The stone room faded into darkness and I felt the ground rise beneath me. Squinting upwards, I saw a narrow crack in the ceiling growing wider as I neared. By the time the rising pillar I stood on filled in the hole of the ceiling, I found myself surrounded by a bright, grassy field under a crisp, blue sky. It seemed that no other form of life was around, and I wondered where I was supposed to go, as there were no indicators pointing me in the right direction. Did this game even have a tutorial?
I glanced down at my attire--a very basic, matching khaki top and bottom--and noticed a light bag slung over my shoulder that probably materialized during the ascent. Flipping the top open, I found a notebook, a pen, a scroll (which turned out to be a map with very few surrounding areas labeled), a coin purse (that held 20 copper coins), and a glass bottle, slightly bigger than my hand, that glowed a faint, golden green. I turned the bottle in my hand and found a label on the bottom that read, Green Fairy - your first travel companion
My eyes widened. There were no holes in the bottle! Did fairies not need oxygen?! Either way, it couldn’t possibly be comfortable being trapped in a tight little bottle. I had to open it.
The second I uncorked the bottle, a little green beam of light shot out from the top and slowly landed on the ground before me. As the glow turned down to a steady glimmer, I could finally make out a small, shirtless figure wearing green slacks. Actually, they could’ve been any color, but the glow he was emitting made everything, including his skin and hair, look like a different shade of green.
“Um...hello?”
“Howdy!” the fairy spoke in a surprisingly deep voice. “Thanks for letting me out of that damn thing. There’s only so much one can do to pass the time in an unfurnished bottle.”
“So are you supposed to give me a tutorial or something?”
“Well aren’t you a rude one? Don’t you want to know my name at least?” the little fairy huffed.
“Oh. Sorry. What’s your name?”
He paused for a second. “I forgot.”
“What?”
“I forgot. How about you come up with a name for me?”
Not the most logical reason for me to name this guy. A bit lazy on the developers’ part, I thought. “Ok, how about ‘Lucky’?”
“No.”
“No?”
“What am I, a dog?”
Okay, so he can’t remember his name, but is ridiculously picky. I sighed. “Then is there a name you prefer?”
“Hmm…” The fairy looked up at the sky. “Blue.”
“Uh...but you’re green.” Only a few minutes into the actual game and it was getting so ridiculous that I almost wanted to log out.
“I like Blue.”
“Okay, then I’ll call you Blue,” I said exasperatedly, deciding against mentioning that he now shared the same name as an outdated children’s cartoon dog.
Blue happily flipped in midair, leaving a small trail of green dust behind him. “Then I, Blue, will be your guide on your journey to find true love!”
I wanted to gag, but instead, I said, “Okay, Blue, what’s the run-down?”
“Everything you need to know can be found in your map and notebook,” Blue said, gesturing to the items in my bag. “You’ll notice that both are relatively blank right now, but as you continue your adventure and discover new things, I’ll help add more information. Isn’t that cool?!”
“Sure is,” I said absentmindedly as I flipped open the notebook to the first page. Sure enough, at the top of the page read in bold:
Lover’s Quest - An Introduction
I had to flip through a few more pages before a blank page showed up, indicating the end of the beginner’s manual and the beginning of whatever I decided to record on my journey, so I plopped onto the grass and made myself comfortable.
Welcome to Lover’s Quest, a virtual reality massively multiplayer online game. You are about to embark on a journey of magic, wonder, and love. Your soulmate has spawned somewhere across the world, and it is up to you to find him! Join forces and become the ultimate power couple!
The next page had a silhouette of a man with a large white question mark over him. The silhouette was mostly red, but towards the top, it faded to black. Slapped at the center of the man’s chest was a 76%. Not exactly as high as I’d hoped in terms of compatibility. Luckily, the manual stated that matches were not permanent. If I hadn’t found this mystery man before they foudn another user more compatible with me, it would update. I was relieved to discover that like online dating, I could also change my preferences, and even if I found this guy, I wasn’t necessarily stuck with him forever. This was just a game, after all.
It seemed that the point of the game wasn’t just to hook people up, but to promote teamwork and collaboration, like pretty much all MMOs. That being said, I didn’t have much information to go off of to find my so-called “soulmate.” I had his username (Ray419), age (23), and online status (green for ‘Online’), but that was about it. They didn’t even show his avatar, and apparently, it would only appear once I made our status as a couple official. If I happened to run into him, how would I know if he was the right guy?
Supposedly, I would feel my heartbeat quicken at an irregular pace the moment we came within a 5-mile radius of each other.
How cute.
“How big is this world anyway?” I asked Blue. “How am I supposed to find this guy if the only indicator I have is my heartbeat?”
“It’s huge!”
“Are you kidding me?!” I fumed.
“Sometimes love just has to happen naturally,” Blue shrugged. “You don’t know when you’ll come across your soulmate.”
“This is so much more of a hassle than online dating in my area,” I mumbled. “Wait, can’t I just look up his name in the user directory or something?”
“The user directory is for mods only,” Blue said seriously. “For the sake of the user experience.”
I sighed. Well, I couldn’t expect a game about a love to be easy. I glanced at the manual again and noticed that the green circle Ray419’s name was now gray.
“Well, seeing as I can’t find him now anyway,” I said, “Might as well get myself all nice and strong for when I do.” I opened up the map. “Any monsters around here?”
“This is a safe zone,” Blue said, hovering above the map and pointing to the patch of land that corresponded with our location. “But there may be monsters lurking in this forest area here.” He moved closer to an unnamed green area north of here on the map.
“Then let’s get going!” I said excitedly.
If Ray419 came online again, he’d just have to wait, because right now, the most important thing right now wasn’t finding love; it was leveling up my pathetic stats.
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