QUILL

The first daily quest was the same as their first quest: delivering a crate to Yelsin across town. Simple enough and they managed to beg sandwiches for their reward instead of stew so they’d have something for lunch.

The second daily quest took place in a sewer outlet that emptied into a canal. Four brown slimes hung about outside the grate covering the sewer exit: one large slime about one meter high and two across, and three smaller versions about the size of a soccer ball.

Jane drew her knife and sounded confident as she moved in. “This should be easy enough, right? Slimes?” Noticing that he wasn’t following her, she stopped and looked back over her shoulder. “You coming?”

“Um, no, I’ll sit this one out. You go ahead.”

“You’re scared of slimes? Come on, Quill, this should be easy, no matter what your stats.”

“Sure. Whatever. Ladies first.”

She shook her head in mild disappointment and turned back to the slimes — then paused. She looked back once more, eyes narrowed. “Seriously, why aren’t you helping?”

He could have let her keep going alone…but he wasn’t that cruel. He relented. “If ice slimes are light blue, water slimes dark blue, and fire slimes orange, then what do you suspect brown slimes are?”

She glanced back at the monsters. “Wood?”

“When they’re sitting outside a sewer pipe?”

“You mean — ew! Poo slimes!” She covered her mouth with her arm and hastily backed up. Then she shoved him forward. “Gentlemen first.”

He whirled and pushed her in front instead. “No, no. I don’t want to be sexist. Equality, fairness, all that. You have a hard-fought right to fight your own battles. I won’t oppress you by stealing opportunities—“

“Quill!”

He chuckled.

She moaned. “Seriously, let’s skip this one.”

“We get a reward for completing all the dailies, though.”

Quill raised his hands in front of himself like he was holding a book. “[Journal].” A book appeared in his hands. The page in front of him read:

DAILY QUESTS

1/3 Completed

Reward for completing all daily quests:

1 silver

1 gear token

He continued, “It may not sound like much, but that silver would feed anyone for a day if they were careful.”

“What do you think gear tokens are?” Jane pulled one out of her pocket from the previous day.

“I can guess, but we’ll find out later, I’m sure.”

“Let’s just skip the poo slimes. We have money for food today.”

He eyed the brown slimes. They weren’t close enough to aggro them so they were safely too far to smell them. He didn’t relish the idea of getting himself and his partner covered in excrement for a paltry reward. Except… He sighed and turned the pages in the journal.

WEEKLY QUESTS

1/7 Completed

Reward for completing all weekly quests:

1 gold

10 gear tokens

MONTHLY QUESTS

1/30 Completed

Reward for completing all daily quests:

1 weapon skill point

Suprise costume

15 chicken legs

10 gold

10 gear tokens

Jane blinked at the last page. “15 chicken legs. Who…ugh.”

“Yeah. But that weapon skill point is probably really useful.”

Jane pouted and whined but reluctantly gave in. “Fine. Whatever. I hate you.”

“Hey! I didn’t design the poo quest.”

“I’m blaming you anyway.”

“That just…not fair at all.”

The slimes were just as foul-smelling as one might think. Like putting your head down an outhouse toilet. Luckily, the elemental beings moved slowly and simply. The two companions lured the three smaller ones out first and stabbed them to death, getting mildly splattered as they did so. The big one put up much more of a fight, and they had no choice but to get up close and dirty. Jane got pressed up against a wall once and Quill run over. And when it perished, it did so in a wet, brown explosion.

Quill stood on the side of the canal, dripping feces and trying not to vomit. At the sound of voices, he looked up.

A small crowd of other players stood a short ways down the canal, watching. They, too, probably had this quest for their dailies. The crowd took one look at him and Jane and shook their collective heads.

“Nope.”

“Skipping that one.”

“Hard pass.”

“Not worth the reward.”

“Hey, if we see those two walking around town—“

“You mean, if we smell them.”

“That too. We should give them nicknames in honour of their bravery this day.”

“The Poo Killers.”

“The Toilet Twosome.”

“Smelly McSmellsBad and his partner, Lady Brownstain.”

As the other players strolled off, backslapping and joking and coming up with even more insulting nicknames, Jane glared at Quill. “I hate you.”

He carefully wiped his mouth off so he wouldn’t get anything inside when he spoke. “Bite me.”

“I will. Later.”

“Hmph.” He reached over and casually pushed her backwards.

Jane’s eyes flew open wide as she fell backwards. She cried out in surprise. Then her body fell into the canal. A brown cloud spread out from her body.

Quill dove in after her. When he surfaced, he found her treading water and scrubbing herself, trying to get all the brown blobs and slime off her body.

She glared at him, not so playfully this time.

He got his face clean before talking, thankful the canal was moving and carrying the excrement away. “Ok, it was the most disgusting quest in history. I’m sorry. Next time, we come better prepared with spears or bows or fire bombs or something.”

She grumbled back, “We’d better.”

The third quest of the morning was a child’s game. Eight glowing lights appeared in the street, some hanging over the cobblestones, others on top of a canopy above a market stall or under a parked cart. They had to run and touch every ball of light before a timer ran out.

Jane didn’t have the stamina for it. Despite being able to move faster than Quill, she couldn’t sprint the entire way in the short time needed.

Quill, moving slower but more steadily, touched the final light just as the timer ran out and flopped to the ground, panting and out of breath.

A small chest appeared in the street. When Jane opened it, copper coins burst out in all directions, many of them getting lost between cracks in the cobblestone road or bouncing away who knows where.

“Seriously? Who designed this?” Jane kicked the chest in frustration, making it tumble down the street a few meters before it vanished. But she set about collecting the coins.

Quill, still winded, heaved himself off the ground and joined her. Every copper, every experience point, every effort counted. If they were going to win this game and survive, they couldn’t waste anything.

After collecting their quest rewards from the Adventurers Guild, they decided to head out of town again. With the dailies done, Jane seemed to return to her usual, more upbeat self.

Quill, his curiosity piqued, pointed down a new road, a crowd of people going in and out catching his interest. “We haven’t gone that way yet, have we?”

“Shall we explore?”

His excitement rose; he loved discovering new things in games. “Never know what we might learn.”

They detoured down the new road, joining a small stream of other players and NPCs.

This street happened to feature several shops. The first they came across was a weapon shop. The sign had a sword and spear above the words The Pointy End First.

Quill saw the line of mechanical devices on either side of the door, facing the street. He slapped one cheek and groaned. “You’ve got to be kidding me.”

Jane, curious, walked over to inspect. “Slot machines? Vending machines?”

Quill sidled up next to her. “Gacha machines. You put a coin and turn the dial or, in this case, pull the lever. Out comes a ball with something in it. You don’t know what’s inside until you open it; it’s a gamble. Usually, they’re filled with toys and stickers and stuff.”

“Hmm. I wonder what’s in these.”

Each device stood about two meters tall and a meter wide. The top two-thirds was a glass case filled with half-white, half-red balls⁠1. The bottom half had a coin slot and lever and an opening where the softball-sized ball would emerge once paid for.

A player a few machines down angrily slapped the gacha device he was using. The player, dressed in a nice, complete set of gear, at first glance, looked to be one of the wealthier players. What really gave it away was the bag of gold coins next to him. Kneeling in front of the gacha machine, he pumped a coin into the slot and pulled the lever, his motions frantic, like an addict. When the ball emerged, he scooped it up and tore it open with a vicious twist.

A cloud of white smoke appeared.

“White again. Dammit!” The player scowled and tossed the two halves of the ball aside and wiping the cloud away in annoyance. The ball halves fell on a large pile of discarded halves. As the player reached for another gold coin, the cloud of smoke slowly coalesced into…a dull axe with a chipped blade. It hovered a long moment, then fell and clanked on the cobbles next to a bunch of other junk: cheese, meat, patches of cloth, planks of lumber, bottles of various liquids, low-level weapons of all kinds.

A second and much smaller pile held a handful of weapons that looked finer. When Quill concentrated, they glowed green and blue, indicating higher quality, perhaps magical.

The player pulled another ball, and another white cloud appeared. He snarled and tossed the pull away like before. “Fucking thing. There should be a guaranteed pull! This is stupid! All it’s giving me is fucking garbage.” He reached for another gold coin.

Jane’s mouth fell open. She closed it with a snap and whispered to him, “There’s a small fortune just lying on the street.”

“But nothing worth the gold he’s throwing away.”

The player, overhearing, threw them a glare. “Piss off.” He pulled again. More white smoke. Another gold down the drain. “If I don’t see sparkles and a yellow item soon, I’m gonna fucking snap.” He reached for another coin.

Quill empathized. He didn’t want to stay and watch, though quite a number of others were pausing in the street to do just that. What the appeal was of watching someone else blow huge sums of money and get stuff was, he didn’t know.

“Oh!” Jane exclaimed, digging in her pocket and pulling out a gear token. “I guess that’s what these are for.” She put it into a machine and pulled the lever. A red-and-white ball dropped into her hands. “Come on, legendary magic staff!” She gave the ball a sharp twist.

A white cloud appeared.

Her expression fell. “Aw…” The cloud slowly formed into a baguette.

Quill pulled out his own tokens. He had two. Dropping them into the machine next to Jane’s, he retrieved two balls. The first was white, a badly carved club. The second was red.

Jane burst with excitement, “Whoa!”

People in the street stopped to watch and murmured.

The guy feeding gold into the machines paused and looked up in angry disbelief. “No fucking way! An epic?”

The red cloud shimmered and slowly turned into…an expensive-looking bottle of wine.

Quill frowned and chuckled at the same time. “What the—“

The bottle dropped out of the air.

He lunged to catch it and missed.

The bottle smashed onto the cobbles, precious burgundy liquid spreading in a pool.

The gambler cruelly laughed. “Epic fail, dumbass!”

People watching groaned and moved on.

Quill stared at the mess, feeling stupid as the broken item faded into nothing. “That…probably would have been worth a bunch of money.”

Jane consoled him, patting him on the back. “It’s fine. Don’t worry about it.” She put her second token in a got another ball. Blue smoke. “A knife. Better than the one I have. Nice!” She plucked the knife out of the air before it could fall, then raised a hand for a high five.

He smiled because he knew she was forcing the cheer but appreciated the effort. He high-fived Jane and then nodded his head toward the shop door. “Wanna look inside? Haven’t been in any of the shops yet.”

“True. Yeah, let’s.”

He held the door open for her, and the pair entered the weapon shop.

Jane squealed, “So cool!”

He, too, grinned.

The shop was filled with weapon stands, each featuring a different type of weapon: swords, axes, two-handed axes, maces, polearms like spears and halberds, daggers, hammers and mauls, and even tridents.

“Oh my gosh!” Jane reverently plucked a wicked-looking instrument of death from one rack. “They have scythes!” The weapon had a shaft as long as Jane was tall. From out of the top came a curved blade over a meter long. It was the kind of tool you see wielded by the incarnation of death in Western culture.

Despite being a farming tool used for cutting crops, the scythe had become a popular weapon in some games, mostly mobile ones.

“Looks like WoF finally gave in. Total fan favourite, but so few MMOs have them. Guess they think it’s unrealistic or something.”

“Or too much work to program.” She gently gave the weapon an experimental poke in the air. “Super unbalanced and awkward. But the coolness factor is off the charts.”

“You want to buy one?”

Jane looked at the price on the rack and barked an incredulous laugh. “Ha! 50 gold for a bottom-of-the-line white weapon? That’s nuts.” Something caught her eye, and she pointed up, drawing Quill’s attention.

A sign with a dolphin hung over one side of the shop, with green and blue items in racks. They looked for a corresponding sign on the other side of the shop and found one for a whale, giving Quill and Jane a laugh. Below the whale were purple and red items.

Dolphins and whales were terms used to indicate how big spenders were in video games. Dolphins spent too much money, perhaps hundreds of real-world dollars. Whales spent small fortunes. It wasn’t unheard of for players to spend tens or even hundreds of thousands of dollars on a game in order to try and get the best gear or characters.

“You ever wonder why stores in games no longer carry worthwhile weapons? Back in the day, you could buy good gear in stores. Sure, they were crazy expensive, but you could save up, and it would be worth it. It felt good saving up and buying that sword or whatever that you had your eye on for so long.”

“But that’s no good when you can just buy gold and stuff, right? They want to lock everything good behind lousy drop rates to keep you hooking and grinding away.”

“I miss games that prioritized the experience over wasting your time. Too bad gambling and dopamine hits make more money.”

Jane carefully replaced the scythe in its stand, ducking to keep from slicing her own head off. “There was something about gear in the Adventurers Guide, wasn’t there? We really need to read more of it.” She pulled out the book and opened it to the appropriate section.

GEAR RANKS

Rainbow - Unique

Yellow - Legendary

Red - Epic

Purple - Heroic

Blue - Rare

Green - Uncommon

White - Common

“No way,” Quill breathed. “Unique? As in, only one of a kind? I thought games never did that.”

Jane read from the book. “Unique… ‘Unique items are just that, unique. Only one exists. In exceptionally rare cases, they may drop from defeated enemies or be found in chests or other locations. However, most are acquired as a reward for the first adventurer to pass certain quests or bosses.”

Quill was stunned. “So the first player to finish one of these quests gets a unique reward. Holy cow. That’s a massive incentive to be the first to do anything. I’ll bet unique weapons are insanely powerful.”

Jane’s excitement was rising too. “I’ll bet unique items are ridiculously powerful. We need to be out there, exploring. Finding all the new quests we can.”

“Tracking down unique monsters. Fighting bosses.”

She paused and grew more thoughtful. “Imagine the competition once people find out about this. It’s going to put even more pressure on us to play hard.”

Quill nodded, his eyes scanning the gear page in the book Jane held. “And it’s definitely going to reward all those pay-to-win guys more than anyone else. The ones buying max level-ups. They’ll be able to go after those unique drops first.”

GEAR ENHANCEMENT

Gear can be taken to a blacksmith and enhanced for a set amount of gold. At different levels of enhancement, gear will improve. The amount of improvement is random.

Gain stat bonuses at +3, +6, +9, +12, and +15.

SUBSTATS

An item can have up to 4 substats based on its quality. Substats include, but are not limited to: bonus to base stats, attack speed, critical hit chance, critical hit damage, and more.

Jane groaned. “So much RNG on top of RNG!” RNG was a term used to indicate randomness, the letters standing for random number generator. “Not only do you have to get lucky acquiring gear when it drops from bosses, but you have to level the gear up and how well it levels up is random?”

“Like throwing your money away.”

She scowled, looking highly annoyed. “MMO gear systems never used to be this bad! Imagine how many times you’d have to go through the same dungeon over and over again until you not only got the gear you wanted but one that levelled up well.”

The more he thought about the whole process, the more overwhelming and discouraging it was. He felt his hope falling. “Yeah, this is mobile crap right here; gacha games do this. Everything’s a casino now, trying to milk people out of their time and money.” And it was going to make their lives in World of Fantasy that much harder.

Jane’s mood seemed to be taking a hit, too, her voice growing dejected. “This is going to make gearing up a huge, expensive pain. We’re going to have to spend so much time grinding pointless monsters to get enough gold to gamble on our own gear.”

Quill felt himself succumbing to inner darkness and tried to force a halt to it. He could feel the myriad negatives about the game system dragging him down and knew it was bad. He took away and closed the Adventurers Guide. “Screw it. Forget this stuff. We’ll just use garbage gear as much as we can. After all, it’ll be outdated quickly enough, right? Level five gear will be useless when we’re level ten.”

She took a breath and seemed to steady herself as well. “Right. Of course. We’ll just wait until we’re end-game before getting into gear. Hopefully.”

“Let’s just focus on the things we can do and achieve. If we spend too much time thinking about this, it’s only going to be discouraging.” He spoke to himself as much as her but he had to keep his spirits up.

“Agreed. It was enough to learn about the gear. We should focus on playing and levelling. We’ll think about enhancing gear or whatever for end-boss fights.”

They shared a pair of slightly forced smiles. Quill, for one, was glad they were on the same page about this. And that both were trying to stay positive. So much about this whole experience seemed designed to pull him down and make him want to give up. He couldn’t give in to that, or he’d never succeed.

A scream pierced the air inside the weapon shop.

Quill and Jane both looked towards a door at the back of the main room.

Jane drew her new knife. “Potential quest?”

“Let’s hope the monsters aren’t giant bears ten levels higher than us this time.”

“I don’t care. As long as it isn’t more poo slimes.”

They barged through the door and found themselves in a storage room and workshop. A long table held various weapons in the process of being polished and tagged. Crates had been stacked up against one wall. One door, open at the moment, revealed stairs going up, probably to living quarters above the shop. Another door likely led outside.

A woman stood at the bottom of the stairs in fright, staring at the scene in the center of the room.

A masked rogue in black-and-gold leathers held a needle-sharp dagger at the throat of a man wearing an apron, likely the husband of the frightened woman and the manager of the shop. The rogue glanced their way and snarled. He began to withdraw his weapon.

The man in the apron must have gained a sense of courage. With the blade no longer at his throat, he grabbed the rogue’s arm and shouted, “Stop him! Help us! Glory, run!” He reached up with one hand and swiped the mask from the rogue’s face, exposing a large nose, a scarred lip, and dark eyes.

The rogue growled and tried to back his head out of reach, pulling the mask back up.

Quill bolted forward, Jane a step behind. The rogue looked way out of their league, but if they were getting this quest, the system should think they were high enough level for it. If the shopkeeper could just hold the man’s arm for a few seconds…

The rogue effortlessly slipped from the shopkeeper’s grip and stabbed him in the neck. “Stupid bugger. Shoulda just paid.”

The wife, Glory, screamed.

Kicking the dying man at Quill to trip him up, the rogue fled out the back door into an alley.

Quill caught the shopkeeper; blood sprayed him in the face and chest as he lowered the man to the floor. “Healing potion! Do you have a healing potion?”

Glory raced over and knelt. “No, we don’t. Please, you’re adventurers; you must have one!”

But they were far too poor to own such things. Helpless, they watched as the man bled out and died.

Quill felt awful, even though it was just an NPC dying and a staged act. He knew the people would take their places again later when other players came by. Still, the death was very realistic.

Jane put her shoulder on the newly widowed woman’s arm. “I’m sorry. What happened?”

Glory, chest heaving with sobs, angrily shook Jane’s hand off.

Jane rolled her eyes and stood up, looking a touch hurt. “Ok, having low Charisma kinda sucks.”

“Let me try.” Quill gave the woman a minute to calm down, then pressed her with questions. “I’m sorry we couldn’t stop him. Who did this? And why?”

Glory looked up at him, wiping a mess of tears out of eyes that were distrustful but much less so for Quill’s sake than when she looked over at Jane.

Jane scoffed in disgust.

The widow tenderly touched her husband’s cheek. “It was the Gold Crusade. We…we couldn’t pay our dues this month.” Her expression turning fierce, she caught Quill’s wrist in an iron grip slick with her husband’s blood. “You saw his face. I beg you: find by husband’s killer. Bring him to justice. Arrest him if you must, but if you have any kindness, remove him from this world the way he did my love. You’re adventurers; you can do that, surely? I’ll reward you!”

Quill eyed Jane, who nodded, and then bowed his head to the widow. “Of course, we accept.”

She nodded once, then turned away from him to grieve.

He and Jane exited the shop through the same backdoor the killer had escaped through.

Before either could talk about the new quest, a sketchy man in sunglasses and a trenchcoat slid up to them, a greasy smile on his thin lips. “Heya. How ya doin’?” His eyes warily darted up and down the alley before he opened his trenchcoat.

“Hey!” Jane’s hands flew over her eyes, likely worried about what such a man was revealing to her.

He wasn’t flashing them, thankfully. He reached into a bag of holding and pulled out a wooden crate. “Can I interest the two of you in a loot box?”

Quill laughed. “Oh my gosh. That’s hilarious.” He elbowed Jane and smirked at her.

She stuck out her tongue, then turned her attention to the stranger. “What’s inside?”

“What’s inside? What’s not inside? Who knows? Potions, weapons, costumes, food, gold, crafting materials — it could be anything! And it could be all yours!”

Jane gave him a level look. “It could be junk.”

The stranger looked appalled. “No! Never.” Then the expression softened. “Well, almost never. Barely sometimes. Really, it’s all a matter of perspective and need. One person’s junk is another person’s treasure, right?” He winked and waggled his eyebrows.

She folded her arms. “Sounds like a real gamble. Waste of money.”

His eyes swivelled once more up and down the alley before he drew himself up to her side and stage-whispered in her ear. “Did I mention there’s a chance to get — legendary gear?”

Quill saw her interest perk up and pulled her away from the scam artist, and started walking down the alley, heading for the street beyond. “Don’t fall for it. Any gear we get will be at our level. What’s the point when we’ll be higher level in a few days, and the gear will be useless?”

Hastily following, a fresh, greasy smile appeared, and the man shrugged as if it didn’t matter. He held the box up, trying to temp Jane even as they tried to leave him behind. “You could always sell it. Or put it up in the auction house.”

Jane looked confused, though she didn’t stop. They exited the alley and came to a stop on the street, back in the sun once more. She looked over her shoulder at the scammer who didn’t seem to want to leave the shadows of the alley. “Doesn’t it bind to the player?”

The NPC didn’t understand the question. But a player passing by evidently overheard and paused. “Weapons and armour don’t bind here.”

Quill’s head jerked in the newcomer’s direction. “What?”

The other player looked resigned. “Yup. You die; it lies there so anyone can pick it up.”

“That’s insane. Realistic, but it would lead to…”

A despondent nod. “Constant theft. I mean, it’s marked with the last wearer’s ID, but if someone takes it and runs off, what are you going to do?”

Jane winced. “Harsh.”

Quill couldn’t believe it. “I guess that gives us some serious incentive not to die. I thought losing XP was bad enough, but losing gear, too?”

The other player stuck his hands in his pockets. “Probably going to be a lot of casual thieves out there. I mean, if you came across a spot where someone died and left their gear, you could just leave it for when they return to claim it. But who’s going to be that honest? Free items? Or sell it for free gold? We all know not everyone’s getting out of this game alive. Gotta do what you gotta do to survive.” With a little wave, he turned and strolled off, seemingly not in a hurry to get back to a game that seemed to be doing everything it could to make things harder on them.

Quill couldn’t blame him. He was starting to feel pretty down himself.