Was his nose numb? What kind of game wanted you to deal with having a numb nose?

He cursed again and rubbed the side of his nose to jostle some life back into it, pulling the disc from his Inventory.

Yea, this was definitely the right path. For all the mystery of this game, the map was pretty easy to read. Blocking the sun from his eyes, he looked to the far distance where smoke rose from the top of a volcano.

Something akin to a Yosemite Sam impression—the whole rackin-frackin diatribe—escaped his lips as he put his head back down and marched on.

The trip did give him time to order his thoughts, if nothing else. He still didn’t understand how Iris could turn on him like that. Mercutio, well, the bard’s betrayal wasn’t surprising, he was kind of a prick. Iris though, she’d seemed nice enough.

The Living Weapon. That was what he’d mentioned right before the attack.

It must be pretty important for her to turn murderous on him. Far as he was concerned, hurting a friend was a big deal.

Although, hurt was kind of a weird word to use, since he hadn’t felt any pain due to his Pain Threshold being maxed out at the time.

Holy crap!

People didn’t feel pain here. They could heal immediately and even come back after death. So many things made more sense. His guild mates wouldn’t think much of killing him when he’d just be sent to respawn. If the Living Weapon was as big a deal as he was beginning to suspect… What had Iris called him? A filthy casual?

Yeah. That didn’t need any explaining.

Considering the ultimate reason he was here, the insinuation that he wasn’t taking things seriously was rather ironic.

A shot of pain went through his chest at the thought of Bella. Closing his eyes, he took a moment to force his thoughts back on track.

Level up.

Get to the Black Keep.

Save Bella.

And the next step for Leveling up would be talking to Handy, whoever that was, at the end of this cursed path. The path that was now forcing him out onto a tapering cliff overhanging the stunning drop to his right into the sprawling valley below.

Arron groaned. Nothing he could do but carry on. He hugged the cliff face, sliding his feet sideways along the narrowing ledge barely wide enough for his toes. The pressure in his foot where tiny bits of dirt and stone were ready to give way made his heart race. He had to steel himself not to freeze up, and several times mentally slap himself for looking down. The trees in the distant gorge were the size of a grain of rice from his precarious perch.

Damnit he hated heights. He really, really, hated heights.

It wasn’t real, but holy hell did it feel real. Forcing himself to breathe more than a shallow gasp, he pushed his thoughts away from the deadly plummet he was inches from experiencing.

Torbin and the group had been upfront with him about their help. They needed a fighter to do some of the newer content, saying it was easier to Level someone up and get used to fighting together, than have someone come in all “swinging dick.” Evidently, ego was a common problem for the players who opted for a “melee” Class.

Arron appreciated the help. The amount of important information he’d been missing was daunting. Not only had the guild brought him up to speed, he was starting to learn the culture of the people who made this game their lives. There was actually a rather diverse—

A small stone moved underfoot, his ankle turning slightly, causing him to overcorrect and push his body and face tighter against the rock wall. Deep breaths brought the scent of rocky earth into his throat.

Closing his eyes, he forced his mind to refocus, and made his legs take that next tippy-toed shuffle. Lifers were the first Torbin and the others mentioned. They were those with the means to spend all their time in-game. Usually hooked up to some sort of automatic feeding device, waste management, and a physical stimulation system to maintain their “flesh suit,” they spent twenty-four hours a day in-game, uninterested in the outside world. And some were getting old in-game. With a 12:1 time ratio, there were many active players with over a hundred years logged in-game.

They had lives in Interius. Families, partners, and businesses. The group stressed that Lifers felt the exact same way about their digital loved ones as anyone they might in the “real world.”

Before logging in, that idea annoyed Arron; the concept of having feelings for a computer program. Since he’d been here, it was becoming easier to understand. Interius felt just as real as the outside world. Touch, taste, smell, it was all here. After a hundred game years, who was to say which world was real and what was fake anymore?

Full Timers were perhaps a bit more tragic. These players wanted to live their lives in Interius, but a lack of funds or other means to care for their physical body, kept them from doing so. Full Timers were often plagued with stress and anxiety when they were logged out, feeling that their life was sliding away between their fingers. With a full in-game day passing every two hours spent in the real world, he could understand how crashing for a night’s rest could feel far too long.

There were a few stories of Full Timers having real world issues arise, health, legal or otherwise, keeping them logged out for weeks or months at a time. By the time they logged back in, years had gone by in Interius. Marriages had ended and even their children were already grown. To say it quickly became a nightmare for a Full Timer to be logged out for any period of time, would be putting it lightly.

Vacationers only logged in for exactly that. Vacations. There were options to spawn in the Paradise Isles, as he’d seen during the game’s intro video, where there were no monsters or stress. They could enjoy a three-month vacation using only a week of real-world time.

And finally, the Gamers. People like Torbin and the rest of his guild. People who logged in for adventure and a break from the world. They came in different intensities. Some of the higher-tier guilds were full of “power-gamers,” a phrase the guild used with a sneer. Mostly they were the regular people who enjoyed the world and enjoyed adventuring in it.

These were the sanest ones.

Coming around a final corner on the narrow path, he took in a sharp breath as he finally stepped out onto solid ground and came face to face with his destination.

A vast, empty void stood like a scar in the mountain face in front of him. Two huge slabs of stone lined a doorway sixty-five feet tall, capped with a massive piece of obsidian.

“Well. That’s something you don’t see every day,” he muttered.

If it was possible, the doorway seemed even bigger the closer he got. It stretched high overhead like a massive yawning mouth. The sound of hammers on metal echoed from the depths before him. A gust of hot wind blew down the corridor, bringing with it ash and sparks, the heat pulling a cough from Arron’s chest.

“Respawn,” Arron reminded himself, pressing forward.