Now standing in front of the magical portal that looks like it leads into a gated grassland, I inspect the gateway much more closely. The screen of portal magic is still that same blue and green landscape I had seen previously, but now close to the portal, I can read "Pet Yard" and the enter button. Rather than using the command prompt "Enter," I just cross through the gateway naturally, using my two well-functioning legs. Despite knowing that I had previously moved through a portal without using the prompt, I'm for whatever doubting myself and decide to cross through without it.
Successfully stepping through the portal, I don't feel the usual tug of my body and instead simply lose sight for a second before finding solid ground on the other side. It's kinda like walking through an open door, but you don't have any of that sight-foreplay that comes with it. Anyway, I now find myself in a small yard that is enclosed in a brown wooden fence. There is no single living animal within the enclosure, which is strange given the name "Pet Yard," but I see a tall standing computer thingy with a glowing blue screen. Looking around some more, I find nothing except for a barn in the distance, outside the fence.
Walking up to the computer thing, the words "Console" pops up under my inventory with three distinct options to choose from, designated: [Info] [Pets] and [Wardrobe]. Curious, I press on [Info] only for a large screen to appear in my sight on the computer. I see that the screen is also called "Console," but underneath the title are two more paragraphs of information and a couple more tabs to read over.
Reading the information, it says, "Welcome to your Pet Yard!" and then underneath it is, "Here you can hatch new pet eggs, feed items to strengthen your pets, and fuse two of your pets to take them to the next stage in their evolution! Enjoy your stay!"
Mmm, okay, cool, I guess. I don't have a pet, though, so this is useless for now.
I decide to continue reading the five separate tabs underneath that paragraph of information. The tabs are as followed: [Pets] [Feeding] [Fusing] [Upgrade] [Wardrobe]. Starting first with [Pets], I read, "Hatching a pet egg will provide you with a loyal pet that will follow you into battle."
Okay, so battle pets then. Is this pokemon or something? I continue reading and pass on to [Feeding]. It reads, "Feed items from your inventory to your pet to make them stronger!" So this is probably where the Feed Power comes into play. Once I get a pet, I can feed my items to it to increase its power, and its strength will improve with respect to the feed power for which it consumes. Easy enough!
Moving on, I read through [Fusing], which sounds like the most interesting so far, and it says, "With some of the technology we stole from the Mad Lab, we can fuse pets together to unlock new abilities, achieve higher max stats, and get your pet to evolve into stronger and more beautiful creatures! Fusing two pets from a given rarity level will produce a pet at a higher rarity level. You can fuse any two pets that are the same family and rarity at any time. However, pets will only have the highest possible ability levels if you fuse them after they have been fed enough items to reach their max ability levels."
That tab was unquestionably much longer than the last two, and it held a few tidbits of intriguing information. For one, what is the "Mad Lab?" Perhaps it's a dungeon, just like the Exalted Kitchen, but I may be wrong; still, it's my best guess. Secondly, abilities. Reading through that tab has notified me of the fact that pets may have different unique powers. What could these abilities be? Anyone's guess, really, but I assume that some pets may be able to attack enemies or something similar and might even heal friends or grab items, given what I know due to my particular set of skills I have acquired over a very long career of playing videogames.
Anyway, I move on to the fourth tab called [Upgrade]. This tab explains, "You must upgrade your pet yard to fuse higher level rarity pets." Another somewhat obscure explanation. I understand upgrading a location to provide for specific levels, but how to upgrade? No idea; I guess I will learn soon. All this is making me feel all videogame-esk again, which makes me wonder if this world is perhaps based on one, and we're all just in a simulation, but that would be crazy! So I doubt it.
The fifth and final tab is named [Wardrobe], and it's long, just like the third tab. Examining it further, it states, "Change the family and species of your pets by activating this terminal's Wardrobe function. You can unlock different species through hatching and fusing your pets. Alternatively, you may also find rare pet species as item drops all around the Realm and use them while in the Vault to collect more pet types!" Yeah, apparently, I can just outright manipulate my pet's entire genome and turn them into something completely different on a whim... That's so cool!
Closing the window, I then press on the [Pets] tab in the Console, which opens up a much larger screen called "Pets." It displays two separate sections, and on the right, I can tab between two options called "Feed" and "Fuse." I see my current items underneath the "Feed" tab and the words "Select Items to Feed," but I don't have any pets to feed, so it's useless. Tabbing over to "Fuse" is also a waste of time because I don't have any pets to feed.
The only thing left to look at is a green upward-pointing arrow with the word "Common" to its left. When I click on the sign, another screen shows up, showcasing a top-down view of the Pet Yard and saying, "Upgrading your yard allows you to fuse pets up to." and then directly underneath that is the big word, "Uncommon." I'm sure of myself in guess that upgrading my pet yard will let me fuse my pets to Uncommon Rarity. There's just one problem: It costs a whopping one hundred and fifty gold to do so! On the other hand, I can also pay with five hundred and twenty-five fame, neither of which I have on hand at the moment.
I close out of the [Pets] Window and open the last tab, labeled [Wardrobe]. Given the intel I had received previously, this should be where I can manipulate the species of my pet. Why does that sound do nefarious? Whatever, the wardrobe screen is now manifest, and I can glean from it what it displays.
On the screen are a bunch of shadowy shapes, probably representing what I have not collected yet, and all these shapes are separated into families. To list a few: [Aquatic], [Avain], [Farm], [Humanoid?], [Penguin?], [? ? ? ?]. Most of them make sense, like [Canine] and [Feline], but whatever sets things like [Woodland] and [? ? ? ?] apart, I'm unsure of, like many things.
To the top of the wardrobe screen, I can see, "Collection: 0/625." Man, that's a lot of pets. Okay, since I think I'm done with the Wardrobe, I close the bad boy and step away from the Console until I can no longer see its notification. Once again, gazing around the yard, I expect to find something else I can do, but there's nothing, and after a couple minutes of walking around aimlessly, I decide to leave the Pet Yard and head back to the Vault. Perhaps there's something I missed, and I want to explore the entire thing before I'm satisfied with leaving. Let's just hope I don't keep Queston and Truudfluue waiting for too long.
(---)
"Aha! I found you, you little bugger!" I shout out in excitement due to my discovery. For a while now, I have been searching all around the Vault, passing by all manner of trees, flowers, fish... fish in trees, trees in fish, flowered fish trees, you know, the usual! But it was all worth it because I found something special.
Right in front of me is a nondescript-looking pedestal with a floating blue crystal. The pedestal is off to the side, in the stone-walled enclosure that's placed right in the center of the Vault of Heroes, the same compound that houses the Guild Hall, Daily Quest Room, and Pet Yard. I don't know why I had ignored it at the time, but I can reason that it was because of my preoccupation with other fascinations.
The reason why I'm so ecstatic about finding this is because of the window it displays...
[Purchases]:
--------------------------------------
Blacksmith: 10000 Fame
Dungeoneer: 10000 Fame
Enchanter: 10000 Fame
Trainer: 10000 Fame
Daily Seer: 5000 Fame
The Tinkerer: 5000 Fame
Yard Caretaker (0/10): 2500 Fame
Upgrade Vault of Heroes: 2000 Gold
Vault Chest (4/8): 500 Gold
Gift Chest (0/0): 500 Gold
Potion Storage (0/16): 500 Gold
--------------------------------------
I have no clue what over half of these things are, but I'm still thrilled! I'm guessing that for a mere five hundred weeks of food for the orphanage, I can increase the number of storage spaces I possess by a whole eight slots! Yay...!
Please kill me...
Besides the point, I'm unsure what everything from "Blacksmith" to "Yard Caretaker" indicates. I can surely take a couple shots at proposing educated guesses, but those wouldn't mean anything, so until I understand what they are, I'm in the dark. Everything else, I can assume to know what they mean and what they would do if I purchased them.
Now that I know where I would be able to purchase upgrades for the Vault, I can confidently say that I have explored the entirety of the place. Unsure if there is anything left to do, I send a couple wayward glances in random directions before saying, "Okay, let's ditch this place," to no one in particular, and headed back through the realm portal.
"Let's just hope I end back inside the cube."
(---)
"Zero! Over here!" I am called upon by Truudfluue, who is waving his arms back and forth above his head, seemingly trying to direct me towards him.
Just a couple seconds ago, I was teleported back to the plaza where I first arrived in the Nexus, which confirmed my fears about not ending back up in the cube. Apparently, it seems like Truudfluue had finished his exploration a lot sooner than I had. Maybe it's because I spent so long looking around for that pedestal that I didn't even know existed till I found it. "Comming!" I yell back in response and jog my way over to Truudfluue.
Arriving in front of Truud, I ask while briefly looking around, "Where's Queston?"
Truudfluue slowly turns his head to the right and starts pointing. "He's over there talking. I was just put on watch duty while we waited." I watch in the direction Truudfluue is showing, and I view Queston communicating with a familiar-looking person dressed in a dark-gray plate and chainmail suit of armor. They are one of the guards who had apprehended me while I was on the ground once I exited the Kitchen, or so I believe.
"Oh, thank you." I thank Truudfluue for the quick answer before continuing with, "How long were you guys out here without me?"
"A while... Why?" Truudfluue responds with a questioning gaze.
His answer makes me kinda worried, so I follow up with, "Did you explore the entire Vault?"
"Um, yeah, I did." He sounds sure of himself.
"Did you see the flowered fish trees?" I ask, curious if he really did look around.
"The flowered fish what?" He didn't!
"Which means that you didn't explore the whole Vault. Did you at least find the pedestal with the glowing blue rock?"
"Yes, I did. It said that I could upgrade the Vault. Do you mean that one?"
"Yup. I will assume that you're fine then." If Truudfluue explored all the essentials of the Vault, that means I don't need to make sure that he didn't miss anything important.
"Oookay..." Truudfluue and I fall into silence after we finish our discussion as we wait for Queston to finish up. It took some time, but eventually, he made his way over to us while Truudfluue and I engaged in idle conversation.
"What took you so long?" Queston inquires of me.
"I was exploring the Vault. I didn't want to miss anything valuable."
Queston looks towards me suspiciously but seems to decide against asking more questions and instead explains, "Alright. It's already a little past two, which means we're running out of time because we should be back at the orphanage by five. I promised that we would visit the realm portals, so let's do that quickly and then get back home."
"Yay! Realm time!" Truudfluue calls out excitedly.
Catching Queston's attention, I gesture for him to go first while stating, "Lead the way." He just responds with a nod before we start walking again, this time towards the realm portal.
(---)
More accurately, I should have said 'realm portals,' as in plural. I was under the assumption that there would only be one that connected to the Realm, but rather, there are two, each with a separate name etched into its base. Speaking of the portal's bases, both are gigantic pyramid-shaped stone-brick structures with stairs that lead up to the realm gateway itself on all four sides. There are also ramps in the four corners that gently slope downward, allowing for ease of use in case of baggage, like a cart or wagon. A couple guards stand around the portals, keeping a watchful eye upon all who leave and enter but never stopping anyone.
There are prominent plaques at the base of each pyramid, denoting its title. The portal I'm looking at, for example, is called "Cube," while the other realm portal is named "Unicorn." Queston had informed me, previously when I inquired, that each gateway connecting to the Realm is interlocked with gates of similar naming. I have no clue what that actually means, and Queston told me that he is also ignorant of their true purpose since, despite portals sharing similar names, they don't take you to the same place in the Realm, but what he does know is that if you enter "Unicorn," for example, you will never be able to find someone who entered the "Cube" portal in the Nexus.
With that explanation, I think I have a better grasp of the logic behind the portals than possibly even Queston, but it's still messy logic. If what he explained is correct, and my assumption turns out to be valid, then that means all realm portals designated as "Cube" throughout the Nexus will only share a realm with other gateways named as such, but they aren't the same since they drop people off in different but consistent places in the Realm. But if all that is true, then that only makes my job all the more confusing because that would mean that multiple realms exist of the exact same Realm... My brain hurts... I need an ice pack.
How do they even expect us 'heroes' to fight Oryx if multiple 'hims' exist? Unless I'm wrong and there is only one! Uhh! Do the people who summoned us here even know about this? Obviously, they have to. This can't be a groundbreaking discovery on my part. I'm not that smart!
Suddenly, Daryl's words about him killing Oryx makes much more sense. If he only killed a copy of the original, clearly, the job wouldn't be complete. With the current happenings of today standing as a witness, that much is apparent. This means that if we want to defeat Oryx, we will have to beat up the first...
All these revelations that I'm making all inside my head cause me to sigh audibly through my nose while wondering why the masterminds behind the summoning didn't just have us direct all our attention towards the original from the get-go and instead allow the people they summoned, like me, to live in literal orphanages... Maybe I'm wrong, and there is only one Realm and one Oryx. I guess we'll have to see in the future.
"Let's go inside this realm portal." Truddfluue indicated towards "Cube" in a hushed tone.
"Okay, but let's be careful, and remember, don't tell anyone," Queston warns.
"I won't," is all Truudfluee responds with before donning a hood that he pulled out of his inventory. I wish I could do that.
"Why are you guys being so secretive? Are you not supposed to go in the Realm?" I ask, curious about their need for stealth.
Queston and Truudfluue send me embarrassed smiles before Queston explains, "Not exactly... I'm almost fifteen, so I could probably get away with it, but if Daryl or Veleda caught wind that I was smuggling Truudfluue in with me... Let's just say I wouldn't have a happy time."
I think that I already understand the reasoning behind their exclusion from entering the Realm, but I still decide to ask, "What's wrong with Truudfluue entering the Realm? He's a hero; he was literally brought here to do just that."
Queston responds back with, "I don't know. Daryl's rules. It would probably be something like, 'It's not fair to the other kids if Truudfluue gets to go but not them,' or something like that." He tried his best to mimic a Daryl impression. "Truudfluue has been coming in with me every time I go to the Realm. Please don't tell anyone."
"Okay, yeah, sure, but if anyone ever asks, I never endorsed your entrance, got it?" I could totally tell Daryl or Veleda and possibly score some 'good boy points from them, but there's a multitude of reasons why I won't, plus I don't see anything wrong with them going in for a quick peek. As long as no one gets hurt, everything's fine!
"You were never here, got it." Queston readily answered before proceeding with, "Hey, Truud, do you have the cloak and the sword?"
"Yeah, they're right here," Truudfluue replies and while pulling out a cloak and an iron-looking sword with its scabbard.
Damn, these boys are basically carrying around illegal contraband in their pockets... Or rather just Truudfluue, and Queston stands to benefit.
"Perfect!" Queston exclaims while grabbing hold of the cloak and sword. He quickly enrobes the mantle over his back and head before attaching the sword's scabbard to his belt.
While looking at Queston, I suddenly come to the realization that I don't know his class yet, and that I only know about Truudfluue's, which is commander, so I ask, "By the way, what class are you, Queston?"
He turns his attention to me and smiles before asserting quite excitedly, "Oh me? I'm a musketeer!"