Chapter Text
“…Clotho blushed and buried her face in her pillow. She had always thought Atropos was beautiful, ever since they had formed their group together with Lachesis, and years of living together, first in the dorms, and then in a shared apartment when the agency had wanted to give the dorm space to a newer group, had only intensified her attraction, rather than dimming it. However, in all those years she had never voiced her feelings aloud, and since Atropos had never said anything either, she had long since despaired at the idea of her feelings ever being requited. But Morta’s messages gave her the same fluttery feeling that Atropos’s praise always had, and she wanted to meet her in person! Maybe pursuing a relationship with someone she met online wasn’t the wisest idea, but it was high time she stopped carrying that flame for her groupmate, and here was someone who actually—”
Idia was interrupted from his writing by the alert tone of a direct message in his game. He had logged on a little while ago, but SDC auditions were today so Yuu was busy, and Muscle Red didn’t seem to be online either. After doing most of their dailies, Idia had opted to leave their character afk and work on their fic while they waited to see if either of them would log on later. They tabbed back to the game to see which of his online friends had messaged him.
<Muscle Red> My apologies for being late. I had an engagement that ran longer than expected.
While he composed his reply, a text came in from Ortho simply saying that auditions had just finished, and that Yuu had said to tell him they had promised a friend to hang out afterwards, so they wouldn’t be online.
<Gloomurai> np, i wasnt waiting too long
<Gloomurai> btw shrimpies taking a rain check on today so its just us
<Muscle Red> That’s perfectly alright. The most recent update added a new side questline they won’t be able to do for a while anyway, so let’s say we go questing together, just the two of us?
Idia felt the ever-present warmth of their hair intensify, and they just knew that if they checked their reflection there would be hints of pink. It wasn’t even like adventuring one-on-one with Muscle Red was at all rare even after Shrimpie had started playing. Yuu just didn’t have as much time to commit to the game, what with all their normie social commitments (Though somehow their normie social life didn’t seem to lead to a normie sleep schedule, as the bags under their eyes were starting to rival Idia’s). Yet, something about how Muscle Red always phrased it just felt so—! Idia shook his head to clear it and typed a response. The quest began in a town near the northern end of the map, so he arranged to meet Muscle Red there once they were partied up.
<Gloomurai> ok, the npc is somewhere in the marketplace, but i didnt wanna see any spoilers so i dont know their coords. lets split up and look 4 them
Muscle Red agreed and ran off to the east end of the market, while Idia stayed on the west end and started wandering around. While he was there, he checked in on a few of the shops. The ones that were available in every town, such as the blacksmith that gave access to equipment crafting, or the general item shop that carried basic potions and other essentials, were in the east side where Muscle Red was searching. Idia’s side had things like regional monster drops in limited quantities for people who really didn’t want to trek out into the snowy plains for one single Dire Snow Hare pelt, or a record shop, which sold magitools (which, entirely coincidentally to be sure, looked exactly like vinyl records) that allowed you to play the region’s soundtrack in your home. Right next to the record shop, he found a little girl npc looping a somewhat melodramatic sobbing emote. To confirm that this was the very npc he was looking for, a line of dialogue appeared in the chat box when he approached.
[System Messages]
<Dorte> Boohoo…
[Private]
<Gloomurai> meet at [my coords]. npc is a crying little girl.
<Muscle Red> Wonderful. By the by, I only need a couple more hare pelts to craft this lovely winter coat that can hold the Freeze Immunity gem I got yesterday, so feel free to accept the quest and figure out where we’re going next while I do that.
<Gloomurai> k
Clicking on poor Dorte opened her dialogue, and she stopped crying and started trying to sell him matchsticks. Not even, like, a box of matches. Just individual sticks. Out of curiosity, Idia clicked the “I don’t need your matches, I can just start fires with magic” option, which just closed the dialogue without accepting the quest. Fortunately clicking the npc again didn’t make him go through her whole sales pitch again, she just asked if he changed his mind and offered the same dialogue prompts again. Accepting this time opened a shop, where the only items for sale were the matchsticks. He bought one, and when he closed the shop his quest list updated.
“Matches in the Snow:
You bought a matchstick from little Dorte.
Light a match 0/1”
<Gloomurai> first step is to light a match. buy it from the npc and then click it in ur inventory
<Gloomurai> tell me when u get 1 and well light them 2gthr?
Muscle Red finished his running back and forth between the east and west sides of the market and approached Idia and Dorte, new armor equipped and set as visible. It was a nice design, the clean lines of the coat complemented his avatar’s silhouette and the fur trim provided a cute touch. The developers had made the somewhat odd decision not to put any sleeves on an outfit supposedly designed for cold weather, but Idia wasn’t exactly complaining— true to his handle, Muscle Red’s avatar had some extremely well-defined arms. Shortly, he finished reading Dorte’s dialogue.
<Muscle Red> Ah, I see, we’re doing a Little Match Girl story.
<Gloomurai> ?
<Muscle Red> It’s a fairy tale from the Sunshine Lands about a matchstick seller much like little Dorte here.
<Gloomurai> nvr hrd of it before
<Gloomurai> hows it go?
<Muscle Red> Are you sure you want to know? I was under the impression you wanted to experience this quest blind.
<Gloomurai> yeah ur right. tell me the story after were done tho, i wanna see how they compare
<Muscle Red> Of course. Ready to light our matches?
<Gloomurai> 1 moment
Seeing Muscle Red in his new gear made Idia want to get into the wintery mood too, so he opened up his closet and selected a cosmetic outfit he’d spent a couple weeks grinding for during a Yuletide event a few years back.
<Muscle Red> Oh, is that a traditional Harveston Applepom outfit? Nice choice of dye colors, it’s quite fetching.
<Gloomurai> ye, theres a rlly good anime about the sledathon there where all the characters wear outfits like this.
<Gloomurai> I picked the colors to match best girl Ai
<Gloomurai> her determination to win brings her team together and inspires them all and shes just so cute on top of that
<Gloomurai> its called Sled Over Heels: Tearing Up The Snow and its streaming on makiroll if u wanna see
<Muscle Red> I used to visit Harveston to watch the Sledathon occasionally in my travels. They get quite spirited, so I’m sure a series about one would be delightful! I’ll be sure to give it a watch when I have the chance.
Great Seven, Idia wished he could see a Sledathon in person. Sometimes he found himself wondering what kind of life Muscle Red must lead, based on the brief insights he let slip occasionally. It had to be far more interesting than the only life Idia would ever see, holed up in his room at NRC until senior internships started, and then holed up in STYX for the rest of his life. He shook his head to try to clear out that depressing thought, and told Muscle Red he was ready to light the match.
Using the item sent him to a quest instance. Looking around, it appeared to be the capital of the eastern country that samurai characters were supposed to come from. Muscle Red was nowhere to be seen, and the party panel indicated that they could not teleport to each other at the moment. Perhaps he had been sent to his own class’s home? A moment later a message from Muscle Red confirmed his guess. His instance was of a small port village in the northern country they were currently in, which warriors called home. He had also seen a couple npcs in the distance he wanted to try to talk to. Idia scanned his screen again, and spotted a cluster of npcs outside a large estate in his own instance as well. Walking up to them caused several lines of radiant dialogue to appear in his chat box, mostly variations on “Welcome home,” and then the instance closed and he was teleported back to the market in front of Dorte. He checked the quest, the next objective was to talk to her again.
[System Messages]
<Dorte> Sir? Are you okay?
[Private]
<Muscle Red> Hold on a moment.
<Muscle Red> Check your status effects, there’s something odd in mine.
There was, in fact, a blue debuff icon above his health bar that wasn’t there before, sandwiched between the green indicator for improved recovery in safe zones and a gold buff icon for some food he had eaten before starting the quest. It was a snowflake, like the freeze icon, but he didn’t appear to be frozen. Opening the more detailed status window, he found the description, “Deep Cold- You have spent too long exposed to the elements, and the cold has set into your bones. -10% movement speed, -10% attack speed (2:53 left)”
<Gloomurai> i see it
<Muscle Red> It must be related to the quest. I suppose there isn’t anything for it except to talk to the match girl again.
The dialog confirmed what the debuff’s description implied. According to Dorte, it was a day later, and he had been standing out in the snow the whole time. He asked to buy another match, to confirm what had just happened, and Dorte eagerly sold it to him. Then he and Muscle Red arranged to light their matches together again.
This time, it took a little longer to load the instance, but they were sent to the same one, which was a relief. It would’ve been a major bummer if they had been separated for the whole quest. The devs must have really wanted to do the class-specific zones for the first match. The new instance was of a massive banquet hall. The tables were laden with massive, glistening roasts and they were surrounded by a cheering crowd. Idia inspected the npc closest to them and realized he looked an awful lot like a member of their guild who spent almost all his time tending the crops in the guild lot, roleplaying as a farmer, and occasionally saying oddly morbid things in chat.
<Gloomurai> hey the guy next to me looks like reaperman for some reason
<Muscle Red> Yes, and this fellow behind me has his armor dyed just like Kuro Shadow’s.
<Gloomurai> the quest says we gotta eat the food to progress, so lets see who we can find in here first
Idia looked around the room, admiring the illusion—in multiple senses—of their friends gathered around. Internally, they tried to guess at what exactly the system was doing. Most likely, it had gone down their friends list, picked several players, and then loaded the avatars corresponding to those IDs. They and Muscle Red were definitely seeing the same avatars in the same places, so this was being done on the server-side, not the client-side. Was it picking from both their friend lists, or just Idia’s, since they were party leader? Their friends had too much overlap with Muscle Red to tell, they both recognized every character in the room. For that matter, what happened if the quest was run by a solo player with no friends? They would have to look it up, or ask around after finishing the quest to find out.
Once they had both thoroughly inspected the crowd, they moved back to standing next to each other in front of the table, and interacted with it to eat the food together. Sure enough, they were sent back to the village again. This time, in addition to the debuff, they each lost a chunk of their magic. It didn’t take long to recover, Idia’s MP bar was full again by the time they had finished typing an annoyed message to Muscle Red (whose magic was taking much longer to regenerate, but only a couple of warrior skills even used it anyway). The quest panel once again said to light another match, so Idia spoke to Dorte once more. They hoped this wouldn’t keep repeating, they could see the novelty of the illusions wearing off if they had to keep doing them.
Dorte actually seemed hesitant to sell them the match this time, even bringing up how, at the beginning, Gloomurai had told her he didn’t need matches to start a fire. However, she eventually admitted that her father wouldn’t let her come home each day until she sold a match to someone , and was convinced to sell one to them. Idia decided to try to put their thoughts on the quest into words before continuing.
<Gloomurai> ok so dorte and/or her dad are def turbo sus
<Gloomurai> she clearly knows that theres smthng up with the matches
<Gloomurai> and these things are like 1g each, shes practically giving them away
<Gloomurai> and i could see her dad insisting that she sell them if it was necessary to put food on the table, but at 1g each!? a single loaf of bread costs 100g!
<Gloomurai> based on the player apartment rents, food prices, etc, at 1g a match a household of two would be barely scraping by if she sold an entire box of matches to every person in this town every day! but her dads apparently fine with her going back after selling to just us!
<Gloomurai> even without the weird illusions shed be beyond sus
<Muscle Red> To be fair to Dorte and her father, the price might just be that low because players aren’t meant to be gated from the quest based on how much gold they possess.
<Gloomurai> no thatd be dumb
Whatever the truth was, they wouldn’t learn it unless they continued, so Idia and Muscle Red lit their next matches. This time, they were in an endless snowy plain together. Looking into the distance, Idia saw an NPC he recognized as the former princess of the central country on the map, who had died in a particularly devastating main story quest a few months ago. He ran towards her without stopping to check the quest tracker, but just before he got in range to see if she had any dialogue, he was removed from the instance, and transported back to the village, this time with the Frozen debuff.
Well, that explained why Yuu couldn’t accept the quest yet. Nothing so far had really seemed to require a high level or anything, but this illusion just wouldn’t hurt them the right way until they actually got to that part of the story. Maybe he should show them some of the sad GMVs that got made about her when they do. A moment after Idia unfroze, Muscle Red spawned in, having presumably taken his time instead of rushing straight for Princess Amina. He wasn’t frozen, which raised some interesting questions about how quest status effects were applied Idia could ponder some other time.
<Muscle Red> Odd, there isn’t a debuff this time. I would have expected things to continue escalating.
<Gloomurai> actually i got frozen
<Gloomurai> ur just immune lol
Looking around, Dorte seemed conspicuously absent. The quest panel even said “Find Dorte.” Auto-navigation was disabled, and there wasn’t even a marker on the map, so it was time to do things the old fashioned way. First, they checked the alley she was usually near. It wasn’t quite wide enough for them to stand next to each other without a bit of clipping, so they walked single file, with Muscle Red in the lead. A little ways in, and the ground transitioned from cobblestone to snow, and Idia spotted footprints leading the way.
<Muscle Red> Well spotted! My eyes just aren’t so keen these days, you know.
<Gloomurai> eh might be ur eyes, might be my screen contrast settings lol
The pair followed the footprints through the alley, out of town, and towards a small crevice in a nearby rocky outcropping. Approaching revealed it to be the entrance portal to a quest dungeon. Idia and Muscle Red were both well above the suggested level, so in they went. The pair were greeted by a long passageway and the faint sound of Dorte crying from further in. Heading down the path put them face-to-swirling-mass-of-wind-and-ice-approximating-a-face with a group of ice elementals. They were annoying, especially since they could all inflict Freeze on Idia, but they weren’t too hard to get past, especially with Muscle Red’s new gear. Soon enough, they reached the boss chamber, where Dorte awaited them alongside an adult male NPC, and entered, triggering a cutscene.
Dorte glared up at the man, fists balled at her sides. Her voice trembled as she spoke, “I can’t do this anymore, Father! You’re killing people!”
Her father had his back to both Dorte and the questing pair, answering without turning around, “Please, we give them sweet dreams, don’t we? A welcoming home, a warm feast, a lost loved one… Those fools seek these visions out on their own, and don’t even notice me drain the warmth from their bodies and souls.”
“B-but—”
“But what? I took you in, didn’t I? Fed you? Clothed you? And all I ask is that you distribute my matchstick lures—” He turned as he spoke, and finally caught sight of Idia and Muscle Red in the entrance, “Intruders? Dorte, I thought you said our latest victims had been fully drained!?”
Dorte turned as well, and gasped in shock, “But they were frozen solid!”
Her father tsk -ed, “Adventurers. A word of advice, Dorte. Never assume an adventurer is dead unless you’ve personally confirmed they no longer have a pulse. And sometimes not even then.” He stepped toward the center of the room, an icy wind whipping up to conceal him from view. “It would have been nice to drain you all slowly as you retreated to a warm dream and never noticed yourself freezing, but we’re clearly past that now. Dorte, we’ll continue our little discussion after I’ve cleaned up your mess.” The wind cleared, revealing a massive ice wraith. It roared, and the cutscene ended, a boss HP bar appearing at the top of the screen for Dorte’s Father.
<Muscle Red> For the record, this did not happen in the fairy tale.
They ran towards the boss, Muscle Red charging straight into melee range while Idia lined up his opening skill. It sent him dashing forward in a straight line, dealing a bunch of damage to an enemy in his path once his character finished the dash and sheathed his sword. From there, he could chain another of his skills, rapidly unsheathing and sheathing his sword to deal a bunch more hits. He could only keep using it while his character stood in place, but that’s why Muscle Red was primarily using skills that drew aggro. Idia finished his opener just as the ground under him lit up red. The ice wraith was clearly winding up for a wide range attack, one that would most likely inflict Freeze. Muscle Red just kept swinging, since he was immune to the debuff and could afford to soak up the damage, but Idia didn’t feel like being stuck in place for a few precious seconds. The range of the attack looked a little too far for his character to run out of in time, so he used his dash move again, but pointed away from the boss, to get to safety. It was a little wasteful of MP, but that’s what potions were for. The two of them worked together like this, Muscle Red keeping Dorte’s dad’s attention with his massive warrior’s greatsword and Idia using fast-paced samurai combos from midrange until the boss was brought to its knees (well, it was a floating chunk of ice, so it didn’t have knees, but it was brought to them nonetheless). The dungeon rewards dropped, and Idia opened his, then sighed.
<Muscle Red> Oh lovely, a new sword! It’s not quite as good as what I’m using, but this icy design will look lovely hanging in the kitchen! What did you get?
<Gloomurai> [Freeze Immunity Gem]
<Gloomurai> and there isnt even anything else i wanna do in this region
<Muscle Red> Oh, I’m sure it’ll be useful again sooner or later.
From there, the quest wrapped up fairly quickly. They talked to Dorte again, who was distraught, but otherwise holding up surprisingly well, then brought her back to town to find the orphanage. When they got there, they conveniently happened to run into the mayor, a rich old woman who occasionally lamented not having had children when she had the chance if you spoke to her in her manor. Apparently she had decided to actually do something about that regret. She was quickly charmed by Dorte, and agreed to take her in, promising to buy her some shiny new shoes to replace the rough, worn out pair she was wearing as they walked away together. After they were gone, Idia noticed something on the ground. Going to pick it up revealed it to be a dropped matchbox, the tooltip saying that the matches inside were just ordinary sticks now, with no magical power.
<Gloomurai> well that all worked out conveniently
<Gloomurai> i was starting to wonder whatd happen to dorte once we dealt w her dad
<Muscle Red> Yes, this isn’t how the original went either.
<Gloomurai> oh yeah, u said u’d tell me about that after
<Muscle Red> Yes, let’s see…
<Muscle Red> I’m sure you can find the full story on the internet nowadays, but roughly abridged, it goes as follows;
<Muscle Red> Once upon a time, there was a little girl trying to sell matchsticks. It was a cold winter night, but her father would punish her if she returned without selling any matches, and no one was buying any. She tried lighting one to warm herself up, and saw a vision of a warm home, decorated for the winter holidays. The next match showed her a grand feast, and the next one her dearly departed grandmother. She lit match after match trying to prolong the vision of her grandmother, but eventually ran out. When her smiling, frozen body was found the next morning, no one guessed that she was happy because she had been reunited with her grandmother in the Spectral Realm. The End.
<Gloomurai> wait thats it? her life sucks and then she dies? no happily ever after?
<Muscle Red> That was supposed to be her “happily ever after,” actually
<Gloomurai> ???
<Muscle Red> The original author was not what one would call a happy man. He had his charms, he had quite the silver tounge for one, but he was also deeply convinced of his own eternal suffering. This isn’t the only story he wrote where the protagonist’s happy ending lies in their death.
<Gloomurai> u sound like u knew the guy lol
<Muscle Red> Do I?
Idia snickered lightly at the thought of their friend having met that author. Muscle Red made jokes like that all the time. Talking about some long dead author like an old boyfriend was probably one of the less weird things he’d said. Idia liked to think they could separate the real things he’d discussed from the jokes and exaggerations, though they supposed for all they knew, he might never have really seen a Sledathon.
Speaking of their real lives… Idia glanced at the stack of Premo albums next to his computer. He still had quite a few of them on hand, even after giving some out to Yuu, Azul, and Lilia. He knew Yuu knew Muscle Red, and Muscle Red knew that Yuu hung out with his brother at NRC. He’d sent Muscle Red links to Premo MVs and fancams before, but he’d be remiss in his duties as a fan not to try to get him to listen to a full album. Maybe he could tell Muscle Red he was sending the album to Yuu by way of his brother to give him (and then wait a few days to actually hand the album to Yuu to handoff, so Muscle Red wouldn’t wonder about the shipping time, if he really was on Sage’s Island)? Then he could share the album, without either of them exposing more of their real world identities then they already had. The plan solidifying in his mind, he started typing his message before he could chicken out.
<Gloomurai> hey so this premo album came out recently and it had a random order bonus
<Muscle Red> Ah yes, an acquaintance of mine was telling me about it. You always like to collect all the gifts from these sorts of things, correct? I hope your quest was fruitful.
Idia blinked at the new information. Muscle Red had never mentioned knowing any other Premo fans before. He had always gotten the impression that he was the only person who told him about this stuff. Before he could decide whether to comment on it, Muscle Red continued on with his standard, absurdly fast typing speed.
<Muscle Red> My acquaintance apparently needed to amass quite a trove of albums in his own quest. He even gave one to me! I’ve already started listening to a few of the tracks, and they’re quite electrifying.
So, not only did Muscle Red make friends with some other Premo stan, but whoever this guy was had even given him the new album before they could!? Idia supposed this should be a good thing, their friend was getting into the best idol group after all. But at the same time, they had wanted to be the one to bring him into the fold and show him why it was that Premo was the best, not some rando who probably didn’t even really appreciate Premo on the level Idia did. Muscle Red had only called him an acquaintance anyway, not a friend or anything. Who just gave out CDs to near strangers? No one who really understood those CDs’ worth, that’s who. Reassuring themself with this idea, Idia typed up a response that hopefully wouldn’t betray the crisis they’d just had.
<Gloomurai> yeah, i got everything thx
<Gloomurai> tell me when u finish the album btw
<Gloomurai> i had an idea for a fic about the last main story quest based on it, and itll make more sense once uve listened to the whole thing
<Gloomurai> dont worry about needing to hurry up tho im working on a chapter for one of my premo fics rn
<Muscle Red> That sounds lovely, I’m looking forward to it.
<Muscle Red> Oh my, look at the time, I almost forgot I was planning to make dinner tonight! I’d best be on my way, do be sure to keep me updated on that story you’re writing, and I’ll see you tomorrow!
It occurred to Idia that just because that particular gift idea had been shot down, it didn’t mean the whole plan was a bust. He had multiple copies of some older albums too, he could send him some real classics instead of just the newest release like that mystery acquaintance, or something else all together. On the other hand, there wasn’t any real reason to send Muscle Red a gift. His birthday had come and gone nearly three weeks ago, a birthday gift that late would just be insulting. And worse, it was only a few weeks until a couple’s holiday, any gift Idia sent in the near future might get misconstrued, and that would just be mortifying. He could just about imagine Muscle Red’s disgust receiving a gift like that from him. It was better not to bring the topic up at all.
<Gloomurai> cya
[Muscle Red is offline]