide myself now. I don\'t have time!

"Phiona!"

Phiona appeared beside us in her parrot form, which is still like 2 meters tall, from our point of view.

"Scout the area for any high leveled monsters. Tell me if you see any."

"On it."

She soared into the sky and turned into her true form. She blocked all the sunlight since she now looks no smaller than a football court.

She circled in the air for a while and came down in her parrot body again. "Nothing!"

"Huh? Maybe underground?..." I mumbled to myself while the other people are already shocked frozen by what they just saw.

"Rosa."

After a terrible earthquake, one of Rosa\'s tentacle came out of ground and looked around, without finding me.

"Down here!" I called from below.

He lowered the feeler in front of me.

"Search from below and check if anything is hiding underground. Push anything you find to the surface."

I turned to Phiona. "Get ready, something may show up."

"Okay." They went their ways.

"They are your companions?" The Priest questioned me.

"Yeah. I\'m a Tamer you know."

No point hiding it anymore so I\'ll just give them an explanation. That isn\'t really the right answer but at least I didn\'t lie.

Rosa soon chased all kinds of animals and small monsters to escape from their hiding places. With a great shake, a dirt block is hurled towards us.

Phiona dived and knocked the block away. "Master, I think Rosa found what you\'re looking for."

"What is it?" I hopped on my feet to get a better look around us. The grass is now taller than our heads which means we became even smaller now. We can\'t see anything like this.

"Lucky!" I summoned my number one helper. "Get the target!"

Lucky charged to whatever was driven out.

I climbed onto Dart. "Phiona, go help them!"

Then I called back to the other people: "Find some place to hide."

I asked Dart to go to the scene so I can give more orders.

The monster is an...ox. To be more precise, it\'s a white water buffalo with three eyes on the forehead! Considering Lucky\'s size, the buffalo must be at least three meters tall.

Must be a powerful boss. Lucky wrestled with the creature. They\'re both strong physical attackers so the brawling looks pretty intense.

The buffalo tried to ram Lucky using its horns while Lucky grabbed them and blocked the attack. A laser beam came out of the monster\'s third eye and hit Lucky in the center. That one must hurt, since Lucky roared in pain and rolled away.

The buffalo seized the chance and began to dig at the ground with its front hoof, which means a signature bull charge is coming.

"Loong\'er!" Lucky is hurt badly so the buffalo\'s level must be pretty high. I need more helpers. "Seal that eye with your spells!"

"Understood!" She floated into the sky and began to cast.

I faced Phiona. "Place a fire wall to block his attack!"

Woosh! Now Lucky and the monster are separated.

Rosa tried to catch one of its legs but it struggled free quickly.

This is not enough. "Night Shade, cover them!"

He rammed into the buffalo\'s body with his horn lowered in front. This is the first time I see Night Shade actually using this move. And it\'s effective. A big bleeding hole is now opened up on the side of the monster. Night Shade shifted away the moment he finished his attack so the buffalo didn\'t find any target to revenge on.

"Phiona! Burn the place and roast it alive!"

The dry grasses soon caught a mass fire. The flames won\'t hurt us because we\'re in the same team. The buffalo on the other hand, isn\'t so lucky.

It was trying to catch Night Shade. Now it realized the target is too fast so it decided to catch someone else, which is me.

Oh silly. Dart is even faster than Night Shade. You got no chance.

I summoned Phantom to suppress its movement. "Occupy its body. Just make sure it moves slower."

"Yes sir!"

It\'s more effective than I expected. Now the buffalo is twitching in place. Phantom sure is getting better at causing nuisance.

"Lucky? Are you alright?" We moved to where Lucky is staying. That wound looks serious. What kind of attack can take down a dragon in one hit? A portion of Lucky\'s torso is burned black. Ouch.

"Have some rest." I de-summoned Lucky since it doesn\'t look he can fight anymore.

The buffalo is now chasing Night Shade again. It\'s fast but not as agile as Night Shade so the situation is quite safe.

But this is wasting time. I noticed I\'m still getting smaller. I need to take it down somehow.

"Phantom Knights!"

"LEAVE NO ONE STANDING!!" A thunderous battle cry roared from above my head. I should have told them to keep it down. Damn it.

"The ox up ahead. Kill it!"

"Yes sir!" The leader ordered. "Lances ready! Release!"

They threw all 30 lances within 10 seconds, and they all hit! Now I see how they can build a freaking prison just using these polearms.

The buffalo now looks like a hedgehog with all those lances pinned on its body, and its white fur completely turned dark red.

"Shit. What level is it? Not dead yet?"

I was just complaining to myself, but Loong\'er heard me and answered. "I think that creature is the vahana of Shiva, one of the three major deities in Hindu. If I remembered right...it\'s level 850 monster." (*)

"Wait what? The ox got a background behind it? Who\'s Shiva, someone powerful?"

"Major gods are not listed among common monsters. You remember my father? He sits on the same level with Shiva. If you must need a level I\'d say they\'re beyond 1000."

"Crap. Will he or she get back on me for making their mount a hedgehog? Well shoot. I\'m dead."

"I don\'t think they will. Lucky can probably protect you. Lucky is a dragon king, the same title held by my father. His rank should be over a thousand as well, don\'t worry too much."

"Woooh, I didn\'t know he got such an origin."

I knew about dragon king but never realized the actual level of this title.

"But you\'re offspring of a dragon king. Will you go past 1000 too?"

"No I can\'t. The system designed me as a level 1000 monster. I guess my fate is sealed. And watch out!"

The buffalo charged at me again!

"Phantom Knights! Cook this thing into beef dumplings!"

"Yes sir! Knights, charge!"

"Crush the bull!"

They surrounded the monster. The buffalo doesn\'t have much HP left after all the ordeal. And ten Phantom Knights with the same level chopped it down without much trouble.

Rosa\'s tentacle suddenly came beside me.

"Um, translation, Phantom?"

"He wants you to call Lucky, he can do something about that wound."

"Perfect!" I summoned Lucky who\'s still laying on the ground, groaning.

Rosa pressed a tentacle on the wound, then he used several more vines and completely wrapped up the buffalo corpse. The corpse was torn into countless shreds after some noise like a meat grinder. Rosa absorbed all the blood and created a red glow on Lucky.

Lucky crawled back up soon. The black mark is still there but he can move again.

"Hey Rosa, that\'s some nice trick!"

"AH!!" Someone screamed. I saw an unfamiliar girl looking at us in horror, while the knights and my companions started back at her.

She\'s probably scared by the battlefield. There are burn marks everywhere, and some of the grasses are still aflame. A giant blood pool is in the middle of the Phantom Knights, Rosa is still healing up Lucky. Phiona is standing on Night Shade\'s back, while Loong\'er is floating above our heads.

...Yeah, this will definitely scare the shit out of most people.

She ran past me before I can say hello. Well, not surprising, since I\'m still tiny. I\'m afraid I\'m only the size of a bee now.

The girl approached the Phantom Knights. "Who\'s in charge?"

They didn\'t answer. They all looked towards the leader knight.

"Are you the leader? Which guild are you from?"

Of course they don\'t know what a "guild" is. The leader answered according to what he knows: "We\'re from the Dark Sanctuary."

Phantom Knights received their titles from that place. They belongs to the dark force, so that answer is mostly correct.

However the girl doesn\'t understand it in the right way. "Dark Sanctuary? A new guild? Never heard of it. I only heard about that Holy Sect."

...That\'s an existing guild established by other players. But that name conveniently caused a big understanding to the knights.

"You\'re Holy Sect??" All of them drew their swords out. Clerics are natural enemies to them, they\'ll never tolerate any Priest and similar classes as allies even if we\'re in the same team.

"Huh? I\'m not! I HEARD about them!"

That was close. But the girl didn\'t realize the danger.

"Did you just kill a big, white ox?"

"We did!" They nod.

"Where is the corpse?" She seems worried for some reason.

"He ate it!" The knights pointed at Rosa.

"But but, it must dropped something right?"

Drop?

She just reminded me to check my storage bracelet. This thing auto-recovers any loots so I didn\'t realize till now.

I took out something that looks like a token. But the moment it left the storage, it grew bigger and dropped on the ground.

Shit. The ox is dead why am I not turning back??

"Ah, here!" The girl saw the item and ran to it. "It\'s under protection??"

Duh. New items dropped by monsters are protected for a period of time, other players cannot pick them up.

She gave up on the item and turned to me. By which I mean, Dart.

"Awww such adorable foxy! What\'s your name?"

The girl asked the Phantom Knights who are still not sure about what\'s going on. "Who\'s the owner?"

I yelled as loud as I can on Dart\'s head. "I AM! HERE!"

The girl heard me but didn\'t see me clearly. "Is that a bug? Wow this game is so realistic."

Then she tried to flick me away!

Before she can catch me, we heard several "POOM"s around us. We finally returned normal.

Now a stack of people are laying on the grass, groaning.

"YES!" I jumped up happily. The girl just stared at the dozen people who just came out of nowhere.

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(*) Vahana: a.k.a God\'s Mount