It was another tranquil snowy day in the Daybreak Guild House. It better had been. They paid 1000 gold for the 'Snow Forest' surroundings. It was strange to admit, but Gray found the guild house to be more homely than his own apartment. The fireplace, the furniture, and the layer of frost on the window. He was trying to spruce up his home in the real world, but he would always forget when the weekend came around. He just got distracted playing Elrin.
Gray sat on the table looking at reviews for a new headset. He could have been doing it in his GECKO II room, but that vacant texture less square was even worse than his apartment, so he was using the internet overlay to search.
An icicle hanging from one of the nearby tree fell and shattered on the ground. After a moment it reformed. The cozy place that had no warmth yet had it at the same time. Warmth for the mind not the body.
The headset market was inflated with several brands. There were so many options that he could choose, and the reviews just seemed to contradict each other. Everything was simultaneously overrated, underrated, and had a niche use. Even narrowing it to a gaming headset still didn’t help. He was certain that he could buy just about any headset model within the last year, and it would be solid.
Yet there was a dark part of the mind. The one that manifested in every buyer. That they would purchase the wrong item. To buy the suboptimal item. This is why he was looking around for an hour.
“Hi Gray,” Melody appeared in the guild house.
“Hi,” Gray turned off his overlay and found Melody across from the table. He was glad to take a break. He noticed that Melody wasn’t wearing her paladin armor. She was wearing a tunic with cutoff khakis and a straw hat. “What’s with the duds?”
“I was slacking on my vocations, so I thought that I would spend the day fishing. It didn’t make sense to go around fishing in some metal armor,” Melody explained. “So, want to come with?”
“Sure, why not,” Gray stood up so that they could leave the guild house, but Melody raised her hands to stop him and shook her head.
“You have to dress up as well!” Melody dragged Gray to Aurora. They still had no mounts because they planned to spend more on the guild house renovations, but moments like this were becoming common for the co-founders of the Daybreak guild. Melody would run off to Aurora to buy some armor or weapons. Gray would watch as the guild coffers were lowered.
Just like she was doing now.
She took her usual stance of hand-under-chin while she checked the market board for all types of accessories. Such was the way to search for the best outfit.
“When is your cousin going to join the guild?” Melody bought an orange bucket hat and put it on Gray’s head. She shook her head and discarded it. Thankfully it was an item that was only worth 15 silver.
“Oh, he said that he would make a character next week,” Gray said. “He’s kinda impulsive something, so don’t expect him to play for long.”
“Hey man, playing video games with family is really cool. Not many people get to have that kind of experience.”
“I guess that’s true,” Gray watched the guild house funds go down by 300 gold. Melody turned around with a smirk and gave Gray his special clothes for this special mission. “Do I really have to dress up?”
“Of course! We need to make sure that we look like actual fishers.”
“But I’m not actually fishing with you…”
“That’s not important.”
Gray the Seer had donned an attire that was beach ready. He was wearing a khaki shorts and a short-sleeve button-up shirt. As always, the fashion of Elrin was in a constant state of shifting between epic fantasy and stuff that could be found on the floor of some fashion designer’s walk-in closet.
After ensuring that he was properly equipped. The two of them made their way to the Sapphire Lands. Melody walked beside him as the two searched for a suitable pond. Melody was carrying her fishing rod instead of a sword and shield. Not that it matters, they could change their equipment instantly.
“You shouldn’t be wearing your Seer gloves,” Melody titled her head to Gray.
“I’m already dressed like a dweeb,” Gray responded.
“You didn’t look like some omega powerful wizard before. You just had a simple cloak on. All classes don’t get cool looking gear until the later levels.”
“…I like the different seer cloaks.”
After a bit of walking, the two spotted a fisher posted up by one of the many ponds in the Sapphire Lands. It was dusk at the time. The digital sun was sneaking away from Elrin for a total of 30 minutes. Such was the nature of a day and night cycle in an MMO. One hour in real life equated to 24 hours in the game world.
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“Looks like a good spot. Let’s hope the other fisher doesn’t mind.”
When the two of them reached the pond, they found that the fisher was Lector. The very same bard that had helped them defeat Tarx.
“Hey Lector, it’s been a bit, huh?” Melody asked. “Leveling fisher as well?”
Lector gave a cool nod and then a small exclamation point appeared over his head. He started to reel in a fish. The carp struggled for a second before Lector yanked it out of the water. Lector put the fish in his inventory and drew his line once more.
Melody plopped down on the edge of the water and cast her own line. Gray sat beside her.
They waited…
They waited…
They waited…
“Melody?” Gray asked. “Are you not going to reel anything?”
The dusk turned into night after just two minutes passing by. In those two minutes, Lector was raking in the fish. Every 10 seconds, he would draw in something. Whether fish or some random leather boot.
“Where the hell are fish?” Melody would have snapped her fishing rod if the game allowed her too.
“Do you need to do something special?”
“No. You just put the bait and go.”
Lector drew his fishhook out of the water and caught it with one hand. He took off a small fish that was serving as bait and tossed it to Melody. It was some orange guppy rather than the dirt covered worms that Melody was using. Lector went back to his business and pulled another fish out of the water.
“I caught this one before. We can actually get this one in the fishing pond that’s in our guild house,” Melody slumped her shoulders. “Ugh…Do I have to farm fish in another place to fish here?”
“I guess, we’ll just have to return to the guild house,” Gray patted Melody on the back as they went all the way back to their guild house. They were still dressed like they were going to the beach, but the endless snow of their guild house washed over them. Melody grumbled and cast her line into their personal pond.
It didn’t take long for Melody to catch her first Verdant Guppy. The exact fish that she would need for future fishing endeavors in the Sapphire Lands ponds. She recast her line. Now she would start the process to get a stockpile of the fish.
“Battle ancient demons, explore magical, and fish for five hours,” Melody joked. “They should have put that on the advertisement.”
“Well, you can always change your vocation,” Gray said. “You can even change your class. Nobody’s locked out of anything.”
“Nah, I was joking. I would rather fish than craft stuff.” Melody explained. “Actually, Gray. I wanted to ask you a question.”
“What’s up?”
A winter wind passed by and kicked up some of the snow on the ground. Melody pulled her rod back and caught a struggling Azure Trout.
“What made you want to roll a Seer?”
“Like why I chose the class?” Gray scratched his head.
“Yeah, is there a special reason?”
“I guess, I just wanted to be helpful. DPS does damage and takes the boss down as fast as possible. Tanks defend their allies and grab the attention. Healers make sure everyone stays with allies. Supports are that class that just helps everyone. I guess that’s why,” Gray chuckled. “I never really thought about my choice that hard.”
“It’s funny cause you usually see players that are already in groups playing supports. You don’t really see solo players playing supports.”
“That’s why I’m glad we met.”
“I’m glad that we met too….” Melody missed a timing to catch a fish and lost one of her pieces of bait. She cleared her throat. “I already have 20, so I’ll just catch a few more.”
“Why did you pick paladin as your class?” Gray quickly asked.
“Oh, I just thought it would be cool. I’m not usually into the sorta hero of light deal, but I just wanted to try it for once.”
“Right, right.”
“Oh and how’s your headset?” Melody asked. “I know that’s it been having some trouble.”
“During general play, it’s not that bad. The game just doesn’t look good. I wasn’t even playing on higher graphics before, but now I just play on the lowest for safety.”
“That sucks,” Melody responded. “My machine’s pretty new. I got it a few months old.”
“What’s the model?”
“It’s a Lumi.”
“I heard those are pretty lightweight and sleek.”
“Yup, they’re powerful enough too. The higher tier gaming stuff is just too expensive, and those headsets weigh like a brick.”
“I gotta choose something soon,” Gray brought back the internet overlay. Melody went back to farming the guppies and after a 10 minutes decided that it would be time to walk on back to the Sapphire Lands. Surprisingly, Lector was still there. The bard assumedly had stacks of fish in his pocket. He gave that same nod to the two as they returned.
With her new set of bait, it didn’t take long for Melody to get a bite.
“There we go!” Melody pulled out a red fish that had blacks over its scale. The fish squirmed off the hook and flopped back into the pond.
“WHAT!” Melody yelled. “What did I do wrong?”
The pond water bubbled as it were boiling. Lector stood up from his rock and raised his sunglasses. His purple eyes widened. He clapped at Melody and pointed at the pond with his fishing rod.
“What is going on?” Gray asked.
Lector steeled himself. Gray prepared to cast a lightning bolt. Was it possible that this was a world event? That some type of enemy would come out of the pond. Lector was a healer, but they had no DPS. He didn’t hear about an event triggering from a vocation. Then Gray’s headset dropped frames.
A radiant red figure rose from the pond. The water glistened and looked like small stars as Gray saw only a snapshot of a giant koi fish moving in frames of two. It was a majestic creature that shed water droplets as it soared. Lector snagged his fishhook in the giant’s mouth as it landed in another pond. A wave of water that was more liquid than was actually in the pond drenched the three of them. Lector’s fishing rod was pulled out of his hands and disappeared into the other pond. Lector’s fishing rod would appear back in his hands a moment later, but he was bested by the fish. Lector kicked the rock that he was sitting on and shook his head.
Defeated, he leaned his rod against his shoulder and walked away. He waved goodbye to Melody and Gray.
“That was insane. Did you see the lightning that was coursing around it?” Melody asked.
“Um, no. My headset had troubles again.”
“Really?”
“Yeah, I guess because it was sudden spawn.”
“Either way,” Melody jumped up on the rock that Lector was once sitting on and pointed at the pond. “I’m gonna catch that fish.”
“Is that like endgame for a fisher? What would it even drop?”
“A legendary?”
“That’s a good damn point, but do you even know how you’re gonna catch it?” Gray asked.
“No, but I’m a damn fisher for a reason! I’m gonna catch that fish and then I’m gonna hang it up in the guild house.” Melody promised the sky, the ponds, and the Sapphire Lands. The elusive koi fish of the Sapphire Lands made an enemy of the fishing paladin.
But of course, their deathmatch would have to wait until Melody was a level 50 fisher.