Esmie the Calamity Chapter 10 (Patreon)

** Gosh, so much to talk about. I don't know how many of you remember it, but I've had chronic pain in my groin for one and a half years now. I finally had a consult for my surgery today! Yeet the pain/dysphoria beans! Surgery is still months out, but things are moving now!

As for the computer... well. You all really knocked that one out of the park. Unfortunately, parts are kinda limited here in NZ. I ordered a new headset a month and a half ago now and it still hasn't arrived because the shipment is apparently stuck at the border.

I'm using a local place with parts that are apparently in stock, and they are going to build it for me. Since, you know... I'm as clumsy as Esmie here. Disaster central, that's me. Anyway uh... here's the specs!

Corsair Carbide 100R Black ATX MidTower Gaming Case
Gigabyte GeForce RTX 2070 Windforce 8G DDR6
AMD Ryzen 5 3600X 6 Core
Corsair Vengeance LPX Black 32GB RAM 2 X 16GB
Gigabyte B450 AORUS PRO WIFI ATX Motherboard
Samsung 860 QVO MZ-76Q1T0BW 1TB SSD
EVGA 700 GQ 700W 80+ Gold Semi Modular Power supply 

No idea when it will be ready, since yeah, pandemic.... but still! SO excited!!!! Anyway thank you all so so so so so freaking much, I've been worried about my current one dying for a while now, knowing I wouldn't really be able to afford a new machine. All that worry is gone now though! Woohoooooo. Okay... enough rambling from me, time for Esmie to ramble instead. Have fun! **

We picked up a simple courier quest from the bounty board in the market square, to deliver a few small tools that a farmer in an outlying hamlet had ordered. We also did some research about the area, and came to a bit of a realisation.

Sure, we might be hot garbage at the game, but we’d also chosen a spawn location that was in a higher level zone. Like many MMOs, CORA had different zones with different difficulty levels, required more gear, skill and levels to complete content there. However, because the world was so damned vast, they had added a compromise.

While some entire regions were dedicated to catering to new players and others were geared towards more experienced players, every area that had a selectable starter zone would have options for low level players. For example, our area was based around players at the level thirty range, all the way up to level ninety or so in the outer reaches of the nation, and the wilds beyond that went up even further.

This meant that essentially, there was one small valley for new players nearby, with a few quests and monsters that we could actually deal with. Then another valley for players at level ten to twenty, and then they were basically on their own from that point. I wish we’d known that before we decided to spawn in Trimacre.

Our courier quest had us wandering into the woods again, although thankfully we’d be following a trail this time. We had really not been prepared for a stroll through the wild forests of this area. Hopefully this trip would be slightly better in that regard. You know, not immediately dying to the first attack. The bare minimum.

“How are you going to spend your first level up?” Lynna asked as we left the front gates of the city. It was now mid morning and the huge redwoods of the forest were casting long shadows across the fields surrounding the city. It was quite pretty really, along with the sparkling dew that still covered the grass.

“Oh… crap, I don’t know,” I frowned, my cheeks probably going a little red. I didn’t know, because I couldn’t see. Just like I didn’t know anything about this game. “What do you think I should do?” I asked turning my eyes up to meet hers.

“Probably just raw spell power, maybe casting speed? Power and urgency,” she told me thoughtfully, then shrugged. “Your guess is as good as mine, sorry. Until we know how you fight, that is.”

“Oh, true.” That made sense. I had no idea how I actually moved in combat, so it was hard to point to any one thing as an area that would help me. Guess I’d just stick them there. Wait… but I’d died really easily. What if I used them for survivability? Sure, and that might help me with testing alchemy stuff.

Placing all five of my new stats into toughness, I paused for a moment to see if I like, felt tougher or something. Nope, didn’t feel tougher… maybe my squish had firmed up a little? I tested, poking at my exposed thighs. Still nothing. I guess there wouldn’t be any physical changes, or at least not with only five points.

I had also gained five ability points that I could spend to by little modifiers for my spells, but I opted to leave them alone until I had time to really dive in and try to understand the mechanics of the ability builder. It was a whole thing, and from what I knew after a night of tossing and turning while I researched the game, something that not a lot of people engaged with properly. It seemed that there were people putting up ability builds online, which people would follow along with, swapping out parts every so often.

“This place is really pretty,” Lynna murmured, snapping me out of my thoughts.

I glanced around, taking in the scenery again. She was right, it was gorgeous. This whole region was basically one massive magical redwood forest, where a kingdom had managed to carve out little islands of civilisation within the wild and often dangerous woods. The city of Loury was located in a low valley, with no real flat area, but rather low rolling hills, like an ocean frozen in motion.

Outside the city, I was actually reminded of how the Shire had been depicted in the many different movies it had appeared in. Winding paths and roads that were in no hurry to lead you to your destination, leading you over stone bridges that spanned gently burbling streams.

The biggest difference were the houses, which took after the city in design, bare, varnished wood done in that curved boat-like way that was everywhere. There were almost norse inflections everywhere too, giving the whole area a cool and unique feel that was hard to properly describe.

I smiled, with such a gorgeous view as this, I couldn’t help it. “Yeah, I wouldn’t mind living in a place like this for the rest of my life. Loury is only a city by this world’s standards… it’s more of a sleepy country town by the real world’s standards.”

“Yeah, Tamaki can get a bit hectic, can’t it?” she agreed with a laugh that was half groan.

“I’d hate to see what UN city is like,” I shuddered, imagining the towers that literally scraped the sky, towering over me with menacing auras.

“It’s pretty crazy,” she replied, and I turned to her in surprise. Her response to my expression was a pure laugh that had me squirming with confusing emotion. “I had to go to UN city to meet Ruth for the first time. It’s actually not as crazy as you think though, more of a small country than a large city. It’s just built weird, on stilts in the water instead of dry land. Really spread out, apart from the big domes and some of the building clusters.”

“Are you in UNC now?” I asked, feeling anxious about the answer for some reason.

She shook her head. “Nah, I’m living in Los Angeles.”

“Is it fun there? I heard they are still rebuilding after the war and they got independence,” I asked, really really interested in how her life had been going, and a little sad that she was so far away now.

Another shake of her head and a sheepish glance away. “It’s too hot, and there’s so many fake people… it’s exhausting. I haven’t seen any evidence of the war, but I hear there’s a lot of wreckage out in the hills and up north at Santa Maria.”

“Santa Maria is where the Oceanic League forces landed!” I said, excited all of a sudden. That was us! That was where Australia and New Zealand landed! “How come you haven’t been up to see it? That would be so cool! I hear there’s a destroyed Jackson Class Mech there that they turned into a museum!”

“I’ve been busy working, little bun,” she laughed, patting the top of my head affectionately. “How about we use some of the money we make from this to fly you over? We can go up and visit it together.”

My heart did a weird fluttery beat as I looked up at her. I really liked being called little bun. I really, really liked it. So much so, that I was just a teensy tiny bit stunned by how good it made me feel. “I would really like that,” I murmured in a small voice, the only level of voice that I could achieve in that moment.

Her eyes were all shiny and soft as she grinned at me, and I felt my heart do a different happy little dance. Goodness, I was full of confusing emotions today.

The rest of the walk through the fields of Loury was quiet and friendly, and I felt myself reacclimatizing to her presence at my side. We’d been inseparable while we were in school together, prompting people to tease us, say we were married and all that stuff.

Of course, that particular line of teasing had ended in much confusion when we’d turned up to our year eleven dance with her in a suit and me in a dress. I’d gotten teased about that instead, but I was so unashamed about the dress that it stopped even at the dance itself. We’d both been pretty silly that night, getting right into the married couple joke and making it our own. I still remembered that night really fondly. Lynlyn hadn’t liked her suit all that much though, sadly. She’d looked good in it.

Wait.

Had I thought she was pretty back then too? I think I might have… why was I only realising this now? I glanced surreptitiously up at her, trying to inspect her without being caught. I liked her wide, almond shaped eyes that tapered off into long eyelashes. Her jawline was pretty great too, the same one she had outside, sharp and defined, like milled steel. What really jumped out at me were her lips, dark purple and shaped like… well, really nice lips. I have no idea how to describe lips. I just liked them, and I especially liked them when they were smiling at me, like right now.

“What are you thinking about, little bun?” she asked, and I jerked my gaze up to find a teasing light dancing in her eyes.

I opened my mouth in an attempt to say something, but no words came to me and I was left staring at her as nothing but a squeak came out.

She laughed, her eyes crinkling in a way that had my heart bubbling and fizzing very strangely. “You’re a little different, you know? In here, I mean…” she told me, eyes roaming my face with a familiar sort of fondness. “Or maybe you’ve just changed over these months?”

“I-I don’t know,” I stammered, my breathing suddenly deciding to give me difficulty.

“I mean, you were always an adorable dork, but now it feels… different somehow,” she mused, gently pinching the tip of one of my ears and lifting it up. She let the ear go, watching as it flopped back to brush my shoulder before springing back into place. “Dunno, maybe it’s just the different gender you have in here.”

“Yeah… well, there was this weird thing,” I mumbled, memory of my default VR body overriding my sudden shyness for a second.

“Oh?” she prompted with a tilt of her head, her own ears twitching forward and to attention. I liked that we both had big floppy ears.

“Yeah, since I didn’t have a body scan, the computer generated one for me and… well it looked like this one, except with uh… my usual stuff downstairs, and no tail or ears, obviously,” I told her, feeling a slight squirm at the idea of logging back out to those genitals. Maybe I could change them from inside the game so I didn’t have to deal with it.

“Huh…” she blinked, glancing ahead for a moment as we crossed another small stone bridge and stepped across the threshold of the forest. “Did it say what it used to generate that body? That’s a bit strange.”

“It was pretty vague about it,” I shrugged.

She hummed and shrugged, “Computers are weird. Maybe it was a SAI messing with you.”

“Maybe,” I mumbled, suddenly wondering if May had the answers. I’d have to ask her the next time I saw her.

“Well, I hope you don’t mind if I say that I like you like this,” she told me, her eyes widening as she realised that it might be more offensive than she realised. “I mean, you were cool before too, out there... but…”

“Nah,” I said, giving her a grin. “I like myself like this too. I have so much squish and floof. It’s amazing.”

“You can say that again,” she said, relief taking over her face. Then she reached out and tried to grab my tail, but it was faster. I was master at the art of tail twitching already, and it buzzed out of her reach.

I got a pout from her.

“You can play with it if we get home in one piece,” I told her with a giggling eye wiggle.

“Oh, you totally have a deal,” she grinned evilly, opening up into a giggling cackle.

Oh no, what had I promised? I was doomed!