VRMMO: World's First Glyphborne-Chapter 16: Treading Water

Belladonna slowly clambered to her feet, staring at the wizard in awe and wonder as he stood in the middle of the lake.

"How are you doing that?"

Instead of an answer, he simply raised an eyebrow at her as if to say ’Really?’. It was only after a second that she wanted to throw herself in the lake and drown from embarrassment. He was a wizard, obviously.

"Oh right... Magic, duh. Sorry, I’m really exhausted."

The wizard chuckled softly as she slumped down against a tree, panting heavily as she did her best to catch her breath and recentre herself, as well as ignore the utterly idiotic question she had asked. She could almost hear hundreds of little voices chastising her for it.

With a warm smile and kind tone, the wizard addressed her again, "Like I said. Take your time to rest. Eat, drink. Re-energize yourself. You will need all your energy, mental and physical, for your training.

When you are ready, you will join me over here."

Belladonna nodded softly, taking a few minutes to regain her energy. Thankfully, although she hadn’t been butchering her latest kills for loot, she had made sure to take a few small cuts of fresh meat for sustenance in these long grinding hours

No point in paying for dried jerky when she was collecting her own meat, after all.

She still had that jerky in her bag, but the raw meat was a newly acquired taste. After all, it came with its own flavoring.

Her vicious dagger-like teeth easily tore through the raw meat as the bloody flavouring exploded within her mouth. Each bite and chew sent more small spurts of blood across her tongue. She had always liked a juicy hamburger, but this... oh this was just heavenly.

Of course, gorging herself on meat that was practically dripping with blood was not a clean nor pretty sight, but thankfully the Wizard didn’t seem to mind. He simply stood in his spot, watching her with curiosity. The notification of her blood bonuses popped up in front of her, thankfully just bumping her perception bonus up to be +10 alongside the Agility bonus which stuck around.

Wolf meat was definitely the best choice.

After a quick ten minute rest and relaxation, Belladonna licked her fingers and lips before springing to her feet. She gave the wizard a nervous smile, embarrassed of the mess she had made of herself, as she walked to the waters edge.

"So I just... walk out to you?"

He nodded softly, giving the same warm smile, "Yes, when you are ready."

Taking a deep breath, Belladonna stepped forwards and felt the strange warmth of the water through her boot as she stepped on its surface, and then around her ankle as her boot broke the surface and plunged deeper.

She just barely managed to clamp her mouth shut, trapping whatever air was still in her lungs, as she fell forwards and face planted the water.

Belladonna quickly and desperately splashed around after her less than impressive belly flop, pulling herself back to the surface and gasping for breath when her head broke through the water. Her arms paddled uselessly as she clumsily made her way back to shore.

Sopping wet, Belladonna dragged herself to her feet and flipped her soaking wet hair from her face. However, It just slapped her face again when she whirled around in anger, thrusting an accusatory finger out at the smug wizard standing on the water like it was nothing.

"What the hell?! You said I could walk out there!"

"Yes, I did. When you are ready. You weren’t ready. I also said you looked like you needed a drink and what better way than this?"

"Ha. Ha. Very funny." Her voice was absolutely dripping with sarcasm, much like every inch of her was dripping with strangely warm water, "Seriously though, How am I supposed to get out there? I can’t walk on water, unlike you."

Belladonna glared daggers at him, clenching her hair between her hands and wringing it out like a cloth before tossing it behind her back dramatically. However, once more the wizard gave her a condescending and smug smile.

"It wouldn’t be much of a test if I gave you all the answers. I brought you here because I saw intelligence, curiosity and determination. Show me I was not wrong about those things."

As if to aggravate her even more than his cryptic answer already did, the bald bastard swirled his hand in the air and summoned something into his grasp. It wasn’t a wand, staff or even a spell book like she was expecting.

Instead... It was a teapot. He crouched down, scooping the water at his feet into the pot before setting it down on the air in front of him. With a snap of his fingers, a small flame appeared under the floating teapot.

"I hope you don’t mind if I get myself comfortable, do you? I have a feeling I am going to be here for a while. Would you like a cup?"

He swirled his hands, spawning a delicate tea-cup and saucer out of nowhere, offering it to her. Not that she could reach it at this distance.

Holding back the urge to throw something sharp at him, Belladonna grit her teeth and let out a low growl, "No thank you..."

She forced herself to look away from the growing source of irritation before he decided to pull out some biscuits to go along with his tea. Instead she focused on the task at hand, analysing the water as it gently lapped at the bank of the lake.

Of course a secret quest would never be so simple. It was a puzzle quest, so there must be some kind of trick she was missing. It would be easier if she knew magic, obviously, but she didn’t know any yet. It would be a pain if she had to leave and come back when she unlocked magic. Just this excursion alone probably put her far behind even the likes of that bimbo streamer with the beast tide event that was going on.

Filled with determination Belladonna tried multiple different things as she slowly eliminated different possibilities. Her various experimentation took her close to the half hour mark, as minute by minute the sunk cost fallacy started to dig its claws into her mind.

The longer she stayed here, the more she was determined to figure out the trick. She absolutely refused to leave without figuring it out, there had to be some kind of way!

She had tried using her bare feet, in case the boots were the issue. She had tried moving fast, moving slow. She had checked the water with pebbles and sticks, looking for platforms or something she might be able to stand on.

She even tried swimming over to the wizard to see if it really was magic that he was using to support himself, or if there was some hint of what kind of magic she should seek out. But all that achieved was him kicking water into her face for his own amusement.

Dragging herself out of the water again, Belladonna grumbled to herself and wrung her hair out once again.

The irritating wizard, who had moved on from drinking tea and was now lounging in a conjured chair while reading a book, gave her another smug smile and spoke once more in that condescending tone.

"Still trying to figure it out? Perhaps you would like that cup of tea now, hmm? A drink always clears my mind whenever I am stressed."

"I am not stressed! And do you have to do that?! Do you know how annoying that is when I’m trying to think! I mean how many times do you need to hear the word no before you understand I don’t want a damn drink!

It’s every five minutes with you! I don’t need a drink. I didn’t want a drink then, and I don’t want one now. I will never want a... drink..."

Belladonna’s boiling and overflowing anger quickly reduced itself down to a simmer, before trailing off entirely along with her voice as she slowly came to a realisation. She stared into space, reviewing everything that the wizard had said to her while she had been here. Her eyes slowly widening into shock and her mouth hanging open mid shout.

In the middle of the lake, the condescending wizard raised a curious eyebrow and smirked once again.

"Oh? What’s this? Finally understood, did you?"

Ignoring both the wizard’s words, and how idiotic she had been, Belladonna instantly dropped to her knees and scrambled over to the edge of the lake. Her hands plunged under its strangely warm, slightly glowing surface.

She quickly cupped the water in her hands and brought it to her lips, gulping it down like it was her first taste of water after wandering the desert for weeks.

Like a woman possessed, she desperately gulped the handful of strange water under the Wizard’s amused gaze.