“Let’s go through our achievements while we collect from the nearby rats.” I instructed the Naiad and Triangle.

  I had to only touch the slain monster with my finger for four seconds, instead of holding it, before I could loot it into my inventory. The game at least didn’t make us carve the pieces ourselves.

  >>><<<

  [New Achievement: You’ve spoken their fiery language. You’ve friended the lizard-folk who like to keep things hot. That’s only because they're cold-blooded killers, as you have now learned. Reward: You will have an easier time friending lizard-folk thanks to the crispy burned rat fat smell on your body.]

  [New Achievement: Double-run! You’ve instantly slain two foes with one hit. Reward: The desire to hit that home-run achievement. Keep trying, bud.]

  [New Achievement: Just punch it. Most fighters unlocked this achievement a while ago. Unless you’re some poetic person defending your recent literary work, you’ve got some catching up to do. Reward: You’re not a fighter.]

  >>><<<

  “Lazy game for crossing out the reward,” I grumbled. Not everything is a participation trophy in this world.

  I continued clicking through my achievements for fighting, excited to see if I unlocked a new title to showcase.

  >>><<<

  [New Achievement: Knocking Death’s Door. You got below 10% health. Wow, living life on the dangerous end there. Don’t push it too much, it will be the end. Reward: You are still alive! Keep this up and people might wonder if it’s your fighting style.]

  >>><<<

  Most of the achievements had pointless rewards. Not one achievement gave me a new title. I wanted one to help unlock more of a barbarian tanking style. That last reward made me wonder if I was on the right path. To be cautious, I put both stat points into my constitution.

  After collecting from all the nearby dead rats. I had over eighteen rat skins and tails and thirty-three more gold coins. Not every rat dropped a tail, a few lost them in the fight. I even located my axe during the search. Its burned wooden handle and wrappings screamed it needed to be replaced soon.

  By the time we finished, an hour of our gaming time already passed. There was only a half hour left. We spent too much time waiting and gathering resources. Naiad’s quest still needed to be wrapped up, and so did mine. To speed things up, I picked up the short-legged half-gnome and put him on my shoulders.

  Later today, once the kids went to bed, I could hop on to progress my quest. I wanted to avoid the same situation as a free-will child fishing off a ship as it’s about to depart.

  I patted Naiad’s head to get her attention. “You know where the rats’ nest is. Take the lead.”

  Naiad shoved my hand off and replied, “The lizard-folk mentioned it, if you had listened to them.”

  “You’re talking like Mom there.” I complimented her.

  Naiad smiled at that. “She told me she had another late day in the office today. Probably the next few days.”

  “I want to show her what I made,” Triangle said from my shoulders.

  This wasn’t the first time these late days had happened. Still, trying to comfort a kid that their parent had different priorities over them wasn’t easy. Sometimes those priorities helped the family, but how to explain that to a six-year-old was hard. “She loves you both, and she is nagging me constantly to make sure you get your homework done.”

  “It is.” Naiad answered, the only one with homework. “I wish she could join us. We could do something together.”

  “We are as a family, supporting each other,” I stated. I wanted to dodge the subject and focus on the game. “Speaking of support, let’s go over our stats. Triangle, I want to talk about your build. I know you’re having fun with building stuff, but I was wondering if you want to switch it up and try something new.”

  Triangle wanted none of it. He tapped the top of my head from my shoulders. “But we already finished my quest. I want to be a boom ark-tech.”

  “Architect” Naiad chimed in.

  A boom architect was an explosive specialist. Triangle had no impulse control. It’s why my ginger snap cookies hid in a desk drawer at home. I tried to convince him, “We can still keep things big. Area of effect healing spells, strength buffs, or fogs of illusions.”

  “Frog summoning would be cool.” Triangle croaked and hopped on my shoulders.

  He twisted my words. The summoning path could be viable for Triangle. It required control of the pet and forced the summoner to train with it. The gnome wiggled on my shoulders, indicating he was done with being carried around. Triangle ran to catch up to his sister.

  “Three, two, one to the nest!” Triangle screamed as he ran past her.

  Too bad there wasn’t a focus stat point to help Triangle out. He couldn’t summon a beast. Burst magic would be easiest for Triangle. The ground cracked under my steps, a sound similar to a pile of snow. Snow wasn’t black, burned, and dried out like this forest. The Clingeo Grove needed a new name. The greenery of the forest was completely gone. No more grasses, undergrowth, leaves, or pine needles.

  I jogged to catch up and brought back the subject of class by saying, “Why don’t you put your two most recent points into intelligence? That will slowly increase your mana points to unlock some cool spells.”

  The narrative has been taken without authorization; if you see it on Amazon, report the incident.

  “Like what spells?” He asked.

  “Massive glowing ones, fireworks, snow.” I enchanted him, trying to think of more spells like fireworks.

  “Done!” Triangle didn’t even listen. “Can we go now and loot the nest?”

  “Hold on, we need to work as a guild. We need to figure out what works best for Naiad. You should add points to—”

  “I can figure out my character myself.” Naiad said. Her eyes darted about as she looked for the nest. She turned around and pointed to a large, fallen blackened tree we recently passed. Behind me, a giant hole, a size of a rat king, hid beneath the recently turned over tree. Its roots snapped and ruined from all the fire.

  “There’s the entrance.” Naiad said, proud of being able to find it again.

  The entire forest looked different now, dead and destroyed. She must’ve had it marked on her map with how fast she found that hidden entrance. I studied my game map. We were over fifty meters away from the wall, meaning she had annoyingly lied to me earlier. Instead of lecturing again, I let it slide for now.

  Naiad ducked her head slightly to go into the entrance. With a grunt of displeasure, I dropped into a squat, the damp earth cold against my knees, and began shuffling after the kids, their distant conversation echoing around in the dirt tunnel. It felt like we were playing around the kitchen table again when they were toddlers. At least I kept the floor cleaner than this den.

  The ash from the fire was the cleanest part. The rest of the gooey gunk I pretended was some sort of spit up… that the rats…

  Nope, playing pretend was not making it easier. It was gross and nasty and why did the game bother coding this level of detail?

  I stopped thinking about the gunk and focused on keeping up with the others. The kids left rat tails behind for me to collect. Triangle gathered any metal or twine scraps to put in his inventory. He did not care for the guts or body parts. Naiad only took what she needed. I gathered whatever was leftover and allowed, intending to sell it later if I didn’t need it after a while.

  The rat’s den opened up into a chamber. I stood up and shook out my legs. The damp, musty smell of the earth filled my nostrils as roots, rough and cool to the touch, tickled my neck while I twisted his head.

  This part of the den got a special title on my map.

  >>><<<

  [You’ve entered the Rat’s Throne]

  >>><<<

  The rat furs and tails of the room were the lowest tier item in the room. Rats were hoarders, this was a dragon of hoarders' level compared to the nests in the city. None of the nests we attacked before had this much. This Throne had a wooden, chewed and scratched up chest instead of a pile of gold coins on the ground. Triangle swung the lid open immediately, without looking for traps or mimics.

  “Look out for traps or monsters before opening chests right away.” I explained while running over. Nothing happened this time.

  “We killed the boss. You really think the game would hide another monster?” Naiad asked.

  “Just be careful of all loot.” I didn’t know the answer because this was our first adventure out.

  I made a note in the game to train Naiad and Triangle about traps later.

  Opening the chest was like a stack of birthday presents. There were two healing potions distributed to Naiad and I. A mana potion for Triangle. The Ring of Stash went to Triangle as well. It gave him a 1% boost to gathering resources. It would be helpful for his harvesting of herbs and ingredients if we wanted him to become a healer as an alchemist. Naiad got a leather armor shirt because it would only fit her. The last gear item in the box was a thing of rope. I grumbled as I took it.

  “Naiad, show me how your division is and split the gold among us.” I smiled. Loot was a great place to practice learning and math.

  “Simple, there’s thirty-three gold pieces. That’s fifteen for Triangle and I who did all the work. And three pieces for you if you don’t complain.”

  “I saved you from the Rat King!” I did not complain, I kept my voice very even.

  Naiad shrugged. Half the coins had already vanished into Triangle’s hand.

  She held three more in her other hand. “You make a good argument point. But…”

  I gritted his teeth at hearing Beth’s saying. Naiad clearly wanted the gold for something and wasn’t talking.

  I played the role of the parent and took the sacrifice. “Fine. Have it. Just let me get all the furs and other loot in here so I can buy us horses. We’re going to need them the further we explore outside of the city.”

  “What does this map mean?” Triangle already moved on to the next part of the chest and was done with the gold conversation. He ran over to me, shoving a parchment paper into my hands.

  The paper was rough, stained, and crumbled even before Triangle touched it. It held an intricate detail of Fanamel city. Someone had drawn out the sewage lines even. There were a few red dots scattered throughout the city, and a few marked by an X. One lined up with the spot where the Shrimp Guild destroyed a rats' nest before. Naiad came over to study the map with me.

  I tapped a few spots on the map to prove my point. “Looks like the location of a bunch of rat’s nests.”

  I put the paper into my inventory, causing Triangle to scream at me, “I wasn’t done with that!”

  “You don’t need it. We are going to quest outside of the city once I get my shield. I need a new one after what happened in the last fight.”

  “But I like tossing bombs at the rats.” Triangle whined.

  “We don’t have time for that anymore. You’ve leveled up and are bigger.” I lied on the last part. His character size hadn’t changed. It was a saying I used to use a lot more when Tristan and Elaine were younger.

  “We always had time for your delicious falafel every day.” Naiad handed a pile of junk over to me. “This pile should be worth fifteen gold. Buy me a pony.”

  I laughed, hoping the last line was joking. Naiad didn’t smile. I cleared my throat and said, “You never asked for one as a kid.”

  “Nah, I’d rather have a lizard mount. But Fanamel doesn’t have any of those yet. We need to go to another country.”

  “So, what did you spend your points on?” I wanted to stay focused on our levels and forget about the map.

  “Dexterity and constitution.” She replied.

  “The first point works, but if we are going to be traveling together, we need you as our damage dealer. You should’ve put more points into strength.”

  “I'd rather have enough health after that boss fight.”

  “Fine. Triangle you ready?” I remembered he already spent his points on who knows what.

  “No. I want the map.” Triangle pointed at my hand.

  “Do you promise to not go off and chase after these nests?” I asked.

  “No.” He answered quickly and honestly. “The lizard people mentioned a reward.”

  “Then I am going to hold on to this. When we have time, then you can ask about it.” I put the map away. “This stuff we’re doing is small fry. Like those nests. We want to get to the endgame. That’s where the game is a challenge and there are incredible fights.”

  “I liked the last fight. Hated the fire.” Triangle said.

  “Same.” Naiad answered.

  “Hey, it’s not real.” I pointed to the exit. “Let’s get going on Naiad's quest.”

  Naiad and Triangle shared a look, and Naiad kicked the ground and moved forward. Triangle followed like a puppy. That was the look kids had when hiding something from their parents, one with a coded language only they knew. It hurt that my son and daughter trusted each other more than me.

  But that’s what I wanted. The siblings to have a relationship, one that can withstand anything the world throws at them. A look my older brothers shared, and left me out of whenever Uncle Rick came over to watch us. I only knew the look meant they didn’t agree and didn’t like what the adult did. It meant my kids were closing me off from something, and that fact hurt. I had to try and get them to open up.

  I dug into my inventory and pulled out three experience bars that were labeled as Hard Tacked Exp.

  “You know what’s great to have when you go into the woods? Snacks. You want some experience bars?”