Meg marched alongside the camels as they passed through the red dunes of the desert. Her scales glistened and hummed with the heat of the sun and while the others around her wiped the sweat from their brow she remained cool and comfortable thanks to her inner dragon flame. Behind them loomed the gargantuan mountains of the border country and from their black snow capped peaks a harsh and jagged wind rushed down to batter them and every grain of sand in the desert. But Meg’s fire burned it away and she walked without shiver or sweat.

The Loong, known as Master Leroy, beside her was in a similar state of comfort. Short and broad he reminded her of a boulder carved out of volcanic rock with his charcoal grey scales and gazelle like horns. His face was broad and blunted and there were heavy bags beneath his pale red eyes and a long thin mustache hanging off the sides of his snout. He wore a quilted robe of rich lavender with a hole cut out for his stubby black tail and slippers on his feet that had been worn down to the barest of threads.

She watched him out of the corner of her eye as they walked and waited for an opportunity to talk to him. Even though he was an NPC she was always nervous about first contact with someone. She didn’t want to say the wrong thing or do something stupid and she inevitably always did. On a good day she could blame the divergent wiring of her brain and the chemical imbalances it caused. But most days she felt as if she had missed out on some class where everyone else learned to socialize and interact and not say things like OH THANKS I ACTUALLY WASHED IT TODAY, when somebody complimented her hair.

Meg remembered there were twenty seven million people watching her though and forced her jaw to do its job. “Master Leroy,” She said.

He turned his short thick skull and smiled at her with rows of pristine razor sharp teeth. “What is it young dragon?” He said.

“I wanted to ask you about your school,” She said.

“Ask away,” He replied. “I am an open book.”

“How much does your rent cost?” she said.

Master Leroy stroked the long tendrils of his mustache and chuckled. “I was not expecting that,” He said.

“You don’t have to tell me,” She said. “I hope I wasn’t rude.”

“Nonsense, you are young and what one might call common can be a mystery to another. My rent is five hundred gold every month.”

“Is that common where you live?” She said.

Master Leroy took a moment and considered her question. “I suppose you could find cheaper rent in one of the more run down neighborhoods,” He said. “My school is located on the edge of the commerce district and my students are a mixture of merchants and lesser noblemen.”

“Hey I’m a merchant,” She said.

“You made quite the sale this morning,” He said.

Her scales blushed and she looked down at her feet rather than meet his unending NPC gaze. “How much do you think you’d need to buy a property in your city?” She said.

There was more mustache stroking and an even longer silence this time. For a second she thought she might have stumped the game’s A.I. or disengaged from the chat function but her worry ended when Master Leroy spoke again.

“I would need half a million gold to purchase my school or a building of similar size,” He said. “as I said, in a less desirable neighborhood you could find something cheaper though.”

It was Meg’s turn to go quiet now. She had one hundred and eighty three gold and fifty copper in her coin purse and this early in the game that was a ludacris achievement. There was no way she could scrape together half a million gold without grinding her ass off. She took a deep breath and exhaled. What did it matter? She could sell things without a shop and Master Leroy said there might be cheaper places out there. What did she expect? The developers wanted people to stick around for the long haul. If she could just rush through the content it wouldn’t be half as fun.

She squeezed her hands into fists and relaxed them, focused on the howling wind and the crunch of sand beneath her feet then the labored grunts of the camels next to her and the sounds of men and women trudging beside them. The grounding technique worked and the desire for things beyond her control melted away and she returned to the moment at hand.

“Where do you live exactly?” She said.

“A most wonderful city,” He said. “the gem of the desert they call it but its real name is BAOSHI CITY.”

LEARNED ABOUT BAOSHI CITY:

+5xp

+3xp SOCIAL

Meg pulled her map up with a thought and looked at a predominantly black screen. The caravan’s path was a brown strip through the darkness and far ahead of it was a red blip with gold letters above it that read BAOSHI CITY. She wondered how much the realms had changed since the chaos age and had the faint desire to search the internet for a full map. She closed the map and abandoned the urge as quickly as it had arrived in her mind.

“Is it far?” She said.

“It depends on the speed of the caravan,” He said. “Usually the trip takes a week.”

“Are you on some kind of vacation?” She said.

Master Leroy nodded. “I have family in the mountains,” He said. “I try to bring them medicine and other supplies every six months. It is the least I can do for them after they adopted me.”

“Did you grow up in a monastery?” she said.

“Oh no,” He said. “the story goes that my birth mother perished at the hands of mountain bandits but she must have put up one hell of a fight because I was found by a human archer, unharmed and surrounded by dead bandits.”

“I’m sorry about your mom,” She said. “she must have loved you very much to fight so fiercely.”

“That is my belief as well,” He said. “And although I wish I had gotten to know her I found love and acceptance amongst the archer’s family.”

“Is that where you learned martial arts?” Meg said.

“My human mother who taught me,” Master Leroy said. “I was a young and wild dragon. Prone to biting and quarreling over the slightest affront and the village boys would gang up on me. It was unfair but I can’t say I didn’t deserve it. One day my mother took me high up into the mountains where the air is so thin it’s almost impossible to breathe. She gave me my first lesson in Zhua Gou.”

“I bet they stopped ganging up on you after that,” She said.

“I was not allowed to fight after that,” He said. “my mother forbid it. She taught me the martial arts not so that I could crush my enemies but so that I could work through my anger in a healthy manner. Grappling and throwing is only a portion of my style. It is also meditation, self reflection, and sometimes board games on a rainy afternoon.”

“So you let them beat you up?” Meg said.

“Once I understood my mother’s teachings I no longer acted out,” He said. “I chose my words more carefully and did not give in to my anger and my emotions.”

Meg’s stomach twisted itself into knots. She wondered how deep the game’s A.I. had wormed into her life for it to produce content that hit so close to home. But again it was easier in a video game than it was in real life. Emotions had been her enemy ever since she was young and she often wished she could take a spoon and scoop them out. Life would have been much easier without them.

She imagined herself a cold, blank faced shell of herself and shuddered. Maybe she would only get rid of the bad feelings like anger and frustration and the annoyance she felt when people told her she was being too dramatic. Then again love was a great feeling and it had led her into the depths of despair more than once. Meg sighed. She already felt like a robot, programmed to mimic humans, half the time. Why was she wishing to be the real thing?

“I can afford your lessons now,” She said. “maybe you can give me one when we have time.”

“I would be delighted to,” Master Leroy said. “but I’m afraid I only accept level one students and you are currently at level zero.”

“That won’t be a problem,” She said.

She left the conversation and pulled up her status menu and studied her character sheet.

She had been level capped for so long she had almost forgotten how to level up. Her mind sputtered and stalled then bit into the numbers on her sheet and it all came flooding back to her. Every time she leveled up she received 3 ATTRIBUTE POINTS to permanently increase one or more of her base stats. She also received 2 ABILITY POINTS that she could use to unlock and improve special techniques that were connected to her skills.

Meg scanned her base stats and remembered how close to death she had been. HARDINESS was her lowest score at thirteen and even though she didn’t want to play a heavy role in combat it was clear she couldn’t avoid violence either. She put a single point into HARDINESS and brought it up to fourteen, giving her more HP and ENDURANCE. Putting a point into her CHARM stat was a no brainer, the better she talked the easier it would be to sell people junk.

With her last point she bounced back and forth between INTELLECT and INSTINCT for a while. INTELLECT governed how smart she was and her ability to problem solve and analyze things as well as her ability to cast spells and her overall amount of MP. INSTINCT on the other hand dealt with her awareness of her surroundings, her intuition and ability to read people.

Both of them would help her in her chosen trade but in the moment being able to read her customers and sense their needs seemed more important than what INTELLECT could offer her so she dumped the last point into INSTINCT and moved onto her ABILITY POINTS.

Each skill had an ABILITY TREE attached to it and every ability needed to be unlocked with a certain amount of ABILITY POINTS. Once unlocked she had to spend more points to improve them. She currently had 2 points to spend and rather than sit there and study every tree in every skill she made herself focus on the ones related to her trade. And then she remembered she had unlocked a racial ability.

She jumped to the RACIAL ABILITIES screen and grinned. At level one every Loong had a chance to gain their FIRE BREATH ability and there was no way she could pass it up. What was the point of being a dragon if she couldn’t belch fire out of her mouth? She poured both her points into FIRE BREATH and was rewarded by a flash of light and the gong sound.

FIRE BREATH UNLOCKED( +2 FIRE DAMAGE MP=3)

Meg shut her status menu and laughed maniacally. She tilted her head back and summoned FIRE BREATH with a thought. Her stomach churned and twisted, the gas inside forming a stream of heat that punched up through her body and exploded in a six foot geyser of orange flame. Master Leroy jumped to the side and dropped low, his hands raised and open.

“I see you’re level one now,” He said. “Was that a challenge?”

She snapped her mouth shut and blushed. Meg bowed low and shook her head. “I’m sorry,” She said. “I was only testing out my new ability. I’d rather take a few lessons before I pick a fight with you.”

Master Leroy relaxed his guard and patted her on the back. “I remember what it was like to be young,” He said. “Tell you what, when the caravan stops, bring your coin to my camp and I will give you your first lesson in Zhua Gou.”

Meg clasped her hands in front of her and bowed as low as she could without falling on her face. "I look forward to our lesson master," she said.

"I am sure it will be most enlightening," he replied.

She bid him farewell and jogged along the flank of the caravan. So much had happened in the last few hours and her body still brimmed with the euphoria of a new game. There was so much she wanted to do and see. She felt like she'd never get beyond the sprawling desert. She knew she would eventually. Some quest or event would draw her into the other territories and there would be new adventures and friends.

But for now the desert was her home and the caravan were her people. She was sure they still had plenty of mystery to wow her with and as she neared the front of the caravan she saw Shaynala and Farook walking hand in hand, their child sleeping in the harness on her mother's chest.

Would she ever find a love like that? There had been two men in her life, one in middle school and another early in college but neither of them had been any good for her. And neither of them wanted her playing Tattered Realms so much. She might have understood that if it had only been a hobby but nowadays things were so expensive she couldn't afford to give up such a lucrative side hustle.

Her mind wandered back to the past. To memories of her in bed with her ex boyfriend. His thin frame nestled against her, his hands on her skin, soft kisses and long smiles. Then the moment shifted and she recalled the arguments, the lack of compassion and empathy and the name calling and then being left on the side of the road on a snowy December day.

"Asshole," she muttered.

Meg buried all the ugly grey feelings crawling inside of her and approached the couple. "Good afternoon you two," she said.

"Hello Eagle Slayer," Shaynala said, smiling. "to what do we owe the pleasure of your company?"

"I was actually wondering about our route?" Meg said.

"We are traveling the ways of our ancestors," Farook said. "from one watering hole to the next until we reach Baoshi City."

"Do you always make this trip?" Meg said. "or do you go to other places?"

"This has been my family's route since the days of the Chaos age," Shaynala said. "we take tools and supplies to the mountain folk and bring back furs and ore and anything else the mountain clans are willing to sell us."

"Have you ever seen a snow leopard?" Meg said.

Farook shook his head. "They are a crafty animal and you'll find no beast better at blending in than the ghost of the mountain. In all my years I have only heard the final screams of those animals they take in the night."

Meg blocked out the images that formed in her mind. She didn't want to think of her favorite animal dragging a helpless goat up the mountain side with blood staining its thick white fur.

"Are there any stops in between the watering holes?" She said.

"There is a small village built around an oasis," Shaynala said. "It will be two more nights before we reach it though. Would you like me to mark our route on your map?"

Meg bowed her head in rapid succession and thanked Shaynala. "I would really appreciate it," she said.

"Very well." Shaynala put her hands out and Meg jerked her head back as a screen popped up in front of her face. She moved it further away and when her eyes refocused she read it.

GIVE SHAYNALA YOUR MAP?

YES OR NO

Meg tapped yes and heard the gong ring once again.

ROUTE UPDATED:

5xp

DISCOVERED LANDMARKS:

+15xp

She opened her map and saw five new red dots staggered throughout the darkness. She thought of Shaynala and Farook making the journey hundreds of times, every rock and creek bed familiar, every danger known and planned for. A lifetime of walking next to camels, loving each other every step of the way.

Their daughter would no doubt live a similar life. Camels would be her childhood friends, the sound of chatter around a campfire her lullaby and one day a dark skinned boy with luxurious black hair and eyes that glistened with mischief would come and ask Farook for her hand. It wouldn't be easy for a man like Farook to give up his daughter. She pitied him if he refused the proposal. If their daughter was half as wild as Shaynala he would be in for a terrible battle.

Meg was so busy thinking about their future she didn't notice the conversation timed out. Farook and Shaynala returned to holding hands and stealing warm glances at one another. A little bit of the simulation slipped into her immersion and Meg drifted back along the caravan, leaving them to their quiet desires.

The caravan moved through the desert at a dull three miles per hour. Never stopping. Never slowing. One camel hoof in front of the other, a bellow here, a spit and a grunt there. The sun burned, the wind howled, and Meg walked alongside the tireless beasts. Her feet ached and her scales itched from the sand that had found its way between them. She wanted to rest, to sleep, to raise her endurance to the max setting and leave them all in the dust.

But she was only level one and she had to deal with it. Bruce stumbled alongside her. His shoulders slouched, his ears drooped even lower than normal, and his silken black hair hung limp over his face, each strand laden with the same sweat that dripped down his face.

"You're tired too?" She said.

Bruce's chin rose an inch and fell. "I feel like I cast ten of those lightning spells."

"We might've been better off letting the eagle eat us," she muttered.

“I would take my jacket off but then I’d be tired and cold,” he said. “how can it be hot and cold at the same time?”

“Welcome to menopause Brucey Baby,” She said.

“Did you get any good news from Master Leroy?” Bruce said.

“He’s going to give me a martial arts lesson tonight,” she said.

“I was referring to the real estate issue,” Bruce said. “But if you want to roll around on the ground with that geezer you should be the one charging him.”

“Are you implying I’m a prostitute?” She said.

“Of course not,” He said. “Prostitutes bathe.”

“I think you're smelling yourself,” Meg replied.

Bruce sniffed under his arm and jerked his head back. “I’m sorry,” he said. “this walking has made me short tempered.”

“And fried your brain,” She said. “we should have tamed that eagle and rode it.”

“Now whose brain is fried?” Bruce said. “the eagles don’t let anyone but wizards ride them.”

“I guess you wouldn’t be walking then,” She said.

Bruce frowned and pushed hair out of his face. The hair slid off his shoulder and back into his face and he sighed. “I’m no wizard,” He said. “I merely dabble in magic. A character flaw my father never ceased to point out.”

“Your dad sucks,” She said.

“Yes he does,” Bruce said. “now about that real estate. Hopefully the sticker shock will kill me and I can give up this tiresome journey.”

“According to Master Leroy he’d need half a million gold to buy a building the size of his school.” she said.

“How big is his school?” Bruce said.

“I forgot to ask,” she said. “but it has to be kind of big right. You need room to practice and store equipment, and a place to sleep and cook.”

“At least it’s cheaper than I thought it would be,” Bruce said.

“Half a million isn’t cheap,” She said.

A thin weary smile split his face and he looked at her out of the corner of his eye. “It is when you’re sitting on a fortune like mine.”

“How much do you have exactly?” Meg said.

“I’m not telling you,” He said.

“Oh come on,” She said. “I’m not going to cut your throat in the middle of the night. You can’t just throw that out there and tease me like that.”

“Keep your voice down,” He whispered. “I’ll tell you but you have to promise you won’t tell a soul.”

Meg stuck out her hand and extended her pinky finger. “Pinky promise,” she said.

Bruce glowered at the gesture then wrapped his pinky around her finger and shook. “I left my home with fifty million gold in my pouch.”

Meg stopped in her tracks and stared ahead of her as he kept walking. He came to a halt and shuffled around to face her. “What are you doing?” He said.

“Fifty million gold?” She said.

Bruce cringed and rushed over to her. He pressed his sweaty hand over her snout and squeezed trying to shut her up. Meg twisted away from him and spit the taste of his sweat onto the sand. “Why are your hands so wet?” She said. “God they taste like clams.”

“If I wanted the whole world to know my finances I would tell them,” He hissed. “You made a pinky promise and you broke it in seconds, unbelievable.”

“I did not,” She said. “Nobody heard me. This whole time you’ve been like, oh that’s a capital heavy industry, I don’t want to blow my money on a long shot and you’re sitting on a goose egg the size of those mountains.”

He came towards her again with his hands raised and glanced nervously at the caravan behind him. “Would you be quiet,” he said.

“I want a raise,” She said.

“Absolutely not,” Bruce said.

Meg put her hands on her hips and glared at him. “Why not?” She said.

“Because it’s my money,” he said. “I stole it from my father fair and square.”

“By that logic it’s your dad’s money,” She said. “Twenty Copper a day,”

“Don’t be absurd,” He said. “If it’s my dad’s money you’re not getting any of it. The stingy bastard pays his help a copper every three days.”

“That cheap turd burglar,” Meg said. “I’ve got half a mind to kick his ass. Thirty copper.”

“We have a contract and you’ll honor it,” he said.

“Show me the contract,” She said.

“You already saw it this morning,” He said.

“Show it to me again,” Meg said.

Bruce groaned and dug through his jacket until he found the contract. He fumbled and swore and shook it loose, nearly losing it to the wind, and held it out in front of him. “Read it and weep.”

Meg leaned forward, squinted, and summoned her FIRE BREATH. A torrent of angry flame flared out of her mouth and engulfed the contract. Bruce yelped and stumbled backwards. His foot caught on a rock and he went down on his ass, his fingers black with soot and ash.

“Whoops,” Meg said. “I guess we have to make a new contract.”

“I have copies,” He said. “It is binding.”

Meg took a deep breath and exhaled. She flexed her fingers and toes and gave her tail a quick shake to shed some of the tension from her body. There was little doubt in her mind that the contract was binding. The game would hold her to it but what was the point in playing in an open world game if you didn’t try to push the boundaries a little.

“Thirty copper copper a day,” She said. “And I won’t give you a haircut with my claws.”

Chat erupted in cheers telling her to keep going. People shouted know your worth and get that bread. One guy spammed Dolla Dolla Billz until he got timed out. BitWilly reminded her about subscriber only mode. She sighed and opened a channel to address her audience.

“Hey everyone. I know you’re having a blast but we have reached the two hour mark and I’ll be switching over to sub only mode. You’ll still be able to watch my hostile negotiations with Bruce but if you aren’t a subscriber you won’t be able to engage in chat. If you would like to become a subscriber just think about the button in my bio and fill out the form. Basic membership costs forty dollars a month and the VIP membership will run you seventy dollars. If you have any questions please reach out to your friendly neighborhood moderators.”

She closed the channel and returned her gaze to Bruce who was still sitting on the ground staring at his fingers. “I’m waiting,” She said.

He looked up from his blackened hands and scowled. “Our contract was sealed with our blood,” He said. “I don’t have to renegotiate anything.”

“Are you sure about that?” She said.

Bruce climbed to his feet and raised his hands in front of him. “Don’t be rash,” he said. “Violence never solved anything and no one likes a bully.”

“But they hate penny-pinching capitalists more,” She said.

His hands parted and his fingers stretched out towards each other. A sparkle of purple light flickered between his fingertips and stabilized into a dancing arc of electricity. “Be reasonable Meg,” He said. “You can’t take a full hit from one of my spells.”

Meg lowered her stance and popped her claws. He was right. At this distance he couldn’t miss and a single spell would deplete her health entirely. She only had one chance. She would have to catch him by surprise with her fire breath and take him down in one hit. It was a one hundred percent stupid move but if she pulled it off she could be rolling down easy street for the rest of their time together.

Bruce’s weary gaze faltered and shifted to something behind her. Slowly his brow furrowed and his spell dissipated. “Sweet green onions, what is that?”

“I’m not falling for that trick Brucey Baby,” she said.

“It isn’t a trick,” He said. “Some kind of, oh damn.”

Bruce spun on his heel and ran surprisingly fast for someone who had been walking all day. Meg grit her teeth and darted forward, her head bent low and tail snaking through the air like a raptor as she ran. And then a distant howling filled her ears and she skidded to a halt and looked over her shoulder. Her eyes widened. Her jaws dropped. “Sweet green onions,” She whispered. “It’s the dynamic weather system.”

Meg forgot all about her contract and ran.

She bent low to the ground and powered through her exhaustion. Her tail slithered and flicked, acting as a balance and a rudder as she fled the menacing cloud behind her. She felt slow and dull. Her mind drifted and snapped back into focus only to drift off again. Her endurance bar flashed red and her feet dragged. She stumbled, fell and clawed her way back up. There wasn’t time to breathe or think. She had to get to the front and warn Shaynala.

But would it do any good? There was nowhere to hide. Nowhere to run. And they sure as hell couldn’t fight the weather. Meg’s left leg went slack and she slammed into the ground on her side. She grit her teeth and pushed herself up and the strength ran out of her arms. She lifted her head, ran her dry tongue over the dry roof of her mouth and tried to shout. Her voice failed her. It was hopeless.

She breathed hard and swore at her slow rate of recovery. She didn’t have time for the math to be against her. At the edge of her drifting vision she saw Bruce’s foot and a moment later felt his clammy hands grip her by the horns. Her scales tingled and she tensed, waiting for the NPC to have his revenge. But it never came.

Bruce took a long wheezing breath and said “HUIFU!”

His RESTORE spell pushed its way through his moist pores and crawled in between her scales. A smoldering heat burned through her body, through her inner flame and into her soul and in the blink of an eye her endurance bar filled and the fatigue vanished. Bruce’s grip weakened and he groaned in a way that made Meg blush as he toppled onto his side in the sand. She crawled over to him and brushed the hair out of his eyes.

“Are you okay?” She said.

He swallowed hard and looked at her with glassy eyes. “I feel like I birthed a camel,” he said.

“Why’d you do that?” She said. “I was about to use you as a scratching post.”

“You were about to be burned to a crisp,” He said smiling. “Now go and warn them.”

She put her hand against his cheek and smiled down at him. “I’ll come back for you,” She said.

“If you don’t you’ll never get a raise.”

Meg looked over her shoulder at their impending doom and wished for her old dragon mount. “Back in a flash,” She said. “Try not to get any sand up your butt.”

Meg crawled over his body and took off toward the front, shouting a warning to everyone she passed. One by one they turned and looked. Saw the raging sandstorm behind them and reached for the reins. By the time she reached the front she was dizzy and shaking and the red warning flash had returned to her endurance bar. Farook caught her as she fell and she didn’t have to tell him what was coming. He looked out at the rugged red landscape and the churning sand tornadoes and turned a shade paler.

Laying in the sand at the back of the caravan Bruce stared off into the distance and clenched his butt cheeks together. “I hate the desert,” he muttered.