After travelling through the tunnel we took short and long breaks over several days in real life.

"We finally reached the end." I am exhausted after the slow progression of our travelling due to all the monsters in our way.

"Ughhh finally." Maddy has probably gotten tired of me after spending so much time stuck in this hallway, luckily we weren't stuck in here 24/7 and still did things outside of the game.

Exiting the dreary hallway which will forever be ingrained in my mind we walk into what looks like a laboratory.

Maddy begins exploring the area while I look through the items.

Thousands of books line the walls in book cases, unlike in Malek's basement though there are many workbenches covered in books as well. Beakers and vials of unknown liquids sit in complicated looking machines. The only way to describe the people who must have worked here is "Mad Scientist".

"Jordan there are some stairs here, I'm gonna go upstairs and see what's around." Maddy's presence disappears from the area while I continue digging through materials.

Most of these appear to be scientific notes. 'I wonder what they were trying to research here, have they ever heard of scientific theory.'

I begin pulling books from the bookshelves and reading the title and skimming the insides. I can understand a lot more than when I first tried reading books, but many of these concepts go right over my head. I begin stuffing my personal bag with the books that I can at least slightly understand.

After taking about 60 books my bag becomes heavier yet the walls look nearly the same as they did before. I decide to instead take one of the workbenches and stack the books there to use for myself. After setting up a place for study I head up the stairs to where Maddy is.

Dashing up the steps I extend my senses and search for Maddy's presence. A look of bewilderment comes across my face as Maddy cannot be sensed in the area.

"Maddy! Maddy where are you?!" I call out to her but do not receive a response.

Opening the > menu I check that Maddy is logged on.

*Call*

____

"Maddy where are you?" I ask worriedly.

"I saw some doggies so I went to say hello but then I got lost."

"You got lost? So you can't find your way back to the lab?"

"I should be able to, but-" Maddy's call got cut off.

____

*Call has ended after user passed 100 meters away*

'Crap did she accidentally walk out or did she get taken?'

Gripping my staff I walk out into the open air. The staircase seems to be shielded by a gazebo like structure.

The surrounding area is covered in a thin coat of (#9370DB) purple grass with a wide range of different flowers. Different types of animals frolic and graze in the area, all of them appearing to be similar, yet not quite familiar. Large orange crocodile sized lizards dash through the purple grass, attacking nearby mammals. Pastel rainbow colored birds soar high through the sky, birds bigger than any bird that could be seen in the real world. Looking past the clouds the sky is a deep green and two suns float in the sky.

"Where the hell...?" I realize that the room brought us not to another floor but to another dimension.

'Maddy said she saw some dogs, so- crap she calls all animals dogs, let's just hope she was talking about real dogs.'

Using [Sense attunement] I scan for any dog like creatures.

'Gotcha!' I find some medium sized husky looking dogs with three tails and a third eyelid. 'Oooo doggies! Wait do they have three eyes?'

I run over to the dog who turns to me and opens it's third eye. Rather than the light blue of it's other two eyes the third eye is a warm golden brown, almost like a sunset cast through the colorful leaves of an autumn forest. I freeze in my track, halted by the force of the eye. I can feel it entering into my mind.

"Hello." A voice enters my mind.

"Ah, are you the dog? Uh yes I am looking for my friend." While this happening in real life would startle me, it being a game allows me to keep a bit of a calm head.

"A dog? Ah yes someone came through earlier calling us 'Doggies' as well."

"Oh, can you tell me where to find her?" I ask the pretty dog for directions.

"Can't help you, she got taken." The warm cuddly fluffy doggy responds rather coldly.

"Huh?!? Maddy got taken? By who? By what? Where did she go?" I begin to freak out at the sudden information.

"Shadowbird got her, took her to mountain."

"A shadowbird? I haven't seen one of those yet."

"You don't see, they appear in the shadows, by then it's too late."

"Huh? They appear from the shadows?"

"Yes, they only exist in shadow plane until they pop out through a shadow and capture someone. They can't take things into other plane so they bring to their mountain nests." The dog closes it's third eye and breaks communication.

'Ughhhh, why did Maddy have to get taken?'

I fix my bags and begin running towards the mountains the dog pointed out. I don't mind exhausting my mana so I use earth and air manipulation to increase my movement speed. Using a small bit of mana each step I gain a much more explosive speed.