2nd Quarter: 15:22:19

  Warriors: 3,067,923

  As we tumbled through the cosmic teleportation wormholes, my nausea kicked in full blast. Up until now, my journeys through the space-time continuum, had just been me inside the green crystal transport chamber. This time, I had a moody, rapidly-growing basil plant strapped to my back and a furry, giant, purple, four-armed beast mashed up close against me.

  Whoever designed this vessel clearly didn’t anticipate this kind of cargo in such a limited space. Nor were these transports designed with comfort in mind.

  As our crystalline shell spiraled along, I clapped a hand over my mouth, gagging.

  “Oopff… mmpff…”

  “What are you doing?” G asked.

  I couldn’t answer. I simply shook my head, keeping my hand pressed firmly over my lips.

  “Do not purge your stomach on me, Extra Cheese Sam. I have just recently started to tolerate you. Let us keep it that way.”

  I nodded, doing everything in my power to not barf. G flashed a hardened glare, crossing his arms. I checked my stats to keep my mind occupied—

  Level: 2

  Race: Human

  Class: Pizza Pugilist

  Rank: 3,067,923

  Points: 2,595,000

  Fans: 1,347,921

  I was gaining fans, but even though I had crossed 2 million points, I was still ranked dead last. My stomach squirmed, like it was filled with a dozen baby Octoglorpuses. I wasn’t going to make it. G’s eyes widened, giving off a whole “I shall kill you where you stand” vibe. Mercifully, after a few moments, we arrived at our new location.

  Teleportation Complete.

  The transport dematerialized, dumping us onto the snowy ground of—

  Location: Arctic Glacial Expanse – Eastern Greenland Ice Sheet.

  I dropped to my knees and blew chunks into the snow. G stepped back in disgust. Count B gave me a gentle pat on the back as I rose to my feet, meeting G’s eyes. He smirked and shook his head.

  “Vylgarianth younglings did not spew as much. And they nursed on acid milk. Be glad you have but one stomach, Pukeroni Sam.”

  We turned our gaze to the horizon, surveying the terrain. It was an eerie scene—an endless, barren stretch of white, rocky, windswept plateaus of permafrost. Glaciers and jagged ice cliffs loomed in the distance. I clutched my elbows, shivering against the blast of frosty air. My HUD flashed several notifications—

  Caution - Extreme Conditions!

  Temperature: -30°C.

  Strong Arctic Winds: 32 KPH.

  Armor Climate Control Activated.

  Count Basil wanted no part of the blistering winds. He slithered down inside the quest pack, drawing the flap closed. G stood calm and unaffected—his thick fur serving as a parka of sorts.

  “C-c-c-crust-fucker… it’s cold.”

  “You call this cold? Bah!” He smirked. “This is good, brisk weather. Try shivering inside the gut of a FrostKryll for half a cycle with nothing but Marglormeel blubber to eat. Now, that, my friend, is cold. Compared to that, this is paradise.”

  “G-glad y-you think so.”

  My teeth were chattering and I was too cold to argue. Instead, I focused on my HUD.

  Mission: Retrieve Orb.

  A pulsing white dot appeared on the fringe of the map. It was 50 kilometers away.

  An alternate icon also appeared—a question mark, which I knew meant a quest. I mentally clicked on it, and an info box appeared.

  New Quest: Peer Beyond The Veil.

  Retrieve Veil-Rift Visor From Hellfrost Hollow.

  Reward: The gift and curse to see all things.

  “I don’t know, ERNI. What do you think?

  “There appear to be several red flags inherent in the quest description.”

  As usual, ERNI’s analytics were straight down the line. Of course, there was one big cautionary note right within the quest dialogue…

  Hellfrost Hollow?

  Now that sounded like a cozy place to visit.

  And what about the whole ‘gift and curse to see all things’ jibber jabber?

  But despite all of that, I was still intrigued. And more importantly, at least Hellfrost Hollow sounded like it was an enclosed space that could offer some protection from these extreme elements.

  I looked up at the big guy. “G, what do you think?”

  “I think anything beyond killing Dom Blady is a foolish waste of time and energy.”

  Stolen story; please report.

  “Got it. So you’re on board.”

  “That is not what I said.” He growled.

  My eyes had already darted to the bottom of the window.

  Accept Quest?

  Yes.

  Mission: Retrieve Veil-Rift Visor From Hellfrost Hollow.

  A blinking icon appeared on the map. The distance indicator showed we were only three kilometers away. I looked up in the direction of our heading to see a jagged ridge of glaciers. Through the swirling snow and whipping winds, they looked like the frozen, crowned heads of skulls.

  “Well, that’s certainly a bit ominous. All right, gang, let’s go.”

  G grunted.

  We trekked for the next thirty minutes through savage winds and sticky footing. Several times, my boots punched so deep into the snow that they got stuck as if welded to the frosty ground below. G would pause his lumbering steps and hoist me out of the snowbank with a scowl.

  And so it went until we reached the mouth of a cave embedded in the side of one of the glaciers. It looked like the mouth of a petrified goblin in dire need of a good dentist. Jagged icicles hung from the top ridge like gnarled teeth.

  Count Basil gingerly reached a leaf out, felt the cold, and retreated inside the quest sack once again. As wind whipped in and out of the cave, it produced a low, unearthly howling sound. G flashed another look of disapproval my way.

  “Wh-wh-what? Okay, so it’s no Four Seasons. Anything’s gotta be better than standing out here in the open.”

  “If you say so, No-Anchovy Sam.”

  We ducked under the icicles and headed into Hellfrost Hollow. Headlamp on, I looked around the darkened cave, startled initially by a flash of movement to my left. A moment later, I laughed, realizing it was just my reflection on a shimmering wall of ice.

  G shook his head, stomping forward into the shadows.

  “What? So I’m a little jumpy?”

  I kept scanning the map, looking for any signs of red dots. So far, the coast was clear. We were only about a 100 meters from the Veil-Rift Visor, whatever the hell that was.

  “Hellfrost Hollow, huh? It doesn’t seem so bad. I mean, it could do with a bit of upkeep. Maybe a few simple comforts from home… X-Box… espresso maker…”

  G grunted, trudging along.

  Now that we were shielded from the wind, Count Basil emerged from the quest sack, pointing and gesturing in the directions that he thought we should go. It was good to see that he hadn’t lost his confidence in such perilous, uncharted territory. But I still had to remind him, “Dude, you don’t have eyes.”

  He didn’t seem to care.

  As we navigated the frosty tunnels, we spotted the frozen remains of animals trapped within the ice. Some of them staring in frozen horror as if they were instantaneously encased in a sudden tidal wave of frost.

  “Unlucky bastards,” I muttered.

  “I would think rather the opposite,” G growled. “Theirs was a swift and sudden end, likely painless.”

  “You almost sound disappointed about that.”

  “That is not the kind of death a Vylgarianth warrior seeks. Speaking of warriors… why have you not named your weapons?”

  “What? My pizza cutters?”

  “Yes. Your blades. A true warrior names his weapons so that his enemies will fear them—far and wide. Stories will be told, songs will be sung about the weapons, the hands that wielded them, and the blood that they spilled.”

  “That’s… poetic.”

  “Back on the mining planets, there was much treachery and many conflicts. More than a few times, blood had to be shed. It was during those times that I came to name the VengeAxe. Naming it makes it a part of you.”

  I could see just how much this meant to G. I listened intently as he told tales of his many uses of the VengeAxe in battle. It was impressive and borderline frightening to see just how much he loved bloodshed.

  I thought about it for a while, and no, it had never occurred to me to name my pizza cutters. But, considering the gravity of this tournament and the fact that they had always been by my side, I felt like G was right. They deserved to have names. Just like Count B and ERNI and G himself.

  I started to brainstorm ideas when a cluster of red dots appeared on the map.

  Mission: Kill Monster Mob.

  SHIIING!”

  I drew my pizza cutters—‘Unnamed 1’ and ‘Unnamed 2.’

  G whipped out the VengeAxe. Count B flexed his vines, maneuvering his leaves as if he was cracking his knuckles.

  We took slow and careful steps, not seeing anything at first. Then there was a noise in the distance. A glass-like clatter. A tinkling cascade of sharp things skittering along an icy surface.

  ME: Heads up!

  GNARLTHARR: Bah. I never understood that expression. Heads that are up usually get chopped off.

  ME: We can debate human slang later. Watch out!

  KRISH!

  There they were. Glassy creatures that looked like rough-hewn ice spheres. Their spindly appendages were long, clear, and sharp, clattering along the frosty surface of the ground. The info box above them read:

  Pricksicles. Level 3.

  I laughed at the name when one of the little fuckers cracked open its jagged mouth and spit an ice dagger right at my face shield.

  KRISH!

  “Owww!”

  The dagger shattered but not before rocking my skull. The creature giggled, scampering up a wall.

  “You little mother—“

  KRISH! KRISH! KRISH!

  Three more icicle darts crashed into my suit, one of them piercing between two of the reinforced armor plates.

  “GAAAH!”

  Each hit hurt—like a flurry of cold punches.

  More giggles erupted as the entire horde of Pricksicles darted from surface to surface, surrounding us from floor to ceiling. I slashed at the air futilely as they zipped back and forth, evading my strikes.

  G was having a similar problem, swinging the VengeAxe in strong arcs, missing at every turn. Count B was getting the worst of it all, batting at the air and shaking as several Pricksicles sliced up his leaves.

  ME: FUCKING ICE-HOLES!!!

  I blocked several more ice projectiles with my pizza cutter shields as I mentally flipped through the playbook.

  ME: Come on, come on, come on. There’s gotta be something in here.

  Frustrated, G sheathed his VengeAxe and started swinging with his massive paws. He shattered several Pricksicles with single blows but grit his teeth as they tore up his knuckles.

  One of the buggers landed on top of my helmet, emitting a high-pitched—

  ”Hee-Hee-Hee-Hee!”

  —before leaping off. A second later—

  KA-BLAM!

  My head pitched forward as an ice blast rocked the top of my dome. The little bastard had crapped an ice-plosion pellet on top of my helmet. I was dizzy, stunned from the shock as the other critters followed suit—laughing and shitting bombs.

  ”Hee-Hee-Hee!”

  KA-BLAM! KA-BLAM!

  Count B, G, and I all took damage as the icy gremlins peppered us with ice-plosions. These little dudes were unbearable. Their attacks were equally annoying and painful. G gnashed his teeth, getting more pissed by the second.

  I didn't know what was worse. The sharp sting of their frostbite-inducing blasts, or those insane giggles.

  I summoned the Kazoo of Crushed Spirits from my playbook and checked its properties.

  Kazoo of Crushed Spirits: Demoralizes Enemies by 25%.

  I quickly played a few notes. It was the strangest sound I had ever heard—a spatial melodic buzz that resonated throughout the entire chamber. The Pricksicles froze in place as the kazoo’s spell took effect.

  A collective ”Awwwwwwww,” echoed through the tunnel as the critters expressed their disappointment at once. They were moving slower now with less fervor. Thankfully, their feral, chittering laughter had stopped.

  With their diminished morale, they became easy work. Count B tossed several at the icy walls, smashing them to smithereens. I stomped on half a dozen, kicking several more, and slashed my way through the others.

  G was on a rampage now—stomping and punching, bashing and smashing every Pricksicle in sight. After a few minutes, the cave was quiet, and the ground was littered with the shattered remains of the annoying critters.

  Victory! Pricksicles Defeated!

  Mission Complete: Kill Monster Mob.

  Reward: +60,000 Points!

  Auto-Looted Pricksicles.

  Items Acquired:

  Frostbite Me Play.

  “Chill Out, Bro” Sore Muscle Patches.

  Our health started to recover. B flexed his leaves as they magically healed from their nicks and cuts. G rubbed his sore knuckles as they did the same.

  We were close now to the Veil-Rift Visor indicator on the map. It was just around the bend, in the heart of Hellfrost Hollow. But, by the looks of things, we were about to enter the darkest and most dangerous part of the cave.