As much as I wanted to lie down and sleep and not have to do anything like some irresponsible child–like a certain dragon, I really didn’t want to be at the mercy of whatever was going to happen at nighttime. Without more information, I needed to prepare.
Tools. Shelter. Weapons. Those were what I needed. Even knowing what I needed, I still depended on just how realistic the world was going to end up being. For example, in some games, you could just take a few blocks of dirt and build a cage around yourself. No monsters could get to you if you did that. Heck, you could have even just dug downward until the surface was above your head and then place a block directly above you to seal off your hiding hole for the night.
In other games, you would have to gather a certain number of materials such as three leaves and five logs, place them all together, and then build shelter using a blueprint. Then it was either as simple as smacking a hammer against the build site until it was done or clicking “build” and letting it do it all on its own.
So, I figured that the first thing I needed to do was figure out what sort of system I was working with.
The first thing that I did was pick up a rock. The second thing I did was get disappointed in myself for being disappointed that nothing popped up. Normally in games, acquiring an item for the first time would cause some sort of notification window. Instead, I got… nothing. All that happened was that I picked up a rock. It was a gray, bumpy rock with nothing remarkable about it.
“Alright,” I said to the rock. “Is there anything you can do? How about uh… ‘crafting recipes?’ ‘Open crafting menu?’ ‘What can I do with this?’”
Thankfully, that last question got me an answer.
Not-so-thankfully, it wasn’t the answer I was hoping for.
| You could probably hit stuff with it, I guess. It is just a rock, so I don’t know what else you’re expecting… wa-ah! Hey! Why’d you hit me with it?! |
“I was testing it out. It is just a rock that I could probably hit stuff with, so I don’t know what else you were expecting.”
| What if I died?! H-hey! That doesn’t mean to hit me again! Are you trying to kill me?!?!?!?!?!?! |
“Dang.”
| W-why do you sound so disappointed? Are you disappointed that you failed at killing me, you virgin?! |
“An annoying window has no right to call me a virgin. You’re probably even more of a virgin than I am, and at least I actually have a chance at losing my virginity.”
Needless to say, I hit Window with the rock again.
Then it vanished from my hand.
“What just happened?”
| I deleted it from existence because you were misusing it! Rocks are for being rocks, not for hitting helpful windows! |
“What part of you is helpful?!”
| The world may never find out! o_o |
“Wait. If I want to figure out how to make you useful… and that rock doesn’t seem to have hurt you at all, then how about this?” I asked, grabbing Window by one edge of her… body? Regardless, I walked over to a tree and held her like a bat.
| Wai-wait! What do you think you’re about to do?! I do not approve! Do! Not! Approve! This is an illegal action! I’ll ban you! |
I swung Window as hard as I could into the tree just like a lumberjack would have with an axe. To my surprise, she actually cut pretty deep into the tree.
I swung again.
And one more time.
We cut the tree clean through, causing it to fall onto its side. Unfortunately, just like in a normal world, it was nothing more than a fallen tree on its side. It didn’t magically burst into a bunch of smaller, more-manageable chunks or anything.
“So much for this world being a game, unless this is supposed to be an extreme difficulty mode.”
|
Rest in Peace
Window
XXXX - XXXX
Window was a friend, lover, and informational status window to many. She will be missed and fondly remembered.
|
“Well, rest in peace, Window. I guess there’s only one thing for me to do now.”
And so, I dug her a grave—using herself as a shovel—and then laid her down in it.
| ARE YOU SERIOUS? YOU JUST KILLED ME BY USING ME AS AN AXE TO CHOP DOWN A TREE AND THEN BURIED ME USING MY OWN FLESH AND BLOOD, DROPPED ME OFF IN A SHALLOW HOLE THAT YOU WERE TOO LAZY TO MAKE DEEP ENOUGH, AND THEN YOU ONLY KICKED ONE LUMP OF DIRT BACK ONTO ME INSTEAD OF PROPERLY COVERING ME! |
“I thought you were dead?”
| IS THAT ALL YOU HAVE TO SAY FOR YOURSELF? AND I’M A ZOMBIE NOW! AN INFORMATIONAL STATUS ZOMBIE WINDOW WHO’S GOING TO EAT YOUR BRAINS, YOU VIRGIN! |
“If it makes you feel any better, I regret not burying you deep enough to drown out your voice.”
| I DON’T EVEN HAVE A VOICE! YOU’RE THE ONE JUST STANDING THERE READING ALL OF THIS AS IT UPDATES ON MY BODY! |
“Yeah, it kind of reminds me those videos back in the day on how to hack things, and since people didn’t have microphones, they’d just open up a text file on their computer to record them typing the instructions into the file. Then there’d generic music on in the background, and the corner of the screen always said something like ‘Unregistered ExcitedCam 2.’”
|
You know that was way too specific, right?
Unregistered ExcitedCam 2
|
She actually got a laugh out of me with that last one, but I looked away before she had a chance to say anything about making me laugh. Of course, after I blinked, I opened my eyes to see her floating in front of me.
| You totally laughed, didn’t you? >3> |
“Do you want to be used to chop down another tree?”
“Then give me an axe or a shovel or something. Or one of those fancy matter manipulators or something that can do everything in one.”
| But that would make it too easy for you! A-ah! Wait! Okay! Stop! Don’t swing me again! Just let me go! |
I sighed and let her go. Then, three items popped out of thin air in front of me. They floated in the air between us just like how she could magically float without any issues.
The first of these three items looked to be a combination of an axe and a pickaxe. It had a wooden handle, a metal head with one end that served as an axe while the other worked as a pick, and at the very bottom of the handle was a small hole going through it with a chain looped through it. Hanging from the chain was… a cartoon dragon that looked just like the one on the shirt that the dragon took from me.
The second item was another combination between two—a hybrid between a shovel and a hoe. No more remarkable than the axe-pickaxe, at least this one didn’t have some little cartoon dragon hanging from it.
Only one item was left, and it was… a pair of leather gloves. Yeah, that was all they looked like. Fortunately, they also looked to be the right size for me to wear.
“I’m guessing that this is my starter kit?” I asked.
| Basically! Try looking at the items and saying, ‘Description!’ |
“Why?”
“But why?”
I gave up, looked at the items, and said, “Description,” in a very half-hearted voice.
|
PickAxe
Durability: 100%
Efficiency: 100%
3 Damage
A tool useful for mining and chopping!
HoeSho
Durability: 100%
Efficiency: 100%
2 Damage
A tool useful for farming and shoveling!
Leather Gaming Gloves
Durability: ∞
1 Defense
Gloves that let you play the game when worn!
See? That’s all totally useful information! I bet you’re happy you did what I said now, aren’t you?
|
“What does it mean by letting me ‘play the game when worn?’ And seriously, you named it a ‘HoeSho?’ Is it a tool for farming or rapping?”
| Fo sho, playa! Also, I don’t come up with the names around here. |
“Then who does?”
| Me, but don’t worry about it. |
“Just tell me what the gloves do.”
| You’re no fun! Virgin gamers are supposed to be excited to try out new things and discover how everything works! Don’t you want to, oh, I don’t know, maybe put the gloves on and then swing the PickAxe into a tree to experiment and see what happens? Maybe something will—wait! Don’t aim the PickAxe at me! |
With the gloves on and PickAxe held between my hands, I walked up to the nearest tree and swung into it. The cracking sound it made was way more dramatic than when I swung Window into the tree. It was the most stereotypical, game-y sound effect for chopping a tree that I had ever heard before.
Four more swings of the PickAxe later and I got to discover the true power of the gloves.
When I chopped down that first tree without any special gloves and with Window as my axe, it fell over just like any tree normally would. This tree, however, broke into a few dozen logs short and thin enough for me to easily pick up and move around.
“Seriously?” I asked.
| Useful, isn’t it? See, this is why you chop trees down with the right tools instead of informational status windows! |
“What if I chop a tree down with you while I’m wearing the gloves?”
| D-don’t worry about that, and please stop looking at me that way. |
More interested in the mechanics of this world than Window, for the time being, I looked down at one log and said, “Description.”
|
Oak Log
Material
Did you really need to use that on a log of wood?
|
“How was I supposed to know if there’d be any useful information there or not? Wait… what if I—Description,” I said while looking at her.
|
Window
Durability: Immortal!
9999999999999999999999 Damage
The best informational status window that anybody could ever ask for! Unfortunately, she has been stuck with a virgin who abuses her, kills her, doesn’t even give her a proper burial, and uses her to ask really stupid questions about wood. Maybe that’s why he’s such a virgin? Because he doesn’t know anything about wood?
|
As much as I didn’t want to admit it, she really was funny. Well, maybe not that funny. I’ve just always had a stupid sense of humor, and she was good at tapping into what I considered funny even if she was insulting me at the same time. Though, I could have done with less virgin references. They still stung even though I knew there was definitely nothing wrong with being one.
| By the way, since I’m supposed to make sure the game is fun and everything, don’t be surprised if the information in the windows change sometime. Like, I have no idea what might happen in the future, so something might not scale right or be way too broken so I might have to change things up on the go! |
“So I shouldn’t expect anything to be consistent because it all depends on your mood and if you made any mistakes before that you’ve got to fix?”
“Can’t you just be less lazy and future-proof things so that you don’t have to make any changes later?”
| Says the guy who couldn’t even get laid. |
“What does that have to do with anything?!”
| The opinions of virgins mean less! |
“You and that dragon need to stop offending large portions of humanity.”
| What’s it matter? You’re the only human here, so you are humanity! That means you’re the only one who could get offended by being told that your virgin opinion means less. Virgin. |
“You’re really beating a dead horse now with the virgin thing.”
| Are you at least going to give the horse a proper burial, or are you going to leave it sticking out of the ground, too? |
“I wonder what would happen if I used this on you,” I threatened her, acting like I was about to swing the PickAxe at her.
That caused her to vanish with nothing but a poof of white smoke left where she was. I probably could have brought her back by trying to get the description of something or just asking for her, but I figured I’d use the time to do some gathering in peace.
The world might not have made any sense, I might have been left to do all the work by myself by some dragon, and there might be an annoying-yet-informational status window who couldn’t think of better jokes than calling me a virgin over and over, but at least I got to be in nature. Peaceful, beautiful nature untouched by humanity’s hands.
Well, I guess it wasn’t completely untouched seeing as how one of the first things I did in said nature was chop down two trees. At least Window could probably just make some more trees pop up out of nowhere.
It was time to get to work.
And work I did.
After a couple of hours of work, I chopped down ten trees, broke up a few large rocks sitting around which split into a bunch of cube-shaped stones thanks to the gloves, and then I realized I had a problem.
With how far I was from the dragon, and how many materials were now all over the area, how was I supposed to get them all back to Vala? I could only carry three logs in my arms at once or two stones if I stacked them on top of each other like boxes. It was theoretically possible to carry all the materials back to her, but there was no way I’d be able to do so without probably pulling every bone in my body and not finishing until the middle of the night.
Therefore, problem.
“Hey, Window, you there?” I asked.
| I am everywhere and nowhere! |
“Sure. So, how am I supposed to get all of this back?”
| What did I tell you about figuring things out on your own? |
“So, you see, I realized something. If I were to swing my PickAxe at something, and then ask for the description of something, you’d pop up right in front of where I was swinging and I could hit you before you saw what was about to happen and disappear.”
| Ha-have you tried holding a material item and saying ‘Craft?’ |
I picked up one of the logs and said, “Craft.”
A large, scrolling window popped up to show me everything I could make using the oak logs. Next to each item was a description, how many materials it would require, a build timer, some other information depending on what sort of item it was, and a “difficulty level.” The difficult levels ranged from one star to five from what I could tell. Most of the list was grayed out with only question marks in place of the other details. All the items that were available only called for wood and stone, so I figured that the list was only showing me recipes using items I had already encountered.
“What’s ‘difficulty level’ mean?” I asked.
| How complex it is! Like, ★ items are easy and don’t take much time or a bunch of materials. ★★★★★ items would probably require take way more work and materials and need a bigger team! |
“What do you mean by team?”
Rather than try to get the information out of her since I doubted that would work without threatening her again, and I didn’t want to risk reusing the same jokes like her, I looked at one of the one-star items in the crafting menu.
|
Pointy Stick
Difficulty Level: ★
Build Time: 1 minute
Required Materials: Any type of wood (x1)
Durability: 100%
3 Damage
Like a spear, but not as cool.
|
To the right of that was a picture of a hammer, so I figured that was the crafting button. I reached to press it and… Window moved away.
I tried again, and she moved again.
While keeping one finger pointed out to where I previously tried pressing the hammer, my other hand pointed the PickAxe at her.
She floated closer and pressed the hammer against my finger for me.
That was when I heard rumbling come from underground.
A group of cartoonish beavers wearing hardhats and yellow vests dug up from below, set up a tent around the log of wood with signs up around it that read, “Construction! Do Not Enter!” and then I heard what sounded like buzz saws and hammers coming from within the tent despite not seeing the beavers bring any of those.
— Wait, why am I more worried about where these noises are coming from than the fact that a bunch of beavers with hardhats just came out of nowhere?!
Exactly one minute later, the beavers came out of the tent, gave me some thumbs-ups, and then dug back underground. The holes that they created from their entry and leave disappeared at the same time as the construction tent and signs. When those vanished, I could see what they were doing underneath the tent.
They turned the log into a thin spear that was longer than the log was in the first place, and it looked like somebody tried sharpening the tip by chewing on it. It wouldn’t surprise me if that was exactly how those beavers sharpened it.
I checked on the spear’s description.
|
Pointy Stick
Durability: 100%
3 Damage
Still like a spear, but still not as cool.
|
Well, at least I figured out how to craft things. Looking at the crafting menu again, I spotted something that was exactly what I needed: a wooden wheelbarrow.
The beavers came back and built it for me just as I was hoping for, and suddenly my problem about how to transport all the materials disappeared.
Of course, I had to make a bunch of trips back and forth to take all the materials back to the dragon. So, that was what I did.
I felt ready to pass out once I was all done.
About two hundred logs and twenty cubes of stone were piled up right next to the dragon.
No, she never woke up despite me dropping everything off right next to her. She did, however, wake up as soon as I was done and lying on my back in the grass to rest.
“Ooh. You were busy,” Vala said while yawning. “But I was kind of hoping you’d have a house and bed ready for me with the internet already hooked up. How am I going to play vidya now?”
I leaned up, ready to throw one of the cubed stones at her, and saw her directing a teasing smile at me.
“Just let me rest for a bit,” I told her.
“Another nap? Sounds good to me.”
“I said to let me rest. You got enough—hey, what are you doing?”
I opened my eyes to find her lying next to me, partially curled up against my side, with her head resting on my shoulder. Her face was right in front of mine and she was looking up at me with sleepy eyes and a smile.
“You’re really comfy. I’m totally going to use you as a body pillow once we’re done defending tonight, okay?”
“No.”
“Aww. Why not?”
“Because I’m going to make a bed for myself and give you some cardboard to sleep on.”
“Don’t be so tsundere.”
“Sue-what?”
“Huh, I guess you’re not as much of a virgin as I thought you were.”
“I’m pretty sure you just offended more people again.”
“It’s fine, it’s fine,” she said before yawning and falling asleep half a second later.
I was too tired to move her, so I guess you could say that I slept with a woman for the first time since I ended up falling asleep with her still cuddling me.