[F-01] [SP] Upgrading at the shop «Training your Friend»

[Benjamin Bookworm 0]

Spoiler

Level - 22           HP - 440             ENG - 44
DMG (Dagger) - 2 (1 base + 1 equipment)
MIT - 0                      ACC - +1                    EVA - 3

Equipment -
[EQ] [T1 Rare Dagger] Emerald Shiv - ACC 1, DMG 1
[EQ] [T1 Perfect Charm] Green Leaf - Evasion (3)
[EQ] [T1 Perfect Charm] Finder's Feather - Loot Die (3)

Ben's shop on the first floor had been quiet for a while- it seemed sales were slowing down lately.  Which was the best time to check out a new quest that he had seen since the newest update. 

The quest was some sort of training one for improving his familiar, which he was definitely up for.  It's just... he looked down at the caterpillar he had chosen as a familiar.  The two foot long worm was a good sidekick to talk to, and would sit in his shop to keep track of sales.  It's just he couldn't really see how the little guy would really be able to help with his crafting.

"OK Sebastian, it's time for us to start working on... on what you do." he said as he picked his partner up into the air. "So, you're going to help me get better at mixing and crafting.  Think you're up for it old friend?"

Sebastian just stares back without a word. 

[Benjamin Bookworm 0]

With a sigh, Ben put his companion down onto his alchemy cart and switched the sign on it from 'Alchemist is in' to 'Alchemist is busy'.  The quest description was pretty vague on what he needed to do, so it was probably up to the familiar on how they learn. But what exactly do you teach a giant caterpillar?

"OK, so you're supposed to try and help me out with crafting things then-" he told Sebastian as he materialized several materials in front of himself. "So I'm going to put out the things we need for a normal healing potion, and you're going to help. So just do whatever it is that your wormy instincts are telling you to help out."

And with that he began sorting out just what he needed to start, holding the ingredients up to Sebastian one at a time and hoping for a reaction, which he still got none. Yet, at least.

[Benjamin Bookworm 0]

The next thing he did was to grab the first ingredient he usually used in his potions, a hand full of herbs that he had found in the wild, and held it up in front of his mixing bowl. "Ok, I'll just start as usual then... unless you have some helpful tips?" he asked his familiar, showing him what ingredients he had in multiple different orders with no response.

He then grabbed a second dose of herbs and hovered them over the mixing bowl, looking for any sort of reactions at all.

"Look Sebastian,  you have to at least try at this." he told the silent caterpillar. "Just, I don't know, poke one of them. Maybe give me a hint at what kind of help you can give." Even if the advice he got was completely off base, he wanted to at least get a reaction more than confused curiosity. At least something to show that Sebastian was listening.

[Benjamin Bookworm 0]

Sebastian, after some thought, crawled on over towards the ingredients that Ben held out, and reached out to the extra batch of moss. He then bit into it, pulled it towards him, and started eating the moss. 

Ben just stared at him as he slowly ate it up, wondering if this was the right way of going about things, but Sebastian just munched away for a while longer before swallowing. "Um... is that it?  Do I not use that then?" he asked, trying to figure out if he was on the right track here. "Maybe I just feed you different things for you to get the taste of them then?  I guess it's worth a shot- not like I have any better ideas at any rate."

He pulled out another few batches of materials and put them out on the table, seeing which ones his familiar would be most interested in. And hopefully which would help train him the most. 

[Benjamin Bookworm 0]

Sebastian looked back and forth at the materials Ben had placed in front, tilting his head quizzically at each one in turn, before crawling over to a second one to grab.  Ben let the little guy do his thing, even if it did take a while, and soon enough Sebastian had started chewing on every material laid out that didn't need to be added to the mix.

"All right, that's a good boy! We're off to a great start so far!" he cheered on, happy to have some sort of mark of progress.  "Now we just have to figure out how to use that nose of yours to find things I didn't know before.  Maybe even some new recipes if I'm lucky." he told his familiar with a a hopeful smile. He'd be happy with anything his familiar could do, but if it helped him work on helping the other players beat the game faster and safer, he would jump at the chance. 

Spoiler

Roll 135196
CD - 7, success
1 Success total

 

Edited January 30, 2020 by Benjamin Bookworm

[Benjamin Bookworm 0]

Benjamin gave his familiar a big hug after that, happy that his training methods were starting to work. "That's a good boy Sebastian.  Yes it is... you're my good boy!  You're going to be the best little alchemist helper in the world." he cooed over his caterpillar, happily heaping praise on to his familiar.

"Now, the next thing we have to do is... I don't really know yet." he said as he placed Sebastian back down onto his alchemy cart.  "Maybe try another recipe I know?  No... how about we try putting out a bunch of ingredients and seeing which recipe you want me to try?  I think that's as good a plan as any to start with." Ben than started grabbing out all the usual ingredients that he worked with, and laying them out on the top of his cart one at a time until he had a nice line of things for Sebastian to try and work with.  Or work on, whatever the case was.

[Benjamin Bookworm 0]

"So, now that we have everything laid out for you, just do what feels naturally." Ben told his familiar.  Hopefully this was going to work- after all, the familiars in the game are just some minor bits of code, with a little bit of AI in them to help. So they should be able to figure out how to help on their own- unless they were programmed to not do so unless certain conditions were met.

At least that was the theory he had heard- nobody really knew how the NPCs in SAO worked, at least not for sure.  So he was just taking stabs in the dark and seeing how things worked.  At least this time the consequences weren't life and death- just if he got better work done when he was making potions and crystals for the front liners... who were in life or death situations.  It seems to always come back around to that, doesn't it?

[Benjamin Bookworm 0]

Ben bent over where Sebastian was sitting, getting face to face with his familiar. "OK, so now comes the part where we see what you can do." he said to his caterpillar, waiting to see his response.  "Any time now... just start nibbling on things again." It took a bit more prodding- and some patience- to get Sebastian to start moving, but he eventually began crawling over to the pile and grabbing one ingredient.  Then another.  And another.  And eventually just started taking a bite or two out of everything there was.

Ben sighed- "Maybe you were just hungry.  Is that it?" and picked Sebastian up, looking at his unreadable familiar. Then putting him down by the food bowl he kept and let him have a few bites of whatever food usually spawned in there.  It just sort of came with the item, so Ben hadn't looked too deeply into it. 

"OK, just a little today.  We don't want you too full to work today, do we?"

[Benjamin Bookworm 0]

"OK, that's enough now. Time to get back to work."  Ben said as he picked a distraught Sebastian back up and put him in the crafting area again.  His familiar took a minute of fussing, where he tried to wiggle back at his food bowl, but finally settled down and got himself set back up at the table.  "Now I'm going to put all the materials back out once again- but this time I need you to just pick out what you think we should use to craft.  Can you do that buddy- just what we need?" he pleaded to his familiar, hoping that this time it would work better.

Sebastian waffled back and forth, trying to see what he needed to do before looking back up at Benjamin, who gave him a nod of encouragement and waited for the caterpillar to make his move and begin to do whatever it was this familiar would do to be more helpful.

[Benjamin Bookworm 0]

Sebastian scooched his way across the crafting table, once more looking at the ingredients once more.  Benjamin watched with wide eyes as he grabbed one of them... then another, and another... "You're just eating all the ingredients again, aren't you?" Ben asked, to which Sebastian just stared back at him while he continued to chew on the leaves in front of him, not caring at all that his partner was disappointed in the complete lack of any effort he was making.

"OK, so you're still hungry, but those are materials that I need to make things.  So I can sell them and buy both of us stuff.  You can't just eat them whenever you want partner, you understand that right?" he scolded the little worm, pulling away all the materials that hadn't already disappeared down his stomach yet and glaring down.  He'd have to try something a little bit different this time and hoped the new methods would do the trick.

Spoiler

Roll 135331
CD - 6, failure
1 Success total of 4

 

Edited February 1, 2020 by Benjamin Bookworm

[Benjamin Bookworm 0]

"OK Sebastian, so if you aren't able to tell me what to do and help out, maybe I should just let you look at the ingredients? Would you be willing to try that out for me?" Ben asked, thinking of new ways of training he could go over with his little caterpillar.  He pulled a few different leaves out of his pouch and help them up near Sebastian, who immediately reached over and tried to take a bite out of them. "No, just sniffing them.  No eating this time.  Do you hear me- no eating." he scolded. 

Sebastian seemed to be confused by this information.  Leaves were for eating- why wasn't Ben letting him just dig in?  It didn't make sense.  Or at least he seemed to think that as he looked up at the snacks sadly, pouting that he wasn't being fed even more, and trying to get Ben to change his mind by giving him the sad caterpillar eyes.

[Benjamin Bookworm 0]

Of course, after all this time Ben had gotten used to his familiar's little tricks.  As cute as he looked right now, Ben had dealt with this act before.  He waited for about a minute, watching as Sebastian tried the sad eyes first, then bowed his head down like he was crying, then rolling onto his side and acting like he was starving.  Sebastian had done this little act before, and Ben just watched and waited until he was done.

"Now that we've finished up with that, it's time for you to start doing something useful this time, OK? Just start taking a whiff and tell me what you feel.  It'll be easy partner." Ben encouraged his familiar, once more holding out his hand with some leaves to gauge his reaction to them.  "Just tell me which of these you think are going to be the best for me to use. Then you can have all the snacks you want afterwards."

[Benjamin Bookworm 0]

Sebastian seemed to finally cool down from his little fit, and began crawling over to what Ben had offered him, sniffing and poking at the different leaves before giving off a quizzical look and seeming to figure out what he was supposed to be doing. He poked at the leaves that Ben offered, but after inspecting them didn't seem more interested in any of them.

"Well, I guess none of these ones were any better than the others? Is that what you're telling me?" he asked Sebastian, getting a quizzical look as a response.  He dug around in his bag and searched until he found a few more leaves and bits of moss from his last material expedition to try with next.  "Well how about we try it again with these bits I found.  I'll show you them one at a time, and you take a whiff and tell me if it's good or not, OK?"

[Benjamin Bookworm 0]

Sebastian started plodding along, taking a bit of a sniff at each of the bits offered, though a bit slower than usual since he was less enthusiastic about just checking things by scent and not eating them. He did as he was told though, and dutifully took in the scent of each item, seeming to mull it over for a while before moving on to the next one.

"All right Sebastian,  what did you think of those? Are any of the ingredients here any better quality than the others, or are you still trying to figure it out?" Ben asked as his familiar sat back on the crafting table deep in thought. Or just done with whatever he needed to do and was waiting for further instructions.  It wasn't really clear to Ben, so he gave his familiar a minute or two to figure things out. Rushing him wouldn't help out with the training they were working on at all.

[Benjamin Bookworm 0]

Sebastian took a few sniffs at the ingredients that Ben had laid out this time, taking his time to check them out one at a time.  Under his partner's watchful eyes, he picked out two different leaves and made some trilling noises at them until Ben put them off to the side.  Then chirped happily after he was finished up, waiting until Ben gave him a little treat afterwards. 

"Good boy Sebastian, looks like we have a few contenders for good materials to work with.  Or at least better than usual. The problem is... I don't know what else I can do with this knowledge." he told Sebastian, placing the ones he identified off to the side.  It looked like Sebastian was finally starting to get the hang of actually helping out around the potion stand.  Maybe this training would actually work out in the end.  Or at least show him some new ways for crafting.

Spoiler

Roll 135412
CD - 11, Success
2 Success total of 4

 

Edited February 2, 2020 by Benjamin Bookworm

[Benjamin Bookworm 0]

"All right Sebastian- we're going to have to keep on going today if we want to make sure what we've done so far will work out.  So we'll have to keep on going today!  Are you up for more buddy?" he asked, his outlook more excited than before with this kind of progress happening.  "So how about you and me try and figure out why these ingredients are better than the rest.  Um, maybe I should start some tests?  But that would mean I have to use them all up to do that, so I'd rather use some other method if at all possible."

Ben looked over the parts that Sebastian had picked, not really seeing any visible difference between any of them, and then opened up his menu to see the item description for each of them, hoping to find some differences.  And found that although the item descriptions were long, they didn't really help out a lot. 

[Benjamin Bookworm 0]

Each of his ingredients had some special description, but as far as he could tell they were all assigned randomly.  Nothing would give him a hint they were different than each other other than cosmetically.  "Yea, I guess if we go this route we'll just have to rely on your instincts on how to do things.  And I'd rather have something more tangible than that if at all possible." he said mostly to himself as he inspected what he had gotten. 

At any rate, running every single thing he harvested by Sebastian and seeing if he approved of it or not wouldn't help out much at all.  So he had to find something else that he could use- or get Sebastian to use.  "Maybe you could help make ingredients?  I mean, spiders make silk, and you're a bug too.  So maybe you can help make more things for me to mix up." he said to Sebastian, getting only a confused chirp in response.  It would be a long shot if he did that, but it was worth looking into since he had no other ideas right now. 

[Benjamin Bookworm 0]

Ben picked up Sebastian, looking at him carefully.  He didn't think that caterpillars were farmed for anything in the real world, though he was not an expert in anything like that.  In fact, he didn't really know a lot about bugs in general.  Still, it was a game and the rules might be different, which was why he was inspecting his familiar as closely as he could, looking for any signs that he was wrong.  "So... I don't think you've ever made anything stranger.  No weird threads or.... other things.  So if you can do anything just tell me.  Unless I have to squeeze it out of you, which means I'm giving up because I'm not doing that." he joked.

"So I guess if you do have any special qualities that can help with mixing, all I can do is encourage you to share them with me.  So... I believe in you!  Come on Sebastian!" he told his familiar, trying to pull something out of him.

[Benjamin Bookworm 0]

Sebastian was just sitting there, letting himself get picked up while making some confused sounding noises at Benjamin.  If he did have any special abilities, he wasn't going to be telling Ben.  Maybe if there was some certain circumstances it could trigger an ability, but that would take a lot of setup.

But, again, he had to try everything to get this training done properly.  So he put Sebastian down and pulled open one of his menus open to take a look at the list of different crafting methods he had, and anything that he could try that Sebastian might help out with.  "So we're going to go over this list one at a time, and if you have anything that you think you can help out with, just make some noise and we'll figure it out.  I'll see if there's anything that you can do to assist me, because you're my little wormy and always help out!" he cooed at the little friend, happy that he was working hard as well. 

[Benjamin Bookworm 0]

Sebastian seemed to be getting more enthusiastic about participating in the activities here, and quickly squirmed his way up to where Ben was working, and watched intently as he started going through his list. 

Sebastian just stared as he took out a vial for mixing potions, scrunching up his face and looking intently to no avail. 

His grinding pestle was brought out, but Sebastian just looked at it funny.  Which was expected.

By the time he brought out his crystal crafting equipment, Sebastian had just settled for laying next to where he was and watching along with his partner.

"OK, so that was a bust, but I think we're close to getting something.  So how about we finish up today, and then we give you some good treats afterwards.  I know you've earned it with all this work you've put in." he told Sebastian, giving him a smile and a scratch behind the antennae.  They were close. 

Spoiler

Roll 135476
CD - 7, Success
3 Success total of 4

 

Edited February 3, 2020 by Benjamin Bookworm