Auralys of Achaea

I started Achaea not knowing what it was about or what was expected. I had no idea what a text mud was, nor what that implied. I had tried one other mud before hand and it drove me crazy. It was boring and it made no sense to me. However, I did not want to give up, so I kept looking, I do not know how I came upon it, but I found Achaea. I do not want to flaunt a cliché, but in this case, it indeed “forever changed my life”.

It was a few days before my ‘irl’ birthday, when I started life in Achaea. However, I had to complete the tour first. I remember being so happy wandering along the road with the paladin, admiring the depth of the world. Then we came to the goblins and I was so scared, and I could not run. It was startling and captivating, and Achaea has been that way for me ever since. There is not a time in Achaea where this has changed. I find myself repeatedly startled and awed ever day.

I eagerly made my choice to join the city of Shallam. Then off to Certimene where I joined the Magi. I was a novice until the Achaean age of 22. After which my character Auralys became an official member of the Magi Guild. I immediately went to work becoming a teacher. I became close to many of the guild members, with the exception of one individual. He and I never spoke and never really had reason to. Until one day, I learned he and I did not agree with the method I taught the novices.

I was upset. Therefore, I confronted him, and we argued for a very long time. I learned later he was a very old and very learned member of the guild and even though I did not like him, I tried my best to respect him. Eventually we, Rarch and I, became friends while in the ‘real world’ I dated, none of my boyfriends understood Achaea, and though I tried to introduce them to it, they still resisted. Meanwhile Rarch and I became closer.

I do not know how the change occurred or why, but I developed a crush ‘irl’ on the player behind Rarch and soon found myself flirting with him, but he seemed oblivious and eventually I gave up. Nevertheless, my character Auralys did not, she attempted to propose to him, while he went off, became a monk and practiced back breaks on me. However, my character pursued and as a joke, I asked what it would take for him to marry me and in reply said, “an octopus”. Off I went and nearly drowned in the effort, but we did become engaged.

In Achaea he bought us wedding rings: a wedding band of twined silver and platinum, I joined Lorielan’s order, and She designed my wedding dress. We then began talking about out of Achaea events in our life. I did not know that his player had begun to fall in love with me, and so out of Achaea my life continued unaware. I had begun to date a man whom I moved to Wisconsin for while Rarch’s player Nicolai was heartbroken and decided to take leave of Achaea. It would have ended there had we not been both in love with Achaea.

Achaea was literally the only thing that kept us in contact with each other. I continued playing Achaea wondering why Rarch was nowhere to be found. Many months passed and eventually he came to Achaea to check messages, but I was there and I demanded to know where he had been. From there I got his phone number, but still did not know Nicolai’s feelings for me. We talked on the phone nearly every day. Finally, he came back to Achaea on a more frequent basis.

It is solely Achaea’s existence that made everything beyond this point the way it is now. Four and a half years after beginning Achaea and meeting Rarch, Nicolai and I finally met in person. We hit it off immediately, and all those years on Achaea and talking on the phone combined into those two weeks, and the day before he returned to Denmark (his home country) he proposed to me. There was no octopus involved, but I did say yes. He even confessed to me that he had been in love with me nearly since the first time we met in Achaea.

In the months to follow, we had to find ourselves a wedding dress, a set of rings. I scoured many jewelry stores before I found one who would make our specific rings but I finally did and now we have them: Two wedding bands of twined silver and platinum. My dress was not as difficult to find, even though it had to resemble the one created for me by Lorielan, for I would not be satisfied with anything else.

We had our wedding soon after he proposed. I moved from Wisconsin, to Denmark and we got married on May 27 2006. We still play Achaea, it is still a large part of our lives, and how could it not be? We sit and talk for hours about things that have happened in Achaea, politics, individuals and what they do, philosophies, and the order. We even make sure that when we speak of Lorielan, we always refer to Her as Lady. We cannot help it.

Achaea has even inspired me to legally change my name to Auralys (though to be fair, I have had that name since I was 13, but Achaea definitely helped!)

I know this probably will not win the essay contest, but I have wanted to tell this story to those who have made Achaea, so that they know it has become a large part, and often the cataclysm of change in many individual’s lives. Especially my own.

Thank you Iron Realms!