Ed felt eager to get back to MOLI. He figured his mom won’t be back for at least another four hours, and with that time, he could explore the tavern and the river banks. Definitely would have to meet some locals, get some more instructions.

And if it was true that an hour inside MOLI was the same as a minute in real-time, he could spend a whole day inside if needs be and still be okay with his mom.

This time, he was not going to go bare-handed. He emptied his bookbag of all the junk inside and stuffed it with cookies, peanut butter, and energy drinks. A baseball hat against the sunburn and a bat if he ever runs into those little creatures again.

But when he got lighted to the Dover’s Tavern, it was night outside already.

“I guess everything looks the same in dark... black,” he said all disappointed. “Hope this is not like a normal environment, and you get to be in daylight for only like an hour a day... because those graphics kicked ass. I mean, what am I going to look at now?”

He looked at the tavern, hoping that at least one candlelight would shine through, indicating at least someone he could talk to. But there was nothing there.

He moved toward the road, thinking which way to go, realizing it was far from being pitch black. His eyes traveled up. “Wow! I approved! What a skylight! A double moon planet! Damn, that looks like the prettiest night sky I had ever seen. Stars so bright, so many, so close…”

The alarming sound interrupted his marveling of the sky. He listened carefully. It almost sounded like someone crying, calling for help.

He moved across the road toward the woods, and the sounds grew louder.

“A girl… It sounds like a girl in trouble,” he said to himself as he slowly put a baseball bet over his shoulder and stepped toward the coming sound.

“Yes, definitely a girl in trouble! Screaming for help! And I’m here to help. With my little friend!” he said and waved his bat in front of him. “My very first quest. About a freakin' time.”

He hurried toward the noise, but the canopy of trees had blocked all the starlight, so he stumbled over a root, just to get up and scurried again.

The screaming grew louder, and he ran harder, expecting those little creatures to have attacked a lost princess or someone like that.

This was an awesome game, and he’s to be an awesome hero! He was going to save her and she will love him forever. Give him a whole gang of babies as well.

“I’m coming to save you, my princess,” he yelled. “You hold on! I’m coming to save you! I’ll slay those cute little creatures, I mean monsters, for you!”

The darkness and a huge tree trunk got into his way, and he ran into it so hard he knocked himself down.

He remembered to get up really fast, remembering the teeth of those little creatures.

But then he turned around, and there was not even a single trace of light to guide him anymore. Not a sound of a princess in distress either. Only darkness, the darkest darkness he had ever seen. And the strange sounds around him he did not recognize. Some might have been crickets, but, others he was not so sure about.

“I’m armed, I’m warning you,” he said. “And not afraid to use it.”

He stumbled around, fell down a few times, and learned to walk very slowly, using his bat to feel the space in front of him.

After a few minutes of stumbling around, almost ready to call on MOLI to take him home, he saw a light sparking ahead, and moved toward it. A campfire. Small, yet so visible in the darkness around.

As he came close, he saw two people sitting around it.

“Locals, finally. Let’s go and meet them and gather some information. Too bad, they look dressed so ordinary. Are those jeans?”

They heard him come, and jumped from the fire, their hands holding the swords on whose blades the light of the campfire danced red.

“Hello, locals, no need to be alarmed. I come in peace,” Ed announced as he stepped out of the woods. “I am a great wizard of… Ari…shire. And you can call me Gandalf, Gandalf the Young.”

Ed was glad to see them lower their swords right away, obviously understanding English, but he could not understand how they had instantaneously lost complete interest in him and had sat down by the fire as if he was not there at all.

He approached them a bit more, looked over their faces. Both were young, mid-twenties probably. One was an Asain, the other caucasian. Then, he realized their clothes were nothing better than the one you would buy at a mall, not something that was on the sheep’s back a few days ago.

“So, this is a multip-player thing, huh?” Ed said, finally figuring it out.

“You think so?” Logan said as he cast him a disappointing look. “Gandalf the Young from Arizona, sorry Ari-bullshit-shire.”

“Why are you so salty?” Ed asked him. Then he saw his bloodied dockers, wrapped with a torn-off sleeve of his shirt to stop the bleeding right under his knee. “Oh, you met those furry little fellas. How many did you get? I got like two hundred of them this afternoon,” Ed lied.

“We got enough,” Logan said, still sounding as if his emotions were more hurt than his body.

“Can’t believe you let them bite you,” Ed said. “And the way you screamed, it sounded like a little girl in stress. I even ran to help you out. If I knew you were so salty…”

“He got even bit on the ass,” the other guy said.

“Came close, huh? And you even had blades. I had to use a stick, and my famous, soccer shot!”

“Shut up!”

“Why? We are in this together. We have to figure this out.”

“You think those creatures were poisonous?”

“No. Do you feel weird?”

“No, not really.”

“Well, why don’t you hop back home and disinfect that shit anyway,” Ed offered the solution

“What? How can you do that?” Logan said surprised.

“You just activate MOLI and tell her to take you back home.”

“MOLI won’t do that for me.”

“Yeah, I can see that. She probably does not like you, she is very selective.”

“It’s not that…”

After a while of discussion, they figured out that Ed had a premium module that let him come and go as he pleased. Then MOLI informed him that the premium module has ten free jumps after which each additional jump would cost 1000 ducats.

“You see, that's good to know. Thank you, MOLI," Ed said after he read what MOLI wrote out. "It just reaffirms my opinion that it pays off to be nice to people,” Ed said, thinking of the homeless dude.

“But, if you start to feel bad, I’ll just run home and get you some medicine. My mom keeps a whole box of it, whatever you need.”

“Thanks,” Logan said.

“By the way, I’m Ed.”

“I’m Logan, and it’s nice to meet you kid. Sorry about that earlier.”

“That’s okay. It’s understandable.”

“And this here is Goro, Goro the Swordmaster. He says he is a biology teacher, but-"

"I am a biology teacher."

“Yeah, but you should see the shit he does with the sword. He killed at least a hundred of those little furry bastards. I think he just saved my life here. But that is nothing to what he’s done to the knights in black.”

“You've seen them too? Those dudes look dangerous,” Ed confirmed.

“Well, not for this dude here. He cut 'em up like they were nothing."

"No shit."

"Like nothing. Six seconds top. Three of them."

"Man, I wish I could have seen that."

"Yeah, unreal."

"Well, I'm sticking around with you. I hope... that's okay."

Goro cleared his throat and said. "What do you two know about this MOLI foundation?"

"No idea. I got mine from a homeless dude I helped out after my friend cracked his head with a stone."

"Shit. You've got some friends."

"It's just Joey. His father and brother beat on him."

"How about you, how did you get yours?"

"Mine came through the email. I thought it was spam, almost deleted it."

"That would be a bummer," Ed said. “So, we also know my screen is only visible to me. You guys really can't see it, can you?”

Goro nodded his head. “I don't even get the screen anymore. She just tells me things.”

"She talks to you guys? Not to me."

"I think you need to purchase the neural addition. Then, she’ll talk to you."

"Oh, yeah. I saw that… it’s like 2000 coins."

"Ducats."

"Exactly. It’s a ripoff!" Ed complained. "Or you think it’s worth it?"

“Your choice, little man.”

"Yeah, I know. And what is your job? Are you still a biology teacher."

"No, I got labeled a swordmaster. Now I gained a hundred points of experience and had earned a whole thousand ducats. My Standing is also up by a hundred points since MOLI also thinks I saved Logan's life."

"A swordmaster, you say," Ed said. "That's a way better than me. I'm a joker. Can you believe that? Me? A joker??"

Goro sighed deeply. "Hard to believe."

“Huh, there seems to have been a mix up. A mistake! MOLI is just informing me," Logan said, standing up from a log, all excited. "They thought I killed their bird and punished me because of that. But now they know I did not, so now… they are correcting that. So, now I am…"

A long second of anticipation had passed. And then Logan just set down, looking beaten down again

“Still a slave,” Goro said in a long voice.

“Yes. But they will credit me back 2000 ducats, so at least I’m positive.”

“That’s how you have to look at it," Ed said, trying to encourage him. "I bet you will advance from being a slave in no time."

"I better. I mean, who wants to play a game in which you are a slave?" Logan asked.

"I am not sure what this is," Goro said cautiously. "But it certainly is not your typical Multi-player RPG."

Suddenly Ed got worried and pointed his finger at Goro's face and said. “What are those red lights moving around your face. Shit, Logan, you've got them too. Are you guys getting sick or something?”

Goro stood up right away, his hand grabbing the sword, but it was too late.

"You better put that sword down, pretty boy, or we'll blow you away!" came a sharp threatening voice from the darkness.

Ed jumped up all scared. Then he squinted his eyes to see dark shapes coming out of the forest with the night-vision goggles on their heads. Their hands were holding guns pointing forward and shooting red laser marks onto three of them.

"Shit! Here comes marines to ruine the fantasy experience," Ed muttered to himself, deeply disappointed.