My sister rushes up the stairs the moment we get to our apartment building, looking incredibly excited. When we catch up to her she’s already opened the door for us.
“Come quickly, Hilda is already inside and I don’t want to keep her for that long.”
“Yeah, yeah, don’t push us.” I look at her with distrust.
“This is going to be so fun.” Sam whispers under her breath.
I look at Sam as well. “What the heck are you two up to.”
“You’ll see very shortly I guess.” She winks as we walk into the living room.
“Get your shoes off and stuff, I’ll go get it.” Élise closes the door behind us and then rushes off.
“Is this about the box that was delivered earlier?”
“I think it is.” Nikki nods. “No clue what’s in it though.”
Hilda shrugs. “Wouldn’t know either but the way Lise is reacting it’s probably great.”
We get our shoes off and I get rid of my choker as well, putting it in it’s box.
“I’m here, I’m here!” Élise skids through the living room with a box in hand and puts it on the living room table in front of us all. “I can already tell this was totally worth the money.”
Lise was planning to run to the kitchen to get a knife but Hilda just reaches for her pocket and hands her her pocket knife.
“Why are you running around with a knife, Hilda?” I ask while my sister gets to work on the box.
“It has a couple of small tools too. You never know when you need a screwdriver or a small pair of scissors.”
“Hmm, I guess that’s true.”
“Oh my Goddess, I knew it.” Sam starts laughing. My sister had just opened the box and the content was for all to see. I could only see pink frilly things inside.
“Huh? What’s this?”
“Your memory that bad, sis?” She asks in return and gets a hold of the box’s contents, lifting it out.
Oh no…
“W-when did you buy this!!?”
In front of me was the pink frilly maid outfit that we’d worn inside of The Echelon. And the worst part is, it’s quite clearly in my size.
“The game has an app in which you can buy outfits you can own in the game, all the stuff is super high quality according to the reviews and I can’t say they’re wrong. This looks exactly like the one in the game.”
“Sorry but, what is this?” Hilda asks, still as confused as Nikki.
“Remember when you and Nikki went for coffee in The Echelon? This is what we were doing in the meantime.” Lise took something else out of the box, it was the picture we took of me, Sam and my sister back in the store.
“Oh my, that’s just fantastic.” Hilda laughs.
“So, dear sister, would you want to show the ladies how it looks in the flesh?”
I pout and look at Hilda’s and Nikki’s faces, they all look very expectantly at me, and my girlfriend too for that matter.
“Fine.” I pout even harder.
“Ah, and don’t forget this.” She takes out the ribbon she’d tied to my tail the last time.
One day I’ll have my revenge, sis. One day. Mark Amicat’s words!
“Sam, could you come with me while I get dressed?” I ask my girlfriend who looks a bit surprised by my question.
“Sure, anything special you need me for?” She blushes.
“It’s just that I can’t tie the ribbon around my tail myself…”
“Ah, I see. Yeah I’ll join you.”
“See you in a bit, kitten, we’re looking forward to it.” Hilda smiles.
“Yeah, yeah.” I pout and walk into the hallway and then into my room. Taking off my clothes didn’t take very long and luckily enough the maid outfit also didn’t take that long to put on either, especially not since I had a Sam to help for the harder parts.
“It looks super cute on you, Ami.” She smiles as she attaches the ribbon on my tail. “This is the first time seeing the real you in the outfit and it’s just as cute as I imagined.”
“Ah, right, I almost forgot I used a different avatar in that game.”
“I like the real you a lot more.” Sam turns me around and gives me a quick kiss. “Pink suits you better.”
“I kinda liked your scales though.” I kiss her back.
“Understandable, they were pretty neat.” She laughs. “Are you ready to get coddled by Hilda and Nikki?”
“I don’t know if I ever will be, to be honest.”
“Haha.” She takes my hand. “Come, let’s go kill them with cuteness.”
I nod and we walk back into the living room.
“Dear Goddess, I think I’m going to get a nosebleed.” My sis puts a handkerchief in front of her mouth the moment she sees us coming back.
“She looks so precious.” Nikki aws.
Hilda stands up and walks over to me. “Uhm, do you mind if I take her home so I can cuddle up with her?”
“No, she’s my plushie. Sorry Hilda.” Sam apologizes.
“And you don’t have your bike’s sidecar with you today after all.”
“Blast it.” She laughs. “Jokes aside, you look really cute in this, Amicia. If you worked in a maid café, I would visit every single day.”
“Wouldn’t we all?” My sister puts her handkerchief away.
“Definitely.” Sam replies. Nikki just nods along.”
“By the way, are we all going to play a bit of Turn of Destiny today?” Hilda pats me on the head. “Not that I would mind looking at Amicia’s maid cosplay all night.“
“Sounds good to me.” My sister nods.
“To me as well.” Nikki does too.
“What about you and Sam?” Hilda looks back to me.
“Yeah, I think some more adventure would be cool.” Sam agrees.
“Of course.” I nod as well.
“Great.” Hilda smiles and scratches me behind my ear.
“I should probably leave now before it gets too late.” She looks at her watch.
“Just send us a message when you get home so we will start up our games.” Nikki gives Hilda her jacket back that she’d taken off.
“Alright.”
“Ah! Hilda!”
“What’s up, kitten?” She says as she puts her jacket on.
“Don’t you want to see the tablet Gamma gave to me?” I grab it from the spot I left it on before leaving earlier today.
“Aah.” She looks at it for a second. “You know what, let me look at it next time, so we don’t have to rush ourselves. Maybe take it along to my house.”
“Oki!” I give her a goodbye hug.
“See you in a bit.” She smiles and hugs me back.
“See ya!” The rest of my family also says their goodbyes.
Once Hilda closes the door behind her we all decide to get ready for bed but not after I check the tablet one more time.
When I open it up I see my follower count has gone up quite a bit since last time I checked but that’s not the only thing that had changed. There was a brand new skill waiting for me at the bottom of the list called ‘stealth casting’.
I let Sam check the tablet too. “Ah so this is the thing you probably used at the game, right?”
“I suppose so.”
She clicks on the skill which opens a tooltip and then reads it out loud. “Your superior focus allows you to cast some spells in a nearly undetectable fashion. While this is useful in certain situations where hiding your intentions is important it does increase both cast time, cast potency and mana cost.”
“Hmm, that’s cool.” My sister replies, she’d been listening to our conversation from the kitchen. “Although I think mana and potency are probably not much of an issue considering your other abilities.” She takes a sip of her tap water.
“Ami gets all the cheat skills.” Sam laughs.
“Well she buffs us too so it’s more like we have an entire cheat party.”
“True enough.”
“Anyhow, I’m heading off to brush my teeth, I’ll call out when Hilda has sent she’s ready.”
“Thanks.”
My sister leaves the room, leaving only me and Sam behind as I shut off the tablet and put it in one of the cabinets.
“Don’t you feel weird just before you head into the game?” Sam asks.
“Uhm, I don’t know, why?”
“Usually we would say good night when we head to bed, right?”
“Aah! I know what you mean. You don’t know what to say now because we’ll see eachother soon anyway.”
My girlfriend nods. “When Hilda left too. I didn’t really see the point of saying goodbye either. Maybe we should say ‘be right back’ instead.”
“But that feels weird when you aren’t using a computer, doesn’t it?”
“I guess.” Sam rubs her chin. “Well, it doesn’t really matter.”
“Mhmm.” I embrace my girlfriend and kiss her on the cheek. “We should probably get ready too. Maybe we can cuddle a bit in bed before we log in.”
“Good plan, babe.” She kisses me back.
Cuddle cuddle, kiss kiss, and even more cuddle cuddle kiss.
Revenge will be swift and delicious! And probably cat themed!
maybe, one day, Ami will get her revenge and not get rolled over by Sam again two seconds later :p
I wholeheartedly endorse cat themed revenge… due to reasons?
@Lionessa :thonking:
Dear Amicia,
Why you so cute that I have nosebleeds?
Sincerely,
Victim of cuteness overdose.
P.s. @FieryKathy I hope you feel better since this post.
Yes, definitely. Thank you for your concern!
important it does increase both cast time, cast potency and mana cost.”
It increases potency of the spell?
I think it should be decreased spell potency. Oops :p
@FieryKathy It's the sneak attack bonus!
While this is useful in certain situations where hiding your intentions is important it does increase both cast time, cast potency and mana cost.”
@FieryKathy forget save because distracted, uwu?
Why do I get the feeling any revenge plan will backfire spectacularly
Because its probably true xD
Thanks for the chap. For any kind of depresso I recommend a bit of Cocoa and Cuddle. Not always a cure but still a good way to lift the spirits.
Cocoa is nice, sadly i dont have anyone im close enough to to hug
I'm sorry. Normally I'm not one for hugs but if I were near by I would gladly offer you one.
@Undett thanks <3
While this is useful in certain situations where hiding your intentions is important it does increase both cast time, cast potency and mana cost
Does it increase or decrease potency? From what they said after this it seems like it decreased potency. Maybe could change it like this:
it does increase both cast time and mana cost while decreasing cast potency.
Awkward good bye cause you're seeing them again shortly online? I felt that before.
I came up with saying "Later on". Basically just means, "see ya later online". And this was 20 years ago when I was playing EverQuest.
EverQuest :o I only know that through an interview with Yoshi-P (director for FF14)
@FieryKathy you can play for free everything but end game.
Can't say I recommend it to youngin's though. It's quite hardcore, and ancient enough to make even Korean mmo grind seem like a walk in the park. There's like zero hand holding. You just get dumped close to your starter town and that's it. Quests are subtle and you have to ask the NPCs specific key words for them to even talk about it. Oh and there's no quest tracker or map.
I'd say it's great to experience if you want the closest thing to a realistic Isekai an mmo can give lol. For writing inspiration.
@Daitengu Did you know that the critically acclaimed MMORPG Final Fantasy XIV has a free trial, and includes the entirety of A Realm Reborn AND the award-winning Heavensward expansion up to level 60 with no restrictions on playtime? Sign up, and enjoy Eorzea today!
@FieryKathy lol yes. Shame I can't use a free account with steam. And those free accounts are having quite the ques.
Also, I absolutely got distracted on my catgrl by having a half dozen classes around 30 by the time my one month sub was up at launch.
@Daitengu oof. well you can always get the normal client now and just play till 60 :p
@FieryKathy I only know EverQuest from Something Witty Entertainment’s Sword Art Online Abridged
@Kristeen most MMOs currently have options for free trials. Always an option to check them out :)
@FieryKathy I played a fair bit of ESO and some SWTOR but I just can’t stand the whole grind aspect. Also I burnt out after logging 1002 hours on ESO grinding for perfect gear and enchants(I gave up because it became a issue of gold for the upgrade materials once I had everything optimized) also there is the issue of soloing 4 person party dungeons on normal difficulty but higher difficulty versions just being the same thing with higher numbers. It kinda gets boring once you max out every skill related to your build and all crafting skills.
@Kristeen thats why I like ff14 since its mostly story based. You can easily get to 90 without grinding anything
@FieryKathy I basically quit because I was mostly just running a daily dungeon and three specific dungeons for quests and then grinding crafting resources or prestige/paragon level or whatever they are called. You know the “you’ve hit max level so now every level up gives you minor build optimization points via 1-3% buffs to certain stats”. I got a nickname invite to a guild for soloing a final boss on a 4 person dungeon that kept wiping us because we didn’t know how it’s TPK mechanic worked. Except me because even after several nerds summoner is still the most broken build in the game. Self heals, damage shields, taunts, debuffs that increase pet damage, stuns from you pets, massive aoe aria denial. Passives that let you solo the highest difficulty dungeons because you basically always have your ult ready. Like I said the most broken build in the game. Literally impossible to die in a normal dungeon except to auto kill moves that require a party member to free you from a bind. Yeah not balanced at all. But when you get to that point you kinda get bored. I mean your at level cap so it’s not like you can just go to a higher level area. I guess you can do raids but that requires a lot of organizing and really isn’t that different from dungeons.
@Kristeen I wanna say I also hate the grind, but my thousands of hours in Minecraft made me think otherwise.
What made me quit MMOs all together wasn't the grind. It was the RNG grind and not getting raid drops for several months for weekly raids. It's that artificial gatekeeping that I truly hated. I never did get past the first raid dungeons in most MMOs I played. Vindictus was probably the one I went farthest in raid wise. I want to be rewarded for work. I got tired of gambling my time and money to progress. Also why I avoid gacha and loot boxes like the plague that it is.