The Renegades

by Vasily Mahanenko

  “Elementary, my dear Dr. Watson,” the pirc extended a claw and punctured the air with it for emphasis. He nodded at my bucket and current stair. “You can stay here and play me a song (only not about that Goldentown, I beg you) and I’ll waltz around with my trusty little moppet…” Chip stroked his object of affection and made his cutest face, which on a pirc looked utterly terrifying.

  “And what will I owe you in return?” After my experience with the paid guides I had begun to suspect that even the flies in Barliona wouldn’t buzz for free.

  “Nothing.” It seemed like my question had caught Chip off guard. “It’s just one of those symbiotic things: I get a morale boost and you get a clean palace square. One good turn for another, in other words.”

  Encountering this kind of generosity in a trivial quest would be odd any day of the week, but encountering it from this pirc was beyond the pale. And yet it would be silly to refuse help, while offering nothing in return would have been dishonorable.

  “Let’s form a party in that case. I’ll share the quest with you and once we complete it, we’ll receive the reward,” I offered a little uncertainly, mentally prepared to turn and run at any moment. After all, I could still remember what happened to Pickle when he offered something similar.

  “What is this party thing?” the pirc howled. “Does anyone here know how to speak normally? Healing, tanking, aggroing…Why doesn’t this game come with a dictionary?”

  So that’s what was driving him insane! Chip was a newbie gamer and gaming argot, with its rich history of a hundred years, may as well have been Greek to him. Well, that’s easy to fix.

  “Let me explain…”

  The crash-course on gaming slang didn’t take very long. I showed Chip how to accept an invitation, create a party and add players to it. I showed him how he could share quests from his quest journal and also covered the structure of a party and the basic roles that players performed in it.

  My new companion listened attentively, periodically asking questions or clarifying the meaning of this or that bit of gaming slang. By the end of our improvised instruction, he understood the various requirements and challenges fairly well.

  “Well? Shall we begin?” he asked once the lesson ended. He stood up from the stair he’d been sitting on and waved his arms.

  With a pirc in my party, the work became more fun. Initially, I really did perform a few songs in 3/4 time, but after that, my knowledge of waltzes ran out and I turned to a different repertoire.

  Warm beer and cold women, I just don’t fit in…

  The pirc kept time fairly well, twirling around (or as he put it, waltzing) with his mop at a breathtaking speed. He hadn’t paused once the entire time, interrupting his scrubbing only to change the water in his bucket. Meanwhile, I belted out tunes on my lute with perfect bliss until a system notification distracted me. I was used to playing as various drunkbodies crawled up on my stage or when the crowd hurled various presents my way. We didn’t miss a beat even the time some ancient punks set some ancient seats on fire—and yet the notification that appeared was much too unexpected. I reflexively began to read the text, and the lute went silent in my hands. Chip twirled his ear with surprise and looked at me quizzically.

  “Has something happened?”

  “Sorry,” I muttered and peered into the notification. “It looks like I’m being offered some new bard stat. Let me read the description, figure it out and then we’ll go on.”

  The pirc nodded and got back to work while I re-read the notification.

  Attention! A new stat has become available to your character: Fame.

  Your mastery as a performer has been honed by years of practice and now bears fruit: Your audience is more receptive to your songs and the spells you cast grow more effective as a result. If an NPC enjoys your performance, he will receive the ‘Impressed’ status effect. This increases your Attractiveness with that NPC by an amount equivalent to your Fame trait. The status effect lasts (Fame × 3) minutes. Once the ‘Impressed’ status expires, your Attractiveness with this NPC increases by 25% of your Fame. The frequency of this permanent bonus to Attractiveness is calculated individually for each NPC. The permanent increase can only take place once a day. If an NPC does not like your performance, this effect may be reversed.

  Do you accept? Attention! You will not be able to remove an adopted stat!

  What an interesting stat. If you choose the right song, you’ll be loved. If you choose the wrong one, you’ll be banished to the forest. Nice role-playing touch. Well at least, I’ll get a chance at being famous in virtual reality. I’ll be a celebrity among the NPCs on this side of the Arras.

  You have adopted a new stat: Fame (Currently: 1).

  I couldn’t wait to experiment with my new stat, but my partner was making a show of his suffering at the absence of accompanying music, so I had to wait a bit.

  “Et voila!” Chip announced ten minutes later, having finished cleaning the last bit of the square and saluting me with his mop and the rag draped over it, like a Roman legionnaire with his aquila.

  “Listen, where’d you learn to handle a mop like that?” I ventured a question.

  “Why, at the academy of course,” the pirc smiled. “I was on duty frequently, and then later, in my third year, they made me PS. And before that, Gomer, my best bud who’s in Angola at the moment, and I would constantly get disciplinary action for some nonsense.”

  I sincerely tried to digest what I had just heard but failed pitifully.

  “For me, what you just said is the same Greek as ‘kek, my death knight alt can tank a raid better than your pal main.’”

  “Sorry,” Chip scratched his chin. “By academy I meant the Federal Military Aviation Academy. I’m a helicopter pilot. When I first entered, I’d be doing custodial duties. And PS means platoon sergeant. Simply put, I’m a run-of-the-mill grunt—just one that’s got a big rotor overhead that keeps him hovering in the air.”

  “You’re pretty well-read for a grunt,” I said, not believing him. “You speak well, but the words you use are atypical…”

  Chip burst out laughing in response, snorting happily and slapping his hips. Then he pointed to his head and made a daft face:

  “I use it to eat!” And once he’d done giggling at his own joke he explained: “Meaning, all I use my head for is eating. But don’t worry—I promise to stop using weird words and try and communicate using simple sentences.” He giggled again.

  His reaction forced me to blush. I deserved it too. He’d basically just pointed out to me that my earlier statement effectively added up to “I thought you army people were dumb jarheads, incapable of putting two words together.” Not very diplomatic of me…

  “Sorry, it’s simply that I’ve only encountered different military jargon until now.”

  Strictly speaking my experience with servicemen came down to arguing with a retired warrant officer who was in charge of security at the cultural center where we’d play local gigs. And it should be said that basically anything the warrant officer said could’ve been substituted with ‘bow-wow’ without losing an ounce of sense. His lexicon had nothing to do with that of Chip.

  “Well, sure, the army is the army. They’ll teach you to drink and cause a mess,” the tailed beast nodded eagerly, clearly relishing my confusion. “By the way, your name is excellent! The last thing I expected to find here is a lover of poetry,” Chip raised his chin and declaimed:

  “I think that the waves will devour

  Both boat and man, by and by,

  And that, with her dulcet-voiced power

  Was done by the Lorelei.”

  He fell silent and added:

  “And it is therefore inadvisable to allow you to sing in a boat. Wet fur has a chilling effect on my skin.”

  That was unexpected. I had figured that there was a chance that someone might remember the old legend of Lorelei, but hearing Heine’s verses recited…Most of my acquaintances don’t even know who that is. They’d most
likely imagine it’s some small-time actor.

  “Does everyone in the army learn poetry or are you a special case?”

  “Many do,” the pirc took of his hat, carefully adjusted the pompom with the feather, smoothened the fields and replaced the hat on his head. “It helps us relax. Well, and it’s entertaining, especially if the translator is decent. I tried to read Kipling the other day—my niece sent me a ‘new translation’—well, that particular translator shouldn’t even be allowed to translate limericks.”

  “Sounds like your brothers in arms would make good competition for me in my freelance gig,” I hummed and waved my hand in the direction of the nearest leaf. “Time to go complete the quest.”

  “Agreed,” the pirc nodded. “Let’s hear what new wisdom the salad wishes to bestow upon us. Maybe we’ll get something useful to do. By the way, what’s your freelance gig?”

  “I’m in a band. I play guitar and sing,” I admitted. “But for a while now, I’ve been earning money as a freelance writer. I manage my clients’ correspondence and write letters for them. Typically of a romantic nature. Especially verses, confessions, and other such purple nonsense. Few people read books anymore and being able to compose an intelligible letter—one that can charm a girl’s heart is, uh, well a rarity. And I’ve encountered so many romantic lines and verses in songs that I can write this kind of Pabulum with my left foot while dozing on the couch. And I get paid for it too. Not much, but in our age of unemployment, it’s something. If everyone was as well-read as you, I’d be screwed.”

  “Well the truth is that there are plenty of well-read people,” Chip didn’t agree. “Even among civilians. But you’ve given me an idea about what to do when I retire. Maybe I’ll start composing letters for people as well. The important thing is to not confuse them with lampoons.”

  “There’s plenty of demand for lampoons too,” I reassured my potential competitor. “The heartbroken ladies commission them by the truckload, so you won’t starve, don’t worry. I even have a steady client for this line of work. Judging by the volume, she has an entire herd of jerks. I can’t imagine where she finds them.”

  “Same place as my ex,” Chip smiled crookedly and fell silent.

  I didn’t wish to delve into his personal life and this topic of conversation petered out between us.

  The leafevator accepted our weight and drifted off on its picturesque route—shamelessly wasting the time we paid for to be in-game.

  “The slang here is cute,” Chip was the first to break the silence. “Some kind of hybrid of specific terms with everyday expressions.”

  “It’s been several decades in the making, starting back during the board game days, where we’d use dice to roll for outcomes. There were many different gaming communities back then and some terms came from other languages as well as from other games. If you add to this the fact that gamers come from all strata of society, each with their own vocabulary and the blending that took place year after year—and you get gaming slang. VR is a curious place where a billionaire may chat with an ordinary kid. Everyone’s subject to the game.”

  “I doubt a billionaire would waste his time or money here,” Chip mused. “Those people like to keep track of their finances. I take it, this isn’t your first time in Barliona?”

  “No, it is. But I’ve been playing games since childhood.” I said and added, “I don’t agree with you about the billionaires. Money in Barliona is converted to legal tender at the government level, so there’s some serious funds in this game. The leet guilds…” Noting the unhappy twitch in the pirc’s ear, I corrected myself, “The best guilds give real-life corporations a run for their money, in terms of income. And their leaders are millionaires. If you see a guild leader from among the top dozen guilds, you can be sure that that’s a billionaire.”

  “No way,” Chip didn’t believe me. “Are you saying that you can earn money by playing here? So why doesn’t everyone get rich and log out?”

  “In theory, yes, you can get rich. You get money for doing quests and then you can cash out irl—uh, I mean in real life. It’s just that the subscription as well as your costs in-game and all the various paid services will consume all your income. Here you have to buy a purse, there you have to buy a new weapon, a horse, a snack at the tavern or resources for leveling up in your profession. The outcome is that at best you break even but end up making enough to pay the subscription. Many players invest money from reality in the game to ensure that their gameplay is comfortable. That’s why I never played Barliona before. I couldn’t even afford the monthly sub.”

  “And now you can?” Chip asked and immediately waved a paw apologetically: “Sorry. Not my business.”

  “Don’t stress it. I decided to gain new experiences in search of inspiration. Someone gave me a few months of playtime as a gift.”

  The leaf stopped at the Branch of Vocation and I buttonholed the nearest NPC who informed me that he’d seen Amaryllis at the druidic training ground.

  “How is it different from an ordinary training ground? And why would druids even need a training ground—aren’t they like pacifist gardeners?” Chip wondered aloud.

  “There’s no such thing as pacifist players in games like this one. Even the holiest of healers can cast a nightmare debuff on you. As I understand it, training grounds are there for all classes in order to develop their skills and practice casting their spells. Rogues use them to level their agility, stealing and whatever else. Bards blast targets with their instruments in their tent. And druids work on their own skillset. As I understand it, they’re not pacifist gardeners here, but simply forest mages with their own particular spells. Haven’t you chosen a class yet? Try and play as a druid if you haven’t. By the way,” I remembered a question I wanted to clarify, “how do you change classes? Are all of them available to you or is there some ladder?”

  “The spellbook has the starting skills of all the classes but they’re not active. I go to an instructor—or whatever they’re called—from a class that I want to study. He activates the skill of his class, I figure out what I need to do with it and then test it out. Something like that.”

  “And who are you at the moment?”

  “A warrior. Actually, one of the reasons I came here was to check out the witches and whatnot. Pircs don’t do well with magic. Although they do brew a mean ale,” Chip added and squinted with pleasure.

  Amaryllis handed over the promised reward and sent us onto our next quest—now we had to polish the same old palace square with some wax. The surprising thing to me was that she made no objection about the increase in the number of the party. So I could share a quest with a hundred players and everyone would get the same reward? Interesting…

  “Wait a few minutes.” I stopped Chip who was headed back to the leaf. “I want to test the new trait.”

  I quickly summarized the Fame trait to the pirc and he stepped aside with his ears perked and ready to listen. I picked out a biota headed in our direction and began to play an ancient heartrending romance from the 19th century. The NPC stopped to listen and once the song ended received the ‘Impressed’ buff. My Attractiveness with her was precisely 21. Not wishing to relinquish my hold on my audience, I performed another song in the same vein and by the end, had three listeners. Once I concluded, the buff timer for the first NPC reset and the newcomers received the buff for the first time. My Attractiveness with the first biota stayed at 21. This meant that I wouldn’t be able to farm Attractiveness with a long concert. Too bad. On the other hand, I learned that the status effect only appears once the song ends. By the way, on the topic of ending…

  I ended my next song in the middle and looked closely at the NPCs’ properties. The buff did not reset. In other words, cutting corners didn’t do the trick. What about this way?

  I recited a short poem from a kids’ book. It was brief but complete and I performed it to the end. However, the NPCs did not find this convincing. They looked around disappointed and went off on their busines
s. I managed to check the properties of each one. ‘Disappointed’ and a -1 to Attractiveness, which had now returned to the baseline of 20. And what if I play something infinite like ‘A billion bottles of beer on the wall?’

  “They don’t seem to value such classics,” Chip sympathized when I gave up at the 999,999,985th bottle of beer. “Are you going to carry on with your experiments or shall we get on with our our MCD?”

  “MCD?” I echoed, puzzled.

  “Maintenance and cleaning day,” the pirc explained. “The day of the week designated for putting things in order, maintaining equipment and resolving other custodial issues.”

  “Yeah, sure,” I couldn’t help compare our quest with Chip’s military characterization. I suppose it was an MCD. “Let’s go do this quest. I’ll carry on my trials some other time.”

  “How did you reach the Tree anyway?” I asked Chip several minutes later as we huffed polishing the floor. If it weren’t for the experienced pirc, I’d never even figure out what to do. “It’s teeming with aggressive monsters, you can’t walk or ride through it.”

  “Escort duty…” Chip cracked a cruel smile and explained: “I got assigned to escort a caravan. There are these caravans here that travel regularly between the pircs and biota. If you wait for it to appear, you can travel protected by the guard—unless you’re that guard. And if you help them, you gain experience along the way too. The only drawback is everyone keeps begging you to ‘tank.’ What a dreamy, magical forest, huh? They give you a stick and a rag—why not just give us a mop? The penalty for careless performance of duty is two days in the brig and a diet of water and bread,” he exclaimed. “All right, I’ve had enough of this crap. Let’s get on with it. Otherwise we’ll be here until the carrots come home.”

  “Erm…” It’s not that I particularly enjoyed a detour into history but I did want to complete the quest. “What about the quest?”