Items.

University Badge - allows unfettered access to the West Shilgrave University grounds.

*New* Cat Map (Singular-decays) - A marked-up copy of a map of West Shilgrave with circled locations where cats have been known to appear. Received from Olamida. Disappears after an unknown number of uses.

*New* History of Icounada Kingdom, Ancient - A pamphlet that summarizes the history of the Icounada Kingdom, from inception to +100. It is used to train Scribes in basic penmanship.

*New* History of West Shilgrave - A pamphlet that summarizes the history of West Shilgrave in the Sheljour Isles, from inception to +500. It is used to train Scribes in basic penmanship.

*New* Widow’s Siege, Primer - A double-sided pamphlet that describes the Widow’s Siege monument. It acts to discriminate against applicants screening for the Scribe class.

“Well, I’ve got three new items: two histories and a primer of Widow’s Siege.”

Mida perked up. “A primer? That’s the test we give to aspiring scribes. It shouldn’t be in there…no harm that it is, as maybe it’ll be helpful, but I think that means my scribes are getting lazy and storing papers where they shouldn’t.”

“I didn’t try with your memory cube, and I don’t recall how Flor activated the lockpicks, but I’m going to see if I can activate them from the inventory.”

Alastair activated the first book on the list. An image of the book opened and then was overlaid by a ten-by-ten grid that reminded Alastair of a crossword puzzle. However, there were numbers in each square, and some of the squares also had a letter in addition to the number. Alastair noted a full alphabet arranged in a grid at the bottom. It took him a moment to realize that the numbers in the grid went up to twenty-six and that four of the letters were already filled. I have no idea what I’m doing. What puzzle is this? Maybe Flor knows. He selected to quit out of the puzzle.

Quit Puzzle? Lose 30 minutes and 1 energy. Yes/No?

To not disturb him, Flor and Mida chatted quietly. Alastair coughed so they would realize that he was out.

“Success!?” asked Flor.

“No. Not this time. I don’t know how to do these puzzles. I didn’t want to take the time to figure it out, so I took the penalty and quit.”

“What was it?” Flor asked. Alastair described it. Flor listened, nodded, and said, “It sounds like a codeword puzzle. I can imagine they aren’t easy to figure out without a tutorial. I guess I can give them a go.”

“You’ll have to teach me later, since we may rely on both of us knowing them someday.”

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Flor nodded and then went into the puzzle-solving state.

Mida said, “Well, I guess you learned something.”

“Oh yeah? What’s that?”

“That you can access the items from your interface and that there is at least one additional form of puzzle out there. Let me make some notes on that.”

Alastair took a moment to enjoy the silence. After hours of dumping his knowledge into a notebook and failing a puzzle, he appreciated dissociation. Before long, though, his mind wandered to consider the many things they didn’t understand about this game or how to escape it. Why wasn’t there some sort of emergency relief valve? Or why even they were stuck in it in the first place?

Someone touched his shoulder and held a light in front of his face. He blinked, and Mida’s face was staring at him closely. “Breathe, slowly, keep going,” she said. “Oh, there you are. Keep breathing. You might want to put your head between your legs or lay on the floor. Breathe in slowly, and exhale slowly. You seem to be in self-induced shock. Breathe. You have to work through it, but it’s possible to come through.” Eventually, she helped him get his head between his legs and encouraged him to breathe slowly.

His head was still between his legs when Flor came out of her puzzle interface. “Success! We now know the history of West Shilgrave, abbreviated.” She looked over, shock on her face, and hurried over. “What happened?”

“Seems like a panic attack or something. I was working through notes and saw his face grow red and his breathing shallow, and then he just stopped. So I worked him through some breathing exercises to help him through it. He should recover shortly.”

“What do you think caused it?”

“No idea. I wasn’t paying attention to him, and he was quiet for a while.”

Flor knelt and put her hands on his knees. “Alastair. Hey, it’s your wife. Can you hear me?” He nodded. “Keep breathing slowly until you feel okay. We’re here for you. Mida, can you fetch some water for him? And maybe a cloth that I can dampen? He seems warm.”

“Sure, right back.”

Flor kept talking gently to Alastair until Mida came back. Flor held up the water for him, but he shook his head. She dampened the cloth and held it to his head. A minute later, he took the rag from her, leaned back, closed his eyes, and continued breathing slowly. Another minute later, he opened his eyes again.

“Can I have that water now, please?” He accepted the cup and drank slowly, then quickly drained it. “Sorry to cause such concern. I think I’m better now.”

Mida said, “Take your time. You two are fascinating. Even though it may seem like I was kicking you out earlier, there is no rush to leave.”

“What do you think happened, Alastair?”

He considered for a moment. “I was thinking about how pissed off I am that there is so much we don’t know. This isn’t just like a lack of tutorial to not understand it, but like a frustration that the game is so poorly designed it doesn’t even allow for rage quitting.”

“I can’t remember you hyperventilating before, though. Maybe the rage component is affecting you somehow.”

“It would be doing the same to you, though.”

“Probably, but I haven’t been frustrated at anything yet. So, maybe it would manifest the same way if I did,” she said. “I don’t know if this will put you in a better mood, but I solved that puzzle and we should both have some inherent knowledge of West Shilgrave. Maybe it’ll be useful in helping us solve the puzzle that is this place and escape.”

“Well, should we get at it? Give Mida a bit of time to go through her notes. We can try to track down some cats based on the map in the inventory, see if we can find some unique items, and maybe find a tavern other than the Onion?”

“Sure. Let’s change the order a bit, though. If we find unique items, we’ll likely spend all our coins and have to sleep at the prison tavern tonight, but we’d need to return late enough that we’re not called to the search party.”

“The Mayor can stay lost in the woods for all we care, right? Great. I think I’m steady enough to get to my feet. Thank you, Mida. We may return tomorrow. Or not. We’ll see how our morning goes.”

As they walked for the door, Flor said, “Please include a reminder that we will probably return around the same time tomorrow, if even for a moment. You’ve been a great help!”