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Wednesday 30 December 2015

Preface Contest for Felicia's Second Life Volume 1

 Hi all, it's Ai-chan again. How are you all doing this fine day? I'm doing great. Felicia's Second Life is almost ready and will be published some time in the middle of January, but there is a problem. I'm kind of stuck writing an engaging Preface.

So, here's the deal. Whoever can write an Introduction to the whole Felicia Second Life Volume 1, I'll give them a free copy of Felicia's Second Life Volume 1 Basic, which includes a better written story with most plot holes patched and better flowing sentences, a map of Felicia's Second Life local region and a side story (The Prince's Forgotten Night). Since you'll have the Basic version, you can also ask for a discount on the Extra version (if the basic sells well), with a lot more freebies. I'll also put your name in the 'acknowledgements' section if you want me to.

So if you want to read FSL LN, but can't afford or doesn't have the means to buy it, you can probably give it a shot here. The Intro should be about 500 words long (can be shorter) dealing only with the events or characters in the book and not your personal opinions of the book. There is no specific format, maybe you can just write it as if you're persuading your friend to check out the book?

While I say 'free copy', from what I was told, Amazon doesn't allow $0.00 sales, so I'll see if the other channels allow giving out free copies.

If you want to give it a shot, send it to my email with the title 'FSL Preface Contest'. Contest ends on the 5th of January 2016. Looking forward to hearing from you guys. Don't post your entries here. Only post your questions here.
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Tuesday 29 December 2015

But They're Not Edible

But They're Not Edible

First route for Traps Are Delicious

It is a nice, sunny day. I wake up early, bathe myself with a sweet-smelling bath foam, walk to the Subang Jaya Komuter Station, then switch trains at KL Sentral. I walk out of the Bandar Tasik Selatan Komuter Station and then walk for about ten minutes to reach my new school, the St. Catherine Girl's School. Considering the location and the distance, this school should've been my last choice, even my old school, Blue Sphere is closer, but this is the only place that will accept me within just a week. If I'm allowed to drive though, this is actually pretty close to my home, only 20 minutes away. Since I take the Komuter railway network, it takes me like an hour to reach school instead.

Besides, the reason I had to leave Blue Sphere when my parents divorce in the first place was because it was expensive. Mom couldn't afford even the tuition fees, let alone all the extras such as school trips, club fees and other stuff. I suppose we could've asked dad to continue to pay for it, but it seemed like mom was against that.

When I received the acceptance letter for St. Catherine, I felt a little blessed for having a feminine face. It gave me a bit more option in this case. Although my National ID still identifies me as male, apparently, the school couldn't be bothered cross-checking my photoshopped National ID with the citizen database. Come to think of it, I'm not even sure if schools have access to citizen database in the first place.

Right now, though, I'm feeling a little cursed for having a feminine face.

"Open wide, Rin. Aaaah..."

"Rin, let's go to the canteen together."

"You girls, back off! She's going to have lunch with me."

Yes, it seems like right now, I'm being fought over by three girls. By order of appearance, they are, the girly Zara, the bossy Shahira and the sporty Loretta. Normally, I would consider this as heartwarming female bonding, unfortunately, my gut feeling is saying that this isn't normal.

You see...

Zara is sitting next to me, our chairs pressed next to each other while she's feeding me small pieces of boneless chicken using a chopstick. Shahira is pulling my hand insistently. Loretta is hugging my neck tightly, mashing her small boobs against the back of my head while pulling my head on the opposite direction as Shahira.

How come I was never this popular as a boy?

"Knock it off!" I hear a voice as each of the girls are smacked on the head with a rolled up chemistry textbook.

"Hurts!" Loretta said.

"Aiya!" Zara said cutely.

"Ow!" Shahira cried.

"Don't scare off the new girl, you weirdos," Aerfean says as she hit the palm of her hand with the rolled up textbook.

"But Aerfean... how can I resist this beauty in twintails? She looks so cuuuute!" Loretta says as she rubs her chin on the top of my head.

Thankfully a certain neighbour used hair extension on me yesterday. Had this been a wig, it would've fallen off. That would be very bad.

Aerfean smacks Loretta on the head with the rolled up textbook again. "Let go of her right now."

Aerfean is showing some really dark aura right now. Or it's probably just my hallucination from the lack of air. Loretta is hugging my neck too tightly!

Faced with Aerfean's glare and the threat of being hit with the chemistry textbook again, like Loretta, Shahira also raises her hand in surrender and takes a step back. Only Zara is unable to sense the mood and continues to shove pieces of boneless chicken into my mouth, while telling me how cute I look eating the lunch she prepared. She even asks me if I'd like her to prepare lunch for me tomorrow.

Ahh, why couldn't I be this popular as a boy?

Soon after that, the bell rings and the students slowly trickles back into the class, Shahira come close and whispers into my ears, "I'm definitely going to capture your flags. Look forward to it, Rin."

Capture my flags? Is this a galge dating sim? No, wait. Since I'm wearing girl's uniform and she sees me as a girl... no way... is this otomege? Noooo!!! My pride as a man!

******

Ding dong!

Comes the sound of the doorbell.

"Who could it be?" I ask while holding my lacquered nails up in the air.

"You're not expecting guests?" a certain neighbour asks.

"No. Who would visit anyway? Mom's not here and apart from the neighbours we exchanged doorgifts with when we moved in, we don't know anyone else."

"Maybe your new classmates?"

"Oh lord, please don't say that, even as a joke! If they actually went out of their way to find out my home, and believe me some of them would likely do it, I will have to wear girl's clothes at all times. Home is the only place I can become a man."

"Doesn't look much like a man when you have these B cups attached permanently on your chest." She pokes my silicone falsies as if to make a point.

"Wait! This is permanent?!!!"

Ding dong!

"Hahaha, I'll let you figure that out." That certain neighbour goes to the door and after checking at the peekhole, opens it slightly.

On the other side of the door are two men wearing AXXA deliverymen uniform, one of them hands her a clipboard to which she signs. Then she opens the door fully, allowing the two men to carry their cargoes inside. Both of them greets me when they see me sitting on the sofa with my fingers raised and my feet resting on the coffee table while I'm waiting for the polish to dry.

"Put it here. Here." She points at an empty spot in the living room. Originally, it was supposed to be a spot for mom's chinaware cabinet, but when my parents divorced, dad wanted the cabinet and its whole contents instead, so that spot has remained empty all this time.

After depositing five cardboard boxes in the living room, the deliverymen leaves followed by that certain neighbour. She thanks them, drops a note of ten into the hand of one of them and closes the door behind them. Then she returns, hugs me from behind and says, "Rin-chaaan, it's a total success ~ They totally think you're a girl."

Groans. "What else would they think when there's a person with a pair of B cup breasts sitting on the sofa while waiting for that person's nail polish to dry?"

"I wonder what's inside the boxes." She goes into the kitchen and comes back with a knife.

"Mom won't like it if you open her stuff."

"But it's addressed to you, Rin-chan."

To me? Could it be my Xbox set? Or the whole collection of comics that mom hid from before my PT3 exams? Did dad send them to me from our old home? Could it be all of the above?

"Eh? Are these your old clothes, Rin-chan?"

"Clothes?"

"Oh, there's girl scouts uniform, I was in girl scouts too! Oh look! School swimsuits! My old school didn't have a swimming pool, so I never had a school swimsuit. And look, isn't this the infamous Mahmud Baginda Volleyball Club uniform that was famous for riding up the butt crack whenever the players make an overhead swipe?"

Girl scouts? School swimsuits? Volleyball club? Mahmud Baginda? Hold on, I have a bad feeling about this.

"Oh look, there's a letter addressed to you."

"Give me!"






You shitty counsellor! I don't have this kind of interest!!! How does he even know I enrolled in St. Catherine in the first place?

"Oh, there's another letter, Rin-chan~"

I press my palms to my face. "I don't want to look at another letter again."

"Oh, it's your end-school certificate from Mahmud Baginda. Oh my, you're female in Mahmud Baginda? A 'binti' too! And this picture is so cuuute! Can I keep this? Pleeeeease?"

Somebody please bury me now.

******

"Got you!" A voice announces as a pair of hands grab my (fake) boobs that are still covered by my white shirt.

"Noo! Don't touch me theeere!" With the glue attaching the silicone and my own skin firmly, I can slightly feel her fingers through the silicone as it contracts and compresses.

"Oh? Then were do you want me to touch?" Her right hand continues to squeeze my boobs as her left hand moves lower.

"Here, perhaps?" she whispers in my ear.

"Nooo!"

Smack!

"Ow!" Her cries of pain and sound of a smack can be heard inside the classroom.

"Don't sexually molest our classmate in plain view at school, you pervert!" Aerfean says while holding a rolled up Physics textbook. She's already stripped down to her bra and panties, but haven't started wearing her Phys. Ed uniform yet.

"I'm just having a bonding moment with Rin, Aerfean. Oh, I know, you're jealous, right? Want me to touch you too, Aerfe-ow!"

"Are you still dreaming, Shira? Want me to put you back to sleep?" Aerfean threatens while standing over Shira. I can't help but notice that Aerfean has a very nice figure, and a pretty big pair of breasts too.

By the way, Shira here refers to Shahira. You know the bossy one of the three girls who seem quite into girls. Or more specifically, they're quite into one particular girl, me. As Malays are generally lazy, they try to find shortcuts in everything. So Shahira becomes Shira, Azrin becomes Rin, Arissa becomes Risa, Nadia becomes Nad, Alia becomes Lia and Loretta becomes Rita. Zara's name can't be shortened, though, as neither Za nor Ra are actual names. Aerfean told me while waiting for the bus after school that at some point in the past, someone tried to shorten her name to Air, but that person got beaten up discretely behind the school gym.

"Uuu, Aerfean's so scaaary! Rin, let's go to my home after school, okay? My parents' won't be home today. We can have all the time we need. Hehehe."

Hey, your parents aren't home? That's even more scary! I won't risk my chastity by going to your home when your parents' aren't around!

Whack!

"Sexually molesting a classmate outside school is also forbidden."

"Then when would I be able to molest Rin?"

"How about 'never'?"

Aerfean is so cooool!

Thanks to Aerfean, I am able to change my clothes in peace without being molested (too) much by Shahira's lecherous hands. I receive several remarks of how cute my camisole is and how it suits my child-like and innocent demeanor.

It's not like I'm wearing this because I want to look innocent. I'm just worried people will discover that my breasts are fake. That will cause no end of my worries.

Today, we're playing handball. I've never played one before, so the rules are a little hard to follow for me. I've played basketball before, but it was quite different. As a boy in Blue Sphere Academy, though, I used to play football, which was previously the national sport. That was until 2015, though. After suffering continuous defeat in 2015 culminating in a horrifyingly embarrassing 10-0 defeat against Saudi Arabia, football carried such terrible stigma that everyone switched to futsal, basketball, badminton and squash.

Please forgive me for this background info, but this is just to make you understand my position. You see, in co-ed schools, handballs, although available, is not played all that much. In boys school, it's not played at all, because it has the reputation of being a 'girly' sport. Because this is a girl's school, they seem to play handballs every two weeks here, so everyone's an expert, except me. And these experts play a very hardcore game. It is a level of violence I have never seen before. Thus how, during a moment of confusion, my reaction to the oncoming ball is so slow that I receive the ball directly with my face.

I don't remember what happens afterwards.

I wake up in the infirmary with a bandage pasted to my forehead. "Hello?" I call as I sit up on the bed.

"Oh it seems like you're awake." A matronly voice speaks from the other side of the curtain. The curtain is pulled open, revealing the school nurse cum health teacher.

"What happened?"

"You were hit by a ball while playing handball. Tell me, how many fingers?" She holds out two fingers in front of me.

"Two?"

"Do you feel any pain on your head?"

"Only where it hurts."

"Are you feeling dizzy?"

"Not really, though I do feel a bit confused."

"Any muscle pain? Can you move your limbs?"

I move first my arms, then my legs. "Nothing much."

"Look at my finger without moving your head," she says while moving her fingers left and right in front of me. "Are you feeling any pain?"

"No."

"Alright, I think you're good to go. If you feel any lingering pain though, go to a clinic quickly, understand?"

"Umm, did you carry me here? Thank you very much."

"It wasn't me. Some girl named Shahira carried you on her back and ran here from the field."

"Still, thank you for fixing me up-"

"That wasn't me either. I was in the staff room when you came in. The girl did that herself, then she came to find me in the staff room. I was only here once it was all over."

"Oh, I see. Thank you anyway for your help, teacher," I thank her anyway before getting up from the bed and leaving for my class.

I enter the class in the middle of theoretical chemistry lesson, taught by Ms. Lakrina Eska. Apologizing for being late, I make a bow and goes back to my desk. Looking at Shahira who is sitting at her seat by the window, I mouth a 'thank you'.

Shahira waves dismissively and turns her head looking out the window.

Since we have only known each other for like two months, I imagine that she has something in her mind. So I leave her alone for the rest of the lesson.

Then comes lunch, and unlike usual, she doesn't pull me to have lunch exclusively with her. Therefore, there's only me, Zara and Loretta. Loretta brings her own lunch today. As usual, Zara feeds me herself, even though she prepared a lunchbox for me as well.

I probably should pay her back with something. I'm eating delicious, balanced meal every lunchtime without spending a cent. I don't like owing people and I definitely don't want to be a freeloader.

Meanwhile, Shahira goes to the canteen without giving me a single glance. Even when we have to interact, such as during group work, she only says the bare minimum to me. Yet she communicates at length with the other members.

This pattern continues for two weeks, by which time even Zara and Loretta starts to feel strange.

"Did you two have a fight?" Zara asks while feeding me fish roe sushi.

"Actually, I'm not even sure of that. She just stopped talking with me one day and I'm not sure why."

"Did you steal her boyfriend or something?" Zara asks again.

"She has a boyfriend?!" Both Loretta and I asks at the same time.

"I'm just saying! I don't know if she has a boyfriend."

"You should ask her, Rin. It could've been just a misunderstanding, I don't like seeing my friends fight over a misunderstanding," Loretta says as she drink her tea.

But aren't you guys competing for my attention? Will it be fine if I fix my relationship with your competition? Of course, I'm not going to say it out loud. Girls are fierce when they're competing for love. Best not make them remember that they're rivals.

After school, I quickly stand to the right of Shahira's table, effectively blocking her escape route.

"What is it?" Shahira who is standing while placing her books into her school bag stops what she's doing and leans against the window frame.

Seeing her acting so cold, I hesitate a little. "Shira... umm... can we talk a bit?"

She gives me a cold look then turns away as she proceeds to close the window. With her back towards me, she says, "Not here."

"Then where-"

"I'll tell you later. Please move aside."

"Wait, are you really angry with me? Why? What did I do?" Without realizing it, I accidentally say that aloud, causing everyone still in the class to turn their eyes on us.

"It has nothing to do with what you did. So please move aside."

"If I didn't do anything then tell me what's the problem, Shira!"

Hold on, why are there tears in my eyes?

"Move aside, Rin. I won't say it again."

Suddenly I feel a pair of hands holding me by my waist and pulling me backwards. Looking behind me, I discover that this pair of hands belongs to Aerfean. Towards Shahira, Aerfean says, "Settle it quickly, Shira."

"I know," Shahira says before she grabs her bag and leaves the classroom.

"Don't cry, Rin," Aerfean says as she wipes my tears away with a handkerchief. "You're ruining your makeup."

"I'm sorry, Aerfean. I-I don't know why I'm crying."

You're so manly, Aerfean. No wonder so many girls fall in love with you. Why is a girl more manly than me?!!!

"It's fine. Sometimes a girl just has to cry. By the way, makeups are not allowed at school."

Aerfean, you've just shattered your prince-like image with that last sentence.

"If you have to wear makeups, wear waterproof ones. But you're beautiful even without makeup, Rin."

Stop confusing my heart, Aerfean!

******

The next day, Shahira stands next to my table, and says, "Saturday morning at 11, Berjaya Times Square Coffeebucks. Here's my number. Don't contact me until you're there." Then she goes back to her seat without looking back, simply leaving behind a piece of paper with a mobile phone number written on it.

"Umm, what just happened?" I ask to no one in particular.

Of course, no one is giving me any answer.

At night, I talk it over with a certain neighbour.

"Ooooh! Isn't that a date?"

"A date?"

"A girl gave you a time, place and her phone number. That's a date!"

"A date? But she knows me as a girl!"

"Oooohh~ So she's one of those."

"What are you talking about?"

"Yu~ri~"

"Oh god, please don't say that. Please don't put a word to this trouble of mine.

"Hahaha! What's the big deal? It's an all-girl's school. Someone as cute as you, transfering so late in the semester, is like fresh meat to those types."

"Please don't say that so lewdly!"

"It's really not that bad. I've had some yuri flings in my day too. Nothing is lost between girls, you know."

"Only my innocence. Besides, have you forgotten I'm a boy?"

She makes a blank face for a second.

"Oh right, you're a boy!" She hits her right fist on her left palm with a loud smack.

"YOU FORGOT?!!!"

"Aww, come on. Even your mother will forget you're a boy looking like this."

"Please don't make me regret doing this..."

"So tell me, how many girls have you snared with your cute and innocent look?"

"None!"

"You do realize I have a direct line to your mom, don't you?"

"So what?"

"If you continue to lie~ I'll send this picture to your mom~" She shows me her smartphone. On the screen is a picture of me sleeping in lingerie. Girl's lingerie.

"Waiiittt! This is blackmail! How'd you get this anyway?"

I try to snatch it, but she manages to pull her hand away at the very last second.

"Tell the truth and this remains between us only."

"Fine! Three okay? Three!"

"I guess I'll just have to send it after all."

"I'm not lying! Really, only three girls are pursuing me!"

"You've been in an all-girl's school for two months and only three girls are interested in you?"

"You're talking as if all students of girls' school are perverts and lechers!"

"Have you even checked your locker, Rin-chan?"

"Locker? My bag can fit everything I need and my desk is more than big enough to keep stuff I can leave at school."

"Oh boy... Rin..." she puts her hands on my shoulder, "Seriously, on Monday, open your locker. And get someone else to stand by with a camera to record every moment when you open it. I expect to see a video, understand?"

"Why do I feel cold shivers all of a sudden?"

"Oh don't worry about it, but please don't forget to record the moment you open your locker, okay? Unless you're prepared to have your mom see this compromising picture of you..."

Scary! You're too scary, certain neighbour!

"Now let's decide what you're going to wear for your date tomorrow~"

******

"I'm here already, where are you?" I send a text to the number Shahira gave me. If she lied and this was someone else's number, well, I'll feel ashamed.

After another ten minutes, I send another text, "If you don't come, I'll do something drastic."

I really do feel like doing something drastic. Sitting here in this cafe wearing sweet lolita dress, it feels like all eyes are on me now. It's so embarrassing. Why would that certain neighbour make me wear this?

"Drastic like what?" is the reply that I receive.

"If you don't come, I'll go home."

Suddenly someone laughs behind me. I turn around and see Shahira in loose white shirt, black beret and pants sitting at the table behind me, laughing while reading a message on her phone. This style, it's the style of tomboys or pretty boys and she pulls off the look perfectly. Why does a girl look manlier than me and still look gorgeous?!

The moment she notice me looking, she coughs and tries to control herself.

"You were here the whole time..." It's not a question, it's a statement.

"I'm sorry, you were looking so cute, I didn't dare approach you."

"Uuu, if you're here, just come quickly! It was embarrassing!" I hit her lightly with my fists as I give my complain.

"Sorry, sorry. Well, let's get out of here then."

She takes my hand and pulls me away without letting me say a word. I would've liked to finish my ice-blended mocha at least. She's so unreasonable.

"Sorry, sorry. I'll buy you another one later. So forgive me, please," she says with a smile.

"Humph, fine! Where are we going?"

"Let's go to GSC Maxx."

A movie, is it?

"Shira, I thought we're going to talk?"

Her smiling face cramped at the mention of the talk, but she immediately recovers before saying, "Watch movie first, then have an early dinner, then we'll talk, okay?"

Just as she planned, we have a nice meal at an exclusive French Restaurant on the 11th floor after the movie. Now, most westerners can't understand why it's such a big deal, but in Malaysia, french cuisines are extremely expensive. A single meal can cost as much as the salary from 10 day's worth of work. Even my mom, whose monthly income is fairly above the average income will not even entertain the thought of dining at a French or German restaurant.

We do dine at Japanese restaurants from time to time. Before my parents divorced though, we often ate at Kenny Lodgers, Tony Roman and BBQ restaurants. My dad is a sucker for red meat. It's a good thing that both my dad and mom are out of the country.

Of course, I can't read the menu, since it's all written in French. So Shahira offers to order for me. After asking for my preferences and allergies, she orders in French. She's very impressive, to be able to converse with the waiter in fluent French. I've learned Mandarin and Japanese, but I've never been very fluent in it.

Shahira tells me that the steak is called Provencal Steak, but she only orders it because her father loves it very much. She herself only orders a normal-looking lamb chop. And this drink... it's wine, isn't it? I ask her about it, but she says it's just fruit drink while making a suspicious grin. Really... I'm going to stick to water. I wonder what's plain water in French?

Half an hour later, we're walking side by side in the upper gardens. It seems like the designers really went all out when they designed the 48 storey building. They made an inner garden on the 15th floor accessible only from the 14th floor staircase and elevator. Although I've been here many times since childhood, today is the first time I found out about this place. Either it's a secret area, or most people have never been here.

Looking at the location and the fact that there's only very few people around, I guess both are probably true. You see, most people won't even go beyond the 10th floor, where the indoor roller-coaster themepark can be found. On the 11th floor, there are only expensive-looking foreign restaurants catering to the rich clientele. From 12th to 14th floor, there is only office space. 16th floor and above are residential areas, where the really rich people stays at. It's said that the higher you go, the richer you have to be. It's something a pleb like me can only imagine.

"Thanks for the meal," I say to Shahira to break the silence while we walk.

"No problem," she says without much emotion.

Ah, this sounds like the tone she used when she was ignoring me! Is she pissed that she had to pay for everything?

"No-no, how much was it? I'll pay you back."

"I said it's no problem. Don't worry, I can afford it."

She probably doesn't even know how much it was, since she used her father's credit card. But it's not good, you know, wasting your parent's money on someone else. Mom always said that I shouldn't owe anyone anything.

"At least let me pay for my half, I'll feel bad if you have to-"

"I said it's okay, didn't I?" she turns towards me so abruptly that I take a step back, causing my back to lean against the pillar that was next to me. She then traps my head by resting her arms against the pillar on both sides of my head.

With our faces merely two or three centimeters away from each other, I can't help but start to breathe heavily. I wonder if my breath stinks. It will be bad if my breath stinks, right? I shouldn't have eaten that steak. My breath must stink now. If only I have mouth freshener or something to get rid of the smell.

Of course I'm panicking! Isn't this one of those infamous kissing scenes? First impression is important, isn't it? Will she be disgusted if my breath stinks? If I hold my breath, will it be okay?

Suddenly she pushes herself away and takes a distance from me. With a distance of one meter away which grows by the second, she says, "I don't like this."

I knew it!

MY BREATH STINKS!!!

"Wait! Let me go buy some mints."

"Mints? I have some here." She produces a bottle of breath freshening mints from her pants pocket.

I snatch it from her hand. Then I empty what remains inside the bottle into my mouth and starts chewing desperately. Shahira simply looks at me with a dumbfounded expression.

"Do you like it that much?"

What are you saying? Who would like mints in the first place? I'm just chewing this to get rid of my stinky breath. Don't misunderstand, it's not like I want to kiss you or anything, but it hurts my pride if a girl thinks my breath stinks.

"I guess, I should apologize for the treatment I gave you for the past week."

Eh? Why are you suddenly changing the topic? Are we no longer going to kiss? Not that I'm saying I'm aiming for a kiss.

"I'd like to know why you've been avoiding me, Shira."

"..."

"Won't you tell me?"

"Rin, what is your opinion on secrets between friends?"

"What's... with the question?"

Hearing the word 'secret' suddenly reminds me how I'm carrying a very big secret right now.

"What do you think, Rin, about secrets between friends?"

For some reason, I start sweating. "Umm, I think everyone has things they don't want people to know about. Even best friends have secrets that they can't share."

"I can understand that, if it's small secrets that doesn't bring harm to the relationship. But I think, big secrets should be shared, don't you agree?"

Sweating. Shivering. Fidgeting.

Does she know my secret? Was this why she ignored me these past couple of weeks?

"Secrets... even big secrets..."

"Rin!"

"Yes!"

She grabs my hands tightly and brings it level to our chests. "If you're close to someone, don't you want to share things with your close ones? Your worries, your sadness, your anger, your feelings, your secrets, won't you want to share it with someone who understands you and accepts you?"

"But... what if after sharing the secret, the other person won't want to be your friend anymore?"

"Then that person isn't your best friend in the first place!"

"Umm, uhhhh..."

"Rin, there's a very big secret between us right now and it's killing me. I don't want this big secret to break us apart, but because of this secret, I was so cruel to you."

I knew it! She knows! She knows I'm a boy! If this gets out, I'll probably even go to juvenile center! What must I do?

"N-no... you only ignored me."

Let's try sidestepping the issue. I'm probably just being paranoid.

"That's why... this secret... a confession is necessary!"

Noooo! She definitely knows!

"This... explain..."

"No, trying to explain this will sound like an excuse."

Are you not going to even let me explain my position?

"Only an apology will work," she says.

Then...

"Rin..."

"Shira..."

She says, "I'm sorry for kissing you when you fainted!" at the same time when I say, "I'm sorry I'm actually a boy!".

"Wait, what?" we say at the same time,

"You kissed me when I fainted?"

"You're a boy?"

"..."

"..."

******

"Umm, what are you thinking, Shira?"

"Haa... that was sudden."

"Are you disgusted with me, Shira?"

"All this time I thought I was a lesbian. But it was a crossdressing boy."

"Are you going to tell the school, Shira?"

"I should do that, shouldn't I? As a good student, it's my responsibility, right?"

"Uuu, please Shira..."

"Just kidding. I've never been a good student," she holds out her hand and with a grin on her face, she says, "Don't cry, Rin. Why would I want to get the girl I'm in love with kicked out of school?"

I catch her hand, feeling elated that it's over now. Shahira, one of my first friends here and the one I'm most attached to, despite her perverted acts. I no longer feel any burden in my heart. No more secrets. I don't have to lie to her anymore. Everything is good. This is what I feel as she pulls me into a fancy looking elevator.

She places a key card into a slot and presses number 43. The elevator moves up as she grabs my other hand. We look at each other in the eye until I realize that we're going into the residential area of the building.

"Err, Shira... where are we going?"

"My home, of course!"

"Umm, why?"

"I'm gonna eat you, hehehe."

This look of a predator in her eyes. Oh dear, I have forgotten that she's dangerous! How could I have forgotten this danger?

"Nooo, don't eat me. I'm not edible!"

"Oh nevermind, I can't take it anymore. I'm gonna eat your lips here. Heheheh."

Hey, your tongue is coming out. Stop licking your lips like you're looking at a piece of meat. No, stop! Don't come closer. Somebody please...

"LET ME OUUUUUUUTTT!"

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Thursday 24 December 2015

Armageddon Chapter 2

Armageddon Chapter 2

"Sis, I need a heal."

"Okay," I said as I dropped my pen and grabbed the gamepad. I held button 10 then pressed button 1 to use the equipped artifact, the Glove of Lesser Recovery.

"Sis, you've just healed that monster!



I did? I lowered the VR goggle and looked through the screen. "Oh crap!" I said as I nudged the right analog a little to the left. My fingers must've nudged the pointer at some point.

"Shit, I died!" my brother whined when his HP bar went down to zero.

I held button 10 and pressed button 2 to use Ankh of Minor Revive. Then I shot 4 pieces of lead to the zombie's limbs to weaken it before my brother finished it for the XP.

"Why is it that you still need aid against a zombie?" I asked as he picked up his loot.

"Well, because sword skills are hard to use," he said with his big butt and big breasts swinging around everytime he bent over to pick up the scattered loot. If this was reality, he'd already have a sore back

"Nobody told you to pick Neet."

"It's because I can't pick Sniper that I pick Neet."

"You could've just picked Soldier, you can advance to Gunman."

"Gunman sucks. My friend said he fired 8 times with his dual guns and the shots went everywhere but the target!"

"Well, dual wielding does have accuracy issues."

"And Sniper is impossible!"

Let me explain a little. Being a sniper is NOT impossible at all. The only problem is for some reason, players whose avatar have big breasts suffer accuracy issues with all kinds of rifles, including sniper rifle. Now go back a little bit in time and notice that I say his character has big butt and big breasts. See the problem? Yeap, my brother is a breast man. I suppose he's an ass man too.

His character's breasts size are even twice bigger than mine in real life. Does he think that the value of girls are only in their breasts? If that's what he really thinks, I'll tell mom.

Still, my value as a girl is in neither breasts nor ass. It's my brain. And my gorgeous long legs. Oh, I have a pretty face too, if I may add. I know men made a double take when I walk past them on the street in my casual clothes, even the men who were walking with their girlfriends. Oh my, I'm blushing.

"Sis."

"Yes?"

"How much do you think this is worth?"

I pushed down the visor part of my headset and saw him pointing to a rusty magic sword.

"Were you fighting a [zombie knight]?" Since [zombie knights] were about the only low level zombie that dropped magic items.

"Didn't you see earlier?"

"No, I was studying."

"So how much can I make with this?"

I looked at the unidentified rusty magic sword. Then I tried searching my memory for an average price for rusty magic swords. I knew I came across a few in the past few years in the auction houses, but since I had always been a rifle-wielder, I didn't take much notice of the swords. I can use it of course, since the nature of the game allows every character to wield every weapon in the game, as long as the stats allow it. But what would be the point of me wielding a sword? It would be like giving a man a bow and telling him to go fishing.

"I think you can get between 20-40 Euro in the auction houses."

"No, not the auction houses, how much will I get with dollars for example?"

"Stop there! It is against game rules to sell game items for real world money. You will get banned and your headset ID blacklisted. Heck, even I will probably be banned since we're playing using the same VRPwr2 unit."

"What? I can't sell this for real money? God damned! There goes my perfect plan!" He swung his sword against a tree repeatedly as if trying to vent his frustration.

"You planned to sell game items for real world money?"

"Of course! That's why I invested in the headset in the first place. My perfect plan is in ruins..."

So buying the headset wasn't actually a boy's short-sighted quest for fun? He actually considered recouping the money spent by making money from the game itself? That was unexpected. I didn't know my pest of a brother actually thought ahead. He should still read the terms of use in the first place, though.

I sighed, thinking I should help him a little. If he did well, surely he could pitch in with the game's monthly fees or something. "If you want to make money from the game, I can probably help you in a way."

"Really?" He stopped swinging his sword at the tree.

"Yup, but not through item selling. Once you can kill an [elder necromancer] on your own, talk to me about making money."

"But [elder necromancer] is a D level monster!"

"If you want to make money, you need to be able to beat up at least D level monsters, better if you can beat C, but that may take too long for you."

"What level can you defeat now, sis?"

"Remember the monster rampage in London last week? That was upper level B. I won because its HP was already depleted from being attacked by other players."

Suddenly I heard the sound of a bell in the real world.

"Hey, go play somewhere. Take this," I tossed him the [glove of lesser recovery], the same one I used to heal his HP.

"You're really giving this to me, sis?" he or she, the character in the game, looked at me in awe. At least I assumed that was 'awe', VR games hadn't advanced far enough yet to be able to create facial expressions through a person's emotions. There were in-game emoticons that could be used to show emotions, but most people just used it to play around.

As for why I said he could be in awe, it was because recovery equipments, as opposed to food and potions are very rare in Armageddon. People who wanted to heal without using potions or food would normally sit somewhere safe and heal through passive healing, use a doctor or priest for quick healing, or pay a hospital or clinic for full healing.

"Yes, it's no longer as useful to me anymore," I said, since the glove healed only 20 HP per use. My HP was already 600 in total. If I used the the glove to heal myself, I wouldn't be able to fight.

"Thanks!" he said as his avatar ran along a side street, probably looking for more zombies.

I logged out of the game and took off the headset. Then I looked at the computer screen in front of me, bringing up the corresponding gahoo chat message. It was from Sara aka Nutcase, the demolitionist and suicide bomber.

"Hey Ria, how's it going?"

"You have a reason for disturbing my study time, Sara?"

"Oh you were studying? Haha, sorry. It's just that something came up."

"And what would that be? If you tell me your laundry flew off again, I will snipe you next time I see you."

"Oh poo! That was a real distress, if you don't know. Who knows what kind of evil a pervert would do if he got his hands on my well-worn lacy bra."

"You're the biggest pervert around. I'm busy."

"Wait wait."

"Waiting."

"Don't you want to take part in liberating Athens?"

"Athens fell?"

"Yeah, 6 hours ago. It was broadcasted throughout the world, just like that time when they lost Rome."

"I was at school, sorry."

"So you wanna join?"

"I got exams coming up."

"It's a paid job."

My ears perked up, despite this being a text conversation. "Details?"

"We got two employers to choose from. One's the Crimean Alliance, they pay in real world money, but only hires high level players. The other's Graeco-Roman Initiative, they pay in in-game currency and in-game bonus for high contribution."

"Tell me more about Crimean Alliance," I typed before going back to my math homework.

"Crimean Alliance is a guild of salary workers and self-employed players who are based in Athens. They're generally mid-level players but they regularly use real world money to pay players to stop demon excursions around Athens. This time they were too late, so their home city got invaded. Right now they supposedly have a budget of almost 800 Euro to hire mercenaries. They can't log in because the central warp crystal is crawling with demons and they need to wait 60 hours from the time of the invasion before they can change spawn location."

"Any problem with the admins?" I wouldn't want to be banned after working on my character for so long.

"Some accusations, but since money and items didn't change hands through their system and negotiations were done using outside softwares, they had no proof."

"Will there be any problem?"

"Minimal, the Crimean Alliance had done this many times before. There is no risk."

"Payment?"

"There's 5 of us. 10 Euro each."

"Are you freaking joking with me? Ask for more, my bullets aren't cheap."

"But you can get bullets from the Sanctuary Warehouse daily."

"Normal bullets. I use armour-piercing, high-explosive, acid, poison and holy bullets. Those are expensive and not available everywhere. The only place that sold holy bullets was in Rome."

"It will be hard to ask for more. They won't be very generous with their real world money."

"Tell them to contact me themselves then. Wasn't I the hero who killed the Monster of Trafalgar Square?"

"Fine. You okay with me giving him your Gahoo ID?"

"Yea-wait. Make sure he's not a stalker pervert or a network hacker before you give him my ID."

"Still got a phobia, huh?"

"Don't you know it." I shivered recalling the memory of being stalked by a computer hacker a year ago.
I was chatting like normal when this guy came out of nowhere and asked to chat. I humoured him. We chatted about many things until he offered to do cam-to-cam and voice chat. I agreed and there came the face of a caucasian man probably in his early twenties. To tell the truth, I had a little crush on him the first time I saw his face. He wasn't ugly at all, for start, and his voice was quite dreamy. The level of our chat raised a little since then, going from the subject of favourite food and daily complains to being alone at home and the colour of my panties and the kind of bra I wore at any given day.

I flirted back good-naturedly, since it felt nice doing dirty chats a bit on the net. He managed to make me hot often that I... maybe I shouldn't say that. Anyway, my face was clearly transmitted to the other side and he definitely seemed to like it. Then I stopped chatting for a few days to concentrate on my studies.

When I came back online, he had sent all kinds of creepy messages. Such as, "What are you doing in just your underwear on the bed, sweety?" or "I know the colour of your panties today," or "I want to touch your pretty butt," or "Don't ignore me, bitch. I know you're at your desk."

That scared me so much that I didn't turn my computer on for days. When I did, he sent me a download link for a movie. When I downloaded it and watched it, it was a video of me changing clothes in my room. From the viewpoint, it was from my own webcam. I was very scared and didn't know what to do. I sat alone in my room for hours until I ripped out the USB cable for my webcam and called Sara for help. Sara was my neighbour a little further down the street back then and left for Germany a few months later. I didn't know what I would've done without her.

She came over right away and comforted me as best as she could, pulling my face into her very prominent bosom. She asked me if anyone else knew. I told her no, as if I would tell my family about this in the first place. She told me that it was pointless calling the police, since the problem still wouldn't be solved and once my family found out they would just take away my computer. There was also the issue of my spycam video, the police could ask the site admins to take down the video, but the stalker still had the original video, and probably a whole lot more videos than the one he showed me.

So Sara told me to reattach the webcam and contact that stalker. He looked happy to see me, but then his expression changed when he saw my crying face. Sara then pulled me off my chair and chatted with that guy, telling him that she was my big sister. Despite Sara having bigger breasts and a mature beauty, he didn't seem attracted to her at all and kept asking to chat with me.

Sara, blessed her, managed to talk him down. Sara told him to destroy the videos, but he refused, saying that he loved me so much he wouldn't be able to sleep without seeing me. Eventually, he agreed to keep my naked videos locked and that he wouldn't hack into my PC anymore. His conditions was that I continued to chat with him daily and that I set aside a few days around my 18th birthday to meet him for a date. Maybe I was just a masochist, but I agreed. I was 15 back then.

Now, a year after, I feel a little lonely. Sure, he was a creep, but he was a handsome creep. And even after the compromise, he genuinely cared for me and my complains. He was sort of like 'a creepy best friend who has an abnormal carnal crush on a schoolgirl' kind of person. Sometimes I would ask his help to hack some youtube asshole's computer as a prank. After about half a year though, our daily conversations became something like bland greetings, asking what's new, and then being quiet for a long time until one of us logged off. Sometimes I complained and he would listen, but it was obvious he was bored. When I pointed it out to him, he admitted it. He said he still loved me but he wished he didn't agree with our compromise back then. I told him to watch my naked videos again whenever he felt horny, and he laughed good-naturedly, but he said he wanted something fresh. Now we hardly chatted with each other anymore.

Of course, since that compromise, I ensured the webcam's cable was pulled out whenever I wasn't using it. I wouldn't let him take nude videos of me anymore. But anyway, that incident was in the past.

At night, I received a message on my gahoo. No, it wasn't the stalker, it was apparently the leader of the Crimean Alliance.

"Good evening, are you Doomgunner in Armageddon Europe?"

"Yes, who are you?"

"I am Alexander Nikolaidis. I go by the same name in the game Armageddon. I am the co-leader of the Crimean Alliance."

Same name in-game and in real-life? This guy is weird.

"My name is Ria. Yes, I am Doomgunner. How can I help you?"

"Are you aware of the fact that Athens fell some hours ago?"

"I am aware of that."

"We, the Crimean Alliance are hiring mercenaries to retake Athens. We offer real world money of the currency of your choice in exchange for your services in the liberation of Athens."

"Any currency?"

"Any major currency. It will be transferred to your bank once the objective is achieved. As for your fee, I have been cleared to pay you 30 Euro upon the completion of the mission."

30 Euro is quite something. That could feed me for like five days, if for some reason mom wouldn't feed me. From the looks she gave me everytime she saw me playing with VrPwr though, I didn't doubt that it would happen one day.

"Can you state clearly the objective of the mission?"

"There are 5 objectives. Primary objective is the annihilation of all demonic entities inside the municipality of Athens. Secondary objectives are: Destruction of the demon's recall crystal; Death of all 10 demon summoners; Construction of 5 watch towers around Athens; Destruction of the closest Hellgate to Athens."

"That's pretty hard. Hellgates are very well protected. Even if you have 100 players together, assaulting Hellgates will mean extremely heavy losses."

"Of course we are aware of the dangers, the mission is considered complete once Athens is liberated. The secondary objectives are not necessary, but welcomed. The parties that successfully completed the objectives will receive bonus pay."

"How much are we talking about?"

"Destruction of recall crystal - 10 Euro, death of all 10 summoners - 10 Euro, construction of 5 watch towers - 15 Euro, destruction of Hellgate - 50 Euro."

"For each person?"

"No, it's group bonus. For example, if 20 players participate in destruction of recall crystal, each will be paid additional 0.5 Euro. I doubt you would need more than 10 players to destroy a recall crystal, though."

"What about reinforcements?"

"None during the battle except for other mercenaries. Upon completion of the main objective, Crimean Alliance members will spawn in Athens and take over sentry duties."

"When will the mission start?"

"9 PM Saturday, your time. Do you accept this mission?"

"Yes, who do I report to?"

"You will be part of the First Support Squad, your Squad leader is Olson Welles. Please go to this link for your group chat. Do you have any further questions?"

"No."

"Very well. We look forward to your success. Good day."

Hoooo, 30 Euro, for just a few hours work. That's way more than what my sister make as a Sugar Beats employee. If only these kinds of jobs come everyday. I'm definitely going to take those secondary objectives, alone if possible. 65 Euro within a single day, that's nice. I won't bother with the Hellgate mission, since it needs a few hundred players together to destroy it. The amount of demons protecting Hellgates are simply massive.
 
Seeing as I would be fighting a large scale battle in two days, I decided to practice. Unlike other games, the cities of Armageddon are faithfully modeled following its real world self. In other words, the city of Athens would be huge. If one were to spend their time exploring the Armageddon version, they would be as familiar to the city just like a local. I aced a few of my geography tests because of that.

Putting my pen down and my books away, I picked up my headset and wireless gamepad. I kicked my brother to the other side of the bed as I plopped down on the bed, put on the headset and started the game. As usual, I went through the game start screen and emerged at the central warp crystal of the city of London. My avatar's fingers touched the warp crystal and a list of locations I previously registered to appeared. I chose Milltown Malbay, in Ireland. It was time to start killing the boss monsters of Hy-Brasil.

It was part of a chain quest that I acquired after taking on a quest of clearing out the entire library of the Royal Irish Academy in Dublin of demons. I don't want to brag, but I did it all alone. Armed with my trusty assault rifle, I took on hundreds of level C demons within a manner of hours. The fight against the boss demon itself took almost an hour and hundreds of bullets. It was a tough fight. For my troubles, the boss demon dropped the Unique item The Book of Hy Brasil as well as other more regular drops.

Maybe I need to give a short explanation about item quality in Armageddon. The quality of items, whether equipments, potions, artifacts and the like range from Poor up to Ancient. The order would be Poor being the lowest, followed by Inferior, Common, Uncommon, Magic, Rare, Epic and Ancient. Out of all these, each quality had their own ups and downs, mostly in the form of power and price. Needless to say, the higher the quality of an item is, the pricier it becomes. The power of the higher quality items are also generally better than those with lower quality, whether in terms of damage, bonuses or special attacks. Items with Ancient quality are always more powerful, but also more brittle. The hero of Paris, Christophe Arceneau destroyed the Hellgate near Paris within hours of its appearance, alone. He was decked in ancient armour, ancient axe, ancient arquebus and ancient amulets. He succeeded in destroying the Hellgate, but lost his ancient equipments due to low durability and was killed by the mass of the remaining demons.

As for Unique items, they're different. Equivalently, they range from Common to Ancient, with varrying powers and bonuses. The only different is that they're limited in number. For example, there is only one Spear of Longinus, a Unique item at Ancient quality, currently owned by a member of the Knights of Rome. Similarly, there are only two Book of Hy Brasil. From the bonuses, I assume it is simply the equivalent of Rare.

I looked up the story of the book on the internet and it was true. The book was real, as in it exist in real life. In-game though, I'm going to spare you the details and simply say that the book not only started the next leg of the chain quest, but also granted a permanent Intelligence score of 20, 5HP per second passive healing and 2000HP active healing that could be activated every four hours. I also got an ability labelled 'Beacon of Hy Brasil', which from the description, allowed me to summon the island of Hy Brasil no matter where in the Atlantic Ocean I was. It was a fantastic drop, even if it didn't give the quest. Regrettably, this particular drop disappeared after I used it, so I couldn't resell it to others. But I got the permanent Intelligence, passive healing and active healing ability. So everything's fine.

Still, since I got the book, I could go to the Island of Hy Brasil, the first ever player to have ever set foot on that mythical island surrounded by mist in the middle of nowhere. As for why I was going to Milltown Malbay, that town was the only place in western coast of Ireland that had a warp crystal. I didn't want to spend hours riding from Limerick. Unlike the rest of Europe, the British Isles are pretty safe from the demon apocalypse, with new Hellgates quickly brought down by the combined strength of the local guilds. Therefore, there was not much need for the Order of Divine Mercy to construct warp crystals in the British Isles, preferring to divert their logistical and military resources to the European mainland.

By the way, the Order of Divine Mercy is also known as 'gamemaster'. It is a guild of gamemasters, who are also players paid by the developers of Armageddon with weekly resources in order to help players push back the demon hordes. Right now, 5 out of 6 gamemasters were focused on European mainland, with two of them focusing on liberating Rome. They conducted events regularly to gain players' assistance in pushing the battle lines. They also have their own AI armies, but are not allowed to use them except as part of an event. Any guilds who want to aid in the liberation events often have to submit a proposal to the gamemasters to get in-game funding.

I warped into the the town of Milltown Malbay from London. It was a small thriving town, filled with NPCs and players who hunted demons in the surrounding countryside. The level of demons in this vicinity was rather low, mostly of the rank E and D, so it was a good place for beginner players. As I materialized, I immediately became the center of attention, probably because of my gear. Unlike the new players, I was wearing an Ancient Breastplate of St. Dunstan as well as one sniper rifle and one assault rifle on my back. On my belt, I had one Sig Sauer P226 firmly in its holster, with four magazines also strapped to the belt.

I am one of the opinion that you only need one magazine to kill anything. If you need to use all four magazines at any given event, you would be better off just running away. If four magazines couldn't kill a target, there's a very slim chance that six magazines would make a difference. Either way, if you need more than four magazines to down something, it isn't the weapon's problem, it's the user's problem. I have seen many who fired full spreads of assault rifle bullets on a single demon. I am not one of those idiots.

"Never thought I'd see a Pulsed Plasma Sniper Rifle. They only give that as event rewards."

Correct. It was an event reward.

"I'd like to have his breastplate. That's obviously an Rare Unique at least."

It's Ancient Unique, you noob. There're only 4 of these in the whole world.

"I think I've seen him before."

Really? If there's someone as handsome and as caddish as my character in real life, I'd like to marry him.

"Hey, isn't that the Hero of Trafalgar Square?"

Oh, that's what she meant.

"Come to think of it, he does look familiar."

Well, duh! If you watched the video I uploaded to the Armageddon Hall of Scenes, you'd know. I made over $200 from the 700,000 viewership royalty for the past week alone. Money, best colour in the world.

"It's him! I watched the video on bootube!"

Wait, somebody uploaded it on bootube? Who the fuck cheated me of my income? I'm definitely gonna report this. I wonder if I got 'cheers' or 'boos', though.

"Umm, hello. I'm a fan of your videos. Would you sign my sniper rifle?" a young girl character came up to me and presented me her sniper rifle, a Hans-Wesley Coil-action Sniper Rifle. This thing is rare, must've costed her a fortune.

"Sure," I said as I opened the signature window and wrote my real world signature, Ruria, onto the side of the weapon using the touchpad. I just couldn't be bothered with designing a completely separate signature for my in-game character.

In Armageddon, since there's no such thing as levels or level requirements, most people end up suffering from having powerful weapons, but low attributes and stats to use them. Therefore, most people use lower level weapons to compensate. However, this means that their attack power are weak. To overcome this, Armageddon uses a system called 'Signature' which allows players to enchant their equipment so it become a living item. The weapon or equipment receives 50% bonus stats from the person signing it. As the person who signed it grows, so will the weapon grow together. There are several restrictions, though. An equipment can only have one signature. An equipment can only be signed by the classes that use them as primary weapons (snipers can't sign a sword, axes and pikes can't be signed). The equipment can't be either Epic, Ancient or Unique.

"Thanks, can we be friends?" the girl asked.

"Sure," I said as I friendlisted her. Her name was Celixia. Cute name.

I should mention that in Armageddon, one could only send whispers to people they had friendlisted.

"Where are you heading to now?"

"I'm going on a quest west of Ireland."

"Can I come along? I'm a pretty good sniper."

"What level can you defeat?"

"I can kill several D level monsters now in less than 3 minutes."

"Unless you have a strong party, no. The place I'm going is crawling with B level monsters. You'll die in seconds."

"I have a party, together we can kill lower B monsters," the girl said, looking excited.

To her, this was probably a good place to farm skill experience.

"Fine, call them. I'll wait for 5 minutes," I said, thinking that even if they would die, at least they would be able to buy me enough time as distraction while I enter the Ruined Temple of Breasal, to slaughter the Irish god Breasal, who'd be minding his own business until I come along and kill him.

Please forgive me, Breasal, a quest is a quest after all.

"Can we join too?" the bystanders came and asked.

There were twelve of them, not including Felixia's party. I shrugged. I wanted to rent a small row boat but from the looks of it, I'd have to rent a charter boat instead.

"Fine, but space is limited. The highest level ones gets to go," I said as I head to the pier to search charter boats for rent.

I got one that could take all of us. At my prompting, the players all pitched in with their own money for the rent fees, seeing as this place would be a great place to increase their skills. It was a great day, I double-charged everyone. Because of that, I got to rent a boat without having to pay the boat owner with my own money and still make a lot of profit. Money, the best colour in the world, even if it's digital currency.
Once we boarded the boat, I activated the Beacon of Hy-Brasil and chanted the words using the microphone attached to my headset.
Iarraim ar an Rí na Gheimhridh,
An té a fuil a chroí sioc,
An té a anáil a scaoileadh amachs ceo,
An té a seithí dóibh siúd ar mian leo a bheith i bhfolach,
Impigh mé leat,
Oscail an mbealach seo,
Is mian liom chos a chéim
ar an Oileán Hy-Brasil.
Nothing happened. I chanted again. Nothing happened again. That was until one of the players, who happened to be Irish, said that he recognized some of the words and asked me to allow him to give it a go. I shared with him the chants and he pronounced it in sounds that didn't match the spelling at all. How the heck did the creator of the quest even expect people to finish the quest if it had to be spoken in Irish tongue?

Anyway, mist then appeared out of nowhere and inside the mist, we could see the silhuette of an island. I instructed the boat driver NPC to navigate towards the island. As we entered together, each of us received the Explorer of Hy-Brasil achievement, signifying that we were the first to enter the island. Which meant that each of us would get double the skill experience over a period of 3 days. Perfect!

******
 
"Alright guys, I have to go do my quest now. See you at the boat later. By the way, do not even dare to leave without me."

"Can I go with you?" a guy in swordsman outfit stepped closer. He was one of those who could barely kill a C level monster even with his entire party helping.

"No, this is a B level quest, you won't survive."

"I can be the tank. My swordskill is great!"

I doubt it. From what I could see, you were just as noobish as my brother.

"No, there's no need. I'll be fine on my own."

"Come on, you can't beat a B level quest on your own."

Why is this guy so annoying? Can't he take a hint?

"For your information, I already beat a B level quest on my own. That's how I got to come here," I said as I unslung my sniper rifle. I climbed a big rock and then pointed my pulsed plasma sniper rifle at the ground.

This is going to hurt, greatly.

"No way, stop acting tough. I can help," the noob swordsman arrogantly offered his help, as if he would be able to actually do something.

"No thanks, I don't need you," I said as I fired the pulsed plasma sniper rifle at the ground at EXCEED power. The shockwave reduced my HP by almost 200 and gave critical damage to my feet, but it propelled me up the sky and got me away from that annoying noob in the blink of an eye.

Of course, landing would be another matter altogether. Not to mention that this place was crawling with lower B level monsters. I would need to do some quick massacre the moment I landed. Then it would be time for my trusty 'Ambush' skill to show its usefulness again.

******
 
"Great god, how many of them are here?" I asked myself after killing about a hundred [beast elves] and [unicorns] inside the Ruined Temple of Breasal.

At first, it was easy, snipe a few of the monsters, and then use the Ambush skill as camouflage. Once the cooldown timer ended, I would snipe again and then hide again. Unfortunately, as I proceeded deeper into the underground temple, the number of overhead crystal light increased and the hallways were brighter as well as longer and straighter. It came to a point where it was impossible to hide, even with the Ambush skill. I had to shoot some of the overhead crystal lights on the ceiling a few times to make myself some hiding spots.

Unfortunately the darkness inside the temple also made it possible to encounter [wraiths] who were attracted to the darkness beyond light. Even the dark spots that I had cleared earlier would be no use. The [wraiths] could teleport. Whether they teleported from somewhere else or materialized out of thin air I had no idea. [Wraiths] are upper C level monsters, so it wasn't an easy creature to beat. Plus, unlike the [beast elves], [wraiths] could only be harmed by holy, blessed or light bullets. I hated fighting [wraiths] because they were about the most expensive non-demon monsters to fight and dropped no loot.

Unless if one counts the [darkness fragments] which is useless, as a loot. Its only used to craft darkness bullets and darkness weapons, which is equally useless since it doesn't harm demons. Darkness weapons can only harm angels and since angels aren't hostile, it's pointless. So [wraiths] is often called, [useless demons].
Finally, after fighting three dozens more monsters, I arrived at the Hall of Breasal, which looked like a meadow despite being underground. The god of the wilds, the giant Breasal, held a pike in his hand as he spoke of something in Irish, which I couldn't understand a single word of, so I didn't bother. Without letting him finish his words, I fired my sniper rifle as a greeting. That initiated combat.

Breasal charged forward, brandishing his pike as if it was as light as wood. With my high Agility score though, I managed to avoid it easily. Unlike other idiots, I didn't spend time developing my other stats. A sniper wasn't supposed to be seen, heard nor attacked. A sniper hid and fired from the most convenient places.

Breasal, seeing me evade his first attack, swung his pike left at my direction. This time I couldn't evade in time and suffered a graze on my chest. That pike must be at least an Epic, to be able to cut through the Ancient Breastplate of St. Dunstan as if through paper.

"Poison!" I cried as my HP dropped steadily with each second in addition to the damage from the attack.
The god of the wilds attacked again, slicing the air left and right. Barely avoiding it, I put away my sniper rifle and took out the Sig Sauer. I emptied the whole magazine of [curse bullets] into Breasal. I looked in satisfaction as his movements slowed and eventually stopped. Not only that, he also suffered the 'amplify damage' curse, which randomly activated with 12% chance upon using curse bullets.

I reloaded the ammunition of the pistol with [poison bullets] before I unslung my sniper rifle again. I took aim at his heart and fired an [HE bullet], causing an explosion around his chest. It didn't make much of an impact, as Breasal seemed to have some kind of barrier around him.

"So... holy bullets?" I asked myself as I took out my holy bullets clip to replace the HE bullets. Then I pressed the trigger and bingo, the bullet went past the barrier. It shattered Breasal's chest and exposed his beating heart to the air.

Unexpectedly, Breasal made a loud roar, which increased his strength and dispelled all the curses inflicted on him. He came at me with twice the speed he had before and I just barely managed to avoid it. At that point, all thoughts of attacking went out the window. I was already too busy avoiding his attacks to worry about counter-attacking. If I was a swordsman, this would be a different matter.

A rifle couldn't block a pike, especially a divine pike. If I blocked it with my rifle, my rifle would break in two. I would rather die than let it happen. Besides, his [roar] halved all my skills. Even blocking would be affected. I'd be better off just running.

It took me about 6 minutes of running and evading, but eventually his enchantment wore off and his speed slowed down to its original level. I took this chance to mute my headset and drop a contact-sensitive flashbang to the ground in front of me before jumping over it just as the flashbang went off. With the flashbang behind me and the sound muted, the flashbang had minimal effect on me. I hid behind a tree, took out my sniper rifle and fired another holy bullet, dealing a headshot in his moment of confusion. Then I activated the 'Ambush' skill.

I waited for him to walk past my hiding place, remaining silent all through it. Then once he was far enough, I dealt another headshot from the back, this time, with the ambush bonus damage applied. I quickly changed place and reactivated the Ambush skill. I repeated this eight more times until he wised up and used his power to cast [grass bind]. It wasn't a particularly powerful magic, as it only bound people and the binding could be easily broken. The only problem was, he now knew where I was.

I had no time to cut down the grass. So I fired the sniper rifle and got myself a chest shot twice more as Breasal charged towards me. I put away the sniper rifle and threw several grenades in his way, dealing area effect damage despite his divine protection. Then I took out my assault rifle, which I had earlier switched into using holy bullets and fired controlled burst. As he got closer, I panicked and fired full burst instead.
In the real world, I cried a river for throwing my precious holy bullets down the crapper.

When Breasal got within a few metres from me, I knew I was done for. With my legs bound by the [grass bind] spell and my assault rifle out of ammo, there wasn't a lot I could do. So I put away my assault rifle and grabbed my Sig instead, along with a [holy grenade]. It was my last holy grenade, made only in Rome. Unless Rome was liberated, this might be the last holy grenade in the world. Nevertheless, I primed the grenade.

As he approached, I fired my pistol with poison bullets blindly. It wouldn't matter where it hit, as long as the poison entered his body. It would be better if it hit his head or heart, but I couldn't be choosy. My only hope would be to get enough DoT (damage over time) and stall time long enough for the poison to take effect.

It happened as I managed to put the 7th bullet into his chest, that his pike hit the shoulder guard of my Ancient Breastplate of St. Dunstan, and was stopped short of damaging my flesh. Sure, I got myself another poison damage stacked on top of the previous one, but at least it wasn't the one hit kill that I was expecting.
Breasal then raised his pike as I took that opportunity to empty the rest of the pistol's bullets into his open heart. At this distance, even with crappy pistol skill, even the most inept couldn't possibly miss that target.

Then as he swung down the blade of his pike, I threw the holy grenade into his open chest. I activated the active healing, filling my HP gauge as the holy grenade went off inside the open cavity of Breasal's chest.
I flew away from the impact of the holy grenade, which also threw Breasal back a few steps. I refilled my Sig's clip with holy bullets and with tears in my eyes, fired the last of my holy bullets at his heart and head. He staggered and he became a lot slower, but he still came closer, wielding his pike as a walking stick. There was no time to reload any of my weapons, and he was still faster than my running speed. So I took out my bowie knife, crossed the single step needed to reach him, and stabbed the knife into his heart.

I stabbed and stabbed, not even caring about anything else. It was either him or me. I'd rather that I was the one remaining alive.

Suddenly a dialogue box opened. That was weird, I had killed many bosses before, but this was the first time that I received a choice of something. I couldn't tell what the choices were supposed to be, as both the question and the answers were written in gaelic or celtic. Whatever, it's not like I can tell the difference. So I chose the one with bonus Purity reward. High Purity was always good.

In Armageddon, high Purity helps NPC interactions because they think you're the good guy.
You have decided to spare Breasal's life. Although Breasal was a pagan god, God would never ask his people to kill indiscriminately. Your willingness to grant forgiveness is an example to all who follow the way of the light. For this act of compassion, you have been granted 10 Purity.
"Are you freaking kidding me? What the hell did I waste my holy bullets for if I let him go now?!" I shouted at the game. Breasal said something in Irish again.
For your mercy, Breasal has granted you the power of nature. You can now enchant any bullets with poison damage on top of its original enchantments. The effectiveness of this skill improves with practice. You have acquired [Breasal's Bloodpact].
"Ah, that's better. So even if I use blessed bullets, it can also have poison enchantment," I said as the usual money rewards flowed in with the sound of coins being poured into a metal container.

Oh, the beautiful sound of money.

I left Breasal to recover on his own. Along the way to the boat, the [beast elves], [dire bears] and [unicorns] stayed out of my way, not even once challenging me. When I arrived at the boat, only Celixia and two of her party members were waiting. I asked her where the rest were and what happened to the others. She told me that they were all slaughtered within a couple of hours. She and her friends were all that remained. Still, she said her skills improved a lot in the past two hours. She seemed to think that she would be able to beat up C level monsters on her own now. We'll see.

So seeing as there was nobody else to wait for, we headed back to Ireland. As we left the mist, the hidden island of Hy-Brasil faded and disappeared. When we look back, it was like there was never anything there.
Back at the pier of Milltown Malbay, we said our goodbyes and parted ways. I think she had a little crush on me, but unfortunately for her, I'm straight. I wouldn't date a girl, ever.

She then greeted a group of people who waited at the town's warp crystal. It seemed like her party members who died during the Hy-Brasil excursion had already respawned and was waiting for her. Instead of friends, I was greeted by a monster instead.

In front of me, was The Monster. Yup, that same monster I killed in Trafalgar Square. That same monster that was so damned hard to kill, it required hundreds of players to weaken it before I managed to kill it with critical hits. Was this another event? Why haven't I heard of this? Or did it come to take revenge? Was there a 'revenge' event or something?

The Monster was definitely stronger and tougher than Breasal, the boss that took me an hour and a lot of holy bullets to kill. It was probably the strongest monster I had fought, probably even stronger than Asmodeus, which took the combined effort of 80 high level players to bring down. I stole a glance at the warp crystal behind me. If I started to run, I could possibly warp away before the monster could reach me. Last time I only won because a lot of players had already weakened it. No chance of that in this town filled with noobs.

I took a step back, which was copied by The Monster. I took another step, which was also copied by The Monster. But The Monster was twice my size and height. Its single step was bigger than three of my steps. With sweat pouring down my face in real life, I turned around and ran full speed towards the town's warp crystal as the townsfolk and low level players scattered in all directions.

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Tuesday 22 December 2015

Traps Are Delicious

Traps Are Delicious

Hi, I'm Rin. When the school I went to went bankrupt, I had to find another school to go to. The only choice left was a school that is so full and crowded, there's hardly any room to breathe. So with only one week left to change schools, I had to do something drastic. I picked the only other choice left, which is an all-girl's school. By the way, I'm a boy.

 

Have you ever feel like being in such a mess, that you have no idea what to do? Have you thought that, at some point, the problem that you've been putting off has been accumulating until it becomes too big for you to handle? Has said problem been plaguing you all night and day, that you stop thinking about anything but that problem?

Well, that's what happen to me. I must have been so preoccupied with my thoughts that I didn't realize I was...

You know... scratch that. I have absolutely no idea how I end up hanging by the concrete parapet at the end of the corridor of the 3rd floor of the school.

"HELP!" I cry out loud. I repeat it twice more as the strength of my fingers starts to slip.

Just as the strength in my fingers are about to fail, my arms are grabbed by two men, teachers. Slowly, with their middle-age strength, they pull me up, until half of my body is in the safezone. They finally let go of my arm once my feet touch the floor again.

It feels so great to have something under my feet again.

"Huff huff, why would you commit suicide, boy?" one of the teachers, a bespectacled man with a paunch belly ask.

"I wasn't trying to commit suicide. I was busy thinking and then - and then the next thing I realized, I was hanging by my hands on the other side of the parapet."

"Must be a very deep subject then. Do me a favour. Next time you think deeply about something, sit," the other teacher remarks before taking his leave.

"Follow me to my office, boy. Wait, I'm clearing my office. Follow me to the - err, I wonder where would be good. Just follow me," the bespectacled teacher commands.

I recall that he's not a teacher but is actually the school's student counsellor. I don't remember his name, though, having only been here for two days. So following his orders, we walk down the Academic Block A, across the canteen, through an area containing a swimming pool. Then through water...

Wait, I'm drowning!

Thankfully, the teacher pulls me out right before I am about to sink to the bottom.

"That's the second time today, boy! Don't choose a school that is almost closed to kill yourself!"

"I'm not trying to kill myself! I just fell."

"How could you fall into the swimming pool anyway?"

I seriously have no idea. "Err... it wasn't supposed to be there?"

"The swimming pool has been there for the past four years!"

"Well, I've never been here before!"

"You should still be able to see it!"

"Then it must be elves."

"Elves?"

"Or aliens. You know they're all over the place nowadays. Just the other day I found some aliens slurping curry noodles at a food stall near my house."

"I don't understand a single word of what you're saying... Well, we can't have you walk around with those wet clothess. Come with me, let's see if there's something for you to wear in the swimming club's changing room."

He then proceeds to rummage through all the boxes stacked to the ceiling, finding cheerleader uniforms, school swimsuits, and a bunch of girly costumes. It seems like the uniforms of every clubs in the school was stuffed here when they decided to close the school. I would love to see these uniforms in action on the bodies it was supposed to be put on.

"I'm sorry, it seems like there's only female uniforms here."

No way, seriously? What am I going to wear?

"Just give me the most normal-looking one. Why is it all female clothes anyway?"

"Most boys here joined clubs without a dresscode, but most clubs formed by girls were obsessed with getting their own separate uniforms. So I guess that's how we're burdened with having to deal with so many uniforms. Even the chess club had its own uniform if I recall correctly."

"Why does it all end up here? Why didn't they take it home?"

"Since they bought the uniforms with money given by the school, it belongs to the club, which in turned belongs to the school. I wish they had just taken it home, though. What am I going to do with all this stuff?"

"Sell it?" I suggest, while my eyes catch on to something that looks like a string bikini.

"Who's going to buy it?"

Perverts, maybe?

"And I'm in charge of this too! So troublesome - hey, I found a new set of school uniform. You can wear - oh, I forgot you're a boy."

In his hand is an unopened pack of school uniform. A girl's school uniform. In his other hand is also an unopened pack of school uniform. Why are they keeping school uniforms here? Do they sell school uniforms?

"Nevermind, just give it to me. I'm shivering."

"Are you sure? It's a girl's uniform. As a teacher, I shouldn't even be considering this in the first place."

"It's fine, just give it. It's not like you're forcing me to wear it, right?"

"Alright. Here, I'll wait outside."

"Thank you. I'll come out once I'm ready," I tell him as I start taking off my soaking white shirt.

******

"Done!" I announce as I come out wearing the full set of female uniform, the skirt of which barely reaches my knees. It's like a normal government school's girl's uniform, a white shirt and pinafore. The only difference is that the pinafore is red instead of the government's baby-blue.

"What's... with the wig?"

"Found it inside one of the boxes labelled 'theatre club'."

"No, I'm not asking you where you found it. I'm asking you why you're wearing it."

"I'm not going to walk around school looking like a pervert."

"I must not judge. I must not judge. I must not judge."

"What religious mantra are you chanting?"

"Nevermind, let's keep walking. Be careful not to fall into the swimming pool, a ditch or a toilet bowl."

Is that supposed to be a joke? I take off my white school shoes and white socks just in case. My original shoes and socks were drenched when I fell into the swimming pool, so I'm wearing a sports shoe and a pair of white thigh-high sports socks I found inside a box labelled 'lacrosse club'. Would be bad if I ruin these too, so walking bare-footed, I keep close behind the school counsellor.

He ignores me as he tries to open one door after another, most of which are locked. In the end, we come to a room labelled 'Student Records'. He takes out a bunch of keys and unlocks the door, gesturing me to follow him inside. It was a room with a lot of steel filing cabinets, two desks and two chairs. There is nothing else here.

"This is the counselling room?"

"As I've said, my office is being cleared. This is the only place that is both free and private. So please take a chair and let's talk."

"Is it fine? Aren't you clearing out your office?"

"It's fine. I still have a week left before I have to turn in my keys. What is your name again?"

"Azrin bin Ahmad Dan."

"Right, don't suppose you know your student ID number yet?"

I shake my head.

"That's fine. You've just moved in anyway." He enters my name into the computer.

I make a nod while being a little excited about wearing girl's school uniform in public. No, I'm not awakening any fetish. I'm not getting hard, either. My heart is just beating a little roughly.

"Alright, Azrin bin Ahmad Dan. 16 years old. Former student of Blue Sphere Private Academy." He gets up, goes to a particular cabinet and takes out a folder with my name on it. He places it on the desk without opening it. Then he looks into the computer screen, before looking at my appearance. He shakes his head.

"This is weird," he mutters.

"What's weird?"

"How you're looking so comfortable in the girl's uniform. Have you done this before? No, I'm not judging, just wondering."

"I have only two principles in this world."

"Oh? Mind telling me?"

"Be the best even if life puts me at the bottom! And if I am unable to do anything about it, I will just go with the flow."

"This is you going with the flow?"

"Correct!"

"Saying that so firmly... you're very confident, aren't you?"

"My confidence is higher than Mount Everest!"

The counsellor looks like he is restraining himself from making a frown, but then slowly forms a forced smile instead.

"So, Azrin, how about we have a little talk? How's school?

"What do you mean how's school? There's only three people in my whole class! And I'm one of them."

"Well, can't be helped. You entered the school shortly after the board of directors announced its closure. I wonder how your transfer even got approved."

"It was approved two months ago. I only stated that I would transfer after two months."

"Ah, I see. That wasn't mentioned here. I should probably add a comment - nah. Let's not bother."

"Is it okay to be so lazy?"

"What do you mean lazy? I'm about to be transferred. All because the principal was an idiot. Instead of reporting that he made bad decisions that made the school lose money, he kept it hidden and kept making even more bad decisions causing us to lose our reserve funds too!"

"Oh, so that's why the school is closing."

"Don't tell anyone you heard it from me. But let's talk about you."

"What do you want to know?"

"Did you make any friends in school?"

"You mean those scrawny geeks? I couldn't summon the mood to make small talks. I can imagine why they'd want to stay as long as possible in an empty school instead of going to a new school where they'll get bullied."

"Scrawny geeks, you say? According to the academic records from your old school, your grades were in the top five. Do you not identify yourself as a geek as well?"

"Hell no! No single word can identify me. I am all rounded, good at everything, bad at nothing!"

"Yet you almost drowned in the swimming pool."

"I was caught off-guard! Anyway, my point is, I do not identify myself as a geek because I don't spend all my time studying. I have a wide range of interest."

"I see. I'm sensing some resentment in this term 'geek'. Did something happen in the past that-"

"Hey! No psychoanalyzing me!"

"I'm a school counsellor. Psychoanalyzing students is my job."

"Well anyway, I'm not a geek."

"I see, so how do you identify yourself in five words or less?"

"Confident! Mature! Handsome! Smart! Motivated!"

"I... see.... You are indeed very confident." He enters some stuff into the computer. "If you are granted one wish, what would it be?"

"World domination!"

"Alright. What is your favourite colour?

"Red!"

"From one to nine, what's your favourite number?"

"Two!"

"May I ask why?"

"Being first grabs too much attention. I can be at the top without having to deal with the hassle of being first place."

"I see, antisocial, huh?"

"I'm NOT antisocial!"

"If a boy slipped on a banana peel, what would you do?"

"I'd laugh at him!"

"What if it's a girl?"

"I'd still laugh at her!"

"What would you consider as humanity's greatest strength?"

"The fact that humans just won't die."

"No such answer. Please choose between 'integrity', 'courage', 'honesty', 'loyalty', 'cooperation' and 'ingenuity'.

"Umm, ingenuity?"

"What is your choice of reading material? Literary literature, comics, fiction novels, science journals."

"Science fiction."

"Fiction novels then. If you were given a million dollars. What would be the first thing you would spend it on?

"Gold and Land."

"I guess 'house' would be closest."

"Hey, what are you doing?"

"An egg or a chicken. Which comes first?"

"Chicken."

"Is that a confident answer or just something along the line of 'I think so'?"

"Confident answer."

"'Definitely chicken' then. Alright. "You are an evil genius! You are smart, passionate to a fault and have good imagination. As an evil genius, people rely on you to make accurate assessments and decisions. You may not always be 'the leader' as your passion can sometimes get in the way, but we can say with absolute certainty that you're always 'the boss' of the group."

"Hey, did you just make me do an online personality quiz?

"Yes, I did. Now time to copy this and paste it into your psychiatric evaluation."

"Hey, don't half-ass my psychiatric evaluation you quack of a counsellor!"

"Get real. It's not like anyone can be motivated working in a school that is going to be closed in a week."

"I think you're the one who should be getting a psychiatric evaluation."

"Haa? You have something to say? Huh?" He took a deep breath. "Alright, fine. Lets talk about your home life then."

"I have a mother. My parents are divorced."

"Do you want to talk about the divorce?"

"No."

"Any siblings?"

"None, there's only the two of us."

"I see. How would you describe your home life?"

"Lonely!"

"Don't say it like it's the best thing in the world!"

"Well, it's not like I can do anything about it. My mother's working away from home at the moment, so I spend every day alone. What is this for, though?"

"Hum? Every student is expected to have at least an entry on their psychiatric evaluation section. You're going to need this when you enter District 24 High School."

"Ah... about that! Can I not go to District 24?"

"If you're worried about being accepted, there's no need to trouble yourself. They received specific orders from the Ministry of Education to accept any of our students that applies to join their school."

"No, it's not about being accepted. I just don't like the school. Is there any other school that I can go to?"

"What's wrong with it?"

"What ISN'T wrong with it? I've visited it once. It's crowded, stuffy, small and geeks get bullied there a lot!"

"I thought you don't consider yourself a geek?"

"That's beside the point! My point is it's a terrible excuse of a school!"

"I'm sure there are worse schools that District 24."

"Yeah, in Bangladesh! Instead of sending everyone to District 24, the ministry should've poured money into this school and keep it open instead."

"It was considered, but there are legal issues with keeping this particular school open."

"I want to go to another school! NOT District 24!"

"Some of our students did choose to transfer to two other schools. They're the only schools that will process the application within a few days. All other schools will take from a month to three months to process transfer applications. They've also loosened their protocols concerning students from our school."

"What school?"

"Bestari Setia."

"Alright, get me into that!" Bestari schools are considered the best schools in the country, offering the best curriculum, the best equipments and the best teachers.

"No can do. They're full."

Of course, being the most elite government-funded school means it's also the most sought after school.

"Then why are you even suggesting that?!"

"You asked for the name."

"What about the other one, then?"

"Well that... there is a problem. You don't have the right equipment. Though... you would probably be able to pull it off, looking like this."

"What? What do you mean?"

"The other school is St. Catherine High School. It's an all -girls school. Which means you have absolutely no chance of entering that school, even looking like this."

"All-girls school?"

"Yes, arguably the best in the whole region actually, even better than Bestari schools. With your grades alone, you will definitely be able to enter. It's even possible to get a scholarship if you ace their entrance exam. But all these are pointless arguments because you're a boy."

"Is there no other choice?"

"You can apply for other schools, but you will have to go to District 24 before you receive their reply. Since I'll be transferred to another school, you'll have to do this yourself. Oh, those idiots. I've told them to keep watch on the ink gauge! Well, try to think about it while I go get a refill for the printer." the counsellor says so as he leave the room.

Think about it, you say? But I've already thought about it. I'm definitely not going to District 24. Transferring to other schools will require my mother's signature, and she's not around to give me that. Even if I can get my mother's signature, I will still be required by law to go to school in the meantime, which means I'll still have to enter District 24. In the case of St. Catherine, I won't be able to enter since I'm not a girl. So what to do?

I pace back and forth in the room, as the skirt swishes around my legs. Then I see the reflection of myself on the window. I can't tell who it is at first, but after a few seconds I realize that it's me. I look no different from a girl. With this, a thought enters my head and I act on it without a second thought.

I cross over to the other side of the desk. Without sitting, I look over the student information displayed on the computer and navigate to the Personal Information tab. The space where my profile picture should've been is empty, showing the words N/A. I quickly change my name from Azrin bin Ahmad Dan to Azrin binti Ahmad Dan and tick female under gender subheader. I change every gender-sensitive pronouns into female before pressing 'update' and returning the display to 'psychiatric evaluation' tab. Then I open the folder on the desk and take out the first page, the Personal Information, crumple it and stuff it into one of my shoes.

I have only taken a seat for four seconds before the counsellor enters. He sits on the chair on the other side of the desk and skillfully changes the printer's ink cartridge in just seconds. Then he turns back to the computer screen and the printer starts printing shortly after.

He sighs when he opens the folder. "Clerks! I know the school is almost closed, but at least do your job properly!"

Then he goes back to the screen, clicks, and instead of printing the Personal Information page, his eyes catch something on the screen. He instantly snorts at what he sees. He looks me up and down while the corners of his lips attempts to turn upwards on his face.

No way, am I busted?

But instead of outing me, with his lips trembling as if unsure whether to laugh, frown or act natural, he asks, "Would you like to take a picture for your school profile?"

"Huh?"

He takes out a smartphone and snaps a picture of me looking dumbfounded. Then he connects the smartphone to the computer and transfers the picture into my personal school profile. Meanwhile, I just sit quietly not understanding what just happened.

With a straight face, he says, "It's late, you should go home now. I'll be around tomorrow in case you want to talk about anything else. Heheheh."

With that said, he pushes me out of the record's room.

With my borrowed shoes and socks on, I walk back to class to pick up my school bag and return home. It's just as I walk past the threshold of the school gate that I realize I'm walking in my new female uniform. Feeling panic, I run back to the swimming club's clubroom and turn the knob. It is locked.

Noooo!!!

After repeated attempts to pick the lock or find another way to get in, I give up. I'll just have to pick up my male uniforms tomorrow, when the teachers unlock the clubroom. Or if it is still locked, I'll have to find that counsellor and ask him to unlock it for me.

Which means walking home in this female uniform. It's fine. I'll be fine. This is training. I'm going to enter St. Catherine. I need the training.

******

Next Monday, almost a week later, I stand before the massive gates of St. Catherine Girl's School. Wearing my Mahmud Baginda High School girl's uniform, I steel my heart and walk into the school that I will be attending for the next two years.

"You over there!"

Crap! Have I been found out? I've only been here for five steps.

I slowly turn my face towards the voice. It is a pony-tailed girl, holding a paper fan in her right hand and wearing an armlet with the letters DC written on it on her upper left arm. DC should stand for discipline council, so maybe she's a prefect?

"Why didn't you register yourself with the guard post?"

"Eh? I still have to register with the guard post? Sorry it's my first day here, I don't know the rules."

I had received the School Rules booklet along with the acceptance letter. If you're expecting me to read all twenty pages of it, though, you don't know me all that well. I hate rules. My personal motto is "Break The Rules, And Get Away With It".

"Your first day? Are you a transfer student?"

"Yes, my name is Azrin Ahmad Dan. This is my first day here. Do I still have to register with the guard post?"

"You should have received a name tag alongside the acceptance letter."

Oh, I did receive it. I forgot all about it, should be in my bag somewhere... "Here!"

"Wear it everywhere until you receive your new uniform and identification wallet."

"Okay," I say as I clip the name tag between the slight swells on the chest part of my school uniform. In case you're wondering, these are silicone falsies a certain neighbour let me borrow. I haven't changed gender yet. Wait, what am I saying? I will NEVER change my gender!

"May I ask, where should I go for now?"

"Meet up with your homeroom teacher. Who is it?"

"Miss Arreana."

She pointed at the closest building. "First floor, Door Number 4. If she's not there, ask the other teachers where she may be."

"Thanks a lot for your help."

"Big sister Sofia."

"Pardon?"

"I'm your senior. So you must call me big sister. And my name is Sofia."

If you're my senior, then you're only a year older, aren't you? I doubt you're a Form 6. Those people's existence are separate from Form 4 and Form 5 students, like me and her. Besides, calling someone unrelated to me as 'big sister' is kind of disgusting. Still, making enemies on my first day of school will be bad for the rest of my days at school. So let's just admit defeat this once.

"Thanks, big sister-"

"Arissa! I've told you many times don't shorten your skirt!"

"Eeek! It's Demon Sofia!" The girl called Arissa squeals before shooting off in the general direction of the academic buildings followed closely by Sofia who is brandishing her paper fan.

******

"Class, we have a new student today. She's from the now-closed Mahmud Baginda High School. Please introduce yourself, Azrin. Make it short."

I look at all 16 female students in the class, take a deep breath and start my introduction.

"Hi everyone, I'm Azrin Ahmad Dan. Please just call me Rin. I live in Subang Jaya. Pleased to meet you," I introduce myself with a cheerful female voice. Well, I don't actually do anything much with my voice, really. A certain neighbour told me that it was fine, and that it wasn't masculine in the first place. It was kind of a punch in the gut, really.

I stand in front, expecting some questions, but, strangely, everyone is quiet. Serene, even.

No way! Did they found out from my mannerism? Or was my voice masculine after all? Could it be that a certain neighbour pranked me? If that's true, I will beat her up repeatedly with a soda bottle when I go back. Assuming of course, I'm not going to be sent to the police in the first place.

"There's an empty seat next to Lilia. You can sit there, Azrin."

"Yes, teacher," I speak with a small voice, fearing that I am going to be revealed as a boy at any time.

Homeroom continues for ten more minutes before Miss Arreana concludes it by telling me to meet her after class for my school entry exam and to pick up my new school uniform. The whole time, I'm sitting on pins and needles wondering when I will suffer punishment for crossdressing in a girl's school. When the teacher leaves the class though, the class suddenly erupts in cheers and the class mood improves immediately. Most of them even come and introduce themselves to me.

From them, I learn that Miss Arreana is extremely strict and expects absolutely noble composure from her students. Anyone who shows any act that is considered unbecoming of young ladies will get the paddle. Yes, they still allow the use of a paddle in this school! So that is the reason for all the serene faces in the class.

Phew, so I didn't actually screw up. Certain neighbour, you're safe from retaliation for now.

"Get back to your seats. Miss Maya's class is about to start," a girl with blondish hair and slightly caucasian face speaks to the girls surrounding me. She is the one who sits at the table in front of me.

By the way, my seat is in the last row.

"You're such a spoilsport Aerfean," a girl by the name of Nadia pouts.

"Aerfean? Are you a foreigner?" I ask.

"My father is Welsh, my mother is Malay. Now put away your stuff. Next lesson is math. Miss Maya Rosacea is the teacher."

And so I spend the first day at an all-girl's school as a girl. Not that it's anything new. I spent three days at Mahmud Baginda as a girl as well. So it's not big deal. I can handle it. I'm not paranoid.

My two remaining teachers at Mahmud Baginda gave me strange glances at first, but never asked questions. My remaining classmates meanwhile, couldn't care less. They probably didn't even notice that their male classmate had turned into female classmate.

At the end of the school day, I visit my homeroom teacher for the entrance exam and receive my new school uniform. They're three sets consisting of white shirt, plaid skirt and blazers. I've never been so excited about getting girl's clothes. No, I'm still not awakening any secret desires. Please don't lump me in with all the perverts who did this for sexual gratification. This is work. Work!

Later at night, I show my new school uniform to a certain neighbour, who proceeds to give me a full hair extension therapy and facial care for a discount while saying things like "Kyaaa! That's so nice!", "You're too cute, Rin-chan!" and "Leave it to big sister, I'll make you the cutest trap in the whole world!"

Her enthusiasm kind of terrifies me. So I only go so far as to allow her to style my hair following her preference. I draw the line when she offers to attach a bigger pair of silicone breasts to my chest.

You're wondering what my uniform looks like? Well, it's a maroon blazer over a white shirt. There's also a similar checkered maroon coloured plaid skirt that goes along with it. A certain neighbour made me wear a ribbon too on top of everything. I obliged her, as I knew I would still need her help in the future.

Routes

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