The Brisshal green opened up before and below one Hanzo Generico, like a grassy sky that lay beyond the horizon. Only, Terrasphere or otherwise, ‘grassy sky’ was distinctly not a scientific possibility, and this particular sky was in fact none other than the ground. It did occur to Mister Generico nee Nicole Rose that hurtling towards imminent death was a cruel way to begin one’s virtual life. On the other hand, it was perhaps a poignant design choice, perfectly reflecting the absolutely abject circumstances of the unluckiest few in the world; of those born at the proverbial apex of a slow suicide-by-jumping. Or not, Hanzo mused as he landed intact upon Brisshal proper. The green was, as the green typically is, incessantly and overwhelmingly so. Hints of brown and white lay at one edge of the expanse, pillared trees and pollenous spores that caught the light of the sun like will-o-wisps in homesick reverie. What lay across the opposite edge was unclear, figures made obscure and splotchy beneath the sun’s glare. Hanzo pressed index and middle finger against temple, and rejoiced as the word ‘Village’ appeared overhead the the sunspot-imagery. Ten minutes or so of trudging through the persistent green, and Hanzo arrived, welcomed by the squealing fanfare of a child held against her mother’s bosom. He offered a nervous wave, realizing all at once how uncomfortable his newly ‘constructed’ arm felt, and the poorly conceived lankiness of his form. The mother glared warily back, while the child quieted, almost in unnatural response. He ignored the disquieting narrative that subtly wove itself into play here, his status as ‘Other’. Oh, it might have helped if he had thought to remove the index and middle finger from his temple. Stupid. Hanzo followed his preconceptions of a stereotypical old world village, surmising that an inn would serve as the hub to this middling village. The Last Rest. A tavern name as endearingly simple as it was strangely morbid, well-suited for a bevy of deathwish-alcoholics. Hanzo had expected some decrepit den of urine-scented hopelessness, with perhaps some grey moss to capture an unintended graveyard aesthetic. What presented itself before him was something else entirely; a well-furnished establishment of mahogany-make, not quite concealing the steamy oasis hot spring behind it. It occurred to him the reasoning behind the fictional name; an inn so stunningly adequate, that it’d be the last resting place anyone ever needed. He entered, half expecting the inside of the inn to be a sauna of some sorts, with naked, overweight, bile-chested patrons rendered in excruciating… well, reality. Some confusing blend of disappointment and relief overtook him as no such image presented itself. Instead, the interior was as well-kempt as its exterior, polished wood decorated with intermittent arrangements of lily and lavender wreath. Men gathered in solitude, bereft of belligerence. “Welcome to the Last Rest,” The bald-headed curator intoned, “Will you be indulging in drink… or the last rest?” ... don’t name drop twice in quick succession, poorly composed NPC! “... Gin and tonic?” Baldie stared blankly ahead, as if confused. “... Ale.” Hanzo tried again, minding his anachronisms. “No, no, you misunderstand sir. We only serve tea.” That very much struck Hanzo as the sort of gimmick a village’s only ‘tavern’ could scarce afford. “... that’s okay, I guess. I’ll do a green, or something. What’s a last rest?” A knowing smile chanced to flicker upon the NPC’s face before he could fully turn away to retrieve the beverage. He answered in sagely manner, as if reciting the manuscripts that contained his life’s work, as if disseminating the essence of his own being, “Our rooms are blessed, you see. When the door closes before our customer, all that surrounds them are four walls that are as if sanctuary. No noise can be heard, not even the ambience of spirits, nor the rhythm of cicada-song. What wells from this soundless void is merely the unbridled joy of the Tranquil, of the Perfectly Alone, with which our patrons can indulge in for eternity.” ... Hanzo gulped down the immaculately served tea, and made his decision right then and there, “And with that, randomly and creepily very eloquent bald guy, I am out of here.” And so he left, without bothering to pay for his tea. He needed to find his friend. Some time later, the purveyor of the Last Rest sent out a notice: Wanted!: A long-haired man of slender build and sleek comportment! May be prone to drinking tea without paying! Payment: A free night’s stay at the Last Rest, where only the catharsis of silence awaits!
The creation process had been so in-depth as to have been overwhelming for Joe. She could be just about anything she wanted, and it wasn't too much of a stretch to get to Adelaide as she was. Joe took the idealistic blonde's place as the world faded away into a plethora of green and brown and blue, the forest and sky respectfully. Adelaide landed among the foliage of a tree with little damage done besides perhaps the odd scrape, and from her perch she was able to survey the area around. Sprawling trees interspersed with clearings lay all about, and in the distance broke into a swath of plains before ending at an endless blue ocean. Between the tree landing and the stunning visuals before her, Adelaide was left breathless. She sucked in some air for good measure, lest she pass out and fall from a tree and die. "Wow." It was, for lack of better word, too real. Joe had played V.R. games before, having wholly immersed herself in anything that caught her eye in lieu of leading a real life, but even this was something else. Just the feeling of the rough branches and leaves against her skin to the stinging of her scrapes, to the breeze that made her shiver. It was exactly what she'd wanted; feeling alive here was the better alternative to feeling asleep in the real world. But this peace couldn't last forever, that wasn't the rpg way. Somewhere nearby a creature squawked, a guttural noise made as if by a dying animal, followed by a more distinct death knell. This place wasn't entirely safe, so Adelaide would need to leave. That, and she had a friend to find. The player looked beneath herself to find any way down, and slowly started to descend by carefully climbing down branches. Halfway down the tree something snapped and Adelaide plummeted to the woodland floor, further injured with more scrapes and some new bruises. "Ouch." She rubbed at her new injuries and winced, feeling oddly satisfied. The level of pain this game allowed further awoke a liveliness in Adelaide that she had long forgotten by sitting in her room for days at a time. This wasn't the ache of a muscle cramp or weary eyes, but the ache of something gained by exploration. Pain in this game would be a badge of honor for now. She pressed a hand to her head in a new motion now, remembering some tutorial about in-game menus and such. A word kindly hovered in the distance indicating civilization, and she began trudging toward it. It would be impossible to find Nico- well, Hanzo, by wandering around the brush and trees. A local hub would be the best place to start. It took some time, but Adelaide finally made it to the outskirts of a small village without injuring herself too much more; Adelaide had managed to trip over a small rocky creek and fallen, soaking her clothes and further bruising herself. Moving around in a new virtual body was difficult enough, but that difficulty seemed compounded by Joe's own very real lack of coordination. She rubbed at a small forming lump on her elbow and made her way toward the center of town, very cognizant of the fact that she was getting stares. She had to purposefully breath at this point to calm her anxious nerves, and settled into a bit of ritual hair-pulling before she was ready to move into the village proper. "Nobody cares, nobody cares.." Her inner mantra kept her just at peace enough to make it to the Last Rest, a 'tavern' of sorts that was likely the best candidate for a meeting place. Adelaide felt her heart-rate pick up even further at the prospect of meeting her only friend, because she had now remembered it had been at least four months since she'd seen the other girl face to face in real life. Meeting here felt like some sort of cheap consolation at this point. Without this meetup though Adelaide may not have had the courage to delve into this game in the first place, so now she would need to muster whatever willpower she could and find her companion. Her feet, however, seemed to have frozen in place outside the establishment. "..Nope." Adelaide couldn't bring herself to move further into what was probably a very populated and bustling building. She stepped aside and toward a more obscure area of the street where she would be out of the way, before taking off in a random direction. Maybe if Adelaide wandered the town in circles her friend would find her?
“If I was a friend of mine, where would I meet?” It occurred to Hanzo that any friend of his would likely meet at the bar, where social interactions went to become, generally, vaguely impersonal and only adequately enjoyable. Then again, ‘Adelaide’ had always set herself apart from the rest of his friends, and had never been the tavern-type per se. This was just as well, for Hanzo had absolutely no intention of revisiting the Last Rest to check for her. The bald-headed NPC had given him the ‘creeps’ quite thoroughly. Furthermore, he had contemplated the horrific possibility that ‘baldie’ may have even been a ‘PC’, here in this second life to channel his peculiar vagaries. The less said and done about the ‘Last Rest’ the better, he concluded. Unless, of course, Adelaide had also decided to follow the thought process of “I.I.W.a.F.o.M, W.W.I.M?”. For if that were the case, Adelaide would likely conclude that Hanzo was in fact situated at the Last Rest, leading her to a course of action opposite his own theories. The caveat, however, was if Adelaide had thought to think even further past the surface, managing to predict Hanzo’s movements based on his theory that she would not set foot into such an establishment, which would in turn lead to her not visiting the Last Rest at all! For whatever reason, idle lectures of determinism and free will surfaced in Hanzo’s mind only to be perished away and replaced with a single thought; this is a pain. In the end, Hanzo opted to believe that Adelaide would undergo a train of thought that roughly mirrored his own. First, Adelaide would believe that Hanzo entered the tavern. Secondly, upon reaching nearabouts the tavern, she would hit upon the idea that Hanzo could not possibly believe that she’d meet at a tavern, and thus promptly turn away to fulfill that particular prophecy. The natural conclusion then would be that she was wandering this beginner town in her search, following the best lead they had: absolutely nothing. “I’msofuckingsmart.” Hanzo muttered to himself, as he pursued this brilliantly deciphered lead. He re-approached the Last Rest with a shudder, recoiling at the sight of oasis-steam that at this juncture seemed more like the ephemeral aura of phantoms. He allowed himself a choice of three cardinal directions; north, south and east, ignoring the western direction from whence he had come. A brief pantomiming of ‘eenie-meenie-miney-mo’ in the face of the discerning public later, and Hanzo had decided upon ‘south’. Streets later, he chanced upon a statuesque lady with blonde-hair like silken gold. Unbeknownst to Hanzo, who had exited Investigation Mode, this was Adelaide Galeforce. As unknowing as he was, however, he instead assumed that she was an NPC of some plot significance, plot significance in this instance being directly correlated with physical attractiveness. “Oh, hello there!” Hanzo called out as he approached, “I’m on… a bit of a quest. Wanna help me out? You sell potions or anything?”
The newly-blonde Adelaide stepped about here and there, across streets and through alleys and around carts. The npcs for their part seemed to want to abandon her, except in the rare occasion that she happened to walk toward them, in which case they would linger and wait. It was as though they were specifically instructed to leave the players alone unless otherwise accosted. This was good for the current player, as she had nearly zero intention of entering into a conversation by will. It was all too stressful. Adelaide would just wander about until she found 'Hanzo', and then probably exist at her friend's hip until she could learn to fend for herself socially. Of course the other girl- well, a guy here in Terra Sphere- would have given some insistent and well-meaning advice about being true to yourself while simultaneously putting yourself out there. "You'll never get over your fear if you just keep hiding, you can do it at your own pace, what would you do without me?" It was a bunch of nonsense to a neet like Joe. Adelaide sighed, her breathing hitching slightly due to nervousness. She wanted to find her friend, but even the prospect of successfully doing so was nerve-wracking, given that they hadn't spoken face-to-face in actual months; Joe would occasionally respond to her friend's texts, and little more. "I wonder if she'll be upset.." Of course that line of self-doubt would seredipitously cut itself short as Adelaide was hailed by a fellow. "Ohshit-" The tall, almost catlike man continued toward her until he was in a conversational range, which was already far too close for Adelaide's own rather specific personal space. She found herself taking an immediate step back, a reactionary movement more than anything else. The woman fought her instinct to flee, and instead tensed her shoulders and folded her arms around herself, as if to protect her organs. "Potions?" It was an odd question, mostly because it seemed to be a non-sequitur, and Adelaide was already pretty bad at casual conversation; it only served to confuse her further. Why would this man approach her? What was his quest? Why did his tone of speech seem strangely familiar? All this and more flooded the woman's brain. Between the pending doom of a conversation and her previous nervousness, she stammered out no particular words, instead making some mumbling noises that wouldn't have served as language for a dog, let alone a person. Adelaide wasn't at all fit to help this man, as she was barely fit to help herself. "Okay." She stood there without another word, still trying to process this egregious assault on her comfort. Adelaide probably hadn't meant to agree to whatever it was the man had said, but that was the first word that came to mind. Oh well.
Hanzo felt momentarily confused, put off by his opposite number’s rather curt response. In his experience, curt acquiescence was the mark of someone either too afraid or too reluctant to say no, of someone who understood that conversation itself was a trap already stumbled into, and that struggle simply invited further catastrophe. It reminded him of somebody he knew, although he gave the thought, somewhat uncharitable, but a second to fester before dismissing it. “Heey, that’s great! That’s a no on the potions though, right?” Hanzo gesticulated, as if waving the matter of potions bodily aside. He paused for a moment, mentally broaching how to approach the subject, before deciding to continue on the quest theme. “So, the thing is that I’m looking for somebody, right? Let’s call them, let’s say… my princess, or something, and I’m their shining knight that’s supposed to save them.” He stopped, staring wide-eyed at Adelaide as if to let the point sink in, “Now, they were supposed to be somewhere, but - we’ve all read the stories - the whole princess isn’t here thing, the dragon’s already got ‘em. And I don’t want them to be alone in the dragon’s black keep, because they won’t like it there, and I want them to feel okay, you know?” He beamed, shockingly pleased at himself for the monologue. “Where do you think we should start?”
Where to start? Well, wasn't that the question of the day. Adelaide had to find her own companion in this small starter town and now she'd managed to rope herself into finding this dude's friend. His 'princess', as it were. Apparently some sort of romantic on a quest, the goof. The imagery was particularly well-placed for this game setting, but that didn't mean it couldn't offend Adelaide's sensibilities. And why couldn't she have someone to save her? Adelaide's own friend was still nowhere to be seen, probably off doing her own egregious VR-LARP elsewhere in the village, which left Adelaide still very much on her own. Sort of; this guy was here after all. "No potions." Adelaide shrugged slightly, a movement so minuscule that it probably looked like she was adjusting a clothing error or something. She was almost afraid to move too much, like a prey animal that knew it was being watched. She had to walk herself back through the man's monologue, desperate to not look too bizarre in the face of what was a rather simple conversation. Ah, yes, 'where to start'. Adelaide didn't have the slightest damn clue. She desperately wanted to tell him such, and then run away back into the forest to live as a hermit, avoiding the shame she felt after this encounter. That wouldn't do, obviously, because she wanted to play this game quite a bit, and she'd promised her one and only friend. Adelaide really, really needed that one friend. "Um.." The woman fumbled again, notably still nervous. Beads of sweat dripped down the side of her head, and she managed to peel her arm away from her body and shakily wipe her damp hair back. "Um...the tavern?" No, no no. Please no. Why did she say that? Adelaide had already avoided entering that place; a veritable fantasy hive of adventurers and townspeople alike gathered at those sorts of places, and would almost certainly be a bustling nightmare. Adelaide could barely stand the attention of one person, let alone the prospect of... two or three plus. She gulped, but it was an uncomfortable feeling; Adelaide's mouth had gone dry. Her tongue audibly peeled away from the roof of her mouth as she spoke. "Maybe she's at the tavern?" Ah, shit.
Brilliant! It seemed this new friend of Hanzo’s was a firm proponent of Occam’s Razor, the path of least resistance, and the simplest option available. Granted, it was a shame that it meant having to revisit the Last Rest, but Hanzo consoled himself with the idea that the establishment would be much more palatable with one - or, if lucky, two - friends in tow. Hanzo nodded with some vigor, some brew made of his own natural verve and self-deceptive ideation. “Wow, that’s so smart actually.” Hanzo pointed a single finger at his temple in compliment; if he had but pointed two, he would have accidentally entered Investigation Mode and ended this entire charade. “Well, come along then, we’ll find our princess at the tavern. I’ll buy your drinks; my treat.” He had conveniently forgotten, of course, that he held no currency. He traced his steps back from the arbitrarily selected street, all the way back to the spring-induced mist of the Last Rest, where his visage plastered the front door for some strange reason. Ignoring that peculiar detail, he entered the establishment, where he was met by the glower of the bald-headed NPC, bushy eyebrows furled in a silent rage expertly concealed by the rest of his face. ... oh my god is that his killing intent?!?! “You have returned, I see.” He began, his voice a deliberate even-keel, as if all his deepest emotions were bubbling beneath and threatening to break the seal, “Are you finally ready, walker of the mortal plane… to pay for your tea?” Hanzo Hattori, in his real past life had been particularly adept at the social nuances and trickeries of the bar scene. He allowed himself a cavalier grin, confident that even in this new world, no bald-headed gimmicky tender of bar would serve as adequate competition in this regard: “... we’re waiting for a friend...” Hmm. The bar held the same few solemn customers at this hour; nobody could rightfully be pegged as an ‘Adelaide’. “... she’ll pay. Just put it on her tab; you got us for collateral! In the meanwhile, just give us your best!” The NPC’s eyebrows seemed to leaven out, traces of the man’s sakki almost visibly wafting away. He retreated behind the counter, nimbly retrieving two cups of white porcelain and orchid engravings. With some great hublub and show, he poured tea the color of pink-orange chrysanthemum into each vessel. He returned to present them to his new guests with a solemn bow. Hanzo chugged that shit right quick before turning to Adelaide. “So, you got any cool friends around these parts? Maybe we can all quest together.” Elsewhere, four figures emerged from the backrooms of the Last Rest, dressed in the black, sterile garb of undertakers. They strolled over to one of the other customers, who seemed to have entered into a state of unnatural consciousness. With a great heave, they carried the man between them, before returning into the abyss from whence they emerged. All that remained was the remnants of the drink the man had mostly consumed. The color of pink-orange chrysanthemum.
