The final word count: 50775 words in one month. I’ll be posting this story online for people to read on my personal site once I go over it a tiny bit (and let things sink in). I have a more detailed post over here too.
I owe a HUGE thank you to everyone who donated to The Office of Letters and Light, that motivated me to get this done (on time). I don’t claim that the story is amazing, or even good, but I’m proud of myself for finishing.
I spent most of the evening yesterday in Vanguard once I’d completed the daily tradeskill on my tailor in EQ2 (and dinged level 60 might I add, nice accomplishment there!) it’s common for me to bounce between multiple games, and station access is letting me bounce between a few without feeling too bad about the cost. It was a pretty exciting day.
My goal was to hit level 43, which was pretty lofty because I just hit level 42 yesterday. What I decided to do was give up the sand in the underwear zones for a bit and head back to Thestra. I noticed there were a lot of green quests in Beranid Hills, all of them solo. Looking at my meagre collection of a whole 10% experience, I figured even if most of the encounters were grey (which they were) I could use a potion and gain 50% on top of whatever the quests would rewards with me. I probably picked up at least 20 quests and one at a time spent the evening clearing them out. By the time I’d killed everything I needed, explored some druid stones, located some dead dogs for some poor old lady, found someones dead daughter (the Beranid Hills are filled with dead things or undead as the case is) I headed back to camp and turned them all in. I was at 14% experience from kills, and after using the potion and turning what I had over to the npc’s I was at 77% experience. Very worth while.
After getting so close to my goal of 43 I couldn’t just give up, so I headed back to Razad, the land of sand in uncomfortable places. I ran around completing the last few quests I had in that area, and before too long DING 43! This is a big level for me. Number one, it means I can now group with level 50’s and gain experience and credit for quests. Huge plus. Number two, I’ve had a robe on me for the past 15 levels. It’s crafted by tailors and it’s level is red. That’s pretty much the equivalent of fabled gear back in T5 for EQ2 before raids were really popular. There’s purple gear (basically mythical) but aside from my craft bag I’ve never seen any. This robe is VERY nice for me and I’m sure I’ll be wearing it for a long time to come.
Besides the leveling, I also found myself a home again in Vanguard. I returned to Safe Haven, which is a guild filled with amazing people. They span across multiple games (including an EQ2 branch on Antonia Bayle) and much like nostalgia in EQ1 and EQ2 I could not ask for a better bunch of people. They’re simply amazing. It was nice to be welcomed back in – and learn that they now have a proper guild hall. This thing is MASSIVE. Screen shot above is me standing in some sort of ceremonial room. We do have a small amount of dues that we pay once a month (I think for my level it’s 5g a month) but it’s well worth it, especially because our guild hall houses our guild trophies. These are statues within the hall that place buffs (three of them, one for each sphere) permanently on guild members.
It’s nice to be back, if for no other reason then to have others to talk to. We had 10-15 people on tonight, which is about what I remember. The guild also organizes events, and I’m looking forward to partaking in a few of those over time. We’ll see how it goes.
Now, onwards to 50!
stargrace