Luribel, the Safe Haven – Part 1

We were out of the woods—literally, but not figuratively.

“We should hurry. Those Dire Wolves’ll be busy fightin’ each other for now, but after the infection regains control, we’re dog food.” I’d rather not bitten any more than I already have, thanks. “Speakin’ of, back there. What did ya do?”

“Oh, right. Well, I reset them.”

“What do ya mean?”

Well, of course she doesn’t know what that means.

But then she added, “Ya mean it works like Restoration Magic?”

Hearing that term, my mind was cast back to what purpose this “reset” feature on the Debuggun was mean to test.

“Yes, that’s it. It’s basically Restoration Magic. Except without a mana cost.”

From its humble origins to check mobs’ stats, the Debuggun began being used to test some more wacky types of magic skills. One of those was <Restoration>, which brought both mobs and objects back to their spawn state, curing status ailments, fixing damaged clothes or buildings, etc. However, <Restoration> was an advanced skill reserved for the Cleric class, and it consumed a stupid amount of mana.

“Really now.” I couldn’t see Yzara’s face, so I couldn’t tell if she was impressed or just thinking through the consequences.

The follow-up to her comment quickly evaporated from my mind. Each step I took sent searing pain up my leg, screaming I shouldn’t even be walking.

“Yer startin’ to slow down, Takashi. Do ya’ve a death wish?”

“Can you blame me? My leg is barely working. It’s hard to even walk, especially with you on my back.”

Suddenly, a punch hit my head, but it was so weak it didn’t even qualify as “hurting”.

“Oh, guess a fly landed on my head. Surely that wasn’t a pathetically weak punch from the Demon Queen.”

“Shut it. I’m way too weak to muster the strength. What matters is the intention. And tellin’ a maiden she’s heavy is a cardinal sin that shan’t go unpunished.”

“As if you care about sinning. But yeah, I could use a place to rest.”

“Gonna be hard findin’ that out here. As long as yer in its territory, ya ain’t safe.”

“Wait, what do you mean?”

“For some reason, I can’t get infected. But literally everything else in this world can, ya included.”

“Infection” was a status condition just as nasty as curses, but rooted in a physical source instead of a magical one.

But why can’t Yzara get infected while everything else can…?

Oh, I know! It’s her level!

“Yer quite silent,” Yzara said. “Figured somethin’ out?”

“Well… I think your level is too high to be infected.”

“My… level? What are ya talkin’ ‘bout?”

Right. She wouldn’t know about levels.

NPCs in Arcforge were not aware of levels; in fact, it was a “forbidden topic” the AI refused to talk about. However, now that Arcforge became “real”, those limitations were probably no longer valid.

But should I bring that up in the first place?

Telling Yzara she was just code written by humans in another world might send her into a fit of rage, so I chose to avoid the topic for now.

“Well, basically, it means you’re too powerful for it to infect you.”

Yzara was, by far, the highest-level NPC in Arcforge; in fact, her level was above the level cap imposed to players, level 100. And an important aspect of the Infection status condition was that only mobs lower than the level of the source of the infection could be infected in the first place.

So does this mean the source of this glitch is a mob?

“Eh. Flattery won’t get ya anywhere, ya know. Whatever the case, ya won’t be able to find anywhere safe here. Half the world has been taken over, and we’re smack-dab in the middle of it.” Well, isn’t that a problem.“The only safe places in the Wasteland are the Polis leftover by the Heroes. But we’re quite far from any. We’d never make it to one alive.”

Wait… that’s it!

“Can you tell me where we are, exactly?”

It ashamed me to admit that the area was so unrecognizable that I couldn’t figure out where in the map we were.

“The Grenton Woods.”

Damn. We really are in the middle of nowhere. I think that’s in the southwest of the map.

Recalling the layout, and judging by the Sun’s position, we had come out somewhere to the East. I was pretty sure there was a small village nearby. These existed even in the frontier, serving as pit stops for players trying to expand into the wild frontier dominated by the Demon Horde controlled by Yzara.

“There’s a village called Luribel nearby. Let’s go there. Might as well and do this where we can at least have some shelter.”

“And what are ya planning on doing, Hero?”

A rather nasty smile sprouted on my face.

“If we can’t get to a Polis, how about bringing one to us?” I said with a smirk.

“Are ya right in the head?”

“I’m completely fine, I assure you. I’ll found a Polis right here.”

* * *

Heroes—that is, players—could found their own settlements in the wild area outside the jurisdiction of countries and kingdoms. These were called Polis, and worked sort of like city-states; they also created a safe zone where monsters could not enter.

I wanted to reach down to the Hero’s Bag on my belt, but with Yzara on my back, I just couldn’t do it without letting go of her leg.

“Nghh… I can’t reach…”

“Woah, careful there. Yer gonna make me fall. Ya want your Hero’s Bag? I’ll get it.”

Wait, don’t—

Before I could stop her, I felt Yzara letting go of her arm around my neck and reach down where I couldn’t. Her shifting on my back reminded me of her softness, but I had to ignore her for the sake of my sanity.

“Fine. Look for a long and black, spiky crystal.”

“Hold on.”

After rummaging through the bag, Yzara pulled out the item I was looking for.

“A Foundation Crystal, eh? Guess that would do it.”

To found a Polis, you needed this special item. Because we wanted beta players to help us debug potential issues with the Polis, we gave them a freebie—every beta tester started with a Foundation Crystal in their Hero’s Bag. That included the freshly-spawned developers, too.

“It’s a bit of a waste to found a settlement here in the middle of nowhere, but that’s way better than getting mauled by the wolves.”

Yzara returned the Foundation Crystal to the bag, and it to my belt.

“So what’s yer story, Takashi? Yer not just any Hero. Ya know way more than yer letting’ on.”

My stomach tightened. Is she onto me somehow?

But while I was trying to come up with a good excuse, she added, “Though I guess a Hero appearin’ in this world after a hundred years is significant in and of itself.”

She said it so casually, I could barely believe what she said.

“Wait, what do you mean?”

“I mean what I said. Every Hero suddenly vanished a hundred years ago. Poof. Gone.”

“A h-hundred years?! You can lie better than that.”

The Arcforge beta had closed down eight years prior, and the servers had most certainly closed down.

But she’s saying a hundred years passed here?!

“I’m not lyin’, though. I can’t forget how joyful I was that day,” Yzara added. “The world was in chaos for a while, and I thought I could finally make my move to conquer the entire globe… but then the White Death showed up. So what happened to ya? Yer quite well-preserved for a hundred-year-old human.”

“In my world, only about eight years have passed,” I said. “Let’s just say… Heroes could no longer exist in this world. Until now, apparently. I got summoned back here by the White Death.”

“Eh. That sucks for ya, gettin’ pulled into this broken world,” Yzara said, giggling a bit. “If that’s the case, then where did ya get yer gun? No other Hero had it before”

“Guess I am just that special.”

Yzara just sneered. “As if I believe that, Hero.”

There was obviously no way I could outright tell her that the Debuggun was just an item given to developers of Arcforge when they spawned in.

“For real now. It was an item I obtained before, and I guess it just stuck around in my Hero’s Bag.”

“You… were here before, eh?” I could almost hear the gears in her mind turning. Uh-oh, have I said too much? “Guess that explains why ya know so much.”

Before she had a chance to pry any further, I decided to ask her my own question.

“So what happened? All Heroes vanished, the White Death showed up, and decided to attack your Horde?”

“Pretty much. Those early days, the Wastelands spread rapidly, and before I knew it, I was cornered in my castle. We had a grand last stand right there, but… well, pains me to admit, but I lost. All I could do was use the last of my power to seal the source of the infection right there.”

“You… sealed it?”

“As much as I could, at least. That slowed down the spread of the turning to only half the world. Its control is still slippin’ out, though. I’ve been on the run since then, and slowly it has managed to weaken me and steal all my skills, one by one. Eventually it managed to seal my Dark Ruler class, but since I used it to seal the infection source, as long as I’m alive, it can’t escape.”

“So basically the only thing keeping this world in check is your existence?”

“Pretty much, yeah.”

Well, isn’t that a terrible situation.

“And this source you mentioned? What exactly was it?”

“Well, I… I don’t know.”

“You… don’t? But didn’t you seal it?”

“I did, but that thing was surrounded by a ton of that black mist. I couldn’t see its true form.”

A mysterious “infection source”—that is, a glitch that managed to conquer half the world and that the NPCs could not explain. Then, the Demon Queen was blamed for its spread, and has been the target of its wrath for over one hundred years.

What am I supposed to do with her now? Should I trust her story?

At least I knew this “White Death” and the Demon Queen were at odds, which gave her a tiny bit of credibility, at least.

“By the way,” I said after a little while walking in silence, “this has been bothering me for a while now, but how do you know what a gun is?”

“Even the Demon Queen would know about guns, ya doofus.”

“That’s not what I mean. Guns didn’t exist in Iditath a hundred years ago, right?”

“Oh, that. Humans invented them.”

Wait, what?

Arcforge didn’t have any guns at all. It was a purposeful design decision to keep the world purely sword and sorcery.

But now this NPC is saying that they invented guns on their own?

“Now that ya mentioned it, how do you know about guns, Takashi?”

“I mean, we have them in my world, too. Obviously.”

How could this be? NPCs weren’t set up to “invent” things. Their AIs were advanced, yes, but they just followed their predetermined script.

This realization filled me with a strange sense of excitement, like seeing your kid say their first word.

Man, they are inventing things now?! Just how much has this world progressed since we abandoned it?

It felt like the world itself flipping the bird at all the execs who cashed out of Arcforge. They weren’t just abandoned and forgotten—they thrived on their own in ways we just never thought possible.

I can’t wait to see what else they came up with next…!

That thought alone was enough for me to push through the pain of my mangled leg.