Chapter 260: The Morning After
The morning sun peered in through the living room windows of Jillian’s house, creeping slowly across the carpet until arriving at the base of the couch. From there, they slowly made their way up to her face, and once shining directly onto her closed eyelids she winced and opened them.
The first thing she looked at was the natural morning daylight, but could hardly differentiate it from the virtual rising sun that she’d been seeing within the game world. She wiped a small streak of drool from the side of her mouth before rubbing her eyes to try and clear up their grogginess, then scratched her stomach over her baggy white t-shirt that she’d slept in.
She could hear the sound of the birds chirping outside, but they were somewhat muffled by two voices talking enthusiastically. She sat up on the couch and turned her head to look up at the source of the voices - a news broadcast was playing on the living room television.
> “Honestly, I don’t even think Juan’s guild team is even going to survive the preliminaries.” One commentator said as they pulled up a screen of team-names. Jillian could quickly recognize some of the names on display and tell what was being discussed.
>
> “Really? They’ve gotten past the preliminaries plenty of times in the past though.” The second and female commentator replied in a surprised tone.
>
> “Yep. The competition this time around is going to be that tough.” He shrugged. “If it was on skill alone, maybe… but, Feng’s guild, Makaroth’s guild… they’ve all got powerful gear and high level members. Any discrepancies they have in skill, they’ll make up for in other areas.”
>
> “What about Eerie’s team?”
>
> “Hm, that’s a tough one… It could go either way. They’re gonna be ones we keep an eye on. Their specialty is best of 5’s, so if they can make it to the main matches they’ll do well…”
>
> “How well are we talking? Do you think they’ve got a chance to finally dethrone Seraxus?”
>
> “Pfft, no way. At least, I don’t think so. What are your thoughts?”
>
> “I think this tournament is just going to be a battle for second place, like always. And anyone who is unlucky enough to get his side of the bracket is just going to have to head home early.” The commentator shrugged.
Jillian rolled her eyes at the screen and quickly tapped her wrist implant to change the broadcast over to Aegis’ livestream after briefly glancing at his Simbox across the living room from the couch, where he was still playing inside. To her surprise, though, Aegis wasn’t currently livestreaming himself. Instead, she was presented with Hae-won as she was engaging with Aegis’ audience over old footage of Aegis when he was taking on the Advanced Shield Mastery quest.
> “It is something we need to take into account guys, certainly.” Hae-won said in response to one of the audience’s chat messages. Aegis’ chat was visible on the stream as she interacted with them, and it was clear she was paying more attention to the chat than the old footage on display.
>
> “Yeah, but see, that’s different. That’s not what we’re talking about.” She shook her head. “Ultimately, the question is, does it qualify as losing your virginity if it's in a virtual world? Or should you still be considered a virgin?”
The moment Jillian heard this, she began paying a whole lot more attention to the message that the chatters were typing. Her eyes went wide with confusion, but it didn’t take her a long time to piece together why this was Hae-won’s current topic of conversation. She went through several more emotions after this, but eventually landed on a devious smirk as she stood up from the couch and walked over to Eli’s Simbox.
“I’m going to make some breakfast. Do you want something?” Jillian asked after pressing down on the touch screen of the box to activate the communicator.
> “Huh? Uh, yeah. Yeah, I’ll be out in a minute.” Aegis replied back, sounding as though he’d just been shocked awake.
“Okay. I’ll whip something up for both of us.” Jillian replied. She then headed to the kitchen to do exactly that, and a few minutes later she could hear the sound of the Simbox opening and Eli stepping out.
“Shit… uh…” She heard him blurt this out, sounding flustered and confused for a moment. Jillian’s devious smile grew wider but she continued preparing eggs in a pan on their electric stove.
“Everything okay?” She called out through the house.
“Huh? Uh, yup. Yeah, everything’s fine. Just gotta go to the bathroom.” Eli replied hurriedly, before he ran through the house to the bathroom and shut the door quickly behind himself. The bathroom, being across the hall from the kitchen door, meant that she could still hear awkward panicked sounds coming from within. Whatever Eli was doing, it wasn’t using the toilet.
“You sure you’re alright?” Jillian asked after she heard two bottles getting knocked over.
“Yup. Yeah. Just fine. Just a little sleepy, that’s all.” Eli called out back through the door. After a few more moments of commotion, Eli stepped out of the bathroom holding a bunched up ball of clothing - the simulation suit that he’d been wearing. Now, instead, he was wearing a bathrobe. He did his best to hide from his mom what he was holding, but she could see it in clear view from the kitchen doorway as he took it and headed to the wash-dryer machine and threw it all inside.
“Something happened with your Simulation suit that I got you?” Jillian asked.
“Huh? No, nah.” Eli replied flustered as he made his way into the kitchen finally, just as Jillian was setting down plates of breakfast for the both of them. The smell of fried eggs and toast filled their noses. He pulled up a chair and sat down but saw his response didn’t satisfy his mom’s curiosity. “I mean, yeah, I just spilled toothpaste on it just now, that’s all. Gonna wash it before going back in.”
“Oh, really? You didn’t brush your teeth though.” Jillian raised her eyebrows at him as she sat down as well.
“No, yeah, of course, not yet, because I spilled the toothpaste.” Eli replied. “Thanks for the breakfast.” He tried to change the subject while quickly diving into the meal. Jillian pretended to shrug and lose interest, beginning to eat as well. A few moments of silence later, though, she couldn’t help herself.
“You know, those suits are designed for that sort of thing. You can detach the lower part and wash it in the sink really quickly, you don't need to put it in the wash-dryer.” She said without making eye contact with him.
“Huh, really?” Eli replied initially with interest, but quickly realized what her words implied. “I mean, why would you mention that though? How do you know where I spilled the toothpaste?”
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“Oooh I think we both know it’s not toothpaste you’re trying to clean off of it.” Jillian shrugged with her eyebrows, but still avoided looking at him.
“What? You think I wet myself?” Eli asked with an exasperated tone, his cheeks brightening to a cherry red. Jillian didn’t dignify this with a response, but instead looked him in the eyes with a look only a mother could give her son to let them know that she already knew.
“You want me to wash it for you? I read the manual so I can show you how to detach it.” Jillian suggested.
“No. Mom. C’mon. Seriously? What are you even talking about?” Eli shot up from the table. “I’ll wash it right now, myself. The toothpaste, I mean.”
“Of course.” She feigned ignorance, going back to her meal as if nothing of significance was happening. Eli rushed out of the kitchen to get his suit out of the wash-dryer, but as he did he could hear the sound of Hae-won talking over his broadcast. It only took hearing a few sentences for him to pick up on what she was discussing.
“Damnit, Hae-won.” Eli grumbled to no-one in particular as he stomped and huffed his way back into the bathroom. It wasn’t hard for him to figure out how to detach the groin area of the simulation suit and wash it under the sink, just as Jillian had suggested.
“I’m done eating. Gonna hop in. Is Lina still logged in? I’d like to chat with her.” Jillian called to him through the closed bathroom door.
“Mom, don’t you dare say anything to her. Don’t say anything weird, okay? Hae-won’s making it weird enough.”
“Why, was it weird?”
“No, it wasn’t, it was gr- look I’m not talking about this with you.” Eli shouted back at her through the door, completely flustered. Jillian held back laughing to the best of her ability as she put her own suit back on over her clothes and made her way back to her Simbox.
“Ah, I love my son.” She smiled, shaking her head to herself.
“C’mon mom, promise you won’t say anything.”
“Okay, okay, fine, I won’t.” Jillian sighed before climbing into the Simbox and beginning the simulation.
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Pyri re-appeared in the clearing as Lina was in the process of packing up her tents from the night before. Pyri also took note that many of the trees that had been destroyed from their battle with the Manticores were already being regenerated and growing back quickly.
“Morning.” Pyri smiled at Lina and waved.
“Good morning.” Lina smiled back, meeting her eyes briefly before going back to packing up the tents.
“Need any help with that?”
“Nope, I’m okay.”
“Okay.” Pyri shrugged, watching her intently. She kept her eyes locked on Lina’s face, trying to see any changes in expressions, but saw none - which she found boring. Temptation began to rear its head in Pyri’s mind as she prepared to ask a question as vague as possible, but was prevented from doing so by the appearance of Darkshot as he logged into the gameworld nearby.
“Ahhh.” Darkshot stretched and yawned loudly. He then took a deep breath and sucked in all the virtual air he could. “Nothin’ like fresh wilderness in the morning.”
“Good morning.” Lina politely said to Darkshot.
“Morning.” Pyri joined in on the greeting. Her mind was still on the cleverest, most indirect question she could ask Lina, but she was beaten to the punch.
“How was your night last night?” Darkshot asked with a mischievous tone.
“It was nice…” Lina replied, but as she did she looked at Darkshot and saw the slight grin on his face that said he knew, and her face quickly reddened.
“Darkshot…” Pyri gave him a disapproving look which wiped the grin off his face and made him clear his throat. She was happy for an opportunity to take the high road while still getting to see Lina’s awkward reaction, but it was enough for Lina to see that Pyri knew as well.
“You guys… saw?” Lina asked shyly, avoiding eye-contact with them as she put the last of her tent away.
“Nah. Hae-won’s been going off all morning though.” Darkshot chuckled. Lina quickly bent her knees so she was in a ball and slapped her hands over her bright red face. Before more could be said, Aegis appeared inside the game world with a look of urgency on his face - everything in his bones told him he’d needed to log back in quickly to protect Lina from Pyri. Unfortunately, seeing her with hands over her face, he knew he was too late.
He let out an exasperated huff of air to show his disappointment in both Darkshot and Pyri as he started fidgeting with his interface to turn his profanity filter back on, then activated his livestream broadcast.
“Yo. Hae-won. I heard you talking. Stop saying weird stuff.” Aegis said, directing his voice to his live streaming icon as his viewership was already sitting at 100, 000 viewers the moment he’d flicked it on due to Hae-won’s discussion. “You guys, too. We didn’t do anything weird, it’s normal to do that stuff with someone you love.” Aegis said in a commanding voice.
His speech worked better than he had hoped, all attention fell off of Lina immediately and Darkshot and Pyri both looked at him with wide eyes of shock. He didn’t understand why, immediately, until Lina as well stood back up and turned to face him with a wide-eyed, shocked expression.
“What?” Aegis looked around them confused.
“You just said…” Lina weakly got the words out before she was interrupted.
“Yo! Aegis!” Rakkan shouted excitedly, running towards the group while accompanied by his echoes. “Aegis, you’re never gonna believe it!” he cheered. In the few seconds it took for Rakkan to run towards them across the clearing, Aegis realized why they were shocked, and what he’d accidentally said. He cleared his throat and desperately diverted all focus onto Rakkan, marching towards him.
“What’d you find?” Aegis asked.
“The rest of the stone fragments. They were scattered around the ruins like you said. My skills helped me find them though. Look, I pieced together the fragments and it looks like some sort of map. I think it leads to a hidden dungeon entrance.” Rakkan said as he pulled a tablet from his inventory. It had cracks, but the many pieces that he’d puzzled together were holding as if some magical adhesive was sticking them together.
“Really? That’s awesome.” Aegis responded with forced enthusiasm. The others, however, continued to stare at the back of Aegis’ head with expressions of disbelief.
“Yeah. See here? This has got to be the entrance. I bet it’s gonna be the highest level dungeon on Kalmoore.” Rakkan replied excitedly.
“Nice. That’s great.” Aegis answered, pretending to be extremely interested in the tablet. Rakkan took this time to look at the others, and only then did he notice the awkward atmosphere.
“Did something happen?”
“Huh? Nope. Nothing happened.” Aegis shook his head at Rakkan feverishly. “Let’s keep grinding Manticores. We can mark the location of the dungeon but, in case it’s too dangerous we oughta hold off going inside for now. We’ll have to come back after we’re done with this tournament business.”
“Oh, right, okay. Well, all the manticores we killed have already respawned. Should I start grouping them up?” Rakkan asked.
“Yup. Great idea. Everyone, let’s start rounding up Manticores and start grinding.” Aegis clapped loudly. “Hustle, hustle, no time to waste.” He motioned them to scatter into the surrounding forest ruins.
Pyri rolled her eyes at him, holding back laughter as she cast fly on herself. Lina shadowstepped away as fast as she could, and Rakkan took off with his echoes. Only Darkshot stayed back to lock eyes with Aegis.
“C’mon, you gotta pull some Manticores too, with your arrows.”
“Mhm.” Darkshot pulled his lips to the side. “Whatever, loverboy. It doesn’t count ‘cause it was virtual, by the way.” Darkshot said while turning to head away from Aegis.
“Hah? Of course it does. It’s basically the same inside the simulation.” Aegis replied defensively.
“Ah! So it did happen!” Darkshot turned back with a devious smile.
“Just shut up and pull some manticores.” Aegis shouted at him angrily, and Darkshot quickly ran off while cackling over his shoulder at Aegis.
“Man. Buncha morons.” Aegis shook his head to himself in disbelief. “They’re like middle-schoolers. You too, Hae-won.” Aegis grumbled. He needed a few more seconds to clear his head, though. Several deep breaths later and his skin returned to its normal color - his focus went back on the task at hand as he heard the stomping footsteps of rampaging Manticores that began to pursue his party through the surrounding forests, closing in on him.