The Earth Online

51 The Second Second World

“This is it?” Kedrick asked in a disappointed tone. Once arriving to the eastern part of the location, they expected to see wild-looking creatures and more interesting-looking terrain.

But the sight that welcomed them looked more like a small town filled with dozens and dozens of players.

“What on earth is going on around here?” Ygritte added to Kedrick’s questions as she stared at the players just drinking and talking to each other.

Compared to how they were for the past month, surviving through unknown forests and killer beasts, everyone was relatively relaxed now.

“Not earth, second planet.” Haya jokingly piped in, to which Ygritte just responded by rolling her eyes and chuckling a bit.

“Actually, James did mention something about this situation.” Thaleos sheepishly said, as he just remembered it crossing his mind.

The beast tamer was so focused on the whole second stage shebang that he forgot to mention one important detail to his team.

Everyone looked at him in curiosity and before he could even say anything, someone suddenly shouted from afar,

“Thaleos! Jesus, Kedrick! Haya and Ygritte! It’s so good to see you all.” When they turned around, they saw the familiar tawny skinned charismatic leader.

“Ryan, dude! How have you been?” Thaleos babbled out in excitement when he saw the Antum Gudea Network’s leader, Ryan the Knight.

“Ryan, bro, how’s everyone been?” Kedrick chimed in as he clasped his large hand on the knight’s shoulder.

Before they knew it, the whole Antum Gudea appeared behind Ryan and they were all caught in a flurry of greetings. They decided to go the nearest inn and continue their catching up there.

“Yeah, so how has everything been?” Thaleos asked Ryan while giving him a straightforward gaze. Ryan took a second to respond as he had a downcasted look on his face.

“It’s been hard, we’ve lost at least half a dozen people. Your training was great but sometimes, there are some situations we can’t control.” The knight responded and the beaded man somberly nodded his head.

After Ryan talked about the quests and adventures they had, someone from across the table, namely Kedrick, shouted a question at Thaleos.

Since the umber man was already a bit tipsy from Irkalla’s tears, he slightly slurred his words, “Thaleos, bro, what were you talking about again? The one thing you forgot to tell us? What was it again?”

Haya and Ygritte laughed at how Kedrick was still trying to process his question. The priest’s confusion prompted the berserker to ask the question instead, “So why are there tons of players but like not enough monsters?”

Ygritte agreed and added her own little piece, “Yeah, and considering that this is the second stage, there should’ve been more compared to earth.”

“Actually, we were also confused about the whole thing. I mean, when we were on earth, we just needed to go the mountains and we’ll immediately find some beasts here and there.” One of the Antum Gudea members asked.

It was Ash, one of their acquaintances in the debate club. The red head man prompted the other members to ask similar questions, and Ryan also had the same curious look on his face.

This sobered up Thaleos as he saw the whole table looking at him. He took out the leather notebook and flipped through the pages.

“Alright, alright, I got it. So to answer your question, I’ll read one of James’ journal entry.” Before the beast tamer could even say something, Kedrick slurred, “He’s saying that as if he’s reading a passage from a god damn bible.”

Thaleos just chuckled at the priest’s retort and started reading the journal text,

Nightmare # 34

September 26

12:13 AM

I hate this nightmare. I’m not sure where I am nor what’s happening. All I kept seeing was a completely different world with unrecognizable animal hybrids.

The place was filled with sand that moved like waves and skies housing various galaxies. It was eerily beautiful.

Thankfully, from across the distance, I saw a couple of humans just walking around. Compared to my other dreams where they were on earth, these humans were relatively more relaxed.

They even looked like they were having a great time. I was confused as there seemed to be more humans than beasts. This made me feel calmer than my usual dreams.

Sometimes I feel like the gods or aliens or whatever they were could feel it whenever I would feel calm in their nightmares.

Because after thinking of how calm the scene was, suddenly the ground started shaking—the shaking was so strong since it even disrupted the flowing sand.

The humans near the vicinity seemed to be panicking when they saw a large vortex forming on the sky.

It seemed like the vortex was going up, since it was gradually getting some sand from the planet and forming stairs towards the sky.

The vortex was extremely big as it can almost swallow a whole village.

As the human prepared their weapons and were ready to fight anything that would appear on the vortex, suddenly a deep voice filled the location,

“Congratulations, humans! At least the ones who survived anyways.” The voice meekly said.

“You have survived and passed the novice adap—

Before Thaleos could even continue reading the journal entry aloud, the ground itself started shaking and everyone stood up from their chairs.

“What’s happening? Don’t tell me it’s happening right now?” Kedrick asked in a confused tone. The umber man was still drunk and wasn’t sure if the shaking was coming from the ground or from his drunken state.

“What the f**k? It’s still shaking, we should go out.” Haya said, which also unintentionally answered Kedrick’s question.

“Yeah, we need to go out and see.” Ygritte agreed and invited everyone to stand up. Although most of them were slightly drunk, they still managed to move efficiently.

Thaleos was the last one to stand up and reprimanded himself for forgetting to tell them about this issue. Ygritte saw the pitiful look on the beast tamer’s face and decided to comfort him.

She shyly clasped her small hand on his broad shoulder and said, “Don’t worry about, Thaleos. It happens to the best of us. We sometimes forget. It happens.”

She finished and gave him a warm smile. The beast tamer gave an appreciative smile and then walked out of the inn with the young druid.

Once they got out of the bar, they saw the sky was almost covered by a large dark blue vortex. Everyone was mesmerized as the sand started flowing upwards and were gradually forming into a majestic-looking staircase.

Before it finished forming, a large blue dialogue box appeared on the side and it showed the familiar elf that everyone has come to love.

“Congratulations, humans! At least the ones who survived anyways!” Ur started out in a happy tune and then ended it with a sad one.

“You have survived and passed the novice adaptation period! As the novice period is officially over, the Godly Games is now entering the second stage.” The androgynous Ur mentioned in a somber tone.

Although they heard someone clearing their throat behind the elf, so Ur forced himself to sound cheery.

“The real door to the alien world is now open! All professionals can enter to hunt monsters and locate resources to make yourself stronger.” The elf mentioned with a forced smile and then bowed his head just as he was ready to say his goodbyes.

“All your questions will be answered once you enter the second world. I wish you good luck. May the gods be in your favor.” Before anyone could even protest, the blue screen disappeared.

Everyone was left to make the choice to enter the vortex.

The whole Antum Gudea and his team of four were all looking at him, prompting him to make a decision.

Thaleos knew how it could be so nerve-wracking venturing into the unknown; that’s why they were so thankful that they had James’ journal with them.

He nodded his head to signal his decision and he decided to take the first step.

Everyone near the vicinity was staring at him.

When they saw the resolute look on the large bearded man’s face, they somehow recovered a bit of hope and confidence in themselves.

Thaleos stepped on the first sand-like stair and was happy to find its stable structure. Although it looked fragile, it felt like stepping on wooden stairs.

“Thaleos, are you sure about this?” Ryan asked as he saw how the man was halfway through the stairs.

“We need to go now or else we’ll get trapped in this world if we stayed for another two hours.” As soon as the whole gang heard those words, they immediately followed suit.

The other people in the town also heard the beast tamer’s words and panicked. Most of them decided to run to where the stairs where—the panicked steps of the people seemed to have triggered a stampede.

Just as the beast tamer was near the large vortex, he saw the hundreds of people fighting to go through the stairs. He tried shouting at them, “Please calm down, we still have two hours! You don’t need to run.”

The beast tamer felt like a teacher reprimanding children, but it didn’t work as most of them tried to outrun each other.

He tried shouting a couple of times more, but he felt like he was just shouting at the void. He shook his head and just entered through the vortex.

Behind him were Ygritte, Haya, Kedrick, and the rest of their alumni network.

As soon as they got in the location, they saw dozens of people streaming in and running straightforward without any second thought.

“No! Go back!” Thaleos tried to pull back the players that went outside of the lines, but before he could pull them back a large creature—one that looked like a dragon but had the head of a lion—swooping in and taking a handful of the players.