Vald sighed as he plopped down onto his desk chair. The school day hadn't included anything exhausting, but Vald felt as if he hadn't gotten a good night's sleep for a week. His soreness always worsened later in the day as well, so he just wanted to fall into his bed and sleep.

Instead of allowing himself that basic pleasure, he forced himself to his computer and to log onto his favorite game. While the online game loaded, he grabbed himself a soda to keep himself awake until he passed out later.

On his way back, Vald noticed the strange sword leaning against his bed as if it belonged there. Even though Vald knew he had to find out who it belonged to and return it, something about the sword felt like it belonged to him and when he had taken from the thief it had returned to its rightful owner.

Shaking his head to rid it of such weird thoughts, Vald sat down and logged on. Trevor was already on and as soon as Vald's character spawned he messaged asking, "School out already?"

Vald chuckled and replied, "Professor didn't want anything really. Have a paper for the class though. My other class is tomorrow."

"Well want to meet up then?" Trevor replied. "I got a mission and need all the help I can get."

Vald agreed and set off for their agreed destination. Getting there first, Vald noticed that Oliver was online and asked him to join them. Within a few minutes the three of them were gathered near a ruined castle, the mission being to "rescue" an NPC from a dragon inside.

They charged and the three of them slaughtered all sorts of goblins and orcs inside the castle, but they needed to take a break to heal just before the main room with the dragon. Vald was breathing heavily in the real world. He clutched his chest as he breathed, and pain flashed around his body as he tried to focus on something else to ignore the pain.

"Are you alright?" Oliver asked. They were using headsets to make talking easier and less time consuming.

His character, named Lizregbel for some odd reason, looked much stupider than he had implied when telling them about the changes earlier. Clothed in all white, flowing robes, the pink double braids only added to the overall impression of frilly and girly. Vald couldn't stop himself from laughing as he related that character to his young and inexperienced friend.

"Yeah," he replied simply.

The three of them turned back to the door and prepared for a hard fight. The bunny floating behind Oliver's character's shoulders darted into the room before them, being undetectable to NPCs. Once confident they were ready, the three friends charged the giant beast.

They were slaughtered. Vald respawned not a minute later in the nearby town, swiftly heading to the blacksmith to repair his broken sword. The other two joined him after likewise repairing their damaged equipment and were sulking.

"We need help," Vald stated tonelessly.

Trevor sighed. "Dumb mission, but now I want to do it more than ever."

"So let's just ask around," Oliver suggested cheerily. "There's bound to be at least one person willing to help us."

I promise to try and stop making obvious references to the manga...it's really hard though and I don't want to change what I've already written. For real though, gaming with a player who looks like Ruruka would be SO COOL!