Gerald: “Listen all, change of plans! We must head to the left flank! From there we shall continue with our original maneuvers! Sprite’s party, do you also hear?”

Sprite: “Yes ser Gerald, loud and clear! I shall transmit your message to my companions!”

Gerald: “Very good, for now you shall support our allied scout division as they push the farthest into Coldpass…and everyone else who’s a Nomad of the Griffin will follow the Guild Master’s lead! Hear and understand?!

…

Over the distance I hear a loud “YES SER!”, which is not a sound effect or the rumble of NPC voiced dialogue, but it’s clearly from a group of Players slightly muffling over each other as they all simultaneously responded in voice chat. I’m guessing it’s from the Nomad Griffin who we just parted away from.

Divine Mortality has an easy to-use and convenient communication system that works fairly well almost always, but sometimes it can get a little wonky because there are simply too many Players talking to each other at once in one area. Our new (temporary) member to our little group is a Himenian girl who is considered to be part of the “Priestess” class since she uses mending magic. We chose to invite her and assist us with our party’s gameplay because she’s easy to get along with, and she especially has a fond relationship with May already. We’re all still relatively new to the game, but we try to treat it at least a little seriously because we don’t want to screw up and die at this Invasion Quest event that’s supposedly very rewarding to participate in and complete because it’s VERY difficult to progress through on your own.

Anyways, right now it seems that Sprite is talking to her guild in Direct Voice Chat, which is basically in-game voice chat that is instant communication. So, unlike Area Voice Chat, you don’t need to be near someone to hear them nor are there any sound effects which can interrupt a message you’d hear directly in the Overworld. I’ve used Direct Voice Chat before sometimes when talking to Krafty or May or Wise whenever we’re far away from each other and are planning to meet up. It’s basically the same thing as most voice communicative social medias or what not. But for our playstyle, and seemingly for many other Players as well, it’s preferable to simply send text messages as you usually would in an MMORPG whenever you’re far away from one another. And mostly use the in-games Area Voice Chat feature when, obviously, near someone because it adds a very nice layer of immersion to the whole experience of this game. Especially when most people who interact with each other are practically strangers. I’d guess half the Player base in our server communicates the way I do, while the other half is reasonably uninterested in adding an extra flare of immersion. Those people are often more likely to be the types of people aren’t ever interested in the “immersive nature” of the game, whether it’s the lore or community. However, it’s not like it matters. At the most radical end of this, I guess spectrum, would be the loud and obnoxious teenagers saying stupid stuff as most teenagers on the internet do. And on the other end of the spectrum, it is the obnoxious “you need to roleplay” and “you can’t talk about the meta!” types of people. I’m probably closest to this half of person, but I’m definitely aware and sane enough not to be so closed-minded and embarrassing like they are! Ugh, don’t get me started on the concept of “roleplaying”. At the end of the day, it’s just one way of having fun, and treating it too seriously without remorse is just calling for regretful memories in the future…I already have enough of those!

Oh right, I already forgot why I started thinking about this. I guess this topic reminds me that Sprite is certainly a roleplayer, who thankfully is like most other roleplayers in this game that understand the concept of balance. So, they aren’t unreasonable or unbearable individuals. And I imagine that if I wasn’t someone who cares about the immersive aspects of this game, someone like May, then I would still be happy to tag along with a roleplayer like Sprite. The way she sounds while talking is simply fun and charming because of the effort they put into upholding their character. At the very least, players like her are interesting because they add flavor to the game’s community, and most of the time it’s not annoying at all because you as a Player are already surrounded by many complex NPC characters that organically inhabit this game world.

Sprite: “It seems like we must change our side route completely!”

WiseMaster667: “So we should strike from the left flank up this valley?”

Sprite: “Aye aye!”

Krafty and May: “Aw come on!”

MC: “The event has only just started, why so suddenly?”

WiseMaster667: “Indeed, this is very inconvenient for our plan. As we’ll take the time to cross to the other side of the valley, everyone else will meanwhile charge ahead.”

Sprite: “Indeed I understand your concerns, but there is good reason for changing our positions. According to my friend ApplePie, “other guilds and our guild have just realized that the inner parts of Coldpass are blocked by a wall””

Krafty: “How do you know that? I don’t see any walls ahead.”

MC: “We can only see the hills in front of us and the mountains are pretty steep so we can’t really see what’s up farther ahead in Coldpass.”

Sprite: “Precisely the case! And the reason why we know that there’s a wall up ahead that blocks everyone from going farther into Coldpass is because our mages constructed earth-towers which they climbed and were able to see the wooden palisade protecting the capital settlement!”

May: “Ahhh, so that’s what those mud piles stretching into the sky are…I was wondering what the heck was going on”

Krafty: “That’s a spell you can cast?!?”

WiseMaster667: “Indeed it is, you channel the spell until reaching a certain height in the air. You can’t move it around, but it allows the user to regenerate a little bit of their mana and basically hide from enemies below. But I didn’t think it could be used this way, interesting!”

Sprite: “Correct and correct! But we must hurry friends if you still wish to carry on with our plan! My guild is already transferring over as you can see.”

Krafty: “But why do we even need to switch flanks? Wouldn’t the wall still be in the way?”

Sprite: “Yes the wall still covers the whole corridor, but the reason why we must switch is simple. There are unexpectedly two other powerful guilds on this right flank which are in our way, and they are already vying for control over on this side as we speak. One of them is called “The Hearth” and the other is the “Knights of the Rising Phoenix”.

WiseMaster667: “I see. Yes, our plan certainly wouldn’t work if you factor in two other large guilds. It seems like everyone is competing.

Sprite: “Oh, and Ser Gerald wants me to tell you all something.”

May: “What is it sweety???”

Sprite: “He says… “May ‘The Hearth’ OBLITERATE and CONSUME those vile fiends that call themselves the Knights of the Rising Phoenix” … tee-hee! Ser Gerald always talks in such a bold and honorable way-style!”

…

(Krafty: “Should I even ask why this has gotten so scary all the sudden?”)

(May: “All you need to know is that little Sprite’s guild has bad relations with the Rising Phoenix dudes. So, Nomad Griffins = good and Rising Phoenix = Bad”)

(Krafty: “Gotchya…”)

MC: “Okay then, everyone let’s go!”

As I’m running across a player-packed and elevated terrain, I wonder how this event must look like from above. In an aerial point of view, everyone here must look like a big mass of dots consisting of Players and NPCs all charging forward up this valley corridor. We are like many individual units in a strategy video game which can all be selected and ordered to go anywhere on the map by the commander.

While every other guild or group-party is moving forwards, my 6-character group-party and the Nomads of the Griffin are busy switching positions from the right flank, and all the way to the left flank. So far, I haven’t seen any enemies, nor do I exactly know how they look like, but right now I do see and hear signs of battle up ahead which we are currently avoiding as we pass through the back lines.

We’ve finally caught up to the Nomad Griffins who have immediately jumped into the fight. It seems like this front is a little quieter compared to the right flank or the middle front. But there are still many small party-groups like mine and less ally NPCs nearby.

Our side consists of, us, the Players or “Divine Spirits” and NPC characters from Orchard Hills. Specifically, the retinue of Duke Alan and his vassals. Duke Alan himself is the one who had commenced this event. I wonder if he wasn’t here in this valley, could this event have started without him giving the “go” signal? It’s interesting to see how an NPC character (who can actually die) in this semi-sandbox world is able to be used by this game’s server as a way to introduce and launce this activity? I imagine that this event was triggered by some sort of script behind the scenes.

Anyways, I still can’t believe how many Players are here all at once, and the game isn’t even lagging that much! At least not for me. If I had to count everyone I saw before this event started, then it would’ve taken me 30 minutes to do it. I’ll just guess that there are… at least 500 Players here! But if there are so many Players, it wouldn’t make sense if there were only 500 enemy mobs to compete against? Depending on whether ‘Coldpass’ is populated by monsters or humanoid enemy characters makes a difference since humanoid characters are generally dangerous to fight, as if you’d be fighting another Player. Either way, the frontline I see in front of me where people are currently fighting at is very wide. It’s taken us almost 5 minutes to cross from the right side to the left side. So, I can only assume that there are at least twice as many enemies up ahead as there are Players.

Sprite: “We’ve finally arrived!”

Krafty: “All this running is making me tired even in real life…”

WiseMaster667: “We are delayed! Let’s quickly join Sprite’s guild and get up ahead of everyone else now”

May: “Say no more, c’mere ye little sh*ts!”

MC: “By ‘little’, are you referring to that colossal thing up ahead?”

May: “Oh my god I haven’t seen something fatter than Krafty and taller than two Krafty’s…”

Krafty: “Haha, very funny, I’m a measuring tool now, aren’t I?

Sprite: “Do not worry friend, tis good to be of use!”

As soon as Sprite said that, May had already leapt forward into battle and all I could hear after quickly loosing sight of her in the chaos is a deafening “OOOOOH!” from the distance.

MC: “I think May has already influenced Sprite”

Sprite: “What could you mean noble Dwelf? Was what I said strange?”

Krafty: “Lady! It wasn’t very strange but just don’t hang around May anymore. She’s a bad influence!”

MC: “Yeah, it wasn’t strange…but I forgot that you aren’t used to our group dynamic haha.”

WiseMaster667: “Funny indeed, but everyone should be killing the enemy mobs like May is or taking the time to cast spells like I am instead of worrying about Krafty’s wound!”

Sprite: “I don’t quite understand, but Yes Ser!”

MC and Krafty: “Uhh, ‘Yes Ser’!”

WiseMaster667 is casting one of his regular spells, a conjuration spell which summon a pack of 3 wolves made out of Divine energy. Casting spells takes some time to cause an effect, if the caster moves then that will likely interrupt their spell. If a spell is interrupted, it might simply not work or sometimes even backfire and cause a negative reaction. It all depends on the caster and the type of spell.

In the “Conjuration” style of (Heavy) magic, there are different types of conjurations that might not actually be all that similar to one another. The game and the inhabitants of the Overworld simply use terms like “Conjuration” as “styles” simply as an umbrella term. I thought that WiseMaster667 was going to be a full a conjurer who summons both minions and magical weapons. But it seems like he prefers to play mostly as a commander who orders his minions around while sometimes shooting off support spells. Right now, he’ll likely carefully send his 3 Wolf minions to attack a certain enemy character, likely from an unexpected direction to further confuse and deal more damage to them.

Wise did order me and Krafty and Sprite not to just stand around chatting in the back, but I can’t help and still observe the scene that’s playing out in front of me right now. I should have known this beforehand, but I guess it’s sometimes alright to be an ignorant adventure, the enemies we are fighting are indeed humanoids. In fact, they aren’t what I expected. I expected to fight some sort of demonic looking creatures, but instead I find myself seeing many SnowMel and pale-skinned Lumenians fighting on the side of our enemy, Coldpass. And they don’t look like simple Marauders either. While the enemy isn’t as well dressed in uniform like how the Duke’s men are, they still appear to me like a irregular military with some form of chain of command. Those in command must obviously be the other type of enemy I’m seeing, ogres. Ferocious and tall and powerfully fat humanoids who are awfully well armored and seem to be the “officer” class of the enemies. They are mostly standing behind the SnowMel and Lumenians but they aren’t afraid of charging into our team. This is still far from an organized fantasty-medieval “battle simulator”, but I can’t express how epic this looks in real time. I can’t wait to see videos of this posted online by some of the Players who are attending, maybe I could even spot myself in it! But in order for that to become a reality, I need to also get in and fight!