“And jumped on him. Don’t forget about that. It was one of my favorite parts.”

  I looked down at her. She truly was tiny compared to me, but I couldn’t help but feel a bit intimidated. “Maybe we got started off on the wrong foot. I’m Frank or Oogliefrank or just Oog, depending on who you ask. What’s your name?” Then I held out my fist for a fist bump. It was the customary greeting amongst ogres, and I had no idea what gnomes did.

  She got the clue, and because my arms were longer than a human’s would be, she was able to reach and bump my fist back. “I’m Violet. Well technically, I’m Violet Violence, but that name doesn’t sound nearly as cool as I thought it would when I picked it.”

  That piece of information was the final clue I needed. The NPC interactions were extremely complex inside Legends of Selmia, but it now seemed far more likely that she was a player. I just played along though. I’d gotten used to doing that with Elgar, Gregor, and the others. “Glad to meet you, Violet.”

  “I had no idea that ogres were as polite as you. I might have to rethink my choices. Not really down for the socially correct experience.”

  I wasn’t sure how to respond to that other than to say, “Trust me, most ogres aren’t this respectable at all.” As though to drive the point home, I realized I was scratching my butt. I quickly pulled my hand back, but she’d clearly seen.

  “That’s right. Let your freak flag fly. If it itches, scratch it. That’s what I say. Those wankers in Belchor are a stuck-up bunch of bastards.”

  “I’m not a fan, but I have to try and get along with them, at least for now.”

  “What I was really hoping was that you could lead me to POP. I tried being nice. I tried showing some of my devices to the people in Belchor, but their engineers called it ‘gnome foolishness’. All they wanted was dwarven weapons. As if those fat, bearded ale-guzzlers could hold a candle to gnome ingenuity.”

  POP was the Pro-Ogre Players. It was a faction which had been created as a result of one of my quests. Assuming Gregor joined, I would have four of the ten players I needed to complete step one of the quest. What I didn’t know was how she had heard about it. Robert and Tauri kept saying there were discussions all over the LoS boards regarding the ogre who cooked and hung out with players, but they hadn’t mentioned anything about POP.

  “I’m sorta the one who started POP, but not sure how you heard about it.”

  “Word is getting out, my very large friend. Now, are you gonna let me join or not?”

  I threw my hands up. “You don’t even know anything about me.”

  “Well, I’m guessing you can cook. At least that is what the rumors say; and that you like players. That is good enough for me. Besides, I’m here for fun. Fun means getting into trouble, and this sounds like the shortest path there. Good things come in short packages, after all.” Then she winked at me.

  I know I wasn’t in my own body, and maybe it’d been a while since I’d had a girlfriend in the real world, but did she just wink at me? I was so thrown off by it that I didn’t even remember to object to her usage of the word ‘players.’

  “Okay, okay. I guess you can join. But don’t you want to see the village first?”

  “Not really. Although, I would like to see if you scrap worth a spit.”

  I quickly assessed her.

  Violet Violence Race: Gnome

  Level: 24th HP: 1240

  Highest stat: Agility

  She was more than ten levels below me, but she must have some impressive gear if her HP was that high without a massive Constitution. She had more HP than I had unbuffed, which was saying a great deal.

  “I’m not going to fight you.”

  “Of course not. You aren’t one of those wankers from Belchor. I want to fight with you, not against you. So, invite me to your party, and we can get going.”

  “How do you even know I can do that?”

  “Look, we can play this game, and I get it if you want to. I truly do. I’m not one to out anyone, but it’s just the two of us here. We both know you are more than just an NPC.”

  I adopted my best confused look. While I desperately wanted to be able to speak to someone as myself rather than as my ogre persona, the rules were very clear. I was strictly forbidden from letting a player know that I had once been human. In fact, the AI had some means of preventing me from even mouthing the words. That left me at a loss for words. I couldn’t confirm what she said, but didn’t really feel like disputing it, either.

  She must have noticed the consternation on my face, because she winked again. This time I got a party invite to join her party. I quickly accepted and then said, “Most of the monsters around here are under level twenty, so there won’t be much challenge.”

  “True but there’s also a dungeon nearby. It’s only mid-20’s so it should be safe for us.”

  Instantly, I was interested. I hadn’t been to a dungeon since my… um… reincarnation into LoS. Dungeons were where all the best loot came from, but back in closed beta, they had been fairly limited. Even if it was a few levels below me, it could easily be worth it for some magical loot. “How sure are you about its level ranking?”

  “Absolutely, I’ve been there once before with my old party, but they all gave up. The kobolds inside can be right mean.” She laughed as she said it. The light glinted off her violet irises, and I wondered a bit about her mental state.

  “But you think we can take it?”

  “Never figured an ogre would be afraid of a bit of pain. I can’t assess you, so you must be at least ten levels higher than me. That means we should be able to handle it, and the loot will be much better, because its location hasn’t become public knowledge yet.”

  That drove the greed within me. A part of me wondered if it was player greed for loot or ogre greed. I guess it didn’t really matter. “Okay, but make sure you stay behind me.”

  “I’ll be a dwarf’s lice-infested beard if I stay back.”

  “I’m not sure that I will be able to Tank it and hold its attention if you attack too quickly.”

  “I surely hope not. What kinda tank would I be if I couldn’t hold the agro. Supposedly you are some kinda shaman, so you just Heal me, and I’ll do the killing. It will be slow-going, but the only way for the two of us, I think,” she said. Then she added, “Unless you like it fast.”

  Now, I knew she was doing it on purpose. She was still trying to get a rise out of me, some kinda reaction. Although what her goal was, I didn’t know. “I thought you were a rogue type. Agility is your highest stat.”

  “Yeah, what of it. Trust me, I’m a tank like no other.”

  Chapter 2- Annoyance

  I felt a moment of concern, but Violet was already off and walking towards her target, presumably the dungeon entrance. I worried about going into a dungeon with just one other party member, especially one whom I didn’t know. What if Elgar and the others logged in while we were inside the dungeon? Or what if I died?

  Sure, I would respawn, but I had learned that came with a price. Namely, every time I respawned; I lost a little piece of myself. My integration with the system increased; and once I hit 51%, if not before that, I would lose my own self-identity. That was a scary prospect. That was actually much worse than death, even with the sixteen levels I would lose if I died right now.

  Being a monster inside a virtual world had its advantages, but one disadvantage was that if I died, I would lose XP back to the prior threshold. For now, the last threshold I had passed was level twenty, and I wouldn’t reach another one until level forty. Now that I was getting close, those last few levels felt like I was reaching out for a goal line that was just beyond my fingertips.

  All of that was assuming that I still believed this was just a game world. Strictly speaking, I didn’t. There were too many things to indicate that it wasn’t. The way the AI interacted me with alone was bizarre, but the breaches, and those creatures asking if I wanted to be free. Those things were still making me uncertain about what this place really was. The one thing I was convinced of was that this was my life now, and I couldn’t afford to treat it like a game. So, I ran after the gnome, but I decided to leave at the first sign of things going wrong.

  It took us about half an hour to reach the dungeon. I remember when I was playing the closed beta, I hated how long it took to get places in the game. But now that it was my life, half an hour jog to get treasures seemed like a bargain. Apparently, it wasn’t just perception, which was reality, but the perspective you had on that perception.

  When she stopped, she pulled a pouch off her belt. I had been wondering just how she was going to fight. She was wearing a tunic and trousers, which still made it apparent that she was a girl once you stopped being tripped up by her size. She only had a belt knife, a coin purse, and the small bag on her person. I had assumed she was some type of rogue character, based upon her race and Agility; but even that didn’t make sense. I assumed the rings she was wearing, along with the earrings, were magical. They were probably what explained her high HP. None of that said she could fight, though.

  Then she proved me wrong. She started pulling armor out of the bag. It had to be a spatial storage device, which made me re-evaluate her. Those things hadn’t been available during closed beta. Their unavailability was supposed to add more realism to the game. Apparently that rule had changed, but I still assumed that it was rare, or at a minimum, a very big expensive.

  “What’s that? Your bag is bigger on the inside?”

  She gave me a withering glare. How someone so tiny could pack so much disdain into a single look was shocking. “C’mon, I thought we were gonna drop the pretense that you don’t know this is a game. At least when it’s just the two of us. I know you have to be a player. It is the only thing that adds up, although I’d kill to know how you got to play as an ogre.”

  As she spoke, I felt like the world was closing in on me. Suddenly, I couldn’t breathe. I fell to my knees, clutching at my throat. There was no way for me to get more out than a squeaking sound.

  She noticed right away and rushed over to me. “Are you alright? Choking on something?” She ran around me and started to pound on my back. When that didn’t work, she shoved her arms around me, except there was no way she could get then even around my sides let alone to meet in front. If I hadn’t been choking to death, I am sure I would have found the image extremely funny.

  As it was, my grayish skin was turning blue, and I was seeing stars. My would-be savior was continuing her futile attempt to perform the Heimlich Maneuver on me. Lack of oxygen, or whatever it was that this body breathed, began to make me dizzy. My mind wondered why she kept trying to tickle my sides.

  Then a notification popped up.

  You are in violation of Clause 103.94(b), which states in part:

  1) All Hybrid Intelligences are prohibited from revealing to players through any conscious action of theirs that they were formerly human.

  You have failed to act in a manner sufficient to dissuade a player’s perceptions. You are not responsible for what a player believes, but you are responsible to do everything in your power to dissuade them from believing you are now or ever were human.

  This is your one and only warning. Further responses up to and including automatic and repeated respawn resulting in system integration may be initiated.

  Then, just as quickly as the attack on my lungs had begun, I was able to breathe again. What the heck. All I wanted to do was curse the AI, but it wouldn’t accomplish anything. Worse, I needed to try and salvage the situation.

  I started to fall onto my back but shifted my weight to the side at the last second. I didn’t want to squish Violet like a grape. She got up and let me roll over onto my back, then stood there staring down at me. For a minute, I thought she was gonna jump on my gut and try again. Eventually she asked, “You okay there, big guy?”

  I coughed some and then nodded.

  “Well, what was that all about?”

  “Umm… spirits not happy with Oogliefrank. Say Oogliefrank pretend be something he is not.”

  She stared at me deadpan for a minute. I was totally certain she was about to out me again and braced myself for choking or worse. But she just winked and said, “Well thems some nasty spirits. Don’t wanna upset them. I personally prefer my spirits with names like Jack and Daniels.”

  I coughed again. “Me no know Jack or Daniel. Is them gnomes like you?”

  She stared at me again. “Fine, we can play it like that. Just knowthat ogre speak is not attractive at all.”

  I hated myself for how easily I had fallen into the ogre speech patterns. Seeing my second life flash before my eyes under the thumb of a seemingly omnipotent tormentor had made me fall in line. Now, I had to find a way to salvage my dignity. The notification which popped up didn’t help me either.

  See, you can learn to behave. Good HI, Good HI.

  Here take a treat. +2 to Strength. Strength is the ogre way.

  I swallowed my pride and let it go. Then sat up and asked. “You were going to tell me about your bag?”

  Fortunately, she caught on. “Yeah, yeah. It’s just a spatial bag. Much like basic storage, but I can store a ton of things in there. Literally up to 2000 lbs. or ten cubic feet of matter.”

  “Sounds useful. How’d you get that?”

  She started to say something then clapped her mouth shut. She seemed to be pondering her words for a minute before she said, “You may not understand. Not everyone does, but pay to win all the way. Use what you’ve got is my motto. No reason to be ashamed.” Then she winked at me again.

  I had so many things I wanted to say, but caution was the better part of valor now. The system AI wasn’t infallible, and it needed me for things, but I wasn’t going to push it at the moment.

  “Okay, so what is your class?”

  She grinned as she started snapping on some super shiny bracers. “Nah, I think the expression on your face is gonna be priceless.”

  Greaves, boots, a belt, and eventually a breastplate followed the bracers. The last thing she pulled out of the bag was a pair of matching gimlet or punch knives. They had nine inch long triangular blades which ended in gauntlets. When she put her hands in them, there was a sound of metal clinking, and they expanded around her hands before locking down. Their length in relationship to her three-foot height made them seem more like short swords than knives.

  I wanted to laugh. So, her hands were locked into knives, and she had some high quality, probably magical armor; but she was still three feet tall and couldn’t have weighed much more than fifty, maybe sixty pounds, even with the armor. I had already learned that mass did matter inside Legends of Selmia, even if physics were not always strictly followed.

  “You sure about this?”

  Apparently, that was the wrong thing for me to ask. A second later she leapt at me and tried to ram her helmet into the ogre family jewels. That simply wasn’t gonna happen, but I tripped over my own feet getting out of the way. A spell was on my tongue if she kept up the aggression; but then there was a rumbling in the brush behind us.

  A foursome of adventurers walked out. Three of them were in mismatched gear like any good noob, while the other was a wizardess in a pretty pink dress which would have seemed more appropriate at Disney World than in the wilderness. The largest of them was a bare-chested human, barbarian by the look of him. I guessed the others as an elven archer, human cleric, and then the Cinderella wanna-be, who also happened to be a gorgeous, blond-haired elf.

  My instincts as a player were revved up. This might not be a PvP zone, but I was an ogre, so players could attack me wherever or whenever they wanted. Faction might help avoid some of that, but it wasn’t a guarantee. So, I began assessing them right away. I was glad to notice that their levels were all between eighteen and twenty-two. I was even happier that all playfulness seemed to have evaporated from Violet as she turned to face the newcomers.

  The big one, and by that, I mean that he came up to the middle of torso, barked, “Need some help with the ogre?”

  Violet and I looked at each other. I wanted to trust her response here, but realized I didn’t know her. She just nodded and said, “I think I can handle him all by myself.”

  The elven wizardess snorted, “He can’t be worth that much XP. Let her have him, we need to get into the dungeon before another party comes.”

  Now it was Violet’s turn to snort. “Not gonna happen. Me and the ogre, and his name is Frank, are about to start the dungeon.”

  “What, just the two of you?” The ranger asked.

  “Got a problem with that?” Violet asked.

  “Sure do. We are here for the dungeon. Look, you can get out of the way, or you can get sent to respawn. Titus here might even camp on your corpse so you can’t get your gear back.” The ranger looked over at the barbarian, who just smiled at that.