Two weeks passed.
In-game, at least.
Time blurred in Elunaria. I stopped trying to track the days. Whether it was morning or midnight didn't matter anymore. The world outside was distant, hollow. This was my world now. Silver trees, cold bows, and a never-ending target I couldn't conquer. The pain, the failure, the constant repetition—they had become my clock. Try. Fail. Rest. Try again. That rhythm replaced my heartbeat.
Caelorn no longer acknowledged me. At first, he had offered curt nods, the occasional correction, or even just a glance of observation. But now? Nothing. The last time our eyes met, his expression was a mix of thinly veiled contempt and resignation. Like he'd already decided I was beyond help. Like I was a weed he couldn't pull, so he chose to ignore it.
He watched others now. Players who shot ten arrows in ten seconds, who triggered popups and buffs and praise from the system. They graduated. I stagnated.
The players noticed too. At first, they mocked, called me a noob, joked about how I held the bow like a shovel. But then the story changed. Whispers began to spread.
There's a weird NPC in the elven tutorial zone, they said. Some glitch. A placeholder. She just stands there trying to shoot a bow she clearly wasn't coded to handle. A broken loop. An inside joke.
Some came just to see me. Tourists. They didn't even try to be subtle—walking up, inspecting me like I was part of the environment. A few waved to see if I'd wave back. Others took selfies. One player even draped a garland of flowers over my shoulder and wrote "RIP Determination" in chat.
They thought I couldn't see it.
But I could.
I saw everything. I heard everything. And each comment carved itself a little deeper under my skin.
I wasn't some scripted line of dialogue. I wasn't a ghost in the machine. I was real. I was here. And I was trying.
At first, I felt shame. Embarrassment. I wanted to shrink. I wanted to vanish.
But as the days wore on, shame hardened into something sharper. Anger. Desperation. Obsession. The kind that doesn't make you scream. The kind that makes you grit your teeth and whisper, again.
The tutorial zone didn't demand food. Or water. Or sleep. The system didn't track fatigue here. It let you grind forever. It let you chase progress until your fingers went numb.
So I did.
It became a ritual. Try. Rest. Try again. Breathe. Draw. Fail. Do it again.
Sometimes I sat with the bow resting across my lap like an old wound. Other times, I stood for hours, fingers aching, arms shaking. There were nights—if you could call them that—when I simply stared at the target in silence, trying to will myself into becoming better. Faster. Stronger.
Sometimes I screamed. Until my voice gave out, until my throat felt raw, until the forest swallowed the sound like it didn't matter.
Sometimes I cried. Quietly. Angry at myself for doing it. Angrier for caring.
And more than once, I hovered over the system menu. That glowing "Log Out" button stared back like a dare. I could almost feel it mocking me.
But I never pressed it.
Because if I did, I knew what would happen. I'd walk away. And I wouldn't come back.
But I couldn't be Mia again.
I couldn't go back to being the girl who was forgotten by her friends. Who sat alone with a cold burrito. Who bought this game out of spite and loneliness and told herself it didn't matter.
Because now I was Lirael.
And Lirael didn't leave.
Lirael endured.
And someday, Lirael would hit that damn target.
But not today.
Today, I'd had enough.
I snatched the bow from the ground and stormed across the clearing toward Caelorn. My feet pounded the moss-lined path, and every step felt heavier than the last. I didn't care if I looked ridiculous. I didn't care who stared.
He stood in his usual place arms folded, gaze locked on some confident player pulling perfect shots. Like I didn't exist.
I marched right up to him and stopped a breath away. "What kind of instructor are you?" I snapped.
Caelorn's eyes finally moved. He blinked once, faint surprise flickering in the corners.
"You just stand here," I continued, voice rising, "watching people fail or succeed like it's none of your business. You never helped me. Not once. You just watched. Watched and judged like some carved statue."
He didn't answer. His expression leveled again back to strict and unreadable.
"Is that what passes for training here? Silence? Disgusted glares? Do you even care that I've been here for weeks trying, trying to get better?"
Still nothing. He simply studied me. Not dismissive. Not amused. Just... silent.
I threw my arms wide. "Well? Say something!"
Caelorn's eyes dropped to the bow in my hands.
"Why are you using that?" he asked.
I blinked, thrown off. "What?"
"That bow," he said simply. "Why are you using it?"
My mouth opened, then closed. "It... it was there. I took it."
"It is not yours," he said, gesturing toward it like one might point at a broken stick. "That is a discarded training tool. Warped. Useless."
My hands clenched around the grip. "Then... where's my bow?"
Caelorn finally sighed. His gaze swept across the training yard, over the players still streaming in, practicing, laughing. His brow furrowed slightly.
"So many of them," he muttered. "Where do they all come from? I've never seen so many elves born in one moon."
He looked back at me.
"Bow distribution is in the village. Near the main square," he said, tone clipped and matter-of-fact. "No elf live without a bow. You must claim your own.
I stood frozen. The heat in my chest turned cold, and my breath caught somewhere between my ribs. I didn't know what to say. My cheeks flushed, my ears burned, and I could feel every heartbeat like it was echoing off my bones.
Players around the yard had noticed. One pointed.
"She moved," someone whispered. "I swear she moved."
"Wasn't in the walkthroughs," another said, eyes wide. "There's no mention of this NPC changing behavior."
Caelorn didn't wait for more questions. He turned without another word and walked away—calm, indifferent, like I'd never spoken.
I stayed where I was, clutching the warped bow. I didn't throw it away. I couldn't. I glanced down at it. Useless, he'd said. But I'd used it for two weeks. I'd bled with it. I'd endured with it. It was mine, even if it wasn't meant to be.
I walked toward the village with it anyway.
Whispers followed me.
"Is she... leaving the training range?"
"Maybe it really is a secret quest."
"I thought she was just set dressing."
A small group began trailing after me. I didn't acknowledge them.
Near the base of a tree-arched bridge, I slowed. A flicker at the corner of my vision caught my eye—another interface, one I'd never seen.
[Stats: View Character Sheet? Y/N]
I accepted.
A screen unfolded across my vision, lines of data written in the elegant script of Elunaria's UI.
Name: Lirael
Race: Elf
Level: 1
Realism Setting: 100% (Skill & EXP Gain +20%)
Health: 160 / 160 (Base: 160)
Stamina: 110 / 110 (Base: 110)
Mana: 55 / 55 (Base: 55)
Strength: 26 (Base: 8)
Dexterity: 34 (Base: 10)
Focus: 24 (Base: 9)
Pain Tolerance: 26 (Base: 6)
Willpower: 28 (Base: 7)
Bow Handling: Adept (Progress: 12%)
Previous Ranks:
- Untrained
- Novice
- Beginner Adept
Next Ranks:
- Skilled Adept
- Proficient
- Expert
- Legend
I stared at it for a long time.
Adept? I blinked, disoriented. I hadn't even known there were ranks like that. A mental window expanded with a flicker, listing the progression. Untrained. Novice. Beginner Adept...
I was halfway up a ladder I hadn't even realized I was climbing.
I swallowed hard.
Behind me, a few of the players who had followed were already starting to lose interest.
"Okay, this is boring," one muttered. "She's just standing there again."
"Yup, NPC. Definitely. Let's move on."
They drifted off. I didn't even blink.
I stood still, my hand gripping the bow tighter.