The portal left him in the middle of a road.
Actually, it was more like a trail scuffed into the grass by the hooves of an ornery bull. Uneven and narrow, it meandered along the edge of an ominous forest. Pine-like trees rose dozens of feet high, straight and uniform like soldiers. Their branches of blue-green needles wove so tightly together that very little light made it to the forest floor where it was as dark and creepy as a moonless night.
The other side of the road had much more pleasant scenery: an ocean of pale grass that lazily rolled like waves in the wind. The sun shone, birds sang, and it looked like the perfect place for a relaxing picnic.
There was only one problem: the giant pink slugs.
Everywhere he looked, they contaminated the scenery. The size of a large dog, they glistened with thick slime, and they leisurely wriggled their way out from the forest, across the road, and into the grass.
The sight of it made Severance shudder. Why? Why did the people making this game decide such a creature was a good idea? Up until now, he'd been enjoying the scenery, but these slugs totally ruined the vibe.
"Ha!" The gruff shout came from nearby, startling him.
He turned towards the meadow, and noticed a tall woman with flowing blonde hair. She stood knee-deep in the grass, with a shield covering her right arm and a sword in her left. She swung down on something in the grass. "Hya!"
Severance tilted his head, trying to figure out what exactly she was doing. She took a step back and gave another mighty shout.
"Heeya, Quick Strike!"
Her sword thrust downwards, quick as lightening.
Squee!
He couldn't see what made the sound, but when she lifted her sword, big globs of slime dripped from it like snot. The sight of it had him cringing. Now he understood exactly what was happening. There was only one thing around here that produced disgusting slime and it definitely wasn't the grass.
The woman shook her blade free of the goop, clearly unbothered, and went looking for her next target. She didn't appear to notice that she had an audience, or if she did, she didn't care.
Severance watched her find and kill another slug like she'd been running a pest control business all her life. It made him wish he was like that, to be able to have that kind of confidence.
Instead, here he was in the middle of a road in a strange place and he didn't have the first clue of what he was supposed to do. Should he try and kill some slugs, too? The idea made him uncomfortable. Even if the things were gross, he'd never fought or hurt anything before.
You chicken. You can't do anything on your own.
His shoulders tensed, teeth grinding together. He started to walk, yet the quiet little voice persisted. It sounded exactly like his sister, Carly.
Why even bother? No one's going to like you, anyway.
"I'm not here to be liked," he mumbled. He was just here because his uncle wanted him to try out the game. That was all. As long as he did that, nothing else mattered.
He kept walking, and eventually the shouts of the warrior woman faded behind him. More than a few times, he had to skirt around a pink slug that decided to cross his path. None of them paid any attention to him, which was just fine—he didn't want anything to do with them, either.
It didn't take long before a large town appeared in the distance. Buildings spread out over the grassland, all single story structures with slanted roofs. Smoke rose in thin columns from chimneys, drifting sideways in a gray haze over town.
As Severance drew near, he noticed a man standing in the middle of the road. The man wore a leather breastplate over a long-sleeved tunic of dark green. A sword dangled from one hip, its broad leather sheath ending just past his knee.
Severance was intrigued. It was like seeing a character from a King Arthur movie. Even the town behind him also matched the theme. There were mostly log walls and thatched roofs, but the biggest building in town was made of stone. It was the centerpiece around which the rest of the town was built. Anyone with half an eyeball would know it was an important place like the town mayor's residence or something along those lines.
"Whoa there, Outsider!" The man crossed his arms over his broad chest and regarded Severance sternly. As soon as he'd spoken, the word Guardsman appeared over his head in gray lettering.
Severance eyed the floating word, feeling both curious and slightly insulted. It was kind of cool to see the guy's name, but wasn't it a little redundant? Who else but a guard would block the way to town?
Actually, scratch that. This guy could have been a thug or a bandit as well. Severance looked the Guardsman over with renewed caution. Could he trust the floating title or was it a trick? He didn't want to get robbed in the first twenty minutes of playing a game.
"What, did I sprout a second head? Why does everyone gawp like a krako when they see me?" The Guardsman tilted his head back and glanced up, as if checking to see if something had appeared above him.
Startled, Severance didn't know what to say. He was just looking at the guy's name. The last thing he expected was the Guardsman to notice and comment on it.
After a moment of awkward silence, he blurted the first thing that came to mind. "What's a krako?"
"You don't know-?" The Guardsman stopped, and then let out an annoyed tch. "Of course you don't. A krako is what pulls our wagons. If you pay attention, you might see one around."
In that case, Severance imagined it was something like a horse. He didn't know what else would be pulling wagons.
He looked past the Guardsman to see that the town was bustling with activity. A lot of people wandered about, most in generic leather armor while a few wore simple tunics and robes. From this distance, he couldn't tell who the players were and who the original residents of this town were.
"What is this place?" he asked.
"It's Ascendance," the Guardsman said. "And if you wish to enter, you'll have to pay the fee."
"There's a fee?" Severance took a wary step back. He knew it. This guy was a bandit. Why else would he try to extort money from players?
"Of course." The guard's eyes narrowed into slits. "Did you think we'd open our home to you Outsiders for free?"
"Well, no..."
The guard nodded curtly. "Exactly. If you want to go any further, you'll have to pay one crystal."
A crystal? Severance had no such thing. The only thing in his inventory was the Guidebook and a Cleric's Staff.
He shook his head. "I don't have any crystals."
Scorn flickered in the guard's eyes. "Of course not. None of you ever do. Very well, you can at least make yourself useful. I see you don't even have any armor, so I'm going to assume you're not a fighter. Am I right?"
"I'm a cleric," Severance said. He didn't like the obvious disdain that the Guardsman displayed. It prickled at him, like an old and familiar itch that he couldn't scratch.
"Yes, I've seen a few of those." The Guardsman unfolded his arms. "All right, I won't ask you to kill Cuddleworms. Instead—"
"Cuddleworms?" Severance nearly choked. "You meant those pink things?"
Just the thought of cuddling those things stalled his brain. It didn't even manage to pull over to the side of the road: it just skidded to a stop mid-thought and there it sat, belching out great clouds of black disbelief.
There was nothing cuddly about those slugs. He'd rather kiss a porcupine than touch one of those snotty disasters.
"That's what I said, yes." The Guardsman's expression darkened like he'd been personally insulted. "As I was saying, you can go find some Twisted Pods in the Northern Forest."
Severance eventually managed to get his brain restarted and hurriedly reversed gears. "Right. Okay, so ah, what are those pod things I'm supposed to find?"
"It's exactly what they sound like. Just inside the forest, there's a vine plant that grows along the trees. Look for twisted seed pods. Unless you're very dim, it's hard to miss. Bring me five of them."
Quest Received: Pick 5 Twisted Pods and gain entry to Ascendance!
Very dim? Severance furrowed his brow. This guy had a real way of convincing people to do things for him.
"Did you hear me?" The Guardsman growled. "I'm not going to repeat myself."
Severance grimaced. "Yeah, I got it. I think."
His attention shifted over to the forest. It loomed like a grim graveyard, waiting to swallow up its next victim. He was supposed to go in there alone? Into that strange and alien place? What if there were bears in there? Or things weirder than pink slugs? There could be anything lurking in that place.
The wind brushed past him, carding gently through his hair and trailing ghostly fingers across his face. He tensed, a surge of sheer panic leaping into his throat. Alone.
He'd never done anything alone. Either his mother was hovering over his shoulder or Carly was tromping along before him in her 4-inch heels. Even though he hated that, they still had been there.
But they weren't here this time. He'd thought he'd be grateful for it, even relieved, but now that he had to go into the forest alone, he found himself hesitating. How pathetic was that? It made him feel useless.
"Now what is it?" The Guardsman's disgruntled voice asked. "If I didn't know better, I'd say you'd seen a few krako already, because that face you're making is exactly what they look like."
Severance dragged a frustrated hand through his hair. This was just a game. That meant he couldn't get hurt, couldn't die—not for real, anyway—and if he got lost, the System would tell him what to do. Probably. So in that sense, he should be fine, right?
"It's okay," he softly said, more to himself than the Guardsman. "I can do this."
"Good." The Guardsman pointed towards the woods. "Then off you go. You're holding up the line."
When Severance turned, he saw the blonde player was coming his way. Her sword and shield had disappeared, yet the lack of weapons didn't detract from her confident stride. She looked a lot like a Viking warrior, with part of her hair braided back to show off her strong jaw and blue eyes. She wasn't much smaller in stature than he, either.
Her eyes flicked to him as she neared. She gave a solemn nod in greeting.
Startled by the gesture, Severance didn't even think to return it. He just stared at her, or more accurately, at the white letters forming over her head: Serene Ali
It seemed that somehow, just by meeting people, he'd managed to learn their names. And in Serene Ali's case, he hadn't even needed to talk to her. He was definitely okay with that.
When the Guardsman tch'd, Severance realized he was standing in the way of the blonde player, who was waiting to see the Guardsman. With a muttered apology, he hastily left and headed towards the dark and foreboding forest. Just the sight of it filled him with apprehension, but surely the Guardsman wouldn't give him an impossible task, right?
He just had to pick five Twisted Pods. How hard could that be?