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Ryoko AI 18

Wright was starting to get mentally tired. His body could sustain due to the nutrition fluid he consumed but mental fatigue was not something to joke about.   The reason for that because currently, Wright had stepped on the next simulation stage where he used a single engine, small sized jet as his aircraft while he had arrived at the stage where he had to turn the situation around.   Meaning, another aircraft was right behind him. It was precisely at his six o’clock, same altitude just a few hundred meters distances between them. But for a fight in this kind of vehicle, the distance was short enough to use gunfire.   ‘What should I do!?’ numerous failure and the prompt that his aircraft had been shot down slowly tore his spirit and accumulate mental fatigue.   It was hard for Wright to dodge and the feeling of the force he felt at high speed inside the simulation was more realistic it made him hard to turn at high speed or take an extreme high-G turn. Wright wanted to make sure that his move would make him able to reverse the position where he was the one at his opponent’s tail.   ‘Even though from the appearance I and the opponent used the same type of aircraft, it is clear that the opponent can truly utilize the aircraft potential more than I do.’ Wright knew this point clearly since he had restarted the simulation over thirty times.   He could not even jinx from the pursuer, his warning and alert signal kept ringing as missile came followed by gunfire every time he restarted the simulation made his will to waver.   ‘Damn it all!’ he did what he had not done before as he lowered the speed and even used the airbrake, making the plane’s speed reduced at an astonishing rate. And then, Wright finally pulled it off albeit barely.   The enemy plane was just slightly in front of him and it realized the error but Wright took it as an opportunity. He finally tightened his hand on his flight stick as he made the nose of the aircraft pointed directly at his enemy.   The enemy aircraft broke the current situation directly by turning hard to the right. Seeing this made Wright follow suit albeit in a totally opposite direction. With this happening, when both of them decided to make a turn it would be an opportunity for Wright to make a shot at it.   After all, what he had done was a Flat Scissor and his aircraft was slightly behind the bogey. The intention to do this maneuver was obvious, to get his firing position at the perfect time and position.   “A chance.” As it turned out, the speed, the altitude as well as the small mistake made it possible for Wright to do this maneuver. Even better, they were at close distance and Wright could even see his HUD showed that he was in gun range.   Wright found the button for firing his gun and did it when he saw the opposition aircraft. Gunfire could be heard as some of it hit to the body of his bogey. Smoke came out and then the wing broke as the aircraft lose altitude.   “Is that all? Strange, I thought it will be harder. Judging from the situation, it seems that the reaction the bogey take for changing the situation is insufficient. Well, guess that shoot has been taken from my lucky star.”   That was the last bit of strength Wright could do after failed dozens of time. He was so tired that he unconsciously closed his eyes and his vision turned dark as quickly as his body went limp inside the module.   -   “Sir Callahan, he seemed to be worn out after all of that. Are you sure this is a good subject?” there was an old man wearing a set of military unit asking Callahan about Wright.   “Absolutely. Look at that flight time, how many times did he repeat just a single task? Need to note that the difficulty the module gives is several times higher than the usual module for trainee. He even spend at least three more Nutrition Fluid. Well, the result is good for this time and better since he repeat some stage a few times.” Callahan looked at the module and the latest data from Wright’s module in delight, his expression was totally the one who wanted to process the data for further research.   “And you better sleep if fatigue started to kick,” Callahan added which the entire staff looked at him in return as if they were relaying this thought, The one who should say that is us.   Callahan’s eyes had turned red and droopy but it felt strange that his face was bright as the sun, creating a little creepy image. Fortunately, the staff that managed the Simulation Room had already used to his schedule and some of his habits.   Some of the staff had to pick Wright, slowly opening the module and clean the entire module before inspecting it for any damage and malfunctions after the operation. This was also one of the procedure after each usage especially since there was someone from Longen Multinational Corporation.   “Now, I want to input these data’s to the place it can be useful for.” Callahan pulled a small thin memory chip from the Simulation room’s Control Centre computer. For him, this data was as precious as a rich black gold at the middle of the ocean.   “Bring him to the infirmary. His treatment should be the best one since he helped me quite a bit.” After Callahan glanced his eyes to Wright and looked at that exhausted face, he told the people that carried Wright.   “Yes, sir.”   Wright then was placed on the special treatment unit in the infirmary. Although it was a simple infirmary the devices in it were helpful even to someone with a light disease. And the admitted nurse then was told by the Simulation Room’s staff about Wright’s condition and the cause.   They did not say about the special module and whatsoever. They only knew to especially pay attention to this new recruit that Callahan had appointed.   Wright had done the simulation so much he started to dream about it. He flew with one bogey in the front while the other at his six. Chased and being chased as it was, Wright felt he moved his plane in the most efficient manner possible while pressing the button to fire the gun and missile at the same time.   One downed, Wright felt that he moved the plane so that he could shake off his pursuer. In that dream, he did it as easy as taking a breath as the opponent failed to hit the missile it launched to Wright. That missile was actually Wright’s greatest obstacle at the last try.   The missile ability to move and track its target astonished Wright despite he had read about it. Heat-seeker missile was not easy to deal with and that proved to be a challenge for Wright to evade one at his current capability but in the dream, he was able!   Not only Wright shook it off but then Wright rushed to the cloud above, intending to lose from his enemy’s sight and successfully done it. Ambushing it with the cloud as a cover, Wright had downed another aircraft.   “Missile Alert!” the computer system inside the cockpit gave a warning to Wright. When he looked outside, his heart felt like stop its beat for a second. Dozens of missile was fired at his position, he was the target!   He could see from the front countless missiles came like a comet with white tail forming from its back. But that was only the front as the missile came from above and below too. Worse, he turned his back only to see the same scene at his front.   The missile alert did not stop, instead, it amplified as the voice grew louder as well. For Wright, that sound was the sound of terror and nightmare!   It drew closer and closer as the alert intensity grew. Wright tried to move his plane but the missiles still locked on to him, persistently pursuing his tail. He dodged the missiles from his front, side, above and below but the missiles behind him were chasing him still.   And then Wright felt a jolt right at his back as the force pushed him forward from his seat, and he could see that his back now covered in the fire before he screamed and then the scene changed.   “Huh!” Wright opened his eyes wide. He was terrified by the dream he just saw. His breath was still in disorder as he reorganized it again. He panted but sobered faster. Cold sweat covered his body.   He found himself lied on the comfortable bed, with the scent of medicine scattered inside his room and managed to get to his nose.   “Where am I? I remember finished the first stage of the simulation. And then I am too tired to even move my hands…” Wright refocused his gaze, finally saw the white and clear ceiling. The room had little lighting but Wright could see the color of the room he resided in.   He lifted his body and somehow the refreshed feeling washed his entire body. His clothes had been changed and he turned around to determine where he was now.   “Good, I should be in the infirmary. But I worried about these kinds of device.” Wright slightly changed his view, below his bed was actually a small box and some wires could be seen connected to the bed.   Other than that, he noticed the room itself was truly comfortable. Wright felt like he was treated like some rich people do. He knew some of the devices he had seen were expensive and not available in the simple infirmary.   The door opened and someone entered the room. Wright was surprised to see the person that visited him turned out to be someone he knew. It was the same person as the one who helped him when he was in a long queue.   “It’s you who treat me?” Wright asked. “Of course. Seeing you overworked yourself and Simulation Room staff came announcing your cause of exhaustion, I feel like something has to be done. And for this night, please just rest your body.” He replied.   “The…hell…so the clock that showed two o’clock near the desk beside the bed is showing me past midnight time.” Wright did not expect that the clock he saw beside him atop the desk was showing the time at night. The clock did not have any signs to show the time was the night.   “Sorry, that clock over there is the oldest in this room. A classic clock that showed twelve hours. I have to remind you that you should take your G-force training too.” That man smiled at Wright before he came out of the room and closed the door gently.   “So tired…” Wright laid down again. But he thought that his body was somehow full of energy even though all his body was rather hard to move.   He fell asleep and darkness greeted his mind.   -   Orwan Empire Capital City, Clayton. The capital was the place where the current emperor resided in. It was located southeast from Pasteur City. The night was long but the emperor had to wake from his slumber at this time of day.   “Your Majesty, someone is calling you on the restricted channel.” At this time Emperor Fritzgerald X heard the voice.   “What’s the matter?” the middle-aged emperor that still wore his bed clothes raised his body from the bed and stood up. His eyes blinked in successive to clear his blurred vision.   “Minister of Defense wanted to discuss something with you.” The emperor saw a young man with his attire completely ready for work. The emperor sighed and took his formal clothes from the wardrobe which revealed a lot of fine and elegant clothes.   “Royalty Clothes inherited from the founder of Orwan Empire and preserved well. Guess I should wear one these days.” The emperor saw yellow and red colored clothes that made his interest piqued before he gave a reply to the man.   “Tell the minister to meet in the designated place, Orland. I will dress up a bit. While at it, try not to make much noise to wake up my daughter okay.” Emperor Fritzgerald told Orland with his finger in front of his lips.   “That is, of course, your majesty. If there is nothing you request for, then I’ll go deal with the matter as soon as possible.” Orland saluted the emperor before leaving quietly, afraid to wake someone up.   “Why did they attack this empire of all places?” the emperor wondered the reason himself though.   Fifteen minutes later, both the emperor and Orland arrived at the meeting places in the downtown of Clayton. Although the skies were still dark the lights on the street and buildings that reached the clouds made the night bright and colorful.   “His Majesty is here.” Announcement from the speaker echoed as people stopped their activity for a moment. They instantly saluted from where they were.   And then someone with a wide and strong stature stepped forward, greeted the emperor. This man wore with him a formal suit, a face that showed the hardened-resolve plastered on his face.   “Your Majesty, this place is not suitable to talk things. Please follow me.” This man was Orwan Empire Minister of Defense, Zaifex. He showed the emperor the way as the personal unit he brought along with him gave way while securing the position around them.   Each important figures had their own personal unit but Emperor Fritzgerald X only had a few men as his personal unit. As of now, they were following him tightly from all four sides. Everyone could see those four were always near the emperor wherever he went.   Some snipers were positioned around the place, each vantage point available was stationed by them. This meeting was classified and even only the emperor and the minister knew about this.   “So where are we going to discuss? The usual?” the emperor asked casually which Zaifex did not reply immediately. Instead, Zaifex asked Orland about one thing.   “About you Orland, how can you become His Majesty Aide? Not telling?” seeing no reply, he spoke about where they were going to.   “Your Majesty, we bring you to the historical tunnel which existed since the medieval era long ago in the past. That is also the place for today’s discussion as the place is the best place in terms of safety.”   Only after five minutes they entered a large and accommodating room along with tight security along the way. One by one, the emperor, Orland, Zaifex and all of the personal unit had entered the room. Then some lights were turned on, illuminating the room that already reserved for the two of important figures.   The emperor realized the chair was soft and comfortable as he placed his back and sat down. He breathed out as the matter Zaifex wanted to tell him seemed important.   “Alright, let’s get to the point immediately. We don’t have much time to spare.” Zaifex opened his mouth before he pressed the button among the remote control he grabbed.   A picture appeared at one side of the room. The picture was projected from the light above the door they entered and landed on the other side. The light gave birth to the picture of a geographical location of their empire as well as their neighboring countries.   The empire and its neighboring countries were actually in the same continent but the middle of the continent sank lower than the sea level, causing the water body to fill the emptiness. Orwan Empire located on the lower part of the continent, if the continent was whole, Orwan was located at the southeast.   The water body that separated the two parts of the continent was not at all large, there was also a narrow place between the separated land and then the world recognized it as Birkin Strait. To the right from the continent was a large ocean named Heighar. It was Heighar Ocean one of the biggest ocean in the world.   While Orwan was located in the southeast part of the continent, their enemy was in the northwest part. The border between the two was precisely at the Birkin Strait where the first encounter with the unknown aircraft occurred.   “At 0000 hour, large activity detected near the other end of Birkin Strait. Well, it is estimated from our reconnaissance satellite that some of the forces from neighboring country relocate their base there. The problem is there is sighting of armored units, artillery, as well as an airbase. High chance that they intended to make a forward base to enter our territory. Your Majesty, the problem is we already agree to a peaceful negotiation at Leisth City and moving to destroy the base they build I’m afraid will not reflect good on your policy.” Zaifex explained the current circumstances.   “Your Majesty, I’m afraid they intentionally stall for time to prepare something. Sorry if I’m being rude but I think this time our neighbor country Ridgar is fully prepared for this. The peaceful negotiation is just a means to give them time and give us a hope for a truce. If that is truly the case…” Zaifex’s words was cut by the emperor.   “It’s normal for you to think about that possibility but the possibility of them to accept the truce still exist am I right? Furthermore, I also want to discern the situation within our neighbor, what happened to them exactly by facing them eye to eye. And we also need time for our Temporary Militia Unit to be ready so your possibility is the worst case scenario.” The emperor looked into the geographical map on the wall and said calmly.   “And I will try my best to avoid war. Because in war, it is the ground for killing with only the unarmed forces and the environment are the restriction.” Though the emperor said this, he knew the majority of people would only see war as an opportunity, a chance for them to step forward toward their dream.   In war, they basically did anything their desire wanted them to. No need to mention it, many history books had already written it. Pillaging the town, burning the structures, doing whatever they pleased.   “That’s what I want to say, Your Majesty. For them, the ends justify the means and it is different from our principles where even the process of doing something matters the same as the result. I can only say that this matter will not be small in the eyes of those superpowers.” Zaifex worried did not place on the current conflict but rather the one who fanned it.   For example, similar in our world where the superpower countries fight both in the light and in the dark. In the light, they faced each other with their own military strength but when it came to the conflict in the dark, they used their influence in the nation with recent conflict to fight. It was the same with the Orwan and Ridgar, they almost entered conflict at this stage and surely at a short time both the superpowers and corporations would jump at this opportunity.   “That worry is already inevitable and not change anything. Right, I also heard that Mister Callahan from Longen Multinational Corporation seeks an approvement of additional time for his newly built Virtual Reality Module. Do you already ask him to get some of that for our Aces?” the emperor asked in interest.   Zaifex revealed a hesitant look, he scratched his head and finally opened his mouth albeit in a disappointed manner, “I am sorry for not achieve your expectation this time. Apparently, Mister Callahan disapprove of our proposal this time. The reason being is that the new module is for the ‘nuggets’ and not for the experienced pilot.”   “I see. Then the result of his module can only be seen from our Temporary Militia Unit am I right? Just hope that their air forces are good enough to get us to pass this predicament.”   -   “Are you serious? That is what he consumed daily…that’s insane and unhealthy. Why did he do that!?”   Because of what Wright had done in the past was slowly to be revealed by John, even the one who had watched over him wrinkled his brows. And the guest this time was two people, a young man, and a young woman.   “Mister Wright is still a young man who are looking for a stable job, you see. Unfortunately, he doesn’t get that yet and even it becomes hard for him to sustain his necessity and to even pay off some of his tax. Forget about the allowance, he even donated most of it to the orphanage.” John wryly laughed, he found it strange but a bit understandable if it was Wright.   “I see. That concludes my little interest in him though. Looks like he still has to undergone the harsh penalty training despite all of that. If you want to visit again, make sure to mention my name again okay.” The man was the one who met Wright in his room.   “Alright then Mister August, John is relieved to hear that Wright is mostly fine and get something from his misfortune. Now, shouldn’t we head back home? We have matters to attend alright.” It was the young woman who spoke.   “No, no. It is my pleasure to greet and answer your need especially when you need it the most.” August replied with a smile.   “Sorry for bothering you. Let’s go back.” “But isn’t this a little inappropriate for us not to say something before leaving, Tanasha?”   At John’s little question, Tanasha only pursed her lips but still moved away without saying anything else. John knew something that he did not know about Tanasha at this day. He only said his concern for Wright but then Tanasha also wanted to come along. And John thought they would be using the standard procedure but who would have thought that they came straight to the place and August came to them.   “Sadly, his physical condition is still in fatigued status. Even with all three of the best nutrition fluid provided, his body will still experience the limitation of human being. Why did he do all of that in the past, eating from thrash, giving all of the empire’s allowance away to the orphanage while he barely sustain himself?” Tanasha muttered but she did not know the reason.   “In my eyes, what he had done is a sign of foolishness. He only took a little from the allowance to pay for the electricity tax and the rest of it was given to the orphanage. Speaking of the orphanage, it is also the one he lived before he went out on his own.”   When both of them went outside, the dawn was coming and the first few rays of light appeared on the dark, blue sky. John only felt that someone like Tanasha was not as simple as he judge but at the same time, he felt fortunate to meet and know her.   “I just wonder, why did you do all of this?” John did not know the exact reason why Tanasha had done all of that to help him so in curiosity he tried to ask.   “John, you only need to know one thing. Isn’t Wright a bit different than most people?” Tanasha turned and looked at John with her calm eyes. John understood the reason even though he felt that was not all the reason Tanasha did this.   “Sometimes, conducting the morals and kindness look foolish. I won’t deny that statement and I can see a glimpse of that in Mister Wright.” John smiled as he remembered how Wright usually greeted him even though his condition was rather depressing.   “Hmm. Be sure to do what you believe.” Tanasha gave a slight smile when John mentioned Wright in such manner. But she also felt that the world this time was not as nice as in the past as she felt the cold wind in the morning swept past her skin.   Of course, she knew that John probably tried to help Wright even though it would only make it hard for himself. But she did not try to stop him, she only hoped that this condition lasted as long as possible.

There is a world, different from ours. The world perhaps the same with us in terms of technology advancement yet their geographical structures, history, and figures are different.   In that world, there are also seven continents just like ours. The land and sea ratio was slightly different as it has a ratio of 3.5: 6.5 but that is not important at all.   It is the prelude to something terrible which is about to happen to the whole world that makes the beginning of something else. In one of the continent in a certain city, a young man dazed off to the vast sky above him.   His eyes were filled with nothing but hopelessness, followed by his helpless expression leaking out slowly. This young man was lying on a large ground filled with grasses. Around him, there was a large pave way which people walked in it. Some of those people brought their kids around the place.   “How should I face today's matter?” the young man muttered but he did not have anything good on his head to solve his current problem.   “Mommy, balloon....balloon...” a girl raised her tiny and cute hands towards the stands which sold the balloons full of color and that moment was just like the everyday matter to the young man who heard all of that. Obviously, the mother would react to that as well, she bought two balloons and the little girl pulled the strings that tied the balloons up and down in high spirit.   The young man felt warm inside his heart just because he could see and hear the kids happily play in this place.   “This park is never empty. But despite that, I can still relax my body and heart here, with the blue sky as a roof and the ground with grasses as the bed. But one thing I don't like to hear is...” the young man was just enjoying his leisure time when he heard another people voice. Different from the mother and the kids earlier, it sounded like a couple flirting with each other.   “Damn it! Just as my moment of peace is about to reach the max...” the young man felt irritated to that.   “The cloud above is just like you currently, floating above most things. And it also likes soft cotton as if I can feel it with my own skin.” The male voice sounded.   But then the female replied, “Clouds is not soft like that. It is the accumulation of the evaporated water from the surface of the planet which grouped together. Why are you still using an old-fashioned expression to flirt?”   The young man then raised his head a little as he glanced with the corner of his eyes towards the direction of the voice. The couple was sitting on a bench and as the young man expected, their position showed that they were already intimate.   “Lovey-dovey couple, here it comes....” the young man sighed, he disliked the sound when they kissed each other, especially when they did that passionately!   In this world where the technological advancement was not much different than ours, there was also free wireless fidelity around the park. And the young man used this to his advantage as well. To reduce his irritation, the young man reached for something inside his pants.   “Let’s see some news on the internet first then. This hour should be the prime hours for news to get broadcasted.” He grabbed his communication device. It was similar to the smartphone either in form and functionality.   After some tapping and slide here and there on the smartphone, he opened the application specialized for the hot news. When he saw the front page of the website, it still showed the news from yesterday until today's morning.   The young man looked at the sky and saw the sun was almost reached its peak and after that, he also saw the clock displayed on the smartphone. It was close to his prediction about the current time and he was almost correct!   ‘This time it should be eleven o clock judging from the position of the sun and the shadows of the thing around me. But looking at the clock on my phone...’   The time at the phone showed eleven past five, slightly inaccurate five minutes from his prediction. He frowned and felt the light of the sun now seemed to be hot, no it was already this late and he still laid on the ground without going to the shade to cover.   “Guess I should move to the place beneath the tree.” The time for the latest news still not arrived and yet he was basking in the heat of the sun at noon. He could see that now people were gathering at the shade of the large trees or they wore a hat to protect their head from the heat.   At the time when the young man sat down on a large tree not far from his previous position, he could hear a bugging sound. At first, he ignored it, who could say for sure that it was something large? Perhaps it was the machine from the construction nearby or perhaps it was also the sound that came from the street outside the park.   But soon he heard that sound come closer and louder as time passed. He did not know why but something from his heart desired it, it was a long time since he had this inside his heart. The young man often heard this sound many times actually but he was always passionate every time he heard this particular sound.   ‘They're above me!’ the sound reached the loudest degree of decibel as it was the moment where that thing passed above the young man. The young man raised his head, with his sparkling eyes and excitement he looked at the blue sky filled with clouds in it. But this time there was something else in the sky!   Their engine roared and it produced a unique sound every time they passed through but that was the thing which the young made like it. Because above him, some jet plane passed through and not just one, it was a squadron!   Of course, the people inside the park also raised their heads simultaneously. They exclaimed and pointed at the plane which already passed through them. Some of them became a little noisy but the majority of them turned to normal again.   “Plane, flying in the sky unhindered. The thing that changed the transportation and movement of civilization...” the young man was filled with awe and still looked at the sky as if his hope was on it.   But after that, his awe and excited expression turned grim all of the sudden. He recalled that the matter today had to be faced no matter what he did to avoid. He just reached for his smartphone once again to check something, for the sake of delaying the inevitable.   When he opened the headline news, it was actually refreshed!   “What’s going on for today? What is the meaning of this?” the young man became flustered. Although the news was astonishing, he only worried about the impact it had on him. He started to hear the people around him urged the closest person to check the news on the internet too.   “Quick check this out! Is it true or is it just a hoax?” someone exclaimed and pulled their friend over. “From the looks of it, it seemed like real though?” “Then if this is real, what should we do!?”   In summary, the content of the news went like this:   Invasion? Several Unknown Flying Object Passed Through The Border!   At 1100, the stationed unit in the border north of the empire detected several unknown flying objects came toward the border. Despite the warning from the stationed unit, the flying objects did not stop nor route.   The worst part is that those flying objects attacked the facility of the stationed unit, crippling them from the ability to identify the intruders. Fortunately, our Ministry of Defense reacted as soon as possible by sending three squadrons to reconnaissance the situation at the northern border.   “Any kind of threat will be dealt with immediately! Until the confirmation of our empire current status, please prepare for the worst.” Said Minister of Defense.   For more detailed news, please watch the news on the television that will be aired in the afternoon.   -   The young man walked away from the part dispirited. There were two reasons why he was sad and the first one was he lost his place to feel peace, to feel at ease. Second, he also lost the only place that provided him with free internet!   “Well, at least this confirmed that the news is real though.” The young man shrugged his shoulders as he walked to the downtown where the place he lived was. Several cars passed by, several red lights were passed as well. The young man felt empty inside, different from where he looked at the sky and the planes.   After he walked through the red light district, he turned around and arrived at a dirty and untidy complex. The only place in the downtown where he could live his life.   “Home sweet home?” despite the sight in front of him was uncomfortable to look but he smiled slightly at the sight of his home. No matter what, that place was his home after all. He grew up and raised at this exact place.   “Is there anyone home?” the young man jokingly asked. Despite the fact that he had become an orphan and this complex was the thing which the previous owner gave to him reluctantly, he was hoping that there would be his family member inside. That hope now only became a fleeting dream, an unfulfilled wish. Meaning that he lived alone for the last years, not that he counted on the years he had passed by himself.   He heard nothing! Of course, that was expected since the complex was empty and isolated, what he wanted to expect from such a place?   Opening the door, he finally entered his house. He turned on the light and the electricity did the job as it made the light bulb shine. And the problem this young man had that made him gloomy since leaving park was because of one important thing...   “I need money.” The young man was almost broke. To the point of searching for free internet access around the city. And the worst part of it was because he was fired from the previous job that made the situation rather hard for him.   ‘Oh, yes. Before that, I need to turn on the television first. There is important news soon.’ He checked his phone again and saw the clock was almost at twelve. It was almost the time and since the news was urgent, he could not miss it. Not since it was aimed at the entire citizen of their empire.   Then he turned on the television and he switched it to the main channel of the empire. It was starting to air and even live broadcast at that!   “Welcome to the noon section of today's news. In [Daily Talk] today, we have an important issue that made me and the crews have to do this on live and that is to invite someone to our studio here.” The host was a female with her wavy, brown hair. Her attire was formal black clothes with grey colored dress covering her knees.   She appeared to indicate that someone was going to come and from the looks of it, that person seemed important. Then she continued, “For today, the host will be me, Rana. Currently, on the internet, we received news regarding the threat around the northern border. And from the source of the news, it seemed like it came from the military itself meaning that this information is permitted to be spread.”   “Excuse me, Am I bothering now?” from the studio, a hoarse voice could be heard and it also broadcasted to the viewers as well. When the audience heard the voice, they were shocked as hell! They recognized this voice anywhere they were in the empire after all.   “Not at all, Your Majesty.” Said Rana the host as she let out a polite smile. She even acted in an initiative to offer the guest a seat. In the studio, there was a large table with several long chairs beside it.   The guest then sat down on one of the long chairs and he directly faced against Rana who also sat down on the opposite side. The guest then said, “I am sorry to intrude you so suddenly but since this is important then you can start.”   Everyone who watched it would be in for a surprise because the guest was the current emperor of the empire himself!   The long but clear subtitle below the screen was enough confirmation of the identity of the one in the interview. It was their own emperor after all. And the young man’s country was ruled in the monarchy as long as five century. But when the last centuries came, the country changed their policy.   The subtitle was written like this: Frizgerald X, Current Emperor of The Orwan Empire. Regarding the national defenses.   “This problem cannot be wrapped up under the rag. After all, the north border of our empire is the international route of the world and everyone must be witnessed it.” The young man who watched the television remembered the geographical location of his country.   Emperor Frizgerald X then heard what the host Rana had to say.  She said, “Usually when this situation happens, what can you do in your position Your Majesty? Can you give an example because maybe some of us are not clear about this.”     “First thing I would do probably to make contact with the unknown assailant. That is why we send some of our planes to investigate. But the problem lies when the unknown craft attacking our facilities and units within our own territory and that act can only be seen as an act of threatening our country!” replied the emperor in a strong tone.   “Oh, another conflict is rising in the border.” The man felt like an interesting topic was going to be revealed on the television. He barely had anything in his life that could make his spirit raise anymore and a new event was one of them.   Usually, he heard about daily news and the main topic was almost the same. The example of that would be a natural disaster occurrence, weather prediction, robbery, infrastructure development, or about the public figure. Everyday hearing that would make a person bored to death if those things failed to interest him.   But his leisure time was interrupted by a knocking sound from his front door. The man’s expression became dark when he heard the sound again for the second time, with the increase in volume and intensity.   He sighed before he stood up and walked to the front door, opened it and saw that someone actually came to this forsaken place. Of course, it was also a routine for this person to show up.   “Mister, when will you pay the taxes? It’s been a month already and you did not pay it to this date. So can you assure me that you will pay?” said the person that showed in front of the man. The person wore formal clothes that indicated his job, someone who collected tax to the people that barely live their life just to pay the tax and live to see another day   “You know my condition already don’t you? I don’t have a stable job because the condition is not suitable for me. Besides, most of my application got rejected anyway.” The man replied.   Looking for a job was not as easy as it seemed, especially if you were only a high-school graduate. That was the problem with him now. He had to accommodate some very basic taxes and even that was hard to do.   “What should I do then? You will have two choices. First is to properly pay up your taxes or this place will be confiscated. There are only these choices left for you.” Said the person. Then he continued, “Mister Wright, I can only help you this far. Sorry.”   The man who was called Wright did not know how to reply. He failed almost a hundred times just because of his educational background. Second, he failed dozens of times to prove his own worth. And third, he felt ashamed for the current life he had was because of the ‘jobless allowance’ policy this empire had stated.   “What’s that? I don’t need your apology. This is all because of me lacking luck and time.” Wright shook his head and smiled when that person said it.   “Anyway, John you only did your job as a new employee. Helping me is already good.” Wright added it to confirm his own words. The person who Wright called John thought about something that he overheard from his supervisor.   It was related to the sudden aggression and now the empire perhaps opened its door of opportunity to the people that still jobless like Wright.   ‘If it is lack of opportunity and luck, I can give Mister Wright this information but should I do it?’ John still hesitated whether to tell Wright about it or not. And this was noticed by Wright immediately.   “What’s wrong? I can’t believe you are still hesitating in something. If it comes to it, I can just move and you have to give me equal compensation.” Wright said.   “Actually, there is something that I have recently heard. I don’t know if you are interested to hear it. Because this can also serve as additional work for people like Mister so would you hear me?” asked John rather nervous. He even readjusted his collar to show how frightened he was.   “Let’s hear it first. And I believe this is a good chance for me as well right.” Wright nodded his head and agreed to hear it.   “Sir, actually the empire wanted its people who don’t get a job yet to at least participate in the Militia Reserve Division just in case something happens. Perhaps by joining you can gain additional income at least for this month.” Explained John.   “Oh, that thing. But that is not easy and I already tried once but got rejected upon registration. Will a second time make a difference?” replied Wright while raising his shoulders. He knew that John had good intention, it was just he did not know that Wright had tried it before.   “Ah, is that true? Anyone can register and can only be eliminated through the test, sir. How can you be rejected in the registration?” John raised his eyebrow. He saw that this short-haired blond man in front of him confused.   “Oh, that is perhaps due to the previous year rules. But this time I hear that anyone can join immediately.” Continued John quickly when he remembered that the previous year rules and regulation was different compared to the current year.   “The cause?” Wright asked as fast as John reacted when he remembered about the recent rules.   “The change in the empire’s policy. This also affects the military and economy, not just on the government alone. So yeah, Mister Wright has more opportunity this time.” John smiled slightly.   Wright started to reconsider this option once more. He opened his mouth, asking: “Is the pay good? How about the duration? Is it different compared to last year?”   “The pay is good. Because I believe a lot of newbies are going to participate as well. But if you ask me, I suggest that you should not participate even register yourself.”   Wright became interested and confused at the same time. In his heart, he wondered if there was a reason why John hesitated to tell him about this earlier. And since his interest was piqued anyway, he might as well ask the reason.   “What’s your reason?” asked Wright again. “It’s about the overall situation. Have you heard about the situation of our neighbor country? It is said that an extreme party has won the election for the legislation and now their focus campaign leans toward the development of economy and military.” Replied John.   Then John added another information, “They now became active in the technological aspect as well. Uh, you know that we are only average in all aspect. So, I probably know that this could lead to large-scale conflict.”   “My intention is to join any part that responsible for defense. Could you help me recommend one or two?” Wright gave it a thought and asked. He disliked aggressor so he would rather become someone in defense than someone in offense position.   “I’m not sure since this is only vague information but someone from the Ministry of Defense give this card to some of the people from my workplace. Perhaps, they expect us to give this to anyone with difficulties.” John reached his bag and then held something on his hand.   “And the last thing I want to ask, the duration. How long until they lift the condition and disband this division? You don’t tell me this yet.” “Probably six month. This is also served as a special service for citizen you know.”   Wright nodded in satisfaction. An extra bonus of the special service would not go bad in the curriculum vitae, right? But first, he had to register himself, again. It was also noted that Wright also asked about the thing such as the living condition while they were in service.   John replied that it would be accommodated so Wright should not worry about that. Instead, John worried that the time for the registration would be full and the time would be limited to just half a month time.   “Alright then. I still have work to do at another place so excuse me.” After politely saying goodbye, John went away and Wright had to think whether he should join the recruitment or not. So Wright returned to the living room, turned on the television while at the same time surfing on the internet.   “Okay, according to this card John has given me this is what I should be looking for…” Wright typed in his smartphone on the search engine and found the thing he wanted. On the screen of his smartphone, he found the thing he had been looking for, the recruitment of the new militia unit.   And at the same time, the television also announced the same thing. This surprised Wright because he had not expected it. The easiest way to contact them was by phone number the television showed at the bottom down of the screen.   But he was filling his registration document online at the moment and in his mind, he wanted to ask about this year criteria as well as the duration of recruitment. In this empire Wright lived, the militia unit could be formed in an emergency.   This was due to the fact that their empire often received ‘teasing’ from the neighboring country and this militia unit was basically a unit in training. The unit would be trained with various kind of task from the army, the navy, and even the air force.   ‘I am just trying, just trying to be a part of this empire’s air force for once. It is enough if I can get experience from it with this opportunity. Please let me pass this!’ Wright hoped in his heart. It was because he surfed the internet with the last bit of his quota he had.  

“Unidentified objects approaching at high speed. Their altitudes probably above ten thousand feet as we cannot see them from the ground.”   ATC gave the two squadrons a general situation. But it did not help as the fighter jets in the air were poorly armed. Most people already had a hunch who their aggressor was but until confirmation, it would remain a conjecture.   “Damn! Everyone, don’t you feel their timing and the place to attack is perfect even for our opposition?” Mosquito One broadcasted his communication to the two squadrons and all of them also set their communication link so their airbase and their fellow wingmen could hear.   “So what if you know about that? Unless you have a solution to this situation then your knowledge of it is just as good as useless.” Wright chipped in. “Uhm, Wright. Sorry, I mean Raven. We better retreat somewhere…” “Retreat? Forget it, we are practice targets for them. That is if they are fighters only but since they come this far, I dare to say some of them are bombers. Our airbase is in possible danger and you want them to raze it completely?”   Wright at least could see what the unidentified aggressor wanted to achieve or at least the possibility of it existed. But the situation was bad for them as it was and they could not even retreat as it would only weaken their potential power both as a deterrence and as a literal military force.   “No, I don’t want this for me to happen!” “Argh, screw it. It is useless to encounter this bogey without even proper armament. We better retreat.”   This kind of opinion started to spread among their rank. Even some of them were the supposedly fallen nobles who tried to restore their honor. Unfortunately, their only concern was for themselves.   “Those who chickened out just get the hell out of here! The rest of you, follow your squadron’s flight lead and identified these bogeys. Better to confirm something than just stay in places, am I right?” Mosquito One said so because he wanted the aircraft around him to be able to put up something without being a burden to the others.   “ATC to all units. Commencing interception is allowed and do not engage the target. I repeat, do not engage the target. Just please delay them as long as possible!” the guy who said this slammed the corner of his table.   Then he continued, “The reinforcement is on their way. ETA in ten minutes from now.”   While the information was spread among the pilots, Wright then communicated with Sparrow Six. Wright knew this man as he was the one that he knew the first time to join the temporary militia unit.   “What’s your TAC name, Traza? I think it should be good since you are rather good at flying.” Wright asked. “Fine. Sparrow Six, TAC name Jester. Uh, oh. Enemy radar spike! Evade, evade!”   From the distance at high altitude, several missiles that left their white trails appeared. Behind those missiles, several fighter jets were moving at high speed. These jets were capable of launching long-range missile attacks outside of the normal view.   Wright also got his first bugging noise from his cockpit. The monotone voice was rather annoying for Wright but he remembered this noise was the one of missile alert.   As far as he knows, evading long-range missiles could be difficult. More often than not, the homing capabilities of these kinds of missiles went beyond what he expected from reading it on the internet.   And then something unforgettable to Wright happened. When he saw around his jet, he could see several explosions within his sight. His heartbeat increased, his sense of danger roared like never before and his hands that holding the flight stick shook slightly.   ‘There are…people in there. Can they survive? Some of them must be able to…right?’   But his thought was just wishful thinking. He heard from the radio what happened. As for himself, he managed to dodge the missile barely because Wright saw the missile passed by above his cockpit.   “No, no. I cannot…” one of his wingmen uttered something before his plane exploded and their radio was cut off. Other than that, he could hear their shriek even if he pretended not to hear it. Wright could think of a reason why that happened.   They could not calm themselves and panicked. You had to prepare for anything and Wright had already done his preparation in the worst-case scenario. He turned his ejection lever over so that he could eject from his fighter when he was doomed to get hit.   But he knew that he could not let the situation remained the same as it would only lower the fighting power they could do. That was why he made his decision.   He moved his planes to gain altitude, increasing his speed while charging to the sources of those missiles. Some people noticed this and shouted over the radio, chattering why someone would directly go head-on with the enemy aircraft.   “Enemy bomber formation sighted. Raven, engaging!” Wright narrowed his eyes as he finally saw above the horizon several bombers with their escorts.   “Wait! Let me help. Jester, engaging!” Traza saw that and applied full thrust to his jet, chasing after Wright. Now among the two squadrons, only Wright and Traza were closing in to intercept.   “Look, there are two aircraft coming closer. Is there something wrong with their head?” in the enemy communication channel, the pilots discussed the two aircraft that closing into their position. “Just blow them away from the sky. I see that one of the planes is the plane that evades our long-range attack earlier. Let’s see if it is luck or skill.”   The escort naturally will repel Wright right away.   “Enemy escort planes. We better watch each other since they will outnumber us,” Traza said. Wright could count that twelve planes were coming to their direction. “It seems they’re on to us. Are you not afraid of this number on the training day with the only gun as your weapon?” Wright asked Traza. “Are you afraid when you directed your planes to their position?”   Truthfully, Wright was afraid. He truly did but since the enemy moved first, he had the right to retaliate in defense. He knew that he had to act fast or else their units would lose the momentum and lost their only chance to fight fiercely.   “Yes, to be honest. But we have to do it whether we like it or not. Besides, we have to inspire our fellow wingmen over there. They are demoralized from the start.” Wright could see the hesitation from his wingmen. He hoped that their struggle would inspire them into moving and join him.   Traza also had similar thoughts but surprised when Wright mentioned it. He had smiled upon his face when Wright had thought about it and expressed it.   “Good. Then I will follow your orders, is that fine with you?” Traza decided and Wright wondered why. “What are you talking about? You want me to lead us?” “Yep. Give your orders and I will comply, simple as that.”   Only after that Wright decided to do as Traza told. Traza was slightly behind on his left while Wright was charging ahead.   “Then just cover my six. I will try to probe their capabilities then decide the course of action.” Wright gave his first order. Meanwhile, Taz Airbase was busy preparing for defense. The people that tried to keep things up to date realized that two of their aircraft were going to intercept the enemy.   “They are insane! Someone, please stop them, we cannot lose them!”   But no one responded. They could only watch as things unfold.   “Mosquito Twenty, enemies have a lock on you.” Traza reminded Wright and Wright slightly moved his Crow by using his yaw movement to the right.   And then Wright pulled his flight stick, trying to get a position behind his enemy. But the fighters Wright had to face rather experienced with this so Wright struggled. The problem arose as several fighters tailed Wright and Traza had to take care of them.   When it was the estimated gun range, Wright quickly fired his gun as he tried to follow the bogeys move by move. It was hard as the G-force that landed on his body was rather a lot for him. Despite all that, Wright could still follow.   Several bullets flew, even dozens of it but the one that hit were only two, at the wing and the engine. Wright’s Crow has a 20 mm caliber gun equipped and when he used it, it launched several bullets. Sadly, it was not strong enough to take down the fighter because this type of gun was pretty standard in the world.   “I’ve been hit by gunfire! Who is that!?” what the pilot did not expect was Wright could follow and even landed a hit by his gun to his aircraft.   “Ugh, we cannot fire the missile at this distance, they are close.” Enemy fighters could not shoot their missiles because Wright close the distance and their missile was heat-seeking one instead, something that Wright took notice when he saw the fighter behind him did not even shoot their missile when he was closing in for the gun kill.   Wright remembered his enemy aircraft. It was the competitor of his aircraft, with its small body but a bit large wing, two air intakes below its body and also a single-seater, HK-20 “Predator”.   The so-called “Predator” was manufactured by another multinational corporation called Huang Heavy Industry. A product of Huang Heavy Industry that boasts in versatility and almost usable in any weather condition.   And this thing now tried to test its capabilities on Wright’s Crow.   “Raven, enemy radar spike!” Traza warned Wright as another plane locked-on Wright’s aircraft. Wright wanted to finish his opponent on his six but then the bandits behind would just shoot their missiles at him.   Traza was also in similar condition but he saw three aircraft on Wright’s tail and then gave his cover. But then he heard from his cockpit that his jet also got a lock-on.   “Damn, they also onto me. Raven, hit and run! Do you copy?” “Jester, evasive maneuver!”   It felt like their minds were one, they knew what to do and what their partner should do. Wright then fired his gun, finally adding the damage to the poor aircraft as it finally lost its wings. This Predator lost to the Crow but then Wright rolled his aircraft upside down as he pulled the lever, went down to lost sight from his pursuers.   Wright panted, his mind was clearly remembering his previous target. He felt strong pressure engulfed his whole body when he followed the movement of his opponent and while he also tried to shake his pursuer from his tail.   Traza could only do what Wright had told, he moved rather close to one of the bandits while keeping his move unpredictable. Traza knew that from their first minute, both Wright and he were only as good as the pilots that tried to shoot them down.   “Argh! I’ll help them then. Now, my fellow wingmen. Some people show their determination to fight, even encouraging us that we stand a chance against them.” Mosquito One said before he continued, “If you have the guts in your heart, better let it out now!”   Then Mosquito One broke off from the formation, entering the area where Wright and Traza dogfight against six aircraft.   Wright then felt a jolt as his body shook greatly. He realized that his speed dropped and he fell into a dangerous situation. He was hit by gunfire from his tail and it hit the engine. This resulted in his speed dropping and his aircraft became less maneuverable, not to mention that CS-12 was relying on mobility.   “You trailed smoke, Mosquito Twenty. Need a hand?” “NO thanks. Uh, oh!” “Mosquito Twenty, enemy radar spike!”   Wright just noticed that one of the fighters got a good position and got a lock on him. Wright’s worry became reality as a missile came from behind, towards him. “Mosquito Twenty, incoming missile!” Traza also warned while he tried to distract the fighter that shot the missile. Meanwhile, Motormouth chose a target and blazed his gun when he saw the opportunity.   “Ugh, who’s that!? Another mad pilot is gathering here, what is this place!? Isn’t this supposed to be current airbase for training nuggets?” “Fortunately, they only have guns. Come on, everyone! You can blast them off the skies, don’t humiliate yourself!”   The enemies reconfirmed their morale and their hesitation disappeared. Wright, on the other hand, had to worry about the missile hot on his tail.   ‘What to do? Use flare…but the weapon system of their missile is probably a lot for each aircraft. I only have five flares…can I even evade the missile?’ Wright had dodged numerous missiles during his virtual training but it was not always successful.   The missile alert on Wright’s cockpit blared endlessly, indicating the missile was still on his tail. Wright felt his chest tightened so much and his vision blurred. The alert went more frequent as the missile got closer.   “Don’t worry so much. I got your six.” Motormouth then went to the Wright’s tail for a moment. His movement was rather smooth but it was still good. Fortunately, Motormouth pulled back and noticed the missile now was on his six.   “Raven, retreat from the battle!” Traza said to Wright but the enemies started picking Wright even more since he became slower. While Wright tried his best to calm down, he saw that more and more HK-20 swarmed to his position.   “I will try but no guarantee these bogeys will just let it go.” Wright strangely felt calm despite the dire situation he was in. He was slower but it was manageable.   “Go get that plane! Don’t embarrass me any further!” the enemy communication line was full of orders and enthusiasm.   “Oh no, that plane is trailing smoke!” a pilot who reserved his plane not to go to the furball looked at Wright’s plane with concern. But his desire to survive was higher and he would rather move around his current place.   “What are you saying? Do you have the guts to help them!? It is not possible for us…just look at those that hit by the missile, they are gone!” another pilot hysterically replied. They just watched the tragedies unfold but they realized their capabilities.   “Hmm…I think…I should help them!” and there is one pilot who prepared to join the furball. This pilot was a rare sight among the group. When the pilot said that, both squadron’s wingmen felt that they should consider why they join the temporary militia force in the first place.   “Ah, that voice. Hey Violet, if you want to join the fun then you help me cover my temporary flight lead. He’s hit in the engine!” Traza knew the pilot’s identity on the radio and greeted her.   “Let me join in too. This risk is as good as the rewards afterward, isn’t it?” an excited voice came from one of Mosquito Squadron.   “Yes, it means you at least have the spirit of a warrior! Come here, the more the merrier!” Motormouth felt his blood circulated faster and it almost boiled because his fellow wingmen started to gather their courage and try to fight the opponent.   “Hah…hah…” Wright felt something was wrong. He felt his breathing became more rapid as the sound that came from his oxygen mask indicated so. His vision started to blur and his head felt rather so light.   Wright glanced slightly below for a moment only to widen his eyes in shock. His left waist had something that should not exist before he engaged with the bogeys. His left waist was stained by red-colored blood and after that realization, Wright felt piercing pain from that location.   ‘I am bleeding and some aircraft still on my six. The radio…what did they say?’ the communication on their side’s channel was filled with some pilots that want to join in the dogfight and Motormouth that wanted to inspire them further.   “Protect Mosquito Twenty, you hear me!?” Traza directed the new group consisted of seven more CS-12. Traza had a bad hunch when he looked at Wright’s Crow and his rapid breath over the radio but he still had to give the group an objective of the sort. Blindly engaging the enemy like Wright and he was not advised if you were not especially doing it often even in virtual training.   “Let me escort him out!” Violet replied and broke off to where Wright currently was.   “Flight Lead, respond! Raven, respond!” Traza loudly said over the radio and everyone listened to it. They heard his rather hoarse voice and felt that something was not right.   “Jester…what is it? What’s the current situation?” Wright gritted his teeth as he gripped the flight stick tightly, to maintain his focus and consciousness. He only knew that some of their wingmen join this dogfight but it was probably a few.   “I am still tailed but the pressure is reduced thanks to our allies. Violet from Sparrow Squadron will escort you out and the rest will join me to engage the escort fighter and the bomber. So go back and land at the base safely, you cannot join in the party anymore.” Traza explained while he hid his bitterness in his heart.   ‘I think, I already know what condition Wright is in. But I don’t want it to be the case.’   “…” for the first time on the radio, no one could hear Motormouth chipped like usual. His plane started to move more aggressive as he made his plane stalled on purpose before he stabilized again and baited a fighter to go to him when he stalled. And this action was successful.   The scary thing was that Motormouth targeted the Predator, not on the engine or wings but it was the cockpit. Yes, what he did was to kill the pilot in it with his gun. And that he did so elegantly no one voiced their opinion on that matter.   “Damn that plane! He purposely going for the gun kill aimed at the cockpit. What to do now? Five of us are down but we are still even in terms of advantage!” the captain of the escort fighter realized that the crazy fighter’s action from earlier was to incite the rest of their squadron to act.   ‘I underestimate them for what they are worth! They are still nuggets in experience but their spirit is that of a soldier.’ Half of them now was chasing Wright but interrupted by Traza, Motormouth and six other planes while the other one escorted the smoked aircraft out from their reach.   “The…bomber…don’t forget…them.” Wright reminded them all to focus on the bomber now that their number was increased. The excitement of their first real battle would often distract the nuggets from their main objective.   “Raven, don’t say too many things. Just place all of your attention to safely arrive at the Taz Airbase.” Violet said to Wright but then she noticed two Predators closing in as they escape from Traza’s interception.   Wright heard the monotonous noise again. His craft was being targeted and it meant Violet should engage them around this time.   ‘Funny, I feel so light but moving my limb became so heavy I need more power. At least let me move to evade the missile.’ Wright thought about his movement when he realized that he was being escorted and had another person protecting him.   ‘But there are two Predators in hot pursuit. Looks like this is the only force from our bunch worthy to be taken into the ranks of the military. Oh, …how much time has passed since the interception…four minutes I suppose…’   Wright only knew that this was their entire number that at least doable in combat and he guessed that this was barely able to intercept. As for the other crafts, he felt doubt if those aircraft would not hinder their effort.   Other than that, he also wanted to give the airbase a time for their air defense to be ready while stalling the enemy for reinforcement. Their primary objective was to annoy their bogeys, especially the bomber.   He then moved the stick, his legs also coordinated with his hands' movement and the Crow moved downward. It looked like Wright decided to let his craft dive straight to the ground. This was rather risky but he lacked the speed to shake off his pursuer.   On another hand, Traza barely felt safe because his second kill was rather hard. He was entangled by four Predators. A pair in front of him and another pair was just behind him. The problem was he targeted the bomber that located in front of the Predator in front of him.   ‘No time to hesitate. Let’s do this!’ Traza increased his speed all of a sudden. He could see the bomber formation was moving almost unhindered and that was his biggest concern. Wright’s words were correct that they should not even miss this big fellow just because they were a bit on the slower side.   “Quickly glue to his tail! He is aiming for our bombers!” a Predator pilot then followed suit when he realized the Crow accelerated and charged straight to their bombers.   Traza then bypassed the two Predators that previously on his sight. Now, he should seek the fastest method to shoot the bombers down using only guns. First was when the bomb bay was opened but it was currently impossible. Second, he had to clip the wings. Third, he could aim at the cockpit instead but he had to gamble with enemies right at his twelve and could just shoot missile as they please.   ‘Of course, I must clip their wings…’ Traza then positioned himself just behind the bomber formation. He could easily shoot them since their distance was close and Traza knew this was also in his gun range.   He then pressed the button to shoot the 20mm machine gun at the wings of one of the bomber. He shot at a similar point so that it could be split into two. Even if it did not, the wing itself would be full of damage and could even affect its maneuver.   The bomber then lost its balance to keep flying in the air, it swung to one side and lost altitude. But Traza knew that the Predators behind him now shot their gun to him. Their gun trails were like layers of curtain and two of them managed to hit Traza’s tail.   ‘This is just gunfire from them. Fortune is still on my side that they are not daring enough to use heat-seeking missile.’ He thought as he gripped his flight stick tightly and made a rather sharp U-turn to distract the fighters. He was annoyed since this proved to be a hindrance to intercept the bomber.   Following closely was Motormouth. He even doubled his speed so that he could catch up and saw the dogfight between a Crow and two Predators and decided to join in.   “Eight miles until the bombers reach the airbase. Reinforcements ETA, six minutes to go.” The ATC gave the pilots the current situation.   Motormouth then looked at the radar in his cockpit and saw that Wright’s aircraft was just as close as the bomber formation in case of their distance to the airbase. But their position was separated quite far and even Wright was struggling despite being escorted by Violet.   “One bomber is down. But it seems that our boys are struggling hard. And worse of it, the bogeys seem to be rather serious now as their maneuver aims to confuse us.” Violet who now had one of the fighters in front of her was trying to gun it down.   “Jester, do you read me?” Wright then tried to make contact with Traza. With the change of the opponent’s movement, he doubted their allies would hold well against them.   And Wright’s hunch was not wrong, the rest of their fellow wingmen that join their fight now were in a pinch. He knew that their numbers and skills were not enough and their opponent was actually toying with them but struggling was all he could do at this moment.   ‘My only concern is the bomber that arrived. Other than that, most of us will be forced to bail out if not immediate death by enemy.’ Wright felt uncomfortable with the pain at his left but he forced himself to open his eyes and moved toward the incoming bomber. It was because he realized that he was the closest to engage them. Of course, he still had bandit on his six but he moved not in a straight line so it could make the pilot behind him to hesitate.

Three days later, when the dawn was not even breaking yet. Wright laid his body on the hard mattress that already became his lifelong friend. Then his smartphone suddenly vibrated and the alarm was set off immediately.   Only after five minutes had passed did Wright woke up. Although it was still before dawn, Wright already made this his routine. His room was dark and only a few rays from the outside could come inside.   “Wait a moment, this day should be the ones where the negotiation is supposed to take place. I remember the news stated such things yesterday.” Wright forcibly opened his eyes that just recently active and still readjust the situation.   The blurriness Wright had experienced then changed slowly to the clear vision he usually had. And then the hardest thing to do right after someone wake up, rise from the bed. He did not know which was heavier, his limbs when he was inside the spinning centrifuge or every time he woke up and had to get out from bed?   One thing he knew, both of them were as heavy as always. Wright snorted lightly, feeling forced to be separated from the warm and comfortable bed.   After taking a bath and preparing his breakfast, Wright then used his smartphone to watch the live stream event from the news channel. And surely, several topics before the negotiation took place and even some of it was just directly fanning the flame.   Even better, the tension between the two countries only increased each time passed and the border was full of movement from the military. Orwan and Ridgar bordered at a water body that separated the continent and thus the navy and the air force were deployed the most there.   “Really, shouldn’t the negotiation took place at Leisth City? That is the port city nearest to Ridgar even the distance between the soil is not much far.” Wright felt strange when he received this news.   One side of him wanted this to continue, turning this to the conflict so he could stay at the militia longer but at the same time, he did not want it to happen. The casualties of the conflict the most was usually civilian and Wright thought about something he had remaining in his life.   ‘The people that live in both countries, the children at the orphanage, that Traza, Cynthia…Am I good or bad for wishing this condition to develop further instead of reaching a truce?’ it was his little wish to die as someone fulfilling something useful rather than the rotting trash of society. But that meant he also wished for the people he did not even know to be hurt, worse if someone he knew became the victim.   Wright kept checking the news related to the negotiation. At most, the reporter only got to the building and not allowed to inquire about the situation inside when the negotiation happened which was happening all the time. Only, it happened real fast as Wright got the news of the building where it took place and the surrounding of that building was packed with people.   “This is still dawn!” Wright did not know how those people got spirited so much for than the presence of their emperor. Yes, that man was the only one that would make those people gathered and even before the sunrise.   “So much for the morning.” Wright placed his chin on his hand and listened to the news.   “Today, we are going to see some important figures which people from both countries know right here at Leisth City. This place was chosen because of the geographical location near the border, a port city which makes it a good place for both economy and military to get in. As for the building the negotiation took place, it is right here behind me…”   Wright could see a shadow of that building. The reporter turned around and pointed toward the building, excitement in each word: “That is our Orwan Empire wonder, Hourglass Tower. That’s right dear audiences, this place is where the negotiation took place. And look at the people…hahaha…”   The reporter was surprised to see the crowd now even reached his current place. It was so crowded even the cameramen were squeezed.   -   “Hmm?” when someone saw the car that came to the Hourglass Tower was escorted by some personal unit, it was at that moment he realized some very important figure arrived.   And at the front of the tower, the car finally stopped and then someone came out of the car. While the escorts than formed a protective layer from all sides. The security kept checking the condition while assisting the personal unit to enter.   And amidst the group, people could see the figure they admired the most especially the people of Orwan. The Emperor himself was wearing clothes that resemble the identity of the empire with the symbol of the empire at the back.   Many people watched this from many media and they had one similar feeling, excitement. They only hope that the situation would get better and avoid the conflict with Ridgar at all cost if possible. If the negotiation failed, they could only prepare themselves to take cover from the collateral damage the conflict would create.   “I’m nervous. Will this situation turned for the better or not?” “I don’t know but the situation around the world is no much better than us. Just hope that the emperor gives his best.”   At the same time, the military was busy with the possibility of the emerging conflict. They prepared the materials, money, ammunition as well as manpower for the worst scenario possible. Even Wright got the announcement straight away.   The tense rose, as the next batch of the convoy, came from the seaport. This convoy was carrying the delegation from the neighboring country, therefore, the tight guards around it. The vehicle, including the one who carried important people, was reinforced with bulletproof material all around its body.   “Oh, good. Now comes the delegation from the other side.”   Most people could do at that time was to see the act of everyone before the negotiation. Then someone just said that the door to the center of the building was closed and no one allowed to get close.   “Surely everyone, this negotiation is a closed one. No one can enter including us from mass media so we can only speculate what the outcome will be.”   Wright did not get any interest in watching some people predicting something unknown. Rather than that he took an interest to the thing that could help him during the time he would be in the militia. This morning, he planned to jog around the city while visiting the park.   From the very start after the test, Wright decided to stretch his body more frequently. Exercising was one way to increase his body fitness. The reason for that was because Wright found out about the importance of physical fitness to someone who would fly above the sky.   Walking around the streets, he saw many people were focused on the news regarding the negotiation. He understood their concern as well but it was just that. All he could do now was to prepare to face anything that might appear in the future, either it was a peaceful negotiation or a futile effort to stop the war Wright had nothing to affect the situation.   “Hah, hah…” he moved his legs faster when he saw the park from afar. His body was only on an average standard so when Wright ran for some time, he felt his legs started to get as heavy as if lead were added to it.   His breath was rough as sweat dropped his head like a river torrent. He still felt tired only after some light exercise. But to him, that was better than nothing and the only concern he had was about the food he could eat.   Wright took a rest and sat on the bench at the park where he could see people were watching the live stream of the situation at the Leisth City, outside the Hourglass Tower. The sunlight then finally reached the park as the sun was rising through the skyscraper.   “Should be the time it starts.”   -   “This is it. Whether we find peace or conflict comes from this negotiation.” Another morning meant another job for someone like John. Fortunately, he was assigned to office desk this time in the City Hall so he only had to be at the City Hall without going anywhere for the rest of the day.   His home was near the downtown so it was easy for him to go to the City Hall. After taking the bus and dropped at the terminal, he immediately went to the second floor to meet his superior. When he stepped into the office, he could see the tense increasing each second.   Especially his superior, that kind of face appeared when something important happened.   “Good morning everyone.” John went to his work table and started to assign each paperwork that would be done immediately and greeted the people around.   “Oh, it’s you, John. Long time no see. Happy to see you back from some labor task.” “Don’t you have a concern about the recent news, John?”   Hearing the response from his coworker made John glad. At least they knew the whole situation would affect them all but sadly John knew he had no power to do anything either. He preferred doing something that could help even for a little.   But mostly, he thought about Wright since he finally knew Wright managed to enter Temporary Militia Unit. If things escalated further, then Wright would sooner or later be on the frontline. And he also curious about Tanasha too but he would not express this outright.   How could she do so many things he knew most people fail to accomplish? It was not about her John thought but what method did she use? His curiosity appeared frequently but as long as she was bringing no harm, it would be fine if he thought about it.   -   Emperor Fritzgerald X was sitting on one side of the round table, waiting for the representatives of Ridgar to come. His subordinates called to him about the coming of the opposite party. The emperor then tidied himself up as he steeled his will.   “Now entering the representatives from Ridgar, Foreign Ministry Abel Kipur. Please welcome him.” The one at the door loudly announced the arrival of the person. And then the first one to appear was the stern-looking face, some of his brown hair that turned white was covered in hair gel.   His eyes were as sharp as a tiger locking on its prey, focused and never let go of the thing in its sight. Although Abel was just a Foreign Minister from Ridgar he kept informed about the world overall. Then Abel sad down and Emperor Fritzgerald now could see that young face of the opposite party.   ‘He is young enough to be a college student, isn’t he? Such an achievement is rare in the world.’ The emperor sighed, did not know whether it was pity or helplessness.   “Greetings to you, Your Majesty Emperor of Orwan.” Abel extended his hand and smiled lightly. And the emperor himself then reached to counter his hand and both of them shook hand together.   “The same pleasure to attend you in my empire’s wonder, the Hourglass Tower. I hope you can enjoy the facilities and the service during your stay.”   And then some other people were gathering on the side of both the emperor and the minister, placing themselves slightly behind the top figures from each nation. Orland who stood the closest to the emperor readjust his glasses, watching the representatives from Ridgar with much attention.   Both sides now felt the pressure because they would do something that affects the nation they affiliated with. It was just both sides had the same helplessness in regards to the situation that yet to come.   -   “Hey, you…do it all over again!” a shout came as soon as Wright made a slight mistake. The first day of militia training, inside the unit was like hell to Wright.   But to him, this was nothing. The biggest hell to him was now the entire empire was in the state of preparing a large scale war. He had never worried about his current condition but to those people he relatively knew, he had concern for them.   His life was already as good as trash, only recycle would be good for him and only some people find the use of him. Three days ago was the start of it all and what Wright was going to do now was placed on the appointed Virtual Training and his special Simulation Module.   ‘About the module…why did the staff at the Simulation Room already choose me my module? On top of that, it is the same as the first time I use. Is this fine?’ the N-0821 module was an unforgettable number in Wright’s memory because it was different.   Because of that Wright doubt that it just some kind of arrangement for a militia like him. He shuddered when his thought arrived at a certain conclusion that he, his performance in the virtual reality and the practical performance would be under strict watch from the people he did not even know.   No, people he only thought as some staff that played their role perhaps also observed him.   ‘Whatever the intention is, I need improving my ability. Just enough to protect the people I care about.’ Wright then redoing all the training exercise all over again. The one that shouted at him was the instructor and this instructor was watching Wright’s every move, hell even his change in facial muscle was observed.   “People from the lowest place in society have to multiply their effort and pray the opportunity comes. If you want to protect someone you care or to beat someone in terms of skill, then do the basic properly, ingrained them to your bones. It is even better to bring it to your dream if possible…”   The instructor also shouted at the rest of the group when he noticed they were slowing down.   This was the course of the recruits every time they were prepared for the upcoming battle. In short, the negotiation three days ago was utterly failed.   -   After the news spread out the words about the failed negotiation, the people from both countries could only prepare themselves for the worst. Wright also did similar things as well before he entered the militia branch unit.   He did this because, during the time he worked, he would be unable to leave even if he wanted to. First and foremost he contacted every important person he had in mind. The second was to prepare his body and mind for an unexpected situation.   Wright got his barracks along with few other people as well. The thick scent of sweat after the rigorous training still permeated inside the barrack. The barrack was large enough but for so many people to be in it, it felt like the space was not large enough.   “Hah, looks like the morning exercise will always be like this.” Wright sat on his appointed bed. Muttering on his own, Wright still felt strange to the people around him. He could not start to speak with them but usually responded kindly. But this time Wright felt like this was not enough.   The problem was, he did not know if they would accept him well. After all, his reason for joining the militia was not good and there were some fallen nobles mixed in as well. Those that lost their brilliant prestige but not lost their pride, the kind of people Wright did not like to face.   Of course in a group where people like Wright who mostly silent, there was someone like to spout things as if his life depends on it.   “That instructor, saying about such things to every recruits like us. I bet that he already repeat such words countless times like a broken cassette. ‘If you want to protect someone you care or to beat someone in terms of skill, then do the basic properly, ingrained them to your bones. It is even better to bring it to your dream if possible…’”   A young man with a rather long, silver hair showed how the instructor had done things for the morning exercise. Of course, everybody already prepared their towel and things to do when you bath but a little chat would not hurt.   “What a joke. If he is really sincere to train us, he should be looking for better encouragement words. Not uttering such words over, over and over again expecting things to change for the better. Anyways, that is my impression on our dear instructor. I’ll go bath now.”   Little did Wright know that he and the man would be on the same boat in this conflict. At this moment, Wright could only regard him as a ‘chatterbox’, someone who liked to talk. After the break in the morning and surprisingly good breakfast for Wright, he was faced with the Virtual Reality Module again at the simulation room.   “Wright, you come with me.” The instructor patted Wright on the shoulder. This time, Wright wore his military attire albeit it was still for the recruits. But when the instructor said that, everyone shifted their gaze towards Wright as if catching a big affair.   “Instructor Sheperd, for what reason?” Wright whispered, feeling unwell with numerous gazes landed on him.   For the 88th Cluster, the responsibility fell on the instructor who called Wright now. He also the one who directed the morning training exercise.   “The staff at the room notified me and asked to bring you in first. Just follow the order!” Instructor Shepherd pushed Wright, signaling him to quickly enter the room. But this motion caught the interest of the young man with the silver hair.   ‘He is that silent lurker in the barrack, right?’ he did not know why Wright was put into the priority of the batch. But it was good to remember someone like that.   When Wright entered the simulation room once again, he was surprised to see most of the staff already stood and it was for the man at the control center of the room.   The man who supervised the simulation this time was the same man with the glasses Wright met during his first trial in the Virtual Module, Callahan Straight. As soon as his sight landed on him, Callahan turned around and their gazes met.   Wright felt a little tense, did not expect the change on the figure’s face make it hard for Wright to recognize him even after he knew the man’s identity. But when Wright remembered about his usage of that ‘special’ module, he could only be thankful for that to this man.   So he smiled and greeted everyone in the room.   “Hello, staffs and Mister Callahan I presume? Can I be informed of what should I do here afterward? I should have entered with the 88th Cluster Unit but it seems like someone arranges me first.” Wright opened his mouth and asked.   “Hoh, young man. How’s previous time simulation at that module? Feeling like the difficulty hard?” Callahan asked while chuckled. Wright’s face sunk, he seemed to realize the difficulty of the simulation in that module was a bit different.   But it did not matter anymore. Wright felt better knowing that but knew he took a long time to finish it that made him down.   “Really? But in the end, I still took a long time to finish it. That is something I can’t ignore and I am looking forward to reducing the completion time.” Wright recovered and said his opinion.   “Alright, every staff now go to the assigned position,” Callahan instructed everyone to go to their own designated position while closing his distance to where Wright was.   “I’ll explain while directing you to your previous module.” Callahan patted Wright, signaling him to follow his lead. Wright soon followed, waiting for whatever this man’s mouth was going to say.   “You see, I currently doing some experiment with the Virtual Module and its relation to the user performance, especially in this age where air supremacy matter most. In the past, we can only train the so-called fledgling of pilots with real aircraft and field experience. But now, it is going to change when this Virtual Reality Module become hit to the world twenty years ago.”   “Personal skills can be developed in the virtual world without any harm to the user, that is how the Air Force use this advantage to train their nuggets. The problem is, after some years this popularity boomed the hell out of the world, the problem of difference in virtual reality and the actual practice are found.” Callahan explained the root of the problem.   “But some of that problem is solved, even the main issue regarding the drastic difference of situation in the simulation and reality cannot generate the weather condition are done as well. So what else the problem?” Wright did not know what else the problem in the development of the virtual module.   Callahan sighed before he answered, “The feeling of truly eliminate your opponent. In other words for any soldiers, the sensation of killing someone. Now you know where I am going?”   Wright went silent. That difference always existed no matter what, an absolute flaw on the virtual reality part. You could improve skills and learn how to fly with no worries since the virtual world would regenerate everything you destroyed in it.   But that also meant you only treated the enemies inside that world as the same as enemy NPC you encountered in the game, no hard feelings. The enemies were also part of that world, they kept reappearing after some time if they programmed it that way.   In reality, though, you dealt with other people like anyone else. Shooting down an aircraft could also mean you killed the one who controls it, in most cases, it was the pilot. This was the thing virtual reality could not produce because everyone inside it at least knew and aware of the virtual world.   “Killing someone…that is the hardest thing to recreate in the virtual world. The sensation of ending someone’s life that will certainly not come back…it will be hard to get in the simulation.” Wright closed his eyes, now considering what would he do if that time arrives? The time when he took down his first enemy plane, fully realized the person in it was probably incinerated beyond salvation.   “Put those things aside, I want you to keep using that module okay, with the registration series N-0821 here I want you to give it your all just like before.” Callahan put his hands on the slightly different module than the majority.   “One question, please? How many people besides me that also use this module ‘accidentally’?” Wright finally asked something that bugged his mind for a while.   “Oh, wondering how many people like you? Well, at least you can see them when you are ready to take to the skies with CS-12 on a simple mission. You look tense the entire way since we met, perhaps you have something else?” Callahan opened the module and faced Wright.   “Just my personal feeling, Sir. And for the treatment, I sincerely thank you.” Wright waved his hand when he entered the same module he was in before, seeing Callahan readjusting his glasses while nodding his head.   “You better doing good things because I spend some investment in you, young man,” Callahan muttered himself before he saw the next one that he put on his recent experiment.   It was the silver-haired young man who liked to talk.   “Hey, how are you guys doing today monitoring us from outside virtual world? Must be fine since this does not begin yet.” “Where is Mister Callahan? I thought I will see him immediately after entering this room but as I thought, that young man probably has something to do with him right?” “Why is everyone ignoring me? The working period is not starting yet, isn’t it?”   The man did not know that his words fell on deaf ear already. The staff prepared things after Callahan gave his instruction so who would bother hearing words from him at this time?

Meanwhile, at a certain place in Pasteur City, the downtown where some large layers of glasses showed numerous advertisement over the buildings was also the place the oldest orphanage known in the Pasteur City existed.   The building for this orphanage was in the old, middle age style where they still had their old artistic style for every aspect of the buildings. Every people who saw it can instantly recognize its difference from the other building because of that.   Around the building was a small garden, filled with various playgrounds for kids in the kindergarten, some lamps to light the garden and the grass that unique to the orphanage alone. After the announcement of war three days ago, the adults who usually took care of the people in the orphanage now was in great distress.   “What should we do? If this situation goes in the worse direction, I am afraid we will not sustain for even half a month.” An old woman sighed after letting the frustrating thing on her mind out.   “Please don’t be so pessimistic, Grandma Berchel. I am sure there will be a way for people like us in these difficult times. It’s just that I don’t find it yet.” Beside the old woman was someone who tried to comfort her.   “But Cynthia, you still don’t understand how severe conflict can bring us, the commoner, to what extent we will have to suffer. Sadly, you don’t experience those conflict in the past so you will not understand.” Grandma Berchel smiled when she heard Cynthia said things with her confidence.   “Even if the possibility is there, but we still have a chance to avoid those right?” Cynthia asked but she did not know the exact answer.   “That, I don’t even know. Hey, little angel…” some kids then ran to the front of Grandma Berchel, asking her to pat them. She only did what she had done for so long, greeted every child that comes to her.   “Granny…is something the matter?” a curious girl asked after feeling the unusual atmosphere around. Her eyes only reflected her curiosity, there was no impureness in her gaze and her tone.   “Yes, there is. Why did you come to find granny this time?” Granma Berchel also understood that the girl came at a slightly wrong time. And as she anticipated, there was something that caused all of this.   “Can one of you tell me what is this all about?” Cynthia also urged the children to quickly answer her question.   “Someone is just outside and the uncles are meeting the person now. Because of that… no one can accompany us.” A nine-year-old boy said. He just followed the other because the others were more familiar with the situation and what to do about it.   “Is that so? Well then, why don’t we go there together?” Cynthia suggested Granma Berchel. The children became excited to go together.   “It’s better to look for our guest. There is no harm in seeing them anyway.”   What they did not expect was the people who visited them. They came from the government as someone among them was responsible for the orphanage. It was rather unexpected because they acted rather fast to do something just after the negotiation at the Hourglass Tower failed.   ‘It is them? How can they come so fast? There is no possibility of any open war and yet they already prepare something in mind.’ Looking at the clothes the government people wore, some of them were even nobles from a prestigious family. And this only made Cynthia restless as well. The orphanage was mostly populated by kids and teenagers, their necessities were quite big and now the possibilities of them seeing the soon-to-be hell on earth called war was a possibility made Cynthia worried.   Cynthia unconsciously grabbed her clothes, gripped it tightly without the intention to let it go.   “Greetings to the elder everyone, don’t embarrass your family.” One of the visitors suddenly said so loudly, letting the rest of their group stood up and properly said their greetings.   “You all should just tell us immediately, if this is important enough then you can do without formalities.” Grandma Berchel said calmly although she knew one or two things about it.   “No can do. This is the morals and principle of our parents and empire, there’s no way we will just go to the conversation without respecting the elderly first.” That was their reason for the greetings.   “Alright, we have something that needs the permit and the agreement from the elder, the time is short on our side so while looking at this paper…I will explain the general situation the entire civilian in the empire is going to do.” Some of the government people came with some paper, moving rather slow and when they arrived in front of Grandma Berchel their body lowered and their gaze was at the very least equal in position.   “So you all have the same thought about this? That the war has a high chance to get far inside our territory. Honestly, I know that this is rather inevitable but are you sure this will even work?” for Berchel who had experienced her share of wartime, she knew the lowest point in a war and the action she would take from this had a higher chance to save the lives of the people under her. When she thought about it, there was also someone else that flashed inside her mind.   “That’s the plan, more or less. Honestly, Madam, we don’t even want to do this but since the negotiation failed, the best we can do is to evacuate the civilian from the potential danger zone.”   -   All the matter for Orwan Empire was to establish their military forces as fast as possible. The condition for the negotiation was rather unreasonable even for standard, it felt like there was no intention for peace talks from the very start. The reporters that day, on the other hand, felt excitement as the news was a hot piece of meat ready to be served.   For three days, the main theme from newspaper and daily news were related to the negotiation and the preparation for the conflict. No joke, the entire continent spread and knew about this conflict but they were playing side watch, silently observing the entirety of the situation. As for the superpower from another continent, they jumped at the opportunity to gain some relation to Ridgar Empire. The main reason because the Orwan Empire was the main backyards for Longen Multinational Corporation. One thing for sure, this conflict was a ‘Proxy War’.   And in the middle of it all was Wright. Now some result of the training in the militia bore some results. His stamina increased and his build was a bit tough than before.   At this time, it marked one month after the failed negotiation. Its detail was not disclosed but instead, a treaty was made to buy time for the civilian of Orwan Empire to get them to safety. This was in their doctrine after all.   Wright moved his body again to the Virtual Room as instructed by the Instructor. Although there is some change in the attitude, Sheperd still seriously did his job.   Entering the designated module, Wright begins his virtual training once again. He just wanted to test his capabilities as of now. The most hateful training for Wright was the G-force training as he was still not used to it.   Now he adjusted his physical capabilities with his skill. He wanted to know whether it is already in a good state or his physical limitation restrained his movement.   “Ah, I don’t know really. Should I be happy or sad? Sure I can improve my flying skill and my physical capabilities but it is because of the impending conflict. Even a month ago, I barely reach the finish line and marked as the last sheep by Instructor Sheperd.” Wright was reminded of his time at the militia.   “Ugh…fifteen…” when Wright tried to do push-ups, he just got past ten and his arm felt heavy and hard to move. Only after a month of rigorous training menu did Wright could surpass fifty push-ups in one go.   Wright then focused himself on the simulated mission inside the virtual world. His plane was the same as before and this time Wright had to shoot down all the bombers in the airspace.   He moved his plane rather fast to get to his target as soon as possible. Only after that Wright shot the missile to the easy target bomber.   “Missile hit!” Wright exclaimed but the bomber still flew albeit the speed and its turning speed decreased so much it looked pathetic. He thought that the missile did not hit the critical area of the bomber or the entire bomber was rather sturdy.   Then Wright slowly closing his distance. He wanted to see that part of the bomber. After only he determined the place did Wright use his mounted gun to shoot at that particular place. After ten rounds, something exploded from inside.   “Aiming at its bomb bay sure is effective huh.” Wright took note of this information. There was a formation after he met the closest bomber which he had to intercept. Otherwise, they could bomb the place Wright had to protect.   Then Wright did an Immelmann Turn in the quickest way possible and applied full thrust to his craft. Since this virtual mission was solely air to air combat, Wright equipped his jet with all air-to-air missile.   He switched to the secondary weapon which could target multiple targets and had longer distance than his standard primary weapon, the heat-seeking AMRAAM. Three of the four targets was hit and shot down while they let out flares as to not let the missile hit.   The last one managed to dodge it since the missile aimed towards the flare instead of the bomber craft. In the same way, Wright gunned that last survivor to its demise.   “Fortunately, they consist of the bomber without an escort. No, the type of the bomber is also not the one with various guns in it so it can be said to be easy.” But to Wright, he used his real physical condition as to test his capability.   It was barely enough…he felt tremendous pressure when he did that Immelmann Turn. If he had to do it continuously, he might even faint and risked himself to get crash.   “Time’s out.” Wright then looked at the clock and it was thirty minutes since he entered the module. The module opened up and Wright could see several faces he recognized. One of them was Callahan Straight that grabbed his glass while his hands held several papers.   Other than that there was also that young man who was so chatty if not noisy. His silver-colored hair was apparent and obvious in the militia so even Wright could identify him at once. He was talking like his life depends solely on it.   “He’s here, everybody. The unofficial favorite recruit this time should have asked for relation purpose but looks like it is still too late.” He said. “Excuse me? You are the one that gives everyone my moniker, huh. I should give you one in kind then, Motormouth.” Wright smiled wryly when anyone mentioned about that nickname and he thought about this person.   Since he was always talking, might as well regard that mouth of his ran by something like a motor. Of course, this is only Wright opinion and no one ever called him that.   “What did you just say!?” somehow he was triggered and looked angry. “Oh, come on now. I think you expect this turn of events already since you look mostly disappointed than angry for being called that.” Wright did not expect that the man was triggered for a different reason though.   “Yeah, but Motormouth sounds like I will keep talking until I am out of juice.” “Imagine that, coming from his mouth…” a fellow recruit pointed out.   “Hahaha…” they laughed for a short moment before coming out of the room. And once again, Wright had to meet with Callahan once more to do something. As for what it was, only the two of them knew.   But in the evening, Instructor Sheperd barged to the barrack and residence of the recruit, giving them an immediate notice with the speaker in front of his mouth. His voice could be heard throughout the entire Branch and the 44th Cluster unit had to ready.   “On this day, you from the 44th Cluster unit finally have its turn to visit one of our operational airbases. I don’t know whether this is fate or something else but we are going there with the 88th Cluster unit. And should I mention to you all that this is not a fricking summer camp!?” Instructor Sheperd screamed like directly in front of Wright.   Wright felt annoyed. He knew that somehow or not, he was the only one to get the most difficult time when just doing something basic. Wright endured it because he better made that his motivation instead.   ‘At first, I am angry at being picked by Instructor Sheperd but now, I do not care anymore as long as I can improve myself.’ Wright thought for himself.   Wright could see everyone gazes at him was different compared to a month ago. At first, they looked at him with pity, hell some of them looked at him with disdain. Being picked by the instructor and also by Callahan when they underwent Virtual Training. Because of this, he gained the nickname of ‘Unofficial Favorite Recruit’ among his peers.   The location of the airbase was 10 km away from Pasteur City and also at the region of Taz Mountain Range. Hence the name of the airbase was Taz Air Base. They came to that place by military truck and they even had to bring their clothes, necessities, as well as the latest performance score in both virtual training and G-force training.   At that day, the recruits saw numerous training jets around the airbase. Wright could see that they would train their ability in this place.   -   “All right, then. So how are you feeling there?” a voice came from the radio. Wright who had worn his pilot clothes now seated on the cockpit of the real jet fighter. It was the CS-12 Crow in the flesh and Wright took a long, deep breath when he saw numerous device at the front of his face.   “Good, just like in the virtual module,” Wright replied. Now he was on his way with his jet to the runway for take-off.   “Good to hear. Now then, you are Mosquito Twenty. You fellow wingman is already up and good. After you start going up there can the mock training start.” The voice continued.   Wright raised his head and saw numerous small dots in the sky. He was the last one to take-off and his 44th was named Mosquito Squadron.   “Roger that, Air Trafic Control. Make sure to remember that my TAC name is Raven and it is good as done.” Wright felt excitement this time. He was in one, genuine aircraft that would take him to that sky. And before he went to the cockpit, Instructor Shepherd gave them all something.   And that was about their first real training. Wright then accelerated his jet, raising its speed so it could reach the necessary speed to gain altitude. And then the next order came for Wright from his unit.   “Is that you Unofficial Favorite Recruit? You better regroup with us at three thousand feet. This is Mosquito one to Mosquito Twenty, regroup and form an element.” “Wilco, flight leader.”   Wright could recognize his squadron by the mark they had on their tail. Wright’s “Crow” as people called CS-12 also had one. It was the picture of the mosquito with its black body and some white spot on its belly while its proboscis was like a rapier. That was the emblem of Mosquito Squadron.   Then Wright gained altitude, positioned himself at the back of the squadron and wait for further orders. For this mock training, they were unequipped and only had a gun as their only weapon. The formation was good and the weather was also as the clouds did not hinder their movement.   “Both squadrons prepare for battle in 10 seconds.” The tower gave instructions to all the aircraft in the air. Wright could see far away in front of him the same number of his opponents' aircraft from the 88th Cluster Unit.   “5, 4, 3, 2, 1…begin the battle!”   The distance between both squadrons got closer before they had to pass each other and then the mock battle finally began. Wright and his wingmen had to take some distance before they turned around and see the other’s jet.   How to win this battle? It was simple as its main objective was to get a lock-on in five seconds to be recognized as downing a bogey. But with the numbers of participant alone, this could turn into a furball quickly.   “Hehe, I got you.” One of Wright’s wingmen got a lock-on with one of the opponent’s aircraft. “Hey, Sparrow Six. Enemy Radar Spike!” one of the wingmen from the opposition warned the one that got a lock-on. “Taking evasive maneuvers.” The one recognized as Sparrow Six then banked to the right as fast as it could and its speed surprised its pursuer. Meanwhile, some of their wingmen locked-on the aircraft from Mosquito Squadron.   “That voice…it sure is a long time.” Wright was surprised to hear that voice to be honest. But he had to put it aside as two Sparrow Squadron’s aircraft was tailing behind him. He jinxed to the left before he did a Split-S and managed to shake off one of them.   Some tried their best to get a lock and maintain that situation while some others had to be the one to get a lock-on and shake off their opponent. The situation turned into a furball as each aircraft was restrained by each other.   But Wright was also watching both his friendly and his opponent was mixed and it was easier for him to change his target in immediate. Rather focusing on one, he better look for a perfect opportunity to lock-on to a target that could fall into his range.   And the opportunity presented itself as one aircraft was passing overhead of Wright’s aircraft. With an optimistic smile, Wright decided to take this aircraft out of the battle.   “Raven has locked-on the opponent,” Wright announced. “Damn! He got a lock on me. I’ll not let you!” the one Wright had a lock had already raised his altitude. Wright kept following on his tail in hot pursuit. Some of his wingmen also locked-on Wright’s plane but Wright moved his plane so that the lock his opponent got was interrupted while maintaining his own.   “Phew, it is hard to lock on your opponent while they also have a lock on you,” Wright commented as he did several maneuvers already just to do that. The G-force he got was quite large even for the current him.   “3…2…1…you’re done for!” the moment Wright counted it to the exact moment his enemy had been eliminated from his radar, he turned right as soon as possible.   “The first blood confirmed for Mosquito Squadron.” Mosquito One commented and he finally noticed a single aircraft was chased down by six.   “Whoa, they are so passionate about getting a lock on me now. Guess gaining attention is not as good as it should.” Wright felt the difficulty in escaping their line of sight as there were more than five of them and shook them off prove to be difficult.   “That Favorite Recruit…well he is still part of our squadron so let’s make him owe us a favor. Here I come. Mosquito One engaging!” “Wait a minute. Motormouth!?” Wright was confused at first when he heard the voice came from his flight leader but that person was the Motormouth.   “Shut up! I am here for the kill. Got a lock!” Wright looked back and saw behind his pursuer three more CS-12 with mosquito emblem on their tail. This situation was exactly like a certain line, Mantis stalks the cicada unaware of the oriole behind.   Wright then raised the nose of his craft, he wanted to make a loop so that the planes on his tail reduced. And indeed some of them broke out of pursuit because even if they followed him, they would be a goner since they got a lock and they should break the lock from their craft.   “Another one down!” shouted the Motormouth. Sadly, it was also the case for their squadron as well.   “Ugh, he’s persistent.” The pilot was glad when some of Sparrow Squadron’s aircraft was reduced but he did not have time to savor it as another two jets was tailing him from his six and eight.   While the furball happened, the one on the ground still looked at the condition of each pilot. Callahan also watched things unfold from the airbase as the dogfight continued. In front of him was a monitor which showed the status of each pilot.   Meanwhile, on his hands, several papers that contained the previous data from virtual training was used as the reference. He readjusted his glasses and separated one paper from another.   ‘There is indeed an improvement. A big gap of progress with that prototype module is seen in this training.’ Thought Callahan. Several profiles could be seen on the paper, including Wright.   ‘Their endurance of high G-force as well as a basic understanding of the situation with only their instinct…hmm…’   Many thoughts of other possibilities raced inside Callahan but he just had to observe the result of the first month. He could see good results but would this last or just temporary? Furthermore, what their reaction to the real conflict would like and would it affect their current ability?   These question would be left unanswered if there was no conflict. For Callahan though, the conflict was both a blessing and a disaster. He just hoped the empire planned well of their citizen, otherwise…   “Mosquito Twenty, watch your six!” Wright heard the warning and he accelerated when he could single out his pursuer. After his third successful elimination of the target, Wright was chased by this one aircraft.   “Sparrow Six, you better do it to that pilot. He’s rather annoying.” One of Sparrow Squadron suggested. “Roger that.”   Wright then moved in an unpredictable pattern, trying to see what response the one on his tail would give. When Wright looked behind, he could see the aircraft slowly lost its lock on him. What surprised Wright was that the aircraft then moved in a manner so that Wright would be brought to where it wanted Wright to be.   ‘The pilot is good. I am going to give him that.’ Wright then banked to the left while the one on his tail moved to the right. And then they changed their turning directly to the exact opposite of their previous turn, directing their planes to meet each other.   Wright could not turn his situation around as their capabilities were similar. Their craft crisscrossed each other for the first time and then Wright tried to lower his speed so that he would make the opponent overshoot instead.   ‘Now is the time!’ Wright finally saw the jet of his opponent and ended the scissors, effectively got a lock.   But to his expectation, his opponent moved upward suddenly and Wright could not respond quickly in kind. Wright lost the lock and moved his jet to find another target that was easier to target.   And then just as their training ongoing, a strange event occurred in the vicinity of their airspace. One of the squadrons noticed this and got distracted.   “Wait a moment, all units…” one of the Mosquito jets then stopped maneuvering and leveled his plane which the pursuer used to get a lock on him and made this person lost the mock battle. But for this person, something was bothering him and it was far more important than their mock battle.   “What? You want to make an excuse for your loss?” mocked his pursuer.   “No, it is not like that. ATC, do you see that on your radar?” asked the pilot. “All aircraft on the current airspace, please cease action and listen.” The guys from ATC immediately contacted everyone on both cluster unit and then send the notification to sound the siren.   “We’ll restore all your IFF to friendlies. I just hope it is not like that pilot said…”   At a high altitude above the clouds, several objects were moving at high speed. The numbers were not much but their presence was rather troublesome since they could only detect it now.

Wright was checked again and again. The scene the medics create attracted attention from his surroundings.   “I am fine. Nothing serious since you all helped me. Let me go there and submit my paper please.” Wright even had to plead so that they would stop treating him like a patient with severe diseases.   “Hope that you will be fine. Although this place is not pleasant to your eyes we will strive for the best to serve people in need.” That was said by one of the people Wright had seen to give him that electrolyte drink.   After that, Wright returned to the previous place he had been queued for. He even asked Traza for securing it for a while. Fortunately, Traza did as he asked or else he had to start over again, he did not want that to happen.   “Thank you. Uhm…is there something wrong?” when Wright saw that Traza held his lunch box, he realized the sour and stink smell from that rotten veggie spread faster some people frowned at it. Traza stared when Wright returned, his expression told Wright that he was unpleasant by that fact.   “How the hell did you place rotten veggies as your lunch menu!? Don’t you have something better to eat?” Traza said in a low but cold tone. Wright swore that he could see the whole face of Traza turned red, the same as his eyes.   “Calm down, chill. This is just my usual day where I have to…” Wright struggled but in the end, decided to tell Traza when he was interrupted.   “Stop. That words of yours are going to be worse if I’m not stopping it. Is this the result of you lacking money and even refusing to use the allowance from the empire and donate it instead?” “Yes. I can’t deny it since that’s the fact.”   -   “John, are you there?” after the noon arrived, it was also the time for break and Tanasha used it to call John. She felt that the only person that could help in this situation would be John. But she had to tell him the things that Wright had to face.   “Hm, is that you Tanasha? What’s wrong?” John recognized the voice and he had an ominous premonition since she called him this soon. “Can you tell Mister Wright about the things I will tell you next, please? I met him and even served his registration process so I feel obliged to tell him but unable to do it.”   Then Tanasha told John about something that related to what Wright had to do to clear his debt in the unit. When John heard it, he was saddened. Tanasha told him all of this not only because John was involved but because she could see that Wright was in a tight situation despite the fact that the empire had given allowance to any unemployed people.   She then realized that Wright perhaps had his reason not to use the allowance, he may have been used a little portion of it and the rest of it was used to do other things. This piqued her interest since most people would use free money to justify their laziness but Wright did not look like someone who hated hard work.   “Wright, he…he has to do that kind of things!?” John was angry. What Tanasha told him was Wright had to receive extra training. John knew very well that with the food Wright consumed daily, it was already a miracle Wright did not get any sickness. Extra training was good and bad at the same time.   If Wright could pass it, he would gain another useful knowledge and prepared for any unexpected situation. But that also meant Wright had to spend more energy which was not good for someone like him with junk food as daily consummate.   “I’m sorry. I cannot do anything to that and you probably know the reason for that treatment. The least I can do is to tell you about this so that you will tell Wright to prepare himself. There is still time for him to consider this and you and I can help him.” Tanasha softly said.   She could only think of helping Wright occasionally and John also thought the same. The first time John encountered Wright, he left John with a very good impression. John became a bit happier and that was the reason he could meet Tanasha.   -   “Here is my paper and proof of registration.” Wright glanced at the person in front of him. The person in front of him had this sharp eyes and when their eyes met, Wright felt like his back was cold. The stare was so much pressuring Wright that he thought safety was at risk.   That person went straight to grab Wright’s paper and read it. Wright carefully looked at this person and realized that the person skimmed through that paper as fast as possible. He is too bored with the same paper the registrant presented, right? Such as what Wright thought.   “Hey, bring me the things related with this paper.” With a monotone, the person ordered the one beside him, who wore standard military clothes to get something.   “Here, your cluster, your training schedule and the time for anything else related to being in Temporary Militia Unit. I wonder why most people want to join this unit and it is the Air Force that gets the most. There are also Infantry and Navy to be considered but I think that is because of the advancement in aviation technology recently.” The person then gave Wright additional information in a paper with special material covered it.   “Young man, sorry to bother you but what is your purpose for joining this unit? Some people joined because of poverty, some others because of crimes and some because of their dreams?” Wright was surprised to be asked.   Wright then turned all of his body around, a smile covered his face. He opened his mouth, “Well, you can say that I fit to be in all of the three reasons you said. I don’t know why you sir mentioned those three that truly suitable for my situation but those are also my reason.”   Wright then went to the side, waiting for that person to register himself. The person in charge was surprised to hear that answer so much that Traza had to stand in front of him waiting.   ‘That man, I do not know why but he has his reason. Hmm, according to the paper here he is here because of poverty resulting in light crimes and joining the Air Force to be able to fly is his dream. What a coincidence it is.’ This person then chuckled before he returned to his monotone voice and cold face.   After the two met again, they shared in which cluster they would be going.   “It says here that I will be joining the 44th Cluster. Traza, why are you looking me pitifully?” Wright read his part of information again when he realized Traza looking at him differently.   “You’re unlucky. Because it is you, I will tell you that I will be joining the 88th Cluster in the Air Force.” Traza laughed a little before he looked at Wright in a serious manner.   “What is this!? A number doesn’t bring any fortune nor misfortune, it’s our belief that brings it to us. The only unlucky thing for me is for you to be in the different cluster though.” Wright said with a hint of disappointment.   “So, to know each other even after this how about we shake our hands?” Traza suggested which Wright followed with his right hand raised. Then both of them clasped each other’s hand and shook it. They faced each other before a faint smile appeared on their face.   “May we meet again if fate permits.” That was what Traza said to Wright before he left.   Following the signs that already placed around, Wright arrived at the large hall with all kinds of devices in every place. Wright had seen the paper and he knew that he barely qualified in its standard. And he could hear some people screaming due to the pressure they experienced.   ‘What is this place? This is so cramped, I believe that this room has been refitted to be a multi-purpose room perhaps. And damn, what are those spinning thing up there?’ Wright focused on the source of the scream.   It came from the spinning thing Wright had seen. After his eyes readjusted to the speed, he could see a small ball at the edge of it spinning at a rather high speed. That would surely put a lot of pressure to anyone inside it.   ‘Am I able to endure that? I don’t know what kind of result I can achieve but let’s be optimistic a little.’ Thought Wright.   That human centrifuge Wright had seen was developed and created by Multinational Corporation Longen. Actually, Wright was impressed by the development of the aviation by this corporation because it caused an advancement in aircraft leaped by several years ahead.   Then a voice from the speaker could be heard to the entire hall if not being interfered by the scream.   “Welcome to the 44th Cluster. For the new recruits, please sign your attendance and follow further instruction. The attendance can be signed at the center of the hall.”   Wright then walked toward the center where a large table was located. There was also a line that separated it from the human centrifuge above it. It was a large barrier and Wright knew that it cost a thousand times of money he was paid in the past at the minimum.   “So here is the one who has the problem.” When Wright arrived at the table and wrote his signature, he heard a mocking voice right beside him. Wright frowned but decided to face the person anyway.   Then he could see the person. He was sneering while his eyes were looking down at Wright. Wright could feel the aura of a noble from that person and he looked good both in his physics and his appearance.   “Anyone joining this militia unit is a troublemaker in nature. Well, anyone like me is expected to make trouble but you, what did you do to be able to arrive here?” Wright was confused about where this person’s capability of arrogance came from. Temporary Militia Unit was also a place where people who had a problem come in.   Wright was a civilian so it was normal but the person in front of him was likely related to nobility. That was the problem. It meant that either it was a special task which Wright had read in a certain web on the internet or they had done something terrible, a heinous crime.   It was indeed dangerous to poke your nose against the nobility but this was in the military, everyone is as worthless as grass or the worthy unit that needs to be taught with a harsh but effective lesson. And discipline was of utmost important so Wright had not worried about dirty tricks.   ‘Though I have to see what kind of person I have to face. It is destined that this person and I are going to be like cats and dogs. A direct confrontation is good since all of us are the same in this place.’ Wright though carefully and still had to accept it.   “What did you say!? I know you. You are Wright, the one who late to pay the taxes because of his own inability.” That person said.   “Yeah, inability to get good luck.” Wright shrugged his shoulders and instead spoke with the one that responsible at the table, “Sir, what should I do after this?”   Because Wright just ignored the person afterward, that person also did not say a word. But he looked at Wright with an ominous glint before he snorted and left.   “Well, we have to place you into the simulation and then placed you into the human centrifuge to test your endurance against the G-force you will experience in the future. After that, we will have to form your body and spirit so that you can both physically and mentally prepare. So hard for me and so hard for you all…” the responsible person at the table was someone with a chubby appearance but he gave an impression of easy to get close with.   Wright brightened and smiled before he said, “Okay. Thank you for your concern. Can I do the G-force test last?”   Truthfully, Wright was afraid to get on that thing! His spirit was stronger since he got to see what it felt like to be a part of Air force who had to do task mainly involved in the airspace. But he wanted to be a pilot, so he had to face that human centrifuge no matter what.   ‘I can refuse but that means I am not qualified to use a jet plane. That is why my first choice will be the simulation.’ Wright thought of himself as someone who could at least capable of doing the simulation at the average on the first try.   -   The Simulation Room.   Wright then applied for one of the modules by the same Multinational Corporation Longen. He knew that at most his scores would be just average because he had never used or trained to do it in the first place.   “I can only give cheers to you all new recruits. It’s okay if the result is not up to your plan though. Good luck.” A man with a lab coat and eyeglasses cheerfully waved at Wright. Wright did not know the reason but he felt that person was here for some reason.   Wright could see perfectly when they were at a close distance that the identity card on his left chest was clearly stated his profession as a specialist in the Virtual Reality and Artificial Intelligence Development. He felt that his module was the one that four-eyed man was cheering for after Wright came to the realization.   “I know it. These models are not even in the military. Perhaps some of it exists in the special operation simulation but not for the militia! Looks like both I and this module are going on its new experience on the same day. Hahaha.” Wright could see as the module closed completely and Wright was put to lie position.   He saw the number of the model was indeed something he had never seen even in the common internet information.   The greatness of this module was it capable of moving the consciousness from the person to the simulation world.   [Welcome to the N-0821 Simulation Module] [Registered as Wright by comparing the data on the server and from the physical appearance of the user] [Flight Simulation Begin] [Level 1: Use and Fly the single seated chopper to the location required while following the instruction]   Then the view changed into the interior of a single seated chopper above helipad. Wright then heard instruction as to how he should raise the chopper, how to lower its altitude, to move it forward and backward.   [Boom, chopper destroyed] the first prompt of failure when Wright tried to do some light maneuvers but then suddenly wind came to hit the chopper from the side, upturning it and instantly crashed to the ground.   Then Wright tried again and this time he grumbled in his heart, even he had to take account of the change in the air as that would also affect his flying. Wright was unaware that the module he used was actually the one that fully supported the user.   “That Module N-0821, how is the overall performance?” that person with the identity of the specialist in Virtual Reality and Artificial Intelligence Development asked seriously to one of the staff that overlooked the entire simulation room.   The room itself contained numerous Virtual Reality Module that was able to be used by a person. As for the one Wright was used at the moment, that was the newest model with a slight change to it.   “Sir, the performance is truly more realistic in that module. I dare to say that there are some weather effects that truly impacted the user so the failure chance increased and ask the user to increase his or her mastery to fly.”   One of the staff answered. The staff could only think of one thing and that was, Whoever that man in the experimented module, I can only pray for good luck to you. Not only that module is for the elite pilot but it also trains their flying mastery over their difficulty to fly in any condition given.   “Ha, ha. Did I pass the first test?” Wright realized that the instruction had stopped ringing into his ears. His ears went deaf because the instruction was the same but the situation in each trial was different. Wright now could fly the chopper perfectly but that was just the take-off part but it did not include the side wind that may come or perhaps the sand storm.   Wright glanced at the right corner of his eyes only to find that he barely passed the test. And he spent two hours going at it. He was tired both physically and mentally but he had to try all of the basic before he even could experience what it felt like to fly a jet plane.   ‘Am I too selfish? This is already long enough for someone to start training in various vehicle and yet I’m still stuck here with this chopper. Let’s remember the basic first, perhaps this knowledge will be useful in the future. Next is some shooting and landing on the heli-carrier.’   [Warning! User experienced dizziness, attempting to assist the user through nutrition fluid. Checking for supply and availability….] [All the type of nutrients available. Choosing the most suitable for the current user. Packing the nutrition fluid in the form of a medium sized box with lemon flavor]   Wright heard many voices, especially the one that gave a sound like it was important. He tried to just get this done with because he was afraid that he overdid his time. Two hours and the only progress he had was just the very first stage with a chopper as the training vehicle, he knew that some people were watching his progress too.   As he pressed the usual button to exit the simulation and open the module, he found that he was unable to successfully exit the simulation.   “What is happening!? Exit! I am done with this for today. If I’m lucky, I can come and train here tomorrow but now I am tired, I can only move my finger and mouth. The…hell is this?”   Wright saw the warning the screen had displayed and he read it all until the recent one where it gave Wright a nutrition fluid. Wright turned to his right where he could see a medium-sized box that appeared like juice box but the box was so unattractive.   “Sir Callahan, just now N-0821 started to release a portion of its nutrition fluid. Should we continue on?” the staff asked the man with the eyeglasses that currently grabbed something from his coat.   “Keep monitoring.” Callahan just said with a stern tone. “But when Sergeant comes and question…” the other staff wanted to argue but Callahan gave his answer as fast as they open their mouth, “Just say to him that the module with the series of N-0821 is in experimental running and we are responsible to watch its every move and every record of the user at the same time, is that clear?”   “As you wish Sir.” They could only reply with the tacit agreement. They all knew that Callahan was a specialist affiliated with Multinational Corporation Longen and even their empire had a few connections with this corporation. Especially its military unit, they mainly relied on the technology Longen had given to run their military exercise and be their power.   Wright felt strange when he saw that announcement stating the nutrition fluid was flavored in lemon. That was his favorite flavor for drink actually and the module just gave it to him.   ‘What is this module doing? I have never heard a module like this. But unfortunately, I can’t lift my hand…’ Wright thought were interrupted by the movement of something near the nutrition fluid box. Something entered the box and then something was placed onto his mouth.   ‘This…is a straw. This module even assists me in this manner. Is it trying to make me ready for accomplishing the simulation?’   Wright forced himself to drink the fluid. He did not expect the nutrition fluid to be so effective at replenishing his stamina and his attention returned to him while he still savored the flavor of it, enjoying its sourness.   “Guess it’s time for a second round?” Wright continued on where he had left.   -   The Simulation Room was opened suddenly because some people entered it in haste. Mostly, the soldier appeared from the door that opened vertically walked neither faster nor slower and always following the movement of a man.   “Where is that Callahan!? How dare he just randomly pick someone to use that module.” The man shouted loudly, piercing the calmness the room usually had.   “Sergeant Hart, we are trying to get that module in the experimental running for the new recruits as to ascertain the module performance in support and the user capability to get the result they want.” Callahan dropped his eyeglasses slightly, looking at Hart with his cold eyes. He was going to Pasteur Branch Unit to do some test-run on the newest module on people like Wright so he did not want anyone from the military to use it.   ‘That module is also experiencing its first time service. There is no way I will let him taint it with some experienced pilots. Anyway, he wants to pressure me both by his position or his uncle position in the corporation, that won’t work on me today.’ Callahan only looked at Hart, his eyes indicating that he taunted Hart.   “What do you mean by that!? This module here is the most suitable for an experienced pilot. Even better if you give it to the member of Skylark Squadron. But here you are, rationalizing your deed with such an argument. If you don’t explain clearly your reason for this then I can make anything you want to do to be delayed! See if you can still develop anything according to your strict schedule.” Sergeant Hart spoke with force in his voice.   “An explanation, I see. Let me be honest with you, the real purpose of this module is to create a better ‘nuggets’ for the Air Force around the world. Do you know that I come to this empire is because of the fact that this empire lacks potential in terms of a new talented pilot? This place is the best to test my module and train one subject to see the progress.” Callahan shrugged his shoulders, opening both arms while smiling confidently.   “But the problem is, we have a high chance to be engaged in a conflict with the neighboring country and we need to strengthen the entire military to prepare them in case the situation really happen. Besides, your experimental module is limited while the recruits this year is greater in number. What are you going to do to all of them?” Sergeant Hart thought that the usage of the module would allow the elite of their military to gain increased strength that allowed the empire to prepare for the worst and be able to turn the tide of battle.   Callahan understood what Hart wanted to achieve. Strengthening the elites of the empire was indeed a faster solution to increase the might of the empire but in war, they had to count every small unit that involved in it.   ‘Although that is good, it is also gambling. I don’t understand the motivation behind his words but to only make their elite better. I feel that something is not right and I better keep going on with the subject is the new recruit.’ Callahan speculated that something behind his knowledge was brewing in this very empire but he was unable to do anything anyway other than continuing his experiment.   “All of them? I will only select a few people to be my test subject. If successful, I will consider the mass production of this module and your empire will gain special treatment for buying this module. Too bad I need approval and the positive rapport from the higher-ups. Besides, I also gained approval from Your Majesty Frizgerald X to conduct my experiment with this empire’s regulation. What are you going to do going against the emperor?” Callahan just casually spoke this when he noticed the stiffness from Sergeant Hart.   “You…don’t tell me about this from the start! If it’s from the Emperor then you should tell me sooner, damn it.” Hart barked when he heard it. He felt restless when Callahan used the approval from the emperor and it only showed for a moment before he conducted himself as usual.   ‘Hmm, strange reaction.’ Callahan did not care about that slight change as it was obvious there was something inside that head of Hart.   Then Hart went away from the simulation room with a harrumph. The soldiers that followed him also left together in an orderly manner.

Stanis walked towards the village with his head angled straight. He was occupied by his own conscience: had he done the right thing? Could he have dealt with it differently and gained a better result? He knew he would only reach an answer he disliked but he also knew he wouldn’t heed the answer anyway, and yet he still thought, bearing weight on his nerves. He had no feelings for Sil, or at least he thought so. But neither did he have a grudge against her, jealously perhaps but not hatred. Yes, maybe what he had done was for her benefit; it would have been crueller to let her live once again, instead of breaking her awful nightmare. He told himself this as he walked through the village gate, nodding at how he had done a service for her. And for no charge at that. The guards at the gate let him pass with no trouble. While the leaders of the village were disgruntled with Stanis, the common folk still saw him as a lamp in the dark, dark sky. After all, they took the brunt of the damage during fights and wars; they knew how to be grateful for someone who saved so many of their lives. Up in the sky, the sun was shy and hid behind several looming clouds. The clouds were thick and grey, warning the Earth of the battering it was soon going to get. The wind too seemed to join in on this assault as it howled mindlessly, blowing dust and rubbish into eyes and clothes. Especially eyes. Before, all he had wanted to do was get equipped and rush into battle against Jen. Now, however, after hearing his suspicions confirmed by Sil, he knew there was a better way to do this. He didn’t know whether Jen would join forces with the village or not, after all, despite being awfully brutal and narcissistic, he didn’t know whether they could successfully bribe her in. Anyway, what he did know was that she wanted to kill him as much as he wanted to kill her, and that she acknowledged his power as much as he did her’s. This meant that she would attack amid war, with plenty of corpses to fuel her necrophilic desires. Unfortunately, wars were commonplace here in the village. Different forces of Aliens attacked daily, meaning Jen could approach at any time and find herself drowning with a plethora of cadavers. However, at the same time, what forced him to fight on the frontlines? Nothing, now that the band of whoresons and wenches had revealed their true colours, he felt no desire whatsoever to fight and hurt for them. No, what he would do instead was wait patiently until the Queen Wench revealed herself, during which time he would sneak past her army of soul-shackled slaves and attack her directly, hopefully rubbing her existence away from even the bowels of history in a single strike. Stanis caught himself grinning at this thought and realised he had gotten ahead of himself. This was all in the distant future, right now he had more immediate things to get to such as equipping himself. He strode through the wide, blood-speckled roads, eventually reaching the Forges. The guards earnestly bowed and allowed him through, from which he received a melancholic feeling. He had built up the whole village to what it was today, only to have it ruined by the crows at the top of the chain shitting onto everyone else. He walked into Rikkey’s smithy and was greeted by the usual crowd. He saw Kevin helping Rikkey in the corner by holding down a senselessly large sheet of metal. These were two people he had once trusted, people he had once laughed and drunk with. The two of them turned around to face him and he finally identified the glint he had seen in Rikkey’s eyes last time: it was pity and regret, perhaps even some compassion. He spat at her sympathy in his head; they had betrayed him all the same, what was the point of acting sorry after such an act? “I need a sword,” he declared loudly, suppressing the distant clangs, “The strongest one you have.” “That’s fine but I can custom make you better one,” Rikkey said while smiling warmly. Stanis wished he could take her smug expression and drag it through the dirt. He snorted at her suggestion and shook his head; she was probably planning to create internal cracks along the blade so that it would snap during the heat of battle. Rikkey looked withdrawn by his response but kept her smile up. She nodded to Kevin and told him to get the sword from the back. “And a set of armour,” Stanis called out after Kevin. An awkward silence followed as Stanis scrutinised Rikkey. “Is anything wrong Stanny?” she asked, hoping to shed some of the gravel he was staring her way. “You look tired, man,” He glared at her for a moment before answering. “Yeah, I guess I’m tired. Tired of all your shit that is,” She gulped down her words and looked away, re-ensuing the awkwardness. Kevin arrived with a sword and a set of leather armour. “Sorry mate, none metal left,” He then looked at Rikkey’s expression and realised that things had taken a turn for the worse whilst he had been out. “That’s fine,” Stanis answered. He rode his finger on the sword’s edge. He then looked at his finger and saw that his skin had been indented, and so grunted. This was probably not their best sword but it was good enough to cut Jen’s flesh. It was a hand shorter than a normal longsword and had black burn marks across its blade. He nodded to Kevin and then made for the door. As he left, he turned around and gave the two a confident and friendly smile, or at least as friendly as he could make it. “I’ll see you guys in hell,” he uttered under his breath. Kevin cocked his head to Rikkey after Stanis had left. “Does he know?” She scrunched her face at the man with irritation and worry. “Course he fucking knows, why else would he act like that?” “Then why didn’t you tell him that you stood up for him?” “Well. what fucking good is that going to do when we’ve now turned sides?” The energy sapped from Kevin’s body and he fell into a chair, dropping his head past its rest. **** Stanis found a fairly private spot and stripped himself, putting on the leather armour. It provided sufficient defence to block maybe 10 strikes but that was it - not that he was looking to be hit anyway. They hadn’t given him a sheath with the sword so he put it into his trousers, the stone-cold pommel squeezing into his stomach. He then walked the way he had come, gaining a few additional stares as people took notice of where his sword was. He walked towards the marketplace and stole a backpack and plenty of food and drink while there. After this grand heist, he ambled out of the village towards the river, over the bridge, and into the forest. He saw several Jaguars on the way who joined his trip and made small talk. They reached Serb’s cave and waited for him to make an entrance. Quicker than Stanis had arrived, the area began to fill up as more and more Jaguars rushed to the spot, the word that Stanis had come spreading faster than a disease. After some time, Serb tread out with Niss by his side, as always. “You should spend some time out in the sun,” Stanis said, “The dark will eventually make you gloomy, y’know?” Niss approvingly nudged Serb, causing the weathered Jaguar to softly smile. Serb deeply sighed the next second before catching Stanis’s eyes and staring into his soul. “Stanis, old dog,” he said. “Yeah?” “We’re… We’re going to leave this place. Leave you humans behind.” “Why?” Stanis asked. “Is it the recent stuff?” Niss nodded her head and Serb raised an eyebrow. “So you know, eh?” He wrinkled his nose. “Yeah, that’s the main thing,” “So where are---” “No, wait.” Serb cut through. “Let me at least explain, old dog,” Stanis put on a resigned expression and weakly nodded. “You done us good, far better than a human would ever do by our side. But the rest of them, they hate you, old dog. I’m no fool and neither is Niss. We know what happens when a group fractures: infighting. Staying by an infighting group is like sleeping while a wildfire invades the cave,” Stanis raised his palms and moved them in an arc towards his sides. “It’s fine, man. Just tell me, when are you going and where to? I’ve got one last ghost to deal with here and then I’ll come with you guys.” Serb finally smiled wholeheartedly, showing all his fist-sized teeth. “Great. We’ll go west of the mountain and follow the slope, and we’ll go tonight,” “Then let’s forget all this doom and gloom for an afternoon then,” Stanis said, opening up his backpack. “Get the supplies out, let’s get drunk here one last time, for old time’s sake,” Stanis didn’t even have to look up to know Serb’s excited expression, or Niss’s annoyed one. One last night. His last day…

“And were you with her or the other top ten? Well, were you?” Pete asked. His tone was sharp, almost bitter. “Neither were y—“Sofia stopped amidst her sentence. She kept her gaze on him but simultaneously revisited her memories. In the cave, she remembered Pete being awfully chummy with Stanis. At the time, she had thought it was just because the two of them had known each other from before. But, what if they had been together in the same group- the strongest group on Earth? No, she shook her head at Pete. “So you’re part of the top ten, are you?” she asked. “Of course, what else would I be?” Pete proudly responded. Internally, however, he was biting his own teeth. It had been going so well and this bitch just had to overcomplicate everything. “I don’t remember seeing you in the first war against those one-eyed Aliens. In fact, I don’t remember you fighting the purple Titans either,” she said. Catching her cue, Moonshine carried on. “Weird, I don’t remember seeing you in the fights either. It’s almost like you simply weren’t in any of them, like you didn’t even fight, despite claiming to be so strong,” ‘Shit, shit, shit,” Pete thought. But just like before, he kept his actual expression masked with a smile, albeit more forced this time. Rikkey leaned on the wall next to him, her short and dirty hair staining the surface. She had her eyes closed, and seemed to not be listening to the discussion. To his other side, Serb sat with Niss. Yet, despite sitting, they were still taller than everyone in the hall by at least a head. He had his beady eyes cast on Pete, the two options in his head clashing once more. “Did you fight with the rest of us in the battles or not, Pete?” Alyona asked, straining his name. “Did you, or did you not, fight for your survival, and that of everyone’s in the village?” “I didn’t fight in the war,” Pete admitted with a bright glint in his eye. Due to him saying it so confidently, most of the people in the hall almost believed that what he was saying wasn’t incriminating. Almost. “But, I was doing something far more important,” he added. “What wer—“Alyona asked, before being cut off by Pete. “Did you think those Titans came right after those one-eyed freaks just because they love queuing up? Well, did you? Somebody had to hold them off, y’know,” “And that somebody was you; is that what you’re trying to claim?” Moonshine asked. “So why is it that when I did catch peeks of you in the village, safe within the walls and sniggering with your other two fools, that you were virtually unharmed? Your clothes had no blood on, no tears, and you weren’t even tired,” Pete coughed out a laugh. Despite being forced, the people in the hall heard something different. It was confident, just like his previous actions, mocking, just like his character, and cracked, also just like his character. “We’re not all as weak and pathetic as you are, sweetheart,” Moonshine grinned in response. She looked to Alyona, then the whole audience. “We have Mr. Top Ten here who apparently doesn’t fight but instead spends his time daydreaming. I think we should test out his claim, what do you say?” The crowd cheered her on, excited about the fight like children on Christmas Eve. While none of them had seen Pete fight, they also knew he was strong from the aura he had given off when trying to get into the village. But how strong was he? Alyona looked at Richie. The portly man, in response, began to think off who would be the best match. The reason why he had been one of the main leaders before Stanis had arrived was because of his analytical skills. However, he felt his ability useless here as he realised that he knew nothing about Pete. He simply hadn’t been a big enough character before the war for anyone to care about him. In the end, he looked at Orena and Caleb. One was extremely strong in certain conditions and weaker in others, while the other was a solid all-rounder. Eventually, he wiped his forehead sweat and nodded at Caleb. The massive, black man stepped forward. He looked the same as he had months back, mostly anyway. He was still muscular, to the point of being sculpted, and he still had large tattoos ranging down both arms. On his back was a greatsword: he would have put it across his waist but it was too long for that to be practical. But what was different about him was his eyes and his face. He looked exhausted, snuffed out of the life that had previously filled him. “Here or outside?” Caleb asked, lifting the sword off his back. “Now, let’s just stop here,” Pete replied, raising his hands in front of himself. “No need to devolve to violence like beasts,” he said while cringing at his own words. Caleb ignored him and shot forward, his steps like that of a rocket’s blast. He swung the sword at Pete’s head. The entirety of his strength was behind the slice, his muscles tightening around each other like bloodthirsty snakes; he was intent on ending it in one strike. <Empathetic spread> Caleb’s grip suddenly loosened and the sword lost balance, heading lower than it should have. Simultaneously, Pete stumbled back and hit the wall behind him. The blade missed him by the hair. Furious at the lack of control he found himself with, almost as if he was drunk, Caleb swung again, this time wider and more careless. Pete tripped and fell beneath the blade. He turned his head once the blade passed and found his mind blank. The sword was headed towards Rikkey, and due to Caleb’s lack of control, it was obvious he wouldn’t be able to stop it in time. Rikkey herself had opened her eyes in the time but found herself lacking to escape the blade. It was like she was running away from a bullet… In Pete’s blank head, one thought appeared: This cannot happen. Mana surged from him and swallowed Caleb, blinding him. Pete’s arm shot towards his waist, towards his hatchet and then towards Caleb who stood right next to him. <Superhuman strength> Pete hit Caleb with the blunt end and pulled on it. Caleb went flying, completely unaware and frightened of what was happening. He landed on the other side of the hall, unconscious with his leg torn off. Silence usurped the room and reigned supreme for a few seconds as everyone turned towards Pete. They had been looking at him before, but now they were looking. He had completely twisted their perceptions of him within a second. Pete himself felt reality dawn a second after Caleb landed. He looked at the bloody hatchet in his hand and felt a horrible nausea in his stomach. ‘Fuck,’he thought, ‘Fuck, fuck, fuck,’ This wasn’t meant to happen. They weren’t meant to look at him with those gazes: they shouldn’t be. This fucked everything up. ‘No, no, no,’ he thought, ‘it’s alright.’ He could still salvage it. Stanis needed to be alive, and they needed to see him as the leader figure, not him. Anyone but him. Pete began chuckling, before choking on his laughter. After coughing away most of the respect and fear they now held for him, he pointed at Caleb. “Will you believe me now? I was with Stanis, and that beast of a woman. Believe me, as much as he isn’t perfect, you’d much, much prefer him to that freak. Believe me,” he ended on, before practically running out of the hall. Serb watched Pete leave with wide-eyes and a frantic heart. Pete was even stronger than him and yet had acted unassuming all this time. This thought went around the entire hall, all of them frightened of what state they could now be in if they had been in the wrong place and chosen to fight. After Pete left, over half of the people on the right side moved to the left. At first, they moved fast with their heads down but after a few of them had crossed sides, groups did so proudly, glaring at Alyona and the people who stood to the right. **** In the two days that passed by, Pete, Skint, and Bear were largely left alone by the whole village. As the news spread, more people began to watch the building they stayed in but few dared to go inside. The trio spent the two days gathering materials and creating medicines out of them, pouring each and every one of them over Stanis’s recovering body. The stench was unbearable, but the trio carried on anyway. And throughout the entire period, not a single person questioned what they were doing… **** Stanis felt… alive. He felt the heavy eye-lids over his sight, and yet at the same time, they were light. Opening them, he came eye-to-eye with a small room, empty of all life…

Stanis got up and bowed his head toward the empty mountain-top. “Thank you,” he said, before beginning his climb down. The wind nipped at his back as he jumped from ledge to drop, causing a strange excitement to build up. The danger he faced was now like a game to him, just harmless fun. Deep in him, however, was a beast who wanted more. It wanted Jen, and her head. And it wanted it now. But he knew he couldn’t. He had been confident before about beating Jen and look where that had laid him to waste away: in the hands of three scumbag backstabbers, as sly as sly came. No no no, he held his excitement back and allowed it to bubble. He needed to at least equip himself first. Close to an hour later, the village came into sight. He wanted to pick up a sword and rush to hunt down Jen and so he walked around the village towards its backside. The reason why he did this was, despite wanting to receive a specially-crafted sword of top quality like his last one, he also wanted to kill Jen without her catching wind of him surviving. And that meant time was of the essence. He walked through the outer-buildings like a spectre, haunting all who saw him. One second they saw a dark-eyed figure walking with murder on his mind, the next he was gone, nowhere to seen and nowhere to be found through mana searches. It was as he was going to leap the wall that he heard his name in the distance. “Has Stanis come and seen you yet?” he heard. Usually, he would have ignored the comment as another one of the hundreds that included his name every day. He was quite used to hearing other people talk about him after emerging to large-scale power in the village. But after hearing this comment, he stopped, crept towards a house next to the wall, broke the lock and strolled in. The voice behind the comment, it was Jayesh… To Stanis’s luck, there was no one in the house, although even if there had been, he simply would have knocked them out before they even got a chance to scream. He lowered the mana fluctuations coming off him to the best of his ability, before covering his presence with a mana shield. Hopefully, they wouldn’t be able to sense him. The conversation had silenced ever since Jayesh had asked the question. It was only a few seconds later that Stanis finally heard who he was talking to. “No. And I prefer him not doing so,” Sil said. Stanis grinned as he heard them bicker back and forth. He had reacted the second he had heard Jayesh’s voice because it had brought along with it roused suspicions. The village was up to something and it was something that had to do with him. And yet no one would say it to him. He had previously buried this thought after lack of evidence from both Orena and Rikkey but it had never truly gone away. He had always known that they were hiding something from him. “I still wish he had seen me though,” Jayesh said. “Why? You said you two left on bitter terms the last time you saw him,” she replied. “Ahh” Jayesh was caught off guard and so turtled up for a few seconds. “Maybe,” he hesitantly said, “ But I’ve known him since all this shit began. We were together in the first group stage in the tutorial,” “You’ve already told me this,” Sil replied. Stanis could practically see her rolling her eyes at the large- Indian man. “No, you don’t get it,” Jayesh said. “He was different then, normal, just like any other person. Worried for his loved ones and scared for the future. He wasn’t always what he is now,” “Yes, he’s changed,” Sil interjected. “So has the rest of the world if you haven’t noticed,” “But that means he could change back, change back to the human he once was, no longer the beast he is now. I wish he had come to see me this time. At least then, I could have tried to help him and we hopefully wouldn’t be doing this now,” Stanis bit Jayesh’s words and spat them out. Help, hmmph. He started laughing in his contained barrier, straining his psyche with each chuckle. Where had Jayesh been in any of his dark hours? Not anywhere close was the answer, even when they had been in the same battle or camp. And now he wanted to redeem himself and act like a saint. Stanis spat at the room’s wall once more for good luck. “Don’t stress it,” Sil said, “He brought this on himself. You don’t need to feel sad or sorry. Hopefully, once the week’s done, we’ll no longer have to worry about him and the disease of death he brings alongside,” Stanis perked his eyebrows and felt his head ringing with joy. He knew it; he knew the village had been up to something. Now it was just figuring out whatthey were up to and how brutally he should crush it. He stood by the wall for a few more minutes, waiting for more information that never came. The two of them moved on with their conversation and so Stanis found himself thinking up another strategy. Instead of waiting for them to stumble upon the topic by accident, it would be a lot easier if he could directly ask them. And even better if they were encouraged enough to answer truthfully. Close to two hours after he had first arrived, the two of them finally split up. He could have taken both but that would have left one enough time to scream and shout. He thought between Sil and Jayesh; the bitch and the hypocrite. Minutes later, he found himself stalking the streets outside, following Sil towards a shop. She walked into an empty alleyway while cutting her route, and he moved. Before she could even react, he took her by storm and struck her across the neck. But unlike the movies, she didn’t faint but instead struggled. So, he simply overloaded her with electricity, waiting till she fell limp before dashing out of the village. **** Sil woke up and immediately panicked. She was energyless and her mind was foggy, struggling to think, let alone drag her slack head out of the mud. Nevertheless, she tried and tried again, although to no avail. Luckily, she felt someone pick her head up by the hair. She stared out of focus at the blur of colours, loosening some tears to clear her eyes. A warm rush of mana soothed her body and she felt her eyes come into focus. And then she felt all the feelings of appreciation leave, instead mortified by the beast she found in front of her. “Long time,” Stanis said, cocking his head towards the village which was visible in the distance. If she could scream, maybe then. But of course not. She looked closer and noticed a partially visible barrier; he would kill her before any help arrived. “So, what is it?” he asked, “What is the plan to kill me?” Sil felt a cold shock and anger rise inside of her. Had he been listening to her and Jayesh? Had the two of them just dug her own grave? Or had he just picked it up from elsewhere and decided her to be target number one. Depending on which one it was, she could play it very differently and have very different outcomes. “No need to think so hard about it,” he reassured her, “All I want is the truth, not some made-up crap,” She nodded but otherwise didn’t respond, still thinking up a well-enough connected tale to spin him in. She heard thunder next to her and started back in shock. In Stanis’s palm, a lightning bolt danced with menacing footwork. If that landed on her, well… She felt her heart stop and her body cool. Gulping down the tale she had just thought up, she looked up to gaze at his face. He grinned at her, a glint visible in his eye. “I survived this, but will you? Well, I’m sure we can find that out.”

Orena led Stanis through winding alleyways, cautiously watching her sides while doing so. "I need clothes," Stanis said, curiously peering at the sights he passed by. It had only been two days since he had seen the village but it had changed so much in that time. "I know," Orena replied, "It's where we're headed right now," "Then why aren't we going towards the forges?" he asked. She shook her head while still looking ahead. "They're all busy right now and resources are scarce: it would take far too long for them to make something adequate for you," "So where are you leading me?" he asked. "My place," she replied, "I've got a few sets of armour that should serve you well until you can get your own set," At this, the conversation stilled and the two returned to walking in silence. Stanis felt an odd calmness from following Orena; it felt like his old days. He used to be frightened of Anatoly and Orena in those days, frightened of everything and everyone in fact. He had looked up to the people able to stand their own ground, the people who controlled their own destinies. He was now one of those people, and yet, he still found his overall experience to be miserable. He was still too controlled by too many factors. He needed to be stronger, much stronger. Stanis left his thoughts and got back to peering at his surroundings. He looked at Orena lifting a barrier up and noticed her lack of weapons. "Where's your weapon? Your spear?" Orena turned around and glanced at his expression, before throwing the barrier to the side. "I don't need it. I only wield it during battle," "Then what about the war-paint?" "Habit," They walked towards a building surrounded by several others. Unlike the other powerhouses, Orena's house wasn't mansion-sized. Instead, the homely building sat in between several others, cosy in its place and cosy in its decorations. It wasn't small but it wasn't large either, instead a typical family-sized house. "I thought you'd go for a larger one," Stanis said. "This one is nice," she replied, "Something I can actually live in," He raised his eyebrows at this. "You've changed. You've lost your bloodlust. You're now meek," he said. She began to laugh, and then chuckle. He felt confused for a moment before he realised what the question said about himself. "Look at yourself," she replied. "Besides, that life is simply not for me. What's the point of all that blood staining your hands when you can't even enjoy life," "You can't choose what life you want any more," he said. She muted at this and led him into her house. It became very apparent to Stanis that she truly was intent on enjoying life from the hallway alone. It was richly furnished with an oil-painting of an owl mid-flight on the right and a vase of bright flowers on the left. The floor was covered with a largely unstained carpet. There was a window at the end of the hallway that shone sunlight through, giving a golden gleam to the room. When he saw this, he couldn't help but stop and stare. While this house looked small and unassuming, it was obvious that it was everything but that. All the things in the hallway were rarities now in the apocalypse, only salvaged in searches through old homes. She heard him stop and turned around, and softly smiled, clearly proud of her home. She invited him into the living room where he stayed as she got him a set of armour. Minutes later, Stanis stared at a reflection of himself fully suited in armour. It was a tight fit but it also had a strong defence, something Stanis could tell after infusing it with mana. His skin was milky-white, and his hair was grey. The scars that had once made his body were no longer, instead replaced by soft and scratch-less skin. Even his back, which had been raw minutes before, was now healed up, as were his feet which had been damaged after walking through glass. "What happened to me?" he questioned his reflection. "I heard the man called Pete cared you to health," Orena replied from the door side. "Pete. Why in fucking hell would he nurse me?" he asked, suddenly suspicious of what had happened. "I dunno," she said, "Just that you were injured after fighting the necromancer, and that his group of goons healed you up," In that moment, the events of his death came back to him. He had been fighting Jen, the bitch, and he had been beaten. Stanis clenched his fists and stared hatefully at the reflection he had been curious about seconds before. He punched it and the glass shattered, falling to the floor and shocking Orena. He had been too weak; he had lost to that bitch. He turned around to face Orena, his eyes narrowed and eyebrows angled. He had changed: she could tell from his aura alone. It was now sharp and volatile, ready to strike out. And yet despite this, she still met his gaze calmly. She knew he could kill her in seconds, but nor was she scared about dying. Not outwardly, at least. "Tell me what happened after I fainted and tell it in detail," he said, a tone of command thick in his voice. "They brought you back into the village, and began healing you up," she repeated. She stood tall and still, calm despite his instant transformation. "Why didn't Rikkey or Kevin do it?" he said. "You're hiding something," She slowly shook her head, as if unaware of the mana building up in his hands. "You should know the answer to that yourself. Your friend, Pete, is more than anyone in this village can handle," "Fine," He grunted and pushed past her, into the hallway and out. When the door didn't open, he kicked it open with mana, sending the splinters flying," Orena walked into the hallway and peered out. Her door lay far away on the ground, or at least the parts that had once made it lay there. Stanis was nowhere to be seen. She sighed and walked back in, settling herself into a chair. She sunk into it and felt her worries subside. She was sick of this world and what it had brought along with it. She had loved it at first, it had been her playground then, her own regal court where she had reigned Queen. But it was when she had ascended to Mosyte rank that she had lost her taste for blood and power. It tasted like shit smeared down her throat. After that, she hadn't fought in anything but the large-scale wars. In truth, she didn't care about Stanis or the large campaign against him. She wanted to die, but she was also scared of it. This was why she still lived today, and why she had joined the campaign against him. She wanted to die, it would release her of all her pains, but she was also scared off it, after all, there was nothing after death. And Stanis Volkov was a sure-fire path to death; he had to be stopped. **** Stanis strode into Rikkey's forge. He saw her clanging away at a burning piece of metal, her clothes wet with sweat and her arm shaking with each strike. In the room were also the other blacksmiths, all busy at work just like her. There was also Kevin at the side, helping heat up one of the forges. "Rikkey," he called loudly. Kevin was the first to turn around. He was initially confused by the strange man in front of him until he realised it was Stanis from the voice. He was almost going to chastise Stanis for talking in that manner to his babe when he saw the aura sweeping off of him. "Rikkey," he shouted. This time, Rikkey, and all the other blacksmiths, turned around. It took them a few seconds to make the connection. "Stanis?" she asked back. "Tell me what happened after the war with the Titans," he said, the same tone of command thick in his voice as before. "I don't know," she said," I wasn't in the fight," "What happened afterwards," he asked, suspicious of the way she responded. "Nothing," she replied. "Your friend Pete took you and cared for you I heard," "We traid visit you," Kevin carried on, "but they wouldn't let no one in there," Stanis looked at Rikkey and she nodded without hesitation. "Do you know where those three fuckers are?" he asked. They both shook their heads. "Alright, sorry about this," he said, before leaving as quickly as he had come. Despite their answers, he still felt something had gone on that everyone was intent on hiding from him. But considering how smoothly and instantly Rikkey had answered his questions, he found it hard to harbour much faith into his suspicions. Besides, even if something had gone down, all he needed was power to get past it. Power he was soon going to gain… **** Kevin looked at Rikkey after Stanis left. He met her eyes and felt the hesitation. "Are we doing the right thing, babe?" he asked. Her forehead creased and she looked worriedly at him. She eventually shrugged and got back to her work.

He flicked the droplets of blood off his sword as he turned around, once again taking in the whole scene. No matter which way you looked at it, his side was winning. There were countless corpses littered throughout but the numbers favoured his side; the Zelaro's invasion had been a failure on all accounts. Smiling at the thought, Stanis rubbed dirt away from his visor before charging back into the heat of battle. The dark puddle the mage had created before dying had already dried up as another powerhouse had dealt with it quickly. But not quickly enough as the sight proved, several dead and sickly bent bodies floating across it. Throwing that thought to the underbelly of his mind, Stanis re-engaged the Zelaro and restarted his massacre. The more he fought, the better he fought, and the faster he cut down his enemies. His arms swung harder and he knew when to dodge and when to expect a feint as it turned out all the enemies had trained under the same style. Blood tainted and watered the ground into crimson marshlands. It stunk of sweat and iron, and the ground squelched and sucked whenever a step was made. While others bit their tongue and grit their teeth as they fought, Stanis fought at a melodic pace, his slashes akin to musical notes he layered up into a piece of music. At this point, there was only one thing he knew how to do, and that was how to kill. He hadn't been good at fighting at the start. In fact, he remembered himself shedding a few tears but nothing too pathetic. But he had tried and tried, eventually building himself up to the powerhouse he had become. Now people feared crossing him on the street, let alone standing across him in a fight. It was through power and fear he lived, and a good life it was. It was as he was fighting that it became obvious that the Aliens were smarter than he had given credit to as the ones around him began to actively avoid his sword. He stabbed and he cut. He sliced and he chopped. But it was as he slashed he felt resistance, quickly stumbling back under the pressure. By stabbing his sword into the mushy ground, he stopped himself, and then looked up. The Alien he had just slashed had stopped the strike with the bones in its forearms, even though it had also cracked them in the process. And yet, despite the pain it should have been in, despite the curses it should have been screaming, it had instead stepped forward with an insatiable bloodlust clear in its eyes. Stanis similarly stepped forward and used his shield to throw the Alien onto its arse. It was as he looked closer that he realised that the Alien actually looked to be in… pleasure. Intense pleasure at that, drool dripping down and eyes dreary. Slightly sick in the stomach, he looked up towards the sky and saw the cause of the change. Coming down were 10 mages similar to the one he had killed with a singular, different Zelaro in the centre of them. Considering the effect one mage had caused on the Aliens, it made sense that 10 mages' spells could cause the change he saw in front of his eyes. He quickly lent down to chop the head off the Alien in front of him. When one chop didn't work, Stanis tried again with more force before standing back up straight. He looked around and sucked in a deep breath. "ALL POWERHOUSES TO THE TOP!" he shouted. In response to his call, the whole battlefield began to change. People who had been blending in with their weaker counterparts all this time began to ferociously charge forward, lines of corpse-filled paths opening up behind them. After surveying the ball he had set in motion, Stanis began to head towards the transparent cylinder himself. He ran across the top of the Aliens as he did last time, shocking anyone who tried to stop him in both senses. As he reached the top, he noticed that a few people were already there. There was Serb and a few other Jaguars, as well as Moonshine, whose red hair seemed to blend in with all the blood, Caleb, who watched the descending Zelaros with a soulless calmness, and Orena, who had her face covered with bright war-paints. There were also other people rushing towards the spot, all of them more than happy at arriving later as it meant they wouldn't be at the front. Stanis looked up and felt his heart beat back to life. The 10 mages were just like the ones he had fought, in fact, they also did the same thing as the last one as they shot dark shots towards the waiting humans. The shots were, however, useless as they all clashed with Moonshine's set-up shield. But it wasn't the ten that excited Stanis, instead the single one that the ten surrounded. It had a similar figure to the ones that surrounded it, apart from the fact that it was slimmer and leaner. This also meant that the thick layer that covered its skin was thinner. It had its expressions hidden behind a white, curved mask. Not that Stanis underestimated it though for its smaller figure, after all, its mana fluctuations told a whole another story. It wasn't of Mosyte rank, instead a Laeon … Momentarily calming his burning blood, Stanis looked around at the men, women, and Jaguars who had heeded his call. "You guys deal with the 10 mages. I think they can teleport once, but just one hit through the heart should end them," he said, raising his sword once again as he saw the Aliens get in range. It was straight after he said this that he felt his body plummeting, eventually coming to a harsh stop on top of another human. He looked up in fear, before the ecstatic excitement kicked in. "You, stop me?" the masked Zelaro asked. It stood where he had stood. It had somehow teleported without any signs, coming to his spot and casting an intense repelling force within milliseconds. It cackled out laughter as it looked down at his rising body. Before any of the people who surrounded it could respond, it was gone again, standing in front of Stanis's face. But this time he was prepared; this time he was ready to kill. He created a link between it and himself but before he could finalise it, he found the ground he stood on no longer there. Instead, he fell into a deep hole that apparently never-ended, his fear growing as he plummeted deeper and faster. All of a sudden, he came out of the hallucination and back to his senses as a vicious Ice shot sent him flying through the air, his hip-armour cracked and pierced through. He once again crashed to the ground and instantly cast Layman's rush and began to run. His excitement had faded away in one second, the only thing remaining being a cold and deep desire to survive. But as he ran through the air, he suddenly saw the masked Zelaro appear in front of him. Uncaring of the carnage he was about to cause, Stanis grit his teeth in anger and released Lightning. Indiscriminately… The men and Aliens below him screamed and died under the wild force that tore through their minds. The masked Zelaro, however, merely deflected the attack with its mana shield before once again creating several chilling Icicles. Stanis finally created the link between himself and the Zelaro, who seemingly gasped in surprise. The blood-curdling laughter it let out in the next second didn't soothe Stanis. Instead, he grew into his terror as he sensed the massive output of mana it sent at him through its link; it had dropped its icicles and was now attacking him with greater ferocity than before. Forced into the corner with all his cards useless, Stanis resigned into the one thing he had hoped not to devolve himself into. He began to send all his mana through the link, his flow of mana destroying the Zelaro's and then heading towards its body. Unsurprisingly, before he even caused any damage, the masked Zelaro released another massive discharge of mana, seemingly uncaring of its mana-pool. Giving up all other methods of attack, Stanis began to Destructively mana recharge with half his mind while the other half kept up the attack. It was to his dismay that he realised that the masked Zelaro had the exact same skill, its chilling laughter only getting louder as the arms race continued. It was at this time that Stanis felt the first strike, a swift chop to his neck. Luckily, his helmet deflected the strike but he found himself unable to move due to the virtual combat he was in. Around him, several of the Alien warriors closed in and began attacking with fervour, fully aware of his immobilized state. Stanis felt his breathing speed up and could see death on the horizon as he struggled to keep his mind sane. The fear he was going through was something he hadn't felt in a long time, in fact, something he had fondly forgotten. He hadn't just shed a few tears in the past, he had fully dug a pathetic little hole for himself and thrown himself into it in those times. He remembered the helpless feeling he had lived through, the knowledge that he had as little sway over his destiny as the careless winds. It was as he was mere inches away from death, his armour cracked and chipped throughout, that he finally felt the Zelaro's output of mana shrivel up. Uncaring of the cause, he viciously attacked at full force. In the next second, their high-level fight was over. He could feel through his link that he was no longer linked to a living being, instead just a vegetable. His anger and pride rose back to their thrones the next moment. He roared like a beast and attacked like a savage as he used his injured arms to bludgeon the surrounding Aliens to death. He had been on the brink of sanity before, pushed all the way there by the Zelaro. But now he was past it…

He struck wildly without thought, tasting sweet respite every time a blow landed. If possible, he would have mauled each and every body he'd struck down but instead there was a never-ending supply of fresh blood for him to taste. While the punches he threw fell short of what his sword could have done in the time, they still hit hard enough to break bones, several of them. It was only after a few seconds of flailing about in the wind that he finally regained some control, using his bruised hand to rub the blood off his visor. Several bodies surrounded him, none of the Aliens dead but not that far off either. Feeding the pain away with a fresh injection of anger, he gnashed his teeth as he leaned down to pick up his sword. His armour had one large crack at the hip and several smaller cracks throughout. If angled well, an enemy strike could now easily penetrate his armour and injure him directly. His sword was still in good condition though, and he still had his dagger hidden away by his waist. As for his shield, he had no clue where he'd dropped it. With murder in his eyes, he looked around for the masked Zelaro. He found his target less than 10 metres away from him, the mask lying cracked on the ground, a severed head right next to it. By it stood Serb, his bronze fur burning blue. Soaked in venom, Stanis dashed towards the body, bulldozing through any who stood in his way. The second he reached it, he began mauling away at the defenceless body, building the steps to euphoria one strike at a time. Eventually, after a few moments had passed, he peaked and screamed, his voice cutting through the volume of the entire battlefield. He then stood haunted over the body lifelessly. It was only when Serb began to harshly curse that he came back to his senses. He followed Serb's gaze and looked over the hill, towards the mountain in the distance. Cresting the hill were Titans. The Titans were 6 metres tall with bright purple skin, and curved, rhino-like horns on their temples. They were all bare without the slightest of protection, and due to this, Stanis could see the sweat dribbling down the Titan's bodies as they charged towards the battlefield. They were, however, armed with weapons mid-way between spears and harpoons. And the worst of the matter was their numbers, the hill now a purple, shaking monster. Stanis surveyed the state of the current battle before making the call. "RETREAT!" he roared, fiercely waving his arms back. Plenty of people had begun doing this far before he had even called out, but the majority who were still stuck in the heat of battle felt their hearts lighten as they heard the command. Doing all they could to knock their enemies down, they turned around and joined the stampede back, flattening the ground to a pulp on the way. The Zelaro were left behind, and unluckily found themselves in front of the coming charge. They didn't try to run but instead stood their ground, after all, they knew how the Titans wouldn't let go of any prey whatsoever. Ignoring the bolt-less thunder behind him, Stanis sped up and was soon at the front of the army. Focusing what little energy he had into his knees, he leapt over Moonshine's enhanced wall and landed on the other side. His body was still injured and bleeding, and Stanis found himself instantly rushing towards the market-place in search of some kind of healing kit. He had no mana left to cast Light healing as the masked Zelaro had sucked him dry of it, and almost his life as well. It was as he was running with blurred vision and a desperate heart that he bumped into a wall-of-a-person. He found himself flying backwards onto his arse and growled loudly as he ploughed into the ground. Whipping his head up, he glared, before switching it to a stare filled with bloodlust as he realised who it was. Pete, on the other hand, looked at Stanis with a calm expression. Skint stood next to him with his palm covering his face, and Bear seemed as if he'd given up all hope in Pete. "WHERE THE FUCK WERE YOU?" Stanis demanded, shooting missiles of spit as he shouted. "Calm, drink this," Pete said while handing him a bottle. "It'll hasten your recovery, although you'll feel shit soon after," Stanis continued staring at Pete with venom clear in his eyes. Pete was the second strongest person he knew, hand in hand with Serb, and yet he hadn't even been at the battle. In fact, he'd mysteriously gone missing a while back. "Look, you're going to want to drink that and hurry to finish the fight with the Titans," Pete explained. "After all, there's something far more dangerous following behind," "What is it?" Stanis spat, before taking a sniff of the liquid, and then swigging it down. Pete shook his head in response and simultaneously ignored the anger that was bubbling over Stanis. "You'll only act stupid if you knew. Just finish the ones up front and you'll see," he said. Stanis then squinted his eyes and looked between the three. Several questions cycled through his head but only one rose over his anger. "Are those…?" He didn't have to finish the sentence as all three nodded solemnly. "But they're no longer a threat, bawss," Skint said, "No longer if wat Pete said was the truth," It was as he finished that Stanis felt the effect of the alcohol in his stomach. In fact, it wasn't actually alcohol at all, instead an impure version of mana-water. Gritting his teeth as the pain kicked in, Stanis then released the tension and wheezed heavily, before finally getting up. Without a word, the trio began to move towards the wall, followed on by Stanis who was still struggling with the impure mana-water. It was only once he had climbed the wall that he allowed himself a rest. Next to him, he could hear ear-shattering booms which turned into whistles, before finally ending as explosions far, far away. It was a while later that Stanis escaped from his spluttering coughs. His mana-pool was full again, but at the same time, he knew that the pain he had just experienced was only a part of the total punishment that would soon come his way, after all, impure mana-water was still impure mana water. Pushing the guards out of the way, Stanis leaned across the wall and looked at the new battlefield. The traps around the village had momentarily worked to slow down the Titans before the purple-skinned demons had used their sheer numbers to run them down. Stanis could see that the previously clean battlefield was now just as muddy and bloody as the last one. Despite only a few minutes having passed, corpses already covered the ground. Further away from the village, the corpses were of the Titans, usually crushed by cannonballs or pierced through by the collateral. On the other hand, directly below the walls, most of the corpses were human, obviously people who hadn't retreated in time. Looking down the wall-way, Stanis noticed Serb, Orena and other powerhouses standing still. The only people currently fighting were the cannon users and people with magic projectiles, the most deadly of the bunch being Sil and Moonshine who rained barrage after barrage onto the Titans. After a few minutes had passed, the gateway that separated the village from the Titans finally broke. Following this were roars and screams from both sides as the humans and Jaguars rushed to push the Titans back out. Stanis was about to join the excitement when he felt his heart burst. He collapsed onto the ground and felt his breath leaving his lungs, his hands struggling to even rise. The trio, who had been quite far away on the wall, was next to him in the next second. "You sure this is a good idea, baws?" Skint asked. He squatted next to Pete, while Bear stood by in an intimidating manner, scaring away anyone who came too close. "Best chance we got, besides it's too late now," Pete answered. "You only have doubts cuz you haven't seen it. There's no way the two of them could survive side-by-side, and if I were to choose between them, I'd choose good ol' Stanny dog any day. The only problem is that he's not strong enough to do so. All we're doing is helpin' him out, that's it," Pete said as he poured noxious chemical after chemical onto Stanis's body. The smell and sight quickly caught the attention of everyone on the wall, although Bear's glare quickly set them looking the other way. The only people who would have interrupted them were too enthralled in the fight to notice Stanis's body changing. When a timeless amount of time had passed, Stanis awoke with another roar. It seemed the whole battlefield had quietened under his roar, and in fact, it had, as the Titans had collectively stopped their bloodthirsty rampages and looked up. His heart was beating far too fast to think and so he found himself frantically looking around for the trio, who, coincidently, was nowhere to be seen. The impurity in the mana-water hadn't just been dirt, instead something had been hidden in it. Unable to control the energy in his body anymore, Stanis leapt from the wall and instantly cut down a Titan. It melted like butter under his touch and yet he found himself unable to enjoy the sensation, the energy in his body demanding more sacrifices like an ancient, nefarious God. It was as he indiscriminately cut through friend and foe that a loud noise in the distance attracted his attention. Soon after he had come down, the Titans and villagers had begun retreating. Both sides had seen, with varied emotions, that he was far too volatile to live long, the energies in his body far too unstable. The Titans, however, found themselves stuck between a rock and a hard place as they stopped dead in their tracks. The corpses they had left behind during the charge were crawling up onto their feet…

He recollected himself before walking any further. While what was currently in front of him wasn’t enough to send shivers down his spine, if the outside of the village was already this vicious and senseless, then he could only guess what hid within the insides… It was a few hundred metres forward that he got a close-up look of the average Haven villager. The man he saw had thin and wispy hairs on his head, almost as if a poor imitation of a mop. His cheekbones, and in fact all his bones, jutted out through his skin. He was lifeless in both spirit and mind, his eyes searching far and wide for a single stream of light. While the man wasn’t stumbling, he wasn’t very far from that either. Even from a distance, Stanis could sense the smell coming from the man: a putrid stench that well encompassed the filthy hovel he lived in. However, despite all these concerning features, the most disturbing part instead had to do with what the man was saying. It was completely incoherent, even to Stanis’s trained ears. But, even so, he could take a good guess at what the man was muttering from the tone he mumbled in and the pitch he groaned with. As Stanis moved further and further into Haven, the more common the soulless zombies became. They roamed the streets with nothing on their mind but… Well, Stanis had no clue but he was sure it was something in between food and hope. In fact, he quickly realised that was it not for the fact that he wore simple, dirty clothes, they would have most likely swarmed him already with no remorse. Either way, he was no saint and he had no charity for them and so he just kept walking. As the number of steps mounted, the scenery surrounding his walk began to change, rapidly. What had been dirty and squalid huts made out of rags and such soon became homes made out of coloured, oak wood.Clean, coloured, oak wood to add to that. Soon enough, Stanis wasn’t even sure of which one was worse: was it the weak, cattle-like humans who lived in poverty, or the well-dressed middle-class that lived in ignorance of the other, despite being just a few blocks off. “Hol’ up,” shouted a man just within Stanis’s earshot. He walked around the corner of a building and came face to face with a white-washed wall. It looked to be made out of laid stone and was at least as tall as a man, if not a little taller. In front of him was a metal gate that passed through the wall, guarded by a company of soldiers. The guards searched through everyone attempting to enter the inner-circle of the village. Their search method was extremely crude but also pragmatic, in most cases, anyway; the way they searched the girl just a few spots ahead of Stanis was borderline sexual assault, although no one, not even the girl, seemed to be very shocked or surprised. The queue Stanis found himself in quickly wound itself towards the gate, its head being chopped off each time a search was complete. From what Stanis had seen so far, it seemed that everyone was allowed in the centre. In fact, it looked as if the guards were actually tax-collectors in disguise, sucking up the money of any who passed by. “Hol’ up,” shouted the man again. Stanis looked at the man who was about to search him and inwardly sighed. From the fact that the man had been shouting hold up the entire time and due to the man’s sluggish appearance, Stanis guessed that the man had some type of mental affliction. The man rubbed his calloused hands all over Stanis, before giving up and letting him go. Pleased by the lack of difficulty, Stanis smiled as he walked into the centre. If the buildings before had been middle-class, the ones he saw now were definitely upper class. They were built with thick slabs of stone and other materials of high demand. The trip through the three sectors of the village felt surreal to Stanis. The way the segregation worked and how the classes had evolved, it all felt very clichéd to him, almost as if straight out of a book. And yet it was real, and to add to that, he couldn’t help but feel sympathetic to the village. Because, at the end of the day, despite being cruel and vicious, Haven was also the village that made the most sense to him. Of course it made perfect sense that the strongest also got the highest rewards and highest quality of life; if someone was unhappy about that, all they had to do was rise to power themselves. It wouldn’t be wrong to call Haven a village of natural order, a social structure made out of humanity’s basest of ideas. And who was he to complain, after all, he was one of the people who had benefited the most of such a system coming into play. The stone buildings only got grander as he walked forwards, easily equalling and eventually besting the best buildings in Yora. In the distance, he could see a wide building standing arrogantly against its surroundings. It didn’t have an elegant design, nor did it have ornate decorations. Instead, in the midst of all the grandness that surrounded it, the plainly built, rectangular block of shaped stone stood high and tall. Curious about the building, Stanis turned around and began heading towards it. Eventually, he was in front of the building, and a few seconds later, inside. He was instantly met with a scene of elegance. There was a receptionist area with several men and women dressed in richly-coloured clothing. One of the receptionist came to Stanis and brought him to a set of comfy seats. “So, Sir, what would you like to do today?” Confused and pleased, Stanis laughed at the way the man referred to him. Sir? He was a man currently wearing threaded, dirty clothes with messy hair splattered across his head. Of course, only Stanis found this funny as he was the only one who didn’t basely judge people by their mana-fluctuations, after all, everyone’s was low compared to his. “What can I do?” asked Stanis, raising his eyebrow simultaneously. “Register a class, leave something precious behind to our protection, commission a quest. Anything you’d like, sir!” Stanis sat there rubbing his chin for a few seconds, recollecting himself all the while. “I want to find a person. Pete… Umm, Pete something. Drunk, lanky, and pale,” The receptionist cringed at the name but quickly recovered before he attracted too much attention. “A simple task. Please follow me,” he said, before stepping outside. Stanis followed him and quickly lost himself in the grand change of scenery. Clearly Pete had done well for himself if this was the type of area he was living in. It was, however, as Stanis set his eyes on Pete’s actual house that he backtracked his thoughts. The house itself was built well out of pricy materials but it was the mess it was in that concerned Stanis, after all, dirt and cobwebs seemed to be an integral part of Pete’ house… “Inside here, sir,” said the receptionist. Seeing as to how the receptionist seemed less-than-eager to go inside, Stanis bid his goodbye and walked in himself. The doors and gates were all left unlocked and so Stanis quickly made his way in. The inside of the home was as well-furnished as the outside should have been. The furniture showed wealth and power, although all of them could have also been in better condition. Stanis heard a mix of hiccupping and snoring coming from the distance. Using them as a flare signal, Stanis closed in on the spot until he found himself outside a certain room. The door was wide-open and inside was a certain Pete, lying atop several empty bottles. “Pete?” Stanis said. Pete awoke from his deep sleep and gave a filthy smile towards Stanis. He pushed himself up and knocked several bottles while at it. “I hoped you would just leave after seeing the scene,” Pete said as he wiped the saliva off his chin and dirt off his clothes. Stanis snorted in response. “So, what were you going to do in the village again?” Pete broke out into laughter and wobbled across the room, picking up his armour which lay atop a table. “Drink a lot and wench hopefully. And when the monsters attack, run away towards your village,” “Oh, I thought you were going to take control of Haven?” Pete snorted this time. “Pfft, me? Fuck that, far too much work for what it’s worth?” “Where are the other two?” Stanis asked. “I got not a focking clue,” Pete answered while putting his chainmail armour on. “Right, then, tell me how I can quickly take control of this village.” Stanis said. “Quickly,” he added after a second. “I knew you were here for some shit like that,” Pete answered while walking towards Stanis. “Follow me, there’s some kind of thing happening in a few minutes. That’s where everyone will be, probably,”…

The soul flickered as it was cast through several tubes. The tubes weren’t physical but instead constructed purely out of mana. The tubes twisted and corded over each other like a group of snakes in a hole. While there were many of them, they all led to the same place. “It’s the first one from the group from Earth,” a worker shouted. He looked at nature’s magnum opus flickering about with disinterest. He had seen it many times before. “That’s pretty good,” another worker said. “They managed to last almost a full day,” “Right,” the first worker responded. “The top of humanity, eh? Imagine—“ “Shut up Bill, keep your dreams for another day.” Bill went into a slump at this and sat quietly on his seat. **** Time passed by and soon it had been a full two hours since the soul had arrived. “Hey Jay, the body still ain’t here,” Bill said. Jay roused from his nap and looked at the soul still flickering in the middle of the large tube. “Get the book,” he said relaxedly. While he looked calm on the outside, this was quite a stretch from the truth, after all, this wasn’t a situation that should occur. Ever. Bill rushed out of the little room they sat in and ran down the corridor. He went past the guards and into the lowermost layer. In there he skimmed through the titles of many books until he found the one. It was dusty from years of laziness, not a single day spent stretching its pages. He grabbed it and made the journey back. He rarely made this journey at all. Both he and Jay were experienced after multiple years at the job; they had initially used the books when starting out at the job but had stopped using them after a year or two. If Bill was to be honest, the fact that they had to refer to a book after years at the job was slightly terrifying. He eventually made it back and threw it at Jay, who caught it with one hand before shooting to the contents page. It was neatly titled ‘What to do in the case of a body-less soul.’, and the casual, cursive the writer wrote with made Jay’s performance a little less forced. **** Time slipped past once again and before they even knew it, it was almost time for their shifts to end. Not that they could, anyway. At least not today; at least not till this problem was fixed. Jay had spent the time skimming through the book, looking for certain signs and hoping that he wouldn’t find others. His demeanour was relaxed but also sharp now. The worst outcomes didn’t seem to be in play right now, something Jay was ever-grateful for. Bill had spent the time looking at the screens, and periodically looking down the tubes themselves. He hoped many things: that it was just a prank; that it was just an accident; that it wasn’t at all serious. But unlike Jay, he hadn’t calmed down as time had passed, instead he had devolved down into biting his nails now. “I think I got it,” Jay uttered. “Is it bad?” Bill asked. He had tried to keep his voice steady but had royally failed at that. “Thankfully not. I hope.” Bill felt the hot and stuffy air leave his body through every available orifice. “What is it then?” Bill finally asked. He had started out by asking of the severity, after all, knowing the soon-to-be status of his life and job was more important than the details. “Well, seeing as there is an absolute lack of signs accompanying the soul, there are three possibilities: One: The body was completely destroyed. Unless they’ve quietly added an absolute monster to the training ground’s roster, this is impossible. Two: Something happened on the training ground that shouldn’t have.” “And considering the fact that we haven’t had any calls yet, that’s also impossible,” Bill finished off. “Yep,” replied Jay. “Three: Someone’s using a spell to hold the body back. Now there’s a lot of spells that could cause this but the most likely one is necromancy; if someone else owns the body now, then the body won’t follow the soul.” Bill sunk into his seat at this. “So what do we do?” There was a silence as Jay thought on the question. “Send the soul back?” he finally said. “Same as I was thinking. Wash our hands of this and hopefully, we won’t be haunted by it.” Bill said with a smile. He then got up and walked to the buttons. He fired his own mana into one, causing a reaction in one of the cores. The core shot out more energy into another larger core, and this chain reaction carried on until the largest one was activated. Bill pressed down another button and twisted a joystick 180 degrees. The soul that had been in the tube was now gone, replaced by nothing. The two of them had acted well, to save their own arses that was… **** He became and everything was. Where there had been nothing, now there was. Stanis was struck still by all the information that bombarded him. But before he could put all the thoughts and ideas in order, before he could remember his own memories, before he could even catch the slightest of bearings, he was punched across the chest and thrown to the ground. He landed in an unsightly manner and immediately recoiled back: leaping to his feet and retreating backwards before whatever had just struck him got a chance to chase. The information that bombarded him was still too much, but gradually going down. Eventually, he could finally focus on the scene surrounding him. Around him was his group from training, alongside the instructor. In front of him stood Berry, unarmed as her hammer lay a few metres back. In his mouth he tasted blood. In his hands he felt his skin peeling off. His nose was definitely broken and his knuckles definitely bruised. But before he could think straight, he felt a burning order strike his head. It was like he was a puppet on strings as he followed the order to the t, scrambling across the ground towards Berry with his arms wide open. He was told to be open in order to trap Berry. But just before he reached her, just before she punched him across the face, he turned direction and rolled to her left. His mind hurt like hell as he fought back, but fight he did. The release of pain was too sweet a gift to ignore, but it was also too sweet for Stanis to stomach. So what if the order burnt through his mind? The taste of free-will was far more palatable, anyway. And yet, his taste of freewill was cut short by another order. Turn around and sprint towards her. Trip her up, it said. Before he could even think about the meaning of the order, he was already acting upon it. But just like last time, he caught his body in the last second and changed course, skidding across the rough ground before falling over. Berry, who had been ready for the last arc of the fight, the part where she lost, was lost for words as she watched Stanis fall over once more. One second he had been fighting her stupidly, sure, but also fiercely. The next he was struggling to even run straight. The fight’s little audience reacted similarly to her, confused at the change of events. But slowly, one by own, they each began to catch onto the situation. Stanis felt the pang of another order but this time fought back before he even understood it. Whatever it was, he wanted no part in something he couldn’t even think about. But unlike the last two times, this time the order fought back as well, fuelled by something mysterious behind it. But just as it fought back, so did Stanis. He aimed for whatever was fuelling the order and heard a squeal from across the field. He felt the order break, and thus cocked his head towards the sound. He saw Jen with her hand across her head, clutching her skin tightly. The other hand was pointing towards him, her lips mouthing another order. He prepared to resist. Stop her charge it said. The order this time had close to 10 times the amount of mana the previous ones had. And as Stanis resisted, this amount quickly grew to 100 times, before eventually breaking. Surprised by the sudden calm, Stanis finally opened his eyes and saw Berry running across the field, ready to smack Jen onto the ground, and grinning all the while. And in the next second this was exactly what happened. Of course, not exactly as it was a lot messier with a lot more resistance, but the notion behind the thought was still there. Jen didn’t try and order Stanis this time, instead focusing on pushing Berry back. But Stanis already had her link, and the fact that the two of them were connected till death didn’t help Jen. He bit his tongue in order to numb himself before forcing the entirety of his mana pool against Jen’s link. The screams started out as loud and shrill as a cat’s obscenities but eventually died down, until they were simply groans. Jen was lying on the ground, injured beyond anything before. The instructor hadn’t stopped the fight at the usual signs of damage, instead he had allowed it to continue until she was just a few breaths from death. Berry sat by her side, her fists thoroughly bloodied. In fact her whole body was bloody, a lot of it hers but most of it Jen’s. But worse off than her was Stanis who lay as good as dead across the ground. He had overdrafted himself by far in an attempt to hold Jen down. While it had barely worked, mainly due to Berry’s assistance, he was still out of it right now. The instructor clicked his tongue as he walked over to Jen, before gently pouring down the mana-water down her throat. His gentle touch grew into an ironclad hold as her unconscious struggles grew. He then went across to Stanis and did the same, before walking back towards the other two. He had told Jen before the fight, in fact the second she had walked out of the teleporter, that having an intelligent undead would be difficult. Dangerous even when you had one as strong as Stanis. But the arrogant girl hadn’t listened then: hopefully she would listen from now on…

"I don't know how you'll respond," Pete said as they left his house. "Respond to what?" Stanis asked. "Respond to… Naa, I don't wanna to ruin it for you," Pete answered. "Come on, what is it?" Stanis asked again. Pete shook his head. "You'll soon see, anyway. Just remember that the guys here are also strong," Stanis snorted and broke into laughter, before noticing that Pete didn't join him. "What? Compared to me? It was only you three who came to the Colosseum," Pete shook his head again and sighed. "If it had been that easy, then I would have already taken control of the village but there are, umm, complications that stop me from doing so," "And these complications link to where we're going now?" "Yeah," The next five minutes passed by quietly as neither of the two spoke. They walked towards the centre of Haven and Stanis quickly noticed how barren the streets were. There were people still here and there but compared to the other regions of the village, it was essentially empty. It was while Stanis was inspecting a particularly decorated house that he heard Pete's footsteps stop. He looked forward and saw Pete looking up. Following suit, he looked up and saw a line of light blasting up from the village. It was a few metres wide and blood-red. Following its path down into the village, Stanis realised that the light was actually coming from the village hall building he had been at earlier. Pete resumed walking and Stanis followed behind. "Is that where we're going?" "Yeah," answered Pete. After a moment of thought, Stanis linked the barren streets with the red-light. "Is that the reason no one's in the streets right now?" he asked. "Yeah, but just the stronger people. The slummies will right now be as surprised as you are," "So you knew this was going to happen?" "Why do you think I'm taking you there right now?" Pete answered with a question of his own. Within minutes, the two of them were standing in front of the village hall. Stanis noticed that the building was actually roofed, and yet the light just pierced through the rock. He looked across and noticed Pete unscrewing a bottle that lay around his waist, before taking a wide swig. Pete rubbed the alcohol off his face before looking at Stanis. "So you're actually going in like this, no weapons?" "I didn't get a chance to get a good one," Stanis answered. "Let's just go," Pete shrugged and led the way. They were met by the same receptionists as before, who recognised who Pete was, and so opened up the way to a corridor that led to god-knows-where. Pete led the way once again and soon they were walking through a hallway that dug itself into the ground. It was well-lit by all types and manners of gems and other precious stones which were embedded in the walls. Stanis inspected the stones as he passed by, eventually curious enough to tear one out of the surrounding rock. It came out easily enough and he rubbed it around in his hand. It was rough, extremely hard, and strangely warm. Applying mana to his hands, Stanis tried once more to crush the stone in his palm. He then looked at Pete with a grin, the stone still whole in his hand. "This is amazing. Would create top-notch equipment," "You're free to try, I doubt anyone here can stop you from taking it anyway," Pete said, "although I doubt you can do anything with it. It's not from Earth and no one knows how to use it," In response to what Pete said, Stanis's mind raced months back. He had been hopeless for everything but death then, and just days from having that very wish fulfilled. But then, he had walked across the beach, finding himself in a tunnel that led towards a temple, a certain temple that had changed his destiny. And that tunnel had also been filled with darkness of intensity that he couldn't find elsewhere on Earth. Was it possible? Stanis broke away from his thoughts as he realised Pete was already walking away. But before he could ask about what he had just realised, Pete raised his open hand over his shoulder. "I know, but it's a surprise," Pete repeated without even waiting for Stanis's question. Grinning, Stanis followed on. What was the point of speculating long models of theory when he could just walk forward and discover for himself? Due to this mentality, Stanis managed to keep himself from asking any more questions. It was 15 minutes later that Stanis saw the end of the tunnel in the distance. He could hear singing and chanting coming through the hole, as well as a pull of force similar to Moonshine's. This force of attraction grew as he got closer, to the point that it was exhilarating as he was just a few steps away from the exit. His blood rushed through his body and adrenaline coursed; he was ready. Stepping through, he was immediately met with a blast of heat. He was in a circular hall in which the ground below his feet burned coal-hot. The top of the hall had more in common with a cavern than a traditional hall: the roof littered with stalactites, each a couple of metres tall. The single revolving wall that encompassed the hall was embedded with gemstones even larger and brighter than the ones in the tunnel. But all of these details were of low-priority. Instead, the most eye-catching detail was the hundreds, if not thousands, of men and women chanting their hearts out. What were they chanting? Stanis had no clue, and from Pete's expression, neither did he. But both of them knew the reason why they were doing so. It was similar to how the frog-shamans had chanted during the initial test into tier-four, each adding their own little bit of power to the grand-formation. Back then, the frogs had been creating a large swamp out of the solid ground; now, well, it was obvious that whatever was going on now was a lot more malicious, a lot more nefarious. To the centre of the hall was a circle of around 20 men and women. In the middle of them was a raised platform that tore through Stanis's mind and spread fear. The air, which had been hot and relieving, was now skin-peelingly sharp. He looked closer at the platform and felt his breath rush out; the multiple hundred strands of generously given mana rushed into the platform, pulling open a rift in the middle of it. Stanis turned to face Pete with wide eyes, his fists shaking. Pete merely looked back, shaking his head like he had done multiple times before. "They aren't turning into monsters, they're actually bringing them into the world," Stanis uttered, shocked at his own words but even more shocked at the stupidity he was witnessing. "Well, it's a good thing you understand. I knew you wouldn't believe it without seeing it; now let's go," Pete said. "What?!" "What?" Pete asked. "You want to go and kill them all? You can't!" "I can," Stanis responded, squinting his eyes. "No you can't," Pete said as he stared Stanis dead in the eye. "Look there," he said while pointing to the other side of the hall. There were large, transparent, egg-like objects there, each seemingly an incubator that grew a monster inside. "Those are ones that have already been summoned. They can awaken at any time, although they would be weaker than their potential if done so. But even so, with those numbers, they will easily take you down, especially since you have no equipment whatsoever," "Why are we allowed here then?" Stanis finally asked, hesitating to leave. "What do they care? They know who I am and know that my motives don't lie opposite to theirs. Besides, they don't fear anyone with such a force behind them," After saying this, Pete began walking away. Stanis looked at the hall once more, before finally tearing himself away and hastily following Pete. "Where are you going?" he asked. "Come to Yora. I might not be able to take them down now, but given a few days, I'll have the right equipment and power to do so. Single-handily," "I was planning on doing so," Pete answered. "But first, we gotta go to the villages surrounding here. Bear and Skint have already made rounds, so let's just go to Silvermoon; I told them to meet us there once finished," Stanis shut his mouth and walked behind. Whoever Pete had been before was no longer who Pete was now. As for why he had changed, only God himself knew…

"Wait, just checking, you're against Haven?" Stanis asked as the two of them left the boundaries of the village. "I thought the village suited you well?" "Yeah, I think it would've if that was all the village had been. But becoming monsters and shit, that just ain't my thing. Besides, the women there never got me and my beard," Pete joked while stroking the beard in question. It was no longer as grand, nor well-groomed as before, with wisps of white porpoising through the sea of dark-brown. Stanis dryly coughed, before turning his head around to look at Haven. "What were you doing in there, then?" "Waiting for you, what else?" "How did you know I'd even come?" Stanis asked. "Oh, I didn't. I just knew that if you did, you'd probably wreck yourself, which in turn would force me to replan the future. So, I told them two to go on without me while I waited a few days to see if you came. If you had come after I had left, well, then no one would have no one to blame. Just bad luck then," Pete said. "Mmm. So what are those two doing right now? Rallying up an army of something?" Pete laughed and shook his head. "No way, they wouldn't be able to do that, and I wouldn't want that. No, they're just warning the villages; the coming war won't be easy and I'm going to need as many meatshields as possible if I'm going to survive this," "Course," Stanis agreed. "So, you're going to join the war?" Pete didn't answer, instead rotating his head and staring at Stanis for a second. "Those who don't fight will fall behind. Those who fall behind will die," he eventually added, sounding to Stanis more and more like a wizened old man. **** Time passed by and soon enough, slower than Stanis had hoped for, a whole day had passed. He had suggested running to their destination to Pete but he had seemed unconcerned about the time they were wasting. In fact, Pete's actions throughout the whole journey confirmed Stanis's belief that he had radically changed. No longer did Pete make a fool out of himself, or even make frequent jokes. He was now reserved and sombre, only occasionally speaking. He hummed constantly and proved to Stanis that he was an adept at the art very quickly. However, the most concerning fact wasn't to do with his new actions but his old; he no longer drank that much. Before, he would have drank till he was drunk, and then some more for good measure. Now, he only occasionally sipped at the Devil's nectar. In fact, the most horrifying aspect of Pete's changes would be the fact that Stanis found himself trusting Pete's advice and ideas. Of course, at heart, he knew what Pete's number one priority was, but at the same time, the ideas he suggested were beneficial for the both of them. All Stanis had to do to keep his bacon was to maintain his sovereignty over Pete. As for what would happen if he couldn't maintain his lead, well, that was a thought for another, later time. "That's it, Silvermoon," Pete said as a small village revealed itself over the horizon. "Are these guys the biggest competition to Haven, then?" Stanis asked. "After Yora it is. Held out quite well against Haven, but when those monsters are ready to be released, this village will be decimated," Walking into the village, Stanis quickly agreed with Pete's judgement. There were wooden stakes and other simple traps and defences around the village, but nothing worth sweating blood over. In fact, from Pete's words, it seemed the village's biggest defence was the people themselves, although Stanis heavily doubted this considering the fact that the two of them had easily been able to sneak into the village without a peep saying otherwise. "Where are we headed?" Stanis asked as he realised that Pete wasn't just randomly walking his way in. "You see that centre building over there," Pete answered as he pointed towards a medium, hut-like hall, "that's where Bear and Skint said they were," "You can contact them?!" Stanis asked, shocked. He had taken mobile phones for granted in the past. Only afterwards had he realised the true power of telecommunications. "Short distance," Pete said. "Bear's got this weird skill that lets me talk to him within a kilometre or so. Nothing like telepathy though, only simple words will go through," Their conversation stilled at this and the two of them soon entered the building and looked around. Unlike Yora's or Haven's village halls, Silvermoon's was just a large empty space without any furnishing or decorations. It was, however, filled with men and women of various sizes and shapes. The one thing they all shared in common, however, was that they were all strong. "These are the two you've been waiting for?" an aged-man asked. Stanis looked around and saw Skint and Bear standing on a raised platform, circled by a group of people, each armed to the teeth. "Yeah," Pete answered, causing the aged-man to whip his head towards him. "Who are you, beast from Haven? I've never heard of a Pete before…" "Not surprising," Pete said as he uncorked his canteen from his waist. Stanis found it strange that he was pleased to see Pete take a deep gulp; the past Pete was easier to understand than the new one. "But I'm not the focus of this; you guys are," Murmurs spread through the hall and the aged man flared his nose and squinted his eyes at Pete. "Hmmph, some dog-shit about Haven producing monsters to kill the rest of us? Do you think we're brainless?" Stanis felt an urge to join the conversation here but resisted the temptation, after all, he knew how much of a mess he could make and exactly how he would fix that mentioned mess. "Looks like it," Pete answered, surveying the hall's overall mood with a chilling gaze. "They're not human and you'll be the first targets, easy pickings to be perfectly honest," Some snorted, while others simply shouted. In fact, was it not for the fact that Pete had begun emanating a dangerous aura, it was without doubt that he would have already been under attack. Still, with the way he was moving the conversation, Stanis guessed that it was just a matter of time until anger broke reason. Before the old man could respond though, Pete added one final point. "Ask your chick. She was there in the Colosseum. She's Mosyte rank; she'll know all of you will be wiped out in a week. And with Haven to deal with before that, you'll probably be wiped out before the week is even over," Stanis followed Pete's pointed finger and caught sight of Sofia in the crowd. She wore reinforced-cloth armour which stuck to her well-endowed figure. She had a set of menacing daggers by her waist, as well as a short-sword. She wore her brown hair loose and it lay by her shoulders. The aged man turned to Sofia and waited. Noticing the clamour around her quieten, Sofia grimaced before saying, "I can't be for sure," She then paused and hesitated. "But I think he's right…" Inside the hall, the anger had been rising and about to break. But following Sofia's statement, the atmosphere cooled down into cold fear. They knew her and trusted her, after all, she was their strongest, their champion. "Fine then," croaked the aged-man. "Let's assume for a second that Silvermoon will be wiped out soon. What are you to do about it, Haven vermin? We're not just some hovel-filled village, we'll be able to survive on the run without your help," he said, basically announcing it to reaffirm the villagers' belief. "As the other villages are doing, you'll come to Yora and join the defence. That way, all of us will survive till the war and most of us will survive even past that," Pete answered. At this, the aged man broke into laughter. Cruel, mocking laughter. "Haven and Yora, I knew there was something going on between the two. So they're linked, are they? This just some ploy to force us out of the village, eh?" As the audience moved, so did Stanis. Power surged out of him and pushed the crowd back. Multiple icicles formed by his head, but before he could fire, he felt Pete grab his wrist. "Stop," he spat, "you're going to kill the people who will soon enough join the defence anyway," Stanis grit his teeth and collapsed the ice crystals around him, each of them falling onto the floor. In front of him, the crowd grew both more aggressive and scared. The power they had just witnessed, it wasn't humane, but at the same time, the way Stanis almost attacked them put them on edge, ready to react any second. "Don't make crap up," Pete said. "If Yora and Haven had a deal, with their combined forces, they would easily crush this place." While discontent with the way Pete phrased it, no one in the village could deny it either. Unlike Stanis, the trio or Sofia, the villagers had actually been here for the whole period and, in turn, witnessed Yora's rise to power. The aged man looked around the hall with worry. The truth was that he was running out of things to argue; what Pete had said was, despite vicious, also truthful. Sofia's word had helped to bring the hall's support towards Pete, after all, everyone here still cared more about their lives than Silvermoon. Knowing that he was already in a losing battle, he went towards the only other thing he could see. "Who are you," he asked while pointing at Stanis. "Threatening us in our own village, you must be eager to show your true colours," Stanis cracked his head from side to side in response. "I'm Stanis, strongest man on this globe"…

Stanis writhed on the ground. He had already circulated the entirety of his remaining mana towards his arm, in order to stop the spreading darkness, but it was a slow process. The instructor seemed in no rush to help Stanis out, instead standing still all the while watching him with great interest. After close to a minute had passed, Stanis finally stopped squirming and lay still. His teeth were clenched and sweat was dripping off of him, making a dark silhouette on the ground. "About time. You, go fight him next," the instructor said while pointing at number one. It took a second for the words to reach Stanis, and he wasn't humoured by them. He was to fight again? He was in pain from his battle with Jen and had less than a quarter of his mana on top of that. But it as if no one else had heard the cruel joke as number one walked from the instructor towards Stanis, stopping when she was only a few metres away from him. Stanis groaned and got to his knees, before standing at full height. He walked past number one to pick up his sword, before looking around for his dagger. It was after a good scan of the ground that he glared at Jen, who turned her head to the skies in response. He could feel the anger building up inside of him, and decided to turn that towards his current opponent. He took a good look at her and realised she had no weapons on her body, meaning she was most likely a magician. Considering the fact that he currently didn't even have enough mana to create a decent mana shield, this fight was most likely not going to go well. She had sharp, green eyes which were slightly slanted, raven-black hair tied in a ponytail, and creamy skin. Stanis guessed she was most likely a mix of Caucasian and Asian. "Your name?" she asked after seeing he was ready. Stanis was caught off-guard by this question. He had expected to just get into the nitty-gritty of fighting and be done with it. "Stanis," he eventually replied. "You?" "Keiko," Stanis felt his sword shaking in his hand. His body was cooling down; he was getting cold, the danger of fighting was finally getting to him. "Are y—" He shot off his feet before she could finish her question. She didn't seem surprised by his response as she instantly cast her mana-shield. He slashed at the barrier and was thrown back in response. The mana-shield wasn't as thick nor strong as Jen's, but it wasn't far off either. He felt a premonition and immediately fled from his spot. Out of the ground sprouted multiple sharp, mangled up vines. He felt the premonition once again and ran. Behind him followed sprouting vines. He ran around the dome-shaped barrier whilst also dodging the bolts of fire she was shooting. It was obvious she was taking it easy on him as she stood casually inside of her barrier, fully aware of the amount of energy he had left. In fact, anyone would be able to tell by the fact that he was running slower every second. Stanis eventually felt the pressure build up too high. He had been running around, hoping for an idea, only to find none come. His anger got the better of him at that moment as he decided that since he had been set up to lose this match, he might as well go out with a bang. He turned around and leapt over the vines that attempted to latch onto his ankles, before tumbling past the fire-bolt. Keiko seemed surprised but not by too much as she merely strengthened her barrier in response. Stanis grinned as he frontloaded the rest of his mana into the sword. Thunder clapped as he slashed at the barrier, before being thrown back. But he immediately caught his feet and ran forwards again, slashing the barrier in the same place again. Not being a fool, Keiko immediately caught onto what he was doing and formed several roots around that part of the barrier, casting a dozen fire-bolts for good measure. He dodged the first four fire-bolts but then began to get hit by the following ones, struggling to stand his ground every time he was struck. He took one last hit which threw him off his feet, the fight coming to a closure as he collapsed onto the ground, his chest heaving up and down. "Not good enough. You next," the instructor said while pointing at the 14-year-old girl. She looked half-concerned about her opponent and half enraged that she had been chosen to fight such a weakened opponent but obliged anyway. "I'm Berry. You wanna a rest?" she asked while dropping her hammer and shield onto the ground. She wore thick, layered clothing with a thick set of metal armour on top. The armour was clearly not enhanced with mana but looked tough nevertheless. Stanis shook his head and stood up. It was clear that the instructor wanted to run him into the ground. He had no mana left and was far too beaten up to actually fight, and yet he had still been chosen to fight. If this was merely a steamrolling exercise, then it was best that he just got it done and over with. "Fine," Berry said while picking her hammer back up. She charged towards Stanis without any further comment, wildly swinging her hammer just as she was an arm-span away from him. He saw the flying hammer and grimaced, almost willing himself to get hit, before thinking otherwise. He ducked below the hammer and punched her elbow. In contrary to what he had been wishing, the hammer didn't go flying out her hands. Instead, she merely corrected her form before hammering at him once more. He stepped back and deflected her strike with his sword. The second the two weapons met, Stanis knew he had fucked up. He was forcibly thrown to the ground by the force. He waited for Berry to finish him off but was surprised after a while as he felt no crushing force against his back. "Come on," she said. "Get up and fight!" Stanis got on his feet, his cheeks the colour of roses. What the fuck did she know? She hadn't been beaten senseless two times in a row. She hadn't been forced to fight a third time after that. The utter fuck did she know? His anger, which had been building up over the course of the two fights, finally came to its peak as it erupted. He madly ran towards Berry, who grinned before swiping at him. Stanis punched out at the hammer in response. He knew his arm would get crushed but all he wanted to do was drain out his anger. The hammer melted through his arm. But as it was half-way through bending his forearm, Stanis twisted and threw the hammer of balance, flinging it to the ground. Berry was surprised by this and reactively lifted her hand in defence, before realising her shield wasn't there. She had dropped it a few metres back in the knowledge that this fight would be as easy as pie. Stanis paused for half-a-second before uppercutting Berry with his good fist, throwing her off her stocky feet and onto the ground. Both his arms shook with pain but he wasn't over with just yet; he might not know any martial arts but Yils had done well to teach him the accompanying movements to the mana circulation. While they weren't ideal to be practised in battle, they were also movements that he was proficient in and could adapt for his use. Berry rolled away from Stanis in an attempt to get on her feet, but he wasn't just going to let her get away. He followed her and kicked her in the stomach as she rolled over. She vomited out air in response. Just as he was about to punch her face, she cast a skill. <Hardened skin> Stanis punched and recoiled back in response; it felt like he had just punched a slab of stone! Berry used this moment to begin her counterattack, starting with a swift kick towards his balls. Without any mana or skills to protect himself with, the fight was done with after that attack. What followed was Berry pelting Stanis's body with her hardened fists while he lay there squirming and crying. A good beating later, the instructor finally called an end to the fight. "That's enough. Now you go up," he said while pointing at the pony-tail man. The pony-tail man seemed reluctant to go and fight someone who already looked half-dead, but in the end complied. "I'm Jonny," he said as he stood a few metres away from Stanis. Stanis merely lay on the ground in response: his face bruised, his fists broken and his whole body exhausted. There was no way he could move, let alone stand up. "Stand up and fight," the instructor commanded. His words were infused with mana and would have convinced the injured Stanis to get up and fight in most instances, but not this one. He was far too spent to actually be able to fight. Seeing no response from Stanis, the instructor walked over. "I'm going to kick you," he said. While this didn't sound very threatening, the sheer intensity of mana collected in his foot would have been more than enough for most people to get up and run. But even as he kicked out, Stanis didn't make a move; he couldn't. The instructor stopped at the last moment, before taking out a canteen which he hid by his waist. "Drink this," he said while putting it to Stanis's mouth. After one sip, Stanis was already struggling to get away but the instructor firmly held onto his head, only letting go after 10 seconds had passed. Stanis collapsed over the ground after this, his eyes open and wide but in an illusioned state. Mana coursed through his body and burnt into it, tearing up any impurities and creating strength where there was none. "This is what all of you will go through," the instructor said while pointing at Stanis, who was now violently shaking. "You and you fight now," the instructor said. It was going to be a long day…

As the group of five got closer to where the flare had lit up, the noises got louder. At first, there had just been few noises travelling through the wind but for every step they took, another beast joined the cacophony. It was now the climax, the roars and screams in beat with the squelching mud. Stanis wasn't scared; he had braved similar scenarios too many times now. Nor was Okoye, Vasile, Jen or Pete; they were just as impassive as he was. The mood between them was sombre and cold in contrast to the humid air that surrounded them. Stanis watched as Pete took another swig, before wiping the droplets out of his beard. In all truth, Stanis also felt the desire to drink and numb himself for what was to come but his mind wouldn't allow it. Every time his hands lowered and accidentally slipped towards his waist, they would find themselves frozen, trembling even. Alcohol would numb him but it would also ruin his decision making. That was an acceptable trade-off in the company of Pete, Bear and Skint, three people he could overpower even when drunk. But the people he had around him now? Vasile was a strong frontline fighter, enough to give him a hard time without a doubt. Okoye was worse, her spells and skills restricting and weakening. What use was his strength if she could easily downgrade it? But the worst out of them was Jen, the silent pyscho. She didn't talk and she didn't move much, but her zombies more than made up for her inactivity. Her zombies seemed to retain some part of themselves from before death and so it made a group of them frightening, each of them strong in different ways. And on top of that, she had supportive skills to strengthen her undead, as if her strength hadn't been domineering enough. Luckily Pete was still Pete. That was the sole joy Stanis got out of the group. Pete cared, of course he did, but he acted like he didn't care about anything in the world. He was the biggest irreverent, piss-head Stanis had met and thank goodness for that; at least he was a person Stanis could vaguely understand and relate to. Stanis's thoughts were brushed away as the figures in the distance cut into his vision. "That's a lot of ‘em," Pete said, his voice almost without a hiccup. "Doesn't look easy either," Vasile said while casting a spell onto his feet. "YarrGHH—arrgh," one of Jen's zombies agreed. "Oh, there they are," Pete pointed with his canteen. The other group's flashy skills were visible even through the hordes of false-men and women that surrounded them. Stanis rubbed the handle of his sword while wondering how they were going to make their entrance. It was obvious from their mannerisms that everyone in the group had been leaders, in their own respects, back on Earth. But assigning such a role between them was impossible for the time being. No single person had enough trust or power in the group to be able to ascend above the rest of them. "Okoye, do your thing already," said Vasile. She grunted in response and took out a large container from under her robes, one far too large to fit under her robes. Inside it was the various parts of flesh she had torn off each of the false-humans they had fought. She opened the container and picked a few bloody pieces of flesh out, rubbing it between her palms while chanting. "Ya, la seto cokoma ----ra ne mato. Shauurgh," The false-humans closest to them, who were still quite a distance away, began to twist and turn, their limbs rolling up and down through their joins. Stanis could see their flesh melting away as they tried to resist, to no success, of course, as their wax-like flesh continued to melt down. A few of the false-humans who were close enough to the group to notice what was going on but far enough to not be targeted began to scream, alerting the rest of the false-humans of Stanis's group's entrance. The response was quick as 8 false-humans immediately left their positions and sprinted towards the group. Stanis tightened the grip on his sword and focused, to which several crystals began to form around him. He shot the ice crystals in conjunction with two simultaneous Blueshot spitfires, his reward for such a feat being a head full of pain. But it was worth it as 3 of the false-humans dropped out of the charge, not at all hurt enough to be injured but still distracted. He raised his sword and stepped forward to meet the first false-human, dodging its punch before chopping towards its neck. It twisted out of the way with a cat's agility before punching out once more, this time at a larger target: his chest. The punch landed and Stanis stumbled back, stabilising himself just before falling over. The false-human was worse off and watched him with snake-eyes while clutching onto its fist. Its knuckles were burnt black and its fist was still twitching. Stanis grunted before closing the distance, leaping over a sweeping kick before thrusting down. The false-human moved out of the way but was still hit by the lightning that grew and fell off the blade. The false-human recoiled in shock but not fast enough as Stanis thrust once more, this time chipping flesh off of its knee. It fell forward and Stanis followed up, chopping down at the false-human's feet. It didn't cringe in pain but instead continued to attack him with its free hands, some hitting while others being miles off. With the knowledge that he didn't have much time left, Stanis frontloaded his sword with much more mana than sensible and violently struck out at the downed biological machine. His hands were numbed frozen and burnt black by the end but it was worth it as the false-man's lopped head lay by his feet. Stanis finally let go of his breath, and looked around as he Lightly healed his hands. Jen's 5 zombies had stopped 3 of the false-humans. From one look, it was obvious that her side was barely winning but it was also clear that she cared very little about the fight as she was watching the still, blue sky. On the other side, Vasile was caught up with two false-humans. He was similar to Stanis in the fact that he was a frontline fighter, but there was a fundamental difference on what they focused on. Stanis had quite a loose focus but it was mostly on offensive strength. Whereas for Vasile, he trusted his transformed state enough for offensive abilities and instead focused his points into defence. This was the reason why, despite managing to take two on at once, he was getting nowhere with either of them as both parties did very little damage to the other side. Stanis turned around and looked at Okoye, before quickly wishing he hadn't. Her opponent was crawling across the ground towards her, only to be stopped time and time again by invisible walls. As for the reason why the false-human was crawling instead of walking, that would have to do with the fact that its legs had been melted off, allowing Stanis to see the bright bones inside. Last was Pete, who had actually far out-broken Stanis's expectations from when he had first met him. Pete was holding himself quite well against the female false-human he had found himself against. His strikes were lousy but also accurate, each of them twisting mid-way to hit their target each and every time. Despite the clumsy way in which his feet moved, his body was still upright and rarely falling or even flailing. In fact, Stanis was certain that Pete would have won by now was it not for the fact that he looked at the false-woman's breasts every half strike… After having acknowledged that none of his teammates were in immediate danger, and more importantly that his hands were healed, Stanis picked up his sword and went looking for a new target. **** Through the course of fighting the false-humans, Stanis used all his skills, apart from Scout and sense, without fail. It was 15 minutes later, with his dagger drained of darkness, with his body drained of energy due to Layman's rush, with his vessels drained of mana due to his wild spell use, that the false-human crowd began to thin. The other group of five had seen his group the moment they had come and had acknowledged them, before getting back to fighting. Not too far from where they were making a stand was a raised platform with pillars arching towards a bright light in the middle. It looked exactly like the teleporter in the nameless man's basement apart from the buttons and levers. Delirious and lost in a sense of bloodlust, Stanis cared little about the objective behind their mission. Instead, his mind was filled with macabre thoughts of striking all these damned things down. But not even his illusions could stop the fear from cutting through as he heard rustling sounds, and then a war horn. Out of the thickets stepped out 5 more false-humans. However, compared to the ones he was fighting and nearly finished with now, these ones were wearing clothes and had actual weapons by their sides. "Shit," Pete muttered from the side, his hatchet almost slipping out of his grip. Shit indeed, thought Stanis. Shit indeed…  

Following pure instinct, Stanis's hand slid towards his sword's handle. He squinted his eyes and then slightly relaxed them once he saw that none of the humans seemed to have much interest in him. Not that his tensed hand left the handle though. Beside him were the trio, just as on edge as he was. The arena they were in was massive. Stanis could see hundreds of other humans within his sight with a space of a few metres between each person/group. Out of these distant crowds, he could see two such people making their way towards him. One of them was a dainty boy with lightly coloured hair. He had no weapons visible on him but Stanis was wiser than he was months ago. In fact, perhaps it wasn't his wisdom that warned him but rather his intuition; there weren't mana fluctuations coming off the boy but Stanis could still, somehow, sense that he was hiding boundless power inside. The other one was a broad-shouldered woman with a sword around her waist. She was about two heads taller than the boy and had a crooked nose, most likely broken from fighting. She wore clothes which loosely fit her but her clear-cut figure underneath told Stanis that she was quite the strength demon. Overall, from what he could see, Stanis doubted he could beat the two. This wasn't him humbling himself or such but rather because the aura they gave off was just naturally domineering. Not that this caused him to take his hand away from his sword though. The two of them came into striking distance and stopped, the boy staring impassively while the woman smiled. Not that it was pleasant smile though: she had a scar across her cheek that went through her lips, giving her quite the crooked smile. "Welcome to Ofu!" said the woman, her voice sunshine grating against stone. "I'm Mieraka and this is Ru," she said while pointing at the boy, who gave a faint smile in response. "I'm sure you've got plenty of questions but wait till we're finished before asking. Too much of a bother repeating myself," she said. "So, you're all currently tyro Mosytes. Mosyte is your rank whereas tyro is your standing within Mosytes. Think of it like novice Mosyte. Hey, that's a pretty good analogy. Why didn't I think of it earlier?" she asked gleefully. Ru sighed in response. His lips twitched and his forehead creased as if he was thinking upon a difficult matter. He seemed to come to an answer a second later as he looked at Mieraka. "You've repeated that 21 times today. Please don't," he pleaded. She gave him a glare in return, eventually turning her attention back to Stanis and the trio. "So tyro is like novice. Medial is the next one as it is like intermediate. Adroite is the last one and it is like adept. So an adroite Mosyte is someone who is at the peak of Mosyte, close to breaking into the next rank. Following Mosyte is Laeon, and following that is Fa'bel. So the strongest people in the universe are adroite Fa'bels. You got all of that?" she asked. All 4 members of her audience nodded. Basically said, it looked like the ranking system contained 9 different ranks, all with different names instead of numbers. "Going from tyro to adroite is easy, all you have to do is power up. However, the leaps between the ranks all require special processes," she said, adding, "although you won't have to worry about that for some time." "Anyway, that's enough about that" she said. "I'm sure the other big question you have is why your attributes got lowered? That's because you've gone past the limit of the system on Earth, meaning you've been transferred to the universal one that everyone is under. Whatever stat numbers you had before, if you had those in this system, then you would be powerhouses in your own respect. Here's a little tip that I don't tell anyone else since they aren't cute enough," Stanis flushed. He hadn't been called cute before. "For the love of Ciae, can you stop crapping," Ru interrupted, "You've called every single person you've seen today cute. Why was I put with you out of all people?" Stanis felt the colour die out of cheeks at this. A simple trick, and he had fallen for it. Before Mieraka could even glare at Ru, Pete rather loudly coughed. Just as all the attention turned to him, he gave Mieraka quite the provocative wink. Now paler than before, Mieraka's scowl turned into a smile that shone on everyone but Pete. "So, you're going to have to wait here until the 1000th person from Earth reaches tyro Mosyte. We'll get going now," she said, almost scurrying away as she pushed Ru to walk away faster. "Hmph. Not my fault she's blind," added Pete while she was still in earshot. Stanis turned towards the trio and felt himself empathising with Ru despite having only met him a minute ago. "What are we gonna do?" "Your call," replied Skint, simultaneously scratching his head. Stanis looked around and pondered for a moment before coming to a decision. "Let's just sit down then. Sounds like things are only going to happen once the 1000th person arrives, so I'm guessing this is some kind of lavish waiting room." Pete grunted in agreement and the four of them sat onto the sandy ground, opening packs and feasting on the scarce resources they had. The four of them were severely drunk hours later and like this, several days passed. They checked the arena out on the second day, only to realise they weren't allowed out. Other than food and drinks, toilets and showers, the Hu offered nothing else. At first, they had thought it would be fine as they had plenty of company around them, but reality proved otherwise. All the groups in the arena were cold and focused on other matters, all just sitting around and focusing inwards. Stanis hadn't understood the reason why until he had circulated his mana. The arena was rich in mana! The trio had ways of circulating mana but it was all brutish compared to his, so Stanis quickly taught the trio, before going into inner meditation himself. It was two weeks later that the 1000th person arrived in the arena. In this time, Pete and Skint had managed to befriend a few others but not to a deep extent or such. Because they were surrounded by people with raging auras, and because the arena was simply a goldmine for mana circulation, most people simply spent the days sitting stationary. Bear joined Stanis on his secluded training, and it proved in their stats as they had more to show than either Pete or Skint did. It was as Stanis was sitting down with his eyes closed, focused on his circulation when a booming voice filled the arena. "Hello all, I am Ciae, leader of the Hu." The words caught Stanis's attention and he turned around to face an old man on the other side of the arena, coming down the colosseum seats. He had a thick, white beard which swayed from side to side as he walked. He had a bald, shiny head and wrinkles over his face, in case his beard wasn't enough for anyone to figure out that he was old. But despite his old age, Ciae walked with a back as straight as a spear, his aura domineering and sharp. He was to the humans like Stanis had been to the frogs. He was the strongest being Stanis had seen his entire life "I'm sure all of you know by now that it was us who first set up the trials on your planet," he said. His voice was loud but not sharp in the least, instead dulled around the edges with a hint of exhaustion on top. "I am pleased that so many of you are at this rank already. I have much to say but at the same time, little to say. I think all of you now understand that the universe revolves around strength," he paused. "All of you are weak." he said. He had stated it bluntly but as Stanis looked around, he could see that no one disagreed with Ciae. How could they? The aura coming off Ciae was simply a mountain compared to the pebbles they were. "But," he continued. "I can see the lust for power in your eyes," he said while looking around. "And that is good because that is the only thing that will make you strong." "Anyhow, you have done well to make it this far so quick, far faster than the rest still on Earth. And that deserves a reward. Sadly, all we know is how quickly you made it here and not how strong you are. On the other hand, I know giving you gifts based on your haste and not your strength directly contradicts what I said seconds ago, as well as the rules of the universe." Stanis could hear the weariness in Ciae's voice grow now. It was still strong and stable, but the hiding exhaustion had now become visible. "We don't have time to host a tournament. None at all. So, in order to determine what rewards you get, you will now be given a medallion with your place on how fast you made it here. Number 1-10 will get the best rewards. Then 11-100, 101-500 and finally 501-1000. Fight whoever you want and take their medallion. The only rule I have is that you do not kill anybody. And I hope you keep true to that rule," he said, all the weariness out of his body gone in that one sentence. What followed Ciae's announcement was several people coming out of the colosseum's gates, carrying medallions to hand over. Minutes later, the mood had taken a dive into freezing water as people stood with blades out, a bright, shiny number above everyone's heads. Stanis had number 317, Pete 318, Skint 319 and Bear 320. It went without saying that Stanis was looking around for the 1 digit numbers in the air as he was certain of not only his ability to get in the top 10 but also the ability of the trio to follow him. Maybe not into the top 10 but at least far higher than what they were at now. Ciae looked down at the crowd below him. "Begin,"...

The fields of mud behind them, coloured red by the blood, began to darken. Water began to rise from the soil: void-like and lifeless. Yet, in a twist of irony, it was this very water that was giving life to the corpses. Some of the Zombies had large swathes of flesh missing, while others were headless, and yet they all rose up all the same. The violet-skinned Titans shook and trembled as they saw this. Unlike the humans on the walls, they had knowledge of what was happening, and that only elevated the terror. Eventually, one of the larger Titan's barked out orders, his voice hasty and thick with worry. In front, Stanis sprinted towards them, his blade dripping blood. He could see the terrible sight in front of him but he couldn't care less; the only thing his body could do was follow his desires and, hopefully, drain the energy that fogged his mind. Stepping forward, he used one hand to swing wide, his fractured armour open to attack. Seeing this opportunity, the Titan in front of him clenched its blood-stained teeth and pierced him with its spear. The sword struck the spear, cutting through its point and then through the Titan's hand. It shrieked with its heart, the shed blood splattered over the side of its stomach. The spear tumbled onto the ground, landing with a clang. In the next second, the Titan followed, its body landing with a thud, a glimmering Ice crystal pierced through its neck. Stanis then dashed to the next Titan, clashing with it, before felling it similarly. It was as his eyes hunted for his next prey that he realised that there were only 3 Titans in front of him, all of them standing defensively. He looked past them and saw various corpses crawling to the life, separated from him by a similarly sized team of Titans. Confused, he looked to the side and noticed the actual army of Titans retreating for their lives. He opened his mouth and looked in disgust at the Titan's left behind to stop him, contempt clear in his eyes. They glared back with loathing and even indignation on their faces. Sneering, Stanis threw the sword to his left hand and raised his right palm in front of the Titan trio. One of them finally broke under the pressure and moved to attack, sick of standing still while Stanis strutted around. But before it could make contact, bolts of lightning stormed out of his palm, enveloping the trio. Their screams were drowned out by the thunder, their bodies hidden by the blinding light. When the lightning finally stopped spurting out of his palm, the trio came back into sight. At least what was left of them, torn strips of discoloured flesh… The Titans that barred the Zombies from chasing the retreating army turned around in shock and fear. The Zombies, lacking any form of emotion or thought to be shocked, used this opportunity to take the Titans down, throwing them to the ground and scrambling over them. Stanis followed closely and used his longsword to behead the Titans, simultaneously rekilling the Zombies. Despite the two teams of Titans trying to make time for the army to retreat, they had both failed. This was especially the case for the team that had tried to stop the Zombies as the Zombies had far outnumbered them, several of them opting to just run past the Titans instead of engaging in the fight. However, as Stanis murdered the zombies that had scrambled onto the Titans, the chasing ones mysteriously turned around and began to head towards him. Stanis straightened to his full height and looked at the army of Zombies now rushing towards him. None of them wore any expressions, instead their faces sagged across their skulls like cheaply made Halloween masks. The change in enemy didn't disturb Stanis, nor his voracious bloodlust. Instead he went about cutting and slicing to his desires, the fight almost too-easy, but at the same time, extremely enjoyable. It was as he cut through another that an arrow smashed into his shoulder, penetrating his skin and throwing him backwards. He instantly sat up and looked at his shoulder, confused at the lack of shaft there. Instead, his skin was stained black and seemed to be deconstructing. Casting Light healing, he looked up and noticed a volley of Dark shots coming his way. Gritting his teeth, he spun onto his sides and then pushed himself up and away from the volley. They struck the ground like missiles, bloody mud exploding out as collateral. Cocking his head towards the direction of fire, he looked past the Zombies and saw a lone woman walking in between all the muddy and broken Zombies. She had strawberry blonde hair, and piercing blue eyes that he could see despite how far away she was. And she was angry, very angry. Her face was scrunched up and her eyebrows angled, her gritted teeth on show. At that moment, Stanis recognised her and took back control of his body. He had drained quite a bit of his energy and was now in a safer spot. He no longer attacked recklessly or grinned as he shed blood, instead opting to stand there still. He ignored the attacking Zombies and took off his helmet, throwing it to his side. His cheekbones stuck out despite his chubby cheeks due to his clenched teeth. There were bags under his eyes, and his patchy, black facial hair littered his chin like that of a 16-year-old's. Most striking, however, were his eyes, fatigued but alive, exhausted but smouldering. "YOU FUCKING BITCH," he spat through his clenched teeth. She didn't respond through words but rather through her Zombies, who moved faster and attacked him with a previously unseen ferocity. Squinting his eyes further, he finally lifted his chin and looked away from her, towards the now blue sky. It was calm, and he was calm, mostly. He blinked with weights under his eyelids, before sighing. In the next moment, just before the Zombies clawed off his head, raucous lightning escaped his whole body, spreading like a disease from undead to undead, biting with a spine-snapping force. Next, he split his mind into two parts, then three, and finally four. He cast Blueshot spitfire with each of them, the bullets of blue machine-gunning down the corpses. The noise was cacophonous, repeatedly ringing with vehement vigour. Following this, glimmering crystals the size of cars began to form around him. Before the Zombies could even react, all of the crystals hurtled towards Jen, falling like asteroids onto Earth. Each of the crystals clashed with her Barrier and shattered, sending shards upon shards onto the crowds of undead. She motioned towards him, and the surviving Zombies moved to block his path. A whistle came from the sky as one of the night's stars began to fall. Stanis looked up, before gripping his sword and moving onward. Jen cast Dark shot after shot, occasionally morphing the ground into leeching dead-zones in order to slow him down. But he moved forward nevertheless, slashing through Zombie after Zombie while also nimbly dodging projectiles, occasionally getting hit and hurtling backwards. The whistling sound in the sky had only gotten louder as time had passed, the bright star becoming an awful asteroid in the sky. He used his skills extravagantly, throwing them around like a magnate with pennies. Only that they were far more than pennies, in fact, under normal conditions, he would have never fought like this. Currently, he was fighting as if there was no tomorrow, wasting all the energy he could into every strike he threw. This was also the reason why the Zombies melted in front of him; the bane of the Titans was nothing but melted butter in front of him. But each strike they did make, each shot Jen did hit caused him to cringe and heave until he was doing so religiously. Also, as he spent his energy, he began to notice a growing pain from seemingly nowhere. The more energy he spent, the more apparent it became and harder to resist it … His mind now almost lost in the pain that plagued him and the terrors that barred him from the Devil incarnate, Stanis took in one last breath. Setting his mind, he looked up one last time. The previously distant asteroid was now like a falling aeroplane in the sky. Blue flames ate away at its edges; its landing would be devastating. He released another bout of lightning and felt the biting pain increase. It was almost as if his body had been poisoned or something, just that the surplus of energy had been hiding away the true extent of damage. The Zombies around him fell but more just moved forward to take their place. Losing himself to his lust, Stanis began to swim through the blood, corpses falling to his sword all the while. Jen shot another Bomb of darkness that exploded right next to him, pushing him almost to the ground. Struggling up, he gave up trying to cut through the crowd. Trusting his armour, he sprinted through the Zombies, his limbs taking hits each second. His organs felt as if they were being torn apart but he kept running, finally reaching the mana barrier. Knowing that there was no way he could cut it open with his strength, Stanis chose to risk what he had hoped to never do with Jen; he created a link with her. Straight away, she burst a vicious amount of mana through the link. Stanis broke the link the next second, causing Jen to break her focus and let down the barrier, allowing him to slip inside. But just before this, the mana she had sent barrelled into him, causing him to collapse inside the barrier, powerless. Powerless… He could hear what sounded like laughter from her. His head hurt and his mind was already torn apart. He sensed her standing next to him, building up a Dark shot right next to his body. Closing his eyes, he made another link with her. This caught her off guard and caused her to break focus. Stanis pushed himself up and pierced her with his hidden dagger. It penetrated her skin and bit into her stomach, causing her to scream. But before the two of them could carry on, the asteroid crashed into Earth. Jen reduced the range of her shield to exclude him, and Stanis created a hastily made one in the last second. He woke up seconds later, hundreds of metres away from where he had been. He couldn't turn his head, but he could see Jen running away in the distance. She was retreating like a weakling, like a coward. Stanis wanted to shout to the villagers to chase and kill her but he found himself unable to speak. Not least because of the pain, but more so because he physically couldn't. He was stripped of almost all flesh, his bones ivory white…

Due to how far he had run ahead, there was still quite a distance between him and Jaguars. He was the only one who stood in front of the wave of Aliens, back-up seconds behind. Instead of flinching back after seeing their brother-in-arms die, the surrounding Aliens instead burst forward. In front of him, numerous, red claws attacked from every direction. "Blueshot spitfire," he said under his breath, the blood coursing through his veins, his eyes wide and bulging. Instantly, a volley of small, blue bullets shot out from his body. They hit the Aliens harder than hammers, and yet, despite the force behind each shot, all it did was push the Aliens back with bruises instead of cuts. In response to the space opened up around him, Stanis swung his sword widely, the blade chipping at some of the Aliens. However, before they could try again, he linked himself to one of the further Aliens. Its single eye bent and its face scrunched up, confused about the novel sensation. But before it figured out the link's double-edged function, he released a wave of mana from his body. In response to this, the linked Alien found its body flying towards him, knocking over several of its brothers on the way. When it finally got to the end of its trip, it discovered that it truly was the end of the road, its head plopping onto the ground. Blade still wet with blood, Stanis rushed toward the felled Aliens. They tried to get up but it was already too late as he sliced and shot Ice crystals through them. But despite his valiant effort, the fact still remained that he was a single man chopping at the sea. No matter how many he killed, he still wouldn't make an effect on the outcome of the war, after all, Aliens were coming down faster than he could ever kill. But this was fine; he wasn't a butcher of the weak, he had plenty of men to do that for him. No, he was the Champion, and the only one worth his duel would be another Champion, another as strong as him. Not that the Aliens in front of him cared about his standing though, instead all they saw was an enemy that needed to be killed. But before they could start another attack on him, a roaring Jaguar leapt into their ranks. "Flaming armour!" Serb shouted, a thick set of armour burning to life around him, scorching several of the Aliens. His bronze fur shined through the flames, almost as if his body was melting. To Stanis's other side, Niss caught up and leapt similarly into the waves of Aliens. Following that, before he could even react, more and more Jaguars ran forward, formally making a frontline against the Aliens. Stanis stepped back and grinned at the violence in front of him; this was where he thrived, this was where he lived. He scanned the Aliens for his target: an actual Zelaro. It was obvious from the Aliens in front of him that they had some relationship with the Zelaro, whatever it may be. This meant that the lofty Zelaro would also be in this battle, and while he had nothing explicitly against them, he certainly didn't have any goodwill for them either. The scene in front of him was truly alike to standing on a beach and watching the furious sea. Heads bobbed up and down like waves, the ones further back higher up and set on larger shoulders. It was while he was calmly watching the battlefield that the Yora village forces finally made contact, taking a more defensive strategy than the Jaguars had done. Finally, just as Stanis was about to give up his search and resign to massacring the lackeys, he suddenly heard a resonating cry come from the Alien's whole army. Looking at the Aliens, he noticed that they were moving faster and with greater bloodlust than before, their whole sentient personality being morphed into something far more beast-like. Knowing that something suspicious was up, he looked towards the transparent cylinder that had now stopped widening. Before, the cylinder had been crowded with Aliens eager to come down, but now, coming down was a single figure. The figure was smaller than the monsters that had arrived just before it, and it also had a far more streamlined body. Interestingly enough, as Stanis used Scout and Search to see clearer, he noticed the figure was holding a staff emanating strong currents of mana. And holding onto that staff was an arm that might as well have been a carbon-copy of the one he had used to have. Baring his teeth, Stanis dove into the lines of Aliens, quickly cutting through them as he moved towards the descending Zelaro mage. Around him, the Aliens attacked harder than before but found themselves dead quicker than before as well, Stanis already drunk on his bloodlust. It had already stained through his bones and he made no attempt to stop it, instead occasionally letting loose a wild laugh as he cut through flesh and bone. Despite all the attention he had already taken firm hold of, including the descending mage's, Stanis was, in fact, fighting quite conservatively. He knew that this battle would last for hours and would only grow in difficulty, and this was why his lightning and one-shot abilities stayed inside of him. Not that using them would change much though: with his ice crystals and equipment, he was already dominating the battlefield. The mage, finally in range, cast a spell. The ground under Stanis grew wet and murky. It darkened and instantly caught his foot, crimson liquid leaking into the darkness. The water splashed and spat as bodies fell into it, the attack indiscriminate and hurting the Aliens far more than they hurt Stanis. In fact, all this did was refocus Stanis's attention onto the mage. He cast Light healing across his foot and forcibly broke the muddy grip around his ankle. Not one to wait for results, the mage sent a volley of dark shots the second it landed. Laughing, Stanis moved forward and shot out large Ice crystals towards the Aliens in front of him. They struck with so much power that the Aliens flew backwards under their force, their bodies shielding Stanis from each of the dark shots. Before the mage could take another free shot, Stanis sprinted forward, rising with each step and eventually running across the waves of Aliens, much to their annoyance and pain. One of the larger ones saw Stanis overhead and reached out, grabbing his ankle from mid-air. Immediately, it felt an Electrical charge thunder through its body, causing it to let go and topple over, putrid smoke leaking out of its mouth. Seeing that he was now close enough, Stanis linked himself to the mage and increased the output towards it, causing an attractive force to pull him forwards. But unlike the simple Aliens, the Zelaro mage was far more trained and reacted instinctively, frontloading its pathway to Stanis with flowing mana. Stanis cringed but carried running forward nevertheless. The way the links worked was that he could create a link to anything he wanted. If it was a living being, however, it had a chance to attack back the same way he could attack it. The only difference was that based on who made the link, so him in every case, their pathway to the enemy would be wider and more efficient. While this sounded amazing, the truth was that if he fought foolishly, then he would quickly find himself unable to think, and soon after, dead. This was because if a few enemies focused their whole mana-pools on him, he would find his own mana-pool insufficient and suffer a severe injury. This was why consecutive links with strong enemies was one of the best things he could do if he wanted to kill himself in battle. Before the mage could even fight back, Stanis was already a metre away from it. But that wasn't good enough, and the mage proved it as it bit its tongue. Stanis sensed an explosive force coming from the mage and looked wide-eyed at the mad beast, only to notice the mage was disappearing into the air. Only the mage's arm was visible as the force finally exploded, throwing Stanis off his feet and into the air. He crashed into the ground and found himself spluttering blood. While his armour could protect him from all types of strikes, what it couldn't do was protect him from attacks that worked through force instead of physical attacks. Luckily, he had landed in a largely empty plot of land, the enemies around him sparse. They instantly moved in to kill him, but not before Stanis released bolts of lightning out of his hand in a fit of anger. He ignored the smoking bodies reeking up the air and moved to pick up his sword. He looked at the battlefield and slanted his eyes as he saw the mage a distance away, just a few metres away from the other humans. The humans near it had immediately backed away but not even that could protect them from the mage's wrath, it using what fuel it had left to send shot after shot into the crowd. Gritting his teeth and dousing himself in his anger, Stanis set himself alight as he streaked across the battlefield with a speed which made his previous run seem like a walk. He quickly closed onto the mage, which in turn whipped its head towards the sky and began chanting harsh sounds. Underneath the humans closest to it grew a wide, dark puddle that quickly began swallowing away at the free meals on top. Stanis merely spared a glance towards the puddle before chasing down the mage who had begun retreating. He could have easily cleared up the puddle with a bit of mana but at the same time, he had more important things to do. No longer able to escape, the mage feinted another explosion, creating a shockwave stronger than the last one. In response, Stanis wholly ignored the danger and stepped up to the challenge, standing a metre away in one second, standing with his blade pierced through its heart in the next. As the mage struggled, and inevitably crumpled down, Stanis looked at it and smiled, his lips curving cruelly. The mage had been a tyro Mosyte, the highest in the rank, and yet he had beaten it with no effort…

Serb nudged Niss off himself before rising to full height. He stood 2 metres over Stanis, and stretched his limbs for a second, before following the man out. They came out into the shimmering sun and walked towards a secluded area by the river, a bit off Serb’s cave. The two of them stood in silence while the river gushed past them, the water crashing past the smooth rocks that created the boundary. The wind carried with it the songs of the surviving birds, soothing but also tensing the moment between the two. “How was your ascension?” Stanis finally mouthed, raising his head so that he could look Serb in the eye. Serb grunted, before staring into the distance. “Alright. I’m still here and living, and that’s what matters,” Stanis couldn’t help but smile at this. “You heard that the world’s going to change again in less than a week, right?” he asked. “I already knew that. I was just waiting for you to come down to Earth before starting anything. Besides, not much we can do in advance anyway,” he said while grinning. The conversation stilled between the two, and the songbirds sang through their silence. Stanis could tell that Serb was far meeker than before, far more kept-in than before, and yet at the same time, more dependent on Stanis as well. If this conversation had taken place a month ago, there was no way Serb would have admitted to something like waiting for Stanis. Running his mind through what could have happened, he eventually came upon the one he thought was most likely, the very one that had also happened to him. “Did you meet anyone stronger than you?” he asked. Serb awoke from his distant stare and turned to Stanis. “Yeah, I did. You know when I told you of what happened when the apocalypse first started. Y’know, the Tigers and Lions?” Stanis thought back and remembered. All the big cats had gone into a similar tutorial programme to the humans. It was there Serb had awakened to his strength and power, but also where he had realised the strength of the Lions who stood above the Jaguars, and also that of the Tigers who stood at the peak of the food-chain. “The ascension programme to Mostye was one shared by all of us. Me and Niss were the only Jaguars there, compared to 5 Lions and close to 20 Tigers,” Serb carried on. “The programme started straight away after we arrived.” He paused. “It was intense, and more so since me and Niss were close to the bottom of everyone there. But she rose, and I rose even further…” Serb stared into Stanis’s eyes. “And I reached the top. I broke past them; I broke past my past limits. But then I realised how weak I was, how weak we are,” he clarified. “I don’t know how long we’ll survive anymore. This war will certainly not be the last and I can only see the pace accelerating. Have you seen any Fa’bels fight? Or even any Laeons?” Stanis shook his head. He had met people like the instructor who he suspected of being such ranks but he had never seen any fights of that level “They’re crazy,” Serb said with wide eyes. “They’re… monsters…” … Before Stanis could respond, Serb changed the focus. “But what about you, how was your ascension? Did you find anyone stronger than you?” Serb laughed after saying that. “It was okay,” Stanis said, “Yeah, a few people were stronger than me, but its fine now.” “Is it now?” Serb asked. It gave Stanis the sense that Serb knew more than he did. “What do you mean?” he asked in response, hoping to clear up what Serb knew. “You don’t seem okay,” Serb answered. The words Stanis was about to say got caught in his throat. He shook his head at Serb in the next second. “I’m fine mate, just like you, I beat all of the people who were above me!” The bronze Jaguar lifted his eyebrow but didn’t comment, putting Stanis further off. He was stronger now, right? He could easily beat Jen now, couldn’t he? He answered both questions with yes and threw himself back into comfort. “What about the other Jaguars?” Stanis asked. Serb didn’t comment on the obvious change of topic and instead answered the question, “Yeah, I told the stronger ones to go and ascend after we came back,” … ***** Stanis kicked the stones out of his way as he walked towards the village. His steps were heavier and more forceful than usual, his expression grim. What did Serb know? Stanis was a tyro Mosyte, not far off becoming a Laeon. He was in a better situation than ever before with more power than he had thought possible. He passed the gates and stormed inside, passing through the crowd like a bull. It was only minutes later that his steps grew light again, his expression more passive. Knowing that it would be at least one more day until his equipment was ready, Stanis went to find Pete for a good drink. It was with pity that he discovered that the 3 Haven boys had disappeared hours before without announcing anything. Straight after hearing this, the first thought that came to his head was that the trio had been tricking him all this time. He had no idea why they would want their enemies to meet up and join forces, but at the same time, he didn’t know much about their motives anyway. Though, even if they were playing him for a fool, Stanis had no concern or interest in the topic. Either way, he knew that all he had to do was crush the opponents in front of him; it didn’t matter to him whether the ones under his feet were monsters or humans, after all, he didn’t fight for anyone or any village, he fought for himself. **** The day soon passed by, and Stanis found himself standing outside of Rikkey’s forge the very next day. The machines inside hummed compared to how they usually roared. He couldn’t even hear any clanging or grunting accompanying the hum, much to his delight. Preparing himself mentally, Stanis opened the door and strode in. The forge was empty compared to usual, the gang of blacksmiths nowhere to be seen. Instead, across a workbench lay Rikkey, her head lying on cold metal. Trying his best to be quiet, Stanis tip-toed across the large forge in search of his equipment. Eventually, after a minute of desperate searching, Stanis gave up and walked over to the snoozing blacksmith. He nudged her awake and waited for her to get up. “Stanis?” Rikkey asked as she rubbed her eyes. She sat wordlessly on the bench for a few seconds before finally coming to. She got up while scratching the dust out of her short hair. Her muscles weren’t far off Stanis’s, and her lean, but torn, body told of the damage she undertook every day. She trudged towards a distant, unassuming box and tore the lid off. She leaned in and threw random metalwork after metalwork out, before finally stopping. She delicately took out his armour and weapons and lay them across the main table, giving Stanis’s ravenous eyes a hearty feast. Neither of them talked for a good minute as Stanis took in the wonders in front of him. The largest of the lot was his full-body armour. All of his armour was coloured matte black and almost seemed to absorb all the light that shone on it. There was a wide breastplate with multiple straps and chains holding it in place. Accompanying it was a thin chainmail that would cover all of his upperbody. Two gauntlets lay by the chainmail, both with vicious-looking spikes by their knuckles. As for his lowerbody, there was a metallic trouser-esque item. Stanis held it and realised it was actually flexible and more like leather than metal. There was also a dark, spiked pair of boots that accompanied the armour set. Pleased, Stanis next looked towards the weapons. The dagger was of higher quality than his last one but at the same time without any darkness power. It had a wide grip that led to a slim blade. The blade itself seemed to cut through all light that shone onto it, reflecting back rainbows. He then looked at the longsword, the main attraction of the entire set. It was as long as an arm and seemingly dyed black in order to fit his armour. The handle was dyed maroon and had a strong grip. The blade was slim and elegant, its neck stretched and arrogant. The edge of his blade looked far more dangerous and vicious than his dagger’s, almost begging Stanis to use it. But just like his dagger, it lacked any type of power, instead just an exquisite longsword. Unable to keep the wide grin off his face, Stanis finally turned his head to the shield. It was, for some reason, dyed white, making it stand out from the rest of his set. It was made out several, reinforced layers of metal. The brace was made out of leather and allowed a good hold onto the shield. The shield itself was rectangular apart from the bottom which slimmed itself towards a point, with a dark-coloured buckle in the middle of it. Unable to stop himself anymore, Stanis rushed to give Rikkey a bearhug. Straight afterwards, he rushed to equip himself of all the parts, grinning all the while…

I wrote with a different style today. Hope it's not too distracting. **** It had once been a grand tree, its branches colouring half the visible sky with a green tint. It had once provided shade and shelter, the splendour of the rolling forest, its grandeur far larger than the human eye could ever capture. Its roots had once been the epitome of elegance, twisting and twining like barrels of oak-coloured snakes, minus the squirming of course. But it was no more. A month before, there had been a tussle between two mammoth-sized Jaguars. They had imbued their claws with magic and their magic with vicious brutality. *ffyien* *ffyien* They had struck each other like sword against sword, their screechings louder than the clangs of a hammer. And because of this, because of how blinded by bloodlust they were, they hadn’t noticed as they had ripped apart the tree’s bark. Instead, they had fought with greater ferocity as time had passed, their collateral damage building up. Then, one of them had done the inevitable; he had missed… The snap, the creak. The shock, the horror. The two youngsters had slipped out of the way in time, their furs wet with cold sweat. On the other hand, the tree had fallen with no way to get back up, forever to be separate as a trunk and a stump. For four weeks, microbes with inflated appetites had feasted. In their wake, they left behind only the fragile husk, it apparently not to their taste. Now only the stump remained, and would remain for the next hundreds of years, staying behind to serve as a reminder. Not of some subtle moral lesson, no, it had and would stay behind to show that the Jaguars, to be one of grandest species in the cosmos, one of the only few to survive out of Earth’s original fauna, had started out in a backwater, nameless forest. But that was the future, and this was the present. Stanis brushed the build-up of dirt off the surface and sat his weary arse onto it. Whoever had cut the tree down, they clearly hadn’t done a good job as the surface was rough and jagged, far from being a luxury chair. But he swallowed down his complaints and instead waved. In the distance, chaotic lines of Jaguars marched, their bright and moving colours hypnotic to stare at. In this rabble of monsters, Stanis noted many a friend. Too many a friend, far more than he would have managed with an army of Humans. The dusking sun gave the sky a dark-orange blush, which in turn reflected off the Jaguars’ furs. The wind blew gently and the Earth gave off enough heat to not chill, but also not enough to burn. At the end of their convoy, Stanis saw the two largest Jaguars trailing behind. Not because they were injured or the such but because they wanted to see whether he would come. He wouldn’t. He had a ghost to confront, a spectre of the past to haze away from his mind. He saw them turn their heads, before cantering to the front. He would join them, eventually, surely. **** 2 days later Stanis shifted on his feet and lowered his head. He was currently on a large hill overrun by thistlebrushes. A few spikes dug into his flesh and drew blood but it was nothing excessive, nothing dangerous. Though, even if it had been, he still wouldn’t have cared, after all, below the hill was a clearing devoid of all plant life. It was, instead, filled with monsters. As if in protest of the larger than life beasts who now covered Earth, these monsters were merely chest-sized at max. They had large, spherical heads with veins throbbing out and instead of facial features, they had two fist-sized holes in their heads. Their figures were stubby and rounded, although that was quite hard to tell due to the swaying robes they wore. Funnily enough, despite their robes obviously being well-made in terms of design and defence, they were also chaotically coloured. Their army-sized camp was both quiet and disorderly. It was quiet because it simply was so. But, at the same time, it was only quiet because of the way they communicated. Instead of talking with words, they hummed with inordinately high frequencies. This was the reason why all Stanis could hear were hums and squeals similar to a dog’s whines. But while he didn’t understand a single word, or better put, tune, they hummed, he didn’t need to understand their speech in order to understand their thoughts. Just outside their grandest shelter, he saw close to ten of these Aliens arguing. From the respect they were given by the populace and the fluctuations that escaped their bodies, he knew that these were the leader figures. And from their wide and powerful actions, gestures and signals, he knew exactly what they were up to. One of the larger Aliens hummed loudly with a falling pitch, simultaneously pointing into the distance. It violently scraped its foot against the ground and paraded its three-fingered fist in a threatening manner. One of the smaller leaders slouched onto a backrest but raised its fist all the same, while another similarly scraped its foot against the floor. They all pointed in the same direction and made plans. At one point, they even began to, what seemed to Stanis, mock their adversaries; the largest leader tip-toed onto its 3-toed feet and began to move in a stiff manner, occasionally growling and at other times shouting gibberish, although those had more in common with squeaks than shouts. The direction they all pointed in was, coincidently, also the same direction the Yora village lay in… The strongest of the Aliens was a tyro Laeon, so the same power as the strongest one Stanis had killed in the last war, and they clearly showed a fervid interest in razing the Yora village down. But, at the end of the day, all of this meant nothing to Stanis. Or at least it wouldn’t have under ordinary conditions: it was just his luck that the conditions were more extraordinary than ordinary. Not too far away from Stanis stood several sentries: all of them undead and all of them belonging to a certain friend of his. He had withdrawn his fluctuations to the best of his ability and had even hidden in the midst of several prickly bushes, not so that he could escape the Aliens’ surveillance but so that he could escape the Zombies’. He had discovered this clearing an hour ago and had straight-away known that he had struck solid gold. She would follow the Alien’s charge for conquest in order to wet her necrophillic desires. She would raze both groups and leave no survivors, before cackling at her victory. He would then strike and leave her begging, leave her crying. He would show no mercy… **** Stanis followed the group from a distance. His face couldn’t mask his excitement and so he grinned like a spoilt child. Well, perhaps what he wanted was that very child-like joy, after all, what was more enjoyable than dominating your most vexing foes. He hadn’t spotted any undead in sight yet but he knew they were coming; he trusted Jen to at least take advantage of such a fight. At the corner of his vision, he could see the village. There were guards hunched up around each of the cannons, frightened of what was to come. Well, he couldn’t actually see their expressions from such a distance, nor did he have some supernatural power that enabled him to smell fear. But still, he couldsmell their fear. They had to face these terrors without an adult supervising their pathetic performance; they had to be scared…

Stanis broke out of his daze and looked around. There were 8 naked false-humans left, and now 5 more clothed ones. He looked towards the teleporter, half-pleading it to just randomly start up and take them home now. He was tired, but he had been tired before. He was bloody, but he had also been bloody before. And he was hopeless, and that was the problem. The other group of 5 couldn’t fight; Stanis knew that. While his group had come from the outside and cleaned off the stragglers, before moving in to thin out the main crowd, the other group had been fighting for their lives against multiple false-humans each the entire time. While he was tired, they were inches from death; they could not handle more. But at the same time, he was not going to be their valiant knight in their moment of danger. He knew for a fact that the rest of his group would run away at the first possibility of escape, after all, he had seen the full extent of their morals a few hours back. And who was he to judge? Before he even knew it, the wind was crashing into his face. Confused, he looked around and saw his opponent lying behind him. Ah, he thought. He had already made a run for it. His mind had clearly formulated an escape plan and his legs had acted it out, all without his consent. Not that he was going to stop now, though. And for whatever reason, the clothed false-humans didn’t seem in much of rush to stop him as they continued marching forwards at their slow pace. Perhaps they already knew that there was no escape. Stanis cursed his mind and focused outwards, finally noticing that he had actually already arrived at the teleporter. His run hadn’t been glorious, by no standard gallant, but at least it had worked. He stepped onto the raised platform, a mix of mud and blood falling off his feet. He waited. Nothing… He went wide-eyed and looked around. He stopped when he caught sight of the other group. They knew. That was why they hadn’t attempted to make a run in all this time. It was because they had already tested it out and it hadn’t worked. Then they had probably been surrounded. In response to which they had shot the flare, hoping to drag his group into the deathtrap alongside. Stanis felt a hot anger rise and burn through his body. It was like his bloodlust, but worse. Who cared that the other group were close to death with clothes and armour ripped. Who cared that they were flailing around, struggling to even move right. Who in hell cared that they had done exactly what he would have done. No, he thought, they had done it to him, and they deserved every fucking ounce of hatred he had inside of himself. He would have run towards the other group and stabbed them all dead was it not for the clothed false-human now blocking his way. It seemed the five of them had split up and gone to their own targets, one of them being him. This thought further enraged Stanis, his teeth gritted and his fists clenched for one short second. In the next, he was flying across the sky, his sweet rage fuelling him as he chopped down. The clothed false-human unsheathed a shortsword in that time and countered his strike. Stanis felt like he had just run stomach-first into a stone wall as he stumbled back, barely managing to strike his sword in the next second to block the clothed false-human’s next strike. The attack twisted his wrist back and Stanis roared, not grandly but shrilly. He was now like a kite with no wind. The anger that had been fuelling him had splintered, leaving his weary body in cold water. No longer was he angry, instead in pain and scared for his life now. He hastily wobbled back, the clothed false-human watching him with curled lips: it had all the time in the world. He looked around and took the whole scene in. The five clothed demons had gone after his group, most likely because the other group was already half dead. There were now four naked half-humans. If those naked ones were dead, the other group could rush to find a way for the teleporter to work as we distract the motherfuckers and then leave. A desperate plan set to mind, Stanis began running. At first, it was more of a violent stumble but as he kept willing himself to run, his steps became straighter and faster. The clothed false-human watched him with a falling smile, eventually a glare as it realised what he was trying to do. It chased after him that second. But it was too late. Stanis reached the other group and slashed at one of the unassuming naked ones. He slashed at another, and then again, and then once more for luck, and another for sweet joy. He felt like a thunderstorm as he indiscriminately slashed everything about, lightning exploding out in every direction with his cackles to accompany it. At one point, he even slashed the number one girl, who fell back and literally fell onto the ground at that. At the end of his rampage, none of the naked ones were dead but they were all disabled in some way or another. That was good enough for him and so he turned towards the group of five. “FIND A WAY FOR IT TO WORK!” he demanded. It wasn’t a question but an order, his voice thick with a rising anger behind it. Stanis heard the stampede-like noise and looked to the side, finally noticing his clothed false-human flying through the air, its shortsword coming down onto his head. Stanis managed to raise his sword and block it in the last second. His feet slipped and he fell over, rolling backwards before coming to a stop. He picked himself up and looked around. He couldn’t hear anything, well, he hadn’t heard much since he had entered his state of bloodlust minutes ago, but now there was no sound. His taste worked though: that he could tell from the mud going down his tongue. He coughed and spluttered it out, suddenly looking 10 years older as he looked up. The clothed false-human stood there with the group of five by its feet, not dead but fearful and awaiting death. However, it didn’t move to kill them and instead stood still watching his performance with the tiniest of eyebrows raised. It was taunting him, he realised, It was fucking taunting him. He began to warily circle the false-human. Layman’s rush was spent. As was Destructive mana recharge. As was his darkness dagger. Scout and sense was useless here, leaving him with only Light healing, Blueshot spitfire and Ice shot. Stanis doubted Blueshot spitfire or even his crystals would do much damage to this demon, but Light healing could help. He had 10 points of mana left, equivalent to 100 in the old measurement. He slowly healed his worst injuries up, all the while watching the clothed demon for movement, who in turn watched him like a zoo-goer watches a deranged monkey. The thought struck him; he smiled as he frontloaded his sword with 8 more units of mana. That was far more than he usually dared to go, his safe line being around 4 units. If he was in trouble, he might stretch it to 6 and allow himself to get burnt. But 8? Never. Never until now. The lightning sliced the air, the larger-than-man sized bolts roaring obscenities as they emerged. “GO!” shouted Stanis as he stepped forwards. He didn’t know if they heard him but that was all the attention he was willing to forfeit in this fight. The clothed false-human stepped up to his challenge, straightening its shortsword before alike stepping forward. He watched and waited with a snake’s patience, before striking out, lightning thunderclapping as blade met blade. He was pushed back but painlessly, mainly because his arms were already burnt from the lightning. He sidestepped and struck again, his blade falling fast but not fast enough as it was blocked once more. And another strike, only to be blocked like every other time. The clothed false-human took quite the damage from the accompanying lightning, sure, but more than anything, it watched with its smile plastered on its face. After all, Stanis was doing far more damage to himself than he was doing to it. His hands were crumbling away, he could feel it, but this was no time to stop and either way, he was no man to stop mid-way. Instead he cut and slashed, chopped and sliced, whacked and diced. His burnt flesh had already peeled away at this point, his arms randomly seizuring every half-second. And then a bright, sharp light blinded his vision. Stanis soundlessly screamed, as did the clothed false-human alongside. To his luck, Stanis recovered first and looked around, noticing the light coming from the teleporter. It had been lit before but now it was shining bright, the globe giving off as much light as it did in the nameless man’s basement. Stanis looked around and saw Jen standing there, gesturing him to go towards her. He briefly glanced back, noticing how the rest of the clothed false-humans were stuck in their places by her meat-shields. That was the only look he took before sprinting for his life, his feet moving with greater energy than he knew possible. But then his foot slipped and he tripped, his ankle bending in an unnatural way. He looked back in horror and saw that he hadn’t slipped, no, he had been cut. He stumbled up, before being cut again by his clothed false-human. He reached out to Jen but saw the distant look in her eyes, the rage coming back to him. He overdrew himself, finding mana where there was none to form countless ice crystals around him. They pelted the false-human like there was no tomorrow, which there highly-likely wasn’t for him if he failed. Stanis crawled towards the teleporter, doubting whether he would live through this. His feet stung and his hands had no feeling in them. That was when he saw the glint of a blade by his hand; he was still holding onto his sword?! A short tear came out as he gripped the sword by his teeth, before crawling like an eager baby to their mother. A cruel mother though, one who casually watched her child getting cut with a yawn a second away. He was a metre away from the teleporter when she nodded and walked onto it, disappearing in the light. He wanted to cry and curse but couldn’t find the energy to do either and so just pushed himself the last step, crying tears of joy at last as he felt his arms collapse. But before the sharp string could travel through his body, a blade cut through his leg and chopped it off. It moved closer, towards his back, and chopped again. He didn’t feel the sting…

The sun was being the proud jewel of the sky when Stanis finally reached the village, its rays shining light onto all beings. From first glance, he could tell that the village was far more busy and lively than before, but nevertheless gave caution to the wind as he strode in, sprinting through the crowds towards the Smithy. Some people recognised him, in fact, most people recognised him but there were a few extra people who had just returned from the front-lines that recognised him. They were shocked and confused at the same time; this was the Stanis everyone had been talking about? This one? Despite their confusion and disbelief, none challenged or stopped him in his path, instead giving him a wide berth across the streets, allowing him to reach the Smithy at lightning speed. He bolted in, Ruun sidestepping away from the gate in order to avoid being barrelled into. The Forgery was already running hot, the usual crew and Kevinworking hard. They simultaneously stopped their work when they saw Stanis charge in, a myriad of emotions going through their heads. But Stanis had no time for an explanation, instead he walked over to the foundry and told Rikkey to help. There was no room for argument in his voice… "AAAAAIIII. Duuunn tarrrk to mii wife lika that maaaan!" bellowed Kevin. All faces turned to Kevin, different expressions on each face. In particular, Rikkey had the most unsightly face she could make, clearly in contest of this wedding that they had never had, whereas Stanis had a sombre expression, half-awakened from his excitement. "He-heargh. I'll leet uuu get avay this time, buut only this tiiimmme, ‘kayy?" finished Kevin as he stumbled to the ground, falling asleep. The countless bottles next to him told Stanis exactly how Kevin had spent his morning. Stanis took one second to recompose himself before looking at Rikkey, who nodded before bursting into action. She set up the foundry and began pouring the necessary fuel into it, most of it being mana from her own body. Stanis took out the Rashkar bones and boulder-fists and organised them, taking the weakest bones first. It was as he did this that he looked over at the rest of the blacksmithing squad who were staring at him with wonder. "Calu, Valentina, get the quenching tank ready. Giang and Duong, get the forge running." Once again there was no question in his voice, instead what he had said were straight commands. And the rest of them followed, rushing to get to their places like actors in a play just minutes from starting. Stanis brought the bones and dropped them into the foundry that was already running hot. In order to break up the bones a little faster and satisfy his excitement a little quicker, he added his own mana into the fuel-mix, the foundry bursting up in flames. It was a few short seconds later, after Stanis had been clothed with the proper equipment, that he poured the mixture out into a rectangular mould. The heat from the bones knocked Rikkey aside, Stanis himself struggling to keep control. It was an unbearable, stuffy-type of heat that seemed to have the desire to devour everything. Stanis prepared a few ice crystals after he was done in order to cool the place, but even they melted in about a minute's time. And yet despite the heat, he carried on. He took the cast metal and placed it into the forge, waiting till it was cooked raw before taking it out. He placed it on the anvil and picked out a hammer from the side. This was the moment of truth… He focused inwards, the mana rushing to his fingertips and a lightning bolt being born. He didn't push himself to his limits, no, that would cause utter destruction to the Smithy if he failed. Instead, the lightning was nothing more than a glimmer, a glimmer that instantly rushed into the hammer he was holding, lightning now crackling through the hammer with little bolts jumping out like dolphins. He took one second to breathe in and stabilise his body before he struck, the hammer ringing true and loud as it hit. *KRRRDINNGGG* The sound resonated through the Smithy and echoed back, Stanis continuing his tempo and striking again. Lightning sparks jumped out during the clashes alongside the hot metal flecks, the whole scene one of danger and idiocy but also one that inspired the people around him. Stanis went in for another strike, only this time his mana flow into the hammer slightly higher than last time. By accident... He noticed this in the nick of time but had none of said time to stop himself in, instead reacting instinctively to create a strong mana shield around the anvil he was using. He also bent both of his knees inwards, ready to collapse the inevitable force that would come his way. *KRRRRRRRRRRRRANGGGG* Before it had been sparkles and glitters of lightning, now it was a fully grown bolt that escaped the clash point, Stanis buckling inwards in an attempt to collapse the force but failing royally as his body was thrown against the anvil like a ragdoll. It was lucky that he had prepared the mana shield as it absorbed and stopped the lightning bolt from doing any further damage, the only hurt one Stanis. Stanis ignored the blood flowing from his head and got up, only to see the sword cracked down the middle. And yet despite his failings, there was a wide grin plastered across his face, one which could even be considered manic. But this was no surprise, after all, it was his control that had failed this time, not the material. His smile broke out into maniac laughter as Stanis realised the potential he had from this. No longer were his ideas meant to be fleeting dreams but actual reality! Thus, it was no surprise that the people standing near him were thoroughly disconcerted by his actions. He had just violently failed, his body thrown against an anvil and bloody, the sword he had been working on cracked beyond repair, and yet he was laughing?! Stanis didn't cut short his laughter though, in fact, he didn't even look at their reactions. Instead, he was so self-absorbed by his success that he madly cheered, only ending the others' nightmare about a minute later when he regained his composure. "Rikkey, will you follow me and take me as your leader?" Rikkey was beyond star-struck at these words coming out of the blue, her brain failing to absorb the words fast enough as she stood there blankly. It was after a few seconds had passed that she nodded, her face gaunt as if she had seen a ghost but with tears rolling down at the same time. Stanis nodded before turning to the others. "Calu, will…." Another nod. "Valentina, will…." Another nod. "Giang, will…" Another nod. "Duong, will…" One last nod. Stanis allowed them one second to regain themselves before he made his move. He moved towards Rikkey and gave her the circuits he had given Orena, Caleb and Sil, before moving towards the other 4 and giving them their due. "Start practising these right now. I want to see some progress once I'm back" announced Stanis as he left, Ruun more star-stricken than not as he watched the slender man leave the Smithy. This was perfect for Stanis. There was success hiding in the Rashkar's bodies, but at the same time, he knew he would not be able to extract said success due to his desires being split. So why not give some good luck to the other blacksmiths and benefit himself at the same time? He had given them their own good luck that they could take advantage of in order to get to the top, and yet at the same time he had put his collar around their talent and drive for blacksmithing. In the future, he would have Caleb, Orena and Sil as his front-line fighters and Rikkey, Calu, Valentina, Duong and Niang as his blacksmiths who made all the equipment for his troops. Of course, he had no troops right now but he basically half-owned the Yora Village already. Once he had crossed the bridge to tier-four, he would spend more time cultivating it but that didn't mean he couldn't sow some good seeds now. It was also this thought that reminded him of his front-line fighters he had largely neglected after arriving at the village. He would have to make sure that they had made good progress in the time he had left them to their own devices, and then provide some pointers in order to speed up that growth. Stanis was zipping through the village as he thought this, ignoring the crowd but the crowd failing to ignore him. Well, how could they considering that not only was he strongest person in the village but also the one who was currently rushing through the streets with half-burnt clothes, smoky-black, wet skin and a mad grin to wrap up the whole act. But just as before, no one dared to stop him and so Stanis passed by the village quickly, his speed picking up as he ran towards the stream. This wasn't because he wanted to take a quick dive and clean himself up. No no no, it was because he was about to kill two birds with one stone…

Stanis gritted his teeth and swung down, his hands burning under the lightning. "AAA—" The scream was cut short. The man was cut short. Stanis landed by rolling across the ground. He stood up and looked behind him. There lay the man, in two pieces. There was a clean cut through his stomach, the opened ends sealed up by the lightning just as quickly as they had been sliced open. The two ends were violently shaking with the limbs moving madly as if they were performing a cultist's ritual. In all truth, the sight was nothing when compared to the stench. The cut open flesh had been burnt closed, the air around stinking of human flesh. The smell was strong and noxious, the people closest to the body gagging in response. The African man reeled in from his shock, looking around. Was this to be his cruel afterlife? Then he squinted his eyes and looked closer, noticing that this was the very scene he had died at. But before he could say anything about it, the pain kicked in. Having your body cut from stomach down turned out to be quite painful, as the African man would soon discover. The people surrounding his body suddenly recoiled in shock and fear after seeing the dead body move. The upper body was senselessly moving and soundlessly screaming. Stanis heard the noises and turned around, quickly coming down from his high. He clutched his chest and fell, his sword falling beside him and crackling loudly as it burnt the ground black. "What did I say about not killing anybody?" Ciae asked, his voice oddly calm and collected. "And how dare you go against me?" he roared. He was still standing by the Colosseum seats as an incorporeal hand formed over Stanis, picking him up before flinging him violently towards the edge of the arena. Ciae harrumphed as he sat back down. The lady beside him whispered, "You better not have killed him. Otherwise, I'll kill you now," "Hmph. Don't worry about it, I just gave him a little shock. Didn't expect him to actually kill the guy until the final moment." he responded. Ciae looked towards the arena and saw that the fighting had thinned out, people frightened by the sudden events. He cleared his throat before announcing that there were only 15 minutes left of the fight, an announcement that seemed to really get people going. Through all of this, Stanis was slumped on the ground next to the walls. He shivered and shook as he watched the procession carry on. He was in pain, sure, but not only was he already used to large bursts of pain but Ciae had also thrown him quite lightly, only making a show out of him instead of actually hurting him. With a hidden agenda, of course. That hidden agenda was what Stanis was now scared off, far too weak to even get on his knees. It was the power of the strike, no, it was the quality of power behind the strike. There had been very little power in the hand fling but the mana that made up the incorporeal hand gave Stanis Goosebumps. He spluttered and croaked, coughing out blood. He felt weak, weaker than he ever had been. Eventually, after about a minute, he managed to focus his mind on a goal. He needed healing. So, he began casting Light healing upon himself, although the effect per cast was limited due to the fact that he couldn't get his circuit into order. Either way, the pain lowered with every cast and it allowed his mind more leeway each time. After finally clearing his mind, Stanis crawled up from the ground and straightened slightly. He saw tiny wisps of smoke still coming from the man's body and walked towards him, eventually coming face to face with his violence. Stanis felt sick in the stomach, and more so in the mind, as he looked at the expression on the man's face and the way his arms moved. Hardening his mind, Stanis walked over and pushed the two parts of the man's body together, somehow the two parts merging. He then repeatedly cast Light healing over the man, ending once he saw some sense within all the pain through the man's gaze. He then bumbled around the man's chest, before noticing the medallion wasn't there. He turned around and saw the place where his sword had fallen, the ground burnt black like charcoal. But no sword… Reality had felt melancholic all this time like he was going through a bad mood. But now urgency cut through, his foolish anger once again rising as he looked around. He saw lightning in the distance and moved towards it, his hand slipping inside his cuirass and grabbing his dagger. He had been angry with the African man, sure, but now he was enraged. The tiny bolts of lightning and crackles of thunder got louder as he got closer, the climax of the moment overruling his senses which had slowly been making a comeback. He slipped past one woman, then a man, and then stabbed his dagger into the next man, only to be blocked. He looked up venomously, coming face to face with the man holding his sword. In his other hand, he held a hatchet, with which he had blocked Stanis's stab. "Oh," exclaimed Pete. "You're finally awake. I knew you'd want these so I held onto them," he quickly explained, "Wouldn't want some dimwit to steal your stuff now, would I?" Stanis glared at the man before grabbing his sword and medallion from Pete's outstretched hand. Pete dropped his hatchet from his other hand and looked at it in pain. "Wait, bossman. What's this?" he asked, before cringing in pain as he began to lose sense of his hand. That was when Stanis turned his glare to Pete's hand, noticing how the darkness had spread through the hatchet into Pete's hand. He moved and tightened his grasp around Pete's hand, manipulating darkness from Pete's bloodstream into his own. Pete was relaxed by the end of it and back to normal as he said, "Oh geez. Tha----" Stanis fiercely slapped him across his face, the type that makes even bystanders cringe in pain, before walking away. Bear came forward and looked at Pete. "I tell that stupid. You still do," he grumbled. Skint shook his head while looking at Pete. "What were you thinking? Fucking dimwit," Pete straightened his head, cleared it off the dizziness and looked at his boys. "I was right. The power, you saw. The fucking power," he said while looking at Stanis's back. "I want it…" **** Ciae opened his eyes and stood up. "Time's up, organise yourself from your numbers. 1 over there and 1000 over there," he said while pointing to the edges of the arena. Stanis walked over to the top ten and noticed on the way that the African man was still rank 27. Not much surprise there though: even after he had healed him, the man had looked scared and at least 10 years older. In truth, Stanis looked far worse than the man, even now. His posture and body language was an easy giveaway for anyone who looked, which was basically everyone as Stanis had stolen the spotlight mid-way through. He moved between number 6, a short girl who looked to be 14, and number 8, a man who had a pony-tail and stood dastardly relaxed. The girl gave him a long look as he moved next to her whereas the man merely glanced. Stanis looked at the rest of the top ten during this time. It was while he was staring that number 10 walked into place, Stanis looking over, only to be given an earnest salute. Stanis looked away as Pete grinned, rubbing his medallion warmly. Ciae jumped from the Colosseum seats and landed in front of the 1000 people. "You have all fought well, and although I'm sure the ranking isn't perfect, I doubt any of you can complain about it now, either." He closed his eyes and stood silent for a second, his face a blank canvas. He reopened his eyes. "Remember that those you just fought to get your ranking are your allies. I know many of you have other allegiances, but remember that you are Human first. The day you lose your humanity in chase of power is the day you will lose it all." "You will now be transported to your specific rewards. Good luck," he ended, walking away into one of the gates. Stanis felt the familiar sting of pain run through his body as all went black. He then opened his eyes in the next second. He tried his best to stay calm but couldn't as he looked around at the scene in front of him. It looked like Earth before the apocalypse…

The naked man looked around at the 5 people surrounding him. The easiest description Stanis could think of was that he was essentially the ideal man. The whole package was here: tall, muscular, sharp jawline and piercing eyes. But this only crept Stanis out more; why was a human attacking them? And why was he naked on top of that? As the man stood still, Stanis began creeping up on him, soundlessly flourishing his sword. Around him, Jen stood as still and dead as ever, whereas Vasile and Okoye stared into the foliage. The man seemed to have come to a decision as he snarled, before restarting his attack on Pete. <Empathetic spread> The man, who had just leapt, found himself unable to balance his landing and slipped onto the ground. Pete moved with haste, using his mace to push the man's arms out of the way before striking with his hatchet. The man snarled in response as blood leaked down his chest, before trying to get back up. Pete had already retreated out of the man's range and was sneaking in a quick drink. The man managed to get to his feet but then slipped again, veering to his right before falling back down. Stanis used this opportunity to attack, his sword crackling threats. He slashed down; the man tried to lean out of the way but failed, the sword catching him by the shoulder. Blood spurt out as the shoulder bone was revealed. Seeing that Pete was up to something and not just randomly drinking, Stanis activated Layman's rush in a bid to distract the naked man. He angled his sword and attacked time and time again, each time hitting the man, who was still wobbly on his feet, but only managing to chip off a bit of flesh each attack. Pete gestured with his hatchet and Stanis jumped out of the way. <Dragon's roar> A deep growling sound emanated from Pete's throat, catching the whole group's attention. It was an inhuman sound, and following the sound was a wave of thickly weaved fire, scorching the felled, naked man. At this time a scream came out from the foliage, to which Okoye turned around and cast a spell. <Spirit wall> A naked woman leapt from foliage with nails outstretched. She targeted Okoye but smashed into an invisible wall mid-way, tumbling down to the ground. <Transform> Vasile's body began growing, his sunken skin growing fuller and thicker, his bones growing denser and stronger, his hair growing long and luscious. The transformation was finished a few seconds later; Vasile still had a human's figure but not that anyone would mistake him for one, though. He stood over 6 foot with corded muscles tightened around his body. He had claws the length of his hands and when he grinned, the long, sharp teeth inside were revealed. He made an alien sound before pouncing towards the now-up naked woman. She defended herself with her own nails but it was clear that she was not set to win as Vasile shredded through her, each swipe taking skin, each slash taking a chunk of flesh. Okoye joined the assault, casting spell after spell in order to ensure that the woman remained weakened. <Shattered illusions> The woman screamed. <Profound weakness> The woman fell to her knees and lost the energy to resist Vasile. <Spirit chains> The woman tucked her body in an abnormal posture, almost as if her body was being tightened by invisible chains. While the naked woman was being slaughtered by Vasile and Okoye, Stanis waited for the flames to come off the naked man. From the power behind Dragon's breath, he hoped the man had died but at the same time he doubted it. "HARRRRRRRRGGHH!" the man roared, the flames flailing around as a figure cut through the cone of fire. He came at Stanis with a rage previously unseen. Stanis backed away while forming several ice crystals, shooting them the second they formed. This seemed to slow the man but not by much as they also seemed to have the effect of igniting the man's anger. Eventually, after he had shot close to 20 crystals, the man weakened and finally fell to his knees, his back showing as he sat on his forearms, coughing blood onto the ground. Most of the flames had gone out due to the Ice crystals and now Stanis could see that the man's skin had actually been burnt black by the flames. Stanis gestured to Pete, who understood, and the two of them began closing in slowly. In the case that the man still had fight left in him and attacked one of the two, the other would quickly bring him down. Luckily, this proved not to be the case and Stanis and Pete began cutting into the naked man as Vasile had already done for the woman. It was only after a few seconds of relentless slashing that the man finally stopped breathing. "About time," Vasile said. Stanis looked over and was surprised by what he saw. The tall, monstrous figure he saw in front of him was nothing like the dying old man Vasile had been minutes back. "The man was stronger," claimed Pete, simultaneously wiping the blood and grit of his hatchet. "He was," Okoye agreed. "But, not by much. Anyone got any analysis skills? I already checked and it looks like these humans don't have souls." Stanis nodded and moved towards the dead man, who now looked to be little more than mangled flesh and bones. He cast Scout and sense and waited. False man model 1 Rank: Medial Mosyte Description: A creation by the Hu. One of several models. This certain model is only found in training areas as they are too weak to be used in warfare. Since he had ascended to rank 4, all his skills had been upgraded. This included Scout and sense. While the information was still lacking, it was a lot better than it had been previously. Stanis told the others what he had learnt and waited for their responses. "One of several models and can't be used in warfare, eh?" Vasile asked. "I guess that means the other models are stronger, meaning we'll probably be fighting for our lives against those things." "Mm. I guess they don't mind us taking these," Okoye said as she moved over to the false woman model 1. She revealed a hidden blade she was hiding in her colourful robes and got to work cutting into the woman's flesh, storing them with some skill afterwards. "I guess you're right," Vasile said as he also moved to the false woman, ripping off some of her flesh before throwing it down his mouth. "Not bad. Hey Pete, hand us some of that drink," Pete chuckled while handing over his canteen. Stanis felt his heart lurch while watching this. Considering what he had seen of the other group, Stanis was almost certain that their group was the one who still held onto a few morals. As for his own group, well, he doubted they even knew the definition of such a hilarious word… "Jen, you better fight next time—" Vasile said. It sounded like he was about to add a threat to the end of it but then reconsidered. Seeing as to how Vasile's transformation didn't seem to have a time limit, it seemed Vasile hadn't been in his transformed state from the start because he hadn't known how they would have reacted to his inhuman state. Caring about other people's opinions was something, Stanis was sure off, that everyone in the arena had been apathetic about. But that was only when the people surrounding them were weak and easily swayed, not when everyone else was just as strong and arrogant as you, which was how it had been in the arena. Considering that Jen hadn't fought, the whole group was still moving around her on tip-toes. Was she strong enough for them to fear or was she weaker than them and as dead inside as she seemed? Stanis himself was concerned about this; if she wasn't going to fight, then she was nothing but dead weight. On the other hand, Jen stared blankly at Vasile in response to his comment. "Anyway," Okoye said as she hid her blade and walked away from the corpse, "We're going to have to get moving now. That guy told us to just survive, meaning it won't be as easy as this. We can argue and cut at each others' throats then." **** The deeper they walked into the rainforest, the more times they were assaulted and the worse each attack. After the second attack, even Jen had begun to fight back. If naked, human-shaped biological weapons hadn't been bad enough, Jen's walking corpses more than made up for it. She turned out to have a class similar to a necromancer's, and easiest said, her skills and spells were all gruesome and wicked. It was 5 hours into their search that a blinding light lit up in the distant skies…

The forges were a collection of over 10 smithies. Each one of the Smithies was large and Stanis could see in the distance that the furthest away ones, the ones deepest within the defensive structure, were much larger than the rest. But before he got to say anything about it, another figure he recognised came out of the closest forge. "What's the shouting ‘bout Ruun?" Kevin asked. He looked at Omar and then at Stanis. "Who're these—" He stopped. "Stanny-boi?" "Hey Kevin," Stanis said. He couldn't help but smile at the sight of the lanky man. This was a man who had no interest in power struggles, no interest in fighting- for the most part, anyway. Kevin ran forwards and shooed Ruun off. He glanced at Omar, then at Stanis who nodded. "Rikkey's going be soo excited, you should see how much she's changed. Heck, you should see how much you've changed." Stanis laughed, much to Omar's distraught as he realised Stanis was a lot more nuanced a character than just a stupid, killing monster. "Forget about me or her, look at you man. Where's the threads, where's the leather?" Kevin laughed this time, to Omar's distraught once again. This time it wasn't due to a realisation but rather just because the spluttering laugher was a rough thing to bear. "Thing's changed Stanny-dog. I always thought I'd go forwards and she follows me, y'know what I'm sayin? But naa, you just had to help her out, didn't ya? Now she's basically the jewel of the village. Y'know, she needed support, I weren't just gonna leave her to herself at that point." Stanis's attention wandered for a moment as they passed by an eye-catching smithy. It was filled with jewels of different colours and shapes. Some of these mentioned jewels were embedded in armour or on weaponry. Kevin noticed his eyes wandering and answered his unsaid questions. "Impressive, ya? I remember when they first brought this ‘ere, focking amazing I'll give you that. But I thought it was just full showy, y'now what I mean? Turns out na, ‘parently it powers the stuff up or something," Stanis raised an eyebrow but didn't let his eyes leave the jewel-encrusted armours. "Is this what Rikkey does nowadays?" "Ha, course not. She's far ‘igher than this," Stanis looked at Kevin and raised both eyebrows at him. "Na, I'm being serious," Kevin explained. "Y'know the five you blessed, all of ‘em are now at the top. And my babe Rikkey's at the top top," Stanis's interest in the jewels soon dissipated and they began to walk towards the largest forge once again. "I'll have to see that," Stanis said. "Maybe she can fix me up with something; my current threads aren't very good," Kevin looked down at Stanis's thread clothes and laughed. While this was happening, Omar was doing his best to stay unnoticed. He didn't know who Kevin was but from the way he walked around the forges, it was clear he was someone with authority. But it was when Kevin had mentioned "his babe" that Omar realised where Kevin got all his power from. Rikkey was the grandmaster, the person with the greatest forging ability in the entire village. She was valued even higher than the leadership of the village, which said quite a bit as it was the leadership who valued people in the first place! Either way, he knew that he was currently getting a once in a lifetime chance right now. Under normal conditions, he would have no chance of coming all this way into the forges and even meeting the grandmaster, but with the common sense-less Stanis, perhaps his luck was about to change. Time slowly ticked by as Kevin and Stanis kept bouncing thoughts of each other. Stanis's hidden crude side fit Kevin's normal personality well and so it made the journey far worse than should have been for Omar… **** Stanis looked up and gasped. The largest Smithy was as tall as 2 houses stacked upon each other, and several times wide. It had solid pillars holding it up, and despite being an open Smithy, the air was still stuffy and unbearably hot. It wasn't so much the grandeur that shocked Stanis, after all, the classer's hall in the village was even grander than the smithy in front of him. But the difference was that one was built by a prosperous race of people and the other had been built by a very stingy leadership group. If nothing else, the grandness of the smithy told him how highly the village valued this industry. Kevin bumped his back and Stanis came back to reality. He walked inside and was met by a whole another scene. If the outside of the smithy showed importance and grandeur, the inside proved the passion of the blacksmiths. Inside, tens of blacksmiths heaved and roared as they banged away at their respective works. All Stanis could hear were the shouting of the blacksmiths, and the clanging of their hammers, and the fizzling of the water as it was let loose on the warmed steel. He didn't even want to look at the rest of the weapons and armour after seeing the first few but his curiosity overthrew him and devoured the sight of every visible metalwork. Each and every one of them were of high quality and Stanis could even see a few similar to his grade from 2 months back. "This way," Kevin shouted at Stanis. He led Stanis past several workspaces until they reached the biggest one at the centre. Unlike the other workspaces, this one was walled off with only the roof being free. Kevin walked Stanis towards a door and let him in. Inside was the woman they had come all this way to see. The roofless room was quite spacious with plenty of room for a crowd to fit in, even with all the blacksmithing equipment lying around. And yet there were only 6 people inside. The first person Stanis recognised was Rikkey, who was incidentally in the centre of the room and at the centre of attention. All gazes were on her as she worked her magic. She still had her hair cropped short and littered with soot and dirt. Her arms were beginning to bulge out and her stocky figure didn't help much with her appearance. Stanis then looked around and recognised the others. The one currently holding another piece of metal over the coal-littered furnace was Calu, the quiet, African man Stanis had blessed. Helping Rikkey with her hammering was Giang and Duong, the two Vietnamese who Stanis had similarly blessed. And currently heating up another forge was Valentina, whose good-looking appearance shone through even the worst of grime and soot. And near the edge of the room, out other's ways, was Caleb with his arms crossed over his chest. It took him a second to recognise Stanis but when he did, he straightened his back and walked over. He was as large as ever, perhaps even larger, at 6'4. His corded, bulging muscles were like snakes strangling each other. His head was now shaven clean and he had a few new scars from the last time Stanis had seen him. "Hey," he said as he held out his hand. Stanis clasped it before letting go. "Are you tier-four now then?" he asked. It took a second for Stanis to realise he was talking about Mosyte rank. "Yeah, what about it?" "I'm going to follow the trail and challenge it," Caleb replied while pointing at the blacksmiths hard at work. Stanis followed his finger and realised that the blacksmiths were actually creating a greatsword, the exact type Caleb used. Stanis turned to look at Caleb, who in turn met his gaze head-on. Stanis searched his eyes and saw a lot more than he had seen in the past. He saw an unwavering pride; he didn't remember Caleb as being particularly prideful but he had clearly changed. He saw a dim light; the Caleb who had been a friendly and good leader now looked tired and in pain. It seemed he only wanted to reach tier-four because it was expected of him and nothing else. But Stanis also saw recognition; Caleb still knew who was on top, he knew what Stanis was. And that was enough for Stanis. "Don't worry about it, you'll finish it in a breeze. Just be sure to finish it quickly though. Not much time till another wave of enemies come," Stanis said, much to Caleb's amusement as he started chuckling. Omar watched the scene proceed in front of him like he would a movie. The people he was watching were movie-isque characters, especially Caleb who the whole village knew for better and worse. "Where're the others?" Stanis asked. "Orena's already gone to follow the trail. I thought of joining her but decided a good bit of protection wasn't overrated. Sil's…" Caleb stopped. He looked at Stanis and his expression before carrying on. "She's moved on from you. Jayesh I think it is. Either way, she's still strong but she's changed, if I was to say the least, that is," Stanis nodded. "I'll find out for myself soon enough," Kevin interrupted the two at this point. "Sorry Stanny, looks like she's really into it. Don't think she'll be out till a good bit of times passed," Caleb nodded and added, "Yeah, I heard when she's like this that it'll take some time for her to come back to reality. Best if you come back later," Stanis looked at Rikkey and the utter focus she worked with. He could tell from one look that her blacksmithing ability had far eclipsed his. He smiled and looked around the room once more. "That's fine, I'll come later. I'll just go visit the leadership now, I guess," "If you want to meet them all in one place, you better go now. I heard they're in a meeting right now,"…

Stanis woke up, his upper body instinctively straightening in a second and his arms at the ready. It was as if he had been hit by a hammer as he saw the walled room he was in, his mind blank. He sat there blinking for a few seconds, his mind racing to catch up to reality. Eventually, the memories flowed like a stream and his mind understood. It was at this time that he realised his body was covered in a small layer of sweat. He yawned and stretched his arms, trying to act casual but the idea wouldn't leave his head. His subconscious was scared of comfort… He had woken up perfectly well every day when rough sleeping, his body ready to fight. But he had been absolutely beaten by the four walls he found himself within and the soft bed he found himself on. Comfort was nothing but a veil that hid danger, after all, there was always someone gunning to kill him, right? Right? His mind seemed to be questioning the void as he got no response. "Argghhh" he roughly scratched his head. There was no point in thinking about this, only time would tell what his body and mind actually feared. He then got out of the soft bed and stood up, stilling once more as another thought struck him. Blacksmithing, there was something peculiar about it, but he just couldn't put his finger on it. What was it? He felt it was something unique to him but his subconscious gave up no grounds, forcing him to aimlessly think with what little information he had. "ARRRRRGHH". He roared this time, frustrated at his mind. He told himself to shut up and just forced himself into action, walking out of the room and into a residential area. Not to say that it was lovely or anything, rather it looked like a dump just like the rest of the world after the apocalypse, but Stanis wasn't one to complain about how decorated his surroundings were. He went to the market and followed his nose to a stall selling some type of meat dish. It was without surprise that the stall-owner instantly handed him a plate, the stall-owner only regaining colour in his face once Stanis had accepted the plate. It was fear; they still feared him. Usually such a thought wouldn't affect him but he seemed to have woken up on the wrong side of the bed, or better still, the wrong bed, as his mind seemed to be more volatile than usual. After devouring down his meal, he once again told his mind to forget it before walking towards the Smithy. His hands were itching for action, although he wasn't sure whether it was because they were excited or instead whether it was just because he just wanted to be thoughtless for a while. Ruun was at the entrance like yesterday, the large man wearing a grim countenance. This frown turned upside down when he saw Stanis, although a few parts of it were still jagged. Clearly, someone had told him who Stanis was since the grim man wouldn't have changed his attitude just after seeing his blacksmithing. Stanis's subconscious was about to take another hit from this when his active mind told it to shut up; was it his fault that he was so strong? No, it wasn't. He, however, knew that the thought had been merely silenced and not killed, but lost all energy to care nevertheless. "Hello ser" announced Ruun. "It's Stanis, Ruun" grumbled Stanis while walking in, surprised to see that the Forgery was already filled. Well, not really because there were only five people in there, but that was filled for the Forgery because it was only these five people who ever came, other than Kevin of course. "Hey Stanis," beamed Rikkey," Back for more, eh?" Stanis chuckled at this, at least there were people who still treated him the same, at least for the most part as he could see the fear and worry in her eyes. "Sure. I'll be trying to find my own feet this time so I won't need that much help" said Stanis, cracking his neck sideways while saying so, before moving onto stretching his limbs. "Calu, you help him with the process, ‘right?" "Mmm" replied Calu. Stanis nodded at the medium-statured African who weakly nodded back before grabbing himself a good bit of the Rikkey's best metal. He ran over to the forge and was about to put in the fuel when Stanis offered otherwise, "Let me do it. Need to get some practise anyway." To which Calu weakly nodded once again. There was no point in being annoyed at others treating him like a dangerous person who was far-away from their hearts when he acted like that in the first place. The reason why they were so scared was because of what he had shown them so far, if he wanted that to change, he would have to change his actions first, right? He picked up a bucket of coals and poured a quarter of that into the forge, the forge firing up in life, literally. He then took the piece of metal from Calu's hands and put it in the forge, throwing some wooden blocks over the top. What followed was Stanis going through the whole sword-making process with Calu helping him by the side. This was how most of the day passed as Stanis spent hours in the Smithy, his clothes sweaty and dirty by the end of it. However, he had also made great progress due to that. He had learnt that softer strikes were better to get the desired shape when Forging the metal. How it was better to slowly cool the metal instead of rapidly doing so during Annealing. How Grinding wasn't so much about the number of sparks as it was about your precision and control. And how Hardening and Tempering wasn't just about freezing the blade in little time, but instead about how controlled you were when you went about it. Due to having learnt all of this, the last sword he made in the day was easily able to slice through yesterday's one with little resistance. He had also been circulating mana the entire time and had made some gains in his stats as well. Stanis Volkov Age: 18 years Mana capacity: 257(regeneration is capacity/4 per hour) Level 47 (Progress to the next level is 10%) Class: Origin Strength: 89 [51 -> 53] Dexterity: 89 [50 -> 55] Constitution: 91 [52 ->55] Intelligence: 85 [38 ->40] Wisdom: 82+5[37 -> 40] Tenacity: 84[51 -> 54] Skills: Layman's Rush, Scout and Sense, Light Healing, Destructive Mana Recharge, Ice shot, Blueshot spitfire, Lightning seed During the time, he had also learnt that Calu wasn't as scared of him as he had thought, instead just innately a quiet guy. Calu was a very easy person to work around as he was always quiet, only speaking when absolutely necessary. In thanks for his help, Stanis had also helped Calu learn how to circulate mana when in the blacksmithing process. Now finished, Stanis took off his protective clothing and decided that was enough for today, the sun already setting. He had noted that Sil had come into the Forgery near midday, waiting a while before leaving once she had realised how focused Stanis was in his work. The first thing he did after getting out of the Forgery was go towards the market, grabbing a fresh pair of clothes and a bunch of bottles before leaving. It was by chance that as he was walking out of the village that he saw Sil walking in, stopping dead in her tracks as she saw him. He dropped his items and gave her a warm hug, sneaking in a kiss and retreating his head before she took the offensive. "Where are you staying?" he asked. "I'll show you" she responded while winking, walking ahead of him while shaking her hips provocatively. Stanis burst into laughter half-way through, causing a chain reaction in her as she too stopped and giggled, holding her stomach as the giggles grew into hearty laughter. It was about fifteen minutes and plenty of kisses later that they finally reached her home, a large building all for herself. It had clearly been well-furnished in the day as the decorations were still there, just duller and deader than they once were in their prime. Stanis dropped his items while Sil closed the door, instantaneously moving towards him with elegance as she hugged his back, causing him to turn around. She, however, was always a step ahead as she had already taken his lips by storm, falling under her vicious offensive. Clothes were quickly stripped off and responsibility and power were thrown out just as quickly, the two more than enjoying the other's company. One thing Stanis had discovered after first kissing Sil days ago was how she loved to be on top in the relationship. This was, of course, hard for her to do with Stanis but that clearly hadn't stopped her trying. Not that Stanis minded though, it was a cute distraction from the rest of the stuff he had to worry about. The two of them had already downed quite a few bottles and so Stanis left her house with less than half his original bottles. He made a quick break towards the market to pick a few more, the vendor smiling greasily as he realised his biggest customer was also the one who took everything for free. Stanis then walked towards the Eastern Forest, his mind relaxing in the moonlight. It was along the way that Stanis began musing about his darkness manipulation, after all, it was something he had meant to get back to. Just as he was entering the forest, he saw the shadow of a particularly large tree and simultaneously dropped all the bottles, his mind lighting up in an eureka moment. This was what his subconscious had been hinting at the entire morning, his hands itching fully with excitement as his mind tumbled down the path. What if he could merge his abilities with blacksmithing? …

He was on a hill which declined down in layers, each layer filled with fields that led to the next row. There was water cascading down between each layer, the fields filled with it. There were hundreds of green stalks growing in the fields, each of them around 1m tall. Up in the sky, there were three suns shining down. The sunlight hit the rice paddies and reflected off into the air, giving quite the surreal feel as the atmosphere was filled with small rainbows. Due to the heat and large quantity of water, the air was humid and moist. Stanis could feel sweat sticking to his bare skin seconds after arriving, the sun beating down on him all the while. Down in the fields, he could see small shapes moving from each plant to the next, cutting them down while singing. They sang in call and response, the words too garbled to hear due to how far he was. However, he could still tell from the tune of the song that the people working were happy, and in the least, pleased with the work they were doing. Stanis's mouth was agape for a few seconds. He needed a moment to take all of this in, to take a possibility of a peaceful, worry-less life in. On the top of the hill with him were the 9 other highest ranked people. A few of them responded similarly to this scene, but the vast majority viewed the sight with sour expressions. "Hoi," a voice called out from behind them. At this, Stanis broke away from his dreams and turned around, catching sight of a man a few metres away from him. Although there were no fluctuations coming off the man, Stanis could tell that he was not from Earth just from his fierce aura. The man wore layered clothing made out of a material that looked like leather. It was obvious from his figure that he was slim underneath the layers, but not muscular. At his waist lay two scabbards, one worn from age and the other without any blemish like unworn shoes. "Hoi," called out the man once again, only this time his tone harsher. He gestured for the ten to follow him. On the top of the hill were a large house and a field the size of a football pitch. The man led them towards the centre of the field, before gesturing them to stop. The man then turned around and walked towards the house, entering it and leaving the ten to their own devices on the field. It came as natural that the ten stood around awkwardly, confused as to what they were supposed to do. They were basically the ten strongest from earth but they were nothing but children compared to an established race like the Hu. In fact, from everything he knew so far, Stanis was almost certain that the Hu were basically humans who had entered the system way earlier than them. Bored after a few minutes, Stanis began looking at top ten in greater detail. Pete walked over and offered to share drinks, something Stanis had to decline. He half-thought of telling Pete not to get drunk here and now but then decided not to argue against the inevitable. All of their medallions had been stripped during the teleportation but Stanis remembered their rankings. Number one and two were both girls, nothing too interesting about their appearances. Of course, when compared to a normal person, these two had hundreds of details to describe but compared to a few other oddities in the top ten, they looked almost just like normal people. Number three was a tall, muscular Asian man. Out of the ten people here, if Stanis was to choose one person best suited to serve as a hero, he wouldn't even need a second to pick number three. He had leather clothes and wielded a steel longsword and a wooden shield. He had shortly-cropped hair, somehow not messily cut, and sharp features. Number four was a black woman wearing loose robes. She held a long, wooden staff with a bird-skull on the top. From her vibrantly coloured clothes and general feeling, Stanis guessed her class had something to do with shamanism or something similar. Number five was an emaciated man with sunken skin. The man looked as if he had just knocked on Death's door and was now waiting for it to open. He stood as if he would fall over any second, only to die from that very fall. He had pale skin and thin white hairs on his head. Number six was by far the simplest person to describe. She looked to be a 14-year-old girl. She had thick clothing and thick armour over her figure but none of that could hide her age. Number eight was the pony-tail man who looked relaxed even now. It was like he knew something that the rest of them didn't know. After about a minute, the man even stripped a few of his thicker clothes off and stood still in the sun to tan. Number nine was a blonde woman with blue eyes. She would have been Hollywood material was it not for the lifelessness in her eyes. She looked as if she had just taken drugs hours prior and had only just come down from her high, unable to bring up even the slightest positive emotion. As was usual, despite describing the others as strange-looking, it was him and Pete who took the biscuits. There was not much needed to say about Pete and why he got so much attention other than the fact that he was currently in the process of getting drunk... As for Stanis, well, if someone had asked the 1000 people from the arena as to who was the most recognisable figure, it would, without a doubt, be Stanis. He had overpowered the African man in a tyrannical manner in front of the entire arena, before getting punished by Ciae. Even now, his appearance was eye-catching. His hair was messy and his skin was discoloured with dirt and blood. But more than that was his equipment which was at a standard that no-one else on Earth had yet reached. The rankings were just numbers. The top ten were the strongest Earth had to offer but it said nothing about their ranking in between themselves. Eventually, Stanis succumbed under the pressure of all the stares he was given and the boredom from standing in the field and started drinking from his own canteen. It was fifteen minutes after his sporadic departure that the man from before came back, carrying a hand load of books with him. He threw the books in front of ten and told them to read, before going back inside the house. Since there weren't enough books for one each, Stanis was forced to share with Pete. It was straight after looking at the first page that Stanis realised that the books were similar to the type that Yils used to read. They were filled with scribbles that were saturated in mana. However, he could also tell that these books were a lot easier to read than the ones Yils had been reading, and thus didn't even cause close to a tenth of the headache they had caused. He quickly finished the first book and grumbled. A few of the others had done similar and were now meditating on what they had just read. Stanis used this opportunity to swap books and read through theirs. Soon enough, he had read through all five of the books. But instead of being pleased, his brow was furrowed. All of the books were about mana circulation, but all of them detailed features he had already learnt from Yils. In fact, he knew more features and details than said in the books. If this was the reward for reaching the top ten, it was a reward wasted on him. The man returned a few minutes later with another armful of books, dropping them in the same manner and telling the ten to read through them as well. Most of the ten were still meditating on the first armful of books but the few who weren't moved onto the second armful. Stanis was finished with these 10 minutes later, just as disappointed as he was the first round. A few minutes later, the man returned with the third armful. Instead of leaving, this time the man stood there and waited. Stanis was finished with these in similar time and similarly disappointed. All the information from the 15 books was enough to create a good circuit structure. What they didn't talk about were the movements that Yils had taught him to accompany those certain circuits. The man saw Stanis's expression and wordlessly gestured him to move over to the other side of the field. It was close 6 hours later that all nine of the others were sitting beside him, the man finally opening his mouth then. "Those will make sure that you have a clean circuit. In a week's time, all Mosytes from tyro to adroite will be allowed on Earth. We have already made the steps and paid the price so that your population moves closer together into a more compact area, however, this will not stop the adroite Mosytes from tearing through your population. At that time, you must be ready to fight their strongest. That means, in a week's time, you must be at least able to fight adroite Mosytes." At last, Stanis saw emotion on the man's face. His lips parted and he grinned, his eyebrows angled upwards creating a menacing expression…

It sounded like something serious had happened between the Jaguars and Spectres as all the Jaguars in the audience began hissing and growling at the mention of them. Stanis stayed his mouth and didn't ask, although Serb had watched him all this time and thus knew he had to explain. "How many Jaguars are there here, Stanis?" asked Serb. "About 350 or so" answered Stanis, a bit of confusion in his voice. "How many do you think were here when we first left the tutorial?" asked Serb. "…". He was met with silence as Stanis stared at him blankly. "Over double that number. Now take a wild guess why over half our whole population has died so far?" "… The spectres" answered Stanis. "I think you can now understand why we won't enter a partnership with you until the second task is completed. You see, we have a debt to pay back and you better believe that we're paying back in full!" said Serb, his lips curling at this. There were cheers from the audience in response, the Humans overwhelmed by the hatred the Jaguars had against the spectres as the sheer volume threatened to knock them over. "I'm sure you're thinking why we can't do it by ourselves, no? I think you know the answer to that already." Stanis thought back to what he knew about the Spectres but was beaten to the punch by Sil. "It's because you need mana to kill the Spectres, isn't it? That's why you wanted all the Jaguars up to tier-two, otherwise they can't even touch the Spectres" "Ha-ha. You've got competition Stanis" answered Serb, "Yes you're right. Those wretched things can't be hurt by tooth or nail, only by mana. I think you can now see the scene of what it looked like when we first arrived on Earth..." "Now, don't worry just yet" said Serb just before the silence could cut through, "I'm not asking you to kill all the Spectres for us. Instead, you weaken the Spectres, after all you have magic abilities far beyond us, and you allow us to take the kills. Eventually, we'll be trained enough to take down their whole base. So, are you up for it?" In truth, Serb was actually worried behind the confident mask he was wearing right now. The top 50 Jaguars, who were tier-two even before the Humans had come, could kill the lower tier-one wraiths but no higher. This was because the Jaguars had much higher potential and strength in physical ability than mental or in magic. If Stanis decided not to help them, after all this endeavour would take a few months in total, then Serb was already too indebted to him to force them, which he now doubted he could even do against Stanis after seeing his strength, and thus it would take close to a year to wipe out the Spectres instead of a few months. Stanis looked back towards Caleb, Orena and Sil. Caleb impassively nodded his head, whereas Orena did it enthusiastically, her body raring to fight, and Sil nodded her head respectfully. "I guess that's a yes from all of us. I just hope this doesn't take an eternity." joked Stanis. "You have my word." responded Serb, the whole crowd going wild as cheering louder than before broke out.   Stanis smiled as he walked towards the Spectre's base. His plan had currently gone well so far, their relationship with the Jaguars only improving over time. This was the final part of it, and he'd be damned if he let anyone ruin his work till now… Walking around Stanis was a group of about 30 Jaguars. These were the newly baptised Jaguars and so they incessantly chattered away around him, excited to kill their race's banes. It wasn't but 20 minutes into the walk that Stanis noticed a toxic shine in the distance, coming closer every second. Perfect. It wasn't too long of a wait until 6 Spectres entered his sight, all screeching and screaming as they saw him. These Spectres consisted off just plain, ripped shrouds with toxic light shining off them. Stanis had learnt that these were the tier-one Spectres: good practice for the Jaguars. He released some mana outside of his body as icicles began to simultaneously form, each about an arm's length long. These were mana-efficient shots for him, each icicle taking just less than 1 mana each. He loosened his control and multiple icicles stabbed into each Spectre who shrieked louder than before in pain. However, Stanis was wrong if he thought that they would simply go down from this as they moved with greater speed and drive as they tumbled towards him, claws sticking out of their shrouds. He quickly formed more icicles, just as large as before and shot them out, this time the Spectres collapsing onto the ground but not disintegrating. Stanis rubbed his brows and commanded the Jaguars to kill the downed monsters, going Jaguar by Jaguar as he told them exactly how to attack with mana. Sure, they could just attack the way they wanted but that would be at the cost of their whole mana reserve. If Serb really did want to take down all the Spectres, each Jaguar would have to kill 10s of Spectres each, meaning they had to learn how to be efficient when attacking. This was the time-consuming bit as Stanis treated these Jaguars like they were already his own troops, not cutting corners with any of them. It was a fair while later that all 6 Spectres had disintegrated into the ground, the Jaguars who had killed them gleeful. The day passed like this and Stanis managed to get all 20 of the Jaguars to a decent level of mastery, although it would be at least 2 or 3 more days like this until this batch of Jaguars were good enough to participate in the raid. That meant it would take about 2 months just to get all the baptised Jaguars up to a level where they could fight tier-one Spectres, countless more to get all the Jaguars up to a level where they could fight tier-two Spectres, and then even more for higher tier-twos… This was unacceptable! Thus, he returned with the Jaguars and immediately picked out Sil to take with him. The white-haired, lithe girl was a bit worried when she realised she was going alone with Stanis but then relaxed her guard as she realised what they were actually going to be doing. Stanis took her to a cosy cave just a minute away from the Spectres' territory and told her to circulate her mana. Due to the fact that she was magic-based in fighting style and class, she already had some ideas about this and thus could roughly circulate her mana. Roughly… Stanis held onto her shoulders and checked her circulation, only to be shocked as he realised the number of mistakes in her circuit. It wasn't as bad as Rikky's had been but it was the fact that she was dealing with more mana in the first place, meaning even the smallest mistakes could have disastrous consequences. Since he didn't want to impart Yils training onto anyone else, mainly due to mistrust, he had to create his own method to give to others. Rikky had allowed him to create a beginner version of this but Sil worked much better as a lab-rat. And thus the night flowed by and Stanis made countless changes to her circuit, testing the effect of each change by telling her to fight Spectres in-and-out. It was hectic for Sil as she was constantly pushing her limits but satisfying for Stanis as he realised the effect he was having, grinning from ear to ear whenever one of his changes worked. One thing he noticed while shaping her circuits was about her body: her skin was scarred all over. You wouldn't notice this when she was fully clothed and wearing her cold mask over her face but it was now clear to him that she had gone through a lot of shit ever since the apocalypse. Considering her beauty and intelligence, she had obviously been riding the high road back before the apocalypse, meaning she must have drastically changed to still be alive now. But then again, who hadn't suffered ever since the apocalypse?, thought Stanis while donning a melancholy smile, after all, he was now basically a connoisseur on the art of suffering. Sil, who had initially been extremely polite and respectful around Stanis ever since realising his power, had softened back to a truer version of herself after discovering his more human-side. "What are you smiling at?" asked Sil. "Nothing," responded Stanis, quickly putting over his smile a cold mask," Get back to circulating." "If you say so, Master" she replied, a soft smile on her face as she heard him "tsk" at her addressing.   It was two days into her training that Stanis finally perfected his method. She, who had initially only been able to kill about 3 Spectres with all her mana, was now able to kill more than 20, all due to the changes he had made to her mana circuit. Stanis smiled as he thought about what he had created. His smile wavered, however, as he thought of the complications this had brought alongside, after all, his feelings for Sil were no longer as simple as before…

It felt like an iron casting had just been lifted off his chest. It had been a week of hell but at least it was now over. The Stanis who now stood slouched with a mocking stump for an arm was incomparable to the "hardened-veteran" he was last week. Stanis had spent most of his time either unconscious, training or helping others. He had only had fleeting moments of combat, each and every one of the moments being easy and quite frankly, clean. This week of endless combat had been anything but that. It wasn't a one-night raid-against the Spectres, it wasn't even a week of being tortured. Instead, it was a grimy, dirty period in which he was consciously making the decision to kill more every single day. In fact, the only period of time Stanis could compare this week to was the time he had spent at the first village, right after the tutorial had ended. He had hated every moment there and he had hated every moment here. And thus it was with a light heart that Stanis sliced into the 20 or so Rashkars, prising out their Storage stones before moving onto the next corpse. Once finished, he opened all of them and was not surprised by the results: 2 tickets for a single point in an attribute. He had taken Caleb's comment about the Storage stones being next to useless offhandedly. But after harvesting more than 1000 Storage stones, he would be a fool to not see the truth. All he had gotten after opening that many were a few dozens of tickets for a single point in an attribute, and a few simple equipment like leather shoes or steel swords. That was it! It seemed the starting period really had been the golden period, a period Stanis had incidentally used to be unconscious half the time and away from Humanity the other half. Stanis rubbed his forehead with his palm, ironing down the furrowed creases. Bah! He might not have tens of skills but he doubted there was any human who could now beat him. He had thought this exact thought when the Zelaro had let go of him but the feeling was even stronger now. It wasn't just his stats, rather the intense battle experience that proved the most valuable. He had been fighting for his life the entire week, how could he not become strong after surviving such battles? Stanis checked his status: Stanis Volkov Age: 18 years Mana capacity: 308 (Mana capacity is actually 468 but 160 points are currently in use) (regeneration is capacity/4 per hour) Level 83 (Progress to the next level is 9%) Class: Origin Strength: 151 [61 -> 69] Dexterity: 146 [59 -> 65] Constitution: 140 [62 -> 69] Intelligence: 159 [45 -> 52] Wisdom: 145+5[43 -> 50] Tenacity: 161[62 -> 71] Skills: Layman's Rush, Scout and Sense, Light Healing, Destructive Mana Recharge, Ice shot, Blueshot spitfire, Lightning seed, Darkness Manipulation He had gone from level 51 to 83 in the time, his level finally catching up to his strength. But that was merely the tip of the iceberg. In a single week, his stats, which had been nearing 100, were all near 150 now. Not only that but he had also upgraded Lightning seed using Intelligence in that time. Lightning seed – Use mana to create lightning outside of your body. Upgraded: Electric transfer- Transfer mana from your body into electrical energy, before sending it into another body. The energy will return to you but strengthened. The cycle can be repeated. But more than his stats, more than his equipment, more than any of this. The thing that proved his strength the most was the battle he had just won. He had struggled to escape from the Spectre boss a few weeks back, let alone fight it. Now, he had just simultaneously killed more than 20 enemies stronger than the Spectre boss… This thought alone plastered a smile across Stanis's face. Destructive mana recharge had a 6-hour cooldown so all he could do was wait for his mana to regenerate naturally and then heal his injuries. He sat down and waited a while. It was a few minutes later that a few Jaguars came over, allowing him to ride them back. The hours quickly passed back at the Jaguar's new base. Stanis ordered them to get a few equipment from the Smithy, quite a bit of food but most importantly a lot of drinks. It was fair to say that the night passed by peacefully, if not maybe a bit raucously. **** It was with a light heart that he left the Jaguars. He wasn't worried about them and he wasn't worried about himself. When he had first experienced the hint of tier-four, it had been a fishing line tugging at him. He could feel it but in no way could he see it. Over time it had become clearer and clearer, now a bright path for him to follow. Halfway through the week, the line had stopped solidifying: he had reached the peak of tier-three by then. But he had carried on training and to no real benefit as the line's clarity had stayed stagnant. This clearly meant he was already above the normal strength of a tier-three. When he had first felt it, he had felt danger, like it was a great mountain hiding around the corner. Now he felt no danger as he followed the line; he had more than enough strength to protect himself, whoever or whatever his foe. What was most interesting, however, was the fact that he hadn't entered tier-four despite going over the top of tier-three's boundary. This showed that it was most likely as he had thought weeks ago, that the two tiers had a qualitative difference between them that you simply couldn't overcome without external help. And clearly wherever this bright line of mana led to was where he would get the external help. He was going east from the Jaguar's base. This was why he had told the Jaguars to bring him the items he wanted from the village as it would have been a waste of time for him to make a detour towards the village. And due to that, he now had a bag slung over his back with food and water in. He had also fixed up his equipment to the best of his ability but none of them looked as they once had. His dagger was probably the best off. Its blade was stained and darkened with blood but those were impossible to see due to the dark, amorphous lines that squirmed across the blade. It was also his strongest weapon but also a consumable so he rarely used it unless necessary. The way it worked was that he had to store darkness from shadows and such inside the blade. That took a good few uninterrupted seconds so it wasn't something he could do in the heat of battle. After that, he could use the darkness to contaminate another being. An example of this would be when he had stabbed the Rashkar leader with it: he had poured all of the darkness in the blade into the monster's bloodstream, which was the reason why it had quickly died as its body had become corrupt from the inside. His sword was the next best off. Due to its lightning nature, it was easy to see all the stains and specks on it. However, despite the new, unsavoury decorations, the blade was still in-tact and just as deadly as it was before. His cuirass, despite being in-tact, was not in the best of times. It had been dented and roughed up from all the punches Stanis had taken. The cuirass absorbed a lot of damage and it also bit back when Stanis poured extra mana into it. That didn't stop the Rashkars' desire to club him to death though. But the fact still stayed that it was in one-piece and functional. That was not something he could say for the rest of his armour. His leather trousers had been ripped in a thousand different places, his shoes dulled and broken. He had asked the Jaguars to bring him replacements but it was just his luck that the war with Haven had only intensified since he had left, all the equipment left in the village ripped or bloody. Therefore, Stanis had done his best to fix up his clothing with a needle and thread but his work was sub-par at best. On other matters, he had also started to go a direction with his stats. Before, he had been thinking of an all-even Status but he had rethought his strategy when fighting the Rashkars. In the end, due to his skills, he had decided on a glass-cannon build. Not exactly glass but his attack was far higher than his defence. He had put more points into Strength and Intelligence, alongside Wisdom, and less into Dexterity and Constitution. One might think such a build was foolish since not only could he not dodge but he also couldn't take any hits but Stanis thought otherwise. With his cuirass and any other armour he made in the future, focusing on defence and dodging would be a bit redundant, and even if he was hurt, he had more tenacity than anything else to take it like a wasp's sting. Stanis didn't rush while following the mana line, instead walking at a leisurely pace. He already knew that any rewards for reaching tier-four first, if there were any, would have already been taken. Perhaps, if he had rushed when he had first felt the tug from the mana line, maybe then he could have had a chance but not now after weeks of training. Instead, he took it as some downtime from all the fighting. He knew he would soon be thrown back into the heat of battle whether he wanted to or not, so what was the point in rushing through the already-fleeting peaceful times? **** "Baws, you sure this the way?" "Course it is you fool, ain't it Bear?" Bear thought to himself before performing a knowing nod, much to Skint's agitation. "Bawss, you know he can barely feel it better than I do!" Bear felt insulted at this, the bear-like man growling before rebutting Skint's claim. "That not true. I feel much better than you ever do," "Shut up, you fools," said Pete, his head shaking at the fools he found himself with. Good-natured fools, but fools nevertheless. "You can feel it and that's what matters. We're going the right direction, ok?" Bear thought for a second before doing an eager nod. Skint reluctantly nodded. Pete scowled at the two, before going back to grooming his beard. There were not many things Pete cared for as strongly as his beard. Apart from his drink, of course. It was a mighty beard that stretched from cheek to cheek like a second, mangled smile. It had to be groomed well, of course it did, after all, he had a certain image to keep up. Lady-killer Pete they used to call him, and now he was stuck with these two idiots. Pete rubbed his beard for a bit before taking off the canteen that hung around his waist. It was dinged and the sheen had been scraped off the metal but what it hid inside was well worth hiding. He uncorked the top and took a mighty gulp, simultaneously feeling all his worries and fatigue drain away. "Bawwss, you wouldn't mind giving me," said Skint. "Us," added Bear, doing his bit to persuade Pete. "Fine. Us, some of that lovely stuff, would you?" asked Skint, going cow-eyed with hands wrapped around each other, pleading Pete. Bear wasn't going to go that low and shred all his dignity but he did his best to show Pete the few tears he had forced out of his eyes. "No!" roared Pete. "I've seen what my stuff does to you two. Drink your own" he said while pointing at the canteens they too had wrapped around their waists. "Boss, you worst after drinks. Stupid. More stupid than Skinty," rumbled Bear, suddenly realising his mistake and holding his hand to his mouth. Pete stared daggers at Bear, and even fiercer at Skint who was now on the ground practically begging at this point. Why hadn't anyone else followed him? Why had it only been these two…

The wind grew as strong as trees and as sharp as daggers while Stanis walked, better said pushed against the wind. He was making a simple move from the village to the Jaguar camp but the journey, so far, had fared far more difficult than he had hoped for. He was quite the striking figure in the tearing winds, his body armoured like never before. Across his feet were monster-leather shoes. The leather grew thicker as it moved onto his legs, his trousers thick and hanging loosely off his waist. Across his chest was a mighty cuirass, the metal simple in design and yet as eye-catching as lightning itself. This was due to jagged bolts that would occasionally leap out of the cuirass, giving away the strength it was hiding. His arms were bare with muscles corded around the bones. He, who had been normal at first, was now ripped all across his body, his muscles large and body shredded. His arms were sinuous and moved like snakes, perhaps giving away their hidden explosiveness. His head, too, was without armour. His shortly-cut black hair struggled against the wind, his jaw clenched and eyes sharp. The amount of weight he had lost over the course of the apocalypse was obvious from one look at his face, his once chubby cheeks now lean and bony. His healthy yellow tan had become a less-than-healthy darker orange tan due to all the time he had spent in the Smithy. Nevertheless, this didn't take away from the sharpness of his face: his black hair and eyes as sharp as a blade. Around his waist lay a sheathed sword. It was as long as an arm and quite slim for its size, it too giving off bolts like the cuirass did. Its scabbard was made out of leather and coloured a plain brown, not that this disguise would fool anyone though. Hiding in between his shirt and cuirass was a dagger, its blade the length of a hand. It had a scabbard similar to the sword and one that did an equally bad job of hiding the blade's strength, if anyone caught sight of it that was. Unlike the sword, the dagger's bright metal was decorated with dark carvings that corrupted the blade. Anyone who, once again, saw the dagger would think of it as an ornate for but only a second due to the deathly aura it gave off. It had been less than a week since Stanis had created his first imbued weapon. He had created and gifted Orena, Caleb and Sil with weapons of their own since then. Their relationship was now a strong one, although mainly held together by Stanis's strength. If they ever passed him, well, only the Gods would know how the rest of the play would act out then… He had grown more proficient after crafting their weapons, creating even more test-runs after those before deciding to remake his Lightning sword. It had come out fiercer than before but at the hefty cost of 50 mana. Nevertheless, Stanis had carried on and created a Lightning cuirass two days later, and finally a Darkness imbued dagger yesterday. The cuirass had the highest cost at 70 mana, whereas the dagger had the lowest at 40. Stanis had been thrilled when the dagger had come out. But his excitement hadn't lasted long. Your allegiance with the Zelaro has been broken by the Zelaro. Trait "Basic Dark vision" has been cancelled due to the broken allegiance. Trait "Basic Transformation" has been cancelled due to the broken allegiance. Trait "Basic Darkness manipulation" has been retained, despite the broken allegiance. This is because the user has sufficient skill in the trait. The trait has been converted into a skill. You have a message from Gahlnym. Do you wish to accept? It had been clear that he had already lost it all so Stanis had accepted the message, hoping it would shine some light onto this turn of events. "Pathetic Human. It has been 3 months since the allegiance was set and you haven't completed the first mission. You are the only representative to not have even completed the first mission yet. You were always unfit to carry our banner, but now you are unfit to even lick out feet." This situation had cut quite deep at first but Stanis had recovered within minutes. Now, he found the whole situation quite funny. They had stepped in and saved him when he had been at his lowest but now let go of him when he was at his highest. What was even funnier was the fact that Gahlnym compared him to other humans; he highly doubted the ability of other humans to beat him at his current. It was only for the two traits he had lost that he felt truly regretful for. The shadows were now back to being dark, and his left arm was now back to being a human left arm. It being human had benefits, such as greater control and balance, but those lost out when weighed against the loss in strength and toughness. In the end, Stanis had told himself to forget about it and move on. He was only getting stronger at the pace he was going at and so there was no reason to hold himself back due to a sudden cog in the works. In all truth, he thought darkness manipulation as his strongest trait, anyway. He had previously thought the other two traits as powerful and his darkness manipulation as weak and redundant, but it was after he had crafted the dagger that he realised the truth. This was the reason why he was so grateful for retaining the skill. **** Stanis drifted through the wind and eventually reached the Jaguars after over a day of walking. The winds had fully died down at this point and thus was, in turn, quite the welcoming gift. He was quickly told that both Serb and Niss had left, and so he went to Ragaar, the second in command, to get information. The fact that both Serb and Niss were now ahead of him placed an invisible pressure on him. He talked a little with Ragaar before getting another Jaguar to guide him towards a good spot. From what Stanis had heard, it seemed the Rashkars were far stronger than he had initially thought. In fact, according to the Jaguars, the reason why they had lost territory to the Jaguars was actually because they were currently fighting an equally strong enemy right now. If they sent a stronger troop to sort out the Jaguars, it would have far too high of a cost on the frontlines. It was quite the sobering walk as the ground was covered with dried blood and the stones scratched and broken. The Jaguars had clearly sacrificed tooth and nail for every inch they had gained. He had gladly forgotten the viciousness of the battlefield but it seemed it had no rhyme or reason to forget him. It was a short while later that Stanis caught sight of a three Rashkars. They were currently in the heat of battle against seven Jaguars and somehow winning despite the odds. Not that Stanis was surprised though, because not only were these Rashkars bigger than the ones he had fought but they also had stone-skins almost twice the thickness. Nevertheless, Stanis threw caution to the wind as he unsheathed his sword. He could use his magic to attack and fight from a safe distance but he was already fairly proficient with magic. What he wasn't so proficient in was his physical fighting. It just so turned out to be that the Rashkars were just as good as whetstones for the Jaguars as they were for him. The air buzzed around Stanis, quiet crackling sounds escaping the blade. The Rashkars quickly caught sight of Stanis and began desperately attacking the Jaguars. The Jaguars, who already had the short straw, had their straw further cut down as they were easily pushed out of the way, the Rashkars frantically running towards Stanis. They knew he was the real threat. Stanis sucked in one last breath before increasing his mana flow into the sword. It needed a base amount of mana to be activated. However, if someone decided to pour any more mana in, it would further strengthen its powers. He bolted to the left, the furthest Rashkars watching with wide-eyes as their brother struck boulders against blade. *KZZT* The lightning whistled while the Rashkar screamed, its boulder-fists sliced open. Out of its wounds sprayed murky-green blood. Stanis struck again, his blade moving faster than before as he sliced towards its chest. This time it had no time to react in, struck off its feet as the blade hit. Unfortunately, Stanis had no time to follow up as one of the other Rashkars hastily attacked, Stanis dodging before slicing outwards. His teeth were gritted all the while, his eyes fearing each and every attack as he dodged by the hair. "RAARAARAAGRH" bellowed the final Rashkar, joining the assault on Stanis. The Jaguar who had guided Stanis here had been told to be nothing more than a spectator by Stanis. However, it was seriously considering helping Stanis out as it saw him struggle more and more. This feeling only grew as Stanis finally ran out of luck, getting solidly hit in the chest. Stanis had to struggle against his mind to get back on his feet and even then, that was only done in the nick of time as the ground he had been lying on was flattened in the next second. He growled, followed by several ice crystals making an appearance around his body. The numbers quickly grew and soon there were soon 6 floating around him. All 6 ice crystal flew out and struck the closest Rashkar into the ground. It would have to struggle for at least a few seconds before it managed to escape its ice shackles. That would be enough. Stanis leapt towards the last Rashkar, before rolling under its fist. He stabbed his sword upwards and willed death. Lightning surged out of his body into the Rashkar, before returning back to his body, and then into the Rashkar, and then into him again. This cycle was repeated 3 times before Stanis finally released the spell. The Rashkar was burnt black with its eyes a solid white. There was no life in it whatsoever, its body burst open in several spots with blood and gore accompanying it. Stanis himself stood dazed over its body, his own body bloodied and shaking from side to side as it threatened to tumble over. He managed to reawaken himself just in time to stop himself from falling. Closing his eyes and clenching his jaw harder than ever before, he forced himself to move. He used a combination of Blueshot spitfire and more Ice crystals to murder the second Rashkar, before moving onto the first one he had downed. It had only rage in its eyes as he continuously cut into it, slowly but surely making progress as its head eventually lobbed off. His head was plagued by disconcerting nausea but he still managed to wipe the blood off his sword before sheathing it back into its scabbard. He then wobbled over to the Jaguars, wheezing out, "Take me back," He had awakened to mana circulation before almost every other human. He had spent weeks crafting his equipment, going further with them than any other human had done so at this point. He had stats higher than nearly every human on this planet, all his stats over 100 and his Lightning seed now an upgraded skill with Intelligence. And yet none of this seemed to be enough… He had given himself a week as the deadline for his Grinding. If he was going to reach an acceptable standard by the end, he needed to be fighting for his life every hour in every day. Luckily, perhaps the only ounce of luck he had, this was exactly what he planned on doing…

The rumbles thundered across the landscape. Stanis stood in the open, his eyes latching onto the speck of dust in the distance. His sword, once flawless, was now dirty with stains of red, green and black. No amount of wiping could rid his blade of these tough stains and so he let them stay, perhaps double-playing as a deterrent alongside being a decoration. But his enemies were not deterred in the least. In fact, he could see that the horde rushing his way were eager if nothing else. A week, a whole week had passed since he had left the village. This might not sound like a large period of time but it was the exact opposite for Stanis. He hadn't had any free moments to indulge himself in at all, instead every hour acting as part of his training. And it had been well worth it. Well, that was what his stats told him but he would learn whether it had truly been worth it within seconds. The singular speck had spread out into many more in the time that Stanis had spent thinking, these multiple specks further growing into monsters of awful features. They were Rashkars, yes, but they were not Rashkars. These animals coming at him were beasts even when compared to the Rashkars he had been fighting, their muscles bulging and faces horrific. His coming had started a new age for the Jaguars. Serb and Niss leaving had left them at quite the predicament but luckily Stanis had taken over their roles. In fact, he had taken over more than just their roles over the course of the week. He had killed hundreds of Rashkars in the time, the total count just shy of a thousand. Now considering he had been struggling against 3 at a time at the start, it was easy to imagine how much stronger he was now. And the Rashkars had taken note of this… They had sent some of their stronger troops to sort out the Jaguars, to prove to them that they were nothing but ants to the Rashkars. Of course, this would have quite the high cost on the frontlines but the Rashkars hoped this decision would pay out in the future. And so Stanis stood still, waiting for the newcomers to greet him. Around him stood no Jaguars. They had wanted to assist him on this but he had declined himself any help. This was his fight; this was his training. The Rashkars were running at quite the speed now, perhaps to add to their intimidation factor. Whereas the normal Rashkars had mighty molar teeth, these beasts had vicious canines. While the average Rashkar stood between 2 and 3 metres, these monsters were at least a solid 3, with a few even taller. And most importantly, while the average Rashkar would have been graded at around mid-tier 3, these were all at the peak. Perfect. Stanis looked down at his sword. The dirty stains and specks glimmered in the sun. He took a deep breath in. This could be his final moments, but at the same time he knew them not to be. No, this was just the beginning. Stanis popped his hesitation and threw himself into a sprint, the incoming Rashkars slightly slowing at his charge. His speed, it was not normal. But they had no more time to ponder on the matter as he flew into the first one, sword crackling loudly. The Rashkar used its fist to deflect his attack, pushing his trajectory away from its chest and into the ground. It gritted its teeth and hastily retreated, only noticing as it took its first step back that its left boulder-fist was sliding off. Murky green liquid leaked out of the clean cut, followed by bright crimson blood. Stanis, however, had no time to carry on as another Rashkar violently swept the ground with its fist. Stanis leapt up at this, at the same time falling beautifully into the trap as another fist arced around his field of vision. But he didn't fluster, instead pivoting his legs so that he fell more centrally with his chest facing the boulder-fist. He simultaneously activated Blueshot spitfire, the bullets making quick work of the ground underneath him, a mighty dust cloud overcoming the whole troupe. The boulder hit solidly, the Rashkar arm almost a rocket as the strike burst forwards with immense force. Then the Rashkar threw back its arm while screaming in pain, the brownish boulder now a matt-black. The smoky, burnt flesh smell further disorientated the surrounding Rashkars. Stanis grimaced as he was thrown to the ground like a rag-doll, gritting his teeth while he got up and struggled through the rabble. Around him quickly formed several ice crystals, their numbers monstrous compared to what he could do a week ago. He closed his eyes and repeatedly used Scout and sense as he made his way out of the dust. Any Rashkar that stood in his way quickly had several crystals embedded in them, Stanis escaping the dust-cloud after a few seconds of navigating. By no means had he done it uninjured but it was fair to say that the Rashkars were in a far worse situation that he was. He could hear a rallying cry from the other side of the dust cloud, followed by roars and thundering footsteps. He focused on all of this which activating Destructive mana recharge, the stony ground somehow growing further lifeless and staler. The rock he stood on grew brittle and collapsed, followed by the ground surrounding it as all of it caved inwards. He jumped out from the growing pit and used Blueshot spitfire once more, the dust refilling the air. However, the Rashkars were already used to his little tricks and this time easily located him, 3 of them charging him at once while the others retried to circle him. Stanis used a wider Scout and sense than usual and noted down the area. He then closed his eyes before refiring Blueshot spitfire four times around him. The dust cloud quickly grew into something more, something monstrous, as the leading Rashkar commanded the order to retreat. It was nothing but petty tricks in its mind. Reality proved otherwise as Stanis compressed many units of mana into his sword, the blade now shining brightly through all the dust. It was no surprise that the 3 Rashkars that had been charging him turned around and ran in the opposite direction. After all, who wanted to go against a sword that was spitting bolts as bright as white and as long as arms. Nevertheless, they were too deep into the tiger's den to go back now, Stanis activating Layman's Rush under his breath. "RAGRRRRGHHHHHHH" "YARARGAGAGHHH" "NHHHEEEEEEEEEEE" They screamed like the Devil incarnate as he swiftly sliced them down, their bodies twitching and scorching even after death. It was without question that Stanis was also getting hurt by such an absurd amount of lightning, however he merely hardened his mind before moving on. He no longer needed the dust cloud to hide his advent as the Rashkars ran at the first sight of his shining sword. But as before, none of them fared faster on their feet than him and thus all of them had grisly endings, the worst one being when one of the Rashkars lit up, before dimming, before lighting up once again. This carried on for two cycles before the Rashkar collapsed onto the ground, the air now thick with the deathly smell. It smelled of a sickly sweet barbeque… What had started out as 20 Rashkars quickly became 6. Not that Stanis had won an easy battle though, no, rather the opposite as his dented Cuirass and wounded flesh proved all of the hits he had taken. It was then that the leading Rashkar noticed something, anger crawling out of its cracked shell of fear. Stanis was disarmed, his sword left a few metres behind him. And yet, Stanis kept walking towards them. One look at Stanis's hand was enough reason as to why he had dropped it, his right arm jolting and shaking madly. "KILLL ITTTT" roared the Rashkar, the other 5 quickly joining its sweet revenge as they bolted towards Stanis. In response, Stanis merely showed his pearly whites. Well, not exactly white with all the blood leaking out of his mouth but his smile still disconcerted the Rashkars. Not enough to stop them but still enough to put them on edge. Multiple crystals bloomed to life, Stanis shooting ice after Blueshot spitfire after ice. These abilities were weak against the Rashkars' defences, sure, but that was only when they weren't continuously layered over each other. The leading Rashkar rose from its turtle stance a few seconds later, looking around to see all of its comrades splayed across the ground with twisted limbs. It ignored the biting pain and sprinted forwards. Stanis stood a few metres in front of it, his body shaking from side to side as it threatened to fall. He squinted his eyes as he saw the largest Rashkar rise from the dead and begin a mad charge towards him, his lips curling into a self-deprecating grin. He was low on mana, very low on mana. There was only one way to end this… The Rashkar punched forwards, its boulder-fist arcing upwards as it aimed to knock Stanis's head off his body. Stanis stepped forwards to accept this notion with open arms, in fact a little bit too eager as his body cut the punch short in its flight. Rather than knocking his head out of its socket, it crashed into his right arm. The Rashkar felt the punch connect and increased the mana flow into the arm, the punch striking forwards with far more strength than before. It was one of the intrinsic Rashkar skills, one that was about to stab the Rashkar in the back. Hit with such force, Stanis's arm flew right off, his shoulder bone cracked and twisted. It hurt but Stanis was used to pain. He could deal with it, especially considering the delirious state he was in. Now that its arm was struck out straight, it meant that it could no longer bring it back in time to defend its body. Stanis spun past the straightened arm and used his chest to take on the defensive push, the Rashkar more than surprised as it realised Stanis wasn't budging. While it snarled and its eyes popped out, Stanis manically smiled and his left arm struck upwards. In it was a dagger. The Rashkar felt death before it saw it, its body draining of all energy. It used both arms to push Stanis away, his body once again like a ragdoll as he flew across the skies before coming to a violent stop. Needless to say, it was already too late. The Rashkar hastily looked for its injury and quickly noticed that its previous wounds were leaking black alongside green and red… It also noticed how its vision was growing blurrier every second. In fact, what it saw in the last second was a dark object stuck in its chest as it heaved with pain. One last wheeze. One last breath. Stanis groaned while he forced himself up. His limbs had been cut and smashed, one of them even taken out of its socket. His cuirass was dented and the rest of his armour ripped. There was blood leaking and bruises all over his body. But none of this could come between his win. His groans turned to manic laughter as he pushed himself to his feet, recovering his weapons as he did so. He drained his remaining mana into Light healings, his body at least functional once he was done. His week of grinding had come to an end. And what a grand ending it had been!

While Jen had been knocked unconscious, Stanis hadn’t. This was why, the second the mana-water trickled down his throat, instead of struggling, he used all his willpower to draft up any power that lay dormant. It was a painstakingly arduous process, but fear of whatever Jen had done to his body forced him onwards. The instructor had picked the two of them up by the neck and thrown them to the side so that Berry and Johnny could batter it out. He had also thrown the two of them side by side, so that their collapsed bodies were facing each other’s. By the time Stanis had produced enough energy to lift his fingers, he noticed Jen rousing from her sleep. Her facial features flickered from expression to expression, eventually ending on a grimace as she opened her eyes. Her eyes were glazed over and she looked dazed at Stanis. Her blonde hair was coloured with mud and her light skin was covered in blood. She was a bit slimmer than Stanis would have liked but even he had to admit that she was beautiful, when she was clean, of course. Not that her beauty took much out of his rage and bitterness for her though. And it turned out that Jen now felt the same way as him as he did as she quickly broke out of her daze, transforming her grimace into a glare that stabbed needles into him. She couldn’t move her lips, yet, to voice her thoughts but Stanis doubted they were anything nice. Seeing her awake put further pressure on Stanis and he struggled even harder to summon energy from his body. If he could get up first while she still lay defenceless, well, he would make sure to make her death as painful as possible. Soon enough, Berry, who had already been exhausted, was beaten and drugged with the mana-water. The instructor then sent Keiko out to fight Johnny. As this happened, Stanis finally managed to move his entire arm: not in a quick or elegant way, but movement nevertheless. Since they were facing each other, it meant Jen could see his progress as easily as he could see hers. Seeing his success, her face grew grimmer. If he managed full movement first, then her fate was to be a grave one. She would have still been usually relaxed in the knowledge that they were currently in the instructor’s presence but the lack of his intervention last fight made her sceptical of the help he would provide. Besides, from Stanis’s reaction already, she knew he wouldn’t like it at all when he realised what had actually happened. “Stop squirming, you’re mine!” she said in an attempt to distract Stanis. He took the bait… “Insufferable bitch,” he wheezed out in between his swift breaths. “I’ll fucking kill you.” “Ha,” she spat out, “I’ve already killed you and I can do it again.” She wanted to maintain her cold front and confidence from before in order to prove that she was still a level above Stanis, but her thoughts seemed to have created chinks in her actions as Stanis merely snarled in response. She searched her mind to distract him once more. She didn’t bother talking with the others most the time but such a fickle pride was an easy giveaway when her life was on the line. “Look at your body, I’ve already branded it,” she finally said. He looked angry at first but then shocked as he peered down at his arms. At first glance, there weren’t any apparent differences, but the more he stared, the more he knew was wrong. His skin wasn’t this taut, his fingers weren’t this slender, and his arms were certainly not this slim. While he was busy being shocked, Jen was busy watching his theatrical performance. She was also summoning up energy on the side but ruining her opponent took first priority. “Do you like it? You were a bit too fat for even my largest puddle so I had to cut a few bits off.” He didn’t respond whatsoever, instead staring down like a hollow shell. He trembled slightly as he realised that there actually might be truth in Jen’s words. The orders she had somehow transmitted to his head, his body being changed. What had she done to him?! She cleared her throat loudly. “I had to cut a few bits off,” she said louder. “Fat, a bit of skin, hair, and your dick,” she emphasised. She had meant to enrage him with the comments, and they did just that, but his anger went in a different direction than she had wanted. Instead of the senseless screaming, shock or silence she had hoped for, his anger simmered inside of him as he realised the one truth. Whatever she had done to him, as long as he killed her, he would be free, surely. With this thought, he focused all his intention inwards. He blocked out all his thoughts of the surroundings and instead focused on regaining his energy. Jen continued to throw, and eventually shout, insults that grew in unpleasantness that the instructor continued to ignore, although with greater difficulty as time passed. Over a short period of time, however, she realised he was making a dedicated effort to ignore her, and so she focused her attention inwards as well. The reason why she had tried to throw him off-track had been because he had already started with a head-start; he would have an able body before her no matter how hard she tried. But if she got to a decent standard and struggled to the instructor, she doubted that the instructor would allow her to die for such a nonsensical matter. Then she could just heal up and deal with Stanis at full strength. By this time, Johnny had been beaten down and so the instructor forced mana water down his throat. Seeing as there were no other opponents left, he quickly dealt with Keiko before forcing her to drink it as well. From the start, he could have easily just beaten all five of them up and forced them to drink the mana-water, but it was better if they beat each other up as it meant that they were constantly refining their skills and tactics against beatable opponents, same as they would be doing in a week’s time. He picked up Johnny and Keiko before dragging them towards the others as well. It was as he was walking over that he saw Stanis slapping Jen across the face; he was still stuck to the ground by his anchor-like legs but his shoulder and arm were fully movable by now, and with this great, new power came new possibilities. Jen had attempted to defend herself but had failed as she could only move her forearm, meaning her insults were always cut short by vicious slaps. The instructor threw the two bodies in his hands to the side before releasing a deep sigh. The day had almost gone perfectly, in fact, far better than he had initially expected. On the first day, he had expected around 4 of them to die, and thus had been surprised by their strength and tenacity. But of course that had been too good to be reality; friction had grown between them and a backstabbing had occurred in the end. He walked over to Stanis and picked him up, and threw him a step away from Jen. He looked at the two of them; one stared back pleadingly while the other glared back. “Keep it civil, please.” he said. “She fucking killed me. And then turned my body,” Stanis roared. Of course it would come down to this the instructor thought. He pointed at Stanis. “You kill her and you die alongside. She now technically owns your body.” He then pointed at Jen. “And I hope you regret your decision now. Unlike simple undead, you can’t just discard an intelligent one when you want. As long as it wants to live, the only way to kill it is by leaving its proximity. And that’s far. And it won’t be happening under my supervision.” he said. After his little speech, Stanis stopped trying to kill Jen. Of course, this wasn’t because of what the instructor had said but rather because of the instructor’s presence. Eventually, all five of them had regained most of their energy and got back up. By this time, Stanis was siting sombrely, allowing his anger to simmer inside for a more suitable time. He had also confirmed that Jen hadn’t actually cut off his sexual organ, much to his delight, although its existence meant very little when he was owned by another being. The instructor eventually got up and gestured for the five to follow him. They walked into the basement and waited. After a little while, four people came out. The Asian man was missing. After a little bit of thought, Stanis decided that whatever had happened between their group was most likely intentional. Considering Pete’s, Vasile’s and Okoye’s characters, it wouldn’t be surprising if the group had done something like abandoning him. Pete, who now looked wearier than before, had a glint in his eye as he looked at Stanis. The warmth was not the type you showed to family you hadn’t seen in a year, instead the type you showed after finding an item you had lost a few days ago. The instructor led the group of nine into the sitting room and began to speak. “6 more days of this and you’ll be set to go back to Earth. I could just drug you but that would be detrimental to future growth, so you will be allowed sleep every night. Take it as the one luxury we offer here; you’ll be woken up sharply tomorrow,” he finished. He then led them upstairs, and put 7 of them into a large room with 10 beds. He then threw Stanis into a separate room, one which was lockable from the outside, before throwing Jen into a similar room. He made sure to lock both rooms before leaving. At first, Stanis had relaxed down to sleep. He had tried opening the door and had failed, and while sleep was a luxury he no longer needed on a daily basis, it certainly was a welcome one on a rough day. And so it was with great despair that he realised he wouldn’t be sleeping that night. That despair was, however, quickly replaced by his ignited anger. Jen, now fully healed, had decided shortly after the instructor had left her that giving orders to Stanis was worth a retry. This reminded Stanis off the link the two of them now shared and so a mana-war between them began. And while Stanis suffered, as he rolled in pain, he told himself it was all alright. After all, tomorrow when they went into the jungle, it was his chance to repeat today’s play with a new cast…

Stanis was just passing by the stream when he reconsidered his options. For appearance's sake, perhaps he should clean up a bit before going onwards. So Stanis eased himself into the stream, his muscles stretching as the water took hold of him. The sky already had a few dark colours to it but the wind hadn't become the night's yet, instead still a warm breeze that helped Stanis relax. He had no soap at the ready and so cleaned himself to the best of his ability without. Mind you, that wasn't very clean but he doubted the Jaguars would mind any dirt. He eventually got out and dried himself, before restarting his walk into the forest. It was half-way along the path that he suddenly realised he hadn't brought any bottles with him. At this point, it was simply customary to do so and he felt more than a little bad without. However, he was already deep in the forest and quite a few Jaguars had already greeted him and were currently in the process of following him. It was clear that he wouldn't be able to sneak away from them and grab a few bottles now. For Stanis, it was comforting being amongst the Jaguars. They didn't fear him like the other Humans did and they didn't give him a massive berth to walk through everytime he moved. Instead, they respected him almost to the point of reverence, his standing similar to Serb's in their society. It was during the final stretch of his walk that Stanis lost worry about the bottles he had forgotten to bring. This wasn't because he had all of a sudden calmed down but rather because it was obvious from one look at Serb's cave that the Jaguars had already more than ransacked the village's supplies. Stanis went to the entrance and waited, one of the other Jaguar Captains walking over to talk to him in the meantime. It was after quite a wait that Serb exited his cave, 3 female Jaguars following his steps. "Ahh, Stanis. Where'y been old dog?" asked Serb, while resting his poor legs on the ground. "It's almost like you didn't realise I was gone while living in Heaven over here" joked Stanis. Hopefully, little pokes at his lifestyle would cause him to get his arse up and moving. "Naa Naa. We knew you were gone because when we went to get a few more supplies," motioned Serb, pointing to all the bottles lying around. "We asked where you were and the other humans said you had disappeared like a few days ago." "It's good to know that you care," said Stanis. The Jaguars watching broke out into laughter at this, Serb himself breaking a cheeky grin over his face. "So, this the regular visit to check if us rotten mutts are ruining your forest or something?" asked Serb, failing to keep the dead-pan look half-way through. "Mmm. You're not too far off, I've been hearing tales about you. Wenching and drinking more than drunks. Simply not acceptable." The others once again broke out into laughter, only this time aimed at Serb. Serb laughed the loudest though, playfully pawing Niss while at it. "Anyway, I'm actually here because I found you guys a whetstone." Stanis paused, tilting his head a little. "Well, maybe a little more than a whetstone but it will keep you on your feet nevertheless." "Oh. So you went on that little trip for us, eh? Well, it's nicely appreciated, ain't it?" said Serb. The howls and cheers from the audience supported his claim. "So, what is it? Where is it? You really going to send us out of this really interesting and not soul-tearing Forest?" asked Serb. "Ha-ha," laughed Stanis. "See the big mountain over there, it's on the other side. Some weird monsters called Rashkars. Very strong, mind you, but also mutant looking. Eats rocks and has boulder-feet." "How strong?" enquired Serb. "Strong enough that I struggled to keep my life against three at once. Well, that was partly due to my stupidity as well but I think you against 3 or 4 of them would be the max, so the rest of you can probably only manage one on ones. If not, just group up on them." Stanis then paused. "But mind you, the ones I fought seemed to be excludes or something, so I guess they were just the weakest ones." "Mmmhm. Anything else?" asked Niss, taking steer of the conversation before either Stanis or Serb turned it to jokes again. "I need their bones, so pass them along to me. Especially their boulder-feet and their shoulder bones." Stanis decided to clarify before they began to get any grand ideas, "Need it for forging. Trying something new and metal isn't strong enough." "So when you gonna do it?" asked Serb, starting another conversation. Stanis immediately understood what he was talking about. "3-4 weeks. You?" "About same time. Niss will be joining me, won't you?" he said while once again pawing at Niss. Niss pushed away his paws and instead asked Stanis more questions. "What do you think their weaknesses are?" "Ahh, lay off it, Niss. You can ask him afterwards," said Serb while motioning to the Jaguars bringing in hundreds of bottles. The rest of the night and a good portion of the day passed by peacefully, Serb teaching Stanis how to increase the concentration of alcohol and getting him fully drunk by day. It was after plenty of gagging and thorough circulation that Stanis managed to get back on his feet and return to the village and even then he swayed quite a bit while walking. *** Time trickled away and very quickly a week had passed. The Jaguars had decided to relocate onto the mountain on the second day and they had begun their fight with the Rashkars the very next day. This meant that Stanis very quickly began to get a supply of good material, meaning he had more than enough to experiment on. Rikkey, Valentina, Calu, Giang and Duong were all fast learners. They had gotten stronger after Stanis had begun training them but it was their skills from before that really made the difference. With their new strength and old blacksmithing skills, they very quickly began upping the quality of everything they made. This, in turn, made it easier for Stanis as he had people to discuss with and thus made his progress with applying a skill to the blade easier. Not that he had succeeded yet, mind you, but he had made good progress and was now only a hand's length away from getting through. Stanis had gone to look for Caleb, Orena and Sil on the day he had come back but it turned out that they had gone to the battlefield in the lack of his presence. They came back a few days later, not too affected by the battlefield, and Stanis began his formal training on them as well. Whereas Rikkey and the crew focused on blacksmithing, Stanis was doing his best to teach these three how to get stronger. Luckily, he was still much stronger than the three and thus had more than enough ways in which to correct them. *** Tanya shifted in her seat, feeling uncomfortable whichever way she sat. She had come back from the frontlines a few days ago and had been shocked by the claims of the new strongest in the village. She had seen and talked to Caleb on the battlefield and thus knew how strong he had become after his little trip and thus it made sense for her to be shocked at anyone being stronger than him, especially when he himself accepted it so. It was even more of a surprise when she had heard that it was Stanis, the boy who should have been dead. Better said, the boy who had died under her leadership… Knowing how cold he would act if she asked him directly, she had gone on a wild goose chase to find Jayesh. He was on the frontlines when she had found him and what he revealed did little to help and instead vexed her. She knew Jayesh had been the one Stanis had been closest to before his death and yet even he seemed perplexed by Stanis's stance on them. Apparently, he said he forgave them and understood why they did it, but at the same time according to Jayesh, seemed to have no desire to mix with them again. Now that would have been fine and all but Tanya had seen Stanis in the village a few times, every time his eyes very quickly catching her and an ambiguous smile coming to his lips. Every time! He never said anything to accompany his behaviour, instead always moving quickly like he was in a hurry. Did this mean she was meant to apologise for her actions? Was she supposed to keep out of his way and never come into sight? Was she supposed to kill herself for her past decisions? Tanya had no idea which one it was and it was these worries that had led her to her situation right now. She had been in a room with Ji-yeon, drinking to their heart's ends when suddenly all of this had burst out of her heart. One might think that she was far too worried for someone who had been fighting on the frontlines but that was even more the reason to worry. She had been fighting on the frontlines all this time, one of the strongest Classers there. And then she had seen Caleb come out of nowhere, alive despite his prolonged mission, and somehow a hundred times stronger than she remembered. And apparently Stanis was even stronger than that!? Tanya shook her head violently and tried clearing her thoughts, although to no avail. She heard Ji-yeon speaking slurred and Tanya brushed the long blonde hair out of her face. "---you're being such a schoolgirl. I swear to God, I'll go to him right now and order to his face. I swear to God. Hehe. Eheehe." Tanya held down Ji-yeon. Just in case. She wasn't sure of how to deal with Stanis but she was certain Ji-yeon would just make it worse… ADVERTISEMENT    

He felt high, like he was hallucinating. He tried to sit up but immediately fell back down. The multiple containers of coloured liquid spun around him, their edges blurred and discoloured. His groans went unheard in the lifeless room. He lay there for several seconds, hoping for a cure that never came. However, as time passed, the fog over his mind did begin to clear up. The bottles around him began to slow down until they stopped altogether. This wasn’t his body, he knew that for sure. He had been given new bodies before but it had still been his body every time. It had felt foreign due to time spent away from it but the familiar sensations had never been far off either, always ready to accommodate his visit. On the other hand, this body wasn’this at all. There weren’t any familiar sensations ready to soothe his visit, instead it felt as foreign as ever despite the fog being lifted off his head. Stanis lay there wet-eyed for a moment. He couldn’t even find refuge in his body and that disturbed him. Striking up the courage to command his new body, he used his arms to push himself to an upright position. He became disturbed as he looked around, many bottles scattered around with various liquids in. In fact, piles of cracked glass were stacked up against the walls, all of them empty except the droplets that leaked out. The droplets pooled into multifarious liquids on the ground, in turn producing the stench that filled the room. It was while he was infatuated with the pools that he felt a growing pain in his back. He prod his back with his hands and immediately regretted doing so. He cringed and let out a yelp of pain, before lying back. The material he lay on instantly cooled his back, evaporating the seething pain. He let out a moan and felt himself diving through pleasure. A few seconds later, he finally mustered up the courage to sit up again. This time, however, he immediately turned around to see what he was lying on. He was surprised as he saw that it was just plain wood, stained a mess of colours by the liquids that surrounded him. He had expected it to be metal from the way it had cooled him. He then hunched forward and twisted his head, peering down his back. His back was like a battlefield, broken and messy. There were small trenches made up of cuts and dead bodies made up by splotches of skin. His back was raw… Bewildered, he prodded his back once more, albeit much softer. He felt the sensation of pain immediately. He glanced at his bloodstained fingers for a moment, before rubbing them against his other palm. He couldn’t feel the heat from the blood on either hand… His thoughts were chaotic and mostly incoherent by now. He didn’t know what was happening or what to think. In a bid to confirm the one thing he knew for sure, he placed his hand around his wrist and waited for his pulse. Only there was no pulse… Scared, he moved his hand towards his neck and felt for his pulse again, before finally resting it on his heart. There his palm stayed as he stared wide-eyed at the wall, frightened by the lack of heartbeats. Pooling mana into his fingers, he cut into his forearm. Then he waited, and waited for the blood to trickle out. It didn’t come out as it should have, fast and flowing. Instead, it came out slow and thick, like it was frozen. Suddenly, he became aware of his body and its lack of heat. His legs were cool, as were his arms, as was his back and chest. As was his head, and as was his beatless-heart. He was dead, no, undead. But unlike his time with Jen, his body was under his own control. Shaking his head in half-disbelief, he steeled his mind and forced himself off the wooden block. He cringed as his feet touched the floor but managed to still his tears. He was naked but that was the least of his concerns. He breathed in and out, no longer due to necessity but instead out of habit. His feet flared up in pain as he walked over the shattered glass that littered the floor, but after minutes of struggling, he found it manageable. He walked over to the door and opened it, before being blinded by the bright sun. Once recovered, he looked outside and found himself looking at an empty marketplace. Some stands still stood but even they were robbed of anything that had once filled their shelves. Concerned, Stanis cast Scout and sense. The scan told him as much as his eyes told him; the marketplace was about as empty as it could get. Shaking his head, he stepped out and climbed a tall building. From it, he surveyed the village and finally found signs of life: on the walls and fighting for their lives. He decided to head there and got down, before moving towards the wall. It was as he walked that he realised that life wasn’t as far away as he had initially thought, instead it was budding just a street away from the marketplace. Groups of people huddled around each other on the ground, chatting quietly with their heads kept down. Some looked at Stanis but instantly looked away, unwilling to catch the sickly-pale madman’s eyes. He walked down the street before entering another, similarly filled with groups of people. He noticed many injured along the way, many more than he would have wished for. Just as he was about to aimlessly enter another, he heard footsteps behind him. He turned around and saw a Black woman staring at him. She had braided hair and a face painted for war. She had no weapons on her body, a strange sight in the village. He looked at Orena, and she looked at him. “Stanis?” she said, half in recognition and half as a question. **** Alyona found herself distracted as she shifted through papers of information. She had already sent Orena to momentarily leash him before he made a massive ruckus in the village. And yet, she still found herself thinking of him. He wasn’t good for the village; he was a monster in human skin. His leadership was flawed and his character was brash. Ever since the second apocalypse, various monsters had been attacking the village every single day. Surprisingly, or perhaps unsurprisingly, their death count had been quite low for the period. However, now that Stanis was awake, she knew such a low death rate was already history. She dropped her makeshift pen and leaned back, taking a breath. It wasn’t that she intrinsically disliked Stanis. In fact, she remembered the first time she had noticed him. He wasn’t a powerhouse then, instead just a strong warrior. But things had happened and he had changed, first for the better, then for the worse. He had come back after months of expedition, several times in fact. And each time, he became more confident, his ego growing until he began to believe that he owned this village. And perhaps he rightly did with the power he bore. But in that case, he at least had a responsibility to nurture the village. But he didn’t: of course, he didn’t. He only cared about one thing and it was blindingly obvious: power. He had no care of other humans or of the village. He lusted power, and it was obvious to her that he was willing to give up his humanity for such a thing. So why couldn’t others see what she saw? Why couldn’t they see the beast he was and where he was leading them? Why? She clutched her scalp, before rubbing her face with her hands. She sighed and lay back on her seat. She had to find a way to stop him, kill him even. But it was impossible, and she knew that. Even if he was weakened, she knew he would randomly find a source of energy out of nowhere. The only hope she had was of the woman he had faced, the one that had almost killed him. Almost. Alyona found herself at a crossroad. She looked at both options, before choosing the one to her right, the right one. She needed to find the necromancer...

"One week to get stronger than you've ever been before. It won't be easy," he paused. "But, it is barely possible." "There is no way for you guys to reach adroite Moyste in one week. It is impossible, even with my help. However, you don't need to be a certain rank to fight people already at it. There have been countless cases of lower ranked people fighting higher ranks, and even winning." "After all, ranks are all about mana," he finished. He gave the ten a moment to think upon his words. Stanis's thoughts whirled around, attempting to latch onto what the man was implying. He was, however, a second too late. "So, we neglect mana and focus on our bodies then?" the Asian man asked. "No. You won't neglect it but you won't focus on it either. You will instead focus on your stats and your skill of application. If two people had the same set of skills and stats, one could still beat the other based on how skilled they are in actual combat." "Now, follow me," ended the man as he began to walk back to the house. The inside of the house was widely spaced but also simple. There were no paintings on the walls, no flowers in vases, no artefacts proudly on display. He led them through the ground floor, towards a door that let them down into the basement. While walking through the house, Stanis noticed that despite the lack of decorations, there were signs of life across the furniture and walls: the chair's varnish had begun to dull; there was paint peeling off the walls; the stove was burnt black. The basement was as dark as a cave and Stanis regretted his decision of not completing any of the Zelaro missions. It was only after they had stripped away his traits that he had realised how much time he spent in the darkness. The man walked over to the side and began fiddling with buttons and levers. He clicked one button and pulled down the last lever, causing a blinding light to appear in the middle of the basement. On the ground was a slightly raised circular platform with arcs curving inwards, towards a globe of light in the centre of the whole platform. "Good," muttered the man before turning back to the ten. "I could whip you into shape; that is what I usually do," he said while unsheathing his dulled sword. It was made out of wood and had scratches ranging down it. But worse than that was the dried blood covering it. "But we don't even have time for that. So, we're going a more extreme route," he said while sheathing his sword. "This is a teleporter, a simplistic one, but one nevertheless. It will take you to a terrain that all of you will find difficult. There will be monsters, and a second teleporter to take you back here somewhere around the area." He paused once again. "You will not survive alone. You will not survive in duos, or in trios. Split yourselves into two teams once there and just survive and come back. Do not try to train yourself or anything of the sort there, just survive and get back. Good luck," he finished, gesturing the ten forward and onto the platform. Stanis felt a familiar sting across his body and relaxed for a moment, allowing the darkness to take everything from him. The next second he was on rough ground, the type that digs into you. He felt a heaviness across his body, half-convincing himself to stay lying but ultimately failing as he leapt up. He stumbled over and fell back down a moment later. He glanced around and saw that the nine others were in similar situations, struggling even to get up. In fear, he brought up his status and checked it: Stanis Volkov Age: 18 years Mana capacity: 32.1 (Mana capacity is actually 48.1 but 16.0 points are currently in use) (regeneration is capacity/4 per hour) Rank: Tyro Mosyte Class: Origin Strength: 15.9 Dexterity: 15.1 Constitution: 14.8 Intelligence: 16.4 Wisdom: 14.8+0.5 Tenacity: 16.4 Skills: Layman's Rush, Scout and Sense, Light Healing, Destructive Mana Recharge, Ice shot, Blueshot spitfire, Lightning seed, Darkness Manipulation His stats had gone up quite a bit since he had first fought the trio outside the cave. Most of his points had come from when he had meditated in the arena before the tournament due to the high mana intensity there. This thought was like a revelation. He excitedly circulated his mana, his mouth going agape at the results. The reason why he felt so goddamn heavy now was because of the sheer amount of mana in this area; one day here would be equal to weeks of training on Earth! It was clear that the others had come to similar conclusions as him as they too stopped trying to crawl up and were instead looking wide-eyed at the air. Stanis cut his mind from circulation and looked around at his surroundings. They were sitting on jagged rock, and all around them was a tropical jungle. The air was hot and humid, and there was water plastered over the plants like sweat. The plants themselves weren't too strange other than their unusually large sizes, grass knee-height and the trees close to double the size on Earth. "Guys, stop circulating. The guy told us to not train here," the Asian man called out. Stanis felt more than a little pride blossom in his heart as he realised he had exactly pinpointed the Asian man's personality. "Yeah, I'm getting a bad feeling," the 14-year old girl replied. Her voice and tone were unnaturally mature for a 14-year old, making him re-evaluate her age. Maybe she was just a really small woman? "He said we'll die if we go alone, but also told us not to go as one large group. I guess that means it's easy for the 10 of us to pass but too hard for three of us," said number two. She was a white woman with brown, shoulder-length hair and brown eyes. She was slim and muscular, her only points of interest being the bright red clothes she wore and the slim blade by her waist. When compared to the other oddities here, she was almost pre-apocalypse material. Almost. "Right, so should we go opposite directions. I know he said don't go as a group but from his words, I reckon it's going to be tough. So, how about signalling the other group if you do find the teleporter?" the Asian man asked. An awkward silence followed. Stanis could tell that there was a large communication gap between the people here. They were all the chosen children of Earth, all prideful and the strongest in their lives until now. Not that he was much different from them though. "Yeah, something bright in the sky or something," number two finally agreed. "Alright, let's get going then. I'll go this way, anyone want to join?" the Asian man asked while pointing eastwards. There was a pause and silence, Stanis half-considering to follow him. Number one and two got up and moved towards him, as did the pony-tail man and the midget 14-year old who might not be 14. "Alright, see ya," said the Asian man as he and his group began walking off. It was clear from their movement that the group didn't consider the Asian man as their leader, but were still grateful someone had taken the role and wasted the effort. Stanis looked around to see who was left. He was finding it hard to stand, let alone move under the pressure from the environment and looking around to see who he was to be with didn't help his with mood. The black Shaman woman, the dying old man, the already-dead model girl and Pete. He sighed as he wondered when and how the talking between them was going to start. He wasn't surprised when it turned out to be Pete who started. "Finally, he's gone bossman. Talking so much, like I was halfway to telling him to shut it," Pete said. Stanis face-palmed himself as he saw Pete take his canteen out. "Too much talking," the black woman agreed. "I would have died by the time he shut his mouth," added the old man. Stanis spluttered out a laugh, the black woman chuckled and Pete choked on his drink. Even the dead, blonde girl seemed to come back to life as her lips curled up. "So, names?" asked Stanis. "I'm Stanis." "I'm Pete," He was visibly drunk by now. "Vasile." the old man said, an odd grandness as he said his name. "Okoye," the African woman said, shaking her staff while saying so. A silence followed. Stanis looked towards the blonde girl and saw her staring at the trees. He clapped his hands, to which she turned around and stared. "Name?" Stanis asked again. "Jen—" she said, stopping halfway through as if she was unsure. "Something's watching us," interrupted Okoye, inconspicuously shifting her staff to point behind her. Stanis used Scout and sense and grimaced. The scouted area was 10 times smaller than it usually was, due to how intense the mana in the atmosphere was. He increased the mana input and cast it again, but this result was the same as last time as he couldn't see any enemies within the scouted area. "How many?" he whispered. "One, two. Two of them," she answered. "Are they coming for us or just watching?" Vasile asked. She laughed in response. "When do they ever just watch?" And just in time too. A naked man sprinted out of the foliage, moving faster than sound as he punched out at Pete. Pete's spine twisted as he bent back, dodging the first punch before stumbling out of the way of the next. The man then kicked towards his waist, Pete using his hatchet to strike back. The kick twisted mid-way through and instead went towards the hatchet, striking the blade with force. Pete fell off balance and tripped over, rolling over his back before standing back up. The man stood there, casually looking around himself. There was no blood leaking down his foot. Heck, there was barely a scratch there…

Stanis grumbled as he ran across the mountain. It would have been a steep climb was it nor for the pathways that ran across it. Thoughts about blacksmithing raced across his head, either being shot down or finding a deep place to settle themselves down for a later use. From the testing he had done, it was obvious that it was the metal itself causing all the failures. This was the reason why he had asked Alyona where the strongest enemies in this region were, because if he couldn't use metal, then all he could do was find stronger and tougher materials. Of course, there was always the chance that the enemies behind the mountain would be like the Spectres, bone-less and without storage stones, but that was something for him to deal with once he got there. Even if he couldn't find his desired material from the monsters' bodies, he was sure he would at least find something in the region. Having come to this conclusion, his thoughts about blacksmithing largely stopped as he looked upwards. The peak of the mountain was out of sight. Stanis had the urge to take a detour and climb up the mountain but decided against it. It wasn't the right time; Yils had told him to kill a tier-three and yet he had struggled against the Spectre boss, despite having tens of others backing him. His face simply wasn't thick enough for him to go back after that… In fact, it was only after he had left their home that he had realised how weak he had been compared to them. Like, he knew he was weak while there due to the myriad of reasons, but it was while not living with them he realised how weak he actually was. This was why he wanted to reach tier-four before going back, at least then he would be able to stand a little straighter in their presence. Eventually, all the thoughts in Stanis's head had been thought through. It was then that he switched to practising his circulation and Lightning seed. He was quite proficient in his other skills, it was only Lightning seed he was lacking in. The trouble with it was the amount of concentration it needed to maintain it, an amount of concentration he simply couldn't throw away in the heat of a battle. This was why he tirelessly practised it, after all, he knew the potential hiding in this skill if he did manage to master it. It wasn't even an upgraded skill but he was certain that it had greater potential than his others' anyway. As for his circulation, that had been one of the two things he had originally come to the village to do. It was all good and all making armour and weapons but his equipment would be simply useless without the strength to back them. There was also the fact that this was all with the aim of reaching tier-four, and he knew that equipment wasn't the way you passed that boundary, rather through a qualitative change in strength. This was how three of his days passed. He could have crossed the mountain in a single day if he had sprinted the whole journey, but instead he took it slow and focused on his training. And this proved itself as he checked his status: Stanis Volkov Age: 18 years Mana capacity: 278(regeneration is capacity/4 per hour) Level 47 (Progress to the next level is 18%) Class: Origin Strength: 94 [53 -> 56] Dexterity: 95 [55 -> 57] Constitution: 94 [55 -> 58] Intelligence: 93 [40 -> 43] Wisdom: 87+5[40 ->42] Tenacity: 89[54 -> 59] Skills: Layman's Rush, Scout and Sense, Light Healing, Destructive Mana Recharge, Ice shot, Blueshot spitfire, Lightning seed The average for Humanity had also grown by a similar amount in the period. Stanis guessed that this was due to a few villages worth of humans being wiped out as he doubted villages similar to Haven were rare. There was also the fact that stronger enemies were coming out all the time: anyone who couldn't keep the pace would merely die then and there. Not that Stanis feared the increase in stats that much. If the average stats looked like that, it meant the strongest people had stats closer to 80 in most attributes, which was awfully close to his, but his strength didn't come from his stats in the first place. The reason why he could dominate others was actually due to the grade of his magic mastery. His ice crystal was the closest to a tier-four he currently had, with Lightning seed just a fingertip behind it. Stanis doubted that anyone else had anything close to tier-four yet, instead the strongest humans had probably just entered mid-tier-three. As for his progress with Lightning seed over the duration, the lightning bolt that had started out as long as a finger was now about 30cm, or exactly that off a foot's. Even better was the aura it gave off: just like the ice crystal gave off a certain aura with the glittering trail it left behind, the lightning bolt had a similar aura. Only the Lightning seed's aura was far more menacing and frightening than anything he had managed with Ice shot. The lightning bolt currently in his hand was zig-zagging across the air like a mad dog trying to attack a person, only to be stopped by its leash each and every time. Stanis was maintaining this with less than half the concentration he had been using before, the process having been repeated so many times that his body simply knew what to do without needing orders. Stanis was currently just a few minutes of the other side of the mountain when he had whispers in the distance. He mindlessly moved towards these whispers until they grew louder, his mind all of a sudden fully awoken as the sound grated against his ears. It was a similar sensation to finding a stone in the food you just ate, each crunch making you cringe. Stanis's irritation only grew as he moved closer to this sound, his mind fully set on murdering whatever was creating this awful noise. He had known that the sound would get worse as he got closer but even then, he was surprised when he heard how it had actually changed. Not only did the crunching get louder but there were also groaning and booming voices accompanying it. Now close enough, Stanis used Scout and sense, the results further putting him on edge. A few hundred metres away from him, hidden by the vast amount of colossal rocks, were monsters. They were quadrupled and were around 2m tall, so similar to the Jaguars in that aspect. However, unlike the Jaguar's sleek bodies, these monsters had bulking bodies that simply looked impossible to move. Stanis estimated that the 2m monsters must at least weigh a ton, and yet they were still moving around on their legs like that was nothing. And their legs, oh their legs! Instead of the standard claws most monsters had, these creatures had small boulders for their feet. What's more, they had twisted faces with wide eyes, no noses, holes for ears and mouths wide enough to split their faces into two sections. Hiding inside these cavernous mouths were wide sets of molar teeth. These molar teeth were the culprits behind the crunching sounds he had heard from the distance as these monsters kept whacking off stone layers with their boulder-feet, before eating it up like a hot meal. Stanis, on the one hand, was intrinsically frightened by these bizarre monsters, but on the other hand, was excited as he further examined them. Across their bodies were layers of stone-like skin. If these monsters were close to as strong as he thought them to be, then this stone-layer must be a viable defence against monsters of similar strength. This meant that it had to at least be immensely strong, if not even stronger. Well, there was only one way to find out, wasn't there? He began producing ice crystals around him, the three monsters in front of him catching wind of the imminent danger as he produced the 12th one. They frantically looked around them, bellowing as they searched around. One of these monsters was coming his way and Stanis could see the worry in its eyes: perfect. Half of the crystals blasted forwards, the monster not having enough time to react as every single one of them pierced through its skin. The monster roared before leaping onto the large rock next to it, before barrelling down towards Stanis's spot. Stanis immediately fell back at this, inwardly shocked at this monster's defence. That number of ice crystals would have been enough to kill several tier-two Spectres and yet all they had done to the monster in front of him was enrage it. Stanis felt his feet slightly go off the ground as the diving monster landed, its force so large that the shockwave lifted him off the ground despite being metres away. He turned around, only for his eyes to widen at the many cracks below the monster's feet. He gritted his teeth before releasing the rest of his crystals, the monsters doing its best to dodge but royally failing, each and every crystal once again stabbing into it. The monster was struck down by this, violently struggling on the ground and causing a pseudo-earthquake as it fought against death. Not that it would win though, nobody won against death when their time was due. But its time wasn't due just yet, instead it still had a few good minutes of struggling left. This kind of defence absolutely astonished Stanis since the 12 ice crystals had taken a decent bite out of his mana-pool and yet all they had amounted to was downing the monster, not even instantly killing it. But he had no more time to think as the other two were on him, roaring a strange scream as their boulders came flashing down, the sun itself eclipsed by these crude hammers…

Thunderclaps roared and fountains of fire exploded out, drowning Ciae's voice. It was clear that people already had targets in their crosshairs, just waiting till they could shoot. On the other hand, Stanis still hadn't found a single-digit number and so he drew back, moving to the edges of the arena while still searching the crowd. While 317 wasn't high up the ranking, it was still higher than 683 other ones. This was why Stanis had ice crystals revolving around himself as he moved. In case someone did attack, an ice crystal aimed at their legs usually put them off. If it hit, well, then they could forget about this whole event as they would be disabled for the rest of it. If they managed to dodge or deflect, all the same as Stanis doubted they'd be eager to come at him after dancing with death. While Stanis ran around the edges and searched for the 10 highest ranked people, Pete, Skint and Bear were using their newly made "friends" to good use. Pete had already established himself as the strongest between them and so the 10-man strong group followed his lead, collectively beating down anyone higher ranked than them. Their reign of terror only increased as the trio began showing off more of their skills. The trio were, at least, within the top 100 and so it made sense they would be powerhouses here. But despite this, there were still people they avoided. These were the true powerhouses of humanity, the select few who were born to dominate. Their skills and spells caught the attention of the entire arena as all of them were grand. However, it was with ignorance and naivety that these few people flourished their skills, after all, Stanis was using these signs to find his prey. After watching for a few minutes, Stanis got sick of searching. The ten he was hunting were apparently hiding as he couldn't even catch scent of a single one. You would think that these ranks were the most coveted and thus in the most chaotic, violent areas but that was nothing out of the ordinary here. Initially, Stanis had thought there would be large crowds of people hunting the top ten. This had likely been most people's intentions at the start but after less than a minute, most of these people had been humbled down. In fact, this phenomenon was actually apparent while looking around. What had started out as chaotic and grand had died down, instead now small fights between two or so people with more controlled skills. Either way, Stanis had given up on solely hunting the top ten and instead just looked around for any high ranked person. The first one he saw was rank 27 a few metres away from him, currently in the heat of battle with rank 48. Rank 27 was a thickly built man wielding a sword similar to Bear's. He was fighting a tall woman who was using throwing knives. Around Stanis formed several crystals, 15 in total. He waited for the right moment, just as the man dodged a knife and its arc around his head to attack. Stanis stepped forward and every single crystal shot out. The man was no stranger to danger and knew when it was looking him in the eye, immediately turning away from the woman to face the incoming barrage. The woman was similarly infuriated by this rank 300 interrupting their battle and attacked Stanis, throwing several knives at him. The man used his bastard-sword to cut through one of the crystals, using its body to block 3 more and then his body to take the rest of the hits. Being a front-line fighter, it made sense that he had focused his points on strength, dexterity and constitution. But to the ice crystals, those were all irrelevant numbers and each of the icy shots pierced through the man. It wasn't so much the screams that caught the arena's attention, after all, screams were commonplace here. It was instead the sight of the man; as the people closest to him turned around, they found themselves stuck to the sight. The man was pierced through from side to side with about a dozen crystals, each the size of a palm. It was this fear that caused people around to stop their battles and back away, half-hoping Ciae would teleport over and exterminate Stanis. However, Stanis's shots were precise enough that all they did was merely prevent the man from moving. With an added sting, of course. The tall woman immediately recoiled after seeing her ex-opponent's state, but sadly not fast enough. A cast of Blueshot spitfire later with a hole-riddled body to prove it, Stanis walked towards the man. As he moved forward, the small crowd that had formed around him moved back. "I'll be taking this," said Stanis as he grabbed the now-bloody medallion, throwing his own medallion onto the man. He then cast Light healing a few times on the man, patting his back before walking away. Stanis went to the woman and healed her as well. In the case they did die from his wounds, Stanis didn't doubt that he would die alongside. He then looked to the crowd, which had already half-dispersed. He was disappointed as he realised they all had low-ranked numbers. Either way, it was fine as he was already set for the second best rewards. In the time Stanis had gone from 317 to 27, Pete had gone from 318 to 18, with Bear on 14 and Skint on 39. Their group of lackeys had also achieved similar success, all of them at least gone up a few hundred ranks. When on Earth, every person currently in the arena acted arrogantly and moved with confidence. It was in the arena, put up against people of similar strength, that they all suddenly realised their true strength and limit. Bear knew 14 was his limit. Skint could go a bit higher, but at the same time there was no point in doing so as he was already within the second best reward's bracket. On the other hand, half-sober Pete, who had initially thought a rank above 50 was fine, found his opinion overruled by alcohol-poisoned Pete, whose eyes were set higher. **** Ciae sat by the raised seats with his eyes closed. Next to him sat an old woman. She sat with hawk-eyes wide and watching. "There are some good seeds here, you should watch," she said. "I can sense them either way," he replied. "Besides, their mana control and strength is more important than flair and show." "I know, I know," she responded. "But some things can only be seen with the naked eye. How many times have I told you that?" Ciae sighed, one that seemed to take all the air out of him and leave his body sunken. "Lay off my case. Just tell me if you see any particularly good seeds," "What do you think I was telling you about, you senile fool?" she responded, chuckling afterwards. "You know what I mean, you bumbling idiot. Any with skill higher than our Chosen," She chuckled at that, too. "I can see a few--" "Really?!" he said while opening his eyes, searching the arena. "Let me finish. But they're going to need good luck if they're going to carry us higher." "Of course they're going to need a lot of luck. But given our period of bad luck, I'm certain it's about fucking time we were given some good luck," "So, which ones do you think are good?" she asked. Ciae stared wide-eyed for a few more seconds, before laying back into his seat with eyes closed. "The top ten all look nice. A few others as well, but none as special as those," "That would be but I can see a few other special ones. Were you lying about watching them with your mana?" she asked accusationaly. Ciae felt a sweat drip down his bald head. "I'm old, I'm allowed rests." "As am I," she responded. "You would be stronger than you are right now if you hadn't been so lazy early on. They said you'd get better as you got older. I wonder what they think now!" He grumbled under his breath and opened his eyes once more, casting a high focus mana search. His eyes widened as he saw the results seconds later. "There's 3 with weirdly clean circuits, one with an almost perfect circuit…" "Maybe you were right about it being time we got some good luck." she ended. **** Stanis grinned as he saw his prey in sight. Currently standing still with an extremely sharp aura was an African man, above his head a small number 7. There was no one attacking the man but it made sense considering the aura he was giving off, it was simply not the level the rest of people here could deal with. But Stanis wasn't one of them. Nor was he going to play fair. Stanis backed away from the man and began forming Ice crystals in the distance, stopping once he had 20 revolving around him. This wasn't his limit but nor was Ice crystals his only skill. He frontloaded his sword and cuirass with the rest of his mana, using Destructive mana recharge straight afterwards. He had made quite the scene by now proven by the people around backing away, watching the crystals with squinted eyes. But worse than the spinning, floating crystals was his sword and cuirass, the lightning coming off them shocking and scaring people. They were used to deadly skills and spells, but equipment? Stanis took a deep breath in, his body loosening before growing tight. <Layman's rush> He exploded from his spot, heading towards the African man with his sword struck. The man opened his eyes and glared at Stanis, moving into a defensive stance. His aura grew and he began activating several skills, growing in size as his outer skin began to expand and harden. The ice crystals were shot out, slicing through the air as they took different paths towards the man. The man roared but didn't even attempt to dodge, instead taking all the crystals standing still. The splatters of blood both dismayed him but also made him more eager, more bloodthirsty. There was a glint previously unseen in the man's eyes as he moved towards Stanis, his fist the size of a small boulder. Perhaps this would have scared others but not Stanis, not after fighting and killing hundreds of Rashkars. Instead he laughed, his cackles joining his sword's crackles as blade met fist. *CRKKKST* The sword cut into the fist but stopped half-way the bone. The man activated another skill while moving back, his body growing darker and more menacing as the crimson coloured blood turned murky-purple. He then ran forwards, clashing with Stanis once more. This time, however, he roared in Stanis's face, purple coloured smoke gushing out. Stanis screamed as the acidic cloud ate away at his skin. He attempted to retreat but failed as the man caught up to him, giving him a helping hand as he roundhouse kicked Stanis's stomach, driving the air out of his body. Breathless and now in burning pain, Stanis hit the floor and rebounded back up, the man already in place the whack him into the ground once more. His fist smashed into the cuirass and he screamed, quickly retreating back. Stanis was disorientated and so lay there, casting Light healing over himself in hope that it would help. As his senses came back to him, so did a terrible anger which raged inside of his mind and took control. He stood up, pouring even more mana into his sword. What was crackling before now thunder clapped, his striking body small against the bolts released from the sword. His lungs released a beast-like growl as he sprinted forwards, the African man trying to dodge but failing as Stanis followed him like a wolf, his eyes solely on his prey. In a bid to knock the hound off his ankles, the man cast a skill that summoned Goblins behind him. These Goblins didn't live long as they were shredded through as Stanis simultaneously cast two Blueshot spitfires, pain flaring up in response. Not that he cared. Knowing he could no longer run, the man turned around and high-kicked towards Stanis's head. If hit, it wouldn't be a surprise if Stanis's head went flying. And so it was a pity as Stanis ducked before copying the man, his foot like lightning as it struck the man into the sky. Stanis squatted before leaping higher than the man, draining his entire mana pool into the sword as he came down. Out of the sword came a single lightning bolt, one triple the size of Stanis's body, one that lit up the whole arena as every single head turned towards the thunderstorm. The African man's transformation ended, the unnatural darkness leaving his skin. His wounds bled red once more, his face one of utmost terror as he fell through the air, his head facing up towards the God about to smite him. He deserved his place in the top ten, he was truly one of the strongest in the arena. And this was the reason why he already knew the outcome of this battle. This was to be his grave…

*thump* *thump* *thump* The noise was rhythmic, a second between each one. Having used Scout and sense, Stanis knew that each of the sounds were actually collections of multiple drums being bashed at once. Accompanying the drums were strange, guttural chanting, the type that makes your hair stand on end. The sounds layered upon each other, rolling and twisting in wicked ways, giving Stanis an awful premonition. Underneath his feet the ground shook. It wasn't a light buzzing feeling but rather one akin to having small needles continuously stabbed into your feet. However, the worst of it wasn't the shaking, it was the sound itself. After having the rolled and twisted, the layers of sound were now something else, a whole another feeling to them. He could hear the sounds with his ears but he could also sense the magic in them with his body. They were chanting a spell, a dangerous one at that… "FALL BACK!" roared Stanis as he began running to the side. The enemies were coming over the hill and so he ran to the side. It allowed him safety and a good viewing spot at the same time. Bear and Pete followed him, getting away scratch-free just as he had. But Skint, he was on top of the hill… Not that Skint was dumb though. Before Stanis had even called out his warning, Skint had begun running. However, the difference between his situation and the others' was the fact that he was already within the enemies' sight. This was why as he thundered down the hill, doing his best not to trip, that several enemies followed him. They were frog-like creatures, essentially, with crusty, brown skin replacing wet, green skin and much bigger, of course. The monsters were goblin height and rode shell sleigh-boards. The shells were all brightly multi-coloured with numbers on each sleigh. Stanis could see 15 frogs chasing Skint, who was now frantically sprinting down, taking no heed of his burning ankles. Stanis forced his eyes away from Skint and onto the hill itself. The ground, from the top of the hill to where he was standing, was slowly changing. He could see mana seeping out of the ground: whatever transformation these frogs were attempting was clearly an inefficient one. Nevertheless, they had clearly frontloaded the spell with quantity over quality as the surface of land began to change, from dust-coloured into wetter, smoother colours. "YARGGHEERGH" Stanis turned his head back to Skint. He had originally thought Skint was in a precarious situation but it was now that he realised how much Pete had rubbed off on his men. The whole running down the hill, the whole flustered look, it had all been an act. Instead of being surrounded and injured by his enemies, Skint was actually freely shooting arrows at the frogs who had been tipped off their shells and caught in his traps. Stanis watched as one of the frogs made it through, its spear gripped tightly as it closed in on Skint. Skint ran to the left, the frog following on its shell. It was as it was just a metre away that an underground force pushed up on its shell, the shell in question discovering its ability to fly and going straight up. The frog used the shell to correct itself in mid-air, falling with its feet straight and spear ready to thrust. It was a pity for the frog that the trap wasn't done just yet, instead a Venus-flytrap like plant stretching out of the ground to catch the frog with its leafy maw. The frog struggled against the plant, ripping at it with its spear. It was just about to escape when an arrow went through its head, the frog's struggles growing weaker after this. The plants couldn't kill anything but they did a good job of keeping the enemies occupied, in fact, forcing the enemies to become occupied. Stanis reckoned that this whole side of the hill was covered in Skint's traps. But he had no more time to watch Skint's shenanigans as the spell began finalizing. What had been rock before was now marshy, mud and water making murky streams down the hill. Stanis watched as the army finally made it to the top, hundreds of frog warriors moving to cover the hill. Never through the entire procession did the drums stop, nor the chanting. And now Stanis could see why. At the peak of the hill stood tens of thin frogs, their bodies bare and naked for all to see. They had various coloured tattoos covering their bodies, and they were the ones holding the drums, banging in unison. In their centre was a bright, green flag. From the mana fluctuations coming off it, Stanis guessed this was the primary cause of the change to the environment. The drums and chanting were the mediums in which the frogs transferred their mana to the flag, which in turn used that mana to convert the stone to marshlands. It had to be noted that every part of this process was extremely mana inefficient but it was nonetheless impressive. Surrounding the tens of painted frogs were stockier ones with spears for weapons. These looked to be your average warrior type, pushing and snarling at each other in order to get to the frontlines. And currently on the frontlines were the last type of frogs, the shell-sleighers. Skint had killed a fair number of the ones who had chased him down the hill but it turned out that there were more of them, sprinting past the warriors-lines, holding onto their shells before jumping on, sliding across the mud. While he had been leisurely watching all of this happen, Pete and Bear had been running up the marshes. The mud stuck to their feet and drained at their bodies. This had very different effects on the two of them. To Bear, it was like anything else. Stanis didn't know the specifics of what the ferocious man had cast on himself but it was obvious it had to do with strength as the well-built man charged up, mud flying up with each step. When he reached the frogs, he sliced and chopped, his bastard-sword moving with a contrasting lightness. Whereas for Pete, the mud was like a whole another mountain to climb on top of the hill. Stanis hadn't seen it take place but clearly he had taken another long swig of his canteen as he stumbled up the mud, tripping over in places. After seeing that, Stanis was truthfully confused whether he was acting or whether he was properly dead-drunk as he doubted the dedication of any other normal person to throw themselves in mud for extra showmanship. His thoughts were cleared up seconds later when a few shell-sleighers came sliding Pete's way, stabbing at him with spears with double the reach of his mace and hatchet. It was by luck, or perhaps through control, that Pete fell face flat at that moment, his body falling into the mud and dodging the spears by the hair. The next second he was back up, wildly swinging his hatchet to the left and almost throwing his mace to the right. And yet, somehow both slashes hit, the two shell-sleighers beside him falling bloody. Stanis could see that Pete hadn't even used Empathetic spread... The battle continued like this, the 3 of them collectively taking out tens in the first minute. But in the next minute, their kill count dropped. This wasn't because the trio were weary or such, instead far from it as they had actually revealed most, if not all of their cards in time that had passed. Bear had grown in size and ferocity after activating a skill mid-way through. Pete and Skint avoided him as much as the frogs tried to do. It was, however, to their bad luck that Bear chased them anyhow, charging into their midst no matter where they ran. Skint hadn't powered up himself but the extent of power hiding in his traps had begun to show itself through the time. If any of the frogs died on top of or near his plant traps, the plants would reach out and absorb their bodies. They would then have some kind of transformation and power up significantly, no longer stuck to the ground by their roots and able to move. These slithering plant monsters would eat up more and more frogs as they moved up the hill, growing stronger all the while and more monstrous. As for Pete, he didn't use as many skills as the other two. Instead, the drunk man fought with a strange but frightening finesse. The terrifying factor was the contrast between the way he fought and the way he moved. He would swing wildly, stumble greatly and spin madly but he somehow stayed upright all the while, his mace and hatchet always hitting critical areas. It was from watching these three men that Stanis realised how much he had underestimated them. No. Instead, it was how much he had underestimated himself. He wasn't merely powerful, he was absolutely dominating… But that was beside the point on the battlefield, instead the real point being that despite their ferocity, the trio were killing less and less as time went on. It was after carefully watching the fights that Stanis realised the frogs were actually getting stronger. He looked up towards the top of the hill and saw that the thin frogs had almost withered away at this point. They somehow hit the drums with the same force and beat as before but that couldn't hide their sunken skins. He looked at the flag, and then at the ground. His forehead creased and he flourished his sword. He then began walking up the hill, speeding up into a sprint as he jumped into the middle of a group of frogs, ruthlessly murdering them as his lightning spread like disease. He constantly cast Blueshot spitfire as he moved forwards; while Ice crystals were good for high damage, the burst machine-gun like fire from Blueshot spitfire was far too invaluable in an enemy thick battlefield like this to not use. The trio's attempts had been like cutting through stone. They had been able to progress at first due to their momentum but had eventually slowed down to a halt. On the other hand, Stanis's was like cutting through butter. The frogs melted under his touch, and his sword's, as magic and blade cut through body after body. After having fought the Rashkars for so long, this battle was just far too easy for him. His mind drifted under the lack of pressure, his attacks growing looser and more daring. But at the same time, he understood where the difficulty in this trial came from, and also that he had far too over-prepared for it. If he had been a normal person, this trial would have been a challenge as the last few kills would have been beyond difficult. By the rate of improvement the frogs had already gone through, Stanis guessed that each of them would be at least as strong as a normal mid-tier three by the end of it. But he wasn't normal. He knew this. The trio knew this. The frogs knew this. And this was the reason why their struggles lowered by the end of his massacre, the remaining few knowing that they had no chance. So, they crowded towards Stanis defencelessly, almost as if they wanted to die by his sword and his sword alone. Stanis found this weird but once again, he wasn't much the thinker once he started fighting and thus gave them their wishes. The trio however, who had to watch this happen, found it hair-raisingly creepy. If his strength had been enough to scare them before, this event was the finisher that made them give up hope on killing Stanis and stealing his equipment as he slept. What they were seeing was wrong on all levels, even a drunk man like Pete could tell that…

The group was largely silent as they walked deeper into the woodland. It wasn't a long walk, especially when compared to the stretch of land they had already crossed, but it was the most silent, tense walk any of them had been through so far. It wasn't but 10 minutes into the walk that Sil spoke up, "Something's watching us…", her voice quivering as she said so. She wasn't a cowardly person but it was a whole another matter when willingly walking towards death, forced to trust a stranger's strength to get through it. They couldn't even turn back anymore without Stanis, after all, they would be ripped apart before even leaving the woodland. Stanis kept quiet about the situation and just walked onwards, the reality being that he had already sensed multiple Jaguars watching and following them. Caleb was just as cautious and worried as Sil was, and for the same reasons she was. It was just too much of a leap of faith to make, and for what? What would they even get if Stanis was strong enough to protect them all: an answer for why the Jaguars wanted to pit them against the spectres? Was such a thing really worth risking their lives for? These questions bounced around his head, his mind feeling like a hurricane had just blown through it. The monsters that had set up close to the village, the ones they had been fighting all this time, were clearly weaklings. He had always suspected such a thing but now he knew it; he now knew how harsh and cruel this world would become if they kept living in their dreamland, believing they were still the apex predator on Earth. Even Orena was worried as she walked. She liked a good fight: true. She liked a hard fight: true. She loved a fight to the death: true as well. But she didn't like this scenario, it was akin to suicide… As for the real reason why Stanis was doing this: he had a suspicion. And if that suspicion was right, the potential rewards of this mission were massive. The silence which accompanied them was only a temporary traveller, eventually reaching its destination and getting off the ride. What took its place were the sounds of the following Jaguars, deep crackling growls and the occasional roar, giving the feeling of a chasing thunderstorm. This quickly proved its effect on the Humans as Caleb tightened the grip over his sword, Orena now walking in a defensive posture and Sil holding a spell on stand-by. Their surroundings also changed, no longer was it just plain, large trees accompanied by the dark, muddy ground. The trees were now clawed and scratched, pieces of splintered wood decorating the woodland floor. It stank of the Jaguars, but not only of them. It was a minute away from the first chipped trees that they came onto a showing of a different type of damage to the environment: disintegration. Parts of the trees and woodland floor had been disintegrated, the smell acrid and sickening… Now that the Humans were deep enough in their territory, the following Jaguars began to make advances, a few of them slowly coming into sight. Seeing that the Humans had no plans to stop, the rest of the followers also made their appearance, soon 10s of Jaguars following the 4 Humans. Most had golden-yellow fur with spots of black over it. These Jaguars were the smaller type, in comparison anyway, only a bit taller than 1 metre for the most part. But there was another type with fewer Jaguars in, a type that the Humans more intimately knew. They had the sleek fur of night, their eyes glowed green and they watched the Humans with a battle-lust. These Jaguars were much bigger, about 2 metres in height. They were also bulging with muscles and had threatening claws. Just as the other three had feared, they quickly found themselves outnumbered by these black Jaguars as more and more began to follow… Out of these black Jaguars was a certain one with scars covering its whole body from head to tail. It was larger than even the average black Jaguar and commanded a sense of respect from the Jaguars surrounding it. This scarred one had a sudden spark of confidence and so it followed its desires: getting closer to the Humans, especially the defenceless Human who had humiliated it. It was very subtle about its movements and this showed as the Humans didn't realise what it was doing until it was only 5 metres behind, following the Humans with a stalker's intensity. It could see one of the female Humans urging the bastard to turn around, only for the bastard to completely ignore her cries. Wonderful! This was all it needed as the scarred Jaguar leapt forwards, its claws slicing through the air as it activated one of its abilities. "Ice shot" softly spoke the bastard, his right arm's sleeve suddenly shining with a bright light as an ice crystal slid out of it, shooting towards the now very scared Jaguar. It sensed the fluctuations coming off this ice crystal and all of a sudden knew that this had been a trap, after all, such a strong ability was impossible to instantaneously activate. But the scarred Jaguar no longer had the leisure of thought as the ice crystal pierced through its head, the large Jaguar hitting the ground with a thud, blood quickly escaping its corpse. The ice crystal returned back to Stanis's arm, fitting snuggly under his sleeved right hand, now wet with blood. His show of strength was enough for the Jaguars as all of the overconfident ones retreated back, their hearts threatening to come out of their bodies if they dared to try their luck. It was about a twenty-minute walk away from their original position that they stopped, Stanis nodding to himself as he noticed the mana fluctuations here gave the strongest signs. The Jaguar leader was here! Behind Stanis and the three others were close to 300 Jaguars, all prowling and roaring. In front of them were several boulders and large stones placed in a weird arrangement, a large cave in one of those stones. "Bring your leader out" commanded Stanis in an authoritative tone as a black-furred Jaguar came out of the cave. It nodded at him before going back in. It was a long wait for Stanis and an even longer wait for the other three, their minds close to breaking point as they wondered when these posturing Jaguars would finally attack. Suddenly, monstrous roar escaped the cave and broke the posturing Jaguars' confidences as all of them retreated, almost kow-towing respectfully as a new Jaguar walked out of the cave. It was between 2 and 3 metres and had enough muscle and fat in order to comfortably fill that height. It had claws larger and sharper than the black Jaguars' and fangs almost double their size. However, none of these things was the most striking, instead that achievement going to the Jaguar's fur. It had perfectly snow-white fur, with dark, corrupted circles over the white landscape, its eyes the finisher as they were matt-black. "What do you want, Human?" growled the white Jaguar, its voice deep and crackling like thunder. This was followed by a heart-clenching silence as all the creatures there, whether they be Human or Jaguar, eagerly waited for Stanis's response. The squeezing feeling around their hearts only grew as the silence remained, Stanis staring into the white Jaguar's eyes. "You were born here on Earth, weren't you?"…

*Clang* *Clang* *CLANNGG* Stanis hammered away at the blade in front of him, eyes out of focus as he carefully controlled his mana to the minute details. Was he successful with such precision? No, but it helped him stay within the threshold that he couldn't pass; once his mana-flow went too much out of control, the imbuing process would crack before breaking. Whatever followed that would not be a pretty sight… His hammer was energized with the Lightning bolt and yet, unlike before, Stanis was hammering away at the blade without being violently thrown back. It was definite progress and Stanis was certain he wasn't far from the completed product. Maybe this one would be his first success… The lightning crackled and tore out of the hammer. Stanis held his hand, his eyes foggy yet burning with intensity underneath as he attempted to control the lightning. His control had slipped for just a second there and this was the result, the lightning immediately attempting to usurp his power. Luckily, the hammer hadn't been in contact with the metal when he had lost control, otherwise it would have been a whole different story… The usual crowd was watching him, frightened by the sudden, large bolts escaping the hammer but also trusting Stanis enough to not run away. In all truth, he had told them to focus on their own work and ignore him. But how could they ignore him when this was their neighbouring scene? All 5 of them had progressed massively since Stanis had gifted them with a few of his circuits, especially since the circuits he had given them were the ones that specifically targeted the areas needed to improve at blacksmithing. They were now able to create mana-strengthened armour and weapons. This had also been the reason why Alyona had used some of the stored Storage stones to upgrade the Smithy. The thing about the Storage stones were that they rarely gave rewards now. However, they weren't completely useless as the villagers could use them to upgrade their village. Still, not everyone gave in their Storage stones but the few who did were more than enough for the village to fill up their coffers over time. After Alyona had seen the new armours and weapons, she had immediately gone to upgrade the Smithy for them. Well, for them and for herself. She had simply wanted more blacksmiths in there, creating this higher-standard equipment at a faster pace. It was hard to not feel pity for her when she realised the root cause behind all of their progress had been Stanis. It was worse when she realised their progress had been due to a gift of his, meaning such a standard of equipment was most likely impossible without that very gift. Nevertheless, it was too sweet a honey for her to resist and she had eventually visited Stanis. She had acted very amiable and very selfless, only after several minutes putting forward her offer. He had rejected her. Well, it had been a straight rejection but not a full loss for her. He had said the other blacksmiths, who he had gifted, could impart their own skills to anyone they wished to do so for. Of course, this was a lower quality outcome than she had wanted but beggars couldn't be choosers, eh? And yet days later, she had been forced to give up even more of her already little-ground. Stanis had ordered the blacksmiths to not impart any of their skills to anyone else until he left the village… This was the reason why it was only the usual crowd watching him today, as Stanis preferred to keep the Smithy quieter and less hectic before he left. All the rebellious bolts of lightning were back in the hammer and Stanis restarted his hammering. He was close; he knew it. *CLANGG* *CLANNGG* *CLAAANGGGG* A soundwave blasted through the Smithy with his final smash, the whole area silencing. Stanis forced energy back into his numbed body and moved, throwing the sword back into the forge. He wasn't even done with the Forging process yet since he had only hammered one section of the blade. He shook his hands a bit before taking out the next heated section and repeating. In total, the whole Forging process took 30 minutes, Stanis's hand fully numbed of feeling by the end. He was then onto the Annealing. Followed by the Grinding. Then the Hardening, before finally Tempering the whole blade. What came out, after over 3 hours of constant work, was a slim blade the length of an arm. It was quite simple with no engravings or markings, instead a plain design. However, at the same time, it was not simple in the least. The sword screamed danger; there were no lightning bolts jumping in and out of the blade like dolphins but its appearance itself unsettled anyone who looked at it. It was the aura it gave off, an aura incredibly sharp and explosive, similar to Orena's aura but weaker. Stanis created a custom handle over the next hour, one just as simple as the blade and attached the two sections together. He then went out of the Smithy and ran towards the Forest, the other blacksmiths hot on his heels. He arrived and slashed the first tree he found. It was disappointing to say the least; his blade was like any other blade, perhaps a little sharper. Stanis felt half his excitement die then and there. And then the thought struck him, one which told him how foolish he was. He flowed mana into the blade, the blade's aura increasing in intensity. Two seconds later, he knew any more mana inwards and it would break and thus stopped. He checked his notifications. You have imbued your mana into an item. The item has absorbed 40 points of mana. This has been taken off your maximum capacity. If the sword's aura had been sharp before, it was razor sharp now, far sharper than Orena's aura. In fact, it was to the point where if you looked very closely you would notice small bolts jumping in and out like dolphins. Stanis slashed at the tree once more, the tree violently struggling and shaking. This might seem unimpressive but one had to remember that the tree he was slashing had a trunk half a metre wide. And it was this very tree, this very thick tree, that seemed to be holding onto its life and branches as Stanis slashed and cut. It was after almost a minute of continuous slashing that the tree finally snapped, the trunk sliding off the base with an awful creaking sound before smashing into the ground, a massive shockwave travelling through the soil. Stanis turned around, madly grinning all the while. The other blacksmiths looked at him with similar gazes, their eyes grinning with their mouths. This was what he had made and this was what they could make. It was wonderful! **** It was only after an hour had passed that the smile finally left Stanis's lips. He checked his stats: Stanis Volkov Age: 18 years Mana capacity: 255 (Mana capacity is actually 295 but 40 points are currently in use) (regeneration is capacity/4 per hour) Level 51 (Progress to the next level is 4%) Class: Origin Strength: 101 [57 -> 61] Dexterity: 104 [57 -> 59] Constitution: 101 [58 -> 62] Intelligence: 99 [44 -> 45] Wisdom: 92+5[42 ->43] Tenacity: 96[59 -> 62] Skills: Layman's Rush, Scout and Sense, Light Healing, Destructive Mana Recharge, Ice shot, Blueshot spitfire, Lightning seed Close to a week had passed since the Jaguars had left the forest and he had made okay progress in his stats. A few of his stats had gone over 100 and so he had been given the chance to upgrade one of abilities. However, Stanis waited for Intelligence to pass 100 so that he could further upgrade Ice shot or maybe even upgrade Lightning Seed. He had been focusing his time and attention into blacksmithing all this time, only for all his efforts to finally pay off today. And it had been well worth it! Considering the hefty mana-capacity price his equipment had, Stanis guessed it was best to only have 2 or 3 equipment like it. The mana cost was most likely due to the strength and size of the item. Considering he wanted to have defensive articles, it meant the mana costs would be higher than for the sword he had just made. That would take around a week at max, and in the following week he planned to spend the whole time grinding out the Rashkars. From what he had heard from the Jaguars delivering his supplies, it seemed the Rashkars had gotten exponentially stronger as the Jaguars had moved further into their territory. The truth was that Stanis's level, if based on his strength, would be at least 20 levels higher at the lower end. This meant that a little grinding could go a long way, especially when what he wanted to do afterwards was pass the bridge to tier-four. Stanis rested his body a bit before returning back to the Smithy. He had decided the best way to reward and keep up his subordinates' strengths was to give them a little gift. And so Stanis began working on a spear for Orena, a longsword for Caleb and a rod with metal ends for Sil. Unbeknownst to Stanis, Serb had just left with Niss at this time. The two of them were going to a secluded area in order to become tier-fours, something their instincts screamed would not be easy or safe in the least…

For a second, Stanis saw himself blasting into the house and killing the two where they stood. But in the next second, he loosened his fists and stumbled back, eventually running away from Sil’s house. He found a dark alleyway somewhere down the distance and ran into it in order to recollect himself. But no matter how hard he tried, he couldn’t throw ropes over his thoughts. He mind wandered from thought to thought, feeling the same emotions of anger and distrust every time. Why was it Jayesh? It was this one fact that was the crux of the problem. He had known that Sil would most likely find another person to have fun with once he left, but why was it Jayesh? Jayesh was someone who he had once been close to but also someone he had left in the dirt. He had sensed no connection between Sil and Jayesh before he had left. But what if there had been a connection? What if he had been getting spoon-fed a sugar solution all this time when hidden beneath the sweetness was a horrible bitterness. Stanis stretched out his arm and leaned onto the wall beside him. He pressed the other hand against his face and stood there motionless. He revisited all his past events through his memories. He was searching for the clue, for the sign that revealed the larger conspiracy hidden behind all of this. By the end of his visit down memory lane, his jaw was gaping wide-open and his heart was beating hard. There were too many clues, too many signs… His eyes roved across the alleyway. He could feel his hairs standing on their ends. But before his paranoia could take hold of him, before it could wrap him in its arms, a bitter coldness rose inside of him. He squinted his eyes and relaxed his back onto the wall. He had underestimated the village; he had underestimated humanity. He had been illusioned by his own power and that of his seemingly powerful Jaguar-allies. He had essentially placed a mirror in front of himself. He had only seen the reflection of himself; he had only seen his faults that he could improve, as well as his greatness. But behind the mirror the pieces had kept on moving, in fact, they had never stopped. It had been fine before as his power had vastly overpowered the village’s. But now it had cast itself into prosperity in his absence, and only now did he finally see the pieces moving. As if only proving his point further, Stanis thought about the lack of Jaguars now in the village. While the Jaguars primarily focused on themselves, they should have at least had one or two Jaguars posted here. He grit his teeth and shook his head. This was not the time for thought; this was the time for action. He cast Scout and sense and followed it up with Layman’s rush. He moved like lightning, sprinting out of the alleyway in less than a second. He then lunged towards the wall of a house. The wall caved inwards and before his target could even move, before his target could even breathe, Stanis’s hand was around the watcher’s neck. Eyes shivering wide, the watcher struggled to keep his heart in his chest as his neck scraped past the reaper’s blade. He was done for; the speed, the power, they had vastly underestimated this enemy… “You scream, you die,” Stanis said. Before the watcher could even respond, Stanis had already picked him up by his shirt’s neck. And just like he had come, he was gone. Eventually, after passing by many a house, Stanis came to a halt and dropped the watcher square on his arse. Gut still rolling, the watcher recoiled from the ground and frantically peered around like a frightened hare. “Are you the only one?” Stanis asked. The watcher instantly reacted to the question and felt his own eyes shine. There was still a way out. He instantly put on a mask and looked up with a fearless expression, before breaking down into deep fear once again. The fierceness Stanis looked down at the watcher with: it was clear that he wouldn’t even take the slightest of bullshit. “Yeah,” the watcher croaked out. In truth, Stanis hadn’t sensed the watcher with his Scout and sense. He had experienced a similar phenomenon with the watchers on him earlier: it was as if they had an ability that blocked his own one. But still, due to his mana sensitivity, he had felt an invasive point watching his actions with a predatory gaze. All he had to do from there on was follow the point back to its source. As for the watcher, he had really fucked up. After half a day of watching Stanis, the multiple watchers had graded him not much trouble and thus had left the watcher as the sole one assigned to Stanis. Just in case they said, just in fucking case… “Why are you watching me?” Stanis asked. His cage broke near the end and the last words came out much colder than he had anticipated, throwing the watcher further on his arse. “Orders,” the watcher answered. “Y-you skipped the defences. You were considered a danger,” He almost choked on the last word, cruelly laughing at his own misfortune. Considered a danger. Stanis snorted in response and asked another question. “Who am I?” “I-I don’t know?” Stanis snorted again. The watcher didn’t seem to be lying but then again, he could just be a very good actor. “Fine, tell me, who leads the village?” “Drak,” So there had been a change in leadership. All Stanis knew about Drak was that he had been the leader of the old Riverbeat village and then in a relationship with Alyona. “I recall Jaguars being allied with this village. Where are they?” “They’re still here, just that they don’t have much contact with anyone other than the leadership,” “Who are the strongest in the village?” The watcher grew further vary at this question. He was now almost certain that this domineering figure in front of him was an enemy spy, most likely a powerhouse from another village. Stanis saw the hesitation in the watcher’s eyes and moved closer. “Answer,” he said, as he released lightning from his palms. The lightning danced around the watcher almost as if they were connected to head-height thunder-cloud. The bolts zapped the ground around the watcher, slowing edging inwards towards the man. “Caleb, Orena and Moonshine,” Stanis wrinkled his eyebrows at the last name, an unfamiliar name. But it was good to know that two of the people he had taught, albeit shortly, were still the strongest. “Who else? That surely can’t be the best you can offer,” Stanis said. He said it with a grandeur that immediately made the watcher re-evaluate him. Not just a rival powerhouse but an exceptionally strong and proud one on top of that. “There’s Sil, David, Jayesh, Tanya, Ji-yeon and Xin. And…” The watcher stopped in the midst of his words. He stared mouth wide-open at Stanis. The links all came together: the interest in leadership, the interest in Jaguars, the domineering power, and a skill to do with lightning. While his appearance had changed, the closer the watcher looked, the more striking similarities he found. “And you.” he ended. Before Stanis could ask another question, the watcher asked one of his own. “Why are you doing this?” He asked with both desperation and exasperation. Stanis squinted his eyes at the watcher. “Just answer my questions and I’ll let you live,” “But you don’t need me. Other people would gladly tell you more if they knew who you were,” “You don’t need to know,” shouted Stanis. His sudden twist in temperament threw the watcher back into a pit of fear. He had felt a moment of security after realising the man who he had been captured by was one of the village’s. But it turned out that Stanis was immune to common sense. “Tell me what happened to the village after I left, and tell me in DETAIL,” Stanis said. “Uhh, after you left. Oh, then. After you left, the blacksmithing industry blew up. The stuff they pumped out drastically improved in quality. Their standard soon blasted to dream-like quality and we began winning more of anything and everything. More people began flocking here and that’s all I really know.” Stanis eyed the watcher with scrutiny. “Honest,” the watcher explained. “I was just chosen to watch the influx of people coming in in recent days. I don’t know much else than what I see with my eyes.” Stanis cancelled the spell and the lightning bolts broke. In truth, even if the bolts had struck the watcher, they still wouldn’t have caused much damage due to how weak they were, after all, Stanis hadn’t been going serious. He moved around a bit on his feet as he thought of his next actions. Things had apparently largely stayed the same, and it seemed the blacksmiths had been the inciting action for all the changes that had occurred. Stanis turned around to the watcher and met him dead in the eye. “What’s your name?” “Omar,” the watcher replied, confused but equally grateful at the turn of events. “Alright then, lead me to the forges, Omar,” If Omar had been lying, then Stanis would be easily able to chop him down as he discovered the truth for himself. But if he hadn’t been, well, then it was going to get all the more interesting…

Stanis awoke. His body felt fine, good even. He lay there dazed for a few seconds as his last few haunting memories came back to him, his leg being chopped off on the teleporter. His body slightly shook as he removed the blanket that was over him, finally breathing a sigh of relief once he saw his leg there and in-tact. He looked around himself as he lay back into the comfy bed. He was in a very clean and fairly large room. It had a few typical furniture, such as a table and chairs, in it, but nothing else other than that. There weren’t many signs of use across the furniture, instead they were all dusty and stale. After a few minutes of rest, with a weary sigh, Stanis got out of the bed. The blankets slipped off him like silk, revealing his naked, scarred body. He walked over to the door and grabbed his armour and clothes. All his clothes were there alongside his equipment. They were ripped and dirty but this wasn’t something that discomforted him, after all, when weren’t they such? He slipped his clothes on and powered up his equipment, his maximum mana limit going down at this. Then the thought struck him, had he levelled up? Considering the false humans’ strength, it only made sense that they gave an equally large amount of experience. But at the same time, the level system had been scrapped and he had ranks now. Stanis Volkov Age: 18 years Mana capacity: 32.1 (Mana capacity is actually 48.1 but 16.0 points are currently in use) (regeneration is capacity/4 per hour) Rank: Tyro Mosyte Class: Origin Strength: 15.9 Dexterity: 15.1 Constitution: 14.8 Intelligence: 16.4 Wisdom: 14.8+0.5 Tenacity: 16.4 Skills: Layman's Rush, Scout and Sense, Light Healing, Destructive Mana Recharge, Ice shot, Blueshot spitfire, Lightning seed, Darkness Manipulation Not a single thing had changed… This meant that the only way to increase his stats was then via circulation. Now in a bad mood, Stanis opened the door and found himself in a fairly large hallway. There were many doors down the hallway and a staircase leading down from it. He walked over to the doors and tried opening them to no avail as he discovered they were shut tight. So, he went towards the staircase and walked down it, holding onto his sword the whole time: just in case. He reached the bottom and realised he now knew where he was. This was the way they had followed the nameless man into the basement. Stanis had already guessed such that but it felt good to have his ideas confirmed. He looked around and eventually walked into the room where the other 9 were sitting and circulating, the nameless man at the front sitting silently. As he walked in, the nameless man aroused: “I’m surprised all ten of you survived that,” Stanis walked over to Pete and sat beside. “So, how did you find it?” the nameless man asked. … “Hard,” Pete eventually said, scratching his beard while saying so. From the fact that Pete’s beard was no longer groomed perfectly, it was clear as day that the test had taken quite the toll on him. “Yeah,” the Asian man agreed. Stanis looked over at him and realised that he was now quieter and less confident than he had been. In truth, this made sense as dancing with death for as long as the other group had done for would take quite some time to recover from. But then again, considering the Asian man’s personality, it wouldn’t be surprising if he bounced back in a few minutes. “Yes, it was meant to be hard. How did you all survive?” … One by one, heads turned towards Jen, who in turn aligned her head with everyone else’s so that she now looked at the wall past herself. “You saved them?” the nameless man asked. “I did,” admitted Jen, looking as placid as ever. The words sounded thick and sticky in Stanis’s head: having a larger effect on him that should be. They sounded wrong to him, not to say that they weren’t the truth but rather that he wished they weren’t the truth. How weak he had been there; how he had been elated to see Jen at the portal; how he had been broken when he realised she wasn’t going to help… The nameless man turned his head from Jen and looked at the other nine. “You got lucky that you got saved by your teammate. I’ll be honest, it doesn’t get easier from here on and I don’t doubt a few of you won’t be here by the end.” When the nameless man had told them to just survive last time, Stanis had felt no pressure on him. Now that he that said he thought a few of them would be dead by the end, Stanis felt more than enough pressure to accommodate two. This wasn’t because of the words themselves, or even the meaning behind, but rather because of the trust Stanis now had in the nameless man’s judgement. Next time, what they needed to do was instantly find the teleporter and escape. This thought led to another, and the question finally struck Stanis. “How do you activate the teleporter?” he asked. The nameless man looked at him, and then at the others. “How did you open it?” As he looked, the others turned their heads away, as if admitting they hadn’t a single clue about what he was asking. “You pour a lot of mana into it,” Jen finally said. Stanis slightly flushed at this. Of course it was mana, everything had something to do with mana, whether it be ranks or teleporters. “Mmmm,” the nameless man agreed, “Anyway, you are here to train non-stop for one week. A few hours have already passed and I’m sure you now understand the difficulty. Since you were saved by each other instead of fighting for yourselves, this time you’ll go into the teleporter with only one group of five.” He pointed at number two, the Asian man, Okoye, Vasile and Pete. He stood up and led the five out and into the basement. Stanis looked at Pete stumble away and realised that this very well could be his last time seeing him. He chuckled inside at that thought, before getting back to circulation. If the only way to increase stats was via circulation, then he was willing to spend every awake moment on it as long as it meant he wouldn’t have to depend on another for strength. The man came back and gestured the remaining five to follow him. Stanis was at the back and thus got to have a good look at the rest. There was number one who was actually not the strongest, the short girl who he no longer believed to be 14, the pony-tailed man who no longer looked so relaxed and Jen. After focusing on Jen for a few seconds, Stanis came to the conclusion that the day he saw emotion on her face would be the day he would also die. They were led back to the large field. The sky was now dark with cold air billowing through. “While they are fighting for their lives, you will fight each other. Some of you are weaker than others. This is the chance to hone your skills without fear of death,” He pointed towards Stanis and Jen, before standing back, gesturing the other 3 to join him. “Begin,” Stanis immediately flourished his sword in the hope that it would temporarily deter Jen. He was half-surprised, half-not when he saw that she was standing there expressionless, showing no interest in fighting him. He gritted his teeth as he saw this. Around him formed several crystals, and he split his mind into two as he simultaneously activated Blueshot spitfire. The crystals followed and the dust-cloud grew, blocking Stanis’s vision. Instead of backing away at this, Stanis instead moved into the dust-cloud and chased Jen, his sword crackling loudly, but not as loudly as when against the false-humans, as he widely slashed. He hit something hard and was immediately thrown back, landing on his feet a few metres back. Around Jen was the mana-barrier that anyone could make after becoming tier-four. But instead of being weak and fragile, hers was thick and coloured dark. Inside of her barrier, she stood expressionless but also injury-less. Stanis growled and circled her, his mind rapidly thinking of a way to beat her, touch her even. After a few seconds, the very idea was in his mind. He only had one-shot at it but it was worth a shot, anyway. He cast Blueshot spitfire into the ground, creating another dustcloud, before going in once more. He cast Scout and sense and saw where the barrier was, using Destructive mana recharge on it. The barrier crumbled away and he cast Layman’s rush before leaping through the barrier. Just in time too as a dark bolt zapped across to where he had been standing. He frontloaded his sword with 8 units of mana, the same amount he had used against the clothed false-human, and slashed, lightning roaring out as it struck against Jen. She stumbled back before casting a few more skills, the ground growing stickier, the air getting darker. But before she could cast enough to stop his advance, Stanis threw his sword, which was still drunk on his mana. It caused Jen to leap away again, her face on the edge of expression as she landed. Stanis was already there and he stabbed her with his dagger. “Ahh,” she moaned. Stanis looked up towards her face and saw her smiling. Her face was pretty but her smile definitely wasn’t. He attempted to recoil back but failed as she latched onto him. The darkness from his dagger had sunk into Jen’s flesh, but out of it came strengthened darkness back his way. He loudly struggled but couldn’t escape her grip no matter how much he tried, eventually losing the energy to even try as her darkness entered his bloodstream. It felt like multiple, venomous snakes with razors for teeth had just bit into him. He froze and crumbled, falling to the ground before violently shaking. “That’s enough,” the nameless commander said. Jen finally let go of him and stepped back. She didn’t, however, take her darkness back with her…

Needless to say, Stanis knew Orena wouldn't let him run now and so he proudly walked towards the three, slightly jutting forward his chest as he walked. "Oh, Stanis, well that's all of us so let's go" said Orena, her voice still chipper… Caleb looked at Stanis, sizing him up before saying, "You sure you ok man? You look like a corpse compared to what I remember you looking like." Stanis looked down at his arms, well arm, and noticed that his skin was still pasty white. The yellowish tint had begun a slight recovery, but it was still barely visible. "Yeah" responded Stanis, forgetting for a moment how vibrant his skin used to be. "You got a hidden weapon or anything? Or you fighting bare-hand?" asked Caleb. "Yeah, bare-hand I guess" croaked Stanis, his confident image going down the drain as he realised he had forgotten to take a weapon. Not that he needed one anyway… "Whatever suits you man" responded Caleb, his voice without worry as they began walking out of the village. They were all professionals here, Caleb had no need to pester him about weapons and amour since Stanis already knew. Or should have known in his case, just that his mind was working a bit slower than he wished it was. The white-haired girl ignored him, doing her fair share to pester Caleb as they walked. Stanis had slept a decent night's rest and thus had a clearer view of the world. They were soon out of the Yora village and walking through its outer defences. The village was heavily-fortified in comparison to what he remembered, the defences no longer rotting or broken. There was a pseudo-wall a few paces out of the village, its height about a metre and length about a metre. It was made out of stone and the area walled off was quite clean, whereas its outside was sticky with blood, literally. There were fences and spikes, pitfalls and traps, broken arrows and blades lying all over the place, all of them stained with dry, dark blood. Some of the defences had been broken down the middle whereas others had only been chipped. All the corpses had been cleared away but there was still the odd limb and muscle tissue Stanis would catch sight of while walking, all of them unhuman-like. There were people busy at work as they walked through, some clearing up the battlefield but most repairing or building defences, the one-metre stone-wall growing as its jaws, the traps, were sharpened. Caleb, Orena and the white-haired girl who he now knew was called Sil, all seemed unfazed by the battlefield as they casually walked through it, the workers greeting them or staring at them with reverence. Stanis wasn't a fool and could easily tell that the people he was walking with were clearly big shots in the Village, most likely half of all this carnage their personal work. That was when he remembered how Rikkey had been talking about making a sword for a big-shot called Caleb. He looked towards Caleb's thigh and noticed a sheathed sword, unnaturally long but actually just arm's length for Caleb. Stanis could lightly sense mana coming out of the sheath, clearly Rikkey hadn't done a good enough job. But if he was anyone to judge by remembering the swords she had been making before, this one was clearly her magnum opus to date. Their whole group was walking south, opposite to the mountains and instead into the plains. The brown, barren soil seemed to stretch on forever, although Stanis knew this wasn't the case, otherwise these strong people wouldn't be scouting this way. From what he had heard and previously seen, he knew that Caleb and Orena were the top of the village. He remembered seeing the rankings up the mountain, his name shortly followed by Caleb and then Orena. Considering he had only gotten his rank by destroying what he now knew was a teleporter, they had clearly killed hundreds to get their place. As for Sil, Stanis had never heard of her before but Rikkey had said that she had come here when Yona village and Riverbeat village had joined together, meaning it was highly likely that this lithe girl with skin paler than his was just as powerful as the rest of them. This journey was not meant to be a silent one, nor a quiet one as Stanis very quickly realised. Orena had hummed ever since she had left the village, her hum an upbeat one, concreting the bad premonition Stanis had thought up so far. Sil wouldn't leave Caleb's side and pestered him, saying whatever came to her mind. Her mouth was like a reverse black-hole as word after word was spouted, whether it be about mana, fighting, monsters, Caleb's tattoos or anything else she could think off. Caleb was far harsher and gloomier than Stanis remembered him being in the short time they had shared in the tutorial. Although, Stanis wasn't sure whether this was due to the transformation the apocalypse had had on him or whether it was more due to the chatterbox walking right next to him. Nevertheless, the chatter soon became background noise to Stanis as he entered a meditative state, using this time to practise as he circulated the mana inside of him. He wasn't training now and thus he didn't do the accompanying movements but even circulating the mana made him feel stronger, for reasons he wasn't quite sure of yet. He had thought that he could sense mana better when he had become an Origin and now he knew it as he could feel it clearer. Orena had said that they were just going to scout but Stanis heavily doubted that such a powerhouse team such as this would just do simple scouting, rather he was almost certain that they were walking towards some kind of dangerous battle, which would, in turn, explain Orena's behaviour in the past hours. Not that he was worried or anything though; he didn't know exactly how strong the people around him were but he himself had experienced battles so many times that he now had no choice but to be confident. This was especially true when considering who his sparring partner had been for the last few weeks. It was about an hour into the walk that Stanis began to see signs of life. The first thing he saw was a skeleton, not a human one he could tell, but that of a bird's. It had been licked clean of any life it previously had, its bones browning in the sun. Caleb walked over to it, half-curious and the other half running away from Sil, and touched it, his finger sticky with dried dribble as he checked. "It's quite fresh." He then applied force onto it, increasing the pressure until it snapped in his hands. "Also is decently strong." He wiped his hands across the ground before walking, the mood taking a dive for the worse as all four of them got serious. Well, three of them in a cold type of seriousness while the last was in a jollier type of seriousness, at least Stanis hoped she was. Such signs such as the licked clean skeleton became common-place as they walked onwards, none of the skeletons rising to above hip-height but the number still worrying. Stanis had initially thought of skeletons soldiers or something from fantasy as this world could accommodate such evil, but he was then confused as he realised there was no mana change in the atmosphere. The sun was now beating down on them and would have caused heat-strokes was it not for the amount of constitution each of them had, easily walking through as they drifted past skeleton after skeleton. Caleb was the first to talk, "I think there might have been a battle between two monsters camps here." The others seemed to agree and so Stanis was left alone to ask what he meant: "What do you mean? I thought they only attacked us?" It was truly like they had seen a ghost as they looked at the pale man wearing dulled, defenceless clothes behind them. "Where have you been all this time? A cave or something?" asked Sil with a sharp tone, the first thing she had said to him so far. The slight flush of colour was hidden by the brightness of the sun and so he was clear, Orena finally deciding to explain as the silence remained. "That was weeks ago. Then other villages and monsters began popping out all over our surroundings. Lucky that they hate each other as much as us meaning that we are now just another race of people here, no longer the only prey." Stanis could add one and one together and thus made the connections. "You guys haven't been here before?" "No, that's why it's called a scouting, fool" responded Sil, clearly someone who didn't have the best of impressions of Stanis. "No, we haven't been here yet. Just that one of the proper scouts noted something shady going around these areas and we thought we might as well see what's happening since it's so close to us and that" properly responded Caleb, his tone fresh and calm as he spoke, perhaps happy that Sil had finally found someone else to annoy. Stanis was about to ask another question when he squinted his eyes, still staring at Caleb. "We're being watched" he whispered, his voice calm as he spoke. "Which way?" asked Caleb, slightly doubtful. "Thataway" said Stanis while pointing towards at Sil. The three of them kept their composure but their brows furrowed, especially Sil's…

Stanis went into deep thought a short while later. In truth, whatever war Alyona was talking about was of little interest to him. Humans? There was not a single human that could challenge him; humans weren't his opponents, whether it through his moral compass or in terms of raw power. Instead, what he thought of was how to become tier-four. It was a bit of an obvious thought but he felt closest to the gates of tier-four when he had pushed his body past its limits against the Spectre when he had released the last ice crystal. However, at the same time, he instinctively knew that he hadn't even touched the gates yet, let alone passed it. All this told him was, once again quite simple and obvious, that he would need to push his current self over a cliff in order to enter tier-four. And that wasn't optional either, he could either do it by choice and stay ahead of the other humans and toe-to-toe with the emerging monsters, or he would be forced to do it when all the other humans caught up to him. That wasn't an option in Stanis's mind and thus he would have to voluntarily throw himself into the face of mind-numbing danger in order to reach tier-four, something this war against Humans wouldn't provide. Having decided his path in his mind, Stanis began thinking up ways to pace through it. He could do it straightaway. And then die… Considering the fact that he couldn't beat the Spectre boss alone and the fact that the pressure the Spectre boss had provided hadn't been high enough for him to reach tier-four, meant that he would die straight away when he challenged a monster strong enough to put on enough pressure. Having crossed out that plan, Stanis went onto the next one. Train himself up in the village before leaving to cross the bridge to tier-four when he felt ready. This way he could make sure that the village was going in the right direction, his direction, before leaving and also train himself and others up at the same time. He looked across towards Orena, Caleb and finally Sil, his expression warm by the end. Yes, this felt like the right pace to go at. The only thing he would add on top of that was adequate armour, after all, none of the armour the system supplied was even close to good defence for him. Instead, he would have to create a good pair of armour himself in the Smithy. Now done with his thoughts, Stanis called Sil, Orena and Caleb over. "I won't be participating in whatever war the Yora village is waging." Stanis said. "In that case I won't participate either" said Sil, shaking her head simultaneously. "No, you will. And so will both of you, Orena and Caleb. You three know how strong I am, a war against other Humans is nothing but a waste of time for me--" "--But for us it's good practice, no?" finished Orena. "You sure about that?" asked Caleb, "We might not be as strong as you are but we were the strongest in the village prior to you coming. And I can't really see anyone progressing faster than we have in this past month, meaning we'll be just as overbearing on the enemies as you are, equally a waste of time for us". Stanis had given all three of them a few simple circuits to practise and Caleb was already thoroughly enjoying the benefits from them. He knew that Stanis could teach them far more than just that and feared this was his way of distancing himself from them. "No." replied Stanis, "You will be the strongest on the battlefield, sure, but there should be a few enemies who should prove a challenge to you." Caleb was about to argue back when Stanis gave him the open palm, telling him to stop. "I will be focusing my time in the Smithy, making myself a good pair of armour while also training myself up. During this time, come to me in order to test yourself and practise. When I feel comfortable with my strength, I'll leave the village and enter tier-four." Caleb was fine with this arrangement, as was Orena. This especially applied to Sil as she knew she would get preferential treatment anyway. "You saw the strength the Spectre boss had. You also know that those teleporters allow new enemies to come out, and so far they've only gotten stronger. You should be pushing yourself if you want to survive in the future, let alone thrive." said Stanis. This was half a command and half encouragement for them. They would, without doubt, rise back to the top ranks of the village within a day of returning, but that didn't mean they were allowed to slack back off. The conversations between the four quickly died off, eventually returning back to silence. All four of them were circulating mana as the hours ticked past. **** It was six hours into the ride that Stanis reopened his eyes. They were now close and he could sense something watching them. He used Scout and sense, its range now far larger than what it was back when he had left the village a month ago, easily catching the sentry in his sight. Stanis told the Jaguar he was riding to speed up until it reached the vanguard of the Jaguar pack. This was where the strongest of the strongest Jaguars were: Serb, Niss, Ragaar, Lisi, Gragr and Hoo. Niss, Ragaar, Lisi, Gragr and Hoo were basically Serb's captains, Niss being the head Captain under his control. All five of them had also made the top ten in the Spectre raid. "Serb, slow down the whole charge" said Stanis. "Why, are we close?" said Serb. "Yeah, just a few minutes from here. I just sensed one of the guys watching us, allow him the time to get back to the village and prepare the reception to welcome us." "Aah, I briefly sensed something watching us. That's fine, I prefer a loud welcome anyway." **** It was an hour later that Stanis saw the village in the distance. Well, before the village was a large army of Humans, around 600 of them from first glance. It was a given that they were armed to the teeth as they prepared themselves to murder the charging monsters in front of them. One of the scouts had sprinted all the way back to the village just a few minutes back, loudly and frantically announcing that there was an army of monsters charging this way. It was fine if they changed directions, but in the case they didn't… It was now that Alyona could actually see the army of monsters that she regretted the decision to send half the forces to attack Haven just a few hours back. If she had known this was coming, she wouldn't have even imagined committing to such a foolish decision. Worse still was the fact that she now felt as if the scout had been severely underplaying these monsters' strength. They seemed to be some kind of big cats, big big Leopards or Panthers maybe. Not that size necessarily meant strength after the apocalypse, but the feeling these cats gave her was heavily foreboding, so heavy she felt she would collapse any second. She hoped that was just a stupid gut feeling and nothing more as she turned towards Drak, nodding her head as the charge was ordered. 300 out of the 800 forces began the charge, all heavily armoured with tower-shields. The rest began moving once the frontline was quite a distance ahead, moving with both haste and caution as they looked out for any surprise attacks. And yet despite their caution, they were still surprised as tens of large icicles formed by the big cats, who had actually stayed put the whole time. The icicles shot through the air, the heavily armoured squad being swatted like flies as one after another was struck down. This wasn't even the worse of it, instead the worst of it was when the arm-sized icicles once again formed near the big cats, before once again shooting out. A similar amount of armoured troops were downed, all of them hit near the thighs or knees. It was like a continuous replay of the first scene as the icicles kept forming, the big cats actually grinning and laughing as they saw the comedic scene in front of them. If this show of overpowering force wasn't enough for the humans to turn back, then what came next definitely was. A man and woman strode out of the big cats, picking up speed into a sprint as they ran head-first towards the incoming squadrons. The man was using a wooden stick to beat people into the ground while the woman simply used a devilish skill, man and woman running away wrought with fear as if they had just seen the devil incarnate. Most of the stronger troops had left to fight on the frontlines a few hours back, but there were still a few left, and they showed themselves as the man and woman were eventually forced to stop their charge. However, it was like the world itself was on their side as warrior after warrior was lifted into the skies, allowing the man and woman to carry on their progress. It hadn't even been ten full minutes when Drak screamed retreat, the remaining forces retreating with high enthusiasm. The man and woman were no longer human-shaped specks to Alyona but clear, cut figures. It might have been a month since they had disappeared but Alyona instantly recognised them, her eyes popping out of their sockets at this. They had been strong, in fact the strongest in the village, but not this strong, not close to this strong. She simply felt the energy leave her body when she saw the big cats calmly crossing the distance, a few licking the bloodied ground while doing so. The injured people who had been left behind in the retreat were healed up as the cats passed, they too, confusedly, joining the walk. It was Jayesh, who stood next to Alyona, who felt his jaw drop as he saw who was in the centre of the cats. None other than Stanis Volkov…

There was another bar of metal in the forge right now, the flames eating away at it while Stanis stood a metre away rubbing his hands. He would be lying if he said he wasn't excited. When he had last been here, all he had really done was heat up the metal and hammer it, which was the forging process, as well as heating it up and quenching it in the water, which was the hardening process and tempering when done repeatedly. But even with that, just by supporting his skills with mana, he had managed to make better swords than Rikkey then. Clearly her blacksmithing skills had come a mile since then. But his mana manipulation and mana pool had come more than a mile, meaning if they added his skills with her knowledge of the craft, well, the possibilities were endless, weren't they? The simple process Rikkey had shown him was a six-step process. The first step was forging, where you heat the metal in a forge before drawing it out by hammering it. This was used to draw out the desired shape, and the metal had to be repeatedly heated in order to get the entire shape right. Stanis's metal was now done and he picked it out with his gloved hand. He had put on the protective equipment like everyone else here. Forging was quite easy to improve with mana since all he had to do was apply mana onto the hammer. And that was exactly what he did as sparks brighter and hungrier than Rikkey's blew off, each strike bringing a whole another cohort of sparks. Due to his increased strength, he could hammer each section into shape in about 10 strikes, much less than Rikkey had done. Stanis's arm was buzzing as Calu, who was watching him alongside all 5 of the others, took the piece of metal and put it back into the forge. It was about 10 minutes later, after each section had been heated and hammered, that the shape was well done all the way around. The next step was annealing where you would heat the sword and allow it to cool. This was to make the sword softer and easier to grind in the next stage, and would take around a whole day of waiting to finish. Stanis didn't have that time and didn't need that time as he put his raw hand onto the red-hot steel. There was no sizzling sound or burnt flesh smell as he had applied mana all over it. When Rikkey had shown him how to make a sword properly, she had largely skipped over the annealing due to being stuck for time. He, however, was going to skip over it because he had thought of another way to soften the metal. He sent a good bit of mana inside the blade-shaped metal and began to massage it, each of the molecules stretching and softening with each push. He had started with an idea of ten minutes in mind but soon realised being thorough would take much longer and instead spent thirty minutes on this step, thoroughly softening the blade. Giang went and turned on the grinder as Stanis walked over to the spinning metal. He had thought up some ideas how to improve this step and went about it straight away. "Don't look at it directly" cautioned Stanis just before applying the blade against the grinder. He concentrated and formed a small cone-shaped cloth out of mana. The smaller end of the cone went onto the part of the grinder he was about to use. The blade then went inside the cone, both ends of the cone open. The cloth was semi-visible now but it was going to become brighter than day as he finally pushed the blade against the grinder. *SKRKTKR* Countless sparks blasted out, suddenly finding themselves restricted by the cone. Stanis wasn't standing directly behind the blade and it was a good job he wasn't as the ground below the cone burned with lava-like intensity, the destination for all the sparks. If Rikkey grinding her blade had grated his ears, he doing it himself was like capping a bullet in his own. However, he didn't mind and instead focused on keeping control of the blade and cloth. This process took about 15 minutes but it was well worth it as Stanis came out with a blade with edges shining brighter than even the sparks. The next step after grinding was hardening, where the sword was cooked with intense heat before being quenched. Stanis didn't have any abilities to do with fire or much clue about air-flow circulation so that part was quite out of his control. But not the quenching. Calu once again took the blade and put it back into the forge, only this time the fuel was upped massively. The flames were roaring loud and yet all eyes were still on Stanis, who stood over the quenching tub. Out of his arm formed an ice crystal, and another one, and another one. He formed a layer of mana over the crystals so that they wouldn't freeze the water and poured the water on top. Even then, the water partially-solidified into a slushie-consistency. The sword was red-hot when it came out, Stanis taking it by one hand before casting it into the freezing cold water. *SHHKARRRRRH* The open Smithy instantly filled with steam to the point of unbearable heat, with only more coming out as the water continued to evaporate while simultaneously cooling down the blade. It was at this time that Jayesh walked in, silently standing by the corner as he waited for Stanis to finish. Stanis noted him but also largely ignored him as he went back to his work. The last step was tempering, which was essentially hardening but heated at a lower temperature and also repeated a few times based on the metal. Rikkey suggested three times and Stanis followed, the blade iron-hard by the end. It had quite a dull look to it but the edges gave away its strength, shining beyond bright in the light. Stanis asked Rikkey to hold up her previously made blade, before cutting into it. His blade went through hers like butter with no resistance whatsoever. Not hiding the smile, he then asked for Rikkey's best sword, which he had already broken, but not with his sword yet. She picked it up and he cut through that as well, this time the noise of a screeching blackboard as it faced quite a bit of resistance. But not enough to stop it as it slid through after 3 seconds. What followed was cheering so wild that Ruun peeked over the gate to make sure they hadn't gone mad. The night-sky was out and thus it was the perfect time for them to part ways for sleep as the five blacksmiths and Kevin excitedly thought of what tomorrow would bring off now that Stanis was here. Stanis himself swung his sword a few more times before finally acknowledging Jayesh, who stood grimly by the entrance. Jayesh stood silently before speaking a few seconds later, "You up for drinks?" "Sure" said Stanis, now following Jayesh as he led the way. The went to the storage hall not open to the public and grabbed a few drinks, before walking all the way back out of the village and towards the stream. It was then that Jayesh broke the suffocating silence for a second time. "I was surprised when I saw you leading the Jaguars". He got no response. "I thought you had died". He got no response once again. "We left you for the dead". "I know" replied Stanis, breaking his personal silence. "But you lived." "No help from you though." The dam finally broke. "I'm sorry. That's all I can say now, isn't it? We thought you were dead then and there, you had been knocked out by a massive bolt. Two enemies appeared, one as strong as the one you had just killed then and another who looked worse." Jayesh felt a need to explain himself further: "We fought him later, you know? The Zelts decided to commit a large-scale attack, all of them in it. We were losing and it was the more dangerous-looking of the two leading the Zelts. But then you destroyed the teleporter and they just crumbled, losing most of their fighting spirit within a single second. If we had stayed there, to fight against those two, I know all of us would have died there." "I guess you would have" replied Stanis, his expression blank while gulping another bottle down. Jayesh sighed before carrying on. "That's really it. I don't know what you went through to get this strong, but I doubt the Zelts treated you well---" "Yeah, they didn't" cut in Stanis, his speech slightly slurring. "--but now it's all done with. I just wanted to make sure that you understood that we had thought you dead straight away. We thought we had left a dead body behind, not an alive one." "That's fine" responded Stanis while standing up, giving the aging Indian man a bear-hug before half-stumbling, half-walking away. His mind was ready to forgive, he knew what Jayesh had said here was the genuine truth. But the crux of the matter was that no matter how forgiving his mind was, his body couldn't forget, and thus his body wouldn't forgive either. His palm was white under the moonlight as he had clenched his fist so hard that his nails had dug into his skin when he had been listening to Jayesh. Perhaps he had already forgiven Jayesh for what he and the others had done, but Stanis doubted they could ever go back to what they had before. It was as he reached the village that he realised that he didn't know where Sil was staying. He cleared the alcohol out of his system in about a minute and then began thinking. It was fine, he was too tired to fuck today anyway. In all truth, there was no real romance between him and Sil, just a base lust between the two that both of them embraced. He liked her and she liked him and that was enough for him. Both he and she knew that they would have to part ways one day but the temporary comfort they found in each other's arms was fine for the time being.

Another gruelling week had passed. Stanis's damaged heart had now healed enough that he was treating Zelgard as a friend, and a good friend at that. He would talk a lot about his life before all of this happened. Zelgard never talked about how he had first met Yils or how they had got together but he did talk about the experiences he had on Earth and such. His eccentricity became less weird and more interesting to Stanis as he spent time with him, Zelgardbeing his eternal cheerleader who he could talk behind Yils back to. He would say how Yils was so cruel and vicious and Zelgard would strangely but whole-heartedly agree. But now wasn't time for musings about his new-found friend, rather it was fight time. Again. Stanis checked his Status: Stanis Volkov Age: 18 years Mana capacity: 51 (regeneration is capacity/4 per hour) Level 27 (Progress to the next level is 2%) Strength: 38 [29->33] Dexterity: 38 [28->31] Constitution: 39[28 ->33] Intelligence: 35[19 -> 23] Wisdom: 32[19 -> 22] Tenacity: 44[25 -> 29] Skills: Layman's Rush, Scout and Sense, Light Healing, Destructive Mana Recharge, Ice shot His points were still rising rapidly, and he had even gained enough experience from training that he had managed to level up once, adding both points to wisdom. He was rather surprised as he looked at the growth the rest of Humans had made in that time; it seemed they too were either learning how to train with mana or were rapidly levelling up. It was unbeknownst to him that both his guesses were wrong, in fact the real reason why the average for Humanity had risen so much was actually because of the relocating the Hu had done for them. The placings of the Villages had been largely random within the area and this meant that some Villages were very close to the others. Contrary to what the Hu had hoped this would mean, it instead led to fights and a lot of Humans had died due to this. Many more had died due to the stronger opponents coming down, nothing like the ones they had been fighting all this time. These two events in unison meant that only the stronger Humans had been left behind, massively upping the average. Stanis was forced to leave behind his thoughts as his opponent clapped her hands. Yils was wearing the usual: a tight top and leather shorts. Her eyes were once again preying on Stanis. She took one step forward and an icicle the length of an arm came flying her way. Stanis was already creating another one as he drained his mana, eyes not daring to look anywhere else but on Yils. Instead of dodging, she struck the massive icicle with her palm, crumbling it within a moment. Her face was a cold mask but Stanis could tell that she was inwardly telling him that it was useless. This surged anger inside of him as he shot multiple icicles out at once, no longer having to create them in his hands as he was now able to create them at once in the air around him. He could currently manage three forearm length icicles at once and they shot towards Yils, although the effect was still the same as last time. In one last attempt, Stanis wracked his mind to focus on the icicles, despite the terrifying Yils walking closer every second, as three icicles began to form around him, only these kept growing past forearm length. They were as long as a full arm, the thick end being as wide as a hand while the other end was a piercing point. His head was now aching from pushing himself but he took one extra step, causing a dangerous twist on them before shooting them out. He stumbled backwards as he tried to regain his bearings, the icicles having drained nearly all his mana. Yils didn't employ her mana shield which would have easily broken these icicles, instead just to show their futility, she faced them defenceless. The mana flowed through her body like tidal waves as she chopped one down, kicking another one simultaneously. Both easily broke and fell to the floor but the third one carried on, stabbing her through the head. Or at least that's what it looked like… Stanis felt his joy die down very quickly as the icicle dropped, her forehead as flawless as before. His grand skill hadn't even managed to break through her skin… Worse than the fear of the beating he was now going to get was the feeling of deep dismay at his failed skill. He had truly put blood, sweat and tears into training himself and yet she had just cut through his spells like butter… He had no more time to brood upon the matter as she came flying, her leg in a wide arc as she whipped him into the ground. He had no time to react as he plummeted down, the ground itself parting as he lay in a ditch in the ground. His mind was so used to being overloaded with pain that it didn't shut down, instead he lay there suffering in pain. Never before had he felt so much joy to feel the burning sensation in his stomach, the mana-filled water quickly getting down to work. His vision began working again as he looked the only way he could, up, to see Zelgard gently pouring water into his mouth. The water felt like it was melting his insides but that was actually a sanctuary from the pain he would have to otherwise focus on. "Still pathetic. You got a lot of work to do if you don't want to die the second you leave this mountain" called out Yil, her voice fading away as she calmly walked back to the house. The last thing Stanis heard before his mind finally succumbed to the pain was, "Don't worry, you're doing just fine. Pe----   Tanya shifted her hand to her hidden dagger as she walked. She felt defenceless here, far too easy of a target to pick on. Around her were a few of the strongest from Yona Village, although none of them would pick on her. Rather it was the people by the sides of the road that she was watching, after allthey were in some random Village. Anyone could be hiding in the passer-bys, anyone… One day it had been fine but then the next day their whole surroundings had changed. It wasn't the landscape that changed, no that had all stayed the same, rather it was the fact that Human and Monster camps were now where there were none before. They were currently in the closest Human Village, just a five-minute walk west of Yona Village, just over the stream and in the forest. Tanya herself had scouted this place out and Alyona had called for peace talks between the two Villages, perhaps even a deal of some sort. They had agreed, on the term that the meeting took place in their Village and not somewhere else. This had set off trigger warnings in Tanya's head but Alyona had insisted to go anyway. Thus here the strongest of Yona Village were, escorting their leader to a meeting in enemy territory. The more she thought about it, the worse it sounded and the more trigger warnings it rang. Perhaps the only thing stopping her from straight out drawing out her bow as she walked was the fact that the three strongest Classers were here: Caleb, Orena and David. The Zelt attack had been catastrophic, taking more than 40 lives with it, but it had also ushered forth the era of Classers. And yet despite the massive increase in Classers, these three had still remained the top, perhaps the rift between them and others only growing. All three of them looked calm, David amiable, Orena intrigued and Caleb with a half-sneer on his face. Also with them were Ji-Yeon, who was definitely the person closest to their power, Jayesh, who had rapidly risen up the ranks during the Zelt attack, and a few other top Classers. The group finally reached their destination as in front of them was a builder familiar to them: the Village hall. The group walked in and what awaited them were several people, several strong people. The number of people inside roughly equalled the number of people her group had brought but Tanya could tell more than anything that the ones standing outside were just rag-tags, it was these people in front of her that controlled this Village. "Welcome to Riverbeat Village" cried out a booming voice, the noise even louder due to the echoes. "Our pleasure" returned Alyona, unfazed by the voice. The man who had called out showed himself, a Caucasian male who was about 6 foot. He wasn't particularly bulging with muscles but was still hench, and more than that, Tanya could tell that he was strong. "Sorry about asking you to come all the way here, I had a scout check out your Village and so I just wanted to even the powers a bit today." He was either talking the truth or trying to put them off guard, but Tanya couldn't tell which one. "Your Village is quite impressive itself, no need to praise ours" responded Alyona, essentially repeating his statement back. "Ha-ha" he chuckled, his torso heaving from the hearty laugh before coming to an instant stop, "No it isn't. That's why you're willing to come into the midst of ours and also the reason why we wanted you to do so." <Dominance> The skill was targeted at their enemies but Tanya's skin sure did crawl as she steeled her mind not to show any sign of weakness. The opposing Humans couldn't manage the same as they began to buckle under Orena's terrifying skill. <Group shield> A voice roared out from behind them, Orena's skill instantly getting countered as a man walked in through the door. He was like a copy of Caleb: massive, bulging with muscles and even had a grave countenance, the only differences being that he was white and didn't have tattoos ranging down his arms. Orena didn't seem to take any offence at this as she stood impassive. "Ahh. Perhaps we got off to the wrong start," said the man in front of them, "I only meant to clear the waters so that we can have a working relationship. See, the thing is we would really love to join Camps…" finished the man off, throwing Tanya off guard. If they wanted to attack, this was the perfect opportunity. Alyona responded, "I thought as much. We would love to"…

It had been twelve full hours since he had been tortured, a period which seemed like an eternity to Stanis who hadn't been able to drown himself in thoughts all this time due to the constant pain. But now the pain was gone, mostly anyway. His body was still bloody, sliced and burning with pain, but he was so desensitised to the pain that this seemed normal now. What wasn't normal was the thoughts he now had to fight. "You're just going to die from torture anyway. Just kill yourself now." Stanis muttered back to it, "Ma—". He couldn't even create an argument against his first thought; he was already hopeless… He continued to lie against his manacles, which were in fact too large for him now as his body had grown gaunt from all the slicing and starving he had been through. If there was one good thing about the torture he had been through, it was the fact that his pessimistic thoughts couldn't cause him to commit suicide; he was far too apathetic to care that much about future pain. Time continued to tick and Stanis continued to lie against his manacles, despite the fact that he could slip out of them anytime. But his body didn't want to: there was safety in the chains he were in. What was he meant to do even if he did slip out? And then a part of his brain ticked back to life; how long had it been since he had been last tortured? This question confused and puzzled Stanis, his idea of time now vague, but the sight of healing flesh gave him a clue. Usually, the torture was frequent enough that he didn't have to worry about his regeneration, but now he did as he realised that his roommate nor his slicer had come in quite a while. A small part of his mind, the daring part, told him to slip out of his manacles. He could do it, so why didn't he? In response, his fearful side started screaming all types torture he would be put through. So what? He was so drowned in pain that he no longer feared it, what could they do that they already hadn't put him through? The answer was a lot and would have terrified him back to his manacles, but he didn't know that as he slipped out, hitting the ground with a thud. It took time for his brain to command him to walk and not just brood, but to no avail anyway as he flailed about as he stood up, before crashing back down. Perhaps the pain meant nothing as he was so desensitised to it, but his pain-resistance didn't give him any strength. In fact, his body was so low on strength that his legs couldn't even support his bony torso… But he had time, more time than he knew what to do with and so kept tying, crashing and diving countless times before he regained his torture-prior balance, well, maybe not that high but good enough to stand up. He walked over to the bones as some still had rotting flesh on, flesh that he happily gnawed on. Stanis guessed that it smelled bad but he wasn't really sure anymore after spending so long in here, after all he had been lying next to his own shit all this time… After tearing off as much meat as there was, he found himself once more lost for ideas. His room-mate usually came in with food sometimes, and so Stanis hoped his roomie would come back, even if he didn't have the time to play games. And so he walked over to the door and waited there. And waited. And waited. But his roomie didn't come and so he was lost again. Stanis guessed he could open the door, but what for? This room was his safe-space, and he didn't care much about what lay outside. Amidst his hours of waiting, Stanis, in his half-conscious state, realised he had a full tank of mana inside of him. He decided he would waste time by using it until his roomie came back. The first thing he did was Light healing, even in his broken mind it seemed a good idea and so he went for it. He had multiple hours free and so this bony man looked alive again by the end of his use, by which time he was bored. He went through his Status, half-ignoring everything until he came upon Basic Transformation. Thinking that was a good idea, Stanis used it on his left arm as he always did. Due to his Constitution, his whole body had healed quite fast on the whole, but his left arm had always been much slower for some weird reason. Added to the fact that the slicer had basically cut off all his meat off his bones at one point, his arm looked deathly right now. But the transformation quickly got to work, his left arm back to its former glory with dark-orange, thick, leathery skin and the menacing red claws at the end. It was to be noted that most his muscle mass had died since last week, but his arm looked impressive nevertheless. As his body was healing, his mind also started to partially restore itself. No longer was 90% of it dealing with constant pain, 5% delirious and only the last 5% actively thinking, now it was closer to 50/50. It would be a lie to say that his body was fully healed by the hours, but it was still pretty good as his body looked whole again. And yet Stanis remained sitting by the door because if he had learnt one thing from his torture, it was a type of twisted patience as the passing of time no longer disturbed him. Unbeknownst to him, it had been a whole day since his last visit that his roomie finally came, a pot of glob within his hands. His roomie was humming, finally happy to leave his station at the front of the Mountain. It was fair enough that Rak wanted strong defence at the front of the tunnels, but did all of them have to stand there in silence? He had better things to do like playing games with his good prisoner-friend. He opened the door, the door loudly creaking as it slid to a halt. Damn, he would have to fix that sometime. He walked into the room, only to see that his prisoner-friend was no longer by the manacles, and so he walked in further, peering around the piles of bones, looking for his scrawny friend. "Roomie!" came a spluttering, rough voice behind him, the guard turning around to face his prisoner-friend by the door. One simply cannot blame the guard for his following actions, after all the image of his prisoner-friend healed and whole was enough to put some very bad ideas in the guard's mind. The guard dashed towards Stanis, cuffing his face before kneeing his groin. Stanis became very confused as to why his Roomie would attack him like this, and the small rational part inside of him screamed rage, a bit of which permeated into the real Stanis as he punched the guard with his left arm. It was this very arm that could go head-to-head with a strength-based tier-two and still come out even. Thus the guard stumbled back, his eyes venomous as he looked at Stanis. "Yurr gong fuckng diee for dis." hissed the guard, shielding his face as he charged forward once more. Stanis, half-dazed, looked at the Zelt sprinting towards him and wondered what to do. One part of his mind said to stop and to talk his friend out of his rage. The other part said to rage himself, teach his friend a lesson. Perhaps swap roles in the games they always played. Since neither option really mattered to Stanis, he decided to go with the second one as it sounded more fun and fair. He was clawed across his chest, but the pain felt like a comforting stab, nothing more as Stanis punched the guard once more. Once again the guard stumbled backwards, but only this time with Stanis hot on his heels, using his left arm to pick up the guard. His menacing claws twisted around the guard's head, the guard crying tears and violently struggling as his grip only tightened. "It's only fair to switch roles from time to time" said Stanis casually as the guard whacked and cut him with his claws. His working memory showed images of him crying and bawling his lungs out as they had played, but the guard had never stopped, so Stanis just presumed this part of the game. Stanis's upper-chest and arms were raw and bloody as the screams stopped, Stanis calmly dropped the body which collapsed onto the ground. The guard would wake up a bit later like Stanis had always done, right? He then walked over to the pot of glob the guard had brought in and ravaged the food, his blood dripping into it multiple times. Afterwards, Stanis went over to the door and once again sat down, patiently waiting for the guard to wake up. A bit of time passed before Stanis decided to heal his raw chest. But a feeling kept barraging him as he continued to heal, a feeling that said something felt off. He merely dropped down and waited after he had healed, but the feeling wouldn't go away. It would be minutes later that he stood up, before looking down his body. It was bruised, sliced and coloured a rainbow, but it had no clothes on… The idea of clothes quickly brought him to his Malitsa, the last memorabilia he had of his mother and his old life. Life… Stanis began screaming, his body raw to this type of pain as he tightened the grasp around his own head as he lay in a foetus position, blood quickly dripping down as the memories came back. An unknown amount of time passed before he stood back up, uncaring about his bloody scalp. There was a glint in his eyes, one that hadn't existed before. He looked towards the downed guard who was barely wheezing out breaths at this point. His good friend would no longer have to struggle against death; Stanis would give him a helping hand…

"HARGHHARRRRRGHHARGH" Raucous laughter thundered out of the white Jaguar's mouth. "You came all this way, into the pit of my den, to tell me where I was born?" There was a pause, a silence. "Well, not exactly. But we can only get onto what I came here for once I know where you were born." "And tell me why should I care?" the white Jaguar cut in, "Tell me what is stopping me from murdering you right now?" Another pause, another silence. "Nothing" answered the white Jaguar, its lips curling at this, "Absolutely nothing!" A final pause, a final silence. "You know what? I used to think Humans as smart beings, after all, I was the king of my jungle and yet I wasn't. All who saw me would tremble with fear before coming back to reality, sprinting for the lives within the next second. I would let most get away, but not Humans, never Humans. You let them leave and they come back with 10 more, armed to the teeth with unnatural weapons, unholy ones that break nature's way. But not you. You are foolish, human." What had started out as a heated roar was nothing but a cold whisper by the end. "You asked me what was stopping you?" answered Stanis, "I am stopping you" The white Jaguar snarled at this and leapt from its rock, coming face to face with Stanis in just a second. "You think you can?" asked the white Jaguar, all its subjects revelling in its glory while its opponents anxiously moved back. "I know I can" said Stanis, the ice crystal slipping out of his right sleeve as he said this, its edges smeared with lines of blood. The white Jaguar squinted its eyes at this. "This is the reason for your confidence?!" it bellowed, its eyes glowing red as it said so. It was using some type of intimidation skill, but Stanis wasn't intimidated. He could hear the seed of worry in the Jaguar's voice, only it was using another layer of volume to try and hide that. Pity for the Jaguar that the seed would only keep growing until it bore fruit of its own. The previous pause hadn't been the final one, this was. The true final silence, both leaders locking eyes while their subjects anxiously watched. The white Jaguar swung his club-like leg. Stanis caught it with his left arm. The white Jaguar then used his body as support to swing the other leg, its claws swiping with power. Stanis stabbed it with his right arm, the ice crystal in his hand. The white Jaguar peered its neck forwards, its gaping maw open wide, revealing all its menacing teeth in all their glory. The madness was clear in its eyes; it had gone beyond anger… "Layman's Rush" His left arm moved faster than light, his palm perfectly straight as he viciously slapped the white Jaguar's face, the animal failing to dodge and insteadbeing struck to the ground. There was blood leaking out of the white Jaguar's mouth as it spoke, "You want to play it this way, do you?" The surrounding Jaguars were worried, but also not worried. Their King was finished with playtime… "RARRRGH" roared the white Jaguar, its body blasting out as its coloured fur was replaced with roaring flames, each flicker licking the air dry. The ground underneath the Jaguar was being scorched brown, the heat in the air dangerously rising, the burning stones releasing noxious fumes. Out of thin air materialised several ice crystals, none of them larger than a palm, but their collective aura more dangerous than the white Jaguar's furious flames. Stanis's face was impassive but his eyes flicked with desire: even if the plans he had failed, at least he would get the chance to kill a tier-three to compensate. His left arm began to give off a deathly aura, the burnt air being sucked dry of life as he used destructive mana recharge. Following this was even more ice crystals coming to life, about 9 in total, leisurely spinning around Stanis. The flames that had roared to life now quietened to the whispers you would find in any library. One more second passed and the flames died out, the burning Jaguar now back to being the white Jaguar. It leisurely pounced up the large boulders, back to where it had started. Serb, the white Jaguar, now gazed down with a complicated look, different emotions battling it out inside of him. If this was all the Human had, then Serb was close to certain he could kill him. But at what cost? The tutorial they had gone through, the higher sentience they had gained through that. He had fought his way through simple trials, before working his way up the Jaguar ladder until he had ruled them all. But how many had died by that time? And then they had been brought to a large arena, with all the big cats there. Jaguars weren't weak, but boy were they not the strongest either, not by a mile. Instead, the Tigers ruled that arena, showcasing dominating power as all the cats fought collectively to beat larger enemies. And then they had been thrown back to Earth, only to quickly realise that what the Tigers showcased wasn't dominating power, rather what they were currently up against was. How many of his own had died by that time? Now there was only a few hundred Jaguars left, at least those that he knew off, all camped here, struggling against the wretched spectres. Sure, he could fight this Human and kill him. But at what cost?! Were the lives of his remaining siblings worth it? "What do you want, Human?" asked Serb, his words rough as he spoke. He was tired. "A partnership." "HARGHHARRRRRGHHARGH" Raucous laughter thundered out of the Serb's mouth, a repetition of the start. His exhaustion was gone, replaced by a liveliness; this human had worked his way up to becoming a Human, and now had dropped back to being a human.

These stone-cold boulders smashed into the ground, Stanis barely managing to slip past them. But they weren't finished just yet, instead the boulders rising up once more, and then again, and again, battering down all the same whether they hit him or not. It wasn't a matter of taking their time and calculating how to hit Stanis as much as it was about trying to keep him occupied, not allowing him any time to breathe and thus inevitably leading to a slip-up somewhere. These monsters, who looked quite dull and defence-based, were smarter than anything he had fought so far. They had identified his strengths through their primitive methods, namely through the death of their brother, and now were acting upon his weaknesses. Stanis himself had a Dexterity value closing in on 100 and yet even that seemed to be just a bit off what it should be as continuously dodged hits by the breadth of a hair. He had no opportunity to go on the offence whatsoever, one second of misplaced thought and his body would be smashed through just like the trails of cracked ground that followed him. "Layman's Rush" roared Stanis, his sudden burst of speed catching the monsters off guard as he escaped their flow. Of course, he could have used that time to counter-attack the monsters and deal some damage but at the same time he knew his strength and its origin; they wouldn't be hurt by his tooth or nail. And this gave him the perfect opportunity to use his strengths as he cast Blueshot spitfire, magic bullets firing out and creating dust clouds out of their bodies. It was a weird occurrence, to say the least, their bodies so filled with rock and dust that their blood circulated it through their blood-streams unfiltered. Not that his attacks really damaged them though, rather the opposite as they shrugged it off. All of a sudden, an idea popped into Stanis's head and lit a lightbulb, a lightbulb that shouldn't be lit in the heat of a battle. However, it was already too late for any further thought as his curiosity had already taken control… One of the monsters roared before leaping towards a close rock, then barrelling down towards where Stanis stood. In his palms formed an icicle, one that grew exceptionally fast as it became over an arm's length within the second he had. He didn't even look at the falling monster and instead just fired the icicle, his body rolling away from the impact a split-second later. The icicle struck, doing little more than scratching the monster. It exploded on impact, shards flying out dangerously, and more importantly, ice granules filling the air. The other monster struck at Stanis, he repeating his previous actions and shooting out an icicle, before escaping the hit in the nick of time. This was repeated 8 more times, Stanis getting proficient at this hit and run style as he shot 6 icicles during the last round. The air surrounding their scene was hot, not unbearably but still hot. The energy in the air had been enough for the simple ice granules to melt, the air now thickening with water-vapour. Stanis had a grin on his face as he looked towards the striking monster: a mad-grin… He forgot where he was for a second as he focused inwards, ignoring the boulder seconds away from splitting his face. Mana rushed to his fingertips, he finding the right source and fuelling it with over half his remaining mana. A glimmer of a lightning bolt escaped his finger, the next second filled with light brighter than white as the Gods smote the world. *KZZRSSRZZZZZ* Stanis was temporarily deafened, struggling backwards only to find himself lying on his back. His eyes regained their sight and he looked, seeing nothing but darkness. He struggled more, forcing himself onto his feet and stumbling away, each step heavier than the last as he realised half his body had been burnt black. This was not only in the sense of the colour but also in the fact that they weren't functioning properly, he having to effectively hop with a dangling arm and an anchoring leg. The darkness eventually left his sight, the sun lighting up the rest of his world. He had night vision and thus being blinded by darkness was a rare occurrence to him, although all questions left his mind as he turned around to see the particulate-thick smoke. It was only then that he realised he had been holding his breath the whole time, opening his mouth to allow breathing, only to start spluttering and wheezing. A burnt, porky smell was plastered all across his mouth, his heart gagging at the thought of it. It was about 15 seconds later that he regained his ability to breathe, no longer taking it for granted as he greedily absorbed as much clean air as he could. His mind suddenly remembered where he was, slowly peering around for any sight of the monsters. He walked around the plume of smoke that rose to the sky, the source a circle around 5 metres wide. Stanis used Scout and sense to help him with his search. Well, he tried to but couldn't as he realised he had no mana left whatsoever… Recalling his actions, it was with foresight and clear thought that he realised how stupid and dangerous of an event he had just survived. The air had demanded more electricity than he had supplied, it forcing him to supply his whole mana's worth and even more, just before he luckily managed to break the link. And that was only one part of the danger, the other large part being the obvious explosion that had just taken place. Even now the air was tingling with electricity, Stanis patting down his hair as he realised that every single strand was standing on their ends. He was about to use Destructive mana recharge when he saw the monsters in question, both hit so hard they had been blown out of the smoke, their bodies as charred and ghastly as could be. Stanis went forwards having already lost the energy to care, stopping himself only once he realised that the monsters weren't dead yet. And thus, in honour of the battle they had just shared, he got closer and Destructively mana recharged on them, their bodies wilting up under his touch. This also had practical use as it made his next work easy. Before anything else, he cast Light healing all over the right-hand side of his body. He was still slightly delirious but not as much as before as he dragged the two bodies away further from the smoke, inwardly surprised that no enemies had come to check the scene yet. Nevertheless, he wasn't going to leave his fate to luck and knew he had to act fast. He used his left hand as a pseudo-blade as he dug into their bodies, struggling at first but then using mana to aid him in his dissections. He took both of their storage stones and threw them in his bag, which surprisingly hadn't been burnt. He was about to dissect them fully when he remembered Scout and sense's upgraded ability. He had been buzzed about it at first, an analysis ability added onto a scouting one. But of course it wasn't going to be that easy, instead him quickly figuring out that the analysis ability had little effect on living creatures. Well, it worked on weak animals that he could easily overpower but enemies he was around equal to? Nope. But at least it worked on their dead bodies, at least this way he could learn a little bit more about them. <Scout and sense> Rashkar Level 68 Description: Quadrupled animal with focus on defence. Rashkar Level 67 Description: Quadrupled animal with focus on defence. It, however, turned out to be more useless than he thought it would be. At least now he had a level and name to them though if nothing else. What was curious was the fact that they were over 20 levels above him, meaning his true strength was most likely in the low 70s if going by this levelling system. Stanis checked his status and confirmed his suspicions; he had levelled up 4 times from killing 3 Rashkars! Stanis Volkov Age: 18 years Mana capacity: 278(regeneration is capacity/4 per hour) Level 51 (Progress to the next level is 63%) Unallocated points: 8 Class: Origin Strength: 94 [56 ->57] Dexterity: 95 [57] Constitution: 94 [58] Intelligence: 93 [43 ->44] Wisdom: 87+5[42] Tenacity: 89[59] Skills: Layman's Rush, Scout and Sense, Light Healing, Destructive Mana Recharge, Ice shot, Blueshot spitfire, Lightning seed His points were something he could allocate at a different time though, right now he had dissecting to do. He quickly cut the Rashkars into many parts and arranged them based on strength. The strongest parts of their bodies turned out to be their boulder-fists and shoulder blades. He took these parts from the two bodies, and a few other tough bones before running from the area, his ears picking up several howls in the distance. It seemed the Rashkars he had just killed had been working at a distance away from the others, which was the reason why the sounds of them fighting hadn't attracted any attention. But it was another story when it came to the black smoke that rose high into the skies or the disgusting, burnt smell that infected the air. **** Stanis was a good distance up the mountain when he finally stopped and opened his backpack, taking out the storage stones and bloody bones. He opened both storage stones and was disappointed. He had heard from the others, when on the Jaguar journey, that the storage stones now had a very small win rate compared to before, but it was another thing to see that with his own eyes. It seemed the success-rate had been temporarily boosted before in order to allow the Humans a fighting chance. Stanis forgot about this and checked how much material he had scavenged from the Rashkars' bodies. With some rough guesswork, he estimated he had enough material for about 2-3 swords: not enough to be truly successful in but just enough to check if there was any potential success hiding in these bones in the first place. Even if there wasn't, Stanis was now set on coming back here due to how good opponents the Rashkars were. He had another grander plan in mind, one which had rooted to life after reaping the rewards from the Rashkars. Based on how good a material their bones turned out to be, this plan could either go forwards or stay a plan. Either way, that was something for the future and so he applied all 4 of his points into Dexterity and 4 into Intelligence before beginning his trek back, this time sprinting the whole distance. Things had just calmed down in the Yora Village but Stanis's return would mark the end of that…

"You want to chase?" asked Caleb, his expression the calmest of the four. "Of course! Ha" responded Orena, doing nothing to mask her excitement. "No. There's no use, it's too far away for us to chase down. Just a waste of time and energy" said Stanis, releasing mana into the environment as he said so, the released strands slowly and subtly floating towards the enemy. He could have used Scout and sense, but the problem with it was the fact that far more mana was needed when scouting larger areas as the scouted space exponentially rose. From what he guessed, he would almost drain his tank if he tried to Scout and sense whatever was watching them: nothing but a waste of energy. Sil looked at him with a mix of disdain and curiosity. Was he lying to get their attention and prove his worth to the team, or did this guy actually have better sensory abilities than her? Despite her thoughts, she didn't voice her doubts and instead just watched him close his eyes and focus, his brow furrowing as he began to directly move the mana. However, before he had even managed to guide them towards the enemy, it had caught wind of his game and retreated. Stanis couldn't actually see through his strands of mana but he could sense in a totally novel way, not at all linked with his other senses. And thus the last thing he had seen was a large cloud of dust being kicked up by the thing as it ran. At least now he knew how fast it was: very fast… Stanis shook his head towards the other three and gestured to keep walking. "It ran or something?" asked Caleb, Orena's excitement dying at this. "Yeah" responded Stanis, his thoughts away from the conversation as he imagined what it could be. He highly doubted it was human: a human shouldn't be able to move that fast. So it had to be a monster, and linked to what Caleb had said about scouting this area since something shady was going on, most likely a strong monster. The last thing Yils had told him was to kill a tier-three and not to fall back on his strength; was this his chance? "How do we even know there was anything there and that you aren't just crapping out of your mouth" accused Sil, her sharp tone bringing Stanis back to the real world. He merely shrugged his shoulders and walked on; he didn't know how strong she was but nor did he feel a need to prove his strength in front of her. And like this, the group went back to normal. Well, there was a slight difference in the fact that all of them were tenser than before, ready for battle, and in the fact that Sil was now poking jibes at Stanis, alongside pestering Caleb. She was learning how to multitask. Caleb was more than happy with the space he was given due to this, but also slightly worried about what would happen if Sil kept making jibes. In his brief time spent with Orena in the past, he had thought her calm and scary, especially during the last trial in the tutorial. She had still been like that when he had first met her back in Yona village, although less scary as he had already cemented into his mind how strong he was: strong enough to beat her. But then her character had devolved into a battle maniac as time had passed, to the point that he doubted he could now beat her. But this was fine as he knew that she had no desire for fickle things like social power and such. As for Sil, Caleb had only met her a few days after the two villages had joined to become Yora village. There had been a large raid on a monster camp that had set up too close to the village, and the previous-Yona village fighters had clearly shown off their strength there, him especially so as he had killed the monster leader. After that, Sil had come to talk to him more often, David joking she had a thing for him, although Caleb knew otherwise. Furthermore, she proved that she had more than enough strength to fight with him and thus he couldn't really say much against her. The girl truly didn't have that many faults, especially when compared to a few of the other people who had risen during the apocalypse. But one of those few faults was the fact that she was interested in fickle things like social power, so much so to the point that she was now poking fun at Stanis due to the fact that she felt him a threat to her position. Orena had brought Stanis to the group, which in turn meant that she clearly saw enough strength in him to be in this group. But it was Stanis's and Sil's youth that worried Caleb: what if these jibes picked up and the two began to have conflict. It was something that most others were willing to let go off when they saw people at it, but Caleb knew otherwise, especially when in the heat of fighting. He had learnt this lesson the hard way from his last village… In contrary to Caleb's worries, Stanis was actually careless about the insults Sil made. It was akin to a 5-year-old calling a grown adult an idiot; he wasn't bored enough to take any offence. Either way, the group kept walking in this manner for many hours. Hours slowly passed and soon it was silence that accompanied them, even Sil too tired to speak. Night had been cast over the sky like a blanket, but the group had decided not to stop walking. Their stats meant that they could go for a few days without rest, especially when they were doing light activities like walking with little equipment. The plains had devolved into a valley quite a distance back, two sides inclining upwards whereas the middle part declined. They had chosen to walk through the valley and so Stanis could only see a strip of the starry sky as he looked upwards. He could feel something watching them… The other three seemed to not notice and thus Stanis kept silent, no need to break the silence with a matter that would soon go away anyway. And that was exactly what happened, the watcher soon leaving without a peep. Stanis could see clearer than the rest of them in the dark due to his trait, and thus could see the end of the valley a distance in front of them. It led towards a wider area filled with trees. It was a few minutes later that they exited the valley, marvelling at the woodland they found themselves in. It wasn't a forest as it wasn't vibrant or lively enough, instead a magical woodland as if they had been fished into a fairy-tale.   The starry skies were now fully visible and the moonlight covered the trees with an angelic light, shrouding the woods with a sense of mystery as the colour pallet seemed deformed and yet simultaneously mystical. Unlike a forest, the woods were quiet save for the rustling of leaves as the group walked onwards. At this point, they had given up hope at finding whatever the other people had talked off, but were also too far in the walk to go back without anything. Stanis was melancholic as he walked, his eyes misty as he felt a novel sense of serenity pass over him. Out of all the places he had spent time in after the apocalypse, this was his favourite. The tutorial was shocking, the camp stressful, the tunnels mind-numbing, the mountain rewarding but this woodland was his favourite, despite having only spent a few minutes in it. He felt anger rise inside of his body as he realised that his moments of serenity had illusioned him from the gaze boring on the group; someone daring to break his moment of peace. His anger turned to fear as he used Scout and sense, realising that it wasn't actually one monster watching his group, rather several. And these didn't seem the cannon fodder type: bulging muscles, sleek midnight-dark fur, green glowing eyes, menacing claws… However, his fears died out within seconds, his body beginning to surge with adrenaline: he hadn't had a moment of rest after the apocalypse had started months ago, having danced with the reaper countless times. How could he be scared by this? It seems Sil wasn't as useless as she seemed, speaking up a few seconds after his realisation as she picked up on the same thing: "Something's watching us. I don't know what or how many but I doubt they come with good-will." Caleb unsheathed his sword, its blade singing for blood in the moonlight, whereas Orena took out her spear, far more menacing than anything Stanis remembered her having. There was no time for him to stare though as the shadows that had been watching them moved, leaving flickers of black in the darkness as they shot forwards. Anyone watching Stanis's group would be able to tell that they were experienced, none of them flustering despite the fact that their enemies were basically hidden in the darkness surrounding them. Furthermore, anyone with a beady eye would have noticed that Stanis wasn't as eager to fight as the rest of them, instead his attention seeming to wander… Out of the corner of his eyes, Stanis could see a glimpse of bright, unnatural light behind him…

"Mere corporeal beings, I see you have come here to die!" said the Spectre, its voice a mix of honey and sunshine. It closed its mouth but that didn't stop the blood leaking out… Stanis sat shocked for a second, his mind elsewhere while the Spectres flew towards him. However, he was far too experienced to stay like this, his body taking control as it jumped off the Jaguar. The tier-two Jaguars hadn't yet killed off all their opponents and so it was up to the tier-threes to take on all the incoming Spectres. Serb roared as he started charging, followed by the rest of the Jaguars who followed him to the T. Finally, Stanis broke out of his self-induced spell and began sprinting, his speed faster than the Jaguars. Behind him was Caleb and Orena, as well as Sil who ran half their speed as she prepared her spells. "CAHCAHCAH" screeched the Spectre boss as it sped up, its hands filling up with boundless power. It was a mere second later that both sides crashed, the Jaguars ferociously launching themselves towards the Spectres who received them with open, razor-sharp hands. Serb's paw was thick with mana as he swiped towards the boss, its hands just the same as it countered. The collision was followed by an explosion as both forces met, Serb being flung back with an injured paw while the boss laughed. However, there was no rest for the wicked as large icicles bombarded the boss, it shrieking with joy as the icicles barely tickled it. "He-he Ha-ha" Stanis kept his composure and began forming ice crystals, the boss narrowing its non-existent eyes and cutting short its laughter at this. This was no longer a laughing matter! If it had been walking before, it was sprinting now as it more than doubled its speed, its non-existent eyes set on Stanis as its hands filled up with greater power than before. To its annoyance, it was forced to stop half-way there as Caleb smashed into it, his longsword so saturated with mana that it had no choice but to turn around. This was enough for Orena as she came from the back, her spear like lightning as it pierced through the boss. In terms of roles between the Humans, Orena was purely damage-based and did the most damage out of the three. Sil was purely magic-based and so she did the second most damage, and in situations like this, most damage as her magic was far more effective than blades. As for Caleb, he was forced to play guard in such situations as the other two were fully offensive, meaning that they needed someone to protect them when they fucked up. This was why the boss instantly rotated its head as Orena was doing far too much damage for it to ignore, its hands violently slapping before even turning around. Orena activated Lightning steps and dashed away, Caleb activating Warrior's dance as he began spinning and slashing and striking and diving around the boss. It was at this time that a massive fire-bolt came flying in, far larger and more potent than anything Sil could create last month. It hit right into the boss's face, throwing it off guard as it fell from an upright floating position to a fallen floating position. "Groundworks" shouted Sil, her combo ongoing as the lifeless ground below the boss came alive, splitting in two before swallowing the Spectre whole. It wasn't a long wait until the Spectre broke out of the ground, mud fragments flying as it looked around angrily. No longer did it looked gracious or amused, rather ticked off and ready to do some damage. It, however, didn't have the time to give everyone the look as Serb and Niss leapt at it, both using fire skills as their claws burnt red hot, causing the boss to yelp as it couldn't dodge in time. The strongest of the Jaguar camp had been showering the boss with attacks all this time but the boss itself still looked fine, its shroud now with blemish but still in one piece. Its hands were still recognisable as hands and its non-existent eyes weren't raging yet, meaning it still had quite a bit of life in it. This was fine as Stanis was now finished, 9 ice crystals the size of his palm spinning around him. They simultaneously left him as they shot towards the boss, the Spectre actively running as it knew the danger of these. It was a pity that the ice crystals flew far faster than it could ever move, each one of them stabbing into the screaming Spectre. There was no leaking blood nor ghost blood, but you could see the misery on the boss's face, its expression now synonymous with anguish. This transformed the next second as it became the definition of angry, the Spectre roaring as mana began to swirl around it. It wasn't tier-four yet and thus couldn't make a proper mana barrier, and this showed as Stanis used Blueshot spitfire, the pseudo-barrier it made becoming tattered and broken within a second, followed by a hungry fire-bolt which snacked on the barrier's remains. Niss came flying in, her eyes the colour of anger as she smashed towards the boss's hand. The spectre boss was done with all of this shit and counteracted, catching the Jaguar by the neck mid-flight. They, however, were not done with doing their shit as Serb had stealthily sneaked behind the boss, activating Sharp claws as he struck, the boss's whole arm flying off. It had no time to turn around as Orena used Dominance and struck its other arm, Caleb joining the attack alongside Sil as this arm, too, flew off by itself, the boss now defenceless. It was now Stanis's time to shine as he activated Blueshot Spitfire once more, the countless bullets making quick work of the Spectre as its whole shroud became holey. He then formed 4 ice crystals in the short time he had and sent them flying, too, the Spectre unable to dodge any this time and so each of them hitting a critical spot. The Spectre boss finally fell out of the air, its body soundlessly hitting the ground as it lay still. Stanis was about to cheer when he noticed its severed arm which was lying by his side. It was vibrating… He only had enough time to scream "GET AWAY!" to Orena and Caleb before the Spectre blew up, its whole body exploding with a toxic light. Caleb and Orena had been too close and it showed as they were now groaning on the ground, their lower halves roasted to black. Stanis was about to cover his nose when he realised there were no poisonous fumes, instead something far more sinister as looked towards the Spectre boss's body. It was once again floating, the shroud covering it disintegrating. The arms he had noticed vibrating had shot back towards the body and were once again reattached, the body baring itself for all to see. The worst thing? That would be the fact that the light coming off the Spectre was no longer bright blue but instead a crimson red. As for its gracious face, that had been tipped down on its head… Spoiler Well, looks like I have to adress a few issues. Storage stones. I did completly forget about them this arc. I later made up a reason why( since spectres don't have them as they explode on death) but at the same time, that opens up the plot-hole of where the few Jaguars got their healing skills from. I think the best way to adress this issue would be by saying there are Storage stones, and that the Spectres do drop them. I just never talk about them this arc, although they do come back in the next arc. The next issue about him transforming his whole body. There are problems which occur if he transforms more his body. Considering the fact that this is an issue, I guess that part hasn't come up yet so I won't really explain it. But I guess one of the chapters ahead will touch on it. It's not just because of appearance that he doesn't fully transform. [collapse]

It was a while until the laughter stopped, Serb's eyes shining as he questioned Stanis. "Forget all the difficulties that would come up due to such a partnership for a moment and tell me why I should even consider it in the first place?" Sil nodded at this, Caleb looked exhausted and Orena had her eyes closed. It was almost as if Serb was doing them a favour by asking the question they had all been thinking, as Stanis's actions over the previous days had only degraded, now at a point that they were nonsensical. "We're both natives of Earth, aren't we? Isn't it just natural to help each other out?" answered Stanis, his answer being two rhetorical questions. In truth, they should have been anything but rhetorical as his answer didn't make any sense, a few of the Jaguars chortling with laughter whereas the Humans felt their hearts sink. Serb himself had a good sense of humour and so too began laughing at this: a hilarious joke. He wasn't even angry when he responded a few seconds later, his funny bone thoroughly tickled. "What a good point, you have my respect, Human." said Serb, his face stone-cold as he spoke. Another batch of Jaguars exploded into laughter at this, their howling soon dying out as they realised Serb wasn't being sarcastic. "Wonderful, us natives should stick together" said Stanis, this conversation now dream-like for the audience as they watched with disbelieving eyes. Serb squinted at this, his matt-black eyes darkening. He was no fool, he now knew that this Human wasn't either. This meant that there was something clearly behind this partnership, something this Human was hiding in clear sight. Perhaps this Human meant to exploit the Jaguars! Whatever it was, it was fine as Serb had his own personal strength to keep the Jaguars alive; all he would do was go along with this Human's ride meanwhile grabbing every advantage possible. "But-" said Serb, " you are the one coming to us to make a partnership, to ally yourselves with us. Tell me what is in it for us? As the initiator, you must have something to give us in order to set good relations, no?" Stanis thoughtfully rubbed his jaw for a second before answering Serb's question. "Nope. I was hoping you would have something in mind that I could do in order to set the relationship." He knew what he was doing; he knew that he was playing into Serb's hands. In fact, his larger plan wasn't as malicious as Serb was guessing right now, instead all he wanted was for the two races to join forces. When he had first left the mountain, he had initially wondered which path was the right one for him: the lonely path or the path that grew from the many little ones that made it. The lonely path was good as he would forever be chasing pure power, his true desire, without any distraction. As for the larger path with space for many others, he would forever be at risk of betrayal and other fickle events: he would be distracted from true power. And thus his wonderings had been solved like this, his focus solely on himself. But that had changed. The time he had spent with Rikky, and then Kevin, and then during the long trip to here with Caleb, Orena and Sil. Sure there were bad sides to it, but it was during these times that he realised he liked the company of others; they might not be as giving as Yils and Zelgard had been, but they were Human, just like he was, and they all had a little good in them. Humans were social creatures: the lonely path was not made for them; there was no need for him to torture himself when the world was already eager to do so! However there was a problem. His feelings of shared humanity couldn't win over his desire for true power or vice versa. This left him at a bit of a crossroad... But then he had figured it out how to get the best of both worlds when he had been fighting the Jaguars. He had a sinking feeling then that these Jaguars were not invader lifeforms, and thus maybe they could become his key to opening a new door. If he could train these Jaguars up, that would allow him to make sure that the Village stayed afloat by using these Jaguars to control and protect them, while still being able to focus on his training without worry. But typical of life, his plan hadn't worked perfectly so far, variables he hadn't expected jumping out, mainly the Jaguar leader's intelligence and strength being so high. But it was fine, he was still certain he could get it to work… Serb took a pause, acting as if he needed a moment to think and not as if he had already thought up a whole plan. "How about two little things? You do both of them for us, and you have my word that we, the Jaguars, will join you. How about that?" "Sure" said Stanis, following Zelgard's example by showing a toothy smile after he spoke, although his was far greasier than should have been. Serb's heart slightly lurched at this but he managed to keep his stomach, noting to himself at the same time that he had to be careful of this strange human and its weird tactics. "Here's the first one: teach all the golden Jaguars about mana. I know they will learn of it over time as many have already done, but we need to be at maximum strength as a race if we want to survive this hell-hole. I'm sure you can do something about this considering your magic abilities, no?" "It would be my pleasure" said Stanis. The white Jaguar was clearly talking about the circulation of mana and not just teaching about its existence. He would have struggled with this task before but after teaching Rikky how to do so, he now knew a quick method of allowing someone to circulate mana, although not to the quality Sils had taught him to. What followed this was Stanis baptising Jaguar after Jaguar, introducing them to mana and how to circulate it. At first, he was just going to do a sloppy job and finish it quickly, but Serb made sure that this wouldn't happen by sitting down close and watching Stanis as he baptised the Jaguars. Perhaps Stanis could have tricked the golden Jaguars but it was much harder to trick a tier-3 monster, who although didn't have even close to Stanis's sensitivity, had enough to notice obvious bad work. And thus in total this work took 2 full days, Stanis successfully having baptised just over 300 Jaguars. The other three had first found themselves in terrible situations as they were free, since they had nothing to do, but also not free, since the 50 or so black Jaguars, tier-two, watched them with suspicious eyes. Their predicament, however, lessened after Stanis had baptised a few of the golden Jaguars, as they became friendlier and began to play. This wasn't to say that their hands weren't close to their weapons at all times though… Since all of the Jaguars were now at least tier-two, Serb once again held another meeting. This time both the audience and Serb himself were more friendly and accepting of the Humans. "You have finished one of the promised tasks. Finish the second one and the partnership is set, Stanis" said Serb, his whiskers slightly twitching as he talked. He had learnt that these Humans weren't as bad as their reputation said so, and thus wished to go forwards in a partnership with them. However, he was still strictly set against doing so if they declined the second task, after all this was the important one. "All you have to do is assist us burn the Spectres to the ground." said Serb. "How many?" asked Stanis, purposefully avoiding the topic of why. He was sure he would find out later anyway. "Every. Single. One. Of. Them." answered Serb, the words barely escaping his clenched teeth…

Stanis turned from his original path and began pacing back, the bottles rattling against each other as he ran. It was a brilliant idea and also one that was as clear as day, so why hadn't he thought of it earlier? Stanis scrapped this thought immediately, his mind too giddy to be affected by his pessimism right now. It was night and so most of the people in the village had gone to sleep, but there were always a few Guards stationed around the perimeter, just in case of a surprise attack. Two of these Guards had just seen Stanis walk out of the gate minutes back and thus were rightly surprised as they saw Stanis running back, the bottles now making a racket. On the one hand, they wanted to tell him to slow down since people were trying to sleep right now, but on the other hand, they decided not to after thinking of their personal consequences if they angered Stanis. The rest of the world was a blur to Stanis as he ran towards the Smithy, his mind going through several ways he could apply his skills to his creations. How many of them would work? He had no clue, but that didn't stop him thinking up even more applications. Ruun wasn't guarding the gateway right now, instead the Smithy had been locked up for the night. Stanis discovered this the hard way as he barrelled into the door, rebounding back as he realised the door wouldn't open under his strength. He rubbed his scratched forehead before creating several ice crystals around him, each of them piercing through the door in the following second, a sizeable hole in their wake. Stanis threw his bottles in before he too slipped through the hole, running towards the forge before lighting it. He threw a truckload of fuel in before running back to where the metal was kept, cutting off a sizeable chunk before putting it into the forge. As the metal was heating up, he checked his Status to see which of his skills had potential use in this field: Stanis Volkov Age: 18 years Mana capacity: 257(regeneration is capacity/4 per hour) Level 47 (Progress to the next level is 10%) Class: Origin Strength: 89 [53] Dexterity: 89 [55] Constitution: 91 [55] Intelligence: 85 [40] Wisdom: 82+5[40] Tenacity: 84[54] Skills: Layman's Rush, Scout and Sense, Light Healing, Destructive Mana Recharge, Ice shot, Blueshot spitfire, Lightning seed Looking through them, he quickly realised that most of his ideas wouldn't work since all but one of his skills seemed to be useless in this field. Having played a few games before in his life, he remembered weapons with one-time abilities or ones with abilities with a cooldown, but neither of the two seemed viable here. This was why all but one of his abilities were useless in this field. But he still had the one, Lightning seed. And Darkness manipulation of course! Stanis hadn't had the opportunity to test Lightning seed much from after having obtained it. Thus, this was the perfect way to combine the practise of his skill and blacksmithing. Stanis quickly grabbed the protective clothing and took the length of metal out of the forge, throwing it onto an anvil. He closed his eyes and imagined his finger as a pot of soil with a seed, before imagining a plant sprouting out of it. This seemed to be the most effective imagery for him as an almost-silent crackle cried out, a small bolt of lightning emerging from his finger. Stanis kept fuelling this little bolt, it growing bigger as it voraciously drank up his mana. Stanis opened his eyes after 5 seconds, doing his best to maintain the lightning. The reason why he closed his eyes to create it was because it was extremely difficult to find the source of the lightning otherwise, the bolt of lightning dancing so fast off his finger-tip that it almost seemed teleport. One might think that all you had to do was flow mana towards his finger-tip and that was it. Sadly, it turned out that the Lightning seed had to be baby-fed in order for it to grow. This was the reason for why it was such a difficult skill to use. It had grown to a decent length by now, around 20cm, as Stanis picked up the hammer with his other hand. He then slowly passed the hammer from his left hand to the right one, his eyes cross-eyed and squinted as he maintained his high focus. *zccZzzZCC* Stanis breathed a deep breath as the hammer now cackled, lightning jumping out of it like dolphins in the ocean. The lightning seed wasn't as mana-intensive as it was concentration-intensive, beads of sweat now flowing down his forehead. He used his left hand to hold the cold part of the metal in place as his right arm rose high, hammer zapping with excitement as it began its freefall. *FPPPTHHH* Stanis was blown away as the hammer hit, his body slapping against the anvil behind him. "Arggh" groaned Stanis, his legs struggling to produce the energy to stand up. His mind was blurred and lost, taking a few seconds to re-find the directions before he stood up. The hammer he had used was fine for the most part, the only apparent change being the black tint it now had. Stanis picked it up and was pleased as he realised that there was no electricity hiding in it to shock him. He then walked over to the anvil, his mind lost for thought as he took in the scene. The bar of metal had been split in half, and not a pretty split at that. It was scorched black where he had hit it, the metal little more than foul-smelling sand under his touch. That was basically all to it, the length of metal now split down the middle with no sign of the electricity that had escaped the hammer. And yet this caused cracks in all of Stanis's ideas. But not big-enough cracks to throw him off track, at least right now. The Forgery's few neighbours did not have a pleasant night as the continuous zapping and explosion sounds filled the night. It was only 4 hours after he had begun that Stanis gave up. He had made progress, sure, but he also knew that this was the limit. He had started by lowering the output of electricity into the hammer, eventually going down to nothing but a hint. And yet the metal still broke… Stanis had, in his frustration and admittedly foolishly, then whacked his own arm with the electric hammer, only to feel little more than sting. This had thrown an even bigger spanner in the works than before, only further confusing the little information he had. He had then decided that it was most likely due to the skill itself, and had thus changed over to manipulating darkness. He had done the same thing as he had done with the lightning, applying it over the hammer, before hammering away at the heated metal. Unlike the lightning, the hammer didn't explode with force and sent him sprawling back, but like the lightning, the metal was ruined under the darkness. The metal under the hammer bubbled and melted, giving off a noxious odour as it did so. How did Stanis know this? His coughing fit gave him enough clues. Stanis had then lowered the amount of darkness he put on the hammer but the results were still largely the same, the metal always ruined. He had then thought up a new idea. He applied the lightning over the hammer before striking the metal, no explosion or anything as the lightning merely spread from the hammer into the metal and air. He then lifted the hammer and once again struck, this time sent sprawling back as the force threw him off his feet. Rubbing the blood off his head, Stanis had then sat on his arse in thought. The only difference between the two hammer strikes had been that one had been with no intent, whereas the other had been with the intent to change the metal. From the testing he had already done, he knew that lowering the strength of his lightning and darkness did lower the damage, but not to the point of success. This meant that his ideas were still viable, the only problem being that the metal wasn't strong enough. He had been working with Rikkey's best metal but clearly even that wasn't good enough. His failures weren't enough to wipe the smirk off his face as Stanis went about roughly clearing up the Smithy, before taking his bottles and walking towards the largest home in the village. He got there quickly and knocked on the door, the noise echoing through the innards of the home. He heard the scattered response of muddled footsteps before the door was opened a few seconds later, Drak staring at his guest. "What do you want?" asked Drak, his voice hiding an edge. "Is Alyona here?" asked Stanis, deciding to keep his words to a minimum. Refusal flashed through Drak's eyes before he changed his mind, calling out Alyona's name. Alyona came walking through the hallway a few seconds later, her clothes not as neat as usual. Stanis didn't need to be a genius to put together Drak's bare chest with Alyona's messy clothes. "Oh, Stanis, what pleasure do I owe to gain a visit from you?" asked Alyona. "Where's the strongest enemies around here?" asked Stanis. "Mm, I guess the strongest here would be from Haven" answered Alyona. "I'm not joining your fucking crusade" spat Stanis. There was a silence. "Where's the strongest enemies around here?" repeated Stanis. "If not Haven, I really don't know." answered Alyona, her expression slightly unsightly. "Oh," cut in Drak, "there is a place behind the mountain." Stanis turned towards Alyona, his stare threatening enough. "I wasn't lying to you" defended Alyona, "it's just that the place behind the mountain is of insane difficulty." Stanis kept staring. "We sent a few scouts past the mountain but they never returned. Then we sent Tanya, who came back in tatters a few weeks ago, telling us how dastardly strong the enemies there were." Alyona carried on. "That's enough" said Stanis as he turned around, running to the market to get a bag to put his drinks in and a bit of food before leaving the village. Alyona turned to Drak, clearly irritated. "Why'd you do that?" "Why wouldn't I? We'll be better off when that bastard of a boy leaves." "That bastard of a boy is also our greatest defence if we get attacked." Drak grunted before walking deeper into the house. Alyona sighed as she followed him. She didn't necessarily like Stanis but she also understood his strength. Her control of others' powers had been her claim to fame, and she hoped Drak hadn't just thrown the strongest person in the village into a spiked pitfall…

Stanis walked up the boulders, the cold stone smooth on his soles, as he headed towards Serb's cave. Using Sil as a test subject he had created a mana circulation method better than his previous one, meaning it was also far better than anything the original tier-twos and Serb was using. But the Jaguars weren't under his control yet and thus Stanis had to check with Serb before going ahead with his plan. It was dark in the cave, although this was not a problem to the Jaguars nor Stanis. Stanis entered without proclaiming his visit and came upon Serb mating with another Jaguar. Stanis vaguely knew the other Jaguar, she was called Niss and was the second strongest in the camp, her fur half between pure black and white with black spots. "Stanis, don't you know not to interrupt a mating couple" groaned Serb as he fumbled over Niss and came to eye-level with Stanis. "Any problems?" Stanis looked at the scene stoically and answered, "I've made a new way to circulate mana which is more efficient, far more efficient than anything you guys are using right now. If you are to eradicate the Spectres, you need to able to use the limited mana you have efficiently. Just checking if you're ok with that." Serb stared at him with his matt-black eyes, watching Stanis for any discrepancies between his speech and act. Satisfied with what he saw, Serb said: "That's fine by me, I'll tell them to organise themselves so they come to you in an orderly manner. In fact, how about you do Niss right now?" Stanis was fine with that and so the peak tier-two Jaguar came over, sitting on her hind legs in front of him. Stanis held her hands and told her to circulate her mana. It came as no surprise when he realised that her circulation was horrendous, much worse than even what he taught the golden Jaguars. This was fine though as Stanis got to work, fixing mistake by mistake as he injected more and more of his mana, fixing up her circuit. It was close to 20 minutes later that he let go of Niss, the Jaguar's eyes gaunt and fearful as she looked at Stanis. Serb seemed amused by this as he prowled over, playfully knocking her over as he took her place. Stanis gave him a toothy smile before starting, catching Serb off guard as the Jaguar cringed at it. If Stanis was classified, he would be a solid tier-three, edging towards the higher ranks of the tier. Serb was only a bit behind him, meaning that once Stanis improved his circulation, Serb would be able to take him on and possibly even kill him. This was why as Stanis was fixing Serb's circulation that a very malicious thought came into his mind. However, it stayed as a thought and had no chance to grow as Stanis refocused his attention back to his work, after all, he was trusting that Serb would become a powerful force under him. And in the case that Serb betrayed him, well, he was sure that he could kill Serb, even if it would cost more after this. Stanis also investigated the Jaguar's body during this time, wanting to know the reason why he was so powerful. For Stanis, it was because of the training he had undertaken on the mountain-top, but what about Serb? His question was quickly answered as he noticed how unnaturally tough the Jaguar was; he had injected his mana into so many people that he was now at a stage where he could vaguely read their attributes, and thus he could tell that Serb's strength looked to be a similar level to his, whereas the Jaguar's constitution was about 20 points higher… In total, due to a tier-three's circulation being harder to fix, the whole process took close to 40 minutes. Serb loudly groaned in joy at the end, stretching his body. "ARRGHH, I feel so good, so strong" roared Serb, his voice echoing through the cave. He looked at Stanis with a wary eye before patting the man out of his cave, "I've got business to do boy, gedouddahere!" It was only after he had left that Serb leapt back onto Niss, playfully snuggling her while whispering, "Be careful of him. Don't piss about with him unless I'm near!" "I know, I could feel it while he fixed my circulation. There's something different about his mana, something dangerous…" Niss whispered back. Satisfied with her answer, Serb went back to lazing around with Niss, the day quickly passing by.   And so the days passed by. The average day for Stanis would be having a short nap, before fixing the circulations of around 30 Jaguars, taking that group to practise, then training himself before finally going out with Caleb, Orena and Sil. He had already fixed all of their circulations and thus began training them up as well, to a standard higher than the Jaguars. He had decided that these three would do well as his subordinates and thus was now tempering them into a standard befitting that position. All three of them were geniuses when it came to fighting anyway and so their progress was fast as he forced them to break past their limits. What Stanis had realised ever since coming down the mountain was that the Humans had been focusing on the wrong thing. The only way to survive in this world was by getting stronger, but most Humans had gone about it the wrong way, focusing on pure strength instead of mana. And even then, the ones who did focus on mana went about it far too much, ignoring physical strength for it. Luckily, he had been found by Zelgard and Yils and they had allowed him to walk down a smoother path earlier than others, allowing him the advantage he now had. He'd be damned if he let others catch up to the head-start he had, instead his plans being to train himself to failure so that he could further that lead: he just had a few things he wanted to sort out before going into seclusion. In about 16 days, Stanis had finished upgrading the circulation technique of all the Jaguars. Following this was just a hard-core grind as all of them began throwing themselves against the Spectres, training themselves up so that they could be ready for the big raid. The stronger people in the camp also gave pointers to the weaker ones, the most popular instructors being Stanis and Serb.   Orena looked across the grassy floor, her opponent standing calmly in ripped, plain clothes. She had once thought him as a weakling, a person below her, and yet he had somehow exploded beyond her horizon before she had even realised. Now she was struggling just to catch up, not that she minded though: she loved the feeling. Sil acted first, shouting as she cast a fire-bolt towards Stanis. He merely side-stepped it while coming face to face with the charging Caleb, using his palm to strike the man-mountain back. Orena used this moment of distraction to charge forward. <Lighting steps> Her feet exploded with energy as they burst her forwards, her spear crossing metres within a second as she violently swiped at Stanis. He ducked below the spear, although she had guessed he would do such and thus had already kicked forwards. He caught her leg and was about to take her for a spin when Sil used Wind's embrace, distracting Stanis for a second as he was raised into the air. He broke the spell in the next second but that was enough time for Orena to leap back, her eyes of a viper as she looked at him. "Flying blade" yelled Caleb while dashing forwards, his long-sword escaping his grip as it flew towards Stanis. He dodged it by the breadth of a hair and noted down in his mind to dodge it once more as it arced back. That was all the time he had to think as Sil had already shot 3 fire-bolts in a row, Stanis dodging two and using his left arm to take the last one, before sweeping his leg across the floor against the attacking Orena. He forgot to check the note in his mind as the longsword stabbed into his back, Stanis thrown off guard as he stumbled to the ground. Caleb saw his chance and leapt the final step, his fist crashing down with the added momentum. Stanis ignored the pain coming from his back and caught Caleb's fist, a shockwave travelling through his arm but failing to stop him as he twisted the tattooed arm. Caleb roared out in pain as Stanis moved onto Orena, catching her sword before slapping her onto the floor. She had used Dominance to try and escape but it fared useless against Stanis. He looked over at Sil and saw that she was charging up a powerful spell, one that would injure him if it hit. It was a pity that it wouldn't have that chance as Stanis placed his right foot in front before lobbing his spear, the spear-head piercing through the air before biting hard into Sil's thigh. She screamed in pain as the spell was dropped, exploding over her body as she was flung into the air, before crashing into the ground. "You're all strong, but you need to learn how to work together. You could have beaten me if you forgot your egos and learnt how to share the spotlight" said Stanis while pulling the longsword out of his back. They weren't quite up to the job yet but that was certain to change over the next few days, just as Yils had done for him…

For a second, everything was silent except for the feet of the fleeing Goblins, almost as if the World itself was waiting for them to leave before restarting time. A few of the people edged backwards as they noticed the chill in the atmosphere: they had experienced enough battles to know when shit was about to go down. Sensing his new prey edging backwards, a grin blossomed over Anatoly's face. He turned around from the Crystal and caught eye contact with some of the others, his lips parting and hand in the air in a pistol sign. "Let's do this!", his voice was chipper as he gestured shooting a round into the air, motioning the start of a race. Chaos broke out in the next second as Anatoly, Fedro, Ailean and his two friends began moving towards the others. However, Anatoly was in for a cruel twist of fate as a menacing spear shot towards him, tightly gripped by the very woman who said she would participate in the backstabbing. Anatoly stopped his sprint, and instead raised his sword in a defensive stance. Orena leapt at him, her spearhead lightly scratching his face as he slashed down at her, which she dodged by the breadth of a hair. A small stream of blood began trickling down his face, although it wasn't much compared to the blood covering him. He was already more injured and bruised than Orena as he had been taken the brunt of the Goblin attacks. "Why?" Her betrayal was responded to with a simple question. Both of the top dogs stared at each other, the chilly atmosphere freezing further. "Because I've always wanted to fight you…", his question was met with a simple response. One could swear Anatoly's lips curled as he heard the reply, although that disappeared in the next second as he charged straight towards her. The betrayers and betrayed stood frozen around these two, shocked at what was happening. However the betrayed quickly broke out of their shock; clearly Anatoly and his group had meant to backstab them, only to be stopped by Orena who seemed to be betraying the backstabbers… It was a bit too complex of an issue to hit them out of the blue, but the important factor was that these betrayers meant to kill the very people they had shared lives with for weeks. Juan took lead, roaring with anger as he pointed towards the betrayers. "Fuck you bastards, I'll be damned if any of you leave this place alive." The Camp leader finally seemed truly heroic in such a moment, his curly hair stained with blood fluttering in the gentle breeze. The others followed, shields and weapons rising as the circle tightened. No longer were they edging backwards, rather they moved towards the five backstabbers. Ailean, his two friends and Fedro had been shocked when Orena had betrayed them and was just about to go and help Anatoly when they noticed the sheep bare their fangs. This was going to be messier than the fight against the Goblins. Jayesh charged at Fedro, alongside Egor and Scowly, whereas Juan, his two friends and the dainty girl charged Ailean and his two men. "TITAN'S TAUNT!" "FROZEN BOUNDARY!" "BEZEEEEEERK!" The few with mana remaining activated their abilities as they clashed against their old allies, blood and limbs flying within the first second. However, the fights surrounding Orena and Anatoly's were nothing compared to the centrepiece they hosted, both howling with madness and bloodlust as blades continuously struck. Anatoly shot forwards, wielding his dual-handed sword with a single hand as the other arm elbowed crashed into Orena, elbow first. Orena responded by twisting her spear in the air to knock his sword onto the ground, followed by a swift kick to his stomach. Despite the cuts they had, despite the pain, despite the fucking madness of the situation, the two of them still fought as they pushed each other to their limits. Once again weapons met, Orena's spear bending under the pressure as Anatoly chopped into it with a heavy strike. She rotated the spear, causing him to go off balance as she recoiled backwards, before thrusting her spear into his ribs. "ARRGHH!" He growled like a beast as he eyed her. She replied with a silent gaze, one that perfectly conveyed the insanity inside of her. Both of them had injuries and wouldn't last much longer; the fight had come to its climax! Orena pounded across the ground as she charged him one final time, her spear positioned behind her in a throwing stance. Anatoly sprinted at her, sword ready to intercept should she throw her spear, and later in a beheading motion as he leapt, merely two metres away from her. The spear left Orena's grip, gliding through the air as it shot towards Anatoly's chest. He no longer had the luxury to respond as he was mid-flight with his blade too far away to reflect, only able to tilt his body to the left as he felt his end nigh. The spear stabbed into his hands, which were holding onto the handle of his sword, before getting stuck half-way through. He fell to the ground, kneeling as splatters of blood dripped down, creating a pool within moments. Embedded across both palms was the spear, making it impossible for him to move his hands. He was no fool; he knew he no longer had any chance. Orena trudged over to his dropped sword with a limp as he remained kneeling. It was as her shadow was cast over his body that he moved. He twisted his wrists so that his palms were facing the sky and ground, before using the ground to force the pole of the spear through the crude, bloody holes. He was but a man, and thus clenched his teeth as he acted. Tears quickly flowed down his face in two streams, mixing with the blood on the way. "AARRRRRRRRRGGGGGGGGGGHHHHHHHH!" The pole was out, his hands once again free, albeit in senseless pain. The holes through his palms were like Christ's as he raised his head, glaring Orena straight in the eye as he said, "Always remember that you took my life on this day. And so make sure you put in my effort, as well as all those of the many you have killed…" His voice was pained, his throat dry as he spoke. He inhaled one last deep breath of air before finishing. "Orena, I hope that one day you find your son. And I sincerely hope, with all my heart, that he will be a corpse as you find him. Kill me." Those were his last words as the sword was swung, slicing his head off clean as it plummeted to the ground. There was but a hint of tears within Orena's eyes, which quickly disappeared as she turned around. Their fight had taken the longest as all around her were even more corpses than before. The last ones standing were Orena, Scowly, Jayesh and the dainty girl whose name was Aaliyah. None of them showed any indication of wanting to kill the others and was also far too tired to even try. So Orena effectively took control of the group as she motioned everyone closer, showing her bare hands to prove her good-will. Not that she couldn't respond if they did try her. Her voice was now fatigued and soft as she spoke, "I wonder who's got the most points", which was followed by a smile and finally a tinkle of laughter as she laughed at her own joke. A few seconds passed before the message came up. Well done to all those who are still alive. You have been recorded as having contributed to the destruction of a teleporter of the Invader species "Goblin". Below are the top ten people with the most points contributed. Orena Stanis Jayesh Elgetor Aaliyah ---------- ---------- ---------- ---------- ---------- You will shortly receive rewards based on your contribution. Stanis stirred awake from his light nap, surprised at all the messages inside of his head. What was this for? What the fuck was a teleporter? Why was he number two on the list? In took him a few seconds to finally rouse from his drowsiness, after which he realised that this likely meant that the others had succeeded at the Goblin Camp raid. He took a guess that the teleporter was how the Goblins had come down to Earth, and destroying it meant beating the Goblins. However, he was still confused as to why he was number two on the list, considering that he hadn't even participated in the battle… Stanis tried to expand his name. Stanis Volkov contributed by: Killing the current master of the Camp, tier-two Kyln the Goblin Mage Killing one of the champions, tier-one Shagra the Sentry leader Killing 4 Sentry Goblins. Tier two?! Stanis double-checked that he still had the Storage stones with him, before blossoming a smile. He then expanded Orena's name. Orena Eze contributed by: Destroying the teleporter Killing one of the champions, tier-one Shakra the Goblin Swordsman Killing 98 other Goblins Also stole all of Anatoly Brege's points by killing him solo. His shock only grew after reading it. She had killed 98 fucking Goblins, all by herself, within hours. More importantly, she had killed fucking Anatoly by herself. Then, he was even more confused than at the start as he remembered that Anatoly, her, Ailean and his two chumps had planned to backstab the whole group. But he couldn't see any of others names, including those of Juan's or Egor's, and here he was reading that Orena had solo killed Anatoly… Eventually, Stanis put this to the back of his mind as he realised that he wouldn't be able to make any sense of it unless he directly asked someone who had been there. He then checked the others' contribution and was happy as he realised that not only was Jayesh still alive, but he had also contributed the third most! It seemed the five of them were the last survivors, the 18 others who had started this raid alongside now bodies in the dirt. You have 64 points for a lower difficulty teleporter. Your rewards have been increased for the low number of Humans (23) involved in the destruction of the teleporter. 10 extra attribute points 5 levels equivalent experience. A spell suited for you. Your suitability was determined by your allegiance to the Zelaro, a race of dark sorcerers. A bound scroll appeared in front of him, which he momentarily ignored as he checked his status. Stanis Volkov Age: 18 years Mana capacity: 14 (regeneration is capacity/4 per hour) (Mana capacity is actually 20, however 6 points are currently in use) Level 19 (Progress to the next level is 3%) Unallocated points: 26 Strength: 20 [19->21] Dexterity: 20 [17->19] Constitution: 20[17->19] Intelligence: 14[12->13] Wisdom: 12[11->12] Tenacity: 18[16->18] Skills: Layman's Rush, Scout and Sense   Stanis was surprised as he looked at his status. He hadn't checked it for quite some time and it seemed the global average had increased a lot since then. It seemed he had increased by three levels for killing the tier-two and tier-one Goblins, and five on top of that for his reward. This meant that he had a grand total of 26 unallocated points! He then proceeded to rack his brains on how to spend these points, after all spending such a lottery of points in a bad way could be the difference between a dead Stanis and an alive one in the future. Strength, Dexterity and Tenacity were all low down his list of priorities as he felt he was already good at close combat and enduring pain. Well, maybe Tenacity could be raised a bit… As for Constitution, Stanis had been confused as to what the point of raising it further would be after he had seen his injuries heal in a jiffy before. Even now, all the bruises and cuts he had across his body were nearly healed up and the pain had basically numbed by now. The only remaining wounds were from the fire-bolts. This was what caused his realisation. The fire-bolts were created with mana, and those wounds were the ones that were healing the slowest. Could it be that an increased constitution meant better regeneration against magic wounds as well as better health? The idea seemed to make sense in Stanis's mind as he nodded in approval of his thoughts. As for the last two attributes, Stanis felt these were the ones he needed to upgrade. First of all, he had the mission from the Zelaro which was effectively impossible for him to complete. Only by increasing intelligence and wisdom could he improve its power, and thus succeed the mission. Secondly, the image of Kyln fighting also inspired him; if he was able to fight at a safe distance while shooting bolts of raw arcane power, he would be absolutely overjoyed as that meant he would no longer have to have his body break down after every fight. There was also the fact that he wouldn't have to go through the damned pain! And finally, the message he got from the System right now furthered his though this way. It said the Zelaro were a race of dark sorcerers and Gahlnym had suggested grand rewards if he passed the missions they set, so wouldn't their grand rewards surely have to do with magic. What use would magic spells have if he didn't even have any firepower to support them? Just to make sure that there wasn't anything within his loot that could sway his decision, Stanis decided to open them. Opening the Sentry's Storage stone, he received a small, emerald gem. It didn't look exactly like what he had expected, but Stanis took a wild guess that this was the Stone of Wonders the Hu mission had implied. Stanis then opened the Storage stone from the Goblin Mage Kyln. To his surprise, Stanis got a message as he opened it. As you have killed a foe whose battle skill is far above yours, you have gained one of their skills as loot. Out of the stone came another bound scroll, now leaving him with two. Deciding now was a good time as ever, Stanis opened both scrolls. Light Healing Use the powers of the Shaman king to lightly heal. Use with caution as overusing it in a short period can lead to hallucination or even cause you to enter another plane of life. Costs 3 mana to use. No Cooldown. It seemed he had gotten a healing skill from Kyln. Stanis didn't remember Kyln ever healing himself during the fight, although he had seen the lower down Goblin Shamans doing it and so it made sense that a tier-two Goblin also had access to it. The Light Healing skill didn't seem to scale of Intelligence or Wisdom, but the fact that it was light healing with no cooldown basically meant that you would need a large mana pool to use it effectively. This pushed him further towards Intelligence and Wisdom. Destructive Mana Recharge A skill made for dark sorcerers. Drain mana from your environment, causing death to your surroundings, to recharge yourself of mana. The amount of draining depends on your Intelligence and Wisdom. Cooldown: 6 hours It was a recharge skill that sucked mana directly from the environment. It was clearly made for mages, in fact it said so in its very description! This was the deciding factor as Stanis was now set on upgrading his magic skills. He accepted both the skills and immediately used Destructive Mana recharge. He could feel a flow of mana from the stone of the cave around him, the flow downstream towards his body. Within two seconds, the influx became too strong for Stanis to keep and he immediately collapsed it. He could see cracks spread across the stone he was sitting on… But on the other hand, he did get 3 mana back from it, exactly enough to use Light Healing. And so Stanis then used Light Healing on the scorched wound on his chest as that was the one healing the slowest. He immediately felt a drain of mana from his body, but no other aftereffects. Rather, he looked at his chest and saw that the wound, which had been scorched flesh about 2cm deep, had healed, albeit only by a bit. But it was still a good thing as Stanis noticed that scorched, dirty flesh was gone, replaced by tougher, cleaner flesh. He guessed that about one or two more uses were enough to completely reverse the damage! Now having experienced the power of his skills first hand, Stanis realised the importance of magic had only increased for him. So mind now set, Stanis spent his attribute points. "Allocate 8 points to Intelligence and Wisdom, 3 points to Constitution and Tenacity and 2 points to Strength and Dexterity." He had allocated over half his points to Intelligence and Wisdom, but it did make sense considering the fact that he had neglected those two attributes all this time. He also removed the shadows from all but his arms in order to increase his maximum capacity, and thus mana regeneration. "Status": Stanis Volkov Age: 18 years Mana capacity: 28 (regeneration is capacity/4 per hour) (Mana capacity is actually 32, however 4 points are currently in use) Level 19 (Progress to the next level is 3%) Strength: 22 [21] Dexterity: 22 [19] Constitution: 23[19] Intelligence: 22[13] Wisdom: 20[12] Tenacity: 21[18] Skills: Layman's Rush, Scout and Sense, Light Healing, Destructive Mana Recharge Now happy with his Status, Stanis lay there for one more hour as he waited for his mana to recharge. An hour later it had regenerated 7 points, enough for him to lightly heal both his chest and left arm from all the burn wounds. It would be an overstatement to say that he was refreshed, but he was certainly feeling much better than before as he got up to his knees. He snacked on a few supplies from his now-bloody backpack as he walked out. It was as he took a step outside that he wished that he had never gotten out. Standing outside the cave was Orena, alongside Jayesh, Scowly and Aaliyah. He hoped that this wasn't going to turn out as the last meeting by the sea went, but he wasn't going to risk it as he immediately tensed, hand shooting for his sword. It was a short but painful beating later that Stanis put down his weapons, and began walking with the others. A new Arc had begun!

Now closer to the Yona Village, Stanis could see that the defences in place weren't nearly as impressive as Kei had described them. The pitfalls were filled with rotting corpses, the spikes broken and scattered, while the wooden barriers they had were bloody and chipped away at every corner: not at all able to stop an enemy charge. And then the realisation dawned on Stanis; the Yona Village was the top predator in the region, they didn't need defences at all when it was their surrounding monsters who were frightened of them. The fact that they were searching as far as hours away from their own village for Monster Camps gave testament to their strength and desire to grow. Before the defences on the Western side was a large stream that essentially separated the Forest from the plains that led to the Village. It was shallow enough to safely swim across, but there was also a wooden bridge that they could cross. After the bridge was about hundred metres of shoddy and broken defences, following which was the Village itself. It was as Stanis eyed the Village that he felt like the place where they had made it must have already been a proper Town before the apocalypse. All the continents had crashed back together and other mashings of landscapes had clearly happened, but you could still find whole Human Settlements. This rising suspicion inside of him came from the fact that the largest buildings, around two stories high, were made out of large pillars of wood, concrete, bricks and other materials like those. Either the System was very generous to the people who upgraded from a Camp to a Village, or most likely these were all here beforehand. After walking over the bridge, they only had to walk for two minutes before they reached Yona Village. At first, Stanis was completely shocked as he saw the sheer number of people active in the place, at least a hundred or so that he could see straight off. He had lived in an urban landscape before the apocalypse and didn't feel pressured by the number of people in front of him, instead he felt joy at seeing that Humans could still survive and thrive, even after the Apocalypse. Callum, who had talked non-stop, saw that Stanis was in a daze and thus clicked his fingers in front of Stanis, finally breaking him out of his joy. Out of the six guys who had guided them, the leader went towards the largest building, most likely the Village hall or such, to report that the Goblin Crystal was already been destroyed, whereas another three of them decided to find someplace to sleep as they were severely fatigued. This left Callum and Kei, both in good moods, who offered to show Stanis's group around the Village. Having no reason no decline, the seven of them were shortly walking around the Village, familiarising themselves. The first place they went to was the Forge, a place that Stanis had expected to be billowing with smoke, was actually empty with only cold equipment to fill the building. It was an open forge with all the equipment there, and yet there was not a single person in sight using them. After a bit of thought, Stanis realised what Callum had said before was true: why would anyone want to work hard bending metal when they were already given good equipment by the system, on top of the fact that they would die if they didn't keep progressing. Right next to the open Forge was a building with an open bit, as well as a closed-off bit inside. It was a tannery and leather-working station all in one. Just as for the forge, Stanis could see various equipment laid out but no people actually using them, or any signs of the equipment ever being used. The outside portion was for the tanning, whereas the inside of the wooden building was for the leatherworking, with a surprisingly cool breeze inside. It was as they were walking across to the next attraction that Stanis noted that to the North of the Village was a towering Mountain. Squinting his eyes, he could barely see pathways up the Mountain and also several openings within it. He then remembered what Callum had said about all the Monsters in the surrounding areas being basically dead, apart from the ones that lived in the Mountains. To be fair, it made sense considering that the whole strength of the Village came from the number of people they now had. In squat tunnels which could cave in at any moment, their numerical advantage counted for nothing, especially when against Monsters that were suited for that type of terrain. Then they walked across to the accommodations, which started out as large double-story and single-story houses, but soon downgraded towards the System-supplied Tents for the weaker, newcomers. Finally, they walked across to the unique parts of the Village: the Classes Hall and the Market. Stanis had to take a deep breath in as he saw the Classes Hall, a truly ostentatious and extravagant building. It was about the height of a double story building and had golden, silver and crimson decorations. This ranged from impressive carvings of jaw-dropping monsters to just the simple displays of multiple, massive crimson diamonds arranged in flower shapes. Simple… The decorations were a mid-way between classy and over-the-top as Stanis felt that they were almost like the System's way of stating how powerful and impressive it was, something that all the Humans already believed in after it had tipped their lives on their heads. There was only a single entrance to the Hall, and quite a wide entrance at that, but there was not a single person going into it. Stanis was beginning to see a recurring pattern across all the buildings… Kei saw his group's confused expressions and explained, "Callum's already told you how strong you become after getting a Class. So why's no one checking it out I hear you ask. That's because you can't even enter the building until you get to level 20! The fact that the people who already have classes basically keep mum about what's inside other than to the higher-ups of the Village makes it even more mysterious. Having finished introducing the Classer's Hall, Kei began to walk towards the final building of interest. It was akin to a Wild-West Saloon with small push-doors that barely covered the entrance. Only after entering did the two themes split ways, instead of multiple tables holding drunk, scheming Cowboys, the inside was actually empty until the very end of the room. At the end was a series of shelves, all with multiple magical items on. The most irritating thing about it was that the items kept moving like they were on a conveyor belt, apart from the fact that they were just on plain wood. Once again feeling the need to explain, Kei turned around and said, "You can only see the actual items you can get once you pay the price." Callum then interrupted him, "Hey I was explaining that last time before you interrupted me!" After a short exchange of expressions, much to the group's amusement, Callum carried on "So you gotta put in something like the Stone of Wonders or like anything valuable in this world to actually get something back." He then paused, took a second to think, before continuing "I'm guessing you guys have some of those, but don't use them. A few of us used the Stone of Wonders here and all we could trade it for were shit like singular health potions when you get multiple from the System's Weekly Supply. The worst thing is you can't get your item back after starting the transaction, so it's best to ignore this place unless you're really desperate, kay?" Stanis's group nodded at this, before exiting the building. The first thing that came to Stanis's mind was the opportunities he had at this Village. He had been hopeless and pessimistic about this world so far, blaming it for taking away the life that he had just salvaged. But now a sprout of hope grew inside of him after seeing this Village; they had started from the same trials he had, and yet had come so far that there were people smiling and laughing across the street, enjoying this miserable reality. He had already built back one life from ruins, surely he could build this one up even higher, to the point that his life was truly worth living. And what he needed for that was power! It was the only thing that people would respect you for here, nothing else… As Stanis was caught within his thoughts, a large beam of light shot out from the Classer's Hall, rising to the Heaven within seconds. It stayed shining like a show of Glory for a few seconds. Kei looked over at them, the excitement visible as he uttered out, "There's another Classer!"…

Sil gawked at the lightning bolt practically prancing on his hand; she was engrossed by it, enthralled by the product of his mastery. When she had gazed into his eyes just seconds before, she had seen a haze of insanity over his vision: he was fully intent on hurting her, killing her even. “What do you want to know?” she asked, gulping simultaneously. She could feel her eyes getting wetter, ashamed of what she was about to do. “I told you already,” Stanis spat, “What is the plan to kill me?” “The necromancer,” she said, casting her head down. “Jen? You guys actually trust that wench over me?” he asked incredulously. She looked up and saw his eyes wide and mouth agape, his face one of pure shock. His expression shifted to one of dismay for the slightest of a second before he exploded out into laughter. He withdrew the lightning bolt into his body and stepped away from her, turning to face the village. His laughter was chipped at the corners and sounded fractured, broken, just like him. He dryly coughed before turning around to consider her once more. “A fitting person to trust. Backstabbers find other backstabbers, I guess,” he said while looking right through her. “So, what’s been done?” She shook her head in response, casting her head down once more in fear. “I hope I don’t have to remind you what you’re betraying everyone you love for,” he said, simultaneously allowing another bolt to crackle to life. His words directly stabbed her open wounds, causing her moist eyes to finally break. Droplets of tears burst out as she began to sob. Stanis leaned in and took in her features. “I don’t care if you’re going to start bitching right now, you whore. Give me details on what you backstabbers have already done,” She scrambled away from him and glared. “That’s why you chose me, isn’t it? Because you’re jealous I got with someone else.” “Jayesh?” he spat back. He turned around and looked into the distance, hiding the ugly expression he currently wore. “I don’t care which whoreson you get with; our relationship was already over with the second I left. Stop begging for rope to help you out of this ditch: there is none to be thrown.” She swallowed the truth pill and gulped at the loss of hope. He was right; she was stretching her logic too far, there was no way Stanis would have been jealous of her or anyone else. “So, what has been done?” he repeated once his emotions were under control. He hadn’t expected such a curveball, especially one that hit home as freshly as hers had. “Nothing,” she said, “the plan only came about recently anyway,” He grunted. It made sense, after all, he had only felt something wrong recently. Besides, it was only Jen that fared a danger to him. “Ha. What’s their reason for rebelling anyway? What’s your reason?” “Reason? Who needs much reason when handling someone as unreasonable as you?” she answered. “Unreasonable?” he said. “I’ve fucking defended that piece of shit village how many times now? How many times have I been the saving grace? How many times have I saved it from destruction?” “You wasted the potential of the village. You wasted every opportunity you had to improve it, instead choosing to only prove yourself in battle.” He sniggered bitterly at this. “And you think the others actually hate me for that? Don’t lie you wench, you know that’s exactly what you and they wanted. Someone who never interfered in the village’s happenings apart from in battle, in which he’d save everyone’s arses,” Her jaw fell slack and she stared with disbelief. It had been Alyona to bring up that point. From what she knew of Alyona, she was truthful and an overall joy to be around. Surely she hadn’t been lying about her point then, had she? He scanned her expression and then looked away. “Please tell me you chose Jen for more than just that.” “Of course,” she responded. “You’re an indiscriminate meat-grinder in battle, murdering just as many of ours as theirs. You’re not worth your cost in lives,” He cocked his head around and raised an eyebrow. “Who told you that? I know you’re too smart to actually think that,” “No-one. It’s not my fault it’s the truth,” she retorted. In truth, it had been Moonshine who had brought the point up, however Sil wanted to act confident in her points now. One had already been demolished by Stanis and she feared their whole argument for killing him was a lot more selfish than she had initially believed. He stood there silently for several seconds, ignoring the evil eyes Sil was giving him. “Whoever it is who brought up such bullshit,” he then answered, “I’d like to see them against the monsters I was killing. I don’t even want to see them achieve the same things I did, I just want to see them last 5 seconds,” They stood and sat in silence respectively. Sil’s organs rolled in fear and indignation. She had been played for a fool: how could she have not seen? But no, because their lies had gone so well with Stanis’s new character, it just seemed too truthful to deny. He was now dangerously cold, volatile and even more self-assured than before. He didn’t even show any emotion to his allies. Of course she would believe their lies, of course. “Well, I think you’ve told me everything I needed to hear,” he eventually said. “No, no, no,” she begged. “We were wrong. Please, I was wrong.” He looked directly into her eyes, the lightning bolt in his hand freezing in place. “I know,” **** “We’re here for help,” Moonshine coolly answered, hiding away her nerves. “Help with what?” Jen asked. “And what do I get in return?” Orena feared her grip would grow wet any second and break, whereas Tanya was infatuated by Jen’s face. She knew they were in a precarious situation but it still begged the question; how did the woman in front her still look so beautiful and clean, despite it being months into the apocalypse. “With killing someone. Stanis Volkov, we’ve heard you know of him already,” Jen squinted her eyes and covertly intensified her aura in the surrounding area. She saw the effect on the 3 in front of her immediately. Pathetic. “How do you know of him and what do you know of him? Tell me,” she demanded. The zombies who had been working in the surrounding area began to crowd towards her, causing the trio’s nerves to worsen. “He’s the strongest in our village,” Tanya answered through clenched teeth. “But he’s—” “A stain on humanity,” Moonshine finished. “Ahh, you must be from the village from before,” Jen said, simultaneously lowering her aura. “The one that acted as last battle’s backdrop. Well, isn’t that funny? To believe his own people hate him; I’m not surprised,” “Yes, he’s more monster than man,” Moonshine added. Jen narrowed her eyes and focused her aura solely on Moonshine. “I know what he is. No need to kiss my ass, you waste-of-air,” Orena felt Moonshine trembling and feared she would ruin everything, although she sighed a second later as Moonshine managed to keep it in. “Yes. I’m ---” “I was going to kill him without any reminder anyway,” Jen cut through. She turned around and slowly began walking away. “No use in ants like you,” “We can help. The whole village can aid you,” Orena pleaded. “Make sure you get the kill,” Jen turned around and sneered. “Help? Me? From wastrels like you? Don’t make me laugh!” she spat. She ordered her zombies to indulge themselves and then walked away, careless of the screams that followed her steps…

It was like a stampede as people from all corners of the Village came sprinting out, wanting to get the first look at the new Classer. Kei nor Callum were exempt from this excitement as they too quickly dashed over, followed by Stanis's group who would be lying if they said they weren't confused. It made sense that another Strong person in the Village would cause excitement, but this much? It was clear they were missing out on something, but they followed the crowd anyhow. A few seconds later, they were at the Classer's Hall. Or at least as close they could get considering the crowd of people which acted as a barrier, blocking them of almost all vision of the new Classer. It was a few seconds later that they realised they were wrong, the Classer hadn't even exited yet and there was this kind of excitement already… The light coming off the roof of the Classer's Hall kept shining, although the crowd excitement did eventually go down as seconds passed. It was at this time that Stanis thought of something, to which he turned around to look at everyone in his group. Aaliyah, Jayesh, Scowly and of course she wasn't here… Now almost certain that he knew who the new Classer was, alongside the rest of his group who had already thought as much, his excitement began to rise as he imagined how much stronger Orena would get. He didn't know when she had slipped away from the tour, but it made sense she had done so considering she had the most contribution for the Goblin's Camp, which in turn had definitely raised her level above 20. A few more moments passed, in which time a few big shots of the Village came through. The crowd split like a hot knife through butter as they parted for these big-shots. Something Stanis was confused about here in the Village was the ratio of men to women, he had thought the average would be 3 to 1 or such after the apocalypse, but instead it seemed more like a bit over 1 to 1. This was even more evident in the group of big-shots who were basically a perfect split between the genders. Stanis's thought-track was quickly broken apart by an explosion of sound from around him; the door of the Classer's Hall finally opening. And to no surprise, the one who came out was Orena. Quickly the big-shots group moved, one of them moving towards Orena in haste. The lady caught Orena's hands, before muttering things far too quiet for Stanis to hear over the ruckus around him. After a brief chat, the lady motioned for the noise to quieten down as she began speaking. "Today is a day to celebrate, after all another Classer has joined our ranks!". She raised her hands, followed by another round of cheering. "Let this be another testament to our Strength, further proof as to why we can and WILL survive and more importantly thrive." Her motions were wild, her voice energetic and her whole image charismatic. Stanis was certain by now that this was the rumoured leader of the Yona Village: Alyona. She had light brown skin and curly hair. Her figure looked like any other woman's with nothing really standing out, although the signs of ageing through her greying hair and sparse wrinkles gave hint to the wisdom she held. Next to her stood Orena, the focus of attention for most people, although she herself seemed confused as to why she had to stand there like a zoo-animal. Her bloody war-paint and dirty braided hair gave quite the image to the spectators, her body as straight as a spear giving further testament to her ferocity. But the more Stanis looked at her, the more he felt something was different. After staring at her for a few seconds while ignoring Alyona's speech, Stanis came close to giving up before asking his group. "Doesn't she look different to usual?" Neither of three seemed to notice until they really focused on her, after which Jayesh spoke first. "Yes, same but different. She has the same appearance, but no longer the same feeling…" Aaliyah and Scowly agreed with him, giving affirmation to Stanis's doubts. It took a few more moments until he realised what it was: the whole aura around her was much more volatile than before. The other three had just identified this as a change in feeling, but Stanis was certain that it was something more… After a bit of thought, he decided it might be something to do with mana, after all his increase in Intelligence and Wisdom had to do something, right? So he remembered the sensation he had felt days ago, the first time he had tried to manipulate darkness. He had started by simply moving mana around his body, and so Stanis replicated the sensation as he forced mana towards his eyes. It was by no stretch a quick process as Alyona's long speech was almost over as he managed it, before starting to drain himself of that mana. His vision very quickly grew sharper, and more importantly allowed him to see finer details which were previously invisible. It was alike being colour blind, only to suddenly see all the shades of colour. With his new vision, which was starting to strain his eyes, Stanis stared at Orena. She must have felt his stare as she broke her attention away from her spear she had been fiddling around with, and towards Stanis, curling her lips as she did so. The very air surrounding her was volatile just as he had thought, it was almost like the surrounding air was getting cut as Stanis saw multiple, light scratches around her. All the cuts were random, and also light as none actually managed to slice through the air, but their weakness went over Stanis's head as he stood there gobsmacked. He then caught Orena's eyes on him, the glint in her eyes sharper than that of a blade's, causing Stanis to quickly subvert his own pair as he felt a dull pain across them. A grim smile spread across Stanis's face, despite the pain his eyes were now in. Clearly his large investment in Intelligence and Wisdom hadn't been useless as he could already feel the effects. He could only barely suppress his excitement as he realised he hadn't even tested out any of his affected skills. He was brought back to reality as the final wave of applause broke out, Alyona's speech apparently over. Shortly afterwards as the crowd began to disperse, Orena was about to walk over to Stanis's group when she was once again caught by Alyona, brought into the midst of the group of big-shots as they walked over to the largest Building in the Village. After a quick internal battle, Orena waved towards Stanis's group, before following the big-shots. At this, Stanis checked his own Status. Stanis Volkov Age: 18 years Mana capacity: 28 (regeneration is capacity/4 per hour) (Mana capacity is actually 32, however 4 points are currently in use) Level 19 (Progress to the next level is 3%) Strength: 22 [21] Dexterity: 22 [19] Constitution: 23[19] Intelligence: 22[13] Wisdom: 20[12] Tenacity: 21[18] Skills: Layman's Rush, Scout and Sense, Light Healing, Destructive Mana Recharge   He was level 19, only a level away from level 20 and more importantly, only a level away from getting a class. Stanis wasn't as interested in the loud reception he would receive as much as the skills he would gain, just like Orena had obviously gotten. He nudged Kei and Callum, before asking if they wanted to go to the Mountains. By the fact that the Village was expanding as far to the Goblin's Camp which was hours away, it was obvious all the nearby weak enemies had already been cleared out. This left only the Mountain monsters, to Stanis's knowledge anyway, whom he would only have to kill a few of before levelling up. "Ahh, you're in good luck my friend. I'm thinking there is an expedition, or raid if you shall, into the Mountains a day from now. I heard it's going to be quite a big one as well as Alyona wants to get rid of the slight that is the fact that there are monsters living right next to the Camp." Pleased with the news, Stanis talked a bit more with Kei and Callum before departing. His destination wasn't the tents to get a good night of sleep but rather the Forest. After walking back over the bridge and into the Forest, Stanis found a quiet spot away from sight before beginning. If his control over mana had increased so much, what then about his control over darkness?

In the Goblin's hand flickered to life a dainty flame, which within seconds rapidly grew into a fire-bolt. Despite the pain he was in, Stanis forced himself to hare towards his fallen spear, which he picked up as he placed his sword back around his waist. Stanis had already used Scout and Sense a few times, but he had only scouted short distances. This meant that he had 9 mana left, 3 disposable mana considering the fact that he always wanted Layman’s Rush ready to use, which took 6 mana. Thus in the split second he had, Stanis used the remaining mana he had to activate Scout and Sense. Having activated it multiple times already, he was now used to the sensation and didn’t lose control of his body. Instead the image of his surroundings appeared in his head, showing him that there was a Goblin armed to the teeth running towards him, clearly a cut above the Goblins he had already killed. Realising the predicament he would be in if that Goblin reached here and joined the Mage, Stanis threw caution to the wind and shot forwards. Instead of being flustered, the Mage watched him sprint with squinted eyes, the fire-bolt in its hand now fully grown. It was when he was only a metre away from the Mage that it released the spell, the fire-bolt shooting towards Stanis’s chest at point-blank range. Having no way to dodge, Stanis chose to take one more with his left arm as he shielded his chest, all the while piercing forwards with his spear. The fire-bolt struck true, his left arm now burning with agony, while his spear didn’t even hit as the Mage merely side-stepped the attack. Stanis felt anger build up alongside the pain, gritting his teeth as he saw the contemptuous look on the Mage’s face. His anger quickly overshadowed all other emotions as he went in for another strike, this time using both arms to thrust the spear forwards with greater momentum. This time the Mage didn’t even dodge, instead a bright, blue light exploded out of its hand. In the next second, Stanis found his spear frozen within his hand, which was also frozen alongside the rest of his body. His whole body was covered with frost, his anger rapidly dissipating as the cold bit into his flesh. The Goblin Mage stepped past the frozen spear and used its whole body to drive its elbow into Stanis’s face, causing him to stumble backwards in pain, before tripping over his frozen legs. It was lucky that he had his coat on as Stanis could feel the warmth coming back, his body trying its utmost to counter these dangerous conditions. Stiffly, Stanis tilted his head up, only to see another flame sprout within the sneering Mage’s hand. Both fear and anger surged inside of him, his arm pushing against the pain and numbness as he gripped onto the spear, before whipping its butt across the Mage’s bare legs. The Goblin’s expression turned to a mixture of pain and surprise as it realised that Stanis was already moving, albeit slowly, but the fireball within its hand didn’t stop growing. This danger caused Stanis’s body to heat up further, his motions now faster and smoother as he managed to bring himself up to his feet. Not forgetting the foe who had frozen him in the first place, Stanis threw the spear towards the Mage. In truth, the spear didn’t have much power behind it as Stanis’s actions were still affected by the frost, but it had enough to cause harm. The spear pierced the Goblin’s thigh, the spearhead tearing through skin into the flesh. The shock and pain caused the Mage’s aim to go off, the fire-bolt he just released shooting towards Stanis’s chest instead of his head. So far Stanis had always used his left arm to take the fire-bolt shots, but not this time as the fire-bolt smashed into Stanis’s chest, throwing him off his feet as he fell onto his back, the pain so unbearable that tears rushed out like a broken dam. Stanis wasn’t even able to roar or scream in pain as he struggled to catch his breath, his body violently shaking in response to the pain. If the fire-bolts to his left arm had been like a dull pain after stubbing one’s toe, this was like the sharp pain following someone scorching raw flesh. If Stanis wasn’t completely out of it by now, he would have noticed that the armoured Sentry he had prior sensed running here had just arrived. “KYLN, WHAT ARRE YOU DOIN? CAN YU NOT SEEE THAT HOMANS ATTACKING THE CAAMP?” screamed out the Sentry, struggling between keeping his anger down and catching his breath. “No worries, ha-ha! I doubt the Humans will break the crystal. Instead look what I just caught!” The Sentry’s anger quickly dissipated and instead turned into confusion as he looked towards the downed Stanis. “Whot? It just ‘nother Homan.” Kyln responded with a cold and stern voice, “You FOOL! Can you not see the darkness coming off his body? I don’t know which one but this Human managed to ally himself with one of the Dark races…” The Sentry completed Kyln’s sentence, its eyes now sparkling, “The Mastars will raward us!” The menacing smile returned to Kyln’s face. He then began chanting. A few seconds later, the stab wound across his thigh was gone. “Now give me your sword so I can cut this shit up, my mana has run dry.” Commanded Kyln towards his subordinate, who immediately followed as it handed its short-sword over without any complaints. In fact why would it complain? It was sure to get a reward when Kyln passed this Homan to one of the Mastars. As the whole conversation had been going on, Stanis had been struggling to keep his mind awake. His body had teetered between unconscious and consciousness after the final fire-bolt had struck, however the time Kyln had used to heal himself had given Stanis’s body enough time to recover. He hadn’t managed to catch a single word of what had been said so far as his body had been in shock, but he did manage to come back to reality in time to hear Kyln say he was going to cut Stanis up. That was enough for his mind to return to the fight or flight mind-set as adrenaline coursed through his blood, allowing him to think up ways to respond to his imminent death despite the mind-tearing pain. The only thing Stanis could think of while in this pain was his ace, Layman’s Rush. He didn’t have the mental power to think of anything safer than his double-edged sword. Kyln was just above him as his Stanis roared with all his heart, causing Kyln to subconsciously recoil backwards in response. Stanis used this time to take out his sword, before activating Layman’s Rush. <Activate Layman’s Rush> The acute pain was gone. The noise within his head was gone. It was just pure euphoria; he felt like a God. Stanis shot to his feet as he swung his sword towards Kyln, who reacted slowly due to the surprise of his downed prey jumping back up. However, he wasn’t shocked enough to be senseless as he instead brought his sword down to meet Stanis’s. The swords clashed, a clear metallic sound resonating in the environment. However, Stanis wasn’t done as he continued pushing downwards on his sword as he felt no pain, causing Kyln’s hand to bend backwards under stress. In fact it bent so quickly that Kyln didn’t even have the choice of dropping the sword, instead his hand bent back so much that his wrist simply snapped. But Kyln was beyond experienced at fighting as his mind set priorities within nanoseconds, deciding that the Human in front of him had become far too much of a threat to be worth fighting. And thus Kyln shot his other hand forwards, in an attempt to make Stanis recoil under the thought that Kyln was sneak-attacking him. It was Kyln’s bad luck as the blood-craving Stanis gave zero shits about danger, ignoring the empty hand and instead springing forwards while sweeping his sword across Kyln’s face. The sentry, who had been relaxed and happy two seconds ago, didn’t even have time to reach Kyln as Stanis sword shot to the air once more, before chopping down in force, causing a deep gash to open across Kyln’s green head. Feeling his anger and bloodlust nowhere near sated, Stanis then bolted towards the Sentry. The Sentry had thick leather armour, and a thick shield. It flustered to grab its knife as it saw the prey turned predator bare his teeth towards it. Now three seconds into Layman’s Rush, Stanis only had two seconds left as he swung below the Sentry’s knife, chopping its hand clean off. The Sentry, realising his odds, immediately bashed his leather shield into Stanis’ face before turning tail. Feeling no pain from the strike to his head, Stanis thundered behind the fleeing Sentry before managing to swipe his blade down the its back during the final second. Within the next second he was no longer a God, nor a blood hungry Demon as he felt weakness overcome his body. The pain came back to life, whether it be from the burning wounds or from the shield to the face which now stunned him. What followed was a struggle to keep his consciousness as he once again teetered by the boundary, collapsing onto the ground within one second, the next waking up to harrowing pain. The Sentry, who now had a rip across its back, lay on the ground fearing imminent death. However it quickly found out that this wasn’t the case. Well, it was still going to eventually die due to how large and deep the rip across its back was, but the reaper was no longer an imminent guest as its personal reaper had collapsed just behind it. Even it didn’t know what came over it; it knew it would die soon, but it also felt a fearsome anger overcome its pain and so the Sentry crawled towards Stanis. After a bit of time, it reached Stanis and began banging Stanis’s head with its remaining hand. It was to be noted that Stanis was already frightened every time he woke up, the pain so high that he couldn’t even remember how he got here. When he felt something drive his head further into the ground, the numbing pain induced fear turned into fearful self-defence. He wasn’t angry as he crawled onto the Sentry, nor was he when he began biting the dying Goblin. He wasn’t even angry minutes later when the Goblin stopped moving, rather he was so fearful for his life that he felt the compulsion to continue attacking the bloody corpse…

His eyes were heavy, so damn heavy. Stanis rolled in his sleep, the chain clanking against the stone as he rolled. He felt weary with no energy to open his eyes, nevertheless get up. Despite his desire for comfort, the discomfort only grew as he kept rolling, the chain now rattling and clanking a nasty racket. “URGGH” His chest began shaking, the air all of a sudden escaping his lungs as he struggled to breath. Tears began flooding his eyes, soon breaking the dam and leaking out. His stomach lurched and rolled, his whole body unable to find the balance. It was the pain, the most intense pain he had felt in his life, his arm raw flesh which stabbed his mind with pain. “AR- GRaAR-AR” He wheezily roared, unwilling to lose the battle but losing every fight anyway. After much struggling, Stanis managed to tip himself back onto his chest, his raw arm no longer against the vicious floor. In the following minutes, he calmed down or at least as calm as he could get in such a situation. Eventually, he even brought himself to his knees as he rose to survey the area. He was in a Cave, the floor made out of chilling stone and the walls made of mudstone. It was pitch black inside and thus Stanis was lucky he had his dark vision. Or maybe not… Surrounding him were piles of bones, most still with rotting flesh attached. Many of the bones looked far too large or small to have been once part of a Human, but some were the perfect size… The rancid smell seemed to have always been here, although Stanis just noticed it now. Within seconds he was kneeling with his head down, gagging with nothing to show for it. More time passed before Stanis finally got up again, this time looking around for some exit from this hell-hole. And he found it very easily, a dirty stone door at the other end of the room. Stanis was just about to crawl to it when he heard footsteps in the distance: whoever was coming not trying in the least to keep down their visit. The footsteps got louder and Stanis found his arm shaking in fear. He knew any sign of weakness would be taken advantage off and so set about to holding his arm in place, only until he saw the wound across his left arm. The pain had been so high that his mind had willed him to forget it, the arm essentially cut off from his mind as the sensation was numb. Despite the thick, leathery like coating his left arm had, there was a hole the size of a fist within the coating in his forearm. It wasn’t a clean hole either, rather a messy, bloody one with strands of dirty flesh hanging off. That would explain why he had felt the tremendous pain earlier. The footsteps were nothing but accompanying music as Stanis became engrossed in his wound, only daring as touch it with his fingertip to assess the damage. “AARRRGGHH” He had gritted his teeth in advance but even that failed to hold back the primal roars from within him. The footsteps had stopped a while back in front of him but Stanis hadn’t noticed due to his focus on the pain. Minutes passed but the footsteps seemed more than patient as they made no sound, the owner of the footsteps watching Stanis with interest. Eventually, Stanis came back to his senses and looked up, only to see a Zelt on its hind legs, about as tall as an average girl. “Why hello”, said the Zelt while straightening its whiskers, “What a pleasant surprise to have company here!”, chirped the Zelt, as if it was just exchanging pleasantries with an old friend. “You look to be in a lot of pain little one, why don’t you show me that wound of yours?” asked the Zelt in a less questioning and more commanding tone. Stanis, however, was no fool and instead turtled up, hiding his arm from the monster. “Now that simply will not do” said the Zelt. “Open up” commanded the Zelt: Stanis instantly felt magic at work as his body straightened itself before freezing beyond his control. The Zelt crept towards his left arm and looked at the wound. “Mmm, nasty wound you have there.” It then knelt a bit closer, a bit too close for Stanis’s comfort. “Should I tell you a secret?” asked the Zelt, its tone playful. “That’s my handiwork” whispered the Zelt, its voice almost too quiet for Stanis to hear. It was fair to say that Stanis’s eyes popped up as he heard this, all his gloom now all screaming out his doom. The Zelt looked offended at this, “You know I’m proud of my work, no need to be so scared. I know exactly what I’m doing”. It then broke out into a manic laughter, its body now full with sadistic joy. “Well playtime has come to an end, it’s time to get to business” sternly announced the Zelt, moving with haste as it brought out a knife from somewhere. “I told you, don’t worry. I wouldn’t kill a specimen like you, especially when we could get a nice price for you. I just need to know which Dark race you have aligned yourself with.” Stanis began frantically mumbling and shaking at this, almost as if he was trying to utter the name Zelaro. “Uh ah ah, that’s not how it works. My master always told me to make them show, not tell. So all I’m going to do is make you show me, that ways I won’t be lied to.” Stanis should have resigned himself to fate by this point but he still struggled, hoping the monster would listen to reason or sanity. “That’s enough” commanded the Zelt, reinforcing the spell as it spoke, transforming Stanis back into a statue. The Zelt worked with brutal efficiency as each of its slices slid easily through his thick leathery skin, chunks of his arm being sliced off each minute. One should be able to guess that Stanis did not take well to this, not well at all as tears began to stream out with force, followed by blood. As the spell got weaker, his struggles and screams only got stronger, each slice bringing a worse reaction from Stanis than before. Close to an hour passed before the Zelt was finished, smiling its fangs at Stanis before leaving. “I’ll be back later to check up how you’re doing.” These words echoed through the tunnel, haunting Stanis’s broken my mind as he lay face-flat on the cold stone, his arm a terrible half-finished replica of what it was before. The bones were still connected and some chunks of flesh had been left behind as the Zelt had been feeling magnanimous this time. Perhaps in such a situation, the first thing one thinks of is suicide, after all the rest of his miserable life will be spent being tortured until the cruel Zelt gets bored and finishes with a grand finale. But that was also the catch, one needs to think this before committing to it. Stanis’s high constitution meant that his flesh was constantly healing and at a fast rate at that since only one area had been hit with magic. The pain he had been through in the previous hours had set him in a delirious state, thinking nothing as he simply lay there. Seconds, minutes and hours passed, although Stanis could no longer tell the difference between periods of time. It was at this time that a tier-one Zelt came in. The tier-two Zelt was awfully considerate and knew of how bored Stanis would get while staying here, and he was a good host so he had sent this tier-one Zelt to keep him company, in order to ensure he wouldn’t get bored. And oh boy was the tier-one Zelt good at this, there was not a moment during his stay that Stanis felt bored. The two constantly played games while they were roommates, whether it be whip the bitch, flail the bitch or even slice the bitch...

Despite being spent and gory, all the men and women still rushed over to the new supplies. This was the first time Stanis was seeing all the supplies intact since he had been away both previous times. Within an instant, he could tell that there was more than enough equipment and food for everyone here, but that wasn't the reason why they had rushed here. Instead, it was to see if there were any rarities that they could obtain before the others could. Despite his desire to do so, Juan had no way of controlling this situation. Instead, it quickly became a one-for-all as men and women ravaged through the pristine supplies, searching for valuables. However, this craze died as fast as it had been born, since a quick run through showed that there was in factnothing special within the supplies. After this, the situation became a lot more orderly. Stanis had the darkness superimposing over his arms, and partially visible darkness over the rest of his body. If one focused their eyes, they would quickly realise that underneath the darkness, Stanis's clothes were all tattered and ripped. So it was Stanis's lucky chance as he eagerly hopped from one area to another, picking up armour after armour. He replaced all of his clothes, from top to bottom, from underwear to armour. He had not only taken a leather cuirass like he had last time, but also various other bits such as leather gloves, and a thick set of trousers. He chose not to get any shoes as he was now comfortable without them. After scavenging his essentials, Stanis then began searching for luxuries. He soon found one very such item as he saw a box with chocolate bars in, hidden away from the others. He stole himself a few bars, which he then snacked on as he watched the others go about their business. Other than the essentials and a few luxuries such as chocolates and cigarettes, Stanis noted that the only other notable thing were these small, glass bottles with red liquid in. One of the people there soon linked the liquid with the HP pots found inside games. What followed was a person downing the whole bottle in front of everyone. He had a gaping flesh wound across his arm, one deep enough that you could see the bone. Within seconds of drinking the Health potion, jaws fell as people saw muscle tissue grow over the bones. The effect ended two minutes later, by which the gaping wound had turned into light cut… Completely won over, the distribution of the health pots soon commenced. It ended with everyone getting two pots. Seeing as everyone was already gathered around the supplies, Juan decided to hold the meeting then and there. "What happened today should not have, and will no longer happen. But in order to do that, we need more information about the very enemies that we are fighting. The questions I have are: How did the enemies manage to counter our formation, considering the fact that not a single one of them had left with their lives last time? Is it possible to kill all these monsters off, and reclaim Earth?" Juan ended with two deep questions, neither of which got a response. Seeing the lack of contribution, Juan decided to start up the discussion. "Stanis, did you see what shot that ball of fire at you? I think that may hold the key to how the enemies knew how we would act." Soon all pairs of eyes turned to the young man shrouded in darkness, sitting on a crate. In the past, Stanis would have been unnerved by this amount of attention, but that was no longer the case after courting death countless times. His voice was slow and filled with power, although the effect was somewhat limited due to his young age. "It was a Goblin, but not a midget. It was at least my height and slim. Not at all to be underestimated, I think you all saw the power of the fire-bolt it sent flying my way. I'm also certain that it had been there since the start of the battle." He barely said anything, but what he did say gave a lot of insight into the question. Egor, the Russian man jumped into the discussion, "Well if it is strong enough to shoot out a blasted attack like that, I reckon it's also quite an intelligent monster. Considering that it was there from the beginning, I think we can also presume that it was there during the last battle. If that's true, that would explain how those monsters managed to break the strategy" The discussion continued onwards as more people spoke up. It was during this time that Juan picked up a scroll that was beneath all the supplies. He opened it up, to which a notification suddenly popped in front of everyone. Missions have been unlocked. Check your missions' tab. Stanis sat there in half surprise-half confusion as he saw everyone around him suddenly stare into the air in front of them. They were reading through the mission they had from the Hu, which Stanis had already unlocked and seen before. Eventually, Juan broke the silence: "Well I think we can all put one and one together. The mission asks to create a village, to which we have to first kill a tier-one monster. I'm almost certain that the Goblin that’s been watching us is that very tier-one monster." After a bit of thought, Juan then walked into the centre of the rough circle. "Guys, we can no longer be the hunted. We are Humans, we were once the apex predators. Now we turtle ourselves here like sitting ducks, and the Goblins clearly thrive due to that. We now have a mission to murder that son of a bitch, I think we need to now organise a full-scale attack on the Goblin's Camp. I think we have all noticed how the Goblins have only gotten stronger over time, and something tells me they won't just stop now. We have to use this chance now to take the head of their leader and gain ourselves some loot while at that. Let's commence the raid tomorrow. I know that everyone is tired from today's fight, but please, know that if we succeed that the goblins will be no more and we will not have to tolerate their attacks anymore. I hope all of you have a good night's rest today, for tomorrow is war!." His speech was met with a bit of enthusiasm as some clapped, while others just kept lying there. Some were already so exhausted that they were sleeping on the spot, and were beyond delighted as they realised the meeting was over. Now finished with the meeting, Stanis walked over to Jayesh, who he talked to for a length of time. Afterwards, he said his farewells, before trekking towards his cave by the sea. He could have just slept in the Camp like the others did, especially now considering that he had become one of the bigger men within the Camp. However, he still felt more comfortable in his little cave. The sky was bright orange, with a sunset soon due as he arrived at his cave. He was about to take off his equipment as he walked in, when he saw plumes of smoke coming from his cave. Now on edge, Stanis tensed his body as he leaned across the entrance, only to be met with another puff of smoke to his face. Inside stood Anatoly, casually smoking a cigarette… Surprised and now a bit more relaxed, Stanis was confused why the top dog within the Camp was by his door. Anatoly barely seemed to acknowledge his existence as he remained standing in his cave, before walking out and stubbing out the butt. He then smiled a menacing grin at Stanis, causing Stanis to shiver more than relax. "You have another allegiance, don't you?" Stanis felt a shock travel through his body as his eyes squinted and the grip over his spear grew. The only way Anatoly would know about allegiances was if he himself had another one. After all, the system only unlocked it for him after aligning himself with the Zelaro. Anatoly was fully unarmed, but Stanis wasn't foolish enough to underestimate him. A tiger was still a tiger, even if you took away its claws. Stanis took a step back while holding eye-contact. Anatoly seemed in no hurry at all to stop him as he continued casually standing there, his ominous grin growing wider. Stanis then heard light-footsteps haunting his behind, to which he turned around. Behind him stood Orena, dry blood pasted across her face in a war-paint fashion, and a sinister spear spinning within her hands. He could also hear another set of footsteps in the distance, one that was slowly but surely getting closer. No wonder Anatoly had come unarmed. Stanis rotated his head back to Anatoly, who shrugged his shoulders before repeating his question. "You have another allegiance, don't you?"…

Stanis rubbed his face as he walked, his cheeks bruised from the recent scuffle with Orena. In front of him were Orena and Scowly, while beside him were Jayesh and a girl called Aaliyah. Thinking back, perhaps he had acted a bit too rashly given the fact that they had all met him with weapons down. But Stanis still kept a grudge inside of him, purely based on the fact that they had watched him get thrown to the ground and not offer an explanation beforehand. In fact, where were they even walking to right now? "Where are we going? Why are we going deeper into the Forest?" asked Stanis, trying his best to keep his voice humble in fear of another whacking from Orena. There was a small silence after him asking the question, almost as if the others were wondering why he had decided to follow them without even knowing their destination. "We're are heading Eastwards towards where there is apparently a Village, well according to what Ailean claimed anyway. There is no point in going back to our own Camp considering there is only 5 of us left, not enough to defend against any more large attacks" responded Orena, clearly humoured by his overdue question. In truth Stanis had already thought this, but had then doubted it as he knew Orena and these guys had killed the Ailean and the rest of the betrayers. "You believe what he said? Didn't you guys kill all of them?" replied Stanis. It was just before anyone could answer his questions that curiosity got the better of him as he added, "I thought you were with them Ore---". He stopped his question near the end as he realised his mistake, but the ship had already sailed. Orena chuckled as she let Jayesh explain it. "We hadn't expected such a dirty backstab from those cunts. It was lucky that Orena chose us over them, as she took on Anatoly, allowing us to kill the other bastards. As for the credibility of his claims, I'm not sure but I can't really see a reason why he would lie about that. Also, it makes sense that some of the better-organised camps already have Villages, doesn't it?" Stanis couldn't argue against his logic, nor with Orena's as she explained her reasoning. "I agree. As for choosing you over them, I prefer predictable people like you to the fickle, power-hungry types. Not that I blame Anatoly for his decision, but he was just too illusioned to be a good leader." Stanis felt approval of Orena, until she finished off her reasoning. "Also, he was strongest. I have always wanted to fight him to the death and I thought that was a better opportunity than any other", she licked her lips after finishing, much to Stanis's worry as he realised he was the second strongest here… He then looked around him and realised that all the people here were the simple type. None of them had aimed for leadership, nor cared off much other than surviving this nightmare. It was as he forgot of his own aches and looked closer that he noticed that all of them were walking with limps or with awkward gaits. He would have offered to Light Heal them, but then he remembered the good man he was and realised that a little pain like this was what built will-power and endurance into a person. Also the fact that none of them had stopped his bashing might have influenced his decision… They were also dirty and muddy, although Stanis couldn't say nor was he as that was merely the norm after the Apocalypse. Orena was the bloodiest by far as her clothes and armour were completely soaked in it, ever her braids of hair had dry blood caked within. As for Jayesh, he seemed less bloody but also more injured. Stanis guessed this was due to Titan's Taunt, which was basically a suicide wish within a large company of enemies like the Goblins. He had also lost a fair bit of weight since the Trials as he now looked gaunt, emptier than he was at the start. Not that Stanis could judge, after all he didn't remember lusting after power or suffering on a daily basis in his old life. Instead, he remembered the young man who had worked hard to finally get the life he wanted, only for it to----. Stanis stopped his thought-track and instead looked at the last two. Scowly was, surprisingly, as tall and muscular as before. Stanis wouldn't describe him as a bear like he had to Ailean, but Scowly wasn't far off. He also wore his serious expression, the very one that had earned him his name. Lastly, there was Aaliyah. She had was of small stature, but also well endowed. Her bust and figure was something, Stanis was sure, that other ladies would have wished for in the past. She had the typical middle-eastern features such as the olive-tanned skin and black hair. Despite all the blood and grime on her, Stanis still couldn't bring himself to call her unattractive. In all truth, she was by far one of the quietest people in the camp, but he was sure that this was a good thing when compared to the other side of the spectrum. On the other hand, he was also certain that Aaliyah's good looks had been everything but good for her after the Apocalypse… Stanis felt his heart relax in the midst of these people, he knew none of them were driven to the point of pursuing senseless murder. Well, all but one of them… It was this thought that made Stanis wonder why Orena had wanted to go with them and not by herself. Stanis had left the Camp for the sea because he had been sick of the atmosphere in the Camp, and more importantly his own weakness. It had clearly been the opposite for Orena, and yet here she was with them. "Orena, why didn't you go by yourself?" Stanis didn't know if he was pushing his luck but it was worth a go. He was surprised when it wasn't Orena who answered but rather the rumbling Scowly. "I used to work in a prison y'know. As you can guess, the boys there were all rowdy and many times would get into violent fights, earning them a place in solitary confinement. Y'know the worst thing about that place? The lack of life, the lack of people to talk to. It makes a man go crazy; I've seen crazy go in, only to come back a lunatic." Aaliyah nodded her head in approval towards Scowly, as did Jayesh. "Maybe I would go loony" said Orena, not at all denying the fact that she was already crazy, "But I did it because I'm not foolish. With the amount of wounds I have, and how dangerous this world has already proven to be, I would rather not take foolish risks like that just for pride. Pride kills, that I know from first-hand experience" The warming mood had instantly chilled after the two dark responses, neither what a person in a living nightmare like this wanted to hear. And then the thought hit Stanis, the most obvious one that he hadn't yet asked. "How did you find me?" "Ha-ha, I was wondering when you were going to ask that", Stanis's chubby cheeks slightly reddened as he realised he was being read through, "Anatoly has a skill that lets him hunt people. He put a trace on you by the beach, and gave trackers to me and Ailean." She took out a triangular piece of wood that pointed towards Stanis. Dismayed at the thought of having his location always detectable, Stanis said "Gimme it", to which Orena simply shook her head, before storing it back. He felt even more dismayed than before as he saw this, he would have preferred someone like Jayesh keep his location than a Demon in human form! The conversations carried on, the group of 5 warming up to each other. The fact that the strongest, Orena, was only interested in fighting the strong and the second strongest, Stanis, was the youngest and most naive certainly helped erase the usual power structure and made the weaker three feel much more comfortable. After a few hours with them, Stanis finally forgave them for their lofty behaviour when Orena had beaten him, and thus offered to heal their worst injuries. After getting another smacking from Orena, who was furious he had hidden it away for so long when his companions were so injured, and another watching from the others who agreed with her, he healed them and they got on their merry way. It was 8 hours into their trek that Stanis used Scout and Sense once more, just to make sure that the path they walked wouldn't end up with death. On his radar showed up a group of armed Humans, marching towards them with haste… Spoiler Note, I remembered this because a lot of people got angry. I meant Stanis being beaten by Orena to be light humour, or that kind of thing, but I executed it badly so it made it seem like she was a complete tyrannical bully. Sorry about that, didn't mean it :'( [collapse]

"Huh" "Ha" "Hargh" Yils punched out, followed by Stanis who was trying his utmost but still failing and Zelgard who made a crude effort. "Stop bending your arm so much as you push" "Huh" "Ha" "Harrrghh" This time his punch followed a similar motion to Yils's but was also just as crude as Zelgard's. "And explode out with force at the end of the push while twisting your forearm." "Huh" "Ha" "Hargargh" This time his punch followed the same motion as Yils's but was even cruder than Zelgard's, who was now half distracted by the overhead clouds. The motion wasn't difficult, instead it was the mana flow that he needed to control at the same time that fared tough. As he punched, he was supposed to make his mana flow in a specific channel, for this punch the channel being from his chest to his arm, all within the punch's lifespan. Stanis's points invested in intelligence finally proved their usefulness as well as uselessness as he practised. He could control his mana flow, but only by closing his eyes and focusing could he move it quickly. The fact that he had to move it quickly, while simultaneously punching fared far too difficult for him as he struggled to breathe after punching. However, Stanis quickly figured out that Yils was not the compassionate type as she allowed no breaks, his body breaking down from fatigue after ten minutes. "You're shit. Don't worry though, you'll be half-decent for your level once I'm done with you!" Luckily, Stanis had a personal cheerleader who did care, and any negative feelings he had for Zelgard were gone as he was brought a drink of cool water. They were back as he realised this water had a mana density much stronger than usual, lurching onto the ground as he clutched his stomach. It burnt… His negative feelings reversed once again after lying there for ten minutes as he remembered the effectiveness of the water. His fatigued body was already healing up, boundless energy filing him up. And his feelings ended on "it's complicated" for Zelgard after 10 more bouts of training that day. The water half-acted as a natural revitaliser and half as an artificial one. This meant that he was wracked with pain after he had finished, able to do nothing other than lie in his bed. The gruelling days passed very slowly, much in contrast to the carefree days he had hastily thrown away. Stanis's mind screamed and shouted at him to quit her training because even his high points in tenacity couldn't deal with this. It was literally akin totorture he had asked for. And due to how broken his mind already was, Stanis wholeheartedly agreed and instantly tried to reverse Yils's decision. It was much to his anguish that she refused, smiling as she told him there was no escape. And there wasn't… One day, he tried to run away from the house in the dead of night, only to hit an invisible shield as he was about to jump off the mountain. Minutes later, he admitted that there was no way past this barrier and forced himself to come back to the house, but not without tears streaming down. Now that his path of escape was closed up, Stanis's mind went into breakdown as it began adapting to his lifestyle, his life depending on its very change. He went about mindlessly, no thought in his head as he practised the punches and kicks, mana accurately moving through his body at all times. It was about a week into training that Yils said that he was now half-decent for his level and that he would no longer need her to teach him how to practise. He wasn't embarrassed to break into tears at this, an iron weight lifted off his chest as he finally got the chance to breathe. Apart from the tinge of amusement across her face, Yils stayed impassive whereas Zelgard rejoiced with him. Hugs and cheers later, she finally carried on. "But I'll be fighting you from now on every day, so I recommend that you don't stop practising by yourself." The first thought he had of her when he had first seen her was fear of this vicious monster and that was the very same emotion he felt now, finally realising that she had tricked him. He would only have to train harder if he wanted to survive against her in a fight, only this time he would have to willingly and consciously make the effort to train. Days passed and Stanis only managed to get through them by Zelgard's help and support. The pale man might not be strong like Yils but he sure was compassionate. One thing Stanis figured out during the time was that his attribute points were actually naturally going up; he hadn't received enough experience to level up despite all these days of training and yet his attribute points kept going up. He had been confused when the apocalypse had started, at how the system actually worked. You started out with attribute points depending on your initial power in those areas but they would no longer increase if you trained, only by levelling up could you increase them. Only now did he realise that he was wronger than wrong, rather it seemed mana was the missing key for natural growth. He looked at his stats one last time before stepping forward to face Yils. Stanis Volkov Age: 18 years Mana capacity: 48 (regeneration is capacity/4 per hour) Level 26 (Progress to the next level is 74%) Strength: 35 [26 -> 29] Dexterity: 34 [26 -> 28] Constitution: 36[25 ->28] Intelligence: 33[17 ->19] Wisdom: 29[16 -> 19] Tenacity: 42[21 ->25] Skills: Layman's Rush, Scout and Sense, Light Healing, Destructive Mana Recharge, Ice shot Despite it already being his sixth fight, she was just as scary to face as she had been during the first. Her preying eyes watched him with unparalleled coldness, her movements fluid and yet sharp as she moved towards him. Out of his hand formed a menacing icicle, growing to forearm length within two seconds. He hadn't been able to do this when he had first gotten the skill,instead taking fifteen seconds to grow an icicle half this length. His hand flickered and the icicle shot forth, piercing the air as it targeted Yils. She calmly stepped over the icicle that targeted her knee, before continuing to walk at a casual pace towards Stanis. This was the worst thing about facing her, how she would casually dodge his attacks and always walk at a slow pace towards him. His brain had been wracked when he had first felt the tension build up in this manner, but no longer as he shot out another icicle, and then another one. They targeted her chest and thigh respectively, although their target slipped past them like she was a ghost. In rapid fire, he shot four more although none of them hit. She was now close enough to strike and Stanis knew that as he stepped forward, his fist severing towards her in an attempt to confuse. She blocked this with her palm but Stanis had twisted his forearm just before he struck, meaning the damage had already been done. She kicked forwards, slicing air as it cut towards his head. He hastily dodged this while roundhouse kicking her hip. She caught this with open hands as she twisted, his ankle snapping with ease. <Layman's Rush> She was already too late to do so, however, as he activated his skill and bolted the remaining distance between them. His head struck like a hammer as head-butted her, although she had already hopped back and whipped him across the head while doing so. Bells were ringing in his head but they were easy to ignore as he pursued, using his left arm to try and grab her. He was mouthing the words before he even caught her. <Destructive mana recharge> His left arm suctioned all the mana around it with destructive force, the surrounding air growing stale. It was too weak though, not even close to penetrating the mana barrier Yils had around herself. Instead, she twisted her hip and kicked towards his wrist, striking with so much force that his hand bent back in a way it never should. "ARRRRRGGGGGGHHHHHHHH!" screamed Stanis, futile however as the heartless Yils kicked down at his shoulder, crushing the bone into paste. She would never stop at just victory: only at murder. He forced the pain down as he rolled backwards, his whole left arm now dangling bonelessly. He was chased as the ground behind him flattened under an axe kick, barely managing to dodge the next overhead strike. He sucked in his breath before rolling to his left, onto and over his left arm which screamed with pain as he did so, but it was worth it as he managed to catch her a millisecond off guard, his right arm shining with blue light that shot out a hand length icicle. She allowed herself to be hit, the icicle crumbling against her beyond-tough skin as she couldn't react fast enough. How did he know she allowed it? Because she was actively keeping down her speed in order to make this a fair fight. "A pathetic effort; you need more training" said Yils with a matter-of-fact tone as Zelgard ran forwards, forcing a cool drink down his throat.   A tremor ran through the female Hu as she checked the system notification. The past week had been torturous for the two of them to go through as more and more strong species invaded earth, no longer a training field but a proper A2 planet. It was obvious what impact this would have on the Human population and so they had pleaded the Glory 8 to re-group the Humans, after all this was originally their planet. Something must have gone wrong as they actually accepted, the message in front of her telling her that they were allowed to re-group the Humans. And so she did, repositioning all the Human Villages to closer proximity to each other. The Humans had originally been spread across all the land, but most camps were now destroyed or abandoned. This meant that the Villages themselves had quite a distance from each other. The male Hu next to her pointed to an Africa-sized plot of land and she followed, the Villages not in that area being teleported in. Hopefully, this would allow them to salvage something out of the train-wreck this lucky finding had already become…

Spoiler Note: No, he's not the weakest. No, this isn't a chinese novel where he just gets moved to a new area with Dragons roaming the skies and Magikarps hunting the waters. Just that these are the 10 strongest humans, and, really, only one of them is stronger than him. [collapse] Stanis sat with his hands tucked around his knees on the field. Next to him lay his sword, and further away sat/lay the others. His limbs felt so weak, sucked dry of every ounce of energy, and yet his body felt so strong, so… He gave up trying to describe the feeling. Whatever it was, it felt better than the sense of pain he had been drowning in for the last few minutes. Soon after the nameless instructor had poured the mana water down his throat, Stanis had felt it getting to work. It had felt like molten steel coursing through his veins, eating away at his blood and flesh. And the worst of it was the fact he had been fully conscious throughout… “Gharrh pur et---“ Stanis heard the instructor say something loudly. His head twitched before turning around to face the instructor. The man was standing tall and straight without any semblance of emotion on his face, almost as if he hadn’t just driven a few people through torture. Almost. Stanis shook his head and focused his mind, finally making sense of the instructor’s words. “Get up. It’s time to go,” Stanis wanted to protest, and almost did so, but stopped himself after thinking twice. He got to his feet and stretched his body. It felt foreign as the flexibility he had before was no longer. His body was stiff and his bones cracked every time he moved. When he had drunk Yils’s mana water, he had never felt like this. This made him think that whatever had just been forced down his throat hadn’t been mana water. But this was a thought for a different time, especially when he had more immediate problems to address. He picked up his sword and slid it into its scabbard. He then walked over to Jen, who was watching the sky as if she was high and had just noticed something for the first time. “Give it back,” he said. He had wanted to make his voice sound low and sharp but it instead came out flat. In fact, with his eyes and shoulder drooped, his back bent and his head cast down, the image he gave off was anything but threatening. The only piece of luck he had on his side was the fact that Jen was just as energyless as him, in fact, everyone around him was the exact same. Jen looked up, her piercing blue eyes strangely soft. “No,” “Wh—“ “It’s mine now. It suits me better anyway,” These were the highest number of words Jen had said to Stanis ever. And they weren’t words he enjoyed. “Fuck you, you fucking bitch. I fucking made that!” Was it not for the fact that he knew how powerful she was, he would have made a move: a violent one. But he did know her power and, in fact, usually feared it. But not now; she had stolen his trump card. “No,” she repeated. Before he could respond, she was already walking away towards the instructor. Stanis gritted his teeth and followed. **** They were soon in the house, and then in the basement. A few minutes later, the other group came out of the teleporter. It was an understatement to call them a sorry sight. They were closer to death than anything else, blood covering their clothes and armour. Strangely enough, Stanis almost swore that Pete was sober as he stepped out. Of course, this was as far from the truth as could be, a fact that attested itself due to Pete’s abilities and his alcoholism, but the sombre aura he gave off wasn’t normal. But while the other group was panting and shaking, Stanis own group wasn’t much of a comforting sight either. Four of them were listless without emotion, thought or care, only Stanis showing anger towards Jen. “That’s all of you. Now come on, you guys go in now,” the instructor said. Stanis didn’t even have time to say a single word to Pete before he was thrown into the teleporter, back to the jungle. The group’s listlessness lasted a few seconds but quickly wore off as they began to adapt to their environment. This wasn’t somewhere where they could act relaxed; even if they had to suck up energy from where there was none, it was still better than the alternative. There was a bit of confusion even after the listlessness had gone away as the members looked at each other to see who would take lead. Going by strength, it would only make sense if Jen took control. But considering her expression, it was clear she had no plan nor desire to do such. Eventually, Keiko stepped forward and took control. “Alright guys, let’s just find the teleporter and escape. No wasting time, please,” she said, especially looking at Jen who was once again looking at the sky. “Jen, what do you need for your zombies?” she asked. “Just a corpse,” Jen replied, finally paying attention. “Ok. We’ll kill some quickly, and then use the zombies to drive through the hordes. Stanis and Berry, you two are the best armoured so you two go to the front and try to soak the damage. The rest of us will just focus on damage, is that cool?” “Yep!” Berry answered. Stanis, meanwhile, was thinking of ways to get his dagger back. It was not only his trump card but also his best creation to date. It was one thing for him to give it to Jen, since she clearly had greater darkness control than him, but it was whole another matter for the rotten bitch to steal it from him. His mind ran through several scenarios. Taking it back by force was a no-go; Jen was their driving force here: without her, they would struggle to make it to the teleporter. Also, he doubted he could fairly outpower her. But who said it had to be fair? The dagger was now hanging off Jen’s waist; all he had to do was take it while she was distracted. What right did she have to fight back after that? While he might be weaker than her, he was still no less brave. “Stanis?” Keiko asked once again with a concerned tone. She wasn’t, per say, concerned about him but instead of him fucking up the plan. “Yeah,” he responded, shaking himself back to reality. “Alright then, let’s go,” she said. They headed west of the clearing, the direction the teleporter had been in last time. Very quickly, they were ambushed by false-humans, who were slowly taken care off. But after the initial fight, the time taken for each fight reduced as Jen’s zombies became a driving force. After about 2 hours of exploring, the group stumbled upon the teleporter. Around it was a full horde of naked false-humans. Jen’s zombies moved swiftly, running forwards to stop the frontline. Stanis and Berry followed, the two of them taking on the few who made it through. Whilst he fought, Stanis could tell that he was stronger than he was before. His body had warmed up from the initial crustiness and was now far better than he remembered it being. The ordeal they had gone through was clearly helping as none of his group looked as bad as the other group had. Sure, they were covered in shed blood but for the most part the blood wasn’t theirs. The only major injury they had been dealt since the start was Keiko been ambushed by a sneaky false-human. It had attacked her wildly and had dealt quite a bit of damage to her leg. Stanis had thought of offering to heal it, but had eventually thought better. He needed to conserve his mana, and more importantly, Keiko was a mage-type who didn’t focus much on mobility or movement skills. This made the slight awkwardness to her gait fine. It was when more than half of the naked ones had died that Stanis heard the war-horn again from behind them, towards Jen’s end. The jungle had fared the same as last time so far and thus Stanis knew that the horn was the clothed false-humans’ signal. He sidestepped the naked one he was fighting and kicked it back, before running towards Jen. She couldn’t send her zombies back to fight the clothed ones as there were still a good number of naked ones left. This meant it was up to him and Berry to act as the backline’s frontline. Just as Stanis slipped past Jen, he sidestepped her and twisted his body. His hands went dangerously low and plucked the dagger off her waist, before stepping on the gas and sprinting away. He clashed with the first clothed one and injected his mana into the sword. He was pushed back, almost thrown into the air, when he spun around and used his dagger to stab the clothed false-human. The darkness very quickly spread through it and it stumbled back, finding no support behind it, and thus collapsed. Stanis grinned but the deranged thing didn’t last long as he felt a tightness in his chest. He felt an awful premonition follow but found his legs stuck to the ground. He looked down and saw the ground was dark and murky, almost like a large puddle of darkness. He looked back and saw a man-sized spinning star floating towards him. The last thing he felt was a chilling coldness, akin to the touch of a frozen stone’s, before he felt no longer. His breath struggled out of his clutches, his chest lying perfectly still. The opaque puddle he slept in grew until it absorbed him…

Stanis didn't know how long it had been since the chase. He didn't know how long it had been since he had last collapsed, and he didn't even know what the time was. But he did know something, and that was the fact that he wouldn't be getting any help. Despite screaming his lungs out before collapsing, nothing had still changed when he woke up. He was sure that the nurse lady had come around a few times to check up on him. But all he could remember from her visits were how she treated him coldly, almost like he was just a prisoner awaiting death. It was then that he realised how cold all the survivors were; even the warmest person here, who was willingly looking after the sick, wouldn't help him. In fact, Stanis was sure that the other two severely injured he had shared this tent with, were now both dead, and not through natural causes but rather because the others wanted to end their misery. Well, that and conserve the supplies… There was only one thing that would serve you here, and that thing was power. Only with power would others care about him, only then would others know him and fear him. Stanis remembered how he had briefly asked the nurse lady what had happened to the Wolf, to which she bluntly replied, his loot, which had turned out to be a skill scroll, had been taken by Juan… Only with power could his life be anything here, and not just another body in the mud. It was this realisation that hurt Stanis so badly: he didn't know if he would even be Stanis by the end, rather than some kind of power-hungry lunatic. A lunatic perhaps, but at least one that people respected. Stanis's fears were quickly replaced by longing, a longing to be acknowledged by others but most importantly a longing for life. And the only way to both was power. So Stanis forced himself up, using the ground to push himself. His whole body was dirty, he didn't need the light to show him that. He could feel how sticky his body was, and how it itched all over. Next to him lay his Malitsa coat, and the cuirass he had been wearing during the fight with the Wolf. Both were ripped and had holes in them. Additionally, both were dry with blood. So Stanis forced himself to lean down in order to pick the two articles up, before traipsing towards the flap. It was light outside, but the Camp was empty as most people were trying to level up in the Forest. After the initial scouting, the Camp had realised how experience-rich of a place the Forest was, and so most were hunting in there in a bid to increase their survivability. And so not many were left in the Camp, but the few who were there openly stared at Stanis as they saw him stiffly walking around. However, Stanis gave no care to these people as he continued his laborious trek towards the Sea, which was to the west of the Camp. People stared at him, but none offered to help him. He was clearly injured as all his movements were forced, slow and heavy, but all of them had their own difficulties to deal with. Even Jayesh, who was definitely the closest person to Stanis here, was busy in the Forest trying to level up. The body of water, which was a ten-minute walk from the Camp, took Stanis thirty minutes to reach. Close up to it, he could finally classify it. It had large waves in the distance that gradually shrank into careless dribbles onto the beach. It was clearly a sea. The sea was a deep azure colour, and spread as far as the eye could see, even past the horizon. There was a gentle hum produced by sea, which was superimposed with the clashes of the colossal waves in the distance. Alongside the countless bird calls that echoed each other, it created music that one could relax to. But Stanis didn't have such that luxury, instead, he stripped bare before drowning his clothes in the sea with his one good hand. The gentle tide nibbled at the dirt on his clothes, and then at his body as he threw himself in. It created a tickling sensation all across his body, apart from on his left arm. Stanis had no soap with him, but he was still able to wash away all the mud, sweat and blood from himself. After the soaking, he dried himself in the midday Sun, simultaneously examining his own body. Surprisingly enough there were only a few bruises left on his body, and the legs he had beyond-overworked in the chase now only had a dull ache. It was clear that the Constitution he had was beyond anything Humanity had before. Even his left arm, which he could remember being raw, now had all its cuts sealed up. Forcing himself to not stay on that matter, Stanis then clothed himself before trekking back towards the camp. His clothes smelled of salt and had an uncomfortable sensation to them, but it was barely noticeable after living several days in blood, mud and sweat. The journey back took only half the time as his mind and body felt refreshed. "Grrrrr" His stomach let loose a low groan as if to communicate its desire over to Stanis. Within minutes, Stanis found himself back at the supply centre, which was currently unmanned. There were several dry rations and a few bottles of water in a wooden chest, which Stanis feasted on, before turning his sight towards the arsenal. All the armour had been taken and so he was stuck with his ripped Cuirass. Luckily there were still weapons left over. His choice was now far harder than it had been last time, despite the massive reduction in selection. This was due to the fact that he only had one arm remaining, meaning that he had to be able to protect and attack with a single arm. In fact what had knocked the final nail into the coffin hadn't been when he had lost sense of his arm, rather when he had seen it in the bright sun. More than a little bit of him had died as he had seen that it was actually healing, and at quite a rapid pace. And yet he still couldn't sense it whatsoever. The only hope he now held was that there was some kind of miraculous cure in this crazy world! He was to be one-armed for the rest of his life, all he could now do was adjust to that fact. And so he began going through the remaining weapons. He instantly ruled out weapons like bow and spear, due to the fact that the power behind both came from using two arms. This meant his already small selection became even smaller, leaving behind only axes, clubs, maces and swords. There were also knives, but Stanis highly doubted his own ability to defend with such a miniscule thing. The decision between them was very quick, as Stanis realised the limited defensive capability held by maces and axes. Only the two-handed ones had a wide reach, whereas the single-handed ones had reaches smaller than the sword. The clubs, too, were out of the question as the ones left behind were all of low quality, being brittle wood and blunt nails. Eventually, Stanis picked a sword that was about one and a half his forearm in length, with a blade that wasn't too thick nor thin. It was quite a simple sword as the handle was made from simple wood without much embroidery, and the rough blade looked to be made of cold steel. As he was going to walk away, his eyes caught onto a pile of shields at the corner of the arsenal. A phantom pain crept up his left arm, one which was gone within a second, before Stanis walked away. He found a small satchel sized bag that could go around the waist, in which he stuffed some supplies before once again walking away from Camp. His destination was the beach; it was weird but he felt a strange calmness at the beach. Perhaps it was due to the fact that it was without danger, both from the World and from other Humans. It was halfway through the journey that Stanis found that his shoes had torn apart. The fabric that held the sole together with the rest of the shoe had ripped. And so Stanis merely left them there before walking on his bare feet. Interestingly enough, the ground wasn't painful at all to walk across. He wasn't sure if this was due to how much pain he had been already been through in the previous days, or whether his body had just toughened due to his attributes. Most likely a mixture of the two. He soon reached the beach, where he began practising using the sword. The reason why most people preferred other weapons over the sword was since it truly more difficult. While other weapons had simple motions used in attacks, the sword had multiple simple motions which had to be weaved together in sequences to be successful. Of course, this was true for most weapons, but the importance of such factor was only amplified when using a sword. He began with simple swings and then swings while moving around. Then he began varying his movements, and then his swings into slashes, slashes into hacks, and hacks into shielding. The attacking was fairly simple on the sword, which was in direct contrast to shielding with it as it was far more difficult. This was due to the small surface area of the blade, especially when compared to something like the shield which was specialised into such function. Soon enough, night came around and Stanis found a small crack in the cliff next to the beach, one large enough to be a cave, and unoccupied enough to be his cave. Stanis used his coat as a pillow as he drifted away to sleep, with hopes that this would all be a dream the next time he woke up. Not only would Stanis wake up the next day to figure out that it hadn't been a dream, but he would also realise that he had forgotten to ask anyone how long he had been in the Injured tent for. Because if he had, he would have figured out that he was actually out-cold for a lot longer than what he expected. In fact, tomorrow was the day of the second supplies, and thus the second battle…

Only fifteen minutes had passed but the test was already over. The trio stood together, watching Stanis clean up the final few frogs. Around them were 10 of Skint's plant traps. Initially, there had been close to a hundred of them but most of them had been killed by the frogs. The ones leftover, however, looked nothing like what they had at the start. Each of the plants were around 2m tall and as wide as bodybuilders. They had thick vines wrapped into half-feet, half-tails on which they moved. They made growling sounds and had leafy maws, similar to a Venus flytrap's, with dozens of thick stone-like teeth inside. Bear's skills had expired and his muscles were no longer bulging out, his mind no longer bloodthirsty. His bastard-sword was soaked in red blood, his eyes staring into the distance, at Stanis. Perhaps it was fear, perhaps it was reverence, but either way, he watched Stanis go about his massacre with quivering eyes. Pete was standing straight, for once. His back wasn't arched and his feet weren't stumbling across the ground. He wasn't grooming his beard and he wasn't taking a drink from his dinged canteen, instead he was just watching. His hopes of killing Stanis and stealing his equipment had initially died down, after all, who would want to go against a monster like him. But as time passed and more and more frogs fell, his greed reignited. The way Stanis's cuirass shined and shocked, electricity arcing off it. The way he flourished his sword as he slashed, the way the bolts ran across the blade, the way the thunderclaps bashed against his ears. He wanted them, he wanted them all. "We should go for it. Imagine," said Pete, his lips curling up at his visions. "No. I won't imagine. It's stupid," replied Skint. He knew Pete was crazy, but this crazy? It was like he was blind and wasn't seeing the same scene Skint was seeing right now. "Very stupid," added Bear, his voice less of a rumble and more of a whisper. "You don't understand boys. He's only that strong because of his equipment. When he's sleeping, we can just take him out!" "No, you and I and Bear know that's not true. When I shot my arrow, it hit his shin and slid off. His skin is stronger than my fucking shots. Lose the dream Pete, this isn't the right territory to play in," "No playing. Please. We all die. Life short, no need to shorten it," Pete scowled at his mates. Cowards, that's what they were. The power Stanis had, that could be his power tomorrow. He shook his head and looked down at his feet. His canteen, despite being dinged and scratched, still shone in the sunlight. Pete took the canteen from his waist and brought it to his eyes, looking at the liquid inside but at the same time looking past it. He scowled once more before taking the tip to his lips. This wasn't his style, he wasn't a follower. But… He corked the top and refastened it around his waist. "Fine. You two sodden fools win." There was a silence. Well, not really as the fighting was still ongoing, but there was a silence between the trio. "So, are we going to befriend him?" asked Pete. "I'm cool with that," said Skint. "I am coool with that." "I don't know," countered Bear. "This man is danger, dangerous to surrounding. Life is short, no need to make shorter or harder. I don't know," he admitted by the end. Skint stepped on his tip-toes and cuffed Bear across the back of his head. Bear scratched his scalp, brushing off the dried blood as he looked confused at Skint. "You old fool. Just listen to us and follow us. You'll come out just fine as long as you are with us," said Skint matter-of-factly. "Yeah. Just follow me and we'll all be just fine," said Pete, while taking another swig of his drink. Bear's response was slow and thought through. He smiled at the two of them, his wide smile scary on his scarred and bear-like face. Scary, but genuine. **** Stanis stood over dozens of bodies, his sword held out straight with blood dripping off it. The scene had only caught up to him. He had moved without thinking and now found himself questioning what had happened. Why had they willingly thrown away their lives like this? They had dropped their spears and ran to him, eager to be killed. He ironed the creases of his forehead and cursed. Fuck it, if they wanted to be killed, so be it. At least they hadn't wailed and screamed on their deathbeds. He looked down the hill and saw the trio making their way to him. Following them were the plant monsters which moved by half crawling, half sliding. Stanis was about to ignore the trio and focus his attention on these unique traps when he saw the greasy, drunk expression on Pete's face. "Bossman," he shouted, "I beg you. Take us under your wing!" Stanis's forehead recreased itself. He hadn't expected them to live through whatever was in the cave in his initial plan. And even later on, after seeing what the test was, he had planned on killing the trio, just in case they came to bite him back in the future for whatever reason. But he now found himself hesitating. The trio were strong, that he couldn't deny. And better still, they had their strengths spread out in different areas. They would be useful in the future if he kept them and admittedly not bad company to be with, most of the time at least. "Please bawsman," said Skint while going onto his knees, diving into mud and blood. "Please," repeated Bear, his rumbling voice back to normal. Stanis hesitated, his hand moving to his sword and worrying the trio, before moving back. "Fine," said Stanis, rubbing his face with his bloody palm as he said so. He told himself that it was fine, as long as he could fix up their behaviour and mindsets, they were sure to be invaluable in the future. But this thought died seconds later as he saw the three of them take out their canteens. Pete looked at Bear, who needed a second to get the message, before running towards the bottom of the hill to get their bags. He took out an extra canteen from there and poured alcohol into it. After bringing it back up, Pete skilfully used his mana to increase the intensity ten-fold, maybe a hundred-fold. Serb had taught Stanis how to do this but it was clear that Pete was far more skilled than either of the two of them would be at this, his control precise. He handed it over to Stanis, who checked it with his mana. Stanis sighed as the three of them held out their canteens, he bumping his with all of theirs before taking a swig. It was sometime later that the system announcement finally rang. 30 minutes has passed. You have killed all your enemies. You have all passed. Stanis hurried to clear his bloodstream before the next process began but wasn't quite so successful. Four beams of light came from the sky, focusing on the four of them. The beams were saturated with mana and Stanis struggled under it all, absorbing it at his maximum rate in order to convert it. It was 30 seconds later that he roared as his body broke past the brink, its very nature changing under the beam. All went black after this… **** Stanis woke up, his back wet and slimy. He growled in pain as he looked around at his surroundings. The system pelted him with a barrage of notifications, making his headache worse. Warning. User Stanis Volkov has gone over the power boundary. You are now being transported to the Universal system. Congratulations Stanis Volkov. You have entered the Universal system. Here is your new status: Stanis Volkov Age: 18 years Mana capacity: 30.8 (Mana capacity is actually 46.8 but 16.0 points are currently in use) (regeneration is capacity/4 per hour) Rank: Tyro Mosyte Class: Origin Strength: 15.1 Dexterity: 14.6 Constitution: 14.0 Intelligence: 15.9 Wisdom: 14.5+0.5 Tenacity: 16.1 Skills: Layman's Rush, Scout and Sense, Light Healing, Destructive Mana Recharge, Ice shot, Blueshot spitfire, Lightning seed, Darkness Manipulation You will be transported to Planet Ofu to receive your reward from your main allegiance, Hu, in 30 minutes. Stanis ignored the last message and instead looked at his stats. The only differences he could see was that his attributes had all been divided by 10 and that his level was gone, replaced by some alien rank. Worried, Stanis circulated his mana. His worries were gone after one second. Despite the amount of mana going down, it was clear that it had taken a grand qualitative leap as it felt incomparable to his previous, impurity-thick mana. In the following minutes, Stanis played around with his mana. Each and every one of his spells had changed: they kept their functions but the power behind them had increased by so much. He then got up and walked around. He went and got his bag from the bottom of the hills and returned to the top, sitting beside the trio who were still in their beams of light. He had tried touching Pete's one but had then retreated in fear, his finger ripped off. It was clear that any external forces acting on the transforming body would be, at once, eliminated. And so Stanis sat around, checking his status and trying to make sense of all that had happened. In the following minutes, the trio woke up. Pete was the first to wake up, then Bear and then Skint. The three of them got their stuff and joined Stanis, the mood sombre at first but then joyful as they tested out their upgraded skills. Eventually, thirty minutes had passed and Stanis braced himself. The world went black once more and he lost all sense of being. **** Stanis woke up upright. He looked around, and his jaw dropped. He was in a massive Colosseum, the arena stretching out every direction he looked. And in that space were hundreds of other humans…

The journey through the tunnel was just as long as before, at least a few hours by Stanis's guesses. However, unlike the journey to the temple, this time Stanis's mind wasn't plagued by a yearning for the temple and so the trek back became more of a time to think upon his thoughts and actions. The first thing he noticed was that he was still blind as a bat, despite the fact that he now had basic dark vision. This either meant that the trait was dysfunctional, which was unlikely since both the other traits were working, or it meant that his trait was too weak to see through this darkness. Stanis had first thought this when he had manipulated the darkness to cover his arms, at how there could be different qualities of darkness. And now that idea was reinforced in his mind since he had no other explanation for such an event. After a bit of thought, Stanis then began thinking about the type of people he had met so far. Some had been kind-hearted, or at-least as kind-hearted as they came after the apocalypse, such as Jayesh, while others had scared Stanis like Orena. It wasn't to the stage of flesh crawling fear that he held for Gahlnym, but it was still at the stage of I don't ever want to fight this person fear. And then he thought of how he himself had acted after the apocalypse. Of some rare moments he was proud of, such as when he had watched Lucas being killed by Jayesh. Although people like him had only become common-place after that trial. However, most of the moments he thought of were negative, where he had acted pathetic and weak. He now understood that this was beyond-dangerous in this world: weakness would only ever be exploited here. There is the old saying that you don't appreciate parts of life, until you lose those very parts. Stanis had felt the epitome of hopelessness and powerlessness in the past few days, especially after he had lost his arm. He had been one of the stronger Humans in the Camp prior to that incident, and now he was sure he could do even better. In fact, he had to do better… Meeting Gahlnym and hearing a bit about the new world told him he had to take risks here if he wanted to survive. The hours became minutes, minutes seconds, and seconds moments as Stanis became engrossed in his thoughts. To his surprise, he could see a light in the distance of the tunnel. He had reached the end of the tunnel so quickly… Unbeknownst to him, it had already been hours though… He ambled towards the exit, now mostly at peace with himself. He walked out onto the dusky-stone, which he now noticed looked like a low-quality version of the stone used in the cave. In fact, it was highly possible that this whole area was designed around that cave itself, all for the Zelaro representative. The grandeur of said place made pride blossom inside his heart: he secretly hoped that the other races' temples weren't as grand. Within minutes of walking he was back at the beach, each grain of sand scratching against his feet, nothing at all like the smooth stone texture. The light he had seen from the tunnel wasn't actually sunlight, but rather moonlight. The moonlight reflected off the sea and into the surroundings, allowing Stanis to see his surroundings with clarity. He still hadn't had a chance to test out his dark vision… The darkness veils across his arms remained as dark as before, even in the shining light. He lifted both arms up; no one would notice the physical difference between his arms with the veils on, but it was a different story when the veils came off. From the reaction Gahlnym had when he first talked to Stanis, it sounded as if he was surprised that there was here so quick. Stanis hoped that this meant that the other representatives would only start coming out later, and would hopefully be weak even when they did come. After all, since Gahlnym had implied that he would have to kill other representatives, it also meant that others would try to kill him… Finally reaching his cave where he had slept before, he was once again at a crossroad. Strangely enough, he felt no fatigue despite having gone through a hell of a day. So he went into his cave, took the remaining supplies that he had left there, and began walking towards the Camp after taking a deep drink of the sea. This was fine as he now knew of the natural buffs Humans had gained from the Hu. Stanis wasn't actually going to the Camp but rather towards the Forest past it. He felt out of place at the Camp due to the fact that he had ran away from the second battle while the others had put their lives on the line. Well that, and now the fact that he had an allegiance to a species that didn't really respect Humanity. A short while later, the Camp was well in sight and larger than before. Stanis knew that this meant that they had won the last battle as the additional tents set up signified that they had already taken out the new supplies. While deciding on whether to walk through or around the Camp, he realised that the supplies could come in helpful and so decided to walk through the Camp. It was as if he was walking through that he saw a shadow in the distance, who he easily recognised as Jayesh due to his now-working dark vision. Jayesh hadn't truly helped him during his Injured-phase but he had provided him with help before that, and so Stanis felt it was only right to pay his respects to an old friend. Despite squinting and rubbing his eyes, Jayesh was still shocked as he saw Stanis walking towards him. It had been 5 full days since anyone had seen him… Jayesh had already thought of him as another victim of the apocalypse by now, only to be smacked in the face by reality. "Jayesh, how are you?" Ignoring pleasantries, Jayesh went straight to what he wanted to know. "Stanis boy, where have you been for the last 5 days? No one has seen you since before the fight last week!" Stanis was about to respond that he had only left the day prior, when he realised at how long he had actually been in the temple for. Only the Gods knew how he had passed that many days without his mind, nor body realising it… "Ahh. I was involved in some shit. Ha-ha, don't worry about it." Jayesh would be blind if he didn't notice the looming darkness snugly wrapped around Stanis's arms, but he was too smart to ask such a personal question. Instead, he was just happy that an old friend was still alive; he had thought he was now passed the kid since he had made new friends here at the camp, but it seemed old was still gold. This time it was Stanis's turn to ask some questions. "5 days, eh? What's happened in that time? How did the fight go?" Jayesh had to think for a while before he responded, after all every day was now a hectic one. "That battle was probably our best. The plan Juan came up with worked a treat, we wiped out all the Wolves within minutes. What followed that was a race to reach and harvest the Goblins first. Ha-ha, you should have seen the Dead 4 there, you would not have been able to tell which side were the actual monsters. But since that day, we have been getting regular attacks from the Goblins. It's why I and a few other lads are on Patrol duty right now, in fact even the people who are sleeping right now are only doing so lightly. The Goblin and Wolf camp seems to be getting stronger, and more numerous. A few small groups have done a few small raids near their base, but no one has actually gotten there due to how numerous the enemies become…" Stanis thought back to what Gahlnym had told him, about how the enemies were only going to get more numerous and powerful as the stronger ones began to invade. It meant that humanity would have to level up quickly in order to put up a fight. "Jayesh, what level are you right now?" "Me? Let me just check. Ahh, I'm level 12 already, but I've heard the Dead 4 are approaching 14. In fact, Anatoly is apparently already level 14. What about you?" "I'm level 9. I guess I'll have to catch up." Jayesh was now more curious and puzzled than before. So Stanis was gone for 5 days, in which he got some kind of darkness power over his arms but he hadn't fought a single monster… What in hell had he been doing? But he was still too wise to actually ask such an intrusive question. "Stanis, it seems you are in a bit of a rush. Why don't you at least take some supplies before leaving?" Jayesh felt he would give his friend the last bit of help he could offer. "Sure. Take me there, the new formation of the Camp is a bit confusing." What followed was the two walking over to the supply centre, getting Stanis some supplies while they carried on some unrelated talk. Amongst this smalltalk was a bit about a nearby Camp breaking up, which had caused an influx of people to this Camp. Luckily there was still more than enough supplies to support everyone, and so the proceedings had passed peacefully. While they were there, Stanis also got a belt to carry his sword by and a solid spear which was the length of his arm-span. He had realised that he had been far too restrictive of himself earlier by only using simple weapons; the ones to survive here would be the ones who took risks. His choice to pick the spear was fuelled by the multiple advantages and capabilities it brought, alongside with Orena's fighting image that brought inspiration to him. Less than an hour had passed since Stanis had arrived, and he was already leaving. Jayesh was satisfied, he had already said all that was on his mind to Stanis and had offered him as much help as he could. The rest was up to Stanis himself. Stanis had thought he had let go of his Human side when he had accepted the monster he would eventually become. But the feeling of gratitude and kinship he felt for Jayesh was without a doubt those of a Human's… Stanis let these thoughts go as he began walking away from the Camp. It had been midnight when Stanis had initially exited the tunnel to the temple, and now it was already 3 am. You could see the hints of sunlight peeking around the corner of the sky, although Stanis didn't need any light as he used his dark-vision to navigate the Forest. His dark-vision was actually pretty good, barely worse than his normal vision. This made the darkness from the tunnel even more enigmatic. Now quite deep within the Forest, Stanis was quite surprised as he hadn't seen any of the scouting Goblins so far. He held his new spear with a firm grip as he trod through the clumps of leaves, a feeling that now felt weird due to how long it had been since he had last fought. About 5 more minutes in, Stanis's ears caught sign of a Goblin. It seemed the Goblins were deeper than usual due to the daily attacks the Camp now made against them. The last time Stanis had been in this Forest, he had been trying his utmost to stay out of sight and maximise sneaking. However, Stanis now felt comfort within the darkness and walked with natural grace. He was sure this had something to do with Darkness manipulation. After a bit of walking, Stanis finally saw the Goblin in question. It was up to hip height like the ones he had fought before, but it was far better equipped. It had what looked like a steel short-sword slung around its waist, and light leather armour across its body. Stanis could see its bulbous face searching around with caution as it walked, most likely due to the dangers brought by the Humans. Well, it was in bad luck… Stanis tensed his legs, before exploding forwards. He covered the distance between the two within short seconds and was on the Goblin just as it pulled out its sword. He first pierced the Goblin with his spear while stepping forward, although the Goblin managed to barely block it with its own sword. However, Stanis was already close and confident enough to drive his foot around the Goblin's stomach, sending it sprawling to the ground. He quickly followed this with a downwards stab, before the Goblin even got a chance to squeal. Stanis himself was surprised at how smoothly the fight had gone in comparison to his previous ones, it was almost like he was a completely new person.

Stanis was kicked out of the tutorial space and returned back to the temple. Stanis Volkov Age: 18 years Mana capacity: 18 (regeneration is capacity/4 per hour) Level 9 (Progress to the next level is 17%) Strength: 18 [15] Dexterity: 18 [15] Constitution: 18[15] Intelligence: 12[12] Wisdom: 12[10] Tenacity: 16[14] Skills: Layman's Rush Funnily enough, Stanis couldn't see any difference in his status screen whatsoever. If he wasn't in the temple right now, he would have doubted the integrity of all that had just happened. And then the thought struck him: what if there was actually more to the Status-screen than just his stats? And so he willed his mind to expand Status. Many functions are still locked to the user. However, Allegiances and Missions has recently been unlocked. Does the user wish to view these? Finally, so that was where the changes were hiding. Stanis said yes to Allegiances. Allegiances Hu – Allegiance was placed when the system was first set up. This allegiance was enforced when the Tutorial ended, effectively making it impossible for the user to change. Zelaro – Allegiance was recently set by both parties agreeing to a representative relationship. Stanis expanded the Zelaro section. Traits granted from allegiance to Zelaro: Basic dark vision Basic transformation Basic darkness manipulation Finally finding the fruit of his labour, Stanis expanded each of his new traits. Basic dark vision- Your vision in the dark is far better than before. Vision is no longer clouded by odinary darkness. Basic transformation- To be a representative of Zelaro, you must be one of them. Activating basic transformation allows your body to change based on how much Intelligence and Wisdom one has. Basic darkness manipulation – To be a representative of Zelaro, you must have the basic skill shared by every Zelaro, the ability to manipulate darkness. You are able to control darkness to your will. The power and complexity of use will increase based on how much Intelligence and Wisdom one has. Despite his macabre surroundings, Stanis became giddy with excitement as he read through the traits. Not only was he now able to transform his body into the one of an able man, he was also able to control darkness itself. There was also the added benefit of being able to see within that darkness. Unable to suppress his excitement of leaving disability, Stanis immediately tried to transform. <Activate Basic transformation> He could feel his body burning up, the last sound he heard being his body creating a thud as it collapsed onto the temple floor. It only got weirder as Stanis realised he wasn't actually unconscious, rather he was only blocked from all his senses. Instead, the only thing he could feel was a pseudo-type of blue liquid that flowed inside of his body. Was this mana? Unable to directly manipulate the mana, Stanis eventually tried to focus its movement into his left arm. It was hard at first, but after a few gruelling hours, all the mana he had was concentrated within his left arm. A few minutes later, Stanis finally understood that he had just wasted hours. All he had done was transport his mana from across his whole body to just his arm, which in turn hadn't caused anything. Lost for ideas, Stanis turned his mind towards the system. Activate Transformation? Ahh, so that was what he was meant to do… Focus on what part of your body you want to transform. Stanis focused on his left arm, to which he could feel the mana inside of him quickly draining. Within seconds, all the mana he had was gone. Having completed the transformation, Stanis willed himself back to reality, to which the system brought him back to consciousness. The first thought that crossed Stanis's mind as he woke up was just how painful his left arm was. It felt like it was being scorched as a burning, blistering pain continued to run down his arm. In shock Stanis dropped to the floor and clenched his left arm, only to notice the pain slowly fading away. He took off his Cuirass armour and his Matilsa coat, before peering down at his left arm. It wasn't a human arm… In fact, Stanis had been wrong in thinking that he would be able to transform his body into that of an able man. When transformed, his body would be beyond able but certainly not that of a man's… Not only was his slightly tanned skin nowhere to be seen on his arm, his arm was not even that of a Human's. It still consisted of the upper arm, forearm and hand, but all three were also physically different in shape compared to normal. His upper arm was twice as muscular as before and also longer, his forearm was thicker and his hand… Well, his hand was long and elongated, with fierce, red claws coming out of each finger. In addition to all of this, his arm was covered in a dark orange, almost black covering. It was thick, about 2cm wide, and felt like smooth leather. Stanis's left arm was about 5cm longer than his right arm, and quite a bit thicker due to the muscles and thick skin. He was completely lost for thought as he continued to stare dumb-founded at his arm; it was his as he could control it, but it wasn't his because it wasn't his fucking arm. Eventually, Stanis stood up and began moving his left arm around, to which he noticed that his left arm was both faster and had smoother motion than his right. Perhaps others would be frightened of their humanity if they had such an arm, but it was the opposite for Stanis. He felt overjoyed at a working arm, needless to say about an arm that was more powerful than his old one. The fact that the arm was fit for a monster, and not a human didn't dampen his spirits one bit after he realised the potential in it. It wasn’t like receiving the monster arm had elevated him to euphoria, rather that he was over the moon as all of the doubts and worries he had earlier left him. No longer was he disabled, no longer was he handicapped, no longer was he on a path to certain death! After a quick celebration over his new arm, Stanis turned his attention towards the second mysterious skill: darkness manipulation. He tried to use it in the temple, only to have his attempts thwarted due to the unilateral light coming from the purple gemstones. Remembering that the tunnel he had come through, Stanis ran down the stairs towards it. Inside it was pure darkness with no light whatsoever, and so Stanis tried his skill once again there. He focused his mind onto the darkness, trying to get it to move. It only took a few moments for him to realise that his method was ineffective. He then tried activating the trait through the system, only for that to also fail. Stuck for ideas, he sat there and tried to think up ways to use this new power. Quite a bit of time passed before he finally got an idea. It was connected to his previous experience with the transformation. Stanis stood up and held his arms in the darkness. He then imagined the sensation he had felt when he had manipulated the mana in his body, and instead tried to do the same in the darkness instead. He stood there for minutes, forcing his mind to come back to the task at hand every time it drifted away. A short while later, Stanis once again began feeling the fluid sensation around his arm. However unlike when he had manipulated the mana during the transformation, this time it also caused feelings of fatigue as he began moving the darkness. Soon enough, small amounts of darkness began flowing out of the tunnel and into the light. The only way of describing the sensation of controlling darkness was akin to controlling water with your mind: it heavily fatigued your mind, but you were able to make it flow into the air and spread out. In fact what he was really doing was actually creating boundaries in the air where the darkness could and couldn't go, which allowed him to control its flow. Feeling his mind close to a migraine, Stanis decided to finish it up by trying to make the darkness tangible. He forced the darkness into a shroud-like cloth, which he attached to his left shoulder. He then ironed the veil of darkness hanging off into his left arm, getting rid of all creases as his left arm became just a block of black. And finally, he attempted to make the boundaries of the cloth even smaller as he pushed it inwards, causing the darkness to constrict his arm. Following this, he snacked on his food and water before falling asleep. After he woke up, he did the same thing to his right arm. The only difference was that he didn't force the boundaries in. This gave the illusion that his left and right arms were the same size and length, despite the opposite being true. And thus now Stanis could no longer see his arms, instead they were both covered in veils of tangible darkness. It was surprising that he couldn't see through the veils considering the fact that he now had dark vision, but this suggested quality differences between the darkness. Mana capacity temporarily lowered from 18 to 14. Release the darkness to reinstate 18 as the limit. Having the system confirm his work, Stanis felt pleased and decided it was time to leave the cave. He had come in as a crippled young man, prey waiting to be eaten by the predators in this world. Now he left as a young man who had potential to become one of those very predators.

Once again, Stanis felt a yearning inside of him for the temple, it was almost as if he was being controlled by another being. He began walking forward, and finally reached the grand stairs. Each stair was about 600m wide and about a metre long. There were hundreds of these stairs rising towards the temple; it was beyond an ostentatious display for just a staircase. But Stanis didn't think that, instead he felt the glory and show of power from the staircase. It was as he placed his bare foot on the first stair that he noticed the texture, silky smooth and yet not slippery. After being lost for thought at this euphoric texture for a short while, Stanis began trekking up the stairs. He looked at his surroundings as he walked, speechless at everything he saw. On the roof of the sky were multitudes of dark purple gems that shone light on the world, whereas surrounding the staircase was a sea of lava. However, it wasn't hot whatsoever in the cave, a feature that was attributed to the heat-absorbing stone. Eventually after hours of walking, Stanis reached the Deer-shaped statues that acted as a gate between the staircase and the Temple. He should have been fatigued, both mentally and physically, at this stage, and yet he couldn't think of a time in his life when he had been more energetic that he was now. As Stanis had seen from a distance, the deer-shaped statues had large torches in their mouths that burnt with intense heat. He took a step forward, only to notice the heat of his surroundings exponentially increase. He was still hundreds of metres away from the statues, and yet he could still tell that those torches burnt hotter than lava. Thankfully the two statues were at the very edge of the stairs, and so he could pass through the centre without any serious burns. He had also seen the statues bleed from a distance, and now closer up, he could see the ruby-red blood flowing down into the lava below. There was a continuous sizzling sound as the blood burnt into the lava. Now finally past the stairs, he could see that the temple was not actually exactly like a Greek one. The multiple pillars did hold up a roof, but in the centre of the temple was a large closed off structure, almost like a separate room. Coursing across the floor of the temple were myriads of amorphous, dusky-coloured lines that continuously changed shape. It was like being on a high-tech sci-fi ship that shone bright neon, only he could tell that this was far more impressive than that. The fear that Stanis had felt in the tunnel was once again completely gone, he was solely controlled by the desire for this temple as he absent-mindedly walked across the ground. It seemed the distorted lines across the ground had no other function than appearance, as they did nothing even as he stepped across them. Now in front of him was the closed-off room. Unlike the marvellous design of the rest of the temple, the closed-off room was purely black and a cube shape. In fact, Stanis didn't even know if it was a solid cube or actually a room. He circled it twice, before realising that it had no door whatsoever. It was as his fingertips touched the dark cube that he felt a strong suction force, causing him to be flung inside through the solid walls of the cube. What he had seen so far was completely novel, things that Stanis had never even seen before, not even in fantasy art. But it was as he opened his eyes that he felt a familiarity with the inside of the cube, but not a good sense of familiarity. Instead, he felt his hairs instantly stand up on their end, goosebumps pop-up all across his arms, and a heady rush of adrenaline into his blood. The invisible floor that he stood on, the invisible sky, the absolute nothingness of this area. This was where the tutorial had taken place… He was ready for the entity to once again speak directly into his mind, and so fell down in surprise as he heard a voice. It was clear and melodic, despite being monotonous. "Welcome Human. You will be put through to a King at once. Please wait here." The voice disappeared after telling him to wait there, although Stanis didn't have much choice in the first place as he didn't even know how to leave. It wasn't a long wait as the soft, melodic voice was quickly replaced by a ball of purple flame that appeared in front of Stanis. From it was projected a voice completely different to the first one. "I am surprised that you found the Temple so quickly, Human." The voice was hoarse and intimidating, one so menacing that Stanis's flesh crawled as he heard it speak. After a short pause, almost as if wondering what to say to Stanis, the voice then carried on. "How are you enjoying your new life Human? Pleasant, no?" Stanis was lost for words, and also far too frightened to actually respond. So after an awkward pause, the voice carried on having understood Stanis's affliction. "That's normal. Let me tell you a bit about your new world. All the land has been forced back together, forming one large mass of land surrounded by sea. It is similar to what was once called Pangea by you Humans. However there are differences, the main difference being that you are the prey. You are nothing more than prey for us, Human, nothing but pathetic food for us to harvest. Or you would have been, but in an unfortunate turn of events, some sympathisers got to this Gold-mine of a world before we could. That meant that the rest of us could do nothing, but invade this World under those sympathisers' rules." Stanis could hear the obvious build-up of anger and found his knees weak as he fell to the ground. "Luckily there are still ways around that. The most direct being that we can pick representatives for our race. Doesn't that sound nice Human? If you work for us, the rewards are endless!" It took a moment for Stanis to take in all the words, before he understood that this new voice wanted him to be an insider for them: basically a spy for them, maybe even a backstabber to Humanity. This went against the intrinsic values inside every Human being, and it was no different for Stanis as he realised this. Despite not having the courage to say no to the voice, he also refused to say yes. The voice, almost as if reading his mind, continued speaking after his decision. "You might think you are betraying your race by doing such, but let me tell you something. Right now, only the weak are on Earth, but it won't stay that way. Soon the stronger beings will start invading, and you will crumble under them. You yourself are disabled, a one-armed human. Do you think you can contest these beings, nevertheless survive? All of Humanity will soon start running towards the other species' banners, there is no other way to survive. Those sympathisers might have already might have already put their mark on you, but they are now out of the playing field. Unlike the other races, we will only have one representative. In fact, you should be eternally gracious that you received such an opportunity from our race, the Zelaro. Choose now human, or go back to your old life, and die tomorrow due to your weakness." Stanis stood there, contemplating his choices. In fact, everything the Zelaro person had said was true, and things he had previously thought. He doubted his survival as a cripple unless he managed to get some kind of magical skill. Wasn't this opportunity even better than that, aligning himself with a greater race? Stanis had no idea about the Sympathisers it talked off, perhaps that was the entity that had placed him in the tutorial, but Stanis felt no pain in betraying them. "I accept. Allow me to your representative!" It was as he spoke he realised how pip-squeak his voice was in this place, especially when compared to the Zelaro. "Exemplary! Accept it!" Gahlnym wishes you to become a representative of the Zelaro race. Accepting such a request will force you to lose your allegiance to Hu. Do you accept?" Stanis willed Accept, as he braced himself for his loss of humanity. The request has been broken. The Hu has fully forced their will onto Humanity and that cannot be changed. However, you can still accept the request, only that you will not lose your allegiance to Hu. Stanis once again willed Accept, surprised at the turn of events. Gahlnym was not ignorant of the change of events as Stanis heard a blood-curdling laugh. "HA-HA, of course they would not give up their lead so easily. This is to be expected, it is fine either way." You have not lost your allegiance to Hu. Therefore you have kept the multiple traits given to you by the Hu. In his mind, Stanis read through all the multiple traits as they flashed past. This ranged from massively increased levelling rate to natural resistance, and even stuff like a hardened body and the ability to safely eat and drink what they couldn't before, such as sea water or poisonous mushrooms. Stanis felt like he had been lead into a trap by Gahlnym; he had almost voluntarily let go of so many traits without even knowing that they ever existed. However, his anger disappeared within the next second. You are now also allegiance to Zelaro. You have gained these traits. Basic night vision Basic transformation Basic darkness manipulation Your allegiance to Zelaro now allows you to take missions from the Zelaro, in return for rewards. Stanis didn't have time to check his new traits as Galhnym began talking again. "You are now part of the Zelaro, know that we have no weaklings within our ranks. The traits that I have given you are merely the surface level ones, you will gain several more powerful ones as long as you complete our missions. Also, remember to find the representatives of the other races, and always be on guard. You will have to kill many of your race in the future, whether you want to or not. I cannot think of many races daring to move against us directly, but that doesn't mean that they won't here on Earth. Make sure you survive Human. Otherwise... Well, you don't want to know!" The purple ball of flame in front of Stanis disappeared, alongside Gahlnym's voice. Stanis had no clue about the Zelaro, other than the fact that they seemed evil due to the temple decorations and how Gahlnym acted. But it sounded like he would find out in the future anyway, as Gahlnym implied that they were one of the stronger species. Stanis forced his mind away from this thought-track, as he opened up Status. After all, he had new skills to look at!

Silence permeated the air as the eight representatives walked across the marble floor, their footsteps silent. They walked with a slow gait, uncaring of the countless other races waiting around them. Up a staircase they stepped, their stride small as they came up to a raised platform, chairs at the top which upon they sat. Around this raised centrepiece were the representatives of countless other races, all expectant and hoping in different ways for the outcome of this meeting. One of the eight lightly tapped the table, all attention now on him. His was a broken mask, no emotion whatsoever on his face. "This meeting is in order. We are here to discuss the rating of the recently found planet Earth" Minutes passed as the raised eight talked amongst themselves. The other race representatives could hear the eight clearly, but none dared to interject into the discussion. They didn't have the power to back themselves up against the eight, whether it be personal power or race power. Most of the representatives here were just people of a race rather than the leader of that race, but this wasn't the case for the Hu. He sat on a chair near the back of the hall. That was not to say that he was in impoverished conditions though, instead the chair he sat on was embedded with several high-class gems, the class of his chair much higher than his surroundings. In fact, it was of a similar league to the raised eight, a sign of their glory. But no longer… The Hu leader was weak compared to a lot of the people here, despite the fact that he was the leader of a race while they were just people from their races. He wasn't watching the eight discuss Earth, instead he twiddled his thumbs. There were two outcomes to this meeting for him: one good and the other bad, neither which he had influence over. Close to an hour passed since the meeting had started and one of the eight once again tapped the table, formally bringing it to a finish. She didn't stand up and face the crowd, they didn't deserve that grace, but she did speak to them, her voice loud and clear without blemish. "We, the eight representatives of the eight reigning races, have decided changes to Earth. Its rating has been raised from designated hunting ground to an A2 planet, the third highest possible rating. The ordinary rules apply to this planet." After saying this, she and the other seven walked out of the building, their gait as slow and steady as before. It was as they exited the building that the other races had the cue to act, some representatives hastily contacting their leaders whereas others lay in their seats with smiles plastered across their faces. The Hu leader didn't fit into either of these categories, instead he sat with his head down as before. There were tears streaming down, his body lacking the energy to even move. On the other hand, in one of the chairs next to the pedestal sat a monster. His arm was covered in dark-orange metallic skin, his grin threatening to rips his face apart. Who would have guessed that the lowest King would be the right one? It was obviously due to dumb luck, but it was the results that counted at the end of the day. He immediately called his leader, ordering the lowest King to keep turning people. They had thought the lowest King had been crazy when he had come up with ideas to set up a base in a designated hunting area and thus had denied him, but who was to guess denying idiocy would come back to bite their hands. Well, it was fine, after all, they had let him get a Temple. Within hours of Earth's rating being raised, the prices for a space on Earth kept rising, the sellers beaming with joy as they allowed the price to rise further. Whereas on Earth, the ones who had bought Temples early on rapidly moved from space to space, turning people to their side with haste. Amongst these people was Gahlnym, chuckling as the others finally saw the truth. He had also been sceptical of the potential of Earth and so had only turned one person, who he had on top promised to be the only ever representative for the Zelaro. Not that it mattered, that thing should be happy it got the chance to become the first Zelaro representative… Travis shield-bashed into the tier-two Zelt, using his whole body to boost the impact. It was to his surprise that it felt like he had just ran head-first into a boulder, his whole recoiling back as he struggled to stay on his feet, disorientated beyond words. Luckily, he had been closely followed by Stanis and thus Travis had a small time-frame to get back up. In this time, Stanis slashed at the tier-two Zelt, who in response snarled towards him before roaring right in his face, Stanis's face now covered with a mask of spittle. It then leapt towards him, using its arms to keep him on the ground as its knee rose, gloriously smashing spittle-face to the ground. Before it had a chance to follow up, an arrow zipped through the air, piercing its chest. Tanya watched from afar, her eyes the size of saucers as she wondered how to down this beast. Her arrow had pierced its chest, but only as much as Stanis's sword had. That was to say skin deep, a small amount of blood leaking from both of their attacks. She quickly checked her mana as Travis once again clashed with the giant. She only had enough for Piercing arrows, meaning that she would be skill-less against any following enemies. The sight of Travis being downed once more was enough for her to make a decision. <Piercing arrows> This time Stanis blocked the tier-two Zelt, standing defensively as he no longer dared to engage. The monster faced him with squinted eyes, before exploding forth, its fist clubbing towards his head. Stanis dodged this, before trying once more to cut the monster, this time aiming for its groin. Sensing the danger, the tier-two monster tilted its pelvis so the blade harmlessly hit its thigh, doing little more than scratching the skin. It was about to retaliate with a high kick when an arrow bit deep into its back, tearing through flesh as it embedded itself inside. The Zelt turned around, anger simmering in its pupils as it eyed the little Human archer. This was enough of a cue for Tanya to start running as the tier-two Zelt began its chase, but not before being caught in the face by a fist, a certain left fist to be more specific. Its face stung with pain as it turned around to once again face Stanis, this time its fury directed at him. Stanis punched again, to which the Zelt responded with one of its own. Just before both fists clashed, Stanis said "Drop". In this split second, the Zelt only had enough time for its eyes to pop out of their sockets as Stanis's arm bled black, the darkness then shooting towards its face. But before the darkness managed to blind the beast, the Zelt did catch a glimpse of the Human's arm, instantly bracing itself as it realised it was not a Human arm… Both arms clashed, strength and defence at a stalemate as both fists recoiled, bones possibly broken. The darkness blinded the Zelt, but not that it mattered much… After all, the Zelts were master tunnelers: they were just as good in the light as they were in the dark. The instant change from light to dark did blind the Zelt, but not enough to cause it fear or worry. It instead lashed out against Stanis, only to hit thin air. However, this was the least of its worries as another arrow struck home, this time penetrating its abs. After that was another shield bash, the Zelt susceptible to the force this time as it crashed into the ground. Now smouldering with anger, the tier-two Zelt roared as it lifted itself up. That was until Stanis kneed its back, sending it sprawling back to the ground. Another arrow pierced its skin, not that the Zelt cared anymore as it was now blinded by rage. That was until it felt a soft Human hand on its scalp. The sensation it felt made it scared, scared for its life... No longer was it in angry as an awful fear overcome it, the Zelt instantly going into a panicked frenzy as it tried its utmost to knock the Human hand off its head within the split-second it had. But it was too late… <Destructive mana recharge> It was like the world itself froze, not a single combatant in the cavern letting out a peep as they saw the tier-two Zelt collapse, its face clouded by blood. Only Travis could see the worst of it because not only had the beast's head instantly greyed but it had also cracked in several places. The remaining two tier-one Zelts immediately turned tail, sprinting for their lives as they ran through the large tunnel. *thump* "graaGHH" *thump* The two tier-ones came flying back out, landing on their arses as they looked towards the tunnel with greater fear than the looks they had given Stanis. Out of it came a flying bolt, one that moved so fast that Stanis didn't even have any chance as it struck him, throwing him off his feet… Out of the tunnel came two more Zelts, both tier-two. One was as large and fierce as the one Stanis had just killed whereas the other was about Tanya's height and held a stone stave in its hand. "RETTTREEATTT" roared Tanya, the bloody Humans instantly dashing back towards the tunnel. The two tier-twos didn't make chase, instead they watched as the Humans flocked out. The only one left behind was Stanis, who lay unconscious, his breath raspy as the two monsters calmly approached him…

A whole week had passed: not that Stanis would know though, or even care if he did. His body was nothing but a plaything for these cruel monsters and their sadistic desires. His body was riddled with wounds, some light and healing such as his stabbed thigh from two days ago. Others were not so light, such as his whipped back, showing a battlefield of scars which hid underneath it fractured bones. His esteemed torturer/ godly guard had decided a few days back that Stanis recoiled too much at the sound of the whip cracking the air, and had thus had fastened his hands into manacles which were tightly attached to the mudstone. This meant that his body was constantly leaning forwards, up and ready to receive a beating. Stanis had cried at first, but then his eye ducts had become too raw and now he was just too exhausted to cry. He still recoiled as the blades nipped at him and as the whip tore his skin, but no more than that as he no longer cared. Sleep was nothing but a foreign aspect now, he was busy being beaten in the day by the tier-one and having his body sliced open in the night by the tier-two. If he was just a little bit more conscious, he would have realised that the tier-two had rarely come in the last few days. But he wasn't conscious and thus didn't realise this. Instead he was sleep-deprived, in agony and had no desire but to die… **** Today was the day, the day where they would hand the destroyed Village on a silver platter to their higher-ups. The higher-ups were scheduled to come tomorrow since that was that day that the rules allowed Invader species' tier-threes to invade. The tier-two Zelt mage, Ryr, rubbed its hands together, its slim claws creating resonating sounds as they clashed. It was excited and it knew it, as was every other Zelt. The Sun had just set, meaning that the Moon would be out in its full glory in a few hours: the best time to strike. It pointed around at the other tier-twos in turn. "Rak, you hold the base. I'm leaving you with a few of the men. Spread them around our base and don't let a single thing in. You hear me?" "Yesss Masster" replied Rak, who was one of the agility-based tier-twos. "Kal, you lead half the force down the Mountain. They will spot you from afar anyway so make as much noise as possible and intimidate the Humans." "Yargh" responded Kal, his voice thick and hoarse as he was one of the massive, strength-based tier-twos. "Zak and Nal, you two will be coming with me. We go down the tunnels and wait till they turn their backs to us to strike." Zak, the second agility based tier-two, and Nal, the second strength based tier-two, responded accordingly. "Goood. Let's go." The higher-ups had provided more of the lower tier Zelts as cannon fodder but no more tier-twos. Nevertheless, they already had more enough to wipe out the Human Village. The three tier-twos ran down the tunnels which went deep into the Mountain. The long-winding tunnels took a few hours to traverse and even longer to build, in fact their construction had been in play before the Humans had even raided the Zelt Camp. Ryr reminisced about the moments he had spent with Human as he thought of their species. His cheeks slightly reddened as he realised he hadn't even asked the Human his name, although he quickly flicked that thought away as tomorrow the higher-ups would decide how to deal with a dark-spawn with high ties like that Human had. He grinned as he thought of how well he had trained that Human, one would think he was born to be a plaything from the way he now took beatings. The hours quickly passed as all was set into motion, Kal loudly marching his troops down the Mountain as the other three waited behind Human lines. It was about to get very fun, very fast! **** Tanya checked her quiver once more as she hardened her heart. She, by no standard, enjoyed the transformation the world had made but she would be lying to say that it had been particularly hard on her. She had done gymnastics and archery for several years, and thus adapting to combat had been easy. And that was all this world was about: fighting, fighting and some more fighting. Using the bow, she had very quickly risen up the ranks of the Camp and had become a Classer the second they had upgraded the Camp to a Village. Now there were 13 or so Classers, but being one of the first showed off your skills. The classes you could get was determined by your battle-ability and method, and the first few Classers outranked the latest ones by far in those fields. This was even more apparent as the Classer Hall would explode out with a pillar of light if the new Classer was strong enough, whereas it would stay dim for the weaker ones, as it had for the latest Classers… But just because she was strong didn't mean she enjoyed the fighting. This was even more the case when she didn't know who would survive today, in factwould she even survive today? By the racket the Zelts were making as the marched down the Mountain, it was obvious they were beyond confident. And then the sense of danger hit her, a strong sense of danger. Tanya became confused as she looked around her, no enemies to be seen. But the tug at her heart still remained, a tug she trusted as it was one of her Class's skills: Scout's Heart. It would tell her when something dangerous was going to happen, and it was pulling her heart like there was no tomorrow right now. Tanya began pacing around the Village, on the lookout for what her skill told her. She thought of Stanis, who had been similarly aged. It was true, they had gotten off to a bad start as Stanis had reeked of suspicion, even her Scout's Heart had told her so. But he had become alright, perhaps even better than alright as she had fought with him in the tunnels. He was strong, strong enough to kill a tier-one solo without a Class, and had various utility skills which she couldn't have been more thankful for. It was why she wished he hadn't died in that raid, otherwise he could have just used his Scouting skill andpazzum, she would have figured out why her Heart was going off so much. After doing a round of the Village, Tanya grew more confused as she still hadn't found the source of danger. Thus she sat down, doing nothing but listening as she grew sensitive to sound. "gr" *thud* She could hear sounds in the distance. She followed the direction and looked: it was just plains. She looked up: nothing. So there could only be one place, and only one enemy she knew of who could do that… Tanya began sprinting towards the centre where Alyona stood. The tanned woman looked at her with concern, despite the clear exhaustion on Alyona's own face. "Alyona, shut up!". Alyona stopped voicing her concerns as she allowed Tanya to carry on, "The Zelts, they're all around us." At this, Alyona peered around at her surroundings before smiling back at Tanya, only to be followed by a face of shock and horror. "ALL WARRIORS TO ME THIS INSTANT!" her voice rumbled out, now no longer weary but rich and powerful. "THE ZELTS HAVE DUG AROUND US. PREPARE YOUR GUARDS INSTANTLY." Following this, Alyona reformed the formation to the best she could in the sparing minutes she had, the Village now defended on all sides. Her face, though, grew grimmer as she realised how many enemies they now actually had to take… The following minutes were chaotic as tension rose exponentially, each of the warriors' hearts pumping hard as all of them realised how dangerous this battle was going to be. It was worse still when the Zelts themselves broke out of the tunnels, emerging to the ground floor like Ants out of a nest. Ryr didn't bother hiding his surprise as he saw the active formations set against them, but that was followed by a cackle of laughter as he maniacally bared his teeth, gnashing them as the whole army of Zelts began their war-cries. Their intimidation had the intended effect as each of the Human's eyes now looked scared: scared for their lives just as they should be! The posturing came to an end as the Zelts began charging at the Village, faster than speeds Humans could achieve as they ran on all fours, bloodlust growing. The results from clash were mixed, some of them being won by Humans while others were won by the Zelts. Either way, the battle very quickly progressed into a sandbox where the aim was for the strongest to kill as many weaklings as they could. But weaklings on both sides began to run out as only the strong were left, leading to even more brutal battles than before. Tanya and Ji-Yeon, one of the other initial Classers, were faced up against Nal, one of the strength-type tier-twos. Ji-Yeon was a knight and thus had heavier armour than most others in the Village, but not yet metallic as the System had supplied any yet. She had a long scar down her face and flowing black hair, but all this detail seemed irrelevant as she fought with fervour, Tanya backing her up with Piercing arrows. This fight was at a stalemate as neither side could push their advantage against the other, but not all the highest fights were like this. David, the 6'1 chubby white man from Stanis's final trial, found himself against Zak, the only agility type tier-two here. Zak very quickly found himself overwhelmed as David moved with speeds that should be impossible, his hands free of weapons but still doing more damage than if he was armed. Each punch, uppercut and smash was filled with so much power that Zak was actively sweating as he leapt around like a lizard, fully knowing it was game over if this man-giant hit him. Orena swept across the battlefield like the phantom she was, each spear swipe beheading countless monsters. Her case became so serious that Kal, the other strength type tier-two, had to actively chase her down and stop her. The main advantage the Zelts had over other races was their defence, even the Zelts who focused on speed and agility had great defence, needless to say about the ones who focused on their strength. And yet it didn't seem that impressive anymore as Kal's whole hide was littered with cuts, some light like they should be but others unnaturally deep, the wounds gaping open. As if it needed to be any worse for him, Kal quickly figured out that this woman in front of him was merely playing around, her spear moving fluidly as she fought him calmly. This further enraged him but to avail on his part as she continued tearing him down. The last initial Classer, Caleb, had one very specific enemy in mind. He haunted wherever he walked, committing greater carnage than even Orena caused. He knew who he wanted to kill the second he saw Ryr, shouting pleasantries as he blew up Humans to smithereens. This caused Caleb to move with haste, a spear flying out of nowhere forcing Ryr to stop his next spell. He squinted his eyes as he looked at this 6'2 African-American who had tattoos ranging down his bulging muscles. Ryr quickly found himself on the suppressed end as the strongest Classer raged at him furiously, Ryr laughing with madness as he dodged sword strike after strike. One might think from the highest fights that the Humans were dominating this battle, but that couldn't be further from the truth. Instead the Humans were the losing side as the countless lower Zelts assaulted them, more of them hiding behind every monster body you cut down. This led to the Humans contracting their circle of defence as they fell back, only the strongest Classers daring to go outside this tight, partially-secure space. And even the Classers began to have a hard time as more and more Zelts threw themselves at them, the fight between them and the tier-twos quickly devolving into fights between them and the whole Zelt population. This fight was destined to be long and arduous from the start, and both sides quickly realised that even victory wouldn't be very pretty…

The big, burning ball of gas peeked over the horizon, taking a long look at the landscape. In the Camp was a band of Humans, all awake and equipped with their weapons. Some were standing vigilant and ready, while others opted to lie on the ground or sit around the crates. There was even a small group of people playing simple games… All of them were quite relaxed, they had catastrophic results last time but they were no longer the same people as they were last week. Now they actually understood the world they were in, and spending the majority of the week hunting Goblins and Wolves in the Forest had caused their confidence to sky-rocket. Encompassing the Camp were simple defences, all of which had limited effectiveness but also took little time to put up. This ranged from short pitfalls to wooden poles sharpened into stakes. There was even a pseudo-barrier made out of said stakes in between the Camp and the Forest. In total, there were 25 people currently in the Camp: that number was 4 less than after last battle. The people here had decided to kill off the two severely injured, and another person had died in the Forest during the week. Stanis had also run away from the Camp yesterday. Jayesh stood near a small group of large, burly men like him. These were the people he had gotten close to, and hunted with during the week. When he had seen that Stanis was no longer in the Injured tent, he had asked around. The response he had gotten was that Stanis had disappeared towards the Sea yesterday. While Jayesh doubted the boy would commit suicide, it was still very much of an option considering the world they were currently in. Nevertheless, Jayesh now had little time to worry about Stanis. All his strength and energy was now being focused on trying to survive! The strong ones in this Camp were definitely the Dead 4, which was Orena, Anatoly, Fedro, and Chen, now also Juan. This was due to their personal skill, and also because of the loot they had gathered. In terms of ranking within themselves, Anatoly was without a doubt the strongest. The pale, muscular, Caucasian man was without rival here, as his skill with the sword was just too high. Following him would be Orena, the frightening African lady. She was not only powerful but also extremely fierce. In fact, her skill, Dominance, was without a doubt the most disturbing here. In truth, her strength was only shy of Anatoly's. After her would be Fedro and Chen, who were both equally matched. Unlike the two above them, these two were actually quite social and were able to create a light sense of comradery with some of the other men. This included Jayesh who saw both in a good light. And below all four of them was Juan, who had basically cheated his way to power. He had used the loot from the last battle, and Stanis's skill to place him with the other four. People hadn't really regarded him as one of the stronger ones until they had seen him fight in the forest. His use of Frozen boundary to break the flow of an enemy was powerful, and also a skill that now many wished they had gotten. It was at this time a piercing howl broke the silence, causing action to explode within the Camp. People rushed to pick up their weapons and shields, while others began sprinted to their places. Juan had briefed the whole camp on a loose formation he had thought up, where the larger men with high Constitution and equipped with tower shields would stand at the front of the group. Behind them was where the smaller, normal men/women who were more skilled in dexterity and strength would go. There was currently no one in the camp who could use a bow or such, and so there was no one behind them. Finally, the powerhouses in the Camp would be near the edge of the formation, so they could instantly charge and cause havoc in the enemy lines after the initial clash. "AWWWWWOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO" "AWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO" "AAAAAAAWWWWWWWWWOOOOOOOOOO" Three more howls followed the first one, reinforcing the fact that a large company was coming. They began appearing out of the Forest, as Juan had predicted. Leading the enemies were 4 large Wolves alike the one Stanis had killed, followed by 50 smaller ones. In fact, it was meant to be 5 large Wolves, but Stanis had weakened their forces without even knowing. Finally following the sea of grey was a clump of green: about 20 Goblin Shamans. Unlike last time, the enemies didn't instantly charge due to the fact that they were better led by the large Wolves. Instead, they strolled out of the Forest and got halfway to the Camp before re-organising lines. It seemed the Wolves and Goblins were smart enough to understand that the Humans had no way of closing the distance between them without losing their advantage. A small group of Wolves, around 10, surrounded the Goblins who stayed there. The rest followed the 4 large Wolves as they began their mad stampede, a frightening charge for anyone on the receiving end. However, the Humans were far better prepared to receive this time than the first, as the large men tensed themselves, forcing their tower shields into the ground as they braced for impact... "AAAAWOOOOO" The first few Wolves ran into the shield-bearers, attempting to topple them over. The second wave just leapt over, allowing them to attack the backline. And then the Dead 4 acted, instantly causing ruin within the Wolf ranks as blade and magic tore them apart. Multiple skills lit up the battleground, whether it be Juan freezing Wolves within their steps or Orena causing Wolves to squirm in terror. This was going to be a short fight. **** About a mile from the Camp was Stanis. The waves were relatively quiet, and so he could hear the cacophony of sounds coming from the Camp. He had understood when he had first heard it that a week had already progressed, but hadn't moved a muscle after that realisation. Stanis sat on a large rock on the beach, debating whether he should go or not. On the one hand, he was weak, perhaps he was one of the stronger ones before, but now he was just a cripple with a single arm. It was by his training yesterday that he had understood how weak he actually now was, it was not an understatement to say that he is now close to how he had been when the first trials had first begun. While on the other hand, there was the chance that this would be the battle to wipe away Humanity from this corner of the world. In the end, Stanis decided that he would at least have a look at the battlefield, even if he couldn't contribute to the resistance. However, in contrast to his decision, his legs stay stuck to the ground, unwilling to take a single step forward. In his mind ran several images of the last catastrophe of a battle. His blurry memories within those delirious moments became ever so clear now, and they frightened him so very much. He was like a PTSD patient, the nightmare still ran deep within him. He felt as weak as a stick in a storm, almost like his body would fall at any moment as he found it hard to keep balance. His head burned with energy, while his body lay dead at the lack of. He would be courageous if he marched back to the Camp and offered his limited services to his own race. However, he wasn't courageous, instead he was a young man who was utterly terrified and sick of all the violence he was forced into. Time passed as Stanis lay shivering in the warm sun, and soon the cacophony in the distance died off. The last sounds Stanis had heard were loud, frantic howls. This made him hopeful that the Humans had won, but there was no certainty without seeing the result for himself. But Stanis no longer held the face to go back right after the life-threatening battle was over; he would be seen as the coward he truly was inside… In a bid to get all of this out of his mind, Stanis began walking across the beach. After walking for fleeting hours, he found himself no longer on the beach. In fact, the beach had died off quite a way back, and yet he had absent-mindedly kept walking across the rock surface. What he was on now was cold, dusky-coloured rock that had cracks throughout the whole surface, allowing for multiple rock pools. The rock itself seemed to absorb his body heat: it felt malevolent. Startled at where he was, Stanis was about to walk back to his old life when he saw an oddly-large crack within the cliff next to the dusk-coloured rock. It was far larger than the cave he had slept in, in fact this one truly had a cavernous mouth that seemed to eat all light as the inside was pure black. He had been scared of facing battle, but now he felt a weird sense of courage alongside a longing for the darkness, almost as if he was being commanded into the cave. He stared at the darkness inside for more than just a moment, before walking in. He didn't even wait for his eyes to adjust to the darkness as he felt a yearning for this cave. The cave was made of the same material the outside rock was, and Stanis could tell due to the same bone-chilling coldness it gave off. The darkness was wickedly alluring, but it also gave Stanis a confusing sense of serenity. His body felt relaxed here… After walking through the tunnel for hours without a working mind, Stanis's mind suddenly clicked as he saw glimpses of light at the end of the tunnel. This also brought him back to reality as he realised where he was: he was in pure darkness as a defenceless, vulnerable man in a vicious world… The fear became very much real as he became disillusioned about his surroundings, no longer was it alluring but more menacing. He felt trapped and terrified by the darkness that surrounded him and dared not pace back through the tunnel. Instead, he began sprinting towards the glimpse of light, daunted by the idea of it leaving him in this darkness. But the glimpse of light didn't leave him, instead it only got bigger as he got closer to the end of the tunnel. Stanis leapt out of the tunnel, and into the light. He bathed in the angelic light as he looked around him, the first thought coming to his mind being that this was no ordinary cave. The cavernous tunnel led to a colossal hall, one as large as the sky itself. The roof was decorated with many dark-purple stones that shone light on this world. The light Stanis had thought was angelic, was actually dark purple and alluring, not at all angelic. Around him, the hall seemed to stretch forever before it reached its own horizon in the far distance away from him. But none of this caught Stanis's attention, rather his eyes were solely focused on the temple in front of him. The temple towered over its surroundings, its crown reaching the sky of this hall. It was made of vibrant dusky stone, which had colour that ranged from dark orange to pure black. The temple itself had multiple, perfect, wide stairs that led to a Greek-style temple. Countless pillars held up a top layer, which seemed heavier than the world itself. The whole image was very scenic, or would have been if it was not for the two grey, animal statues which had torches of crimson blazing within. Around the two-deer like statues were stone barbs that sliced into the animals, causing ruby-red blood to continuously flow down from the statues… It was clear that this temple was for the malevolent; it was certain that this was no ordinary cave…

Jayesh and Stanis conversed with David and Caleb. The topic of the talk quickly steered to the trials they had been through, interestingly something that neither Caleb nor David seemed unfazed by. In fact, the two of them seemed quite chipper about it as they talked about the difficulties they had overcome. It was a topic everyone still alive at this stage could talk about, something that they could all connect to. Despite no one opening up or going into too much detail, both parties expressed good-will towards the other as they identified them as some of the few good left in a sea of bad. The trio of scumbags conspired in hushed whispers, arguing when they should act. At first, they had thought of acting now but had shortly realised that the message could come at any moment. It would be better to act after everyone had, hopefully, split up. However, minutes later, the message still showed no signs of appearing, nor any cues as to why, and so the three ran out of patience. At worst, the people here would stop them, but wouldn't kill them. Why? Because this was a team activity; each trial had only gotten harder, and facing a ten man trial with only seven would be indistinguishable from suicide. On the other hand, at bestthey could… Having agreed, one of the Indian men turned to Jayesh before almost walking towards him. He was quickly stopped by the other Indian man who said, "Forget it Romesh, he's surrounded by many others. He might be a brother, but he might not be one for our cause. Let's just do it instead." Romesh seemed won over as he stopped in his tracks, to the interest of Stanis and Caleb who saw this as Jayesh and David talked onwards. They were certain something was about to happen. The trio made their move as they walked closer to the injured Asian and European girl, alongside the wild looking African lady. It was as they were walking over that the Asian man pursed his lips, before letting loose a wolf whistle. This seemed to catch everyone's attention as all eyes turned to the group, now in the centre of attention and in terms of positioning. Apparently unfazed by the attention, Romesh let out some sincere words of adoration. "Hey baby, are you feeling a bit down? How about you let me make you feel good again?" If looks could kill, Romesh wouldn't have made any more steps forward. But looks couldn't, and Romesh did. "Look babe, you're patching her up all bad. I can teach you, alongside my good friends", said the other Indian man as he motioned to Romesh and the Asian. Both of them smiled sincerely, although the meaning was far more malevolent than suggested. The two girls were both frightened as they saw the trio advance, regardless of how cold the atmosphere had gotten. Jayesh was now shaking, his arms tense as he forced himself not to move. Stanis had already taken a step in front of him in order to stop him, although he didn't know how long the effect would last considering the trio had only gotten worse. It was to his luck, or bad luck that the message finally appeared. This is your final trial, the final wall between you and your home planet. You are set in two teams of ten, each around 1km away from the other. You have 2 hours to reduce the number from 20 to at least 10. Good luck! Number of participants now alive: 20 The Asian man took this opportunity to make his say. "Will you look at that, we are going to need everyone in tip-top condition if we are to win this. How about this: we help you, and you help us back? What do you say about that boys?" He said this as he turned around to look at the four remaining guys who were still standing back, although Jayesh only got further incensed as he saw his provocative look. Stanis too could feel anger bubbling inside of him. As for David and Caleb, both of them were standing back, waiting to see how everyone else would act… The trio were now within striking range as they made one more peaceful notion to convince the girls. The Indian guy, with a mocking tone in his voice, said: "Come on, why can't we just—" He was stopped in the midst of his sentence as Jayesh was already far too furious to let this slide. "FUCKING LAY OFF HER YOU BASTARD!" He then began charging at the three who were now frozen. Well kind of: they were frozen but it wasn't three… In fact, Jayesh had been a second too late to make his debut, after all the trio had forgotten that not only were the girls within striking range of them, they were also in the striking range of the girls. The African lady, within a split second, had moved one foot forward which was followed by her spear, which shot onwards like a striking snake. The blade at the end pierced through the Indian man's face, blood now dripping down his body. But that wasn't the end as the blade exited through the other end, before reversing its way out. It made a line of blood across the ground as it slid out, all of this happening within a single second. The trio didn't even have time to think, nevertheless react. It was then that the remaining duo finally took in what had happened, as their hands shot to their weapons before striking them out. <Activate Titan's Taunt> A moment later, the two felt intense, burning desire to attack the thing behind them as they rotated their bodies. What met them wasn't a human, rather a towering, grey Giant who smashed his spiky club into Romesh's face. It went beyond disfigured as bones cracked, the man collapsing to the ground only to lie in agony as he awaited death. Funnily enough, the African woman hadn't shown any sign of emotion so far, not even as she had pierced a head. But now her lips curled menacingly,before she let out a single word. "Interesting", her voice was rough and sharp, exactly like her image but in direct contrast with a typical woman's. She then leapt in front of the Asian man, now only a breath away. <Activate Dominance> It would be too far of an understatement to say that the man broke out into fear. Instead, it was more accurate to say that, despite the burning desire he still felt to attack Jayesh, his mind still overruled that in terms of priority as he fell down to his knees in shivers, breaking down into tears and snot within moments as he began pathetically begging towards the African lady. It was fair to say that everyone here had seen their fair share of violence and gore after passing the trials, but not a single one of them had ever faced anything as intrinsically alarming as this as they saw the man earnestly lick the ground, as he continued bawling out requests of mercy. It showed quite clearly how the woman had been fighting all this time… Instead of being disturbed like the rest of them, the African woman merely let out a tinkle of laughter, before violently slamming her foot into his face. She then followed it up with an overhead stab downwards, onto the now-helpless man. Even Jayesh, who had been previously enraged, could feel his skin trembling and a weakness in his knees as the lady's ability affected him. His anger had completely dissipated after he saw the cruel demonstration in front of him; it was fair to say that he was now more scared than angry as his eyes were locked onto the African lady. It wasn't an exaggeration to say that a dropped pin would be as loud as thunder in this moment, as no one moved or talked, almost as if people had forgotten how to. It was as people came back to their senses that they began to hear the messages. Number of participants now alive: 19 Number of participants now alive: 18 Number of participants now alive: 17 The African lady then tilted her head up, before locking eyes against Jayesh's. She met him with deadly, provocative eyes, although was to be disappointed as Jayesh refused the challenge. Dispirited, she raised her spear before flicking the blood of the spearhead in an arc. She then calmly walked back to where she had been standing, careless of the multiple gazes directed at her with mixed emotions. It felt like an eternity had passed as people finally released their breaths; such a monster was far too dangerous for them to be calm around. Within seconds, the centre of the circle had transformed: from a trio of men, to now a trio of bloody corpses with one grey-giant in the middle. His mana finally run out, Jayesh released his transformation before walking back away from the girls, towards Stanis and the others. There was a long awkward pause before David felt like he had enough as he stepped forward. "Alright guys, we are going to have to work together if we want to pass this trial. We can all go home after this, doesn't that sound nice?" He sported a jolly smile before continuing on. "Let me see to that wound, I can fix you up in a jiffy!" It was almost like the past was being repeated as all gazes were now on David, no one willing to believe he actually was doing this. David seemed to innocently notice his error as he dropped his weapon down next to him, before exaggeratingly motioning to the African lady that he had nothing in his hands. "Don't worry, I've got plenty of practice in healthcare. Besides I'd rather not be on the receiving end of that spear!" He forced out a joke as he moved closer to the girls. Caleb decided to join him, only to meet the African lady's inquisitive gaze as she noticed that he still held onto his weapon. Unlike the others, he stared at her straight on, before smiling and claiming, "Don't worry, we're a team." Stanis could swear that he saw the African lady half-smile at that… A few minutes later, David was done with some rough bandaging around the Asian girl's foot as he once again stood up. Seeing as he was the most agreeable person here, he decided to step up as the leader as he motioned everyone close. "We can't be a team without even knowing namesguys. How about we all introduce ourselves? I'll go first, I'm David, born and bred in the U.S.A". He then did his trademark-innocent smile, before motioning to Caleb. "Hey guys. I'm Caleb, from the U.S just like David." This carried onwards around the circle. "I'm Stanis. Nice to meet you all". "My name is Jayesh, a pleasure to make your acquaintance". The Asian girl shyly went next, "I'm Lucy, thanks for helping me", followed by the blonde girl "Hi, I'm Sarah”, and finally the star of the show, "I am Orena". It wasn't the greatest start, but certainly a step in the right direction as the mood went from beyond-chilly to bearable. David was all smiles as he then began walking deeper into the forest. "I think it's this way guys!" The rest followed, although with great caution at where they stepped, and more importantly, who was behind them. It was as they were walking that the messages came. Number of participants now alive: 16 One more step. Number of participants now alive: 15 Number of participants now alive: 14 A few more steps. Number of participants now alive: 13 Number of participants now alive: 12 Everyone paused as they waited for the messages to end. Number of participants now alive: 11 Number of participants now alive: 10 You have 10 more minutes remaining. If you are alive by the end of that, you have passed. Number of participants now alive: 9 They remained standing at the spot, happy at the notion of passing without doing much, but also far too paranoid to sit down and relax due in the company of strangers. There was also the fact that nearly all of the opposing team had killed themselves within a few seconds, further worsening the mood. There was only one minute remaining as the last message came. Number of participants now alive: 8 Nothing else occurred after that, as the final message all had been waiting for then appeared. Well done Humans, you have passed the final trial, and thus the tutorial. You will now be transported back to your home planet. We hope you had a great experience in our tutorial! Now a message from the host: "Well done Humans, at least those of you who have made it so far. I said you would return home, and that you will do. Just a note to say that your home will no longer be what you remember it being. Each team will be placed into random groups, and scattered over a small selection of Land. Your planet will now be more like the tutorial, just with a lot more freedom, although that comes at the cost of massively increased danger. The reason why we placed you in this, what some may call, a cruel trial is to weed out the weakest. Your planet will no longer be the same again, and I, as your sponsor, wholeheartedly hope that you will all survive on your planet having experienced the true reality of life. Good Luck!” Stanis once again felt a sting across his body, before finding himself back in the starting place, the area with no floor, no sky, no air, no nothing. But this time it wasn't just him, instead, it was also everyone else from the trial he had just passed. He finally got to see the only person from the opposing team. It was a white, tall and muscular male. His body was wide and his jawline sharp. The man had cold, grey eyes that evaluated everyone from his team with great scrutiny. Naturally as the sole survivor of his group, he had blood all over his clothes and skin. Although interestingly enough, he had no cuts or injuries on himself… And then Stanis lost consciousness. The next time he would be awake would be back on Earth, back on Land and most importantly back Home. Well, what was left of it anyway…

Time seemed to freeze as Stanis went through his options. He could admit to having an allegiance and then die. He could lie and feign ignorance, but his actions so far had already given him away. Or he could fight. The chance of survival if he chose to fight? Close to zero. However, that was already better than the other two options, both of which had zero chance of him surviving. Judging by the fact that Orena was only a few steps behind him, it meant he had small time to turn the tables. Unbeknownst to him, Anatoly had already read his thoughts, the small twitches and darting eyes were as easy for him to read as an open book. He could see the glint in Stanis's eyes, and yet he still stood tall and confident. Stanis opened his mouth, keeping his eye on Anatoly as he spoke. "Fuck you" The second the last syllable rolled out of his lips, his legs shot forward, propelling him towards Anatoly at shocking speeds. Anatoly watched the spear pierce through the air, before lightly nudging it to the side as it was milliseconds away from stabbing him. The spearhead whistled past Anatoly's waist, centimetres away from a fatal strike. Closely following the spear was Stanis, fuelled by the adrenaline. Anatoly placed one foot forward, before pivoting his hip to the side as he forced his other knee into the sky. Understanding that the trajectory of the knee would cause it to meet his groin, Stanis instinctively lifted his knees up in defence as he soared towards Anatoly. Despite being countered, Anatoly seemed not to care at all as his knee only continued to rise, effectively switching its target. *thump* Stanis felt a piercing pain erupt from his stomach, his mouth gasping for breath as his body recoiled from the attack. He collapsed onto the ground, breath raspy as he clutched his stomach. He then felt a force on the neck of his Cuirass, one that pulled him back to face-level with Anatoly. <Activate Layman's Rush> Stanis' mouth struggled out the words as he saw the incoming fist. His face was clobbered moments after mouthing the words. But it no longer mattered, he no longer felt pain or fatigue. He had no longer had any limits... Stanis's arm shot up like a snake, striking whatever was holding him up. It turned out to be Anatoly's other hand, which felt a burning sting as a fang-like hand bit into it. In shock, Anatoly stepped back as he tried to create some distance between them. However it wasn't to go his way any longer as he watched Stanis move faster than time itself, in one second falling to the ground, the next second up in his face. He felt an impact across his stomach, spittle spit-firing out of his mouth as he was flung backwards. However, contrary to his expectations, the now-flying man felt himself stop in mid-air. He had no time to think as another scalding fist upper-cut him, sending him into the sky once more. Before even having the chance to regain his bearings, the now semi-conscious man saw a leg axing towards him. The leg whipped him back down to Earth, sending his brain into overdrive as the countless sources of pain overwhelmed it. Stanis was about to whip out his sword when he felt a force across his feet, only to be off the ground within the next second. He may be immune to pain during Layman's Rush, but he sure as hell wasn't immune to being tripped up as he fell face first into the ground. He was about to get back up, only to be stopped by a large pole against his back which forced him down. Before he even got the chance to react, he felt an overwhelming pain spread through his body. The time was over; he was fucked! The pain wasn't as unbearable as after previous uses, but it still caused him to be devoid of energy as he lay there, now at the mercy of his assailants. He then heard a female voice, albeit hoarse, behind him. "He just asked you a question Stanis. No need to kill him…" Was it not for the pain he was now writhing in, Stanis would have surely countered Orena's statement by saying that they were clearly here to kill him. But fate would have it that he was in writhing pain, and so was instead forced to listen, finding nothing but sand within his mouth. In a distance, he could hear a voice shouting towards them. "Oh shit. What have you guys done ‘ere?" The voice rumbled as it spoke, sending echoes into Stanis's ear. To his surprise, it was knocked-out Anatoly who actually answered. "Just asking him, ha-ha. Didn't know I would get such an adverse response." Stanis was finally released from his pathetic pose as the pole left his back, allowing him to get back up. However, before he even managed to stand, he felt another arm grip him by the shoulders, only to help him up. It was as he came to eye-level that he got a chance to observe all the people currently here: there was Anatoly, who was actually the one who had just helped him up, Orena, who he was sure was the one that had initially tripped him over and then kept him down by forcing the butt of her spear on his back, and the Ginger man that had migrated to the Camp recently, who was also the one that had gone berserk during the battle. These were only quick, glancing thoughts as a fist streaked through Stanis's vision, before twisting into his face, sending him sprawling to the ground once more. Before he lost consciousness, the last thing he heard was the Ginger man saying, "Not again!" to which he heard Anatoly respond "I always pay back my debts". He was sure the conversation kept going, only he no longer had the chance to hear anymore as the darkness quickly cradled him in open arms. Minutes, or maybe hours later, Stanis slowly opened his eyes. His breathing was rapid and raspy, and his body was burning up as his mind shot straight into fight or flight mode. His body lay on the side of his cave, and to his front stood the three from before. They all motioned their heads towards him as they heard him wake-up. Anatoly was the first to speak, "So, will you now tell us whether you have another allegiance or not?" His pale face had a red fist-shaped mark on it. Stanis edged his hands towards his waist as he tried to get a hold of his sword, only to realise that his weapons had been confiscated… His head then tilted up, only to see his weapons lying behind the three in front of him. Now fully accepting option 3 had failed, Stanis decided to go with the honest, straight-forward one, hoping that this one wouldn't result in him being smashed across the face. Or worse… "Yeah" He swore he could see a smile blossom across Orena's face, whereas Anatoly broke out into a manic chuckle. Stanis flinched his body as he prepared to be struck, only to realise that the three stood their ground. Understanding that he wasn't to be immediately murdered, Stanis got a good look at the three in front of him. Orena was as he remembered her, braided hair in a half-ponytail, scars across her body and the signature blood war-paint painted across her face. Anatoly had the normal Caucasian characteristics: a strong jawline, a slim nose and piercing, grey eyes. His body was strong and athletic, akin to those of professional athletes. The Ginger man, who he still didn't know the name off, was even larger than Anatoly who was already quite tall. He stood at around 6'4 and had a true bear-like figure with wide arms, wide legs and an even wider chest. He had a large, red beard and brown eyes. He also had long ginger strands across his head which were shaggy, akin to Jayesh's old hairstyle. Knowing that this very well could be the last scene of his life, Stanis felt an awful chill spread through his body. He felt cold, he was shivering, and he squeezed his body down as his mind went chaotic. It was a completely different feeling to fighting, those too could be the very last moments of his life, and yet he felt so alive with the adrenaline coursing through his veins, each blow revealing new risks. Here he had no power whatsoever, his life was truly under their control. Before his mind got the chance to further think over the situation, Anatoly finally broke the silence. "Here's the thing Stanis, let me tell you something you should already know by now. The strong RULE this world. You got that?" It was like the man had become another person, no longer was he casual and relaxed, instead his eyes were filled with fire and his body larger than ever as his very personality seemed to shift. Stanis weakly nodded, his willpower taking more blows every second he was trapped by these 3 lions. "Good. Now tell me, are you strong?" The whole conversation seemed to be made up on the spot as even the two around Anatoly raised their eyebrows, interested to see how Stanis would respond. The first thing that came to Stanis's mind was straight denial, he had thought himself one of the stronger ones, before being beaten down within seconds. However as he was about to say it, the words became stuck in his throat as he saw the intensity of Anatoly's gaze. Stanis very much felt that his response would determine his life from now on. He took one deep gulp, before finding the strength to look back up, and answer. "Yes. Yes I am" "Ha-ha, damn right you're strong, within the Humans anyway… But do you honestly think you are strong in the wider aspect? Stanis had no chance to answer as Anatoly carried on, his hand-motions now wide and dynamic. "FUCK NO. WE ARE ALL FUCKING WEAK! Have you not seen the enemies getting stronger every day, which only forces us to push ourselves even further. And yet we are still only barely able to contest them. " I. AM.SICK.OF.THIS." The pale man's face was now red, and you could see the veins bulging out of his arms. "You might now think that the new-world is unfair, we are naturally destined to be at the bottom. To which I tell you the world couldn't be any fairer right now. So tell me, why we are not thriving then?" Now fully submissive, Stanis instantly shook his head. In response, Anatoly threw his head back, before roaring out in laughter. In contrast to their previously amused expressions, Orena and the Ginger man now stood seriously by him. "Has your Contractor not told you anything?" Gahlnym was his contractor, but Stanis was confused as to what Anatoly meant. In addition to this, he was now also feeling scared. "Think about it like this, the enemies coming down are all monsters who have been living in a dog eat dog world their entire lives. They will all have mountains of corpses underneath their feet, the base requirement for them to have survived this long. This couldn't be any more different from us. So where are we lacking? Let me tell you where: it's due to the fact that we are still soft in thoughts. The fucking retard currently leading the Camp, Juan, is a weakling, who is a bitch on top of that. He is just as weak as the others in the Camp. Now, this doesn't mean that they don't have their uses though. Anatoly's grin grew wider as he spoke. And by no stretch was it a pleasant smile. "Tomorrow we will attack the Goblin's camp. That's the perfect time to utilise their usefulness to its max. Only we will leave the Camp alive. After that, there is a larger settlement East of here which we can go to. Chen has already died despite being one of the Dead 4, all because he had far too many weaklings surrounding him during the battle. And so the only ones leaving tomorrow's battle alive will be me, Orena, Fedro, you, Ailean and his two. The reason why you will be coming with us? Simple, you are one of the stronger ones." Now done with his speech, Anatoly walked up to the shivering Stanis, before lightly slapping him across the face. "Sleep well mate, you have a long day tomorrow!" Following that, he, Orena and Ailean walked off, back towards the Camp. Stanis sat there, still shivering despite the warm breeze. Tomorrow was going to be eventful, to say the least.

The first lifeform walked towards the second. "It's now official, the allegiance between the races is now broken." said the first lifeform heavy heartedly. Silence followed her words. The second lifeform stood with eyes closed, deep in thought. "It was obvious from the start that they were merely baiting us out of the control we held." Said the second lifeform, voice thick with apathy. He had known this from the start when he had first heard of their allegiance. "But," he continued "at least now we have a bit more space to move around in. Is there any news of any conflicts yet?" "Not yet, but I doubt they're far off." "What about villages? Any of them set up so far?" asked the second lifeform. "Luckily so. Currently 30 villages have been set up, but it has only been a single day since the mission was unlocked by the wide population so we can expect far more." Answered the first lifeform, a hint of joy hidden deep in between the layers of worry in her voice. But the hint of joy didn’t last long as the second lifeform revealed his worry, “I don’t worry about the villages. But I do worry about tier twos… Depending on what race the tier two is, they could sweep through whole Camps…” Both of the lifeforms felt suffocated, all the advantages they had were now gone except from one, which meant that they couldn’t provide extra help to the Humans. But it wasn't all gloom as the last advantage they held was also the most important one, the one that meant that Humans couldn't lose their allegiance to the Hu no matter what. The first Hu then began fiddling around on her device, sending reports to the headquarters as well as searching through the functions they had left. Despite having given up the control powers, they still had the base functions. These were simple functions without great power. However, it wasn't as if they couldn't become powerful though. Any of the races using these functions at the right moment could easily turn the tables…       Jayesh's feet thundered through the forest, around him three others. For this full-scale raid, the group of 23 had been split into rough groups of 4, each group balanced instead of being specialised. Around Jayesh right now were two other guys, both with balanced builds. The last member of their group was a dainty looking girl who specialised in dexterity. She had a short sword the length of her forearm but no shield, which went to show how much she trusted her dexterity. Jayesh himself was equipped with a slightly larger than forearm length club with metal spikes at its head and a tower shield that he was virtually dragging along as he struggled to keep up with the other. His high constitution meant a high stamina as well, but he couldn't contest the speed of the others. In the distance, he could hear screams and roars. He then heard a blaring blow-horn deep within the Forest; it was now certain that the Goblins knew off their raid. Not too long from that, he began seeing bobbing green heads in the distance. Following the multiple Goblins were several Wolfs… Having learnt their lesson from the last battle, the Humans no longer desired to stay still as they instead charged. Jayesh pushed himself to take the lead, while the others followed him, all ferociously roaring as they engaged their enemies. "ARRGHHH" Jayesh ran forwards while lifting his tower shield up, and just in time as he felt a shock run through half his body, a Wolf having leapt onto his shield. He managed to lift his shield despite the Wolf on it, before whacking his club across its skull. He wasn't sure whether the Wolf had died, but nor did he have the time to check as another Wolf leapt at him. The battle around him was just as intense as one of the guys barely skirted a set of snapping jaws, before rolling past another. There were about 8 Wolves in total who clashed with this group. Following them were 12 Goblins… It was certain that things were about to get bloody! Having dodged three claw strikes in a row, the girl attacked in response as she danced with her sword. No longer was she dainty as she kicked and roared as she fought, spittle flying out, closely followed by blood. The Wolves were having a hard time as they found it hard to hurt these Humans who were already well battle-hardened, but that was another matter as the Goblins finally arrived at the scene. No longer was it a 4vs6 but rather a 4vs18. Seeing the large influx of enemies, Jayesh whacked the Wolf he was fighting towards the side, before charging into the midst of the Goblins. "TITAN'S TAUNT", he screamed out his skill, allowing his teammates to fully utilise the taunt. About nine of the enemies instantly rushed Jayesh, unable to control themselves as their bodies felt an intense urge towards the barbaric Silver giant. His teammates quickly used this to their advantage as they rushed past their combatants, before massacring the taunted enemies. It was as easy as cutting through butter as cold blades rapidly shed burning blood. Within moments of his skill use, Jayesh found himself bloody but not injured. Around him lay several corpses, quite a few downed by his own club. In thedistance he could see the girl chasing the last enemy, a Goblin who was smart enough to understand the odds of this fight and thus turn tail. Despite their win, the 4 then began trudging deeper into the Forest. The reason why only Jayesh and the girl had used their skills was all because of the number of enemies they would be facing; it was fair to say that they had hundreds of enemies to first pass before even reaching the Goblin Camp. This had been the reason why the previous raids had failed, purely due to the number of enemies that began popping out. Within minutes of fighting the first set of monsters, Jayesh's group found themselves against 30 more enemies. Each of them, now sticky with blood, raised their weapons once more before charging the Goblins. It was going to be a long day…     Quite a far distance away from Jayesh was Stanis, who was completely covered in darkness. He was quite a spectral sight as he ran through the sun-lit Forest, one second invisible within the shadow of a tree, the next visible as he dashed through the light. After the raid had started, the Camp had been split into groups before marching into the Forest. Stanis had easily slipped away from his group, much to their dismay. He could hear countless shrieks and screams and howls and cries within the distance, all of which added to the atmosphere as Stanis moved with greater speed and vigilance. His face was cold as he traversed the Forest, using Scout and Sense during dangerous moments to evade collisions. It wasn't as if he couldn't fight the enemies, rather that he didn't want to be caught up in any large fights as he desired something far greater than just a bit of experience. And yet despite his mercy, fate still demanded him of blood as he occasionally found stray Goblins, such as the one that was in front of him right now. Well, perhaps it was wrong to call them strays and better as sentries as they stood regular distances from each other, monitoring their surroundings. Stanis didn't know what they were on the look for, but he doubted they would be pleased to see his appearance nevertheless. And so he acted fast every time he saw one of them, causing them shock as they saw a phantom sprinting towards them. However the Goblin Stanis was currently rushing towards was clearly an experienced one as its shock quickly dissipated, the Goblin swiftly executing a defensive stance with its short-sword. All of the Sentry Goblins were far stronger than the average Goblin, brawny rather than scrawny. They were at least at the level of the large-Wolf riders and were equipped with thick, leather body-armour as well as a short-sword and a knife. The one currently in front of Stanis was clearly a cut above the rest of the Sentries as it swiftly jumped over Stanis's first strike, before cutting his second strike down, causing the spearhead to stab into the ground. It then followed its advantage as it shot forwards with its sword, forcing Stanis to drop his spear and fall back. However, the Goblin wasn't just going to throw away its hard-earned lead as it increased its stride, causing it to be a metre away from Stanis within a second. It was as it was about to slice his head off that Stanis's arm came flying towards the sword. The Goblin sneered as it laughed at Stanis's foolishness, before swerving its blade around so that he would cut himself. Stanis, on the other hand, was grimacing as he gripped the blade with his left arm, before pulling the Sentry towards him. The Sentry, now fully off guard, fell right into Stanis's arms as he head-butted it, before whipping out his sword. A sword swipe and *thump* later, Stanis cast the darkness off his left arm as he looked at the damage. Across the palm was a bloody ridge, although not a deep one to his relief. The blood coming out of the wound was just as red as his red claws. It was as he was distracted by the pain that he felt a sweltering heat just around the corner, to which he lifted his head, only to see a fire-bolt metres away from him, shooting closer every second he stood there. Unlike last time, Stanis didn't have enough time to react and only managed to hastily roll under the raging flames. Even then his left arm was hit, the flame adding to the pain and burning his dark-orange skin bright. As he rushed to gulp down a health potion, he heard a manic cackle not far away. A few trees away from him was the tall, slim Goblin who had shot the fire-bolt at him during the last battle. It had a menacing smile plastered over its face, which only widened as it saw Stanis's pained expression. This wasn't going to be a fun fight…

Stanis paced through the tunnel, this specific one having a spiral structure as it went upwards. It would be a lie to say that his heart was blossoming hundreds of colourful flowers as he thought of finally leaving the Zelts' base. Rather, his face had a cold mask, his countenance dull: both of which relayed his inside emotions. It was hard, a hurdle to overcome every single step. His resistance to pain had gone up massively, but that didn't mean the pain was gone, rather just that he could deal with more of it. If he could have cried, he would have. Despite the torturing being over, the memories alone sunk his heart, his mind forever a shell of what it used to be. The darkness that surrounded him was the only company he had, his yellow-tinted skin now ghastly-white due to the lack of sunlight and the torture. His body was weary but he still walked. "RRRRRRAAAAAAAGGGRRRRRRHHHHH" A roar echoed through the tunnel, catching Stanis by surprise as his heart began beating faster. Rak had caught his scent. "I WILLE TEARR YOOU APARRRT", every word was emphasised as the second shriek caught up to Stanis. In fact, he swore he could even hear a gnashing of teeth, similar to how the blades cried out when they scraped against each other. This was like his first trial again, his body overflowing with fear as he abandoned his amble walk and broke out into a desperate run. He didn't want to see any of that species ever again. His pale arms were flailing about as his legs struggled, pushing through all the pain. And yet, despite how fast he was going, he had no chance at all of outpacing Rak. Rak was an agility-based tier-two. The difference between a monster and tier-one monster was that a tier-one had simple skills and command over normal monsters. However, the differences between a tier-one and tier-two were just too many to state. But all in all, tier-twos were, on the whole, as smart as humans and just as powerful. Stanis hadn't invested many of his points into Dexterity and thus was destined to be slower than a human who had only focused on it. The same concept applied to Rak. Soon enough, Stanis could hear the footsteps behind him. They started out as gentle as a light drizzle, but almost as if the skies themselves had burst, the light drizzle became as rapid as a torrent and as loud as thunder. Stanis could hear the raspy breaths behind him, the roaring so much louder, the growling of a real beast. But he could also the light at the end of the tunnel, this time the light not unnaturally bright but rather the gentle shine of dawn. He pushed himself further as he saw the hint of hope, unwilling to let this chance fly away. But this only caused his chaser to grow further enraged, his predator becoming a truly bloodthirsty monster. The last step: his feet but a metre away from the exit, the sun shining in all its glory just in front of him. But he also caught; the prey in the net. Rak had leapt a second back, his claws lacerating Stanis's ankles. Despite the rough pair of hands weighing him down, Stanis persisted onwards, using his hands as a leverage as he pushed himself out. The sunshine on his skin made half his worries die, the fear of never escaping the tunnels now gone. But turning around to look at his bloody wound brought back another handful of worries, his eyes wide with fear as he looked at ferocious Zelt in front of him. Rak opened his mouth wide, before lunging forwards, his eyes set deeply on Stanis's thighs. In fear and shock, Stanis kicked up with his maimed feet, the immediate danger gone as he struggled backwards into the sunlight. However, this was nothing but a fleeting sanctuary as Rak merely followed, once again lashing out. His hand violently slapped against Stanis, the sensation immediately bringing up memories of the countless times he was whipped and flailed in his mind. Stanis was crying as he was pushed down, his body losing all strength to fight as Rak clawed him once more, this time the target his arm. The sharp claws scraped off his leathery skin, the image in his mind instantly that off the slicer dissecting his left arm. Stanis began shrieking, his mind only all but gone as he uselessly struggled a bit more. The fear of death and pain, something he had embraced within hisweek of torture, were back to being the harrowing fears they once were, his mind desperately searching a path for life. He wouldn't live this fight: his mind knew this as the lessons were too deeply ingrained in his flesh but that didn't stop it trying as it searched for a way out. His lips mouthed the words, the words that had once thrown him into the pits, but now the only words that could get him out. It was as addicting as a drug, the feeling euphoric, and his body once again a dirty slate as he relapsed. "Layman's Rush" Rak whole-heartedly laughed as he attacked, this time his leg flickering past Stanis's eyes as it kicked him into the rough ground. But he didn't cry nor scream anymore: he no longer feared death, he no longer feared the pain and most importantly, he no longer feared the race in front of him. His flesh no longer remembered, only his furious mind left behind. Stanis's right arm shot out, holding Rak's leg which was just about to retreat. He pulled the Zelt onto the ground with previously impossible force, an ounce of fear birthing in Rak's heart as he watched the transformation. Just as Rak was diving into the ground, a left fist came out of nowhere, shooting his feet into the air as he now collapsed backwards. But Stanis wasn't done, this was his moment to enjoy, his moment to take out all the hatred that had been overshadowed by his fear. He leapt to the skies, his flailing foot kicking Rak in the groin, sending him higher into the sky. Only three seconds left. In one second, Rak came down, caught by a left arm before he hit the ground. Within the next second, a right arm came forward menacingly slow. Rak was only half-conscious at this point, his mind out of it from the sudden bursts of pain. But even in his dazed state, his eyes still popped out as he noticed the intense mana fluctuations around Stanis's hand. "Destructive mana recharge" And in the last second, the arm placed down on Rak's face as the lips mouthed the words. Within milliseconds, Rak's life was drawn away, his head to neck instantly greying to the colour of ash. And then the head cracked, akin to how the crystal teleporter had shattered, skull fragments exploding out as bone grains filled the air, the smell rancid. There was no blood… And as always, Stanis collapsed to the ground, his battle-high fully over. The after-effect had gotten better after he had buffed the skill, but during the previous times, he only had to go from a state of no pain and fatigue to a situation with a lot of pain and fatigue. This time, not only was the pain and fatigue incomparable to the previous times, there was also the added element of his broken mind, causing triple damage as it hit like a truck. A few minutes passed and Stanis lay motionless on the ground, drool leaking out of his mouth. He was tired, tired of life. And yet a little voice inside of him told him to carry on, eternally fearful of the rest of the Zelts who would follow. So, he lightly healed his worst injuries and began trekking up the mountain, somehow hopeful that the summit would be devoid of danger. He didn't bother with Rak's storage stone, just as he hadn't bothered for the guard's. Three full hours had passed as Stanis saw the peak in sight. His ankles had only been weakly healed and therefore had broken down half-way through, thus he had crawled the rest of the way. His right arm was now red, bruises abundant and cuts plentiful. His left arm was in a similar situation, although to a lesser extent. Stanis had given up hope an hour in but he had still kept going, a foolish drive to at least reach the top before collapsing. It was similar to how marathon runners carried on near the end, despite the intense pain and fatigue they had built up, simply on willpower. The sun was now at the peak of its arc, shining cheerfully for some while raging down onto Stanis, the heat at an unbearable level as his back had already burnt red. But he was almost there: just a bit more and he would be at the top where he could finally rest. The question of what would be up there never occurred to him, his mind blindly pushing his body. An hour later, he was finally there. His numb arms pushed him forwards one last time before he collapsed, his arms bleeding as he lay in the beating sun. There was nothing around him; the top of the mountain was not a spike but rather a large, flat field, one so barren that only the dry ground could be seen. But there were footsteps from behind him, followed by voices ever so rich in mana. "Ha-ha, I win. I told you he would make it all the way up here!" "Humph! I should have just killed him before he made it"… “Mmm. You always cheat like that…” “…” **** "Welcome Human," said a blue flame. … "Swear your allegiance to us right now, and be rewarded" it ended with, the tutorial space now silent as Gahlnym waited for an answer. Franz was kneeling down, his head in a bow as he wondered whether that was the cue for him to speak or whether there was more. Gahlnym guessed the Human felt conflicted about betraying his race, but only got one word in as Franz started talking alongside. "I'm so sorry, Lord" said Franz, harshly berating himself as he realised he might have just ruined his chance. "Carry on" responded Gahlnym, internally pleased with Franz's appropriate use of pronouns. "I would be eternally honoured to serve you, master; you and your race will not be disappointed by my servitude." A harrowing laugh followed. "It is good to see that you know your place, Human. Remember that although we might be above you, you are also above every other Human from this day forward, after all you are part of us now"…

Now in a sombre mood, Stanis walked over to Juan's tent with a slow gait and heavy steps. Not knowing when he should go in, he then stood outside the tent whilst eavesdropping the discussion ongoing inside, waiting for an appropriate moment to barge in. It seemed the ongoing discussion was about what Jayesh had told him: how the camp should be structured. Hearing countless speakers, and understanding that it was an open discussion, Stanis realised he wouldn't be interrupting anything, and so strode into the tent. Inside, it was dark, especially when in contrast with the outside, and so Stanis felt as blind as a bat in the darkness the second he walked in. Not wanting to make a show out of himself, he managed to push his body towards the edges of the tent, before then waiting for his eyes to adapt to the darkness. His motion seemed to be effective as no one came and asked him what he was doing, instead he was only given curious glances by a few when he had entered, before they eventually lost interest. Now that the sound wasn't so muffled by the tent cloth, Stanis could hear the discussion in clarity. There seemed to be two big talkers in it, both males and both seemingly vying for leadership. After a few seconds inside the darkness, Stanis could finally see the people around him. There seemed to be around 14 or more people in here, meaning around half the people in the camp were currently here. Another thing was that there were about two or three guys for every girl, although none of the girls here was the soft-spoken type. Now onto the two big-shots: one was a tall, and muscular man with a deep voice that Stanis had heard before, so Juan, and the other was a smaller, slimmer man who spoke in a language that Stanis could swear that he had heard before. It was after a few pensive moments that he realised that the language the man talked in was exactly the language his parents sometimes used speak in: Russian. Neither of the two wanted the other to have all the control, although the general consensus in the room seemed to be towards Juan instead of the Russian man, mainly due to his proactive thinking during the battle. The discussion went on for a few more minutes, around thirty in total after Stanis had entered, and ranged from what should be done with the rewards from the Storage Stones, to what kind of leadership the camp should have. All in all, it seemed that the Storage Stone's rewards would be going to theDead 4, apart from the skill's scroll. The reason why this conclusion was reached wasn't that the people here wanted to give up their rewards, rather because it was extremely difficult to split them up fairly. So the logical conclusion reached was to give them to the strongest, as they would once again most likely be doing the most work in the next fight. Of course, there was the issue of betrayal and back-stabbing, although no one out-rightly mentioned it as they wanted to keep the warm(ish) atmosphere. The next issue of leadership was decided by the majority for Juan to have loose control of the others, as most trusted his quick and decisive judgement. Having stayed up all night and now finished with the discussion, most people swiftly left the tent in order to go to sleep. Juan too was about to leave with a girl, who had been beside him from the start, when Stanis caught him by the arm. Understanding his intentions, Juan motioned him to come outside, and so the three of them walked about a minute away from the tent before talking. Now in clear light, Stanis could see Juan better. He was tanned, with curly black hair, and had a well-kept beard. His body was as Stanis had seen in the dark: muscular and wide, although what Stanis hadn't seen before was the slight limp Juan walked with. The girl beside him was a brunette Caucasian girl, who had no notable features other than her long, straight hair and her good looks. It was clear that she and Juan had a relationship, although that was a bit weird considering the fact it had only been a little more than a day since their normal lives had ended. "So what do you want to talk to me about?" asked Juan, with an inquisitive look in his eyes. Stanis could tell from his expression that they were currently not on the same page... "I heard you wanted people to scout out the area, something about the forest or such?" Juan's expression dropped ever so slightly, before instantly recovering. "Ahh. Considering the fact that you are so eager, I guess you have already slept. Go ahead and scout the forest, the Dead 4 are already doing so, and I'll send more people in a few days." He then closed the already-small distance between him and Stanis before he whispered into his ears, "If you find out anything especially interesting, do tell me in private, and I will definitely make it worth your time." He then patted Stanis across the back like a wise older man, before walking back to the tent with his hands around the girl's shoulder. On the other hand, Stanis stood dazed for a few moments before following them back to the camp. It seemed Juan was taking the challenges to his position quite seriously, perhaps too seriously considering how he had acted right now. A while later, Stanis decided to stop thinking about it, all the people here were on edge due to what they had been through yesterday. Juan's behaviour seemed nothing out of the ordinary when taken into context the atmosphere of the Camp.   Back at the Camp, Stanis went back to the provisions place to get a few more rations of food and water. He was planning to only be out a day or such but also wanted to be prepared just in case. He also went through the simple arsenal that the System had gifted them, through which he got himself a forearm length axe alongside an equally sized wooden shield. Both were a much better quality than what he had before, and so now there was only one last thing on his mind: his old clothes. They wouldn't provide much extra protection, especially against violent attacks, but the sentimental value held by his Malitsa coat was far too much for it to be just discarded. And so he searched around in the injured tent before he found his bloody coat alongside his jumper and Cuirass armour. He cut the Malitsa coat across its waist so it would allow better manoeuvrability, before wearing his Cuirass over it. He now had three layers on, one which had protection against the elements, and another which provided protection against injury, at least for the most part. Having gotten everything, Stanis cast his rucksack, containing his supplies, across his back before setting off towards the Forest. It was at the top as he looked back that he saw the surrounding area of the Camp in better detail: the Camp was right in the centre of 3 landscapes. Down North and South carried on plain, brown land with nothing that special to it. To the East of it was the Forest he was currently on the edge off, whereas to the West was a large body of water. From the constantly crashing waves, Stanis guessed that it was most likely the sea and not a smaller body, although he couldn't be certain. The oak-brown Forest had quite an enchanting spirit to it, especially when in comparison to the camp. Crunchy twigs and crackling leaves dominated the Forest floor, which coloured it with various shades of orange and brown. He could hear a few squirrels scurrying through all the mess, or at least he hoped they were squirrels. There were also various plants across the floor, whether it be the brightly coloured mushrooms, or dull-green, leafy plants with strong, aromatic smells. As for the middle layer of the Forest, it was exclusively brown trunks that reached to the sky. If one looked close enough, you would also notice the moss-veiled trails all across the trunks, although the brown of the bark still dominated the colour palette. And the crown layer at the top was a mixture of the blue sky and the large, bright green crowns of the tallest trees. Danger seemed to be non-existent in the idyllic Forest, although Stanis was already too battle-worn to actually believe that. Instead, he walked through the Forest with a slow gait, while keeping his body low in order to lower his surface area. He had considered grabbing leaves and twigs to cover himself with, however, he had eventually decided against this due to the sound they would make as he moved. Stanis's precautionary tactics came into effect about ten minutes after setting foot into the Forest, as Stanis heard rhythmic sounds in the distance, getting louder every step he made forward. Having a vague guess at what it was, Stanis decided to use a tree as cover as he leaned himself against it, whilst also crouching down. A few seconds later, the small whispers across the air had become clear footsteps. Accompanying the footsteps was a jolly whistle, albeit a rough one, which too was getting louder as Stanis waited in his position. From the footsteps, he could tell that it was only one enemy, as he could only ever hear two feet moving. How did he know it was an enemy without even looking? That was to do with the fact that he doubted any of the Dead 4, who were also currently scouting, would dare act so lackadaisical in enemy territory. And so the only animal he could think of that was bipedal and in the region were the Goblins that had attacked recently. It only made sense that they too had a camp close to the Human one, otherwise, why would the Goblins attack their camp when there was another Human one of a similar standard not too far off? Moments later, the Goblin finally came into sight. It was a small thing, barely above hip height compared to Stanis, but had a menacing dagger wrapped around its waist. Other than that, it was totally unarmed with neither weapons nor armour across its body. Still in its own world, the Goblin hadn't noticed Stanis as it kept walking past his line of sight. It was around ten metres away from Stanis, or a two-second sprint, when he decided to make a move. Knowing he was already in ideal conditions, Stanis didn't wait as he immediately sprinted forwards, cracking several twigs across the ground as he dashed towards the Goblin. The Goblin was beyond shocked as it saw a Human charge towards it, and fumbled at its waist to grab its dagger. However, it was met with a wooden shield to its face before it could, followed by several stabs across the now-felled Goblin's body. It had died without making too much noise, much to Stanis's joy. He then checked Status. Stanis Volkov Age: 18 years Mana capacity: 18 (regeneration is capacity/4 per hour) Level 7 (Progress to the next level is 76%) Strength: 17 [15] Dexterity: 17 [15] Constitution: 16[14] Intelligence: 12[11] Wisdom: 12[10] Tenacity: 16[14]. Skills: Layman's Rush His experience had gone up by 4% for just killing a single Goblin. Stanis was sure that specialised, stronger Goblins like the Shamans he had faced before, were worth far more experience than a simple, weakling scout. It made him wonder how much experience Anatoly had received last battle since he had torn through the Goblin Shamans like a hot knife through butter. Stanis then remembered how Lucas had thrown away Xiu's life in the first group trial in order to get extra experience, all in order to level up. It was clear for anyone living in this world right now how important levels were to survival, and thus Stanis was unwilling to let such a goldmine get away. He would kill a few more scouts, and only go back once he saw the danger rise to high. Plan set to mind, Stanis began creeping further into the Forest. It was unclear what he was currently on his way to? A goldmine of experience, or just an early death?

In front of you is a pack of six brown Wolves, led by a Goblin Shaman. Leave none standing to pass this trial. The Goblin Shaman is worth more experience than the Wolves. Stanis, Xiu, and Lucas stood in half-stupor as they took in the meaning behind the message. However, the Wolves were not going to let such an opportunity go, they didn't even need urging from the Goblin as all six of them began sprinting at the Humans. At the same time, Jayesh also began charging at them, roaring louder than all of the Wolves combined in an attempt to wake the others up. "ARRRGGGGHHH!" They clashed in the middle, Jayesh using his large, wooden shield to bash the faces of two Wolves at once. Simultaneously he used his menacing club to whack a leaping Wolf across its ribs. Having stopped three Wolves by himself, he gave the others enough time to prepare as they too engaged the remaining three. Lucas bolted forwards before swinging his sword across the Wolf's muzzle. The Wolf tilted its head in order to dodge but was only half successful as it was cut lightly anyway. It ignored the pain to leap at Lucas, who merely sidestepped to the left while using the face of his shield to whack the Wolf to the right. He then followed this up by leaning forward, before lightly slashing the Wolf's back. It wasn't an exaggeration to say that Lucas was talented at fighting. On his side was Stanis, who had reacted a bit slower, but had still managed to meet the Wolf's charge with one of his own. He too had used his shield to block the Wolf's open maws but was faced with less success than Lucas, since he had underestimated the force behind the charge. His forearm buckled inwards as the Wolf jumped onto his chest before pushing him over. However, Stanis had learnt from his experience with the Chimpanzee, and so he immediately leapt back to his feet, before re-engaging the Wolf. Xiu was the least confident at fighting and had decided to not charge at all. This turned out to be a mistake as the Wolf simply overpowered her during their clash, throwing her violently onto the floor. It then hopped onto the downed Xiu before attempting to bite her face off. In shock, Xiu bashed her small shield against its snout, before using her knife to stab it. This caused the Wolf to jump off in pain as Xiu got back up, tears now running down her dainty face. She was in shock and was thus struggling. The whole battle seemed quite even at the moment. That wouldn't be the case for much longer… The moment the Wolves had begun their charge, the Goblin Shaman had already begun chanting. And now its chant came to a close. "… rack wooshaw MAAAAR!" It banged its stave onto the ground as it screamed out the chant. Straight afterwards, it began its next chant. Jayesh, who had been managing against three Wolves all at once, suddenly found that two of the Wolves began darting at him faster, clashing him with far more power than before. Their increase in explosiveness was so high that when two of them charged him at once, despite using his shield to block them, the force behind their attack still forced the bulky man onto the ground. The last wolf came in for the kill as it leapt up, although it was blocked by a weak backhand club strike to its head. "ARRRGGHH" Jayesh roared once more before rising to his feet. He used his shield and club to force the two strengthened Wolves to his side. At the same time, he bellowed out to Lucas. "LUCAS. TAKE ONE OF THE WOLVES. I CAN'T HANDLE ALL THREE AT ONCE!" Lucas felt his spirits dampen as he heard this. He could talk the talk and also walk the walk. After all his fighting skill was most likely above Jayesh's. But it was another matter of actually doing it, of actually putting himself into the face of danger… Half-reluctantly, he used the edge of his shield to uppercut the Wolf he was still fighting. He then ran the short distance to reach the stray Wolf Jayesh wanted him to take. He slashed it in order to get its aggression, before running back to his first Wolf. Now both of them directed their anger and jaws towards him. It was during this time that Stanis aimed his axe, before propelling it through the air at his Wolf. Due to his lack of skill, the axe wouldn't cause any serious damage even if it did hit. However, the Wolf had no way of knowing this in the moment as it instead leapt to the side in order to dodge the axe. It was met with a large fist to the snout from Stanis, who had sprinted after throwing the axe. After being hit in its sensitive spot, it staggered disorientated. Not one to let such a chance escape, Stanis held his shield with both hands before smashing its edge onto the Wolf's head. This caused the Wolf to get stunned as it momentarily fell to the floor, unconscious. Stanis quickly grabbed his axe from the ground before chopping the head off the downed Wolf. He had won his fight! Looking around, he saw that Xiu was struggling the most, and was just about to run and help her when he heard Jayesh. "GO AND KILL THAT FUCKING GREEN SHIT. IT'S HEALING THE WOLVES!" Stanis looked over to the Wolves that Jayesh was fighting, not only were they more ferocious than the others, their bodies were also suspiciously flawless despite all this fighting. And so he began sprinting towards the Goblin Shaman. Lucas, who was barely dealing with two Wolves, suddenly remembered what the message had said. <The Goblin Shaman gives more experience than the Wolves> He didn't know how much more, but he was almost certain that only by levelling up could you thrive in this hell-hole. And so he pushed his abilities to the limit the second he saw a chance: smacking the shield against one of the Wolves before dodging the other, only to cut its neck while it was still in flight… "ARR ARRGGHH". His head hurt like hell but it was worth it. He could see Stanis running a few metres in front of him and the Goblin Shaman retreating on its squat legs. And so he began bolting towards it, despite his growing headache. It was no surprise that he outpaced Stanis, who was wearing four layers over his chest, by far. In fact, within five seconds he had already outrun Stanis and was just a few metres away from the Goblin. Stanis, knowing that he was no match for Lucas, turned around only to see the Wolf Lucas let go join the assault on Xiu. He began running back, just as Lucas reached the Goblin. The Goblin turned around, before using its stave to do an overhead strike. But it was too slow. Lucas merely dodged it before stabbing his sword into the Goblin's head, a clean strike. And so the Goblin fell, dead in a single attack. On the other side, Jayesh had already killed one Wolf and was nearly finished with the second one. Soon he knocked the second one off its legs, before smashing its brains out in a rage-filled strike. He was smouldering with fury. Stanis just reached the final two Wolves. One was incapable of moving very well as it lay on the floor, severely injured and bleeding to death. Stanis, like Jayesh, fumed inside when he saw Xiu's state. The other Wolf wasn't in for much luck as Stanis pelted it across the head, before smashing his axe down. It hurt his arm like hell, but it meant nothing as he raged onwards. Xiu was lying on the ground, writhing in agony as most of her internal organs lay open to the sky. The area around her was exclusively red. Her face had been clawed off, all you could hear were moans of suffering. Stanis walked forwards, before looking backwards. Jayesh caught him with a firm glare, before nodding. The axe sang as it shot downwards. A small, lonely head hit the ground. Stanis could feel himself trembling. This wasn't due to the fact that he had just executed a human, no, instead it was due to the source of her death. In fact, before he even got the chance to act, he could hear a furious roar behind him. He merely sat down next to headless body as he watched the scene; he trusted Jayesh would win. Jayesh shot towards Lucas, who was still dizzy due to his headache. It hadn't helped that the battlefield was filled with load roars and cries. Perhaps his loss in battle skill didn't mean much against the Goblin Shaman, but it sure meant a damn lot when facing a monster like Jayesh. "WHAT THE FUCK ARE YOU DOING JAYESH?!" He hoped Jayesh would listen to reason, but Jayesh deafened his ears as he clashed with Lucas. Lucas was skilled with the sword, that was for sure, but it meant little when a man mountain knocked the sword out of your hand with their shield. What followed was Jayesh pushing Lucas over before getting on top of him. Distraught and desperate, Lucas shrieked out to Stanis. "STANIS PLEASE HELP. THIS BASTARD'S FUCKING INSANE!" But Stanis just turned a blind eye as a flurry of punches pummelled Lucas's face. "ARRGGHH" "ARRGGGGGGGGGHHH" "ARGG---" "grrgggag" The screams quickly turned to gurgles as the punches continued. A short while later, Jayesh got back up, with blood dripping off his iron-fists. Stanis was sure he would do the same if he had the ability. He and Jayesh didn't know Xiu for long, nor did they know her very well. What they did know was that she was a genuine and sincere person who was trapped in this ordeal with them. A fellow human with similar feelings, just trying her best to survive. And she had been let down by a fellow human, who had left his own position just for greed. Just for a bit of extra fucking experience. It was a few minutes later that both Stanis and Jayesh calmed down. They then realised that both of their actions had been too rash… Well done, you have survived another trial. Since there are only two left, both of you will get double the experience and double the points from your level up. Level Up! Stanis Volkov Age: 18 years Level 5 (Progress to the next level is 42%) Unallocated Stat points: 4 Strength: 13 [13] Dexterity: 17 [12] Constitution: 14[13] Intelligence: 12[11] Wisdom: 12[9 ->10] Tenacity: 14[13] Stanis allocated all his points to strength. So far he hadn't much use for Wisdom or Intelligence. He genuinely hadn't been hurt much and so didn't need a very high Constitution. And his Tenacity and Dexterity were both enough for the time being. Strength increased from 13 to 17. As a reward for passing the level 5 mark, you are awarded a skill matching your battle style. You have passed trials and people you couldn't normally by bending under the pressure. You are awarded the skill "Layman's Rush". Layman's Rush - For a limited time, have all your abilities heightened to their maximum state, despite any fatigue/pain you may be in. Best used when in a serious situation to rapidly turn the tables. Effect time is currently: 5 seconds. Costs 6 mana to use and has 1 hour cooldown time. Having unlocked your first ability, you have unlocked mana. Your mana is equal to intelligence + ½ wisdom. Your current mana is 18.   Here is your status: Stanis Volkov Age: 18 years Mana capacity: 18 (regeneration is capacity/4 per hour) Level 5 (Progress to the next level is 42%) Unallocated Stat points: 0 Strength: 17 [13 ->14] Dexterity: 17 [12 ->13] Constitution: 14[13] Intelligence: 12[11] Wisdom: 12[9 ->10] Tenacity: 14[13]. Skills: Layman's Rush   You have only one more trial to complete before you can return to your planet. This trial will be the hardest so far, and thus you have two hours to prepare in. Good luck!

It was soft and warm: absolutely lovely. He felt like he was in Heaven, perhaps he was… His memories caught up with him as he could see himself crawling up the mountain for hours, with no goal but to reach the top, which he found was completely barren when he got there… A large part of him was happy, finally at comfort now he was dead. There was also a small part of him, a very small part, which cried at his loss of life, but Stanis didn't even recognise this part until he realised it was him before raiding the Zelts. That must mean the larger part, the part with stronger emotions and sharper memories must be him after the raid when he was locked up. So who was he right now? His emotions were turbulent; the large part dominating the scene but still failing to kill off the little part. He instinctively opened his eyes, his vision clouded by a field of white. He could put in the effort to get up and look around, check where he was and what to do. But he didn't want to; he might not know where he was but he knew it was warm and comfy, a feeling he didn't want to ruin. And thus, Stanis eventually dozed back to sleep, a genuine smile, which was a tad rough around the edges, plastered over his face.   Time passed and he awoke once more. This time he could feel his stomach demanding food, but he who had dealt with worse hunger and torture in the past week easily ignored it. He should have been restless after waking up once more, his drowsiness gone after a good night sleep. Instead, all he wanted to do was prolong this feeling, thus he lay still as time passed, letting it drift him off to sleep again. As he slept, two voices talked over his body. "You couldn't pick up a lazier one, could you?" asked a person. The voice was high-pitched with a sharp tone, giving a serious feeling. "He made it up here and won me my bet. Anyone who helps me is a good man" responded the second person, the voice mellow and thus giving a warm, fruity feeling. "Humph" grunted the first person. The second person giggled back, donning a toothy smile at their partner.   Stanis awoke once more, for the first time feeling discomfort at his situation. It was strangely warmer than last time and his body had begun to sweat in response; no longer the ideal conditions for a lie in. He pushed the white cloud in front of him, the cloud lifting under his all-mighty hands as he realised it was actually just a duvet. He looked around and found himself in a small but cosy room. He himself was lying on a bed which was just as long and wide as his body. Next to it was a small, dulled mahogany table. The room itself was quite plain with creamy walls and no windows. Across the room, which was about 4 by 5 metres in size, was a bookshelf. It was a bit of a redundant addition to the room as it had no books on its shelves, but Stanis wasn't one to complain as he sank into the cosy atmosphere. He lifted the covers up and examined his body. He was still naked as before but the new wounds he had made for himself during the fight and up the trek were beginning to heal. Most his little cuts and scratches had scabbed over, whereas the larger injuries such as his broken ankles had only just clotted over. He worried for a moment whether his saviour would be angry about him dirtying the sheets, but his worries were gone as he realised they probably knew about that when they brought him in. Besides, they couldn't do worse to him than the Zelts had already done, could they? Could they? In all truth, Stanis was also a bit unsettled by the situation he found him in. He wasn't used to getting help like this, not in his past life and not at all after the apocalypse. However, he guessed this wasn't the biggest reversal in his life either, after all, far more surprising things had happened, especially in the last month or so. He slipped out of the bed and onto his feet. He didn't know where he was or who his saviour was, but the small part inside of him told him to thank this person for what they had done. The large part was silent, bewildered at how it was supposed to respond to generosity. So he walked over to the doors. There were two doors in his room, and so he opened the first one, only to be revealed to a small bathroom. It was small but also clean, something that wasn't very common after the apocalypse. He then opened the second door, this time to be revealed to a large hall-like room. It had about five times his room's size but that wasn't what caught Stanis's eyes, not at all. Rather it was the woman sitting on a chair, across his door, which caught his eye. She was tanned and had quite a toned body. More importantly, she had flowing red hair that went past her shoulders and deathly grey eyes, eyes that preyed on him. The rest of her face and body became a blur as he stumbled back, her eyes the only thing he could clearly see. They were so cold and sharp, almost as if they were tearing up his mind right now. In the next second, he was lying over his room's floor, her piercing eyes still present in his vision despite him now staring at ceiling… "Yils! Why would you do that? You are such a sore loser." called out a mellow voice, the words breaking her eyes out of his vision. No longer was the world blurry, but he could feel cold sweat all over his back, despite the fact he had been only been out of balance for a second. A hand caught his wrist and helped him back up. The hand was unbelievably soft and warm to touch, just like lying in the bed had been like. He was back on his feet and waddling across the hall-like room, a set of hands supporting him the whole way. The red-haired woman looked back at him half-way through, although she was very quickly reprimanded. "Yils, stop it. Stop scaring our guest!" It seemed Yils was almost going to respond, before changing her mind and scoffing. She then went back to the book she had been reading before deciding to terrorise Stanis. In all fairness, Stanis stood no chance from the beginning. He remembered the feeling of terror he had felt from Gahlnym's harrowing voice, but this lady's glare was far worse. Simply a bastard sword to a dagger. The soft voice whispered to him: "Sorry about Yils, she's not very modest. Although I guess neither are you, let's get you some clothes!" The whisper had turned into an exclamation mid-way through, earning another scoff from Yils and a giggle from the warm voice as it turned him around to walk in the opposite direction. They were out of the large hallway and now into a sizeable room, furnished to a higher standard than Stanis's and with better decorations. The soft hands opened a wardrobe and helped Stanis to it. "So which clothes do you want? Choose your pick!" Stanis peered through the clothes, only to quickly realise every article of clothing was very casual. There were dulled t-shirts and shirts, as well as different types of shorts and a singular pair of trousers. The colours were all worn out but the clothes were still of decent quality. Stanis turned around to look at his benefactor for the first time. It was a man Stanis's height with dark hair that contrasted his ghastly pale skin. He was slim with very little muscle definition, especially when compared to Yils, and looked very affable. His eyes were bright green and his face slim and sharp. Clearly this was his wardrobe as he was wearing a thin shirt and cotton shorts, both worn out. He looked older than Stanis would have looked prior to the apocalypse but now far younger as he didn't have any signs of exhaustion, lack of sleep or even any bristles of hair swamping his face like every man now had. His benefactor gave him a toothy smile as Stanis looked, before asking: "Do you want Yil's clothes? Although I don't know if she would let you wear any of hers. Let's go and ask!" said he, thoughtfully rubbing his jaw as he did so. Stanis didn't know whether to laugh or cry as he realised this man was serious…

His head ached. It ached like a bitch… Stanis kept rubbing his temples, hoping that would cause his headache to go away. About 30 minutes later, he would get exhausted from all the rubbing and collapse back to sleep. About an hour later after that, he would finally wake up. The moment he opened his eyes, he knew something was strange. He tried to remember what he had been up to last night, but his memories were beyond muddled and forcing himself to remember only caused his head to hurt even more. So he lay there, wherever he was, for about an hour more. Stanis did get clues about where he was from the time he lied there. First of all, the roof above him was not that of his apartment's, nor was it off the open skies'. Rather it was a dark, leathery-like roof, although he couldn't be certain due to the fact that the lighting was very bad in here. The next clue he got was from the occasional people he heard making noises. He had enough of these people interrupting his sleep half-way through his lie-in and was about to give them a piece of his mind, only to turn around and notice that they were all injured. The sounds he heard were groans: groans of pain. How did he know? The blood and bandages were a pretty big give-away. Furthermore, the smell in the building he was in supported that idea. The smell was pungent, and discomforting on all levels. It smelled exactly like what Stanis imagined the critical section of a Hospital was like, although even that probably smelled better than this. It was as Stanis's courage to get up was being built up that a ray of light entered his life, literally. He could see a ray of light splitting the room in half, which he followed backwards to discover that a corner of the room was actually a flap! It was bright outside, and so in contrast, it produced dark silhouettes of the people at the doorway. The ray of light then disappeared and Stanis felt a fear build up inside of him. Wait, what? Stanis couldn't remember the last time he had been scared of the darkness, but his body seemed plenty scared of it right now. It was almost like an inside joke that only his body and the world understood, whereas his mind just stood there confused. The people who had walked in seemed to be checking up on the injured people lying here, as he could hear their voices travelling the room. He then felt the voices in his ear. "Are you okay?" It sounded feminine, most likely a pretty girl. So Stanis cleared his throat before speaking, didn't want to give the wrong first impression. "Yeah, I'm fine. Do you know where I am? I don't remember what I did last night at all." The girl then laughed, clearly amused at his response. Stanis felt good inside about her response to his response. She then said, "I envy you for forgetting what happened. Let me just fill you in, there were the trials that happened, and then t---" Stanis cut her off half-way through her sentence with a crestfallen voice, "Okay. You can stop there. It's come back." He now understood why his body had been shivering in the dark. More importantly, he truly understood the profoundness of the phrase, "Ignorance is bliss", at this moment… The girl then moved on. Stanis, realising he could no longer lie here when the world had gone to shit, eventually got up and walked towards the flap. In truth, the memories he had shocked him a lot, not only was it completely bat-shit crazy, it was also far too much to go through in a single day. But a quick check of the Status brought him back to this insane reality. Stanis Volkov Age: 18 years Mana capacity: 18 (regeneration is capacity/4 per hour) Level 7 (Progress to the next level is 72%) Unallocated Stat points: 4 Strength: 17 [14 -> 15] Dexterity: 17 [13 -> 15] Constitution: 14[13 -> 14] Intelligence: 12[11] Wisdom: 12[10] Tenacity: 14[13 -> 14]. Skills: Layman's Rush   Please allocate unallocated points! As much as he wanted to put all his points into Strength or Dexterity so he could pass 20, and then buff his skill, he also knew that that was a bad idea. Instead what he needed was Constitution and Tenacity. He had fainted after a single attack from a Wolf and then had been weakened ever since. "Increase Constitution and Tenacity by 2 points each." Constitution has increased from 14 to 16. You are above your species' average. Tenacity increased from 14 to 16. You are above your species' average. Sighing at his pathetic performance yesterday, Stanis walked outside through the flap. It was then that the sun fried his eyes, forcing him back into the tent for a little longer as he waited for his eyes to adapt. A few moments later, Stanis forced himself outside as he shielded his eyes with his arm. The place outside looked completely different than it had yesterday, in both a good and bad way. It was good because Stanis had only briefly seen a bunch of boxes, which he had assumed to be the System's supplies before he had been forced into battle yesterday. Today, or during the night as he had slept, the boxes had clearly been unpacked. Stanis turned around to look at the tent he had been sleeping in, it was very large and a dull green colour. Around it was 3 others just like it, each able to fit in around 20-30 people. In front of the tents was a supply section with simple foods and water that Stanis could spot. A lot of the people in that area were also wearing single-coloured simple clothes, like shirts and jeans. It was then that Stanis looked down, only to notice he was wearing the same as the others. So where were his Malitsa coat and his knitted jumper? However, his worries went down quite a bit after he remembered how bloody all his clothing had been after the trials, nevertheless the battle here. As for the bad changes in the area; it had been pristine clean when they had first arrived at this place. Now you could see blood everywhere, alongside other scraps like bones and flesh that people hadn't cleared up. Worst of all was the musty smell of blood that still dominated the area… Feeling his stomach's yearning for food overcome the bloody smell, Stanis walked over to the provisioning centre with the supplies. It was as he was walking over that he noticed a certain large Indian man, half muscle- half fat, who had shaggy, greying hair. Or at least used to have hair like that, it seemed Jayesh had sliced off most of his long strands, leaving a very uneven, but short mess behind. The person at the supplies was very nice, considering that the World they were now living in, as he instantly gave Stanis a pack of dry foods, alongside a few bottles of water and finally a few thicker articles of clothing, alongside a simple leather backpack to carry that all in. Not that clothes mattered much though, as the sun was completely out, but Stanis felt a lot safer with more clothes on than less. He then ambled over to Jayesh as he nibbled on a few crackers. By the bags under his eyes, Stanis could tell that Jayesh hadn't slept at all through the night. Stanis budged into Jayesh, before offering him some crackers. "No thank you, I'm qui---. Oh, it's you Stanis! Ha-ha, I'll take some then." Only God knew what Jayesh thought off Stanis that he was so willing to take his food but not others… "How was the fight Jayesh?" Stanis asked the burning question inside of his head. He could feel the temperature go down a few degrees as he heard the response, "It was alright. I thought you had died at one point, but was in no luxury to help you. I then noticed you crawling over to Orena so I had guessed you were okay. But other than that, it was almost a total disaster. The system said it would be putting down supplies every week, and it seems the monsters were attracted by the supplies themselves. Only the Gods know how we will deal with them next week, considering what happened yesterday. We are now down to 27 able men and women, with 2 who are so severely injured that no one wants to make the decision as to whether we should kill them or hope for a cure in this insane world." "Oh, are they in the tent over there? I was in that one as well." "Well, that makes sense, considering how smashed you looked during the fight and how chipper you are right now. That's the designated injured area, where we've basically dumped all the injured and hoped for the best. One of the other tents is for the men to sleep in, while the other one is for the ladies to lie in. The last tent is currently being used as a headquarters kind of thing, for the new leader." Stanis was surprised at this, and so he inquired more about this sudden change. "Why is there a leader? How was he chosen? Is he strong?" Jayesh merely shook his head at Stanis's questions. "Don't be so fast. He was chosen since he was the only one wanting to lead so far. Remember during the start when a guy shouted for all the shield-bearers to make a defensive line? That's him, Juan. As for why we need one, it's because we really need clear goals to meet if we are to survive by next week. Is he strong? I don't know, I was too caught up trying to survive all those fucking Wolves that I didn't have the time to check. It seems like you don't know anything at all, I might as well tell you everything I know so you stop pestering me with these questions. I know that we do have some strong fighters. They're apparently called the Dead 4 since someone said you would be dead for sure if you fought those guys, and that name just stuck. Those are the four strongest here, and I certainly wouldn't contest that claim. It includes Orena, the sole guy from the other team in our trial who is called Anatoly, and two others called Fedro and Chen" Stanis had been doubtful about the claim, but he completely shut his mouth after he heard about Orena and Anatoly. He had first hand seen both in action, and so he didn't need any convincing. Jayesh, seemingly pleased with Stanis's expression carried on, "The other thing is that we apparently had 70 of those Storage Stones after the battle had finished. Juan opened all of them and found 10 cards which allow you to have 1 extra point to one of your attributes when you break them, 5 that give you additional experience and a scroll that gives you a skill. The general consensus seems to be that these loots will go to the Dead 4. Oh on that note, what level are you currently?" Stanis replied "Level 7, close to Level 8. I just upgraded my attributes after I woke up." Jayesh had shock plastered all over his face as he looked at Stanis. "How did you manage that?! The average is currently mid-level 6 with only the Dead 4 reaching level 7." Stanis exercised his memories a bit, before his rosy, chubby cheeks began to blush further. He then looked Jayesh directly in the eye as he said, "I killed the ones that were on their deathbeds as I crawled over to Orena…" Jayesh broke off into a fit of coughs, struggling to stop. He no longer looked Stanis in the eye as he spoke. "I guess I really need sleep, I'm clearly too tired for this. Since you already slept as others worked, why don't you go and see Juan? I heard that he wanted some people to scout out the area. You would be a perfect candidate considering how high levelled you are." He then walked off without waiting for any farewells. Stanis stood there, looking at his feet for a while as he contemplated what had just happened: it wasn't his fault that he had stolen other's kills. He had been delirious! Deciding to put Jayesh's clear act of thick-headedness behind him, Stanis began walking towards Juan's tent. It was as he was walking he noticed a wide hole in the ground. He tipped his head over the edge to look, only to see numerous human corpses at the bottom. His eyes instantly caught onto the face of the girl who had been next to him in the shield line, the one who had weakly smiled at him. Only her head was there… Stanis had felt so much more light-hearted after his sleep, but now he once again felt the sombreness of the situation creep up into his mind. This was the apocalypse, anyone could die at any moment…

After the three had left, Stanis continued lying on the ground, his mind beyond paranoid as his vibrant imagination began thinking the worst of his future. It would take an hour or so for him to crawl back into his cave, a few hours to finally go to sleep, only to wake back up two hours later. And yet despite the short time asleep, Stanis still found himself in crippling nightmares. Stanis opened his eyes, only to set his sight upon his arms. No longer were they covered in midnight's veils, rather he could see them with clarity. One arm was slightly chubby, had hair all down it, and its muscles contracted around each other like hungry pythons as he gripped his fist. He did the same for the other arm, but this time there were no contractive movements, in fact there was no movement at all. There was no hair down the arm, there wasn't any flesh on the arm, and it wasn't even the same skin tone as the rest of his body! Rather it was a dark orange covered monstrosity, showing Stanis exactly what he was becoming. And then he walked. He didn't walk in a certain direction, or towards anything, but rather just walked. A timeless period later, he was surrounded by the people of the Camp. They were not demanding anything of him, nor haunting him, rather they looked at him with fearful eyes. All of them were becoming crueller by the day, but Stanis was more like the monsters they fought on a daily basis than one of them. It started with jeering, and then a few rocks being thrown. And then Stanis saw the crowd splitting, only to reveal Anatoly, Orena and Ailean. They were armed… He had no time to think, nevertheless react, as cold steel bit into his thigh. He fell down, before squirming around in pain. Anatoly then booted him across the ground, laughing as the others watched. "Squeal you little bitch... It's shit like you that makes us weak... Just die already!" What followed that was punches being thrown, stones being thrown, and Humanity being thrown away as they assaulted him like Monsters. The very Monsters he fought on a daily basis… He didn't know what he felt last. Was it numbing pain, was it grief at what he was going through, or was it scalding anger at what his life had become? And then Stanis woke up, sweat dripping down his face as he tried to regain his composure. He was in pain: he felt like crying, he felt like screaming, he felt like he was dying. Fortunately, his body stopped him from doing anything rash as he found himself without the energy to even get up. It was a few torturous minutes later that Stanis forced himself up, before walking outside of his cave. The sun was shining, and Stanis looked at his arms. Both were fully opaque and looked exactly the same. After having reassured himself, Stanis paced down the beach several times. Only after coming to a conclusion did he stop, only to start walking across the beach once more. This time he didn't stop by the end of the beach and kept walking. Soon his feet were treading over the smooth, dusk coloured stone. He was going back to the Temple. It was then that he noticed the long cave, which acted as the entrance, was no longer there. Surprised and confused, Stanis spent several minutes looking around before giving up. This would have played largely on his mind, was it not for all the absurd things he had already been through. Giving up, Stanis walked back to his own cave, before equipping himself ready for battle. It was then that he noticed the skill scroll that he had looted last battle. He had left it tied to his waist, only to have it far overshadowed by yesterday'sfriendly meeting. Now mostly-calm, Stanis opened up the scroll. Scout and Sense A skill which uses mana to instantly scout out your surrounding area. Using more mana will increase scouted area. Do you wish to accept this skill? Having no reason to deny it, Stanis accepted it. You now have 2 skills: Layman’s Rush and Scout and Sense. Unsure of what to expect, Stanis immediately used it. <Activate Scout and Sense. Use 6 mana> Instantly, Stanis fell into a brief ethereal moment as his soul seemed to come out of his body, feeling lighter than ever before as his prison-like shell came off. And then he was back inside his body, shocked by the sudden roller-coaster ups and downs he momentarily lost control of himself. Managing to catch himself, Stanis went through the information that had just been injected into his brain. He could see what 100m around him looked like a few seconds ago. It wasn't to the detail of able to count grass, but he could see the landscape and what was in the area. It also didn't have a penetrative element, and so he couldn't see underground, or into completely closed-off areas. There was also no other sense involved other than sight, but that alone was good enough. Realising the potential of his new skill, Stanis ran across to where the Temple should be and used his skill. But it was to no avail as he realised that the cave had completely disappeared from Earth. Still, that no longer plagued his mind as Stanis realised how this skill allowed him to be able to do more. Now he could better react to difficult situations. It was on his way to Camp that Stanis began formulating his own plan, one that revolved around the two he already knew. He knew the whole Camp was going to be raiding the Goblins, and he knew that Anatoly was going to use them, and then leave them to die. He was certain that Anatoly hadn't given him all the details, but it was more than enough for him to think about. The whole point of the raid was to kill the tier-one monster and harvest its Stone of wonders. Anatoly hadn't explicitly told him, but Stanis was sure that Anatoly meant to steal it and flee with it. This was the reason why he and his group hadn't left yet, and also the reason why they had come to force Stanis in, through carrot and stick. After all, he was one of the stronger ones, and especially with Layman's Rush, he could completely ruin their plan. Stanis guessed that they had most likely done this to anyone else who was strong in the Camp, as they needed assurance of help to get inside the Goblin's Camp, kill the tier-one Goblin and then to not attack them as they began fleeing with the Stone of Wonders. Of course, they had hidden things away from him, as well as anyone else the cajoled in. But that was to be expected considering the danger they would be placing themselves in if they didn't. In the end, after a bit of thought, Stanis decided he would act upon the moment. Perhaps he was still too "soft" in thinking like Anatoly had said, but he preferred not to kill others like they were going to do. However, he had also grown and now had his own ego, the very same ego that Anatoly had yesterday trampled over with muddy feet. Stanis felt feelings of indignation and anger at the fear he had been forced through… Soon enough, he reached the Camp. It was loud in the Camp as he realised everyone was getting ready, with a few who already were. By chance, Jayesh turned out to be one of them. Stanis walked over to the large Indian man. He had a pensive look on his face as if he was thinking something deep. It went without saying that the man in front Stanis right now was different to the one Stanis had met during the tutorial, and the same thing applied to him as well. "Jayesh, you ready?" said Stanis, to which Jayesh raised his head. "I am. Although I don't know if I'll be leaving that wretched place alive" responded Jayesh. He then waited a moment to collect his thoughts, before speaking them. "You don't know how the previous raids went since you were injured. But every time we did it, we never managed to get deep into the Goblin Camp as the number of those monsters increases massively. Perhaps it will be different considering this is a full Camp raid. But all I'm saying is that we are putting all our hopes into this raid: we win and we get to make a village, but if we lose… Well if we lose, we’ll all be dead!” It was almost as if Jayesh was directly talking to the thoughts Stanis had minutes back. However, Stanis maintained his straight face as he listened. The two continued talking for a while as the others got ready. It was as they were talking that Stanis decided that he would at least try to make sure Jayesh didn't die. They hadn't known each other for long, nor had they spent that much time together. But Stanis was sure that Jayesh was one of the better men here, and people like that deserved to survive for longer in his opinion. Moments later after his decision, the powerhouses of the Camp began walking out. This ranged from Juan, to Anatoly's group, which included Orena, Ailean and two others who had migrated Camps alongside Ailean. One of them was a thin African man of short stature, while the other was an Asian man of average build. Neither looked very friendly, but it wasn't to the stage of giving away their plan. Stanis nodded towards Anatoly, who merely smirked in response. Soon enough, Juan did a little inspirational speech before the whole company set off in motion. There were 23 of them to be exact. Stanis was sure that the number of people coming back would be 0. This would be due to the combination of the Goblins and Wolves, Anatoly’s plan, and Stanis’s plan…

Stanis's whole body shivered, despite the burning sun overhead. That Goblin, if it still was a Goblin, was clearly a cut above the rest. It made him feel apprehensive, especially the way the Goblin had licked its lips while pointing at him. Unfortunately, this wasn't just something he could push to the back of his mind, it had too much of an impact for him to be able to do so. At the same time, the others who were finishing up the battle were now back on edge. They were too far away to see the Goblin's figure, nevertheless its face. But they had seen the bright orange ball of fire soar through the air, as well as the plume of dark smoke that now rose to the sky. Not a single person thought it was a human, after all, Humanity was too busy being hunted in this world to actually have the time to cause destruction to others. This meant that it was most likely a monster… This would explain why the Dead 4 had been focused on during the battle, despite them killing all the enemies. It was because there was some kind of Goblin strategist watching them from the Forest. This would also explain why the red-headed Berserker hadn't been focused on during the battle despite being as strong as the Dead 4, it was because he hadn't participated in the last battle. Soon enough, all the enemies were cleared and the Humans were the only ones left standing. Weak waves of cheers brought Stanis back to reality as he broke away from his paranoid thoughts. In an attempt to distract himself, Stanis began slicing open the stomachs of the Goblins, in search of their Storage stones. A few minutes later, Stanis was engrossed within his bloody work as he sliced through his multiple kills. However, his spirit further dampened as he saw the Goblin corpse with finger imprints across its scalp… However, instead of breaking down or puking at what he was becoming, Stanis instead just continued his process of eviscerating the Goblin; he had matured. A few more minutes later, Stanis was finished and had now collected 15 Storage stones. Not knowing how the other people would react to one person getting nearly a fourth of the total loot, Stanis began opening them where he stood. Out of the 15 Storage Stones, he got 4 cards which allowed you to increase one attribute by one point, 2 cards that gave him extra experience points, and finally a skill scroll. Stanis immediately used both types of cards on himself, and then wrapped the skill scroll around his waist belt, alongside his now-gory blade. Stanis Volkov Age: 18 years Mana capacity: 12 (regeneration is capacity/4 per hour) (Mana capacity is actually 18, however 6 points are currently in use) Level 11 (Progress to the next level is 55%) Unallocated points: 8 Strength: 19 [18->19] Dexterity: 19 [17->18] Constitution: 18[16 -> 17] Intelligence: 12[12] Wisdom: 12[10 ->11] Tenacity: 16[15 -> 16] Skills: Layman's Rush It seemed Stanis was now exactly mid-way between the survivors, not good nor bad. However he had also levelled up twice during this battle, and now had 8 unallocated points due to the cards he had used. After a bit of thought, Stanis decided to increase his Strength and Dexterity by one, Constitution by two, Tenacity by two and Intelligence by two. The other choices were quite self-explanatory but as for his sudden investment in Intelligence despite neglecting it for so long, it was to do with the mission he had from the Zelaro. It said that he had to kill 20 beings with his darkness, and Stanis was certain that his powers couldn't even kill a fly, nevertheless the monsters that now plagued Earth. However, he also remembered that both his Transformation and Darkness manipulation traits increased in strength based on his Intelligence and Wisdom. Stanis wasn't sure about what he would get if he passed the mission, but Gahlnym had said some grand words about the Zelaro, and so he was quite hopeful. Strength and Dexterity increased from 19 to 20. Constitution has been increased from 18 to 20, and Tenacity from 16 to 18. Intelligence has been increased from 12 to 14. You are above average for all your upgraded attributes. You have passed the threshold of 20 with three of your attributes. Would you like to upgrade any of your skills by any of these three attributes? Stanis checked the description of Layman's Rush once more: Layman's Rush - For a limited time, have all your abilities heightened to their maximum state, despite any fatigue/pain you may be in. Best used when in a serious situation to rapidly turn the tables. Effect time is currently: 5 seconds. Costs 6 mana to use and has 1 hour cooldown time. Despite the wondrous effect it would have on him, Stanis hadn't used it at all during this battle. This was due to the crippling pain, and fatigue his body would be in afterwards. It was an overpowered skill from Stanis's viewpoint, but one that came with just as high of a cost. If he upgraded it with Strength or Dexterity, he was sure that the skill would become even more powerful, but also one that would be followed by an even worse after-effect. However, Constitution could possibly fix this problem, after all that attribute was all about health and recovery. He hoped for the best as he willed the system to upgrade Layman's Rush. Layman's Rush upgraded. Now, after the ability's effect is over, you will experience a weaker aftereffect, and your body will have increased regeneration after the ability effect is over. To Stanis's luck, his gamble seemed to have paid off as he got even more than he had bargained for. There were no values attached to the increased regeneration, however, that didn't matter as even a weak increased regeneration was better than nothing. He once more checked his Status. Stanis Volkov Age: 18 years Mana capacity: 14 (regeneration is capacity/4 per hour) (Mana capacity is actually 20, however 6 points are currently in use) Level 11 (Progress to the next level is 55%) Strength: 20 [19] Dexterity: 20 [18] Constitution: 20[17->18] Intelligence: 14[12] Wisdom: 12[11] Tenacity: 18[16] Skills: Layman's Rush Having finished his upgrades and changes, Stanis looked towards the Camp. The rest of the people were in a similar position to him as some were still harvesting Storage Stones, while others were mentally upgrading their Status. During the first fight, no one had particularly cared about the Storage Stones and had allowed Juan to take all of them in the stead of the Camp. Now, none of them was stupid enough to do such a thing as people rushed to harvest the monsters they killed, and occasionally, by accident, others' kills as well. Doing a quick headcount, Stanis noted that the number of people had gone down from above 30 to the low 20s now. The reason why Stanis didn't fight in the group with the others wasn't due to him hating them, but rather due to the bad experiences he had undergone while in the Camp. However, right now was one of those moments that he needed to re-join the Camp, and so Stanis began walking towards the others. Now closer to the battlefield, Stanis could once again see the brutality of large-scale fights. His fight scene was certainly not a pretty sight, but it was far better than what he was faced with now. The soil was soaked and mushy with blood, the ground littered with countless corpses. He could see broken weapons scattered in between the corpses, as well as a few corpses so badly mangled that he could see protruding bones. His mind sobered, and his heart hardened as he saw the mess in front of him. He remembered the stories about war that he used to hear over the news, about how the soldiers still got nightmares and were sick over what they had seen years past. It was clear that he was currently in a living nightmare, perhaps one even worse than what they had gone through. Now within the crowd of people, Stanis was surprised as he heard a clear voice break the tense silence. It was one that he could vaguely understand, even without the system translating. The Russian man spoke with a loud voice, and at a slow pace. "We were all hit hard when the realisation came that we were in a stalemate, and I think I can fairly say that every single one of us feared our lives then. And so I would like to say: Thank you, Stanis. You have saved multiple lives by following your battle sense, instead of some dumb formation." He then performed a bow, albeit exaggerated. His right-hand man, Scowly, did the same. It was clear that these men were taking clear shots at Juan, who had made the plan, despite the fact that no one had any qualms about it before the fight. Stanis's heart slightly lurched as he remembered the power struggles within the Camp: he had not missed them in the least and had actually been happier without them in his life. He felt used as he realised the Russian man was using his effect on the battle to strike at Juan. All the others understood this as well, even the people who had recently migrated Camps understood this was a shot at Juan, but people still clapped for Stanis as what the Russian man had said still had truth to it. Stanis killing the Shamans, and releasing the pressure on the powerhouses had drastically shortened the longevity of the battle, and in turn the number of people that would have died from it. Since he was the target, Juan should have been shot down a peg by the indirect accusations, but he was now far more confident and comfortable in his position as the leader than he was two weeks ago. "Egor that is very well said. I could not have said it better myself. As for you Stanis, you have my deepest gratitude for saving those who should be dead by now." Juan then walked up to Stanis, before patting him on the shoulder. It was clear that he was unfazed by Egor's accusations. Now finished congratulating Stanis, he continued talking, "Many of us are injured, and all are exhausted. However, there is still work to be done! Let's first carry the worst of us back into the camp, into the Injured tent. After that I want every able man and woman to come to the emergency meeting I will be holding in 10 minutes. Our plan should have worked perfectly, just like last time, but I think it is obvious to all that someone, or something had directly countered it. We need to have an emergency meeting about what that thing is. After all, we know that the Goblins and Wolves aren't smart enough to plan such complex strategies. Our survival is dependent on the information we have, and how we plan around that. Let us no longer make mistakes like this, as it has cost us eight lives within this very battle. What then about the ones to come?"

"RAWWWRR" The monsters roared as they came into sight, moving with haste as they charged at the humans. Stanis could now see them clearly as they sped past the last treeline, his mind slightly relaxing as he recognised them: no longer a mysterious enemy. They were as he had Scout and sensed before, compact feline bodies with bulging muscles. Green glowing eyes with angular teeth and a hint of whiskers. They had lustrous dark fur over their bodies, allowing them to camouflage into the darkness as they moved. They had dreadful claws attached to their warhammer-like legs which bit into the ground as the pummelled forwards, now mere metres away from the humans. If he wasn't wrong, thesemonsters were actually some kind of big cats, most likely leopards or jaguars. There was no time to think as the two groups clashed, blades striking against claws. Orena had already activated her skills and you could see small slashes randomly occurring in the space around her, as well as the fact that she had activated Dominance. And yet despite her skills, the jaguar still seemed unfazed as it fought with greater ferocity instead of retreating, growling loudly as it did so. "Fortified guard" shouted Caleb as he slashed his brand new sword in the Jaguar, timing it just right so that he dodged its claws but still hit its skin. However, he found himself shocked in the next second as the sword got lodged in its flesh, the jaguar tightening its muscles surrounding the blade in order to catch him off guard. He was struck in the following moment but managed to come out largely unharmed due to his heavy armour, roaring as he pulled his sword out, coming face to face with the jaguar once more. While the others had been unsheathing their weapons, Sil had been preparing her spells. "Fire-bolt" said she as a bright bolt of compacted flames shot towards the incoming jaguar. Nevertheless, the Jaguar ran forwards as it went head-first against the fire-bolt, coming out of the clash with flames eating away at its hair. "Wind's embrace" screamed Sil, caught a bit off guard as she realised how reckless these monsters were. The jaguar charging towards her was instantly lifted off the ground and held in the air, its struggles useless as the fire continued to burn its body. Despite the strength of this spell, it was also just as mana-heavy and thus Sil dropped it within the next second, ready with her next spell. One has to remember that these 3 were 3 of the strongest, if not the strongest of Yora village. And yet the Jaguars were currently fighting them as equals, even though they were starting to lose their edge of surprise. This meant that these Jaguars were unnaturally strong, most likely between tier-two and three. There were four jaguars, one for each human, almost as if they had decided that would be enough to kill them all off. The one charging towards Stanis was the strongest one, a 2-metre tall black jaguar with claw marks all over its body. It was the strongest of the four jaguars here not just because it was bigger, but also because it had a clearer sense of when to go in for a strike. And that time would be now as it saw that Stanis was distracted, his eyes wandering towards those damned spectres. The scarred jaguar chose to bite instead of clawing and so it bit forwards, its gaping maw heading towards his head. It was when the crooked teeth were only centimetres away from his face that Stanis acted, his right fist moving with blinding speed as he upper-cut the jaguar. You could see its eyes widen and its jaws close as it felt a dizzying force overwhelm its body. But it wasn't free just yet as a monstrous left arm homed in, whacking it across its front leg and causing it to go flying towards Sil. The jaguar rushed to its feet after it crashed into the ground, only to find itself diving into the ground once more as it realised it couldn't even stand up… "Hold that one" calmly said Stanis, finally being able to turn around as he confirmed his suspicions. Behind the group was a band of floating shrouds, shrieking eerily as they floated closer. They didn't move with blinding speed but still would be past all the trees and in the fight scene within about 10 seconds, meaning that the humans would quickly find themselves vastly outnumbered. The worst thing about these shrouds was the fact how they didn't look real, rather ethereal as they floated in and out of the world, a toxic-yellow shine escaping their bodies. There were about 5 of these shrouds heading towards them. Stanis reclassified them as spectres as he stared at them, the spectres not armed to the teeth with claws or muscles, but still somehow managing to give off the same amount of danger with just their sets of drooping, floating shrouds… If he had eyes on the back of his head, he would have noticed that both the other humans and Jaguars were getting panicky and on edge as they noticed the howling spectres, the Jaguars to the point that they were backing off… It was as these spectres were just a few metres away that Stanis realised how mana-rich these monsters were, to the point that they were almost pure-mana constructs. Sil was now irked enough by the situation she found herself in and also free enough to act due to the space given by the retreating jaguars that she could fire a spell, a fire-bolt piercing through the darkness as it shot towards the closest spectre. "SHRRRRRRRKKKKKKKK" shrieked the spectre as it was struck, staring at Sil with its narrowed non-existent eyes. What others had seen was the fire-bolt striking the spectre, which recoiled back in response before shrieking at Sil. Stanis had seen the same fire-bolt striking the spectre, only his sensitivity to mana meant that he could see the inner happenings a lot clearer. The fire-bolt had basically been absorbed by the spectre's body, the fire-bolt putting up a good fight as it burned and caused havoc inside, before being drowned out in the next second by the amount of mana the spectre had. This caused Stanis to narrow his eyes as he looked at the spectres now within sprinting distance. "Blueshot spitfire" said he, a tinge of worry clear in his voice. This was his first time using the skill and so the astonishment he felt was allowed, his outstretched arm tingling with prickles of pain as hundreds of small mana-bullets were released from it. These bullets then shot towards the spectres, their ferocity far higher than Sil's firebolt as they made quick work of the spectres, cutting hole after hole into the already-ripped shrouds… Stanis found that he couldn't help but drop his jaw as he watched, his surprise clear as he saw the multiple spectres drop onto the ground, burning away at the mud and grass as their shrouds disintegrated. An acrid smell was all that was left of these harrowing monsters after a few seconds had passed. "You… you…" muttered Sil, her voice wrought with shock as she struggled to speak. Stanis had known his skill would be strong, after all, it was the skill of such an impressive sounding class, but for it to be this strong? There was a new layer of respect as the others now talked to him, the power structure in the group redefined. "Those Jaguars, they ran when they saw those spectres" said Caleb, rubbing his injured arm as he did so. Stanis used light healing on the party's wounds as they spoke. "They were strong, I would say at least higher tier-twos" said Orena, her body largely uninjured but her spear coloured in blood. "They weren't trying to kill us" responded Caleb, his expression thoughtful as he finished his sentence, "Just trying to injure our legs…" From what he had seen, Stanis was now sure of what had happened. "Those Jaguars are the ones that had been watching us all this time. They didn't make a move until those spectres moved in, and yet even then, they only tried to injure our legs and ran when the spectres got too close. Sounds like they were just trying to pit us against those wretched ghosts" said Stanis, his theory cutting most of the loose ends off. Apart from the most important one that was... "But why?" asked Sil, her voice more reverent and respectful as she spoke to Stanis. "We'll figure that out as we go deeper" responded Stanis. "You want to go deeper? I'm pretty sure there will be more than 4 jaguars if we keep going, you really want to push our luck?" cut in Caleb, his voice filled with worry as he spoke, now fully aware of how strong he was in the wider sense. He'd been beating the Jaguar he'd been pitted against but he also knew that that wouldn't be the case if he was against two jaguars, needless to talk about any more than that. "It's fine; I'll handle it" said Stanis, the golden light escaping the horizon almost celebrating his transition into the limelight…

Around them were several of the monster corpses. According to Tanya, the Village called these monsters Zelts. Scowly limped backwards, a nasty gash across his thigh. Jayesh stood there rubbing his right arm, his club arm, since several of the Zelts had attacked it after identifying it as his blind-spot. Stanis had been cracking his neck, until he had turned his head around to Aaliyah. The heady rush of adrenaline only increased as he looked at her body, his own body motionless as his mind lay dumbfounded. She looked exactly like Xiu had been… His memory became brighter than day as he relived it, charging backwards to knock the Wolves off her. Then he had looked at her body, only to become wrought with anger. Her body was ripped and bloody, the Wolves' claws holding no hostage as they had swiped and slashed without remorse. Her whole body was gashed, not a single part clean or whole. The sounds she had made before he had killed his first every human were groans and moans, them being the only sounds she could make when overcome with pain. Aaliyah now lay in a similar situation, albeit to a smaller extent. She was clawed all over and the poor girl was streaming tears of blood, unable to even roll onto her sides as both of her sides had been clawed. She was covered in blood… He could feel a small part of bile travel up his stomach, his body struggling to keep it down. It wasn't the sight in front of him that hurt him, rather the memory he had of when he had been pure and naïve. Perhaps he was still such as his mind was now completely frozen, devoid of all thought as if it was a blank canvas. Jayesh patted him on the back with force, almost causing him to fall to his knees. This broke him out of his spell as he regained his senses, his mind screaming for him to heal her. And so he did, casting Light healing several times across her most serious, life-threatening injuries. At the end of her treatment, she was still crying in pain but no longer in threat of death. Stanis could have continued to heal her, but instead stopped as he saved some mana for Scout and sense. He had merely had an emotional moment a while ago and was past that, his mind now back to normal. They waited there for about ten minutes as Tanya struggled to help Aaliyah up. Aaliyah would no longer be fighting, she was now far too weak both physically and mentally. An awkward silence followed as people expected the others to offer up to walk her out of the tunnel, and was slightly shocked at the lack of. This struck the final blow to Stanis's mind, a clear teardrop slipping down his face as he realised how cold he had become. The worst thing was that despite his realisation of his unsavoury changes, he still refused to walk her out as his mind reassured him that this was now life. He could no longer backtrack his changes, unless he wanted to die that was… It would be completely wrong to say Stanis was the only emotional one in this situation, but he was the one who had just understood the reality that many were still struggling against. And he accepted it, not with open arms but with understanding ones. Tanya comforted Aaliyah for one more minute, reassuring her that no more harm would come her way as long as she backtracked through the tunnel. Then, with heavy hearts and even heavier steps, the remaining four ventured deeper into the maws of the tunnel. To no surprise, the frequency of attacks only rose, although the amount of Zelts in each attack stayed similar. As the number of Zelts downed by his arm grew, Stanis grew proficient at killing them as he now understood their bodies and attack patterns. The thing about Zelts, in his mind anyway, was that they were very tough. Their outer body was built like stone with their fangs and claws even tougher than such, all to protect their fragile organs inside. Every time Stanis had increased his Constitution, he had the feeling that his whole body including bones, flesh, organs and all the other parts were increasing in toughness. The Zelts seemed to be different as their insides were still soft and easily sliced through, although this truth was only entertained as long as you could cut that deep in the first place. They were like a mix of moles and dogs, their body and behaviour as strong and ferocious as a dog's whereas their body shape was more akin to a mole's. Their strength was in their defence, whereas their weakness was predictably their attacking power. A single Zelt would barely be able to damage a Human who was alive at this stage of the apocalypse, and this was where their numbers came in. They compensated for their weakness by using overwhelming numbers against single opponents, which when successful ended with bodies looking like Aaliyah's. As for how to attack them, Stanis's personal style was to use his left arm as a shield. Their claws might be tough, but certainly not that sharp. It was by luck that his left arm was also very tough due to the dark-orange covering, meaning he could use it as a highly mobile shield while chipping and slashing away with his sword. This tactic had fared him well as both he and Tanya were largely uninjured, whereas the wounds and bruises on Jayesh and Scowly had slowly built up. Stanis had healed the worst of their wounds, but his mana regeneration of seven per hour could not hold up to the frequency of the Zelt's attacks. It was after experiencing 8 total attacks from the Zelts that the group saw a light at the end of the tunnel. The torch in Stanis's hand had not died out despite the number of times he had dropped it, and he was just about to extinguish it when Tanya stopped him. "Stop here guys." At this, the whole group turned around towards her as she began briefing them as to what lay in the light. "The light is coming from a cavern, about as wide as two houses. Inside it will most likely be tens of small Zelts alike the ones we have so far encountered, and one or two larger ones. We reckon the larger ones are tier one monsters, but that isn't to be underestimated as their toughness is exponentially increased compared to the smaller Zelts. Considering it has only taken us three hours to pass the tunnel, I'm guessing we are going to be the first through to the Cavern. About five or six of the tunnels will join on, although we shouldn't expect any help considering how fast we made it here." She then moved onto the battle stratagem. "Jayesh and Scowly, you two hold the brunt of the attacks from the small Zelts. There will be too many of them to kill without taking double the damage back, so just try your best to block them. Stanis, you focus on killing the little ones and I'll focus the tier-one Zelt. I'll be using my Class skills so I should be done quickly, and thus able to provide you with support. Just try not to die…" The group went into motion again, the light at the end of the tunnel getting larger with every step. It was as Stanis walked out of the tunnel that he tensed his muscles, straining his every fibre as he saw what Tanya had described in person. There were stalactites covering the roof of the cavern, which was about as tall as three men and as wide as ten men lying head to heel. There was an azure pool at the far end of the cavern as well as several other smaller puddles scattered across. The stalactites actually had a glow to them, which was reflected in the pools and thus created the light they had seen. At his side of the cavern were six tunnels, whereas at the opposite end was just a single, large tunnel. But all of this was missing the main point: the Zelts. There were about thirty small Zelts, each sized similarly to a dog, scattered across the Cavern. They were, however, growling and closening in towards the Invaders who had just walked in. Worse still were the two Zelts in the far-distant pool, both about chest height with far fiercer features. Perhaps the only luck Stanis's group had was the fact that the two large Zelts were making love, the slightly larger one humping the slightly smaller one, creating constant splashes of water and growls. Both seemed completely disinterested in the Invaders as they carried on, leaving the smaller Zelts to deal with them. Tanya looked across the cavern and instantly changed her plan, "Change of plan. Let the bigger ones carry on and just massacre as many small ones as we can before they have a change of mind." This seemed the appropriate plan as Jayesh charged into the smaller Zelts, immediately using Titan's Taunt. Scowly followed him, before using his skill as well, at which his strikes became truly powerful and his defence as high as Jayesh's, all at the cost of his mobility. Tanya used Piercing arrows, before shooting out several arrows. Each one of her shots was a death sentence, some even piercing through multiple Zelts before stopping. Stanis, with his lack of sustainable offensive skills, went the old-fashioned route as he fought with arm and sword. His left arm was almost impenetrable as multiple Zelts broke their teeth biting into it, whereas others dulled their claws swiping him. This wasn't to say that he wasn't in pain though, rather the opposite as he followed his adrenaline, blade splitting flesh and spitting blood through every slash. No longer could the large Zelts mate as the smaller ones faced overwhelming force. Instead they rushed out of the pool, before shrieking out a roar. "CRAAGGHHARGHHAGHHH" The echoing roar improved morale for the remaining ten or so small Zelts, now fighting with vicious vigour as the two large Zelts bolted towards the Humans. <Bladeworks> Stanis heard a soft sound from behind him, followed by a large suction of mana. He turned his head, only to see Tanya armed with a shortsword, her bow thrown on the floor. Her eyes shone neon-blue, her sword begging for blood. This was a Classer…

Stanis could see the grey splodges-turned Wolves better after a few seconds. Doing a quick mental count, he counted around 60ish Wolves. Considering the fact that there were 5 teams from the tutorial here, he guessed that there was a bit less than 50 humans here. That meant just a bit over one Wolf per person. However, the green splodges-turned Goblins then reminded him that this would be a lot harder than that, especially once you factored in the Goblin buffs and heals… The Wolves were about 40 seconds away when people started to panic: a stampede of enemies charging at them made them momentarily forget the tutorial they had just been through. There was also the fact that the tutorial had only made them fight against small groups of enemies, not 60+ at once. Thinking logically, this fight should still be fair due to Wolves' number advantage being cancelled out by Human's strength advantage. However, the factor that completely tipped this equilibrium on its head was the fact that the Wolves acted as a pack, whereas the Humans acted solitary with no bonds to the people around them. This meant that each person felt as if they were fighting the Wolves all alone. It was then that someone decided to take leadership, Stanis couldn't see him but he could hear his voice. It was the voice of a man, possibly in his early 30s to 40s. Then Stanis actually heard the words being shouted out, "ALL SHIELD BEARERS TO THE FRONT". Stanis looked down his left arm, only to notice that his hand was still holding onto the strap connected to the leather shield. Never in his life had he felt so cold at a moment, despite the fact that he was still wearing a jumper and a coat and an armour on top… Jayesh turned around to see Stanis in a half-stupor and decided to pat the boy on the back as he motioned for Stanis to follow him. Mind still half-absent, Stanis walked through the crowd as he made his way to the front. Along the way, he bumped into a few people who turned around in annoyance, although they let him go after seeing the shield in his hand. Making their way to the front, Stanis saw that a line formation had already been made. It was currently made up of 8 or so men and 4 or so women. Stanis and Jayesh joined onto the end, joining up shields in a row. Perhaps the only comfort Stanis got in such a situation was the fact that Jayesh had a large, wooden, rectangular tower-shield. This meant that the tower-shield heavily overlapped with his due to its size. Stanis felt a push against his shoulder, to which he rotated his head only to see a girl his height next to him. She had a smallish leather, circular shield like his. Noticing his look, she turned around and gave him a weak smile before turning back forwards. A few moments later, Stanis finally caught up to reality as he realised he was staring at this stranger girl, to which he too turned his head forwards, before attempting to focus on what was to come. It was to his dismay that he realised he couldn't focus at all, instead all he could think about was the rumbling of the ground getting stronger as the Wolves got closer. Now only 20 seconds away from impact, Stanis could finally see the Wolves with clarity. He could see their open maws housing rows of sharp knives, he could see the saliva dribbling through their mouths, he could see at how much force their legs were moving at as they began the final sprint. And then he could feel his stomach turning, his skin shivering despite the numerous layers, and his knees feeling weak as if he would collapse any moment. It was like a sea of grey as the waves of Wolves became the only thing in his vision. Soon the waves of howls also hit his eardrums, further forcing dread into his already fear-stricken mind. This was nothing like the Trials in the Tutorial; this was no simple step up in difficulty. Jayesh had just managed to stabilise his breath as he turned around to look at Stanis. It was clear as to how fearful Stanis was in the moment, in fact, one could see that the axe and shield were inches away from falling out of his sweaty palms. In response, Jayesh took one deep breath before bellowing out with all his might, "IMMMPACCCT!" The sound seemed to hit Stanis like a truck as he subconsciously tightened all his muscles and the grip over his weapon. Jayesh's scream seemed to have a similar effect on everyone in the shield line, as the people behind could literally see them straighten up. "AWWWWOOOOOO!" The Wolf directly in front of Stanis buckled its hind legs, stretching its tendons to their limits as it leapt onto Stanis's shield. If Jayesh's scream felt like a truck, then this was an actual truck running him over. Using his shield simply as terrain, the Wolf vaulted into the struggle behind him. Stanis, on the other hand, felt his knees completely buckle in, before breaking under pressure as his feet slipped, sending him sprawling to the ground. *thump* His collapse was grossly overshadowed by the events taking place around him. The second his body hit the ground was the second his mind gave up, losing all care about the world as he simply fainted. "argh ha argh ha arhg" However, there was no rest for the good… He woke up gasping for breath as he felt the weight of a Wolf plummet onto his stomach. Above him, he could see a Grey Wolf, just as shocked as he was as it saw that the corpse was actually alive! In anger, Stanis had no time to think as he forcefully slammed his wrist against the Wolf's neck. He would later wonder why his hand had gripped the axe so hard, despite fainting. Because instead of whacking his wrist against the Wolf's neck, he actually whacked the shield against its neck, breaking its bones in the process and causing instant death. And yet the half-conscious man still got no applause for his kill, instead what he got was a spray of burning, crimson liquid that freefell onto his face from a nearby kill, followed by the Wolf collapsing on top of him. There wasn't much going through Stanis's mind at the moment, rather only two things: "Need air" and "Need to get out of here". And so after a few seconds of heavy breathing, Stanis pushed over the dead Wolf before forcing himself up. Like a Meerkat, he frantically looked around, hoping for some kind of safe spot somewhere. And to his luck he saw it, Orena. The African Demoness in human form would have usually acted as an incentive for him to run in the opposite direction, but now he was attracted to her like a fly to light. He pushed his way through the sea of corpses as he made his way over to her. On the way, he found countless Wolves and Humans, half-dead on the ground. Despite the danger he was in, his kindness still made it so that he would swing his axe against their necks. Well, kindness and large amounts of untargeted anger. If he was to waddle through the battlefield in the heat of it, he would have been picked off within seconds and re-sent sprawling to the ground, only this time with a broken neck. However, the fight was already closing to its end, despite having only started about a minute ago. Now there were only small groups of stray Wolves collectively fighting stronghouses such as Orena. Around half of the Wolves on the ground were already dead, whereas the other half was awaiting it. And so it was all to Stanis's benefit as he cut through lives while slowly waddling through: his victims all defenceless on their deathbeds. Around 10 minutes later but an eternity for Stanis, he finally made his way to the beacon called Orena, before glancing up pleadingly. Orena had just finished up, as on the ground around her lay 8 corpses. She then noticed the crawling, bloody Stanis erupt from the corpses, just a metre away from her. This time she didn't do her signature tinkle of laughter, instead, she just looked at Stanis before saying in a weary voice, "Boy, you are still far too weak. How will you survive here?" It was to be noted that both of them were delirious by now, and neither cared at what she was saying. In fact Orena wasn't even facing Stanis as she talked to him, instead, she was looking into the distance, towards where the Forest was. Stanis, following her eyesight, turned around as well, only to notice his vision was all blurry. He then proceeded to rub it for a while before he tried again, this time squinting as hard as he could. In the distance, he could see the European man from the final trial, the sole survivor from the other team. The man had within his grip a long, double-handed sword that he controlled like it was paper. Stanis couldn't hear the screams, but he could barely see the terrified expressions on the Goblin Shamans as they attempted to run away from him. But to no luck. Instead, the man committed carnage, mass murder within moments as his blade went from one Goblin to another, create macabre art everywhere he stepped. Stanis was entranced by it, unable to take his eyes away as he watched. If he could, he would have watched even more, but his lethargy caught up to his body as it realised he was in a safe place. *thump* His body hit the floor, collapsed but not dead. At least not yet…

From a quick glance, Stanis counted close to half the Village's population hiking up the Mountain. It seemed Alyona was truly serious about completely destroying the monsters in the Mountain this time. Stanis also very quickly noticed that the blonde girl, whose name turned out to be Tanya, was a big-shot in the Village. Her claim to fame? Turns out she was one of the five Classers in the Village… And even better, she was not at all well-disposed towards him in the least as Stanis and his whole group quickly figured out from her glares. Eventually, Jayesh slipped from the front of the group towards the back where Stanis was. "Hey mate, why has she been glaring at you all this time? You do something to her?" whispered Jayesh, the last question rolling distastefully off his tongue. The glares she had given him weren't the irritated type, rather distasteful and soaked with suspicion. "I don't know, I haven't done anything. I only met her yesterday in the Forest!" whispered back Stanis, claiming his innocence. His innocence wasn't very well received, especially as the very topic of the conversation tilted back her head, giving a glance of mild fury as her eyebrows scrunched up. It was almost like a charge of electricity had just zapped through his body as Stanis felt a shock and a sudden moment of danger, until she tilted her head back forwards. Fucking Jayesh, getting him into trouble… He stole Tanya's glare and showed it to Jayesh, who merely crossed his arms in innocence before saying, "I'm not the one she's glaring at." He was speechless as he heard this, his own friend attacking him with the very thing that they were just heartfully talking about a second back. Jayesh then began looking around, almost as if distancing himself from Stanis as he didn't want to be on a Classer's bad side like Stanis already was. After tripping up Jayesh, Stanis was satisfied and also began looking around. He could see Orena in a group of big shots, all who looked strong from a single glance. Alyona was also in that group and so it seemed she had cajoled Orena in. He guessed that the other Classer was also in that group, although he couldn't tell which one it was. On the other hand, Stanis had not caught a single glimpse of David or Caleb ever since coming to the Village yesterday. That wasn't that surprising but the fact that they weren't on this raid did slightly confuse him. After roughly looking at everyone here, Stanis estimated he was above mid-way in terms of strength. Of course he would be able to take down the strongest, apart from the Classers, in 1vs1s using Layman's Rush, but that was also a skill he would rather not use. Tanya was a Classer to do with the bow and so Stanis was pretty sure he would be able to take her down, especially in enclosed spaces like the tunnels. After about an hour of hiking, they were finally near the tunnels. The Mountain was by no stretch a large one but it was quite steep and so everyone was forced into single-file down a thin pathway. Eventually they reached the tunnels, which there were about 30 of. Each tunnel was about as wide as five men and as tall as a single one, with all of them apparently leading to the same place. Thus every group chose a tunnel, before venturing inwards. Stanis should have known beforehand but he was surprised as he saw that it was close to pitch-black inside of the tunnel. His night-vision allowed him to see like it was bright inside, but he was confused as to how the other four would cope in this type of darkness. His question was quickly answered as Tanya brought out a torch from her backpack, which she lit before handing over to Stanis. This was to be expected as he was the only one with a free hand, but Stanis felt that her accompanying message was just not necessary. "Use your left-arm for the good of us Humans…" Her sharp tone and the tension in the environment stopped Stanis from any rebuttal, but he was sure to remember this for a later date… They slowly walked through the tunnel, although this seemed an unnecessary precaution for the most part as they continued walking undisturbed for close to 20 minutes. It was also in this time that Stanis found that the torch in his hand wasn't actually burning out fast, instead it seemed the oil drizzledover it was some special type. Stanis was almost, admittedly foolishly, relaxed when he heard the first foreign sounds. The first sound he heard was a very distant chirrup that echoed through the whole tunnel, followed by rapid clicks. This call was then responded to by a few others, immediately causing Stanis to tense up. Other matters had made him forget to do so, but he suddenly remembered about Scout and Sense. <Activate Scout and Sense> He drained six mana as he did so, unwilling to take any risks. And it was fully worth it as he could see about five monsters coming down the tunnel and almost double that coming from below them… Stanis immediately told the others, who were not pleased to hear the news. The others had forgotten alongside him about his skill, but Tanya seemed further irritated that he hadn't used such a valuable skill all this time… Stanis ignored the annoying girl and instead looked at the monsters rapidly approaching through his mind's eye. They were running on all fours towards them, their sleek and muscled bodies giving them the confidence to run at a rapid pace. Their bodies were covered in short hairs and they had long claws, claws much longer than what the Wolves had. He no longer had any time to leisurely watch the monsters as he saw the first one in the distance, followed by several others. His whole group had already backtracked quite a few steps in order to avoid the ones that had been waiting directly below them, to which they would have been able to hear digging sounds from was it not for all of them entering battle mode. They were arranged in a 2-2-1 formation, with Jayesh and Scowly at the front, followed by Stanis and Aaliyah and finally Tanya. Tanya nocked an arrow, before releasing it towards the monsters in front. Stanis now understood why he had felt an awful pressure push down on him when she had threatened him yesterday as the arrow sliced through the air as it passed, quickly lodging itself within the head of a monster. "CRAARRGH" It growled and winced in pain momentarily, but didn't stop itself from carrying on the charge, albeit now slower than its counterparts. Tanya rapidly nocked more arrows, two more shooting out before the frontrunners made impact. Jayesh roared as he knocked one into the air, before bashing it back down with his club. Scowly did a similar thing, although with less success as his opponent managed to dodge his strike. They were soon met with three more as Stanis and Aaliyah stood their ground, fully aware of the many more that would soon be popping out of the ground. Stanis used Scout and Sense once more, only to see that one of the monsters was just about to pop out of the ground in front of him. He swung his sword with perfect timing as the blade slashed across its face. It was as his blade met flesh that Stanis realised it was more like blade meeting stone than anything else. This would explain why the Village hadn't cleared this Camp of monsters yet. He stepped back as he avoided the claws of an emerging one, before swinging his sword once more. The sounds of combat made a cacophony as the thumps, groans and growls made quite the awful orchestra. It was about 30 seconds deep in the fighting that Stanis heard a high pitched scream from next to him, only to tilt his head to see Aaliyah on the ground. There were four of the monsters clawing at her feet and crawling across her downed body, some of whom doing so despite having arrows lodging out of them. <Activate Piercing arrows> He had already stepped several paces backwards and so his opponents were running to catch him, allowing him a second to watch as an arrow imbued with mana pierced through the whole body of a monster, and then through another one, before causing both of them to go flying off Aaliyah. The other two monsters crawling on her instantly went on guard, although too late as two more arrows shot out, one getting a headshot whereas the other one penetrated through a set of claws. Stanis only had two monsters left after having a killed his first a few seconds ago, and so he brought his attention back to his fight as he stepped forward, his sword already in motion. One swing slashed through ribs, whereas the next was caught by a set of claws. But that was easily fixed as he punted the monster across its head, before ending the life of the slashed one. What proceeded was a clean-up as he and Tanya helped the other three, all the monsters dead or close to after a few seconds had passed.

The group immediately armed themselves after Stanis reported to them. Considering that they were Human, there was still the hope that it would be a peaceful meeting, but it also didn't hurt to be cautionary. Orena had already stolen Stanis's spear off him after hers had been basically broken by Anatoly. Jayesh still had his menacing club, as well as his tower shield that looked as if it had seen much better days due to all the scratches and cracks in it. Scowly had a foot-long length hammer and a similarly large shield to Jayesh's, which made sense as both had been in the vanguard during the battles. Aaliyah armed herself with a sword a bit longer than a foot and a small leather shield. And finally, Stanis equipped himself with just a sword, mainly due to the fact that he had forgotten to pack a shield after switching weapons to the double-handed spear. The marching party in the distance stopped and armed themselves as they saw Stanis’s group "AYYYY. We don't want any trouble mates, so how'd you mind putting those weapons down?" asked one of their party, waiting to see how Stanis and his group would respond. It was Jayesh who responded, "Put your weapons down and we'll do the same." The opposing party's talker shrugged his shoulder, before slightly lowering his blade. He then motioned his teammates to move closer, stopping their walk a few metres away. There was six of them, and thus they outnumbered Stanis's group by a single man. Although if it did come down to a fight, Orena was definitely worth more than a single man. Their talker then had a thoughtful expression, before asking another question. "You guys have come from the West right? You didn't by any chance come by a Goblin camp, did you?" Stanis didn't see any harm in admitting to wiping the camp from the face of Earth, although he was beaten to the punch by Jayesh. "Yeah, we killed them all. Maybe a few runners in this area, but the Camp is now gone." Their talker added. "So you guys destroyed the crystal?" "Yeah" The opposing party seemed a bit downtrodden as they heard this, but also believed it as everyone but Stanis was soaked in blood which was clearly not theirs as they weren't injured. They edged backwards a bit, whispered to each other, before once again coming closer. "I guess you guys are the last of your Camp? Those crystals aren't easy to destroy, so I'm guessing the rest of yous died?" It seemed their question was mid-way between a We can help you if you agree and We're checking if there are anymore of you, in case it comes down to a fight. Now that Jayesh had basically taken the communicater spot, he responded. "Yeah, what's it to you?" The opposing group slightly loosened their grips as they heard this. "You've seen the missions, right? You know the first one is all about a Village? You guys wanna come to ours?" Stanis and his group discussed it among themselves, having realised that this party in front of them was most likely from the Village they had heard off from Ailean. Knowing that they were on the same path anyway, it wouldn't hurt to have a bit of guidance to the Village. "Sure, we were trying to find a Village anyway" replied Jayesh, to which their talker chuckled, before motioning their weapons down. Weapons down, but still drawn. "Come on then, I reckon we can get a bit closer knowing we aren't going to have to kill each other" joked their Talker, before finishing with, " We should get a move on. The Village is quite a distance from here." And thus the two groups merged into a larger one; at first, everyone still had tight grips over their weapons and roving eyes that watched their surroundings, but those grips and eyes eventually loosened after a few hours on the road. Stanis was talking to an Asian guy called Kei from the other group. He turned out to be just two years older than Stanis and going to a University in America. The two youths eventually warmed up to each other as they talked about Uni life, as well as all the shit they had gone through ever since the Apocalypse had begun. Over time, the topic of their conversations veered from these subjects to their current lives, and more to Stanis's interest, a bit about the Village. "I don't know how that Camp started mate," said Kei, pausing as he jumped over a large tree-root, "cuz I only came a few days after. My own group straight from the tutorial were utter shit and we were nearly wiped out during the first battle. After getting a few supplies, me and the other few survivors decided we would go search for other Camps. We went to one, which was destroyed by infighting just one week after we arrived. And so we were on the search again, and then we found the Camp which is now called Yona Village, named after the leader there. And I'm telling you, me and the others knew straight away that we'd found a gold-mine after we got there!" Then the man to the side of Kei spoke up, taking over from Kei. "Damn right we knew. We get there and guess what we see?", the man who Stanis remembered was called Callum then eagerly looked at Stanis, waiting for him to make the wrong guess. "I dunno. Tons of corpses or something?" responded Stanis, internally amazed that people could still have positive emotions like eagerness in this day and age. "Alright that too" admitted Callum, "But the main thing was the fortifications mate. They had like proper spikes and pitfalls surrounding the Camp. That girl, Alyona, who is the leader, has a good brain as she quickly brought the whole Camp under her control shortly after the tutorial, and such a good leader meant massive progress. There were tons of corpses still lying outside when we first saw the place, far more than had attacked us at our old Camps, and yet when we went inside to, we saw that there were also more people alive than our old ones ever had!" Kei was smiling as Callum talked, clearly reminiscing the times he had found some light after crawling through darkness for so long. Kei then carried it on, "So it was still a Camp when we got there, about 60 people I would say. They somehow knew about the missions bar and instantly unlocked it for us after talking a bit about it. Fast forward a few days, Alyona sets the whole Camp into motion to kill a tier-one, which is fucking easy when you have about 60 people. You should have seen the fight, some of the people in her Camp are absolute mad-men when it comes to fighting. We easily broke the Crystal and PAZAM, we had a Village in our hands." Kei took a breather as he motioned for Callum to carry on. "Yeah Village and that. I mean as you can guess, the number of people in the Village starts to explode upwards as we start finding new people still living in Camps or running away from monsters. More people means higher fighting force, and we started clearing our area of all the teleporters. Of course not all of ‘em, like the Monsters in the Mountains were just too difficult to beat all the way back due to their terrain, but I think we destroyed 3 of ‘em already. That's actually why we'd come all this way since we heard rumours of another weak teleporter here." Stanis's interest was already empty, and so he tried to gently veer the conversation more to about the peculiarities of the village. "What does the Village do? Well, first of all, y'know the amount of supplies you get is based on how many people you have? Well upgrading it to a Village actually improves the quality of the supplies as well, like we got proper food in the Village and we got plenty of meat from the monsters. Also after upgrading it, we got a few more buildings. Like there's now a forge and tannery type of thing there, although no one's really sure what's the point of all of that when we already get all our equipment from the weekly supply.” There is also this kinda of market thing where you can trade stuff for Stones of Wonders and other valuable things like---" He was cut off as Kei lightly punched him. "Why aren't you mentioning the most important thing?" To which Callum rebutted, "I was saving it till last. Y'know, save the best till last." "What is it?" asked Stanis. Considering how anti-common sense this world was, the best thing from the Villages was most likely something magical or such. "Right, so it's when you get to level 20, you are able to go to this building which apparently lets you choose a job or something. I dunno to be sure, but the few who have done it got wayyy stronger after going through the process." Orena, who had stayed relatively quiet all this time, piqued up. "How many are there over 20? How strong would you say they are?" Her agenda behind asking a question was clearly to know how many more strong people she could grind under her feet, whereas Kei took it in the way that she was worried. "Don't worry, we Humans have to stick together during this mess. Not really many fights there, nor much infighting since the leadership and structure is really strong. Anyway, there's only four people so far who have got the upgrade, at least it was when we left yesterday. Two girls who have been in the Camp from the start, and two guys who just recently came and settled down." "Who's the strongest?" asked Orena, her tone a bit more provocative than before. Callum seemed to get the message behind her words and said:" One of the girls is some kind of bow thingy, much better with it than Kei over ‘ere." He got a few laughs as Kei tried to punch him again. "As for the other girl, has some crazy good sword skills I gotta say. Wonder what she would be like under the sheets" He got more laughs from this one, as well as a short glare from Jayesh. A few of the guys even looked at the quiet Aaliyah as they laughed. "As for the two guys.", he crossed his arms as he talked to Orena, "not being Sexist or nothing but I reckon they're the strongest. Both are fucking massive, a few inches above 6 foot, and are wide as hell. The black one's filled to the brim with muscles, something that works well with the tats he has running down his arms, whereas the white one is a bit more on the chubby side which makes him look innocent, although he's everything but that when you see him fight." The whole other group nodded in approval of his judgement, whereas Jayesh rubbed his messy beard. "They wouldn't be called Caleb or David, would they?" he asked. "Oh shit, how'd you know? Are they from your camp or something?" responded Callum. This made sense to Stanis, he had initially wondered where the literal meat-mountains from the final trial had gone after the tutorial; he had seen them during the first battle but not afterwards. It seems they had left straight away, and just wandered for a while as they had only made it to the Village recently. The conversations carried on, and after a few more hours of walking through the Forest, Stanis finally saw the end of it as he saw plain ground in the distance. And just a bit past that ground was a collection of buildings and tents, surrounded by spikes and other simple defences. They had arrived!

Stanis lifted his weary eye-lids, only to see the outside of his cave well-lit. Drowsy and exhausted, Stanis slapped his face in order to wake himself up. No longer could he live the torpid life he used to, well, if he wanted to continue living that was. A few minutes later, he was doing a bit of spear training. Afterwards, he treated himself to a large breakfast, before remembering the Missions bar. It had been unlocked yesterday, but he had forgotten to check it that day due to all the things that plagued his mind. Now free of those, he finally got his chance to open the mysterious Missions bar. He willed "Missions" in his mind. Missions: Missions set by Hu: Become the resident of a village: (Optional Add-on) Kill a tier one monster and harvest the Stone of wonders. Use it to personally set up the village in order to get additional rewards. Missions set by Zelaro: Use the darkness to claim lives. Take 20 lives to pass.   The mission set by the Hu was all about setting a village up. It seemed they really were all about Human survival. The easy way of passing this was to just become the resident of a village, whereas the harder route was by setting up a village yourself. This meant you had to kill a tier-one monster and harvest the Stone of Wonders, whatever those were. As for the Zelaro's mission, Stanis was confused. Could he use the darkness to kill people? How? So far he had only used it as a means of hiding his body and hadn't even thought of it of having any fighting potential. And so for the next hour or so, Stanis kept playing around with the darkness near him, trying to make it destructive in any manner. It was fair to say that the stone he was testing on wasn't any worse off by the end, despite all his torture. Eventually, he gave up and began equipping himself with his weapons. He had his sword tied around his waist and held his spear in his arms. He also put on his coat, over which he put on the tattered Cuirass. He really should have replaced it last time he had been to the Camp… Today was the battle over the supplies. It had already been two whole weeks since the tutorial had finished. However, for Stanis, it was more a few days as he had been unconscious for several days, and then in the temple for several more. And yet what he had done during the other days more than made up for the uneventful ones. Now ready, Stanis began walking towards the Camp. It was a weird feeling walking back, after all, not only was he going to returning to the Camp, but he was also willingly walking towards a battle. The reason why Stanis was going there was that although the battles were so dangerous that a single misstep could translate to death, they were also a gold-mine of experience and loot as long as you survived. A few minutes later, he had arrived at the Camp. Surprisingly, there was not a single person there. He walked a bit deeper into the Camp, in particular towards the supply centre, only to be disappointed as he found no spare armour. He then heard a loud shout towards the East of the Camp, to which he responded by running towards it. A distance in front of him were all the people from the Camp, all clearly tense and tired. Luckily no one saw Stanis as he was in the shadow of a Tent as he peeked over. Realising that everyone was preparing for battle, Stanis used this opportunity to apply the Tent's shadow over himself. His body already had the darkness over it, but he had forgotten to do the same for his equipment. Close to a minute later, Stanis had finished as all his weapons and clothes were now black. It was now practically impossible to see him within the shadow as he completely blended in. However, instead of walking towards the others, Stanis ran north, towards the empty plains. He then ran from shadow to shadow, moving east towards the Forest. When at the Forest, he chose to lie inside a Tree's shadow as he waited for the Goblins to make an appearance. He didn't have a long wait as he soon heard marching in the distance, alongside several howls. It seemed someone within the Camp had sharp ears as everyone rushed into position. The formation was the same as last time, with the large men with high Constitution and tower shields at the front, followed by the rest behind them. The powerhouses were to the sides of this formation so that they could quickly run out and cause carnage. There were a bit over 30 people in total, a third of whom Stanis had never seen before, and so he guessed they were from another Camp. This formation had worked very well last time, and so no one found any reason not to use it again. Stanis was hiding at the edge of the Forest, and so was in prime position to see all Goblins and Wolves run out of the Forest. Within seconds, the enemies were all out and causing a cacophony of noise, in an attempt to intimidate the Humans. In truth, it wasn't having much of an effect on the Humans, who were now used to violence and all its tricks. However the longer the Goblins did it, the more it began to wear on their minds. They couldn't move forward, as that would make their formation close to useless, meaning that the enemies had all the power over the battlefield. Within the enemy ranks were four different types of troops. There were around 50 Goblins on foot, 10 of them being Shamans. Surrounding them were 20 normal-Wolf riders, equipped with a simple spear and leather armour alike the one Stanis had killed the day before. Leading this rabble of a group were 4 large-Wolf riders. These Wolves were large and menacing: they were of the same race as the one that had chased Stanis close to death. The Goblins on top of these Wolves were of the same race as all the others, however, they were also muscular and vicious. It was pretty clear that you needed to have certain requirements to ride these Large Wolves, and strength seemed to be one of those. Soon enough, the posturing came to an end as the Wolf riders began to charge forwards, followed by the foot-Goblins. The Shamans stayed back, with around 5 Goblins there to protect them. Interestingly though, the Goblins left behind seemed to be the weakest and least eager, which would, in turn, explain why they had been the ones to be left behind. At the front, alongside the other Shield-bearers, Jayesh tensed himself for impact as he saw the large-Wolf riders tumbling towards him. A second later, he heard a loud howl but no sounds of clashes. Instead, the Large-Wolves ran around the Shield-bearers, and instead aimed behind them. Bycoincidence, this was also where the Dead 4 were standing. The Shield-bearers were about to turn around, in order to provide support to the sides, when the normal Wolf-riders clashed with them, causing all of them to hold their ground. Half of the normal-Wolf riders followed their leaders and targeted the sides. Within seconds, the foot-Goblins were also there and began to surround the Humans. Instead of causing carnage within the enemy lines, the Dead 4 found it hard to move, let alone provide support. By further coincidence, all four of theDead 4 were targeted by one Large-Wolf rider each, and several normal ones who came to provide support. Instead of focusing on the maximum amount of people, the Goblins instead chose to focus the quality ones. This made perfect sense, apart from the question as to how they knew who the powerhouses were, especially considering that not a single enemy had lived through last battle… Not only this, but it was also quite obvious that Goblins weren't the most intelligent of beings… Despite being surrounded and attacked by multiple enemies, the Dead 4 still put up an amazing fight as each and every one of them caused the two sides to be even, despite the number difference. In fact, Orena was beginning to get the edge within her fight, and Anatoly was close to killing his Large Wolf rider. Unfortunately, around them, the other Humans were not of the same level and were suffering due to the sheer number of enemies attacking them. Apart from the Dead 4, there was only one other person, that Stanis could see, who stood out. He was a large, bear-like Caucasian man. He had bright Ginger hair, and his fighting style was fiery and powerful, just like his hair colour. Around him already lay several Goblin corpses, and more only fell as the frenzied man blindly cut left and right. Stanis had definitely never seen this impressionable man before, and so he knew this had to be a powerhouse from the other Camp. Stanis also noted that despite the man's exemplary fighting skills, he was not focused on by the enemies… The battle was now at a stalemate as both sides had advantages that neither could push past. It was destined to be a long and arduous battle. Or at least it was meant to be until Stanis began moving. He tried his best to stay low, and in cover as he moved closer and closer towards the Goblin Shamans. The reason why the two sides were at a stalemate was because the Large Wolf riders, alongside many other Goblins, were constantly getting buffed and healed by the Shamans. Due to their bad arrangement, the Humans couldn't even break out of their individual fights, let alone attack the Shamans who stood far away. Within a few seconds, Stanis was mere metres away from the group of Shamans. He crouched, tensed his muscles, and then dashed the last few metres. The Shaman closest to him only had enough time to be spooked, as it turned around in surprise. Stanis was flying, his spear swinging through the air as the Shaman made eye-contact. "ARRRRRRRGGGGGG" His spearhead sliced through two necks, causing two stumps to plummet to the ground. The closest Shaman to the two just-dead ones began shrieking, before beginning to run away. However, it wasn't able to get very far at all as it tripped over another Shaman. The humans weren't the only ones in a bad formation; the protecting foot-Goblins had huddled together in order to chat as the battle proceeded. Since the Shamans wanted to use them as meat-shields if an emergency arose, all of them had huddled together behind the foot soldiers. The faults of such an arrangement were coming to light as Stanis pierced through the chest of the tripped up Shaman, before throwing his spear towards another. Instead of running away, the Shamans who managed to get out of Stanis's range began chanting at him. In the meantime, their "protectors" came forwards, although they looked more vulnerable than the Shamans themselves. Stanis slid his sword out of his waist-belt, before rushing the closest Goblin. The Goblin raised its short-sword in response while blinking, only to receive a large, deep cut across its stomach. The remaining four Goblin fighters all ran forward, using their numerical advantage to fuel their courage. Stanis side-stepped a sword strike to his neck, before using his left arm to pick up a Goblin by its head. In response, the Goblin violently struggled, before being kicked to the ground. He dodged another strike, and then pushed the closest Goblin away, causing it to collide with another. As they struggled, Stanis met blades with the last Goblin, before overpowering it and then stabbing it across the head. He then sprinted towards the one he had kicked down, who was now crawling away, before also stabbing this Goblin. The last two Goblin fighters were now free but didn't seem at all eager to once more engage Stanis in battle. Instead, they edged backwards as they hoped the Shamans would finish chanting. However, the Shaman chants would take quite a while to complete, too long, in fact, for the fighters to survive as Stanis bolted at them, before slicing both down. Half the Shamans now stopped their chants, after all, they had been cancelled. They had been chanting buffs and healing onto the fighters, only for the fighters to die a little too fast… However, the other Shamans were now finished as they aimed at Stanis. One after another, green bolts shot towards him. Stanis rolled out of the way of the first one, followed by him barely tilting his head away from the second. The last out hit home, causing destructive arcane energy to fill his left arm. "ARGH" Stanis yelped at the pain, which luckily only stung as much as a wasp sting. Now fuelled by further adrenaline and anger, Stanis roared as he shot towards the Shamans. Within seconds, he killed 4 more. One of them had managed to pick up a short-sword and slashed him across the leg, although that had done little more than further infuriate Stanis. He forcefully knocked over one Shaman, sending it sprawling to the ground, before picking up the last one using his left arm. There were tears dripping down its face as it stared at him, his body burning up as he tightened his claw grip. This slightly crushed the Shaman's head, to which it screamed in agonising pain. This broke Stanis out of his anger, and irrational sadism, as he cut its pain short with a cut to the neck. He found the one he had punted to the ground, who was now playing dead, which he also proceeded to kill. Unbeknownst to him, the moment he had first disrupted the Shamans had also allowed the Humans to take the lead. As he massacred the rest of them, the Humans began to dominate as it became a one-sided battle. Stanis took his time to breathe heavily as he tried to calm down, his body burning with unbearable heat. He then felt an awful premonition, to which he shot to the ground. *BBMMMFR* The spot where he had stood was now scorched black, with thick, toxic smoke billowing out of it. Stanis followed the trajectory of the fire-bolt into the Forest, where he saw a large Goblin. It was at least as tall as him and had a similar slim, athletic figure to him. More importantly, it pointed at him while licking its lips, before bearing an ominous grin. It then disappeared from his sight as it retreated deeper into the Forest.

It was after minutes of weakly punching the corpse that Stanis finally stopped. After rolling over, he just lay next to the corpse, his pain and exhaustion overshadowing all thought. Stanis had completely forgotten about the fact that he had buffed Layman's Rush with Constitution when it had reached 20, and thus was pleasantly surprised as he felt the pain slowly dulling. Now this wasn't to say that he wasn't in pain anymore, rather that the pain was lowering to a point that he could actually think straight now. And with thought came the realisation that he was lying in enemy territory, defenceless and powerless to resist any more foes. And so Stanis crawled towards his spear, which he then used as a walking stick to support himself as he stiffly got up. Slowly and without stability, Stanis trudged over to the two corpses. He sliced open their stomachs and eviscerated the Goblins, before finally finding the Storage stones hidden deep within. Having collected the Storage stones, Stanis bent over once last time to get his sword, which he attached to his waist, before stumbling away from the crime scene. A few minutes of trekking later, he found a cave which he went into due to lack of better options, before collapsing inside. He managed to gulp down his last health potion, before laying there still. When running, a tip that is commonly given is to not stop for small breaks, no matter how much pain or fatigue you are in. This is because your body goes back to resting mode, which causes the fatigue that you were ignoring all this time to come back in full force. This, in turn, makes starting up again so much harder. Stanis quickly discovered this as he realised his body was so fatigued and overworked that he could no longer move it, now just a spectator of the world. Going against the fatigue felt like he was pushing against a mountain, foolish and useless. Eventually, Stanis no longer stirred and just lay there, using Scout and sense occasionally to check his surroundings. He was shocked to find that every time he used it, not a single Goblin came up on his radar. Unbeknownst to him, every single Goblin was at their Camp, fiercely fighting the Humans.     It was a scene that would shock any man or woman, no matter what they had already lived through. In the centre of the Camp were crudely-built, wooden huts. Surrounding these huts were countless green heads, continuously decreasing as more and more moved to the outside. On the outside were several Humans, all fighting with barbarity as they struggled to keep their lives. But the most harrowing matter was the ground, no longer was it solid ground but rather a marsh as blood from the innumerable corpses leaked into the Earth. The mud squelched every time a step was made, causing mud and blood to splatter everywhere. On the Humans side, there were 13 remaining. This was Anatoly, Orena, Fedro, Ailean and his two, Juan and two of his, Egor, Scowly, Jayesh and the dainty girl who had been in Jayesh's group. The rest of the people who had left the Human camp alongside these 13 were all dead… As for the Goblin's side, there were about 100 remaining including the Wolves. This might seem a lot, but the number had been over double before Today's raid. In fact, even now that number was rapidly decreasing as blades soared through the air and heads fell. The two notable Goblins were a Wolf rider and a Swordsman. Both were bulging with muscles and as tall as men, thus dwarfed their counterparts. To top this off, they were also both very skilled at fighting as they were the two who had stopped Orena and Anatoly from moving forwards. Furthermore, these two Goblins were the main targets of the Shamans' healing and buffs. And yet despite all their advantages, these two Goblins were still sweating rivets and shaking with anxiety as they fought. They were both tier-one Goblins and had managed to stop the strongest Humans by using their own strength and the strength of their Camp. But the truth of the matter was that neither of them were the leaders of the Camp, rather their mage Kyln was. But for some reason, neither Kyln nor the other tier-one Sentry boss was here. If the two of them were here, it was for certain that the Humans would die off in seconds, after all, Kyln was a proper mage who could use multiple spells. But luck would have it that Kyln had instead disappeared just as the Emergency horn had been blown, and the Sentry boss hadn't returned after saying he would go find Kyln… The Goblins felt hopeless as they faced the heavy assault, but they weren't alone in that feeling as the Humans felt the same, their limbs made out of stone. They had been swinging, dodging and killing for hours now, and yet they were still not in the centre of the Goblin Camp… In fact things had looked good for a while after they had first sighted the Camp, but had only gone downhill since then as the battleline hadn't moved whatsoever in all this time due to the countless Goblins ready to replace the frontline. In truth, most of the survivors had already considered fleeing, but had immediately cast that thought away after realising that the Wolves would easily catch their weary arses. It was as the two hopeless sides clashed that something broke the sick flow of the battle. A bright light appeared from the centre of the Goblin Camp, one that continued to increase in intensity. Despite the frugal free-time and vision they had within their fights, Anatoly and Orena , who were both ahead of the rest, were able to see a purple Crystal in the centre of the Goblin Camp. It was this very crystal that was shining out the bright light into the surroundings. The crystal was about the height of a Human and floated in mid-air, its flawless purple exterior seemingly absorbing all light as it had no reflection whatsoever. Ten seconds after the initial light, Anatoly and Orena saw a shocking sight. Out of the edges of the Crystal struggled out a Goblin, seemingly unaware that it was currently crawling out of solid matter… The realisation dawned on the two; Anatoly immediately roaring out in the next second. "FUCKING PUSH YOU BASTARDS. THE CRYSTAL IN THE CENTRE OF VILLAGE ---" He stopped his roar for a second as he dodged another Goblin strike, before swinging his sword across its neck. "--IS SOME KIND OF TELEPORTER. FUCKING DESTROY IT AND WE WIN!" This roar was paramount to the outcome of the battle as the Humans pushed harder than ever before, no longer hopeless as they could finally see the end of this torment of a fight. Most people were dry on mana after having used their skills during the prior fights, but this wasn't the case for Anatoly or Orena, both of whom hadn't used their skills to kill the simple Goblins. Now that the right moment was here, both of them used their skills as they began penetrating the Goblin line towards the crystal. <Activate Dominance> <Activate Lightning steps> The Swordsman Goblin, alongside the normal Goblins attacking Orena, became terrified as the opponent in front of them became a Demon, causing them to tremble as she bolted forwards like real lightning, sparks of blood exploding around her as he spear moved faster and faster. <Activate Paramount skill> <Activate Blood shots> Akin to the Swordsman Goblin, the Wolf-rider Boss also found his life quickly come to an end as the Human he was fighting became a true monster, his actions now flawless, almost as if he was one with his sword. Anatoly skirted multiple attacks as he pushed forwards, every dodge coming so easily to his body, meanwhile all the shed Goblin blood from his attacks shot out like real bullets, piercing foe after foe. The carnage that commenced was unstoppable as both Orena and Anatoly quickly made grounds, breaking away from the rest of the Humans within moments of activating their skills. But their skills were just skills at the end of the day, and thus had active times. These active times ran out before either of the two could reach the Crystal. This should have caused them to become easy pickings as they were stranded from the rest of the Humans by a sea of Goblins. Instead, this wasn't to be the case as their surrounding Goblins felt every desire to run away from these two monsters, and thus only half-heartedly attacked them. Their skills had a double effect as not only did they kill tens of Goblins and Wolves within moments, but they also instilled terrible fear in the remaining ones. Due to the little resistance against them, the two continued to push forwards and eventually reached the Crystal at around the same time. Behind both of them were trails of blood, bones and corpses. They then began striking, smashing and piercing the Crystal, although to no obvious effect as the Crystal looked the same as before. Their actions also re-ignited anger and fear of their higher-ups within the Goblins, who doubled down their attacks on the two as they desperately tried to separate them from the Crystal. While Orena and Anatoly had penetrated their way through the Goblin lines, the others hadn't just stood still but had instead followed. The end of the fight was nigh as Anatoly's tenth smash into the Crystal caused a crack, albeit small. This caused the frightened Goblins to attack with even greater fervour, if such a thing was possible, finally managing to create some distance between Anatoly and the Crystal. However, focusing their resources on Anatoly had allowed Orena to have greater breadth and soon she too caused a crack to the flawless Crystal. Now the Goblins' struggles were meaningless as they no longer had enough of them to stop the Humans as many more strikes hit the Crystal, the small cracks rapidly spreading across the surface. "RAAAAAAAAAAWWWWWWWWRRRRRR" *crack* The Goblins roared one last thunderous shriek before the Crystal completely cracked, shards falling onto the ground as Crystal dust filled the surroundings. You have destroyed the teleporter of the Invader Species: Goblins. Kill the remaining spawned Goblins to increase your contribution and be alive in ten minutes to receive your reward, which will be determined by your contribution. Contribution can be stolen. A dead Contributor's points will be passed over to the killer. The remaining Goblins began frantically fleeing, no longer having rhyme nor reason to stay here. It was as their prey ran away that some of the Humans began turning their eyes towards each other, murder on their minds…

Stanis stood behind a colossal tree, performing hand gestures inside of its shadow. After a bit of practice, he realised that it was easier to control the darkness by motioning at it with his hands. He began plastering the shadow of the tree onto his face and feet, as well as any other open skin. A few minutes later, he was finished and a message popped up. Maximum mana capacity is now reduced from 14 to 12. Release your creations to reinstate 18 as the maximum capacity. Now his whole body was covered, most of it by clothing but the rest by the darkness. He stepped out of the darkness and into the light of the rising sun, only to notice that his feet became partially visible again. It seemed the darkness from the shadow was indeed of a lower quality than the bits he had taken from the tunnel, which was completely opaque even in the sunlight. This was fine though, Stanis had only been practising with the tree shadow to make himself more intimidating and not for any directly practical reasons. He threw his backpack, which he had taken from the Camp, across his back before treading deeper into the Forest. Within the backpack were the supplies that he had recently taken, alongside the Goblin's Storage stone from the Goblin he had just killed. In truth, he had never actually opened a Storage stone; the ones that he had collected last time when he came to the Forest were gone when he had woken up… The stones themselves were grey in colour and looked exactly like a real stone. The main difference being that there was a ridge in the centre of the stone and a shiny, partially-visible cross symbol across the body. To open them to get the loot, all you had to do was crush the stone within your fist, which would magically give you the reward. Stanis was planning to kill a few more Goblins, perhaps scout a bit deeper into the Forest in order to see the stronger enemies, before backtracking to his cave by the sea. Due to the fact that he was already fairly deep in the Forest, he didn't have to walk for long until he heard signs of another Goblin. Unlike the one he had killed today, this one seemed to be humming an upbeat tune as it patrolled the area. The behaviour was strangely human-like and would have been something that would have perturbed old Stanis, especially him from the tutorial. But Stanis was past all of that now, in fact it was more accurate to say that the Goblin's actions were sentient, rather than Human-like. The only reason why it was described like that in that in the first place was because Humans had been the only sentient race on Earth, and thus the strongest. That was far from the truth now… Stanis stuck to the shadows as he moved from tree to tree, gradually getting closer to the Goblin without it noticing. It walked at a leisurely pace, and was equipped similarly to the other one he had just fought, with light leather clothing and a simple short-sword. Stanis stayed still at his position for a few seconds, waiting for the Goblin to walk past. He then began sneaking behind it: crouching and lightly stepping. The Goblin had long, fat, pointed ears that drooped backwards and a few strands on its head. Hearing something behind it break its tune, the Goblin looked back in surprise, only to see the glint of a blade centimetres away from its face. The blade swept past the Goblin's face, creating a trench that ran through the middle. Its body fell to the ground, before being stabbed once more in the head. This time, his performance was even more flawless! After cutting open the Goblin's chest, Stanis clawed out the Storage stone before walking away. He didn't care if another Goblin found the corpse, rather he now wanted more enemies. His confidence and fluidity in battle had upped his fighting strength massively, and now he wanted someone to test that on! What Stanis had encountered so far were just small, regular patrols. There was another type of patrol that was currently active, a larger and far more dangerous patrol. By coincidence, it was scouting the exact region that Stanis was walking towards… Moments later, Stanis caught a strong scent of something that unsettled him: wolf urine. There were scribbly, yellow lines across the base of a tree-trunk, and it was still obviously wet. He could feel his heart lurch as he remembered the chase he had been through, the terror he had felt during, and the hopelessness he had felt afterwards. Within seconds of his find, he began hearing a conversation in guttural voices. "Ug find some hooman yesterday. Ug kill it good, I be like Ug." The response was just as simple. "You naver be like Ug. Ug highest…" The argument continued until a third party entered the conversation. "Quiet fols. Wolfy smell hooman. Get wapons outs!" Stanis had been lucky last time as the Wolf he had fought had only been recently brought to Earth and thus didn't know the scent of Humans. That was not the same for the Wolves of today, as all of them knew the scent of Humans quite well. The patrol had detected him and were coming for him. Knowing that they would be here soon, he had the choice of getting a lead ahead of them if he decided to run, or he could throw away that lead by staying here and facing them off. Sounds of multiple legs running across the ground soon reached his ears, and he could feel his heart beat harder every second. He felt like prey as he stood there, waiting for his predators to reach him. Deciding he didn't want that, he chose the third choice and began sprinting towards the Goblin company himself. Moments later, he saw the trio in question, alongside their Wolf. Two of the Goblins looked exactly like the one had just killed, wearing the same leather armour and wielding the same short-sword. However the third one was seated on a normal Wolf, and thus reached Stanis's chest height instead of hip-height. It had higher-quality leather armour equipped and a simple spear. The first image that came into Stanis's mind was that of medieval knights: charging at one another on horses while wielding lances. This was like a lower quality version of that. The wolf became giddy with bloodlust as it caught sight of Stanis, and it began sprinting ahead of the other two Goblins. The Goblin rider only felt the same way as it edged the Wolf on, eager to kill a Human. Stanis pulled his spear over his head, before launching it towards the Goblin rider. Seeing the incoming spear, the Goblin rider immediately leaned its body to the side before falling off the speeding Wolf. It then had to pick itself and its spear before once again charging Stanis. Stanis equipped himself with the sword, before stepping forward as the Wolf leapt at him, jaws wide open. He used his left arm, which was still covered in darkness, to catch the Wolf by the throat, before slashing his sword down its neck. He then dropped the Wolf corpse onto the ground, his left arm now bloody despite being covered in darkness. One would be able to see the fall in speed of the charging Goblins as they noticed how fast Stanis killed the Wolf. However they were already too close to run, and so they trusted their numerical advantage. Unluckily for them, Stanis bolted forwards before smacking the makeshift spear out of the Goblin-rider's hand using his left arm, before propelling his foot into the surprised Goblin's face. The other two were now on him, and so he side-stepped one attack before jumping out of the way of another. He quickly recovered as he swept his sword against the closest Goblin. It screamed in pain and fell back as the other one stepped forward, only to receive a fatal stab in its face for all its courage. Stanis then followed up the Goblin-rider, who was now attempting to run away, by leaping onto it, before slicing its neck. The last remaining Goblin had a gash across its stomach and looked with eyes full of terror as Stanis came to face it. Throwing all of its dignity to the wind, the Goblin prostrated itself across the ground, wincing with pain as it did so. For a second, Stanis wondered if keeping this Goblin alive for information would be a good move, but in the end decided such a low-down Goblin wouldn't know shit and so just stabbed the Goblin as it continued begging. Stanis felt a small pain inside of his mind as he killed the begging Goblin. It was by far not his best moment, but nor was it his worst. In the end, he justified the killing by saying this was what the world was like now, before looting the multiple enemies. He now had five bloody Storage stones within his backpack and decided that was enough as he began walking back to the Camp. It was on the journey back that Stanis took off the black veil covering his left arm. When he had caught the Wolf in mid-air, he had realised two important things. The first being that his left arm wasn't just a little stronger than his right arm, it was much stronger. The second being that the thick dark-orange skin covering his arm must be tough, despite its smoothness, as the Wolf had bit his arm before it had died, and yet he had only felt an ache now. He looked at his aching arm, only to see a bit of a scratch on the leathery skin. He doubted his skin would last against a real, forceful bite, but regardless it was still a good defence. He reapplied the veil of darkness across his left arm, before jogging back to the Camp. Quite a few minutes later, he arrived at the Camp. Instead of entering the Camp though, he ran around it, before continuing to run towards his cave by the beach. It was weird, but he felt more comfortable living alone than with the people at the Camp. He was sure quite a few of them had seen him run past, but gave no worry to their stares. What he didn't know was that one of the people staring at him as he had run across was Anatoly, who looked with particular interest at the darkness covering his arms. Anatoly knew vaguely about Stanis, but even he had thought that the kid had committed suicide by drowning himself in the sea, or at least that's what he had heard from snippets of conversation. It piqued his curiosity how the kid was still alive and kicking, but more so how the kid had gotten such a unique skill. It was dusk when Stanis finally reached his cave. He opened the 5 Storage stones, in which he got 2 cards that allowed him to upgrade one of his attributes by one point and another card that gave him extra experience points. Stanis Volkov Age: 18 years Mana capacity: 12 (regeneration is capacity/4 per hour) (Mana capacity is actually 18, however 6 points are currently in use) Level 9 (Progress to the next level is 97%) Unallocated points: 2 Strength: 18 [18] Dexterity: 18 [17] Constitution: 18[16] Intelligence: 12[12] Wisdom: 12[10] Tenacity: 16[15] Skills: Layman's Rush Increase Strength and Dexterity by 1 each. Strength increased from 18 to 19. Dexterity increased from 18 to 19. You are well above the average for your species. Stanis hadn't even noticed last time but it seemed that Jayesh was right about him being in the temple for multiple days, as the average for all the attributes other than Intelligence and Wisdom had increased. Stanis Volkov Age: 18 years Mana capacity: 12 (regeneration is capacity/4 per hour) (Mana capacity is actually 18, however 6 points are currently in use) Level 9 (Progress to the next level is 97%) Strength: 19 [18] Dexterity: 19 [17] Constitution: 18[16] Intelligence: 12[12] Wisdom: 12[10] Tenacity: 16[15] Skills: Layman's Rush Satisfied with the progress he had made today, Stanis proceeded to practise his spear-work for a long time, before having his dinner and going to sleep in his cave. Tomorrow was going to be a long day, especially considering the fact that it was the day of the third battle over supplies…

The new life-forms who had started the System, and in turn sponsored Humanity were still in the Earth's exosphere. However, unlike before, they were no longer alone and all around them, on every side, were different life-forms resting. Some, like them, were able to and thus had decided to sponsor a race on Earth. Others didn't have that chance or didn't want it, as they instead had opted to integrate their own species onto Earth. It was all fair though, as they did still have to follow certain guidelines and procedures, and thus couldn't just colonise the whole of Earth with their full force within a day. At first, the two lifeforms who were behind Humanity had been joyful, after all, they had been the first to discover Earth. Activating the first system meant that it automatically became more authoritative and powerful than any other activated after it. This meant that most of the other races had opted to use the system they had started, meaning it gave Humans more of an advantage as they had the most, even if limited, control over the system and could pass on tips and items the other species couldn't. Of course, not all the species were using their system, some had decided to activate more expensive ones anyway. But those would still be subpar to theirs, due to the law of order. And so everything had looked good: not only did they wield the most power out of all the life-forms in the exosphere due to the law of order, but the species they sponsored were also, by far, the most dominating on Earth. In fact, it looked too good… The second life-form looked at the first, who had a despondent expression, before sighing. It looked like it really had come to worst, but he felt he might as well ask to make sure. "What's wrong? Anything wrong with the system?" The first life-form gave the first a glancing glare, before saying "You know what's wrong. This really was too good for us. The other bastards knew how much of an advantage we held, and so they have decided to team up. The fucking invader species have teamed up with the sponsored species, all in order to just tipple our advantage…" It looked like the worst situation the two had theorised had actually come into play. The teamwork between the sponsored species and the invader ones wouldn't be perfect or permanent by any stretch due to the countless variables, but it meant that Humanity now had a force against them that was right now equal to them in force, but one that would only get much stronger as time went on… Both of the life-forms then stood in a restless silence, before the second finally spoke again. "Fine then, just activate maximum assistance." The first had thought this long ago, but the risk with it was just too high, "Are you sure? If we activate maximum assistance, it means we'll have minimum control over the Humans and miniscule control over the other species. It basically defeats the point of us setting up the system in the first place: the Humans will become sponsored only in name from us, they will not be bound by anything…" The second simultaneously replied as he already knew what his partner would say, "They fucking forced us. They knew we'd have to do this, which is why they probably teamed up in the first place. Otherwise, we would only keep falling in power as the others raised theirs; we might as well put all our support into these Chimps and hope for the fucking best!" With no argument in response, the second life-form simply went to the system controls on the device she was holding, before applying the maximum help she could do. It was as she clicked [Accept] that the system asked one last helpful and cautionary, but taunting in this situation, question. Are you sure you want to commit to your changes? There will be no way back, and you will be sacrificing your power in order to do so. With a heavy palm, the second life-form tapped the device. [Accept] Changes are now underway. A short while later, Changes are now complete. Good luck! **** **** Stanis felt the solid ground under him, as he opened his eyes to a blue sky overhead. He couldn't move his head, nor body whatsoever but he knew this was Earth. In the far distance, he could see the solid ground continue past the horizon. He could barely see a wide expanse of green at the corner of his eye, and he could hear the roaring crashes of the waves and the smell the salty whiff. In his direct front, he could see people he knew: Caleb, David, Lucy, Sarah, and Jayesh. This meant that behind him were Orena, and the dangerous-looking, cold European from the other team… Despite the fact he couldn't move, and the fact that he could see that no one else could either, he still felt shivers run down his spine as he thought of the two monsters in Human form behind him. Welcome back to Earth, Humans. We truly hope you enjoyed our Tutorial. All teams have been grouped together with four others, all groups a short distance from the next. The area you are currently in is very important: it is where we shall be dropping resources every week. This includes living resources necessary to live with, a few luxury ones from your own previous lifestyles, and a few extra special ones which will help you to survive in this World. We highly recommend you protect this area for those very reasons, after all, they are just as appealing to you as they are to the other inhabitants of Earth. The planet Earth has transformed, allowing it new capabilities. We will now explain a few new realities of this world. Firstly, at the heart of every life-form you kill, you will find a Storage Stone. Simply apply pressure upon it to have a chance for it to release certain gifts. This can range from additional Statistic points, additional Experience, Skills and many more. We recommend that you chase the path to improving yourselves if you want to survive, and more importantly thrive on Earth. These Storage Stones will be an integral part of that. Secondly, you are no longer the dominating species on Earth, nor are there any right now. We recommend that you do not forget the Humanity you share with the people around you. Those bonds will only get stronger as you realise your weakness in this world and will be another integral part of survival. Thirdly, with the resources you get from the monsters around you, whether it be from their bodies or the Storage Stones, you can create buildings. These buildings will be simple and serve a simple function. They do have the ability to get better, but only if your species wills it and makes it so. And finally, what we have told you now is only a minuscule part of the reality you are now living. To end this introduction, we have a message from your Host: "Humans, I have provided you with as much support as I can. Your dominance over Earth will now be challenged through every means possible, and I truly hope that you will be able to survive through that. I repeat that you are no longer the dominating species: you will no longer have the luxury that comes alongside that. I believe that you being a part of our race means that you will find the Path to success eventually, I just hope it doesn't take you too long…" Stanis could feel his body coming back to his mind's control, but was still lost for movement as he tried to take in all the information from the message. It was a short moment later that he realised the severity of his situation as he discreetly placed one foot forward, before attempting to move the other. But danger wasn't far off as he could swear he felt a deathly-cold hand tighten around his shoulder. He paused for a second, hoping the feeling to go away. But it turned out to be a curse as he could only feel the tightness getting larger. And so he slowly turned his head around, only to come face to face with Orena. She still had blood painted across her face, as well as her hair braided up. Her eyes were dangerously provocative, although Stanis dared not to challenge her as he looked down in reflex. She let out a tinkle of laughter, before saying "Stay close boy. Tell the others the same, a battle is close." Stanis almost felt the urge to tell her he was no boy, despite his chubby face and short stature, he was a fully grown man, 18 years of age. But something inside of him told him to just shut up, and follow the lady's commands as he walked forwards to the others before relaying Orena's words. None of the others, apart from Jayesh, had much of a feeling about him, but it was the opposite for Orena who they all had a very clear and distinctive feeling about. It was then that the noise started, born a rumble across the ground, but soon became a shaking stampede across the land. Stanis turned his head towards the East, only to see a Woodlands. This had been the greenery he had seen at the corner of his eyes when he had been motionless, although it was more like a Forest than a Woodlands as he looked closer. It was about a kilometre away, and he could see small splodges of grey and green popping out from the Trees. The splodges slowly built up, before they began charging downwards towards the Humans. It was a few moments later that Stanis realised that the grey splodges were actually ravenous Wolves, and green splodges were Goblins with staves, running behind. There were even a few mounted on the Wolves. It looked like a battle really was coming…

Stanis lay on the ground, for the first time in the day having a long rest. Next to him was Jayesh who sat there meditating. Stanis thought about the most recent fight between Jayesh and Lucas, stuck on whether what Jayesh had done was right or not. In the moment he had felt it was just to kill Lucas, but now he felt different. Someone as strong as Lucas would survive, and more importantly thrive in a place like this: he could have tagged along to gain equal success alongside. It also seemed weird now: why had Jayesh been so enraged in the moment? "Jayesh, do you think we were right in killing Lucas?" "Ha-ha, it was me who killed him, not you boy." There was an awkward pause before Jayesh carried on talking. "Let me tell you a little about me. I used to have a high managerial position in a very successful company in New Delhi, a company which had exploded into success and was following that very path onwards. I had a daughter, a lovely thing. I don't usually let her go out at night, but it had been one of her closest friend's Birthday parties. I also knew her friend's parents, so I had felt fine with letting her go. The night passes, and the day comes around. My daughter isn't home yet. I had felt pain in both mind and body, I feared this was a sign by the Gods telling me she was dead. It was the next day when I found her, to my luck alive. However, it wasn't all to my luck, neither to hers. She had been raped…" Jayesh was now heating up, his face hardening and voice getting louder as he carried on, "I had refused many arranged marriages, not wanting her to be stuck with some stranger she wouldn't love. Needless to say that I was enraged to know that some shit had raped my own daughter, causing her trauma and injury. So I took her to the Police, and we filed a report. She vaguely knew the boy, and so I was quickly able to get information on the bastard. The week passes by, and I hear no news of the bastard being arrested. Instead what I do hear is many stories from my close colleagues, they say my daughter is a slut. They've all heard of how she was raped, and more importantly, they have all heard the real story. In the real story, my daughter is a slut who was asking to be raped. Instead of blaming the bastard, they instead pity him. What if he caught some kind of STI or bad karma from fucking such a beast? They blamed and insulted my daughter, the victim! I then went to the Police, only to realise that the report was proven to be wrong. Despite all the trauma and physical marks over my daughter, despite all the eyewitnesses, apparently, there is no evidence to convict him. Instead, they tell me to make sure my daughter doesn't lie again, but not before telling me to not mess with the bastard. He's a big-shot, easily able to grease a few hands, especially corrupt policing ones. I was furious and yet powerless, it was obvious that injustice had been done on all accounts and yet the world still blamed my daughter. I quit my job, and took my daughter far away from that hell-hole, far away from that hell of a society. But you know what Stanis? You know fucking what? The trauma stayed in her mind: that stuff isn't easy to forget. It ruined the previous life she had, and it continued to ruin the life she was having. She was betrayed by the people close to her who she trusted, and she was betrayed by the people in power and control, all for a few extra rupees. Now you tell me how I could have ever let that bastard of a boy Lucas go? One of them already ruined my life, and more importantly my daughter's. Why would I let another go when they are right in front of me? Perhaps this is a curse, a curse that I am now living due to all my bad karma. He willingly let that Wolf go, allowing it to tear that poor girl apart, all for a bit more experience! I will tear apart bastards like that, that is now all I can do for my daughter and any other victims like her. Jayesh's brown face had begun to flush red, sweat flowing down his face as he talked. It was clear that he was passionate about this, it was clear that he had no regrets about killing Lucas. During the following silence, Stanis thought about why he had disliked Lucas. "Jayesh, I can't say that I have gone through anything as hard as you or your daughter have been through. But I don't need that to make a judgement on Lucas. And you know what? I don't mind him being dead, he was a prick, a man in love with himself. I can trust my back to men like you, but I can't do the same for men like Lucas. Instead, I would fear my back with him…" The mood between the two warmed as they kept talking. Humans had reached the apex of the Food chain due to their social skills, and communication was how people connected. Stanis and Jayesh might be separated by age, but they were brought together by their beliefs and judgements. Soon the two had completely forgotten about the time limit on the preparation time as they relaxed, talking about things they dared not to in real life due to real-life consequences. It was then that Stanis asked Jayesh, "Jayesh, did you get an ability as you passed level 5?" "Yes I did. I got one called Titan's Taunt, apparently, it forces all the enemies around me to attack me. They have no choice but to attack me." Stanis meekly smiled before replying, "Are you sure that's a skill and not just a suicide wish. The trials haven't gotten any easier as we have carried on. I feel like using a skill like that will just have everyone around you attack you, and kill you. Ha-ha, have you been fighting suicide style all this time?" Jayesh chuckled, the first time he had laughed in a long time. "That's what I had also thought at first, what is the point if I will just die after using this skill. But I also upgraded my Constitution above 20 as I levelled up. The thingy in my head then said that the first attribute to pass a multiple of 20 could then be used to buff a skill. I only had Constitution over 20, and only had Titan's Taunt as a skill, so I just upgraded that. I then got Stone Skin, which greatly toughens up my skin during Titan's Taunt. Pretty good, eh?" Stanis was still not convinced as he said, "Are you sure that's going to stop swords or hammers?" Jayesh must have felt challenged as he then stood up, before motioning to Stanis to do the same. "I'll activate Titan's Taunt, try and hurt me during it." <Activate Titan's Taunt> Jayesh's body slightly grew, whereas his skin went dark grey, before also growing in size. The already large Indian felt only like a Giant now, like true Titan. Jayesh then motioned to Stanis, before putting forward his arm. Stanis, not wanting to do too much damage, first smashed his fist against Jayesh's arm. It was to his surprise that he found out that it felt exactly like, well, punching rock. Jayesh's arm hadn't even moved, whereas he felt like he'd broken his fist. Next, he picked up his axe before striking downwards with the blade. This was a far better attempt as the blade caused Jayesh's skin to crack slightly, but nothing else… Knowing that he had no way of breaking Jayesh's defences, Stanis was about to sit down, having gained a dead fist and nothing else when he remembered his own skill. "Wait a second Jayesh." Jayesh gave him back a look of impatience as he stated "You better hurry. This uses 1 mana per second, and I've only got 8 in total". Knowing that he only had around 4 seconds to test his skill in, Stanis quickly activated it. <Activate Layman's Rush> Unlike Jayesh's body, his didn't grow whatsoever. Instead what he felt was boundless energy flowing inside of him: he needed to release it! Not knowing how much damage he would do, Stanis decided to kick Jayesh across his chubby stomach. His leg sliced through the shrieking air, followed by a much louder roar of pain. "ARRRRGHHHH". Jayesh was literally shot into the air, before smashing back into the ground. There were small cracks under the heavy stone man, and more importantly, countless cracks across his stomach. Jayesh released Titan's Taunt, before rolling over onto his side as he tightly held his stomach. He managed to utter out, "You're a fucking cunt", in between his groans of pain. On the other hand, Stanis was all smiles as he saw his new friend lying on the ground in pain. He had genuinely felt downtrodden as he had heard Jayesh's skill's name. "Titan's Taunt" compared to "Layman's Rush". Now he felt great knowing how powerful his skill actually was. That showed Jayesh to gloat in front of him again! It was then that his skill ran out. The only way to describe it is akin to being absolutely high on drugs, before falling back to the reality of your situation. Stanis truly felt his fall from grace as he fell to his knees, his body, especially his leg, aching like hell as rivets of sweat dripped down. He now understood why his skill said that it was best used in serious moments to quickly turn the tables. It should have also included "You better kill your enemy in this time, otherwise, you are fucked!" Once the dull pains were over, the two of them began laughing as they realised their situation. They were in life or death situations, constantly up against vicious monsters with the constant fear of betrayal, and yet here they were beating each other up for fun! It was a bit later that the two of them began to warm up, the preparation time was nearly over. Jayesh showed Stanis how to properly warm up, as he had once been an amateur wrestler. Your preparation time is over! You will now be sent to your last trial, the last part of the tutorial. Here is a message from the host: "Remember Humans, be truly vicious. That is what you will need to survive, and that is what you will be learning now. As for your reward for surviving, how does your own planet sound?" Both Jayesh and Stanis felt the now-familiar sting, just before reopening their eyes. No longer were they on a plain landscape with nothing but dry ground. Instead, they were now in a luscious, green forest. The ground was ruled by moss and grass, and all around them were countless trees and bushes. You could only vaguely see the blue sky behind the canopy of emerald crowns, although the blinding sun still shone through like Gold. Following a swift scan of their surroundings was a quick scan of their new teammates, which there were 8 of. It seemed they were now in groups of 10s. There were three girls, and seven boys, including Jayesh and Stanis. All of them were standing in a circle within a wide green opening. Now that everyone had glanced at their environment, they should have all started talking, but instead the groups of people colluded together with others from their previous trials. A blonde, toned European girl walked across the circle towards an Asian girl, who had a nasty cut across her right foot. She was sitting on the wet ground with a few leather bandages wrapped around the cut, although they did little to staunch the blood flow. Next to the two girls stood an African woman. Unlike the other two girls who looked to be in their 20s, she was most likely in her 30s. Her posture was perfectly straight and erect, and next to her she held a very intimidating spear the length of her body. She had foreign blood across her face in stripes, and also had her hair in long braids knotted together into a half-ponytail. Overall she gave a very threatening image, and although the other two girls didn't know her, they clearly felt safer around her as they had edged closer. Closest to Stanis and Jayesh stood two men, one African-American and another European, possibly North American. The African-American was taller than everyone there, standing at around 6'2 and was incredibly muscled which matched his grave face. He was wearing a basketball vest, which was important as he had countless tattoos ranging down his toned arms. Next to him stood the white man who was just shy of the African-American's height. However, instead of being muscled, he was quite chubby and looked innocent. Although that would be a mistake for anyone to think, considering the fact that he had already passed several trials… Both men seemed to know each other and seemed in mutual trust of each other. Being the closest, Jayesh decided to talk to them, who was followed by Stanis. The African-American turned out to be Caleb whereas the White man was David. It turned out that both were from U.S.A and had both been living in the same City, although neither had known the other. Finally on the far end stood two Indians and one Asian man. None of the three was very unique, as both Indians had dark brown skin alongside thin moustaches. Both were also wearing shirts and jeans, although in different styles. The Asian man was just as typical, he had yellow tinted skin alongside slanted eyes and short, black hair. The most interesting thing about him would be the fact that his face was quite chubby, especially when in comparison to his slim figure. All three of them had been through the previous trial together and had quite a bit of blood on their clothes. There was, however, something far more interesting about the three than just their appearance. It was the fact that all four of them would have survived the last trial together, it had been a pity that the fourth had been a Mexican girl who was far too good looking for her own good when in the company of wolves. Now the three scumbags were entranced by the European girl's appearance… The entity hadn't made its message yet, and the men far outnumbered the girls here. They were sure they could have a bit of fun before the trial started…

His face was deep in the earth and his tongue was shrivelled from the sand. He gagged and spat, using his arms to simultaneously push himself up. His eyes were strained and raw, as if he had just woken up from an uncomfortable dream. Perhaps he had. When he had no saliva left to spit, he rubbed his hands on his trousers and used them to wipe the grains off his tongue. While he was doing this, he noticed how cranky his body felt, as if it was covered to the brim with rust. His shoulders kept locking in random positions and his fingers moved erratically. Breaking out of a fit of coughs, he pumped his chest out and pulled his arms back as far as he could go, as if they were taut strings being stretched. A thunderclap started from his back and ran down his spine. His eyes went wide as if he’d just snorted a line of cocaine. His pupils swelled and devoured his irises, making his vision vibrant and sharp. He felt a sharp sting of pain and then a tsunami of pleasure wash over him, sending his body and mind into euphoria. He looked down at his hands and was amazed at the number of pale stains over his milky skin. They were obviously from Pete’s treatment and yet he hadn’t noticed them till now. He thoughtlessly cracked his knuckles, releasing even more thunderclaps, before feeling a similar add-on to the euphoria, albeit smaller. He then tilted his head down, towards his legs. Just like his hands, despite being milky white, there still were pastel stains ranging down both of them. Expectant, he raised one leg and shot it down, feeling the euphoria before hearing the thunderclap this time. He did the same to the other leg, and stretched the rest of his body, before staring wide-eyed into the sky. He had never noticed it before but all the clouds looked devilish, echoing the barren, inferno-filled world the apocalypse had brought with it. It was so bright, so blue, so beautiful. He raised his fist and stared at it and the sky behind it. It was shaking from side to side, filled to the brim with energy and excitement. He couldn’t stand around; he felt far too energetic, far too deep down in euphoria to swim back up. He dashed and immediately found rocks, apathetic of their size or shape. He hastily dug holes and placed them inside, making sure they were nested before making links with all of them. He placed mental resistances against them and then began to shoot lightning bolts at them, his teeth quaking with excitement. The pools of lightning built up, gaining momentum and fervour, a vicious, vicious fervour. His barrier crumbled down, piece after piece falling. And so, he let down the whole thing. His shout was quiet, basically mute compared to the thunder. He was like a reverse pylon, an arc of electricity shooting out of his body into the clouds, lighting up the surrounding skies in a menacing flash of light. He fell limp like a piece of wood. But the lightning wasn’t done just yet. The potential difference between his body and ground was so large that the energy that had slipped into the ground came back, barraging him with another hit of electricity. His body violently convulsed, a plaything to the world’s forces. Time passed and he woke up again, his mind and body in a worse state than before. He eventually got up and stumbled around, falling onto his face many a time. But the pain was nothing, nothing compared to what was coming. He shook his body and stretched it, and the bones cracked. The pleasure made him gasp for breath, completely drunk on the intense euphoria. Time passed, and time passed. The cycle repeated itself and he fell further into depravity, his appetite for pleasure growing. However, as if in a cruel twist of fate, the more he did it, the less pleasure he got, making each experience worse than the last. Yet, he couldn’t stop; of course, he couldn’t stop. An unmeasurable time later, he got back to his feet, Orena’s armour already far past ruined. His mind was sharp, focused on one point: lightning pleasure. But he knew he wasn’t going to get it anymore; his body was already tempered to its maximum, there were no impurities left to clear. So, he sat for he could do nothing else. He knew his ego would come and rescue him sometime in the future, and when that time came. When that time came… **** Orena followed the other two down the unorthodox path. Tanya had a ranger class and so she led them, following the necromancer’s tracks. As for Moonshine, she listlessly whistled, uncaring of the noise she made. Orena knew Tanya well; she had been one of the powerhouses when the Yora village had still been the Yona village, early in its infancy. She was good with the bow, although she couldn’t even put up a fight against today’s powerhouses, whether it be people like Caleb or Moonshine, let alone monsters like Sofia, Pete or Stanis. Or the necromancer woman. As for Moonshine, she had come with Richie, the portly man. At first, Orena had assumed her to be Richie’s sugar babe, a leech that just lived off of his power. But it was soon after Moonshine had arrived that Orena had drastically changed her view of the red-headed woman. No, she wasn’t selling her body to survive, far from it. She owned her own destiny and her proficiency in gravity control was something even Caleb struggled with, let alone anyone else in the village. Tanya had a longbow hoisted across her back and Moonshine had a shortsword by her belt. Orena had a long, simple spear in her hands. She wasn’t worried about meeting the necromancer lady, after all, what was the worst that could come of it? Death? As much as she wanted to live, she wasn’t scared of death either. As long as it would rid the village of the plague that infected it, well, that was enough, that was worth dying for. Tanya raised her hand and signalled to stop. Orena abruptly stopped and gripped her spear, while Moonshine peered over Tanya’s shoulders, looking for what had scared her. “What is it?” she asked after finding nothing out of the blue. Tanya pointed in the distance, further than Moonshine could see. “Either someone really hated that body, or, more likely, it was used even after its death,” Orena nodded. Although she couldn’t see the corpse in question, if Tanya could see what she had just described, then it only made sense to stop. Moonshine looked between the two. “Let’s just go. The necromancer hasn’t sensed us yet, has she?” “No,” Tanya replied. “But I can feel a wicked aura here. She will be able to see us soon enough I think,” “Well, the thing is you she can’t see us and you can’t see her here,” Moonshine said, “So let’s get going,” Orena felt sweat drip into her grip as she walked. Even when facing Stanis, even when he had been threatening her, she hadn’t felt this scared. But the aura this place exuded, just like Tanya had said, was simply wicked. Orena had no idea how Stanis had fought the necromancer, let alone how they would manage to escape if negotiations did go wrong. In little time, Tanya stopped them once again. “I can see walking corpses there,” she said as she pointed into the distance. Once again, neither Orena nor Moonshine could see what she was talking about. “What are they doing?” Moonshine asked. They waited as Tanya watched the corpses for a few minutes. “I don’t know. They’re doing a lot of things but it looks like their main purpose is to collect corpses. A battle went down here not too long ago,” “Then let’s go further in,” Moonshine said. Tanya turned wide-eyed towards her, staring with shock. “What?” Moonshine asked back. “Orena, prepare yourself for battle, same with you Tanya. No point in standing around when we came here with a purpose,” The trio walked closer and closer, and soon Orena saw the corpses as well. They were clearly not human and they were clearly not newly-born zombies, but the corpses they carried were quite recent like Tanya had said. “So, what are you doing here looking for me?” a soft voice came from behind them. Orena immediately shifted her body around and snapped her spear out, ready to strike. Tanya fumbled but similarly nocked an arrow, and Moonshine turned around looking largely unconcerned. Despite all three of them having their mana spread out around them, they still hadn’t detected the woman sneak up on them. There she stood, blonde hair brushing over her shoulders. She gazed at them with piercing, blue eyes. Around her stood only one zombie and yet Orena already felt damned…

Cough, cough, cough. Stanis woke up in a fit of coughs, wheezing loudly as he tried to breathe in. His whole body hurt. There was not a single part of his body that wasn't in pain, not a single limb that wasn't damaged. After coughing out a fair bit of blood and phlegm, he then tried to cry. Only that tears wouldn't come out, instead he vividly felt how raw his eye-ducts were, and more importantly how much they stung. Due to the pain, his body tried to subconsciously cry more, which only caused him even more misery. The pain spiralled upwards until his body just lost all energy to move, instead opting to lie there on the ground in perfect stillness. Stanis Volkov Age: 18 years Mana capacity: 18 (regeneration is capacity/4 per hour) Level 9 (Progress to the next level is 17%) Unallocated points: 2 Strength: 18 [15] Dexterity: 18 [15] Constitution: 16[15] Intelligence: 12[12] Wisdom: 12[10] Tenacity: 16[14]. Skills: Layman's Rush   Please spend your unallocated points. Unable to move his body and unwilling to move his mouth, Stanis expanded Constitution within his mind. Constitution: The attribute that determines the tenacity of the body, how tough and hard-wearing it is, and the stamina one has. Upgrading this attribute will allow you to take more punches, for a longer time, and still be able to get up faster than others due to your increased recovery. He immediately willed his two points into Constitution. If he needed anything right now, it was the power to recover. Constitution has been increased from 16 to 18. It is above your species' average of 15. Stanis Volkov Age: 18 years Mana capacity: 18 (regeneration is capacity/4 per hour) Level 9 (Progress to the next level is 17%) Strength: 18 [15] Dexterity: 18 [15] Constitution: 18[15] Intelligence: 12[12] Wisdom: 12[10] Tenacity: 16[14]. Skills: Layman's Rush What proceeded this was hours of consistent pain as Stanis simply lay there. Over time, the pain did begin to dull, allowing him some simple movement with his limbs, well most of them anyway. Stanis wasn’t sure of how many hours had passed, but he was definitely getting better. Stanis forced his right arm up, lifting it to eye-level, before allowing it to drop back down. He then brought both his legs up, before dropping them too. He would have done the same for his left arm, or at least tried, however he couldn't even feel it. It was almost like he didn't have a left arm, his sense of feeling was cut by the shoulder. It was as he touched his left arm that he noticed the chilling cold, a deathly cold… And so Stanis went back into his depression, brooding for the countless hours at the situation he found himself in. Not only was his body close to breaking, his left arm had fully broken and left him with just memories of having four limbs. He loathed this new world: it had ruined the effort he had made to remake his life on past-Earth, and now it gave him a death sentence by taking away his arm in a kill-or-be-killed world. "ARRRRRRRGHH!" He wailed in anger, followed by sobs of grief. There were only the two critically injured people left in the Injured Tent, and so Stanis's actions were unseen for the most part. This was apart from Jayesh who had just come across the tent, before listening in, and then walking off. Sometimes time was the best remedy. On the other hand, Stanis felt lost and angry, why did fate love tormenting him so badly? It was a repetition of violence, death and agony over and over again, with only fleeting moments of calm before the cycle restarted. The pain and misery he had gone through when casting away his old life and friends had been large, but he had still done it as he had hoped. Now he hopeless; he was handicapped in a world where progress was the difference between life and death. He began pounding the ground with his right arm as his misery grew, apathetic about the extra pain he was causing the healing fist. He was sick of this life, sick of always being on edge, sick of constantly wondering whether he was the next one to die or whether it was the person next to him. "AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAARRRRRRRRRRRRRRRGHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!!" A howl of a mixture of anger and grief escaped his lips. After releasing his emotions, his body felt exhausted, and he once again became incapable of moving… **** **** A fair distance away from the camp stood the Russian man who had been against Juan for leadership, alongside his subordinate who filled him on everything that had happened in the camp. "It seems Juan is basically the full leader now; there is now a clear power structure and people follow his word." The Russian man raised his eyebrow at his subordinate, who was a large, muscular man who had a very wide chest. His face seemed to be a constant scowl and thus was loosely known as Scowly by the others. Scowly felt the need to explain this to his leader as he saw the expression, "He has set it so that he is at the top of the chain, followed by the Dead 4, and finally the rest of us. It seems all the loot from last battle has already been used up by the Dead 4, and Juan." The Russian man placed his knee in front, before taking on the thinkers pose. It made sense to him that Juan would sneakily take some of the loot without telling anyone, in fact he doubted anyone from the camp was surprised by this. What was more interesting was the fact that Juan had placed himself so high up the pedestal, without the power to maintain it. Self-power was the most important factor here in the apocalypse, and Juan did not have enough of it to put himself above everyone else. Wondering of ways he could topple this fragile structure Juan had just set, the Russian man thought of something he had recently heard. “I heard some boy brutally murdered a large Wolf, bigger than any on Earth, with just his bare hands yesterday. I then heard that the Wolf actually had a skill scroll in its Storage Stone, which Juan took for himself. You think that boy is worth standing up for? He is definitely strong, and will be grateful if we help him.” Scowly responded, “Ahh that story. The boy was strong, that’s for sure, but I’ve heard from the nurse girl that his left arm is now broken. Like so cold that it’s just not part of his body anymore. I reckon it’s too much of a risk to do for a cripple like that: he might be strong now but everyone will be past him in a week. But it’s your call…” The Russian man thought for a while before coming to a decision: “Naa, you’re right. Far too risky when things are so volatile like this. Worth reconsidering though if the kid survives the next battle…” **** **** Meanwhile in the Headquarters Tent was Juan. His hands were shivering with excitement as he looked at what was in his hands. When he had gotten his first skill, he had been hopeful. However, it was within moments those spirits had been crushed: his skill had turned out to be that he could amplify orders by enduing mana into speech. It was effectively useless in a hyena's den like this; who cared about team strength when he didn't even have the personal strength to stand above the others? But this could change that. It was the skill scroll that had been taken from Stanis's kill. Juan read it once more to make sure that it was the real deal. Frozen boundary In an area, depending on how much mana is used, freeze everyone in it for a second or longer. The shattering of frost will cause injury on release. A simple skill all in all. But this was enough, even the fucking Dead 4 that lorded over him would fall to him now. This was because if they did fight him, they would quickly get the advantage and follow it up. But what if their actions became frozen for a moment? It was enough for him to lunge forward and stab them, enough to instantly turn the tables. This skill would become beyond strong if he used it at the right moment. Juan only thought about the people he could surpass with this skill. He gave no thought to Stanis who he had stolen the skill off, after all who cared the opinion of a liability?     A short distance away from the Injured tent sat Jayesh. He was staring vacantly at his open, calloused palms. Having been through serious stuff himself, Jayesh knew that time was a necessity as it would cause people to calm down and become more rational. But what if Stanis was set down the wrong path, which was easy in a crazy place like this, would he not just keep going down that path with no one to advise him? Jayesh felt it was his duty to at least help out his young friend; they hadn’t known each other for long, but Jayesh knew that this kid was too nice and naïve to survive in a hellhole like this. And so the kid would either die, or have a massive personality shift without anyone there to help him. Jayesh forced himself up to his feet, and was just about to march towards the Injured tent when another thought struck him. Considering how cruel this world was, he would be incapable of looking after Stanis in short time. From what he had seen so far, Stanis seemed sensible, and had already made the right choice to fix himself up in his previous life. Could this situation not act as a catalyst to further mature the kid? And thus he sat back down; he trusted Stanis. And more importantly, he hoped his decision was the right one…

For a moment, it seemed as if the world had frozen over. The villagers on the wall watched Jen retreating in the distance, far too stunned by what had happened to even think, let alone move. Then, Pete lobbed himself over the wall, followed by Skint and Bear. They ran towards Stanis’s body: a horrific sight. His bones were still in-tact, mana-strengthened enough to not crack under the Asteroid’s landing impact. But his flesh didn’t have that benefit, at least not to the same standard. This was why most of his flesh had been torn off their bones, leaving him a pitiful sight even when pitted against other corpses. He looked as if a messy diner had slobbered all over his bones, leaving flesh in only the hardest to reach areas. Skint looked at Stanis’s body. The heart was ruptured and the lungs were wide-open, with various others organs in similar states. He couldn’t help but put a hand to his mouth as he realised Stanis was still, miraculously, alive. “Unbelievable,” he muttered. Pete took a large canteen from his waist, enchanted it, and began pouring it all over Stanis, at least what was left of him. Once done, he commanded Bear to take the body into the village. Chances were that Jen wouldn’t return but even the slightest probability was already too much. Bear delicately picked up the body and threw it over his back, and then started running towards the village, fully aware of how much time they actually had. Skint followed on behind, and Pete took a deep gulp of his drink before doing the same. It had been less than 5 minutes since they had left the village but upon arrival, they found vast crowds blocking their entrance into the village. “OUT THE WAY!” Skint shouted, clearly agitated. Several people responded to him with curses, while others simply watched. “We got yer leader here. Get the fuck out of the way,” Pete clarified, although his response was much the same. Seeing that the disgruntled warriors preferred blocking their path instead of moving, Pete cast Dragon’s roar. A deep growling sound emanated his throat, inhuman and threatening. Some of the warriors caught onto the danger from the sound alone but were already too late to escape. Thick waves of fire burst from Pete’s mouth, scorching close to 20 people. Their screams were silent compared to the fire’s crackles, and seconds later, shrivelled, coal-black bodies littered the centre of the crowd. From the top of the wall, Serb watched the collision with the rest of the Jaguars. Inside his mind, he debated which choice to make, but outwardly, he stood cold and expressionless, the rest of the Jaguars shocked and confused by his lack of orders. Before the crowd could react aggressively, the trio released their auras. The crowd backed away at this, finally aware of the devilish beehive they had poked. And yet, they didn’t give way. Pete squinted his eyes and motioned to Bear to drop Stanis’s body. But just before the collision devolved any further, a sharp voice cut through all the rustling. “Open way,” Alyona said. The crowd quickly listened and parted for the trio. Pete glared at Alyona just before he entered the village, now aware of who had set up the human barricade. The trio ran towards the marketplace, followed on by the crowd. They arrived and found a building to rent, throwing Stanis inside before gathering several items from the marketplace, all under Alyona’s gaze. She eventually sighed before walking away, ordering all but a few to follow her. Minutes later, as Pete was lathering modified medicine onto Stanis, an announcement set the village abuzz. “All Powerhouses towards the Village Hall. An important decision will be made in a few minutes,” This message was sent through the village’s notification system and through several of Alyona’s men who shouted it out in public. Upon hearing this, Pete looked towards Stanis. He was now in a better condition than before, his organs largely healed and flesh recovering. In about a day or two, he would be good enough to fight again. The only reason he had survived this long was due to his stats, his Endurance and Tenacity sky-high. But even with those, Stanis could only survive the next two days with Pete’s medical skills. Sighing, Pete looked at Skint and Bear. “You two keep supplying him with mana and make sure he isn’t attacked. I’ll go and check what’s up outside,” he said. Following this, he walked towards the village hall, fully aware of the multiple people watching him along the way. In front of the hall, he took out his canteen and began drinking, emptying and throwing it to the side before entering. Inside, several hundred people stood around. The furniture that had previously decorated the hall had been stripped away, allowing more people to fit in the hall. Seeing that everyone worthy of mention was in the hall, Alyona started the meeting. “I’m sure you all know why we’re here instead of rebuilding our defences. Stanis,” she said before pausing. “He’s the strongest here, no doubt, but I think his actual utility, and leadership, is questionable,” She looked around the hall, catching plenty of eyes before carrying on. “I’m not strong enough to make a choice that all of you will follow, neither are any of you. The only person capable of that is, thankfully, the person currently injured. This meeting is about whether he should live or not,” she finally revealed, not batting an eye as she said it. “Could those who will argue for him move to the left side, and those who will argue against him move to the right,” People started moving, almost all towards the right. The two people who moved to the left stood out, their position like David against Goliath. They were Rikkey and Pete, and both were quickly scrutinised by everyone else in the hall. Serb stood with Niss on the right side. He looked at the brown, oak floorboards for a few seconds before walking across to the other side, followed by Niss who smiled at his decision. “Ok, I think the decision is quite clear,” Alyona said with a flat tone, mostly flat anyway as she couldn’t fully hide her pride, “But I think it would even better if we can all reach the decision together,” Pete openly smirked at this, earning him even more looks. He hadn’t been in the village for a long time but he did know about the 3 who stood beside him. Rikkey was the head-blacksmith, somebody with the ability to create remarkable equipment, someone who was irreplaceable to the village, whereas Serb and Niss headed the Jaguars, a force just a hair’s breadth short of the humans in terms of power. Alyona wanted to convince them to join her as they were both too influential to lose. As for himself, he was close to certain that she knew nothing about him. Alyona ignored Pete and carried on, attempting to appeal to Rikkey and Serb. “He’s strong in battle, so strong in fact that he turns the tides of battle himself. But he has a similarly sized detrimental effect out of battle, taking power like a tyrant and then failing to do anything. I think you’ve all seen this,” she said while opening her arms wide to include everyone in the hall, “but his personality is volatile, extremely so. So much so that I no longer wonder when he will betray and destroy the village, leading to all of our deaths, I now just wonder when…” Several of the people who surrounded her began applauding, the notable figures being Jayesh, Sil and Richie. Others stood silent and uncaring like Caleb, Orena and David. But the applause was spoken over by Moonshine, her tone sharp. She had her red hair tied across her back, giving her an elegant look despite the mud that covered her armour. “I think you’re giving him too much credit, Alyona,” she said, sneering right afterwards. “He’s strong, sure, but his fighting is wild and random. In the fight against the one-eyed things, he took the spotlight but was thrown around the battlefield like a ragdoll till Caleb and Serb stepped in. As for the fight against those purple giants, we all saw how justly he fought. So justly, in fact, that he split up his kills evenly, each one of the giants for each one of our forces, his own allies,” She directly looked at Serb and Niss. “You saw how many Jaguars he killed there; he’s a walking bomb. If you choose to keep him alive now, you’ll only regret it later when he explodes. And when that happens, I think you can already see how many of us he will take with him before he finally falls, after all, we’ve all seen how good he is at killing his own allies,” … A cacophony of clapping followed, people warmly gazing at Moonshine. Serb himself glared at her, although inside, he felt lost on what to do. Pete stood at his side, feeling slightly embarrassed and guilty at what he’d done. And even after all he had done, Stanis had still failed to take Jen down. He loudly coughed, drowning out the applause and turning the attention back to him. “That’s all nice and all, but how are you all going to survive without him? I saw it from the walls,” he said as he pointed at Caleb. “It must have been real hard to strike down an immobilised enemy, eh?” He then gave the same raised-eyebrows look at Serb. Just before Moonshine struck back at him, Pete carried on. “And the fight outside the walls, eh? You guys were doing really well without him, weren’t you? Not like they’d already broken into the village and minutes away from massacring you all, eh?” Pete looked around the hall with a glint in his eyes, his teeth already on show. “You all saw the last fight against that Necromancer monster. None of you, even if you all joined together, could do that.” He then pointed towards Alyona, the chuckle deep in his lungs leaking into his voice. “I don’t know why you want 1000s of people to dig their own graves, but it all sounds a bit fucking sadistic to me,” Pete didn’t receive any applause, not even a single clap for what he said. Instead, he got exactly what he’d wanted as a large number of people just leaning towards Alyona’s side began to reconsider what they were doing. Pete looked around and saw several people hesitating, self-conscious of where they stood. “Come on, if you want to survive and live, come to the right side already,” he said with a confident tone. In response, almost 20 people moved from the right side to the left, beefing up David and shrinking the Goliath. “Pete, is it?” said Alyona, “I don’t think that necromancer was a monster. In fact, if my vision serves me right, that looked exactly like a girl. And if my memory serves me right, she would have cleared away all the Titans without Stanis’s self-harming effects anyway,” “Pfft, woman, you should be glad you don’t know her. She’s as good as a monster. She’s a fucking necromancer, why do you think she was heading towards this village? To eat biscuits and tea?” It was at this that Sofia, from the Silvermoon village, came in. “Pete, don’t chat shit here. I was in the Colosseum right next to her. She didn’t kill anyone in there, despite everyone wanting her medal,” Sofia then addressed the entire hall. “I don’t know much about her but I do know that she’s one of the ten strongest humans on Earth, alongside Stanis. I don’t know what tension they have but she can serve just as a good a protector as he can, in fact better as she doesn’t kill her own allies,” Pete kept his expression masked with a smile but couldn’t help but gulp. …

Pete hadn't meant to intentionally say it as loudly as he had. Silence followed as all heads turned towards the duo. They were both wearing simple, thread clothes without armour or weapons, and now apparently one of them had died… Stanis turned to look at Pete. His eyes were dull and easily distracted, obviously drunk, but beneath the dullness was a glint as sharp as a blade's. Pete had revealed a part of his true personality a while back and there was no way Stanis could forget that; right now, Pete had drunk enough for a normal man to be tipsy but not for him to be. In the end, Stanis sighed instead of calling him out. It looked like the walk back wasn't going to be as quiet as he had initially hoped. "Yeah, she fucked me good," "You didn't even get a single one?" Pete asked. "Naa. Well, technically I got all of them, but I didn't manage to do it with my own hands. I'll make sure to pay each of them back what they deserve when I see them," "Especially Jen?" "Especially Jen." "You probably won't meet them though," Stanis smirked and ignored Pete's comment. As the enemies got stronger, the territory humanity held would keep decreasing. Considering the top ten's strength, they obviously wouldn't be killed during the period. Perhaps not tomorrow but they were all destined to meet again someday. And for some of them, Stanis was intent on making it their last day. Sensing the drop in temperature, Pete knew he had reached the threshold. If he pushed his luck anymore, he would discover who was now stronger but that was also something he wasn't so eager to find out in such a fair situation like this. Instead, he went towards a topic that was soon going to become reality. "When do you think the stronger ones are coming?" Stanis thought back in time for a second before answering. "What did they say? 1 week or something?" "I think so," replied Pete, taking another gulp and draining the whole canteen. The woman walking behind them must have been debating with herself whether she should talk as when she did, she started with a stutter. "W-wwh," She cleared her throat before trying again. "What do you mean by stronger ones?" Skint lifted his head up as he heard her ask the question. He was just as interested in their conversation as the woman was. "Enemies around level adroite Mosyte will be allowed on Earth soon," Pete said lazily. "Adroite Mosyte? But that's way too quick. There's no chance we can contest them," she responded. Straight afterwards, she blushed and Pete loudly smirked. "There's no fairness to any of it. We aren't really meant to win in the first place," Stanis finally said. After a brief silence, the woman restarted the conversation. "Where are you guys from?" "Yora," Stanis said. "Us three are from Haven," Pete said. The woman instantly moved her hands closer to her daggers after she heard this. But before she could add her own comments, the two at the front, much to her relief, stole back the spotlight. "You're from Haven? I thought they were meant to be strong there," Stanis said. A thunder-like chuckle rumbled from Bear and Skint choked on his own laughter. It was only Pete who kept a straight face. "We are strong," he said. "Ha, I don't mean it that way. I meant I heard that there were tons of strong people there so why was it just you guys who actually came all this way to advance?" "Ha-ha. Why would they want to lift their arses at all when they have everything they want there?" Pete said. … It took a second for Stanis to see the full picture. From how strong Pete had been in the past, he had most likely been one of the higher people at Haven. But considering his character, it made sense that many people wouldn't follow him there. And so to test his luck, he had followed the mana-trail to advance to tier-four. Suddenly, Stanis remembered the woman with them. "What about you, where you from?" The spotlight was back on her. She tightened her fingers around her dagger handles as she answered. "Silvermoon village," "Hey, ain't that one of those ones?" Pete asked. "Ya," Skint answered. "I think the second strongest one." Stanis turned his head with a puzzled expression on his face. Skint instantly answered. "There were a few villages fighting Haven back at the time when we were there, I think Yora village was one of the weaker ones at the time. Silvermoon was basically one not too far away from Haven, but one with elite warriors basically," "Oh," Stanis replied. "So are you the strongest from there. Umm, what's your name?" "Sofia," the woman answered. "Yes, I was the strongest there." She loosened the grip over her daggers as she saw how relaxed and apathetic the group were to each other's allegiances. It was at this time that the group saw the hint of light at the end of the tunnel. "So, what are you guys going to do?" Stanis asked. All four of the people here were strong enough to provide valuable support; it was ideal that they didn't go too far away from him so that he could easily hunt them down if needed. While it was true that none of them were actually allied, instead the opposite, Stanis couldn't see any reason why that couldn't be the case. "What are we going to do boys?" Pete asked, scratching his own face with the canteen as he spoke. It was clear that he didn't really care about their destination. "Don't really care baws," Skint replied. "Haven. I have payback to give," Bear said. "Haven it is then," Pete said to Stanis. "I'm going to Silvermoon," Sofia said. They exited the tunnel as she said this. They were currently on a grass-covered hill. The sun was shining bright and a cool wind was breezing past. "Right then," Stanis said. "I'll chase you guys down if anything comes up. Find me in Yora if you need to," Following that, the five of them split ways. Perhaps still wary of Pete's trio and Haven's reputation, Sofia followed Stanis back to Yora before parting ways. ...

Stanis walked along a rugged path. Leathery flora grew through the seams of the ground. The build-up of cracked stone made the path look like the rest of the natural terrain. But Stanis knew better. The last time he had been here, the last time he had walked up this path, well, he hadn't even been walking and he remembered very little of it. However, he did remember the fact that he had been crawling up the path, his legs torn and bloody, his mind numb but strangely determined. The sun was now low in the sky, ready to see the other face of Earth. There were thick, grey clouds around the mountain, ready to unleash the rain they had chained up inside. He saw boulders around precarious corners, ready to break past their boundaries and accompany him to death any second. But they didn't, and the clouds didn't rain, and the sun didn't leave just yet. It wasn't the best he could ask for but it wasn't the worst either. The suspicion deep in his heart was still there; he knew the village was hiding something. He remembered Pete giving him impure mana-water to drink during the war, which had in turn transformed him into a wild tempest, shredding through all and any. Then, he had become rightly enraged after seeing Jen, that bitch. He had fought her to the bitter end, literally for him and figuratively for her. The last thing he remembered was Jen running away in the distance, and his powerlessness as he lay there, unable to even tilt his head. Stanis clenched his fists and growled, before forcefully booting a fist-sized rock out of the way. He had been helpless then; he had been pathetic. As for what happened after that, he had very little idea. It was confirmed that Pete, Skint and Bear had taken him into their care. But why? And what had they done? His tanned skin was now paper-white and as soft as mud. The muscles and callouses that had made him him had turned into soft and delicate skin. He knew that Pete, nor Bear, nor Skint had engaged in the wars, instead opting to stay back and … do what? They were some of the strongest people he knew and yet they stood back like dodgy backstabbers. No, they were dodgy and sly: there was no question about that. And he knew they were up to no good, no good at all, and yet he had no idea where to find them. He growled once more and launched another rock out of the way. He was now reaching the top of the mountain where the flora grew much taller and tougher. The curved, bronze-tinted plants grew like bamboo, making an impenetrable forest of their own. Stanis had to slash them out of the way as he got closer to the top. He had stolen a coarse longsword from Orena's house, although she seemed to not have minded him taking it due to its lack of elegance. However, what it did have was pure, messy power, but even it struggled against the tough plants. An hour later, he sighed and put his sword down. Behind him lay hundreds upon hundreds of chopped plants, and in front of him lay the top of the mountain. Strangely enough, the peak of the mountain was arena shaped and sized, and was also clear of all the natural rubbish that had blighted the pathway. The top was completely empty of life, although Stanis knew better than that. "Yils," he shouted with his palms around his mouth. "Zelgard," "Yils! Zelgard!" He shouted several minutes, before finally giving up. "I killed a tier-four," he said, "Just like you told me to. In fact, I also killed a tier-five, a Laeon rank," He was met with silence. Stanis felt his temper rise but managed to keep rein of it. He was now stronger than he was before but he also knew that Yils was far above him. "Where are you?" he eventually bellowed down the mountain slope, hoping that they were somewhere close enough to hear him. But like before, he was met with the same response. Close to an hour later, Stanis grumbled curses under his breath and sat down. He remembered how they could make their home invisible to all forces with just a simple click. If it was persistence and patience they wanted, then that was they were going to get. Besides, he knew that as long as he settled down here, they would eventually have to show themselves. If they weren't so eager to help him out, well, he might as well start what he had come here for… **** Caleb dowsed his great-sword with water and began cleaning it. There were blood stains across its blade, and the edge was chipped in some areas. He wiped the blade with a cloth, repeatedly scrubbing the cloth up and down. Some of the stains were much tougher and seemed impervious to his method but he kept going, giving no thought as to stop. He didn't do this because he liked a shiny sword on the battlefield. He fought on it every day; it was his home. He felt comfortable in his home, whether he held a dirty sword or a clean one. He didn't do this because he wanted to maintain the sword either. That was just a side-effect of his diligence. No, he simply did this out of habit because he was so used to it that he could do it without a single thought or command. His body already knew what to do and that eased his mind. There wasn't much to live for anymore. He had been someone before, someone with life, hope, and ambition. Then the apocalypse had come down like a hammer, crushing the lives of many. He hadn't been one of the many, no, he had been one of the few who had only risen further due to the apocalypse. He had risen to levels he didn't know possible; people peeked at him with respect and envy, far too scared to look at him outright. He had become a leader: a character people simply couldn't ignore. And then… And then. And then nothing. He had been worn down by time and experience itself. The more time he invested into fighting, the better he became, and the less illusioned he became. There wasn't any fruit to fell in fighting, no treats to pick up afterwards. This world prevented that; there was no life to be had except through fighting, and that was not a life worth living. It was slippery slope downwards. They fought with the intent of winning, the hope of life afterwards, and if they lost, good riddance. But if they won, well, then they would simply fall lower into a tougher fight with worse odds. There was no time to breathe, no time to… At least he was good at it though. Caleb broke out of his thoughts and looked at the timepiece next to him. It was time for another soul-sucking meeting. There was a knock on his door. He opened it and saw David, an old friend. The two of them walked out and into the street, towards Alyona's luxurious mansion. They were greeted and he sat, blankly staring at the vase opposite him. It was on Stanis again, of course it was on Stanis again. If there was one person Caleb pitied, it was Stanis. The stronger you were, the longer it took you to realise the downward spiral you were in. And Stanis had only become powerful recently. And he was young. And he was stupid. Which all in all meant that he had a lot more time of illusionment left before he saw the world for what it actually was. By then, however, it was most likely he would be one of the strongest beings in the universe, while Caleb would most likely be lying in his grave, content at the shot he had at least given. "Do you agree, Caleb?" Alyona asked, bringing him back to attention. "Yeah, sure," he said, absent-mindedly. "Good," she said as she looked around the well-furnished room. "Tanya, Moonshine and Orena, you three find the necromancer and make contact. Make sure to take caution, and just escape if you fail. The rest of us will try and hold our ground meanwhile, alright?" Caleb found himself oddly nodding. At least something was going to happen now, something more…