Second Chance

Onward and Upward

There were several someones waiting for me when I got home. After a moment's confusion, I recognized them as Talbot, Smythe, and Ian. I gathered my courage with a deep breath, and headed in. Ian was stroking the outside of my house with a creepy expression on his face, probably calculated, and Smythe and Talbot were discussing something. My house's architecture, if I had to guess.

"Ah! Miss Zoe! Have you finally decided to come to me to sell your soul?"

"You're outside of my house, Ian."

He seemed disappointed by my dry response, but that didn't stop him from giving one of the window shutters a long, drawn-out lick, maintaining eye contact all the while. Wasn't he worried about splinters?

Talbot ignored him and ran up to me, worry in every line of his body.

"I'm so sorry, Zoe. I was planning to stop by alone, cause you haven't answered any of my messages, but they showed up here too. Apparently they followed my symbol in the friend menu."

I hadn't noticed any messages. I checked and, sure enough, there were a little over a dozen messages from Talbot, increasingly worried. I ruffled his hair, ignoring his attempts to duck out from under my hand.

"Sorry, dude. I didn't even notice that you were messaging me. What's up?"

My casual speech got a couple of odd looks, but Smythe recovered first. Well, I said recovered, mostly he just grunted and then spoke in his rumbly drawl,

"We wanted your help getting to the Night Town."

I furrowed my brow, considering. The Night Town was a legendary town that could only be approached for the first time at, well... night. After that, a player could warp in whenever, but they wouldn't be able to walk back out if they warped in. There were a lot of theories about it, but not many facts. Most importantly, Night Town was in a different place every time. So far, it had been impossible to predict.

"Have you figured out how to predict the location?"

Talbot was nearly bouncing in place.

"Yes! Or, rather, Milo has. He put together a map that shows where you're most likely to be attacked by monsters on any given night, and through a process of something that involves a lot of math, has narrowed down the location to a few points. He was a beta player so his guess would be better than anyone else's."

I'm sure they already knew that the location pattern could be different than the beta. I considered for a moment.

"I want to go ask someone something. It should take just a moment. Check out the view or... whatever."

I hurried into my house, and used the portal there to send me to the town center. It was settling down, as most adventurers left at night, either logging off or going out hunting the night monsters. I located the nearest townsperson, and caught their attention with a quick tap of their arm.

"Excuse me, where is Night Town tonight?"

It was just a hunch, but I figured the locals would keep a much better track of the shifting town if the monster concentration moved with it. She goggled at me for a moment before smoothing down her apron.

"Well, I never... Your parents should have taught you this sort of thing, child. Here."

She drew a map out of her pocket. Lucky she had it, I hadn't thought to grab one.

"Nocturno is in the mining areas to the southeast tonight. Should be right about here."

I memorized the location and the, I presumed, actual name of Night Town.