Chapter 021

  Paperwork Conspiracy

  Ethan noticed the porter's suspicious attitude as soon as he hobbled into Hollow Court Apartments with his new friend.

  Mia's body seemed to half-freeze in the entryway with some type of magic or talent being used by Raymond to prevent her entry. She still moved, but her progress was barely visible.

  "You do not reside here, Mia Haoyu," Raymond stated, "you may gain entry by…"

  Ethan waved the man off, slinging water everywhere. "She's my friend."

  The man's demeanor changed entirely and then Mia suddenly stumbled forward, catching herself. A smile stretched across the old porter's face, immediately welcoming of her presence.

  "Good evening sir, and ma'am," Raymond said instead, "I hope you're keeping him out of trouble. Looks like you found some trouble! That's for sure!"

  They were soaking wet from head to toe, and Ethan was covered in wounds that had stained his clothing. The night porter didn't seem to notice or care they leaked water all over the carpeted floor.

  "Rough night," Ethan said.

  "Looks like it, sir. By the way, you do have two letters. Would you like them?"

  "Yes."

  Raymond turned to the postage slots, grabbed the letters, and then handed them over. Ethan accepted, putting them into his inventory for later.

  "Thank you."

  Raymond smiled. "Anytime, sir. Enjoy the rest of your night, and please, lay off the liquor. It doesn't seem to do you any good, judging by your appearance."

  Ethan smirked, deciding not to answer. After taking a few steps away, Mia shot him a curious look.

  "You have a night porter in your apartment?"

  He was surprised by her question, having assumed that all the player characters started in an apartment with a similar setup. "You don't?"

  "No, genius boy," she laughed, "but we can talk about it later. I have more… specific questions. And you need to sit down or lay down or something."

  Up the steps to the third floor, they neared his apartment. "Why do you call me that?"

  "I don't know," she shrugged, "first thing I thought of when I saw you the first time. Don't think anything about it. If you don't like it, I'll stop. It's the least I can do, considering what you did for me."

  Ethan absorbed her words, half-understanding. Sometimes he rambled and blurted out random thoughts as well, before cursing himself for having said them. He'd also been known to assign nicknames to people, though he hadn't done that in a while.

  "Nah, it's cool," was all he managed to answer before unlocking his door and stepping in. Only then did he suddenly remember the state of his apartment. He turned back to Mia, red in the face from embarrassment. "Uh… you should know… My character started out as a completely broke alcoholic, but I actually don't drink that often, if ever."

  She stepped in behind him and looked around the tiny space. He watched for any signs of judgment, but she barely gave any away. Either the woman had a good poker face or she understood his quick explanation. That hadn't been the case when they first met, so this was a good sign.

  "Makes sense," Mia said, nodding. "I started the game with a cat. Can you believe the freaking nerve of these game developers!?"

  Ethan was surprised. "A cat? Like a pet?"

  "Yeah, genius boy!" she blurted out. "I mean, Ethan… An orange cat named Honey. She's cute, but it's a bit on the nose, don't you think? How many Asians have you seen in the game so far? They made me the cat lady?"

  He couldn't help but smirk. Someone had a sense a humor at least, and the punchline was just vague enough that it could be written off as random chance.

  He didn't really want to think about that, though. All he really wanted to do right then was sit down, but that was a bit funny, at least in his opinion.

  Shuffling over to one of the chairs at his table, he sat down, knees nearly giving out before he found sweet relief. His feet and hands hurt the most, but he still felt lightheaded and weak as well.

  Kicking off his boots, he exhaled loudly and put his head in his hands. The wounds still hurt to his touch, and he flinched at first, but then found a bit of comfort as the minutes ticked by in silence.

  "I don't know about you, but it's been a long day."

  Mia sat down next to him. "Yeah."

  Another long moment of silence seemed to stretch out into an awkward several moments. After a while all he could hear was the both of them breathing.

  "Do you need…" Mia finally asked, "some type of first aid or potion, or whatever this game world uses to heal injuries like that?"

  Ethan perked up. "Why? Do you have something that cures Undead Fever?”

  "No," she answered, "but I know where to buy some, if you can make it through the night. I can probably sell some junk I picked up in order to buy whatever you need. It's… well… You're only injured because you saved me, so I probably owe you big time for a while."

  "No need," he smiled, but he did feel thankful she acknowledged his help. He also felt a great deal of fatigue setting in. "You don't owe me anything. If you know exactly what I need, I’ll pay you for it… just, don't try to rob me if I fall asleep, or run off into the night again and get yourself killed."

  She nodded, yawning, and glanced towards his meager bed. He turned to look at it as she did.

  "You can use it if you want."

  Mia pulled a face of disgust. "Ew… No thanks."

  He shrugged, understanding but still a bit offended.

  He wasn’t that gross, was he?

  Choosing to ignore her reaction, he said, "Okay, but don't say I didn't offer."

  She shook her head but said nothing. The silence returned, and he didn't like that much.

  He was sure that she'd looked at his profile, so while it was on his mind, he gave hers a quick glance. Not much had changed since the last time he looked, except that she'd joined an affiliation and earned some type of title.

  Mia Haoyu

  Level 3, Muckraker, D-class Writer, Gulf Horizon Newspaper, Healthy, Last seen at your apartment unit in Hollow Court Apartments.

  Reading her profile reminded him of the evidence he'd stolen from Officer Packley. Journalists loved evidence, right? He stood quickly, startling the woman.

  Wincing in pain, he unbuckled one strap of his overalls to get better access to all the folders and papers clustered inside his clothing.

  Mia stood quickly, stumbling backwards. She yelled out, "what the hell are you trying!?"

  He froze in place and shot his eyes towards her, quickly realizing what the situation might look like from her perspective.

  His face turned red as he tried explaining. "Uh… Well… It's not what it looks like, trust me."

  "I don't care what it looks like, pervert! Keep it away from me!"

  Stolen content warning: this tale belongs on Royal Road. Report any occurrences elsewhere.

  Ethan froze again, trying hard not to laugh. The smirk on his face didn't seem to help the situation, since Mia kept backing away from him.

  "We have a big misunderstanding here," he laughed, and kept digging for the treasure trove he already knew was half-ruined.

  He was aware of her eyes. She watched him skeptically as he pulled a huge clump of waterlogged paperwork from his overalls and plopped it on the table. Then he rooted around for more, carefully pulling out various pages that had come loose in his overalls during his fight with the Vampirs.

  Mia's shoulders relaxed but her eyebrows remained furrowed in confusion. He didn't say anything, and instead waited for her to ask. She cautiously stepped closer, hopefully with the realization he didn't intend to do any funny business.

  "What's all that?"

  Ethan looked at the soggy wet mess on his table. If they were lucky they might be able to read half of it once the papers dried, but he also knew they couldn't let the papers dry as a huge clump and get stuck together.

  "That, my new reporter friend from the newspaper," he said with a smile, "is a bunch of evidence I stole from the police."

  Her eyes looked back up at him and she cautiously approached it. "What kind of evidence?"

  "I had a mission to talk with an officer, and when I was there, he had a stack of folders on his desk with important sounding names written on the tabs." Ethan pointed at the pile and laughed. "Had a chance to swipe them, so I did. The folders didn't look like that when I stole them."

  "Why…" Mia seemed to be at a loss for words. "What? What names?"

  "Well," he said, "Some that might be familiar to you like Lantern's Pharmacy. I didn't have space in my inventory. I was on my way here when you, uh, well… When I stopped to help you out. I didn't have anywhere else to put the folders, so naturally…"

  She nodded, accepting the answer. "And the names?"

  He hesitated, realizing they still hadn't accepted any social screen requests from one another, or actually even discussed any formal arrangement for this.

  "How about this," Ethan decided, "you can team up with me and another player named Jason McArthur. We'll form a little group that can protect each other. Strength in numbers or whatever. I'm not saying that you do, but if you do feel like you owe me something, maybe you can sort through that stack of stuff with me before it dries out and you can learn something good while I go to sleep. Then, you give me a summary of it all."

  "I can look at it?" Mia pointed.

  "Sure, but only if you agree to not rob me or go running off into the night like I said before."

  "And if I somehow learn something out of this wet mess, and then share that with you? What then?"

  "We call each other friends, then, I guess?" he shrugged.

  "Okay."

  She answered him a little too quickly for Ethan's taste, but it probably shouldn't have surprised him. She was a writer for the local newspaper. This kind of thing was exactly what her character's job was designed to do, just like his had been setup as a handyman.

  They opened their social screens and accepted each others invites.

  After that, they spent a little time together sorting out some of the individual papers from the folders. It quickly became apparent to Ethan that she was already familiar with some of what they saw in the first few pages.

  It also didn't take long for wet sheets of paper to cover nearly every surface of his small apartment. Yawning, he finally felt so tired that he was just going to have to risk falling asleep with the woman free to do as she pleased in his apartment.

  Laying down on his little mattress on the floor, he tried thinking about his day. Still half-awake, he vaguely saw Mia focused intently on the papers, trying to fan some of them dry with her hands.

  His own hands still clenched in pain, fatigue fogging his mind, he closed his eyes and let darkness take over.

  Hours passed, but when Ethan woke up it had felt like mere seconds at most. His eyesight was blurred, and he felt foggy and groggy in general, not exactly sure how he'd made it back home alive.

  Then he remembered the vampire fight in the rain, all his many wounds, bringing a girl back to his place, and laying evidence paperwork all over the place to dry.

  He sat up, wincing as the wounds on his hands stretched across the weight of pressing himself up. It was a real shame that leveling up didn't actually heal him. That would have been nice.

  He looked around, but Mia wasn't there. Glancing at his watch, he saw the time as 3:17 a.m. It was the middle of the night, so where had the woman disappeared to?

  Surely she wouldn't sneak away in the night like he'd asked her not to, right?

  Ethan shook his head, hoping that wasn't the case. Valid explanations flooded his mind. She could be sleeping in the hallway or sitting in the bathroom quietly reading, or she had decided to go chat with Raymond, the night porter.

  Whatever the case was, he didn't feel much like investigating. He rubbed his eyes, noticing that all or most of the papers were still scattered around the place.

  At least she hadn't taken them. Out of curiosity he checked his inventory and didn't see anything missing. This lead to him remembering he had two new letters from the postage Raymond had handed him.

  He was about to open them, but realized he hadn't picked his talents from leveling up to three and then four. That was much more interesting, in his own opinion, and it would give him something to do while he waited to see if Mia returned.

  A quick glance at his current talents reminded him what he already had.

  Awareness: [ 1 ]

  Handy: [ 2 ]

  Knives: [ 1 ]

  Negotiator: [ 2 ] [ +1 ]

  The only one he wasn't particularly thrilled with so far was Handy, although it had helped him accomplish the tasks given to him by Thomas Gallagher, so that was something.

  Eventually, he hoped to get rid of it completely or he would never invest more points into it. Either way seemed appropriate as he was excited at the idea of killing more vampires.

  Moving on, he looked at his three options. For some, the obvious choice was, well… obvious. But Ethan decided to take his time and still think through which one might be the best.

  Resilience

  Your ability to keep going despite adversity. Mental stimulation to persevere against extreme adversity gets stronger with each point increase.

  Pockets

  This talent allows you to store additional items on your body through the use of mysterious pockets almost impossible for anyone to steal from, let alone identify. Gain two protected inventory slots for each point invested.

  Ambidextrous

  The ability to use two items or weapons at the same time. The skill improves with each point increase.

  Ethan sighed at the options. Once again, he had a difficult choice to make.

  Resilience got an immediate no from him, but between the other two, he had to decide what his priorities were. Did he really want more inventory space or did he want to maximize his ability to use Sadie's Fangs?

  Given the description of Pockets, it was safe to assume there was some type of talent or ability that players and NPCs could have to pick-pocket from him. Having the Pockets talent provided what seemed to be protected slots that pick-pockets couldn't take from.

  Jason had failed to mention that when they'd discussed the talent previously. It was an added benefit that made his choice difficult. Then again, he thought back on his fight with the Vampirs, and with his inability to use both of Sadie's Fangs at the same time.

  Actually, it wasn't difficult at all.

  Protected Pockets were neat, but the feeling he'd had when he killed two creatures of the night with his mysterious new blades? Priceless. Would it be even more amazing if he could take action with both of them simultaneously?

  The answer was obviously yes. He could get Pockets later.

  New Talent: Ambidextrous - You now have the ability to use two items or weapons at the same time. The skill improves with each point increase.

  +200 XP

  You have 5,686 XP total

  You need 1,814 more XP to reach level 5

  Feeling good about his choice, the screen flickered and jumped to his next talent point option. Ignoring the list that now included Ambidextrous at one point, he quickly read the next three.

  Occult

  Unlock dark secrets as you delve deep. Peer beyond the veil of reality to glimpse the unseen forces lurking in the city's darkest areas. Discover more about the underworld and the forces of darkness with each point invested.

  Driving

  Develop vehicle operation and evasion skills. From high-speed chases to controlled getaways, mastery over various vehicles increases with each point.

  History

  Recall significant facts and details about New Horizon City and all districts in which you have visited, read about, or heard about. Each point invested gives you a deeper understanding of historical events, cultures, and figures.

  It was the first time Ethan actually wasn't sure if he should pick a new talent from the options or put his level four point into one he already had.

  Of the three options, he quickly ruled out History. While knowing all kinds of cool information about the past sounded neat in theory, he didn't need to be a walking wikipedia.

  That kind of talent, he assumed, was more fitting for a character like Mia, who had started as a writer. He realized then that he had no idea what type of player she actually was, and what her goals and motivations were in the game. For all he knew, she also had no desire to play as she'd started.

  As he'd considered previously, Driving also didn't seem all that important for his immediate needs. Sure, it might prove helpful at some point in the future, and he didn't want to ignore the long-term benefits of building up such a talent, but he knew he still needed things that could help him right away.

  Occult interested him the most. With it, he would better be able to understand the forces of darkness he wanted to kill. But, he concluded, there was a big difference between knowing how to kill the enemy and being able to kill the enemy.

  Looking back to the top of his Talents screen, he took note of the ones he'd already accumulated.

  Ambidextrous: [ 1 ]

  Awareness: [ 1 ]

  Handy: [ 2 ]

  Knives: [ 1 ]

  Negotiator: [ 2 ] [ +1 ]

  All five had been useful so far, but his least favorite of them was Handy. At level five he would be able to move one point to any other talent if he wanted.

  Ethan had an idea. If he chose Ambidextrous or Knives with his level four point, and then used The Courage of the True perk from his affiliation with The Green Fists to redistribute one Handy point to the other, he would have Ambidextrous and Knives both at two.

  He would also still have the Handy talent at one and his level five point to use however he wanted.

  His head tired of thinking too hard on the matter, he decided to go with his gut feeling. It told him to put his point into Knives.

  Upgraded Talent: Knives - You now have a better ability to wield knives with skill. You are actively identifying and mastering the art of knife-fighting and knife-throwing. This includes all shurikens and ninja stars, kunai blades, and any handled daggers or knives with blades under 12". Mastery over knives increases with each point.

  +200 XP

  You have 5,886 XP total

  You need 1,614 more XP to reach level 5

  Jason had brought up a good point about the stat system. Neither one of them knew exactly how the numbers were crunched behind the scenes.

  Surely the Knives talent and the Ambidextrous talent fed into each other and provided multiplying bonuses when he used Sadie's Fangs, right?

  Smiling at the thought, he closed out his screens and looked up at the ceiling. He'd been going through his talent options for a good while, and Mia still hadn't returned from wherever she'd disappeared to.

  Without even realizing it, Ethan drifted back into a good sleep.