Shadows moved slowly across Winston’s farm as fat clouds floated across the blue sky. Winston sat with Trish on top of the giant rock formation next to his farm and looked down over his domain. He let the jungles tepid breeze wash over him as he took some time to relax.

“I liked it better when it was symmetrical.” Trish said. Winston laughed. She’d come over this morning and Winston had spent the day hanging out and mostly slacking off. With his quest done and his tree-farm planted he didn’t have as much daily work as he used to. Harvest days were always busy but there were only four of those a week. The other three days were much calmer.

“So did I. I planned it all out in my head when I started and I planned on expanding it all equally to keep things nice and neat. Now I’ve got this growth off to one side where I had to plant all those damn trees for Jason.”

“You didn’t have HAVE to.” Trish told him. “Or you could have waited a few days worked something better out instead of just sticking it on one side of the farm.”

Winston shrugged. “I wasn’t sure how much long-term planning I wanted to do and since your here I’m guessing I was right to be suspicious. Are you here to protect me again?” Winston asked her.

Trish shrugged. “Not really. They’ll just wait till I leave if they really plan on doing something. I’m just sick of all this crap.” She said, sounding bitter. “It just sucks too see how little they value me after all this time. Is this why you didn’t join my clan?”

“Part of it. I mean, I can’t join anyone’s clan for months yet. I’m not necessarily opposed to joining a clan but not you’re clan. There’s always going to be conflict in a clan but if you’re someone in a decision making roll it’s going to put pressure on you and I don’t want to do that. I also didn’t get a good impression of them at that party when I met them. And it’s been less than two months and here we are already. Granted, I was a large-ish part of that problem, but it would have come up eventually anyway.” Winston said.

Trish snorted. “Yeah, I get that. Seems you were right too. The part that pisses me off is that I never really noticed how much I’ve been putting up with until this blew up. I’m so sick of the politics. I didn’t get into gaming to deal with politics. We were supposed to be the up and comers, the smaller, less corrupt, guilds trying to topple the monsters. Ya know? Know it turns our we’ve become what I’ve always wanted to fight against.” She said with a sigh.

“You die a hero, or live long enough to become the villain.” Winston misquoted.

“That’s why I hate batman. It’s too dark. Superhero stories are supposed to be about good beating evil, not about trying to overcome internal darkness and a savage world full of grey morality. That’s what the real world is for. I prefer my fiction a little more light-hearted.” Trish complained.

“That’s why I’m a farmer. No moral ambiguity to be found. I just want to be left alone to grow crops.” Winston told her.

“Your actions and your words don’t really match up, with as much trouble as your always stirring up.” Trish said with a laugh. “You wanna log for a bit then hit up Marnie’s for a burger?”

“I gotta call the Swords before Troll gets back to Wraith Harbor, but after that sure. I could eat.”Winston told her and brought up his friends list before sending a message to Therion.

Winston: Hey boss, Can you get one of your underlings to send me your portal chedual for this week? I also wanna know what it would cost to get one of your mages to pop a portal from Wraith Harbor to Sword’s Bastion.”

Therion: No Hi, No hello, just straight for the favors and you don’t want much do you?

Winston: It’s not a favor when we made a deal. That’s called a transaction, or a trade, or possible an exchange.

Therion: Whatever… I’ll get someone to message you.

The message ended and Winston stared at the window for a moment before he shrugged.

“Get what you needed?” Trish asked as she laid down on the rock.

“Nope, but someone’s going to message me.” Winston told her. “Meet in an hour?” He asked. Trish gave a thumbs up, before her arm dropped and her avatar closed her eyes and went to sleep. Winston hopped down off the large rock and waited for his interface to beep.

The dealing took a while. He had to pay 11,250 gold for the portal, which would open at 1:00 on Tuesday. It was only Saturday now and school started on Monday. Winston sent Troll another message to let him now when the portal would open then logged out. He was starving and he had to get some burgers.

*****************************************************

“Are they ready yet?” Jason complied as he looked over the field of small trees. Winston rolled his eyes. The new saplings weren’t even up to his waist yet and he was asking if they were ready to cut down.

“If you want them to be, but I feel like you should wait another week or two. They have only been planted two days.” Winston told him with disgust.

“Don’t get all high and mighty with me. How long is this gonna take?”

“I don’t know. I’ve got a bonus to tree growing speed but I’d guess at least three weeks, maybe a month. Mahogany trees can grow 200 feet tall, and that’s in the real world without magical blessings and class bonuses. Runa only knows how large they can grow here.” Winston told him.

“Runa only knows? You’re getting way too into the whole faith thing.” Jason told him.

Winston shrugged. “You’ve gotta be sincere with in-game faith. It monitors your brainwaves. That’s how the company got into so much trouble when the game first came out. Big scandal and all that.

“Wellever, what am I supposed to do for a month?” Jason complained.

“Quests? Skill Training? Maybe you could change zones and let the trees regrow a bit? You need to create a sustainable harvesting plan.” Winston offered.

“You’re no fun.”

“Noted.” Winston muttered as he walked over to his tree and knelt down in the dirt. He let the sensations wash over him and tried to pick out how things were going. The tree was growing slowly but Winston knew he had to keep an eye on it. The firemana he’d put in the soil would dissipate steadily so he’d have to keep adding more as it went away. Winston reached forward and touched the little tree, it lit up with a green glow as he cast [Norish] on it. Winston added a few sprinkles of the crushed core then worked it into the soil around the little sapling.

“What about this guy?” Jason asked as he walked over.

“Probably even longer, although I hope not. This will cost me a fortune if I have to give it more fire materials every day.” Winston told him.

“You’ll still make a fortune.” Jason said.

“Not really. It costs too much. I’ve already spent 7000 gold on it and if it has to grow for a month I’ll need more stuff. I’d guess I’ll spend something like 15-20 thousand on this. Even if we can sell it for 30 or 40 thousand that’s not a huge profit for a month of constant care, especially if we’re splitting it.” Winston told him.

“Most players would consider 10 or 20 thousand gold a pretty good profit.” Jason pointed out.

“Yeah, well, most players are idiots. I’m more interested in the skill levels I’ll get rather than the money. It’s just good to keep track of all your expenses when your running a business. Expenses have a way of sneaking up on you is you aren't careful.”

“Whatever. I’m gonna go read, Sanderson’s new book is out and if these arn’t ready there’s no point in hanging around your farm.” Jason said, before he went into Winston’s hut and logged.

“See you at School tomorrow.” Winston called after him.

Winston looked over his farm and wasn’t sure what to do. The oranges would be ready for harvest tomorrow but today he was pretty free. He looked over at his trees and finally got an idea. He hadn’t done any brewing for a long time. He’d bought all the stuff for it and just never got around to trying to build up his farm. It was finally time to see if he could do better than his first few ill-fated experiments.

He walked into his hut and grabbed a crate of apples and pears. There was always a bit of left-over from each harvest and he’d have to just throw them on the compost heap if he didn’t use them. Instead he drug them out into the sun-shine along with his cider press. Since he’d stopped growing grain he didn’t have the ingredients for beer, so he’d have to settle for cider or wine, although wine took a lot of acids and enzymes that he didn’t have. So cider was the most straightforward and simple.

He pressed the apples and pears into juice and dumped them into a pair of half-casks he’d bought a long time ago for just this purpose. He’d never had pear cider but the concept should be pretty much the same. He tossed in some cinnamon and extra sugar then added the yeast before capping off both barrels. He’d have to crack them once a day to let out the carbon dioxide but he didn’t see much use in dragging out his fancy air-lock for two barrels of cider. He’d make Troll bring back some barley, corn, and hops for him to play with once he got back from Chronopolis.

Winston went to feed Bog then decided to do some exercise. His last couple of level-ups hadn’t been up to standard that was partly because of how fast they’d been, but it was also because without planting, plowing, and harvesting fields every-day he just wasn’t getting the same level of physical exercise he had been. He brought up his character sheet.

[ Name: Win Mills Level 18]

[ Race: Yawnshu Class: Grove tender]

[ Attributes Status]

[Str: 58(+3) 61 End: 72(+12)84 Hp: 269/269 Mana: 240/240]

[Con: 53(+3) 56 Agi: 30 Stam: 388/388 Panic: 1/12]

[Cord: 52(+3)55 Int: 41 Hunger: 68/110 Thirst: 24/110]

[Wis 59(+2) 61 Faith: 63(+11)74 FP:366/366(472/472)]

[Res: 42(+4) 48 ]

[Guild: - Titles: 3]

[Fame: 15 Friend List: 2/5]

Yeah, he hadn’t gotten as much strength of stamina as he had been getting. 3 wasn’t bad but he’d been used to getting 4 a level. Constitution was actually slightly better than usual but he had been beaten up a time or two so that was expected. The only significant boost was in his faith points and that was only because of his class bonuses.

If he didn’t want to lose a lot of potential stat-points he’d need to start exercising. So Winston grabbed a barrel of fruit, tossed it over one shoulder and started to jog around the perimeter of the farm. It was best to head these sorts of problems off early.

The halls of Ulysses S Grant memorial highschool were filled with an odd sort of resigned happiness the next day. Everyone was happy to see all their friends again after the long break but everyone was acting put-upon since they couldn’t admit they were happy to be back at school.

Winston felt great. He’d climbed out of his system sore and sweaty just before dinner, then grabbed a shower, eaten supper and watched TV until bed. He’d slept like a baby and was actually awake at school for once.

He walked into homeroom and sat down in his normal seat. Jason stumbled in just before the bell rang and unlike Winston he looked like he hadn’t slept at all. He had bags under his red rimmed eyes and looked at Winston with blurry eyes.

“Rough night?” Winston asked him. “You should really chase the hookers out before dawn. Otherwise they might charge extra.” He added cheerily.

“You’re an asshole when your awake.” Jason grumbled.

“It would be pretty tough to be an asshole asleep.” Winston reasoned.

“I think you could manage it.”

The two chatted until the bell rang and Winston sat through his morning classes until lunch. Where he met up with with the gang.

“Do you want me to make you some new wards?” Brad asked when Winston sat down with his food.

“I’d like you to but there’s not much point. I wanted it mostly the hold off the wild-life but I haven’t had any problems with animals. No, if someone comes to mess with me again it’ll be players and the ward wont stop them. They’ll just break it. It’d be a waste of money.” Winston said with a shake of his head.

“Trish’s guild still giving you trouble?” Ruger asked, looking between him and Trish.

Winston shrugged. “Trish thinks so and I’m pretty sure they will. I don’t really know why. It stopped making sense a while ago. I mean, I don’t blame them for the first time. I was mad but I at least understood their motivations. Now it seems oddly personal and I’ve met the other two leaders exactly one time.”

“Well, if you need a new spot to set up a farm come to our guild. We’re not big but there’s quite a bit of free land around our guild-hall. You could rent from us pretty easily and we could use the extra money.” Ruger said.

Wintson nodded at him. “I’ll think about it. We’ll see how things play out but if I do need a new place I’ll look you guys up.” The rest of the day went by in a blur and Winston rushed hope to hop back in the game. It was orange day and there was hours of picking to get done. When his screen loaded his view was filled with notifications.

[You Have Died]

[You Have lost 1 level]

[You Have lost 3 gold]

[Your Pet Bogdona Had Died]

[She has lost 1 level]

[You May resurrect her at any time if you have the appropriate skill]

[Your Apprentice Has Died]

[No Apprentice Rewards Received]

Winston found himself standing next to a few stone ruins a couple hours walk from his farm. It was raining again and the tepid rainwater did nothing to cool his growing anger. He started to walk back through the jungle and his rage grew with every step. It was nearly supper time when he finally made it back to the farm and his towering rage transformed into something cold and dangerous as he saw what was left of his farm. Which was nothing.

His hut had been caved in completely. Everything inside had been smashed to pieces or stolen. All of his trees had been cut down and burned. Even Runa’s shrine had been destroyed. They’d left nothing. More than a month of hardwork and effort all gone in a single day and they’d waited until he’d gone back to school so there was nothing he could have done about it. They’d even killed Kishia, who was a defenseless NPC. It was all gone and for no reason.

This wasn’t about sending a message or about applying pressure to gain some advantage. This was a naked provation. It was someone with power stomping on someone else just to prove they could. Winston’s teeth ground together as he looked over the ashes of his farm. He brought up his interface and took a screenshot. Then he turned around and started to walk away. If this was how they wanted things to be than that was fine. Before he’d nearly been at cross-purposes with the Blood Hounds but they’d just made it a war.

Winston smiled grimly as he walked away in the still pouring rain. They apparently didn’t think Winston could hurt them. He’d just have to show them he could.