We started heading towards a small spot West of the hideout where there were strange new signs of abnormal activities.

Pearl and Mei; the twin older sister and younger brother didn't seem to make it online today, on such a short notice too. This makes my appearance seems more like an appropriate intrusion. Since now their party of four—Marc, Rina, Hailie, Me—was less clanky.

Marc—the short blond guy with somewhat curly, short, goofy hair—was the frontline with shiny heavy armor, an inventory filled with healing potions, some actual realistic adventuring gears like ropes, waterskin, bedroll bought and ready. As I've mentioned before, like Jack of Lion's Parade, he was one of those white male fighter player, not that I am shaming them

Do note that I used the word frontline generously here, considering that he was… More or less, a fighter. Broken record, yeah, I know.

Rina—the "tall as hell what the fuck" woman, and very light, airy blonde hair, almost grey—was an archer, and from what I've heard, she planned to change her race to Elf when she reached level 80 for that roleplaying potential in the future, which, she probably planned beforehand and she liked that race, considering how her Tweak username was RinaWenswood and I recognized that elves usually named themselves like that.

Then there was Hailie, who, was just going with the vibes… From what I've heard, after distributing loots fairly, she often just gave them all to Mei, you know, that short, large-witch-hat-wearing showmaker that was also the accountant of the New Destiny?

Mei would buy the necessary items for Hailie to prepare for their adventure and hand her back the excess.

"What about you, Cory?"

I startled when I heard an unfamilar male voice saying my real name, I turned over to Marc, who was looking to me. Once again, broken record, but this was the first time I didn't have to tilt my neck to talk with a guy.

"Did you just say Cory?" I asked,

"Oh, shouldn't I?" He looked at Hailie, "She always uses that name when telling stories about you."

I glanced at Hailie, who was absentmindedly spinning her head from side to side, following the trajectory of a random butterfly. I coughed to get her attention, she turned to me, and I gestured over at Marc, but I guess she didn't understand anything, because she proceed to just… wave at me happily?

"Oh… I'm glad you decided to hang out with us today, Cory!" She said.

God, she just doesn't get it, does she?

I've been maintaining perfect anomity for 15-ish years, all ruined in barely 15 days. Just like how 15 decades years of India being portrayed as spiritual, godly place on movies and TV shows just to be ruined by 15 internet posts.

"Yeah, I'm glad too, Hailie…" I sighed, turning back to Marc, "Uh, what was you asking again?"

"Ah! We just shared plans for our character in the future, I was just wondering what's yours?" He said, walking one hand on the sheathed longsword on his hips like some kind of patrolling guard, "I think I want to go the Barbarian class, but that would mean getting an actual tank for this team some day, haha."

"Mm… Me?" I tilted my head, a hand on the chin, "I'm currently level 50… Wait, let me check."

I opened my screen and skimmed my eyes through a bit,

"Nevermind, 51 now, I wondered when did I leveled up, but anyways… I'm going to do the Apprentice Knight quest after decluttering my mind from all this New Destiny stuff."

"Oh, an advanced class? Good luck, I heard it can be tough! And knighthood means you're going to be really involved in the plot of Danielle," He commented.

I waved Marc off, chuckling awkwardly,

"Yeah yeah no worries, I've done this a hundred times already, I'll be fine… Besides, I have the lore of the kingdom and Sir Galahad from Beginning City at the back of my mind. Also, you should consider using some other class before getting to Barbarian because it's not accessible until level 60, you're not getting there with your current class and a rusty sword… Wait, what's your current class, even?"

Before Marc could answer, we heard faint snarkling from behind, only then did I noticed that Rina had been walking behind us the entire time, eavesdropping… Though not really eavesdropping since it was a public conversation.

"You two are so cute together." She said, two indexes pointing at the two of us.

I looked at Marc, who was laughing, then back at Rina, while hearing giggling from Hailie from the other side.

"Ma'am I'm a raging homosexual who got aroused from physical abuse and erotic asphyxiation while this man looks like a less visually appealing Kit Harington. I can assure you that none of your shipping attempts would hold up in court."

Is what I wanted to say.

But then I reminded myself that Hailie was in the vacinity, so I couldn't be my filthy and unfiltered self, so I just chuckled alone.

"Why do you say that?" I asked her,

Before answering, Rina unpromptly walked forward and patted both of us on our head.

"Look down at yourself."

God damn lanky people and their privilages, if one day the apocolypse happens and the sky falls, y'all be my tankers.

I digress, and looked down at myself.

"Oh…" I chuckled at the realization.

Hailie was wearing priest ropes and a cool little pair of white boots stained by the dirt, Rina was wearing light armor that exposed both her arms from the shoulder, but covering her body quite well, making her look a rectangle.

While both Marc and I were the kind of players that decked out in the best defense gear. Metal gauntlets, boots, chestplates, kneepads, all the jazz.

With this weird and unnecessary realization, Marc raised his fist up at me, hovering it for my response, and I did, putting up my own fist and bumped it with him.

He smiled, his eyes almost closed as he grinned his teeth, and I gave back with a little head tilt with a nod.

"Maybe you can join us more often, Cory!" Hailie brightfully came by and hugged my arm.

"Now now young lady," I turned to her, and fake-frustratedly started pulling on her cheek, "What did I told you about not using my real name in the game huh?"

"Oaaa ouch ouch ouch aoooooooch." She yelped,

As I was bullying Hailie (ingame) for the first time, I realized something that I didn't know if it was a Darkmoon Adventure thing or a thing with her physical body being translated over here, but Hailie's cheeks were…

"Very squishy, right?" Rina chimed in, poking Hailie's other cheek "After extensive experiment, we've noticed that Hailie's avatar seems to be a lot more responsive than the rest of the players, her skin feels smooth, too."

"Yeah, very squishy…" I commented.

We stopped walking at that point, Marc just awkwardly stood there and looked around while we experienced her cheek, then on ourselves to test the different in texture and feel.

"Ouaaaachhhh…" Hailie continued to yelp.

But halfway through, I realized something and looked up at Rina.

"Why were you guys experimenting with my friend's cheeks?"

"I blame Mei," Rina chuckled, "She's very touchy and loves to disregard personal space."

"Oh yeah?"

I thought about the girl who made such a loud entrance during the court case… Oh god, I think she yelled out her username and were accepting friend requests? SparklesQueen, was it?

"Speaking of Mei…"

As we finished bullying Hailie and started walking again, patting the girl on the back and head as empathy of sorts, Marc started talking, eyes up on the almost orange skies:

"I think she said something about wanting to craft a new hat with a thermodynamic-supported material, probably Darkened Goat's fur and Winter Cotton,"

"She told you that?" Rina tilted her head, "Why thermodynamic?"

"She said she wanted to craft a boomerang." He added.

"Oh... Boomerang?" Hailie blinked a lot, trying to visualize it while rubbing her cheeks, "Is it that thing that shaved like a 90 degree angle stick with two ends and it comes back to you when you throw it with the inner of the created angle pointing down?"

"Yep, that's a boomerang," I commented, chuckling to myself when I heard her ridiculous description as if she never saw one before, then I turned to Marc, "She wanted to make a hat boomerang? Like that one from the video game?"

"I supposed," He shrugged, "She told me and Pearl about it while we were talking about crafting materials last session after you guys logged of. Pearl started scolding her real bad, pulling her up by the ear, too."

"Ouch." Rina commented,

"Ouch…" Hailie nodded.

"Wait, tell me again, who's the older twin? They're like, uh, they're twins right?" I asked,

"Mei," Rina turned to me, answering, "Mei's older but it never seems that way, she's like the troublemaker, their contrast is insane."

"What did Pearl say?" Hailie asked curiously,

"That it's ultimately the dumbest concept in existence because… Let me remember, something about…"

Marc pondered a bit, before twisting his thumb and index, mimicking Pearl pulling Mei by the ear and scolding her, then, he put on a stereotypical European accent.

"You are one exceptional unintelligent human being, Mei!! Do you have any idea how bad of an idea you are proposing right now? What do you want the hat to be? Sharp? Then you will cut yourself and everyone just walking around. Heavy? Then you'll have your spines realigned before reaching level 50! Think, Mei, Think!"

"Something like that." Marc ended.

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