Private Eastern Brisshal A journey better meant for two.

[Tick Tock]

.

Components were required, and so far that which she seeks proved to be beyond her scope.

Frustrating as it were, a walk through the starting area should prove to be far more resourceful than to put her neck on the line based on mere rumours of what she IS after, and to give some fresh air to her silent, visually cackling companion, the bodyless skull flew around leaving in it's wake a muted trace of magic never too far away from it's creator.

While they didn't allow her to keep the book at Honeyhome's local bookstore, nothing some papyrus and ink could not solve to format a small list of flora to keep an eye out for, both for it's effects and it's description. The imagery to match is nowhere near as good as the author's, but it served well to keep a clear distinction between each.

Still, it embarassed her deeply to see how crude her art could be. A weakpoint that always plagued her in real life, so comfortable with technology and how it facilitated proper presentation for her projects. A keypoint she would have to break in Terrasphere.

Onyx knelt down on one of said examples. Peacebloom, a white little flower of fairly average usage, and a key ingredient in both alchemy and traditional medicine alike. Not a rare finding, but the locals suggest to always keep a few.

Pruning shears at hand, she knelt down to carefully crop the upper-quarters of each specimen. Slowly but surely a smile grew upon her lips, gentle and absorbed on the task at hand, wagging her tail unconciously so from side to side against the jade blades of grass behind her.

@Juniper Lockton

 

[Juniper Lockton]

.

Then down came a shooting star over Eastern Brisshals, a sign that a new person had joined their world in Terra. This new person was one Juniper Lockton, a young woman escaping a life of hopelessness into a world where she could be herself. This being her first venture, her heart raced as she prepared herself for her first interactions. Would she be attacked immediately? She'd learned enough to use the auto assist and stuff, at least.

Here goes nothing.

Appearing in a clearing within sight of a town on the horizon, she spawned particularly close to where a young beastfolk, a wolf girl it looked like, was tending to some flowers. Looking revealed that she was a player, not an NPC, though from what she'd heard you had to look to tell the difference.

She cleared her throat, may as well try to interact now. What would her voice sound like? How did that work? She changed her voice but had only heard generated samples of what it might sound like. Well, here went nothing.

"This is-" She paused. Her heart beat faster. The sound of her own voice was liberating, freeing, "This is quite a sight to spawn into. Those are quite lovely. What are they?" She smiled gently, hoping that she wasn't being just a weird new person to this poor player.

@Onyx

 

[Tick Tock]

.

A shooting star across the sky. Even in daytime the visibility was clear, an abnormal phenomenon, the herald of a new player's first entrance into the game, and no sooner than that her ears flickered as she heard the raspy, homogenic sound of someone clearing their throat, amber eyes shot in the direction of the simply-dressed beastfolk that just spawned in.

Onyx rose an eyebrow, as her first two words didn't quite make a sentence, yet far from an anti-social, this girl made a surprising recovery with that smile of hers.

"These are peaceblooms." Gaze set itself back to her duties once reminded of the flowers, cropping them down as she spoke. "People around this world employ them in traditional medicine. Hmm, think of them as their version of the hyssopus officinalis or the plantago major. I'm yet to find out how true that is though." They lacked the technology or the means to prove it, even if such doors were slowly opening to them if only they so allowed magitech to do what it was intended to.

After a few silent moments where she pondered how exactly to continue their conversation and after enough collection, she paused only to offer the little shears towards her fellow beastfolk, locking eyes with her yet again, impassive. "Want to give it a try? I don't mind an extra set of hands." She lied, but breaking the ice felt far more relevant right now. The skull that hovered next to her soon dropped lifeless onto the ground.

@Juniper Lockton

 

[Juniper Lockton]

.

Getting a good look at the other woman, she was immediately impressed by what she saw. Modest beauty, reserved and quiet. Like a personified nature reserve. Quietly nurturing, beautiful, dangerous. All befitting a wolf.

"Peaceblooms." She repeated, crouching down to get a better look. She looked confused, ears flicking subconsciously as she recited the scientific names of comparable plants from the real world. Blinking, she looked embarrassed, as if she hadn't studied for a pop quiz.

"Version of the what?" She asked timidly, hoping that she wasn't being annoying by asking. She was eager to learn and try new things, but she wasn't all that smart. She'd missed out on a few important electives and been taught a wholly religious education instead. It wasn't great.

She blinked again as the shears were offered to her, looking back up to an impassive expression to make sure it was okay. Taking them, she tenderly tried to copy what the other girl had done and felt satisfied with herself as she succeeded. Offering them back to her, she smiled before offering a hand to shake,

"I see why you do it. This seems very peaceful and calming." She offered, "I'm Juniper. I suppose you could use Juni instead, if you wanna shorten it."

 

[Tick Tock]

.

Her confusion came unsurprisingly quick, both to the way she toned out the name of the flower itself, to the very scientific naming the similar examples (similar, as far as she could guess).

"Of the hyssop and the greater plantain. Of the Lamiaceae and Plantagi...-" She twisted her tongue for one half of a second that broke all facets of her neutrality with a frown that lasted just as that stumble did. "-Plantaginaceae families respectively so." A nod reaffirmed her own thoughts as expressed, but the confusion this girl portrayed reminded her of how little she's been interacting with others on Terrasphere. A game meant to be social, a MMORPG at that, and yet here she is: being the least approachable possible by shoving needlessly complicated terminology no one would drop on a regular conversation.

"They are just all used for medicine, don't worry about the names." She reaffirmed, watching her closely as Juniper 'Juni' proved to be better as a worker than a listener. If she were to look back at Onyx, she would get an encouraging nod to proceed, at least until none of them were left and ended up on the wolf's hands, only to banish and become code to rest inside her inventory.

Her right hand stretched out and awaited for the shears to be returned, only to give it the same treatment as the samples right now. "It is. And these sell for a bit around here for the locals. Not that much, but certainly enough with how dangerous the woods have become. Medicine is very valuable nowdays." Onyx straightened herself up, hands reaching into her pockets. "I'm Onyx. Pleasure's mine, Juni. I take it you are a newcomer. Well then, would you like to tag along for a while? I can answer your questions and I get someone to pick up ingredients for me." She offered, her hand stretching out once again, this time however, to help Juni back up on her feet.

@Juniper Lockton

 

[Juniper Lockton]

.

Instead of clarification, all she earned for her question was more confusion. Great, thanks. At least she got the reason for her gathering them and then got her name. That was good, right? Oh, and she invited her to go help pick more! A cute girl immediately dragging her along on a personal side quest? Gaming.

The fox began to walk side by side with the wolf, the black wolf catching her attention in all the right ways, eyes hardly able to stay off of her. The only time she wasn't thinking about Onyx was when she was thinking about how amazing she felt right now. It all felt so real. If only it was.

What a great name for a black wolf. Onyx.

It had a good feel in her mouth. Almost familiar, easy.

"I'd love to~ Just point and I'll get it for ya!" but what questions did she have? Maybe...

"How long have you played? Are you one of those mentors that helps noobies or do you just happen to be in the spawning area?"

 

[Tick Tock]

.

As they walked, Onyx offered lack of awareness, blissful ignorance, as a token of her hospitality. She ignored it for quite sometime the intrigued looks the silver fox gave her, and yet...

Her eyes targeted Juniper's, body language insinuated animosity, yet her face made certain to dissuade that notion quick enough, if only leave it up to interpretation at the worst case. "I did a good job with my avatar, didn't I?" She tried discretion over confrontation with a smile most amicable, customer-service like.

"With pleasure." Onyx pulled her Ui open with one gesture of her hand.

Party

Onyx has invited you to join their party.

That should, at least, make it easier to find eachother should circumstances split them apart.

"Not so long, yet whose to say I cannot do both?" She teased back. "You could say a week or two at best. But you help me and I help you. I'll even buy you a weapon if that's what you need. For now though, let's focus on our task, we got a few exemplars to take."

She gestured back to her list, presenting it to Juniper. The closest next was Liferoot, the very definition made it obvious that it grew near trees, yet nature magic was a requirement to let these roots come to life. The specks of green on the trunk or a good nose should be able to track it down, at least that's what the many little notes of immaculate calligraphy said.

"I'm trying to reach Vintergard, but I heard it's became hostile territory under the ruling of drones and futuristic machinery that Terrasphere never saw before apparently past ancient civilization ruins." She explained

@Juniper Lockton

 

[Juniper Lockton]

.

"Hm? Oh!" Embarrassed that she got caught, and didn't even realize she got caught for a moment, she blushed deeply at the question. Even if it was rhetorical, the answer was yes, and it was provided in the form of a sheepish nod.

Not long after, a request to join her party came up and Juniper accepted the invitation, affirming that she accepted it verbally, "There we go, I accepted."

"Both it is." She responded easily, shrugging, "Would you? If you could at least show me where I could buy weapons for my class, that'd be amazing! I wanna buy a full witch outfit eventually." As she talked, she started looking sharply for Liferoot. Tail wagged impatiently, ears twitching, nose sniffing. Ah-ha! Finally, she found some as indicated in the book and grabbed some, smelling it. She had the beastfolk power of enhanced sense both in hearing and smell, and so she memorized the smell so that as they walked, she could more easily find more of it.

"It smells earthy, medicinal. Huh, I guess that makes sense." Giggling a little to herself, "Vintergard sounds dangerous. What makes you wanna go there?"

@Onyx

 

[Tick Tock]

.

Taking notice of body language alone, Onyx replied with a similar gesture, albeit far more collected than the fox and her chaotic bag of emotions going rampart right now "Thank you."

"There are no classes on Terrasphere. No preset skills, nothing of the sort. There are no two similar magics nor playstyles. You have to define that by yourself." She felt that needed to be said first and foremost, yet any answers were halt clean once Juniper turned out to be far more caenis than she assumed, the girl wagging about to spot life root as if it were but the simplest of tasks, to which she pulled out a small diary to take notes of the event, short and sweet, quill left between pages. "Nicely done, Juni. We just need one more and I think it should be enough for what I have in mind. Dreadnaught's blossom should be next." Onyx took a much more passive role, where she once was the guide now is she led on by the newbie and her blessed nose.

"As for a witch outfit, we will see. Fashion seems to have taken the best of both worlds." She gestured to her own get-up to get her point across, hands spread inside her pockets to set apart her coat briefly. "Your weapon of choice is whatever you want it to be. Think about how effective it would be in our world, and it certainly applies to this one."

A smile grew upon her lips momentarily, appreciative of the wits this girl had or just her nose and their beastfolk nature that allowed her to accurately detect Liferoot's properties. Yet the descriptions given mitigated that feat in her eyes. "Indeed, I have mostly focused on medicine so far, if only because the next step are far more hazardous materials that can spread contagion or be poisonous to the touch alike." When prompted about Vintergard, a hand tapped over the inner pockets her overcoat had, yet restrained from continuing with whatever she was about to do. "You see, Vintergard used to be a city once. One of this world's greatest kingdoms if tales are to be believed accurate and not exaggerated at all. They said an unidentified 'aerial ship' dropped upon the capital and destroyed everything." A world-wide event? The concept turned her voice from casual chill to ice-cold once she had to turn on the detective work switch.

"Like I said there are drones scattered all around Vintergard and so are shards and splinters of the original ship. I'm mostly interested on their components. I want to create my own weapons out of them."

@Juniper Lockton

 

[Juniper Lockton]

.

"What is it you have in mind anyway?" A question bubbled up out of curiosity as Onyx mentioned the potential purpose for gathering ingredients. She looked at the page for Dreadnaught's Blossom next, identifying it quickly with eyes like scanners and then began darting around to find it. It couldn't have been too far!

She didn't think too hard about how the soft praise made her heart flutter.

Touching her fingers together shyly at mention of the witch outfit and how it was possibly there, but maybe not, she perked up again and offered what she'd been thinking as far as weapons now that she had the chance, "Oh, I want to get two spherical foci to channel magic with. The floating kind." She seemed so confident in what she was talking about, but where had she even gotten the idea?

As she talked about Vintergard, Juniper looked on in wonder, mouth slightly agape as she blinked, "Are you like...an inventor, too? Or just a crafter? I wanna get into crafting, maybe gathering stuff like this. It's nice and calm out here. This is nice." Her mind quickly cycled through talking points, easily distractible as she was.

@Onyx

 

[Tick Tock]

.

"To learn. I need to understand each plant through it's chemical extraction. Medicine, antidotes are the mildest of examples, with poison, acid and toxins being the next step." Anything else she had to say would be put on hold as her eyes went wide the moment Juniper went after that purple & black flower, it's petals were all spread, and that was a sign the poor fox probably didn't know of. Gloved right hand stretched out immediately to hold back Juniper's wrist, frowning. "Don't. Touch it. See it's petals? That implies it's poison finally spread from it's roots and reached the stem." Yet despite her severity, she took a second to stare back at her hand, at the warmth that this woman radiated... "Are you ill? You are a bit too hot right now. It's not so warm out here as far as I can tell."

Soon after, Onyx pulled from her inventory a pair of clamping tongs to hold the stem of the Dreadnaught's blossom and give it a quick crop with the shears, sending it back to her inventory shortly after, right on time as the topic of weaponry returned. "Spherical foci... Yes, they should have of these on Honeyhome. The place is a hub for new players, and I'm certain the natives can explain things better with how many travelers they dealt with." She paused, bobbing her head to the side to gesture Juniper to follow as they would swiftly change directions to the East. "Come, I'll set you on track. As for your question? Yes, I picked magitech and alchemy as my masteries. I'm as much of an inventor as I'm a gatherer."

She glanced back at her, side cast from her shoulder. "Every mastery has a function outside of combat, but I suggest you get into combat first. Grow stronger, because you can only collect so much without getting in trouble around here."

@Juniper Lockton

 

[Juniper Lockton]

.

Juniper had done okay in school, but certainly was never the brightest of the bunch. She thought she understood what she was saying, but there was often a shadow of doubt in the back of her mind. As she thought about it, she reached towards one of the flowers they were picking now only for her hand to be grabbed, to which she gasped lightly.

"Oh! Sorry." Ears flattened against her head in a quick and genuine apology.

The following question made her blink and tilt her head, "Ill? Oh, no, I'm always warm like this, far as I can tell. I feel great!" Better than ever, in fact. She nodded at the recommendation for Honeyhome and its landers as a way to learn and equip herself. The woman shared advice and wisdom and she mentally noted it all down before finally responding,

"I will! That's really good advice, thank you. But how would you say I should get stronger? Do I have to do PvP? Or is it just PvE?"

@Onyx

 

[Tick Tock]

.

Juniper was all too prone to embarassment, and the ears she would normally not possess in real life clearly worked as a give away of it with how they flatten when faced with a scolding. Despite the lack of reprimend, the result turned out to be the same as she got the message across, to Onyx's surprise, that is. Usually it's the careless airheads who listen the least. Yet this one knew when something's done for her own good.

And it felt important to point that out. "It's okay. Be more mindful next time, as I won't always be there to stop you."

Onyx gave a determined stare to that wrist, listening yet as her ears flickered to her words, amber orbs could only focus on this girl's body. Nothing remarkable save for aesthetics. Pretty, as if someone took hours only to design their fox fantasy, and it shows.

"Must be a trait then. You shouldn't be this warm." She stood back on her feet with a sigh of relief pushed out. "If you have any symptoms, do let me know. This game is incredibly realistic, and disease is probably not out of question." And off they went down the woods, not taking too long to get across the scenery of beautiful jade greens and trees with great variaton in size, going from obnoxious to short, before they pulled out to the main road. Dirt. No traffic lights, no cars, no nothing Just pure fantasy on a long road that had the sun right at the horizon, still high in the sky that marked the beginning of their journey across the well-travelled surface. Even now one can see the bare minimum of the tracks left by large wheels from the caravans and wagons pushed by muscular horses rather than engines like their own world.

Silence soon ended at Juni's ingenious question. Anybody else might have given them yet another scold and a frown for it, but as a newcomer? Expected this would come up one day. She gave her a parent-like look, the kind that nor disapproves or condemns. Merely looks for the right words to explain herself. "PvE. PvP is frowned upon. I heard rumours of this game's deadly nature, but I'm not sure if they are real or not." Yet the idea of dying and coming back, experiencing death? It made her morbidly curious. "Try not to die. But if you do, please write down anything you felt, so maybe we can learn something out of a tragedy."

@Juniper Lockton

 

[Juniper Lockton]

"I won't always be there to stop you." The words rung in her head, immediately realizing that it might be better if she were.

"I'll do my best to listen and learn." She nodded, tail wagging and ears happy again. She nodded again at the insistence that she tell her new companion of any symptoms, should she arrive. Her question about PVP lead to an interesting request that made Juniper chuckle a little,

"Yea, if I remember, sure. Something tells me if I die and get revived, writing notes won't be the first priority. But maybe! I'll try." She'd always kind of wondered what dying felt like and how they might replicate it in this game, though.

"I don't think I've heard anything about dying in this game, though. What do you mean, deadly nature?" She asked curiously, struggling to understand as someone who had never watched an isekai or anything before.

@Onyx

 

[Tick Tock]

.

Openess to learn usually lead to good results, and Juniper could see that much at least. Yet the way she chuckled at her request, while it didn't catch her off-guard, it intrigued her, considering how some could find it a crude or even ominous request of sorts with the lack of tact and the apathy she wore under her sleeve at all times.

"I would appreciate it if you could, but it's fine if not. It's an experience no one would want to go through, and certainly not revivify through their memories. But that is speculation, something I'm not interested on." Dismissive, as theorizing about it leads nowhere. Death is a topic humanity is at large unaware of, no matter how much technology progresses or how many philosophers rise, no one can give an answer and the dead tell no tales.

Onyx slowed down the pace, figuring she shouldn't hurry this conversation in the slightest if the company is pleasant enough to indulge on the 'how', 'why' and 'what' rather than blindly rush into the game like everyone else. "You know this game is illegal, do you?" She asked, incredulous. "There are rumors of people who died in the real world when they died in the game. Some say they can still find the characters of these dead players walking around Terrasphere. Unreasonable, don't you think?" She looked back at Juniper, but despite how unreasonable it sounded, the fox could see there was no less seriousness on the subject nor on the wolf alike. "I haven't heard much, but neither have I gone out of my way to ask. In anycase, it's best if you steer clear from dying if you gonna keep playing."

And that jumped her back to the beginning of her array of questions by mere intrigue. "Curious, why are you playing this game and not any other VRMMORPG? Was it to chase some cheap thrill like the others who disable their pain limiters and embrace a game that feels as real as the outside?"

@Juniper Lockton

 

[Juniper Lockton]

Not interested in speculation. Scientific. Juniper found this an appealing trait, curiosity now flickering over her face again as she tilted her head, tail wagging behind her. Her expression became more grim as she realized the truth about the game.

"Oh..." Was all she had to offer at the moment. But...even if it was illegal and deadly...she'd never felt this happy in her own skin.

Even if this wasn't real skin.

"That's probably a good idea." Suddenly looking a little nervous and afraid. Who all could turn on her and kill her? What if there was some kind of error and super strong monsters killed her? She'd be stuck here forever.

But would that be the worst thing? What did she have going for her in her real life? The thoughts were whisked away by another question that she perked up to, ears twitching again,

"It's more about the social stuff for me. I can't really...be myself at home. So I thought I'd try things out here and see how it is. Hasn't disappointed in the least. I just wanna make friends and be happy, really. Home life doesn't make that easy." She looked a little sad as she looked away, sighing. She was probably saying too much already, huh?