I should note that the Fayroll world was seamless, so you never had to wait for new levels to load. Noobland, that safe cradle where players were never bothered and almost never threatened, was, therefore, indistinguishable from the big world. The border between the two worlds, as far as I could tell, was where the forest opened onto a field from which the walls of Aegan were visible.
The walk along the road was anything but boring; there was too much going on. First, a sobbing girl, about six or seven years old and wearing a pink dress, stopped me and plaintively cried, "Sir, would you help me?"
"What happened, sweetie?" I assumed the pose of the Brave and Valiant Protector of Little Girls.
"My name is Mary, and my little lamb is lo-o-o-ost! We're always together, and now I can't fi-i-ind him!" Tears poured from her eyes.
"No worries, let's go see what we can do!" I responded.
You have a new quest offer: Find Mary's Little Lamb.
Task: Find and save Sean, Mary Sue's lamb.
Reward:
300 experience
Accept?
That word "save" had me a bit worried, but I didn't have much choice. The hopeful look Mary gave me saw to that...
The snow-white lamb wasn't far away. Far from it. It was in the next field over—though it wasn't alone. The lamb was there with five or so rabbits, if you could even call those creatures rabbits. They had red eyes, long ears, and nasty, whiskered faces, and they were Level 7. They kicked the lamb from one to the other.
I watched the spectacle and wondered what the developers must have been smoking to come up with that kind of surrealism.
"Sir, please help Sean!" The little girl pulled on my sleeve.
"Right," I responded. "And if I go help him, who will help me? Your little friend's a goner, and we'd better get out of here before they see us."
Mary burst into tears, which attracted the attention of the rabbits. They stared over at us, obviously deciding if they should give us the same treatment as the lamb. Without waiting to see what they concluded, I grabbed Mary and took off in a headlong dash for the road. There, I quickly declined the quest, handed the sobbing girl an apple, and walked away without a backward glance. I felt a little bad, but those rabbits looked nasty. Level 7—are you kidding me? Good thing they didn't try to hunt me down.
Suddenly, I heard branches snap to the left of the road. My club in hand, I quickly jumped off to the side. Out of the bushes, leaped five players who then crossed the road and dove into the underbrush on the other side. Behind them, ran a gray-haired old man in the strangest boots I'd ever seen. His enormous beard fluttered in the wind, and he brandished a club in his hands. He, too, crossed the road and followed the sound of branches breaking into the forest.
"Well, hello..." I shook my head and continued on.
Three minutes later, the entire scene played out once more, this time, with everyone dashing from right to left.
Here I am just walking along, and they have someone chasing them up one side and down the other. There's an interesting life for you, I thought wistfully to myself and kept walking.
When the group dashed by for the third time, I grabbed one of them by the sleeve.
"Hey, man," I said. "Where are you running? Is it a quest? Can I come with you?"
"Seriously, you idiot?" I found myself stared at incredulously by a fidgety player named Mastik. "That guy with the beard is trying to get us. We went into the forest to cut some clubs, and he came out of nowhere. 'What are you ruffians doing here?' And bam—he started hitting us with his stick. 'You little good-for-nothings! Coming around here ruining the forest. Get out before I kill every last one of you!' A-a-a-ah!" Mastik caught a glimpse of his pursuer bursting out of the forest and dashed off.
The old man stopped when he got to me and looked suspiciously at my weapon.
"Factory-made," I quickly assured him. "I love the forest. When I was little, all I cared about was protecting wildlife."
"Better be." The old man, who was labelled "Forester," looked at me darkly and melted into the woods.
"Crazy," was all I could say.
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