Fantasia

(After some intense negotiation, it has been decided that this counts as a ‘Fey’ scene and narrator comments have been allowed as long as they do not overly impinge upon Leandriel’s dignity.)

 

When the portal inside the practice arena flashed and disgorged a passenger, Fey was flabbergasted to see a wingless Leandriel standing in its glow.

“…What happened to your wings?”

“Players above level 60 are returned to their level 60 avatars for laser tag,” Leandriel reminded her gently. (See Chapter 56 if you don’t remember.)

“Wow,” was all she had to say.

“‘Wow’?” Leandriel repeated curiously.

Fey shook her head. She was not about to explain to Leandriel that he was an entirely different kind of impressive now that he had shed his bulky wings and traded plate armour for lighter cloth and leather. Without the larger-than-life stature, his unrealistically perfect appearance became more noticeable. (Can a real person be unrealistic?)

 

Changing the subject, Fey introduced her teammates. “Blade you already know,” she started.

“Hey,” said Blade. The two exchanged (manly) nods.

“Sirena you’ve met, but I guess I didn’t formally introduce you,” Fey continued. (See Chapter 45 if you don’t remember.)

“Hi!” Sirena said brightly. She held a hand out, which Leandriel shook. She then very obviously turned her head and mouthed, ‘Oh. My. God.’ to Fey while still in Leandriel’s line of sight.

Determinedly pretending Sirena was a normal person, Fey ended with, “And this is Mimi.”

Mimi nodded in greeting and also held a hand out to shake. Leandriel grasped her hand with a friendly (but not, like, overly friendly) smile. In contrast, Mimi wore her usual neutral expression.

Fey considered Mimi’s expression slightly too neutral for the circumstances. Before she could follow up on the thought, she was distracted by a squeak.

 

“Magic!” Fey exclaimed delightedly as the mushroom hopped onto Leandriel’s shoulder from somewhere along the angel-now-celestial’s back and then jumped into his former owner’s arms. “How have you been? Are you behaving?”

Despite having an above-average grasp of the English language, Magic chose to answer in Squeak. (“Good. Missed you. Lee-Lee missed you too.”)

Fey raised an eyebrow. “He did, did he?” She looked over at Leandriel.

 

Leandriel had no idea what his pet had just said, but shifted uncomfortably. “That is…”

 

Fey grinned and shook her head. “Just messing with you. I don’t actually understand all the squeaking.”

Switching to English, Magic asked, “Where is Amethyst?” His pronunciation was generally perfect, but ‘Amethyst’ sounded more like ‘Am-mee-thyst’.

“Oh, I sent everyone to play in the forest,” Fey answered. “You could probably join them if you want. Pets aren’t allowed in laser tag.”

“Okay,” Magic agreed.

“I’ll take you,” said Leandriel.

Magic snuggled against Fey for another moment and then hopped back to his current owner. Leandriel disappeared out of the arena for a moment and then reappeared sans mushroom.

 

(For those lamenting the absence of Feypets, rest assured that their shenanigans during the tournament shall be chronicled within these virtual pages.)

 

“Ready to play?” Fey asked.

Leandriel donned the laser tag gear that appeared for his use. “If you would not mind, I would like to take a moment to reacquaint myself with my level 60 abilities.”

“Of course. Take your time,” said Fey.

 

Leandriel nodded and took off at a jog. They were currently in a forest arena setting, so his path quickly intersected with a tree. Instead of slowing down, he sped up and hit the tree at full sprint, running a not-insignificant distance up its trunk. Before he ran out of upwards momentum, he pushed off to land against another tree. In a series of leaps that looked like they were taken out of a martial arts movie, he ascended into the treetops and disappeared from sight.

 

“…Am I supposed to be able to do that in ten levels?” Fey asked no one in particular.

 

Mimi walked up to a different tree and looked upwards with her eyes narrowed in concentration. She climbed a few paces up with Climbing Claws, then paused. Carefully controlling her movements, she jumped straight up and grabbed the trunk of the same tree. Her strength was much lower than Leandriel’s, but the ability to hook her feet into the wood allowed her to gain a comparable amount of height with each leap. She also disappeared into the treetops.

 

Fey nodded sagely. “I’m supposed to be able to do that now,” she answered herself.

Sirena patted Fey’s arm consolingly. “We love you despite your mediocrity.”

“Thank you.” Fey’s tone was so sincere that it looped all the way around to meta-sarcastic.

 

Blade shook his head and changed the subject to the practical. “So what are we doing for teams?”

Sirena raised a hand. “I wanna be on his team.” It was clear that ‘his’ referred to the new arrival and not Blade.

Fey silently agreed with the sentiment, but since the point of this whole endeavour was to improve their skills rather than contrive to be on the winning team, she said, “We’ll ask, but I’m pretty sure he could take us 1v4.”

 

On paper, that did not look likely, as Leandriel was now only 10 levels higher than Fey and Mimi and did not have a rogue class, but Leandriel was Leandriel and Fey had boundless confidence in his abilities.

Neither was Fey’s confidence unfounded. (Or rather, it was, since she didn’t know any of the information in this paragraph.) Leandriel’s level 60 attributes were much higher than those of an average player. Fantasia was a game where pushing one’s limits resulted in an expansion of those limits, and as a beta tester, he received constant feedback on how to optimize his abilities. He gained an average of five spontaneous attribute increases with each level, putting his level 60 attributes on par with those of a level 90 player not earning any attribute bonuses. Helping him gain those bonuses as well as independently adding to his overall ability was his extensive training in martial arts and acrobatics. (Real or not, he sure is unrealistic.)

 

Sirena huffed in amusement. “He is so your type.”

“He is,” Fey sighed. “It’s a problem.”

“What’s a problem?” Blade asked.

Elf and mermaid turned their heads to look at the human. Blade instantly felt more outnumbered than he actually was. (Classic mistake. He still can’t avoid all the pitfalls.)

“‘What’s a problem?’” Fey repeated. “My type is apparently ‘unrealistically perfect’.”

“Unbelievably good-looking,” Sirena added.

“Supernaturally athletic.” Fey put in.

“Abnormally tall.”

“Impeccably well-mannered.”

“Quietly outrageous.”

“Incredibly generous.”

 

“Okay, okay!” Blade held up his hands as if to defend himself from adverbs. “I get it. Geez.” Fey and Sirena had begun to look like they would have started a contest to see who could list more virtues without repeating vocabulary.

Sirena looked miffed at the interruption. “I still had a couple of good ones.”

“Probably better we stopped before you started talking about giant swords or something,” said Fey.

“Would I do that?” Sirena asked innocently.

“If you really were innocent, you’d have said, ‘What are you talking about?’” Fey pointed out.

 

At that moment, Fey spotted a silhouette in a distant tree. Whatever witty reply Sirena came up with went unheard as the figure leaped straight down without any attempt to slow the fall. Fey physically flinched and gasped audibly as the figure hit the ground, viscerally expecting blood and broken bones. Instead, Leandriel – of course it was Leandriel and not Mimi – rose with his usual easy grace and jogged over.

“What?” Sirena asked.

“Oh, nothing. Just Leandriel being quietly outrageous and giving me a heart attack,” said Fey.

“Oh. Just the usual, then,” Sirena said. To the approaching Leandriel, she said, “Back already?”

“I have played laser tag previously, so it was more a matter of reaccustoming than relearning,” Leandriel explained.

“We were just talking about teams,” said Fey. “You’d be okay going 1v4, right?”

Leandriel hesitated briefly before saying, “That would not be a problem.”

Sirena grinned (diabolically) and sidled up to Leandriel. “You want to be on the same team as Fey, don’t you?” she asked in a stage-whisper.

 

Fey smiled pleasantly and walked over to sling an arm companionably over her shorter friend’s shoulders. She then backed up, dragging Sirena with her. Fey’s smile was so natural-looking that one could almost overlook the fact that her elbow was now hooked around Sirena’s neck in what could become a chokehold with a very small shift in movement. “Sorry for my friend,” she said, voice apologetic and musical, “She has some undiagnosed mental disorders.” (That’s a bit hypocritical, coming from our heroine.)

For his part, Leandriel looked embarrassed and did not answer. The ensuing silence may have then killed either Fey or Leandriel, but thankfully, Mimi came to the rescue by dropping out of a tree in a controlled fashion.

 

“Shall we get started, then?” Fey asked. She was still smiling pleasantly (because the alternative would be to curl up in a ball of mortification and die). Her forearm applied warning pressure to Sirena’s windpipe and the mermaid remained silent. (Do mermaids even have tracheae?)

Leandriel cleared his throat. “Yes, of course. Are we using the current arena settings?”

“For now. We’ll probably rotate through them all if you have the time for it.”

Leandriel nodded. “Whenever you are ready.”

 

As (a figurehead) team leader, Blade was the one to initiate the practice match settings on behalf of his party-mates, which would recharge their guns, disable their equipment when their respective quotas of lives were consumed, begin the hour countdown to end the match if there was no knockout, and teleport everyone to a random starting location.

 

<Practice match: Leandriel versus Blade’s team>

<Match settings:
Size: 50x50m
Time: Noon
Land: Forest
Additional elements: None>

<Match begins in 10>

<9>

<8>

<7>

<6>

<5>

<4>

<3>

<2>

<1>

<Match start>

 

The players flashed to new locations and began to move.

 

 

“He is so ridiculous,” Fey grumbled, watching the match from a virtual screen on the sidelines. It was the kind of affectionate complaining one applied to loved ones’ idiosyncrasies. Having only one life, she had been the first one knocked out and had been cooling her heels for almost forty minutes.

“You love it,” Sirena pointed out. Having two lives and no physical abilities, she had been the first one shot and knocked out approximately 15 seconds after Fey.

Next to Sirena, Blade leaned close to the screen as if he could uncover some secret that would grant him Leandriel’s physical ability by staring. “How did he do that?” he asked for the eleventh time in thirty minutes. Having ten lives, he had lasted a surprisingly long time while Leandriel focused most of his attention on Mimi.

Fey did not bother answering. Leandriel was performing mind-boggling physical feats at such a rate that she did not even know which particular one Blade was asking about.

 

Leandriel was currently flashing through the forest with incredible agility, using the trees like a humanoid pinball to abruptly change direction and also vary his vertical position.

To a new observer, Leandriel appeared to be wasting energy for no reason, as there was no current laser fire to dodge. However, he was down to three lives from ten, all of those lost with a single, perfect shot when he was distracted and slowed down. His gun currently had 53 shots remaining while Mimi’s had 93.

 

The sniper and guardian were at an impasse. Mimi had not landed a shot since Leandriel had knocked Blade out and been free to focus solely on evasive maneuvers. On the other side, Leandriel could not find Mimi hidden inside Shadow Cloak somewhere in the trees. If she shot, he would have some idea based on the trajectory of the beam, but she would no doubt shift locations immediately after any shot and so far, Leandriel had not chosen to sacrifice one of his remaining lives on the chance to locate her.

 

“If the match times out, Leandriel wins,” Sirena murmured. There were fifteen minutes left in the match.

“He’s not going to run out of stamina,” said Fey, guessing that that was what Mimi had been waiting for. Even before getting angel wings, Leandriel’s stamina had been close to 200 and he was additionally used to moving around in heavy plate armour, not the light cloth he currently wore. It looked like he could easily keep up his breakneck pace for hours longer.

 

As if mentally in tune with Fey, Mimi chose that moment for action. Three parallel laser beams sliced through the air as Leandriel pushed off a tree; he dodged the central one, but one of the extras created by Arrow Clone managed to catch him on the chest.

Leandriel immediately sprinted in the direction of the shot, no longer bothering to vary his trajectory. Having consumed some of her mana with Arrow Clone, Mimi’s Shadow Cloak was now diminished enough that Leandriel could faintly see her because of his higher level. His vest and helmet flashed red, visually marking the 30 seconds in which he was invulnerable to laser fire and also unable to shoot.

 

Knowing she was slower than Leandriel, Mimi did not immediately scramble out of the way. She remained perched in her spot in a tree, watching the frightening speed of his approach with her usual sang-froid (*French*). Only when he reached the base of her tree did she move, zipping sideways like a squirrel to keep the trunk of the tree between them.

 

Deciding he did not want Mimi to have the height advantage, Leandriel bounced his way up into the treetops, his equipment still flashing red. Other than continuing to ensure she was shielded by the bulk of the tree, Mimi made no move.

 

“Interesting,” Fey murmured. While Leandriel had the strength to leap between trees and Mimi did not, her Climbing Claws gave her the ability to easily maneuver on her single tree and stop at any position. Not being able to dig into the tree trunk, Leandriel either had to land on a branch or hug the tree with both arms, not allowing him to shoot properly.

 

“That reminds me, shouldn’t we all get metal climbing claws made?” asked Sirena. “The rules say we can bring any equipment we want.”

“If you think it will help, we can have them made. They wouldn’t allow us to scamper around like Mimi,” said Fey. Mimi’s shadow claws did not physically penetrate the surface she clung to and therefore did not get stuck on the way out. She could also manifest them anywhere on her body and anchor herself with a single attachment without risk of falling.

 

Leandriel’s equipment flashed back to green and the real game was on. The match continued with moments of breathless stillness alternating with flurries of movement. They stayed near the treetops, neither one wanting to give the opponent a clear helmet shot. When not in clear view, they would try and sneak silently to a good position. A clear sightline resulted in them simultaneously dodging and trying to get a shot. Mimi shot once more, but Leandriel managed to block it with his shield.

 

Mimi managed to locate Leandriel just by seeing one hand gripping a branch. Deciding it was time to reveal all her abilities, she used Guided Shot to curve her laser beam around the tree and tagged Leandriel again, leading to another flurry of movement.

 

Blade swore in admiration. “That was awesome.”

“Go Mimi!” Sirena cheered.

“Ooooh,” said Fey in nervous excitement. She was not sure who she actually wanted to win the match.

 

Deciding that he would not be able to win with a knockout, Leandriel fled the close quarters and returned to evasive maneuvering, preferring to try to time the match out without losing his last life. This time, he supplemented his acrobatics with random bursts of blinding light, often taking that time to pause or completely reverse direction, causing Mimi to occasionally lose sight of him for a few seconds. She dropped to the ground and began to stalk the celestial, wary of return fire but aware that she had to land another shot to win the match.

 

<One minute remaining>

 

Mimi began to run and took even low-probability shots, no longer conserving her gun charge. For his part, Leandriel went impossibly faster, his impacts against the trees so forceful that he created a loud boom each time and even managed to sway their huge trunks.

 

<10>

<9>

<8>

<7>

<6>

<5>

<4>

<3>

<2>

 

Mimi expended all of her mana and sent a shot with twelve Arrow Clones, using Guided Shot to curve them in a converging sphere.

 

<1>

 

Leandriel reflexively activated his most powerful defensive ability, Holy Incineration. An eruption of light consumed the arena, so bright that Fey, Sirena, and Blade had to cover their eyes even through the screen.

 

<Match end>

 

Everyone waited breathlessly for the result.

 

<Winner: Leandriel>

 

“That was awesome!” Blade yelled, running back into the arena, as pumped as a rabid sports fan after a particularly impressive play.

“What even happened at the end there?” Sirena murmured. “Laser fire shouldn’t be affected by a holy barrier.”

“I think what it did was destroy the shadow copies,” said Fey. “The real shot went through but didn’t hit.”

Sirena sighed. “All down to luck in the end. Whatever, Mimi’s going to destroy everyone in our level bracket, and that’s what matters.” She walked out to join Blade, who was now yelling excitedly at Leandriel, who was good-naturedly nodding while Blade recounted the exploits Leandriel himself had just performed.

 

Mimi slowly walked back to the group. Her expression was not obviously upset, but it was more severe than usual.

Fey walked up to the sniper and enfolded her in a hug. “You were awesome.” Fey’s tone was not consoling, but matter-of-fact.

Mimi smiled slightly, but the expression did not reach her eyes. Unusually for her, she returned Fey’s hug with a brief squeeze before letting go and stepping back.

 

Nodding somewhat absently to Blade’s exclamations, Leandriel watched the interaction between Fey and Mimi and was surprised to feel a pang of jealousy. He had not been bothered by the earlier physical closeness between Fey and Sirena, though of course, the circumstances had been somewhat different (what with the choking and all).

 

Fey and Mimi joined the group. “You were awesome,” Fey said to Leandriel. Her tone was almost the same as when she had said the words to Mimi, but somewhat altered by her complex emotions towards the ‘NPC’.

 

Leandriel smiled, ignoring the jealousy as much as possible. “Thank you. Would you like to play another round?” he offered.

Fey glanced at Mimi’s expression before answering. “How about we all go eat something and then see how we feel?” she suggested.

Quashing another surge of jealousy, Leandriel nodded along to the general agreement and headed to the Elvenwood with the party.