Astreya

As she made her way out of town, the girl gave a small breath as she looked back down at the directions given. So it seemed that there was going to be a bunch of directions for her to follow to get to where the bandits had taken the kid. She frowned as she moved, the young woman letting her usual cheerful outer shell drop once it was just her by herself again. Even around the NPCs she kept the front up, but when it was just her... she couldn't help but to find herself more than a little perturbed by the situation. She knew that Kagamine wasn't able to actually feel pain, or fear, or

"Yes! Yes I do!" the woman responded, clearly upset about something. Astreya figured it would come out sooner or later with the quest, and so the woman just nodded in response, waiting for her to continue. "I...I'm sorry, I'm not usually so worked up about things, but my son..." Astreya frowned. While she didn't have a kid, obviously, she was still the daughter of someone else, so having to think of her own parents being this upset over something happening pulled at her heart strings a little. "Hey, it's cool! Just take your time. I'm sure I can help out somehow." The woman too

Unlike her friend and charge, Astreya had slept quite soundly, having no problems at all. Granted, most of that was just due to the fact that they were going to be going around on the first floor, and that wasn't any real danger, so far as she was aware. There was little that could actually affect her on this floor, which was nice. She knew, of course, that Melodie wasn't nearly as defensible as she had been when's he'd first started, but that was neither here nor there. If anything too dangerous showed up, Astreya would be certain to kick it into next week! She didn't want there to be an

Astreya had mainly come over to the desserts table to try and work out some sort of way to try and keep things from falling apart. She had just gotten to the party and already there had been all sorts of things happening at once, and she couldn't help but to feel a little bit afraid that there was just going to be a huge meltdown at this party. She had been to a large number of parties over the years where things had fallen through when one person had an issue with another, and that had left things in a rather...terrible sort of way. Thankfully, before she'd really had a chance to int

Quest Details- Astreya gave a long, low inhale before a big happy grin split her face. She always enjoyed the third floor, with all of its greenery and things going on. It was just pretty to look at, no matter which way she looked at it, and so she couldn't help but to come back here time and time again. Of course today, she had decided to take a little detour off the beaten path a bit and head toward Flora. Since she'd started to get her rear in gear again, she had been seeking out several quests that she'd missed the first time while she was just sort of wandering around.

Thread Completion! Total Words: 3319 / 30 = 110 Astreya EXP: 110 * 5 * 3 = 1650 Pastebin of Words! Col- 4098 Total 1 Page: +400 Col 202914 (Hunting Familiar): +2377 Col 202923 (Hunting Familiar): +1321 Col Materials- 5 Total 202919 (Foraging): +1 Material 202923 (Hunting Familiar): +2 Materials 202922 (Foraging): +2 Materials Foraging XP- 25XP 4 Failures: +12 XP 1 Success: +5 XP 1 Critical: +8 XP Other Loot- 202914 (Hunting Familiar): T3 Rare Armor/Shield (1)

Thread Completion! EXP- Total Words: 13,225 / 30 = 440 Astreya EXP: 440 * 5 * 3 = 6,600 EXP Melodie EXP 440 * 5 * 1 = 2,200 + 450(Quest) = 2,650 EXP Pastebin of Words! Col- 2 Pages = 800 Col total (Astreya lets Melodie keep it all) Astreya: 4,491 Col (202885, 202907, 202940) Melodie: 800 (pages) + 500 (Quest) = 1300 Col Materials- Astreya: 4 Materials (202940) Melodie: 5 Materials (Quest) Other Loot(Astreya)- Perfect T3 Armor/Shield (1) (202855) Perfect T3 Trinket (1)(202855) Rare T3 Consumable (1) (202907) Rare T3 Weapon (1)(202907) Other Loot(

Astreya grinned widely at Mel as the pair began to make their way out of Zakariah's shop, and then from there, they turned, heading back the way they'd come in, heading to the gate. "It's a little scary, but you mostly just fight the weaker ones so it's not too bad. They like, they spawn in for the quest, so they're meant to be a little weaker. You shouldn't end up fighting any of the, like, full-grown ones," the girl added, wanting to make sure that the girl was at least comfortable with the upcoming fighting. "Plus this quest alone should give you enough to level, and that'll give yo

The fact that Melodie didn't sound convinced in the slightest didn't escape Astreya, the woman giving a small smile at her friend's uncertainty. She supposed that, at the end of the day, she couldn't really blame her. They didn't have any sort of guarantee that what they were going to do at the Front lines was actually going to mean anything. Sure, they'd been told that clearing the game would let them all go free...but who knew if that was really the case? But she couldn't give into those doubts- Astreya had to keep that hope to keep her moving forward, so she tried to push it out of her

At Melodie's words, there was an unfortunate gnawing in the bit of Astreya's stomach. Not that she believed they were being lied to, of course, or that such a thing could even happen... but all the same, the fact that this was a thought she'd had as well, something to just make her doubt and second-guess, came up to the surface in her mind. She felt the discomfort but swallowed it back down as best she could, putting on a brave smile. "Naw, no way. Besides, even if that is the case, we don't know that yet, right? So, like, we can still hope for the future of getting out and going back to

"Yeah...I don't really, like, know how I'll get back to a normal life after all of this. Everything is totally all screwed up for me now," the girls poke, shaking her head slightly. While she wasn't the biggest gamer, at the same time, there was very little actual 'game' that was happening here. Much of it was just struggling to survive in this world, and that was also outfitted with the constant need to adventure, kill mobs and so forth to level up in order to survive the stronger stuff. ALl of that was just to get to the Front Lines. "Going back to, like, a life where I don't have to fi

"That's true! There's rules and stuff that we don't get to deal with in the real world and all that junk," Astreya agreed, nodding along with the girl's words. It seemed she was starting to open up a little bit, which Astreya was happy to see. The girl was definitely a shyer sort, and that was always hard to have them open up. The armored girl was a social butterfly and genuinely friendly to people, so she found that getting people to open up wasn't difficult so long as you were interested in what they had to say and could just be nice. There were a lot of people that she had met (honestl

"Yup! No rules at all. Life does what it wants and we all just gotta, like, figure out how to survive it," she spoke with a slight grin before she paused, gesturing at the landscape around them. "Y'know, kinda like this game I guess. We just gotta survive no matter what it is!" she cheered, lifting both hands in her excitement. Astreya was fairly easy-going, in most things, just letting things roll this way and that. She enjoyed keeping things happy and upbeat when she could- it was far easier than trying to play serious all the time. Astreya gave a slightly sad smile at the woman

The boulder seemed to be in bad shape, but Astreya had this figured out now. She shifted inward, pulling her fist close before lashing out with a singular, powerful strike that slammed hard into the center of the remaining boulder. There was a brief hesitation after her strike, as if the attack hadn't done anything at all... before the remnants of the boulder exploded backward away from her, washing over the greenery and the woman exhaled slowly, giving the older fellow a wink and a thumbs-up. "Got it!" she cheered. The older fellow nodded with a smile. "You've done well. With this,

As she connected though, she felt something slightly with the movement. As if she were on the edges of feeling out a Sword Art for the martial arts. It felt kind of silly to call them Sword Arts when there wasn't a weapon, let alone a sword, involved, but she wasn't going to criticize the game itself. It wasn't the game's fault. Instead she tried to emulate what she'd just done again, following the same movement, but as her fist connected, it felt off. She didn't get that same surge. Frowning, the woman took a step backward, practicing a few different strikes to see if she could feel

The woman exhaled slowly as she took up an even, almost practiced stance. It was one that she'd used time and time again, but that was back in the real world. Sure, she felt the appraising eye of the old dude watching her, but she didn't mind. She was going to take his advice here. He'd suggested she take it slower, so that's what she would do. Pulling a hand back, she could feel the changes in her breathing, and while she wasn't exactly spiritual enough to really embrace martial arts, she did know how to make a punch hurt. The stance and the breathing were things her mom (who did do

"You think I should, like, totally focus a bit more, instead of just hitting it over and over?" she asked him, curious what he thought. Supposedly he was the one training her for this quest that she was on and she realized she hadn't asked any of his opinions at this point. She had just been stubbornly hitting it over and over again until she had gotten some sort of something from the rock itself. "I would. I see what you're trying to do. Weaken it slightly to find a better way to attack, but take it slow and think it through. Make sure your stance is in place, and focus. Then when

With the kick flaking off another small piece, Astreya decided to take her luck further and began to once more go full on into attacking it with everything she had, trying to get somewhere with it. Each strike did a little bit but she wasn't really making any headway at all on the thing, and it was starting to frustrate her a bit and so the woman began to take a step back as she once more felt her own struggles with the large thing before her. She needed a few moments to really just...change her plan of attack. The first part had been mindless hits until the boulder had shown a weak poi

The girl panted as she watched the large object before her for a moment longer, as if trying to determine the best (or easiest) way of breaking on through it. Unfortunately, it didn't seem to much matter no matter how much she examined it, there just wasn't a weak point showing. "Man, this like, sucks," she admitted aloud as she looked over at the older man, who was watching her with some interest. "Hitting a rock that doesn't fight back, I mean." The older fellow let out a laugh. "It is understandable, but the patience and power you are showing is quite admirable. You are making cons

She took a small step backward as she examined the rock again. The large piece that had fallen off had been the part she'd been aiming to break off, and now it was sitting normally, the thing about three quarters the size it had been. But that had removed any of its weak points as well and she frowned as she looked on at it, wondering if she could find another easy place to strike. Unfortunately she was not able to, and instead shifted her body forward, just pummeling the rock as hard and as fast as she could. Each blow sent chips of stone flying off in a random direction, and she knew

She took a step back away from the rock for a moment, watching it. She could see there were some cracks starting to develop within it, and that was a good thing- that meant she was going to be able to find some other weak points within it. The young woman's eyes closed for a moment as she took in a deep breath, concentrating as her father had taught her to do, and that had only come back to her mind with that waterfall thing. Still, she changed up her stance slightly, and as she did, the old man's eyes widened just a tad before she threw her fist forward into the rock. The force behind

"Take your time. There is no fast path to the mastery of martial arts," the man spoke, even as Astreya threw another fist and a kick to follow up on it, the young woman not exactly inexperienced when it came to hand-to-hand, due to her own experience in the real world. The problem was, she didn't know any of the motions for the Sword Arts for this. She had learned them for the Straight Sword and that allowed her to do what she needed to attack many targets at once, or one target very very hard, and she didn't have that luxury with slamming her gauntlets and greaves against this thing ov

She pulled the heavy blade from her back and spun it once before planting it in the ground. "Can I like, keep my armor on?" she asked. "I don't wanna break my hands on this thing," she continued, making a gesture toward the rock. The old man nodded, and so she shifted, pulling her stance back slightly before moving, throwing her entire weight into the blow. She wanted to make sure she was doing it not only as the old man had instructed her before, but also from what she'd learned from her dad. Strike as if you're punching through your target, to help maximize your force. The woma

Astreya came along with the older fellow, not quite sure what was about to come up, but she figured that whatever test came next, it'd be about at the same level of weird. Not that she was totally against learning all of this martial arts stuff, but at the same time, she didn't really know why she was here, beyond the quest itself. It wasn't like she was going to actually even use the martial arts skill, although she supposed maybe it might be helpful in case she ever got disarmed. Soon, they arrived at a large boulder, and the girl arched a brow as she looked at it, and then back to th

Astreya nodded slowly. "I figure they were just, like, trying to do what they thought was right, but it's like. Just because they know something doesn't mean it'll, like, always apply, y'know?" she spoke, frowning slightly. Her dad was the biggest culprit of it. The man was firm and unyielding in everything he did, and there were only a few moments where Astreya had seen actual warmth and kindness coming from him in her lifetime. Not that he was harsh, or cruel to her, he was just emotionally distant and she'd just come to expect that from him. "My dad kept trying to allude life to chess