The Game

[griffon8]

Oh damn, I just realized. This friend 'Ken' is going to be Kenji in the MMO.

[Silentcook]

Writing KS as an MMO has got to be one of the strangest.

Maybe not quite as strange as you might think. >:3

[nevrop68]

The idea seemed strange to me at first but I am really liking this fanfic. Keep up the good work!

[Mirage_GSM]

Chapter 4
After ten minutes of surprisingly entertaining puzzle solving the lesson is over and Shiina and Shizune come over to my desk.

<Hi Hicchan! Would you like to come to the caféteria with us for lunch? We can show you around the school afterwards.>

I also rise from my desk. <Sure. I’m quite hungry by now.>

That sounded a bit lame. I need to get a hang of this IC thing… I notice the classroom is rapidly emptying now, except for the girl called Suzu who is still apparently sleeping at her desk.

<What about her? Isn’t she going to have lunch?>   Shiina’s character shakes with laughter. <WAHAHAHA! That’s Suzu. Don’t worry, she’s only sleeping. She has narcolepsy.>

I am just about to ask Shiina why she is still emoting all those strange gestures, when she follows this up with. <And IRL she has a small baby, so she is AFK often.>

Shizune interrupts with some more gestures, but again it is Shiina speaking. <Come on, or all the good stuff in the caféteria will be sold out.>

I follow the two of them to the cafeteria. Talking to the guy at the food counter opens up a selection of several foods. Only two or three of them are in the range I can afford with the few Yen that seem to be my starting money in this game. Others… I scroll down. The prices for some of those dishes are tens of thousands of Yen. What the…

<The food is really expensive here, isn’t it Shiina?>

Another laugh. <WAHAHAHA! Yes, Hicchan, it sure is, but when your allowance rises you’ll eventually be able to afford stuff like that.> <Your allowance depends on your experience level.> <Oh, and please call me Misha. Everybody does.>

I select one of the dishes at random and we walk to an unoccupied table. The room is filled with dozens of other players chatting about various topics, but I try to ignore them for now and focus on Mishas words.

While we eat, I decide to ask the question I wanted to ask this whole time. <So, Shi… Misha, why doesn’t Shizune ever say anything?> <Is her keyboard broken?>

I somehow expect another laugh, but maybe she forgot to emote it this time. <No, Hicchan. Shicchan cannot talk. She is deaf and can only use sign-language.>

<So how do you understand her?>

<I learned sign-language of course.>

This is followed by a longer pause again, probably while Misha is typing.

<It is a skill you can learn by expending XP. The higher the skill the better you understand it, and when it is really high, you can choose to have it translated automatically. Since I always hang out with Shicchan, I tried to max it out as soon as possible. Manually translating everything can be a pain. I’m almost done now, but most of my other skills suck because of that.>

I try to wrap my mind about what Misha is telling me. <So every char… everyone here has a disability of some sort?>

<WHAHA! Of course Hicchan, that is the whole point of this school.> <i.e. game>

<So if you don’t mind me asking, what kind of disability do you have?>

<Oh, that’s so very forward of you, Hicchan. Asking this of a lady on your first date!>

Date? I don’t even know if she’s a girl or a guy in real life!

<But if you have to know, I suffer from a very serious case of Unguis Fragilis. I’m told it is incurable. It’s very sad, really…>   I’m momentarily taken aback. <Does that mean you’re going to… die?

Again the laughter. It’s starting to get on my nerves a bit. <WAHAHAHA! No, I’m not going to die. Unguis Fragilis means that I have brittle fingernails.>

And while I try to make sense of that statement. <It was probably an easter egg by one of the game’s programmers. They removed it with the last patch, but those who already had a character were allowed to keep them.>

<So, have you thought about joining any clubs yet?> The flurry of gestures coming from Shizune immediately before this question leads me to believe it was her who asked it.

<No. Actually, I don’t even know what kinds of clubs there are – or what a club even is for that matter.>

Shizune continues gesticulating, while Misha translates. <Clubs are the activities you do after classes are over. You are assigned a class you have to attend, but you are free to attend any clubs you want to. In this school there are no limits to the number of clubs you can join.>

In the pause where Shizune is typing her next sentence Misha interrupts. <That’s because having to visit the same club all the time would get old very fast in a computer game.>

<There are all kinds of clubs: Track and Field, Literature, Swimming, Cycling, Chess and many others. You can also petition for the creation of new clubs.>

<If enough people support the petition, the new club might be added with the next patch.>

I think that was the first bit of communication I got directly from Shizune. Seems the whole deafmute thing doesn’t apply to OOC communication in tells.

<So, what club are you two in?>

I think it is Shizune who answers. I am slowly getting the hang of recognizing the timing between her gestures and the text appearing on screen. <Misha and I are on the student council. We organize events, act as a go-between between the students and the faculty and help a bit enforcing the schools rules.>

<I.e. we relay requests from students to the admins and are allowed to deduct a few XP for OOC behavior.>

I can see how this could cause the student council to be less than well-loved by everyone… <But I’m completely new around here. Would they give such rights to someone who has only just arrived?>

<Oh, don’t worry about that, if we vouch for you the faculty won’t have any objections.>

<Shicchan’s big brother is one of the admins.> Misha gives credibility to this preposterous statement.

Yes… Sounds like a gross abuse of authority to me. I don’t know if I want to be part of that. While I try to think of a plausible way of turning them down, a bell is ringing.

<Oh, seems like lunchtime is over already, Hicchan, we have to go back. The afternoon lesson is history. Just think about joining the student council for now, okay?>

So, I’ve literally been saved by the bell. Relieved I follow the two of them back to our classroom.

[Demoneq]

Interesting.

Aside from the story, I like the idea of punishments for breaking role-playing policies being in place, people doing that can sometimes be a pain on WoW servers.

[Zombiedude101]

I can forsee Kenji trolling people already.

[The O.H.L.]

This is such a strange concept.
I like strange.

[Hoitash]

This is such a strange concept.
I like strange.

Ditto.