Despite her exhaustion, Rayna didn’t sleep well. Every time she closed her eyes, a crack of a campfire or the footsteps of one of the other players would jolt her back to wakefulness.

She gave up around dawn, leaving her tent to take a walk around the camp. The morning was quiet, even with the few early birds that flitted about, making food or practicing their combat skills.

They weren’t very good, from what Rayna could tell. They wobbled through the steps and their weapons rarely hit where they wanted them to, but at least they were practicing.

What was Rayna doing?

Kalin Jenka… Who was he? Rayna didn’t know anything about him, but he seemed to know something about her, or at least, he thought he did. He told her to lay low while he got the others.

What ‘others’?

Rayna shook her head. She had far too many questions and no one to answer any of them, which seemed to be a running theme in her life lately. She would get her answers as soon as he returned, all she had to do was wait.

Rayna stopped walking as laughter drifted to her on the morning breeze. A man and woman sparred, one with a sword, the other with a staff. Other players sat nearby, laughing and trading jokes with the sparring pair.

A spark of jealousy lit inside Rayna. Even in all of this, stripped of their home, their lives, their basic necessities, they were smiling and laughing as they worked together to prepare themselves for the challenges ahead.

And Rayna was waiting for a visit from a man that she didn’t even know.

This is stupid.

Rayna returned to her tent, making sure she hadn’t left anything inside, then she moved to Corban’s tent.

“Corban, are you in there?” Rayna whispered, trying not to wake the people sleeping in a tent nearby.

“Nope,” Corban said right next to Rayna’s ear.

She jumped back, slapping Corban on the arm. “Don’t scare me like that!”

Corban rubbed his arm, grimacing. “You were the one sneaking around my tent. What’s up?”

Rayna removed her cloak and tossed it to him. “You want a nicer place to stay?”

Corban caught her cloak, raising an inquisitive eyebrow. “What did you have in mind?”

* * *

Rayna checked on Corban through their party link. His HP was just over half full and he had managed to gain a few levels, it seemed.

Rayna healed him through the party link. It was probably the most useful feature she had found with the party system so far. Unfortunately, whoever designed it hadn’t thought to add a chat.

She leaned over to count the people in line, tucking the edge of her hair under her hat. She traded several monster drops for the beanie, hoping it didn’t look too much like something from Earth. Despite her decision to ignore Kalin's instructions to stay put, there was something about the way he had told her to cover her hair. In any case, glowing hair was probably too easy to spot in a crowded city.

The gate guard wasn’t the same one as the night before, thankfully. This one was a Sisseni, like the guard from the Northern gate that had been nice to her, even though he couldn’t let her in.

“Papersss,” he said in the same hissy voice as the other Sisseni.

“I’m here to apply for them,” Rayna said. “I was told I could do that here.”

The man nodded. “Name, race and level.”

“Rayna, Lerian, Level 25,” Rayna said.

The guard’s eyes flicked up and he tasted the air with his tongue. Without saying anything, he hastily wrote a few words on a piece of paper and handed it to Rayna, shooing her through the gate.

She looked at the paper.

[Rayna — Level 25]

[Lessan]

Rayna frowned. He got the race wrong. Should she—?

She turned back to correct him, but he shook his head, gesturing for her to leave.

Rayna decided not to push her luck. She could correct the error when the line wasn’t quite so long.

Rayna pulled up her map, setting it to track her desired location. As she followed the glowing line on the floor, she tried not to think about her actions from the previous night. The more she thought about it, the sillier she felt. She had thrown a near temper tantrum over something that was clearly just a misunderstanding, and a reasonable one at that.

She couldn’t blame it on tiredness, since she was even more tired than she had been the night before, so she could only conclude that she had been overly sensitive about Amon’s comment about her not being human anymore. She would have to be more careful. She had too many secrets to be so emotional.

As Rayna reached her destination, she steeled herself for what she was about to do. She had hoped to avoid this for a few months, but apparently, she wouldn’t even get to ignore the problem for a full day.

She needed the City Hub, not only as a way in and out of the city, but because it could give her what she needed most: control.

Rayna tried the doorknob. It snapped off before she could even try to open it. Looking around to make sure no one was watching, Rayna took a step back and kicked the door in.

The old wooden door flew off its hinges entirely, slamming into the wall on the other side of the room.

The City Hub was a carbon copy of the one in the mountains, except that everything was falling apart. The chandelier lay in pieces on the floor, the tables and chairs were all missing one or more legs and the front desk was covered in claw marks from some large animal.

Moving to the other side of the room, Rayna found the stairs to the upper floor. They didn’t look structurally sound, and Rayna decided to leave that part of the exploration for later.

There were two other doors, one on the left side of the room and one on the right. Playing Eeny, meeny, miny, moe, Rayna decided to explore the left side first.

The inner door opened much smoother than the front door had, and the inside of the room was in better condition than the lobby, but there were still books strewn all over the floor and a small glass orb that had been knocked off its perch on the desk.

“Well, I have to start somewhere,” Rayna said aloud, rolling up her sleeves. She tidied up the room, placing the books back on the shelves. She didn’t have a broom, so she ignored the thick coating of dust at the moment and focused on putting everything back in order.

It was probably a useless exercise, but it made her feel better about the hovel that she was planning on making her home.

Finally, she placed the glass ball back on its pedestal.

“Who are you?” a hostile voice said from behind Rayna.

She swung around to face the woman. She was young, probably only a few years older than Rayna, with the same horns poking backwards as Amon had, but she didn’t have wings or a tail.

Did the extra features come with age? Or were Amon, Ronari and this new person completely different species?

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“I’m Rayna,” she introduced herself. “And you are?”

“Aila,” the woman said. “Keeper of the Ellis System Hub.” She looked around, a frown marring her brow. “What happened to my hub?”

Rayna wasn’t sure what to tell her exactly. “It’s been a long time since the hubs were active,” she said. “Three thousand years, give or take.”

Aila’s eyes widened. “Three thousand years? Is the System inactive? What happened to the others?”

Rayna didn’t know how to answer the woman’s questions.

“Good work, Rayna,” Ronari said, appearing behind her. “I thought it would take you longer to make your way here.”

Rayna should have told Aila not to contact the System yet. She would have to remember that for future hubs.

She turned around, forcing a smile. “Yeah, I wanted to test out the teleportation feature,” she said truthfully. “I couldn’t do that without a second hub.”

Ronari nodded. “Good idea. Let me just fix this one up for you.”

Rayna frowned. “You can do that?”

Ronari waved her hand, and the hub began repairing itself. Rotting floorboards were replaced with shiny new ones, the chandelier vanished, and a new one appeared to light the room. The tables and chairs all spontaneously fixed themselves and the claw marks vanished from the front desk.

“I thought the System couldn’t make anything from nothing,” Rayna commented, running her hand over one of the new tables to see if it was real.

“It didn’t,” Ronari said. “I just swapped them out with items from storage. There is a limited supply, so if there are many more hubs that are broken down like this, it might require outside help to fix.”

“Ronari, what’s going on?” Aila asked. “This girl is—”

“Helping me,” Ronari slipped in before Aila could finish her sentence. “She is going around to download information and find the System hubs. The information network has broken down and I’m just trying to piece it back together.”

Aila looked from Rayna to Ronari, frowning in confusion.

“Ronari became the Administrator,” Rayna said cheerfully. “I’m just helping out.”

“Don’t belittle your role,” Ronari said as if she was being benevolent. “We all have our own tasks to fulfill in the rebuilding of Ember.”

Aila shot Ronari a look that could curdle milk, but she smoothed her expression before Ronari turned around.

Rayna nodded. “Very true. Very wise… Anyway, I’m actually meeting someone. So, if one of you could point me to where the teleporters are?”

“Through the door over there,” Aila said, not taking her eyes off Ronari. “Just put your hand on the terminal, the System will take care of the rest.”

Rayna thanked her and rushed through the door before anything could pop out of her mouth that she would regret.

“Ronari—” Aila began, her tone cold.

“Not yet,” Ronari hissed. “Wait until she’s gone.”

Rayna rolled her eyes.

The terminal was little more than a pillar in the center of the room with a square metal plate coming off of it.

Rayna laid her palm flat on the plate and a notification popped up.

Please choose a destination.

A list appeared, populated by only a single item: the Caverns and Cave Rats Dungeon Hub.

Rayna selected it and her vision flashed white.

She was confused for a moment, since the room didn’t seem to have changed, then she remembered that the hubs were identical.

Sure enough, when she left the teleportation room, she found Amon in the main area, chatting cheerfully with Corban.

“Rayna,” Amon said. “It’s good to see you again so soon.”

Rayna nodded. “Nice to see you too, Amon. Wish I could stay and chat, but I have somewhere else to be.”

Amon frowned. “Before you go, there’s something I have to tell you.”

Rayna shook her head. “Next time, maybe.” She grabbed Corban and started pulling him toward the teleporters.

“It’s really important. Ronari’s not—”

“I know,” Rayna said.

Amon blinked. “You know?”

“About that, about me, about the System. I have too much to do at the moment. We can have a proper talk later.”

Corban looked from Rayna to the stunned Amon, his brows knit in confusion.

“And you’re just going to let her keep pretending?” Amon asked. “Why?”

“Because if she’s pretending, then she’s not bothering me,” Rayna said. “Keep this quiet, okay?”

Amon hesitated a moment, then he nodded. “Good luck, Rayna. We’ll do what we can to keep things running smoothly.”

“And I’ll see what I can do about the monster problem,” Rayna promised.

Before Amon could say anything else, Rayna dragged Corban through the door and put her hand on the plate. Just before she disappeared, she heard Ronari’s voice in the other room.

Good. That meant she wouldn’t have to see her on the other side.

Aila was waiting for them in the Ellis hub, looking furious.

“Everything said within this hub is confidential,” Rayna said to Aila, startling the woman. “I don’t want Ronari or anyone else hearing about it without my express permission, understood?”

Corban blinked. “What are you—”

“You have my word as a Keeper,” Aila said. “I take it Ronari is mistaken about you?”

Rayna nodded. “I may have given her the impression that I know less than I do. It’s easier to keep her out of my business when she thinks she has everything under control. Did her magic hand wave earlier fix the bedrooms as well?”

Aila nodded. “The hub is in full working order.”

“Good,” Rayna said. “How many rooms do we have to work with?”

“Every hub has a thousand rooms, split into five tiers: bronze, silver, gold, platinum, and diamond. The price of these rooms increases with the tier, starting at five coins a night for the bronze rooms.”

“How many of each room do we have?”

“Six hundred bronze, two hundred silver, one hundred gold, seventy platinum and thirty diamond,” Aila said.

“Perfect.”

Corban shook his head. “All right, someone want to clue me in here?”

“I found a way to house the Chosen without stepping on Ember’s toes,” Rayna said. “Can we waive the fee for a while?”

“We can, but we shouldn’t do so for long,” Aila said.

Rayna frowned. “Is there a reason for that besides capitalism?”

She didn’t want anyone to go homeless just because they couldn’t hunt enough monsters to keep paying the fee. Though five coins was pretty easy to get if you could find a Robi, it still felt like an unnecessary step.

“The coins are not there for the sake of making people pay, but rather, they’re a way to gauge how much energy the System is expending to keep the room open for them,” Aila explained. “If a room costs five coins, that means it took the System five Essence points to maintain. The System uses coins as a way to ensure that it has enough energy to maintain the functions it is offering.”

“I see,” Rayna said. “Leave the fee then. The System gave us all a hundred coins to start, that should keep someone housed for a few weeks while they’re searching for a good source of income.”

A grin spread across Corban’s face.

“What has you smiling?” Rayna asked.

“I figured out what your deal is,” he said. “You’re the Administrator, aren’t you? It’s the only thing that makes sense.”

Rayna lifted an eyebrow. “It took you long enough.”

Corban’s smile faded slightly. “What?”

“I wouldn’t have done all of this in front of you if I wasn’t letting you in on the secret.”

Rayna had thought about it, and her plan wouldn’t work without another person. She needed to travel, and she needed to talk to people. If the events of the previous night were any indication, convincing the humans that she was one of them wasn’t going to work out. So instead, she would have Corban interact with the humans and she would deal with the Emberians.

He wouldn’t have been her first choice, but Ronari stashed Emma somewhere, and Rayna had no idea where Janet or Patty ended up. Corban was pretty much the only human in her vicinity that Rayna had any ties to.

Hopefully, she wouldn’t regret this.

She went and told him everything. Even more than she told Phira, though she planned on filling the Tinkerer in later. She didn’t even keep the stuff about her race secret. She needed him to understand the gravity of the situation.

“Well…” Corban said when she was done. “That isn’t what I expected.”

“It’s been a ride, yes,” Rayna said. “Are you in or out?”

“Do I have a choice?” Corban asked.

“Yes,” Rayna said firmly. “I’m not Ronari. You have a choice, and I won’t threaten to erase your memory if you choose to walk away.”

Corban took a step back. “You can do that?!”

“Yes,” Aila said.

“No,” Rayna corrected.

Aila frowned. “Is the function offline?”

“I disabled it,” Rayna said sharply. “It should never have existed in the first place. The System is a tool, not a god, and it doesn’t have the right to mess with our heads.”

Aila didn’t look happy, but she nodded her acknowledgment. “If you find yourself needing to reverse the decision, I will serve as one of the thirty parties needed to re-enable it.”

“I won’t need it, but thanks.” Rayna turned back to the matter at hand. “So, one more time. Are you in or out?”

Corban hesitated only a moment. “I’m in.”

“Good. I need you to go explain the plan to the people in the tent city and start moving them to the hubs. Don’t try to go through Ellis, use Amon’s hub in the mountains and teleport them here. Also, I don’t think I need to mention it, but I will anyway. Don’t tell them anything about me. Everything you heard today is top secret, okay?”

Corban nodded. “I won’t tell a soul.”

“Aila, can you block anyone from coming in or out of this hub?” Rayna asked.

“Yes,” Aila said. “Is there a particular person you would like to block?”

“Everyone for now,” Rayna said. “Only accept people through the teleporters. No one goes in or out the front entrance except for me.”

Aila nodded. “Understood.”

“I thought this was to sneak us into the city,” Corban said.

“No,” Rayna said. “It’s to get the humans out of the open. I’ve seen what a horde of monsters can do and if anything attacks that shield, it won’t hold for long. This gets them behind a wall without invading the Emberian’s territory. Think of it like an Embassy. This is Earth soil from this point forward.”

“I’ll pass the word to Amon,” Aila said. “Are there any restrictions on his hub?”

“Besides me, only humans in and out for now. Is there a way to enter the dungeon without passing through the hub?”

Aila shook her head. “Yes and no. It acts as a barrier between the dungeon and Ember. The only time an entrance opens elsewhere is during a dungeon break.”

Rayna frowned. That could be problematic. She wasn’t trying to take ownership of the dungeons.

“Then anyone can enter or exit Amon’s hub, but only humans can use the rooms and teleporters,” Rayna decided. “As we open more hubs, we might open rooms up for rent, but for now, we need to take care of everyone out in the open first.”

“I’ll go get people moving, then,” Corban said. “We’ll take the camp from back to front in waves so it’s less obvious.”

“And I’m going to go find my patron and let her know where I’m going. I’m hoping she’ll sponsor my efforts, but if nothing else, I need advice for my First Ascension.”