As we make our way on to the third circle of questing, let us take a brief diversion and look in on the first terrace of punishment that can be easily observed. Terraces are dotted here and there about the nine circles, and are areas of special punishment for those chief protagonists that are in abundant evidence within the nine circles.
Ah, and so we arrive.
The patently manifest.
Please note the sign on the wall outside the entrance: ‘Herein are punished those who state the bleeding obvious’, and the small sign beneath: ‘Note: If you state the bleeding obvious, you’ll be punished in here. Ow! Please not the fire! Aiiiieeee!’. Amazing how the sign maker managed to articulate his screaming agony on the sign, no?
There are many sinners being punished and tortured in the most inventive manner imaginable in this terrace, but we shall focus on a particular one, the person who shouts “Heal me!” at healer classes.
If you’ve played a healer class, it’s guaranteed that you’ve met this sinner on your travels. They’re the person who, at the least convenient and most stupid time, whisper, say or broadcast on all known communication channels and radio frequencies that now is the time for you to devote your time to restoring their rapidly diminishing health levels because, frankly, they’re more important than everybody else.
This is irritating on so many levels that they had to invent twenty seven new levels to encompass it all; it was during this time that they also found the long lost 14th level of irritation which had somehow got stuck down the back of Melmoth’s sofa next to a boiled sweet and six pence in loose change.
There’s nothing worse than having fought your way into the depths of some dungeon, having survived numerous encounters with multiple groups of aggressors and come out relatively unscathed, than to have someone holler ‘Heal meh!!1’ when you get in to a sticky situation and their health gets somewhere below the 50% mark. Just so that you sinners can try to understand, the conversation – IF WE WEREN’T SO GOD DAMN BUSY HEALING YOUR SORRY ARSES – would probably go a little something like this:
Sinner: “Heal meh!!11”
Saint: “What?”
Sinner: “Heal pls”
Saint: “I’m gob smacked. Heal you, you say? Me? A healer? With my reputation? Well, I don’t know, it’s such a radical proposal that I’ll have to mull that one over for, oh, until the rest of your health expires, I would imagine”
Sinner: “But I need healz!!11”
Saint: “Yes. Yes you do. Quite badly, in fact, seeing as you’re taking such punishment from that mob there. The question is, how am I supposed to know this?”
Sinner: “Wuh?”
Saint: “I mean. As a healer, I’m busy over here writing a thesis on the subjugation of women being rooted in the patterns of economic exploitation. Not to mention the sheer amount of laundry I have to get through, do you know how difficult it is to get Felblood out of Mooncloth? There’re some interesting botanical specimens over here that I need to catalogue, and I’ve also got the biggest booger up my nose and it’s going to take me a good half an hour with my eyes squeezed closed in concentration to work that little sucker out. So, bearing in mind how incredibly busy I am, it’s a miracle that we made it this far into the instance, really, what with me being the only healer. I can only imagine that some form of divine intervention, some celestial cosmic event occurred over the past eleven battles that enabled the entire party to emerge from the fight relatively unscathed. I mean IT’S NOT AS THOUGH I’M SITTING BACK HERE, ALL DAY, EVERY DAY, STARING AT YOUR HEALTH BARS AND PLAYING HEALTH-BAR-WHACK-A-HEAL AND NOTHING ELSE. IT’S NOT AS IF MY ENTIRE PURPOSE IS TO KEEP YOU ALIVE, AND THAT, CONSIDERING THAT I AM PLAYING A HEALING CLASS, SPECCED FOR HEALING, WEARING HEALING GEAR, WITH A DEGREE IN HEALING FROM THE GRAND ALL-HEALING UNIVERSITY OF HEALING, I MIGHT, MAYBE, JUST PER CHANCE, BE QUITE AWARE OF WHAT THE HEALTH OF MY PARTY IS, AND WHO NEEDS HEALING AT ANY PARTICULAR TIME.”
Sinner: “Buh my health woz low”
Saint: “Did you die”
Sinner: “Well it looked as thou…”
Saint: “DID. YOU. DIE?”
Sinner: “No.”
Saint: “And do you know why you didn’t die?”
Sinner: “Bec…”
Saint: “RHETORICAL QUESTION. It was because you were healed. By the healer. Because that’s the healer’s job. That’s me, by the way.”
Sinner: “Buh my health woz real low”
Saint: “Well I’m sorry.”
Sinner: “It’s alri…”
Saint: “SARCASM. Just because your health gets low, does not mean that I’ve run off to finish my thesis, or to find a place to wipe that booger because I don’t want to get it on my robe. I haven’t suddenly forgotten where I am, and what class I play. It may just be that the fight is a tough one, and that there is someone who is a higher priority than you who needs healing. You’ll get your turn. And if you don’t, there was a damn good reason why, and think yourself lucky that I’m here to resurrect you.”
Sinner: “I woz just sayin”
Saint: “Why? WHY?! Why are you so special that you feel the need to point this out to me? Do I tell you what to do? Do I? Do I tell you to “Swing your sword!”, “Use your combat abilities to do damage!”, “Attack the mobs!”, “Cast magical spells to the detriment of our enemies!”.”
Sinner: “No…”
Saint: “No. No I don’t. But I should, because then maybe, just maybe, you’d begin to understand what it’s like.”
** Sinner dies **
Sinner: “Rez pliz”
Saint: “Can anybody here resurrect?”
Sinner “You can”
Saint: “Anybody? No? Shame, we’ll have to leave Sir StatestheObvious behind.”
Sinner: “But u can rez. Hello? Hello?”
And so we continue on our journey, with the faint call of “Pliz, I need rez. And maybe some gold.” fading away to nothing as we leave the sinners of this terrace to their eternal punishment, too grisly to describe here, but well deserved all the same.