In the middle of the wilderness, the group came across a tall black tower. It was covered in vines, but its entranceway was clear and filled with a blue light. There were complex characters above the entrance, written in white.

“Can anyone read that?” asked Ara.

“I can,” said John. “It says, Trial 236. It’s in the language of the Bright Ones.” This was just like the trial tower on Kumra. What sort of trials did it contain? Would it test his weaving skills like it had done last time?

“Bright Ones,” Ara murmured. “We shouldn’t let this opportunity go to waste. Let’s enter.”

“Eh, are you sure that’s a good idea?”

“You want to walk around it, Big Crow?”

Big Crow flew to the top of the tower and then came down. “It’s all the same up there. There are no windows. We have no idea what we’re going into. I vote we stay away.”

“I say we go into the tower,” said Lin. “The artefacts of the Bright Ones are worth a fortune. They can even buy planets.”

“What’s the use of a fortune if you die obtaining it, eh?”

“I say we go in too,” said Rose, stroking his flame thrower. “What’s there to fear?”

“Then let’s go,” said John. People always feared the unknown. Big Crow was not wrong to be cautious, but being over cautious was a bad thing. One would lose out on many things in life this way. The Trial Tower was an opportunity that John could not pass up.

As soon as John stepped into the blue light he was sucked away to a completely different place. The tower disappeared and he was back in the wilderness, but it was not the same wilderness. It was the area beneath the hill of his lonely planet, where the elves had found him. The tower had somehow teleported him back to this world. Why had the tower chosen to teleport him here? Did he have a strange link with this planet?

“Ara,” he shouted. “Rose! Lin! Big Crow!” The only reply was his echo.

He climbed up the hill and found his cave. Everything was there the way he left it, except for the holocube which was gone. He climbed to the top of the hill and looked around hoping to catch a glimpse of anyone.

“No luck,” he sighed. Would he be alone for the rest of his life? Was this his destiny? Had his reincarnation been for nothing? Doubts assailed him. Maybe he should just give up and die. No! He had to survive and find Earth again.

He fashioned a stake out of a strong stick and moved into the forest. He inadvertently stepped into the territory of a rogue tusker. The elephant charged at him. John threw his aura covered stake at the elephant’s head causing an explosion of gore. He was not the same John as before. He reckoned he could take on a master of the planet quite easily. He found a deer and killed it for his dinner. He wondered how the others were doing. Sher Khan was in Lin’s pet space so he should be fine.

John thought about exploring the rest of the planet but decided against it. The old Bright One had said there were no people here and John trusted his words. If Ara and the others had been teleported to this planet, it would be like finding a needle in a haystack. He proceeded to build a wooden house in the valley below. When he finished the construction he realised that he had made several mistakes. It was not perfect, but it would keep him warm and the rain off his head.

John built furniture – a bed, a table and a chair. He built a small shed where he could butcher his kills, and a kitchen with a chimney. His project took him a whole year. Loneliness soon set in. John would often think of his days on the Swift Retribution and on Kumra. He had been so happy then. He had not truly appreciated the company of people. With the memories of his past life now fully integrated into him, he felt differently. He remembered the busy streets of his city, his over protective parents his sadistic sister. He’d often fantasize about being back on Earth, with all his powers intact, Earth’s lone guardian against an invasion of aliens. They’d all hail him as a hero.

Karamen’s betrayal no longer bothered him. He could understand Karamen’s desire to live. Moreover, elves were almost immortal, so the prospect of death must have seemed all the more daunting. He forgave Karamen in his heart. He suspected that Karamen had not gone all out on him during the fight. Despite the poison, Karamen shouldn’t have been that weak. John had tried his best not to harm Karamen which had left him with many openings. As John replayed the fight in his mind he realised that Karamen could have killed him a hundred times over. Something had stopped him from making the final blow.

Years passed and John’s loneliness grew unbearable. He looked for some young monsters to tame. They were too wild and tried to kill him, no matter what he tried. He managed to keep a puppy for three months before it grew up and reverted to its wild nature. Even man’s best friend was untameable on this planet.

John was now a man. He was tall now, about six feet tall. He no longer hunted just for food. He hunted for the sheer pleasure of it. It kept his mind busy. The deadlier the prey the better. He went searching for the masters of the planet. Killing these massive creatures was a challenge in itself but John’s weaving made it a one sided fight. His aura reserves grew every day. John soon reached his forties. He experimented with his powers and learned how to fly in the air. It was easy once you got the hang of it. He learned how to summon a river of fire, hailstorms of light, arrows of deadly darkness, gravitational balls and spatial rifts. He was now the true master of the planet. He wondered if he was a match for Ovin the Destroyer. Relar had said martial artists used internal energy. He wondered if he could tap into it. John meditated for years trying to get some glimmering of this internal energy, but failed every time. Perhaps it was impossible to channel internal energy when one’s aura circuits were already formed.

John looked at his reflection in the lake one morning and noticed that his hair was beginning to grey. How long had he been on this planet now? John couldn’t remember. Years? Decades? Centuries? It all seemed the same to him. Most people started greying in their forties, but John was not most people. With aura energy to complement his vital processes his ageing should have slowed after reaching adulthood. Perhaps it truly had been centuries. His memory was still sharp, but he could feel his strength fading.

One day, while John was sitting on a mountaintop gazing at the sunrise he felt a pain his chest. He began to black out and then he breathed his last.

“Congratulations on passing the first trial,” a soft and gentle voice woke him up.