The first day's journey was uneventful, but that came as little surprise when the travelers remained relatively close to the kingdom's capital city. Few monsters were willing to show their faces where the king's army regularly patrolled, even when most of that army was out on the kingdom's borders. However, most monsters were preparing to hole up for the winter; according to Janek the only creatures that could make trouble during that period were violent ice spirits and rare beasts that drew strength from the deepest cold.

"We'll have to keep our eyes open from here on out, though. Lots of things are trying to fatten up in order to make it through the next six months, and the farther from the capital we get the more audacious they'll become." The chimes in Janek's beard rang when he shrugged. "Of course, that also means ye got to watch out when spring finally rolls around. Monsters come out of the woodwork like cockroaches, and every last one of them is starving."

"Is that so?" Tesla's heavy tail twitched idly as he dug through a travel pack in search of his bed roll. It was something of an annoying discovery to find that the game developers for Diamondback chose not to include an item box function for Book. It made for greater realism within the game, but Tesla could already tell it was going to be a pain in the ass to pack and unpack his gear everytime he made camp. Besides, why have "Equip" if you're not going to have "Item Box?" It wasn't like an automatic equipping function was particularly immersive. Was the lack of an item box really a feature or just a bug that couldn't be resolved? "Is that why you ringed the ailuros around the camp site?"

"Damn right. The big cats are light sleepers; they'll know something's coming before ye or I will, and anything that's tough enough to get past them will at least be weakened before it gets to us." Janek already had a modest fire going; he was busy cutting vegetables and dried meat into a pot helmet full of boiling water. "They'll be blocking the wind for us, too; another bonus." Tesla silently thanked anyone listening that the shaggy dwarf used the Clean spell on his helmet first.

An hour later, and with bellies filled, Tesla and Janek leaned back against their saddles and idled at the fire. The dwarf smoked tobacco leisurely from an expensively-decorated chibouk pipe, presumably to keep from lighting his beard on fire, and waxed on about various battles he'd fought in, alcohol he got drunk on, and women he'd slept with. Tesla figured that better than half of the stories Janek told had to be made up, or else the dwarf wouldn't merely be at level seventeen.

Tesla himself continued to work with the golems while perusing the small amount of information Father Prymaug was able to supply him with. Luckily, collating the copied scroll into Book actually unlocked more data than what the scroll itself had. Unluckily, the information provided wasn't particularly useful. Yes, the Golemeister Job Class was a fusion of both the Golem Puppeteer and Golem Engineer; it had all the skills and improved versions of the skill enhancements available to its component first-tier Classes. On the other hand, the Golemeister appeared to have no unique skills exclusive to itself. Likewise, there were slim pickings with regards to control techniques or repair hints, and practically nothing whatsoever on creating a golem from scratch. Would it all be trial-and-error? Would he unlock this information as he leveled up?

"One thing I do know; the Golem Engineer half of this Job Class is expensive as hell."

"What's that?"

"The workshop, basic tools, raw materials, refining equipment... depending on what type of golem you're working on you need a completely different layout, and that costs money." Tesla held up a hand and the tin golem obediently flew down to perch on his finger. "Something as small as this bird requires so much investment to produce, but the value of the golem itself is minimal. All it can do is start a fire, but a shard of flint and an iron striker is significantly less expensive. If this is all a low-level Engineer can do, how do they level their Class enough to work on overblown mecha like the cataphracts?"

"Mecha?" Janek's eyebrows wiggled in confusion, then settled as he took another draw from his pipe. "Never mind. I hear most Engineers level in the early stages by doing lots of repair work. All the early designs are crap, anyway, so most folks wait and build up their monetary reserves so they can build and sell the intermediate-level stuff." The dwarf exhaled a big, rough cloud of smoke with a relieved sigh. "Yer actually lucky; as a Golemeister ye can bypass all that just by fighting."

If worst comes to worst, I guess I might be able to see what I can purchase with real-world money in the cash shop. It might mark me as a "premium player," though, so I'll hold off on that as a last resort. "Wait, what about "early designs" and "intermediate designs?" Doesn't anyone create anything new?"

"Not very often; ye just said it yerself, right? Golem creation is expensive. Who can afford to throw good money after bad, making useless things?"

Tesla frowned, then launched the bird back into the air. "Then there's no room for improvement."

"Maybe, maybe not. Occasionally ye'll hear of new upper-tier golems being developed, though mostly they're cataphract-class. I hear that a lot of Sparks try to leave the Old World for the New World as fast as they possibly can; they say there's lots of old war machines buried in the New World, and every new excavation improves our golems and other constructs by leaps and bounds. Supposedly many Sparks will take on golem-based Job Classes in order to get in on the rush, and they wind up producing totally unique creations of their own in the process." Janek doused his pipe, then climbed into his own bedding. "I'd say yer Job Class isn't useless. It's just not particularly useful here."

"The "New World," huh?" Book?

They're probably level-restricted, to keep new players from wandering into areas they're unprepared for. In the end, it's all the same: Level and grind, level and grind.

"My first real test of battle, where I bet my life for victory, growth, and power. Why the hell did it have to be slimes?" Tesla held a vague sense of being cheated somewhere, somehow, by someone he'd never met. It was the second day of the trip, and no more than four hours after sunrise, but Tesla was already disappointed.

"Quit yer whining. Three aren't going to do much for me at this stage, but they're just fine for a young soldier's debut. Especially when that soldier has to rely on garbage for weapons." Janek held back the snarling ailuros with firm words and a few finger-wags while throwing snark back over his shoulder at his ryujin companion.

Tesla casually sidestepped a slow-moving pseudopod and shot Janek the finger. "So, what's their weak point?" At least they weren't caricatures or anything; each looked like fifty gallons worth of bluish-white amoeba oozing its way across the snowy tundra instead of a teardrop gel with googly eyes. Their fighting style was slow and repetitive: Prey would be snared by a tendril of the slime's flesh, then engulfed and suffocated. Most living things on Corundum died in a column of smoke, dissolving into a greasy stain of ash the slime could easily digest. Sparks, on the other hand, died in a quick burst of hardy flame that left nothing behind for a slime to gain nourishment from, but apparently the slimes didn't get that memo. Tesla idly wondered where meat came from as he dodged another lashing, gooey arm. Whatever, they're probably just item drops when you butcher an animal.

"They don't have one. Ye just have to keep scooping them apart until they die." The dwarf scratched his nose. "Ye could aim for the nucleus but ye'd not only have to reach pretty deep for that, ye'd also have to do it fast. Lots of rubes get themselves killed thinking slimes are one-hit victories. They get too close, reach too far, and wind up getting swallowed. Even a spear can be useless if the slime just moves the nucleus out of the way, and then they won't let go of the spear."

"So, instead, I'm stuck cutting these things apart, little by little?"

"Yeah, that's pretty much it. Just don't use yer bare hands or yer tail for this; there's too big a risk of being grabbed. If ye had a proper weapon ye could let go if it got stuck, but yer own claws? Not so much."

"My perspective is bad for this." The brass golems dashed back and forth around the slimes, taking and losing advantageous positions while the monsters groped at them blindly. Eventually one of the dogs charged past Tesla, extruded the shears from behind its jaws, and clinically snipped away an overly long rope of turgid liquid before retreating from another slime's lash. "I'm stuck until a slime overextends itself too far to snatch at me. If I had a better read of the field I could improve my attack rate by making more efficient use of the space."

"Ye've only got two eyes, Tesla."

"-Maybe if I make use of the golems' senses, as well, I could improve the overall control?" Tesla reached into a pouch at his waist, extracted the tin golem from within, and tossed the bird into the air.

"The more ye divide yer attention, the slower yer reaction time will get. Don't use untried techniques on the battlefield!"

"Hmph. Who the hell do you take me for? It'll take a lot more than a mere four-point perspective to slow me down." Okay, bird, give me a top-down visual. Dogs, I want your spatial awareness data. Tesla felt a tingle in the back of his mind, then nothing more. Not enough output? I have been limiting myself to baseline yields since I logged in; let's expand it a tad. Right, let's see what happens when I- oops. Corundum shrieked to a halt. Mmm, looks like even two percent total neural load is way too much. Not even the ODIN can keep up with me at this rate. Still, it worked; Tesla felt somewhat outside of himself as he absorbed the information provided from four different perspectives, especially since two of the four had Tesla himself within their field of vision. Then again, for an Alpha-class Core Child capable of handling millions of data feeds, calculating exponential orbital trajectories, and operating tens of thousands of military-grade peripheral mechanisms while discussing Oppenheimer with history-buff generals, Freud and Wundt with psychiatrists, and Led Zeppelin on classic music blogs all at the same time... Tesla found he was having a harder time operating with so little rather than being burdened with too much. I am not even using my co-processors yet.

With a mental grunt, Tesla dialed back his yield to one percent, then .5, then .05, then .025... finally, the world began to move again. The process was incremental, but Corundum's subjective time slowly sped towards what could be called "normal." In the interim, Tesla studied his targets. Their positioning is bad: All three are studiously avoiding the others' reach. They will not be able to cover for one-another in this fashion. Perhaps they cannot? The slimes were blind after all, and forced to rely on secondary senses to perceive their surroundings. Either their senses cause interference to the others or they consider each other prey, as well. Regardless, they are providing open corridors between them. I can exploit this. At the same time, Tesla calculated the viscosity of the slimes' flesh based on their resistance to the golems' shears. With a shear-closure rate of .0625783 per subjective picosecond the dogs can reliably sever up to four inches thick of the flesh without damaging the cutting edges. They must also travel at speeds equivalent to sixty feet per second to avoid counterattacks without damaging their own structures. Once 67.291% of the target's biomass has been excised, it will be possible to execute the coup-de-grace. Based on the avatar's Dexterity, Perception, and Wits stats, the necessary strike at 1,200 inches per second, the encompassing awareness required to recognize the primary target, and the thought-to-action ratio required to successfully initate the attack are all within the bounds of a level one ryujin Dream Eater's virtual physiology.

Tesla's eyes hardened as the world's time returned to its subjective 1:1 ratio. "Execute the scenario."

"Ye were reckless." Janek sniffed knowingly as Tesla mounted up. "There was no need to go leaping in after the nuclei."

"There was nothing reckless about it; all the possible outcomes and scenarios were projected, and from them I selected the most feasible strategy to complete the battle in both the shortest time possible coupled with the greatest margin for error." Tesla settled himself firmly back in the saddle. "You forget, Janek; on Corundum I may be a weak, newborn "Spark" but in the land of my origin I was something else altogether. What I did back there with those slimes was nothing compared to what I have done in the past."

"Is that so? Well, bully for ye. Just remember, yer not back in the glory days of yer past anymore. This world doesn't operate on the rules of yer old one; ye aren't a god here, even if ye can't die." The two men rode on in a stiff silence for a while, then Janek nodded his head. "Also, bite yer tongue; yer starting to put on airs again with that uppity speech. Ryujin might be rare, but don't let them catch ye talking like a noble. Didn't I already tell ye that?"

"Fine," Tesla growled, "if you want to say I was reckless, then I was reckless. The slimes were a bad pairing, alright? It's not like I'm the one that picked them out, you know."

"...Ye need better golems."

"I need a lot of things that aren't going to fall in my lap just because I need them."

"Ha! Ye and me both!" Janek slapped his thigh, then poked a stubby finger at the younger man. "Tell ye what, let's see if I can't find us a den of kobolds. The little rat bastards prefer swarm tactics, but they're terrible at landing a blow. The two of us can clean them out in no time, and get the sorry taste of that crappy fight from before out of our mouths."

"As long as it isn't out of the way, why not?'

"On yer right!" Janek's heavy splitting axe dropped hard, bisecting a four-foot rat man as easily as tearing a sheet of paper.

Tesla drove his claws into another kobold's skull, but he spared no glance as it erupted into smoke. The oncoming rat to his right brandished its crude club in a menacing fashion, but it, too, quickly dissolved into ash when the ryujin spun in place and shattered its ribs with a blow from his tail.

Thanks, Book. Tesla parried another club with the vambrace strapped to his forearm, then swung his free hand like he was pitching a baseball. "Nocturne Dust!" In response to his command, a hardball-sized sphere of sand launched from the Dream Eater's palm and detonated in the midst of another five kobolds like a grenade. No one was harmed by the explosion, but four of the five rats collapsed on the spot and began to snore.

When the remaining kobold turned on its fellows to give a "wake-up" thwack it was promptly hamstrung by both brass golems and fell with a shriek. The rat man only had enough time to scrabble onto its back before one dog pinned him beneath a heavy metallic body. Then the other dog delicately scissored open the kobold's throat.

"Janek, in the shadows! Is that another spell caster!?" Tesla cold-cocked a kobold waving a rock, then slashed its belly open with another Dragon Claw.

"Probably!" The husky dwarf booted another rat between the legs, leaned back, and threw his axe with both hands. The weighted blade hissed through the air in a parabolic arc before burying itself in the chest of a chanting kobold wearing a deer skull on its head. The kobold coughed stickily, then collapsed; the "Poison" spell it was attempting fizzled and faded away. "Damn Spare me the poison, will ye!?" Janek unlimbered his outsized hammer and began pummeling a path to his beloved axe.

Tesla ducked beneath a haymaker swing produced by a muscular rat wielding a rusted sword, then countered from all fours with another Tail Swipe. The spat teeth as gray matter was ejected from its ears, then burst into yet another smoky wedge. "More in the mix; are we at the bottom of this damn hole yet, or not!?"

"Yep! Anything below here is where they chunk their filth!" Janek cratered another rat man and reached his axe. Den was deeper than I thought, the dwarf mused, they don't usually go down ten whole levels. Maybe it's an old goblin hive that got cleaned out in the past. "Their boss will show up soon enough! When he goes down, the rest will bolt!"

Sure enough, part of the rat swarm was swatted aside as a hairy, bear-like creature with humanoid features shambled to the fore wielding a greatsword and a tower shield so corroded they were practically useless. Book tossed up an identifier screen over its shoulder declaring the monster to be a

"Oho, a bugbear! I thought this place was a little too well-built for kobold work! So it was a goblin hive after all!" Janek spun his axe and settled into a stance. "Shame there are no goblins; a few of their women would've made the after-party a hell of a lot more fun!" The fiery dwarf charged into his bellowing opponent, a beast over twice his own height, and began hacking away at its knees.

"That's just sick, Janek." Tesla sidled in from the side and blasted the bugbear's worn shield with a well-placed Dragon Claw.

"Ye've never seen a goblin woman before. Little minks are as good looking as their men are ugly! Pity they're just as dumb, though!" Janek hacked through the bugbear's worthless sword with a three-hit combo of overhand strikes, then buried his axe in the monster's gut. Tesla's descending hammer tail was the last thing it ever saw. "Less intelligent, actually. All they're capable of is sex; it's part of the reason why goblins always breed back so fast."

"I don't know. It just sounds... weird." The ryujin watched the remaining kobolds run with a complicated expression on his face. "Like it's wrong, somehow."

"Reality isn't like the bard's tales, rube. There's a positive dearth of noble ladies in distress just waiting for a commoner to rescue them and get under their skirts. Goblins are pretty popular in the slave markets; orc women, too, though they're more expensive. No surprise, there; they're actually happier after they're caught." The dwarf holstered his axe and stretched. "It's not legal in Diatom, but that's only because it isn't cost-efficient in this climate. Get used to the idea, kid; monstrous women are treated a damn sight better by us than by their own men, and don't even get me started on how our women suffer when they get snatched." Janek shivered, then spat on the floor. "I've seen things that'll wake me up in a cold sweat, and most of them involve kidnapped women. An orc's boudoir is a house of horrors, and that's nothing compared to a hobgoblin's nest."

The next day was uneventful; Tesla and Janek overran a trio of bark-covered hogs the size of ponies that were frothing at the mouth, crushed one a hybrid of both a reptile and a bat with fish scales and, of course, red eyes, and slaughtered another small group of kobolds simply by charging the ailuros straight through them.

"Not much of a haul for the past two days; just fresh monster meat to feed the cats with and a couple of coins."

"Good stuff comes from dangerous monsters. Ye want the big rewards, then ye got to risk yer life for real." Janek twitched his outrageous mustache. "We got no time for more than what we're doing; that den was a little costly, too; we lost an antidote and a couple recovery potions cleaning it out."

"I thought we found an antidote in the bugbear's chamber; what happened to it?"

"Can't use it, could be poison in an antidote's bottle. We'll have to get it appraised, first."

"You can do that?"

"Kobolds aren't real smart, but they're rat bastards like I said before. I don't know how they do it, but they can do it."

Tesla looked to the horizon. "Sun's beginning to set; should we put up camp?"

"Not just yet; let's try to get in another mile or two, first." Janek waved a hand at the highway. "If we can do that we just might make it to Aurora's Caul by the end of tomorrow."