Chapter Fourty Six: Conclusion

"What are you doing?"

It was kind of funny how Red didn't bother to sound formal when scolding Crow.

"Why, I'm putting up a tent, of course. My team is exhausted."

Once again the Black Brotherhood promoted anticlimatic developments. As members of the Rising Sun Camp started sending away the players that had come from all over to watch the dispute, Crow and his team just lingered, using their official - even if illegally obtained - status of Camp members. With or without healing potions, Jet was stumped, and slept the rest of the afternoon.

"I do remember saying you were the 'Castaway Chief', and that you were not allowed inside the Camp."

"That's why I placed my tent on the 'outskirts'. I'm sure you won't object to that, right?"

Red inhaled angrily, his puff of smoke resembling steam escaping from a pressure vessel. He rolled his eyes and left, muttering "Fine!" as he went.

Camping there was in part an excuse to see the aftermath - the worried looks of Prince's allied forces when they realized just how close the elf had been of losing, how Prince send the mob away reminding them that Crow and team had been cleared of all charges and were not kill-on-sites anymore, how the Fame status fluctuated as people learned of the result and made their own conclusions - but also was part a vital survival strategy. Not all had been persuaded to leave the Black Brotherhood alone - perhaps Prince's Charisma had taken a blow, perhaps the grudges were just too deep - and staying next to the Rising Sun Camp granted them some measure of security.

The afternoon ended with a visit from Prince himself.

"Don't forget: at dawn, Moon City harbor."

"I won't. Now get out of my camp."

And finally, at sundown, things were quiet again.

Crow and his party left in the middle of the night.

Everything they owned was already packed inside their inventories and a few convenient backpacks, the outrageous fee of 10,000 crystal coins per capita to board the NPC ships already at hand - mainly obtained by selling the possessions they couldn't take with them.

Odd Squad was there to see them leave, but few other people: perhaps one or two familiar faces that had changed their usual black robes for less conspicuous gray ones, and many others who were too suspicious of Crow and company and would not believe them gone unless they saw it with their own eyes.

They boarded, and the ship slowly distanced herself from the docks.

By the time the sun had completely risen, the Black Brotherhood could not be seen from the shores of the Central Continent.

The End

A few weeks later Feng Lan got to the university to find Yu An looking absolutely dejected.

"Yu An, what happened?"

He raised his eyes slowly to meet hers. He smiled. Their relationship had indeed returned to normal not long after Crow had left the Central Continent.

"Hi, Feng Lan. You're early."

"Second Life has been quite boring lately, so I logged off." She lied, but Yu An gave a crooked smile that showed he knew better.

"Really? And here I thought the Bardic Bandits were running amok, rivaling your musical career and highwaymanning all of your roads, and the Gas Mask Robbers with their hallucinogen gas of unknown origins... and a dozen of teams that call themselves 'the Black Brotherhood, umpteenth branch' and how they never claim the same number, so they might actually be related to each other, if not to the orginal ones."

Feng Lan rolled her eyes.

"I see you have a good informant."

That too, he thought, but to shake her off he answered:

"Second Life's official website is my informant." His expression got serious again. "Or at least it was, until two nights ago."

"What happened two nights ago?"

"We were killed in the North Continent, and none of our characters reappeared in the rebirth point."

"Wait, what were you doing in the North Continent? I thought you had taken a ship East."

"Oh, that." Yu An beamed. "You know how the trip takes about four days? Well, no day two we commandeered the ship and launched ourselves as pirates."

Yu An closed his eyes, reliving the experience. Somehow they'd put their hands on those seventeenth century shirts with their large sleeves kind of loose around the elbows and a collar that always looked like you had a napkin stuck on it. And it was the first time he had occasion to wear his red cloak, which made him impossibly happy.

Lan watched his dreamy expression and sighed longingly. She missed "adventuring". "Conquering" was good - great, in fact - but she was done with it and the aftermath to conquering was "ruling". Adventuring beat ruling hands down.

"Unfortunately our days of piracy didn't last long. Second Life doesn't have enough ship traffic and port towns to keep a pirate occupied. Not even enough sea monsters! So we just looked for a place where the rulers were less likely to bother chasing us criminals, and we thought 'Of course! The Flower Overlord!', then changed our course to the North Continent. Everything was going great for the first few days, then we started meeting insanely strong NPCs who seemed to hate players, and finally one of them got us. But we didn't respawn, and couldn't log back on. And the official Second Life website was frozen when I tried to find out what was going on and report the error."

As he told his tale, Feng Lan's expression darkened. The Flower Overlord had been missing for a while now: she hadn't shown up for the meeting Prince had called to discuss the suspicious assassins, and had for a while become a suspect herself. But the insanely strong NPCs he described matched almost perfectly with the assassins that had been plaguing the overlords, and if they were NPCs... than the Flower overlord was probably the first victim.

"Hey, Lan, aren't you Second Life's official spokesperson or something? Don't you know anyone to whom you could report this error?"

"Actually... I think I do."

Weeks passed.

The predicament in Second Life became more and more grim as the Great NPC Revolt grew worse and Long Dian revealed his plan to hijack the world's resources and build himself a new, disease free body.

"Are you telling me..." Yu An asked slowly, his expression darker than Lan had ever seen it, "that this Long Dian guy used this self aware artificial intelligence he accidentally created to wreck havoc upon the whole world and actually kill people... because he was diagnosed with an incurable disease and was not meant to live long? You know, I don't think I can relate to that. I don't think I can relate to that at all. To me that is just being a brat."

The girl didn't have an answer to that, so instead she went back to a topic that had been nagging her for a few days.

"Yu An, how are you doing? You look bad."

"Bad?"

"Worse than usual." She nodded, not caring anymore if implying that he usually looked bad was a bit rude. Their level of friendship could forgive that much.

"It's nothing."

"Now I am a hundred percent sure it is definitely something. If it was nothing you would at least joke about the thousands of somethings you already have."

Yu An rolled his eyes.

"I guess I would, wouldn't I? Fine. I miss Second Life. I miss Second Life more than I miss you."

Time had made this type of remarks less biting.

"I thought you were dating a girl. Jiu something?"

Yu An gave a small laugh.

"Going on dates. Not dating. Not yet. But you got me." His expression grew serious again. "More than I used to miss you. And that is quite something."

"I'm sorry."

"Don't be. It's not as if I don't have anything to look forward to. My team has been meeting offline a lot recently."

And there was the Traverse Con coming - the first online meeting of Second Life's worst criminals. Previous criminals, since all their accounts had been deleted. What would shady guys like Shade look like in real life? Who were the secret identities of his fellow Black Brotherhood members? And how would Hua Feng Yi react when she learned he was Crow?

"Plus, I trust there will be a Second Life 2.0... right?"

"I'm not falling for that, Yu An. I haven't told my brother about that, I haven't told Gui, and I'm not about to tell you."

She removed herself to her seat in pretense anger.

"You may run, Feng Lan, but you will once again fall into my schemes."

"Not while Justice stands", she argued back with their rehearsed heroic banter, "and Hope shines and whatever whatever."

They laughed.

The (for real) End

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So, thank you guys for bearing with me for the past five years, practically six. It was a long time to keep everybody waiting, and I would have actually given up along the way if it wasn't for your reviews. I thought it was really kind of you all to read and comment, and that I should show my appreciation to you all by actually completing this work.

In the mean term, I have graduated from university, and will start my graduate studies on Nuclear Physics.

This fanfic is my farewell to FFNet. If one day I have another story that simply won't sit still in my mind, I'll make a point of writing the whole thing before posting, because when I write chapter by chapter I get addicted to your reactions, and the cycle of keeping-you-guys-waiting-because-am-too-busy-to-write-but-refusing-to-quit begins all over again.

As a last favor, I would like you all to review, and in exchange I'll be available to answer questions through PMs.

Goodbye. Life long and prosper!