Page 33

“Video games can be a bad influence,” I agree. “But he made something that has brought people from all over the world together. And I love the game. And if he didn’t make the game, and I didn’t run off to the woods, then you wouldn’t have the fifth seal now, would you.”

All eyes go to Ornix.

“You have the fifth seal?” The red dragon speaks.

“Yes, Jak. I have the seal. Someone was trying to send it north using kobolds as couriers. It was not a good choice.”

So there’s Equinox, Jak, and Arkos. Equinox is obviously the scapegoat of the castle. I can tell already that he gets blamed for everything and has learned to shoulder it without thinking about it too much. I feel a kind of kinship with him already. The pair of us look at one another with sidelong glances as the other three enter into a serious conversation about the seal.

I drift away a little and sit on the grass. Equinox follows me and sits down next to me.

“So,” he says. “You’ve been taken as a captive by my uncle.”

“Yeah,” I laugh. I didn’t expect him to be that blunt about it. Ornix acts as though this is all completely understandable and reasonable. Equinox seems to know that nothing that is happening right now is okay by human standards.

“Are you okay?”

“I am okay,” I say. “I’m… okay.”

I don’t want to say too much to him. He’s a stranger, even if he’s a sympathetic one.

“You’ve played the game before, huh.” He grins.

“Dragon Fire Eternity? Oh, my god, so much! I love it. And so much of it seems to be true to the real world.”

“Yes. Uncle is not happy about that part of things. He’s asked me to make some changes, so there’s going to be a big content drop in a few months. What class did you play?”

“I was healer for a while, because my group needed one, but I always liked DPS. I played Dragonkin.”

“And now here you are,” he says. “I knew the second you went to the forest you had played before.”

“I tried to level, but it’s not as easy for real. Killing real things is much worse.”

“I never really intended for the game to be a tutorial for the realm, but it looks like you picked up some gear anyway.” He nods his head at my eclectic outfit.

“Kobold stuff. I need a proper weapon, though. I managed to sharpen a stick. That’s not a good way to do anything.”

“Could be alright for fishing if your dexterity was high enough.”

“I don’t know what my stats are, but they feel like they’re all zeroed out.”

Equinox laughs at my joke. It’s nice to talk to someone who feels like they’re on a similar level to me. He might actually know what it’s like to be human. He’s someone who has built a whole digital world for people to play in.

“Why did you make the game?”

He shrugs. “For something to do. I get bored. We are the dominant faction in the realm. My uncle is a strong and capable leader. There is little call for a young warrior like myself. I can do all the training missions in the world, but at a certain point I needed to do something with my mind. People need me in the way nobody in this realm does. Here, Ornix is in control. In my version of the realm? I’m in control. And I have subjects who get to do things they could never do in their own world. I love what I’ve made.”

I smile at his passion for the game. “You should. It’s really incredible. I didn’t get to play it as much once I made friends in college, then I had to go out all the time and stuff, but your gamefilled in so much of my time when I didn’t have friends, and I even met some really cool people in it.”

Equinox grins. “It’s amazing to have a player here. I wish I could have more people see this place and realize that there’s more here than they could imagine. Could you see it? Hordes of specially handpicked human players running the forest dungeons for themselves, then moving on?”

“That would be crazy,” I say. “And I’d get to see some other people. I don’t think I’m going to get to see anyone like me for a very long time.”

Equinox looks at me solemnly, and for a moment, I wonder if I have said too much.

“Do you want to get back to the human world?” He mumbles the question to me.

“Oh, my god, yes. Can you help me?”