Equestrian Earth: A Life Beyond His Own

by Nxegex

Rating: teen
Tags: My Little Pony: Friendship is Magic, Original Character, Adventure
Length: 77179

Games are a nice distraction from reality, until they become your whole world.

Paperback had always seen games, whether on a screen or a table, as a way for him to escape reality for an hour or two. He would spend all weekend hanging out with his friends and playing D&D, and made gaming the center and highlight which his life revolved around. So when the group goes on hiatus a friend suggests he get the newest MMO, complete with a Virtual Reality system. It seems like a brilliant idea to satisfy his need to escape at first, but sometimes making a game too real might mean that the players never want to leave...

A spin-off of the story Equestrian Earth, although I try my best to make this story standalone. Content rating set as Teen for depictions of fantasy violence and other possible themes as they may be added.

Published 2012-09-30 14:24:02 UTC
Last updated 2013-10-02 16:58:42 UTC

Chapter 2: The Game Begins

Paperback sniffed the air around him as a beam of sunlight struck his head through the curtains of the window in his apartment. If the sun had already risen to that height, and if could smell the trash can already, then it was obviously Friday and he desperately needed to take out the garbage.

Rolling over from the position he was is, he fell off of his bed and onto his hooves, still perfectly unwilling to open his eyes. Thank Celestia that he had managed to wrangle a class schedule at the college that freed up his Fridays. Usually he reserved today for his continual hunt for employment, but after three months of applying everywhere in town, he had just about given up. At least his parents across town were still supporting him, paying for his classes and schoolbooks, and his rather tiny living space. They were threatening to cut him off again, though, so he would have to continue sending proof that he was still looking for work.

At last, he finally found the strength within to open his eyes. Green irises found themselves widening as his pupils shrunk in pain from the exposure to light reflecting off of the bare white walls. Fumbling around with his telekinesis, he eventually managed to feel his way around his bedside table, where he kept his glasses. Planting them firmly on the bridge of his nose, his vision cleared to grant him the sight of his one-room hideaway. A corner of it was taken up by his bed, the sheets half kicked off with him never attempting to fix them.

A large rug took up the center of the room, lightly carpeted with a nice white/blue decorative pattern that went around the border. Blue lines crisscrossed the center evenly, forming a field of white diamonds that had blue fleur-de-lis pointing at wherever the lines intersected. It was relatively clean, he had picked it up off the street like he did with most of his furniture, and after a half hour of beating the crap out of it on a rope outside he had declared it sanitary enough to cover the hardwood floor. Against the wall was a small television, just large enough for him to play his X-Buck on without the image being too small or grainy. Without a table for the TV, he ended up laying on the rug, controller held in front of him within his telekinesis.

Placed on the inside wall opposite of the bed was a small refrigerator, where he would often keep a weeks supply of microwavable meals. While mostly consisting of pot pies and tiny pizzas, there was also a very small supply of fruit and vegetables, and any sugary or salty snacks that he would munch on while rampaging through a late night bout of Modern Warpony 2. The instrument used to cook the frozen foods lay on top of the fridge, a battered microwave that still amazingly worked despite Paperback accidentally dropping it while moving in. He would cook true meals more often, but the apartment didn't come with a stove.

Against the last wall, halfway between his bed and the door to the bathroom, lay his desk and his only chair. Taking up half of the desk was a monitor that was new when compared to the rest of the junk in the room, and the computer underneath ran fairly decent since his friends were nice enough to donate their old computer parts that they had replaced with whatever was new and better on the market. Being the only working space, the other side of the desk was normally covered in a hodgepodge of papers from whenever he actually worked on his homework. Right now however it was holding his most recent acquirement in the evolution of gaming.

A large white box held Equestrian Earth, the next big thing in gaming along with the Interactive Pony Visor, supposedly the debut of virtual reality technology. Pulling open the box more than he had the previous night, he pulled out a shiny white helmet that had a bulky eyepiece. Several wires sprouted like the stems of flowers, connecting the helmet to a similar white cube almost as large as his head. His intuition told him it was obviously a hardware piece that allowed the helmet to connect with the computer and other devices that were compatible with it. Placing the helmet aside, he pulled out the cube. Another couple of thick cables shot out the back end of this one like multiple tails, ending in different pieces that looked like they would match with different machines. He saw one that would obviously connect with his X-Buck, and another that he could plug into the back of his computer. Putting the cube aside as well, he tipped the box towards him, and began ruffling through the remaining contents to find an instruction manual.

“I know there has to be one somewhere...” Paperback mused to himself, examining the myriad of pamphlets, pieces, and wires that were tossed out of the box onto the floor. “Let's see... Return policy, throw that here. Warranty papers get thrown here. Ooh!Bubble wrap!” Paperback giggled like a colt as he popped a few of the nefariously fun air bubbles before putting it on his bed for later.

“Aha! There's the blasted thing. Interactive Pony Visor or IPV instruction manual.” He exclaimed, using his telekinesis to pull out the little white pamphlet and hover it in front of his face. The instructions on connection and use seemed simple enough. “Simply plug the IPV into the system you wish to use it with and insert whatever game you want to play that the IPV supports.” Pausing for a moment, he performed the menial task of setting the white cube down on the ground, and connected it with the computer using the provided cable. The game disk was already done, having been placed in to install the night before.

“Next, place yourself comfortably laying down with the IPV secured tight on your head, so that the appropriate neural sensors may interact correctly with the brain.” Well, this was also simple enough. Grabbing the pillow from his bed, he plopped it down on the floor in front of him. Telekinetically grabbing the helmet now, he tried to place it over his head. Except it wouldn't fit. Turning the helmet over, he realized that the helmet didn't have a hole for a unicorn horn to fit through. “Hold on. I think I missed a step here...”

A few minutes later, he had skimmed through the IPV manual to find where it showed how to interchange the top plate of the helmet for one that was more unicorn friendly. Now the helmet had a stylized white unicorn horn on the front, hollow to allow him to place it over his own. Now so prepared, he laid himself down with his chin on the pillow in front of him, and slid the IPV over his head.

As soon as it was snug and tight, the visor filling his vision lit up in a blinding flash that made him close his eyes for a moment. Opening them again, he found himself staring at the desktop for his computer. How do I move the mouse... Okay. That's cool. He thought, as simply thinking about moving the mouse up and down caused it to do so. He practiced moving it all around the screen for a minute or two, before finally scrolling it over and clicking on his prize.

His vision went to black as the game started up, the company logo appearing before he was sent to a title screen depicting ponies fighting all manner of nefarious creatures. Commanding the visor to select the 'Create New Account' option, rows of information showed up on his screen. Options of username, password, email and so forth were before him. “But how do I type?” He said aloud, and magically the words appeared in the username text box.

“Alright, that's cool, now how do I backspace? Wait. No. I don't want- stop it!” He shouted at the screen, as every word he spoke continued to fill up the bar. He groaned. He probably had to combine talking with mental will. “Back.” He sternly commanded the machine, and groaned again as the computer took him back to the sign in screen instead of erasing the line. Poor choice of words there, Paperback. He thought, as he moved the mouse over to the 'Create' button again. This time he had a better idea of what he was doing, and when prompted to enter a username clearly intoned with force of will “Dime Store Novel.” It was a silly moniker given to him by his group, a play on his name and the fact that he was usually broke, despite that not being related to the phrase at all.

Next, he put in a password with the same amount of force. By the time he got down to the email section of the sign-up sheet, he was beginning to get the hang of the speaking portion too, not having to put as much force into his words. He began experimenting further down the line, and by the time he was entering his date of birth he understood that the system would pick up on subvocalization within his head, as long as he was concentrating hard enough.

Finally, he was ready to log in. About. Freaking. Time.

His vision with the visor now showed him a view of a clearing in the woods, bright light streaming down from the sky. Standing in the middle was a virtual pony that was white coated with a black mane, average sized, and without a cutie mark. This was obviously a customization page, as several boxes displaying options allowed him to do things like make the pony shorter or taller, or edit the coat color. At first he thought about making his character something stunning and flashing to the eye with neon colors striping the body and whatnot, but he quickly decided that the idea was silly, and just edited the avatar to look like himself.

Orange coat? Check. Green eyes? Check. Height and build? Close enough, at any rate. He most likely wouldn't have any trouble in a body that was only a centimeter or so off from his own. Brown Mane? Well, he supposed it was okay to give him just a little bit of flair, making it stick up in spikes a bit in the back. Now it looked far more interesting than the flat, rounded style that he usually kept it in.

Next up was the cutie mark. Instructions popped up in his vision, directing him to clearly imagine what he wanted the cutie mark to look like, and then push it through his brain so that the visor could pick up on it, and place the image on the avatar. Concentrating hard, in his mind he envisioned his own cutie mark, an open book with no words written on it. Staring hard at the avatar, a bright sparkle appeared on the flank, and a perfect copy of his cutie mark appeared. Now he was staring at a slightly cooler looking version of himself. He clicked the submit button.

The various displays shifted and changed their wording. On the right he saw a long list of classes to choose from, with information bars on the left describing the abilities of each class. But what would he pick? In the Dungeons and Dragons group he was currently playing a cleric, but he was tired of being a support role. Fighters were just a bit too overdone for him, having played one in the previous campaign and not having anything to do other than roll for his greatsword. He could be a rogue, but from what he heard in the lines yesterday everybody wanted to be a rogue. What was it with rogues? He could be a mighty paladin, who with his heavy armor and light array of spells made a devastating tank. Or, he could be a mage class, who utilized a wide variety of spells in a squishy frame to literally rain damage down onto opponents. He was torn, and was about to choose the paladin for some close-combat experience when something made him stop

Then, further down the list, he saw it. The perfect class for him. Everything that he was looking for, all in one bundled package of magic and badassery. The Spell Warrior. An arcane magic fighter class that channels spells through the caster's melee weapons for incredible effect. How could he not choose this? He read more of the lore, and found it all astounding. Spell Warriors often lead disciplined lives, far more rigorous than that of their fighter or mage counterparts due to their nature of combining two highly exclusive disciplines. A spell warrior might spend their days training hard under the sun, while at night he studies ancient tomes of magic. The life of a Spell Warrior is not an easy one, but to the devoted it can be immensely satisfying.

That sounded difficult, combining magic with might. Browsing further down in the class features, he noted some of the bonuses and drawbacks. Some of the perks from the fighter and mage class were there, albeit powered down a bit. A primary drawback that marked the class was a ten percent experience penalty. While steep, it made perfect sense to Paperback. It stated right in the lore above that Spell Warriors have to train twice as hard to master the disciplines that they used. While the penalty would make his leveling slower, the opportunity to play such a challenging and mentally rewarding class was too good to pass up.

Selecting the Spell Warrior class, he felt his point of view being shifted, slowly moving him towards his avatar still in the center of the clearing. His mind merged with the body, and he felt himself able to move his virtual limbs, a decidedly different experience from moving them in reality, since he was still aware of his body in the real world.

The clearing which was the backdrop for the creation of his new form melded into itself, and from itself into nothing. He stared into a white expanse, formless and without depth. The emptiness soon parted however, because in his vision a figure emerged into existence. An equine shape, features obscured by the blinding light which emanated from behind her, rose forth an indeterminable distance away. Whether massive in the distance or right in front of his eyes he could not tell, but a sweet voice spoke into his head.

“Hello Paperback, are you ready to begin your journey?”

Paperback blinked when the figure said his name. The voice was decidedly a mare's, but who was it? How did it know him? So many questions raced through his head, but he chose to ask only one, for asking more than that might lead down a myriad chain of questions that might never be answered. “Who are you?” escaped from his lips, staring in wonder at the figure.

The figure chuckled. “Such a yearning mind, always seeking new stories and new answers. Not a who, but a what. I am the central A.I of the game, but many have taken to referring to me as the Goddess.”

A central self-aware intelligence that watches over the players? A goddess indeed. His mind brought the old term to his head Deus Ex Machina, God from the machine. This certainly brought a literal meaning to it. Words sprung to life in his head, and he spoke them before realizing what he said

“High above the Goddess stays

Her face looking ever down

O'er her subjects she cast her gaze

Yet on her head she wore no crown”

The goddess chuckled again. “If your strength is but a quarter of your wit, you will do well in the world. A realm of friendships both old and new await you, Paperback.” she spoke, as the goddess began to fade into whatever realm of unbeing in which she spent her time. “A darker side of magic and old monsters of lore reside here, however, and you will need all the friends you can get.”

Paperback groaned, feeling hard ground beneath him. The light of the goddess was gone, but he retained a coherent memory of the conversation. It was thought provoking, to say the least. What had caused him to blurt out poetry like that? Yes, he wrote some whenever he was in the right mindset, but sharing it like that was just plain embarrassing.

Looking around him, he found himself standing on a large, circular, decorative stone platform, perhaps twenty meters wide, purposefully designed to look impressive with spires rising up from the back and sides, the front opening up onto a street of some sort. There were a variety of ponies around him, some were shaking their heads and looked about as dazed as he probably did. Translucent profiles could be barely glimpsed above players' heads, and Paperback saw that by focusing on an individual one it would become solid, showing a name, class, and level. He experimented, quickly changing from player to player to view their profiles and classes. Rogue, bard, ranger, rogue, fighter, rogue, mage, paladin, rogue... He didn't see any other Spell Warrior's like himself. That ten percent experience penalty must be really off-putting.

As he was looking at all the other new arrivals, which slowly spread out and started roaming the city, he could see more ponies fading into existence. Most were new players like himself, equipped with nothing but a basic knapsack, but every now and then there was the odd higher level pony. He saw one fighter at level five, who after arriving promptly ran off down the street, loudly muttering something about cockatrices. This must act as the respawn point in the world as well as the point of entrance. Paperback thought.

Just then, Paperback noticed an elderly stallion down the street eying him sideways. About fifty paces away, this strange looking unicorn was blue with a gray mane and beard, and garbed in a wide-brimmed gray hat with a deflated top. A robe of matching color covered the front half of his body, leaving a symbol of a question mark clearly visible on his flanks. The awkward eye contact continued for another fifteen seconds before the elder waved for him to come over impatiently.

With no idea of what else to do in a game that he knew barely anything about, Paperback trotted over to the bearded stallion. As he approached, a singular green name appeared over the head of this figure instead of a profile, marking him as an NPC. The name said 'Query' and below that in hyphens it said 'Tutorial Master'. As he closed the last few steps to walking distance, Query began speaking to him in a slow, musing voice that rumbled in a baritone pitch.

“Ah, I was wondering when someone was going to answer my summons. So many new players in the city, and yet most of them completely ignore old Query here.” The stallion paused for a moment to straighten his hat, and cleared his throat once before continuing. Paperback stood patiently, eager to find somewhere to begin in this game. “Welcome to the world of Equestrian Earth, Dime Store Novel!” Query continued, using the moniker that was probably plastered above Paperback's head as a profile, along with everyone else.

“Since you are new to the city of Aeroslida, I am here to give you directions, and to hopefully start you off on your own grand quest. You seem to have the hang of the Interactive Pony Visor pretty well, so let me just brush you up on some of the more common gameplay elements you might not be aware of.”

“First, if you haven't noticed already, you are currently carrying a knapsack, which will be your most important tool throughout your early levels. It will hold all of your gear, and the loot that you will find while exploring the world. If you open it, a menu will be brought up that will show you all of the items you have, along with inventory space left available. Try it now.” Paperback reached over to the brown sack that was strapped to him. Lifting up the flap, he suddenly found his vision filled with empty transparent circles, where any gear that he got in the future would be placed.

“Good, as you see, the circles spread out to cover your entire vision. You'll be able to see through them, but the more gear you have, the more your vision will be blocked. It's suggested not to go digging through your items in the middle of a fight. Now, to retrieve items from your inventory, you simply need to think hard about what item it is you want placed into your hoof, or in your case possibly, telekinesis. I'm placing an item into your inventory now. I want you to equip it by selecting it in your pack and thinking 'equip.'”

Following the lengthy tutorial instructions closely, Paperback saw an item pop up in the top left circle of his inventory. It was a hammer. Focusing his vision on it, he saw that it was useable as a melee weapon, albeit probably one of the most basic ones in the game. Using the subvocalization technique that he had worked on earlier, he selected the hammer and it fell out of his inventory, and he felt added weight on his side. Looking over, he saw a holster now wrapped around him, hammer located ready inside it. Focusing his telekinesis, he grabbed it and swung it around experimentally, making sure he got the feel of the weapon and how he was supposed to use it.

“Hah! You're a natural. Generally when I get ponies coming to me they're the ones that actually need my help. I'll breeze through the rest of this now. Also in the inventory you can scroll left or right, bringing you to either the 'equipped' screen, where you can view what you are currently using; the 'social' screen, where you can add, message, respond and generally keep track of all of the friends that you make while playing the game along with the people that you're ignoring, but that really isn't nice, now is it? There's also the map screen, where you can view the world and the places you have discovered. ” Query seemed to just go on and on and on. Did NPC's have to stop to take a breath in between their sentences? It didn't seem so.

“Anyways, I've probably taken up enough of your time, but can you do a quick errand for me? I need something delivered to the innkeeper but I have to stay here in case other players need help...” Here we go, this was the part that Paperback was waiting for. The inevitable quest chain that would teach him everything he needed to know and then some about the mechanics of Equestrian Earth; and if he was lucky, would put him a step ahead of all the people that had started playing last night. Taking the package into his sack, he cantered off down the cobblestone street, eager to begin.

The stereotypical beginning quest chain was as mundane and copied as it came. After arriving at the innkeepers and delivering the package, he was asked to go downstairs and kill five rats that had infested the basement, at the same time giving him instructions on the combat system.

The quest chain went on and on, with Paperback being the content little errand boy for what seemed to be half of the NPC's in the large city. While wandering, questing and pest exterminating, he had gained enough experience to reach the second level. A conveniently placed quest NPC who was a red recolor of Query named Talent, complete with an up arrow for a cutie mark, took him through and explained the talent trees that each class had. The Spell Warrior class in particular branched off quite tree-like in two directions, with combat oriented talents on the left and magic oriented talents on the right. Following the middle path up the center of the tree presumably led to powerful combo physical/magical talents, but he could only see the talents that were directly connected to the first one that he put a point into, which was called Strike.

Strike was your standard straightforward melee ability. At the first rank, it's activation increased the physical damage of the next attack by three percent, with a relatively low cool down time on the ability. It would max out at five ranks, giving him a full bonus of fifteen percent if he decided to fill it up all the way. He had also passively gained the Spellsword ability, which allowed him to cast spells in tangent with the strike talent. At the moment, he knew no spells, but Talent had told him that various trainers of the different classes could teach some to him for a fee, or he could learn them through talents or scrolls found in treasure. This was in fact the next quest, to go to a trainer, who sold him the Shocking Grasp spell, a low level close-range lightning technique which he could combine with Strike for great effect.

Now Paperback was nearing the end of the quest chain, he could feel it. He had steadily been sent to see more and more important ponies in the social ladder. A visit to the blacksmith had earned him some basic bracers already, and he had upgraded his carpenter's hammer to a kitchen knife when he gathered tomatoes for a chef.

The current quest that was assigned to him in the chain was to apply for citizenship papers at the office of domestic affairs, in the capital quarter of the city. This had to be the final one, not much else made sense to come after. One final little formality quest to get out of the way to give him some starting bits and turn him loose in the world. That was all that was standing in his way.

Of course, the final quest would have a boss of some sort, even a tutorial line like this one. As he walked up the steps to the office where he was to apply for citizenship, a sly looking gray NPC earth pony burst out of a back room with a sack over his shoulder, a dagger held in between his teeth. A call of “Stop him, he's a thief!” sounded forth from the room the rogue had just left. The only pony there to stop him was Paperback. Finally, some true action. A chance to be the hero. A subconscious part of Paperback's mind that he was always aware of but never payed attention to jumped forward, demanding him to act now and stop this dastardly thief. The other part forced him to remember that this was still just part of the quest, part of a game.

Still, he could at least act the part, couldn't he? “Halt, criminal scum!” Burst forth from his lips as his telekinesis pulled his knife out of it's poorly crafted sheath. The thief immediately aggravated onto him, which wasn't much of a surprise, it was probably scripted into the event. “Out of my way!” the scoundrel cried through clenched teeth, swinging his head wildly to cut with the dagger still in his mouth.

Paperback took a hit across the side of his shoulder. The game itself didn't really register 'pain' to the player, but would give a little stinging sensation to the brain through the headset. The magnitude was low enough that it would barely register discomfort, even with foals, but would remind the player that they are indeed damaged. Crippling strikes to limbs would cause the player to lose the ability to move the affected limb properly for a few seconds, delaying them further in combat.

Keeping the knife close to his side to try and parry the next attack, Paperback returned the favor with a quick jab using the Strike ability, empowered with Shocking Grasp. The knife glowed with a stray spark of electricity that arced into his opponent's body when hit, causing the thief to snarl in pain as the knife sunk a few centimeters into his chest. The attack however, left Paperback completely open as he retrieved his weapon, and he earned himself another slash for his efforts. Feeling his hit points go down, Paperback smirked, because he was doing more damage than the thief, and probability stated that the battle would be his.

The battle went with the two opponents trading slashes back and forth for another five seconds or so, until Paperback's strike ability came back up. Lunging forward again, he scored a slash across the face, and the thief dropped his bag and knife, crying surrender as he fled out into the street, where scripted guards ran up to arrest him.

One of the guards walked up to Paperback, and Paperback knew his quest chain was finally complete, because his quest marker pointed directly at this stallion. “Good work on stopping that thief from escaping. Who knows if we would have been able to catch him in time?”

Paperback responded, “I could not stand idly by as a rogue made off with stolen goods. I simply did what was necessary.” He gave a short, light bow of respect to the officer.

“And the guard thanks you for your assistance. Here, I'd like you to have this as a token of our appreciation. Now, I must be off. I need to take this criminal to jail.” The officer pulled a folded suit of armor from his pack, and Paperback felt it transfer into his. As the guards walked off with the thief in tow, Paperback peeked inside to find a Rusty Chain Shirt. Armor-wise, it was certainly better than going exposed, but it was rather lacking as far as this game's armor went. He put it on and immediately felt it's encumbrance added to his invisible stamina stat. It gave him some partial protection around the middle, but his legs and head were still completely exposed except for his bracers.

Paperback turned around to face the inside of the building again. An aging old pony with a quill cutie mark hobbled up to him and spoke, “Oh thank you for stopping that robber. You must be Dime Store Novel, correct? Query told me that you would be stopping by, and asked me to write up your citizenship papers in advance...”

Two short minutes later, another quest was complete, and Paperback was 'officially' a citizen of Aeroslida. And to top it all off, he had just leveled to three. This game was amazing!

Level Up!

Paperback has reached Level 3!

He has gained the following skills
Strike Rank 2: Next physical attack does an additional 6% of damage.

Strike swift, strike true.

Chapter 3: An Open World Awaits

“The land below was green and fair
The greatest beauty to behold
Plains and forests planted there
And mountains filled with hidden gold”

Now barely armored and with a few dozen bits to his name, Paperback trotted down the streets of Aeroslida, where various players higher levels than him were shouting out their wares for sale, either created using the in-game profession system or found while roaming throughout the land that was ancient Equestria. Most of the players were in the level range of five to nine, but an odd few were running around in the double digits. He thought he even saw a fifteen gallop by him. No doubt others had reached this level by now, with the game having been open all night and some ponies apparently not requiring sleep. Most of them must be out in the world, though, going through intense grinding sessions or being some of the first players to run through the dungeons that supposedly filled the world.

He was already level three, wasn't it about time that he went out grinding and questing? This game didn't have a plot structure that was coherent to him yet, or perhaps he just hadn't found the right NPC to give him the quest on how he was supposed to get off of this city. That left him wandering around, gazing at the spiraling structures and being shouted at by player merchants, who upon seeing that he was a low level figured that he didn't have the bits and left him alone.

Since he had some money on him from completing the tutorial quest chain, he retraced his steps back to the spell trainer where he had first learned shocking grasp. It wouldn't hurt to have another spell to alternate his Strike ability with, since Shocking Grasp had a longer cooldown time. Browsing the meager amount of spells that were available to his class and level, he eventually settled on a spell called Chilling Touch. A frost spell, Chilling Touch didn't have the damage progression that Shocking Grasp would in the later levels, but it had the Chill effect, which slightly sapped the strength of those affected. Satisfied with his purchase, he continued on his way to look for a quest.

Honestly, he knew it would destroy the realism a little bit, but the developers just had to have a way to identify quest givers. Nothing says 'Hey! I have a job for you!' like a giant exclamation point above your head. Turning up a hill, he headed into a circular plaza overlooking the drifting world below, which his map quickly marked as Chariot Park. The plaza itself was huge, it would take him about three minutes to walk around the circumference. On the far side by the ledge of the city were the chariots that gave this part of the city their name. They were continually taking off and had new ones landing every minute or so, with ponies entering or leaving the city with each one.

Around the other edges of the plaza was the largest concentration of players that he had seen in the game so far. The nexus of activity was quite obviously where the routes of travel met, and ponies were using anything they could to stand above the crowds and shout what they were selling. Paperback stood there for a moment, trying to figure out the best path to wade through the sea of ponies, when the sight of a uniformed captain of the city guard caught his eye. This pegasus pony had an actual name over his head, and seemed to be talking to several ponies at once.

As he approached the guard, whose nameplate read Corporal Breezy, the pony suddenly turned to him and started spewing out a lengthy amount of words. Despite the clamor and hubbub of ponies around him, Paperback could clearly hear each word as though the plaza around them was empty. It must be another scripted event, since so many people seem to be using this NPC at the same time. He thought, tuning in to listen intently to the words.

“You there! Yes, you! I don't suppose I can ask you to run a quick errand for me? I need these reports handed off to-” At this point, Corporal Breezy suddenly turned away from him, as another pony walked up to start the quest, yet the words continued on uninterrupted. “-Lieutenant Crossroads, who's positioned at the primary camp of the guards just outside of Saddleworth. I would do it myself, but I'm stuck here on guard duty for a few hours yet. Can I count on you?”

Realizing that the Corporal was waiting for a response to continue the script he replied, “Of course. I can deliver them for you.” The quest giver, having turned two or three times during the conversation to different ponies to give them the same quest that he was starting on, turned back to him and said “Thanks! Here's the reports. Just tell Crossroads that I sent you, and she'll give you a small reward for your efforts.”

There was probably more to be had from that conversation, but any in-depth characterization for Corporal Breezy must be overwritten by the automatic dialogue that is preset to deal with overcrowding from players. Turning away, he began maneuvering slowly through the churning throng of ponies that were buying, selling, meeting, greeting, laughing, or whatever else they were doing.

It took him a full minute to get to the other side of the plaza to the launching station for the chariots which should have been only a fifteen second light trot. Really, the players needed to decide consensually to find a new meeting area. This was ridiculous.

The chariots seemed to be scripted as well. Pulled by uncharacteristic, unnamed pegasus ponies, they seemed to arrive regularly once a minute per town in order down the line. Locating the Saddleworth chariot line, he saw that he was still third down the line for a chariot to arrive, the one for Chafferton was just leaving now. Not much to do but sit and wait.

As he stared off towards the south at a far distant mountain range, he found himself wishing that he had made a pegasus character.

Jumping off the chariot with the other ten or so ponies who were riding with him, Paperback landed on solid earth for the first time since starting the game. Saddleworth seemed like a quaint enough town for the virtual world. About fifty or so buildings, including a stone town hall and a large inn. In front of the inn was another market area, however this one was a lot less crowded with only about thirty ponies milling about in small groups. Most of them were of only a level or two higher than him, and could be easily picked out by the poor quality of their armor. The ones that were his level and lower could be picked out by their lack of armor. There was a small group of players that appeared to be in the level nine to eleven range sitting around a table with a roll of parchment stretched out on it, arguing pointedly in lowered voices.

He knew that he was going to be heading out to the nearby camp, which he could see on a hill from here. From there, he was probably going to get sent out on a quest into the wilderness to help defend the borders or whatnot. He might as well get a head start, and gather all of the quests that he could find while he was already in the village. Which meant going around and talking to every single NPC.

At least the town was small. Going into the inn and talking to the master of the house sent him to three different ponies that might need his help. The barkeep needed someone to go out to the Cushaw farm and collect pumpkins to be turned into cider. Being sent to Farmer Cushaw, who was in the city with his wife, gave him a quest to clear off a pack of boars that had overrun the farm. The Mayor needed somepony to investigate the mine, because the workers sent off a few days ago hadn't returned.

Of course, the fact that there was a military encampment on the hill less than five minutes trot from the town did nothing to alleviate the troubles of the townsfolk. Upon arriving and speaking to Lieutenant Crossroads to whom he delivered the papers, he was asked to do another quest since the guards were just oh so busy at the moment. Paperback knew that the game developers were doing this for the sake of giving him some early level quests, but he wished that they weren't so contrived, since he could see a couple dozen generic NPC warriors just milling about.

Crossroad's quest for him involved him patrolling down the main road to the east, where supposedly they were having troubles getting reports through to an outpost located outside of a place called Barrelforest Valley. The developers just got lazy with the names in some parts of the early game, he could tell. Hopefully the areas in which higher level monsters dwelled would be far more creative. He wanted some doomy doom names of doom. A Baron Armageddon to rage through for him to fight.

He supposed he was getting his hopes up this early in the game. True, he had only played for a couple hours now, but it was the walking that was getting to him. In most games despite everything appearing to be to scale, distances between cities and places of importance were skewed, allowing the player to gallop between them within a half hour for a distance that should have been a day of travel. In Equestrian Earth, with virtual reality a norm for the game, everything, even distances were to scale. Yet again, he found himself wishing he had chosen to play a pegasus. Flying from place to place to complete quests so much faster probably meant that pegasi had a few levels advantage over the rest of the players already.

Ending his mental tirade, he found himself about halfway down the east road, where his map notified him that he had reached the 'Cushaw Farm', one of the places where he was supposed to quest. Sure enough, as he poked his head around the side of the farmhouse he saw a field full with pumpkins and boars. The boars seemed to be milling about aimlessly, one of them was munching into a smashed pumpkin. It looked like this would be easy enough, the boars were only second level.

Paperback slowly moved forward with his knife out towards the nearest boar, which was staring blindly at a fencepost and completely inattentive to its surroundings. Apparently he crossed some invisible barrier that existed though, because suddenly the boar turned around and charged him! Crap! As the boar reached him and tried to swing it's tusks up to gore him, he sidestepped, catching one tusk in the side rather than both in the chest. The blow pivoted him, allowing him to stab the boar in the neck with the Strike ability, empowered with Chilling Touch to weaken it. The boar swung around, now visibly slower than before, and it attempted to knock into him again. He sidestepped easily, and landed a slash across the face. I am so much more agile in this game than real life! He thought happily, as a third and a fourth attack from him hit home on the boar.

The effect from Chilling Touch seemed to have worn off, but Paperback speared his dagger through the boars face for the killing blow, empowered with Shocking Grasp. The boar fell, sparkling softly to indicate that there was loot to be had. Kneeling down, he searched the body and came up with a boar hide and a tusk. As he came back up, the body digitized and disappeared, as slain foes in this game are wont to do until they respawn.

This seemed easy enough. After his spells cooled down, he was already prepared to fight the next boar, sitting idly a few steps into the field. Disregarding his previous attempts at subtlety this time he ran straight up to it in a charge, knife set to strike with Chilling Blow again. The boar turned and leaped at him as he closed the distance, and the two of them clashed. His weapon scored a hit and triggered the spell while the boars tusks smashed into his chainmail. The two backed up a step only to clash into each other again, the boar's attack weakened from the effects of Chilling Blow.

Paperback struck again with a Shocking Grasp imbued into his knife, and a few arcs of lightning raced across the boar's body. As he brought his knife down for the final strike, the boar dropped over dead, falling on to the ground with a solid whump. Confused, he stared at the knife in his telekinetic grip. He hadn't brought the blade down yet, how was it dead? He stared down at the body. He couldn't loot it. He looked at his quest information; the counter of boars he had killed had not gone up. He gazed at the body for another few seconds, before giving up and assumed that the game had glitched on him. He would get the next one.

He stopped to gather a pumpkin from the field. Going about this task was not like he expected. Instead of physically picking up the pumpkin and putting it in his pack, he simply had to crouch and loot it like he would a monster, and it appeared into his pack. It didn't seem to add any weight to him, nor did he know how a whole pumpkin could fit into the pack. The answer was probably the same one as a lot of things in both the real world and the game. Magic.

Now started on two quests Paperback turned towards the next boar, which was pacing randomly with him a few meters out of its aggravation zone. Another battle ensued, with him following much of the same strategy as before. As he prepared to strike the final blow, again the boar fell over dead before he could hit it. This time however, he thought he saw the cause, a small bolt of magical energy struck the boar in the side, causing it to hit zero hit points. Turning, he looked back at the house, where he saw a blue and red head poke back behind the wall. Was that it? Did somepony seriously just steal my kill?

Snorting loudly, he trotted back to the farmer's house to confront the obnoxious kill stealer. He came around the side that he had seen the head, but nopony was there. He knew he had seen that head. It couldn't have been his imagination playing tricks on him, could it? No, whoever it was probably just started walking around the house the other way. Well, he'd show them!

He galloped around the house now, determined to confront the kill stealer. As he turned the corner, still nothing. He continued around another corner, now he was back at the side of the house facing the field. Still no one. Turning around he galloped in the other direction, nostrils flaring in annoyance. He reached the side opposite the field. Not even footprints! What the hell! Unless-

He looked up. There, lounging on the roof as if he was watching a show, was a dark cyan pegasus wearing a simple cloth robe grinning like an idiot. “You! What the hell, miss! Stop stealing my kills!” Paperback yelled up at the offender, who was now chuckling into her hooves, as if trying to keep from bursting out into laughter. “I don't care what's so funny, just knock it off.” Paperback continued, snorting as he stamped away back to the field. Hopefully now he could kill something and actually get experience for it.

He stared at another boar that was looking back at him uninterested, since he wasn't in it's aggro range yet. Hopefully he'd be able to kill this one, if the pegasus would stop interfering. Sparing a glance over his shoulder, he saw her there, smiling at him from the roof where she lay watching him. True, her blue and red mane was kind of cute the way it hung down over her face like that. Maybe if he actually got to see her up close he might like her. He shook his head furiously. Now was not the time to be admire the enemy. He faced the boar again, and they charged at each other to meet with tusk and knife.

Again, he prepared to deliver the final blow. Again, a stray bolt of magical energy arced around him at the last second, striking the boar and slaying it, taking his experience, quest advancement, and loot along with it.

Sighing, Paperback turned and walked back to the mare with a defeated look on his face. She looked at him smugly, perched on the roof where he couldn't reach her. “Alright. Fine, you win. What do you want?” She turned her head and brought a hoof to her chin exaggeratedly as she pretended to ponder what it was she wanted. Finally, she called back to him.

“Well, you seem like a strong fightery type of person... I don't suppose you'd be willing to group up and take some hits for me? That way we can both get our quests done.” Weird. Her voice was a strange southern belle soprano with a lilting tone to it. It was an accent he was unfamiliar with in person, but he heard it on television shows every now and then.

“Yes, yes. Fine. Whatever it takes to get these quests done.” Paperback said. “Could you at least come down here and stop acting all princess like on the roof?”

The pegasus complied with a smile and spread her wings, gliding down to him. “Why of course darling, anything for you.” Sweet Celestia this mare was laying it on thick. What was up with that? Then sh got closer, and Paperback could see some of the features more detailed. Wait a second... That jaw was far too square, the body too angular.

“You're not a chick, you're a dude!” Paperback blurted out angrily as the now-confirmed male pegasus landed next to him. The colt started laughing hysterically, his voice now far lower than before in an acceptable male range.

“Ding ding ding! He's a winner!” The colt said, with that idiotic grin splashed onto his face again. “Honestly, I was expecting you to run around the house a few more times before you looked up. And the look on your face right now is priceless! What, were you thinking of asking my virtual self out before you realized I'm a stallion?”

Paperback's face turned from a dark orange to crimson as blood rushed to his cheeks, an angry frown on his face. The hair was kind of cute... and now it's not. He thought. “No.” He said sternly, an obvious lie through his normally stoic face.

“Aw come one, don't feel bad. I pull that one on a lot of people. It's the hair that confuses em, you're not the first.” He stylishly threw his hair back in a 'fabulous' manner, obviously exaggerating his movements. “Since we'll be working together, I might as well let you know that my name is Sound Wave. E Tu?”

“Paperback. Pleased to meet you.” He said through closed teeth. He was still miffed at the prank, but in hindsight he supposed that it was pretty funny. As Sound Wave offered his hoof, Paperback took it, and the two shook as Paperback mentally sent a group invite to him. Looking at Sound Wave's title above his head, he noticed that he was a level two bard. Squishy early game character, no wonder he wanted someone to group up with. That cloth robe he was wearing probably couldn't take a hit well at all.

“Well alright then Paperback, let's kill some boars and gather pumpkins now, shall we?”

It really was easier with two people rather than one. As a low level bard, Sound Wave only had two spells. One of them was the basic attack spell he was using to steal Paperback's kills earlier, and the other was a light buff he could use to increase speed for a short time on the both of them. After another fifteen minutes of quick fights and waiting for a couple of boars to respawn, they had each killed and gathered the necessary amount of boars and pumpkins.

They had talked all the while too. Mostly of things they noticed in the game, but Sound Wave mentioned that he was a singer and worked on the weather part time. His cutie mark, a G Clef next to three tied, ascending eighth notes and a quaver, was evidently his mark in real life too, marking him as a talented singer. Proven, when halfway through Sound Wave started lightly singing a little jingle to the background noise of killing boars.

As they were leaving the farm, Sound Wave turned to Paperback. “So, what other quests are you working on? Might as well knock them all out of the way together.”

Paperback didn't like to admit it, but the relaxed nature of the pegasus next to him was rather pleasant to be around, kind of like Rusty Nail who he met yesterday. “Well, I've got to clear the road to Barrelforest, and see what happened to some ponies at the mine, which is in the other direction.” He replied, looking at his quest log.

“I have the second one, but not the first. Who's that from?” Sound Wave said.

“It's from Lieutenant Crossroad, in the military encamptment.”

“Seriously? I was there and only got a quest from the smith to get some ore from the mines. Never even saw the Lieutenant.”

“Wait, I didn't get that other mine one. Share it with me?”

“Oh yeah, sure. Share the Crossroads one.”

The two of them went to their respective quest logs, and shared the quests with each other so that they could both get the rewards for them. If it was really that easy, then working with a group might help Paperback get quests in towns faster too. With Sound Wave flying above and Paperback running below, they could each get half of the quests and just share them with each other. It would save the two of them probably a half hour each time they reached a new town.

“Well, this is the road to the forest, shall we keep going this way?” Paperback said, gesturing to the road that lay next to the farm. Sound Wave agreed, and they both started trotting towards the distant Barrelforest Valley.

The trip there was rather uneventful. A few new locations were discovered on his map on the way, some of which Paperback made a note to come back and delve into later. The terrain they went through was mostly plains, with some sparse forest thrown in every now and then for texture. The monsters encountered just off the road were a bit more challenging than simple boars, and a wandering hermit offered them a quest to take out a highwaypony who was camped out on some rocks overlooking a fork in the road. They gladly accepted, since they were already headed in that direction. During all of the random encounters, Sound Wave was bumped up to third level, and Paperback jumped to fourth ten minutes later.

Level Up!

Sound Wave has reached level 3!

He has gained the following Skills!
~Piercing Note, Rank 2: Caster plays a note which rips towards the target. Increases Damage to 130%.
Like scraping a chalkboard.

Level Up!

Paperback has reached level 4!

He has gained the following Skills!
~Strike, Rank 3: Your next Physical attack deals an additional 9% physical damage and 3% magical damage if used with a spell.
Strike harder; with more magic!

Modestly pleased about his continued progress in the game, he was happy to note that the next level he would be able to start branching out to different talents, rather than just putting a rank into Strike every level. Although, he might just choose to put the last two ranks in there anyways. It looked like their was another ladder option that you would only be able to take with max ranks in strike. Oh well, he would figure out his mind later. Right now, there was a bandit to kill.

The duo saw in the distance a place where the road they were traveling on split in two directions. One headed off towards the northern mountains, and the other headed towards a forest nestled at the base of a grouping of large hills. Overlooking the fork about fifty meters away was a large natural rock structure which the highwaypony was supposed to be camping out at.

“So, how do we wanna go about this?” Paperback said, looking sideways at his compatriot.

“Knock on his tent and politely ask him 'Hi there! We know you don't know us, but could you please stop robbing and murdering ponies? That'd be great, thanks!' I'm sure it'll work fine.” Sound Wave exclaimed in a voice that was difficult to contrast between excited sincerity and sarcasm.

“Sound Wave, I'm no good at sarcasm. Was that sarcasm?” Paperback looked puzzled.

“Yes, Paperback, yes it was.” Sound Wave said in a mock sigh. “We're going to march into his camp, probably exchange a line or two of witty banter, and then slay him easily. Now, forward march!”

Paperback rolled his eyes at the idea of being given orders like a soldier, but started walking towards the rock nonetheless. As he reached the rock, he could see the faint smoke trail from a campfire on the other side. He began a slow, quiet shuffle around the side, attempting to stop his mail from clinking while keeping himself low in the high grass to avoid being spotted easily. His magical reflexes were poised to seize the dagger hanging in the sheath on his side. Sound Wave crept up behind him, a spell charged and ready to fire at the slightest sound.

Finally, they could see the corner of a tent. Sneaking ever so slowly, more and more of the campground came into view. Finally, they saw the bandit, a brown earth pony wearing a red bandana over his mouth, laying on the ground relaxing. And Paperback stretched his head out a little more and saw the other two bandits.

Whoa. Three of them. Probably not a challenge we can face quite yet. Paperback tried to back up, but his retreat bumped him into Sound Wave, and the abrupt stop made his mail clink. All three of the bandits turned and looked at the sound. He muttered, “Oh for the love of-” but whatever love he was swearing by was cut off as the three enemies simultaneously charged at him.

Various challenges issued forth from the bandits mouths, spewing such inane drivel like, “Your money or your life!” “No one crosses us!” “Your head will be a nice trophy for the boss!” Wait a second, what was that last one? Paperback thought. So these highwayponies have an organization of sorts? How contradictory to their chaotic nature.

Paperback filed the information away, and roared in response to their challenges. He drew his dagger and lunged forward. A bolt of sound energy rushed over his shoulder and struck the first bandit, courtesy of Sound Wave. As he brought down his first attack, he charged it with a Strike and Shocking Grasp, cutting the bandit's health down to a third of it's maximum amount. The brown earth pony took a moment to recover from the blow, by which point Paperback was already swinging his dagger for another hit. A slash was scored across the side as Paperback leaped sideways to avoid the second bandit. A swing from a short sword impacted off of his mail, doing less damage than it would have if it had hit flesh but still dropping a noticeable chunk off of his hit points.

He turned to face his new opponent, a second earth pony that was an azure color with a straw mane wielding a short sword. Unlike the previous pony, this one was wearing some armor that looked like it was about to fall off, as ratty as it was. Paperback retaliated to the attack from the short sword, scoring a hit on the azure pony in his unprotected facial region. The next swing from the sword missed him by a hair. The first brown earth pony was maneuvering around short sword to finally take a swing at Paperback, but Sound Wave had charged another Piercing Note, and brown fell over as the last of his health was depleted. Wait a second, wasn't there a- WHUMP

He didn't need to finish his internal question as his thoughts were distracted by a crimson blur that shot at him from the sky, launching him back several feet. Great, third bandit is a pegasus. Paperback mused as his health points cried out that he had just taken a critical hit. Now depleted to a third of his HP, he needed to start playing defensively as his two opponents had barely taken any damage so far. To his left, Sound Wave was frantically charging another Piercing Note spell, and by the time it was ready the two had closed the distance with Paperback, who was still picking himself off the ground.

Sound Wave's spell struck Short Sword pony, while Paperback used Strike with Chilling Touch to reduce the strength of the pegasus, who was wielding a solid ball of steel on a metal handle. Even though the game was only triggering a minor ache in his side from the blow, Paperback could imagine what it would actually be like to be hit like that. Maces hurt.

He pranced back and forth, taking a glancing hit from both his opponents while waiting for his Strike to cool down. Sound Wave launched another Piercing Note at Short Sword, who responded by turning his aggravation onto the bard. Unable to get airborne in time to escape the charging bandit, Sound Wave was reduced to comically running around the camp, unable to charge a spell in fear of taking hard damage.

At least it left Paperback with only one opponent though, and he was now able to retaliate at the pegasus who was continuing to try and break his ribs with the blunt instrument. His Strike came up again, but Shocking Grasp still had another second on cool down, so he saved it while making another swipe with his dagger. Now he had two spells up, and triggered them both simultaneously to deal enough damage to finish off the mace-wielding pegasus.

He turned his attention to the final bandit, who was still chasing Sound Wave around the encampment with fury sounding between clenched teeth. Borrowing a tactic from his now deceased pegasus opponent, Paperback charged forward, barreling into the side of the earth pony. Racial modifiers weren't on his side, however, as the pony was not knocked prone by his attack and merely shifted the aggro back onto his near-dead avatar. Jumping backwards, he bought himself time until Strike was up again, and lunged forward with the dagger as yet another Piercing Note came from the now freed Sound Wave. Both attacks hit their mark, and Short Sword collapsed mid charge like a ton of bricks.

“Well now. That was fun.” Sound Wave said, looking over at Paperback. Paperback glared daggers at his uninjured friend; his own hit points only at about a tenth of their maximum. He was distracted, however, by his quest log bonging at him. Looking inside, he found that not one, but two quests had been completed. The one for the wandering hermit who asked them to kill the bandit was cleared, and so was the one for Lieutenant Crossroad who had asked him to scout the road to Barrelwood Valley. Sound Wave had obviously gotten the same notice, because he was staring interestedly into a blank point in space from Paperback's perspective

“Huh. I'm guessing that what happened was that we fought two separate mob groups. One was the bandit that we were supposed to find here, and the other was the two who were probably patrolling from here to the forest.” Paperback thought aloud. Now they had four quests completed, and it was time to return to Saddleworth and the military camp before heading off in the other direction towards the mines. First, however, the was the matter of loot...

“Alright. I'm taking this mace here. I can probably do a ton more damage with this than that kitchen knife I was using.” Paperback said, kneeling down to loot the pegasus of his valuables. Alongside the mace was some some coins which was automatically split between him and Sound Wave, and a miscellaneous item that he could sell for a paltry sum.

Sound Wave was kneeling over the body of the brown pony, coming back up having looted the bandana off of the bandit's face, and his weapon from the ground. “You're taking the bandana? I'm pretty sure I ripped that thing up enough with my dagger that it's not even worth selling anymore.” Paperback said, moving on to the armored azure pony.

Sound Wave just shrugged. “I can get it repaired by a tailor back in town or something. Wear it on my forehead. I'll look cooler that way, and people will mistake me for a girl less.

“Alright then. We better head back to town now, we've got all the loot.” Paperback replied, having looted the belongings of the second bandit. “We can turn in some of these quests on the way.”

About ten minutes in on their walk back to town, Paperback felt something in his pack heat up to a noticeably warm temperature. “Hold on, Sound. Something's happening.” Opening the pack, he brought out a parchment labeled Friend List and saw that someone was trying to add him. He glanced at the username, and saw it was 'Manic Mechanist.' Memories from last night flooded his brain, and he realized that it was Rusty Nail trying to contact him.

“Hey, it's this guy I met at the game store last night. Gimme a sec to add him.” Sound Wave nodded in reply, and their walking speed slowed to a near crawl as Paperback attempted to multitask. Accepting the friend request, Paperback soon started receiving private messages on the parchment from Rusty Nail. 'Hey mate, where's your location?'

Speaking aloud, and leaving a confused Sound Wave nearby, he replied “Heading to a town called Saddleworth to turn in some quests.” A reply was not long and coming, and soon Rusty's words appeared on the sheet of paper. 'I was there just last night dude! Think it would be cool if I joined up and hung out?'

“Hey Sound Wave, this guy Rusty Nail who I know wants to turn our party into the three musketeers, you alright with that?”

“Sure. After that last battle, I would consider a third party member to be of quite strategic interest.” Sound Wave spoke nonchalantly. Of course, he wasn't the one who almost got killed. Goddess knows what dying is actually like in this game. Looking down at the parchment again, he said “Yeah, it's fine. I'll see you there.” A reply of confirmation from Rusty, and the parchment was rolled up and put away into the pack again.

A few more minutes passed, with the two of them talking amicably about nothing in particular. They soon reached the hermit who had given them the bandit quest, and upon turning it in, Sound Wave gained enough experience to level up again.

Level Up!

Sound Wave has reached level 4!

He has gained the following Skills!
~Piercing Note, level 3: Caster plays a note which rips towards the target. Increases Damage to 140%
~Soothing Chord: A light blast of magic is directed towards the caster or his allies, healing them for a small amount.

“Next time I get injured like back there, I expect you to use that.” Paperback joked, once Sound Wave told him what abilities he learned.

“Heh, don't worry. You won't be shipped home in a coffin on my watch.”

“So they'll be sending whatever is left of me in a matchbox then?”

The friendly ribbing continued on like this as the two wore out their stamina bars a few times while galloping back to Saddleworth. Upon arrival, they turned in the other three quests that they had completed, earning Paperback just barely enough experience to level again. After deciding whether or not he would continue leveling up Strike, he decided that he would, because the talent that required him to fill all five levels of it led up the middle of the talent tree, where he guessed that all the really good abilities lay.

Level Up!

Paperback has reached level 5!

He has gained the following Skills!
~Strike, Rank 4: Your next attack now deals 12% bonus physical damage, with any spell attached dealing 6% more damage as well
~Elemental Weapon: Enchant your weapon to do minor elemental damage on each swing.

He liked the sound of that second ability he earned for leveling. Looking at it more closely, he saw that he could make his weapon deal either fire, cold, lightning, or acid damage with each strike that would passively consume a small amount of mana. He enabled it on his new mace right away, now each strike would deal fire damage not to mention any spell or ability he used in concert with it.

The two of them split up for a while to sell their respective loot. Both of them had boar hides and tusks from their first encounter, and some from random encounters on the road. They also had the loot from the bandits, and Sound Wave wanted to get that trashed bandana repaired.

While Paperback was browsing some of the wares of an armor merchant, he felt the hair on the back of his neck go up. Turning around, he didn't see anyone watching him, but as he turned back to the merchant, he found a green face staring him in the eyes.

“Wagh!” he cried, falling backwards over his hooves. Rusty Nail stood there, laughing uproariously.

“I swear, that is never going to get old.” Rusty said. Paperback took a moment to examine his friend as he picked himself off the ground. Rusty was a level five rogue, wearing some sort of brown or padded armor over his chest that gave moderate protection. A wicked looking curved short sword rested in his sheath, it was probably enchanted in some way. “So, ready to adventure, mate?”

“Hold on a few minutes Rusty, I'm looking at armor. I need to replace this rusty piece of junk I'm wearing right now.” Paperback said, turning his attention back on the vendor and all of the stats that the different armors had. Rusty groaned and rolled his eyes. He shook himself and fidgeted in place for a moment, before giving the rest of the area a look around. Something caught his eye, and he turned back to Paperback.

“Alright then, while your doing you shopping thing, I'm going to go hit on a lady or two. Be back in fifteen minutes.” Rusty said, trotting off in a strut obviously meant to impress. Paperback turned, and his eyes widened.

“Rusty That's not-” Paperback started, but suddenly cut himself off.

“Not what?” Came Rusty's reply

“Nevermind. It's nothing. Go ahead.” Paperback said. Rusty turned, and continued to canter off with a humongous smile on his face. Paperback nearly died from holding in the laughter that threatened to burst his lungs as Rusty sidled up alongside Sound Wave and brushed flanks.

Chapter 4: Forging a Party

“Though kind at first the world did seem
Dark ambitions stirred beneath
Evil ponies do plot and scheme
And great monsters gnash their teeth”

Paperback had finally picked out the armor he wanted. Chatting up with the NPC vendor who stood nearby, he purchased a set of Conscript's Mail, which was an iron and shiny replacement to the rusty old thing that he wore now. It wasn't magically enchanted; that would cost him too much. Rather, he used the gold he had saved to buy Iron Bracers, a dramatic improvement to the battered pair he wore now. Indeed, their durability was about to drop to zero, and he got only one bit off the sale of them.

Indeed, it should not have taken him ten minutes to purchase such relatively simple armaments, but he was distracted by the show happening at the cloth vendor across the plaza.

Rusty Nail walked towards Sound Wave with a gait that could only be properly described as a classy strut, and even then the term might not do justice. Cool, confident, self assured, Rusty was quite obviously confident in his way among the ladies. How successful he was at actually scoring a mare remained to be seen.

Smoothly sliding his way next to Sound Wave, Rusty's first move was to gently brush flanks. Too light to be rough, but just hard enough to not be an accident, cutie marks of a wrench and musical notes met in a sensual stroke. While this moment of physical contact was happening, the side of Rusty Nail's mouth opened and said, “Hey there good looking lady. What's a sensual young thing like yourself doing in a game like this?” Even from a good twenty paces away, Paperback could hear every word, and felt his eyes start to water from laughter. Even Rusty's laid back tone of voice sounded more refined.

Sound Wave caught on immediately, it seemed, and switched to a more feminine voice. Unlike the southern belle accent he had pulled on Paperback, this one was much more believable. A mild voice of a city mare came from his lips, just barely loud enough for Paperback to listen in. “Oh, you know, even a filly like myself gets to be a nerd every now and then.” Luckily, Sound Wave's more characteristically male facial structure was hidden by his mane, which fell down over the side of his face facing Rusty Nail.

“Well now, perhaps you'd like to swing on over to the inn there and have a drink with me? My treat.” Rusty said. The merchant at the armor stall gave a questioning look at Paperback, who was sniggering into a hoof as quietly as he could. Leaning over, Paperback whispered the situation to the NPC, who gave a grin and started watching the show as well.

“It's sweet of you to offer, but I was actually about to head back out and do some more quests.” Sound Wave countered, continuing in the female identity.

“Well I can do questing too! How'd you feel about having a dashing rogue like me protecting your flank from all the monsters out to get you?” At this point Rusty rubbed against Sound Wave's flank again, eliciting a light giggle from the pseudo mare.

“I bet that you'd spend more time watching my flank than protecting it, tough guy.” Sound Wave said, and after saying it he bumped Rusty's flank back, making Rusty giggle too.

“Alright then, you go off on your way. I don't suppose I can have a smooch before you take your sexy body out and slaughter some wolves?” Rusty looked downright hopeful at this point. Paperback knew what was coming next. It would be so funny, yet so painful to watch. The most apt synonym his mind could come up for the occasion at the time is that it was like watching a clown car about to careen off a cliff.

“Oh, if you insist, then I suppose I can give you that one little thing.” Sound Wave said, except now his voice was lower and decidedly colt-sounding. With his long hair now brushed behind Sound Wave's head, Rusty was given a view of Sound Wave's face for the first time, and the green pony promptly recoiled in shock. He tripped over his hooves in a comical manner, which Paperback could only guess was how he looked whenever he did it. Rusty rolled over on his back to right himself, and glared slack-jawed at the colt who had just tried to seduce him. The worst part it seemed for him is that it almost worked.

Now back onto all four hooves, Rusty made an exasperated half-strangled noise that came out sounding like, “Yeahthatsnotgonnhappenokbye.” Turning quickly, he broke out into a clumsy run that ended behind the stall where Paperback and the Armor merchant were laughing openly by this point.

“What's the matter, Rusty? Expectations not living up to reality?” Paperback said after he managed to calm down. In response, Rusty shot him a death glare from underneath the cart where he was now hiding.

“Alright. You have your stupid armor now, right? Can we go?” Rusty muttered a few minutes later after Paperback had made his purchase. He was still sitting underneath the armorer's stall, probably now more so out of boredom than humiliation.

“You're so terribly impatient. Are you always like this? I was adventuring with another person whom I just met today before you tagged along, and it'd be polite to wait for him.” Rusty rolled his eyes at this and Paperback shrugged. He could tell that Rusty was a hardcore gamer at heart, and any moment not gaining experience was a moment wasted.

“Alright fine, fine. I don't suppose you could tell your other dude to hurry it up?” Rusty said, finally extracting himself from under the cart.

“Oh don't worry, he's coming over now.”

“Where? I don't know what he looks like.”

“He's that one. Right there.”

“Wait- no. You don't mean-”

“Yep.”

“And you knew?”

“Of course.”

“And you didn't tell me because-”

“Some humor was required. More compelling drama this way. I felt like it. Take you pick.”

“You are an ass.” Rusty Nails hissed, putting extra emphasis onto every word.

Sound Wave reached the duo at that moment. He had a new robe protecting him; a starch white garment with a red trim on it. It looked nice enough, but still wouldn't stop most damage in combat. In addition, the red bandana which he had gotten repaired was now tied around his forehead, keeping some of the hair pushed back in a way so that he'd only be mistaken for a filly part of the time.

An awkward silence settled over the group as Sound Wave completed the triangle. He stared with a bemused expression at Rusty Nails, who in turn shot daggers with his eyes at Paperback, and pointedly avoided eye contact with Sound. Paperback merely stood there, smirking with his eyes closed at the mental picture of Rusty flailing over his back hooves. The picture would stay with him for the rest of his life, because it was that perfect.

“Well then Rusty, ready to head out? We're going to the mine to do that quest for the mayor.” Paperback said a few seconds later, having filed the memory away where he would be sure not to forget it. Rusty let out a halfhearted affirmation, and the three of them turned to the road.

A few minutes had gone by. Silence pervaded the three of them, the awkwardness caused by Rusty not speaking to either of them spread to Paperback and Sound Wave, and the two just rolled their eyes and walked without talking. This continued on until about halfway to their destination, when Paperback finally talked.

“Look over there.” He said, and the other two obediently turned their heads and followed the direction his hoof was pointing.

“That is a big freaking boar.” Sound wave said after a moment. Indeed it was. Standing half again as tall as a pony, a massive boar could be seen moving through the undergrowth far off to the right of the path. A wooded area, the distance and shadow cast by the leafy branches made it hard to make out anything beyond it being a boar and humongous.

“Probably a challenge. Should we kill it?” Paperback said, trying to make out a name or a level on the thing. He was unsuccessful, there was too much space between them.

The two of them seemed to think it over for a minute, before Rusty finally opened his mouth again. “The big beastie you two are looking at is named Briarbuck, so I heard last night. A high level monster who has a ridiculous roaming range. A group of four fivers like us ran into him farther up north and got squashed flat before they could do much of anything.”

“Four level fives should have been at least able to do something against it.” Paperback countered. After all, he and Sound Wave had been able to take out three bandits who were leveled four and five, and this was only one monster.

“You would think so, wouldn't you? Nah, Briarbuck is apparently an 'Elite Monster', which means that his stats are buffed up beyond that of normal.” Rusty Nail stopped for a moment, and chewed on his tongue before continuing. “Not long after, a level ten fighter showed up with one of the fives to show him where they found it. I saw them arrive, and then I saw them arrive again a half hour later. Talked to him for a minute. Apparently the fighter got his flank kicked back all the way to Aeroslida while barely making a dent in the boar's hitpoints.”

“Right. So. Avoid the scary boar thingie for now. We'll get back to it later. Probably has some sweet loot.” Sound Wave said.

The trio continued on their way, now talking regularly since the spell of silence over them had been broken with the encounter of Briarbuck. Shortly, they saw the mine ahead of them. A clearly marked entrance into the side of a hill, the entrance to the tunnel was carved through gray stone, which jutted out around the hole. A track ran out of the cave and to a nearby hut, presumably built from the solid trees that were scattered here and there in the clearing. A stream ran around the hill from the mountains to the north, forming a natural barrier around another half of the clearing. Thus, the only way to enter the mine would be to walk straight to the front door, unless they wanted to swim or climb.

NPC's registering as 'hostile' were scattered about in groups of one to four. Ponies, who were bandits much like the ones destroyed by Paperback and Sound Wave earlier, of all different races. A bit more than half were earth ponies of obvious rogue and warrior classes. Another quarter or so were pegasi, including one that was patrolling the skies above the clearing in a vague elliptical motion. The remainder were unicorns who were placed into the larger groups. Obviously they were spellcasters of some sort, which would make them the first ones that Paperback had dealt with in the game.

“Alright. So how do we want to go about this?” Paperback said, a safe distance away from aggroing any of the bandits. Sound Wave gave him a blank stare, while Rusty looked thoughtfully at some of the single guards patrolling the outside perimeter.

After a moment, Rusty looked at Sound Wave thoughtfully, then spoke aloud “Well, we can always have the bard here grab them one by one with a bolt, then the two of us can knock them over quick enough before any of us get really hurt.”

Paperback nodded. “That will work. Ready Sound Wave? Start with single guards first.”

“Don't I get a say in this?” Sound Wave said, clearly uncomfortable with being the first target.

“It's the best plan. Don't worry, we got your back.” Paperback said. Rusty Nail pointedly said nothing, but turned his head away and whistled nonchalantly. Paperback quickly smacked him on the shoulder with a hoof.

“Oh alright fine. We promise not to let the big bad bandits hurt a single hair on your precious mane.” Rusty said, stretching out the last part of the sentence with as much foalish sarcasm as he could muster.

“Alright then. Here goes something.” Sound Wave said, and charged the first bolt of Piercing Chord. Letting it loose, it struck a lone guard square in the ribs, and he quickly turned and charged towards the trio. Pulling their weapons out, Paperback and Rusty waited until the guard was upon them then both simultaneously struck with abilities. Paperback brought his mace down on the bandit's head with a Strike/Shocking Grasp combo. Rusty Nail had the wicked looking dagger in his mouth, and sliced it across the pony's side. A second attack from Rusty, who was slightly quicker in attack speed from using a light weapon, brought the bandit down to zero and he fell over.

“That was ridiculously easy.” Rusty Nail said, leaning down to loot the corpse. A small amount of bits was distributed between the three. “Let's try grabbing two this time. We didn't even get hurt.”

“Feeling cocky, are we?” Paperback mused. “Alright Sound Wave, wait for that pegasus overhead to fly around and then grab those two over there.”

Sound Wave obliged, and a Piercing Note went zooming towards another earth pony bandit. This one had a buddy, and both angrily ran towards the party bard, shouting more generic throwaway lines. As before, when they reached the two melee fighters, they were quickly engaged by Paperback's Strike and Rusty's Backstab, the latter allowed the other pony to get ahead of him before engaging.

Both bandits had their attention turned onto their new aggressors, and melee combat ensued. Paperback dropped his enemy to below fifteen percent of his health, and he turned away, intending to retreat towards another group of three some distance off. “Sound! Speed Riff! Now!” Paperback barked, and Sound Wave hastily cast the spell that boosted the party's movement speed. With incredible agility, Paperback caught up to his prey and smashed his mace into the side of the bandit's head, felling him with Strike. The bonus to movement speed was already over, but Paperback was in a good position to intercept Rusty's bandit when it tried to do the same a second later.

“Alright, so they run when pushed down to low health. We really don't want to let them get back to their friends.” Paperback said, resting while his hitpoints came back up to full. “New addition to the plan, whenever one of us gets them to the point of about to run, we all focus on him, got it?” The other two nodded, perfectly willing to let Paperback take charge and make the plans. Since when did I become the leader type? He thought, I never do any of this plan stuff in the D&D group.

The next two encounters went smoothly. Another two bandits went down in the first one, and in the second which was composed of three, a pegasus bandit had tried to take off early but was quickly grounded from a Piercing Note. A fair bit of loot from coins, weapons, and paltry amounts of armor were split between the party. Now was the real challenge. A group of four bandits was their last remaining main obstacle to get into the tunnel, one of them being a unicorn.

“Now. This is the tricky part. The unicorn over there is level six, which is higher than us. However, if Rusty can get close, he can continually disrupt his spells. Which means that I'm going to have to hold off three at once. Sound Wave, you're going to be healing me as soon as they reach me. Don't let me die, or else I'll haunt you for the rest of time.” Paperback said sternly. The last part was obviously meant as an idle threat, but the rest of the instructions were quite clear.

Sound Wave gulped loudly as he stood at the maximum range allowed for him to be able to cast a spell. Paperback stood beside him, ready to engage three fighters. Rusty was far off to the side as close as he could get without being spotted -which was rather close, seeing as he was a rogue- so that he could rush the wizard as soon as the fight began.

The first spell was thrown, and struck a pegasus in the side and 'crippled' his wing long enough for him to choose to sprint towards the caster rather than fly. Two others shortly followed him, and the unicorn's horn began to glow with energy. Rusty sprinted in and tackled the unicorn, causing the spell to fly wildly into the air and dissipate. Meanwhile, a second Piercing Note hit the pegasus as the three closed distance with Paperback and Sound Wave.

A third Piercing Note hit the pegasus at the same time that Paperback smashed him with both of his Strike and Shocking Grasp abilities, causing him to crumple. Now the two earth ponies remaining were flanking Paperback, and he took a couple hits before he could jump out of the way. Gritting his teeth, he punched out with a hoof and cast Chilling Touch on the earth pony who wielded a mace like his own. That pony weakened, Paperback used him as a shield to keep between himself and the unstruck bandit, while using his mace to bash the first one in all the while. He still took some more damage, but luckily Sound Wave's Healing Chord meant that he was still floating around two-thirds of his health.

Paperback glanced over, and saw that Rusty was making quick work of the wizard, using his abilities to disrupt most spells, and the wizard wasn't dealing enough damage in melee to be any significant threat. Turning his attention back to his opponent, he swung his mace up and brought it down with Strike, finishing off the wounded bandit. Now, there was just the one left. Feinting, he moved to the right, only to sidestep a blow and bring his mace in from the left, knocking the bandit across the side of the head.

Now all he had to do was wait for strike to come up again, and the combo should be enough to send this one running so that Sound Wave can- WHUMP.

A familiar sound, that whump. The pegasi bandit that was circling above had obviously seen the fight, and had dived down to help. He was sent sprawling across the grass, his eyes rolling in his head. Picking himself up, he could feel the damage making his hitpoints cry tears of blood as they were sent skyrocketing down into critical levels. Curse whatever designer gave pegasi rogues that auto-crit ability when diving from the sky. Another healing spell from Sound Wave brought his health back up a little bit, but he was still on the defensive as the pegasus and earth pony closed in on him.

Suddenly, a green blur charged the earth pony, sinking a dagger into his hide. Rusty it seemed has finished off the unicorn and had come back to help. The earth pony bandit took another quick hit from Rusty and fell, leaving the pegasus trapped between the two fighters. Closing in, Rusty and Paperback swung their weapons in unison, dealing massive damage to the pegasus, which Sound Wave launched a Piercing Note at to drop him out of the sky when the bandit turned to run.

Level Up!

Sound Wave has reached level 5!

He has gained the following skills!
~Soothing Chord, Rank 2: Increases the amount of health healed by the ability.
Music to soothe the soul and mend the body.

With the fight over, the group looted the bodies. The activity went in relative silence as weapons, armor, and other trinkets were picked up until Paperback spoke, “So. I vote that next time we let the bard try and fight one.”

Sound Wave's spluttered protests were almost unheard over uproarious laughter and agreement from Rusty Nail. With the task complete, the trio turned towards the open mouth of the earth that led down into the mine.

“It's surprisingly well lit for a dank hole in the earth.” Sound Wave said a few minutes later, remarking at the lightly lit stone walls that surrounded them. Lanterns were located every thirty feet or so; be it hung up on walls or placed on large stones that jutted out of walls without being cleared. The tunnel caverns reflected more light than they probably should have, and what should have been near darkness was instead simply shadowed.

They followed the rail for mine carts down a central tunnel, with side passages splitting off at random intervals down the track. Patrolling enemies moved around down here, but the trio kept quiet and ambushed them whenever they passed by. These bandits walked in pairs, and one of them was usually carrying a lantern, which made them easy to spot as they walked up from the tunnels below.

After they passed the fourth or fifth passage branching off into a dead end, Paperback noted that his quest marker discreetly appeared, and signaled him that the person to turn a quest into was near. “Hold up a moment guys, Quest marker points down this passage.” Paperback said, and started walking down the gradual slope of stone. Rusty Nail and Sound Wave followed close behind, their quest markers also activated.

At the end of passage there was no lantern, so it was less illuminated than the rest of the mine system. Still, Paperback could see that the tumbled rocks and boulders here were not natural, but like there was some sort of collapse. He drew closer to the cave-in, and felt gritty stone and sand fragments underneath his hooves. “A cave in? Explosion?” He mused aloud, but suddenly the shadows in the corner of his eye moved.

Paperback was tackled yet again, and slammed into the side of the cavern by an earth pony rogue who had been blending into the darkness behind a boulder. The rogue got another two hits on him, but by then Paperback was back on his feet and Rusty had started the assault with his dagger. Bringing out his mace, Paperback grimly noted that the bandit was three levels higher than the party. No wonder my hit points dropped that much.

Still, the rogue was only one bandit, and it did not take terribly long for the three to dispatch him. As the foe was killed, Paperback noticed that there was a hole in between the rocks at the top, and that he had been unable to see the faint amount of light pouring through until he had gotten closer. A mare's voice issued from the crack, calling out “Hello! Hello! Is someone out there? We need help!”

Paperback placed his two front hooves on the rocks, raising himself up enough so that his voice would carry through the hole back at the mare. “Yes! We're here! What happened?”

“Oh thank goodness!” The mare's voice replied in relief, “Bandits have overrun the mine! We're all of the workers who they didn't kill. They piled us into this tunnel and collapsed it. We're trapped down here!”

“Is there any way for us to get you out?” Paperback inquired loudly.

“Yes! We have some blasting powder in the central cavern farther down in the mine. If you could bring that up here, you could blast these rocks enough so that we can dig our way out.” She said.

“Alright, don't worry, we'll be right back!” Paperback said, and turned around to start walking up the cavern as his quest log bonged to tell him that he completed one quest and started another.

Next to him, Rusty Nail was admiring a sword that was now equipped to him. Fairly standard looking, it nonetheless gave off a sparkle when light from a lantern hit it and looked well cared for compared to the other gear of the bandits. “Hey Rusty. Where did you get that thing?”

“This baby? I looted it off the rogue that ganked you back there while you were chatting it up with the miners, mate.” Rusty Nail said, gesturing back to the spot where the now digitized bandit used to be.

“It's enchanted, right? How come you didn't share that with us?” Paperback asked, a slight crease in his brow.

“Didn't think to. I saw something better than what I was using, so I grabbed it. I'd share now, but it binded to me when I equipped it.” Rusty said, shrugging his shoulders. Paperback frowned. “Look, if it bugs you so much, then set the party details so that enchanted stuff has to be rolled on before it can be looted.”

The frown stayed on Paperback's face as he kept walking. He could do that? Slowing down his pace so he didn't trip, he experimentally opened up party options and saw that he could indeed set the loot rules for enchanted items so that everypony had an equal chance at acquiring it. He toggled it so that even low level enchanted items would be shared, and closed the tab.

Feeling more confident about their ability in combat, the three of them no longer snuck about and instead boldly marched down the tunnel to the central cavern where they were told that they would find the blasting powder. Along the way, they found a mine cart on the tracks, and a quick search found some of the ore that the smithy back at the guard outpost requested of them.

Level Up!

Rusty Nail has reached level 6!

He has gained the following skills!
~Backstab, Rank 3: The rogue does 190% more critical damage when attacking an enemy from behind.
Through the spine and out the heart, the battle's over before it could start!

With more bandits dropped and more ore discovered, they soon saw themselves looking into a large chamber which the tunnel exited into. Stretching about thirty meters across, the ground was smooth but in uneven steps as rocks has been cut around rather than through to make the floor. The center of the cavern was lower that the outside ring, and many barrels and crates were stacked there. Including, Paperback noted, the blasting powder.

Unfortunately, the entire room had bandits scattered to and fro in it, about eight in all. Most were of fourth or fifth level, something that could be easily taken on by the trio, but another eight level rogue could be spotted entering from a different tunnel, and a ninth level bandit overseer was standing at the back of the cavern to direct operations.

“Put yer backs into it lads, we need to strip this place of all the ore it has before the guards get wind of us being here.” The overseer barked at the milling ponies. A few of them were swinging pickaxes at the walls while other were digging through minecarts.

Three heads slowly withdrew to behind the cover of a boulder, and Rusty Nail turned to his two compatriots. “Alright. So. I think we can take them.” He whispered.

“Are you crazy?” Sound wave hissed. “There's no way we can take on eight at once! Especially with two of them that high of a level.”

“No, no! Just hear me out! Look, one of them is taking some of the barrels that have the powder into a tunnel over there, right?” Paperback stuck his head out over the rock again, and he indeed saw one of the bandits pushing a cart with two barrels of powder in it. “Alright. So. We know that there's still at least five barrels of explosive powder in the center of the chamber so-”

“Paperback, please help me tell him he's crazy!” Sound wave frantically whispered, as the realization dawned on him of what Rusty's plan was.

Paperback, himself feeling just a bit daring said, “Hold on. I want to see where he's going with this.”

“Thank you. Now. As I was saying. There's still some barrels left, so if we can get everyone on the two of us near the center, Sound Wave can sneak over to a lantern and throw it on the pile. Lantern breaks. Barrels go boom. Everyone goes home happy, except for the bandits. Easy, right mate?” He said in an undertone, turning to Paperback for support.

Sound Wave interjected again, “And what about the part where you two go boom with the bandits?”

“We run past em as soon as you give us the signal and duck into a tunnel. Sure, one or two might survive the blast chasing us, but we can take em.” Rusty Nail countered.

“And what signal am I supposed to even be giving you?” Sound replied in contempt.

“Were you not listening? You throw the lantern.” Rusty said, a hoof brought to his forehead in mock irritation.

Paperback spoke up, “While there are indeed many flaws with this plan, it is far better than the 'run in there and tank them all' option which is second.”

“Alright then. So we're in agreement. Don't screw us over on this, you spoony bard.”

“I'm not in agreement! And what did you call me?” Sound Wave said irritably, but an answer would not be forthcoming, because Rusty and Paperback were already strolling into the cavern.

At first, it was like the enemies didn't even notice them. They reached halfway to the center pile of crates and barrels with only the overseer staring at them incredulously. Then, at once, all of the bandits stopped working and just turned and stared. The overseer, a brown earth pony with a two handed sword of some sort strapped across his back, stepped forward with mail armor clinking in the dim underground. “And 'oo the hell are you?”

“Oh, we're just some nobodies come to see what you're all doing down here.” Rusty Nail said sweetly, pouring on the same charm that he had tried to use to seduce Sound Wave earlier. The ponies around the sides of the cavern now slowly moved in, surrounding the duo in a ring. Paperback had figured out Rusty's plan. Since this was a named character, it would obviously have more AI than the common variant, and thus combat could be held off with the right conversation.

“If you're here, then you must have killed your way through my men above ground.” The overseer snarled, mouth turning downwards in a wicked grimace. From his position, Paperback couldn't tell if Sound Wave was grabbing a lantern or not. He really hoped he was. It would be rather impossible to fight off seven ponies. “We ain't accepting new workers into our organization. You made a big mistake coming in here...”

The ponies around the side were grinning now, drawing weapons. Great, the presence of one major NPC made them all the more realistic, and therefor far smarter. Paperback strained his ears behind him, desperately listening for sound against the back wall. What was that? Scrape... clink! Went a sound, and Paperback could have only one guess as to what that was. “NOW!” He shouted, and turned around and bucked one of the barrels containing explosive powder over. Rusty did the same with a different barrel, and black powder spilled all over the smooth stone floor. Both of them drew their weapons and cleaved their way through a guard behind them, running for the exit as fast as they could. The duo took a few hits as the bandits turned aggressive, but that was only a minor concern to Paperback as he saw a lantern flying through the air in slow motion.

In a moment that seemed to last for eternity, Paperback and Rusty hung in midair with six angry bandits lunging after them, the seventh lying dead on the floor. Of course, no moment ever truly freezes in time, so it was inevitable that the lantern would land in the middle of the bandit group, fire igniting the powder that lay on the floor and rushing up to the barrels full of it.

Fwoooo-BOOM!

Paperback was flung forwards into the tunnel, with Rusty Nail landing on top of him. He knew that the IPV wasn't supposed to simulate any sort of true and lasting pain, but the heat from that blast was just a little too toasty for comfort, and his head ached something terrible. As Rusty rolled off of him, he groggily stood up and checked his hit points. Five percent left. All things considered, he should really be dead right now, so he was willing to call five percent a miracle.

Sound Wave poked his head up from behind the rock. His health had taken far less of a dive, and still stood at a solid seventy five percent of their maximum. Immediately, he began casting a Soothing Chord on Paperback.

As the healing relief of the spell washed over him, bringing his life into a more stable number, he saw Sound Wave's eyes shrink in fear. He turned his head, and saw the big boss overseer leaping at him with that greatsword. Well. Figures he wouldn't die.

The sword came down, and Paperback rolled with the hit, bringing his health yet again dangerously close to zero. Luckily, there wouldn't be a second swing from the overseer, because Rusty already had his sword out and jumped on top of the bandit, where he thrust his weapon through a weak point in the armor to deal massive damage and finally bring down the rampaging warrior.

Level Up!

Paperback has reached level 6!

He has gained the following skills!
~Strike, rank 5: Your Strike deals 15% additional melee damage, and 10% improved spell damage.
Strike with your weapon and strike fear in their hearts.

Paperback abandoned getting up and just lay on the ground for a moment, as the game went through the process of letting him feel that a couple of his limbs were crippled and that he desperately needed some healing. Another healing spell from Sound Wave washed over him, and the game allowed him to move his left foreleg again.

Rusty Nail was looting the bandit overseer, and a small tab opened up in Paperback's vision which depicted the greatsword that the high level enemy was wielding. It was enchanted with a bonus to strength, but none of the three of them were proficient in two handed weapons. “Well, looks like we'll just roll to see who gets it to sell.” Paperback said, and the three selected that option. The game rolled a number between one and a hundred for them, and Sound Wave won the weapon with a seventy-five. A simple enough system.

Also in the leader's inventory was an 'opened letter', which despite there only being one on of them, could be picked up and looted by all three. Opening it in the inventory revealed correspondence between the overseer and some sort of boss, who was implied to be the leader of all of the bandits in this region. A new quest was acquired, which was to hand the letter over to Lieutenant Crossroads.

The other bandits were looted as well, and lots of coin and unenchanted items were split between the three of them.

“Shall we go get the other barrels now?” Paperback continued. The other two agreed, and they set off down the the tunnel where they had seen a bandit take the barrels previously. Two thugs were by the cart that had the barrels, but they were quickly dispatched with relative ease. It appeared that they could not loot the barrels like they could with much of the ore they were finding, so the three of them had to alternate pushing and pulling the cart back up the track.

They arrived back at the side tunnel where the miner ponies were trapped behind the cave in. “Alright, we have the barrels!” Paperback shouted, as he propped himself on a rock to get his voice to carry through the hole.

“Great! There's a bend in this tunnel that we'll shield ourselves behind! Light em up!” The mare said, and Paperback and Rusty each rolled a barrel over to the wall.

“Are you sure that this won't just collapse the cave more?” Rusty Nail said, as he pried off the lid of his barrel.

“Pretty sure. The NPC wouldn't have suggested it otherwise, right?” Paperback replied, doing the same.

“Alright then. Let's go get a lantern” Rusty said, and fetched one of the ones further back in the tunnel. From a good twenty feet away, he used the flame in the lantern to ignite a small train of powder that led back to the barrels. The previous incident with explosive materials probably fresh in his mind, Rusty quickly backed off out of the blast range.

Hissssssssss- BOOM went the powder, and after the dust settled the tunnel was clear, several ponies poked their heads around a corner deep further back in the cave. One of them, a mare, trotted up to the trio and said “Oh thank you! We thought we were going to die down there.” The identification above the pony named her Forepony Silver Stone.

“We were only too happy to help.” Paperback said. He heard movement in the main tunnel, and turned around to see Rusty Nail sneak up and backstab a bandit who passed by. “We should get out of here and back to town, more bandits might still be lurking about.”

“Good idea.” Silver Stone said, “Can you lead the way?”

“Of course. Stay close behind us.” Paperback replied. Silver Stone nodded, and half a dozen ponies fell into line behind Paperback as he and Sound Wave made to catch up with Rusty, who was slowly eliminating any patrols that might have respawned.

After a short minute they arrived outside, and the miner ponies visibly brightened their mood when they felt daylight for the first time in what must have been at least a day. They were instructed to stay there for a moment while Paperback, Rusty, and Sound cleared off a couple groups of bandits who were blocking a straight shot out of the clearing. After doing so, they all ran past some of the bandits, who turned to chase them, but those gave up after a few minutes, which gave the group a straight shot back to town.

As they turned in the quest to the mayor, the various miner ponies split off to their homes. The trio received a fair amount of bits for their efforts, which Paperback was already planning on what he was going to spend it on first. I saw a nice helmet back at the armorer's stall, or there was that morningstar at the weapon vendor...

Level Up!

Sound Wave has reached level 6!

He has gained the following skills!
~Galdr of Strength: The caster plays an invigorating song that strengthens allies, helping them deal increased physical damage.
♪We sing our song of Strength and Might/Fear our power, for now we fight♪

New morningstar strapped securely to his side, the three headed off to the nearby hill where the guards encampment was. They each turned in ore to the smithy, Paperback received a nice pair of iron boots for the endeavor while the other two chose cloth and hide armor respectively, since neither of them could wear metal armor pieces.

They went to turn in the final quest, which was to turn in the paper they found on the overseer's corpse to Lieutenant Crossroads. Paperback showed her the letter, and she read it for a minute, her expression continually grew more grave as she reached the bottom. After she finished, she turned back to Paperback and company, and addressed them.

“This is bad news. I had hoped that the sudden increase in bandit activity was completely coincidental, but it appears not. Bandits with organization... Such things have spread destruction to entire towns over the centuries.” Crossroads turned and walked over to a map unrolled on a table, the trio following close behind. She pointed to a marked farm southwest of the town, “The letter says that the ore they were gathering was to be taken to the old Sundance farm. It's been empty for about ten years, so it wouldn't be too much of a surprise that they're holed up in here. I know that I shouldn't get dependent on all of you, but I can reward you well if you go out there and find out what they're planning on using that ore for.”

Paperback of course agreed to do the job. As the three of them left the command tent he turned to the other two.

“Well, it looks like we've found the first major quest chain.” He remarked, trotting with a spring in his step. He was rather excited to have a true quest chain on his hooves, it sounded intricate with it's rumors of a bandit organization.

“Yep. Interesting. Say, I gotta do a gig thing in an hour, so I gotta head off.” Sound Wave said. “If you guys wanna wait a couple hours for me, that'd be great.”

Paperback nodded. “Yeah, I suppose I could. Rusty?”

Rusty shrugged. “I can wait, mate. I gotta go tinker with some mechanical stuff anyways.” It was interesting how quickly Rusty accepted Sound Wave as a friend when just earlier today he was repulsed by him. Paperback noted that he wasn't the type to hold a grudge past an hour or so, rather like him and his D&D group. It was a fine party they were turning out to be.

Paperback turned back to Sound Wave, “Yeah, looks like we're taking a two hour break. Then we can knock a couple more quests out of the way before we need to sleep.”

The other two just stared at him for a second before Rusty Nail rolled his eyes, then digitized and vanished as he logged out of the game. Sound Wave chuckled for a moment, then said. “Y'know Paperback, the IPV let's you play the game while you're asleep.”

Then Sound also digitized and logged out, leaving a confused Paperback staring at the spot where they just were a minute ago. Then, his eyes widened in sudden realization, and he shouted at their empty positions, “You can play this game while you're asleep!?!”

Chapter 5: Heroes Not Included

“Though fate is grim neither fear nor mope
Great heroes step forward to the light
Across the land they rise and spread hope
Pillars of Evil shake with their might”

Paperback pulled the helmet off of his head. His eyes flared with the afterimage of the Equestrian Earth world, the last thing he saw as he logged out staring at the spots where Rusty Nail and Sound Wave had been just a few moments ago. He blinked, clearing his head of the glow and trying to adjust to the dim light of the room. How long had he been playing?

Rubbing his eyes, he turned towards his computer, now on the desktop. He peered at the tiny numbers in the corner, making out the time of 1:20. That early? He had woken up around nine-ish, if the rising of the sun was still reliable. How had so much time within the game passed so slowly in real life? He was fairly certain that even magic couldn't answer the question; unless time compression spells had been discovered sometime when he wasn't paying attention to the real world. Brow furrowed, he racked the deep annals of his memory to try and bring forth any information he might have stored away that could shed light on the subject.

Paperback was one of those people that collected a repertoire of random facts and useless information that could be pulled out ever so often to answer questions like these. How he remembered all of it was unknown to him, since he often couldn't remember his own homework more than half of the time. He made grandiose leaps in logic that would make little apparent sense to anypony other than himself, and arrived at a corner of his mind where he blew the dust off of almost-forgotten tomes of vague knowledge.

He remembered that the speed of thought was several times faster than what ones body could react at. Since the computer was processing everything at faster than the speed of thought, technically the players in the game weren't speaking their ideas at all, but it was equivalent to a form of telepathy through machines. The average pony will go through five or six cycles of dream sleep every night for fifteen minutes at a time, but the actual content of a dream for the dreamer will have seemed to have lasted several hours. Thus, what had been a full day in the game had actually been condensed down to one sixth of the time, and if the neural interface could trigger the rest portions of the brain, he could indeed play while he was asleep.

Sometimes he managed to impress himself with his ability to reach a logical conclusion. He allowed himself a smug smile as he stretched his legs. And then he ran to the bathroom, for nature had been calling him for the past hour and he didn't even realize it.

A few minutes later Paperback exited his adjoining bathroom with a most contented sigh and headed for the fridge. Vaguely he remembered that he hadn't eaten that morning, and his brain was tricking him into thinking he was hungrier than he should be because it felt like he had gone a full day without food inside the game. He pulled out a cup and filled it with sink water, sticking it into the microwave to heat it up. He placed a Noodle Cup nearby, where he would out the water momentarily.

A disgusting stench reached his nostrils and he flared them in disgust. He looked down, and saw the full trash can still sitting there. Oh. I should have emptied that this morning... He thought, as his mind trailed off into a half-formed list of other things that needed to be done. He pulled up the trash bag with magic, keeping it a good ten feet away from him as he exited his apartment and walked to the dumpster. It was about the limit of what he could do with his magic; he never bothered to learn many other tricks or exercise the ones he did know.

He unceremoniously flung the offending garbage into the dumpster, dropping the lid down onto it a bit harder than he needed to. Instead of going straight back to his apartment, he lay down on the grass for a minute, resting in the warmth of the sun. It wasn't as if he actually had anything to do back at the apartment. At least, anything he wanted to do. While he sat, he thought about nothing, and time flowed smoothly without interruption or distinction. He enjoyed the little moments like these. Peaceful, serene, and free of worry. After what he would guess was about fifteen minutes, he forced himself to get up.

Paperback trotted back inside of his apartment, kicking the door closed behind him. Checking the microwave, he found that the water was now lukewarm and growing colder by the second. He grunted in disgust, and started the microwave for another minute. That done, he pulled off the seal of the Noodle Cup with his magic and wrapped his hoof around the warm cup of water. He poured the latter into the former, creating lunch. Like science, only disgusting. He hated Noodle Cups. Freeze-dried vegetables and noodles that quite frankly tasted like crap. If only he found a job, he could afford decent food.

He looked at the clock on his computer again; only 1:43. Still an hour and a half to kill. Sighing discontentedly he laid down in front of the TV and wolfed down his lunch.

Finally, it was time to return to the game. The last hour had been spent watching a rerun of the Coltbert Report and the Daily Show with Jon Stalwart, his prime source for news of the outside world. Paperback didn't keep up with politics or most current events, but accepted the information that the two comedian reporters laid out with a grain of salt, half-formulating his own opinions about events but still remaining in a state of impassiveness.

He checked the clock one more time, ensuring that the time was three thirty. Well, he would be a few minutes late. Hopefully they wouldn't go off without him. He placed the helmet over his eyes, and entered the world of Equestrian Earth.

The light of the virtual sun flooded his eyes as he felt himself materialize into the world. The bright sheet of white quickly separated into a spectrum of colors, as the sky filled with blue, the trees became green, and the dirt he stood on shone as a light earthy brown. He blinked a few times as his eyes adjusted, then looked around for his friends.

Spinning on the spot, he did a quick three-sixty of the area. Not there, not there, not there... Aha! There. He thought, spotting a familiar cyan coat next to an olive green one. He walked over to them slowly, observing the two. They were blatantly avoiding eye contact, with Rusty Nail studying the tree off to his right and Sound Wave staring up at the sky disinterestedly. Paperback sighed inwardly. It seems that it's going to take some time for these two to get used to each other, or at least for Rusty to get used to Sound Wave. And I thought I was the antisocial one. He quickened his pace, and his hoofbeats made the two turn and see his approach.

“Hello again gentlecolts. Are we prepared for questing and other such tomfoolery?” He said, in a slightly amused voice. It was also as chipper as he could make it, which was a bit of a stretch. He didn't do happy, really. The half smile on his face passed for real enough though.

Sound Wave returned the smile, and waved a hoof in the air at his approach. “Thought you bailed on us, Paperback. Rusty here looked ready to head out without you.” Sound bobbed his head at Rusty, who rolled his eyes in an obvious 'whatever' motion.

“Can we get on with it? We need to go to the Sundance Farm or whatever and kill everything.” Rusty said, filling his tone with as much plaintive boredom as a child would at his mother in a beauty salon.

“Oh you are just oozing patience right now.” Sound Wave said, his voice full of sarcasm. Immediately after he said it, he leaned his head closer. His eyes lowered seductively and he dropped his voice to a mock whisper, “Although, you are kind of cute when you pout like that.”

Rusty leered at Sound with a scowl, and a low growl rose just audible in his throat. His neck lowered into a charging position and a hoof rested on the pommel of his sword. Sound Wave stared at him for a half second before plastering a cheesy grin over his face. Rusty evidently took it as a mocking insult, and the growl rose in volume.

“Easy there Rusty. He's just getting you riled up.” Paperback said, giving a light chuckle at Rusty Nail's expense. The joke in and of itself wasn't that great, but the reaction was still funny. Rusty didn't seem to be taking these jokes so well, though, so Paperback would have to talk to Sound about cutting back on them later. “Now, if the directions we got from that NPC were correct, Sundance farm should be to the southeast. The road heads east-northeast so we might as well just trail blaze our way there.” The farm was actually south of the mine they were at before, and a bit closer to the town to boot. They could probably make it there, finish the quest and come back within a couple of hours. In-game hours, that is. Which would translate to... what, twenty minutes in the real world?

Paperback was interrupted from his train of thought by a hoof poking him. He looked up, and saw Sound Wave in front of him, Rusty staring over his shoulder. “You were saying we were going to trail blaze and then it looked like you went to sleep. You alright?” Sound Wave said quizzically.

Paperback blinked. “Yeah, I was just calculating how long it would take us to get there in the game and how it translated to real-world time. Thinking must just take me longer since our brains are already running at obscenely fast speeds.” He said in a matter-of-fact tone. His two compatriots both gave him blank questioning looks, but dropped the matter, allowing them to move on.

To travel over open terrain was far different from traveling on an established path in the world. The landscape was an ever flowing ocean of rolling green hills with boulders jutting up from the ground, obstinately marking their spot on the world. Creatures wandered about the open land; the likes of coyotes and boars traveled in packs for protection while here and there larger creatures could be spotted off on their own as they stalked prey. As they passed particularly close to a cluster of trees, the trio luckily spotted a pair of eyes glaring at them from the bush. They reacted swiftly enough to avoid the pounce of the mountain lion as it went straight for Sound Wave.

The fight was hard for them, the mountain lion was level nine compared to their level six, and Paperback didn't feel comfortable moving on until he had received a Soothing Chord from Sound Wave, to heal the massive damage the mountain lion had caused when it's claws raked his sides.

They were almost to the farm now, if the invisible map marker in his head was reliable at all. There was a stretch of trees that looked like it covered the view of the side of Sundance Farm that they were on. “I say we just go through. I'm bored of walking.” Rusty Nail said, as they drew closer to the cluster of forest.

Sound Wave shook his head, “No, we should definitely go around. There might be another mountain lion sneaking around in there. Or two. I doubt we could fight two at one time.” Between the three of them, they actually probably could if Sound Wave focused on healing the two melee units, but his argument was still solid.

Paperback thought it over for a moment, as the three of them moved ever closer to the woods. “Well, I think we should-” He cut himself off, staring into the brush. It was moving. “I think we should run.” He stated plainly, but his feet wouldn't, couldn't. They remained rooted to the spot as if a druid has ensnared him. His gaze remained fixed on the massive shape that was turning in the brush.

Sound Wave and Rusty Nail stared at him for a moment, then turned to look at the glen as well. They too stood transfixed as the shape of a massive boar, easily twice the size of a pony, turned to face them. Sound Wave whispered in a half-strangled voice, “Oh my...” and then left his jaw open.

The behemoth made eye contact with the three little ponies that must have looked appetizing to it, as they stood there like a free meal. A guttural snort came out of it's mouth, and then it roared, as it charged forward at them with it's tusks lowered for a gouge.

Rusty Nail broke the spell first. “It's Briarbuck! Scram mates!” He quickly turned and galloped off as fast as he could. Paperback and Sound Wave turned and followed not a moment later, but Briarbuck the elite monster had already halved the distance between it and the group.

Paperback was right behind Sound Wave as they reached their top speed, but it still would not be enough. “Sound Wave! You're a pegasus! Fly, dammit!” Paperback shouted. Sound Wave apparently heard him, for his wings opened wide and he began gaining altitude. Rusty Nail had a good lead on them of at least fifteen feet. How far away was Briarbuck now? Paperback spared a glance behind him, and didn't even have time to scream as a tusk rammed into him. Everything after that was darkness.

He was in the white space again. That eternal plane of nothingness from which reality spewed forth. Where he first met the goddess. Paperback was not given time to dwell on this fact, however, for he already felt himself being pulled and tugged. It appeared his visit would be for the briefest of moments, for he soon found the nothingness slipping away and reality took form around him.

Immediately, he felt the aftereffects of the attack which he had received. He was felled in a single blow to the side from one of the monster's tusks, which had pierced his armor and went straight through his lungs. It was not particularly pleasant to think about, but the pain was already fading. The memory of the wound he would carry with him, the first time he had experienced death within the game. What inwardly surprised him though is that he didn't really feel anything about it. He died, time to start over. He supposed he was just a little bit sad, but more because he would have to walk all the way there again.

He looked around and found himself in a large room. It was rectangular and plain, with windows higher up to let in light. The walls were the familiar stonework of Aeroslida city, and the floor was solid planks. Beds which players were supposedly 'resting' on lined the walls and had a row in the center of the room. Beds that had no one near them would occasionally have a player materialize next to them; other unfortunate souls that had fallen victim to spells, swords, or monster teeth.. There were plenty of beds in the room for the amount of players that probably died hourly within the game, assuming that people didn't take their sweet time and moved along outside.

Across the room on the far wall, underneath the windows, a familiar blue-coated pegasus materialized, eyes clenched shut and wings still splayed out in a flying position. Paperback walked over to Sound Wave, who flinched at the hoof placed around his shoulder. After a moment, Sound Wave looked up at Paperback, eyes wide still in shock from dying.

“Are you going to be all right?” Paperback asked him as he withdrew his hoof from Sound Wave as the pegasus straightened himself out. Although death was but a temporary thing in this world, it seemed so real. Paperback frowned on the inside as he mused about the possible psychological implications of that, but kept as warm of a face as he could muster on the outside.

Sound Wave shook himself once as he finally tucked his wings to his sides. “Yes, I'll be alright now, it was just so sudden that I got scared and... “ Sound Wave trailed off, clenching his eyes shut at the memory of it. He opened them but a second later and turned to Paperback. “I was already fifteen feet in the air when I died. He jumped and got me.”

Paperback's eyes opened wide at the news, but didn't have time to respond because in the space one bed over a green earth pony materialized. Rusty Nail had a different reaction to death than the other two; instead of silent contemplation or terrified shock, his countenance resonated with an inner rage as he joined the other two. “I managed to last a good half minute longer than the two of you, only because I got so much farther ahead. Bastard can run. And he doesn't seem to have a limit on how far he'll chase you, either.”

“He jumped and got me. Boars aren't supposed to jump. That isn't something they do, is it?” Sound Wave added again, perplexed.

“No. they aren't. I'll admit though, it was pretty spectacular to see him knock you down onto the ground like-” Rusty Nail started, but cut himself off when he saw that Sound Wave had his eyes closed tight, ears flattened against the side of his head. “Oh come on. You can't tell me you actually got scared from dying. It's just a video game. Not like real life.”

“You don't get it! It's virtual reality, but with the emphasis on reality! That was too real! You have no idea what it's like to be grabbed by the wings like that. Pegasi are supposed to be free in the air. To lose your flight like that is just absolutely terrifying.” Sound Wave retorted. The two of them slowly leaned towards each other, prepared to escalate. Paperback stepped in before it could happen.

“Knock it off you two.” Paperback said sternly. Both sets of eyes turned towards him, and he continued, “Yes, we died, and both of you experienced it in different ways. How each of you handle it is your own business, and fighting like this solves nothing. Now, let's take a short break and buy and sell or whatever we need to do, then we'll head back out there and be more careful.”

Both of the others agreed, and they left the respawn house, headed off to different directions in the market. The first place that Paperback headed to was the Spell Tutor. He needed a few different spells to alternate between besides Ice and Lightning.

A few minutes later, he exited the Spell Shop with rank two of Shocking Grasp, and a new spell called Burning Hoof, which would deal a percentage of the initial damage dealt over time. There were some other neat ones he would definitely buy in the future, but for the moment he was low in funds to have all the spells he would want. Not to mention that plenty of them he needed a higher level for anyways.

Once the trio had arrived at their predetermined meeting place- right outside Chariot Park- they prepared to maneuver their way through the ever-churning mass of ponies who seemed to be always present within the plaza. The break had been what they needed; Sound Wave and Rusty Nail still weren't making eye contact, but at least now they weren't about to try and kill each other. Sound Wave gave a smug grin to Rusty Nail and Paperback, then used his wings to take to the sky and soar right over the crowd, and presumably landed right by where their chariot would arrive. As Paperback looked for an opening to cut through the throng, he stared wistfully at the sky and wished that he had rolled a pegasus.

Rusty nudged him, and Paperback broke out of his daydream and looked where Rusty was pointing. “An opening. There. Let's go, mate.” The two quickly dived into the open spot and managed to slowly push their bodies through the mob. After three minutes- two longer than his previous trip through Chariot Park- Paperback and Rusty managed to make the line for the Saddleworth Chariot just as it was arriving. They managed to both fit comfortably enough inside of it, while Sound Wave flapped lazily outside to keep the chariot from getting cramped.

Finally, they were at the Sundance Farm. Rows upon rows of neglected corn stalks slowly withered under the glare of the sun in the fields. Beyond them lay a farmhouse and a barn that appeared to be long abandoned. Someponies had quite recently moved into the area, however, because bandit ponies could be seen wandering the fields and around the house. A few pegasi patrolled the skies, which Paperback kept a careful eye on. He was rather tired of getting smacked around by diving rogues.

“Alright. So. Go about this the same way we did at the mine then?” Rusty Nail said, his hooves propping him up on a broken length of fence as he stared uninterestedly at the patrolling bandits. Paperback was busy behind him, levitating a stick to draw a top-view map of the farm so they could plan a route of how to get to the farmhouse with fighting as few mobs as possible.

“Yeah, probably. It seemed to work pretty well last time.” Paperback said, looking up from the map to note how the guards were moving. A lot of it was sporadic and irregular, the bandits seemed to have no set path they patrolled on, but they usually never went out of a particular area. Each of the pegasi above were doing a oblong figure eight, which he would have to time in order to avoid drawing them in during a big fight. Unicorns were in some of the groups, mostly the ones closer to the house. Satisfied with his map, he dropped the stick and turned to his two teammates. “Alright, I think I have it figured out. Sound Wave, pull that group there...”

A good half-hour of fighting later, the three of them finally made it to the house. It was an expansive two story building that must have, a long time ago, held an entire extended family. Time had worked its toll however; the windows were all boarded up, and the wood was so weathered that half of it looked like it would collapse at any minute.

Sound Wave turned towards Paperback, “So, what are we looking for again? The quest wasn't exactly clear.” He said inquisitively.

Paperback shrugged, not taking his eyes off the entrance to the house. “We're supposed to figure out where the ore goes after it gets taken here. There will probably be, like, a ledger or something. A quest marker will probably appear once we walk inside.”

Rusty Nail shook his shoulders and cantered into the house, “Let's get on with it then, mates!” He said over his shoulder. He crossed the doorframe, and entered the living room. Paperback and Sound Wave followed close behind. As the three reached the center of the room, a gentle plucking and a thwiff sound could be heard.

Rusty looked at his shoulder, which now sported a black-feathered arrow penetrating his leather armor. “Ow.” was all that came out of his mouth. Everyone paused and looked at the arrow, but the moment soon passed as Rusty ripped it out with his teeth and grabbed his sword, charging at the archer reloading in another room.

Paperback gripped his morningstar in his telekinesis, prepared to help Rusty beat the archer into oblivion. He was distracted by a thumping sound coming from the stairs, and swung around to see another three ponies and one unicorn, who promptly charged him and Sound Wave.

Twirling the morningstar like he would a blade, Paperback leaped at the nearest enemy and struck him in the side with Frigid Touch. He quickly spun around and smashed another pony with Burning Hoof applied to the mace, in a deadly dance of weapon and spell. He noticed a lack of support from Sound Wave, and turned around to see him frantically going hoof-to-blade with the third warrior.

The glance cost him though, for a fireball impacted on his chest and made him flinch, all the while his two melee opponents recovered and hacked at him with an axe and a sword. He swung his morningstar again, and Shocking Grasp struck his burning opponent in the side of the head and dropped him. That left the axe-wielder and the unicorn in the back. With all of his spells on cooldown, Paperback relied on the trustworthy spiked iron ball that he was hefting around. He swung it in rapid succession, ignoring the attacks of the enemy to finish the fight. One jab to the chest. Spin around, strike on the side. Back the other way, swing up and... Paperback heard a crunch that was far too satisfying as his mace delivered a brutal uppercut to the axe-wielding pony, and he slumped over like a stone.

Another fireball impacted with him. That damn unicorn had only hit him twice and was still doing most of the damage. He realized that his health was down to a third of its maximum, and ran to disrupt the wizard's next spell. As he entered into melee range, a few wide swings from his mace got the spellcaster off balance, and the third spell went wild. Now sure that his attack would connect Paperback readied Strike and Burning Hoof, smashing the unicorn between the eyes. Stunned but not yet down, another stroke finished him off.

Now Paperback just had to deal with the earth pony attacking Sound Wave. He turned around, and- Oh. Nope. Rusty already took care of him. Wonderful. He sheathed his weapon and lay down on the floor, letting the game's natural regeneration do it's work on his battered health bar. “Well. That was exciting. Let's find some information, shall we?”

The ledger they had found didn't lead them any further down the command chain, but it did mention other collection sites for ore. Lieutenant Crossroads realized that they were by far some of the most capable ponies under her command. (“But we aren't even part of the guard!” Rusty complained.) Thus, she had sent them to a forward command posting led by Crossroad's superior, one Major Dowsing. Major Dowsing had quickly accepted Crossroad's recommendation, and immediately gave them multiple quests to send them out to the other collection sites and shut them down, so that the bandit organization could be crippled.

Which is how they found themselves outside of an old stone building that was abandoned years ago. The abandoned building theme might be just a tad overplayed, but it did fit thematically. According to Major Dowsing, the entire area around here used to be populated by ponies, but had been abandoned over half a century ago due to Parasprite infestations. Now, the only ponies that lived here were the bandits who had recently come and set up shop.

“Alright, so we have to kill fifteen thugs and fifteen brutes. Then we have to kill the overseer and search the place for any clues as to where the main base might be located.” Sound Wave said, reading off the quest information. He looked up, puzzled. “What's the difference between a thug and a brute?”

Rusty spoke up, “Y'mean besides the name plate? Nothing really, except thugs use Bleed and brutes use Cripple. And I suppose brutes have a bit more health.”

Paperback was trying to draw out another map in the dirt of where all the mob groups patrolled. He kept peering into the rapidly fading light of the sun as the game went into another night cycle. After another minute, he threw his hooves up in frustration and wiped the map clean in his anger. “It's too damn dark for me to keep track where they all are. We're just gonna have to wing it.”

It was rather lucky for us though- Paperback later realized- They seem to be as blind as we are. They had enough trouble anyways, dealing with the thugs and brutes, and all of the other mobs that were not thugs and brutes but they still had to kill to get through. They actually ended up clearing the entire field around the house without having met the quota of enemies they needed to kill, so they hung around outside for a while until enemies started to respawn.

Inside the house they fought in close quarters with this site's overseer, a wicked looking unicorn who seemed to have very little trouble casting in combat. Her guards weren't helping matters either, they kept trying to break through Paperback and Rusty in order to try and attack Sound Wave. After the battle was over, searching through the house yielded no fantastic results. Some papers on how much raw materials were being moved they brought with them, but nothing revealed the location of where all the materials were being sent.

“Well, four more places to go.” Sound Wave said, as he looked at the map for where the next closest site was.

The most obnoxious thing about this portion of the quest chain, Paperback decided, is that all of these collection sites are too damn far apart. Luna's virtual moon shone overhead, halfway to full. The game's night sky was a reflection of the real world, and Paperback could look up and spot some of the constellations that he could remember offhand. To him it was strange to see the sky so full of stars; in the city where he lived there was almost always enough light pollution that the sky remained a dusty black expanse, save for the moon.

If a day in the game is every four hours, then a full moon can be seen inside the game just shy of every five real-time days. Paperback thought idly. The trio plodded along slowly, cautiously peering into every grove of trees and around every rock. The encounter with Briarbuck was still fresh on their minds, and they quite keen on not dying again. Eventually, the outline of a cluster of building's came into view, softly lit with a solitary lantern in the middle of them.

“God, It's so dark and we keep getting ambushed. Can we please move on now? We can come back to this one in the morning.” Rusty Nail said as he slammed his head into the wall of the second house they searched in frustration. No sign of any overseer yet, or location of any base.

“No Rusty. We're going to do it now. Because we're here. And walking takes forever.” Paperback said sternly. In truth, he was quite annoyed with the ambushes too. One of the bandit types they had to kill were Ambushers, which lived up to their name and constantly harassed the party from the shadows with arrows. “Alright, there's nothing here. Let's move on to the next house.”

No sooner had Paperback stepped outside than three arrows streaked out of the shadows from the opposite building and stuck into his side as if he were a pincushion. He drew out his morningstar and muttered under his breath. “Goddammit.”

“How the hell did the overseer get on the roof?” Rusty Nail said, staring up into the night sky, where a unicorn was lit on top of a building by the dim glow of his horn. They had moved on to the third collection site by this point, and it was nearing one in the morning.

“Some way that's ridiculously complicated, I'm sure. How are we going to kill him?” Sound Wave questioned in turn, as he continuously casted healing spells to keep the two melee fighters healthy as they dealt with the Cutthroats pouring from the building.

“We can't do a thing, so that's why you're going to do it.” Paperback said, spinning in a circle as his morningstar caved in another skull. Sound Wave just stared at him blankly for a moment, pupils shrunk in disbelief.

“And just how the hell am I supposed to do that!?!” Sound Wave shouted, interrupting the spell he was casting to leap to the side in order to avoid a shadow bolt that came streaming down from the unicorn in the lofty perch.

Paperback slammed a hoof to his forehead in annoyance, which caused a lapse of attention that allowed his opponent a free hit on him. “Sound Wave. You. Are. A. Pegasus. Fly up there and hit him.” Sound Wave frantically interjected that he didn't even have a weapon, so Paperback leaned down and looted his now dead foe, and retrieved a dagger which he tossed over to the bard. “There. Now you do. Go.”

“Yeah, stop being such a spoony bard and go kill a warlock.” Rusty Nail said, interjecting into the conversation as he nimbly stabbed and jumped around two bandits who were unsuccessfully trying to flank him.

“Stop calling me that!” Sound Wave cried in irritation, then gave up and leaped into the air towards the overseer, while he shouted a mix between a war cry and a squeak of fear.

“Eurgh. Why does this- ow- damn roof have to be- stop it- so freaking small!” Rusty roared in frustration as he leaped from floor to table to ledge in an elaborate dance to avoid the raging earth pony warrior who was swinging an ax at him. The two dueled on the open top floor of a stone tower that stuck out of a hill like a thumb. Sound Wave flapped just in range for him to cast healing spells at the party rogue; while Paperback was holding his own on the stairs, using the narrow surface to keep his foes fighting him one or two at a time, and was able to swing his mace to knock them off to the ground floor.

“Just finish him off! I still have another five or six guys left to go down here!” Paperback called up. Granted, the common enemies were of a weaker variety than the overseer by a good three levels, but the endless fight was beginning to wreak havoc on his mana.

“Easy for you to say! This freak could kill me with a few direct hits!” Rusty shouted down, leaping to the left in a roll as the ax came crashing down into the table where he had been just a moment before.

“Just jump on top of him and stab that sword into his throat!” Paperback roared, swinging his morningstar at his current enemy's front legs, sweeping them and causing the bandit to lose his balance and tumble to the first floor.

A brief lull in the fighting for Paperback occurred as his next opponent made his way to fight him. Paperback strained his ears, but he no longer heard any sound coming from upstairs. “What happened up there?” He yelled

A reply was a moment in coming, but after a few seconds a shocked Sound Wave replied, “Um. Rusty just tackled the Overseer off the roof.”

“Well, it worked out in the end, didn't it?” Rusty said, as he peered at their next target. It was now late into the night and the full expanse of the cosmos was arranged above them, stars and moon giving off a silver light over the grass and the tollhouse next to the bridge.

“Yes, but you had to walk here on your own, and hold us up by twenty minutes.” Paperback said. Rusty's stunt had killed the overseer, but he had landed a moment later and died himself. For a pony who had technically just committed suicide, Rusty was surprisingly chipper about the whole thing.

“Well, I got the experience for killing him, and you got that shiny ax to sell. So, can we go and murder some dudes now?” Rusty didn't wait for a reply, but instead slunk off into the tall grass, and leaped onto a lone guard, bringing him down before he could raise an alarm.

Paperback sighed and Sound Wave shrugged his shoulders before the two followed the rogue towards the bridge. Another collection site, another overseer to kill.

“Finally, last collection site down. And no information found, so that means that Major Downer will have found out something for us and send us off to go kill more things, making our work here basically useless.” Rusty Nail said, kicking over the pegasus overseer before her body digitized away. She was a rogue, and kept trying to dive onto them from the air during their combat, quickly flying back up when she missed. Paperback loathed her with a passion.

“Major Dowsing.” Paperback automatically corrected, “And technically our prime directive is to cripple the bandit organization because they obviously want all these supplies for something. Besides, we got a whole bunch of loot and experience.” Indeed, the only reason that they hadn't had to go back yet was because they had found enough new packs that all of them had enough inventory space for all of the worthwhile items they found.

They reached the outpost just as the sun was peeking over the horizon, causing the stars to fade out of sight and into nothingness until the darkness came again. Between the three of them they all took a good twenty minutes to sell their accumulated loot to the camp quartermaster, and left with their coin purses far heavier than they had been before.

After that, they found their way over to the command tent, where Major Dowsing patiently waited for them. Dowsing was a thickly muscled earth pony with the cutie mark of a dowsing rod. His coat color was of a light purplish-blue combination not unlike a plum, with a starkly contrasting yellow mane and an impressive handlebar mustache. “Hm-hmm! So, you have managed to take down all four collection sites, have you? And no luck on where a main base of operations is? Well, it seems that not all of us can have good fortune. I on the other hand may have found just the information we need!”

For the love of Celestia, the game wasn't even being subtle about it. Dowsing continued to talk, evidently being one of those ponies that just plain enjoyed the sound of their own voice. “While you were out killing the overseers, I and the guards did a little bit of scouting. Who should we spot but a pegasus pony that was clearly a messenger! My scouts and I all report seeing him at different times of the day, which would put him on a schedule of visiting all five collection sites. If you can find the messenger, you might just very well be able to sneak and follow him all the way back to their hideout. After he leads you somewhere, kill him and take whatever letters he has on him.”

The nature of this quest was quite understandable, but how to accomplish it was completely ambiguous. “So we have to wait around one of the collection sites for the pegasus to show up, then follow him around until he leads us somewhere where we hadn't been before?” Sound Wave asked, clarifying on the simple plan put forward by Paperback, who nodded in reply.

“This is going to be absolutely boring. Who brought the cards and cider?” Rusty said, as they approached the site they were going to stake out. They were headed to the bridge, which was further southwest and the last collection site they had attacked the last night.

“Stop complaining.” Paperback said halfheartedly, not putting the effort into making it sound like an order. “At least we can farm the bandits here until we see the messenger. Now, who wants dibs on the annoying overseer?”

Three hours later and in the beginning of the afternoon, Paperback and company had annihilated every bandit around the bridge and the overseer in the tollhouse at least four times. At the moment they were sitting on top of a hill across from the house; far enough away that they wouldn't be spotted by the bandits as they respawned. They ate a virtual lunch, because their brains, thinking that all of this was happening in real time, were tricking them into thinking that they hadn't eaten in almost a day. Thankfully the virtual food had taste, somehow, and worked as a placebo to quiet the brain's hunger.

Paperback kept his gaze pointed skywards as he munched lazily on a sandwich, watchful for the pegasus messenger that he was told would come. A glint caught his eye far in the distance, and he quickly notified the the two other ponies laying near him.

“Think that's the messenger, mate?” Rusty questioned. Rusty was the most vocal complainer of having to sit around and wait, and had started to tire of slinking off and killing any lone guards that had respawned.

“Yeah, probably. It's not like we've seen any other players out here recently.” Paperback replied. And it was true, while they quested during the morning and afternoon of real time they had encountered only a few other groups of players- and the occasional lone wolf- outside of Saddleworth. According to Rusty, Corporal Breezy who had given Paperback the quest to come down here switched between three different quests to give out to players, sending them to one of three 'Starting Towns' located around Equestria. Combine the separation of new players with the fact that at any time half of the online population seemed to be in the main cities of Canterlot and Aeroslida, plus the fact that it was a Friday and plenty of ponies were working or at school, and it seemed fairly reasonable that they had run into as few players as they did.

Another few minutes of waiting granted results as the pegasus came into better view. A golden yellow coat with a mane striped in blue and green, the messenger was lightly armored and quite obviously an NPC with how he/she landed right in the midst of the guards and walked into the tollhouse without any challenge from the bandits. “Get ready, we're gonna have to run after him.” Paperback said.

“It could be a her.” Sound Wave interjected.

“Yes, but for the purpose of avoiding having to say him/her and not calling him an 'It' I'm going to refer to him as a male.” Paperback replied.

The messenger exited the house and took off to the west, following the river upstream. “After him!” Paperback cried, and the three went galloping around the camp in order to keep up. The messenger didn't seem to be in any hurry, however, because he flew at a pace that was quite easy to keep up with from the ground. Of course the programmers would make him fly slower. Otherwise the earth ponies and unicorns would never be able to complete this damn quest.

The chase continued for what might have been a half hour, or perhaps a bit longer. The trio was careful not to be seen by the pegasus, who would stop and look at the ground every so often. Whenever this happened Paperback usually had to retreat to a tree or some other method of total cover, because his coat stuck out like a sore thumb in the green landscape. The gentle rolling landscape eventually gave way into steeper hills and eventually into the beginnings of a mountain range. This led into a wide valley with steep inclines on either side. It was well forested, and several times they almost lost track of the messenger when the leafy canopy covered the sky.

There were more bandits here as well, slinking here and there between the trees. Rusty it turned out had a keen eye when he applied himself, and could veer off and take down individuals before they sounded an alarm. Ahead of them, they saw a clearing in the trees, and the messenger slowly descended.

“Alright. He's on the ground. Can we kill him now?” Rusty Nail said, clearly fed up with the long trek.

“Wait a minute longer. There's nothing here yet.” Paperback replied, slightly annoyed with his partner's foalish behavior. The messenger walked on the ground now, and passed through a tightly packed group of trees on the far side of the clearing. “Alright. Let's move up.”

The three of them ran through the clearing so fast it was as if they were flying. They soared over the low undergrowth that was scattered between the trees, and what they saw before them made even Rust Nail's jaw drop in amazement.

Underneath a mountainous overhang, a small city was carved into the rock. Covered in the shadow of stone numerous buildings jutted out of the mountain like jagged teeth. A clear path led through the middle of the town, which ran up to a hole in the cliff that stood open like a great gaping maw into the earth. Due to the overhang, the town itself was virtually undetectable by air.

“Alright. If this isn't their main base, then I give up. Rusty, you can kill him now. Before he gets any closer to town, preferably.” Paperback said, letting a note of urgency edge into his voice as the messenger drew closer to the stone city where distant ponies could be seen walking the rooftops.

“On it mate.” Rusty said, and charged forward, using his stealth and speed to get almost all the way to the messenger before he heard him and turned around; only to receive a face full of sword. A Piercing Note followed right afterward, and between the spell and Rusty's attacks the messenger fell swiftly despite his level. No alarm was raised, and no guards came rushing at them as they quickly looted the body and retreated back into the trees, the only sound being a whispered "I told you the messenger was a she."

Level Up!

Sound Wave has reached level 10!

He has gained the following skills!
~Soothing Chord, Rank 4: The amount healed by this ability increases
~Speed Riff, Rank 2: The duration of the speed boost increases by five seconds.
~Battle Harmony: The bard receives a passive 1% bonus to damage and healing caused by the bard for each nearby party member. This bonus doubles for any nearby party member that is also a bard.
“If we work together then we can accomplish anything!”

Level Up!

Paperback has reached level 9!

He has gained the following skills!
~Corrosion: This spell deals acid damage, and lowers the targets armor value for a short time.
~Arcane Vendetta: You passively gain a better chance to hit against spellcasters of any kind.
Hit the annoying spellcasters to death.

Level Up!

Rust Nail has reached level 10!

He has gained the following skills!
~Hamstring, Rank 2: You aim for the legs, slowing the enemy by 30% for a short time.
~Camouflage: You can blend in to your surroundings, making you harder to spot while you're not moving.
~Acrobatics: Gain a bonus to your jump height.
~Poison: You may apply poisons to your weapon.
A good assassin only needs to hit once. The poison does the rest of the work.

Paperback turned to his two comrades, “So, shall we head back and turn in the quest or move forward?” He personally did not care either way. The game would still remain fun for him.

Rusty Nail immediately voted for moving forward, and Sound Wave agreed to Paperback's amazement. His argument being “We should at least go a little ways into the cave to see what we're dealing with, since we'll have to come back and kill everything later anyways.”

It seemed like sound logic, so the three of them made their way up the path to the black hole in the rock. Bandits of course tried to attack them, and these were a higher level than the collection site ones, so fights proved to be more of a challenge again. The entrance into the mountain was enormous by pony standards, stretching twenty feet high and wide, gently sloping downward into the earth. Thirty feet in, a faint opaque screen could be seen as it shimmered softly in various hues of blue.

“This must be a dungeon. I briefly heard about them.” Paperback said. One of the NPC's in the hugely underrated tutorial questline had explained them to him. “Once we cross over through that screen, we enter a dungeon which is saved to our party. No one other than party members will be able to enter our dungeon; anyone else who walks through enters their own copy of the dungeon.” He paused to take a breath.

“Most dungeons are built so that five players of the appropriate level are reasonably challenged. Less players can enter, but the difficulty rating stays at five. The difficulty will increase somewhat for additional party members that enter, so a party of nine will still be as challenged as a smaller party would.” The maximum amount of ponies allowed to be in a party at once was ten, so you couldn't just have fifty ponies go in and destroy everything.

“I say we take a quick peek inside. Like Sound Wave said earlier, let's see what we're up against and we'll come back later.” Rusty Nail was agreeing with Sound Wave now. When did this happen? Paperback thought.

The thought passed as quickly as it came, and Paperback took point in their triangle formation. “Alright then, let's step inside. It shouldn't be too difficult if we've swept through all the bandits this easy so far.”

Paperback opened up his eyes in the respawn room.

“Goddammit.”

“Alright. So. We need more people.” Paperback said, as he sat down next to Rusty Nail and Sound Wave at a restaurant, to eat a virtual dinner to for the placebo affect of being full.

“And how do we find more people? It's not like we know anyone else in the game that's already level ten.” Sound said. He flinched ever so slightly when a passing pony accidentally brushed against his left wing. Rusty Nail had been overwhelmed by arrows and fell first, which left a hole in the defensive line for a Brute to rush through and finish Sound off with a warhammer. At least it was quick, Paperback took another full fifteen seconds to die, as weaker minions delivered several cuts onto him before Warhammer came around and crushed his skull in. It was a messy, violent death which he quickly pushed out of his mind before it could haunt him.

“We cah juh pik uh soem rahlbghoms ah do ih.” Rusty garbled out, his mouth full of sandwich. He paused for a moment and took a big swallow while the other two just stared at him, and he repeated himself. “We can just pick up some randoms and do it. Other people are surely on that quest, we just need to find 'em.”

“What, just, stand on two hooves and bellow into a crowd for people to step forward?” Sound Wave said dubiously.

And that was how ten minutes later Paperback found himself inside the swirling mass of ponies in Chariot Park, Sound Wave and Rusty Nail flanking him. “Looking for more for Bandit Caverns!”

Chapter 6: In Dungeons Deep

“Wherever evil rears its head
Through caverns deep and dungeons old
They travel and fight in Light's stead
With strength and courage, destiny unfolds”

A half hour of game time had gone by without any luck at recruiting any more members to the party. It must have been about four or five in the real world now, and the huge influx of people that suddenly logged in after getting home from school or work forced the group to retreat out of Chariot Park to a store balcony some blocks away while they planned their next move.

Paperback had a map unrolled on the table of the Gladden Fields; the expanse they had trekked across repeatedly over the previous game day when they shut down the collection sites. He wasn't using it at the moment, but rather stared into it while he thought, to pretend that he was doing something. Next to him Sound Wave sat and idly stared into the air, playing some game with his imagination that only he could see. The two of them were waiting for Rusty's return. After the Chariot Park deal they had all gone off and sold the last few pieces of loot they had, whereupon Rusty Nail had demanded to know how much gold the two of them were carrying and then ran off to 'check on some stuff' in a manner that was quite unlike the laid back rogue that they had come to know.

The two of them thus sat with nothing better to do than to wait for Rusty at their new meeting point. Once or twice, they had looked up in interest as a flash of a green coat came into view, but quickly became bored again when the pony they spied was not that of Rusty Nail. Paperback had just gotten it into his head that he should message the rogue to see where he was, when a crashing sound came from the shop inside and Rusty burst onto the balcony.

Paperback started “Rusty, where the heck have you-” but Rusty quickly cut him off with a hoof to the mouth, and reached into his saddlebag to pull out two pieces of paper, and hoofed one to each of them.

“List. Go. Shop. NOW.” Rusty Nail said in a commanding tone that was completely out of character for him.

“What in blazes Rusty?” Paperback said, as he picked up the list with magic and quickly glanced at it. Rusty's reply was quick and forthcoming.

“We died in the dungeon because of our gear. We still are using crap we picked up in the earlier levels. I ran around town and marked what gear you both should get and what shops and stalls to find it at, along with gold prices. We meet back here in fifteen minutes. Now, GO!” With that Rusty pulled a third list out of his pack and then leaped over the balcony railing. He received moderate damage from the fall and some incredulous looks from both his friends and several passerby as he tore off down the street.

Paperback and Sound Wave just stared blankly at each other for a moment before they gave the lists a more thorough look. “Well, we do have the money. We might as well.” Sound Wave said, as he slowly stretched his wings.

“I honestly shouldn't be so surprised. When I met Rusty, he told me he was hardcore min-maxer. Guess it just slipped my mind.” Paperback said, stowing the map of Gladden Fields into his inventory.

The two parted their separate ways into the market district and followed the instructions written out for them. It looked like Paperback would be buying a completely new ensemble. First off was his bracers. They were still cheap iron ones, which he sold for a pittance of gold and swapped out for a minor upgrade of Solid Iron Bracers.

Across the street he traded his mail for an upgrade; Steel Chain of the Boar. He put on the enchanted item, and marveled at how well it fit him, and how light it seemed. Was it just him, or did he feel a bit sturdier too? The item supposedly gave him a bonus to his stamina, but he didn't know if such effects would be tangible. Quite pleased with this one, he paid the large sum of bits for the armor and moved on to the next store.

Right next door was a blacksmith that he could get shoes at. The list required him to get a pair with only an armor rating, but there was an enchanted set that would let him jump higher- only for the price of all of his remaining gold. Still sorely tempted, he followed the list and moved on.

While he was making his way down the street to the shop that sold capes, Rusty came barreling up the road. Surprised, Paperback stopped for a moment as Rusty ran a full two circles around him, presumably to check his gear. Rusty stopped suddenly and stared him in the eye for a moment, before slamming a hoof against his own face, groaning. “You're so slooow!” He complained, then continued galloping at his previous pace up the street.

Bemused at the encounter, Paperback made his way into a clothing boutique, where he bought a Toughened Black Cape, which boosted his armor even more. It was like Rusty was building him to be a tank, which was an absolutely silly notion, since he did the most damage out of the three.

He continued on like this at another two stores and a stall owned by a player, where at these places he bought some flank armor, a steel headband, and some potions. The stall he wasn't required to go to, but he had some bits left over, and a shiny pair of rimless glasses caught his eye. They were much like his own in the real world, and they felt comfortable and familiar in front of his eyes when he tried them out. At least in the game they had no risk of falling off of his face, and he didn't need them for his vision.

Shopping now complete, Paperback returned to the balcony where they been planning before. Rusty Nail had obviously been done for a while, and he tapped a front hoof impatiently as Paperback climbed up the stairs. Rusty was now decked out in some blackened leather that covered the front half of his body, with matching bracers and pauldrons. Sound Wave stood next to him, the pegasus dressed in a new light blue robe. The bandana around his head looked a bit different, probably enchanted now, Paperback thought. He also had a new dagger strapped to his side, and a lyre or harp of some kind on the other.

“What's with the Harp?” Paperback asked, puzzled a bit at the instrument.

“Lyre, technically. It's a bard thing where we can equip instruments to improve our spells.” Sound Wave said, as he reached back and pat the instrument with affection. “Since it's only for one class, magically enchanted instruments are rather hard to come by. This Lyre of the Sea Breeze cost as much as the rest of my purchases combined.”

“Can we please head back to Saddeworth now? We'll probably have a better chance at finding people who are on that quest there.” Rusty Nail said, “Oh, and Paperback? You are so slow at shopping.” With that said, Rusty leaped off the balcony- again- and trotted off to Chariot Park.

Saddleworth was a bit more crowded now that it was late afternoon in reality. A bit, of course, means far too many. The open marketplace that earlier had fewer than forty ponies now held closer to a hundred and fifty grouped here and there throughout the town. There were probably no fewer than another hundred out questing, if the amount of ponies coming and going from the town was any indication. Rusty Nail looked about in dismally as the chariot landed.

“There's so many level ones and twos now... Where did they all come from?” Rusty Nail groaned, “We'll never be able to find others our own level in this mess.” He craned his neck up and put his hooves on top of a box as he tried to see over the heads of the crowd.

“These must be all the ponies who bought the game today after they got off school or work or whatever. Well, some of them. There are three other starting towns that probably look just as much of a mess as this.” Paperback said, “Aeroslida was full of just as many low-levels, but you were probably too busy min-maxing to pay attention.”

“Well, we need to find people. Sound Wave, can you search from the air? Pretty much anyone with armor that isn't beginner gear should do. Rusty and I will look down here.” Paperback said. Sound Wave nodded, prepping for takeoff. “Check in by the tavern after fifteen minutes.”

The group split up, and Paperback went in a slow circle around town, peeking at faces and nameplates. The vast majority of people were indeed level ones and the occasional level two, but every now and then he would see a level three with the same rusty armor that he had from the tutorial quest chain. If NPC's could be happy, then Query, that old wizard, must be elated to have helped so many players understand the game. Indeed, those who had obviously completed the tutorial moved with purpose, and seemed to have a clear idea of how to go about finding quests. Paperback made a mental note to go back and thank Query someday.

There were a few players around Paperback's level, but none of them had the time to do a dungeon, or had other quests they were attending to. He returned to the inn a bit early and waited. Sound Wave and Rusty Nail arrived moments later.

“Paperback! Four ponies a bit higher in level than us just arrived on the chariot!” Sound Wave said excitedly. “This way!” Paperback of course followed swiftly.

Indeed, four ponies walked towards the road heading southwest, towards Gladden Fields. After a brief moment Paperback recognized them as the group that he saw earlier in the day as they argued around a table when he first arrived in town. He caught a snippet of conversation as he approached,, carefully phrasing what he was going to say in his head. He walked slowly though, and absorbed bit of their conversation while he carefully took a peek at their faces without making it noticeable. Three of them were pegasi, which surprised him a little.

“We almost had him that time. We at least know their base is probably in the mountains now, but if Nitro had just been more careful we would know for sure.” The speaker, a large coal-colored pegasus stallion with a crimson mane looked pointedly at a blue-coated pegasus wrapped in a black cloak. Paperback frowned at the coloration of the first pony. For some reason, a lot of teenagers thought that black coats were 'cool' or 'in style' or something, and he had seen several of the new players sporting them. With custom characterization, it was unavoidable that there would be a few, but to Paperback it would have been nicer if people had picked the coat colors they had in real life. Unless of course those really are their colors in real life, who am I to judge?

The blue pegasus, Nitro, gave a halfhearted glare at his teammate for a moment, before giving up as his face turned into a smile. “Hey, how was I supposed to know that that flock of vultures would be hostile? “ He seemed too happy. One of those perpetually joyful people that could wear out Paperback in an instant.

“The messenger avoiding them too should have been a bit of a hint.” The coal-coated pegasus said.

“The mountain lion that showed up when we rushed to help was a bit of a surprise.” The only unicorn in the group said. Paperback detected a Canterlot accent in her voice. Her coat was a rich purplish-blue color, with a styled mane that was striped cyan and blonde.

The third pegasus, with a coat of midnight black and a mane of the same color with a violet streak, nodded vigorously as she added in. “Mm-hmm! It jumped on us so fast that it got Chalice before I even realized what had happened.” Funny, Paperback thought that from her energetic movement that she would be louder.

So now he knew two of their names. Oh god, how to approach them without being awkward. I hate initiating conversations what do I say I can't make it be awk- Luckily, he didn't have to say anything, because Sound Wave spoke up first.

“Hi there! We couldn't help but overhear your conversation, but are you talking about the bandit messenger for the quest from Major Dowsing?” Well, not terribly awkward. Certainly better than anything that would have come out of his own mouth.

A brief pause occurred before the black pegasus spoke up. “Yeah, we keep failing to follow him back to the hideout. We don't suppose you know where it is?”

Rusty Nail talked next, “Sure thing, mate! We actually just did that quest, and we're looking for people to help us clear the dungeon that's there.”

Nitro, who gave off the impression of a constant sugar-high, said, “Ooh! I knew there would be a dungeon there! I did one earlier with some other people, and it was a lot of fun.”

The unicorn, Chalice, chimed in, “Some help would certainly be appreciated, if they're as tough as Nitro said they were. I'm Chalice, Chalice Longshot. This one, “ she waved a hoof in Nitro's direction, “Is Nitro Rush. Over there are Night Stalker and Dilluted Livo.” Both black coated pegasi gave their own greetings when referred to. The large stallion, Night Stalker, gave a slight nod of his head while the mare Dilluted Livo waved her hoof.

“I'm Rusty Nail.” Rusty said, extending a hoof which Chalice shook. At least Rusty wasn't trying to hit on her, like he accidentally did with Sound earlier. Or, at least he wasn't hitting on her yet.

“And I'm Sound Wave.” The cyan pegasus said, as he traded a hoofbump with Diluted Livo.

Which left Paperback shaking hands with the giddy Nitro, “Paperback. Pleasure to meet you all.”

Rusty Nail took over talking again “Well then, let's merge groups, and we can head off to Major Dowsing's outpost; it's almost a straight line from there...”

The integration of the two groups was far more seamless than what would be expected. The Night Stalker character was the 'official leader' of the group, but they had sort of melded together in a pure democratic mish-mash rather quickly. At first, they all stayed together on the ground up until they reached Major Dowsing; where Paperback, Rusty Nail, and Sound Wave traded in the messenger quest for the obvious one. Kill the bandit leader, and bring back his head.

Level Up!

Paperback has reached level 10!

He has gained the following skills!
~Improved Telekinesis: The range at which the Spell Warrior can effectively swing his weapon is increased, and he can lift heavier objects passively.
~Elemental Aura: Toggled. This ability, when on, consumes an amount of mana per second to deal elemental damage of the user's choice to surrounding enemies
To be shocked, scorched, corroded, or frozen. Plenty of ways to kill a pony.

He received a small congratulations for his level up, which raised him from being the lowest level party member to being tied for the lowest level. That new toggled ability of his... combined with his Elemental weapon, it would prove to be quite the damaging combination. Not to mention that it would probably drain him of mana by the end of a single fight.

The group then slowly split into two as Night Stalker and Dilluted Livo took to the air with Sound Wave, to better scout ahead. This left Chalice, Rusty, Nitro, and Paperback trotting along on the ground, keeping a brisk pace to match the pegasi flying above.

Paperback, no longer leading the group of three, fell back into a routine that was so very similar to his real life. Rusty kept a speedy tongue about him, almost as fast as Nitro in how fast he could spew words out of his mouth. Chalice Longshot, while not keeping the same verbal pace, spoke often enough that she was a regular part of the conversation. The orange spell warrior, however, stayed a few feet behind, and gave only half of his attention to the conversation. The last time he had interjected with anything was a full ten minutes ago.

“... and so it turned out that the engine pistons were so grimy that they weren't pumping right, so I had to douse them in cleaner that was strong enough to strip paint.” Rusty said, as a conversation wrapped up about technology and engineering. Nitro was some sort of tinkerer of machines himself, and the two hit it off on the spot. Chalice, who was a librarian in real life apparently, had read a book or two on the subject and was at least able to understand what they were talking about. Paperback simply nodded his head whenever it was expected of him, completely clueless as to what they were talking about.

Nitro responded with... something. Paperback had stopped paying attention again, mind lazily looking at the scenery. He absentmindedly took in the details, only for them to be forgotten bit by bit a minute later. They had reached the top of a hill, near the mountains and the bandit hideout. The sun made a slow arc through the sky as it descended behind the mountains ahead of them, bathing them in shadow. Paperback stared north, where the twilit sky danced in effervescent shades of purple, slowly replacing the smoky orange light of the sun. The hills before him lay half-shrouded by their own shadow, and what might be miles ahead a forest already blocked all light with it's canopy, leaving the floor an impenetrable midnight black.

His gaze shifted around the landscape, before he settled his vision on the forest far beyond. As he stared into the undergrowth he could have sworn that, for a moment, he had been granted eagle vision to see the trees as if they were naught twenty feet away. And in that brief glimpse, he saw two cold yellow eyes stare back at him. Two cold yellow eyes framed by tusks. It was Briarbuck, and he looked hungry.

It was at this instant that Paperback knew who his true opponent was. The overseers, the bandit leaders, any dragons and kings- all small and insignificant compared to the beast that roamed freely in the land. Briarbuck walked the realm of Equestrian Earth, hungry, mad, and smart. Those eyes had a spark, and that glare said more in a second than any conversation would. Briarbuck saw him, and would gladly feast on him, and any other adventurers, over and over again to feed his insatiable bloodlust. No puny pony could stand before his terrible wrath, he would gore and trample any who would try and resist and run down those who would dare flee him. He would see the land a barren wasteland devoid of life, simply out of sheer spite and contempt for all other living creatures. Celestia protect us all.

The eyes disappeared as quickly as they came, the shape of the beast withdrew into the darkness of the undergrowth. Paperback turned to notify his companions, but found only air. Drat! How long have I been standing here? To avoid the beast that roamed in the darkness beyond, Paperback checked his map, and started galloping in the direction of the bandit city to rejoin his group.

He didn't need to run very far, he managed to catch up to them just after they crossed into the long valley where the bandit city stood. Although the very last light of the sun did not reach in here, he could find his way around using the light of the gibbous moon and the stars. The fact that Rusty and Nitro were still talking helped immensely.

He reached the party swiftly and found the six of them scattered about on the ground, the pegasi returned to the ground to avoid losing the rest of them in the night. They were making a fairly good pace, but if any of the rest of them were talking the were drowned out by Nitro and Rusty, who were calling to each other from ten feet away as they continued their conversation on machines.

Paperback took up a spot a few feet behind and to the right of Chalice, the soft clop of his metal boots signifying his presence. She looked back at him and said, “Oh there you are, I didn't even see you vanish earlier. Where did you go?”

For a moment, Paperback wanted to warn them all. To shout at the top of his lungs that the true evil in this game was Briarbuck the Ever-Hungry, devourer of all life, and that he needed to be stopped. He wanted to, but he realized that no one would believe him. So instead he simply replied, “I stopped to admire the sunset for a bit, and lost track of you all. Glad I caught up.” It wasn't a lie, really. It just wasn't the entire truth.

Chalice nodded, and didn't pursue the subject further. They were almost to the cliff where the city lay, dug into the mountainside. Rusty and Nitro were quiet now, and every half minute or so another silent ping notified him that he had gained some experience. Nitro and Sound Wave had closed the distance between Paperback and Chalice, forming a sort of diamond shape. Rusty Nail, Night Stalker, and Dilluted Livo were nowhere to be seen, although he had a fair guess that they were sneaking ahead, taking down wandering patrols.

How would this dungeon work, with the seven of them? Sound Wave had been specialized to be a healer, thanks to Rusty's ridiculous min-maxing abilities. Rusty, Night Stalker, and Livo were all rogues, so they could easily be the damage dealers of the party. From what Paperback had read up on Rune Casters, which was what Chalice was, they made great support and crowd control casters. Nitro Rush was a paladin, and if the bulkiness of that great big black cloak told Paperback anything, it was that he was packing heavy armor underneath it.

That just left him. Some sort of awkward, half-tank, half-damage combo. Rusty had obviously made him buy gear that increased his endurance and stamina, as well as being highly protective while not quite being heavy armor. It cut his mobility terribly though, the added weight of the heavier armor slowed him down far more than he thought it would. His damage wouldn't scale as nicely now either, and he would start lagging behind and slowing down the party.

First, the clearing. Then, the thicket. Finally, they could see the buildings of stone displayed before them. Ponies could be seen as they walked across rooftops, lit by the dim light of torches mounted on walls.

“What an incredible stroke of good luck!” Sound Wave quietly exclaimed, pointing up the road that disappeared into the tunnel that lead into the heart of the mountain. “There's the messenger coming down right now, it should be easy to nab her.”

“Night Stalker, if you would do the honors.” Rusty said, and the large black pegasus took to the skies and circled around behind them so that he wouldn't be spotted. The messenger walked to the end of the road and then spread her wings, where she quickly attained flight, about to fly right over the thicket where the party was hiding.

She never got the chance to pass by them though, because a massive black blur slammed into her from above. Her wings crippled, the messenger collapsed to the ground with a dagger in her neck, just five feet short of the rest of them. A victorious Night Stalker stood above her, who quickly retrieved his weapon, and the important quest documents. The other three who needed to loot her followed suit.

Night Stalker turned to Rusty, “So, were you planning on heading back with us to Major Dowsing while we get the dungeon quest?”

Rusty shook his head, “Nah, the three of us will stay here and farm. We're all close to leveling up again, so that way we'll be closer to you guys. Although, I saw something here last time that might make your trip just a little bit faster... Give me just a moment.”

Rusty sped off towards the city, where he quickly disappeared among the stonework. A few seconds later, there was a silent ping as everyone in the party gained experience, and then Rusty could be seen again. He appeared to have hitched himself onto a chariot, which he pulled back to the group in a sort of awkward lopsided angle, since the chariot was meant to be pulled by two ponies.

Once he got back he said, “Here you go. One chariot, so that two of you can carry Ms. Chalice there and back without having to walk all the way.”

Chalice looked dubious, “That... Is incredibly convenient. It was just sitting there?”

“Well, it was guarded. Was.” Rusty said, putting a bit of emphasis on the past tense word.

Nitro Rush was helping Night Stalker and Diluted Livo into the harnesses for the Chariot, which Chalice hopped into when they were finished. Night Stalker said, “We'll probably be back in about fifteen, maybe twenty minutes. Try not to get killed?”

“Don't worry, I won't tackle any overseers off of towers.” Rusty replied, which gave the four of the other party confused looks as they took off to the northeast. Sound Wave hushed a chuckle into his hoof at their bemused expressions, while Paperback gave a roll of his eyes that ended on his friend.

A quick grinding session ensued, that was in no ways organized or methodical at all. The three of them had a level above the highest mobs outside the dungeon- save for one or two leaders- and they used that as their only advantage as they raced up and down the buildings, sweeping aside anypony who stood in their way. Most mobs came in groups of one or two, and the often didn't see the trio of warriors in the darkness before they crashed down upon them like a silent wave. Spells were flung, skulls were bashed, and quite a few ponies were sent hurtling to their deaths off of the buildings- something that Rusty Nail got good at rather fast. Sound Wave got more time in for practicing with his dagger, and he remarked that he found close combat exhilarating.

Not having the other four in close proximity meant that the original trio was gaining more experience again, and it wasn't long before Rusty Nail and Sound Wave leveled up, making Paperback the lowest level party member again. Shortly after, they received a ping in the party chat, asking them where they were. Night Stalker and the other three had returned, and they were wondering where all of the bandits had gone.

“I sent them on a little trip.” Rusty Nail said, choosing the most overused pun ever, and made Paperback roll his eyes inconspicuously. They left the chariot where they could easily find it later, and entered the swirling mist that signified the entrance to a dungeon.

----YOU ARE NOW ENTERING BANDIT CAVERNS----

The blue portal that led into the instance could only be described as... Squishy. Uncomfortably squishy. The barrier offered a yielding resistance which was equivalent to the feeling that one had when they pushed their face into a bowl of pudding. Not that Paperback would know from experience, of course. Paperback instinctively closed his eyes as his face met resistance, but his breathing was unimpeded. The invisible gateway seemed to cling onto him, slowing down his movement until all of his body and tail were through and he was abruptly let go.

He opened his eyes now that he found himself free of the squishy, uncomfortable portal. He knew this area. He had been here once before, although he didn't make it past the first wave of mobs. The first room of the dungeon was a hallway, which led straight and level to a large gate room of some sort, where bandits awaited. The stonework here was smooth, leaving the walls with a glassy surface. The floor was comprised of misshapen marble tiles, cemented together in a jigsaw pattern which the group's hoofbeats echoed off of.

Nitro Rush was point leader, Paperback following close behind as an off-tank as they approached the first room. They could see the light of hanging lanterns before they reached the room, staying just out of sight of the guards that Paperback knew were waiting there. Four archers, two rogues, and the most obnoxious warrior wielding a warhammer. Rusty and Night Stalker were ironing out a plan on how to take them.

“Alright, so we have Nitro and Paperback tanking the big one, while the three of us-” Rusty said, referring to himself, Night Stalker, and Dilluted Livo, “Rush around and keep the archers from getting off too many shots.”

Night Stalker nodded, and turned to Chalice, “You were crafting runes all the way to the camp and back, right? Snare one of the melee fighters so that they don't bug us or the tanks as much.” He then addressed Sound Wave, “Keep your heals focused on the tanks, that hammer looks like it packs a punch.”

“I know from experience.” Sound Wave said dryly. On their first attempt, warhammer had gotten a lucky critical hit and managed to smash Sound in a single blow. The party Bard was not enthused.

“Well, that's it then. Your turn, boys.” Rusty Nail said.

Nitro grinned excitedly and hopped up and down, making his heavy armor underneath his cloak clink against itself. “Our turn! C'mon Paperback!” The excitable Paladin charged down the hallway, while he reached into his saddlebag and pulled out- of all things- a massive scythe which he somehow gripped in his mouth. Accursed game physics. Paperback thought for a moment, before he broke out of his stupor and ran after him, mace in midair.

The bandits were surprised to see them, to say the least. Nitro roared with a voice of thunder between his teeth and the scythe, an impressive feat. The other bandits reacted, archers quickly knocked their bows. The two- no, three rogues? Oh well, one more wouldn't make a difference. Warhammer was the slowest, however, he gazed in open mouth awe until Nitro leaped into the air to swing his weapon around in a cleave.

That certainly got his attention. Paperback though as he swung his mace back and forth, getting the aggro of the melee fighters by knocking two of them in their skulls. The rest of the party was right behind him, and the third melee fighter was already caught in vines that sprouted out of the floor. Three shadows jumped around him and knocked into the archers- a moment too late in his opinion, because he now had two arrows sticking out of him. The soothing relief of a healing spell washed over him moments later, far more powerful than Sound Wave's previous ability. Guess that harp was something special.

His morningstar let out stray bolts of crackling lightning as he dueled the two bandits. Whenever he parried a thrust from a dagger, the other got him in the side. It was slow going, but their health decreased steadily, and as they flanked him for damage again he swung around and planted a powerful buck right into one's face, which ended that tactic. He turned to help Nitro with the Warhammer- oh, no, the rogues have that handled.

Now that there wasn't immediate combat in occurrence, Paperback allowed himself to get a better look at the room. It was quite large, and high enough for three ponies to stand on top of each other. Along the walls to the sides four pits into nothingness could be seen. Empty mine carts were in the room, so it could only be assumed that these holes were where they dropped their ore off for... whatever they were doing. On the opposite side of the room where they entered from there was a gate leading into a hallway similar to the first.

“Well, that was easy enough.” Rusty said, as the bodies were looted. As easy as it was going to get, anyways. The party continued on and left behind the entrance hall, which led them into a slowly descending hallway which curved ever so slightly to the left, a gentle corkscrew into the earth. The walls were crafted like above, smoothly polished stone reflecting the light off of lanterns placed along the wall. Artistic reliefs were present on columns embedded into the wall every twenty feet, but most of them were defaced by graffiti or rubbed out.

“So the bandits didn't make this place then.” Paperback thought aloud. He didn't think so, they showed no signs of the craftsmanship or the patience required to make something this artsy and stable.

“What was that?” Diluted Livo said behind him, her quiet voice barely vibrated off of the walls. The party was arranged in an arrow, with Nitro at point and Paperback just behind him to the left. Behind Paperback was Rusty, who constantly peeked behind him for patrolling mobs. Night Stalker and Diluted Livo were on the other side, sandwiching the two main casters in case of a surprise attack. Unlikely in a beginning dungeon, but it was agreed that this would be the standard party formation from now on.

“Oh, just commenting to myself. The bandits didn't dig out these tunnels, they're far older than that. They simply found this place and moved in.” Paperback replied, deigning to give an explanation even though it wasn't required.

Chalice spoke up from the back of the arrow, “What makes you say that, then?” A gentle voice, like a teacher talking to a student, asking him to show how he reached the correct answer. She probably already knew the evidence.

“The walls. They're polished until they glisten, but some spots are gritty and have a lot of irregular bumps in them, probably erosion from dripping groundwater. Then there's the pillars. All of them were artistically designed, but most of the reliefs are unrecognizable either from age or the bandits scribbling all over them. I highly doubt bandits have the patience to make these marble floors or carve reliefs into the wall.” Paperback said. He realized that he just said more words all at once than he had in the entire time that they had all been a party together.

He looked back to catch Chalice giving him an approving smile. His mouth half-attempted a grin, but he never could smile quite right. Inside though, he was beaming with inward pride as teacher put a gold star next to his name. A little private victory of knowledge, but he would take it in stride.

Night Stalker perked his ears up, “Bandits ahead. Encounter number two, same plan as before.” Architectural musing time over, Paperback charged with Nitro Rush into the fray.

The curvature of the path grew ever-wider as they went downwards, descending at a gradual pace. Quite a few mobs patrolled up and down the hall, but they were small enough as to be quickly dealt with before any serious time was wasted. Eventually, they reached a door on the left wall that would lead into the center of the spiral. The door was ornate, with more reliefs on it that were long since erased by time. Perhaps if Paperback paid more attention in history he would know which of the old pony cities this place belonged to. Probably one that consisted of earth ponies and unicorns; he couldn't imagine pegasi being at home down here.

The group readied themselves for combat, then Nitro Rush and Paperback charged through.

The first thought that struck Paperback was that the pony standing in front of them was absolutely massive, at least a pony and a half tall and overshadowed even the large Night Stalker. The second thought was about how much the hammer that the giant wielded would hurt. Thought number three was actually a question in the form of; how the hell can we hit him with that much armor?

Nitro, unabashed, by the size of the enemy, rushed forward into the massive room to tackle the pony head on. Unlike the brute in the first room, however, this pony had sharp reflexes. Quick as a whip he bit the shaft of the giant warhammer by his side and brought it swinging around. It smashed into Nitro in mid-air, and launched him into the wall.

With his ally down, Paperback charged the massive pony who was named Steelweather, from his nameplate. A gold border embellished it, indicating that Steelweather was an elite monster. It would certainly explain how a single blow took out half of Nitro's health. Before another few moments had passed, he had three rogues bouncing around Steelweather with him. Luckily, the massive hammer was capable of being dodged. While it did have the momentum to keep moving, it didn't change directions easily and the rogues used their speed to full advantage.

Paperback however seemed to be completely out of luck. His new heavier armor slowed him down considerably, and after just a minute his stamina was almost completely drained from dodging and rolling. He soon received a full smack from the hammer and was sent sprawling back with a crippled leg and a seriously depleted health pool.

Now Nitro was back up though, and this time he completed his charge into Steelweather, which knocked him off-balance and momentarily halted the deadly whirlwind of the warhammer. That opening was all that the three rogues needed, and they jumped on top of him relentlessly. Daggers struck in the opening between armor plates, and Steelweather finally fell.

The division of loot had already begun by the time a healing spell washed over him, two holographic windows opening up in his vision displaying loot to be rolled for. The first of which was the Forepony's Greathammer, which no one in the party but the paladin had any proficiency in. Nitro passed on it though, and so it went to Night Stalker to sell. The second piece was Steelweather's Helm, a surprisingly stylized closed steel helmet with miniscule decorative horns. It was better then the Iron Band he had, so at the urging of Rusty he took it.

To have a helmet on for combat disturbed him greatly. First off he had to take off his glasses to wear it, which triggered mental reactions in his brain that he needed his glasses. Yes, in the game they were for aesthetic purposes only but he did rather like having them. Secondly the closed helmet cut off most of his field of view, which irked him to no end. If he wanted to see anything happening to the side of him he would now have to turn his head in whatever direction he wanted to look. It was magically enchanted to raise his strength though, which would help his struggling damage output.

“Now you look like a fearsome warrior, mate.” Rusty Nail said, as Paperback equipped it. Fierce? He didn't feel fierce. He felt foolish. Like he was about to run into something.

“Because of how that hallway curved, we got turned around a bit. This hallway will take us directly beneath the mountain.” Chalice said, as her horn glowed with a spell. She seemed to sense Paperback's inquisitive look- now mostly hidden behind the helmet- and continued, “There's more spells besides combat ones, I spent the gold to learn a few of them. Quite useful.” Of course there would be more spells to lean besides Shocking Grasp and Burning Hoof. Why didn't he bother with getting some of them? She probably used Know Direction, or the MMO equivalent of the level zero Dungeons and Dragons spell.

The party began their descent further down into the dungeon. This new hallway was carved in a manner similar to the one above, but this one had corridors branching out on both sides every twenty feet. These corridors traveled a very short distance to rooms where ponies evidently slept. Sleeping rugs, and even a few beds were here- as well as more ponies who weren't so pleased to see them. There was gold scattered in various places though, so going into each one was worth their time. In one room, there was even a lone pony sleeping. Before anypony could say anything, Rusty had quietly snuck up and dealt him a killing blow.

This hallway continued for another thirty feet, and began sloping downwards again. The corridors to rooms stopped, but now there was two openings that directly entered some sort of common area, where there was a large group of bandits in each room.

“Try and sneak past or take them out?” Night Stalker said, and the debate began. The majority were in favor of gaining the extra experience (Paperback favored sneaking past, while Chalice was ambivalent). So, the group sneaked towards the left common room.

It was at least twenty feet wide and forty feet across, with a woven rug covering much of the stone floor. A fire blazed at one end, making Paperback wonder where the smoke went. Four gruff ponies were playing cards at a table, the noise a constant squabble punctuated by curses. Another two ponies, one of them a unicorn, were engaged in a game of checkers, much more silent than their counterparts at the other end of the room. It was strange to see bandits behaving this way. They seemed normal, like the everyday ponies he could meet on the streets of Los Pegasus.

His mind darkened with cloudy thoughts. Is the purpose of this game just to murder ponies who probably don't deserve that? Are the developers just sick fiends who wanted to make a game where they could slay creatures at random without guilt because they were digital?

Then one of the bandits turned and saw the group as they charged. “Oi! Intruders! Knife em!” Oh well, so much for the pleasant dream of bandits being 'innocent.' The developers weren't evil, they were just people trying to test the bounds of technology and create a story. He'd had crazier delusions than that.

...No, Briarbuck being an insidious evil mastermind of a boar who was out to devour the world and leave it a barren empty wasteland was not a delusion. He was quite sure of that. Murder was in that boar's eyes...

Back to the virtual reality at hand, the group met the charging bandits head-on. Literally, in Paperback's case. He smacked one bandit aside with his morningstar then rammed his newly protected skull into the next bandit's head. That one fell onto his flank stunned, he would be out of it for a few seconds. Just enough time for him to deal with his first opponent. A rapid combination of Strike, Lightning Grasp, Corrosion, and Burning hoof took a decent quarter of his mana away but dropped the rogue like a stone.

A shout from behind made him turn around, just in time to see Chalice and Sound Wave get jumped on from behind. It seemed that the rogues in the other room heard what was going on and decided to join the party. He ran back to them and gave a mighty stroke of his mace which dislodged the bandit on Sound Wave's back. A skid on his side slammed him into another bandit that was about to leap onto Chalice.

At least he wasn't restricted to wielding a weapon in his mouth like these five newcomers- not like he'd be able to in a helmet anyways. The two casters backed up as he stood his ground, using the shaft of his weapon to parry blows and smashing with his head whenever someone got too close. In this manner he managed to hold off his foes until the rest of the party finished up behind him and surged forward like a wave to deal with the next group.

More loot and room searching, then back to the main hallway. They were now presented with a double door, about two ponies high and made of a solid wood with iron bindings. A moment of deliberation, and they pushed the door open...

There were many words to describe the place they just entered. 'Large' would not be one of them. 'Large' was a ridiculous understatement for the sheer size of the cavern. A better word perhaps might be 'massive' or perhaps 'colossal'.

It was indescribably gargantuan. The cavern stretched so far across that were it not for the torchlights marking paths on the other side, one would not be able to see it. Their own entrance put them on a pathway that was carved into the wall, descending slightly as it curved around the cavern. Built into the walls were carved surfaces that must be more buildings; they had window slits with light pouring through. Before them over the edge of the path stood nothing. A gaping pit that stretched across everything and emptied down into the darkness below which no light could pierce, not even the shining of the moon from an opening in the ceiling. The moonlight gave a blue glow over all of the paths that crisscrossed over the chasm, which connected the various passages that came out of the walls. It was a staggering sight.

“Wonder what's at the bottom...” Rusty Nail muttered, peering over the edge. He took a dagger out of his inventory and dropped it, turning his ears to hear when it hit bottom. One second... two... three... four... five... six... seven... eight... nine. Was that a clang? “That's...” Rusty looked up in thoughtful concentration as he attempted to calculate the distance. “Deep,” he said, “very deep.”

Master elocutionist, that one. Paperback thought, observing what lay before them on their current path. It twisted to the left, carved into the wall of the cliff. Assuming the cavern was roughly circular in nature it probably covered a decent fifty degree arc. There appeared to be two separate mob groups patrolling back and forth, and near the exit leading back into the mountain there was a bulge in the path where a group of warriors rested.

“It's simple.” Rusty said, looking back at the party. “We get the pegasi to carry us to the final path that leads to the boss room.”

“And which one is the final path?” Chalice said, pointing out the obvious flaw in his plan.

“Err... uh...” Rusty floundered for a moment as his brain caught up with his mouth. “Oh. Right.”

“Let's move on then.” Night Stalker said, pointing down the path that they were already on. The party kept to the same formation that they were now accustomed to, with Nitro in front and the rogues plus spell warrior flanking the spellcasters. They rammed into the first patrol group with enough force to quickly overpower them. The second group was more prepared. Having heard the fighting above, they managed to get off a spell and some arrows before the melee fighters closed in, but still were ruthlessly mowed down by the group of seven. The last group who were positioned on the bulge in the path was larger than the other two, and it was here that what could possibly be considered a fight took place, albeit a short one.

Night Stalker and Diluted Livo, in what looked like perfect synchronization, unfurled their wings and charged two archers in the back row. The result of the charge (which Paperback knew only too well from the times that he had been assaulted from the air) sent the archers sprawling backwards, but with no further floor to land on they hurtled to their death at whatever lay at the bottom of the pit.

Nitro and Paperback meanwhile slammed into four melee fighters who were organizing themselves. The holy wrath of the Paladin and arcane might of the Spell Warrior kept them at bay, which let Rusty Nail slip past and disrupt the two unicorns who just launched their first wave of spells.

The fight unraveled shortly after that, as the damage dealers took out the remaining archers and mages. All seven members of the party then converged on the lone warrior remaining, which brought him a pitifully quick death.

The door led them away from the massive chasm and into a large room that was high enough for a pegasus to comfortably hover. It was carved in the same manner as the rooms above, with smooth walls and pillars. They entered into the middle of the room, with a hallway branching out on the right side. On the left there was a massive pile of rocks underneath a hole in the ceiling, which Paperback immediately assumed was ore dumped from the first room up above. Light was provided by torches on the back wall, and tiny windows high on the fore wall that let in the minute amount of reflected moonlight from the cavern just outside. Barrels were placed haphazardly in clusters around the room; upon closer examination it was revealed that they were full of ore that was sorted and ready to be carted off.

A quick search around the room yielded a little loot of ore, and some gold tucked away in a pot in the corner. Hoofbeats that sounded from the hallway cut their search short, and another battle commenced as the two tanks slammed into the front line of the bandit patrol.

A swift finish to the fight set the seven of them moving down the hallway, which had the slightest curve to it before the party reached a doorway.

“It's probably another boss fight; the door is similar to the last one.” Rusty Nail noted. A stone double door with faded reliefs eroded by time, which would most likely swing away from them

“Well then. Give me a moment to give you all a buff or two and then we'll move on.” Chalice said, as her horn glowed and she began to work her runic magic.

After their minute of preparation, Nitro and Paperback pushed on the doors, forcing them to swing aside and let the party through.

A blast of warm air buffeted the party when the crack between the doors was large enough. Before them lay a massive central forge, pouring out molten ore into various containers. Anvils and other such devices were being hammered upon by blacksmith ponies of all races, forging weapons and armor of all sorts. On a platform up above, a unicorn overseer raised himself onto the railing, where he peered down at the new interlopers.

All work in the forge ground to a halt as the doors continued to swing of their own momentum until they banged into the wall. A short stare off occurred then, neither party making the first move.

Paperback had actually been growing steadily more fidgety as they progressed through the dungeon. He had been hiding it well, but the continued agitation of dead silent waits between battles had given him an itchy trigger horn. Combined with the fact that he was already acclimatized to the fighting of the game made him absolutely despise this face off. With a menacing roar- although inside he was giddy with nervous excitement- he swung his mace as he charged the nearest foe.

Half a second behind him was Nitro Rush, scythe spun in a deadly twirl as his body pinwheeled in the air, kept aloft by his wings. The scythe rent one of the blacksmiths for massive damage, and those on the ground floor converged onto the two tanks. Night Stalker and Dilluted Livo flew into the air, where they soared over the machinery and straight over to the unicorn, who lobbed a fireball before they reached him.

Chalice was snaring some of the blacksmiths to keep the two tanks from being overwhelmed, while Sound Wave took an air position where he could heal anyone who needed it. Rusty Nail sprinted around the room, where he took down any ranged units in quick bursts with all of his abilities.

Paperback sucked in a breath a a burning sting smacked him in the side. Many of the blacksmiths wielded half-forged swords, still glowing hot from the fire. They dealt quite a bit of damage even when the hits glanced off of his solid pieces of armor, but at least then the heat from the blow was dispersed evenly throughout his body.

Now surrounded, he toggled on his Elemental Aura to deal with the enemies. He felt a slow but constant drain on his mana begin as his body crackled with electric power. Stray arcs of energy shot up and down his coat, attracted to his metal chainmail. Then as if a switch was flicked on, the arcs multiplied in number, shooting off of his body to strike the bandits around him. He spun around with his mace, and struck all who got near him. Combined with the passive energy he was imbuing into his weapon, the power that radiated around his body quickly felled the lesser minions.

Above, the two pegasi rogues were having difficulty with the boss. The unicorn had no difficulty casting in combat, and was deft and nimble enough to dodge their attacks while he charged up spells. Another fireball blasted into Night Stalker, who couldn't dodge the speedy missile at such close range. Rusty Nail, finished with the periphery bandits, leaped up the path to the platform. Now faced with three rogues, the wizard was cut off from dodging so easily, and he would be quickly taken care of while the three down below finished off the minions.

A minute later the party slowly shuffled around the room as they looted bodies and searched around the forges. A fair amount of loot was had, which included a Runed Cape and a Pendant of Mana Restoration dropped by the boss. The cape, which gave some armor and a boost to intellect went to Paperback, while the Pendant went to Sound Wave.

The exit, which was behind the boss on the platform, made a sharp turn and brought them out into the grand cavern again. They could see the pathway that they were on before a good hundred degrees around the circle, where the grand stone door which led them here still stood open flanked by torches. The arched path in front of them led straight over the chasm, a seeming miracle of engineering that held without any support in the middle, where it dropped into the deep darkness.

“What's down there, anyways?” Sound Wave said, as he stared into the abyss. Paperback had to wonder if the abyss stared back. Some great monster, perhaps?

“Well, we have wings. We could fly down and check. Would only take a minute or so.” Nitro said, whereupon he flapped his for emphasis.

“Us unicorns need to regenerate our mana a bit more before we take on the mobs on the other side, so you're more than welcome to.” Chalice said, resting so she could drink a mana potion. Paperback's mana was still only half full as well, but he would be fine for the next fight. “I'll admit, I'm a bit curious as to what's down there myself.”

“Well, I wouldn't mind flying down. Let's go grab a couple of the torches by the entrance and fly down.” Night Stalker spoke as he took to the air, quickly followed by Dilluted Livo and Nitro. A slightly hesitant Sound Wave took off a moment later, following the three other pegasi down to the depths below.

The two torches were held in hoof by Night Stalker and Nitro Rush, and the light dimly reflected off of the cavern walls for what must have been two hundred feet down before they were swallowed in darkness.

The wait began, a patient Paperback and Chalice Longshot rested while the uppity and energy-fueled Rusty Nail fidgeted as he paced up and down the near side of the bridge. Paperback had removed his excess agitation during the last fight, so he did not feel the itch of the trigger horn bother him.

A minute passed in silence. Almost imperceptibly, the earth gave a quiet shake and some loose dirt dislodged itself and fell to the depths below. The three of them twitched their ears in unison; something was wrong.

Paperback opened up the display that detailed the statistics of all the members in one's party. Sound Wave used in mid-combat to see who needed healing the most.

Chalice had done the same thing evidently, because she repeated the same thought that echoed in Paperback's head. “Night Stalker is dead.” She said in a hushed voice.

Rusty Nail turned to her, “What?” He too opened up his display, only to frown at the information that confirmed what she said. Night Stalker had died, and they hadn't even heard it.

Another tremble of the mountain, and Nitro Rush's health bar immediately dropped to zero, confirming another pony down. “What is happening down there?” Rusty said impatiently, as his fidget grew worse.

Paperback thought he heard something echo up the chasm, but it was so quiet and distorted that it was impossible to tell if it was a real sound or something eerie his head created. “Did you hear that?” He asked the two of them. Chalice nodded her head, while Rusty just continued to glare into the darkness below. His only movement the occasional twitch of an ear, like an antenna trying to get a signal.

Not thirty seconds after the first shudder, a third one came. Sound Wave's health bar grayed out, another pegasus claimed by whatever was picking off the party that went down below.

Ten seconds passed. Twenty seconds. Thirty, and no fourth shudder of the earth. Night Stalker had respawned by now, and Paperback had sent him a ping which he would hopefully respond to after he got his bearings together.

Another noise echoed up the cavern, still imperceptible, but a much higher pitch. It seemed muted, so the speaker must be much closer. Dilluted Livo had survived, and was slowly making her way up out of the abyss.

Nitro Rush and Sound Wave had respawned by the time that the trio on the arch could see Dilluted Livo slowly winging her way up the cavern in a circular motion, too tired to fly straight up. Unless the atmosphere of the cave didn't allow that. Paperback didn't know how wings worked. Night Stalker had sent a message through the party chat, but it just said “Flying back. Should be there in fifteen.”

Dilluted Livo finally reached them, where Chalice and Paperback helped her onto the arch where she collapsed, stamina depleted. She breathed deeply for a minute before she could even attempt to talk again, but it was obvious she was still a tad hysterical about whatever attacked them down below. Chalice managed to coax her to slow down her speech so that the rest of them could understand what happened.

“Well, we got a few hundred feet down,” she started, “When Night Stalker said he thought he saw the bottom. We got a bit closer, and found a huge stalagmite formation that was clustered there. We hovered above the floor just close enough so that we could just see it, and right next to the stalagmite cluster was an underground lake.”

She stopped to take another breath, this was obviously where they were attacked. “Night drifted over lake while the rest of us hovered around Nitro's torch, looking at the cave floor and wondering how something this massive was formed. The entire cave shook, and the light from Night's torch disappeared. We looked around and he was gone, just a tiny splash in the lake. The three of us floated to where he was to look for him, but we didn't see anything.”

Another breath, which marked where Nitro was nabbed. “We panicked, and drifted out a bit further than we should have from each other, looking for him in the darkness in hope that he didn't get grabbed into the lake. Then the light from Nitro's torch was gone before we could even turn around and see what got him, just another splash in the water. We were flying blind now, and both of us screamed. I tried to fly towards the exit when Sound Wave's scream got cut off, and I panicked.”

Chalice laid a comforting hoof around Dilluted Livo, who closed her eyes and lowered her head to the ground, still tried from her ordeal. The rest of the time they waited for the rest of the party to return was spent in silence.

Night Stalker, Nitro Rush, and Sound Wave returned, flying through the open door and soaring over the chasm to reach the other four. Night Stalker and Dilluted Livo shared a small embrace before he turned to the three who had remained behind. “Did she tell you what happened?”

Rusty Nail replied, “Yeah. So something is down there, and we don't want to mess with it.”

Night Stalker nodded solemnly. “I was dead the moment it grabbed me. Didn't even see where it came from.” Nitro and Sound gave echoes of 'me neither'.

“We don't have to go down there for the dungeon, so we should just continue on to killing the leader.” Paperback said, eager to put the messy experience behind them. “It's probably just a flavor element thrown in that at the same time keeps us from digging around down there. Sounds like something I'd do.” The rest of the party agreed, and they moved onwards. While he said his words with honesty, he couldn't help but have a few internal doubts as to the presence of... something... lurking underneath this dungeon that could easily kill them all. Something like Briarbuck, but worse.

The next few rooms after the bridge brought them into more bedrooms, all chock full of bandits which the group struggled with; mostly because just when they thought one fight was over a patrolling group would wander in and attack them. So far, at least, they hadn't suffered any battle-related deaths; but they had come perilously close a few times when any of the rogues acquired too much aggravation from the bandits.

They followed the chain of rooms as it brought them back into the cavern again, slightly above where they entered before and another fifty degrees around. An archway that crossed the cavern forty degrees further took them to a set of storerooms, where there was enough loot to fill everyone's saddlebags.

“There's quite a lot of weapons in here...” Paperback said. It had taken him a while, but he was comfortable enough to speak to the rest of the party normally now, compared to his silence when they first joined forces.

Rusty gave a chipper affirmation as he scooted back and forth across the room. If the game's mechanics didn't make all of their bags store things in a seemingly extra-dimensional way, Rusty would have probably collapsed from the weight of his lucre.

Chalice on the other hoof understood his line of inductive thinking. “More weapons here than bandits we've seen in this dungeon.” She said. “Enough weapons to equip a small army.” The implications of that were actually quite startling to think about.

“I suppose it's a good thing that we're taking out the leadership then, huh? No need to have a bandit army mucking about the countryside.” Paperback replied. All of the weapons in the room were of low quality though, not better than what he was using now. He didn't bother to fill up his bags with them, because there would surely be enough to stuff them with any mobs they might yet encounter.

The next room was to the right, and held foodstuffs that a growing army might need. The bandits in this room were quickly dispatched, as well as the ones that came down the stairs to see what their ruckus was about. The party continued upstairs, which held more weapons and armor, along with several barrels that Paperback and Rusty immediately recognized.

“Blasting powder.” Paperback said, when asked what it was.

“Yeah, we had a helluva lot of fun with this stuff in a cave once.” Rusty continued, and earned a glare from Sound Wave.

“By 'fun' they mean they nearly blew the three of us up.” Sound Wave said, obviously distasteful of the memory.

The other four wore faces that ranged from shocked to dubious, with Nitro giving a grin that bordered on amusement. “Nearly blew you three up? What happened with that?”

“Sound Wave was perfectly fine, he was practically out of the blast radius. As for how it happened...” At this point, Rusty Nail told the brief story of how they needed to deal with seven bandits in a room using what materials were available to them, with a few interjections from Paperback whenever an important detail was skipped.

“..anyways, so we have some barrels here, I was thinking why not try something similar? We do have a boss in the next room. Probably.” Rusty finished, gesturing over to the stone door that was similar to the previous two that preceded a boss room.

“Don't do it. He'll get us all killed.” Sound Wave said dryly, his eyes fierce enough to shoot daggers as he burned his gaze into Rusty Nail's head.

“We probably shouldn't. Just to be on the safe side.” Night Stalker said. Rusty's idea was quickly shot down, with not even Paperback's support (although he wasn't opposed to the idea either). With that, the team pushed open the door, and faced the next boss.

He was one ugly sonofabitch, that was certain. Unkempt, scarred, and warty were just three of many adjectives that could describe him. The fight itself was straightforward, he had four guards around him that were hard to keep aggro on; and more than once Paperback had to run around and tackle one who split off to attack Chalice or Sound Wave. Eventually the boss fell, and Paperback earned himself a nice set of shoulderguards.

This room led outside to the cavern again, directly above where they had entered before. There was an arch that led to the other side from here, crossing over the one they used earlier in a perpendicular fashion. On the other side they found even more rooms full of bandits trying to kill them. What would feel like tedium if it was being described was actually nonstop excitement and wonder to Paperback. The entire dungeon was beautifully crafted, with each room unique in it's own way. Combined with the adrenaline of constant fighting and he was kept well entertained.

The next series of rooms were a miscellaneous menagerie of war rooms and the like. Minions here were fewer in number but far stronger, the bandit leader's elite forces. The loot was better too, and Rusty looked morose as he discarded some of the weapons he picked up in the storerooms to fit his share of the treasure which would sell for far more than cheap iron swords.

Finally, they reached what could only be the final room. Before them lay a set of stone double-doors much like the previous ones, except they were twice as large and wide. A guard was set outside, four elite bandits who had quite some fight in them before they went down. One of them was holding a fancy hammer, which Paperback eagerly traded out his morningstar for. The Runed Hammer, strictly speaking, was slower than the morningstar since there was a particular surface that he was supposed to strike with, but the increased output in damage made up for it threefold.

“Alright, the final room. At least, it must be because if it isn't then I'll throw a fit.” Rusty Nail said. His bags were full and his temper was short, he had seemed close to exploding when the group shot down his suggestion that they all go back to town to sell their loot so that they would have empty bags to collect everything else.

“Has to be the final room. We've been in here for a couple of hours and it's only the first dungeon.” Night Stalker replied. The logic behind that was fallible; who knew how long the dungeons were in this game? Still, Paperback sincerely hoped he was right.

“Alright then, are we ready?” Night Stalker continued, playing the part of team leader.

“No! We are not, hold on. I have to buff you all. I've been saving the runes for this occasion.” Chalice said, deftly using her telekinesis to reach into her bag and pull out several of the focus materials that were the heart of her more powerful spells. Although a low level, Chalice still had a buff for each member of the party, depending on their role. The rogues got damage buffs while Nitro and Paperback got health. Sound Wave and herself received boosts to their magical ability.

“Now we are ready to proceed.” Chalice said in a very ladylike manner, after she finished the last of the buffs. She still had several more runes at the ready to be used in combat, hung loosely on a sash where they could be grabbed easily by her telekinesis.

The team, now in formation, pushed open the door.

Before them lay a massive table, covered by a map of Equestria as it was. Chairs were lined up on the sides of it, each one holding a pony that looked more grizzled and bloodthirsty than the last. There was only one chair at the table that faced the door, and in it lounged a bored looking unicorn, the leader of the bandits.

A tufted shadow gray coat adorned his body, with a dark straw-color mane that was slicked back down his head. Light orange eyes regarded them with a cold sneer, like a cat who just found a mouse. He put down a cup that he had been levitating, before he calmly put his front hooves on the table and pushed himself up. On the table they could see him better, armored in a cyan chainshirt with various pieces of steel adorned on his shoulders and hooves and a greatsword sheathed on his back. Now centered on the table, the Bandit Leader gave the seven of them a good long look before opening his mouth, a chuckle escaping his lips.

“So... You all are the ones that have been causing all of this ruckus.” He said. His voice had a tenor pitch to it, and oily, with words that slithered into Paperback's ears and disgusted him. “I imagined you would look more... Oh, I don't know, ferocious. Something that I might actually be afraid of.”

Paperback already hated him. It wasn't hard, this was a stallion that probably gave off an aura of loathing. He wasn't done speaking yet, though. “Since you've marched all the way down here I might as well tell you my name before I kill you. The entire world will hear it soon enough. I am Hark Steedwell, King of the Bandits and someday all of Equestria.”

Arrogant, cocky, smug. Paperback was going to enjoy knocking this one down a peg. He considered making a snappy retort, but Night Stalker started talking. “I'm afraid we have no intention of dying here, but we'll be sure to pass your name along with your head when we give it to the Major. That way they know which gravestone is yours.”

Hark's chuckle turned into full blown laughter, a cackle that reverberated off of the walls. “You think that you are a match for me and my inner court?” The other eight ponies that were sitting down stood up, weapons and spells being readied. “A foolish mistake, and it will be your last!” Hark then unsheathed his greatsword in his telekinesis, a breath of frost started running up and down the blade as he did so.

So, he's a Spell Warrior then. Paperback mused, having recognized the Elemental Weapon ability as it was activated. That would make Hark the first significant Spell Warrior that he had encountered since he started the game.

“The only way you'll be leaving here is with your head in my bag.” Night Stalker replied, and the party readied their weapons as well.

“Fine then. Bring it.” Hark said, and the groups charged. The Bandit King leaped, clearing the rest of the table and barreled into Nitro Rush, scythe and greatsword met together in a clash. That left Paperback with the council then. He split to the right, with the intention to take on the four ponies that were there, while he saw the three rogues split left to take on the four on the other side. One of the fighters that he faced suddenly found himself grappled by vines that burst form the floor, and rendered him immobile for a few precious seconds while Paperback engaged.

Paperback's first step was to charge the mage that was on his side of the table, where his hammer dealt a crushing blow across his side. As the other two battle-ready combatants closed in, he toggled on Elemental Aura, and his body was coated by flickering flames that shot out and scorched any who were near him.

Across the hall, Rusty Nail, Diluted Livo, and Night Stalker were doing well against their four opponents. They had all focused their most damaging abilities on the most powerful of the four first, and he was already almost down, while they activated their crippling abilities to weaken the rest of their opponents as they finished off the weakened one.

Nitro Rush wasn't faring too well against Hark. The pony's speed was uncanny in his armor which should be slowing him down. He nimbly sidestepped the swings of Nitro's scythe, taking glancing hits from what should have been decapitating strikes. Meanwhile he mercilessly retaliated with his greatsword, which rent into Nitro's armor several times. Behind him, Sound Wave was doing his best to heal the party tank, barely keeping him floating at around half health. Nest to him, Chalice Longshot was casting all of the offensive spells she had to provide support to Paperback, who couldn't receive any healing backup.

The fight continued on this way for a minute, at which point Paperback had finished one of his opponents and injured the others indiscriminately. The three rogues had killed two of their opponents, and just as they finished off the third Hark Steedwell roared, “You have no idea of the limits of my power! This world will be mine!”

Paperback felt a tingle in the base of his neck. Hark was doing something, but what? He looked over, and his mouth dropped in shock.

A rain of fire, centered over the three rogues, had opened up and was dropping head-sized fireballs on them. It scorched their fur and armor, and even those that didn't hit them directly splashed on the floor and exploded. Dilluted Livo was the first to fall, a whimper as a fireball impacted her, and then she was gone. The bandit that was still over there was next, for he was not immune to his commander's spells.

Frantically Sound Wave tried to switch his healing over to the rogues to save them, but this left Nitro without any assistance, and Hark finished him off. Rusty Nail and Night Stalker, who had left the rain of fire at this point, were split up from each other and were thus unprepared when Hark charged into Night Stalker, who was mercilessly ended. Hark paused for a half moment as he decided who to go after next. Rusty Nail was on the opposite side of the fire rain, and cut off from the fighting unless he ra around the table. He charged the casters in the back next, and what happened was nothing short of slaughter.

Rusty Nail, a moment too late, leaped onto the Bandit King's back as Chalice Longshot dematerialized. Paperback didn't get to see any more, because he fell at that moment too, unable to keep the three bandits that remained at bay.

----YOU ARE NOW LEAVING BANDIT CAVERNS----

We were damn close too. Paperback thought, as his mind touched the white space. For a moment he felt himself stretch towards infinity, but just as quickly it was gone, and he opened his eyes to view the walls of the respawn house. A quick glance around spotted five of his party. Dilluted Livo was leaning onto Night Stalker's shoulder while the rest stood and recuperated from their defeat. Across the hall, Rusty Nail materialized and shook his head.

“That was unpleasant.” Chalice commented, hoof subconsciously rubbing where she had been slashed. It seemed an almost nervous tick that everyone responded to in this game; rub the spot where you should have died, but here you are.

“I'm not really sure how we're supposed to beat that.” Night Stalker said, as he put a hoof around Dilluted Livo's shoulder's.

“Yeah, a fire rain? Way too much AOE damage. 'Nerf Hark!'” Rusty Nail said, and yelled out the last part in a mock rallying cry.

A bickering argument commenced between Night Stalker, Nitro Rush, and Rusty Nail on how to defeat Hark Steedwell. Rusty favored everyone attacking him at once, but Nitro pointed out the obvious flaw that then there would just be too many adds for them to handle, and then they would still all be in one place if that fire rain got thrown down again. Nitro wanted everyone spread out as much as possible, but Night Stalker countered that then no one would be able to help each other of they got in trouble; not to mention Sound Wave's healing ability had limited range.

As they took their conversation outside the argument only got louder. Paperback thought back to the fight, looked over every detail in his head. How would they defeat the Bandit King? And then, he thought up a brilliant plan. Sure, some of it was based on guesswork, but he had always been rather good at inductive reasoning.

“You three! Quiet! I've figured out how to beat him.” Paperback said, in a much more commanding tone than usual. His sudden outburst made the other six turn to look at him, and he gave them all his most serious face. “I paid attention to everything during the fight. This is how we'll do it...”

----YOU ARE NOW ENTERING BANDIT CAVERNS----

It was a risky plan, to say the least, but it had the best possibility of success. After explaining it to them, Paperback had sent Night Stalker and Dilluted Livo to pick up the cart that they had left outside and bring it to Aeroslida to taxi up him and Chalice. The cart could only carry two ponies so Rusty, with the highest speed and stamina, would be carried to the ground by Sound Wave and Nitro Rush and then run to the mountain, to save as much time as possible. In the meantime, Chalice replaced the runes that she had used up in the last fight, with a few changes as per Paperback's plan

Only twenty minutes later they were inside the dungeon again, hurrying down the winding passageway to the gargantuan cavern. The pegasi carried the landbound races to the top archway, where a short sprint found them outside of the final door again.

“Alright. Chalice, buff us. Everybody, healing potions attached to your bag.” Everybody shifted uncomfortably at that last part. True, one could tie a healing potion to the outside of their bag to make it easily accessible, but it was also not protected by their inventory's magic, and could be smashed by an enemy.

Chalice went about casting her runes that she prepared on the way over to the mountain. Damage runes for the rogues, magic boosts for the two casters, and fire resistance for the tanks. A paltry amount of resistance at low levels, but it should be just enough. Now prepared, they pushed open the door.

Hark sat there, coy and weaselly as ever with his eight bandits around him. “So... You all are the ones that have been causing all of this ruckus.” His voice called across the room as he moved to the center of the table. “I imagined you would look more... Oh, I don't know, ferocious. Something that I might actually be afraid of.”

It was up to Nitro to give the signal. C'mon. Don't make us listen to the entire thing all over again. Paperback thought, just about ready to start the encounter himself, his own planned be damned. “Since you've marched all the way down here I might as well tell you my name before I kill you. The entire world will hear it soon enough. I am Hark Steedwell, King of the Bandits-”

“Yeah? Well I'm the king of getting all kinds of impatient!” Nitro roared, not going to give Hark the satisfaction of finishing the entire speech. Nitro jumped onto the table, scythe already out and swinging. Paperback and Rusty Nail ran to the right while Night Stalker and Dilluted Livo moved to the left, to intercept the bandits as they rose from their chairs. All five of the primary attackers moved back; the bandits followed, until they were all clumped at one end of the table. Even Nitro as he dueled Hark on the table.

“Now!” Paperback roared, and the three rogues, the spell warrior, and the runecaster all focused their spells and abilities on a single target as Paperback marked them. One bandit fell. Then two. Then three. One by one the fighters paused to drink their potion before it was broken or too late. Then, with one final swing they together smashed a fourth bandit, which prompted Hark to stop fooling around.

“You have no idea of the limits of my power! This world will be mine!” The Bandit King roared, horn aglow as fire started raining from the ceiling. This was the second cue. The four in melee range grappled with their opponents, forcing them to switch places. Now the bandits were squished into a box with the party on the outside. With a mighty sweep of his hammer Paperback struck two of them and pulled their aggro onto himself. He jumped back into the fray as the three rogues backed away, even as fire rained from above.

Paperback swung and rammed and kicked, anything to pull attention to himself and force all four of the remaining bandits to stay with him as the first sheet of fire reached them. With his rune of fire resistance, the damage became just tolerable for his hitpoints, while for the four bandits it was a preview to hell. Two turned and tried to run, but the rogues quickly cut them off and finished them, weakened by the fire as they were.

Still, Paperback was critically injured and about to fall, which enacted step three. Nitro Rush jumped back to disengage from Hark, and avoided enough swings so that Sound Wave could refocus his attention to the near-dead spell warrior. Two Soothing Chords was enough to keep Paperback on his feet, while the two bandits who were attacking him fell to the fire. This triggered the fourth phase of the plan, and everyone jumped onto the table to take down Hark Steedwell.

The Bandit King fell, offering the final words of “All... hail... the... king...” before his eyes closed, defeated by the victorious adventurers.

Glorious loot lay to be divided amongst them. Paperback won the cyan chainshirt, which turned out to be made of mithril. Besides being heavily enchanted, it was incredibly light, and he felt far more maneuverable in it than he did his previous armor. There were other items that the bandits dropped, and just about everyone got an item upgrade, if not two. There was also a chest in the room, which lay filled with bits, giving them all a hefty amount even after being split seven ways.

Also on Hark's body they found a key, which unlocked a door that was hidden in the back corner of the room. It led up a staircase to Hark's personal chambers, where another staircase spiraled upwards towards the surface. The key unlocked another door, where before them they could see the shimmering blue mist that signaled the exit to the dungeon.

----YOU ARE NOW LEAVING BANDIT CAVERNS----

How far up did that last staircase take them? They were on some sort of balcony, probably Hark's personal bolt-hole if things ever turned nasty for him. Although it was dark still, the light of the moon shone over the northwestern expanse. The rolling hills of the Gladden Fields stretched out farther than the eye could see, and to the north lay the woods where before Paperback had seen Briarbuck.

The party followed a small natural stairway which winded down the mountainside, and placed them just outside of the bandit city. Bandits could still be seen patrolling the walls, unaware that their leader was dead and that all seven of them carried a copy of his head.

They retrieved the chariot. It was an extraordinarily useful commodity, the pegasus chariot. Even if they couldn't find a place to store it for further adventures they could at least sell it to another player for a nice amount of bits. Instead of flying back though,the gorup agreed that it would be a nice change of pace to walk.

During their journey, conversation broke out about Paperback's planning ability. “I don't know how you came up with such a masterful plan, but it certainly worked.” Chalice spoke.

Paperback merely shrugged. “Well, we had to die once for me to figure it out, but usually I can figure things out intuitively like that.”

“Well, I certainly wouldn't mind if you did a lot of the planning from now on. You seem to have a fairly good idea of what your doing.” She continued.

“I don't think I'd mind it either.” Night Stalker said, and a moment later Paperback felt an invisible ping as the power of being the party leader was slid over to him. First the leader of three, and now seven. He would try his best not to let them down.

The group continued it's chatter as they made their way back to Major Dowsing. Even though it was the night cycle in the game, there was still quite a few players about. It was about nine or so in real time, so plenty of ponies were retiring for the night, putting on their headsets to join the land of Equestrian Earth.

They occasionally stopped to trade information with players, all of which were- without exception- lower levels than themselves. Being the first group to clear a dungeon had it's benefits, and their levels had all jumped up by quite a bit, hitting the mid-high teen range. Most of the people they encountered were in the seven to nine range, and trying to figure out where the collection sites were in the dark. Paperback was more than happy to point a lost group in the right direction, and even give a little bonus help as to what they could expect there.

Every so often, a group would tell them a tale about how they encountered the demon boar, Briarbuck, who stood three ponies high and shot smoke out his nostrils. While Paperback silently clung to his belief that Briarbuck was an intelligent evil entity who was out to consume the entirety of the world leaving it a barren empty wasteland, he did think that these players were exaggerating just a bit.

Major Dowsing was of course ecstatic to see them, he talked their ear off for several minutes and heaped them with praise. Magic items were rewarded to them, and Paperback chose a set of lower body armor that covered his flank entirely, but was still light enough for him to maneuver in. There was a fine line between protection and speed, and he saw the power that resided on it.

They continued on their way back to town, now on the main road rather than traversing the countryside. They ran into other ponies even more frequently, including some who say they saw Briarbuck. The change of conversation to the boar was inevitable, so Paperback thought it as good a time as any to speak up about his experience earlier.

“Y'know, I saw Briarbuck while we were all traveling to the Bandit hideout the first time.” He said casually.

“Oh? Where?” was the general response he received.

“Right before we entered the valley, I stopped and looked northward. The sun was setting, but I saw him thrashing about the undergrowth in the forest way out there.” Paperback said, recounting his experience.

“Really? His range extends that far? I knew that he traveled around but that is just ridiculous. We probably should have warned some of those other players.” Rusty Nail said.

“The chances of them running into him are slim. Besides, we don't need to scare them about the fact that Briarbuck is intelligent and inherently evil and wants to devour the world.” Paperback said, the last part all in a single breath. He continued on like it was nothing, but the rest of the party had to stop and give him a double take.

“Are you quite sure about that? You might just be overreacting a little bit.” Chalice said, and looked at him as if he was unwell.

“I saw Briarbuck, and he saw me. He looked right into my eyes and I could tell right then that this was not a normal boar.” Paperback replied.

“From miles away...?” Dilluted Livo whispered in the background, in as much disbelief as the rest of them. Great. He just had to go and say everything. Only a half hour of being the party leader and already everyone thought he was insane.

“If you don't want to believe me, that's fine. Let's just drop it.” Paperback muttered, sliding into an irritable mood.

The conversation quickly shifted onto other things, which Paperback paid little attention to. His mind was focused on Briarbuck the Devourer again, and there was very little chance of him changing his mind anytime soon. They were nearing the town, just another fifteen minutes off. Up ahead they could see the cluster of hills where Paperback, Rusty, and Sound had their first adventure together In the mine.

Night Stalker stopped and swiveled his ears, head perked up and alert; the chariot he was helping to pull quickly rattled to a halt. “Do you hear that?” He asked the rest of them.

The rest of the party lifted their heads up to listen too, and indeed, they did hear something. “It sounds like... screaming.” Chalice said, “And it's getting closer.”

Livo and Stalker unhitched themselves from the chariot, ready for battle. “We should go help them!” The quiet pegasus said, wings flared in a manner much unlike her tone.

There was a thicket of trees to the left of the path where they thought they heard the screams coming from. Momentarily abandoning the cart, they rushed through the thicket to see the clearing that was on the other side, looking over an expanse of hills before the next forest.

Three ponies ran out of the nearby woods, towards the thicket in their direction. They still had a good six hundred feet to clear; the party wouldn't even be able to see them if it wasn't for the moonlight.

From the forest behind them came the sound of a roar, and trees buckled and broke as a boar easily four times the size of a pony crashed through them. Smoke billowed from it's nostrils, eyes mad and yellow glowing in the moonlight. Out of the mouth of the beast came the most horrendous voice as it rumbled in a voice that shook the earth, “FEAST!”

Paperback was the first to react. He turned around and faced the rest of the party, took a deep breath, and in the the most serious tone possible said, “I. Told. You. So.” Another pause as the rest of the party was still too stunned to move. “Well!?! What are we waiting for, let's move it! Nitro, you're with me!”

That snapped the rest of the party back into action. Nitro unfurled his wings and shot forward like a dart, quickly catching up to Paperback who got a head start. The other five members were not far behind. “Nitro! Help me ram it!” The Spell Warrior yelled. Nitro, manic on an adrenaline high, was only too happy to oblige.

The two passed the fleeing ponies and charged the oncoming devourer. As the beast lowered it's head to gore them, they gave a might jump and leaped over the oncoming tusks, instead colliding straight with it's face. Paperback made the first impact with his helmet-protected head. Nitro, unprotected, landed second and brought the beast to a standstill.

The tanks disengaged, dazed from their impact. Briarbuck was as well, and moaned as it shook stars out of it's eyes. The rogues caught up, and darted around the beast, slowing and crippling it wherever they could. Briarbuck had transformed since they last saw him, in some places shards of something similar to bone were jutting forth from his hide, deflecting strikes and blows. Nitro received the first healing spell from Sound Wave, having taken damage from the collision. Paperback was already up, hammer in his telekinetic grip to smash Briarbuck in the face over and over again, as much as necessary until the beast died.

Briarbuck was up now as well, wildly swinging his head to catch the rogues that were darting about him with a tusk. A lucky strike connected with Rusty Nail, and he was sent sprawling across the grass barely clinging to life. “Oh no you don't!” Paperback declared as Briarbuck tried to move in for the kill. With a leap, Paperback jumped into the air and brought his hammer down on the beast's right eye.

If Briarbuck was angry before, it compared nothing to his fury now. Back legs shot out in a kick and connected with Night Stalker, dazing him for a moment before he could return to the fight. A tusk scraped across Paperback for massive damage, staggering him until he received a quick healing spell. It wasn't a Soothing Chord though. Looking around for the source he saw one of the ponies that had been trying to escape holding a staff above her head.

He grinned and dove back into the fray, a directed Strike from his hammer chipped a tooth of the beast. Rusty Nail had rejoined the fight with Night Stalker, and they repeatedly sliced their weapons into Briarbuck's side. Surely it had to be close to death? With six characters on him? With synchronization, Paperback weaved out of the way, letting one of Chalice's spells hit the demon boar, sapping it of some of it's strength.

Now with reckless abandon, the team closed in for the kill. Dilluted Livo was on top of it, slashing at any weak points she could find beneath the bone armor. Paperback burnt through the last of his mana, and had to grip his weapon between his teeth as the hammer fell out of his telekinesis.

Nitro leaped into the air, determined to deal the finishing blow. His scythe glowed with holy energy as he brought it down in an arc. With the strength of the gods, the Paladin's weapon cut clear through the neck of the beast, and Briarbuck was no more as the head was decapitated from the body.

The deed was done, the monster vanquished. The body, now without a head, stumbled around blindly before it too collapsed. At least the game was low-gore, because otherwise they would all be soaked in boar juices. Jubilant cheering erupted from the throats of Paperback and his comrades, including the three ponies who's lives they had saved.

“Ooh! I found a dagger! A rare one! Obsidian!” Dilluted Livo exclaimed, as she ceremonially looted the corpse.

“Don't take it yet!” Paperback yelled. “Put something else back on him so that the body won't disappear.”

“What are we going to do with the body?” Nitro asked, as he leaned a hoof on the severed head.

The sun slowly rose over the town of Saddleworth. It was crammed with players, both those new to the game and those who had been playing all day. Rumors abounded about the great beast that wandered the wilderness, and many adventurers had given up on going out after being eaten for the third time and instead frequented the tavern. Briarbuck was on all of their minds, either cursed or feared, or a combination of both. Reportedly, two people had already complained about the game difficulty after getting eaten and had logged off saying that they were returning the game to the store.

Down the western road, a group of adventurers was spotted and upon hearing their number it was regarded a miracle by many that they hadn't attracted the beast and been eaten. A pegasus flew over to get a better look at them, and flew back excitedly, shouting the good news. Within minutes, a crowd had formed outside the entrance to town, wanting to see if it was true for themselves. As Paperback and company pulled up with their chariot in tow, everyone mobbed about to see their prize that they were carting back.

Word spread through the town like wildfire, and the head of Briarbuck was planted onto a post and raised outside of Saddleworth. It seemed the entire village had moved out to the road to celebrate the death of the beast and the skill of the heroes who slew him. The wilderness was safe once more, and players were already preparing to head out and begin questing again.

I think I like this game. Very much indeed. Paperback thought, as he waved to the crowd. I wish I could stay here forever.

Level Up!

Paperback has reached level 15!

He has gained the following skills!
~Improved Telekinesis, rank 2: The range at which the Spell Warrior can effectively swing his weapon is increased, and he can lift heavier objects passively.
~Elemental Weapon, Rank 2: Toggled. When on, this ability consumes a small amount of damage every attack to deal bonus elemental damage.
The wrath of the elements is at your disposal.

Author's Note

And in far too many words, here is the long-awaited Chapter six! I stayed up all night to get it to you guys.

I probably could have cut out a good four thousand words from this, but I didn't. Why? Because. That's why.

Chapter 7: Making Conversation

"As valiant heroes travel the land
They encounter others who share their zeal
Rivalries form between these mighty bands
"Who is the strongest?" They wish to reveal"

The sun was rising high over Aeroslida as Paperback sat for an early lunch with Sound Wave, Night Stalker, Dilluted Livo, Nitro Rush, and Chalice Longshot. Their band was missing one Rusty Nail, but the earth pony had insisted on skipping lunch and was now off somewhere in the Gloomeadow fighting Plant Horrors. That left the six of them to munch happily on their meals and take a break from quests.

After celebrations in Saddleworth began to disperse as players headed back out into the now much safer world, the group agreed to a short break. Paperback took off the IPV ever so briefly in order to relieve himself and grab a quick snack before he settled back onto his bed to 'sleep' for the night. It still struck him as impossible that he would be able to roam the world of Equestrian Earth while his body received a full night's sleep. Even as his mind reconnected to the system, he could feel his body relax and shut down.

The five minute break he had taken in real time had been a half-hour in the game, and it was while everyone was off preparing themselves for bed that Rusty had run off to quest and fight.

The six of them had gotten a table situated on a balcony which overlooked the lower quarter of the city. To their left they could see the Cloud Library, it's three towers rising above the smaller buildings situated all around it. Across the city sat Chariot Park, the tree that stood in the center just visible over the roofs that stood between them and it.

With lunch completed, the group began to debate about what to do next. Night Stalker was in favor of going right back out to start questing again while Chalice said that she wanted to take some time to explore the profession system that the game had set up. A clear course of action could not be reached by consensus, so the group split up to do the one thing that they could agree on- shopping. “After all,” they said, “We can meet back here in an hour or two and figure out what to do then.”

Paperback needed the small break from the others anyways. The little social pony inside of his head kicked over the energy bucket with his hooves crossed obstinately, demanding time for himself. He did feel socially drained. It was like being tired, except he was already asleep so that didn't make much sense.

He excused himself as the group went their separate ways, and drifted off in no particular direction. He had a fair bit of gold in his bags; easily enough to buy almost whatever he wanted within the city. Except for a store, he thought silently, those are expensive. When he had been granted citizenship within Aeroslida, he had seen quite a few papers explaining various noteworthy things about the city. One of those were current property rates. To purchase property cost an exorbitant fee, not to mention owning a merchant license and the cost of any wares one might sell. All of that together for the first month would easily total above a hundred thousand gold... for a tiny shack. He didn't even want to think of what the cost of a larger building was. Thus, since it was so early into the game the only players who had shops were those who had received vouchers from the developers. The rest were run by the NPC's, who would probably retire ridiculously wealthy if a player bought their shop.

Paperback only had a measly thousand bits, and that was after selling all of the loot he had earned in the Bandit Caverns. Since he had the gold, he might as well go and get enchanted pieces of equipment to replace some of the standard items he still had on. Plus the accursed helmet he had won. Not that he didn't love the extra defense, but he really needed something that either allowed him to wear his glasses or at the very least didn't cut off his field of view. The helmet sat in his saddlebags; there was no way that he was going to wear it when he didn't need to.

He also needed some spells. Not just combat-related spells, but simple things like Light. Utility spells. That would be his first stop. The Mages tower was right near the Cloud Library; he had memorized the layout of the city streets after doing the tutorial quest line. Costing a good quarter of his gold, he upgraded his four basic elemental spells and got many other spells, such as Light. Another was Arcane Mark, which allowed him to leave magical runes on just about any surface. In an impulsive mood, he took a spell which otherwise contradicted his normally quiet and shy personality; Clarion Call, which raised the volume of the speaker by several magnitudes. While he never expected to use it on himself, maybe Rusty would want to shout something at some point...

Spell training completed, he moved onto gear. Much of it was still acceptable, but he felt the need for more powerful shoes, along with something that he could use instead of the helmet when he needed to see. Or he could pay to have his current armor improved, they did have blacksmiths for that sort of thing. A wander down the market streets took him to an armorer, who gladly sold him Brightforged Steel Shoes to replace his. They were incredibly light, if not as protective as some of the other options he had for upgrades.

He went a different route when it came to headwear. Eschewing the idea of a helmet altogether, he traveled to the Enchanter's shop, where he purchased an Owl's Circlet. While it offered little in the way of armor, it was heavily effective at boosting his intellect and granting him a bonus to his mana. He needed it; with all of his toggle abilities he could run out of mana in a fight rather quickly.

After that he went to the cloth armor store. No capes that were there were a suitable replacement for the Runed Cape; so Paperback shelled out the bits to have it improved. The clothier told him it would take about a half hour, which led to him stepping out to find a way to pass the time. A half hour had already passed since the group had split up, so once he retrieved his cape Paperback would still have about an hour until they reconvened.

He still had four hundred bits left, and not a clue of what to spend them on. He could go and start a profession, but which one? There were too many options to choose from. Even thinking about them hurt his brain. Miner, smith, tailor, tinker, tanner, enchanter, crafter, and a dozen other things. There were other non-skill based professions like painter or sculptor; things that didn't take up your profession slot but you used your own real-world experience to be good at.

He paused and sat down on the side of the road for a minute, and spared at glance at his rear armor which covered his cutie mark. An open book. What was he good at? He had always just assumed that his cutie mark meant that he was good at reading. Yes, he was, but was his special talent really that mind-bogglingly simple and straightforward? He felt like he was being deprived of something extraordinary simply by being ordinary.

Paperback from a few years ago might have begun to sulk at this point, and slumped into another fit of self-loathing and pity that radiated out from him in spirals. Not today though. He had worked long and hard to train himself to not think that. He was a stone to the idea of what-if's and could-have-been's. No longer would he dream of what never was, lost in a sea of despair and sadness from time wasted and chances lost.

It was too high of a price to pay.

Paperback felt his resolve strengthen, bolstered by his own poetry. He knew his mind reflected and reinforced whatever he put in there, so it was simple to trick himself with positive thinking. He felt his neutral mental state return, this time with a rather high sense of self-esteem of who he was. He looked down at his flank again. It was a tragedy that the very thing that made him unique should have to be covered up.

In front of him was an artist's studio. A sign depicting a pallet hung above the door and several paintings were displayed in the window. He knew just what he wanted to do with his remaining gold now.

Twenty-five minutes later, he exited the shop with carefully applied paint to his flank armor. Where polished steel had covered up his cutie marks there were now masterfully applied symbols of an open book. He felt complete again.

He still had some time before everyone was going to meet up again, so he admired the architecture as he strolled up and down the streets. The game's systems had reached critical mass in players it seemed, because Chariot Park overflowed into the rest of the city, with players conversing in every square or corner that he could see. At least they didn't block the road as they did in the park, otherwise he would never be able to move around.

Curiosity of what a high vantage point would be like brought Paperback into one of the shops built into a city tower. He traversed the spiral staircase that brought him to the third floor, a study of some sort with wooden floorboards and a glass door to the balcony outside. As he moved towards the door, a steady knock, knock, knock accompanied him for part of the way. Eye raised inquisitively, he turned and looked at the wood. Wood doesn't knock like that, he thought. He moved across the wood again, this time the knocking replaced by the expected thump-creak thump-creak thump-creak of the floor resisting his weight and then sighing as he moved off of it.

He shrugged and moved to the door, exiting onto the balcony. It wasn't spacious, by any means. Perhaps five could stand comfortably on the extrusion, with no covering should there be foul weather. Before him though lay a marvelous sight. The infinite majesty of the virtual world lay before him, an endless expanse of beauty and design! Far off in the distance he could see the Gladden Fields, and even farther than that lay the Razortip Mountains where the Bandit Caverns lay. If he peered to his right he could see the last golden spires of Canterlot pass out of his view as the city of Aeroslida continued it's elliptical path across the sky. To the left, he could see one of the great dragons that pulled the city through the air, wings that beat a steady, slow rhythm.

There was that knocking sound again. It sounded clearer, if a little distorted by the slight wind in the air. Where in the blazes was it coming from? He peered in all directions for the source, which ended with him gazing above him.

Near the roof of the tower was a pegasus mare, who finished pounding her hoof on the wall near the domed roof and started to mark notes down on a clipboard held in her hooves. The pencil was of course gripped in her mouth, as she expertly manipulated it with her teeth and tongue. He used to have to do that, before he had learned telekinesis. Celestia bless whomever had made edible erasers; the taste was unbearable otherwise.

The mare looked down and noticed him. A bright, apologetic smile crossed her face as she came down closer and spoke. “Sorry about that! I wasn't bugging you or anything with my work, was I?”

“Not at all.” Paperback replied, as he noted some of the mare's more interesting physical characteristics. One of her eyes was lazy, and rolled about in it's socket, and gave her the impression of looking everywhere at once. Poor mare must get teased about that. He thought, as a bitter taste reminded him of his own childhood. He had been born with a crossed eye himself, which forever looked towards the bridge of his nose until his parents had paid to have it fixed.

He pushed down the memory and made a mental point to not say anything about her eyes. No need to come off as rude. He didn't break his gaze away though; other ponies might have but the eye itself wasn't really that distracting. ”I merely wanted to look outside with a view. What are you doing up here though?”

The mare replied, “Oh! I was just checking out the design and style of the buildings.” She said, as she glided down to the platform to land before her wings folded in. Her voice was bubbly, like the cutie mark on her flank. A straw-colored mane bounced around her face as she skidded into a landing, hooves bouncing off the stone surface of the balcony twice before she managed to slide to a stop. Not terribly graceful. “I was surveying the buildings in the game to see where the developers got their inspiration from, as well as if the buildings obeyed real physics.”

Paperback followed what she was saying, although he failed to grasp why somepony would go out of their way to study them. “So where do the building's pull their inspiration from? I was wondering about that myself, because of the huge differences between the buildings near the top of the city here and the ones further down.” Keep your focus together! His consciousness demanded. Here was a complete stranger talking to him, a girl no less, and his mind was threatening to shut down on him again. Blasted antisocial tendencies.

The yellow-maned pegasus blew a tuft of hair out of in front of her good eye in mild annoyance as she explained, “I can't really pride the developers in their historical accuracy. These tall buildings at the front end of the city-” She paused to wave at a few of them, such as the Cloud Library, the Capitol, and other towers similar to the one that they were on, “are clearly derived from seventh or early eighth century Stalliongrad design. The way that the domes peak are a perfect giveaway.”

She then faced the lower end of the flying island, where several smaller buildings that occasionally matched the size of the tower they were in now dotted the city. “In the merchant district, all of the taller building's are based off of early Canterlot models. They're usually magically enchanted to not fall over- unstable as they are, so that's why you can still see such designs all over Canterlot today.”

Not that he had ever been to Canterlot, although he wasn't about to interrupt her. She seemed to be on a roll as she pointed her hoof downwards at the smaller buildings that lay in between the others. “The rest of the town seems to be made of an assortment of buildings using architecture that spans country villages over a five-hundred year period. It's like mix-n-matching legos from a bunch of different sets. Most people might not notice the difference, but I certainly do.” She gave a harrumph with an abrupt, heavy nod of her head. Then smiled sheepishly and turned to him. “I'm an architectural design major at college. I can't help but notice the inconsistencies.”

Paperback nodded. This mare obviously knew her stuff. Now he just had to not look like a fool in front of her. She's actually kind of cute, wouldn't mind getting to know her better. Thoughts like this surprised him; he didn't exactly have any desire for a relationship, lone wolf that he was. “My name's Paperback. Pleasure to meet you.” He said, holding out a hoof.

“Ditzy Doo! Pleased to meet you too!” The bubbly gray mare said as he took his offered hoof with two of her own and shook it vigorously; her wonky eye spun around in it's socket.

Paperback resumed the previous conversation. “So you can tell the style of the buildings, but what was the knocking for? Material?”

“Oh! That! Well, actually I was checking on the stability of this particular tower. Unlike all of the other buildings which are firmly in place, this one is slanted just a bit.” Slanted? It didn't seem like the developers would put in something that was imperfect. The tower didn't feel slanted from the inside, anyways. Ditzy Doo took into the air again, wings held her unsteadily aloft. Not the most coordinated pegasus he ever saw; although he refrained from saying such rude things both out of politeness and the fact that he wasn't terribly coordinated either.

“Generally a slant on a building indicates a faulty foundation. Coupled with the constant motion of the city, and there's a real recipe for disaster.” She continued. Disaster? What was he doing up here then?

“Is it, um, safe to be up here then?” Paperback asked, a touch of nervousness in his voice.

Ditzy laughed as she flew backwards around the roof of the tower in a sort of lopsided angle; having only one eye probably threw off her sense of direction. “Of course it's safe. The developers probably just put the tilt in as some sort of quirk.” She said. Her irregular flight path made her bump into the side of the tower, her flank made a solid whump as it connected.

Crack!

“Oh. That doesn't sound good.” She said. Paperback looked at where she had made contact with the building, and didn't see any cracks. Which meant that the crack was somewhere else... Like the bottom of the tower.

The tower below them had had enough of whatever abuse it had been put through in it's life, and one of the lower supports gave way. Slowly, imperceptibly at first, the tower began to sway.

Crunch!

“Yeah. That doesn't sound good at all.” Paperback agreed. He attempted to turn around and go for the stairs, but the building was already collapsing; the floor in the previous room was gone. Frantic, he turned around and watched the ground slowly come up to meet him. Ponies in the streets looked up with mixed faces of disbelief, terror, and alarm.

“Oops! My bad!” Ditzy yelled to the ponies below as she moved out of the way of the giant crushing instrument of doom.

With a groan lost amongst the sound of the collapsing building, the tower gave one final sway and turned, the balcony he was on shifted a few degrees to the left, which left him at an angle where he wouldn't be crushed quite immediately. Paperback seized his chance and jumped up on the rails, hooves scrambling to find purchase on the stony side of the column as it began its inevitable descent to the city below.

As the tower turned a bit more and descended a few degrees down, not quite yet at full speed, Paperback's hooves pulled him onto the steep wall that was declining more and more by the second. Not declining enough, however. Before he could reaffirm his grip, his hooves slipped and he began sliding down the wall of the tower.

Oh dear. The thought ran briefly in his head as his hooves made contact with a jutting stone on the tower, which caused him to pull off a rather comical front flip that continued all the way down the tower.

Of course, the structure wasn't done turning yet. Almost to the ground, the tower tilted around just a little bit more, which unceremoniously flipped him off. He didn't care though, because the one thought that moved through his head was that he was going to live!

At least, he would have, if it wasn't for the fact that the building was right on the edge of the city, and he had fallen outside of the safety rails. Even as the tower crushed an entire street, Paperback's continued motion launched him off of the side of Aeroslida.

The ground did look so very far away. Propelled into free fall, Paperback could only think bitterly that he really should have made a pegasus character instead.

The ground hurt. A lot.

Paperback woke up in the spawn room, thoroughly perturbed by his brief moment as a gravity-made pony pancake. The house was ready to burst with all of the ponies crammed from wall to wall, most of them looking confused as to why they just had a building dropped on them. He joined the throng that was slowly moving towards the exit, and wondered at how much destruction was caused.

The damage was extensive; but overall not as bad as it could have been. The tower had spun and fallen in such a way that it crushed an entire street, but only caused minor damage to the buildings on the side. With how populated the streets were, about seventy people must have been crushed; all players. The NPC's had the reaction times and wit to flee into nearby buildings and were already out again; faces aghast at their destroyed carts and supplies. Poor Ditzy made one heck of a mess.

The tower itself was half in rubble, but the other half lay cracked and collapsed, covering the street like a tunnel. Some sort of maintenance crew was already deployed, which kept ponies like him behind barricades while they began repairing the damage. Quick and efficient- and probably using more than a bit of magic- the crew had cleared the street and had already begun restructuring the tower. Paperback noted that there was gryphons on the crew as well as ponies; the first other species he had seen in the game.

With nothing more to see or do here- and quite eager to leave to avoid being questioned and put on the spot- Paperback meandered off to enjoy the last bit of time he had before everyone was supposed to meet up again.

He ended up spending his time near where they were going to meet up. He had a good view of one of the many squares where players grouped together, and watched the many ponies roam about. Some browsed the various stalls set up. Others ran straight towards Chariot Park; those who recently respawned and couldn't wait to get back into the fray. He must have spaced out like he was prone to, because in no time at all Night Stalker, Dilluted Livo, and Nitro Rush were surrounding him.

“Hey! Paperback! Equestria to Paperback!” Nitro Rush yelled in his ear, abruptly ending his momentary daze. “WAKE UP! We're deciding what to do.” If Paperback wasn't paying attention before, he certainly was now. With a whinny he jumped up to a sitting position, only to fall backwards off the cushion he was resting on. He rolled over into a less exposed position and stood up, looking at the three around him.

“Yes. I am awake. That was unnecessary, and ow.” Paperback said, as he rubbed the base of his ear with a hoof while it tried to fix itself from the noisy assault. Note to self: The games idea of limiting pain does not include blowing out my eardrums.

Nitro just gave him that idiotic grin that was always superglued to his face. Paperback sort of wanted to buck it right at that moment, but refrained from doing so. “Oh good! Anyways, there's something that I really, really want to do because I heard that some famous ponies are playing the game right now but I'm just a bit nervous so I was wondering if I could get you and some of the others to come with me to get their autograph or something because-” By Celestia, didn't this pony need to breathe? “-I would feel really stupid doing this by myself and having some other ponies come with me would make it a lot less awkward.” Nitro finally finished. Paperback nearly blanched partway through; that run-on sentence felt like it gave him cancer.

“Hold on. Let me see if I can piece together what you just vomited out.” Paperback groaned, and ran what Nitro just around in his head a few times for a second before continuing. “There's a group of famous ponies playing Equestrian Earth right now, and you want to meet them, but you don't want to do it alone so that you don't feel awkward.”

Nitro nodded vigorously. “Uh-huh! I'm a humongous fan of theirs.”

“And just who is it you want to meet?” Paperback continued in a slow, overly-patient voice that sarcastically emphasized his annoyance. Night Stalker and Dilluted Livo looked on bemusedly.

“The Elements of Harmony!” The blue pegasus said, and jumped into an exuberant backflip using his wings. “Only the six coolest mares in all of existence! Not only did they redeem Nightmare Moon and turn her back into Princess Luna, but they also beat Discord and turned him back into stone!”

Ah yes, the Elements of Harmony. Even Paperback- shut in that he was- knew of them. When Nightmare Moon returned and brought an extra six hours of night to Equestria, he maintained a relatively calm demeanor, donned a scarf, and took a walk to the sound of the city in a state of hushed panic. When Discord returned and brought his own little reign of chaos to the world for a day- and a night, and another day, that five-minute cycle was confusing- Las Pegasus was far enough outside of the MadGod's sphere of influence that it stayed relatively sane. Relatively. Paperback had spent that national emergency curled up in a blanket on the floor, controller in front of him as he drowned out the noise of flying tomatoes pelting his window.

“The Elements of Harmony? I didn't know you were a fan.” Paperback commented. Sure, the six mares were technically famous, since they were heroes of Equestria and all, but not much was known about their private lives. Or their public ones, really. Being the favorites of Celestia might have something to do with their small village not getting flooded with paparazzi. “How were you planning on introducing yourself to them? Walk up and just ask for an autograph?”

Nitro's grin turned from ecstatic to sheepish. Okay, so he definitely hasn't thought this one through, Paperback thought. “Well, we'll need to think of something if you want to impress them by being more than just a fanboy. We'll get back to that in a minute.” Paperback turned towards Night and Dilluted. “So did you two have anything that you wanted to do? And where's Chalice and Sound?”

Night Stalker spoke up. “Chalice is off looking at the enchanting profession, and Sound joined a group of Bards who are performing down in Canterlot.” Well, chalk those two off for this mission then.

“Actually, Night and I wanted to try the Pony vs Pony arena. We were hoping we could get some of the group to join us in making a team.” Dilluted stated, her quiet voice barely audible over the Areoslida din. So the game had PvP matches, huh? That gave him an idea...

After a moment of thoughtful consideration, he addressed the three others. “Alright. I think I know how we can meet the Elements of Harmony, and make a PvP team... First, we need to find them. I want to know just who it is I'm dealing with before I make a fool of myself...”

The next half hour led them clue chasing over most of Aeroslida. It turns out four of the six Elements had stores in the city already from vouchers, but none of them were in at the moment. Rumor and happenstance reported six mares heading onto a chariot to one of the starter towns, which was the best lead that they had gotten so far.

Paperback spoke to his three pegasi companions, “Alright. The three of you, fly down there and see if you can spot them. If they're new, then they're probably at the... The Sherpwood.” He said, having to pause to check the name on his map. “Don't talk to them or announce yourselves in any way yet. I need to view their group dynamic myself before I figure out how to converse with them.”

“And where will you be, oh socially awkward one?” Nitro said, and ribbed him.

“I have to somehow get through chariot park and wait for the right chariot to arrive. I'll be about a half hour behind you all.” The proper term for this moment would be 'Wingless Pony Problems'

Night Stalker leaped into the air, followed by Dilluted Livo, “We've got a better idea. Sit right there.” Night Stalker said, and the two of them flew off over the edge of the city. Minutes later they were back, and towing the same chariot they had found outside the Bandit Caverns.

“Where did you store this thing?” Paperback asked, amazed that it hadn't been commandeered for some other group's use by this point.

“In the underbelly of the city, in one of the old tunnels that leads out into the sky. A lot of them haven't been fully explored yet, so we felt it was safe to stash it there for now.” Night Stalker replied.

“Smart thinking, although we'll probably have to find somewhere else for it soon, or else just give it up.” Paperback said, as he hopped into the back. Night Stalker and Dilluted Livo took a moment to harness themselves, and then they soared down to Sherpwood Forest a half hour ahead of the previous schedule.

The forest was much larger than the small patches and groves of trees that were scattered about the Firmidda Fields. Located near the southern border of Equestria, the Sherpwoods had a more lush, tropical feel to them, and were thick enough that players could run about and get lost without ever meeting anyone else. A deep gorge ran through the back end of the forest like a scar, that had very few bridges that crossed it. There was a relatively small starter town nearby, but the standard chariot landed closer to the forest than the village; and as a result many new players would skip the town entirely. Paperback instructed his pilots to head further on towards the back of the woods. “We need somewhere to hide the cart anyways,” went his reasoning.

Near the middle of the forest rose a series of small hills which Night and Dilluted pulled the chariot behind. Once Paperback was off they carried it up into a tree, where it wouldn't be so easily seen and taken.

“Well? Where do we start looking? Nitro said, as he peered around from the tree branch he was balancing on.

Paperback pointed as he spoke, and directed the three others. “Nitro, search near the entrance of The Sherpwood and back in the town. In case one of them is new, they might be farming up there. Night Stalker, Dilluted, take the west and the east; they might be fighting around the hills. In case they are a higher level, I'll be searching the backwoods here. Whoever finds them, send out a ping.”

The four of them split off to search. Paperback had given himself the backwoods for a reason, of course. He needed to make up the level gap that had grown between him and the rest of the party, and farming on the monsters while he searched would be a perfect way to make up that ten percent penalty.

Now... where to start... Ooh. There's something ahead. He thought, and slowed down his movement in order to make less noise. In a clearing in front of him sat a jumble of wood, faintly lit by the glowing flowers that crawled up the trees in vines, and ran along the ground as undergrowth. It looked like a bunch of sticks and logs, but as Paperback concentrated on it, a health bar appeared. The name above it said 'Timber Wolf', and it was a high enough level that it would actually prove to be challenging for him. He firmly gripped his hammer in his magical field, and gave a leap forward.

The pile of lumber stirred to life as he charged at it, glowing green eyes appeared and glared at him. A mouth full of sharpened teeth opened and growled at him before powerful legs sprung at him in return. A flaming strike made contact with the side of the beast, as it's mouth hooked onto his back in a bite. The beast certainly dealt sizable damage; a fair piece of his health disappeared as he shook off the wolf and brought his hammer down for another blow.

The beast attacked him with its claws this time, as he swung his hefty weapon downwards onto its back. The timber wolf's claws slashed against his chainmail, dealing far less damage than the teeth. The next few blows traded were like that; Paperback blocked and defended himself whenever the wolf tried to get a bite in, and lashed out when he could get away with a scratch of claws. The fight endured for another minute, until Paperback valiantly smashed the timber wolf in the face, whereupon it gave one last low howl before it crumbled back into an inanimate pile of wooden logs and branches.

Paperback leaned on the shaft of his hammer, observing his fallen foe. What had they taught him about timber wolves in the scouts? Besides their taste for pony, they were fiercely territorial and known to hunt in packs; and they also had the nasty habit of playing dead to catch a foe unawares. They rarely wandered

Wait... pack creatures. Paperback rolled this thought over in his head for a moment, before a loud, aggressive howl sounded out behind him. Eyes opened wide, he turned his head around. Beneath the shadow of the trees, three pairs of familiar glowing eyes stared back at him. He backed up and carefully maneuvered around the remains of the dead timber wolf.

Only, it wasn't acting so dead. Faint little globules of light from the glowing flowers in the clearing slowly spun in the air, moving towards the body of the beast and into it. Even as he moved around it, the beast began to pull itself together, and it's eyes opened too.

Four. Four angry timber wolves, one of which he had already killed once. Quite a recipe for disaster. Hammer secure in his magical grip, he charged...

… In the other direction. Cowardice? He preferred the term 'disorderly retreat.' In a moment of mad chaos, he jumped over logs and through vines, the timber wolves hot on his hooves. Giddy from the chase, he shouted out behind him,

“Those who live to run away,

Can fight again another day!”

Were timber wolves intelligent enough to realize that they were being taunted? Paperback certainly wasn't slowing down to find out. He was headed back towards the hills in the middle of the forest now, and felt a little winded. Weaker monsters were about, and gave him a wide berth- or rather, the timber wolves hunting him.

There was the hill. Could he climb it? No, too tired, and the wolves would get him. He turned to run around the base of it, just managing to keep ahead over the rocks and roots that sprawled over the forest floor. Was that a group of players ahead of him? Three of them, the highest at ninth level. They couldn't help him, they would get slaughtered. It was too late for him to turn around though, so before he charged past them he yelled, “Move outta the way! Taking the doggies for a walk!”

They gave him a blank look as he reached them, which quickly turned to fear when they saw what was chasing him. Quick as a flash they dove into thicker parts of the forest, and saved themselves while Paperback galloped through as if he had the hounds of hell after him.

More forest. It was getting thicker now, he was having trouble maneuvering and the wolves were catching up. There! A break in the trees! He tensed his legs, and gave one last mighty jump. A timber wolf leaped after him, and tackled him through the branches. Paperback turned, ready to beat at it with his hammer, so he didn't immediately register the cliff.

He noticed after a moment that he was falling. After the timber wolf yelped and let go he looked below him. This was a mistake, since he now hit the rock face first. I would have the luck to fall into the only gorge in the forest. He thought bitterly. Of course, it wasn't luck so much as he had stopped paying attention to where he was running.

Ponies, of course, are remarkably ductile. Many can be bent, knocked about, pulled, or otherwise manipulated and still bounce back up like a spring. Some remarkable few can even bend or contort their forms in ways which defy their anatomy. In this case, it meant that Paperback would not land here, but would instead bounce off the rock he just faceplanted onto, and down to the next one.

With the momentum that he had going, it didn't look like the next landing was going to stop him either.

Or the third one.

The fourth bounce was merciful in that he ran out of cliff to fall down and instead belly flopped into the water. He lay there for a moment, the gentle current moving him nowhere particularly slowly. As he pulled his face out of the water to breathe, he saw the twigs and wood of the timber wolf that fell after him on the shore of the river. It didn't look like it would get back up anytime soon. It was with a silent satisfaction that he rolled over onto his back as the game informed him that he leveled up.

Level Up!

Paperback has reached level 16!

He has gained the following Skills!
~Thunderous Blow: Whenever the Spell Warrior is using a bludgeoning weapon, he can choose to deal Sonic damage with the Elemental Weapon ability.
~Concussive Strike: Wielding a bludgeoning weapon when using the Strike ability gives the Spell Warrior a 10% chance of dazing a target for 2 seconds. (A dazed opponent has their movement and attack speed reduced by 50%)
“It's time to bring down the hammer!”

Some time had gone by and Paperback had half-pulled himself out of the water. His head lay on a rock on the side of the gorge, while his back end was still being gently tugged by the current. It had gotten a little stronger as he was pulled downstream, which prompted him to pull himself to shore before he went over a waterfall or whatever lay ahead. He had had enough falling today, thank you very much.

It was a light buzz that came from his pack that brought him out of his stupor. Reaching inside he pulled out his friends list and saw that Nitro Rush was messaging him. 'Hey! I found them! Come quick becauseI'mreallysuperexcitedandohmyGOSH I can't wait to meet them!'

There was no doubt who 'them' could be. The Elements of Harmony. Paperback almost wanted to refer to them as 'quarry' or 'prey' but it wasn't exactly the nicest way to refer to somepony. Not that he was much of a hunter anyways. They had a class for that sort of thing. He mumbled aloud, so the paper in front of him could catch his words and write them out to be sent. “That's great. I'm at the bottom of a gorge and still not back to full health. Can somepony pick me up?”

Nitro's reply took a minute. 'Uh, sure. Night Stalker is on his way now.' It would probably be a few minutes before Night Stalker found him, even with the menu that pointed out the locations of all the other members of a party. Before too long though, the near-silent sounds of the charcoal pegasus landed near him, and Paperback struggled to his hooves.

“How did you get into this mess?” Nitro said, as he took in the sight of a beaten and thoroughly wet Paperback. Paperback took a moment to shake himself, and rid his coat of much of the water that still clung to him.

“Pack of timber wolves. Chased me through the whole damned forest.” Paperback said dryly. Night Stalker wrapped his forehooves around Paperback's midriff, and hauled him up to the top of the gorge. They set off towards the other two located in the shallow edge of the forest, Paperback moving at a brisk gallop to make up for lost time.

They arrived to a part of the forest near the entrance where there was a lot of hollows and divots where fog would gather. A narrow array of monsters were here, mostly consisting of bizarre animated mushrooms that served the party no real threat. Nitro Rush and Dilluted Livo were waiting there for them, the former bouncing up and down on his hooves in anticipation.

“They're right over there!” Nitro practically squealed.

“I'm going to stop you right there.” Paperback said, and held a hoof up. “I know you are really excited but please try not to get your hopes up. We only got here because we followed the rumor mill, which, might I remind you, is hardly a reliable source of information. There are many, many ponies with many, many coat colors and we don't even know exactly what the Element Bearers look like. Princess’s protege privilege generally means that there aren't a whole lot of pictures of them to go around, and we could easily be mistaken and I would really, really not like to have to apologize to a group of mares because we made a mistake in identifying them.” He took a deep breath and finished with, “Especially because what we are doing currently amounts to stalking.”

“Yeah, I was going to mention something about that.” Dilluted Livo said. “Isn't this rather creepy? I mean, isn't there a better way to find out about them without following them around all stalkerish like?”

Paperback replied. “Not if I want to find out their group dynamic. I just need to see who's in charge, and get a feel for each of their personalities. That way when I approach them- which will probably be sometime in the next fifteen minutes or so, this observation shouldn't take long- I can prepare satisfactory replies to anything they might say, while still sounding realistic, achieving our ultimate goal of challenging them to a bout at the arena, and not making myself look like an idiot..”

Night Stalker nodded slowly, piecing together what Paperback just said. “So... what you're saying is you want to hear them so that you can make a conversation tree in your head, kind of like an RPG.”

“Exactly. That's the gist of it.” Paperback said, and nodded his head in affirmation.

Nitro questioned him. “So, you can figure out what they're going to say in reply to anything you say, and prepare entire conversations ahead of time? Is that what you're special talent is?”

“Well, it's more like I have a general list of things that they might say in reply to anything I say, and it just branches outward continually from there.” Paperback said.

“That's actually kind of creepy.” Nitro said. “And you're supposed to be the socially awkward one who doesn't do well in conversation.”

“Well, I need time to prepare! I can't do things like this on the fly, hence the social awkwardness.” Paperback said defensively. Yes, it was probably related to his special talent of reading in some way. After all, book characters are modeled after real ponies, usually. Spend enough time reading and role-playing and you can usually figure out what any sane pony will say in response to something. Usually. It was worth a try sometimes.

Paperback peeped through a bush, giving him a slightly obscured view of the clearing beyond. They were just far enough away that he would have to strain his ears in a minute to hear what they were saying over the racket of the battle they were in. There were six ponies in the clearing below of various coats and colors. Pink, sky blue, white, orange, violet, and yellow. From what very few pictures he had seen (mostly consisting of a blurb from the Coltbert Report on the royal wedding with the six in the background) this seemed to be the right group.

They were currently in battle with what appeared to be a large number of the animated mushroom creatures. As they defeated some, more appeared from beneath bushes and burrows and joined the fray. It seemed that the group of mares had stumbled into a nest and were clearing it out. Since he couldn't take note of their voices yet, he watched their fighting style. Two of the Elements of Harmony appeared to be melee fighters, while three were most definitely casters.

The last member was a pink pony that didn't walk, but bounced around the field. Paperback was baffled how she did that, and he shuffled his own hooves wondering how it worked. She was throwing exploding cupcakes, which Paperback didn't recognize what class that was. None came to his mind that he knew threw combustible confections. A wild card, then.

He recognized the purple unicorn as Celestia's student, if Coltbert was right about anything; what was her name again? It looked like she was shouting directions to the others, but if she was he couldn't hear anything. Of course, she must be using the party chat. Shame he didn't know how to read lips. This would throw a bit of a chink in his plans. How could he learn how they would react if he didn't know how they spoke?

He would worry about that later; in the meantime it looked like this fight would last a bit longer, so he was content to settle in and watch the show. Around him, he could feel his companions do the same, silently observing from their own obscured outposts.

Thump. Paperback felt something bump into him. His eyes narrowed, he did not want to be annoyed right now.

Thump. Whatever it was hit him again. It was dealing damage to him now, albeit a pathetically small amount. Careful not to rustle the bush too much, he turned his head around to see one of the orange mushrooms ramming him with it's head. “Mushie” the monster plate read. A first-level monster, and a weak one at that. To attack it, we would have to pull out his hammer. It would make enough noise to most definitely draw attention to him. Sighing internally, he turned back to watch the fight and let the little mushroom continue in it's quest to destroy him.

After a few more minutes, it looked like the fight was nearing a close. Less mushrooms were appearing, and eventually they stopped coming altogether. The Elements were left to mop up what remained of the mushroom army, which took only minutes more. As the last one was smashed into a pulpy oblivion, all of them visibly relaxed.

Thump. Behind Paperback, Mushie still persisted in the assault, quickly tipping the scales on how badly Paperback wanted to smash it compared to how much he didn't want to be spotted.

As the leader of the Elements sat on the ground to regain her mana, Paperback saw one last mushroom pop out of the bush and make a fast waddle at her from behind. It took paperback a moment to notice what was wrong with it; it had a stick of dynamite for a head. Part of him wanted to shout out a warning. Another part demanded to stay hidden. A third part watched what was happening like an oncoming train wreck; one knew exactly what was going to happen, yet couldn't look away.

She looked like she shouted one last thing, although he couldn't tell what it was she said since the mares were using party chat. Then she was gone, the exploding mushroom having killed her instantly, leaving behind only rapidly disappearing virtual bits. The other five of the party were thrown backwards by varying degrees depending on their proximity, but otherwise lived.

Thump went Mushie, unable to be deterred from it's task.

Well, one of their party had just died. Although the purple unicorn- seriously, I can't remember her name. Coltbert said it at least twice- would undoubtedly be respawning soon, some of her party members were distressed over her demise. The yellow pegasus looked like she was ready to burst out into tears, with the other white-maned unicorn consoling her. With their party leader gone, it looked like the orange pony was taking over- so she's their secondary leader, looks no-nonsense enough- since she waved the others to gather around. She gave a rather short set of what Paperback could only assume to be directions, and headed off back towards the entrance of the forest. Four of the others followed. Paperback had no intention of approaching them when they were like this; he would give them time to reunite and then take his move.

The pink pony stayed behind, looting some of the mushroom remains that lay around the clearing. Paperback studied her intently. He was too far away to make out her name plate, but he really wanted to know what class was in the game that threw exploding cupcakes.

Suddenly, the pink pony looked down at her front-right hoof. She picked it up, gazing at it intently before blowing on it deeply. What in Equestria is she doing? She put it back down again, scarping it against the ground while continuing to blow on it intently. Is her hoof on fire or something?

She then turned, and stared directly at him. How could she know he was there? He hadn't made a sound this entire time! He was more than fifty feet away, completely hidden in a bush and making no noise. Was she a psychic? Did those even exist? The pink one's eyes narrowed with a frown slowly creasing her face. Oh most probably a psychic. He could practically feel his three companions start sweating from their position in the tree next to him. If they were discovered like this is would be worse than over for Nitro's dream of meeting the Elements of Harmony. Could charges be pressed for stalking ponies through a game?

Thump. Mushie was still there, going for the most annoying monster award.

Suddenly, Paperback was struck with an idea. A particularly stupid idea that might not work, but he was willing to grasp at anything to save their hides at this point. Using his telekinesis, he grabbed the offending mushroom from it's position attacking his rear, and pulled it forward. With a shove, he pushed it out of the bush in front of him. Faced with a new enemy in sight, it promptly ran towards the pink psychic.

The pink pony's eyes brightened up and she giggled at the mushroom as it charged towards her. As if she was oblivious to it's harmful intent, she picked it up with her front hooves and spun around with it. She was saying something, but whatever it was got lost in party chat. She put the mushroom down, where it was so dizzy that it fell over, making the pink pony laugh even more. She then hopped off in the same direction that her friends had gone, leaving behind three sweating pegasi, a panicked unicorn, and one disoriented mushroom.

A minute went by before Paperback moved, pushing himself through the undergrowth into the clearing. Mushie saw him, and immediately went back to pummeling his side. Paperback blatantly ignored the monster and waved for the other three to join him.

“So... did you learn what you needed to?” Night Stalker asked, “and are you going to do anything about him?” The second question was directed at the orange mushroom that was continually bumping itself against Paperback.

“Yes, I think I learned enough- although not as much as I wanted to.” Paperback replied. The group seemed to run pretty democratically- albeit with the princess's student as a tie-breaking vote. Even so, other members of the group seemed ready to take charge if things seemed ready to splinter, like the orange paladin pony who led the group out of the forest, or the white unicorn who comforted the distressed yellow pegasus.

“And as for this guy...” Paperback continued, as he spared a glance back at the Mushie. The blasted little monster had rammed his armor so many times that some of the paint on his cutie mark had rubbed off, copying Paperback's open book motif onto the Mushie's flat-topped head. “You get to live, for saving us. Try not to get attacked by any players, alright?” After he prodded the Mushie with his hoof a few times it got the message and ran off towards it's burrow, diving deep into the undergrowth and finally leaving him alone.

Nitro just stared off in the direction where the presumed Elements of Harmony went off in. His eyes were wide open and they shone with sparkles. He turned towards Paperback, his face full of anticipation. “Can we go talk them now?” He said, the undiminished grin returned to his face in full force.

“Down, boy.” Paperback said sternly. Nitro responded by replacing the smile with a mock pouting face, ears lowered in sadness. “They just lost a party member, who presumably was also their leader. Challenging them before they have a chance to recover would just be... inconsiderate.” The yellow pegasus was crying, for Celestia's sake!

“They probably went back to the city to find her when she respawns. Let's go back to the cart and get to Aeroslida. We'll challenge them there. It's near the arena anyways, and we can sign up right afterwards.” Paperback trotted off towards the backside of the hill, where their cart was hopefully still tucked away in the trees.

“By the way, what are we going to name our team, anyways?” Dilluted Livo chimed in. Then the arguing started.

“I'm just saying, 'The Reapers' is a name that will strike terror into any enemy!” Night Stalker exclaimed from his position in the front of the cart. He'd been pushing the name for the past ten minutes

“Yes, and I'm just saying that Hoofington already named their ball team that. They have us beat by a good thirty years on the copyright.” Paperback retorted.

“Can you copyright a name like that? I don't think that's how it works.” Dilluted Livo said. She was flying alongside the cart this time, with Nitro taking her place in the harness.

“I don't know either, but it just seems bad form to copy them like that. We should come up with something that's original.” Paperback replied. He sat in the back of the carriage and felt quite a bit useless getting carried around like this.

“Ooh! I have an idea!” Nitro shouted from the harness. This would not be his first idea. Or his tenth. Paperback was still shaking his head from the name 'The Kool Katz,' (“with K's instead of C's! And a Z!” Nitro had insisted.) “And this time it's a good one!” Well, he had only said that three times before. “We should be Team Packers! 'We'll send em Packing!'” Nitro said exuberantly, with extra emphasis on the tagline.

It was corny. Really, really corny. And about a thousand times better than the 'Fighting Forks' and the other inanity that all four of them had been spewing. Livo shared Paperback's sentiment, as she added, “I kind of like it. It's better than 'Team Limitless.'”

“Yes, you've already expressed your thoughts on my taste in team names.” Paperback muttered.

“Well, we don't have to decide on the name just yet. We'll give it some thought before we sign up.” Night Stalker said. “Now brace your nose, it smells a little in here.”

They had arrived at the floating city of Aeroslida, and Night was maneuvering the chariot towards one of the openings that dotted the lower half of the city. They led into the sewers, which is where Night had decided would be a good place to store the cart to keep ponies from taking it. As Paperback quickly found out when they were making their way back up to the city above, the underbelly was a twisted maze of caverns and sewer pipes. Night Stalker wasn't lying either, they really did stink. Getting lost twice only made Paperback irritable until they found the exit.

The crew had a fairly good idea where they would be able to find the Elements of Harmony, if indeed the rumors were true; Paperback retained his doubts. During their search earlier it was revealed that the orange mare who- according to his observations anyways- was the Elements emergency leader owned a tavern called the Sweet Fruits in the market district. Her name was Applejack, according to Nitro, who gave him the names of all six of the mares.

“Why would somebody rent a bed anyways?” Nitro asked as they walked through the streets. “We're already asleep. It's not like you need more sleep inside the game.”

“A couple of reasons. One makes sense, the other is preference.” Paperback replied, as his mind pulled out his extensive knowledge gained from Query the tutorial master. “As a preference, some players don't like to run around the world in the dark, so they rent a room to sleep in until the daytime. As for the other reason, sleeping or logging off in a bed makes you 'Well Rested' for a time, which means you gain bonus experience from killing monsters.”

“Ooh... That makes sense. Okay.” Nitro replied. Across from the plaza they had reached sat a squat and homely wooden two-story building. A decorated sign hanging from a pole above the door declared it as “Sweet Fruits,” their ultimate destination, and where they would hopefully meet the Elements of Harmony. Without stalking them. Any more than they already had.

Paperback took a deep breathe outside the building, trying to formulate his thoughts into a coherent map of the coming conversation. “Okay... I think I'm ready. Try not to derail the conversation overmuch, I don't want to get distracted.” The others seemed to be paying half attention, they looked a bit nervous as well. “Remember, in conversation we need to be stealthy as to what our true intentions are. You're rogues, you can be stealthy, can't you? Approach the subject in a roundabout way, as it were. I'm going to try and steer the discussion in the way we need it to go, so again, please don't derail it.”

“Alright. Here goes everything...” Paperback muttered, and walked through the door. His three companions followed close behind.

Inside the Sweet Fruits tavern everything was a blaze of color and warmth. Enchanted candles floated above the tables, providing illumination along with the large open fireplace that sat in the middle of the room. The fireplace's chimney doubled as a pillar of support, and funneled up through the ceiling and the floor above. Tapestries and paintings dotted the walls, providing bright and contrasting colors depicting scenery of all sorts. Almost all of the tables had a player or two sitting at them, so he didn't immediately register where his target was.

Sitting behind the bar though there was the orange mare that he had seen in the forest. Now that the light was better and he wasn't looking through a bush, he could tell that her coat was a more vivid shade of his own rusty brown color. Next to her sat the pink psychic and the yellow pegasus. All three of them were dressed down in different armor than before; theirs looked brand new and custom made, judging by the detail that went into all the accessories. All three of them looked absolutely stunning, even the one wearing enough plate armor to ram through a wall with. A true craftspony spent a lot of time on them.

It was time for him to approach. He took a few steps forward, while he used some of his mental processes to ensure he gave off an aura of confidence. Like before, he managed to trick his mind into thinking what he put into there, and already he felt more at ease as he made the final few steps to get within allowable talking distance.

Keep it casual, Paperback. He thought. “Hey, could we have a drink here?” After he said it, but a moment too late, he briefly had an internal panic attack. Should I have said please!?! He let his face show none of his uneasiness. A perfect mask. Who said that theater classes were a waste of time in high school?

The orange mare decked out in plate armor turned towards them. “Sure. Mind giving me some names?” Paperback sighed with relief inside. So far so good; so his brain immediately took a moment to analyze her voice. Definitely a country mare, but lacking the drawl that was stereotyped so often in media. Reasonably intelligent, but her knowledge lied less with book smarts and more with practical things.

“I'm Paperback,” he said, gesturing to himself. He then waved a hoof towards each of his companions in turn. “This is Night Stalker, Dilluted Livo, and finally, Nitro Rush.” His companions each acknowledged the orange mare in turn, Nitro looked like he was about to explode.

“Hey! Are you guys the Elements of Harmony?!” Nitro blurted out.

Celestia. Damn. It. All. To. Tartarus. The blue fiend was going to ruin them before they got more than a minute into the conversation. Paperback's first instinct was to spin around and plant his back hooves into Nitro's face, but he suppressed that feeling deep down inside him, and placed heavy boxes on top of it. He instead swung out his hoof and smacked Nitro on the shoulder. “You idiot! Do you want to give away our intentions?”

The three basically confirmed Elements of Harmony looked at them skeptically. “What intentions?” Applejack questioned.

An awkward silence ensued for two seconds before Dilluted Livo thankfully broke it. “Eh heh, we weren’t that stealthy were we?” She chuckled.

“Nope. What do you want?”

Well, since it was all basically out in the open now Paperback struggled to form a coherent sentence and regain control of the conversation. “Well, I'll be honest, we want to ask you a little something something.”

“Shoot.”

“Well, my friend here” Paperback waves his hoof at Nitro again, “is actually a really big fan of you mares, and he wanted to meet you.” Nitro was bouncing up and down so fast he looked like he was vibrating.

“Pleased ta meetcha. Ahm Applejack, and this 'ere's Pinkie Pie and Fluttershy.” Applejack said, gesturing to the pink pony who had almost discovered them earlier, and the yellow pegasus. Pinkie Pie looked just as excitable as Nitro; she wasn't bouncing like him, but her smile looked wide enough to split her face in two. She spoke then, a torrential flood of words that spewed forth from her mouth at speeds that nearly made Paperback's brain shut down.

“Ooh! I didn't know we had fans! Is there a fan club where you you all get together and talk about how awesome we all are and wear wigs that look like our manes so that you can feel more physically connected to your idols? I know Rainbow Dash has a fan club like that, they meet in a treehouse every month-” Sweet Luna, she talked even more than Nitro did once you got him going. Paperback edged himself away a few inches as she continued rambling on. Nitro and Pinkie Pie kept talking animatedly next to him as he turned back towards Applejack to ask his question.

“Anyways, on to my question. We, meaning my group and I, are wondering whether we may challenge the Elements of Harmony to a pony versus pony match?” Paperback said.

Applejack frowned and replied, “Right now?”

“No, of course not! Not with so little notice or preparation time.” Paperback said. “I was thinking tomorrow night at the Skydome. They're opening it up then for early exhibition matches for players to get a feel for the pvp combat system, since they're starting up a tournament bracket in a month or so.”

Applejack appeared intrigued, so when she asked how this would go about happening, he gladly explained. “We would go sign up now with our basic team roster, and then we have until tomorrow night to train independently. Then, a couple of hours beforehoof we would show up and finalize our team roster and the rules for the match. It's all very informal right now, so nothing is set in stone until right before.”

The shy yellow pegasus who had been sipping at her drink the whole time looked at Applejack from behind her pink hair. “I don't know. It sounds really scary, and dangerous...” Fluttershy whispered. Paperback had to strain his ears to hear her over the sounds of Pinkie Pie and Nitro still jabbering away next to him.

Applejack looked thoughtful. “Ah don't suppose we could have some time to think it over? The rest of mah friends might want to have a say in this.”

“Of course! You are of course under no obligation to accept.” Paperback replied. Would the rest of the Elements agree to a battle? Some of them certainly didn't seem the battling type, most certainly not the pegasus who was currently hiding behind her own hair.

Pinkie Pie jumped back in again, “Ooh! A battle? I'd LOVE to have a battle! It'll be superfuneriffic and I'll bake some extra special cupcakes just for the occasion!”

“Pinkie Pie, we can't just rush into things like this. The rest of the gals will want to vote on it.” Applejack said, and gave the pink pony a stern gaze.

“Oh come on Applejack! It's just a weensy little battle, and the worst that can possibly happen is that we'll have a lot of fun doing it!” Pinkie Pie exclaimed. Then she added in a low conspiratorial voice, “There's no need to be a scaredy-cat, Applejack.”

That most certainly did it. Applejack's brow furrowed and she stared Pinkie Pie straight in the eyes for a solid five seconds, with Pinkie Pie still giving her a sly look from the side of her face. “The Apple family ain't scared of nothing no-way no-how.” Applejack declared, then pointed her hoof towards Paperback. “You're on. The Skydome, tomorrow night. Pinkie Pie, go sign us up.”

Pinkie Pie and Nitro both beamed, and Paperback even allowed himself a small smile. He had been afraid to push this mare's buttons, but Pinkie Pie had done that for him. Night Stalker and Diluted Livo looked more happy that they were finally going to get to fight somepony.

Nitro left with Pinkie Pie to go sign up the two teams at the skydome, which let Paperback actually order a drink and relax for a bit. He wasn't really one for alcohol, so he sipped on his while Night and Livo conversed with Applejack, and to a much lesser extent, with Fluttershy.

The two talkative ponies returned a few minutes later, whereupon Pinkie Pie exuberantly proclaimed that “The fight between Team Awesome and Team Packers is a go!”

Applejack raised an eyebrow. “Team Awesome?”

“Yeah! See, when we went to go sign up the games manager said that we needed to have a team name- at least one that he could file us under for now so when the time for the match comes we can change it if we want- and so I was standing there thinking of a name and it suddenly came to me, What Would Rainbow Dash Do? And so that's why we're Team Awesome!”

Applejack shrugged. “Makes sense to me, I guess.” She said, then turned to Paperback and his crew. “So we'll see you tomorrow night. Prepare to get your flanks kicked, Apple-Family style.”

It was just a minor ribbing, but Paperback could tell by the glint in her eye that she was very prepared to back up that statement. He replied in kind, “I'll make sure to wave at you from the winner's circle.” The two of them shared a friendly yet competitive grin before Team Packers excused themselves, saying their goodbyes to the three members of Team Awesome and the Elements of Harmony.

“Well, I should probably let Sound Wave and Chalice know that we're doing pvp tomorrow night.” Paperback said after they exited the tavern; he pulled out his friends list and composed a private message that he sent to both of them, and suggesting that they get on early tomorrow night to prepare for the battle.

“Alright, well, Dilluted Livo and I have to get up and get ready for work. We have the morning shift in the royal guard.” Night Stalker said, his eyes obviously searching out a clock in the corner of his vision. After a final goodbye, the two of them logged off.

“Royal Guards, huh? You meet all kinds...” Paperback said to nobody in particular, before he himself devirtualized and exited the game.

Author's Note

This chapter was brought to you by the amazing and incredible powers of chocolate, able to keep me typing in a crazed sugar high until four in the morning.

Chapter 8: Challenges and Champions

“In the arena they struggle to win
Two teams fight by hoof and by wing
No holding back, the fighting begins
For them death is but a temporary thing”

One eye opened, staring into darkness as Paperback tried to rouse himself from his slumber. He didn't feel the heat of the sun yet, so it must have still been early in the morning. The eye shut again as Paperback reached out with his magic and lifted the helmet off of his head. He let out a deep yawn as he stretched out his hooves, rolling slightly to rid himself of the blanket he had slept underneath.

His room had cooled overnight; the crappy apartment insulation offered little resistance to the coming chill that signified that winter was only a couple of months away. As soon as the wave of air rolled over his body he felt more alive, and only then did his eyes open.

It was just about sunrise, perhaps a little bit earlier than that. Possibly the earliest he had woken up all week. His magic instinctively reached towards his dresser and grabbed his glasses, planting them firmly upon his face.

What would he do today? He had some time before he felt like hopping back into the game again. Sighing, he stumbled over to his fridge to find breakfast. Boredom was forever his greatest enemy. Well, no, apathy is. But the boredom comes from the apathy. He thought, trying to straighten out his mind. It's not as if he didn't have a dozen different things that he actually should be doing instead of playing games, it's just that none of them could hold his attention for more than fifteen minutes at a time if he got anything done at all. He had a half-formed list taped to the front of the fridge, and he read it before he opened the door.

Find, apply for, and get a job.

This first item on the list Paperback had already worked on for months, even before he had moved into the apartment. How could something as commonplace as employment- any employment- be so difficult to find? It's not like he had a bad resume. His was better than some of the other people that he had seen employed. He just didn't have any work experience, which was all that really seemed to matter in the rapidly expanding city of Las Pegasus. A list of sixty places he had applied to was scribbled onto the back of the paper; he made the rounds to ask if any positions were still open only a few days ago. No, he wouldn't look for work today. He didn't want to deal with the disappointment

History paper due Two Weeks

The words 'Two Weeks' were written over a number of other dates that had been scribbled out as the deadline drew ever closer. He had known about the paper since the beginning of the semester, and the book that he had to write it on was still laying underneath his bed. He had skimmed it briefly, but everything after the preface was a first-hand account of events from over six hundred years ago and attempting to decipher Middle Equestrian syntax when he didn't have his full brainpower available just made him frustrated. No, no paper today. He didn't need to deal with the headache.

The other three items on the list were 'Go Grocery Shopping, Return Library Books, Go Running.' The first one he didn't have any money for until the end of the month when his parents gave him his 'allowance,' the second he had done two days ago- so he grabbed a pen on the floor and scribbled it out- so that really only left the third. A run for him didn't usually mean a run, more of a light walk that might involve a sprint once he got to the park. The only reason it was on the list was because he didn't want to get flabby; although that prospect didn't look likely with his slim diet of microwave dinners, raw vegetables, and bread. Ah, what the hell. I'm up a good four hours earlier than normal, I might as well. Paperback thought, and pulled out a carton of milk to pour in his oats.

He felt energetic, which was not a word he normally associated with mornings. He might as well use the energy before it passed. He took his time to wash his breakfast dish in the bathroom sink and placed the bowl away where he could use it again later that night.

Paperback stuck his nose out the door and sniffed the cool autumn air before venturing out for the morning. Around his neck he had wrapped a bright red scarf, one of the few articles of clothing he owned. He locked the door behind him and tucked the key into the lining of the scarf; it was a convenient pocket for something so tiny.

He didn't have a particular destination in mind, so he set off down the street at an unhurried pace. Meadow Road led deeper into the residential part of town in the foothills, and if one followed it long enough it would eventually wind around to The Heights, an upper-class neighborhood filled with rich eccentrics. It was mostly ponies who had made their fortunes early on in life and spent their time by spending their money on impulse and throwing lavish parties. From The Heights one could see the cloud city that was the original Los Pegasus, still floating next to the famous “Applewood” sign.

Paperback had no plans of walking that far. He would likely only reach Lark Park near Rough Sketch's house before he turned around and headed back home. Along the way he encountered a few other ponies, and exchanged a quick “hello” before both parties continued their march. Most of them were heading off to work deeper in the city; others were the early risers that kept the gears turning. Weather pegasi were already hard at work moving the clouds around, “Partly cloudy morning, with overcast later in the day and a light shower in the evening.” A pegasus replied when Paperback asked what today's forecast was.

After a good twenty minutes of exercise he found himself at Lark Park right as the sun peeked over the eastern hills. The birds which gave the park its name were madly singing away as they hopped about the grass, looking for insects to devour. After a brief stretch, Paperback did a couple of quick laps around the field, stopping after his muscles began to ache. Why couldn't he run as far as he could in Equestrian Earth? He was a weakling out here in the real world. Combined with a few too many hits to the head and his terrible eyesight, and he could easily fall into a pit of self pity if he dwelled on such things for too long. At least his hearing was good.

On the subject of hearing, what was that noise? Music? Yes, I can hear it a little better now. Paperback thought, twitching his ears to listen in all directions and find the source. The song was fast, and heavy on the drums. Paperback turned towards the street, where he saw an open garage door that the music was pouring through. Rough Sketch's house, of course. Might as well say hello; they hadn't had one of their usual bull sessions in a while.

As he reached the house, Paperback knocked on the side of the garage. Inside, he could see Rough Sketch on the floor doing wing-ups. Weight sets sat nearby, obviously recently used, along with an empty bottle of Mr Pepper soda. A computer was on a cart; the source of the music, obviously. On the screen was a flashy Neighponese anime show, the likes of which were Rough Sketch's muse and primary source of entertainment.

As the sound of Paperback's knocking reached the cream-colored pegasus' ears, Rough Sketch gave one final push off of the ground and hovered in midair without flapping for two seconds. He landed on his hooves and grinned at Paperback standing in the doorway.

“Hey there Paper. What brings you out before the sun shines?” Rough Sketch said, using the break to stretch and cool down from his workout.

“Well, I woke up early for once in my life and decided to take a walk. Heard your music from across the street and came over to say hello.” Paperback replied. “What got you up so early? Usually you sleep in until noon.”

“Saying that I got up early implies that I went to sleep at some point.” Rough Sketch said. He started moving about the room to clean it up a little bit, putting the weights back on their racks and kicking the soda bottle into a corner trashcan

“So you've just been up all night lifting weights and watching anime?” Honestly, Paperback wasn't so surprised. Rough had a peculiar fondness for being nocturnal. “Don't you have work today?” Paperback continued, implying that it really wasn't the best idea to stay up all night.

“Not until three. I was gonna watch one more episode then go to sleep, wake up around one. Plenty of time to shower and eat.” Rough Sketch said, then sat down on a pillow in front of the computer. He tossed another pillow next to him, motioning for Paperback to join him. “Now sit and watch this show with me. We'll make you like anime yet.” Paperback grimaced, but complied. It wasn't that he didn't like anime, it's just that many of the shows didn't appeal to him. Of course, those would be Rough Sketch's favorites.

After the show was over, Paperback stuck around for another half-hour, just chatting about various things of little importance. Equestrian Earth was mentioned in passing, but it didn't display prominently in the conversation as much as Rough Sketch's interest in the Interactive Pony Visor.

“It's absolutely incredible.” Paperback said when asked about it. “I had some reservations about the violence at first because the game feels so real, but I'm adjusting well enough. The graphical display is no-gore so I don't get disgusted, and I'm not sure if I've actually fought any real ponies yet, mostly just monsters controlled by the system AI.” Paperback really didn't know whether the ponies at Bandit Caverns were intelligent or not, and it was kind of bothering him. Yes, they were evil even if they were real, but he didn't want to be an executioner.

Rough Sketch of course cared a little less about Paperback's ethics and morals and more about the visor. “It's better than what Story or Java thought it would be.” Paperback continued when pressed. “The visor uses magical impulses that connect and interfere with the brain's signals, so when you try and move you move in the game, without running around or breaking anything in real life. It takes some real concentration to interrupt those signals once you're in the game, so you'll have to consciously disengage yourself if you want to do something as simple as scratch.” That amount of complex magical technology also explained why the helmet was so heavy.

Eventually Rough Sketch excused himself, needing to wake up for work later in the day. The two of them exchanged an ironic “Good Morning” as Rough closed the door and went upstairs to sleep.

Paperback began the trot back to his apartment. The sun was rising into the sky now, raising the temperature of the air around him to a cozy temperature that made him feel snug with his scarf around him. The heat also had the added benefit of making him feel more energized,even after his small workout. Eh, why not, I'll go and make the rounds again. He thought, and headed off into the city to continue the hunt for employment. He had several hours before he expected to return to the land of digital dreams, and he felt this was the best use of his time.

Six hours later he had nothing to show for his efforts except for an empty stomach, sore legs and a sour attitude. Disappointment always did these to him, and today was no different. He made a slow, complete loop around the entire city as he poked his nose into various places he had applied to and let them know he was still interested if a position opened up. It was nearing two in the afternoon, and his stomach was making the grumblies, so he made his way back home under the overcast sky and the slowly cooling air as the weather pegasi prepared for the evening rain.

He made himself a sandwich as the television blared on in the background about how after a brief economic downturn, things were starting to look up. For everyone but me at least. What the hell am I doing wrong that no one will hire me? He really didn't want to have to move back in with his parents. Anything but that. They were absolutely unbearable, and although they didn't do it out loud anymore he could still tell that inside they constantly compared him to his older sister who had moved to Canterlot years ago. If he moved back in there the silent grudge matches would just escalate into shouting again, and none of them wanted that. It's why they agreed to pay for the tiny apartment for a few months.

With his stomach now less empty than before, he looked towards the clock and saw the time was at three o'clock. The perfect time to dive back into the game and drown his woes in the exciting, virtual reality haven of Equestrian Earth.

As the visor slid securely over his head, his vision was filled with the bright light of the Goddess' domain as he logged in, her voice sweetly saying “Welcome again, Paperback.” As always, before he could reply he felt a familiar falling sensation, and the vision of the white space disappeared as his body virtualized into the world.

He was standing right next to where he was before when he had logged off early this morning. Standing where he should have spawned was another pony, who gave him a sort of wide-eyed stare as Paperback popped into place next to him. The pony muttered “Honestly, I never really get used to that,” before trotting off.

Paperback felt better already inside the game. It was currently nighttime, two days had already passed in the world since he had left. Under the crescent moon gleaming from above the entire city of Aeroslida felt bright and shiny. Despite the time of night in-game, plenty of players were roaming about, usually in groups of threes or fours. Paperback spotted the odd romantic duo here and there, along with the lone wolves who skirted about the edges of crowds; not stopping to talk with anyone but instead pursuing their destination with a single-minded determination.

Due to the time, he assumed, very few non-player characters were up. The only ones up and moving about were the night guards, and one enterprising potion salesman who was making a killing while his competitors were asleep. With none of his other compatriots online yet, Paperback went off to find something to occupy his time. He didn't feel like grinding alone, and Chariot Park was too much of a disaster zone to move through right then anyways, so that left him with destinations inside the city.

The first thing he did was go and check out the rubble from the building that had collapsed the night previous- from his perspective, at least. It must have been three whole days inside the game since it fell. Once he found his way to the street that should have been covered in bricks and ruins, he found that no trace of the destruction remained. The tower that had fallen stood aright again, and if he didn't know better he would say that no calamity had ever occurred.

The workers who had repaired the building had done a remarkably fast job. He had seen them on the scene when he had respawned after the accident, and they had already started clearing up the street and allowing traffic to start flowing through.

He really hoped Ditzy hadn't gotten in trouble for the incident.

He made his next destination the Cloud Library. Perhaps a little reading to pass the time would lighten him up. Maybe they would have the final book of the Wheel of Time series, he certainly wanted to finish the chronicles of the Dragon Reborn. The library was the largest building in the city by terms of area, but second tallest in height only to the capitol building. The three towers that made the basis of the building rose up in a triangle formation around the center. The main building rose three stories high with a domed top while the towers stretched another five after that, topped with the familiar Stalliongrad design that adorned all the major buildings of the city.

The inside of the library was elaborate with its arched hallways and decorative columns. The center room which was underneath the dome was round and large, with desks arrayed on the floor for ponies to work at. Despite the time of night, the room was lit by torches and lanterns, all lighting up the floor, bouncing off of the golden domed ceiling, and then returning to the floor again to bathe the room in a soft amber glow.

Even at this late hour of the evening the library had a fair number of ponies within it. Most of them were NPC's; pages and librarians shuffling around shelves, and some scholars burning through the midnight oil. A few players were scattered about, peering through the books and tomes. Most of them were a few levels below him. Those that had spent all their time grinding to get to higher levels were still out there, most likely having surpassed him by at least five levels by now.

He spent some time browsing the shelves, taking in what material the library had. A bit of comprehensive searching revealed that, no, they didn't have the Wheel of Time series, nor many of the other popular modern books. Instead they had the most extensive collection of knowledge from the classical and pre-classical era that he had ever seen. Some of the books were as young as a hundred and fifty years old, which may have put them officially out of date with the era of the game, but were still six generations apart from modern day.

Others were stories that he didn't even think existed in the real world. Highly decorated books caught his eyes, flashing titles like The Lich of the Silent Swamp, Escape from Kurst's Castle, Crossing the Vile Divide, and The Great Withering at Gloomeadow. The last of those listed caught his eyes, and he pulled it off of the shelves and down to the central room where he could read beneath the light of the dome.

As he suspected, the book was entirely about the lore within the game, focusing around the Gloomeadow and how it became as it was now. Once an area of great plains and forests known as the Viridian Vale, the land had fallen under the terrible curse of an ancient necromancer who took the name Mors Finitum. Mors slayed the ancient guardians of the Vale to raise as his own servants in death, and much of the land was razed to create his machines of war. The goddess made a champion of her own named Anda'shar, and they did battle. It ultimately ended with Anda'shar sacrificing himself to seal the guardians, as Mors escaped heavily weakened.

“With the guardians slain, the valley was left unguarded.
So the beasts of the land were taken, enslaved for a new master.
The trees rose up, and they were used to fuel the fires.
The waters wept, and so with toxins it was poisoned.
The air cried out, but with thick smog it was silenced
Then there was no one left to weep, for the guardians were already gone.

“Now what remains in the land lay cursed and twisted
Scouring the land for those filled with the breath of life
Hungry for the feeling of living so long since denied to them.
The forms of the ancient ones, once protectors, bound under evil's spell.
Trapped in their prison by the goddess, sealed upon Anda'shar's lips.
The goddess locks up the curse that locks up the spirits, until the keys are found.”

I thought I wasn't going to do any deciphering today. Paperback complained mentally, rubbing his head. Much of the book was translated into common equestrian, but at the back end of the book was the original writing that much of the book was translated from. The last two verses were written like gibberish and had no explanation anywhere else in the book; the original author must have stumped whoever wrote this edition.

The first 'stanza', if the passage could be considered a poem, just summarized everything that the book explained, with some redundancy. Mors captured the spirits of the guardians, and reanimated their earthly forms to do his will. With the protection from the guardian's gone, Mors was then free to bind the animals and plants, and the very earth, wind, and water in the valley under him.

The second stanza was where things started to make less sense. Despite Mors Finitum being defeated and forced to retreat it appears his minions were still swarming around the now-called Gloomeadow and the surrounding areas, along with all the other nasty things that tend to pop up when a place is left abandoned for a century or two. The goddess and Anda'shar then proceeded to lock up the physical forms of the guardian's who were under control by Mors, the latter of which died during the process. That is where Paperback stopped understanding anything. Where the hell is Anda'shar's lips? And why doesn't this book say what happened to Mors after he escaped?

Of course... if the guardians were locked up before this book was written, was it possible that they were locked up still? The thought was inside of his head now, a burning curiosity that demanded to be explored. He had a full two days of game time before the battle between Team Packers and Team Awesome, plenty of time to gain some levels and explore the ancient history of the Gloomeadow.

Paperback looked around the study, and noticed that it had become much brighter without him noticing. It was early morning in the game world, and the sun was just beginning to streak through the dome that covered the center of the library. Daylight was a perfect time to set out on a new adventure. He placed the book back where he had found it, and exited the library.

Simply getting to the Gloomeadow presented its own host of challenges, as Paperback found out. The area wasn't a popular destination for chariots because there wasn't a major town nearby and poor visibility during this time of day made for hard flying. This of course meant that he had to wade through Chariot Park in order to take the next vehicle to Saddleworth, irritated and uncomfortable by the large mass of bodies surrounding him.

Once he reached Saddleworth he had to head east in order to reach the Gloomeadow. There was a pass in the mountain range to get there easily, some miles north of where the Bandit Caverns was located. The trek there was a long hours walk, passing by the same mine where Rusty Nail, Sound Wave, and him had their first adventure together.

The passage through the mountains very briefly took him into a higher elevation, where he could see the snow level just a few hundred feet above him. He hadn't run into many players out this way, although there were a few. It seemed that the popular spot for people his level was around Trotting Trail, a road which led out of the Sherpwoods and eventually to Trottingham. There was, of course, a chariot that routinely went to Trottingham, so that would most likely have something to do with the traffic of the road.

He moved swiftly through the steep parts of the trail, eventually overtaking two ponies and a pet that he fell into chatting with. Golden Percussion was a yellow-cream-coated, boisterous and jumpy unicorn mare, sporting a sunlight-yellow mane with peach highlights, which fluttered freely over her plated armor. A greatsword was strapped to her back, along with two shortswords on either side of her shoulders, and what looked like some daggers tied along her front legs. Her forceful and up-front personality was a great counterbalance to that of her partner, Dusty Rhythm.

Dusty Rhythm was an unassuming, faded-toffee-colored earth pony with a dull olive main that fell down over the front of his face. Decked in leather armor and sporting a crossbow, he subconsciously shifted around the group, keeping an eye out for danger. He had a dark-colored wolf the same size as him that followed his footsteps, who kept sniffing the air disdainfully. It sounded like the beast had a cold.

“We're musicians!” Golden Percussion exclaimed exuberantly when Paperback asked what they did. “I'm one of the drum players in the Manehattan Orchestra, and Dusty is a bass player in his band.”

“Musicians, huh? I'm surprised you didn't opt for the Bard class.” Paperback replied. Like Dusty, he too was keeping an eye on the cliffs around them. They were in the narrowest part of the pass now, an easy place to set up an ambush if a class about Equestria's military history had taught him anything.

Golden Percussion scoffed and rolled her eyes. “Why on earth would we want to play a class that just mimics what we do in real life? There's no challenge in that.” She jumped side to side a few times, dodging imaginary enemies in her head. “Besides, if I feel like banging on a drum set I can just pull out a hammer and pretend that the monsters' skulls are cymbals.”

How enchantingly morbid. Paperback thought, then answered when he was asked what he did in return. “Well, I fancy myself as a writer sometimes, but so far nothing I've written has panned out. So right now I'm just looking for a day job to pay the bills.”

Golden looked intrigued. “Ooh... What kind of things do you write? Adventure stories? Mystery thrillers?” Here she seductively lowered her voice and made bedroom eyes at Dusty Rhythm. “Or maybe romantic love poems?” Dusty Rhythm blushed and stared at the cliffs, saying “Golden, please, not now...”

Paperback hushed a snigger that almost escaped him, and came to Dusty's rescue. “Not love poems, but I do write poetry on occasion. Otherwise I have about two or three stories that I'm switching back and forth on.”

“Well, since you write poems, would you care to share one with us?” Golden asked inquisitively.

“Erm, well, I suppose I could. Hold on and let me see if I can remember one.” Paperback said, and racked his brains. If nothing else, it could turn out horribly but he would never have to see these ponies again, so it wouldn't matter much in the long run. “Yes, let's see here, okay... This is one of my more recent works, titled 'Nightly Rev-' OW!” He roared, interrupted by the spear that impacted his midriff. His mithril protected him from suffering more major damage, but it was still thrown with enough force to really hurt and punch through the armor.

“Nightly Rev-Ow? Kind of a strange title. I don't recognize that last word- oh, we're under attack.” Golden Percussion said, turning around to see Paperback pull the spear from his body. “Silly me.”

“Yes Golden, there are trolls on the hillside.” Dusty said blithely in a sarcastic manner. He already had his crossbow out, and released a bolt up the cliff at the creatures. There were four of them, white-furred beasts with long, sloping arms hollering and snarling while waving more spears in their hands. The lead troll who had thrown his spear at Paperback ran weaponless, loping forward on all fours at incredible speed down the hill. The troll wouldn't need a weapon to try and kill him; those long claws would do just fine.

Dusty Rhythm's bolt struck true, and embedded itself into a troll shoulder. Said troll leaped down onto the path, swinging its spear wildly at the earth pony. Dusty ducked under the spear, then jumped up and kicked his rear hooves at the beast, prompting him to perform an acrobatic backflip as he cranked the lever to reload his crossbow. As he released a second bolt at the troll, his faithful wolf tackled it.

Meanwhile, Golden Percussion jumped in front of Paperback as the next two trolls came barreling down the hillside. “These are mine!” She declared, and readied her greatsword. She relentlessly slashed the first troll to reach her, completely ignoring the second as it attacked her from the side. She finished off the first fight quickly, ending it by goring her weapon through the troll's torso. She left her weapon where it lay, preferring instead to challenge the other troll with the two short swords tied to her bags.

Paperback wouldn't have minded watching her fight, but the fourth troll reached him at that moment. He pulled out his hammer as he sidestepped the troll's first swing with it's spear. The troll tried again, bringing the weapon down in an arc towards Paperback's head. Paperback held his hammer out to deflect the blow, then promptly sidestepped again to swing the hammer into the troll's shoulder. Even as the troll retaliated Paperback didn't relent, smashing his hammer into the troll over and over again, using up all of his spells to bring it down as swiftly as possible. Flickering flames rolled around his body from Elemental Aura, striking outward at his troll and Dusty Rhythm's next to him. Within a few short seconds he had battered the troll's HP to a fraction of its total, putting all of his strength into one final finishing blow. The troll crumpled before him, as Dusty and Golden's opponents died as well.

Golden retrieved her weapons from the bodies of the troll's with a giddy smile on her face. “That was fun! Ooh, I got troll tusks.” She exclaimed, bending down to loot the bodies of her foes. Paperback received a patch of Troll Hide for his efforts, something he could sell later to the leather workers or whoever could make use of it. The trolls were a much more challenging fight than the bandits back in the Gladden Fields; it was an encounter that he was glad he ended quickly by burning through all of his spells.

It seemed that in the excitement of the battle, Golden Percussion completely forgot that she had asked Paperback to recite a poem. He made a mental note to not remind her.

High on a ridge overlooking what was once known as the Viridian Vale, now the Gloomeadow, Paperback encountered the 6th legion forward surveying post, a small group of the Guard sent there to overview the area. They needed some extra help charting where the abundant natural resources of the Gloomeadow were most densely located. The leader of the camp, one Commander Green Tea, needed an adventurer or two to fight off the Plant Horrors that kept skirting the base of the ridge. To round it off, the camp quartermaster wanted Paperback to collect moss samples for a dish that he wanted to try out. Paperback decided he wasn't going to ask for the recipe on that one.

However, none of the guards had never even heard of the name Anda'shar, much less where his lips might be. A couple of them knew about the ancient guardians, but not much more than that they were killed, enslaved, and then reanimated while the valley gave into decay. Golden Percussion and Dusty Rhythm offered to invite him into their group while they quested, but he politely declined, saying that he wanted to look into something he uncovered in the library.

He made his way down the side of the ridge to the valley below. It was an open expanse of green that had a gentle slope as it made its way downhill. The tall, springy grass was alive, yet a dull gray-green color, wet with dew and rose up to just below his shoulders. A thin covering of fog gave it a mysterious chill despite the sun being well on the way into midday. Here and there the grass rustled as animated bushes with gnarled claws roamed the meadow. They were easy enough for him to take down, being a level lower than him. His elemental aura scorched them as they got close to scratch at his hide; followed by a few quick and merciless beatings with a fire-augmented hammer to finish them off.

After smashing a few of those, he moved on further down the hillside. Traveling through the mist revealed small copses of trees scattered here and there. Just at the edge of his sight he could make out a larger grove to the south, near the edge of the meadow, nestled into a ridge in the mountains. A stream issued forth from the grove, running diagonally down the hillside where it passed right in front of him. Leaning down, he gave the water a small taste, then recoiled in disgust. The water, while having the appearance of being clear, had an unpleasant taste that was part metallic and part rotten egg. What in Equestria is giving it that taste?

Paperback traveled upstream towards the copse, where he found the streams source- fresh snowmelt from the mountains, pouring down into a small pool before overflowing into the river. He took a closer look at the rocks on the wall, noticing gray metallic streaks in them. Is that... Iron? He wondered. If it was, it would certainly explain the metallic taste of the water. A silent ping updated him about a change in his quest status, and a brief check revealed that he had made progress on surveying resource-rich areas for the camp. So it is iron then. The other taste in the water must just be from the fact that this entire land was poisoned. Even the soil had a gray, sickly look to it.

As he followed the stream down the valley, he ran into several tributaries that emptied into it and slowly the stream became a river. The land began to level out, and the river moved a modest pace as it flowed through the mist. He had run into plenty of different varieties of living plants, and a few Twisted Beasts; they were various wolves and deer among other creatures that were hideously misshapen and discolored. The beasts forced him to move at a slower pace, since they were hard to see when they stalked in the tall grass until they decided to come barreling out at him. Out of the plant horrors he had slain, he had killed enough to complete Green Tea's quest, and collected quite a few odd plant samples for the quartermaster to try in his bizarre recipes.

After beating down the fifth or sixth Twisted Wolf that tried to ambush him, Paperback thought he saw something ahead in the mist. It was a large shape, standing on four legs on a rock outcrop that rose above the grass. Paperback slunk down low, trying to hide his bright, contrasting coat color beneath the dull, gray vegetation. A few more feet forward brought him close enough to realize that the shape was being unnaturally still, and was a stone color. A statue. Hardly something that he need hide from.

He stepped onto the outcrop that the statue was positioned on. It stood twice as tall as him, a beast with the body of a wolf but the antlers of a deer. Three smooth, featureless eyes stared unblinking into the distant east, down the rest of the valley to where the ocean presumably lay beyond. Paperback looked down at the base of the statue and saw lettering etched into the stone, “Woden.”

“So then, Woden, what's your story?” Paperback said out loud, sitting down to stare in the direction the statue was faced. The river circled and ran down the north side of the outcrop, while a tributary came down from the south, meeting in a muted babble right before him.

“Not much of a talker, huh?” He continued. “I don't suppose you know where Anda'shar's lips are?” Still no reply. “Yeah, it seems no one does. No one I've run into anyways.”

Splotches of grass in the distance shuffled occasionally as the creatures hidden there moved about. The top branches of a shrub, the mutated back of a wolf, the jagged antlers of a deer; they all seemed content on leaving him alone while he was up here. Paperback looked at his immobile companion again, the cross between a wolf and a deer.

“You're supposed to be the animal spirit, aren't you? One of the guardians of the vale before it ended up like this. Fine job. Don't suppose you can tell me where you're locked away? I suppose my questions are just getting redundant now.” Paperback got up to keep moving, heading south towards another grove of trees.

He fancied a fight with three plant horrors as he got there; their shrubbery shapes darting out behind the trees to challenge him and his magic. After the fight ended he moved forward to see what they were guarding. An ore vein, another update to his quest log on finding the natural resources of the Gloomeadow.

He thought he heard a chattering sound from somewhere. I didn't think there was any real animal life here. He thought, looking for the source of the noise. A glance upward revealed a squirrel staring at him... with horribly mutated fangs and patchy fur. “Zombie squirrel. Great.”

Another seven squirrels crawled around branches to reveal themselves by the first. “Zombie squirrels. Okay.”

Then he glanced around the rest of the trees and saw the other five dozen of them, all staring at him. “Zombie squirrel army. Well now isn't this wonderful.” He flicked his elemental aura back on; this wasn't going to be pleasant.

Those damn squirrels were ornery, and far tougher than they should be. Paperback thought, waking up in the respawn area. It was whack-a-mole near the beginning, with him smashing as many of them as he could, but his swings weren't fast enough to take out them all; same with the damage from his aura. Needless to say, dying to a hundred little bites was far from pleasant.

Well, he was back in Aeroslida now, and he had little patience for walking all the way back to the Gloomeadow at this moment, so he might as well study a bit more. About the guardians, specifically. Maybe they held a clue to finding out where Anda'shar's lips were.

A quick lunch later and he was back at the library, gazing over The Great Withering again, looking for any subtle hints about where Anda'shar may have been buried after he died. Nothing. Any clues or references to where the guardians were sealed were either not here or so obscure as to go over his head. Placing the book back on the shelf, he went to the directory to find anything similar.

His saddlebags grew warm; he had a message from somepony. Pulling out his friends list, he saw a note from Night Stalker. He and Dilluted Livo were online, and wanted to know where they were going to meet up. “I'm in the Cloud Library right now.” He whispered, the words taking shape on the paper for him. “Meet me here if you want, I'm just doing a little bit of research.” As soon as he sent the message he got another one from Chalice who just logged on. He sent her the same message, and continued to try and browse. Ten minutes later Sound Wave messaged him, and another ten after that Nitro logged on. Night Stalker and Dilluted Livo showed up first, taking in the rows upon rows of books underneath the golden dome. The others weren't too far behind.

Chalice seemed to be the most interested in the library's collection, as well as what Paperback was studying. “So what do you have your nose buried into there?” She asked, finding Paperback staring intently at one of the several books he had pulled off of the shelves.

“Investigating the mysteries surrounding the Gloomeadow, ancient nature guardians that were corrupted and bent to the service of a necromancer, where they were sealed away from the world, and how the bloody hell the lips of Anda'shar relate to any of that.” Paperback said, sliding the book he was scanning down the table so that he could pull out a new one, where he flipped to the back for an index. Not finding one, he began flipping through, his eyes trying to catch any key words in the brief scan he gave it.

“Care to share your results?” Chalice asked. The only one actually interested in the research. The others were talking softly at the other end of the table while they waited for Nitro to show up.

“Close to nothing. I found a statue to one of the guardians, Woden, when I went to the Gloomeadow, but not too much else of help. Then I got ambushed by zombie squirrels, so I came back here to do more research.”

Chalice silently mouthed the words 'zombie squirrels' before shaking her head bemusedly. “Woden sounds familiar to me, a little bit. I can look into it tomorrow. Who are we waiting on?”

Paperback closed the book in front of him and pulled out another one. “Nitro. He's off buying potions and a couple of other odds and ends.” This book, Heroes of the Ancient World, looked promising. Perhaps it would have something on Anda'shar.

Night Stalker lifted his head up at the other end of the table and gave a noticeable sniff. “Does anyone else smell that? Smells like ozone.”

“Aha, here we go.” Paperback muttered, having found the name Anda'shar right near the beginning. “Anda'shar, champion of the Goddess against the Necromancer Mors Finitum... Fought against the corruption in the Viridian Vale and Splendid Valley... Can I get a burial place?”

Sound Wave sniffed the air as well, his nose crinkling. “Yeah, I smell it too. What- What is that!?!” He suddenly yelled, pointing towards the center of the library. Paperback looked up, and he saw it too; what could only be described as a tear in the fabric of virtual reality. A black line split the air in a vertical column underneath the golden dome. The space around the tear seemed to flatten, losing color and depth. To Paperback, it looked like the compressed area was breaking down into thousands and thousands of tiny numbers.

Suddenly the tear exploded outwards, a bright light blinding everypony staring directly at it. When Paperback could see again, he felt himself being enveloped by a rushing wind. Where the tear was a moment ago now stood a tornado, nearly twenty feet tall. Near the top two translucent films shifted rapidly between shapes before choosing one and stopping. With a chill, Paperback realized that they were eyes.

“Wind elemental!” Paperback shouted over the storm of fluttering papers. The elemental was the center of a vortex that was picking up papers, books, and ink and throwing them around the room. Right before he could grab it, Heroes of the Ancient World was ripped off the table and was lost within the storm. “Charge it!” He drew his hammer and jumped onto the the table, swinging at the elemental with reckless abandon. I was that close to finding the information I needed!

The two rogues leaped into action, rising into the air and moving with the current to slash at the tornado. Sound Wave and Chalice moved a safe distance away and started slinging spells at it.

From behind him, Paperback heard a familiar manic laughter as a blue head wielding a scythe rushed pass him and dove straight through the tornado, spinning wildly. “You went and started the party without me!” Nitro said through the shaft of his weapon.

The battle went on like so for another thirty seconds before Paperback became frustrated and shouted out. “This isn't working! We're barely denting its hit points!”

“Well, it is wind! We're doing what we can to it!” Chalice shouted back. It seemed like spells were having the most effect, but still a negligible amount. The elemental seemed barely interested in them; it spent its attention on trying to destroy as much of the library as it could. If only it would stop spinning and fight them instead!

Wait, spinning... There's an idea. “Night! Dilluted! Nitro! Sound! Get up there and fly in the opposite direction of the tornado's spin!”

“You want me to WHAT?” Sound Wave shouted from the back. Paperback knew he heard perfectly well, the party bard just still didn't like getting into close quarters. The other three pegasi followed his instructions and changed direction, flapping against the air current that the wind elemental was generating. Sound Wave fell in line a moment later, and together the four of them ever so slowly weakened the gale.

Paperback looked up at the health bar of the elemental expectantly. Sure enough, the pegasi counteracting the air current was weakening the monster, and it's health bar was decreasing steadily. “Keep it up! We're getting somewhere!”

The wind elemental was more than happy to turn its attention to the adventuring party now. It formed the air currents around it into two arms, and began grabbing chairs and tables to fling. Paperback rolled out of the way of a chair and struck at the elemental with his magic, only to have the same chair be carried by the whirlwind's momentum and run into him again. Dazed, he got back up and continued attacking.

It was the pegasi's turn to be attacked now. The tornado funneled all of the books spinning around it into a stream, and aimed it up at the pegasi trying to stop it. Sound Wave received a face-full of knowledge and fell out of position, but the other three held firm. It was almost done now, the tornado was slowly losing speed. With a final sigh, the elemental stopped its rotation and disintegrated, the translucent eyes falling onto the floor and turning into a pile of dust.

“Well. That certainly made a mess.” Night Stalker said, having floated down for a landing in one of the few places where the floor could be seen underneath the mess of books and paper. A window popped up in the corner of everyone's vision, telling them to roll on some rare loot, “Breath of Whirlwind.” A rare component or reagent of some sort. Sound Wave won it and stuck the bottle inside his pouch for later.

A scholarly-looking unicorn wearing a robe ran up to them. “Thank you for stopping that horrible tornado! It surely would have destroyed the library.” The designs around his hat and the brim of his robe marked him as the library's curator, Paperback thought he had seen him duck behind a bookshelf when the tear opened up in the center of the room. The curator continued, “If there is anything we can do to repay you, just simply say so.”

Nitro was still hovering a few feet up in the air, the flapping of his wings causing papers on the ground to ruffle in the breeze he generated. “No problem! Team Packers is here to help!” The paladin looked down at the mess he was spreading on the floor and quickly landed, a sheepish grin spread across his face. “If we could not have to clean up, that would be awesome.”

Paperback chimed in with his request. “Actually, I was reading a copy of Heroes of the Ancient World and I'd like to get back to it. When you find it, can you put it on hold for me?”

“Sure thing!” The curator said, having already begun on lifting tomes up with his levitation magic to be sorted and shelved. Several other librarians and assistants had started cleaning as well, putting tables and chairs upright where they belonged.

“Stop! Wait! Is it over already?” A voice said, it's owner swiftly coming into view. A muted pink-maned unicorn slid along the floor as he tried to come to a stop, having rushed down the aisle to get here. His hooves hit a book, whereupon he flipped over and skid the last few feet on his chest. Quickly he got up and dusted off his silver coat and decorated robe, turning towards Paperback and the party. “Did I miss the fight already? I heard an elemental spawned here.”

“Yeah, we already took care of it.” Paperback said, giving the newcomer a quick once-over. He was a mage of their level, something not terribly common inside the city at this moment with everypony serious about leveling out grinding.

“Ah shoot, missed my chance. Well, as long as it's taken care of I can report back that it's dealt wth.” The unicorn said, he seemed about to turn away when Nitro interrupted his retreat.

“Report back to whom?” He inquired, head tilted to the side.

The unicorn grimaced for a second, realizing that he said something he probably shouldn't have. After a brief pause he collected his thoughts and explained. “Okay, well, I'm Silver Silk, a Moderator of the game. I go around making sure everything is running smoothly while disguised as a player. Occasionally I have to deal with glitches in the system that cause random things to happen. For instance, a monster spawning inside a library. This is privileged information, so don't go spreading it around.”

Nitro grinned. “Oh, don't worry, we won't need to. Moderators who are also players is one of the worst-kept secrets of the entire game. I've been here for only a few days and already know that.”

A crease formed on the Silver Silk's forehead before he shrugged it off. “Yeah, I guess we've been doing a rather abysmal job of keeping ourselves secret.”

Paperback hadn't heard of moderators inside the game. Where had Nitro come by this information? And what other sort of glitches could happen? “By glitches in the system, do you just mean monsters spawning where they shouldn't, or do you mean other things like a monster that gains levels and becomes more powerful?”

“Oh. Yeah. That one.” Silver Silk replied as his voice went deadpan. “Some random boar offed a player, somehow gained a level, then started attacking all of the other mobs around him. By the time we had gotten wind of it the beast had taken down a party of level five players by itself, and it all just sort of spiraled from there.”

Paperback nodded to himself. It figured that Briarbuck wasn't planned in the game code. Silver Silk continued on, “We sent a few mods to take care of it but by then the boar had gotten a name above its plate and was camping along the roadside for players that strayed off the path. It refused commands to power down and ate them, becoming even more powerful. Last I heard he was stopped a few days ago by a large group of players that finally took him down.”

Silver Silk put the pieces together at that moment and gave an appraising eye at the six of them. “I'm guessing that was you all then? That's two times you've helped us out now. I might as well remember you for future occasions where monsters get out of hand.”

“No trouble at all, just pass a message our way and we'll be glad to help out.” Paperback said.

“Yeah, Team Packers will send 'em packing!” Nitro said with an overabundance of enthusiasm. Paperback was torn between a grin and a cringe at hearing their slogan.

“The same Team Packers scheduled to fight in the Skydome tonight? I'll be certain to get a seat.” Silver Stripe asked.

“Don't worry, we'll put on a good show.” Paperback assured him as the moderator went off to do what ever it is that moderators do while logged in. Moderate the city, he supposed. He turned towards the rest of the party. “Okay, now, we need to get some training in. I would suggest the Gloomeadow; I was there earlier and it was quite empty of any other players.” With no dissent, Night Stalker and Dilluted Livo flew off to retrieve the cart while the two unicorns made their way to the edge of the city.

The six members of Team Packers stalked through the tall grasses of the Gloomeadow, separately stalking and taking down any poor Plant Horror or Twisted Beast that strayed in front of them. Night Stalker and Dilluted Livo were rather adept at the task; their Rogue abilities uniquely suited to sneak up and take down single targets before they even realized they were in combat.

Nitro Rush and Paperback were not rogues, and when they locked onto a target they tended to charge in with all of the subtlety of a rampaging dragon. Nitro's Warscythe tended to cleave through most enemies with holy power, while Paperback stacked his most powerful spells onto his Strike ability and smashed whatever was in front of him.

The two casters of the party stuck together, always within a short distance of one of the tanks of the party in case they happened to attract too much attention at once. Chalice Longshot would root an enemy in place while she and Sound Wave would lob offensive spells at it for the few seconds the monster had before being quickly destroyed.

After only twenty minutes, the party had cleared out most of the monsters from the Surveyor Outpost to the statue of Woden, completing along the way all of the NPCs' quests they had picked up. Here they were stopping for a breather while everyone regained their health and mana.

Nitro was peering at the statue of Woden curiously, trying to imagine a wolf-deer with three eyes in his head no doubt. “So it is a Wolfalope? Or an Antehound? What animal would this be?” He said aloud.

Paperback shook his head saying, “It's supposed to be an ancient nature guardian, it can look like whatever it wants.”

Nitro continued to examine the statue while Paperback sat by the stream running down the mountains from the south, idly examining the water as it ran over the rocks that have been polished smooth over the years. It was only a foot deep and perhaps thrice that wide, with the tall grass coming up right to the opposite bank. The tall, rustling grass...

“Hi there!” A green face shouted, poking it's head out of the grass just a foot from Paperback's own. Paperback stumbled backwards, tripping over his own back hooves and falling onto his back. He swiftly recovered, swinging his adjacent hammer at the grinning head, which promptly ducked and caused him to catch only a few black strands of mane. Rusty Nail rolled onto his back, laughing hysterically while Paperback fumed, wondering whether it would be worth it to just get one good swing at his head.

“The look on your face whenever you do that is priceless!” Rusty said, now back on his feet. Paperback heard the quiet chuckles coming from the rest of the party behind him. He inwardly groaned in dismay.

“So, I got a message that you all were starting up a proper pvp team.” Rusty said, careful to keep just an inch out of Paperback's swing range.

Chalice started to talk, cutting off Paperback who’s speech would have been most likely littered with profanity. “Yes, we're facing off against another team tonight. Were you planning on helping us?”

“Nah, a team of rogues does not a team make. Besides, I already found a few mates who'll be running in a three pony team with me when tournament season rolls around. I might come and watch you all fight though.” Rusty said. “If you mates are getting in some last-minute grinding, I'll lead you 'round the marshlands at the bottom of the Gloomeadow where some of the tougher mobs hang out.”

Level Up!

Paperback has reached level 20!

He has gained the following skills!
~Armor Training: You now take fewer penalties when wearing medium and heavy armor.
~Flame Stomp: You stomp your hoof on the ground, cracking the earth and sending a blast of fire out in a line in front of you for twenty feet. Enemies in the area are slowed for 20%.
~Resolute and Sturdy: You are strong and quick on your hooves, gaining a 30% resistance to being knocked over or pushed back, or other effects which attempt to move you from your current position.
The first rule of fighting is to stay balanced.

Paperback opened up his eyes in the spawn room and gave a cold glare across the hall at a sheepish yet grinning Rusty Nail. The earth pony was, of course, the reason of their early return to Aeroslida.

“It's just an overgrown tree, you said.” The orange unicorn muttered as five of them collected outside. “It can't be any harder than Briarbuck, you said.”

“Well, I figured that since you had just hit level twenty it wouldn't be that big of a deal. I didn't realize that that particular river was the zone boundary.” Rusty claimed in his defense.

Night Stalker joined in. “Rusty, you really need to get better at picking fights. That was a disaster.”

Rusty just muttered something under his breath while Paperback composed a message to send to Sound Wave and Dilluted Livo, who had both survived the encounter. “Could you please pick up the cart on your way back? I think we're done for now.”

With their confirmation coming a moment later, Paperback turned towards the rest of the group who was unfortunate enough to have been crushed by a giant tree creature. “Okay, so, we have another two hours before the fight. Rest up, check gear, learn spells and so on so forth and we'll meet in front of the Skydome in an hour and a half from now.”

With various nods of assent, the group split up their separate ways. Paperback and Chalice headed for the arcane tower; Rusty had looked like he was going to tag along until he heard their destination and then went off towards the market instead, muttering about 'magical unicorn nonsense.'

“I'm headed to the labs next door,” Chalice said once they reached the arcane tower. “There's a buff rune I've been working on in my spare time and it's almost ready. Should prove useful tonight.”

“Experimental Arcane labs? What's that?” Paperback asked, looking at the unassuming building right next door.

“It's a building where you can create your own spells in-game. It costs quite a bit of gold, and there's a lot of paperwork involved, not to mention training to make sure that it works right.”

“Well I might have to try my hoof at making my own spells someday. For now though, I'm going to go in and learn a certain spell that I've had my eye on.”

“No no no, you're going at it all wrong again! Remember, you must be Determined to reach your Destination, and move with Deliberation.” Professor Transfer stated, liberally using what the brick-dust unicorn called the 'three D's' involved in the teleportation spell.

Paperback felt his eye twitch as he stared at the spot ten feet away on the floor from where he was standing. His horn glowed as he poured all of his concentration into the simple task of ripping apart the fabric of reality so that he could instantaneously move from one point in space to another. Oh, wait, did I say simple? Paperback mused sarcastically. The lesson had gone on for half an hour now, far longer than it had taken him to learn any of the other spells in the game. Shocking Grasp, his first spell, had been mastered in a matter of twenty seconds.

It was supposed to be easy to learn spells inside of the game, even if you couldn't cast them in real life, right? It certainly didn't feel that way right now. Professor Transfer stood by the circle Paperback was supposed to be teleporting to, stating the same pieces of trite information for the sole purpose of annoying him.

Paperback clenched his jaw and eyes shut from exploding out his frustration at the professor. He shot his hoof out, imagining giving Professor Transfer a satisfying knock upside the head.

To his eternal amazement, his hoof made contact, forcing his eyes open out of shock to see a stunned Professor Transfer staring back at him, who quickly broke out into a grin that rivaled Nitro's in size. “By the Goddess, you've done it, boy! You've successfully managed to teleport!”

Paperback stared at the circle on the floor, which he wasn't standing on just a moment ago. His mind briefly registered the drop in his mana, and the surge of energy he experienced when he had tried to punch the professor out of anger. A switch suddenly flipped inside his head. Was it that simple of a trick? Curious, he shut his eyes and tried to focus on the same way he had channeled the energy just a moment ago. In his mind he clearly visualized the spot that he had started in, and pulled on his magical energy again.

He opened his eyes again, and found himself right where he had begun. Ecstatic, he repeated the process and ended up next to Professor Transfer again. “Sorry about the smack, Professor. But, thank you! Thank you so very much!” Paperback said, shaking the professor's hoof.

Professor Transfer smiled with the face of a teacher pleased with a student, and said, “Your mane is on fire.”

After dousing Paperback with a drench spell, Professor Transfer then went on to explain about the friction that tended to occur when an object abruptly appeared and forced all of the air nearby to move, usually in a rather explosive manner. A few more teleports gave Paperback the practice he needed to control the energy output from the spell so that it wouldn't light his hair on fire again from the energy explosion.

As the time for the match drew near, Paperback had a few more spells under his belt as he went back to meet up with the rest of the group. The seven of them met up outside of the Sky Arena to make their last minute preparations. Rusty Nail tagged along just long enough to drop them all off some sandwiches for a quick lunch before he headed up to the stands to find a seat. Paperback, as the team leader, went to the organizers box and sort out the last minute details of the fight.

He returned to the locker room where the rest of Team Packers was waiting for the match to begin. “So,” he announced as he entered the room, “the matches today are being commentated on by none other than Princess Luna.” That got everypony's attention.

Nitro got directly in front of Paperback, exuberantly asking him, “Did you see the Princess? In person? Up close? Is she as pretty as the pictures?” Paperback pushed Nitro's face out of his personal comfort zone before he answered.

“No, I didn't see her, just the organizer. Some bloke named Chaotic who is also commentating.” He took a short breath and continued talking again to try and steer the conversation towards a more relevant subject. “Anyways, I've submitted our roster and it looks like we've kept our level advantage over Team Awesome, so they're pulling in a seventh member to even out the numbers.”

“So, while we're planning here, what additional assets do we have?” Paperback said. “I can teleport now, but it's not much of a use in combat because of it's mana cost.”

“I have a bird now.” Night Stalker said.

Paperback turned towards Night Stalker to see the crimson bird that had made itself at home sitting on the rogue's back. “Oh.” He simply said. How did I not notice the massive freaking hawk when I walked in? He struggled to reformulate his thoughts and said, “So, what's its name?”

“Her name is Crimson Flair.” Night Stalker said, turning his head to give the bird an affectionate rub. Dilluted Livo shot the bird a look of jealousy. “Her favorite things are soaring, preening, and splashing in the blood of her slain enemies.”

Paperback's mind went into a full derail and all he said again was, “Oh.”

He forced his brain to resume working again and continued, “So she fights?”

“Yep.”

Okay, he could work with this. “Alright, hold her in reserve until the battle starts to pick up and you can send her after whoever is being obnoxious.”

Night Stalker spoke up again, “Oh, also, I'm an archer now. Finally had enough points to make it worth switching specializations.”

And there went the group's dodge tank. “Okay... We can work with that too. Need some more ranged damage anyways” I should have seen that coming before now. His cutie mark is a bow and arrow for Celestia's sake.

Dilluted Livo began speaking then in her usual soft demeanor. “I've bought a whole bunch of new gear to replace my old things. I should do a lot more damage now.”

“I went and practiced spell deflection.” Sound Wave added.

“And I've got an even bigger scythe now!” Nitro said, whereupon he nearly cut off Paperback's head next to him just pulling it out of his packs. Luckily the Spell Warrior managed to sidestep just in time to avoid receiving a very close shave.

Paperback nodded at each of them- save for a slightly disgruntled look he shot at Nitro- and turned to Chalice Longshot. “Chalice, you said that you had a new rune that could come in handy?”

Chalice nodded and said, “Yes, I call it Soul Gift of the Wielder. It's a weapon empowerment rune that draws upon the strength of both weapon and wielder to calculate it's full effect and adds it again to your power. I was going to place on your hammer once the fight started. It will activate whenever you channel any magic to it and give your weapon quite the punch.”

“So you've tested it out then?” Paperback said.

“No, I couldn't because of the rarity of the materials needed to make it, I only have enough for one cast. The theory and magic behind it is sound, except, well-” she cut herself off.

“Except well- what?” Paperback asked, raising an eyebrow.

“Well, it looks like it only will work right some of the time. The rune is rather unstable, so there's a chance that the rune will just blow up, probably taking you with it.“

Paperback rubbed a hoof against his forehead to try and soothe the headache that was forming. His team seemed determined to deliver pieces of whiplash news right after the other; just when he thought they had something great, a drawback almost ruins the entire damn thing. He cleared his mind again and brusquely stated. “Forget it, we'll use it anyways. I'll just be sure to be right next to one or two of them when it decides to go.”

Then Paperback went into his battle plan, which all in all amounted to something like “Run at them and hit them until they die.” There was no subtlety or strategy involved, just a no-holds brawl against their opponents and hope to overwhelm them. Paperback did refrain from telling the party that the only reason he was implementing this plan instead of choosing specific objectives was because, despite their level advantage, currently their class abilities held little synergy together. Meanwhile, Team Awesome currently preparing in the other locker room had a myriad of classes and abilities that could work together in some quite scary combinations. They had a front-row view of this in the Sherpwoods, and that was back when Team Awesome was still in the single digits.

The large bell that hung outside in the stadium began to sound, giving out a booming bass ring that echoed throughout the Skydome. Paperback, wrought with anxiety that he was trying his best to hide, thought it sounded a lot like a funeral bell.

“I hope you are as excited as I am ponies, because the Skydome is ready to RUMBLE!”

The words boomed around the interior of the arena, its origin coming from the announcers box that was situated high up above the battlefield. Adorned with bells and decorated with stars and a crescent moon, it was clearly meant to represent the pony who was sitting there. Princess Luna. Paperback had never seen one of the princesses outside of pictures or paintings before, but even from this distance he could tell that her beauty was astounding. His heart skipped a beat at the thought of competing in front of royalty- nay, divinity! How on earth was he in any way mentally or emotionally prepared for this?

Calm, I must be calm. Paperback thought, and pressed his ears flat against his head to shut out the noise. The incessant cheering of the crowd dulled down to a low thrum inside of his head as his brain slowed down to find a sense of order. He could not allow himself to be paralyzed with hesitation, or fumble over his words and make a mockery of himself and his team that stood behind him. Presentation here was as important as fighting.

“Okay ladies and gentlecolts!” Luna shouted. “Today we have a little treat for you, for the Elements of Harmony are competing today!” The voice of the Princess of the Night echoed within his psyche, sonorous yet excited. It seemed she too was looking forward to the battle ahead. From the tone in her announcing, it sounded as if she heavily leaned towards the six mares waiting on the opposite end of the battleground. He tried to not let it concern him; the Elements of Harmony were the ones who freed her from being Nightmare Moon after all. A little favoritism was to be expected.

Judging from the crowds reaction, it sounded like the Elements of Harmony were also the favorite of the crowd for this fight. Luna continued to introduce the team. “Yes that’s right! They walk among us in the world of Equestrian Earth, gracing us with their presence. Their magic of friendship triumphs all that stands for evil! They are truly heroes! Give it up for Team Awesome!”

The roaring of the audience reached a fever pitch, and the noise broke through Paperback's calm. The tranquility he was tending inside of his mind shattered like a pane of glass, and he felt himself get a little disheartened. The six mares on the other side of the field seemed to enjoy the attention they were receiving and waved back to the crowd, minus the shy yellow pegasus of course. They were heroes, of course the crowd would be biased towards them as well. He had only a pale shadow of hope of ever achieving the same amount of praise.

As the initial noise reached a more tolerable level, the other announcer began to introduce Paperback's team. Paperback had briefly met him when turning in his team roster. His name was Chaotic something or other, it slipped his mind at the moment.

“And in this corner,” Chaotic began. “Are a couple of new players to the Skydome! They, however, had made quite a rustle in the Cloud Library yesterday as they fended off the wind elementals and protected the sacred scrolls, books, and players that could have been torn apart by their whirling magic.” Wind elementals? There was only one. Granted, it was a big, high-level one, so Paperback could see how it might have been reported as two. “Again sorry for the monsters, they were a glitch.” A glitch, huh? There was quite a light show in the library as the elemental was summoned for it to be just a glitch. “But they'd pushed on through, sent the wind demons from whence they came, and now are here to try their luck in the Skydome! Give it up for Team Packers!”

The noise that issued from the crowd was noticeably smaller in comparison to the onslaught of applause that Team Awesome received moments ago. Still, the noise was enough to disrupt him as he tried to glue the glass pieces of tranquility back together, and he left the entire mess on the floor as he looked up at the crowd for the first time. An entire three rows of one particular stand had been taken over by what appeared to be every librarian and page from the Cloud Library; they cheered the loudest, waving their hooves over their head. One stand to the left and up two rows sat Rusty Nail, passing on shouting a cheer and instead releasing a massive battle roar, one hoof raised towards them in solidarity.

Paperback raised his front hoof back at him and the crowd, accepting their praise for what it was worth. Still, the nagging reminder about how much louder the audience became for Team Awesome ate at him from a corner of his mind like a childish grudge.

“Please shake hooves and get to know each other before we begin! Courtesy is always important,” Luna said.

“Oh come on, is that really necessary?” Chaotic asked.

“What? Courtesy is important.” The Moon Princess insisted.

The two teams approached each other across the empty stone floor. The six mares were much like how Paperback saw them before, except this time they were all decked out in new gear. Very flashy new gear, his mind noted. Then he noticed the small armored bipedal that barely rose to chest height on a pony striding with them. Their seventh player is a dragon? Paperback thought with some incredulity. He had never seen a dragon before, not even a young one. Even though he left his tranquility shattered on the ground behind him, he found the nerve to keep his voice calm and his movements level as they squared off.

“Howdy!” Applejack greeted. “I believe we’ve met before.”

“It’s a pleasure to meet you again Applejack,” Paperback smiled. “I’m glad you’ve accepted our challenge. To be honest, I never really thought you would agree to face us.” It was a true enough statement. For heroes, they seemed rather down to earth about things. Applejack did, at least. She was the one who Paperback had the easiest time of making direct eye contact.

“We take challenges very seriously,” she casually said. “It’s our motto to do the best we can be. Glad to be up against you.”

“Same here.” Paperback replied. He wasn't quite sure if it was true anymore, after the amount of applause they received. The nagging childhood grudge still sat in the back of his mind.

“Wait,” Rainbow Dash said accusingly. The mare then proceeded to hostilely invade Paperback's personal space by getting directly in front of him, leaving just a couple inches between their faces. His instinctive reaction would be to swat anything that got that close to him with the really heavy hammer he had resting by his side. He crushed that impulse, but the only thing his brain could think to do besides that was give a nervous smile. “Why are you up against us anyway, and how did you know us? Ponies don’t just causally walk up in a bar and issue a fight. Are you a spy?”

“What? No no, nothing like that,” he quickly said, trying to save himself from the wrath of the very angry pegasus. “This match actually wasn’t really my idea.” She glared at him. Damned intimidation check is working, a dice-rolling corner of his mind though. “Okay maybe it sort of is. But really, to be honest, one of our friends was a really big fan of yours and the only way I could think of properly meeting with you would be to go up against you. Everypony knows that the Team Awesome clan loves to overcome challenges.” The last part was an absolute bluff, but it could be true for all he knew.

The purple mare in the lead- Twilight, Paperback corrected his mind- glanced around him to see a giddy Nitro Rush unable to contain his excitement. “Are you Nitro?” Twilight asked. “Applejack had mentioned you before.”

“Yes! Yes I am!” he smiled, having one of the most visible rushes of euphoria just from being adressed by his idols. “I can’t believe I’m finally meeting you!”

“It’s nice to meet you too,” she smiled back. She then turned towards Sound and Chalice, who had not been present at the time the challenge was issued. “So,” Twilight said. “I don’t believe AJ has mentioned you two before. What’s your name?” she said to the cyan colt.

“My name is Sound Wave,” he gave a short, courteous bow, ever the performer. “Nice to meet you Twilight.”

“And my name is Chalice Longshot,” said Chalice, putting just enough defence and respect into her words. Her Canterlot society breeding was showing. “I’ve been looking forward to our match today. It’s such an honor to go up against you.”

“I wouldn’t know about that,” Twilight chuckled. “There are far better players than us.” Paperback wisely chose to not reply to this statement, having no idea as to how to not offend her properly. The arrogant Rainbow Dash started talking again anyways, saving him from making a rude mistake

“Well, I don’t know about me, but it’s obvious that I’m the best there is!” Rainbow Dash flexed her wings. The negative within that statement made Paperback cringe. This Rainbow Dash was not only loud, and proven herself to be a braggart, but seemed to be slightly below the cut in intelligence as well.

“Really now?” Applejack grinned. “Ah wouldn’t say that about last week when ah bucked you into last week.” It seemed the friends were not above deflating each others egos when needed. That was good. The bickering continued for another few seconds before Twilight interjected.

“Girls!” Twilight shouted. Both of them stopped what they were doing and stared back at her. “We're in the middle of something here?” The two apologized sheepishly as Paperback heard his team chuckling behind him. Paperback let himself slip a small smile which Twilight returned sheepishly. He offered a hoof, which she shook, and the two teams retreated back to their corners.

“Livo, if you can, try and go for the druid first? I know its mean, but she's probably the easiest one to knock out of the fight.” Paperback said in the few moments they had before the countdown began. Livo saluted, whatever she said was lost to the roar of the crowd behind her.

Chaotic began the countdown, his voice booming over the stadium. “Battle On!” He cried, and the bell high in the back of the wall rung once loudly, proclaiming the start of the match.

Night Stalker pulled out a bow and expertly fired a short volley of arrows at Twilight. Her small dragon companion torched the arrows out of the sky with a blaze of green fire before they could hit hime. Okay, so, that is definitely a dragon. That might get obnoxious. Livo ran forward as the arrows were fired, attempting to quickly shut down Fluttershy in the back, but unfortunately the loudmouth braggart Rainbow Dash intercepted her and the two began a complex knife fight off to the side of the arena. That would unfortunately keep both of them occupied for a while.

Meanwhile, all Paperback did to start the fight was hold out his hammer to Chalice, saying quite simply. “It's time to try out that spell, Chalice.” Chalice Longshot went to work with her magic, forming the rune on the face of one end of the warhammer.

It seemed that Twilight wasn't about to let her finish, though. A burst of magical energy shot from her horn and rocketed towards him. Sound Wave reacted quickly, strumming his Harp to weave a shield that blocked the path of the missile. Twilight was determined to see this attack through, it seemed, and poured even more mana into the attack in a show of brute magical force. Sound Wave tried to keep up, but was forced to abandon the shield or else risk using up all of his mana this early on in the fight.

The missile, now empowered by the increased magic Twilight used to bypass the shield, rocketed towards Paperback. Chalice took a step backwards, hurriedly shouting. “It's done!” Paperback grinned then. So it only needs a bit of magic channeled into the rune, huh?

Taking a step forward, he swung his hammer rune-side first at the approaching magical spell. His weapon connected, the magic of the missile colliding with the Soul Gift of the Wielder, and everything went white.

Paperback could feel the rune, it tugged on him and his weapon, binding them together in an intricate pattern that resonated his magic back and forth in waves that amplified his power to magnitudes that he weren't even consciously aware were possible. Was this the power of the soul? His gift to himself as the wielder of the weapon?

The dust settled and Paperback felt a manic grin stretching across his face as he stared at his hammer. It was now the size of a large weapon, dangerously powerful with the amount of force he could now command it to bring down as he struck.

“Not bad for a first test, huh?” Chalice asked from behind him.

Oh yes, this is a very nice test. Paperback thought, the manic side of him eager to try out his improved weapon. He forced himself to try and calm down, and attempted to remember the details of the rune as described by Chalice earlier. “You said this could possibly blow me up, right?”

“Possibly.” Chalice said simply. Paperback noted that she took another step away as she said it.

“Guess I'll have to take that chance.” Paperback said. He took a few steps forward, and immediately realized a glaring problem in this plan.

How the hell am I supposed to wield something this freakishly huge? Paperback thought as he struggled to keep the hammer on balance for a strike, even with his augmented strength. He was used to moderately sized hammers, not freakishly titan-sized monstrosities that could crush him if he dropped it wrong.

After another two steps he found his footing and finished his charge forward. His original intention was to hit Twilight by causing a flame stomp with his new god-weapon, but a pillar of earth erupted from the ground in front of him and stopped his hammers progress. He smashed his way through two thirds of the pillar- a worthy feat- but found that he had gotten it wedged in the rock. Well now I can't get it out, he thought frustratedly as he pulled at it.

The enemy was not keen to give the most apparent threat on the enemy team a break, it seemed. Just as he thought he felt something shift with the hammer, Rarity stepped forward with a call to Twilight of, “Stand back dear, I've got this one.” A stream of gems landed at the base of the hammer and exploded, forcing Paperback to leap away without his weapon.

Cursing under his breath, he retreated a few steps as he saw his hammer fly up into the air. A white blur he vaguely recognized as Rarity flew forward, launched from another pillar of stone, and kicked his hammer towards him with the force of a great typhoon.

“Oh sweet Celestia-” was all he had time to mutter before he was forced to bring his front hooves up to stop his own weapon from killing him. The impact sent him sliding across the floor on his back hooves, thankfully protected from the friction by his boots, which reduced the pain to 'burning' from 'the fires of Tartarus'. He couldn't catch a break though, because immediately after he was forced to pick up the awkwardly large hammer to bash away another volley of gems that was sent at him.

Up in the announcers box, Princess Luna and... the other one were commentating. They briefly complemented his reflexes, before mentioning Fluttershy. Huh, what is she doing?

Sparing a glance, he saw the yellow pegasus surrounded by a horde of lizards which she seemed to be commanding. Great, it looks like Livo wasn't able to take her out of the game like he asked and now she had managed to summon minions to fight for her. He looked a little further off to the side, where he saw her still at battle with Rainbow Dash, both of them at a stalemate where they occasionally lashed out at each other, looking for an opening.

That was when Paperback heard the singing. He looked over and saw Sound Wave strumming his harp again in a gentle lullaby. The lizards were slowly shifting their heads to the music and then laid down to sleep. Paperback took a moment to snigger, perhaps a bit rudely, at her helplessness.

From up high Princess Luna was remarking about how there wasn't much action going on in the fight. Paperback put his full attention back towards the enemies in front of him, doing a head count. Twilight and Rarity were in front of him, with the dragon protecting them from Night Stalkers arrows. Rainbow Dash was dueling with Livo still, while Fluttershy was being helpless in a corner. Applejack was coolly eyeing his team like he was hers, and Pinkie...

Where the hell was that pink psychic? He carefully gave an overview of the battle as he took a brief rest to try and get his health back up. It looked like Applejack was going to finally join the fight and go after Sound Wave, on the other side of the field from Paperback, unfortunately. He couldn't get there fast enough while toting around his obnoxiously large hammer. Night Stalker rushed to help, and the two of them starting pouring on some damage when she couldn't block both attacks at once. Twilight began another spell duel with Sound Wave as the dragon scorched more of Night Stalker's arrows that he aimed towards the spellcasters. No sign of Pinkie Pie anywhere.

“Okay, is that how you wanna play? Let's play!” Night Stalker shouted, fed up with none of his attacks being effective. He put a hoof to his lips and gave a loud, shrill whistle that could be heard even over the din of the crowd. A red streak came soaring out of the sidelines and charged the dragon, and tackled him to the ground.

“How do you like my bird? Her name is Crimson Flair. Be nice to her!” Night Stalker called as the little dragon had to roll away from the bird as it pecked at him, leaving cracks in the concrete.

Night Stalker was busy himself, however, as a hammer almost as obnoxiously large as Paperback's was sent flying in his direction from Applejack. His eyes were keen though, and he jumped out of the way just in time. Paperback figured it was time to get back in the fray, and hoisted his weapon back up in his magical grip. He wouldn't get there in time, unfortunately. Applejack smashed aside another two arrows that Night Stalker sent at her, and she used her tremendous strength to leap over the third, swinging her hammer over her head where it shone with the radiance of the sun.

“Oh, this will hurt.” stated the announcer that wasn't Princess Luna. It was the understatement of the century.

Night Stalker regained his wits just fast enough to avoid a direct hit, but a glancing blow plus the force of impact from the hammer hitting the ground was more than enough to send him flying backwards into the wall. There was a scattering of light as his body disintegrated to be respawned.

Twilight's duel with Sound Wave was interrupted by Nitro Rush, another pony who was a contender for the 'most ridiculously oversized weapon' award with his scythe. Why did he suddenly decide to join the fight now, and not earlier when he could have saved Night Stalker?

He was about to go over and help them out himself when he felt a bite on his leg. He turned around to find a lizard chomping down on him.

“Didn't Sound Wave sing you guys to sleep?” Paperback roared angrily, swatting it with his oversized hammer. That took care of one, but now he had over a dozen lizards hissing and biting at him, and it took all his concentration to avoid having them swarm all over him. As such, he missed the first volley of gems from Rarity until they pelted his side.

The battle continued with him angrily stepping over and swatting lizards as he made his way towards Rarity, while she produced more and more gems to fire at him. He knew his health was getting low, but so was her mana, and he let out a cry of triumph as the white unicorn collapsed from exhaustion.

“You've lost all your MP!” He cried “Now I shall-” He was cut off buy a lizard that had jumped up and bitten the back of his neck, weighing him down. More started climbing up him, and he let out a scream as he was covered by lizards in what should have been a moment of triumph.

“So that's the second time today that I've been killed by a swarm of animals.” Paperback said gruffly, staring at a locker back in the locker room.

“I wasted half the match trying to chase down Pinkie Pie, and failed miserably.” Nitro said. For once, the smile was wiped off of his face and the only thing Paperback wanted to do was get him to wear it again.

“I honestly don't think that's your fault.” Chalice interjected, as she pulled a brush through her hair. “She someone managed to sneak up behind Sound Wave, you, and I and put us to sleep with... whatever that was.”

“I ended up dying first from an attack that didn't even hit me directly.” Night Stalker muttered, his focus diverted to watching Crimson Flair preen herself.

“Meh.” Sound Wave simply said, which summed up just about all of their moods fairly well except for Dilluted Livo. The black-coated pegasus mare was humming happily, having been the only contender on their team to have made a kill. Her and Rainbow Dash's duel had picked up near the end, and both of them had ended it with their swords in each others backs.

“Aw, cheer up guys. We had some fun at least, right?” Livo said, flashing a hopeful grin.

“I guess.” Sound Wave said, “I mean, I did get to magic duel one of the best unicorns in Equestria, And I'm not even a unicorn.”

“I developed and tested a spell, even if it did cost most of my gold.” Chalice said with a satisfied sigh.

“And I got to meet my idols the Elements of Harmony they're so awesome!” Nitro squealed, the smile returned to his face.

“Well, I guess it wasn't all bad.” Paperback agreed. “After all, I did get to wield the awesome and oversized god-weapon.” He then added as an afterthought, “Even though I have absolutely no clue how to use large weapons like that. Gotta do some training before we use that rune again.”

A short while later they were taking a rest in the park when they ran into the Elements of Harmony again. The girls showed them what they won from the fight, and amends were made over the fight earlier. Paperback had another seven names on his friends list now. It feels good to have friends.

Author's Note

So. Another chapter up. I've finally gotten through my many, many delays. The next chapter should come out a lot sooner because the following things are no longer clogging up my life.
1. D&D: The major contributor to this chapter's delay. I was DM'ing a campaign, and now that campaign is over. Someday, I'll write a book on it, and it will be great.
2. Moving: My family moved to a new state. Much stress was caused. I am all moved now though, so, yeah.
3. School: I moved too late to go to school this quarter, so I'm not doing any school until January.
4. Continuity: This is the chapter that heavily coincides with the chapter from Chaotic Note's story. Trying to fit in everything that I needed with everything that I wanted drove me insane several times.

So, yeah. I'm writing other things on the side now too (like actual novels), but I should still hopefully update this story again in late November. (As always, no promises)

Chapter 1: Reality Blues

Another mind-numbingly boring morning of history continued to suck the life out of Paperback. The everlasting minutes stretched on to infinity as the professor continued to lecture in a strangely hypnotic voice that attempted to convey excitement, but rambled on in such a monotonous way that any enthusiasm in it flew right over his head. Paperback spared a half glance at the wall behind him, where the clock was. Still another forty-five minutes to go of Early Equestrian Colonization. With a mental sigh, he tried futilely to turn his attention back to the lesson on Buffalo Migration and some of the earliest contacts with pony settlers.

He slowly realized that he was beginning to zone off again. This happened to him every now and then, when he wasn't doing enough with his mind. His thoughts began getting fuzzy, so he tried to reset his brain, blinking his eyes rapidly to kick-start it with activity.

Blink. Blinkblinkblinkblinkblinkblinkblinkblinkblink.

Damn it. I promised myself I wasn't going to do this anymore he thought, as the brief surge in energy allowed him to refocus on the endless slew of words drifting around his ears. Crinkling his nose, he forced his glasses up a bit farther on his face, staring at some of the information written on the board. He looked down, managing to use his levitation to pick up a pencil and jot down a few notes.

He already knew most of the facts being spewed at him by the shadow blue unicorn, so he put his pencil down, his right hoof propping his chin up as to resist the urge to sleep at his desk. He spared a brief glance at the other thirty-odd students sitting in desks around him. Not a single one had their eyes closed, or their heads propped up. The various mix of unicorns, pegasi, and earth ponies, to a one, were all listening in rapt attention with their eyes on the professor or studiously taking notes.

Was it just him then? Was he just so incapable of giving a single damn that he could now be certifiably classified as an asshole? He could feel himself slowing down again. His thoughts were starting to get sluggish and connect less often. Gotta kick-start his brain again.

Blink. Blink. Blink. Blink... Bli- Damn it...

His eyes refused to open again on his command. He had to reach up with the hoof he was using to rest his chin and push up on his forehead, and they snapped open.

Bright light filled his eyes as he stared down the hill. Down at the other end of the valley, the native buffalo known to be part of the militant group led by Sitting Bull prepared to move. His commander, Lieutenant Colonel Custard, was preparing the force for the surprise attack.

Around him were the thirty-odd stallions he was fighting with, dull armor barely reflecting the light of the early morning sun. Swords holstered on sides were ready to be drawn. Paperback beat at the ground with his front hoof nervously, eager yet terrified to begin. He rolled his dark orange shoulders, which shifted the shoulder armor he was wearing around uncomfortably.

The horn sounded, leading the entire force over the hill in a spectacular charge. Paperback himself was located in the front of the right column, shouting his battle cry with the rest of the forces. He glanced towards the central column, and saw golden-maned Custard gleefully galloping in front of his forces, already a length in front of the rest of his soldiers. It figured that the stallion's vanity wouldn't let him be anywhere else but at the front where everyone could see him.

The panicked buffalo blew trumpets of their own, and formed up far quicker than expected to mount a counter-charge. A hundred feet before the two armies connected, Paperback reached to his side and grabbed the hilt of his sword in his mouth, pulling it free as others around him did the same. Slowly the equestrian army spread out to surround the buffalo as the front line took the brunt of the attack. Thirty feet away, and Paperback already had his first target picked out. A bead of sweat ran down his cheek as he slowed down for a half second, gathering up all of his strength in his feet as he made a triumphant jump, intending to dispatch his foe with an easy blow...

His eyes opened. He found himself staring at the blackboard at the front of the room, his right hoof pressing into his jaw, with the dusty professor continuing on with his lecture. Paperback could feel minute amounts of adrenaline pumping through his body, urging him to run, jump, do anything to get active. Trying to calm down after the intense daydream, he turned to look at the clock. Had that much time really passed? Only five minutes were left of the class. Gritting his teeth silently, he forced himself to levitate his pencil and write out facts and dates, even if he already knew the information being given to him...

Sweet Celestia, he was finally free. Paperback was one of the first to throw on his saddlepack and trot merrily out of the door. The whole daydreaming bit was embarrassing, but at least he hadn't woken up to find that he had accidentally charged the teacher. He used to have a bout of sleepwalking for a few years when he was a young colt, but luckily he hadn't had an episode of that since middle school.

Somewhere in the maze of ponies that made up the student body of Saddleside Community College were his friends, few as they were. Traversing the sprawling campus was a chore, taking a good twenty minutes to walk from one end to the other. At last he spotted his friends, the four of them sitting at a table; books were out, but no one was really studying, instead choosing to gossip over the latest happenings in the gaming and cinema world.

“Gentlecolts.” Paperback said simply, nudging a cream-coated pegasus over a bit to make room for him. Rough Sketch complied, wordlessly shifting the sketchbook that he was doodling in to the left, not even taking his eyes off of the page. Despite being a good artist, Rough Sketch's cutie mark was actually a bottle of Mr Pepper soda. It was no mystery that he liked the stuff, often going through a two liter bottle every day, but as to why it was his cutie mark remained unknown to the rest of the group.

Rough Sketch often called Paperback's cutie mark of a blank, open book too mainstream, at which point Paperback's retort would come that Sketch refused a mark of a pencil or some other symbol denoting an artist simply because he was a hipster. Rough Sketch would vehemently deny such accusations, and the verbal blows would trade back and forth for another minute before both refused to speak to each other for a whole half hour. Good friends make up however, and unspoken apologies made sure that the two never stayed enemies for long. Besides, they gamed together. The group would flounder if a rift drove any of them apart.

To the right of Paperback sat the unofficial 'Leader' of the group, which was kind of stretching it since they mostly decided on whatever they did as a team. Story Roller was a light blue unicorn that really only got the title because they met at his house every Saturday to roll dice, and he ran quite an engaging tale as a dungeonmaster. The evidence was further backed up by the image of a gold twenty-sided die adorning his flanks, the universal image of the tabletop fantasy game they all enjoyed.

Across the table from Story Roller sat Sweet Nothing, who were both fiercely dismantling and criticizing the ending of the newly released game Magic Effect 3, and completely ignored Paperback's entrance. Sweet was a rather pessimistic, and at times nihilistic, yellow earth pony with a white mane; the perfect colors to contradict his negative and sometimes abrasive personality.

“-I'm just saying that the ending totally didn't live up to anyone's expectations!” Story Roller said, an edge of hysteria in his voice, throwing wildly into the air. Paperback didn't bother to buy the new Magic Effect game, and now that the endings were spoiled for him by the group there really wasn't any point to it.

Sweet Nothing looked ready to throw his face into his hooves in exasperation as he replied, “I know! I've been saying that I agree with you this entire time! Why are we still talking about it!?!”

A very awkward pause followed this statement as the two of them stared past each other for a moment, refusing to make direct eye contact.

Paperback cleared his throat, signaling that he was now going to start a new conversation. Both faces turned towards him. Story Roller's with that small angry frown he always wore when he felt like he lost something, Sweet Nothing with his head on one of his hooves and a sarcastic and condescending smile on his face. Pausing for the appropriate second-and-a-half, Paperback continued. “So, Roller, are we gonna game this weekend?”

Story Roller let that stretched out 'Hmm' out of his frown as he thought about how to deliver his words. When he finally decided to start speaking after a few seconds, the news he delivered was not good. “Well, we can't really do anything this weekend because my dad finally got me that internship at his company... So between that and my homework we're going to have to put off D&D for a couple of weeks until I can figure out how to balance everything out.

Paperback gave out groan and threw his head up, tossing his messy, medium length brown mane that almost reached his eyes behind his head as he rolled his green eyes around. “Oh c'mon! I need to game! I've beaten all the video games I have to the point of dullness, and my book list is empty. I'll be dead from boredom by Monday.”

“You still have those bits that you were saving for an occasion like this, right? Just spend those and buy Magic Effect or something.” Story Roller countered, giving a shrug.

“Yeah, I do, but you guys have already bought and spoiled the ending of every game worth playing that's come out in the past six months, not to mention all the others.” Paperback sighed, giving in to his fate of misery that was coming up. Story Roller shrugged again, unsure or not caring enough to say anything.

At that moment, the fourth pony, sitting across from Paperback, conveniently decided join the conversation. Java Bean, a shorter brown earth pony that was the brains of the group, looked up from his laptop and whatever piece of code he was writing and spoke up. “Y'know, Paperback, if you need a new game to try, there's supposed to be this really high-tech MMO that comes out tomorrow.”

“A new game coming out, and none of you are talking about it? Have you all replaced yourselves with changelings when I wasn't looking?” Paperback said in mock disbelief.

“You know that MMO's in general aren't really our thing, Paperback, much less fantasy ones. We did discuss the technology that this one is using in the group forum though, if you remember.” Of course Paperback didn't. Whenever the group geeked out over a new piece of hardware he usually stopped paying attention, not being a tech pony as some of the others were. Java Bean continued. “Well, this game is supposed to be using state of the art Virtual Reality technology, something that's still supposed to be at least ten years away. How they finished it this early, I'll never know, but we're all getting one of the headsets because it's compatible with a lot of the new games they're releasing.”

Paperback looked disbelieving as the concept of functional VR technology.“Virtual Reality's supposed to be one of those urban legends of the technology world, isn't it? What's this game called, anyways? I might as well look it up.”

Opening up a search bar, Paperback's horn lit up in a red glow as he used his telekinesis to type in the words. Equestrian... Earth...

This certainly looked like a promising game. The graphics were some of the best around, and if this Interactive Pony Visor thing was to believed, the virtual reality would maintain three-dimensional realism while allowing massive open-world exploration. In a massive multiplayer game, too. Paperback could only imagine the amount of data space required to operate such a thing. Magic was certainly involved in one way or another. What kept the system running mostly glitch free? Did they have a team of a hundred moderators working around the clock to ensure that nothing broke?

A few clicks later, and he found the trailer teaser. Sweet Celestia, the cinematic looked amazing. It seemed that a main plotline of the game or a final villain of sort was being hinted at, but it was rather vague and ambiguous. Not to mention that it was completely overshadowed by the various characters on the screen swinging swords, casting confusing cantrips, and performing amazing aerial acrobatics. Whatever it was, it would probably show up in a release update in a couple months, when enough ponies reached whatever preset level they determined.

Another click later, and he found himself staring at a video of the gameplay. It started out looking out into the distance, as the horizon of far off mountains slowly moved. The character recording from first-person perspective must have been a pegasus, because it suddenly took off, zooming off of a ledge to the ground below, only to swoop up at the last minute for the viewer to see, an entire city flying and being pulled by dragons. As amazing as that is, there is no way that is physically possible. The pegasus soared back up, above the city spires, and gazed down at other players and NPC's littering the streets below. Other pastel ponies flew the skies with the recording pony. All of them were dressed in fantasy armor that looked so real that Paperback refused to believe that graphics became this good almost overnight. This was obviously just some elaborate hoax to fool him, right?

There was only one way to find out. He emptied out his emergency gaming fund from the lock box underneath his bed, and piled all the bits into a bag which he placed in his saddlepack. He could just walk from his apartment in suburban Las Pegasus to the game store just a few blocks away, place an order, and come back to get it tomorrow afternoon.

As he rounded the corner of the street to the game store, his jaw dropped. A line of ponies, already stretching forty to fifty long, were camped out in front of the store in an orderly line going around the game store corner, nearly two. No other games were scheduled to be released tonight, so this entire line of college age gamers must be here for this new game, this Equestrian Earth. Looking at the front window of the shop, he saw posters covering all of the windows, more than half of them advertising the new game, and the other half advertising the Interactive Pony Visor. Whoever runs the company that made these will have so much money by tomorrow, that it might even rival the royal treasury.

He made his way around the sides of the store, falling into line behind a green earth pony lounging on a lawn chair with a pair of shades over his eyes. Paperback had a hard time figuring out whether the stallion who looked to be the same age as him was awake or asleep. He stared for another moment, until sighing and sitting down next to him, marking his spot in line. It was only one fifteen or so. It would be a long wait till the midnight release, but he might as well. If he waited until tomorrow, they might sell out. Who knows how many people planned on showing up later?

Suddenly, the apparently sleeping pony next to him shifted up his shades, and gave Paperback a goofy grin that stretched across most of his face. “'Sup?” he said, in an languid tone. “You here for the game too?”

Paperback shuffled his front hooves pensively, trying to think of a way to edge himself out of conversation without hurting this easygoing pony's feelings. Social contact was not his strong point. While he had a social phobia when he was a younger colt, now it was just a plain introverted personality with a deep dislike for conversation with unknown people. “Um. Yeah. Only heard about it today.” He would have said more but was suddenly cut off by the pony

“Only heard about Equestrian Earth today? Aw dude, where have you been living for the past six months? Under a rock farm?” Genuine surprise stretched across the green pony's face, oblivious to the fact that not everyone kept up with the latest happenings in the gaming world.

Paperback rubbed one of his front legs with the other in a rather embarrassed manner as he hung his head. “Well, I don't play video games that much. Usually I read or I play dugedadagon...” He started mumbling incoherently. He was loathe to say the name of his tabletop RPG around people, it being the trademark of nerds everywhere.

“Whoa dude, Dungeons and Dragons? That is the game, the grandaddy which spawned all the cool stuff we play now, including the game we're waiting for.” Paperback's ears perked up. This laid-back cool colt knew about his game and the history of it?

“You know about the game?” Paperback said with mild surprise, no longer with his head looking down. Next to him, the green pony had the cheesiest grin plastered all over his face at that moment.

“Know the game? Mate, I lived and breathed that stuff for a few years back in middle and high school. I'm kinda over it now, but everypony's gotta know the roots of all their hobbies. I still keep all the old rules for 3.5 and Pathfinder tucked in right back here.” At this he tapped the back of his head with a hoof, pushing his messy black mane everywhere. “I played a rogue. Eventually learned all the talents and feats needed to min-max that sucker until the DM almost kicked me out of the group.”

“M'names Rusty, by the way. Rusty Nail.” The green pony said, holding out a hoof from where he was reclined on the lawn chair.

“Mine's Paperback. Pleasure to meet you.” Paperback said, taking the hoof in a firm shake. Anyone who shared the hobby of the eldest fantasy game deserved respect. There was much that they could discuss together.

“- So max damage from sneak attack dice using underhanded? There's almost no situation where that talent would be useful!” Paperback countered.

“Normally, yeah, but you're forgetting about the max ranks in stealth combined with being a small creature. Not to mention the stacking bonuses from a Chameleon Ring and Glamored Armor.” Rusty Nail explained, the smirk on his face having barely left even once during the conversation

“Yeah, but even so, most DM's will catch on quick and roll surprise encounters on you, then you won't get to hide and won't get the bonus.”

“You've never played a rogue have you? First rule of being an assassin rogue, always dip in Shadowdancer for Hide in Plain Sight.”

“At a minus ten penalty, even with stealthy sniper, you still have to be spotted sometimes.”

“It happens, but you have to understand that by the time I was level fourteen I was getting a stealth bonus of forty eight.”

“I call bull. There's no way.”

“Hah! Do the math. Seventeen ranks in sneak. Fifteen from the bonus from item enchantments. Four for being a small creature. Eight from my dexterity modifier, and another six from skill focus.”

Paperback was already mentally adding all the numbers as Rusty listed them off. He groaned in frustration, for Rusty was right. Rogues were the easiest class to break in the Pathfinder variant of Dungeons and Dragons. “I concede defeat this time. Rogues are indeed overpowered.”

The two of them had been going back and forth about Dungeons and Dragons for quite a while now, and had covered most of the aspects of the game; from how to make Paladins viable, to how all DM's are cruel, and even a hilarious story told by Rusty Nail about the time the DM ran them through a railroad plot for three sessions before all the players threatened to quit. Now they were back to the topic of Rusty's min-maxed rogue, and Paperback was eagerly taking mental notes to use against Story Roller sometime.

Rusty suddenly turned around and stared off into the distance, concentration intently on something that Paperback couldn't see or hear. “What is it, Rusty?”

Rusty turned back to Paperback and groaned in frustration. “It's three thirty, mate. The peace and quiet is gonna be over soon. The schools just let out, and I know that all the gamer colts are gonna be charging down here with their allowance money from the past four months to buy this game.”

Paperback shuddered involuntarily. It's not that the middle and high school student population was bad, necessarily, it's just that there happened to be several thousand of them. Even if a fraction of them wanted the game on the opening night, and split themselves into equal groups among all the game stores in Las Pegasus, there was still going to be several hundred if not more cackling, hyperactive, swearing colts lined up behind them.

“Mate, I figure we got about fifteen minutes before the little demons of Tartarus start arriving, so I'm going to pop over to the nearest sub shop and get me enough food to last the rest of the night. You want me to grab you anything?” Rusty said, finally detaching himself from the lawn chair that he had been almost glued to for the past two-plus hours.

“I have twelve extra bits on me. Grab me two sandwiches?” Paperback said, levitating out the coins and dropping them into a pack that Rusty had hanging from his shoulder. Rusty Nail nodded, and wandered off to the sub shop down the road at a leisurely pace. Paperback breathed a sigh of relief. He rather liked this Nail fellow, but talking with him could be exhausting. The pony could just keep on going until the stars were out, and then keep chatting some more. At least the conversations were intelligent.

Rusty's prediction turned out to be accurate as fifteen minutes approached and already the first group of gabbling colts approached the game store, happily squealing about how awesome the game was going to be. Thank Celestia that some other groups had arrived before the colts did earlier in the day, so that Paperback did not have to be in their immediate vicinity. A half hour went by from when Rusty left, and the line now stretched over a hundred and fifty long, winding around three and a half sides of the store and now working on going down past the street.

Finally, Rusty Nail could be seen meandering down the street, several sandwiches, bags of chips, and bottles of soda threatening to burst his overstuffed sack. It seemed at first that he was just passing by, with no intention of jumping in the line, until suddenly he spun around and a sandwich launched out of the sack, directly at Paperback's face. “Catch!” being the only warning given.

With the highly tuned reflexes of a sloth and the grace of a hippo, Paperback suddenly leaned backwards to avoid the flying lunch, managing to trip over his own back hooves and fall over on the ground. The sandwich flew three feet to the right and two feet above where Paperback's head had been a moment before.

“Heh. You could have just used your fancy magic to catch that, you know.” Nail said, chortling merrily as he slid his way back into the line. Many of the squealing colts that saw this immediately began vocally expressing their complaint, with choice words that would make their language teacher put them in a corner. Rusty Nail promptly responded by turning around and facing the accusers, giving them a hearty salute and a descriptive suggestion about where they could put their game once they got it.

“Colorful.” Paperback responded simply to the display of egregious language that just transpired. More poorly constructed insults issued forth from the challenging colts, but most were simply resigning themselves to the fact that no one was coming to pull this obvious line cutter out. Most of the older gamers, the college level ones and even some of the high school colts, were giving knowing nods. The unspoken gamer code decrees that friends may hold spots for each other for cases of snack foraging and bathroom expeditions.

“Anyways, I'm not really the greatest at magic. So, yeah. I don't catch things well when they're flying at my head.” Paperback continued, dusting himself off of dirt that he just collected from the concrete.

“Good to know. I'll keep that in mind for when I want to see you trip over yourself again.” Rusty said, giving a sardonic grin. He pulled out the rest of the food, and the feast began.

The day wore on and soon Celestia's yellow sun turned to red and disappeared over the horizon, giving way to Luna's moon, which shone a brilliant silver crescent over the camping gamers. Stars which would normally be vibrant in the sky were dimmed by the light pollution of streetlamps and whatever lanterns and flashlights the gamers brought with them to keep their card games going on late into the evening. Paperback and Rusty had spent the rest of the afternoon playing gin rummy with the trio of ponies in front of them, and the later part of the evening when it was too dark out to keep play was spent with the two of them telling each other stories about their life.

Rusty Nail, despite being a rather bright colt, had decided to not go to college after graduating high school. Instead he opted to join a garage, where he could tinker with wagons and all other sorts of machinery and get paid for it. Nothing kept him occupied like finding a new piece of machinery, taking it apart, and then trying to figure out how to put it back together again. He had struck out on his own a few months ago, and now rented a small flat next to his workplace. Rusty was full of stories about things that he had 'accidentally' broken, sometimes with hilariously disastrous outcomes. The only thing that he enjoyed as much as fixing things was playing games, and winning at them.

In return, Paperback told Rusty about his quiet, socially sheltered life. His overprotective mother who kept him from having fun outside was the main cause of him turning into an introvert who spent more time with books than with friends. He didn't really have much of a plan for his future, he was thinking he'd get a major in film and then try his luck being a cameraman for the booming movie industry. He saw gaming as more of an escape from a rather tedious life, and eagerly turned to it with obsession.

As it neared closer to midnight, Rusty Nail had finally slowed down on talking, and now the two of them were resting; Rusty Nail in his chair, Paperback curled up in a reasonably comfortable position on the ground. All the food had been eaten hours ago and Paperback had thrown away the trash in a dumpster, Rusty Nail protecting his spot as per the gamer code.

Now Paperback felt simply drained. He didn’t think he had talked this much with anyone in quite a few years. The social pony inside of him was currently holding the energy bucket upside down, shaking it while saying, Well, time to go read a book. Paperback hadn't let anyone get into his personal space ball of social activity this quickly before, but the green pony lounging next to him had that sort of infectious personality that got inside you.

Finally, a clock tower nearby struck midnight, and the front doors of the game shop swung open. A wide cheer erupted from many of the gamers, the earliest of which had shown up eighteen hours ago. Paperback himself was too tired to cheer, but let himself wear an exhausted smile. Rusty Nails jumped up and was already back to his indefatigable self, wearing a grin of excitement that stretched from ear to ear.

The line moved quickly. Ponies were shepherded in and out of the store by an assistant in groups of five, and Paperback and Rusty Nails managed to make it to the storefront in less than twenty minutes. As they entered the front door, Paperback had to squint his eyes to adjust to the sudden light, and as his vision returned, he saw the glorious sight of the far wall behind the cashier. Stacked with boxes to the ceiling, every single one of them contained an Interactive Pony Visor and a copy of Equestrian Earth for direct download to a machine.

Silently, with an ironic humor, he realized that he had come to the store early in the afternoon with low expectations, and had let himself be caught up in the hype of the game. Now here he was, letting himself shell out the last of his gaming bits until he could find a job and have his parents stop supporting him financially.

As he exited the store with a shiny box held within his levitation magic, he couldn't help but feel a bit giddy, even with how exhausted he was. Rusty Nail came out right beside him, his box doing a balancing act with one corner in his knapsack and the rest of it balanced on his back, grinning like an idiot all the while.

“Think I should tell all those foals in the back of the line that there's no way that there's going to be enough for all of them?” Rusty Nail said, a malicious glint in his eye.

“Rusty, I do believe that you just delight in causing misery and a touch of chaos.” Paperback said, eying his new friend.

“Of course! They'll be able to come back in a few days when they restock anyways, and this way I save them the trouble of standing in line for another half hour.” Rusty laughed.

“You're terrible. Do what you want, I'm going to go home and sleep. Need help getting your lawn chair balanced with the game?”

“Nah. Ratty old thing wasn't even mine anyways. Found it sitting on the sidewalk in front of somepony's house on the way here. Somepony can take it home as a consolation prize. Don't get mugged on the way home, and I just might see you on E.E. tomorrow.”

“It's a plan then. You have what I'm making my username as?”

“Yep. You still have mine, so eventually one of us will find the other. See you in the morning.”

The two of them finished their goodbye's and went off in their separate directions. Rusty Nail went to go break the bad news to the middle school students still waiting in line, and Paperback headed back to his apartment to catch up on some much needed sleep.

As Paperback locked the door behind him, he carefully lowered the game onto the desk next to the computer, where he could gaze at it, and open it up for the game. He planned on letting it download throughout the night, and would figure out how the Interactive Visor worked in the morning. Sliding the disk into the CD tray, he was given the silent satisfaction of seeing the downloading bar pop up onto the screen, moving at a reasonable pace. It would be done in a few hours, but he had no intention of staying up that long. Collapsing into his bed, he quickly surrendered himself to dreams.