“No idea!” Sang said. “But judging from where we’re headed, we’re going to be getting a lot closer to the kingdom! Look!” She pointed to a massive tower that was slowly coming into view.
“Yeah, that’s Verrata Castle over there,” Van said as he struggled with holding onto the back of the Dragon. “Definitely getting closer.”
“This beats taking a Griffon, doesn’t it?” Sang asked as she spotted a massive clearing not too far off. The Dragon began to descend gently down towards the clearing. The grass was bright green and there was a small pond next to it.
“I think we’re at the Dragon’s home!” Van said as their ride landed on the ground gracefully.
“Thank you, noble heroes, for rescuing me from the evil sorceress, Glemilda!” said the Dragon as Van and Sang hopped off of her back. “As a way to show my gratitude, I wish to bring you to my little hideaway. You will find within this pond whatever it is that you need for your journey! But I warn you... be cautious, for you can only draw from it once per person!”
“Score!” Van said as he hurried over to the small pond and shoved his hands right in. A second later, he pulled out a flute. “Perfect! It’s a Flute of Enchanting! Whenever I play it, I can cause up to eight people or creatures to stop whatever they’re doing and watch me!”
“Don’t they do that anyway when they hear you attempting to kill them by playing those wretched bagpipes?” Sang asked as she approached the pond. The words Pond of Desire hovered above it. There wasn’t any kind of interface, so she shrugged and reached her hand in. The pond water was cold and caused her to shiver a little as she reached her hands into the water. She fumbled around, hoping to grab something. As her fingers moved around in the water, she suddenly felt something materialize in her hand. She pulled her arm out of the water and saw that she was holding a bundle of arrows in her hands.
Arrows of Flaming Return Acquired.
Damage: 150 +10 fire damage per second.
Ammunition: Unlimited, as Arrows fly back to your quiver after being fired.
Sang glanced at the stats with an impressed look on her face. This was pretty much exactly what she needed—better arrows, and no more having to worry about keeping track of how many she had. Of all the things she disliked about the game, inventory management was probably one of the biggest parts of it. It wasn’t that she didn’t have a head for numbers, but she just found it to be incredibly boring, having to sort through all of her gear, find out what items she needed, etc. She wanted to play a ranger, not an accountant.
“Get anything good?” Van asked once he’d let out a few sharp, shrill pipes from his flute.
“Arrows!” Sang said. “The good kind, too!”
“Perfect!” Van said with a grin. He turned around and looked at the Dragon. “Oh, wise Dragon princess, we ask of you, what is the easiest way to reach the kingdom of Verrata from here?
The Dragon snorted for a moment to consider the question. “The easiest way to reach your destination is to take the Cobblestone Road through the jungle. Just don’t walk off the path and you will be able to reach your destination safely.
“Great!” Van said as he turned to face Sang. “You ready to get moving?”
“Let me level up first,” Sang said as she glanced at her experience bar. It had certainly moved up high enough to bring her to the next level, and she was excited about the opportunity.
Sang grinned, looking at her new character options. She was really starting to get better at this whole gaming experience. She glanced up to catch Van staring at her with a big smile on his face. “What’s so funny?” she asked as she grabbed her gear and began to walk to the woods where the Cobblestone Road was located.
“Nothing... I just noticed you seem to be enjoying this game a bit more than you were a while back,” Van said with a grin.
“Yeah, well, I think I’m starting to come around. That adventure was fun, and the best part was that we actually survived it. I have to admit, there is some serious satisfaction when it comes to successfully navigating through a mission.”
“That’s the spirit!” Van emphatically agreed. “We’re going to make a gamer out of you yet!”
“Oh no,” Sang laughed, “I’m never touching another one of these things after this job is over. I’m even going to delete my Sudoku apps off of my phone after this.”
“I don’t get it,” Van said as they walked alongside each other into the jungle. There was a different kind of heat inside of this place. It was humid and muggy, reminding Sang of her childhood visits to her grandparents in Vietnam. The temperature was almost the same. “You’re here in one of the most powerful simulations ever created, probably the greatest game ever made, and you’re going on a big adventure... winning fights, battling villains, getting experience... and yet, after all of this, you still don’t like video games. What gives? Why all the hate?”
Sang grimaced as they walked. “I knew a girl once. In high school. She was a bright kid, probably one of the brightest. She was a good friend of mine and we’d talked about going into the military together. She didn’t want to be CIA, but she wanted to be a detective or an investigator of some kind. Brilliant girl... had the best grades, focused to the highest degree. She could literally do anything that she wanted. Then, her parents were getting a little worried about her, and said she was too high strung, so they bought her a special laptop with a game on it. It was one of those online ones, sort of like this, but a lot less… visceral. Anyway, long story short, my dear friend ended up just kind of cancelling on her life. She stopped excelling, stopped pushing. She just gave up her dreams and started playing her game all the time. Last time I checked, she was just working some kind of regular 9 to 5 job. No FBI, no military.”
“So?” Van asked as he looked at Sang with a puzzled expression. “What does that matter? Sounds like she’s enjoyed herself.”
“She threw all of that potential away on something so trivial and meaningless.”
“How old was she? 15? 16?” Van asked. “What kind of kid needs all of the pressure of being some kind of top performing wunderkind anyway? Sounds like she cracked from the pressure and found a good escape.”
Sang shook her head, remembering how her friend had slowly withdrawn from all of her social circles. “It wasn’t like that, Van. She had promise. She had potential.”
“And what? Just because she chose to do something else with her life means that she wasted her promise and potential?” Van asked. “It seems awfully unfair for you to make her life decisions for her. I mean, if she wants to screw around online, and make friends and work a regular desk job, who are you to tell her she shouldn’t?”
Sang felt a flash of anger surge up inside of herself. “Because she had so much to give! She changed, Van! And what she became, I didn’t particularly like.”
“So, it was about you, then? Not her?”
“No,” Sang said with a growl. “I didn’t mean it like that. What I meant was that she became something that, deep down, I knew she would hate. The bright, star student would never have wanted to become a slacker and a loser.”
“Ha! There it is!” Van said, stopping and pointing his finger at her. “You think that people who play video games and enjoy their hobbies are losers!”
“So? You knew that already,” Sang said as she tried to ignore the smirk on Van’s face.
“No, you don’t get it!” Van said. “You’ve created some kind of standard in your head. That standard tells you that there’s some kind of moral superiority in being a high energy, high achieving individual. So, if anyone else around you deviates from that standard, you to classify them as a loser. Let me ask you something—what do you think about people who are always watching television shows?”