I own nothing involving Overlord or its' original characters.
Juniper Baxter couldn't stand the silence of the office. It rang in her ears like a thousand bands playing, mercilessly banging on her ear drums. She tried to focus on anything that was available. The sound of her cubicle mate tapping his pen on his desk. The fan across the room blowing air at the lucky few closest to it. The printer in the break room. Yes, office life was dull. The meager salary they gave her never felt like it was enough to compensate for the pain of a throbbing head.
Closing her eyes, she leaned back to try to relieve the eye strain from the bright computer.
"Hey, Baxter. Need some drugs?" came a voice from behind her. Juniper lazily opened an eye and spun around in the swiveling chair to face the voice. It was her cubicle mate, Suzuki Satoru (the pen tapper) and coincidentally her best friend as well. His dark hair brushed against his face as he stared at her. She stared back.
"What... what kind of question is that? Of course. Pass me the ibuprofen." She reached her hand out expectantly as he shook the bottle over it. Thanking him, she tossed the little lifesavers into her mouth and swallowed. Eyeballing the man next to her, she asked, "Got any plans for tonight? Maybe we can catch a drink?"
The young man smiled at her. "You already know what I have in store for tonight." He pointed at the back of his neck and wiggled his eyebrows. "You should join me instead."
Juniper couldn't help but sigh and shake her head, exasperated at her friend. "Satoru, you know I suck at that kind of stuff. Last game we played I lost 40:1... and I'm pretty sure my one win was because I got you trashed that night." Yes, that night had been spent pumping each other full of booze to wash away the terribly bleak life they both lived. It wasn't a safe way to play but what was fun without a little danger?
"Baxter, that was Yahtzee... It's not even a skill-based game."
"Yeah I know. It didn't stop me from losing 40 times or writing zeros on your scorecard after you were toasted."
"I KNEW that wasn't a mistake, you cheat!" He shot daggers at her. "You owe me!" She raised her eyebrow at the exasperated man. Seeing this reaction, he added, "And if you don't like it you don't have to play anymore."
"Sold. When do you want me to meet you?" Juniper rolled back to give attention to her screen. The time really didn't matter, it wasn't like she had anything else to do anyway.
He resumed clicking his pen against the table. "How about... 7? Grab a bite before getting to my place. You won't be done for quite a while."
"Whatever, nerd," she countered, "I have immunities to your gameri...ness?" Stuttering and lost for lack of a better word, she flushed slightly when he laughed at her.
"Ms. Baxter and Mr. Satoru," came a stern, booming voice. "Resume your work or I'll make you stay overtime today since your after-work life is more important than your work."
Ringing silence began again almost immediately as her hands resumed typing. She looked down at them.
I hope I don't get a cramp today. Thank god that ibuprofen is kicking in.
Flexing her wrists back and forth, she peeked over at Satoru to see how he was faring. His hands leapt across the keyboard with astounding accuracy, a slight smirk on his lips.
He looks a little too focused...
She picked up a pencil from her desk and chucked it at him, hitting him on the shoulder. He flashed a smile in her direction before resuming his work, his mind planning over-excitedly about involving his non-gamer friend in his activities.
Juniper tried to focus on her work, anticipating the evening to come.
Walking to Satoru's house is loud.
Juniper had to cross the shopping district to get to the outskirts of the dingy apartment complex he lived in. She still couldn't believe that he lived there even after she had offered him a room in her own two bed one bath apartment.
It isn't fancy but it's better than his shack, at least a little. Clenching her teeth, she pushed and shoved her way past the shopping district, cursing up and down every time someone got in her way. She was eventually able to make a dart down an alleyway and head towards his home.
Walking up the stairs of Satoru's was a trip down memory lane for her. How many times had she been up and down them to see her friend? Running up them to support him after the passing of his mother. Perhaps that's why he stayed here- too many memories. In return, he had raced down the stairs to see Juniper when her own folks passed eventually.
We really need breaks from all this mental trauma. One that doesn't include alcohol. I'll throw up if I have another sip of tequila. Drinking was her own pastime- Juniper's life was bland enough as it was. But as of late she had come to the realization that rarely did the two of them ever do what he wanted to do.
Tonight is going to be different. Reaching his floor, she knocked on the wooden door of his apartment and waited patiently.
It wasn't but a 15 second wait before he answered her knock. "Hey, you're right on time. I just booted my back-up chair up for you."
She shook her shoes off at the door and pushed past him grinning. "Then what do I do till then? Do I have to warm up my mind to prepare for swinging imaginary swords?"
He shut the door and rolled his eyes at her words, playfully pushing her over onto the couch. "I can't wait to make you eat your words. And no... that is definitely not how it works."
"I see.. I see.." She stroked an imaginary beard and leaned forward in the chair. "And tell me... what else do I need to know to begin this long journey of fictional adventure?"
"Shut up. Give me one moment and I'll have the headsets synced up." He rolled his eyes at her once more and disappeared into his room down the hall.
Juniper slumped over in her seat and sighed. She didn't even have to ask which game he was going to make her to play. Yggdrasil was the only one he was obsessed with. A DMMO-RPG fantasy game. When it came out 10 years ago it was the talk of the internet. People scrambled to obtain a copy and start building their empires. Satoru had been a bit late to the game; Juniper recalled all the times he come to work that first month he played, complaining about the number of people that killed him. Everything changed after his first month though.
"Hey, I'm ready for you back here. Let's get going!" She could hear him clap his hands in a beckoning manner from the back room.
For all he puts up with from me, I can do this for him.
"Hurry up. I'm usually on an hour earlier than this." He raised an eyebrow as she strolled into the room. Waiting patiently as she took her last few steps to stand next to the setup, he went back to rummaging around in the underside of the chairs. The padded metal loungers sat next to each other, the headsets on the middle of them.
"Why haven't we done this before?" Satoru asked her as he sat down and played with the headrest settings.
"Well, I suppose gaming has never really been my thing, I guess. I never got into it as a child," she explained. "That and maybe the bugs that are apparently everywhere in the game. You know I don't do roaches."
"Bugs are cool. Just wait till you see Cocytus."
"See what now?"
"Nevermind."
Juniper picked up the helmet and inspected the visor. Shiny and straight as it was, when she curiously flipped it upside down, the inside looked like something she could only compare to a horror movie. Sensors and wires ran all along the inside and led out into one long cord. Horrified, she picked at the thick mess of cables.
There is no way I'm putting this on.
She glanced past the first chair to the second... only to notice how much nicer his headset was. That one not only looked nicer but also looked like it was less likely to give her an electric shock. Before she even knew what she was doing, she reached for it. A hand stopped her and lifted the nicer helmet high above her head. Juniper scowled at the taller man.
"There is no way I am using that murder helmet!" she exclaimed. "Have you seen that thing? It looks like a middle-schooler's failed tech project!"
"It's just something I put together. It should work just fine. I looked up a tutorial to make a functioning headset. It'll be fine!"
"Fine! Fine? Look at this and tell me what is wrong!" She held up the contraption and exaggeratedly gestured at the wiring.
"Well I already tested it and I didn't die!" he yelled at her. Keeping the headset still out of her range, he reached over her and grabbed the murder machine, slamming it onto her head. "Just plug up to the damn thing and lie down."
She grumbled and begrudgingly submitted to his instruction. Grabbing the thick rope of cable and inserting the plug into her neck, she laid down and adjusted the cord around her head. She couldn't see through the visor but could hear Satoru rummaging around. "What are you doing... I thought you wanted to get started asap." She teased, "It's not too late to switch headsets with me!"
All she could hear was him snickering as he started to fiddle with her headset. "No way in hell. And we'll be online in just a moment, I just want to hook our headsets up together. I need to guide you through the opening character creation and scenes, young one." He patted her on the helmet sarcastically.
"Aaaaaaand here we go!" His excitement quivered in his voice. The visor clicked on and the power started flowing. She could feel the surge of energy that displaced her vision before a rainbow of colors flowed into her sight. All shades swirled around her as she was sucked into the vortex and deposited onto a flat platform. The colors moved away from her, making makeshift walls with their ever-moving form. It was like being in a room in the middle of a river. Two seconds later another platform materialized with the figure of her friend on it. He grinned at her chest, wiggling his eyebrows.
"My eyes are up here, doofus!" she yelled. She warily looked past the platform to the floor. It was hard to tell where it ended.
I'm stuck with a perverted nerd in a colorful hell. There are several things I'd like to be doing that's not this.
"I can't see you, idiot! You've never played a game with me so I don't have your virtual body uploaded! You're essentially a ghost to me!" he snapped back, shrugging his shoulders.
Juniper looked around the trippy room. If she didn't have seizures before she was going to have some now. "OK, so what do I do?"
"Nothing for now. Just sit back and watch!" The grin seemed permanently glued to his face as he popped his knuckles and clicked invisible buttons.
The room immediately went dark. She waited in the void only for a moment before a dim light began to glow from beneath her. It escalated in brightness as it revealed a vibrant green field and bright blue sky. Her eyes widened at the realism. Bees calmly buzzed past her invisible torso and the grass swayed in the breeze. The wind moved the clouds miles above her head, casting a shadow on her face. If she didn't know better, she could have felt the warmth from the virtual sun. Giant words appeared before her, spelling out the game's title in a large, exaggerated font.
YGGDRASIL
So far, Juniper was blown away by everything so far.
"Ok, so I'm here. And you know what? I'll give credit where credit is due. If the rest of the game looks this good you just might be onto something." She couldn't lie to the man - the impressively realistic opening looked like someone had copied and pasted one of those nature documentaries into the game. Still in awe at the realism, she looked over to Satoru for instruction.
"Jesus Christ!" she shrieked, jumping at the sight that greeted her eyes. There was no longer the tall dark-haired nerd she had known for years as her best friend. In his place stood a massive cloaked skeleton at least twice her height. Long black robes draped close to the floor, its external trim on the hood and sleeves gold and the inward hem along its sternum purple. Red glowing eyes peered out from under the dark hood and its fingers each had their own ring. A glowing red orb could be seen in the lower part of its ribcage.
"Baxter it's me!" The skeleton turned towards her, robes flowing around it. "I really should have gotten you into this years ago. My username here is Momonga."
Trying to regulate her breathing, she confirmed that that was indeed Satoru's voice coming out of the magic skeleton. Inspecting the assembly of bones, she observed the lettering above its head. It read out 'MOMONGA LVL 100'.
"Why are you a skeleton, out of everything you could have been?" Her heart still pounded in her chest from the scare. "How does anyone recognize you?"
"Well," he explained, "I don't want to be recognized. I want to be someone new. We'll make you a body and a character too, so you can pick what you want to look like!" He lifted his hands again and started to type mid-air.
"So... elaborate on that not wanting to be you thing?" she asked, genuinely curious.
"I just wanted to be someone new. To me, the point of a game is to be someone you're not. So, I chose to be a Heteromorphic character, an Elder Lich on the verge of being an Overlord to be precise!" he told her with elation. A smiley face emoji popped up next to his face, letting her know how happy he was that she was doing this with him.
"Ok... So, let me educate you about this." He dropped his hands as giant flags waved around her with symbols embroidered onto them. "The first race is human. These are your basic people. They are boring and mean and you're not choosing them."
"Oh, well thanks dad. Just tell me which one to pick so I don't have to hear you nerd out."
"Easy then. You're with me. You'll be heteromorphic. That way you can join my guild eventually!"
"Alright... what will I look like?" The three flags multiplied into 30 or 40. I'm supposed to select one from all of these?
It was as if he could sense how intimidated she was by all the options. "Tell me what you want. If you could do anything, what would you do?"
"That's easy. I want laser eyes." She laughed at herself. "Did you know I wanted to be Cyclops when I was little?"
"That's hilarious... and I can do that but it doesn't have much to do with your race...more to do with what spells you select. Pick something else." The skeleton snorted.
"Why'd you ask then? Well, second best would be flying. With actual wings - like a bird! Who hasn't wanted to soar through the sky before?" Satoru shuffled around on his invisible keyboard again. The options limited themselves to a dozen or so. She read through them. Braineater... I don't want to know... Demon... Dragon... blah blah blah...
"Wait! Does that say angel?" She couldn't help but start to feel a bit excited.
"Yes, it does!" Satoru clicked on it. An image came into existence where the race names had once been. It was a basic human with wings and white robes. "That race has two transformations. The first is humanoid looking, second is..." Another gesture on his keyboard. "This!"
The second was taller and a little more complex. The face elongated and became shielded with something resembling a cross. Wings became larger and metallic and the arms elongated into hands that held a golden sword.
"And the third?" she asked, adrenaline increasing.
"That one is determined by your karma. So, essentially how evil or good you are. You get to choose your karmic rating to start off with and then the game moves it towards positive or negative depending on your items and actions. These are only options too, they require that you invest some levels in shapeshifting."
"I have no idea what that means... but karma? What karma are you?"
"I'm... basically as evil as they come. Don't worry, I'll take care of your levels and the like."
She laughed, "You weren't kidding about wanting to be the opposite of your real self." Her invisible gaze looked at the second transformation again. It looked acceptable.
"I guess... this is ok!"
"Why are you trying to be pretty? But if it's what you want then whatever. Give me one second and I'll make it look like you. You can change it as you like after. I'd usually walk you through everything, but they're doing a system update on some minor things and I want to be able to check them out before anyone else has a chance to take advantage of them. Sometimes bugs can work in your favor." He went back to typing on his platform. With nothing else to do, she took a moment to observe the other races. If she was to be an angel then what did the demon look like? Juniper glared at the demon option, cursing the fact that she still had no hands.
"Can you click the demon race? I just want to read it." Satoru grunted in response as the category expanded open in front of her eyes. The first transformation was a normal humanoid looking woman with leathery wings. The second had more options. So basically... it was a lizard lady. The avatar in the picture had the head of a green frog thing... the text called it an imp. The third transformation was up to its karmic level as well. There was an asterisk next to the blank third transformation screen. Referring to the bottom of the page, it claimed that demons automatically started with a negative karmic value, and could not go into the positive. If demons are naturally evil, then it stands to reason that Angels are naturally good, right? She squinted to read the tiny writing in the Angel panel of her screen.
It read:
*Angels are naturally positive karmic heteromorphic beasts; however, they can easily fall into the negative. Falling into the negative as an Angel will have adverse side effects [to] on your character. *
"All done! Look at yourself now!" Suzuki proudly proclaimed, "I think you'll like what I did!"
Yes, hands! Juniper looked down to wiggle her fingers. She flexed them out just as her skeletal friend did and succeeded in summoning her own invisible keyboard. Bottom right included a button that read 'mirror'. Clicking on it, she examined herself with awe.
In that moment, it made sense why Satoru wanted to be someone else. How tempting it could be. It was still her... but with wings! She reached to touch them. They looked like they'd be the softest things she'd ever felt, if she could feel.
The clothes were exactly like the avatar in the example as well. White robes with gold trim around the hem. A gold circlet just above the brow bone. Again, she had to admit it - she looked incredible. Satoru had literally gotten everything down, the face looked just like she did in real life. Her avatar's figure looked superb as well. Not too skinny, she had a little meat on her bones. Dark, straight hair and... amazing hips.
"Aw, Satoru! I'm so flattered you think I look like this in real life!" She waved a hand at him and threw him a flirty wink. "You shouldn't have!"
His avatar stared at her. "That is literally what you look like in real life, Baxter... And call me Momonga. Calling each other by our names is weird online."
Juniper saluted the senior player in a silly fashion, "Sure thing cap'n!"
He rubbed his temple, "Just click configure options by the right side of the mirror. I'm going to get going, you're killing me. I'll see you at the spawn point. Don't forget to make a username... we'll pick your first job class when you spawn in." He waved his hand dismissively at her, apparently exhausted by her plethora of energy.
"Whatever nerd, bye." She waved her new hand at him to go away. In an instant he was gone and she was left to her own devices. Clicking through the options, Juniper got to work.
I don't want to change my figure... yes. A little bit of this and a little bit of that... yes that's nice. Ooh purple! It didn't take too long for her to become satisfied with her looks. Originally brown hair was now a light purple. Once flat, it now held a slight wave to it. She'd customized her wings to be a bit longer- just enough for the longer flight feathers to touch the ground. There were even options to select tattoos, which she did in earnest. Her parents always thought them to be trashy, but since the option was there, she selected a henna-like floral design that started at the wrist of her left arm and worked its way to elegantly flow off her collarbone.
I wonder if I can undress myself... She clicked off as many clothes as she could. Stopping her actions and leaving her a bit disappointed, the system flashed a 'no mature content' warning.
I guess that makes sense. It would have freaked me out if Satoru knew what I looked like under everything.
Overall, she was glad to be doing this. She concluded she looked pretty cool as she confirmed her character's getup.
A scale popped up in front of her. Karmic value? She hadn't even really thought about it. Well, Angels are supposed to be good but... Juniper stared at the scale. It was nice of them to add the scales of justice into this, a unique nod to Egyptian mythology. As of this moment, the scales were completely even. She toyed with the idea of being as evil as her friend.
I suppose that would be fine... Juniper tried to tilt the scale to the negative.
It refused to budge. She frowned and tried to move it again. Nothing.
Whatever. She huffed and let it be.
She assumed it was possible to change her karma later on, the note had said it was possible anyway, so no harm done. She clicked confirm. The field surrounding her dissipated, fading into gray like she was losing consciousness. When the room was completely dark, a single question remained in white lettering.
USERNAME:
She... hadn't given this any thought. Even though she'd had an entire work day and a 20-minute walk, the thought honestly hadn't crossed her mind. She pondered in the dark. Wow, it really is hard to come up with stuff on the spot. She was nowhere near as creative as Satoru... Momonga, she corrected. Her normal name would be just fine, right?
USERNAME: Juniper.