EFate: An MMO Story Chapter 55: Recruitment Drive

As his friends disappeared into the streets of Tonbura, Eric's mind turned to the subject of recruitment. Truth be told, he hadn't actually thought about who to recruit to his party just yet. After all, before deciding on who to invite, first he had to see if his friends were fine with the idea. Now that the decision had been made, however, it was time to think seriously about who he should ask. A hastily constructed party would only hinder his efforts, forcing him to work harder than needed, and perhaps even causing him to fail the quest.

No, if I'm doing this I'm doing it right, Eric resolved himself. The first step to forming a strong party was choosing strong party members. Naturally, he had a few ideas for who to invite, but he couldn't just invite anyone. The composition of a party was one of the biggest aspects governing a party's strength. Five mages were going to be far more restricted in how they could approach combat than a balanced team comprised of various fighting styles would. For this reason, it was important that he didn't simply choose the four strongest people he could find, but rather, select strong fighters that would compliment the strengths of the other members of the team.

With all that said, there was one person who Eric had to at least try and recruit: Astrid. The perky and upbeat blonde archer was perhaps the most talented archer he'd ever seen, and that was saying something when both himself and Jun had started off as archers. The only problem was that as someone who'd made it to the top eight of the militia tournament, Astrid was doubtlessly going to be someone that a lot of different teams wanted to recruit, including his own friends. Luckily for Eric, he had an advantage in this department thanks to his recent acquisition. Calling up his friends list, Eric found Astrid's name and pressed it. As he did so, a series of runes appeared in the air in front of him.

[System: To finish casting the Whisper spell targetting Astrid Feathershot, simply infuse mana into your status crystal and place your hand atop of Astrid Feathershot's personal runes.]

Seeing this, Eric wasted no time in following the system's instructions. As he did so, the runes lit up, glowing brightly as they vanished into his status crystal. Standing in silence, Eric waited as a strange sensation filled his mind. Pacing nervously, he maintained his connection to the crystal, continuing to infuse it with mana as he wondered whether he'd done something wrong and caused the spell to fail. Just before he was about to sever the connection and try again, the sensation in his head vanished, and a voice echoed through the crystal at his waist.

"Um, what's going on?" a feminine voice could be heard muttering. "- whisper spell allows you to communicate with others across long distances? What?"

"What's that, Trixie?" another voice echoed through the crystal.

"I just got a system message. Something about a whisper spell? Any of you get this?" the first voice asked. A chorus of denials followed this question as Eric stared at his crystal with a bemused look. It would seem that Astrid didn't quite understand what was going on.

"Hey, Astrid. What's up?" Eric asked, raising his status crystal to his mouth.

"Wha?" a chorus of confused voices and a shriek echoed back through the crystal as the connection cut. With a bemused expression, Eric stared at his status crystal for a moment before casting the Whisper spell once more.

"Astrid? You there? It's me, Eric," he said in a calm voice once the spell completed, doing his best to sound as unthreatening as possible.

"Eric? Like, Eric from the tutorial?" Astrid's voice emerged from the crystal, a note of hesitancy audible in her tone.

"The one and only. Are you free to talk?" asked Eric. As he said this, a chorus of whispers and giggles could be heard from the other side.

"A boy, Trixie? You never told us!"

"Who is it? Is it that cool archer guy? The tank we partied with yesterday? Tell us!"

"Yeah! Tell us, Astrid!"

One after another various voices could be heard spilling through the crystal.

"It's not like that! He's just a friend!" Astrid's pleading voice could be heard, as she desparately attempted to convince her friends to stop teasing her.

"Should I contact you at another time?" Eric asked with an amused tone.

"No, now's good. I just need to get away from these vultures," Astrid replied, the voices of her friends growing distant as shooing sounds could be heard coming from the crystal. As the crystal went quiet once more, her voice reemerged. "So, what's up?" she asked, doing her best to sound nonchalant.

"Have you heard about the new militia mission?"

"Yes, why?"

"I'm looking to form a team, and was wondering if you might be interested."

"Me?" Astrid echoed with a surprised voice. "Why me?"

"You're the strongest archer I know. Why wouldn't I ask you to join my party?" Eric replied. Plus you're pretty cute, and fun to be around, he added silently.

"Isn't Jun your friend? Why not ask him?"

"We're each forming our own parties. Jun's not an option, not that he'd join if I asked," Eric said with a laugh, doing his best not to imagine the verbal tirade he'd have to endure if he asked Jun to become his subordinate. "Do you already have your own party?"

"No. Normally I'd go with my friends, but they're not interested in fighting more goblins. They had enough trouble during the expedition to Lichfrost. They'd prefer to stay in town and craft, or stick to the lower level monsters near town. They told me I can just go and find another group without them if I want to keep leveling, but I'll have to leave them behind," Astrid said sadly.

"Sorry to hear that," Eric replied awkwardly, unsure of how to continue. Lapsing into silence, Eric stared at the crystal, trying to find the right words to say as he maintained the Whisper spell.

"Are there any others in your party yet?" Astrid asked at last.

"Nope, you're the first one I asked."

"I'm honoured," she giggled. A little of her usual cheerfulness coming back.

"Will you join then? I offer great benefits. Dental, healthcare, witness protection..."

Astrid laughed. "Witness protection? What would we need that for?"

"I have enemies," Eric said with a deadpan voice, causing more laughs to emerge from the crystal.

"Alright, I'll join," Astrid managed through her giggles.

"Great! I'll contact you once I fill out the rest of the party. Did you have anyone you'd like to invite?"

"Maybe some of the others from the Battle of Lichfrost? None of my other friends are interested. And how are you contacting me anyways?" Astrid asked curiously.

"I learned the Whisper spell earlier today. It's the spell that opens up the private messaging system. Don't tell anyone, but the requirement is level thirty or higher Arcane Magic," Eric confided.

"I'll keep quiet," she promised. "But how should I contact you? My Arcane Magic is still only Journeyman 4."

"Your Arcane Magic is Journeyman 4?" Eric asked with surprise. He'd focused on magic almost exclusively since his first run-in with Lucy and still only managed to hit the Intermediate level today. So the fact that Astrid, who focused on archery, was already halfway through the Journeyman level was rather impressive. "I didn't know you practiced magic."

"Yup!" Astrid said proudly. "My magic levels up when I practice archery skills like Frost Shot. Anything that requires me to use mana helps level my Arcane Magic. Water Magic requires me to use actual spells though."

"Interesting."

"Right?"

Thinking about it for a second, it made sense. Basic Arcane Magic was essentially the act of manipulating mana. Any skill that used mana would logically allow the user to become more proficient at manipulating mana. Eric just hadn't noticed it himself because none of his sword skills used mana. Also, Hurricane probably wanted to ensure that all players would be able to use the Whisper spell eventually. Private messaging was a hallmark of online gaming, and the Fate forums were always full of threads asking about its inclusion. Allowing players to level up Arcane Magic through any activity that used mana solved that problem. Realizing that Astrid had gone silent, Eric broke out of his reverie.

"Anyways," he began. "Do you have Strife? Just in case we need to stay in contact before you get the Whisper spell."

Confirming that yes, she did have Strife, Astrid and Eric exchanged their Strife info. Promising to contact her once he'd a.s.sembled the rest of the party, Eric ended the spell, allowing the crystal to go silent once more as the flow of mana was cut. Now that he'd recruited Astrid, Eric's thoughts turned to who else he should invite. a.s.suming that Alistair's advice was correct, and Lark turned out to be a capable spear user, then that meant he'd have one ranged and one melee dps, in addition to his own role as a flexible fighter who could switch between ranged and melee combat as needed, that meant he was still missing a tank, and possibly a healer. While healers were nowhere near as necessary for a successful party in Fate as they were in other games, a good healer was still great to have, especially after a fight.

Unfortunately, the only healer Eric knew was Mark. No other healers had made it to the top thirty-two of the tournament, and the only other healers that had been present in the Crowsea Platoon had been NPC's. Not that Eric had anything against NPC's, but considering one was already enough for now. There was no way that he wanted to lose almost half his party permanently if they wiped in a raid. That was a stress he could do without for now.

So no healers, what about tanks? Who do I know that can tank? Eric wondered, turning his attention to the most important role that he had yet to fill. A good tank could make or break a party. There was a saying in Tae Kwon Do, 'The best offense is a good defense,' and this saying held true in Fate as well. A good tank could control the flow of combat, enabling the rest of their party to fight without having to worry about being overwhelmed. On the other hand, a bad tank could sink a good party through mismanagement of the combat situation, allowing their healer or damage dealers to be overrun. Because of this, finding a good tank was absolutely essential, while Eric could theoretically act as a tank himself, his defensive specialties lay in not getting hit, not preventing the rest of his group from being hit.

Running through the list of the players from the tournament on his friends list, Eric's gaze fell on Turk's name. Turk was certainly a good choice. A capable tank, he was calm under pressure, dealing with multiple opponents as his allies took care of the others. He also had good synergy with Eric already from their first excursion to Lichfrost Forest, the only problem was that he and Aria were likely a package deal.

Still, it wasn't as if a six player party was the worst thing to have. While Alistair had suggested five as the maximum, six was only one more, and Aria was a good player in her own right. Plus, a healer wasn't an essential member of the party in Fate. Many of Riptide's various adventures and expeditions so far had been done without Mark present, and they'd all turned out just fine so far. So long as Eric learned a bit of healing magic himself, the party should be fine without a dedicated healer. Resolving himself, Eric cast the Whisper spell targetting Turk.

Turk's reaction to receiving Eric's call was nowhere near as surprised as Astrid's had been. After a moment of brief surprise while Eric described the function of the Whisper spell, he easily accepted the situation, talking to Eric like he'd been using Whisper for weeks.

"So, what's up? I know you didn't contact me just to show off your new spell, right?" Turk asked, a trace of hesitation entering his voice as he questioned Eric's motives for contacting him. Clearly, the impression Eric had left upon him was not that of a serious-natured fellow. The possibility of Eric using the Whisper spell just to brag was not low.

Eric laughed. "No, I actually did have a reason for contacting you. Did you and Aria get a notice about the militia briefing just now?"

"Yeah. We just left. We were just wondering about if we should form a party or not. I a.s.sume that's what you're contacting me for?" Turk asked seriously.

"Hi, Eric!" Aria's cheerful voice came through.

"Hey, Aria," Eric greeted her. "Like my new spell?"

"Yeah, it's awesome! You'll have to teach me how to use it."

"I'll teach you how if you guys promise to join my party," Eric replied, a sly grin crossing his face.

"Deal!" Aria responded happily.

"It's not like we have a party right now. But I'd like to hear a bit more about your party first," unlike Aria, Turk was still completely serious. "How many other members do you have? What positions can they play? Why do you want us?"

"I have one, possibly two other members so far apart from myself. The for sure member is Astrid, the archer who made the top eight of the tournament."

Turk made an approving grunt upon hearing this.

"The other member I'm looking at is a spear wielder. Along with you two, we'd have a tank, a melee dps, one physical and one magical ranged dps, and then myself who can flex between melee and ranged, magical and physical as needed. We're just missing a healer unfortunately, but I don't really know any other healers aside from Mark, and he's part of another party," Eric explained, quickly giving them the rundown on Riptide's situation.

"I can be the healer if needed actually," Aria cut in. "I've learned a few supportive spells recently to help Turk out. Aqueous Shield, Minor Heal, Watery Rejuvenation…"

"That would work perfectly then," Eric replied happily. "With that, so long as I can convince the fifth member, we'd be good to go."

"A tank, two ranged, and two melee? That's pretty good. And you've managed to get some strong players too," Turk said slowly.

"The purpose of this party is to become famous and dominate the rewards for this operation so that we can play influential roles in the upcoming a.s.sault on the Ironfrost Horde. I can't have weak players now, can I?" Eric responded. "So, will you guys join?"

"Sure!"

"I guess," Turk echoed his friend's enthusiastic response with a decidedly less enthusiastic response of his own.

"Glad to hear it. Do you guys have Strife or anything? Just in case we need to contact each other while you guys don't have the Whisper spell yet."

Exchanging their information with Eric, Turk and Aria promised to make their way over towards Tonbura soon to meet up with the rest of the party, bidding him goodbye as he terminated the spell, shutting off the flow of mana to the crystal once more.

Three down, one to go, Eric thought. Aria having taken on a more supportive role since the Battle of Lichfrost was a welcome surprise. Now that they had a healer, all that remained was for Eric to see if Lark truly was strong enough to accompany them as the party's fifth and final member. If she wasn't, he would have to find another fighter to join them, which meant he needed to act fast. Every second wasted was another chance for other parties to recruit the remaining strong players in the Lunbrengur Region.

With that said, where did Lark live again? Eric wondered. Thinking back, Alistair had only told him that she lived somewhere near Tom's smithy and that Tom would be able to direct him towards Lark's house. Stowing the pouch with his status crystal back at his waist, Eric stretched his arms above his head, enjoying the afternoon sun on his face before setting off for Tom's smithy.