Sumire

Maybe she needed to be more... aggressive with this. Like, moving to it instead of letting it come to her each time? Reacting effectively made sense in theory, it would allow her to control the engagement, but this was a video game rather than real life, so maybe she was supposed to just be suicidally aggressive all the time. Would be a little easier without the whole 'death game' thing, granted. If you just respawned, losing some HP wasn't a big deal. Right now though, losing ANY damn HP seemed like a bad idea, and losing all of it was a super double bad idea.

"...Ah, what the hell." Her anger still burning bright, it didn't take much convincing or preparation alike for her to try to go on the offensive, charging the boar the moment she had finished making the decision. It was never really a question of whether it was wise or not, only if it would work. It was definitely harder to line up the strike than it had been standing still, but for whatever reason, this time the boar didn't avoid it, maybe too focused on hitting her, and the spear carved through the virtual body with a surprising amount of pushback that might have knocked the weapon from her hands if she hadn't been paying attention.

It certainly knocked a lot more out of the boar though - specifically, all of it, as the two halves split apart before breaking apart into a million tiny green... thingies that drifted upwards and disintegrated into nothing, leaving even less behind.

Rolls

Stats

Monster below loot minimum parameters so no LD rolls etc

Trying to keep her frustration in check, Sumire stepped backwards, trying to form a bit of space between her and the psychotic midget killing machine in front of her. It kept... getting in so close that she couldn't really swing at it right, and getting this dumb Heft skill to work right was apparently a lot harder than it looked. It was supposed to gut the bad guys, but like, diagonally, and getting the right angle was hard as hell. It kept just straight up missing, and then the boar was inside the range of her attacks, and she had to try to make some distance for another shot. This definitely didn't seem like top of the line professional gaming to her, but what did she know?

Going by how well that back and forth went... not much. Her spear went wide again, carving a brutal line through absolutely fucking nothing, and the boar whiffed its own attempt to rip her apart. Which admittedly, was less intimidating now that she knew they were fairly harmless, but for all she knew the next enemy would just kill her in one hit, so it sounded like a good idea to NOT get hit if she could at all avoid it.

Rolls

Stats

Oh that was IT! Her face twisted by a grimace as anger consumed her, Sabrina's grip on her spear tightened hard enough it was almost painful as she tried to right herself from the loss of balance a moment ago. At this point she was going to just straight up murder someone, specifically this dumb ass pig, and turn it into god damn bacon. It felt as though the damn thing was mocking her, casually avoiding everything she threw at it with contemptuous ease. Wasn't this supposed to be a freaking starting monster? She'd heard they weren't too hard to kill, but had already missed it a few times, and was down to uhhh... half her energy, ish.

History flowed like a river and time repeated as she swung and missed again, but this time the strike went wide, and the boar came hurtling in like a furry meteor. Or at least a furry pebble; it did some damage, but after a moment of panic she realized she still had nearly all her health. That was one bit of good news at least, the big pig didn't seem to hit that hard. So she just had to... hit it... really hard. She could do this. Even if it made her never want to fight another monster again.

Rolls

Stats

Once the initial burst of surprise and fear wore off, a tidal wave of frustration washed over her at the realization of how much of a complete fucking disappointment that had been - she hadn't even remembered to use the skill, and neither of them had hurt each other in the least. Better than dying instantly, but Sabrina was in no mood to look at the bright side of the situation, instead targeting the stupid creature as the source of her fury. The damn spear was heavier than she'd thought, and longer. Which was kind of the idea, yes, but maybe something a little less unwieldy would have been less of a waste of everyone's time.

At least this time she remembered to use the Sword Art, which should totally be called a Spear Art - bring the spear low, then swing the sharp bits upwards, hopefully cutting the boar in half. Or... at least brutally vivisecting an innocent bush, as the boar avoided it, then tripped over her foot, sending them both careening in opposite directions with their prides far more damaged than their bodies. 

Attack rolls

Stats

"Hey! You! Over here! Were you born that ugly or did you fall out of the ugly tree and hit every branch on the way down?!"

Feeling pretty satisfied with her scathing wit, the more than slightly nervous Sumire braced, her lance pointed at the pig-thing as it reacted to her provocations, recognizing her as an enemy. She assumed it was just mad she was right. A piercing squeal, and it charged her without any further notice, which took her a bit off guard - it hadn't looked nearly that large from 30 feet away and those horns were actually a lot more intimidating than she had assumed they would be. But the faster it closed in on her, the closer it was to getting a spear to the face, or wherever she hit it. If she hit it. Hoo boy. Was combat always this nerve wracking?

Using basic attack on the boar / getting attacked

Her nerves proved to be too much for her, and the clumsy attack went wide as the raging boar continued hurtling towards her. Sabrina nearly panicked on the spot, but a mixture of adrenaline and sheer dumb luck led to her retaining barely enough presence of mind to step to the side as she tried to push the boar away, dealing no damage to it but rendering it momentarily unable to strike her in turn.

Stats

It took several minutes of very cautious hunting to find something that looked like a relatively safe fight - a lone boar that was just... grazing, or... whatever it was boars did when they weren't goring people and ripping them in half. Was grazing a cow thing? She'd never actually seen a cow in person. But boars were like, uglier pigs, so it was probably fine.

Okay. Checklist for not dying. Potions? Check. She hadn't been sure what to bring, so Sumire had settled for just bringing all of her healing potions, she'd heard you were supposed to save the buffs for important stuff. Were boars important? She hoped not, but that was why she was just gonna fight one of them for now. Try to get a feel for how this all went. Hopefully uh, not die in the process. Ok. She had her armor on too. She wasn't sure how much it'd actually help, but better to wear it than not wear it, right? And her spear thingy. Grabbing it with both hands, the lengthy weapon too heavy to really control with one hand, she wondered for not the first time if she shouldn't have gone for something lighter - but then she'd have to be closer to all the stuff that could kill her, and that sounded... very not great.

Sword arts... ok, she didn't really know what any of those actually did. X2 was bigger than X1, so she assumed the X1 thing was bad. It was an AOE, whatever that meant, she'd try it later, but now now. Stun sounded cool, she was pretty sure that meant the bad guy stopped moving, but it cost a LOT of these 'energy' points. She didn't think you died if you ran out of energy, but if it meant no Sword Arts (Spear Arts?) that was probably super bad. So... the basic 'Heft' looked like her best bet. It looked like it did a lot of damage and was reasonably cheap. The boar couldn't do shit to her if it was dead, so the stun thing was probably useless anyways.

...No, she had to be able to take care of herself.

Sabrina wasn't an idiot, she knew it was dangerous, and she knew the frontlines were WAY more dangerous. She didn't really care about those, and this wasn't the first step towards any of that crap. They would clear the game for her eventually, in the meantime she was just gonna live here fine. But in order to do that, she had to get a few of these so-called 'levels' and boost her 'stats', was the lingo for it, so she could gather and explore without risking a fatal end to her adventure.

Taking a deep breath, she stepped forward, over that invisible line in the ground, over the weakness of her own heart. Not a big step. Not a different person. But progress nonetheless.

Sabrina herself wasn't focused on any of that though; what mattered to her was that she had to find a lone enemy. She didn't know jack or shit about AOE, but it didn't take a rocket scientist to do basic addition and subtraction, and 2 was bigger than 1. No, she needed exactly one enemy to start off with, something... well, ideally as weak as possible. Unfortunately, there seemed to be a pretty good variety of enemies out here, and she didn't know which of them were stronger than others. Was a boar tougher than a wolf? What about a giant bee? There were a surprising number of weird bug things out here, and while they didn't look quite as tough as the boars, they also looked harder to hit.

Oh, right, the spear and armor. Sumire rotated her shoulder in its cuff and experimentally moved around a bit, still far from comfortable in this crap, much less with the large weapon hanging off her back. This was maybe the... third time she had ever worn this armor-ey crap, and the first time she had actually expected to use it in a life or death situation. She'd actually only worn it in case Lyle needed help with murdering some fools, but apparently this quest had a combat component to it as well. That didn't necessarily mean she was gonna use it, but... eh, what the hell. Might as well give it a shot. "Thanks Mizz Calora, I'll be back soon with the spoils of war!" See, why weren't real people this polite? She didn't think she was unreasonable, but there was a helluva difference between 'Sabrina, would you take out the trash?' and 'Sabrina, what the fuck did you break this time.' Night and day. Light and dark. Some kinda... yin-yang symbology, whatever, she wasn't sure where she was going with that.

Making it to the town gates wasn't much of an issue, especially after yesterday, but the invisible barrier between safety and death was a bit harder to step over this time. In town, it had seemed like a great idea to beat the shit out of a couple of monsters, no biggie, just murder them and feast on their souls. Or at least their loot. Now, looking out at the greenery of the plains, it was a lot harder not to think about how many people had died doing exactly that. And uhh... she didn't feel like THAT much of a badass that she could shrug off any chance of the same happening to her.

At the same time though... Sabrina didn't see much of a choice, really. Okay, maybe there was an obvious one she was just too dumb to understand, but the way she saw it, she might as well at least be able to protect herself on the first floor. Yesterday's gathering had gone alright, but what if she had encountered an enemy she couldn't avoid or outrun?

'Not dying' sounded like a pretty good feature for a profession as far as Sumire was concerned, and she had already figured out the temporary thing from Zack's explanation yesterday and a bit of asking around town. In her mind it was a pretty simple tradeoff; if she got good enough gear it could last her a while, but a constant stream of potions might be harder to come by. Apparently there were a pretty wide variety of professions, but she was more concerned about just getting one going.

"Now there is one problem unfortunately. The short lifespan of many of the materials we work with means that an alchemist has to acquire new materials regularly, and unfortunately I am running quite low after a few, ah, mishaps with some other young folks I ran into earlier. Would you mind gathering a few for me? They aren't difficult to find and can be acquired in a number of ways; most can be acquired from gathering, and you can substitute other reagents from the abominable monsters roaming the plains. I don't mind too much which you bring me back, just try to fill out a few categories, if you would?" Evangeline continued, listing off a number of options and alternatives that Sumire did her best to remember. "Don't worry dearie, you can check the quest log at any time to see how you're doing." ...That was a thing?

"It's good to see you prepared for anything! I won't take up any more of your time, just be careful out there. When you get back I will happily teach you more."

Well, wouldn't be a quest if not for the zany twists, she supposed. After a bit more chatter and some helpful directions, Sumire struck out on her own again, this time headed towards a different part of town where her target was apparently located. As always, Zackariah's directions were solid, but this place seemed more like a... she didn't even know, man. Like a mix between a festival, a carnival, and hippie town. Plenty of stalls and fancy signage, not so much in the wise of street signs and useful info. She would have walked right past the tent had she been paying the slightest bit less attention, catching the sign out of the corner of her eye before barging on in. But... politely. Also, she didn't actually barge into anything, on account of some distinguished-looking old lady coming out of the tent before she could.

"Hello, young lady. Are you looking for something?" "Uh, yeah, actually, I'm looking for Ms. Calora, I wanna learn more about alchemy. 'm Sumire." The old lady brightened up, her sweet look not masking the intelligence in her eyes. Why the fuck did everyone here have to be smarter than her? "You've come to the right place, Sumire." Sabrina was glad she had picked a properly Japanese name for this damn game. It was so nice to have everyone say your name perfectly the first time; it was almost musical hearing it. Not like "Saburina", which sounded like some kinda fuckin' band name, she'd pretty much given up on trying to get people to say that right. "Alchemy is a proud art that specializes in transmuting materials together and from one state to another. While solutions and crystals do not last forever, they can greatly improve your abilities and save your life in a tough situation!"

Stats:

Quest: Earning a Living {Alchemist}

Well rested and ALMOST in a good enough mood to tolerate the smell of... whatever blacksmiths did, the metal melty crap, The Artist Formerly Known As Sabrina took flight on wings of - she walked to the location of her adventure of yesterday like a common pleb. No amount of pleasant mood or fanciful imagination was going to let her strap on some fairy wings and yeet herself across town, and she had asked about that. It seemed like kind of a big omission, she wasn't an expert on fantasy games but she had read enough about elves and pixies and stuff that Sumire was of the strong opinion that they should totally exist here. Apparently boss-man had used up all his creativity on the death game thing.

For better or worse, Zackariah's abode hadn't disappeared overnight, and she had something she wanted to talk to him about before she did this blacksmithing thing. She hadn't promised Lyle she'd show up at a specific time after all, and right now she had some more learning to do. Hopefully.

The old rascal was in the exact same place he had been yesterday, and... may or may not have recognized her, she couldn't remember if this was how he greeted her yesterday. "Hello, young lady. How can I help you?" Hmm. Ah, whatever. "Hey gramps. Can you teach me more about that potion making stuff? It seemed crazy handy, I heard you can make all kinds of cool stuff with it." He blinked, apparently having expected another opening line, but after a moment seemed to regain his bearing. "I would be happy to miss, but I'm afraid my specialty is primarily potions. Alchemy is an ancient art with a great deal of versatility, capable of composing powerful salves as well as crafting crystals with instantaneous effects. May I recommend Ms. Calora? She is quite the accomplished alchemist, and I'm certain she can aid you in that."

As it turned out, she was right - a blessed happenstance on a blursed day that had previously seemed determined to make her feel like an imbecile. Granted, part of it was just that ol' Zack gave good directions, but it turned out a blacksmith really wasn't that hard to find, what with the smoke and smell. Score one for restoring her bruised ego! Chuckling to herself at the irony of it, and in a much better mood now, Sabrina steeled herself for the stench of sweat and fire and... decided pretty quickly that she didn't have any interest in ever becoming a blacksmith, full stop, end of story, no way no how. She wasn't the prissiest princess to ever walk Aincrad, but she'd be damned if she ruined her nails with this crap.

Still, if she'd learned anything today, it would probably be smart to at least check out what they had to offer. It might be useful after all, and maybe the actual, uh, act of crafting was less gross than it looked to be from here. Steeling her heart and girding her loins, Sabrina grudgingly entered the smithy and found Lyle without much issue, trading greetings back and forth, a bit of small talk about Zack, and made the delivery without further issue. After thanking her, Lyle mentioned some kind of issue he was having, and after a moment's thought finalizing her decision she agreed to come back the next day to see what she could do to help.

But tonight, she was gonna sleep like a god damn princess with nary a pea to be found.

Thread Summary

Quote

[Total]
+ 4SP
+ 400col
+ Tier 1 'Health Potions of Rare Quality' (+40HP)
+ Tier 1 Uncommon Damage Potion (+1 DMG)
+ Tier 1 Over-Health Potion (+50 Max HP)

He nodded, still smiling, but his eyebrows rose as he seemed to remember something. "Of course, Sumire. Though if I may ask a personal favor of you, would you mind taking a package to the blacksmith for me? I promised him some potions, and - ah, actually, this might be a good experience for you to meet him as well. While monsters and chests can provide very powerful equipment, a good blacksmith can do the same in a much safer manner. If blacksmithing isn't your fancy, other adventurers can do so for you, but it is wise to try it for yourself before deciding!"

Huh. A delivery, and a new opportunity for learning. Eh, who knew, maybe it'd be cool too. "Sure thing, gramps. Just give me a name and some idea of where the hell I'm going, and I'll get it there. It's the least I can do after, uh, well, you know. All this." She couldn't quite meet his eyes as she finished, but he seemed quite the opposite of nonplussed, instead waving her concerns away with a sweep of his hand and a chuckle. "Thank you, miss. Your target is one  Lyle Tealeaf, a blacksmith in town. He's actually quite close, only a few blocks down." He continued with the directions, which didn't sound too complex - and besides, it was just a blacksmith, they probably had anvils and furnaces and stuff, how hard could it be to find?

Sabrina nodded, a little dumbstruck and with a newfound appreciation for these NPCs - and a slight note of horror at the realization that she had been treating them like they were just robots so far. Zackariah had been a new experience, yes, but who was to say she hadn't just been willfully blind to similar depth in others? Unlike real people, they weren't deceptive and unreliable. If anything, maybe she'd had things the wrong way around.

"Ah yes, a gift, if you don't mind. I actually prepared a few other potions for you earlier while you were gone. Some healing potions of course, but a few with heartier effects in combat; this one strengthens your blows for a time, while... this one raises your durability, also for a time. Please keep in mind these are not permanent effects, but they should last for a good amount of time... certainly a battle or two, maybe even a few hours. Don't waste them, but remember that not using them when needed is wasteful in itself - you must use everything at your disposal to survive."

There wasn't much else to do but nod again, struck by the realization that even after she had been kinda-sorta a bitch to him he had still been willing to get this gift together for her. She hadn't really been paying attention to some of the quest setup and assumed the reward was just the knowledge, some dumb tutorial you did once and then never thought about again. This... this was absolutely not that. "...Thank you, Zachariah. Really. This has been a new experience for me, and one I won't forget."

"Hmm? Yes, Sumire?"

The elderly man seemed roused from his own thoughts as he finished arranging potions and turned to her, and the gentle smile on his face made her feel even more like a piece of human garbage for her thoughts on first meeting him. It was frustrating, but there was absolutely no justification in her mind for it, and while her emotions weren't exactly ruling her now, neither could she deny them. "I, uh... 'm sorry for being rude when we met. I really appreciate your teaching me all this. And... it was fun, too." Was it fun? The crafting, yes, definitely, she quickly confirmed. She definitely felt positive about that. The adventuring... had that been fun? It had been dangerous. Thrilling? Exciting? Was that fun? She had never really thought too much about why she did what she did, but it was hard not to now with such a rush.

Zackariah's kind smile grew a bit, not enormously but she was perceptive enough to pick up on it as well as the twinkle in his eyes. "You were raised quite well, young lady. No apologies needed, I am simply glad you gained from the experience. Too many young adventurers these days treat potions as unimportant, relying entirely on strength and valor to carry the day. Those are certainly important things for a warrior, but cleverness and preparation can even seemingly impossible odds. It is good to see you take to the lessons so well. But don't forget to keep practicing! For this lesson it didn't matter much, but the higher quality the potion the more value it can provide to you, whether in potency of usage or col for selling it to others."

Zackariah gently took the potion from her, something the slightly overwhelmed teenager made no attempt to stop, and busied himself putting it away. For her part, Sabrina was more than fine simply... standing there, taking in the experience. For maybe the first time since coming to this damn game, she felt as though she could understand how people could get interested in this kind of game. Not enough to call herself a gamer, that was for sure. But... it was such a fresh, new experience for her. Creating instead of abusing or destroying. Pushing her mediocre intellect further than she normally would, but in a way that sort of made sense, as though there was a meaningful structure to things. She still didn't know what the complicated sensations flowing through her from the adventure itself were, but this stuff she could understand.

...And with a sense of gratitude flowing through her, it was a LOT easier now to see that... she had been kind of a bitch at the start. Even if he was just the equivalent of an imaginary robot, someone must have written this character to be a decent guy, and he had only done right by her so far. Greeting him with sarcasm and lackadaisical uncaring had, uh, probably not reflected well on her. If only she had put that much thought into her initial greeting. Nonetheless... "...Hey, Zackariah?"

Before long he had her DOING it rather than just talking about it, and while it was an... uphill battle, the elderly alchemist walked her through each step. His gentle guidance helped keep her from wasting too large a volume of the gathered materials, and after a few minutes she had... something resembling a potion. Holding it, staring down in the murky, swirling crimson, it was yet another strange sensation in her bosom as she considered the fruits of her labor. Sabrina was well aware that she wasn't much of a creator. She didn't really... add. She used existing structures, exploited them, rarely adding to them meaningfully. This was something new.

Zackariah's words after carefully inspecting the shifting potion jolted her out of her reverie with ease, and she almost dropped the damn thing before recovering and paying attention. "Not bad for a first try. Don't worry about the look right now, the parts are still mixing, it will attain a more uniform coloration within ten minutes. I'd say... mmm... it's a hint too light. When pouring a measured quantity from a beaker, be sure to take a moment and ensure ALL of it is delivered. There are various qualities of potions, and a Rare or Perfect one can be significantly more potent than the average alternative. Don't worry miss, you'll get it with practice; you picked that up quite nicely!"

• Quest materials lost [-5]
• Quest potion gained [+1]

If he was nonplussed by her coarse verbiage, Zackariah didn't show it, instead clapping his hands together and looking quite pleased. "Excellent, excellent! Follow me inside young lady, let's get right to brewing those potions. Time's a-wastin', and Blumenkranz withers quickly." Well, he seemed properly... what was that word, the British thing. Choffed? Chuffed? She wasn't sure, but it seemed appropriate. As her newfound potions mentor hurried inside she followed along, feeling partially like she was following Snape and partially like Dumbledore, they entered a pretty cool little... workshop... thing, she had absolutely no idea what most of the stuff in there did but it looked and smelled like the kinda place a mad scientist would make potions in.

"Sumire, the first thing to keep in mind is that preparing a potion is primarily a question of proportions. You can't simply add a random bunch of berries, you must carefully mix the materials together in appropriate ratios to maximize the efficiency of the resuming potion. For example, these berries should be mashed using this grinder, I'd recommend about fifteen to start with. The exact number will vary with their size of course, but in the end you want this many millilitres of the resulting concentrate for each health potion you desire to create. Now if we were making a damage potion..."

The elderly man droned on, quickly but thoroughly explaining the tools of the trade as well as the uses of each material, some of which could be used in multiple ways. It was all a bit overwhelming, but it was actually quite interesting, WAY cooler than that chemistry bullshit in school, and Sabrina found herself nodding along as she struggled to keep up with all the information.

Walking back to town turned out to be a whole hell of a lot easier than this whole stupid adventure had been - the giant ass fortress in the middle of everywhere wasn't exactly hard to see, and she wasn't wasting any attention on searching for materials, so she could focus on more important things. Like, for example, not getting ambushed by monsters and brutally murdered mere steps away from safety. That would be bad. Doubleplus ungood even, to crip a phrase from that book she had read about the dystopian society. Which made it very easy to justify taking an occasionally circuitous route to avoid monster spawns, even if she really wanted to just go through them.

Again though, it didn't take a genius or a professional gamer to have heard the horror stories of new players getting beaten down by even a few monsters, and Sabrina was far from egotistical or suicidal enough to think she was a better fighter than they had been. So she was patient and took her time, and before long the massive gates of the Town of Beginnings loomed large above her. Safety at last. Safe enough that she could finally relax again. It was an almost... alien realization. Utterly without compare. She hadn't even thought about it that much while out and about, but after a year and a half of cowering in town, she had almost forgotten the prickling tension she recalled all too well from school. But here, it wasn't just an angry ex-girlfriend or a spurned suitor. Here she could actually die. It was... she didn't know what it was, exactly. Something. Something intense. Something new.

Zackariah seemed happy to see her again, or perhaps he was just programmed to act that way. Sabrina was having a bit of trouble reconciling the idea of NPCs being mindless robots with ones like him that seemed to act more like - well - people. It almost made her feel uncomfortable. "Welcome back, Sumire! Did you find the reagents alright?"

...It was strange to be greeted with welcoming kindness after so many days coming home to an empty house. In reality or this false world, that never seemed to change, and for a moment she despaired that it never would. But it was gone a moment later, the young adventurer all smiles as she greeted the elderly NPC as though nothing had happened. "Heya, gramps." Hefting the bag of gathered materials, she grinned at him with a sense of genuine accomplishment that took her off guard when she realized it. "Hell yeah I did!"

Things took a bit of an awkward turn when she nearly happened on a boar, but what had looked relatively harmless from a distance was a lot less so from 20 feet away and the brave young adventurer hightailed it the FUCK out of there as quickly as possible. She didn't understand aggro at all, but it didn't take a professional gamer to figure out that the bad guy not seeing you is better than them seeing you, and they hadn't been all that close in the first place. But it did mean another damn detour, and it ended up being nearly an hour before she found the stream she had been hoping for. It wasn't much of one, certainly no raging river, but that was quite alright by her - from what she had heard, larger bodies of water meant you were getting close to the scary part of the first floor, and she wanted absolutely nothing whatsoever to do with that shit.

Dousing the Blumenkranz flower in water was super easy, barely an inconvenience, which was... almost disappointing, she'd half expected an alligator or something. Or was it crocodiles in freshwater? She had only been to America once, and wasn't quite an expert on which was the saltwater inhabitant and which preferred freshwater. Hmm. Maybe she'd look that up later, if she could find any info on it.

For now though, she had to find some... the page wasn't super clear, or maybe she wasn't reading it quite right, but apparently willows near the water had some kinda flowers or nuts or something, and she was supposed to get a few of those. Well, at least it was as easy as following the river up or down stream. Hmm. "Eenie, meenie, minie... thataway", she decided, pointing downstream and following her dreams towards what looked like a decent sized copse of trees of some kind.

...Which definitely had some kinda bugs inside, and she was NOT going to explore that shit, no way no how. But there was a willow on the verge, and the weird little pod things on it came off pretty easy. Gottem!

Quest materials 5/5

To some degree, Sabrina was acutely aware that she was being a bloody child about this. She wasn't dumb. Not that smart either, she had faced that down long ago, but no matter how much her emotions ruled her actions they could not completely devour her mind. Her luck or lack thereof in finding the materials for this quest was no one's fault really; it was not her skill or intellect that had led to relatively quick finds now or the dearth of results initially. The game wasn't inherently badly designed because she didn't finish the quest instantly. It was just... frustrating. That was all, really. She was mad that she hadn't gotten her way instantly. It sounded even more pathetic in her head, and the mix of anger and shame served to help her focus, at least to some degree.

That was two down - the berries, and the roots. Time to make like a tree and leaf. Specifically, leaf this area and find some running water, as well as a... Blumenkranz flower. Apparently you were supposed to dip them in water, and that made some kind of reaction that... ah, whatever, the why and the how didn't matter, it was probably some goofy video game logic anyways. Nonetheless, she kept her eyes peeled and got moving, her pace a little hurried as she realized that her earlier outburst had a chance of attracting monsters - best to be well away before they arrived. If they arrived.

Good luck struck as she ambled onward; the rainbow-hued flowers were exceedingly easy to locate amidst the gorgeous greenery, mostly on account of them being every color other than green, and while the first thicket she found of them had a monster in fairly close proximity, forcing her to steer clear, it didn't take long to find a second that was much easier to access and pick a few.

Quest materials 4/5

It was amazing how much a stroke of half decent luck could do to change one's mood, and as her fury from before fled into the night there was a bit more of a spring in her step as Sabrina started paying a bit more attention to whatever was going on around her. Thankfully there didn't seem to be too many monsters around, she had barely seen any in a bit now. Maybe walking off the beaten path was wise. Or maybe you were supposed to be bored. Before this place turned into a death game, she would have expected there to be a lot more enemies to keep all the players busy. Maybe the 'gamers' were supposed to fight with each other over the enemies? This "PVP" crap was apparently a big deal for some people, and 'Rina didn't get that at all. What was so cool about murdering each other? Before the death game thing obviously. Now it was clearly bad, but even then it just seemed... dumb?

Dammit. Focus. So what else DID she need? Hmm. The berries were good. There was also some kind of.... ok, she didn't even know what that meant, but some kind of... roots, huh? Hmm, that looked oddly familiar for... some... reason...

"MOTHERFUCKER!"

Without even having the decency to give a damn about anyone hearing her, though with just enough presence of mind to look around for enemies, a fuming wannabe witch walked angrily back to the fuzzy flowers and viciously uprooted one, which, yep, had the EXACT god damn roots she was supposed to be looking for. Normally she'd be happy, but having her feelings toyed with by an uncaring god of chance was a crime punishable by a thousand years of torture. Possibly more if she wasn't at least a bit closer to her goal.

Quest materials 3/5

Ok, ok, it wasn't THAT bad really, or at least that was what she kept telling herself as her temper continued to fray. Yeah, it was... not great, and this quest was a load of bullshit designed by the kind of lunatic who would trap a few thousand people in a death game, but that didn't mean she was giving up - it was personal now. She would find these damn... whatever thingies... if it killed her, hopefully not literally, but if it would spite the lunatic who designed this crap, she was willing to consider that too. Try wiping THAT much blood off your face, Mr. Insane Science Asshole. It'd be more satisfying to kick him in the junk until she ensured he would NEVER reproduce, but that would be an acceptable followup. ...Would that be considered a weird motivation for becoming a frontliner? Wanting to kick the guy who made this game in the junk a bunch of times?

Contemplating the pros and cons of CBT, Sabrina walked right past the blue-speckled bush and was half a dozen feet beyond it before she abruptly stopped, turning around in amazement at the discovery. Hey, didn't that look a lot like... this time knowing what she was looking for, it was actually quite quick to find what were possibly called Fremckleberries, unless Zach had had a stroke while writing it. She supposed that was about as possible as the rest of all this crap.

Quest materials 2/5

A short time later, her flower-floofing completed without injury and the flowers still standing proudly where they grew, Sabrina left them to their own devices to compose herself. Yes, the fluffiness had somewhat satiated her frustration, but she had been out here for a little while with absolutely nothing to show for it yet. She hadn't expected to find everything instantly on the first try, but admittedly the half-blood had expected a more even progression. No wonder she had never really gotten into video games. If this was the best they had to offer, rolling some stupid dice over and over until you found what you wanted, she didn't get what gamers saw in this stuff.

Onwards and upwards, huh? Except the only place she was going was Bullshit Junction, 'cuz these berries weren't even on the damn list either, and unlike the flowers they just looked kinda like budget raspberries. Which was kinda cool in its own way admittedly, berries that DIDN'T explode you were cool, but that didn't mean they were safe to eat either. Touching flowers was one thing, but slightly shaken by the poisonous berries earlier she didn't want to risk eating these.

Did they? Up close, it was actually harder to tell. Sabrina wasn't, like, the goddess of flowers or anything, but she was pretty sure something was weird about these. It was kinda concerning to even touch them after the other berries turned out to be so damn poisonous; were the sorta fuzzy looking.... thingies on these flowers actually fuzzy, or like, super death poison stabbers? If the wind started blowing hard enough, was she about to get a faceful of guided death missiles, Nature's way of telling her to gargle a cactus? ...Surreptitiously looking around her just in case anyone was watching, the wayward adventurer shuffled around the flowers to be a little less downwind and pored over the damn paper that now governed her life.

After reading over the list twice, she grudgingly accepted that the flowers didn't actually seem to be on it at all. Either ol' Zachapoo was trying to get her killed, or these were neither useful nor dangerous. Hmm... another glance around for monsters, and she carefully stretched out her hand to grab them, ready to recoil in unending agony.

...Huh, they WERE kinda fuzzy. Hehe. It was sorta funny feeling. She giggled helplessly at the strange sensation. It was so strange for some fake flowers in a video game to feel so real, even weirder than a normal flower but no less genuine. 

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future edit: forgot that LD for gathering was 11 instead of 15 here, gonna pretend that was a fail