After a quick glance at my character sheet, I knew it was time to move on. If I didn’t, I’d either spend too much time asking Desi what everything meant or I’d spend too much time looking into all the help files, explanations, and whatever the equivalent of tool-tips in VR is. There’d be plenty of time later to look into things, once the group was all together. And, like as not, Susie would be able to interpret things for us.

So, it was the moment of truth. Or, at least, the lead-up to the moment of truth. Once I flew through that doorway, I’d be in the game world itself, and would need to find the others. Fortunately, we already had a plan for that.

The downside of the whole ‘community server’ concept was that everyone started in the same area. So all the little communities up and down the coast and on the other side of the bay, everyone would have one starting city with the requisite amenities: vendors, quest givers, bind points, guards, arenas, and the like. That wasn’t a downside in and of itself, but rather that all twenty-five thousand or so players would be logging in for the first time at roughly the same time and the same starting place.

That, of course, meant that we’d be scattered throughout the city. You can’t really have twenty-five people all spawn at the same point, much less twenty-five thousand. Well, you could in a game without collision detection, but since we’d be in VR, overlapping polygons weren’t quite the same thing.

One good thing about being rather late, low down in the queue for opening servers was that there was some information already readily available. The city’s initial layout was basically the same for every server, so we had looked over maps until we had decided on a good place to meet. When I say “we,” I mean that Susie had done the research and had told us where she thought would be best for us all to meet.

This would be a small park just a couple blocks in from the southwestern gate in the city’s walls. We’d be in a park, rather than a building like a tavern or inn, to accommodate Naomi’s centaur character. Well, that and as high schoolers, we probably still wouldn’t be allowed in a tavern, even if it and our bodies were virtual.

That’s our modern society for you, wanton violence, gratuitous sexuality, and economic exploitation are perfectly fine, but a little wine or weed, and the long arm of the law comes crashing down ….

Regardless, after an experience with one beachside bonfire boozefest of a party last summer, and the horrible monster of a headache the day after, I had no personal interest in alcohol. I don’t think any of us did, not even Mika with her tough-as-nails tomboy persona. So, no taverns, even if they end up being allowed. So much for the old game-starting trope of “You all meet in a tavern.”

“Well, thank you for your help, Desi, but now it’s time for me to meet my friends. Or, at least, get to the meeting place and wait for them if they’re slower than I was.” I fluttered my wings and executed a mid-air bow with an elaborate flourish. I had thought about trying a curtsey like I’d seen in old shows and read about in fantasy books, but … having a female body didn’t mean I needed to be especially feminine in my actions.

Stolen content warning: this tale belongs on Royal Road. Report any occurrences elsewhere.

Desi smiled, waved, and floated backward into the mists, fading out much like the Cheshire Cat. “Remember what I said about your geas,” she said, her voice lingering even after her form had disappeared.

I nodded. As a consequence of allowing her to meddle with Fate, I had paid for the guaranteed healer class and a better roll than average, by accepting some unavoidable obligations. Two were relatively minor in effect, but would be with me for as long as I was this character. The other was more significant, but once the conditions were met, the obligation would be fulfilled.

The actual bigger one I wasn’t too worried about, as it was something I needed to work toward rather than immediately accomplish. The long and short of it was that I had to create a church or temple, more than just a shrine, for Sirae. It wasn’t just the building, either, but I would need to recruit clergy, at least enough of a staff that it could run on its own even when the High Priestess was out adventuring. The whole thing, however, was a long-term goal, something to slowly build toward rather than immediately accomplish in the first week of the server.

The other two geases were smaller but no less significant. In fact, one would probably affect my day-to-day life in DVI and the other would likely come up more frequently as time went on.

One of those was, well, related to my class as a High Priestess. I would have to assist other followers of Sirae as I was able -- once she had other followers than just me. That didn’t mean going out of my way to find and help people, but if they came to me, I would have to provide what help I could -- within the limits of reason and within the purview of a High Priestess. This, more than any, is the one that might lead to sporadic inconveniencing my friends.

And the other? Well … I was required to be a vegetarian, or rather to eat no meat, whether flesh, fish, or fowl. Eggs and dairy were apparently fine for this fairy.

Now, I don’t know how often that would come up in DVI. It may be virtual reality, but it was still a game at its core. That meant that certain things, like needing to eat were probably omitted. If anything, food and drink would likely be for buffs or for speeding up downtime, and surely there would be vegetarian options for both of those. If nothing else, breads and the like.

And even that would probably be a bit more of a challenge than it seems. I mean, I do love me some steak, and pork chops, and chicken, and hamburgers, and … well, as a coastal kid, we had a lot of seafood, too -- especially salmon, but shrimp and crab weren’t uncommon. Oysters and clams abounded, too, but since neither of my parents liked either, Jenna, Jocelyn, and I never had the opportunity to acquire a taste for them. And shellfish were definitely an acquired taste.

But the geas only affected the character in the game, not the player, of course. So it, too, would just be an inconvenience or mild annoyance at worst.