After sitting down for a while on the surprisingly cooling moss, Mei suddenly thought of something. There an internet interface in case the players wanted to surf the net. She could use the wiki to see the map of the Greylands.

'Internet!'

A tab displaying only a search bar appeared.

Guugle Search: limitless wiki greylands map

The top result was expected, the Limitless Wiki regarding the Greylands. Mei clicked on it gleefully. The webpage loaded instantly, displaying:

This page has been blocked.

Sorry for the inconvenience.

Well, it wasn't unexpected that this happened. If players were able to get all the info straight from the built-in browser, wouldn't the devs lose a lot of money? But unlike what one would expect in this situation, Mei grinned. She thought of a way to bypass it! Since Guugle was not disabled, she could go to the image section to view the map there!

If you want to skim on the gold, try logging out and memorising the whole map.

Good luck!

Mei was speechless.

She could now see why the devs had put a fully sentient Ai system. They would be able to track every single bug and exploit with ease in this manner. Well, that still didn't warrant them letting the Ai be a jerk. A repeat of the previous message would be fine, wouldn't it?

Sighing, she stood up and stretched. It wasn't that she felt sore; it was just something she liked to do after sitting for quite a while. In the worst case scenario, she would have to let a monster defeat her so that she could respawn- Wait, are those tracks on the ground?

Unsurprisingly, a giant insect spinning at ridiculous speeds atop moss would tear a lot of it. Mei realised she could have followed those from the start. With a sigh, she began to follow it...

Alzeth is summoning you.

Teleport there?

Yes No

Speak of the devil! This was definitely much more convenient. She was glad they didn't forget about her. But before she hit yes, she had a sudden thought. As those crawlers made the tree their nest, surely the fruits must have pretty good effects or value? It was game logic. If there was good treasure, most game developers would not let it be obtained with ease. It was much like how a dragon would be guarding mountains of treasure. And this situation (although not as exaggerated) was the same.

Under the dim moonlight, Mei could see one of the fruits on a low hanging branch. She would be able to grab the fruit if she jumped!

It was now or never. She took off at her fastest speed toward that fruit. She heard snarls from the critters atop the tree but didn't stop. The thought of dying, even in a game wasn't pleasant, but she was just level one! What was there to lose?

She heard the thuds of the crawlers hopping off the tree as she neared it. Ignoring her urge to turn around, Mei jumped as high as she could and managed to nab the fruit.

'Yes!'

In a flash, she disappeared. The crawlers hissed angrily at having their treasure stolen, but there wasn't much they could do now that she was gone.

Meanwhile, Mei landed behind Alzeth and Emerr with a familiar sensation. In front of them was a hissing Crawler covered in ice. Its condition looked terrible. Thick pink liquid flowed out of the crawls in its shell, a byproduct of the game's blood censorship for those who didn't enable it.

"Oh? What took you so long?" asked Alzeth swung the weapon at the crawler once again.

-868

A red number floated off from the crawler as he slammed the poles downward onto it with a loud bang. Mei could have sworn she could hear the bamboo crack from how hard he hit.

"Oh, this," she said, holding up the fruit.

"Later, I'm busy fighting!" Alzeth dodged the creature as it rolled weakly toward him.

As Mei was behind him, it was heading in her direction. But from how slow it was now, Mei suspected even a toddler could dodge a roll like that. She stepped to the side and let the creature roll pass.

"Oh, by the way," Alzeth said suddenly.

"Huh?"

"You want some XP? Attack it!" he pointed toward the crawler.

"Um... Okay," said Mei.

She felt a little uncomfortable, but she summoned her not so trusty rusty sword. Alzeth raised his eyebrows.

"Hah!" she shouted as she swung her sword.

-2!

With a clink sound, her sword was deflected. This was despite the fact that she aimed at the flesh beneath the cracked exoskeleton. Worst of all, a purple number meant that she dealt a critical hit! As expected of an RPG. Low levelled beings would be barely able to scratch enemies many levels higher.

"Ehh, that's enough for you to get a bit of party XP. I'll finish it off now!" Alzeth ended the misery of the creature with another slam.

-867

Grey Crawler (Lv 20) defeated!

200 EXP total.

100 EXP to Alzeth. (50%)

80 EXP to Emerr. (40%)

20 EXP gained. (10%)

Race EXP 35/100

SpellSword EXP: 35/200

"Alright, it's time to wrap up and head back to town!" said Alzeth.

"Huh?" Mei was confused. "Didn't you take down the Crawlers with ease?"

"Nah, it's not like that at all." Alzeth shook his head. "We had to keep running until there was only one crawler chasing us. We wouldn't be able to take down two at once, you see?"

"But-"

"Shh. After taking down just one, I'm down to only 50 mana out of 450!" Alzeth explained.

"Oh," Mei said after a slight pause, a bit dejected.

She thought they were going out to fight many monsters in an epic adventure. As it turned out, they were heading back after only a single battle.

"Oh! You actually managed to grab one of those fruits!" Alzeth nodded his head in approval, finally noticing the fruit in her hands. "According to the wiki, those give 200 EXP and restore 500 health and 200 mana after you finish eating them!"

"That does sound pretty good." Mei nodded.

If she ate just one of those, she would level up straight to level two. It was also a pretty decent recovery item. She was expecting Alzeth to ask her to share it though.

"You want some?" she asked.

"Not really. I'm level 14 and Emerr's level 13. You're the one who needs to level up." Alzeth said solemnly.

"I see..." Mei felt a little embarrassed but was glad that he was that generous. 200 EXP was equal to the amount of experience they get from defeating a level 20 monster, which was certainly a large amount for those around Lv10-15.

"Speaking of which, I've got a great idea!" said Alzeth.

"What's-"

"We'll send you out to pick more fruits. Then when you grab the fruit, we will quickly summon you back! It's the perfect plan!" Alzeth said excitedly, starting to gesture haphazardly.

"Eh? But..." Mei paused.

It was indeed a rather good idea, but Mei didn't feel comfortable facing the Crawlers again now that she knew how truly helpless she was against them. She wasn't sure if there were anymore low hanging fruits left either. But now that she thought about it, wasn't this like an adventure? It was exactly the reason why she was excited to head into the Greylands!

"Alright!" she after thinking for a bit. "But how do I get back to the tree?"

"Oh, that's easy." Alzeth smiled. "Remember my weapon dragging across the moss? I do that to make an easy trail back to town! You can also follow the trail to get back to the nest."

Mei found that pretty clever.

"By the way, remember to open up your party chat when you reached the nest," Alzeth said. "When you're there, send a message in the chat. I'll send a summon invite afterwards."

Mei nodded. She waved goodbye to the two, headed off the fruit still in hand. She was planning to eat it as she walked to save time.