Chapter 14
Days had passed, and I still couldn’t believe I’d won.
I was better at game development than I’d thought.
My hard work was paying off, literally. Banners, blue-for-first streamers, and deflating balloons still hung along the walls from the party Buzz had thrown for me several days ago, celebrating my first-place win, which had been sweet but uncomfortable.
However, I owed him so much. With Buzz, Lin, and Charisse checked off my list, it was time to turn back to IK.
I’d known it would not be easy to find the Dragon’s Eye Opal.
I mean, obviously IK hadn’t done it yet.
After days of searching, I hadn’t found a single clue that had panned out.
The clacking, yells, and overall hubbub of my surroundings made it hard to think.
I tried to come up with ideas of where to look as I worked, shuffling food and drink around DragonByte.
The aroma of pizza mingled with the smell of gamer sweat—made more pungent by the heat wave—turned my stomach.
Or maybe it was the frustration of not finding clues about the opal.
The biggest problem was that the armor was so rare; few people had heard of it—except those who knew IK.
I was beginning to wonder if it was a custom item made for him by one of the devs.
But wouldn’t they have given him the whole set?
And that would be kinda cheating. I cleared the cache of computer number thirty-nine and wiped up a sticky brown soda spill.
My irritation rose. If he had won that tourney with one-of-a-kind dev armor...
I shook my head and looked up at another call for service.
IK wasn’t like that. I’d give it a couple of weeks before I asked VerdantArcher and ShadowImp about the armor.
He knew them IRL and they might spill the tea either way.
For now, I had a few more tricks up my sleeve.
With the scholarship to SCAD settled and Lin’s place to stay, there wasn’t much for me to do but pack and spend more time with Mom.
Ni had been coming in almost every day. He sat in the corner with his friends, relieved, like I was, that our AP tests were over.
He really wasn’t a bad guy. I could enjoy him from a distance.
He just triggered my sensitivities. Every girl who met him had a crush on him, except Lin.
She was devoted to Maddox. I still didn’t know why.
She was a closed world where, if given permission to enter, you were only allowed to explore certain places.
DragonByte’s front doorbell beeped and in breezed Lin and Charisse.
My friends didn’t come by as often. Charisse made it sound like they were trapped in a weird limbo between wanting to spend time with me when they could and worrying they were adding to my workload. Besides, we would see much more of each other come the fall.
Luckily, I was just delivering drinks to some rank-smelling guys near the door, so I could get to them right away.
They headed to the front desk and signed in.
I’d tried to tell them it was nice having them there and two more didn’t matter when there were fifty or more customers, but it hadn’t changed their habit.
Also, I just wasn’t very good at expressing my feelings.
I was getting better. I had been honest with them at the awards ceremony.
And I’d been honest with IK about missing him.
He hadn’t said anything about that yet, and I wondered if he understood what I’d really been saying.
But I wasn’t ready to tell him I liked him just yet.
I settled them on the main floor at a spot where they could be together and the smell wasn’t so bad. “I’m so glad you’re here.”
Lin raised an eyebrow at my gushy attitude, but I really was. After our discussion at the game jam, I’d had a breakthrough, and I had to get right on it. It was important to me to start this new stage of life as I meant to go on.
“Ooh, I’m so happy to see you too! It’s felt like forever since we spent quality time together.
You still owe us a shopping trip. Why do you only get one day off a week?
We wanted to come see you and shoot stuff.
Well, Lin wanted to shoot stuff. I’m just going to create perfect outfits for the avatars. ”
I suddenly had a great idea. “Do you guys have time to help me look for something?”
They both nodded. I knew their summers were fairly open, though Charisse had been involved in a theater workshop. Their parents were paying for their college. It made me jealous for a moment. But I quickly quashed it.
I explained what I was looking for. I even showed them my idea book with some hints I’d written down and flipped past the bad drawings of armor and weapons as quickly as possible.
“If you find anything in your online search that sounds promising, just copy and paste into the doc I’m sending you both.
Later, I’ll go in-game and check each lead.
Also, sometimes there are ways to combine rare objects to get a chance to create set armor.
Let me know if you get a line on any of those formulas as well. ”
“Ooh. It’s like a mystery and we’re helping you find the clues. I love mysteries!” Charisse said.
I smiled. Some people never change. Having them here would also give me the opportunity to follow through with the second step of my plan.
Now that I was going to SCAD with them, there had to be something that they wanted or needed.
I checked in repeatedly during my work hours.
Sometimes carrying a rag, sometimes an empty tray after delivering food or drink.
They would search for a bit, then take breaks playing games before going back to the search.
I was touched by how diligent they were.
Watching them closely and trying to interrogate them on the sly to figure out what I could do for them, I had another epiphany.
Lin and Charisse appeared to be opposites in every way, but they were both like me.
Though both had loving, whole families, both of them were afraid to trust. Lin barricaded herself behind a tough exterior, and Charisse hid under the mound of words she spewed.
That was why we were friends. We needed each other. It was hard to find people you could trust. I was truly lucky to get into SCAD with them.
It was almost lunch break when Lin came up to me, putting her hand on my arm to get my attention over all the noise. “I found something!”
I made hand signals across the room to Buzz to let him know I was going on break, and he gave me the nod, so I scurried over to see what had her so excited—excited for Lin, anyway. I followed her back to her computer, weaving through the press of bodies and tables.
The blog was rather dry and very technical, though I followed it well.
I scribbled it down in my book. The author was speaking my language.
Then I got to the part that had her so enthusiastic.
It had been written by one of COTSA’s devs, and they gave a few hints for some of the more unique items in the game.
Like the couplet poem for the Shadows of Forgotten Lords quest, the information was written in a code I would need to figure out. But it was something tangible.
I yelped and hugged Lin tight. Charisse must have felt left out, because she joined us in a three-way hug. I had what I needed, and once again, I owed my friends big time.
THANKS TO LIN AND CHARISSE’S help, I had an opal ring to find.
Mom was already at work, and I had the day off with no plans other than to meet IK and the others later.
The clue was tricky, but I had an idea of where to begin.
I started up the game, placed my headphones on my head, and ScarlettSaber fast-traveled to a town near a haunted forest. The trees twisted out of the ground and toward the sky.
The marks on their bark looked like melting faces.
The boss of the forest was Bandit Lord—like Robin Hood, only evil.
He waited in the forest for adventurers, then killed them and kept their loot for himself.
The clue implied that a Dragon’s Eye ring was part of his hoard.
First, I had to get through the giant spiders and the evil crows.
Then, one by one, I had to face and defeat each of his unique band of robbers.
Finally, as I came around a tree, Bandit Lord fell on me from above, his dagger taking a chunk out of my health bar.
I whipped around, my sword slicing him back and returning some of my health.
He was hard to spot in brown pants and a green tunic, so I followed the movement.
We went back and forth as I sliced at him with my ever-trusty blood sword, and he returned each thrust with his dagger.
The dagger seemed to do double damage or had armor-piercing or something, because it did so much damage that my life-stealing and potion-drinking could barely keep up.
I dodged behind a tree, and he followed.
I ducked, and he jumped over, hitting me from behind.
A phone trilled, and I flinched, missing a hit and getting a blade to the gut for my lapse.
I rolled, slicing at his legs, and he finally fell.
I wasn’t looking forward to fighting him again.
He’d respawn if I got too far away or logged off, so I needed to find the opal today, if I could.
But before that, I needed to check if Mom was home because it was her phone I’d heard.
I went out to the kitchen and found her phone on the counter, but Mom wasn’t in her room or anywhere else.
She must have accidentally left it. I called her office and let her know I had her cell.
“Thanks. I don’t know how I forgot it. How has your morning been?”
“Good.”
“Don’t play games the whole time. Eat something healthy and don’t just drink soda. Love you. Bye.”