[Players! Players!" XK22 clapped his paws happily as the System's notification concluded, convinced that this was good news for the gang. Saying then, still with a big smile on his anatomically impractical face: [The System has just released a Search and Rescue Quest! Do you want to go? Do you want to go and get it?], all without even knowing what exactly said Quest consisted of.

"Give me a beer and I'll conquer the world..." Shot out of nowhere a Roberto who was unconvinced he was even going to get his ass off the chair, raising his own glass to the sky for some reason. Don't ask me which one. After that, he drank in one gulp what was left of his portion of good liquid gold, before putting his elbows on the table and staring at the others without adding even one more syllable.

This was his own way of starting a discussion, but it was relatively appreciated by the kind Mario who, unlike his companion, bothered to ask XK22: "And what is this Quest? What should we do? And what would we gain from it?", passing the hot potato to the little being that only then began to have some doubts about his expectations.

[Eh... So... I...] He stammered while looking at the Players' faces with a slight panic in his heart, not finding any of them with the look of someone who is ready to jump into action. However, wanting to live up to his title of Assistant, he hurriedly searched for the information that the System had told him about this, but without finding any noteworthy results.

[The Quest will begin at the rescue of the NPC Child 00123. I don't have any... I don't have any clues as to the progress of the actual Quest... I'm sorry. The System rewards will then be determined by the difficulty of the Quest, as well as the Penalties...] Finding himself, near the end, introducing a term that made the troublesome smoker next door throw a half-hearted blasphemy.

"Ah, great. So we can take it up the ass not just once, but twice. Fucking generous..." Causing the temperature of the room to drop and causing a brief shudder in the other two mentally challenged virtual drug addicts.

"What... what are Penalties supposed to be? Does that mean we risk something by accepting this... Eh, this Quest? Is it something always from your video games?" Camilla then asked, pulling her husband's sleeve, hoping she had misinterpreted the Assistant's words, showing a naivety perhaps born out of necessity.

Alex didn't have an answer ready for her, as he didn't have a clear idea on the subject either. After all, in RPGs or MMORPGs, there could be penalties for failing to complete an objective or mission, but there was never a real standard in this regard. In practice, within the bounds of common sense, it could be a bit of everything: from losing levels to losing items, to even serious consequences to the point of forcing you to replay several hours of content before you could retry the same mission.

In a nutshell, it depended on how much of a child of Satan the developers behind the game, or the area, in question were, and, at the moment, the boy didn't have much faith in the people who had set up the Game they were in.

"XK22," called for the little creature's attention after a few seconds, asking even before the other could open his mouth, "What do we risk if we fail?" While, on the other side of the table, Roberto added in a rather blunt tone, "Besides the neck bone, of course." Leaving poor XK22 to move his neck between the two so he could look at their faces as they spoke.

[The Penalties involve the loss of Credits. In case of failure, Credits will be removed from the Team Bank or from the Players' inventory,] he answered immediately afterwards without leaving any downtime, as it was an information he had already saved in his memory since the defeat of the Boss. Although, realizing only now that he hadn't yet explained such an important part of the System, the soft little being couldn't help but feel a little guilty.

"What if we run out of Credits? Or, even better, what if we were asked to pay for Credits we don't have?" Mario tried to push, only to find himself thinking about his own 40 Credits. Until a moment before, he had considered them as little more than a consumable currency within the Game. Now, however, a feeling began to arise within him that managed to put pressure on his shoulders.

[In case of a negative balance... In case of a negative balance...] Then, dear XK22 hinted his own answer, but without concluding it. It was a delicate subject and, to tell the truth, it scared him a little. From his point of view, the people who were now there with him were the only ones he had ever met and, even though he had only exchanged a few words with them, he had become attached to them because of the settings given to him by the System.

[In case of a negative balance the Player is removed from the Chessboard, with no possibility of recovery. The data of his Instance will be erased automatically at the end of the automatic check from the System,] he resumed to say after forcing himself, describing, in his own way, what normal people simply defined as 'death'.

"Great. Why did I expect that?" Entered Roberto's speech at full force, sprawled in his chair as only a nobleman of other times would have known how to, giving a certain emphasis to each syllable of the word 'fantastic'. He wasn't completely pissed off yet, even if, if you judged only by that idiotic expression on his face, it would have been impossible to even understand that.

Still, his balls were spinning. Not to the point where they whirled like a helicopter blades and lifted him off the ground in a vortex of bullshit, but that was the general thrust.

"So if we went outside... Ah, right. Let me check out where this NPC is," Alex tried to get the discussion back on tracks that weren't entirely derailed by bringing up the Terminal and clicking on the map option. Once selected, he could see the Game Zone, the space they were currently in, in whose center was the mall, divided into vertical and horizontal lines. It was not at all as pretty as the satellite maps of the navigation systems, but it was doing its dirty job.

Then, using his little fairy fingers, he became able to increase or decrease the zoom on a particular area. Also, marked by a red dot, Alex quickly found both his own location, that of his companions, and, far up towards the northern border of the digital map, also a yellow square indicating where the NPC was at that moment.

"That's pretty far away... It's going to be a mess getting there." Mario thought, craning his neck to take a look at the projected map in front of Alex too, roughly estimating what the distances might be using the size of the mall as a yardstick. However, once she heard the giant's words, Camilla stood up from her chair, saying in a loud and ringing voice, "Get there? Are you going to do something so stupid?" Immediately making her thoughts on the topic fairly clear.

"If losing all of the Credits is equivalent to a dry death then it makes sense to try and get as much as you can," however, the big guy stood up to her, matching his own reasoning with a long heartfelt sigh. "Think about it," he went on to say, crossing his arms and staring straight into Camilla eyes. "We have a seven-day limit on something we don't know a damn thing about. Anything could happen to us and, I'm guessing, our Assistant can't tell us anything ahead of time. Am I wrong?" he concluded, moving his head to the side to look for an answer from XK22.

The little creature had already been asked a question about Phase Two, but hadn't been given the opportunity to say much since the gang had instead preferred to eat lunch rather than pay attention to him. Not that it would have changed much really. Even if they had, his answer would have been the same as the one he gave at that very moment, which was: [I have not been given any information on this matter. I'm sorry, Mr. Mario].

The big guy shrugged, fully expecting something like that. Saying, as soon as he returned his gaze to the bursting couple, "See? The only thing that's certain is that we have to keep the points they gave us after beating the Boss the same as gold. If we lose those we're really in deep shit. And in all likelihood the Quest rewards will be more Credits that could save our ass. I mean, I don't think we have the luxury to let this opportunity slip by." Calmly and composure eviscerated the symbolic amount of dick they were taking up the butt without any vaseline.

And, it had to be said, he wasn't wrong at all. Thinking about it carefully, the girl also came to the same conclusion, more or less. It wasn't clear how dangerous it would be once the Quest began, but if the Monsters were like the ones that had attacked them on the ground floor there would be little to worry about. However, if they were forced to fight other Bolzig level Monsters then it would be a very different matter, and having seen the condition in which her dear Alex had ended up, Camilla couldn't overlook that possibility for a moment.

"Even if you say so," she then set off on the attack, in a fierce attempt to win the argument and change the giant's mind, complete with a sharp palm strike against the surface of the table. Poor table, he had done nothing wrong. "We just survived a terrifying Monster. We're all tired and definitely not in our right mind right now. Do you really think we should take such a risk? If it wasn't for Sabrina's care, you wouldn't even be able to stand on your own right now. Do you remember how you were standing earlier? What if next time Sabrina wasn't there to help you?" Moving forward with her head held high and without catching her breath, causing her face to turn red in a way that was almost sympathetic; if you ignored the screaming, of course.

"I've been taking hits all my life. I remind you that I was there taking the Boss's punches in the face. And now that my Level has increased I've become even more resilient than before. Don't underestimate a second line!" Mario defended himself from the, metaphorical, left hook of the nice-assed demon. Swaying his head and tightening his guard, again as a metaphorical image, without fatigue disfiguring his face. Although, towards the end, the boy seemed to suddenly explode as if Camilla had just insulted his mother, raising his voice and losing his cool for the first time in front of the happy gang.

"Don't fight... Don't fight..." Sabrina tried, unsuccessfully, to get in the way by suddenly throwing herself in the middle of the fight, not knowing what else to do. The tone of her voice, however, was too low to be audible and was quickly overpowered by another scream of Camilla who, pressing her index finger against Mario's chest, told him to lower his tone and stop talking bullshit; I am paraphrasing for the more sensitive ears.

That woman when she wanted to was truly scary. Hard to imagine that same natural disaster in the morning had not only been useless, but had spent much of her time in tears. Ah, how nice to see that good intentions sometimes could even tame a tyrannosaur with boobs. Not even a grenade could have such an effect.

In any case, having lost the manhood contest against Mario after a few more exchanges in which both sides suffered some injuries, the girl turned to look for her boyfriend to support her war effort. Unfortunately for her, Alex proved to be more of a man than that situation would have benefited, at least according to Camilla.

The imbecile, in fact, who remained seated in his seat leaning forward with both hands resting in front of his chin, did not seem very surprised by the latest news. Rather, after rearranging his ideas, he supported Mario's approach by saying, "He's right, we can't ignore an opportunity like this...", leaning his forehead against the support formed by his thumbs after only a few words, ending the harangue with a wistful sigh.

"Alex..." Camilla was speechless, cornered once again by the opinions of the majority. She didn't really get very angry with the moron, despite the open betrayal he just displayed, but that wouldn't make her give up. Her temper certainly wouldn't let her.

However, there were very few options available to the girl. Sabrina, for example, ninety-nine percent would not take a stand, as she had done before. Seeking her support would therefore have been just wasted time. The only other potentially useful person was Roberto, and Camilla wasted no more precious time before pulling him into the discussion, raising her voice again and pounding the table one more time.

"You don't agree with them, do you? Didn't you say you wanted to talk calmly and decide on how to spend the available Credits, right? Now we also know that their value is even higher than we could have imagined. Don't you think we should take our time to better choose how to move forward?" Mixing, to give Caesar his due, explosions in which her emotions were the only thing you could feel with moments in which, once she caught her breath, she managed to show herself amazingly rational.

God, if you had found her in front of you, your first thought would have been to call the police, but you wouldn't have done it anyway out of a sense of respect for her. Maybe. Probably. Or rather... I don't know. Let's go on, Roberto had already started to answer, annoyed but honest.