Excerpt from the Gallahan-Spotter Consensus agreement: Signed by Valerie Nova and Xyraena Gallahan-Virroth in 3004 A.C

Act 1: This document hereby declares the Agreement of Spotters as independent, all judicial and structural decisions fall solely within the Agreement’s preview.

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Act 122: All Spotters, regardless of recognition and rank, shall have equal input into the discourse.

Act 123: If sufficient numbers disagree with decisions made by ranks above, the decisions are null and void.

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Act 200: All Spotters are to be assigned a rank and appropriate work based on them: Guardian, Protector, Primary/Secondary Lead, Boot, Trainee

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Act 579: No more than 13 and no less than 6 Guardians must be assigned and available for duty.

Act 579. Note-1: Each Guardian receives with their rank, the ability to appoint two Protectors with no regard of previous rank and based solely on their own, personal requirements.

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The fields surrounding Nova Vertex sprawl out like a carpet, filled with wheat, sunflowers and canola. I take a look around, the sights paint themselves with a scale unheard of on earth.

An enormous mountain range covers a large part of the horizon, its peaks breaching the clouds, wearing them like a scarf. While moving forward it becomes abundantly clear that the entire area is quite “hilly”. The road dips and rises from time to time, then it flattens out for a while only to dip and rise again.

Moving through the fields is fun but also quite taxing, the constant downhill and uphill of the path feels like a rollercoaster.

- “Hey, Xerra. We’ve been walking for a while now. How far into today's journey are we right now?” - I break the silence. There’s nothing worse than a quiet trip

- “We’re not that far in, I’d say about a quarter of the way there. We’re going to take a break soon to not kill our legs.” - Xerra’s response is sharp, she’s not even looking at me.

After more or less another 30 minutes of walking we take a stop at something of a pre-set location. Seems like it’s a go-to rest spot for people moving on this road. There’s an unlit campfire, surrounded by four half cut logs down their length.

I take a seat, Valerie throws her backpack next to a log and plops down on it, Xerra grabs a waterskin and pours a red liquid from it into some cups she pulled out as well. Wine?

There’s a few minutes of silence as we all drink and eat to replenish our strength. I pull out my sword to inspect it a little bit closer. Xerra and Valerie are looking at me curiously as I eye the blade up and down, checking the edge. It’s sharp, very sharp.

- “Do you know how to use this thing Leshy?” - Valerie asks me with a smirk on her face, supporting her chin on the palm of her hand.

- “There’s not much logic to blades as is, you stick ‘em with the pointy end right?” - I mimic the motion of stabbing something. I should probably give this thing a few practice swings, I have no clue how to actually use this.

After standing up I slash the air a few times, it feels kinda effortless. It’s a strange feeling considering I’ve never swung a sword before.

- “Well, you’re more or less right. Why don’t you spar with Xerra? Let her teach you the ropes?” - Valerie’s suggestion is met with a stare from Xerra.

She takes a few steps away from the campsite and readies her Glaive, pointing it at me… She’s set to go at it. It’s kinda sexy to see a woman of her looks be this feisty.

I take a few steps to the side, clearing the area between us for the sparing.

…Her aura is strong, I ready my blade looking at her. I notice myself avoiding her eyes, she’s intimidating. This is supposed to be a sparring time Xerra… But it feels more like settling a grudge of some sort.

Her form is rigid, her stance is solid and devoid of anything even resembling hesitation. The ground below her is supporting her, almost as if picking her over me. I can feel a tremor in my hands as I ready my blade, it feels heavier than before.

What is happening? It’s not like I can die in my own damn dream, but every single atom in my body is screaming at me to run away right now. I’m scared, not of Xerra but of what she’ll do to me.

- “Fight Leshy…” - Valerie stands up and crosses her arms, you’re telling me to swing at her but I’ll die if I do so.

I look at Xerra standing in front of me, there’s nothing there. No Fear, Joy or even contempt… I don’t exist.

I’ll die if I move… But I have to swing at her, how will I know how to fight if I don’t fight. How do I know if every fight is like this or no.

- “It’s fine to be scared, swing at me boy” - She called me boy… I’m a child about to need a diaper change just by standing in front of this woman and she calls me BOY…

I try to take a step forward… It’s working, my leg moved… Now the other one… A high pitched screech starts to appear in my ears, drowning out all the noise around me.

- “Hit her Leshy!” - Valerie looks at me with some concern on her face now. I have to swing don’t I? You won’t really hurt me Xerra… Right?

I breathe out, you can hear my body tremble in the air exiting my mouth… I position my blade as if to stab her and launch myself at Xerra with all of my willpower… But I’m not going for the stab, I’ll slash at the last moment!

As I close my distance I shift my blade to the side, ready to swing…

As I blink, just before I close my eyes… She’s right there, 10 meters or so away… My eyelids slowly narrow my field of vision, for a short while… there’s nothing but darkness. I continue moving, my resolve now strengthened by the adrenaline pumping through my veins.

My eyelids finish the blink, my eyes lubricated and ready to look her in the eye. They slowly open, revealing her hand not more than an inch away from my face. I can’t finish opening my eyes as her hand grabs onto my face with a force as if an elephant stepped on my head.

I feel her fingers dig into my skin as she pushes me with ease. My sword is already out of my hand, flying away for a journey of its own, disappointed at its owners incompetence.

I’m flying, no ground beneath my feet… It’s quite pleasant, for a little bit.

I can feel her fingers press in more and more into my skull, like she’s trying to pop my head for fun. The air starts whooshing around my head as I feel her slam my head downwards.

By the time my eyes are fully open again, I’m on the ground grasping for air as the force of her slamming me down pushes the air out of my lungs. Her hand firmly grasping my face and her Glaive… Her Glaive is stabbed into the ground where she once stood.

She didn’t even use her weapon… I look her in the eyes before I black out. They’re a volcano, an unstoppable force of nature. I gasp for air a little bit more and pass out soon after.

The aftermath

I look at his limp form under my hand… He’s passed out, weak…

- “How is he supposed to make for a good Spotter if me shoving me gently knocks him out? You should’ve denied him Valerie.” - I look over at Valerie, narrowing my eyes at her.

- “You call that Gently Shoved? Are you out of your mind girl? You were supposed to spar with him, knock him around a bit and show him how to use the weapon he picked. He probably doesn’t even know how to open the blade yet.” - I sparred with him, Valerie… She continues - “While I understand that him interfering with how we do things around Nova Vertex might’ve tipped you off a little bit, it does not give you the right to abuse your own power like that for your own petty grudges!”

Valerie’s words cut quite deep into what’s in my head… I look down at Leshy after taking my hand off his face, blood’s running out of his nose and mouth. He’s alive though, still breathing…

- “He’s eager to be a Spotter and what you did just now is give him enough psychological torment to retire even an experienced Spotter. Think about your actions next time Xerra!” - I can’t respond… I stand up off of Leshy’s body and look at him once more…

I grab onto his hand and waist, lifting him up… He’s heavy, or is it the guilt of what I just did biting into me? Why did I do that… I’m fucking stupid sometimes, you’re an Idiot Xerra.

I take him over to the camp and lie him down in a more comfortable position on the ground.

After setting him down I go to pick up my Glaive…

- “I’m going to take a walk, we’ll rest here for the day…” - I walk off into the field, hoping to clear my head a little bit before I come back to the camp. And since I just knocked out the person I’m supposed to train, there’s no way we can continue walking to reach our original destination.

Back at the camp

The unfamiliar sound of ringing fills my ears as I open my eyes. Above me, the evening sky of Gallahan. I can feel the warmth of the lit campfire next to me.

I lift my body up, it feels sore. Like I just fell from orbit. I feel the back of my head quite a bit and I’m pretty sure I have a concussion.

- “Are you alright Leshy?” - Valerie walks over to me and extends out a hand with an ice cold towel. I immediately press it against the back of my head and let out a long sigh from the nice feeling that sends jolts down my spine.

- “Yeah I’m fine, but… I’m fine” - At that moment I realize that my hands are still trembling a little bit. Not as much as during the sparring, but they are certainly not stable right now. - ”I’m just a little shaken is all.”

- “Well, I’m glad that’s all. She used quite a bit of force there… By quite a bit I mean she’s gone over the line. She’s out for a walk right now to clear her head a little bit.” - Relax? She needs classes if she has anger management issues. - “What’s the problem between you two? Xerra told me about the thief girl you captured and put to justice but I am curious about you. Is there some problem I don’t know about and should be made aware of?”

- “There is no problem, I met Xerra yesterday when I woke… I mean made it into Nova Vertex. Listen, this is all very new and confusing to me. I just got my ass handed to me, and that’s an understatement. I don’t know what her problem is” - I’m not sure why I’m reacting emotionally to this… - “I don’t understand why she would dislike me. I just came here and wanted to do something fun…” - It’s just a dream, why am I panicking like this?

- “Ok, ok. If you say that you’re new here that would explain things… The thief girl Nyxie you captured had it coming for her, but she’s a local ‘favorite’ so to speak. The people living near the market district, including myself, have been helping the girl manage her life and take care of her family. Including letting her steal from a stall undisturbed if that ever happened. I’m not sure what sort of punishment she’ll get, but it won't be pretty…” - I think back to the thief girl and the whole incident, people did seem a bit antagonistic to me.

- “Regardless of anything, stealing is just wrong. Surely there was a better way to help her instead of feeding into her habits” - My remark makes Valerie clearly uncomfortable. Seems it crossed everyone’s mind but nobody wanted to directly involve themselves into the girls business.

There’s a moment of silence. All of this is making zero sense, I need to find out why I’m here and how I can get back. I push my face into my hands and take a long and deep breath. The moment is cut short with the rustling of nearby wheat. I grab my sword and Valerie puts up her hand at me.

- “Relax, it’s me” - A familiar tone, the red mane of Xerra makes itself visible as she exits the field and makes her way to the fire.

She walks over to me and kneels in front of me. I don’t let go of my sword, my hands start to tremble again, but this time I try to hide it as best as I can. Can’t let her see… Why am I even reacting this way?

- “Is your head alright? Let me see.” - She reaches out her hand towards my head. I pull my head away while gripping my sword, as if that’d help me.

- “I’m alright Xerra, it’s fine. I’m all fine” - My voice comes out a whimper.

- “I’m sorry…” - She says under her nose and goes to lie down on her bedroll, gulping down some wine out of the waterskin.

Those are the last words for the day, a simple apology from Xerra. They don’t put me at ease and after turning in for the night I have trouble sleeping again.

No weird dream this time. I was just scared…

Once the next morning comes, I get a quick lesson on getting myself oriented in the local area. Xerra and Valerie point around the map, explaining all the important landmarks. After the short but insightful lesson, we begin our walk, this time we decide that unless absolutely necessary we will not stop at any of the intermediate stops on the way and just b-line it to the destination.

As we walk through the fields, up and down the hills, we reach a nice rhythm. Nobody’s really tired and our pace is quite rapid. Though I get the feeling, these two are slowing down for my sake.

We encounter some more locals on the way carrying grain and straw on hand-pulled carriages. Valerie chats with them a little as we pass each other. Some of the locals are enthusiastic towards me, happy that I decided to become a Spotter.

After 5-6 hours of walking, the sun is slowly falling towards the horizon. The sky turned a nice yellow-pink hue as the colder, evening winds entered the area. I think I recognize some of the forest patches and buildings in the distance from what these two have shown me on the map..

After cresting one of the hills, the road shifts down once more, revealing a stunning little hut in the distance. It’s the destination, we finally reached it! After coming closer to it, the construction is reminiscent of a log hut that’s been insulated.

The outside of the building is covered in mortar, some chunks of it are missing here and there, revealing the wooden logs underneath. There are cutouts for windows on the front of the building as well as the side facing us. The roof is a simple layered cloth, each layer has a gap and the whole thing is lifted slightly over the building, steaming a little, giving the entire building a slight bloom effect.

There’s no front door so to speak, rather there’s a cloth blinder hung at the threshold. The inside is simple and practical, there’s a fireplace at the back wall and in the middle there are some stools and a table, there is no floor with the grass doubling as a carpet.

Settling down is much easier this time around. Mirroring the first camp, Valerie throws her backpack and plops on one of the stools. I pull out my sword and start playing around with it while Xerra lights the fire right away, giving the inside a warm, orange-ish hue.

While I give my sword a few practice swings, Valerie pulls some veggies out of her bag and goes over to a cauldron stuffed in one of the corners, picking it up and taking it over to the fire.

- “Brewing potions?” - I chuckle at Valerie who glances back at me.

- “Didn’t know you could brew food potions.” - She replies, at the same time she starts preparing something to eat.

Xerra comes over to me and crosses her arms. She’s eyeing me up and down, there’s a little bit of unease between us.

- “Leshy, would you mind if I try to show you the ropes of how to fight with that sword?” - She tilts her head looking at my awkward swinging - “I don’t know about fighting but at the very least I’d show you how to swing that thing and how to use it”

- “It’s a sword right? Stick 'em with the pointy end?” - I reiterate my previous statement about how to use a sword. - “Or is there more to it than I’m aware of?”

- “Well, the sword you picked up isn’t for stabbing. Let me show you, hand it over” - She reaches out to me and I hand the sword to her. She swings it around with grace, familiar with the workings of a weapon like this.

With a nod the blade shoots open with a tang sound. Where the fuller once was, there’s now a gap, splitting the double edged sword in half.

- “There we go, I still remember how to do it. Alright, listen up Leshy…” - The lesson starts. I stand up and walk over to Xerra, watching her closely - “This is what’s called a Wave Blade… I’m sure you know what Wave is?” - She raises her eyebrow at me, I nod at her, even though I have no clue what she’s talking about.

All of this means nothing to me, I watch as Xerra explains the workings of the sword and how it all comes together, but none of this shows up in the game or in any writing I’m aware of. I mean, the sword itself isn’t even a thing, we wanted to have quite unique weapons, a sword splitting in the middle is not unique in any way.

- “Anyway, The way this thing works is simple. You shove as much Wave as you can in a short period of time into the groove and swing. The mechanics behind it are complicated so I won’t explain them in detail but by releasing the pressure from the blade you send out a lot of energy towards whatever’s in front of you.” - Her explanation is short and sweet but doesn’t really tell me anything…

- “Wait, so how do I push this Wave into the groove? I’ve never done that before.” - I shrug and Xerra sighs, shaking her head. She then hands me back the sword and puts her hand on my back.

- “Focus. Just, command it to open like moving your finger” - Like moving my finger she says? Do I go super saiyan too when I want it really really badly?

I feel a gentle Wave of heat come off Xerra’s hand on my back as I’m trying to focus on the blade opening. There! The blade splits with a tang sound and the gap appears again.

- “Nice! Well done. Now focus on the Wave, feel it around you and push it into the groove like I explained”

I close my eyes and clench my body, more heat comes off Xerra’s hand almost as if to encourage me to make it happen… But Rome wasn’t built in a day. There is a bit of a tingling sensation, nothing more outside of that.

- “I can’t do it Xerra. I just don’t feel this Wave you’re talking about” - I say to her, sprawling out my arms. Maybe I do feel something, it could be just a fart though.

- “I guess it’s a good moment to stop for today. You got the blade opened on your first try so that’s good. I’m not worried about your progress.” - She slaps my back with the hand she used to help me and walks over to Valerie, pulling two of the stools to the fire and sitting down on one of them.

- “So, what’s going to happen tomorrow? We reached the first point of our quest, surely you have something planned?” - I ask the girls curiously, while they relax by the fire. - “And what are we going to do about food? There’s maybe 4 days of rations in my backpack?” - Food’s been on my mind for a while now.

- “Well” - Xerra begins - “You will be taught some basics of tracking Titanothars, there are ancient tracks around here that are well preserved. We’ll do some sparring again to get you up to speed with just swinging that sword of yours and outside of that, if we have time, maybe some hunting? Rabbits?” - She thinks for a little bit and nods to herself. - “I’ll show you how to set rabbit traps and where to look for them in the wild.”

Sounds like we’re not gonna be going anywhere tomorrow and stay here for the next night. It’s like I’m the main character of a training arc in a Shonen Manga. It’s quite exciting. We chat for a little bit more, drink some of Xerra’s wine and the two ladies teach me some songs Spotters sing when they meet together out in the wild during camps.

After some time Xerra effectively passes out from drinking too much and both me and Valerie decide that it’s a good moment to turn in for the night. Tonight I had a simple dream, a dream that reminded me of something…

It’s been a few days since I fell asleep in front of my computer. I don’t know how much time has really passed but my whole body is telling me that it has indeed been three days.

I worry that maybe I did actually fall in a coma, or that this is what my brain sees before I die? My decisions so far have been based solely on the premise that this isn’t real but… What if it is? Did I get fucking Isekai’d into another world?

If this isn’t real, then my brain is doing a dang good job in making it seem as real as possible. My body still hurts from being demolished by Xerra. But if this IS real then I am in deep trouble. I could die to any beast walking by, that thought terrifies me.

As the next morning comes a familiar sound of cicadas enters my ears. My eyes open and above me just as the last views of my old room fade away a straw roof makes itself visible.

I lift my body up. Strangely it feels light, my head doesn’t hurt anymore either. I have a look around the hut to see Xerra with what seems to be a major league hangover. Valerie is on the other hand tending to her right now, handing her some water.

- “Morning?” - I stand up and take a quick look around the place, there’s Xerra’s waterskin, leaking the remaining wine from its open top. - “Are we going to be good for the day?” - My question is met with Valerie looking at me with a gentle smile. She gives me the thumbs up.

I’m sure she doesn’t want to make noise due to Xerra’s current… Condition.

- “Well, you’ll find me outside, I’m going to try and practice some of that Wave thing to see if I can get it going.” - On my way out, I stop just before exiting the door and look back at Valerie. - “Are there any pointers you can give me? I’m going in blind otherwise”

She takes a moment to think, placing her index on her chin. After a few seconds she stands up and without saying anything spreads out her arms. Almost as if to indicate “everything”. Like how you would ask someone “how much do you love me” and they would just… Spread out their arms in response.

The sun is slowly rising above the horizon and the sky is a nice and warm shade of orange. I look around the area to see if there’s a decently flat spot to train at… If possible, away from prying eyes.

A few hundred meters away there’s a spot I can use. It’s in a lower area as well so I’m not immediately visible to anyone passing by and can focus on myself instead of being paranoid.

Standing in the middle of the open area, giving myself ample space for whatever might come. I pull out my sword and focus on it for a little bit. I try to remember the feeling I had when Xerra helped me pop it open.

A minute passes, my muscles tense up and I focus my entire being into the blade. It’s an extension of my arms, a part of me and I can feel it. It’s right there. With a tang the blade pops open at the fuller, exposing a gap between the two sides as they did before. I keep my eyes closed, focusing even harder on the blade.

My senses strengthen as I keep focusing, the gentle wind brushing against my skin feels like a raging hurricane and the chirping of cicadas turns into a cacophony of noise. My body is filled with the world around me, how it sounds, the pulse of life flows through it and into my body like a Wave of power.

My eyes open. I keep my focus, squash it down, caging it between the bars of my will. Not letting it escape. The intoxicating feeling of unbridled power gushing through my veins is hard to contain.

My body hurts like a bitch right now but it’s nothing compared to how Xerra threw me about… My grip on the sword's hilt tightens. I feel the surge of adrenaline just as Xerra’s voice can be heard from behind me.

- “Why don’t we spar?” - Her voice rings in my ears. Xerra enters my field of view with her Glaive pointed at me.

Her eyes are fierce, a flaming volcano about to erupt. Her presence nearly knocks me down like a massive wave of heat. The muscles in my body tense up... I nod at her and we both take our stance.

Xerra’s perspective…

I take my position and point my weapon right at him. His hands have a slight tremor to them and his legs are visibly shaking.

He’s terrified, no wonder after what I did to him. Now he has to face me again and…. In a strange twist of fate, this is exactly what he needs to learn.

His body must be screaming at him to run, to turn around and run away. But he stands there. His eyes are like a raging tornado, determined to fight. He’s clearly made up his mind but his body didn’t figure it out yet.

My mouth contorts into a smirk… I’m smiling, I can’t help but smile. My blood is pumping, the adrenaline fills my veins like a drug. I can feel my chest pulse as my heart hammers away. I can beat the shit out of him with nothing but a pinky, and yet…

He’s looking right at me.

There’s this thrill you get, when the fight’s more than just a beatdown.

I plant my feet slam the blade of my Glaive onto the ground and point it back at Leshy, inviting him to swing.

- “Swing boy!” - He’s still standing there. I’m going to keep taunting him until he comes at me…

He’s coming… From the right!

I adjust my Glaive to block his blade. A loud tang is heard as our weapons connect, sparks flying all over the place.

There’s a lot of force behind that hit, all this Wave is pushing him into overdrive.

He swings at me again. This time from the top.

He’s very easy to read, but not as slow as I thought. I block his blade with the pole of my Glaive. It’s entirely made of Eruptium which makes a lot of sparks go with every hit.

His blade connects… tang...This one’s even more hefty.

My feet sink into the ground up to my ankles and the soil immediately surrounding us compresses.

He’s going too hard, he’s not aware of how much power a body with Wave can produce.

Still mid block, before the sparks hit the ground I force my right leg out of the ground and slam it into his stomach.

- “Slow!” - His body takes off the ground and flies a few meters back hitting the ground back…

I don’t pursue, instead I decide to back off. It’s important to give some space after pointing out a mistake or misstep.

I look at him slowly composing himself on the ground. Come on Leshy. Get yourself off the ground and face me.

- “Was that look you gave me at the start just for show? You almost had me, ha!” - I taunt him and take my stance, showing my readiness to continue will give him that push I hope.

… That was so fucking corny… I’d run away from me, if I was him. Tang!

Whoa there. I almost didn’t see him… Almost. He tries to stab me in the stomach with the sword as I deflect it to the side.

- “Hold!” - My Glaive slams into the ground with its pole as I let it go and grab Leshy’s wrists and stomp on one of his feet, effectively immobilizing him for the time being.

- “What…?” - His muscles pulse from exertion, several bruises from nothing else but the amount of force sent behind his blows show around his wrists. I wouldn’t be surprised if he cracked some bones in his hands. He looks bewildered that I even had the balls to stop the fight.

- “Sloooooow down. You need to regulate the Wave more. Right now you’re just slamming at me while pumping as much of it into yourself as you can.” - I let go of his wrists and slam him with a left hook. - “And now you’re too slow!”

- “Fuck! First you tell me to slow down and then you smack me. Son of a bitch” - It’s really funny to see this guy so frustrated. He’s been quite… Carefree so to speak.

- “Pay attention!” - My turn Leshy! I launch off the ground, launching myself at Leshy who’s still picking himself back up - “Dodge!”

Pretty sure it’s instinct and my yell. But he dodges out just fine. I slam my Glaive into the ground. The force of my swing creates a gash in the ground where the blade of my Glaive lands. The grass around us is slowly turning from lush green to a warzone.

The other side of the conflict

The weight of the sword is increasing with every swing. My muscles are pulsing with pain with every move as I navigate the fast paced situation I have found myself in.

Tang, our weapons connect again, I’ve never seen this many sparks in a single point of impact in my entire life.

As each hit connects and our weapons clash in a violent dance I can feel the fibers of my muscles shred themselves with the force of the conflict.

Xerra suddenly jumps away from me with a backflip, clearly for flare. She plants her feet into the ground. A shockwave of wind pulses from her body as she positions herself to throw her Glaive.

Her hair begins to wave as if it was weightless, looking more like flames. A bright red glow begins to emanate from Xerra’s eyes.

- “This is how you use Wave…” - In monotone, the words exit her mouth just as she throws her Glaive.

In a fraction of a second, there’s a loud bang heard throughout the area. The area is filled with dust and dirt flying in all directions, following the violent winds caused by Xerra.

I couldn’t dodge in time. Hell, I didn’t even see the thing before it reached me. The dust is thick and I’m having trouble seeing anything further than a meter away from me.

But, it’s right there. I look down and the tip of Xerra’s Glaive is not more than a few inches away from my abdomen, floating in the air.

Maybe she didn’t throw it and is holding it? Waiting for me to swing through the dust?

We stand there locked in a battle of wits. Whoever moves first, falls.

Half a minute passes, no movement from her… But the dust is slowly settling and I can make out a person in the distance. Unmistakable in appearance, Xerra’s still where she was when throwing the Glaive… So how did it stop?

I look back down, my tunnel vision dissipates… And that is when I realized just how far behind I am from those two.

- “Good job Leshy, I think that’s enough training for now” - She’s right there… She wasn’t there before. Valerie is holding the Glaive by its pole.

And there’s smoke coming from where she’s holding the weapon.

She caught it… Not only did she catch it mid flight, she made her way from god knows how far back to standing in front of me in a fraction of a second…

They are both monsters!

I can feel the pupils of my eyes shrink. My eyes go wide from shock at what we did with the area. It’s destroyed, like a cluster bomb fell and said “Fuck this spot specifically”. My body loosens up and my knees give in. I fall back onto my ass, letting go of my sword.

- “Aaaaargh!!!” - The pain that follows is like nothing I’ve ever felt before. Every fiber of my muscles is screaming. The tendons in my arms contract and relax violently, my jugular veins pulse pushing through unbelievable amounts of blood with each heartbeat.

Speaking of the heart, it is SLAMMING against my ribcage right now. I don’t know how close I am to a heart attack but this is as close as I hope to get.

I can’t hold up the weight of my body and crumble onto the ground, occasionally spazzing as my body figures itself out after all the damage I’ve done to it.

- “And that is one of the lessons to learn from today. Focused use of Wave appropriate to the limits of your body. The other lesson was to combat your own fear” - Xerra’s making her way over, spewing her wisdoms at me. Help me not be in pain maybe? Before peptalking me? - “You did well, like Valerie said. Take a short rest, we have some tracking to do in an hour” - In an hour I’ll be passed out from exertion. And she wants me ready?

Fucking monsters I tell you. Ain’t no way they are human in any capacity…

- “Relax Leshy. Are you aware why your body is reacting the way it is to the Wave?” - Valerie holds me under the arm and pats my shoulder a few times.

- “More or less. This body ain’t ready for whatever amount of Wave I pushed into it. “ - I use the word "amount " but I’m still not entirely sure if the Wave is a physical thing. She starts taking me to the log hut.

- “Well, that’s not entirely correct. The wave is not a physical thing, it’s not like you’ve drank too much water and now you have to pee really really badly” - Her explanation comes out calm, but she’s tapping her chin, thinking about how to approach my question. - “But in general, if that’s the way of thinking that makes sense to you, then I think it’s best to keep it that way. Everyone has their own experience with how they use the Wave”

I try to relax, listening to Valerie’s explanation of the Wave. It seems she caught on that I’ve never truly delved into this Wave thing. She goes into some detail while I’m recovering some of my strength at the hut.

Turns out that everyone’s way of presenting their usage of it, is dependent on their personalities, temperament and what they want to do with it at the moment of using it. For example, Xerra’s way of presenting her Wave is fire, fiery things happen around her when she pops off.

And mine? Still figuring it out, it’ll take years for it to take its true shape and nature and until then I should focus on managing its use and making sure my body is ready for the real deal.

- “What about you Valerie? I’m still figuring my stuff out, Xerra is a walking Volcano… What about you?” - She looks at me with an amused look after ask my question.

- “I manipulate Gravity. I can make things light or heavy within an area around me. That includes myself.” - Her tone is playful, making one of the mugs fly up while she explains. Fire is scary, but gravity? This woman controls one of the fundamental forces of nature?

Valerie hands me a water skin, it’s very refreshing water. Probably the best water I’ve drank in my life. There is something to say about pollution on Earth and lack of it here. Things just smell and taste better now that I thought about it. I look over at Valerie who is currently going through her backpack, pulling stuff out and putting it back in.

I’m still grappling with the idea that this might be real, that all of this is now my reality and I have to come to terms with it. For the past decade I sat by computers, clapping away at a keyboard and now I have to fight with a sword in hand because that’s the world I woke up in. I don’t understand.

Once again I shelf the ideas I have for what happened to the back of my head and focus on the fact that I have to be ready, for anything. I look at Valerie once more who is chatting with Xerra.

- “Valerie… Could we use your power to help me train?” - Can we Hyperbolic Time Chamber this stuff? Weight training is not effective in our world. Just hogging down your body with weight doesn’t do anything. It needs to be localized.

But when you think about it. Using just the right “amount” of Wave while training to push my body over the limit and increase my strength with a faster pace than usual could help!

- “Hmmmm. I think so, what do you mean exactly though? What kind of help would we be talking about here” - Valerie breaks away from her conversation with Xerra and tilts her head, tapping her chin.

- “Well. Every day before we sleep, you’d make my weight double to what it is right now. I’d do simple training like push ups, sit ups, etc. Run a few kilometers. And over time you’d increase the weight of my body more and more.” - I slap on my bicep and cross my legs, grinning at her.

- “We could exponentially speed up your training… Sure, I can do that but there’s a limit to how long I can do it for. If you don’t need a week straight of weight increase then sure, we can do it.” - Valerie spins her finger around in the air and tilts her head even more.

We spend a little bit of time chatting about training, what sort of training I should do. Xerra actually offered to join at one point as well. After drinking some more water and taking a bite out of carrots, Xerra kicks my leg and we start making our way out of the hut.

My body hurts like a bitch, the entire lower half is more or less made of jelly beans and my spine feels like it’s going to snap in half. Without any time wasted, we begin making our journey further out. Xerra’s clearly got a direction in mind. Meanwhile Valerie’s making sure I’m walking straight, occasionally catching me by the shoulder when I stumble.

Our journey starts by making our way up a steep hill. As we get closer and closer to the top of it, the angle at which we have to go up increases. It’s a rough time to get up here but not impossible. After employing my arms to help me get up there, grunting and panting. I join Xerra who’s waiting for me and Valerie at the top. Overlooking the area.

- “Here’s how you spot Titanothar tracks Leshy” - She helps me up at the last moment of the climb and turns me around by the shoulder. Pointing at something… She’s pointing at the area around the hut we spent the night in.

It’s visible in the distance, we’ve taken a couple of hours to get here but due to the uphill nature of the walk we didn’t go all that far. I look at the hut and then I start scanning the area around it. Looking for Titanothar tracks.

Oh.

My mouth drops open as the realization hits me. The shed is in the middle of a gargantuan footprint. It’s not apparent at a glance but the whole area where the Shed is, around a 4 or 5 kilometers radius. has sunk a significant amount. This whole area is a crater?!

- “There’s more tracks here, point them out” - Xerra, slaps me on the back and grabs my head from the back, points it at something.There’s more tracks?!

I start looking around, searching for a visible lift in the ground, similar to what the edge of this print looks like.

- “There!” - I point out two more in the distance. - “And there” - There’s more… It makes sense… Something like this should have more than just one leg, this is a “track”, but how are you supposed to notice this?!

- “Good, as you can see. There’s not much to tracking Titanothar prints… They are kinda hard to miss once you see one!” - Xerra slaps my back again with a chuckle. She’s not wrong. There are at least a dozen of those prints all around us. And when you put some logic to it, they probably lead to wherever this behemoth was making its way.

For all intents and purposes, this is a “Track”. She’s right too, the moment one of them became obvious, you can see them everywhere. This entire area is littered with dips and valleys, basins filled with water.

- “It’s also exceedingly hard to miss Titanothars. When the entire ground is shaking violently and animals are running away you’re a little too close at that point” - Xerra starts making her way further down the road, waving me and Valerie to follow her. There can only be speculation about the Titanothar’s true size from my side. If laws of physics apply like they do in my world… These things are something else. We spend the next couple of hours talking about the features you’d notice when stumbling upon a Titanothar’s track. How to determine its freshness and the direction in which the thing was moving.

Xerra also takes me around the fields, showing me how to set up simple rabbit traps and how to spot where they are by looking for poop… Funny. I guess it makes sense though, you gotta eat on the road and carrying a truckload of food is not entirely a smart idea.

By the time we arrive back at the shed it’s already getting dark. We settle down once again for the evening, lighting the fire and making some more food. Xerra once again pulls out the alcohol and we start passing the wine around in turns.

The evening goes about the same as yesterday, Xerra drinks too much, passes out and we end up turning in soon after with Valerie.

I slept well today, actually better than you’d think considering my body’s still screaming in pain… But it feels like a weight was lifted off my shoulders.

Next morning

The cicadas are quieter today, probably because a damn bomb exploded nearby… I mean us, me and Xerra. Anyway, I lift my body which once again is surprising me. It’s like we didn’t fight yesterday, I’m not sure if it’s whatever this Wave is or if my body can take more than I thought.

I look around and surprisingly Xerra has a hangover again… Shocker! I don’t think she’s an alcoholic, so to speak. She doesn’t drink during the day, just before going to sleep.

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Valerie is just like yesterday tending to her, handing her some water and wiping her forehead with a cold towel.

- “Rough morning again huh?” - While getting my gear together, I make an offhand remark at Xerra’s state. - “Have you considered… NOT drinking before sleep?”

- “Shut yer trap…” - Hungover like hell and she’s still scary. Christ… Xerra looks at me with some concern - “Are you alright though? You fucked yourself up with that fight yesterday.”

I see her concern. It’s very clear she’s not just asking because it’s the normal thing to do. She’s a terrible liar, her eyes give it away immediately. She’s worried if the fight yesterday had the same effect on me as her outburst did on the first attempt at a sparring match.

The fight yesterday was… Liberating. She’s still scary and whenever she moves close to me, I tense up. Her presence is not threatening to me and I know that… But I can’t just forget. I sound so stupid when I say that, even to myself…

- “Well, I’m actually doing better than I thought I would. No pain at all today.” - I give her a friendly wink while fastening my belt and sword to my waist.

She’s taken by surprise. My wink must’ve thrown her off…

- “I’m going outside to train some more. Any more pointers before I break my body again?” - With a giggle I ask for more guidance from Valerie and Xerra.

For a second there, they sit and think. Valerie stands up and looks at me. Almost like she’s going to do the whole arm thing again.

- “I’ll go with you, you need to focus on your physical training while trying to use the Wave” - Xerra nods and waves us off with a “I’ll be fine” look on her face.

We make our way to the same spot we sparred at yesterday. Just as yesterday, I position myself in the middle of the open flat area… This time with a little less grass and a bit more hole in the ground going on.

- “Sit down on the ground and try focusing on the wave like you did yesterday, without your weapon this time. Use your body instead” - I follow Valerie’s instructions and take a seat on the grass.

After closing my eyes I begin following the same process as before. This time an additional challenger has joined the chat…

- “Don’t relax Leshy, it might crush you if you do.” - A simple warning that conveys everything I need to know… My clothes turn to lead and I can feel my body in general at least double in weight.

It feels kinda familiar, like home even. Reminding me of the real world and my physical body. It’s not that I doubled in weight, now I just weigh as much as I do normally. It strains my muscles, my back starts feeling a familiar pain. My shoulders slump from the weight of my arms.

It hurts, it’s very uncomfortable… But it feels normal for once.

Maybe because of that I had no trouble focusing on the world around me, it was easy to tune out the familiar strain of being overweight. It does not take me long to find the same place I was in yesterday.

The world around me becomes loud noise, the strands of grass rubbing against each other reverberate in my ears, creating a symphony with the Cicadas joining in soon after. The wind once again, like sandpaper, scrapes against my skin.

The overstimulation from the world around me is followed by the increase of weight lifting. Did Valerie stop using her gravity on me? I move to look behind me, at where Valerie took a seat herself.

I open my eyes, curious as to what she’s doing. Her eyes are laser focused on me with her hand stretched out in my direction. I guess she’s still using her power.

I look around some more, trying not to move too fast and disturb my focus. I think I’m not pulling in too much of this Wave, this feels like a generous “amount” but not as much as yesterday.

I close my eyes and try to pull it back a little bit, using the hypersensitivity as a guide of sorts. The noise becomes more legible bit by bit as I tune my perception to the new feeling. The cicadas and grass are no longer just noise.

After opening my eyes again a tremendous sight fills my vision. Like an all encompassing fog, a gentle aura flows along everything, following its shape. I can “see” rabbits and other small animals move about the field from hundreds of meters away… By “see” I mean more like a “feeling”? I don’t see them physically but I know exactly where they are.

Like the area turned into a spider web and I’m the spider, anything that moves about it is immediately apparent to me… But it’s not just limited to the ground.

I can see the birds circling the area in search of food. The hunger they feel is obvious to me. The fear of the immediate danger that comes off the small animals seeps into me, filling me with the familiar sensation.

I watch as a falcon dives down. It’s mark selected out of all the rabbits jumping around. With a quick snatch, I feel the rabbit's aura disappear and the satisfaction of a successful hunt fills my brain with dopamine.

It’s enough to snap me out of my focus. I suddenly feel the weight of my body again. It catches me off guard and I have to prop myself up with my hands to not fold in on myself like laundry.

Almost as soon as I show my lack of focus the increase in weight lifts and I take a deep breath. I swing around on my butt and face Valerie who’s already making her way over to me.

- “How was it?” - How was it, you ask?

- “Probably the same as it is for everyone when they learn this stuff.” - Scratching the back of my head I stand up and we make our way back into the shed.

Xerra, now looking as if nothing happened before is doing push ups with her armor off. She’s very nonchalant about it in fact… Considering the fact that she’s more or less half naked right now, I can’t help but look away. She’s quite pretty, which adds to the “excitement” of this view.

- “How’d it go? Anything interesting?” - Soon after me and Valerie sit down and start eating some bread, Xerra joins us and starts dressing up into her armor. - “Come on, give me the details”

- “Well, from my perspective he did fine. Didn’t rip himself apart at the very least” - Valerie giggles, I can’t help but feel she’s being serious about the ripping apart. - “You said that it was probably the same as everyone. Anything of note that happened when you were focused?”

- “I’m not sure. I saw or rather felt everything around me. A bird killed a rabbit and I felt both. The fear of being hunted and excitement of a successful hunt.” - Manga and Game logic dictates that people with magical powers can feel other magical powers. That’s why I didn’t think much of it as it happened but..

Valerie gives me the “ooh?” look and Xerra is scratching her chin, thinking deeply about what I said.

- “Could you say that you felt the world around you? How did it present itself? What did you see? Tell us more” - Their curiosity about my experience does not go unnoticed. I’m sure it’s just them trying to help me understand how the Wave works better.

- “Well, if I was to describe it… I felt every individual living thing around me? I knew what it wanted, what it felt and in the case of the rabbit, how it died” - Valerie’s “ooh?” expression turns into a “Huh” expression. - “All around me I could see something like a Fog? I guess I saw the Wave?”

- “I think we figured out the way you present your Wave so to speak” - What are you on about Valerie?

- “Don’t tease me, I’m sure you two are so well attuned to this Wave that you feel a bird flying from several kilometers” - It’s an offhand joke right? They’re probably teasing me for their own amusement at this point.

- “Nope!” - That was the fastest Nope in the west that came out of Xerra’s mouth. - “I can hear and see you. During a battle I can determine where you are based on the ground vibrations and the sound of your armor moving around as you run. But I can’t see a convenient bullseye aura around you or anyone else I’m fighting.“

- “So, what do you think the nature of my wave is?” - I’m genuinely curious now. What was it I saw when focused on the wave?

- “Well. I have no clue… But it’s something to explore” - Explore you say? I might have to plan out how to use and abuse this power then.

We chat a bit more about wave natures and that they can show a lot about a person and what personality they have. Me and Valerie crack some jokes at Xerra’s expense about her hot headedness and impulsive nature.

Valerie then prepares some food and hot tea for dinner. As we’re eating I realize that we have no specific plans for today…

- “So, other than the training in the morning… What are our plans for today?” - I don’t direct this at any specific question but I get an answer from Xerra almost immediately.

- “We spend the rest of the day training you. First we’ll do some physical training and then we’re knock each other around a little bit more. Or rather, Valerie will. It’d be boring if only I swung my weapon at you!” - Xerra gives me an elbow to the side and chuckles a bit.

We chat for a bit longer and set up a physical training regime for the next few weeks.

- “Leave your gear behind, take only your sword, shirt and boots off, only your pants stay on” - Xerra gives me instructions to prepare for the training. I wonder why I would be doing the training half naked, but I don’t question it. It kinda makes sense?

I leave behind my gear, keeping my pants on and carrying the sword outside with me. We walk for a little bit to the same spot we were just training at and I can’t help but note that something’s off. And it shows on Xerra’s and Valerie’s faces as well.

Where once was a battlefield. Filled with holes in the grass and broken ground… There are now stubbles of grass growing. Like an unshaven face, a carpet of short, freshly grown grass covers the places where we did the most damage.

We settle down in the middle of the field and begin my training. Xerra instructs me step by step. Push ups, Sit ups, Running in circles. All of that while Valerie uses her gravity manipulation to make my body heavier. About as heavy as before.

Feeling comfortable, I continue through the training. I sweat and my legs mostly hurt. Especially since I’m not much of a runner, but generally I feel great!

There’s not much more to this, we continue for about 30 minutes before taking a break. Valerie clearly needs a bit of a rest, she’s not tired… At least I don’t think so. But nonetheless, we sit down, drink some water and enjoy the moment of respite.

Next on the menu? Me…

- “Alright buddy, get your shit together. Focus up and make sure you see the aura like you described it before, got it?” - Fair enough, Xerra.

Before I take the moment to focus, I look at Valerie, who is currently putting on… Boxing gloves? Normal gloves? Not sure, but it looks quite rad.

I turn my back to her as to avoid distraction and begin to focus. This time the process is fairly fast. Within seconds I can feel everything around me, just like before. Valerie has stopped her gravity manipulation on me beforehand, so now I have the chance to feel my body with the Wave flowing through me.

The aura is everywhere as well. This ever present fog, not sure if it’s the Wave itself or something else… But it’s a very ethereal view. I look at Xerra, curious if there’s anything strange.

Her aura is very much… larger, significantly larger than any of the animals. I can feel her thoughts and feelings enter my brain.

Concern, Guilt, Grief… Strange feelings coming from someone so upbeat. I decide not to pry or push myself further into what she’s feeling. That’s not the point of this.

Instead, the point of this part of the training is now positioning herself in front of me. Xerra takes a few steps back… then a few more, and more. Several dozen steps more in fact. She’s about 400 meters away right now.

The weight of the air itself shifts around me. This is significantly stronger than what she used before during my training. My shoulders slump and I can feel my muscles and skin being pulled down.

- “Trying to slow me down?” - Let’s take a page from Xerra’s book. - “You’re only going to get me mad, you know?” - How are you going to respond to Valerie?

As much as I’d like her buttons to be pushed, she’s unfazed by my meager taunts. Now that I look at her… She’s in a boxing stance, holding up her guard like Mike Tyson.

I eye her up and down and what catches my attention are her gloves. I take a second to look at them closer… They, of course, are white and mint colored to keep her color scheme going. The part that will most likely hit me is round and smooth, covering her fingers and knuckles.

They also look like they hurt… A lot! On the other hand she looks very, very funny… Those gloves are easily 3 sizes too big, for her size. Imagine a hobbit trying to wear Michael Jordan’s shoes… Like that but with gloves.

She looks so… not threatening.

- “Don’t get mad when I’ll hurt you…” - Oh I’m aware… I know that she could fuck me up with nothing but her pinky if she wanted to. That doesn’t mean I can’t have some fun

There’s something I forgot about when using my newfound ability. I can feel what others feel if I focus on them. And I would mention that with Valerie, but there’s nothing to mention… It’s like she’s completely empty right now.

No anger, fear, guilt, excitement, nothing. Her mind is as clear as it can possibly be. It’s kind scary.

I don’t know if I anticipated her attack more than I thought… Or if my instincts just kicked in. It felt more natural than sparring with Xerra.

Valerie’s fist flew right above my head, barely brushing against my hair as I duck down. I can feel the pressure in the air from her punch. That punch would knock me out, I’m 100% positive.

I jump back a few paces, making some space again. It’s futile, I know that… But I can’t just sit in her face and hope to survive. This isn’t like the fight with Xerra, I’m calm and Valerie…

- “Wouldn’t hurt me?” - Huh? - “Are you sure about that?” - She read my mind? Is there something about the wave she isn’t telling me yet? Maybe her nature… but she controls gravity. I feel her increasing my weight even now.

Did I say it out loud? I look at Xerra, she’s just smirking right now. She pities me?

This fight just got a bit more complicated… I can’t read her at all. She is currently in my head somehow.

- “Whatever you can think of, I already thought about you doing it.” - The fuck is she saying, there’s no way… She’s just trying to get in my head.

I have to swing. My blade at the ready I close the distance.

The enormous sword wooshes through the air towards Valerie. It’s so close to hitting her before getting blocked by her left hand… Rather, the glove on said hand.

The sword slams into the ground, adding to the already present wounds of my last sparring in this field.

You’d think that insight into her mind would help me fight Valerie… But she’s blanking on me. There’s no indication as to what she wants to do next.

Her right fist slams into my side. I use my sword's blade to keep balance as I slide away a few meters from her.

I have to figure out a way to predict her next move.

- “Having troubles reading me?” - Is she really using taunts against me now? Not fair! That was my tactic… It failed, but it was my tactic!

- “Not at all Valerie…” - Her aura is strong, there’s clear differences in its “size” between Valerie, Xerra and any of the animals around.

Tang! I slash my blade at her with as much force as I can. She’s completely unfazed and looks very… unamused by this fight.

I take a pause and think for a bit, if there’s anything like a tell in how she fights. She’s been blocking my blades like they weigh nothing.

Nothing? Tang! She’s on the offensive now. Almost lost my ear to her fist flying by.

Every time she swings at me the air pressure behind the punches gives away how much force is behind them.

I think I have a plan…

Valerie’s perspective…

Phew, he’s got some brain, this one. Unlike his fight of passion with Xerra he’s carefully considering things.

Normally I should just smack him around but I want to let him get used to thinking in a fight. It’s crucial for him.

Oh? He’s looking at his blade, I think he figured it out. Let's taunt him some more.

- “Listen, you can always walk off. There’s no shame in taking care of your own body!” - He’s either going to chicken out or stand his ground knowing he’s about to get his ass whooped.

What are you going to do now Leshy? Rush me? Try to disorient me? I want to see some… Creativity.

Here he comes. He’s holding his sword backwards, the blade pointing downwards and its hilt towards me. Let’s see what this is about.

Leshy’s winding up as if to throw the sword like a spear… Needless to say, he chucks it at me with quite a heft behind it.

Wrong choice friend, you forgot I can manipulate gravity. I put up my guard and make the sword as light as a feather, just like before.

Blocking something so light requires no amount of strength. A baby could catch this thing. It flies off high into the sky as I parry it with my gauntlets.

…! What?!

- “Gotcha!” - He’s right in front of me, must’ve pushed himself a bit more to get close to me. Look at that smirk, I’ll let him have this one.

His fist slams into my stomach with quite some umpf behind it. I lighten myself and fly backwards from the impact.

On one hand I want to show him how it feels to have the upper hand and on the other I have to absorb the impact. There’s no need for me to take unnecessary punishment.

I land softly on the ground, light as a feather. Now here’s the question, do I now beat him down to show perspective? Or do I let him “win” for the sake of building confidence?

He already had his ass handed to him by Xerra… Twice, but I fear that letting him off the hook easily will make him overconfident and he’ll start underestimating everything…

Sorry Leshy… The sword bites the ground, the blade sinking halfway into the soil right in front of Leshy.

He grabs the weapon and dashes right at me… Overconfident, no good yet.

I hold my position and plant my feet, in the corner of my eye I see Xerra jump away a few dozen meters more. She knows, but Leshy doesn’t.

I let him get real close. I wait for him to be in the middle of a push towards me when both of his feet are off the ground.

The air around us starts trembling. With every passing microsecond the weight of everything around me goes up…

3… 4… 5… Times.

Leshy instantly slams into the ground with a loud thud. Struggling to keep himself from getting squashed by his own weight.

The increase of gravity around distorts the air, creating a hazing effect all around us, shifting and snaking our vision around.

Vegetation in a 30 meter radius turns into a carpet, planted flat onto the ground, any dust that was up in the air is now firmly on the ground.

He’s trying to stand up, struggling with all his power, gasping and grunting… I’m sorry Leshy but you’re staying down until I allow that to happen now.

Leshy’s perspective…

I am now on the surface of saturn. Slammed against the core of the planet, struggling to get up… I’m of course being poetic, but that doesn’t change the fact that I’m fucked.

That throw was such a good Idea too…

I try to look around but my movements are quite… Restricted right now, not like I have a choice but to take a nap on the ground. The whole ground is shaking, the air feels like a lead blanket and maintaining focus on the Wave is becoming hard.

I shift my head to see what Valerie is doing now… Like nothing, she stands there, her guard gone and mind still a blank slate.

But her eyes tell a different story, there’s care in them. She’s doing what she has to do…

- “What is the lesson to learn from this?” - She walks over to me, like the world around is normal and not crumbling under its own weight. - “What, is the lesson, to learn from this… Leshy.” - Her tone is cold, simple. Very plain compared to how warm she sounds normally.

I struggle to breathe, sweat building up on my body as my muscles struggle to hold up their own heft. It doesn’t end here…

My body begins to slowly sink into the soil, its weight… or rather the gravity around me increasing even more. The struggle to move my head and look at Valerie right in front of me is hard, but I’m able to look at her boots at the very least.

How do I get out of this? Do I just let it flow and deal with my body later? But what would be the point of overdoing it just to get fucked by ripped muscles and broken bones.

But I have to do something…

- “There were 3 lessons in this training. First, you learned how to think and act based on the information you gathered” - Lessons? We’re just kicking each other around to get used to fighting. - “Second, you felt how good it is to land a hit on someone who’s far beyond your league.” - I give you that Valerie, it felt really nice…

- “Third… No matter how strong you think you are, you’re never strong enough.” - …!

For the whole fight she made sure to stay calm and clear headed. Didn’t give me anything to work with knowing that I can “feel” emotions.

There’s one very clear thing I feel from her right now and it’s not good. Her blood lust is filling the entire valley where our fight is taking place.

My mouth fills with a metallic taste. I’m drowning in her need for violence and blood. She’s like a vicious animal, a hungry wolf ready to eat me alive.

I’ve lost this one… Fuck!

Valerie slowly lifts her influence over the area, her blood lust goes away as if nothing happened. She’s back to her empty, calm self. If there’s one lesson to learn, it’s that I have no comparison to those two.

- “I’m not going to lie, you’re very, very scary Valerie” - There are bruises on my chest, shoulders and anything that was facing the ground when she forced everything down.

She walks over to me and reaches out her hand to help me get up. I take her up on the offer, I just got my ass handed to me and there’s no way I’m saving face by acting tough now.

I relax, make sure to release my focus on the Wave gradually and not give myself any shock. I don’t know if there is a shock for dropping it too fast but, better safe than sorry.

- “So, how did I do? Do I get bonus points for landing a hit on you?” - Valerie just smiles at me and pats her clothes down to beat out the dust.

- “Don’t flatter yourself boy. She let you hit her. Haahaa!” - Xerra walks by slapping her hip, laughing at my naivety.

The place looks like a wreck again, but it was fun. I scratch the back of my head a little bit and make my way back into the shed, following the girls inside. I’m pretty sure we still have more than half a day left to do stuff. I wonder if these two have something planned in advance.

- “So? What’s the plan for the rest of the day? Surely we’re not stopping right now?” - Xerra and Valerie have a strange look on their faces, like a strange mix of Anxiety and Anger. Did they have an argument or something today?

- “We do not have a plan for the rest of the day. Valerie thinks we should take you for a real hunt.” - Hunting a real Titanothar? This soon? We’re really going off script here! - “But I personally think you’re not ready.”

- “You don’t think he’s ready because you feel bad for giving him trauma and a head injury. Now you’re overprotective Xerra.” - Those are some strong words. I feel like I should not be here right now.

- “You have no right to bring this up in front of him… That is for me to deal with. He’s not ready, he doesn’t even know how to fight for real yet.” - Xerra is very animated. Normally she’s a stiff tree trunk when talking but now she’s throwing hands around. It’s like I’m the third wheel of an argument between a married couple.

- “He hit me during the fight, there are very few people alive that can say that” - Wasn’t that because you let me Xerra?

- “One: You let him land it, Two: You proceeded to turn him into people soup a few seconds later” - I’m going to have to step in and get this thing on track. They’re not making any sense right now.

- “So what, he needs to understand victory as well. Our job is to make sure he’s prepared for the everyday life of a Spotter. He has clearly no clue what’s coming and we HAVE to show him.” - In game lore, Spotters only spot. They never did anything but that. That’s the whole premise of the game, the weapons are for self defense. So what are they on about?

- “What is going on?! I need you two to slow down and explain this conversation, because right now you two are just yelling at each other.” - That should put it on track.

Xerra crosses her arms and rolls her eyes. Valerie walks up to me, she looks a little concerned.

- “We need you to hunt a Ludocanis Malus with us.” - What. Is. That? - “They are very, very dangerous to anyone under the age of 10, hunt in packs and… Well, you’ll hear it when we track some down.”

- “And why do you think I shouldn’t do it Xerra? Is this beast so dangerous that you are worried I can’t take it on?” - Xerra looks at me with narrow eyes, thinking about my words for a little bit.

- “I think you’ll do fine, at least physically. I’m just not sure what will happen to your sanity after seeing them this soon into the job.” - Those things cannot be that dangerous right? It's the tutorial. We’re supposed to hunt a fake Titanothar and understand our weapons a little bit.

- “I want to do it. You say I can handle myself and Valerie thinks it’s the right next step. Why would we avoid it?” - I’m not going to lie. Thinking of fighting something this dangerous makes me excited. - “What is this Ludocanis Malus? What more can you tell me about it?”

- “Without giving too much away for the sake of a learning experience, all I’m going to say is…” - Valerie thinks for a little bit, tapping her index finger on the chin - “...Don’t think about what that thing eats. It’s not worth the lack of sleep”

- “Fine, you don’t want to share too much with me. But at least give me something to go with here.” - The information right now is: It’s scary, eats something you don’t want to think about and realizing what it is will make you lose sleep. Sounds like a horror story.

After that short but heated exchange, we all agree that the best course of action is to at least find a pack of those things. We’ll decide on the spot if we want to pursue combat or not.

We scramble around, maintain our weapons after the battle. I put on my gear… Can’t be chilling topless in front of two ladies. This time Xerra prepares some food. It’s… Spartan? A bowl of rice with some rabbit meat from the traps we set up. It’s good, don’t get me wrong. Delicious even. It’s just very simple.

All of us finish our meals and the drinking begins. We start chatting about the fight, going into some detail about my ability to sense things. We came to the conclusion that the reason I cannot feel Valerie’s thoughts, comes from the fact that she’s just good at keeping herself in check during a fight. Basically it’s just experience showing itself.

I take a look at my hands, they’re covered in bruises, my knuckles are red from scratches and punches. It’s weird looking at my hands like that. My real body never really worked in that way. I mean it never worked hard labor to give it those bruises and marks of physical exertion.

I glance over at Xerra’s and Valerie’s hands, they look flawless. They must be taking good care of them huh. Repeated exertion toughens up the skin and prevents further damage.

- “So, you two. How did you meet?” - Let’s see if I can maybe gain some insight into them. See how they match with the backstory we have set in game.

- “Well, do you want to tell the story or do you want me to do that?” - Valerie asks Xerra.

- “You do it, you’re better at it” - Xerra seems a bit uninterested. Or stressed about the story, one of those.

- “Alright. So, the story is actually not that complicated or interesting. Before we… I established the modern system for managing Spotters. We were all kind of disjointed. We each did our own thing and gathered the bounty for finding any information about Titanothars. That was a couple of decades ago so you might not actually know this. I’m quite an important lady” - She’s not being facetious. Valerie swings her hips left and right playfully, acting like a caricature of a noblewoman

- “Anyway! One of those days I stumbled upon a Titanothar track, massive footsteps. Biggest I’ve seen.” - I don’t know how serious I should be taking Valerie at this point but Xerra is chuckling. So at least part of it is true. - “Way in the distance I hear loud bangs and a bunch of dust columns. Sooo, like any respectable spotter I follow the loud noises!”

Bangs, dust, loud noises… I think I know where we’re going with this.

- “After catching up to the noise “ - Valerie dramatically poses with her hands stretched forward - “THERE she is! Feral, angry. Originally I thought she lost her shit and went berserk, but it turns out… Xerra doesn’t have a ‘past’ so to speak” - Different backstory: Check. - “She was naked, only holding that Glaive of hers, swinging it around wildly, hitting anything nearby. I’m not going to go into detail here but I had to basically beat the shit out of her until she passed out. Then a lot more other stuff happened that is not part of this story and there she is.”

No backstory, feral, lost herself somehow. Xerra’s a blank slate who found a new life as a spotter huh. I would inquire further but it’s not really my business, at least not until it becomes relevant to our travels somehow.

- “What about you Leshy? How’d you end up here?” - I knew that question’s going to come sooner or later. I have in fact planned out the response to this.

- “Well. I come from Farth, it’s a small town on the coast of Gallahan and the Northern Kingdoms…” - Eleanor's backstory is going to do well here. I know some things about this world. - “...When I was young I had the privilege of seeing a Titanothar from far away. Ever since then I wanted to become one. I was directed to come to Nova Vertex to sign up since you provide basic training for people like me.” - Valerie’s giving me the ‘Hmmm’ face again. She’s deep in thought listening to what I have to say. - “A little bit into my travels I’ve ended up in Malak, you should know the place. It’s not that far from Nova Vertex” - Xerra’s looking at me with narrow eyes.

The tension is rising in the air. I talk a bit more about my backstory to them. All the while this whole interaction feels a little bit like a scene from a movie I watched a while back… Where the spy gave himself away with a simple gesture of showing the wrong three fingers.

- “Interesting. Your background sounds similar to someone I’ve met a Long time ago” - What? Valerie met Eleanor? I guess it would make sense if this world is based on the specific playthrough I ran… But that doesn’t explain how she would know Eleanors backstory.

There’s a short time of silence, not too long. Just long enough for it to become a little awkward…

- “Well, let's focus on our next task, which is locating a pack of Ludocanis and exterminating them.” - Right, Valerie puts the conversation back onto the main topic. Scary dog, gotta kill it.

- “Where would you start looking, Leshy? What would be the first step?” - Xerra’s asking me this, means that I’ll probably be on my own for most of this.

- “Well… First I’d have to know how the animal presents itself when hunting.” - That’s right, I don’t have enough information to even begin asking questions. - “Next I would probably talk to the locals if they noticed the animal”

- “Good. Let's go for a walk.” - Valerie and Xerra both stand up and take their gear. - “Take everything, we won’t be returning here”

I pack my things up and follow the ladies outside. We’ve talked for a little bit so the time is now closer to evening and the sun is already projecting a nice orange-yellow hue onto the sky.

- “Where’s our next stop?” - I have to satiate my curiosity here. We’ve just kinda up and left without really explaining anything to me. I don’t like when things are unplanned, it throws me off my rhythm.

- “We’re going to camp outside of a local area where some farmers live with their families.” - Alright, so we’re doing a stake out. Hunting the hunters so to speak. - “We’ve received a report about a possible pack of Ludocanis roaming around their homestead.”

Valerie explains the report to me in some detail. Apparently a pack of the things we’re hunting was spotted a while back in this area. No specifics as to how many were available.

According to what Valerie told me, Ludocanis Malus is in the middle of the food chain, above wild dogs but below anything larger than itself. Their hunting tactics are dangerous and they mostly target younger representatives of whatever they are currently hunting.

I tried asking as we made our way to the homestead about more details, but both Valerie and Xerra said that the best way to understand how they work is to figure it out on my own.

The trip doesn’t take too long. On our way we meet one of the farmers that reported the pack. They looked visibly concerned about Ludocanis’s presence. Valerie did what Valerie does best, made sure they feel safe now that Spotters are dealing with it.

The sun is just about to hit the horizon. We find a place to camp out and set the location up. We prop up a simple tent with two sleeping mats inside. When I try to set up a campfire Xerra intervenes saying “No light, it scares away anything roaming at night”. We have to function in a complete blackout for the time being to not scare away our target.

- “Leshy. Do you think you can figure out a way to find our target without interviewing the locals?”

- “What do you mean Xerra? Is it not better to gather information from the locals?” - You’d generally try to gather as much information about what you’re looking for before even attempting to hunt it.

- “Not exactly. Part of our work revolves around making sure the locals feel safe, Leshy.” - Okay, I understand that Valerie. But showing our presence should be considered a show of force.

- “Alright then. If It’s preferable not to directly interact with the local population then I’d search the area. Wait!” - I just got an Idea! - “My Wave, we could use that to feel out any animals in the immediate area. I’m not sure if I would be able to reach far enough to notice them though.”

- “Well then, you better get to work Leshy.” - Xerra sends a wink my way.

The sky is now mostly dark and the area is shrouded in a nice veil of darkness, hiding our presence quite well. I sit down in a meditative pose and focus.

Making sure to tune out everything I don’t need, I open my eyes and take a look around, the familiar aura covers the area. I can feel every living being around me… But I don’t need them, I only have to figure out where the Ludocanis is.

One way I could go about this is by tuning out everything familiar to me, which are local critters, bunnies, birds, and humans. That leaves only a few things in my “field of view”. I can feel the range of my ability increase as I tune each one of those things out. Now, how do I determine which is Ludocanis… What sort of feeling would I get from a middle of the food chain beast?

It seems like an opportunistic hunter, ambushes are probably its way of getting food. The adaptation of hunting in packs indicates an alpha male or female of sorts to lead the pack. Let’s focus on that.

I close my eyes again and tune out more and more of things I don’t need. The grass, trees, bushes. I don’t need any of those. After opening my eyes again, most of the aura is gone and only a few spots are visibly highlighted.

- “What do you see?” - Valerie's curiosity is charming, but I have to focus.

- “Shush” - That’s all I can say without losing my grip on the Wave

There are multiple single targets all around us, considering that I’m searching for a pack means those are not what I’m looking for. A little bit further out there is also a massive aura, it’s rapidly moving away from us and after a few seconds it’s gone. I wonder what that was.

…! There, I think I got it. There’s a large group of animals about a kilometer away from us. They are not moving around too much and there is a clear “alpha” with a much bigger feeling around them.

But that’s not all, they are all hungry. Probably because of the distance my sense is blurry but I can feel their hunger and anticipation. I sit there for a little bit, memorizing the direction where I’m feeling them from.

Just like before, I slowly drop my focus and breathe out to calm myself a little bit.

- “There, about a kilometer away I found a group of animals that were hungry. I felt clear anticipation from them but everything else was muddled.” - I point with my finger in the direction I saw them. - “Turns out that if I tune out the things I don’t need, my range increases but the fidelity of the feeling and connection drops the further away I look.”

I have to make sure Xerra knows I’m ready. Explaining this revelation should show her that I’m moving forward with my training.

- “Alright, lets keep the camp open and move closer to that group” - Xerra and Valerie stand up, stretch and prepare their weapons. - “Be ready Leshy”

I follow their lead and keep my sword at the ready.

It’s very dark outside right now. I can barely see more than a hundred meters ahead of me and unlike the road, we’re walking on a field. The ground is uneven and it’s easy to stumble and trip. I have to carefully watch my step as we move towards the direction where I sensed the pack of animals.

I can feel the sticks and grass rustle beneath my boots with each step. The cicadas are quiet, the world around us has ceased to produce any noise with the occasional gust of wind brushing the grassy fields around us.

After only a couple hundred meters I begin hearing the occasional laughter of a child. First it was just a chuckle here and there but as we move closer and closer… It sounds like a group of children playing. Did I get it wrong? Are we about to walk onto some kids camping, scaring them to death?

- “Sounds like it’s just some kids. We should turn back and wait some more” - My opinion is met with a very strong look of disapproval from both Valerie and Xerra. They’re breathing heavily through their nose and a silent clatter is heard from Xerra’s armor.

- “No.” - Valerie takes a deep breath before continuing - “We’re moving forward”

I’m not really sure what I’m going into. So far everything tells me we’re going to kill some wild dogs. Looking at the combat skills of this body, I’m rather confident that I can take whatever it is.

Xerra and Valerie are also with me, nothing can go wrong. We’re as good as done with this. The playful sounds of kids playing around are now no more than a couple hundred meters away from us. I look around for signs of human activity, a campfire, people walking around, anything.

Unfortunately nothing like that shows up in my field of view. Xerra kneels down with Valerie and they turn towards me.

There are these moments in your life, you were either a part of them or heard about them from others. Those moments where you are with someone so much more experienced than you, that you believe they can make no mistake. That they have prepared a plan for everything.

But then when the big show happens, they show cracks and holes in their experience. I feel like I’m underestimating the issue we’re dealing with right now. Like I’m underprepared in every way. The look, I’m getting from the two ladies who are supposed to be the authority for me to follow is telling me everything I need to know.

“I am not prepared”

I can’t let this collapse on me though. We have work to do, regardless of what the work ends up being. We slowly continue moving in the direction of the playful sounds.

- “Focus up Leshy. We’ll support you and take care of the small fry, you take out the alpha” - Xerra sounds tense, her posture tells me she’s apprehensive about what’s to come.

I follow Xerra’s instructions and begin focusing on the Wave. Making sure that the only things I see and feel are the beasts from the pack we’re hunting. A gentle mist forms right where our targets are. They are very close, somehow we were able to sneak up on them.

- “Valerie will give the signal, we’ll jump in on her mark and start fucking them up” - Xerra’s whisper is louder than you’d expect, but not loud enough to disturb our mark.

I crouch down and look carefully in the direction of the pack, the playful sounds are clearly coming from them… They’re imitating children, it’s terrifying.

Valerie lifts her hand and makes a chopping motion. That’s the signal.

Me and Valerie immediately slam on the gas and speed towards the pack. In a fraction of a second Valerie takes out two of the smaller ones with one blow and without hesitating continues on her rampage.

I look around searching for my target, there it is. It’s huge, while the ones that Xerra is fighting are no bigger than a German Shepherd, this guy’s the real deal.

It’s easily 3 times as tall, its paws are the size of my head and each finger ends in a razor sharp claw. This monstrosity has 4 tails and a very thin waistline. At first glance I thought the fur moves on its own, but that’s not it. It’s not fur, it looks like maggots covering the beast's body. Writhing around, pulsing like a wave.

The laughter stops with the beginning of our assault, Xerra and Valerie are slowly clearing out the small fry, the ground gets soaked in their blood. It’s my turn to fight.

The alpha snarls at me, brandishing its teeth. This feels familiar, my body is screaming at me that I should run. If I’d let them, I’m sure my legs would just turn me around and walk the other way as fast as possible.

But I can’t do that, not today. Sweat begins to build up on my face and neck as I aim my sword at the monstrosity. There are two things I feel from it right now. It’s “Food” and “Kill”, but… that doesn’t truly put into perspective this feeling. It’s Primal, it’s coded into this thing. This isn’t hate or just hunger. This is what it needs on the most basic of levels.

It has no remorse, it has no feelings. It just needs to kill and then eat the kill.

I blast off the ground, a wave of dust leaves the area I was standing at as I fly through the air, towards the beast. Slash, I cut it! A spray of blood coats the ground. There’s a massive gash where my blade hit.

I dodge as one of its tails takes a swing at me. “Shit!” It’s trying to herd me into its mouth. The putrid smell coming from his throat makes me gag.

I can’t dodge this one and my sword is too far away for me to reliably put it in between me and its teeth. There’s no other choice, I have to block it another way.

After clenching my teeth, to not bite off my tongue I move my left arm in the way of the bite. I make it sound like this is planned but, it’s all instinct. I just did it to protect myself…

Time passes in slow motion during moments of extreme pressure and stress… but when pain is involved, time almost stops. I feel every single tooth that enters my arm. I can feel how the muscle gets slowly ripped away from bone and my tendons snap from the force of the bite. My upper arm gets clenched by the beast’s jaw.

Once it has a good grip on me I can feel my legs leaving the safety of the ground, I’m flying through the air now with my arm bleeding like a motherfucker. Luckily I’m able to catch myself on the landing with my legs and the sword.

My left arm has no feeling and is dangling around like a Christmas tree decoration. I take a glance at it from my own morbid curiosity, blood is flowing out of it like from a half open water tap. I try to clench my fist but it’s no use, the arm’s gone.

Unfortunately, there’s not enough time for me to satiate my interest in the wounds. It’s coming, and it is much faster than expected. Adrenaline is pumping through my veins as my heart slams against my ribcage.

I have to get it, I can’t be acting all tough and ready and not finish the job. It’s running at me full speed; 10 Meters, 5 Meters… The monster only thinks about the kill right now, it wants to finish me off and move on to its next target.

Valerie and Xerra are both finished with their part of the job, getting ready to pounce from each side of the beast. I bite my lip and turn around. There’s no shame in what I’m about to do. I look at where the best direction to run is, considering Valerie’s and Xerra’s current location around me.

I book it right between the two partners. Full speed, as fast as my legs allow me to… Right as I reach the point where they are closest to me. Slam! Valerie with a bang shows up right above its spine, slamming it down with her fist. At the same time Xerra lands on top of its head, with ease pressing the blade of her Glaive into its skull.

It’s over. We’ve won… I take a breath to relax, that was probably a very very bad idea. Immediately the pain in my left shoulder became evident.

- “Aaaagh! FUCK!” - My knees give underneath me, the pain pulses through my body and tears start trickling down my face. - “Fuck, my arm!”

I grab my shoulder and squeeze as hard as possible to stop the bleeding, but it’s no use. I’ve lost too much blood already and my vision’s starting to fade.

- “Leshy! Stay with me buddy!” - I think that’s Valerie. Everything around me is muddled and blurred.

They’re trying to stop the bleeding, yelling, trying to keep me awake, but it’s too late. I can’t feel my body and my throat is dry. I always wondered how it would feel.

The moon looks very beautiful, I breathe out and close my eyes. It’s not a bad way to go.

The familiar sound of cicadas fills my ears as my eyes flutter open. I feel a sharp pain run through my left side as I wiggle my way out of bed, must’ve slept on it for a long while.

Dragging my ass out of bed is generally hard but today it feels especially so. I feel like I had a special kind of dream, one of those introspective ones that leave a lasting sense of longing? It’s hard to put my finger on what exactly it is.

After standing up I as usual get some clothes on me. Shorts and a Shirt, nothing fancy. I have time to play around with, as usual I’ve woken up before the alarm. It should start ringing in a couple of minutes.

And so my day starts.

I make coffee, sit by my computer and play some games. Three hours pass, time to work. I make sure the game runs fine and dandy.

Near the end of shift. Let's join the brief for the next day. Nothing special, as usual. Mentions of a new hire and the list of tasks to test the next section of the game.

Finished my shift and wrote a report for Corporate to archive. Made some more coffee, sat back down to play some games again.

The sun goes down at a brisk pace when gaming. I like that.

It’s time to sleep, the clock struck midnight. I set my alarms and hit the pillow with a sense of longing lingering in the air. The earth rotates at an astonishing speed, the days come and go faster and faster.

The familiar sound of cicadas fills my ears as my eyes flutter open. I feel a sharp pain run through my left side as I wiggle my way out of bed, must’ve slept on it for a long while.

Dragging my ass out of bed is generally hard but today it feels especially so. I feel like I had a special kind of dream, one of those introspective ones that leave a lasting sense of longing? It’s hard to put my finger on what exactly it is.

After standing up I as usual get some clothes on me. Shorts and a Shirt, nothing fancy. I have time to play around with, as usual I’ve woken up before the alarm. It should start ringing in a couple of minutes.

And so my day starts.

I make coffee, sit by my computer and play some games. Three hours pass, time to work. I make sure the game runs fine and dandy.

Near the end of shift. Let's join the brief for the next day. Nothing special, as usual. The new hire has apparently been selected and the list of tasks to test the next section of the game is handed over as usual.

Finished my shift and wrote a report for Corporate to archive. Made some more coffee, sat back down to play some games again.

The sun goes down at a brisk pace when gaming. I like that.

It’s time to sleep, the clock struck midnight. I set my alarms and hit the pillow with a sense of longing lingering in the air. The moon looks very beautiful, I breathe out and close my eyes.

The familiar sound of cicadas fills my ears as my eyes flutter open. I feel a sharp pain run through my left side as I wiggle my way out of bed, must’ve slept on it for a long while.

Dragging my ass out of bed is generally hard but today it feels especially so. I feel like I had a special kind of dream, one of those introspective ones that leave a lasting sense of longing? It’s hard to put my finger on what exactly it is.

After standing up I as usual get some clothes on me. Shorts and a Shirt, nothing fancy. I have time to play around with, as usual I’ve woken up before the alarm. It should start ringing in a couple of minutes.

And so my day starts.

I make coffee, sit by my computer and play some games. Three hours pass, time to work. I make sure the game runs fine and dandy.

Near the end of shift. Let's join the brief for the next day. Nothing special, as usual. The new hire starts tomorrow and the list of tasks to test the next section of the game is handed over as usual.

Finished my shift and wrote a report for Corporate to archive. Made some more coffee, sat back down to play some games again. I’m not sure what to play today.

The empty feeling in my stomach gives me anxiety. It’s time to sleep. I set my alarms and hit the pillow with a sense of longing lingering in the air. The moon looks very beautiful.

The familiar sound of cicadas fills my ears as my eyes flutter open. I feel a sharp pain run through my left side as I wiggle my way out of bed, must’ve slept on it for a long while.

Dragging my ass out of bed is generally hard but today it feels especially so. I feel like I had a special kind of dream, one of those introspective ones that leave a lasting sense of longing? It’s hard to put my finger on what exactly it is.

After standing up I as usual get some clothes on me. Shorts and a Shirt, nothing fancy. I have time to play around with, as usual I’ve woken up before the alarm. It should start ringing in a couple of minutes.

And so my day starts.

I make coffee and my phone rings. Check the message… I’m training the new hire starting today. No gaming before shift, gotta make sure I prepare a training regime for the new girl.

My shift starts, I prepare for the call. Anxiety is sky high, I was never good with new people. I join the meeting and wait for a couple of minutes. I’m as usual early, better early than late. There she is. I turn on my camera and she follows suit.

There are some people that have a thing. People that can look plain as anyone else, nothing special about them but that one thing.

I’m a rogue planet strolling around the universe in search for my star to warm me up and fill the cold iron core inside. Her glow pulses through my skin, I’ve found it. I have to steer closer to this atomic furnace, it doesn't matter if I burn up.

Her eyes peer right into the deepest parts of my soul, they shine brightly illuminating everything around me. They are fierce, focused. Her gaze is like a volcano about to explode.

- “Hello Jan. I’m glad to be working with you from now on” - Her words slice pieces off the air around me.

- “Yes, hi! I’m Jan, pleased to meet you Veronica… “ - There’s an intensity surrounding this person. I can’t quite put my finger on it.

All the way through the first day of training I can’t help but feel like I’m talking to someone I’ve known for a short but eventful time. Like she’s a key to a core memory I’m missing.

My shift is done. I write my report for corporate so that they can archive it as usual. Every minute after the shift is prolonged by my insides twisting themselves upside down. The empty feeling only growing stronger as time moves on.

The empty feeling in my stomach is becoming an abyss of impossible proportions. It’s time to sleep. I set my alarms and hit the pillow, the lack of motivation lingering in the air.

The alarm wakes me up the next day. The familiar sound of cicadas fills my ears as my eyes flutter open. Their irritating symphony only there to mark the next day of nothing really happening.

I focus up, trying to tune out the noise. Just like I practiced… Practiced? What am I doing, this isn’t some manga where I can focus up and tune out things that annoy me.

After taking a deep breath I drag my ass out of bed and begin my morning routine. I’m running behind the clock as is, I don’t like it. I always wake up before the clock and today I’m thrown off because of this feeling that’s been haunting me for the past week.

I get some coffee, sit down at my computer to play some games before work as usual. There’s a minute to check the phone while the game loads, reminding myself of the next steps for Xerra’s training.

I play for a little bit, trying to relax but it’s just not coming to me right now. Gaming feels like the wrong way to go right now. Might as well work some more on Veronicas training and make sure she gets all the information she needs to not get fired in a week after my training.

It’s done. I’m pretty sure everything she needs to know is in there. After finishing up the coffee and smoking a cigarette I get ready for our call.

This woman is a statistical impossibility. Someone with this much energy cannot exist. The training goes smoothly, she catches everything quite fast and asks a lot of questions. Clearly eager to learn, but what worries me is what’s going to happen once she realizes how monotonous this job truly is.

It’s the end of shift. I join the meeting and we talk about the tasks for the next few days. Finished my shift and wrote a report for Corporate to archive. Made some more coffee, sat back down to play some games again. I’m not sure what to play today.

Just as I’m about to launch some random game there is a smell in the air. I miss the rabbit meat from… From where? I never had any as far as I can remember.

Ehh, it’s probably some other meat and I’m just mistaking it for a rabbit. The game loads and I finish my day with some more gaming. I set my clock as usual and hit the bed.

The days just keep on going at this point. I’m not even sure how much time has passed, Veronica has finished her two weeks of production training and is doing just fine on her own. We sometimes chat on a call when working.

I mostly do it to keep her company, being her direct superior it’s my job to make sure she’s doing well. Even if I’m not a fan of that. Since I’ve met here I’ve had this feeling in my stomach, that she’s something I’m missing. That she could finally, maybe, hopefully let me just enjoy life as it is.

There are so many things wrong with this train of thought. I know… She just joined the company, I’m her superior and I’m already thinking about taking advantage of my seniority to get on her good side.

Luckily I have enough self restraint and respect to not push myself there. I’m a professional, this is my job and we only work together, that’s it.

The next day is just the same, well we do the voice call with Veronica for fun. It’s actually quite a relaxed day, the task is to make sure that the game doesn't crash under load. Since it’s automated a bunch of people get on calls and just chat about or watch videos.

- “So Jan. You’ve worked QA for a few years now, any funny stories from before my time you could share with me?” - Veronica is a curious little thing. I take as second to think about what story to tell her, what about this!

- “Actually yeah!. So, the story is actually not that interesting but it should be plenty fun. Before you joined the company as a QA. We were all kind of disjointed. We each did our own thing and tested Vertex haphazardly, just picking a thing to break and trying to brute force it. That was a couple of years ago so just after the company released the first builds. I know… I’ve been here for a while, I’m actually quite important you know!” - I deliver the story with a funny tone. Trying to lift up the “funny” part of it. Veronica giggles at my humble brag.

- “Anyway! One of those days I stumbled into the server room to stress test the networking.” - I don’t know how serious she’s taking me but… She do be giggling. - “I start the test as usual and leave for coffee. After coming back I hear loud bangs and a bunch of dust way back in the dark corner of the server room. Sooo, like any respectable spotter I follow the loud noises!”

- “Spotter? Do QA’s here call themselves like the in-game faction?” - Spotter? I never said spotter, anyway I continue the story.

- “I meant QA. I get to the place…“ - I stretch my arms outwards to indicate the “what” moment. I know she can’t see me, but I still do it. - “THERE it is! Feral, angry. Originally I thought it lost its shit and went berserk, but it turns out, that specific node is from some dusty old garage and nobody knows where it really came from” - This is nostalgic to talk about. At this point Veronica is trying to contain her hysterical laughter - “I was able to salvage the machine and keep it running for the duration of the test. In the end we ended up exchanging it for a brand new module soon after… I liked that rusty old thing”

- “That sounds hilarious in fact. It’s also kind of sad that you threw that thing away.” - Veronicas words sting deep. But she’s wrong!

- “Actually I have it here, I bought it off the company and it’s running as my personal server right now”

- “That’s so sweet! It’s like keeping an old dog to make sure it has a good end!” - Good end… I wonder if my end was good. - “Actually Jan, I was wondering. We live in the same city, why don’t we meet up for a coffee? I’d love to meet you in person.”

Coffee with Veronica, the proposition is enticing and I guess It’d be a good idea to drag my ass out of the house for a little bit. I’m still a bit apprehensive about things like this, but if she’s the one inviting me then It’s a bit less… Weird?

- “Sure Veronica, let’s meet up on friday? Weekend time, we’ll be more relaxed and won’t have to talk about work”

- “Friday! Friday is perfect Jan. I’ll make a reservation and send you the location” - Reservation? She wants this to be fancy.

The stress test finishes and we decide to end the call for the day. A sense of foreboding lingers in my room. I don’t like such impromptu invitations from people, they never end well for me.

End of shift, no meeting today because the boss is out for vacay. I file the usual report to Corporate, feeding their machine more and more data every day.

Even though there’s this weird feeling in the air that something bad is going to happen on Friday, I am finally able to focus. Feelings like this fill in the void in me and let me focus on other stuff. I no longer have to wonder what’s supposed to be there.

The day’s almost over, time to game. Time flies by when I play games, I like that.

The next few days fly by smoothly. Nothing interesting happens other than Veronica letting me know where the meeting will take place. Funnily enough we’ll land on the same Tram stop so we decide that to be our meeting place and then we’ll walk to the restaurant.

It’s friday. The alarm wakes me up, this time on purpose. I decide to not stay up late and wake up just before work, this way I have the energy to deal with my “date”.

For the whole work day we continue doing the stress testing. This time I decide to not get on call with Veronica and instead focus on mental preparation for the meet up.

The day is generally uneventful other than me and Veronica both confirming we’ll be there today. You know, gotta make sure nobody’s getting stood up here. Honestly, if anyone’s getting stood up, it’s me.

Right after work I file my report and get ready. The best pair of shoes I have, a sports jacket with a plain white shirt and some jeans. Business Casual, has enough spice to be perceived as elegant but not as elegant as to alienate the other person.

Not soon after I find myself on the Tram to our meet up spot. It’s packed with people so headphones are a must. I can’t stand hearing everyone around me talk about something else, it gives me sensory overload.

I’m going to spare you the specifics of what I’m listening to, just know it’s metal adjacent. Luckily though, the trip is short. 20 minutes later I find myself at the meet up spot. As always, I made sure to be early. How early? Nearly an hour early.

Unlike any normal human I need time to settle after my routine is disrupted. It’s easy for me to lose my balance. Just so it’s clear. I don’t dislike surprises. I just need a little time to get myself on track whenever said surprises happen.

I pull out a cigarette and light it, change the music to something more relaxing. After that, I just stand and smoke the cigarette, engulfing myself with the music and how it feels.

There we go, now I’m feeling ready. More ready than before and it’s about time anyway. Time passes quite fast when smoking and listening to music. It just kinda flows like a river and you can’t help but let it take you with it.

It’s about time now. She should be here in a couple of minutes. Thus I keep a look out for every Tram that makes it to this station. Oh? There she is, much smaller than I expected.

She told me she’s short but I wouldn’t be lying if I said she’s pocket sized. She’s also wearing a nice lemon colored summer dress with white flowers printed on it and a simple pair of white sneakers. Very white sneakers, she cleaned them today. She doesn’t look taller than 5 foot 5 and 140 pounds.

Compared to her I might as well be a giant. 6 foot 7, nearly 400 pounds. Anyway. She looks wonderful, it does make my heart skip a beat.

- “Hey! You are enormous!” - She’s spreading her arms out, like someone trying to show you “this big” when you ask them.

- “And I don’t date kids. I should call the police to find your parents” - Don’t think I’m not going to clap back Veronica.

- “Funny. Shall we?” - She points in the direction of the restaurant and without further ado we start walking to the restaurant.

Funnily enough it’s not a long walk. Only a couple of minutes later we’re at the place, we didn’t exchange any words during the walk. I think we’re getting used to being around each other without a computer screen in the way.

It’s a fancy place. In fact it’s fancy enough to have a concierge at the entrance to lead us to the table Veronica reserved. I don’t know how she can even think of affording this place, I make substantially more money just by seniority so this is no problem. I should consider paying the bill I guess.

We take our seats and within seconds there are two cards in front of our faces with the waiter introducing himself. Apparently he’ll be our personal waiter for the evening, he left us a button we’re supposed to press whenever we need him. Interesting way of working, I like it.

- “Have you been here before Veronica? Any recommendations for a shut-in like myself?” - Humorous self-deprecation check. Showing some of your softer side is always good.

- “Not really, it was recommended to me by a friend of mine. But the ice coffee here is apparently absolute FIRE. I think I’ll get it, will you be getting anything to eat?” - She’s asking me if I’m going to get anything to eat? This sets the stage.

How should I approach this? I’m hungry, but not so hungry as to need to eat right now. She’s either asking this to see what I’ll get or to see how long we’ll be here… If I get a meal, that’ll equal me wanting to stick around for a bit. If I don't, that could mean that I just intend to drink my beverage of choice and dip on her as soon as we’re done, what to do?

- “I’ll get something light. I’m not super hungry, but the night will be short if we’re just going to drink coffee and leave.” - There’s a salad looking thing they serve. Normally I’d go for a full on steak and potatoes with it but that’d make my chubby appearance make more sense.

I’m going to go with the salad looking thing. I can’t even pronounce the name but it sure looks fancy on the image… And the price tag is something that would make a minimum wage worker gag.

That’s it. I have to pay the bill, regardless of how the evening goes. She’ll have to live on instant soup if I let her pay for her half.

- “Well then. I’ll get the same, it looks delicious.” - Please don’t break my wallet Veronica.

We call the waiter with the button as instructed. In seconds the guy is there, like he’s on roller skates and just zooms between the tables. Impressive.

The order takes no longer than a minute. We basically just mirror our orders, she gets the salad I picked and I get her coffee. It’ll make it simple to talk about the food.

Now’s the moment that can make or break the date. If you start the wrong topic, it can go very bad. There are some proven ways to start a conversation with someone you might have romantic feelings for and also have spent some time with them.

One of such topics is NOT WORK. Veronica clearly missed that memo.

- “So, how long have you been part of the company Jan?” - I don’t mind talking about work luckily, she probably understands the level of shut in I am.

- “Almost a decade now. I basically joined when they started the thing up. What made you want to join Veronica?”

- “Well, one: I heard the game is going to be really good, two: my friend is someone that works on the game design team.” - Corporate nepotism. Though she’d get the job even without getting recommended by someone inside.

She’s smart, pretty, and full of energy. Has that “thing” about her that makes my cogs turn very fast. Compared to her I’m slow, boring and mid looking at best, not ugly but not too pretty either.

- “Well, the game is as you saw it. We keep finding bugs every week.” - I’m going to continue the work topic for now. - “You’d think that a team of 10 QA’s would be enough to mark all the bugs as we go.”

- “Right? Dev’s be slacking! We should go to the office and whack them with a squeaky hammer!” - Squeaky hammer? What is she, twelve?

I can’t help but chuckle though, that is such a weird thing to say. We keep talking about work, then seamlessly go to our personal lives. The conversation just flows on it’s own, from topic to topic.

We don’t even acknowledge the food and drink coming to our table, we just continue chatting. Slowly eating our food and emptying the glasses.

Our faces are red, sometimes our legs bump into each other under the table and it sends a jolt, starting a short but uncomfortable silence between us. And then just like that we’re back to chatting.

The walls around us crumble and the other tables just sink underground. I feel like I’m being enveloped by her whole being, her hair extends snaking around my arms and legs. Lifting me off the ground as we keep talking. Her eyes glow more and more with every minute, filling the area with a homey warmth.

We’re in our own world, just going and going on and on about whatever comes to our minds talking about birds, cars, work again, then some more about our perso… - “... I was thinking about it for a little while now but I think I fell for you a little…” - …nal lives. What?

The restaurant snaps back into existence around us. Looking at Veronica blushing in front of me feels like watching a movie through a fisheye lens. I don’t know what’s next to happen.

I mean, she’s my coworker. I knew there might be something between us but I expected a second, third date even. Not a first date confession like that.

- “Don’t leave me hanging like that, tell me stuff, anything.” - She’s a lost puppy now. Her gremlin act all gone, the glow in her eyes much dimmer than before. Saying her peace clearly drained her energy.

- “I don’t know Veronica. We’re coworkers and while this date is wonderful… I need time, not like ‘I’m not going to tell you’ time. I actually need time. It’s been years since I dated anyone…” - I ramble for a bit but the gist is: I don’t know if I can date right now but I acknowledge something between us.

As you expect though, the night ends here for both of us. The bomb was dropped and wiped out all our batteries in a flash.

- “I’ll pay the…” - She’s going to do stupid. Stop her from doing stupid.

- “No you will not. Don’t get me wrong please. Today was wonderful, thanks to you I had so much fun!” - I try to play up our day. She’s not down by any means but maybe a little dejected that she didn’t get an answer. It’ll eat away at her for a while.

I call the waiter and pay for our food… The bill is special in itself. I’m pretty sure rent for a week isn’t that high. Did she come here expecting me to pay for this? Smart woman, read me like a book already.

We make our way outside of the restaurant.

- “Well then Jan. I’ll see you later?” - Later? We’re taking the same tram, can’t escape me that easily.

- “Are you sure about that?” - I wink at her and put her hand on my forearm, leading her to the tram station - “Normally I’d take a Taxi but considering we take the same tram, why would I avoid spending more time with you?”

I have to make sure she understands that I wasn’t pushed back by her emotions.

- “You don’t have to pretend Jan. It was too much for a first…”

- “Shush.” - Without thinking I put my index finger on her lips. Her reaction is adorable as she jumps a little from the sudden closeness. - “Who said It was too much? I just need time to process this.”

We arrive at the tram station a couple minutes later. There’s nearly 20 minutes before ours arrives.

- “Oooh! Look at this thing! It’s so fluffy!” - A doggo? Cute puppy actually, if there’s one soft spot I have. It’s for cute puppies… Which kinda mimics my soft spot for Veronica I guess.

I kneel down in front of the puppy and ask the lady leading it “Can I pet it?”. She gives me a nod and smiles. I reach out my left arm to let the doggo smell it.

It takes a sniff, then another. Without a warning it bites me…

- “What…” - My left arm begins to ache. It hurts almost as if someone’s trying to rip it from my torso. The lady quickly apologizes and pulls the dog back. The bite didn’t even pierce skin, then why is this pain so excruciating.

The void I’ve had this whole time is getting filled. Images of me waking up in this other fantastical world enter my mind, the training with Xerra and Valerie. The fight with Ludocanis and how it ends. It’s all there, it all makes sense.

I died, didn’t I? This is it? What awaited me after dying was just my boring mundane life? I hear static around me, everything is blurred out. Cold sweat is flowing down my face, the lady and her dog disappear in front of me…

The sky turns white, trees turn flat and crumble. The buildings fold onto themselves like houses of cards, disappearing around me one by one.

I stand up and look at Veronica who’s standing there, like nothing happened. She has that look again, like we knew each other before.

There are words I want to speak right now, but my mouth is open. I want to tell her the truth of how I felt for the past few weeks, how her presence made my days bright again and blew the boredom out of my life.

We could start dating and maybe even move in together after a few months, hell. She could move in even now, why not! We could have a nice dinner every afternoon. I’d propose to her in my house, no reason to be fancy right? We could get married and have a life, live a fulfilling life.

Cold sweat turns into salty tears as I reach out and place my hand on Veronica’s cheek.

- “I know Leshy. You have to go, right?” - I don’t want to go, it was getting fun here. I finally had fun!

My knees buckle under me and I break down. Crying everything out. This life sucked for so long. It took so much for me to even live normally and when it finally gave me something to bite on, it took it away.

Veronica crouches in front of me and strokes my head, silently telling me it’s going to be fine. That this is how it’s supposed to be.

After my eyes open again the familiar face greets me with a sense of relief I’ve never seen before. The pain in my arm is still there.

My only working hand on instinct grabs her by the collar, pulling her in. I push my head right under Xerra’s chin and cry like a baby, without regard for anything else. Letting everything flow. I just wanted to die and be done with it…