NaNo 2012 - Split 8

Heading into Vernia to seek answers seemed like a tempting idea, given the current nature of this problem bestowed upon me, but just as well, it seemed like a bad idea. I was still completely in the dark about just what exactly was going on right now, and I hated that, yet, I feared that spending more time in Vernia might’ve dragged out the problem even further.

Seeing a doctor was completely out of the question just as well, for I didn’t want to drag my parents into the matter, so I was left with only one option: to find out what happened myself.

With resolve this time, I logged back on to Vernia, silently praying that whatever time I was going to spend inside that virtual world was not about to further screw me over.
The first thing that I noticed when I was thrown back into the world of Vernia was that I was still in the battlefield, laying there on the ground, still rather burnt and bloodied from the whole affair. I felt slightly better though, from the liberal application of healing items from the incident before, and with a wince, I stood up, or at least, tried to drag myself up on all fours.

Like the first time I had gotten injured in this realm, everything still ached, from my tail to my wings to my paws. Even my wings, which had sustained colossal injury from the last time I logged on, sort of hurt, and the one on the left still felt like it was twitching every now and then. My hide was still charred black from the massive burns that I had sustain from the entire incident as a whole, and for the most part, the burnt flesh underneath was rather tender as well. A bath might’ve been in order for myself but there was no source of water in sight, a key factor as to why my attacks had been so effective before, for there was nothing to help dissipate or wash off the acid that had claimed the lives of so many on that fateful battle.

Speaking of the battle itself, the entire stretch of road that the battle had occurred at was nothing but the empty now, the bodies mostly cleared and the debris generated removed. There were potholes in the well-worn path, places where the acid had scoured, and only some of those were filled, filled with acid-burnt rocks that had been brought up during the fight. The bloodstains and the smell of death still lingered the area, not a warning, but an indicator that there had been a huge loss of life here in the days from before. I regarded the entire scene that had been laid out before me with a sort of sadness that filled my mind, for there had been so many lives extinguished on this spot. Granted, it was supposed to be a game, but some of those in the army had been actual players, and I had to feel sorry for those who had been doused in acid on that day.

Still, coming back to my senses, I wondered, Where was everyone, or everything, for that matter? Plodding around the empty, desolate field, it was more than enough to know that everyone had more or less moved out, and upon checking my map, I could only guess that the most likely place that everyone had gone to was back to Stefan’s village, which could be found by following the path that the army had been marching down the other day. Slowly, putting my paws in motion with a slow limp, I made my way back to the city, partially in hopes of getting something to help with my recovery. I chose not to fly that day for the burns that I had obtained not only left me with stiff muscles, but had also left a sort of twitch in one of my wings that had not quite gone away yet, and I wasn’t quite willing to risk planting my muzzle into the dirt to test whether I was fit to fly.

True enough to my guess, as I walked on further, a troop of soldiers came running by in my direction, looking for me. Apparently, under Stefan’s orders, there was supposed to have been a group of them on regular patrol to look out for me when I next came back online, or so the current captain of the troop told me. While I waved them off dismissively, telling them that I was more than fine, the captain of the troop, a young-looking man of a tanned complexion and a face that showed of one who feared little,  insisted that I was to be escorted back, for not only would their head be on the block if I had returned before them, but just as well, should anything happen to me, their heads would suffer the same fate.

I sighed and gave my consent to them, my thoughts going back to Stefan. While he had saved me the other day from the wizard, I had not quite forgotten the issue as to how all of this came to be, in which he had tricked the guardians of other villages into coming over to discuss the chance of an alliance of some sorts, before forcefully capturing them and essentially pulling off a coup.  It was one more thing I had to settle with him, and all in all, I realised that I had no idea what had happen to Grozar, Drarsten or Larius, and hoped that they were all well, in the least.

As we neared the walled village, I could sense the guards stationed at the main gates visibly stiffen up as I approached, even from a distance. The distinctive smell of fear began to waft towards me with the turning of the winds, and at once I knew that there was a general atmosphere of hesitance and insecurity towards my arrival. Still, wordlessly, they let us in anyway, the guards who had opened the gate giving me a wide berth as I squeezed myself through the gates, before resuming my slow sort of limp to wherever I was being led to.

The atmosphere of the village in itself had seemed to have improved though, for as I walked through the streets, though there was still plenty of beggars and malnourished, hunger-struck people, I could still more or less feel a sort of improvement to the general feel of the village. It was a tad... happier, in the least, not so much reeking of gloom and doom that I had smelt went I first entered the village.

Upon reaching the town square, I found that to my rather pleasant surprise, a feast had been laid out to me, and approaching from down the streets, I could see Stefan and the others coming out of a building and heading straight for me.

“You’re back!” Laruis said, giving me a punch in my foreleg. The others held a generally same-ish sort of greeting towards me, to which I acknowledged, smiling. Even in my current appearance, which was nothing short of looking terrible in my charred, mottled black-green hide there was still an air of friendliness and gladness towards having found me, and after a few more greetings and salutations, the feast was held.

Eating, in general, sort of started to make me feel a lot better already, and without realising, I was a lot hungrier than I had known. While the others feasted on sizable cuts of steak, seasoned with herbs, I feasted on a sizable cow, where I was generally hungry enough to have eaten the entire thing, bones, entrails and all.

It was odd, though, how we had all once been enemies against Stefan, though now there was a sort of air of camaraderie amongst everyone at the moment. “What’s happened, while I was gone?” I asked.

“A lot, friend.” Grozar said, smiling, “With the court wizard having been taken out of the picture, things have finally began to start looking up.”

“Indeed.” Drarsten said, holding up a tankard to a me, “We’ve been... negotiating terms, since the four of us not only saved his sorry village, but also helped him stay in power, so in return we want to call some of the shots in the way he runs this place.”

“Yes...” Stefan chipped in, “though I would very much have preferred not to agree to such terms that these... rascals have proposed to me, I suppose it’s the least I could do, since you helped to put that blasted wizard down...”

“Rascals?” I said, raising an eyeridge, “We save you from a coup from your own local wizard who had you thrown in jail, the same one that you had thrown us into, and were nice enough to spare your sorry ass, and you are... reluctantly accepting to these terms?”

“Well, I have given your villages back to you guys and am holding a feast in yours names, for saving not just my ass but the village’s as well, what more do you want from me?” Stefan replied.

“A serious commitment to keeping shit in order.” Larius said, “I mean, look at this village. The people are starving, there are beggars on the street. Are you proud to be ruling over this village?”

“Indeed.” Drarsten added, “The state of this place is a good reflection not only as to how well you’re governing it,  but it also says a lot about your character.”

“Look around, Stefan.” Grozar chipped in, “Your people are miserable, and you can still walk around with your head held high? I don’t mean to be rude, but even this feast seems questionable. While we’re here enjoying lavish amounts of food, your people are starving. Do something about it.”

“Yes, yes, I see your point...” Stefan said, bowing his head a little, “I suppose I haven’t exactly been the best of leaders...”

“Suppose is an understatement.” I snorted.

To that we all nodded and went back to our food, chatting around in the increasingly relaxed atmosphere of the food and drink that was being passed around. I found myself having a rather good time, despite the pain that would surface here and there from my existing injuries. The food was good and the drink was strong, and the rest of the whole process seemed to go about a lot better.

I still didn’t quite have any answers yet, given the amount of time that I had already spent in the game so far, I wanted to call it a day with all of them and start heading out in search of answers as to what was going on, but I supposed that I had to first close another chapter first, one that I was in the middle of now, before starting another one.

Somewhere along the line, there was a general sort of recollection that I was still generally not at the peak of my own health, and there was a call for some dragon-sized sort of remedies  that might’ve helped. I was fed a few potions of healing, these ones dragon sized and far more effective than the ones that had been administered to my on the battlefield that day. It was amazing, how these potions worked, in all honesty. It was one thing to have been able to chug a potion and be completely fine afterwards in a game, but to experience it yourself, well that was something interesting in itself.

Upon drinking that rather vile-tasting fluid, I instantly been to feel a mix of feeling better and having my stomach churn at the same time, and the pain seemed to sort of vanish quickly. It was truly a magical sight, to see wounds close and cracked and burnt scales slowly return to normality, and in a while, I looked almost as good as new, save both some of the dirt, grime and soot that remained, along with a few scars left behind from the incident once more. They weren’t anything too noticeable on my hide, save a few marks on one of my horns and a scale or two here that seemed a little... abnormal. Otherwise, I was back to being an almost-completely healthy dragon in seconds, to which I chirped, pleased.

The rest of the feast and the like went by rather smoothly for the most part, save the few moments here and there where Stefan tried to propose an alliance between all of us. While still somewhat reluctant to, given how he had treated us from before, he reasoned that the general placement of all the villages that we guarded made it advantageous for us to work together, which was why he had originally wanted to take over ours. I myself, for the most part, was generally reluctant to want to have anything to do with Stefan in the first place, but someone reasoned that if we formed an alliance, it would provide us with an opportunity to rein Stefan in, should he go too far in doing something stupid (to which there was an offended protest from Stefan at such a comment), and with that reason, I reluctantly agreed to doing so, though I wished for my own village to retain both is sovereignty and its own law. Terms were generally agreed upon and there was a sort of informal consensus that we’d come together as a single power in the region, and immediately, discussions were underway.

Seeing that this wouldn’t be over very soon, I excused myself and logged off from the game, feeling hungry myself in the moment that I had regained consciousness in my own body. Sighing in frustration at the lack of progress, I drafted an email to the game’s administrators in hope of getting some answers, before making my way downstairs to address my own needs.

---

The next few weeks passed by in a rather... surreal manner.  My routine had more or less become wake up, go to school, wait for school to end, come home, and then log on again, in search of the answers to my problems. The administrative team that managed the game itself had replied to me over time, giving me some half-assed, vague answer that included a mentioning of looking into the matter further, which probably meant that nothing was going to be done about it.

Still, Vernia itself was quickly becoming one of the most popular games, with it quickly becoming the talk of the school. My friends, many of them non-gamers, didn’t really bother with it, and I suppose that was a nice respite from gaming every now and then, to be able to talk about something other than dungeon loot, questing and the latest in-game updates.  Over recess, my friends and I rarely talked about games, in fact, and preferred to stay on to things in real life, like homework, school, and, well, girls.

As time had proven though, the five of us, Stefan, Drarsten, Grozar, Larius and I proved to become fast friends and strong allies as time passed. As the game grew, so did our strength, both individually and together, and allied, we soon found our ranks growing and our villages expanding into cosmopolitan centres of trade, security and opportunities. Players began overtaking the populations of each city as the game’s player base grew by the day, and in no time, the map had been changed, altered by the game’s administrators themselves, to instead show cities under our names instead of the small, impoverished villages that they once were.

Of course, though amongst all of us, Stefan had much to learn, but he would see his village rising to become the capital city in all its glory, becoming a player-controlled hub that many would flock to, beginners especially, to seek opportunities and riches, along with the power that came from experience in the game. Being the most powerful of all of us, he would be the one that would more often than not be sending us jewels, money, and whatever form of expensive gifts that he would come across every now and then, and we would likewise support him by helping  with keeping the city supplied with food, for it would be known in the later days that the area around Stefan’s was poor for any form of food cultivation whatsoever, despite its prime location.

Still, it was like a dream come true for all of us, together, and our friendship had pulled together what none of us would have been able to imagine to have been possible from the beginning of it all. For Stefan, it was his dream come true, a great nation carved out form (some) of his own efforts, and for the rest of us, we were content to govern over our own lands, living the good life. Though our desires would vary, like Drarsten starting his own archery school and Larius coming to be one of the best debaters and ambassadors in the region, I was more than happy to keep my game’s life as the way it was, and for the most part, my own village would remain unwalled and small, though it was one of the safest ones amongst all of ours, it having a level fifty eight dragon guarding it.

Yet, few people knew of the guardian of the tiny village of Stervenstaug, which in itself, had also proved to be a rather disinteresting place, keeping the bulk of the travellers and players from really bothering to settle down here. There were the occasional bouts of travellers needing to pass through the village to get to Stefan’s, but they came as fast as they went, and life was relatively unperturbed for my subjects.

As time had proven, indeed the mountain had become one that was perfectly suited for me to hold and lay claim to as well, its resources, position as a vantage point and defendability making it not only an attractive place to call home, but an important one as well. Few dared to contest me for ownership over my home, not only because of the daunting, near-vertical terrain that dominated the mountain, but also because of the dragon (that those would unluckily find) dug up into the mountain, easily wiping scores of men off the side with breath weapons.

It had also turned out that the game developers had not quite been able to balance the game very well, as it would come to light that some classes were hard to start out with, while some were easier.  The races of Wrym would prove to be a very inhospitable one early on, would prove to be almost impossible to play as more players came in, presenting a larger danger to newbies as more and more people came to ganking beginners for easy experience and gold. My survival on its own had turned out to be a fluke, or what I deemed as a favourable turn of circumstances, having been able to not only secure this spot early on in my career, providing me with an undisturbed area to develop my character, but also strong allies that would share mutual needs for security from one another, thus helping me to more or less kill off anything that I couldn’t handle. Gzar had further been catapulted into nearly godlike statuses from the adventures that had shared with one another early on, with us now about ten levels higher than any of the other owners of each city.

Stefan, in time, also did find out that my mountain was sitting atop a huge stockpile of mineral ores and rare materials, which were invaluable not only to trade, but for crafting powerful items as well. I was rather reluctant to allow his men to go around digging under my mountain, which, despite our friendly relations, were sort of hampered by my own draconic instincts, who would dictate that while I could maintain allies, there would be no disturbances from them in my territory. It took a long time of persuasion, both from Stefan to me and myself to my instincts that it would be beneficial, so in trade for the allowing of mines to be set up and my assistance in the protection of their land, Stefan would provide for my supplies instead of straining my own village, though the occasional tribute from Stervenstaug was still nice.

On the first days that I negotiated with him, I had only asked for enough to sustain myself in-game in return for the spoils of my mountain for a dragon had little use for metal and jewels and coal and all the like (though I did fancy an odd trinket to decorate my cave), yet Stefan, being a somewhat lavish spender as usual, did extend his goods a little more than what I asked for, as a form of appeasement to me. Still, it did not go unappreciated, for the ‘extra’ gifts were often much more than what I expected. For example, it was not more than a day or two ago that the blacksmiths had forged a set of armour for me out of steel. While it wasn’t exactly protective, it did at least serve as a sort of outer shell, and from my experience, would probably block a hit from something like a trebuchet and save me once. I kept that set of armour polished and shiny, stored on a mannequin of myself, reserving it for future battles.

As I lazed about on the top of the mountain that I had come to claim in Vernia, I watched over the land as many players, beginners and regulars alike, went about their own tasks in the distance, sometimes fighting one another with clashes that left someone respawning. The free-world sort of affair in-game had seen the rise of some of the more prominent players and their clans as well, beginning to establish themselves as rulers of certain towns and villages. Occasionally, some would venture out to try and expand their influence over other towns as well (as they gained supply and gold bonuses from owning more), waging small wars between each other. Sometimes they were successful, sometimes they weren’t and sometimes there were long, bloody clashes that ended with a truce and a merging of two powers. Our kingdom, as it had come to be, would also often see action against some of the more daring and adventurous ones, though none were usually strong enough to contest us, let alone pose a threat.

As I laid there, occasionally answering the call to battle, I began to grow bored one day, and decided to take a flight over the land in front of me, keeping an eye on the ground below me. My searching, in all my free time both in-game and out of game proved to be rather fruitless in general, for not only were the admin teams rather useless in helping me, but this was a rather new technology as well, so for all the information that the world wide web provided, none would prove to be able to identify with me. It seemed that nobody else, through asking and searching, seemed to experience the same sort of problems that I did, which were the surfacing of bouts of rather uncontrollable behaviour, most of them coming in the form of violence and a protective, obsessive sort of feel. I called them the dragon-mind, for they seemed to bear a close resemblance to how Gzar behaved in game, though these were wholly random and subject to appear as they pleased, though I experienced frequent bouts of them around shiny things. The little outbursts of the dragon-mind seemed to worsen as the days came by, with myself experiencing both more frequent and violent bouts of uncontrolled behaviour that I myself couldn’t predict, and it was beginning to put me a lot more awkward positions than before. I was being asked to seek counselling in some cases, while my friends were also becoming more and more concerned for me, but these attempts to help me proved to provoke the dragon that was residing somewhere in me, leaving me with no other option than to pull back further and further away from human interaction. It was ironic though, how weeks before I was hoping to see less people and have more time to myself, and how I was now desperately seeking a bit of human contact.


As I flew overhead, continuing on auto-pilot in my own leisurely flight, a cry, or more accurately, a scream, snapped me out of my flight-trance and derailed my train of thought promoting me to look in the direction of its origin. Looking down towards one of the roads that I was flying over, there I saw a newbie, cowering behind a half-broken shield as someone else, a higher levelled player, bore down on him, mashing the shield to bits with his mace. It was probably another one of those farmers, the kind of people who picked on beginners for easy experience to level up, picking on the obvious newbie.

With a resigned snort, I adjusted my wings and made a steep dive landing right behind the newbie with a ground-shuddering thump, intent on teaching the ‘farmer’ a lesson or two about bullying. It was not usually my habit to practice such forms of ‘justice’, even within my own lands, but today, I made an exception, for I was bored.  The newbie, dazed and confused, remained on the floor, clutching his head from a previous blow as he remained oblivious to the large, ominous shadow that was cast over him while the other man, having recovered, stood wide-eyed as I towered over him. A quick HUD check confirmed that he was about level fifteen, while I on the other hand, was levelled much higher.

Stepping over the newbie, I gave the bully a disdainful snort before growling, my acid breath dripping a little bit from my maw for effect as I towered over him. My large form, coupled with the sight of the clear, viscous acid that dripped from my maw and burned even in the soil that it touched proved to be a very good motivator in preaching the importance of not picking on beginners, lest something similar happened to the bully himself, which was apparent in the look on his face. However, his expression didn’t quite match the expected intelligence that I was really hoping for, as the bully took a brave swing at my foreleg with his mace, cracking the brittle, hollow bones that gave me my ability to fly. I roared in pain and swung back at him with the injured forepaw in an experienced swipe,  smashing his armour in and having in break a few ribs as his breastplate caved in, sending him running off in a smart retreat the moment he had recovered from the blow. As I watched him hobble off into the distance at speeds that would betray his actually-injured form, I tended to myself, ransacking the small knapsack strapped to the front of my chest with my broken paw as I scoured it for a healing item, preferably one that had an instant effect, to at least stave off the pain, grunting in annoyance as my broken forepaw was bent this way and that, hurting it even more.

As I did so, the awestruck newbie recovered and picked himself off the ground in a haze of confusion and fear that was spread across his virtual face like jam on toast as he rummaged through his pack and brought out a minor healing salve, presenting it to me with both hands, head bowed and on one knee, an obvious attempt at a gesture of respect.

It wasn’t quite the formalities that I was used too butI took it as a gesture of thanks from him and applied the healing salve to my forepaw. Though it didn’t quite heal my forepaw, it succeeded as it dulled the pain a little, making it somewhat more bearable for me to lean on for support. I nodded at him and regarded him with what I assumed I was presenting as a stoic look, posing a little in that small moment of glory for myself. One might say that I was just being full of pride at that moment in time but I could have honestly cared less, for it was my territory, and I would do as I pleased, or at least, so my inner dragon reasoned.

I reached back to my cave a while later and managed to apply some of the more complex healing items to my forepaw, bringing it back to normal in mere seconds. I took a bit of time to shove some extra healing items into my inventory pouch that I wore whenever I went out of my cave, be it for an adventure, a trip to the capital or a simple evening stroll, making note to remember to use them in the future.

Having done that, I sighed and curled myself up over the bed of straw that I had accumulated, pawing at a bit of beef that was meant to be Gzar’s dinner. My virtual self didn’t quite feel hungry, but rather, more contemplative that night in Vernia. Perhaps there were more interesting things to go for, apart from defending my territory and its allies and trying to find the meaning to all these bursts of feral rage that consumed me in real life. Granted, those were somewhat more important things that I should’ve handled, but it was honestly starting to get a little dull, and I tried to entertain myself with something else to occupy my time while I scoured the land of Vernia for answers. Thoughts of expanding were shot down personally, myself not quite wanting to invest in the invasion of others, while thoughts of pushing out and exploring were shot down as well, for the area needed my protection every now and then, especially against some of the stronger, further-out kingdoms that were not visible against the horizon.

As I went about contemplating any further-drawn out thoughts about entertaining myself in the slightly-longer run, my thinking was interrupted by the sound of metal clanking against the rock, like a sharp object stabbing itself into the hard surface of the rock. The pristine mountain air that flowed into my cave on a regular day was suddenly tainted with the smell of flesh and steel, and in an instant, I knew that it was a human that had managed to make his way up to my cave.

I sat quietly and watched as a gloved had slapped itself upon the end of the small outcropping of rock that I usually took off from, patting around and looking for a form of leverage to pull the rest of its body up. Snorting in quiet amusement, I placed a talon near the searching hand, and upon grabbing on to it, there was a pull and the person behind the hand came into view, his head coming just over the edge of the rock.

It was somewhat hilarious, to see the expression on his face as he caught sight of me, making the unpleasant realisation as to just exactly what one of his hands was holding on to, it being the thing that he had just used to pull himself up with. There was a look of instantaneous regret on his face as he looked as if he was contemplating to let go and fall to his untimely demise, but with a sense of responsibility of my own actions I hoisted the now-screaming man over the edge and brought him up onto the platform that I usually lounged upon, looking over the landscape of Vernia.

“Welcome, to my rather... humble abode.” I smiled, giving the man a purposely-toothy grin, showing off my rows of serrated teeth that lined my maw. The man, in turn, let out a rather terrified squeak, trembling. He was only an archer of level eleven, and judging from his expression, not expecting to find me situated this far up here.

“Few ascend this mountain, and fewer ever come up this high, braving the cliffs like you havem young adventurer...” I continued, arcing my tail dangerously, letting it curl ever so slightly as I let it trail back and forth, “So, what brings you here...?”

“I-I came up here on in search of ri-riches...” he stammered, his eyes travelling over to the insides of my cave, which had a few rather valuable things in display, “ A friend of mine told me there was much to lay claim to up here...”

“Ah, well, indeed there is much here.” I said, eyeballing him over the rapidly fading evening sun, “But whoever said it was free to lay claim?”

The young archer seemed to express both an emotion of regret and fear at the same time upon me saying this, or at least, more so than before.

“I could let you off with something from my coffers, seeing that you have made it up so far, but I cannot guarantee that you’ll be able to make it down in the middle of the night...” I said, this time with a slightly more dangerous tone. The young archer gulped, but in a moment, caught me off-guard by suddenly falling to his knees, begging that he be spared, for he was but a beginner merely investigating rumours and spouting as many excuses along those lines as possible, even offering to give me the name and location of the person that gave him the rumour.

To that I laughed heartily and silenced him with a gesture, motioning for him to allow me to speak, catching him somewhat off-guard at such an expression. “Ah, hah... haha...” I snorted, trying to wipe the tears in my eyes with a claw, “I’m not going to kill you, silly man. I don’t have any use for you in the first place, and besides, if I did kill you, I wouldn’t quite be giving off the correct image, myself being the guardian of Stervenstaug, no?”

“What?” came the bewildered reply, the man regarding me with a somewhat sceptical look, “You’re the guardian of that little... little... backwater town?”

“Yes,” I replied, “Indeed I am. Did you not find it odd that there was no guardian station at the village itself, for all that it was standing upon?”

“Well, uh... yes.” He said, “I wasn’t quite expecting a... dragon, to be the guardian of such a tiny establishment like that, given a dragon of your caliber!”

“Ah, well, I like the simple life.” I said, giving him the draconic equivalent of a shrug, “But anyway, so, what do I do with you, in the meantime?”

The archer cast one last glance over his shoulder and looked at the rapidly setting sun, before turning back to me and shrugging with a weak smile.

“Well... I suppose I could fly you back down in the morning, I guess, so please, make yourself comfortable in my humble abode.” I said, almost dragging him into the cave. The man was still as stiff as a board, obviously not expecting me to have behaved the way I was, but I entertained him nonetheless, having him as a guest to my cave. It was not common for me to hold one anyway, so I thought that it would’ve been an interesting thing to do for a change, instead of just wiping them off the face of the cliff.

Ambling back into my cave, I went around to tidying up a little and cleaning my already-clean cave up a little more, all the while doing so while the archer himself stood to a side awkwardly, looking quite out-of-place in a dragon-sized home. Obviously, I wasn’t quite accustomed to having guests, and after a while more, I realised that I should have given him both a seat and a drink. I looked around the cave, trying to find something that I could use as a chair for him, something that wasn’t too high, yet wasn’t too low. Considering that there were no chairs inside my own home, for I was but a quadruped dragon, I instead opted for using a rather thin dragon-sized book as a chair for the poor man, before setting some water to boil in the large kettle that I kept inside my cave. The man gave me a worried look as I added a bit of tea leaves to the water, perhaps him thinking that I was about to prepare him for a meal, and was about to stand back up to attempt leaving until I managed to offer him a cup of tea and calm him down by assuring him that he was not about to be eaten.

It was somewhat amusing for me to have done so, but seeing as to how he was in the presence of not a fellow adventurer but a dragon, I assumed it was only natural of him to do so.

We sat there for a while, in awkward silence, sipping on cups on unsweetened tea, the archer occasionally coughing here and there. “Tea too strong?” I asked, cocking my head.

“Ah... no, not at all, uh, heh...”

“Oh come on.” I said, fanning out my earfins in disbelief, “Really now?”

“Okay, fine, it sort is.” He said, looking as if he was expecting to be eaten.

“Ah, alright, I’ll brew another batch for ya.” I replied, pouring the current one into an oilskin pouch. The oilskin pouches that I had for myself tended to make water taste funny, which was probably one of the reason why I never used them myself, but out of politeness, I tipped the current kettle of tea into one of my largely unused ones, before tossing less tea leaves into a new batch of tea.

“So, young adventurer,” I said whilst tending to the boiling mix of liquid in front me, “What might your name be, and again, what brings you to these parts?”

“Ah, uh... my name would be Harold, sir.” He said,  “And I came here upon hearing the rumours that there was, well... treasure up here.”

“Drop the ‘sir’, call me Gzar.” I replied, “And where on Earth did you hear such rumours?”

“Some local players staying down there told me, si- uh, Gzar.”

“Their names? Might you be able to remember their names, or at least one of their names?”

“Y-Yes, there was an elf, hanging out with two other guys, in guard uniforms, real players, I believe one of them went by the name of War...War-something...?”

“Ah, those three.” I said, “They know me, or at least, I think they do, but they mean no harm, I suppose. Just pranking some of the travellers, though I doubt they actually expected you to make it all the way up here.”

The young archer nodded, looking wistfully over the darkened lands now as he held up his own mug for me to pour some of the new tea in.

“Better?” I said, cocking my head.

“Y-yes...” he said timidly.

“You’re still... afraid.” I said, flicking my tail dismissively, “I can smell it in you, or rather, I can smell your emotions, rather.”

“What...?” the man said, confused.

“Haha, well, we dragons can smell fear, literally, along with other emotions that other creatures feel... Not exactly an easy scent to describe to you here, but trust me, I smell fear on you, you are still... cynical of my hospitality?”

“Well, likewise, it’s not every day that a dragon invites you in for tea, don’t you think?” the man retorted.

“Fair enough, but just let it be known that I have no intentions of harming you.”

To that, the man nodded, and went back to sipping his tea, cupping his mug with shaky hands as the cold, Vernian night approached, bringing in a draft. He shivered considerably and I decided to drape a spare sack around him like a cloak, for myself lacking anything better to do so with. I knew that nights in Vernia were cold, but my draconic form gave me some resistance to the elements as well, leaving me without a need for... well, blankets.

“I’m sorry, I don’t use blankets.” I said, gently wrapping the thing around him. For the most part, Harold already looked somewhat terrified of me from the beginning of things, and now, even more so as my large claws worked around him. As delicately as I could, I patted him on the back with a large forepaw, hoping that it wouldn’t scare the crap out of him, and that in itself proved to be somewhat effective.

As we sat there in stoned silence, my thoughts once again wandered off into finding an answer to my little... issue, hopefully something in-game or out. It was funny, how the game tended to work, where so many things were being discovered by both NPCs and players alike, things that the developers had missed out themselves, or not even planned. For one, I thought that it was rather awkward that certain things happened, like the discovery of necromancy in the game, which was, according to the game developers, something that they had not programmed themselves, but rather was something that the game sort of programmed and coded itself for. Again, self-creating programs were not uncommon in the context of today’s world, but still, it was rather interesting altogether that the world of Vernia was advancing on its own, very much like a real world.

“You look troubled.” Harold said, interrupting my thoughts, “Something on your mind?”

“Ah, well...” I said, noting the uneasy look Harold sported, as if hoping that had not just offended me, “You see, I’ve been experiencing... problems on my own.”

“Loneliness?” he said, smirking.

“Well, not so much that. It’s... complicated.” I half-lied, “and there are things that just don’t add up, you see. I’ve been trying to solve it myself for quite a while now, but I have yet to find my own answers, or at least, the right ones.”

“What do you mean?” he said.

At this moment, I wasn’t too sure whether I wanted to lie to him or not, but seeing that he was a complete stranger and free of any influence from outside sources and someone that probably wouldn’t find me in real life, I decided to come clean. “Well, it’s... how do I say this...” I stalled, flicking my tail, “You are aware that this is a virtual reality game, don’t you?” I said.
“Mhm?”

“Well, basically, as you can see, I’m one of the rarer breeds of players, playing a dragon. I don’t quite know how to explain this to you, but basically, I think I might be going crazy in real life.”

Harold regarded me with a confused look, but motioned for me to go on. “Well, as of late, the instincts of... well, my dragon, have seemed to sort of spill over into my ‘human’ mind in real life. It’s becoming harder and harder to control by the day, and I fear that if anything should further develop, I might end up hurting more people as the days pass.”

“What, you tried to eat someone?” he said, half-jokingly.

“No. Seriously. It’s been... taking over me. Well, I don’t know how to explain it to you too well, eh, but right now, it’s starting to give me bouts of violent and strange behaviour, and if this doesn’t get settled soon, I might end up in the looney bin, yeah?”

“But you seem perfectly fine here...” Harold said.

“Yeah, that’s the problem.” I replied, “So far, I’m only able to fully control myself and my thoughts when I’m in Vernia, and tends to be... a bit of a problem, you see? It’s like, as the day passes by, my real self is starting to become more... feral, as we dragons call it,  and I could best sort of put it, well... maybe it’d be accurate to say that my mind is... uh... mutating.”

“I don’t quite catch you...” Harold replied, now sounding even more confused.

“Look, well basically, as a high level dragon in Vernia, I’m starting to change.” I said, tapping my head “Not in a physical sense, but in a mental sense. I’m becoming more of a dragon up here.”

“Ah... I see...” Harold said, “But how will spending any time in this game help you to get around the problem?”

“Okay, so here’s the thing.” I replied, “The first occurrence of this happening is the first in all of the game’s history, but given how fast things self-develop, I’ve been looking for an explanation as to why I’m losing myself, and even more so, how to get around curing it. I’m hoping that someone somewhere has figured at least something that might even slow down the effects of what’s happening to me. I’ve been doing a lot of reading and searching so far, and I hope to be able to find something here, since the game’s admins have basically done jack shit for me. ”

“Well, if that’s the case, then it sounds rather interesting!” Harold said.

“Ah. Trust me, not that fun when your own life lies in the balance.” I retorted.

“Uh, well, if it’s anything, I’d be willing to help you out, you know.” He replied.

“You serious?”

“Well, generally speaking, I don’t think I have much to do in this game, anyway. I mean, I’ve done a lot of bandit camp raiding and helping old women find their jewellery and all that whatnot, but so far, I’ve lacked that sort of ‘Zing’ in my experience here so far, you know? Perhaps travelling with you might sort of prove to be more interesting than roaming around.”

“Well...” I said, “I would appreciate the offer of some help, I suppose, but I don’t even know where to start myself.”

“Ah, then perhaps that might be the problem?” Harold said, leaning back into his chair a little bit, “If you could identify where the problem came from, it’d be easier to find the solution, or so I’ve learnt.”

“I suppose so...” I replied, “Worth the shot. If you must really know here it all came from, the last session that I had before all these funky mind problems came about was when I was tortured by a wizard.”

“Tortured?”

“Yes,” I continued, “By a wizard using lightning spells.”

“How so, how do you know that it might’ve been the origin?” Harold said before taking another sip of his tea.

“Well, basically, when he was torturing me then, it had been just after a large battle, one that I would not like to go into detail very much, per say. What is important though, was that I was feeling pain. Real pain.”

“What do you mean by ‘real’ pain?” he said, scratching his chin.

“You know how when you get hit in this game, you feel pain?”

“Mhm?”

“Well, basically, what happened here on my account was that I began to feel pain somewhere in the midpoint of all the torture, and I felt a sort of... pain in my head.”

“But how would that be different from regular pain?” he said.

“Well, if you’ll believe me, I’ll tell you that it was just something that I could feel, like I knew that I was actually being injured in real life.”

“Did it really happen, though?” Harold asked, “Did you really get injured in real life?”

“Well... I did get a nasty headache from all of that, but I don-“

“Aha!” Harold said, “there we go, that might be the point of entry right there!”

At this moment, all I could reply him with was a stiff ‘Oh’.

“If you want, we should probably go around looking for books about lightning and lightning magic, then. If you stick around the magic players and shops, I’m pretty sure you’d be able to find something, notes, books or anything of that like that might provide some form of explanation, or way to reverse it. After all, quite a few books in the game have already been written in the context of the real world...”

I nodded to this idea, suddenly wondering to myself why I hadn’t thought of it before, at all. Good job Ray, of all the things, you forget how to problem-solve.

“Well, but that’s all just, well, ideas, so to speak. I’m not sure if they’ll actually be useful or not, but I’m hoping that they will be.” Harold said.

“Indeed. Perhaps I should begin tomorrow after I get you back down to Stervenstaug, Harold.” I replied, putting myself down a little closer to his level.

The night was young and there was little much to do apart from talking to one another, and soon we were doing nothing more than waiting out the night with idle banter about how our lives were. There wasn’t much to talk about, per say, but we often fell into long, philosophical arguments that seemed to circle endlessly, much to my enjoyment. I soon found that it was this kind of thing that I genuinely enjoyed talking about, and with a flair that I myself had not found within doing anything for the longest I could’ve remembered, I went forth, just... talking. It was good, in a sense, to finally have had met someone who seemed to be enjoying the same sort of thing that I did as well, full, long-winded discussion that held more than just quest rewards and the amount of homework we did regularly. No, this was something else entirely, and secretly, in the corner of my mind, I felt rather reluctant to have to send him off in the morning. Something prompted me to simply keep him for myself, a prisoner, for all that it was worth, but I knew that I couldn’t hold him back, and as we logged off that night, I did so a little wistfully, feeling that I was about miss the company that I had just made.