After hearing what had happed to Erik, Eldrian was left gobsmacked. He had never expected that the NPCs would forcibly conscript them.

"This is gonna blow up so much." He sent to Erik, wondering how the company would respond to this situation.

This was different from the others, where players had actually wanted to join the event. Or where the violence of the battle had left them in shock. In those cases, even if the player had been used, they had been given a choice at one point. They had even agreed to the realism by signing the contract, thus the company can ask why they didn't expect it.

This was different though, now they were given death and servitude or servitude. Or a player could recreate their character, yet there was no guarantee that it would not happen again.

"I hope it does, that punch fucking hurt."

Reading this, Eldrian burst into laughter. He knew how much it could hurt in the game, and a punch would not hurt much. He certainly wasn't going to tell this to Erik, not wanting to ruin his pride.

"Don't worry about the punch, the game has more to offer," He said instead, alluding to it without directly saying it. "I also suspect that the company will soon do something about this."

"What do you mean?"

"I know they can control, or rather inform the NPCs about their wants. This happened on my second day, when an emergency update was done. I think that they will do something similar to control this event and prevent it from happening again."

After this they talked a bit more. Eldrian felt that he had indeed been too absorbed in his training, yet he didn't know how to lessen it. He wanted to fight and he wanted to be good at it. How was he supposed to train less and achieve that?

By the time Eldrian reached the adventurers guild, their chat had fizzled out to simply sharing details of their different cities. Eldrian realizing that he really needed to find out more about Phallos. Erik almost knew more than he did and had had fun with flowers. Eldrian felt strangely jealous of the simple fun Erik managed to have.

In the end they simply concluded to keep sharing the things they find, Eldrian also promised to send Erik the modules of the Tier 0 spells he had. Erik needed to learn magic as quickly as possible if he wanted to survive the madness that his starting city was going to be.

Erik begrudgingly agreed to learn magic, hoping that he would not need to use it to fight. He would like to use it in other manners though.

Entering the Adventurers guild Eldrian headed straight for the mission-boards. The guild was far busier than he had thought it would be. On his way to board, he asked a random person what was going on.

"We are gathering and meeting for the mission."

"What mission?"

"Check the board, it is impossible to miss."

Curious Eldrian quickly found the mission they were talking about. The paper containing it was four times the size of the others, drawing all the attention to it.

Reading it he quickly learned that it would be another event, much like the first. This time on a far grander scale, including an actual army and not just a team.

'Well, fuck...' Eldrian mumbled, realizing that while the situation was better than Vruntis, it was near to the same. The only thing making it better was the Taurus was still holding out.

From the notice, he learned that they had lost two cities and had called for help. Phallos answered, with this mission. This mission was both a relief and a recognizance mission. Phallos are both granting bonus money to kills and to information related to the monster invasion.

After reading it Eldrian head to the counter to learn more, having a few questions left.

"When is the Taurus Relief mission starting?" He asked a blond lady at the counter.

"Wednesday. Didn't you read the mission description?"

"I did, I just want to make sure about a few things." Eldrian felt embarrassed, while he had asked to make sure. He did not like the look the lady was now giving him.

"Do I qualify for the salary, even if I am Tier 0?"

After a slight pause, the lady broke out in laughter. "No, why would we offer a salary to someone who can't even use magic!"

"But,"

"No! Only Tier 1 and up can claim the salary."

'Dammit, I don't think I can master magic by Wednesday.' Eldrian complained to himself, feeling that he would likely miss the start of this event. He also felt insulted, he had offered more than many in the last event. Why did he need to be Tier 1 to be considered worth something? Naturally this was mostly true only due to his weapon being a magic weapon. Something which can mean more than a single spell or skill.

"Can I join later?"

"Sure, but you will have to sign up after reaching the army. Only then will you be considered as part of it."

"That makes sense," Yet Eldrian wasn't happy with this response.

'Do I sit it out, or go?' He asked himself as he left the guild. He wanted to go, especially if he managed to learn some magic. Yet he didn't think he should rush himself. He needed to learn more than just Tier 0 magic, he needed to reach Tier 1. He had no idea how hard that was going to be, he could only hope it wouldn't be too hard.

"Dangit, I don't want to miss this." Eldrian felt certain that this mission would be tough, nothing in the game had been easy. But due to this he also felt certain that the rewards would be great.

Thinking of this he was reminded of the Alpha he had in his inventory. 'Shit, I forgot about it!'

Quickly he called to his cubic inventory and looked inside it. It seemed that the Alpha's body was still fine, but Eldrian felt that he needed to process it soon. He didn't want to let it stay inside for much longer.

'Alright, master magic and process the Alpha! That is this week's plan!' Eldrian determined, finding that he really would not be able to join the start of the mission. Luckily he could join later and he was certain that this mission was going to last very long.

After confirming his plans he decided to spend the rest of the day in lesaure, first going Old Swords to see if he could visit Vivian a bit. He hadn't seen her since handing in his quest. If he found her he would ask her to show him around more, else he would simply show himself around.

He was slightly jealous of how convenient the map was for Erik, wishing he could even just see the entire map. The search function would simply be a bonus.

...

Eldrian spent the next few days continuing his training during the night and studying during the day. Each day he made some slight progress, slowly finding a way that allowed him to connect to more of the module.

By the end of Tuesday, he managed to break an entire pathway from the spell module. While it caused him quite a shocking pain for a few seconds, he quickly got used to it. After repeating this a few time he started feeling his control move past the simple pathway which had broken off.

'Tomorrow, tomorrow I will succeed.' He thought as he looked at the forums and saw some player posting complaints about how long they needed to travel for the new quest.

They had walked the entire day, yet according to the NPCs, they weren't even a tenth of the way. Seemingly needing three days' walk to reach the border of Phallos.

This lifted Eldrian's mood a bit, as it assured him that he would not miss too much. Especially if he bought a horse to ride.

Erik on the other hand was having a worse time, or he would be if he was actually playing the game. He had decided to try and join the game after being forced into war, yet he was quickly forced into training. Not wanting to train he tried to get away, only to be beaten up.

Furious he suicided, and as he respawned he saw soldiers already rushing at him. Luckily he didn't see Akarui present, thus he forcefully connected from the game.

Leaving the soldiers in wonderment as the person they were chasing simply disappeared into particles.

Eldrian had laughed when Erik had told him later. He found Erik's choice to be a good one, there was no reason he needed to play and hate it. It was supposed to be fun. He was laughing since Erik was the only person who could really take such drastic measures. Most other players would be bound by their equipment and XP. While they can place their equipment in their inventory, they can not do anything for their XP.

Tomorrow was also the hearing for Miracle Corporation, where they were going to defend themselves against the players who were trying to sue them. Yet the news from their side was, well silent. They had simply said that they wished to broadcast their hearing, saying that they wanted to take that time to explain some of the things to everyone.

Naturally, the players had no complaint about this, hoping it would humiliate the company.