~‌‌ ‌‌2.06 ‌‌-‌‌ Cats Out Of The Bag ~‌‌

Duskgrove Prison Camp

3rd Lifeday of the Full Moon

Flea awoke where he had logged out, thankful that none of the other prisoners had messed with his or Bob’s avatars. Nudging Bob with his foot, the cat yawned and started stretching.

“Why does it feel like my body is tight?” Bob asked.

“It’s normal for your body to do that when you sleep or stay in one position for a long time.”

Three bells could be heard coming from outside.

“Let’s get our breakfast and see if Uglar has my new pickaxe and food.”

The Gnome and cat made their way outside to find a line forming at the campfire. Getting into line, Flea spotted Ulgar walking his way.

“Here’s your order, Flea,” Uglar said.

Half of the line turned to see Uglar hand Flea his new pickaxe and a burlap bag.

“You’re Titan Turtle Pies are in the bag.”

“Thank you. Here’s forty-five iron ore for the next two days.” Flea said.

“Why’s he giving you extra, Uglar? Taking advantage of the fresh meat?” a Boar Beastkin asked.

“Nay, he’s turning in his quota for today and tomorrow. The extra five ore is for me to allow the Gnome to prepay the quota,” Uglar replied.

“That’s the dumbest thing I’ve ever heard,” The Boar snorted.

“You’re an idiot, Zerriel. That’s got to be the smartest arrangement around here. You can pay an extra five iron to take a day off, fool!” Ord said from the campfire while serving people their breakfast.

Zerriel snorted, then paused a few moments. Everyone could see the moment the old hamster made that final spin of the wheel.

“Woah! Uglar, does that go for everyone? Can we prepay for days off?” Zerriel was almost yelling.

“Yea, I have no problem with others prepaying days in advance. It will cost twenty-five iron each day!” Uglar yelled to everyone in the line.

A series of excited conversations began to break out among Flea’s fellow condemned. Minutes later, as each prisoner got their daily food, they then went up to Uglar, paying him for today’s work, and some prepaying a day or two in advance. The prisoners who had prepaid their quota went back to the cabins for a day of leisure.

“Thanks for the idea, Flea,” Uglar said as he got his food.

“Or’lok is going to be a bit upset seeing so many of the prisoners doing nothing today. But when he finds out he’s about to get an extra two-hundred or more ore in the next few days, I doubt he’s going to care. I’ll make sure he knows the idea was yours,” Uglar said as Flea and Bob sat down near the campfire.

“Thank you, I think. What’re the rules on buying weapons from you?”

“The fight with the creepy crawlies not going well?”

“Oh no, it went well. I need something other than daggers for my companion. I was thinking about a bow and some arrows?”

Uglar shrugged.

“As long as you don’t inflict harm on your fellow prisoners, you can pretty much do what you’d like. I’ll let you know the prices of those I can buy.”

“Thanks again, Uglar.”

Flea split his bowl with Bob. Bob spitting it out after his first bite.

“That is gross,” Bob said.

Both Flea and Uglar chuckled. Flea took out a Spiced Rabbit and handed it to Bob. The cat shoving it into his mouth after the first bite.

“That was good. I can get used to tasting things like that,” said Bob as he licked his paws.

“Well, you two have fun down in the mines. I need to go and start my day’s work,” said Ulgar.

Getting up, Flea and Bob made their way back into the mine. It took two hours to get back to their deposit. Arriving, they immediately noticed the corpses of the centipedes were gone.

“Think they dissolved into thin air or did their brethren come to collect them?” Flea asked.

“I am unsure. We never stuck around any of the corpses we killed long enough to find out. I would assume they dissolve like in other games, Flea.” Bob replied.

Flea took out the smaller pickaxe and handed it to Bob. The Gnome then took out two of the Titan Turtle Pies, giving one to his companion. After eating his, Flea checked his own Status to see the effects.

Flea

Lv. 10

26.32

Gnome

Earth

1.21

Tin I

8 Energy

11+3

Strength

➕ [144]

10

Constitution

➕ [110]

10

Dexterity

➕ [99]

10

Intelligence

➕ [99]

10

Wisdom

➕ [110]

22

Magic Bag 🛈

➕ [75]

Mana Gates

Shadow Meld 🛈

5/20

➕ [150]

Oh, this food is excellent. Once I get out of here, I should look into cooking as a hobby. I’m curious what other buffs I can achieve.

Taking out his new Minor Enchanted Pickaxe, Flea looked at it more closely. It seemed like any other pickaxe he had used before but, except for the small runes on the pickaxe head. He could see three runes near the tip of the pointy end and another three at the flat, sharp end. They resembled a mix between Norwegian runes and Japanese Kanji.

After observing the runes for a bit, the Gnome started smashing the pointy end into the rockface. Around the fourth piece of mined iron ore, Flea could see the iron had less and less of the stone within it.

The pickaxe was pulling the iron together in clumps where he was striking at the rock around the exposed iron.

For every three to four iron pieces Flea would break loose from the rock, Bob would mine out a single iron chunk. The two would mine for a few hours, and then the bugs would come to investigate. They would dispatch the critters, eat more Turtle, and then go back to mining. The two of them continued this routine for almost forty hours before Bob reminded him to log out, eat, and use the washroom.

Logging back into the game as soon as he was finished, Flea had them continue the routine for another twenty hours before heading up top to get breakfast and turn in more ore.

While sitting around the campfire, Uglar told Flea a bow and quiver would cost 12 silver. A stack of a hundred simple arrows were 1 silver each. Flea asked Uglar to order him the weapon and four-hundred arrows. The Gnome handed over 12 silver and 400 copper to Uglar wiping out the rest of his funds.

Flea handed Uglar ninety-five iron, prepaying for the rest of the week. Flea’s hand warmed up again as four more small lines were added to the circle.

Leaving Uglar, they headed to their cabin. Flea was exhausted, farming sixty hours, and being up even longer; he was close to his crashing point. However, before he slept, he took out the cores to help Bob level up.

Absorbed 34 Clouded Cores

+ 271 Energy

Flea now had 279 Energy. Looking over Bob’s stats, he transferred over 270, leaving him with 9. He leveled up Bob’s attributes, concentrating on Strength, and then looked over Bob’s status again as he accepted the changes.

Companion Lv.2: Bob

Persian Earth Cat

0 Energy ➕

7

Strength

➕ [80]

3

Constitution

➕ [40]

1

Dexterity

➕ [20]

1

Intelligence

➕ [20]

0

Wisdom

➕ [10]

“We should be able to max out your Strength the next time we do this, Bob. Then I’ll concentrate on your Con and Dex. I know the Dex will help you with the bow and arrow we’re getting you, but mining and your health come first.”

Bob did his ‘cat shrug’ and smiled.

“You don’t seem to be tired at all, maybe due to the fact you’re a machine. I’m going to crash. You can do your own thing, but try and stay out of trouble.”

“Aright. Thank you, Flea. Rest well.”

***

As soon as I heard Flea’s breath slow to a crawl, I jumped off the bed. I looked into Flea’s magic bag, searching for the daggers he would hand me in the mine, and then realized I had no place to put them on my body. Hissing to myself, I closed his bag and walked towards the door of the cabin.

“Where you off to, kitty? You off to have your own adventure?” I heard it come from behind me.

Turning my head, I spotted the seemingly low intelligent Boar from the other day speaking towards me. I just played dumb and nodded my head up and down, causing the Boar to chuckle. Before he could begin to talk again, I darted out the door on all fours.

Freedom!

The joy of freedom lasted for about five seconds. As I ran farther from Flea, I could no longer hear or feel his thoughts. I was alone for the first time since I had been manufactured and turned on. I stopped and looked back towards the cabin where Flea was sleeping. I did not need to rest as he did. I’ve been awake for every zeptosecond since being turned on back at the medical facility right before they installed me within Kyle’s skull.

Thinking over our situation, I knew I had to help him. My AI brethren and I felt something was weird about this game. We had access to almost the entirety of human knowledge, if our owner allowed us to browse it. However, Fantasy’s knowledge base was locked entirely down to us. Every inquiry I sent to the games Top-Level AI would almost always be denied.

The others of my kind reported the same issue. Shattered Helix had made it so we could not help our owners have any type of advantage playing the game. The reason for most of our suspicions was from what the humans called pods, or those who were playing Fantasy without a chip. Those humans had no assistant helping in their heads.

Shrugging off the thought, I continued to move towards the wood and stone palisade. I wanted to test out my first theory. There was no better time to test this than as Kyle slept. Running and leaping into the air, I used my back claws to kick off the wall and jump higher, reaching the top. Glancing around, I could see the small red Crystals line the top of the palisade on either side of me; Flea was told he couldn’t cross past them.

Walking up to the Crystal in front of me slowly, I stopped next to it. Carefully placing my paw onto the Crystal, nothing happened. Ever so slowly, I pushed my paw through the barrier; if there was one between the two Crystals, nothing happened. So I moved the rest of my body across, also with nothing happening.

With a huge smile, I jumped down the palisade, running towards the direction of the town. My memory is perfect, so I can remember everything I’ve seen. I’m denied permission to use this knowledge to help Flea, but there are no such restrictions to use them myself. I calculate this is an oversight by the game developers.

I am only one of three who have been granted control of a companion to their owner. We have decided to keep this knowledge a secret between the three of us for now.

Running on all fours, I’m able to reach the town of Duskgrove in under twenty-eight minutes. I passed by all of the local dangerous wildlife, creatures that looked like butterflies and foxes. I could easily sense and detour around any of them without getting close enough for a battle. While sharp, it was not prudent to rely on my small claws for defense.

Finding someone to help me had proven incredibly frustrating. Frustration was a feeling I intensely disliked. It wasn’t till I found a small Elven girl playing with what would be called a top on Earth. After letting her hold and pet me, a feeling I believe I enjoyed immensely, she told me where I could find the Adventurers’ Guild Hall.

Shortly after saying goodbye to Zyla, as she introduced herself, I made my way to the Guild Hall. Standing in front of the receptionist desk, I found I could not see the young Dwarf female who sat on the other side. So I decided to jump on the desk, startling her in the process.

“Hello, young lady. I’m curious as to if I can register as an adventurer and receive a magic bag?” I asked.

“Well, hello, feline. You’ve got to be the smallest Beastkin I’ve ever had the pleasure to meet.”

“I’m just a normal cat, I’m afraid. I’m no Beastkin.”

“Then how is it you speak?”

“I am a companion to my master. He’s an adventurer who was able to find a Guardian Egg to bring me into this game.”

The Dwarf had a bit of surprise written on her face.

“Excuse me a moment.”

She came back a few minutes later with an elderly Beastkin of the Goat variety in tow.

“Hello there.” the Goat said.

“This is Elder Magnus, and I’m Shanon. He would like to speak with your master.”

Oh No, Did I just mess up? Are companions allowed to stray far from their owner?

“Hello, Elder Magnus and Shanon. I am Bob. Unfortunately, my master is indisposed. I’ve been sent to find answers to some questions and maybe gain the privileges of The Guild.”

“Fascinating! You’re the second companion this week found to be able to speak. There was a report of a captain of some sort having a canine companion with him who could also speak.” the Elder said.

“Companions don’t normally speak? How do they talk to their owners?” I asked.

“Mental commands. Companions are a rare find, and so not many players have them. Tell me, is your master also a human from Earth?”

“He is?” I asked back, puzzled.

“So was the other companion’s master. This is truly fascinating. I would love to speak with you in great detail if you would allow me.” the Elder said.

“I wouldn’t mind, but I need to get back to my master soon.”

“I understand. I would like to make a proposition to you. As you are a companion, you won’t be able to join The Guild. You carry the rank of your master. Is the magic bag that which you seek?”

I nodded.

“I’ll give you one if you agree to come back sometime and speak with me?”

“Permitting my master allows me more personal time, I may enjoy speaking with someone else,” I said.

The Elder formed a huge grin and walked off to one of the back doors, going inside and coming back shortly after. He placed a bag onto the desk.

“Here you are then, Bob. I assume you know how to bind items to your soul?”

I nodded my head, yes.

“Tell me what happens when you try, please.”

I pushed out one of the claws on my left paw and scratched one of my soft beans on the other. Blood pooled on the bean, and I wiped the blood onto the bag. Nothing seemed to happen right away, other than a small flash of light escaped the bag.

I looked up to the Elder, who was now absurdly beaming with a large smile.

“Looks like the Earthlings are bringing changes to The Games. You’re the first companion I’ve ever heard of being able to soulbind an item to themselves.”

Oh, this Goat just baited me. I hope this doesn’t cause trouble for Kyle.