The man asked, "Why are you here? Did both of you rush back to human territory without me?"
Terri laughed, and asked teasingly, "Poor Justin, did you feel abandoned?" She explained, "I've been taking exams since we did that quest, and when I finished my last one, I had eight messages from Quin talking about some sparkly egg. The latest one said that he was meeting you here, so I paid for a portal trip as soon as I logged in."
Danika blinked in surprise, these people spoke easily of things like logging on and exams. This wasn't a scenario scripted by "Living Jade Empire", these were players.
Her purchaser, Quin, hurriedly protested, "I didn't rush back without you, I took a griffin tour over the dragon range between elven and human territory, and we were shot at by goblin catapults. My guide evaded them, but mine was shot down."
"Oooh, did you get any cool screenshots?" Terri asked enthusiastically.
"About two hundred of the dragon range, I was hoping I might spot some lairs," Quin replied wistfully.
"I meant of getting shot down by goblins," Terri complained. "And if you're going to take that many pictures, you might as well upgrade to video."
"No way I'm giving 200 Karma to the Gods of Memory just to get video," Quin said dryly, "what if I died?"
"If you want to go hunting dragons, you're definitely going to die," Justin said sourly.
Quin said, "I wasn't thinking we could take a dragon yet, but maybe I could steal a discarded scale while one was out. I only need one to get that enchantment laid on my gloves, but they cost ¼ million on the market."
Danika looked at her skin and wondered if she ever discarded scales. She didn't see any lying on the bottom of her egg, and the tiny scales of her skin seemed smooth and glossy. She'd bet that the chickens had gotten some off her tail during her evasion training though.
"Anyway," Quin pulled the topic back, "can you identify this egg please Terri? And then can you check what kind of curse or enchantment is on it Justin?"
"I can try," Terri agreed. "Did you steal it from the goblins?" Danika's egg changed hands much more gently than it had during the first transfer. Presumably Terri held her now.
"No," Quin told her wryly, "I managed to sneak away from them, but ran into some pixies. I thought I was going to die, but it wasn't a whole pixie pod, just a few stragglers who wanted to trade for supplies for their nest."
"He traded all the elven mead for it," Justin said dryly.
"It was taking up a lot of inventory space anyway," Quin replied defensively. "And the egg isn't just sparkly, there's at least one enchantment on it. Or maybe it's cursed, since I can't put it into my inventory. I haven't dared log out since getting it."
"I don't think it's cursed," Justin said in a puzzled tone, "if that's the only effect you've noticed. Even if you can't put it away, you are able to hand it over to us easily enough. When Terri is done I'll go ahead and spend the materials to examine the spell, if you want. I was assuming that it was probably just an active illusion enchantment to make an ordinary egg magically sparkle and sucker you into buying it."
"Hey," Quin protested.
Justin laughed and added, "I'm pretty curious now though."
Danika was even more curious about why none of them seemed to be able to identify her as another player. Surely at least one of them had looked at her through their menu lens by now. Maybe the eggshell blocked the view both ways?
"You're so lucky to have a tank with some ranger skills and a wizard with some enchanter skills in your party Quin," Terri said teasingly. "But I'm not sure about what this egg is, my identification skill only says that it's half pixie."
"Hey, why does that make you look so excited?" Quin asked suspiciously.
Justin spoke with repressed excitement, "Last time Terri couldn't identify a species fully, it was that disguised elf."
"So?" Quin and Terri asked in unison.
"Elves are half dragons," Justin said smugly.
"And?" prompted Quin.
"And I haven't bonded a familiar yet!" Justin exclaimed as though it were obvious. There was a moment of silence and then he explained, "fairy dragons are familiars of legend. Familiars don't just boost your casting level, you can borrow their skills."
"Even assuming that the half I can't identify is dragon, what skills would it have that are so amazing? And why would it be called a fairy dragon instead of a pixie dragon?" Terri questioned.
"I don't know why most pixie halfs are called fairies, but fairy dragons are illusionists," Justin said smugly. "It would be like gaining a second specialty."
Danika wanted to protest that she wasn't an illusionist… but wondered if that was why she was able to see and move the particles of her light cantrip.
"I bet a fairy dragon would make a really cute pet," Terri said speculatively. "I could try taming it, if you fail to bond it."
"It's my egg," Quin said possessively.
"I know," Justin agreed.
"It's all speculation anyway. Examine the enchantment it's under first?" Terri suggested.
This was apparently an involved process, as not only did Danika change hands again, but the whole group traveled to somewhere else, where they rented a room. "Why are we renting space here? I thought you'd paid for your tower's private portal?" Quin asked.
Justin replied a little grimly, "Oh I did, but I'm scheduled out three more weeks for the installation. Not enough people want to play enchanters, because even though it's a magic path, it's basically a crafting job. And there are apparently only a handful of NPC enchanters of high enough level to do portal work in the whole game."
"Wow, maybe you chose the wrong specialty? Sounds like you'd have made a killing if you'd focused on enchanting?" Terri questioned.
Quin replied first, "But what would we do without our main damage dealer?"
"Hey, are you looking down on my DPS?" Terri questioned with mock anger, and then added more practically, "He could probably have built us some pretty nice equipment to boost our damage and effects by now."
Justin spoke with exasperation, "If I'd chosen to be an enchanter, I'd be too expensive for you guys to support. All the successful ones so far work with the big guilds, because of all the different materials enchanting requires."
"Speaking of which, thanks for using up all this stuff on examining the enchantment," Quin added unsubtly, "on my egg."
Justin laughed.