"Dude I still can’t believe we did that.” Miguel said, his voice hoarse from exhaustion. He was astride a chestnut brown horse riding back towards the exit to The Tower. The clear night sky provided plenty of light, making travel relatively easy.

“Yeah, that shit was insane.” Sam was also on a new horse. The mystery reward for completing the Princess in the Castle had been the riding skill and a horse of their choice from Duke Mace Farnham’s personal stables.

Ethan was exhausted as he rode his own piebald charger. His bed back in the guild hall was calling his name something fierce. The horses were an amazing reward for the day’s adventuring. Normally players could buy them around level 10 but they were rather expensive. Ethan hadn’t been able to justify spending the gold on a mount when he was in constant need of gear. But this beautiful mare was now bound to him. It didn’t matter if he died, the horse would spawn as a Summoning Rune in his inventory that he would always have access to.

On top of the horses each member of the guild had gotten fifty gold and almost half a level’s worth of experience. Between that and the experience from the battle in the great hall, Ethan was closing in on level 14. There is a real possibility that tomorrow I’ll hit 15, this is the fastest we’ve ever leveled.

“Ethan, did you hear me?” Leah’s annoyed voice brought him back to focus.

“No, what?” He was so tired that even if he hadn’t been distracted by their good fortune, he wasn’t sure he’d have realized she was talking to him.

“I said, what’s the plan for tomorrow?” Leah asked him again from her black destrier.

“We haven’t really touched this floor at all, so we’re back here.” Ethan struggled to remember the other subzones of the first floor. We could do, um, the caverns, or the um, um, um….” He trailed off, his brain too tired to finish the thought.

“That’s the only other subzone.” David added from in front of him. “Then it’s the maze for the floor boss.”

Ethan nodded, his tired eyes crossing and doubling the number of Davids on horseback in front of him. He shook his head to clear the double vision.

“I won’t lie, I can’t make a decision tonight.” He shook his head again, attempting in vain to keep his eyes open. “I’ll decide after breakfast in the morning.” 

Roughly half a mile in front of him, slightly obscured by trees and bushes, was the exit to the Tower Entryway. At first Ethan wasn’t sure if he was hallucinating the shimmering blue gateway, he was so tired. Luckily, David urged his mount faster and disappeared through the portal. 

“See you back in the entrance.” Miguel slapped his reins against his mount’s neck excitedly and it took off at a gallop. Sam, Tae-Won and Leah quickly followed, their horses throwing up small clouds of dust in the darkness.

“If I try that, I’m going to end up falling from my horse.” Ethan said aloud to himself. His horse continued towards the gate at a steady pace. Faster than he would have gone walking or running, but not nearly as fast as his friends had made the short run.

Several minutes later, Ethan arrived at the doorway. When he guided his horse through the entrance, he was surprised to find himself drop several feet to the ground when his mount disappeared out from under him. If he’d been more alert he would have expected his horse returning to it’s summoning crystal in his inventory. Instead, he stumbled before getting to his feet.

“Guess no one wanted to wait for me to get here…” Ethan said to the empty room, his voice bouncing off the stone walls. He was a little disappointed that not even David had waited for him. Usually they reviewed any encounters immediately after they called the night, to be by himself for the trip back was an odd feeling. Ethan just shrugged to himself and walked towards the portcullis, which was already raising itself for him.

Exiting The Tower for the night, he looked in his inventory for the new mount summoning crystal he’d received. A second later, his piebald mare stamped her foot and snorted through the bit in her mouth.

“Easy girl.” Ethan rubbed her head affectionately before climbing into his saddle. Something about this animal, even though Ethan knew it wasn’t real, made him feel at ease. The mare nudged gently him with her head, bringing a tired smile to his face.”Alright, alright, let’s get going.”

It took him two attempts to mount the horse, he may not have had a debuff but he was so exhausted he couldn’t make his muscles work correctly. I really hope I don’t fall off on this ride… 

The trip to Startesgarde took less than half an hour on horseback, over halving the time it had taken his group to reach the Tower that morning. When Ethan arrived back in front of the guild hall, he was surprised that he had managed the entire trip without falling asleep or off his horse. He was also surprised that there were no lights coming from the front windows of the guild hall. Was I that far behind everyone?

HIs horse disappeared once again as he approached the building, expecting it this time he managed to not fall completely to the ground as he had earlier. Proud of himself that he’d managed not to fall, especially given how tired he was, he made for the door to the house. 

The heavy wood door creaked when he opened it and Ethan swore under his breath. He wanted to be quiet as he came home, with no lights on everyone had to be sleeping. Pushing slowly, he managed to get the door open wide enough he could slip through and quickly closed it behind him. 

The kitchen and living area were completely dark, even the viewing screen they used was off. Giving his eyes time to adjust to the dark, Ethan was shocked when he noticed that there wasn't even any light coming from under the doors of the two bedrooms on the first floor. Man, no one is awake. The stairs groaned and squeaked as he climbed them, despite how quiet he attempted to be. The high pitched noise seemed to echo in the small building and Ethan prayed he wasn’t waking anyone.

Once he finally made it to his bedroom, he immediately began unequipping his armor. He could have easily fallen asleep fully dressed if he’d sat down for even a second. His fingers fumbled with the buckles and straps, taking him longer than usual to remove everything. The buckles on the sides of his cuisses ended up taking longer than the rest of his armor, leaving him frustrated enough to not even pick up his discarded armor from the floor before climbing into his bed.

Ethan laid in his bed for several minutes thinking about nothing, just enjoying the comfort of laying down on a soft mattress instead of standing in his armor. His body felt similar to when he’d come off sixteen hour shifts in the restaurant’s he’d worked in in the real world: achy and sore. His limbs throbbed from the extra blood flow as his digital body worked to repair his digital muscles.

In less time than it had taken to remove his armor, Ethan was asleep.

Ethan’s left arm was a charred stump below the elbow and blood ran in rivers down his exposed skin. Cradling his mangled limb to his body, Ethan looked around for any healer available.

“I got you little brother.” Arianna was absolutely beaming as she touched his burned arm. Instantly, all the pain in his body disappeared and he watched as his arm began to regrow from the wound. Shattered bone reformed and regrew before muscle, blood vessels and skin covered his arm again.

“Thanks!” Ethan had not even felt the physical pain of the burn on his arm, the giant golden letters floating in the air had completely distracted him from anything else.

FLOOR 100 CLEAR! 

Fireworks exploded around the announcement and a smaller notification had been sent to every player in the game.

***System Notification***

The 100th floor boss has been defeated! In five minutes, the log out function will be enabled and all Players will be able to leave The Tower. Tilest Games thanks you all for playing!

When Ethan started looking around for any of his guild members who’d survived the final battle, he was surprised by a sudden tackle from Miguel.

“We’re going home!” Tears streamed down his friend’s face when Miguel released him from his bear hug.

Mihal marched up to him, pounding his spear on the ground in excitement.

“Maybe when we all get home, you can finally put on a shirt!” His mustache bounced as he chided Ethan. Jerry, Alera and Linda laughed at Mihal’s joke. Ethan didn’t care,there were only seconds left until they all logged out finally, nothing was going to change his mood.

The timer continued to count down and Ethan walked through the crowd of surviving raiders, still looking for anyone from his guild. He had scanned the raid interface looking for the names of his friends but couldn’t even find them listed.

***System Notification***

The logout function is enabled as of this moment in time. Once again, thank you for climbing The Tower.

“Miguel, have you seen anyone else?” Ethan shouted over the crowd as people everywhere began logging out. The grid of the raid interface was rapidly shrinking as the players left the game.

“No, but I’m sure we’ll find them on the outside.” Miguel said as he shook his head. “Speaking of which, I’ll see you out there. Love you man.”

And Miguel disappeared too.

Ethan smiled and hit the giant log out button that had suddenly appeared in front of him.

“Ethan!? Ethan!?” His mother’s voice greeted him, but his world still remained dark.

“Mom?” Tears of joy ran down his cheeks, he could feel her hands on his face, covering his eyes.

“Be careful son, you’ve been out a long time that we’re covering your eyes so you don’t hurt them.” Ethan’s father’s voice was as strong as he’d remembered. 

“I don’t care,” Ethan sobbed, “I just want to see you.” He reached up and pulled at his parent’s hands, trying to uncover his eyes.

“Okay, okay.” HIs mother’s voice responded and he could hear her crying too. “I’m going to move my hands now, just take it slow.” Ethan could feel the pressure leave his face and he slowly opened his eyes.

Brighter light than he could have ever imagined assaulted his vision. Blinking, he tried to clear his long closed eyes and finally see his parents. 

“Oh Ethan,” he could hear his mother still crying as he continued trying to find her face in the bright light. “I lo---”

“OH FUCK!” Daniel’s scream and a loud crash abruptly woke Ethan from his beautiful dream.

Ethan shot up in his bed, his dream still vivid in his memory. So deep asleep he had been, that he hadn’t realized when it was happening that he was stuck in a dream. Now that he was awake he was pissed that he’d tricked himself and also that Daniel had screamed so loudly, waking him up.

Half a second later he bolted from his bed. Barely awake, he stumbled across the room stumbling over the pile of amor he hadn’t stored in his inventory properly. Pain shot through his foot when he kicked his heavy helm, catching his smallest toe on the edge of the face guard. 

“Shit.” Ethan winced in acute anguish, but continued to the door. 

Miguel looked surprised to see him when his door swung wide open. Ethan quickly glanced around the small room. David was kneeling halfway down the stairs over Daniel, his hand glowing as it rested on his chest. 

“What happened?” Ethan’s voice was panicked, the sudden rush of adrenaline waking him up. 

“Heeey man.” Miguel’s voice slurred his greeting and his eyes were glazed over but he smiled wide at Ethan. 

“Daniel had too much to drink and fell down the stairs.” David had risen from the stair he was kneeling on and came up to the crowded landing. 

“Well, to be fair, I fell and then he fell.” Miguel grinned madly as he swayed on his feet. 

“He okay?” Ethan wasn’t really concerned for Daniel, he’d seen David heal him but felt the need to be polite. Despite the fact his drunken friends had woken him up. 

“Yeah he’s fine,” David replied. “These assholes thought they’d match me for drinks at Tara’s.”

Ethan groaned in sympathy. He’d tried the same thing once or twice when they’d been roommates, it always ended with him hugging a toilet and David laughing at him. In the real world, David’s tolerance for alcohol was almost legendary, a trait that had somehow carried over in game. 

Miguel still swayed next to them, his eyes now almost closed. He looked like he’d fallen asleep on his feet. David backhanded him softly in the gut. 

“What, huh?” Instantly Miguel’s eyes opened. 

“You need water and bed.” David ordered the Cleric, pointing at the door to Miguel’s room. 

“Yeah that sounds…” Miguel stopped in the middle of his sentence and looked like he was about to vomit, but held it in, “great.”

Behind them, Daniel did vomit, all down the stairs. 

“Sorry.” Daniel's voice was pathetic in its tone. “I’ll clean that up.”

Ethan simply turned and looked at David. 

“I’m going back to bed.” He shook his head in frustration as he turned and went back to his room, saying nothing else to his friend. 

He laid in his bed for several minutes, the sound of Daniel clumsily cleaning the stairs keeping him awake. Finally, after Daniel had quit making noise in the hallway, Ethan went back to sleep.