The next day, I bought the GPS. It didn't look any different from a regular GPS. It was suprisingly easy to use since it didn't ask for an address, merely asking for coordinates. It made sense honestly, the world was kinda gone. There wasn't any addresses to go to. As a result, I didn't have to worry about fumbling through menus. When I put in the coordinates that were being broadcast over the radio, a blue arrow appeared in front of me.

I jerked, startled at the suddeness that it appeared. A mechanical female voice emerged from the GPS. "You are approximately 12.8 miles from your destination. No major obstacles are detected. Time until you reach your destination is currently four hours and seventeen minutes. Please follow the blue arrow to your destination."

I blinked a couple times. Well, this was going to be interesting. I packed up the tent, a matter of just storing it in the inventory, and headed off in the direction the arrow indicated. On the way I bought a turkey and swiss sandwich from the shop, feeding the wolf that trailed beside me pieces of the sandwich occasionally.

There was surprisingly few incidents with local wildlife until I reached the river. It was only knee deep and the current was quite calm. I started across it without hesitation. That almost proved fatal. Something suddenly grabbed my foot and yanked me off balance, sending me tumbling into the river.

I spluttered and gasped for air as I surfaced. A large boulder that had been beside the river's edge turned out to be a turtle in disguise. A very large and angry turtle, at least five feet in size. It grabbed me by the ankle again and swung it's head.

This turtle was much stronger than it should have been. A fact that was demonstrated as I went soaring out of the river, slamming into a tree nearby.

I recovered quickly and grabbed my laser rifle, it's burst mode already prepared. The turtle was already climbing out of the river, moving swiftly towards me. I lifted my rifle and pulled the trigger, a burst of photonic energy lashing out at the turtle's armored hide. The laser hit the shell and refracted, scattering around it. There wasn't any forcefield like I was expecting. The laser was simply ineffective.

Before I could do anything else, the head of the turtle slammed into my gut, causing me to fall to my knees as I gasped for breath. It body slammed me, sending me farther away into the forest. As I attempted to get to my feet, I saw the wolf I had summoned before attempting to attack the turtle. It ignored the wolf until it suddenly bit the tail that was poking out the back of the turtle's shell.

With a speed that made the turtle's head a blur, it whipped around and sliced the wolf's head off with a single bite. The flash of blue from the wolf's forcefield disappeared the second it bit down. I lifted my hands and pointed them at the turtle. With malice in my voice, I whispered "electric stream."

The white-blue energy shot out and hit the turtle, causing blue light to surge around it as the forcefield attempted to protect it from the electricity. The blue light disappeared and the turtle started to convulse. I quickly summoned my sniper rifle from my inventory along with a grenade. Stopping the surge of energy in one of my hands, I quickly pulled the pin on the grenade and tossed it at the turtle.

The grenade bounced twice before rolling to a stop next to the turtle's shell. I stopped electric stream and started running. I barely managed two steps before the explosion knocked me off my feet. I quickly turned towards the explosion, wanting to see if the turtle was dead. I saw it emerge from the smoke caused by the explosion, parts of its shell pitted from shrapnel.

I aimed the sniper rifle and fired, the slug slamming into the turtle's shell. Cracks spread where it was hit and the turtle staggered backwards. I was slammed into the ground from the recoil, but I pushed off from the ground. I fired twice more, the first bullet creating more cracks on the shell. The second one broke through the shell completely, pieces of it flying off and dissolving into grey goop.

I watched as the turtle dissolved before I let out a sigh of relief.

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Combat has ended! You have defeated 1 Prism Turtle, level 50. Loot gained: 10 Chunks

I took a glance at my shield points. 107/500. Too close. I laid down on the ground and just relaxed, attempting to take my mind off of the harrowing experience I just had. That proved to be wrong as a hawk divebombed my face. A quick shot with the sniper rifle spooked it, but it made me realize that nothing was safe now. I couldn't take the time to rest.

Standing up, I summoned another wolf before following the blue arrow again. I encountered small creatures every now and then, killing them the second I saw them. Finally, a little after lunch, I arrived. 

The first time I knew I was close was when a man stepped out of the woods, dressed in military fatigues. Seven other men joined the first, all of them dressed in military fatigues. They kept their guns pointed at me as I was quickly surrounded. I put my hands up, scared that I was going to be killed. The one in front, a short man with a unibrow, approached me. "What are ya here for sonny?"

I gulped before replying. "I, uh, I heard on the radio that people were getting together around here. I wanted to see if I could take shelter here too." I dismissed my wolf that was currently growling at one of the men. Some of the tension disappeared when it dissolved into grey goop.

The man peered at me for a few seconds after the wolf disappeared before nodding. "Alright lads, you heard him. Sergeant Reynolds!"

One of the larger men stepped forward. He was black, bald and appeared to be in his late thirties or mid-forties. "Yes Lieutenant!" He said with a salute.

The lieutenant gestured towards me. "Take sonnyboy here to the major. He'll give him the rules. Stay on the base after that, our patrol ends in ten minutes anyway." He turned to another of the men. "Private Thompson, radio camp and tell them we have a newbie."

Sergeant Reynolds gestured forward with his gun. "Come on mate, we've got to get you back to camp."

I nodded and followed him as he took off through the forest. As we walked, he started talking. "Sorry about the rough greeting. We've had a few crazy people show up before you. One guy acted like he was on drugs or something, kept muttering that he was the savior of the world or some nonsense. He pulled a plasma pistol and killed one of the privates."

I let out a sigh when he said that. Reynolds looked at me and laughed. "Don't worry man, the private respawned.Pretty mad at losing his nanites, but he's fine." Oh yeah. I forgot that death wasn't permanent.

I gave Reynolds a grin. "That's good. Glad the private is alright then. I have a question for you though, how did you get so many military people together? I was with some people before and I didn't appear with them."

Reynolds chuckled. "Well, we honestly don't have a lot of military personnel together right now. There are a total of three hundred people on the base, with around half of those belonging to the military. As near as we can tell though, everyone appeared in random locations. Where were you before this mister...?"

I chuckled as well before finishing his sentence. "My name is Tony Elsen. To answer your question, I was at Silicon Valley for a new job. Good ol' California."

Reynolds nodded. "California, nice. As for me, well, I was stationed in Hawaii. The Major was running a base down in Texas while the Lieutenant you saw before was in Chicago on leave."

I raised an eyebrow. "Then how come all of you managed to stay together?"

He patted the radio strapped to his wrist. "Our radios. Every military personnel has been required to carry an encrypted radio for a while now. Thanks to that, we were able to communicate with each other when we spawned. Major Kincade was the highest ranking officer within comm-range, so we took our orders from him. As a result, we all ended up here, at Base Goten."

I nodded in understanding. "So you're really just a mash of random military personnel that were in the area."

"Yeah," Reynolds replied. "We even have a member of the Swiss army here actually. We were really scrambled all over the world."

I grimaced. "If everyone was scattered that far apart, it must be chaos out there." There was a pause before I spoke up again. "So, what are these rules that the lieutenant mentioned?"

Reynolds shrugged. "The rules are pretty easy going for civilians. If you wanna stay, you have to contribute. A tax of sorts, if you will. Other than that, stay civil and don't cause any trouble. If you know how to fight, we'd ask that you help out by hunting for nanites to help develop the base further. That's pretty much it. Major Kincade will fill you in better though. Ah, look."

He pointed ahead towards a clearing in the forest. "The base is right over there. Come on Tony, best to get there quickly. We don't have much time to waste."

I grunted as I picked up the pace. The beast wave counter flicked as the numbers changed. 27 hours, 19 minutes remaining. Yes. We really didn't have time to waste.

Nanite Count: 68 Chunks 809 Shards.