“Do you understand where you went wrong?”

Maya had been pacing her room for over an hour, debating herself endlessly as she tried to reason a way out of the stupid predicament she’d gone and gotten herself stuck in the middle of.

“Going down an unknown street with the full knowledge that luck had already been steering me wrong?”

She shook her head.

“That part was fine. Even if I didn’t find an apothecary or a regular quest, I found enemies to fight. So where did I go wrong?”

She flared her arm-feathers irritably, knowing the answer. It still infuriated her to remember.

“Allowing momentary sensation to overwhelm any common sense. Drowning didn’t matter. Dying didn’t matter. It’s a game. It. Is. A. GAME.”

She stomped particularly hard as she spun at the end of her route, stalking back the other direction.

“I panicked. I let myself panic. I stopped thinking and started reacting. And every single action from that point onward was one mistake after another.”

She whirled, panting, and screeched in fury at her stupidity.

“And trying to negotiate with a deity while at -90 luck?! What was I thinking?! Obviously that was the worst possible time to try talking to the Oracle! What was she supposed to say? Or think? It was stupid. Stupid stupid stupid!”

Maya paused in her pacing, turned to glower at her reflection in the full-length mirror alongside the wardrobe. She pointed at herself accusingly, feathers flared angrily all along her body. She looked particularly fierce and not like someone she wanted to cross.

“Get that through your thick feathered skull,” she hissed venomously at her reflection. “Dying. Doesn’t. Matter.”

Momentary panic was no excuse.

“If you don’t have time to stop and think, then do it anyway and hang the consequences. Panicked thoughts are stupid thoughts. Reactionary thoughts are stupid thoughts. Look what you’ve done! Now both sides are angry and you’ve lost half your preparation time for the assault.”

Maya fell silent and let her angry shout echo and fade. She sat down at her desk, suddenly weary, her frustrated energy spent.

"So what now?"

She stared out the window in front of her, out over the shining gemstone-coloured buildings of the mage academy, to the huge stone wall that enclosed the city, to the distant hills and even more distant mountains rising as black jagged outlines against the star-flecked sky.

She took a long, deep breath, trying to recover some sense of equilibrium.

She’d made mistakes. Large mistakes, that would take serious work to overcome. But nothing unsurpassable. As she’d told the Oracle, she wasn’t going to give up just because she was soulbound now. If the Trickster didn’t like it, well, he could do whatever and she’d find a way to fight back somehow.

But first. . .

“Load game 3 new specialization.”

Back to Path of Life, with a brief disorienting moment of shifting from her desk to her bed. Maya glanced at her character stats. 144 health. Yes, not being a fragile caster. Seer may be incredibly useful for knowing how to take down an enemy, but she hated the feeling of vulnerability that came from having so little health.

Especially now she had the prospect of a chain of -100 days. With her current luck penalty at -65, there was no point in even bothering to roll until this wore off. So today, -90, was going to be her best day for a while.

Visiting the player housing area and staking out Standalone’s house for the next few days was sounding more and more appealing, but she had no doubt that in doing so she would confirm any suspicion he may have formed after catching her there last time.

Questing was another option, but again. . . -90 luck. She doubted she’d even make it outside the city without tripping onto a sword or something equally stupid.

She could get through this.

She sat for a while, thinking back through the previous day’s events. If she stuck with this save, never loaded save 8 again, would she lose anything worthwhile?

Not that she could remember. She’d made some journal notes, which she’d need to rewrite, but that wasn’t important.

The only thing she could think of was the Fate’s Follower specialization. She hadn’t had a chance to see what it did, but if it was associated with the Trickster probably something random with a chance to be helpful or harmful in equal measure.

Did she need a third specialization to juggle? No. Whatever it offered, she didn’t need it. Seer was perfect for recon, Path of Life for survival and combat. That was enough for her. She wasn’t going to push her luck any more today by visiting the Trickster a second time. She made a note in her journal to ask him about the specialization next time she needed to talk to him anyway, but otherwise set the matter aside.

Which left the question of what she could do for the next 3 days 18 hours. She could still go north to visit Smallhollow, or east to Windy Creek, but if things would have been hard at -11 luck, they'd be nigh-impossible with -90.

After some consideration, she concluded that she couldn’t do anything if she worried about how much misfortune she had hanging over her, so she was going to throw caution to the winds and try everything.

She opened a journal page and started a new list.

-Visit arena. Even losing gets me money.

-Do some normal quests.

-Recruit Veyanto to go someplace dangerous for today’s Trickster quest. He seems most likely to be interested.

-DO NOT TRY TO HELP RESEARCH it would go very badly in fact avoid that area entirely.

-Visit Domitius and see what his deal is.

-Find the Travelers’ Hall that everyone is always talking about.

-Go back and loot the dead lizard guy under the city that I killed earlier. Or would he still be alive in this version? How do saving and loading even exist in a multiplayer game?!

Maya stopped there, because she was out of ideas and starting to introspect a bit too much. She knew that any path she allowed her thoughts to continue down too far right now would lead to depression, and she was determined to stay positive. If everything else about her life was negative, she’d just balance it out with determination.

Hopefully.

And right now, that meant taking decisive action.

She stood and crossed to the door, managing to get all the way to the front gate of the mage academy before tripping and falling on her face. Her beak smacked painfully off the cobblestones (-1 health) and she sighed as she stood and brushed herself off out of a sense of vague obligation, though there was no dirt to have picked up.

Which action reminded her forcefully of her current state as wearing only garbage gear. No wonder she kept dying. But, every time she thought about upgrading, the same argument came back. It would be most efficient to wait.

So, arena. There she had Shadow's sponsorship to provide on-level items, so it was the one place she didn't have to worry about the fact that her own gear was sub-par.

Though, that did remind her that she was running very low on throwing knives, and if she was going to be fighting in the arena she'd definitely want access to her most powerful attack. She still had plenty of money. As long as she stuck to main roads, she shouldn't get lost just heading to the marketplace and then the arena.

She kept a constant eye on her map while she moved slowly and carefully, the trip prolonged but passing without her falling again, or, more importantly, getting lost. The blacksmith in the beginner plaza was still at his forge, hammering away, as Maya approached.

“Not now,” he growled, when she called out to him, without even looking up from his work. He was pounding madly at a piece of metal, then holding it over a flickering gold-green flame for a few seconds, then pounding away again.

She leaned against the nearest building to wait, nibbling at an apple from her inventory while she watched. It tasted of nostalgia, oddly enough, reminding her of the early days when she’d just been fighting off bully children and not planning raids on top-10 players.

“Do you have any higher quality knives than the ones I bought last time?” Maya shouted, thinking that if he was too busy to stop work he could at least talk.

“I said not now! Go bother someone else!”

He held the metal over the fire again, but his tong slipped and the curved piece of metal fell in. Cursing, he scrambled to pull it out, but it was warped now from where it had landed. He returned to pounding at it, his expression fierce and angry.

Maya decided the better part of valor would be to remain well away from him until he finished. She fled, resolved to return later.

She stopped by Shary’s produce stand on principle, which was currently being watched over by the eager young elf boy she’d saved on her first mission. She asked his opinion on the produce, and he cheerfully pointed out the best fruits (or at least, his favourites) and she bought three peaches, two pears, four mangos, and a large spiky blue fruit he called a starmelon, which he insisted was the best thing ever.

The haul cost her 4 silver, but she was happy enough to have someone treating her normally that she didn’t care.

They sat down and had something of a fruit picnic together while Maya kept stealing glances at the blacksmith in case he finished his project. He never did, but Maya learned that the elf boy’s name was Elaph, that he planned to be a warrior when he was old enough to get a class, that he loved starmelon (which tasted very much like blue raspberry in flavor, but with a faint nutty taste that made it seem more like a real fruit than an artificially concocted facsimile thereof,) and that he was an orphan who Shary treated like an adopted psuedo-grandson.

It was all very nice, relaxing, and made Maya very very worried that she was creating relationship flags here that would result in poor Elaph being kidnapped or killed or something because of her. With her luck being terrible, she almost expected them to be attacked straightaway regardless.

But in the moment, she didn’t care. Nothing went wrong, apart from one fruit which exploded when she tried to cut it and she managed to stab herself with the knife in the process. She turned over the cutting of fruits to Elaph thereafter.

She smiled and laughed, and they talked about nothing important and ate their way through half of her purchases before a stranger appeared in the plaza.

Elaph jumped to his feet. “I’m still on duty. Thanks for sharing your fruit! Shary won’t let me have starmelon more than once a week because it’s so expensive. We import it, you know. It doesn’t grow on this continent.”

Maya waved and smiled as he hurried back to stand behind the produce stand, then she slowly packed the uneaten fruits she’d bought into her inventory. She kept watch for a few minutes in case anything dangerous was about to happen, but it seemed that for the moment her luck had restricted itself to causing minor inconveniences.

Maybe the beginner plaza was immune to bad-luck disasters. That would be nice, having a safe area to retreat to whenever things got too rough.

She idly watched the new arrival as he strode purposefully toward the blacksmith, moving with the unrealistic speed of a high agility character. He’d nearly reached the shop counter when the smith gave the metal one final resounding hammer blow, then set the piece aside in another oven and paused to wipe his face.

Finally. Maya stood and crossed toward them, hanging back a bit with the hopes that the other player might put the guy in a better mood. She needed all the help she could get, and maybe a nice expensive order from a high-level player would cheer up the smith.

“. . .and two thousand of your best knives,” the player was saying, “and five hundred throwing stars, and. . . let’s see your finest spears while we’re at it, eh?”

Maya ran a quick calculation. She’d spent 3 silver for 24 knives after haggling, which had seemed like a lot at the time, but now felt like a trivial expense. Two thousand, though? That would have to cost. . . 2 or 3 gold. Which. . . still sounded pretty trivial, actually, as far as being assured of not running out for a long time.

Most quests paid in silver. Maya wondered if Standalone’s bribe had severely skewed her mental calculations for the value of items.

The smith hauled out several crates and set them on the counter in front of the player. “This is all I have on hand.”

“That’s fine, I’ll take them all. And the spears?”

They spent another several minutes going over the quality and style of various spears, then the player purchased three of them and put everything in his inventory.

Maya started forward, but before she could reach them the smith hurried back toward his holding oven with obvious intentions.

She broke into a sprint. “Wait, I need some throwing knives, please wait just a minute!”

“Out of stock,” he growled, as he pulled out the unfinished piece of metal to start banging on it again. “Come back in a few days.”

Of course. She turned and ran after the player instead.

“Excuse me! Wait up please!”

He paused, turning to look back, and Maya saw him stifle an obvious laugh under his hand.

His armor was sleek and black, just shy of the appearance of a matching set. The shirt had an inlaid spiral crest of glimmering stones that seemed to shift colours to blend in with whatever was behind him. It was difficult to make him out against the shadowy street behind him. Maya suspected that if he’d been wearing a complete set rather than just the chestpiece, he might have been invisible just standing there. His hair was equally black, long and loose around his shoulders, framing a pale face and bright golden eyes.

“Hi there,” he said, almost managing not to sound like he was laughing at her. “Are you new?”

“No! Well, kind of. This is my fifth day playing.”

“So, yes.”

“Well, not really! I mean, I’ve done a lot of stuff in those days.”

“Congratulations. Why are you chasing after me?”

“I need some throwing knives, but the smith said you bought all of them.”

“I did, he’s right.”

“So, could I buy some from you?”

“I need those. He didn’t have enough, so now I’m going to have to search the surrounding towns as it is.”

“Oh, come on! What could you possibly need thousands of throwing knives for?”

“For throwing at enemies. You may not believe this, as a low level, but higher level foes require a lot of attacks to bring down.”

Maya bristled. “I’ve fought the Crimson Flame dungeon’s Rising Phoenix, I know what high level enemies are like. Why else do you think I’m so low on knives?”

The player gave her another once over, a faint frown on his face. “Crimson Flame dungeon, you say? How very interesting. How about this, then? I’m sure you got something decent from such an important dungeon run. Trade it to me, and you can have some knives.”

“I got several items, which one do you want?”

“List them off, and I’ll think about it.”

Maya did so, and the player nodded along.

“Deceitful Sickle and Crimson Flame Token, for 500 knives.”

“Deal.” Neither item was geared toward a mage, and Maya wouldn’t have to worry about running out of knives for a long time. She handed them over, receiving a full crate in return, which she slipped into her inventory.

“Before you go running off," the player asked her, "what’s your name?”

“Maya. And you?”

“Sevard. Ranked 40th, if you’re curious.”

“Oh, um, I’m ranked 250th. Heh.”

He coughed in surprise, swallowing whatever he’d been about to say. “250th? But isn’t the lowest player level 10? How did you take on a level 25 dungeon?”

“I’m level 8, actually, though I was level 6 during the dungeon. And it was a group effort. I didn’t do very much personally.”

“Must have been quite a group. Bring along several 30s, did you?”

“No, 30 was the highest. We had some 20s, and a couple under 20. And me.”

“Against the Crimson Flame dungeon? That’s the one with the giant phoenix with his area-attack spells?”

“We’re all mages, so we were able to keep mostly out of range and dodge behind pillars.” Maya couldn’t help feeling a growing sense of pride. It had been crazy, but they’d done it, against all odds.

“An unbalanced party of low levels against the third-hardest fire dungeon in the known world? And you won?” His voice kept getting more and more incredulous.

“It took about an hour, we kept trading off who would run around with aggro while waiting for everyone else to respawn for another round. And then in the end, I had just enough energy left to finish it off.”

“At level 6, you personally killed a level 25 boss?”

“Everyone else did most of the work. I just got lucky.”

“Eight item drops though? The most I’ve ever heard of was 4. You're not exaggerating to show off or anything?”

“Very lucky.”

“I guess so.” Sevard tilted his head consideringly. “You know, I’m between jobs right now. Care to team up for a bit? I’m curious to see if your luck might rub off on me.”

“Oh, you don’t want my luck right now, trust me. I would not improve your chances at all.”

“Someone else on your team is your secret weapon? You just swoop in at the last second to steal the glory? Or are you worried I’ll call the bluff on your frankly unbelievable story?”

“No, nothing like that. I’m just having a bad day, and you really don’t want to get mixed up in it.”

“Well, all the more reason. Look, I get it. You’re pretty new, and things can get crazy around here easy. But the fact that you were camped out eating fruit with a produce NPC makes me think you could use the company.”

“The rest of my team has logged out for the night, and. . .” Maya found herself suddenly on the verge of crying, and tried to cover it up by turning away. Sevard's unexpected sympathy was almost too much. “I’m just not having a good day.”

“Hey, it’s okay, we’ve all been there. How about this? If it’ll make you feel better, you could give me. . . you said you were a mage, so how about the Juggernaut’s Collar? I’m a bit of a mercenary, so just hire me. I can escort you wherever you need to go for the next few hours until your team logs back in, and we’ll call it square.”

“Th-thank you. I’m sorry, I’m not usually. . .” Her voice broke, and she wiped at her eyes with her feathery arm. “Bad day.”

“It’s alright. I understand. Take your time.”

Maya got herself under control, then nodded and tried to smile. “Ready. Where to?”

“That depends. Are we going as just a couple of people hanging out, or are you hiring me on?”

“Oh, yeah. Here, take it. I was just going to sell it anyway.”

“You don’t have to,” he said, hesitating before accepting the item. “It was just if you wanted to. I’m not threatening to leave if you don’t pay me.”

“No, it’s fine. I want to. And you don’t have to consider it a payment, just a gift. For being nice.”

Sevard laughed. “I’m rarely accused of being nice.” Then he frowned. “If you’ve got all this high-level equipment to sell, why are you still wearing that?”

“Oh, because I have a really hard quest to finish in a few days, so I want to level up as much as possible before spending any money on upgrading my equipment.”

“Well, then. Let me just see what I can do about that. Since we’re exchanging gifts and all. . .”

He stared off, presumably looking through his menus, for a long while.

“Level 8, you said?”

Maya nodded.

Sevard started off down a side alley. “Follow me."

Character:

Maya Starborn Average Androgynous Harpy Level: 8 Affinities: Magical Physical Tier: 1 Class: Trickster Specialization: Path of Life Base Equipment Modifiers Total Strength: 8 0 0 8 Momentum: 11 2 3 16 Agility: 8 2 1 11 Control: 8 19 0 27 Attunement: 17 0 1 18 Focus: 8 0 1 9 Intelligence: 15 0 2 17 Flexibility: 8 0 1 9 Luck: -25 - -45 -70 Unassigned: 2 Health: 144 of 144 Will: 18 of 18 Stamina: 108 of 108 Energy: 88 of 88 Speed: 1.31 Switch penalty: -33%, 8.3 secs Stealth: 0.71 Chain bonus: +5% Awareness: 0.9 Cooldown: 95.5% Max abilities: 4 Abilities Abilities: [5 of 4] Wind Whisper

[5 energy] Blow into cupped hands, then push the air toward the target.

Creates a light breeze, a quick gust, or a damaging slash.

[Overcharge: +5 energy, +0.2 sec cast time, +50% force/duration/dmg] 1.9 sec

5 dmg

(wind) Throw Knife

[5 stamina] Throw a knife at a target with high accuracy. Requires a knife. 0.8 sec

3 dmg

(physical) Windborne Blade

[45 energy, 5 stamina] Cast Wind Whisper in a loop up and behind, aligning with throwing arm.

Throw knife straight at target with wind as augment. 4.3 sec

33 dmg

{physical} Spark

[5 energy] Draw magic into palm and snap fingers to ignite into a spark of fire.

Can be used as a light or thrown at a target. 1.1 sec

3 dmg

(fire) Sense Balance Discern if an area is lacking in or has an excess of any materials, creatures, etc. Perks: Quick Strike Decrease one ability’s activation time by 30%.

Lasts 3.5 minutes.

1-hour cooldown. Inventory Item Name Slot Str Mom Agi Con Att Foc Int Flx Minor Chestpiece of the Dancer Body 1 1 Ordinary Gloves of Control Hands 13 Minor Waistwrap of the Dancer Legs 1 1 Footwraps of the Acrobat Feet 2 Lesser Bracelet of Control Arm 1 4 Trickster's Mask (Mage) Special Money: 70 Gold, 2 Silver, 12 Copper Quality Item name Details Flimsy Newcomer Tunic Flimsy Newcomer Leggings Soulbound Trickster's Dice Soulbound Trickster's Orb 2/5 uses remaining Flimsy Orchard Map Normal Apple x2 Rare Diviner's Orb 1/3 uses remaining Normal Throwing Knife x509 3 damage (physical) Special Key - Arrival Plaza Apartment Expires in 26 days Special Key - Room 6, Sapphire Hall Special Arena Equipment Token Registered to Maya Starborn Uncommon Juggernaut’s Collar Level 29, +12 mom, +11 str Uncommon Boots of Fluidity Level 29, +6 mom, +6 con, +6 flx, +5 foc Rare Crimson Flame Charm Level 30, +12 att, +12 foc, +6 int Legendary Ring of Concentration Level 29, +24 Int, +12 Con Legendary Necklace of Acuity Level 29, +18 Flx, +18 Foc Legendary Circlet of Acuity Level 29, +18 Flx, +18 Foc Normal Peach Normal Pear Normal Mango x3 Missions Mission Description

Time Reward Trickster Day 5 Visit a higher-level zone and defeat an enemy more powerful than yourself. 20h 8m Trickster's Reward

??? A Private Grudge Claim Standalone's house in Conquest and hold it for at least 10 hours. Personal House Trickster Day 4 Claim in Conquest the home of the next player you see.

Once claimed, hold it for 24 hours. 5d 20h 8m Trickster's Reward

??? Arena (Shadow) Spend at least one day every week fighting in the Arena Ongoing Variable Trickster Day 3 Lose a fight to another player in the Arena DONE Ordinary Gloves of Control

+5 reputation with The Trickster Gazebo Construction Construct a new gazebo for Maylon the Poet

[Optional] Also varnish the entire structure once built DONE 3 silver 50 copper

+5 reputation with Maylon the Poet Trickster Day 2 Lose a fight to another player in PVP DONE Lesser Bracelet of Control

+5 reputation with The Trickster Windy Creek reconstruction Locate the missing workers' tools

Construct a new dam by Windy Creek

Help clear the wreckage of the old Windy Creek Dam

Help construct a new bridge over Windy Creek DONE 5 silver, 80 copper

+25 reputation with Windy Creek village Trickster Day 1 Side with a person who is losing an argument or disagreement. FAILED -5 reputation with The Trickster Help Shary the Produce Merchant Find the missing apple delivery boy. Ensure his safety and the successful delivery of apples to Shary's Produce Stand. DONE 5 copper

3 apples

+10 reputation with Shary and Elaph