A loud scream rouses me from my sleep, and I look over to Xavier since screams are usually what we hear when he brings somebody home. Xavier looks at me and shrugs before turning and pointing to Ed.
The first thing I notice about Ed is that he's drenched in sweat. Considering the fact that the Gala was supposed to be celebrating New Years, and it's insanely cold down in Ponyville, just the fact that he was sweating in his sleep was clue enough he had a nightmare.
"Oi Ed," Will says, still in his sleeping pose. "Something wrong?"
"Not entirely, just a nightmare is all." Ed has been breathing heavily, at a worrying pace no less, since he woke up. Realizing this, I get up off the bed and walk to the coffee machine.
"No point in that," Ed says, taking a gulp and finally calming himself enough to breathe through his nose. "but thanks for your concern."
I shrug and walk back to the bed, almost tripping on Xavier's leg under his blanket before stumbling onto the mattress I call my bed.
"God dammit Xavier..." I say as I lift my head up and glare at him. Tonya sits up behind him and I'm surprised to see that she hasn't been ravaged by the monster that supposedly lies dormant within Xavier. I don't even know what that's supposed to mean but that's what Xavier tells me, and when you're stuck in a video game where your only option for survival is to not die then I guess most everything is believable right?
"I like trains..." Xavier's voice fills the air right before the train stops right in front of us to take us to the old castle. How it is that the old castle has a train station is beyond my comprehension, but most people just attribute it to video game logic.
The doors open on the train, and I hand the conductor that steps out of said door the five bits it costs to go to the old castle. The rest of my friends do the same and we sit in the car nearest to the dinner car in case we get hungry, which is often in this world.
I look to Ed, who's been slowly ostracizing himself from us, and watch as he fiddles with some kind of potion in his hand. Curious as to what the potion does I scoot closer to him and make it evident that I'm staring at it.
"What's in there?" I ask, pointing to the vial of liquid.
"They were passing out XP boosters at the gala. Apparently it doubles the XP earned form fighting for about an hour." He raises it to his eyes and swirls the liquid around, as if he were debating whether or not he should use it now or later.
I open my inventory to make sure I got one, and find it with ease in a new section of my inventory.
"When did they add a boosters section in the inventory?" I ask, looking around to everyone else. Will speaks before I have time to look in anybody's direction.
"They had an update last night while everybody was either at the gala or sleeping in their hotel room. They added the new inventory section, a PVP specific area, and a raid boss in the Everfree." I can feel my eyes gleam with excitement as Will mentions a raid boss being implemented into the game. Back when we couldn't afford the VR headset, not that any of the VR games back then were interesting, we would stay up nights at a time farming raid bosses in Borderlands and Eden Eternal, the aforementioned MMO in which Ed would hog all the items, for the rarest loot around. Those days were great.
"But," Will says, "our first priority is finding Steven." This cuts my nostalgia buzz as I realize how long finding Steven is gonna take. We'll be way too over leveled for the raid boss by the time we find Steven.
The train's whistle cuts our conversation short as I feel it's wheels comes to a stop. and the doors open to reveal the large stone door that leads to our info team's base of operations and the hub for anybody who normally stays in the Everfree. Will immediately walks over to Vax and catches up on the information they've received since Xavier's "suggestion". I say that with the biggest air quotes possible, as we all know Xavier was just messing with all of us when he said Despair was a straight up G.
I stop at one of the railing blocking off a small stage and watch as a couple of our spies get briefed on their next info snatching mission. Now that we know about the Neverland guild, we don't wanna take any chances. So we're sending in any thieves/spies on reconnaissance missions to see what they're preparing for or planning to do, if anything.
As I observe the group of players, one stands out among the rest. The only character in the group whose reached level fifteen, which gives you a class upgrade once you reach that level, who didn't upgrade to a spy stands at the back. I'm not sure if it's one of the dye packs, or he used the custom paint option and gave himself fur the color of, well, basically army camo. His shaggy brown hair seeming rather misplaced among the rest of his fur.
Besides the unusual choice of colors, the thing that really stands out is the fact that he's joking around with some other player to his left. As expected he gets called out by Black Star, who's giving the briefing, and I decide to butt in.
"Hold up B.S," I say, calling Black Star by his entertaining nickname "I'll take him off of your hands for a bit." B.S. just gives me a confused glance, before tossing his hand in the thief's direction.
"You want this guy? By all means take him. I don't think I could hear another bad pun without having to snap something in half."
I wave the thief over to me, and look at his name tag before having to deal with Will's skepticism about if we should bring him.
Incognito
Thief: LVL 15
HP: 2,347/2,347
MP:476
Clelestial Crusaders
No doubt Will's gonna think a thief who has a higher level than all of us would be a good idea. I turn and walk towards Will, with Incognito following in suite, and tap his shoulder to get his attention.
"Ya think adding this guy to our group for the time being would be beneficial?" I point my thumb behind me to Incognito once Will turns around. He moves his head so he can see Incognito clearly, and gives a whistle of amazement before nodding his head and sending Incognito and invite.
Within seconds his HP and MP are displayed under Tonya and I watch Xavier raise his eyebrows at the sudden new member in our party. He turns to us and I walk over to explain everything. Before I get my chance though, Will sends a message into the party chat telling us to regroup on him. I do as I'm told and listen intently as Will gives a briefing.
"As we know, an update went live while everybody was at the Gala or sleeping. One of the things added in the update was a PVP specific area, since this entire game is a PVE instance, save for the dungeons. This gives a considerable amount of XP for the victors. Which has gotten the attention of many players. Knowing Steven's tendencies when we played normal MMO games, he's gonna be there.
"All of us, save for Incognito over here, are going to go there and see if we can find Steven." Everybody's eyes shift to Incognito in confusion. We put him in the group for the specific task of helping us in this. "Incognito on the other hand," Will says, "will leave our group and go undercover into the Neverland guild."
Our stares concentrate on Incognito even more, knowing that he's probably gonna be going through hell just to help us learn more about the guild that could spring on us at any time. Will motions us to get up, which we do, and starts walking towards the train with us following behind to get to what has been dubbed "the Badlands."
As my shoe touches the compacted sand of the desert, I notice how much hotter this area is compared to the rest of the places we've seen. The temptation to remove my armor increases ten fold as I wait for everybody else to get off of the train.
"Damn," Will says as he puts his hand over his eyes to see more clearly, "it feels like we just stepped into an oven."
"Better than a meat locker." Xavier comments. I nod and turn as Will passes me and motions us to follow him.
Within seconds the PVP area comes into view, and I can see the outlines of two people clashing swords from inside a cage as Will stops us.
"Alright," He says as he turns around, "Incognito, leave the guild and see if you can find a member of Neverland. Jake, try to find a different member and see if you can analyze their fighting style. If they're being trained like a military then knowing how one fights could easily lead to an effective counter attack on an entire platoon. Xavier and Ed will go looking for Steven while I map out the battlefields. Apparently this place also has a guild war area and I intend to find it and figure out how it works."
Before I have time to respond, everybody has split up to do what they were told, and the notification of Incognito's temporary leave has passed through the guild chat, followed by a few members panicking as what I assume was their friend leaving the guild for an unknown reason.
DougDoll:Wait why did Incog just leave?
xXSwagster69Xx:I dnno lol #yoloblazetraitor
DougDoll:Why hasn't this guy been kicked from the guild?
xXSwagster69Xx:Cuz I rek noobz
I immediately regret my decision and pray that there's still hope for humanity.
Regardless of the brain cell killing guild chat, I scope out the crowd to see if there're any members of Neverland here, and see a large amount of them clumped around the entrance of the cage where the players fight. I look at the two fighters in the cage and witness as another member of Neverland flaunts his skills, easily overpowering his hunter opponent.
The Neverland member is a thief who has very good skill with his weapons. I watch as the thief flips away from his opponent, and rushes him again as he lands. He turns clockwise and swings his dagger at an angle where it will pierce his neck if he's caught off guard. The hunter raises his machete and his block his successful, albeit sloppy, and stumbles as the thief brings his off hand back and shoots it back immediately as a cestus appears on it. The cestus connects with the hunter's jaw and takes out what little health he has left, knocking him into the realism mode.
A large screen appears in the center of the cage and appears to be spinning.
Winner:Pyralis
I look at Pyralis and take note of his features. dark grey fur, red mane, sunglasses, looks like a strong silent type.
Before he has a chance to move out of the cage I raise my hand and shout.
"I challenge thee!" Pyralis looks at me, then to his friends, and back to me. He shrugs and says some unspoken command which his friends hear. They open the door to the cage and usher me in. As I walk into the cage a screen pops up.
Cage fight rules and regulations
Don't leave the cage until a winner is decided
Fight goes until the timer is up or until one of the fighters enters realistic mode
Crisis skills are prohibited
So are healing and mana potions
God I hate lists
And irony
Shut up I'm getting paid minimum wage for this job
place bet:000000000
I decide to put one hundred bits in favor of Pyralis, since I know I'm just here to observe fighting styles.
A countdown pops up in the center of the stage, counting down from ten, as Pyralis and I get into the closest thing to a fighting stance that either of us can make with our lack of experience.
As the timer reaches zero, I tighten my grip on my shield while Pyralis charges me. The same words I heard at the gala flood my ears as Pyralis shouts them.
"Four" I watch as his dagger lights up in an orange hue, rather than a purple one, and take a precautionary step to the left so his dagger flies past me rather than hitting my shield.
Seeing an opening, I remove my shield for just long enough to thrust my sword into the side of his torso. As the blade makes contact with his torso he is knocked away from me, but quickly catches enough traction to come back at me once he lands. Rather than speaking some form of number lingo he just swings his dagger with amazing speed, and I struggle to move my shield in the right position so that I'm using up as little mana as possible with each hit.
"Reflect." I activate one of the newer skills that I'd gotten during our grind to the proper level for the next major dungeon. Wherever it may be.
As the skill's description had said, once Pyralis hit my shield with his dagger, using it to try and stab my neck for a critical this time, my shield lets out a blinding flash and he's is forced into a defenseless state.
As he stumbles backwards, I use the other skill I'd learned over the previous month: parry. Basically parry deals damage double that of what the attacker's previous attack would have done. Normally it would be a counter on it's own, but when combined with reflect it does even more damage.
The big white 1,000 appears above his head is more than enough proof of that as a critical hit appears below it. Pyralis falls on his back and does a sweeping kick as he gets up. He hits my ankles, which trips me up, and is in a stance to hit me before I even hit the ground. He reels his off hand back and balls it into a fist, spawning the cestus. He hits me in the chest, propelling me as I hit the ground fast than I would've.
I don't have time to get up before he places himself on my stomach and punches me in the face repeatedly, chipping away a my health as he goes. By the time I'm close to entering realism mode, my face has gone numb to the point where I can hardly feel his fist.
He reels his fist back and hits my nose bridge this time, putting me into realism mode, and steps off of me. I get up as the spinning screen declaring Pyralis' victory appears above us. He pats my back and helps me walk out of the cage, since I've begun fading out of consciousness now that I'm in realism mode. Once we're out of the cage Xavier and Tonya are there to get me to Will so he can tend to my wounds.
"That's one brutal way of winning." Xavier says with a grimace. Tonya just nods and begins scanning the crowd for Will, who's standing in front of an open field. I hear Ed call out his name and watch as he turns to look to his left. I look as well to see Ed pointing to me. Will turns, sees me, and starts running to me. He frantically casts one of his healing spells on me, and within seconds I feel renewed.
I get my arms off of Xavier and Tonya's shoulders as Will and Ed reach us. By the looks of things Will found the war zone and Ed didn't find Steven.
"Dear god what happened to you Jake?" Will asks
"The fight didn't end too well. my opponent went with a 'punch you in the face until I win' strategy."
Ed whistles and points to something on my cheek. Before I get time to check my face, a figure catches my attention. I can't distinguish any features, since he's wearing a cloak, but I can tell he's been watching us.
"Who's that?" Everybody looks to where the person is. Will grabs his mace, ready to unholster it in case he would need to fight. He begins walking slowly towards the figure, but to no avail as they back away at the same pace.
Getting a bright idea, I make a beeline for him, pushing Ed and Will out of the way in the process. The cloaked figure sees me, and darts into the crowd behind him, while I just keep sprinting. I just need to keep running. If I keep running I can reach him. He's in a crowd, it'll be harder for him to move as fast as I am.
When I reach the crowd, I try to push past as many others as I can. Thankfully the majority of people are just NPCs here to bet if the bidding is too low, So I don't get too much flak from them. I see the cloaked figure, and am close enough to see his username. But there's a player blocking me from seeing the full thing, only the last three letters.
ven
When the player passes, the only thing remaining is a cloud of smoke where the person was. I stop where I am as a thought enters my mind. Ven... the last three letters of Steven's name. That was Steven, and I just let him get away.
I sit down on the sand as the realization sinks in. I could have gotten to him, I could have brought him back. I grab a handful of sand and watch it slowly slip through my fingers, making a small sand cloud as it falls and settles somewhere else.
A message pops up in front of me, and I open it hesitantly.
Come on back to the train quickly. It's about to leave, and the next one won't come for an hour or so. I saw his name too
-Will
I get up and trudge back to the train. Steven didn't want to be caught; that's the only thing running through my head. If Steven didn't want to be caught, then that means he's given up on us. He either hates us or can't be around us. As the thought sinks in and I step on the train, my eyes get blurry with tears. As I sit down Will notices the tears streaming down from my face as my breathing gets shaky.
"Oi Jake what's wrong?" Will sits down next to me.
"Steven ran from us. I don't think he wants to even see us anymore." Will takes a second to contemplate this before answering.
"He ran because he thought Ed's words still stood true. He probably just thought that we were going to harm him."
"I doubt he thinks that. He probably hates us. I think we should just stop looking for-"
"Dammit Jake!" Will grabs the collar of my armor and pulls me close to him. "We will find him. It doesn't matter if he hates us anymore. We're a god damned team, and we will bring Steven back." He releases his grip on me, and leans back on the chair.
"It's okay to be sad Jake," Will stares at the ground as he speaks his favorite quote. "it's okay to be angry, or scared, or even hurting. But no matter what, it is not okay to just give up hope. If you lose hope in yourself, then have hope in others."
I wipe my eyes as everybody else gets on the train, and start thinking about what Will said. I've heard him say it a million times, but this time it feels genuine. As if something just clicked in me when he said that.
If you lose hope in yourself, then have hope in others.