Currents shot down his arm and leg, crippling him, causing pain he never fealt before, thrashing in agony became his whole existense, nothing else was real, only pain.
"Lets go to the village and see if they have any real quests" Seth was taking command of their group again after the raid to the torture chamber and freeing the victims.
Carol shook her head "I have to log off soon and get some sleep before work", then she added "But it was fun playing with you so I'll try and come back tomorrow", she entered a cabin and payed its fee so it would become her respawn point and safe room.
Logging off she breathed hard, seeing Allen like that terrified her, thinking it could be her and not him was a horrible nightmare she never wanted to live through, deciding never to log to the captain Slom character unless Allen was fine she immediately sent him private messages and chat requests that he will recieve as soon as he got out of that horror show.
Another message she sent to Janice to see if her rebellion succeeded and a last message to the authorities she worded carefully to imply someone was tampering with NPC blockers and implants.
With a sigh she went to sleep and was haunted but even worse nightmares than usual, player characters had a wider feed than NPCs and the experience was much more vivid.
Waking up she found the forums buzzing with questions about special classes now called "resurgence classes", after checking the lists that different players put together she realised they were talking about NPC approved player characters, it was no secret to her that grinding those was a sure way to become over powerd if you put years into it, but compared to other types of characters it just wasn't worth it.
Getting the same stats a legendary sword was possible but took months of hard work where getting the sword was a simple as paying a few bucks, so why would anyone bother?
She posted her message about the stupidity of the whole discussion and got back to her day, eating breakfast alone in her cell, logging in to the NPC server selection brought her the list of current open NPC contracts and requests and she skimmed it until she found a group request for a healer.
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Picking her favorite NPC which was technically a healer put her in the shady inn where the quest started, "Hello there" she approached the group highlighted by the system "I hear you need a healer for your quest to hunt the abominable bushman".
Their jaws dropped, looking at the NPC approaching them was like seeing a legend come to life, she looked like an angel from some grotesque depiction of hell, spikes through her arms and body were linked by dark metal chains, her face had no features, just a blank slab of skin, a pain maiden was a healer only if you interpreted that term on a very broad scale.
"What the fuck did you call for moron?" one of the women in the group slapped the ranger looking guy on the head, "you were supposed to ask for a healer of our current level", she shook her head "now it will cost us double to call for something else".
"My name is Roman" he answerd, "and I didn't ask for this", he pulled up his request and sent it to her, "see, need NPC healer for grotesque bushman quest", stopping another slap to his head, "and im not paying for another one".
"Fine" she sook her head, "I guess we can work with that thing", she kicked his leg "but no kinky stuff".
They slotted Carol to their NPC role and started the quest, drawing stares from bistanders and players as they were walking down the street, which elicited a few elbows to Roman's side.
[System: Notice, side quest available to group, would you like to offer it? Y/N]
"We should go look at those ruines", Carol said after accepting the side quest prompt.
"What?" the woman turned and looked at her, "did you just speak?"
"We should go look at those ruines", Carol repeated and pointed to the side of the road.
"Why should we do that?" Roman chimed in.
"Did that NPC just speak?" a staff wielding fighter asked from the side.
"Yeah", the woman answered, "Duke I think we found a side quest"
"Never heard of a side quest on the Abominable Bushman hunt", he looked at Carol, "What do you think is out there?"
"I can hear the cries of fallen dwarves", she started the quest lines "guarding their treasures even in death".
Duke looked at the other woman "What do you think Lena?"
"I don't know", Lena said putting a hand on her sword, "I never heard of dwarven population in these regions".
Carol continued her narration "The dwarves were vanquished long ago", her voice emantaed from where she should have a mouth but her face never moved, "only their spirits haunt their long lost halls".