CHRONICLES of a PC Gamer Stuck Inside an RPG (Book One: Duelist)

Chapter 13 - First Lesson

After I put my boots back on, I was led to the small pond that I had noticed earlier. I felt reassured by the presence of the valuable platinum coins pressed against the bottom of my left foot.

When we reached the pond, Kalistra turned around and looked at me with an anxious facial expression. Her tail flickered back and forth. "Party with me," she requested in a low voice.

"Huh?" I blurted out with a confused look.

The cat girl sighed in irritation and muttered something about "stupid humans."

A moment later, a pop-up appeared in front of my eyes. "Kalistra has invited you to her party. Accept? Yes or No." I clicked on "Yes."

Once I became her party member, Kalistra called up my player screen and started to review my player stats. "Why the heck is a grown man like you still at level one?" she growled. "Did you just arrive in this world yesterday?" she asked sarcastically. This human was old and should not have been stuck at level one! What the heck had Lawrence been doing with his life?

"Actually, I arrived this morning," I replied honestly.

The cat girl's ears bent back and she hissed again. Her tail whipped around behind her like a viper ready to strike! "Look, I am in no mood to play your stupid human games. I don't know what you did before I met you at the tavern and I don't care to know. You don't meet the minimum requirements to start your swordsmanship training. So you have two choices. You can pretend that you never came to this dojo and go home. Or you can train your body, under my personal tutelage, until you meet the minimum prerequisites to begin your swordsmanship training. However, I will still have to charge you the dojo's beginner rate of five silvers per day. Payment is required at the beginning of each day of class," she explained.

"Um, what exactly am I lacking?" I asked innocently.

Kalistra sighed loudly. "An Initiate of the Butterfly School of Swordsmanship is required to have 15 points in Dexterity, Intelligence, Strength, and Constitution. Among all the schools of swordsmanship within the Kingdom of Merlin, our dojo has the highest prerequisites before we admit prospective students into the school," she announced proudly and then continued with her explanation.

"We also have a lesser-known requirement: honor. For most applicants, we simply look at their reputation. If their score meets a minimum threshold then we presume that they are honorable until they demonstrate otherwise. For candidates with very little reputation, we seek a personal demonstration of the applicant's honor. In your case, you demonstrated your Honor by immediately taking responsibility for your insult to our school's founder. My papa assessed your apology and he had deemed that it was sincere. That's why he allowed you to enroll in our school."

I nodded at that explanation. I thought it was weird that Kalistron was staring at me for a long time while I was offering a deep bow to him in apology. Heck, I thought he made me bow before him for such a long time specifically as a form of punishment. However, I wondered why he assigned Kalistra in particular to become my instructor.

"You should know one more thing," Kalistra added hesitantly. "Kallimon is not just a founder of our school. He is also my ancestor. If my papa wasn't present when you made your insult publicly, I would have been honor bound to kill you on the spot."

I folded my arms as I looked at the cat girl up and down. She wasn't particularly big or strong. If anything, Kalistra probably leaned on her speed as a cat girl to fight. "How would you have done that without a sword?" I sneered openly. Was she going to bite me to death?

Kalistra's whiskers twitched at my arrogance and she shook her head. "Very few people in this dojo have had the privilege to party with me. If you actually took advantage of this and checked my own stats, you wouldn't have made that stupid remark."