Initializing

by K. T. Hanna

  This time as she set out, the light was still bright enough even though the sun was setting, and she had no qualms about the path at all. Considering she was three levels higher than the last time, there wasn’t much to be worried about.

  And then group chat lit up.

  Beastial: Change of plan, Mur. We’re headed toward the Wolf city, Ululate. There should be a wagon just inside your city walls, I hope it hasn’t left yet. Pay two silver and jump on it. Make sure it’s going in the right direction.

  What? Why? Murmur was already changing direction and jogging back the way she came, activating her meager sprint ability.

  Devlish: Because the skeletons are measly. No meat, and very little profit in them. Money makes the world go around. Even this one. We just got on the wagon from Nocturn.

  Beastial: I was checking while I ate. I think, if I read it correctly, there are bandit camps over that way.

  Murmur smiled. Well that sound like fun. I’m in.

  She only just made it and as she ran around the corner of the huge metal gate. Her sudden appearance caused the horses in front of the wagon to shy.

  “So, sorry.” She said, activating Soothe and watching the wild eyes of the animals lose their glaze. “I’m headed to Ululate.”

  The young human man at the head of the cart eyed her, his gaze just short of a leer. “Awright then, lass, is it? That’ll be three silver because ya done spooked meh horses.”

  Murmur handed him two silver, focused on his eyes, and projected her will through her charisma.

  “Take yer seat.” He blinked at her, and at the coins, shaking his head as if he’d forgotten something, and waved her through to the seating area where three other passengers had already taken their place. Then he clicked at the horses to make them move. The cart was surprisingly comfortable, its suspension better than Murmur anticipated.

  As they rolled out of the city, the young man smiled, his leer gone. “My name’s Jan. Nice to meet ya.”

  “Murmur.” She answered, checking her stats quickly as a sneaking suspicion rose in her mind. Sure enough, as the horses moved into a trot, she found it.

  Hidden skill activated—Thought Projection.

  Class: Enchanter only.

  Level—not applicable.

  Developing your inner senses has further developed your psychic powers. Thought Projection can be tricky. Make sure you never use it in anger, or the results might be surprising. With frequent use your skills will increase, while the opposite will occur should the skill not be used. See your trainer for specifics when you reach Thought Projection (25).

  Your hidden skill Thought Projection has increased in potency. Current status: Thought Projection (1)

  She frowned, and glanced back at the three other people in the wagon, and wondered why she hadn’t noticed the vehicle before.

  “Jan,” she asked. “Does the wagon leave often?”

  “Na miss. A few times a day. I do a trip to Stellaein, Ululate, then Frangit, and back again. It’s not much, but it’s a livin’. This is my last run for the night. I’ll be staying in Ululate. I don’t like to go out in the dark.” He flashed a smile back at her, but kept his eyes mostly on the horses and the road in front of them. “Might I ask what brings ya out this way?”

  “Meeting some friends near Ululate.”

  Are we meeting in the city or outside of it? She shot to her friends.

  Havoc: We’re going to need to bind, so at the binder would probably make sense.

  He had a point; she didn’t want to make that run back if she died.

  “Well you be careful, mind. Ululate is a fine city, but there’s been some bandit activity of late, so make sure you’re inside the walls before dark.”

  Be cautious around Ululate. Tales of Bandits have spread far and wide. They hide near the foothills in the caves beneath the peaks. Each cave is said to be a warren, from which few adventurers return. It’s even said that theses bandits have slain foes far and wide, retrieving items of all sorts of importance.

  With the horses moving at a brisk trot, the scenery passed by a lot faster than on foot. A light breeze ruffled her hair, and the smell of the earth was lively. Murmur leaned back and ran the words of yet another vague quest through her head. Her level three robe was tattered. It was time to start getting serious. About leveling, about gear, and about reaching the end game to find those forsaken keys.

  Climbing down from the wagon, Murmur stood in shock at the difference from her species’ hometown. The streets were cobbled stone, with wooden structures all around. The deep red wood gave a cheerful vibe to the whole area, unlike the serene atmosphere she’d grown used to.

  Ululate was nice. Homey feeling. She even found herself smiling as it lightened her mood. Reflexively she adjusted her thought shield and made sure she’d be aware of anything dangerous. While right now it seemed to require constant vigilance to make sure it was activated, it had already proved its usefulness once.

  It would likely take the others a bit longer to reach the city since Nocturn was farther, so she walked farther into the city and stopped at a bulletin board. Smack bang in the middle was a wanted sign. Placing her hand on it, a flash of information sped across her eyes faster than she could read. She had to pull up the log to find it.

  Wanted!

  Dul’uak the mayor of Ululate has put a price on Darjin the Bandit Leader’s head.

  Task: Venture to the northwest of Ululate and find the Bandit Leader in one of the caves. Return his head to Dul’uak

  Level Range: 8+

  Difficulty: Group

  Reward: Experience.

  Faction: Unknown

  Murmur pursed her lips as she read. This was the first quest that took on a quest format. It was...underwhelming. After everything she’d been through, she didn’t even realize there were normal MMO styled quests. As she turned around and surveyed the bustling city, she also realized she’d never actually visited the city portion of Stellaein, with its shops and businesses. She checked her money stash, which amounted to almost twenty-two gold, and headed off toward the vendors.

  There were carts around a central statue of a robust luna, its face tilted up toward the sky as if casting something in that direction to encourage the beautiful fountain. Murmur headed for the store she saw with a tailor’s symbol.

  Walking in, she admired the soothing greens that adorned the shop walls. On a rack to the left were robes. With a smile she walked over, and leafed through them.

  “May I help you?” The luna lady looked at her with kind eyes, which were nestled within soft brown fur. Her muzzle mirrored a slightly lighter brown, and her ears were small. Her form sang out that she was a proud wolf, and she carried herself with pride. And her thoughts were mundane enough that they didn’t set off any warning bells.

  “I’m looking to upgrade this.” Murmur gestured to her robe, and then the rest of her body as she realized it had all come from dead skeletons.

  “Which attributes are you hoping to boost, young lady?”

  She sounded like Murmur’s grandmother. “Intelligence and Charisma mainly.”

  “Excellent.” The shopkeeper rummaged through the rack for a few moments before deftly pulling out a pale lavender robe, a dark purple belt, and a matching set of bracers, and shoes. “The pants I have only have armor class on them, though.”

  Murmur hurried to reassure the lady. “That’s perfectly okay. Would you happen to have a cloak?”

  “I’m sorry. Not at the moment, that’s something usually left to master crafters.”

  After inspecting the gear and being satisfied with the set’s statistics as a whole, Murmur steeled herself and asked for the price.

  “Seven gold and eight silver.”

  Murmur cringed, but changed into the gear after forking over her hard earned cash. She seriously needed to get some cloth and learn how to freaking sew. The robe added two points each to Charisma and Intelligence. The bracers were another one point boost to Intelligence, and the
shoes did the same for Charisma. Better than a hit in the head with a sack of cement. “Thank you.” She said, and walked out of the shop, straight into Jirald’s chest. She stumbled slightly, the height of her locus body giving her a momentary unsteadiness. His arm slipped around her waist with a touch that was far too familiar.

  “Hey you!” He grinned. His arm lingered, and his fingers drew tiny circles on the fabric of her robe.

  She took a step back, trying to break the contact, but he held on. “Hey yourself.”

  “Level eight already?” He cocked an eyebrow, his face uncomfortably close. “I’m almost there myself, but not quite.”

  Murmur narrowed her eyes, and deliberately gripped his hand almost as hard as she could and removed it firmly, locking her eyes onto his for emphasis. “Great for you.”

  Jirald’s eyes sparkled with something just this side of evil, and Murmur had to steel herself against backing up farther. Her gut screamed at her not to give any ground to this guy, because he’d just keep taking. She had no clue what his deal was, but she did know he needed to get the fuck away from her. Just as she was about to verbalize the thought, Devlish’s voice rang out over the crowd.

  “Oy! Mur! You’ve been neglecting chat again!”

  Relieved at the interruption, Murmur barely gave him another glance before walking quickly to join them.

  “I don’t like him, Mur.” Sin muttered, as they headed back to the gate.

  “Yeah. I’ve noticed.” Murmur knew without a doubt that Sin’s instincts were right. She just didn’t know what the fuck Jirald’s problem was.

  They sat off to the side of the gate on a set of benches obviously reserved for travelers, picnics, or perhaps smokers. Devlish stood, hands on his hips, holding out the scroll to Murmur, his eyes pleading with her.

  “C’mon Mur. Do it. Do it. Do it.”

  “Pleeeease,” intoned Sin and Merlin at the same time, directing a beseeching look to Havoc.

  He raised his hands in a sign of self-defense. “Don’t look at me. You’re the ones she’s going to shove into a box and pour cement over.”

  Murmur chuckled despite her irritation, and finally snatched the bloody scroll out of Dev’s hands. “Fine.”

  Guild Charter.

  Must contain the signatures of the guild master and five others. The actual guild charter must be filled out within five Somnian days or the guild will be dissolved and the charter is void.

  “But the deal stands. I’ll lead, but I’m not fucking doing anything.”

  “You realize that’s an oxymoron, right?” Havoc grinned at her.

  “Yeah, yeah, shut up.” She activated the area for the name and looked at everyone. “Same as usual, right?”

  “Of course,” they chorused.

  Shrugging and belatedly reflecting on how much blood this pale robe was going to show, Murmur filled in the names, and signed next to her own. A couple of minutes later with the charter fully signed, it swirled in the air and a shower of sparks flew around it before it sank back into her hand. Murmur activated the guild interface and made the others officers for now, knowing she’d be able to adjust the rest of the roles at a later date.

  Inspecting Sin, Murmur smiled.

  Sinister

  < Fable>

  Officer

  “Perfect.” She smiled, and then laughed. “Maybe we should send out feelers to some of our former guildies, eh?”

  Beastial grinned. “I thought you’d never ask.”

  Murmur decided to try and test the HUD. Without pulling it up fully, or even accessing her quest log, she directed the game to share the Bandit Leader’s Head quest. Sure enough, after a few moments, everyone had accepted it.

  “Weird.” Havoc stood up, stretching. His pet mimicked him in an oddly satirical way. “Haven’t seen a quest type quest since we logged in here. Most seem to be activated depending on situation and skill.”

  “Or conversation,” added Murmur, happy to find out that she wasn’t the only one in her group to have noticed. The thing was, with something as complex as the system seemed to be, she wasn’t sure if all players would notice they were quests, or even if they’d activate them. Unless they investigated further, she could see a lot of people taking the scrolling text as a simple bit of information to interpret the area with.

  “So glad I’m not the only one being tormented by persistently vague quests.” Sin stood up and stretched too, wiggling her hips as she did.

  Murmur laughed. “I can’t believe you actually do that in-game.”

  “Do what?” She glanced at Murmur, an eyebrow raised in surprise.

  “That stretching wiggle thing you always do.”

  Sin opened her mouth, but closed it again, her cheeks reddening. She finally shook her head and cleared her throat.

  “We still need to bind ourselves to a gating spot. And I’m not traveling all the way from Nocturn to get here.” Sin looked around, obviously trying to find someone who could fulfill the task.

  Merlin frowned. “I’ll take a run around and find a priest or someone.”

  Murmur sat down, feeling out the crowd. Slivers of thought made their way to her, dissipating before she could make sense of them. From her experience so far, that simply meant there was nothing much to find. She wondered if it could grow powerful enough to just pluck the thoughts from someone’s head.

  It didn’t take Merlin long to uncover someone, and they followed him up to the center of the city. Away from the path surrounding the fountain, under several nicely grown trees, stood a very nondescript human in a plain beige robe.

  Murmur tried to look at him to get a feel for his description, but the more she tried to focus on him, the fuzzier his visage became. She frowned as she waited her turn to be bound to the spot, wondering what the motivation was behind a character players couldn’t remember. An idea forming, she probed the area around him. His eyes manifested a bright blinding cobalt for a split second, making eye contact with her briefly before going back to what he was doing. Shit. Maybe that hadn’t been a good idea.

  You notice a strange man in Ululate. His features are indistinguishable, and his aura has an electric charge. While his actions don’t betray a purpose, you can’t help wondering what it is. Be wary, and remember to shield well.

  Thought shielding (25). Congratulations. You will find it more difficult to strengthen your internal powers from here on in.

  Scowling, as the bright golden sparks of binding shone around her character, Murmur activated her quest list and sighed.

  “What’s up?” Havoc’s voice was right at her ear, his breath hot and startlingly real, making her jump.

  “Sorry Mur.” His eyes lit up in shock and he stepped away. “Didn’t mean to startle you.”

  “S’ok.” She smiled, not sure why she was uneasy. She’d known Havoc almost as long as she’d been playing MMOs. He had an excellent grasp on class, no matter what he played, but he was often the serious one, and yet she’d never felt uncomfortable around him. Maybe it was because she’d been so deep in thought. He didn’t say things to get a rise out of anyone, nor did he deliberately try to make sexist jokes to break the mood. She felt like she owed him an apology.

  Something about the binder had her on edge. “Just a bit jumpy. Probably tired.”

  “Aren’t we all,” Devlish laughed it off as they approached the gate again, but Sin’s eyes wouldn’t leave Murmur, and she knew she’d probably be inundated with messages shortly.

  Don’t stay. Flee. Don’t activate the transition.

  Murmur whipped her head around, trying to see where the stray thought came from, but apart from people walking to and from the gate, nothing stood out to her. No one was watching her, no one seemed overly agitated. This ability was going drive her batty. Slotting it away in the notes section that she’d yet to use, Mur tried to crack her neck and release the tension that was slowly building up. What fucking transition?

  Sinister: What’s wrong with you?

  Nothing. T
hat new ability is just... kind of heavy.

  Sinister: Heavy? Like a weight, or heavy intellectually?

  The latter.

  Sinister: Want to talk about it?

  Mur smiled. Maybe later, when I figure out what it’s even doing to me.

  Sinister: Speaking of which...

  She glanced at Mur and indicated the others.

  Murmur took a deep breath.

  “So you know; I knew the skeletons were coming because I activated this weird ability called Thought Sensing. Anything remotely interesting or dangerous in our proximity will sort of leak through to me.” Her tone was bored. By now she wasn’t exactly sure the ability was a boon at all. Maybe it was a testing ground to see who would go insane with actual voices playing in their head at random instances.

  Beastial blinked at her, the others not far behind in reactions. Mostly they just gaped. The large viking ran a hand through his hair. “So you can hear our thoughts?”

  He seemed uncomfortable, and Mur was pretty sure his thoughts might involve certain characteristics of the female form. She grinned. “Only if you’re thinking something that could affect us, or be dangerous to us, or to me personally. I think. I’m still figuring it out. It sort of sifts through things, like flour.”

  “Baking analogy.” Dev reached out and ruffled her hair again. “Nice one, Mur. Also, I don’t like you being as tall as me. It makes treating you like my little sister harder.”

  Murmur laughed. “Then don’t. I don’t need you to protect me, in fact, maybe I’ll end up protecting you.” She winked at him, and they all laughed, although she wasn’t sure why since she wasn’t joking.

  An idea occurred to her. “We’re all going to have to craft in our downtime, you realize.”

  “What downtime?” grumbled Beastial.

  “Hey, better than nothing.” Murmur put her hands on her hips and glared at them. “When we start to pull away in levels and establish the guild. Or we could just recruit good crafters.”

  Beastial frowned and started scanning his HUD again. “I’ll keep an eye out. We might not want to wait that long.”