Juliet rotated her avatar around a few more times to look at it from all angles. She had chosen the elf race, she knew that her brothers had said they should all be humans but she didn’t care she wanted to be a spritely elf!

But now as she stood there looking at here character she began to feel a bit guilty. She enjoyed playing with her siblings but at the same time this was her first VR game and she wanted to have fun being something different. Eventually she gave in a small concession and changed her race to that of a half elf. Now her avatar looked slightly less like a spritely elf and a bit more human. She had kept most of her physical features unchanged except she had shortened her avatar’s height. In real life she stood at a tall five feet and ten inches. But she had always disliked this since it made her feel awkward being taller than most of her friends and it made it difficult to succeed in her sprinting track events as a smaller body was easier to accelerate. So, now her avatar stood at a much smaller five feet and seven inches. Her hair which she usually kept short. now reached her waist and gleamed like spun gold. Her skin was delicate and pale like fine china, no matter how often she was in the sun her skin refused to tan like her older brother’s.

With a nod she confirmed she was finished.

-family members are given the option to start together. Would you like to start with Pete and Weiss?

"Yes."

-Your Account has been activated. Welcome to New Road

_____________________________________________________________________________________

Peter gave a satisfied nod. Before him stood his avatar, it looked similar to him with a few differences. He had also altered his height like his twin, though he made his avatar taller to make up for the inch he was missing from being six feet tall. It always bothered him how he hadn’t caught up to his older brother in height yet. He had made his skin pale like his sister’s and had altered his hair to black and his eyes to a fiery orange. This was his common character build for all games.

“Finished!”

-Your Account has been activated. Welcome to New Road.

After the momentary nothingness he opened his eyes to a crowd of people milling about. He was slightly confused as he had expected to appear before the gates of Morata rather than in this other place. Unlike his brother he took the time to look around and see what was behind him. His eyes widened in surprise as he saw a verdant garden of Eden spread out behind the mass of people. He took one step, then another and another until he was running towards it. His curiosity was on fire as he rushed down the path threading through green hills dressed with flowers of every color imaginable. In fact the amount of beauty in the area was enough to make him feel slightly nauseous from the sensory overload!

He slowed to a walk until he came to a wizened old man who was leaning against the fence that had recently appeared to define the limits of what appeared to have been a pasture. His posture suggested he was exhausted and was trying to regain some of his strength. Pete walked up to the man and stood before him.

“Excuse me, but are you ok?”

He was typically a mischievous and rude person but he had already grasped from previous games that being nice to NPCs resulted in rewards!

The old man glanced up as he breathed heavily through an open mouth, in which sharp canines could be seen.

“To think the day would come that a foolish human would worry about me! Humph!”

“Sorry did I say something wrong? Also, what do you mean by human? Aren’t you one too?”

“NO!”

The old man surged upright to his full height which was slightly taller than Pete’s. He bared his fangs as he glared at Pete.

“I am a noble of the night! The greatest and most majestic of all the races! I am the Lord Tori! Don’t you dare compare me to a mere human!”

It was the vampire lord Tori! Somehow over the past two hundred years he had weakened to such an extent that he had appeared to age! He had truly become a different person from when he had fought alongside Weed!

“Oh, so you’re the pedo-vampire that would fight alongside Weed two hundred years ago.”

“Geuk!”

The old vampire lord flinched at the direct and straightforward insult that Pete had delivered. It had become common knowledge in the later years of Royal Road about the vampire lord Tori’s obsession with cute little girls.

“So, how did such a noble vampire end up as an old grandpa.”

Tori’s eyes narrowed in annoyance, while a bit of his former powers were brought to the fore. Pete could feel the menacing presence and stiffened slightly.

“What… did you call me boy?”

“You look like a dried out husk. What happened to the magnificent being that slaughtered hundreds of foes in the Final Battle.”

At this combination of facts, insult and praise the vampire sighed and looked truly like the old man his appearance suggested.

“It’s this land. We of the night were not meant to come here, but thanks to him we were able to. He has since moved my people back to the continent where we can have a chance of surviving. I however remained; I will still hold true to my oath on that day and will continue to serve him through his reincarnation.”

He paused as he smiled ruefully as only an old man could, “But in these past two hundred years this place has drained all my vitality away, I have also been starved of fresh blood. Now I’m just a withered husk who will be of no use to his reincarnation.”

A very small part of Pete felt sorry for Tori. After a moment of silence he leaned against the fence beside Tori.

“Yeah, but I think it’s amazing that you’ve lasted this long. Besides you’ve already come this far so why give up now?”

“Ha! You may be right, if only I had a drop of fresh blood I would have enough energy to make it to the gate…”

Tori let the sentence trail off as Pete stiffened.

‘The bastard was planning this!’

Then Pete slowly smiled, he was after all very clever and had used the same ploy innumerable times. He stood up and moved back in front of Tori again.

“I suppose I could let you have some of mine.”

“Really!?”

It almost seemed as if it had started raining in Tori’s mouth from the amount of saliva that he was releasing.

“But.”

“But…” Tori suddenly became nervous, bad memories of Weed still floated up from time to time and the boy in front of him was making him remember one too many!

“You will have to owe me an unspecified favor that I will call on at an unspecified time.”

The memories! They began storming through Tori’s mind. The kid he saw before him was just as devious as Weed! But he also knew that he wouldn’t survive much longer without the aid of the boy. Eventually his desperation won over his experiences.

“Very well.”

Pete held out his arm and the vampire hungrily began to consume his blood.

You are bleeding -2 Hp/s

Pete winced slightly at the pain as his health slowly drained away with his blood. It was soon forgotten as he watched the transformation taking place before him! As Tori consumed his blood, he appeared to regain his former youth and vitality! When he had finished, he was no longer a wizened old man but a youthful, noble of the night!

Tori rose and stood tall for the first time in what felt like an eon. He flexed and rolled his arms, legs and neck before breaking into a smile.

“Yes! My power has returned to me after all these years! Now I can go forth and crush the bastards that forced me to make that horrible oath!”

Tori referred to the dark forces that had blanketed the Versailles continent in shadow during the Final Battle. It had been because of them that he had been forced to ask for Weed’s help. Now all he could think of was claiming vengeance!

“You had better not forget your oath to me.”

Tori glanced down at Pete with an expression that mixed disdain with annoyance. Pete returned his look with one of that simply said that he knew he was going to be obeyed.

“Tsk, I will not. Now I must be off!”

Tori transformed into a bat and left for the gate. Pete rested himself against the fence once again.

‘I too should probably head out.’

He took one more glance back at the world he wouldn’t get the chance to explore before following the path back to the gate. Had he stayed for just a few minutes longer, he would have seen two enormous shapes flying through the sky. One would sparkle and shine in the sunlight, while the other was a simple rocky brown color.

It was Bingryong and Wy-1! They too were moving towards the gates. Over the two hundred year period they had formed a close bond as they were the last of Weed’s sculptures, the Wings of Light had never made it back.

“HE has been reincarnated by now, don’t you think?”

“Yes, it would be best if we did not show ourselves in Morata.”

“At least it’s not like he can do anything against us now, we are so much more powerful than he is currently.”

“He would find a way.”

At this they both shivered, knowing that any form of disobedience would be met with swift punishment a hundredfold.

“What do you plan to do once you return?”

“While he was a god he restored the dragon race by creating new eggs, they should be hatching soon, I must go and ensure they

are safe! What about you?”

“I had nothing in mind other than to eat tasty creatures again. I’ll help you while I’m at it, we just need to find where the eggs are and protect them until they hatch right?”

“Yes, there are many things that are on Versailles now that would like nothing better than for the Dragons to never return.”

Bingryong thought about others! His cowardly tendencies had left him over the course of his stay on this other plane of existence. Wy-1 had changed as well, after the death of his brothers he had blamed himself, believing that it was because they had been so complacent and had never bothered to get stronger unless Weed was forcing them to. Now, he was as strong as Bingryong!

The two masters of the sky flew onwards and through a gate that had opened for them, high above the one the players were

traveling through.