Monroe

Chapter Two Hundred and Fifty-Three. Hawaii.

Scuba diving, while fun for Bob, had not been a Monroe approved activity.

The big Maine-Coon liked water well enough, but he was not at all comfortable with going underneath of it.

As much as Bob had enjoyed the otherworldly beauty of the reef they had dived, he'd cut it a bit short.

Now he was back on the beech, applying a slicker brush to Monroe's coat as an apology for leaving him on the chartered boat with strangers.

"That was gorgeous, yeah?" Jessica asked as she wrapped a towel around her hair.

"It really was," Bob agreed. "It's kind of weird, I've been living on another world for a couple of years now, but it's so similar to Earth that it doesn't feel that much different." He shook his head. "Being underwater like that was something truly special."

"Pretty sure there's magic to breathe underwater, and probably to handle increased pressure as well," Jessica said as she stretched out in the lounge next to him.

"There is," Bob confirmed, "although from what I understand, if you're deep enough to need it, the monsters that appear are high enough level to be an issue for most people, which makes the waves really bad."

"That would put a damper on underwater cities," Jessica mused.

"Not that the current population of even Earth requires us to colonize the ocean floor," Bob muttered.

"It will though," Jessica said, "soonish I'd think. Figure the King saves like, ninety-percent of the people, we'll have seven billion or so. Fifty percent of those people live for three hundred years or so, dropping a few kids as they go. Population growth is going to be explosive."

"I think it'll be interesting to check in every decade or so and see how things are going," Bob replied idly, inspecting his handiwork. Monroe was sprawled in a languid puddle, his silky coat perfectly straight.

"You're only going to pop back over every decade?" Jessica asked.

"Should be able to collect enough books to keep me going, see how things are progressing," he shrugged, "I haven't exactly set any plans in stone yet. Or on paper even."

"I suppose I can see that," Jessica sounded slightly reluctant as she agreed. "It's kind of hard to adjust my thinking to accept the realization that I might live for thousands, maybe even tens of thousands, of years."

"I'm told that reincarnating helps with that," Bob offered. "When you tier up, and then reincarnate, part of being a different species includes an innate understanding of your lifespan. Apparantly, the higher tier species often take a long time to progress because they don't suffer the same sense of urgency that we do."

"So when you hit tier seven and reincarnate, you'll end up with some weird elf-like sense of time then?" Jessica asked.

"Pretty much," Bob replied. "It's something I've been a little worried about. I haven't ever had friends before, and I'm concerned that the difference in perspective is going to damage my relationships."

"Well, I know I'm pushing to at least tier six," Jessica stated firmly, "and I know Dave and Amanda are as well."

"Honestly, tier seven, with an Affinity Crystal or two, is a fairly safe place to be on either Earth or Thayland," Bob said. "Assuming you have a few friends, you can survive a tide. You need quite a few people at tier six to have the same degree of safety."

"Yeah, but we're still probably a year or more out from tier seven, and that's if we rush," Jessica replied. "I mean, we'll get there, but I know that after I tier up and reincarnate back down, then rush all the way back up, it's going to be time for a break."

"I wouldn't mind taking a break, but I need to be powerful enough to standup to, or run away from, the various powers that might be coming after me," Bob sighed.

That particular line of thought always stressed him out.

Elizabeth smiled as she kicked an oversized lizard in the face, knocking it back and giving herself room to bring her massive sword down on its neck.

She'd waded through an ocean of blood to reach level twenty-five, and now she was beginning her journey through yet another.

She'd reincarnated as a Paragon, and the difference between tier five and tier six was palpable.

Elizabeth was willing to admit, privately, that her new height of six feet six inches gave her a vastly different perspective of the world. She hadn't been pleased by the increase in her size, initially, but she'd adjusted to it, and as everything remained proportional, she hadn't become some sort of mannish giant.

She felt her form was more Amazonian.

Another lizard died, and she continued her merciless campaign of extermination.

She'd been gathering information from both people and books, and it seemed that facing a monster tide would require her to be at the peak of tier seven. There was quite a bit of disinformation, and people didn't really like to discuss the matter, but it appeared that the noble houses who had access to Affinity Crystals, and paths to take advantage of them, tended to be the bulwarks against the monsters. These nobles, based on their species, were tier seven.

Elizabeth had frequently found herself frustrated by the lack of succinctly explained research, performed with an understood methodology. Knowledge was power, and the manner in which the nobility of Greenwold horded explained some of the difficulties they'd suffered over the years.

She had embarked on the path of 'The Ever Victorious Legion of the Light', a path which Huron had hastened to explain had nothing to do with the Church of the Light, although he found no fault in it.

It was a path presented and propagated by the Endless, and Elizabeth was quite certain that Mr. Whitman was the man responsible for it.

She had become quite convinced that Mr. Whitman had somehow obtained a great deal of knowledge that was not available to anyone else in Greenwold, and was doling it out through various outlets. The temptation to hang him up by his heels and shake him until all those secrets fell out was rather strong.

She reached down and scratched Purro behind his ears. The Path of the Ever Victorious Legion of the Light had provided her corgi's with armor, but she'd been able to shape the design.

"Your Majesty, it's nearly time for your meeting with Huron," Carson, one of the men detailed to her security, said quietly.

"Tempus fugit," she replied with a sigh. Her armor didn't allow for a watch, at least not at the moment. She'd thought about having one welded to the back of her gauntlet, but hadn't yet bothered, and likely wouldn't. Her detail ran her schedule with far more precision than she would have been capable on her own.

Elizabeth slid her sword into her inventory and fell into step with her detail as they surrounded her and headed toward the Gateway that would take them out of the Dungeon. Glancing down, she grimaced. It was easy enough to ignore in the moment, but the truth of the matter was that wading through an ocean of blood was not in any way a metaphor. She needed to bathe before meeting with Huron.

"All I'm saying is that as nice as Greenwold is, it's fucking cold as shit for like, nine months out of the year," Jason shook his head.

"Yeah, but the alternative is Earth, which to be honest, is going to be an absolute shit show," Amanda replied.

"But it's not the only alternative," Jason disagreed. "Back me up on this, Bob. There are a nearly infinite number of dimensions controlled by the system. It shouldn't be that hard to find one where Earth isn't populated, and settle down there. Thanks to magic, it isn't a one way trip, we can always pop over and catch up."

"He's not wrong," Bob agreed. "Although he is exaggerating the ease with which you can transverse dimensions," he shook his head, "I know I've mentioned before that the only reason we can pop over to Earth so easily is because it doesn't have a dimensional barrier of active mana. But, that said, you could likely find an Earth like planet to settle on if you spend some time looking for one."

He wasn't exactly sure how the conversation had gotten onto this particular topic. They'd suffered a party wipe, and while they were building new characters, it had come up.

Jason, despite his reverence for the British monarchy, was determined to find a place where the only people they were beholden to was themselves. He'd been polling the various people brought over from the D&D initiative, and had found quite a few kindred souls.

"Exactly," Jason nodded, "it might take a bit of doing, but imagine having Earth all to ourselves. No giant governments trying to control everything, no ridiculous tax laws. Just a decent sized group of, dare I say, decent people."

"Sign me up for a vacation hut on your Earth's version of Hawaii," Bob muttered as he looked out over the ocean.

The sun was setting, and the view was stunning.

They'd agreed to play outside under a pavilion, no one wanting to hide indoors.

"Oh, I'll shove over for you, no need for your own place," Jessica assured him with a wink.

"I don't know that I want to abandon Greenwold," Dave chimed in, wrapping an arm around Amanda. "We've put a lot of time, effort, and mana crystals in building out the apartments and the Dungeons."

"Yeah, but ultimately it's been what, a few months?" Jason replied. "I can assure you, with a supply of higher level people, that work would be easily replicated in a fraction of the time."

"Why give up what you have in Greenwold?" Bob asked. "I doubt everyone would want to leave, and honestly having a place to fall back to from either location makes tactical sense. If a particularly bad tide rolled in, you could evacuate to safety."

"That actually makes sense," Amanda admitted thoughtfully. "Evacuating to Earth isn't really feasible, as we are a multi-national group, and I'm absolutely certain that not even magic can put an end to the love affair every government on the planet has with bureaucracy."

"So, how would you go about it?" Jason asked Bob.

"Why ask me?" Bob replied.

"Because you're a right paranoid bugger," Jason began, "not without cause I'll admit, but I'm certain you've given this idea a bit of thought."

"He's got you pegged there," Dave grinned.

"Pegging?" Jessica somehow managed to make her grin seem naughty. "Is that something your into? I've not tried that, but I'm flexible."

Amanda groaned and shook her head, while Erick, Bailli, and Nora all looked confused. "That was awful."

"What's pegging?" Nora asked curiously. The Thaylanders hadn't had much to add to the conversation about planet hunting.

"Not something I'm interested in," Bob replied wryly. "And I'd recommend building an interplanetary vessel, as the portal you use is unlikely to reach another world, and will most likely dump you into empty space."

Jason nodded thoughtfully. "Space being vast, I can understand that."

"So," Bob began, "build yourself a ship, and make sure you have plenty of crystals. You might end up spending years in space trying to get to a planet."

"You'd need some high level crystals so they didn't disappear in the middle of the voyage," Dave mused.

"I think you'd need to be pretty high tier to even attempt it," Amanda added.

"I don't think it's something you should try before tier seven," Bob agreed. "Magic is amazing, and you can become truly powerful, but when it comes to space travel, I haven't figured out how to cheat yet. Although between shielding, stasis, plant growth, and constant acceleration, you can actually make a go of interplanetary travel."

"I'm assuming you'd pop over, and then check to see how close the nearest planet was, and if it appeared to be an Earth type," Jason said. "If there wasn't anything within range, or it wasn't suitable, you'd want to come back to Earth or Thayland space, depending on where you'd left from, so that you could try again."

"I'd suggest having an exploratory vessel, designed around a powerful telescope, and an actual colony ship," Bob added. "It's definitely not something to undertake casually. Yes," he sighed, "I have given it a little thought, and you could easily end up stranded."

He left it unsaid that if you had a portable Dungeon like his Arcane Depths, being stranded wouldn't ever be a concern. That was a secret he wasn't quite ready to share with anyone yet.

Although if they decided to actually try exploring the multiverse, he'd make sure they knew.

"I wonder how many versions of Earth have humans on them?" Amanda mused.

"It would be interesting to find out," Dave grinned. "I bet there are some where dinosaurs still rule the Earth."

"That's pretty likely," Bob agreed. "Depending on when the System integrated the universe, wouldn't have been struck by that asteroid. Then again, maybe another natural disaster would have ended them."

"Between Drake and Fermi, I don't know what to expect," Amanda groused.

"Well, based on the number of species you can apotheosis to, it's pretty clear that there are completely alien civilizations out there," Jessica chimed in. "Maybe the Draconians evolved from dinosaurs."

Bob noticed that Nora's eyes were starting to glaze over.

"As fun as this speculation is, aren't we supposed to be getting a fresh group of characters ready to put an end to Elmric the Emminitely Evil's reign of terror?" Bob asked.

"I've got a fresh warlock ready to go," Amanda replied.

"You're fresh warlock looks identical to your previous warlock, darling," Dave told her, peering over her shoulder.

"No, this is Sara without an 'h,' which is totally different," Amanda objected.

"Leviticus Teifling, Fathomless Patron," Dave read off.

"Hush you," Amanda placed a finger to his lips.

Mike looked at the bright orange stasis box with the big yellow smiley face on the cover, and groaned.

"Well," Eric began, "at least they aren't black?"

"I'm not sure this isn't worse," Mike grumbled as he rubbed his eyes.

They'd taken delivery of a new batch of stasis boxes at the beginning of their shift, and Mike had initially been pleased when he'd read the note indicating that per his discussion with the King of Greenwold, they'd been painted a brighter, more welcoming color, complete with friendly imagery.

"It kind of reminds me of a safety vest," Eric offered.

Mike shook his head.

Their first 'customer,' approached and gawked at the stasis box.

"I'm going to find coffee," Mike said before quickly retreating. As hideous as it was, the new color scheme was much more likely to incite laughter rather than fear.

The whole mess made him wish he'd taken Bob on his offer to go to Hawaii.