Chapter 2
If this isn’t a dream, it’s a dream come true.
I…woke up.
Here.
In Gem Ridge. In a dilapidated farmhouse. After dreaming about a normal work day, where my boss was an alligator that tried to eat my leg when he found me crying in the corner.
I spent the entire day yesterday using a fraying rag I found to scrub a clean corner into my modest abode. Genuinely, I did not know that the clear water I drew from the well by my house could turn black so quickly.
Nor did I think the broom I found to sweep out about three hundred thousand billion cobwebs—I counted—could manage such feats while being entirely constructed of four straws.
I’m fine.
Really.
Thanks for asking…
My bed creaks as I slip from the stale sheets that I oh-so-carefully aired out yesterday, and I exhale relief when the wooden posts don’t collapse. Every breath near the poor bed worries me.
As I rise, each sore muscle and aching bone completes roll call, screaming its presence into my ears.
I rub the sleep clinging to my eyes away before I get my glasses off the worn nightstand beside me and push them onto my face.
My stomach growls, taking up the rear of roll call.
I look down the length of my cute, sturdy khaki dress at it.
In Vale of Gems, I eat solely to recover HP in the mines.
The mines, presently, aren’t even unlocked yet.
So, what is this nonsense?
Now that I’m thinking about it, I am dreadfully thirsty, too. And thirst isn’t even something in the game.
Or, you know, my dreams, usually.
Attempting to regain moisture in my mouth, I check for inconsistencies in my surroundings—any clue that I’m dreaming, even though I don’t tend to frame-tale my dreams and the boss equals alligator nonsense I just woke from felt far more dreamlike.
Same old crusty floor. Same old ceiling full of spiderwebs I couldn’t reach yesterday. Same old ashy fireplace. Same old rusty starter tools by the door, including that pathetic broom, which—for your information—was not included in the game.
Everything that was rotted beyond repair I carted outside last night to make a rudimentary burn pile. The entire time, I grumbled because Vale of Gems doesn’t have burn piles. On this property, there’s supposed to be a shipping bin that Lazul checks each night for goods he can pay me for.
Normally, I put my trash in there.
Not because Lazul pays me for it.
No.
Because it’s what he deserves.
And he deserves it double if I pretend this is real life.
I have half a mind to tell him to touch grass if he—as an actual person not following insane genre-standard coding—believes it’s okay to drop a helpless girl off on a property with an outhouse.
Prepare the farmhouse for the night quest aside, my own personal quest list has grown to include marry Samson…and stage a coup.
It really is such a shame this place doesn’t have a shipping bin.
I’d feel so much better right now if I knew that Lazul carted off all my burn pile junk in the dead of the night.
Speaking of trash, where is he?
He said he’d be by in the morning, and I don’t know what’s going on if this is really real, but I do know I have never once in my life woken at the game-designated wake up time of 6:00 AM.
Without checking what my journal says, I speculate that it’s probably a modest 10:00 AM, which means Lazul has two hours to show up before it is no longer morning.
Which also means I have some time to see if I can’t figure out how to use the rusty tools and start clearing a path toward my love. Project marry Samson before I wake up is a go.
Determination renewed, I grab my backpack and the weathered handle of the axe by the door, march outside, and stop short at the sight of the red mail flag sticking up.
Setting my axe over my shoulder like a proper farm girl, regretting it immediately, and plopping the tool down against the mailbox post, I brush off my clothes. With somewhat more muted enthusiasm, I open the little mailbox door and pluck a remarkably nice envelope from beside an old bird nest.
Mm.
Lovely.
I will have to clean this out, too, I guess.
Why couldn’t I have had a nice, uncomplicated, hyper-realistic dream that started in Samson’s arms? Why did I have to begin this lucid masterpiece with so much housework?
Sighing, I pop the seal on the envelope and read:
Dear Citrus,
I want to apologize for leaving you in such dire straits. There’s a lot about Gem Ridge that it’s too soon to share, but know that I believe everyone who ends up here is here for a reason.
Ever since the disaster, I’ve had a lot to manage alone, so it’s a relief to know someone else will be pitching in.
That said, please accept the enclosed amount. It isn’t much, but it’s what I can offer right now while we’re still piecing ourselves back together.
Perhaps while you gather supplies in town with these funds, you can introduce yourself to the locals?
Just a thought.
We could really use the refreshing presence of a newcomer right about now.
I have an uncanny feeling about you.
Sincerely,
Lord Lazul
If I had to guess, that “uncanny feeling” is guilt.
While I haven’t yet gotten a chance to see my face, I made Citrus a petite thing, shorter than me. Cuter. Big eyes, round nose, sweet smile.
As adorable as the slew of generic pixelated options allowed.
From what I can tell, my hair is Citrus’s shoulder-length sunny gold, I’ve got the glasses and the dress, and my figure is giving the essence of consumes more than a single tear-soaked burger a day.
Looking like Citrus means I am the human equivalent of a plumped up little mourning dove.
And Lazul made me sleep with spiders.
I hope the guilt of that uncanny feeling consumes him.
As I’m stuffing the letter back in the posh envelope, a gold coin catches my attention.
That’s right.
His letter mentioned that he was paying for his sins.
A single coin of penance is utter nonsense, but Lazul’s a pompous rich kid, not a monumental jerk butt, so I wonder if currency stacks differently than I’m used to in the game. Maybe my weird little pine cone of a brain is taking further creative liberties.
“The outhouse was off-script enough, thanks,” I mutter, swinging my pack around.
I fish out my journal and go to my inventory page.
One thousand coins.
My eyes widen.
Before the information computes, a breeze flips me to the quest page. Yesterday’s conversation is gone, but I watch as a line strikes through Prepare farmhouse for the night.
Once that text vanishes entirely, a new quest appears.
Greet everyone. 0/23
“You are joking,” I say aloud. If—and until I lose the last of my brain cells, that is a really big if—this is real life and I have been majestically transported into my deepest fantasy, I am not emotionally prepared to meet over twenty real people!
The beauty of a farm sim is walking up to an NPC, right clicking, and reading a few lines of random dialogue. I do not need to say a word, and people progressively like me better. Or when I do have to say something, I get two options.
Two.
And you know what?
Both are normally right.
Because even if one gets more social points than the other, as long as I keep showing up and right clicking, people will keep liking me.
Easy, peasy, Citrus-squeezy.
What’s wrong? appears in my journal while my eye twitches.
“What’s wrong?” I stammer. “There’s a reason I play cozy games.
There’s a reason the skill tree prioritizes things like fishing and mining, not charisma.
I am so bad at greeting people, my boss put me in the back of a hot kitchen, during summer, in Florida!
Even though I’m just a little lady!” Muttering, I say, “I know I’m cuter in this world than I am in real life, but still.
I told my rotten boss about my astigmatism, and it granted me no mercy at all. ”
Hardee’s managers have a lot of nerve for ignoring such severe medical conditions while also not offering healthcare.
Freeing a breath, I state, “Bottom line: dream or not, first-person socializing is off the table. It’s on the floor. In a hole.”
It’ll get you closer to meeting Samson.
My inhibitions melt away. “Samson is still on the table?”
Samson has never left the table, Citrus.
I need to not picture Samson on furniture.
Clearing my throat, I say, “Fine. I will do my very best to commit acts of communication with t-twenty-three entire people. But if I break down in tears at any point, Samson better be there to dry them. Or else.”
When my journal doesn’t humor my dramatics, I pack it up along with my coin, discover my bag swallows tools no problem, and dump the pathetic starter equipment I found in the house inside.
Axe, pick, hoe, and watering can secure, I make my way carefully through the muddy land back into the heart of town.