After Ryker spent our Town Tokens on a new building that would house our Teleportation Circle, it took less than half hour for the portal to be up and ready. I hadn’t been sure what to expect. The “construction” process involved an opaque barrier around the ground for the new building, and then the building just appeared, as thought it had been teleported into place. Presumably, some of the ground was also teleported out, otherwise this building would have no foundations.

Ryker wants to share Teleportation Circle controls and options with you. Y/N.

I selected yes, and immediately dove into the virtual settings for the Teleportation Circle. As Samantha told it, Teleportation Circles were a huge potential danger to a village. Fortunately, they came with a variety of security features. First, I required all incoming guests to make public to the town their name and level. Then, I changed the settings so that all arrivals would be considered “pending,” until approved by Ryker or myself.

In order to approve arrivals, we would have to be in the town.

This meant that nobody would be able to enter the town through the Teleportation Circle until we came back.

Once Samantha was satisfied with the settings changes, I glanced up to see Ryker staring at me.

“You don’t like the changes?” I asked.

“It’s fine,” Ryker said. “You just did that really fast.”

“Millennials,” I said, with a shrug. “We’re digital natives.”

Then I took a look at the available towns in our Region. Each town had a short description next to it.

San Diego Navy

Old Pine Town

Hillary’s Home

Epoxylips

SLO

Reno

Las Vegas

Phoenix

Air Force Town

The list went on, and from the best I could tell, I was only able to teleport inside California, Nevada, and Arizona.

Of course, there should be far more than these towns in these three states, or humanity was fucked. But these were just the towns that had built a Teleportation Circle, and had opted to leave their town name public.

We selected Old Pine Town, and after waiting for a second or two above a very complex rune pattern that was inscribed into the floor, we found ourselves teleported into a bland room similar to the one we left. We were standing on an identical rune pattern that took the shape of a circle, over ten feet in diameter.

If not for the new people in the room, I would have suspected we were still in Reed Town.

I was surprised to see some familiar faces in the room. I saw Bradson, and one of his followers from the Hard Mode difficulty. Sergeant Wallis was there, as well. There was a man in his fifties who I had never seen before, probably a resident of Old Pine Town.

And there was River. She had new robes lined with runes, and her staff with the red jewel on top drew a lot of eyes. The moment she saw me, I saw rage flash through her face.

“Hell no. Get him out of here.” She turned to Bradson. “He killed Kris. And Darrel. And Paul.”

“What?” I said, surprised. “That’s not true. I—I didn’t even know they were dead.”

Everyone in the room was staring at me. Even Ryker.

River pointed her finger at me. “At the end of the tutorial, he started collecting Yanir flowers. I immediately warned him not to. Then a wyvern flew over and went on a poison-breathing rampage. Jarek,” River basically spat my name, “was ready for it and immediately started running. I was forced to buy a life-saving potion the moment I arrived at the Auction. Kris, Darrel, and Paul, our teammates, died of the poison.”

My immediate reaction was to wonder, Who the fuck was Paul? Then I realized he was probably one of Bradson’s people.

Fuck you Samantha, I thought in my head. This is why you should check in with me before trying crazy shit. I almost died, and three people did die. And now we are going to be kicked from the team.

I looked around at the angry stares. “I’m sorry,” I said, as humbly as I could. “If I had known what would happen, I never would have done it. I wasn’t thinking straight. It was an accident.”

Bradson’s angry voice called out next. “And I suppose you weren’t thinking straight when you left my team? We were planning on your support. The moment you left our group, our formation was thrown off. Victor died just minutes after you left to try to get closer to the tree. All because of your greed.”

“I want a teammate I can trust to watch my back,” River said. “I can’t trust a fucking weasel. He has the blood of four people on his hands.”

Any regrets now? I asked Samantha. This is your fault.

“Let’s put it to a vote,” Sergeant Wallis was saying. “Everyone opposed to Jarek joining the team, raise your hand.”

Sergeant Wallis, Bradson, and the one military kid whose name I still didn’t know raised their hands.

River raised her hand, and then emphatically lowered all her fingers except for her middle finger.

Ryker and the man from Old Pine Town just stood there awkwardly.

“That’s majority,” Sergeant Wallis had the grace to look apologetic towards me.

I didn’t make a move to leave.

“In other words, get the fuck out,” River spat at me.

I turned to the man from Old Pine Town. In his hands, I could see papers—maps—of the surrounding area.

“I’ll solo the hydra myself,” I said. I went over to the maps and took one.

It was a crude drawing, clearly not made by a professional. There were four landmarks. Old Pine Town, a river running down from the mountain, a small waterfall, and the hydra not far from the waterfall.

“Are you the mayor?” I asked the man.

He simply nodded.

“Is there anything else I need to know?”

He opened his mouth, but River spoke first. “It’s a level 55 monster, surrounded by level 35-45 monsters. I’ve seen you fight, you don’t stand a chance in hell against it.”

“I’ll take that chance,” I said. I started stripping off my gear, putting it into my Interdimensional Pouch. Soon, I was just wearing an undershirt and running shorts. Once all of my equipment except for my sword was stowed away, I pulled out my backpacking backpack and shouldered that.

I gave Ryker the pouch with all my equipment in it. “No peeking,” I said. “And wish me luck.”

The room was dead silent as I left the room.

Old Pine Town reminded me of what Reed Town looked like when I first saw it. The inhabitants had a look of fear, there were very few people around, and I couldn’t see any signs of upgrades for the town.

I was surrounded by mountains, and it looked like the town was built on the outskirts of a small pre-Atropos town. It was the kind of town people would stop at to get gas on their way to somewhere else.

I jogged out of the town, ignoring the sentry’s questions and odd looks.

It wasn’t hard to find the river, and so I jogged my way up the mountain side, following the river.

This is your fault, I said, again, to Samantha. These are important potential friendships and alliances. You’ve made them hate me.

Samantha sighed.

In for an inch, in for a mile, I thought back.

I was pissed. I was mad at Samantha, and mad at myself, and resentful that I couldn’t even explain myself to the other Hard Mode Challengers. It had been two days since I arrived back in the real world, and I didn’t feel any closer to finding my siblings.

At least if I fight alone, I don’t have to worry about you endangering other people.

I encountered a wide variety of monsters as I followed the river up the mountain. There were wolves, lions, bears, and hawks.

Most of the monsters tried attacking me as I progressed up the mountain, and I killed them with relative ease. The lack of a path was more annoying and slowed me down more than the presence of the monsters.

The waterfall was a true Californian waterfall, which meant it was more like a trickle than anything else. The water fell about fifteen feet down an outcropping of rock, forming a small pool.

I’d been imagining a sheet of water falling to block a hidden cave, but that was clearly not the case.

I still hadn’t encountered many high-level monsters, which was something of a concern to me. Maybe they were all gathering by the hydra?

As I left the waterfall, I could start to smell poison in the air.

I pushed passed the underbrush into a clearing, and I set off the hydra’s trap.

Over a dozen monsters, none of them below level 30, charged me at the same time. Several giant birds that looked like eagles flew around to cut off my retreat.

I rushed directly forward towards the two direwolves in front of me. I’d fought them before, so I was most confident dealing with them.

I put mana into Agility and started running forward. I was able to dodge most of the attacks, but it was impossible to completely avoid taking damage due to the number of attacks around me.

I slit the throats of the two dire wolves ahead of me, barely avoiding their claws.

I kept an eye on my health in my status screen. I’d taken a few points of damage from the monsters around me, and my health was gradually ticking down from the poison in the air.

A humanoid face appeared in the bark of a tree in front of me, and the tree swung a branch like a whip towards me. The tree looked like it was rotting and half-decayed.

I dove to the ground, following Samantha’s outline, but a root rose from the ground and wrapped itself around my ankle.

At the same time, three branches whipped towards me.

I swung my sword, severing the root that held me in place, but I wasn’t fast enough to escape the lashes from the three branches. Each branch left a long, bloody gash on my exposed arms and legs.

I continued running deeper into what had become a poisonous cloud of green fog.

Fortunately, with my additional Perception, I could still make out the enemies around me. I had to skirt around several trees, but other than that I blazed through any monster in my path.

I was a bloody, limping mess by the time I caught sight of the hydra.