"The Tale of Blood"
by Zyla

Several years ago, while recovering from a minor back injury, I was searching AOL for a role playing game. Having tired of the likes of Zelda and Final Fantasy I wanted something I could interact with. I found Dragonrealms.

After spending nearly 3 days reading all the rules and several player documents regarding the different races and guilds, I felt prepared to enter the world of Elanthia. Well, it was thrilling! I had found the game for me. The text base was perfect for what I wanted. I had a 386 Jurassic computer, no color video card, and no idea what a front end (FE) was.

So I set out to explore the world of Elanthia as the Elf Zyla Kahlen. I chose the Warrior Mage as my profession, and set out to map the town of Crossing, by hand no less! Keep in mind, at this point my experience with computers was limited to data entry and financial applications. Creating a map was beyond my knowledge, and I did not have the ability to download the FE with my pitiful system.

I stumbled along the typical newcomer process, buying armor, spending tdp's and getting lost at almost every corner. I watched my fellow adventurers with great interest, learning about the proper way to conduct myself and discovering the fine nuances of life in Elanthia. Each day was a new adventure, something to discover or some skill to learn. I relished each opportunity to spend a few hours online in my newfound home.

One afternoon, I hurried home from work and popped into the game eager to set off in search of the latest adventure. I had only just earned the second circle and wanted to start learning more skills. I arrived in front of the old Warrior Mage guild in Crossing, but this time in some guy named Blood-something-or-other began to advance on me. I was dumbfounded, and I sat there a moment watching my white screen with its black print scrolling across showing me this player attacking me! I tried to retreat, whipped out my longsword, but to no avail. Two swipes and he had stunned me, and the third killed me outright. Well, don't you know I was infuriated! I knew full well unconsented pvp was against policy, yet here was this player doing just that! I had read where we could call for assistance from the Game Masters in the event of a problem, so I did just that. In the meantime, I departed and ran back to retrieve my belongings before someone else took them. I had lost all my coins, having not discovered how to use the bank yet.

I was still retrieving my things when GameMaster Treveri arrived to assist me. I was very impressed with the whole GM thing, from his entrance to the wonderful things he wore. But I was still miffed about this player killing me, then just running off and leaving me there with not so much as a "Goodbye, turkey!"

I poured my heart out to Treveri, who was very kind and listened to every last word of my fateful experience. It was then that he chuckled at me. I thought, "He's not actually amused by my misfortune, is he?" I was confused to say the least. Treveri patted me on the back, drew some coins out of his pockets for me and announced, very eloquently, "Zyla dear, that was not some guy named Blood-something-or-other. It was a Bloodwolf invasion, and you were a casualty." I nearly fell off my chair! I laughed so hard there were tears in my eyes and my face hurt. And I just knew he had to be dying, too, though he was very composed and most gracious about the whole thing.

To this day, if you ask Treveri about Zyla and the Bloodwolf, I'm sure you will still get a chuckle.