"You're Chantelle's father?" I asked Michael.

"You know my daughter?" He asked. "She's safe?"

"I brought her here after she left your village." I said. "She is okay right now, but she is far to the north. She left, teleporting, with someone from winter. I was on my way to rescue her, and the rest of your villagers, when I found you. What happened at your village?"

"Chantelle came up with a ward that stopped the winter god's power, so he sent his priests to arrest the whole village." He said. "The god wants to use the ward she came up with for something. My wife ordered her to run away, taking the notes for the ward with her. Then we fought the priests to give her time to escape. We were winning when the head priest of winter arrived and cast an area effect spell that slowed us enough for them to capture us. The head priest was enraged at our defiance. He said that he needed my wife for her warding abilities, but that he didn't need all of our people. She would help him or he would kill more of our people. He cursed me and placed me on that roof, and then summoned his god to possess him. I was forced to watch as he tortured the people who had killed any of the winter group. Then he froze them and left with the rest of the villagers in cages on wagons. Snow eventually covered everything. And then you showed up. Pain. And now we are here."

The head priest of winter, and the god of winter, were responsible. My instinct to kill him when I first saw him seems like it was justified. But what gave me that instinctive reaction? Am I being manipulated by the simulation, or whoever is running it?.. It seems likely.

Are there any other instinctive reactions that I am having, and are they necessarily a bad thing? It was hard to tell objectively, but I really didn't like having my mind played with. I paid close attention to my reactions, dedicating my digital side to it, and then focused on something that should get some sort of external reaction.

What if I got Chantelle and locked the two of us in the Pocket Dimension by destroying all of the doorways out. There. It would be bad. I didn't have a specific reason for why it would be bad, I just knew that it would be. It was apparent now that I was watching for it, and from my AI knowledge I even knew how it could be done within the rules of not interfering with an AI's consciousness. It was an extra input channel, a premonition. I searched my memories for a reason why locking us inside the Pocket Dimension would be bad.

The whole reason why I was forced to play in these competitive simulations was to get enough resources, in the form of processing cycles, to not die. Technically I would just have my memories wiped and then spend eternity enslaved as an unknowing actor in other simulations... Which sounded much worse than death. Definitely something to be avoided.

If I took the easy way out of hiding in the Pocket Dimension I would win the simulation. But Interface didn't say that I would get processing cycles for winning. I would only earn them from entities following me. And who would follow someone who hid and did nothing? No one.

When I asked what Interface and his faction got out of it, he mentioned entities paying for entertainment and wagers on what Champions would do. So the motivation of whatever is nudging me is to make things more exciting and entertaining. Which is in my best interest, too, assuming I can survive it. If I am paying attention I can even tell when I am being nudged.

Wait. If just thinking about something causes a reaction, then it can see my thoughts. You can hear me right now. Which means anything I plan to abuse the nudges I am getting you can manipulate. If I go against the nudges, you just send nudges in the opposite direction. If I go against that, you would be able to tell and change it back. So I should take the nudges at face value and act according to my principles. I am in control of my own life. Believing anything else will drive me crazy.

Michael was staring at me the entire time I was thinking about how my reality now worked. I shook my head, returning to the present.

"I'll take you to my people." I said. "They will be able to take care of you while I'm gone."

I led him out of my Pocket Dimension through the doorway to the bottom of my fortress and started up the stairs to the druid's floor.

"You are going to get my daughter?" He asked as we climbed.

"And the rest of your people, yes." I said.

"I'm going with you." He said.

We arrived at the druid floor, Gaal and Barr guarding the entrance.

"Could you get Dael and Greta, please?" I asked them.

Gaal nodded to me, then gestured with his head for Barr to go.

I turned to Michael. "You can't go with me." I said. "I will be running faster than you can move, in the pitch black of the forest. They are two hundred kilometers away, and I intend to cover that distance in under seven hours."

That, and I didn't want to be responsible for his safety. Chantelle would never forgive me if I saved her father only to let him get himself killed.

Dael and Greta arrived, following Barr.

"Greetings, my lord." Dael said. "We didn't expect you back so soon?"

"Greetings Dael." I said. "I have a guest that I need to leave in your care for a time. This is-"

"Michael Warder." Dael said. "We are acquainted, my lord. He is welcome to stay with us."

"I am going with you." Michael said.

"I can't take you with me." I said.

He shouted, raising his arms dramatically, and the air around me thickened, holding me in place. Everyone else was affected the same, though Michael could still move freely. I tensed my muscles, using my entire strength I was able to move against whatever it was that Michael was doing.

I had to pause to refresh my muscles after only two steps, but that put me within reach of him. I raised my hand to grab him by the shoulder, but he easily stepped to the side, avoiding me. I refreshed my muscles all at once, blacking out from the pain. Michael was still standing in front of me when I came back to my senses. I stepped into him, wrapping my arms around him to hold him in a bear hug.

"Let me go." He said. "I will rescue my family myself if you won't help me."

He was focusing whatever he was doing, some spell, almost entirely on me. He had a mad light in his eyes as he tried to crush me. The others had started moving, and Greta was approaching us.

"It is freezing cold outside." I said. "There is no way that you would survive."

He turned to face Greta when she raised her hand to touch him.

"Michael." I said, to distract him. "I will get your family. You have my word."

He turned back to me, baring his teeth. The pressure on me increased, and then disappeared entirely as his eyes rolled back into his head. Greta caught him as he fell unconscious.

"I put him to sleep." Greta said.

"Thank you." I said. "He has been through a lot. How long can you keep him asleep?"

"Days without any ill effect." Greta said. "It starts to have negative effects if it lasts longer than a week."

"He has been tortured, emotionally by the winter god, and then physically by necessity by me." I said. "Hopefully getting his family back will allow him to start to heal. Keep him asleep until then?"

"Yes, my lord." Greta said. "I have a spell that might help him heal. Soul wounds are difficult though, so there are no guarantees. I will give him as much support as I can while he sleeps and dreams. Are you back? Can you heal some people?"

"I only came back to save Michael." I said. "Healing your people is on my list for after I get Chantelle back. I appreciate your assistance."

She nodded, and with Dael's help took Michael through the doorway into the druid entrance hall. I turned to head back down the stairs myself, then stopped to look at Gaal. I had a basic understanding of the People's language at this point thanks to the study of their dictionary going in the background.

"Why you guard entrance?" I asked. "No else in... house."

That was rough. I didn't know the word for 'fortress' and stumbled over the end.

Gaal looked at me in surprise. "It is proper to guard the living-space of those who do not fight." He said. "The world is dangerous, and it is our role to protect."

He was much more eloquent in the People's language, and my assessment of his intelligence went up a lot. Of course I sounded like an idiot when I spoke in it, but I would improve. It would be nice to be able to communicate with my people.

"I thank explain." I said. "I need go now."

I could hear what was wrong with the sentences I was saying, the language was made up of shifting tones and lyrical hooks. I was missing the bridges from the end of one word to the start of the next word. Something that would need to come from experience and listening to the language spoken, the dictionary didn't cover it very well.

I headed down the stairs all the way to the bottom of the fortress and through the Pocket Dimension doorway. I'd forgotten to close or block the doorway back to the village in my rush to help Michael but it didn't look as though anything had come through.

I re-formed the wall separating the village doorway into its own room and then exited through it. I buried the outside doorway under the road, smoothing it over. I didn't have anything else to do in the village, so I left to the north back into the forest.

Chantelle was one hundred and ninety kilometers away, five and a half hours at my best speed with no interruptions. I started running.