The tavern sat lit by tableside candles, and small torches hung upon the wall. Several players sat about, conversing with each other over potential farming areas. Two players, in particular, sat secluded in a far corner. Since Ruby Aurora was a new player, the noble knight Alistair William promised he'd assist her in leveling up. If he knew just how much of a scrub she was, he might have reconsidered.
“So, I can use what's known as Elemental Magic right now?” Ruby said, scanning through her character menu for the tenth time. Alistair nodded, seeing that she was finally understanding her class.
“Yes. At your current level, the most you can expect to do is fire off a few blasts of like fire or ice or what-not.” The idea of what-not being fired at monsters brought various ideas to Ruby’s head, sparking a slightly concerning smile on her face. “Okay. Now that we’ve got that out of the way, anything else you'd like to know?” Ruby pondered the thought for a moment, glancing back to Alistair.
“As a matter of fact, just how do I even cast this magic?” Ruby’s question completely blindsided him, causing him to almost drop his mug of cinder and choke on what he had tried to drink. It wasn't quite the question itself that caught him off guard since Ruby had no idea how to play until a bit ago. It was the way she just spoke. There was a hint of childish frustration in her voice, making him question just how young this new player was.
“Actually, the spells you can cast should be directly linked to your thoughts.” The dumbfounded look on Ruby’s face told him he needed to explain things a little better. Alistair cleared his throat, taking a quick sip of his cider. “That means all you really have to do is think about the spell you want to cast, and the game’s system should take care of the rest. There is a short casting time for most spells. It's always a good idea to keep that in mind, so you don't get caught off guard while casting.”
“Oh. Okay. That doesn't sound too difficult.” Alistair nodded, unaware that Ruby was quietly muttering to herself.
“That being said, I think it's about time you see for yourself how your magic work…” Alistair’s sentence, along with the table and his cider, was abruptly torched. While he was talking, Ruby had been whispering the incantation to the first spell on her list, aptly named Blaze. Between the scorched look of Alistair’s face, and the dumbfounded look of concern on Ruby’s, it was hard to tell who was caught off guard more. To their surprise, nopony else at the tavern seemed to care about the small embers burning off in the corner. “Okay… Note to self. Explain to new player not to cast spells indoors, at least not near allies.”
Ruby hung her head in shame, holding her staff in her lap. “Sorry, Alistair. I didn't think I could cast in town. At... At least I didn't cause any damage.” He brushed the soot and ash off his face and armor, trying so hard not to break into laughter. A small piece of his hair still burned, though. “Umm, Alistair... Your hair is burning.” Before Alistair could register what Ruby had said, she leaned in, licking the tips of her fingers, and extinguished the small flame. She pulled away, locking her gaze mere inches from Alistair's face. His vermilion eyes looked fantastic close-up. Had his eyes always looked this way?
“Umm, Ruby. Ruuuuby? Ruby!” Alistair raised his voice sharply, whipping Ruby back to reality. “You okay there?”
“Y-yeah. I'm good.” Ruby pulled away, resting fully in her chair again. “Sorry. Don't know what came over me.”
Alistair chuckled, thinking he knew what happened. “That, my dear friend, is what's called Player Lag. It happens from time to time when playing online games, especially if your network connection bugs out.” An awkward stretch of silence consumed the two of them.
Trying to bring the conversation back on track, Ruby spoke up, “So… Where are we going to ‘train’?” She hoped 'train' was the right word.
“Yeah. Sorry about that.” Alistair stood up from his chair, prompting Ruby to do the same. “Follow me. I know where you can get some field training.” Alistair made for the tavern door, leading Ruby behind him. Either of them noticed the four sets of eyes following them as they left.
Within minutes, the two of them stood at the main gate of the town. “Before we leave, we might want to party up.” Alistair quickly explained himself before Ruby could look confused. He swiped his hand down, opening the Player Menu. After pushing a few options, a text box appeared in front of Ruby.
The Player Named Alistair William has invited you to a party.
Accept Dencline
“Use your finger to accept the invite.” Ruby obliged and the text box vanished. A new display appeared at the top left of her vision under her character name.
Ruby Aurora Lv 1
Hp: 250/250 Magic: 290/300
Alistair William Lv 3
Hp: 650/650 Magic: 260/260
“See? Now we can keep an eye on each other.” The puzzled look of amazement on Ruby’s face prompted for Alistair to explain. “Whenever you and any other players are in a party, all of you can see where the other members are. Also, as you can see, we can both see each other’s health and magic. Now, if you are ever low on health, I can see and come help you.”
“This game just keeps getting more and more complex… I like it, and the party find is confusing. Anyway, lead the way party leader.” That title, especially coming from Ruby, did nothing to lessen Alistair’s swelling ego as he gave a childish grin, unsheathed his sword, and pointed it towards the open fields around the town.
“Onward party! There are monsters to slay and loot to gather!” He started marching out of town, his sword arm still extended to the sky.
The fields surrounding the town were massive, to Ruby at least. Various creatures seemed to pop into existence as she walked around. “Ruby.” Her attention fell on Alistair. “This is Trotona Range. It surrounds the starting town and goes on for some time. There are more challenging monsters the farther out you go. For now, we will be sticking close to town. Come now. There’s a good-sized spawn for some leveled mobs.” Marching onward, Ruby couldn't help but keep gazing at how realistic and vast the field was. She could even feel the wind and grass beneath her. She had read over the information about how the headset worked. Being able to transfer virtual sensory data to a pony’s brain to allow for near-realistic sensations, but none of that did it justice.
It didn't take long for Alistair to lead Ruby to the small canyon ridge that served as a tremendous low-level hunting ground. Numerous boars roamed the area, minding their own business. “Those boars are the mobs we’re after.” A random thought now crossed Alistair’s mind. Something that should be asked about. “You don't have a problem ‘hurting’ creatures that resemble animals do you?” His attention turned to Ruby, expecting some sort of reasonable answer. What he saw instead was his dear party member pointing her staff outward towards one of the boars and quickly releasing a volley of Firebolts. He just stared at her purely dumbfounded.
“Sorry. Did you say something, Alistair?” Ruby looked at him, wondering if she did something wrong.
“N-no. No. You're good.” The degree of calmness in her actions scared him. That was the calmness of a gamer. Somepony who had played games far more severe. The idea that Ruby might be as serious of a player as he was, and a mare, made him even more interested in learning just who she was IRL. That, however, would need to wait as Ruby’s magic was not enough to kill the boar, who was now charging at her. It was adequately introduced to Alistair’s shield as he slammed it down in front of Ruby and braced for the impact. The boar slammed into the shield, sliding Alistair back and bounding itself backward a bit. The boar’s short time of confusion wasn't wasted as a sword stab brought it down. It fell, fizzled a bit, and faded, awarding both Alistair and Ruby with a little experience. “Not bad... For a beginner. Keep that up, and you’ll get somewhere in this game.”
“Thanks. I just did what felt natural to do.”
Natural. Yeah. There was nothing natural about that three-shot spell burst.
Their focus was brought forward by the loud squeals of the boars as they moved around. They met gazes and smirked. “Come now, Ruby. These boars aren’t going to defeat themselves.” Ruby nodded, raising her staff once more. Firing several more Firebolts at the boars, she drew them in one-by-one towards Alistair ’s sword.
It took a while, but eventually, all of the boars in the area were defeated and granted both of them loads of experience. Ruby slumped against a rock, surprised by how exhausted she felt just playing a video game. “That... Was a lot of them.” Her eyes traced over to Alistair, who, much like the want-to-be cool guy he wanted to be, stood tall and proud in the middle of the boars’ spawn area. He turned on his heels and marched over to Ruby.
“You did great for your first time Ms. Aurora. Your magics helped out a lot in this fight. And with how many boars we both slayed, you should have leveled up.”
“Oh, sweet!” Ruby actually sounded excited by the news. “How would I check?”
“You remember where your Character Stats are?” She nodded, opening her menu. “Character Progression should right next to it.”
“Found it!” Ruby scanned down the various options at her disposal for her level up. “Now let's see... Intelligence would boost my Magical Power and increase my total Magic. That would be best in my mind. Wouldn’t hurt to focus most of my points into that.” It was at that moment her eyes fell on the tag of the following page. “SubClasses?” Ruby scrolled over to it, completely taken back by how numerous the Mage’s SubClasses were.
Spell Sword
Stat Focus: Strength, Intelligence Level Requirement: 15
Elemental Specialist
Stat Focus: Intelligence Level Requirement: 15
Summoner
Stat Focus: Intelligence Level Requirement: 35
Must have taken no SubClass to take Summoner
Elemental Master
Stat Focus: Intelligence Level Requirement: 35
Must have taken Elemental Specialist at Lv15
Additional SubClasses Info Locked
Character does not meet Special Requirements
The Elemental Specialist SubClass sounded interesting. To have a vast number of large spells to throw at enemies made the little inner devil inside her excited. At the same time Summoner didn’t sound too bad either. Calling forth massive otherworldly creatures to fight for you. But Summoner would take time to reach, and being unable to pick a SubClass until Level 35 would mean Ruby would be stuck with whatever spells her base class gave her. Granted most of them would scale to her Intelligence, making them stronger, it wasn’t much scaling so she would have to rely on Alistair to defend her. That didn’t sound fair, even though something told her, he would defend her without her even asking him. Anyway, she didn’t need to make her choice now. Ruby swiped back to her Character Progression and finished applying her new level. As soon as she finished, a prompt about the Daily Spin Reward appeared in front of her. “Alistair . What’s this about a Daily Spin?”
“Oh, that? It's an item spinner. Every day you can spin it for free. Whatever the arrow lands on, you get. It's actually an excellent way of getting high-level stuff early on. No matter what it lands on, though, it’ll be beneficial in one way or another.” The Daily Spin was actually where Alistair got his sword and shield, both of which were rather rare drops. He leaned against the rock, watching Ruby spin for her reward. In the back of his head, he didn’t expect her to get anything of significant worth. However, the Princess of Luck blessed Ruby at that moment.
“Umm… Alistair ..? What’s a Master Spell Scroll?” He literally almost choked and fell forward.
“Excuse me as I throw my foot down my throat.”
“What?”
“Nothing... That is beyond rare. I think like only two players ever got one of those, even by normal means. In the hands of a magic caster, it grants them a random spell from their class as a one-time cast. The item is so powerful, it has already been banned from open PvP servers. Just the scroll itself could fetch a heavy amount of gold. There’s a lot of players who would go to any lengths to get one.”
“Which is the sole reason why the pretty lady should just hand it over now.” Both Ruby and Alistair ’s attention jumped to the figures now gathered around the entrance to the rocky canyon. Two, three, four players blocked the only way out of the area. They all approached, making sure not to make any openings in their formation to allow escape. One of the central players spoke, being the one who spoke before. “Let's see what we have here.” He looked over both of their levels. “A Level 4 sword and board Warrior, and a Level 3 Mage. Well, ain’t this our lucky day, boys? Now. Hand over the Master Spell Scroll. Otherwise, you’re going to end up losing more than just that scroll.” Ruby looked confused by his statement. “Oh.. Did you, friend, here not explain how duels work in Everfree? In the normal servers, the player who loses a fight against another player, or in this case a party, loses an item, at the winner's choice. That means, when we beat you two, you both are going to lose four items. And to be honest, that sword and shield also look pretty nice.” Alistair was no longer in the mood to listen. He drew his sword and took a battle stance, to the amusement of the four players.
“Ruby. Get out of here. It's not worth it to take them on. I can buy you time. Just get back to town. There they can’t mess with you.” He had no chance of beating them. They knew that. He knew that. But if it meant keeping them off of Ruby, he was more than willing to lose his rare gear. “Go now!.” He shouted at Ruby, quickly jolting her to retreat. She turned and ran towards where the boars' main spawn was, which happened to be at the base of a sheer rock wall. Putting her staff on her back, she climbed the rocks towards the top. Every moment that past that was filled with the loud clashing of steel against steel and magical explosions. Even Ruby knew Alistair wasn’t going to hold out for long, let alone long enough for her to make a getaway. That fact irritated her. Why was it that in every game the two of them played, he always ended up holding back the enemies while she got away? Why was it that his character always lost it's life defending her? Her irritation with that fact grew. Her anger towards those players grew. Ruby quickly couldn't stand it any longer. If those jerks wanted the scroll so severely, then she was going to give it to them.
She dropped from the wall, suffering mild fall damage. She whipped out her staff and the scroll, holding each in one hand. Ruby opened the item prompt for the Master Spell Scroll, triggering its effect. It glowed the text on it, changing before her eyes. The Master Spell Scroll suddenly changed to a Calamity Flame scroll. She read over the stats on the spell quickly, her focus broke by the sudden shout from Alistair as his shield went flying off, slamming into the nearby rock wall. Letting the moment get to her, Ruby began reciting the spell’s incantation, not caring that she was pretty much shouting it.
The four players toying with Alistair, and even Alistair himself, all looked back to stare at Ruby. “What are you… Oh.” Alistair, realizing before the other players what she was doing, shoved the player attacking him away, grabbing his shield, and retreated back to her.
“Boys! The caster is making a move. Strike before she has time to finish chanting!” They all nodded, charging forward. This time, however, Alistair was ready for them. Each of their strikes were deflected as he kept the fight to a one-on-one. Even with his high defensive stance, the damage was starting to stack up. It wouldn’t be long before they overcame his shielding and struck hard.
“Anytime, Ruby!” His backside was starting to get toasted, a small byproduct of the spell’s chanting. “Okay, then. Guess you can handle yourself…” He kept the players off as long as he could, quickly taking a heavy blow. Seeing their opportunity, the four players pushed past Alistair and going for an attack on Ruby. Her spell went off, literally cutting things close to the chest.
“... I beseech you now. Calamity Flame!” The spell scroll in her hand faded, and harsh flames burst outward from Ruby, engulfing the four players. It spread out, scorching the rocks, as well as the grassland above them. Everything with a health bar, with the thankful exception of Alistair, were quickly reduced to ash.
As the flames subsided, four yellowish orbs floated about where the four players once were. “Ruby. Next time… Try not to cut things so close.” She just grinned at him, offering a hand to help him up. Alistair got up, brushing the dirt, dust, and scorch off his armor. “We should get back to town. Those four are likely to come back with more friends. Also, I think it's getting late IRL. We can get back to town and log out for the night. Sound like a plan, Ruby?” The fact it was getting late now bothered her. She only planned on playing this game for a few hours, not most of the day.
“Yeah. Let's get back to town and log out. I think I’ve had enough excitement for one day, at least.”
“One day? You just wiped four players out with a single Lv 10 spell. I think I’ve had enough excitement for at least a week.” That got a good laugh out of both of them. Their laughter came to a halt when they saw just how far that Lv 10 spell reached. The grassland around the top of the canyon was still on fire, slowly spreading outwards. Alistair just looked at Ruby, placing his hand on her shoulder. “Ruby. You really need to stop starting fires.” And just like that, their laughter returned. They got back to town without any problems, opting to log out at the Tavern where their prior discussion was. “So…” Alistair got Ruby’s attention. “... Today was fun.” Another stretch of silence broke out, only being broken by Ruby herself.
“Same time tomorrow?” The words slipped out before her head could think about it. This was supposed to be a one-time play, and here she was, suggesting that they play together again. Too late to turn back now.
“Sure.” It seemed like Alistair wanted to ask another question, but didn’t. “I’ll see you tomorrow, Ruby Aurora.”
“Same to you, Sir Alistair William.”
The two of them logged out. Sweetie Belle pulled the headgear off her with her hoof. She let out a sigh, her eyes glued to the ceiling. “Sweet Celestia. I’m hooked on this damn game.” Sweetie chuckled. “Well... Tomorrow is another day. And Ruby Aurora wouldn’t dream of missing out.”