Lovely Warfare

Chapter Four

When Charlotte spoke, her voice was serious, "Alright, we'll team up. For now anyways."

Emma released her breath and relaxed, her tension instantly rolling away. A fight between them wouldn't occur, so she wouldn't have to kill.

Charlotte stepped close to the edge of the building and stared down, "The game's started already, but why're those people walking around?"

Emma didn't have to look to know what she was talking about. "Those are the NPC's, they're supposed to be the common folk in this game. By talking to them we can receive quests, buy and sell things or simply steal from them. They help disguise us from the other assassin's since you can blend in with society."

"Well, let's do that! Let's blend in with the common folk of this game," Charlotte suggested.

Emma frowned. The idea wasn't bad, by blending in with the NPC's it would make it easier avoid death but... "Even if we do camouflage ourselves that won't make us safe. Even the NPC's give experience if you kill them. They also drop their items too which might make us a target at some point."

Charlotte pouted, crossing her arms across her chest. "We have to do something. I'm not going to wait to be killed."

"We have to build up our experience, the stronger we become the harder it'll be to kill us. Plus we still have to worry about the boss battles, after all we are still in a game," Emma said.

Charlotte rolled her eyes, "Then let's go do that then."

Emma nodded. The most important thing was experience, that was something all gamer's could agree. She figured that most of the others had gone on their way to build their experience since the fear of death loomed over everyone.

"We should do something simple first. Something that won't get us too badly injured," Emma murmured, trying to think.

"Well duh! Way to state the obvious," Charlotte responded, walking past Emma and heading down the stairs.

"Where are you going?!" Emma called out, hastily following her.

"Where do you think? To talk to some NPC's. Don't those guys always have missions for people?"

Emma followed after Charlotte and tensed as the two stepped out of their hiding place. She brought her sniper up preparing to shoot at any moment. Being out in the open was not good, there could still be players waiting to kill despite knowing the truth of what would really happen. Emma scanned the area trying to search for any sign of irregularity. It baffled her as to how fearless Charlotte behaved but she supposed it could be attributed to the girl's newbie status.

"Hey you!" Charlotte called out, stepping up to a boy who was in the middle of chasing around a small chicken. The boy was obviously an NPC due to his naturally bland facial features. He was a kid, most likely ten years old and appeared to have a pre-built personality of a trouble maker. He frowned and looked up at Charlotte with a defiant look on his face.

"Help me catch Lulu!" He demanded, pointing at the chicken. As soon as the words left his mouth, a small exclamation point hovered over the chicken's head seeming to signal the target.

"Yeah, yeah we accept," Charlotte responded, walking up to the chicken. In response the animal squawked and ran off earning a "Hey!" from Charlotte. She was about to break off into a run but Emma placed a hand on her shoulder, stopping her.

"Use the hints," She said, pointing down at Charlotte's wrist.

"Eh? When did this thing appear?" She asked, glancing at the small blue band around her wrist.

"That's the menu; it's where we store our weapons, potions and anything else we need to store. It's also where we upgrade our skills and learn the specialties," Emma explained, "If you press there, it'll tell you what the current mission is and where we need to go and what to do."

Emma gently pressed a small diamond in the middle of the wrist band and a screen popped up. The screen was slender and had three different buttons displayed: Inventory, Skills, and Missions.

Emma pressed the Missions button and the screen flickered to a separate one which had text explaining the quest and a small map displaying the exclamation point.

"Well, this makes it a whole lot easier," Charlotte commented. "This mission is worth twelve points-- wait! Since we're teaming up, does that mean we split or something?"

Emma shook her head, "Since we're supposed to be enemies we wouldn't split the experience points. I have to go on another Mission."

"Oh."

There wasn't anything else Emma needed to explain. She watched as Charlotte chased the chicken around frantically, getting frustrated as the elusive chicken avoided her grasp. A part of her wanted to speak up and instruct her to use sneak to take the animal by surprise but she remained silent. It was slightly entertaining to watch her struggle.

After twenty minutes of worthless effort Charlotte finally seemed to understand what she had to do. She froze in place and waited for the chicken to turn its back to her, then immediately snatched it up.

"Yes! I got you, you little sucker!" She shouted, holding the wriggling animal under her arms as she blushed.

Emma lightly clapped her hands, noting the progress.

When Charlotte glanced at Emma she immediately avoided her eyes and pouted, as if she was embarrassed. "Now what?" She asked.

"Now you return to that kid. Handing him the chicken will give you your experience."

Charlotte began to do just that, making her way through the crowd of NPC's and heading towards him.

Emma followed her, glancing around them in the hopes of finding her own mission. As her eyes scanned around, out of the side of her eye she saw a glint and immediately shouted, "Get down!"

There was no time to explain. Emma instantly dropped down and crouched low, holding her sniper up and peering through the scope.

Through her scope she could see that a battle had begun between two other players.

Charlotte had managed to crawl close to her while still gripping the chicken, "What's happening?"

"Put the chicken in your inventory," Emma ordered, not taking her eyes away from the battle scene.

While Charlotte did as she was told, Emma felt her heart nearly leap out of her chest. There, in front of her, was the perfect scenario. Two unsuspecting players fighting in broad daylight, the perfect length away for a sniper attack.

"Shoot them," Charlotte said, sending a shudder down Emma's body.

Emma ripped her eyes from the scope to stare wide eyes at her. "Don't you remember that they'll die for real?!"

"But we have three lives. We can get killed at least twice before it actually matters."

"N-no! I can't!"

"Come on! I thought you were the expert in this game? Show me what you've got."

Charlotte's blue eyes stared back at her, seemingly gazing into her very soul. Emma shuddered again and positioned the sniper, zooming in on one of the two's head.

All sound was drowned out by the sound of her pounding chest. Her finger found its way to the trigger, hesitantly hovering above it.