Chapter 4

At first Rob only saw black. A vast sea of darkness. Eventually, his ears began to prickle. He could hear the sounds of noises nearby. Waves crashing upon the shore. He felt his cheek rub against a soft, though slightly scratchy, surface. As his eyelids cracked open, even within his blurry vision, he could quickly make out a beach and a shoreline that stretched deep into the distance.

He rubbed his eyes. He stretched and cracked his neck. He felt like he had awoken from a long sleep. There was something about the teleportation from the Class Selection to the Tutorial zone that felt less instantaneous than the transport from near-death by suicide splatter to strange white room. Rob couldn’t explain why that was. He was sure if The Administrator was still with him, he’d probably not get an answer from him either.

Rob’s eyes winced. The sky above was a clear bright blue. The sun shone down brightly, reflecting off the beach, and making it difficult for his eyes to adjust.

He turned away from the beach and sea to the huge patch of green in front of him. Tall, slender palm trees lined the entrance to a vast tropical jungle. The trees with their green fronds fanned out and casted soft shadows on the sand below. Between the jungle and him was a large shiny rock.

Rob contemplated his new surroundings. The beach, trees, and shoreline all looked like a tropical island that existed on Earth. He was basing that mainly off shameless yet addictive beach volleyball video games and post-cards hanging in the back of taxi cabs. That was the extent of his tropical island experience—his family had been too poor growing up to go on sun-soaked beach vacations.

Rob turned his attention to the lapping waves in the distance. At the edge of the horizon was a vast blue sky with the fain silhouettes of two planets. One had a distinctly Earth-like appearance, and the other did as well but with a faint orange hue.

He had never considered for a moment he was still on Earth, but the sight of the two planets definitely confirmed it.

The Grand Authority System must have sent him and others who were in his Tutorial to a planet that had been turned into a Tutorial zone, or–given the powers he’d so far witnessed from the Grand Authority System–it had simply created a magical subspace where this Tutorial was taking place.

Breaking Rob’s thoughts was a slight moment of panic. His heart raced as he patted his hands in the sand. He sighed with relief when he found his spear right next to him.

Phew.

So far it didn’t look like the system had given him an inventory like most video games did, so he was going to have to keep track of his stuff.

On top of that, he’d arrived on the island wearing the same clothes he’d been wearing right before he’d leapt off his apartment building: a white t-shirt, jeans, and sneakers. A few things that hadn’t teleported with him were his phone, wallet, and keys. It didn’t look like he’d have much use for them here on the island anyway.

He had been so focused on getting his bearings on this new island he’d been transported to, he hadn’t noticed a system prompt in the corner of his retina.

He called it to the forefront of his vision.

Welcome to the Tutorial: Pre-Tutorial still underway until all participants have spawned

Please standby and await further instructions

Pre-Tutorial Bonus: 300% extra experience points for any monsters slain during the pre-Tutorial period

Rob read the new prompt closely.

He once again felt vindicated for his swift movement through Class Selection. He was almost positive The Administrator had been trying to slow him down.

More than that, he could glean a bunch of information from that prompt alone.

One, he wasn’t going to be taking part in this Tutorial by himself. Second, people were still chatting with The Administrator in the Class Selection zone, hence why the Tutorial hadn’t officially started. Third, the island was populated with monsters, the killing of which would grant experience points, all pointing to this new reality operating like a video game.

Got it.

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He felt his heart race at the idea of fighting monsters. His grip tightened around his spear. Something about the idea excited him. Thrilled him.

As far as he could tell, there were no monsters in sight.

He figured he should review his Profile one last time before he went and started hunting. He would do it quickly though, as he didn’t want to lose a chance at that 300% bonus.

He called up his Profile once more. It had changed from the last time he’d looked at it.