The Charismatic Glass Cannon

There was a general store, armory, smith, and apothecary that I passed until I saw a sign that read “Inn of the Prancing Pirate.” The pirate was faintly crossed out and replaced by “Pony,” but “Pirate” was still more legible. It was as if the owner was told he needed to change the name but didn't want to giving a half ass attempt with some cheap kid’s finger-paint.

I walked up the couple of wooden steps to get reach the front porch area of the inn. Then, I noticed three things that were very out of place in this medieval tropical town. There were three vending machines on the porch, just to the left of the entrance to the inn. They reminded me of the video game Borderlands, with the vending machines looking more makeshift and high-tech than what I was used to getting a soda from back home. Wait was back home, right? I’m not sure that’s right, but you get what I mean.

The far-left vending machine was a deep purple with white accents and labeled “Random” with a large, white, cock-eyed question mark. The second was labeled “Weapons & Armor,” and had a cartoonish rendering of plate mail and a glowing blue short sword. The last one was army green with brown accents and labeled “Food & Potions,” featuring a loaf of bread and a large healing potion in its advertisement.

I first approached the “Random” vending machine. As I got closer, an interface-looking window popped up. It showed two categories of loot boxes to choose from, “Race” and “Spell Tome” both at Mythic rarity. In the top right it corner, there was a box with a deal sticker and a -33% discount for the food box, which was also Mythic rarity. The “Race” and “Spell Tome” boxes cost 5,000 red shards each, but oh so lucky for me, the food box was on sale for 3,350. What the hell would Mythic food be? I didn’t have a clue. I only had just a bit over 300 shards, so I didn’t think I was going to find out any time soon. I really wished that warranty deal would have gone through. What did we agree to again? 8,000 shards? Shit. But damn do I need a spell that does some damage. At the very top it showed ‘37 hours remaining until vendor refresh.’

I then went over to the “Weapons & Armor” vending machine, where there was an assortment of different weapons from swords, axes, bows, and others. The only one that had any real magical properties was a bow in the deal section in the top right corner that added electricity damage to its shots. With my low dexterity I didn’t think it would be a good idea for me to take up archery.

Next, I went to the last vending machine, “Food & Potions.” There was a protein bar that was currently on sale for only five shards, which didn’t show any benefits other than the benefits normal food brought. Other than the bar, there was a long sandwich on a baguette-style bread, and potions of health and mana each bottle costing 50 red shards for the noob level.

I stepped away from the vending machines too nervous to spend my money just yet until I figured out what monetary demands Level 3 might have. I needed to be saving up for some spell tomes. I needed something that could actually hit a monster.

The inn had front doors like in a western movie, swinging in both directions and falapping back and forth after I pushed through. I was greeted by a large room with wooden tables and chairs making up the space, with a long bar opposite where I currently stood. There was a creature behind the bar wearing a leather apron and a white shirt. The creature was beautiful, resembling a mix between Chris Hemsworth and Henry Cavil, if the mix had grey blue skin and short horns.

“Welcome in! New to town, I take it?” the man said as I approached the bar, his voice sultry.

Am I the only one questioning my sexuality right now? I was about to pay off Vinnie, but I just had to come back and look at this guy. Like, damn.

“And I must say, that is quite the outfit,” he continued.

“Yes, just got in,” I replied, ignoring the interface.

I looked down at my outfit, realizing I should maybe have some walking around town clothes so I didn’t stand out. Either that, or I needed to memorize some sage words of wisdom I could share unsolicited with strangers.

“Sorry, didn’t mean no offence. Oh, you must have come in with the Juneflower. Captain Eriinie is a good man. Glad to see he made it back. The name is Keep. People call me Bar Keep, Keep, The Keep, Oi, I'll respond to any,” he said with a laugh and a smile. “How can I be of service? Room for the night?”

“Hello, nice to meet you. My name is Kent. A room would be great. How much is it per night? I don't know how long I will be staying.”

“30 red,” Keep said.

That was about 1% of my winnings from the trivia.

“Okay, you have a deal,” I said, the shards appearing in my hand after I selected them from my interface.

“Cool trick you have there,” Keep said, eyeing the shards in my hand.

“Oh, why thank you,” I replied, clearly signaling I was confused.

So much for fitting in. Why don’t you just show up to a new place dressed in wizard robes and magically make money appear? Oh, wait, you already did that. Made lots of friends back on Earth, I take it?

Did this asshole interface just say, ‘back on Earth’? What was he talking about? Before I could think any further on those words, Keep spoke.

“I'd watch out flashing powers like that or the fortress will try and conscript you. Not too common around these parts. Besides the watchman, not too many others,” Keep said. “Your room is upstairs. Room 207,” he said, handing me a key.

“Thank you,” I said, taking the key. “Oh, you wouldn’t happen to have seen a guy dressed like a chef, would you? Like a white outfit with lots of buttons on the front. Tall white hat,” I said, demonstrating where all the buttons would be and the size of the hat.

“Sorry to say I haven’t. Sounds like an outfit I wouldn’t forget,” Keep replied. “I’ll keep an eye out and let you know. It’s in the name. I’m always keeping an eye out.”

“Thank you,” I replied with a nod.

I started to head upstairs.

Is my brother alive? I thought towards Kiwi as I walked up the steps.

I sighed.

My room was adjacent to others on a balcony that overlooked the bar and seating area. I could check out the surroundings later; first, I wanted to get to my camp and see if there were any signs of my brother.

I put the key in the lock and twisted. As the lock clicked, a faint light shone from all the edges of the door. I opened it, revealing my library tower spire. I walked in, closing the door behind me. I’m not sure why, but it was a relief to see this place again. It somehow felt like home even though I had spent very little time here.

I headed to the hallway that connected mine and Jace’s areas. As I approached his door, a grey lock appeared with a thick, greyed-out chain. Under the lock, it read “No access.”

“Shit, he really is gone.”

As I walked back to my area, I stopped at the upgrade old-school pay phone machine that was between our camps. It was no longer greyed out, stating 100 red shards for an upgrade to Camp Level 2.

I currently had 312 red shards so it was doable to upgrade, but it would be a chunk of what I had. I walked back to my library area and saw that my first unlock was at Camp Level 2, which would unlock the first bookshelf. I had to believe it did something for me, hopefully giving me a spell I desperately needed. I needed a goddamn damage-dealing spell like my life depended on it. Which it kind of did. No, not kind of, it 100% did. I got up to go back to the upgrade telephone machine, but the TV above the exit caught my eye. Before, during Level 1, there was a countdown. This time it just showed Level 3 at the top.

[Total Starting Population: 8,128,828,837]

[Total NPC Population: 4,545,646,536]

[Total In Stasis: 2,528,637,474]

[Total Mob Population: 126,286,371]

[Total Died in Dungeon: 700,683,148]

[Total Remaining in Level 1 (Level Complete): 0]

[Total Remaining in Level 2: 50,065,963]

[Total Remaining in Level 3: 177,506,595]

[Total Remaining in Level 4: 0]

[Total Remaining in Level 5: 0]

[You are currently in your camp. Time is halved in camp.]

Shit, almost 300 million people had died since I was last in my camp. That was an unfathomable amount of people. I wondered if one of those millions was my brother. I saw that nobody had reached Level 4 yet, but there were quite a bit of people currently in the same level I was. If you can say quite a bit. Was that only 3% of the world’s population remaining?

I walked back to the upgrade telephone machine and put in the 100 red shards one by one. As I put in the last shard gold, stars sparkled all around, going from the top to the bottom of the walls. When it was done, I went back over to my spire library. There was now a Meh Level Random Spell Loot Box floating in front of the bookshelf. I took it and added it to my inventory. I now saw the rest of the books were from pre-AI fucking our shit earth. I saw Harry Potter, Game of Thrones, works by Brandon Sanderson, Matt Dinniman, Terry Pratchett, and Neil Gaiman, among others.

I opened my interface, selecting the loot box.

“C’mon, don’t fuck with me game. Give me something that does damage,” I begged aloud.

The spell only had three question marks signifying my interface wanted to break the news.

You have received the spell Mundane Duplication!

“FUUUUUCK!” I roared talking over the interface as it continued.

This spell creates a temporary illusion lasting a few seconds on something larger, or a longer-lasting more solid illusion for something smaller. It only works on mundane items. The higher the user’s magic stat, magic ability, and level of the user the better the quality of the illusion and the longer it will last. For you, I have no idea what will happen. Maybe I’ll ask Vinnie if he will take double or nothing. It will probably be shitty. I’m betting on shitty, of course.

After I recovered emotionally from yet again not receiving a spell that did direct damage, I tried to think of how I could turn this into something that could help me. I now understood how the spell worked, it was pretty simple. Hold something in one hand, and an illusionary copy appeared in the other. I held the bottle of mini heals in my hand and tried. Nothing happened. I tried it with a mana potion. Nothing. My ring and necklace. Nothing. I came to the conclusion that those must not be mundane items, something I would have guessed, but hey, you had to try, right?

From what happened last time, I was nervous about using the Depends again in any sort of interaction. This time I tried with the half tube of IcyHot, holding it in my hand. In my other hand, the same half tube of IcyHot appeared as my mana went to zero. I opened my interface, and it said “Illusionary Copy of IcyHot.” In the block that the Illusionary Copy of IcyHot was taking in my inventory, I saw two small texts in the bottom right corner. One said “Time Remaining” which was set at 999,998 minutes. Below that, it said “Illusionary Quality,” which was at a 99.99% match.

Well, I guess this was sweet. If my rough math was correct that was like just under two years that the illusion would be good for. Then I had an idea, but I had to wait for my mana to recharge before trying it, so I went to Jace's area. There was a message on Jace’s screen stating “camp increases would not take place until the applicable user was present.” I didn't know if that was a good sign or not. Would it still say that if my brother was dead? I didn’t know. I used the restroom and spent way too long doing what should have been simple math to calculate where I was at on how long it took to recharge my mana. I was currently at 17 minutes.

Once my mana was recharged, I pulled out the sack that had all my shards. In my other hand a duplicate sack appeared. It fucking worked. The same information was in the bottom right as the IcyHot copy, with 999,998 minutes and Illusionary Quality at 99.99%.

The first thing I did was go over to the camp upgrade machine. I put the first duplicated shard in, but the machine just spit it out. I saw a red-texted error appear in the small display box as I fished the shard out of the return.

“I guess that would have been too fucking good to be true,” I muttered under my breath.

The next thing I learned was that I could not duplicate the duplication. The idea of having a giant pile of shards and then copying and adding, copying and adding, shattered. I spent the next couple of hours in my bed copying my sack of 212 shards until I couldn’t keep my eyes open any longer. I was glad to have a nice place to sleep, but I suddenly felt very alone. I also felt exposed. Before, I thought that the camp space was safe. I wasn’t so sure, having been in William’s camp not too long ago without his consent. But sleep overtook me, my body not caring about my safety concerns.