The dirt and gravel switchback track that we were following led steadily up the side of a very wide mesa. Sarah had taken charge of Queakers and was providing the bichon with a walking tummy rub that I wouldn’t have been able to pry the dog away from with all my strength. As we plodded along Jim and Karen filled me in on the situation with the rest of the team.
“We have a good mix of the basic classes represented in the team,” Karen explained. Lando is a Warrior, Jim is a Monk and Kelly is a Thief. I am a White Mage, Lyle is a Black Mage and Sarah is a Red Mage. Erin and Karl have the more basic class of Fighter. We aren’t quite sure about Queakers, yet. What is your class, Harris?”
“Well Karen. I am not really sure. It’s likely Tactician with rifleman and stealth specializations, but nothing was confirmed during my awakening. I don’t know what you all experienced, but I really struggled with some of those menus,” answered Harris.
Jim wore a surprised grimace when he said, “While we were waiting for you we all shared our experiences and they were very similar, Harris. After the blinding flash of light we all saw blue screens of text that described the Unified System, gave us a rundown on our quests, allowed us to select our classes, gave us a rundown on the tutorial and let us review our attribute points and talents before we appeared here to make the initial push to the safe zone and training ground. It was just like a video game, which was apparently an intentional decision by the Unified System to facilitate the transition following its review of our culture. Did something different happen to you?”
“Well–” drawled Harris. “It sounds like our initial experiences were similar, but I didn’t progress very far through the process that you described. I explored the system menus and then spent time putting together a complaint. Not sure if it will have any impact, but I wanted it on record that I am not consenting to this Unified System. I think that you know that I am all for a little might and magic, but this seems pretty bogus to me. I am not really sure what impact any of it has, except that our paths apparently diverged after seeing the initial blue screens. I am also avoiding the United System interface as a matter of course.”
“Ok. Harris. I can’t say that I am shocked that you did something like that, but I am not sure that is practical. I guess we’ll just have to see. It has been a crazy day and I don’t think that any of us have any idea what is really going on, but we all agreed that given what we have seen we should get to the safe zone and sort things out from there,” said Karen.
“Sure Karen. I am with you all the way,” I replied with a wink and his best effort at an endearing smile. Karen was great and if there was anyone who would get us through whatever was happening it was Karen. It was also great that Karen understood that it was going to be neither productive nor all that fulfilling to argue the point about using the Unified System with me. She would do her best to make sure it all worked out for everyone, including me, whatever I believed and however inconvenient it was, which is why I would do the best to not be a burden despite my stance on the topic.
“So where did Tactician with rifle and stealth specifications come from?” asked Jim.
“Well I did recognize that this was an awful lot like a game as I was trying to work my way through the initial screens and then the menus, so I made the suggestion as a part of my complaint. I mean it can’t hurt right? Anyhow, that’s the way that I choose to play it and I can’t change things now, so may as well make the best of it,” I explained.
“Well I guess I can’t argue with that,” said Jim with a smirk. We had played too many games together for Jim to bet against my ability to work a logic tree. We picked up the pace as the sun began to dip toward the horizon. The mesa had a steep rise and the winding path was taking time to traverse. When we finally reached the top it was twilight and we were greeted by another unexpected sight.
The entire top of the hill was surrounded by a pale, iridescent blue light. The rest of the team was nonplussed by this faint bubble of light in the lengthening shadows of the early evening, apparently having seen some images of the same as part of the initial integration explanation. The blue light was a barrier of sorts that prevented intrusion by hostile entities and facilitated natural healing and recovery. It also supported information collection for Unified System related quests that could occur in response to certain conditions.
Unlawfully taken from Royal Road, this story should be reported if seen on Amazon.
When we initially appeared in this new space we were in a relatively featureless grassland with the mesa rising imposingly in front of us, both high and wide enough to impair our view of everything but the open grasses behind us. After cresting the ridge of the mesa we could see a sea of trees spreading out before us. A taiga of pines, larches and spruces spilled out toward the horizon before us and turning around the grassland did the same. This was nothing like the forest of birches, black beaches and hemlocks that we had been camping in the night before.
The truly unexpected sight at the top of the hill was the pioneer type town that spread out from the crossroads near the center of the mesa. Timber buildings with rough hewn beams, shake roofs and wide wooden porches lined the street on each side. It was clear that the bounty of the taiga provided plenty of wood for construction and somewhere there must be a mill to generate the boards required for the finish work. Glass was clearly a bit of a luxury, but some buildings that appeared to be stores or restaurants featured ground floor windows with large glass panes. Despite the prevalence of wood in the outpost, brick and mortar and even concrete and adobe constructions were scattered throughout the outpost.
It looked like a little wild west frontier, but it was dead silent. There were stables with no animals, stores with no wares and saloons with no patrons. The town wasn’t huge, but it was definitely of a scope that it was unsettling to see it appear deserted. My better informed teammates apparently expected this as well. Their system induction explained that we needed to reach the safety of the outpost by nightfall given the “active nightlife” in the area and that we’d need to complete some basic tasks in town to prepare for the start of the tutorial in one week’s time.
Just past the crossroads in the center of the mesa was a residential structure best described as a small hotel. The ground floor had a central administrative area with a lounge on one side and a library on the other. The lounge had a bar with tables arranged in a central floor along with an upright piano and a glassed window facing the street outside. The library was surprisingly large with floor to ceiling bookshelves completely filled with richly bound tomes. The walls of the library were decorated with maps and there were large armchairs and small tables throughout perfect for reading.
Each of the main areas on the ground floor had a large fireplace for both heat and light. The fireplaces were made of stones that appeared to have been collected in the area and simply mortared together with a rough, natural fit. There was a chandelier in the lounge area with candles that could be lit and oil lamps in sconces or on side tables for additional illumination. As we took a quick tour of the ground floor we found plenty of firewood available and a large bunk out back full of additional seasoned logs.
The guest rooms were on the second floor, organized along a central hallway accessed through staircases on either side of the central administrative area. The lobby space had a very high ceiling that spanned both floors on the inn. A balustrade in the central hallway allowed one to look out over this area, but the rooms facing this balustrade were all locked. That left essentially two wings of rooms available on the second floor, one over the library and one over the lounge and kitchens.
There was a communal bathroom on either side of the hall in each wing, so four in all on the second level of the hotel. Mercifully these bathrooms were well equipped and had running water fed by a large cistern on the back portion of the roof of the building. The water was only warmed by the sun, so it was always going to be pretty darn chilly, but it could certainly be worse. The weather felt a bit like Oregon State currently, but we were apparently planned to be here a full year and if the seasons swung too cold we’d likely have a few plumbing problems to work through. That would certainly be worse.
There were more than enough single rooms for everyone to have their own and everyone claimed one, even Queakers. Well in Queakers’ case Sarah claimed it for the room next to hers for Queakers. Sarah was across the hall from me, each of us occupying a corner room over the library. Erin grabbed the room on the far side of Queakers and Lyle grabbed the room next to me. The rest of the team setup in the wing above the lounge.
The rooms on the second floor weren’t spacious or luxurious, but they were more than serviceable. Each room had a double bed, a small writing desk, a trunk and an armoire. Each room also had at least one relatively large glass window with external shutters and the corner rooms had a window on each exterior wall. Everything was well built and was relatively comfortable.
Yeah. If this was a progression fantasy, it really wasn’t all that bad. With starting accommodations like these it was hard to imagine that we’d be trying to sleep in trees or build a wizard lair in some dank cave. With this setup we also, and I can’t emphasize this enough, had no reason to be subjected to the smells that must be commonplace in many of those other situations. Unwashed people, poor sanitation, viscera, blood and the like must be a pretty sinister soup, so wearing that as your eau de cologne around town has always been one of the most disturbing conventions of the progression fantasy and Lit-RPG world to me. Especially when things get romantic in the field–like just no way. It looked like we would be at least spared a precipitous decline in our personal care and hygiene and that of our fellows, for which I was very grateful.