Later that night, Arena decided to get acquainted with the game. She made a ranger named Nayeli, resorting to the random name generator for something that hadn’t been taken. The number of people that played this game must be staggering.

When she finished the tutorial, an invite popped up from someone named Solitaire for a guild called Shattered Sodality. She accepted and a message flashed on the screen immediately in blue text from Jasmine, "Hi Nayeli! YAY! Welcome to the guild! Solitaire, send her some newbie gear," That had to be Lorna. "If you click on the tiny button on the bottom left with all the little people on it, you can see who's in the guild." She did, and it showed that Solitaire was a level 80 human cleric (who she already guessed to be Sterling), Jasmine/Lorna was an 80 elf mage, and Theseus was a 42 bard that had to be Nate. One, Renata, was a level 80 necromancer, in a different color, and had a special GM text next to it. She supposed it must be Anita, but she wasn’t sure. The others she couldn't quite pick out, though they were all much lower in level. Theseus, Renata, and the others were offline. She carefully added each one as a friend.

A message appeared in the middle of the screen that Jasmine was trying to summon her. She clicked "Accept" and the screen changed into a dark swamp. Solitaire and Jasmine were standing there. Solitaire wore a dark robe and had little bolts of lightning swirling around his head. He carried a large staff that glowed. Jasmine’s light pink and red robe were shockingly bright, and she had a fire sprite floating next to her. Her shock pink hair matched her robe.

"This area is way above your level, but we wanted to give you some gear," said Jasmine. Solitaire began to give her equipment, explaining in terse terms how it was used. They gave her a nice set of green armor and bow and explained how to summon her pets. Then they teleported her to a newbie zone and stayed with her while she did some quests. Solitaire healed her and put on what he called 'buffs', which gave her extra armor and more damage.

The blue text popped up again from Solitaire, which she now knew to be the guild chat channel. "This game is about territories fighting over one another, trying to capture one another's castle. We're in Aspherion territory and defend its castle. We can also exchange goods and kill monsters in our territory and in the neutral territories. We can kill monsters and even other players in other occupied territories. Originally, we intended to just use this to communicate, but it's fun in the off-hours."

Jasmine added, "And if we get a little bored and tired of hunting, we start dance parties in the market square!"

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"Correction, *you* start dance parties in the market square," responded Solitaire.

"Sometimes the party ends up in the hallway. Renata turns on the overhead music. Solly can get down. "

". . ."

Arena was laughing out loud.

"Stop laughing, Nayeli," wrote Solitaire. "I can hear you across the hall."

That made her laugh even harder.

Jasmine began a jig knee deep in swamp.

He raised his staff, and suddenly both her and Lorna's characters were running away in opposite directions. She didn't know how to stop it. None of the keys seemed to work. She stopped in the middle of the swamp, facing a large purple slug. It moved to attack and was engulfed in a single giant ball of lightning.

"Don't mess with the cleric," he said in guild chat.

Arena was still laughing.

A yellow notice popped up that Theseus was online. Lorna teleported them all to their guild hall.

“Greetings, my lady Nayeli, welcome to our humble little band!” Theseus made a flourished bow. He wore a brightly colored cape and a jaunty blue hat with a feather. Following them around as Lorna showed her the guild hall, he serenaded them with a lute and really bad poetry in guild chat.

"Theseus, if you use the word unicorn one more time, I'm going to guild kick you," wrote Solitaire.

"There isn't much else that rhymes with EULA form!" he retorted. Arena was afraid to ask what an EULA form was.

"C'mon, let's get Nayeli up to level 10 tonight. Then we can take her to the red rocks desert zone." Jasmine said. With Theseus’ and Jasmine’s help, Arena played her character to level 10. They took her to a desert region and she took a bunch of quests to kill scorpions and find things. She started to get some useful equipment and time was going fast.

"Do you ever use voice on this?" she asked in guild chat, remembering her roommate always was on a headset chatting with her guild.

"I talk to all of you enough," wrote Solitaire. "Besides, Theseus starts singing along with his lute and he won't shut up. Takes the bard thing a little too seriously.”

Theseus knelt in front of Solitaire. “I am ever humbly at your service.” Lightning suddenly rained down from the sky, tumbling over Theseus. “Brilliant! I always wanted special effects!”

"It might be better if we stayed in text,” wrote Jasmine. “Removes the possibility of being identified. They might find out I’m a fourteen-year-old boy."

“What, and then you’d get chased by all the fourteen-year-old girls?” Theseus threw his head back and laughed. “That’s my next alt!” Arena knew an alt was an additional character, and was probably what the rest of the characters in the guild list were. She would have to ask how they made their characters physically respond in the game.

Arena was starting to get the hang of playing the game and she was finding that she was really enjoying herself. She suspected it wouldn’t be as much fun alone, but with the constant ribbing and light sarcasm of the Misfits, it was a lot of fun. With their help, she got up to level 15 that night, though they all played later than they probably should have.