Darith sighed with relief. “Woulda been a lot easier if I knew there was a ground down there.”

“Haha, no kidding. That was awesome though! Phew, this certainly beats my day job.” Aaron said while hopping a bit, completely filled with Adrenaline. Darith slowly made his way down the wall as several pop up messages appeared and a big glowing light appeared at the center of the room on the floor.

Gained: +200 Experience Points

Level Up!: You've reached level 4! +1 Unspent Attribute Point

Title Earned: Spider Slayer(?)

Rank Up!: Spell Mastery reached Rank 4!

Attribute Up!: +1 Agi, +1 Con, +1 Int, +1 Str, +1 End!

Darith read the messages and double checked to confirm that the quest was marked as completed, which it was, while he climbed down to reach the floor, Aaron reading his own as he walked down the newly formed ice ramp.

“Hey, I got something called Spider Slayer, it says it increases my damage against all spider type monsters by 5.” Aaron said then looked to Darith. “Oh hey, you’ve got it too!” Aaron pointed to Darith’s name, causing Darith to look up at Aaron’s which now read Spider Slayer Aaron, Level 5.

“Hah, that’s cool. It says we can change it in our character tab, but might as well use it, don’t have any other titles yet.” Darith said.

“Yep, Congrats on level 4!” Aaron said.

“And you, level 5! That means you can invite other players to join your group now!”

“I can’t think of anyone I know that’d want to be a part of this.” Aaron replied with a shrug, then let out a laugh. The two then put aside their menus to take a closer look at the glowing light, both noticing that there were quite a few potions lying around from the eggs that the Queen destroyed while she was dying.

Laying on the ground beside the body of the Queen glowing were 2 things. A bag with gold coins leaking out the top, and a shining pair of icy white gloves.

“The boss drops boss loot.” Darith smirked.

“Gloves huh?” Aaron said as he looked at them.

Name: Silk Grips of the Frozen Queen (Rare)

Slot: Gloves

Type: Cloth

Armor: 3

Attributes: +2 Int, +2 Spr

Special: Reduces casting time by 5%

Description: Cold to the touch, made from the silk of the Ice Spider Queen

“Interesting, so you can get stats from items in this game.”

“And gold. How bout You take the gloves since they seem better for you, and I’ll take the coins?” Aaron suggested.

“Sure... Do you know what you can use those coins on?” Darith asked curiously.

“Not a clue, but it never hurts to have money.” Aaron smiled as he picked up the bag and it vanished to his inventory, while Darith grabbed the gloves and they vanished in his hands only to reappear on his hands.

“These are awesome, they feel a little weird though. Now my Fireballs are a bit faster, that’ll definitely help a ton.” Darith said, waving his hands around a bit as Aaron scanned over the room.

“She isn’t here either. So she didn’t fight this thing, she went a different way, deeper into the labyrinth.” Aaron said to himself, then looked at the ground with disappointment.

“Well, let’s grab these potions and head back to Mayiera for now.” Darith said, and Aaron nodded, but all his excitement from a moment ago had already gone.

The two were fairly quiet on their way back to Mayiera, and the tunnels were completely void of any more skittering, which was partly a relief to Darith but also worried him, it meant he had to find something else to hunt. When they got back to Mayiera she tapped them both on their heads to restore them to full.

Name: Mayiera(Neutral) - Level ??

Quest: Find and destroy the nearby Frost Spider Nest

Objective: 1/1 Frost Spider Nest Destroyed

Reward: + 100 Experience Points, Item: Beginner's Ring of Meditation

Level Up!: You've Reached Level 5!

You can now invite other players (4)

+25 Health, +20 Mana, +10 Energy

+1 Unspent Attribute Point

Name: Beginner's Ring of Meditation (Common)

Slot: Accessory

Type: Ring

Special: +2MP/Minute

Description: Simple copper ring with a basic enchant - rewarded to aspiring adventurers

“Thank you so much for clearing out those spiders, now the only thing left to do is find those Coldrin ruins!” Mayiera said excitedly as she handed them both a ring.

“What’d she give you?” Aaron asked as she watched a ring appear on Darith’s finger.

“Looks like a mana regeneration ring, really helpful, with this I can almost cast a Firebolt a minute.” Darith said happily.

“Oh, she gave me an Energy regeneration ring.” Aaron said as he looked to the plain silver band on his finger, Darith’s was over his gloves and bronze instead of silver.

“Alright, 2 levels and a bunch of skill ups, I need to have a look at my Character Info.” Darith said as he sat down across the fire from Mayiera and opened up his character window.

Name: Darith Gender: Male(Male)

Level: 5 Race: Nemothyne

Title: Spider Slayer Class: None

Health: 155/155 Mana: 125/125 Energy: 80/80

Strength: 6 Intelligence: 21+1.05

Agiliy: 3 Constituion: 5

Endurance: 4 Spirit: 8+0.5

Charisma: 1 Luck: 1

Armor: 6 Unused Points: 4

Basic Skills

Conceal Rank 2

Sprint Rank 1

Cartography Rank 1

Through the Pain Rank 1

Evade (No Rank)

Gamer's Mind (No Rank)

Gate (No Rank)

Return (No Rank)

Masteries

Spell Mastery Rank 4

Staff Mastery Rank 3

Spells and Abilities

Firebolt Rank 4

Multicast Rank 2

He briefly looked over his skills before looking at his equipment. He was wearing the gloves, the three starter pieces of armor with the staff, and the ring, but he had quite a few empty equipment slots. He still had a lot of work to do, or so he thought to himself as he closed the menu.

“Alright, with this I can try inviting Liana into the game.” Darith said as he stood up and stretched.

“Ah, well good luck! Hopefully your friend accepts.” Aaron said with a distant smile.

“Well, first we’ve got to find your wife, right?” Darith said, though quite reluctantly. Inside he wanted to instantly go grab Liana, but part of him knew he couldn’t just leave Aaron alone in this Labyrinth. He himself was now curious what could have happened to her.

“You don’t have to keep helping me, I understand you want to go with your friend.” Aaron said as he started to turn and walk back into the Labyrinth.

“Hey, you helped me reach level 5! It’s only fair that we stick with it until the end, A quest is a quest right?” Darith replied.

“Eh... Killing that boss, getting stronger, it feels good. But my wife has been stuck in this cave somewhere for 2 days now. It’s not a quest for me anymore, and I’m not sure where I have left to look. I don’t even know if she’s even in this cave! I don’t know enough about this game!” He shouted, getting frustrated the more he thought about the situation.

“If she's here, in this cave, we’ll find her.” Darith replied, trying to reassure him.

“How do you know? I’ve wondered those tunnels endlessly already, I’ve only ended up back here.” Aaron snapped back.

“Well, for starters, I’ve got a map.” Darith said.

“Wha, huh? A map?” Aaron said, his face lighting up suddenly.

“Yup.”

“Wait, how?” He asked in disbelief.

“Well, I taught myself the Cartography skill. It’s not complete, but my interface has been mapping the cave for me as I travel through it, so we can keep track of the dead ends.” Darith said.

“How’d you do that? Teach yourself Cartography?”

“Well, I just started drawing a map and it turned into a skill.” Darith shrugged.

“Dang, why didn’t I think of something like that?”

“Cmon, let’s get going. Maybe we’ll see one of those Gnark things that bit Mayiera.” Darith said as he marched back into the Frozen Caverns.”

“I’d rather not see one.” Aaron replied.

[Jaese - Evidence]

“Officer Jaese?” A faint voice whispered, though Jaese could barely hear it, it sounded muffled and he couldn’t see the source. All he could see was darkness, surrounded by black space on all sides. “Excuse me, officer Jaese?” The female voice repeated, now much more clearly as he opened his eyes to see a nurse standing over him. He had fallen asleep in the waiting room. It took him a moment to regain his composure, and as he briefly glanced around he saw that it was now night outside and the people in the waiting room were all different from when he had shut his eyes.

“Y-yes, what is it?” He shot up, suddenly alert as feelings of worry about Chris flooded into him.

“The doctor can speak to you now, they just got out of the Operating room.” The nurse said, she was not Kristen though, he didn’t recognize this nurse and briefly glanced at her name tag to read ‘Sarah’.

“Where?” Jaese said as he shot up out of his seat.

“Follow me.” Sarah replied, leading him out of the waiting room some good distance until they reached a group of doctors and nurses standing in a circle, all of them looking exhausted.

“How is he?” Jaese asked them without hesitation.

“You’re his partner? The one that brought him in?” One doctor spoke as he stepped away from the group. This doctor had a bald patch on his head and white hair around the sides, aged and short.

“Yeah.”

“Well, he’s out of immediate danger, we stopped the bleeding, but whatever he was stabbed with cut him deep and in a weird shape, it punctured some organs. Once he’s recovered a bit we will have to go back in. It’d help us a lot if you told us what exactly he was stabbed with.”

“It was ice, he was hit with a chunk of sharp ice.” Jaese replied without hesitation.

“You’re sure about that?” The doctor asked, though not in a manner of doubt, only of confirmation, which felt good to Jaese as he heard his response.

“Positive.” Jaese replied.

“Alright, makes sense I guess, given the wound. Must’ve been a pretty big piece though. There’s nothing more we can do right now, you can see him but he won’t be waking up, we’ve got him heavily sedated. I recommend you get some rest and come back tomorrow, we’ll let you know if anything changes.”

“Alright, thanks. I’d like to see him first.” Jaese said.

“I’ll show you to the room he’s in.” Sarah replied, walking past the group of doctors. Jaese quickly followed her until they arrived at Chris’s room and the nurse opened the door for him. As he entered he saw another nurse inside checking the machines hooked up to Chris. He was laying in the bed with his eyes closed and his chest covered with bandages, different machines and IV’s hooked into his arm and a mask over his mouth to help him breath.

Jaese didn’t get far into the room, he just stood there staring at his partner from the door way for a moment, clenching his fists. Finally he walked in and stood over Chris’ bed.

“Can he hear me, or is he completely asleep?” Jaese asked, turning to Sarah briefly.

“He’s completely unconscious.” She replied. Jaese nodded slightly, then turned back to Chris.

“This is my fault... I was hiding... maybe if I followed, if I fired with you guys, he would’ve gone down.” Jaese whispered as tears began to fill up his eyes. “You’re the tough one though, always going in first, always looking out for me. I’m hiding in the back being scared again, and all I can do is wait for you to get up. No one even believes a word I’m saying about what happened.” He whispered, taking a moment to wipe the small stream of tears rolling down his cheek. As he said this and looked down at his wounded partner, he remembered the words of the girl in the wheelchair from earlier in the day.

“No, not this time.” He clenched his fists and scrunched his brow. “I’m going to be the tough one this time. I’m going to figure out what tricks this guy used and I’m going to take him down.” Jaese said to himself, his expression now angry.

“Take good care of my partner.” Jaese said, directing his words to the Nurses now, then headed out of the room, the two nurses only exchanged looks with each other briefly as he left. He made is way to the elevator and to the first floor of the 5 story hospital, then headed out the front door.

“Jaese, how’s he doing?” Arnold called out to him as he arrived at his car parked not far from the hospital’s front doors.

“They just got him out of surgery, said he's stable for now but not clear yet.” Jaese replied.

“He’s tough, Chris. Something like this won’t be enough to take him down, and when he’s up we’ll be able to go after this guy.” Arnold replied with a smile.

“What do you mean, when he’s up? Go after this guy right now. I told you everything that happened.” Jaese replied as he stood beside his squad car door with Arnold moving to stand by it’s headlights.

“Look, I’ll be honest with you. What you gave us is useless. I mean, come on Jaese, what would you think if I told you it started snowing and some bulletproof man shattered glass and shot ice at you?” Arnold replied to him.

“It sounds crazy, I know. He must’ve used some sort of weird tricks to pull it off, but the evidence backs up my story, doesn’t it?”

“There’s nothing that backs up your story. I’m thinking maybe you hit your head, or maybe this guy used some sort of hallucinogen on you. Doctors are running blood tests, we’ll figure it out. Until then, you just need to get some rest, and don’t bla-”

“There wasn’t a hallucinogen!” Jaese shouted angrily as he slammed his fist against the driver seat window of his car, making a loud thunk noise.

“You sure about that?” Arnold asked him with a raised voice, motioning his eyes to the window that Jaese had just punched. It took Jaese a moment to register why he was motioning to the window.

“No, that’s impossible.” Jaese said as he knelt down and eyed the glass, checking all the windows of the car to see them all in perfect condition. “This was broken. When I got to the hospital, it was broken! He must’ve done something... Fixed it somehow, another trick maybe. My car has been parked here all day, right?” Jaese said panicking as he walked up closer to his Captain.

“It has... But...” Arnold tried interrupting him.

“Then check the security cameras on this parking lot, there’s got to be something, someone must’ve done this to make me look crazy...” Jaese insisted.

“Jaese, it isn’t just the windows on this car, none of the squad cars had broken windows. There also isn’t any radio reports of you or any officers saying they were seeing snow. Heck, we couldn’t find a single bullet casing at the scene, and none of the officers were missing any ammo themselves.”

“That’s impossible, I saw it, I’m not making any of this up!”

“I know what you think you saw Jaese, but there’s nothing to back it up. So just go home and get some rest, maybe when you wake up your memory will clear up, we’ll know more about what happened when your blood work comes back and Chris is up.” Arnold replied calmly, but this only aggravated Jaese and caused him to step closer to his captain.

“But I’m telling the tru-” Jaese started saying.

“That’s an order. Go home and rest.” Arnold repeated, this time in a much more commanding tone, his expression changing to a very serious stare. Jaese paused, staring back a moment then looking up, going deep into thought, running his mind over everything that happened. He turned and angrily kicked the door of his car while shouting, then unlocked it and got in, starting up the engine. Arnold watched as Jaese drove out of the hospital parking lot, then pulled out his cell phone.

“Jaese is heading home, do me a favor and send a unit over to keep an eye on him. Something about all of this just isn’t adding up.” Arnold said into his phone.

Jaese’s body flooded with adrenaline as he drove, his heart started to race as his mind ran over everything that happened. He was certain they made the call in about the snow. He knows he saw it, so how was it not recorded? How’d the glass get fixed, or how’d it break in the first place? Why’d he see it break if it didn’t break, what happened to the bullets? Chest wound... Chris has a chest wound. Four officers are dead.

“It happened.” He shouted at his windshield as he drove through the night of the city. As he did, it felt familiar. “Last night, just like this, we drove, and it was snowing.” He mumbled. “That’s where I’ll start.” He said while taking a deep breath, calming himself down as he turned his squad car on the next street, driving towards where he and Chris had been parked the night before. He stopped the car on the side of the road in the exact same spot they were, then turned off the engine.

“We were here. Chris was driving, but he saw the snow too.” He said to himself, then turned the engine back on and started driving towards the bank. He stayed calm, glancing out at the night sky every chance he got, but there was no snow, only a clear night sky.

“Here, this is where it started.” He whispered to himself, pulling the car over to the side of the road to park in front of a tall city building. It was a hotel, and he quickly turned off the engine and stepped out, still in his uniform from the night before. The hotel was classy and had a doorman and valet, the latter approaching him as he got out.

“I’ll only be a minute.” Jaese said to the valet before he could say anything.

“No problem officer.” The valet replied while stepping out of Jaese’s path. He walked into the hotel through rotating glass doors and across the lobby towards the front desk, meeting the receptionist there.

“Hello, how can I help you?” She replied, a young girl wearing the hotels dark red and white uniform.

“Hi there, I’m officer Jaese. I’d like to ask a few questions. Do you know who was working this shift last night?” He asked her politely, his mannerisms had transformed completely to appear as a respectful officer.

“Oh, well that was me, I work weekdays from 6 pm to 2 am. Did something happen?” She asked nervously.

“Nothing to worry about miss. Did you notice anyone suspicious entering or leaving the hotel?” He asked.

“Suspicious? Well, we get a lot of people around this time, but no one that I can think of really stood out.” She replied as her eyes looked up and to the left as she thought about it.

“Anyone wearing a large black or blue coat, maybe with a hood?” Jaese asked.

“No one like that.” She replied confidently.

“Would you mind if I spoke with your manager?” He asked.

“Sure, no problem, I’ll get him down right now.” She replied.

“Thanks.” Jaese smiled at her politely as she picked up a phone. He took a moment to step away from the desk and look around the lobby. Perfectly normal, hotel staff walking around, with normal guests.

“He’ll be here in one moment.” She said from behind him.

“Thank you for your cooperation.” He replied politely without turning around. He started glancing around for security cameras, spotting several, and to his luck one was pointed out of the front doors of the hotel.

“Officer Jaese, right?” A man called, causing Jaese to spin around and see a large chubby man with short brown hair wearing a black suit.

“And you are?” Jaese asked while reaching his hand out to shake the man's hand.

“Name is George, I’m this hotel manager. What seems to be the problem?” George asked.

“Oh, no problem, I just need to see your security footage from the previous night.”

“What’s this about?” George asked with raised brows.

“Well, did you hear about the bank robbery a few blocks away?” Jaese asked.

“I did.”

“We believe your cameras may have caught one of our suspects on tape, do you mind if I see the footage?” Jaese asked.

“Don’t you need a warrant for that?” George asked hesitantly.

“Only if you say I do.” Jaese replied politely.

“Alright, come on then.” George turned, leading Jaese through a door behind the reception desk. “Heard that robber got away with quite a bit, shot a few police officers on the way out too. If I can help catch a guy like that, you better believe I’ll do it.” George added.

“Did you notice anyone or anything suspicious last night?” Jaese asked as they traveled down a hallway and arrived at a metal door to which George pulled out keys and started unlocking.

“I’m the wrong guy to ask, I don’t come in every day, wasn’t here last night. Here we are. This is Phil, he’s watching our cameras, he was here last night too.” George said as they entered the security room, Phil standing up from his chair while putting down a cup of coffee, then reaching out to shake Jaese’s hand.

“Nice to meet you, I’m officer Jaese. Can you show me the security footage from last night between 10 pm and 11 pm? Of the front of your building.”

“Sure.” Phil replied excitedly as he jumped back into his chair and started hitting some buttons on a keyboard. The room was small but had a large desk with 8 monitors hooked into the wall above it, each displaying black and white camera footage from different parts of the hotel.

“Here, the screen in the center. What are we looking for?” Phil said as he pointed at the monitor.

“I’m looking for a police cruiser passing the front of your building.” Jaese said as he leaned in. The camera showed the entire front entrance of the hotel as well as the street in front of it, and as it played forward the street was empty. Phil fast forwarded the footage a bit until they spotted two police cars driving by.

“There, that’s it. Can you show me that in slow motion?” Jaese asked. Phil rewinded the footage and played it slowly, showing the police car drive by the hotel in slow motion with its sirens flashing. There was nothing, not a single snowflake. Jaese was positive it was snowing when they passed this hotel.

“Can you show me any footage of the roof at this exact time?” Jaese asked.

“Alright, give me one second.” Phil said as he pressed a bunch of keys on the keyboard. “There.” As he said this, the monitor switched to display a view of the hotel roof looking over the city.

“Play it.” Jaese said, and Phil unpaused the footage. There was nothing, the rooftop was empty, not a single snowflake was present. Jaese let out an annoyed sigh.

“What are we looking for?” Phil asked as George watched silently.

“Nothing, doesn’t look like your cameras caught what we’re looking for. Thank you for your cooperation and sorry for the trouble.” Jaese said as politely as he could, shaking both of there hands.

“No problem.” Phil replied.

“Sorry we couldn’t be of more help.” George added.

“You two have a nice evening.” Jaese said as he walked out of the room.

“Good luck catching the bad guys.” Phil replied enthusiastically. As he walked down the hall his mind was blank, he stopped thinking for a moment. Panic and doubt seeped into his mind as he stepped back into the main hall, and then out of the hotel. It wasn’t until he sat back down in his squad car that he regained his focus.

“Maybe I really did imagine all of it. When I think about it, how could any of that stuff really happen?” Jaese asked himself in disbelief. “A drug, or something? Arrgh. It felt so real!” He shouted to himself as he scratched his fingernails through his hair. “The only way to know if I’m crazy is to ask Chris, or wait for the drug tests to come back.” He let out a long sigh, then started the car engine to head back home.

When he parked in front of his apartment building he started to feel his exhaustion set in. He stepped out of the car and heard two sets of footsteps walking toward him. Quickly turning to spot two police officers. He recognized their faces but couldn’t remember their names.

“Jaese, right? Sounds like you had a rough 24 hours.” One of them said.

“Yeah... Captain send you guys to babysit me?” Jaese asked sarcastically.

“Just a precaution. So what happened at the bank?” He asked.

“Ah, I told everything to the captain already.”

“Yeah I heard you saying some ice shooting snow man killed our boys?” He asked, Jaese hearing a bit of hostility in his tone.

“Y-yeah...” Jaese said, and before he could say more he felt a hard fist connecting with his left cheek, knocking him clean off his feet and against his car. The officer that hit him stepped forward to swing again but was restrained by the second officer.

“Hey, calm down, relax man.” The calming officer said as he pulled the angry officer backward with his arms held down.

“Calm down? This guy’s drinking or doing drugs or something on the job, and gets 4 officers killed. He got Joshua killed, man! And all he gives us is some bullshit story about snow and flying ice bullets! Screw you, Jaese.” The officer shouted at him angrily. “You better hope Chris wakes up!” He shouted as he was pulled further and further from Jaese back to their car parked across the apartment buildings parking lot.

Jaese wobbled back to his feet and rubbed his cheek where he had been punched. It hurt, a lot, he could still feel it stinging, but what hurt more was that he felt as if he deserved it. With that in his head he staggered slowly towards his apartment building, confused, tired, and in pain.