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from his near character death experience, Lucious
asks, “So which way?”
    Wesley looks around the
foyer. The game designers had decorated the room with thick, massive
strands of cobwebs, casting a veil over the room and covering over
possible doors and exits. Even with the fire spell, only a small
portion of the room has been cleared of spider webs. We
will have to split up and clear the room in order to locate the exit, he realizes and decides to verbalize his intent to the party. He
looks at the rest of the party, which is waiting patiently to hear
his plan. “Since the room is filled with spider webs covering the
exits, we need to clear out the cobwebs first. And to do it quicker,
we should split into two groups of two, with each group consisting of
one fighter and one spell caster. I will go with Lucious, because he
has a light source. Diana should hold the torch while Conrad clears
the cobwebs with his club. Our objective is to locate possible doors
and exits along the walls. But don't leave this room. Once we uncover
all the possible exits, we'll methodically explore each one together.
If you encounter monsters, just holler and vice versa,” he proposes
in great depth.
    “Sounds good to me,”
the barbarian replies as he passes his torch over to the priestess.
The plan is as any good as any that Conrad can come up with by
himself. “I'll start with the left side,” he offers.
    “Fine, we'll take
right,” the mage readily agrees and starts walking to the opposite
side of the room. It is conceivable that there are multiple exits out
of this room, and therefore one side is as good as the other.
    “Wait for me,” the
cavalier reminds the young man. Will
this kid ever learn , he sighs.
    Lucious stops walking
suddenly, and grinds his molars. Tap-tap-tap-tap. He taps the end of
his staff on the stone floor impatiently, waiting for the old veteran
to catch up.
    Wesley walks at a
leisurely pace, disregarding the clearly annoyed spell caster, and
finally stands in front of the impatient mage. As Wesley swipes at
the cobwebs with his shield and moves forward into the cleared space,
he notices that the radius of illumination from the staff has not
moved. “Please keep up with me, Lucious,” he calls out over his
shoulders.
    Chastened a second time
now, the mage slowly walks forward, his circle of light keeping pace
with the cavalier. This is just
like walking a dog , Lucious muses to himself.
    * * *
    Diana alertly turns her
head from side to side, while holding the torch in her left hand and
her mace with her right hand. She does not want to be caught off
guard by a leaping giant spider like Lucious was a moment ago. The
torch illuminates only a three feet radius, requiring her to stand
close to the barbarian while Conrad swings his ivory club to clear
out the cobwebs. Fortunately, they are in sync with one another, and
Diana easily matches his forward advancement in the room.
    Klunk! The club
unexpectedly hits a wall, and the reverberation of the blow causes
Conrad's hand and wrist to go numb for a moment as the biofeedback
loop sends the pain being experienced by the avatar back to the
player. Stoically ignoring the pain and not giving any outward sign
of distress, the barbarian sets his club on the ground and uses his
bare hands to wipe away the remaining dirt and web on the wall.
    I
am not going
to touch that with my hands , Diana thinks as she makes a
face. I don't care if this is
just virtual reality rather than my real body , she thinks
as an image of her real life, physical self sitting at home in front
of her powerful workstation computer pops into her mind. She is
dressed casually in blue jeans and a red tank top, her hair bunched
up in a bun, and wearing WoE's special virtual reality head gear and
gloves connecting to her powerful octa-core desktop computer.
    What's
this , Conrad wonders as his fingertips come across a gap
along the wall. Tracing his fingers along the gap, he works quickly
to reveal the