The Earth Online

44 Preparations for the Next World Part 14

After a few days of just training, the all decided to take a break for a whole day just to rest. But the Antum Gudea network members seemed to be excited, as they kept practicing new moves and strategies together.

The night trainings have been so effective that a couple of them had already leveled up.

They were all so pumped up that they started afternoon trainings, as a group, killing lower-level beasts and one elite beasts.

Since Thaleos’ team already set the training regimes, he left Ryan in charge of training under the guidance of Ygritte.

The druid was left to the task of controlling the hunted dead critters to become training tools. After a couple of night trainings and day resting, Ygritte can now properly control her power and even amplify it to a certain extent.

Haya and Kedrick were tasked to develop harder training regimens for the alumni guild. Them developing these regimens really helped the pair in decoding team strategies and adjusting to new attack patterns.

Since they knew that beasts were going to be relatively smarter in the new world, they were making sure that they were ready for any kind of attack.

Thaleos, on the other hand, was preparing the tools and potions they needed to go to the god’s playground. He knew that the cube scene that they wanted to enter was near mid-tier difficulty.

He started packing bloodlust potions, companionship scrolls, and other items that Ganuru has recommended. The beast tamer smiled as he was reminded of his recent encounter with the wise orc,

“Let me guess, you want to keep the Akkadian cube or mayhap get another?” The aged orc muttered under his breath, as Thaleos passed through the threshold.

“I’d be surprised, but knowing you, you basically know everything.” The bearded man jokingly said and then waved at the store owner.

“A useless power nobody needs.” The grump old beast whispered under his breath. Thaleos didn’t seem to hear the wise orc’s words and just continued looking around the store.

“So, is it possible?” The bearded man earnestly appealed. Ganuru just tilted his head to the side and gave the younger man a smile.

“Of course, I need not to have these all. Take one. Win the game for me and you’ll get my ultimate Akkadian cube.” The orc answered in a joking manner.

The beast tamer didn’t take his word seriously and just graciously took the Akkadian cube. He paid the old man around 4, 000 thousand shekels.

“You do know that this isn’t enough, right?” Ganuru half-heartedly protested, to which the beast tamer just replied with a smile and, “Guess knowing everything isn’t a useless power after all.”

Thaleos didn’t see it, but the old orc was smiling when he left.

~ ~ ~

The group of four were currently driving towards Mount Nergal and were planning to for one of the portals to the god’s playground.

Thaleos explained to them about James’ detailed account of the god’s cube. Going through the young man’s journal, the beast tamer realized that his previous patient seemed to be the happiest when he was in the cube.

James explained in his journal that the cubes have infinite sequences and scenes. But he noticed that these sequences depended on the location of the portal.

The young man stated in his journal that one of the portals in Mount Nergal—one hiding below one of the lakes—had the sequence of the paralyzing staff and chain mail prizes.

Time and time again, Thaleos kept reflecting on how the journal was basically the only thing keeping them afloat in the Godly Gambles.

They only had a good head start because of the journal, but he knew that they need to outgrow some of the information and create their own solutions.

“We’re here!” Kedrick shouted once they arrived at the foot of the mountain. The beast tamer prepared one utility bag for each of his team members.

Each bag was filled with potions, scrolls, and other ingredients they can use on the spot.

After hiking for almost half an hour, they finally arrived at the murky-colored lake.

“I swear to god, if the second world’s filled with these hiking trips, I’m just gonna stay and accept my fate here on earth.” Kedrick gruffly muttered as they were stepping into the water.

Ygritte just laughed at the umber man’s statement and gracefully waded through the lake.

“It should be right around here.” Thaleos pinpointed as he saw Haya stopping on the lowest point of the lake, where the water reached up to their waist.

“Where is it?” Haya asked as he tried his best to look through the murky waters. 

“Well, based on James’ description and my calculation, you’re most likely stepping on it, right now.” The beast tamer carefully explained.

“What the hell, that’s weird. Why aren’t I falling down? Shouldn’t I be fall—” Before the tan man could even finish his statement, he suddenly fell straight through the water, almost as if someone pulled him from under the water.

“Yep, this entrance is a bit of a secret, so it takes a couple of seconds before you—” Thaleos felt like he was being pulled straight into a vortex, it felt like his guts were being pulled before him.

Even though it felt like forever, before they knew it, the beast tamer, druid, and priest were back to the large looking cube.

They were greeted with the sight of large scenes on all six sides, even the top and bottom—overwhelming them, yet again, with beautiful sceneries.

They spent the next couple of seconds just staring at the sights, until Haya woke them up from their reverie.

“Come on, let’s get this over with. I swear, this cube has some kind of alluring power or something.” The tan man took of his shirt and did his best to dry it before putting it back on.  

“Alright, so which scene is it?” Ygritte asked as she stared around some of the scenes that depicted paintings, and other simples, like galaxies or city lights.

“We have to wait for a bit, I think it’ll show up on the third wave of changes.” Thaleos responded while going through his utility bag and making sure that nothing was damaged.

“So, what’s the scene all about?” Kedrick queried as he sat on the floor and crossed his legs. Just as the man was about to get comfortable, someone suddenly appeared in front of them and loudly shouted,

“Welcome to the Gods’ Playground! I am—” The clown paused when he saw who was in front of him and gave a cheesy grin.

“Oh, this is pretty funny! Enki kept ranting about how you guys made his game boring. Kudos to that! If you have made it interesting, then there’s a large chance that he’ll trap you guys in one of the scenes.” The clown laughed at the horror on their faces.

“Oops! Sorry, I wasn’t supposed to say anything. Well, what’s done is done.” The clown half-heartedly apologized and continued chuckling on his own.

“Anyways, good luck with the game!” Suddenly, the smile on his face was wiped off, “I mean it, really. Don’t make it too interesting.” Then the clown quickly disappeared, leaving them confused.

“What the actual f**k? So, we’re risking getting trapped in here forever?” Haya shouted in a hushed and panicked tone.

“No, we have to go out.” Ygritte said, as she heard that little detail from the clown. Thaleos was also shocked about that one little fact because James never mentioned it.

I really need to stop solely depending on James’ journal, the beast tamer thought to himself as he saw the fear imprinted on his friends’ faces.

“Unfortunately, we can’t go out until we win.” Thaleos frankly responded and did his best to look confident. He knew that they needed him to be strong right now.

Kedrick saw this attempt and backed up his oldest friend.

“We’re talking about the gods here, they get bored with anything. I swear. We can fight our best and they’d hate it because we’d be too predicted.” Kedrick boldly stated and Thaleos added how the gods were only interested with unorthodox methods—hence, Enki’s previous challenge.

“We just need to stay safe and always do everything that’s predictable. That would definitely get the gods off our backs.” The beast tamer hypothesized. After a couple minutes of convincing, the atmosphere returned back to normal and the other pair were calm again.

“Thanks for that! My anxiousness always gets the best of me.” Haya responded, to which Kedrick and Thaleos assured him that his reaction was completely normal.

They, too, were panicking but decided to become the group’s pillars of strength.

“Alright, going back to business, what did the scene look like again?” Ygritte asked while fixing her dark lustrous hair into a tight braid.

“Well, James mentioned that the scene was a painting of an open house. He mentioned that it seemed cartoonish to an extent, as each room had multiple elements on it.

Also, there seemed to be red-color figures, with the size of a child, running around the different rooms.

“Let me guess, we have to chase after them?” Haya questioned in a tired tone. If there’s one thing the berserker hate aside from ‘berserking’, it was running.

“Actually, James never mentioned it directly. He just said that we can find the prizes in the rooms.” Thaleos responded as he kept staring around the different scenes; making sure that he wasn’t skipping or missing anything.

Ygritte clutched his arm, signaling him that she could watch over the other side. After a few minutes of pure silence, they suddenly felt a strong and intimidating presence pervading the area.

“Oh, if it isn’t my favorite team.” A smooth and seductive voice bounced off the whole cube.