College Boy Signs Up For Class

There was a pregnant pause. It was almost like Margaret was at a loss for words, which I didn’t know was possible.

“Pardon?” Her voice was tight, trying not to betray her panic.

“This is a game, right?” I said. “So that means I can beat it.”

It made too much sense. I knew it was true the moment I said it, and so did she.

“Games don’t have victory conditions,” Margaret said. “Take Earth. That was a sandbox, full of nothing but exploration. That didn’t have a final boss.”

“And what about this world?”

Another pause.

“You may have to consult the lore pages that come with your phone. I gotta say, they’re pretty dense and complicated, so be sure to read each page very carefully to see if—”

I pulled the phone away and yelled at Gina, “Is there a final boss?”

“The Demon King,” she yelled back without moving from under her tree.

A grin spread across my face as I returned to my call.

“The Demon King!”

Margaret drew in a slow breath through her nose.

“Okay yeah. There is. There is a final boss. But wouldn’t you rather explore the rest of the world? There’s so much to see, so much to do…”

“No. I want to kill the Demon King. That’s my ticket outta here,” I said.

“Oh, for the love of—” Margaret pressed her mouth closer to the receiver and brought her voice to a harsh whisper.

“Look, I’m not supposed to tell you this, but Quest of Heroes got rushed in development. The devs were too caught up in the world-building and making a complex magic system that they forgot to make an actually good game. So this world is full of minute details and lore tidbits and mini-games and whatever. In other words, total bullshit. 

“Progression is very difficult, and that’s on purpose. That way you don’t beat the game too quickly. There are tons of simple pleasures around. That’s also on purpose, to distract you from the rest of the game. The Demon King is the final boss, but it doesn’t take that much effort to kill him. If you do, yes, you win the game and the game is over. That means you’ll still have years left on your contract, which in theory means you’ll have another choice for a life service plan.”

All the pacing back and forth was doing practically burned a line of grass away.

“Does that mean I can go back to Earth?” I asked. 

Margaret made a bunch of high-pitched noncommittal noises that are hard to describe.

“Welllll… I don’t know. Genuinely, I don’t know. You may have to appeal to higher management that this is a special case, cuz we normally don’t let people back into permadeath games, buuuuuuut…”

“You’re saying there’s a chance.”

“I’m saying there is technically a chance.”

I never played American football, but I did what could only described as a touchdown victory dance. Pure happiness in my veins. I was jumping and twisting and turning, I don’t even know what I was doing. Neither did Gina, evident from the look of horror on her face. 

But I heard Margaret’s voice pipe up on the call.

“Whoa there, don’t do a touchdown victory dance just yet,” she said. “Because you’re on a time limit.”

That girl knew how to kill the mood instantly.

“What do you mean?”

“Remember, your brother is living on borrowed time. Another Reaper is about to be sent, assuming they haven’t been sent already.”

I chewed on my lip. “So how long do you think he’s got?”

“I dunno. We always say that an unscheduled Reaper dispatch takes three to five business days, but that usually means a week. Two weeks if we’re slow. But with how long it takes for higher ups to sign off on anything, there’s no way it’s happening sooner than a week.”

“So I have to kill the Demon King in a week?” 

“Six days actually. You’ve already spent a day in there.”

My breath caught in my throat just thinking about it. How did my life change so much? I didn’t even know what a goblin was little more than a day ago. And now I have six days to kill a demonic king with a loved one’s life on the line. 

“Okay, so how do I go and do that?” I asked.

“I get that I’m customer service, but that doesn’t mean I’m omniscient,” Margaret said. “You’re the one who should know the best gameplay strategies, not me. I’m just working an office job.”

“But I suck at video-games. I’ve never really played them before.”

“Oh. Then why did you choose Quest of Heroes?”

“I DIDN’T CHOSE THIS, YOU DID!”

But my words never reached her. The only thing I got in response was the dial tone. Standing there in the field, clenching my phone with a burning face, I realized Margaret pissed me off on purpose so she could get out of the call. She was probably cackling at her littler prank back in Hell. Where she belongs.

Gina watched me with an arched eyebrow as I stomped over to the tree’s shade.

“Well?” she asked.

“I have to kill the Demon King in six days.”

She nodded. “Sounds tough.” She stood up, dusted herself off, and strode to the guild hall.

“Whoa, whoa, whoa!” She paused and looked back at me in annoyance. “Where are you going?”

“Back to the guild hall?” She pointed back to the carved stone building. “You need a class. That was the whole point of us going.”

“Didn’t you just hear me? I said I have to—”

“Kill the Demon King in six days, yes.” Gina rolled her eyes. “So let’s stop wasting time. If you want to do that, you need a class before starting your journey.” She continued marching on, leaving me to catch up.

How was she handling this news better than I was?

Upon reentering the guild hall, I felt like the biggest moron in the world. Right in the center of the building, like the ticker at an old airport, was a floating bulletin board. It’s edges glowed golden as it displayed what looked to be bounty posters. But instead of people, the illustrations on these posters depicted places or monsters. Some posters described small tasks, like guarding a flock of sheep. Others were bigger, like laying siege to a goblin tribe. But at the very top of the board was not a poster, but a banner. A long, sprawling black scroll with four words glowing like hot coals.

DEFEAT THE DEMON KING

“How did I not notice that before?” I asked.

“You were too busy staining my shorts with your tears.” 

“Screw you. So what is this thing anyway?”

“The quest board.” Gina walked me through the throngs of people as she explained. “The main purpose of the guild hall is to hand out quests to adventurers. The more quests you complete, the more levels you unlock, the more loot you get, and the more powerful you become.”

“Some of them look awfully challenging for beginners.”

“That’s because those ones aren’t for beginners. The beginners choose the quests way at the bottom of the quest board, over there. But we like to show them all the possible quests so they get a feel for what this world has to offer.”

At the very end of the guild hall were standing tables with forms and brochures along their sides. I could still hear the rabble of the main tables behind me, but over here it was all but vacant. The bright sun shining through the windows, arcing down towards the horizon, almost made this area look peaceful. 

Gina thumbed through the stack of forms and pulled one out, handing it to me. It said “Class Selection” at the top. The rest of the page was filled with empty circles next to the names of all possible classes. It was like a single multiple-choice question, with an emphasis on multiple.

“Once I choose a class,” I said, “then what?”

“That’s it,” Gina said. She picked up a nearby feather and small, dark pot, dipped the pointed end into the pot, then offered the feather to me.

I plucked it from her hands. “That’s it? I was expecting something more… I dunno. Significant.”

Her eyes narrowed. “This is the most significant decision an adventurer makes. This more than anything else shapes the journey they embark on, the quests they take on. Keep in mind Daisuke, this choice is permanent. And this could be the decision that saves Chouji’s life.”

Her very helpful reminders made my palms sweat. But she was right. That was exactly what was on the line. And I couldn’t delay any more. The sun would start setting soon, and the quicker we got out of the beginner area, the better.

The inked feather passed over every blank circle as a vague recollection of the description echoed in my head. Thief… monk… fighter… I was surprised by just how much I retained from Gina’s incoherent ramblings. It was barely anything, but I was expecting to draw blanks. But knowing just how dire the situation was, there was only one class I could choose. My eyes scanned the list one more time, found the class, and filled in the correct answer.