SBURB/GRUB, LOHAC [John & Vriska]

[Vriska Sekret]

Vriska sat in her room, glaring at her laptop. "Patch FASTER! I want to play SGRUB already!!!!!!!!" Half of the things it claimed to be doing didn't even make sense. What were rafter tubes, and how could it be rehabilitating them? Oh well, at least it was almost done. As soon as it finished 'Counseling Joist Gaskets' and 'Launching Manifestation Systems'. Leaning back in her chair, Vriska pondered what insane person made this game, with its multiple worlds, insane alchemizing system, and different races. While pondering, the game finished updating and logged her in.

Vriska rummaged through her sylladex, making sure everything was still in the correct place. That done with, she smirked and selected a world to quest on. Having not been to the Land of Heat and Clockwork yet,she decided to head over there. Might as well, see if there's anything to make her dice even more awesome. Moving her character to LOHAC took very little time, and Vriska began to set her avatar to running around, killing various monsters and collecting the grist from them. She vaguely noticed someone else questing in the distance, and decided to go over and pester them.

AG: What're you doing 8esides looking dum8 with that ridiculous hammer? It looks like you stole it from a circus meant to 8lind eyes with their tacky colors.

[John Egbert]

John's dad's getting dinner ready, and even though he'd wanted him to set the table, he figures he can do it later. He just got a new update disc in the mail, and nothing was going to separate him and SBURB. Absolutely nothing.

He jammed the disc into the drive, crossing his fingers that the old computer would take it, and grinning wildly when it did. John waited for the update to patch, drumming his nails on the desk, and replaced his hand on the mouse when it finally finished.

Oh. The startup screen was the same, and he was still on LOHAC.

What the hell was this update for, anyway?

Someone was pestering him. 'arachnidsGrip.' He'd never played with them - oh, they were a Light player, like Rose - but he'd never seen that outfit before that her avatar was wearing. He sent her a message back.

EB: my hammer's great! i just alchemized it, okay? it even came with its own theme song when i got it. i don't really know what it's good for yet.
EB: ...where's your weapon?

[Vriska Sekret]

Vriska smirked and had her character pull out a set of dice. She'd alchemized them to be more specialized than the ones she had, because some of the functions of the dice were just useless. Why anyone would want to summon a taco, of all things, she would never figure out.

In any case, surely the Wind person had never seen anything like them before. Or if he had, she wanted to find the person using dice and challenge them. What was that quote again, she wondered. Oh, yes, there can only be one. In this case, only one wielder of dice. She chuckled.

AG: This set is my weapon! They are the 8est!!!!!!!! They are definitely 8etter than your hammer.
AG: Theme song? That's a silly way to determine a weapon's cali8er. It is much 8etter to choose a weapon 8ased on power and su8tlety. Hasn't anyone told you that?

[John Egbert]

John quickly opened up his options menu, making sure his Nanna didn't hack into his account again while he was sleeping and change all his weapons to the most ridiculous-looking ones possible. Stupid Prankster's Gambit. He'd gotten her back good for that one - and that'd taught him to change his passwords often.

He looked at her orange-clad avatar. Well...that was certainly different. It looked like she was fighting with little squares and triangles of...wait, were those RPG dice? As in, old tabletop stuff? He didn't even think anyone used them anymore. How did you fight with dice? Did you throw them at Imps? Maybe she had alchemized them to work like little bombs or something. That would be cool.

He shrugged off her insults and suggestions, barely even letting them effect him, and wrote back a reply.

EB: how do you fight with them? are they like hand grenades? that would be pretty cool.
EB: nah, it's pretty powerful. i just really liked the theme song. i sing it like an opera guy every time it comes out.

He then proceeded to demonstrate for her.

[Vriska Sekret]

Vriska laughed, spinning around in her chair as she did so. Oh, god, the theme song was ridiculous! It certainly didn't help that it did sound like an opera and was completely out of place. Grinning, she waited until he had finished to pull up her dice and find any enemy to demonstrate the dice on.

Locating an imp that was wandering close to her, Vriska tossed her dice and hoped that they would land on a useful and impressive outcome.

AG: No, they do a 8unch of different things!!!!!!!!

Vriska watched the final dice settle, and grinned as the imp was squashed by a rock. It looked like a rock from LOLAR, but she wasn't sure. It was appropriately colourful, though. Perhaps she would find out later, if she found someplace missing a rock. Vriska shook her head, sighing and going back to concentrating on the current topic.

AG: See???????? So cool. And a lot more versatile than your hammer.
AG: At least your hammer kind of matches your class's color scheme, it could 8e a lot worse.

[John Egbert]

John honestly always had a lot of fun pulling out the Warhammer of Zillyhoo. Other players generally got a kick out of it, especially the song. He couldn't tell if the Light girl had enjoyed it, as they weren't on call with eachother. (He really would have to get around to installing the newest version of Pesterchum sooner or later. Supposedly it had voice chat and webcam features.)

He hoped she enjoyed his performance, nonetheless. Opera singing always did take a bit out of him. He looked on as the Light girl took out her dice again and waited. Watching her attack, he held his hand in his chin, then grinned as the rock fell on the imp.

He took a closer look at the new rock - yeah, that rock was definitely from the Land of Light and Rain. He'd have to tell Rose about it so she could bring it back. Despite the name, LOLAR rocks were always too heavy for him to put in his sylladex.

He smashed a few smaller imps with the Warhammer and typed a quick response back to AG, simply letting her attitude roll off his back like water to a duck.
EB: that was actually pretty cool, haha. is it a random outcome every time?
EB: oh man, that's so true. i saw another breath player going around once with a black and white lance. i don't even know how he got something like that.

[Vriska Sekret]

Vriska grimaced. This person seemed to be impervious to all insults and snide suggestions. That made absolutely no sense, everyone cared when they were insulted! How annoying. At least he appeared to appreciate the dice, unlike some people, and was amusing. The hammer was also a better weapon than it had appeared at first glance, she grudgingly admitted, if only to herself. Shrugging, she typed off a response.


AG: They are very cool. And pretty much, yes! They only do useful things, though, 8ecause there's no point in having random things like 8ubbles appearing when you're fighting.
AG: Yeah, I've seen a 8lood player running around with a rain8ow sickle, and it looked a8solutely ridiculous! I think I have also seen that 8reath player, actually, he was in a moral quandary a8out whether or not he should kill the land's enemies!
AG: I left 8efore he got himself killed.

She grinned, remembering that. The idiot was probably still trying to win over the creatures of that land. Watching the breath player kill a few of the imps, she went after a couple, hoping for another heavy damage attack. Tossing the dice, she groaned when the imps ended up floating in an slime block. They'd get out of there long before they died! Tossing the dice again yielded a satisfactory flame that set the slime on fire. She wasn't going to question game mechanics when they worked in her favor!

[John Egbert]

John had to read over the response AG sent a few times for it to sink in. A rainbow sickle? Really? Now this was a guy he'd have to meet. He wondered what he'd have to alchemize to get something like that. Most of his weapons turned out to be green - but then again, a lot of his items that he'd collected were green. It was strange - green wasn't even his favorite color, his favorite was blue. Jade's was green...come to think of it, Jade owned a lot of blue items. He'd have to take that up with her later.

EB: i dunno, bubbles might be pretty useful if you come to an underwater planet or something. then you could use the bubbles to breathe when you ran out of air. the land of gills and sobbing.
EB: hahaha! that poor guy. he probably needs a walkthrough or something.

John paused for a second and wondered if there were actually any walkthroughs for SBURB. Rose had started one, but quit once she realized that SBURB was a pretty open-ended game, and also that no one could understand what she was saying.

EB: so who are you anyway? i'm john. i'm a heir of breath!

John watched her attack some more imps with her dice - wow, those things were handy. He wondered if he could somehow get a set - it would be unlikely that his character would be able to use them, though. He didn't have a dice strife specibus when he started out. He wondered if this Light girl would mind if he tagged along on a quest, because she was definitely a force to be reckoned with.

[Vriska Sekret]

Vriska read over what John said and grinned. He didn't get that she wouldn't go to an underwater planet without proper preparation, but other than that he seemed to be at least amusing.

AG: Why would I go to an underwater planet without the proper equipment?? That would 8e rather stupid, unless you wanted to drown.
AG: I don't 8elieve there are any comprehensive walkthroughs, 8ut he most certainly would 8enefit from one if he actually took the advice!

Vriska threaded her fingers together, resting her chin on them, and stared at the screen. He'd given her his name, so social conventions would declare that she should give this 'John' hers. On the other hand, would he care if she gave a false name or lied? Probably not, if he didn't care about the insults. Still, it wouldn't harm anything.

AG: I'm Vriska, the Thief of Light!!!!!!!!

Vriska had her character grin, bemoaning the fact she couldn't make it a smirk. Hopefully they'd add more emotes soon. She pulled up her map and looked for things to do while waiting for John's response, trying to figure out where quests could be obtained. She hated it when it wasn't clearly defined. Still, she could start at the center and work her way out if nothing else. Perhaps John'd know where to find quests.

AG: Oh, where's the nearest quest?

[John Egbert]

John looked over her replies and laughed, shrugging. She was right, but he saw another point of view. A slightly more difficult to deal with point of view, but a different one nonetheless. He typed another reply to her.

EB: i don't know. maybe you couldn't alchemize an underwater helmet or something? either way, they could come in handy.
EB: i don't know if you do, but i share grist with the rest of my party. we have to budget it a lot.

John grinned. Another Light player would be good to have in his party, especially a Thief. He still wasn't exactly sure what Rose did with her weird Seer powers. Maybe she could see how lucky a person would be? Vriska. Cool name. He wondered if it was a fake name - either way, he'd store that in his brain for later.

EB: a thief of light, huh? you must have all of the luck. do you steal it from the imps?
EB: yeah, i actually have a quest coming up. a little old guy on the land of wind and shade told me i have to go defeat typheus. i hear there's a grist overload there.

His avatar displays the same overbite-y grin he's giving Vriska through the computer screen, and he stores his hammer away, getting ready to switch planets if she wants to.

EB: are you in?

[Vriska Sekret]

Vriska thought briefly about the quest, then shrugged and decided that she might as well join up with him and go kill Typheus. She'd heard about him before, and other denizens, but had ultimately decided not to go up against them. Still, she'd leveled up since then and there'd be two of them. Leaning over the keyboard, she typed up a response.

AG: 8ah, difficulties. There'd have to be something I could make or 8uy that would let me 8reathe underwater! That's practically the 8asis of this game, you can make everything.

Vriska stared at her screen for a second. He shared grist with other people? What a strange concept. Ah, well, she wouldn't have to do that. If he wanted her to do so, too bad.

AG: Yes, all the luck!!!!!!!! I can get it from anyone. Imps don't have a lot of luck, generally. I 8et Typheus would, though!
AG: I'm in! Well, as long as I can keep my share of the grist. I haven't 8een to LOWAS, though.

Vriska stored her dice back in her strife syllabus and swapped her shoes for Rocket Shoes and had her character indicate she was /ready.

[John Egbert]

John really hoped Vriska would go on the quest to defeat Typheus with him. He knew it was going to be difficult, especially alone, and her dice might come in handy. It seemed like those things could create anything to help the situation out of thin air, practically. He wondered if she might have another pair on hand that she's not using anymore. It could be really cool to combine them in with the Zillyhoo...nah. He'd ask her that later, he'd just met the girl. (Girl? John wasn't sure, really. The avatar was a girl, but you could never really tell online.)

EB: yeah, that's true too. it's a lot harder to buy stuff, i think. i mostly alchemize from things i find in random drops and in chests.

John didn't mind sharing grist with his team too much. Rose was a really good budgeter, anyway. Dave kept track of the boondollars and boonbucks, but everyone knew that those really didn't matter too much. It was all about the grist.

EB: yeah, he definitely would. i mean, it's a boss battle. if he's stayed alive for that long and nobody's beaten him yet, he's gotta have some kind.
EB: that's fine by me! my party's not here right now, anyway.

John ran his avatar over to Vriska's and had his avatar take hers by the hand- and with the Windy Thing, he launched them both up into the air towards LOWAS. It was strange - a lot of John's real life extranormal abilities were similar to his in-game ones as the Heir of Breath - well, except for being able to fly. He could launch other people into the air, but himself. He really should get to working on that.

[Vriska Sekret]

Vriska turned away from her computer and got up while she waited for whatever strange power John was using to take them to LOWAS. Stretching, she moved over to her bedside table where she grabbed a half-full bottle of water and a protein bar before walking back to the computer. Defeating Typheus and his minions might take some time and she wanted to have everything she'd need at her desk. She still remembered the time she'd almost died because she'd had to get up to get food, and there was no reason to endanger this victory. Especially with the reward that would come from defeating Typheus. Sitting back down, she watched the loading screen as they landed on LOWAS.

AG: It is interesting to see what happens when you alchemize the random items in those chests, although the results are so frustr8ing sometimes!!!!!!!! Some items do not follow any logic when com8ined.

Vriska grimaced, remembering the time she'd combined a set of paper wings and a small rocket, hoping to get a rocket pack, but instead getting a origami rocket pack or a set of small flying rocket birds. She'd made the rocket birds, and finally figured out how to get rocket shoes, but it was annoying when obvious combinations failed to work.

AG: He could just 8e a tough 8attle! 8ut if he doesn't have a lot of luck, he'll still have a gr8 pile of loot. Hopefully minions that have luck to steal as well!

Looking at the chat log, Vriska wondered if she'd met those party members or if they'd be useful to fight Typheus. Still, they'd be more people to split the grist and boonbucks with, so no reason to ask about them unless it looked like they needed help.