I didn't write an email to Eirlys, I just walked up and told her about the navmesh exploit. Because that's one that worth fixing, considering that 30 people had already seen it.

She seemed satisfied with my revelation and started jolting down my words on her tablet.

Though… One thing that still irked with me.

I still remembered what I asked Eirlys before I log online with Hailie. I asked if it's okay for Hailie to be invulnerable like this, considering how she'll be interacting with people? If they know, they'll try to use her, and if they can't, they will probably be mad and abuse her even more… Verbally or visually, if- uh, if you know what I mean.

To elaborate, by that I mean, if I'm salty at someone who can't be hurt or feel pain, I'll just tie them up and make them look at assholes, literal assholes of old men for hours straight.

Y'know, two girls one cup type shit? Just less funny and more disturbing?

Eirlys didn't flinch, didn't even lift her eyes from her tablet, typing away at the new exploit I informed her of.

"She'll be fine. As you said, there are no pain receptors enabled for her, and if anything happens, she can just log out. Then I'll deal with the problem myself, banning the kidnappers, griefers, trolls, whatever. And I trust you'll do the best to keep her safe, otherwise…"

She glared at me before finishing the sentence, and I get the message. The type of threat that these mob bossesque people would have.

Her words settled like lead in my chest, she didn't seem to care or have the same worries that I did.

Not that she was cold toward Hailie, far from it, actually, but she was so damn confident, so matter-of-fact. Meanwhile, I was the one gnawing on the thought of Hailie being babied like a fragile porcelain doll.

What was the point of a game if you couldn't be hurt, like, literally half of the fun is the challenge, dude? What's fun for the other players if you can't bully your character a little? I mean, not literal real bullying, but the push-and-shove of survival, the frictions that made this world taste sharp instead of bland.

If Hailie was invulnerable, then what? She'd just float through untouched, charmed by everything, untouchable by consequence, I hated it, lowkey, I'm spite of the fact that she had this invisible shield, maybe I'm just jealous… Maybe… Or just hate having to play with her, despite how much I like her in real life.

But I digressed.

Hailie and I logged on, we met up again (because it's been a day since we played together and I've moved around a bit since then) and I led her to an address that was shoved into my eyes…

No, literally, I ain't joking ya… Some idiot up in corporate (i.e, mods of the New Destiny guild) thought it's a good idea, I guess, to pin the address of the guild's hideout/base of operation in the guild's chat, then pinned it.

The hideout of New Destiny.

They had carved this place into the side of a mountain, and it was… Frankly, ridiculous. A hideout? This was more like a damn city.

From the outside, it looked like a crude wound in the rock, a dark maw half-hidden by draping vines and jagged stone. But inside, through a half-hidden entrance way, it opened into an expansive cavern that had been reshaped and reimagined until it almost felt like a government building.

What's left of the mountain still loomed overhead, with stalactites and dark stone stuff, but the guild had filled it with life. Dark oak beams reinforced the walls, torches and lamps and chandeliers to lit the whole place up better than even direct sunlight could, catching the glint of steel armor, the sheen of bottles lined across the long bar giving it the warmth of a rustic lodge rather than a dungeon.

The place itself could've housed a hundred people easily, side to side were many round tables with 4 chairs each (some may differ because people tend to pull chairs to sit with their friends if it's a group of 5 or more). The walk from the front door to the bar at the end was like trying to look across the horizon, and every step of the way was crammed with life as there were around 40 players here right now.

"We would need a lot of healer for this dungeon, it's an endurance fight."

"Did Tote ever get back to you about those crafting materials?"

"Let's ask Olga if she can greenlight us some more men on this trade with the Kwanna guild."

"¿Dónde está el Iraní?"

"Hey so is food in this game Kosher?"

"Did you guys see the livestream footage of the people who did phase 3 of the raid? Scary shit, I wonder why that thing can cast 4 times in a row."

People laughing, shouting, trading gear, waving their items like street vendors hawking wares. A few groups huddled over maps, plotting their next expeditions.

It was… annoyingly active, truly worthy of the #1 guild in the PC version, they really knew how to recruit and organize people.

And there I was, sitting at the bar, alone with the guild's bartender who, sadly:

- Is not a woman

- Is not hot enough even as a man for me to flirt with

- Looks underaged.

I was nursing a drink I knew I shouldn't have ordered because I had no idea how drunk my dumb body could get here. I told myself it was just to "loosen up," but I was already loosening more than I liked.

Across the room, Hailie had become the night's centerpiece, I am impressed, but not surprised, because of course she had, everyone love a good optimistic bubblehead who's a cute woman, who plays healer and is above level 20 (21 to be exact), too long didn't read: She can bring benefits to the table, add her kindness, her ability to look interested in anyone… and she was everyone's darling in under an hour.

So even though, yes, I coerced her into being a cleric because of my own needs, I still didn't lie when I said "That's what people want in a party"

She was surrounded by at least a dozen players, all peppering her with questions, leaning in close as if every syllable from her mouth was gospel. She answered them all with that airy laugh of hers, her snow-white hair gleaming in the lamplight like a beacon.

Meanwhile, I sipped and sulked, trying not to stare too hard at her while pretending I wasn't.

She'll stay out of trouble, surely, I can't think of what could go wrong, unless someone was touching her thighs under the table and she was too dumb to call him or her out… Oh god that would be troublesome, considering she didn't even understood that when I groped her when we first met.

But, my mind was off her for that moment, and that was when someone slid into the stool beside me.

The mage.

He was dressed the same as last night, decked out in that irritatingly shiny set of level-thirty-ish gear, robes layered with enchanted stitches, gems that faintly glimmered like they hummed with power.

His posture was stiff, almost courtly, and when he spoke, his voice carried that clipped, precise cadence that belonged more to a nobleman than a gamer.

"Good evening," he said, in an accent that reminds me of 'em darn Bri'ish.

"Suppppppppp." I turned, raising my glass in a lazy greeting while dragging my word like a drunkard, for dramatic purposes mostly because I'm totally not drunk, "Pearl, right? That's what Olga called you last night."

He inclined his head in acknowledgment.

"Correct, and you are CJS69Real. Though… it hardly rolls off the tongue, does it?"

I smirked. "Yeah, news flash, smarty pants burp, in game names are weirder than real life names or nicknames."

A faint smile tugged at his lips as he got no rebuttal, then silence, the uncomfortable, heavy kind that felt like a test. I broke it first, swirling my drink in the glass.

"So," I said, tilting my head toward the room, "Why trust me this much? No, let me rephrase, why trust any newcomers in general? Take me for example, We only met last night, and now here I am in your secret hideout, dragging along a new girl with me, you people realize how stupid that sounds, right?"

Pearl didn't flinch. "Because Olga decided it was acceptable."

…

I waited patiently for an elaboration, yet got none.

"That's it?"

"Indeed, that is it." He sipped from his own glass with infuriating calmness. "She is our second-in-command, when she makes a decision, we trust her."

"And you? You seems like you got a brain" I said, frowning, "By that I mean, uh… compared to the people I've seen, yeah, so why u no in charge?"

I spoke toddler at the end there for some reason, probably to mock his aristocratic accent.

He set his glass down gently, like placing a crown on velvet.

"Because unlike many, my duties extend beyond this world, I already carry enough responsibility in my life outside the game. So I supposed moderating a guild on top of that would be… untenable."

…

Is this fucker insinuating that we're no-lifes?

Then, he leaned closer.

"Which is why I will ask you, CJS69Real, what do you plan to do with the guild during and after your one-week trial?"

I blinked.

"I do not believe," Pearl continued, his tone unyielding, "that you are the sort to sit quietly and follow orders. So, what is your intention?"

The words hung there like a blade.

And I couldn't help but grin.

I wonder if this mad man was suspecting me, and is scouting for the sake of his guild's safety.

Or he was some kind of maniac that would help me instead, to see something burn, like the abandoned child and its village's warmth.

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