Cole’s first night in Vestria was plagued by dreams. While his body lay defenceless, his mind was assailed with images, sounds, and emotions that he couldn’t properly process. It was a weird mix of memories from his home life, tinged with elements from his time spent in the VR world of Vestria Online.

He went to school, as he had when he was younger, but the lessons were in a strange runic font that he couldn’t understand. The teacher was yelling at him, berating him for being so stupid, but he just couldn’t get it to make sense.

He received his final exam results in the mail, unsurprised but still hurting all the same, as he realised that they would get him nowhere in life. The results blurred, switching into his Vestria Online gold balance, and his sadness became a strange, euphoric elation.

Cole was on the job site, and his boss was in the crane showing off to his work buddies. The heavy machinery swung around over his head, and Cole had a gut feeling that something was going to go wrong.

Cole was lying in the mud of the worksite, nerves flaring with agony. People were screaming, yelling to help them move something off him. What had happened? Was it a monster attack?

Cole couldn’t see anything except the 4th rune, the golden, incredibly complicated one that was tied to his soul. He reached out instinctively, trying to touch it. The glow faded, the returned, blazing with a golden brilliance.

“RISE”

Cole shot upright, panting. He rubbed his chest, feeling some strange pain in the centre.

It was morning. Clouds had come overhead, and rain had started pouring out. He rubbed his eyes, and then prepared to move. He stripped off his shirt and gathered up his few improvised tools, as well as the spare fish, and wrapped them up in the shirt in such a way that he could tie it around his waist like some sort of sash. Cole then grabbed two of his spears, leaving the third thrust through the middle of his smoking, barely alive campfire as a marker, before continuing his path following the river.

Cole made as frequent use of his Runic Speed as he could manage, careful to avoid the warning sign that was the throbbing headache he had begun to associate with overuse. Because there was no mana bar like there was in the VR world, Cole was slowly getting used to the idea of ‘feeling’ instead, rather than just looking down at marker or number.

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Cole continued, using the blunt ends of his spears as trekking sticks when he was waiting for the cooldown on his Speed rune. The rain eventually cleared, which made him incredibly grateful, and took it as a sign to have his first meal of the day. Cole sat on a convenient log and unwrapped the last fish from the leaves, wolfing it down. He was not quite as happy with the taste as he’d thought he would be, but he supposed he hadn’t had anything to properly marinate it with.

Once he’d finished his meal, Cole stepped up, tracing out his Runic Speed once more, and began another stint of rapid dashing down the riverbank. While he was running, his mind went to his 4th rune, the one that had appeared at the end of his dream.

“Rise” Cole wondered, “What does that even mean?”

Of course, there were plenty of things that it could mean. Taken literally, it could mean to rise into the air, possibly even unlocking flight. It could also be more of an abstract concept, to literally rise above the competition. On the contrary, and what Cole thought was far more likely, was the ability to ignore pain, when being knocked down, he would be able to Rise up and continue to struggle.

It was an interesting concept, one he would have to explore later, but Cole felt the rune begin to fade away, and so he turned his focus back towards the path forward. He was nearing the foot of a large hill.

The river continued to surge forward, having cut a valley through the hill, but there was no easy or safe way to stay alongside it, so Cole began the climb up the steep gradient. The spears’ secondary use as trekking sticks was made even more apparent, as he found that having four points of contact with the uneven ground kept him from tripping.

Cole began to sweat. While he’d become more used to running, owing to the fact it was basically all he’d done since arriving in this world, the added strain from hiking up a steep hill was beginning to take a toll. His arms, back, and shoulder were all crying out for a release, but he forced himself to move on.

“You’ve felt worse than this, keep moving!”

And so Cole continued up, occasionally glancing down at the river which was far below, and humming a tune from Earth, the rhythm matching the regular thuds of his spears hitting the ground. Finally, he reached the crest of the hill.

A slight ledge lay in front of him, so Cole threw his spears up, freeing his hands to help him follow through, a test of his upper body strength. Once he’d pulled himself up (which took much longer than he’d like to admit), he surveyed the landscape, and began to cheer.

Down the other side of the hill, where the river became level with the earth once more, was a small town, which seemed to be some sort of fishing village, with a wooden palisade erected around the parts that did not border the river. From this far away, Cole couldn’t make out any distinct shapes or people, but he could see boats floating off a dock, and smoke puffing out of a few chimneys. There had to be people there.

Cole traced out his speed rune, eager to finally see some people. Although in his old life he went weeks without seeing anyone, except in his mirror, for some reason he now had a strange desire to be around his fellow humans. He bounded down the slope, almost losing his footing a few times, spears held up and out of the way of rocks and logs that they might snap against. He supposed that he must look like a crazy hobo from a distance.

As the ground began to flatten out, and he could see more of the village, Cole reinvigorated his pace, tracing the rune again, and ignoring the headache that began to pound behind his eyes. He still couldn’t see anyone, maybe they were behind the palisade?

As continued his mad dash towards the village, Cole missed two important things.

Firstly, the corpses of various monsters, scattered around in a huge area, in a 1km radius from the gates. Second, a flash of light, a human shaped figure that blurred, then disappeared.

Even if he hadn’t missed the second one, it wouldn’t have mattered much anyone.

Something slammed into him, knocking Cole to his back. He saw stars. What had happened?

As his vision swam back into focus, he could see a tall figure standing over him. Cole heard a gruff, low voice growl, uttering only two words.

“Down, boy”