by Matt Vancil
“More?”
“I don’t even want to be playing, okay? I hate this game.”
“And this is supposed to sway me?”
“I just need to get in touch with her, that’s all. Or someone who knows her. Is there like anyone in-game with account holder information? Subscriber names, contact info, that sort of thing?”
Yanker considered. A pair of nude elves ran by, on fire. “Admins. They monitor gameplay in the most populated zones. Kind of like lifeguards, except they’ll let you die.”
“Admins, got it. Where can I find one?”
“Marrowstone City.” She pointed toward the tangled forest. “Other side of Inkwood and the Moonhollow.”
“Thanks.” Noob bowed and ran for the woods.
“Whoa! Don’t go in there, you dumbjack!”
“No time!” he called over his shoulder. “She’s already been gone a day, and I have to—”
A streak of white. A globe-headed arrow slammed into the ground at his feet in a burst of coagulant. Noob jerked to a stop, ankle-deep in glue. Yanker circled around in front of him.
“As I was saying,” she said, shouldering her bow, “you’re heading towards a level capped zone, an epic zone. It’s absolute death in there. Too many beasties. And it’s way heavy in PVP.”
“Like the plastic?” More burning elves ran by.
“Player versus player. In there, you’re fair game. Especially with that name. Seriously, what were you thinking? Was ‘Kill Me’ taken?”
“Probably. I didn’t try that one.”
She narrowed her eyes. “Are you griefing me? ‘Cause if you’re griefing me, I will gank you and camp your arse, just you wait.”
Noob shook his head. “I don’t even know what those words mean.”
“Okay, then. If you want to get to Marrowstone, go back to the starting zone, level out, and walk around Inkwood like everyone else. The quest chain will lead you right there. It won’t take you more than a day or so. Just play the game.”
“I don’t want to play this game! I’m not here by choice! I’ve got a life I’m trying to get back. Could you just take me through the woods, just to the city?”
She looked away. “I’ve got plans.”
“You’re playing a video game.”
“Somehow? Still not swaying me.”
“Look, I’m sorry. You’ve been very patient with me. It’s—I’m not having a good day. I hurt someone I love, and I can’t get in touch with her, I’m seriously worried about her, and—” He looked up. “And now a bunch of naked elves are throwing squirrels at me.” A barrage of rodents rained down. The elves cheered. “It’s obvious I don’t belong here.”
“Ya think?”
“But if you do this one thing for me—get me to the city—you’ll never see me again. I promise.”
“Tempting.” Yanker brushed a disoriented squirrel off her shoulder. “What the hell. I’m out of dailies anyway.” She pulled Noob out of the glue trap. “Stay close, try not to die.”
“Stay on the path.” Yanker set out at a steady jog down the dirt trail that snaked between the gargantuan trees. Goblins darted through the trunks around them but stayed clear of the road. “It’s just a few minutes through here.”
“Cool,” said Noob. “I’m hoping to be off in an hour.”
“An hour. That’s cute.”
Noob craned his neck to take in the canopy. Hundreds of feet above, the highest limbs interwove in to a latticework that kept the forest in preternatural darkness. A gust of wind, and a flurry of leaves swirled down, each trailing its own pattern. “These graphics are amazing.”
“Yeah, it’s pretty sweet. Have you seen the stills from the expansion?”
“They’re making more of this?”
“They should be. It’s a brilliant world.”
Far off the road ahead, in a shadowy section of the woods, a wall of gnarled, up-reaching trees ringed a wide hollow. It looked for the world like a temple complex with wooden walls and towers. “What’s that?”
“The Moonhollow. Super tough dungeon. Don’t even think about—stay on the path!”
Noob had missed a turn and run a few yards into the wood. He corrected his course back to the trail. “Sorry,” he said, jogging back to her. “That didn’t seem so bad.”
A giggling goblin bounced out of the woods and stabbed Noob in the face. A red bar appeared above Noob’s head and shrunk by ninety percent. “Hey!”
Yanker stopped. “What?”
“That guy stabbed me!”
A single arrow from Yanker dropped the goblin. “I said stay on the path. What part of that was hard to understand?”
“He just ran up and shanked me!”
“Well, yeah. You aggro’d him.”
“I didn’t even know he was there!”
“It’s triggered by proximity. And because your level’s so low, their range is gonna be like doubled.”
Noob’s health bar crept back up to full.
“That”—she kicked the dead goblin—“is why you stick to a level-appropriate zone and don’t go play in—”
Another goblin jumped on Noob’s back and stabbed his health bar to a sliver.
“Oh, for fuck’s sake.”
“Um… help?”
Her arrow took the goblin above the eye. Noob watched it twitch at his feet while his health spooled back up.
“What do I do?”
“First, get back on the damn fucking path.” Noob did. “Second, when you’re getting smacked, don’t just stand there. You’ve got a weapon. Do something. Run, drop a defense, whatever. Did you even do the tutorial?”
“I think it’s pretty clear I did not.”
Yanker sighed. Chuckled. “Okay.” She looked around. “All right. See that squirrel?”
“Yeah.”
“Kill it.”
The squirrel wiggled its nose at Noob. “Uh… no thanks?”
“Look, it’s the only thing in these woods that won’t drop you in two hits. It doesn’t even have levels. It’s here for decoration.”
“Then why do you want me to kill it?”
“I don’t care if you kill it or not. But you need to know how to defend yourself so I won’t feel bad about dumping your arse in the big bad woods. Now stab me some squirrel.”
“Okay, sure.” Noob glanced down at his victim. “Sorry, Nutkin.” I am Noob, Slayer of Squirrels, Scourge of Small Cute Woodland Creatures. Reid hit some keys at random.
Noob reached out, whip quick, and touched the squirrel. He heard a plunk, and an acorn appeared in his inventory. “What was that?”
“That,” said Yanker, “was Pickpocket. A useful ability, sure, but not in the middle of combat. Try again.”
Reid hit more buttons. Noob burst into dance, rolling his hips with carnal enthusiasm and disco pointing skyward. “Why am I dancing?”
“No idea. That’s not even a button.”
“How much damage am I doing?”
“To the squirrel? Or my patience? Just right-click it.”
Click. Noob drew a dagger he didn’t know he had and stabbed the squirrel. Its health bar appeared and shrank by three-fourths. With a squeal, the squirrel fled into the woods.
“Yeah!” yelled Noob. “Not too shabby. That wasn’t so hard.” Noob disco-pointed and hip-rolled in triumph. “Why am I still dancing?”
The wounded squirrel ran right into a crowd of goblins. As one, they turned, spotted Noob, and bounded towards him in a cascade of giggles.
Yanker unslung her bow with a sigh. “I got them, but you owe me for the arrows.”
“Thanks.”
Yanker took aim.
A dash of movement caught Noob’s eye. He spun, saw a white-cloaked character with a crystalline staff a stone’s throw away. The name was R-something… he didn’t catch the full thing before she ducked behind a tree.
“Hey,” said Noob. “There’s someone—”
“Busy,” said Yanker.
Noob spotted another
figure, this one translucent—charcoal-skinned, chalk-haired, with ears that pointed past the crown of his head—sneaking up behind Yanker. “Who’s that?”
She shot two goblins dead at once. “Busy.”
“There’s someone behind you.”
The dark elf plunged his sword into Yanker’s back. Yanker’s health bar appeared and dropped by half. “Lurker bastard!” She whirled on the now fully visible dark elf and went for her sword.
The elf became fully visible, as did his name—Greef, Level 100, of
“Run for the city!” she cried, “West-northwest!”
“What’s happening?”
Greef stabbed Yanker in the throat. With a scream, Yanker toppled forward and died.
Greef flicked the blood from his blade and sheathed his sword. On his tabard, a big spiky monster dangled a squirming victim above its mouth.
Noob, still dancing, drew back. With a laugh, Greef pointed behind Noob.
Noob heard a goblin giggle. He turned right as the wave of goblins crashed over him, stabbing gleefully.
Reid slumped back in his chair. On the monitor, Noob lay dead in the forest, face down beneath a message: You have died.
Well, that hadn’t taken long. Reid considered how much time it might take to make a new character and find another untaken name, and the thought made him want to puke. He hadn’t factored mortality into his Astrid-finding calculations. He wondered what the body count record for a single player was, and how quickly he’d break it.
On screen, Greef squatted up and down over Noob’s head, electronically teabagging him.
A new message popped up beneath the first: Go to the Underworld?”
Why the hell not? Reid clicked Yes.
Noob materialized in a cavern so thick with mist he could barely see his hand in front of his face. He was a ghost, wispy and incorporeal, his body made of the same mists of the cavern.
The mists parted before him, and Noob found himself standing at what could only have been the Gates of Hell; the moaning faces encased in the iron were a dead giveaway. The Grim Reaper scrutinized him from a podium by the gates.
“It is not yet your time,” intoned the Reaper. “Return to the world, and live again.”
Noob didn’t move. The Reaper pointed a bony finger. Where he pointed, a light shone through the mist and burned a passage through the fog.
Ghost-Noob jogged down the mist-shrouded tunnel, away from the Reaper and the wailing gate.
* * *
Still in ghost form, Noob emerged from the Underworld into the woods where he’d died. A creaking sound made him look behind him just as the misty tunnel popped out of existence.
Noob walked to his corpse, which prompted another message on Reid’s screen: Resurrect here? Reid clicked Yes.
Mist poured from Noob’s body. A bell pealed, and Noob was flesh once again. He knelt by Yanker’s body. “Hey… are you okay?” It seemed an odd question to ask a corpse. She didn’t respond. Maybe she hadn’t found her way out of the Underworld. Maybe that was only a thing for low-level characters, and the stakes were higher when you were higher level. Maybe it actually was her time, and the Reaper had drawn her through the Gates. In which case, he’d literally gotten her killed.
“Sorry,” he said. “I’m really sorry. Thanks for being nice to me. And patient. And, uh… good luck in Hell, I guess. For what it’s worth.” Her body faded and was gone.
Someone cleared his throat. Noob rose to find Greef smiling at him.
The dark elf pointed at Noob’s level and said something that came out in gibberish.
Noob considered running. Greef’s blades were sheathed at his hips. That seemed promising. Reid couldn’t imagine there being any in-game benefit for killing a character 99 levels below you. And it had been the goblins that had dropped him before, not Greef.
Greef said something else in gibberish. Noob figured he’d try diplomacy.
“Hi—”
Greef cut him in half.
* * *
Noob re-materialized before the Gates. The Reaper glowered down at him. “It is not yet your time.”
“Are you sure about that? Sure feels like my time.”
“Return to the world, and live again.” The Reaper pointed down the tunnel through the mists.
Ghost-Noob considered his options as he watched Greef dance obscenely above his bisected corpse. If he reanimated, Greef would kill him again. He could log out and wait for Greef to get bored waiting to kill him and leave, but that was time not spent looking for Astrid. He could always make another character, but that toon would be stuck back at the monastery, and he’d have to play for hours to get to Marrowstone. God knew he’d never find someone else to take him through the Deadlyfuck Murderwoods.
Reid figured he could make it about ten steps before Greef hacked him to death, in which case he’d at least be ten steps closer to Marrowstone and an Admin. He sighed, resigned. If it got him closer to Astrid, he was up for a few hundred rounds of catch-me-kill-me.
Angels sang, mist poured from his body, and a newly reincarnated Noob sprinted west-northwest and made it two whole steps before Greef threw a net that anchored him in place.
The dark elf sauntered over. Pieces of his armor disappeared with each step until he was naked but for a loincloth.
Greef decked Noob across the face, knocking his health bar to a sliver. “How is this fair?” Noob asked. The second punch took his head off.
“Hey, is it yet my time? I’ll bet it’s my time.”
“It is not yet your time.”
“Righto.”
Last fucking time, thought Reid, and then I’m logging out, burning my laptop, and joining a monastery. Preferably one with a vow of silence. The celibacy wouldn’t be a problem. It wasn’t like he was ever going to have sex again anyway.
He found Greef running back and forth between Noob’s head and body, teabagging one after the other. This, thought Reid, this is pwning. I get it now.
Reid positioned Noob’s ghost at the maximum distance the Resurrect here? prompt would allow, which put a good twenty yards between him and the dark elf slapping balls on his face. With a click from Reid, Noob took flesh and took off.
After three paces, he was still alive. He chanced a look back. He’d gotten the jump on Greef—the dark elf had just now noticed he’d slipped away and was chasing him in a dead sprint. I’m gonna make it! he thought, and was so intent on watching Greef that he didn’t notice the goblin mob until he’d run right through them.
The goblins cheered and joined the chase, all giggles. Noob bore down and sprinted. West-northwest, west-northwest, west-northwest—
—and the woods parted onto a golden plain. Beyond, the mighty computer-generated fortress of Marrowstone City shimmered into resolution. Noob made it to within a stone’s throw of the wall before Greef punched him in the back of the head.
The punch stunned Noob to a walk, which gave the goblins enough time to catch up and start stabbing. Noob saw Greef pull out a mop—the weapon that would claim his life—and scanned the ground for the best place to leave his corpse.
Trumpets blared. Swords flashed around Noob. Bits of dead goblin flew in all directions. When Noob could see again, he saw city guards identical to the ones in the monastery. The goblins had broken their aggro range, and they’d rushed to Noob’s aid. And with the goblins dead, they turned their attention to the next threat—the naked dark elf armed with a mop.
Greef tried to flee. The guards caught him just as he’d begun putting his armor back on. They took turns hacking him before Greef gurgled and died, naked but for boots and cape.
A primordial roar carried Reid up from his desk. He punched the air in triumph. “That’s right! You like that? Ride! The! Wave! And! Feel! The! G’s!” He punctuated each word with a violent pelvic thrust.
He pounced back on his keyboard. “What button was that? What button?”
Noob burst into d
ance above above Greef’s body. “You’re dead!” he sang. “You’re dead! You’re dead, and I’m alive!” and timed each “dead” to a hip-rolling disco thrust. A voice in the back of his head said he should really get inside the city before Greef returned from the dead. Another voice said fuck that guy. Noob kept dancing, to the applause of passersby.
A shadow fell over Noob. Well, it was too good to last. Noob turned to see what had come to kill him this time.
The man looming over him wore black, riveted armor that looked like it had been made out of a locomotive. His helmet even had a cow catcher in place of a visor. Above the giant’s head floated a name: The Truth, Level 100, of
The Truth was wearing the same knight-flipping-the-bird tabard as Yanker.
The Truth looked from Noob, to Greef’s near nude, mop-arm corpse, back to Noob, and applauded.
Noob bowed. The Truth turned to go. “Hey,” said Noob.
The Truth turned around.
“Um… if you see Yanker again, could you thank her for helping me out? I kind of got her killed.”
The Truth nodded. Noob couldn’t tell if that was a yes, or if he was agreeing that her death was his fault.
“Alert!” boomed a voice from the sky. “Server reset in ten minutes.”
The Truth bowed to Noob, sat, and faded from sight.
Noob peered up at the gates of Marrowstone City. Reid recognized it as the fortress of stone and glass he’d skipped during the opening cinematic. Shit. If he’d known he was coming here, he would have paid more attention.
From the center of town, streets branched away from a cobblestone square down cottage-lined roads. Characters of all levels milled around and leapt through the town square, and cryptic chatter flooded the city chat channel:
“LFG Temple of Thunder.”
“WTS [Shadowmeld Cloak] 4,000g OBO”
“750 conjurer doin glows outside castle, free with mats”
“Tehr Lehrds ehrf Dehrknehrs now recruiting! Lehrvel 20 Gehrld!”
“WTB runthru Pirates Den 100g”
“rangers are so overpowered”
“shut up fag ur gay”
“CHUCK NORRRISSSS!!!!!”
“Low Low Gold! 10,000g only $39.99! pirates4hire.com!”
