Breaker of Iniquity

Chapter 4: Ascension

Edward sat on the edge of the dilapidated balcony calculating how many more Tokens of Memory he would need to replace his current belt. What exactly makes a belt "epic" anyway? he wondered. Soon, he lost count, wondering where his friends had gone off to.

Edward checked his friends list to see who else was online and who might be up for something. A long list of greyed out names above and below a few highlighted ones appeared. He barely recognized the names of the people online. Alabaster Rose was the kind of snooty guy from that one dungeon with the thing...maybe. Fontle Bottom was a jokester who was fun to hang around, but he wasn't very good in a fight. Or was that Mr. Bojangles? Edward sighed.

Most of his online adventures that required a group involved Matt, Mars, or both. Mars was one of the few players to stick with the basic set of magic and make it work. Like many players with skills like his, however, he was very unsociable. The first party he ever made with Matthew was when they were five. It was Edward's birthday, and they were helping his mother with the decorations. Matt moved away about three years later, and they had been playing games together online ever since. Everything from Arc-Age to CoD: Zero Hour. If it was fun, they found themselves locked in epic combat together. Especially if it had swords. More often than not, BO (Breaker Online) made it feel like he was sitting in the same room as his childhood friend again.

I should get him something, Edward thought. The cultist robes would have made for a subpar gift. Edward imagined the look on Matt's face if he showed up to his house with a box of bloody robes. Not awkward. Some cloth bolts fresh off the auction house would suffice, no doubt. Cloth was cheapest in Sinharaja, so that's where he teleported.

The muted golden tones of the sandstone architecture always came to life when it caught the light shimmering off the lake in the center of the city. The non playable characters wore turbans and desert robes. Edward didn't know what they were called, but they looked like dresses. On his way to the auction house, he caught a new player looking down at the ground as a much more experienced player and his friend laughed at him.

"Wow, you're bad," said the player wearing a few epic pieces of gear. "You're so bad you should just quit the game."

The newbie said nothing.

This was none of Edward's business. It didn't need to be. The auction house wasn't far.

"I mean I knew beast mages were useless. But man, even for a noob you suck so hard, the hoes in Lumina must come to you for advice."

"I'm not a noob!" shouted the noob. "I just—" he stopped himself.

Edward paused to listen.

"Anyone who gets killed by Jellies is fucking worthless. You," said the elitist, "are fucking worthless."

Edward frowned. Jellies were a role playing game staple, the easiest of the easy. But controlling a character in first person with just your thoughts had a massive learning curve. Everyone like the elitist always seemed to forget at one point they were beginners too.

"Hey!" Said a third person. "Knock that shit off." The would-be hero was a noob himself, or his gear said so at least. He wore the starting battle axe and some basic leather armor. Then again, more than likely he was some guy's alternate character.

"No one's talking to you, scrub," said the elitist. "And no one cares. Mind your own business."

"I'm making it my business, leave him alone."

The elitist laughed. "What the fuck is wrong with you? It's a fucking game."

"You're right, you should probably stop using it to measure your dick," said the white knight.