The information that the inn is two hundred years old struck Cecilia like lightning on a blue sky, leaving her speechless.
Gertrude, the innkeeper, was confused by her reaction, for obvious reasons.
"Miss Cecilia? You 'kay?"
"Ah. Oh, right. Yeah… wow, two hundred years. I wasn't expecting that. Time sure does fly. How old is the village, by the way?"
"Oh, the village was built at the mythic age of the players, around when the kingdom itself was founded. A couple of months ago we had a celebration of the five hundred years of existence of the kingdom, so the village must be as old."
"Five hundred years…"
Cecilia's mind was blank once again.
((Five hundred years, mythic age of the players… well, the second part makes sense if this is the game, but that many years… whaaaat?))
Gertrude patiently waited for her guest to digest the information, as she understood that the girl was in shock. After some time, she pointed out.
"Your coffee is going to get cold."
"Oh, right. Coffee. Coffee's important."
Cecilia, of course, loved coffee as much as any other Brazilian. Though she never was into the fancy mixes like lattes and such. She liked the simple and pure coffee, exactly like the one in her cup right now.
Needless to say, she hasn't drunk a single sip of coffee ever since the accident.
"Black as the Devil, hot as hell, pure as an angel, and bitter like my soul."
Cecilia muttered her 'prayer' that she often said when drinking her coffee, which drew another hearty laugh out of Gertrude.
"Yeah, that's a great way to put it. Though this coffee is sweet, not bitter."
She said that exactly as Cecilia was sipping the coffee, which indeed had the indelible and unmistakable taste of sugar. Cecilia's grimace as she tasted it made the innkeeper laugh yet again.
"Marya, bring another cup of coffee to Miss Cecilia, without sugar."
"On it, Mom!"
Marya had been in the kitchen, cleaning stuff, from the sounds she had been making. It was quite obvious that this was a small, familiar enterprise.
((The medieval ages didn't have sugar… well, they didn't have coffee either. So this is probably the result of this being a game world.))
"I'm sorry… I just can't with sweet coffee. The way sugar overpowers and kills the taste of coffee is too much."
"No problem at all. I'll make sure to remember it next time. Back at our earlier conversation, it seemed that I said something that was unexpected to you?"
"Yes… I don't know how to explain it, because I don't even know myself what the hell has happened. But my last memories before waking up in this inn are from a time when this village had just been built. If it is the same village that I remember at all."
"I see… Yeah, that would put anyone out of their minds. So, are you from the age of the players, then?"
Cecilia immediately regretted saying what she said. She didn't want to disclose that she was a player herself, but she wanted to learn more about what the woman meant with that expression.
"What exactly is the age of players? I never heard that name before."
"Hmm… according to our legends, it refers to a time when extremely powerful people lived and roamed around the world. They called themselves players and were from another world."
"Here's your coffee without sugar, Miss Cecilia."
"Oh, thank you, Marya."
The gleam in Marya's eyes as she received the 'thank you' was enough to lift anyone's spirits. But soon after she got back to the kitchen, Gertrude resumed her tale.
"They would appear, do their things for some time, then disappear. And one would never know where or when they would appear again. They founded several kingdoms, cities, and towns. This village was created by players, as was the kingdom in which we live."
"Are there other kingdoms from that time that still exist?"
"No, Drakestadt is the last one standing. Kingdoms rise and fall all the time, but Drakestadt always keeps on living, thanks to our wise queen Aelindra."
Our girl almost spit her coffee when she heard that name. Of all surprising things, that was the most surprising one.
"Oh, now that I think about it, the queen is a dark elf just like you. That's why she managed to be the queen for so long and also to maintain the cohesion of the kingdom. Do you know her?"
"Y-yes… She's an acquaintance of mine from the old times."
After that blunder there's no way she could deny knowing the queen without raising suspicion. But at least she could hide that the queen was her daughter. For now, at least.
No RL daughter, of course. An NPC daughter. Still, her daughter nonetheless, for all effects in this world.
((If Aelindra is here, does that mean… Are my other NPCs also still around? And Helen as well?))
Cecilia was hit by the feeling of butterflies in her stomach at the thought about Helen. But still, she did her best to remain calm and focus on what was in front of her.
((About Aelindra, there could be other people with the same name, of course. But another dark elf with the same name and in the same nation would be rare. And someone able to get into the position of queen…))
That thought made Cecilia remember another important piece of information she was missing.
"And what happened to those players, if they were so powerful?"
"Oh, it was a tragedy. An event called 'Closing of the Servers' whisked them all away. They spent months saying goodbye to their fandoms. Apparently the same event also caused the gods to never appear again."
In the game, the GMs impersonated the gods that the NPCs worshipped according to the lore to give quests and create events that would shake the world up every time it began to be too stale.
They left most of the balancing and generating of quests in the hands of the players and the player-based economy. But sometimes they needed to intervene to keep the game fun and fair, especially if some group snowballed too much to the point of taking the fun out of other players.
Priests like Cecilia theoretically gained their spells from those gods, but that was an automatic working of the system that didn't involve the GMs. As she was able to cast a spell earlier, it means that those functions didn't stop.
"A closing of the servers, huh? That sounds ominous…"
"Isn't it? Though I have no idea of what that means. I'm just repeating the lore I learned as a child."
If the servers closed, it would mean that the game would turn off and cease functioning altogether without maintenance. But it seems that it kept existing, and that NPCs from that time are still alive.
((Wait, do NPCs even live to begin with?))
"In any case, my last memories are from that time, yeah. What you said matches with what I remember, and that closing of the servers hadn't happened yet."
"So you're at least five hundred years old. Impressive. Elves really do have long life spans."
Cecilia was actually eighteen, but she wouldn't correct the innkeeper in that regard. If five hundred years have passed since that time, then she's five hundred years old, for all practical purposes.
No, in the background she wrote for Morielen, the character was already 228 years old. So, right now, she should be 728 years old.
((I'm a mummy.))