Side quests.
The effort to help Gussie and connect her with a suitable beast tamer has all the hallmarks of a side quest in the game. I consult the game system.
[Side Quest confirmed. Side Quests unlocked at Level 2 and above.]
Okay, so what is my objective in this Side Quest?
[Side Quest: Help Gussie bond with a Beast Tamer from the House of Riddlehoeven. +2 XP for helping Gussie bond with Mr. Riddlehoeven.
[Side Quest: Discover what happened to the beasts tamed by Mr. and Mrs. Riddlehoeven. +15 XP]
Hold up! That's an official Side Quest? The beasts disappeared a year ago. Is the trail even warm at this point? But 15 XP for such a dangerous endeavor? I'll take it.
Who could have been responsible? Did someone just accidentally let the beasts out one day and they got lost? Was that Queenie seen hanging around the villa in the days and weeks prior to the vanishing? Could it be an inside job?
But for now, Demos and I have a job to do. Make sure Gussie's debut is the best it can be. Make sure that this parrot talks Lamant's language.
Lamant's study is a law student's wildest dream. Shelves upon shelves and stacks upon stacks of books and scrolls and magical tablets. Beast taming charts and information and posters listing local laws line the walls.
A mini-laboratory with wooden tables occupies half of the study. Steam and vapor rise from a row of beakers and vials, flasks and crucibles. Potency Pills and other pills glow inside the lab containers. They look ready. Pills of every variety and color. Oval-shaped ones, square ones, tiny spheres. Rust colored ones, light green ones, cyan ones. I wonder what they all do?
Straightening up from his inspection of one of the beakers full of booster pills, Lamant turns and approaches Kaline with a smile. He's handsome and strong. And he has a surprisingly pleasant smile when he takes in our little group.
Opening his arms, he beams with pride. "I take it the hunt went brilliantly."
"We can feed the entire villa and the surrounding village," declares Vedette.
"Blaze and Demos were perfect," Kaline cheers. "They did so well."
"Blaze," Gussie cheers, echoing Kaline.
Scarcely taking notice of her, Lamant frowns. "I heard about the wood elf poacher. She will be dealt with! Unfortunately, she's nowhere to be found."
Yes, Lamant, tell us what you know about Queenie. But first, we have a more pressing matter.
"Oh, her," Vedette says with contempt. sticking out her lower lip. No one pulls off disdain like Vedette. "Demos and Blaze ran her ragged. Honestly. I know wood elves are honorable, but skulking around in a hot, muggy jungle like that is so beneath her."
Kaline agrees, her eyes flashing fiercely. They glow golden when she's especially excited. She really is sweet and a force of nature. "She'd have a better chance of holding a windstorm than holding Blaze and Demos. And Gussie here scouted for more poachers like a pro, so Demos and Blaze were safe. They're a great team."
I bump against Demos. [You hear that? We're a great team.]
[Naturally.] His ears wiggle. Is that a blush I see? He looks modest, none of his usual bluster. [We have great Mistresses who are wise. We are blessed by the Primal Beast.]
The Primal Beast, I should mention, is the ancestor of all the tamed beasts. The Primal Beast is a bit of a mystery in the game and in the world of Tanglewood. No one knows its stats, even.
The system warns: [The Primal Beast is said to be a deity and the ancestors of all the tamed beasts. Its blessings are many, and its wrath great. But that is only a legend.]
Only a legend. That tracks with everything I know.
_________________
THREE MONTHS AGO
Waiting for his law school exam study group in the lobby of the Law Library, Josh Lyonne scrolled through all the gamer forums for the beast taming MMORPG.
Countless entries and threads and posts had been devoted to the Primal Beast, which, gamer legend held, appeared in the game as the Final-Final Boss. When your beast attained a certain legendary level, you got to face off against the Primal Beast. Serious gamers never revealed the Primal Beast's identity because the company actively shut down any forums or podcasts or Twitch streams that revealed the Primal Beast. Only a handful of gamers worldwide had ever played the bonus level with the Final-Final Boss.
People online claimed to have cheats and strategies and special in-game ways to unlock the bonus round with the Final-Final Boss. Of course, nine out of ten of these were complete fakers, while the tenth was recycling debunked cheat codes and strategies that had been going around ever since the game launched two years ago.
Josh wanted badly to see the Primal Beast and play the bonus level for bragging rights. Right now, studying made him tear his hair out, and he thought that to face the Primal Beast would be the ultimate stress relief.
The enthusiastic, focused voices of his study group broke into his intense obsession with the game. Amber peered over his shoulder. "Oh, you're deep into Tanglewood."
Her knowing smile made him feel incredibly warm. "Eh, the game is fun for stress release. AND we've got a lot of stress. Let's go in and crack the books on some contractual law."
________________
Amber. My law school crush. Her voice teased me just before the cram session. And it was her voice that cried out in horror when I collapsed from a heart attack. I don't mind admitting that I had a huge crush on her.
"She's not for me, girls."
Lamant's firm, abrupt denial shatters my reverie and returns me to the present.
"But Dad," Kaline and Vedette shout.
"Mr. Riddlehoeven, please listen to reason," Ser Maartenwitz urges. "The link was severed between you and the beast. You need to take on a new one. It does not enhance the image of a beast taming house to have a beast-less master at the head of it."
"It wasn't your fault or Mom's," Vedette adds with compassion.
"Stop blaming yourself," Kaline urges, carrying Gussie on her arm for Lamant to inspect more closely. "It really wasn't your fault."
UGH. Poor Lamant. Listen to your daughters.
"NO." Putting on a facade of cool mastery, Lamant upends one of the beakers, spilling a pearl-shaped pill into his palm. Holding it out, he says, "Blaze needs to try this. He's younger, not as advanced as Demos. It will boost his powers."
Ordinarily, I'd leap at this windfall, but Lamant isn't listening to us. I've got to convince him! But how? Think, Blaze, think!
And then a crazy idea hits me like a thunderbolt...