“So we basically have no plan and a whole zone to explore.” Lily stated as she ate an interesting leafy salsa wrap.
She was smiling as she said it. This basically put me with my questing on exactly the same page as her with her exploring around scanning things. I couldn’t say I felt much different.
You must gather your party before venturing forth.
“So Chen, you feel like some adventure?” I asked. The catgirl was doing a handstand while eating cereal with a spoon held in her tail. “Sorta, but I have guild business to deal with; so unless you have the credits to rent me out for extraction duty, imma have to decline.”
“Well as soon as we start picking credit up, we’ll know exactly who to request.” I told her, giving her my most charming smile. I guessed that extraction duty had to do with getting people out of dungeons.
I finished my own breakfast, which consisted of cupcakes. What, Pinkie makes delicious cupcakes. And got up, walking out of the library.
“I think Iron Hoof is going to be coming with us.” I told her. “I think he is excited to get some adventure.”
“Oh, thats nice I guess.” she said in the way you might say that a surprise dentist appointment is nice.
“Isn’t that the crazy RP dude?” Chen asked.
“Yeah” I responded. “Don’t worry, he should be cool, even if he does take things a little bit seriously.”
Why is Lily so mad?
We finished our breakfast and began heading out of town. “So where to first?” Lily asked.
“I figure we’ll head out to the strawberry fields.” I started singing.
“Let me take you down, cus I’m going to-”
she continued for me “-Strawberry Fields, nothing is real.”
We were still singing when we got to the edge of town. Iron Hoof was waiting for us and fell in step without even commenting on the song.
I decided I should get to know our new member. “So, do you just hang around Ponyville?” I asked.
Iron Hoof looked at me “Every day I go into one of the nearby areas for training, but I don’t tend to stray far.”
“Why would you train in a game with a merit based levelling system?” I asked. I supposed that seeking fights would increase the chances at gaining merit, but only slightly if it was simply going forth into a dangerous area and waiting for something to happen.
“Combat takes practice, I need not fight enemies simply for upgrades, I also do it to keep myself sharp, and to remind the nearby hostiles that ponies are not prey.” He explained.
We made our way into the immense strawberry patch. I took the time to sample a few berries on my way in. They were utterly delicious. I looked around the patch, hoping to chart a path through the strawberries to some landmark. I figured the Spire city would be a good place to start if I wanted to gather information.
I led us in the direction of the spire city, eating strawberries as I went. Iron hoof was being quiet as expected. Lily’s silence was less characteristic. We didn’t appear to be getting any closer to the Spires.
I took off, hoping to get a look at what lay ahead. All I got for my efforts was a dizzying sense of scale. The fields didn’t continue forever, but they might as well have for all the progress we were making at our current pace. I did a flip for fun then landed.
“We’re going nowhere fast.” I said, “as nice as the strawberries here are, I would rather not spend hours walking through them.”
Iron Hoof considered this, “I can travel very quickly if I power up my armor, but it would be exhaustive of abilities and quite possibly attract attention.”
“Attention from what? You’ve been around here, what are the threats?” I asked
“Well” he began, “The main threats are players, the fields are a popular places for duels and banditry alike. But this area also has its annoyances. Sometimes the annoyances work with the threats” I really didn’t like where this was going. “The annoyances would be the fairies, they make mirages, pull pranks, sabotage gear, and occasionally decide to give presents. Pinkie Pie loves them.” from his tone of voice I could tell that Iron hoof was far less enamoured of the creatures than the premier Pink Party producer of Ponyville.
Having dealt with my share of fae in D&D I shared his sentiments. I also came to terms with th e fact that I probably couldn’t make any plans to avoid them that would amount to more than teasing from their perspective.
“Well, if you don’t want to attract attention, I could simply do medium range dimension skipping.” Lily provided.
I shrugged “Sure, save some ability uses for emergencies later, but if I fly on ahead, you can jump to where I am every few minutes. Pick some berries for me while you’re here!”
I began to fly. I felt a little guilty for ditching the two of them with eachother, knowing as I did that they didn’t much like eachother. But they hadn’t exactly been the most fascinating of company for me yet today, and hopefully some time together would let them get to know eachother better. Besides, I like flying. A lot. I’m sure most humans given a whole new body with the ability to fly would feel the same. Goodbye to the not flying ways of the past. Any situation in which flying is a legitimate option, I think I will choose to do it.
Now, flying is, as I just described, a wonderful, sensational, amazing thing which I feel amazingly lucky to be able to do, no matter the body or world I do it in. It does not however, come without its drawbacks. Like any ability especially regeneration flying can hurt you. Flying is not supposed to hurt you, if you do it right it won’t hurt you. One form of doing it wrong is crashing. Normally not crashing isn’t hard to do; when there is an invisible cliff in front of you however, it is pretty much impossible not to do unless you expect it.
I made a mental checklist of signs that the Dungeon Master, or in this case world programmer likes to watch you squirm. Unexpected but intuitive side effects of ability use: check. Little to no starting wealth or connections: check. A pervasive favor based economy: check. Next thing I knew I would have an overblown bounty on my head, get one of those curses that other people mistake for a blessing, and wake up to petitioners who wanted me to save their kittens from trees.
I pounded my hoof against the invisible barrier and heard exactly what an adventurer dreads and expects in this situation: giggling. Turning my head I saw a tiny winged fairy. The fairy didn’t look so much like a little woman with wings as it did like a little blob of sunlight with wings. Looking at it directly hurt my eyes, even from a distance of over 100 feet.
It gave me a rude gesture. I pulled my sunglasses out of my saddlebags and calmly put them on. Then I did the most foolish thing possible under the circumstances. I chased the annoying little sprite down.
Now I know you are likely thinking what a dope, how obvious can baiting get? And were this to be an ordinary game in which I get some time to make such a decision and am not high on adrenaline and the annoying pain of having just crashed full speed into a wall, I am sure I wouldn’t have rated it too high either.
I poured a Ki point into sprint, and the chase was on. I dived toward the field, catching up with her in seconds. I smirked, but just as I was about to grab her she turned on a dime.The maneuver caught me by surprise. By the time I had banked to follow she had already gained almost 50 feet on me, and was still giggling in that annoying pitch only obtained by small children who think they have gotten the better of you with a prank or behavior.
More intent than ever on catching the silly thing, I raced after it. I felt some odd currents on the wind and felt the sensation of thing moving past my head as I chased the fairy down. I had it pinned down, I was flying directly above it. It tried to dart off to one side, but I brought my grippy hoof down towards it and.....
What I was grabbing didn’t feel like a fairy. No fairies are not that large, or that scaly. Nor are they tails. Maybe the sense of touch of a hoof is just too weird for me, because the thing I was grabbing definitely felt like a scaled tail.
I let go as my vision and hearing both wrenched sideways. I felt an awful sense of vertigo grab me as what I was seeing changed from being a fairy and a field of strawberries, into being a dragon and a rocky trail.
Oh and did I mention the dragon? Yup, DM liked watching me squirm.
The Dragon was about a pony and a half in size. While one could certainly do worse for a dragon, that still made it a whole pony larger than something I wanted to fight unarmed. It was red, sleek, shiny, and had very healthily sized wings and claws, with a long tail that ended in a chitinous looking black blade. It was the kinda design that I would ordinarily be able to admire for several minutes. A healthy majestic looking feral dragon, whose design leaves no doubt as to the predatory nature of its species.
So yeah, predatory, real, no time to admire.
I tried to jump back from the dragon, only to have it catch my wing with the tip of it’s tail. Magic or no magic, the loss of lift and control from my wing sent me tumbling backwards across the rocks.
The dragon pounced, trying to pin my hooves with its talons. But I had no intention of being that easy a meal. I deflected its left talon as it came down and kicked it as hard as I could in what would be the armpit, were it not a quadruped.
It turns out that knowing the name of a nerve cluster isn’t necessary to hit it. Any spot with a flexable limb coming out of it needs to be soft and full of nerves; no matter what kind of animal you are.
The dragon faceplanted to the right of my head, as the leg it expected to use for support went numb. I rolled out from under it and raised myself to all fours, preparing to block any swipe it took with a hoof.
Instead of taking a swipe, it chuckled. “Hey, you’re pretty quick.” He rose to a bipedal posture. “Am I to take it that means you meant for some sparring when you grabbed my tail? Or do you just like it rough?” Whoa...I’m pretty liberal when it comes to sex but. With a male dragon, in a random rocky trail on our first meeting? To be fair I had been thinking he would be sexy were he not trying to eat me. But...
He saw the confusion on my face and started laughing an enthusiastic, slightly mocking laugh. “Hahah, slow down there stallion. I was only joking, that kinda thing is more Argos’ gig than mine. I was actually hoping you’d be more into the sparring thing.”
Right, learning to take people less seriously. I had always been a person who took what people said at face value. I had to know a person for a while to understand that they were joking when they said things like that.
Rather than give in to the urge to collapse in embarrassment about my misunderstanding, I ignored it, held a hoof out to my new, totally not sexy at all dragon friend. “Fractal Cloudfront” I introduced. He held out a claw “Sparks.” He introduced in return.
“Actually I’ve got some friends around here somewhere, we were headed for the spire city when some fairy started messing with me. I actually grabbed your tail thinking it was the fairy.” I explained
“Ohhh, yeah good luck with that. You need luck, guile, or overwhelming magic to catch a fairy. When I start thinking I’m being messed with by their illusions I just close my eyes and blast randomly. They usually decide I’m boring and dangerous and leave.”
I think I like this guy.
“What happens when you aren’t seeing an illusion and do that?” I inquired.
“Oh a fight usually; I actually did it at the amber spire once! And lived to tell the tale!” He cleared his throat. “Beset on all sides by magi, the Draconic Adventurer Sparks spit fire and vengeanc........”
His tirade was interrupted by a crash as a rock behind Sparks exploded. I should have been surprised when Iron hoof came crashing through it as a small humanoid reptile landed from what was evidently an immense jump with a roll backwards. But somehow, I really wasn’t.
I was surprised when a purple miniature gundam suit flew by and started launching can lids at me. Not too surprised to duck mind you.
I tried to yell at everypony to calm down. But no noise came out of my mouth. Sparks launched himself at Iron hoof, while breathing fire. Iron hoof’s armor started glowing red as he brought his weight up and swung a forehoof to meet the charge. I watched Sparks shout as he was slugged, but no sound came out.
I stood on two legs and started waving to get everyones attention, hoping I could signal a ceasefire in charades.
For my effort I got tackled by an impossibly quick reptile with a sword. Buck it. I decided, this fight was going to happen whether I wanted it to or not, and in all likelihood we were going to get our flanks handed to us. But I might as well make a good showing of myself.
I hugged the kobold just as he had been about to stab me, catching him off guard, and robbing him of any room to manuever his blade. Then I took off. My body has a few advantages when it comes to taking off, as well as a few when it comes to grabbing things. As it turned out, I could use friction grip with a great deal more of my body than just my hooves, and I didn’t need my legs to be in any particular place in order to fly; especially given my freaky hovering powers.
The pink armor girl was aiming at me, but hesitated to shoot while I held the kobold who was so obviously her companion. This hesitation allowed for Lily to teleport onto her back. I didn’t plan for that! The sudden extra body dragged pinksuit down quickly, and lily disappeared just before she hit the ground.
Trusting my companions to keep their quarries busy, I focused on the kobold. He dropped his sword, caught it in his tail, then swiped at one of my hind legs. I let go of the leg, and he kicked me with it. Before he could rip into me more I dropped him. He landed on his feet, seemingly unfazed by the 20ft drop onto solid stone. Then jumped immediately back up to cut at me.
The fact that a three and a half foot tall lizard could jump that high just didn’t seem fair.
I dodged the swipe, only for the kobold to draw a set of weapons and begin throwing them. The first two missed, but the third sunk into my thigh, dangerously close to sensitive territory. It was obvious that I would have to either wait for him to run out of knives, run away, or go on the offensive.
The first was an uncertain occurance in a magical world. The second left him to mess with my non-flying friends.
I dived suddenly, watching the lizard redraw his sword, then spiralled to the left with a roll, poured a point into sprinting, dived just left of the lizard, then leveled out to strike with both forehooves.
The whole manuever took about a second, and managed to catch the kobold off guard enough that I clipped him with a hoof. I could tell from his reaction that this was better than most melee attacks would do against him.
I looped around for another pass, but this time he was ready for me. The sword sunk into my shoulder painfully as he ducked and sliced. I passed right over him, thrown off course by the pain and loss of wingpower.
Eating dirt sucks.
He gestured to his throat then mouthed
‘Why can’t I talk? Get whoever is silencing us to quit it’
I shrugged ‘Fairies!’ I mouthed back. He chuckled a little. Then pointed to himself and the armor girl chasing Lily around, then at me and Iron Hoof and Sparks ripping into eachother.
I smiled and got up. Walking with two injured legs sucked. I pulled the knife out of my thigh, then regenerated myself, and made my way towards the ongoing brawl.
Both Sparks and Iron Hoof were messed up. They were silently panting for breath, each had only one operational eye, and looked like hell. Iron Hoofs armor looked like it was burned into his skin, blood was running out of his left shoulder, and he had a latticework of clawmarks on his face. Sparks meanwhile had one wing bent out of shape, his face looked like it had been put through a meat tenderizer, and a nasty looking gash on his chest was leaking blood like a tap.
I really hoped miss mecha suit was a medic.
Wasting no time I jumped between the two and shook my head at them in turn. I pantomimed a fairy, then zipping my lips, then pulled them both into a very gentle hug with my wings. I hoped they got the message.
They did. The lot of us gathered around. The girl in the mecha suit started applying some kind of gel to Sparks’ wounds, and upon some non-vocal persuasion on the kobolds part, began doing so to Iron Hoof as well, before gesturing that she was running low.
The kobold made the peace sign, then gestured to us, then pointed to the spires in the distance. I nodded.
Iron Hoof approached Sparks and offered a hoof. The two shook while smiling at eachother like best friends. I wasn’t about to complain, but it seemed I was travelling with two people for whom beating the snot out of each other was a preferred method of introduction.
Lily was watching them like they were absolutely insane. I was meanwhile watching their wounds close unnaturally quickly. Apparently mecha girl had medi-gel.
We began walking, and I immediately learned that the kobold didn’t require words to attempt to hit to hit on people. He spent pretty much the entire walk to the city smiling at Lily, making dramatic gestures and jumping around playfully, and making certain to brush her legs with his tail as often as possible.
I was completely uncertain whether to be annoyed at his lack of subtlety, or impressed at how effortless everything he did looked.
Given that he had just handed my flank to me in a fight. My relief over him being my friend instead of my enemy prevented me from involving myself. Instead I hung with Sparks and Iron Hoof. Sparks spent the entire trip switching between sizing us up, and blowing fire rings into the air. Iron Hoof spent the entire trip doing perimeter checks.
We were in a rocky valley, the strawberry fields behind us, the road to the spires ahead of us. Apparently the road we were on was a less popular one, because we only ran into one other person headed to the city. It was a hooded man riding an electric cart. I paid him no mind, other than to wave.
A few minutes out of the city we got our voices back.
“What say we make camp?” the kobold said. “The city is an eventful place, we have comfy tents, and I’ve been playing for a while tonight. We can get to know eachother a bit in the morning.”
The party quickly agreed. Sparks and group pulled out tents from their respective inventories which quickly set themselves up. “Would the lovely lady like to share my tent.” The kobold asked Lily with a bow.
“...um” Lily responded uncertainly.
“Actually I’ll share with you.” I put in, knowing Lily’s shyness.
“Okay, I suppose I’d love to get to know you too” The kobold said, in the absolute most suggestive way possible. “After all, we do seem to be the respective party diplomats. I have many exciting diplomatic topics to share with you in the morning.” I eyed the kobold appraisingly. He was half my size, had a truly obscene number of weapons strapped to him in various places. His scales were a dark green, that faded to lighter green on his stomach. Looking down from there I realized that I had no actual way of determining that the kobold was male. The voice was androgynous enough, and being a reptile, it didn’t have any external reproductive equipment.
I shrugged and said “We’ll see about that in the morning.” Then walked into the tent.
It was bigger on the inside. I suppose I should have expected that, this world being what it is, but it really caught me by surprise. There was a king sized bed in the room. There was also a fully stocked bar. What does one of these tents cost I wonder?
The kobold walked in behind me, closed the tent door, then walked over to the bar and poured an amber coloured drink. “Argos, by the way.” he said. “Since you were wondering.”
So I got the gender right.
“Goodnight Argos, I’ll see you in the morning.”
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
I appeared back in the lobby. “Congratulations, you have leveled up! Reason: not being beaten, swept up, or used by a higher level party.” The lobby entity announced. Pink Streamers launched from the walls. “I thought you would like some streamers and balloons to celebrate; like the pink one would have done!”
I think the Greeter is stalking us!
“Have you been watching me play?” I asked.
“Oh yes, you are fairly enjoyable to watch. Are you going to have sex with Argos?”
Creepy! “Um, no, no I am not; but on the off chance that I am having sex with anyone, could you... yaknow, not watch.”
The lobby entity sighed, “For you, I could not watch. Argos will be ever so disappointed that he can’t cross pony off his list.”
“He has a list?” I asked.
“Yup.” she responded.
We get all the cool friends don’t we.
“Yup, you’re even friends with Meridan and Pinkie Pie. You rebel you!” The entity responded.
“Greeter, did you just read my mind.” I asked, seriously beginning to get creeped out.
“Would you believe it if I told you that I simply guessed the most logical course of thought to match your facial expression and line of questioning? Speaking of which, I’m a disembodied greeting program, watching people is perfectly natural for me, and shouldn’t disturb you.” She said.
She is reading my mind.
That would officially be stowed away in my mental baggage for later use, alongside the fact that liking Pinkie somehow made me a rebel. I looked at the floating level chart. I need offensive ability. I chose an ability. Then, to mix things up, walked through the red door.
Third Level- Monk of the Inner Circle- abilities learned: Gravity Strike
Title: Pony Adventurer. Location: Spire Rock
Party members: Azure Lily, Iron Hoof - Argos, Jenna, Sparks