Build Sequence Is Key

Exercise

A knock on the frame of his cube made him look over to see Nicole.

"Hi!" She said, "I can't believe we are roommates!"

Nicole was a tomboy who butted into him and his friends games all the time.  A few of his friends had taught her to play craft of war and now she showed up and played with them to about half of their sessions. She hadn't been as committed to the game so she had always been one of the weaker players. But weaker as all in context, it meant that she lost more than she won against Jason and four of his friends. But against everyone else she was unbeaten.

Well unbeaten statistically. Due to the random nature of the game loosing was just a fact of life. It didn't matter if you won or last a single game. It mattered how you played over a week, over a month, or the year.

Talking to her was easy it was like everything just clicked. So he mentioned that all he needs is a place to exercise. She laughed and told him that the cubby is also his exercise gym. Jacking into the Jublanji reality is a full body immersion. The gear will present him with the alternate world of the game, but his body will still be moving and working doing everything he is experience there. All the cubes were also basic gravitation manipulation devices and could simulate any environment.

"So if you really want to just exercise, you can log in a do jumping jacks or lift big rocks." She teased him and then punched him in the arm.

"Oh, well, maybe I will just stick to playing for now." Jason said completely seriously.

Nicole looked at him funny.

An awkward pause later she asked, "Hey! Do you want to go with me over to room 27?"

"Umm, sure?" Really he just wanted to try out the system, but didn't know how to get rid of her.

"Okay, come on." Nicole backed up out of his cube and grabbing him by the hand pulled him towards the door.

She lead him to the stairs, "It is only on flight. Better to take the stairs." She said over her shoulder.

Before he knew it he was at the door to room 27 and she just opened it up without even knocking and stepped in.

It took him a second to register what he was seeing. In this room were his friends. Jake, Steve, Ben, Adam, and Nathan were there sitting on chairs around the table in the center of the room. He noted mentally that he hadn't seen the table in his own room. He would have to see why they didn't have one.

"Oh! So you finally decide to show up!" Steve said mockingly.

"Jason! We thought you weren't shifted! What happened? Where have you been for the last two days?" Ben asked unbelievingly.

"Ha! Now we are complete!" Jake intoned.

Jason looked around the room it was like the mirror of his own. Here it looked like there was one female and the rest were males. Males who were specifically his best friends from Earth. A rather put upon girl sat on the edge of her cube one row up in the right. Ignoring his friends questions for a moment he asked her, "You wouldn't mind switching rooms with me, would you?"

Nichole have his hand a little involuntary squeeze. He didn't know what that meant, but felt like she probably didn't want him to leave her room.

"Ha! I wish! What room are you in?" She asked curious.

"Room 35, just down from the elevators. You are Elise, right?"

She automatically nodded when he got her name right, "No way, you are in the same room with Ruth? What I wouldn't give to be in your room. She just broke up with her boyfriend. They were, like, together for two years!"

"Why don't you go there now? My cube is right below hers you can take it when I am not there. I think I am going to plan on being..."

She broke him off, "What are you dumb or something. Why would I use your cube? I mean it is nice of you to offer. But I was just there and you should really go back to your room. There is a system alert. And it says for everyone to go back to their room. That's why I am here with these dweebs instead of taking care of Ruth."

Nicole grabbed his arm, "Jason we have to get back. The system messages are important. I didn't know."

"It is okay, Nichole. No problem." Jason put his hand over hers trying to comfort her. For some reason he didn't feel like panicking about it.

Nichole was dragging him back out the door. So he said to his friends, "I'll be back!"

They laughed at him and waved him away as they turned back to discussing whatever they were talking about.

"I am so sorry. I guess I am not used to checking the system alerts yet."

Jason smiled laughed as they ran up the stairs, "No worries, I have no idea what is going on anyways."

They burst into their own room and Jason immediately saw that there were fewer people here now. Some of the girls must have gone back to their own rooms.

"Good! I can't believe you left right before a system message!" This came from a girl on his right, Belinda, Jason believed her name was.

Going on she said, "Get in your cube and get your stuff sorted out! Hurry, hurry, hurry. My system says that you are a complete newbie, not even a tribe or a peon yet."

Nicole was flabbergasted, "You don't even have a peon yet?"

Jason confused said, "Peon, what is a peon?"

Now Nichole was rushing him too, "Never mind! Just get in your cube and take the tutorial."

Just then the lights in the room dimmed and a polite sounding chime bought all their attention.

[Please enter your cubes. Please enter your cubes. In ten minutes the grace period will end and the story line will begin. Repeat: In ten minutes story line mode will begin. Repeat: in ten minutes story line mode will begin. It is now possible to progress the story line. Monsters will spawn randomly.]

The text version of what the system said appeared horizontally on the table and vertically on the wall above the door. In addition a map was displayed with the locations of all nine inhabitants of their room as well as some simple statistics about their current wealth and military might.

Jason's eyes absorbed the information greedily. And then realized that while everyone had some distance between adjacent territories, Jason's own territory was way off to the side.

"What?"