The Ranch

I was standing far enough away from the others for them to be unable to hear the radio. I quickly hit the button and sent a hurried response to Punisher.

"Punisher, where are you at?"

[Bzzt] "I'm…" [Bzzt] "…beetles everywhere…" [Bzzt] "…anch monster, size of a bea…" [Bzzt] "...nting you, Ronan."

"I think I know where you're at; stay right there."

I clipped the radio to one of the front straps of my pack and made my way to Robert, who was currently engaged in a conversation with an older man by the central fire pit.

"Hey Robert, I need to head out for a bit; one of my friends is in trouble."

He turned, and his expression changed to one of resolve. "I'll come; what's the situation?"

I shook my head. "No, it's fine; you need to protect this site. I'll be more than enough."

The radio buzzed to life as Punisher began shouting on the other end.

"Hey Ronan…" [Bzzt] "…some assholes at…" [Bzzt] "…I'll probab…" [Bzzt] '…ahh shit!" [Bzzt]

I radioed Punisher back a couple times, but there was no response. I looked at Robert with a worried expression on my face. This didn't happen in the past because Punisher naturally made his way here by the third week of the first season. I had not thought about the possibility that he could run into other dangers this early on if he made his way east from the start.

"I've got to go. You stay here; I'll be fine."

Robert nodded. "Okay, but if you need any help, you know where to find me. If you aren't back by sundown, should I send a rescue party?"

I smiled at the question, knowing full well that a rescue party of humans would do very little help if someone like me was in trouble. "No, I'll be back. Don't waste any manpower on finding me if I don't return right away."

"Okay, just don't get yourself killed."

"I don't plan on it."

With that final exchange of words, I turned and disappeared from Robert's sight, using all 142 points of my ability to their fullest. I ran with one sole goal in mind, and that was to find my best friend. Punisher was the only person in this shitty world that I knew I could trust with everything I had, and there was no way in hell I was going to let him die here.

Tim the smartwatch manifested a face on his glass screen and shouted up at me. "Hey, Ronan! Where are you going? Where's your friend at?"

I looked down at Tim while I was running. It was hard to hear each other because of the speed at which I was traveling, so I had to shout back. "I am going to a place called The Ranch. It will become a popular farming spot for Bramblefiend Shamblers in the future because it's covered with Sludge Beetles. The beetles are their main source of food, and shamblers aren't very hard to kill as long as you're around level three or four."

"Then your friend should be okay, don't you think?"

I shook my head. "No, he ended by saying 'ahhh shit.' That doesn't sound like he's doing alright. I think something unexpected happened."

"Use your oracle abilities; see what's happening then!"

"It doesn't work that way."

Tim still didn't have any clue that I was from a different timeline and had returned to the past. I wish I had oracle powers and could see what's happening to my friend, but the only thing I could do was make educated guesses based on what I remembered of the area. From what I knew of The Ranch in the past, it was controlled by a group of humans starting the second week of the first season, so no one should be there.

"Fucking shit, I think I know what happened. He's stumbled upon a group of criminals right now. They'll be known as the enforcers in the future. They're a bunch of mad men who were supposed to take over that area in a week, but there's a good chance they're there right now."

Tim the watch manifested two arms so he could cross them. "Looks like your oracle powers do work when you need them to."

"I guess, but that's not important right now; we need to find Punisher."

Tim was quiet for the rest of the trip as I maneuvered my way through the forest. It was a refreshing feeling to be moving so quickly. In such a short amount of time, I had already achieved an agility stat that was almost comparable to what I had in my last life. Years of work accomplished in a single day, but it would probably not be so easy from here on out. There weren't going to be this many opportunities every day; I was just fortunate that I knew about so many things from the very start.

After less than ten minutes of running, I reached an area of the forest that was littered with bugs. All across the forest floor were slow-moving beetles covered with a thick layer of oozing slime. I landed on a thick branch that was extending from one of the larger trees in the area.

"Looks like we're in the right spot; this is the ranch." I quickly looked around the area with my heightened senses. There were no creatures in the area besides beetles and shamblers.

Tim's face extended and stretched around my wrist to get a better look below. "This is the area? Is that what you farm on the ranch?"

I shook my head. "No, that's not what is farmed here."

A hulking, twisted creature made of brambles and thorns rounded a cluster of trees in the distance. These were the Bramblefiend Shamblers, one of the easier creatures to hunt that was worth three points on the leaderboards. They were weak to fire and could easily be baited as long as there were sludge beetles in the area.

I pointed at the Bramblfiend Shambler. "That is what is farmed at the ranch."