“All right,” John said. “That’s it for this session.”
“Did you see that!?” Carlos shouted as he pumped one fist into the air. “He was so shocked by the Anti-Mage bullet that I was able to [Backstab] him. You can’t cut me with a magic lightsaber when you’re dead, bitch!”
Carlos pointed his finger mockingly at the two-inch-tall miniature laying sideways on the game board. Octavian’s model had been knocked over to indicate that he had been slain.
“Those Spellblight bullets were a great idea, Vincent,” Elizabeth said. “How did you come up with that?”
“I don’t know,” I said, scratching my cheek meekly.
“You got it from an anime, didn’t you?” Carlos said with a smile.
“I can neither confirm nor deny the veracity of that statement,” I said, defaulting to lawyer-speak in my equivocation.
“Maybe you should wait until you’re actually a lawyer before you start talking like a President,” Elizabeth said.
“Speaking of which,” John interjected, cutting our conversation short, “I’d like to run one more session to end the campaign. I want to run the next hundred years and see what your characters do with the rest of their lives.”
“Rest of their lives…” Carlos trailed off. “That’s a bit heavy, man.”
John shrugged. “You guys have been adventuring for the past two years and killed every one of Vairekhor’s problems that can’t be handled by the local militia. The world won’t have to deal with another threat on your level for the next hundred years.”
“Well, Vinzadir will be dead by then,” Elizabeth said, looking at me with a mixture of sympathy and mockery.
“Damn elves,” I said with a smile. “You guys live too long. I guess you’ll just have to deal with my dozens of grandchildren.”
“Dozens of gunslinger grandchildren,” Carlos muttered with a smile. “How horrifying.”
Elizabeth looked at the corner of the room, her eyes wistful. “Elstine will probably settle down after a few years.”
“Sure she will,” Carlos said sarcastically.
“What do you mean by that?” Liz shot back.
“All I’m saying is we all saw how Elstine’s attempts to flirt with the Prince went,” Carlos said with a smile. “I believe it ended with the line, ‘I like you as a friend.’”
“Elstine gets more action than both Slader and Vinzadir combined!” Elizabeth responded without hesitation.
Our campaign had been running for more than a semester before I realized that Liz could be just as crass as Carlos or me. Before that point, I had viewed her as one of the “popular kids” who was only a temporary visitor to our campaign. Much to my delight, under that polished exterior, she was just as imperfect and vulgar as the rest of us.
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“And I suppose he goes to a different school?” Carlos chuckled.
John cleared his throat and spoke once more. “We should figure out a good time to hold this session. Are you all free at the same time next week?”
Unfortunately, circumstances forced me to raise my hand and say, “Sorry, but that won’t work for me. Exams at the Law School start a week earlier than the others. I have my Worker’s Comp. Exam that Monday, and I really need to spend that whole weekend in the library.”
“That’s fine,” John said. “I’ll just put a form in the Discord, and everyone can fill out their schedule over the next two weeks.”
“Works for me,” Carlos said with a shrug.
The four of us left the basement of Dey Hall on the northern campus of UNC. I’m fairly certain we weren’t supposed to use those big empty classrooms for our RPG sessions, but nobody ever stopped us, and they didn’t lock the doors to the building until the morning after we held our weekly meetings. Night had fallen hours before, and the quad next to Dey Hall was lit by more than a dozen bright streetlights.
I followed Carlos onto one of the many brick walkways that crossed Polk Place, and Wilson Library loomed beside us. The library’s marble pillars and gargantuan dome seemed almost monstrous in the artificial lighting. Wilson had always seemed more to me like a castle than a library.
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Slader’s dark hood and leather armor concealed his form well in the darkness of night. Though the ascended torches cast us all in a bright orange glow, he melded into the darkness like a phantom. Perhaps it was the elven cloak he wore that allowed him to scatter light and conceal himself so well.
“Hey, guys. My roommates and I are throwing an end-of-term party at my place. You guys are welcome to come,” Slader said with an uncharacteristically relaxed posture.
I was Vinzadir once again. It was an inopportune time, so I closed my eyes tightly and slowly began to count.
One… two… three.
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When I opened my eyes, the long black cloak and leather armor was replaced with a Hawaiian shirt worn as a short-sleeve jacket, a graphic T-shirt, and plain jeans. I was Vincent.
In my moment of confusion, Elizabeth responded, and I only caught the second half of her statement.
“...be alcohol at the party?”
“Of course,” Carlos said, offended at her insinuation that he would throw a party without alcohol.
“Sure, I’ll take some of your booze,” Liz said.
Cautiously, I said, “I’ll go if I can crash at your place overnight.”
“You okay with the couch?”
“Of course.”
“What about you, John?” Carlos asked.
“Sorry, but I need to get back and feed my animals. I’ll see you guys next week, though.”
“See you then,” Carlos responded.
After we said our goodbyes, John went east, and the rest of us went north. Carlos, Elizabeth, and I took my 2007 Honda Accord over to Carlos’ home about a mile to the north. With the slow-moving traffic endemic to the center of UNC’s campus, walking probably would have been faster, but I had to move my car before it got towed.
In less than an hour, I was sitting on a couch with a red solo cup filled with cheap vodka. Someone else might have found the accommodations offensive, but the cheap alcohol and cramped space of Carlos’ living room filled me with nostalgia. I wondered if that would be the last time I ever attended a college party.
I was correct, of course, but not for the reason I thought. Within twenty-four hours of that moment, UNC would be destroyed, and the concept of colleges as I knew it would be changed forever.