What could one man do to a small house in only one and a half hours? Turns out, quite a lot of damage.

We overturned the table that was in the kitchen, set back up the fridge also in the kitchen, then headed over to the living room where we propped up the shelf once again after it had been taken down on the floor. We fixed the leg of the table back up in the living room too. We also set back down the carpet that now had a massive hole in it in the middle under the table. We went to the storage room and saw that everything that was nicely packed up had been torn down almost indefinitely. My mom just told us to get out and closed the door gently behind us.

We went to the garage and had to fix EVERYTHING. Even my bike was nearly torn apart. Fortunately my dad must've added some extraordinaire hard steel to my bike because the frame of it was untouched.

It took half an hour to fix up the garage and we went to the basement afterwards. It looked like he had only moved a couple of things in the first room where the colorings from Obsidia were and in Coals' room it looked virtually untouched. As we were confused about why everything seemed perfectly fine we went to the third room—the laundry one—and saw why.

He had opened Pandora's box at the bottom of the washing machine since the gap where the spiders usually were... now gone.

"W-W-Where's the spiders?" Coal asked us. Obsidia shrugged while I stated,

"I'm pretty sure the agent moved the washing machine which made him find our spider friends," I stated, moving the washing machine back into place on top of the gap. We collectively walked all the way upstairs to the second floor where my mom helped Obsidia clean her room up while I cleaned my room up.

There wasn't much damage to my room, mainly my closet took the most beating with my clothes scattered everywhere around the doorway of the closet. I looked at the time and saw that it was already around 2:30. I needed to clean up quickly if I wanted to get to the entrance of the Isle on time. I picked my clothes up, which I didn't exactly have many to begin with, and placed them back in my closet when I saw the box where my journal used to be, completely crushed.

Great, I needed to crush that box and throw it away anyway.

I moved towards my cabinet and saw that the compartments were completely emptied. But since I didn't have much in my cabinet to begin with, I quickly picked up my stuff and stashed it inside their cabinet drawers. I yawned and moved toward the paper that was on the ground.

It was still there, all crumpled up right next to my bedside table that had been opened. Unfortunately for that agent, there was nothing inside the table nor did he inspect the lone piece of paper that showed everything I needed to know on the floor. I laid it flat on the table and locked the door behind me.

I put the paper on the floor and stomped on it just like Veronica did, resulting in a holographic screen being shown right in front of me, showcasing where the entrance of the Isle was and where me and my friends would need to go to get to the factory. I just hoped that my dream wasn't 100% truthful in that those animals that I freed weren't there.

I took a deep breath crumpled up the paper, put it in my pocket, and headed out of the door to see Coal getting out of his room at the same time.

"Not much stuff to fix?" I asked him.

"Nope. You?" He asked me while sniffling.

"Not much." I shrugged, going downstairs as Coal followed me. It was now 2:35 PM. It was getting closer and closer to the time of going to that factory, though I had no idea what I was going to get myself into. I hoped it was everything I had dreamed of, literally and figuratively.

It was fringing nigher to 3:00 PM which I was excited about since it would be the first time I explored somewhere outside of my own house. Meanwhile, me and mom started to prepare dinner as my sister watched and played with Coal playing some game in the basement and both of them were... getting a bit too pissed off about the game.

"I can't believe we fixed the house in record time." My mom said.

"Just wait until next year. We'll get a sub-hour record." She laughed at my remark as she put the quesadillas we were preparing in the oven.

"Now we wait for them to bake. I'm sorry you have to go before you eat."

"It's fine. I'll just grab a snack and head back to the house quickly. It isn't that big of a deal!" I exclaimed. I looked at the time and it was five minutes before three. I better go now if I wanted to get there at least a little bit later than usual.

"Alright Mom, I gotta go," I stated, putting on my shoes and tying them. My mom then went through every single risk that I was taking. As if I didn't know about them right then and there.

"Hey, listen! Be careful when you're crossing the street and always look both ways, when you're in the forest make sure you pack yourself some water and food, and always be sure that nothing is sneaking up at you. And oh! Make sure there are no traps!"

"Mom! There's not gonna be some trap in the forest, no one goes out hunting in this town anyway. I'm gonna be fine, don't worry. I promise I'll be back at least right after dinner." I didn't know at the time how long the

"You promise?" My mom asked me sincerely. I nodded and kissed my mom's forehead.

"I promise Mom. Seriously, don't worry about it. I'm with my friends and they'll make sure I'm okay." In actuality, I'LL make sure they're okay. But I don't want my mom to worry about me any more than she already was.

As the oven dinged, signaling that the quesadillas were ready, my mom sat down and prepared for dinner. She was talking about the stupid inspection with Coal and Obsidia who had heard the oven and rushed over to the dining room. They relaxed before eating their quesadillas.

We were unwinding and I was waiting until it was three o'clock sharp. However, while they were eating and I was recalling my dream in my head. Yet another doorbell rang across the house. My family was worried and Coal decided to stand up and head to the door. As my brother opened it, he realized the person there was for me and yelled,

"GEORGE! Your girlfri—"

"Shut the hell up," I said. As I looked toward the person who rang the doorbell, I found out that it was Aquafene. I told my brother to give us some privacy as we talked. He nodded while I closed the door behind me.

"Hey Aquafene, why are you here? Aren't you supposed to be going to the entrance of the isle?" I asked her.

"Well, I wanted to talk to you about the factory. I didn't have a ride and since you're the only person that lives the closest to me I thought why not go to you? Anyway, I had a weird dream last night about the factory and I want to share it with you if that's alright." Aquafene said in a startle.

"That's really weird because I also had a weird dream about the factory too. And uh, it's fine if you want to share a ride with me." I said. I caught sight of my family slowly coming closer to the front window to eavesdrop. I shooed them away with my hand while I looked at Aquafene.

She had on a white and blue crop top with baggy blue jeans. She also had a beanie on that hid her hair. She looked like someone from the 1990s rather than someone in 2813. I mean, what I was wearing wasn't much better as I had...

Why am I talking about fashion right now!?

I looked behind me to the doorway and said in a solid tone, "So, what was your dream about?"

"Well, it started with me in a field between two biomes. I saw a jacket saying something but I forgot what it said." She said.

"Mhm," I replied.

"Then after that, I saw the factory and hurried over to it where I went inside and felt a huge... presence, I guess you can say?" She stated.

"Me too, yeah," I responded. The reason I wasn't exactly responding too much to Aqua was because one, I didn't want to potentially scare her off by saying too much. And two, I wanted to make sure my family wasn't actively trying to eavesdrop on us since this was a truly important conversation to keep secretive.

"Then I saw a piece of paper on a capsule that said, ah what did it say. . . Oh! Destiny. After that, I woke up in a forest where I saw two older guys, a big boom happened and as they left I walked to the center of the campfire where I saw a piece of paper saying—"

"Faith, right?" I interrupted her.

"Nope. It was, 'Forgotten'." She said. Looking directly at me like I knew what to do.

"Well, that's weird. Mine said 'Faith'. My dream also had two girls who were—" I better not reveal what exactly we were potentially heading into right now.

"Well hey, maybe you have more luck than me hahahaha!" She said, a speck anxiously as she looked at the ground, then at the sky.

"Ahhaha maybe. But I don't exactly think that our dreams matter anyway. They're just representations of our fears, that's all! Maybe I fear to be faithful while yours is to be forgotten." I stated. She nodded and looked at my shoes.

"Anyways, that is strange. Having the same dream and all. I'm thinking about this, and I can't believe I'm about to say this but, it's a bad idea to go to the factory Aquafene." I stated, which was technically the truth in my mind at the time.

"But what if our dreams are the exact opposite of what we think, like you said? What if this is a warning that if we don't look for these spirits, they will be released and cause havoc!" She stated.

"Hmm... not sure about the releasing spirits but you do have a point there," I said. Now that I thought about my dream I suppose it was only a bizarre one. I mean, why would the animals be there at all? This wasn't some sort of vision into the future anyway.

We should've been okay.

Plus there was no turning back, I had already convinced everybody about this factory.

I contemplated on whether or not we should go and finally decided after a couple of minutes of silence that we should indefinitely go to the factory as quickly as possible since it was well past 3:00 PM.

"Shouldn't we go?" She asked me. It was like she was reading my mind.

"Yeah, let's go," I said, heading into my open garage and getting my bike. Aquafene sat at the back and we rode our bike to the Pond.

The Pond was a place that was just... a pond. But after me and Aquafene did some extensive research ourselves over three weeks, plus with Veronica's help, I discovered that the pond was the entrance to some sort of pathway that extended through the forest. We didn't know what it was leading us to but now, I knew it was leading us to the Isle of Colganla. I would've told Aquafene then and there about what we were heading toward but she interrupted my thoughts,

"Angel was right. This seat is comfortable." I became flustered.

"W-what!? S-she told you that?" My voice cracked.

"Mhm. She told the whole group chat about what happened when you were going to the Waterway. How you oh so valiantly rescued her from her parents. How you fixed a tire. How you meet up with Steve and Fron's sisters. Basically everything! Including this seat being super comfy." She said. I tried to contain my stillness as I peddled the bike toward the Pond being shown on the GPS.

"Hey. Are you nervous?" She asked me suddenly.

"Uhm. Half and half." I took a deep sigh of relief as I knew that she was trying to change the subject.

"You?" I asked her.

"Before my dream, I was ecstatic about going on this adventure. Now though..." She looked at the sunset from behind us.

"Now I'm a bit anxious."

"Well, what if our dreams are for nothing? Like you said, maybe our minds are trying to distract us from going to the factory."

"I said that there might be something dangerous in the factory, not that." She stated.

"Ehhhhhhh, same thing!" I exclaimed with a bright smile on my face.

"We can't go back now, we better figure out what even is inside this factory before it's too late right?" I asked her. She nodded as we pedaled to a full stop at the Pond.

That's where we saw two people, one was Angel and the other person I hadn't met before but he looked wealthy based on the guards around him...

Wait, those weren't guards. Those were soldiers and the same ones that had been inspecting my household beforehand. What the hell were they doing here protecting this kid!? Maybe he was... no. I couldn't think like that.

They were keeping him safe and his clothes looked like they came from an exotic place, maybe Hasgula, a building that was known solely for fashion and that my sister Obsidia wouldn't stop bugging me about. To be fair to her, that's where I got most of my fashion sense in the first place, which I didn't even want. Curse you Obsidia!

As I parked my bike, I headed over to Angel and greeted her,

"Hey."

"Oh hey, George! Aquafene! Where's the rest of the gang?"

"I have no idea," Aquafene stated. I shrugged to signal I agreed with her.

"Do you have any idea what is going on with that kid over there?" I asked her.

"Uh, no clue. He looks sort of rich though. I have no idea who he is. Aquafene?" She asked her.

"No clue." She stated back, skipping a rock over the pond and landing at a wooden pole that was holding up a sign, warning people to not swim in the pond.

"Also why are you so early over here in the first place?" I asked her.

"Well George, if you must know I'm here to watch the pond before sunset," Angel responded.

"Angel. It is 3:10 right now. And knowing us, we don't usually get somewhere on time. Hell, I think that's why Emily cursed out Robert in our group chat in the first place." I stated and she rubbed her arm. I needed to continue pressing her to get a straight answer off of her.

"Angel, I've known you for over a month by now. No way you would enjoy something like a pond by just looking at it, especially in sunlight. Why are you here, seriously?" I said. She sighed.

"Fine. If you must insist on why I'm here, I heard from Veronica that she wanted to go on our adventure with all of us for some reason all of a damn sudden. I came here to try to calm myself down and maybe meet up with you since I thought this was your favorite pond. Guess I was right huh?" She said.

"Nah it's just the closest to my house," I responded. She looked disappointed that she got my favorite pond wrong.

"Are you kidding me!?!" Aquafene looked at Angel. She looked confused as Aquafene sighed in bummer.

"You met up with Veronica!?" I don't know why, but I completely glossed over what Angel said other than just my favorite pond being this one.

"Yeah, and?"

"She doesn't know about Veronica all that much apart from the first day," I whispered to Aquafene. She whispered back to me,

"Ohhhh. That makes sense."

"Remember Veronica? That one girl that you saw on the first day?" I asked Angel.

"Yeah, I met her today. She seemed much nicer and even brought me a gift basket. She simply asked me if she could come with us."

"A-And what did you say?!" Aquafene asked nervously.

"I told her no. Emily would probably beat her up into a pulp anyway and I don't want a supposed former bully to come on our trip." She said, looking at the pond as me and Aquafene came to be less tense.

As I pointed to the guy being blocked by the two soldiers. Angel responded,

"I told you already. I have no idea who he is. I can't even make out his face since it's blocked by the—" As one of the soldiers moved out of the way, Angel had her mouth half open in shock and looked directly at us, her eye twitching,

"G-Guys." She looked like she saw a ghost.

"Hm?" Aquafene stated.

"T-T-That's Ethan Redwood. He's one of the sons of the Emperor." She stated.

"Wait what!? No way." Aquafene looked just as shocked as Angel. Honestly, I didn't give a crap.

"Interesting. I guess this is his favorite pond huh? Sweet. It's a nice pond anyway." I said. Aquafene and Angel looked at me like I was crazy. Maybe I was but I generally didn't care about the Redwoods.

"Well, since we legitimately can't interact with him because if we even speak to him we'll probably be slaughtered, we might as well go to where the path begins?" I asked them both.

"Sure George, but I don't know why you don't care about Ethan of all people." Aquafene replied.

"Well, you'll have to tell me why he's so important apart from being the son of the Emperor on our walk there," I said.

And so, we soon left the pond while I locked my bike in place. As I looked back, I swore I saw Ethan looking back at me through the two soldiers.

"Okay. So you know back in history class in middle school how Mr. Historia refused to talk about anything about the Redwoods?" Angel asked me.

"Yeah. We continuously tried to make him tell us and even bet money on who was going to make him tell us. Your point?" I asked her.

"Well, during middle school I tried to figure it out myself and found out that Ethan was telling all of the schools to not even mention the Redwood name in a bad way. Or else, they would be killed." She stated.

"That's horrible!" Aquafene exclaimed. I on the other hand had another question in mind.

"Why didn't you tell anyone about this during middle school?"

"Because one, they'll think I'm crazy and two, you knew about my reputation in middle school even heading into high school. No one would believe me." She said. To be fair to her, she had a point.

"Uh, Angel. What did you say to Veronica as an explanation for why she couldn't come? She always needs an explanation for something." Aquafene out of nowhere stated.

"I would've gone with saying that the adventure was found out by us to be too dangerous for you to come," I stated. However, Angel replied,

"Wouldn't she just think that's a blank excuse since we're already bringing eleven people?"

"Pfft nah, I'd tell her the factory only said it could fit eleven people at a time as the factory would collapse if it fits anymore than that. Even if she doesn't believe me we can just tell her ourselves that the factory would collapse and make her believe us. Sorta a foolproof plan if you ask me, Angel." I said.

"Yeah. More like a plan a fool WOULD make!" Angel replied, laughing at her own remark.

"What did you say to her?" Aquafene asked her. We stopped at the entrance of the pathway.

"I said that it was way too dangerous for a person as popular as her to come with us. Plus, I said that everyone would probably look at her as an enemy rather than a friend. So I made her promise not to go with us and she understood. She also said something about her parents stalking her anyway."

"That should work," Aquafene stated. I shrugged and grunted at Angels' previous cheeky comeback.

We sat down at the entrance of Colganla and we began getting nervous that no one else would come.

"Hmm, they should be here by now," Angel stated, looking at her Scruplot.

"A Scruplot Angel? Are you that attached to school or something?" I asked her.

"Well, I don't have a clock or watch with me! I can't bring my home phone with me for obvious reasons. So this is the only way I could tell the time." She replied.

"Sounds dumb," Aquafene stated, taking out her watch from her wrist and checking it. I overlooked her shoulder and saw that it was 3:16 PM. I started to whistle because of pure boredom and closed my eyes.

"When did you learn to whistle?" Aquafene asked me. I stopped suddenly and opened my eyes.

"Long story. Don't want to get into it right now." I stated. Aquafene rubbed her wrist while Angel said,

"You're a good whistler."

"Thanks," I stated back.

My whistling habits happened during elementary school. I never really noticed it and though I whistled at random places here and there, I never knew how I whistled in the first place. One day after elementary school, I went to my mom and asked her about it. Her eyes welled up in tears after I asked her and ever since that day, I never asked her about it again. I promised myself I would never upset my mom after that dreadful day.

That was whenb a day before I graduated from elementary school, I had gotten sick. I was going to miss the graduation ceremony which was a bummer since I wanted to go. My mom put me in her bed and when she was cooking some chicken noodle soup to help my health downstairs in the kitchen, I got curious and went into her closet. That was when I saw pictures upon pictures all displayed in neat files of my dad. He was whistling in one of these photos and as I looked at it, I saw he was whistling at a baby.

Me.

I, again, never exactly knew my father. I knew he fought for a horrible cause, and he died for that cause. But other than that I had never met him at all. Well, up until that day. That was when I figured out that my dad taught me how to whistle. I never knew how to control when or when not to do it though, but of course, he didn't have the time to teach me.

If I had talked about it with Aquafene and Angel, I likely would've cried. Not that I couldn't cry in front of them, but I felt this wasn't the time to show my emotions like that.

Anyway, one by one the rest of our friends came. First thankfully came Robert and Jack with Jack's parents driving one of their bajillions of cars and parking at the parking lot right next to the pond, wishing them luck.

Then came Maurice and Emily riding on their electric scooters. They parked them right next to my bike and made sure they were locked. Finally came all four of the rest, Alice, Peo, Steve, and Fron all in Steve's stupid-looking buggy. He was also wearing his comically large backpack. Probably fitted with the latest inventory of survival equipment.

"Mind if you three tell me who that guy is?" Emily asked after all of us greeted each other. She was pointing towards Ethan being guarded by those two soldiers.

"Ethan Redwood, ladies and gentlemen. One of the sons of the Emperor, and supposedly the next to heir the throne." I stated while frowning. Everyone else looked anxiously at me.

"Don't worry. He's not gonna bother us, at least I hope he isn't." I shrugged, getting up from the ground while I helped Angel get up from the ground herself.

We were now ready to embark on a journey to search for the supposed 'Lost Souls'.