“Would you mind letting me pull?” Agathar growled to me over voice chat as we crouched behind a low palisade wall, staring off into an orc encampment. We’d walked for hours to get here, and it hadn’t been easy at all. The problem with crossing the wastes was the lack of a bind stone. There was one at the beginning of the zone and one just beyond the encampment we were standing in front of. Other than that, if we died, we would be whisked away, back to the beginning of the zone where we’d started. That was kind of a good incentive to stay alive.

“I don’t get it, Miles,” I said as I checked my inventory and sorted my bags. “Why are we out here? We could have just made Zate armor at home.”

“My name is Agathar,” Miles reminded me. Yes, of course, Miles was his real name.

“I think we can go with a first name basis at this point,” I said, shrugging my shoulders in real life. “Besides, what are you hiding behind that avatar of yours?”

“Intense anger,” Miles said, peeking out from behind the barricade and surveying the scene before us. Just beyond the wall, the orcs were camped in a massive, cratered, burning scene of misshapen tents and decaying bodies. At the very center could be seen a huge headquarters of sorts fashioned from the ribcage of some long-dead beast. Between each section of rib was a section of floor, each tier dedicated to some form of crafting or weapon storage. The tiers upward however were not our concern; we were only interested in what was down below.

Deep beneath the rot and hatred of their bone fortress lay a shaft penetrating the deepest recesses of the earth and reveling in the orcish stench. If we could reach deep enough, we would find what we were looking for: The Forge of Kez. See, it wasn’t enough for Balthar…I mean Melvin that we were able to forge Zate armor, but forging it in Kez would give it enhance abilities, make it tougher, and even raise a user’s mana pool. The enhanced durability would come in handy, especially considering that Zate armor couldn’t be repaired. That was the price of Tiffany’s meddling: if the source of Magelite were to be destroyed, Zate armor would eventually disappear from the world. We could wear what we had for a time, but it would become broken, damaged, unusable. I was having trouble imagining the world without it, honestly. It had been our security blanket for so long.

“Can you cloak us?” Miles glanced back at me. Wizards have the ability to turn themselves and others invisible for a short time – the number of people you can cloak depends on your level and the number of points you’ve put into the skill.

“It’ll cost,” I said nonchalantly. Using an invisibility spell did a lot more than just make you invisible; the first time you did it, it would cut all your stats by 1/3, then by ½. It would continue to grind you down until you were a shadow of your former avatar’s self. The effect would only last for a minute or two, but a minute is a long time when you’re delving into enemy territory.

“If we’re in and out it shouldn’t matter,” Miles told me, still peeking out into the encampment. “Just cast it.”

I pressed the corresponding hotkey on my keyboard and watched as our avatars were enveloped in a black transparent shroud, blinking us out of existence save for a faint outline that the game kept in place, visible only to us so we could keep track of our characters as we moved forward.

“We have 40 seconds,” I reminded Miles. “Make a mad dash for it.”

I didn’t have to tell him twice, he shot out from behind the barricade and immediately dipped through a crater, zipping between two NPC orcs and leaping over a tent.

“Be careful,” I said calmly as I followed his lead. “Stay away from the ones with outlined names. They’re aggro even if we’re invisible. If they break the cloak we’re going to have a problem.”

“I know how to play the game,” Miles lectured me. “You’re one to talk you know, you led the Standard of the Dain into the god damn chamber and let her play the song.”

“You’re still salty about that,” I said. I was annoyed, really annoyed. “You’ve been a dick ever since we started this…quest. You want to tell me what’s bothering you?”

“Other than you ruining a game that I pay monthly for?” He said snidely. “Not much at all.”

I followed him a bit further, through a weapons cache and to the backside of a wooden shack, haphazardly built of logs and sheet metal. Just beyond, a massive orc patrolled the decaying grounds, axe dragging along the ground, creating a trench in the mud as he went. We pressed our backs to the wall and waited for the footsteps to pass. We had ten seconds remaining. Without a word, we bolted from the wall, across the open ground and onto the scrap-metal ramp surrounding the outside of the bone fortress. Getting in wasn’t as easy as walking in – there was no door at the bottom. It meant traversing the ramp until we found the entrance near the mid-section, and then working our way down. As we rushed up the ramp, reaching the second rib, the invisibility cloak expired, exposing us to the world around. It wasn’t unexpected, we were far enough between orc patrols that we wouldn’t be within line of sight as long as we hurried. I sat there and waited patiently for my mana bar to recharge as I downed a blue potion.

“What’s the deal then?” Miles demanded as we stood on the massive ramp and waited impatiently. “Are you fucking her?”

“Sorry, what?” I asked, completely caught offguard. “Am I what?”

“I know you,” He said irritably. “You’re not nearly this stupid. You wouldn’t just let a bard walk in and play, so what is it? Do you know her in real life?”

“First of all,” I growled. “Even if I did, ugh…that’s disgusting, talking about people like that.”

“So you ARE fucking her,” Miles accused. “Why don’t you just say it, not like anyone’s around to hear you anyway.”

I raised an eyebrow and pressed the invis hotkey again, shrouding us in darkness. Miles too the cue and ran forward, I followed him. Our digital feet pounded against the scrap metal, it sounded like the entire structure was going to collapse. It wasn’t real of course, it was just a sound effect triggered by the movement of our feet in the given area. A 3D model couldn’t collapse without the right scripting. We shot around the bend, dodging orcs and staying clear of the named bosses with red outlines. We couldn’t risk running into one; my bag was full to the brim with crafting materials and one stack of mana potions; I didn’t have a single health potion on me. My mage had a basic healing spell but that wouldn’t cover both of us. It was stupid but this wasn’t an assault mission. The shroud wore off too soon, we were close to an orc patrol, and Miles quickly darted to the end of the ramp, dropping off and gripping the sides. I followed his head once again and we hung in silence until the patrol passed. We pulled ourselves up once again but before I could hotkey the shroud again, Miles held his hand up.

“Wait,” He said, then gestured to an avatar about ten feet from our location. I squinted. It was a fae, a tiny character really, about three feet tall, hovering just above the ground, magnificent purple butterfly wings keeping her aloft. It wasn’t an orc, and it wasn’t a NPC. That was a player character. What was a player character doing all the way up here?

“Hello?” I said, moving forward. The character looked toward me, the name ‘Millie’ floated above her head, and no guild name denoted beneath.

“Uh, hi,” She said, her voice crackling out over the mic. Yep, definitely a girl.

“What are you doing up here?” I asked. “This is kind of a high level area for you.”

She was only half our level.

“I’m kinda new,” She admitted. “I’m on this quest to get the—”

“The Horn of Plenty,” Miles finished for her. “Sweetie that’s a group quest, you’re supposed to come here with at least four other people.”

“But it’s a level 40 quest!” She exclaimed “I’m level forty!”

“We’re level 80, and we can’t take the level 50 orcs wandering around here. You see the arrows below their names? The three triangles? That means they’re three times as powerful as the level they’re showing. So if you see a level 40 with three stars, you need to treat it as a 120 or so. That’s not because the game is cheating, it’s because they have certain attributes maxed out. Like say for example a ranger with 100 plus dexterity. Or a warrior with 100 plus strength. You might be the same level, but they can still kick your butt. See what I’m saying?”

“But…but what am I supposed to do?” Millie was sounding a bit frustrated on the other end there. “This was just a quest I picked up and…I can level up if I finish it.”

“Don’t worry,” Miles reassured her. “You’re a fae, that means you have the feather fall ability. If we bring you into our group we can all jump from the top of the fortress and just glide down the center, we won’t have to walk. We’ll finish your quest and do what we came here to do. Easy peasy.”

“Miles,” I said quietly. “Should we really trust her? I mean we’re in this situation because I trusted someone—”

“Todd,” Miles said, probably rolling his eyes in real life. “We’re in this situation because you trusted a high level rogue. Even if she was in illusion form she was still playing a rogue. A bard is a rogue, a swashbuckler is a rogue. I’m trusting a new player, look at her equipment, we’re going to be fine. She can get us down there, we can help her finish her quest, easy as that.”

“Ugh, fine,” I shook my head, a useless gesture since they couldn’t see me doing it in real life. “So Millie, you’re a…oh, you’re a priest, that’s awesome.”

“Yeah!” She said excitedly. “I can heal you!”

The truth was she couldn’t heal us, not at her level. I mean she could, but it wouldn’t make much of a difference.

“Okay, let’s get this show on the road,” Miles said. “We have one more level to go up, then we’re inside. You guys ready?”

“Yeah, I’m ready,” I said. I couldn’t help but feel incredibly uneasy about the entire thing.