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Volume 2 Chapter 3 – Tourism
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Author's Notes:
Was away, now back...
Got another chapter awaiting PR, will post tomorrow or day after
Debbie had no interest in games. She had always thought playing games were a waste of valuable time and money. The only reason she was playing RR was due to her job. Being one of the co-owners of the Tour-Agency, Exotic Vacations, her partner pioneered a new type of holiday package: Relaxing in Virtual Reality.
Reluctantly, Debbie was coaxed into trying out the game. In her first experience with the new virtual reality game, she was mesmerized by the scenery and awed by the potential for tourism. Only by trying the game out personally could she understand why everyone else in the agency was positive with the pioneering project.
Since RR was an extension to her job and she had little to no interest in the game contents, Debbie took the class of a Stable Master. Originally, the idea was to own a carriage to cart the tourist around, however, Debbie thought that being able to offer horse riding as an alternative way of transport would improve sales. As their office was located in a heavily urbanized environment, offering their clientele chances of riding animals was a great innovation.
Stable Master class was a unique class that allowed the player to create stables. Mounts or Rides stored within any stable could be withdrawn from any other stable owned by the same Stable Master. This was the reason Debbie took the class; As her agency opened up more areas for tourism, she could transport the same animals instantly to various kingdoms within the game instead of buying new ones for each and every location.
Saddle was another skill that came with her Stable Master class, that could make any tamed monsters into rides by attaching a saddle onto it. For obvious reasons, the rides needed to have sufficient size and strength. Forcing a dog to carry a human three times heavier then itself was not possible. Saddling an orc, troll or other bipedal monsters was not feasible either. Another drawback of this skill was the need to buy animals or monsters from NPCs or Players.
Within the game, Debbie started out in the frontier city of Serabroug, Rosenheim Kingdom. Her choice of the frontier city was due to the cost of rides. In central region of RR, the levels of players were high, coupled with the need to travel distances for unowned dungeons, drove the prices of horses and ponies up. In Serabroug, the average level of players was lower, with plenty of free hunting spots, there was little need for distance travel, reducing the prices of mountable animals.
An average horse in Serabroug cost 100 gold with young gallopers reaching as high as 500. Since she would be buying horses used for tourism, Debbie could not rely on the cheapest dying mares or the obnoxious colts. Thus, she was prepared to pay 300+ gold per animal. Compared to Central Cities, the price was halved, but still, it was an expensive investiture. Since there was high potential and little risk, Debbie believed that profits would flow in later.
To have her plan working, her first objective was to obtain gold. Instead of grinding like other players within the game, Debbie had taken the option of buying game money from the net. After paying cash earlier, she was to meet someone named Bob at the Eastern gate of the city she started in. The location was picked due to its low traffic flow because there was little activity towards the eastern side of Serabroug.
The transaction was done smoothly and her pockets were weighted down with 50,000 gold. After Bob had disappeared after passing her the game currency, Debbie was left standing alone with the NPC guards of the Eastern gate. Before she moved off, Debbie noticed small dust clouds forming at the horizon. Knowing that the dust clouds could only be formed by a something traveling fast across the plains, she pondered over what was heading her way.
“I wonder who or what is coming this way?” Debbie asked nobody in particular.
“Oh, that must be Baronetess Bunny coming from her region” One of the NPCs responded to her query
“Baronetess Bunny? Is she with an entourage? The amount of dust stirred seems too much for just a horse. But the speed she is traveling looks a little too fast for a group”
“Aye, Lady Bunny is always doing absurd things” the other NPC guard replied
“She is most likely riding the cat 'Meow'... hahaha... a huge cat that is...” the first guard chipped in.
“Large cat?” Debbie muttered... With her interest piqued, she moved away from the main road, stood behind one of the guards and watch as the rumored Baronetess arrived.
After a few moments, a girl with rabbit ears dressed in a cute costume came riding on a giant cat. It wasn't really riding as she sat without saddle with both her knees together at the left side of the cat while leaning her body forward laying on the feline's back. The cat was also not normal, even though it looked like a tabby, it was bigger then a tiger, with a body length of nearly 3m long and shoulder height of over 1.5m tall.
After dashing pass the gates, the cat braked to a stop leaving 4 indented lines of earth with its paws. The girl alighted promptly then pointed her orange-colored staff towards the disfigured floor. Within moments, the marks were gone, leaving a smooth pavement as if nothing had happened before.
“I am going to the Library, do whatever you want, but don't cause any trouble” she told the cat.
“Ok... ok... don't nag... I'll visit Silva then go laze at the ranch” the cat replied
“Alright, see you in the ranch later, update Prize about the market prices for me”
Watching the exchange, Debbie was stunned and missed her opportunity to introduce herself. At first, she was just curious about having a cat as a ride, but when she saw the size of said-cat, she was a little overwhelmed. Furthermore, when the cat spoke, she jaws dropped, causing her to miss the chance to speak out. By the time she gathered her thoughts, the girl was gone.
Not willing to let such a possible holiday-attraction escape, she turned to the NPC guards for information on the rabbit-girl as the guards seemed to know about her. Forgetting that they were NPCs, Debbie conversed with them as per normal.
“Is that the baronetess you people mentioned?” She asked the guards
“Yup, that's her, the troublesome one, Lady Bunny of Galitzid Prairie”
“Monsters are not allowed in the city, but she skillfully avoid the trouble by raising a city cat”
“You mean that big tabby is a city cat??” Debbie asked incredulously
“Aye, something like that... She is some sort of a breeder and her ranch is in the city”
“Yeah... due to that cat being a local, it can enter and exit the city without a license or under restrain... not to mention her throwing her Baronet Rank around when our Guard Captain questioned her motives.”
“Other then the cat, does she have any other strange animals?” Debbie's curiosity heightened.
“The Lady has lots of giant cats, thought only Meow and Nyaa recently start talking”
“My relative that lives in the East once mentioned that she has giant rabbits at least 2m tall soldiering the area... There are also rumors of giant chickens running around... I can't say for sure if those are fact or fiction, but rumors of the East is plentiful.”
“Now that you mention giant animals, there are also rumors on big sized racoons working at the site of the old Lair of Livart. Great old times when we go hunting kobolds and goblins there”
“Ahhh... good old times... I still remember when I was just out of boot camp...”
While the two guards at the Eastern gate were reminiscing about their past glory, Debbie was in deep thought. She had just caught a glimpse of something that was extremely favorable to her agency. It could be a wild goose chase, but it was better to verify the validity of the rumors then to let such an opportunity slip by. With a change of plans, she ignored her original goal of buying horses and journey out of the city eastward.
Unlike normal players, who had to stay in the city for the first game-month, Debbie was using a Tourism Account with special rights. As a tourist, the avatar was created with a decent level of 50, came with a class, acceptable gear and no newbie protection. The avatar also had anti-theft and no death penalties. To not upset the game balance, Tourist could not participate in events or wars and they could not craft anything. They could gain neither proficiencies, experience points nor fame which made them static.
This special type of account was created when her company negotiated with RR game developers to use the game for sightseeing. The developers happily made such accounts as a means to promote the game further, but they offered no means of directly buying game currencies as artificially injecting money into the game would break the balance. They did point Debbie to the Dark gamers.
Walking eastwards was not a very smart choice for Debbie. The distance between Serabroug and Bunny's region was 6 hours by horse or over 25 hours on foot. Even the closest place, Livart Rest-stop was at the midpoint of 3 hours away on horseback. In addition, she was leaving with her pouch full of gold, a newbie error that had caused grief of many who bought game-money using cash.
There were a few greedy players who had spied on Debbie while she was collecting her gold from the well-known gold seller. They initially had the intention to swindle the gold out of her using deceit, but since she exited the city right after, they decided to kill her for her funds.
After 15 minutes of strolling, Debbie was ambushed by a team of 3 rapacious players.
“Halt!, Leave your money here and we will left you off”
“You can either do it peacefully or we can kill you and loot your corpse”
“From your attire, you are not even Lv70, so don't resist, for we are all between 100 and 120.”
The last bandit player who spoke got hit on his head by his comrades
“Shut it idiot, don't tell her our levels or she may want revenge”
“Erm... Sorry miss... just imagine you didn't hear that last part”
“There is no point playing bandits, I'm a Tourist, you wouldn't get anything for it” Debbie explained
“What is that? Tourist? Some special class?”
“Don't lie to us, we saw you obtain lots of gold from Bob the gold-seller ”
“Players drop a percent of funds they carry, so give us 1000g or we will kill you”
“Just buzz off, you can't rob a tourist” Debbie told the Bandit trio before attempting to leave
Without a doubt, poor Debbie died and turned into a wisp of white particles. Sadly for the PKers, the only thing they got was the red make of a Player-Killer. Due to the special type of account Debbie was using, she dropped neither gold nor gear. She did not even have to wait 24-hours, as she respawned minutes later back in Serabroug town square.
Recovering from her death, Debbie was rather shocked that there were users playing as bandits. As someone who did not play much games, she could not understand how those players could do things that were so morally wrong.
After the initial surprise, she calmed down and smiled at event. She had been lucky on two counts: First, the bandits targeted her partly due to her own stupidity, she had ventured out of the city with people knowing she carried large amount of gold. It simply meant that if tourist were common knowledge, they would not be targeted. Also, the ambush happened while on trial, with the experience, she had options to either deter or remove such threats during the 'real' event. If the attack happened when she was leading other tourist, the consequences would be dire.
On further thoughts, Debbie found her actions to be rather rash. She had not bothered to check the distance to her destination, by just blindly following the road, she would have died to random monsters or even starvation. Even if she made it to her destination, the owner, Baronetess Bunny, was not there to negotiate. The bandits actually saved her valuable time. Giggling at her fortune, even in its twisted form, Debbie decided to do some research before trying another journey.
This story has been unlawfully obtained without the author's consent. Report any appearances on Amazon.
Next stop, checking out the prices and supplies of Horse and Ponies. Not knowing where exactly do they sell those animals, Debbie made her way towards the Army Stables. Who else would know such information other then another Stable Master.
With a notebook she bought from the general stall, Debbie had recorded all the information she needed within the city. The prices of good food, fine accommodation, places of interest, beautiful sightseeing spots and various little things a tour-guild would need to know. There was also the prices of Horses, Ponies, Elephants, Camels and several other beast she could Saddle.
The best part for Debbie was testing out the quality of the food. The dishes made in RR was on par with High-Class restaurants, and the best thing, she could eat 50 servings of different variety of food without the worries of calories. Half working and Half having fun, she passed the game day fruitfully and logout for 2 hours bypassing the lonely game night.
*****
After she logged back into RR when the game morning arrived, Debbie approached the Carriage Depot looking for a way to the East. From the drivers there, she found out that there was free carriage service to Livart Rest-Stop, courtesy of the owner. The problem was, there was no carriage traveling further east. The only ones going there were wagons, so if she wanted to visit the area, she need to hitch a bumpy ride with the haulage.
Thinking she had nothing to lose, Debbie got directions from the teamsters to find the wagons going to Galitzid Prairie. Following the given route, she reached a ranch located in the northeastern side of Serabroug. There she met with things that could only be termed as bizarre
For starters, there was a wagon preparing to depart. Running up to the wagon, she found the driver to be a young boy around 14 in age, much too young to be a teamster, yet he was driving the horse drawn cart. Within the wagon, there were bags of salt and 5 large squirrels, each a meter tall. Inspecting the animals almost gave Debbie a heart attack. With her class Stable Master, Debbie was able to know the levels of tame animals, even if they were not hers, the squirrels were all lv150.
Asking the boy for a ride to Galitzid Prairie yielded a confused look on the youth. Instead of answering, he alighted from the wagon and entered the ranch to ask permission. Feeling that her persuasion skills would be useful, Debbie tagged along with the teenager. There she was started again. From outside, the Ranch looked normal with a farmer tending crops and random animals lazing around, but within, was a sweat shop of rabbits and raccoons tanning leather and making candles... and all of them stronger then her puny Lv50.
The most surprising issue was the overseer of the ranch. It was not the farmer tending crops... nor the candle maker distilling animal fats... it was a talking squirrel who barked orders at the working crew. After hearing from the teenager and seeing that Debbie had entered the ranch, it started talking to her.
“Why do you want to visit the East, the owner doesn't like random guest” the squirrel asked
“I have a proposition to make to Lady Bunny, the Baronetess of Galitzid Prairie” Debbie replied
The squirrel raised an eyebrow then demanded:
“Speak of your proposal”
“I want to form a business contract, but I need to know if Giant Chickens are real”
“What if they are?”
“I want to loan them for my tour-agency, we will pay accordingly.”
The squirrel turned away from the female and continued to 'talk' but no sound came from its mouth. From the little things that Debbie knew about RR, she guessed it was using 'private conversation' with someone. After its silent discussion, the squirrel finally turned back to Debbie and said:
“I can't make the decisions, so you will need to ride with Aaron there to the manor house. The ride on the wagon will be bumpy because we have not expected visitors. Do not be alarm when the escorts arrive.”
With its closing statement, the squirrel went back barking orders while Aaron, the underaged teamster, led Debbie back to the wagon. After she sat comfortably with the squirrels, the horse-driven cart set off towards her destination. Once it left Serabroug through the East Gate, the escorts arrived. A pair of cats, each as large as a jaguar, ran alongside the wagon, they were both lv150 too which made this convoy too well protected.
Ignorance was not always a bad thing. Normally for other gamers, they would be shocked by the workings within the Ranch. Those who knew of game mechanics would understand the impossibility of such a sight. Debbie was lacking in game knowledge, after seeing a cat talk, she just assumed herself as Alice in Wonderland, therefore her behavior in front of the talking squirrel turned out positive and gained her audience with the 'owner'
Also, normal players would think twice... maybe even a few more times, before hitching a ride with a crowd of high leveled creatures... they were not even humanoids... Even though each of them could easily end her life, Debbie thought nothing of them and just went with the flow... “I wonder how deep this rabbit hole goes” was her thoughts.
*****
After hours of traveling and a sore butt, Debbie finally arrived at her destination. The area had a tranquil feel, but not worthy enough to be a scenic spot. A girl dressed in purple priestly garb was waiting for her outside the Manor-House. To the left of the priestess, were 10 giant chickens, each bigger then an ostrich and standing 2m tall. Their shape were proportional to farm chickens, which made their 1 meter width intimidating.
“Hi, My name is Angel.” The girl greeted
“Hi, I am Debbie from
“From what I heard, you have a proposal for the Baronetess?”
“Ah Yes... But first, can I try to saddle a chicken for testing?”
“Saddle?”
“I have the class called Stable Master, and I can saddle tamed beast and make them into rides.”
“Oh? What a unique class that is, feel free to try it.”
Given permission, Debbie did not waste any time. She proceeded to put a saddle on one of the Giant Chickens. With the harness done, she then attempted to ride it. Angel stood at the side silently observing while ordering the Giant Chicken to obey Debbie.
After running a few laps around the Manor-House, Debbie was satisfied with her test. Riding the Chicken back to Angel, she alighted then directed the walking bird back to its flock. Pulling Angel away so they were out of listening range of all the animals, she spoke:
“Erm... I don't know how to say this, but is it possible to buy those Giant Chickens from you?”
“From what you just did, you want to make them into mounts?”
“Yes, they are beyond my expectation. If the tourist comes into RR and ride them around, the experience would be excellent and unique, they will...”
- Angel then endured listening to Debbie prattled about tourism, safety and chocobos. -
“... and so, following that popular game in the previous era, we will name them chocobo instead of chickens.”
“So you want to buy those as rides for your Tourist” Angel Summarized.
“Yes!”
“One more question, why did you drag me away from the animals for discussion?”
“Heh... I don't know... its just that I have seen so many talking animals, I don't know if they can understand me or will they get angry over treating them as goods.”
“Oh... don't worry, the chickens are stupid... bird-brains... Anyway, you are lucky as chickens are one of the animals we are willing to sell, others like squirrels, racoons and cats are not for sale. I believe you had seen them talk, so you are right in your assumption when dealing with those intelligent ones... Since I am willing to Sell”
“And I am willing to Buy” Debbie happily caught on
“Lets get down to the finer details...”
*****
On an Evening of an undetermined later date:
A group of Chocobo riders were traveling in the outskirts of Serabroug. They had just finished visiting the twin moon lake, a scenic area where the calm surface of the lake reflected the full moon, drawing a serene picture. It was an awe-inspiring sight. Taking the fast running avian, the group was currently returning to Serabroug where they would stock up on food for exploration on the next day.
Under the bright ambient glow of scattered moonlight, a female garbed in a fancy cloak led the riders on their way back to the city. She differs from the others as she was instead riding a huge rodent. Although she kept claiming that the white rodent with brown patches was a hamster, members of the group teased her calling it a giant rat.
While the merry group was traveling noisily, the leading female suddenly held up her hand and addressed the others seriously.
“A group of 40 players has been sighted around 500m from here and they are moving towards us. There is a chance they are bandits. Estimated time to interaction is 10 minutes.”
“Wow, they are relentless”
“Didn't we meet one such group on our way to the lake?”
“But isn't such encounter fun, spice up the vacation by much”
For a group of slightly over 20 members, the possibility of being ambushed by bandits did not rain on their mood, instead, they were pretty happy about the meeting. Seeing that they were more then enthusiastic, the leader asked:
“Are we going to charge through like what we did in the morning or do you people want more action?”
“Action Action”
“Where is all the fun where we only escape”
“Massacre them, there is nothing to lose.”
Debbie could only sigh. The so-called vacation had taken a twist in its meaning. Although she was the leader of the tour group, she still had to cater to their whims as they were customers. From sixteen year old teenage girls to sixty years old grandpas, everyone seemed to be out for blood.
On their first encounter with bandits, the group was frightened and followed orders to just ride the chocobos to safety. However, once they saw the stampeding power of the avian runners, half the group turned back to stomp on the downed attackers. The rest did not take long to join with trashing their would-be assaulter. Tourist were not able to initiate attack on other players, but using 'self-defense' against banditry, they had every rights to kill.
From there, things went downhill. The group would purposely show off their gold in town and loudly proclaim they will be bring even more back at their return times. They aggravated the greed of other users tricking them to attack the group. Just like the current scenario, Player Bandits would try to rob these tourist just to be stampeded by the chocobos.
On her side, there was no losses. When a tourist dies, he or she would just respawn at the starting area. If the animals were slaughtered, as they were mounts, they would simply respawn in the stables after some time. The bandits would gain nothing, but somehow they kept coming.
Giving instructions to the tourist group on where to meet for dinner after gaming, Debbie sighed again before she hit the 'logout' button.
Ever since the start of this new Virtual Tourism, Debbie got a side job: Chocobo Stable Master. Players ranging from Newbies to Veteran Guilds would approached her to buy Chocobos. The running birds had proven to be better then horses in both appearance and usability; There was even a Guild that renamed themselves as
Even if the price of Chocobos were extremely high at 1500 gold per bird, they were always sold out, and each new batch took about a game month to produce. Sadly, even though Debbie was also selling Giant Hamsters as an alternative mount, nobody was interested. Due to their size, the hamsters lost their normally cute fuzzy looks and were claimed by the customers as 'Bears with the wrong face' or 'Giant Rats with the wrong color coat'
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