My thoughts come back to me as I hear giggling from above me, blinking a few times. I slowly sit up, still in the cart. I shake my head, looking over to Anduda as she's wearing a giant, stupid looking grin.
"That is fun to do." She says.
"Yes, now its your turn!" I reach up at her horns making her pull back in fear. "Just kidding."
"Asshole!" She says. That's what you get.
I sigh. "I guess I should thank you for calming me down though."
"No problem." She shrugs.
If that didn't make me go basically unconscious, I would be more okay with it...
"You ready to head inside?"
"Huh?" I ask. Did we really make it all the way back?
"Man, you must really get lost when someone rubs your horns. We are back at the guild hall." Leo says, hopping down off the cart.
"Jesus... I am going to get you back for that..." I turn to Anduda.
"I'd like to see you try." She says smugly. You do realize I am still hundreds of levels higher than you, right?
I shake my head, making my way out of the cart. She follows behind me, hopping down and almost falling over in the process. I smile as she looks up to me.
"Not a word." She says.
"I wasn't going to say anything." I shrug. Hell, I can still barely walk, I just find it cute.
We walk through the lobby area, a few people stifle laughter from around us. We continue up the stairs as I let out a sigh. I am going to figure out how the crafting system works now so that Anduda can have something that will protect her... We walk into the office, Anduda flops over onto the bed that was laid out for the extra people.
"Can we not do something so stressful next time?" She asks.
"It leveled you up quick, it'll get better." I say, sitting down next to her.
She groans, "I don't like it thou-! *click* Ow! The hell was that for!?" She looks up to me holding her head from me tapping one of her horns very lightly, as I have no clue how much strength she can handle.
"You need to stop complaining about it. You need to level up so you can defend yourself, especially with how powerful the monsters can be here."
She growls but stops the conversation, burying her face into the covers. I would be insane to think I will always be right next to her to protect her...
"You really act more like her mom than a younger brother." Leo says, startling me.
"I do not!"
"Uh... the way you just scolded her, yeah, that was like a mom." Reggie says.
"It was not!"
"Yeah... it was." Melina says.
"What the fuck!" I throw my arms up in annoyance. Why is everyone turning on me right now!?
"It's not like it's a bad thing, it's just how you were acting." Melina says while walking over and sitting on the other side of Anduda. "She is just worried about you." She says to her.
"I know..." Anduda says, muffled by the bed. "I just don't like being talked to by my younger brother like that..."
"You were acting like a brat..." I mumble.
"And you are being petty..." She says, looking up at me.
"I am going to make you armor that is going to be so frilly, and flowy, and-"
"Don't you fucking dare!" She yells, sitting up.
"Oh I will, it will be so cute and pre-"
"I swear to god!" She says, getting closer to me.
"Oh? What are you going to do about it?" I ask, tilting my head.
"Melina, sick'em!" She says, pointing to me.
"I'm not your summon." She says with a chuckle, as she sneak attacks Anduda's horns from behind.
"God... Fucking... Damnit..." She says as she falls backward into Melina, who quickly switches to hugging her. Anduda shakes her head and tries to break free from Melina's grasp, quickly realizing that she isn't going to be able to do anything against her and slumping down with a huff. I chuckle at the pouting dragon.
"I think a dress would look good on you." Melina says.
"Nope! Not happening!" She shakes her head.
"Aw come on! I'll even wear something similar!" I say. If it will embarrass you, I don't care if I embarrass myself.
"No! I'm already uncomfortable enough looking like this!"
"Fine." I shrug. I don't feel like pushing it anymore than I already have, they haven't showed that they were too worried about the new body, but I guess there was more than meets the eye.
"You better not-"
"I won't, really, I was just teasing you."
"Thank you..." She looks up to Melina, "Are you going to let me go now?"
"Maybe... This is really nostalgic for me, let me stay like this a little longer, please." She says.
"Okay..."
Wow, I didn't really think that she would allow her to hold her for longer...
After a few minutes Melina releases Anduda.
"Speaking of clothes... Are you going to change out of your armor you changed into in the dungeon?" Melina asks me. Oh, right...
I equip the loose shirt and sweatpants again, as they are comfortable to relax in. Anduda's vision lingers on me a little longer.
"Not thinking of something dirty about your own sister, are you?"
"Fuck no... I was just wondering how long you have spent playing the game... Other than that time a few years back, I didn't really hear you talk about it. Then we kind of stopped talking to each other..."
"Oh... I don't know my hours in the game actually... something like 10,000? It just kind of blurs together after awhile."
"Wow, you spent a lot of time playing this..."
"Yeah... I didn't really have anything else that kept my interest." I shrug. "It's not like I needed money, and going out with friends wasn't really an option after they all moved away."
"True." Anduda says.
"Wait..." Melina says. "It just kind of clicked with me how many hours you said... The game came out 3 years ago..." Her eyes go wide, "You've played 10,000 hours in the 3 years the game has been out?!"
"Something like that? I don't actually know how many hours I have, last time I checked was a long time ago."
"How did you even have the time to play it?"
"I would... rather not talk about it..."
"Fair enough." She shrugs, looking towards Leo, "By the way, what are the plans moving forward?"
Leo looks over and shrugs, "I don't know about you guys, but I have no clue how long we are going to be here. I would rather not go further into the late-game areas if we don't have to."
Melina gets a serious look on her face, "Has... Has anyone died yet?"
Leo looks down, "I haven't heard of anything happening, but that doesn't mean that it hasn't happened. There are possibly hundreds of thousands of players here, maybe even in the millions. I am sure someone has died, but we just haven't heard of it yet."
Him saying that makes me question where they would have all gone. The streets should be filled to the brim everywhere, it was a popular game, and a lot of people tried it, so the starter areas should be literally bursting with a wave of people... The game ran off separate servers, so did everyone get... pushed to different realities?
"Fuck..."
"We will just have to play it safe until we know what happens." I shrug, Anduda is looking away from me, so I quickly pull her into a hug and flop onto the bed. She lets out a little yelp as we fall and she starts to squirm to try to break free.
"Why are you like this?" She asks while looking up at me.
"I haven't talked to you in years, even longer since I've seen you in-person. So I want to hug you for a little."
"Did this whole thing really change how you act that much?"
"Hmm?" I didn't think it was really changing me a whole lot...
"You used to not like physical contact, like, at all."
"I don't know, maybe I just changed over the years?" This is... a little worrying...
"Maybe, but it seems a little weird that you would be fine with it in just a few years."
"Right now, I don't really care." I am actually enjoying just holding you. "You were acting a lot different than you normally do in the dungeon."
"I... noticed... after we left." She says while clutching onto me slightly.
"It's fine, I think it was something with the level difference." I hold her a little tighter. "Hopefully it'll get better as you level up."
"I hope so, I don't like how it felt... It was like I was having a panic attack the whole time." She buries her face into my chest, and I start to rub the back of her head. "That feels good..." She says muffled. "Just don't touch my horns..."
"I won't, really." I smile a little down at her. You really are cute like this, maybe I can get you to wear something pretty if I give you something cool as well... I will have to figure out how the crafting system works first, in the game, I just had to get near a crafting station and I was able to do it in my inventory... But I have no idea if that's how it works now...
Anduda's breathing softens, and her body relaxes, I assume she fell asleep. Shit, well I can't really check my menu, I don't want to wake her up... wait, do we have to touch the menu or can we just think about what we want to interact with..?
I pull up my menu and look around it, trying to figure out how I would even be able to do this.
"You okay?" Melina whispers.
"Yeah," I whisper back, "just trying to figure out something."
"What is it?"
"I want to figure out the crafting system, so I am trying to see if I can interact with the menu without touching it, but I haven't really tried anything yet."
"Oh, I haven't tried anything yet either..." She says, looking to the side. "We can open it up without touching anything, so we might be able to change tabs without touching it too." She puts her hand on her chin.
I turn back to my menu, looking over to my inventory and focusing on the button. After a few seconds, nothing happens and I let out a sigh. At this point I am just going to cast something to touch the button for me...
"Oh!" Melina whispers loudly, "I got it."
"How did you do it?"
"I didn't think about the button, but the menu I wanted to access."
Huh... that's actually really simple... I think about opening up the crafting menu and it appears on top of my other menu, overlaying them and making them hard to read. Well shit, might want to close the other one... I close the previous one and take a look over the crafting system, it looks the same mostly. I select one of the options and internally chuckle to myself maniacally. The displays are more detailed... and, the overall customization is better.
Oh I am so making a cute dress for you...