Neverness To Everness Beginner Guide: Surviving Hethereau
If your first baBefore you completely ruin your account by spreading your upgrade materials across a dozen weak characters, you need to understand the underlying math governing this massive city.
Neverness to Everness throws an overwhelming amount of systems at you the second you finish the prologue. You are trying to balance action combat, open world exploration, and a full blown real estate simulator all at once. It is incredibly easy to make a fatal mistake early on that leaves your combat roster permanently underpowered while your businesses go bankrupt. I am going to walk you through the exact progression traps you need to avoid and how to build a starting account that actually functions.
Surviving the Level Cap Traps
The game uses a tiered leveling system that actively punishes you if you stop paying attention to your quest log.
Your baseline account progression is tracked through your Hunter Level. Almost every single game mode, story chapter, and domain is locked behind this specific number. You increase it by clearing quests, spending stamina, and uncovering anomalies in the wild. However, your Hunter Level cannot scale infinitely on its own. It is strictly hard capped by a secondary system called your Appraisal Level.
Once you hit Hunter Level 20, 40, and 50, the game abruptly halts your progress. You must complete a highly specific promotion quest to increase your Appraisal Level. If you ignore this quest and keep grinding activities, your experience overcaps and the game brutally slashes your incoming experience down to a tenth of its original value. Before you waste hours grinding for a fraction of the reward, clear your promotion quests the second they appear on your tracker.
Be warned that increasing your Appraisal Level also buffs every single enemy in the open world. If you find yourself getting instantly flattened by random mobs after hitting Appraisal Level 3, the game allows you to manually lower the difficulty by one tier. Just keep in mind that this function triggers a strict 24 hour cooldown before you can revert it.
Managing Your Double Stamina Economy
You do not have a single stamina bar to manage. The developers split your daily energy into two completely separate economies, and ignoring either one will permanently stall your progress.
Knowing When to Stop
You can easily burn yourself out repeating this 20-minute loop for days on end. You need to establish a realistic stopping point.
If your initial pulls hand you two S-Rank characters of any kind, that is generally a fantastic place to stop. Because the game eventually guarantees you an S-Rank from pity and hands you a free selector, starting with two solid units practically ensures a full, high-end roster. If you are determined to min-max, do not stop until you see either Daffodill or Jiuyuan on your screen. Snagging either of those two gives your account the mathematical advantage necessary to crush the endgame content without breaking a sweat.
If you want to maximize your account power, you absolutely cannot ignore the Tycoon side of the game. Pushing your City Tycoon level unlocks massive combat rewards. By reaching Tycoon level 18, which realistically takes about two days of casual play, you unlock Chiz. She is one of the absolute strongest Cosmos DPS characters currently available in the game. Pushing slightly further to level 21 hands you her best in slot weapon for free. Open your cafe and start running deliveries the second the game allows you to.
The Truth About the Reroll Grind
Unless you are a hardcore competitive player, spending your first day constantly wiping your account is a massive waste of your time.
Neverness to Everness features a highly forgiving banner system. The limited banner character, Nanally, is guaranteed at pity. There is zero risk of losing a coin flip to a standard character here. On top of that safety net, the game throws two random S-Rank standard characters at you, provides an S-Rank selector ticket, and hands out six free characters just for playing the campaign.
If you are absolutely desperate to reroll your account, you should only be targeting Jiuyuan or Daffodill. Jiuyuan is the ultimate support unit for Nanally, while Daffodill is the undisputed queen of Break Damage. If you are not hunting those two specific units, stick with your starting roster and focus on clearing the story.
Also check out: Neverness To Everness Reroll Guide: Best S-Rank Targets
Building a Functional Early Team
Button mashing will only get you through the tutorial section. To survive the mid game, you have to understand the Esper Cycle.
Combat revolves around filling your Cycle Rate meter and swapping characters to trigger massive elemental reactions. You also need to pay close attention to the enemy Break Meter. Depleting this white bar stuns the target and leaves them completely vulnerable to your highest burst damage abilities.
Instead of burning your Character Pixels farming heavily randomized Artifacts early on, invest everything you have into guaranteed power spikes. Level up your main carry first, push their weapon levels to the cap, and max out their skills. Leave the artifact grind for the endgame.
Crafting the Perfect Nanally Team
If you pulled Nanally from the limited banner, you have a few powerful options for building around her. She pairs flawlessly with Jiuyuan for heavy Anima synergy. If you want to trigger the Blossom reaction, slot in a Cosmos character like Zero.
For the absolute strongest setup, you want to chase the Hexed reaction by mixing Anima with Incantation. This specific build requires tracking down Sakiri. If the gacha system refuses to give you Sakiri or Jiuyuan, you can pivot to a pure Discord team using Adler, Daffodill, and Haniel to cover your tank, DPS, and support roles perfectly.
Alternative Starter Teams
If you decide to skip the limited banner entirely, you can easily build around the free units the game hands you. Zero is a Cosmos character who fills the Esper Meter instantly, making early reactions incredibly simple to execute. Pair Zero with Mint and Adler for an easy Blossom and Hexed reaction starter team.
When you unlock Chiz from your Tycoon progression, you can transition to a heavy Cosmos DPS setup. Because Chiz actively buffs the Charged reaction, you want to surround her with Lakshana and Anima supports like Hathor and Jiuyuan to maximize her output. Finally, if you log in for three consecutive days, you receive Aurelia for free. She is a Psyche element damage dealer who thrives on the Stain reaction. Pair her with Lakshana characters like Hathor or Skia to heavily exploit enemy vulnerabilities.
Navigating the Open World
Hethereau is massive, and running everywhere on foot is a fantastic way to waste your gaming session.
You will eventually unlock motorcycles, cars, and even a train system to navigate the districts. Your top exploration priority should be locating every ReroRero Phone Booth to fully unlock your fast travel network. To clear the fog of war off your map, you must track down the towering Wertheimer Tower in each specific region.
While you are exploring the streets, keep an eye out for hidden Oracle Stones. You can drop these items off at the Witch's House in exchange for premium currency and Hunter experience. Checking in with the Witch daily also grants you a temporary combat buff and a treasure hunt location, which keeps your account progression moving forward even when you run completely out of stamina.
