Quest Chain

“Game?”

She thought for a moment, humming softly to herself. “Well… not really a game, but a quest chain.” I didn’t know whether it was fear or excitement bubbling inside me. Her gaze turned toward me, her expression growing serious. “It’s a hard one.”

Well, that answered that question. Fear it was.

“Can you tell me the reward?”

Emma briefly considered it before answering. “At the end? Level Four.”

My gut twisted. I knew what that meant. I’d be getting answers to the question that constantly plagued me. Was Emma sleeping with other guys? Obviously. But this was the difference between knowing and knowing. Could I handle that? Shit. Did I even want to level?

She waited patiently, letting my inner self tear itself apart trying to decide which was the better poison. Continuing on as things were, or go for something more?

I was about to tell her my answer when she interrupted. “Isaac.” My mouth snapped closed. Her expression was grave. “Level Four is…” She stopped to think. “Endgame content.”

I took a deep breath, plugging this new information into my equation. The last level. If I went up to Level Four, that was it. I could handle it, right?

“So Level Four is the final level?”

“Yes,” she answered softly. “But there is always the hardcore content, right? You know, the difficulty mode where you can’t manually save and it deletes your save file if you die.” She laughed, probably seeing the color drain from my face. “Don’t worry. You are not ready for that.”

Jesus Christ woman. If she could even be considered a woman. Emma was a vampire and I was nothing but a thrall.

“So,” she said with a beaming smile. “Shall we play?”