"Quest reward in Zailleon," Rua told her. He could see her nervousness, and wondered if she was terribly familiar with the game--it didn't seem like it. "I got the egg, hatched it, and she's bonded to me now."

He glanced behind him, but didn't see anyone paying much attention to them. He turned back to Terrel, whom Relayia was watching in an idle manner. Her attention had been attracted by the woman's change in behavior. "Anyway, she won't cause any trouble, I think," he continued, and motioned upwards with his arm. "Go on, Rel. Find me something about Kasdim-Ur."

Relayia steadied herself on his arm, giving the swordsman a reproachful look over her shoulder and wing, chirping again. He motioned again, and this time the dragonet took off, flapping her wings and gusting Terrel's hair in the process.

"And now we should go ask someone who works here for help," Rua said as he watched Relayia begin her search.

Terrel flinched as the thing flew right by her head, but she recovered quickly as the dragonet flew out of their sights. "Right, yeah, good idea. These people are usually helpful, right?"

Rua shrugged. "Beats me," he revealed. "I don't usually come to Allondell. If I need to access a library or go to a codex, I go to Kallagulia."

Realizing they had an opportunity to not be entirely surrounded by books, Terrel began to lead the two of them out of the aisle, wondering how long it would be before a scream of "Dragon!" filtered through the air.

"Kallagulia, huh? Where's that one, again?"

The smells and colors of the market began to seep in. Here the clean streets gave way to the . . . slightly more haphazard avenues of the market districts. Here bright colors, laughing children and vendors hawking their wares took the place of studious calm.

Without consciously realizing it, Lace slipped in front of Ajax, Syn staying behind as a rearguard. It took her several seconds to finally note that she'd fallen into her training like an old glove, treating Ajax as the principle, rather than a guide. Too late to turn back now, she called out behind her, "Italy, eh? Any city in particular?"

For her partner's part, Syn kept a wary eye out. First for threats, she didn't particularly trust the city where men could run around throwing magic . . balls? light-orbs? whatever. dangerous things at others. And there apparently weren't any guns to be had.

Second she looked around for a weapons vendor. In the other world, she would have been looking for someone she knew, or someone who's sigil she respected. Here, she wasn't sure. The AI people, the NPC's, as she was almost positive they were called. Did they think? Could they cheat you? Were there NPC mob-like organizations? She sighed inwardly, doing another sweep with her eyes, she really wished Lace hadn't tossed the manual away.

Narhari was surprised to see Lace take charge, moving to the front of him. She still seemed to be "following" his direction, but as he looked behind his shoulder and saw Syn mirroring the movement, he came to the conclusion that what they were doing was something they'd done before. From their attentiveness, and a few others things, of particular note Syn's desire for a gun-like weapon, Narhari had a few guesses as to their professions--well, former professions, anyways. He doubted many people would return to the real world, if they did at all, to find that they still held whatever job they'd had before falling into the game.

"I traveled the countryside for the most part. The only notable city in Italy that I visited was Padua. I'm an investigative journalist in social media, but before that, I was a student of European history. I was collecting regional folk tales for a publication..." Narhari trailed off. That was a rank memory; he'd done most of the legwork, yet he hadn't even been listed as an author. He shook his head.

"How about the two of you? What brought you to Budapest?" he changed the subject, though he did point to a building that was relatively close, though it might take them a few moments to get there, pushing through the crowd.

"Middle of the Zailleon continent," Rua told her as he followed her out of the aisle. "They've got a library just as good, and just as packed, as this one here."

He thought about it for a moment, then cocked his head to the side. "Probably has the same rules about letting pets roam inside," he said. Rules that neither of them were familiar with.

Terrel hrumphed a bit. "So much for the 'City of Wisdom' then," she muttered, finally escaping the claustrophobic aisle into a place where she could see the main, circular room where they'd first encountered the terminals. On the opposite side of it, there seemed to be a series of tables with people shuffling and organizing books. The thought occurred to her she probably should've gone there first, but she ignored it.

"Zailleon?" she asked, almost as an afterthought. "Who puts a giant city in the middle of a continent?" All the other ones she'd heard of were at least close to the oceans.

"Well, it acts as a hub of sorts, I guess," Rua told her. The swordsman headed towards the table full of organizers. "Newdam's a port, but once you arrive in Kallagulia, you can find a path to anywhere else on the continent. It's convenient."

He reached the table and started looking through the books, while still talking to Terrel. "It's pretty easy to find a party there," he said. "So it has its worth. Coastal cities are good for traveling to other parts of the world."

"Yeah, I guess," she responded, her voice falling out a bit. Sometimes she forgot that this was all a game. Kallagulia might exist because someone just decided it was good for players, not because it'd been built from the ground up from vibrant trade in the area, or something. NPCs gave people 'quests' but if you weren't paying close attention, it didn't feel like part of a game. If someone asked you to save their cat out of the tree, that pained look on their face made you believe they really, really cared. Sure you got a nice little coin purse for doing it, or whatever they were prompted to give you, but if you weren't careful you could feel like you bloody saved the day. That was the point, it seemed.

When she got out of this game, would she instinctively look over people's heads for their names? Sure, players could turn that off--for seeing other people or for being seen--but that wasn't common in a city like this. You started expecting it to be there. She loved Ymaggion because, even though she couldn't read, she had a computer in her head that read for her; that wasn't something you got outside this world. Not for anything she could afford, anyway. And yet she hated it, because she knew none of it was real, and she wondered how long it'd be before she couldn't remember the difference anymore.

A rare thing occurred, for her: a thought.

"Ymaggion is roughly the size of the real world, right? I mean, I know it's not exactly the same, and the geography is different, but generally speaking it's a parallel world, yeah? I wonder if... I wonder if I could visit coordinates, you know, like satellite ones, inside this game. I mean, there's probably nothing there, but I'd still like to go anyway." She trailed off, frowning and wishing she could take her words back. He had enough to roll his eyes at about her already without her sounding dreamy all of a sudden.

"Yeah, that's what I heard," he said after a moment of thought. "'bout the size of Earth is what I was told."

Back when he first enrolled in the beta test for the game--courtesy of winning a contest held by one of the game stores in the town he lived at--Rua had been disappointed that they had chosen to make this virtual world the same size as the real world. "Why limit themselves to that?" he wondered. There were countless planets bigger than theirs, and years back someone had released a game that generated world spaces at such a size it could close the gap between Earth and the sun! If such a game world could exist with computers as less developed as they were now, why did they use such a comparatively smaller size?

Once he was in the game, he realized why: no matter how popular, how anticipated this game world was, there would never be as many players in it as there were people in the real world, even if non-player characters were factored into the census as well.

The game... this world... was much larger than it appeared, and even if it were the same size, it made Earth seem small.

He planted a hand on his hip, and listened to the rest of Terrel's statement, and gave her a nod. "Sounds like an interesting idea you've got," he told the woman. "And besides, game developers are clever. They like to throw in easter eggs in their games.

"What's to say they didn't leave something behind for people who thought like that?" he pointed out.

Terrel nodded slowly, the idea sinking in gradually as she thought about it more. Well, maybe she'd get lucky. Maybe they'd end up needing to travel to Zailleon--the game equivalent of North America. She had no idea what South Dakota looked like in Ymaggion, but she wouldn't mind finding out all the same. At the very least, she knew where to go, if it ended up being along the way.

They were descending the stairs now, though, and in a moment they faced the counters. Behind them were a dozen or so NPCs, a few of them already helping players but most of them open. She thought about stepping forward automatically but realized she'd probably just make a fool of herself, so she just glanced at Rua instead. She really, really hated libraries.

Rua could read her unspoken request and silently relented, stepping up to the counter and making his presence known. "Can you help me and my friend with something real quick? I'd just like to know if you've got anything concerning a 'Kasdim-Ur'," he asked.

The NPC looked up at Rua dryly. It was amazing. With all the programming in the world, you would think that they could've made these dusty creeps a little more interesting, but the wizened looking woman just blinked uninterestingly as Rua spoke to her. She glanced down at the terminal keys beneath her fingers then seemed to think better of acting too quickly, looking back up.

"Spelling, please," she requested simply. It was too dull to be offensive or polite. Terrel was immediately thankful she wasn't the one dealing with this woman.

Before anyone could do anything else, though, a shriek split through the library halls. She'd heard that sort of scream before, and her guess was that the dragonet had finally been noticed. Either way, it was an excuse to not have anything to do with books or research or librarians, and she was going to take it.

"I'll go check it out, yeah? Just to be sure," she said, not wanting to sound too excited over the whole thing. Before Rua could tell her to calm down or something, though, she all but bolted away, headed back up the stairs.

The librarian blinked once at Terrel, not phased at all by the scream or her departure.

"Spelling, please," she repeated.

Rua winced at the sudden outburst behind them. Looks like they were about to find out about the pet policy in the Library of Minervum. He nodded to Terrel as she made her departure, and turned back to the librarian.

"Uh... one sec," he said lamely, bringing up Oracle's message again to check the spelling. "Right. K-A-S-D-I-M, hyphen, U-R. That work?"

The librarian nodded once, drooping her head to glance at her terminal as she inputted the dictation carefully. The screen lit up, illuminating her face slightly, but a moment later the woman frowned at what she saw, tapped a few different keys, and frowned further. After almost a dozen instances of this happening, the woman looked thoroughly perplexed, finally raising her head to look over her shoulder, beckoning a man over that seemed to be supervising the counters.

He came over quickly, stooping down to peer at the screen, "What is it, Janiss?"

Janiss, immediately seeming like an elderly person strapped with a touch screen device, gestured abstractly at the terminal. "I... I've never seen anything like this. I put the query in, and it says there are two sources relating to it, but nothing shows up."

At this, it was the man's turn to frown, and he glanced up at Rua with hesitation for only a moment before lowering his face to the terminal again swiftly. "Well, that can't be right," he muttered with perhaps an ounce of annoyance, though it was quite subtle. "You tried an archive search? And the parse list?"

Janiss nodded more fervently than you'd think a woman of such little excitement would be capable of. The man shouldered his way in front of the terminal, then, and did his own share of tapping. After a few moments, his mood seemed to change to something more triumphant. "Ah here it is! It says here the two sources you're looking for have physical locations in the eighth repositor--" he trailed off, his triumphant expression crumbling.

"Eighth, sir?" Janiss questioned uncertainly, trying to crane her head to see her own terminal even with the supervisor in the way. "I thought there were only seven?" she said slowly, but then she scowled at the terminal, "Oh, what now?" The blue light that lit up both their faces had faded. "It's rebooting!" The frustration was palpable in her voice, but as she looked to her supervisor she found a different attitude: concern.

The supervisor collected himself, standing up straight and speaking to Rua. "I'm very sorry, sir, but it seems there's been an issue with our system. Rest assured, if you'll return within a week or so, I'm sure we'll have everything sorted out for you," he said, though his voice was far from confident.

"Uh, r-right," was Rua's nervous response. He wasn't sure what to make of this--either the librarians were genuinely stumped about this, or he had just stumbled on a quest. Neither spoke well of the situation.

If it were the former, then Oracle somehow got information on an entity that could no longer be found in the data systems... and if it were a quest, then Kasdim-Ur was likely an NPC. An NPC who somehow made a prophecy eerily accurate to their situation.

This was nuts. Rua gathered his wits and shook his head. "Can you send forward me the information later?" he asked. "I might not be around Minervum in a week."

"Of course, sir. We logged your account as you entered the library, so we'll send information your way if we get it," the man responded, a distinct lack of confidence still in his voice.

In another part of the library, Terrel had managed to stop the shrieking, but now it had turned to shouting. These people were really not helpful at all and not the least bit considerate. She'd been trying to talk sense into one of the security guards, but now two more were coming up, and another one was chasing after the dragonet with a broom and a bag. Not much of a threat to their seeker friend, but certainly annoying.

There was clearly only one real solution.

Each of the security officers carried a stun gun at their belt. Pretty good level item, she'd been told, only they didn't take too fondly to you stealing one. Without thinking, she lunged for the thing, grabbed it, and started to run as fast as she could, shouts immediately on her heels. As she ran, she took a moment to compose a PM to one mister Rua Dragonheart.

Not sure if Relish found anything. Meet me outside when you know--I think they want me to leave.

-Terrel

Rua blinked as he got a private message from Terrel, and distractedly nodded his thanks to the librarians before opening up. He read it quickly, then turned back to see Terrel running out of the building, with both his dragonet and a security guard chasing after her.

He brought his hand up to his face. "This is gonna be one of those days..."

Hah. They couldn't catch her, not in a hundred years they couldn't. Terrel jumped as many steps as she could, hurtling herself towards the entrance and regretting she couldn't spare the time to offer Rua an apologetic look. She could apologize later. The exit was in sight now, and before she barreled out the door, the woman took the stolen possession and hurtled it back at her pursuers, not wanting to get charges later for theft. Trouble she could deal with, but the angels could be bloody abusive sometimes if you gave them reason. Without another pause, she thrust herself outside the library. Hopefully they wouldn't follow her past this point, but more importantly she hoped that either Rua or Relish had found something of merit.

It wasn't too long before Rua found the woman, hiding not far off from the library. She must've been concentrating on not getting caught by security deciding to go after her, or else she would've noticed Relayia sitting upright on her shoulder, trying to keep balance due to the book she was trying to hold with her forelimbs and wings. Her tail was partially wrapped around Terrel's neck as an anchor.

He shook his head as he approached. "Do I even want to ask what that was all about?" he asked, his tone clearly irritated. He crossed his arms and waited for a response.

Lace lithely moved through the bustle of the markets, she and Syn ever seeming to move as one, shadowing and vanguarding Ajax's steps. She shrugged her shoulders languidly, her simple clothing rustling softly. "We travel a lot for business. Used to work for the U.N." She explained casually, glancing around the market, drinking in the sights with a smile.

Behind, Syn stayed silent as they finally reached the building. Doing one last spin before entering herself, habit and paranoia hard to shake, especially in this new, magic-filled land.

Terrel gave the thing on her shoulder a sidelong glare. She didn't hate it, but there just seemed to be no winning involved for her, especially with the dragonet in play. It appeared Rua wasn't going to be understanding on this one.

"Well, I was trying to make sure Relish here had some time to find, you know, whatever it was she was going to find," Terrel said, looking suspiciously at the thing. She spotted no tome in its talons. "The guards were not helpful at all, so I had to make some room. Just incase she need more time."

Terrel frowned at Rua though, in turn, noting his own empty handedness. "Please tell me one of you found something."

"I found something out," Rua said, his tone grim. "And it's nothing good. Rel, here."

He held his hand out to the creature, and she chirped, spreading her wings and loosening her tail from Terrel's neck and jumping off of the woman's shoulder. It glided the short distance to drop the small book off in Rua's hand and with a flap of her wings, began to circle the air around them.

He glanced at the title of the book, noting it to be a basic informational guide about liches. He sighed and shook his head, then looked back at Terrel. "There's a problem. Their terminals said there's two physical sources on Kasdim-Ur. In a repository that doesn't exist."

Marcus hitched his new pack over his shoulder and walked up to Sark. "All ready," he said, patting the bag, "and I've got some supplies, too!" He saw that the others were all prepped and ready to go, and he grinned. An adventure was kinda nice, even if he hated being in this game. Then the Serbian grinned back at him, licking his teeth in a really disturbing way, and any enjoyment that Marcus was getting out of this was ditched.

"Let's just get this over with," he said, boarding the boat.

Hm. The U.N.? That was interesting, though he couldn't say he was surprised. Perhaps they worked for Interpol. Well, either way, the two seemed to have a very unique skill-set; ones that he'd not expected to find within the game. After all, how many players could boast having held a gun within their hands, much less having had used it? They would be few and far between.

"Ah." Narhari did not press. He did not want to alienate his new "acquaintances", and she would have elaborated if she'd wanted to say more.

"There are a few things within this shop that might be of interest. They should have a crossbow, if that will do for now, Syn." He pulled up their catalog, a special screen that was unlocked upon entering the building. He turned it to face Lace and Syn both. "You'll mostly find low grade medieval weaponry on that list. Daggers, short swords, javelins and the like. All of it will be relatively plain," he motioned to the relative emptiness of the place, "which explains why there is no one here."

"This store is an oft forgotten feature of the game, but free weapons, armor, and basic gear are provided here. Generally it's used for newbies, but these stores are only passingly mentioned in the tutorial. Most people are too excited to bother looking. You'll only be able to take a few things, but we won't have to pay a dime. That way, you can save for more important things."

Edited by WillowtheWhisp on January 5, 2014 at 8:11:04

Terrel scowled, annoyed that their search had yielded no results besides her own humiliation. It took her a full moment, though, before her mind managed to catch up to precisely what Rua had said. Repository. She knew that word. She remembered it because it was a long and confusing word, and she'd had no idea what it meant when she'd first heard it.

"It wasn't the ninth riposte--err, repository, was it?" she asked, frowning over the word she still didn't really understand.

---

Sark raised his eyebrows at the Serbian fellow, but a moment later he realized that, indeed, everyone was ready. So soon? Quite peculiar, but no fighting it, he supposed. "Nothing to get over I'm afraid, Marcus. Boat casts off in three and a half hours whether we're all ready or we're not."

The other four were already descending beneath the deck of the boat, no doubt to resume the drinking and card playing. Sark figured he should probably go join them and strengthen the team bonds or whatever, but he really didn't have the drive at the moment.

"I think I managed to get us all separate rooms," Sark said, after a moment of blissful thought. "Care to find out with me?" He had no idea if Marcus was the insular type or not, but as much as Sark didn't want to go drinking cheap ale and gambling away his big toes, he also didn't want to be stuck playing with his knives all by himself.

"Eighth, actually," Rua clarified. He sighed and planted his hands on his hips. "They said it was located in the eighth repository, when they only have seven."

Relayia finally landed on his shoulder, and wrapped her tail around his neck while he continued. "I can see that going two ways for us," he explained. "First idea is that Oracle somehow got information that was deleted from the game or something. The other idea is that we just stumbled upon a quest... which would mean Kasdim-Ur is likely an NPC. An NPC who made some prophecy that relates to us trapped players."

Neither idea was healthy for them. Magical.

"Or... it could actually be in the eighth repository," Terrel responded slowly, her mind finally caught up. She got the word right that time, though. "They closed repositories eight through twelve a while back, but there's still stuff down there. All the NPCs were made to forget, the records were stripped clean, and now it's just something that a few people remember."

She paused, looking through the night fruitlessly at nothing in particular before deciding to explain, "I ran a job in Minervum a few months back. Someone wanted something from the repository, so we got it for him." Terrel frowned suddenly, though, as if she'd said too much. She looked at Rua suspiciously. "You're not a cop are you? Because you have to tell me if you are."

Rua blinked at Terrel's statement. "You mean there's supposed to be more than seven of them?" he asked, bewildered. Why had they closed them and erased their records? Bizarre. He shook his head at Terrel's question--guess he knew where Terrel's skill set lie. "No, I'm not a cop. If there's more than seven repositories, where are they at?"