9+ NINE +9

Surprised by the sudden change of plan and at the same time slightly annoyed that you made the decision after they all jumped into the river, your team nevertheless gets ready to continue on foot from here. You on the other hand, immediately hop out of the boat once it hits the shore and go to find that mysterious stone pillar.

Covered by vines and moss, the stone pillar towers over you like an ancient giant, left to battle the elements alone for centuries. As you begin to remove the moss and cut away the leaves, you make a terrible discovery. All the symbols, signs and engravings have been sloughed off. Tracing some of the edges with your finger, it's almost as if they were chiseled off on purpose.

Ultimately the pillar is useless to you, there is nothing you can learn from it that you didn't know before. You hear leaves rustling behind you and suddenly Salvador bursts through the trees asking if you've seen the sloth that looks exactly like Dr. Higginsbottom. You nod your head, at least the sloth didn't disappoint when seen up close.

Having used up immense energy to fuel your superior brain power, you dig out some dried mango from your pack to replenish your strength. As you remerge from the jungle, you spot Emily trudging up the riverbank with the other men who had tried to move the tree. You offer her some mango too, but she just glares at you silently as she starts wringing the brown swamp water out of her socks. If she doesn't want any that's fine, you didn't want to get close to her anyway. You only packed three premium cotton beige shirts and there was no need to get one dirty so early on.

After a few more minutes of organization, the team is all set and it's time to head into the thicket. You get to do the first ceremonial hack with a machete, effectively slicing the toquilla palm, blocking your path, in half. Finally, for you, the real expedition has begun!

Not much hacking is needed after that and you easily move into the rainforest, the dense vegetation being mostly over 100 feet above you. Except for dodging the occasional hanging vine and liana, its mainly just hours of monotone walking. At some point it even begins to feel as if you're walking in circles. You spot your own flower embroidered handkerchief on the mulchy rainforest floor ahead of you and that's when you realize, you have been going in circles for real!

You look over at the guide and Salvador confidently leading the group. One is carefully studying a compass while the other is checking the wind direction with his finger, it all looks pretty professional to you. But then pure and utter outrage spreads across your face, wait a minute, they're both holding the map upside down!

You yell at everyone to stop and whip out your own trusty map. Annoyed, the guide comes up on your right to explain that we just need to go left from here while Salvador comes up on your left and says turning right is the way to go.

Both of them have managed to get you lost in the first place, yet looking on the map yourself, one of them must be correct this time.

Follow the guide's advice and pick left go to 11

Follow Salvador's advice and pick right go to 12

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