Not sure whether it was the Explorator uniforms and badges that three of us were wearing or simply the confidence with which Sam and I led the others through the lift lobby and stepped onto the next one going up, giving us some kind of authority bias, but to Daisy and Voice’s surprise our party skipped the queue entirely and stepped straight onto the next lift going up.

  “We skipped the queue!” Daisy said once we were out of the lower building and rising up the cliff.

  “You queued last time?” I asked, a little too innocently.

  Sam tapped his lapel with its small golden shield indicating his status with the human government. “One of the perks,” he said.

  On entering the Explorator’s office, and discussing unloading everything so Sam could submit it, we found out that groups are combined together and what we gain together we all get. There would be no benefit to trying to funnel it to a single person. ‘To encourage teamwork’ was the unrequested explanation. On seeing what we had to submit, we were hastily bundled into the back office, where Christoph was manning the desk.

  “Ahh, welcome back, you two, with friends,” he grinned at us. “I was told you have picked up a lot of documentation and cleared a couple of sites for further exploration?”

  “We certainly have,” Sam declared proudly. “We gained access to the central services building, where we found these notes.” We started unloading the documents we had collected and had split between us. “We also scouted out a communications hub further south and brought that back online.”

  “That was you?” Christoph’s head shot up from his review of the documents, “We’ve had a few communication boosters out in the tower region, but bringing the southern landing commhub online has allowed us to communicate with the farms out that way and sped up our ability to respond to requests for help.” He stood up from his desk. “Let’s go and have a look at the map updates you have brought in.”

  We stepped out into the main room, Christoph manipulated a console and the local region map shimmered slightly. A green dotted line showed our route, south out of Landing, east out to the farm, south to some fields. It showed moving around as we cleared the field and then checked that it was fine. West down into the Central Services warehouse. Our exploration of that building, then south along the coast road to the Commhub, before heading north back to landing.

  “Is this where you found those documents?” Christoph asked.

  “Yes,” I replied. “It’s a large warehouse and office space.”

  “Jockson!” Christoph called out, and a burly man with sergeant’s stripes came out of the back room and saluted.

  “Sir!”

  “Get a squad to secure this building. I’ll get your full orders to you before you depart." Christoph highlighted the Central Services building.

  “Yes, Sir.”

  “Sergeant, in the middle of the front room, there is a filing cabinet. Behind that you will find a power box. Inside that is the key to the shutters; you will probably also need to turn the power on.” Voice called out. The man looked at him and nodded in acknowledgement before departing towards the back rooms.

  “Thank you,” Christoph said to Voice. “That should save them some time. If it is as you described, it will make for a good staging place for shipping goods back to Landing.”

  “Will you have any issues with one of the guilds having claimed it?” Sam asked.

  “Claimed it? I don’t see any indications that it has been claimed.” He tapped away on the computer. “Can’t see anything… from a legal standpoint, their majesties have already declared that only System-recognised ownership is valid. This building has also been tagged as a municipal resource. Those aren’t considered valid properties for guilds. Ok, let’s see. This route had been previously scouted, but you had a wider width of scan.” The map filled in a blue zone following most of our route, but in places, there was a green border expanding out from it. “No one had cleared the inside of this building.” The Central Services warehouse got filled in, in green. “And it looks like everyone gave that ‘business park’ with the Comhub a wide berth.” It also filled in with green with our route along the roads, gaining their blue core with a green border. “Let’s see how that all updates your Guild’s shared exploration map.”

  “Our what?” I asked.

  If you spot this tale on Amazon, know that it has been stolen. Report the violation.

  “When a guild member updates our map, it is added to their guild's shared map so they can more efficiently collaborate.” There was a slight flicker on the region map and parts of Landing started filling in green. It spread east and covered several of the towers, paths headed south, with one trail heading further south from where we fought the spiders, which I assumed had been Kelsey’s journey from the coast. You could see a green trail going along the coast in the sea, which I assume was Sam and my journey. “Not bad. I’m looking forward to seeing what more your guild can do. Ok, I’m authorising the full payout for this exploration. It’s going to take a few hours, though, to get through all those documents you brought us. So expect to hear from us again before the end of the day with the rewards for those.”

  Christoph arranged for our rewards and then headed into the back office to review the documents we had just dropped onto his desk. We gained 500 for each site we explored and another 250 rep points for the route we took. This raised me to 3250 rep points, taking me into rank three with the Explorators.

  “Just hit rank three,” I said, with a grin as I headed over to the terminal with the faction shop on it, which I could now access.

  Accessing the store terminal opened a large screen in my HUD. Typical looking storefront, the left-hand side had categories which could be expanded. Description of the item, a picture and a price. I expanded out the ‘armour’ selection and selected the top category, ‘back’. There were several Explorator cloaks listed. I clicked through several and the image was slightly different variations of the same cloak; there were options for different colours at the bottom as well. The variations all had names like [Explorator Cloak of the Agile Mage], which gave bonuses to moving through nature. In addition to Mage, there were Dragoon, Ranger, Defender, and Medic. There was a good selection of types for each, and clicking through some of the options, they also had different variations like Agile, giving a more movement bonus, Penetrating, giving bonuses to bypassing armour or toughness, and Stalwart, giving bonuses to defence.

  Everything was more of a sidegrade on what I presently had, and I couldn’t access the next tier of items, though, apparently, that would unlock when I got to rank five. I picked up an [Explorator Mask of the Robust Mage], which covered my mouth and nose, gave resistance to airborne poisons and pathogens and enhanced mana and health regeneration, that set me back 5 gold.

  I found the others waiting outside.

  “Kelsey had to go,” Sam said when I joined them. “Her mother is insisting on a sit-down family dinner. I shouldn’t say, but we shouldn’t expect to see her again tonight… her dad said they were going to break it to her that her mother is leaving… so she might not be in a state to play…”

  “I don’t mind leaving off going to the next base until she can join us,” I say. “It would be a shame for her to miss out on this leg of the journey after being part of the earlier ones. There is plenty we can take care of around town, and join the others at the towers…”

  “Indeed,” Voice confirmed. “I’ve managed to complete the Mage quest and wouldn’t mind picking up the next one.”

  “Same,” Daisy confirmed with a grin.

  “I should have focused my spells more; I’m still a way off all of them. I wouldn’t mind finding that combat trainer, though, so I can start working on the Arctic one,” I said.

  “Training would be good for me as well,” Sam said.

  After accompanying my friends to their respective trainers, we headed into town to try to find where the Combat Trainer had set up shop. Fortunately, the NPCs were quite helpful in directing us, and we came across his dojo about halfway between the lifts and the Wardens’ base near the towers.

  The squat two-story building was surrounded on three sides with training dummies. On the front, facing the road, a large open courtyard stood with three roped off circles where various players were facing each other in friendly spars. Sitting on a rocking chair, smoking a pipe, was the familiar face of the Weapon Master. The man’s face lit up when he saw Sam.

  “Ahhh, I am relieved. I was worried you had gone down with the Indefatigable,” he said as he stood up. “Come, let us see how you have all fared since we last sparred and if there is anything I can do to help you.”

  He led us into the building and over to one of the back rooms. Large windows let in plenty of light, revealing the sand-covered wooden flooring. A rope circle sat in the middle of the room. A musky scent, which reminded me of well-maintained gyms, hung in the air. The walls were covered in a huge variety of weapons.

  He indicated for Sam to go first and then stepped into the ring himself while drawing his blade.

  Sam saluted his opponent with his own blade and then joined him in the ring. They acknowledged each other and then the old man said, “Begin.”

  I saw Sam move, and then realised he had been reacting as the loud ching sound echoed in the room as their blades collided. Then they collided again. A ringing chachophony of sound as two expert swordsmen began to push each other and explore what the other could achieve. What followed was a complex tapestry of feints, reposts, and footwork as the pair of them circled each other and made use of the space around them.

  “Enough!” the Weapon master said with a huge grin on his face as he put some space between himself and Sam. “You have improved considerably from our last spar. I have some friends you should meet and cross blades with. The best way for you to improve further is by challenging more difficult opponents.” He turned to look in my direction. “You. You were using a quarterstaff, if I remember correctly. Seeing you in that mage garb makes sense. Come, show me how you have improved.”

  I stepped forward as Sam stepped out of the ring with a big grin on his face and drew out one of my BattleStaffs.

  “No. None of those magic sticks.” The Weapon Master crossed over to the wall and retrieved a pair of quarterstaffs from the wall-mounted racks. He tossed me one as he came back into the circle.

  “Begin.”

  I stepped forward and sent a thrusting strike at him. He nodded to me and lazily parried it aside.