Adarsa opened his eyes, and was reborn.

It was more metaphorical than anything else- in fact, his character looked mostly the same, except wearing clothes he could only hope to afford. A silk shirt, a fur cloak with a golden butterfly-themed clasp. A delicate sapphire crown-

Adarsa blinked. He remembered what he had done, just moments ago. Boots, kneehigh and black, soft suede with lambskin on the inside. With gold embroidery and a hefty heel.

He did not have boots. He did not have anything, actually. Just his bare feet standing on the far-too-soft grass and earth beneath him.

"Um," He said, looking up at the woman- who wasn't really. Dressed for fieldwork? "Yes, that's me, hi, uh," Adarsa looked at his feet again, as if the shoes could have simply manifested there. They had not. "Where- why aren't I wearing shoes?"

This was off to a rocky start.

Suddenly very tired, and not of the mind to be assuaged by any answer she did or did not give, Adarsa lowered himself in the chair. This was terrible. He felt he might faint, even.

Astoundingly, the answer she gives is- abhorrent, maybe. Normal? The fact that he designed shoes- custom? For himself?- and was now standing here with no shoes-

That was normal?!

He laid there. Black spotted in his vision. This simply couldn't be happening. Who designed this game? A monkey? One of those barefoot zealots? Did they hook a computer up to a squid and see what it churned out? He- he was going to have some emails to write when he was done here, that was for certain.

"Hm?" Adarsa was dragged out of his reverie by the first question. His ideal date. "Oh! My perfect date..." He sighed, eyelids fluttering closed as he remembered. He'd had a lot of almost-perfect dates... but only one that was perfect.

"We were in college- both studying abroad. He- he serenaded me, with these sonnets. He wrote them himself." Another little sigh. He had truly been something else, hadn't he? Forget another playing field- the man had been on a wholly separate planet. "He rented out the entire floor of this beautiful restaurant- We... we just talked, the entire time. Not... We talked about poetry. About the great works, about language and translations and intention and... and when we finally left, just outside the door, he kissed me. And he asked if he could walk me home. I- I said yes, and then I asked him to stay." Adarsa blinked, seeing not the dark cast walls of his room, arms wrapped so tightly around his chest in morning sunlight-

But the woman, who looked away only to write on her clipboard. Ada took the moment to wipe away tears he didn't remember shedding.

With a disdainful sniff, he tried to focus on the remaining questions.

The next, he gave a little laugh. "Hero? Me? No, absolutely not. I- I'm not cut out for that sort of thing. That's... firefighters, or EMT workers, or people who pull children out of cars, not... " He shook his head.

He perked up again at the final question. "I'm very determined." Adarsa said, with utmost, unwavering certainty. "I set my mind to somrthing, and I do it. It's always been that way!" Like when Darcy had said he couldn't go to college, and he'd gone anyway. But... a bad habit? Adarsa thought. "And, um... I suppose..." Hm. Tricky. "I suppose I can be a bit lazy? I do like sleeping in when not on a deadline..."

Adarsa sat up a bit when she said that was it. Those were... odd questions, but if it worked, then it worked, right? He watched her file away the paper intently, as if he could glean what she had written. He could not.

But, it didn't matter- she pulled out a little orb, setting it into his hands. It said MUDKIP... whatever that was. Was that a new one? He had no idea. "Oh! Um, thank you!" He said anyways, because Darcy had always taught him to be polite. Maybe a mudkip was cute but... given it started with "mud" he wasn't going to bet on it.

Adarsa stood, fixing his cloak as Ash swept past him towards the front of the tent. This was it, then, wasn't it? He was about to get into the part of the game with other people. His heart thrummed in his chest. His future was out there!