StoneMason was gone by the time I got back from my abrupt bathroom break. The break had gone on longer than intended as I paced around my cramped house and kept track of my heartrate. Playing games all weekend had to be getting to me.

It was for the best. The list of items had contained too much for me to absorb at one time while also dealing with a kid who didn’t know which end of his body was used for what. I’d have to deal with that butler, who seemed to find everyone distasteful.

I walked down the halls quietly, relying on assistance from [Stealth] and the enchantment runes I’d covered my clothes in. That, and I wasn’t after a fight. I wanted clarity, a purpose, and a drink.

But what had really forced me to log off was the stupid system quest that popped up after StoneMason told me the answers were only a box away.

Quest: Road To Redemption, it said. Along with a gloriously long list of checkboxes to click off. Things like, find the princess and deal with her. Only princess had an asterisk by it and a note that she was now a queen. Even my quest text mocked me.

Aside from the snark, it wasn’t exactly a bad list. I had to try and fix Dari or remove his curse. That I liked. There were some notes about paying back my debt to another kingdom after causing an insurrection. That one, I didn’t like as much since gold was easy come, easy go.

What really bothered me though, wasn’t the simple idea that everything could be solved by going through a checklist of objectives. I didn’t like the idea that this game had been simply waiting for me to look for an answer then dropped the list out in one single dump.

The manner meandered, or I meandered through it, while reading the finer details. “Give up the drink?” I mumbled then snorted. “Not likely. Drinking with no hangover is the best thing about this game.”

That checkbox on the quest text turned an angry red after my declaration. It didn’t go away. I thought about my earlier peaceful moment in the woods with the dogs. “Maybe,” I amended, “but not likely.”

The text went to yellow. The implications were beyond me right now. I hummed and went through more of the goals. Each one made me sigh heavily. “How am I meant to remove Woe from a tree? Kill it?”

I didn’t relish the idea of fighting that monstrous tree. The ghosts of girlfriends past had always chased me and filled me with dread. I’d rather face Dari’s evil enslavers in their raw form. Which none of my quest text said anything about. It might be for the best that I’d never have to go back to that stupid forest.

Even with its musky smell in some areas, I preferred my grove and the forest that’d grown around it. It wasn’t as dark or creepy. It was simply nature. There were all sorts of critters who fearlessly dodged between the trees away from my pack of rabbit chasers.

My mind continued to wander as each item on the list brought up some bit from the past. The more I thought about it, the amount of stuff I’d done in the year since playing this game had reached a staggering height. I’d lived almost an entire life in here on the weekends. Every Friday had tried something new, sometimes absurd or petty. More so then I’d ever done in the real world. Out there I’d performed the same day job with the same depressing results for years.

“Too many rooms. Not enough,” I paused and didn’t know how to finish that thought. This had to be my fourth time through this manner and for all I knew, I was heading up one wing and down the other. “I don’t know. Something. This place is empty as heck.”

None of them rooms had monsters. There weren’t even evil, giant cockroaches hanging around to set on fire. The place had vaguely been cleaned up, or at least out. Piles of dust layered the windowsills and fingerprints mixed with moss on the glass. Their floorboards weren’t much better. Nails stuck out every other foot but I hardly felt them.

Maybe I was being too quiet.

“Hello?” I ventured.

No one answered. I stuck my head in a room and glanced around. Broken shelving lines two dressers and a hulking monster or army of dogs had ruined the bed. I couldn’t tell if these were servant’s quarters.

After a moment of disconnected thoughts, I realized that Johnny had made us that insane map last time. I fiddled around with my menu, brought it up, and deleted most of the notes about traps. There were still hidden corridors marked, danger areas on display, but he’d also left a bit of information on the sections of the house.

If I wanted to find a butler who seemed to oversee this entire manner, there were two spots to look. One would be near the rest of the servant’s, in the largest room. Though this game might have a head maid or something else so that couldn’t be relied upon.

However, at the entrance to the house owner’s wing might be a better location. Surely, they’d keep their “best” help nearby. I ventured off in that direction, taking care to avoid the haunted dining hall and it’s hungry table. There’d been zero to fight inside but I didn’t want to run the risk of the game simply waiting to sneak up on me.

I almost missed the background music of old school games. At least then I’d know if huge battles were coming up soon. Maybe there were players with a skill of some sort that let them hear rousing battle tunes.

This hall was a dude. I backed up and down another forked pathway and tried to count the rooms. There were at least a hundred here, making the place thirty or forty thousand square feet. Despite its size, the dogs could probably run end to end in ten minutes flat and still have energy for another lap. Except Sleepy. He’d pass out on a floor and wait for someone to bring him back treats.

The butler fixated on the dogs’ presence. That served as another reason to leave them behind. I abruptly realized that guilt also played a part. It should have with Dari, but he was more intelligent and made his own choices too.

These rooms were fancier but still run down. Most of the book shelves were picked over and those items that remained were ruined by age. I hoped they’d return to some semblance of normal if we lifted the curse. It had to be rough to sleep on these beds.

“Mister Friday. You’ve returned to grave our halls once again with a unique odor.”

One arm came up and I took a sniff. It wasn’t great. The dry heat of China had been miles worse.

“I took a bath,” I said as I turned around. The man himself had snuck up on me. Despite his vaguely friendly tone he looked like a corpse that had been run over by a parade of cars then stitched into a shape that vaguely resembled human. And he still managed to look down his misshapen nose at me.

“You’ve bathed,” he drug out the statement. Fleas hopped off of him and scattered on the floor. I shivered then lifted my hands for a healing spell. He didn’t try to fight me and let the colorful energy wash over him.

His body returned to a far neater presentation. I babbled a bit while the change made him less barf inducing. “At least once. Got messy again after though. Wasn’t my idea.”

I’d stumbled into town for a drink wearing the unholy mess that was my digital character. No one looked at me twice. Players out here in the boonies rarely cared.

“No shoes still.” His words were growing crisper.

“No shoes.” I nodded and pretended to be serious. “They ruin my communing with nature.”

He frowned and gave me yet another once over. Bright blue eyes. I couldn’t remember if they’d been that color before or another one. I felt fairly sure it was at least the same butler. There might be a whole army of them in here somewhere.

“Perhaps we could adjourn to the garden.” He gestured down the hall to a door that went out into monster land.

“It has bees.”

My words finally bothered him enough for the butler to sigh deeply. “Would you at least consider moving off the carpet?” he asked. “Mud is easier to clean on wood.”

That was a fair request. I took two steps to the left and out of the bedroom I’d wandered into. He took another deep breathe and shuddered so softly I wondered if I’d imagined it. Then he politely smiled.

Carefully he picked at his clothes and removed a stray piece of lint. “Mister Friday, what brings you here this time?”

I pulled up my inventory and started yanking out piles of rings. The butler stood there and made no move to collect them, so I put the mess on a nearby dusty surface and continued pulling out everything Johnny had given me.

The butler frowned. “That is an unexpectedly large number of rings.”

“I’m not even sure these are all the ones you were looking for. It’s just what we gathered.”

“But so many?”

My shoulders lifted. “Have there been that many suitors over the years?”

His eyes literally glazed over, giving him a ghostly look against the grand window. “Perhaps. It’s hard,” he faded away. “Time is strange here. And how we look at the world, even stranger. Even now, it seems like you’re here, but not here. It seems like there’s ghosts wandering the halls but if you were to seek them, you wouldn’t find them.”

The man rambled for a bit, but I got the impression he was talking about other adventuring parties. It must be strange to be a computer character stuck in a place where hundreds of people might be roaming through. I knew this place couldn’t be this empty, not with a player town nearby doing their thing.

Or maybe he’d gone off the deep end and was lost in some sort of fragmented memory loop. His far away gaze reminded me of dementia patients. I glanced around and noticed that there were no zombie maids this time either.

He still didn’t prompt me on what to do next. The butler seemed lost staring at all the rings. I waved a hand and asked, “Do I hand them to her?”

“You’re not ready to meet her yet.”

My gaze tightened at that statement. It could have been the game being clever, or the butler telling me I hadn’t earned the right. Either reason bothered me.

“Why?”

He gave a tight smile then dusted himself off again. “When you’re truly lost, ask again.”

No boxes popped up. Nothing with my [Road to Redemption] quest changed. I looked side to side then decided to treat it as a possibility for some future weekend. Not this one. My eyes closed slowly as the words sunk in and went nowhere.

“Then what should I do?”

“Wait.”

“How long?”

“As long as it takes.”

“Useful,” I said dryly. “I’ll just wander off for another month and check back in.”

“Perfect. That should be an appropriate measure of time. Additionally, all manner of ruffians have been prowling our grounds, making it impossible to keep the missus in good spirits.”

An eyebrow lifted. Now we were getting somewhere but his claim of that shriking presence being “in good spirits” had to be a joke.

“Relatively,” the butler amended before continuing, “If you’d be so kind as to clear the grounds out of its uninvited guests while I see if any of these rings spark a change in the miss.”

“All of them?”

“That’d be unreasonable. No matter how much your strength has grown, you’re simply one man. If one man could do everything, there’d be no need for my class.”

I couldn’t tell if that was a back handed insult or simply a fact. He had a point though, this entire building would be impossible for one person. Though, I hoped he didn’t mean I’d need a part of people to clear the unwanted guests.

Assuming he wasn’t talking about every single monster within shouting distance. Rose might love that. Not me.

“What’s out there?”

“Some ruffians in search of their query.”

My body chilled then another flush followed.

“I’ll see what I can do,” I said slowly. Admitting they were probably following me seemed counterproductive. We were getting along so well for a cursed undead servant of some high and mighty miss I-forgot-her-name, and the local drunk druid.

I flipped through my notes. Either I’d never noted her name, or no one had mentioned it. It didn’t bother me much either way at this stage. The rings were turned in, my quest had vaguely updated. I read the text slowly.

Quest: Widow’s Husbands Part II

There’s a matter, of a promise, before the Voices for all time, between a widow and her suitors, trailing woe along behind. Of course, this has to do with the men who occasionally visited, not those who fled.

Status – See if returning the promise rings lifts the curse or gets you in more trouble.

“Bet I know the answer already,” I muttered. Based on the quest text, there’d be only one real outcome. None of the promise rings would be right. The lady who owned this place would go insane. An epic raid of die hard thrill seeking players would decent upon the manner and fight for loot and experience points.

I sighed. Maybe Johnny had more rings somewhere.

There were a few boxes about minor skill increases as a result of my quest progressing forward but nothing stood out. Skills ranks rarely matter anyway, the game was more about taking actions rather than having seven hundred million strength to lift a rock up a hill. Whatever challenges were throw a player’s way could be faced by the skills they had or thinking outside the box.

I’d learned that after talking with many, many drunk players. Their stories were always the same. Something had gone wrong. They didn’t have a easy button to press and make life better. They found a way out using two sticks, a piece of string, and bat wings. They escaped and gained a new skill.

Or they died. That probably happened just as frequently but no one in the bar told those stories. No one wanted a rousing tale of daring and adventure that ended in “And then they cut my head off”.

The butler had vanished along with the pile of rings. My view of the outside seemed remarkably still. The clouds overhead were either frozen or not moving. I ventured down the hall until I found a door that went outside and stood there staring at the horizon.

There were people out there fighting against nature. Literally. I saw the bounty hunters too. At least that’s what they seemed like. A dozen men danced around in field with a giant tree that swung branches at them.

I pulled my mug out of player inventory and checked the bottom. Not a drop left in there. I didn’t feel drunk anymore. Only exhausted and tense. My back ached. One side of my skull started throbbing abruptly. Likely from a budding tension headache which meant I should log out and stretch.

That darn tree had grown huge over the months. Faces had once been carved into its skin but most of them were impossible to pick out. I couldn’t even tell where they started and the monsters actual snarling face began.

Staring at the [Tree of Woe], while sober, sucked.

It ate a bounty hunter while I kept a blank gaze. It should have bothered me more but they were so far away it almost didn’t matter. They were almost figures dancing on a television screen.

Guilt kicked in. Neither of them would be here if it wasn’t for my prior choices. I could fix at least one of them and clear an item from my bucket list for Friday the 13th. Then after I cleared this stupid quest list, I could decide if I wanted to start over, or keep on going and enjoy the relative solitude of walks in the woods.

“Onward!” I shouted happily to no one. My shoulders drooped. The dogs would have barked in joy.

Out I stepped, and the world pulsed. Both legs stopped moving but the rest of me kept right on going. Pain registered before the bounce of my body hitting the floor. Eyes crossed. An ear popped then numbed.

I fumbled for a healing spell. My free arm drug across the filthy grass. Shudders raced up to my head as the druid feedback told me about the revolting ground.

The world rattled as something nearby screamed in my ear. I turned. Teeth framed a bottomless pit of sorts. A few solid blinks brought the rest into horrifying focus.

“You again,” I said.

The returned ghost girl shrieked in my face. Both eyes popped and the already sideways world spun to one side without my permission.

Numb lips struggled to form words. My arm jerked upward toward a inventory window. “That’s rude.”

She dove at me. I rolled, pulled out my [Staff of Thaddaeus] and channeled a larger healing spell into it. The crazy ghost boss swum up from the ground, hair wild and clawed fingers spread wide. She screamed long and loud until my eyes vibrated.

The healing spell I’d channeled popped. Green swirled between strands of white. Rotting grey of the landscape withdrew at incredible speeds. The ghost’s screamed turned to mournful howls as she fled.

I huffed slowly and let the healing magic wash over me. Dizziness faded. Dull ringing in my ear stopped. Both legs shook as I stood. My heartbeat sped up despite the fight being over.

But it wasn’t. I held the staff off to my side and fought my rapid breathing. The air smelled cripse. A mix of pine and sourness. The smell overrode everything else, even a distance chill that laced up my toes from the ground and still somehow felt comforting.

The glow reached a maximum. All around me the manor felt vibrant and full of life. I turned toward the grand window I’d been staring at. Inside ghosts of children laughed and played. A woman sat in a rocking chair tettering back and forth.

“What?” I asked empty air.

A tiny, see-through girl blew hot air onto the cold glass. She traced out a heart and the word “mom” before it faded.

That’s what I was fighting to fix here. A broken home almost beyond repair. Inside it, with enough healing magic or breaking the curse, a home with happy people living a full life. The kind of life I’d had until mom left. The kind of life I could never have of my own.

Maybe that’s why this stupid quest had lodged itself into my brain and refused to let go. If I couldn’t have it, I could try to at least make sure someone else did. Even if they weren’t real. It’d be like my day job, only the power to help someone get home at the end of the night was wholly in my hands and not in some machine that dolled out medication.

“I can do this,” I mumbled. The words felt weak, small, and timid. Maybe it was me that felt like those things.

As soon as the healing glow reseeded, the angry ghost came again.

She swooped. I sighed, pointed the staff again, and started to chant. The ghost fell for my ruse and veered to one side. Her body twisted in on itself at impossible angles.

“Neat trick.”

The monster yelled. I spared a glance toward the distance where the [Tree of Woe] had stopped moving. There were dozens of men out there, moving around it. I couldn’t sort it out quick enough.

Her body swung in horror show jerks, back and forth, eyes on me the entire time. Then she dove again.

“Ah!” Up came the staff, end glowing dimly from [Illumination]. Maybe she’d be stupid enough to think it was another one of those healing aura bombs I’d done earlier.

She veered off to the side, howling mournfully the entire way. I turned unsteadily, trying to keep an eye on the monster.

The thudding of my heart from earlier kept on coming. I’d thought myself past getting excited in a game but this came on too suddenly.

I needed to log out and breathe.

The humming of her wail echoed softly off the building behind me. It didn’t help me figure out which direction to keep guard on.

“Left? Right?”

No one answered me.

I eyed the bounty hunters again. They weren’t close enough to scare her off. That’s what had done it last time. Summoning the dogs. I could do it again but they needed the rest. Getting myself killed closing up quests wouldn’t be the end of the world. Other games might have issues if players died but Continue Online expected people to get killed frequently.

Those thoughts distracted me. The wails pitch rose from my right. I tumbled to one side.

She caught my [Bear Foot] and drug me along the ground. I flailed, trying to find purchase and struggling to keep a grip on my staff. For a moment I forgot about healing and swung the staff. It passed through her body uselessly.

My foot was released anyway. I scrambled to get control of my own body and lifted the staff again. With all these increased ranks for my healing paths, the weapon, I managed to keep her hat bay. Last time I’d run my mana dry with a foot in water and been trying to summon my dogs.

It wasn’t the combat skills that kept her back.

“Oh, I’m onto you.” I nodded furiously. “You don’t like healing. You’re like the butler. I’ll bet you turn into some-“ she yelled and my ears rung. I put up a hand and calmly traced a small healing spell.

The specter flew back and forth just out of reach. Even one of my lower end healing spells created a sort of bubble she didn’t seem willing to enter. I took that as confirmation.

“Come on. It won’t hurt.”

I stepped toward her, staff lit up. It seemed brighter than normal.

The ghost shimmered and wailed. It backed away. The creature that had my heart racing earlier now seemed pathetic. Or at the least, cowardly. Maybe that’s why she only attacked people who were by themselves.

“Don’t lie to a priest now,” I said. “That’s a sin. I’m sure.”

Getting her into the radius of an effective spell would be harder than expected. Unless I could distract her somehow. A vague plan occurred to me. It’d probably fail but it felt like my best bet to achieve all of this weekend’s goals.

I jabbed at her with the staff. She flickered fast to a new location and slowly crept in. The dark pits in her face where eyes should be grew wider and seemingly desperate. She waited for a moment of weakness. My focus was on trying to herd her into a healing bomb. Not that they were actually called bombs.

[Prayer Burst] had been the original name. After merging it with [Druid] path healing spells, it got changed to [Burst of Nature]. The names were stupid, and I hadn’t nailed down the actual healing totals aside from “a lot” and “enough to keep crazy ghosts at bay”.

The ground behind her had an uneven slope. Behind me sat the mansion. She didn’t attack me inside so I hoped indoors was off limits to her.

I turned and tucked the tip of my staff into my shirt then lumbered awkwardly for the door. With my other hand I charged up the healing spell.

Behind me, her scream changed. Hair on my neck stood on end. I ignored it and kept my hands on the staff. It was a miracle that I didn’t trip on the awkwardly held weapon. Not that I’d thank any of the Voices for such a small favor.

She grabbed my foot again. My other leg held for a second then gave out. Sharp pain jutted up from my knee. I slid the staff awkwardly down along my pants, trying to keep the building glow obscured. I thought of too many choices for next time. Clothes to obscure the tip. Turning off the stupid [Illumination] spell was impossible since the [Burst of Nature] required it.

It worked. She ignored my budding spell and continued to pull on my foot, dragging me into the field. Further away from the vague sanctuary that the mansion might be. I let her and pushed the staff in her direction, making sure she couldn’t escape.

Her head flicked back to mine right as the spell bubbled. Green and white light flooded the area again and she pulled away.

My knee slammed into the ground. Healing magic washed over the area, numbing the pain almost before it registered.

The angry ghost didn’t escape. Her scream went from annoying to subsonic screeching. My eyes strained to register the sound as something sane. Both legs wobbled as but functioned well enough to get upright. I huffed heavily, used the staff to brace myself, and watched the ensuing light show.

The large floated down to the ground. Feet formed. The strung out limbs shrunk to almost a third their previous length, until a young child in absolutely ragged clothes stood staring at me. Her bare arms wrapped around each other for warmth.

My stomach clenched and heart skipped a beat. This was the terror of solo players at [Widow’s Children]. She was a literal child, cursed like everyone else in this mansion.

I felt sick. Especially after the week I’d had.

“Are you my daddy?” she asked with the innocence only a child could manage.

I stared at the tiny girl. She looked exactly like the one that had been in the window with ringlets spun in her long hair. Her bottom lip tucked away in a partial chew and a broken faltering smile that never reached her eyes. It was the same darn look of hope people gave me when they were dying. I was a doctor, not a miracle worker.

No. I was a glorified ambulance driver.

“I’m not,” I said slowly. Dealing with kids took more care than anyone could ever manage, especially a man with no family like me. Maybe there’d been a chance many years ago, but after the service kids were even harder to deal with.

Her face crumpled and I hastily added, “But I’m trying to make this place better for you.”

She turned her head slightly then cast both eyes down. “You’re not daddy?”

I shook my head. She may not have been looking but I couldn’t bring myself to say the words at first. A deep breath made me shudder. This was just a game. “I’m not.”

“Do you know where he is? I asked momma and she said,” pain blossomed at the back of my head and the world went white.

Vision returned with one pinprick of light that slowly spread. Distant pain registered and breathing hurt. I pushed past that and told myself that the hurt would go away once I logged out. For the umpteenth time today, I fumbled for a healing spell that might cure dry mouth.

Nothing happened.

“Where,” the word escaped without follow up.

“He was just staring at a bit of nothing. Lucky we came along when we did. Bam. He’s out. None of those filthy dogs in sight. Them other Travelers are as gone as gone could be.”

Their words didn’t filter right. Something scrapped along my back. Two men were puling me along by my legs at a quick pace. They didn’t care about bumps or bruises.

“What’s that tree doing?”

“He won’t leaf us alone,” the other responded. He chuckled at his own brilliance. “Get it. I said leaf. He’s a tree.”

“Oh, I got it,” the other one responded. “Damn thing. You sure it wouldn’t just kill him and save us the work?”

“They said no. Likes to take his Traveler’s corpse and use it for fertilizer. That’s what happened to the other two. Remember? It’s all in the damn log. Verified by the guild leader hisself.”

I groaned. That sounded disgusting. The [Tree of Woe] camping on my corpses wasn’t sane. Thought it could be possible, since I’d never let my current characters get caught by it. Something had to happen to the prior Fridays after they died. I wondered if the darn monstrosity had chased down all twelve of my prior bodies.

“Hey There Traveler Friday. We’ll be with you in just a second. Gotta get somewhere safe you know. Can’t have interruptions.”

“What?” I asked.

“We’re taking your body somewhere safe. Before we take your head.”

My eyes closed slowly and opened one at a time. The words replayed a few times before they registered.

I tried again. “What?”

“We’re taking your head.” The bounty hunter who drug me along looked to his friend then shrugged. “Here’s good enough.”

They let my body flop to the ground. I struggled to muster another healing spell but couldn’t manage much of anything. Either my arms didn’t work or something had gone wrong. I checked over my items. The [Staff of Thaddaeus] had returned to player inventory. Thankfully being [Bound] meant it was hard to lose. My clothes were all damaged beyond repair.

I didn’t have much to my name to lose if they did kill me, so it wouldn’t matter if they did take my head. In fact, that had been one of my goals. They get a corpses head, I get rid of one of the problems of Fridays past.

My mouth still worked and that’s all I needed.

“When you see the queen,” my cheeks hurt but still managed a smile, “tell her I know the truth.”

A cough made me double over, as much as I could without arms. Or at least, I presumed my arms were gone. The pain feedback from my ARC made it impossible to focus on such a simple problem. And without arms I couldn’t cast [Druid] healing spells. [Priest] ones were still possible, but now wasn’t the time.

“What’s that supposta mean?” the dumber of the two idiots asked.

“She’ll know,” I said then smirked.

Once the message was delivered, I hoped that this insane pursuit of my head in name of baby-mama drama would cease. She’d have one to put on a pike and know that was a Traveler, I could simply show up and get some magical DNA test to prove she’d been lying this entire time.

No kind of queen, of two kingdoms, could hold her empire after such an overwhelming lie. Hopefully. Next weekend I’d see how well this gamble worked out. Then after that I could do the next item on the to-do list. Remove the woe from the [Tree of Woe].

Because that should be easy.

The bounty hunter blinked slowly then shrugged. “You heard the man. We’ve got a head and a message to deliver. Maybe we’ll get a bonus.”

“Just as likely she’ll send us out here to chop his head off again,” another bounty hunter said. “We ain’t mailmen.”

“For gold I’ll be a princess in a dress, I will.”

“You’d like that.”

“Might at that. All them people bowing and all that gold.”

I snorted dryly. Both of the glared down at me with their fat lips puckered into frowns. They spit to the ground and cursed at the same time, “Travelers.”

One lifted an axe. The other bent over and pulled on my hair. I cried out at the agonizing stretch.

Then they chopped off my head.

With a flash of meaningless pain, the blade separated noggin from neck. I logged out and went to get breakfast and coffee.

Sleeping now would be impossible. The soft look of that sad little girl haunted me. All she’d wanted was her dad. I still remembered feeling that way. Once again it struck me that I’d outlived my entire family. That thought was shoved into a quiet dark place along with so many others.

Inside the cabinet with my coffee was the last bottle I’d drank dry as reminder of what had started this nonsense of playing virtual reality games. It sat there, empty, taunting me with a promise of easy oblivion. My hand shook briefly as I reached out and managed to grab only coffee.