chapter 13 good salt (work in progress)

the message started with a rough and manly voice "I'm lieutenant gregosh of the Greylocks, I found myself lost in a strange radioactive world, my ship propulsion system it's out of commission, I have the energy to keep the shield up for two weeks, I request emergency extraction, I repeat I request emergency extraction"

follow up message received "this is lieutenant gregosh the ship it's officially out of energy, my suit energy it's also falling, it is a matter of time and I don't have much of it, once the hazard protection it's down in less than 1 hour the radiation poisoning will reach a critical level, to whoever receives this message, in my ship there's a black box, if you recover the ship in the future, bring that to the Greylock consul, a lot of lives depend on it, we are born alone and we die alone, I had a good run goodbye" the message end's here . . .

Daniel said "even when about to die this guy was thinking about his mission, I wonder how much time passed"

the cold voice responded "it's been a little over 300 years, that guy rerouted all the power to the emergency broadcast and let himself die"

Daniel said "ah, you are still here"

the voice responded "this is still an evaluation and I am the examiner"

Daniel thought for a moment and then said "I see"

the voice responded "the test it's here because the circumstances are perfect for a test, now you should listen to the other message, receive the mission, and make a decision"

found signal coming from the west, unable to triangulate precise position, a message has been found do you wish to listen? y/n

Daniel obviously chose yes

the second message started with a mechanical voice "this is the emergency signal of the shuttle spacetuna of the star merchant group seven, system damage critical, all the crew member deceased on impact, broadcasting signal for cargo recovery, the cargo consist of uranium ore and trixium alloy, you will be rewarded to retrieve this ship and deliver it back, information's are supplied to facilitate the recovery, the atmospheric condition are acid clouds and rain, flora and fauna mostly poisonous dangerous but not aggressive, temperature normal, radiation levels low, this message will keep broadcasting for 5 more months before the energy cells are exhausted"

suddenly a notification popped up

join the sea of stars 1 of 4 [tutorial mission hell difficulty]

part 1 of 4: retrieve a working and charged spacesuit

part 2 of 4: . . .

part 3 of 4: . . .

part 4 of 4: . . .

reward part 1 of 4: damaged ss class spacesuit (actual rank D repairs required)

reward part 2 of 4: . . .

reward part 3 of 4: . . .

reward part 4 of 4: . . .

reward for completion: anomaly race (none of the many races and forces will be hostile with you unprovoked, corrupted overseer forces excluded)

this was the first time for Daniel, but he was now an educated kid and had researched online how the game worked, he already knew thanks to the forum that he needed the uranium to power the ship, and he also knew that the crew dying on impact meant the spacesuits were broken and probably no longer working, but the mission required a working one

the only choice seemed to go retrieve the one gregosh was wearing, the problem was that after 300 years even if it had still energy to broadcast a weak signal it might not be enough to activate the hazard protection for 5 minutes, so he didn't have enough time after coming back to this safe zone, to go to the poisonous area and recharge the suit with the spacetuna systems, the mission sounded straightforward so the fact no one completed it, was absurd, and there must be a trick to it.

Daniel was trying to calculate his options, the official info was really poor, but certain people had uncontrollable urges, some had to comment on everything they saw, and others had to brag about their adventure in the hell difficulty tutorial, generally all of them were not trustworthy and just liked to spread salt after failing it, still the poor quantity of informations was quickly growing under the more salt people threw at this impossible mission, and there where ways to verify them

first of all the cold voice was some sort of artificial intelligence designed to use psychology to add weight to the already troubled challenger, Gregosh's suit it's in a corroded state and needs repairs before the hazard protection can be activated, the radioactive area it's rich of uranium but the challenger has no mineral extractor, many information came together and soon after Daniel had an idea on how to do it, but he wasn't sure it would work, people don't always tell the truth and some comments might be traps for the other challenger, so daniel had to choose carefully what to believe

an S.L.B player has a few essentials, the first it's the spacesuit, the second it's the backpack aka toolbox, which not only contains the minerals, tools, weapons, and loot, but it also has the repair system, to fix damaged technology if the resources in it are sufficient, the third it's the ship, even if it's the ugliest and weakest ship ever existed without one it's impossible to play

the mission didn't have a time limit but the cold voice was itching to poke at him and said "what little brat are you scared silly"

daniel looked at the sky and replied "this first objective it's a trap, if I go to get the spacesuit, and then go to the cargo ship with it the suit will not be repairable even If I do arrive there, before even considering the poisonous zone I need the backpack, the first zone I should go it's either the hot or the radioactive one, since the radioactive one has the suit and the poisonous one a spaceship and resources, either the cold or the hot has the backpack and the mineral extractor"

the cold voice didn't reply even after a couple of minutes, so Daniel said "the cold and hot zones have wildlife, I can't go without a weapon, so radioactive it is"

this time the cold voice said "interesting" then stopped talking again and started to observe this kid with more attention, the psychology programmed in him wasn't working on this odd kid, he had to try more carefully

Daniel said "I see, it's really subtle and gets masked with everything else that's going on, but the answer to which zone should be visited first it's in the first sentence of the first message, really smart I wonder how many people discovered the truth, they would probably drown you in salt again, but lieutenant it's a military rank so he has to have a weapon with him"

Daniel didn't worry about the silent treatment given by the cold voice, as he was speaking more with himself than with it, and without hesitation turned towards the east and started to jog towards gregosh remains, following the distress signal

while walking the radiation buildup started and the many creepy plants and glowing rocks were really scary, a simple shadow could look like a monster and the winds through the plants filled the air with creepy roars

but Daniel already knew that these sorts of tricks were nothing more than mind games, apart from the fact that he never forgot that this was a game, when an artificial intelligence tries to use psychology it uses an extremely logical approach and still lacks the adaptability of a human mind, the roars were regularly spaced and the shadows always looked like monsters

a normal person would be shivering right now, but in a "natural" situation the roars would be sparse and the shadow more distorted, precision means that this simulated environment seemed even more simulated to Daniel's, and the nanites analysis

but something was simulated well, and that was the destructive effects of the radiation on his body, this was the second time Daniel felt pain in his life, he started to grow nauseous, and he was experiencing weakness and fatigue, but he pushed through and continued to jog through the creepy forest

after a 2 mile jog following the signal he finally found the crash site and saw the shipwreck, the ship was clearly once a small fighter in black and blue colors with a very sharp triangular shape, but now it was totally wrecked, the only part still whole was the cockpit connected to the batteries in a makeshift way, probably to power the life support

as he approached, he noticed something strange, the suit was inside the cockpit folded and clearly taken off voluntarily, the corpse of gregosh was nowhere to be found, Daniel already knew that radiation had probably already decomposed the body completely, after 300 years not even bones could be found, but apparently gregosh was not even wearing the suit when he died.

Daniel was here on a mission to test his theory and instead of going to the cockpit to get the suit he went to the wreckage and started to rummage through the ship's small cargo space, after 5 minutes he took a white box from the wreckage mess, and a notification popped up

congratulation, you found a gun box

daniel knew that gun boxes for realism's sake will deliver a gun that could fit inside, with this size a knife or a small handgun were the ones with higher probability, and he obviously wanted the small handgun, even if he never fought anybody and didn't know how to use either of them, a handgun would obviously be superior since he didn't have any technique for either, luckily as he opened the box a small handgun appeared

congratulation, you obtained small laser cricket

name: laser cricket

type: small handgun

rarity: D

damage: 15-20

damage type: heat ray

specials: power regulation

inside it was a small ordinance laser pistol, with a silver cylindrical body looking more like an automatic syringe with a red tip, and 3 batteries(magazines) happily Daniel said "I was right, but this is the only thing that survived here"

then he gripped the gun and started going to the cockpit, what once was the magnetic lock of the cockpit was completely destroyed, so he just had to push it and it opened, Daniel finally took the suit that was grey and looked like a tight-fitting spacesuit with some areas covered by some sort of red polymer armor and when he took it a notification popped up

congratulation, you obtained Gregosh spacesuit (broken)

different from the handgun the notification did not contain any data on the suit, Daniel already knew it was broken but it was still suspicious, the comments talked about it and said it was because it was graded below f for now and so was categorized as scrap, but if he put it on the life support would still be working, still he had another use for it and just brought it back putting it in a makeshift bag made out of his avatar trenchcoat

he then took the black box and another notification appeared

congratulation, you obtained the black box (some people may reward you handsomely for this box)

has he obtained everything he needed here, he immediately started to jog back, he spent 20 minutes jogging and 7 searching, so he still had a good 33 minutes to go back to the safe zone before the game over

but things couldn't be so simple, going he had to follow the distress signal to the source but now he had to remember the way back, from what the comments said, this was the big obstacle that killed 99% of the challengers who choose this zone first, so much that a voice this zone was the tutorial mission best trap started to ferment in the player base