Natasha the Halve

My room was filled with the noise of a keyboard being abused. There I was, playing an online video game with my friends late at night, when a voice reached my ears.

“Heal me, heal me, heal me!” a cry not uncommon to us.

In the screen in front of me, the form of a warrior was bathed in glowing blue light.

“Gotcha… no need to scream,” came the response from our healer.

The game we were playing was a classic isometric MMORPG released back in 2016, Redeemer’s Bush. As a free game it was surprisingly among the better ones of the decade, though not exactly at the top. However, as a bonafide MMORPG, it required dedication and commitment to experience the full game in a satisfactory manner. That is, it took time to “git gud”, and everyone had loads of free time due to the global pandemics that ruined the decade.

“We’re about to end, start praying!” I said to the mic.

We all went silent in order to do our own rituals to increase our luck.

The mode we were playing was a staged game mode that pushed players to survive and kill monsters quickly before a timer ran out. The difficulty increased along with the amount of players and the stages cleared. Every stage had waves of monsters you had to defeat in order for the boss to show up. Once defeated, the next stage would be available. Pretty simple.

This time, just like any previous, the boss showed up and we ground pounded it to oblivion in less than a minute.

The corpse of a being out of my worst nightmares disappeared, replaced by a portal to end the stage. Our expectations rose. It was at the very end of the 10 stages when players were rewarded for their efforts. We were all aiming for different items that had the same chance of dropping.

As the loading screen shifted to the map we were at previously, a pop-up mini screen showed up in my monitor.

[You’ve acquired a new item!]

[Mythical Weapon (2-H Spear)]
[Alma Pike]
(Attack 9675 – 14281)
(10 Sockets)
-STR + 250
-Crit Rate + 750
-All Skill Levels + 1
-Damage to Large/Boss Monsters + 40%
-Critical Hits apply a Debuff for 5 seconds
-Damage to Debuffed Enemies + 25%
-Damage taken from Debuffed Enemies – 30%
...+

“Wooo! Yeah baby! That’s what I’ve been waiting for!” I screamed to the top of my lungs.

I stretched my arms and legs in joy, pushing me back too fast, making me fall backwards. My keyboard flew away along with my mouse as a barrage of rage-fueled screeches reached my ears. As the back of my head hit the ground, I started laughing and giggling away.

“Did this bitch fall off her chair? Lmaooo!” someone said.

“Fucking classic...” another said.

I stood up while laughing and feeling a wave of satisfaction I hadn’t felt in a while.

“Well… I’m off to the enchant gacha, everybody. Have fun and GG.” I said as I sat on my chair again.

“Good for you Nash. Have a good one.” a familiar voice said.

“You too, Lilly. Talk to you later.” I said and disconnected from the group call.

I sighed as I laid back and stared at my large monitor. I opened the game’s inventory and used an item to teleport back to town. While the game loaded, I turned to a side monitor and unpaused a stream I was watching. A cute rabbit v-tuber was playing “CraftingMines” and committing war crimes once again.

I saw a few comments saying [Geneva Suggestions kusa].

I chuckled and typed a few emotes on her live-chat and focused back on the game. The town opened up and I went up to the blacksmith dude and interacted with the little UI that popped up, transferred bonus stats from my previous weapon to the new one, filled the gem sockets with max-level stones, ascended the thing to ten, enhanced it to plus one hundred and closed the UI.

I clicked on a scroll in my inventory and began the tortuous process of gacha enchantment.

A small window popped up and flashed as the enchantment took place.

[+ 1.5% Block Ignore]

“… Next!” I clicked the ‘enchant again’ prompt in the little window.

[+ 11% Threat Reduction]

“… You know you want to give it to me, you little shit!”

[+ 230 Magic Attack]

“Useless!”

[+ 45% Threat Generation]

“...”

[+ 120% Dmg Against Full Plate]

“Who uses that?!”

[+ 400 Magic Resist]

“Give me attack statistics at the very least...”

[+ 10.2% Physical Damage]

“Too low!”

After what felt like an eternity and around 200 enchant scrolls later, I was finally starting to see an improvement in the quality of the rolls, until something happened that I could not ignore.

[+ 45% Physical Damage]

“What? It can go that high?!”

I stared at the screen and re-read the line many times to confirm my eyes were not playing games on me. I quickly went to my second monitor and searched the values of potential enchantments on the official wiki.

Confirming it was neither a bug nor an exploit, I returned to the game and prepared myself to brag about my godly roll to my clanmates. Suddenly, my sight went blurry and my hearing became muddy. My body began to tingle all over with that same crippling sensation you get when sitting on the toilet for too long and your legs become numb.

“Oof! What the fuuu...” And I lost consciousness while mumbling curses to nobody in particular.

---

In a world far, far away – so far that humanity on earth would never come to know about it, the laws of the universe worked in a very different way from those belonging to the milky way. A force that could be called fantastic or even miraculous was a part of the inhabitants’ everyday life, allowing feats that would defy nature in our eyes.

From replacing fuel and allowing combustion in almost every environment, to allowing land-locked species to breathe underwater or fly above unreachable clouds. Some would call it magic, some would call it miracles, some would call it divine powers, mystic arts, etc. No matter the name, it was undeniably there in the grasp of those willing to learn its wonders.

Such a force of nature was ever present in this world. In the trees, the soil, the bees, the water… everywhere. Its people were as varied as were the uses for such a force. The beings who were shaped by evolution were also influenced by this force since time immemorial. While the action of using such a force received many names throughout the ages as well as the force itself, in current times it was widely known by one name. E’er.

In such a world, in a forest drenched with E’er, a figure slowly manifested itself. At first, barely visible lines formed a vaguely human shape. The event began with a few atoms coming together and forming cells, then the cells formed tissue, specialized tissue formed organs, and, in turn, these formed systems. A creature that looked like a human was being created in the noisy symphony of the forest.

Birds chirped, trees and foliage swayed on the wind, millions of insects went about their day, water flowed noisily through streams both far and near, animals of all sizes leisurely moved around, slept, ate, etc. Life was following its natural course in this forest, ignorant of the miracle that was occurring in its midst.

The creation of life.

As the process was coming to an end, the body slowly shifted positions from a vertical – almost standing – position, to laying on its back. When it touched ground, a pulse of concentrated E’er converged on the creature. It soon gained a rhythm.

Do-don-n. Do-don-n. Do-don-n. Do-don-n. Do-don-n. Do-don-n.

Then, slowly, air began flowing on its own into the lungs.

Suu-haa. Suu-haa. Suu-haa. Suu-haa. Suu-haa. Suu-haa. Suu-haa.

Finally, a jolt ran from the top of the body’s head to its feet.

Their eyes shot open.

---

A loud gasp escaped my lips as I came to. It felt as if I hadn’t breathed in a million years. I greedily gulped air as I reached for my throat. As my vision cleared from a world of white, and my senses caught up with me waking up, I froze in place.

Green.

All I saw was green.

I blinked a few times, and, soon enough my vision gained detail. As I kept on breathing, my nose picked up scents. I sat up as fast as I could and looked around with wide eyes. My hands dug into the soil I was sitting on. It was warm and pleasant to the touch, even as I felt greenery and a few pebbles that should cause discomfort, it felt good.

I opened my mouth and gently bit the air. The sound of my teeth was loud and crisp, instantly removing the possibility of this being a dream. The rich smell of dirt, weeds, trees, water, and something clean was all too real.

I could hear the wind blowing, the trees doing that tree thing when the leaves sway, a myriad of birds and flowing water.

I quickly noticed a few things. I could breathe with surprising ease. As if years of chronic smoking had vanished into the void. My lungs reached full capacity without any discomfort. That elicited a small hum of satisfaction.

My eyes could see clearly, too clearly. Never had I seen the world with such pristine definition. It was almost as if the world ran at 8k 144fps. I instinctively knew I could see better than before, and not just in details. There was a change in how fast I could see images. It truly felt as if I could see way more ‘frames’ per second than before. It was incredibly hard to grasp, but the simplest explanation would be that silly comparison.

As I looked around, a strange sensation began to blossom in my heart. Not in a figure of speech, it felt as if something physical was taking form within me. As if pure instinct, I tried concentrating on this odd feeling. It was like taking over the automatic breathing mechanism within my consciousness.

These comparisons need to stop.

The sensation of a bubble gently popping inside my mind overcame my senses. A flood of information assaulted me, but somehow, it was properly processed without causing major confusion. I somehow understood I had become a better version of a human. Faster, stronger, more adaptable, more durable. What came after was like a splash of cold water in a sunny day.

I somehow knew how to use a spear. Not in a sense that could be concretely seen with a skill. Just like you knew you could do a backflip, I knew I could perform various feats. As understanding dawned on me, it all pointed in a direction that both excited me and frightened me. With this knowledge came the realization I could ‘summon’ objects out of something similar in concept to an inventory.

This was exciting because it screamed fantasy-RPG, and frightening because it was identical to a fault to my character in the game I was playing when I lost consciousness.

I looked at my hands and balled them into fists. I felt unbelievably strong.

Then I noticed something that made me choke and almost faint.

My chest was more or less the same, if not a size bigger. The problem was between my legs.

“Why do I have a massive dick?!” my loud voice echoed in the forest.

I immediately facepalmed.

Those were my first words after arriving in a fantasy world.

"……"

It wasn’t just a penis between my legs. I could also feel my female sexual organ.

“I’m a futa?!” I facepalmed again.

The damage was already done. No point in despairing.

While I liked both genders, I leaned more towards men.

“But to like dick so much that I get one for myself...” I groaned. “What kind of man would have sex with a woman who has a bigger penis.” I shook my head. “Not including deviants.”

Truth was, it didn’t feel out of place at all. Almost as if I was born with it and had it all my life. The organ was, in my opinion, quite well endowed. Even in its flaccid state, it was at least 18cm long.

“Anyway. Let’s change the subject.” I said to no one in particular.

I stood up with little trouble and inspected my body to check if anything else was different.

My toes dug into the warm soil with a satisfying feeling. I tensed up my legs and noticed they were sculpted as if belonging to a sports maniac. My skin was lighter than before, which I lamented. I quite liked the tan I had going. My muscles were rock solid and I happily welcomed the abs I was sporting. I always liked abs.

Who doesn’t? I’ll fight whoever says they don’t.

I didn’t have a belly button but shrugged it off.

My body was uncannily hairless, which made me shoot my hands up to my head, where a healthy amount of hair flowed down to my knees. I sighed in relief. Grabbing a good amount, I brought it forward to inspect it. The familiar color of gold made me release a sigh. I furrowed my brows and looked up trying to see if they matched. Gold again. Nice.

I posed in victory. Genes mostly unchanged.

My arms were noticeably more muscular than before, though not in an extreme fashion, more ripped than swole. My back felt right, no longer hurting when stretching or exerting force. I posed like a bodybuilder and tightened all the muscles I could strain. Nothing felt out of order. It actually felt good. There was none of that stinging after flexing muscles to their limit.

“Good bye bad posture.” I muttered while posing for good measure.

Once the self was taken care of, I turned my attention to my surroundings. There was a lot of greenery which obstructed view and didn’t let me see more than 20 meters in any direction. Trees around me grew close to one another, but sparse enough to allow the rays of the sun ruling the sky to penetrate the canopy. Unfortunately not enough to actually see the king himself. Temperature-wise it was around 20ºC if not above that. With the amount of sounds that were present, it was safe to assume no predator was around.

Returning to that odd feeling that was what I could best explain as an inventory, I extended a figurative hand and tried to grab something. Surely enough, I could 'sense' the cold and smooth surface of metal. I tried ‘pulling’.

A set of brownish leather clothes materialized at my feet. Something that resembled socks, pants, a vest, and gloves. After that, the loud thunk of heavy metal armor resounded as whitish silver pieces of armor fell on top of the leather.

“Figures I have to dress myself instead of it just auto equipping.” I did my hair in a single braid, then crouched and started the process of wearing clothes.

I noticed pretty quickly that leather chafed my more sensitive parts, so I looked for the 2017 summer event underwear/swimsuit I got in a gacha box to protect them. To my surprise and relief, my new partner down there seemed to shrink to nothing when I wore the thong that was the lower piece of clothing. As for the increase in bust size, the bra was a perfect fit, so all was good under heaven. The leather pieces fit like a glove and were as comfortable as second skin sportswear. They even had the feeling of elastic cotton on my skin.

I would have stopped there if not for the fact that I felt too exposed, as if not having armor made me queasy.

Then came the hurdle of figuring out how the clasps and belts worked for the armor. After a long few minutes of mental gymnastics I managed to figure out the order of things.

The metal pants went first, then the boots, then the shin guards, then the knee coverings, then the breastplate, then the gloves, the arm guards, the elbow guards and finally the shoulder plates. I spent more than an hour wearing the armor on. Too time consuming.

The end result, however, was way more comfortable than I initially expected. It clearly weighed more than it should, and it made me think it would be too cumbersome to move around with, but things turn out different. I tried stretching and the armor pieces didn’t interfere at all, plus they felt unreasonably light. I moved around and it was as natural as being naked, but with the ease of mind that heavy metal armor brought with it.

The armor was silvery white and all the pieces connected to each other, not a single piece of leather to be seen. It looked like an exoskeleton rather than heavy plate armor. The chest area sported a golden sun. Straight lines of the same color imitating rays of sunlight stretched outwards.

“As expected of a fantasy world.” I said to no one in particular, once again.

As I posed in various ways, a thought came to mind.

“My weapon…”

I performed the insightful exercise of reaching for the unfathomable inventory and soon enough found the pike I got in my last hours of life back on earth. It materialized in my hands with a weird effect much like a reverse of when the big bad titan snapped people into dust. As it settled, I felt a rush through me. My muscles surged, tightened, and then relaxed. A jolt went down my spine and my legs quivered with energy. It lasted less than an instant.

“Is this how steroids feel like?” I asked the air.

It was a thick, light blue pole with a pointy bottom. The head proper was a bladed tip around 80cm long, twenty centimeters at the widest, making it a mean weapon to stab and swipe with. The material of the blade was bright orange, heavily contrasting with the body. A gritty surface ran along the pole for better grip. At 3m long, it was a pretty good pike.

What do I do now? I thought as I looked around me. Is it the classic ‘water, shelter, food’? Or should I follow flowing water and see if I can find sentient life? Will a small life form come to aid me? Ahh… I just found food and water in my weird pocket dimension inventory thing.

A dumpling fell into my open palm from thin air. It was warm and releasing steam. Taking a bite off it, I started walking towards the sound of flowing water. The rich flavor of meat and various vegetables filled my mouth as I thanked all living beings above divinity for the existence of food in MMOs. Using the pike to sometimes move shrubbery or branches out of the way, I started humming to kill time.

Looking around, a lot of flora was surprisingly colorful. Violet glowing mushrooms, plants with almost neon-bright flowers, so on and so forth. Birds were harder to spot, and mostly just sat in branches chirping and flying around. I saw what looked like woodpeckers, hummingbirds, sparrows, thrashers, and many, many others I had no idea the name of. I eventually stumbled across a turkey sort of bird, but at least five times bigger, easily reaching my shoulders.

I stopped to look at it and it just glanced at me and went on its way as if I didn’t exist. Its feathers were shiny and had an almost magical glisten to them. I watched as it came to a stop a good ten meters from me and dipped its head on water.

The stream is there! I lowered my position and closed in on the turkey. It merrily drank from the stream with no worries about the mortal realm. As I stood next to it, it lazily turned over to me, stared at me for a good five seconds, then slowly dipped its head in the water, stared at me again and tilted its head towards the stream.

“Oh, are you giving me permission to drink?” I asked the turkey.

It made turkey sounds back at me.

“Well, I thank thee, mighty feathered leviathan of the forest. Such grace is wasted upon one such as I.” I bowed exaggeratedly and used both hands to support myself as I went on all fours and dipped my head in the water.

The cool water was refreshing and a mouthful left me quite satisfied.

The turkey nodded at me and once again made turkey noises. It then turned around and walked off with the pompousness of a king. I noticed a goofy smile on my face as I watched such a regal bird leave downstream. Standing up, I decided to follow it.

“My feathery King, I beg thee to allow one such as this lowly one to ask thee a question.” I said to the turkey.

It responded with more turkey noises.

“I see! Well, then. Do you perchance, in your vast wisdom, happen to know of any settlement nearby? Perhaps humans? Elves if they exist in this realm of yours or any sentient creature who may be of aid to me? You see, your excellency, I happen to not be from your mighty realm and find myself quite lost.” I was starting to get a hold on this.

Again turkey noises.

“Aha! I shall follow thee if thou would excuse such daring behavior.”

Right… I thought. Thee, thy, thou.

More turkey noises.

The conversation went on for what felt like hours. Sometimes the turkey would drink from the stream, after which it would graciously allow me to get my fill and I would profusely thank it. Other times it would pick the soil for seeds or whatever turkeys ate, an activity I would embarrassingly reject, stating that such fine dining was not fit for one as lowly as myself. Instead, I would summon a dumpling and feast on it.

The stream, though, was one of the few things that changed from our routine. It widened and became more tranquil the further we walked. The day, too, saw some changes as it became brighter, leading me to think I arrived in early morning. As the sounds of birds quieted down and trees started growing further from each other, I questioned my sanity when the thought of the turkey actually guiding me crossed my mind.

But wait. I thought. This might very well be a magical turkey that guides the lost. I haven’t seen any other turkey since meeting this one.

I stared at the bird in question with new eyes. Of course, this could be one big coincidence. Or not. It didn’t really matter. I was fine with both outcomes.

As I was absorbed in such thoughts, I noticed the stream narrowed and the sound of water becoming louder than our footsteps. Some thirty meters in front of us, another stream, or rather, a river, ran its course. The stream we’d been following joined the river after descending a few rocks. Opposite of us, a few meters beyond the river bank, was a road. Well, to call it a road was too much. It was a beaten path. Greenery gave way to pressed dirt in a thin line along the river. Its brownish color a give away in such a green environment.

As I was staring at the path, the turkey made some turkey noises. I turned to look at it and sure enough, it was staring at me as if expecting gratitude.

“Oh! Thy Highness! How can I repay such good graces you have laid upon this lowly one?” I bowed and put a knee on the ground. I quickly checked my inventory to see if I had anything that would please a turkey. I found grapes and summoned them.

I offered the grapes to the turkey and it instantly went for them. It grabbed the main stem in its beak and flapped its wings a few times while turning away, not without glancing at me one last time and nodding its head. I nodded back.

“Well… fuck me,” I whispered as I watched the bird walk away. “It really is a magical turkey.”

I let myself laugh for a bit and stood up. I had a river to cross. How? No idea. I could jump over the water or swim across. Though the latter option wasn’t very attractive.

“Jumping it is,” I said as I walked back a bit, returning my weapon to my inventory.

The river was easily thirty meters wide. Jumping to the other side should be impossible, but I had yet to check my physical prowess so I had nothing to lose. If I fell in, I’d swim. If I sank, I’d walk underwater as fast as I could. Something inside me made me feel as if I could jump across no problem.

I started sprinting and as I came to the last step of land, I pushed myself.

I flew

 across. I didn’t even gain altitude. Much like a bullet, I shot forward. It didn’t even take a second. I slammed on the river bank. I heard water splashing behind me, most probably perturbed by the shock wave of my ‘jump’. The crash formed a crater with me as its center, obliterating most of the unfortunate terrain I landed on. Dirt, stones, and more raining down on me as I pushed myself up. I could’ve sworn I heard the distant gobble of the turkey as if laughing at me.

I kept quiet as I checked myself to see if anything broke or needed fixing. All was fine. I didn’t even feel the impact. At first I thought it was good old adrenaline numbing the pain, but after a few minutes, nothing came. I stretched to double-check and everything felt fine.

“Huh,” was all I could utter.

Coming back to reality, I walked off towards the path. I had two directions I could follow: upstream or downstream. I tried the old and proven method. Check the water. If the water carries anything that would suggest a settlement, go upstream. If not, go the other way.

Honestly speaking, I had no idea what I was looking for. This was a fantasy world if my guess was right, so I highly doubted I could find anything too telling. There’s no way plastic exists, right? Less so light metals like cans or the like.

It was a sparkling clean river. It even had fish, insects, and a plethora of other life forms.

“If water won’t give, check the land,” I said to myself, returning to the dirt path.

That, too, didn’t tell me much. I was not a tracker. It looked agreeably used, but sparsely so.

“...Okay. If land won’t give, check nature.”

I approached a clump of trees and searched for any fallen branches.

After finding a slightly thick and long branch, I made it stand up on the ground.

“Pretty please, pretty please, show me where to move my feet.” I let go of the branch and watched it fall.

It pointed upstream.

“There we go.” I tossed the branch back where I found it and began my walk.

That is, downstream. You must be thinking ‘Why?’. Well allow me to enlighten you. You should go where the end of the stick/branch on the ground is pointing to. I don’t know why, but that has worked for me when I was younger. Twice. That still makes it a 100% success rate. Fight me if you think otherwise.

So began the long walk along the river. Accompanied by the sounds of birds and other small critters, what was late morning turned into noon. This time, however, I was not distracted by the presence of a magical bird, allowing me to fully immerse into myself and try to make sense of what was available to me.

The first was obviously myself. I had somehow absorbed my game character. The game had levels, classes and all the common features of mmo’s. My main character was a spear-wielding warrior. I had evolved it from a base Swordsman to a Hoplite, then to a Lancer, and finally a Dragoon. Each class granted a number of skills, with few skill points to level said skills, preventing players from raising all skills to their max-level, suggesting a more balanced skill set where players made personal choices.

Most players, however, went with the tried and confirmed set of skills, and I was no different. The main thing that had caught my attention, though, was that I could feel all the skills at their maxed-out state. Though I could not see them as you would in a game, with text and everything, I still instinctively knew they were there. I knew I could throw my weapon and it would somehow return to me. It was just like how I knew I would need to go to the bathroom a few hours after eating a meal. It all felt linked together.

I was an individual belonging to a society of science, however, so I had to try for myself. Seeing is believing and all that.

I took out my weapon. I felt the same rush of energy as before, but this time it was milder. I had never in my life thrown a javelin or anything of the sort, but I now knew how to, and my muscles reacted accordingly. I picked a patch of grass in the middle of the path a good thirty meters away as a target and took aim.

I threw the pike as if I'd done it a million times before.

It flew in a beautiful arc and embedded itself on the ground just where I had aimed, not a millimeter off. It sunk down to the bottom tip and disappeared from sight.

I gaped at the event. It flew fast and the impact made the ground shake a little. Not one second passed and the pike formed in my hands. It didn’t fly back. Instead, it teleported.

“Holy shit!” I breathed out in amazement.

I walked up to the impact area and, sure enough, there was a hole in the ground. Ripples formed on the ground outwards up to ten meters in radius, as if a heavy object had fallen there. It seemed the ‘skill’ retained its area of effect feature.

I continued walking and trying all the arsenal of skills I could. Some, however, could not be performed. I assumed that would be the case. One of my classes required me to be mounted to access its most powerful skills. Most self buffs and defensive skills worked as normal, however, so that was a nice thing. I struck the air in front of me while advancing with as many skills as I could, and felt the existence of cooldowns carried out into this world, though tamed for the most part.

As seconds turned into minutes, then hours, I realized the defensive buffs were not disappearing. I kept track of the time. Two full hours went by before the buffs wore off.

That was a radical change from the game, which made sense when brought into reality. It was nothing imbalanced like immunity to damage or anything of the sort, just static damage reduction, resistance to knock-backs, knock-down, stagger, slow, arrest, and immobility. Nothing unbalanced. I noticed the skills ready again and used them once more, realizing they were always ready, leading me to believe they were supposed to be up at all times.

Instead of waiting 35 seconds for a charge skill that advanced a set distance, I could charge as long as I felt like, running at a shocking speed. When I stopped, something told me I had to wait for five seconds for it to be available again. In the meantime, I tried out more skills.

All in all, I never stopped swinging, stabbing, impaling, twirling, and spinning, even without the mounted skills as I moved. Being careful myself, I never hit a tree or the ground, so there was no damage to my surroundings.

After around four hours of walking something happened that made me stop as if struck by lightning and fall on my knees.

The path had kept itself right next to the river and the trees around me were growing more and more distant until the canopy was thin enough for there to be gaps. That was the moment when I glanced up while swinging my pike and saw something strange.

Them.

Two suns.

“Yo… That’s terrifyingly amazing.” I said from my position on the ground.

I had certainly read novels about worlds with two or more suns, but it was a completely different thing to witness it with my own eyes. I raised a hand to cover my eyes and was once again shocked.

My reflection on the plated gauntlet was glowing with a golden hue. I noticed from the corner of my eyes that my nose glowed too. As I removed a plated glove along with the leather one beneath, I inspected my hand. There indeed was a golden glow coming from it. I checked closely and noticed that the glow stayed even when in the shade.

“Is it that... bio photo something?” I remembered some plants and insects ‘absorbed’ sunlight and glowed in the night. The name, however, escaped me.

My glow was nowhere near as bright as a firefly or fungi, but it was noticeable enough to see it up close. It didn’t hurt to look nor did my eyes sting.

“Whatever,” I said, standing up. “I’m sure that’ll be useful when going underground.”

I kept walking. This time focusing on my ephemeral inventory. After a while I chuckled.

I had all my items, plus all of my account character’s inventories and their respective banked items. In terms of currency, I had over twelve billion gold coins. Farming all the time was showing its results. As for useful items, I had nine mythical weapons, result of playing for long hours trying to get the pike I now held. I also had seven sets of equipment optimized for endgame content. One for the wizard calss, one for the cleric class, one for the scout class, two for the archer class, and two for the swordsman class. Each set specialized for a specific role.

I had all the costumes too. Costumes are justice. School uniforms, animal costumes, Victorian-era dresses, futuristic space suits. You name it, I had it. I had a lot of consumables too. Potions, scrolls, enhancing anvils, repair kits, identifying magnifiers, food, drinks, the list goes on: I was serious about the game, after all.

An unexpected surprise, but a welcome one.

While checking my inventory and walking, the suns began their descent in the sky. Late afternoon turned into early evening and the only thing changing was the width of the river. I stopped once to relieve myself after eating ten dumplings and a few soft drinks. I even had toilet paper, a result of too many failed gacha pulls. The developers of the game were known for their joke items. I was grateful, however. I didn’t want to use leaves.

After burning the evidence with a fire-based weapon, I resumed my trip.

The late evening turned into the night a few hours later, and, much to my surprise, the path joined with a proper road both wider and much more used. There were even tracks that looked like horses’ and thin marks I assumed were from carriages or the like. By then, the river was no longer covered by the canopy and the sky was visible from the road, the forest edge on my right as I looked up into the sky and the three moons.

Yes. Three.

One purple, one white, and one that looked like a small planet but much smaller than any of the other two.

“This really is a fantasy world, huh?” I whispered as I stared at the moons.

The purple and white moons were closer to each other than the small planet in the sky. The latter being in the other side of the visible night sky.

The sounds of birds and wildlife were replaced by owls and other nocturnal animals, like the distant howls of wolves and sometimes a cat meowing loudly.

Even after having walked most of the day, I didn’t feel tired. My feet were surprisingly comfortable in my leather socks and metal boots. My legs actually felt reasonably well-rested instead of pained and tired as I'd expected them to be. That was either due to my new body being more resilient or the equipment being far better than I initially thought; whichever it was. I kept on walking.

Lit by the many stars and the three moons, the night was as uneventful as the day. At times I got hungry and ate a dumpling, at other times I drank water from the river or soft drinks from my inventory. I also relieved myself in the bushes a few times.

As the sun rose, I got bored. Nothing was happening.

“Is this the Nile or something? How long is this river? Give me some people, for fuck's sake!” I grumbled while having breakfast and dipping my feet on the river.

Then, I had an idea.

I fixed my armor, took out my pike, aimed it down the road, and charged. As the skill did its thing, I also activated all my buffs. That must have increased my speed exponentially. I heard a loud boom around me and then silence as I sped down the road. I heard nothing but the sound of the wind hitting my face and rushing past my ears.

Did I just break the sound barrier? I wondered, not wanting to open my mouth in case some magical bug entered. And I had seen many bugs so far. The world around me flew past and even though my speed was ridiculous, I could still see in detail and was able to steer myself when the path followed a curve in the river.

Though the world was silent for me, it was still a sight to see. And so, time passed.

After hours of me running full speed, the suns began their descent.

I also saw the road change. It was as straight as could be. I could even see for thousands of meters ahead. I could even see the carriage I was closing in on.

A carriage! I shouted in my mind. Civilization! Gods be praised!

As soon as I saw the vehicle, I was almost reaching it. I slowed myself by ‘deactivating my skill’ and only using my legs, which was quite fast still. I must have saved myself a week of walking by just charging and running. I’d need to check my math, though.

As I came up to the carriage, I noticed the few horsed people around it. There were ten escorts surrounding the carriage. After I completely stopped, the sound of my speed caught up to me. We were surrounded by a powerful burst of wind. The horses panicked and their riders clutched their heads in fear.

They all turned around while unsheathing their swords.

“Who goes there!?” the nearest man to the carriage shouted, pointing his sword towards me.

With his shout, all the guards pointed their weapons at me as well.

They were all wearing matching leather armor, brownish with a green ‘Y’ on the chest. There were seven men and three women, the latter noticeable due to the difference in their vests. They have boing boings. As far as special features, most had tanned skin with sun-bleached hair, while a couple had lighter skin and darker hair. Brownish eyes and generally malnourished bodies.

“Hello, there.” I said. I had no clue what to say.

“Who are you?” the man who had shouted brought his horse closer to me, an aggressive look on his face.

“Natasha, you?” I gave my name. This was my first interaction with people in this world!

“Hmm.” his face relaxed. “Haven’t heard of...”

“HELP!” his words were cut off by someone in the carriage screaming at the top of their lungs.

His face soured and I couldn’t help but give him a suspicious look.

“Finn! Go check up on the Lady!” the man facing me shouted back.

“Yes, sir!” a young-looking guard responded and approached the carriage.

As he opened the cloth at the back, a leg struck out and hit him square on the face. He crumpled to the floor as a figure shot out of the carriage.

“HELP!” a woman running for her life screamed again. “THESE ARE BANDITS! PLEASE HELP ME!”

I noticed various things happen at the same time. The carriage flickered and became a cart, the man in front of me raised his sword, and three 'guards' moved to block the path of the woman.

I was in shock. Not because of the illusion, nor the man preparing to attack me, nor the fact the woman who was running with all her strength was naked, not a centimeter of skin without a wound. Her ears. Long at around 20cm, her ears bounced every time she took a step.

I felt my mouth fall open.

An elf! I thought, just as the sword hit me in the neck.