Recording interview between AI Lucy and Andrew.

so, this is in some kind of joke, right? 

No of course not. 

I mean you have to have over a billion candidates, right? 

Actually, we have 3.4 billion. 

Andrew let out a huff as he landed in his chair.  "why me there are only 10 million spots open?" 

Yes, and the reason why you made it to the stage is your versatility.  You have studied with the Marine special forces, are an active nurse practitioner and have been actively training to become an XO pilot.  You were selected for the prep team.  If you pass this interview you will be assigned to ship you will be the first to land on a planet and begin the setup process for the colonists that will be following shortly after your arrival on the planets.  You were chosen because you have combat experience as well as medical training.  You will be sent to the first planet that has any unknown life. 

-From the point of view of Nola's adventuring party- 

Cade grabbed a leather satchel from Ren.  He walked over to the broken warlord and shoved the hand of the warlord into the satchel.  "Store this." Suddenly the entire upper half of the warlord was sucked into the satchel.  Kate got up and then walked over to the legs and stored them as well. 

Nola watched and waited until he was done.  "Bag of holding?" 

Cade still smiling said." Yeah, this one specialized for non-organics.  The first time we took down warlord, we immediately spent all the money on one of these bags and none of us complained about it.  I mean this warlord armor probably weighs around 200 kg." 

"My knowledge on artifacts is a little rusty, but I've never heard of a combat avatar?" 

"Those are actually new.  Up until last week they were labeled as scrap metal.  The HUD only updates an artifact item when somebody finds a manual for it.  Don't know who founded and they haven't turned in the manual to the Guild, so we don't know any details about them, this is also the first one I've seen active." 

"That artifact was labeled as inactive, wasn't it?" 

"Yep but that means the lake was probably drained or they built a bridge somehow if this is like any of the other artifacts were to have a huge payday here.  HAN, HERE THAT."  Han was still unconscious.  "Ha, that normally works.  All right, Nola, let's get finished up." 

Nola looked at Ren who was still taking care of Han.  Ren is an earth mage she's also the groups medic which is why she was examining Han.  Ren's hands were glowing as the bruise on Han's stomach faded away. 

Nola let out a sigh.  Ren was using a spell called rapid growth.  The spell caused injuries to heal quickly, but not regenerate; you can't regrow limbs or even reattach them using the spell.  Otherwise Millie would've been healed long ago. 

Nola turned towards Cade.  "The golems were speaking Elven, or at the very least were using the HUD to translate.  Do you know of any golems that spoke our language before?" 

"No, all golems are level 0, they speak some kind of language but not any of ours.  This is the first time I've been able to understand them." 

"You're not worried about that?" 

Cade let out a laugh.  "No of course not, were adventurers, strange and new things are found every day.  They may use are language now, but they still attack on site, so nothing's really changed." 

Ren let out a shout.  "Han is up." 

Kate clapped his hands together.  "Okay everybody, the guild's aware what's going on, and they've given us the go-ahead.  Nola, you can stay with us, or you can head back to town.  but we're going into this artifact figure out what's going on." 

"I'm coming with you." 

"Great, now here's the plan, figure out how the golems are getting out of the artifact, which is located in the center of Drake-lake, get into the artifact and rescue Kevin, also we need to find out if somebody's been using artifacts to kidnap people or if the artifact itself is kidnapping people.  Any questions?" 

Nola spoke." Don't you and Ren need earth to cast your spells or some in your creatures?" 

"Yep which is why I'm going to summon two armored bears before we go in.  Whenever we get into a tough fight I'll dismantle one of the bears and Ren can use it as components.  I will recombine it later and will move onto the next fight." 

Amy turned towards Nola.  "I know you're a  strategist, but do you have any useful abilities besides that." 

"I've been specializing in logistics for when Millie takes over, but I do have a few spells.  Sleep and rapid growth." 

Cade smiled." Great we have two healers.  Nola, I want you just to heal anybody who gets injured.  Ren, I want you to save your magic for damage spells." 

Han pointed towards Drake lake.  "The spell is pointing in that direction." Han lowered his hand the tar he was holding stop glowing. 

The group came out of the forest and saw the lake.  Nola looked around." Isn't there supposed to be an artifact here?" 

"Yes." Cade pointed at the island in the center of the lake with a single tall tree standing on top of an odd rock." That's where it's supposed to be maybe it's been covered up with dirt since the last survey group came through here.  We will head left along the lake shore to see if we find anything odd." 

Everybody started walking except for Han, who stared at the tree while scratching his head." I don't think shadows are supposed to move like that." 

"Han you're in front." Han lowered his hand and ran up to the group. 

The group continued to walk around the lake before coming across something...  old.  A group of statues, five of them, Nola recognize them for what they were.  "These weren't in the report where they?" 

"No, they would've been buried." 

Nola stared at the five statues, three were caught in the act of sprinting, terror written on their faces one had fallen to the ground it had raised its hand up, and another had turned around to grab that hand.  These statues were ancient from the day when the world lost the gods and magic.  Two-thirds of the continent was still unexplored so finding these out in the woods wasn't uncommon.  Nobody knew what happened in those days just that all 12 gods fought something and the world lost all of its magic in a single day and those who were too close to the fight turned into stone. 

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"Ill report these to the guild." Cade pulled out his guild necklace and held it.  "All right let's keep going." 

Looking forward Nola turned her head to Cade and asked." Why do you keep pulling out that necklace?" 

"My Guild tag is connected up to the Guild investigations team. Since this is an unexplored area, the guild asked me to report everything I came across, so that means I have to pull out the guild tags and focus on sending a message." 

Amy sniffed." Yeah, there's definitely a lot of iron and tungsten up ahead." 

Cade smiled. "All right let's pick up the pace." 

Amy and Han were in the lead, Cade and Ren were on either side of Nola as they walked. As they walked, they came across a broken artifact on top of the mound of dirt. It was an artifact that had been crushed, suddenly the whole assembly came alive and turned towards them, only to have it fall apart scattering pieces as it turned. 

"What is that?" Nola asked. 

"I think it was once a defense turret."  Cade scratched the back of his head that meant it was guarding something and artifact nearby or... Cade walked up to the broken turret and began sifting through the dirt with his hands. "Yep here's a door. Han, get over here and smash it open for me." Cade stepped away from the doorway and began summoning two armored bears. 

Two mounds of dirt slowly began to rise as Cade held out his hands, the earth slowly formed arms and legs before the head suddenly poked out of the mounds of earth. The earth slowly fell away revealing stone-like scales underneath. "There we go, a level 9 and a level 11 armored bear. Ren, use the one that's ahead shorter, that one's only a level IX and you can use it for your spell components." Ren nodded. 

Han reached into his backpack and pulled out a cylinder with two handles on it. Han then proceeded to slam the metal cylinder against the doorway causing it to ring like a bell. 

Nola stepped back and covered her ears. With each hit of Hans Ram the door bent in a little more. After three hits the door swung inwards as the latch broke. 

"All right step back, I'm going to send one of my bears in." Han got out of the way is one of the bears shoved its shoulders into the doorway, the bear was stuck for a second but then the bear it twisted and broke the metal frame. As the bear fully got into the tunnel Cade Started and yelled. "OUT OF THE WAY."  Han dove to the side picking up Nola as a noise of a continuous explosion went off from the tunnel. Chunks of the bear went flying by as they turned back into dirt. 

Nola looked around and saw Han Amy and Cade were all on the ground picking themselves up. Cade let  out a chuckle as he spoke. "Well, I better re-summon that bear. Ren, go ahead and buff the bears, their storm armor isn't strong enough. There's a tunnel leading to the giant ship it also has a turret at the end." 

Amy look at Nola.  "Are you sure you still want to come with us? " 

"Yes, this is the only lead I have on where Millie might be." 

Cade raised his hands.  "Right right right, let's get going."  Cade summoned a new armored bear and Ren used earth armor on it.  The new armored bear's scales slowly glowed, and turned into black obsidian.  "All right everybody, get on either side of the doorway.  The bear is going to cause a lot of ricochets."  The new Bear glared at Cade as it walked into the tunnel.  The same continuous explosion began coming from inside of the doorway as fragments of stone and metal came flying out.  "Ok, whose first?"  Cade looked at everyone and grinned; everybody else just stared back. 

Cade said a little less enthusiastically.  "Okay, I'll go."  Cade turned and walked into the broken doorway. 

A minute went by.  "ARE YOU GUYS COMING?" 

Amy shouted back in a surprised tone.  "You're still alive?" 

"Get in here, or else I'm going to claim all the power crystals." 

Han was the first to move, he quickly ran into the tunnel while saying.  "Cade if you're stealing everything valuable again I'm locking you up in the first chest we come across." 

"That's not a threat because you know I am the only one who can open those." 

"You're also the only one that can fit inside." 

Nola and Ren let out a chuckle as they walked inside followed by Amy. 

After walking through a long hallway, Nola came out into a small room for the walls were made out of shipping containers stacked three high Nola looked around and saw that there was only one way forward Nola turned to speak to Cade who is being held by Han.  Cade's feet were off the ground it is to hands were raised with a nervous smile on his face while Han held him by his shirt.  Then Amy walked into the room, and the door slammed behind them sealing them off from the tunnel that led to the outside. 

A message appeared in front of Nola's eyes 

Warning you have entered an UNKNOWN ERROR 

threat level ERROR

UNKNOWN ERROR type UNKNOWN

Congratulations your adventuring party is the first to have entered an UNKNOWN ERROR. 

Item drops have been ERROR. 

Everybody froze as they read through the message, Cade was the first to speak. "I've seen this message before. Normally, a dungeon shows this when you walk in, but I've never seen it inside of a Giants artifacts before.  this isn't good." 

Han dropped Cade.  "This is somehow your fault."