Why didn’t anyone tell me…

Not so long ago Elar jumpedfully formed into the world, not remembering his past and not aware of his present. As he came to himself, he was holding a trimmed branch and facing a kindly old gentleman in what appeared to be a run-down abbey.

“Can I help you?” asked the man.

“/level 30″ said Elar. This was not what Elar meant to say. He didn’t even understand what it meant. But it was his voice that said it and therefore he must have subliminally known that was the proper thing to do. He looks quizzically around.

A loud voice boomed in his ears that nobody else appeared able to hear, “You have been granted enough experience to reach level 20! Click on your trainer to gain levels.” Now Elar was thoroughly confused. He approached the old man again. “Excuse me, but what was that I said about 30?”

“Can I help you?” asked the man, in the same kindly voice.

Elar is suddenly startled by the noise of trumpets and a light show that left him dazed and slightly deafened. He ducks and covers his ears. The kind old man hadn’t noticed, but people all around him started to talk. “GRATZ!” “W-0-0-t!” “Conga Rats!” “dingrats!” While he didn’t understand, they didn’t seem hostile. After gazing around, he returned to the old man again.

This time, Elar was surprised less by the noise and lights, but he did find them disconcerting. But this time there was no fanfare from the lunatics. Elar decided to drop the stick, as it didn’t seem to be doing him any good. “I need to use the restroom. Where can I find one?” Again with the trumpets and fireworks. “Can I help you?” came the same deadpan reply.

Elar decides the old man must be deaf or playing a joke on him and decides to wander off in search of the loo. Continuing on his way, he sees what appear to be pig farms. But these pig farms seem unusual. For one thing, there are no fences. Also, no barn or feed. Assuming this is connected with the nonsense with the old man, he takes note and continues on. Not far away he discovers a road that appears to have been well travelled, but bears no distinct marks of actual travellers. There are a set of pillars leading into the distance, and he follows them to the gates of a large stone city.

At the gates, he finds a lumpy set of stones and three guards. The guards are standing upright and in position, slightly swaying in place. They are wearing shining plate armor and kilts, which strikes him as a rather odd combination. But as he has to go, he approaches the nearest one and asks, “Pardon me sir, could you point the way to the little boys’ room?”

The guard turns and looks at Elar, but says nothing. There is no change of expression to indicate that he has heard properly or not, but he is clearly  not replying. “Is it inside?” The guard stares on. Elar looks off into the distance behind him to see what the guard is looking at, but there is nothing of interest in the trees. Elar turns and walks across the lawn toward another guard.

“Pardon mate, could you point out the loo?” At this point he’s feeling some pressure and would be more comfortable knowing there’s a public restroom nearby than thinking there isn’t.

“Hail traveller! Do you have [ a moment ]?” Replies the guard.

Elar is so taken aback by the actual pronunciation of brackets that he is stunned to silence. He reassembles his face into what he hopes is a non-offensive gape and asks faintly, “A moment? Why, is it far?”

“I sent a message to our nothern patrol two days ago and have not heard from [ Lieutenant Keebler ].”

“I’m sorry to hear that. Listen, where is the restroom in this city?” The guard takes on the same glazed look that the first guard gave Elar. “Hello?” Waving his hands in front of the guard confirms to Elar that this man is narcoleptic. Elar decides that a sleeping man is not going to help him find relief, he moves into the corridor that leads to the city.

Walking into the corridor, he finds himself paralyzed. Then the world goes black for an everlasting painful moment. He’s unable to breathe. Then a colorful banner appears. After perhaps 15 seconds of this, he is dropped on his feet from 2 feet over the cobbles. He staggers a bit and stays upright. “Well, that was odd,” he mumbles.

He turns a corner to his right, leaving the corridor and looking into a courtyard. There are a few people around, apparently doing nothing. They appear to not see each other and are not talking. They have booths of clothing, armor, swords, and daggers. It appears to be a merchant quarter. He approaches the nearest vendor. The vendor looks to be about twenty, slim and bearded, wearing unadorned linen clothes that seem to fit almost too well. “Where’s the loo? I’m in a bit of a hurry,” Elar asks.

The vendor does not reply but pushes out what appears to be a price sheet. Elar pushes the sheet down and tries again. “No, thanks anyway, but I really need to find the water closet. Could you point the way?” The vendor pushes another sheet toward Elar.

Elar’s now starting to panic. Little restroom alarms are going off all up and down his torso, telling him that he has very little time left. He rushes off toward a large building farther from the entry. There are no doors, but it is a covered building. Inside on the left is a grey stone staircase. In front of him is a gorgeous, perfectly geometric table with a golden challace emblem on a red field in the middle. The table shows no sign of use. As he stares at this, someone jumps from the upper balcony, which Elar had not yet noticed, squarely onto the table. Elar can hear the bones in his legs shatter as the man tumbles to the floor.

“Geez man, are you hurt?!” Elar rushes over.

“yah, 1 mroe shoud do it tho, thx” says the man, dragging himself toward the staircase with only his arms.

“What?!” asks Elar, amazed. The man is already up the stairs as Elar chases him. The man flops his broken body over the railing and falls again onto the table and stops moving.

Elar isn’t sure what to make of this. The man apparently was aware of what he was doing, but Elar wasn’t able to stop him. His bowels give a groan of warning, and Elar decides that he’d better not be found above a dead body that obviously fell to its demise. He backs out of the balcony, down the stairs and back out into the courtyard.

He is now on the other side of the courtyard from where he entered. There is a forge and anvil here, and some people are standing next to it, swaying in the same gentle way that all the others have. Things below are getting desparate, but he decides to approach these people. “Perhaps if I show a bit more interest they’ll point the way,” he thinks. They are talking as he approaches.

“… then cleric casts HoG on the paladin, but the casters stay outside the walls.”
“Hi everyone.” Elar says.
“hey”
“oy”
Elar watches for a few moments. The conversation does not continue. “What are you doing today?”
All at once, one of the men blurts out as fast as he can speak, “then send in rogues and dmg casters. theurgs cast no more than 8 pets each and hide on teh hill”
One of them replies, “makin hinges lol”.
Elar looks at the man. He doesn’t appear to be making anything at all. He’s standing quite still, many feet from the forge and anvil, and is quite clearly not holding a hammer or heating any metals. “Don’t you need a hammer for that?” He asks the odd man.
“got one, they’re only like 2sp”. He pronounces the “2sp” as if it were spelled toosp.
At this point, Elar is starting to think there is something wrong with all the people in town and has more pressing things to be concerned with. The pressure on his insides is becoming quite uncomfortable in waves. “Listen, I need to find the loo.”
“stoopid rp server. I shoulda gone to gaheris.” says the taller of the two men. He is dressed in plate and holding a 7 foot long spear with a jagged point that appears to have never been used.
“noob” replies Hingeman.
Elar has had enough. He runs off. To his right he sees what appear to be close packed two story houses in a small cobbled street. As he comes through the gateway to this street, he spots another guard. He also is swaying gently, as if to some etherial unheard Lawrence Welk music. “Quick! Where’s the loo?” asks Elar.
“Hail traveller! Would you be ready to assist the [ Defenders of Albion ]?”
Elar is noting clear signs of danger below. Throwing caution to the wind, he yells “I HAVE TO POO! WHERE DO I GO!?”
A voice returns from no particular location, “dude you’re safe in town, just go”

And so he does.