Heather marched triumphantly down the forest trail with the panel in hand. She looked over the strange device and agreed it looked like a tablet computer. Frank walked beside her, watching as she studied the screen.
“What was that speech about?” he asked.
Heather looked up from the panel and shrugged. “I don’t know. Isn’t that something a necro person would say?”
“That's something a cartoon supervillain would say,” he replied. “What were you trying to do?”
Heather sighed and tossed her head in frustration, feeling a little embarrassed. “I just wanted to say something dramatic to make the goblins believe I was powerful. You heard Queen Umtha, we are friends now, and I wanted to make a show of it.”
“I guess,” was all he said as she went back to looking at the panel.
She studied the glass surface, trying to make out what it meant. There was a rough image of herself on the front, but the rest of the screen was dark and featureless. There were five buttons on the screen, but they had no words and were little more than blue boxes. She saw no way to use the device and began to poke at the screen.
“What do I do with this?” she asked in frustration.
Frank stood on his toes so he could get a better view of the screen. He studied it for just a moment before scratching at his head with a long nail. “Is there a power button?”
Heather turned the thing over in her hands, inspecting every side but finding nothing that stood out. “I don't think so.”
“Maybe you have to speak to it,” he suggested.
Heather shot him a glance but had no better ideas, so she held it up.
“Turn on!” she shouted, but nothing happened. “Start!” she commanded, but the screen stayed black.
“Maybe you need a secret word,” Frank said.
“Maybe it’s broken,” Heather snapped.
“I don’t think you can break them,” Frank argued.
She sighed and held the thing up and then vigorously shook it.
“What are you doing?”
“It looks like an etch a sketch, so I'm shaking it like one!”
He sighed and stood as tall as he could to look over her shoulder again. “Maybe it has an eye scanner?”
“An eye scanner?” she repeated.
“You know, like in the spy movies. You hold it up to an eye, and it scans you to make sure you're the right person.”
Heather shrugged and held the panel to her face. She walked only two steps before nearly tripped over a rock. With a sigh, she went back to shaking it to see if it would do something.
“I don’t think that will work.”
“Well, something has to work,” she said. “There are no buttons or controls or even a port to plug anything in with.”
“Did you try pushing the lights?”
Heather looked down at them and ran her finger down the five lights and nothing.
“Why must everything be so hard?” she complained and searched the backside again.
“We must be overlooking something,” Frank said.
“Yes, we’re overlooking how stupid everything in this place is.”
“You're just saying that because you’re upset about being here,” Frank replied. “If you took a moment to look around and appreciate what it was, you might change your mind.”
Heather glanced his way and felt terrible about being so snappy. He was right. She was upset about being here, but who wouldn't be? She didn't volunteer, and no matter how special the reasons, the visitors had stolen her life and made her a prisoner. This panel was her only key to a way out; there must be a way to make it work.
She continued to fiddle with it as they walked, eventually reaching the forest edge to look out over the grassy plain. Frank made a nervous sigh as he fumbled with his fingers and looked to the distant hills.
“So, I can tell you how to get to the city,” he suggested.
“A city? Whey would I go to a city?” Heather asked.
Frank scratched at his head and looked around in confusion. “So you can be with other hero players.”
Heather held up the panel and waved it in his face. “You promised to help me figure out how to use this go get out, remember?”
“I know but–,” he began, but Heather cut him off.
“No buts, I want out, and you want the panel. Just take me back to the graveyard,” she insisted.
“Are you sure?” he asked. “The graveyard is full of skeletons and dead things.”
“Yes, I'm sure. I'm the necromancer, aren't I?” she replied with a playful smile.
“You don’t even know what that is,” he replied.
“It’s a wizard that summons the dead,” she repeated back, trying to copy his voice.
“And that’s all you know about it,” he pointed out. “You should go to the city. I am sure you can find somebody to help you there.”
Heather came to a halt, stamping a foot and pointing into the green fields. “Just take me to the graveyard!” With a sigh, he walked on as she started to shake the panel again.
Heather poked and prodded the strange device. She searched it a dozen times for buttons or sockets or anything she could manipulate. After an hour, she began to grow, convinced that she needed a remote or maybe a phone app to use it properly. The excitement of finding it had long since worn off and become boredom. Now she realized they had been walking forever, and her legs were tired.
“Can we sit for a minute?”
“If you want,” Frank replied as he looked around. “I don’t see anything dangerous.”
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“Good,” Heather sighed as she sat on the grass, tossing the panel aside. She stretched her arms and looked about the green landscape wondering why she was here. What possible reason did the visitors need with a girl who hadn't even finished her architect's degree? If they needed somebody to design a house, they could have picked a better person. Just as she began to wonder what other reason they might have, Frank spoke up.
“Can I try your panel?” he asked.
“Be my guest,” she replied and held it out to him.
He picked it up and turned the panel every which way, inspecting its surface. After twenty minutes of fruitless effort, he tossed it back down.
“Maybe it is broken,” he suggested halfheartedly.
“Just my luck,” Heather growled. She pulled her legs up and folded her arms over her knees. “I need a bath and a change of clothes. I feel grubby, and I stink.”
“There is a stream near the graveyard,” Frank suggested. “You can get clothing in the city, but I think you get a starting outfit when you make your choices.”
“Well, I can't make any choices because the stupid thing is broken.” she reminded him.
“I just said that out of frustration,” he replied. “I am pretty sure these things are indestructible; it must be working. We are just overlooking something.”
Heather sighed and slapped her hand down over the panel. “This stupid thing is absolutely-”
[Identification Successful. Welcome, Heather.] a chirpy voice said.
Heather's eyes went wide, and they both looked down to see a brightly lit screen below her hand.
“I told you it was a scanner!” Frank mocked and stood tall with arms folded over his chest.
“You said it was an eye scanner!” Heather shot back.
Frank could only shrug as she pulled her hand away and carefully lifted the panel to see a dazzling array of options.
The screen was a series of menus and buttons. It highlighted a tutorial on how to properly create what it called a “presence” in the world. It also offered to help by making suggestions to what it thought most suited her. The lights on the side of the screen corresponded to the sub-menus she could access by touching the lights. These were menus where she had choices waiting to be made. Frank quickly deduced that the lights would go out once the choices were made.
“So what does it think you should play?” Frank asked as he looked over her shoulder.
“How do I see that?” she asked, still dazzled in wonder.
Frank reached out with a hand and tapped a single long nail on the screen over a button.
Heather tapped the button that said [Class Recommendations] and read the window that opened.
Frank covered his mouth as he struggled not to laugh. The first option was damsel. The second was fruit collector. Her third option was goblin herder.
“What kind of stupid choices are these?” Heather remarked as she read them. “I am not playing a fruit collector, and what are you laughing at?”
Frank tried to choke back his giggles, but there was no stopping it now. The look on her face was one of sheer indignity as she pouted over the choices.
“You don’t have to pick any of those,” he said with great struggle. “Just go back to the first screen.”
She tapped the button going back to the main screen and began to search for a way to make something that would annoy him.
“How do I pick paladin on this stupid thing?” she growled.
“This is a tutorial screen,” Frank said. “You have to open the character builder first. Try the first button.”
She tapped the first light to find an array of options. She was lost in a sea of choices where she could alter any feature of herself. Everything from her eye color to the size of her feet could be adjusted. She could be taller or shorter, thinner or heavier, tan or pale. She could even pick impossible skin colors, like blue or green. The very first choice it wanted her to make was race.
She tapped the menu and saw a list that scrolled on and on of possible races. “I could be a bird person?” she asked as she saw the blue feathered image of a Kirakea.
“There are a ton of races,” Frank said. “You can be almost anything.”
Heather was lost in a sea of options until she found a form that made her stop. “Oh my gosh!” she cried. “That is so cute!”
Frank looked at the screen to see the image of a faerie-looking woman with butterfly wings.
“It is if you’re a girl,” Frank said with a dismissive tone.
“I happen to be a girl!” she argued.
“You can change that.”
“I can?” she asked with a raised brow.
“You can select your gender there,” he pointed to a corner of the screen.
Heather leaned closer to stare at the button in shock. With just a press of a button, she could be a man. She pondered it just a moment until remembering that men were jerks and went back to flipping through the list of races.
“It will take all day to look through this,” she complained.
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“Well, we can't sit here all day. If we want to get back before dark, we have to get going,” Frank urged.
“She sighed and stood to follow him as he took the lead. She continued to poke at the panel, flipping through race after race, lost in the possibilities. There were so many choices her head began to spin, and it became even worse when she realized some choices like an elf had subcategories. She was delighted to discover she could tag favorites began to add options to her list.
She liked the look of the mermaids but didn't want to be limited to the water. The winged people that resembled angels looked fascinating and went on her list. She found several cat races she liked. One looked like an actual cat that walked upright, and another that looked human but had cat ears and a tail. Both went on the list along with a beautiful tree-looking woman with leaves for hair. There were a dozen different insect races, but none of them appealed to her. One interesting race was a blue-skinned human with four arms and a diamond-shaped stone in its head. It said the race had bonuses to magical skills, and she pondered the idea of being a wizard with four arms. The next option made her glance at Frank to make sure he wasn't looking. It was a mostly naked woman with a pair of bat wings and a clawed whip in her hands. The title read Succubus, and Heather was enthralled until she discovered how they fed.
“No! No! No!” she cried out loud.
“No what?” Frank asked.
“None of your business!” she shouted, clutching the screen to her chest. She waited until he went back to walking and returned to the choices. Hours went by as she read about the races and the possibilities. Her list of maybes swelled to a thirty when she finally arrived at human.
“How boring,” Heather said as she read the description.
“What’s boring?
“The human race,” she said. “They don’t get any special perks.”
“Yes, they do,” Frank said. “They can be any class and use any weapon. Plus, they have almost no restrictions on environment except underwater.”
“Yeah, but they don't have a tail, or four arms, or fangs, or cat ears,” she insisted.
“Humans also start with extra skill points to raise their starting skills. They are the only race that can triple class as well.”
“Tripple class?”
Frank nodded. “Most races can choose two classes to play. Humans are the only ones that can choose three, but there are limitations.”
“Wait, so is ghoul your race or your class?” Heather asked.
“It's my race. My class is a grave dancer.”
“What's a grave dancer?”
“It's a class that can build a graveyard and gains special powers as it gets larger.”
“So could I be a grave dancer?”
“Only if you pick an undead race,” Frank replied. “Some classes are race-specific.”
“What other undead races are there?” she asked.
“Zombie, skeleton warrior, vampire, ghost, banshee, wraith, lich, and a few others.”
“Are any of them pretty?” she asked.
Frank glanced at her and nodded to her panel. “Type in vampire.”
Heather typed in the name, and sure enough, a picture of a male and female vampire appeared. The woman was the perfect idealized vision of dark beauty.
“But I have to obey the rules of the race,” she asked.
“Yes, you will have to feed on blood,” Frank replied.
Heather sighed and typed in banshee. She was pleased to see a ghostly woman with a slender frame and wisps of smoke around her body.
“What about her?” Heather asked.
Frank looked at the screen. “That’s a type of Ghost. You can’t go out in the sunlight, and you feed on the life force of people.”
“The life force?”
“Read the description,” Frank suggested.
She read through the description to discover banshee incapacitates their victims and then drain them of their energy until they die. She didn't like the idea of slowly feeding on some helpless victim, so she pressed on.
“So what do ghouls eat?” she asked.
“We can eat anything that is meat,” he said. “But I can also gain energy by burying people in my graveyard.”
“You can?” Heather asked.
He nodded. “It was part of why I wanted to play the class. I wanted people to explore the graveyard and die in the caves underneath. Then I could bury them and use them for power or points to make the graveyard bigger. The bigger my graveyard, the more I can bury.”
She noted the joy in his voice as he talked about building his graveyard. It was the one thing that he seemed to have a true passion for, and she found it fascinating.
“You really want to build a graveyard?” she asked.
“You can do all sorts of cool things as a building class. Your powers are tied to your buildings, but you can make amazing things. I could make a graveyard that is miles long and fill it with buildings, fountains, trees, and cool statues. You can build all sorts of dungeons and tunnels underneath it full of rooms and traps. If you build a dungeon heart, you can summon all sorts of monsters to hide in the rooms. They will defend the dungeon and the heart, and you can control them.”
“What about the skeletons?” she asked. “Don’t you already have those?”
“Those spawn automatically as the graveyard grows. As it gets bigger minor things like the skeletons or rats will spawn, but the really fun stuff requires a dungeon heart.”
“Maybe I could build something?” she pondered.
“You would have to pick a building class,” he pointed out.
“But I can pick three classes,” she said.
“Only if you play a human,” he reminded her.
“hmmm,” she said as she tapped the side of the panel. “I wonder if it would be fun to build something,” she added, thinking of her dream to be an architect.
“Didn’t you want to find a way out?” he asked.
Heather looked up from the screen and sighed. “I do, but so long as I have to be here, it won't hurt to have a little fun. Besides, I don't want to be eaten by Nillacs.”
Frank laughed. “Or carrion worms.”
“Is that what that big thing is called?”
He nodded. “They are attracted to sound. If you're quiet, they rarely notice you.”
Heather made a mental note to stop screaming around the worms and went back to her panel. Despite the lack of wings or cat ears, she added humans to her list. Eventually, she grew bored with looking at races and went to the next button and found the class selection. It was locked to one class until she picked a final race, but it still allowed her to cycle through the options.
She was amazed at the choices. There were dozens of varieties of wizards, priests, and rogues. The warrior classes were as varied as clouds in the sky, with all sorts of options to customize them as they leveled. There were also vast lists of what it called “mundane” classes. These were classes more akin to simpler things like a baker, or fisherman, or Inn Keeper.
Many of the mundane classes had interesting perks and fun skills to make up for their lack of combat prowess. She liked the flower Singer class and its ability to grow flowers with songs. It had a neat power that created a cloud of pollen to blind and confuse foes. The water dancer was also interesting and would allow her to walk on water and shape it for various uses.
She hunted through the options for hours until she finally remembered something and typed a name into the search box. She looked at the pictures with alarm and began to read a fascinating description of the class known as a necromancer.