When they arrived in Oakridge, Anika could feel a sense of excitement. Being tied up didn't bother her. It was fascinating to see so many other real players milling around. They were mostly humans, but occasionally she would see a short and stocky dwarf, complete with the long beard and angry face. There were other races too, but she wasn't sure what to make of them. Some were very tall and slim, elves of some sort and others were creatures she had not encountered before. She realized now who was a real player and who was an NPC. The real players moved around in a very different way, they would sometimes stop and look around before setting off again at a sprint. The NPC's typically walked around at a steady pace, it felt as if they belonged there whereas everyone else was just passing through.

Oakridge had a large fortified wall surrounding the entire town. Everybody had their papers checked in front of a large gate before they could enter the town. She overheard her captors explaining to the guards that they had caught her on the Kings Road with no papers and that they were taking her to the stables to work off a debt. Once they were inside the walls, Anika could see an even greater number of players running around. As they walked through what could best be described as a market square, she could see the players hanging around the various stalls, buying food, equipment and haggling with each other and the other NPCs. She couldn't wait for this little game with the officials to be over so she could talk to some real players.

"This is where you will work until you've paid off your debt."

They had arrived at a large riding stable. There must have been over 20 horses stabled there and it smelled of shit like a proper stable.

New Quest: A debt to pay

You must work in the stables until you have paid off the debt you owe to the Magistrate at Oakridge

Reward: Travel Documents

Accept Yes/No

She accepted the quest and saw that her progress showed 0/2 gold. After looking around inside the stables, she noticed a couple of areas that were marked as having tasks to do. There were piles of soggy hay with a sign next to them, explaining that the foul-smelling hay would need to be cleared off the floor and taken outside. There was also a section with riding tackle that needed shining. All the tools for her to do the work were provided, so she took her time to decide which task to get started with. Beth was still by her side but didn't look too impressed with where they were.

She was rewarded with two silver coins after working in an area for a while. It was disappointing though, she estimated that it would take at least a couple of days to work off her debt at this pace. Then it struck her, she had just been playing along without questioning what she was doing. At that moment there was no one around to guard her, and no real reason she couldn't just leave the stables as long as she avoided being seen by the guards.

After peaking out of the entrance to the stables for a while, and being sure that there were no guards around to spot her, she made a move and wanted to find a tavern where she could hide. She didn't get very far though. As soon as she had taken one step outside of the stables, it was as if she had hit an invisible wall. There was no way for her to leave the stables, despite trying at a few different angles. This made her furious. Could they do this to her? She didn't have time for this, surely there would be some way around it. Could they expect new players to take this on the chin? New players who had only joined the game a few days ago. Would they really be expected to perform these monotonous tasks for a couple of days before they could proceed any further?

She kicked the invisible wall, but all she got in return was a sore foot and a snigger from some of the other players on the outside. Anika wasn't someone to make a fuss, so she turned her back on the town and went back inside the stables to get to work.

Anika started with the easiest jobs first. She didn't like horses, so cleaning the riding gear and sweeping the floors were her first priority. After spending about 20 minutes on a task, she could see her purse being credited with a couple of silver coins and the work she had just done would reset. The floors would get messy again and the shiny tackle would be dirty. It was soul-destroying. Beth was getting hungry, she didn't look happy, but there was nothing Anika could do about it. Apart from getting Beth to eat one of the horses, they were stuck working in the stables until this stupid quest was done with.

After a few hours of monotonous chores, Anika welcomed a distraction when the guards brought in another player. It was another human, a warrior by the looks of it. He didn't seem bothered or annoyed at having been given the same sentence as her. He looked quite amused and smiled as he walked past before getting stuck into mucking out the stables. She looked at him, trying to figure out as much as possible before daring to start a conversation. By focusing on him, she could see he was level 9 and that he was indeed a warrior. This information came up as a small panel above his head when she attempted to focus on him.

"Hi." The warrior had stopped what he was doing, turned around to check her out and gave her a little wave.

"Hi. My name is Anika, what's yours?"

"I'm Ben. How's the work going?" He went back to shovelling hay, but looked over his shoulder, waiting for a reply.

"It's ridiculous. I only started playing a couple of days ago and I didn't have any gold. Then I was caught on the road with no travel documents, so now they're making me do this shit to pay off my debt. What a stupid quest."

He shrugged his shoulders as if it wasn't a big deal.

"It shouldn't take you too long. I will be here for a while. I killed one of the NPCs, so I'm stuck here until I get my reputation with Oakridge back up to neutral. It was all worth it though, it will stop some idiots I met from completing their quest for at least 24 hours. It's all fun and games." Then he winked at her and chuckled.

"I'm not here to play around though, I'm looking for someone. At the rate I'm going, I won't be out of here until tomorrow or the day after. It's taking me ages to earn any money doing this stuff." She flung the tackle on the floor and kicked the bucket in front of her.

Ben stopped what he was doing and looked like he was thinking hard about something.

"So you need two gold to get out of here, right?"

Anika nodded. Ben just kept staring at the hay in front of him, deep in thought. Then a little smile played on his lips and he hesitated a few moments before speaking.

"I've got two gold you can have, but you must do me a little favour once you get out. Interested?"

"Definitely. What do you need me to do?"

Ben took a deep breath and let it out with a sigh.

"I don't want you to be worried, or to think that this is a big deal. I'll give you whatever gold you need so you can complete your quest, and I'll even throw in extra once you are done as a friendly gesture. Don't go thinking you can just take my gold and leave though, I have lots of friends around here. You won't get very far before I come and make your life uncomfortable. Understood?"

Anika nodded. The thought of cheating him hadn't even crossed her mind. She was happy to do whatever it took to get out of here sooner rather than later.

"Go on then, don't keep me in suspense. What do you need me to do?"

"Well, you know that NPC I told you about, the one I killed to upset a couple of other players. She is a quest giver, unimportant around town compared to other NPC's, but she offers a quest for Mages. Without completing her quest, most Mages don't get their first decent robe. It's a long quest chain and many of them spend a couple of days working through it, then they have to get back to her to complete it. It's a decent robe with good stats, but many players don't bother with it because they level up so quickly that it becomes useless before long. Anyways, I ran across a couple of players that were doing this quest. They barged in on my territory and stole a couple of kills outside the Deep Dungeons where I was farming. They didn't even give me the loot or say sorry, so as you can imagine I was pretty pissed off. To cut a long story short, I'm here to have fun and these guys ruined that for me. Now it's my job to spoil their fun. Killing that NPC means they will have to wait at least 24 hours until she re-spawns before they can complete their quest. I'm sure it's pissing them off right now."

"Don't tell me you want me to kill the NPC once it re-spawns." How stupid did he think she was? Killing that NPC had landed him straight in the stables with a longer sentence than hers. Why would she risk that?

"I know what you're thinking, but trust me, it's not a big deal. Chances are you won't get caught anyway and everything will be fine. I was just being careless, I knew there were guards close by when I took her out, but I did it just to piss them off. All you need to do is make sure that no other NPCs, especially guards, see you when you kill her. It's easy, she's got a little house outside town where she does all her weaving. Just hang out there and send in your little pet once she comes back online. I reckon she'll be back tomorrow morning at some point. You up for it?"

Anika wasn't sure, it seemed risky. At the same time, she figured that she couldn't be much worse off than she already was. The thought of staying in the smelly stables for another few days doing these menial chores was not in the least bit appealing. The extra gold would come in handy.

"Are you 100% sure I can get away with it as long as nobody sees me?"

"You have my word. Trust me, I've been playing this game for years. You might lose reputation points with Oakridge, but in the greater scheme of things, that won't set you back unless you're planning to hang around here for some reason. You said you were looking for someone right?"

"Yes. I'm looking for my son. All I know is that he plays in the tournaments and he's into PVP. I joined the game a couple of days ago to come find him and I'm not making much progress so far."

Ben's eyes lit up.

"Cool! That means he got sponsored. Most players who compete in the tournaments have to get sponsored, there's no way us normal lot can afford Perma pods, and you need those things to deal with your character dying so often. Any idea what team he's on?"

Anika had to think for a while.

"Warheads or something?"

"Pure Warheads? You've got to be kidding. Pure Warheads are the top team at the moment. They've always been high in the rankings, but in the last two seasons, nobody has touched them. If you're serious, and your son is playing on their team, then he won't be hard to find. Those guys are like celebrities man."

Anika's heart beat very fast. If she had got the name right. If Ted was on this Pure Warheads team, it seemed like she was getting close to figuring out where he might be.

"Can you help me find out where he is then?"

"Sure. If you help me with my little game, I'll check with a couple of friends. The tournaments are held at a secret location, they don't want lots of players to turn up and distract everyone. But, if you're in the PvP circuit, you have a pretty a good idea of where to go when the time is right. At all other times, most PvP players fight for reputation and resources around contested borders. I should be able to find out where the Pure Warheads do most of their fighting."

"Okay, I'll do it."

There was no question any longer. To hell with the risk of being caught killing an NPC. If she was successful, she would have a lead to follow. This could be the breakthrough she needed.