Chapter Seven: Not Chargen Up

Again May 8; Day One

When he woke, it was for dinner.  There were a lot of oohs and ahhs as the helmet was passed around, and an open light of jealousy in his younger brother Short Guy's eyes at the VirtLink.  And instead of playing more after the meal, as he had planned, he found his father giving permission to his brother  to use minor games.  His father had figured correctly that they would include some minor stuff like three-dimensional solitaire, Car Race Up Pike's Peak, a strategy game entitled 'Lightning Mage.', and a half-dozen others as well as the main VR game, Tower of Rhodes.

And the excuse for this 'total injustice' as he muttered under his breath was that he had to do his homework.  The problem was that he only had the device for a week, and he had to find some way of convincing Gameworx to let him keep it longer, for at least the whole time he was laid up.  Otherwise, being stuck in the couch, which had seemed terribly rough, but now with the cessation of boredom, the renewal of that pain felt crushing.  And he was not going to find the answers to such in his math or history homework.  While undoubtedly brave, the 'tunnel rats' of Vietnam had little to say to him.  And what good was A=LW, anyways?

Fuming, he worked his way through the homework, and then snappishly demanded the headset back.  His brother gave him a look, as if to say 'you can't thump me now', and then ignored him.  Furious words raced up his throat only to here his father clear his throat.

"Finish the game, boy, then let your injured brother have his helmet."  The words were soft, the same way a fifty pound bag of cement being dropped off the roof is soft and quiet.  Neither of the boys cared to challenge their father.

Five minutes later, the treasured helmet was in his hands with his brother trying to act like he didn't care anyways.  But before the helmet could go on, and after his brother had left to do his homework, his father raised his large arm and a hand a few inches.

"I'm keeping an eye on this new thing."
"Dad, it's just..."
"New ain't bad, necessarily.  But it can be, and even when its not, its unexpected.  There is going to be surprises in the best of cases."
Jackson paused, and then nodded.  Unfortunately, it was a good point.  He needed to 'keep a weather eye out' and 'watch his six.' which were two of his Uncle Ram's favorite expressions which he just used to annoy Jackson's father, which raised him to near demigod status in Jackson's eyes.  Someone willing to taunt his father just because, had to be a minor god.

And with that thought, Jackson slipped the much awaited helmet on.  Flaps and eye shields and contact lenses, freshly cleaned, came down, and in.  A free fall down a whirlpool of light, and he was back in the chair, the throne.

It was still Day One of his receiving the helmet.

The Attic Archivist was across from him, sitting behind his desk, eating a red apple.  When he saw Jackson, he quickly stowed the apple away in his desk, and ostentatiously washed his hands in a water-filled finger bowl to avoid getting juice on treasured books.
"Do you...?"
"No, no I don't.  In fact, because of your help, I will be able to go home early.  The wife will like that."
Jackson blinked.  The idea of quest-giver NPCs having wives and houses threw him a few inches.

=Quest 'Help the Archivist' completed.  +1 to Intelligence, +1 to Dexterity.  Your relationship with the Archivist has improved to 'An Acquaintance of Mine'.  Level up.  You gain 10% to one skill or attribute.=

=You are now Level Two. Congratulations, Adventurer.=

With that, Jackson teleported to his Chargen Room with its white walls and floor, and green chalkboards.  He viewed the stump with disfavor, but wanting to try it out, he sat down on it.  If he sat just right, it would not wobble.  Otherwise it was as good as a rocking chair, or almost.  It had too short of a cycle to be truly relaxing.

He checked out the chalkboards.

Player Nickname: Jackson
Character Name: Undetermined
Character Race: Undetermined (Human)
Sex: Male
Time spent playing: 8 Minutes 32 Seconds.
Player Number: #283,422

Muscle 1
Dexterity 12
Toughness 1
Wisdom 1
Intelligence 12
Charm 1

Climbing 1% bonus
"2001" Easter Egg, small
Helping Hand (1 use)
Panfluorion Language: Childish (2)
Memory +2%
Alchemist: Potentially Dangerous (1)
Minor Lawbreaker (bounty 2 gold denarii)
Finding Secret Hides and Levers: +2%


Relationships
=============
Attic Archivist: Quite a Nice Young Fellow (3)An Acquaintance of Mine (4)
Alchemist's Guild: Potentially Dangerous Renegade (-1)


Health (Muscle + Toughness + Wisdom) X 5: 15
Mana (Toughness + Wisdom + Intelligence) X 5 = 1520

Quests
======
Where is the money going to?/ Questgiver: Attic Archivist/ Level B
Help the Attic Archivist is completed/ Questgiver: Attic Archivist/ Level AA

Fame = 17 pts. "Just a guy in the street."
====
Entering the world: 1
Exit and Enter; 1
Relationships positive: 4 X 1
Relationships negative: 1 X 2 (Each negative point is multiplied as a positive twice whereas a positive is only multiplied once. There is more than a little truth to the idea that you can do a dozen things right, but people only remember the one failure.)
AA Quest and B Quest Taken: 2
AA Quest Completed: 5
Easter Egg: 1
Bounty: 1

There were a number of points to spend for his initial character creation, and that 10% bonus as well.  Rubbing his face, he jumped up, punched the air, and exited Jackson's Hole.

And it seemed as if the Archivist was still talking.  He laid out a parchment on his desk and oriented it toward Jackson.  Then he dipped a quill pen, and made ready an inkwell, a small, bottom heavy ceramic pot  of surprising thickness.

Jackson walked over to the desk, and looked down on a pulsing sheet that occasionally had words and numbers appearing and disappearing on the parchment.

To the left, under name and race (....Elf, Human, Neanderthal, Halfling, Gnome, Dwarf....These are the starting races.  It is possible to change through high-level Transformation spells, or God magic, or for certain quests to reveal a hidden truth about one's ancestry to change the characters race.)

"Ah, this is another chargen, or character generation method." Jackson breathed.
"Yes, the guided tour method. Many adventurers prefer it as they set forth in the world. But, if you like..."
"No, no, this is good."

Curious, Jackson tabbed Neanderthal, expecting a short, bent over man, but instead finding a high-browed man with wide shoulders and heavy hands, holding a crude spear.

"Neanderthals receive a +2 Muscle bonus, and a +1/10th a level Muscle bonus.  They are commonly Large Animal Hunters, and may not initially choose any career with 'Academic' in its description as they are Hunter-Gatherer barbarians, shamans, rogues, or scouts.

They received double damage from vitamin deficiency, which with their lack of Vitamin D in their homeland led to their getting rickets in record numbers.

They have a .5% percent chance of Awakening in critical situations, and developing psi power.  They could freely interbreed with Human as they are simply a Human breed, the equivalent of a Bulldog to the more average Golden Retreiver in the Wolf Kind."

Images of him leading a Mammoth hunt, of driving a spear a good eighteen feet long straight into the heart of a fleeing bull Mammoth left him hungering for more, but he stuck to his plan, and passed on.  Still a built in +10% bonus on Muscle was nice indeed.  It would be a good character choice for starting players.  But Jackson considered himself more experienced, even if in this game, he was a noob.

Elf was not really his thing, and curious he checked the devs idea of Gnomes.  Mad, Yankee, garage inventors, who occasionally scaled up to Thomas Edison's Menlo Park Laboratory size before blowing it all to pieces in a crazed attempt to merge a Starheart with a dead dragon's body.  Oh, yes, evidently Gnomes also went in for the Dr. Frankenstein route as well.

A green-skinned fellow in much patched overalls, with a crossbow mounted on a metal helmet, a cigar in the teeth, and two more crossbows in the hands winked at him from the page.  It made him laugh.

The last sentence summed up his feeling for the race.

"Other races tend to view them with disdain and wonder, from a long way off, preferably."

That left the last choice of Dwarf.  As he touched it, the parchment lit up.

"If this is your choice, it can be temporary until you leave the City.  In that case you will be Unformed." A bipedal being of crude clay as if shaped by an untalented potter in a hurry appeared on the parchment.  His eyes opened, and his mouth opened.  Even looking at him was a bit distasteful. The clear disadvantage of Unformed was that he would receive none of the advantages, which outweighed the disadvantages it seemed to him for each race.  On the other hand, it gave him more time to think things over, and decide if he really wanted to be a Dwarf.

He chose 'Unformed' and felt a ripple over himself.  Now he looked as some sort of crudely made clay golem not yet baked, but with roughly the same features as himself.  It was as if a first grader had made a picture of him.

Examining the bonuses available, he saw that Unformed had a uniform 20% reduce damage buff, could not drown, or be charmed, or have their non-existent blood drank by a vampire.  On the down side, they were never Trusted, had a distinct decline in Charm of -3, and could not run.

Now that he had chosen a 'race' even the temporary placeholder one, his clothes changed in an instant from what he wore in the Real World to a most righteous, or holey, burlap bath robe, and a pair of down to the knee, loose linen shorts with a ragged hem.

Checking them out brought up their stats.

Discarded short robe of Elstim the Drunkard.  Protection, physical 1. Durability 8. Charm -1
Old tablecloth turned into shorts.  Protection, physical 1. Durability 8.

With wonder and distaste, Jackson smelled the odor of garbage wafting off his robe.

Motivated by curiousity, Jackson looked up to quiz the Archivist, and found him on the other side of the room looking through several books.  A system message prompt popped up.

Game Dev is considering adding the Unformed as a race.  As to how we 'read minds' most Humans subvocalize questions in their throats, and our AI is very smart. Have a nice game, Game Dev Four.

The stats or attributes were as follows:

Muscle
Dexterity
Toughness
Wisdom
Intelligence
Charm.

Muscle covered raw strength, but could also be branched out into the sprinter's quick twitch muscles, or the long-twitch muscles of the marathoner.  It also provided some armor, and health.

Dexterity ranged from pencil spinning, to Parkour, to knife lobbing bad guys in the throat, and even to some degree to social charm.  A klutz was not just disadvantaged physically, but socially as well.

Toughness helped resist damage, gave health most strongly, powered the body during mighty feats, and during long drawn out bouts of activity.  It even helped shield one from magics of certain kinds.  Safe to say that a certain Hobbit with a devouring ring had a great deal of inner toughness helping him resists its blandishments and thuggery.

Wisdom begins with the awe filled respect of the Creator.  It was a sound understanding of a situation, and the ability to act on things that you knew had to be done when forex, dragon terror had unmanned everyone else nearby.  It was the golden crown among attributes.

Intelligence is memory, correlation at time, the comprehension of languages and spells, and the rare flash of genius in a new  idea.

Charm ranged from simple looks to a magnetic personality to a man 'bone deep ugly, but trustworthy because you just knew he was a decent fellow.'  The charming had an easier time of things, it was said by the wise, and the wise were as often so, right.  The highly charming would gain levels faster if faced with the same situation, and they would rarely be left behind when a rout came.
This message was last edited by the player at 04:58, Sat 28 May 2016.

Pursing his lips in thought, Jackson noted the system stats.  Nothing too far-fetched he decided, although how they played out could be interesting.  He was glad it was not an Amberite system, or a pure levelling system, but a mix of levels and use with surprise benes would work.  And just what role did the skill of the user play in the game as well?  These questions were still unanswered after he spent twenty minutes in the Tower of Rhodes wiki, and an hour more thumbing through some likely forum posts.  The hit and dodge mechanics were hidden inside deliberately obscuring shadows and a black box.  It did seem clear that higher stats meant more speed, more damage, and more accuracy.  That sounded ominous, if you were on the left end of the bell curve, like the typical female was to the typical male, being slower, less accurate, weaker, and less able to withstand morale loss in a fist fight, there was simply no real challenge.

However, he did not notice a raging forest fire of complaints on system design which suggested good things to him.  Players were not hesitant to point out flaws, both real and unreal.  Take #gamergate.  Media corruption and massive condescenscion had run right into a bee hive of genetically engineered mutant space bees from Warworld.  Taking on social outcasts with above average IQ's and keenly developed competitive instincts by threatening to shame them was the worst thing the provacateurs could have done.  It reminded the gamers of all the insults they had endured so far, thus angering them, and yet, such attacks had no power to cause fear among the pariahs of society.  It had been amusing, watching a blue-haired school marm walk into a bear's cave and start to lecture him on proper dental hygiene.

AT least that was Game Dev Two's view revealed in a post labelled 'About GG.'

Satisfied, and pleased that the No Fun Police would not be coming to Tower to shut down his fun, Jackson read up on a number of builds.  At the end, he decided the best way to stand out was to do something different, but not insane.  It had to be effective, and thus maybe he could catch the Game Dev's attention, and get himself more weeks.

Either that, or he could pull the Three Investigator's trick, and argue that the free limo services promised for thirty days did not mean a month, but thirty days of use.  He could argue that his week was defined by a business week of actual play time, measured in hours.

Slating that as Plan D for Desperation, he began to lay out his points.
He wanted, based on the design theories of his Alaskan internet friend, Brian, survivabiity.  There were too many things out there that allowed SMD, Sudden Massive Damage.  Thief assassin strikes with poisoned daggers in a blur of attacks; Ranger archers with a yew longbow and a broadhead arrow magicked to double its speed every second in flight, and worse.  Survival first, and so he checked over his twenty points, and allocated some.  He added eight points to Toughness.


Muscle 1
Toughness 1 9
Dexterity 2
Wisdom 1
Intelligence 2
Charm 1  (-3)

A picture of himself as a Human appeared on the parchment.  He had bigger muscles, but not markedly so.  He looked harder, more suited to walk into a biker bar, and walk back out with all his body parts still attached.  The eyes were gray, as was his, but this picture had them coldly staring out at him in silent challenge.  His pic stood lightly, and had a glint of understanding in his right eye.  Twelve more points to lay out, and he spent five on Wisdom.  The last seven he reserved for the moment.

You  have 10% to spend for levelling up.

Okaaay....Thinking to spend that on Muscle, he did the math, and shook his head. The forums had said the system rounded up in the player's favor, and rounded down in the player's favor.  Just one of the little benes adventurer's got.  It was a tiny edge, but he'd take it.

 Now he had Toughness  +10%, Toughness 10 (rounded up from 9 to 10), Dexterity 2, Wisdom 6, Intelligence 2, Charm -3 as an Unformed.  Checking the pic, he saw depth and contentment added to the face along with some slight biceps, and a general 'don't mess with me 'tude.  With a sigh, he added 7 to Charm.  He preferred not to have outright weaknesses, but his Intelligence, and his Muscle were very low, and he did not want to think about his Dexterity.  It was like he had laid the Curse of the Klutzenheimer on himself, but the advantages of faster levelling with high Charm were so useful to his game plan of quickly getting noticed that he did it annyways, even tho' it offended his gamer nature..


Muscle 1
Toughness 1 9
Dexterity 2
Wisdom 6
Intelligence 2
Charm 1  (-3) (5)
This message was last edited by the player at 02:13, Sun 29 May 2016.

Rechecking what he would look like as an Elf left him still cold to the notion.  One of the settings was to use a version of himself, and so he had tried it.  A Gnome version of himself had him laughing hysterically, and making Yoda jokes to himself.  The Neanderthal had more Muscle, and looked pretty good, if a bit on the slim side for the body size which evidently started 2X and went up to 5X.  Human was nice, but he already knew that.  Dwarf tho', well, he found himself liking the look.

Give the dwarf a round shield almost as tall as he is, an axe with a reverse pick, and a metal helm, and he would be a mini-tank of destruction and doom.

Just for amusement's sake, he aged the dwarf into young manhood where he got his first five inches of solid beard.  That, in a bit of whimsy he made red to contrast with a pure black long enough to tie up in a ponytail, and help pad his helmet.

He liked it.  It was enough like himself to be comfortable and familiar, yet, different enough to be amusing and adventurous.  Making a mental note to himself to go for this option unless he found something better, he turned back to the Archivist as he spoke.

"Dwarf is an unusual choice for a first time visitor." The Archivist said putting a book back up in a bookcase.  "But that offers advantages."
Jackson raised his head up, like a hunting dog, drawn to the word 'advantages' by a great deal of behavioral conditioning from other games.
"Like....how?"
"I cannot really say.  There are rules.  However, did you know that there were many First Week Quests for the very first Visitors?"
Jackson wanted more of a clue, but, well, this reminded him of a time he went into a bike store, and saw a cute girl offering prizes if you won a drawing.  She had practically begged him to sign up.
Later, he had won a fifty dollar gift certificate from that store, which was one of the better prizes.  If nobody signs up for a prize, except for you, it doesn't matter what the odds are.  You win.  And for whatever reason, hardly no one had signed up for the drawing held by that bike store that weekend.
"I see." Jackson said, giving the matter the gravest sincerity he knew how.  The Archivist nodded in approval.  "Any other pointers?"
"Did you know that you Visitors are considered to be the Returned Dead of families in the worlds?"
"Um, yes." Jackson had read something vague about that in the game history files.  The story had not caught his attention, and so he had skimmed it.
The Archivist nodded, and smiled, and Jackson realized that was that.
"So, you said 'considered in the worlds', what is your view of us?" Jackson said stretching for the sky to relieve his back even as the Archivist sat down.
"Well, certainly not the Returned Dead.  That's just silly."
"Oh, yes, quite."
Jackson waited even as the man opened a parchment.
"Well, I could explain it, but I did a much better job writing it down for a scholarly article.  Which unfortunately I lost yesterday."  And before Jackson could question him, the Archivist stood.  "And no, I don't know where."

=Will you accept the quest "Find the scholarly paper 'Cause of Visitors, a Speculation'"?=

The Archivist was leaving the room, via way of a secret door behind a bookcase, and Jackson thought to himself, 'how hard can it be'?  He chose the button 'yes', and felt a surge of triumph go through him.  His third quest, and he had not yet left the starting chamber!  And already he was Level 2.

A yawn escaped his lips, and wishing he could stay, he exited the game.  Once back in the Real World....except why was the game not real?  Did not things happen? Was he not affected?  Once back in the Physical World, he noticed his dry throat, and the late hour.  The whole house was asleep which made him leary of waking someone to get a glass of milk.  But then he saw a crystal glass of water with melting ice on a drawn up TV stand.  Probably left by Mom.  He smiled in gratitude, took it up, endured and enjoyed the chill, and fell asleep.

Chapter Eight : Trapdoor Down, Way Down.

May 9, Day Two

He was woken by Short Guy snatching up the Virtlink helmet, and slipping it on.  He gave his brother a venomous stare, wondered what the effects of multiple users of the same contact lenses were, and began to maneuver himself off the couch.  A plastic bag, a short walk, and a shower later, and he was back.

Mom had laid out oatmeal with sliced peaches with a side of sunny side up eggs for him.  He ate it desultorily as his brother grinned, and hummed to himself inside the golden and crimson slashed helmet.  Finally, Mom came in, and rapped on the helmet to get Short Guy's attention.  Seeing his brother disconnect, he began to speed up.

"Oh no, mister. Homework."
He groaned.  She gave him a Look.  He sighed in defeat, and held out a hand.  She picked up, and gave him his textbook.  It was hard at first as his brother kept making noise, but finally, he left.  Jackson got one class done, and the questions, minus one which he just could not find in the book.

Popping his neck, he scooted forward, and reached for another textbook.  Instead of retrieving it, he knocked it on the ground.  For a long second, he considered giving up, and using this as an excuse to go to the Tower of Rhodes.  Instead, he kicked out a bare foot, and used friction to drag it close.

A long reach, and it was in his lap, just as Dad came through on his way to work.  Some encouragement from the man, and a kiss for his wife, and the man was gone.  Jackson dove into the work with all the eagerness of a dead man walking doing his last mile on Earth.  Eventually, he was done, and his shoulder and fingers ached, and although there was more to do, he felt like he had done enough for now.

Lunch was grilled cheese, more milk ('for strong bones') with a little coffee for taste, and steamed broccoli.

And then he was free! Eagerly, he one-handed the helmet on, and instead of going to the game, he checked the Helmet Wiki.  In there he found the following...

"...ionized water is formed into a semi-spherical shape that works as a contact lens.  This lens dissipates after the helmet is disconnected, although some users claim to feel it still there.  This innovation allows for sterile lens for as many users as are connected.  Every six months, the tiny water reservoir needs to be refilled with the Gameworx Refill Bottle, or with sterile, distilled only, water.  Gameworx is working to create a system to allow ordinary optically deficient people to use such a system without the need of a large helmet.  However, advances in LASIK and other technologies may make this only a minor venture.  But still, even for those few not helped by other technoligies, Gameworx will seek a way to help them."

Jackson snorted with laughter at the self-congratulatory prose.  Still, it was an interesting thing.  And it pointed to a future where his generation might be the last one to wear glasses.  That would be cool.  "Hello grandson, see this picture of your grandpop?....What are those things on your face, grandpop?....glasses, grandson, glasses, see back in the old days before the Moon Colony..."  Jackson snorted at himself this time, and shifted to Tower of Rhodes without difficulty.


Once there, he tried the secret door, to no effect. Currently, he was alone, and trapped in the Attic Archivist's room, which meant this was an Attic, he assumed. After that attemtp, he searched for more only finding a hidden notch in a bookcase which held a tiny room exactly like his right down to the Unformed guy looking closely at a bookcase which held a notch.  Feeling a touch of weirdness blow through the room, he closed the notch, and stepped back.

You've found Fractalism Easter Egg #1 of Ten. Congratulations.

  Then he looked at his partially built character sheet for clues, for abilities not  yet used.  Instead he found the words Title: the Honest transcribed there below the 'Welcome to Jackson's Hole sign".  Looking up, he spotted at his right shoulder, a new thing, a floating data  pak in pale green over his right shoulder where he saw the following:

Jackson the Honest
Unformed, Level 2
Adventurer/Alchemist
This message was last edited by the player at 02:25, Sun 05 June 2016.

Jackson Taylor, still in his Unformed avatar, studied the character parchment on the Attic Archivist's desk.  The man had gone home to his wife, and left Jackson up here alone.  Outside, the sunbeam was now coming  through and hitting the wall of the bookcase midway up highlighting "Color Magic" and "Rotational Geometries of Jovian Satellites".

Player Nickname: Jackson
Character Name: Undetermined
Character Race: Undetermined (Human)
Sex: Male
Time spent playing: 14 hours, 22 Minutes  15 Seconds.
Player Number: #283,422

Muscle 1
Toughness 9
Dexterity 2
Wisdom 1
Intelligence 2
Charm 1  (-3)

Climbing 1% bonus
"2001" Easter Egg, small
Helping Hand (1 use)
Panfluorion Language: Childish (2)
Memory +2%
Alchemist: Potentially Dangerous (1)
Minor Lawbreaker (bounty 2 gold denarii)
Finding Secret Hides and Levers: +2%
Toughness +10% *already figured in.
Small, short story of History

Relationships
=============
Attic Archivist:An Acquaintance of Mine (4)
Alchemist's Guild: Potentially Dangerous Renegade (-1)


Health (Muscle + Toughness + Wisdom) X 5: 55
Mana (Toughness + Wisdom + Intelligence) X 5 = 60

Quests
======
Where is the money going to?/ Questgiver: Attic Archivist/ Level B
Help the Attic Archivist Chain Quest is completed/ Questgiver: Attic Archivist/ Level AA
Find the Scholarly Paper/ Questgiver: Attic Archivist/ Level A

Fame = 32 pts. "Just a guy in the street."
======
Paper Chase Quest Taken: 1
Level Up:  5 X Level = 10
Unformed Chosen: 4

Good thing he had a 'secretary' as it would be easy to lose track of specific details in this wondrous spectacle.  He had clean forgotten the need to track down the corruption in the City.  The Quest set up reminded him of Scrabble for some reason.

But before he could follow that thought out, he examined the entirety of his character sheet.  For a long moment, he just stared into space.  Then he walked clockwise around the room in his bare feet.  That did nothing to jog a thought loose, so despairingly he banged his head against books in passing.  Ah! Scrabble allowed one to get double benefits from a properly placed word.  If "Up" was finished by a 'p' that started a 'Punch' that was two words.  If he could arrange to double up on his quests, take on as many quests as he could, he might be able to make it efficient.  So that was his plan, as soon as he escaped this attic, he reminded himself.  And that plan was what Scrabble had reminded him of.  It would be easy to get off course, to wander, strike one way, then another.  He had to stay focused on his goal.  Enough Fame or other Interest in order to extend his time.  Otherwise, he would be stuck watching soap operas for five weeks.  He shivered at the thought, his mouth curling up in disgust.

Using the skills he had picked up from the book on secret doors, he kept searching the rest of the room, and found nothing, but an empty safe, and a hundred ruble bill buried in a book.  "Treasure Hunting in Radioactive Zones."

Finding Secrets is raised to 3%. Good deal.
NOTE:1% chance of Awakening. Fail.  No ESPer-anto today.

So radiation triggered a chance to get psionic powers?  That could be useful.  Any unusual power could be the edge in defeating someone like himself in a Player vs. Player duel, which Jackson wanted to avoid for now.

Putting that book up, he noted that the windowlight had crawled the height of two shelves upward so that it was almost shoulder height.  Cursing, he again dragged his throne over, and put up a chair atop atop the throne
This message was last edited by the player at 02:20, Sun 29 May 2016.

Wobbling, he quickly scanned the books spotlighted by the sun through the high window.
"Etymologogy of the Giant Mothra."
"Side Effects of the Spell: Power Word Nuke."
"Clean Air, the Nuclear Way"

A row down, and he saw a dozen small red books.  Curious he pulled some out. Two versions of Mao's Little Red Book he held in his hands.  Feeling them, he began to see what they were about...

The one in his left hand whispered to him.

"Power comes from the barrel of a gun."  And it showed him curing China of syphylis by executing fifty thousand sufferers.  Disgusted, he threw it down to smack on the wooden floor.  For a second, it seemed as if it would open.

The other had a different covering, a slicker, almost slimy one.  And then he saw that which he wished he had not.

"Archmage, how are we to create this Communism. Confucious say..."
"Confucious was a fool. With power, all is possible."
"But to change the nature of Man is..."
"Merely a matter of tools. Drain the golden dragon of its heartsblood for ink.  And skin the  twenty most beautiful virgins in the Middle Kingdom for vellum. That should provide the power to change the world."
"Yes, Lord Mao."

Gorge rising, Jackson flung the book down, and spat on it when it smacked hard on the floor.  His spit sizzled, and a glowing purple font appeared in front of him, startling him so he toppled back.

You have taken the Oath of Eternal Enmity first penned by Thomas Paine, specifically against the Lords of the Red Death.  Fame +10. Wisdom +1, Intelligence +1.

  The other in the row were spellbooks, and given their titles he did not want to grab them.  This was not his thing, at least not  yet.  Reaching further over by bending unnaturally so at the waist, he tottered and began to arrest his fall by grabbing the first title he could to save him.

It went, and so did he.  Curling back into a loose parenthesis, he came down in a rolling spill that left him not as shudderingly awful, or shrieking in pain from broken bones as he had thought.  Rising carefully to his feet, he checked to see if the book was in good condition.

=The Value of a Good Book. By checking on the book before oneself, you've earned favor with the Librarians.  You gain one free Yellow token to be picked up at the information desk.

Due to your acrobatics, you gain 1% less damage from falls.

You gain One Small Short Story which can be told to increase Reputation/Fame.=

The book's cover was yellow, and the title 'Climbing'.  Curious, Jackson opened it.  A second later, he wished he had not.  The world swirled away to be replaced by a pearlescent fog that limited visibility to ten feet.

A short female gnome, dressed in a pale yellow gown, with a 'L' ring on her thumb approached out of the fog.  She held a small metal tray.  On it were three white bowl in a line with a few inches between each of the little ramikins.   Inscribed in the side of each ramikin was a single word, either 'Treasure', 'Trap', or 'Thing'.  Treasure was greyed out.

That made sense.  He had no treasure to offer.  That left the choice of a Trap or a Thing.  He wondered why it had not done this when he chose the earlier book, but then he remembered it had been green bound.  And then there was the Archivist's enthusiastic warning not to open a red bound book.

"What are you here for?"  He asked striving for more information.
"My people are great gamblers, and I lost a bet to one of the Archmages."
"Which one?"  Jackson felt that knowing the weaknesses of the mightiest of the land was a useful thing.
"I don't know, you quasi-material beings all look the same to me.  So now I must serve in the form of this creature for a hundred years."
"Now choose, or I must choose both at once for you."
"I..."
And Jackson fell into a drippy, stone chanber, one side fronting on an aisle through black iron bars.  His left ankle winced at the twisted footing.  Laying there, waiting to be eaten, and then waiting some further until he heard a genteel voice with a German accent from behind him.

"You don't think you could speed this up, mein herr?  Bacik the Demi-Troll left enough hot cheesedip to feed a horde, and I'd like getting back to home."
Jackson rolled to his feet, and hub-hub-hunh erupted from his mouth like ash flakes spinning out of a volcano.

The Dietrich, for such was the monster according to its nametag over its right shoulder, stood seven feet tall in bare hornyfeet, and had three arms, blue, green, and yellow with tri-finger talons, with nary an opposable thumb in sight. The thing took a talon, and flicked a bit of snot from its nose to land steaming on the wet stone floor.

"Ulp."
It lunged toward Jackson who scrambled back. 13% of his health gone in one strike.  There was no way he would beat this creature, Jackson knew.  Still, he looked for his inventory and buttons popped up along the bottom of his vision.  One blinked vigorously.

"Activate." He murmured. And time stopped.  He was in the white room with green chalkboards named Jackson's Hole.  Looking around he saw nothing to use as a weapon.  But it gave him time to think, and time to catch his breath, and time again to come up with a plan.

Closing the inventory window let time begin again.  That  could be handy, he decided.
He dove forward in a low charge like a wrestler grabbing for a leg throw, but he held the wobbling stump from his Hole on its side.  The thing rolled on, and smashed the legs out from under the Dietrich. Showing no mercy, Jackson came on.  The yellow arm came out, and Jackson struck at it in an overhand chop, but the arm faded back too soon. The Dietrich had tricked him with a feint. A green arm, on the opposing side, raced in, and scored him across the ribs.  It was only the fact that the three-armed thing was lying on its side, legs still entangled with the stump that let Jackson stumble back quick enough to save his hide.

20% Health Reduction; 31% Total.

Giving in to fury, and impulse he stabbed out with a leaping kick, and caught the creature in the nose which sent it reeling back, leaking blue blood.  A single pause as he got his feet underneath him again, and resolved to take advantage, he charged in, poking down on the monster, driving him back down to the floor as it tried to rise.

The Dietrich's health bar over its right shoulder had dropped to yellow.

And then a plunging stab, fingers stiff, from his left, caught the Dietrich's throat.  This was followed by haymaker from the right.

Near Fatal Damage. 58% damage. 89% Total.

Fatal damage.

The pain, even if slight, that he endured for the simulacrum, kept going.

Everything turned pale, and then hyperreal. He could see the floor, and the wood grains in the floor.  And then it was as if lightning with wings of arcing sparks grabbed him, and thrust him back into the throne, only.

Congratulations: After Defeating a Yellow Book Guardian in the First Room, you receive the <b>title 'Ghostkiller in the Attic'. 272 other players have achieved this.  Your Rep is bonused +5.</b>

Way funny, guys. Jackson grumped as he got back to his feet.  The yellow book on Climbing still lay on the floor, and Jackson grimaced as he looked at it.  He had received no benefit other than fame from beating the Dietrich.  So since the thing was a Book Guardian that probably meant he could read the book in safety now.

But maybe not, and he was somehow at 49% damage.  The Dietrich must have got in a strike or two that he had not noticed in the wild flurry of the fight.  Another such fight would finish him.  But....

Nervously, he reached out and grabbed the book. Nothing happened.  Oh.....gritting his teeth, he opened it. Concepts about climbing bounced into his brain, and he sighed in relief.

Climbing +10%

Level Up. You are Level 3.  Congratulations!  You have gained 15 to Fame, and 10% to any skill or attribute.

Sighing with relief, he called up the Initial Load Page to check for some information.

And his next step, was in a dark room.  He stood facing the 'Play Game' button.  There was to his left, an 'Exit Game' button hovering in the air.  Next to it was 'Check Other Games' button.  Also, 'Inventory', "Game Wiki', and 'Forum', and 'Official Announcements', and 'Email Game Dev 4' was available, each one floating off by itself in the dark room floored by stone.  There was also and 'Exit' sign afloat.

  A bit thirsty, he tabbed the Exit Game button, hit the 'Yes' in the Doublecheck, and took a few seconds before the dream world faded from before his eyes, and he saw his own living room through teary eyes.

The VirtLink helmet, crafted by Gameworx, released his head.  Tired, he one-handed it awkwardly off his skull.  Looking about, he saw with gratitude that his mother had left him a tall glass, just out of easy arm's reach because she was afraid he might wave his arms and knock it over.  Taking it up, he gulped half of it down, and stopped at an incipient brain freeze.
"Whoooh." That had been good.

Finding himself tired, he settled in for a nap.  Dreams of yellow bound books nibbling on his toes, and wolves chasing him faded as he fell into a deeper, dreamless sleep.  Hours passed, and he woke to find Short Guy had absconded with the helmet.  His mother told him that brother had gone off to his own room to 'avoid bothering Jackson'.  She and Jackson shared a smile at Short Guy's transparent ruse.

He talked with her for a few minutes, and found after she left that he could not muster the energy to yell for his brother.  Instead, he lay back as Mom cooked, and watched the news.  The Suicide Hill Initiative was being pressed onward since there was not anything else happening for their to be news about.  He and his father made jokes about the news.  Even as a little kid, his father had taught him to distrust the news, not just for its bias, or its sensationalism, but for its sheer incompetence.  According to Thomas Jefferson: The man who reads nothing at all is better educated than the man who reads nothing but newspapers.

Dinner was a nice, soft meatloaf with whipped potatoes, and chunks of broccolli.  All of which was easy for him to eat one-handed.  A raspberry tea kept up the liquid end of things.  And food summoned back Short Guy to join with them.

After dinner, and idle chatter, he was ready to take back the helmet when Kevin rang the doorbell in a distinctive ring-ring-space-ring that the two of them had used as code years ago.  His mother invited him in, got him some tea, and Short Guy escaped to his bedroom with the VirtLink helmet.  Kevin gave him a rueful grin, aware of the continuing low-level war between his best friend and said friend's younger brother.

"More homework." Kevin said.  Jackson groaned.
"I am just barely keeping up."
"I think the teachers think you should get the full benefit of school at home."  Kevin said with a sympathetic head tilt.
"They going to send Jotunn over to smack my head into the locker?"
Jotunn was their name for an over-large third-string footballer.  Oddly enough, Jackson had never had any problems with the quarterback, or the first string.  It was the bench riders who had taught him to avoid certain after school events.  Its not that the quarterback was his friend, but the guy had his own thing going on, and other than a passing nod at Jackson, he ignored the lower status boy.
"I heard some teachers discussing it.  I think they decided to wait until you were fully healed, and then they would give you to beat on to Jotunn for a birthday present for a whole day." Kevin said mock seriously.
Jackson sighed. Both knew some of the teachers might as well do that.  When they were not actively useless, they were siding with the thugs.  Jackson was definitely grateful it had not been Jotunn in that car on the hill.  If it had been, Jackson was pretty sure, the car would have deliberately brushed him.
"Maybe I should homeschool." Jackson sighed.
"My dad is considering it." Kevin said to much shock.  "Yeah." He said to a suddenly listening room. "He says that when the metal detectors went in, in this small town, that was the last straw." He gave Jackson a loaded stare which Jackson interpreted as 'and when you got toyed with by some other guys, that was the real last straw.'  Jackson nodded to say 'message received.'

They hung out with each other for a couple more hours.  Kevin even got to try the Helmet after sending Kevin to Short Guy with a brotherly ultimatum.  "Give, or I'll hide the batteries."

After that, it was homework, and then bed.

================================================================

May 10, Day Three


  Curious, because he had been reminded of something, he flipped through the hiding of secrets book in the Attic.  And when he came to candles, he knew his solution.

Nervous that he should be caught, and embarrassed, he searched quickly in the Archivist's desk, not for gold doubloons, nor a spare shirt in some other color than gray, but for a candle and a match.  He found what he sought in the third drawer after passing over some curious implements.
                                                                                        Four candles held in his left hand, small sweet smelling pale yellow things of similar but not exact copies because they were formed by non-industrial methods, and in his right hand a single match.  Nerving himself up, he struck the match on the desk, only too late wondering if it was rough enough.  But it caught flaring bright.  Transfixed for a moment he stared at it.

Fire: One of Man's first friends.  Tool, weapon, object of worship, great danger, and punishment as well.  You gain +1% to Fire Use.

Cool. Jackson thought.

Do you wish (one-time offer to learn of the Arts of Fire?

A 'yes' and a 'no' hung in the air before him as the world waited still and quiet beyond the question.  Jackson wished he had read more up on the Game Wiki.  He had never gotten to this in his quick looks. and dabs of melted wax in  each of the rouoghly equiddistant from each other.  With eyes half-closed, he waited for the smoke to whirl.  The smoke fled to a spot on the floor and vanished.

"Gotcha." Jackson said with a laugh.  He needed to get out of here.  Or did he?  He could spend a night here, reading greenbacks and yellowbacks.  Picking up skills, why by dawn, he could....

Silwoon.

All the bindings had turned red.

What with Green being painless, and Yellow killing him, Red was not to be considered.  Mayhbe once he gained ten or twenty levels up.
This message was last edited by the player at 18:45, Thu 09 June 2016.

The candlesmoke drew him to a crack in the floor, and his fingernails running down the crack hit a switch, pregnant with tension.  The door popped up, forcing him to dive back on his butt or get a nosebleed.  Then it sagged back half the distance, and waited.  A murmuring of voices blended together, soft and distant now came to him.

He looked out the trapdoor, and was struck with vertigo as his picture of where he was totally realligned.  Below him, a ten story open atrium of a two hundred foot at a guess diameter circle.
"I'm in the attic of a ten story tower." He murmured to himself, shaking just a bit.  Around the tower, except for a few doorway areas, were walls of bookcases.  In fact, one could not be sure that the whole buildng was not a bookcase with books for walls, and large copies of First Edition Webster Dictionaries as founding stones.

He began counting the number of shelves as somewhere around fifty, and not even halfway up, he lost his place.

The weirder thing was that you could take a flying carpet to any level of the library atrium.  Several hundred were swooping about, and under each other now.  It seemed pale blue had the most restictions.  With dark blue, yellow, being more free, and gold-fringed yellow, of which there was only one,held a rather spry old man who seemed to go wherever he wanted, and others stopped to let him pass.

Now, as to getting down, some of the carpets went down the floor to a pile of rugs twenty feet high attended by an Arabic merchant.  Others tho' ran to the giant, yet slender tree that ran up the center of the library atrium.  Voices and scents rose to him, and among them was the tip of the tree, swaying ten feet below him, bringing nausea and vertigo with each sway. Next to it was a five foot square, and from it went a curving staircase without a railing.

He needed to get down. For a long second he considered climbing out the window, breaking it, and going down outside the tower, but that would be ever more insane, well, he hoped so.  And then the notion of breaking caught him.

He dragged over a chair, and lowered it as far as he could by the back, leaning over the edge on his belly.  It was ten feet, and the chair three foot, and his arms gave him another two feet.  He waited, trying to find when the right moment was to drop it between the foot high railings around the table.

Right now, he wobbled between hating the designers of this game and loving them. And then the chair slipped from his fingers, bounced, and tipped over.  He snarled, realizing he was going to take out one of the library patrons below. Then it fell, tottered over the railing, and fell back to slide with a clatter on the table fully inside the railing.

This wasn't going to work.  He yelled until his stamina bar choked off his cry for help.  No one came to help.  So he went back to Plan A.  This time, with the fallen over chair to serve as guide rails, he nailed the chair.  It rocked, but the other chair held it up.

Now it was eight feet to the seat bottom.  Still too far.  He took a stool. and very carefully dropped it.  One bounce and it was gone over the edge.  There was a lot of yells as it streaked down the ground.

Unprovoked Attack. You have attacked an Assitant Librarian. Critical hit.  You have killed an Assitant Librarian.

You can either receive a Benefit to 'Out of the Blue' or 'Critical Hit with Improvised Weapon'.

The messages appeared in front of his vision, demanding a response.  Out of....what did that mean?  Oh, probably a surprise attack, one with no warning whatsoever.   The other was well, not actual  weapons, but grabbing coffee mugs and bowling balls and whatever else was at hand.

The second was more versatile, more generally useful, but the other offered more of an opportunity to maximize damage.  And considering that he was a first, err, second level character, he needed to crank up the damage as much as he could.

He chose.

You have gained Level One to OOB Surprise Attack.  You have dropped from Unimportant Visitor to Dangerous Klutz.  Now the general Librarians did not like him.  Not sure what else to do, he dragged over another stool, but the memory of it bouncing came back to him.

Something was nagging at him.  Spatial configurations, ah! He lifted over another chair, and this one he flipped upside down, so that its front faced the back of the lower chair.  Now, with fingers aching, and starting to sweat, so much that he smelled his own odor, he let the  chair wriggle down a bit further.  And then it dropped.

Too early. And yet it hit, and landed.  Four feet down, and he lowered a stool.  It dropped one foot, and the under legs caught the stool, and he swayed in relief.  Pushing himself back, he wiped the sweat from his forehead.

He gave himself one minute to rest, and then pushed himself forward on the smooth wooden floor.  He had to get going before he froze up.  Looking over, he knew it was a game.  But the height, the sheer, aching solidity of the wood under his fingers, the fingers pointed at him with angry voices,  all of it was so incredibly real, and vivid.

Pushing himself forward, bracing his arms wide against the trapdoor edges, he found his knee  with its Raggedy Pants +0 hooked on the trapdoor.  Jerking it gently back and forth, he tried to work it free while his face hung out from the arched ceiling of the Tower.  Closing his eyes, he was able to slip free.

A gasp of relief, and he lowered himself further, using his thighs to hold him up.  Reaching, stretching his fingertips touched the stool.  Legs sliding, despite pushing outward, he was not just strong enough, and down he went.  Grabbing for the stool with his left and then his right, collapsing under his weight, he bodysurfed down his suddenly bruised chest down the exterior of the stool, flailing for another grab, but not too much so as to tumble his tower.

"Oh God...!"

Unspecified Appeal to Deity. Short. Emergency. 10% Luck Buff for five minutes.

He went through a chair leg, and thump down to the flat where he lay stunned.

Stunned Due to Impact.  50% Health loss.  That was a bit rough.  His muscles felt sore and stiff allover. And distantly down below, the second stool spattered on the creamy orange marble ten stories below.  Laying there, gasping for breath,  he shook his head,and forced himself to sit up.

Reputation decline one level from Dangerous Klutz to Incompetent Maniac with the Librarians.

Reputation declined one level from Just Another Visitor to Ill-favored for the City.

Great. Now the Librarians were talking of the malicious idiot to their pals in the marketplace, and their pals were all making mental notes to keep a weather eye out for one Jackson Taylor and his Bar Stool of Doom.

Now, he sat up, and looked down.  The branch looked too slender to hold him.  It was a pale yellow, with gold streaks running through it, faintly.  Clearly not a natural wood.  An oval shaped leaf, bright green, and probably delightful to little bunnies hung from the branch, and he pulled at it without thinking.  It did not give.

Leaf from Ye Olde English Oak, discovered by Watson and Crick.  Health 999/1000.

Was that the leaf or the oak, he wondered, and jabbed with his hand the hand-wide trunk holding him up.  After which it occurred to him that that might fall under 'sawing off the branch you had set upon'.

Ye Olde English Oak. Singular. Unique. Legendary.

His eyes widened at the superlatives.

Health 999999/1000000,  Mana 43000/70000,  This is the Foundation Tree of the Tower, the City, and the Small Worlds so it is said.  For keying in on the most important feaure of a setting, Wisdom +1;  For disrespecting the Tree, you have lost one Global Reputation Point.

Jackson swore a vulgarity.  Now everyone in the whole game would see him as Not that Trustworthy.  Evidently he had peed on the statue of the local godling.

If he did not watch out, they'd hang him by the neck from The Tree before he got to the ground.  Irritably, he looked over the edge, and saw the swaying floor beneathhim.  No, it was the landing that swayed.  And boy did he want to throw up.  But the penalties for urping over Tree and Librarians below might involve that hanging.

So, with a rising sense of desperation, he turned over, and slid his feet over the edge. Contact was made with a flexible and thin step.  Hugging the Tree, he went down.  Worse, the stairs wound about the trunk, with an occasional small branch to serve as a hold and an obstacle.

The steps were in four repeating colors, yellow, blue, green, black edgings on their light piny look.

"Any time soon."

He heard over his shoulder as he was ten feet down.  With a yelp, his legs swung free, and he dangled.  A taunting face, with a pointed ear visible on this side grinned at him.

"Visitor can't hold on." The dark skinned face said, showing bright teeth in delight.

"Dratted Dark Elf." Jackson replied with all the air he could spare as he pushed his fingers around questing for a better grip. Below him, nine stories down, a clear spot had formed, and silence had not come, but the noise had diminished.

"Oh, you wound me.  I am an Emboddied Afrit.  Pal, see the magic carpets?  The Tower of Rhodes, a city on the Great Sea. Oh, we have your Dark Elves, and even the Alfar, but there is also a Sea in which things swim that made the mighty Romans afraid of the water."

"I ...."  Jackson gritted his teeth.  "Apologize.  I did not mean to cause offense."

"Why of course you do.  You Visitors, so many ashamed of their own lands they come to the Tower to find new lives."  Jackson stared.  That was a new and weird interpretation of where the Visitors came from, and why. Usually they were considered either deliberate adventure seekers who took a chance on a hole in space, or the unlucky who got caught in one.  Still,it seemed the game's claims of unprecedented variability and realism were holding up very well.

"Can you rescue me?"
"Can I? Easily.  Will I? No.  I am bound by Ancient Treaty to serve the Library, and you are an enemy of the Library."
"But, I'm not....I love libraries."
The Ifrit grinned, his teeth pointed.
"Oh, I believe you, which makes this that much more special."
He paused, examing his red-taloned fingers.   The clear sign of being open to an offer intrigued Jackson as his arms began to burn.
"I have money."
The Ifrit gave him a weary gaze.  Jackson tried to remember is monies, but he had not checked his parchment character sheet for that.  However, he was quite sure it was very low.
"What do you want..." Met the shaking of the Ifrit's head in negation. "Ok, is there a quest you wish me to enter upon, Noble Efrit."
"Nice bit of flattery there. We like that." The Efrit grinned too widely for a human mouth.

The Breaking of Ancient Treaties 1:  Read the Yellow Bound Book 'Little Red Book' by Chairman Mao.  One week time.  Failure will result in circumstances returning as if it were.

The last bit was vague, but the object seemed simple enough.  Read a book about politics by the premier mass murderer of the twentieth century.

"Accept" or "Reject" glowed in front of his vision as it did the other times.  He focused on the first, and saw a sign saying that the Quest was Accepted.

The Efrit began to float away.
"What are you doing? Rescue me."
The Efrit turned back, and smirked.
"If you review our conversation, you'll note I never explicitly promised I would, and I certaintly never gave a time limit. Oh, look, lunch break.  To be fair, once I get back from lunch break, I'll ..."
Jackson took one swing, and launched himself with a scream half-caught in his throat at the departing monster.  Instead he caught the edge of the rug, overbalanced it, and tried at the same time to fling himself up even as his fingers lost contact with the rug's edge.

But the rug continued its rotation, dumping the hated rider head first and howling downward while coming level under Jackson even as he fell down on it.  Resting flat on top the rug was the most divine sensation he'd ever felt, even better than kissing Kimberly that one time.
"Good rug."  He said in gratitude, and he felt the rug vibrate under his hand.  It seemed eager, and playful as well like a small puppy. "Thanks rug." He said more sincerely, and the  rug seemed to radiate happiness.

Looking over the edge at a scream, Jackson saw the Ifrit with its tiny wings beating madly which was enough to guide him a bit, but not enough to fly, and he tore into another Librarian taking him high in the shoulders, trying to grab the man's rug, and failing.

You have gained experience points for assisting in killing a Librarian 2nd Level.

Whaaat? That was so uncool.

And then the Ifrit hit another one in his rapid descent, and tore him apart, but the kinetic energy dumped into the corpse was enough for the Ifrit to land lightly on the bloodied rug under its feet.

You have gained....

Angrily, Jackson waved the message off.  This buzzard had tried to murder him, cheated on a deal, and now killed two schmucks which was counted as Jackson's fault, at lesst in part.....The really annoying part was that he could see the logic of the arguement. But hating it only made him hate the Ifrit more.

"I will rip you limb from limb, boy, your body will be spread all over the Small Worlds for the weak to gawk at, and the strong to fear the wrath of Naaloc the Ifrit."  The words were flowery and delieverd with intent, and the world seemed to take on a shade of pink to Jackons.

"Let's dance!" He howled, and dove forward straight at the Ifrit who looked startled for the  instant.  The other Librarians fled out of the way with cries of dismay.

"Ball and chain, rug." Jackson whispered.  It was the only plan he had other than plowing straight into the huge creature, so he hoped it worked.  The Ifrit accelerated at him, but less enthusiasticaly.

Crippling fear of heights tried to grab him, but he was too much in the zone to come out.   As they shot toward each other, a grim line on his mouth, and burning flame erupting from the nostrils of the Ifrit, that Jackson turned left and sidways. and then just a hair in, as he curved back.  Going even more to the sideways, and coming back to the right he inverted over a startled Ifrit who tried to reach out for him with its betaloned hands.

Perfect.

Jackson grabbed both hands, below the talons as if  he had all the time in the world, and took the Ifrit off the other rug.  Still diving inversted down, he cut right, and kept barrel rolling twice as he raced toward the near wall.

And then he let Naaloc the Ifrit go. The being spun out of his hands, and went splat on the wall behind the information Desk.  A red mist rose, and an unearthly shriek that dimmed the lights in the hall presaged the Ifrit's return to its Infinite Sand Waste.  Jackson, as soon as he had let go, began slowing down.

He plowed into a wall of books.  And with that his consciousness went sideways for a second.    When he fully awoke, the rug had been removed, and he was holding on to the bookcase, fourteen full cases up.

You have gained a level.  You are Level Three.  You have one point to distribute.

You have gained a Level by slaying Naaloc the Ifrit.  Your reputation with the Ifrit has gone down one from Prey to Clever, Nasty Prey.

He floated down the last fifty feet, landing near a man-high pile of magic carpets.  Others wee waiting in line, and one gave him the shocked eyes.  He smiled back, and the young guy flinched so Jackson minded his own business.

A bubblingly enthusiastic girl walked by accompanied by a taller, severe Librarian in blue robes.  She was cute, and had somehow managed to upgrade to ...

Short leather shoes of the Mountain Goat; Plaid Quilt Short Skirt of Northern Charms; Silk Blouse Arrowguard; Necklace of Orisons with a Good Dagger at her waist.

"So I just read this, and that, and that Green books, and I'll be able to Summon Kittens from the Hunting Fields of Bast?"

She went on, so quickly that he did not hear the low voiced reply, and then he heard a voice filled with loathing.  In front of him was a short, and nerved up Librarian in white robes, younger than the other, and behind him two other larger types.

"Next." His lip curled scornfully.

Jackson understood, or thought he did, and so he just nodded, picked up Ruggy, and gave the rug a finger from his lips.
"Thanks Ruggy, You saved my life."
For a second, Ruggy glowed, and seemed more vivid.  The Librarians looked surprised, and then waved him on.

His first stop was to head toward the Green section on Holy Magic, which took him past the 'Theology and Other Sciences' section, turning back when he came to 'Wound Charts for a 1000 Kinds of Monsters', staring in befuddlement at two whole shelves of "Mansions of the Rich and Deific", until he wondered what kind of Pan-Dimensional Deweyism ran this Library, fumbled about for a few minutes, that left him wishing he could stop and see more. So many possibilities, it made his inner bibiiophile weep to pass them up.

And then he came to Orisons and Minor Healings, which was at least three shelves in itself.  But somehow two large men, in white robes with gold trim, one had five inches, and the younger had four, and both carried well varnished, sweet looking, nobbed rods bound around at a dozen places with ornamented gold now stood in his way.

"No can do, boyo." Said Mr. Four.
"But..."
"Need a library card, sir." The word 'sir' came out 'cur' from Mr. Five. "Regulations, sir."
"And I can get one from where, gentlemen?"
"Ha, he called you a gentleman." Said Mr. Four.
"I'll have you know, i work for a living.  No lace doilies at my wrists.  And to answer ye' question, the Information Desk by the Front Gate is where normal Visitors can get theres."
"And I'm not normal, I take it..." Jackson ground out.
"Not unless all Visitors kill three Librarians, and one Slave of the Library on their first day.  No sir, you're not normal at all."  Mr. Four took over from Mr. Five.
"Slave? Are you kidding me?  Isn't that barbaric?"  Jackson felt genuninely offended for a moment.  But it was hard to sustain considering he knew they were talking about the jerk that had tried to kill him.
"Either slavery enforced by spells, or extermination.  The Ifrit are evil, son.  If we had King Solomon's Ring we could bind them into jars, but I'm not sure solitary confinement for thosuands of years is worse than toting some books."

If you are still deeply offended by slavery of the Ifrit, you may undertake the quest,: Quest for the One Ring of Power.

It seemed the designers had along with hard moral choices, a taste for humor.  Comparing Solomon's Ring of Djinn Binding to Sauron's Ring was amusing enough.  After a bit, Jackson chose 'Refuse'. He realized he did not know how to make things better.

Knowing what you don't know is a step on the road to wisdom.  Your star begins to shine among the Wise.

Jackson blew his breath out, nodded in defeat, and walked out the wide front doors onto a pavoillion of white marble stretched out over ten acres.  Players of flutes, and singers, entertained picnickng city goers who had crossed the outer ring of smooth grass to the inner  marble.  By the front gate, a statue, forty some feet tall, made of bronze. He was reading a book on his right knee wth full intent.  Befir he knew what he was doing, Jacksonwasheading toward the statue like a homing pigeon.
This message was last edited by the player at 16:50, Tue 24 Nov 2015.

The statue radiated an intensity of presence that seemed to make Jackson fade.  Still, he came closer, and looked closely at the great statue high above him.

The Reading Man.  Some call it an avatar of the deity, the Man with a Book, w hile others think its just a statue. Regardless, none who see it ever forget it.+The Statue guarding the Front Gate of the Tower of Rhodes does not seem diminhished by the more than four times taller Tower of granite behind it.  Instead, its dark bronze beauty seems as a jewel on a ring.  Durability: Unknown.  Mana: Unknown.

Looking around, Jackson scoped out the terraced marble circle, and the ring of grass beyond, and the ten story granite tower above, and while a number of people were looking at the statue, none were looking at him.  And so he reached out and touched the pinkie toe on the sandalled left foot above the five foot tall marble plinth the statue rested on.

It was warm.  Not sure what he expected, a spark, lightning, or a rush of information in his brain, but it was warm.  Without thinking, he touched it again.  And then he found himself levering his leg up on to the plinth, using his opposing arm to reach out and grab at a middle toe as big as his thigh.

He could stop, but why?  So he pressed on, and upward, even as shouts came from behind him.  First they were kids, "Mommy look at that strange man" said one little girl with an adorable lisp caused by a lack of tooth.  Then it was adults, and amidsts amazement there were some cries of 'get down, you bum' followed by the shrilling of whistles.

"In for a penny, in for a pound." Jackson murmured, and pressed forward.  Even as he climbed p on the forearm on the left side, he heard yells below him.  but despite an abundance of javelins among the blue cloaked ones, no one threw one at him.  Perhaps it was because the statue was sacred.

Still, he wanted to read that book.

And so despite a plea, he turned like a moth to the flame, and read.

And so despite a plea, he turned like a moth to the flame, and read.  Jackson paused, in shock, not understanding.   But sudden illumination came to him, as he realized that he was reading the tales of his adventures in the Book of Heroes as he was reading the Book of Heroes.  It was kinda confusing.  He had hoped for something more.  Especially now that he was likely to be arrested by the blue cloaks.

Town guard. The Book read.

Jackson blinked. Unsure that the Book was talking to him.  Then he decides that it was.  Do I get a quest out of this or something?

Do you want a quest, or to be rescued?

In a burst of greed, typical of the adventurer, Jackson, hey, he said, I'm not greed, but even as he denied it a thousand examples of his greed occurred to him, and he shut up so that the Book could finish.  Ah yes, Jackson asked 'Can I have both'.

Sure.

Said the suave and debonair Statue, but there was no one else to read it as he was not sharing his book with some barely sentient being, so he went back to his usual reading speed of ten thousand words per second.

Jackson dissappeared with a pop, and a burst of green light.  Feeling out of sorts, he stumbled, and caught himself on a wall.  The stone under his hand, the curve, the rough, and the heft of it helped stabilize him.

Evidently, he was sensitive to Teleport Sickness.  In reading the rules, there had been some skills, and some problmes that one could not find out beforehand, like whether one was strongly at ease with teleport or not.

Looking downhill, he saw the cobblestones end, and a great, glass bridgew with suspension cords depending from towers, all glistering in a heavy fog that obscured the back half of the bridge.

"Food." The wind seemed to whisper.  His nose twitched at the scent of roast beef.  Turning about, he looked and saw a half-dozen player characters, as judged by their mostly ugly ripped jeans, and riped shirts being led down an ascending street by a Librarian armed with a cudgel and a trumpet.

....Food....

The building he was leaning on was a warehouse. It smuggled out....

....roast beef, cornbread with jalopenos, spinach and cheese, what he and his brother would call 'Green and Yellow Glop' just to annoy their mother.  The real world was intruding, and he searched for an 'Out' button.

Above him on the wall glowed 'Exit' which led him back into a darker alley, and considering what he had read on the wiki of the dark alleys of the City that was not reassuring.  Far safer to go in alone to dome dugneon that tyt to force passage through the winding streets of the Gordian Knot, which was the most fearsome neighbourhood in the City.

The road took him down and into a wide open space like an underground subway station without the rails.  A couple dozens others were down here, and by their actions, jerky misteps, and searchign glances he jusged them to ber players.

Waiting behind half a dozen at a turnstile with a frowing man-at-arms with a halberd to help keep order, he saw the ones in front of him pass through the turnstile, and be replaced by a book which a deft handed Librarian in green robes would catch out of the air, and bear to a bookcase on the far wall of a great cave.

In mere seconds, he was up, and...

Your Story Waits....

And it was the oddest sensation.  He felt as if he were compressed and folded, almost like the Seventies slogan 'do not spindle...' which had referred to treating humans as punch cards for the then leading edge computer mainframes.

The helmet visor slid up, and the ear flaps popped up, letting in cool air to cool his sweaty hair.  Uncertainly, he took it off to see smirking faces.  Everyone had gathered again in the living room for supper.

Mom was holding a full plate, mounded up, of the aforementioned foods in one hand near his face, and silverware in the other.  He took it, seeing his brother and father grinning at him.
"So is this the new eatery?"
"Until you get that cast off, yes, I think so.  Besides we've let you two go off to your own rooms too much.  Now, with you pinned down, and your brother champing at the bits to play your helmet, it seems a good time to do the family dinner thing."  His father said from a chair over by the television.  That was like Dad.  He tried to use events to make it easier to do what he thought useful to do.
Mom got him a drink of mint tea, which eased his sinuses.  After saying Grace to the Almighty, the quartet dug in.  Toward the end, a couple of Jackson's friends came over, and his Mom came out with a banana pudding heavy on the whipped cream and light on the vanilla wafer cookies as he liked it.

His friends joined in for the dessert even as his brother gulped his own down, and dove for the helmet.
"Gently." Jackson said.  His brother ignored him, and was soon lost in a mouth-breathing haze of delight.  Jackson was not sure he liked that look, and since he was pretty sure it was his much of the time, he made a mental note to try to do something about it.

He explained to his friends the issue with his brother using the helmet, and they were well familar with his father.  The man could discuss ideas with ease, but at some point he said 'that's it', and that was it.  Unless he could come up with some angle, he did not see him changing the man's mind.

They all, except for his brother, watched an hour of a werewolf detective using her superior schnozz to solve crimes, along with the occasional leap from a third story building to get a forgotten cup of coffee for the captain.  After that, his friends went home with protestations of coming again soon, and the house quieted.  Surprisingly tired, he found himself dreaming of explaining to Mr. BigWig, who in dream logic looked like a cyborg Benjamin Franklin that he needed more time to fully explore the benefits of the Virtlink.  Next thing he knew he was tied to a flying kite and cyborg Franklin was explaining that with the 1.87 kilowatts from this experiment, he could return to the Future, and destroy VirtLink before it took over the world.

Shaking, with a moan, he woke.  His face was again sweaty, and he faced the fact that he was going to have to face the dreaded shower somehow this day, or his mother would as she had said 'have him stand in the backyard and get hosed off by his brother' who had looked gleefully interested at the possibility.

It was one o'clock in the morning, and the house was silent.  Without much better to do, and feeling the pull anyways, he booted up the helmet, and dropped into Rhodes.  He found himself at night, with dozens of brightly colored stars overhead.  The scent of horse dung clung faint in the air, mixed with sweet wood smoke.  His breath came in a small fog from his mouth.  Chill breeze held his forearms.

The Glass Bridge before him was, if possible, more beautiful at night.  It was definitely spookier.  Dark shadows hung about it, and only to the midst of it could anything at all be seen.

This was his destination, and aware that he was probably on the Town Guard's catch list, he decided now was as good a time as any.  It did fit his goal of trying to be different, but not insanely so.

The large sloping square, formed of large granite blocks was lonely.  No human, or elf, or other creature save for a lone rat halfway across could be espied.  Nodding gravely to the rat, he walked on, feeling eyes on his back, wondering if something was about to drop out of the dark sky above, and take him away.

When he got to the edge of the Glass Bridge, with fogs extending out to his right and left, he saw words carved into the glass.

"This Bridge leads to adventure, dismay, wonderment, reward, and terror.  There are other Roads you could choose to take, you need not take this one."

Pausing, Jackson called up his character sheet.

It appeared as a parchment in his hand.

Player name: Jackson
System name: Hal851
Character name: (unchosen)
Character race: Unformed
Level 3

Muscle 1
Dexterity 1
Toughness 8
Wisdom 1
Intelligence 1
Charm
Spare Points: 2


Clothing:
Ripped T +0, Durability 10/10
Badly Ripped Jeans +3 Physical, +1 Energy, Durability 10/15
Shoes, none
Weapon: Wooden short sword, basically a well-formed stick.  Durability 20/20; Damage 1-4 plus Muscle
Coinbag, small cheap bag, 5/5
Coins, 0 coins.

Unformed 'race' buffs: 20& Across the Board Damage Reduction; Immune to Drowning, Charm, and Blood Drain or Blood Magics. 25% decline in Charm; Cannot be Trusted (save by Chargen Guidance Characters).

==The last bit explained why the Attic Archivist could Trust him, Jackson thought.==

He could not run.

Skills:
Alchemist Level 1, unlicensed--Is this white stuff salt?
Panfluorion, Artificial Logical Language of Scholars: Level 2--Childish
Find Secret Levers Level 1
Link to the Eternal by Prayer Level 1
Out of Blue Surprise Attack Level 1
Unspecified Appeal to the Deity; 10% Luck Buff for four minutes.  Also raises Eternal Link by small fraction.
Acrobatics 2
Flight 2
Mechanically Increased Damage Throw 1
Analyze 1
Charioteering* 3

Immunities:
1% Less Damage from Falls

Character Notes:
1. Honest.
2. Minor Lawbreaker

Reputation:
6
Global Untrustworthy Point

==Ah, that did not mean he had lost a Reputation Point.  But what did it mean?==

Items in Inventory
Yellow Token, not yet picked up, but an IOU note was there.
One Small Short Story
One Small Potion of Health
One Small Potion of Mana
Small Red Easter Egg +1 Reputation

==========================================================================================

Jackson paused and went back with furroweed brow to tab on Charioteering.  The rest seemed understandable, but he had never touched a chariot in this game.  In fact, the only game with chariots that he had played had been Civilization Five, and the boardgame Circus Maximus.

A small screen opened up.

"Congratulations on taking Third Place in Pike's Peak Race to the Top."  You have received Charioteering Level 3 as your prize.  he stared and then laughed.  His brother was going to be really surprised tonight.  Heh.

Floating underneath the Glass Bridge, a foggy shape of a three-master Clipper ship slid through more than real waters.  Looking down, he saw Things swimming in the depths, but they paid him no mind, not caring what pallid Humanity had to say or do.

Shivering, in reaction, he walked further out onto the Bridge.  Clip-clop, the horse's hooves came up to his left, but when he turned to the nearer railing, he saw nothing but drifting fog.  Fear clenched his stomach, and he rather desperately wanted to go back, right now.  He could cross the Bridge in the dawnlight, like a sensible person.

He stood there, and listened to winds whistle through the strands of the suspension bridge, and just waited until he calmed down.  Now, with deep reluctance, he took a step forward, and another.

Shaking his head, working his jaw, he stepped past the first tower of the Glass Bridge.  By now, the Clipper had passed on a long time ago.  The City behind him faded, leaving only lights in a swathe, and and great Library Tower looming above the clouds.

"Help." A low cry off the side of the Bridge called out.  Trying to track it, he turned his head back and forth, until he caught the second one, and seemed odd.  Drawing his pathetic 'sword' he ent forward, looking for trouble, and finding none.  Once over the edge,he looked down, and saw 'Billy' with ahh his bravado dangling from a bunji cord that got out of zing.  Without him hauling it u, thecould bed o


Do you help Billy from his predicament.  Award ????.  Penalty: Falling into the Whatever (character annihilation, no ressurection.)

Jackson gulped.  He had heard of this feature of the game.  There were certain deaths so final that either your soul was destroyed, or something else, but the end result was having your character account deleted.  If you wanted to play, you had to restart with another character. While that was scary enough, he figured it waited until you were well up in levels, and familiar with the Game. Again, this game had confounded him.  In passing, he wondered if this was like real life.

"Accept." He murmured. "Ah, Billy, I'm going to try to help you."  He shouted, leaning over the edge of the glass railing.  The first look nearly unmanned him as he seemed to be staring down, into infinite space.  Vertigo had him clutching the railing with awkward fingers of both hands while he crumpled up nextto it.

He could not do  this.

"Bless you, man, bless you." The tenor reply wobbled between deep gratitude and soul shattering fear.

"Drat." Jackson muttered.

"What?" Billy called out anxiously.

"We'll have you up in a just a mo' Billy. Just a mo'."

"When you say 'we', you have more than one of you?" The plea was strong, but Jackson could not lie.

"Just you and me, pal."

"Oh, I...."

"Not to be rude, Billy, but I need to think.'

An awkward silence descended.  Jackson went down a couple feet.  The bungie cord was well knotted off at the top end around the glass railing on the left side of the bridge.

"KISS," Jackson muttered, and then added for Billy's benefit. "Keep It Simple, Silly.  I'm just going to lift you straight up, hand over hand."  So saying, he braced his knees on the railing, and began to lift. The first hand felt immovably.  The second, his left, was weaker, but he knew it could be done.  The third hand bit into his fingers, drawing blood. The fourth slipped through his bloodslick fingers, cutting deeper, and dropping Billy with a shriek.

Billy's cry doppled up and down the divide.

"Still there, pal?"

"Hanging in." Billy replied.

Jackson studed the railing.  He wanted to do this smart.  A pulley, or...what was a pulley?  A pulley was a device that divided weight by distance, thus making each moment of less weight, but many more moments.

He had no rope, no wheel, and somehow he was sure that if he left Billy here, the NPC or fellow player would die, and not be ressurected.  That would make the world a poorer place, he decided.

He bent down, and his eyes fell on his ripped, ragged jeans.  Off they went, leaving him in a pair of tighty-whities that were unshuckable, and permanently clean, and undamageable as well.  They were even more durable than The Tree with the Spiral Steps in the Tower.  Shivering in the cool, he began to tie the cuffs of his pants to the bungie cord.

Cold Fingers.  Debuff -50% of Agility.  May get worse.

He stuffed his fingers into his armpits, blew on them, wiggled them, but nothing was enough to get rid of the debuff, and with it, he was simply too clumsy to tie an efficient and effective knot with uncooperative and stiff material.  He tried several times, but either it failed to cohere, slipped off, or untied itself after a test yank.

Then he remembered his brother's sneering voice from last summer.

"Sweat! Come on, sweat! You think Mom's green beans get picked by themselves?"  His brother being supervisor and he doing all the work had been the result of an ill-timed bet on who could finish  Sniper Duel first.  His brother had played, and he had started to, only to find out that the power went out.  The state governor kept meddling in the electric market with each attempted 'minor adjustment' making things worse, and being blamed on evereyone but him.  And his brother had checked the brownout schedule before making the bet.

"Sweat." Jackson murmured, and began doing jumping jacks.  After thirty, he shifted to push=up, and then to sit-ups.  But now, puffing a bit, and with his Toughness reduced by 1, leaving him 7, he was warm enough to to ignore the Cold.  From there, he kept moving, tying on the cuff edges to two thirty six inch separate spaced tie on points.  Now, leaning back, he pulled on the upper leg.  With the softer grip, and more plentiful grip, and the ability to lean back, he was able to start inching Billy up.

Once, he got to the cuff end, he swapped it for the other leg which was nearby, and continued.  His Toughness dropped one more on that transit.  And there were many more transit's to go.  And about this time, he realized he was not doing a pulley.

Shaking his head, he pulled on.  His lungs worked overtime, and his arms began to be spaghtti-like, cooked very well, that is.  Sweat dripped into his eyes, and he avoided wasting energy or time, by simply closing his eyes to ward out the stinging salt rain.

Stamina in dangerous territory.

The screen appeared  despite closed eyelids. He ignored it, and after a bit, it went away.  Pull, pull.  An inch at a time. Pull. Fingers ache. Bones hurt.  Back protests.  Legs tremble as he leans back, giving it his all.

And then the low durability pants rip, just a bit. He jolts back up, out of his trance.  And the pants rip across one leg even more. Suddenly, there is no weight on the end, and he hits the ground hard.

Lost 10% of Health.  Already lost 30% due to overexertion.

Failure.

A yell.  By now, Jackson expected the game devs to have Billy's bungie cord snap at this sudden resurge of weight.

Another yell.  Not that far away. No splash.

Puzzled, Jackson rolled over, and crawled over to the edge.  There, hanging by one hand was Billy.  The hand was strong, with rough fingernails, and a faint greenish skin.
"You're an orc!"
"Not a Tolkien one."  It took a second for that distinction to run through Jackson's mind.  In the great classic, Lord of the Rings, orcs were the twisted and corrupted form of elves, immortal.  Other breeds of Orcs were less evil by nature, being closer to drunken frat boys or soccer hooligans than immortal foes of all that is good.
This had two points that were immediately relevant once he chose to save Billy.

No three.
"Do you promise to not attack me, unless attacked, and, uh, the same for the City."
Billy sighed, and then spoke solemnly in reply.
"By the Seven Eyeballs of the Watching One, I shall be bound as you say.  If not, may I lose my sight."

The Contract is VALID.  A grating voice came from the air, full of presence, and vast  ower.  Jackson gulped.  Orc gods did not sound over pleasant.

The other two was that Billy was enormous.  He looked six feet tall, and round as a barrel.  No wonder Jackson had such difficulty lifting him up.  And lastly, that same size helped to some degree as it came with a great deal of Strength, but even now, Jackson could see the strain in the orc's eyes as it dangled by one hand over the abyss.

Jackson looked to the problem, but soon realized he could not use the bungie cord to lift the orc up.  It was tied about the orc's feet.  The orc  must have been pulling himself up along with the cord as he got dragged up for him to grab the edge when the jeans went. Jackson imagined the mad lunge, and shuddered.

There was no way he could lean over, and pull the orc up.  He'd be overbalanced.  Now he could climb on the outside, and..not that wery likely doom.  Quickly, he untied the jeans, and tossed one leg down to the other arm.

"Grab on."  it fluttered there for a second, and then the orc lunged for it.  And it spun out of reach in an errant breeze which left the orc, which left Billy rocking back and forth like a pendulum.

"Hang on.  Hang on."  Jackson muttered loudly enough to be heard. The encouragement seemed to help, and the orc steadied himself.

"This time, easy does it, Billy. Easy."  And so taking time he could ill afford, the orc let the pants flutter on the back of his broken clawed right hand.  And then it was his, and he closed his hand with barely a ripple in his stance.

Jackson began to pull, to get the other arm up.  And then he had to use more of his Strength to get the chest of the orc up a bit.  So grunting he tugged, pulled, and hoped that the rip in the other leg did not go.  And then there was no strain, and he staggered back to the accompaninment of whistles and laughter.

Turning about, he saw five players, standing twenty feet away.  Using his Analyze skill he saw above their right shoulders some info.

Player.  Clan: Bright Lights. Level 8. Fighter.
Tbe others were similar, but with 'Thief, Mage, Archer' on them, with an NPC Henchman loaded down with gear.

"The Town Guard does not patrol the Bridge, noob." Said the Fighter, who went by the name of  Major Ow.
"Neither does anyone from the New Worlds.  Kind of an oversight, don't you think?"  Said the Mage, in what seemed to be a well-practised bit of theatre.
The Archer confirmed their intent by drawing an arrow.
"Major Ow has the Feat, Soul Destoyer 2.  I only have SD at Level One.  My turn to level up."

Suddenly, Jackson realized it was a lot worse than he expected.  They would cripple him, but not kill him.  Then they would toss him from the Bridge.  For a second, he wondered what advantage Soul Destroyer gave you.  It must be pretty potent to judge by the greedy look in the Archer's eyes.

There was nothing for it, but to go full attack, and hope to get killed before he got tossed.
"Cowabunga!" Jackson screamed, charging even as he drew his wooden sword.  A flat-head arrow   hit his sword-arm, numbing it, barely he held on to it.  If he was not so unusually tough for such a noob, it would have caused him to drop his 'sword'.

The next arrow came to the archer's hand, and Jackson threw the stick into the bow, watching it bounce about several times, including hitting the archer in the eye.

"Aargh." Pained, but not seriously wounded, the Archer stumbled back.  And the Fighter stepped up, waited and stepped out of the way of his grasping charge, and a katana flicked out, and cut Jackson's hamstring in his left leg.

Squalling in pain, Jackson fell off to the right.  A Mage stood above him, preparing a Sleep spell.  Jackson used his good leg, and kicked him in the knee.  The spell grounded out, and the Mage toppled into sleep.

Signs appeared on the mental vision, but he waved them aside.  There was no time.  And then the Fighter's katana was at his neck, and there was no more time.

"You are a persistent pain in ..."

Crunch. The Fighter's head spun free.  The Archer focused, and began reaching, but a giant saw like sword chopped through bow, string, and Archer's right hand.  A few finger's landed on the ground.

Jackson looked up.  Billy stood over him.  Using Analyze, he saw...

Billy the Barrel, Orc of the Western Plains,  Level 20. Fighter.
This message was last edited by the player at 19:59, Mon 30 Nov 2015.

In reply to Tadeusz (msg # 232):

Billy reached down a jug sized hand, and casually lifted Jackson back to his feet. The Glass Bridge softly glimmered in response.  The headless Major Ow, his wind-tossed spirit seeking to get back to his body from his spawn point near the Library Front Gate, lay there next to a snoring wizard.  The de-fingered archer lobster-crawled backward with fear written in large letters across his wide face.

"Yo-You cannot kill me.  You'd be a Player Killer, then."

There were sizable penalties for PVP.  No experience from the kill or for ten hours afterwards started the banes.  Worse, during those same ten hours, anyone could kill the PK-er without penalty.  And the chance to drop items was doubled during that time.  Last, a PK gained a +1 to Reputation, but an anti-PK-er gained +3 to Reputation.

"I'm going to a Training Land next. Don't think I need to worry that much.  Player versus Player was forbidden except in tourneys in the varied training lands."  Jackson said thoughtfully.  Billy gave him a wide-toothed grin.  The Archer paled.

Jackson considered things deeply.  Yes, he wanted to forgive the player.  Perhaps doing so would get the fellow to reconsider his ways.  But then he remembered the eagerness of the Archer to throw him off the Glass Bridge, and annihilate, if not his actual soul, then his game account.

Justice demanded he throw the man over.  Grace, a favor unmerited by the recipient, suggested he give the man another chance.  Either choice had very definite pros and cons.

"Give me that dagger, and the belt."
"No, you can't..." And it was true that unless Jackson had high level theft skills that he could take a dagger from another person, without killing them first.
"Or else I throw you over the edge."  the Archer startled, searched Jackson's face, and wisely decided the young journeyman was not bluffing, for he wasn't.

Reluctantly, the Archer unbuckled the belt with a snarl, tossing them at Jackson's feet.

Belt of Power; Muscle +1; Toughness +1; Armor 5% Physical; Uncommon; 33/35 Durability

Picking up the tan leather belt, Jackson grinned.  Not bad, not bad at all, he decided.  Then he drew out the dual leaf-edged dagger.

Dagger of Wounding; target will continue bleeding one health per ten taken until blood flow stopped.  Charisma +1  The blade was nice, elegant, and the handle was wire-bound with alternating steel and copper threats.  It was a very pretty dagger with a nice seven inch blade.

Damage 2-10; Durability 48/60; +30% value due to attractive design.

Pleased, he finished up reading the details and put it on to the accompaniment of the glowering of the Archer.

"N'bow" The orc said. "Leb's geb da stoof." And he leaned eagerly down to examine the dead fighter.  "WHAB?" He roared as he came up, his hand's empty.  The Archer was standing by now, and he giggled.
"Major Ow had his gear triggered to go to the Henchman.  And you can't deliberately target a Henchman."
Heart sinking, Jackson approached the sleeping mage, and tabbed him on the back of the head, which should open up his holding concern.  Inside was nothing but a note.

"You Lose, Sucker. Plus, I'm adding you to my Hate List.  You are going to regret this day."

The sheer simplicity of the message which did not descend into ranting and raving chilled Jackson.  Ranters were often bags of hot air, worrying, but not really dangerous.

You are the Personal Target of Mage maddenzee, Level 8 Human Mage.  Good luck!  Reputation gain +1.

After checking with Billy, he found that he was the only one who got the message.

In unison, Jackson and Billy turned to glare at the Henchman. He was all of five feet tall. Also he was four feet across, if you went by the equator instead shoulders or cankles.

 "Um, guys, err noble adventurers, I understand your rage, err desire for justice, but I must obey the party leader, Major Ow.  And by the Twilight Protocol of 134 A.F., Henchmen are immune to direct damage."

Jackson thought hard for a second.

"That means we could fireball the whole party...."
"If they were alive.'
"Yes, yes." Jackson snapped out.  This smarmily unhelpful hench was quite a pain.  Even his yellowish-brown tunic was ugly, let alone the gray woolen slacks.  "And get you, but we could not do that now as you're the only target?"
"Um yes, admirably concise and accurate, Master."
"We kinz rov himf."  Billy the Barrel said with his odd jaw impeding communication.
"No, not possible, noble adventurers. The Twilight Protocol of 142 A.F. cleared up that issue.
"Can anyone just get a Henchperson and go on a PK spree?" Jackson asked exasperatedly.  To this, he was assured that it was quite unlikley.  The Bright Lights had been very lucky to have stumbled on him when he was unemployed.

It seemed as if the Henchman was trying to tell him something without telling him something, but for the life of him, Jackson could not firguer it out.  He conferred with Billy, another  player, who agreed with him.  The duo let their enemies walk with a handwave, and turned back into the fog of the Bridge, aiming for the far end.

Trumpets rang out in the thickening fog, the rumble of a tank went by, Something more than human seemed to examine them for a passing second, and then they achieved the far end of the  Glass Bridge.  Sweat dripped down both of their faces, but the cool air, and brilliant skies dried that up quickly along with an unobtrusive arm wipe.

A flash of lightning leapt across the daylit sky, even tho' no sun was visible, and they had left in the night.  But suddenly he was not sure how long the trip had taken.

"Gentlemen, you come at a slow time.  I'll be glad to advise you on your choices as to what of the many worldlets to go to."  A trim, and sharply dressed in dark navy vest with white lapels, and crimson leggins with bowler shoes stood in front of them.  It took them a second to think to loo down to find the s ourcce of the distraccting noise.

The gnome flicked a long ear seeing as he now had their attention.
"For the Orc, the Blood Lands, or the Bitterroot Labyrinth wold be..."
"I am a sub-chieftain of Orc Up! Tribe from the High Muskogg.  I would go back there.  My friend, you are welcome with me.

Jackson checked on the wiki for info about High Muskegg.

Russian player V. Davilenko created with his Life Power the Orc dominated Siberia of a post-apocalyptic future where horrifying magics came back after a Russian-American time war shredded civilization.

Jackson blinked.  It sounded bizarre.  The following phrase was not a shock.

Reccommended for experienced players only.

Jackson shook his head 'no' to Billy the Barrel.

"Looks downright....scary."

"Its not so bad once you get used to random time jumps and Radioactive Zombies.  But I need to get back.  I was challenged to make that bungie jump, and it was supposed to be part of my birthday celebration....only."

"No one showed up." Jackson blinked, catching up quickly. "And someone hired the Bright Lights to Soul Destroy you."

"Tribal politics, whatya' gonna do? You can win a vote by providing the best feast, or by outshouting your opponents, or by bashing in their skulls, or, well if they all accidentally swallow poison the day before the election, you win automatically."  Billy shrugged.  Even more sure that was not for him, Jackson shook hands with his friend, wished him luck, and a fast axe, and watched  him walk up to an engraved stone just beyond the Glass Bridge.

The stone, like dozens of others lay in the road.  Each was different in size, and shape, color, and design.  Billy stepped on one, murmured a soft word, and like a rainbow shot skyward, and vanished.  A cold blast of wind, dank with death and rot came back through the worldgate, but then the brightness of Possibility Meadow which lay just beyond the Bridge overwhelmed the orc's destination.

"Choose one." The waiting NPC said.  He was dressed in a sweater vest and a kilt with a dirk at his waist.

"I'm obviously new so why are you telling me like that..."

"Its because you're Unformed. You're not sure what you want, and if you see something, like oh, Demi-Aqua, well, your choices get more limited to Human, Elf, or Dolphinoid."

"But the Attic...."

"We offer more choices here.  We try to funnel most of the players into Astrica.  Experience shows its the most popular.  But not having chosen so far might mean you're not suited for a  Quasi-Medieval World."

"Actually, I am.  I....would like to play a Dwarf in Astrica."  I just needed some time to think it out, Jackson told himself.

The gate host kept his hands behind his back, and smiled warmly if sedately.

"Still the most popular world once you get down here.  Its also the most developed.  And not to spread rumors, but we often add the more popular player-created worlds to Astrica as New Lands.  Your friend Billy the Barrel's world is on target for joining Astrica in two to three months."

Second small Easter Egg acquired. +1 Reputation.
Second small story.

So the game devs wanted him to spread rumors, and would reward such with Reputation bonuses.  Interesting.

The gate host led him over to a blue marbled rock that was marked with a golden star like an asterisk with its center full of gems.

"You can enter by stating your name and race. Call me, if you need help."  And the gate host walked a dozen paces away to wait in the midst of the Bridge.  Jackson bent over, and suddenly a shadow fell upon him.

Fear put his tongue to the roof of his mouth, and lent trembling to his arm. He looked up, and wven withut thinking it, he scattered back.

The man had ripped chain mail over plate mail marked by a simple design that radiated menace.  His helm was dirty, and bloody, and eagle feathers mounted as wings from both sides  of it.  His eyes were a relentless black.

A mailed hand rested like a challenge on the hilt of a zwiehander back belted by a belt of something precious and rare.

Checking his level made Jackson want to faint.

Neanderthal Paladin, Level 240, Worldmaker X2

A quick Wiki check revealed a high-level game within a game.  Jackson whistled to himself as he skipped through the details, only grabbing the high points.It was a very expensive game indeed.

For a minimum price of 50 levels, 20 attribute points, and 2 million gold, the player who had to be at least Level 100 could, within certain limits both moral and practical, ask for the creation of a worldlet.  Then the more players who went there, the larger the worldlet grew.  Such a competition!

There were over fifty worldlets loose, and unnattached.  How many had been created earlier, and then fused with Astrica, or with others, the Wiki did not say.  No, he was wrong.  There were 50 created by Level One Worldmakers.  Level Two was significantly less,in fact, there was only one Neaderthal Paladin on the list.

Hector who followed the Just Warchief to battle, and led a clan, the five hundred strong Order of Martians.  Martians?  Jackson blinked, then got it.  The Just Warchief had other names in other worldlets, one of them being Mars.  So, his followers were Martians. Jackson very badly wanted to throw something at the 240th level Paladin with the sly humor, but wisely resisted the impulse.

Is it wisdom to not stick one's hand in a sausage grinder, or is it simply obvious.? Wisdom _1  The rather insulting message popped up, and was gone in a trice even as Hector bellowed out another challenge.

"Bring forth Hadasseh!"

The gate host, or g. host had, in his terror become a ghost.  Jackson, even off to the side, and out of the primary effect cone of that incredible bellow which blew back fog, and caused lights all over the City to turn on, felt like joining him.

50% Damage. The Power of Fear. The Voice of Righteous Wrath.

Time to get out of Dodge, Jackson decided.  He began to fumble more for the stone, trying to find some way of activating it.

"Dwarf me, Dwarf go, Dwarf Astrica....Dwarf dwarf...."

The paladin looked over at his trembling figure with its still Unformed cut in likeability. The player could easily, casually wipe....

"Let the Shield of the Warchief stand about you." The words were kind and implacable.  And suddenly the tearing winds were gone.  Instead, all about him was a translucent leather shield.

"If you don't mind, Dwarf-to-be, I'd like you to Witness this Event. As an Impartial Observer."  I was not sure just what that meant, but saying no seemed stupid, and actually ungrateful.  Despite his terrible presence, he, well, I liked him.

A Librarian in black robe, with gold threads edging him, arrived on a flying carpet of considerable sumptuousness.  He landed at the far end of the Bridge which did not seem very far away, not compared to how long my transit had been.  The once-sleeping mage was now stumbling away in sheer fright, hiding his face behind his robe, which was one legit method of hiding your personal details even to fairly high Analyze skills.

"Why have you come, Lord Hector, to a City at peace?" The voice of the Librarian was like the chime of a great trumpet, ringing, brassy, and yet perfectly clear.
"You know well, Master Librarian."
Jackson decides to Analyze this newcomer.   Level 180 Librarian, Human. Rochester by name.  With that he got a plus one to his Analyze skill.  Cheered up, he studied the new man.

His hair was a light brown, short-clipped with a thin mustache. His eyes were a pale gray that seemed to catch every detail.  And with a bit of shock, Jackson realied this man or NPC, he was not sure, had already absorbed pretty much everything there was to know about Jackson Dwarf-to-be, just as one of many factors in the dispute.
"You claim we shelter Hadasseh the Assasin who murdered your second this week.  We do not."
"Then prove it. Blow the Leaf Horn and he will be expelled.  If I am wrong, I will give the city, this my sword."
And he drew forth the seven foot long zwiehander, and held the two-handed sword easily with his right hand.
In the space of a knowing, hours passed, and the Master Librarian cried out.
"Put up Entropy's Song. Please, You will destroy the City."
With this wail, the Paladin sheathed his blade in what was now the early morning light.  Jackson looked up, and even from here, he could see the light fall on the Reading Man's book.  How he wanted to read that book. He thought there were far more secrets in it than just his life.

And he looked up to see the Sun, and was struck dumb.  For there was no sun high in the sky.  Instead a woman in long robes with glorious, golden hair stood on nothing.  And in her right hand she bore a wax candle nearly as tall and thick as she was, and the light of that burning gave morning to all the City.

"Its something, isn't it?" The Paladin chuckled. "I still remember my first visit.  I was 98.495 of the First Hundred Thousand, and I am still shocked by the realism and the firmness of reality, and yet the utter whimsy of the Tower game.  And you saw the Lady with the Candle, and you heard the guide explain that the City was forty miles across, and a bubble universe created by thirteen arch-mages who lived under the Tower."

"And the stars..."

"The stars are holes in the paper sack which covers the bubble."

"Why is the City protecting...."

The Paladin sighed.

"I didn't understand it at first, but I did some actual research.  It turns out that cities have a strong tendency to be mortality sinks. "  He drew in a breath to explain, but Jackson nodded.  It meant more people died that were born.  The Paladin nodded in approval at his explanation.
"Plus, you have the incompetent, either from nature, or from being immigrants who lack acculturation."
"That's me.  I have no clue what's going on."
"But you're not hiding in the City.  Which you could easily do, even with that Minor Bounty Mark in your karma field."
Jackson shrugged.  He had kind of known that he did not need, need to flee the City.  It would have probably been okay to lose a day. But then, on the other hand, he really needed to find some way to show himself valuable, to get more than a week out of the game.

He explained this to the Paladin as they both waited for the Master Librarian to come back with the City's decision.

"Tough situation.  I can't take you on.  There are no dwarf paladins as far as I know."  The Paladin said, and then a larger, more sombre black rug floated in.  Two large Librarians held a man with a hooked nose, and a venomous glance in chains as he struggled mightily against them.

"Here, now he's out of the City. Not our problem. Now get lost." The older of the two Librarian guards snapped out even as they threw the assassin off the rug, before sweeping back up into the air.

"What cheek." I murmured, and the Paladin chuckled.  Jackson tried to analyze the assassin, but for his troubles got a splitting headache.

"Poisonous Mind, bucko.  I'll carve pretty boy up first, then you're next."  The assassin grinned with relish and malice.

"Flip the stone!" Came the paladin's warcry as he charged forward, the whole Bridge shaking and swaying under the tread of his Herd of Bull Elephant Boots of Stampeding, while Entropy's Song in high guard drew TEOTWAKI closer with each passing second.  That Assassin stealthed, but led the way with a dozen bottles of varying substances running from Black Powder Bomb, to Greek Fire, the Four Winds, and finally Pots of Duper Glue.

Fire raged down the Bridge, and but for the Shield of the Just Warchief, he would have learned Cooking Level One.  But the shield creaked, and blades smashed together so that the Glass Bridge began spalling off small shreds with each bit doing  a hunded pontds
This message was last edited by the player at 20:31, Sun 06 Dec 2015.

The Glass Bridge swayed, and flecks fell off the nearer tower and overhanging cables.  A shimmering noise like a thousand tiny drums rose and crescendoed through the air as more and more cables of the suspension bridge were bombarded by the fierce energies thrown out by the Paladin and the Assassin in their death struggle.  Raging fire competed with snakelike coils of corrupted Dark in a ball of swirling fury that had already obscured two combatants, and threatened to engulf the suspension bridge's center towers.

Three night-time crossers like Jackson, but not shielded evaporated in a second  as they huddled together in fear.  There must be others he had not seen, Jackson thought, feeling pity for the weak caught under the rage of giants.  Others because the Glass Bridge was a strange space which varied in length and breadth, and had more than one worldline it went through so that two men might leave at the same time, and never see each other.

Large Chronoglass Splinter. Shield damage 20%  The message flashed as a foot long spike of glass hit the Shield of the Just Warchief which was already buckling from the intermittent flame bath as both high level characters went at it tooth and tong.  The unleashed Wrath of a Paladin was something to see, through a telescope, with light filters.  The Assassin's fury was not so much seen, as felt now as the fight began to take place in higher and higher planes of existence since mere normal Reality would melt under their rage.   The Assassin's death-sworn blades were cloaked in anonymous shadows formed of confusion and malice.

A lady elf staggered out of the firestorm atop the bridge from some alternate reality.  She was covered in blisters along her elegant forearms, and her long, auburn hair was alight with another kind of red, that of fire.

Analyze came swiftly to him, suggestng he was getting better at the skill.

"Elf Wizard. Level 9."  Her health bar was down near the end of yellow, he judged uncertainly.  How had she gotten that high a level in the City?  And even still, how had she survived the Bridge of Currently Fiery Doom?

The second answer came in a second, even as Jackson squinted against a flare of pure, white light as she tossed down a bandolier that had been full of Massive Health Potions, but was now empty save one.  It was afire which is why she gave it away.

Analyze.

Bandolier of Ten Large Potions. Master quality. Durability 2/20.  The thing was almost trash.

A brilliant and glorious light shown from the midst of the fight, making the Bridge to glow like a disco ball set on overheat.

"The Edge of the Cloak of a God. Damage.  Area of Effect attack.  Double effect to opposing alignment."  Jackson noted that Damage did not give any details which suggested that such a skill was at the outer edge of his understanding, but the destruction would have to be enormous.  His Shield buckled and vanished with a sigh.

The sky rippled and glimpses of other, higher, and lower realities peaked through.  The Paladin had asked and recieved the Boom.  A cry so utterly dark, full of hatred and despair came rom the far side of the fight.  The Assassin had been hit hard, and airly so,, to.

She lay low, having thrown herself down under most of the damage, and quick fished her dropped  Bottle of Major Healing, the last from  the bandolier, his Analysis told him, and chugged it like a pro.  This gave her enough strength to crawl forward inch by inch away from the fight.

Jackson was impressed by her fortitude, but even with his 20% damage reduction buff, he would last about two seconds unless he got out of here..  Could he yell to the Paladin?  After all, the man had shielded him.  But that was before War Rage gripped him, and his voice was not loud enough.  No, those on the Bridge without a shield or a means to escape were on their own tonight.

But what kind of warcry was 'Flip the rock'?  Shouldn't he have cried 'Deus Vult' or 'Semper Fi' or 'Death and Glory'?  Even 'Go Team of Unnamed Group' would be better.

His hand brushed the gateway rock, the one painted royal blue, and garlanded with a golden arrow.  Without more ado, he lifted the rock, and set it down backside up. On this side, he was intrigued to see pale red lines intersecting all over a background of golden field, suggesting warm rocks.

Even as his Shield cracked, he said 'Dwarf.'.  At the same moment, he tossed the foot wide hand-built paving stone right at the lady mage. Even as he fell down a long hole he looked to see if she caught it, and used it to jump to Astrica.  But he fell so far, so fast that he did not see her fate.  Enraged, panicked, mourning, fearful, and wondering he fell which oddly became more and more comforting as he descended. Ringed about him were layers and layers of stone, both dark brown, utterly black, and pale yellow.  It warmed his soul.  The other emotions left him, replaced with a love for this place.

A flat rock glimmered before him.  It grew larger as he fell, and he saw that it covered the bottom of the long well he came down.  Instead of fear, he laughed a full, hearty, raucous laugh which set the cave tunnel to ringing.

The Cry of the True Dwarf.  Save for Dragons and Drill Instrctors, Dwarves have the loudest voices of all known Sentients.  This gives the Dwarf an advantage in arguing with Elves and Humans, but many Dwarves feel like this is taking advantage of weaklings.  Others, however develop their Voice to the point that they can kill a flying vulture at thirty paces.  Not all Dwarves have the Voice.

Good. Jackson's eyes gleamed.  He needed to start levelling up, and to find some way to distinguish himself so that he could keep the Virtlink helmet for more than a week. Otherwise, he was quite sure, he'd go mad.

Getting closer, he saw a Dwarf push out a pink mattress for him to land on.  Then the fellow motioned for him to land there.  But, but, it was so very pink.

"I'm not afraid of the rock." Jackson spoke almost sang to the tune of 'Ghostbusters', and with a deft hand re-aimed himself to land hard on the glimmering rock. The rock was smooth, chocolate brown, gently curved, and lit by sparks inside it.  As he came closer, he saw its beauty like a large, semi-precious stone.

 The other one who waited down at the bottom just stood and stared.  And Jackson plummetted the last hundred feet, suddenly sure he had made the wrong decision.  And with him dying, he'd probably have to respawn back at the Attic, which would cut down on his days to distinguish himself already.

SHWHOOM.  He landed amidst dust and cracked rock spitting off to his right and left, and no pain nor damage showed on his screen.  Instead, he got this message.

Trust the Rock.  +1% on any skill involving large rocks.  Rep +1

The other dwarf shook his head, dragged the unused mattress over to the corner, and sat down at his desk.  He look ill-tempered.
"Sorry, I skipped  your bed."
"Yeah."
Annoyed, Jackson glared at the other dwarf who after a bit looked up.  Jackson wanted to softly enquire, but he found himself snarling, nose to nose.
"What is your problem?"  It sounded like the flute of a war trumpet mixed with a chainsaw on  full rev.  The other dwarf fell back a step.

The Challenge of the Voice. Level Two.

"I...I am the runt of the litter.  Only fit for manual labor.  And here I get a primary chance to level up, and the Outworlder spoils my efforts."

Jackson backed off.  Outworlder hunh?  Not a bad name, wonder what the story behind it was going to be?  For a moment, Jackson rebelled.  Why did he have to be the one to help?  But then he shook himself like a dog, and pushing down suddenly bushy hair with an open hand, he squinted around him.

The room of the Glimmering Rock was empty, unfinished except for the landing pad.  A wide doorway led done three wide stone steps to an adjacent hall.  Looking around as he paced out the room, running his hands over the earth warm rock walls, he felt the room to be unfinished.  Even to his eyes, the walls were not straight, nor flat.  They did not form a square, and they had indentations in them.

Seeing a soft bit of rock, he pulled at it. With a bit of wriggling, the orange rock came free.  This led to a prompt:

The Hands of the True Dwarf are as picks in other races' hands.  Level One.  You may remove Deeply Soft Rock.

He checked the Wiki, and it turned out that Unhardened Volcanic Tufa was the softest 'rock', followed by Sandstone, and then Deeply Soft Rock.  The hardest was Primeval Granites.  Dwarf alchemists had discovered halos of Inner Fire inside such granites.  Some of these fires were but minutes long, while others were thousands of years long.  The ones in the Primeval Granites had under two minutes to burn a  mark of the Inner Fire into the rock.  They did this, and there was no sign such had trickled in later.

So, the Goddess of the Earth, Mother Earth, had created the base rock of the land of Astrinca in less than three minutes.  And unless you got into the Magica Minera or the Precious Stones, that was as hard as it got.  Almost drooling, Jackson read the short Tale of the Lost Miner.


Urpik, the son of Rock, the son of Big Stone, the First Dwarf, rose one day with his new invention the pickaxe.  He began to dig, and headed North toward the towering mountains.  He made the first canal by accident when he ran into the Tree Shaded River, and let a fourth of its water course down toward Dwarfhome.

On the far side, tired of the Sun, he began to dig deep.  And so very long he went that he passed into caverns far below the Surface.  Lost in wonder, he walked for days through them, and not having ever been lost before, he did not think to make a map.  But he grew hungry, and made to go back.  Now he was not as such as we are, for he was tainted by the Breaking, but he was still far nearer to Perfection.  So he was almost able to make is way back, but a cave-in blocked the way and confused him.

So he began digging with his hands.  First soft, then hard, the very hard stone.  And he dug more and more, and such was his pride that he swore he would bh his left hand, he would not rise to the surface until he was under Dawarfhome.  He became a great digger, chewing up miles in minutes.  There are no Green Dragons because such was his speed that he dug right through the Patriarch and Matriarch of the race who had not had children yet.

Years passed and he dug more.  He felt moments of despair, but he faced them with faith.  Finally, all he wanted was to go home, but his vow held him.  More years passed, and he realized what he must do.

He cut off his left hand.

Thus oath fulfilled, he dug straight up to find his location by the stars.  He came up inside Dwarfhome, by the canal he had built do many years ago.  And the piles of refuse he had created from his digging became the Many Plateaus, and the Dunzikibarian Foothills.

the END

Grinning, imagining being able to dig like the son of John Henry and a nuclear powered tunneller bot, he began to peel back layers, and then yank chunks even as the visible energy bar in the right top of his vision shrank too fast.  He tried to pace himself, trying to peel back larger layers, but his Muscle was not up to it.

Panting for breath, he he examined his nicked fingers, and bloody hand scrapes.  Perhaps a pair of gloves would be useful next time he tried this.  In five minutes, he regained his endurance.  More rocks fell to his right and left as he dug in to the wall.

A flicker of black appeared to him.

Suddenly, he stopped.  A prompt came up:

You have found a Coal Vein.  +2 to Mining.

He kept on, being careful to dig the coal separate from the other rock which gradually increased in density.  Forced to slow down, he began to put his muscles into the effort.  Suddenly, he fell to his knees, gasping for air.  The thick dust fog did not help him breathe.
"You stupid, stupid, dwarf."  The greeter yelled at him.  In response, Jackson coughed, deep and long, a racking, gasping monster. He wobbled, and then fell over on his side.  Down at the floor, the air was clearer.  His eyes were filled with black sparkles.

Exhaustion can sneak up on you, and enough can knock you out.

And with that, his eyes closed.

He was in his helmet, and the helmet was flashing a sign in front of his eyes.

"Please stand by for updates, and reports."  So he slipped it off, and enjoyed the sense of cook air on his sweaty hair.
This message was last edited by the player at 17:34, Sat 16 Apr 2016.

Faint dawn light was coming into the windows, and he knew he would catch flak for playing his game all night.  Unless, he got that much needed shower.  Sniffing his arm pit on his right, he ruefully agreed with himself.

Now to get up, and silently.  He had made it up before for visits to the bathroom, but by himself it was harder.  The couch under him felt as if a swamp were grabbing at him, and rocking forward did no good at all.

He started schooching forward, pulled by the extremely limited power of his heels dug into the floor in front of the couch.  This took a good three minutes, and finally, with a feeling of dreadful impatience, he was ready.

He drove his calves down and thighs up, shooting upward.  The gained height dazzled him as it revealed a different room. And then he wobbled.  No, he went back, and then straight and then his knees gave, and he plunged couchward, a falling meteor swathed in bandages to make the burning fall through the atmosphere less intense.

With a jar, he hit, and the air left him.  A flare like a liquid spill ran down his nerves.  Had he injured himself again?  Waiting for a report to come in, all he felt was minor strain, and a twinge in his left knee.  It seemed he had lucked out and not hurt his shoulder again.

He considered calling his parents, but he had an idea.  This time he scooched forward, and he made sure that there was a straight line running from his feet to his shoulders.  And then he leaned forward just a bit.  After that, he began to slowly force himself up, until with a bit of rocking, he in all his ungainly glory with one arm outstretched stood tall.

He made his way from the living room to the hallway with its old shag carpetting, and tried to be silent.  Brother Terry did not need to know about the VirtLink helmet....oh wait. He did.

Once at his brother's door, he began to hit it with his toe.  Impact after impact, soft, but with increasing force left him with the realization that when you wanted brothers to wake, they never would, but when you were sneaking in after curfew, even the drop of a paper tissue could wake them.  Disgusted, he turned away, and the door opened.

Terry was clad in an off-center T-shirt, hair spiked inartfully, shorts, and his eyes were dull enough to serve as a 'Drink Coffee Now!' poster.

"What?"
"Shhhhh."
"Wh...."
"SHHHHH!!"
And a much more quiet response from his now awake brother led him to talk.
"Bro, I need you to help me with the shower..."
"Ewww."
"Not like that. Just put on plastic bags over my plaster.  I'll get the rest."
"Ah..."
"And you can play with the helmet until time to go to school."

That was enough.  After the bags were on, and Terry had left, he used a long armed brush to scrape off his other clothes.  The hot water fell on him, and sluiced off the layer of grime leaving him refreshed.  Getting dressed took more time.

Back in the living room, he found his brother entranced, mouth-breathing while a bowl of oatmeal cooled beside him.  His mom brought out a bowl of his own, loaded with whipped creme, raisins, and brown sugar.  She handed it off, and then snagged the helmet.
"If I make food, I expect you to eat it, mister."
Terry sighed. "Yes, mom."
She left, and Terry started in with a distinct lack of enthusiasm on his 'glop' which he had never really liked.

"Say bro. I want to experiment.  You play, I'll spoon feed you."
Terry looked at him weirdly.
"I can't do the speed games..."
"Try MineClearer. Start at the Basic, and go up in complexity, restarting at Basic until you get the whole of them in a line."
"You looking for an eggshell, bro."
Jackson paused, and decided he was so it would not be dishonest to agree.  But his brother gave him a skeptical look anyways before the eagerness of the game overtook him.  Granted, a simple puzzle game like MineClearer did not equal the interest of Pike's Peak Racecars, but the realism of riding a WW2 destroyer hunting for mines was astonishing even if the underlying system was a simple thing of mostly logic.
Ten minutes later, the bowl was empty which proved Terry's theory that it was safe to eat in the real while playing in the virtual was at least somewhat correct.  Terry had only choked, and turned red-faced once after all.

His mother came in, and left several times, making comments as to time.  Jackson began to get worried. He might have wasted this time with his brother, because in game, sequences really did mean a lot.

"Get your backpack, Terry." His father called, and Terry stirred.
"I'll get it bro..." Jackson said, and again levered himself upright. This time he was faster.

Level Two Awkwardly Encumbered Standing, he told himself. Stiff-stepping out of the room, he went in search of his brother's backpack.  Not in the bedroom. Not in his bedroom which Terry seemed to have taken over for a model train set up.  Not in the bath....no wait, it was behind the bathroom door.  Why there?  Jackson couldn't say, but it was.  He lifted the hefty back pack and came back to Terry just in time to find his brother removing the helmet with a trepidatious look under the low wattage fatherly glare.

"I don't want you to do Terry's ..."
"It was my idea, Dad."
"Oh." The man deflated considering things.  Since he had often asked them to help each other out, there was little he could say.
"Let's go, then. See ya' later, kiddo."  His father ruffled his hair as Terry gave him the helmet.  Terry gave him a hidden smile as well.
The two left on their way to school. Shortly thereafter with phone in hand, his mother came in, telling him she'd like to go yard sale should he be okay with staying at home alone.
He tried to keep his excitement down, but she gave him a quirked mouth grin.
"Try to do a little homework while I'm gone.

A few minutes later which stretched out and out as she kept finding one last thing to do, and twenty minutes later, he heard the roll of tires shushing over the asphalt.  In a trice, his helmet was on.

===========================

The deep, comforting browns and light tans of the Receiving Room soothed him on a below the conscious level.  It was like his father's presence.
"You're back from the Dreamworld." The laborer attendant had said.  The piles of stone were now gone.
Jackson looked about, and then checked the Wiki for 'Outworlder' and 'Dreamland'.  The NPC's, or non-player characters, a term derived from Gygax and Arneson's Dungeons & Dragons, had a myth that the Outworlders or Players were Dreamworld Entities able to take physical form for a while, and then return to the Dreamworld for refreshment of vital energies or other inscrutable reasons at times.

So, he was an Outworlder.  Interesting.  It offered some possibilities regarding banishing spells that might not affect locals, or the indigenous population as M.J. Young and E.R.Jones had used in Multiverser.

"Indeed, I am." He spoke calmly.

The Voice of the True Dwarf is full of quiet authority. Level 3.

The NPC Greeter had waited patiently as he accessed the Wiki, which was probably programmed into them all as part of their base code.  Now, the little dwarf, called 'Runt' by some, stirred.

"I appreciate your cleaning up the mess."
"Well, it was manual labor, and if I max out at that, maybe I can get a new skill."
"Nevertheless, you helped me.  Besides work isn't bad."
"Hah. I work when I get the chance thrice as hard as anyone else, but respect? Money? A kind word? No." The stark bitterness in the Runt's words touched Jackson.
"Can I help?" Jackson asked, hoping for a small quest.  Instead a screen appeared in front of his eyes.

The Dwarf at the Bottom Holds the Whole of Society on his back with little thanks. Without his relentless labors society would collapse.  Help him and society learn better. Rare.  Gain Wisdom, Intelligence, Charisma.

Do you accept?  Yes or No?

His heart shot up behind his eyes, and his right arm slammed down hard on the Yes button.  A Rare quest at such a low level was wunderbar.  One that promised Attribute bonuses in multiple areas was even better.  Undoubtedly there were more prizes available depending on how he did. Particularly since no downside was mentioned.

"Thanks. Friend." Your Relationship with Runt has improved to Amicable. "Even if you can't help me, well at least you tried.  And thats more than a hundred have done."

Jackson nodded, and reached out to pat the other dwarf on the shoulder.  Poor fellow, that was why there was no downside.  He was so far down, he expected to get kicked.  Merely having someone treat him as a fellow Son of the Rock brought moisture to his eyes, and straightened his spine.

Which was well, because another dwarf came running in, shouting out demands for product.
Grist. Dust bags. Loose gravel. Coal!!!
At that moment his fiery eyes lit upon Jackson's pile of coal, and the newcomer, a shouting tornado, plunged toward it, opening his carry bag at his waist.  Jackson shouted for him to stop, but that did nothing.
Jackson got in his face, and shouted again, which only got the man shouting back at him in a booming smash that left Jackson's ears bleeding.

Damage. 5% of Health. 20% Hearing debuff for ten minutes.

Jackson pulled himself upright, and reached down inside himself.

"YOU. THERE. PUT. DOWN. MY. ROCK." The air shivered, and the frantic tornado spun to a halt, and toppled over on his back.  He looked shocked.  "Now, put my coal back, thief." Jackson snarled.
"All of this is for the miners to use in...."
"I mined it. Its mine." Jackson interrupted.
"No, its, according to long traditions...."
Jackson paused, and then smiled.
"Long traditions that just started up when Runt here got this job, eh?"

The Dwarf on the floor looked appalled and then tried for indignant.  Jackson was having none of it.
"You, Thief. Get out, and next time bring some coin if you want to buy a fellow dwarf's work."
"My name is Rockhead." The dwarf said, standing. "And this is no fellow dwarf." He sneered toward Runt who cringed a bit.
Jackson did not remember deciding to do it.  But suddenly his fist was flying, and a back-hand smash landed into the jaw of Rockhead. The dwarf fell over.

Damage to hand and health. 7% from impact with dwarf skull.  RECCOMENDATION. Next time you punch a dwarf, wear a metal gauntlet.  +1 to Fist-fighting.

Rockhead rolled to his feet laughing.
"My grandmother hits harder than you do."  But all the same he left.  Runt was staring at him with a mixture of awe, horror, and adoration on his face.
"He's going to bring his friends."  Still Runt's eyes glowed,and he stood straighter.

"Then we build a wall."
"Which they will tunnel through."
"Wall first."
And suiting actions to words, Jackson began to yank chunks of rock from the wall.  Runt joined him, only he had a pickaxe that unfolded from a tiny back pocket held pickaxe.   Once opened up, it was hollow, and so dust was packed inside to give it heft, and this dust was pressed down by a pressure plate in the handle driven by a single screw.

After a pile Runt's height was gathered, Jackson began, under Runt's intermittent direction as he kept digging to build a low wall.  A single dwarf came wandering by, but he was so clearly a spy or a gossip that Jackson chunked a rock at him, and chased him off down the tunnel from which he came on the left.

The wall began to narrow, and it reached neck high on Runt.

Dig Soft Stone with fingers.
Lay dry stone wall.    Level One.

From the right tunnel which was more directly in front of the blocked in doorway, Jackson saw a collection of five sturdy looking dwarves.

"Its the peace negotiation...." Jackson began with some enthusiasm.
"Tear this wall down, RIGHT NOW, and get back to work you lazy pig-eyed stupe!"  Another dwarf with the loud Voice was out there, and Jackson clearly saw that negotiaions were not  yet.

His hand trembling, he put up another rock in the barrier.  Then he put up another one, and by this time, Runt had recovered enough to hand him another rock.

"Hey, wait, stop that."  The voice of the senior dwarf sounded startled.

"Why?"

"You're holding up the mine and smithy works."

"If we don't are you going to dock our pay?"

"Yes, indeed." The senior dwarf roared, and then some jibber jabber was heard on the far side of the wall.  Finally a loud sigh.

"Look, ah, Runt, it seems there has been a bit of a misunderstanding.  You're supposed to be paid one copper per wheelbarrow load of rock, and one copper per bucket of fine dust."

"Isn't there a receiving fee?" Jackson laughed to himself.  Things were going much better than he thought.

"Um, well....that is probably fair." The senior dwarf began to talk,but the wall to the right bulged, and then collapsed inward.  A dwarf came out, armed in steel plate, and with a war pickaxe, he menaced Runt who had no armor, and a much smaller axe.

Jackson sprang toward them, and slammed into the first one, driving him back, which toppled the ones behind him like dominoes.

You have levelled up!
Other messages sprang to his vision, but he waved them aside.  The dwarf under him tried to catch him with the war sxe, but he had yet to find creatures like these who dodged with a will.  But then, Jackson grabbed the handle on the war axe, and took the other end in his teeth.

Spitting out ivory chunks, and refocusing his eyes, he got clear-headed in just enough time to see the axe come down amidst his forehead.

You are now dead.
You have lost half your experience.Do you wish to respawn in the Attic of the Tower of Rhodes, or do you wish to respawn on the Arrival Rock in Dwarfhame?

That took a bit of thought.  If he spawned on the glittering, brown stone just off to the right, then there was a possibility that these yahoos would rekill him on the spot.  On the other hand, going back to the Library meant losing valuable time.

It interested him that certain stages seemed to have their own potential rebinding point that was not announced to the player until doom had overtaken him.  Perhaps that would come up in the future.  Or perhaps not.  The game was said to be stunningly realistic, which so far held up as far as the sounds and smells, and even the base nature of exploitation of the weak seemed as perrennial in the Dwarf race as the Human Kind.

Still, he would have some faith.  Probably the designers had not let the dwarves get that nasty.  He chose the rock.

With a sudden surge, his ghostly form was on the rock, and then breath rushed into his lungs, that is, the lungs of the body beneath him, which was also him, and he found himself being sucked in by the breath of himself, which was all very confusing being bi-located, until suddenly he was one again.

Grunting he sat up, and saw that Runt was being slapped and loudly chastised until the senior supervisor came in, and shouted at the others to stop it.  But surrounded by the others, his position seemed tentative.

Looking troubled, the white-haired supersvisor dwarf, who had not on armor, nor heavy weapons like the other, more vigorous, and crudely glaring dwarves surrounding him, went to Runt and lifted him up.

"Now get back to work." The leader of the axe laden dwarves hollered.  His name was Shortsquint, as the glowing letters above his right shoulder said, and he was also a Level 10 Miner.  From some of his reading, Jackson knew that Miner was a Fighter-Crafter hybrid class, neither as good as either, but a valued worker in peace, and a nice back-up in times of war for the pure Axmen and Shieldwarden classed Fighters.

"Leave him be." The senior supervisor, Hardrock, Level 20 Delver (which was a pure Crafter class), said, but without great force.  Shortsquint just glared, until his boss repeated the order with some more force.

"You'll be paid."
"Not that ridiculous..."
"Um, no, you have to pay for fixing the damage.  So, ah, one copper for two..."
"For three." Shortsquint interjected, and Hardrock looked, and sadly, Runt seemed willing to accept this gross injustice.  And he even seemed happy, which got Shortsquint mad.

And he turned about to find something to take his anger out on amongst his comrades, and his eyes fell on Jackson.
"Not even a real name, baby dwarf." Shortsquint jeered, pushing back his 'friends' of which he really had none.
"No, ah...,"  And suddenly Jackson remembered.  "A mining jack is a good tool.  So I am the son of a mining tool.  Good Dwarf name, that."
This set Shortsquint back a pace, and earned Jackson something.

The Dwarves of Dwarfhame raise your status +1.

Annoyed at this threat, Shortsquint came up to him, and raised his axe.
"Wait...you gonna PK me again?" Jackson realized he had made a mistake.  He should have gone with the Library respawn, and chanced getting caught by the Town Guard as he ran across town to the Glass Bridge.

"No. No." Shortsquint had an evil grin.  "If you die, you ghost, and all your stuff ghosts with you.  No, you give me all your stuff, or I will, as you call it...PK you."

Gritting his teeth, Jackson considered all his options.  And so it was that he found himself bereft of clothes, except for a pair of tighty whities, that were unloosable by game edict, to cover his privates.  No money, no clothes, and how was he to get ahead?

Suddenly, he saw the lot of them picking him up, and carrying him from the room through the now cleared doorway.  As he went, Runt called out in a voice of gratitude, and some fear.

"Thank you, Jackson. Thank you so much."

Quest completed.  Gain +1 Wisdom, and experience.  He checked his experience, as he was being toted through dwarf made hallways, and found he was most of the way to the next level.  Excellent.

And then as he came to the outgate, the passageway from Dwarfhame that could only be breached by the outgoers, he realized the kidnappers plans.  Mightily struggling, and uselessly so because the least of the five had more than twice his Muscle, he finally gave in, and quickly added five names to his Personal Enemies' List.  They smirked at him in turn, and booted him out of the cave mouth, and into bright sunglight in a green meadow.
This message was last edited by the player at 07:07, Tue 05 Jan 2016.

A short obelisk cut its shadow across his face as Jackson knelt on all fours in the thick, green grass.  He sighed with relief at having left the abusive and exploitive Dwarfs of Dwarfhame behind.  Now he could get on with the meat of the game, and find a way to distinguish himself.  He had too, if he wanted to have more than one week in this wondrous designed reality.

He had the VirtLink helmet for one week, and one week only.  Unless he managed to convince the makers of the helmet that he was interesting enough to let him have the helmet for a further test period.  Otherwise, he would be forced to sit with his broken bones on the couch, and watch soap operas.  Jackson did not feel so depressed over the prospect of waiting while his bones knitted that he would rather be dead.  But he considered asking his doctor to put him in a medical coma to salve the terrible pain of utter boredom.

So, with new hope, he looked up and saw a pair of streets leading off from the small grassy commons he stood in, along with a half-dozen other blinking creatures.  The vertical road led away, and up a cobblestoned ascent with Tudor two-stories on both sides.  A horse drawn wagon came down the hill, in fits and starts, as the driver leaned over with a multi-jointed armthing made of frame and painted bright green to scoop up poop of varying colors, although mostly brown.

The new players were mostly Level Two and Three, which made Jackson stick out among them with his higher level. A cute Elfess, in woodland brown leathers, and equipped with a slender short bow, and four arrows ranked as Level Three.   A heavy-set Half-Orc ranked as Level Two, and all he had was a club made from the roots and trunk of a small tomiddlng tree along with the beginning cloth.

The poo wagon took the turn, and ran onto the horizontal street which was more plentifully speckled.  A shoppe with three bells on its sign, another with a paintbrush, and a third with a horse's ass were clearly visible. Others retreated back down the street into obscurity.

He stood, and checked his stats out.

But then he felt a cold knife at his throat."Walk to the left."  He hesitated, and a slight nick stung his neck.  A bead of blood trickled down.

You've been nicked like a shaving cut, but it was no razor that did it.  Greetings from Astrinica's Guild of Assassins.

Gulping, he did as he was told.  Soon, all half-dozen of the new arrivals stood shoulder to shoulder in nervous, sweaty anticipation.  Most did not seem willing to look aside, but he did, and saw an elfess of Level One standing in her plain green tunic, and her short deep green skirt, she looked appealingly vulnerable.  But her eyes went straight forward, and he could see little of her face except for her suddenly trembling lip.

"You'd do alright in the Red Lantern House." He heard a whisper from behind, and he felt a sudden fury. Jerking to his left to the source of the leering voice, earned him a deeper nick.

Chivalric Impulses: +1 to Charisma.  This time was well, for she is a Lady, but be careful not to protect the Warriors and the Wanton saving it for the Weddable and the Wedded Long.Not a shaving cut. Lose 5% of Health. Crit Hit.

And suddenly there was a black clad man, Human, behind him, with a terribly pointed blade.
His Ident skill kicked on.

Arkansaw Toothpick.  Its sharp along the blade, but primarily useful in 'making a point'in an arguement.  Rare.  10% chance of Arterial Bleeding from stab.  3% chance of one-turn FREEZE debuff for all within ten feet when viewed.

It certainly froze Jackson in place, along with his intestines, at the shining focused brightness ran down the blade.  And then before Jackson could find out who their tormentor was, the dark-clad man stepped into shadow, and was not to be seen.

"Major Grass Bind!"  Another voice, bored, but authoritative called out from in front of them.  The Human, Eltar the Enchanter, Level 14, for Jackson was not making the same mistake twice had tapestry robes over inner robes over leggings of heather, purple.  His feet were in shiny, black moccasins, and an ungainly staff, six feet long, and bedecked with chains, Mardi Gras beads, strings of seashells, and a bird's nest reabsorbed a flowing green gauzy light.

The first response of one of the huge fighters was to bellow with laughter at the staff.  He looked to be a quarter-Ogre blood, which was the most a player could start with.  There were rumors of Genealogical Quests where you could discover ancient ancestors of unusual renown, or nature.  Everything from finding out that dear old great-grandpa was not really an unusually ugly Human, but a full-grown Troll, to meeting the first of your line, and receiving his Blessing, to meeting the god who had seduced great-great grandmother all those years ago, to finding a pair of ancestral katanas guarded by familial ghosts was supposedly possible.

Jackson, on the other hand, sought to get out.  He strained his arms, below the elbows, while trying to keep a dumb look of surprise on his face as an elf came up behind Eltar the Enchanter.

Acting Innocent. Level One. Do try harder, at pretending not to try.
Major Grass Bind is a 5th Level Spell, but you are working on breaking it in your area.  7% damage to Spell.

The spell had caused the green and healthy grass to grow straight and long, and then wind about legs and arms up to their waists in a ten foot square which covered about a tenth of the Arrival Green.  Jackson noted that this Tudor town had an Arrival Commons, while Dwarfhame had an Arrival Rock of glittering brown.

"I am Illurrion of the House of Green."  His robes swelled and bellowed in the sudden breeze, like a ship of the line at full sail, but with silken sails of white on the outside, then green crushed velvet, then white heavy silk, and a cravat of green silk.  A circlet of electrum graced his dark hair, and on it twinkled a diamond the size of a walnut.

Upon checking his level, all I got was 'Illurrion, Lord of Gates.'.  No level appeared which was a bad, bad thing.  Either he had a level hiding skill, and his projected unconcern argued against that, or he was so insanely high level that the game was trying to warm me not to let him sneeze on me for such a wad of snot would surely slay me.

"You are the newest to come to our city.  We neither asked you to come, nor desired it.  But now that you are here, there are rules and roles to go by."

"Hey, we're supposed to go find quests and kill monsters." A Level One Gnome spoke up impatiently.  His name was Hector.

"And so you shall, but under our guidance.  We have no need to provoke the monster races...."
"Whatever, dude. Let me out."
Already, Jackson could see that this was a bad move.  This Illurrion was acting like some entitled gamemaster, or GM's favorite player because he had all the cards stacked up already.
"Eltar." The word was slow, and seemed reluctant, but Jackson saw the flash of genuine joy in Illurrion's eyes as Eltar raised his ridiculous staff.  Not knowing what else to do, Jackson burst out laughing as loudly as he could.  This paused events as everyone stared at him.
"Man, Illurrion, where'd you get this clown?  I mean, that staff...."
Illurrion chuckled.
"Yes, well, we keep our promises.  Eltar here thought to be clever in paying services.  So, when he demanded the staff of power we promised him, we gave him a staff....didn't we Eltar!?!"  The last was screamed, and the enchanter cringed.  "Right across his back, until he passed out.  Then we woke him again, and did it again.  Let me tell you, even with the pain filters turned way down, getting hit over the back two hundred times stings just a bit, especially the last fifty."
Illurrion stared across the crowd, catching not my eye, but my high level, and going on to end at Hector.  No one said anything.

After that, it was a simple matter of two orc guardsmen coming up with a big bag, and us dropping anything of value, including the beginner level pants and shirts into the bag.  One Level Three elven archer cried as he put in his fancy bow that he must have bought with real world cash.  Jackson had nothing to contribute, being already stripped down to his tighty whites.  The others were in like fashion, with the girls having white t-shirts as well. This was the bare minimum of coverage allowed in public, and not even a Nova Lance fire spell could burn through these flame, acid, and moth proof underthings.

Illurrion handed us off to a Human, Level 10 Fighter 'Lord Vance'.  He was dressed in cur-bouilli armor, with a falchion blade on his right hip, and a straight dagger on his left hip.  His face was stern, bored, and more than a touch cruel.

He led us to an orchard just outside of the west gate.

"Its bunny killing time. Kill ten bunnies, you get lunch."
"No weapons, I suppose?" Jackson asked, evenly.
"Not my problem.  Oh, if you eat the apples, the landowner will release his big mastiff, Ally.  She's black, brown, and about three hundred pounds with a head the size and shape of a bad of Wonder Bread."

The others stared, and Hector cursed, but low enough that our prison guard, for that is what he was, could ignore it.  He just laughed, and sat down on the edge of the road running between the orchard and the town gate.  Even in this hideous mess, it was a beautiful day.  The precision and depth of the animation was amazing.  Each bit of grass, each hair hanging from guard boy's nostrils, and even the rising stench of heated bodies all about me was real.  Incredible, just incredible, Jackson grinned to himself.
This message was last edited by the player at 04:06, Thu 07 Jan 2016.

Jackson studied the orchard. It was bound on the east and town side by a straight gravel road on a ten foot embankment.  Regularly spaced apple trees, at least a hundred, held a mix of green, and reddening apples.  Underneath was thick grass, an occasional branch, and rotted fruit.

It should be a good place to find rabbits, Jackson decided.  What with all the free fruit available for rabbits to eat.  So he started forward, grabbed a branch.

Rickety, fungus laden branch. Durability 2/2.

He dropped this, and took a stick that was thicker and not overly burdened with many flimsy branchlets.

Small stick. Not much of a weapon. Durability 8/9.

Another ten feet through the luxuriant grass that went up to his dwarf knee, and boy, howdy was it weird walking as if two feet shorter, and one feet wider.  Plus, he felt just more solid all the way through.

Dwarves are 50% denser than Humans.  This enables them to resist damage, power through obstacles, and sink like a stone in any body of water.

A small rabbit ran out, and before he could get at it, two elves were charging the furry frightened beast which promptly leapt out of the way. The elves came close to a fistfight.  Looking about, Jackson realized that everyone had sort of focused on him, and was spread out over a half-acre of forrest.

"Spread out!" He hollered, and suiting actions to words, he started to jog off.  He got away before anyone could importune him.  As he ran, he noted the extra effort to go up to a full run, which was prohibitive.  So he jogged, and finally halted nearby a river embankment.Despite that, he was not winded in the least.

Now he understood the Dwarf in Lord of the Rings as the Ranger, Elf, and Dwarf chased the kidnapped Hobbits.  He might not have a woodsense as a Ranger, or the preternatural lightfoot of the Elf, but he simply did not get tired with a simple jog.

However, it did seem to cut down on his situational awareness.  A bunny was three feet to his right, nose trembling, sniffing the air.  He thrashed at it with the branch, and missed.  Howling with frustration, he charged after the zig-zagging beastling.

Level One. Young Rabbit.  Tasty over a fire

A wild throw of the stick. Another miss.

Now he put his head down, and pulled our the stops.  It zagged, and so did he. It doubled back, and he ducked, rolled and came back to his feet, facing the other way.  Finally, his endurance beat out the bunnies greater speed, and he fell on it.  His big hands sought it, and just like that, his hands crushed the bunny to death.

Your handsi are weapons. +2.

This he put in his inventory which was empty of everything but the story and the egg.  Evidently, he could not lose those.  Now he had <1 Smushed rabbit> and a small bit of experience.  No doubt, there was a quest chain of rabbit killing that would lead to him getting a larger exp bonus in a bit.

Getting up to his knees, he decided to stay down.  Maybe he could hunt rabbits better as a cat than as a giraffe.  He swivelled his head, back and forth, until the neck was a bit sore.  And then a bunny hopped by ten feet away.  Stalking it, he came close, and saw that it was aware of danger.

Its nose was trembling, and its round eyes darted around, and it had halted eating with a bit of grass poking out of its mouth.  Jackson dug his toes in to the ground, and lunged forward.  Simply not fast enough.  But he scrambled up after it, just in time to see the elfess step out from behind a tree, and with a nice golf swing see the bunny off.

"Thanks." She giggled.
He sighed. She frowned a bit, picking up the bunny.
"Look..."
"I can give the bunny back, if..."
"No, you got him. Thing is, you're easy on the eyes alright.  But we need to spread out, or we'll..."
She interrupted.
"Ok.  My name is Kiyu.  I noticed you're the highest level, and well, this is not the game I thought I was going to be playing."  She fluttered her hands.
"Me neither." He admitted darkly.  "Thing is, I figure these guys have this thing wired.  Did you see how ready our host, Illurrion was to jump on Hector?"
"Yeah, you saved Hector with that fake laugh of yours."
"Fake?" He acted offended. and she giggled again.  It was a nice sound.
They stared at each other a bit, timidly enjoying the moment.
"Kiyu, my best plan right now is to watch and learn.  So...." He waved her on, and she nodded, and darted off with a light step that barely moved the grass, and with his Ident...

Very primitive golf club.  A 9 and a half.  Durability 6/11.

...on her 'weapon'.  It seemed likely that she played golf in the Real World.  Which brought to mind the question of what is real?  This while artificial, could be tasted, felt, even hurt, so the experience was real, thus the world was real.  After all, Splenda might be an artificial sweetener, but it was still real.

He continued to stalk, and next time he came up on a bunny, he flung the stick at it, stunning it.  His quick scramble forward got to it just as it stood up, and his hands convulsed.  One more smushed bunny for his inventory.

Light Stunning with Thrown Stick.  A hardened warrior might not even notice your attack, but against the right target it can daze them for a few seconds.  Level One.

Stalk.  Like a Cheetah stalking an Antelope.  Level One.

The hunt went on, and he found himself enjoying it.  His third and fourth went in easy, but as he came up on his fifth which stood near the trunk of a tree with clearing sky beyond, he felt a sharp fire in his right knee.  Moaning just a bit, he looked at his knee. There was a four inch gash, red with blood threre.  And he felt hardly capable of dealing with this.

A sharp-edged rock in the grass gashed your knee. Ow.  8% health loss.

He sat there in the dark green grass, and winced as his right knee involuntarily moved with his breathing.  Jackson knew he needed to get up, to do something, but it seemed better to sit in the moment.  After  a bit, he heard shouting, and that got him to start to get to his feet.

Then stiff fingers shoved him back down on his buttocks.

"Looks like you've got the Hidden Disadvantage of Low Food Impact Morale Reserves."  A prompt popped up.

Hidden Disadvantage: Low Food Impacts Morale Reserves.  Your Morale is derived from your Charisma and Wisdom. 10% of Minor Injury causing rapid loss of Morale, leaving the hero without moves.  Jackson waved it aside with his head, and caught the eye of the boss guardsman who was quickly bandaging him up.

"I....thanks."
"Don't misunderstand, noob. You're valuable to me.  I want you producing, not spending the next hour getting back up to speed.  And unlike some of my brethren, I know this wasn't your fault.  Its one of the 'little tricks' the gods play on us players."
"Or the AI..."
"Same thing. In here, the AI is the gods. Now eat this, and get back to work."  The boss gave him a honey roll.

Normal Honey Roll: One food. Restorative to Emotional Damage +20.

The warm, and gooey roll, crusted with sugar, and drizzled with honey must have been made not that long ago in someone's kitchen.  It was heavenly, and in way too short a time, Jackson was licking his fingers.  Regretting it, he rolled over, and rose to his feet.  Part of him wanted to be grateful to the boss for the simple kindness, but he resisted this, not wanting to fall prey to Stockholm Syndrome.

He shuffled forward, not able to crawl anymore, and his legs loosened up within a half-dozen steps.  The stick in his right hand was looking a bit beat up, so he kept his eyes out for another, and in so doing, found a nest of small bunny babies.  They were in a small pile of branches under the tree.  Aware that he could rapidly reach his goal, he still slipped past it.

Two hares burst out from underfoot fifty feet later as he was listening to the sound of rushing water in the distance.  It was meant to confuse the predator for a second as it was forced to consider which one was closest for the optimal strike.  And in that time, thepair of rabbits would escape.

Jackson did not play along.  He dove down, seeking for both.  The one inthenew

Spared Bunny Babies: +1 Charisma to Humanoid Females.
This message was last edited by the player at 17:18, Wed 13 Jan 2016.

One hand landed hard on the smoothness of bunny's back, and the other landed on a tense, short-haired leg.  With a one-handed crunch, he smushed the first, and then dragged the other one back to him.

Level One Hare.

Once his left hand closed on its neck, it was all over.  Gulping for air, Jackson scrambled back to his feet, noticing how much easier the deed was now that he was a dwarf.  The shorter distance, plus the superior muscles made for something he thought.

"Weebles wobble, but they don't fall down." He murmured, remembering an advertisement for a toy his father had mentioned.  Now, he was a Weeble of a sort.  The two hares went into his back pack inventory even as he deliberately pushed aside the all-too-realistic feel of them. His grandmother had killed chickens by spinning them, that is, wringing their necks.  He could smush some pixels. This resolution brought him a little closer to the ten hares quest he had been set, and left him scowling at the information feed.

Two-fisted Terror: Level One at using both hands simultaneously for an attack.

It was good, but he was hoping for a level up sometime soon.  Maybe you had to get the whole ten, no matter how creative you were because the End Quest bonus was so huge compared to the Individual Combat bonuses?  Jackson shrugged.  It made sense.

He began walking further under the orchards, and spotting a hunter up ahead in this at least twenty-five acre orchard, he turned right.  A bunny was at his feet, apparently hoping the tired human would step over it.  No such luck.  Jackson immedciately, without thinking, booted the bunny into the nearest tree.  If his kick did not finish it, the sudden stop at a tree tunk cetainly did.

With six in his inventory or backpack, he took a moment to look about.  There were three scattered over a quarter of an acre, and he set out to get to them, keeping to the cover of the tree trunks when he could.  Upon arriving, his stomach rumbled, and he grimaced.  It had been hours since he ate, and he wondered what his body in the real world, err the God-created, instead of Man-created world was like.

The bunnies were aware enough that sneaking up on them wasnt going to be easy. And he had only one throwing stick, then he considered something else, and searched for hard apples at his feet.  The first four slushed against his fingers, but then one hard, wizened old man of an apple, using that as an example, he looked until he found another.

Withered Apple, Green (2), durability 1/1; Will raise endurance and health by a mild amount.  Character is suffering from low food impacting enurance and agility.  Do you wish to eat the apple

Carefully, he clicked 'no' not having a desire to try conclusions with a large mastiff dog.  Then he lined up the shot, noting his arm was shaking, he took a moment to steady down.  Confident he had it, he looked for the target, but it was gone.  Repressing his curses, he looked for the other bunny. It was hopping off, and he had to decided to take the quick shot or not.
This message was last edited by the player at 18:58, Fri 15 Jan 2016.

In reply to Tadeusz (msg # 238):

He flung it, and the thing was low and wide.  Sickened, he watched,  The apple came in low like a cruise missile, and tagged the hare in the butt, spinning it head for tail twice.  Without thinking, the other hand snapped, and that apple finished the hare with a nice headshot.

Both apples were broken in half, and smelled of juicy tang to his hungry stomach.  Passing on, he added number seven to his backpack inventory.  This was not getting his mission of doing notable, cool, and great things done.  Without a significant cool factor, he was doomed to lose this game at the end of the week.  That was not going to happen.

  His legs were plodding through the early afternoon grass, and it seemed as if he had been hunting for hours.  As the heat rose, the water on the grass faded, and the grass lost its vibrancy to a more staid green. The scent of rotting, occasionally fermenting apples became a heavy odour that hung in the air all about him.  Maybe at day's end, as he stood their in his tighty whities, he could get a bucked of water dumped over his head to clear off the le parfum appellier.

A handful of target apples were held in his right hand.  With his left, he took a shot, and missed.  Another shot at one jumping high for a look-see, and he caught it mid-air.  Eight done, and he was swaying a bit on his feet.

Unhappy with his slow progress, and the rising heat, he went on.  Missing the next three, cooled his temper.  He forced himself to let go of resentment, and think clearly.

"I need water."  Once visualized, he looked about and noted a very gradual, one percent slope away from the high roadway, and the city of arrival.  So, he should walk downhill.  Suiting action to thought, he set out, with renewed hope.  A hundred and fifty yards away, he heard the splash of a fish.

Twenty yards further, and he stood atop a vertical earth embankment that dropped down to a six inch beach, and a fifty foot wide curve of a river.  In it, he saw an Elf swimming, and in the deepest part, there was a multi-colored fish of dimensions like a short telephone pole, being both long and comparatively slender.

The water taunted him, but ten feet down, and deciding to risk it, he jumped.  The landing on the beach came with a prompt.

Vertical drops.  One of the greatest killers of dwarves other than cave-ins, overdosing on alcohol, orcs, and general bloody-mindedness.  Level One.  You Survived!  Bonus to further drops, not countng sugar gum drops.

Evidently, the moderator had been drunk when they created that line, Jackson thought.  And then he fell forward into the river, hitting a stone which he clasped, but the slick gunk coating it defeated his grasp.  And he fell deeper rolling down a slope with unnatural speed  until with a thump across his back, the whirling stopped.

He still held his air, but the surface was less than thirty, he hoped above him.  So he leapt up, and began to swim for the top only to collide with the sandy soil again.  He had no armored boots or jeans to weigh him down, he thought, and tried again, only this time, he drifted a bit further down, attracting the attention of the telephone pole with a yardstick of teeth.

"You're fine." He spoke to himself in his mind.  "Now, just think. Ah. Dwarves sink in water.  Said so right in the character design."

With that knowledge, he dug in with his feet, and began climbing up.  He scrambled over the rock he had been first stopped by, and kept on.  Meanwhile the telephone pole floated a few feet to his right, pacing him.

Air was becoming a problem, and a red band was creeping down on the right of his vision screen.  Since he had not seen this before, he imagined it was the oxygen meter, and when all the red was gone, he'd be dead.  For a brief second, he considered that as a way to get rid of this unwanted rig of control.  No, it was too far back.

Jackson kept on pushing even as the line dropped rapidly.  It was too late. He was dead, Jackson realized.  And he stopped trying, just waiting for the 'You Are Dead' screen.  But then he wondered, why stop?  Truly, he wanted to win, not just to ease his boredom, but to win.

And with that, he began to pump his legs again, faster, and then faster until he ran face-first into the clay embankment.  This dumped him on his posterior, which led to his regression to a past area of travel, and sliding back down hill.  With a frantic swat of his arms, and a grabbing for anything underwater, he came to a halt, just inches above the river.

There he took a sweet, oh, so sweet breath.

A Deeper, Truer Motivatiom: +1 Wisdom +1 Charisma..  Now that you have mustered the courage to admit a hidden truth to yourself, you have gained in strength.

After a bit, he alternated breaths and watching the red line disappear, with gulps of water from the river bordering the orchard.  Soon the clog-headed, wood-brained weariness had receded, leaving only a normal weariness of muscle.

Now he needed to get out of the river before the overseer caught him 'goofing off' and exacted some penalty. Sadly, he looked downriver to escape, but while an elf might make it, a dwarf could not float to freedom.

Considering the steep bank, he opened the Planned Construction tab, and the Small Structures tab underneath that.  Fitting some wire-frame boxes together gave him the outline of a staircase.  Working quickly, his hands like short stabbing shovel blades, he sliced away at the embankment.  Tossing the remains of step one behind him into the river, he quickly moved on to step two.

Hands like shovels. Level Three.  You can already do Soft Stone, but here you learn Doubletime.

The clay flew, and he moved on to step three.  Starting to pant a bit, h efinihsed slcikging that back, making the step smooth, and finished.  Then forcing himself onward with more speed, he reminded himself that he loved the earth.  Solid stones, sturdy paths, heavy dirts, and pebbles alike.

Spell: The Strength of the Earth.  Mother Earth is the lead goddess of the Dwarves, and as they love the Earth, so loves she them.  You are revitalized and brimming with energy.

The last four steps flew by, and he came back up to the top to see three slave orchardists waiting for him impatiently as they lifted not a hand to aid him.  In fact, one of them, a Human said that he should hurry up.  And now, Jackson got a view of life from the other races.

Dwarves worked hard.  It was regarded as a fact of nature.  No one needed to thank a dwarf for a well-made bridge arching over a thousand foot ravine, or comment approvingly on a set of solid doors guarding a castle entrance.  The shock of such rudeness left him numb and gasping for a second, until he gathered himself, and turned about and put a foot in the posterior of the Human who was the last in a file descending the staircase cut into the embankment.

One solid shove was all it took, and all three ended up in the river.  Jackson walked away, even as his exp or experience point total shot up to nearly Second Level.  Humming to himself, entertained by the shrieks of the game characters behind him, he went hunting for Rabbit #9.
This message was last edited by the player at 20:23, Tue 19 Jan 2016.

Enjoying the sounds of splashing, and the random whacko insults the game inserted in place of actual profanity, or harsh vulgarity, Jackson whistled as he got back to work, hunting 'wabbits'.

"Porous Banana Shaped Skyscraper!!"
"Geometric Dome!"
"Igloo with Hot and Cold Strawberry Fizzes!"

The insults were behind him.  For some reason, the AI was stuck on buildings as insults.

"Dirty, poor, no armoured, no weaponed, not real Dwarf thing."  That was odd.  It was awkward, a bit, like someone knew how to partially get around the censorship. Jackson looked back.

"Dim, oh, dim, like a frail candle, and wit is a thing you do not own."

"Dimwit." Jackson muttered, but the word came out "Milk Chocolate Rice Crispies."  Jackson snarled in frustration, and the other voice carolled out its laughter.  It was ahead of him, and not from the ungrateful trio in the river.

"Fie, fie, the nest, are you not, no, no, indeed not so.  No matter the effort, you will neir be..."

Jackson listened, tilted his head back and forth to help localize the sound.  He came at a tree, and rounded it, for it seemed larger than before, more ominous.  A braying of laughter, a menagerie of catcalls, a whole warren of angry, red-eyed rabbits, more than twenty, less than a hundred.

And they charged.

The tree was there. It was easily available. But he could not do it.  And as they charged, teeth out for his blood, they faded as he stood there leaving but one panic-stricken rabbit that began to holler out abuse.

"Pineapple. Chocolate Strawberry. Unleaded Gasoline. Klingons and Jedi, Portfolio, Porch!!" lEven as he tried to scramble back, and tower up all ended when Jackson put a heavy dwarf hand on him.

He lunged for the foul-mouthed rabbit, and a full hundred other rabbits sprang up from around him in a circle.  Hand paused on Foul's neck, he waited.  They waited. He began to apologize.

"I..."
"Y-y-es?" The enticing sound jarred Jackson' s nerves, and feeling dumb, feeling hopeful, he realized he was not playing the game to surrender to rabbits.  They could kill him, but no quarter!  Or penny.

Savagely, his hand crunched down on the Foul Rabbit's neck.  The others jumped for him, and before he could close his eyes, they lost shape to become a ring of black fog.  In a trice, that vanished as well.

Bites gashed his hand, and blood flowed, but that only led him to grab on with the other hand, and squeeze the harder.  When that was not instantly enough,  Jackson began banging the critter on the tree trunk.

Finally, it died.

Congratulations.  You have killed a Level Two Shadowcaller, a Foul Rabbit.<th>You are now Levelled Up.  You have One more skill oint to spend.</th>

The body came with a Fur Loincloth of Lupine Fear.  Using Identify, he found out that the fear was not his fear of rabbits, but their fear of him.  Strapping it on made him feel more clothed.
This message was last edited by the player at 16:59, Fri 22 Jan 2016.

A prompt appeared in bright purple in the middle of his visual area.

Did you play all night, dude?" Come on, I want a chance.

This went away, and a video box of the same thing showed.  It was his brother, tousle-haired, clad in robin's egg blue t-shirt, and years too short pajama pants celebrating 'discreetly', for penguins.

Considering what trouble his brother could make for him by casually dropping an innocent question in front of his father.  Jackson could see it play out over the breakfast table, and so began to log-out of the game.

A minute later, he slowly took the helmet off, wincing at his painfully crushed ears.  Even the carefully sculpted and precisely measured foam paddles could not ease all the discomfort  of a long trip to another world.

"Let me try it.  Come on, there's only an hour before school.  You got to play all night." The whiny, desperate tone got on Jackson's nerves, adding to the burn from realizing he would have to go along.

"Bro, bro, calm down."
His little brother by a few years stopped reaching for the helmet.
"Look, I need you to play some, but how I say to play. OK?"
"Whatdaya' mean, Jack?"  Jackson did not like Jack, but sometimes it slipped in, and he had learned to ignore it as not worth fussing about.  Protests just seemed to cause a lot of sturm un drang, and little rain.  Besides, it happened rarely.
Still keeping a possessive hand on the helmet, Jackson spoke firmly.

"I want you to try to unlock Easter Eggs.  Like, win the Explosion game from Easiest to Hardest levels in a row, with no failures."
"And if I fail, start over?"
"Yeah."
"But why is the eggs...."
"Just do it. Is that a deal?"
Jackson handed over the Virtlink helmet, its gold and crimson flashing strange in the early morning light working through the window and the thin curtain.
"Do I have to do Explosions? What about Pikes Peak road race?"
"If you can get a Second Place first go, sure."  Jackson said.  Third place in the road race to the top of Pike's Peak had gotten him a Charioteering skill, which granted was not that great, but free skills, were free skills.

Slowly getting up, even as his brother logged on, he went for his wash.  It was the third day of the Helmet, and he was not getting anywhere fast.  When I get back in, he thought as he brushed his teeth, I am escaping from those dweebs.  Maybe I should just delete my character, and restart?  He wondered.  But he had at least a few options before that happenned.

Sitting back down, feeling refreshed, but increasingly tired, he flipped on the television to hear promises from the news weatherman that today was going to be a glorious day for being outside.  Annoyed, he flipped over to the Food Channel, and watched some highly energetic guy dish up steak fajitas for his pals 'on a beautiful day in the Napa Valley'.

His mother came in, saw the show, and laughed.
"Someone's hungry."  She came back to see him dozing off to a detailed discussion by a researcher on whether Neanderthal Man was just a case of Rickets.  His mom woke him by waving a steakburger and onions under his nose.

This perked him up, and he tried to straighten up in the couch, earning him another wince, but smaller than last time.  Despite the oddness of the meal, it went down well, and before he fell asleep, he saw his younger brother log off, and give him a flashy smile, and a big thumbs up.  But before his brother was out the door, and on his way to school, Jackson was asleep.
This message was last edited by the player at 19:07, Tue 26 Jan 2016.

Down the swirling tube of colors, and Jackson arrived in the leaf-green grass under the orchard trees.  A gorgeous evening with a purpling sky awaited him, and a cool, evening breeze brought the scent of trees with a note of apples, then river, then a faint bit of city.  A heralding cry echoed over the orchard, and the rabbits all came out.

Jackson set to hunt some more, but the cry came again, a pure, sweet note, and he saw others trudging back to the road.   Day's end, and he had not gathered his ten rabbits.  With a quick dash, he grabbed another and smushed it.

Lethal hands. Level 3.  The prompt posted, and was gone of its own accord.

Now he had ten.  He put this last one into his backpack inventory. And as he walked on up, he rearranged things so that only the ten rabbits were in his backpack, and all the rest of things were in his inventory.

Arriving at the recall point with their prison guard standing on the road above them, this time fully kitted out in red lobster armor.

Analyze.

Armor Plate of the Enormous Red Lobster.  Roughly equivalent to plate mail with an open helmet.  If antennae are undamaged, allows 360 degree vibratory sensing.  Such Lobsters grow in Kenton Delta, and are very tasty, as well as making good armor for the Hydromen.  Waste not, want not.

And with a club made out of an uprooted tree.

Analyze.

Tree Root Club.  Must be pulled out of the ground by hand.  Advances strength and knockback.  A light damage weapon.

With the sun shining behind him, it was difficult to see their 'master's' face.  No doubt, that was planned.  That, and the casual way he stood worried Jackson. There were eighteen gatherers, some clearly new that had joined the game midgame day.  If he was not afraid at being faced with eighteen enemies, who had good reason to want to engage in a very close examination of his liver, then he had a trump card or three waiting.

Following directions,most of them clustered at theirguards feet.  A couple stood well back.  By the stiffness of their posture, and the fury radiating from them, Jackson knew what they were, at least in the real world.  They were Omega, socially clueless, honest to a fault, angry at a brutal world....and feeling betrayed because they had come here to Astrinica for something better, and finding instead slavery.

"Get in line." He snapped out to them.  A hand wave, majestic, imperative, unfeeling, pointed to a spot in the grass beneath his feet, and down the berm.  A few people moved about, and there must have been a high percentage of Anglos, of Americans, because soon a ragged line was formed.

The first man raised his load of dead bunnies up to the boss who towered above him.  The rabbits were snapped up by teh boss's inventory. In return, he lowered a wooden bowl with a gold cord to the first man, Vik Storm.  As soon as the unfortunate touched the bowl, a handful of porridge spilled out to cover Vik's hands, and drip down his arms.  Meanwhile, a rich, golden light oozed up the cord, and with a sorrowful groan from Vic, the light left him, and trawled up and into the boss's hand.

A shocked silence followed as many Analysis skills kick on.  A vibrant intensity of focus hung in the air between the prisoners and their overseer.

Jacob's Bowl.  Jacob offered porridge to Esau in exchange for Esau's birthright.  Foolishly, Esau agreed.  Ancient, Rare.   No more details were offered which meant he was not high enough level to know them.

Another man stepped up, and with a sour look on his face gave up both rabbits, and a level to the overseer.  A gnomish girl had to climb the berm a bit to hand up...

One of the new guys, an alert, athletic sort to judge by his watchful eyes, and  his loose body movements sprang past the gnome girl.  He came light-footed, even if bare bodied save for his tighty whities, and paused.

The overseer made a slow jab, and the young athlete, to judge by his poise and grace, stepped inside, grasped the arm, turned, and flipped the overseer down on the berm.  A roar of hatred rose from the crowd, even as Jackson began moving back, they began moving forward.

And out of the clear twilight, a lightning bolt struck, ripping the hero in half, and gravely injuring those nearest him.  And out of the air, but two yards to the right, as Jackson saw it, of the overseer appeared the overseer.  His eyes were filled with lightning, and his hands held four sparking arcs each which he began tossing viciously at anyone within range.

Meanwhile, the illusion on the downed overseer dropped, and there lay revealed a battered gnomish girl.

"Fools. You think to defeat the Serpent Cartel?  I've seen all your tricks, and I have pain and suffering..."

"Let me go!"  One of the Omegas yelled.

"Just you? Why?" The ranting madman was gone, and in his place a sneer competed with honest concern.

"No, everyone.  And why? I'll tell you why.  Do it, or I'll delete my character, and start over.  I don't have to put up with this garbage."

The overseer looked worried, and the people in the crowd grinned, although Jackson noted that no one came rushing to this young man's side, unlike the first attacker.  And then Jackson saw it.  In the overseer's eyes, there was a hint of falseness.  Which meant, he was not afraid.  Jackson was hiding behind an apple tree by now, and he wanted to shout out to warn the other guy, but his voice was ...

Dwarven.

He stepped out and bellowed.

"He wants you too."  And the words slapped the air, and cracked off the berm, and silenced everyone for a full second.  The listening young man turned, and Jackson saw insight glimmer in the fellow's eyes.

No one else seemed to have grasped this, and now that no one but Jackson was looking at him, the overseer was openly smirking.  But then, Jackson saw the trap of an Omega come down hard on the fellow.  Honesty.  He had made a challenge, and he would stick to it to the bitter end.  Other social statuses, higher ones, had more flexible ways of dealing with challenges, but there is a reason others stay out of the way of a truly provoked Omega.  Wrath and a terrible honesty ride with a red sword in hand.

Even as Jackson faded back, the other fellow turned and cursed the overseer.  And then deleted his character.  Days, possibly weeks of effort were gone, and hoping against hope, Jackson hurried away, listening for a groan from the overseer.  Instead, he heard triumphalist gloating.

"Free, high level, high potential NPC, third level bard.  Not bad, and utterly loyal to the rulers of this city, which is the Serpent Cartel." The overseer taunted the now absent player.  "Thanks sucker.  Now where were we..."

And Jackson fled across the thick grass, clad only in his underwear, and a determination to escape. Rabbits ran before him, as his legs pumped.  But as he went by without stopping in the deepening gloam under the apple trees, they came to a quick halt.  And then stared at him curiously as he went on by.

Dwarven Running: Gain a level.  Not ready for a triathalong, err triathalon, yet.

Shouts behind him encouraged Jackson to move even faster.  And then he had to stop.  The river bank came up quicker than he expected, so he had to stumble to his knees to keep from going over.  Looking down, he could see a phosphorescent jellyfish drifting by a few feet below the water's surface.

Even if that was not Earthly, the silver, the shine, the pinks and purples, and a hint of green all created beauty.  Despite the Serpent Guild, he loved this world.  It was soaked in beauty, so vivid, so bright that even the most insensitive clod would be uplifted just by being here.

"There he is!"  A harsh voice hollered behind him.  With no time to lose, Jackson leapt up, and grabbed an apple from the tree.  It was round, a bit spicy, firm to the touch, but not hard.  Its red ran from glossy to matte spotted by circlets and down to green.  Its taste shocked him.

Juice trickled down his chin, and strength seemed to course in his veins.

Rebel with a Just Cause.  You have defied tyranny.  +1 to Willpower and Charisma.  +10 to Reputation.

A long, bloodcurdling howl came from far to the right, and the circle of pursuers stopped.

"It ain't magic apples, noob.  You're going to wish you'd come with us."  And they all halted, with some pulling out wineskins.  The group looked like the town guard or something.

"Tell me, how does this work?"

"What work?" Asked Brian the Daysmasher, Level 10 Axewarrior, according to his floating infopak above his right shoulder.  The howls came closer, rapidly.

"You lock us up, but surely that takes time and effort....better to hunt..."
"Nah. Look, your overseer is on his way to getting 'Bane of Rabbits'.  All he has to do is turn in a thousand rabbits.  And he gets some pretty sweet benes.  Five days or so of magic practise while he watches you suckers, and he's got it.  Without the mind-crushing boredom. "

Jackson thought back, and he realized that he had heard there were a lot of Totally Over The Top Rewards for doing things like walking backwards for thirty days, and Teetotaler for a month supposedly gave you a big bonus to poison resistance stats.

"We've got it wired.  Maybe you'll be smart, and when you come back from the dead, you can join the Town Guard."  The offer seemed genuine, and Jackson was touched.

"I've other plans." He said as the three hundred pound, shoulder high black and mastiff, with a face like a brick shot smoothly over the grass down toward him, and was on him before he could say another word.

Jackson leapt back, and with his stick smacked the dog across the face.

The Mastiff of the Orchards: Level 8.  You do two points of damage to it.  148 health left.

Rage overcame caution, and the giant dog took a second too long to realize it should hit the  brakes.  Then it did, but this led to it flailing all four legs as it went over in a somersault.  And Jackson reached out and grabbed its neck collar with a determination to hold on, despite pain and health loss.

A leg scraped his chest, drawing blood.

Minor damage:  Be glad this dog is not a werewolf....or is it?

With a smash, both of them hit the water, sending it spirallng up, and then splashing down.  Down in the river, the two struggled, limbs thrashing.  Jackson kept his forearm straight alongside the mastiff's jowl, and his hand in a deathgrip around the thick leather collar.

A bite savaged his arm.

You've been bitten. 10% damage.  Strength tempraily reduced by 3.

The pain made it harder to hold on.  Jackson one-armed a pull-up as they both swayed a yard beneath the shimmering surface.  Now level with the beast, he drove a stiff fingered spear strike into the underarm of the dog.  It convulsed, and air bubbles escaped.

This time it came back for a truly vicious bite aimed at removing the confining hand by severing it at the wrist.  A short jab put paid to that notion as his fist collided with the mastiff's sensitive nose.

Another bubble of air, and now Jackson could see that the creature was looking desperate.  Letting him, the two of them shot upward, and breached the sky of the river.  Air came ready to Jackson's lungs as he had experience in underwater swimming.  But before the great hound could get more than two frantic breaths, Jackson lunged onto his head, forcing it under.

His hands scrabbled about, collecting jabs from teeth, and the mastiff threw him off, but Jackson hung on below.  He used his greater density, and the leverage gained from being at one end of the dog to yank his head below water.  Now frantic, the beast clawed with its hind legs at the collar, striving to win free.  If he did, Jackson would sink all the way to the bottom as dwarves  cannot swim effectively, and there drown.

Swimming: Level One.  Its a very odd skill for a dwarf to have, and its not enough to keep you afloat.

A raking claw ran down his forearm,

Clawed by blunt claw: 3% damage.  Now its Lucky 13%.

Suddenly, he felt the leather in his hand give way a bit.Aww, come on.  A bad luck joke? You gotta be kidding me.

Yanking himself up, he grabbed an ear, and toppled the beast over to the left, and above.  Continuing the barrel roll, he got above it as it came back to the surface.  Now riding it, he looked gleefully about.  Shouts from the shoreline spokeo f amazement and stringing  bows to skewer him with arrows.

The mastiff yanked its head around to bite, and he shoved it underwater.  A few seconds later, and another growling snap had him slam his fist into the beast's skull.

After that, it was a matter of floating away while keeping a close eye on the mastiff for any tricks or sudden bites.  The river banks glided past over the next hour, and he saw a number of fish, along with compact car sized turtles lounging on oak logs toppled by lightning strike off the river embankment.

Miles passed in this way, and the only bit of excitement was when the mastiff tried to shake him off, or when an overly aggressive, and large fish decided to try a strange looking worm for dinner.  Jackson slapped the water loudly, and yanked his toe out from the mouth of the over-sized big mouth bass leaving behind some blood, and taking with him some pain.

You taste good with tartar sauce: The local aquatic life has taken a liking to you.  1% damage.

Checking his health screen showed that he had gained back four percent of his health on the long ride.  So, he was only down a tenth, right now.
This message was last edited by the player at 17:44, Thu 04 Feb 2016.

They floated into the night now, and rain came.  Bolts of lightning hit black rocks which extended above the river, and illuminated barren unfriendly stone beaches.  A landscape of jutting rocks, some in the river, had replaced the high banks and friendly oak forests.

His arms quivered once or twice a minute, and he lay his head on the back of the mastiff who only whimpered in response.  It startled when a bolt fell down nearby, and Jackson realized he had come as far as his impromptu raft was going to go.  Wearily, he began guiding the dog to the shoreline.

Dogrider Level 2:  Bow Wow Wow Wow.....Woof.

The mastiff cheered by the prospect of land began dog-paddling as well.  The current swept them in, and suddenly the dog was struggling forward under the strain of exhausted muscles, and the weight of a dwarf.  Jackson merely thought about letting go, and his arms released as he fell into a foot of water.

Sputtering he shoved himself back to the surface to see the giant mastiff standing tall on the stone ledge of the beach, a black rock with occasional swabs of soil here and there.  This would be a perfect time for it to take revenge, Jackson knew.  And his spawn point was still back in the city of the Serpent Cartel, so that would make the long,tiresome late night float all worthless if the beast killed him here.

Instead it stared at him.

Curious, Jackson tabbed the information package that floated over anyone's right shoulder.

Great Mastiff of the Orchard, Jackson's Escape Raft
Status: Exhausted.
Status: Neutral.

Jackson stopped their, and dragged himself up and out of the water.  Slowly, so as to not frighten the beast into attacking. he pulled out the remnant of the apple he had stuck in the band of his tighty whities on his hip.  Placing this on the ground, he backed up.  For a second, nothing happened, and then the mastiff darted forward, snatched the chunk of apple, and bolted into the night.

"Well, that didn't work." Jackson sighed.  Using the flashes of light, he looked about until he found a shallow overhand scooped into the base of a nearby rock mass stabbing skyward fifty feet, all irregular edges and shapes.

Mentally worn down, he logged out of the game.  Once back, or aware of the world, he flipped up the ear flaps, and even ordered the contact lenses to come out.  The user was supposed to do that everytime, but he knew some contact users who slept with theirs, even if they were only just regular contacts.

Taking the helmet off his soaked head, he saw that it was getting near noon by the clock hanging on the wall above the television.  And without more ado, he slipped into sleep, mind and body both exhausted.  And his body keyed up with nervous tension which he could not release with a brisk run, or some weight lifting.

The dreams were incoherent fragments, which was a change.  But that made sense since his mind and body were run down, and over extended.  He did not need some grand overarching story plot right now.

He woke to the smell of pea soup, and found his stomach growling.  His father looked up at him from across the living room, and laughed.  Jackson grimaced, and being very careful straightened himself back up in the couch.  It did not hurt much at all.

"Doing better are we?" His father asked with that quiet mix of keen insight and absolute authority that was his way.  Jackson nodded, and glanced at the television.  Taking the hint, his father reached over, and took the remote up off the television stand, and turned it to face the set.

To no one's surprise, local news came on.  The councilman was emoting to a collection of housewives about The Hill that Jackson had injured himself on.  A few scruffy looking guys were filmed doing two word rebuttals in the like of 'Not cool' while the councilman had exquisitely eloquent, and measured paragraphs that acknowledged all sides, but made it clear there was only one reasonable choice.

Close the Hill.

"What do you think?" His father's voice cut thru, and then he paused the jibber-jabber with his remote.
"I think I'd like to get my helmet." Jackson muttered feeling tired all over again.
"Your brother has had it for the last hour.  He said you wanted him to play a full set of Demolition from the simplest screen to the largest?"  His dad's eyebrows rose in question.
"The game, the main game, it gives you benefits if you master side games."
"Ah, and?"
"I...don't like it, but..."
"I understand the pull the helmet has.  Every man of reason and imagination occasionally feels the need to pull away from the grosser stupidities of the outside world.  And of those..."
"Politics is the worst." His mother said, coming in, bearing a large tray.  His father got the mini-table for him, and he saw a huge bowl of pea soup with ham chunks, apple pie with a lattice crust, and a large glass of ice with lemon water.
He looked over at his father, who nodded agreeably.
"Your mother's heard my views before."
"And generally agreed with them, or I'd not married you." She replied with a secret smile for him.
But.... Jackson knew there was a 'but'.  But sometimes a man had to do his duty even if he'd rather let fools be fools.  That was another 'Dadism'.
His skinny little brother was fetched, with a bit of a 'tude, which evaporated at the sight of apple pie.
"Bro, you need to get hurt more often." He spouted, and then the other three of him stared at him in Shocked Mode, and his face colored.  "Um, anyways, halfway up the Demo.  Its a lot more fun in VR.  I'm the captain of a mine-hunter ship, and we're trying to clear a mine-field. And they have all these alternate campaigns you can play....some based on history like the Bay of Inchon, and others like, what if the Federal Government can't get tax money from Alabama, so they mine Mobile Bay?  I haven't tried the alts yet, bro, no worries, I'm still on target for getting a Perfect Clear on the main, m'kay?"
Jackson nodded from around a chunk of ham, and then the two boys settled to serious eating as their father and mother caught each other up on events of the day.  Most of it was the same old, same old, but looking at them smiling and joking about little things with each other was heart-warming and strange.

After food was done, Jackson considered his father's words, and with a smile said his brother could have the helmet another thirty minutes.  Just how many more days did he have until Gameworx wanted their helmet back anyways, he wondered.  But then he opened his Facebook, and left a message for his pals.

"Just cuz I did an accidental Superman on The Hill doesn't mean we should close the place down.  What are the skaters and bikers and such to do?"  He paused, aware that it was weak tea, but he could not think of anything else, so he sent it. Within twenty minutes, he got a bundle of Likes from a lot of guys and even some gals.  One of them was a local X-treme sport 'star' for values of a relatively small town.  He had a YouTube channel, and he performed trick rides for some events.

"That was kewl, man.  Sorry about the broken bones. They can be a bummer."
"Just ....what I meant." Jackson replied.
"Yeah, I hear ya'.  Look, you mind I put you up on my website?"
"No, go for it."
"Oh, btw, here's a link..."  "It helped me a lot."  The link led to a variety of treatments for broken bones, torn muscles, and such.  Many were untraditional.

Jackson shrugged, and asked his mom to get him a few things at the grocery store next time she was out.  Deke's mom, the nurse, had also explained that what with the new advances, it was hard for a doctor to stay current.  Furthermore, med treatments were often aimed at least common denominator situations so that someone willing to spend some consistently greater effort, could on some cases get markedly better results.  On other things, tho', the baseline treatment was as good as it got.

Her best advice had been to listen closely to his body, because what helped one might not help him.

With that done, and feeling as if he had started on the Quest his father had given him, he yelled for his brother.  He came quickly, evidently hoping that good behavior now, might translate into more time later.  Jackson thanked him, and donned the somewhat stinky helmet, but after log-in, the world generated smells overwhelmed his bro's sweaty hair smells, and his own for that matter.  But he was glad to have got that shower earlier.
This message was last edited by the player at 19:58, Tue 16 Feb 2016.

Inside Astrinica, false dawn cast odd shadows over the black stone beach, and the rippling water of the River beyond.  On the far side, thick pine forrests grew, but here, he saw nothing, not even a few weeds in a crack in the black rock overhang.  The half-cave had protected him throughout the night, but not twilight rolled in slow and steady.

"Nothing ventured, nothing gained." He muttered to himself, and leapt out of the cave looking around for an aggressive beast set on removing his cranium.  Only birds of dark hue circled in the direction that lay back to the City of the Serpent Cartel, which Jackson decided to call 'North'.

"Upriver, the City, and North are all the same.  Which means I am on the Right side of the river coming down it, on the West Side.  Boy howdy, this place is desolate." Jackson looked about, noting flat plates of brittle looking rock lapping out, laying atop each other.  In his sight were three large blocky juts seventy feet or so high which he named.

"You are the Three Sisters Washing." He muttered.  In his mind's eye, he could see them coming down, instead of day by day, but season by slow season to wash their clothes in the river.

Name accepted as the Three Sisters Washing. Namer +3 Fame; Named Location +2 Fame. Charisma bonus +.01%.

Leaving the River behind, and his temporary shelter in what he dubbed as the Younger Sister, which earned him another point of fame, he noted a new icon in the far left of his view screen.  Checking it out revealed it as a Name Power monitor in the shape of a half-open eye that was only a little filled with nearly transparent liquid.

A further check under HELP revealed that he had to have a combination of Events multiplied by New Sights to equal Name Power.  And if he just ran around naming things willy-nilly, he'd get no Fame from it, probably as he would quickly run out of Name Power.  Given that Fame was a way to get access to some of the cooler quests, and get better deals, and entrance to meet kings and high priests and such-like VIPs, he wanted Fame.  He also thought it might help convince GameWorx to let him keep the helmet beyond the few more days allotted.

He swept the Name Power 'half eye' icon off his visual screen.  He could, if he wished, clutter his visual field with dozens of information icons, maps, inventory checks, health and thirstiness and mana scales, along with Fame Reports on each person met.  Instead, he limited it to a Health Scale colored the traditional scarlet up in the top-right corner set at Medium-Small Size.

Not infrequently, the brittle and thin top plate of the black stone cracked and crunched underfoot as he went due west, and away from the River. More jutting 'statues' showed up, and then the land dipped down to a wide flat plain covered by more black rock streams stretching for miles in great curves, intermixed with large puddles of flaky stone.  Miles away was the source of the devastation, a smoking volcano.

But how did this place exist without being soon overrun by new plants?  Unlike most post-apocalyptic dreams, Nature comes back mighty quick when Man stops chopping trees and mowing grass and relocating cougars.  Then Jackson spotted little piles at random intervals all over the vale floor.  And some were moving.

One rose, walked ten feet on all fours, and then pulled up something.  Jackson thought it had to be a weed because the expressive actions of the creature were just like a man pulling a weed from a garden, something Jackson had done for hours at a time in his parents' backyard garden.

A purple font appeared with a message in front of his visual field.

Spot: In the game of noticing minor, telling details, you are Level One, and have discovered where you left your head.  Its on your shoulders.

Jackson snickered.  He heard a crunch to his right.  Carefully, slowly, feeling the weight of eyes on himself, he looked.  A grey, tattered skin thrust itself at his face. Sounds, wheezing sounds, came from the middle of the pat....the face.  And the creature, bipedal, stinking of corruption and formaldehyde, and whatever cheicals a dark necromancer uses to summon up the Dead.

Its arm latched close to Jackson, but he was already ducking and diving back to the other direction.  A spurt, then a full-tilt sprint, and the crackling rock underfoot betrayed him.    His left leg went skyward even as the zombie howled for him to 'mgilglrkam'.  Rolling forward along the graoun, ignoring the messages of damage from his Silver Surfer fall on his buttocks, and his roll among sharp-edged rocks which dashed blood spatters all about.

This scent confused the zombie who poked at one of the blood droplets.

Coming to his feet in a smooth move, he jogged from the zombie, careful not to overexert himself,  but a zombie came  L=dg from behind a tower to his left, the stone reminiscent of a spear pointing skyward to cut off  his escape.
This message was last edited by the player at 15:43, Mon 22 Feb 2016.

With a zombie closing on his left, clad only one boot, and tattered pants, Jackson veered off to the right.  He himself stood out in his fresh, bright tighty whities which was his only garb.  Without weapon, he ran for it.  A death here by zombie would be unpleasant as they were said to hold you down, and chew open your skull, if they could.  Worse, it would set him back at the Spawn Point for this entrance to the World of Astrinica.  Those were hours he could ill afford to lose in his quest to become notable.

The mad moaning shook his nerve, and although he tried to go faster, he felt as if he ran through a cloud of melting gummie bears.  The dwarf lack of stride did not help either.  The creature was too near on him for him to climb The Spear Blade.

More purple ink.  Fame for naming, The Spear Blade, a black mass of jutting rock vaguely spear like.  +1

Rounding it, on steady feet, and about halfway around, a zombie leapt out of a barely man-sized cave, hitting Jackson in the left shoulder.

Shoulderstrike: 8% damage.

 Going with it, Jackson rolled down the slope of the far side;

Damaged Zombie Hider: 18% Damage. Jackson receives 2% more damage to make it 10% for rough day.

 ...using each thump of the rolling tumble to maximum advantage.

Arm torn loose.  32% more damage. 1% damage to self.

Leg and arm detached, violently. Zombie temporaily incapacistated.  Hero takes 5% more damage.

  When he got down to the bottom, a leg, and two arms were missing as well from the scar-faced undead.  A horny toed stomp to the face ended it.

Damaged Zombie Hider: Destroyed.

Fame + 2. You've killed your fist monster.  Fame +1. And it was a Zombie.  Fame +5.  And you did it without weapons, or armor, or magic.

Title: WEAPONMIND. The sword is not a weapon, nor is the spell.  The mind is the one true weapon.  Exhilarated, Jackson bounced up, only to see a half-dozen coming down the east end of the sloping valley he descended into pell-mell.  Turning about, he saw a near dozen zombies coming from the west, or the direction back to the river.

Not ready to take on eighteen zombies, he spun about and headed back up the loose, shale slope he had just tumbled down.  But going up was far slower than going down.  The rocks slid under foot, and dust got up in  his nose, making that rather large proboscis twitsch.

A clattering noise came from above, and loosing his gaze from the slippery rocks right after showed a zombie waving its arms frantically, as it high-stepped down the slate slope toward him in a semblance of control.  Jackson drew his self into a sphere, held tight,  and then lashed out with a low kick. The
This message was last edited by the player at 15:24, Thu 25 Feb 2016.

Poised Trip/strike did 11% damage to the onrushing zombie, but more importantly tipped it head down, and heels skyward in a bounching traffic that ended for the main mass at the bottom of the slope.  For the head, it rolled on a bit further, and dissappeared behind another one of the black rock, natural towers that dotted the platescape.

Pulling himself back together, he began to run like a robot man on a bike machine, elbows in tight, legs pumping high.  Thus powered, he surged up the slope, burning energy prodigiously, but arriving at the crest of the hundred yard wide slope in time to drive his right fingers in through the eyesocket of one undead thing.

Your hands truly are deadly.  +1 Instakill. 


Title: FELLHANDED+10% Unarmed hand damage.

Ripping that one loose from the pull of gravity, he swung it as an awkward flail.  Two more zombies fell to his depredations.  And he carefully leapt to land on each one's face, leaving behind ruin, and slick goo.  Nearly falling on his suddenly slippery feet, he turned to the left, and ran along the crest as another eight came up around the curve of the nearest tower.

And here he ran, being careful of footing, for a trip right now could be fatal.  The zombie horde grew to fifteen, and ran in a horrid mockery of the smooth grace of a runner, all herky-jerky moves, and near falls.  Instead of sweat, pieces of flesh fell off.  And they came for him, but he ran.

He did not run as a Human might, all lurch and a cloud of dust, or with the lightooted grace of the Elf, but he ran as a Dwarf does.  Barely above a jog for a human, and slow-ish for an elf, but he ran atLevel Up. +1 to Character Stat. a pace that he held for the first hour.  He gained three more followers, and lost two, due to accidental stumbles that took them into fathomless holes in the ground.

His run west took him into rolling hills and bogs at the bottom of such.  To the left, or south, there was an enormous mountain vaguely shoe-shaped.  It served as the schwerpunkt of a dozen lesser mountains in a northward pointing arrow.  How far were they away?  Well they had not come noticeably closer in an hour's jog.

Jackson paused, and looked back over his shoulder.  Thirty-five zombies trailed after him.  Thankfully, he had not run over any First Level Noobs in his run.  And by sheer bad luck, which Zombies seemed to have a disproportionate amount of, he had lost four more zombies.  But he was beginning to be aware that his Run To the Horizon plan had a problem.  Dwarves do not get tired easily.  He could without difficulty run a deer, or a horse into the ground, and just keep on going.  However, Zombies, as undead, sustained by foul necromantic energies did not get tired at all.

He still had a few minutes, and so he studied his circumstances to find an advantage.  The great mountain was vaguely shoe shaped, like a tennis shoe.  A steep frontal slope, followed a mild rising slope up to a volacanic cone.  From it smoke drifted.  And on the far side, the back face, or heel face of the mountain was a near vertical three thousand feet climb.  Laughing, Jackson knew what had happened.

A bored coder, his brain fried, hadbeen tasked with creatins some mountains, unique and interesting mountains.  "It'll be easy." Said his boss as the man prepared to leave for lunch. Desperate the coder looked down, and saw his tennis shoe.

A toe or front slope, the laces rising, and the hole, from which rose the stench of bad foot odor.  Jackson thought he could run to it, but he would probably get entangled with half a dozen mobs of varying sorts on hte way.

Jackson ran down to the bog, and looked for suitable islands in the middle.  None seemed apparent, and the zombies got closer to the fifty foot wide pool.  There! One off to the far corner.  He ran toward it as the zombies pelted down hill behind him.

Drawing himself up, and using Poise, he did a two foot jump.  Then landing with both feet toes wide on the island.  And then the island lurched under him, and he sprawled wide, and landed on his back in the water.  Falling in terrible cold with diaphanous fronds, and bits of floating greenery


And the giant turtle moved..

Dismayed, Jackson kicked away from the five foot long turtle. He fled to the bottom even as the turtle flipped inverted, and with one lazy stroke of its frying pan sized flippers came at him.  Human eyesight would have been totally useless in the dark, cold mirk, but Dwarfvision had a few advantages, enough to see the general shaes about him.

There was no place to hide, so Jackson resolved to let his sword, be his shield.  The turtle came down on him, and opening its liter sized mouth for a chunk of Jackson.  To disrupt its timing, Jackson leapt forward, and as it jaws gaped eveen wider, he shoved his wooden sword cross-wise into the turtle's mouth, like a dog with bone.

With a clatter that echoed through the water, the giant turtle clamped on the sword, and sliced it in two.  Shoved up just a bit, the turtle passed overhead.  Jackson dove in a rolling somersault down into the mud pit at the bottom of the pond.

The turtle swept back around, leaving broken  zombir carcasses in its wake.  The brainless, but very tenacious undead had advanced into the water to seek him.  And the giant turtle's bone-slicing bite had made short work of their legs and arms while Jackson lay hiding down in the viscous mirk.  One more pass over, and body parts rained down on Jackson.  The turtle drifted deeper, looking for tasty dwarf instead of the inedible zombies.

As it came closer, Jackson remembered a training trick his uncle, a horse stabler, had told him.  You teach a horse not to bite you by getting a real hot baked potato and sticking in your sleeve.  The horse takes a chomp at you, and gets a mouthful of tongueburn and mashers.  After that, it thinks all humans are composed of burning mouth unpleasantness, and leaves arms and other bits alone.

So as the massive turtle came down on him, Jackson scooped up a zombie arm, and held it near his forearm.  The next bit made his stomach churn.  He deliberately let the huge face take a bite of him.

Bite 16% damage; right arm damage, debuff 50%

Jackson winced in pain as his arm and the other dead flesh both ended up in the turtle's mouth.  It was surprising how well the biofeedback got one to feel pain, he noted, wondering if the effect was getting stronger, the more in sync he got.  But, the turtle let him go, disgusted by the mixture of good and bad tastes, and swam off to avoid the useless invaders of his home pool.

Jackson called up his breath monitor, and saw that it was deep in the yellow.  Evidently dwarves also could hold their breath for a long time.  He noted a sleeping bed icon, and queried it, being careful not to activate  it.

Dwarves in caveins and other low oxygen situations may put themselves into a deep coma with minimal life signs.

With his eyes, he clicked on the 'more info' button at the bottom of the note.

If you do this, you may choose up to 10.5 hours in .5 hour increments.  Jackson grinned.  He could go to sleep for almost half a day, and wake up.  But no, the zombies were approaching, slipping and sliding down the mucky underwater curve of the large pond.  If he slept, he would be discovered.

He considered going toward the turtle, and taking his chances because there were fewer zombies there.  Or he could swim and try to outrace the undead to the shore, but he already knew dwarves swam poorly, and sank well.  If he had a full breath, he might take on a zombie...

Jackson waited until one of the zombies got close.  And then with his prepared footing that he had dug out, he lurched toward the creature.  Getting closer, he saw its arms reach for him.  He shoved the zombie arm he still had into its mouth, and ignoring the grasping hands, scaled its body like a ladder. Up to the waist, and then to the shoulders, and then one piledriving kick which drove the zombie down a foot into the mud shoved him chest high above the water.

He took in a great gasp of air, and a little water spray which threatened to make him cough, but he fought it back.  Grimly swallowing, he plunged back knifing down to the bottom.  Once there, he turned to his left, caught the ladder zombie by the neck, and twisted it off.

A brush to the right, and he struggled to spin.  But a zombie was coming down on him in a tumbling run, so he ducked under it, and vaulted it over and deeper into the pool, taking the ladder zombie headless corpse with it.

Stricken by fear, he completed his turn to the right expecting at any moment to see a ghastly dead face with mouth wide.  Instead, he saw a frond drifting in the water. Relief flooded his veins, and he charged as well as he could uphill.  A zombie came at him from the right, and he remembering a demo of prowess in the lunch room by some jocks stiff-armed the thing back.  Another one rose up out of the muck, and he planted his foot on its skull with terminal force.

Rising up above the water, he felt a sudden surge of weakness as one does when leaving a pool as gravity reasserted its full dominion.  Lurching toward him from the left through knee high water, came splashing his demise.  Suddenly feeling his foot yanked, he fell, but took advantage of his dwarfish stature to turn it into a rolling somersault that left him on the clay edge.

The splasher came after him, and he rolled over and over as it reached down for him.  But it was faster, and grabbed him on the third revolution.  He spun backwards, and ripped its legs out from under it.  It somersaulted, and landed on its back, still clinging to him with both hands.

Your body is a weapon.  Most warriors know how to punch and grapple, but you are different.  Headbutt, kneestrike. finger tip stab to the eyes, its all the same to you.  Improvised tactics now have the same skill level as your grapple skill.

A quick roll to the right crossed the zombie's arms, and broke the grasp.  Without more ado, he came to his feet, saw five zombies still out of the water, and ran back up hill the way he had come.  As his clothes dried, and chafed giving him a minor debuff which was cancelled out by his greater familiarity with the terrain, he kept a steady pace.

The zombies pursuing him were not able to learn from their previous run so when he led them by a pit, he lost two to the depths.

You have LEVELLED UP.  Congratulations!

The message startled him, and that broke his stride letting the leader of the trio chasing him nearly catch up.  Putting on some steam, he pulled away, deciding at his next peaceful moment to do some point spending and assign his ten percent bonus.

Spotting a heavy chunk of slate, he went downhill five steps.  There, he scooped it up and waited.  The leader and the two trailers came directly at him.  And struggling against the heavy weight, and the slippy slidiness of the loose slate ridgeside underfoot, he circled wide.  They stopped for a long second, and then turned back up to him.

"Just like that thing in the Olympics." He said, remembering the televised shows of curling where athletes tossed thick discs down the ice to reach a target.  He twisted back, and spun forward and released his flat chunk in a arcing toss that came down on the leg of the trailing zombie, tearing it free.  The second zombie was swept away by a growing avalanche of rocks. The putative leader got caught by his follower, and struggling to free themselves they both sailed downhill a good hundred yards.  By the time they stopped, neither were un, but just dead and decapitated.

Am I my zombie's keeper? You are the first dwarf to kill a zombie with a thrown rock.  Fame +30

The Creator understandably did not approve of Cain's actions, but the gods of this land do approve yours.  Charm +1

Jackson considered investing his two points, and decided that Muscle could do, and that another 10% bonus on top of the earlier one would be good.  That made his current strength score to be 6, what with 5 X 120%.  Immediately he felt stronger, and stood easier as his strength doubled.  Looking at his arms, he noticed some definite bulges which looked good to his eyes, and hopefully the ladies as well.

But before he could congratulate himself further, he saw zombies walking toward him from the horizon.  And Looking about he saw others, a few close, more in patches further away.  But there were a lot of zombies out here.  He needed to do sometbing.

Jackson started running again.  The zombies fell in behind him, and he only hoped that some were not coming at him from in front to cut him off.  As he got back to the black stones jutting up from the smooth black layers of rock, he saw, nearer the river, movmeent.

Time to stop.
This message was last edited by the player at 14:15, Fri 22 Apr 2016.

Still working on the litRPG, but an opportunity has turned up to write a Sword and Planet short story.

Big, tall, rugged, many wrinkles, oddly yellow eyes, wavy blonde hair, likes adventure

========================================================

Spotting a glint of yellow, David Crossland checked on his crew which was struggling up the glacial slope, and then bent down easily at the knees to dig it out of the crusted snowpack with his scarlet handled ice axe.  A surprisingly heavy golden coin came free thumping down in his leather gloved hand.  A flash of bright sunlight shot off it, and the snow pack almost glowed under the crystalline blue sky of mid-Greenland summer.  Twenty miles away, a darker blue denoted the harbor where they had beached the large catamaran Sea Dancer

"Whatchu got?" Sgt. Moran, a graduate of the Rangers, and the American and the Italian (in a NATO cross-training program meant to keep links strong in case the Soviet Bear got hungry) mountaineering school was fifteen feet below him, and holding a twenty foot long pull cord that led back to the sled, and to the five foot wooden cubic box resting ominously on the sled.  Four other men also pulled, and climbed, and gasped for breath.

Below them, Marsha Lincoln, great-great whatever of The Lincoln, she had informed them on their first night was supposedly pushing the sled, but really leaning over it, letting it pull her up the mountain.  Dissppassionately, David knew it was to be expected, and that when the stories were retold in Washington D.C., that Marsha would be the one doing the trailblazing and pathbreaking instead of himself because 'men!'.

He knew this just as he knew Pvt. Carmine drank too much, and Dr. Randall Howell was a hypochondriac who also suffered night terrors and woke up in the middle of the night, most nights, with a towel in his mouth to muffle the screams.  As Research Team Leader, it was his job to know his men, and one woman, their strengths and their weaknesses, breaking points, and sticking points, baseness and fineness, all rolled into one confusing mass.

"Take a break." He ordered, and with no protest, men dropped on their sides, belayed their lines with ice axes, stopped and soaked in the bright sunlight glittering all across the half-mile wide sheet, and all the way down two miles to the base camp.

In three quick jump steps, letting gravity do the work, David came down next to Moran.  He showed him the coin.  On one side there was a high-browed, curly haired man with a prominent nose.  On the obverse side was a bas-relief of a man's hands holding up a globe with almost identifiable continents on it.  It was a good two ounces.

"Whoah. Another weird..."  Moran motioned toward his own backpack where the two of them had decided to stow the weird things they had found.  A half-burnt torch; a bronze short sword, a cracked jug decorated with what looked like swimming, and frolicing pleisiosaurs in blue ink on white ceramic were cradled in not-really-spare towels in the backpack.

"Yeah. Moran, give them a hot soup break.  Make sure that Miss Tough As Any Man finishes her soup, and that she's properly belayed off.  I do not want to chase her bouncing butt down the mountainside again."  A firm look enforced the command.
"Sir. Sorry, sir. I..."
"You took her seriously.  You thought all those TV commericals about how its the 80's, and Girl Power were for real, instead of finely calibrated skunk juice. 'To see what is in front of your nose is a constant struggle'  --Orwell."
"Well, let's just hope we can get thru '84 without Big Brother watching us, eh?" Moran replied with disgust.
"I'm going up top. See you in a bit."

David Crossland left the team behind, knowing they were in good hands.  It was his job to pick the course, and to remember the skill levels of those involved.  Only Moran and Doc Howell were close to his level of mountaineering skill.  And he was taller and stronger than both which helped a lot.

Going up, he got near the crest where the planned to put the unmanned lidar station.  It was the hope, the very classified hope, of the Reagan Administration that a blue-green lidar could spot Rooskie subs in up to a tenth of a mile water.  The lidar, unlike radar, was laser pulses, but worked on roughly the same principle.  Looking over the crest, he saw another harbor but five miles off, and the submarine traversed, so it was thought, waters beyond.

Without more ado, David began hammering in a long piton.  He worked quickly, methodically.  If he were spotted here from the city, it might raise questions, and given how the KGB had turned paranoia into a high and sacred art, that might mean the whole project would be a wash.

A voice shouted from below. It was Moran.

Some waves of snow had crossed the ocean of placid slope.  Fearing an avaalanche that might wipe out his team. he froze. And then the snow gave way under his feet.  He grasped the long piton more tightly, but to no avail.  He held it, but it did not hold the snow.

Falling admidst snow clouds, David forced his body to relax.  The drunk survived his car crash because he was loopy and loose whereas his victim was panicked and tightly bound by straining muscles and did not survive. But no floor smashed him, and the clouds dispersed so he could see further, even fifty feet down, and David Crossfield began to pray.  It was a regular thing with him, ever since his young wife had died, he had found the only thing that kept him going in the first year had been frequent conversations.  Now he just did it, and seeing as his life was ending, he felt it was a good time to chat.

And the snow parted, and far below him, hundreds of feet down he saw a wide circular pool.  A spurt of hope was rapidly shut down by reality.  At this height, hitting water was the same as hitting concrete.  Still the pool looked man-made, marble lined perhaps?  If he was going to die, he might as well sight-see on the way out.

Around him, a cavern with an open top, perhaps part of a volcano, spread two hundred feet across.  Black rock walls, and hey, what's that?  He saw statues running in a wandering line up the side of the caldera.  Each one titan sized, and the one further down having its head covering the foot of the one above.

Looking at the figures, he was struck by the skill of the artisans.  The robed figures almost seemed alive.  And the faces while expressive, and incredibly handsome, seemed realistic.  One man had a scar on his lip; another a twice-broken nose which made David wince to see the twenty foot tall man who looked as if he enjoyed fighting.  Another man had a clearly missing pinkie finger that looked as if something with more teeth than brains had snacked on him.

As he plunged and prayed and peered, he felt a smile come across his face.  He would soon be with Karen.  And the Almighty had given him a fascinating puzzle to ease the journey.  Far better than hacking out his lungs like his great-uncle had.

Some of the men had items in their hands.  Down at the bottom, or next to it, a man held a globe in his hand, a globe that seemed like the one on his coin.  And beyond him, was the start of a city like that of the Pueblos, built into a cliff overlooking the onrushing pool.   The man below him held out empty hands in a sign of pride, pointing to the city as if to say "I Built This!"

And with that, the meaning of the various items held in hands snapped into understanding.  The man with the globe held on his shoulder was a mapmaker.  And shockingly accurate for how ancient this site was.

And then his blood ran cold as he saw the man several generations? above the mapmaker.  This man held a long box, like a coffin, but it had a door in its side.

"No..." He began, and hit the water.

Not dead. was his first coherent thought as he thrashed about in bubbly wagter.  If Fenris had a doggie bowl filled with champagne, it would be like this.  Except that columns of liquid would rush forward in the shining liquid that glowed of its own accord.  All examined him, and most turned aside to other purposes.  A few grabbed him, slung him, and dumped him elsewhere.

Spluttering, he came to the surface underneath the shade of palm trees.  The heat smacked him in the face, quickly wicking his face dry.  An olive skinned face of nigh perfect symetry appealed like a dream.  Dark eyes, long lashes, and full lips over a slender neck, the long S-curve of her bent head and neck and upper back gracefully guarded by a back plate of shining dark hair they all came to a point with a flash of eyes, and a startled gasp.

A simple tunic of pure white cotton, belted by a gold chain showed her bare feet.  The quilted ruby vest tightly bound under her breasts to push them up surged as she took in a breath to flee.

"Stay." He flumbled out before falling face first back into the oasis. Rising again, in chest deep water, in the center of a sandy oasis with a baking heat that registered as awful and shocking, more so because of his recent past in the chills of Greenland's ice and wind. She looked curious, tilting her glorious head to the right to peer at him.

In the distance he heard yells, and cries of fury and fear.

"Stay.' He said again, noting a small box in her right hand, the color of the sand, in which things glimmered.

"Staff?" She asked.  There was a Germanic accent.  He knew that language as well as Russian and Spanish, and a bit of Mandarin, so he switched to it.

"Stay." He said, coming to the edge of the pool, the water falling away from him so that at first he was her height, when he was knee deep, and then he stood above her, with his ankles still wet.

She smiled faintly, and said in a German with an English accent that she could not stay.  But even as she shoved small bits into the box in her right hand, her actions fumbled, and were slow.  Was it fear, he wondered?  And then he looked up to see a man in black pantaloons, and sashed at the waist running down toward her under other palm trees.

Stepping swiftly around her, he felt the strap on his ice axe still around his wrist, and brought the tool up in a cross guard.  His enemy's sword was a crude, curved thing, one edged, like the poor, clumsy cousin of a falchion.  The charge of the shirtless man led him into a downward slash that David could have seen coming from the edge of the oasis where other groups of men fought.

A simple cross block did for the sword strike, but the sheer momentum had the man crashing into the unprepared David.  They both went down, but as the man raised up to pierce his sword point down into David's face, the mountaineer raked the crampons on the bottom of his boots all along the thigh of his would-be killer.  The man halted his action to scream, and without further thought, David drove the spiked back of the ice axe into the man's temple, killing him instantly.

Rising up, looking around, he saw the girl frantically packing diamonds into the small box.  To his right, a cluster of children, tents and other women shuddered, and wailed, and prayed.  Behind him, he heard movement, and he saw raiders kill two men, and begin to run off a couple dozen camels.  Off to the left, a hundred yards away, raiders were  battling what had to be the men of the oasis.

"You?" He asked the girl if she would be okay, but she misunderstood.
"I, Hider of Treasures." He blinked, and then understood.  Her job, in case of a raid was to gather up the portable loot, stuff it in a camoflaged box, and hide it.  But that changed his mind, and answered his question.
"No, your name?"
She blushed deeply.
"I, Marta Chief's Younger Daughter."
"I'll be back, Marta." He said, unconsciously imitating Ah-nold.  And he ran off, with her gaze heavy upon his back.

David was not sure what had happened.  He was not dead, since the Archangel Michael had not shown up to take him to see the Risen Christ.  That left a slew of possibilities starting with dreams, but he'd never wanted to visit desert sands.  Mountains were his thing.  Time travel? Alternate universe? Alien abduction by Grays?

But whatever the case, it was clear that the raiders main goal had been to steal the portable wealth of the community, the camels and the jewels, and then make off.  Even now, he could tell the raiders were less attacking and more defending.  If the men of the oasis lost the camels, they might well lose the tribe.

Running he came up to the last of the five detached raiders.  The man waited for him, with a poor falchion in hand, and a dagger in his waist sash.  A huge mustache drooped across a mocking mouth.

But David was a good head and a half taller than the man.  He had been tall back home in his job at the University of Chicago, but here, he was verging on giantic.  The running block shoved the sword back, and letting the weight of it spin him around, he then slammed the butt end of his axe with its spike on the bottom of the titanium carbide hammer through the back of the man's neck.

Slowing only to scoop up the man's sword, he turned and ran, almost into an arrow.  A quick, panicked side step kept his thigh intact.  Ahead of him, a bowman, with a tiny bow, a mere twenty inches tall, was reaching for another arrow.  A full tilt sprint, legs reaching high,  and there was not enough time.  But the pressure got to the archer, and he dropped the arrow.  David brought the axe down, and split his skull.

The remaining three raiders were trying to drive off the camels to a side unoccupied by combatants, and the camels were picking up speed.  One man leapt for the side of a camel, and using its hair climbed on up.  Regretting both needs, David came up behind one of the raiders, did for him by throwing the falchion.  And then leapt for the side of another camel.

The crampions dug in, and the camel stopped and screamed.  This gave David time to get to the top, leaving a hopefully superficial bloody trail behind.  Once atop, and it was a great way from the ground which swayed and wobbled unpredictably under the camel, he began to kick, yell, and beat his ride to get it moving again.  With a snort of disgust, and a spittle flecked wave of it lips, the beast set out moving again with the herd.

He kicked it, trying to get the beast moving faster, but it turned its head about and nearly took off a finger with a lightning fast strike that gashed off the back of his left hand.  Gritting his teeth in shock, David realized what generations of desert dwellers could have told him: camels were ill-mannered, rude, vicious beasts.

Without a better plan, he leapt to his feet, ignored the protest underfoot, waited for the buck, and rode it with his leap to the next camel up front.  That one yelled as well, and David took two steps forward, and prepared to jump.  But it collapsed sideways, not a true collapse, but enough that it threw him off to the right.  There he grabbed another camel about its neck, and hung there in front of it.

That beast took a notion to bite him, but it was well-used to shirtless men, or riders in tunics.  A thick, and increasingly hot mountain parka was no part of its plans.  David took the chance to climb around it, and then kick it into motion as it was on the right side of the herd.

Surging forward, getting up into a gallop that threatened at every step to toss him out onto the sand, he clung with crampion and grasp.  The raider on his left stayed the course, yet the group leader with a gash on his face heard the onrushing camel, and turned back to check, revealing his horrid face, and ruthless eyes. They yelled at each other, and with all too casual skill wheeled about as one.

David tried to drift off the spearpoint of their two joined camel heads, but they were too skillful riders to let him attack one on the flank when they could force him to fight two straight on.  Seeing this, David saw he had to do something unconventional, or breathtakingly stupid to surprise them.

He went strong to the right, and as they spun on their camel's hooves to face him, they got out of perfect alignment.  David threw the axe, and it tumbled once, way to slow.

Please. He prayed.

The raider bent low to control his camel, and the spinning blade caught him in the throat.  The raider leader gave him a perplexed look as he had just given up his bestmay his only weapon. Instead of trading glances, David came in, and leat from camelback, an unsettlingly high way up, grabbed his axe handle, and planted his feet on the leaders camels flank.  The leader came down with an awkward slash defeated by the mountain parka before his man's body swept him with it off the camels to land on David.  First the sand, then David on his back, then the leader, then the mere raider was the sandwhich. But as David fell, he put up his left arm  with his elbow pointed up, and as he planned, the leader landed throat first on David's elbow, crushing trachea and larnyx.

Pulling himself frantically, out of the pile of dead bodies, David got up and looked about.  The raiders were clearly disengaging, but the women were yelling.  Looking toward where they pointed, he saw a man in cunning sand colored garments had snatched up the girl and her box of stones, and made for the far edge of the oasis where horsemen awaited.

Speaking great vulgariities in his fury, David grabbed the once leader's camel, and his axe, and rose to go to war with a rebel yell.  The kidnapper startled to see him coming, and fled before his wrath.  And he followed, over the edge of the dell of the oasis, into a wide, and very strange world.

The End.
This message was last edited by the player at 15:32, Wed 06 Apr 2016.

Compelling Science Fiction magazine is looking for Hard SF short stories.
1. Based on an idea.  2. Engaging.  3. Illuminate and explain that idea.    Also, being positive is better.
==============================

After buying ten thousand cubic miles of Saturnian air, and fifty thousand embryos, and a Von Neuman robot factory, along with a dozen balloons the size of Yankee Stadium which he planned on cutting down to size, Chester tied  it all to his solar sailboat, the Apache Running with carbon nanotube wire, set his percomp the task of calculating a safe, not least time, course, and took a chill pill.  Inside the long needle of the center fuselage, wires grew taut as solar pressure winds bore down on the mylar 'reverse parachute'.

A normal parachute has lines going up to its edges, and the air pushes back, slowing the drop.  The RP looks much the same, but the solar winds bear down on the mile wide mylar sail, and the carbon nanotube wires transfer the energy to the capsule, which is where the drop device or person would be in a regular chute.  Tailing behind the capsule, held by wire are the other things Chester had bought from the Goblin Market in Lunar Orbit. And the whole thing moves very slightly, with each second increasing its speed as it headed outbound to the gas giants.

Thirty years later, still under the influence of the chill pill, which had cryogenically frozen him, he passed through the thin asteroid belt.  The place was practically empty, unlike the tales told by holo of rocks bumping into other asteroids.  Still, his percomp was able to call a fast mover to come and fix the third quadrant of the sail which had torn badly.  A ten mile slash was nothing to sneeze at. The space spiders he bought, or more precisely, his percomp, acting on previous inststruction, did so.  The spiders were flung by a mag-launcher owned by Thompson's Repair Service from his home asteroid in a looping orbit at many tenths of lightspeed, and they used Jupiter's gravity as they looped it thrice to slow down.  Then they had slowed enough to impact with less force than a feather hits Manhome.  There the spiders began tapping the sail for its electric current it gained from the solar wind, in order to move.  And as they moved, they stiched, each darn coming from the substance of the spider itself until the slash and the spiders were both gone.

Mars passed, and the distances grew longer.  Jupiter went when it was on the opposite side of the solar disc.  And Saturn loomed up ahead, still over a decade away.  The solar sail did some minor corrections.  And the Apache Running swept in, avoiding the storied rings because those bits of ice and rock which formed the rings would have overwhelmed Chester's spaceship like water hitting single ply toilet paper.

Coming to the Saturnian equivalanet of geocentric orbit, which on Manhome was 23,000 miles up, and on the vastly larger Saturn so much higher, Chester woke.

"I'm here to press my claim to Saturn Tract #418dzr currently held by Marslord Escrow, Ltd.." He radioed.
"Welcome to Saturn, noob. I'll trickle the Extremely Basic Saturn Welcome Wagon and Survival Guide to you over the next few hours on your slow link. For the record, what's your name?"
"My name is Chester.  I'm a clone of Chester Set Three who is a clone of..."
"Great Chester. Gotcha. Not our first Chester out here.  You guys tend to do well."  There was a pause. "And the voice ident says its you, and we have you registered. Welcome again to  Saturn, Freeholder.  This is Luis the Voice,  personal singer for when you get tired of perfect computer recordings, and want a real human voice on the lasercom."

The bit of self-advertisement past, a satellite in higher orbit began firing a low power laser which reflected as a red dot off the upper clouds of Saturn.  Chester began winding in the sail until it was only a hundred yards across, and so folded on itself to be much, much tougher.  Then he signalled go, and another sat fired a more powerful laser and began pushing him forward.  With skills inborne, Chester the clone of a clone, followed the red dot down.  Above him, the projection of the guiding dot, and the power pulse passed from sat to sat as Saturn pulled him ahead of them.

The buffetting winds made the can howl, and not for the first time in his life, Chester prayed to the Creator of the System, and the Galaxxies beyond.  Given that a block of quantum demistable ceramic could hold all the personal data of everyone of the fifty billion humans alive, and all the histories and other creations of Man for the last seven thousand years, Chester figured the Almighty would have better computers than the ones available for a months skilled labor, and sent up a private email with the heading of "HELP!".  As soon as he did, he remembered all the data that pointed out the extreme safety records of his type of very flimsy, but precisely engineered can.  Comforted, he gritted his teeth, and piloted downward until he arrived in his Freehold.

It was ten miles deep, ten miles wide, and a hundred miles long, a vast rectangular cubic space, and by law, and custom, it was all his.

The guide laser cut out, followed by the power pulse, and he started to drift in the winds.  Quickly he hit the deploy button.  At first large balloons scooped in air from the repurpsed main sail winch drive as he slowly fell.  With a bit of nervousness, he saw the bottom of his Freehold approach.  No one owned the lower one, except for the bank, and banks were legally forbidden from pressing trespassing charges for anything less than a month.  It was a battle between gravity of Saturn five hundred miles below, and the balloons, with air resistance, and the occasional fluke of wind gusts of a hundred miles an hour and higher playing a part.

Chester took an anti-nausea pill.

At a mile above the bottom of his Freehold, he began to steadily rise.  A second set of balloons began filling, and the first were being transformed into much larger set of solar heated air pumps.  Chester had been in transit for a long sleep, and three months, and he was getting tired of his tiny space.

The A set of balloons became solar pumps, and the B set held everything up, with the following C set acting as air anchors, which had not been the plan, but that was why Chester was here, in part.  The C balloons sent out hither and yon on miles long cables which being in differing winds helped keep the center mass reasonably stable for wide values of 'stable'.

The D set of balloons was a lesser air pump with a heating array, and moving balloons.  In short, it was a solar powered, not steam engine, but hot air engine, which turned heat into motion, and motion into electricity.  By now, there were some forty balloons of varying sizes in Chester's Freehold.

And with electricity came battery replenishment.  Then water, and a bath.  Then lasercom links with the Nearby Saturn Area of fifty thousand miles.  When that door opened, it enabled a link to Manhome Lasercom, and he squirted a message back to his clonefather.  After that, he began 'surfing the local Net', picking up useful tips, he told himself, but really getting himself in his mind out of the small can.

He paid Luis for a birthday song, and had a party for a dozen 'guests' spread out over twenty thousand mile half-sphere.  Some of his new friends were freeholders, and others were crewdogs on Saturn run tramp ships, and some mined the rings, and others manned repair stations in high Saturn orbit, and one couple was down on Saturn itself.

Balloon set E began as a free-floating pod, and F was its air anchor.  Midway through F, he realized that C and F's wires were bound to get tangled in a good windstorm, and so reluctantly, he built G as a mover.  G had large, sail shaped balloons, and each sail was set so as to catch the wind and send the great mass of twelve balloons, each as large as a five story building, at least, in the right direction.  Again, with wide values of 'right'.  It steered like a drunk pig.

G moved E and F to the far end of his freehold, and stayed there.  Being very cautious, he built I as an air anchor, and stationed it clear of his main area.  Then he built J, which was only five balloons, and then several more in the center, a flower's petals and a center.    Heat turned to motion, and the outer petals spun, sucking in air, and expelling it, making them even faster rocket wise.  Soon, he had some inquiries if he was making a weapon, and he explained carefully that he was not.  Although he acknowledged the concerns gravely for J could certainly be used as a weapon.  It spun at over three hundred rpm which could give a lot of velocity to a dart attached to it, and aimed at another freehold.

But instead,  he took one of his valuable cameras and set it on J, and gave open access to its controls so that anyone who wanted to look around could do so.  That simmered down the complaints.

Inside J, air came in, and purified air, filtered for various dust and liquid particles, went out.  And the piles of dust grew.  And the piles of dust were sorted into various piles, such as hydrocarbons, iron, and silicon.

The Von Neuman factory came on, in fits and starts, at a very low power.  A mile long tube balloon ran from J to the VNFactory.  Electricity ran from the home can.  New balloons, inferior true, but new were being built.

A month later, Chester moved into his 'Mansion', a set of a dozen balloons that he could run around in, with full oxygen and pressure.  The Dozen Roomed Mansion floated above the Home Can, and the balloons supporting it, and helped hold up the rising weight of the VNFactory as it gathered power and built itself into a larger design.  It did not evolve, for that was random.  It operated according to an incredibly precise plan, and human judgment.

Six months later, it had doubled in size, and K, L, and M were supplying power with heat>motion>electricity engines.  N, O, and P were holding things up, and Q was C, but tripled in size.  A good blow came, and the whole mass barely moved.  Other less, conservative designs ended up yelling for help, and salvagers came and rescued them, in turn for the standard 10% of valuables contract.  But Chester avoided that disaster.

A year later, and he had his Thousand Balloon Party with an actual guest physically present, and congratulations from all over the Demisphere he lived in.  He received a message from the Chester Collective back home 'we're proud of you, boy.'.

He spent the day in joy, and had a feast from his new hydroponics room built on to the Main Can.  With songs of rejoicing, and a dazed look, he spent the day, and then his visitor was gone, and it was back to work.

One of Saturn's megavolt lightning bolts hit some of Q and fried a dozen balloons in a quarter of a second, and almost took down his Net, but the breaks functioned as advertised.  Leary of a multi-bolt strike, he bought more breakers.

In another year, he had his first Acre.  It was a platform inside a balloon the size of Yankee Stadium, and here on good earth an inch thick, with hydroponic trees he had traded for, and covered by grass, and all this above a silicon-iron alloy a millimeter thick which formed the base of the Acre with the great balloon's upper part arcing expansively above him, he opened the first package from the creche.  Each small blob was a human being.  The VNF had built the incubators which were aligned on the Acre.  Attending them was a robot nanny.

He offered a prayer which was popular among new parents.  "Please, God, don't let me mess this up."  And he put the small package with its dozen even smaller humans into the incubator.  The machine tested, and lights went green.

Good to go.

Six months later, the first Human babies were born to Chester's Freehold.  They cried, they pissed, and they fussed.  Luckily by then, the VNF had made another dozen bots.  Somehow the babies broke two of the bots, which were supposedy milgrade.  And Chester got less sleep even as he watched in amazement, and spent his days playing and reading to his little charges.

There were rules for this type of thing.  It was easy enough to tell your little ones that you were Baal or Zeus, and sometimes when they cried and fretted, Chester understood the ancient parental warning.  "I brought you into this world, and by George, I can take you out."  But all such was verboten in the extreme.  No one wanted a repeat of the Jihadi creches of the later TwenOne.

At three years of age, he put in three dozen.  When those were three, he put in ten dozen.  Twenty years later, and Chester's Freehold had thousands of children and hundreds of apprentices (for 'teenagers' was another concept that was verboten), and even his first natural born birth.

It had not been planned, but by chance, and a small gain from that chance that led to another similar advantage, that Chester's Freehold became the Hoarder's Capital of Saturn.  There were those who even in a modern day, with three-d printing, they wanted actual objects instead of a pile of feed stock, some software planes and energy.  These 'Hoarders' took up lots and lots of space with their things like collections of All the Dodge Trucks ever made and so forth.  Well now, such Hoarders had a place to hold their stuff, and even display it.  It was called a Museum, but really, Chester's Freehold was the storage shed of Saturn.

And this is but one of the stories in how the Clone Lords tried to rule the future by making it full of themselves.  Or as they sent him a message. "Well done, Lord Chester." And he smiled, and made a clone of himself, and sent it when it was old enough out toward Pluto.

The End.

Jackson Taylor's Character:
==============================
Name:Jackson
Race: Dwarf
Has a 'Helpful Hand' unused buff.

Relationships:
1. Attic Archivist: Acquaintance of Mine
2. Alchemist Guild of the Library of Rhodes City: Potentially Dangerous Renegade
3. Worldmaker Paladin, Level 240: Promising Young Chap
Languages:
English: Level 20, fully competent adult speaker level
Panfluorion, dialetical language of scholars, Level 2, childish

Skills:
Alchemy Level One
Acrobatic Fall: -1% less damage from falls
Analyze Level 3

Qualifier
1. Lawbreaker, minor

Bonuses: (spent)
1. +1 to Intelligence
2. +1 to Dexterity

Level 2
1. 10% bonus to one skill or attribute

Unformed had a uniform 20% reduce damage buff, could not drown, or be charmed, or have their non-existent blood drank by a vampire.  On the down side, they were never Trusted, had a distinct decline in Charm, and could not run.

Attributes
+++++++++++++
Muscle O +10%
Dexterity 1+1
Toughness 8
Wisdom 0 +1
Intelligence 1+1+1
Charm

Remaining points 10

Titles: the Honest, Weaponmind, Fellhanded, Ghost in the Attic

Inventory
===========
Small, short story (2)
Basic Easter Egg
Wooden short sword
Ragged pants, jeans, armor 3
Ragged tunic like t-shirt armor 0
Yellow token
Potion of Health, small
Potion of Mana, small

Money
======

Fame 10 +5
=====

Oath of Eternal Enmity against Lords of the Red Death Fame +10, Wisdom and Intelligence +1 (spent)

Up to just before his strike on a librarian.
This message was last edited by the player at 19:12, Thu 28 Apr 2016.