Chapter 50

Leander settled his tray at a table in the dining hall and took a seat.

The VirtualRealities campus offered its employees full amenities, including an all-day supply of fresh, cooked food prepared by talented chefs and designed to be both delicious and healthy. People could cook their own food and eat in private if they chose to do so, but Leander ate most of his meals in the dining hall.

Across the table, another tray settled with a clatter, and a short, vivacious woman dropped into the chair. Lacey, one of the company’s many talented artists and also his friend Kevin’s girlfriend. “Hey, Leander. I heard you got a girlfriend.”

Leander blinked. “I beg your pardon?”

“Oh, don’t even try to deny it. I got it from Kevin, and he’s a terrible liar. ‘Fey’, that was her name, right?” Lacey tucked her chin-length hair – blue today – behind an ear.

Leander took a breath and focused on his food. He could feel his face heating up, and could only hope that the blush was not obvious. “Obviously, she is not my girlfriend.”

Kevin dropped into the seat beside Lacey and Leander took the opportunity to shoot him a stern look.

Kevin raised his hands defensively. “Hey, it’s not my fault. She has some freaky mind-reading powers. I barely said two words and she figured it all out.”

“So? Details!” Lacey demanded.

“I think not,” said Leander, tucking into his meal.

“I’ll get it out of you one way or another,” Lacey threatened, pointing her fork at him.

Leander did not know how to respond, so he remained silent.

A pause. “Ugh!” Lacey exclaimed disgustedly. “Honestly, you’re impossible. I don’t see how any girl would like you when you’re so boring.”

Leander’s hand paused halfway to his mouth before resuming movement.

“Hey, chill, Lacey,” Kevin chided. “He’s cool.”

Lacey waved a careless hand in Leander’s direction. “I mean, yeah, he has a lot going for him in the looks department, and he’s pretty talented at a lot of stuff, but you have to admit you’re boring, Leander.”

“Indeed,” Leander agreed, striving for a light tone. He apparently succeeded, as Lacey made an exasperated sound and changed the subject.

Leander failed to follow the conversation as it continued, thinking about Lacey’s comment.

He was a somewhat boring person. When it came to jokes and banter, he lacked the quick wordplay required to participate in the fast back-and-forth most of his colleagues – all of them highly intelligent and creative – enjoyed. He enjoyed routine over more chaotic adventures, and most of his favourite activities were fairly quiet by the standards of his age group.

Leander was long past the age where he thought he should change his personality to fit in with others. It did not bother him if people thought he was boring, as he found his own life quite interesting.

At least, it did not bother him if most people found him boring.

His mind drifted to Fey’s vivacious smile and incredible mental agility.

“I don’t see how any girl would like you when you’re so boring.”

Leander was in a rather sombre mood when he logged into Fantasia that evening.

◊◊◊

***

Fey logged into Fantasia and looked over the possible rogue feats she could pursue to qualify for her next advancement skill.

The rogue feats seemed similar to warrior feats in that their titles were all puns of varying cleverness. They differed in the fact that almost half of them had little to do with combat or killing. Instead, many focused on sneaky tasks such as walking around undetected and reaching improbable-to-reach areas with acrobatic skill. (The other half, of course, involved killing large numbers of monsters in sneaky and underhanded ways.)

Fey flicked back and forth through the list, trying to decide which feats she should aim for first. She wanted to try for ones that would not take too much time, while avoiding the ones she was likely to accomplish without even trying (such as killing large numbers of monsters in sneaky and underhanded ways).

That sounds doable. It was definitely a feat that Fey would not incidentally accomplish through regular adventuring, and she did not think climbing a tree in the Moonwood would take too much time.

Fey peered up and around the village, trying to gauge where the highest point would be. The building parts of the tree-buildings were mostly one and two storeys in height, but the trees themselves reached much higher into the sky, blending together in the canopy above.

After some consideration, Fey decided to ask an expert and wandered into Kallara’s potion shop.

The elven healer looked up and smiled. “Fey! How are you today?”

“I’m good, thanks. Do you have any idea what would be considered ‘the highest point’ in the Moonwood?”

Rather than replying, Kallara pulled out one of her many tomes on potion ingredients and began leafing through it. “Here.” She proffered the book, opened to a page on some kind of thin, golden vine.

Fey read the description:

Dawnling – This rare plant is surprisingly hardy and can survive in a large range of temperatures so long as it can find a place that meets its sunlight requirements.

The dawnling needs to absorb the first rays of light at sunrise, and can usually only be found at places of highest elevation. It has powerful holy properties and can be used to enhance the potency of a large variety of potions.

Fey looked up at Kallara and asked, “So, does this plant mark the highest spot in the Moonwood or something?”

“Oh, no, that would probably be just above the top level of Tallen’s tavern, but do me a favour and climb that tree all the way to the top to collect a sample, would you?”

Fey rolled her eyes in amused exasperation and accepted the atypically-offered quest. “Yes, Kallara.” Returning the book, she headed over to Tallen’s to begin the climb.

On the walk over, it occurred to Fey to find it strange that Leandriel had not yet messaged her this game night. It had become a predictable pattern over the past week that the angel would contact her almost exactly five minutes after she logged on, just enough time for her to get her bearings in the game and have the leisure to focus on a conversation.

She checked her friend list; as usual, Leandriel’s name was listed in green to indicate his online status.

This left her in somewhat of a quandary (*dither*). Logically, Leandriel was likely to have a reason for breaking his pattern of behaviour, such as being involved in a task that would not take well to interruption. However, equality in relationships demanded that Fey not wait around and force Leandriel to take all the initiative in their interactions. If he generally used her logging on as a prompt to initiate a conversation, he was likely to forget today even after finishing whatever task he was currently occupied with.

Fey rolled her eyes at herself. She hated dithering. Over an NPC, no less. She decided that she would wait a couple of hours to give Leandriel a chance to finish whatever he was doing and then PM him (*decisive*). In the meantime, she had a tree to climb.

Climbing a tree that doubled as a tavern did not begin the same way as climbing a normal tree. Sending Boris and the glooms out to amuse themselves in the forest, Fey entered the tavern through its open archway and began climbing stairs.

“Hi, Miss Fey,” piped the twelve-year-old Todd, falling in beside her as she climbed. “Will you be dining with us today?”

“Maybe later,” Fey answered. “Do you think Tallen will mind if I climb out the window?”

“Oh, lots of rogues have already done that. Dad usually charges a 10g fee for insurance purposes, but since you’re a VIP, you can probably just go for free.”

Fey chuckled. “For ‘insurance purposes’. Your dad has a keen business sense.”

Reaching the top of the first flight of stairs revealed a second; the tavern had expanded to a third floor. “Wow, when did this show up?” Fey murmured.

“A week ago,” Todd answered proudly. “I helped.” He pointed to a section of railing that was a little bit warped compared to the rest of the building.

“Good job,” Fey praised sincerely, continuing up the stairs. The work might be imperfect, but since Fey had never created anything out of living wood, she was not qualified to criticize.

The third floor of the tavern was much the same as the first and second, dominated by long tables and benches. Four arched openings acted as open windows.

“Which one should I take?” Fey asked Todd.

He pointed to the window behind the stairs. “I think less people fall when they try that one.”

“Oh, joy,” Fey said dryly at the prospect of falling to her doom, heading towards the indicated aperture. Leaning out, she looked down to see the significant distance to the forest floor, then craned her neck in the opposite direction to see the even-more-significant distance to the top of the tavern-tree.

“Do me a favour and keep any items I drop if I die,” she said to Todd.

“Oh, you won’t die. Nobody else had more than a couple of broken bones,” Todd said reassuringly.

“I’m climbing to the very top to collect a plant for Kallara,” Fey explained, her tone of one who had come to terms with the inevitability of death.

“Oh,” said Todd. “Okay, I’ll take good care of your stuff, Miss Fey.”

“Thanks.” Fey slid out the window and stood on its bottom ledge, looking for handholds. Fortunately, the third floor of the tavern was high enough that a tree branch was within reach. Fey wrangled herself onto that branch and began the slow, tedious-and-yet-dangerous process of climbing to the top.

With careful attention to detail, Fey made it up to the point where the branches began to sag under her weight (without dying). Looking up, there was still a ways to go before reaching the actual treetop.

The situation called for a lighter touch. “Amethyst, I choose you!” said Fey jokingly, not accompanying the words with a throwing motion.

Failing to understanding the (Pokemon) reference, Amethyst nonetheless looped her bubble-arm around a branch and began travelling an acrobatic (loopy) path upwards.

Fey was notified of her pet’s arrival at the tree’s peak by a cheerful squeak. A section of golden vine began drifting downwards, and Fey had to scramble to catch it before the lightweight plant was scattered by a random draft of air.

“Phew.” Fey relaxed after catching the dawnling sample—

only to be startled almost to the point of falling out of the tree by Amethyst’s daredevil plunge straight onto her shoulder. The slime jumped as soon as she saw a clear path through the branches, landing with enough of an impact that she made a splatting sound.

“Son of a—!” Fey exclaimed, cutting off the profanity right before it appeared. After regaining her balance, she scolded her pet. “What did you do that for?”

Amethyst squeaked sheepishly. (“It looked fun.”)

Fey sighed and began climbing down.

***

Sirena and Blade sat in a travel carriage heading northwest for the second day in a row. Sirena was exercising her Prayer bar and beseeching Thrain to change the weather. Thrain, being a storm god, obliged by sending rainclouds, making the weather rather gloomy.

Beside each player was a pet. Firefly the fyrfalcon perched miserably on a stand Blade had purchased for her, feathers fluffed and looking generally miserable in the damp atmosphere. In contrast, Squishy the jellyfish – now a full-sized adult – floated in a tank beside Sirena, looking inscrutable (due to the lack of face, facial expression, and body language). Presumably, rain did not bother it.

Despite the weather and the monotony of being stuck in a carriage, the players’ mood was decidedly animated.

“Did she really?” Sirena asked. “That’s diabolical.” The words were accompanied by a giggle.

Blade was chronicling some of his childhood adventures, waging war against his older sister as only siblings could. He grinned. “Well, I got her back the week after by washing her clothes and putting them all in the dryer (2).”

“You didn’t!” Sirena gasped, truly aghast at the idea of an entire load of ruined clothing.

“Three pairs of jeans that wouldn’t fit anymore,” Blade confirmed. “Best of all, I didn’t even get in trouble with our parents. ‘Honest mistake’,” he added with mock-innocence.

Blade and Sirena were having one of those effortless conversations that flowed naturally from topic to topic without losing interest on either side. As part of the magic of the conversation, they were completely at ease with each other as only long-time friends usually were, except that all of their anecdotes were fresh and interesting.

“I shudder to think what she did to you after that,” Sirena said. She sighed. “I wish I had a sibling.”

“That’s only because you’ve never had one,” Blade countered.

“Well, you’ve never not had one,” Sirena returned.

Blade shrugged. “Yeah. Everything has its good and bad parts, I guess.”

“So philosophical,” Sirena teased. “Oh, the rain’s about to let up.”

Firefly immediately perked up at the words, and Blade opened the carriage window to let her fly outside, ready to hunt.

“So, what’s it like, being an only child?”

***

Fey returned from an expectedly disconcerting visit to R’shelle, the rogue trainer, with the level 20 skill Shadow Strike. It was somewhat similar to Vicious Strike in that it added extra damage to her blows, but it was not limited to the first attack of a fight and had a chance to stun the opponent. It could only be used with the inverted mana created by Shadow Cloak.

Looking at the system clock, Fey saw that several hours had passed in the game. Leandriel still had not sent a PM.

Stop being an awkward turtle. Resolutely, she opened the message interface and sent:

She received an immediate reply.

Fey frowned at her conversation history. Leandriel’s wording was still obviously characteristic of him, but something was off. He was not adding his own thoughts and information to the conversation, instead just replying directly to what she wrote.

If he’s not busy… then he simply doesn’t want to talk to me. The thought was surprisingly painful.

A slower reply this time.

Fey closed the interface, feeling a tightness in her chest and throat that she took a deep breath to dispel. The attempt was only marginally successful.

Resolutely, she pulled up the list of rogue feats and headed into high-level monster territories.

***

“Leander, you are a first-class idiot,” Leandriel denigrated himself. “You literally could not have sounded more inane.”

Lacey’s words echoing in his mind, Leandriel had not had the nerve to message Fey when she logged in. When, wonder of all wonders, Fey had actually been caring enough to contact him… “Leander, you are a Grade A idiot.”

Magic asked worriedly, “What’s wrong with Leandriel? Who is Leander?”

“I’m Leander, and what’s wrong with me is I am a lack-witted, slow-thinking, awkward fool.”

Magic shook his head. “Leandriel is smart.”

“I fail to see any evidence of your claim, sir.”

Magic blinked. “Um… Leandriel knows a lot of words.”

Leandriel sighed and conceded the point. “Yes, yes. However, having a vocabulary is really quite useless if I am too moronic to string words together to form basic conversation.”

Magic blinked again. “Um… This is a basic conversation?”

Despite himself, Leandriel huffed in amusement. “Yes, I suppose it is.” He patted the mushroom affectionately, loving its literal, but surprisingly creative thought processes.

Those behaviour patterns were definitely not from him, but rather Magic’s original owner.

Leandriel pinched his temples in one hand, calling himself an idiot silently so as not to worry his pet.

Footnotes:

(1) Reach for the Top is a general trivia quiz show for high school students in Canada. Credit goes to Dethati for this achievement, which was originally named “High Perch”

(2) The author does not recommend ruining other people’s clothing as a method of punishment or revenge. As a much-less-destructive laundry-related alternative, she suggests you consider taking the used dryer sheet and placing it in the other person’s socks.