January 14, 2019, 6:15am.

Mentally prodding my interface for a journal, I watch excitedly when the display changes before my eyes.

However, it leaves me slightly puzzled. There isn’t much to see. While it does open with four tabs along the left, my current tab, labelled Zone Quests is just an empty list with labels at the top.

Since this is just the first of the four tabs, I quickly switch to the second tab, System Quests, finding my first entry.

Quest: Survival. Requirements: Survive for 30 days. Reward: Variable. Time: 30/30 days remaining.

Focusing on the quest doesn’t reveal much more than what it says in the title. It does “helpfully” suggest that I find food, shelter and water. Which at least tells me that we’re going to need sustenance. Unfortunately, this further cements the idea that I'm actually stuck here, and we’re not just logged into a game.

Looks like I'm joining Josh in his survival training. Thirty days though? I guess our bodies are truly here then. God, I hope so. Pretty sure I’ll die if we stay logged in for thirty days. Okay, the first rule of practical philosophy, treat your apparent reality as if it’s true. For all intents and purposes, my arm is still my arm.

Even if my real body is lying there helpless, slowly withering away into… Stop it, Alexis. That's not helpful. Also, possibly not even true. You don't know what's happening.

Mentally sighing, I try to focus on the third tab, personal quests, but my thoughts keep circling back to the survival quest. Unable to change my mental focus, the system quest tab stays open instead of switching to the third tab.

I don't know a single thing about survival, not real-world survival anyways. The closest thing I've come to survival training was when my papi (my papa's father) took our family to his cabin. This was back before the ugly tree incident when my Dad's side of the family was still on speaking terms with my mom. I'm not 100% sure, but I think the cabin had power while they brought the food. About the only wilderness skill I learned there was how to stack newspaper and cardboard to start a fire. Somehow, I doubt there's going to be much newspaper to use here.

That doesn't even account for foraging, hunting or skinning. I've done it all in games, but it's all automatic there. Everything I've seen so far makes me doubt it's going to be that simple here.

My ruminations on survival finally subsiding, I continue, moving to the third tab. Inside I find three entries, the most extensive page of the journal so far.

Quest: Learn Magic. Requirements: 0/1 elemental manipulation skills learned. Reward: Variable. Time remaining: No limit.

Quest: Escape Time Freeze. Requirements: Find a way to disable class-based time freeze. Reward: 1 iron ranked integration point. Time remaining: 1056/1110 minutes.

Quest: Return to Earth. Requirements: Find a way to return to Earth. Reward: Variable. Time remaining: 360/360 days.

Yes! YES! YESSS!

The first two quests are nice but it's the third and last quest that really grabs my attention.

Because the last quest is a little terrifying and exciting. It implies there is a way home, which is great.

But the idea that if I don't complete it in time, I might never find a way home leaves me unsettled, to say the least. This practically confirms I'm not going to find a logout button. If I was in control of my body, I'm pretty sure I'd slump to the ground then start crying.

One more small plus to being time-stuck.

The first quest leaves me feeling better about heavily investing in my intellect and spirit attributes. I'm not sure how easy it'll be, but I'm hoping I can get fire or earth manipulation unlocked. If we're trying to survive, being able to cook strikes me as important. And earth manipulation might be useful for creating structures. There's a river just north of us so we should be okay on water, right? I think Josh knows more about survival than I do, so maybe I'll ask him for advice.

The second quest is encouraging, as it implies I'm not stuck waiting the full eighteen hours for time to unfreeze. If I can figure it out. I also have no idea how good the reward is.

What is an iron rank integration point? What can I use it for? Is iron rank good? Not that it matters, just getting out of the time freeze would be reward enough.

Now that I'm done going through the quests, I try to add another quest. I think really hard about studying dinosaurs, but nothing happens. I try adding a couple more arbitrary quests like reading the quest log three times fast, but with no new results.

As this avenue of exploration isn't yielding fruit, I switch my attention to the fourth tab.

Unlike the first three tabs, it’s simply labelled Pandora. The script isn't block text like everything else in my interface. Instead it's written in the same flowing script as on the letter. When the tab opens, I’m greeted by a mostly empty interface. But this time there are four small icons just below the tab. Focusing on them, I glean their general meaning. There's an icon for write, draw, erase and new page.

Is this a personal notation page?

Grasping the pencil icon with my mind, I start taking notes. I’m able to literally think words into existence.

Closing the interface, I try mentally sending notes to the journal.

Peter Piper packed pickles pretty poorly.

Opening it back up again, the words are there, criticizing poor Peter's pickle packing skills. Further experimentation allows me to discern that I’m able to split up or combine my notes at will. This is going to be so very useful.

I spend a couple minutes listing what I’ve discovered so far, in order of importance:

There is a system that likely allows me to wield magic. Josh has a pink bathrobe, with roses on it. I’m in an unknown location, in my kitten onesie, surrounded by standing stones. There’s at least one huge dinosaur nearby. I need to survive, with Josh, for 30 days. I'm on another planet, called Akilo, and have 360 days to return to earth. I’m able to freeze time, though not on purpose (yet). I have a mental interface that reads my mind and lets me take notes. I don't have to worry about making that rice last two weeks.

Thinking about being able to use magic, I ponder the standing stones. Now that I can take notes, I can record my observations if I study the southern stone. Wishing I could let my eyes play over its surface, I instead direct my focus to the few runes that I can discern clearly. There are several linked symbols connected together, but only one shape I would call a complete rune.

While inspecting the linked runes, I notice the energy isn't consistent. When I observed the stone in real-time, it seemed like the runes were constantly glowing. From my current perspective, I can tell that the magic is pulsing through the runes. The light fades for a little less than a second before returning to full strength for the next nine.

I study the moments when the glow fades then returns, trying to puzzle out what's causing it or where the energy is coming from. Watching carefully, I realize the energy, which I assume is mana, is travelling upwards from the ground into the runes. Unable to track the flow further while not having any other ideas, I inspect the only rune that is entirely within my view.

It reminds me of a Q overlaid with an arrow, with a couple of extra lines leading off which link it to the other runes. I'm not sure what I'm expecting to gain here. I guess I'm kind of hoping that by studying the runes I might unlock a runescript or enchanting skill. So far though, all I'm getting is an appreciation for whoever carved these runes. They're skillfully made, the lines etched into the stone with no sign of slip or mistake. Since I have this new mental notebook, I decide to sketch the pattern into my journal. Even with the ability to draw directly with my mind, my drawing isn't half as precise as the rune. In fact, I'm pretty sure I can draw better by hand.

Okay, now that I have this rune recorded in my journal it's time to stop exploring my interface while staring at this rock. I have a quest to break out of this time-freeze. That means that I should be able to.... manipulate time or something. Right?

I try to feel how the time-freeze is affecting me, to see if there's anything noticeable. There's a kind of friction that I've felt whenever I think about moving or doing anything which feels like a good place to start. Concentrating on the feeling, I attempt to close my eyes then notice... an intangible field. There's a barrier between my thoughts and my body, muting my actions. When I try to direct my will towards it, I feel an energy rising from my chest in response.

The energy feels full of potential. The scorching heat of the noon summer sun. The gentle comfort of hot tea on a cool autumn day. The bitter chill of a winter blizzard. All of these feelings are just a taste of what I feel within this energy. There's only one thing this energy can be. This is my mana. It's responding to my will, though it remains formless, swirling behind my eyes as I struggle to close them. I spend a few seconds relishing the fact that my mana responds to my will so readily before returning to the task at hand.

I try sharpening my mana into a needle, but it doesn't want to hold the shape. I can form the needle easily enough. It's just that once I have the needle formed, if I stop picturing it, the mana collapses back into formless energy.

Every time I try to use it to pierce the barrier my attention wavers. Not much, but it's enough for it to collapse. I need a way to make my mana take a shape while holding it.

I'm confident the best choice would be a rune, though I'm basing that on the standing stone in front of me. I only know the one. But it still seems like the best place to start. So, I begin shaping my mana into a needle again, but this time I try to overlay the needle with the Q-arrow rune. The result is amazing yet useless. The new structure is neither stable nor does it resemble a needle. In fact, it's making my head hurt trying to hold it together. But the amazing part is the notification I receive.

Skill unlocked: Mana Manipulation, (skill level: 1)"

Releasing my monstrous rune, I open the relevant page to focus on the skill. The familiar feeling of potential is there but now I'm also able to sense three shapes that I hesitate to call runes. They're so basic that I decide to call them rune-shapes instead.

There is one that is a modified version of an arrow that might achieve what I'm hoping for. I immediately take my mana then start shaping it into this modified arrow. It's not a complicated design, basically, just three pointed-arrow symbols stacked on each other.

But trying to shape it feels as though I'm trying to push my mana backwards uphill. I keep trying to push my mana into the arrow, but my mana just gets harder to add. Before I'm halfway done the construct, I start to get an extreme headache. Not willing to give up, I keep pushing mana into it, but I can't get the construct past two-thirds complete.

There's clearly a reason why this isn't working, but I'm not sure what. My mana flow is clearly stuck where the second set of arrowheads split off from the rune-shape. Concentrating on my mana, I can feel my mana flowing back down the part of the mana construct I have in place so far. Am I trying to build the arrow backwards?

Allowing the existing structure to collapse, I start over, reversing the direction of my mana flow. This time the mana construct practically snaps into place. It still takes some effort to maintain the structure but it's so much easier than my earlier structure that it's barely worth mentioning.

Now that I have a basic structure, I need to make it serve my needs. I've given the mana direction, but it still lacks purpose. In this case, the purpose is to break myself free of my time-freeze, but how to instill that in the arrow? I try imbuing the arrow with thoughts of freedom, movement and not being stuck inside my own head, but that doesn't help.

Next, I try to imagine piercing through the barrier, like I was attempting with my needle. This feels like I might be on the right track as I feel more mana flow into the arrow. It's more complete, but there's still a component missing.

Just one final push then hopefully I'll be able to utilize my first spell!

But I can't think of anything that works. I picture a balloon being popped, but it's not what my spell needs. I project the image of a nail piercing a tire, but it doesn't help. I keep trying to throw images and concepts at the spell construct, but it doesn't help.

I'm not getting anywhere, so I circle back to the shape of the rune then observe it with my mind's eye.

What am I missing?

The answer is so obvious it irks me. My arrow needs a bow. It has purpose, shape, direction, it just needs propulsion. Creating a second rune in the shape of a bow, mainly because the symmetry appeals to me, I feel the entire construct hum. There's a tension in the construct as I hold the shape in place. I'm pretty sure that if I release the bow, the arrow will fly forwards now. I mentally point the arrow towards the barrier over my eyes, but then I pause.

Am I ready to break out of this time freeze? Is there anything I want to do before I return to the normal flow of time?

Easing off the bow, I keep the arrow construct ready as I give myself a moment to think. I decide to at least quickly copy down the parts of the other runes neighbouring the one I can see. Before that I let the arrow dissipate then quickly check my mana. Even with all my mucking about, it appears I've only used a single point. Maybe it's only expensive when I actually cast a spell?

As I'm copying the partial runes, my eyes adjust further, which allows me to copy entire runes, though the quality is subpar at best. Since it takes longer for my eyes to adjust than to copy the runes, I amuse myself by creating the other shapes with my mana. Other than the arrow, there are still two rune-shapes that my mana manipulation revealed to me. There's a small triangle with "legs", that continue out past the "bottom" side of the triangle. The other is a circle with a single straight line that leads from the edge into the circle's centre.

Learning my lesson with the arrow, I try to push my mana into the structures in whichever way provides the least resistance. As I pour my mana into the triangle, it flows from the top point, along both sides, then converges in the centre of the bottom side as it travels to the tips of the legs. Even though the legs are twice as long as any single side of the triangle, the mana reaches their ends at the same time as the mana meets in the middle of the bottom side. The entire structure snaps into place at once, with a satisfying mental click.

I may be stuck on an unknown planet, no food, shelter or clue as to how to survive, but at least I'm learning some magic!

Jotting down another fancy rune from the standing stone, I turn to the last basic rune-shape. The circle. With this one my mana wants to start at the center, running up the line to the circle. Once my mana reaches the circle, it splits off in both directions. Once my mana meets on the opposite side of the circle, the construct snaps into place just like with the two previous rune-shapes. However, I also notice that mana now flows continuously through the outer circle of this rune-shape, even as it waits for me to complete it. Having constructed all three shapes, I decide to cycle through constructing them, practicing as I jot down the much more elaborate runes on the standing stone. Twenty minutes later, I'm just about done recording all the runes I can see from where I'm stuck when a notification pops up.

"Skill increased: Mana manipulation: (2)"

Sweet. I'm able to increase my mana manipulation skills, even when I'm stuck in this time freeze.

Switching back to my resource page, I check my mana again. I'm pleased to see It's still almost full. However, I notice that my focus hasn't increased. In fact, it's now at less than half. That implies I've used more focus than I've regenerated since I threw myself into this time-freeze.

Has my practice been using focus?

I decide to check by creating another mana construct while keeping my resource screen open at the same time. Sure enough, the second the construct snaps into place, my focus decreases by 0.1. Not a drastic amount, but with the number of constructs I've been creating it's definitely added up. I also note that the construct takes 0.1 mana, but when I collapse the structure, I regain the mana.

Does this mean I need focus for my spell casting? I guess I'm lucky that my focus is decent. I'd hate to have unlimited mana then be unable to cast spells because I have no focus.

I want to keep practicing, but now that I know it takes focus, I don't want to be left empty either. There are too many unknowns about what we might need to do, and I'm still locked in my time-freeze. The smart thing to do would probably be to wait through my time freeze while letting my focus recharge. Maybe even keep practicing once it's full.

But that sounds boring. Really boring.

Instead, I decide it's time to return to the land of the living. And breathing. I know my body is technically still moving along at its regular rate, but the lack of breathing is starting to disturb me. I haven't been paying close attention, but I think I've only taken one breath since I started this whole time-freeze thing.

Conjuring up my bow and arrow construct, I once again aim at the barrier.

Here's hoping this works.

Mentally bracing myself, I release the arrow, then it slams into the barrier, right behind my eyes. At first, I'm not sure if my mana construct even did anything. But then I feel the barrier crumbling.

The moment it does so the feeling of being encased drops away so suddenly that I start to collapse onto the grass.

Before I'm able to rejoice in my freedom, I'm assaulted by burning worse than any sunburn I've ever had.

Ohmygod! AGGGGHHHH!

The burning is everywhere, especially in my eyes. The burning is so bad that I scream myself hoarse while I roll back and forth, rubbing my face, my arms and even my toes into the grass, trying to find relief before I lose my grip on consciousness.

Ruby stained lips, smudged and uneven, try to engulf me. Twisting away, a giant hand reaches for me, the corduroy sleeve, large as my head.

I escape into a grasping bog, sea blue gowns dancing along the edges. A flash, lights flickering, as I run down an endless corridor.

Until the door. It's cold.

Frigid brown eyes bore into mine. Judging.

"Trust me," the man with eyebrows the size of a picket fence warbles, blocking a door which is swallowed in shadows, twisting away until it's gone.

A ripping sound echoes before the world turns to ash.

The nonsensical nightmare fades away as I reawaken to the pain. When I finally recover, I open my eyes seeing red. Well, more of a fiery orange.

"Ah, I think she's coming around," says the woman whose eyes of emerald green peer at me through the fiery mane of hair shrouding her face.

"Are you alright? You gave us quite the scare, what with all the screaming," she worries, those piercing emerald eyes staring into my soul.

I nod, not trusting myself to speak yet. Looking up at her I wonder who she is. I realize I've lost track of how long I've been staring at her as the pain subsides. As in, I realize my time sense isn't working. When I try to focus on it, my head explodes with that same burning sensation, but now it feels as though it's inside, trying to escape my skull. I close my eyes, trying to block out the pain, but it doesn't really help.

When I open my eyes again, I see Josh is standing behind the woman, concern written clearly across his dark face. His dark curly hair has broken free of whatever constrained it, getting in his eyes. His face relaxes when he sees me looking up at him. Funny, I think he's more worried about me, his neighbour who he hardly knows than I can ever remember my mother being. Weird, what you think about when you're lying on the ground suffering from the worst headache you've ever had.

As the headache dies down, emerald eyes speaks again. "So, my name is Bethany. Beth to my friends. What's your name friend?" Her gentle smile conveying more warmth than a hot cup of chocolate when she asks.

"Alexis," I reply. "Uh, Lex to meh-my friends," I stutter out. Ugh, my brain feels like it's churning through butter. My words slow and disjointed.

"Nice to meet you, Alexis. I hope we can be friends. Do you know what happened?"

"Uhm, I might have fuh-frozen myself in time then used mu-magic to break myself fuh-free early. It appears to have buh-backfired a little," I stutter. Thus said, I wonder if I lost health. I think about reaching for my status, but the idea of another headache dissuades me.

"What?" Josh interjects, doubt flickering across his face. Beth sits, staring at me silently for a moment without saying anything before nodding. I'm starting to feel embarrassed as no one says anything else when I realize Josh's focus has shifted away, like he's reviewing something only he can see.

"Does this have something to do with why I can see words floating in the air, and why you think this is a game?" He questions, once again turning to me.

"Uhm yuh-yeah, about that. Eh-either this is the muh-most advanced game the wuh-world's ever seen, and these guh-guys are going to make a ke-killing. Or..." how do I explain that I just spent two hours in pause mode, exploring my interface, copying down runes and of course, taking my first steps in learning magic.

Without sounding crazy that is.

I take a deep breath (and oh yeah, despite the pain, that feels good) before continuing. "I thu-think we're really here. I don't thu-think this is a game."

"And I thu-think I majorly screwed up my ah-attribute's if that's the case."

Josh stares at me for another few seconds before nodding, as if I've just said the wisest thing he's ever heard.

"You know, that was the best sleep I've had in years." Beth's deep feminine voice catches my attention again. "All it took was waking up in a whole other world with a computer speaking directly into my head," she continues with a wry smile curling her lips.

Her eyes meet mine. Now that I'm not in pain, I give her a once over. She's older than me. If I were asked, I'd say she appears to be about my mom's age. I'm guessing mid-30's or early 40's. But Beth has a presence to her that my mom never did. She kind of reminds me of my 10th-grade biology teacher Mrs. Bueller. Though, if I'm honest, it's mostly because of her mane of fiery orange-red hair. Unlike Josh and I, Beth's at least dressed to be outdoors, wearing a comfortable, green hooded jacket, jeans and a pair of leather boots.

While I'm sizing up Beth, I continue rubbing my head and digging my toes into the sod. The burning has died down to a slight itch instead of "oh-my-god I'm on fire" levels of pain and my head has likewise recovered, but it's still throbbing slightly. I'm just considering reopening my interface when Beth starts laughing.

I watch as she tosses her head back and forth, her fiery mane of hair flying everywhere, continuing to laugh. It doesn't sound like a maniacal, I can't believe this has happened to me laugh, but I can't be sure. Maybe she only just noticed Josh's bathrobe.

Either way, she doesn't laugh for long. There's still a smile on her face as Josh moves up to her.

"Thank you for taking care of Alexis, ma'am. Do you happen to know where we are?" Josh asks as he extends a hand to help her stand.

Ignoring his hand as she pushes herself up, Beth brushes herself off before replying. "I haven't the slightest. And I'm not nearly old enough to be a ma'am," she declares as she glares up into Josh's eyes. She has to look a long way up. Josh is fairly tall, but she only comes up to his chest. The top of her head doesn't even reach his armpit. I think she might be shorter than I am. Not that it matters, as I see Josh visibly shrink at her response. If I didn't know better, I'd think he was afraid of her.

"I think it's obvious where we are. Clearly, we are in the middle of the standing stones of Akilo, our starting area," comes a new nasally voice from my right.

Turning my head as we all glance over, I see a middle-aged man in a pyjama suit... suit pyjamas... they're pyjamas that have the appearance of a suit. He's not looking at pink bathrobe Josh, nor fiery-haired Beth. Even though it was their conversation he interrupted.

He's staring at me.

His bushy eyebrows are drawn together, his deep brown eyes send a chill down my spine.

"So, did I hear you say that you've used magic already? Excellent. Most excellent," he declares, steepling his fingers like one of those villains from a nineties children's show. His gaze never wavers.

Before anyone can say anything else, yet another voice rumbles forth, emanating from the standing stones around us. The words are deep, coming slowly as if they are only supplied grudgingly.

"Welcome Forerunners, to Akilo, your assigned training world. Your initial training will be focused on helping *error, species not found* adapt to inclusion. You will be able to shelter within the arrival zone for one night before the protective barrier's residual energies are depleted. For the next 30 days, all survival skills will have reduced focus assistance costs, lowered unlock requirements and will grant improved focused insights. Good luck."