Fantasy Justice: Incarceration

Sunday, April 4th, 2060

Felorius, Unholy Alliance Territory

Sara awoke to the sound of her alarm. With practiced ease, she opened the HUD and turned the noise off. But this time, something was immediately different—the quest button was flashing. She excitedly pressed it.

“Holy shit!” May called out in the tiny room’s darkness. “We’ve got our special quest!”

The two women bumped into each other in their rush to turn the light on, but they still managed to do so. They were both still in their underwear, as neither of their costumes were particularly comfortable to sleep in.

“Fifteen percent XP! That’s practically four months worth of dungeon crawling,” Sara said.

“Look at all this gold. And a goblin radio!”

“I’ve missed being able to listen to music whenever I want.”

“No kidding! Nice to get some good news for a change.” May suddenly looked worried. “But what about Clare?”

Sara was immediately crestfallen. “If she decides to leave the party after I talk to her, we’ll miss the quest. Even if she changes her mind later, it might be too late.” She sighed. “We’ll have to put off our talk until afterward.”

“Damn teenagers—we’re always procrastinating on something,” May joked. Sara laughed slightly.

Both women materialized their usual outfits. “I hope Clare will be excited at least,” Sara said.

“Not really her style.”

They left the room and knocked on the tank’s door. Not only did she not look excited when she answered, but she seemed even more dour than usual. “Clare, good morning,” Sara greeted her. “Did you see the quest?”

“Yes.”

“‘The Rogue Demon.’ Sounds like a typical kill-the-monster quest,” May noted.

Sara looked to her in confusion. “My quest is called ‘The Treacherous Vampire.’”

“That’s the one I have,” Clare added.

“So the Magical Girls get our special quest, and they immediately split us up?” May shook her head slightly. “What’s the company thinking?”

“I don’t know,” Sara told her. “Does your quest also say to report to the Goblin Queen for details?”

“Yeah. I assume Pari’s on my quest. ...It says we gotta be there by eight, or we get teleported to the throne room. And fined some gold.”

“But someone has to tell the other parties we won’t be able to go with them today.” The Magical Girls had been traveling to and from dungeons in raids with a couple of Rough Rider parties.

“I’ll let them know,” May said. “You two should watch for me and Pari at Queen’s Square.”

Sara nodded. The three walked to the nearby trolley stop while speculating about the quests. May parted company from the other women. Once they were seated in one of the trolleys, Sara looked to Clare. “Are you nervous about the quest?”

“Not really.”

“Excited?”

Clare glared at her.

“Right, stupid question,” she said with a slight laugh. After some hesitation, she continued. “Is something wrong? If you don’t mind my saying so, you seem a little grim—more so than usual.”

“...There’s an issue that needs to be addressed. But I’d rather wait until after this quest to do so.”

“Okay.” It seemed her talk with Clare might be even more complicated than she thought. But there was nothing for it, so she decided to change the topic. “You know, I read about the actress who plays the Goblin Queen. Apparently—”

“I’m not in the mood for small talk.”

“Oh. Sorry.”

For the rest of their ride, and the wait at the bustling Queen’s Square trolley stop, neither woman spoke. Soon, Pari arrived on one of the trolleys.

“I was hoping I’d find you here!” she said in relief after Sara waved her over.

“I wasn’t completely sure where to wait for you,” Sara admitted. “I was afraid it might turn out like one of those old sitcoms from before cell phones.”

“Where’s May?”

“She went to tell our raid to go on without us. By the way, what’s the name of your quest?”

“‘The Rogue Demon.’ Why?”

“You and May have a separate quest from us.”

“Is that bad?”

“Not necessarily—custom challenges are generally well-balanced for the participants. The company doesn’t really want to kill us while we’re making them money. But to create tension for the audience, the challenge has to be difficult enough that there’s some possibility we’ll fail.”

“That makes sense. ...Oh, hey Clare.”

The tank nodded slightly. Sara and Pari continued the speculation on their quests until May arrived. The party then proceeded north to the main entrance of Castle Malice, crossing a very long cold iron drawbridge over a moat filled with monstrous fish.

At the open gate, they were stopped by NPC guards in elaborate armaments. “Who goes there?” one asked. A yellow question mark floating over its head indicated that it was relevant to the quest. The armored goblin had a blank look on its face—like most NPCs, this one was run by a computer algorithm.

“The Magical Girls, here to see the Queen,” Sara said.

“Follow me.” The question mark disappeared, and the women walked after the goblin as it proceeded through the gateway. Above them were “murder holes” through which defenders inside the wall above could attack with relative impunity.

There was a large, dirt field between the outer and inner walls of the black stone castle. The field had a number of pits with spikes that had to be walked around. A multitude of arrow slits on either side of the party were intended to allow archers and mages to attack intruders. There were larger holes high up in the walls for dropping boulders, tar, boiling oil, and unholy water. Narrow bridges crossed the expanse at varying heights above them. They were easily destructible so that the inmates could break them if and when they lost control of the outer walls to invaders.

Assuming she was still alive come Invasion Day, Sara would no doubt be defending this fortress from the onslaught of the hunters and their massive siege engines. She realized that she was not the only one thinking this—May and Pari also looked around solemnly. Clare seemed lost in thought, however. The goblin lead them around the massive spire—the gate into the castle proper was on the opposite side from the outer wall’s entrance.

“So why do we have to see the Queen?” May asked.

“Probably for the sake of our show. She’s a popular character with Fantasy fans—more so with those who like the game’s fiction, but it’s still a boost for us that she’s appearing. I should mention, we’re supposed to remain in-character when we see her until told otherwise.”

May sighed. “We’ve gotta role-play?”

“It’s nothing complicated. We should all greet her simultaneously with that bow and fist-over-heart salute John always does and then say ‘Your Majesty.’ Rise after she returns the salute. She’s addressed as ‘Ma’am’ in any following conversation.”

“Since you know about this stuff, I nominate you to handle the talky parts,” May said.

“Technically, Pari should be our leader for role-playing purposes—she is part of the ruling goblin race.” Sara looked to her mischievously.

“What?” the mage asked, alarmed.

“I’m only teasing—I doubt they’ll care if I speak for us instead. Worst case scenario, they might feed you some lines to say for the show.”

Pari did not look pleased by this possibility. “But when you say we’re going to be talking with the Queen, will it be Lillian Huntington?” she asked nervously.

“Most likely, assuming the company considers us important enough.”

“I don’t want to act across from someone that good! I’ll look completely foolish!”

“I wouldn’t worry—all of this is just a formality for structuring our show. They won’t use anything you say unless they get a good take.”

“Hold on,” May said. “Lillian Huntington—I thought she retired after her accident?”

“No, she just moved into voice acting,” Sara explained. “Even the best humanoid robot bodies are still a little uncanny valley, so she couldn’t appear on screen except as a digital character. Even though her career was on a downswing, FJI still had to pay an arm and a leg to get her to play the Goblin Queen full-time.”

“I wonder if her autograph would be worth something?” May joked.

“It would be unusual if someone that privileged were to give Fantasy inmates the time of day,” Sara pointed out.

“Yeah, we probably should concentrate on not pissing her off,” the demon player admitted. “Otherwise she might not work with us.”

The healer nodded. She once more glanced briefly at Clare, but the tank still seemed preoccupied. Sara hoped that whatever her issue was, it would not detract from her combat readiness.

The party, still following the NPC, eventually circled half the castle’s spire and arrived at the gate to the interior. It opened as they approached, and then began to shut once they were inside. The hallways and rooms of the spire were luxuriously decorated—fine red carpeting, impressive artwork, and elaborate furnishings in an antique style.

However, the virtual opulence of the castle was never actually enjoyed by anyone. On Invasion Day, townies and low to mid XP adventurers would be stuffed into the massive structure like sardines. On every other day, inmates only saw this place on their way to see the Queen.

A long walk down a hallway brought the group to an elevator in the very center of the spire. It was an enclosed room and made entirely of thick glass, though there were bronze railings to hold on to.

“Is this safe?” Pari asked in concern as they all stepped inside.

“Only relatively flimsy objects are destructible, except on Invasion Day,” Sara explained. “This seems solid enough.”

Without warning, the elevator accelerated upward at a completely unreasonable rate. Everyone but the NPC held on to a railing. At each floor there were not only doors out of the elevator, but a long series of windows that allowed one to see outside the building in tiny glimpses as they passed by.

The spire was two kilometers in height. During the second half of their upward journey, the elevator finally began to decelerate. This happened so rapidly that Sara felt as if she weighed almost nothing.

The elevator came to a halt in the midst of a massive throne room. The decorations were similar to those in the rest of the castle spire, but even more opulent. There were numerous NPC guards similar to the one who had escorted the party. Sunlight poured into the room from a wide skylight above.

The Goblin Queen herself sat on a splendid gold throne that rested on a raised dais. Her long brunette hair was done in fancy ringlets, and she wore an ornate purple dress in a ballroom style. A bejeweled golden crown rested on her head. Her skin was a slightly darker shade of green than Pari’s, and she also had vampire fangs. Despite Huntington being in her early thirties, her character looked to be in her teens. Sara took note of her nameplate:

Queen Zaxarena

XP 100% | NPC (Raid Boss)

Unholy Alliance

“My Queen, I present the Magical Girls,” the NPC escort said with a salute before stepping aside.

The four women stepped forward and simultaneously did the salute with a bow. “Your Majesty,” the said in unison. The Queen rose and returned the salute without bowing, and the magical girls finally stood up straight again.

“My loyal subjects,” the beautiful goblin began in an imperious tone. “Your courageous exploits have come to my attention, and so I have sought you out to defend against new threats to my rule. With nearly all my forces committed to the war against the Kingdom, your victory is imperative to safeguard our Unholy Alliance.” Of course, any one of many NPC guards standing in this room—each at max XP—would be far more effective in combat than all of the magical girls put together. Video game logic. “A vampire possessed of great necromantic powers has gone mad. He hides in the city sewers, emerging only to attack peasants and add them to his growing army of undeath. Sara Takahashi, Clare Ward—you will find and eliminate this traitor to the Crown.”

The Queen looked expectantly at the pair. “Aye, Ma’am,” Clare said loudly. Sara repeated this.

The goblin continued. “An army of demons from the Underworld has taken up a fortified position in the mountains north of here. Their leader seeks to conquer this city. May Roberts, Pari Tehrani—you must assassinate this dangerous interloper.”

“Aye, Ma’am,” May said, followed by Pari.

“The demon’s forces are too numerous to face directly, so I advise stealth,” the Queen added. “Once the leader is dead, I’m confident his followers will submit to my authority out of fear.”

There was a brief pause before a disembodied male voice was heard. “Got it in one!”

“Who’s fucking brilliant idea was it to get me up this early?” the Queen—or rather Lillian Huntington—asked irritably. She materialized a mug of coffee and a cigarette into her hands. She took a sip from one before taking a long drag off the other. Sara supposed the woman had her VR system set up to dump caffeine and nicotine into her brain case when she did this. “Well?”

“No idea,” the voice said.

“Eight years of this shit, and the company still can’t get their act together.” She puffed on the cigarette more before approaching the other women. “So, Magical Girls. I’ve seen your show—pretty entertaining. You’re already a cult hit.”

“Thank you, Ms. Huntington,” Sara said. “If you don’t mind my asking, why were we split up for our special quests?”

“I’m the talent—no one tells me what the fuck the writers are thinking. But if I had to guess, it’s being done for shipping purposes.”

“Shipping?” Sara asked incredulously. “Our fans are matching us romantically like we’re fictional characters?”

“Obviously. Some fans like the current ‘Mara’—that’s May with you. But the more popular pairings are Clara and Pay.” Pari blushed at the latter portmanteau. Sara also noted a brief flash of anger from Clare, but that did not surprise her.

For her part, the healer could not help but briefly entertain the notion of “Clara.” She found Clare intelligent, determined, and undeniably beautiful—or rather, her character model was that last. But the tank’s political views were a deal-breaker.

May was mildly amused. “Why ‘Pay?’ Couldn’t it be ‘Mari’ or ‘Marisa?’”

“I don’t know. I only see it called Pay by the fans. Or sometimes Pabel.”

Sara and Pari both looked away briefly and tried to stifle their laughter. When Sara finally recovered, May had a sour expression.

“Oh, I checked out your sex videos too,” Huntington added. “Hot stuff.”

She eyed Sara and May provocatively, and they shared an uncomfortable glance. “We’re not exactly thrilled with strangers watching us,” the demon player explained.

“Huh. Too bad you don’t have any say then,” Huntington said indifferently. She then looked upward slightly and raised her voice. “We shooting the promos or what?!”

“I’m just about ready,” the disembodied voice said. “You inmates—if you want more special quests in the future, I suggest you cooperate fully.” A small box appeared, floating some distance in front of the throne. Huntington walked over and stepped up onto the dais before the throne. She motioned the other women over, and they joined her. She finally disappeared her coffee mug and cigarette.

“Stand close together,” the voice said. “Look into the camera.” Now that she was standing on the other side of the box, Sara saw that it did have a lens like a camera. “I want smiles—except from Ward, we don’t want to undermine her image.”

Sara covered her mouth with one hand in amusement. “Lower your hand!” the voice yelled at her. She quickly complied. “Remember, smile! Okay, altogether now: ‘Watch the Magical Girls, only on FantasyStream!’”

They had to try this several times before it was done to the presumed director’s satisfaction. Additional promos using the same language followed. First there was May and Pari with the Queen, with May in her casual outfit. Pari blushed when May was instructed to put her arms around the other woman. May also looked slightly awkward, but they complied with the request.

This was followed by Sara, Clare, and the Queen. Sara was instructed to smile, lean against Clare’s side, and make a ‘v for victory’ sign with one hand. The tank simply continued to look displeased, with no instructions for the director.

“He’s really not gonna ask her to smile once?” May muttered to Pari.

Huntington overheard and scoffed. “I think if she tried, she’d end up throwing a fatal exception. ‘Process smile undefined.’” May chuckled slightly, but Clare had no reaction.

Soon this ad was also done. “Next we’re doing an ad with just Takahashi in Japanese,” the director said. “Translate the usual line.”

“You’re just going to assume I’m fluent?” she asked, mildly annoyed.

“Are you or aren’t you?” the voice asked impatiently.

“...Yes.”

“Good. Do it all energetic and smiling like those weird ads they have there. Fantasy Justice doesn’t get enough views in Japan—marketing is hoping this show is an opportunity to get better penetration for our IP into the Japanese entertainment space.”

“That sounds filthy,” May quietly observed.

“Fine, fine,” Sara told the man impatiently. “But I think having an American aping a different culture is going to come across as tone deaf—I’ve never even been to Japan, you know.”

“Just get to it.”

Sara made several attempts, but the director only became more and more frustrated. “No, this isn’t nearly as Japanese as I wanted!”

The healer’s patience was at an end. “Fine, you want Japanese? I’m going full magical girl!” Sara raised one arm, materialized her spear, and twirled it around in a number of different ways like it was a baton. After spinning herself around once, she suddenly lowered her arm with the spear behind her and pointed at the camera with her free hand. She extended her fangs, then pitched her voice higher than usual and shouted in Japanese. “The enemy of justice, magical vampire girl Sara, commands you to watch her on FantasyStream!”

There was a brief silence before May, Pari, and Huntington all burst into laughter. “What the hell was that?” May asked incredulously between laughs. Sara would have expected at least some mild amusement from Clare, but the tank remained unmoved. The healer retracted her fangs once more.

“Perfect!” the director shouted. “What the hell did you say?”

After translating for him, she continued. “But I was being sarcastic. Don’t use it!” When she received no response, Sara hung her head in embarrassment. She then returned her spear to her inventory. “Everyone I know on the outside is going to see that...”

“Okay, next I want some bikini armor shots,” the director announced.

“What?” Pari asked in alarm.

“Absolutely not,” Clare added angrily.

May was also unenthusiastic. “Yeah, no. Fuck that.”

“You already have our character models,” Sara complained. “Why do you need us to get glamour shots?”

“The pictures always have a dead-eyed look when we do it that way.”

“Then get someone else to use our character models.”

“And pay them? I can have you do it for free.”

Inspiration suddenly struck Sara. “Do you really want to keep Ms. Huntington waiting around?”

“Hey, good point!” the actress said angrily. “Just use the damn character models.”

“Fine,” the director said. “But I need an ad for promoting the drama Magical Girl show on the sex Magical Girl show.”

Sara sighed. “If that’s really necessary, I’ll do it.” At least she could spare her companions the pointless objectification.

Without warning, Sara’s normal outfit disappeared, leaving her only in her black leather bikini armor. “What did you do?” she asked indignantly. But then the pain started—Sara had never exposed this much skin to sunlight in Fantasy. Her vampire player race caused her brain jar to torment her nervous system with rapidly escalating agony. She felt like she was on fire.

When trying to re-materialize her clothing failed, Sara ran behind the throne and tried to hide in its shadow. She was in tears as she curled up to keep away from the sunlight.

“What the fuck?!” May shouted. “Stop it!”

“Goddamn it,” Huntington said. “Just turn off her pain signals. You do this every time we get a woman inmate who’s a vampire, you fucking pervert.”

The pain finally stopped. Sara rose and tried to catch her breath. The other women all looked angry and disgusted by what had happened. Pari was also in tears.

The last promo was shot with Sara in her bikini armor, holding her spear like it was a stripper pole. But given what had just happened, no one was taking any further amusement from the absurdity of the proceedings. Clare and Pari both seemed embarrassed, and mostly looked away. Sara was relieved when she was able to materialize her default outfit once more.

The final sequence shot was the outro from the throne room. After receiving instructions, the women were all teleported into the exact same position they had been in at the end of their arrival.

“Go now, my loyal subjects!” Huntington cried, once more in-character. “Serve your Queen. Serve the Unholy Alliance!”

“Yes, Ma’am!” They shouted in unison. They saluted, and then turned and walked back into the elevator.

“Got it,” the director said. Suddenly, all four magical girls were teleported onto the drawbridge leading into the castle. This sudden shift in location was even more disorienting than the last. Sara’s quest button flashed—she found that her quest description had been updated to include a map.

“Holy shit that was awful,” May said.

Pari looked to Sara. “Are you okay?”

“I’m fine,” she insisted, though honestly she was still shaken from her ordeal. “I wish I’d gone goblin in my plea though.”

This drew nervous laughs from May and Pari. “We should get started on our quests,” Sara told the others. “Let’s meet at the cathedral when we’re done—I know you have mass today, Pari.” But then the healer noticed that Clare looked about as miserable as she had ever seen her. “Is something wrong?” she asked the tank.

“I’m fine,” she echoed. “I wasn’t in the mood for the idiocy we just experienced. The role-playing, and all those incredibly fake ads. ...This place is filled with lies.”

Sara nodded. She hoped this negative experience might make the tank more skeptical of the authorities who put her here.