Josh limped down the steps towards the campfire. His body ached all over, and his skin felt sticky and clammy with dried sweat. He hadn’t washed since he’d arrived in the world, and now he felt faintly embarrassed by that. That morning there had been a communal bowl in the Benton household for people to wash their face and hands in, and it had been easier for Josh to decline when it came to his turn rather than insisting on clean water for his own personal use.

As soon as he got within six feet of Frenxy, he could feel the same tickle he had got from Shuriken right before he attacked, and he gave her a quick, alarmed glance. She had picked up her crossbow again, but it was dangling by her side rather than pointed at him.

“How do you view character sheets?” Josh asked, when he reached the bottom of the steps.

“You just need to look at someone and focus like you do when you bring up your own character sheet,” Var said.

“Oh cool! Do you mind if I do that with you guys? Can anyone tell if you look at their character sheet?” Josh was deliberately amping up his naivete and enthusiasm, although he couldn’t tell how well it was working yet.

Var sat down, and the others followed suit, although instead of sprawling on the ground they now perched on the logs.

“You can look,” Var said.

Josh focused on them one by one. Transparent windows popped up each time he did, but the information was sparse.

[Frenxy

Master Alchemist

Level 21

Player rank: 389

Gladiator rank: 276

Kills: 62 | Deaths 35

Karma: -1,200]

Var was actually Varian, a level 29 commander. Meestra was spelled Mistrz, and was a level 25 man-at-arms. Drunk Guy—his name was Wook—was a level 19 tailor, which explained the group’s fancy outfits. Their player ranks were in the 300-400 range, and their gladiator ranks were sitting around the 200-300 range, except for Varian, who was ranked at 186. They all had thousands of points of negative karma. Josh was hoping desperately that the same rules held here as they did in Spiralia Online, and that he was too low level to offer them any experience if they killed him. It felt like a flimsy shield against their combined, speculative stares.

They must have been inspecting him as well, because Wook said, “What the hell is a plumassier?”

“You put your real name in?” Frenxy crowed. “That’s so cute!”

“Nine hundred and ninety first player,” Mistrz said shortly to Varian, not even bothering to address Josh. Varian twisted his mouth thoughtfully.

“What class choice did the Guardian give you?” Varian asked.

Josh hesitated.

“Just plumassier. Those were the only slots left.”

They all glanced at each other.

“That means the fifth assassin slot was taken,” Varian said, his eyes gleaming. “There’s a baby assassin in play, boys!”

“It’s been four weeks since Kenway got iced,” Frenxy complained. “Stormzy probably picked the new guy up in less than a day. We got no chance.”

Stormzy? The Storm King? If he was the leader of the scourge did that mean he was also an outlander? Josh should find out more about Kenway, since it sounded like he'd been killed and not resurrected.

Mistrz had been busy cutting glistening slices off the haunch of venison.

“Worth checking out,” he said, eyes on the meat.

Varian nodded, then turned back to Josh.

“How did you get so far from the starter zone?”

“I didn’t check my character sheet until the evening of the first day I arrived, so I didn’t see the quest to go to Leybeck until then, and by that time I was miles away.”

Frenxy gave a little snort of laughter. It was clear she thought it had taken Josh the whole of that first day just to work out how to open it. He bit down on the urge to correct her.

“Just as well,” Varian said, with lazy authority. “Stormzy has agents in Leybeck. You wouldn’t have stood a chance.”

“What happens if Stormzy gets you?” Josh asked cautiously.

“You’da been his slave, that’s what,” Frenxy said. “Ain’t nothin’ happens in there what don’t have his say so.”

That sounded like a lucky escape for Josh.

Mistrz had started handing out slices of meat to the others. Josh noticed that he gave Ophala’s portion to Varian, instead of directly to the girl herself, and there was no portion for Josh until Varian jerked his head and said, “Give the noob some too.”

There was silence for a little bit. Varian hand fed bits of the venison to the village girl in a way that made Josh nauseous. He wasn’t the only one, he saw—Frenxy was disgusted too. Mistrz just ignored her as if she wasn’t there. Josh decided this was probably the best course of action, and glanced down as his own portion.

There were bloody juices leaking out of the meat onto the leaf that served as his plate. It suddenly reminded him of Reiner’s axe slashing into Shuriken’s body over and over again, and the trail of blood from the raw wound in Gerill’s throat, and the way Josh’s knife had slid into the assassin with only a little resistance, as if he was cutting butter, and suddenly it was all too much. Josh dropped his portion of meat and sprinted over to a patch of thick weeds, where he emptied the contents of his stomach in a series of involuntary heaves. He hadn’t eaten since morning, so what came out was mostly a few teaspoons of bile. He knelt there, grasping for breath, then wiped his mouth.

He just wanted to walk out of the amphitheatre and never speak to these arseholes again.

Once he’d regained his composure he took a deep breath, summed up every scrap of willpower he had, and walked back to the campfire.

“Sorry,” he said. His voice sounded thick and ragged.

They were all regarding him with bemusement.

“You vegetarian?” Frenxy asked. She said it with all the scorn a dedicated PC gamer would use for someone who played on a console.

Josh shook his head.

“No.” He tried to think of an excuse, and his mind flashed back to Goodwife Benton expertly pulling the slimy mess of entrails and other innards out of the chicken carcass this morning. “They made me kill and gut a chicken this morning, and it just ... reminded me...”

“Who did?” Frenxy asked.

“The villagers. In Haven.”

She appeared to find the concept highly entertaining.

“Why d’ya do it? Why didn’t you just refuse?”

Josh blinked at her.

“I couldn’t ... I mean, they offered me a bed for the night and gave me food. It seemed rude to say no.”

Frenxy laughed so hard she nearly fell off her log.

“Oh my god! That’s so funny!” To Josh she said, “They ain’t real people you know.”

“What do you mean?”

Unauthorized tale usage: if you spot this story on Amazon, report the violation.

“They’re just NPCs. They don’t have actual feelins, nothin’ like that.” Her tone was one of someone kindly explaining an obvious truth to an idiot.

Josh was surrounded by murder hobos. That was why Shuriken had killed Gerill and Hold My Beer as if it was nothing. He glanced at Ophala to see what she had thought of this conversation, but she and Varian were touching foreheads and she was giggling.

Right. Josh should probably tell her that her brother was dead, but he would need to choose his moment.

“Is there any water?” he asked.

Frenxy rolled her eyes, grabbed the jug from Wook and ordered Josh to hold out his hands so she could pour some in. It was a rough and vinegary red wine, but it still tasted better than the inside of Josh’s mouth. He sat down, picked up his leaf plate and contemplated the meat. For the first time in his entire life he had no appetite.

Frenxy glanced at Varian and said, “So you must have questions about … you know … all this?”

Josh put the leaf plate down again. Maybe he would try some later. Questions, he thought. Right, questions. Actually, I do.

“Okay,” he said. “So … who put us here? Are there any clues? Who is the Guardian? Is Six Spires a whole planet or is it just the lands that were in the game? If we’re just sitting on a flat fragment of terrain how come there’s gravity and an atmosphere and stuff? Is Six Spires billions of years old or thousands or was it created recently and if so, who created it? Where do all the people and animals come from? It seems like we got recreated in this world, in new bodies that were almost identical to our old ones, instead of transported, but we could be in a computer simulation. Do you guys have any evidence to support either theory?” Josh paused for breath, and then thought of one more question. “Oh, and did you all come here after playing Spiralia Online? Did you get the immortality quest? Did you get snatched while sleepwalking?”

There was a stunned silence while everyone stared at him wide-eyed. Oops. Had he let out too much of his inner geek? These were gamers, though, surely they must all be geek-adjacent at the very least.

Frenxy broke the silence.

“We don’t mention the before,” she said flatly. “I didn’t mean those kinds of questions. I meant, more about levelling and stuff.”

“Oh.” Josh blinked. “Oh, sorry, I didn’t mean to ... sorry. Right. Levelling and ... yeah, okay.” He did have questions about that too. He took a deep breath. “Is it true we resurrect after we die?”

Varian answered him this time.

“It’s true.”

“Okay, how does that work? Do you appear back where you died, or is there a shrine or something? Is it instant? Is there a limit to how often you can die? Do you lose levels or experience? Do you resurrect uh ... naked … or do you keep your clothes and things?”

“You appear at predetermined points,” Varian explained. “They’re not marked in any way, they’re just somehow special. The place you appeared would have been one of them. Normally they’re slightly hidden, like in amongst rocks, or bushes or whatever. When you die, you lose any experience you haven’t applied yet. It takes anything from one to two weeks to respawn. You resurrect with your clothes and gear, so long as you were touching them, wearing them, or carrying them in a bag which you had on you.”

Josh was conscious of a flood of relief. The timeframe meant Shuriken wasn’t about to rush into the camp at any moment and accuse Josh of killing him. Josh had been planning to excuse himself as soon as was reasonably possible, but now he saw he had some leeway.

Also, repugnant as the idea was, he needed to apply the experienced gained from Shuriken’s death very soon. He couldn’t do it while he was in the presence of Varian’s group, though, in case they would be able to see the pending levels and realised how he must have gained so much experience. Suddenly hiding his status would be just as suspicious.

“Right,” he said. “Thanks.” He should probably ask questions about levelling. “What’s the best way to level? How long does it take to get to max level? Is level 40 still the max?”

“Best way to level is to kill monsters,” Frenxy said. She directed a glare at Varian, and added, pointedly, “Less’n you’re in an area which ain’t got no monsters.”

“Not true,” Mistrz said briefly. “At low levels crafting is very fast, as long as you have plenty materials.”

“But crafting classes are shit!” Frenxy protested. “Nobody wants them!”

Mistrz shrugged.

“Depends what you craft.” He added to Josh, “Decorating with feathers probably not good. Paper maker is good. Tailor, cook, brewer, they are good. Very popular. You can be rich. Blacksmith is like god.” He nodded to Frenxy. “Alchemist good, is like combat class.”

“I am a combat class!” Fenxy said, outraged.

So basically, Josh thought, if you were the kind of crafter who could make everyday items that could be worn, ingested, or used as weapons, you were useful. Maybe he could make hats with magic feathers in them. Hats of disguise or invisibility!

He had lots of feathers back at the village. If he could survive for long enough, he fervently promised himself that he would practice as much as possible, until he ran out completely.

He suddenly realised that the tickle he had sensed earlier must have been the feathers on Frenxy’s crossbow bolt. They must be enchanted somehow, maybe to improve how the bolt flew. Shuriken musst have had some kind of crossbow bolt or arrow with enchanted feathers too, allowing Josh to sense him just before he struck.

It would be a really good idea to extend the range of Feather Feel.

Josh noticed that Wook had been staring at him for a while now.

“We should power level you,” Wook said suddenly.

“Oh my god,” Frenxy said in disgust. “Shut up.”

“No-one is power levelling anyone,” Varian said easily, and gave Josh another smile. “Sorry to get your hopes up, but we don’t give out freebies to random level 3 players. You would need to convince us that you’re worth our time.”

“Uh, yeah, that seems fair.” In his head Josh was thinking frantically. His initial gut reaction had been a kick of interest, but that was stupid. He didn’t want them to power-level him, because if he got to a high enough level they would get experience for killing him, and if they were so desperate for it, then maybe they would be tempted. Or, he realised, that would be their reason for power levelling him in the first place. They would power level him deliberately just so they could farm him for experience.

Ohshitohshitohshitohshit.

Varian had just told Josh that he had to prove himself, but the little Josh had already seen of Varian showed just how manipulative he was. Varian would probably want to make Josh jump through hoops to gain the group's favour, and generally act as if the power levelling was a huge reward. Maybe he thought he could make Josh feel grateful enough to agree to it.

What would a bard do? Fake ignorance, and act like they would be doing him a favour, and the moment their backs were turned, high tail it in the opposite direction. So, nothing had changed really, since Josh had been planning to do that all along.

He suddenly remembered his plan to tell them about the broodmother. He’d let himself get distracted.

“Uh,” he said. “If I knew about a potential source of experience not far away, and I gave you directions to it, maybe you could help me in return?”

They all glanced at each other, except for Wook. Ophala, who had lost Varian’s attention during this conversation, was looking put out.

“Alright,” Varian said finally. “I’ll bite. What did you find?”

Now that he had their attention Josh hedged a bit, just to keep them dangling.

“I’m pretty sure some other outworlders set it up. They’re farming it for resources, I think? So it’s not without risk, right?”

Varian shrugged.

“You let us worry about that.”

“Okay, someone dragged a voracian broodmother upstream onto the moors south of here.” Josh described the pool he had found her in. He tried to hint at the area, rather than give exact directions. “And I wanted the eggs because of the venom, but if you guys could kill the broodmother too, that would give us experience, right?”

They all considered it, although Josh could see the gleam of avarice in their eyes.

“Not egg farm,” Mistrz said. “Maybe a few eggs, yes. But this XP farm.”

“Like, seriously?” Frenxy sounded excited. “Like, you let them hatch and grow and pretty soon you got ‘em all up and down the river? And you kill them all, rinse, repeat! Oh my god, I just about creamed my pants!”

“Nice setup,” Varian said, his brow furrowed. “Who?” He looked across at Mistrz. “Harrow’s crew?”

Mistrz nodded.

“I think yes.”

“We can take ‘em, right?” Frenxy demanded.

Varian smiled.

“We can if they don’t know we’re coming.”

Josh wanted to mentally apologise to Harrow and his crew, but on second thoughts they were the ones who had apparently planned to fill an otherwise harmless river with man-eating monsters, so maybe he didn’t feel that sorry for them after all.

Maybe Harrow’s lot and Varian’s lot would all kill each other. That would keep them out of Haven’s hair for a week or two, at least until they all resurrected.

Now that he'd actually met some of the other outlanders, Josh was no longer surprised that they were being killed permanently. No doubt many of the locals had been given ample motive to find a method that worked. Josh could even blame them, not completely, if Varian's group were a representative sample of what outlanders were like. There were so many things wrong with this world.

His mission accomplished, all Josh had to do now was find an excuse to leave the camp and return to the village. He had a sinking feeling, however, that Varian’s group wouldn’t be willing to let him go so easily.

“So, what do we do now?” Josh asked.

“Sleep,” Varian said decisively. “Go south in the morning.”

“I don’t have any blankets,” Josh said. “Or anything to sleep on.”

Varian gave him a dismissive look.

“You’ll live.” He didn’t sound sympathetic.

Josh wanted to suggest he go back to the village and sleep there, mostly because he wasn’t sure how long he would be able to keep up his harmless, perky, upbeat façade in present company. On the other hand, if he tried to leave they might try to stop him, and he didn’t want to tip them into showing their hand too soon. Plus, if he did go to the village they might follow him, and he didn't want them anywhere near the villagers. His heart sank as he realised he would have to stay with them, at least for a while.

He didn’t think Varian would start offering to power level him immediately, so he would probably be safe at least until he’d shown them the broodmother. He would need to slip off before then. If he could.

“What was that?” Mistrz looked up at the steps leading down to the amphitheatre.

“What?” Frenxy asked.

“I heard something.” Mistrz gathered up his shield and spear again. “Something moving.”

Frenxy sighed dramatically, grabbed a vial from her belt and drank it, then closed her eyes. She held her hands out in front of her, as if trying to feel the air around her.

“No magic,” she said. “Human. NPC I think.” She pointed to the top of the steps. “There.”

There was a shuffling sound as something small and hunched stepped into view.

“I’m sorry,” said a thin, cracked, quavery little voice. “I didn’t mean to intrude.”

It was an old woman.