Level Up

by Craig Anderson

  “Now that is a terrifying thought. So what is the point of it all?”

  “What was the point of it all before?”

  In a perverse way he’s right. Does it really change anything? The world is no less real today than it was yesterday. Well, apart from being trapped in a video game.

  That needs to be my focus. I can’t live the rest of my life like this. If I am going to have any chance of winning the game in the required timeframe I need to understand what it is exactly that I am up against.

  I need a plan.

  “Sarah, do you have the rules for your game written down somewhere? In a design document perhaps?”

  Her laughter echoes around the office. When she stops she says, “Sorry about that. We are an indie studio, documentation isn’t really our strong suit. I’m pretty familiar with the game though, what do you need to know?”

  I have so many questions, but I need to establish the basics. “How do I level up? What are the criteria for gaining Exp?”

  Sarah thinks for a moment before answering. “We use a graded Exp system. You only need a couple of hundred EXP for the first ten levels or so, but after that it starts to ramp up. Most standard tasks will give you exp, defeating enemies, visiting new areas for the first time, trying out new equipment. The biggest source of exp comes from completing quests. Every level grants a skill point, which can be used to improve stats on a skill tree. The first point in a skill tree grants a special ability, and then after that every 5 points will get you a new skill.”

  “Ok, sounds like pretty standard stuff. I need to get my level up so I am less vulnerable. Let’s find some low level mobs so I can farm some easy exp and get a few upgrades under my belt.”

  It’s not the most sophisticated plan, but it is a start. Doing something has got to be better than sitting around contemplating the fact that the universe isn’t real and we are all just 1s and 0s. I feel like that should bug me more, but like Jasper said, it really doesn’t make all that much difference. The world is no less real today than it was yesterday, even if I now have HP to worry about.

  We haven’t even made it out the front door when a gentleman stops me. “Young man, I need your assistance. Can you please fetch me a latte. I had one too many beers last night and would prefer to avoid driving.”

  I’m about to tell him to take a hike when a new notification appears, making me jump. I glance at it.

  New side quest - See you latte.

  You’ve got to be kidding me. I thought I would be slaying dragons and vanquishing demons. Instead I’m going to conquer this guy’s hangover.

  Carlos says, “Oy mate, bugger off, we are in the middle of something here. Go get your own damn latte or find some clueless intern to do your bidding.”

  The man turns to walk away and I shout after him, “Hold on. I’ll get you a coffee. What kind would you like?”

  He turns back to face me but his expression remains neutral. “I only drink lattes from a small artisanal coffee shop on the other side of town called Grinds of Yore. I shall wait for you here.”

  Oh right, because the point of a fetch quest is to force you to trek all over the place. An arrow appears on my HUD, pointing the way.

  I start to walk and Carlos and Sarah chase after me. Carlos says, “What are you playing at? We are supposed to be getting you some exp. Now’s not the time to be fetching coffee for some random dude…” he stops talking and smiles, “This is a side quest isn’t it!”

  “It sure is. Sarah, can I have more than one active side quest at a time?”

  She nods and I continue. “We should see if there are any more, I don’t want to be hiking back and forth all over town.”

  “Are these worth decent exp?”

  “Yes, but we had a declining Exp reward for subsequent side quests, so each one will reward you with less Exp. We didn’t want people to ignore the main quest and get massively OP. Let’s find a few more to round us out.”

  Fine by me, I don’t want to spend the day being a glorified errand boy.

  I step out of the building and see them everywhere. People just milling around, with little blue dots above their heads. After a deep sigh I set off to chat to all of them, and before long there is a long list of side quests for me to fulfill, each more mundane than the last.

  There’s only one small problem. “Can we take your car Sarah? Carlos is having some mechanical issues with his…”

  She shakes her head. “I don’t have a car. I ride my bike to work.”

  “I’m guessing it’s not big enough for the three of us.”

  “It would be a little cozy.” She thinks for a moment. “Perhaps we could borrow someone else’s car?”

  Carlos’ face lights up and he says, “How do you get around in the game? Is there fast travel?”

  “We hadn’t implemented fast travel yet. The only thing we had to help speed up going from one area to the other was horses. We had some more legendary mounts too, but you had to capture those.”

  “And how did one go about acquiring a horse? Did you have to buy it, or tame it, or could you steal one from someone else?”

  Sarah picks up where Carlos is going. “You could steal them from outside the taverns. As long as a royal guard didn’t witness you stealing it wouldn’t register as a crime.”

  He turns to me. “Excellent. We are going car shopping.”

  Carlos leads us to the university pub. They look in much better shape than Carlos’ car, in so far as they still have wheels. Carlos heads straight to the flashiest red sports car, a big grin on his face. He gestures to it and says, “Sir, your steed awaits.”

  I stare at him blankly until he says, “No time to waste, get out your magic sticks and get this door open.”

  “I can’t steal someone’s car!”

  He turns to me. “Sure you can. You heard Sarah, it doesn’t count as a crime unless someone sees it. Chop chop.”

  “Can’t we just get in a taxi?”

  Carlos slaps me hard in the face and I see my health bar lose a sliver. He says, “You need to think like a video game. Normal rules don’t apply right now. You are the hero in this game, you can do whatever you like with impunity. Now let’s hurry up, these random items aren’t going to fetch themselves.”

  “But this isn’t a horse. Who knows how the rules will apply.”

  Carlos chuckles and points at the front of the car. “Way ahead of you buddy.”

  I move around the front and groan. It’s a Mustang. This is just crazy enough to work. I get out my two sticks and rub them against the lock until the bar appears again. It takes me a few tries, but then the door springs open with a satisfying click and I get a new message:

  Lock picking upgraded to level 2

  I move on to the ignition, but this lock must be harder as the zone to land the arrow in is smaller and the arrow is moving quicker. This is going to require all my concentration.

  I’m just getting the hang of it when someone shouts, “Oy! Get out of my car!”

  Oh shit. I immediately jump out of the car, but Carlos shouts from the passenger seat, “You’re the hero remember! You need this horse to complete your quest. What would you do if this was a game?”

  The owner of the car is approaching fast and he’s not smiling. He is also at least twice my size. He doesn’t wait for an explanation, he punches me right in the face. It hurts like hell and takes a worrying chunk off my health bar. I can’t take many more hits like that. I stagger backwards and try to regain my composure.

  I’ve never been in a fight before, at least not one where I was intending to fight back. Normally my special move is to look pathetic until my opponent starts to feel bad about hitting me, but something tells me that’s not going to work in this scenario. A new status has appeared above this guy’s head. Apparently he’s a level 10 brawler. His health bar is far longer than I would like it to be.

  I remind myself that I am the hero and I punch the guy as hard as I can. At first it doesn’t look like it is doin
g anything, but I try a few more times and see a small notch in his health bar. Each hit is taking off one point at a time, and he has 50 health. I shout back to Sarah, “What are the odds of a level 1 character beating a level 10?”

  “Pretty slim. He only has to hit you a couple of times to kill you and it would take you all day to take him down. Your best strategy is evasion. If you can try hitting him from behind, sometimes that triggers a stun animation.”

  I wait for him to try and punch me again and I combat roll out of the way. It feels ridiculous and I am waiting for him to run over and kick me like a football, but instead he stumbles and stands there, giving me a chance to hit him. I punch him in the back of the head, but nothing happens.

  Several people walk past, but nobody pays any attention to the full on street fight that is happening. I’m rolling more than a hippie in Amsterdam, but not a single person has stopped and got their phone out. My attacker keeps making the same lunge for me and I keep darting out of the way and jumping up to give him a quick punch in the back before he can turn around. After several hits he suddenly starts to wobble on the spot when I hit him and Sarah yells out, “Quick, he’s stunned!”

  I hop back into the car and start to wiggle the sticks. I shout out, “how long do I have?”

  “Just a few seconds.”

  The bar bounces back and forth. In my peripheral vision I see the cars owner shake his head and turn on the spot, trying to find me. It is now or never. I stop the arrow dead centre and the car roars to life. I floor it and we lurch out of the parking lot. I shout out, “He’s going to call the police.”

  “That’s not how our NPC’s behave. If you can get out of his line of sight he should forget all about it.”

  I stare in the rear view mirror and sure enough, as soon as he becomes a dot on the horizon he shrugs and casually strolls into the pub.

  I catch sight of myself as I stare into the mirror. There is a large welt forming on my face and there is certainly going to be a black eye. Being a hero is hard work.

  Carlos hollers, “Wow! That was a close one. Nice work on the stun. We need to get your trained up in combat pronto. How is your health bar?”

  “Not great. Just over half left.”

  Carlos turns to Sarah. “How do you regain health in the game? Are there potions or healers, or is it handled via items?”

  “Both actually. Food can be used to recover health but it won’t remove status effects. You’d need to go to a basecamp for that.”

  I notice a phone charger, so I fumble my phone out of my pocket and get Carlos to plug it in. After a few seconds it comes back to life, along with a lot of voicemail notifications. I’m going to guess that I really don’t want to listen to any of those.

  “STOP!” yells Carlos and I spank on the brakes. I turn and he points at the glowing sign declaring a drive thru is just around the corner. He says, “We need you at full health, we can’t risk you being ambushed and getting killed before we’ve even gotten started.”

  I point at my face, “You think a cheeseburger is going to fix this?”

  He shrugs. “It couldn’t hurt.”

  We drive up to the window and I order a quick bite. Carlos orders some ridiculous combo meal.

  “I didn’t see you getting punched in the face!”

  “Doesn’t mean I can’t be hungry.”

  Sarah refrains from ordering anything. She still seems on edge.

  I take a big bite of my burger and hear a sound effect as my health bar refills a portion. I quickly polish off the rest and am back at full health. I take a peek in the mirror and am surprised to see my black eye has gone. I find myself wondering just how much I could heal this way, and then immediately hoping that I don’t have to find out.

  LEVEL 7: COMBAT TRAINING

  I hand deliver the man his latte. He smiles and says, “Thanks! This is exactly what I was looking for. Here’s your reward.” He hands me a gold coin that looks like it would be worth a small fortune if it didn’t immediately vanish in my hands. I get an update that 2 gold coins have been deposited into my account, plus a handful of EXP. Then he smiles and walks away.

  Carlos says, “So we aren’t going to talk about the fact that he just stood in the exact same spot for two hours waiting for you to return with his coffee? That guy is clearly either an NPC or the worst employee ever.”

  “Based on Jasper’s theory we are all NPC’s.” says Sarah. “That reminds me, I should go check in with him, he’s going to want an update on our progress today. What level did you say you are now Marcus?”

  I do a quick check. “Level 4. Those last couple of side quests didn’t even make a dent. It is definitely time to go do something else.”

  “Where have you been putting your skill points so far?”

  “Actually I haven’t yet. I’ve been saving them up. I want to get a better feel for the combat before I start putting points into skill trees. I don’t know where I need the most help.”

  “That sounds like a very sensible approach.” She turns to leave and then spins back. “I won’t be long, can you both stay out of trouble?”

  “Of course. We’ll wait right here.”

  Sarah is barely around the corner when Carlos exclaims far too loudly, “You’ve still got a pretty huge crush on her huh.”

  I make a shushing motion. “What is the matter with you? She’s only down the hall. That’s not the kind of thing you just blurt out.”

  “You’re about as subtle as a swift kick to the nuts. If she has eyes, she’s noticed. Are you going to tell her how you feel?”

  My mind goes back to my quest list. How on earth am I going to meet that final objective? I splutter out, “Hell no. I don’t want to make it weird. She’s just out of a serious relationship. I’m just going to work on our friendship.”

  “Congrats mate, you’ve maxed out your friend zone skill.”

  “Don’t do that. You know how I feel about her.”

  Carlos is about to spout some sage wisdom, or more likely another helping of utter bollocks, when my phone rings. I glance at the screen and the icy chill of panic sets in. It’s my Mum. In all the excitement this morning I have totally forgotten to call her. She is going to absolutely flip her lid. I put on my best sick voice and answer the phone, “Hey Mum.”

  “Hey sweetie. How goes the adventure?”

  I’ve already got my passionate tale of a sudden virus locked and loaded, so it takes me a moment to say, “I’m sorry, what?”

  “I just assumed you were out somewhere having an adventure with Carlos.”

  How does she know I’m not at work? That is such a Mum trick. “Yeah, we aren’t working today, we have a few things to take care of.”

  Here it comes. Which variation of the lecture will it be, the one where I ruin my entire career or the one where I need to be more respectful of other people’s time. Perhaps she will mix things up and go with a combo.

  …any minute now.

  At first I’m concerned that we have been disconnected, so I say, “Hello?” in that way that only people not expecting a response can say it. Mum replies, “I am glad to hear that things are going well. You should go check out the darker side of town, perhaps you’ll find what you are looking for over there. Remember, I’m here if you need a place to rest and heal up.” She sounds strained, like she is talking under duress. I want to ask more questions, but she hangs up on me.

  Oh no, it’s worse than I thought. Carlos sees the look on my face and says, “How much trouble are you in?”

  “A lot. My Mum didn’t tear a strip off me. Something is seriously wrong.”

  It takes him a moment to fully appreciate the implications of this. “Wait, she’s now the heroes Mum. That means she’s basically going to just ignore all the horribly dangerous stuff you’re doing and spout nonsense and exposition.”

  “What does that mean? What has happened to my real Mum? We have to go check on her.” I turn to leave.

  “Hold up. She’s in character. That
’s not going to stop while the game is still going on. The good news is, there’s no reason for it to continue when the game is over. The best way for you to help your Mum is to win the game.”

  That makes a twisted kind of sense. Of all the things that have happened today, this is the one that hits home the hardest. Mum is a pain in my arse, but she is reliable and consistent in her admonishment. It is like she has been taken away from me, replaced with this artificial automaton. I could hear the fight in her voice though, my Mum is still in there somewhere, straining to get out. I’m not sure if that would be a good thing right now.

  My phone rings again. Maybe Mum has broken free of her programming and is phoning back to tear me a new one. I answer it and hear the screech of an enraged Jenkins, “Where are you? It has been hours sine you left to get changed. Are you planning on coming back?”

  I put on my sick voice, the universal one used by every employee no matter what fictional ailment they are coming down with. “Sorry, I meant to call you, I’ve suddenly come down with something.”

  “This is unacceptable. I will be raising the matter with HR.”

  The line goes dead before I can say anything else. Carlos sees the look on my face. “Jenkins?”

  “Yep. He’s pretty pissed.”

  “Screw Jenkins.”

  “But…”

  “But nothing, you are the hero of this game. Since when does the hero have to put saving the world on hold to pop into the office? Jenkins isn’t going anywhere.”

  He’s not wrong. Let HR do their thing. What’s the worst that can happen?

  I’m still contemplating that when we hear screaming outside. Carlos and I both share a look and we run out of the building to see a young woman surrounded by youths in hoodies. One of them is tugging at her purse as she desperately holds on to it. There is no-one else around. She spots us and screams, “Help me!”

  I pause. They all have health bars above their heads. A quick scan informs me they are all level 4 ASBO’s except the guy tugging at the bag, who is a level 6 Hooligan. He is going to be a problem for me, but I can’t just leave a young woman to be mugged. Time to put my combat skills to the test.