Life After the Apocalypse

The dwarf accepted the melon from the girl, listening to her answer. She felt a lot less like an NPC from the game, which had limited or no dialog options. Compared to what he was dealing with, or even his real life, the melon girl seemed to have it pretty good. "Adventurers... we are pretty self absorbed aren't we." he paused to consider, it was an odd conversation to be sure, but if this was his world at least for now, he might want to start treating these NPC more like people and less like things. "I think we are all stuck here for a little while... and I've heard the fruit is quite tasty, so you may be quite busy."

"Thank you for the melon." he paid out of his limited tutorial funds. He supposed he might have to venture out at some point to forage or kill some things in order to keep having money for melons.

---

Max sat with his melon and listened to Tabby. He imagined they were quite the pair, the biggest dwarf possible and the tiny rotund cat. Max chuckled at the thought of the melting graphics card,

"My rig was state of the art like 5 years ago. Every cent I had from my crap job sunk into that. I was a raid tank back in high school, the main guy, Maximum Carnage." he said in a deep voice and did a little flex for emphasis.

"All nighters every weekend, barely getting to school... damn I'd kill for a Mountain Dew." he chuckled "Waste of time they all said... seems like maybe not anymore."

He offered part of his melon to Tabby.

"This wasn't ever my main game, but I went to college to learn graphics and game design, so wanted to test out the latest, get ready for a big interview, which probably wasn't going to happen anyway. Definitely state of the art..." he shrugged, as well as you could in full plate armor. "College..." he looked around at the world he seemed to be stuck in. "another waste of time... unless we somehow find a terminal some place."

He took a bite of his melon, looked up at the melon girl, "It's pretty good." he said as he waived to her.

Max laughed again, "My ex would freak out thinking I was flirting with the melon girl..."

With a sigh, looking at his melon, "There is no spoon..."

He looked up at the immense dwarf who suddenly loomed over the conversation. He looked down at the piece of fruit in his hand. "Is there a melon girl?"

He turned the fruit over in his hand, squinting. Its juicy surface caught and reflected the light. The jagged edge where it had been torn free broke in an unpredictable fractal pattern, with stress lines along the rind and a distinct change in texture where it had separated. He (unfortunately) felt the juice seep into the fur between his fingers.

He wondered if he could find a handkerchief anywhere. Or a change of clothes, for that matter.

He shifted uncomfortably as the conversation shifted to college. He looked off to the side, remembering that tumultuous first year, friendless and alone and deliberately cut off from the online space that had been his adolescence. The space he was forced to look in the face right now.

He subtly changed the subject.

"So, like, I'm no computer engineer, right, but... this is... insane, right?" He motioned vaguely around himself. "There's no computer on earth that could fake this, right? It would have to be like the Matrix, right? You'd need to, like, pump VR directly into your spinal column and then fool your brain into thinking it was real. And then you'd have to convince two people they were seeing the same thing at the same time?"

"I mean, I know my laptop isn't up to the task of... simulating... like... " his whiskers twitched, and he took a sniff, then looked down at the piece of fruit, caught off-guard. "...smell..."

His head dipped down, his tongue poking out of his mouth, touching the side of the melon. Immediately, his mouth opened and he crammed the entire chunk into his fanged maw.

"Holy shit dude," he muttered through a mouthful, his voice hitching in a genuinely vulnerable emotional moment, eyes shimmering on the verge of tears. He brought his hands up, swallowing hard, trying not to spill any of the ambrosia. "I thought it was COVID food forever..."

The big man laughed warmly, "All those years of them trying to get us to eat healthier, all they needed to do was make everything else taste like crap." He continued to eat his melon.

Clara decided to wait near the giant tree at the city center while the others explored. As she leaned against the trunk, idly observing the bustling city, she noticed two figures conversing nearby. The towering, red-haired dwarf was sharing a piece of melon with the tiny tabby catfolk. The contrast between the two was amusing.

She approached the duo, offering a handkerchief to "Tabby Fatts", as she quickly learned his username. "Here, you might want this," she said, gesturing towards his stained fur. "I'm Clara. I saw you trying to signal us earlier. Thanks for the help." She paused, suddenly at a loss for words. It had been a while since she'd met so many new people in a short timespan, and the adrenaline rush from the battle still left her a bit anxious. "So, uh, you both seem like veteran players? Do those kinds of PK shenanigans happen often here?"

>>> Intrigued by the melon talk, Tina fished out a gold coin from her satchel, stood up and purchased one for herself. "We ran into the mush-food thing back at that village, Belle. The locals invited us to eat with them. Some kind of stew and it was...bad." Tina thumped the melon, listened to it, smelled it as she spoke, "No flavor, no real 'mouth feel' despite how good it looked. Found out at breakfast the next morning that the berries and cheese we were served actually had flavor even if the bread didn't..." Producing a small knife from the same satchel she'd retrieved the coin from, she split the melon into chunks. Offering some to Calamity, she sat back down. "BradL33 says something about the apples he'd picked having flavor too. Seems a bit random what does and what doesn't have flavor..."
>>>She pondered the subject as she ate a few slices of melon. "I don't have any real idea how all of this is happening. It can't really be a computer game. Elder Tales wasn't even a VR game so I can't see how any of this, despite the obvious 'game elements' could be anything computer related. It's got to be something else. Right?"
>>>"What's your take on all this?" she turned to Colin. "You're a...Summoner, right?" That Class on my list to make a tutorial vid next after Enchanter. Haven't even started doing any research on it. Why'd you go for Summoner?" she offered him a slice of melon.

---

>>>"I... really couldn't say how people are living with anything right now." he put his hand up where his chin would've been if he were human but adjusted it for his new lupine physiology. "The shock of being here and being something 'inhuman' is a pretty big thing to get over in just one day. I mean, everything is still kinda in flux, I guess. Nobody has set any norms for behavior. We're all just kinda 'winging it' for now.
I sure hope those PK assholes aren't just opening up the floodgates for normalizing shitty behavior. Gamers aren't really known for being altruistic...or empathetic." The big Wolf-Fang sighed, though it came out as a bit of a huff. "IDK" he actually spoke the acronym out loud "but people who PK are just assholes who want to farm content off of others, sans consent. Get off on being 'salt farmers', I guess."
>>>When Grace dropped the big question on him, he sighed again with that chuffing sound that having a muzzle translates it into. "I remember charging out onto the field alongside this huge tank guy, hoping he could take a couple of hits for me while I tried to disarm either that fat Pirate or that archer. I didn't see what got me but I sure felt it! Tore through me like nothing I'd ever felt before but after a second it just stopped and..." he paused, concentrating on reaching for words to describe his feelings. "And then just kind of nothing. Well, not nothing. It felt like when you get lost inside a dream but you're not lost. Not really. Like you don't recognize where you are but you know you've been there before. Then I woke up here. Tho I swear, when I woke up I felt like I was the 'real me' for just a split second."

Max chewed a piece of melon as he considered Clara's question, "I'm Max... well in the game, it worked pretty much the way you just saw. PvP allowed everywhere, but guilds would work together to declare low zones safe. If you were a level 12 and wanted to fight a level 10, no worries, go for it."

"But kind of an honor code, higher levels didn't go after low levels. If someone broke the code, well folks like me and Tabby would jump on our decked out mains and vigilantly justice would start. A whole guild raid team would roll up on those breaking the rules and they'd get there ass kicked. Then every time they'd step out of the city, it was open season on them for a bit."

"Usually their own guild would chew them out in chat also. Especially in the higher guilds, rep is everything. Sounds like these guys are going to get some of that."

"Hell, half the time, the lowbie you thought was getting ganked was an alt for a higher level player. Guy would respawn into his own high level character and come back for revenge. We can't swap characters anymore, so lucky ones logged in with their mains. Worlds a lot different with a level 10 than a level 50.

Big dwarf ate some more of his melon.

Tabby graciously accepted the handkerchief. Trying to regain his composure, he used it to dab the corners of his eyes, regaining a tiny measure of his masculine stoicism as he caught his breath. "Hoo. Uhngh... thanks." He used half of the cloth to try and remove the worst of the stickiness from his paws.

He gave a little shrug in response to her gratitude. "I mean... it was all I could do." He looked at his staff, still stubbornly extended, leaned on the stone next to him. He looked off to the side. Clara might be able to tell he was glancing at his UI. "I guess my name's Tabby now." He let out a heavy sigh.
He seemed a little happier to reminisce. "I haven't played in... probably ten years? Back then, PvP was just kind of a dick-measuring contest. You couldn't really get loot or anything. There weren't even any arena standings. So it was roleplay, trolling, or some combination of both. We staged a couple guild-v-guild battles for the lulz, but it was all pain, no gain."

In contrast to his vulgar language, his kerchief etiquette was either thoughtful or practiced, or both. He took the sticky, wet half of the handkerchief and folded it into a neat square that left the clean side out, so it could be tucked away without gobbing up her pockets. He offered it back, uttering another soft, "Thanks."

He leaned back, reconsidering. "There was some skirmishing over rare world spawns, or quest mobs, I guess, but that's all I can think of. But I dunno if they added something since way, way back when."

He blinked a little as the other thread of the conversation resolved. His head tilted a little bit, and if it weren't for his bulky cap trying to conceal his feline features, one could imagine an ear perking. "Wait, you say cheese was the same way?" He looked between Clara and Tina to confirm. "Well that blows my theory about, like, naturally growing things."
His lip pursed a bit. His tail shifted uncomfortably as he glanced off to the side. "I work with too many fuckin' techbros who are way too into Ready Player One to not have some wild ideas jammed in my brain about it. But... I mean, I dunno." His averted gaze turned skyward. "They all sound insane until you, you know, think about what looks like is happening, I guess."

Grace swallows as Broohy describes the pain of death. She had in fact surrendered in the hope she would die, and know for certain… but now she’s glad to only get a description.

"I’m sorry," she says, not really sure how to console someone for his own death… which is temporary. "I just hope Serena felt that too—not like I’m mad and wish pain on her. My hope is that after experiencing it herself, she’ll see how awful it is."

…unless people want that Real Me feeling.

Clara listened as Max and Tabby shared stories from their past. She had heard of aggressive PvP behaviours in multiplayer games, which was one reason she hesitated to join this one for so long. However, she was glad she'd finally taken the plunge. The people she met, like her party members and these newfound acquaintances, had been nothing but kind. Sure, the earlier skirmish soured the experience a little, but it was reassuring to know most players were against such hostility.

Taking the handkerchief back from Tabby, Clara smiled, as much as a feline face could smile, anyway. She couldn't help but notice the way he had carefully folded it. Despite his somewhat colourful language, he seemed to have a gentle side. "Sounds like you both were in big guilds back then? Are any of your old friends still around?"

As Tina handed her a piece of melon, Clara muttered a soft "thank you". "You're right, this actually tastes pretty good. Maybe we should start a list of edible things. There must be a pattern to it, assuming this is still a game programmed by someone out there."

Tabby leaned forwards and gave a sad shrug. "I dunno. Friends lists weren't account-wide back then, and I apparently g-quit before I signed off.... well, for college. I haven't seen any of them around, and," He looked down at his furry paws, turning them over, flexing his stubby fingers, still in disbelief, "I don't think they'd recognize me if they saw me. If they even remember me."
"If it's a game, programmed with real intentions. Going theory number..." he looked back down at those fat fingers, taking a tally. Why were there only four of them!? He shook his head, pushing away the disorientation, "Theory number four is that we're all wizardly demigods that have been cursed or afflicted to think they lived in a magic-free, technological world for... I dunno, some fuckin' reason."

Max finished his melon as the others continued to chat about things, "This was never my main game, I just popped in here to take a look around with the new release, poor choice apparently. Not sure if my old crew tried the same or if they are happily playing on our old server."

His computer programming brain tried to work through everything, "Some things here make sense as a game, but the code would never have anything for taste or smell, so if this is still a program, that came from somewhere else, like the geography. The original game didn't have cars or overpasses, so that came from something else. It makes sense then that things look good, but taste horrible, but no idea about the fruit."

>>>"Okay. Well, I put everything in the Bank so that's sorted." the Druid announced as he returned. "Definitely a different experience from the game... You actually have to talk to the Bankers. I wasn't sure what, exactly, to expect but face-to-face interaction wasn't really on the list."
>>>He noticed everyone chowing down on chunks of melon and bought one for himself. The avid eating and lack of complaints about it was enough to sell him on buying one. "Thanks for sticking your neck out for us back there." BradL33 said to Max. "I think I've got some gear for a Guardian in my Bank. Guardian was my 'main'... Level 82 'Nanny' build. Berserkers and Gladiators didn't really fit my playstyle. This is my Alt, a Druid 'harvester'." He sighed, "Well, I guess this is my main now..." BradL33 sliced open the melon and took a bite, pleasantly surprised at the flavor. "Everyone else out shopping?" he asked as he sat down in the sun dappled grass beside Tina.

---

>>>"Eh. I don't know if my experience with it is the same as anyone else's. Maybe it's a different experience for everybody..." the big furry Swashbuckler shrugged. "I mean, some people seemed okay with the experience but not everyone who 'came back' has a good experience with it. Seemed pretty hard on some."

>>>The Cathedral was a bit crowded with the number of people respawning, those there to meet up with them as well as the curiosity seekers. Not everyone was on friendly terms, given the circumstances of those respawning after the brawl, but nothing more violent than a few strongly worded arguments arose. Starting combat inside the City was against 'The Rules' and those were enforced by the City Guard.
>>>While Grace and Raquel conversed with Brophy, a sudden hush fell over the crowd for a moment only to be replaced moments later by a cacophony of shouts that all drowned each other out.

>>>"What's that about?" Brophy asked. His genial expression changed the moment he spied the big Pirate from the PK Crew trying to make headway through the crowd with Serena in tow behind him.

Grace listens to Brophy, grateful for the info. "Brophy… if you know someone who was hurt by the death-and-resurrection… like, real hard? Please. Invite then to the meeting that starts in about 45 minutes.

"It’s important that these voices get heard, especially if they’re too low level to fight for their lives."

She then faces the crowd, looking past that fat pirate at the one who chose not to kill her… or maybe just blinked long enough for Piphany.

"If you’ll excuse me, I believe I found the one I’m looking for." Grace’s eyes are locked on Serena’s as she says this.

She walks over to the archer who started the whole mess.

"Welcome back," she says politely to Serena (completely ignoring her party members).

Raquel stands beside Grace, giving the elf a wary look, as if daring her to try something. Her hand hovers above the hilt of her katana.

Max nodded to BradL33, extending a fist for a bump, easier for him to manage than a shake, "Got your back... I hate bullies in games. If I'm going to be built like the Hulk, should be doing something with it. Easy to risk it when I knew I'd just respawn right over there." he pointed at the direction of the cathedral. "Your friends went over to look around the church."

Max spent a moment looking at his hands, wondering how long it would take to get used to the change, then looking over at Tabby who obviously had a lot more to deal with. "Appreciate the gear offer. I probably need to go grind some levels, at least that would be what I would do in game, get some skills. Charge... Shield Slam... Shockwave... would have knocked those guys on their ass."

He pauses for another long moment. "Damn, wonder if we will be here that long, took forever to level that high."

Tabby let the silence hang for a moment, his head and whiskers drooping. "Shit, I hope not."

>>>"I wonder if people will even want to do things like 'leveling'?" she wondered aloud. "Combat is definitely a different experience without a monitor and keyboard between you and some of these nightmare creatures." She wondered if it was even something she wanted to do. "Hm. I wonder what people are going to do here. No jobs, really. Not like on Earth. Most of the stuff here is done by the locals. People of the Land, I mean. So... what's left for anyone else? I can't really see most gamers starting a homestead or becoming farmers..."


>>>"Fair point." Bradl33 agreed. "Max just said he might be up for it... But here's another wrinkle. Where?" he sliced off another chunk of melon as he formed his thoughts. "Used to, we could just look up the areas to hunt. What monsters lived there, what levels to expect, their loot drops, party strategies, vulnerabilities... Everything was easy to plan out to the finest detail. Now? Not so much..."
>>>Nodding towards Calamity, he continued, "She had a good point a minute ago. She said keeping a list of foods with flavor might be a good idea. I agree, but that got me thinking... People used to rely a lot on online guides, maps and lists to be able to play Elder Tales effectively and now nobody has access to those. So...maybe there's a way to bring some of that back."

>>>Guy returned in that moment that BradL33 let his speculation hang. He carried a bag bulging with bottles and carried two in his hands. "Ayo! Great news!" he seemed elated. "There's booze here! Real booze!" he looked around and started handing out bottles, around a liter size each, although in different style and color for each bottle. "No flavor, tastes like water but drink enough and it kicks in with same effects."

>>>"Trapped in a fantasy MMO world and the first place you go is a liquor store?" Tina scoffs, opening a bottle and smelling the stopper.

>>>"Not like that, bruv. Went looking around, ran into a bunch a' Players outside a tavern absolutely piss drunk. Asked around and found out. Craaazy, yeah?" he explained, adding one more mystery to the pile.

---

>>>"Well, that looks like trouble..." Brophy commented flatly as he watched Grace and Raquel head towards the swirling crowd gathering around Serena and Mr. Boaty as he tried to run crowd control to get her out of the Cathedral. The twin black cats were nowhere to be seen.
>>>The crowd of gathering Adventurers began to swirl around Serena, Grace, Raquel and Boaty like reporters or paparazzi outside a courthouse. Most of them angry, upset or both.
>>>"What do you want?" the Archer growled as Boaty tried to keep the pair moving towards the exit. "Come to gloat after backstabbing me?" The woman seemed upset but it wasn't entirely aimed at Grace specifically... Maybe aggravated at how things had escalated beyond the simple PK she had wanted and now they were going to be the center of some very negative attention. Maybe how something that used to be trivial fun was suddenly a "big deal".

"Why would I gloat?" Grace counters calmly. "I didn’t fight, then you hesitated but… I wasn’t expecting you to be killed unless you killed me first.

"I was hoping you stopped because you wanted to know why I wouldn’t fight back. It wasn’t a trick to get you killed." Rather than go on, Grace pauses. The word ‘killed’ leaves a sour paste in her mouth. "Are you okay, Serena?"

Brophy’s death was painful. Grace hopes Serena felt something as awful—not because she wishes real pain on anyone, but in the hope that Serena knows what she was putting others through.

"Of course you want to level up. Did you see how those people got one-shot?" He rubbed one arm, his fur still tingling after the near-miss of Tabitha's lightning blast. "And with the travel gates down, if you want to get to any other city, you're gonna have to walk. And I doubt the road is all noob-friendly from here to Big Apple."

"And triply, because fighting in person is pants-shittingly terrifying. You want to sneak halfway to somewhere, get kicked in the dick by goblins, and wake up in the cathedral with wet pants? Or do you want to live through it and pull up your spare trousers and get to where you're going? You can't exactly take the redeye instead - and even if you could, you'd have to commit goblinoid genocide to farm enough gold. Hell, even if you want to squat in this blasted apocalypse town, you have to punch at least three rats a day to get rations and room at the inn." He had apparently put a little thought into how he might at least scrape by without having to poke his nose outside the walls, and the calculus had been pretty grim.

"Even if you want to just hide in town and craft, where are you gonna get your mats? Gatherers are getting more gold defending themselves than you can net with just your starting cash. Unless you're like some kind of... paperclip-to-pickup-truck barter arbitrage savant of some kind. And that's assuming anyone wants the noob shit you have to grind to get your skill up."

Okay, maybe more than a little.
"Dude, I don't really want to tell you how to live your life, but... don't you guys have some kind of powow big wig meeting to go to in like..." He lifted his arm and looked down at his wrist. Then, he patted at his pocket, as if he might find a phone to check the time. He paused, eyes darting back and forth. "Fuck, uh, like... ...twenty minutes or something?"

"Mr. Fatts is right, you know." Wheeler said offhandedly, working through his notes, "It's been a day and no new blood has arrived. We're it, gentlemen, the bottom rung of the power ladder. In a society made up of powertripping man-children, we've either got to climb or resign ourselves to a life of exploitation and victimhood. There are a lot more Serenas and Tabithas out there." he said with a smile that was meant to be smooth and ingratiating. It was that, to an extent, but it was also strained.

"This meeting is going to be significant." he said simply, "We made enough racket to shake the gods out of the heavens, and now, now they'll deign to have some lowbies at the table. Once." he held up a finger for emphasis, "We're not exactly a unified demographic, this might be the one chance we get to give voice to our interests."

"Have you considered what you want to say?"