Both Jason and Hakeem took shelter in an abandoned cabin. The cabin was close to the only road in this rural area. Jason took a peek through the window and scanned the road for any possible monsters. He didn’t forget to use the night vision goggles, although it wasn’t in high quality at least it got the job done.

Clear.

There was no monster on sight and Jason turned walking back towards the wooden table. He sat down as he saw the sight of Hakeem staring at empty air. He knew Hakeem wasn’t in a daze since the man was probably looking at the blue window. After a few seconds of silence, Hakeem glanced at Jason with his eyebrows arching like an eagle.

“Is this why you changed so much?” Hakeem said.

“Yup. You get how it is, it’s just like a game,” he said while taking out a bottle of water and chugging it down. He was relaxed and unperturbed by the dull occasional explosion coming from a distance. It seemed the Canadian Armed Force was fighting hard against the monsters.

Hakeem fell into silence once more. With his arms crossed over his chest he was still having a hard time processing through all of these impossible events. He was like any rational person in this world but seeing is believing. The man that sat opposite of him showed that this blue thing floating in front of his sight was the real deal. Just a few minutes ago, he saw Jason killed a kobold in front of his very eyes.

A furry beast unlike he had ever seen. A tall wolf humanoid standing tall even taller than him at two meters in height. He himself had no confidence in dealing with a creature like that other than running for his life. Once more, Hakeem glanced at Jason.

“What level are you at?” Hakeem asked. In his younger days, he had experienced playing these types of games. He didn’t ask more questions than needed.

“Nineteen,” Jason replied as he sipped the water bottle in his hand.

“and that werewolf?” Hakeem asked. One thing he needed to know was the level of those monsters. In any game that involves level, fighting something that was beyond your current level was considered stupid unless you have the ability of the top one percent.

“It’s a kobold,” Jason corrected Hakeem.

“A kobold? That freaking huge thing is a kobold?” Hakeem couldn’t believe what he just heard. In his previous gaming experience, the kobold was a small size creature similar to a goblin except they were furry like an Alaskan Malamute. Hakeem got worked up hearing that name as he stood up in place.

“It’s was level thirty-one,” Jason said.

“Thirty one!” Hakeem couldn’t calm down, with this new revelation it only brought him cold sweat. The huge gap in level told him, he would die the moment any monster touch him.

Jason took his time wiping the blood away from his arrows. Out of the fifteen, he shot, two was rendered useless, leaving him with twenty-eight left. The high-quality arrows did a good job as expected from the price that Bryce paid.

“I’ll die, man, if I go out there!” Hakeem shouted out of the blues. Now, he realized how stupid his action had been. He thought since the crack was still far away, he could still persuade this friend of his to turn back but now it was impossible. Since now he knew the truth.

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“Be my guest, I ain’t stopping you,” Jason said.

Hakeem still couldn’t comprehend the nonchalant attitude shown by Jason.

“You could have died man, you’re like level nineteen and there’s a ten-level gap between you and that kobold,” Hakeem said. After he finished that sentence, he realized something was odd. He glanced at Jason with a strong gaze.

“How did you kill it?” he just realized that Jason who was low level managed to kill a stronger level monster.

“With this,” Jason showed him the bow. It wasn’t the best explanation but he sent the message across.

“That doesn’t make any sense and how did you even dodge that last attack? You suddenly disappeared in front of it,” Hakeem was pressed for answers.

Jason's whole body vanished in front of Hakeem’s eyes, the tall man jumped in surprise as his eyes were quivering.

“Jason?” Hakeem said.

“I’m here,” Jason popped out from behind and Hakeem jumped once more in surprise, his hand suddenly swung to the back on reflex.

Jason ducked as he dodged the unexpected slap.

“The FUCK! You scared the hell out of me man, don’t do that. You know I got a weak heart,” said Hakeem as his hand massaged his left chest, calming down the rapid beating of his heart.

“Tone down a bit, you don’t wanna attract any monsters around,” said Jason.

Hakeem immediately on guard as his body went low and his head turned to one side and another. After making sure no monsters were coming, he then sighed out of relief. He glared at Jason.

“Don’t do that,” he pointed at Jason, “and how the hell did you that?”

“It’s an ability,” said Jason.

“Ability? Like in a game?” Hakeem asked for confirmation.

“Yup,” Jason replied.

“Man, this is crazy. This is really crazy,” said Hakeem as his head was shaking from side to side.

“Get a grip, you’re like an All-Star high school basketball athlete. This kind of thing shouldn’t bother you that much,” said Jason.

Hakeem stared at him with annoyance plastered across his face. He didn’t want to retort of how this situation had no relation with him being a basketball athlete.

“So, I’m about to go, you want to follow or what?” Jason asked Hakeem.

“Are you listening to yourself man, I’m like level one. The level one. You really want me to die?” Hakeem exaggerated both in his words and also his motion. Jason understood what Hakeem said, he was expecting more from this athletic friend of his but his reaction was far too different.

At first, he didn’t want to drag anyone else into his mess but with Hakeem already here and experiencing the whole thing. He thought it wasn’t bad if there was another person capable of doing what he could do. The more the merrier.

“A bit of advice, the world is changing and not in a good way. From what I see, those monsters are going to keep coming out from those cracks, and no matter you like it or not, one day they’re going to step in front of your doorstep. It’s either you run back to your home or you stay with me and try to get stronger,” Jason paused for a second before he continued, “Your choice.”

Jason stared at Hakeem who was deep in thought. A few seconds later, Hakeem got up and stood in front of Jason. He got his game face on and Jason could saw it clearly. Jason grinned seeing that this old friend of his had made a decision.

“I need a weapon,” Hakeem said.

Jason handed the fixed blade dagger to Hakeem.

“Try not to lose it, its a gift,” said Jason.

Hakeem grabbed the hilt of the dagger and stared at it with a slight frown. He readied himself for what was about to come.

“Let’s go,” said Hakeem.

Both made their way out of the cabin and walked along the paved road. It was brighter since the moon was out. At least both of them aren’t blinded by the darkness like before. Hakeem followed Jason closely to the back with his eyes kept shifting around all over the place. He was still nervous about all of this.

“By the way, what’s your stats?” Jason asked while keeping his eyes to the front.

“Strength seven, dexterity six, stamina six, both energy and energy resist are zero,” said Hakeem while he hesitated to tell Jason the last one.

Jason sneered listening to those numbers, as he had expected from an athlete. Hakeem’s average base stats were higher than him but he didn’t hear about Hakeem’s agility.

“You forgot about your agility,” said Jason.

“Its one,” Hakeem whispered.

“What?” Jason turned around in surprise. He didn’t expect Hakeem’s agility to be that low. If he remembered correctly, Hakeem was quite a sprinter.

“You’re not lying to me are you?” Jason asked.

Hakeem hesitated as he didn’t want to say it.

“Back in college, I ruptured my Achilles tendon,” said Hakeem.

This wasn’t like Jason expected. He thought he got an agile partner in the making but it was more like a lump of extra baggage.

“Then how did you run just now?” Jason asked.

“It’s painful but I can barely run like I used to,” said Hakeem.

Jason was having a headache, then his senses were tingling. He pulled down the night vision goggle as his vision went green. He turned around in a full circle as he saw what was around him. Multiple gleaming eyes shined under the night vision. They were hidden between the trees readied to ambush the two humans standing on the road.

Hakeem saw Jason’s reaction and he too turned flustered. Looking around, he caught sight of a pair of eyes staring at him within the darkness of the forest. He slapped Jason by the shoulder trying to tell him something. Hakeem didn’t dare speak a word. While on the other hand, Jason grinned as he said.

“Try not to die, we’re being ambushed.”