June gnces around, trying to figure out an idea. “Umm, we can. Hmm. Oh! Water. We don’t have to outrun them or guide them into someone else. We just need to escape their notice.

  “There should be some kind of river next to the city, if only to provide water and trade. We just need to keep running and hope we find it before the monsters catch up.”

  Gem nods and makes a peace sign, “Sounds like a pn! Re-up my buff and I’ll give us a direction to head.”

  June raises an eyebrow, “I don’t see how the buff will help pick out a direction, but sure, have at it. [Cat’s Paw]!”

  Gem ughs, “Oh yeah! That’s the stuff.” And they speed up, angling towards a tree a little to the side.

  With a hop and a jump, Gem flies up and barely manages to grab the lowest branch. From there, the momentum swings them up, which they use to rapidly swing from branch to branch until they get above the canopy. Their st swing with an extra dose of oomph to get some air.

  Once up there, they don’t try anything top fancy, only a bit of a spin to get a nice look around. Then their trip down is a good bit less graceful. Gem keeps their forward momentum, but mostly let themselves fall. They only grab a few branches to redirect around trunks.

  Then they hit the ground in an over the shoulder roll that goes out of control. Gem tries to pop back up on to their feet, but all that achieves is the roll turning into more of a limb filing tumble. Until they run into a tree.

  June catches up to them and grabs Gem’s arm, pulling them to their feet. Though Gem is a bit out of it. Still, they manage to keep running until they recover some.

  June shakes her head, “What was that? Like, the climb up was impressive, but gravity beat you something fierce!”

  Gem, a little woozy, manages to get out, “The game’s messing with me! I actually can do shoulder rolls irl. There was a root or something that tripped me up.”

  June sighs, “What did you see?”

  Gem gestures slightly to the right, “The city is there, but I didn’t see anything to note the river. I guess they wouldn’t exactly be using tall, masted ships around here.”

  June, “Well, more than I expected. We’ll go straight ahead then, even if we don’t find a river, there should be some streams kicking about.”

  And they did! Well, it took a worrying amount of time with the sounds of monsters behind them getting ever closer. The duo probably wouldn’t have survived if the monsters had gotten eyes on them. It was only the fact that they had to follow their scent that slowed them down enough for the pair to run away for so long.

  Gem turns to June, “So, do you know how to dive?”

  June ughs, “I don’t even know how to swim!”

  Gem shakes their head, “And you called my pns crazy! I guess there’s no better time to learn.” And Gem grabs June up into a princess carry once again, before taking a flying leap, barely making it to the center of the stream.

  A stream that was flowing at a decent clip, their heads popping up quite a distance downstream.

  June sputters, “I wasn’t ready for this!”

  Gem giggles, “Don’t worry, I’ve got you. Besides, the faster the flow, the quicker we’re out of here!”

  June, “Yes, but to where?”

  Gem, “Probably somewhere even more dangerous. We just have to keep an eye out for trouble and head to the shore the second anything looks like trouble. At least the area seems retively ft. I do Not want to go through the waterfall trope.”

  June goes pale, well paler. The cold water did a good job of sapping her color in the first pce. “I didn’t even consider waterfalls!”

  Gem shrugs it off, though not physically. That’s kind of hard to do while holding someone in a princess carry and treading water for the both of them. “Look on the bright side! My body is apparently strong enough to swim for both of us. When it comes time to get out, you’ll be rested.

  “Though we really do need to get you swimming lessons. This feels like a melt river with how cold it is. Thankfully, we must be a good distance from the source or you’d be in danger of freezing! At least if you were swimming, the exercise would help warm you up. Not that you can do much when it comes to swimming in cold water.”

  June cringes, “Now I have something else to worry about! How long do you think we should stay in here?”

  Gem looks around, “Well, probably should first get out of the forest. That way, we can see any nearby dangers. Hmm, well, I guess tall grass will block sight just as well? Meh, an open field, would at least be a new territory. Less likely to have the same monsters catch up to us!”

  June sighs, “Guess we wait.”

  Gem, “You wait, I’ll see about keeping us afloat!”

  And wait she did.

  Gem, “I see with my little eye, something brown!”

  June, “Is it the branch in front of us? Again?”

  Gem, “How’d you guess?”

  And wait.

  Gem, “So, I’m thinking of ignoring the usual way people are pying. Like, I understand staying in one pce? But come on! This pce practically kicked me out already.”

  June, “You mean you didn’t want to join any of their groups?”

  Gem, “Yeah, that. Anyway, a good wander feels right. Maybe I’ll find a pce to settle? And it isn’t like I pn to try and find the edge of the world or anything! I’ll be sticking in the vicinity. There simply won’t be a home base, at least to start. Have you heard about the floating homes? Like, can’t take them into danger zones, but a safe pce that follows you on your normal day to day?”

  And wait...

  Oh, nevermind, the forest seems to come to an end a bit in front of where they are.

  Akhier

  Dungeon's Path

  So the world ended. Whoopsie? We didn’t even see it coming. Quite literally as it came at us faster than the speed of light. Don’t worry though, it got better. Also, I am not joking about the world ending. Most people say that and mean humans are inconvenienced for some reason. Nope, all matter disintegrated at the atomic scale there for a few moments. Apparently the local universe wasn’t actually stable? Don’t ask me to go into too much detail. It would require both of us to have a few more college degrees than sense, and I at least ck them (both the degrees and the sense). Anyway, the energy/matter/wibbly wobbly strings were at a local minimum and not the universal minimum. Basically, what we took for sea level was actually a nice little mountain ke and when the dam busted so did, well, everything.

  Now here is where things go a bit off track with what normal meant before. You see magic is real, qi is real, gods are real. Not on old Earth mind you but souls pay little attention to time and space so we dreamed of it. In fact, the closer the shift in reality got to Earth, the closer our dreams got to the new reality. This is basically me tip toeing around the fact that it was a ‘System Apocalypse’. Reality became a video game, I became a dungeon, and this is my story.

  Doyle Huxley just wanted a normal life but as the above might clue you in on that just isn’t in the cards. He gets to experience a “Path Based System Apocalypse” and some early paths he takes, both literally and figuratively, lead to him becoming a dungeon.

  The aim is to release chapters once a week on Friday.

  Cursing will be avoided and no naughty adult action will take pce in the story.

  NeoRealm

  Jason has just turned 18 and will be finally be able to py The biggest VR game out there, NeoRealm. Using a bit of knowledge from his past (life) he wants to start his adult life with a bang. Taking the road less traveled will sound quiant compare to where he wants to go.

  ~NeoRealm~ the most realistic VR game to date. A Fantasy world which even after years of exploration is still mostly unknown. Want to experience the mysteries of the Arcane? Become one of the many types of Magic Users and work to improve your ranking till you can move mountains, or just ftten them if you prefer. Do you just desire to wield sheer physical power? Then train your melee skills beyond all others and decimate towns with a single swing. Or maybe you just want to know what its like to be a cat person. We have those too. Come on in and join us at 5x the speed of boring old reality (you heard us right, not your average everyday 4x time compression!). *WARNING - limited to those age 18 and up, we are not responsible for any minor losing their grasp on reality, sanity, or species

  Banished Talent

  There were things hidden in the darkness and they’re about to introduce themselves to the hood of my car. Not that the knowledge will do me much good. Some Talents aren’t too appreciated by the Powers That Be, and with magic? Sometimes the best option is to just Banish the problem.

  I’m Alvin Smithson and let me tell you my story.

  Alvin grew up on Earth, or at least one shockingly simir to what you’re familiar with. Except for the magic. And Alvin? Despite never having experienced magic before, he believed in magic a little too much. So when magic found him, he was past the point of being returned to his boring modern life. Then things got worse when they tested him to see if he had any magic of his own.

  Join me, as we get a front-row seat to Alvin being banished from Earth and as he descend into a painful rebirth. He won’t be leaving the pnet alone, though. Much to his misfortune, a person going along has decided this is all Alin’s fault and is more than willing to make their displeasure known. So now Alvin only has a limited time to learn about his power in a pce actively trying to kill him.

  Can Alvin adapt fast enough? Gain the power needed? Or will he be just another life snuffed out in a realm where no one has ever escaped from?

  This novel has been finished and while you can read it in the entirety here and on my Patreon, there is a more polished version avaible for purchase as an ebook for 3.99 on both Amazon and my Patreon. I will get more of the cut if you buy it on my Patreon shop, but I understand that getting an ebook on kindle can be a hassle so feel free to use Amazon. If anything, it will help boost the story in the algo.

  [colpse]