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. Headquarters, John now noticed, was built half into the mountain. Where they exited from reminded him of a few old military bases he had seen, while the other half looked suspiciously like a giant Victorian mansion. Somehow, that didn’t surprise John.

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 HQ by sun down with an accurate map of the area and anything they were able to find along the way. He guessed Peter or the Council had planted a few surprises to help or hinder them in there. 

First, they were brought to a small forest clearing. Which was a suitable location to plan out their next move, John figured. Trying to gather as much information as he could, he asked the others about their abilities. Predictably, the black haired man refused to share. 

“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 the humidity in the air. Means he’s pretty useless on a dry day. Not that he’d want me to tell you that,” she chuckled a bit, and the man shot her a piercing gaze, “anyways, I am a shapeshifter. I can transform parts of my body into animal parts. And I can transform fully into an owl,” she said straightforwardly, but was clearly eager to show off her ability. Her form bended in on itself, feathers popping out of her body as it shrank, half hidden by blinding light. Still outstretched her arms moved at an awkward angle and her fingers changed into small talons. It only took a few seconds before instead of a woman a snowy owl was standing there, about thirty centimeters tall. Once about a minute had passed, the same thing happened in reverse, and Yan appeared once again, “helps with scouting,” she half smiled. 

Charlotte was clearly reluctant 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. Splitting it into two flat discs with a high pitched sound John couldn’t quite 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, both the air around and itself were vibrating wildly. Creating a sound that was both incredibly loud and somehow followed a steady beat. It almost resembled dubstep music, though John wasn’t entirely sure that’s what it was. Not a second later it was flying back into her hand as she demonstrated her powers further. With the other part of the halo vibrating less intensely. Unlike the other, it’s beat had the pace of a fast rock song but the sound of metal. Despite that, it had more of an effect on them, as it pushed John and the others back, and when Bass cut the air with it, it sent shockwaves in the direction of her movement.

“Ok, that should be enough,” John reached out to stop Bass, which he now understood was an extremely appropriate name. He didn’t want this to get out of hand, and he had realized how her powers worked. She could manipulate soundwaves somehow, “thank you for demonstrating, Bass, Yan. It helped me get a clearer picture,” Bass smiled, and Yan stared nonchalantly, “anyways, I do need to know your abilities as well Charlotte. If we’re gonna be able to work as a team I should probably know what everyone is capable of.”

“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 so she said as little as she could. Her shaking from earlier was gone, but her reservation wasn’t. Maybe her fear had disappeared, but her anxiousness definitely hadn’t. 

“Right, well… How about we do 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. Can you handle that?” he paused to see her response and she nodded in agreement, “good, since 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 crossed her arms and retreated a step, almost like she was closing herself off even 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.

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

“I guess he’s gone. Hopefully he’ll follow the plan. Anyways, you all should know what powers I have as well. Especially if I’m supposed to be leading you. I’m like a character in a video game. Meaning I have skills, get quests, and importantly for us at the moment, I can form parties. Since we’re working together I think it’s a good idea to form one now, so if you get a request to join it, please do,” both Charlotte and Yan looked confused, but he didn’t have time to address their confusion. Since he barely even knew how to explain his powers.  

Trying to move on, he thought of the word party and a small screen appeared. It informed him that he was allowed six members and that he could invite anybody by thinking of their full name. Additionally, it also told him he would be able to see the others on his Minimap as long as they were within two hundred meters. His Minimap's functionality would also extend to them while they were within four hundred meters, and everyone would be shown each other’s health bars. Excited, he thought of the names of the three people around him. All three were still staring at John, utterly confused as he read some invisible thing in front of him. 

That was disrupted by a popup appearing in each of their fields of vision. Every one of them reacted differently. Bass eagerly pressed the “Join Party” button with her whole hand. Unlike Bass, Yan investigated the screen for a bit before tapping it with her thumb, and Charlotte stretched her hand after a while and pressed on the screen as far away from her as possible. 

Despite their different responses, they all pressed the button, and their levels, HP, and Mana bars soon appeared in John’s field of view. Surprised gasps from the three girls around him told him much the same had happened on their end too. Looking over their levels, John noticed Bass was level 15, and so was Yan, and weirdly, Charlotte was level 20. Once everyone had recovered from the initial shock he figured they didn’t have much more time to mess around. Telling the others as much, they agreed, and the three of them that needed to head out of the clearing set out for their own tasks. Yan flying into the air, and him and Bass heading out of the clearing in opposite directions. 

About two hours later, at what John guessed was around 4 PM, they were half way done with mapping the forest. It turned out to be a smaller task than he thought. The walls trapped an area that was about two square kilometers and Yan’s help cleared that much faster. Exploring the forest in a spiral pattern turned out to be the best, beginning from the center and coordinating their directions from there. So far, none of them had seen the black haired ice mage and they hadn’t found anything else of interest. John started thinking there would be nothing for them to really do in the forest. Until Yan landed at his location suddenly and transformed back to her human form.

“There are some ruins over there,” she pointed to the north, “I’m not sure what you’ll find over there. So I’ll leave it to you to check it out, you should be able to handle it” John figured she found this a good chance to test his mettle, “if you need any help, just flag me down and I’ll send Bass over,” with those words she left to the skies once more, flying fairly low to see into the now thicker forest. John also knew Bass was walking around nearby. 

He appreciated the offer of help if he needed it, though he was sure there was nothing there. They had found a few other ruins, but there was nothing in them. It was probably just more old medieval watchtowers or small stone cottages. Nonetheless, he moved towards the ruins, determined to see if these were any different. Part of their mission was definitely to explore such things, so it’s not like he had much choice. Still, 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. When they had headed out of the clearing he put them on, sure he would need them if they encountered any enemies or beasts, and now they might prove useful.

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, as if it was sliced in half. Below it, on the forest floor, was more evidence of civilization. Stones were 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 was similar to the other ruins in the forest, and the architecture of what remained in all of them was the same as that of the watchtower he had first visited in this Plane. Something more was there to find, he was sure, but he didn’t have enough evidence yet. 

Getting closer to the watchtower itself to take a better look, he heard a rumbling sound. It clearly wasn’t natural, and it repeated itself after a short pause, ’whatever is causing that, it probably isn’t friendly,’ he raised his staff, readying himself for what was coming. Whatever it was, it was getting closer. The sound of rumbling and the shaking of the earth increased steadily, and John caught a glimpse of something behind one of the rocks. 

He saw a creature made of mud and earth, shaped 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 probably.... I wonder who’s controlling it, or what,’ there was no time for that sort of 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. Once he passed the stone, he saw a bit of black on the ground behind the golem, and it spotted him as well. 

A blood curdling sound instantly echoed through the ruins. It was like the rumbling of the ground moving 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, either, as the monstrosity of dirt charged. The thing’s Feet awkwardly bent and straightened as the brittle material moved across the ground with long steps. Half way through the charge, the monstrosity dropped the body of a familiar man onto the floor.

’Fuck me,’ was John’s last thought.