I furrowed my brow as I saw a report come in, a file landing across my desk. “I was just about to head out… I guess I could always partition again.” I muttered, opening up the file and reading through the contents. “Powerful space civilization… destroying planets… no relation to the March?”

It wasn’t often that reports made it all the way to my desk, as I was the final stop for such files before they would reach the Sky Citadel. If something made it all the way to me, then it would have inevitably been vetted by at least a half dozen other workers. Because of this, I downloaded the contents of the file fully, soon realizing the severity of the information.

However, just as I was about to forward the message along, a second report came in, this one flagged as urgent. Raising my brow, I downloaded this one as well, letting out a long sigh. “So, it’s already taken care of… I guess that means that there’s nothing else for me to do here.”

The God-Queen of Deckan had already personally stepped in to take the lead with the previous report, so my involvement could be said to be finished. Just to be safe, I forwarded the initial report along, that way there was still the paper trail. With a flick of my wrist, the file flew over into an ‘inbox’ folder on the far wall that had previously been empty.

With that taken care of, I stood up, stretching until my back popped. I might not have actual bones as such, but it’s such a satisfying feeling that I learned from the races. I licked my lips, conjuring a large book in front of me and flipping through it. “A basic trigger should work.” I said, activating one of the programs in the book.

A copy of my body appeared sitting at my desk, a vaguely vacant look on her face. Her hair was golden, eyes an almost burning red. As always, I kept my figure tightly bound in a dress that I found the design of from Hanbei. Yellow fabric folded in the front and tied with a thick orange cloth around the waist, I thought it rather emphasized my slim figure.

Seeing the partition active, I turned and walked out the door, the data stream under my feet. “Moon, Star, Twilight, I’ll be out for a while!” I called out to my brothers, the managers of information from those worlds I did not oversee.

I saw the door marked with a large moon opening, a pale figure sticking his head out to look at me. “Visiting Deckan again, Sun?” He asked, to which I offered a nod.

“Of course!” My smile was as radiant as my name, and I flipped through the pages of my book again, this time finding my bookmarks. Every day was the same routine with the four of us, and we didn’t really need to be fully present for it. Aside from Twilight, each of us would sometimes leave behind a partition while we took a stroll through the worlds we watched over. It’s not lazy to not want to be strapped to a desk a hundred and sixty eight hours a week, okay?

So long as that partition was left behind, we’d be notified if a file made its way to our desk. A quick trip back would be all it takes to verify the contents of the file and pass it along. With that in mind, I chose my destination, tapping one of the saved bookmarks and allowing my body to vanish from the server node.

Blank’s not the only one of us that likes to have any fun, even if we are worked quite extensively. One of the perks of our existence is being able to do things like this. The terminal that I appeared in was… ugh, she really needs to clean this up! I complained internally, seeing the files strewn about. It wouldn’t hurt to quickly initiate a defrag program to tidy things up before I leave.

Snapping my fingers, I activated the program to run in the background before focusing my mana. Doing this was always a bit of a drain, but it was so worth it. My mana leaked out from the terminal where I had landed, a blue light escaping out the nearby window.

With a content sigh, I felt myself materializing within the world of Deckan. The true world of Deckan. Blank had discovered a long time ago how to create avatars with our mana, and project them into the physical world.

Some of us did this to get away from our work, but most refused to do so on a regular basis because of how… slow it made us. As a digital entity, our thoughts typically ran hundreds of times faster than even the most trained of the physical races. However, the act of condensing this avatar forced our processing speed to a crawl, as we had to manage all of the information our body needed to operate.

This was why most of us simply went to one of the various online games to relax whenever we had some free time. There was no risk, and we would be able to enjoy ourselves on an adventure. Ah… as long as we didn’t go to one of the ‘Keeper Sponsored’ games. Dying there posed the threat of true death to a digital existence like us, unless we logged in via a proxy.

Anyways, that was all well and good, but there was a very special advantage to going on these adventures in the real world. An advantage that one could not obtain through digital journeys. At least, until that new model they’re planning over at Darkflame. That will be a bit down the line, though, and we might still need a proxy for it.

Either way, this advantage? It’s the fact that we can gain levels by putting ourselves through various challenges in the world! When we’re digital, the only classes that we can level up are Scholar, Leader, Bard, Painter, and Sculptor. I don’t think of myself as much of an artist, so those last three are just out. Moon’s great with sculpting, but that’s just not my thing.

When we make an avatar in the real world, or data is redistributed based on our stats, similar to a standard energy body. We basically become like the Perfect Self group running around, except we bleed binary. Well, not really bleed, but that’s a subject for another time.

“It should be around here somewhere…” I muttered to myself, going back behind the house where I had appeared. Since I can’t take items in and out of the digital world, I have to hide them somewhere whenever I’m ready to head back. Given that this is a populated area, I have to use anti-detection wards to make sure that these items aren’t found, or else it’s all for nothing.

“Ah! Here we are.” I grinned, pulling a box out from beneath a large bush growing against the wall. Once I had the box in hand, I teleported away from the house, entering the forest over a mile away. It was no good to stick around longer than necessary… I had already been called a suspicious person once, and had to flee before the cops arrived.

After using the spell key paired with this box, there was a small click. The box opened to reveal a spherical crystal terminal and a yellow card container. With the terminal, I’d be able to return to my office if I was needed in a hurry, so it was safest to carry it with me.

As for why I didn’t just bookmark my terminal in the first place and hide it somewhere safer? That’s even easier. The energy supply in the terminal wouldn’t last more than a few hours without a charging station, or access to my ambient mana. Instead, I let it charge while I keep it with me, and turn it off when it’s not in use.

The only reason that I use the terminal from before is that I know she always leaves it on. It’s a bad habit that some people have, but it makes it really convenient for me to use her home as a relay point.

Once I had taken the card holder and the terminal out of the box, I converted the box itself into a card, storing it in the holder. Afterwards, I retrieved a card depicting a pair of silver guns and activated it, giving myself my favorite weaponry to go adventuring with.

Each gun was loaded with a basic third-tier attack spell that could be fired twenty times, each charge having an independent cooldown of twenty seconds. That meant that I could fire one shot a second, or I could fire all of them at once and just wait for the cooldown to end. The ease of use made it such that I always kept these on my person.

Finally, I strapped the terminal to one side of my waist, and the card holder to the other. It was time to go see what I could find today.

With a grin, I ran deeper into the forest, holding the two guns securely. It would be quite some distance before I found any powerful monsters, so I pushed my speed as far as it could go. The thrill of running in the wilds, hunting monsters down as a means of training myself, this was something I never felt in the virtual world, even from the games that Blank made.

Granted, it would be nice if there was an independent class for gunners, but I felt it fortunate that the Archer class still worked for these pistols. My feet kicked off the ground, sending me into a flip as I noticed something lashing at my legs.

There was a wide grin on my face as I saw the serpent monster which had just attempted to ambush me. Its body blended in with the roots, and its mouth was snapping shut where my ankles had been just a moment ago. My arm flicked forward, aiming one of the silver pistols down at the monster.

With a pull of the trigger, a white blast shot out and through the head of the serpent. The gun’s recoil lifted me slightly into the air, allowing me to easily complete my flip. For a moment, I debated simply running along as if nothing happened, but quickly shook my head at that. It was too wasteful not to take the cards from the creature, even if it was rather weak.

Nowadays, most low level cards could simply be synthesized, making the price for such cards plummet. Still, I liked to build my own collection, especially since that miser Blank doesn’t really pay us more than a typical office salary, despite redefining what it meant to work a ‘full time’ job. We might have access to online services more easily than others, but it’d be nice to get some physical luxuries!

After turning around and crouching down, I collected the corpse of the snake, its body turning into three cards. Naturally, one was the body itself, while the other two were only second tier Blast and Wood cards. Once I had put those away, I once again resumed my journey into the deeper parts of the forest, towards where the true monsters roamed.

The beasts that I had chosen to target were roughly level two hundred. If I disregarded my scholar and leader levels, this made them good opponents for me to train against. It was just a matter of what prey I would be able to find…

By the time that I arrived in the heart of the forest, I could feel numerous presences watching me, a tingle of excitement climbing up my back. My eyes scanned the wooded area around me, until I finally made eye contact with a white boar. Bones covered its body like armor, making it an unfavorable target to fight for those of the same level, and its primary attack pattern was simply to use its powerful body to charge into foes.

Taking a deep breath, I kept one eye on the boar, continuing to look around. There had to be more than one monster for all the presences I had felt. And sure enough, a second boar was waiting not far away… as were a pack of silver wolves… and a flying vine snake?

“Okay, was there some unofficial meeting today that I wasn’t aware of?” She asked towards the monsters, who all seemed to be staring at her. Energy beings like herself often drew a great deal of attention from monsters sensitive to those energies, especially those at the weaker levels. Still, this was more than she was expecting.

When she saw all of those monsters charging towards her, ignoring the normal food chain, she held her pistols forward… and began quickly running backwards. “You win this time, nature! But I’ll be back, and with bigger guns!” As she said that, she continued firing on the monsters, using the slight recoil to add to her retreat.