[Solo] Mayu, the Barbarian

[Mayu]

Mayu opened her eyes slowly. She was sitting back to a wall of an unknown building. She looked around. The place was packed. It wasn't her room, that was for sure. And she wasn't sitting before her computer screen either. It was a peculiar place, an unknown to her. The people before her were also not types she ever saw before. They looked like a bunch of misfits taken from one of those conventions her fiance's brother attended. Wearing colourful armour and weaponry, they all shown the signs of confusion.



"Elder Tale! This is Elder Tale!" someone shouted. A crazy statement. How could they be in a video game? In flesh? Flesh... she quickly got up. Something was not right. She was taller, a lot taller. It was strange. She started to check her body. Instead of her normal chubbiness she found a tall, sporty figure. Her skin seemed to be slightly tanned, her hair of brown colour. She moved her finger along her own lips. It found a small, hard protrusion coming from within her mouth, a fang most likely. She noticed a small puddle just few feet away from where she stood. She made a step in its direction. It was strange. Walking seemed a lot harder than it used to be. She deduced that it was probably due to her hight and different balancing of her body. After carefully strolling to the water, she looked into the shallowness. It reflected the sky, the clouds and someone. She somewhat knew the face. She finished "sculpting" it just few minutes ago. Or maybe hours? She wasn't sure. Anyway, the reflection belonged to her character from Elder Tale- Mayu. To be more precise- she WAS Mayu. At least that was what it seemed like. She touched her nose and so did the woman in the puddle. It was certain, it was her now.



"What happened!? Why are we here!"

"I want my mom!"

"Fire up you fuses bioches! Its party time!"



Mayu was so occupied with this situation that she forgot about the people around her. She could feel both panic and excitement that filled the place. Some people seemed to be in ecstasy while some in total despair. What was for certain to her was that it was too crowded here. She decided to split.



***



Slowly but surely, she walked. Or rather tried to. Almost every step was followed by sudden lose of balance and near toppling over. After around 15 minutes of moving she found herself next to a small house standing amongst the bigger buildings. The cries and screams of people were just a background noise coming from a distance. She assessed the small building before her. It's windows were broken, the doors were laying beside the entry leaning on the wall. Since the previous expansion all of the buildings were explorable and could be bought. She slowly walked into the small cottage. Nothing blocked her so she assumed that either the building was just a piece of scenery or that the game rules did not apply any more.



She walked into a small room with a pane-less window on the wall opposite to the entry. Both sides were lined with boxes full of something that looked like debris. She sat down on the edge of one of the said containers. It was quiet here. She could finally begin analysing the situation. Unlike others she felt neither fear nor wonder. She was simply indifferent. No matter how she looked at it, she still did not care about what happened, just like she would in the real world.



She pondered. If this really was Elder Tale why was she and the others in it? Was there some kind of a signal given by the game that simply hypnotised her and made her somehow dream all of this. She pinched her cheek very hard. The pain she felt was certainly real. If it was not hypnosis then what? Did an alien kidnap her when she booted up the game or what? She stretched. As she brought her arms down, something happened. A menu appeared. She winked few times. The screen was still there. She raised her hand and moved her finger along the buttons. A window titled "Character" appeared.



"Mayu, level 1 Samurai" it said. It also displayed all of her statistics and the skills she picked. She knew this interface quite well- it was similar to what she used previously when playing the game. She fiddled for a bit with the various screens. When reviewing her equipment an idea suddenly struck her. She quickly closed all other windows and brought up the system menu. She pressed the logout button. Nothing happened. She pressed it few more times. Still nothing. It simply did not work.
_________________

Words: 797

[Mayu]

Mayu sat there in that little abandoned cottage she found. The menu was still before her eyes. She kept it open as she was not sure how to bring it up after closing. Then it struck her. What if she died? What if this was some kind of a purgatory for her to suffer for all the bad things she did? What would her family do when they found her cold, dead body sitting in the chair before the monitor, dangling from it like a broken bauble on a Christmas tree which just suffered a close meeting with one of those little, spazzy cousins of her. She felt something. Something unusual for her. Fear- she couldn't recall when was the last time she felt it. Her chest felt heavy, as if someone put one of those medicine balls you use during rehabilitation at the hospital on it.

In about two weeks she was supposed to get married. Her fiancé, Tim, he was a good lad. Smart, caring, never did an evil to a single soul. She bore no feelings for him... however he had something that made her normal, gray and boring days a bit more colourful and warmer. When he proposed she couldn't just reject him. She knew she would probably regret agreeing but she did it anyway, on a whim. Now an image of the poor sod, sobbing over a small, dark green vase containing her ashes appeared in her head. Her body suddenly deflated, like a peacock who just saw another one with feathers even more magnificent than his. Her tummy started to act weirdly, as if a lump of ice manifested itself inside. She felt terrible... but she welcomed those feelings. In the past she felt little to nothing. Everything was hazy now. Anxiety and powerlessness were... refreshing. A bunch of different thoughts went through her head. She had to make sure if she has indeed perished... she did not know how to go about it. She could either stay here, to ponder for a bit more or be more proactive and go into the world. Staying here would bring her nothing... but at the same time she felt that she needed a bit more time...

After a minute or two Mayu clenched her fists, sprung up, like a viper attacking its victim who just stumbled upon it, and directed herself to the exit.

Staying here won't change anything. I need to know what is going on!

***

Two days have passed. The woman went round town, gathered intel in the only way she was capable of- by listening. It seemed that no one was sure why they were transported to Elder Tale. Her body seemed to be a legit thing however- she felt hunger. When she was moving around starving, one of the npc heard her tummy growling. The little girl, who was the said npc, chuckled and gave her few apples. She ate half of them instantly, enjoying every bit of their sweet, juicy interior. Since she was incapable of speaking, she had to use a non verbal ways of communication in form of bowing before the little thing. The little girl found it to be quite entertaining. After "saying" their good byes, Mayu continued on. After few hours she found out something peculiar. She overheard a conversation between a dwarf and a werecat. From what she understood the food items sold by the npcs tasted like cardboard. No matter how good looking or complicated the dish- it tasted the same. It was curious to her, especially since the apples she had before tasted normally. Strange.

She wandered for few more hours and went back to the abandoned cottage she found on the first day. She made it her base of operation since no one seemed to be wandering around that part of town.

***

The next day she woke up early. The sun was slowly crawling from beyond the horizon as she stood at the entry to the cottage. She unsheathed her sword. It was a starting weapon of low quality, a simple two handed Japanese blade. She gave it few swings. Its swishing as it cut through the air resounded in her head. She actually liked that sound. An idea poped up in her head. She opened her menu. In town yesterday she learnt that pressing your finger before you brought it up. She had no clue how someone came up with it and frankly, she didn't care. She opened the skill menu and clicked her Ace Move: Youkaigiri. The blade of her sword began to glow with bright cyan colour. She looked around. She moved towards the old doors standing next to the entry and cut at them. The blade went trough them without damage and the glow disappeared. The process of using skills seemed to be quite cumbersome. She failed to see how could it be usable in combat as it required a lot of time to perform. Maybe if she trained a bit.

Training, huh?


___________

Words: 836

[Mayu]

Training, or rather levelling would be what any player would do. But this wasn't a game any more. She, or rather anyone, could not be sure as to what dangers loomed outside the city borders. The monsters could either be extremely weak, like they should be in a starting zone of any game... or they could turn out to be a lot more furious than one can imagine. In her previous voyages into the world of Elder Tale on the European server, she would start every new character by doing basic quests which involved fighting weak monsters. She usually died few times when doing so because of, for example, pulling too many monsters at the same time. Her character would then respwan in the nearest cathedral. Alas, it was in the game... and this was not a game, it was reality... at least that's what her conclusion was after all this thinking she had during those past few days... and in reality after dying you do not respwan. She felt restless. Up till now she never gave it a thought but where would she get money from for food? She knew nothing of craft or such. While one of her subclasses was a blacksmith, she herself knew of blacksmithing as much as she could remember from that visit to one of those culture fairs when she was 12. Again, in game she would simply bash some mobs and pick up the loot they left. It would contain some money, maybe an item or two. She would sell the items she couldn't use and gain money that way. The situation was grim. A cold chill went through Mayu's back as she imagined herself starving to death... Not knowing what to do she ventured into the streets.

***

Another day has passed. Seeing her scraping for food, one of the NPCs gave her a few carrots. Only then another thing occurred to her- that the NPCs, people of the land as they were called in Elder Tale, were not only few pixels on the screen with a line of code or two behind them. They were normal people. The girl from few days back, now this fellow. An NPC would not take pity on her... it would simply stand in its assigned position, waiting for players in order to give them the same, boring quest each time. Here, the landers were like normal people. They seemed to have their own problems, their own lives. She saw other adventurers trying to attack some of them. Luckily the Royal Guard, a remnant from when this was just a game, stopped them in time.

As Mayu walked down the street, towards the cathedral she saw a large commotion. A huge group of adventurers stood in the circle around someone. The woman approached them curiously.

"... then I saw a bright light! And the next thing I knew I was in the cathedral, alive once more!"
"You sure brah!? You're telling the truth?!"
"Kurva, this is great!"
"Aye! Aye! This changes everything!"

Since she could not speak she was unable to ask what was going on... However the amount of information she received was enough. It seemed as if not only the Royal Guards carried over from the game but also the respawn system. A sudden warmth took a hold of her, as if a blanket of hot air wrapped itself around her cold, stressed body. This indeed changed everything! While not most fast paced and flashy, she found combat to be the most entertaining part of Elder Tale. Then again this wasn't Elder Tale any more... It did not matter. She decided- it was time to pull herself together and make some gold. Plus it would put her mind at ease, it would give her something to do. And few levels would not hurt.

___________

Words: 639