Aydin, Julio, and Midas reached the Shrine again, only to see everyone in wild activity with most people cutting down trees to create structures which Midas could infer to be shelters and tools.
People were moving up and down, helping each other with anything they could. The atmosphere was mostly jovial and it seemed to Midas that people were still trying to be positive about their circumstances.
"Those trees… Should we tell them?" asked Julio.
Midas shook his head and said "How sure are you that they don't know? And even if they don't know, do you really think that causing a panic is the right way to deal with this?" to which Julio stayed quiet.
Of course Julio didn't know whether they knew or not. And he most definitely did not want to cause a panic, especially if people's emotions were being affected without their knowing.
"I think Midas is right. And since he can't prove it, we might be called Liars and treated terribly because of it," said Aydin.
"We should keep this to ourselves for now. If the situation changes, then we will change with it if need be," said Midas to which Julio and Aydin nodded. Seemed like a plan.
"Julio? Midas? Hey!" said Corinne who was with Maria and another small woman. This woman was the same one Midas had complimented before, saying she had beautiful eyes. Midas smiled when he saw this girl and he also smiled when he saw Maria.
Maria, contrary to her weak presence was actually a powerhouse with an A Rank Gift, while Corinne and the Girl both had B Rank Gifts. Although this other girl, who Midas knew was named Mai, only had a B Rank Gift, it was incredibly useful too.
Aydin was calm after seeing the women, as expected from a Con-man. Julio, on the other hand, started fixing himself up and straining like a soldier. Seeing Julio immediately melt like an ice cream in a cone on a hot day after seeing the little girl Maria, Midas knew he couldn't count on this guy anymore.
"Hey, Ladies. I remember that Gwen said that you guys would go to the Stone Tablet. Did you already check it out?"
"Yeah, we have and we found nothing much there so we left. But when we left some guys were saying that they wanted to stay there so who knows what might happen. What about you? I see you're sporting some wooden tools. Did you make them yourself?" asked Corinne curiously.
"Yeah, we did. Not bad right?"
"Really? Can you make some for me too? I actually heard about the tools from Maria and I was absolutely going to ask you to help us out the next time I saw you. I feel really lucky to see you now actually," said Corinne with a bright smile. Midas found it remarkable how beautiful this woman was, even a mere smile seemed like flowers blooming in the spring.
If it wasn't for this minor headache he was sporting, he would most certainly find this scene very enjoyable in his heart.
It was not a headache caused by dehydration as Midas was very well hydrated and that would have gone away by now if it was that simple. Hence, Midas inferred that it must be due to his Skill usage. Maybe he had hit a limit on his usage for now and he just had to rest up for a while.
Something else Midas found funny was the fact that even with a headache, some of his other Skills would work fine. Like his [Hidden Divinity] was still fully operational. He wondered what that meant really.
"Yeah, why not. But, you'll have to wait as I still have to make them for this guy over here" said Midas while pointing at Aydin. He continued "Ladies, this is Aydin. Aydin, these are Corinne, Marie and…"
"Mai," said the girl. She was 1.5 metres tall and she was wearing a black hoodie with black jean shorts. Her milk coffee coloured skin colour resembled people who came from the East, especially the '-istan' countries, and her short brunette hair and her round face made her look very cute.
"Mai. Nice to meet you Mai." said Midas with a smile on his face. Aydin stepped forward and introduced himself at this time.
"Hello, Corinne, Marie and Mai. I'm Aydin, from Turkey. It's nice to meet you ladies. I hope we can get along well from now on," said Aydin with a suave and clean delivery. Even Midas was impressed.
He knew Fraudsters were the type of people who could draw blood out of stone, and he could see that Aydin definitely had the Charm to do it. It must have something to do with his trait.
"Nice to meet you, Aydin. I guess I will be seeing you a lot from now on too?" asked Corinne to which Aydin responded "Of course, heck, you can see me whenever you like."
Midas couldn't help but smile from the side. Was this guy trying to 'shoot his shot' as the kids used to say 60 million years ago?
"Pfft Haha, I'll do that Aydin. Anyway, we have to get going now. We are building shelters and we need to collect some stuff."
"Yeah of course, I wouldn't want to hold you back. You gotta show us your shack when you're done building it," said Midas. And with that the women started laughing and walking away in the same direction they were heading towards before coming across Midas and Julio.
"Bye guys," said Corinne.
"Bye," said Maria and Mai followed after them both.
Julio stood there, looking at Maria's backside, almost drooling like a perverted stalker. Can this guy please chill?
"Aydin, Mai is definitely your type," said Midas mysteriously. Aydin's eyes popped open. He knew what Midas was talking about. Previously, Midas had said that he doesn't have an Appraisal Skill, but he knows someone who does. Was this the person?
Julio, hearing this much couldn't help but quip from the side, saying, "Ehhh, really Aydin… Not bad. It's fine as long as you stay away from my cute little Maria."
"Eh??" Aydin was flabbergasted.
"Kekeke," giggled Midas at this misunderstanding. But he wouldn't fix it.
Meanwhile, there was some activity next to the large Black Gate that was in the Shrine's domain. A crowd was gathering and some people were having arguments.
"What's happening there?" asked Aydin, to which the rest of the men were clueless. They then made the decision to go check out the commotion and after a while they started hearing the complaints of some people who apparently wanted to go through the Gate to leave the Trials.
"They're testing out the Transfer Gate thingy. It looks so impossible, but it's actually so cool. Watch." said someone in the crowd.
The Transfer Gate looked like a 2 dimensional plane standing in Mid air, with nothing but Black swirling clouds on it. Midas and the others saw some people throw logs of wood through the Gate, only for the logs to appear on the other side.
"What, it doesn't work?"
"No, look at this…"
Then suddenly, the same guy put his arm through the plane, and some people standing at some opportune places and capable of seeing the image on the other side, began voicing out their surprise.
"Where's the hand? It's not coming out on the other side!"
"Woah… So cool. How does it work?"
"It's a wormhole, guys. It's a wormhole to the Next Trial. The Green Lizard said so." said someone else.
"How do you guys even know there's a next Trial? What if this is the way out of this shitty experiment?" said a black haired Korean man passionately.
"..."
Immediately, there was silence and scepticism. Some people's eyes lit up with understanding, while others wanted to know more, so they probed further.
"Bro, what do you mean?" asked someone else.
"I'm just saying, do we really have to do what they tell us to? Do we really have to spend 180 days here? There's no food, and all we have are our Skills which are mostly useless. I mean come on."
"I mean we have those apples now, don't we?"
"You're gonna survive on apples for 6 months?" said the Korean mockingly.
"So what? You want to leave?" asked another person mockingly.
"And why would I not? Who knows why they brought us here. Why should we do what they want us to?" asked the Korean.
"..."
"You know what, he might be right." said someone else.
"Yeah, you might be onto something."
"Wait, but what about the rewards?" asked another woman.
"Rewards? Fuck the Rewards! Isn't it rewarding enough to live? There's nothing here. Just trees and people. You know, today I saw someone beat someone else up until they passed out, and nobody did anything about it. That would never happen in the real world. This place is messed up, there's no food, no laws, no order, and it's driving us crazy. We need to get out of here as soon as possible."
"So what are you going to do?"
"I'm going to step through this Transfer Gate and leave this place," said the Korean.
"Pfft, is that it?"
"Wait, how do you know that Transfer Gate isn't some device that will kill us?"
"The green guy said that if we step through it, we'll leave," said the Korean
"And now you believe him… Even though you clearly said that you didn't believe that we would get rewarded for staying here… Come on bro, are you hearing yourself speak right now?" said a voice in the crowd, and immediately everyone was stirred by its claims.
"Yeah bro, like… you sound like you're not sure."
"You're just trying to send us into the next Trial so you can get all the rewards, aren't you?"
"Yeah, if you're so sure, why don't you test it yourself?"
"Look okay, fine. I will test it myself. I will step through the Gate. But I can't do it alone. I need you guys to promise that if I step through, someone else will go after me to check it out with me."
"Fine, I'll go with you. I hate this place." said another blonde guy who had scars and inflammations on his face. It seemed like he had recently taken a beating. No wonder he would want to leave.
Seeing the man's face, Midas was again reminded of the importance of personal safety. This place had no concept of Law and Order, at least for now. The only law was Strength. Midas had to acclimate and make as many preparations as possible to ensure his survival.
At the Gate, this sequence of events caused everyone to start exclaiming. The noise brought more and more people to watch the spectacle.
"Wow, they're actually going?"
"Damn, they've got guts!"
"Good luck guys. If it is a way out, please tell our parents about us."
"Wait, aren't our parents watching?"
"Oh yeah.."
The Korean now said, "If it really is a way out, I will try to find a way to come back and tell you. I will try to save you."
"What if the Gate isn't a way out? What if it's a one way Gate to the next Trial? And what if the next Trial is more dangerous than this one?" asked Midas at this moment. Immediately the scene quietened down.
"Hey! Who the fuck are you? When everyone was volunteering, you didn't say anything because you're a coward right? So now why are you speaking up again?" said a voice and immediately everyone was spurred to voice out their own opinions.
"Yeah, cowards should just shut up."
"Keep quiet and keep your doubts to yourselves."
"Pussy."
Midas shook his head and merely watched. Something smelled funny about this situation.
Bible of the Self, First Testament of Man, Gospel of Power, Chapter 11, Verse 1 says: "People don't sacrifice themselves for others, they merely use others as Objects to prove their own Self Worth."
This whole thing was nothing more than a charade.
Worse was that some of these true Cowards, who hadn't come forward when it was time to prove how brave they are and volunteer to pioneer the other side of the Gate, were now praising these "Sacrificers" because they were too afraid to go through with this plan themselves.
The pot calling the kettle black. Except Midas wasn't black. At least not in the sense of what it means to be Coward.
Some time passed and the Korean was congratulated and encouraged to go through with his now new friend the blonde. They were treated like heroes, astronauts who would go on and touch the surface of a new planet, and hopefully, bring back good news.
"Okay, I'm going through." said the Korean, whose name was Sungha. Then he walked forward and stepped through the gate, disappearing within it.
"Woah!! He's gone!!"
"Oh my god, he did it. What do you think happened?"
"Wow. I really hope he went back home," said someone else, crossing his fingers.
Now everyone else looked towards the Norwegian blonde, whose name was apparently Finn. Finn waved once, and then he stepped through the gate. But this time, something was different. The Gate changed colours. It turned White and flashed brightly. And then panels popped up in front of the people.
————————————
Announcement |
------------
[Finn Schonhauser has passed through the Transfer Gate and went to the Next Trial.]
[As the first person to pass through to the Second Trial, his achievement has been recorded and announced.]
[More Details can be found in the Index's Statistics page.]
————————————|
"..."
"Pfft! Kukuku…" In the silence, the first person to utter a sound was Midas with a chuckle, followed by Aydin.
"What's up? Why are they laughing?"
"It's that coward again."
"So annoying."
"Why don't you shut up, before we beat you up?"
Midas merely put his hands up in defeat and said "I'm sorry guys, but I just found this situation funny. And the worst thing is that you guys were scammed."
"What?"
"What is he talking about?"
"Huh could it be…"
Midas shook his head, not bothering to explain himself. Aydin, however, seeing an opportunity to spit in everyone's faces after being made fun of, laughed and said to Midas "How can they not get it? Only one announcement pops up, and it pops up for the second guy? Where did the first guy go?"
The nearest people to Midas' group started realising the problem soon enough and some of them started speaking about it.
"Yeah. Why was there only one announcement?"
"Hey, where's Sungha?"
"Maybe he went to Earth?"
"What? So the first guy would be able to leave the Trials while the rest have to go to the next? I highly doubt that."
Soon enough, everyone started talking.
"What if he used a Skill to fake it?"
"Like What?"
"Invisibility? Teleportation?"
"No way..."
Aydin clicked his tongue as if lamenting that he didn't think of that scam first. Midas turned and saw that people were approaching from all sides after seeing the Announcement and decided to leave before things got weird like what happened the day before with the Holy Books.
"Guys, let's leave."
"Yeah, let's go."
And like that, they left, but not before Midas turned to look at someone who was looking at his group poisonously from behind. It was the same guy who had been arguing against Sungha at the start and then called out Midas for being a coward later on.
' Eh… When did I offend him? Oh I see… '
This was a planned little play by a group of people, and it was executed in a coordinated fashion. Midas sighed inwardly, understanding that he may have offended some really dangerous people inadvertently.
"We have to build some shelters too when we get there!" said Julio who was flexing his arms again. Midas had been subconsciously counting and this was the 124th time Julio was flexing his arms in his presence. Midas smiled at these guys' antics.
"Didn't Corinne say there were people who wanted to move there?" asked Aydin.
"Can't we just stay with them? We'll just build shelters away from them." Said Julio with surety.
"Yeah, sure. I'll design them and we'll all help out to build them" said Midas playing along.
"What will I do?" asked Aydin with a curious gaze at the two.
"You can just turn into me and be handsome like me. You were very handsome back then, you know?" said Julio while nodding in the manner of a senior instructing a junior.
Aydin rolled his eyes and said, "What, am I not handsome enough now?" to which Julio and Midas started laughing.