Nurses. In white uniforms. Everywhere. Not all were women, about half of them do. But they did treat the Beta Testers like kings. Everyone remained silent. Aaron did too, since his attention was too busy to the nurse shocking his legs (literally) with some kind of device while he was only wearing a robe. Not exactly the right time for his libido to rise up, especially when the team was right beside him just over the curtain.

Aaron talked to Eric, then to the rest. Lisa seemed too frozen to go back and wanted to resign. But she knew there was no going back. Lina tried to calm her down, soothe her and all that, while these three guys were all calm, fine and dandy and their attention elsewhere.

Except for Eric though. That guy was cool, he had to admit. “Where’s Amy?” Aaron asked, pretending to act normal when the nurse shifted a damped cloth to his thigh.

“Don’t know. Might wait for us next door. You guys find anything interesting?”

The whole team heard his loud voice and Lisa was the one to answer first. Quite shocked at that. Literally and metaphorically. “Last thing I saw was a huge corpse. Next – I woke up in some kind of castle. But the pain and I don’t wanna go through that again. I’ll ask Amy if I can leave.”

Aaron could’ve said, but you can’t, can you? It’s part of the contract. But part of him wanted to just stay quiet and let the situation unfold for itself. The guy beside him seemed unsatisfied by the answer though. Eric snorted, and he could already feel that useless atmosphere floating above Lisa.

Before, she was lively, quite arrogant at that. Now scared shitless. The corpse popping out might be the most favorable situation out of them all. Feed out the weak and bring in the strong. Laurence was the first one to get up but needed help. A few minutes later, Lina and Eric did too. They wanted to leave now, it seemed. Or is it the other way around?

Lisa quickly dashed behind Lina, her head sunk down, clutching ahold of her shirt. Finally, Aaron followed behind. Well, how about that? They did arrive next room. Amy was there, sitting at the desk shuffling through her laptop. She stopped when the glass door slid open, though. Even the wall was made of glass.

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The atmosphere was alive and well. Lovely enough for Amy to receive a good glare from the rest of the team – if she was an M that is. Lisa was the first one to speak. “I want to resign.”

“No.”

That was quick. Lisa definitely tried to be intimidating, but none of it passed Amy. She was like a different person back when she was helping us die. How did they know she was Amy? Her nameplate was lying on her desk, of course.

Amy looked like the happy-go-lucky type of girl. But no, she was mature but her stature was small so was her voice. Which was quite cute if you only listen to her without looking straight into her eyes that strikes authority.

Turning her head to the side, Amy took a good look at Laurence. “You alright my baby boy?”

“Yes, aunt.”

Now she was his Aunt. What a surprise. So, a boss was the one helping us? And a relative of the company at that.

“You’ll go back in two hours,” said Amy. “Until then, ask anything and everything you want to know.”

First, Eric stepped in. He asked why she didn’t tell them everything at the beginning but she only shrugged. There was no more response after that, so they tried another question.

About being the masked woman who helped them though, she answered everything honestly. Might be lying through her teeth, but he still needed reassurance. He was paid to do his job, not ask questions. At least not until his life was on the line.

Few minutes had passed and now Lina was trying to calm Lisa at a corner. Eric seemed to be in deep thought and Laurence was the same. He didn’t know what to do now. Go back in the game and try his best not to die? What an amazing advice. She said it was required for them to survive as much as possible in the other world, but couldn’t she at least… no, take that back. She reminded Aaron how interfering was against the rules, that she only took a detour to avoid the cops and possibly, execution from breaking the contract. Not literally execution, but more like killing her future, which was the same, after all?

Aaron didn't contest anymore and neither did the others. It turns out they had to play the game as much as possible once the Intel was sufficient enough to be gathered in one place for the company to take control. How was this all possible? The one who made the game wasn't a human. It was an intelligent being, probably new species, first of its kind.

An Artificial Intelligence, not surprisingly.

The room was filled with deep thoughts and whatnot, but a shout came from the banging door. It was a man, gasping for breath as he tried to pick up his glasses and put it on.

"You need to go back," Everyone doesn't sound pleased. He looked like a man who wanted to save his son from getting run over by a car. “Now.”