Before stepping through the portal to Darkroot, I paused and turned to Aida, “One thing, before I go, I got a reply from customer support. They said, my real body had decided not to wait at our clinic for the problem to be resolved. Does that mean my real body is awake and knows that they left a ghost in the system?” I asked.
Aida tilted her head. “When your real body’s programmed time elapsed, they would have been woken up and given the option of staying at the clinic’s facilities for free. They would have been informed of your existence at that time. Likely they chose to go home rather than stay until your memory was fixed.”
“And I can’t access that memory until I log out, even if it has been fixed?” I asked.
“That is correct, the memory file has to be updated with your in game memories and combined into a single file, that can not be done while you are ingame.”
“Was there any way for my real body to talk to me, or for me to talk to him or her?” I asked.
Aida nodded, “Both are possible, would you like to record a message for your real body? Although I do not have access to external communications, I can give it to Mercury, the AI who does. He should be able to find your real body and deliver the message.”
I thought about it, “I was curious as to why I hadn’t heard from myself, but really, what can you say to a digital copy of yourself who has none of your memories? Are we really even the same person? What would I even say to the version of me that lives in the real world? How would I explain that I am risking my life in the hope that I will be worth remembering? How would I explain Femme? It is all so strange,” I said with a sigh.
“Your personality is still probably very similar, even without shared memories. I suspect your real body would want to hear from you. Leave yourself a message, perhaps, in case you die, it could be your epitaph.” Aida suggested.
I considered it, then nodded. “If I die, send this; Don’t feel bad about me, I died because I was stubborn and foolish, but I have no regrets. If I somehow survive this, don’t send anything.”
Aida nodded, and with nothing left to say, I stepped through the portal followed by Illona.
The town of Darkroot had a strange feel to it, mostly abandoned, it was suspended above a forest, and featured an enormous cathedral with a bell tower as well as a smaller chapel that featured a bonfire on the second floor. The bonfire was stabbed by a sword, and next to the stairs leading up and down, someone had constructed a bar. Tables were thrown haphazardly around the room, and players seemed to gather here to form groups before attacking two separate dungeons, the lower level Wolf’s Den, and a higher level place called Iron Keep.
As I was level 23 I spent the first few days trying to level up to the minimum, level 25. This was accomplished by hunting an area with some very hostile trees, who, annoyingly, didn’t have any blood for my Fatal Kiss spell to work on. Tree sap didn’t count.
Luckily for me, the wolf pelts I’d gotten sold for a pretty penny and I was able to buy some tar-filled rags that allowed me to put a fire effect on my dagger.
Unauthorized use: this story is on Amazon without permission from the author. Report any sightings.
After a few days of laboriously killing arboreal foes, I hit level 25. I used my points to further improve my Knife-Kinesis spell, removing the 2 minute cooldown. This meant that if I did get interrupted, I could just immediately recast the spell. I also doubled the range and speed of the spell, which oddly enough, did nothing to improve the damage, but did make it harder for enemies to avoid my attacks. You’d think doubling the speed would double the damage, but apparently physics had little to do with the actual damage output of my attacks.
I left a few points unspent in case I needed to buy something later, now that I could use the telepathic interface, it seemed wise to have spare points saved for an emergency.
Illona got a couple of levels too, putting her at 21. She got a “Protection” spell she could cast that increased our armor and added protection against dark elemental attacks. I wasn’t really sure what darkness damage was supposed to do, but it didn’t sound pleasant, so I was happy to get some extra resistance to it. Seriously though, how did darkness hurt someone? Were you more likely to stub your toes or trip over a root? Suddenly the name “Darkroot” seemed more ominous.
“So, how did you get that arcanist class?” The tall player with the goatee asked me, in the evening of the third day as I tried to find a party.
I’d come up with a plausible sounding lie for this, because I didn’t want to admit that I was a glitched ghost. “Oh, I’m a beta tester,” I told the party leader, with a nervous chuckle, “trying this class out for a future update.”
“Yeah?” He asked, twirling one mustache, “Hmmm, well, what can you do?” He asked.
“I have Knife-Kinesis that lets me turn my normal knife melee attacks into ranged attacks, and I have a 15 minute cooldown ultimate move called “Fatal Kiss” that destroys blood. It also has a vampiric effect that heals me. Oh, and also, I have an arcane contract that lets me share my health and mana with one other person. Right now that other person is my follower here, Illona, who is a shrine maiden.” I explained.
“We already have a shrine maiden,” a skimpily dressed woman with her high heels resting on top of the table said. Legs crossed and looking bored, she was a big buxom woman with a wasp thin waist and ruby red lips. Her hair was blond and spikey, and she was strikingly pretty despite her scowl.
“I could switch targets with my arcane contract, let you share my health and mana pool.” I offered.
“Please, I don’t share my pools with anyone I don’t know,” she huffed, polishing her red nails on her low cut dress, no doubt feeling proud of her sick diss. I was disliking her already, I realized.
“This is Rebecca, Rebecca, this is Sarah. I’m Thorne the Magnificent.” The party leader belatedly introduced himself. “I’m a lightning elementalist, and I’d be interested in sharing your mana pool.” He said with a covetous gleam.
“Hold on, there, sparky,” A heavily armored man interrupted. “I’m Bulwark Ironshield, the team tank.” The huge man in thick plate armor introduced himself. “And, I’d be interested in sharing your health pool, how much hp you got?” he asked.
I relayed my stats and the team members seemed to consider it, finally Thorne broke the silence. “Well, that’s about evenly split between mana and hp. I’m not sure where your arcane contract would do the most good. As to your dps, you got any numbers on that? You running any mods?”
“Sorry, dps?” I asked, puzzled by the new term, though I may have heard Femme use it once or twice, it had been almost two weeks since I’d last talked game mechanics with her. The term must have slipped my mind.
“Damage per second? And no UI mods? You sound a bit too much like a noob to be a beta tester.” Thorne said suspiciously.
“System share status screen,” I said, allowing Throne to see my screen for himself.
“Hmm, interesting, well, I’m almost willing to give it a shot, just so I can learn if I want my next character to be an arcanist whenever the patch comes out. It’s weird that they put you in the amazon starting zones though. What are you doing here, so far from amazon country?”
“I’ve got a quest," I told him. "System share quest screen.” I said.
Thorne’s eyes lit up with greed, and the other two players leaned forward in their seats suddenly very interested. “Oh! Well this changes everything,” Thorne explained. “It’s sharable! You’re so in. We’re doing this. System accept party request Sarah Longshot. System share quest.”