Sitting through Mr. Bab’s Biology class was an almost impossible task for Joshua. He couldn’t stay focused and had when he left at the end of the class, he had no more idea about what’d they’d been discussing than what he’d had before even walking through the door. His thoughts were a jumble of confusion and apprehension, which he just couldn’t sort out on his own.

Who were these two new people? Where was Olivia? Were they related to her not showing up at school somehow? How had he selected them? Could he choose people in his dreams, at random, and get notifications on them? If they really were his concubines, why couldn’t he pull up information on them through the WRP interface, like he could with Olivia?

Around and around and around his brain went, but unfortunately the cogs in it were just spinning in place. Thanks to everything that had happened, he now had 8 UP and 8 CP which he could spend again – 3 from the reward for Selfless Endeavor, 3 for the Companions Tale, and 1 from each of the concubines joining his harem – but he had no real idea what to spend them on. Nothing really seemed like it’d help solve his current uncertainty.

‘Purchase Skill, Inspect, Level Three,’ Joshua commanded to the interface, quickly followed by, ‘Purchase Skill, Inspect, Level Four.’ Of all the skills and abilities, he’d taken so far, it was the only one which actually offered any real insight into anything at all.

Unfortunately, even with the extra ranks in the skill, there wasn’t anything available for Joshua to inspect to get the answers he was looking for. Carefully, methodically, frantically, he went over every aspect of his interface time and time again, checking each and every aspect of his stats, skills, talents, advantages, disadvantages, and quests, but there wasn’t anything which he could find which explained to him who his concubines were, or how he’d acquired them! By the time first period was over, Joshua was in a complete funk and utterly disgusted with the whole situation.

“I’ll just pretend the whole dang thing is something I dreamed up,” Joshua mumbled to himself, as he sulked into second period.

“DREAMS ARE WHAT A MAN IS MADE OF!!” Apparently overhearing him somewhat as he walked through the door, Coach Beale’s voice boomed and echoed from his desk and down the hallway. “UNFORTUNATELY, THERE WON’T BE ANY CHANCE TO DAYDREAM IN CLASS TODAY! IT’S TEST TIME!”

“Great…” Moaning pitifully to himself, Joshua stomped over to his desk and unceremoniously dropped his bookbag atop it. Flopping down into his chair, he made a sudden decision regarding his last point; ‘Purchase Skill, Concentration, Rank One.’ Even though he couldn’t be certain about how large a change a single point could make, he knew that with the mood his mind was in, he was going to need every little bit of help he could muster in taking his test.

And, apparently, it worked. Or else the points he’d spent trying to improve his intelligence were finally starting to pay off. Once class actually started, and the tests were all passed around, he managed to shift his attention from his currently unsolvable worries, and onto his schoolwork – and once he got into the grove of things, Joshua found that either this was one of the exceptionally easy tests that Coach Beale gives from time to time to be nice to his students, or else he really was getting smarter.

He wasn’t the first to finish the test – there were always a few nerds who blew through such academic hurdles as if they were Olympic Sprinters running the 400 – but he still had almost twenty minutes to spare once he was finished.

‘Purchase Eternal Companion Olivia Davis Physical Strength, Level Five,’ Joshua commanded, after the test was done and he was sitting with his head down upon his desk. Surprisingly, a, ‘ERRP ERRP,’ resounded in his ear and a notification window popped up.

Notification: User request can not be completed. User is not participating in the Eternal Companion Subsystem at this time, and is not currently eligible to migrate over.

“Well fuck…” Joshua mumbled softly to himself.

“NO TALKING DURING A TEST!” Coach Beale’s voice boomed across the room, and he slammed a book down hard upon his desk. “BLAAAM!!” In any other classroom, students would’ve jumped up, screamed, or fell out of their desks from such a disruption during the middle of a class, but for Coach Beale’s class, it was just another Thursday.

“AND THAT INCLUDES YOU BRYANT!!” Yelling, Coach Beale threw a piece of chalk across the room and thumped one of the football players atop his lowered head.

“Huh? But I wasn’t talking Coach?!” Looking up from where he was concentrating on his test, the massive linebacker looked utterly baffled and confused.

“YOU ARE NOW, AREN’T YOU?! THAT’LL BE AN EXTRA LAP FOR EVERYONE IN PRACTICE TODAY!”

“Yes, Sir!” Saluting almost military-like, Bryant nodded vigorously.

Sighing deeply, Joshua attempted to ignore the antics of the uber-jocks and tried to spend the rest of his companion points once again. ‘Purchase First Lady Olivia Davis Physical Strength, Level Five,’ he thought inwardly towards the WRP icon.

“Ping!” This time, the expected sound and notification popped up without any issue whatsoever.

‘Damn picky ass interface.’ Cursing inwardly, Joshua tried to think of what else he could spend the last three points on for Olivia. She’d been testing Strength – and he was curious himself to see if the increase continued on, in the same linear 10 pound per point increment as it had before – but he didn’t have enough points to buy rank six. Even if he did, he wouldn’t want to spend the points on it, until she should have a chance to test her limits once again in the weight room.

‘Only a few points left,’ Joshua reminded himself, ‘and things get more expensive with the more ranks spend in them. At this point, all I can do is buy a few cheap advantages for her… How about I go with, Purchase First Lady Olivia the following skills – Nightmare Resistance, Rank One; Fear Resistance, Rank One; Martial Arts… Umm…’

Scrolling down the list, Joshua realized he really didn’t know all that much about the various martial outs out there in the world. He’d heard of karate, of course, and kung fu, judo, and boxing, but he had no idea what the heck some of the others were. ‘Krav Maga, I choose you,’ Joshua smirked softly to himself, in his best Pokémon imitation, ‘at Rank One!’ He wasn’t exactly certain what type of martial art Krav Maga was, but it didn’t sound like anything remotely taught around his dinky little backwoods’ hometown – and unknown fighting styles were always better than having your opponent being able to predict your every move. Right?

Content that he’d did as well as — if not better than — ever on his test and having spent all the available points he’d earned once again, Joshua relaxed for the remainder of the class period and patted himself on the back for a job well done. ‘It’s kind of crappy,’ he thought to himself, ‘how much one simple disadvantage like a dislike for underwear affects someone. I would’ve thought it quite petty, but Olivia can’t even sleep properly thanks to it. Heck, it might end up being a real pain in the ass, if we ever end up having to camp outside in the cold.

‘Choose,’ he thought to himself grimly, ‘do you strip and sleep naked and unarmored inside a plush sleeping bag, or do you attempt to sleep in your plate armor?’ She was still his knight, as well as his first lady, as far as he knew, and it’d have to suck to try and rest in heavy armor for her! ‘The very least I can do is try and make certain she doesn’t have bad dreams and sleeps well! It just seems frustrating that minor disadvantages seem to have more of a visible affect than actual, full-fledged advantages offer!

‘A whole character point just to help give a knight a little courage, and only one minor point to give them an endless wedgie!’ Sighing deeply, Joshua was seriously thinking of making a new personal rule for himself — buy off every disadvantage he could first, and then focus on advantages later. In many ways, the system reminded him of something a banker would come up with! Borrow money at a twenty percent interest rate; invest it and earn a two percent interest rate.

‘And the worst thing,’ he sighed to himself, as he got up to move to his next class as soon as the bell rang, ‘is I promised Olivia to buy the same disadvantage for the next lady I choose as our companion. Stupid! Stupid! Stupid! That’s a great way to start off on the wrong foot with someone — along with just whisking them up and into your party without a single say in the matter!’

‘This whole damn system is just meant to screw people over,’ Joshua thought moodily to himself. As he settled down into history class, he was determined to try and mitigate as many problems as possible in advance this time, before he decided on a second companion. He couldn’t do anything about the two odd notifications he’d gotten this morning, but he could certainly try and do his best moving forwards!

As soon as the bell rang for the end of history, Joshua made a beeline towards the library again, with a creepy smirk twitching across his face. He hadn’t seen Olivia all morning, and the way the other jocks and cheerleaders were talking, she wasn’t at school at all today — but it was thanks to her that he thought he’d finally found the perfect answer.

“Rebecca!” Half shouting to get the girl’s attention as soon as he entered the library, Joshua drew a dark gaze and warning glare from the librarian on duty behind the desk. “Sorry, Mrs. Reed,” he apologized instantly, in a much lower voice. “I just need to talk to Rebecca for a few moments before heading to lunch. Is she in here still?” Putting on his best puppy dog face, he tried to look as apologetic and innocent as possible.

“She’s in study room C, poor thing,” the older, white-haired granny told him softly. “She’s not feeling the best, so don’t bother her too long,” she warned him, sternly.

“I won’t,” Joshua promised, whispering as he slowly walked past the rows of books towards the door to the closed off room on the far left. Knocking a few times gently, he slowly cracked the door open and then went inside once he saw Rebecca looking up at him from her seat at the large conference table.

“Oh good,” he whispered, speaking just a little louder now that he’d shut the door behind him. “You’re alone,” he said, relieved.

“I still haven’t seen her,” Rebecca informed him, before turning her attention back to the book she was staring at.

“Seen who?” Joshua asked, puzzled for a second, before her meaning donged on him. “Oh! Olivia! She’s apparently not here today,” he told her, before moving over to sit himself at the table across from her. “I’m actually here for you this time.”

“Well, la de da and put panties on a kitten,” Rebecca sighed, rolling her eyes slightly. “You’re probably the first this year to actually sit down for more than two minutes in front of me. Just what do you want?” She asked, suspiciously, frowning heavily in her direction.

Not backing down from her glare, Joshua swallowed down the lump in his throat and asked, bluntly, “You’re dying, aren’t you?”

“Yeah, any minute now,” Rebecca growled, before faking several coughs. “Koff! Koff! You’d best watch out,” she warned, “or else you might catch it and be next. Death is greedy, you know.”

“Hmmppfft!” Snorting, Joshua just smirked slightly, completely ignoring her provocation. “Heart disease isn’t contagious, he told her confidently. Just sitting here with you for a bit isn’t going to hurt me. I’ve got a few questions for you.”

“Fine. Whatever.” Shrugging indifferently, Rebecca slowly folded down the cover on her book and leaned back within her chair. “It’s not like I’ve got anything better to do while I’m waiting to die. Ask away.”

“Will you answer me truthfully,” Joshua asked, smiling brightly at her.

“Sure. Why not?” Shrugging slightly, Rebecca exuded waves of complete indifference. “What do you want to know? Can I masterbate, without having a heart attack? I dunno. Would you like to find out?” Snorting derisively at him, it seemed as if Rebecca was determined to push him away, or at the very least, make Joshua completely uncomfortable.

“Not right now,” Joshua laughed lightly, holding tight to his determination. “Maybe later,” he offered. His time being teased and staring at Olivia for the Companion Familiarity quests was helping to steel his heart considerably. “What would you do, if you could live? What price would you pay,” Joshua asked, determined to stay on topic.

“Oh, I see what this is all about now.” Leaning back in her chair, Rebecca half chuckled to herself. “You’re just like that idiot Susan — you’re wanting me to tell you how unfair life is, how much it sucks, and to reassure you that it’s okay to end it all. Well screw you!”

Snorting disgustedly, Rebecca leaned back and lifted both of her black-nailed middle fingers towards him. “Life’s precious, jackass,” she assured him. “I’d murder a dozen old dudes, if you put me in a room with them and assured me that one would match my blood type and a transplant would give me an extra day to live. I don’t want to die, and you shouldn’t either,” she told him, forcibly.

“But what if the cost was something unexpected, or something you didn’t want to do?” Joshua pressed on, emboldened by her words. “What if you had to become a porn star, or a sex slave, or something similar, just to live?”

“Then I’d relish it,” Rebecca laughed freely. “A porn star sounds like an excellent life. It’s much better than dying without ever being able to know the warmth of a partner, and when work’s done, the rest of your life is your own. It’s incomparable to the cold hard ground,” she chuckled sagely.

“A sex slave though…”. Frowning, she shrugged slightly. “I guess that would depend. If it’s just being such rich old perv’s sugar momma, I’d be fine with that. Go running when he’s in town, make him feel good, and then live as I want between booty calls…. Sure, I’d have no problems with that…

“…But tied up to some bed, pumped full of drugs, and rented out constantly like some inflatable blow up doll for the mafia, or some drug lord? There’s no life in that — just torment until you die.”

“I guess if your life is that bad, kid,” Rebecca chuckled, “then you have my permission to kill yourself. Not that I can believe your life’s anything like that at all — you’re here bullshitting with me, after all.”

“One last question then,” Joshua smiled happily. “What if the price evolved your eternal soul?”

“Ha!” Half laughing, half snorting, Rebecca shook her head dismissively. “So what if I had to sell my soul to the Devil, or something like that?” Rebecca chuckled lightly to herself for a moment. “Then I’d happily do it, kid.” Even though they were both the same age, Rebecca came across as someone much older, who was speaking down to a small child.

“I don’t believe in God,” she told him bluntly, “but if He’s real, I’m going to Hell anyway. I can’t believe some benevolent being in the sky would go around building children just to let them suffer and die mercilessly. And, since I can’t believe in him, all the religions I know assure me I’m going to hell.

“May as well become the Devil’s play toy after I die, if it lets me enjoy a full life,” Rebecca laughed. “It can’t be much worse than swimming in a lake of fire for eternity anyway.”

“Then I choose you as my second companion,” Joshua told her, smirking slightly for a brief moment, and then frowning when nothing happened. “I choose you as my second lady?” Joshua asked, questingly. “Of my harem,” he added lamely, starting to blush as his embarrassment built as nothing changed.

“Well thank goodness,” Rebecca laughed, mockingly. “I’ve been chosen for a harem! Phew! Didn’t think I’d ever get to mark that off my bucket list. It’s just a shame I only came in second. I’d always dreamed of being the first harem-ite,” she chuckled, sarcastically.

Sighing deeply, Joshua was undeterred as he tried again. “I, User Joshua Campbell, choose the lady in front of me, Rebecca Thompson, to be my Eternal Companion and/or Second Lady of my Harem.” Crossing his fingers, he was thrilled when a “Ping!” resounded in his ears and a window popped up before him.

“Ha!” Snapping his fingers triumphantly, Joshua couldn’t help smiling brightly at Rebecca. “Gotcha!” He told her, smugly. “You’re now my second harem-ite, as you put it.”

“Wooooooo…. Color me impressed,” Rebecca snorted. “I think you can leave now,” she told him, coldly, seemingly past her limit to endure his antics.

“World Renewal Project!” Quickly pushing the words out before she could get up and walk away, or shoo him away, Joshua half bounced in his seat from excitement. “It definitely worked,” he chuckled gleefully.

“Let’s make a deal, Becca,” Joshua offered, beaming magnanimously. “Let’s both walk out of this room together and go talk to Mrs. Reed. If you can just ask her what the World Renewal Project is, I’ll go away and won’t pester you anymore. If not, then you’ll join me for lunch and let me explain while we eat.”

Sighing like she was indulging a simpleton, Rebecca cautiously asked, “Will you really leave if I ask about this World Renewal Project thingy?”

“Absolutely,” Joshua promised, crossing his heart with the motion of his hands. “I swear on a stack of Playboys!”

“Fine.” Looking completely annoyed, Rebecca pushed back her chair and slowly strolled out and up to the old librarian, as Joshua followed along behind like a little lost puppy. “Mrs. Reed,” she asked soft, “do you know what the…”

“What what is, dear?” Lifting up her glasses, the old librarian cocked her head slightly to stare at Rebecca.

“What the…” Rebecca’s face twisted up in obvious confusion as she simply couldn’t get the words out, no matter how hard she tried.

“Yes?” Mrs. Reed was truly staring hard and direct at Rebecca now, obviously starting to worry that something might be seriously wrong with her.

“Do you know what the cafeteria is serving for lunch?” Rebecca finally asked, sighing heavily and slumping her shoulders in defeat. “I think I’m going to go get something for a change this afternoon. I’m a little big hungry,” she lied, unconvincingly.

“Well, that’s a relief,” Mrs. Reed smiled, the concern slowly fading from her old, wrinkled face. “You need to eat more,” she told Rebecca, motheringly. “Today it’s a choice between hot dogs and corndogs.”

“Yep,” Joshua chuckled, snidely. “Leave it to a school to think that’s a choice. Do you want your weeny in a bun, or breaded on a stick? If you want,” he offered Rebecca laughingly, “I’ll go keep you company. Heck, I’ll even let you lick my stick afterwards.”

“Young man!” Mrs. Reed glared and snapped angrily, seeing Rebecca’s cheeks turn scarlet with embarrassment. “There won’t be any of that type of talk around here!”

“Yeah,” Rebecca chuckled softly. “Perv much?”

“Huh?” Joshua blinked stupidly, not realizing what the fuss was all about.

“What’s your name, young man? You’re going to spend an hour in detention this evening to think about what you said,” Mrs. Reed promised, picking up her attention booklet.

“Bryant Jeffries,” Joshua lied, not missing a beat as he headed towards the door.

“Is that right?” Lifting her glasses, Mrs. Reed turned her attention to Rebecca for confirmation.

Rebecca stood as still as a statue for several moments, before finally shrugging and noncommittally answered, “As far as I know.” As Mrs. Reed began scribbling Bryant’s name onto her pad, Rebecca took the opportunity to ease out of the library as well.

“So what the heck was that back at the library?” Rebecca asked, sitting down at one of the corner tables of the cafeteria alone with Joshua.

“I dunno,” Joshua shrugged, moodily. “Crazy old bat is going crazy,” he guessed, shrugging his shoulders slightly.

“Not her,” Rebecca stressed. “Me! I know why she was upset — a guy telling an innocent young girl she could, quote, lick his stick, unquote. You were perving in front of an ancient pretty hard there, dude.

“What I want to know,” Rebecca sighed, “is why I couldn’t ask her about that World Renewal thing. And why couldn’t I tell her your name isn’t Bryant?”

“I wasn’t perving,” Joshua exclaimed, innocently. “You women are the pervs! I was just offering to let you lick my stick,” he assured her, defensively, before tugging the handle out of his corndog. “It’s the best part,” he muttered, holding it out towards Rebecca.

“It’s just a stick!” Rebecca sighed, rolling her eyes.

“It’s not,” Joshua insisted. “Look! It’s got the crunchiest part left on it, where the breading pulled off the base of the weenie!”

“Oh good grief!” Groaning like she’d heard it all now, Rebecca shrugged her shoulders uncaringly. “Whatev’s,” she sighed. “I don’t care one way or the other about any stick up your weenie. What the bleep is wrong with me,” she asked again. “Did you hypnotize me, or something,” Rebecca demanded, suspiciously?

“Something like that,” Joshua admitted, “though it’s not hypnosis – it’s God’s will, as far as I can tell.”

“God?” Rebecca snorted. “As I said earlier, I’m not a believer in God.”

“I don’t care,” Joshua shrugged. “Just like you don’t care about the stick up my weenie, it doesn’t matter. Call it God, Fate, Life, the government, big business, or whatever conspiracy theory you want to endorse, at the end of the day, what’s going on isn’t my fault, but that of some sort of Higher Power.

“You probably won’t believe what I’ll tell you today,” Joshua warned, “but you’ll come to realize that I can’t lie to you now – just like you can’t lie to me now, no matter how hard you try – and a simple nap will prove my words true.”

“A nap will convince me of God, or some sort of higher power at work,” Rebecca chuckled. “I highly doubt that,” she snorted, derisively.

“Doubt all you want,” Joshua shrugged, “as I said, I don’t care. Here’s what’s happening and what’s going to happen to you the next time you go to sleep,” he promised. “First, you’re not part of the World Renewal System, which is some sort of project by something – which I’m just going to call God, as I can’t imagine anything else being powerful enough to pull all this off – that’s going to completely recreate humanity and the world.”

“At this point,” Joshua warned, “I can’t really say what the end game of everything is, but we’re both now beta-participants in WRP, and one of the first unbreakable rules is that you can’t talk about the beta with anyone who’s not already participating in WRP. You can’t tell your mom, your priest, your teachers, your psychologist. Nobody,” Joshua assured her, before adding, “and it’s not me that’s going to stop you; it’s your own body.”

“Just like when you tried to tell Mrs. Reed,” Joshua pointed out, “your body just won’t listen to you now. You simply can’t talk about it,” Joshua stressed, “just like you can’t lie to me, hide things from me, hurt me, or betray me.”

“Or disobey me,” Joshua added, after a moment’s pause, causing him to sigh deeply afterwards. He’d really wanted to keep that part to himself for a while longer, but apparently the system wasn’t having any of that! “I’m stuck with most of the same rules concerning you,” he tried to assure her, hoping Rebecca wouldn’t think too poorly of him – after all, she was already calling him a perv at every chance she got! “The only real difference is I don’t have to obey you,” he stressed, in spite of himself.

“So, I have to obey you now?” Quirking an eyebrow upwards, Rebecca half-chuckled. “I’ll admit,” she smirked, “you’re right. I don’t believe you today. Truth be told,” she smirked, “I doubt I’ll believe you tomorrow either.”

“Like I said,” Joshua shrugged, “that’s fine, for now. A nap will change everything for you...”

“Why?” Rebecca interrupted.

“In the morning,” Joshua chuckled, “you’ll wake up with what seems like a tattoo floating in the corner of your left eye, which reads WRP. If it’s like Olivia’s was, it’ll be locked and inaccessible for you, until you catch up to me again and I give you permission to interact with it.”

“Riiiggghhhttt…” Rolling her eyes heavenward, Rebecca obviously didn’t believe a word of it.

“After that,” Joshua continued on, completely unperplexed, “life will change to where it’s almost like you’re playing some sort of virtual reality game. You’ll gain stats, advantages, and disadvantages. There’s skills and quests, and all that stuff,” he promised her.

“I don’t know for certain,” Joshua told her, optimistically, “but I imagine your sickness will be listed as some sort of disadvantage, which we can work together and pay off for you. If not, then you probably just have an incredibly low stat somewhere for health, and we can buy it up and correct the problem.”

“The end and the short of it,” Joshua chuckled, “is that you sold yourself and your eternity to become mine, for a new lease on life. It’s why I asked what I did earlier – I can’t talk about the system itself to anyone who’s not a part of it, but I didn’t want to just kidnap someone else into it just all willy-nilly again. You said you’d pay whatever price was required to get better, and I took you at your word,” he smiled brightly, finishing up his meal while he was talking.

“Yeah… Riiigghhtt.” Once again, Rebecca just laughed it off. Honestly, she was thinking he was completely addled in the head. “I tell you what,” she chuckled. “IF any of the things you’ve said ends up happening tomorrow, and you’re not completely and utterly insane, then I’ll happily become your… whatever. Cure me,” she promised, “and I’ll be your friend, lover, sex slave, girl-toy, or whatever the heck it is you want me to be.

“I’ll willingly be your second harem-ite, if that’s what I need to be,” Rebecca assured him, firmly and without reservation. “BUT,” she added, just as firmly, “if tomorrow I wake up the same as today, you’ll leave me alone and won’t pester me with such juvenile delusions every again.

“It’s not bad to live in a fantasy world and daydream for an hour,” Rebecca sighed, forlornly, “but I’m afraid I’m living – and dying – in the real world. I don’t have time, or the heart, to engage in hopeless escapism,” she said, wistfully.

“Then we have a deal,” Joshua chuckled, offering his hand out towards her to shake. “Either I told you the complete truth, and tomorrow you’ll come seek me out to have me unlock your WRP icon on your own, or else we’ll probably never see each other again until your funeral.”

“Ha! I won’t even see you then,” Rebecca chuckled, “but you’ve got a deal.”

Unconcerned about their personal drama, the bell leisurely rang, signaling the end of lunch as the two shook hands and went on their separate ways.