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7:02 am Jinn, have you found anything yet?
9:30 am It’s been less than three days K, chill. I said I’d look and call if there was anything. Guess what? Nothing.
9:31 am I know, I know. Just... some of the folks in bugs & glitches, they said they’re getting more reports.
10:16 am Not from me. What about?
10:17 am Loading problems. Lag.
12:37 pm Sounds like a you problem K, not a me problem.
12:37 pm I’m pretty sure it’s not.
Ace flicked the message away and turned back to the old crate she was scavenging from. There hadn’t been any more problems since discovering Briny Breeze. Truthfully, her days were smooth and following a set schedule. Wake up, check progress, kill Tom in some way that upped her lowest CORPSE skill since he was a douchebag worth 20 xp, and then decide what to do for the day. Briny was warming up to her charms, especially since she kept romancing Saul and made sure to murder Joe from the shadows so no one could pin it on her. If anything, winning over Saul had been too easy. His whole shtick had been helping the community, so everything she did to gain xp, like the little errands and chores the NPCs gave her also gained his affection. After helping more than twenty people in town, he’d become available as a lover and fuck yes she’d taken advantage of that. Her fingernails scraped against glass.
“Sweet, a bottle of olive oil!” She checked it over carefully, feeling the smoothness to see if there were any cracks or leaks. Nothing. “Perfect! This’ll improve the food the diner cooks, and in turn, that’ll improve the morale of the town.”
*Cooking with Fire! - completed - New goal unlocked*
She set it in her backpack, which was lying in the middle of the room, and went back to digging through crates in the old warehouse. There was a ton of stuff here, and after she went through the easier things to sell, she was going to have to send some of the kids over here to pick through the remainder.
“Betty and Gare, with Orrin and Amber standing guard.” The younger kids worked the same amount of hours as adults did, and they were easier to order around. Also, just like how she leveled up, the more they did the same thing the better they got at it. She kicked the finished box to the side and stood up, very happy that the realism stopped at blood and didn’t include stiff muscles. She’d been in this part of the warehouse for hours, looking for items besides salt. Another reason to love places near the beach, there was usually someone who knew how to gather salt, others who knew about crabbing, clamming, or fishing, all of those activities depending on the area of course.
“And on to the next one,” she groaned, opening her status to see what the newest one was. Annoying, not being able to shoot straight for something and needing to plan things ahead of time. Tackling them two, or even three at a time was better than one by one, and she wasn’t going to let anything stand in the way of getting her prizes. Even as she started planning how to hit the next goal part of her mind wondered what type of weapon she’d wield.
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[Message detected; flagged as portal bound]
1:33 pm K, got some news for you! Met up with Mallow (tester Mallory Lowes). Says she died a few days ago and didn’t automatically respawn—took her 3 hours!! VICA isn’t responding to her either. Tried to get her to stay, but she’s a traveling merchant so she’s off.
2:15 pm Thanks Jinn! I’ve located her about half a day’s walk north from Briny Breeze, heading toward the mountains.
4:10 pm K, what the fuck’s going on? Not respawning? I’m not here to die.
4:10 pm System was slow to reboot her, but it did, so take heart. We’re checking into that.
4:11 pm And?
4:11 pm And nothing so far.
4:12 pm Just tell me if I need to hit the emergency deactivator.
A horrendous roar deafened Ace and she tore her eyes away from the distracting glow of the screen. A few minutes ago she hadn’t been seen as a tasty snack and she’d answered K’s message, but of course, in the few minutes it took them to reply, a hunting woiger had gotten a sniff of food and pounced.
“Always at the worst time!” she grunted, throwing herself to the ground and rolling under the creature’s jump. At least now she had a proper weapon instead of hoping for branches and a conveniently placed rock. With that in mind she grabbed her knife and sliced as hard as she could. Blood spilt onto the ground and spattered all over her right side.
1 woiger defeated - 25S xp, 5R xp gained
*Drop & Give Me 20 completed - New goal unlocked*
“Sweet. That’ll help up my strength.” One of her middle skills since Briny Breeze was a great place to scavenge and make new things, not exactly fight other beings and creatures. There was probably a place better for that *cough* the damned dismal swamp *cough* and she was happy not to be there. The beer here, mostly from before the apocalypse, were flavorful and harbored secret hints of cherry and other fruity flavors. Those lovely bottles were buried deep in her backpack and all of the piss-water beer was what she sold to Ronald at the Supply Shop.
A long box emitting a glowing light appeared before her.
Congratulations Ace ~ You have completed half of your goal list! As a thank you, you have been given a weapon personalized for you.
Ace’s CORPSE: Level 4 (179/500 experience points needed to level up)
Current XP Status:
20C, 20O, 5R, 30P, 5E, 25S
* Charisma II - 45/100
* Opportunities II - 45/100
* Reflexes II - 25/100
* Perception II - 7/100
* Endurance I - 83/100
* Strength II - 16/100
As your strongest skills are Charisma and Opportunities—
Stolen novel; please report.
Ace pumped her fist at that. It’d been difficult, finding small increases to both of those skills, but as she’d drawn nearer to hitting the first half of her goal she’d carefully followed her stats. Flirting with Mai, the one woman who baked in Briny added an extra 2C xp for the day and scanning the upper part of the broken clock tower allowed her to up Opportunities, Reflexes, and Endurance. Too bad she hadn’t been able to keep those at the same level as well.
—and so this staff has been configured for your character.
Wicked Quarterstaff of Ace
Two-handed weapon, length 1.8 m; weight 1.7 kg. Unbreakable.
The Wicked Quarterstaff of Ace is attuned to the soul of Ace. When held, Endurance is passively collected into the purple skull at the top, shown by a violet light. If a single eye is lit, there is a +2 Endurance for carrying items. If both eyes are lit, there is a 5% chance to use collected Endurance to get back up after being knocked down.
“...what?” Ace’s mouth dropped open. “No no no, you were supposed to buff my best stats dammit, that’s what I’ve been working on!” She re-read the message and tore into the box. It was an awesome staff, she had to admit that much. The top had a grinning skull carved out of the wood, brainless so to see the eyes better, and teeth sharpened into fangs. A rich dark brown flowed from the top to bottom.
As your strongest skills are Charisma and Opportunities and this item is to aid you in growing stronger, your lowest stat has been used and so this staff has been configured to your character.
“Ugh!” She looked over the staff again. “Not sure why it has a skull on it instead of just being a knot of wood, but hey, I’ll take it.”
She grabbed it, hefted it in her hands, and felt her smile grow wide enough to hurt. Not what she wanted, and certainly not what she’d been gunning for, but it could have been worse. It could have been breakable, or one use only.
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6:21 am Jinn, the problems are getting worse and I’m hearing rumors that this is a multi-level attack. I’m sending these messages by bypassing the normal system to reach you, and even then I have to keep looking over my shoulder every second. The office has become a war-zone, it’s not safe here anymore, there have been accidents from design to customer service. My friends... I can’t—I don’t know who’s behind this. Trust no one from the office. I’m depending on you. Please. Please don’t betray my trust too.
[Message found 6:35 am from Mx. Kay Oh, customer service representative #124 aiding tester #13, Jinn Livingstone, AN: Ace]
[Message hidden 6:35 am]
[Message deleted 7:03 am]
[Message sent 7:05 am; final destination re-routed]
7:05 am Jinn, I’m sending future messages by bypassing the normal system to reach you. More glitches and bugs have appeared, but it’s still safe. Everyone, all staff from design to customer service, is working on fixing these problems. I’m still depending on you to send me any information you find. Thank you.
8:12 am Yeah, already told you I would K. I’m not stupid enough to forget that in a week. Glad to hear things are getting better out there, permadeath’s a fucking scary thought. Tell me if anything new happens on your end. When this is over we’ll get drinks or something.
8:12 am Drinks sound good. I’ll pay.
Ace nodded and smiled. Perfect. It was always better to have the other person paying table charges and shit. She made a note to pick an expensive restaurant, then looked at the map in her hands again. One week later had written changes up and down the sides. There was Viston, a smaller town south of her, a small island past the waters that the locals said was haunted, and by comparing with Mallow’s map, there were places marked that she would have never known about, such as the North Narrow Passage Ranger Station, an encampment halfway down the rip she’d seen from Romeo’s place, and an old junkyard a little further southwest.
Today was a day for exploration. She’d topped off the water storage and food supplies, an extra NPC she had encountered on the road had joined Briny Breeze, bringing the population to a perfect 100, and everyone had a job to do. That meant she could visit Viston and see what the deal was over there. And of course, gain a shit ton of xp while working through remaining goals.
“Um, hey.”
She eyes the laggy youth shifting from foot to foot at the outer gate. Like most people around there was dirt pretty much ground into him, his clothing was ragged, and he wasn’t wearing shoes.
“Sorry Ace,” apologized Susan, the guard on duty. “I didn’t see him slip up.”
Ace concentrated on the kid. Lukas, age fifteen, good at farming.
“What do you want?”
“Wanna join. Heard rumors this place has food n’ water n’ beds!”
“Sure kid. Welcome to the community, your job’s taking care of the tomato garden.” A very slight glow appeared around his feet, green to show that he had a job and it was food related.
*People, Not Dalmatians completed - New goal unlocked*
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[Message detected; flagged as portal sent]
[Message hidden 9:08 am]
9:08 am K, haven’t heard from you and time’s almost up, I’ve got today and tomorrow morning until the game goes dark. Hopefully no news is good news. If everything’s been fixed and I’m checking for nothing, we’re going to Sunrise Splendor and you’re buying. I’ll at least warn you that I’m not a cheap drunk. I’ve accomplished almost all my goals, so I’m heading out with a friend to finish the last one and celebrate. You know how to get in touch with me.
[Message deleted 9:10 am]
Ace shook her head. She was more than a little annoyed that K hadn’t talked with her lately. On the other hand, she still hadn’t seen any problems, so maybe there really wasn’t anything to talk about. Whatever. She’d helped when she could, and now it was time to concentrate. She had an awesome weapon built for her, and there was only one goal left, one she hoped that meeting up with MS5 would be able to help with. Almost a full day to take care of one goal? Should be easy. She was going to own Briny Breeze if she could choose her location. With the time and effort she’d poured into the trade routes, water purification, and food storage, she’d rather have all of that than need to start at ground zero with another place. And the second one might not be as well situated. Ace tapped her status again.
Goals: 1 listed, 49/50 achieved
Twisted Imagination - Have more than ten mutations in total, including one that affects the brain
“And that’s the lingering fucker giving me a headache.”
She had five mutations for the thirteen days she’d been playing, and three of them had been given at the creation of her character. Now she was placing her hope in MS5. They’d contacted her a few days ago, sending a child messenger to Briny Breeze and asking if the person in charge there would like to talk to a traveling healer. Ace had jumped at the chance. It had been rare for fellow testers to pass by her settlement, and even better, the healer wasn’t one of the many assholes dominating the field. MS5, who was as frightening as a marshmallow in reality, made the arrangement to meet later on in a nearby meadow, south of the town and on the path that led to Viston.
So that’s how she was going to spend the rest of her time in OMR. Bring as much booze as she could carry, show off her quarterstaff, and try to figure out how to quickly add more mutations.
“There has to be some way to do it,” she muttered. “Otherwise, they put something completely random in a list that allowed everything else to be done with a little bit of hard work. Which wouldn’t make sense.”
Her trusty old backpack was still holding it together, so she grabbed that, setting it down on her bed and going over to a footlocker she’d found and taken. Some dried fish, potatoes, and bottled water joined a towel, a CD player that ran on batteries, and exactly two CDs. Little Armageddon by Skip the Use and Forever (Explicit) by Mystery Skulls. “Ghost,” her favorite after “Nameless World,” began to play. She snatched another bag that held all the great beers she had found, and set off out the door.
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[Message detected; flagged as portal bound]
[Message hidden 2:29 am]
2:29 am Jinn get out! It’s-
[Message deleted 2:30 am]