An exercise in teamwork

Their exploration teacher turned out to be an unfamiliar face. A mild mannered, stocky, older man by the name of Peter Trails. Supposedly, he used to be an explorer, a good one too. As he told it, in his hay day he had led almost a hundred different expeditions to fifty star systems. He also believed in teaching while in the field, which is how his five students found themselves in a large testing course barely twenty minutes later. They had exited the HQ through a series of massive steel doors and were led into a forest nearby. The headquarters, John now noticed, was built half into the mountain. That part looked like a few old military bases he had seen. The other half, however, looked suspiciously like a giant Victorian mansion. Somehow, that did not surprise him.

The testing course they were led to was an area of thick forest surrounded by earthen walls where they were supposed to simulate a regular expedition. John was given leadership of their small group, and was told to return to the HQ by sun down with an accurate map of the area and anything they were able to find along the way. He guessed they had planted a few surprises in the general area.

They were brought to a small forest clearing first. That was where John thought it best to plan their next move. In that pursuit, he attempted to ask the others of their abilities. The black haired man responded predictably.

“That is none of your concern. Now, return to whatever filthy hole you came from and let those of us who know what we’re doing take care of this.” Luckily, Yan once again came to John’s aid.

“He’s an ice mage. From what I’ve seen he can make ice from humidity in the air. Means he’s pretty useless on a dry day. Not that he’d tell you that.” She chuckled a bit, and the man shot her a piercing gaze. He said nothing, however. “Anyways, I can transform parts of my body into animal parts. Plus, I can transform fully into an owl.” She seemed eager to show her ability off. Her form seemed to bend in on itself, feathers began popping out of her body as it seemed to shrink, half hidden by a blinding light. Her arms moved at an awkward angle and her fingers soon changed into small talons. It was only a few seconds before a snowy owl was standing there, about thirty centimeters tall. Soon after, Yan appeared once again. “Helps with scouting.” She smiled. Charlotte seemed reticent to share her own abilities, so John asked Bass next.

“I’ll show you what I can do.” A grin crossed her face. She grabbed the halo around her head and pulled it off. It split into two flat discs with a high pitched sound John could not describe. He now noticed the halo itself had sharp edges on it, where the two parts were split, each having a raised side and a lower side. A single motion later, one was rocketing across the clearing, vibrating itself and the air around as it went. The sound was incredibly loud, and it somehow followed a steady beat. It emitted a sound that resembled dubstep music, though John wasn’t entirely sure that’s what it was. It came flying back into her hand as she demonstrated her powers further. The other part of the halo began vibrating less intensely, it had the pace of a fast rock song but the sound of metal. As it vibrated, it seemed to push John and the others back, and when Bass cut the air with it, it sent shockwaves in the direction of the cut.

“Ok, that should be enough.” John reached out in an attempt to stop Bass, which he now understood was an extremely appropriate name. He didn’t want it to get out of hand, and he had realized how her powers worked. She could manipulate soundwaves somehow. “Thank you for the demonstration, Bass, it was quite helpful.” She smiled. “Anyways, I do need to know your abilities as well Charlotte. If we’re gonna be able to work as a team I should know everyone’s capabilities.”

“I can heal you guys if you get injured, and if we encounter anything… dangerous I can help deal with it.” She was obviously still hesitant to say anything. Her shaking from earlier was gone, but her reservation wasn’t. Seemingly, she wasn’t scared anymore, just distant.

“Right, well… The general plan is going to be this. Yan, you fly up in owl form and scout the surrounding area. If you see anything of note, tell one of us three about it and we’ll go look.” He pointed to himself, Bass and the black haired man. “Otherwise, you focus on having that map ready by sundown, and meet back up with us here then. You should be able to get the best vantage point for that. Charlotte, you stay here. If anyone needs healing, come back here and get Charlotte to help you.” He stopped for a minute and faced Charlotte. “If you can deal with anything dangerous on your own that’s great, but I’m not going to risk my healer by sending her into an unknown situation. Not that this area should be too dangerous.” She seemed to retreat into herself a bit more. “The other three of us are going to scout the ground and look into anything Yan can find. That sound good to everybody?” Everyone but the black haired man nodded.

“Seemingly, you aren’t entirely incompetent. I shall follow that plan of my own accord.” That was his only response as he left the clearing. John shouted after him, there was still more to say, but he did not come back.

“Well, he’s gone. Hopefully he will follow the plan. Anyways, you all should know if I’m going to be leading you. My powers are based on those of a character in a video game. Meaning I get skills, quests, and importantly for us at the moment, I can form parties. I’m going to attempt to form one now. If you get a request to join it, please do.” Both Charlotte and Yan looked confused, but he didn’t have time to address that before he formed a party. He thought of the word party and a small screen appeared. It told him he was allowed six members and that he could invite anybody by thinking of their name. The screen also informed him he would be able to see the others on the minimap as long as they were within two hundred meters and that everyone would be able to share his minimap and view theirs and the other’s health bars as long as they were within four hundred meters. Quickly, he thought of the names of the three people around him. They were all now staring at John, utterly befuddled as he stared at some invisible thing in front of him. That confusion was disrupted by a popup appearing in their field of vision, however. Each one of them reacted differently. Bass eagerly pressed the “Join Party” button with her whole hand. Yan investigated the screen for a moment before tapping it with her thumb, and Charlotte spaced out for a moment before also pressing the button with her index, as far away from her as possible. Regardless, their levels and HP and mana bars soon appeared in John’s field of view, and given the surprised gasps from all three of the girls, he assumed a similar effect hit them. Bass was level 15, and so was Yan. Strangely, Charlotte was level 20. After examining that, he knew they didn’t have much more time to mess around, so he instructed the others to go about their assignments, asking Yan to use the minimap to her advantage while mapping the area, and began to set out into the forest himself.

About two hours later, at what John guessed was about 4 PM, they were half way done with mapping the forest. It turned out to be a smaller task than he thought, as the walls trapped an area that was only slightly bigger than three kilometers in length and width. They had explored the forest in a spiral pattern, beginning from the center and coordinating their directions somewhat successfully. So far, none of them had seen the black haired ice mage and they had not found anything else of interest. The silence that was ever present in the forest was starting to get to John. That was when Yan landed at his location.

“There are some ruins over there.” She pointed north. “I’m not sure what you’ll find over there, so I’ll leave it to you to check it out.” John understood her desire to test his mettle. “If you need any help, just flag me down and I’ll send Bass over.” With that, she left to the skies once more. She was flying fairly low to see into the now thicker forest, and Bass was walking around the woods nearby. He appreciated the gesture, though he was sure there was nothing there. They had found a few structures of similar note, but there was nothing in them. It was just more old ruins of a medieval watch tower or a small stone cottage. Nonetheless, he moved towards the ruins, determined to see if these would be any different. He grasped the staff in his hand tightly as he moved. It was lucky that it and the gambeson had survived his misadventures in the first plane. He equipped them after heading out of the clearing, sure he would need them if they encountered any enemy ****. Their mission was clear. Regardless of the likelihood of there being nothing to find in those ruins, he needed to check them out.

A few minutes of trudging through undergrowth later, he was able to see the ruins. It was a small watchtower whose top half was completely gone. Below it, on the forest floor, was some more evidence of civilization. Stones seemed spread around haphazardly. John guessed a few of them were from the tower, but some others were placed strangely like old walls. Perhaps part of houses or some sort of defensive fortification. He wondered how old all of the ruins they had seen even were, and who built them. The level of decay he observed here seemed similar to the other ruins in the forest, but the architecture of what remained in all of them was quite the same as that of the watchtower he had first visited in this world. He wagered there was something more to all this, but that was only a suspicion. Getting closer to the watchtower itself, he began hearing a rumbling sound.

’Whatever this is, it probably isn’t friendly.’ He raised his staff, readying himself for what was coming. It approached quickly. The sound of rumbling and the shaking of the earth increased as John saw a glimpse of something behind one of the rocks. It was a creature made of mud and earth, shaped mostly like a human but much more bulky and with significantly simpler features. It’s skin was rough in places and soft in others. Obviously owing to the texture of the ground in the area. ’A golem.... I wonder who’s controlling it, or what.’ There was no time for idle thought however.

The closer it got, the more John saw dust being kicked up from the ground around it. It was dragging something. What exactly, he wasn’t sure, but it was obviously nothing good. He ran to the right to get a better view of what the creature was grabbing. The moment he saw a bit of black on the ground behind the golem, it saw him. A blood curdling sound echoed through the ruins. It was like the sound of the ground rumbling combined with a high pitch scream. So entirely unnatural that any chance that this creature was native to the area was erased from John’s mind. His action did not end there, however, as the monstrosity of dirt charged. Its feet awkwardly bending and straightening as the brittle material attempted to move across the ground quickly. Half way through the charge, the monstrosity dropped the body of a familiar man onto the floor.