Data Dragon Danika

"You asked about a song ZipZing?" Ryullusion reminded. "Did you want me to play it?"

"Um, can you just summarize it?" Danika asked.

"No, because I've never heard it," Ryullusion replied laughingly. "I can play it through my skill menu though. Definitely something a musician can't exactly do in the real world."

"Play it! It sounds fun," MatchlessMinion insisted.

Ryullusion grinned and obliged. The 'Little Dragon's Notorious Tale' was a long ballad. It was mostly about ZipZing's adventures during the past couple of months, although the last one mentioned had happened a couple of weeks before the expansion. It mentioned her guild Endless Song fairly frequently, but Danika didn't think it presented her as a thieving murderer like Immer Portman had described, even though the events he'd listed were all included.

Kit smiled and even laughed once while the bard played, but Danika noticed that her face resumed its tired and sad expression as soon as it ended.

"None of you had heard this?" Icieth questioned doubtfully. Her cute little ottermin face didn't seem to show as wide a variety of expressions as MatchlessMinion's chinchillamin, but her dark round eyes certainly conveyed her disbelief well. "I had heard it even before I heard the great bard sing it!"

"I've certainly never heard it before," Danika assured Icieth. She looked at Kit worriedly.

Kit responded to her gaze questioningly with, "I don't think I've heard it before, but I'm not certain. The tune seems a little familiar?"

"I bet Sea Song Tione wrote it," MatchlessMinion said authoritatively.

"I don't think I've told him about all of those quests though," Danika objected.

Shrubbery volunteered, "I told him about the one where we were trying to collect a trolls tooth."

"I may have told him about a few things," MatchlessMinion admitted a little defensively a moment later.

Ryullusion laughed, and when they looked at him, he suggested cheerfully, "It sounds like the dolphin has quite a few spies set up around the little dragon?"

"I'll just ask him," Danika said with exasperation. She pulled up her menus and started a message.

Icieth gazed at her with wide impressed eyes and clasped her hands in front of her chest. "Directly messaging the great bard," she marveled.

"There's an even better bard standing right beside you," Danika pointed out dryly.

"Just different," Ryullusion protested. "I'm sure my skills aren't as good as his yet within the game."

Icieth turned and gazed up at the tall dark haired elf with surprise.

"Of course they aren't," Danika agreed, "but only because he lives here."

Kit laughed again, and nodded at Ryullusion. "She's right, the dolphin gets 4 days for every one of yours too."

Aishin's little bat fluttered up to ZipZing again. Danika blinked and read the message twice, then she swiped over to the guild pages and checked. "Edwardian sold the building already!" she announced.

A flying fish arrived with another message a moment later. Sea Song Tione had replied: "I did! I'm so glad that the song of your noteworthy adventures is being sung even on land! I am currently writing a new one about how you were there when the mountains fell and the ocean swept beyond the edge of the world!"

Danika shook her head, and contacted Immer Portman next. The gnome arrived promptly to transport the building to its new owners. He was so quick that Kit was able to stay and watch the whole thing.

It was a little amazing. The gnome undid the string on the large pouch, which flattened out like a very small tarp. He activated an enchantment on his boots, and walked up the side of the building and swung himself over the edge onto the roof. There he laid out the flattened pouch, so that it looked like a small handkerchief with strings hanging out, and then he extended the strings.

The strings of the pouch grew longer and longer, until they touched the ground on either side of the building. The gnome descended in the same fashion he'd climbed up, and then began pulling on the string in front of him. Space seemed to bend as the bag seemed to stretch out over the roof without growing any larger.

Immer Portman moved to the next string and cinched it down by about the same amount. As he moved around the building pulling the strings tighter, the building slowly slid into the flattened bag. When the bag finally touched the bare ground, the strings were still pretty long, as they stretched out to where the border of the building had been.

Portman didn't just scoop it up yet though, he continued to move around it, tightening the strings by about the same increment he'd been using the whole time, until they were only a couple of centimeters long. Then finally, he took hold of the strings on both sides at once, gave a swift hard tug, and the bag pulled up into a rounded pouch once more.

The gnome trotted away with barely a word of farewell, leaving a flat empty lot behind.

MatchlessMinion questioned, "Didn't it have a basement? I thought we'd have to fill in the hole it left."

Ryullusion grinned at him and replied, "Magic!"

Shrubbery walked out into the empty space and knelt. She touched the ground and frowned.

"What's wrong?" Danika asked worriedly.

"It's alright, the ground here is just dead. I guess that makes sense though," Shrubbery replied calmly.

"That doesn't sound alright," Kit pointed out.

Shrubbery stood and smiled reassuringly. "Don't worry, it'll just take a bit of work and a couple of extra days before we can plant our guild hall."

"You're going to plant the guild hall?" Icieth asked doubtfully.

"Welcome to Endless Song," Kit said wryly. "Anyway, I should get going. I'll see you guys next time."

Danika noticed that she didn't say tomorrow, and asked a little sharply, "Kit?"

Kit looked up at her, where she hovered at the border between the garden and the empty space. "Zip?" she replied questioningly.

Danika couldn't bring herself to ask directly so she babbled, "Um, you didn't get a day off this weekend, and, there's been, I mean everything is…"

"I'm going to move to a night shift, which pays more, and will let me play at the same time more easily," Kit explained tiredly. "This schedule was for the transition."

Shrubbery walked over and hugged her. "That will be really cool," she told Kit.

"I guess that means you're all trained up now, congrats!" MatchlessMinion added. "And wait just a second, OK?"

"Okay?" Kit replied a little more cheerfully as she looked at the little chinchillamin curiously.

MatchlessMinion removed the largest pouch he carried, and demanded, "Stand back everyone!"

Danika moved back a little and gazed at him curiously. She wondered what he was about to do. A moment later he pulled the enormous piece of sandstone statuary that they'd gotten from the memory quest out of his pouch. It landed beside him with a whomp, and a puff of dust all around its edges.