Sorry, something came up so I couldn't write these past few days. This one is a short chapter so I hope you can hold on till the next one. ?

After getting lost at least another 4 times Ludius and...

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"What's your name?",

"Sandra, what's yours.",

"Ludius.", and they continued walking.

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After getting lost at least another 4 times Ludius and Sandra arrived at the village gates. The village, only a few hours travel from the forest edge as it turned out, wasn't large in size; with only 15 odd households. But what it lacked in size it made up for easily with its well built shops and blacksmith for players and npcs alike.

The surrounding wall was only made from crudely assembled logs, sticks and the occasional rope but it would take a beating from any animal in the forest for enough time for people to deal with it. The gate itself was only a pair of large wooden doors.

A man dressed in cheap plate armor was holding back an older looking fellow of around 50 with grayish hair and a plump physique.

...

"S-Sandra!", the older man shouted while he quickly ran over to the women.

"What!", automatically responded a startled Sandra.

After looking all over and making sure Sandra was alright the man continued to speak," Thank god you're all right! You didn't return and I feared the worst."

"Don't worry father, as you can see, I'm fine. Now let's go home."

Finally the man was happy again and slowly walked back to the gate with his daughter, Ludius following to one side.

"Who's the pointy eared guy?", whispered the man loudly.

"Oh Ludius, he saved me in the forest."

"What! No never mind we'll talk about this later.", the man turned to look at Ludius.

"Hello young man, the name's Ed. I'm Sandra's dad. Who are you?",

"Me? I'm Ludius, a traveler of sorts."

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In QV only other players know about the existence of 'players' and 'npcs'. Which can often lead to many unwanted situations.

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"Hmmm... A traveler. Ok. You can stay and eat dinner at my house tonight; and tomorrow I'm sure Sandra will show you around."

"Sounds good to me.", replied Ludius.

And they continued into the town.

"Thanks dad.", Sandra whispered to her father.

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After a slap up meal and being shown to his room, Ludius set aside his sword and went to sleep.

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In QV sleeping is akin to logging off, as you skip time in one world whilst being in another and in order to accommodate this kind of play the time ratio between QV and real life is 1:1.

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The boy sat up in bed and took the VR headset from his head.