A plaintive pinging sound woke Kaldalis up at some unknown point between midnight and dawn. He found himself sitting up, cursing the sound and flailing his arms as if looking for an alarm clock to spike into the floor. It felt like between five and ten minutes before he realized it was the messaging system.

Kaldalis cursed once more before blearily fumbled with the mental commands to open the source of the sound.

The message was, naturally, from Nakala.

It began very plainly.

Very funny.

Kaldalis stared at the line, bleary eyed, for almost a whole minute. What had he done again? Had he made a joke? Referenced some outdated meme again?

Then he remembered the looping scribbles he’d sent and laughed to himself. Right.

Glad the system seems to be working. I’ll let the team know. Also, your prank didn’t send anyone else into a panic, so I think these messages are secure. Or, at least, secure enough to say more than just hi.

So I was gonna tease you by keeping this under my hat until you asked, but it’s no fun to keep secrets from you if you don’t know I’m keeping them. Your stream is taking off. Whatever you’re doing, keep doing it. The first stream payouts will come through this system at the end of the week. In about three in-game days. I’m looking forward to seeing your reaction when you recognize some of the names contributing!

Launch went great. Not as great as Monsoon expected, but the marketing is starting to kick in. They kind of held it back at launch because so many people jumped on the boat and a two week boat trip wasn’t compelling content. We’re hitting our stride now that you’ve made landfall, and the grumbling from the suits is starting to quiet down now that viewership is up.

On another note, the window is closing for me to get in. The last call for devs is on an unspecified day next week or the week after, and anybody not going in is going to be moved to new projects, or is needed to stay out to manage maintenance and patches. So be ready to help me catch up as soon as I hit the ground.

No pressure, but I’d really appreciate you picking up the pace on getting the encampment in order. You need to get the place to qualify as a town for us to use it as a starting location. I didn’t work on the town building systems, and the guy who did is already in the game, so I can’t ask him what the milestone is. It’s either the Horde attacks, or else it’s some specific series of buildings. I’m not sure which.

The clock is ticking!

By the time he finished reading the note, he was wide awake. As such, Kaldalis read it a second time to make sure he got everything.

A couple of things stood out to him.

First of all, his stream was being supported. That was nice. He wondered what contributors' names he’d recognize. Celebrities would be out of the question. Maybe. Who then? Their old raid team? Or perhaps Nakala got word to his sister what he was doing and she’d actually chipped in a little.

He’d find out soon enough. Three in-game days wasn’t a long wait, and if he asked for clarification, Nakala would - as always - use her knowledge to tease him further. The only way to get an answer out of her was to not ask at all.

The second thing that struck him was her word choice when talking about the town. Horde attacks? Plural? Was it a typo? Was there another attack by the Horde while he was asleep? Was some phasing system in effect, separating him from other player’s interactions with the Horde?

Was there another attack on the way?

He tried not to think about that, instead issuing the mental directions that would produce a piece of paper and pencil in order to reply to her.

I’ll do my best for the town, he began, but without more direction, I’m flying blind. Obviously, I want to help the encampment grow and become more secure, but if I don’t know what exactly the trigger is to make it a starting point then I can’t really work towards it.

He tapped the end of his pencil against his chin, wondering what else he had to say. He didn’t really have the time to fiddle around with the messaging system and figure out how to send her another follow-up separate from this reply, so he wanted to get it right the first time. What else did he have to say?

First and foremost, I need to make sure the camp is still going to be here, he wrote, deciding to use the letter as a way to talk through his internal monologue about her request. I would love to promote the idea of building up some more proper buildings here, but with the defenses as they are, you’d all be spawning in on a ruin full of clawed hairball monsters. Security is paramount here.

I also don’t want to be dragging people into wild goose chases. Myrin, Balrim, and I have a lot to do already, both to secure the town, to fight the horde, and to keep all the League NPCs happy. I can’t be derailing those needs for something that might not work. If you can tell me precisely what needs to be done, then I’ll get it done. You have my word. But if it’s just a big “maybe” then I’m just going to hope the expedition leader knows it and is working towards it already.

Kaldalis looked over the letter before sending it, and had one more thing to add.

If the marketing was smart enough not to put a two week boat ride on the stream, then maybe you can get them to feed me - or the other players - this information to stop the next wave of players from doing the same. If you can even tell me the in-game name of whoever built the system, I can find and ask them myself.

Help me help you.

-Dylan

Satisfied with that, he issued the mental order and the paper and pencil vanished. The message in the window on his vision was replaced by a little arrow indicating that he’d replied.

He laid back down and tried to get back to sleep. It was still early enough to be worth getting some rest, especially after staying up two hours later than normal due to fishing.

Once again, though, when he closed his eyes he was met with unpleasant visions.

The encampment overrun. Monstrous beings, not just the syncoresi, but others as well, like what Haldir had described. Freakish monsters with bodies made of sand rampaging around kicking the buildings over. Walking bonfires consuming everything flammable in sight.

All the while, Nakala was diving off of a metaphorical cliff, waiting for him to clear a safe place for her to land. He was her tank, right? He was supposed to give her the space to do what she needed to do. How was she going to get started in this game if she wasted two weeks on a boat just like he did? And at the same time, how was she going to get started if the town she started in was just one bad day from being enveloped by lunatic elementals?

And it wasn’t just about her.

The people already in town needed his help.

PC and NPC alike needed this encampment to be safe and secure so that they could do their quests, complete their research, and explore the island. After the losses suffered at this last attack, securing the place as a town was vital - if this place became a valid starting location, then suddenly there was new blood coming into the camp.

More adventurers meant more of everything else. Materials. Defenders. Explorers.

Nakala or no, securing the camp was essential. But how was he going to accomplish that if he didn’t even know what needed to be done?

At some point, he had to have fallen asleep, because he realized he was laying face-down but couldn’t remember rolling over. But with the daydream-turned-nightmare still playing behind his eyelids, he wasn’t interested in rolling back over and trying again.

Fuck it. He’d gotten some sleep between whenever he came back from fishing and when Nakala’s message woke him up. He’d be fine.

Kaldalis struggled to free himself as the blankets tangled around him. He got to his feet, although his movements were slow and almost laggy. A few mental commands at his character page later, and his gear was equipped again.

He yawned, loud and drawn out. Part of him really did want to get back to sleep, but it wasn’t because he was exhausted. Just because he hated getting out of bed so early.

And it was early. The horizon was just starting to turn purple over the water, which was very pretty. But sleep was evading him, and if he wasn’t going to sleep, he was going to get started doing something. Anything. Because every moment felt like wasted time, especially with so much resting on his shoulders.

Sure, there were other competent people in town, but how many of them knew what he did? And how many of them had stream sponsors to keep entertained?