Private Western Brisshal Westward and Wayward.

[Brutus Dahlgren]

Goblins, it was always goblins.

Brutus found himself heading further west than he'd ever found himself before. Leaving the bounds of Faldren for Astorea, which...honestly didn't seem like much of a difference since he was essentially in the same forest he called home. Ironic really, he though traveling across a border would have some sort of pomp or circumstance, maybe a change in the backround OST (if there had been one to begin with) or some sort of atmospheric shader applied.

There was none of that.

Instead he found himself hunting goblins as per usual. His eyes hunting the same tracks he'd been following for the last two hours. A hit and run on some huntsmen that had earned the ire of Old Man Stankins, who in return sent his problem solved out to stomp it out real quick.

Brutus' worked double time, the green menace had a headstart on him and if he gave them any slack they would disappear into the woods only to strike again at another date. He had to nip the problem right in the bud and remind them that Brishal wasn't free game anymore.

There were heroes back in town.

Suddenly he stopped, craning his ears slightly. Something was coming, a snap of a twig, the rustle of leaves and then-

HAIYA

A trio of goblins dove from the branches above him, daggers brandished. Brutus chuckled, they'd sprung a trap on him. The goblins descended like lime green dropbears, and with one wide swoop of his canon he managed to knock all three of them from the air with practiced ease. They landed against the trees with a loud THWAM, one of them was out like a light from the word go. One was up quickly, and ate another smack before it could even think twice about what had hit it. The slower of the two survivors had a little more wit to it than the others and tried to flee. He found himself catching a canon ball to the back with a loud BOOM.

That was three of the seven down, but the other four definitely knew he was in the area now. And he was packing heat.

 

[Darkness]

Hands rested against tear soaked cheeks as the elf tried to get all the built up pain out again. Every day trying to wear that smile for her lost friends, every day failing and looking like a harbingers of doom even now. Her magic leaking out into the ground with her tears as the grass whittled, the leaves turned grey, and the wind shifting to cold as she continued to weep in solitude.

This was until the very loud sound of someone using a cannon in the woods and the wildlife going wild in response that Kaede rapidly cleared away her tears and tried to remove any real trace of crying with the quick use of Chronomancy to revert her physical state to prior to the moment of weakness. Eyes narrowing as she focused on the general direction of the sound with furrowed brows.

"Who the fuck uses a cannon in woods?! Subtle or don't even come out here..."

Mumbling as she rose from the rotted area and slowly dug her nails into her palms to draw blood and allow it to drift around her and turn black with corruption before sending them out as relays to figure out what in gods name needed such a large blast to deal with. Her expression frowning as she forgot the key fact she can see from her magic net, only sense any magic within it and had to go explore herself.

Feet dragging against the dead grass as it followed her where she went, black cloak rustling in the wind as she kept her focus out for what disrupted her alone time when she had tried so hard to go somewhere isolated and off the unbeaten path. Black tendrils snapping from her cloak to catch an arrow as she slowly turned her focus over to the attacker's direction.

"I don't advise doing that agi..."

Her warning cut short as she had to snatch another arrow from the air before it could land with a heavy sigh. Right hand rising a single finger at the second attacking goblin as the shadows grew longer reaching out and upwards to his small frame. Bone like arms and hands clawing into his legs and dragging him into the earth until it stopped moving and was left half swallowed by dark magic.

"A-Noy-ING!"

@Brutus Dahlgren

 

[Brutus Dahlgren]

Brutus found himself on the run. Three down, four left to go. They couldn't be much further ahead than the attack party he was sure of it. A mix on reasoning and animalistic instinct was roaring through his head as he stomped through the ground. His blast had set off a lot of local wildlife, but there was something telling in the absence. The Goblins still on the run had already disturbed the local critters, leaving him an easy to follow trail. His feet pounded the verdant forest soil heavily as he loped through the foliage, a beast on the hunt.

That was, till he found his quarry running back in his direction, panic in their eyes. He grinned and hit one with a flying knee, the other the unfortunate subject of a fly by canon smack. Both tumbled backwards, following Brutus' and his momentum. He planted a foot on the first goblins chest and crushed his head with his canon, the other tried to scamper to his feet and ate a gout of flame being shot out of his hands which singed him to a crisp.

"A-Noy-ING"

HIs ears pricked up as he heard a woman's voice, drawing his attention in the direction of where the creatures had been running from. His brow furrowed and he hefted his canon onto his shoulder, taking a couple wary steps till he had managed to draw a line of sight upon the elven woman. She had quite the...strange aura around her but Brutus couldn't quite tell what was up with her. Stopping a decent distance away he called out to her.

"Yo! You okay over there? I was chasing some goblins and I think they came this way. They didn't bother you did they?"

@Kaede Hoshi

 

[Darkness]

The voice would slowly draw Kaede's focus, a brief moment of shadows crossing her eyes as she looked almost like she was going to attack before grumbling and adjusting her hair to remove the shadowing and gesture to the half swallowed goblin in the ground. At this point her magic eating most of the flesh and armor it had leaving the brittle bones as she waved the same hand used to gesture to have the rotting cease with another grumble.

"They likely would not have had someone not used a giant cannon and sent them this way in their panic."

Her gaze cold as she moved back to her spot and sat down once more gazing up to the sky above between the tree branches that still had leaves on them. Her mind mostly working overtime to get her magic to stop pouring out since now she had to worry this person might just call her out for having taboo magic like many others had done in the years trapped in the game.

"Not many things in this part of the woods bother me much anymore, A blessing and curse of being here to long they know to avoid where decay goes..."

Waving a slow hand around, part of her catching on she made matters worse for herself only to sigh and return more of her focus skyward. The black orbs of blood returning as she waved one hand east and laid down in the dirt. The person would likely, hopefully gather she might be pointing to where other goblins had gone or that she wanted to be left alone. All the voices in her head agreed that either of those options was preferred.

"Something pinged my net over that way, might be your goblins that did not die already or could be I don't know or really care."

Yawning as she finished speaking and lowered her hand back to her side and rolled slightly away from the person to resume dealing with her own demons, if people wanted to hunt things more power to them, but Kaede would leave sleeping dogs lay to avoid losing herself in the darkness of her own magics. Part of her mind now replaying the suffering of the goblin's final moments, the though drawing a hidden twisted smile from the elf.

 

[Brutus Dahlgren]

"Yeah...sorry bout that one. Three of em got the drop on me so I kinda had a knee jerk reaction."

Brutus turned his head to the direction the woman had pointed and squinted. Stuffing another ball into his barrel, he squinted, took aim, and BLAM. Sent a shot firing off into the distance. He strained his ears for a moment, and then about a second or two later he heard the telltale dying screech of a goblin, which was as good a hitmarker noise as any videogame could have ever given him. With that done and dusted, her turned his attention to the woman before him. She was...unlike anyone he'd ever met really. Though, the longer he stood there the more he realized the air smelt of blood, and she was the source.

Hemomancy.

He'd only interacted with it once, but it was enough to put his hackles ever so slightly on edge, not that he truly needed an excuse. He could probably cut himself on the edge presented by this woman, but he got a succinct feeling that it wasn't some...facade that others had put on. He'd met a fistful of knew starcalled who called themselves Bloodlord Danter, or Fallen Angel Xavier, or any other My immortal OC catchalls.

This woman seemed to mean business of some kind or another, and Brutus was...tentatively intrigued. It was like the dame at the start of every noir novel, and Brutus was the headstrong gumshoe who left the force cause he didn't play by the rules.

"You mention decay, is that part of your power? Are you a..." he paused. "Are you a star called just like me? Or are you a natural denizen of this land?"

@Kaede Hoshi

 

[Darkness]

"A mix of both, once starcalled then locked into this game because trust betrayed, tried to sleep with the wrong person, and tried to be the hero..."

Fingers moving as she counted each of her deaths to the best of her recollection. This person was not gonna leave anytime soon it seem judging by how he did not take the hint she wanted to be left alone so simply sighing as she sat back up and looked at him with an annoyed glance. one hand tracing the ground as the dirt turned back into grass and she decided she might as well start cleaning her own mess up.

"Downside of being a starcalled, you aren't warned what magics people don't like and just like that four of the five magic you take are taboo and then you get stuck with them in the game."

More mumbled words as she kept drawing the same symbol across the ground to slowly have the range increase as she turned the hands of time back to give back the life she had taken from the land without reason. Sure she loved to see it as dead and barren as she felt inside but leaving it that way makes the next who come across it start looking for the cause and she always ended up the first on the suspect list due to a few to many drunk tempers of the past.

The thought of getting drunk to forget her troubles started to cloud her mind as she shifted her head rapidly to dismiss it. He focus moving to the nearby tree as she moved from drawing on the ground to the air to restore it next while she glanced over to see if the man was still there, if he was she would mumble something under her breath before talking loud enough to be heard a bit better.

"You did your I assume 'quest' why not go turn it in or something? That is what you new players tend to think is all that matters."

Yawning again as she stood up and dusted herself off to go move around and mend the area some more. Half way into mending a tree her staff would bend to face the east drawing Kaede's focus who only sighed and looked over to the man before going back to her work on the area. the voice of her corrupt staff yelling at her to stop ignoring it and act on the voices that told her to make sure this person would leave her alone by force not just very clear hints.

@Brutus Dahlgren

 

[Brutus Dahlgren]

"Eh," Brutus shrugged. "The danger to Honeyhome is dealt with. Stankin's knows me by name so it doesn't matter if I show up today, tomorrow, or a week from now. What does matter..." he trailed off motioning to her.

"Is the mystery I've been presented here. Did you say you're locked into this game?"

His mind flashed back to Ilya and her warnings.

"That would be...three deaths right?" His brow furrowed. He'd felt pain in this game, he couldn't imagine what simulated death felt like. It sent a tingle down his spine, a mix of dread and curiosity in a deadly cocktail.

Instead of taking a step back like most would have in this situation, he found himself taking a step forward, followed by another and another as he found himself towering over her, offering a hand to shake and a warm smile.

"Well It appears we may have gotten off on the wrong foot, and for that I'm sorry. The name is Brutus Dahlgren, and despite what sort of magics you practice you'll only ever catch judgement from me on how you use it, and..." he motioned to the act of her restoring nature to its previous state. "My gut says you're not so bad. Do you...mind if I ask you a few questions?"

@Kaede Hoshi

 

[Darkness]

Kaede could only sigh as this person just kept pushing and trying to find out more from someone who had little show of interest in sharing. But with a flash of her lost friend crossing her mind she could only sigh and mumble 'ok ok, TRY to be the nice person' as she turned to focus on the man as he introduced himself. scratching the back of her head as she paused her work to give him her full focus.

"Yes, did they not warn you of that risk? Though I was never warned it just sort of happened. Yes you get three lives before UI-locked, some said the real body dies at that time but no real concrete info or something..."

Kaede waved to dismiss the idea of talking more about that matter. Sure she wanted to know herself, she also wanted to know why the non UI-locked players vanished four years ago, and how they now started to show up again with more new people. But she was not the type to ask others questions unless it was truly needed information. Recalling he had introduced himself she figured to do the same.

"Kaede, Kaede Hoshi... Both here and in real life if you want to look it up. Just don't tell my old man if you go in person, He'd make hell and heaven move to get me back or kill you for tarnishing his memory with the idea I'm still alive in some sense of the word..."

Kaede's mind drifted to think who else really would car she was gone, or here trapped. Nobody but her old man really, her only friend in real life rarely spoke to her anymore since they fought last time they spoke. She had nobody else really. Shifting her weight to lean against a tree as she waved a hand hinting he had the floor to ask his questions.

"If I don't feel like giving a reply I'll just move to go heal the land some more... though it is more reverse time not heal... I can only look back on the damage, eventually it will still come to pass."

Slowly running a hand against the tree she was leaning against as her staff drifted from her back and formed the black halo over her head as if a mind it's own. A lack-luster hand reaching to grab and place it back where it was before with another sigh of annoyance. Between the voices in her head, this person, and the staff wanting to kill more things or take payment for helping with a single goblin she was not going to get much relaxing done.

@Brutus Dahlgren

 

[Brutus Dahlgren]

Brutus narrowed his gaze as she spoke, dumping a mountain of data to parse through in one jumbled heap. It was like she'd just presented him a word search, and his normally dumb gorilla mind wouldn't have been able to handle it, but for a moment being Brutus wasn't worth the effort right now. He needed to be Olivier, re-engage the part of his brain that actually put words together coherently, and tread carefully. This woman could be a vital asset, or potentially a dangerous foe if upset.

He would start with the most benign of statements, with the chronomancy. "Is that how that works? I've seen people use it to heal and not have the wounds come back. If you wind back the clock and then let things progress, would the damage not come to pass if you didn't will it?" He let that one hand in the air for a moment, before continuing.

"As for the UI Lock, I've heard that phrase before, but in in regards to any official warning. There's been nothing but rumors about this game since it was shut down for a bit. Something about government regulations creating some great firewall to lock it the fuck out, guess it finally slipped back through the cracks. I'm assuming, based on how it sounds, it means you're locked out of all the game shit, like seeing your bars, managing your inventory, party invites and such? Does that happen right after death number three? Or on death number four?" It sounded like a morbid topic, but he needed to know for Corsair's sake as well as all of his other friends in the game. Speaking of morbid topics...

"Lets say I did look you up when I log out today..." his brow furrowed. "Would you want to know if you're still alive IRL?

@Kaede Hoshi

 

[Darkness]

"Even if you heal something living it will eventually die, so all turning the clock back does is simply give it more time before that end..."

Kaede looked at her hands, the amount of times she had tried to turn herself back to hopefully return to reality. The times she tried to turn back death of landers or UI-locked players that all ended in failures. Hearing the part about government cause a reaction Kaede was not used to and took her by shock. Her corrupt magic taking over for a brief moment as she glared at the man with only hate and distain for bringing up someone with status.

"You do well not to mention those of noble or higher status near me MORTAL!"

As Kaede's magic lashed out around her decaying things far more quickly Kaede struggled to get her emotions back under control. That damn third death effect still getting the better of her after four years and the higher up the title the more she lashed out. Turning towards the tree as she slammed her forehead against it to get herself back under control with a heavy sigh as she turned back around while the magic let go of her form.

"Sorry... You get four lives, three deaths before the UI can't be open anymore, and if someone does not revive you within ten minutes from that point say goodbye to this world also... Least that has been the cases we followed on our end."

Kaede looked at the mess she had caused during her little slip up and could only grumble as she reached both hands out and began mumbling a incantation while also drawing the magic circles as a large clock formed overhead and turned backwards to restore the area in bulk this time before she would return her focus on the male with a dark faded gaze in her eyes.

"I've resigned to the facts. I died for a third time in game, cant touch or open the UI. I've heard other UI locked speak about others checking up on them to find they kicked the real world bucket. I doubt I'm a special case."

Her hands lowering as the spell finished up and she leaned back against the tree. There was not much else one could do from within the game anyways to fact check. Someone could have just thought it be funny to say they died RL and we have to take their world for it. Her expression was back to emotionless as she looked back to the sky watching another star cross it. Another either ill-informed, reckless, Unknowing, or the sort chose to play this death game.

@Brutus Dahlgren

 

[Brutus Dahlgren]

Brutus jumped a moment at her outburst, but watched with a mix of fear and curiosity as she wrangled herself back under control. That was...new and unusual but he feared asking her about it might trigger another event.

"I see. Fourth death is the real deal, third death locks you in." He paused for a moment letting that sink in. He watched as she worked her magic again, healing the land around her as she spoke. It was powerful magic, both her power to harm and to heal, but something was clearly amiss. One could chalk it up to being trapped in the game, but Olivier had his doubts.

"So uh, I know this might sound a little presumptious coming from a new player, but you seem like someone in need of..." He paused. "Well something is the best I can deduce at the moment. I wouldn't be as bold to say a hug, but maybe just an ear to listen to you vent for a bit? Someone to hear your story? To say you've been through a lot would be an understatement, one simulated death alone would be traumatizing, let alone three.. "

@Kaede Hoshi [Sorry for lack of formatting phoneposting is hard]

 

[Darkness]

Kaede could not help the small smirk across her face, her talk about issues this person was really dense after all. Musing the idea over a few times in her head as she just went to sit down in some grass and sighed heavily. Avoiding had not worked, drinking only made more issues, and the only person she talked to about this sort of thing was dead now. The voices chanting she would only move that curse onto this person if she spoke of her issues and resigned to that idea and wanted it not to come true.

"Last person I shared my story to is six feet under with many others. Trust me on this one kid, or whatever you are behind the avatar you picked I'm not someone you want to get mixed up with and that is fact and proven by others who have."

Sure she wanted to get the weight less on her shoulders, but marking someone with the black thread of fate she was carrying was not ideal if she wanted to avoid turning into someone like the edgy loli or the others who wielded the same magic. Darkness was better walked alone, knowing someone still held a light to cast it on her somewhere.

"The offer was nice of you though... Let's get back to questions then shall we?"

Kaede's tone was of bitter plead to change the topic and don't push her to talk to some random stranger she only just got the name of. Eyes watching some birds that chose to return to the area but keeping just out of reach of her magic's slipping range. Sometimes she wished she could fly, just go into the near endless sky far from the worry and troubles and just stay there forever.

@Brutus Dahlgren

 

[Brutus Dahlgren]

Brutus frowned as she seemingly recoiled from his offer, not that said reaction was strange, but perhaps in that he was simply hoping the hail mary pass would have ended in a touchdown. She wasn't likely to crack open just with a pretty please and a ten minute lunch. She would probably need other reassurances and a bond to form between them.

"Alright, fine enough I suppose. Though if what you say is true, I have two deaths before I'm really putting anything on the line, though I'd like to keep it at no deaths if we can. In order to do that I guess I'm going to need some information." He would banish his canon to his inventory and take a look around, finding a comfortable spot to sit across from her without invading her space.

Almost like talking to a shelter dog.

"So then, speaking of deaths. What's...that process like? I assume your HP bar hits zero, you suffer a shitload of pain if you have the sensors on, but like, what's it like waking back up again?"

He had more to ask of course, but he figured he would feed her the questions one at a time, let her proffer her own answers and perhaps he might just be able to twease some info from her without directly asking it.

@Kaede Hoshi

 

[Darkness]

Kaede traced the ground as she was asked the question, shocked he would start with such a thing and not something more like a pebble on the ice ahead where as this was like a flamethrower on thin ice in comparison. A small smile as she could only say to herself 'figured that with someone who uses a cannon as a weapon.' before looking him dead in the eyes with her reply as clear as she could speak.

"Each person had a different experience from what I heard, depending on your magic or how it was you died... For those like me, we see all those we tormented or hurt, the looks of joy that we died like some of them had or worse... Then blackness, a voice calling out a strike, and next you know sitting on a church alter with something that clings with you after death... A new fear, a dislike of certain people, or phantom pain, etc..."

Kaede's hand would stop drawing in the grass as she recalled her first death. The crushing pain of jaws biting into her and ripping apart before the darkness took her. The voice of her magic laughing how she was killed, and waking back up in a tiny church that caused her to freak out and run away in fear the space would close in on her and crush her inside. The image giving her the air of tension as she gripped her chest and tried to calm her breath.

"All in all, not something I'd advise undergoing... Much less if you decided pain needed to be real not halved and manageable... Each death also takes part of you with it, some say they barely recall some things, others still haunted by the pain they endured the moment before the darkness."

Shifting in the grass as Kaede watched some clouds before returning her focus to the man trying to get a better judge of his character and not just judge by what she had been shown. He seemed like the type to care for others, had some experience playing his character, but was dense and did not seem to leave dangerous things alone without open threats made against him. Not like Kaede could fault him, she used to be the same when she was drunk.

@Brutus Dahlgren

 

[Brutus Dahlgren]

Her words hung in the air whilst he chewed his lower lip, drumming his fingers idly on his thigh while he let all of that sink in. Perhaps he'd dove off the deep end with this question, but it was something he needed to know.

Understanding was the enemy.

"I don't plan on dying, like I said. But we need to understand the process to figure it out, how to combat it. I've heard stories of VR games doing something similar, putting people into comas or crippling them, but I've never heard of people meeting ghosts online before. There's something unique afoot, someone behind the game and behind it's rules. There has to be right? The game didn't come from nowhere."

That thought did bother him a bit. Terasphere had dodged the VRA or whatever silly acronym the government had assigned to watchdogging this tech. Nobody had any idea about anyone or anything associated with the program. There were no devs, no wikis, no credits, the whole thing seemed like it came from nowhere.

"On another note. When the game was disconnected, and all the players left, I'm assuming you were left here. What happened? How did the game react to...being shut down so to speak?"

@Kaede Hoshi

 

[Darkness]

"How did the god react to an ant biting him? The game moved forward, just like everything else would. Kingdoms fell, people died, the few of us 'Star-called' that got left behind either forced to work with others like us or have a target on our backs for people who sought power most others could not obtain so easy."

Kaede's hand moved from the grass to display the clock magic once more. Chronomancy from what she knew took years to master, and that was if you could find where to learn it or got lucky to be born with the affinity to it. The idea someone could simply turn time back in an area or with enough power an entire region? The idea would entice anyone who cared little for the cost the caster would endure for such power at their own leisure.

Then you had to add on Kaede picked several taboo magic and she had a larger target then most and had to learn how to use it for her own safety and the cost of such was the nagging and yelling voice of corruption inside her head shouting Ragnarok is now and such things. Moving her hand back down as the clock vanished and she focused on other things that fell into the same question.

"Those who had been playing at the time vanished, like that old movie with the purple alien and the stones. Some could not endure the reality of that, and fell into their own vices until it ended them or someone rescued them..."

Her hand reaching into her cloak to pull the small drawing of harmony she kept with her as a reason to fight, and reason to not give into the gloom entirely. Moving it back into her attire as she leaned back some to relax and hide the fact she started to cry again from recalling those painful moments of the past four years struggling to keep her head above the waves and the memory of what she did when she sank below them.

"Next question... And just to note, this is simply the words of an out of the fold player, consider it the same as ravings of a mad woman. People like Astor, or his band of spotlight locked players would know more then someone who drank most if it away then spent the rest hiding from the price of her actions."

@Brutus Dahlgren

 

[Brutus Dahlgren]

"I see, so the game carried on..." he paused. "So the servers never went offline..."

Brutus pondered her reply, sitting cross legged. She was struggling with these memories immensely, it would seem. Four years, locked away from her real life, from friends and family, imagining them thinking you for dead. It was enough to break anyone shy of a sociopath. Yet it also yielded something...unexpected. The Servers never went down, meaning that the government had never truly nailed Terrasphere shut. They'd simply...locked it down somehow with a firewall. Censored it from the internet. His animalistic senses betrayed her in other ways, he could smell the tears beginning to well up on her eyes, hear the faint tremble of her breath as she spoke. He leaned forward, gingerly extended one arm forward, and gave her a light pat on the shoulder.

"Well, how about we change pace a little bit. This is a lot to try and go over, and I can tell you're...having a go of it. I've done nothing but ask questions about you, do you have anything to ask me? New of the outside world? News of how things might be in the spawn zone? Anything like that strike your fancy?"

It wasn't terribly much, but it was the closest thing he could think of to changing to topic, allowing her to drag her mind away from this sore spot and perhaps tread some new ground. It would also give himself some time to come up with another question, perhaps one that wouldn't touch such a nerve.

@Kaede Hoshi

 

[Darkness]

Kaede did not really approve of getting touched, but she was not about to cast magic to deform his hand for it as the voice told her to do in the moment. Simply moving away slightly and clearing her tears as she sighed heavy and rose to her feet. She did not have questions for someone like him, the only thing she wanted to know about going on in the real world she doubted was something he had heard about. shifting her weight as she rose to her feet and started to walk over to the east where the male had shot down the goblin.

"The only thing that concerns me about the real world is if the next book in a manga has come out. The author last I heard got into a serious accident and was on their way to recover."

Sure someone might ask about their family, friends, or if they had flying cars yet or silly shit to lighten the mood. But Kaede just wanted to be left alone to deal with her issues as she knew how, avoid people and take it out on nature or things that deserved it. This person had his heart in the right place, but this was the wrong person to try and fix. Her steps a slow motion each feeling more weighed down the the previous as always.

"I just go where the winds don't lead, social area are a timebomb for me... New players I encounter I warn to leave before the game ruins their lives... People who ignore me... I pray they eventually trust someone's words about these warning."

If the man chose to follow her she would eventually make it to where his attack had detonated and would begin mending the area. She wanted to fix it for a while now but was trying to be nice to the man for sake of her promise to Harmony but at this point she was treading on thin ice herself and she did not want to fall under the waves and harm him if he miss-stepped just slightly.

"Are you sure there was only as many goblins as you had counted? I fought one, and from the sounds of things you took on a few also but goblins are like spiders, or an infection... they spread quickly..."

@Brutus Dahlgren

 

[Brutus Dahlgren]

Following after her as she spoke, he simply chuckled. "Give me the name of the author and the series and I'll look it up for you." He watched as she healed the spot where he'd nailed a goblin and blew it to kingdom come and then counted on his fingers.

"The report from the huntsmen said seven and I could seven dead green chucklefucks. But you make a good point." He knelt down to the fading remains, watching as grass wound itself back to fresh vegetation and then looked off into the distance where the goblin was running.

"I'm willing to be my canon that there's probably plenty more of the spiteful little fuckers holed up in a series of caves or some kind of...ruins just thataways. Rumor has it this whole half of the woods is fucking crawling with the fuckers ever since the Starcalled vanished."

He turned to look to her, then back to the trail, and then back to her.

"I don't suppose I could interest you in an adventure or sorts? Perhaps a little bit of...stress relief?"

@Kaede Hoshi

 

[Darkness]

'Stress relief' Kaede could not look this man in the eyes for that comment, or keep her temper under control as her dark magic flared wildly around her as she stomped towards him. Yes he was new, yes he was not UI locked like her, but the idea she gathered from his words was going out of their way to go kill goblins for 'adventure' or 'stress relief?!' Eyes like daggers as she pulled her magic back under control mostly.

"I Get it, to people who just started playing they don't seem like living things. But consider it this way, they don't come back when killed and that is the same for people like me. You are viewing killing or harming other creatures as 'stress relief' or 'adventure' and that makes you no different from sociopathy."

Kaede would exhale before getting the rest of her magic under control and quickly scanning around them for damage control and happy her corrupt magic had not mixed into the dark magic for once. Either way as Kaede moved she seemed to be heading in the direction of the goblin's escape plan. She was not going to tell him she was going there to deal with them anyways, but she wanted to make sure this person valued the life of things even if they did not seem real at the moment.

Hell the game itself was confusing and Kaede had several crazy theories on it. There was so much we did not know about it, or the human capabilities, the fact the area had traces of their world lost to time also added to the idea Kaede had. There was some in the past that once thought you could project your spiritual and mental state across the existence of time, maybe this game was the experiment of that. Who was to say these 'Landers' or 'NPCs' had not been living beings from a dystopian future?

There was simply to much they did not know that kept Kaede awake all the time. Moving to take some cover as she noticed a few goblins checking some of their animal traps as she sighed internally. She wished she could have taken magic that allowed her to speak with them, or could find something with knowledge about this place or lived here longer then most. maybe then she could stop worrying about the minor details and focus on what she could do in the now.

@Brutus Dahlgren