As he walked along the dirt path, steering wide around the softer ground lest he squish mud between his toes, Jake found that ethereal thought floating back in through his mind. The feeling that there was something he desperately had to remember. It always came when he was looking at the old oak trees that boarded on the path, and turned liquid and unattainable when he looked elsewhere.

Something about those old oak trees was calling him, but no matter what he did he couldn’t grasp it. A bird somewhere nearby shrieked, a high piercing sound, and the memory clarified. He saw the car coming toward him, it’s breaks screaming; the tires spewing acrid smoke. The uncontrollable bouncing as he skittered across the grass berm, coming to a stop under the grand old oak. That’s why the oak trees by the path kept calling to him!

In his minds eye, the movie continued to play. Everything was out of his control. The car sped off leaving the horrible smell of burning rubber behind. The other car - the one that had been on the correct side of the road had stopped. The old man driving it hadn’t had a cell phone, and Jake had left his behind when he’d left home - he hadn’t wanted any distractions while he was riding.

They had been in middle of nowhere, there wasn’t much chance of another car coming across them. Jake had convinced the old man, against his wishes, to find the nearest phone and call an ambulance. He hadn’t been able to feel anything specific over the waves of pain crushing down on his body. He hadn’t had any idea how hurt he was.

All of that came later.

The old man had obeyed, rushing off to call the emergency services. Jake had been there, alone, for what felt like an eternity before the ambulance arrived. He was fairly certain he’d drifted in and out of consciousness - one moment the old man had gone, the next he was there again. He nattered away, calming words that had no effect on Jake. Jake had thought he’d been doing it to calm himself as much as Jake.

The ride back to the hospital was a hazy blur. The paramedics had given him strong doses of god-knows-what, but it had worked to dull the pain. It was just a shame it had muffled everything else as well.

The next thing he remembered came quite a while afterwards - after the surgery. They’d explained that Jake had been rushed into surgery, but he didn’t remember any of that. All he remembered was the doctor sitting down to break the news. She was an older woman who reminded Jake of his mother, before she’d passed. She had kind eyes, and smelled slightly of lavender. She should have been calming, but instead she had been the bearer of bad news.

They thought he might learn to walk again. The spinal cords were mostly intact, but something in his brain seemed to have changed during the accident. He wasn’t sending the right signals to his legs. She’d told him about the rehab options available, but he could tell from the way she said it that she didn’t really believe it would work.

And then there was the other doctor. The tall one with shifty eyes, who spoke with a slight stammer and couldn’t seem to sit still. He’d suggested an additional therapy - something experimental. He’d claimed they’d had success in the past. Though they’d never tested the theory on injuries as severe as his, Jake at least had hope.

He'd needed hope in that moment.

The new treatment was meant to supplement his rehab exercises. Immersion gaming had moved forward in leaps and bounds, far faster than the VR gaming generation had started. Studies had demonstrated that immersion gaming could teach skills that were directly transferable to real life. The military had spent mind boggling amounts of money developing the technology for their training simulations, and it had filtered into the civilian market quicker than ever. The shifty eyed doctor had assured him that being active in the game would help rebuild the pathways in his brain. That, combined with the physical rehab exercises, should get Jake up and walking in no time.

He’d all but promised it.

Everything clicked into place in Jake’s mind as he stumbled on a dip in the path. This wasn’t reality - this was the game the doctor had talked about. He’d realised he’d been playing a game of course - the prompts made it pretty hard to ignore - but he hadn’t quite connected his playing to everything that had come before.

It was the better part of an hour after leaving the clearing before the township came into view. It was smaller than Jake had first thought it would be, from this side he could see that the dirt path he was following led straight through town, continuing to fields on the other side.

The town seemed to be no more than a dozen buildings deep, with only 2-3 buildings off each side of the path. It hummed with the sounds movies had taught Jake to expect from a medieval town - chickens clucking, children playing, and the distant clanging sounds of a smithy at work.

The path had been empty ever since leaving the clearing, but Jake could now see the first characters in the game. A young woman was pegging up washing on a line strung between two trees, a small child hiding in her skirts. A few men were carrying a chest between two of the houses. No one seemed to take any notice of his approach.

As he reached the first building, he saw a well crafted wooden sign affixed to it’s wall. Large block letters were carved into it, and stained dark with soot, spelling out “Greenest” - identifying the township for everyone. He’d barely made it halfway from the sign to the inn when he heard a voice.

“Greetings traveller. Are you ‘ere ta join the Adventurers Guild?”

Jake turned around to see where the voice was coming from. An old man stood a few meters away, leaning casually against the back wall of a house. He was dressed in dirty clothing made from the same coarse fabric Jake was wearing. He grinned at Jake through a scraggly beard, revealing a maw with only a few teeth remaining. Jake had no idea whether he was another player or not, and wasn’t sure whether it was appropriate to ask.

“Yes sir” Jake replied.

“You’ll be wantin’ ta talk to Annie then, up at the Inn.”

The old man inspected his gnarled arthritic knuckles for a moment, then turned back to Jake with a look of surprise.

“Most of ‘em run along real quick like. No ones got the time to be talkin’ to the likes of me.” He made a wheezing sound, and Jake realised he was laughing.

“Who are you?” Jake asked.

“I’m just an ol’ man now. Was a time I was an adventurer me’self, but I gave it all up when I found this place. Greenest is the best thing tha’s ever happened to me. Well, aside from me kid o’ course.” He nodded in the direction of the woman Jake had seen pegging up the washing, or perhaps he was motioning to the young child at her feet. Jake didn’t much want to know.

The old man had returned to studying his knuckles, so Jake muttered a quick goodbye and made for the Inn. He was certain that the old man had been an NPC - a Non Player Character - but they didn’t seem to have anything more to offer him, not at the moment anyway.

As he stepped into the Inn, Jake saw that it was a small establishment. The tall roof boasted a mezzanine floor, against the back wall of which were three doorways Jake assumed led to bedrooms. The section near the fire was populated by a few crude wooden pews. In the back, next to the ladder leading to the bedrooms, was a bar. Judging by the clanging pots he could hear, the kitchen lay beyond it.

The room was empty but for a middle aged man leaning against the bar. He was bald, bearded, and built like an Ox. A dishrag hung over his shoulder, indicating that he was an employee rather than a patron. Jake decided to approach him.

“I’m looking for Annie, about the - “

“The adventurers guild, yeah we know Annie. She normally sets up shop by the fire. You’re in too early though, try looking by the craftsmen across the way” The big man pointed at a side road across the path with one enormous paw.

“She’s the blond one. Hard to miss.” He gave Jake a wink and made his way toward the kitchen before Jake could respond.

Jake wasn’t sure what exactly he’d expected from his interactions with NPCs, but it certainly wasn’t this. He was careful to keep his sigh quiet, lest the big man hear, as he made for the door. He hadn’t officially been given any quests yet, and he seemed to be walking around blindly. He really hoped Annie was going to be as easy to find as the big man had said, he wasn’t in the mood for a wild goose chase.

The crafting district dominated one side of Greenest. From what he’d seen, Jake was sure the other side of the township was reserved for housing. The workstations were in neat little rows, each station under a small awning to protect the occupants from rain if the weather were to turn. The whole district was built up on bare earth, much like the path he’d followed into town. It was abuzz with the clinking of tools, and the low rumble of conversation. Several of the stations had fires burning, casting up smoke to tickle at Jake’s nostrils.

The barman had been right, Jake spotted a blond woman the moment he walked over. She was talking to a slender young man who was part way through scraping an animal hide. Annie was a plump woman, so short her weight almost made her round. Her blond hair hung halfway down her back, and seemed almost radiant in how clean it was. Though she was only talking to the one man, all of the workmen seemed to glance in her direction every now and then; though Jake wasn’t able to read any of their expressions.

He approached from the side, wanting to position himself so that both Annie and the crafter could see him coming.

“Excuse me, Are you Annie?”

The woman turned to look at him, and he felt like he was being pinned in place by her gaze. Her eyes were jet black, with no differentiation between where her pupils stopped and the rest of her eyes began. The smile that greeted him however, was pleasant enough.

“That’s me. Are you here about joining the Adventurers Guild?”

Something popped up in the corner of his vision, but Jake ignored it for now.

“Yes, I am”

“Good, good. I’ve got a few things for you to do, after which you can meet me at the Inn and we’ll sort the formalities. You’ll need to attune with the Aetherstone by the northern gate, visit the Druid Enclave to the east, and speak with Wilkes over there” she pointed to a tall man sat at a desk near the smithy.

A prompt appeared between them, and Annie looked at it pointedly.

You’ve been offered a quest:

Annie wants you to perform 3 tasks and report back to her.

Rewards: 250 XP, Adventurers Guild rank.

Do you accept?

As with all the prompts so far, Jake punched the green button.

“Excellent. I’ll see you back at the Inn later. Unless you have any questions?”

Jake mentally reviewed the list of tasks and decided he didn’t.

“No, thank you. I’ll see you later.”

Annie returned her attention to the man she’d been speaking to, and Jake turned his to the icon that had flashed up during their conversation. As he focused on it, a prompt popped up just below his centre of view.

Congratulations, you found Annie!

50XP awarded.

Jake smiled to himself - he’d just earned his first experience in game!

Deciding to get the quickest part of the quest out of the way, he approached Wilkes’ desk. The tall man looked up from the myriad of papers spread across the old desk, peering at Jake over the top of his glasses.

“May I help you?”

“Um, yeah. Annie told me to talk to you?”

“Ah, another adventurer I see. Have you given any thought to the crafts?”

“What do you mean?”

“There’s much to this world beyond combat and exploration young man. Skill in the crafts can take you far in life - people always have a need for the weapons of a smith, or the armour of a leather-worker.” As he spoke, he pointed a long slender finger at different stations around the square. He seemed to be pointing out only the stations that Jake already recognised, shedding no light on the others. Perhaps that was the point.

“You can choose to activate any two crafts at a time. These can be replaced at any stage by talking to the relevant craft masters.”

Wilkes paused for a moment, looking Jake over.

“Perhaps you’d be best suited to woodworking to start? Miko over there can teach you the basics, no doubt he could sell you the tools of the trade as well. Most new adventurers only take one craft to begin with” Wilkes gave him a knowing smile, though Jake wasn’t quite sure what it was that he knew. The icon had flashed in the corner of his vision again, but he felt it would be rude to pull it up now.

“Thank you Wilkes. Say, you wouldn’t know where I could buy some shoes would you?” Jake gestured to his bare feet, though Wilkes’ gaze never left his face.

“Stannis, the leather-worker over there, should have something that will fit you.” The tall man nodded to the man Annie had been talking to when Jake had entered the square. At some point during his conversation with Wilkes the plump lady had moved on to another stall, leaving Stannis free to approach.

Jake thanked Wilkes for his advice, and examined the prompt as he approached the leather-worker.

Congratulations, you have learnt about the crafts!

50XP awarded.

2/3 quest objectives complete.

Stannis was willing to sell Jake some comfortable shoes for just 5 Silver Pieces, which Jake learnt was exactly half of a gold coin. He couldn’t tell whether he’d gotten a fair deal or been swindled, but it hopefully wouldn’t matter. His feet in this world were tough and callused - the walk along the path had not been uncomfortable - but it was nice to not have to worry about stepping on a thorn or sharp rock, surely worth the price?

Jake smiled to himself as he slipped the shoes on, and decided to head for the northern gate. From the position of the sun, he deduced that it was the gate at the opposite end from where he’d come in. All he had to do now was figure out what the hell an Aetherstone was.

Finding the northern gate was dead simple. And identifying the Aetherstone didn’t take any great skill. It was a shard of glowing blue crystal that looked solid, and levitated at his shoulder height. The thing was about three feet tall, and bobbed up and down ever so slightly - as if moving to an unseen breeze.

On instinct, Jake reached out to touch it. The stone was cool, like an icepack fresh from the freezer. It took a second of holding his palm against it before anything happened, and then a flash of light blinded Jake for a long moment. A few prompts appeared at the corner of his vision, but he was focused on how the steady glow of the Aetherstone had become a rapid pulsing. Sensing that it was time he withdrew his hand, and the shard soon returned to it’s steady glow.

Jake decided to read the prompts.

Greenest Aetherstone activated!

You can now teleport to this point using the command.

Congratulations, you attuned with the Greenest Aetherstone.

50 XP awarded.

2/3 quest objectives complete.

The prompts drew a smile across Jakes face. He could teleport in the game?

That’s awesome!

Granted, he had no idea how to activate the teleport command, but he was sure he’d be able to learn soon enough.

Annie had mentioned a druid enclave as his third task, but Jake was couldn’t remember what direction she’d said it’d been in. Unbidden, a window appeared on the right of his field of vision, listing out his quest objectives:

Join the Adventurers Guild:

* Speak with the trades representative

* Attune with the Aetherstone

* Visit the Druid Enclave

Beside the instructions was a small fragment of a map. A village dominated the centre of it, the boundary fences clearly marked. Beyond the village however, everything was a solid black swirling with pale smoke. A compass icon in the top right corner indicated that north was up.

A yellow dot showed on the map some way to the right of the village - the village must be Greenest, so he had to go east for the Druid Enclave.

Happy with his deductive skills, Jake waved the prompt away. It seemed like he just had to think of what he wanted to see, and the prompts would appear. Curious, he thought again of his quests. Sure enough, the prompt reappeared in the same place, the map ready to guide him.

Jake was already standing at the northern edge of the town. The main path continued due north, but there was also a well trodden track leading east. It wasn’t packed dirt like the northern trail, just a track of shorter grass, but it seemed to be heading in the right direction.

Jake left Greenest to continue his quest.