Terry had never been a schedule driven person, or a morning person, or a night owl. He had lived his life as dictated by the obligations that called on his time. This was not just the case for his boarding school days, but in his life with his mother as well. He never really had the control to go and do whatever he wanted and in this new world that really became a noticed feature.

His class structure for learning and training with Mother Martin, Morris, Selina and Hurk took up most of the day. He had breakfast, lunch and dinner with the group or at least one other person and was with them throughout the day to learn and train till nightfall and then sleep. The week however was not all like this. The time structure on the Deck was set around a 30 hour day with about 14 hours of light and 16 hours of dark. This was not hard to adjust to and to make things easier there was still a 7 day week like Terry had observed back on earth.

The days were just numbered in the primary dwarven langues and Terry picked up on the counting structure quickly. He was in lessons for each day, however as Mother Martin regulated her academy she understood the importance of breaks and weekends and so Terry’s weekend was Day 7 (Selvin) and Day 1 (Grun). The rest of the academy was on a 2 month long summer break, though the season in the Dimondlands was called Sun Months. The seasons were typically named for the weather most common at that time.

On the first weekend that Terry had off he traveled to town with Morris, where he met some townspeople and did some shopping. He had gotten some simple uniforms from Mother Martin, but they were not comfortable, mainly consisting of the tracksuit styles that were common in levels.

Terry was amazed with the variety of stores and shops in the Iron Bay. It was a coastal shipping hub that ran along a channel called the Straight to the Heart. The channel ran swiftly up the coast of the two neighboring continents, the eastern Diamondlands and the western Heartlands. The Heartlands was a mecha for trade goods, such as cloth, food, and different accessories giving the town a heavy flow of goods and merchants.

The Iron Bay itself had several beach mines as well that produced ores and elements that assisted in the creation of the magical technologies and accessories that gave the town its luxuries. Morris had told Terry about this over the day of shopping and generally hanging out that first weekend. As a result of all of this Terry was happy to see that fashion on the Deck for humans actually followed generally the same path as it had on earth.

Shops catered to the variety of races and species in the town by labeling their windows with symbols. Finding clothing was as easy as looking for the man symbol and entering the shop. Once therein the clothing was simple and similar they even had denim and cotton t-shirts in a wide range of colors.

Terry was able to buy a few pairs of jeans and a couple simple plain shirts for relatively cheap and was happy to have a wardrobe similar to his comfortable style without much adjustment.

This was not the case for every weekend however, the next was spent going over a literal information dump with Rosa, as she unloaded hours of research on the experiences that she had been reading about.

Rosa had taken a great liking to reading, she had become obsessed once she realized her soul attribute of knowledge gave her an enhanced and sophisticated reading ability. It was like she was making up for lost time as she poured over accounts and books of any and all genres she could in the library of the academy. Once she heard that Terry would be in that weekend, due to Morris needing to pull a few shifts at his blacksmithing job, she had pounced and spent hours going over everything from children's tales to mathematical books on the rotation of the Deck’s planet by skilled engineers and scientists.

Not wanting to do that again the next weekend and both Hurk and Morris once again being forced to work. Terry went into town to find some entertainment of his own. He knew some of the locals, but they were all shop owners and waiters. Terry was quickly just window shopping to pass time near lunch on Selvin. He was trying to figure out a nice place to check into, Mother Martin gave him a small allowance for small jobs she had taught and left him to complete so that he could improve his skills.

He heard a familiar voice, but could not place it till he turned and saw the person it belonged to.

“Hey Terry, good to see you, been a little bit right? How have you been?” The voice was that of Penni, the human who had directed him to join and complete a level on the first day. He smiled as she approached.

“It has been a while, though it feels longer.” He smiled, Terry was okay with small talk as that was his normal conversation style. Never having really made his own friends he generally got pretty good at talking about nothing. “I have gotten all my Attributes and even made some potential teammates. What are you up to?”

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“I was heading to lunch, wanna join? Tell me about what you have seen in the gateways? Swap some stories?” Penni was surprisingly forward and Terry agreed, nearly being dragged along as Penni reached out and tugged him down the step.

Terry at this moment seemed to take in the look of her, she was human and just about his height. She was not from Earth, but was an OOT from a planet called Turf. The differences for humans from Turf were apparently a more stocky build and only having three fingers as Penni was wider and more pronounced shoulders and hips.

She was wearing a casual outfit of fabric shorts and a short sleeve button up that reminded him of an archaeologist from the Jurassic Park movies he had loved back home. Terry smiled at the reference in his head, she even had her long brown hair up in a ponytail waving merrily behind her as she pulled him along. It was all adorable, he thought and they entered a restaurant at the end of the step.

They were seated at a booth and Penni animatedly asked questions about Terry’s experiences so far. The restaurant reminded him vaguely of a Thai place in his college town, the booths had a bamboo decor around the seats and light smooth wooden tables. Green was the prevailing color and there was even a lucky cat statue with three eyes on the counter next to the cat person hostess and waiter that staffed the eatery.

After Terry told a short and lighthearted version of his first day, completing the levels and getting accepted to live at Mother Martin’s academy, Penni’s jaw dropped. “I had heard of her, of course she is a celebrity here. It is no wonder though with a story like that that she would want to get you signed on or trained up. I have been here for a month and just got my last attribute that same day you got all four. Just crazy.”

“I would not recommend it, I was asleep for 4 days after all the levels and upgrades. Not sure I will do that again.” He told her.

She smiled which seemed to light up her slight features, “It might be worth it though getting it all out of the way like that sorta sounds like a fun way to play. I think I would enjoy the challenge. Have you heard of all the different types of levels here, we had nothing like that on Terf.”

They had ordered the same thing, Terry had no idea what the food was like here. It came at that moment, it was a noodle bowl with shrimp and cabbage. The dressing was sweet and tangy and it all smelled wonderful. Terry asked, “What is Terf like? How different is it from here?”

Penni’s smiles faltered, “Well it is mainly two environments, dense jungle or barren rock deserts created by volcanic activity. There are also only two races: Humans are the minority and the majority are reptiles of all varieties. Everything from lizardfolk, Crocomen, Iguanians, Draconians even, they dominate the planet. They often hunt the Humans, that’s actually how I ended up here.” She went quiet and Terry felt awkward not realizing that is what he had asked.

“Earth is very different from that,” he felt a need to change the subject so he started telling her about the world of Earth and the people that made up the planet. Her expression changed to excitement.

“You mean on earth humans are the primary race, there are no others?” She asked surprised and suddenly excited.

Terry finished chewing, “Yeah, I mean there are a lot of races of humans. Different continents there have spawned many varieties and the mixing of these races and cultures have created even more. We don’t have the magic of this world, but we have luxuries through technological discoveries and tools that create amazing and wonderful things. The music and art is awesome and the games we have are like a safe version of the levels here, except you control a character in the games more often than being in them yourself. There are games where you are the player, but they are safe and most of the time you can only get hurt rather than die in them…” She was amazed at the sound of this human dominated world and Terry and her continued talking throughout the meal and for a few hours over drinks and dessert.

It was an amazing time and Terry even walked her back to the Player Tavern where she was staying at the end still answering questions about one obscure part of his world or another.

“You know, I was feeling the pressure of being here. We had magic on Terf, it was all element based and the reptilians kept most of the knowledge of how to use it to themselves. When I showed an aptitude for healing and the wood element I received Coil, my snake. She would become my keeper once she grew and imprinted on me” She told him.

Terry cut in, “I thought she was a ball python? They don’t get very big on my world.”

“It is actually Bahl Python, B-A-H-L. It is some deity on Terf known for being vile and massive. That is why the species is named after them. She will get more intelligent and grow to about 30 feet and 4 feet thick overall. It might be different here with the attributes though.” Penni spoke as if this was a simple fact and Terry was suddenly intrigued and terrified. He did find it odd the Bahl existed on two planets of humans, but he did not ask after that, he only knew the demon from a video game anyway.

“In any case,” she continued, “Thank you for your stories. I am leaving in a couple days but would you like to get together tomorrow maybe train a bit? I am heading to the capital directly to complete my final levels and see what sort of job I can get after that. Tomorrow if you want to meet up I can show you some different techniques, the knives sound cool and I would like to see them.” Terry agreed and he was excited and surprised to receive a hug as the girl bid him good night and went into the tavern and then presumably up to her room.

The next day was fun as she met him at a local studio to spare and train, giving him advice and listening to more stories of his world. He decided he would have to look her up once he went to the Capital himself and see if they could catch up once he made his way there in the future.