It was a day, like many others, most people living in Order would go about their days dutifully, training, resting—or living their lives. Yet, this day wasn’t quite the same as others for Rio. He’d thrown on his finest black robes. Spent an hour pulling his hair back and ensuring he was presentable in every way down to the last detail. And that was just appearance.

When he’d double-checked his notes—those compiled by the Eighth Court Squad—he’d done so in a meticulous and intense fashion. Which ignored the fact that he’d poured through those notes over the last several days with both the Captain and the First Lieutenant as well.

Everything had to be perfect.

One couldn’t present such vital information in front of every single Court Guard Captain and their first Lieutenants without going to such measured steps.

The data, he was certain, was clean.

Rio bowed his head as he reached the door to the meeting place—a woman made of gold stared at him for a long moment, then went to the doorway. It was several times larger than himself, made of a thick ancient Spiritwood that had probably more mana running through it than most people would ever achieve in their lifetime.

She pushed it open with a casual touch.

Without the massive door, the inside was revealed. Arranged and seated on pillows on the floor were all ten captains. All ten lieutenants. The entirety of The King Above’s court squads; enough firepower here to level several hundreds of world, personified in the most elite of the Force of Order.

Rio cleared his throat. Waiting for his cue.

“You may enter.” Captain Ash—his captain, spoke.

He stepped in, knowing better than to waste a single of their precious seconds if he could help it, and found himself once more in one of the most magnificent rooms of his life. The meeting area was grander than the entirety of the palace, which sat in the center of the prized city of Order.

Every wall of this room was inlaid with soul jade, the living gem intermingling and meshed in the grain of the wooden engravings on each wall. Yet, there were only three walls. The back wall was taken down, opening straight into a scenic half-mile-wide courtyard—the Palace Garden, a lush place filled with the rarest plants gathered from across the entirety of reality.

This place represented the height of two forms of beauty: natural and manufactured, and it’d been made long ago to show that both could coincide.

Rio almost stumbled as all of the Captains and First Lieutenants stared at him. No matter how many times he’d done this, he’d never get used to that feeling.

“Rio,” Captain Ash prodded him gently, twisting his long silvered hair and tilting his head, “Please step before us and deliver the report.” Ash was, of course, the captain of the Eight Court and the head of the research and intelligence community for their prestigious Court Squads.

Rio moved forward—

“Fewer survivors than usual?” Mumbled a bald man; he had several dots on his head and sat with his hands connected beneath his robe sleeves. Captain Kon, head of the Fifth Court Squad.

“A continuing trend,” chimed in his lieutenant, a woman with short-cropped blond hair.

“Please. If we could all remain quiet while my Second Lieutenant delivers the data, then we can discuss trend lines further.” Captain Ash cut in, shooting the Fifth Court Squad members an unhappy look.

“Bah. He’s just going to say what we know already. Same thing we’ve heard the last several times. Subjecting the poor kid to keep delivering the same thing again and again every year is ridiculous. Unless we’re gonna finally do something about the data instead of sitting here. With fewer entering the labyrinth and finding their way to us, we’ll stagnant talent. Clearly this is intentional.” Kon continued.

“Quiet.” Uttered the massive shadow of a man in the back of the room; his voice shook the foundations. The Captain of Squad One.

With that, Kon finally and gracelessly decided that it might be in his best interest to shut up. After all, it wasn’t in your best interest to give the Captain of Squad One a reason to quarrel with you. He might just bury you in the ground. There were quite a few dead captains over the last thousand years who got on his wrong side. Rio cleared his throat, giving a respectful bow to both the Captain of Squad One—and his own Captain then stood straighter.

Just one last look at his paper to steady himself.

“Reports of the latest integration indicate an effective survival rate of thirty percent from the system’s generated tutorial dungeon; assuming the data continues to trend this way for the current integration, given our models, that seems likely. The reason being, as we’ve determined before based on supplementary divination, the ‘Tutorial’ dungeons generated by the system continue to range wildly in difficulty. Not all integrated are cut out for the full brunt of reality. Still, to go from seventy-five to thirty…” Rio paused, catching himself. “…As we’re all aware, this is the lowest rate we’ve seen yet. The last five integrations have an effective rate of thirty-five to forty. As the Captain of the Fifth squad pointed out, the percentage of effective survival just keeps lowering. We’ve compiled the trend and can deliver more observations about that.”

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“The worlds being integrated are getting weaker. That is all that we’re seeing. It is nothing to concern ourselves with. One cannot expect strong crops from weak fields,” Captain Jiri said, with a sad shake of her head. The woman always had a way of scaring Rio. It was as if those verdant green eyes of hers could pierce into his soul and dig right through his skin like a knife.

“Previous integrations with such low survival rates are predicted to do the opposite. Might I remind you our historical data reveals that they tend to have better classes, levels, and skills after exiting these ‘tutorial’ dungeons.” Captain Ash replied.

“And where are all these promising new recruits with better classes, levels, and skills?” Jiri asked.

At this, Ash turned quiet.

None of the new integrations had broken through to the realm of Order yet. They hadn’t had a chance to see these new survivors in person. To do so required them to conquer a boss monster of considerable challenge… Normally. This was meant as a final test to the new world, to make sure they had a champion strong enough to connect them to the overall labyrinth and greater community before opening the floodgates. Yet another safety measure put in place by the system.

The prevailing theory among Squad Eight was that this final monster in these new worlds was too strong.

These ‘effective survival rate’ numbers were a beacon of hope but also misleading. Sure, thirty percent of a newly integrated world survived the tutorial dungeons—but that didn’t mean they would make it past the final challenge.

No, it was an effective rate for the first step. A hopeful number of survivors.

It might take years to open the door and fully connect the world to the labyrinth… But, as Rio and Captain Ash feared, given the data in the last twenty years and a failure of any reality to take that next step… The true survival rate was likely zero. Until proved otherwise by one of these concerning new worlds opening their final door.

“We’re strong enough without new recruits. Better to tend towards the crops we have now and see them flourish and strengthen; new worlds have never been a priority of our business as the ten-court squads.” Jiri said, causally dismissing the likely deaths of billions of individuals.

Rio stared at her.

“New blood is the life of any military organization.” Kon countered.

And like that, the captains devolved into another arguing match. Rio was allowed to deliver the specifics of his report after Captain Ash stopped them once more.

The data was grim, and as Rio recounted what he knew, he could only sit and wonder—just what was going wrong.

Why was the system upping the difficulty, and killing so many? Was it in response to them? Was this Earth to fall into the same fate as the last twenty integrated worlds? Not a soul left alive after they’d been dragged into greater reality?

Rio went through the data and couldn’t help but feel the sadness sink through him; it felt like a funeral for yet another billion. As he delivered the numbers, it was easy to forget. One life could be all the difference, and here they came, year after year, talking about so many snuffed out of existence.

###

Colt entered the portal and found himself in some twisted version of Nashville. Or at least, a whole block of it—but yet, it wasn’t only just downtown Nashville. Since there were far too many damn trees, too many plants, and too many rocks, it was like nature waged war on the city and attacked everywhere. It broke through the road, erupting into trees and piles of grass and vines. From where he popped into existence, he could even see a tree that had attacked a car, spearing right through it.

There was a faint mist to the air, too—colder than it had been before. He could see frost in his breath, making him remember that one winter, his father took him up to Duluth on a road trip. Back then, there’d been so much snow he could’ve been buried in it; the air here felt like it was ready to run wild with the weather and bring a blizzard down on his head.

Colt stepped forward, then heard a whoosh sound behind him, but it was just Nate. Appearing in the same exact way he had.

The former army man took in the scene quietly, weapon in hand.

Another couple of whooshes. Then Sarah and Jimmy were along for the ride, too. Though what remained of the dungeon they’d been in was gone. No doorway on this side. It seemed the exit was a one-way street.

“Well. Guess we’re back.” Jimmy said, stumbling around with wide eyes. “Shit, you think my apartment is still somewhere? I have a stash there and some food—“

Nate gave the city a once-over. “This isn’t all of Nashville.” At least the parts they could see from where they’d spawned.

“How can you tell?” Jimmy asked.

“My car was parked in front of the restaurant—we’re about five miles away. You can see the skyline of downtown, too. But if you look at that skyline, you’ll see that some buildings are missing. So, this isn’t all of Nashville. We head south, far enough from here, and we’d find our restaurant. If it still exists.”

Jimmy shook his head. “How can you tell where south is?”

“Buildings, man.” Nate sighed.

Colt saw a shuffle of something moving down the street—his knife came to his hand; he slipped into a fighting stance… Only to see the shape of deer rushing through the overgrown street and into an alley.

“I don’t like this place,” Colt said, his eyes running along all the different openings. Buildings, too. All of those tall skyscrapers that way could house any number of monsters. Or none at all.

Colt checked his Status—just to be sure. And there it was, a full display of his levels, too. Though they had left the dungeon, the System still stuck around. Just like he’d thought it would. And with that, there was sure to be danger.

“First order of business is to find a secure location, set up defenses, and gather food and water.” Nate pointed out, directing their attention. “Let’s take a walk… Be cautious and silent. We might stumble upon other people… But that’s by no means a reason why we should break stealth. There is no government, and we don’t know how bad things are. We don’t know who we can trust.”

With those grim words of warning, Nate began to lead the way down the street, sticking close to the buildings.

Colt followed, slow yet sure. A shadow to Nate. One whose knife was ready to take out anyone who threatened the kitchen crew.

Nashville wasn’t the same place they’d left.