[SD:M/H] Ejection Completed Without Error - Chapter 9

June glances around, trying to figure out an idea. “Umm, we can. Hmm. Oh! Water. We don’t have to outrun them or guide them into someone else. We just need to escape their notice.

“There should be some kind of river next to the city, if only to provide water and trade. We just need to keep running and hope we find it before the monsters catch up.”

Gem nods and makes a peace sign, “Sounds like a plan! Re-up my buff and I’ll give us a direction to head.”

June raises an eyebrow, “I don’t see how the buff will help pick out a direction, but sure, have at it. [Cat’s Paw]!”

Gem laughs, “Oh yeah! That’s the stuff.” And they speed up, angling towards a tree a little to the side.

With a hop and a jump, Gem flies up and barely manages to grab the lowest branch. From there, the momentum swings them up, which they use to rapidly swing from branch to branch until they get above the canopy. Their last swing with an extra dose of oomph to get some air.

Once up there, they don’t try anything top fancy, only a bit of a spin to get a nice look around. Then their trip down is a good bit less graceful. Gem keeps their forward momentum, but mostly let themselves fall. They only grab a few branches to redirect around trunks.

Then they hit the ground in an over the shoulder roll that goes out of control. Gem tries to pop back up on to their feet, but all that achieves is the roll turning into more of a limb flailing tumble. Until they run into a tree.

June catches up to them and grabs Gem’s arm, pulling them to their feet. Though Gem is a bit out of it. Still, they manage to keep running until they recover some.

June shakes her head, “What was that? Like, the climb up was impressive, but gravity beat you something fierce!”

Gem, a little woozy, manages to get out, “The game’s messing with me! I actually can do shoulder rolls irl. There was a root or something that tripped me up.”

June sighs, “What did you see?”

Gem gestures slightly to the right, “The city is there, but I didn’t see anything to note the river. I guess they wouldn’t exactly be using tall, masted ships around here.”

June, “Well, more than I expected. We’ll go straight ahead then, even if we don’t find a river, there should be some streams kicking about.”

And they did! Well, it took a worrying amount of time with the sounds of monsters behind them getting ever closer. The duo probably wouldn’t have survived if the monsters had gotten eyes on them. It was only the fact that they had to follow their scent that slowed them down enough for the pair to run away for so long.

Gem turns to June, “So, do you know how to dive?”

June laughs, “I don’t even know how to swim!”

Gem shakes their head, “And you called my plans crazy! I guess there’s no better time to learn.” And Gem grabs June up into a princess carry once again, before taking a flying leap, barely making it to the center of the stream.

A stream that was flowing at a decent clip, their heads popping up quite a distance downstream.

June sputters, “I wasn’t ready for this!”

Gem giggles, “Don’t worry, I’ve got you. Besides, the faster the flow, the quicker we’re out of here!”

June, “Yes, but to where?”

Gem, “Probably somewhere even more dangerous. We just have to keep an eye out for trouble and head to the shore the second anything looks like trouble. At least the area seems relatively flat. I do Not want to go through the waterfall trope.”

June goes pale, well paler. The cold water did a good job of sapping her color in the first place. “I didn’t even consider waterfalls!”

Gem shrugs it off, though not physically. That’s kind of hard to do while holding someone in a princess carry and treading water for the both of them. “Look on the bright side! My body is apparently strong enough to swim for both of us. When it comes time to get out, you’ll be rested.

“Though we really do need to get you swimming lessons. This feels like a melt river with how cold it is. Thankfully, we must be a good distance from the source or you’d be in danger of freezing! At least if you were swimming, the exercise would help warm you up. Not that you can do much when it comes to swimming in cold water.”

June cringes, “Now I have something else to worry about! How long do you think we should stay in here?”

Gem looks around, “Well, probably should first get out of the forest. That way, we can see any nearby dangers. Hmm, well, I guess tall grass will block sight just as well? Meh, an open field, would at least be a new territory. Less likely to have the same monsters catch up to us!”

June sighs, “Guess we wait.”

Gem, “You wait, I’ll see about keeping us afloat!”

And wait she did.

Gem, “I see with my little eye, something brown!”

June, “Is it the branch in front of us? Again?”

Gem, “How’d you guess?”

And wait.

Gem, “So, I’m thinking of ignoring the usual way people are playing. Like, I understand staying in one place? But come on! This place practically kicked me out already.”

June, “You mean you didn’t want to join any of their groups?”

Gem, “Yeah, that. Anyway, a good wander feels right. Maybe I’ll find a place to settle? And it isn’t like I plan to try and find the edge of the world or anything! I’ll be sticking in the vicinity. There simply won’t be a home base, at least to start. Have you heard about the floating homes? Like, can’t take them into danger zones, but a safe place that follows you on your normal day to day?”

And wait...

Oh, nevermind, the forest seems to come to an end a bit in front of where they are.

Gem squints, “I’m seeing a lot of tall grass. I know I said wait until a change of biome, but should we wait until we’re a distance in or just get out right at the edge?”

June, “Oh thank goodness! I feel like I’m about to turn blue!”

Gem, “So get out at the border?”

June nods emphatically, “Yes! Oh, and I guess there is less likely to be a DemiBoss waiting for us? Like, the edges of biomes have their own danger, but it isn’t really suited for either.”

Not needing anything else to justify it, Gem turns over onto their back and begins to tread water towards the shore. Though it shocks them when their feet finally touch the bottom. Which thankfully isn’t a mucky mess as the stream is a bit too swift for that.

However, that very swiftness also makes getting up a challenge. Gem’s legs numb from the chill have a hard time bearing their weight and the stream keeps knocking them over. About a block further down, though, Gem finally manages to get the two of them up onto the shore.

Gem collapses onto the ground as June stands up and begins stretching and kicking their legs to try and warm up. Gem glances over, “You think we lost them?”

June takes a moment away from wringing their hair out to respond. “I’m more worried about finding something else at this point! We’re in shape to run anymore. I’m half frozen and you’re exhausted. We should probably just hang out here for a good bit to soak in the sun and catch our breath.

“Thank goodness SD didn’t go with a more realistic system for stuff like exhaustion and adverse temperatures! I’d probably be half dead and you wouldn’t be good for quite a while.”

Gem, “Blarg, you aren’t wrong. I guess they learned their lesson after the SciFi game. At least there you had mad science to solve it. Though I guess here, they could have used magic. Kind of wish my Stamina was a higher rank.”

June rolls her eyes, “You have C rank and that’s your lowest! New players who don’t go with random have a B rank in one stat as their highest. There’s a reason you face so much trouble in the starter city as a random.

“You just need to focus on making sure they don’t fall as you level up and you’ll be golden! I’ve seen the stats, only a tenth of the player base makes it to level ten without at least two of their stats falling a rank.”

June waits, but there isn’t a response, so she looks over and instantly facepalms. Gem had fallen asleep. “What am I going to do with you?”

Later, Gem wakes up in their VR capsule and they take a moment to get their bearings. “Oh shhh! Did I die? Why was I kicked out of the game?”

In a rush, they reactivate the capsule and sink back in. Though once in, they’re greeted by a message in the barren hub area.

{

Stamina Overdraw detected in SoulDive

Body Compatibility below allowed threshold

Gradual Capsule ejection completed without error

}

“Huh, that’s an odd message. Wonder what that actually means? Also, if it judges compatibility, what happens if someone makes a stupid body or chooses something radically different like a taur frame? Well, I’m not going to find any answers here. Back to the game!”

And one quick trip through the SD portal found them once again up in a tree. They almost let go, but at the last moment grabbed on tighter. Along with that, it took all of Gem’s willpower to not shout in surprise.

A gentle tap on their shoulder got their attention. A good thing as they would have probably jumped out of their skin a moment later when June whispered right next to their ear. “It’s not my fault, but there’s a tortoise monster sleeping below us.”

Gem glances down, and yep! There’s a big ol’ turtle down there. “How did I get up here?”

June shrugs, “It wasn’t easy until you got forcibly logged out. At that point your body went on autopilot and all signs pointed towards you trusting me, so autopilot followed me here. Believe it or not, right next to a water source is not the most secure or secretive place to rest.

“We actually aren’t that far away. I’d show you, but about 20 minutes ago, that thing showed up and went to sleep. Until then, this was a pretty decent hiding spot.”

Gem, “To be fair, it is still a decent hiding spot. It didn’t spot us, after all.”

June, “Well, that’s one way to look at it. Now, why did you end up logged out in the first place? Like, I would have much preferred you be back when your body recovered. The SAI specifically designed the logged out behavior to be obviously artificial and robotic so no one could mistake it for the actual person.”

Gem shrugged, “Capsule said something about being under some sort of body compatibility.”

June frowned, “That’s rare for people who’ve chosen random. Part of the whole, ‘LoL, it isn’t even random’ of it, is the fact that you get a body you match up with.”

Gem, “Oh, my current Stamina in game is probably too low.”

June raises an eyebrow, “What?”

Gem nods, “Yeah, I was never really one to exercise, but I could walk for hours on end. In one place I lived, there was a nearby park where I would take a day and spend it hiking around. It didn’t even matter if I hadn’t done anything like that for a while.”

June, “That isn’t how it is supposed to work. You know that, right?”

Gem, “It isn’t like I had some kind of superpower or anything. I still got tired and stuff. There wasn’t ever a point that I couldn’t keep walking during my usual hikes. Pretty certain people in the past had to walk just as much to get places. I’m only odd in a modern world of cars and such.”

June rubs the bridge of her nose, “That isn’t. You know what? Fair enough. If that is how you work IRL, you’ll probably have this problem anytime the game forces you unconscious from exhaustion.

“Hell, it was probably why you managed to work yourself to exhaustion like you did. While you were gone, I did some light reading and you really should have dropped sooner. Now, I hate to be circular, but this situation feels awfully familiar. Do you have a new way to get out of it?”

Moving Hills - Chapter 8

Wind Blades Till You Can't - Chapter 10