Reclaim (Ft. Wynona)

 About Time...

Spoiler:

Being home so late was unusual to Ren. Since he never had a reason to stick around after school, he'd always immediately head home when classes were finished. He liked to tell himself he was part of the "Going-Home Club", and it was sufficient comfort. His father, who was equally unaccustomed to Ren's sudden lateness, even raised his eyebrows inquisitively. To which he replied with a recap of his day.

"A friend, eh?" his booming voice startled our sleeping cat. "And a club! My boy, tell me more about this club."

The teen sat down in a chair beside his father and began to speak slowly, slightly embarrassed to say how he had joined an anime club. 
To his delight, his father only smiled. 
Leave it to dad to make embarrassing things feel less embarrassing.

--

After their conversation, Ren went upstairs to his room to unload the stress of the day. Haphazardly throwing his bag and clothes on his bed, the impatient teen flopped down into his leather computer chair. He wanted to get a few hours of dungeon raiding in before he shoved off to bed. 

Just before he did so however, Ren was greeted by a notification, signaling a new friend request. It must've been Wynona. Without a second thought, he clicked "Accept", and logged into his MMO: Legion of Legacies.

--

[OkamiDash]: anyone awakeeee? 
[OkamiDash]: we dem boyz

Ren opened up the guild tab, but unfortunately no one was awake. 

Deciding that he didn't want the night to be a bust, he began recruiting. For the first few minutes, he only encountered full parties or low leveled players. Optimism was fading, until he saw a lone player who seemed to be afk. Well, trying won't hurt anyone.

[OkamiDash]: aye, wassup?
[OkamiDash]: omfg???? dude. your equips are so garbage how are you such a high lvl.  lolololololoololololololoolool
[OkamiDash]: im sry nvm. that was rude of me to critizse. are u alone? do u wanna raid??

After a series of long and boring train delays, Wynona finally stepped out of the crowded subway and began sprinting home. She reached into her shorts pocket and took out her phone, jabbing her thumb into the power button and squinting as the phone's bright light contrasted the night's dark atmosphere. A short sigh of relief passed through Wynona's mouth. It wasn't too late to go home yet. Her eyes drifting down from the time displayed on the top of the screen, a few notifications caught the girl's eye.


A double XP event, huh? Wynona hadn't touched Legion of Legacies in a week or two, being busy with school. It wouldn't hurt her to stay up a little late tonight and do a party quest or two, she thought. A few minutes of jog-sprint-running passed by, and Wynona was finally at her doorstep. She put her key in the lock, twisted, and opened up the house's white wooden door. Wynona was greeted with a dead silence. All of the lights on the bottom floor seemed to be turned off. "Must've gone to sleep early." Wynona shut and locked the door behind her and started heading up the steps to her room.

Finally, in the shelter of her own room, Wynona sat down on her chair and spun herself around. It felt so good to be home after a long day of school and train delays. The girl quickly scooted up to her desk and turned on her monitor.

The SMILE Web Forums were still on her screen, a heated anime debate thread that she had been reading for about a week. Wynona bookmarked the page and exited out of Chrome.

A mess of icons crowded her desktop, most of them being Steam games that she downloaded just because they were free and never bothered to play them. Her squinted eyes scanned over the crowd of wasted storage space and she finally came upon Legion of Legacies, a small Steam MMO that had recently garnered a medium sized fandom for being generally good. Wynona punched in her credentials and clicked "Login," and picked the most populated server.

Wynona's character popped up on the screen, wearing level 1 equips and the "Beginner Adventurer" badge despite being level 246, nearly the maximum. She was in the hub town of Cindre where a few groups of newbies congregated and bots spammed their advertisements for "CHEAP GOLD AND GEMS." A few seconds passed by of Wynona's character just standing there, and a new player suddenly walked onscreen.

OkamiDash was his name, and he seemed to be decked out in pretty high leveled equipment. The new player started taunting Wynona and apologized almost as fast. It seemed like they wanted to raid.



[shunt]: i live for the challenge
[shunt]: idk if i wanna raid with you tho.. you seem a little low leveled..

Wynona smirked behind the screen and made her character sit down on its EXTREMELY EXPENSIVE CHAIR ITEM, flashing a wink emote at the other player.

[shunt]: whats in it 4 me?? i know u cant do higher level raids so you must want me to carry, right??

Th-The nerve! Of this...This...

Freakin' hilarious character! Ren threw himself back in the chair, stifling a burst of laughter. He nearly fell backwards, but caught himself before the wheels slipped him under. While he must admit, she clearly has some veteran sign of a well-seasoned adventurer... She talks big game. She clearly underestimates the will and persistence of a shut-in. Without skipping a beat, Ren began his reply.


[Okamidash]: tell u what lol. 1v1 in champion's coliseum. ill even unequip my good stuff.
[Okamidash]: in return...

Ren rolled his chair back, allowing it to spin around for a moment as he pondered a valid give-and-take. The luminescent glow of the phone illuminated his dark room, and it signaled a notification for a new event. The teen's eyes widened with anticipation as they scanned the text of the new event.

[Okamidash]: i just got a gr8 idea from a txt i got from another game i play
[Okamidash]: basically its a 1v1 pvp match, but we choose each others equipment and loadout.
[Okamidash]: if i win it basically means im totes better htan u lol... jk. i dont need someone weaker than me to carrry me. js lol
[Okamidash]: if i lose, u can have my good good chair...worth 3bil...

He proudly displayed his SUPER EXPENSIVE EXCLUSIVE EVENT CHAIR and made his avatar smirk.


[Okamidash]: or whatever u want...im strong enough to get you anything cos i have connections. but if i win, we raid. 

After typing his response, Ren smirked coyly. He was a master of provocation. There was no doubt this user [Shunt] would take the bait. After all, the first step to victory is to win the battle mentally.

[OkamiDash]: ne ways....what do u think? 

Oh shit.
That was the super expensive exclusive event chair from the Halloween event! Wynona clenched her teeth and started slamming on her keyboard.

[shunt]: cmon kid. get real here. ill beat u no matter what

[shunt]: the 3bil's practically already in my inventory lol.

Wynona right clicked on the boy's character and sent a friend request.

[shunt]: lets go already

The girl clicked on the Dimensional Mirror icon on the top right of her screen, displaying a list of locations she could teleport to. She clicked on Champion's Coliseum and sent a challenge to OkamiDash. There was no way he could win this.

Getcha.


Now that Shunt was practically putty in his hands, all that was left was to turn on the skills. Ren cracked his knuckles with over exaggerated enthusiasm and placed his wrists over the laptop. This game was in the bag.

Accepting the friend request, and following after her, they made it to the PvP arena: The CHAMPION'S COLISEUM. Ren smirked, feeling good about himself. Shunt didn't know the intense training he had endured to get where he was. Despite being lower leveled, he had great confidence in his experience. After all... Years ago, he was crowned the strongest player in the entire game at one point...


But that was history, and he had made anew and now present day, he was about to launch Shunt into the punishment dimension.


[Okamidash]: ok, to restate rules. ill equip u with things from my invo, and you give me something. it can be anything u want.
[Okamidash]: u can even make me naeked ...
[Okamidash]: LOLOLOLOL JK but id probably beat u liek that ne ways lol 


With that, he right-clicked her avatar and requested a trade, attempting to equip her with some of the highest tier of armor the game would allow, but gave her a dinky level one butter knife to contend with. 
Ren laughed to himself. 

High-tier armor.. and a butter knife? Wynona nodded. She could work with this. Opening up her own inventory, the girl dragged level 10 thief equips into the trade window, along with a level 20 warrior sword that she hadn't sold yet.

[shunt]: think u can manage with this ?????

She confirmed the trade and equipped OkamiDash's gifts.

[shunt]: wow. snazzy

Wynona equipped the butter knife.

[shunt]: oho.. a whole +5 str... thx

[shunt]: i wonder if you'll like yours..

The equipment given would surely cripple Ren's chances of victory.

If he were a casual.

Ren laughed out loud, throwing himself back on his chair and laughed again. Although the challenge sounds daunting, he still has absolute confidence in his great experience. Absolutely no way could he lose.

[Okamidash]: lol ez pz 
[Okamidash]: u know, you can back out anytime u want..js i dont want u getting mad or anything

He spoke with the PvP NPC and created a room.

[Okamidash]: i made the room. you can come if u want. but you better be reddyyyy )

Entering the room, Wynona gently jabbed the S key with her finger and laughed a hardy woman laugh as she saw her stat window.

[Name: shunt]
[HP: 10352/10352]
[MP: 9999/9999]
[STR: 2405 (200+350+55)]
[DEX: 5]
[INT: 5]
[LUK: 5]
Absolute motherfucking murder.

[shunt]: once the countdown ends, you're dead, kiddo.