The next day, we found that Doug had run off to find his friends. Apparently he wanted to live with them while we were in the city. He’d thrown out vague promises that he would come play with us later, but secretly I hoped he’d stay at arm’s length.

So with just Elena and I left, we wandered off towards where I knew there was a cheap apartment complex. Guess we were going to be roomies for the time being. I could have done worse, and since she knew about my… situation, she might be able to help me navigate womanhood. God that was a weird sentence to say, even in my own head.

Wait. Oh no. As we were walking, I blurted in a suddenly worried whisper, “Elena, do girls get periods inside the game?”

My new friend stared at me like I’d lost my mind for a moment, then broke out in a fit of coughing laughter. “No— no, cutie, you don’t need to worry about that.”

Heat flamed across my cheeks, both at her reaction, and also because of the little pet name she’d used for me. It caused all sorts of funny feelings to curl lazily and comfortably in my stomach.

“Shut up,” I grumble, unable to come up with a comeback that’s even remotely serviceable.

“Hey, don’t be like that, Roomie,” she laughed again, putting her arm around my shoulders. The contact sent goosebumps all over my body. Damn, she was a lot bigger than me.

“You’re being very flirty,” I frowned, glancing up at her.

She shrugged, her smile a combination of apologetic, happy, and unabashed. “I’m a flirty person, at least with pretty girls like you. I’m gay, by the way. If you didn’t realise that already.”

“No, I was completely clueless,” I said with deadpan sarcasm. “I thought you were straight. Even when you kissed me while I look like this. That’s just a super het thing to do, kissing other girls.”

“Goodness, you’re a sassy little one aren’t you?” she grinned.

I huffed in response, but I also, again, couldn’t think of anything else to say in reply. I had no idea how to handle being flirted with in this way. I was so used to taking the… the dominant side when there was flirting or whatever. Now, here Elena was, proving that not only did I enjoy being on this end, but that I was completely inept. Ah well, at least it was the type of flirting where two friends find each other hot, and not some deep spiral into love. I was less than interested in that right now.

****

Ardgour, like every town and city inside the game, had several different player housing areas of various levels. Some were what we called real-space housing, which was when the house existed within the actual game world. Then there was folded-space housing, which was usually the low end kind, and existed within its own instance, only the door having physical representation within the game world.

The place we arrived at was one of the folded-space variety. It was a three storey tall circular place, with a diameter that was three times its height. I didn’t know the exact measurements. Its roof was the same as most buildings, covered in grass and small trees, along with some pretty little hangout areas.

The entrance to the building was a low, circular door that nevertheless dwarfed me. I allowed myself a private smile when I realised that I’d be bumping my head on things a whole lot less in this character.

Elena pushed the door open for me again, something she’d been doing since Doug’s stunt with the chair. I think she was trying to prove she was chivalrous too. I just thought it was funny, and sort of endearing.

Once inside, however, she appeared at a loss. “Uh… so who do we talk to?”

The foyer was nice and cosy, with wooden panelled walls that had been plastered over. The supports were thick beams of dark oak, each one looking older than I was. Opposite us, there was a desk with a massive tome of a book resting on its worn surface, but nobody was sitting at the chair behind it.

“The fold homes in Rell are a bit outside of the lore, so there’s no NPC. We can just head over there to the desk and use the book there. It should list all the vacant apartments and what they cost.” I explained to Elena, taking her hand so I could lead her over to the book.

Flipping back to the contents page of the book, I traced a finger down the artfully cursive text until I found the two bedroom apartments. Page sixteen. Okay. Flipping there, I began to read through each listing, trying to find one that wasn’t taken and sounded nice. In the interests of variety, no two apartments were the same, right down to the amenities they came with.

“Uh, what does that mean?” Elena asked, interrupting my train of thought.

Glancing over at the listing she was pointing to, I found myself amused by a rather odd feature that the apartment advertised.

“It means exactly what it says on the tin,” I chuckled, glancing up at my friend before I continued. “That apartment apparently has a nature inspired bathtub. It’s probably made of rocks and stuff, with moss and ferns or whatever. I think I’ve seen one before. Weird that it's in a place as cheap as that, though. Looks like it also has a really nice kitchen too, and a… wow, a little library? Wait, and a skylight? What the hell… why is this so cheap?”

No sooner had I asked that question, however, than my wandering finger found the answer. The bedrooms were actually just nooks off the side of the main living room. Granted, we could just buy some privacy screens, but still. We’d be living on top of each other if we decided to get the place.

Tapping the information I’d found, I glanced back at Elena and raised an inquisitive eyebrow. I didn’t think I would mind too much, but she was the one who’d spent her whole life as a girl, not me. I didn’t want to pressure her into anything she’d be uncomfortable with.

“That could be fun…” she mused. “It could also blow up in our faces, if we aren’t personal-space compatible.”

“I’m small, so I don’t take up too much space,” I grinned, clasping my hands behind my back so I appeared even smaller. It was such a cutesy little action, but I was cute so whatever.

Elena’s lips parted for a second, her breath hitching as she stared at me. “God, I am so gay.”

“Is that a yes?” I asked, widening my eyes into full on kitten cuteness. “I really like the sound of that bath, and the library will help with our mental stats. Looks like someone had this place before but left all their books. Probably a deleted character.”

“Wait, the game doesn’t remove that stuff?” she asked, surprised.

I shook my head, willing my expression to become even more hopeful. “Nope. Some things get removed, but stuff like a library stocked with books doesn’t.”

“Okay, okay,” she laughed, putting a big hand over my face to cover my pleading expression. “Put those big doe eyes away and let's sign on for the apartment, then.”

With a triumphant grin, I turned and picked up the quill next to the book and signed my name on the dotted line. The ink dried immediately, then flashed with confirmation. Passing the quill to Elena, she copied what I’d done on the second line, and we both watched as the lease was finalised.

“There we go!” I said. “Now there should be an objective marker… ah, there it is!”

Following the marker, it led us into a side hallway and almost halfway around the circle before we reached our door. Like all the others that had been packed in here, it was a circular wooden door with a big ring door handle in the middle.

“Only the two of us can open the door,” I told my new roommate. “It’s locked by code, too, so nobody can break in or anything. We can add people as trusted, so they can open the door based on various parameters that we can set.”

“Okay, that’s really good. We can relax when we’re in there then,” she said, looking genuinely relieved.

I smiled. “Yes, yes we can. So would you like to go inside?”

“Hell yeah, let’s go.”

When we stepped through the door, we were greeted by a cramped entryway, a room that was little more than an extension of the hallway it led to, really. The walls were the same plastered-over wood, and the support beams were the same dark oak. The floor of the entrance consisted of smooth cobbles, but beyond the archway leading to the rest of the house, it graduated to a worn mahogany.

“Wait, why is there two doors?” Elena asked, pointing just to our right.

She was right, of course. The door we had entered was painted a faded blue colour, while the one directly next to it was green. To explain, I needed something from the small array of hooks beside the brass coat hanger.

Picking up one of the two keys from there, I motioned for her to take the other one while I explained, “These keys act as a sort of portal device. When you’re anywhere outside of the house, you can channel mana into it for two minutes, and then it will port you home, right into this room. From there, you can hang around in the house or go out the blue door into the city. Assuming you don’t do that to reset your world position, taking the green door will place you back where you came from.”

“Wait, for real?” she asked, eyes widening as she looked at the little tarnished iron key in her hand. “That’s so convenient!”

“This game likes to make sure we’re all fairly comfortable while we play,” I grinned, spinning the key across my knuckles. “Unlike some games, they understand that we enjoy a nice shower every day, and to sleep in a warm bed each night.”

“God, that’s a fucking mood,” she said, giving me a wry smile.

I wiggled my perfectly arched eyebrows at her in amusement, then turned and headed for the rest of the house.

The hallway curved slightly, with one door on the right, and one door on the left. When I opened the one on the right, I found a small kitchen, stocked with a basic wood fired oven and grill. It had a sink too, which was great because getting water to drink in some places was a pain in the ass. It could literally be a life saver sometimes.

The door on the left led to the bathroom, which was actually three separate rooms. The central room housed the wash basin, while to the right was the actual toilet room. Opposite me was another door, which when I opened it, I found led to the bath I had been so interested in.

Yup, this place had definitely been worth it. Halfway across the room, the wood and plaster of the house gave way to rock, moss, and a steaming hot spring. Above the bath, a diamond mesh skylight had been installed, allowing for natural light to filter through and into the room. It was very pretty, and even better, the bath was big! Like, five meters by five meters! Okay, that was an exaggeration, but still. It was big.

Turning, I flashed a triumphant smile at Elena, who was stood looking over the top of my head at the place. “God damn,” she muttered, her expression almost a mirror of mine. “How are we meant to leave this place and actually play the game?”

“With great difficulty,” I laughed, my eyes roaming the room for other details. There was a towel drying rack against the same wall the door was set into, along with another sink for cold water.

Back in the hallway, we navigated the odd little bend and entered the main living room. Immediately, I noticed the sofa and two big armchairs set right into the middle of the room, arranged around a beat up old coffee table. Off to our left, a dining table had been pushed against the wall, along with a bunch of wooden chairs.

Set into the right wall was another door, which I made a beeline for, throwing the door wide once I reached it. The little library! Oh my god, almost every available space inside the room was taken up by an overstuffed bookcase. I almost laughed when I saw the poor abused desk that had been shoved to the back corner.

“There’s so many books,” I said quietly, my gaze tracing over what spines I could see. “Who the hell owned this place before? Why did they just leave all this here?”

“Honestly, I’d be curious to find out,” Elena remarked, leaning against the doorway beside me. “Also, why did they have so much stuff, but they didn’t upgrade to a better place? Sure, the bath is nice, the kitchen is functional, and the living room seems warm and comfy… but it’s also really small. Plus, all the shit in here, including the floor and walls, is a little banged up.”

“It’s really odd, yeah,” I hummed, playing with the fluffy tip of my braid.

Then, shrugging, I turned and made my way back into the living room. “Can’t figure it out now, though. I want to see the bedrooms!”

The bedrooms turned out to be about half the size of the living room each, which in itself was only like six meters by ten meters. They were raised half a floor above the main room, and mercifully, they already had big privacy screens in place.

When I bounced up the stairs to see the room itself, I found it adorned with a chest, a single bed, and a small nightstand. That was it. Dang, I’d been hoping for a bit more furniture.

“I am so going to buy some better stuff for this place,” I called, turning to look over the living room at Elena, who was investigating her own room.

“Yeah, that would be cool,” she replied, running a hand through her brown hair with a look of resignation. “The bed doesn’t look all that amazing either.”

“Okay, beds first,” I agreed, just now noticing the lumpy mattress. “Oh god, definitely beds first.”

Preferably a double bed too, because… wait. Nevermind I was fucking tiny now. No need to get a double bed. Well, no need. There was still definitely a want in there, and plus, a double bed as a four and a half foot fairy girl would be like, fucking huge. I had to experience that. No wait… I needed to experience that.