Firm: Opal’s Story

It’s heavy and dark.

Wait, I’m heavy and it’s dark.

I can’t see anything…

Ah right! I need to open my eyes.

The world of sight opens up to me and my first thoughts about it I speak aloud “It’s very green.”

I’m lying on my back looking up at countless, spectacularly green leaves. I don’t know why I think it’s spectacular but it is.

I feel a small wetness rolling down the side of my face and head from the corner of my eye. A tear I suppose. Strange.

It’s still heavy, I feel heavy and not in the emotional sense. Well maybe if the tear was anything to go by, a little emotional. I’m not sure why. I can’t think of any reason I’d be sad… or heavy really. I lift an arm so I can look at it. My arm is very white, even whiter than the leaves are green. My hands don’t look heavy, they look… beautiful? I wiggle my digits around.“Am I vain?” I ask the leaves but they don’t respond. Typical.

I look to my left and then to my right.

I see a lot of trees. Luckily only the leaves are so green, it all comes together into a very.. thick forest look. Well, except me I suppose. The rest of me seems to be just as white as my arms… Oh wait! I sit up and look down at myself. “Ooph” a breath escapes me as I fight my heaviness. Not all of me is white after all, what a great discovery! Looking down at myself I see two spots of pink on my white chest. “Fancy” I mutter as I poke one of my pink colored nipples. “Definitely vain.” I inform the leaves of my deduction. As my head moves forward to see past my breasts I spot black hair falling to my side.

Ohh! My hair is also not white! I grab a bunch of it and bring it in front of my face so I can get a closer look. It’s very black. I wave it around and it swishes back and forth in front of me. I seem to have a lot of it too, it comes down to my belly button. I poke it. I wonder why it’s called a button, if anything it should be an anti-button. Curious. A little bit below said belly anti-button is a separate black patch of the hair but shorter and lonely. I pat it. “That’s ok hair patch, I’m lonely too. We can be lonely together.” I console it. Hmm? Am I lonely? Weird.

If I’m lonely I just have to find other people and make friends! I stand up a little slower than my enthusiasm would demand… Still heavy. Perhaps I’m just tired, I was lying down. Not sure what I was doing before that. Maybe something strenuous, like teaching stuck up leaves a lesson. Now that I’m standing I feel high, or was it tall? Yeah, tall. I look down at the ground. “Ha, take that dirt. Shorty.”

A leaf falls and lands on the dirt, consoling it and hiding its shame.

“Hmph.” I turn away from their dramatic display.

I go back to inspecting myself, turning around to see the butt I was just sitting on. It’s also very white like most of the rest of me it seems. I grab it and give it a good grip. I can’t grab it all at once it seems. Is it why I’m heavy? I shake it a bit… probably not. I hastily brush off the dirt I spotted on it, hoping nobody saw it getting intimate with my flawless posterior. I look around again. Luckily the trees are dumb and can’t tell anyone.

Suddenly I can’t move, I’m frozen in place.

Did I get caught? Am I too heavy?

No, I see a falling leaf stuck in mid air. That doesn’t make sense. Right?

I can’t talk either it seems, just like the dumb trees. Am I dumb too?

I try really hard to wiggle even a little bit.

Ding!

Oh! Did I..

Something blue fills my vision. A box.. a screen, that’s a flat box right? It has writing.

Duh Flatbox.

Ding!

The previous screen disappears and a new one pops up in my face. Is it mad I called it flatbox?

“Aww, Thanks Flatbox.” Oh, I’m unstuck. I wiggle really hard. Much better but flatbox left me alone again with the shrubs. Well it did say new players should think Menu. Is that me? Am I a new player?

If so what am I playing? Too many questions and I can’t ask the slow foliage for answers.

Ding!

Another blue message assaults my forest filled vision.

I have to choose a class? Do I know what that is? “Hey Flatbox, what’s a class?” I ask it…

No response. The same class options are still in front of me.

I think I like fighting so Fighter sounds good right off the bat, I also like my body.

Not sure I’m smart enough to trick stuff other than short dirt and dumb trees, so that’s a no for Thief probably. I look around again and I’m still the only person around here unless the forest counts as help. So Healer is out too. Fighting with magic might be fun, but I think I’ll go with the coolest option, my body.. I mean “Fighter please Flatbox!”

Ding!

Flatbox leaves again. What was it? I think Menu and I hear Flatbox’s chime.

Ding!

I can summon it!

Ok, so when I think Menu this shows up. Status then?

Opal, such a good name. Why is it a good name you ask?

I don’t remember… but it’s mine and it sounds pretty. What more could a body fighter ask for? “Ahaha!” I laugh into the green above me. It rustles in the wind, terrified at my awesome name. Oh right I forgot to tell it. It’s dumb anyways, it probably wouldn’t understand.

I shouldn’t be too mean to the leaves. I am 20 after all, older than them. I can still make fun of dirt though since I doubt I’m older than that shorty.

Right! I figured out how the menu works, lots of thinking. Should be easy for me then. I nod to myself, satisfied with my own intelligence. 5 is probably really good. I even think I know what most of this blue screen means… maybe. Free points?

Ding!

So I use free points on my stats, to get a class skill or to unlock another class? I only have 4 right now so do I spend them on stats or do I save them for the other stuff? Well it’s not making me choose now like the class so I’ll wait. Back to the Menu then and then...Class.

Ding!

Oh, so that’s why some of my stats are higher than the other ones. My health and stamina are also higher than my mana but it doesn’t mention them in the per level bonuses. Maybe they are based on my other stats, or it’s mentioned in the Skills menu? Can I just go straight there without going back to Menu first? Skills.

Ding!

“Yay!” I celebrate, doing a little wiggle. It worked, that should save me some thinking in the future. Now what does any of this do? I can guess that passive means I don’t have to do anything for it to work and active means it has to be activated. Magic is for mage stuff most likely but I’m a body fighter so I can ignore it. Do I activate it with thinking like the menu? Power Attack.

I feel a weird tingle but it doesn’t do anything else. Ohhh strange, I suddenly have the urge to hit something. Urge isn’t the right word. I feel like Power Attack wants me to hurt something with it so I walk over to a tree and slap it for being slow. I don’t tell it it’s dumb though, Power Attack doesn’t want me to hurt its feelings. My palm connects with the tree’s bark, producing a loud thunk sound.

The tingle is gone now so I inspect the bark. I can see my hand print in it. Is that good? I don’t know but I feel better. “Does that make me a violent person?” I ask the wolf as it bites my beautiful white ankle with its nasty slobber mouth. It growls incoherently. Typical.