Chapter 12: The Travails of Technology

After the Gatekeeper let them pass, they poked around and were amazed by what they saw. They were in a gigantic building, with several portals just like the one they had come through, all leading to different places. There were lots of people coming into and out of the portals. "This place is huge. This must be some sort of teleportation hub," Artalax said. The adventurers walked thorough the long hallway, passing many more portals, until finally they came to the Welcome Center. "Be on your guard," Tariel warned. "We don't know what's going on. This might be a trap."

Tariel approached the attendant at the Welcome Center cautiously. "Hello. Where am I?", Tariel said.

"Hello. Welcome to Carpathia, also known as the Adventurer's Paradise, rated number one kingdom for heroes by Adventurers' Quarterly for the past ten straight years," said the attendant. "How may I help you?"

"Probably the first thing we could use is a map."

"Are you from Altaria?"

"Yes. How did you know?"

"Only in Altaria would they use such primitive technology. Old-fashioned maps were obsolete a long time ago."

"Obsolete? What was wrong with them?"

"Well, first of all, paper maps tend to be ancient and hidden away in the lower levels of dark dungeons," the attendant explained. "Also, very often adventurers would complain that even after they found the map, it would be written in a foreign language so they would have to get it translated even before it would be of any use."

"Well, yes, I knew that maps were hard to use. But you say they're obsolete? What do you use instead?"

"We haven't used a paper map in decades. Look at this." The attendant brought out a large handheld device. It looked like an MGPS unit, except that it was much bigger and had several buttons at the bottom. The attendant pushed one of them and a map-like image appeared on the display.

"Look at this. A complete world map is integrated with the global positioning device. It shows you not only your coordinates but also provides a map of your surroundings. You can zoom the map in and out so you can see as much as you want. You'll never need a clumsy paper map again!"

"Now that's useful. How much does –"

"Wait, there's more. The device has a built-in proximity radar." He pushed a button and lots of dots popped up on the screen. "250 meter range, friend-or-foe recognition capability. Not only will you never get lost, you'll never be snuck up on from behind again!"

"I don't understand this. So you have all this technology and you still haven't even developed electricity yet?"

"You're right."

"But how can that be?"

"I don't know either. These just come in unmarked boxes, we take them out and sell them to you. I have no idea how they work. Oh, and did I forget to tell you about the new communication feature?"

"Communication feature?"

"Yes. You can talk to anyone else in Carpathia using the handy telecommunications interface. Just type in the name of the person you want to talk to, then talk! Very easy to use. And the cost per minute is much lower than for standard telepathy."

Tariel bought four of the devices, one for each person in the group. "These do seem to be really useful," Artalax said. "Given that over 93 of the average adventurer's time is spent outside of a monster infested area, anything that lets you find the monsters more quickly will really make us more efficient."

"Efficiency. That's all you adventurers seem to care about," said Princess Talia. "Just who can kill the monsters the fastest. We haven't even had one romantic love scene during the entire time I've been with you."

"What's the point of romantic love scenes?" asked Tariel. "They're always very inane, unbelievably slow, and outright boring."

"I like them," said Talia. "I, fore one, would consider it boring to go around fighting monsters all the time."

"Well, it's no sense arguing about it now," said Tariel. "We have to figure out why nobody who has come here has ever returned. So let's start exploring."

"Okay," said Talia, "but please promise me we will get a romantic love scene in here somewhere."