On the following day, after going to bed late into the night once again, Daniel woke up as tired as a person could be. He had slept for only two hours, but he had to endure it, for that was his last week at the firm.

  After a hot bath, a hot cup of coffee, and a nice turkey sandwich, he went to work trying not to look like a zombie. It was a busy day at the office. Despite people knowing he would soon be gone, the tasks were still being piled onto him.

  An accountant came over to his desk, said good morning while barely looking at him, and dropped a few documents on his desk before returning to her cubicle.

  “I thought I was just gonna finish all the assigned tasks during my last week,” he said to Samara, craning his neck over the partition to catch her attention.

  “Yeah, I know. I’m as surprised as you are,” she said, her eyes fixed on the monitor.

  Daniel’s mind started to conspire if they were doing that on purpose.

  “Well. It doesn’t really matter, right?” he said to her, half-smiling.

  “Why?”

  “Cause soon I’ll be out of here, working in our professional organization.”

  Those words took her eyes off the monitor to look at him.

  “Should we start working on the paperwork?”

  “There are a few steps I need to take before going official. My guild needs to grow and thrive first. Then it’ll be time to file a corporation.”

  “Got it. You have my contact when you need me.”

  He thanked her and got back to work.

  ***

  Hours later, back in the virtual world, Ragnar walked through the ruins of his sanctuary. The place would be abandoned, almost spooky if it weren’t for the nine black Iron Bears roaming the place.

  After a brief walk, the Iron Druid returned to the trail’s end leading into the refuge’s inner entrance—the same place he hosted the volleyball party. So much had happened in a short span of time that it felt like it was a long time ago instead of a few days.

  A soft and rhythmic rustle came from behind. Ragnar stayed still, looking at the trail’s end.

  “Where is the little one?” Torvell asked, stopping at Ragnar’s right.

  “Roaming the forest, I guess.”

  The bear was about to keep the conversation rolling if it wasn’t for Niki’s arrival. Her avatar was a small black spot at the left, visible edge of the trail. The druid waved at her, and she waved back before sprinting at them.

  Her green eyes stayed on the big Iron Bear at Ragnar’s side.

  “Did I miss something?”

  The druid explained to her what had happened after the gala at the duke’s estate.

  “That’s awesome, right? Wait, why aren’t you smiling and jumping around? Your sanctuary has Iron Bears again.”

  “It’s a complicated matter.” The answer came from Torvell.

  Niki nodded as she could now hear the beast’s voice after entering Ragnar’s guild.

  The trio stood there, chatting while waiting for the rest of the guild. After fifteen minutes, the conversation drifted towards the rebuilding of the sanctuary. Niki presented a summary of her ideas. Ragnar listened to them, but when it was time to evaluate them, voices reverberated through the rocks siding the trail.

  The Iron Druid expected that his guildmates would arrive in batches. A few would come alone and others in groups. But the moment their figures revealed themselves walking out of the rocky wall, Ragnar counted more than thirty.

  They sure were loud.

  To speed things up, Havoc started by saying, “We all met in Salem.”

  “We spawned close to each other at the duke’s palace,” Artic said.

  “So we waited for each other’s friends before departing as one big group,” Skiff said. “You know, the journey can be quite dangerous. We had to trek through a jungle just to get here.”

  “As I said last time, Skiff, that would be our first priority. We had to fight an evil cult, remember?”

  “Yes, boss!”

  Ragnar took a good look at his new subordinates. Most of them were close to level 30, wore simple sets of armor, and had their eyes peeled on him: the big druid that showed off himself at the Battle of Torino Village, humiliated two guild leaders, and became the latest Baron of Salem.

  Taken from Royal Road, this narrative should be reported if found on Amazon.

  But he expected more people. Ragnar’s speech a few days ago had flooded his guild page with joining requests. Even now its inbox was full. But after a long night powered by coffee, he analyzed the hundreds of interested players, settled on the 40 new members, and approved their requests. However, only 26 of them showed up.

  Maybe my 15 minutes of fame are finally coming to an end, Ragnar thought.

  He then greeted them, “Thank you all for coming here. I’m glad to see that so many people took the initiative to come here. As you can see, this druid sanctuary has been totally destroyed by that evil guild. But thanks to all our effort and sacrifice, we vanquished them with ease.”

  “Hell yeah!” yelled an excited priest.

  “Thank you for your enthusiasm.” Ragnar pointed at him and blinked, then continued, “But life in the Ragnarok Guild will not be only glory battles, barbecue parties, and volleyball matches like you see in our social networks. Here, we work hard. Our first priority is to rebuild this sanctuary and lay the foundations for our baronate. That’s right, you’re not hearing me wrong. We’re building a fucking city.”

  Those wide-eyed recruits looked at each other, and after a brief moment of silence, they went into a frenzy. Some shouted, others whistled, some high-fived or fist-bumped their closest friends after finding out they got into an ambitious guild.

  Ragnar smiled ear to ear. His first speech was a thunderous success that exceeded his expectations. So he had to ride that thunder.

  “Members of the Ragnarok, old and new, it's time to finally open a path here.”

  “Thank the gods,” Niki said.

  “My old friends,” Ragnar announced, pointing at the original four members of the guild. “Lead them to the woods west of here and wait for me there. I won’t take long.”

  Artic nodded and shouted, “With me, you punks!”

  “He’s just joking,” Niki said to appease the newbies.

  They all flocked around the older members and followed them out of the sanctuary.

  Ragnar stood there for a moment, watching his growing guild depart. Then he spun on his heels and faced the inside of the refuge.

  ***

  “‘I won’t take long’ my ass,” Artic said.

  All around him was the rest of the Ragnarok guild. Some were seated on the ground, others on moss-covered stones lying around, a few leaned over the trunk of the nearest trees of the western woods.

  “You guys think we’ll open a path through here?” Niki asked, sitting cross-legged on top of a cube-shaped stone.

  “I think so,” said Havoc, standing to her right. “This is the most trail-like path leading to Salem, so…”

  The swordswoman was cut short by Niki’s bored murmur, “Finally.”

  Their attention went to the east, where Ragnar and a party of nine bears were approaching through the green grass fields.

  “Sorry for the delay,” Ragnar said after arriving. “It took a while to gather our bears. But first things first. I’ll need a lumberjack master to oversee the opening of the path. How about you, Artic?”

  The knight nodded.

  “Great. The opening must be at least ten meters wide. That’ll be enough to build a road capable of sustaining some traffic. I guess not all of you know it yet, but the duke promised me to help in the building of my baronate. Actually, it was mostly about the sanctuary, but I’ll work on a better deal with him soon enough. That’s why the path must be wide enough to fit columns of riders, wagons, wheelhouses, and all that shit.”

  “What about the bears?” asked Skiff.

  “They’ll be helping us tear down those trees.”

  “But aren’t they creatures bound to nature?”

  “You’re right. But these bears are different from those that died heroically in battle. These ones are bound to me first. They promised to work hard to redeem their shameful past.”

  A newbie nudged another and said, “This guild has a lot of history, huh?”

  His words caught Ragnar’s attention.

  “The lore of this place could fill a brick-sized novel.” His gaze drifted back to the group as a whole. “Unfortunately, for all of our newcomers, I won’t be participating in the lumberjacking. My attention is needed elsewhere. Niki, as you may have realized, now we’ll be planning not only the sanctuary, but the whole baronate. How about we convene at the Ceremonial Plateau to plan the whole thing?”

  “Sure,” she said.

  Before departing, Ragnar finished instructing Artic on how the path opening should proceed, and only then did he and the assassin make their way to the Ceremonial Plateau.

  ***

  “Here we are, again,” Niki said as they arrived at the summit of the plateau.

  “Same place, different view,” Ragnar said, gazing at the burnt, ashen horizon surrounding them.

  “Last time we were here, I said it would be a lot of work to rebuild this place. I can’t even imagine the effort it will take and the amount of material we’re gonna need.”

  “We have more people now and the duke agreed to help us.”

  She nodded, opened the creation tool, started browsing the menus, opened a bunch of tabs, and tweaked some of the settings.

  Ragnar opened the creation tool and gasped at what he saw.

  The sanctuary was populated with gorgeous buildings big and small, all of them interspersed with trees, bushes, flowers, and other foliage. The whole place would be worthy of a druid sanctuary when finished.

  Between all that, what most caught his attention was the main building. Once an empty compound, it was now a large three-story palace surrounded by a wall and four outer towers.

  “Did you by any chance get inspired by the Taj Mahal?” he asked.

  “Busted,” she admitted, shrugging with a mischievous smile.

  “At least you changed it enough to fit the setting.”

  “You’re damn right I did. I’m not a cheap copycat.”

  Beside the reduced scale, the main difference lay in the absence of the domed roofs. This one was all flat. Each floor was smaller than the lower ones, providing space enough to rally troops or gather some friends at a balcony party.

  “It’s beautiful. It’s even better than I was expecting,” Ragnar admitted. “Weren’t you supposed to be super busy with college?”

  “I was, but I’m almost done now that my graduation project is finished. All I have to do is present it to the professors.”

  “I’m impressed. This is professional work. Congratulations, you are now Ragnarok’s Chief Architect.”

  “Wasn’t I already that?”

  “You were the guild’s architect. Now you’re the chief, so all projects must be approved by you; and you get to decide with me how my baronate will look.”

  “Neat.”

  If you're enjoying this story, please consider rating it and leaving a review to please the algorithm gods.

  | (You can read ahead on my server)