A couple pieces of clothing are produced from among the gathered players in short order, and I thank them repeatedly. Even if they are just random spares no one needs, it hits a bit too close to how I had to borrow clothes after moving in with Fara.

What they hand me looks a little silly, but it's something. A pale yellow shirt, oversized and baggy on my small frame, with tiny orange triangles all over it too. A teal, calf length skirt with wobbly green lines scrawled vertically down its length. A reddish jacket that looks a little too close to a hoodie style to fit with the fantasy setting. All three items are rough around the edges, stuff people don't really need but haven't dumped from their inventories yet. And none of it matches in the slightest, so when I throw it on over the towels, I look totally ridiculous.

Oh well, at least I'm dressed now. As I rub my thighs together awkwardly, I wonder where I'd be able to find new underwear in this world. At least this skirt isn't terribly short.

Still supporting Lara as she shuffles along, I follow Ollin and the others toward the edge of the plaza, significantly larger than the one section where we were fighting, ringed in by towers like we were. When I look around, most players are dispersing in the aftermath of the invasion. A solid number are just sitting down on the ground where they were standing though, clearly in need of a rest, like Lara.

Lots of them are taking the opportunity to log out too, their bodies dissolving into bright lights that return to the sky, like when they die. Only it's slower and without the same visual impact behind their ascent. Their minds returning willingly, not by force.

It doesn't take long to tell where our group is headed. It's a rather large building right at the edge of the plaza, between two streets that stretch away into the town. Four stories, with windows and wooden balconies lining various sections along this side. It wasn't within the area bounded by the towers earlier, so it's untouched, unlike the practically decimated fronts of the ones that were near the battle earlier.

The people at the front of this building, who all give the impression of pretty high level players, open up the large double doors and begin funelling inside. When Ollin reaches the doors, he stops to hold them for us, so we can go in before him. I thank him quietly. Hell of a gentlemen, isn't he...?

Not far off the main hall where we enter, there's another door into a conference room. Big wood table, chairs, and everything. No whiteboards or power outlets for electronics though, wouldn't really fit the fantasy setting.

Once we're all seated, I note that I'm at one end of the table, sharing a chair with Lara so she can continue to snooze against me, while most of the others are at the far side. Only Helios and Ollin sit nearby, Helios to my left, Ollin on the right. I guess the rest are just here to spectate.

“So, Mei,” Ollin starts once we're situated, “about your search for a seer. My apologies, but to my knowledge, we don't have a seer that suits your needs in Lenarlil.”

“Oh, that's...”

He raises a hand before I can say more. “You'll need to search elsewhere for your seer, but you don't have to go alone. I'm sure there will be Guardians willing to join you. I can put up a notice for the quest if you'd like. What sort of rewards would you be offering?”

Rewards?!

“U-umm?” I wave my hands, panicking a little. “I don't really, umm- I'm sorry. I have...” I swipe up my inventory. “I only have seventeen hundred gold...” There's no way that's enough for anything, I saw the number of digits on the prices back at those shops.

Wincing, I apologize again. “I'm sorry, I just got here, I basically only have what I was carrying on my back...” Saying that only makes it worse. “No, not even. All my equipment was destroyed in the battle. You gave me these clothes too.” I finally bow my head. “I'm very sorry, but I don't have anything to offer.”

Besides vendor trash in my inventory from some starter monsters, there's nothing else. At least my arrows returned to my inventory when my quiver was torn apart, but I only have like twenty left anyway.

To my surprise, my apologies are met with... excitement? “Really?” he asks, eyes shining. “Don't worry about it. I'll put up the quest for you, we should have some more news in a little while. It's late and you must be tired after your journey, why don't you go stay at an inn? Helios, could you show her to one?”

“Of course,” the elven man agrees easily.

“Now, unless there's anything else, I'll be seeing you tomorrow, Mei.” Ollin offers a kind smile as he stands, and I nod.

“Yeah, thank you for all the help, Ollin. I'll see you in the morning.” I say that, keeping my thoughts to myself for now. I don't get it. Why is he offering so much help, even though I don't have anything to offer...? I'll figure that out later though, when I'm not so tired, and my mind doesn't feel like it's been through a cheese grater.

As I'm rising, Lara suddenly rouses without warning. All at once, a good chunk of her strength returns and she sits up straighter, in way better shape than before. Like her weakness from a moment ago was just an illusion. She shakes herself, a small chuckle passing through everyone watching, Helios and Ollin included.

“Welcome back to the land of the living, Lara,” Ollin says. “Thanks for everything today. I'll make sure you're properly compensated later, alright?”

Still blinking rapidly and a little off, she looks around the room we're in, scratches her head, then nods at him. She's probably going to deal with things later too. Ollin waves us out of the room.

“So... where are we now? What are we doing?” Lara asks after we make it out of the building.

“Taking Mei to an inn for the night,” Helios explains. “Ollin's putting out word to get her help on her quest to find a seer.”

“Quest? And a seer?” she questions me, so I explain the same thing to her as I told him earlier, how I need to know more about my Curse after that whole disaster earlier. And how Ollin offered to get others together to help me out. “Yeah, that makes a lot of sense,” Lara sighs, “that battle was a nightmare...” We only walk a little further before we reach an inn. It's just down the block from the other building.

“Room for one, overnight,” Helios explains shortly to the stout woman behind the counter, her eyes moving from him to us a few times, clearly suspicious of me. After he passes her the money, she gives him the key and he hands it over. “Alright Mei, I'll be back to pick you up tomorrow at... let's say eight in the morning. Sound good?”

Eight sounds... wait. I squint and try to think. Days here are only twelve real world hours. It's like days pass twice as fast, so twelve noon and twelve midnight out there are both midnight here. That means eight in the morning here is... four in the morning real time? I think so anyway, math is really hard right now. It's about ten pm, so that's still six hours away.

But in here it's... eight pm according to my menu. So twelve hours. But... still only six real hours since the clocks basically run fast. My head is spinning by the time I work through all that. I'm still not too confident in my understanding of time in this world.

Leaving all that aside, I'm supposed to get up at four in the morning to continue with this? Do these people have no lives, to be playing at a time like that?

Wait, that's actually a normal time to sleep, which VR sleep sort of is, so it would kind of make more sense to be here during the off-hours in the real world. Besides, it's the weekend anyway. Doesn't make it much less weird to consider though.

I glance at Lara, and she nods to show that timing should be fine, so I agree.

“Good, I'll see you then. What about you, Lara?” he turns his attention on her.

“I'm going to stick with Mei,” she answers simply.

“Alright then,” his response breezy and unconcerned. He waves a hand and gets going.

Before we head upstairs, we get a table on the first floor to eat. We're quiet for a bit, Lara asking a passing waitress for whatever they're serving right now, and then we wait.

“...So...” she eventually speaks up, but glances over at my stream camera.

I pull it in front of me. “Hey, everyone, I'm going to finish up streaming now, I'll be back later, when it's time to head to... what was that, city hall or something?” Lara confirms my thought and I nod a few times. I glance to the chat, seeing lots of goodbyes and a few staff suggesting to take a break and get some rest. And food. It's always food. I smile, wave, and shut off the stream.

“There, now what-” I'm cut off again when the waitress arrives with two bowls of soup and a big loaf of delicious looking bread. I thank her excitedly. I've actually had decent food again since moving in with Fara, but nothing like this.

I dig in greedily, both eating fast and savoring every last bite. I dip the soft bread into the soup, some kind of unfamiliar meat similar to beef, with a thick, but not quite gravy-like consistency, loaded with chunks of vegetables.

When I'm finished, I lean tiredly on the table with a long, contented moan. My belly is full and I'm getting really sleepy. I guess you need to sleep here too. Lara watches me closely, and settles for eating her own soup quietly.

Once she's done, she jostles me so I don't fall asleep at the table and we head upstairs. “You can sleep in game,” she explains on the stairs. “It'll put you in real sleep and pull you back into VR sleep whenever you set your alarm. You can also choose to log out when you go to sleep. Your character will disappear, then reappear in an unoccupied room when you log in again and it will count you as rested as long as you're gone long enough.”

“Mm, alright.”

“Let's log out, we can get a snack or something,” she suggests. I'm really full already though... “Oh don't worry, your real body still needs food like usual,” she adds when she sees my expression.

It's a bit hard to imagine when I feel like this, but I tell myself she must be right and nod anyway. When we reach the room, she sees me inside, but says she needs to get her own for her character to count as rested. I guess logging out in the street won't help with that, you need to be somewhere you could realistically rest.

“Alright, see you in a minute then.” I shut the door and lie down on the somewhat stiff bed. The mattress doesn't exactly feel like straw, but it's definitely not as soft as a modern one. Not that I really mind, I've been sleeping on the floor this last week anyway. But for Mei, I don't know...

I'm still a little unsure, feeling like Mei deserves something nicer, but give up on it as I swipe my menu open. I'll be disappearing as soon as I log out anyway. Finding the option in the menu, I set it to log me out when I go to sleep, and lie back.

It must help me get to sleep, because even with my mind abuzz with everything that happened today, I find my eyes closing within moments. I really am exhausted...

I slip under, the world fading away to darkness...

Then I surface once more. I don't feel remotely as tired, like I just woke up from a nice nap, as I blink up at the ceiling. Fara's ceiling, I realize. I lift my arms, and the heavy weight reminds me that I'm me again.

Ugh...

Moving to stave off the immediate disgust, I sit up, then stand. Just keep myself occupied without time to hate my existence. I look over at Fara, still asleep in her bed.

I don't want to be any more of a disgusting creep by staring at her until she logs out, so I hurry out of the room.

She said we could get a snack, so I go over to the cabinets in the kitchen and start searching. Just like she said, the feeling of a full belly has completely vanished, like it was all in my imagination. Which I suppose is sort of true with it being a game and all.

I manage to find some chips and a jar of salsa buried in the back of the fridge, so I set them out on the kitchen counter.

Fara comes out of her room as I'm pulling a bowl from one of the cabinets. “Chips and salsa?” she says when she sees them.

“That's fine, right? It's not someone else's, is it? They won't be mad at me for eating it, will they?” Maybe I should just let Fara eat it, I'm not all that hungry anyway. I had dinner today, it's not like I should waste their food money on snacks for myself...

“It's fine, it's fine,” Fara raises her hands to calm me. “It's a good midnight snack. No one's gonna mind, that salsa's been in there so long I'm surprised it hasn't grown legs and walked away.”

“Oh...” I mumble. As long as no one wants it I guess...

Fara grabs the jar, triple checks it for mold, then dumps it in the bowl and pulls us both over to the couch and clicks the tv on to some random show in another language for background noise.

She plunks me down on the couch, bowl and chips in my lap, and sits up on the back, directly behind me so she can snag the food from over my shoulder.

It's a weird position, with her legs spread off to either side of me so I can't even really look back at her without twisting around awkwardly. But I don't question her. She always has her own reasons for things, I'm just too stupid to understand.

She munches on the food briefly, and I scoop up some too. I'm not sure if I should be comfortable or uncomfortable right now.

“So, a lot happened today...” Fara finally begins after a few chips. “How are you feeling?”

“I'm not sure. Not that great. Just, you know, because.”

“Mm, because why though?” she asks, leaning her chin down on top of my head and resting her arms along the back of my shoulders. That makes me more uncomfortable. Not Fara, just that feeling the touch reminds me about myself existing.

“Being me,” I sigh down at the bowl. The salsa inside doesn't look appealing anymore. “Being Mei is just better because she isn't me. She can do things and talk to people and accomplish stuff on her own. Sure, she isn't perfect, but no one is. But she's a whole hell of a lot better than me.”

“Ray, I'm sorry, I don't understand.” Fara sounds troubled. Of course she is, she has to deal with more of my shit. “Mei is just you playing a character, isn't it? It's still you inside, so how could she be different than you?”

“I don't know,” I respond, frowning even more. “She just is.”

“Hmm... It is still you in there, right? Not other-you? You didn't act anything like when you're dissociating at least. Well, except for that bit with the boss's head. That was a bit... yeah...”

I shrug. “I'm pretty sure it's all me," I answer. "Or Mei, I'm... not exactly clear on the difference now...” I admit reluctantly. Why is Mei so much better than me even though it's me being her?

I fucked up a few times because I'm useless, but I succeeded at being her almost the entire time I was in there. Even during that battle when Xanaad totally mind-fucked me, I only slipped for a moment. And Mei pulled herself right back because she's strong enough not to hide from the pain.

But like Fara just said, it's me being Mei. So how...

“I'm sorry, I don't understand.” My hands are starting to shake. “I don't know what the difference is, but it's different.” I swallow hard.

“It's fine, perfectly fine...” Fara speaks soothingly, rubbing my shoulders before she goes for another chip.

I wait anxiously for her to finish munching on it, my own stomach in knots at this point. I want to stop thinking about this. I don't want to ruin it. Even if it's me being Mei, there has to be a difference, or it would just be me. But it can't be, because then there would be no Mei. Just me. I wouldn't get to not be me anymore.

I can feel myself sliding closer to the edge. This is getting too overwhelming. “Can- can we stop, please? I'm sorry. I'm sorry, Fara. I don't want to think about this anymore.”

“That's fine, Ray, we can stop if you want. Is it alright if I talk to Mei about it later?”

“Sure.” She'd be better. More useful for this. She's smarter than I am and would be way more help figuring things out.

Fara doesn't press me any further. She changes the channel to some sitcom. Not the kind of thing either of us would normally watch, but we just sit there and laugh along with it. When it ends, the late-night news comes on. Mostly it's stuff going wrong around the world, but that's just how the news is. I roll my eyes; everything needs to be a disaster.