Frostbitten Wayfarer

Zoe finished catching up with Joe and then started making her way towards Emma’s tower. He had a good point. He always did, Zoe knew. She wasn’t sure what she’d do if she hadn’t met Joe when she was stranded in this world alone. Maybe she would have stumbled onto some other kind person that would have helped her.

Most of the people she’d met seemed nice enough, but she didn’t meet them first. She met Joe, and she couldn’t be more appreciative of what he’d done for her. Of what he continued to do for her.

Whether Moaning Point or some random forest, or some town that’d she’d never been to before, Zoe would probably enjoy herself just as much. There was no reason to tunnel vision on Moaning Point so much, to stick herself to it and decide that it was the most important thing for her now.

That just took out so much of the fun of exploring, of discovering things and learning new skills. She didn’t need to worry about her friends mortal lives, she just needed to appreciate them. Everything seemed so clear to her after the talk with Joe. She laughed at how silly she’d been before.

Why would she rush off to Moaning Point in the hopes of rushing through things and accomplishing greatness overnight. The world had so many more things to see, so many more things to do. She could spend a few years mastering her skills, playing with her enchantments, checking out all of the classes there were to offer.

And if Emma and Joe died before she managed to find a way to make them immortal? Then that would suck. A lot. But that was part of life. Neither of them would be happy if Zoe ran herself ragged pushing herself just in the hopes of finding a solution. Hell, Joe wasn’t interested even if she did find a solution.

Emma’s place looked quite a bit different to how she remembered it. The tall black tower still stood in the middle of her large yard. But a vibrant garden replaced the previous drab green grass. There were a couple fruit trees planted, one that looked like Ifosa and another that looked like oranges. Green bushes bustling with herbs buffeted her nose with scents, and the stone walkway that led to the frontdoor now weaved throughout the garden.

Zoe walked up to the door and rapped the knocker. Some cluttering noises resounded from behind the door and shortly after, Emma opened the door. When she saw Zoe, her face lit up with a smile and she rushed in for a hug.

“Zoe!" Emma shouted. ”I thought you were going to be gone for so much longer.“

“Me too.” Zoe smiled.

Emma walked back inside and led Zoe upstairs to the kitchen.

“So? How’d it go? Tell me everything.”

“Hmmm. It was good. Lots of zombies.” Zoe sat down at the table and summoned a couple of her venison wraps. “I made a bunch of these. That was probably the highlight, if I’m being honest.”

Emma grabbed one and took a bite, then laughed. “Of course you would think making some bland venison wraps would be the highlight.”

Zoe rolled her eyes. “They’re pretty good for what I had to work with. Why did you let me go without any salt? We talked about it on our final exam, too. Bring salt. And then I didn’t bring salt!”

Emma laughed. “Yeah, we did, didn’t we? I can give you what I’ve got now if you want?”

“No it’s fine, thanks though. I’ll just remember to buy a whole bunch before I leave again.” Zoe said.

“When’s that gonna be then? You heading back right away?” Emma asked.

Zoe shook her head. “No, I talked with Joe and I dunno. I enjoyed it, I guess. I liked seeing the numbers getting bigger, but that’s all it was. There was no excitement. Other than the last day, but that was more of the dangerous excitement than the fun excitement.”

“Ooh? Share. What happened on the last day?" Emma asked.

“Okay, so I wanted to find my limit before I left, right? I didn’t wanna come back without even seeing as much as I could have. At the second stage there were these smarter, tool using zombies. Sometimes they had armour, so I wanted to try and take out one of the armoured zombies myself head on.” Zoe explained.

“Couldn’t handle one?” Emma asked.

Zoe shook her head. “I think I could have, looking back on it. I just wasn’t prepared. I grabbed the zombie’s attention and it rushed me down while it brought some of its friends along. Smashed right into my shield and sent me tumbling down the mountain a bit.

“I panicked and didn’t know what to do, so I just tried to escape as quick as I could. I think that I could have dealt with it if I just calmed down first, but it’s really scary, y’know?”

Emma nodded. “I’ve never been, but I can imagine, yeah. Like when a boar’s rushing you down on your first hunt.”

Zoe nodded. “Yeah, exactly like that. I could have handled it if I was better prepared, if I knew what I should do. If I calmed down, I could have handled it. But I didn’t, so that’s a moot point. At least I know that’s a problem for me now.”

“So what’s the plan now?" Emma asked.

“Well before you interrupted me, I was going to say that I’m probably going to stick around here in Flester for a few years. Maybe head out to Korna. I liked the exploring part, learning about Gafoda and seeing what was there was fun. But once I knew, continuing on felt more like a job than anything else. Kinda pointless.” Zoe chuckled.

Emma nodded her head. “Well I’m glad you’ll be around for a while then.”

“Enough about me though, what have you been up to? I noticed the garden, it’s really pretty.” Zoe asked.

“I thought it might be fun to start a garden. Had a mage come out and set it up a few weeks ago. I really like it, honestly.” Emma said.

“Yeah it seems really nice. I had a garden back at home, too. It’s really relaxing.” Zoe said.

“Mhm. It is. Plus, it’s really nice going out and grabbing some fruit for a snack or herbs to cook with. Something about it just feels so much better than when I bought them.” Emma laughed.

“It does, right? Food you grew yourself always tastes better.” Zoe said.

Emma nodded. “Other than that, life’s been pretty boring. Lots of work lately though while we’re prepping for barlahai. I started talking with my mum again, too.”

“Oh did you? How’s that going?” Zoe asked.

Emma shrugged. “It’s okay. She’s tried reaching out to me every so often ever since I moved out. And I always just tried to ignore her. After what she did to you I couldn’t bring myself to really want her in my life anymore.

“But then you left, and it was honestly kinda lonely.” Emma said.

“Oh I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to-” Zoe started.

“No, no I’m not upset at you. It was just that before I moved out, mum and dad were always around. And then after I moved out, you were always around. I’d never really been totally alone like that before, not really. And it wasn’t even that bad. I’m making it sound a lot worse than it was. It was just like, suddenly I realized that all I have are my work friends and that’s it.

“So when my mum tried reaching out again, I figured what the heck. It’s been a long time, I’ll give her another chance at least. And it went okay. We met up at that sandwich shop you like so much, and we had a good conversation. She feels really bad about what she did now.

“But part of me thinks that she only feels bad about it because it ruined her relationship with me. I don’t know if she really understands what she did wrong or not. She wants to apologize to you though, if you’re up for talking someday? No pressure though of course.” Emma asked.

Zoe thought about it for a moment. She’d gotten quite a few levels since she last met Emma’s mom, but she still hadn’t caught up. And that’s not even counting whatever levels Emma’s mom has gotten in the past few years. If she wanted to attack Zoe, then Zoe would be just as helpless as she was before she knew.

But on the other hand, Emma was her friend and if her mom really was trying to be better then Zoe didn’t want to stand in the way of their relationship being fixed.

“Sure, I can do that, I think.” Zoe said.

“You sure? It’s okay if you don’t wanna, I’ll just tell her you’re busy or something. Really it’s totally okay if you don’t wanna.” Emma pushed.

Zoe nodded. “Yeah, I’ll meet her and talk. No promises that I forgive her though. Like I get why she did it, but I still don’t like it and it was super scary.”

“Of course not!” Emma waved her hands in front of her face. “I’d never make you forgive her. Thanks, Zoe.”

“No problem. I’m happy to help you out. How’s Oliver been doing?” Zoe asked.

“He’s great. Been finding lots of places to hide lately though, not sure where he is.” Emma laughed. “Have you rethought your Alacrity? Wanna get Haste again?”

“No, Alacrity’s been nice. I did end up finding a few combinations of enchantments that are cool though.”

“Share, share. I want all the details.” Emma pried.

Zoe shared everything that happened while she was in Gafoda and Moaning Point.

“I never would have expected the enchanting class to be so strong, to be honest. It definitely fit you, but that’s surprisingly versatile.” Emma said.

Zoe nodded. “Mhm. It was really strong. I just took it cause I thought it would have some good magic bonuses that would help my healing, plus some extra levels into vitality. But it ended up working out really well. Maybe something else would have been better offensively, but honestly after playing with Enchanted Mirror I don’t know if I could go back to having to enchant absolutely everything manually again.”

“You could always just not enchant things, you know?” Emma asked smugly.

Zoe gasped in shock. “What a terrible fate you wish upon me!”

Emma laughed. “Yeah yeah, you like your enchanting. The rest of us get by just fine though, you know?”

“You really should give it a try someday, honestly. I could teach you if you want?” Zoe asked.

“I think we’ve talked about this before, haven’t we?” Emma asked.

“Maybe?” Zoe shrugged.

“I might be interested, but it just doesn’t really excite me is all. I like more active things. Make bow, shoot bow. That’s good. The whole sitting down and manipulating my mana is really not for me.” Emma explained.

“Right, yeah I think you have mentioned that before. I still think it’s a really useful skill, though.” Zoe said.

“Come back and teach me about skills when you catch up to my level, miss still twenty-nine.” Emma said.

Zoe gasped in shock again. “I can’t believe you would invade my privacy with such a terrible skill!”

“Do you not identify people?” Emma asked.

“No, I mean I do. But I try not to use any information gathering or manipulating skills on friends at least.” Zoe explained.

“Like your empathy?" Emma asked.

Zoe nodded.

“I don’t mind anyway. If you know how I’m feeling or what level I am that makes no difference to me.” Emma shrugged.

Zoe identified Emma. She’d made it to level forty-three, progressing even faster than Zoe had been somehow. Though, she doubted that Emma had as many skill levels as Zoe did.

“Fair enough I guess. I’m not sure that Identify’s all that useful of a skill anyway, to be honest. Well, outside of enchantments.” Zoe said.

“How so?” Emma asked.

“Well I mean, I fought the level thirty some odd zombies and I was handling them pretty easily. Even the thirty-six I could’ve handled if I was just better prepared. That’s higher than me and I was totally fine against them, other than just being a little inexperienced.

“Even if they got to level forty five or so, I don’t think the raw stat points would have made the difference. They still would have been too slow and easy. Like even you at level forty-three are probably weaker than me on a pure numbers level, no offense.”

“None taken. Probably true, too.” Emma shrugged. “You’ve got way better class bonuses than me, overall. And higher level skills, too. I don’t get to bypass the level cap like you do.”

“Exactly! And I don’t wanna be so arrogant to think that I’m some special chosen one with the best classes. Other people absolutely have or know about Patient Decider, and have amazing starting classes. That can’t possibly be unique to me. And if the dungeons are just going to create things with classes already, then why couldn’t it create things with weak or strong classes?” Zoe spewed.

“I mean it still gives you at least some kind of framework though. At least you know how many classes somebody has.” Emma said.

“Okay that’s a whole different can of worms. Why the hell is my third class not called my second class? Why is my first class actually my second class? Joe told me about it forever ago, and it made sense. Mostly. Until I actually had my third class. And then ever since whenever I’m thinking about my class it’s always just the next class or the Enchanting class. Why is it so stupid?” Zoe ranted.

Emma laughed. “It is kinda stupid, isn’t it?”

“It’s so! Stupid!” Zoe shouted.

“I never really thought about it much. Got my first class when I was seven years old, my third class just a few years ago. It’s just the way it is, I guess.” Emma said.

“It’s so annoying, oh my god. You have no idea. I look at my stat sheet and it says class three. Which is the second class I picked. Which is the class after my first class. Class three. The one after my first class. That’s so stupid. Why.” Zoe ranted.

Emma laughed some more. “It’s not that bad. You’ve got the first class you pick and then all the classes the system gives you.”

“No. It’s stupid and I hate it. Anyway, I’m gonna head over to that bookstore I told you about to maybe pick up a new book if you wanted to come along?” Zoe asked.

“Yeah sure, that sounds like fun. Hopefully he’s actually there today.” Emma said.

“We’ll go buy some salt if he isn’t. Also if he isn’t. Lets get the salt first.” Zoe said.