Top 5 Comments:
- TenuousAbrasion6511: Nice antlers, asshole.
Likes: 14.5k
Top reply - Juicynight909: He cries a lot
Likes: 7.2k
- TroyYaBoy96: MASK OF THE FUCKIN OAKEN GROVE! LETS GOOOOO!
Likes: 11.6k
Top reply - MajesticTwelve: but Smokeshadow was hot af. This guy is what [REDACTED] would look like if he fell off the wagon and took up insomnia as a profession.
Likes: 5.5k
- ShadowedOne: YELL AT ME MOAR DADDY LUCK!
Likes: 8.3k
Top reply: - Kaustik9682: 50 credits says Bambi Tryhard here pisses off the wrong god and gets his dumb ass smote again.
Likes: 3.1k
- RedEminence42: Even with the two Divines the odds on this guy are bananas. I stand to make a small fortune if he lives past his first dungeon boss fight. I don’t know what the [REDACTED] was thinking when this guy was selected, but if Luck the Fuck lives, I’m banking big creds.
Likes: 6.6k
Top reply - AudaciousPrime765: Bad bet. Those Divines put a target on his back as wide as the Rhydis. A Proffy will get this guy before he ever steps foot in a dungeon, guaranteed.
Likes: 2.2k
- HeartShapedBox: Don’t listen to the hate, Luck. You’re a magnificent stag.
Likes: 4.2k
Top reply - ArdentRequiem: Too bad it’s hunting season.
Likes: 7.3k
It was about as bad as I expected. “Well, I saw ‘Luck the Fuck’ coming, but Bambi Tryhard? Fuck that guy,” I said. “First of all, Bambi didn’t even have antlers until the last 30 seconds of that movie. Secondly, how the fuck do these people know who Bambi is?” I demanded as I lay on my back in my bed at the Fleet Fox. I had the Socials tab open, the panel hovering just above me. Illuma was still running, filling the room with pale light and casting long, jagged shadows. Sage didn’t immediately reply.
One moment, Luck. I’m querying your sponsor for permission to discuss this subject.
“Oh, uh, okay,” I said, my outrage at the comments settling to an angry simmer. About 30 seconds passed before Sage spoke again in my head.
Permission granted. Concerning your question, many derivatives, such as those adjacent to your Earth, have only minor variations in their histories and cultures from those you could find on your planet. As such, these worlds retain many of the same cultural features and figures. While there are Derivatives that vary wildly from the Earth that you know, many are quite like your own. It’s entirely possible that the movie Bambi existed on this viewer’s derivative.
I furrowed my brow. “So, my universe, and the audience’s universes, plural, are somehow derivative of Gaia? Like, Gaia is ‘Earth Prime’ or something?” I was somewhat bewildered. “And these people watching and commenting are from an Earth like mine, but in a parallel universe? Gaia, what, conquered them, and networked them together? Like some fucking interdimensional Roman empire?”
Querying… There was another long pause. In addition to the people of Gaia itself, the program is viewed across 767 functional derivatives, many with populations in the billions. Your understanding of the nature of derivatives seems to be accurate. Concerning the remainder of your question; permission was denied. I’m sorry Luck, I’m not permitted to share any further details at this time. Let’s continue to review your Socials.
“Just one more question, and I figure this will get denied, but I really just want to know because I’ve always wanted to know. What about aliens? Has Gaia made contact?”
Querying… Sage paused, then went on a short moment later, sounding surprised. Permission granted. To date, all discovered species are terrestrial natives of their iteration of Earth, though there are some intelligent species on other derivatives that would appear very alien to you. Derivative earth iterations like these are known as ‘Exotics.’ Feyhold is one such world. These iterations aside, Gaia has not made contact with any extra-terrestrial species in any known iteration, nor does it seek to. The prevailing theory remains that extraterrestrial intelligent life does exist within most universes, but Gaia has no interest in pursuing the matter beyond its security implications.
Well, that was disappointing. I figured if I had access to universe-spanning information, I might as well satisfy one of my long time curiosities. I was just as surprised to get an answer as Sage seemed to be. Unfortunately, it seemed like the Fermi Paradox was still a thing here. “Well, no aliens kinda sucks, but I can see how that would suit you guys just fine. Thanks for sharing,” I said, unsure of who exactly I was thanking. I switched to internal dialogue, “Why are you telling me this now, Sage? Two days ago you couldn’t tell me Gaia’s basic unit of measurement, now you can open up about societal structure? I don’t get it.”
It was the sponsor’s choice to make a reply. They do not always share their reasons with me, but I speculate that this information was released because it contextualises your Socials. The reply concerning extra-terrestrials was an indulgence, I believe. Regardless, the Central System would filter the conversation should we step into forbidden territory.
An indulgence? I thought, curious. That was interesting. It meant there might be some leeway, some instances where I could leverage my ability to get information out of my sponsor. They were making use of me, I would be happy to make use of them.
I filed that and let the matter drop, knowing I was probably lucky to receive what information I did. I grudgingly looked back to my Socials tab and my beloved comment section. Most were just trollish crap I had fully expected, but one in particular concerned me.
“What’s a Proffy?” I asked Sage as I read through it again. My eyes flickered to the very last entry as well. Being called a ‘magnificent stag’ was…new, but it was the reply that gave me a chill: ‘Too bad it’s hunting season.’
‘Proffy’ is slang for a Gaian Professional. As I mentioned before, they’re like both actors and athletes. Some, called Embedded Professionals, remain on Feyhold between seasons when the game is inactive, and star in Drama Streams based around their characters. These ‘Characters,’ which the Professionals have spent months or years building, join in the game once it begins, just like Feyhold’s npc adventurers. They compete with deviant players and other professionals for the duration of the game. There are many star players that will be featured this season, and you’re likely to run into professionals in larger settlements.
“This viewer makes it sound like they’re going to be hunting me for my gear, which is fucking fantastic,” I said with a sigh. “How do they even know I have it? Don’t the showrunners hide the stream from the players?”
Yes, the stream is forbidden to active players, and sponsors are forbidden from speaking of it to players. Advisors are permitted access to information pertaining to their player only. It’s unlikely that any of the embedded Professionals know about your Divine items, but several waves of professionals join the game after the Deviants are given some time to acclimatise.
I listened closely. These people would be my enemies. These professionals are sponsored by high-level officials and celebrities, and they often enjoy the advantage of clandestinely viewing the first week of the program, though it’s supposed to be against the rules. You receiving two Divine items would certainly be notable to those looking to exploit new players. We’ll need to use extreme caution when interacting with other players. There’s no way to distinguish a Professional from a Deviant player in-game, other than inferring their status from their behaviour. I will assist with this whenever I can.
This story has been taken without authorization. Report any sightings.
“Fucking hell. Cheating and corruption is par for the course, naturally. I didn’t expect this to be fair, but I guess this is where the PvP side of the game comes in.” I sighed. “ It’s insane; I have to try and beat dungeons alongside these people, who are trained professionals, and at any time they could stab me in the back for my shit,” I said flatly. “I feel like I’m going to have trust issues.”
It raises the tension considerably, Sage said in a sober tone. If it’s any comfort, those in a party with you cannot attack you directly.
“Some comfort,” I said with a sigh. “This is a drama, right? This will-they-won’t-they kill me shit is sure to be fun for the audience.” This was prime fuel for paranoia, and I could feel it creeping in, but this was something I could only really deal with when it happened. I dreaded the thought, if I was being honest, but my anxiety and trepidation were underpinned by a steady determination to survive. My goal had to be my guide, not my fear. Fear destroys rationality. Fear is purely reactive. Fear yields the initiative. I thought the words as though they were a mantra. I vowed that I wouldn’t hesitate when the time came.
I continued to stare up at the Socials tab as I tried to reassure myself, my world lit by the lonely orb of Illuma and the luminous glow of the interface tab above me. My hesitation would be a gift to my enemies, and one I couldn’t even remotely afford to give them. These professionals were basically primadonna mercenaries with Twitch streams. They wouldn’t hesitate, if killing me benefited them. They’d be eager. Killing me would mean views. Subscriptions. Money. Killing a noob for his gear would be exactly the kind of thing some god-awful fandom would thrive on. Paid murder hobos, I thought.
Sage, perhaps sensing a need for a distraction, pointed me towards a rectangular button on my Socials tab that read ‘Leaderboards.’ I mentally tapped it, and an entirely new tab opened, replete with information. Sage began explaining.
This section displays the different leaderboards that make up the program’s ranking systems. You’ll find a wide variety of top-ten lists for everything from Experience Earned to Gear Rating, to Damage Dealt, and more. There’s also a consolidated list for the top ten players ranked by their averages across all categories, including popularity with viewers. These lists can be expanded to view the top 100, or 1000 players in each category. Remember that there are over 10 000 players this season.
There were a lot of categories. There were the lists Sage indicated, as well as many more combat-based lists, but one in particular gave me pause. ‘Player Versus Player Kills.’ I set my jaw and read it over. This list only had five entries at present. They were:
- Quaid the Unkempt. Kills: 1
- SolidState. Kills: 1
- Jade Sky. Kills: 2
- SemperFi. Kills: 2
- Rook Hade. Kills: 3
These numbers weren’t large. Not yet. But, they weren’t meaningless. Rook Hade had killed three people in as many days. That was serial killer shit on Earth. I didn’t know the circumstances; maybe it could have been self-defence, but I found that unlikely. PvP kills would be something viewers would feed on like sharks. Some players would lean into it, professionals or otherwise. There would always be a contingent of people who took the darker path, just like on earth. It was an unfortunate truth, and one I wouldn’t forget. I memorised each name for the time I might come across them.
I wondered if I would be dealing with some genuinely disturbed people. Yes, I decided. Yes, I would. By design, this game normalised murder. It was a god-damned feature. To the professionals and the audience, this crazy shit was a sports drama. Like the god-damned WWE, only with dragons and gnomes and death dungeons. I hadn’t seen any damned dragons yet, but those fuckers were out there. I knew it. That was bad enough without adding my fellow players to the list of things likely to get me killed. I sighed and tried to just let it go, because what else could I do?
There were many less grim top-ten lists; things like Items Crafted, Gold Looted, Distance Travelled and Pets Collected. Pets, I thought, That could get crazy. Pets in fantasy games were always like a cacophony of strange, adorable, trollish, terrifying creatures that could range from pooping unicorns to tiny gnomish airships to any number of miniature eldritch horrors. I once had a pug for a pet in World of Warcraft, and the ugly-adorable bastard would even drag his little digital asshole across the ground with a derpy look on his face if you stood idle for any length of time. Abi’s mom had a pug; the digital version was true to form, especially the derpy part. The things are loveable, ugly-cute little floor monkeys.
I scrolled my way through the rest of the categories with curiosity. I didn’t rank anywhere on the consolidated top-ten list, but that wasn’t surprising. I suspected the embedded professionals that Sage had mentioned would be well-represented on these lists. The rest of us still had to figure out what the hell was going on. I didn’t know the circumstances of the other deviants, but this was all a bit of a fucking culture shock. Regardless, there was no way to distinguish between deviants and professionals, so it was all speculation.
“Phew, there’s a lot of stuff here, Sage. Can you filter results to any lists where I rank within the top 100?” She complied, and the myriad of lists disappeared, leaving four, which hovered, arranged in a square above me. The first read:
Total Kills:
- StrangeDays. Kills: 16
- Quint Essential. Kills: 18
- Bon Slay. Kills: 20
- Trey Stone. Kills: 23
- Luck. Kills: 25
- Bones. Kills: 33
- Jace Windway: 35
- Talon. Kills: 41
- SolidState. Kills: 46
- Rook Hade. Kills: 57
I’d killed 25 times. Sure, they were monsters and they wanted me dead, but the number stared me hard in the face, unsettling me. It would only rise from here, and soon there would be actual people on that list. I tried to dismiss it as inevitable, but I somehow still felt guilty. Sad. Like it wasn’t who I was supposed to be. Like I should be ashamed.
Rook was there again. SolidState made an appearance here too. I was surprised to find myself ranked 6th in total kills. I felt like I’d been busy with the goblins, but Rook’s 57 kills, not to mention three player kills, seemed like a ton. It seemed like maybe they had known what they were doing before the game started. I stared at the name. It sounded like some bounty hunter from Star Wars. With those kills, it had to be a pro. I had a vague sense of foreboding, but I pointedly ignored it as I turned to the other lists. I ranked highly on Skill Levels Gained, coming in at 14th thanks to the mask’s bonuses. To my surprise and horror, I topped out the Most Dangerous Encounter list, which was very, very sobering. The list included the name of the player, the mob or mobs they had faced, their level disparity and their status; alive or dead. Some had faced Elites, others groups of mobs that must have overwhelmed them, because one thing was true of every entry except one. Everyone on that list was dead. Except me. Holy shit, I thought, my heart skipping a beat. The disparity between myself and Embermantle was 150 levels.
I had not done anything that earned me the right to survive that encounter. Either sheer luck or divine mercy had decided my fate, not skill or cunning. In terms of a game, that felt cheap. In terms of survival, it was a literal gift from a god. An asshole god, to be sure, but still a god. Maybe my name had somehow metaphysically paid off. If so, it made for a worthy trade-off for all the god-awful puns I had set myself up for.
There was one final list that I made, and once again I was ranked number one. It was the Gear Rating list. I sighed. God-damnit. Once again, I did not receive my gear on merit. I didn’t deserve it. But I sure as hell wasn’t about to throw it away. The ring alone could literally save my life, and had.
But, I had not earned this, not yet. That was what would piss people off. The mask didn’t make me a better fighter, not inherently. I was relying on its power to supplement my lack of experience. My own skills were beginning to rise, but the mask was pulling a lot of weight. I sighed, feeling both guilty and defiant. Guilty like I was cheating, defiant like I didn’t care.
Regardless, I didn’t want any damned recognition. In this case, it was practically a death sentence.The game assigned a point value to gear based on its rarity rating; common, uncommon and so forth. Divine gear was rated at 100 points per piece, which brought my total to 220. The closest to my score was someone named Aela Drenais, sitting at 57. This was not an honor I was eager to embrace.
“Do you see this shit, Sage? It’s like a priority list for anyone who’s hunting players for good gear. Now, anyone I meet who has the sense to check their leaderboards is going to know that I’m well worth stabbing.”
I see it. It’s certainly problematic, and all the more reason to be wary when we reach highly populated areas. On the upside, players seeking strong party members will know you’re well-equipped for quests or dungeons. She was trying to sound optimistic, bless her heart.
“I suppose that’s something,” I said. I was tired. Tired like someone had forced me to spend soul-sucking hours swiping Tinder profiles.
Holding high ranks on the leaderboards does earn you rewards. Depending on your rank, you’ll receive gold and a chest once a week for every list on which you rank in the top 10. Provided you maintain your ranks, you should have rewards awaiting you at the end of this week.
“Chests and gold I will definitely take,” I said as I closed the tab and looked over at the hovering sphere of Illuma. I needed to practice with the spell, almost as much as I needed to train Arcane Bolt. I sat up in bed, swinging my legs over the edge and taking a long breath, then releasing a deep sigh. Being a sorcerer let me modify the spell, and it was time to work out exactly how I could do that.
I regarded the glowing orb, just about the size of a baseball now that it was level three. I closed my eyes and relaxed, visualising the great river. I was soon able to find the flow, and soon after, the slow trickle of power that drew on my mana as I maintained the spell. I focused on that tiny stream of power, traced it from my centre, down my arm, to the manifestation of the orb of light that hovered in the air nearby. I studied its connection for a long moment, focusing on the feeling of power traveling through me, and I breathed slowly and began to push and pull the mana flow gently, pulsing the power into the orb in staggered waves. I furrowed my brows with concentration as I strove to manage the change. It wasn’t a regular pulse, not at first. Maintaining the spell had become easy, but actively managing the mana flow, changing it, required finesse and control that I didn’t quite have yet. It was like repeatedly flexing a muscle while maintaining a grip on something else. One had to concentrate on the grasp, but also the flex.
I don’t know how long I worked at it, sitting there staring at a light that was almost flashing.I drained my mana bar many times over, and when I finally released the flow and let the spell fade, my eyes were blurry and strained, and I was exhausted. I blinked wearily at the notification that told me I’d reached level five in the spell, and I toppled back into bed. In moments, I was asleep.