As the party of last night began to die down, my guild retreated off towards our inn in the 2nd town. All thanks to Hailey, I was able to get a good night’s sleep.

As I dozed of easily in bed, I dreamt about completing the simulation and going back home. At the morning, at approximately 7am we ate the breakfast that Hailey prepared as usual, and Hailey packed up our food for lunch as we headed out to the newly unlocked part 2 of the maze.

We all shouted: “Teleport, Diqing” A bright blue flash erupted as we were teleported to the first town of part 2. As we walked around in the town, we saw that it was bigger than all the towns other than the first town (Shinpong).

As we walked through, we spotted a weapons and armors shop for higher levels. It was for levels 30s and above, and we all quickly bought the armors which were suited for us.

I decided not to buy any as my armor was already level 28 armor, so with a level 34 rare katana I should do, I thought. Before we went out of the safe zone I said: “Let’s split into two groups since Leo’s with us, Terry, Luke and Peaches will go with Leo. The rest of us left will be the 2nd group, let’s welcome Leo to our guild.”

Everyone was eager to let him in, he had been friendly to us ever since we all met. Everyone was congratulating him to be able to make it into our guild.

So as we went out of the safe zone, we saw what the terrain of the 2nd part of the maze looked like. It was a jungle type area, filled with jungle type creatures.

Such as 2 legged crocodiles wondering in the swamps, four armed monkeys which stuck in groups, large wolves which attacked in groups of 3. Truly, the 2nd part of the maze was not suited for solo players. On the other hand, the terrain was a misty jungle with high trees. The trees were so high, the leaves on them nearly blocked all the sunlight, as a result. There was only enough sunlight for us to see attackers. All of the jungle, looked the same therefore it was quite hard to navigate, even with the map.

As we skimmed through the mobs, we found out that even though they attacked together they had relatively low stats for their level. We easily managed to dispatch them, as we gained xp. We had each gained 2 levels by the end of the day, despite being split into groups of 4 and 3. Even though we had been much more slacked off than a normal grinding day because of the constant moving to find the 2nd town in the 2nd part of the maze, we still did not feel tired because we were pumped up to finish the simulation.

We had the will, to live, and to meet each other again as friends in the real world. The 2nd town, was a town which looked more like a town with straw huts. It was much smaller than the first, but it was still a safezone with

After we went to the town which was our destination at the 2nd part, we went back to the Shinpong to tell everyone that we had unlocked it and it was now on the teleport list for towns.

After we did that, I went to Terry and I asked him: “Bro, can you help me do a favor?” He laughed and asked: “What favor though” I answered: “I need you to help me upgrade the rare katana I’ve got, I’ve got all the parts to upgrade it to max. Thanks to all the loot drops we got today you can upgrade it to max, if you don’t fail..”

He laughed and replied: “I’ve got max level crafting buddy, there’s no way in hell I can’t upgrade it into max level” I said: “Thanks” He replied: “No problem, I’ll give it back to you by tomorrow.”

After that, I went into the inn room that belonged to me, and I layed down on my bed and went to sleep. It was pretty easy to sleep, as it was tiring today.. But I was also excited for my max level rare katana that I’m going to get. I couldn’t wait, and that kept me up. But eventually, my eyelid’s heaviness drove me to sleep.

As the alarm clock at 7am buzzed again, I got dressed and went outside of my room, meeting my guild. As we had the breakfast hailey gave me. Terry handed me the katana, he said: “Man, that thing’s stats are amazing..”

As I looked at it’s stats I was surprised, I yelled out: “WHAT?” Everyone rushed over to me and looked at my Katana’s stats. They were all surprised, it could with ease one shot all the mobs yesterday with a normal strike no skill needed.. Terry said: “With max upgrades, this thing can do 30x the damage needed to one shot normal mobs here… It also changes damage depending on the wielder’s level… But it can be said that it’s the strongest longsword in the game…”

I replied: “It’s a bit overpowered..” He replied: “Probably a glitch in the simulation, lucky us.” As we dressed up and did our daily routine, we began to go towards the 3rd town.

Within 5 days, we reached the dungeon entrance. We had gone through the entire part, and all the mobs were practically the same. It was the same old boring, yet tiring routine for 5 days. Navigate using the map, and head towards the town that we were navigating towards.

As we unlocked town after town, in day after day, we easily managed to unlock all 5 towns and reach the dungeon entrance by day 5.

As we were dragged our ingame bodies towards our ingame limits, we continued with sheer human determination. At day 5, when we finally reached the dungeon entrance we decided it was time to head back, we were too tired to start it and we didn’t want to get player killed.

As the 7 of us went back, we started chatter about the 5 days of hiking we did and how it was finally over. We were all looking forward to Hailey’s stew tonight.

As we got back to our inn in the 2nd town, Hailey started making the stew. The rest of us started chattering about how good her cooking was. Hailey was always a great cook, however we learnt from her that she wasn’t only a good cook ingame, but she was also a good cook in real life.

Well, I guess that’s what explained why she was able to blend in ingredients and make new food that wasn’t in the system. As she bought the food out, she overheard the normal chatter we were having and she said: “Ok ok, time to eat guys.” Being the normal hungry food loving me, I dived in first.

As I did, I said: “Damn, this stew is great!” Hailey replied: “Thanks, I made one like this in real life but, it was harder to make one in here using the ingredients I had here..” I said: “Nice job! It’s one of the best stews I tasted.” Luke interrupted us and said: “Look at him, trying to get the girl.” Peaches patted on Luke’s back hardly and replied to him: “Cut them some slack, at least he’s trying..”

Both me and Hailey blushed bright red as normal and we shouted in unison: “Look! We aren’t a couple!” Luke retorted: “Aww, how cute. Truly a couple if you can think the some things and shout it out in unison in the same time like this.”

Hailey looked like she was about to slap him when Peaches got involved once more and said: “Look look, Hailey’s pretty much about to break and slap you. So I suggest you stop, and maybe stop reminding them of this subject. If you want relationships you should let them progress alone, not forcefully.”

After that short lecture from Peaches, I could tell she was lowkey teasing me and Hailey. And we both blushed bright red again, as everyone laughed. We were all having a good time, well probably not me and Hailey. But we were all laughing and having fun like a group of friends, meetings like these made me feel like the virtual reality I was in was much better than the real world.

After the great meal, we played a game of cards. We didn’t have anything to gamble so we just played, and after it got boring we all went into our own individual rented inn rooms to sleep. Once I took a nice shower, I went into my room and slept like a rock.

As the annoying alarm clock beeped next morning, I woke up in a flash in anticipation for what the mobs in the dungeon would look like. As we all gathered up and had our fill in breakfast, Hailey packed up our supplies and gave them to Jingxi and Leo to carry. We all hiked around 15 minutes clearing the mobs which came towards us. After our short 15 minute hike, we came to the dungeon entrance.

The dungeon entrance was a ancient door like entrance, it had green leaves all around it. It was like whoever made it didn’t want us to see it. As we opened the door, 3 tribal dressed like humans rushed towards us. As we cleared them, we discovered that they were level 36s.

Thank god we had leveled up to level 45+, or we would’ve been very unprepared for these tribals. The tribals were dressed in shirts made of leather, and short skirts made with grass with shorts on. They all had one thing in common, they wore the mask of what resembled a fire demon.

I was confused, as I thought that in all religion, no one would ever serve a fire demon.. Well except for satanists but, they’re an exception. But in here, it was as if they worshipped a god that had toppled over their old god. That was my only good guess for why.

I could tell everyone was confused, so I told them my point of view: “I think that these tribals were the type of people that worshipped one man, then the man was beaten by a demon and now they worship the demon.”

Everyone nodded, no questions asked. As we came back day after day, as we went up floor by floor there was more and more demon - tribal cooperation. Well, I thought to myself over the days: Why care about the lore, they’re just AIs.. All we have to do is kill the boss and get outta here. As we fought floor after floor, each of us managed to level up to level 54+, and this was with Terry being the lowest at 54, then Peahces at 56, then Leo at 57 and Jingxi at 58, Luke at 59 and Hailey at 60 and me at 62.

And it wasn’t just us farming here, it was other people too. I could tell everyday that the clearers were getting stronger for the upcoming boss fight.

As we mapped the last part of the maze, we got up to the final floor in the 4th day of farming, relatively fast compared to last time.. But.. as we got up to the final floor, we saw nothing. It was only a room with pillars and walls. Jingxi shouted: “How THE FUCK can this be?

We’re in the top floor, how the hell isn’t the boss room here” I said quietly: “Can this game be.. Rigged?” We all were disappointed. As we went down to the entrance of the dungeon, we spotted a girl. A girl wearing the same grass outfits, but guarded. I said: “We haven’t seen her earlier, strange.”

Luke said: “it could be a trap.” Hailey chimed in and replied: “She only appeared when we reached the top floor, she could be our ticket into the boss room. Let’s rescue her and take her quest.” We all agreed to Hailey’s suggestion.

We saw that there was 10 guards guarding the girl, the girl’s name was Lesley. A young blonde haired girl wearing a white and blue dress, only about a head shorter than Leo. The guards were all fire demon guards, and pretty high leveled too.

They were all level 40, but since we were at much higher levels we managed to easily dispatch them. As we freed the girl from the cage, we noticed that there was a blue text in front of her saying “Quest: Free the Earth tribe, has started”

Hailey then said: “See? I told you guys not to hesitate, now to see if the quest is relevant..” After we freed Lesley from the cage, she started speaking. My name is Lesley, I’m the daughter of Earth tribe’s leader, Darius. I need your help, please!