As it turned out, passing through the wavering heat haze wasn’t a pleasant sensation. Jay rushed through the other side, running straight into Casey and knocking the pair of them over. Zenya growled at him, which was a clear warning.

When Lucille stepped through the portal, Casey and Jay were still on the ground. Lucille’s feet were barely a few inches shy of stabbing Jay in the love handles.

“You move fast,” she said. Jay disentangled himself and stood up. Grinning wickedly, Lucille took one of her fingers and put it to her lips. Casey flushed red, looking generally embarrassed, and tried to calm Zenya.

Jay looked around and found they weren’t really in the forest anymore.

Casey looked at him apologetically. “Sorry. I was so surprised I forgot to move out of the way.”

Jay just shrugged it off, scanning the area. He didn’t see any Demons or goblins or Elves or anything like that.

The trio was standing next to the wall of a large camp. The wall was constructed of wood and went as far as Jay could see in either direction. In front of him, inside the wall, were wooden buildings. The construction material was a different kind of wood, not the native Burlen trees. Most of the buildings were large, far too big to be dwellings. The construction was solid, not that Jay would try banging a hammer or axe against them for a real test.

From his street-level vantage point, there were five buildings in view. The camp definitely contained more buildings than five. It looked at least the size of a city block from the curve of the walls. Whether it was a large or small city block would require more investigation.

“There’s no shot we’re alone, is there?” Jay asked. Sarcastically, he added, “Maybe this is some kind of village stuck outside time?”

“I doubt it,” Lucille said, taking him seriously. “Tumultua doesn’t really have much ancient history. There’s just enough to get the game going. Players are supposed to start making history in twenty-seven days when politics opens up.”

“At least, that’s the idea,” she smirked as if she knew something Jay didn’t. She might have known some of Lester’s plans for the political landscape. Jay was forced to contain his own remarks. He was uniquely situated to understand some of Tumultua Online’s ancient history. Unfortunately, he still couldn’t go spreading it around yet.

“Uhm, guys,” Casey said, pointing to a slight goblin they hadn’t noticed. Luckily, it didn’t look like a raider or a scout, but it stared at the three players with wide eyes.

Jay sprung into action, swinging his repeating crossbow around with all the haste he could muster. He blasted two shots from the crossbow. The repeater seemed to manage a shot every quarter second or so. Both bolts hit the goblin in the chest, causing it to slump.

The whole group waited on bated breath for something to happen. The automatic cranking of the crossbow had not been quiet. Jay scanned the area as Lucille and Casey did the same. No goblin heads peeked out as the moments ticked by. There were two possibilities: no one noticed, or nobody wanted the party aware they were being watched.

When nothing horrible manifested, Jay took the time to Catalog his new entry.

“Next time,” Lucille said as he added the creature to his Bestiary, “We should try the bladed weapons. They’re much quieter.”

“Oh, sure,” Jay quipped. “We might as well ask the goblin if it’d like to scream before we kill it.”

“Point taken,” Lucille agreed, “but we should look into another crossbow for you. That repeating crossbow is awesome, but whatever else it might be, it’s not appropriate for a stealth mission.”

Jay nearly slapped himself in the face, realizing the stealth ability from his Bestiary would be exceptionally useful. He couldn't switch to a stealth ability, since Synthesization still had seventy or so hours left on the cooldown.

“Maybe,” he admitted. “It’s a new weapon. I just found out repeating crossbows existed, let alone how to use one properly.”

Lucille let it drop because they hadn’t suffered any real ramifications. Everyone was still exploring their new area. Lucille was looking around, Casey was watching Zenya explore, and Jay was staring at the ground.

He was staring at the dirt with a purpose. He was looking for tracks the party hadn’t already disturbed but wasn’t finding anything interesting. Of course, they were by a wooden wall, inside of a magically transported camp, in the middle of the woods. It was quite possible the goblins didn’t feel like running guards around in circles with the other layers of protection in place.

Jay gave up his search in the dirt to scout through the building. Inside, there were four rooms, each slightly larger than a room inside his apartment. Satisfied with the otherwise empty building, he moved the goblin’s body back inside the building it came from.

The situation was a little messed up, but it would hopefully buy them a few hours to explore. It didn’t come out of a home; the large room seemed to be for storing foodstuffs. Most of the food seemed non-perishable, so it made sense that it was all collected here.

Jay hoped there wasn’t anyone looking around for the goblin. The game labeled it as a goblin citizen. He was surprised to see it listed as a citizen. Although, the area certainly seemed large enough for more than just military use.

While he was gone, Lucille and Casey were whispering animatedly about the strange quest. Nobody would expect saving a dire wolf to involve a magically hidden camp in the middle of the woods. Even with deeper experience in the game, Lucille hadn’t seen or heard of any similar quests.

After Jay completed his task, Zenya took off without a sound, bounding through the grass away from the rest of the party. The timing was exceptional, as if Zenya had been waiting for Jay to finish. Casey quickly fell into an actual panic and sprinted after her new friend.

Lucille met Jay’s eyes before following just behind Casey. He followed them, quickly realizing Zenya was much quieter than everyone else.

Unauthorized reproduction: this story has been taken without approval. Report sightings.

Eventually, the dire wolf pup stopped, hesitating at a small alleyway that led deeper into the town. Zenya looked to Casey for instruction. She shook her head sadly at the small animal, pulling her closer. The pup kept trying to break away, yipping quietly at her companion. As Zenya and Casey tussled for half a minute, Jay and Lucille had no clue what to do.

Eventually, Zenya won the battle with a low growl in her throat.

“Fine, fine,” Casey grunted, relenting and releasing the animal. “We’ll go this way, but we’ll do it properly. Jay and Lucille can decide how we approach the camp.”

She turned to Jay and Lucille, looking for support. They exchanged glances, unsure of the best way to continue through the city. Feeling very silly, Jay knelt down to talk to Zenya. It was a strange feeling, speaking directly to a wolf’s snout while trying to make eye contact.

“Listen, Zenya,” Jay said. “You can lead us wherever you want, but we must go slowly, okay? Door to door.”

The pup watched him intently, leaving him feeling she might actually understand. Jay pointed at each of the doors visible down the short road. “One by one, we need to check them for enemies. Got it?”

He cocked his head, hoping the wolf would understand the confirmation request. Or any of it, really.

Jay waited for confirmation on whether or not Zenya understood. The pup bounded over to the first building as soon as he finished speaking. She sniffed in front of it briefly before continuing on to the next building without going inside.

Jay felt rather silly for trying to negotiate with a wolf.

Weighing his options, Jay decided to check the buildings, even as Zenya left them behind. Rushing into the process, he didn’t stop to plan with the other players. Lucille ended up waiting by the door, though Casey elected to remain in the street, watching Zenya running to and fro.

Jay crept through the building, looking for any signs of goblins inside. The building he moved through was an armory. Goblin spears, swords, and even axes were collected throughout the arsenal.

He was fortunate enough to find a small quiver of twenty goblin arrows. It didn’t hurt to be prepared. Although, he suspected the automatically reloading crossbow would still deal better damage.

Signs of goblins were missing from the armory, which is when Jay realized what Zenya was doing. She was smelling the buildings to see if there were goblins inside.

He walked back outside and found Lucille waiting by the door. Jay whispered to her, “Zenya’s sniffing out any enemies.”

Lucille looked surprised but quickly adjusted. The wolf pup continued down the road. On the left-hand side, she finally stopped in front of the last building in her path. Instead of alerting as she had before, Zenya started to bump her head against the wall, whining desperately. The little wolf looked deeply troubled.

Casey ran to her side, with the others following shortly behind. Expecting enemies, they opened the door slowly, with Jay peeking his repeater crossbow around the corner like a soldier he had seen on television once.

They did not find enemies inside.

The room contained several small cages with a dire wolf in each cage. Zenya ran to a cage and yelped at the depressed wolf inside. The larger caged wolf raised its head, seeing Zenya. It tried to reach its snout through the bars to nuzzle her, but it would not fit. Zenya ran over to Casey and started to circle her legs.

The behavior was obviously dire wolf pup for “fix this.”

Quest Updated: Missing Mother. Zenya, the wolf pup, has located her mother inside the goblin operating base contained in the Ilran forest. Find a way to free Zenya’s mother. Objective 1: Free Zenya’s mother. Bonus Objective: Any additional dire wolves saved and released will deepen Casey’s bond with Zenya. [Recommend Party Size: 5+]

Casey rattled the cage, checking if it was locked. It was. Jay hadn’t expected it to work but agreed it was worth trying.

He felt motivated to protect the wolf cub’s mother. There was obviously something going on between the dire wolves and the goblins. The quest seemed to lead toward figuring out what that was. Jay was interested to learn, even beyond his desire to help Casey and Zenya.

Unfortunately, there wasn’t much to go on in the quest description regarding getting started. The party would need to explore the camp further.

Lucille was standing with her arms crossed in the doorway. Jay approached her, putting a hand on her shoulder. She looked up at him, only realizing his presence at the feel of his touch.

“What’s up with you?” Jay asked, intending to be innocuous about it. Lucille’s face twisted into a scowl. She was still looking at all the dire wolves in cages. This building had ten trapped dire wolves, including Zenyas’s mother.

“I really like animals,” Lucille said. “In the real world, I’ve got a pet rabbit. Wolves would probably try to eat him right up. But something about seeing all these animals caged up seems wrong. I mean, wolves aren’t even food. What does anyone need with a dozen caged dire wolves?”

“Nothing good,” Jay said. “Maybe training them somehow? Or pact magic like you, Casey? The dire wolf with the scouts eagerly jumped to their defense. I didn’t spot any magic collar or anything on the body, so I can’t even imagine how they’re doing it.”

“We’ve gotta stop this weird stuff the goblins are doing,” Casey added, hugging herself tightly. “I don’t like it at all. Such a weird pathway for a quest to take. I just wanted to complete my first contract.”

“It’s just a game,” Lucille said, lacking Casey’s emotional investment in the quest. When Casey’s face fell even further, Lucille quickly added, “Uhhh… but we’ll figure it out.”

Jay was highly interested in the quest. He remembered the quest engine the small studio executive had mentioned in his earlier video research. It seemed like their current quest was part of the dynamic quest engine Tumult Corp. allegedly stole. Based on his gaming experiences, the party would need to explore more of the goblin camp to learn more.

Jay was having fun. The trapped animals were a little weird and realistic since most games simply put them under the goblins’ command. After that, the game wouldn’t explain itself. If it did, a generic quest chain would explain how the goblins were taming wolves.

In Tumultua, a simple ability usage to create an animal companion triggered a time-limited quest to save a dire wolf mother. In the middle of the woods. In a magical goblin camp.

The whole thing was bizarre.

But Jay was enjoying himself. The only thing missing was Sarah. Of course, Sarah would also demand they hunt the goblins who trapped the dire wolves and bring them to extinction.

She was built like that.

“If I know how games are made,” Jay said, pausing to gather attention from Casey and Lucille. “The answers to our problems are deeper inside the camp. We obviously need to explore more for Casey’s quest. Odds are good we learn what’s up with this camp along the way.”

“Agreed,” Lucille said.

“Okay,” Casey said sadly. She was trying to pull Zenya away from the cage. The pup absolutely refused to leave her mother’s side. Casey was muttering a bunch of words about the need to leave and go finish the quest. But the pup wasn’t listening.

Jay thought it was a masterful stroke by whatever quest engine or game master designed the experience. The pup’s fate was tied to the mother’s. If they failed, Casey wouldn’t just lose her companion; she would have truly failed Zenya.

In fact, Jay thought their plan was downright devious.

“Come on, Casey,” Jay said, putting his arm lightly around the young woman and pulling her away from the cages. “The sooner we figure out what’s going on, the sooner we can get Zenya back. We’ll do it. I promise.”

“We will,” Lucille agreed. “We can invite others if we have to. I’ll even forcibly recruit people from the guild if we have to.”

“Why haven’t you invited others already?” Casey asked with genuine curiosity.

“Doesn’t it seem kind of fun to try and handle it on our own?” Lucille asked. “I’m looking forward to seeing their faces when we tell them about it.”

“Sarah will be so mad about this quest when I tell her. I guess that would be fun,” Casey said as she thought about it. She felt better as some anxiety about completing the quest was alleviated. Imagining her friend raging about the wolves raised Casey’s spirits. The party left the building, walking together.

After exiting, they came face-to-face with a patrol of goblin guards. No guards patrolled the walls, but that didn’t mean there were no guards.