[F06 - SP] The Cowardly Turtle <<The Gemini>>

[Yugana 0]

Kikyo walked into the town on the sixth floor of Aincrad. It was a nice little place. She had never seen a jungle outside of some of the pictures she had found of exotic places her father shipped to. Of course, she knew it was all an illusion, but it was still a pretty site. Even if it was fake, the humidity she was feeling certainly didn't feel that way. The water in the air clung to her and the heavy armor she was wearing wasn't helping that at all. She had gotten this from some merchant when she had first joined the game. It seemed like a good idea, but she wasn't paying attention to what she was buying and ended up getting something that was absolutely horrendous. She had ordered something much more useful and fashionable, but it seemed like it would be some time before that would actually be finished. Maybe she could find the time to make it on her own, though that was probably more effort than it was worth right now.

[Yugana 0]

There was a slight pause as she made her way through the village. At the prompting of some random front line player she had met, he came this way. She couldn't remember the player's face, but she did remember their suggestion. They had told her to come here and face some sort of doppelganger that gave an extra skill for defeating it. Though she was concerned, they said it scaled to her level and that she had the perfect gear for it. Not wanting to say no, she had just nodded and made her way over to the floor's main town. Supposedly the person that would challenge her was around here somewhere. Looking down alleyways, she found herself worried about getting jumped. Though eventually that fear died down, as she remembered this was a safe zone where she couldn't be harmed. All someone could do was give her a scare. A very easy scare...

[Yugana 0]

It wasn't long before a hooded figure was seen lurking in the shadows. Peering towards them, they seemed to take notice of her. They commented on how weak she seemed, which she found to be mean. But they relented when she told them about the challenge that they supposedly offered. Though they seemed confident they would beat her, she didn't want to let down the person that had suggested she come here. At the very worst, she felt she would be able to run away from the fight and back towards another town to cancel the inevitable duel. Of course, she was surprised when they guided her to the outskirts of town. As she saw the safe zone bonus wear off, she grew more nervous. Now she could be attacked from any angle and no one would be able to stop them. The only solace she had was that the mysterious figure stayed close to the safe zone, so she would be able to duck back into it if she could scramble over the low wall. Not that she was confident in her own climbing skills.

[Yugana 0]

Out of nowehere, the hooded figure attacked. As soon as the hood fell, she noticed that they were a mirror image of her. It was herself, but someone who was much more confident then she was. Jumping back in shock, she held the little dagger she had gotten for free in front of her face. It wasn't much, but she hoped it would deter them. Their dagger came crashing down into her side and she watched her health go down. But as the figure did that, they seemed to go to far and rammed into the spikes on her armor. As soon as they did, their health bar went down to practically nothing. She was thankful she hadn't quite killed them, but they were reeling back from the attack already.

"What in the world? How did you defeat me so easily?" Their voice sounded just like hers. Soft with honeyed tones to it.

Spoiler

Roll ID: #120053
BD: 6 - hit (1 * 1 = 1 - 1 = 1 damage to gemini)
MD: 8 - hit (5 - 0 = 5 damage to Yugana; 18 thorns damage)

Yugana: 15/20 HP | 2/2 EN | 1 DMG | 18 THN
Gemini: 0/10 HP | 5 DMG | 1 MIT | 

 

Edited July 26, 2019 by Yugana

[Yugana 0]

"I am so sorry! I didn't mean to hurt you like that. I just thought the spikes on this armor were decorative. I didn't think that would hurt you at all. I'm so sorry, so sorry, so sorry."

Kikyo was constantly apologizing to the figure that looked just like her. Realizing that they were still hurting from the attack, she quickly went over to them and attempted to patch up their wounds. She didn't know much in terms of medical knowledge, just a little bit of first aid that she knew. There wasn't much use for it in her culture, everyone was safe from simple cuts and scrapes. The worst she had to deal with was a paper cut, not someone getting impaled on a metal spike. She did what she could, but watched as they slowly began to fade out.

"Thank you, for trying to help me. Take this scroll, it will help you in your journey."

[Yugana 0]

Taking the scroll, she still tried frantically to save the person before them. There was no stopping the bleeding though, and as they began to push her hands away with what little strength they had left, she realized that they didn't want to be saved. Backing away from them, she let them slowly drain the last of their life by their own dagger and shatter into the distance. Maybe it was something to do with being an NPC and wanting to be done with their job, but they seemed like they were ready to die. Or maybe it was all a ruse, though she doubted that was the case. They seemed genuinely surprised at her gear, which the higher level player had commented was perfect for the challenger. She just hoped that wherever they were now, that they were doing ok for themselves. She would hate to have caused them much more pain.

[Yugana 0]

She decided to linger outside of the town for a little bit longer, as well as realizing that she should equip the spear that she had gotten from the blacksmiths. Even now she was already getting used to being the defenseless damsel in distress. As much as she wanted to avoid that, she couldn't help but slip into that familiar territory. Maybe she should've stayed back home, then she wouldn't be in this mess. Her parents would probably be hating her for the decisions she made. Not that she had much happy feelings for them either. They were trying to marry her off to some scumbag and she didn't want to have any part of it. But tradition was tradition, and tradition dictated that she marry someone of strategic value instead of for some silly concept of love. And every day, she was forced to always be following tradition because "That's what has kept this family alive for generations," she puppeted her fathers speech.

[Yugana 0]

The strange mockery seemed to draw the attention of a couple passer-by, but she quickly went back to being shy and avoiding their eyes and they eventually went back to ignoring her. She shouldn't have done that. Bringing attention to oneself was not a lady's job. They should only be in attention when someone else calls her to it. Never before that, and she should try to no longer be the center of attention as soon as is politely possible. As such, she tried to move a little ways away from the area that she was currently in. It made no sense for her to stick around and continue to make a fool of herself.

What was she thinking, she had come here to try and get away from all these silly things. She didn't want to be a lady, she just wanted to be someone with their own individuality. But years of denying her that had made her start to even deny herself the freedom that this game was giving. She wasn't even sure if those people back there were players, they could've just been NPCs programmed to react to any speech.

[Yugana 0]

Once she was calming herself down again, she realized that she still had the scroll that the NPC had given her. opening it up, it seemed to be blank, but then a prompt popped up, surprising her. After recovering from the shock of something like this, she realized it was asking if she wanted to learn a new skill. She pressed the confirm button, and watched as the scroll shattered in front of her eyes. She was worried that she had just wasted the item, but realized that she had gained a new skill when she checked out her skills in the menu. Concentration... She didn't quite understand what it meant with the skill effect, but she figured it would be useful for later. Maybe she could figure out a creative way of using it. She could concentrate on finding something. Or maybe even concentrate on getting home. "Probably just wishful thinking at this point."

[Yugana 0]

Deciding to make her way a little bit more into the town again, she looked around for anything important. She couldn't quite tell though if anything was actually important or not. She had never done shopping or anything on her own, always just a list to hand to a servant and they got everything for her. Now she was assaulted by the smells of the bakeries, the sounds of taverns, and the beautiful dresses of tailors. Reminding herself she already had one in the works right now, she turned away from the shops as best as she could. It was one of the habits she knew she needed to break. One of many, but she was going to have a hard time breaking through all of that. Maybe one day she could finally find herself free of everything her family had been teaching her. One day, she wouldn't have to worry about her bleak future.

[Yugana 0]

There wasn't much besides shops and seedy taverns in this town, so Kikyo decided that it would be best if she went back towards the town of beginnings. There was a brief pause as she fidgeted with the transporter. She had still yet to figure out the UI that was on it. Once she had figured out where to go, she quickly found herself whisked back towards that starting floor. Once she was back there, she decided to do some more looking around. As it was a more heavily populated floor, there seemed to be a bit more variety of items available in the starting town. Of course, she was unsure just how much there was to be found here, but it seemed many people had set up a life down here. Most of the people who either couldn't or wouldn't make their way up the front lines were here in the city.

[Yugana 0]

Once she had made her way through the various attractions of the beginning floor city, she decided to wander out into the fields a little bit. Enjoying the sweet summer air, she decided that it would be best if she could try and find something worth her while. There wasn't much to be had, or maybe she just didn't know what she was looking for. Or even worse, she had to do something to unlock the ability to find materials without killing animals. She had read in one of the guides that there was a skill called gatherer. It was fairly lowly recommended by most of the info brokers, but it seemed like an invaluable skill if it allowed one to get materials without fighting monsters. Or maybe the fighting just got easier. She didn't even know what it was like to be in combat, she had avoided it ever since the game was revealed to be a trap.

[Yugana 0]

Bemoaning to herself quietly about her own luck, she went towards the town of beginnings to try and find something to spend her time on. It seemed that she should've tried to take a bit more time with the hooded figure, but that fight had ended so quickly. She really hadn't realized that it would end up being her doom if she had that spiked armor. She didn't really want to hurt anyone, but she figured it was a useful tool for protection. Though she wanted to control who she hurt so she didn't have to do more than was necessary. What if someone accidentally hurt themselves on her armor, that would be terrible. Granted, most people would probably be safe if it was for real, but with this being a game she didn't know what would set it off. At least she had the armor she had requested from the tailor, hopefully that order would be finished soon enough once they got the materials needed for it.

[Yugana 0]

There wasn't too much to be seen in the town of beginnings, but she wasn't surprised. After being stuck down here from her own nerves for about two years, she had already seen most of the sites that there were to see. She had taken charity from just about every wholesome organization that had formed, had window shopped at just about every locale. About the only things left for her was talking to the old man NPC that seemed to be the tutorial quests. She was seriously not sure if she should actually take him up on that or if she felt she could just do it on her own. Probably best if she found someone to do it with though. Of course, that meant she had to find someone to do things with. And knowing her, she would shy away from anything that was meeting new people. Being so used to people coming to her, she hadn't had to get connections on her own her entire life.

[Yugana 0]

But, the town was still a nice little quaint place for her to be. They certainly made it feel peaceful even if the rest of the game was meant to try and kill you. Maybe she could find some other peaceful places like this if she went out more. There had to be at least some other places as nice as this. It couldn't all be gritty reality. Well, it could be, but it wouldn't be such a renowned game from the beta testers if it was all dark all the time. It could be, but she doubted it would get as much of a player base if it was. Those kind of games always seemed so miraculous for staying around as long as they did. Then again, she had never really been able to play video games before. Maybe the occasional dress up or cooking game, but nothing with a dark tone. She just assumed that was because there was no need for her to play them. Why consume entertainment that didn't culture you?

[Yugana 0]

But that was in the past and she wanted to branch out some more now. Maybe if she found some other games within this game she could figure things out more. Or maybe she just needed to have gotten out more. She may have been cooped up in the house, but maybe she could've put her foot down against her parents. No, that would've been a bad idea. It wasn't becoming of a lady to try and order people around. The only lady who was allowed to do that was the lady of the house to her lowest servants. Even the butler had more right to say something than the lady of the house. At least, that was what it seemed. Her voice was never heard and she just wanted to quietly move through life for a time. But here, she had a voice, she just needed to figure out how to use it properly and actually let her ideas be heard.

[Yugana 0]

Not that she had opinions. No, heavens no! It would bne wrong of her to be holding any opinions of her own. That was for the men to do. The men did the thinking and she was there to look pretty and make her family appear to be wealthy. While the men kept to their suits, she was to where fancy dresses and change her appearance as often as possible so that way everyone knew that they had the money to buy new clothes whenever they wished to. That was her role in life, but this wasn't that life. Here she was a nobody just clinging on to survival. Maybe a few would recognize her last name, but she doubted anyone would associate it with her father's company. Though, she had a feeling the game may have been shipped through her fathers company more than a few times. It was a popular enough item that she was pretty sure he had a hand in its distribution.

[Yugana 0]

Maybe she could gain some status, though everyone here seemed pre-occupied with survival, so she doubted that that would be worth it. She was used to being the product of status, she had never held it for herself. All she had to do was sit or stand there and look pretty. She may have done that very well, but she wanted to break free of that now. Of course, she hadn't the slightest clue what to do to break free from all of this little mental programming. She had had it drilled into her head that she was worthless without a man in her life, but that just didn't sit well in her stomach. Maybe she should try to move forward and forge her own path. Though that was going to be hard considering that she had little left to explore at her current power. Figuring that she just needed a bit more power, it was time she actually tried to level up in this game.

[Yugana 0]

Though that meant that she had to get violent with what was going on in this game. She doubted that there was a way for her to be useful and still leveling up without taking out a few creatures. It just seemed so stupid that she had to do that. But it did seem to be the only way. This game truly was designed by someone who wanted to play with people's lives. So what if they were just a program, she had heard that it was a living and growing program and that meant it would feel the pain that came its way. She didn't think it was fair just to play on people's psychology to get them to do things they would never do in their real lives. Then again, was there anything about this game that was fair at all. Perhaps she really should just discard all of those feelings. But what would her parents say if they realized what she was doing while in this game.

[Yugana 0]

But that was the whole point of her being in here. She had come into this game because she wanted to get away from her parents. There was no reason for her to care about their opinions at this point. Though they were likely going to be helping people, it would be out of a sense of obligation for shipping the game and not because their precious daughter was stuck in it. They were more likely to try and rip her headset off so that they didn't have to deal with her if that didn't bring about several social consequences. Maybe they would hire someone to do it themselves. Actually, who knew if there wasn't just a serial killer who went around ripping off the headsets of players so that they die to the headset itself without dying in game. If there was actually some way to break in, that would probably be a pretty effective way to kill for someone who doesn't even have a heart.

Thread Summary:

Spoiler

Gemini:

• 3 SP
• 600 Col
• <<Concentration>>

One page of RP:

• 1 SP
• 400 Col

Total:

• 4 SP
• 1000 Col
• <<Concentration>>

 

Edited July 28, 2019 by Yugana