Quickly before Jack’s eyes he is in the familiar boring crystal room, with the crystals shining away in their familiar yet unfamiliar pattern of lights. Looking around the room Jack still sees nothing of interest and just stands where he is thinking about some of the information that he read.

Each region should have around 4 system cities, this is to allow each player to have somewhere to respawn and act as a hub area. These are controlled by a City Lord who has control of everything in that city. Each city lord will have some sort of weapon that is able to utilise the power of the city given to it by the System.

It’s all very vague but the basic idea is that, each city lord will be incredibly strong individually and when you include the fact that each system city also has an army that will have at minimum 200,000 people in it. Each region could therefore be said to have a standing system army of nearly 1 million soldiers, making them a serious force to be reckoned with.

That’s not including the fact that each soldier has an advanced profession that aren’t accessible until you level up your town into a region capital. The mechanics behind the game are actually quite intricate, such as if the city lord is killed then you can’t just take over the city. You have to first take over the city heart and remove all the soldiers from their professions. If you get a city lord to submit to you, you don’t get to claim ownership of the city. It still remains a system city until the city heart is claimed for the other faction unless other arrangements are made.

No one is really sure how the processes will really go in that regard because the players are nowhere near the stage of being able to take on system cities if they choose to, this is all information provided to players on The World private forums via asking City Lords.

Jack is still standing where he was, smirking to himself as he thinks about how strong he would be if he could take on a 1 million soldier army by himself or even have his own army behind him, roaring as they charge into the enemy’s front line. He can just picture himself decked out in white kingly armour, holding his sword out ordering the charge from the front line. The banners fluttering beside him filled with various graphics of dragons but the largest one having a majestic White Dragon on it.

Letting his thoughts get away from him, he ignores everything in this boring crystal room. Not noticing that the crystals have changed their pattern, lighting and dimming as though they’re communicating with the crystal next to it. The unseen eye is still staring at Jack which is just slightly brighter than previously but still entirely unnoticeable amongst the crowd of lightened crystals.

Slowly the crystals flashing lights start to converge with the pattern shifting towards the unseen eye and they all start to slowly dim with the unseen eye slowly closing after which Jack’s vision starts to shift again and he’s greeted with the first sights of the game since he logged off and it’s a wholly unfamiliar scene.

Jack is laying down on a bed within a wooden room, arguably looking like an old fashion inn or something similar, he tries to sit up but immediately notices that his arm is pinned down and turning his head, a look of shock comes across his face.

There’s a woman resting her head on his arm using it as a pillow, with some drool coming from her mouth with a slight smile. They’re both covered by a blanket and quickly feeling the rest of his body, a wave of relief comes over his body as his clothes are still on. He tries to shake the woman with his free arm but she quickly snorts and turns her body around to face away from Jack while still asleep.

Jack sighs to himself and tries to pick up the woman’s head which he succeeds at, slowly picking up her head and then lowering it down onto the pillow. As soon as her head touches the pillow though, a loud snort is heard and she quickly sits up.

“Oh you’re awake sir, you suddenly said you wanted to take a nap so I wasn’t sure what to do and since you know I don’t have a house anymore I thought….” The girl says in a half daze and slowly mutters under her breath “That since you didn’t kick me out of the room, you wanted me to join you in bed” in an almost whisper and her face slowly going red.

“What? What are you talking about? Who are you? Where am I?” Jack says while he quickly steps out of bed, feeling his body he doesn’t feel anything different. The City creation stone is still within his body so he finds that a relief. Looking around the room, he can see a few pieces of men’s clothing hung over a chair, a few swords laying on the ground and the left overs of a meal on the table.

“Are you feeling ok sir? Did you hit your head? Do you want me to get the doctor?” The woman asks Jack with clear concern in her eyes. She looks rather pitiful and almost scared. Jack quickly feels a headache coming on, he truly has no idea what is going on.

Last scene he remembers within the game, he was outside the hole he dug which was near nothing at all, there were no towns that he could see on the fields nor any roads. How did he suddenly appear within a town?

Jack just rubs his head in frustration, not knowing how to deal with this situation but looking at the woman, he doesn’t feel she has any malicious intent so he can only take it one step at a time.

“I seem to have forgotten a few things, could you tell me what happened from when we first met?” he asks in defeat.

She looks at him with a raised eyebrow, “Are you sure you don’t need me to get the doctor?” she asks again with clear concern on her face. Jack has no idea how to alleviate her concern so decides to say something to make relieve her.

“Sorry, it’s a curse my family has, sometimes we’ll forget everything that happened during the day after we take a nap and the only way it can be solved is by having someone we trust to tell us everything we forgot” he replies hoping that she’s able to accept it.

“Oh that’s why, sorry to hear about it sir, you should see the priest as he might be able to fix that” she says while coming to Jack’s front proceeding to hold his hand.

“My name is Jessica Guld Returner, my village was destroyed a few weeks ago and I made my way to this town but as I was walking around town trying to find some work and a place to stay, the mayor’s son saw me and decided that he wanted to take me away and be one of his concubines” she explains while reminiscing, during some parts she has a painful look on her face and mentioning the mayor’s son she almost has tears in her eye.

“As his guards were dragging me away to his carriage while no one in town was willing to help me, you stepped out and broke the guards arm” Jessica says while holding Jack’s hand with a smile.

“You were like my knight in shining armour, you broke two other guard’s arms and knocked out another 3, you were so strong and valiant” she says with a bigger smile on her face, Jack’s eyes go wide and cold sweat starts to pour down in back.

“You then forced them to leave behind their clothes, their weapons and their money while they were running away. They threatened that they’ll be back but you just ignored them and walked away, I didn’t feel safe so I just chased after you…” she added with a clear reminiscing look on her face.

Jack is now incredibly worried, those people will be back because it’s the mayor’s son’s guards and threatened that they will be. Jack quickly goes over to the table and inspects some of the belongings, the jackets are all rather heavy and made of leather with a symbol of feather over the breast.

[Leather Armour, Feather Town Guards]: Grade: Blue Stats: Defense+2, Description: A blue grade armour that is inscribe with the insignia of Feather Town.

This confirms that the guards were officials of this town, looking at the swords on the ground they are similar, just standard iron swords but with an insignia on the hilt of a feather.

[Iron Sword, Feather Town Guards]: Grade: Blue Stats: Strength+1, Description: A blue grade sword that is inscribe with the insignia of Feather Town.

Jack’s heart is now pounding; he hasn’t even founded his own village yet he has somehow while he was logged off made a lot of trouble within this town. Putting down the armour and sword, Jack sits down on a chair and cradles his head. Jessica walks behind Jack and pats his back and proceeds to give him a shoulder rub.

Jack looks up at Jessica who has a kind smile on her face lifting Jack’s spirits. Just as he is about to speak up, *BANG BANG BANG* “Open the door” a stern male voice is sounding behind the door.

Jack’s eyes go wide and his eyes dart around the room looking for an escape avenue, he quickly walks over to the window looking down at the street and sees at least 50 guards surrounding the building. The pounding at the door continues, Jack has no idea what to do in this situation he just wants to jump out the window and run.

Looking at Jessica, she is clearly worried but she also looks exhausted as though she wouldn’t be able to keep up with him if he decided to run. Remembering his trials from yesterday he steels his heart, “Don’t worry, I won’t abandon you” Jack says with a confident smile to Jessica, she meekly nods her head and stands out of the way.

Jack proceeds to put one of the leather jackets on and places a sword on his hip, finally feeling as though he’s in a fantasy game and prepares to open the door but an unfamiliar yet familiar voice resounds in his mind.

“User, 73 hostile intentions detected with minimum cultivation that surpasses the User by a factor of 3, using force will result in User’s death in 99.999% of scenarios, plan escape route?” the voice asks.

Jack isn’t sure what the voice is but he’ll take the olive branch in this situation and quickly presses on the Yes prompt that is in front of him. His vision is quickly filled with a path like a GPS route in his mind, passing through the wall that is beside him and by the looks of it running along the roof to escape the town walls.

Jack bitterly smiles and motions for Jessica to come closer to him and proceeds to whisper his plan to her, which startles her but she’s clearly excited to be going through something like this suddenly. Jack then picks her up on his back, ignoring the loud banging at the door sounding as if the door is about to be broken down, walks up to the wall that he can see in his vision and lets out a punch.

*BOOM*

A loud sound as though an explosion went off can be heard, Jack quickly jumps out of the hole he just made as the door is busted down, Jack quickly starts running with Jessica on his back while the people left in the room are holding their swords with their mouths agape not knowing how to process what they just saw.

Jack quickly runs along the path, one block, two blocks away from the inn that he was at. Three blocks, four blocks and the path shifts from running along the roof and is down on the ground level now. Loud shouting can be heard in the distance, sword clatter and horses can be heard as all the guards that were surrounding the building are now making a mad dash to chase after Jack and Jessica.

Jack continues to run, not worrying about his stamina and not feeling the weight on his back from Jessica, who is now screaming for dear life.

*Whoosh*

An arrow passes by Jack’s head as he looks down the end of the street, he can see a few of those guards are blocking the end of the street with several of them holding a bow. Notching another arrow and drawing it back slowly.

“Surrender now and you won’t be hurt” the leader of the group of guards yells out.

Jack just ignores that and goes down a side alley, still following the path in his mind. The path quickly becomes a series of twists and turns, quickly approaching the wall’s gate. His running speed somehow being much faster than the guards that are chasing him.

They approach the end of the path in his mind which is leading them to the gate, he proceeds to let Jessica off his back and attempts to cover his face and openly displays the insignia on his jacket that he stole from one of the guards.

He calmly walks into the open and to the front of the gate, one of the captains notices him but quickly sees the jacket he is wearing and just gives Jack a nod, to which Jack nods back hoping that his sweat isn’t noticeable on his forehead.

They get ¾ of the way through the gate but suddenly behind them a loud shout can be heard.

“Stop those two!” the commander of the guards with the bow shouts while pointing towards Jack and Jessica. Jack now proceeds to drag Jessica through the rest of the checkpoint in a rush but he’s blocked by a big burly guy that looks like the commander of the gate.

“Stop right there” the big guy says while he proceeds to place a hand on Jack’s shoulder.

Jack can feel the pressure on his shoulder, the big guy is using his weight and muscles to pressure Jack into submitting, it feels like someone is pressing down 200kg on his shoulder while cutting off circulation. Jack grits his teeth and places his own hand on this big guys hand and proceeds to squeeze.

The big guy just smirks and increases his own pressure, now it feels like 300kg on his shoulder with a clamp cutting off all blood flow. Jack starts to yell, his eyes suddenly have a red glow in their centre and squeezes his hand on the big guys'.

Soon after some snapping sounds can be heard as the pressure on Jack’s arm lets up slowly, the big guy also starts to yell but for another reason as he raises up his hand from Jack's shoulder. It can clearly be seen that most of the bones in his hand are broken.

Jack quickly takes the opening and dashes out of the gate. The guards that were chasing behind quickly notch their bows again and let off a few shots but Jack has quickly vanished into the forest nearby.

The big guy is standing there with a bitter smile on his face looking at the area Jack disappeared and asks the commander of the guard team, “Who was that?”.

“I don’t know” the commander answers and shakes his head. He honestly has no idea, he was just ordered to bring the two people in that room back to the mayor’s property, he knew nothing about reasons or anything.

“I really hope you didn’t bring a disaster upon us” the big guy replies and walks back into the checkpoint, seeking for some medical attention. The commander turns around and orders his men back, they are city guards responsible for the mayor’s family. They have to leave the operations outside the city walls to the hunting parties.