A New World (Gamer, Book 1) (12 page)

"Are you okay?"

He shakes his head. He's only got the faintest
hair of life left. He could die any second now from the shock of
winning alone.

Bug Detected
flitters
across both of their screens. They look around in fear as the two
most dangerous words in testing appear in front of them.

Something whistles down from the sky above
them. It’s burning bright silver and looks like a shooting star
with a glowing tail 20 meters long.

The object slams down into Harry's chest and
he cries out in agony. It's the very same sword that the wizard was
using before and Harry's face is shocked as his life force
immediately disappears and him with it.

He wakes a minute later to find Axel standing
over top of him. She is looking down at him in worry and he can
understand why. Bugs in the game can kill and Harry could quite
possibly have died in real life as well just now if something had
gone wrong.

She helps him to his feet and he, feeling a
burning sensation on his skin, yanks down on the remains of his
leather shirt. There is a very realistic looking scar in the middle
of his chest, which is black around the edges and not
disappearing.

They slowly stumbled back to the battleground
and find the sword that nearly killed Harry for real lying in the
dirt. He walks over to it and looks down at the instrument of his
near death.

"That was very, very dangerous," Axel
says.

He looks over at her to then back to the
sword.

"I know,” he says “Maybe the dragon wanted to
kill me as a parting gift?"

Harry reaches down and grabs hold of the
weapon. The glow fades away and it becomes nothing more than a very
shiny piece of steel shaped into the form of the sword.

He gives it a few test swings. It seems like a
regular weapon, yet somewhere deep down inside he knows it's
not.

They quickly open their inventories and do the
mandatory loot check that is so exciting for gamers everywhere
after a boss kill. Axel receives a new bow: It's gold and
incredibly gaudy.

Harry manages to get a mystery bag, which
turns out to have ten gold in it. He claps happily at his good
fortune.

They both smile at each other and Harry puts
his hand up. Axel high-fives him and they laugh loudly after
surviving what could have well been their deaths.

"I guess that's it then. Did you get your
gold?"

She looks up and Harry checks too. They both
received fifteen gold each and, from the fight they have gone
through to get it, it is well-deserved.

"I did," Axel says, happily.

They stand silently for a moment. There is a
sense of companionship between them; of those who have fought a
mighty battle and lived to tell the tale. Yet all good things must
come to an end. The quest line is over. The party is over. Or at
least it seems so until Axel clicks her fingers.

"Didn’t I promise to take you to someone who
could teach you magic?"

"The craziest mage you have ever
known?"

"That would be him,” she says. “Hold on a
second while I check my email."

She stares off into the distance for a few
minutes and it’s not long before she looks back at
Harry.

"He sent me an email a day ago. He is not far
from here, in a small town that you are just going to
love."

Harry smiles at her and looks back at the
woods.

"I guess we’ll continue our adventure together
for a little while longer then,” he says.

Axel laughs.

“
Don’t worry. I don’t think this
is going to be anything less than a beginning. That’s the feeling I
get anyway.”

They begin the long trudge to their
destination. Little does Harry know, but what he is about to learn
is going to change his life in-game and out forever.

A No Class Kind Of Magic

Level 8, 26 Gold, 4 Silver.
Location: Cat Girl Town. State: Both Shocked and Strangely
Excited.

"I can't believe something like this is in
this game. What is this place?"

"I told you that you would like it. Every guy
is always so happy when they discover Cat Town."

Harry stares around with a queer sense of
enjoyment that is evenly mixed with surprise. Everywhere he looks
there are women of all shapes and sizes. They are nothing like the
women of the real world. No, these are cat girls and they are
plentiful!

Everywhere Harry looks there are cute fluffy
ears sticking out from long wavy perfect hair. There are fat women,
skinny women, athletic women, and every other kind of women one
could imagine. None of them are real live women, just NPCs, but
they look like they are enjoying their computer generated lives to
the limit.

I wonder what exactly was going through the
design team’s mind when they created this strange little town in
the middle of the forest,
Harry wonders.

A bunch of young testers race by with a few of
the NPCs in tow, they are drinking something brown and bubbly that
is nothing like the stim shots people enjoy when partying in the
world outside. It looks pretty tasty and Harry is eager to try
it.

They walk through the crowd of players and
NPCs. As they make their way through the town, Axel explains that
the one they are looking for will be somewhere nearby. She has
already specified that he's probably going to be in the weirdest
place in town and that place is likely to be the
One Up Mage
Store
.

"What is it with this cat girl thing? I don't
remember this in history class."

"I'm not surprised. They were a small fad back
in the day when they had television."

"Television? I've read about that. It’s a flat
object that people stare at that plays images."

Axel laughs and brushes her hair out of her
eyes.

"Someone paid attention in VR school,” she
says before continuing. “I know it's a bit old fashion compared to
what we have now with our virtual dreams, but television was quite
big when we had it."

"And on television they had these cat
girls?"

"Yep. And they were quite popular
too."

Harry sighs and chuckles.

"I’m never really going to understand the
people of the past. What's so great about women with cat
ears?”

Axel laughs and slaps him on the
back.

"When you get old enough, I’m sure you’ll
figure it out.”

"Hey, you’re the same age as me."

"Are you sure? I could be some fat guy who
never leaves his Sleep Tech and pays a company to send over a robot
to purge and change my food system now and then."

Harry stops and turns to her. The look on his
face says he believes her.

"You seriously have to be kidding me," Harry
says. "I am sort of imagining a super fat red headed monstrosity
trying to get out of his undersized Sleep Tech. That's not you,
right?"

Axel laughs and slaps him around the
ears.

"You are so naïve for someone with your real
world problems,” she says. “Testers have avatars that are exact
duplicates of their bodies, idiot. It helps the GMs identify us if
something really bad happens in the system."

Harry laughs and tries to calm his breathing.
Although it is absolutely fine if Axel was a big fat man, it would
sort of ruin his image of her and he likes his friends to be his
friends, not people pretending to be something else, which is very
common in the world of 2222.

They stop outside of the magic shop and Axel
puts away her bow. She looks over to Harry and gestures for him to
put his weapons away too.

"The magic users of this world are a little
bit feisty. They have a tendency to shoot first and ask questions
later. It is a good idea not to give them a reason to
attack."

They step inside and Harry gasps in surprise.
There are all form of magical items, spinning, twisting, flying
around the room and putting off bursts of colored light, among so
much more, everywhere he looks. It is the strangest display he's
ever seen in his life and even weirder is the collection of men and
women standing around these flashing items.

The majority of the wizards in the large room
seem to be wearing relatively normal robes, but here and there
among them is someone dressed in ridiculous colors, glowing or
naked – like one woman standing in the corner staring at a strange
looking bird. It takes Axel waving her hands in front of his face
for a minute before he fully recovers.

They walk over to the counter and the NPC
greets them with the usual overly-happy welcome. Axel asks if
someone named Josh is around and the NPC frowns and jerks his thumb
to the back room.

They step through and find a relatively normal
looking brown robed wizard firing little red beams of light from
his fingers at a target in the distance. Axel stops and puts her
finger over her lips as they watched the man carve up and destroy
what looks to be a large spider.

"When are you going to say hello,
Axel?"

"Just letting you finish. I don’t want you
turning around and burning me with those things like last
time."

I would never do such a thing
, appears
in little white letters in front of Harry's vision,
she is just
being silly
.

"I'm not being silly. My ass still hurts from
where you cut it off the last time I came to visit you.”

"That was a complete accident. I was just
testing to see if a particular spell worked.”

"You carved off a good chunk of flesh,” Axel
says matter of factly. “You still owe me the one gold for letting
me bleed to death after that."

He sighs and sorts through his pockets. He
flicks a gold coin to her and she catches it to bite it once before
pocketing it and turning to Harry.

"Josh is a wizard, if you can call him that,
and I am pretty sure he can help you with what you
want."

The man walks over and starts to inspect
Harry.

"He’s a bit fleshy. I thought I told you I
need skinny ones."

Axel raises her eyebrows.

"He's incredibly normal. Why do you want
skinny ones anyway?"

The man taps his foot and tries to look
innocent and Axel lets it go.

"His name is Harry and he wants to learn
magic. Will you help him?"

"I might, but what's in it for me?"

"You want a fee on top of what you plan to do
to him?"

"Plan to..."

Axel and Josh turn to stare at
Harry.

"Please be quiet while the adults are
negotiating," Josh says.

They look back at each other and grin
evilly.

"Have you told him what I have
planned?"

"Not yet. I assume it’s the usual."

"Usual...?"

Axel covers Harry's mouth.

"He would be more than happy to assist you in
your experiments.”

The word
experiments
rings in Harry's
mind. Josh looks at him with a look that promises bad things on his
face and Harry starts to worry.

"Of course, we have to do a test
first.”

"A test sounds fine. What do you have in
mind?"

"Well you want to know why I need skinny ones
right? I figure I can show you right now."

He clicks his fingers and a portal appears
next to him. The NPC looks through the door and its eyes burn red.
All three of them look at the angry looking computer-generated
shopkeeper and decide it's time to leave.

Axel pulls Harry through the portal and they
appear in a dark cave.

"Well, Harry the test starts here."

Don't worry. He is not as bad as he
seems,
appears in white in Harry’s vision.

"How are you doing that?"

Axel rolls her eyes and Josh glances at
her.

"He's new. Give him time."

"It's called
whispering
. All you need
to do is imagine forcing your words at someone and it will appear
right in front of them around about here.”

She holds her hands up in
explanation.

Harry stares at her and tries to force the
words
I am whispering
at her. She looks expectant but
nothing happens.

"I guess you are going to need a little bit of
practice. You’ll get it eventually."

They turn back to the cave and Axel draws out
her bow. Harry pulls his new sword out and Josh looks at it in
interest.

"That's quite a weapon you have there," he
says. "I don’t suppose you want to trade it for some
gold?"

Harry is tempted, but something inside of him
tells him that it is not a good idea to let this thing out of
sight.

"I think I'll hold on to it
thanks."