After the conversation with her boss, Aya spends the rest of the day waiting for someone else to call her about her attitude towards the president's secretary, even if she explained her history with Viviana it was unlikely the higher-ups would take her side.
Aya could imagine the woman's cruel smirking face as she's forced to quit the job she's worked for a year, all on the words of someone who didn't treat others with basic respect.
Aya's foot taps and taps on the floor. The girl was unable to sit still, counting down the minutes until the clock hits 5:00 pm so she could leave the office for the day and cool down.
Nothing happens and Aya is left heaving a sigh of relief once closing time comes around. She picks her bag up and rushes out the door before anyone could say anything to her.
She walks briskly toward the bus stop, almost running to the Seelim bus once it pulls up to the stop. Getting in, she greets the driver and heads to her seat with an exhale.
Aya wipes the building sweat on her forehead with the back of her hand and allows herself to sink into the worn cushions of the bus.
Comfortable as always.
Aya pulls out her phone, taking her mind off work with some research about the game, opening a web page to read about the pros and cons of each class she had taken interest in.
"Can I be both an adventurer and a production class?" She asks herself. Her evening routine goes on as usual, greeting the tired men that come on the bus and listening to music until her final stop for the night.
The bus stops at its usual resting spot and drops Aya off so she could begin the walk to her house all the while the girl stares at her phone, mumbling about the game.
----------
Aya enters the building still staring at the forum page she was reading, unbeknownst to her a figure approaches from the other side of the hallway, sipping on a drink from a nearby fast food place.
The two collide once more and Aya is shocked to see it's the same girl from earlier. Brown eyes narrow, glaring hard at Aya whose phone had clattered to the ground from the collision.
"You know you're really starting to piss me off." The girl growls. Aya sighs, placing her hands on her hips, the worry and exhaustion from her work day bleed into her voice as she speaks.
"Look I'm sorry about this morning, I was trying to catch the bus and I wasn't looking where I was going. You look new around here, maybe I can help you unpack or something as an apology."
The girl standing opposite her, sips loudly from her plastic cup, taking a long moment before she replies.
"Work eh? Come to think of it, you do look like shit, no offense." The girl says.
"Hey! I had a hard day alright." Aya protests.
"It shows." The girl replies with a smirk.
"I'm Mars." The girl says introducing herself.
"Aya." She says giving a polite smile in turn.
"Be a bit more careful when you're walking, not everyone's so nice." Mars mumbles, the girl squats down to pick Aya's phone up, scanning the page and noticing the Moon Valley tabs.
"You play?" She asks curiously. Aya nods.
"I just got into it not too long ago."
"What's your class?"
This content has been unlawfully taken from Royal Road; report any instances of this story if found elsewhere.
"Haven't picked yet, can't seem to make up my mind." Aya whines. Mars grunts, making an expression Aya can't read.
"What's your play style?"
"I want something to do the fighting for me." Aya says without much thought. "I've been thinking about it since my first quest. But I also want to do Production."
"Silly girl, production classes are job classes. You get 'em with quests." Mars says.
Aya gasps, holding her hands to her cheeks in embarrassment, she thought you could only do one or the other.
Mars smirks.
"Noob!"
"Hey!" Aya whines, folding her arms and sticking out her tongue, she finally gets a chuckle out of Mars who thinks she's cute.
"You're lucky you're cute." Mars says finishing up her drink
Aya could only laugh, taking a moment to observe the other woman. The girl is a full head taller than her, with dark hair cut asymmetrically in a wolf cut style.
From head to toe, she wears black starting with a black bomber jacket over a midriff tank top and black sweatpants.
A simple combination but stylish as well.
"Let me see your stats." Mars says holding out her hand for Aya's phone, the girl opens the Moon Valley app and hands it over. Soon Mars is scanning Yvlena's gear and gauging her abilities.
"Level 4 already, not bad." Mars says, thinking deeply. "Your stats aren't the best,"
"Hey!"
"Go for summoner." The girl finishes, handing Aya back her phone.
"But summon stones."
"You can find them if you grind hard enough, some NPCs also sell em, and of course the auction house."
Aya grimaces at the thought of having to shell out some of her gold to get a summon.
"With the right gear, I think you could be very powerful though, go for summoner, easier to get a production subclass with that." Mars says.
"Really? Why?"
"Trust me, Beast Master will have you looking over your new pets constantly, necromancer won't fit your play style as it's super offensive but summoner is well rounded. You aren't going to PvP are you?"
"PvP?" Aya asks, Mars raises an eyebrow, bursting into laughter.
"You really are new at this." Mars says ruffling Aya's hair.
"You have a fire stone too."
"Oh, yeah I noticed that. What does it do?"
"Allows non-mage classes to cast spells, it's pretty rare you should put it on the auction house for 10, 15 Gold."
"That's a lot of Gold." Aya says nervously.
"Trust me on this, if you get a high grade stone it sells for 50 and up." Mars explains. "Where'd you find this anyway."
"From a fox in Bloom Forest." Aya replies without hesitation, Mars flicks her nose, wagging a finger at her.
"Don't just share info like that." The taller girl says. Aya rubs her stinging nose.
"And yet here you are, giving it to me for free." Aya says with a smirk of her own. Mars throws her head back to laugh heartily.
"Yeah, I like you a lot, Aya." She says patting the girl on the head one last time before walking away, the sound of her boots on the creaky lobby floor fades as Aya heads up to her own apartment to think over what the girl had said to her.
Getting back up to her apartment after the run in with Mars, Aya checks the time to see that it's almost nine.
A bit later than she usually arrives, but it was worth it to make a new friend and learn some vital information she might not have come across herself.
As she opens the door, she spends her time putting the fire stone on auction for 15 Gold thinking nothing of it as she hangs her bag on the usual hook.
While brushing her teeth and changing, Aya takes the time to think about Mars. The girl had obviously been in a bad mood when they met earlier today but now she seemed surprisingly friendly.
"I wonder what she's doing in a place like this. She doesn't look like she belongs here." Aya says to herself. "Maybe she's just down on her luck."
Aya cleans up and changes into her PJs so she can begin another round of Moon Valley for the day.
After logging in she receives another round of Moon Points and potions so she proceeds with her Herb Gathering quest.
[Herbs Gathered
Fox Tail: 5/5
Bloom Lilies: 2/5
Star Root: 0/5
Luna Orchid: 5/5]
"Okay, so I made a ton of progress yesterday." Aya says.
After some fruitless searching which nets her a few more common spices, 3 Spring Yams, and Fox Tails, Aya gears up to challenge a new enemy.
"Guess I have no choice but to start attacking." She says moving her character to encounter some creatures.
She comes across a new enemy type, a pair of creatures shaped like mice but Aya knows they're dangerous from the look in their eyes. The mice lunge at her, Aya dodges letting them miss.
A battle begins.
The two mice barely do any damage against her, missing and missing until Aya deals the final blow.
"Wow, those guys were weak!" Aya says.
[Yvlena Acquired
EXP: 51/200
***
Star Root (Herb) x2
Mushroom x2
***
Moon Points x5]
"The field mice have the Star Root but not much else though, they don't even give good EXP." Aya says.
Continuing to search them out, Aya finds two more, one shotting them out of existence before they could even blink.
With that her Star Root hunt is complete.
[Yvlena Acquired
EXP: 64/200
***
Star Root (Herb) x2
Mushroom x2
***
Moon Points x10]
"Let's see how many herbs I have left, should be just the Bloom Lilies left."
[Herb Gathered
Fox Tail: 5/5
Bloom Lilies: 2/5
Star Root: 5/5
Luna Orchid: 5/5]
"Almost done." Aya says wandering through the beautiful forest, Looking for the rabbits or foxes that would have her final herb. Soon Aya's character finds herself in a darker area of the forest.
Bloom Forest L2, The label reads.
"L2, like level 2!" Aya gulps, the previous area was already pretty challenging before she leveled up to 4, this area seemed like it would be way more difficult.
The once emerald leaves were now a shade darker and thicker, less light filters through the area and the places once teeming with wildlife go quiet.
The second level of the Bloom Forest makes her nervous but Aya wanted to finish the quest today. She pressed on looking for any enemies she could fight to give her the herbs.
"I can't get stronger if I don't do this." She tells herself.
Strangely there are no enemies within the area she walks through, but rather than relieve her it only makes Aya more apprehensive.
Usually, a fox or two would have strolled by ready for her to attack it but not even a hint of an enemy drew near.
Soon the forest path stops in front of a dark hole surrounded by woven leaves.
Aya goes over to interact with it, bending over the leafy, gaping mouth of the opening.
A pair of glowing, green eyes open in the darkness. Aya backs away but out of the hole, something leaps into the air and lands before her.
The ground shakes, rattling at the force of the enormous creature.
It's a giant, fluffy horned rabbit. The biggest she had encountered so far. The massive beast towers over Yvlena, easily over the size of the tallest trees within the forest.
[You have encountered Hidden Boss: Horned Rabbit Queen]