AN: I have loved playing dungeons and dragons and wanted some way to incorporate it into a story. This IS going by the game rules, though I call it a video game instead- since all the characters need access to it. It follows the rules from 5e and you don't need to know about the game to understand the story.

...

Chapter 1: Into the Game

Saguru tried to raise the hood more but his eyes were stinging. He had to blink and even that was painful. Letting out a breath, he settled on closing his eyes.

"Kuroba, where are we?"

He couldn't see his classmate but he could hear him, and better than he should have been able to. The grass made the slightest noise against his feet, his clothes shifted in the breeze.

"Um… a forest, I think. I don't really see any buildings around here. We must be pretty far away."

"What, exactly, happened?"

"Well… I can't say what you were doing but I was just sitting at my computer. Next thing I know I'm blinking sunlight out of my eyes and missing the hot girls I'd been looking at."

Saguru had noticed a few things after he had been forced to shield his eyes. One, yes, he seemed to be in a forest. Apparently he'd somehow been knocked out or the like and taken here. He knew the last thing that he had been doing was reading a book in his room, the low light nothing like the burning pain of the sun. The second was the clock had told him it had been after eight last he checked. It was now clearly some time mid afternoon and he'd somehow lost almost a whole day.

The third, and strangely not the most upsetting, was that the quick glance he'd gotten of Kuroba had told him that something was terribly, terribly wrong, or this was some horrible joke gone too far.

"Kuroba, you do know that your skin looks almost blue, do you not?"

"Take a look at yourself, blackie." He heard a snicker. "Unless you're too afraid to."

Saguru, very slowly, opened his eyes and looked at his hands. He turned them over, finding that he had actual black skin – or close enough to it. He closed his eyes again, putting a hand in front of them.

"Before I start going into shock, do you have any idea what happened?"

"Well… no, not really. Not even a partial guess. I have a bad idea I know where we are though."

Saguru felt the hood be pushed off his head and he winced, half opening his eyes to glare at his classmate and the unforgiving sun.

"Thought so."

"What?" Saguru took the second to put the hood back, blinking a bit in suprise now as well. There was far more wrong with Kuroba than the slight light blue color of his skin. His eyes were a vivid shade of green and his hair was almost white, though clearly more on the silver side, with a strange glint about it that was very similar to his skin.

"Well, I was playing this online game with a few friends when it started getting popular at school. This kind of looks like the forest in the beginning, if you start off as an elf. Aoko had said she wanted to try it so I had come back here, but we didn't have time to make her character yet."

That all sounded very familiar. "Right. She was trying to help me with mine first, though she was giving me little say in the matter. Apparently she hadn't wanted mine to look like yours." He tried to calm his heart rate a bit, forcing his eyes open as he looked over himself. He had strange clothes, similar to Kuroba's but with some green to the outrageous amount of black, making the sun more painful against his skin. He could feel the strap around him and pulled on it, seeing arrows in a quiver.

"I must be dreaming."

"Then we're stuck in the same dream and I really don't want to be stuck in it with you." Kuroba sighed. "The sun's really bothering you, isn't it?"

Saguru nodded.

"I wish I could say this was a dream then, but it's looking less and less like it is and more like someone found a way to mess with us without us knowing. I don't know how or why though, or why it's you and me here together. I know more kids from school were playing than just us."

"I just made a character a few hours ago. Aoko-kun had insisted that I do more than just study, so she spent her time helping me instead of making one of her own." He looked around, trying to figure out the difference between this illusion and the game. How had it been done? Was it Spider? It didn't seem possible. This was… this was far more real than he thought possible. It was reason enough for he and Kuroba to be here, but not enough for them to be experiencing the same thing without knowledge of what they should be seeing, and he doubted the man played computer games.

"We should go inside somewhere. The light will be hurting you until the sun goes down or we get some clouds, if that's how this is working." Kuroba tapped near his eye. "And I have darkvision in the game, so I don't mind walking around with you and figuring this out when you aren't in pain."

"It's not all that bad, as long as I have the hood up and I'm not looking in the direction of the sun."

Saguru felt something all of a sudden. Something seemed to glow around him a moment and he scarcely noticed a similar glow around Kuroba for about the same duration. He looked at his classmate and back at himself. "What was that?"

Pick a class.

The words floated a bit in front of him. Saguru noticed that, as he stood straighter and turned towards them, they shifted once more to remain in his view. He noticed a countdown on the side with something that looked peculiarly like a loading icon. He shook his head, the words moving, showing behind his eyelids even when he blinked. He noticed the 29 under the icon turn into a 28.

"Wow. Talk about a realistic game." Kuroba was smiling. "I already had a character. I wonder why it's asking me. I guess it might just default to that if we don't answer?" His classmate shrugged. "Whatever the heck is going on, this is weird, even for me."

Saguru nodded, though it was hard to see Kuroba with the words in his vision. "Ranger," he answered the prompt quietly, seeing if it would make the words go away. It did. He had already filled out the character description for the game a few hours ago and remembered most of what he'd been asked.

Now free to look around without hindrance, aside form the drawbacks of his apparent new eyesight, he noticed a pack near his feet. He didn't find it all that heavy as he picked it up and looked through it, finding some basic supplies.

He heard Kuroba sigh, moving once more. "Yeah, it defaulted. Seems I'm a rogue again. Don't you dare say anything."

If they had been playing this as the game it should have been, he might have. Now… everything was confusing and he put a hand to his chest, noticing his breaths coming fast all of a sudden. He felt an arm around his back but it wasn't enough to keep him standing and he noticed himself fall, the burning, bright world going black.

….

Kaito caught Hakuba as the stress got to him. It looked like he blacked out. He took the hood off again, now that Hakuba couldn't protest. Kaito didn't have a mirror to look at himself, so he turned his attention to the detective.

He must have chosen to be a dark elf before this. It explained why the light was hurting him and why his skin was black. The red eyes weren't as strange as they should have been but, with the new skin color, pointed ears, and snow-white hair, the only color to him stood out in eerie fashion. He was happy his eyes were closed now.

"Since he's out, how about I talk to myself for a bit?" Kaito set him down gently, sitting down in the grass beside him. He looked over at Hakuba a moment, looking down at his own dark clothes that possessed no color to break up the monochrome. He had a cloak, which he took off, covering Hakuba's eyes with it. There, that was something.

"So," he said aloud, tipping his head to the side. "We're in a game, or so it seems. This feels too real to be anything other than it is." He touched his now long, pointed ears. Yep, he felt very much like the moon elf that his character had been. "Koizumi-san probably did this. I guess if I hadn't seen real magic, this might have made me pass out too." He looked back up at the sky. "But I don't remember doing anything to her for her to be mad about, and I'm pretty sure Hakuba-kun wouldn't have bothered a girl if the world was ending."

"Are you going to just keep talking to yourself?'

Kaito felt his heart jump into his throat. He hadn't heard anyone coming but then again, they had come from behind and he had been talking to himself. The voice was far more familiar than the small child with flaring red hair and light stone colored skin.

"Now that makes less sense than everything else. Why are you here?"

"I should be asking you that, shouldn't I? Impossible things are more up your alley than mine." The boy tipped his head back to the forest. "Hattori's here too. I just happened to hear you speaking to no one. While that's fun and all, think we can figure out what's going on, Kid? I can't seem to find the trick behind what's making us experience this."

"I look like an elf and you can still tell it's me?"

"I knew who you were before. I looked you up after that whole sunflower fiasco." Conan smirked at him as he tipped his head. "I don't think I would be talking to a stranger now, and I wasn't wholly certain it was you, so be happy I didn't let things lay. At least I didn't go to the police."

Kaito sighed. Tantei-kun was no fun. "I'll deny it to the end of time but, why not? Let's all get together and have fun in this impossibility. Tell him to come here though. I can't really bring Unconscious-san with me and I get the feeling that leaving him here is a bad idea."

Conan nodded, letting out a breath. Kaito met his eye when he looked back up. "We really are inside a game, aren't we?"

"Apparently. Considering I haven't really had the chance to look around, I can't say much. I've only been playing a month or so."

"That's more than me. The kids made me make an account and play just a few days ago. I barely reached level two."

Kaito grinned. "I'm a level nine, but that's not that impressive."

"Were. You're not a spell caster, are you?"

Kaito shook his head. "No, I was in a party with another melee fighter. Neither of us had magic, though I thought about it."

Conan nodded, but he didn't know why. Obviously the little guy understood something better than he did.

"It's the best way I can explain this. Spell casters, obviously, gain spells as they level. I tried casting one I got at level two and nothing happened. My lower level ones are all fine though. I think, when it asked us to pick our class, we were all bumped down to level one again. How any of this makes sense, I don't know, but I did mess around a few minutes ago. It seems we didn't show up that far from one another."

"So… you can use real magic? Show me." Kaito was interested. Sure this might all be some kind of trick, likely was, but things seemed real enough and he was interested.

"I'll use an obvious one, since it's not that hard to tell that I'm a fire elemental." Conan reached out his hand, palm up. "Al Nir."

The words sounded really funny when he said them, kind of like there was a background noise to them that he couldn't explain. He did watch as a fire started in his hand, staying there and not seeming to hurt him.

"Cool." Kaito reached forward to touch it himself and Tantei-kun pulled back.

"Are you being stupid?"

"Huh?" Kaito tipped his head to the side, sticking his hands in his pocket, which he seemed to have many of. "What? Don't want me to touch your fire?"

"It's still an attack. You could hurt yourself."

"Produce flame is a weak attack." Kaito didn't have to be a spell caster to recognize the spell. He'd heard the wording before and any level one caster that wanted to light a fire would openly cast it.

"Yes, if you were a level nine. You're a level one now, and I can't tell if hit points are still dictating life or death here. You sure you want to risk it?" Kaito could swear he saw a flame behind the small detective's blue eyes as he return his hand to where it had been, daring him to touch it now.

"I'm good." Kaito would have rose to the jib on any other given day, but too many weird things were going on now.

The strange, child-like laughter that floated from out of nowhere didn't help the already confusing situation.

Kaito and the small detective both turned as something shimmered before them, slowly turning into a small, hooded figure. Their red robe covered most of them but the girl didn't waste much time pushing the hood back, revealing dark, purple-tinted hair and familiar red eyes. She couldn't have been any older than the detective at his side – or at least, the detective's current age.

"I've got you now. My magic may not be strong enough to affect you, but if you ingest it I can trap you somewhere else that can do my work for me."

Kaito put a hand on his hip, a smile on his face. "You're related to Koizumi-san, aren't you?" This girl was far too young to be her, any version of her, and her skin was darker than his classmates by enough that it made the similarities they shared meaningless. That helped, along with the fact that there weren't that many people he knew that could cast magic as real as this.

"Yes," the young girl stated proudly, putting her hands on her hips. "And you've been bothering her for a long time, so I did this." She put her arms up, indicating to the world around her. "This place is full of monsters that can take care of you for me, and just in case that didn't work, I left a few of your enemies in here too." She pointed a finger at him and grinned. "And you lose!"

With some more childlike laugher that was close to sounding maniacal, the girl was again slowly vanished from before them, like smoke rising, before it was silent once more.

"Ah, wait…" It was pointless. She was gone as fast as one could light a match and then blow it out. He didn't even get her name.

What a very short and to the point explanation.

Kaito waited until he was sure she was gone before letting out a breath. Hopefully Akako would notice what had happened and get them out. This wasn't her style and it looked like they could really die here, if they were forced to play by the rules of this game. His character had died plenty of times in the last month – or at least, been unconscious and could very easily have died. He'd never had to start all over, but that was because, as a party, he'd never lost.

Kaito looked down at the little guy. "Sorry about this. Looks like you were dragged in here because of me."

Conan shrugged. "You give me answers and maybe I can do something about that."

"Sure." Why not? It wasn't as of the little detective would believe in real magic. He was up for an exercise in futility. "For now it's safe to guess that we're playing by this game's rules, so no throwing fire at anyone."

"I already figured that out. You were the curious kitten, trying to get yourself burned."

Kaito rolled his eyes and looked back down at Hakuba. "We should get to town. I'm not sure if we have the money that we should have started out with, or how far skills we have will take us."

Conan nodded. "I'm guessing the burglar's pack is yours. That black one, right? I had a few coins in mine but I wasn't exactly a rich character when I started this. If skills stay with us though, I can probably get us a place to stay without wasting gold."

"Hm?" Kaito raised an eyebrow. "Really? Well, worth a try. Hakuba-kun's going to be heavy though, and it will look weird going into town with him."

"Hattori can do it, as long as we can get him to agree to. Getting him here and getting an explanation out of you is going to come first. Stay here. Just because I'm coming back isn't reason for you to run off, and I know you were thinking about it. If this is real, being in a party is the safest."

"Yeah, yeah. I'm not an idiot." Kaito scratched the back of his head, watching Conan nod and walk back off into the forest. He had a very good point there. This wasn't the kind of game you could solo. Two people in a group, even with weak opponents, was just short of deadly unless you buffed up you defense to the max. Even then it would be close.

Unlike Hakuba, Conan, and likely himself, from what he could see of himself, Hattori-kun was easy to recognize, even if he hadn't come through the trees with the newly fire-haired detective. He looked like himself, save for maybe his hair being a few shades lighter and eyes close to matching.

Kaito laughed to himself a little. "Who picks a human?"

"Shut up." Hattori didn't look too happy, crossing his arms and glancing around. His eyes went back to him after. "So who are you?"

Kaito looked down at Conan who just smiled and shrugged his shoulders. Being introduced as Kid to someone like Hattori was the worst idea he could possibly think of, and he was happy Tantei-kun had given him a way out, even if he hadn't thought he would.

"Kuroba Kaito. Nice to meet you." Kaito tipped his head back towards Hakuba. "I'm a classmate of Hakuba-kun."

"Hakuba-kun?" Hattori walked over to the detective. He had to admit, Hakuba looked nothing like himself when his hairstyle was hidden. "The heck?"

"Dark elf," Kaito explained. "Not a lot of people pick human or dark elf, because of the drawbacks in either nighttime battles or day."

"As if I was goin' ta be an elf. I'm not that kinda guy." Hattori grinned, drawing a rapier and putting it over his shoulder. Kaito could tell by the thicker metal armor that he had on, like the light stuff the three of them were wearing under their clothes, that Hattori had picked an 'up close and personal' class.

"Monk, paladin, fighter, or berserker?"

"Fighter, though I ain't really got much right now. Looks like I was playin' little longer than K-ku-Conan-kun. Already had most 'a my stuff down 'fore I lost it all."

Kaito put a hand to his chin. "Why bring you into this game though? I don't really know you and you don't really know me."

"She said 'ingest' just now, right?" Conan leveled a look at Hattori. "I was given a cupcake in my locker after school. Hattori decided to visit and ate it while he caught me walking home. I found another one the next day. I'm guessing that had something to do with it."

"Ah!" Kaito hit his fist against his cupped palm. "Someone gave me a cupcake too." He looked down at the little guy. "Girls like to give me things some of the time though, so I hadn't thought it was anything weird."

Conan just shook his head. Kaito had nothing to say back to that. If anyone had given Hakuba anything, he likely would have ate it to be polite, more so if Akako's family member that trapped them here had simply gone up to him with it.

"That answers a little bit, but I'm not really sure how we got here or how we're supposed to get out. That girl just now is related to a friend of mine, someone who has real magic. I know you're not going to believe me but look around and tell me this isn't real." He reached down and tugged a little on Conan's pointed ear. "Hopefully Koizumi-san notices she did this to us and gets us out. Other than that, I have no idea what to do."

"Not die would be a good idea, and hands off." Conan rubbed his palm against his ear. It made Kaito smile. As weird as it was, being in a world full of magic and adventure with the detectives kind of sounded like fun.

"So… you're a wizard, I'm a rogue," Kaito said as he pointed to himself. "You're a fighter… and I think Hakuba-kun said he was a ranger. That's… that's horrible. We have no healer." He had to laugh to himself. "That's pretty important to have, but I guess since we all do pretty good damage, we don't really need one. Hattori-kun, if anything happens, you're up front. You have the best armor."

"Duh, I figur'd that." Hattori tapped a finger against his armor. "But this is still startin' stuff. I'm guessin' we're not gonna play the game but try and keep ourselves out of danger 'till this gets settled. Goin' ta town seems the best idea."

"Yeah." Kaito patted the spot on his chest where he was missing his basic ammo that he'd kept with him. "I need a bow for one, my character didn't come with one, and darts."

"I jus' need better armor, but I ain't got enough gold fer it."

Kaito grinned. "I have a charlatan background. I should have enough to get you what you need, and I can make some on the side if I need more."

He heard the little detective laugh at him. "You know, the point of role-playing is to be someone you're not."

Kaito huffed and shrugged. "I've played the bad guy before. It's not fun."

"Help!"

Kaito jumped, hearing the sound of twigs snapping, footsteps thudding loudly through the forest. There were more than a few other voices mixed with the female one he had heard, quickly turning into words that he couldn't understand.

He noticed a shift near him, Hakuba seeming to wake up and take the robe off his face. "Goblins."

"What?"

Hakuba met his gaze, his eyes scared and serious at the same time. "Those are goblins. Can't you hear them?"

"Well of course I can, but how the heck do you know what they're saying?"

"He's a ranger, right?" The little detective shifted, a flame coming back in his hand. "I guess he must have learned to speak goblin. I had a few languages myself, and I can hear them too."

"Great. I got no idea what they're sayin' but I bet it ain't good." Hattori shifted in front of Conan and Kaito ducked back, trying to get Hakuba to stand up. He was sure the detective would be zero use in combat, seeing as he didn't get any of that explanation and likely thought this was all still some dream. He didn't want him going into shock again.

"We have to hide," he told him, trying to get his arm under him.

Hakuba stood halfway before a girl broke through the tress, falling into Hattori-kun's arms.

"Please help me!"

Kaito didn't miss the goblin faces all starting to stick out behind the trees, small, dark skinned creatures with long noises, tattered clothes, and yellowed, pointed, teeth.

"Shit."