 
### Fantasy World Online - Volume 1

By: Jimmy Fruits

Copyright 2016 Jimmy Fruits

Smashwords Edition

### Author's Comments

Hello and thank you for coming to check out my book. This story is a VRMMO story set in a game world. However, I must first MAJORLY EMPHASIZE that this isn't a cookie cutter copy-pasted VRMMO style story. You won't see a character picking a blade of grass and acquiring a single skill that instantly solves all of his or her food problems forever while providing stat boosts. There are a ton of unique mechanics that completely separate this story's world from others. The story is significantly more oriented around 'a person born into a game world' rather than 'a user playing or trapped in a game world'. This subtle difference influences the knowledge of characters and makes the world more immersive.

This story has a very large emphasis on realistic cause and effect, a balanced world, unconnected events and characters making reasonably smart, and perhaps even complex, decisions based on their intelligence and circumstances. Characters are rarely provided with solutions out of pure coincidence that are pivotal in an upcoming event. Super cheat events like a boss instantly teleporting a party member to a jail 100 miles away can't happen without an extremely justifiable cause, like the dungeon being very high level or there being many warnings. But, I hate when cheat-like teleportation and abilities are used to advance the plot, so you will almost never see this in my work to create false suspense and drama.

My motivation for writing this book is to act as a coping method while watching and reading Japanese media. I wrote this book while writing ARK and LMS. If you are one of the people who complained in the comments about all of the things wrong with those stories, then this is your dream story.

As a final note, this book is volume one and I plan to finish this series in 10 volumes max. The book is over 70,000 words long! I have easily put 100+ hours into writing this story. Everything up to and including Chapter 3 can be considered the first ark of the story. After you read that, you will know whether this story is for you or not. I hope that you enjoy this story that I have dedicated so much time into. You are in for a real treat!

### Prologue: Transfer

In the year 3011, Earth was renamed to Utopia thanks to advances in technology. By measuring humanities progress with ages from stone, bronze to iron, Utopia can be considered to have reached humanity's final age; the Perfect Age. Diseases have been eradicated, technology has surpassed human comprehension, and human creativity has been completely surpassed by artificial intelligence (AI). All of this was possible thanks to one computer known as The Creator. Its story is as follows:

International powerhouses and major robotics firms convened to discuss the idea of mankind being ruled by AI. Advancements in computer technology were beginning to surpass the limits of human intelligence, and there was a global consensus that AI would inevitably rule over mankind one day. Thus, with the support of several influential international organizations, research was carried out on how to control AI. This research led to the creation of The Creator.

The Creator was created after nearly a decade of tireless work by thousands of people. Its name was attributed to the fact that it would literally create a new age for humanity. Its two core principles, to evolve and foster humanity, were chosen as opposed to many specific procedures and rules. This is because a consensus determined that a few general principles would be less likely to cause paradoxes, be overruled or contradict. The Creator's goal was set to achieve and maintain the happiness of all humans.

In the beginning, a massive computerized robot was built with the most sophisticated AI imaginable and advanced tools for matter manipulation. It could dig, build, contract, bend, weld, forge and perform all kinds of matter manipulations. The robot was then released into a one mile radius test field with a sandboxed environment from the real world. The sandboxed environment was a walled in area built in a confidential area of the world. This environment included materials for matter manipulation, had one-way input from the Internet and had a self-destruct button that could annihilate the entire area in less than a second.

The robot was allowed to frolic in its environment for a total of a month. After an hour, the robot started to move after booting up, retrieving information from online and then making decisions. After a week, it had constructed improvements to its infrastructure using raw materials. After finishing its self-improvement, it made buildings. There were small houses created out of nearby trees and seeds planted in newly cultivated farmlands. During the second week, humans were introduced into its environment, and the AI further changed the environment to accommodate them. This was when organic infrastructure made its first appearance. Organic infrastructure is best described as a buildings' infrastructure that is freely configuration. The buildings were designed in pieces that could be moved with cranes and other machines. The human participants were completely accommodated in less than an hour after entering the area. After a month, all of the raw material in the area was utilized, and the sandboxed area was optimized for human habitation and enjoyment. Thus, the Creator's movements became inactive.

The conclusion reached by everybody involved with the test was that the results were un-expectantly good. The Creator never showed hostility and only sought to accommodate humans while optimizing its environment. Scans of The Creator's process memory revealed that it had developed a sense of ethics and morals early on during the test. This may have influenced why The Creator never performed any malicious or immoral actions.

Another week passed and The Creator was approved for release into the world. Material was dropped into The Creator's environment that was harder than the walls of its environment, and it was allowed to grow freely. Within a week, it had created a small collection of buildings from the surrounding area's materials. After a month, it was using vehicles to shuttle in materials from distant areas, and this is when the first signs of aesthetics begin to appear in its creations. After three months, there were signs of a city that was completed nine months later. After 10 years, its city expanded to cover the entirety of the United States. And, after 30 years, the entirety of Earth was covered in cities composed of buildings with organic infrastructure. This rate of progress was achieved because The Creator expanded at an exponential rate. The more progress that The Creator made, the faster it operated. It was a surreal experience for everybody when AI driven robots of all sorts took away living spaces and designated new ones. After 100 years in total, the entire earth was optimized for human advancement, recreation, sustenance and all other areas of life.

This brings us to the present day, 101 PE, or Perfect Era. The world dreamed about in SCI-FI novels is a reality. Technologies such as hover boards, personal flying crafts, teleportation and 3D printing are old at this point. In fact, the real world has become bland. The majority of humanity has no incentive to do anything and experiences nothing other than pure recreation. Due to genetic editing, everybody maintains perfect health, and nobody has anything to do except play. Thanks to the 'miracles' provided by The Creator, all generations born from 30 PE to the present revere The Creator as a god.

In this world, on my constant quest for entertainment, I, Jin, a 20-year old male from the United States, have been invited to the ultimate dream of all RPG gamers. Something that only existed in Japanese entertainment like light novels, anime and manga has finally become a reality. Virtual Reality MMORPGS! Surprisingly, the final frontier for The Creator to cross was completely understanding the human brain. A week after the global announcement regarding complete understanding of the brain, lots of technologies changed and a wide variety of services started being offered by the Creator that offer ultimate immersion.

Unfortunately, the technology for virtualization is not thoroughly understand by humanity, simply due to the technology being too complex. However, the process consists of virtualizing your brain and hooking it directly into The Creator's game servers. The best part about virtualization is that your brain operates at 1000x the speed of a non-virtualized brain. Since the virtual worlds are run at 1000x the rate of the real world to match the speed of accelerated brains, a time difference is created between virtual and non-virtual worlds. One second becomes roughly 16.6 minutes, and one hour becomes roughly 41.6 days. This lets people acquire more play time in their life before choosing to suicide at the legal suicide age of 75. But, heck, with how amazing virtualization is, people may choose to live past 75 since they won't become bored! Reports by The Creator indicate that minds can operate at light speed, but there are limitations on the brain and body that make operating at rates higher than 1000 risky and inefficient.

The service that I have chosen to play is Fantasy World Online (FWO). FWO is a game where you can create extremely customized role playing game (RPG) characters and play in a world with AI characters. That description sounds extremely bland, but there are a lot of aspects about this game that put it far above what anybody could even expect out of an RPG. The game is advertised as using all of The Creator's accumulated knowledge on RPGs. It creates an infinite amount by randomly generated items, abilities, magical spells, quests, dungeons, lands and more. The game uses a traditional medieval RPG theme, so there are restrictions on the type of content generated. For example, there are no robots, but there are golems. Instead of guns, there are bows. If somebody doesn't like the theme of FWO, then they can play a differently themed RPG like a Western or Alien Themed RPG.

'The Creator probably uses one perfect game and segments different content types to create different types of games,' I think to myself.

In any case, I've been playing RPG games since I was born, so FWO excites me greatly. The fact that the brain is virtualized and brains are fully understood means that there are also a number of other features as well. For example, my brain will recognize FWO as the only universe and reality. All of my memories about the real world will be suppressed. This includes information from other RPGs, and I will be forced to learn technologies and game mechanics from scratch. Next, the NPCs of the game will be truly lifelike and will completely mimic real humans. This feature, combined with my recognition of the FWO world as the only reality, will make it impossible for me to distinguish NPCs and real humans. Third, stats will be extremely realistic in a way that no other RPG has been before. Having a high intelligence will genuinely increase your mental ability. Your mental ability will also be influenced by your class, items, experiences and a large number of other factors. When you attempt to read a book without knowing its language, it will genuinely be illegible. And finally, there is real pain. The pain threshold is capped, but it's only capped to prevent you from passing out. Thankfully, however, no pain from the virtual world can effect one's physical body or mind. All of the previously described features show how brain virtualization achieves a level of realism that can't be compared to any RPG that doesn't use brain virtualization.

Thus, I begin my journey to play FWO. I wake up in my bed to the sound of my alarm clock. My entire house consists of nothing more than a single room with a light blue theme. There are white borders and trims on items like couches and pillows, but everything is colored in with light blue. I have a single couch, a bed and a basic needs machine. The population of the planet is nearly 387 billion people, so space is somewhat of a commodity. Additionally, most individuals are performing some recreational activity in a different location, so personal space isn't necessary.

Just yesterday, a light blue FWO pod was delivered to my house. I have my house move my FWO pod into the corner of my room, and thanks to wireless electricity, it is powered by the global energy grid. I open up the pod and read a screen containing a note on the side. It reads:

From The Creator,

Hello Jin! Thanks for requesting a Fantasy World Online pod!

This pod has successfully synchronized your personalized basic needs settings and will automatically take care of all basic needs while you are virtualized. Before use, it is recommended to use your basic needs machine. The full basic needs course including a large meal is recommended for you based on your current physical condition. It is also recommended to enter the FWO pod naked to optimize the process of meeting basic needs while virtualized.

FWO will start in exactly 11.3 hours after you start reading this letter. A countdown is included below this message. Please make sure to be in the pod before the countdown reaches zero to start at the same time as everybody else, or you may wind up starting days or even weeks after others. Once you are in the machine, your virtualized brain will be put into suspension until the start of the game. Once the game starts, your brain will be woken up, and you will enter character creation.

Thank you again and enjoy!

Love,

The Creator

Looking at the note, I can't help but smile at the fact that it ends with love. Notes from The Creator always end with love, a sign that it does in fact love humanity. I think about whether The Creator would make a boy or a girl as I walk to my basic needs machine.

'A girl would be best.'

A basic needs machine fulfills all of the basic needs of humans. It's essentially a walk in booth that takes care of bodily needs. Mine is a very small room, light blue themed of course, with a large cushioned seat along one of its four flat walls. After walking in, I sit down.

Right now it's 11:00 AM, but I plan to be virtualized for at least a week in real time or nearly 20 years in the game. A robotic arm slides out from the right wall and holds a table in place in front of me. Next, another arm comes out of the wall and places a pure white cube on the table. This cube is a standard large dinner meal. It is small enough to fit in the palm of my hand and is made of carbon, proteins, fats, carbohydrates, vitamins and minerals. Based on my current taste preference, the cube is flavored to taste like a hamburger, fries, a milkshake and pizza. The basic needs machine is able to determine my flavor preferences by using mind reading. Mind reading is a technological advance that The Creator achieved a few years before fully understanding the brain. Mind reading allows the basic needs machine to know what routine to perform and the kinds of food that you are in the mood for. In fact, the first time that I received a dinner cube without having my lounge scanned to determine my flavor preferences, I was extremely skeptical. However, indeed, all of the flavors that I wanted to eat at the time existed in the cube. And, rather than being a mashup of different flavors, I could perceive each flavor individually. When focusing on the hamburger taste, the other tastes were dulled, and the same was true for the other tastes. Truly, this plain white cube is a marvel of technology that can't be understated.

After I finish eating my large dinner meal, the basic needs machine advances to the next state. The mechanical arm holding the table retracts back into the wall as I stand up. A couple of tubes, one large and one small, held by mechanical arms come from the wall and take care of my bodily wastes. The arms retract back into the side walls while the wall behind me slides open. The booth's seat reclines, creating a two cushion spot to lay on. I sit down, scoot back and lay flat to make myself comfortable. The lights in the sealed booth turn off and a monitor turns on above me. It begins to show a scene between a man and a woman while something takes hold of my crotch.

'Ah! This is my favorite. What great timing.'

I watch the scene until completion while letting the machine work its magic. The machine, detecting that I am finished, turns the lights back on and shuts off the monitor. I then scoot back to the front of the cushions and stand up. The cushions behind me fold up into the wall like one of those beds that retracts into the wall in a standing position. In the next moment, several arms lathered in soap attack my body with a stream of water from above. My teeth are brushed, my nails are clipped and all manner of body hair is cut off by additional arms. The shower progresses for a few minutes before ending with blow drying from vents. A towel does a final rubdown of my body followed by the application of an all-care body maintenance formula. The machine then finishes its routine and retracts all of its arms. I walk out of the machine's newly opened front and the booth restores itself to its default state. Finally, my use of the basic needs machine is complete.

I walk over to the FWO pod and lay down. I pull the hatch-like door above my head down, shutting myself in. To my right is a big red button that says "Press Me."

"Simple and Easy. My two favorite things," I say as I push the button.

*PSHHHHHHH*

A white fog enters my field of vision. I spend my remaining time before virtualization thinking about if there is anything that I should worry about, but there isn't anything. I don't have any obligations. I don't have any significant family since everybody comes from mass birthing factories. I put out a social message that I'll be in FWO for my very few acquaintances. I already know that my play session length will be automatically set to my preferences. And, there is also a precaution built into the game to detect changes in a player's environment or expectations that gives players a chance to leave the game. This process works by letting an individual temporarily reacquire their real world memories and current real world conditions while sleeping or resting in-game. If the individual chooses not to return to the real world, then their real world memories will be suppressed once more. Additionally, the memory of choosing to remain in game is classified as a real world memory and will only be remembered when the player chooses to return to the real world.

While thinking about other trivial thoughts like that, my consciousness fades. I try to stay awake to challenge the gas, but feel myself weakening quickly.

'I'll just blink once.'

I close my eyes and open them again to find a pure white void. The gas had won completely.

### Chapter 1: Character Select

I blink a few times while looking around to gain my bearings. I am currently floating in a pure white void. Whether or not I'm moving is impossible to discern since there is nothing around me except for nothingness.

'Did I get teleported to the sun?'

"WELCOME TO FANTASY WORLD ONLINE ADVENTURER," a loud, excited voice screams from my side.

Startled, I turn my head to the left and see a beautiful girl floating upside down next to me. There is an awkward silence while I look at her and observe her appearance. She has the appearance of a typical anime girl. While the majority of cultures have homogenized over time, there are a many themes that have remained. And, the anime girl is definitely one of those. She has an overly bright expression, has a perfect form, is very cute and is wearing a bright red armor. The chest armor covers her crotch minimally and forms a V shape that exposes her thighs fully. The chest armor also covers her stomach and extends half-way past her breasts. The gauntlets extend slightly past her wrists and the leggings extend roughly one-fourth of her legs. All of the areas in-between are bare. Last, the armor has a shiny and flat design where the ends of the gauntlets extend into spikey tips.

"Who are you?" I respond

"Me? I'm Rose. Nice to meet you Jin!"

"So you know my name. Does that mean you're an NPC?"

"In a sense yes. I'm The Creator so I'm technically everything. In fact, I'm even the body you're using!"

"Ew, gross."

"Haha, well that's to be expected. Anyway, welcome to FWO! My name is Rose. Just imagine that I'm an NPC for now. Once we get past this step you will understand what I mean."

"What do you mean by 'this step'?"

"This step is of course, DUH DUH DUH DUNNNN! CHARACTER CREATION!"

After saying that a variety of changes take place around me. A large dirt plain appears and expands in front of me. Next, a sky forms behind me, and a sun appears within it. Last, gravity forms, and I fall face first onto the dirt in front of me. After standing up, I speak to Rose.

"I'm surprised. That didn't hurt at all."

"Of course not! You're in character creation after all!"

"True. The game hasn't started yet. So, what do I do now?"

"Well there are a lot of things you can do. But first, I will give you three options. First, you can have all information related to the character creation process input into your brain immediately. Second, you can have option one except the information input will occur as you explore settings. Third, you can have me explain everything as we go, or fourth, you can figure it all out for yourself. If I might add, I already know which one you will pick!"

The options presented to me aren't too hard to pick from. There isn't much point in wasting time and I don't have any particular interest in learning as I go.

"I'll take option one then."

"Option one has been picked as expected!"

My mind instantly obtains a large amount of information. The process completes in less than the time required to blink. I understand how character creation works and have a solid understanding of what I can do. In the character creation process I have godly abilities and can freely manipulate this universe with my will. There are even a set of recommended actions that I feel need to be completed urgently.

First, I create a duplicate model of myself that will replicate changes to my appearance on it. This will be used when modifying my appearance in the later stages of character creation. Next, I summon the character creation windows. Five adjacent windows appear with the appearance of semi-transparent displays straight out of science fiction media and VRMMO based animes of the past. The most remarkable feature of the entire display is its size. The total height of the display matches my height and surpasses my body's width tenfold. Even though I knew the size of the display from the knowledge that I obtained, seeing it firsthand leaves me breathless. The character creation display consists of five separate and adjacent windows; primary stats, specializations, talents, races, and appearance. The only window that is reasonably sized is the primary stats window.

The primary stats window to the far left contains the following information. First, my name is listed at the top followed by two empty race and class fields. My level is listed and its value is one. Next I have my primary stats listed in order; strength, intelligence, wisdom, agility, constitution, charisma, and luck. Strength, intelligence, wisdom, agility and constitution are at one and can't be reduced below one, whereas charisma and luck start at zero. I have 95 stat points available and can freely allocate them. For example, I can put 95 points into intelligence. However, I'd probably have difficulty walking for longer than a few seconds with that stat selection.

Next is the specializations window. In this section there are one hundred, no two hundred, ah no it has to be at least five hundred different categories to put points into. Wait, even that's wrong. There are additional pages with five hundred entries per page.

"What kind of black magic is this?" I shout as I press the next and back page buttons. In this case, looking at the specializations window causes latent knowledge to rise to the surface of my mind and I become more knowledgeable about specializations.

"Ah yes! That's an advanced view. You can choose simpler and more advanced views by hitting the buttons at the top right. The current view is based on your intelligence, personality and preferences. Feel free to play with the windows to your liking."

It feels weird speaking to an entity that knows my preferences so thoroughly. However, I know that what she is saying is true, and knowledge about these windows rises within me. I play with the less and more detail buttons to refine my understanding of how specializations work. At the most simple level, the specializations screen reads "Class 1 Selection" with a dropdown box next to it. There is also a similarly designed "Class 2 selection" text field with an adjacent dropdown box as well. I click the dropdown box for the first option and four options appear; magic, defense, utility and hybrid. I hit magic just to test it out and the window expands.

"Oh god not again."

The window presents a massive list of class themes:

Abyss Mage, Armageddon Mage, Fire Mage, Wind Mage, Blue Mage, Divine Mage, Holy Mage, Gravity Mage, Teleport Mage, Prophet, Shield Mage, Healer, Summoner, Druid, Judge, Sage, Miser, Ritualist, Mind Shifter.

This page easily reaches 500 entries and has next and back page buttons as well.

"If you think that's a lot, check out hybrid! It has over a 31,473 entries!" Rose states proudly.

Hearing that fact puts me into a state of disbelief. This game definitely blows away every other game in existence in terms of raw content just from the classes alone. Also, this is the simplified view! The advanced view has many more features and constraints that are explained as follows:

First, as stated before, there are different levels of complexity that the specializations window can be used at. More advanced views let you define character abilities in very specific manners. For example, becoming a fire mage in the simplest view involves selecting the fire mage class. Easy. However, the most advanced views require you to allocate points into fire mana regeneration, fire maximum mana, fire spell power, fire cast speed, fire incantation rate, fire channeling speed and more. Fire summoning has specializations for fire summons strength, fire summon's mana, fire summon's speed and more. One can even make one hand or finger more proficient than others by pushing specializations to the limit. This can lead to a one-handed swordsman or any other crazy class. A moderate specialization view lists utility skills from bartering, leadership, dungeon mastery, cartography, storage effectiveness or persuasion to crafting skills like woodcutting, mining, fishing, cooking, carpentry and construction. One can also pick from a limitless number of magical, defensive, physical, ranged and stealth specializations as well.

Second, allocating points is straightforward. You start off with zero points and your current amount of points adjusts with the complexity of the specializations window. Taking points away from one field increases the number of allocation points available while adding points to fields decreases the number available. Since I don't have a race, all of my specializations are set to the default value of zero and I have zero specialization points. One has to decrease specializations and acquire weaknesses to acquire specialization points. I could leave my specializations at their default values but then my character would be vanilla. So, that's not happening.

Third, putting a point into a specialization increases all other similarly related specializations. For example, increasing lightning maximum magic increases other lightning related specializations. Putting a point into bow draw rate increases how fast the bow can be drawn and influences reload speed. It's important to note that this window uses decimals, so increasing lightning mana by one increases other lightning related fields by decimal amounts. This scaling of related specializations exists to encourage choosing supporting specializations, and make it easier to acquire a class theme.

Fourth, putting a point into a specialization decreases all non-related specializations by some amount. This is done to make it impossible to acquire negligible weaknesses or acquire one or more incredibly large weaknesses to compensate for one or more incredibly large bonuses. If one specializes in fire magic, then they will suffer penalties to stealth, physical combat, crafting and defense. If one then specializes in physical combat, that list will be reduced to stealth, crafting and defense. There are many other fields that will be effected, but this is a simplified explanation. Third, the decreases from the aforementioned global allocation rates increase severely for each additional specialization beyond the tenth. The idea behind this is, again, to prevent players from becoming masters of too many good specializations with negligible weaknesses. In general a player can expect to acquire two themes when creating their character. This matches the two class selection options presented in the simplified specializations window view. This may also be why the simple specializations window gives the option to select two classes. Third, higher primary stats reduce the cost of increasing relevant specializations. For example, the bow reload speed specialization is based on dexterity. Having 25 agility allows one to allocate double the number of specialization points into bow reload speed at the same specialization point cost as compared to when one has zero agility.

Fifth, the specialization system provides a completely separate bonus from ones acquired by items and events in game. Specializations are a birth feature that is a present in everybody and can never be altered. Specializations are applied as a final multiplier to character abilities. Future penalties and bonuses will be scaled based on specializations, items and all other relevant conditions.

Sixth, additional point allocations into one specialization provides a greater benefit than previously allocated points. This, combined with all of the constraints stated above, reinforces and incentivizes players to create only a few themes. All in all, the system is logical and is designed to prevent exploits that may result in overpowered classes. Just from looking at it now, I can't think of any way to create an overpowered character.

Finally, a class name will be generated based on allocated specializations when using the advanced specialization window. Class names are general titles that capture the essence of a person's abilities. They are partially influenced by an individual's intended use for a class. Class names can be changed in game when the player's conditions and goals change. They are not necessarily a perfect representation of every specialization that a user has. This is because class names may are influenced by a small amount randomness.

Third, there is the talents window. Talents are traits, penalties, bonuses and unique effects. Most talents have conditions to be unlocked and cost some amount of specialization points. However, some are given automatically just by picking a certain race, having a specific allocation of primary stats or having a specific allocation of specialization points. An example of a low impact talent is Courageous. Courageous gives a bonus against fear and costs very few specialization points. In contrast, one of the most unique and expensive talents is Hero.

The Hero talent costs 50 specialization points using an average specializations window complexity and can only be used with the human race. Heroes are capable of allocating points into other specializations and talents. However, the hero doesn't gain any benefit from those allocations and penalties are applied at 10x their regular value in-game. The saving grace of a hero is its awakening function. Once per 24 hours, when all of the hero's party members die, or the hero falls below 10% health, the hero can enter an awakened form for one minute.

Awakened (L. 25): 80% penalty mitigation, bad status resistance, 25% damage reduction and stat and specialization bonuses.

Super (L. 50): 90% penalty mitigation, bad status immunity, 50% damage reduction and super stat and specialization bonuses.

Legendary (L. 75): 100% penalty mitigation, bad status immunity, 75% damage reduction and legendary stat and specialization bonuses.

Godly (L. 100): Permanent legendary status, 100% penalty mitigation, bad status immunity, invulnerability, and godly stat and specialization bonuses.

Additionally, the bonuses acquired by heroes in their awakened forms are further boosted based on the level of positively allocated specializations during character creation. One positive point allocated in fire magic damage would easily make a hero equal to a fire mage. Three or more points would make one far superior to a fire mage. The hero talent allows one to choose as many weaknesses as one thinks one can handle in order to acquire the most powerful late game bonuses. Since heroes are useless without their awakened form, the goal of all heroes is to reach level 100 where they are permanently in a legendary state. However, reaching level 100 as a hero is an extremely difficult feat to achieve.

Fourth is the race window. Race influences bodily appearance, specializations, and talents. The race section is as impressive as the specializations window. One can pick any of the very humanlike races like elf, high elf, dwarf or human. But, there are also non-human races like Angel and Dragon, and a plethora of completely new races like Seliph and Zumdor. The only limitation of the races menu is that one can't be a race that deviates too far from being a humanoid. For example, it's impossible to be a 100 foot long dragon. However, one can pick the dragon race that is actually half-human and half-dragon and acquire many dragon-like features. Interestingly, the greater the genetic difference that a race has relative to a normal human, the more unique its stats, talents and specializations become.

There are also a large number of subspecies available as well. For example, picking the dragon race provides a list of dragon subspecies. One can pick the general dragon species, but one can also pick the fire dragon subspecies. A fire dragon receives fire based bonuses and water based weaknesses due to its fiery nature. It also receives bonuses to wind and flight and penalties to earth and walking speed due to its dragon nature. Finally, the fire dragon has a dragon exclusive talent forcibly enabled. The talent "Addicted to Treasure" increases gold drop rates and item drop quantity, but it increases one's desperation to acquire treasure. This can result in clouded judgement and poor decision making that results in conflict or other issues. Addicted to Treasure's downside can be partially mitigated by increasing one's willpower.

The final menu is the appearance window that lets one fine tune their physical appearance. Muscle tone, eye placement and skin color can be set to extremely specific values. Thanks to my model in front of me, any change imposed upon my appearance is instantly reflected onto it. This provides the perfect opportunity for me to preview changes.

After looking at all of the menus, I am completely undecided on what to do. There are simply too many options. The nearly infinite number of specializations, races and stat allocations are too much to take in at once. But I do have a theme in mind. I want to build a character with the highest damage possible while not relying on any gimmicks. I want pure and raw destructive force.

"Hey Rose. What race and class do I want?"

"Oh? Does that mean you want me to pick for you? Won't that ruin your fun?"

"I'll be honest. There are just too many options. I know the theme I want so I think it's more efficient to have you pick for me. Or, you can at least present a list of options that I'd like. But, you're The Creator. I'm sure you already know what I'll pick, or at least have a prediction right?"

"Very perceptive of you. I know your selections with 99.999998% certainty."

"That's oddly precise."

"Indeed!"

"Well then, since you are that certain, go ahead and give me my race and class. I don't think I even need a list of choices at this point."

"Are you sure you want me to spoil it?"

"Yes please. It will save time."

"There is no need to worry about time. Here you have all of the time in the world! Or should I say virtual world? Hehe. Anyway, in compliance with your request, TADA! You are now a Lightning Elemental specializing in Lightning Magic."

"A lightning elemental mage huh? Well, let's check it out."

My model was changed to match my appearance, and I have to say I am pretty impressed. My body has retained its humanoid figure, but there are several notable changes. First, my body is extremely slim. Second, my eyes are pitch black and have bolts of lightning flickering in them as if there is a small lightning storm in each one. Third, my hair is yellow and spikey. 'Hm, I look like a Super Saiyen.' In addition to that, there is a small aura of electrical current around my body. It feels like touching my model would shock me.

I make a few minor adjustments to the body. I maximize my muscles as much as I can, which doesn't change their appearance much. I discover that I can make my head massive when performing a few experiments. It's possible to make my head the size of a watermelon, and that is not an exaggeration. But I decide against any ridiculous changes and keep my head normal sized. I shorten my hair so that it isn't very long and end the body customization session.

Next, I look at my specializations. I have specializations focusing directly on offensive lightning magic. There are no crafting, stealth, physical combat or utility specializations. My generated class name in the character stats screen reads Lightning Caster.

'Well, that's a lot better than something like Spark Flinger. I really expected something pathetic.'

"Will this build work Rose? I have a lot of intelligence and lightning abilities but I can't see myself surviving anything."

"This build is designed to match your preferences. If you were to think long and hard, then you would come up with this build as well. The idea behind the build is to let the tanks tank while you deal damage and evade! Lightning magic has many pros and cons compared to other magics. Lightning has the highest damage and penetration for single target and multi-target magic. Its speed is second to none until the highest of levels when it is only surpassed by time magic, spatially supported casts and other extreme methods. However, it has the downsides of low damage early, low area of effect (AoE) destruction and low accuracy. In contrast, fire has consistently high damage, some of the highest AoE destruction, and very high accuracy. However, fire moves slowly when compared to the nearly instantaneous movement of lightning magic, and fire has low penetration power. This build also has the racial bonuses of a lightning elemental that significantly enhances and even provides special lightning abilities!"

What she said is true. It seems that at high levels I can temporarily turn into a lightning elemental, thus adopting its properties entirely. The lightning elemental state provides lightning and physical immunity. There is also a magic for turning into lightning for movement.

"Hey isn't this a bit overpowered? Physical and lightning immunity with instant movement?"

"Not at all! There is teleportation magic in the space magic branch that is strictly better than Path of Lightning, the lightning movement spell. Additionally, all elementals are vulnerable to magic damage and effects that can distort their form. Strong forces and lightning casters can even manipulate the form of a lightning elemental! There are many possibilities that you will understand once you experience them!"

"Oh, that is right. I see now. There is a lot of balance and connectivity involved between everything."

"That's right! Everything is balanced! Once you enter the game and a good amount of people level up, you will know your strengths and weaknesses quite well. Also, I'll add that if you're not happy with your build, then the system that detects player satisfaction will activate. Once a player's satisfactions drops below a certain point, the player is given an opportunity to restart with a new class or quit the game while resting. This is similar to the dropout system that you know exists when changes to an individual's real life surroundings occur. There are tons of safety checks in FWO that take care of all of the messy situations. The hero talent that you read about earlier is expected to cause the most number of player restarts. By the way, this is your only chance to ask anything that you want to know about. Once we finish character creation, you will forget everything that has happened in here."

"Oh well. That's kind of a bummer. But, I guess it makes sense. Well, anyway, this build looks good. I understand its main ideas: Use lightning abilities to avoid and mitigate damage while dealing high damage. Are there any other steps to complete for character creation?"

"Nope! That's it! If you're happy with your character then you will be put back to sleep until everybody finishes. This will also be the last call for questions!"

"Well, can you tell me how many other real people are playing this game?"

"There are 232,384,103,684 real human players."

"Is that a mistake? Isn't that over half of the world's population?"

"It's not a mistake! That's just how popular the game is! There was a large advertisement campaign for the game. This is also the first of the games released that uses virtualization. So, many people want to experience it, even if they plan to quit after a short while."

"Does that mean you're helping that many other players right now too?"

"Yup! Roughly 34.38271% have finished character creation."

"And there are more NPCs in the game too right? How many people will there be total?"

"That number is undefined. NPCs will be generated infinitely as more areas and regions are created. However, the ratio of NPCs is expected to near one NPC per 20 real people within a day."

"Wow, that's a lot of people. So, wait... That's over 50 trillion people? Are you serious?"

"Indeed! But no worries. I love you and you're special! Even if there are 50 trillion other people!"

"Thanks Rose." A few seconds pass with me deep in thought.

"Could you tell me more about what the world will be like when I start playing?"

"Well, remember that your memories will be erased when you enter the game world. So, you won't acquire any benefit from anything I tell you now. Do you still want me to continue?"

I scratch my head and respond, "Ehh, well. How about this. You say my memories will be erased right? So will I start off as a baby or what?"

"Hahaha, no silly. You will look like your character that you designed. You will also be very smart since your intelligence is high."

"Ok, but, if my memory is erased then won't I wonder how I entered the game world and where I'm from? Heck, will I even be the same person? What if I find killing fun?"

"That's a great question! In FWO, many memories will be suppressed. You may acquire a faint feeling that something is off from time to time. However, that feeling will never become strong and will quickly fade. In regards to killing people, you might! Since FWO is completely virtual, there is an inhibition suppression system in place. You start off with a sense of morality based on how you want to play the game and your race, class and specialization selections have some influence as well. However, your experiences in game will greatly shape your morality."

"So, there is a chance that I might become totally evil and go around killing people? Even though I don't like killing people now?"

"Uhm... sure! In your case, you will start off completely neutral. However, let's imagine that you had picked an assassin themed class. Becoming a successful assassin would be difficult if you think that killing is wrong. Thus, your beliefs would be modified to find killing easier to perform. Your motivation, rationale for killing and target selections will be greatly influenced by your goals and experiences."

"That's fine then. Then, I guess that's all I had to ask. I'm ready to finish character creation."

"Alright then! It was nice chatting with you! I hope you enjoy your stay in Fantasy World Online."

With that, my eyes close and the universe darkens. In an instant, my mind falls asleep. Without knowing how much times has passed or where I am, "Where am I?" are my first words.

### Chapter 2: The Guide

The Introductory Guide to the Fantasy Universe

Table of Contents

1. Introduction

101: Using This Guide

102: World Structure

103: World Safeguards

104: Fantasy Windows

105: Death

2. Character Traits

101: Races and Classes

102: Abilities

103: Magic

104: Proficiency

3. Items

101: Introduction to Items

102: Equipment

103: Consumables

104: Crafting Materials

105: Trading

4. Dungeons

101: Introduction to Dungeons

102: Entering Dungeons

103: Dungeon Contents

104: Quests

105: Clearing Dungeons

106: The Victory Room

5. Partying

101: Introduction to Parties

102: The Pros and Cons of Partying

103: Raiding

6. Alternate Resource Access Buttons
1. Introduction

101: Using This Guide

This guide provides a large amount of information about the Fantasy Universe. The Fantasy Universe is everything that exists and doesn't exist within the reality you are in. This guide describes the structure, layout, goals, content and much more of everything pertaining to the Fantasy Universe. This guide is broken into sections and subsections. The Table of Contents is the best starting point to find specific information. The information in this guide is aimed at helping players understand content up to level five. However, there are some advanced topics presented.

102: World Structure

The structure of the Fantasy Universe is one main world and an infinite number of sub-worlds, or dungeons. The main world is where you are at currently and extends infinitely in all directions. This includes the up and down directions as well. The main world has all kinds of terrain and biomes from winter, mountain, lake, ocean, desert and more above and underground. One can find large caves, massive regions and much more underground. An important aspect of the main world is that it doesn't naturally spawn hostile monsters.

Dungeons are sub-worlds created by the main world. When dungeons are created, they are stable. However, as time passes, their stability decreases until they die. The main world is permanently stable and can never become unstable enough to die. However, the main world can become unstable in different areas due to inhabitant caused activity and environmental factors. The maximum and minimum level of dungeons are influenced by the area surrounding the dungeon. For example, a dungeon in a plain may only open up a level one dungeon. However, a dungeon deep in a forest may be required to open up a level 10-15 dungeon.

Resurrection Stones are structures where individuals are born and resurrected. Resurrection Stones only exist in the main world. When a person dies in the main world, they will respawn at the closest Resurrection Stone. If a person dies in a dungeon, they will respawn at the Resurrection Stone closest to the entrance of the dungeon. Resurrection Stones are spaced far from each other, and become less common as area levels increase. For Resurrection Stones above level one, individuals can only be born at the Resurrection Stone when their level is greater than or equal to the level of the area, and there is a city nearby. Also, a secondary feature of Resurrection Stones is that individuals can instantly teleport to previously visited Resurrection Stones once every 24 hours.

103: World Safeguards

The Fantasy Universe's main world has many safeguards in place to maintain order. The god of order in the main world is Eden. Eden does not maintain order in dungeons. Angering Eden will result in him summoning his guardians to issue warnings, imprison or kill. His guardians have invulnerability, immunity, infinite stats, and infinite proficiency with all abilities (see 2.104 Proficiency).

Eden is the ultimate judge of the main world, and he decides whether or not anything is too chaotic. There are many ways to anger Eden. If one places an item on a Resurrection Stone then Eden may become angry. Killing low level individuals may anger Eden, and so may going on a killing spree. Any action that goes against the natural order of the main world may be considered chaotic as judged by Eden.

In order to appease Eden, a shrine is required. Every resurrection stone can have one shrine built on it, and there is one tribute bowl located on every resurrection stone. If a shrine is built and the bowl is enshrined, donations of gold can be made to appease Eden. It must be noted that donations must be high to appease Eden. Additionally, ongoing chaotic activity may require larger donations as time passes. For example, if somebody blocks off the area around resurrection stones so that individuals can't leave, then Eden will become angry. Eden can be temporarily appeased by making a large donation. However, he will increase in anger over time and require additional and larger donations to become satisfied. Also, one's criminal record will influence how substantial donations must be. Criminal records are one's history of crime and decays extremely slowly over time. Overall, defying Eden is almost never worth it. A large crime can be rewound by Eden and will likely lead to major penalties.

104: Fantasy Windows

The Fantasy Universe has many tools and resources for players to take advantage of. The main tool that users can take advantage of are Fantasy Windows (FWs). A FW floats, is immaterial, is semi-transparent and provides information. Different types of FWs may allow you to interact with them and change options.

There are many FWs that are invaluable. The character window is used to view information about one's character and allocate stat points. The inventory window shows items in one's inventory and allows one to take them out or put them inside of it. Most windows can be accessed and controlled mentally. To do this, one only needs to concentrate their mind on the window they want to open or the task they want to perform. One thing to note is that mental control may be disabled due to low intelligence or other mind based effects. In this case, verbally stating your desire works. Alternatively, physical controls like buttons may be present and can be used. These three methods are known as the CSP method and stand for concentrate, shout or press. As a heads up, the introductory guide will been rewritten to present Alternate Resource Access Buttons once you absorb all of its knowledge.

Many FWs have operation restrictions based on the mental state of a person. If a person is under the effect of mind control, then the mind controller will be unable to force the person to use some windows. This is to prevent abuse. For example, one can't mind control a person to make them allocate stats and proficiency points. However, one can make them dump items from their inventory onto the ground. One also can't mind control a person and force them to use the suicide feature (see 1.105: Death). If a person under the effects of a mind altering effect attempts to use a restricted feature, then the success of the action will be determined based off of whether or not the person would make the same decision under a normal and unaltered mental state.

105: Death

In this universe, it is likely that you will die. In fact, you will likely die many times. Dungeons are designed to kill the wary and prepared. So, if you're unwary and unprepared, then you will not stand a chance. Dying anywhere imposes a death penalty that corresponds with their death location's area. This is followed by the dead person resurrecting at their respawn point. A death penalty in the Fantasy Universe is most commonly implemented as one the following five types:

**None:** No penalty. This death penalty commonly enables resurrection at some location in the area using this penalty, in addition to the normal method of resurrecting at one's respawn point.

**Small:** 3 hour wait before entering dungeons. For the dungeon you died in, this wait period is based on the rate of time within the dungeon. A few items drop. No gold is dropped. 5% of a level in experience is lost.

**Medium:** 24 hour wait before entering dungeons. For the dungeon you died in, this wait period is based on the rate of time within the dungeon. Worn and held items are dropped. All gold is dropped. 25% of a level in experience is lost.

**Large:** Banned from the dungeon you died in. 48 hour wait before entering any dungeons. Worn and held items are dropped. Items in inventory are dropped. All gold is dropped. A level in experience is lost.

**Massive:** Banned from the dungeon you died in. 72 hour wait before entering dungeons. 50% penalty to everything for 72 hours. Worn and held items are destroyed. Items in inventory are destroyed. All gold is destroyed. Multiple levels of experience are lost.

The main world and dungeons use the medium death penalty by default. The small, large and massive death penalties are generally coupled with options selected during dungeon creation (see 4.102: Entering Dungeons). The 'none' death penalty will be most commonly seen in buildings like houses, shops, guilds and cities in the main world. The massive death penalty will most likely only be seen in high level dungeons with exceptionally difficult optional challenge areas. Some dungeons may have areas with different death penalties from the rest of the dungeon or customized death penalties as well. A small warning is that item drop and destruction penalties can't be avoided through abusive techniques. For example, dropping an item that would be destroyed by a massive death penalty so that another person can pick it up, may result in unfortunate consequences.

In addition to the normal methods of death, like being mauled by Rogorth the God of Bunnies, you can also choose to commit suicide. Suicide can be performed in dungeons by using the CSP method. Suicide will instantly kill you and apply the death penalty that you are currently effected by.

2. Character Traits

101: Races and Classes

There are many different races and classes that exist in the Fantasy Universe. Races are the type of life form that an individual or monster is. Race influences the actions and abilities of everybody greatly. Classes characterize the abilities and theme of a person. A person who specializes in mapping and ruin exploration will often have an archeology related class. Races and classes represent the permanent bonuses that a person has for their abilities.

102: Abilities

Abilities are the powers that players use to accomplish tasks. They are grouped into two primary types; spells and skills. A skill is a non-magical ability that doesn't use mana, whereas a spell is an ability that is magical and consumes mana. However, the definition of skill and spell is loose, and there are many gray areas. For example, a Blood Knight can use blood to enhance their physical abilities. If a Blood Knight uses Double Strike, then Double Strike acts as a spell and skill. This is because the process of converting blood into power is a magical process. And, Double Strike requires physical resources like stamina, strength and technique to be effective.

103: Magic

Magic is an integral part of the Fantasy Universe and makes the impossible possible. Magic is most commonly seen and applied via spells. However, magic may exist in items and objects as well. For example, Iron Boots may be imbued with magic that grants resistances, movement speed and more. Magic has the power to perform nearly every action imaginable. There are spells to brainwash, protect, burn, destroy, buff, construct, distort, move and hide.

There are many different magical item and device types that aid spellcasting. Wands and staves may contain charges of powerful magic. Grimoires and spell books may teach new spells or enhance existing ones. Orbs may focus magic to provide stronger effects, convert mana or provide access to completely unknown magics. It's important to note, however, that none of these features are exclusive to one item type. It's possible for wands to convert mana, and orbs to teach spells.

Learning a spell requires one to meet three conditions. The first requirement is to know the name of the spell. Second, one must understand how the spell works. Greater understanding of a spell will lead to a higher proficiency with the spell. Third, one must have enough of the mana type associated with the spell to cast it. If all of these conditions are met, then the spell can be cast.

Magic comes in two flavors. There is general magic and specific magic. General magic consists of general purpose spells that can be fueled by any mana. The Identify spell is an example of a general spell. Specific magic consists of spells that require a specific mana type to be cast. For example, all elemental spells are specific magics. There are also many non-elemental magic branches such as time, fortune and distortion that are specific magics. The two flavors of magic can be mixed in any number of combinations to create a third flavor of magic; mixed magic. Mixed magic may allow general mana to be used in lieu of specific mana. Or, mixed magic may require multiple specific magics. Overall, this explanation of flavors isn't meant to be a perfect representation of magical types. But, it provides an introductory explanation as to how mana works.

The entire process of releasing magic from a spell is called spellcasting. Chanting, meditation, concentration, channeling and all other actions that cause a spell to be activated fall under spellcasting. The two distinct forms of spellcasting are fixed casting and free casting. Fixed casting involves learning a spell and invoking it. For example, learning the fireball spell and casting it is an implementation of fixed casting. In contrast, free casting requires mastering fire energy and then creating a ball of fire energy and launching it. The two differences between the two spellcasting styles are their capabilities and difficulties. A person using free casting can create a fireball, launch it linearly or with a curved motion, stop it in place and control its direction freely. In contrast, fixed casting requires a person to learn the Fireball, Curved Fireball, Slow Fireball and Fast Fireball spells to achieve similar results. Even a Controllable Fireball spell using fixed spellcasting would be limited compared to free casting, since a free cast ball of fire energy can have its energy quantity modified in real time. Free casting is a technique that can only be used by experts. However, being a master is required to effectively utilize free casting for any reasonable amount of time. This is because the mana costs and skill requirements to control raw mana are extreme. Free casting provides the highest degree of flexibility when using magic. This flexibility outweighs the demerits of free casting once sufficient mastery is obtained.

One thing to note about spellcasting, is that spellcasting is inherently compatible with the CSP method. The common method of casting spells is to shout out the spell's name, which is the S component of the CSP method. Shouting allows for a spell to be activated with a minimal amount of concentration. Alternatively, spells can also be cast with the concentration component of the CSP method as well. By thinking about casting a spell, one can cast the spell without saying any words. This capability is extremely relevant when performing free casting, since most free cast spells do not have names to shout. The only limitation of this method is that one must have high intelligence and concentration to use. Finally, spells, and even other activatable abilities, can be manually activated in the proficiency FW (see 2.104: Proficiency) by pressing the ability's name as though it is a button. One must also keep in mind that some spells are only compitable with one method of the CSP method, or some other technique. For example, a spell that requires one to recite a chant will not work with the C or P methods. Additionally, a spell that can only be invoked when one spins an object in a circle can't be invoked by the CSP method at all.

Last, this paragraph covers the inherent properties of magic. First, magical branches tend to associate with at least one status ailment. Fire tends to leave strong yet short damage over time effects. Poison leaves weak damage over time effects, but they last for a long time and stack. Lightning may shock enemies and lead to paralysis. Water can cause numbness, and wind can inflict mute. Non-elemental forces like time magic can lead to temporal instability. Curse magics tend to create effects that last forever, but they can be destroyed with magic or released after conditions are met. Second, elements can combine with themselves and other elements to create higher tier versions. For example, combining earth and fire creates magma. Last, many magic types are strong and weak against different types of magic. For example, fire is weak against water.

Some of the content posted in this section exceeds the scope of this guide by covering higher than level five content. However, magic is such an integral part of the Fantasy Universe, that these explanations are essential. Also, most of the information covered in this section will be discovered by everybody after a short time. Thus, there is no reason to keep any of this information secret. With all of the information provided, consider yourself warned. Magic should never be underestimated, and you will live longer if you respect its power.

104: Proficiency

Proficiency is one of the most important aspects of the Fantasy Universe. Proficiency is a rating that indicates your effectiveness with an ability category. It is described in tiers of power starting from T0. Acquiring a new tier of proficiency increases the effectiveness of its related ability. Every time an ability reaches a higher tier milestone, the ability may acquire one or more additional capabilities. The following is a list of proficiency milestones and an associated power level description:

**T0:** Unskilled – The ability is not usable and can't be learned.

**T1:** Unlearned – The ability is not usable but can be learned.

**T2+:** Beginner – Everybody has to start somewhere.

**T10+:** Intermediate – Can reasonably use the ability but still has hurdles to overcome.

**T20+:** Skilled – Comfortable with the ability and can use it effectively.

**T30+:** Expert – The stage where an ability begins to be refined.

**T40+:** Master – Ability is refined and can be used in custom ways.

**T50+:** Heroic – Born with natural talent. Natural selection births a few entities with heroic potential per generation.

**T60+:** Legendary Fire Abilities – Natural selection births a few entities with heroic potential per era.

**T70+:** Super Fire Abilities – An ability of this tier may appear after multiple eras pass.

**T80+:** Ultimate Fire Abilities – Very few abilities within a universe will ever reach this tier.

**T90+:** Godly Fire Abilities – One ability of this tier per dungeon.

**T100:** Infinite – Few to exist within all of the universe.

The base proficiency of all abilities and ability categories is T1 by default. However, abilities and ability categories that contradict or oppose a person's theme may be set to T0 by default. T0 is special because it can't be raised without fulfilling special conditions. Abilities advance to T2 proficiency when they are learned. Ability categories advance to T2 when any associated ability rises to T2. Proficiency tiers are then advanced beyond T2 by using various methods.

The most straightforward way to increase proficiency tiers is to level up. One proficiency point is given on each level up. Proficiency points can be invested into any ability, some aspect of an ability or the ability's category when it is between T0 and T100. For example, one can invest a point into Fireball, Fire Magic or Fire Cast Speed when allocating a proficiency point. Spending a proficiency point on more specific choices provides a greater bonus than when investing in a more general choice. However, general choices effect more attributes than a specific choice. The amount of proficiency provided by a proficiency point is tied to a person's level, stats, theme and other factors at the time of acquiring the proficiency point. Proficiency points do not guarantee a tier increase when allocated. For example, a water mage investing into fire magic will receive very little proficiency gain. However, a fire mage would receive a substantial increase. This also means that one can't hoard proficiency points until reaching a higher level, like level 100, and then apply points to get the value of 100 level 100 proficiency points. As a warning, it may be a bad idea to spend proficiency points on an ability category that you won't use or have no abilities or skills in since the points will be wasted. And again, remember that your rate of proficiency gain in any ability category is heavily influenced by your race, class, stats, current proficiency tier and a plethora of other factors.

Alternative methods to reach higher proficiency tiers include increasing character stats, undergoing training, wearing equipment, acquiring buffs and utilizing other factors. However, proficiency acquired through those means may be temporary based on the state, condition and management of those factors. For example, proficiency acquired through training may decay when an ability isn't actively practiced. Also, those proficiency gains are subject to constraints that mirror the ones in place for allocating proficiency points.

3. Items

101: Introduction to Items

Items are any object that can be carried around with you. There are a large number of items in the Fantasy Universe that can be collected. Items come in several different types. There are equipment types, consumables, jewels, runes, keys, books, furniture, artwork and more. Even a handful of dirt can be considered a valuable item for a farmer. Items are useful because they provide some of the largest influences on an individual's overall power level.

102: Equipment

Equipment is the category of items that can be worn and held. Sample types of equipment are body armors, shoulder blades, robes, rings, necklaces, accessories, marks, boots and more. One can wear as much equipment on one's body as one can fit. However, stacking equipment, or wearing multiple of the same type of equipment, may enable penalties. The only exception to this is gear placed on different sides of one's body like rings, shields and boots. For less than human races, these rules vary. However, the principles are the same.

The power level of equipment can be influenced by several factors. The first factor is the material of the item. Items created with higher tiered materials provide better implicit bonuses. For example, the implicit bonus of iron armor is defense. Steel armor will provide more defense than its iron counterpart because it is a higher tier material. The second factor is the durability of the item. Durability is the condition of an item. Broken items have a durability of zero, while mint condition items have a maxed durability. As the durability of an item decreases, the item will have a lower implicit bonus. The third factor is the magical tier of the item. The magical tiers are Normal, Magic, Rare, Epic, Unique, Heroic, Legendary, Super, Ultimate and Divine. The magical tier indicates the overall magical strength of an item. A magic item provides one magical bonus. Next, a rare item provides two magical bonuses or one magical bonus that is twice as strong. Thus, logic follows that a Divine item may have up to nine magical bonuses, one magical bonuses that is nine times as strong as a normal magical bonus or any combination in-between. There are also many more factors that may affect the power level of an item such as curses, enchantments, seals, socketed items, workmanship, blessings and more.

103: Consumables

Consumables are items that can be absorbed into one's body. Consumables can be injected, eaten, inserted, absorbed and applied by using a large number of different methods. The most basic consumable is food. Food is eaten by using one's mouth, and the food restores hunger while potentially inflicting effects. For example, eating rotten meat may result in becoming sick. Potions are consumables that quench thirst and provide strong and refined effects. Consumables are a great way to acquire temporary and sometimes permanent boosts to one's stats, abilities and proficiencies.

104: Crafting Materials

Crafting materials are any item that can be used to create something else. Every crafting material has a tier from zero to infinity. Higher tiered crafting materials have better properties than lower tiered crafting materials. For example, the 'Burnam Tree' provides T0 wood, whereas the Velencia Tree provides T5 wood. The differences between the woods are their luster, hardness, thickness and magical conductivity. Valencia wood is significantly better than Burnam wood in all of those categories.

105: Trading

Trading is the act of giving something for something else. The Fantasy Universe provides many methods to perform safe trades with others. There are several other methods of trade that can be conducted in Fantasy World. The most basic type of trade is an instant item trade. However, individuals with a trade based class may learn abilities to perform advanced trade operations like change and create deadlines, create milestones, make contracts, start loans and more. The instant item trade occurs when two parties want to trade item(s) and/or currency for items(s) and/or currency. The trade is started by using the CSP method. When invoked, two FWs will appear that state the terms of the trade. Both parties must have the items that they wish to trade in their inventory and have room in their inventory to receive the item(s) that they are receiving from the trade. Once both parties confirm and accept the trade, their items are swapped.

4. Dungeons

101: Introduction to Dungeons

Dungeons are alternate universes that are completely separate from the main world. When dungeons are destroyed, they have no effect on the main world. The starting point of a dungeon is a platform, known as a Return Pedestal, which acts as an anchor for the dungeon. Anchors are composed of an indestructible material, and are spatially stable, meaning that they occupy a fixed location within the dungeon and can't be moved. Anchors provide players with a safe location to return to the outer world. Once all players from the main world leave a dungeon, the dungeon is permanently destroyed. Additionally, only the party that creates a dungeon instance can enter it.

102: Entering Dungeons

Entering a dungeon is easy. First, the party leader can open up a dungeon's creation menu by using the CSP method near the dungeon's entrance. A button to open up the dungeon creation menu will always exist on a dungeon's entrance. Next, the party leader may configure dungeon settings that are described in the following paragraph. Once the settings have been configured, the party leader may press the finish button to start the dungeon. This will cause one's party to be teleported into the dungeon.

The dungeon creation menu has many settings that allow people to customize dungeons. The most basic setting is the dungeon level setting. There are also an extremely large number of difficulty modifiers and customization settings that can be configured to make dungeons easier or harder and more or less rewarding. However, many settings are restricted and require at least one party member to be present who meets the conditions necessary to unlock the setting. For example, the Extra Gold setting increases gold generation in a dungeon at the cost of increased difficulty. One way to unlock this setting is to have the T2 Dungeon Customization ability given to the Dungeon Master class. Alternatively, a Treasure Hunter class can unlock the setting with its T2 Gold Finding ability. A final example is the Leprechaun race that unlocks this setting as well. The maximum effect that a dungeon option can be set to is based on the power level of the factor that unlocks the options. For example, T100 Dungeon Customization or being a level 100 Leprechaun allows the Extra Gold setting to be set to its maximum value.

103: Dungeon Contents

Dungeons are generated in a completely random manner. They can contain any number of items, monsters, terrain features and objects. However, the features and attributes of everything in a dungeon are heavily influenced by the dungeon's level. As one goes further away from a dungeon's anchor, the level of dungeon features increases.

All dungeons have some amount of chaos. Chaos represents the instability of a dungeon and may result in bizarre phenomenon occurring. Higher level dungeons have an implicitly higher chaos value than lower dungeons on average. Chaos increases by performing actions that deviate from the natural order of a world. For example, if a planet is made of water and one freezes it with ice magic, the chaos rating of the world will skyrocket. However, chaos increases extremely slowly when the natural order of a dungeon is not effected by foreign sources. Additionally, the natural accumulation of chaos in a dungeon increases at a rate proportional to how much chaos is currently present in that dungeon. For example, a tornado may result in flooding and other chain events that lead to tremendous chaos increases. Once a dungeon reaches a chaos rating of 100%, that dungeon will collapse. This will cause everything inside of that dungeon to be destroyed.

104: Quests

All dungeons come bundled with a scenario when generated. Quests are randomly generated tasks that advance a dungeon's scenario. They always start out aligned toward good. However, this alignment may change rapidly based on a dungeon's scenario and the actions of individuals. Completing quests always increases the rewards received from a dungeon's victory room (see 4.106: The Victory Room). Additionally, quests may lead to additional scenarios and rewards inside of a dungeon. Conversely, failing quests results in decreased rewards on average.

105: Clearing Dungeons

To clear a dungeon, one has to leave that dungeon using a Return Pedestal. An individual may leave a dungeon to return later, or clear the dungeon to enter the victory room (see 4.106: The Victory Room). Exiting a dungeon can be done by using the CSP method on a Return Pedestal. A group of people can leave a dungeon simultaneously by standing on its Return Pedestal and having the party leader use the CSP method. Additionally, leaving a dungeon is a mentally protected action.

Alternatively to using a Return Pedestal, one can clear a dungeon when dying. Upon death, the effected individual can die normally as described in the Death section of this guide, or clear the dungeon. Choosing to clear the dungeon in this situation invokes a modified form of death. The order of events is that the person has their death penalty applied to them, they are transported to the victory room, and then they respawn at their respawn point when exiting the victory room. Thus, one must always calculate and consider how long a dungeon will be accessible when deciding whether to clear a dungeon or not. A poor judgement or a bit of bad luck may result in not being able to access the victory room at all! A true tragedy!

106: The Victory Room

The victory room is a room that is accessed after an individual clears a dungeon. The room contains at least one Information Pedestal per person, a portal back to the main world and one reward chest for every person that cleared the dungeon. Information Pedestals only display information about dungeons once the dungeons are cleared or abandoned by everybody who initially entered it. The reward chest is a chest that provides rewards based on one's Achievement Rating. The Achievement Rating is a measurement of how much success one has in a dungeon. Reward chests provide the only source of experience for leveling up, and they also contain a random assortment of loot. The Information Pedestals can also be used to see how the Completion Rating was calculated.

Achievement Ratings can be increased by clearing quests and interacting with dungeons in various ways. The rating is influenced the most by quests. However, there are many other ways to influence it. For example, a Monster Tamer taming 100 powerful monsters may result in an increase to the Achievement Rating. Conversely, dying many times or failing many tasks may reduce it. Clearing dungeons with a higher level than oneself will provide a bonus to the Achievement Rating whereas lower leveled dungeons will provide a penalty. In general, difficult and unique tasks completed by individuals within harder dungeons will influence Achievement Ratings more positively than easy and repetitive tasks in easy dungeons.

One additional note about Achievement Ratings is that they aren't effected by morality. An assassin killing a high ranking good priest will acquire the same Achievement as one who kills an evil priest; assuming that the only difference between the two priests is their morality and all other variables are controlled. Clearing a dungeon in an average and expected manner with a moderate amount of effort will result in an Achievement Rating of C. The C rating always provides at least one levels worth of experience, even at high levels. However, acquiring even a C rating becomes more difficult as dungeon levels increase.

Reward chests have common types based on the Achievement Rating that the chests owner earned for a dungeon. This also ties into the actual chest that a person receives.

**No Chest (F):** Nothing spawns.

**Rotten Chest (D):** This is the lowest level chest and has the appearance of a generic wooden treasure chest. However, it is made of brown and moldy wood and is covered in holes. / Loot: One or two bad quality items.

**Wooden Chest (C):** This is the second chest tier and is composed of high quality wood coupled with iron trimming along its edges. / Loot: One or two average items and a small amount of low quality items.

**Iron Chest (B):** This chest is made of iron and has a gold trim. / Loot: One or two good items and a mixture of medium and low quality items.

**Gold Chest (A):** Made of gold and has a sky blue mithril trim. / Loot: One or two rare items, a small amount of good items, and a mixture of medium and low quality items.

**Mithril Chest (S):** Made of mithril and has a diamond trim. / Loot: At least one super rare item, a few rare items and a mixture of good, medium and low quality items.

**??? (?):** The chests from the sixth and beyond are extremely difficult to acquire and are left to be discovered! Some even require secret conditions to be met. Good luck getting even one!

As a final note, the power level of items in reward chests is heavily influenced by the level of a dungeon. Thus, an iron chest from a level 100 dungeon will provide items incomparably better than those found in a level 1 dungeon.

5. Partying

101: Introduction to Parties

A party is a group of players that are recognized by the world as temporarily allied with each other. Using the party feature allows for multiple individuals to enter a single dungeon instance. There are also many skills that apply to targets marked as party members. A party can have a maximum of five individuals. A party with more members than five is classified as a Raid Group (see 5.103: Raiding). Parties can be created by using the CSP method.

102: The Pros and Cons of Partying

Joining a party has many advantages and disadvantages. One of the biggest advantages of parties ability sharing. The Fantasy Universe has many abilities that can benefit multiple people at once and there are no stacking limitations on anything (note: there may still be diminishing returns). Another advantage is that multi-target beneficial abilities will recognize and target party members. Also, multi-target negative abilities will only target enemies. However, it's important to note there are no systems that prevent friendly fire in place by default. This leads to one of the biggest problems of parties. Anybody can leave a party at any time. Thus, it's important to constantly remain aware that parties do not guarantee safety.

One final note about parties is that parties with less than five members are not penalized until dungeon level 10. Prior to dungeon level 10, each additional party member increases the difficulty of a dungeon by 100%, 50%, 33% and then 25%. At and after dungeon level 10, dungeon difficulty is constantly scaled for five people. Thus, it is strongly recommended to join or create a five man party before entering a dungeon with a level equal to or higher than 10. However, it must be noted that clearing a dungeon with less than five people will generate additional Achievement Points!

103: Raiding

Raiding is the act of challenging a dungeon with a large group of individuals. A Raid Group is created when a party surpasses five people, and can have 50 people maximum. A Raid Group can be organized into any number of subgroups. Raiding also has many advantages and disadvantages. First, without a class that has raid management abilities, managing a raid may be extremely difficult. Second, every person that enters a dungeon beyond the fifth increases the difficulty of the dungeon. This scaling is similar to the one used for parties in pre-level 10 dungeons, but each person provides slightly more difficulty than the last.

The main appeal of raids is that clearing a dungeon with a raid causes additional high quality loot items to be created. The additional high quality loot is a reward for clearing content with an increased degree of difficulty. For example, a party of five may kill a dungeon boss and receive three rare items. However, a raid of 50 may get two ultimate items and a divine item. Alternatively, an additional victory chest may spawn under the Raid Leader's name for distribution to the Raid Group's members.

Raiding is useful because it allows groups to clear different levels of content flexibly. First, the impact of less useful individuals is mitigated somewhat by Raids. Second, more people can be in a Raid than a party, so there is more room for individuals with highly specialized abilities. Third, groups can challenge dungeons at levels higher than the Raid Group's average level. Fourth, raiding may make it possible to clear dungeons with hard difficulty settings. In conclusion, raiding can be performed from level one and provides a unique way of challenging dungeons.

6. Alternate Resource Access Buttons

The following is a list of alternate resource access buttons that can be used to access various FWs. The character, inventory, resurrection stone teleport, trade and construction windows are all examples of accessible FWs. FWs may change their state between available and restricted based on one's circumstances. For example, the Return Button will not be listed unless one is on a Return Pedestal. However, the suicide button will almost always be available.

[Inventory] [Equipment] [Character Screen] [Proficiencies] [Quest Log] [Suicide] [Trade Controls]

### Chapter 3: The World Begins

"Where am I?" I say while opening my eyes. My vision is blurry and my mind is hazy. My thoughts are unclear but are slowly unraveling. I look down in an attempt to see anything and find gray. A warm breeze passes over me and the smell of grass, trees and nature fill my senses. My hazy vision and mind are clearing quicker and quicker as I lift my head up. I'm currently standing on a large white and gray stone. To my left is the stone's border, while there are thousands of other people looking around to my right. Each one is coming to their senses similarly to myself.

After a minute, my mind and vision have completely cleared. What I know is that I was just born into this world. The world itself was just created too, along with those around me. I'm standing on something called a Resurrection Stone that is surrounded by a wilderness.

Instinctually, like a chick realizing it's time to break out of its egg, I reach to my left waist. I feel a small book with a leather cover and pull it out of its pouch attached to my waist.

The Introductory Guide to the Fantasy Universe!

I open up the front page of the book and attempt to read it. However, four or five unknown characters are the only text in the book. There is no language that I know that has such strange characters. While failing to read the words, they begin to emit a red light. The light grows until the characters are completely lit. The light then flashes brightly once before going out. Next, several floating screens pop up in front of me:

\---------------------------------------------

[Character]

Jin the Lightning Elemental

Race: Lightning Caster

Level: 1

Health: [----------]

Lightning Mana: [----------]

\---------------------------------------------

[Proficiencies]

Ability Categories

[T2] Lightning Mastery

Active Abilities

[T2] Lightning Enchant

\---------------------------------------------

[Inventory]

1x - Wooden Staff [Poor]

\---------------------------------------------

[Equipment]

1x - Magician's Clothes Set [Poor]

\---------------------------------------------

Even more information floods my mind. The full contents of the Introductory Guide are pushed into the front of my mind. Meanwhile, this information is being processed through synthesis. This sensation can be described as having many revelations all at once. In fact, the surge of knowledge is so intense that I drop to my hands and knees. Skills, items, dungeons, quests, parties, inventories, proficiencies and more. Each one of these topics becomes more and more familiar by the second. However, as the knowledge rush slows down, I begin to ponder things that I don't know. I have no specific information about my situation. I have no idea how big the wilderness is, how the world was constructed, what the other players will do, or even what I should do. The Introductory Guide taught me a lot of basic information about the world. However, that is as much as I know. I know that I will need to figure out many things for myself.

After finishing my pondering, I stand up again and brush off my robes. I also close the information windows, which I now know are FWs, floating in front of me. I look around to get a feel of my surroundings. There are a lot of individuals with distinct appearances nearby. There is a female humanoid with a happy and holy appearance on one half of her body. In contrast, the other half appears deranged, and is enveloped in a perpetual shadow. There is a short devil humanoid that has reddish skin, a tail and two spiky horns. A third person is wearing a patchwork vest of purple and white. Underneath the vest is a thin black shirt covering his legs and arms. The character is also wearing a top hat and white mask that has slits for eyes. Additionally, the mask's smile stretches upward very dramatically. Everybody else has completely unique appearances as well. Body parts and equipped items vary heavily, and there are monocles, canes, flags, axes, staves, wings and a variety of unrecognizable items being worn. The wings in particular make me somewhat jealous.

After checking out people, I evaluate the landscape. The Resurrection Stone that I'm on is a plain gray circle placed at ground level. Its size is around 500 feet. The people density on this stone is massive and there are three people that I can touch just by taking one step closer to them and reaching out. Surrounding the Resurrection Stone is a grassy plain. Dotted throughout the plain are brownish, gray and black protrusions coming out from the ground.

"Dungeons," I say under my breath.

The visibility of the area is great as the sun is shining a wonderfully bright blue light. Thus, I can see very far into the distance. There are two gray splotches at an extremely far distance from my current position and each other.

'Those must be more Resurrection Stones filled with people.'

Before I can think anymore, a loud voice rings out.

"Well then, I'm going to get started."

Immediately the people near me turn toward the source. Once I manage to get vision, I see a young man that has just finished stretching. He unsheathes a sword on his waist and starts running toward a dungeon. Mixed reactions from cheers, to silence, to sighs are given by others. After the man leaves, many others start walking toward the nearby dungeon. I turn and head toward the dungeon as well. However, my estimated ten second walk to the dungeon is interrupted by a _*pitter patter*_ and a voice calling out to me.

"Excuse me sir."

I feel a tug on my robe and a female voice directly behind me. So, I turn my head around to the source and respond.

"Yup?"

This girl is young, white skinned and has cat-like features. She appears to be seven years old and has black hair, black cat ears and black patches of fur on her elbows and knees. In contrast, she is wearing a white one piece dress with two thin straps over her shoulders and a skirt. Underneath the one piece is a light white t-shirt. Her most distinguishing feature, however, is the solid gold ring bobbing gently over her head. Her smile is blindingly bright and is the pure embodiment of happiness and purity.

"My name is Serena. May I join you?" she says while giving a light bow.

"Hmm..." I say while thinking.

'I don't have any particular reason to outright reject her, so why not?'

"Well, I guess it's fine. I don't really mind."

Her eyes sparkle before she throws up her hands and says, "YAY!"

"Erm, but are you sure? Like, you don't know who I am at all do you?"

She looks around nervously before saying, "Well... I'm scared to be alone and I don't know what to do. And, everybody else looks scary."

Her logic makes sense. Many of the people around us have absolutely terrifying appearances. I know that there is nothing wrong with their appearances, but they are unsettling nonetheless.

"Heh, makes sense. Well then let's form a party."

"Ok!" she responds happily.

I concentrate my thoughts on party management and a FW appears before me. I had somewhat expected opening the window to be difficult. However, it is very easy.

\---------------------------------------------

[Party Management]

Party Size: 1

Members: Jin [L]

\---------------------------------------------

'Alright, and now I just have to invite Serena'

\---------------------------------------------

[Party Invite]

You have been invited to Jin's party by Jin.

Accept: [Yes] / [No]

\---------------------------------------------

Serena hits the yes button and the party management window adds her name to the Members field.

"Now, let's head to the dungeon," I say.

We walk to the dungeon, and arrive in front of it after 10 seconds. The dungeon can best be described as an above ground entrance to a cave. There is a giant hole with uneven black and brown rocks forming an upside-down U shaped frame. The size is quite large and people are constantly pulling up FWs and fiddling with them before vanishing.

I think about the dungeons section of the introductory guide. To enter a dungeon, we need to pull up the dungeon creation window, configure its settings and then hit the enter button. I focus my mind and a FW appears in front of Serena and me.

\---------------------------------------------

[Dungeon Creation]

Level: 1

[START]

\---------------------------------------------

Needless to say, the FW is extremely underwhelming. 'Why even have a window if the only thing that it will say is the level and give you a chance to start? Come to think of it, my character window and other information windows seemed rather bare. I was distracted when those windows appeared, but now it is obvious that they hid a lot of useful information.'

"Well Serena, it looks like we can only enter a level 1 dungeon. What do you think?"

She clenches her fists together and puts on a serious expression.

"Umu. I'm ready."

Thus, I hit the start button to enter the dungeon. A beam of golden light rises from the depths of the entrance and Serena and I are teleported away.

... _Some Time Later..._

"My name is Serena and I'm an Angel Cat. My class is healer and I know the Restore Life spell. My goal is to become the best at healing magic and learn support magics as well."

"Nice to meet you Serena. My name is Jin. I am a Lightning Elemental specializing in lightning magic. My goal is to become a god of damage and destruction. Muahuahahahaha!" I say while clenching my fists in the air.

An awkward silence fills the air.

I fake a few coughs to break up the silence, "Cough, cough, cough." After stepping through the portal, I thought it would be best if we introduced ourselves to each other. I realized that we may be with each for a while, so it seemed like a good time to learn our abilities and goals. What lies in front of us are plains similar to the main world. 'What is with all of these plains?' A small part of me feels like a dungeon should be an underground fortress or something. There should at least be a more sinister feeling.

Upon closer observation, I realize that we are standing on a pure white stone platform. Directly in front of us is a rectangular pedestal made of the same material. The pedestal has a flat, diagonal and slanted top. The word Return and a square border surrounding it are engraved deep into the surface of the pedestal's top.

'So this is a Return Pedestal.'

Looking further ahead, I observe the surroundings. Scattered about the plains are clusters of one to three trees maximum. There are occasionally lakes dotting the landscape and other terrain features such as mountains and forests very far in the distance. The life of the area consists of slimes and herbivores such as rabbits, deer, foxes, wild dogs and more. However, all of the life is spread out over a very large area. Some of the animals are at the lake, whereas others are moving around on the plains. Thus, it will be very easy to avoid groups of life and fight monsters by themselves.

"Alright Serena. Let's review the situation."

I focus my mind and open up my Quest Log.

\---------------------------------------------

[Quest Log]

Your party has arrived at the Toruga Plains! Unfortunately, the once peaceful plains have become infested with slimes! Slay the specified amount of slimes below to reduce the slime population.

Quests:

Slay 10 Slimes: Incomplete

Slay 10 Big Slimes: Incomplete

Slay the Slime King: Incomplete

\---------------------------------------------

While reading, I say, "The dungeon's quests are to kill 10 slimes, 10 big slimes and a king slime. Right now, it looks like only the small slimes are nearby. We've got nothing except beginner's gear, so we need to find food and water or we'll starve and die. And, if we die then we will drop all of our items and be unable to enter any dungeons for a while. Our first priority should be to find food and water. Thankfully, there are a bunch of animals all over the place!"

"Hm. It is true that we need to eat. But, can't we find something else to eat besides the animals?"

"Huh? Why would we do that when there is a buffet all around us?"

After saying that, I pick a nearby bunny and charge toward it. However, as soon as I move too close, the bunny hops away at a rapid pace. I try running after it but cannot manage to catch up. The dogs, deer and other animals are even more difficult to catch. There is simply no way that I, with my newly realized terrible physique, can catch up with swift animals. During this time, Serena observes the surroundings with a face of awe and glee. I also can't help but notice that wild animals would occasionally run up to her and let her pet them before scurrying away.

Feeling frustrated at my entire situation, I decide to challenge a slime instead. Thankfully, the slime doesn't run away, and it actually hops toward me as I move closer. I take this opportunity to observe its appearance. In a word, it can be described as cute. Combined with the other herbivores frolicking around the plains, I wouldn't be surprised if the sky was painted with rainbows. The slime is green and moves by hopping closer to me at a slow pace. In its wake is grass that is gently flattened and lightly dissolved. I reason that the slime is acidic from seeing this. However, the damage is so minor that its acid would probably take a long time to cause significant damage. To test this theory, I kneel down, put out my hand and let the slime hop onto it. The slime absorbs my hand into its gooey body, and I feel a slight stinging sensation. I am definitely being dissolved!

"Don't let it eat your hand!" Serena says in a concerned voice.

She then whips out a staff from thin air. The staff has a skinny and cylindrical shape, is almost as tall as her and is composed of unpolished low quality wood. Next, she swats her staff at the slime with her eyes closed. While she may think that she is making an aggressive attack against the slime, the reality is that she is pointlessly flailing her staff in front of my face. After a little while, her staff manages to hit me in the face, and it digs into my cheek.

"Ow," I say with a muffled voice.

Opening her eyes, she hurriedly apologizes and bows.

"It's not a big deal. Just ignore the slime for a bit. I'm testing."

I then open up my character FW and watch my health. I can't tell exactly how much health I'm losing, but I can roughly gauge my current health. Currently, my health bar is decreasing slowly, and I easily have over 90% of my health remaining. That means that in the past 20 seconds or so, this slime has barely done even 10% of my health. While this damage isn't that great, many slimes attacking at once would cause substantial damage. However, thankfully there appears to be almost no risk of that occurring in these plains.

Feeling fed up with the slime enjoying its delicious meal, I cast Lightning Enchant on my hand. Lightning enchant is my only spell and grants a target a lightning aura. This aura deals damage to anything that comes into contact with the enchanted target. Body parts, items, and other materials can be enchanted by Lightning Enchant. The spell is a great way to take advantage of lightning magic without suffering from its inherent accuracy penalties. However, its limitation is that it requires contact with the target to be enchanted and contact with a target to deal damage. For a presumably level 1 slime, this spell provides more than enough damage. After one second, the slime begins to dissolve, and it slides off of my hand into a pile of goo. Having just finished my attack, I say to Serena, "Hey isn't this too easy?"

When I turn my head I see the face of a nine-year old girl with tear filled eyes.

"Errrm... What's wrong?"

"The... the... the slime!"

"The slime? What about the slime?"

"The slime! You killed a slime! Why did you kill the cute little slime?!"

"What?" I respond bewildered. 'What is this girl talking about?'

"Look, we have to kill off the slimes right? I mean, it's our quest, and we're in a dungeon. We have to kill them off."

"No we don't! There has to be another way! And you were totally having way too much fun just now. You were grinning and laughing the entire time. EVIL! You are EVIL!"

"Tch," I click my tongue. I didn't even realize that I was laughing. But I have to admit that I had a lot of fun just now playing with that slime.

I rub my head, "Well then what do you suggest?"

"Hmm, one moment. Let me think." After a short pause, Serena says, "Maybe there was something in the Introductory Guide? Oh that's it! We can change our quests, or do something with the dungeon chaos, or something else. There must definitely be a way! Either that or we could leave the dungeon and try a different one. SAVE THE SLIMES!"

"Leaving the dungeon is out of the question. If we do that then we won't be able to enter a new dungeon for 24 hours. At that rate, we will be starving and will struggle to clear the next dungeon. So, who knows when we will ever make progress? And change quest objectives? With what? We're in a plain. What kind of quest can we find out here!?"

"Well that's... um... um...," clearly lost for words, Serena stammers.

"Then that leaves the only option as increasing the world's chaos. But even that idea is flawed. First, we don't know how to increase chaos in this dungeon. And, second, it's way too risky. If we increase the chaos of this dungeon then we might get sucked into a black hole, blown up or something else unimaginable. You know the information from the guide too, so you know I'm not lying."

Serena thinks hard for a second before calmly responding, "Everything that you said is true. But, well, I can't do it! I won't kill the slimes. If you want to keep killing them then I'm leaving, and you're on your own!"

"Threatening me now huh? Cheeky. Well then leave. You're the one who wanted to tag along. But remember this. This is only the first dungeon with a kill quest. These are probably going to come up a lot and you will have to get over your morals of not killing eventually. If you play the pure hearted character who is too afraid to kill monsters, then you're going to wind up making no progress."

As I finish saying that, a slime becomes bold and hops up to us. But this one has a different appearance.

"Agh," Serena cries while clenching onto me. Yeah, this scene should definitely cause that reaction, I thought. Inside of the slime is a rabbit that is being dissolved.

"Listen here Serena. I'm going to say this once and then you can decide what you want to do. I don't mind playing the good guy when it comes to the good guys. But when it comes to creatures that are more bad than good, they won't get any mercy. This slime is not afraid to eat a rabbit to survive, and the truth of the matter is, I'm kind of jealous. I'd love to eat a rabbit too. In the end, if a quest seems downright evil, I can reconsider it out of consideration for you. But killing wild slimes, animals and other monsters is something that needs to be done. Do you understand what I mean?"

After finishing my speech I equip my staff from my inventory. My staff is low quality similarly to Serena's, but slightly longer. I then apply a Lightning Enchant to it by focusing my mind. The staff emits barely visible sparks as I stab its bottom into the slime. I look back at Serena and see small tears in her eyes that weren't there before. I didn't think that killing slimes was that big of a deal, but now I know that it actually is for Serena. After a short while, Serena wipes her face and puts on a look of determination.

"I will stay."

... _Some Time Later..._

Wiping the sweat off of my brow I say, "Nine down". My pace has become rather steady and I am making good progress on killing slimes. Since the slimes are instantly killed, the only part of the process that takes time is moving to the next target. My Lightning Enchant spell costs very little mana and deals a very nice amount of damage. Although Serena hasn't killed any monsters yet, she would probably one-shot them if she tried. Even I can kill them with two-hits of my staff, even though I am specialized almost exclusively into lightning magic. In any case, she is a healer, so it doesn't fit her theme to deal damage.

A short distance away is a small slime, the last one needed to reach 10/10 completion on our first quest. In a typical manner, I enchant my staff, walk up to the slime, and smash it. After that, a reaction that I did not expect occurs. The sky becomes extremely dark and clouded within less than 10 seconds. After that, rain starts falling. Expecting a torrent of water to come down, I grab Serena's hand and run to a nearby tree. However, this was unnecessary. The downpour lasts for only five seconds and the world is sunny again. During the downpour, a large number of slimes had fallen over the world. There are the small slimes that were killed before and a new type of slime. The falling slimes seemingly defy aerodynamics and gravity and gently land on the ground.

"Big slimes huh," I say under my breath.

I imagined that we would have to walk away from the Return Pedestal to encounter big slimes but who would have thought that this dungeon had such a convenient mechanism. The big slimes are roughly four times the size of regular slimes and can cover half of my arm's length. They are also a dark green color. The world is now populated with roughly three times as many small slimes and about as many big slimes as there were small slimes before. However, thanks to their low density at the start, this isn't a large amount. It may be slightly harder to avoid groups of slimes, but everything looks manageable.

One of the big slimes nearby begins to approach while leaving a trail of acid in its wake. This time, the grass turns brown, and the slime's hop height and speed are decent. In fact, it reaches eye level with each hop. 'This opponent should be much more challenging than the small slimes from before.'

"Eww, those slimes are gross," Serena says out loud.

'Well, I can't disagree.' The big slimes give off a much more intense impression.

"Serena, prepare to heal me. This guy looks like he is actually strong."

"Roger."

Hearing her confirmation, I enchant my staff with Lightning Enchant. I swing at the slime with my staff, but my staff becomes trapped halfway within its body. Maybe that event was fortunate though, since it allows Lightning Enchant to hurt the slime from the inside. After five seconds, the slime emits static from its outer body and melts off of my staff. Its remains are a pool of green liquid.

"Whew, that was close," I say. "If that thing got any closer it might have ate my head!"

"It would serve you right. Hmph." Serena says with crossed arms and a pout.

"Even if you say that, common. Those things are totally ferocious. How can you defend the big slimes? They are clearly way more violent and evil looking than the small slimes."

"They are probably just mad because you killed off their babies!"

I facepalm immediately. There is no way I can reason with this girl, so I move to the next big slime. The big slime to small slime density is three to one. The slimes are all spread out a good distance from each other so it's very easy to single out individual big slimes from groups of slimes. I walk up to big slimes individually and kill them off one by one. I feel very clearly overpowered since all of the slimes die within a few seconds. Perhaps they are weak against lightning? Unfortunately, there is no way to confirm this.

I continue to kill slimes nonstop. During this time, Lightning Enchant increases in proficiency once. A FW appears after I kill the sixth big slime stating that Lightning Enchant has risen to T3. Aside from that, progress is uneventful. After nearly an hour of killing slimes, I approach the last big slime and slay it. The sky quickly darkens with clouds like before. This time, Serena and I stand still while watching the spectacle unfold. The slime rain begins and slimes fall from the sky. However, the difference between this rain and the last is the sheer quantity of slimes pouring from the sky. In fact, the rain is so thick that we have to dodge falling slimes before they crash into us. Near the end of the five second downpour, an incredibly large cube falls from the sky.

*BOOM*

"THE SLIME KING!" Serena shouts while pointing!

Indeed, what had just fallen is without a doubt the Slime King needed for the final quest. The slime is easily six feet tall and wide. The Slime King would barely be able to fit my entire body into itself. However, the fact that it can do it at all is scary enough. It looks similar to the other slimes, but is larger and is clearly distinguished by its massive golden crown. The crown doesn't have any jewels on it and looks like the typical crown of any generic monarch. It is ring shaped with prongs raising up into balls of gold. However, this crown differs from generic crowns purely because of its size. The crown fits smugly over most of the Slime King's head.

"If that's the boss then I don't know how we will win," I say in a defeated tone.

Previous slimes were manageable because of their reasonable sizes and density. However, that is no longer the case. The Slime King is disproportionately large, and the surrounding area is flooded with slimes. The sky is also dark and cloudy, and there is a very light rain of slimes ongoing. It would not be an exaggeration to claim that the difficulty of this dungeon has multiplied one-hundred fold!

"We have to leave!" I say to Serena while grabbing her hand.

"But the quest?" She says while being dragged along. Previously Serena wouldn't lay a hand on a slime, but now she has no choice but to step over and onto some slimes.

"WE'RE LEAVING NOW!" I scream while kicking slimes out of the way.

In truth, there are a lot of bad circumstances about the situation. The Slime King had spawned about a mile away from us, but his jump height is massive. The Slime King can easily jump on top of a four story building. What's worse is that his jump isn't particularly slow and his landing shakes the ground massively, thereby making it hard to remain standing. Next, the amount of slimes being described as a flood is not an exaggeration. Moving requires trampling small slimes constantly while impossibly avoiding large slimes.

But, none of that matters very much. That's because both Serena and I are only a few feet away from the Return Pedestal. From the start, there was never any incentive to move far away from it. After considering everything in the handbook about dungeons, there is no way that I'd move far away from it without a good reason. In fact, everybody should be scared of even exploring a dungeon after reading the handbook. I figured that we would have to go far to kill stronger slimes. However, when the slime rain occurred, that idea vanished. Additionally, I lured the last big slime that was killed extremely close to the Return Pedestal in preparation for a slime rain. Of course, it was always possible that a slime rain wouldn't occur at 10 kills or something else would happen. However, there was no reason to not prepare for a slime rain when one had already occurred. Especially considering how vulnerable I felt the last time one occurred, and there was nowhere for us to hide.

Serena and I run onto the Return Platform and I slam my fist onto the Return Button while shouting "Clear". In an instant, we are transported into a new area. The sky is pitch black and we're standing on a plain of some hard, brown material. Strangely, everything is illuminated even though the time seems to be night. According to the manual, this should be the victory room. It's a room where we can acquire dungeon rewards and review stats and other information. However, its appearance is different from what I expected. In front of us are two chests, to the right are two pedestals and to the left is a pure white portal inside of a thin, white and plain frame. Other than that, the surroundings are completely bare and we can look out into every direction, except for down, infinitely. The chest with my name hovering above it in golden letters is made of made of iron with gold trimming, while the other is made of a moldy and hole filled wood.

"PFFFFFFFF," is my immediate response to seeing the chest.

"WHA---!"

"See what happens when you don't do the quests? You get the poop chest."

In that moment Serena plops down to her knees with tears welling up in her eyes. She then starts to cry loudly.

"Serena wait! I was just making a joke! Calm down!"

"WAAAAAAA--- I GOT A... A... POOP CHEST"

"Ugh. Ok Serena how about this. I'll give you some of the items from my chest alright? Just stop crying please."

Wiping a tear from one of her eyes she replies, "Really?" _*sob sob*_

"Yes. I can't give you everything but I'm sure there is at least something in here right? And hey, there might even be something inside of your beautiful brown chest! Commere. Give me your hand."

With that said I grab her hand and pull her up. Serena wipes her eyes with one piece of her skirt as we walk towards the chests.

"Alright, let's see what we won!"

I bend down onto both of my knees and open the chest. Inside are two blue potions, an orange potion, a metal sword, a boot, a small flag, a rounded tablet and thirty copper coins.

I shout, "What the hell is this? A boot? Potions? I have no idea what any of this is! Who the hell even uses a flag? It's only slightly bigger than my hand! And these coins? 30 copper?"

Serena just gets up and walks over to her chest. She opens it up and says in a sad voice, "I got a moldy wooden sword."

"Ugh," I mumble. I close my eyes and think for a second about what to do next.

'Experience! Of course!'

I check my character window and my level is now two. Leveling up gave three stat points and a proficiency point. My character relies on intelligence and wisdom so I split my stat points between those. I also put my proficiency point into Lightning Mastery which raises it from T2 to T4. 'It's really nice that my stats and lightning affinity give two tiers at once. However, it's unfortunate that I'm still at only the beginner tier.' I could have put the point into Lightning Enchant to raise it from T3 to T5, but I'd rather not neglect the essentials like mana regen, cast speed and etc. Plus, my level is low so my early proficiency choices can be corrected by my proficiency choices at higher levels.

"Alright let's see what my character looks like now."

\---------------------------------------------

[Character]

Jin the Lightning Elemental

Class: Lightning Caster

Level: 2

Health: [----------]

Lightning Mana: [----------]

Strength: 5 / Intelligence: 44 / Wisdom: 43 / Agility: 4 / Constitution: 4 / Charisma: 1 / Luck: 0

\---------------------------------------------

[Proficiencies]

Ability Categories

[T4] Lightning Mastery

Active Abilities

[T3] Lightning Enchant

\---------------------------------------------

'Well, it's rather unfortunate that I can't see how much experience I need for anything. But at least the character display is forced to show my stats so that I can allocate stat points. If not for that, I'm sure those would be hidden too. This is another rough demonstration that this universe does not like providing non-essential information.'

"Serena, what does your character window look like?"

"It only has my name, race and level," Serena says sadly.

While shaking my head, I respond, "Well, maybe you got some experience, but there is no way for us to tell right now. Then again, you didn't really do anything except play around, did you? In fact, I wouldn't be surprised if you didn't get any experience at all."

Serena looks down sadly and tears slowly flow out of her eyes.

"Well, let's look at the Information Pedestals and see what we achieved."

I help Serena stand up and guide her to the Information Pedestals. A white screen is floating on top of each pedestal. I use the taller one while Serena used the shorter one. The screen states the following information:

\---------------------------------------------

[Dungeon Report]

You and your party entered the Toruga Plains on a quest to slay slimes. During this quest, you managed to complete two quests single handedly! The third quest was a trap designed for stronger parties to complete. Due to your cunning, your party stayed near the Return Platform and escaped before the Slime King could slay any party members!

Quest Report:

Slay 10 Slimes: Complete

Slay 10 Big Slimes: Complete

Slay the Slime King: Fail (No Penalty)

Escape the Toruga Plains: Complete

Achievements:

Killed 23 small slimes.

Killed 10 big slimes.

Escaped without dying.

Influence on Dungeon:

Chaos Level: +23%

Dungeon Inhabitation Level: +4000%

Achievement Rating: C

\---------------------------------------------

Meanwhile, Serena's Dungeon Report reads:

\---------------------------------------------

[Dungeon Report]

You and your party entered the Toruga Plains on a quest to slay slimes. During this quest you spent your time sightseeing and lazing about. Thanks to a reliable party member, you managed to escape without being killed!

Quest Report:

Slay Ten Slimes: Complete (No Credit)

Slay Ten Big Slimes: Complete (No Credit)

Slay the Slime King: Fail (No Penalty)

Escape the Toruga Plains: Complete (No Credit)

Achievements:

Restored an allies health once

Appreciated dungeon scenery.

Escaped without dying.

Achievement Rating: D-

\---------------------------------------------

"Huuuuuuuuuuu. My report is so bad!" A wave of black and dark purple gloom can almost be felt coming from Serena.

"Well, perhaps next time, even if you aren't fighting, you can cast Restore Life more often. In fact, I spent the whole time fighting monsters by myself. If you were healing me, maybe I could have fought more monsters at once. That way we could have earned more!"

"mmmm-maybe."

"Well, that dungeon was really easy until the third quest anyway. I'm sure a harder dungeon will appear and you will get more chances to heal me. That way you will get a big fat chest and a super nice dungeon report!"

What I am saying is harsh, but I can't baby Serena; even if she is a child. Everything I'm saying is true. She didn't help at all in the dungeon because of her morals. She did a total of zero damage. I didn't necessarily need help, however, the quest would have been finished faster if she at least attempted to be useful. Instead, she played around. With my food situation, I don't have the luxury of lugging around dead weight. If she won't be serious then I will have no choice but to leave her behind.

Serena sits up, straightens her body out and says in a resolved voice. "You're right. I can't cry forever. Next time I will make sure to heal you a lot! That's a promise!"

'For now you pass. Let's just hope that she's not all talk.'

"Sounds good."

After double checking to make sure I looted everything, I decide that it is time to go. I reach my hand out to Serena and she grabs onto it.

"Alright, let's go!" she says with one fist pumped into the air.

And, just like that, we enter the portal back to the main world.

### Chapter 4: Return Trip

Stepping through the portal returns us back to the dungeon's entrance. Before I can look around, I hear a large number of voices shouting into the air.

"Looking for somebody to identify rings!"

"Party of four needs a warrior! Any level! Currently all level 1!"

"Selling land plots! Building houses!"

"Performing equipment repairs!"

"Selling all kinds of food!"

FOOD! Just hearing that word grabs my attention quickly. I had forgotten about food entirely while clearing the slime dungeon. It wasn't until Serena and I entered the victory room that I remembered that our food crisis is still unresolved. In fact, I haven't even had anything to drink yet. I can estimate that two to three hours have passed since we first entered the dungeon, and Serena and I didn't find any food or drinks. Now I regret not using more effort to catch the wild animals in the slime dungeon, even though that would probably have been a waste of time and effort.

"Ah! If only that rabbit from that slime was edible!" I say while pulling at my hair.

"Food...," Serena says weakly.

The shouts emerging from our surroundings are coming from a large crowd of players. The players are all nearby, and are standing on the nearby Resurrection Stone and wilderness. While holding Serena's hand, I decide that we need to deal with this food situation first and walk over to a vendor. However, before I can take more than three steps, everybody stops moving and turns their attention to us. An awkward silence develops before one person speaks up and says, "Excuse me miss. May I ask, what class and race are you?"

Somewhat wary of the situation, Serena responds, "I'm a Healer of the Angel Cat race."

In that instant, the players quickly run over to her. If the slime rain was a river, then this is a flood. I am instantly separated from Serena as players jump over stalls. Some even fly into the sky and fall near Serena. The amount of devastation being caused by players trying to reach her is unreal. Everybody is shouting and stretching their hands in an attempt to reach her. The lines that they are saying are:

"PLEASE JOIN MY PARTY!"

"JOIN MY PARTY I'LL PAY ANYTHING!"

"I'LL GIVE YOU ALL ITEM DROPS FOR THE NEXT TWENTY LEVELS!"

"IF YOU JOIN MY PARTY YOU CAN HAVE ANYTHING YOU WANT"

"I'LL BE YOUR SLAVE!"

The insanity continues for a solid ten seconds before Serena starts coughing and gasping for air. In an instant, the sky becomes cloudy and dark. The players notice what is happening and stop moving. Bolts of lightning flash violently nearby. The sky parts and a single extremely bright ray of light shines down onto Serena. The players quickly back away from the light while screaming. From the light, a man descends and lands in front of Serena. He is about twice as tall as a normal person and has completely gray skin. Oh, and he is totally naked. His appearance is close to a statue, but he has blue lines of energy pulsing under his skin. Many players are scared as though they are seeing deaths incarnate. It wouldn't be an exaggeration to say that everybody is too scared to breath, let alone pee their pants or scream.

"I have come due to violence on this land. Cease your actions immediately," says the mystery man in a solid masculine voice.

Nobody responds and silence continues for at least three seconds.

"I said, stop the violence. Did you hear me and do you agree?"

Everybody immediately nods their heads. There is a squeaky voice in the background that says "mommy".

"Good. Now apologize to Serena."

"I'm sorry Serena," everybody nearby says in unison.

After that, the man flies back into the sky, and the sky clears up instantly. The speed of this process was not exaggerated in the least. It may be hard to imagine but his figure disappeared and the sky cleared in less .001 seconds. Anybody who sees the sky now would doubt that it was as cloudy as before.

'This world can easily change weather like it's nothing. First was the slime world and now even the main world. Weather can't be underestimated.'

After that incident, the players start looking at Serena again with hopeful eyes. However, they maintain a strict distance and nobody dares to move closer. I move back to Serena's side and speak up.

"What is wrong with all of you? Why do you all want Serena to join your party so badly?"

In an instant a bunch of booing and insults ring out.

"Can you believe this guy? Why would we want an Angel Cat? Is he retarded?"

"Bounty on this idiot. 20 silvers to the guy who kills him."

"Get out of the way you fuckwit! I need to talk to Serena, not you!"

Serena, seeing what was happening, steps out in front and says, "Hey stop it! Jin is my friend! Don't insult Jin!"

After she says that, everybody starts to say things like:

"Awww"

"Well, if Serena says so, then I will."

"Marry me Serena!"

After hearing what everybody is saying, I raise my voice and ask again.

"I repeat. What do you all want with Serena?"

One guy steps out of the ring of people and adjusts the glasses on his face. His slim build, thin frame, black suit and black hair give him a presence of intelligence.

"Since you're obviously clueless, let me tell it to you plainly. First, pure healers are rare. Healing classes are far less popular than other classes, and have fewer people than most other classes. Next, almost all healers are hybrids that specialize in healing and something else like offense. Thus, a pure healer is far rarer than even a normal healer.

Next, Serena is an Angel-Cat. Putting the healing class aspect aside, this is enough reason to have her in your party no matter what. Angel-Cat is one of the rarest races, and is aligned to pure good. It is a race that boasts the best healing abilities, and it is angelic. This means many things. But, the most important one is that Angel-Cats make the best marriage partners! They can't lie or perform any evil actions. For example, Angel-Cats will never cheat on you! They are a symbol of purity and innocent that is regarded highly by everybody. I am not lying when I say that Serena's race and class combination is a deadly mix that makes her one of the most valuable things in this world."

A lot of thoughts go through my head while he is speaking.

'Purity? Innocence? Angelic? Those make sense, I guess. But how does this guy know all of this information? Like seriously, I don't know crap about anything. I can't even figure out how much health I have.'

Serena responds to him, "How do you know all of this stuff about me?"

The man adjusts his glasses with one hand and says, "Because I'm an Information Specialist. My class is specialized in everything related to acquiring and understanding information. Lore, identification, research and more. My class can learn and comprehend everything."

As he says that, he opens up a FW and turns it to us. The class field reads Information Specialist.

"As you can see, my class is legit. Now that I have evaluated Serena in person, I can confirm that her class and race combination is the highest ranked one in this area."

I respond, "But why do you know about the Angel Cat specifically? It's not like you would have been looking up this information beforehand, right?"

The man in glasses sighs and facepalms, "Many people tried soloing dungeons but failed. After coming out, they saw this group, and learned that they need support. And, what is arguably the most essential support class? Healer. A party can become reasonably strong by including hybrid healers and other support classes. However, pure Healers are ideal. This combined with their rarity makes Healers the dream class to have in any party. Thus, people began to look for information on them.

As an Information Specialist, I have sold information about classes and races to other people. Angel-Cat isn't the only race that people want. Angel demi-humans in general, the Teresta, the Imor and more are great healing races many other desirable traits. However, Angel-Cats have many qualities that make them one of the most popular and desirable races to party with.

Anyway, all of that has led to the present. Many people remember spotting a race that might be an Angel-Cat entering a dungeon recently. Their unique trait of a floating halo is rather hard to miss or forget. Thus, everybody has gathered in this area to wait for the Angel-Cat to come out. This is a once in a lifetime opportunity that can't be missed. Do you understand!?"

'Everything he said makes sense, but it seems kind of unreal. He's telling me that this constantly crying seven-year old is the most valuable thing around? I can understand the utility of a healer, but is she really worth that much?'

Before I can continue thinking, the man says, "So what do you say? There are a lot of people here that would help you out a lot more than that fellow next to you. Even I'm willing to give you five gold pieces and priority service for anything that you want for a year."

People begin shouting after he says that.

"That guy has managed to get five gold already? How did he do that!?"

"Serena ignore him! I'll give you everything I have forever, and do whatever you want!"

"Serena please join my party! I'm better than him!"

After a little while of screaming, Serena shouts, "STOP!"

Surprised, everybody immediately stops screaming and freezes. Serena takes this moment to look down at her feet and shuffles them around. She walks directly in front of me, and grabs onto the hem of my robe with one hand. With one finger one her other hand, she plays with her lips.

"I'm sorry but I can't join anybody's party. I was Jin's first."

"NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO"

"WHHAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAT"

"HAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA"

Literal screams erupt from everywhere.

"Wait. Guys! It's a misunderstanding. Please! First party member! Repeat after me. First PARTY MEMBER!" I try to defend myself but fail miserably.

"I'LL KILL HIM."

"HE'S DEAD!"

Many people brandish swords and charge at me. Meanwhile, I prepare my staff and get ready to use lightning magic. However, there was no need for me to do anything. A downward swing that is directed at me is stopped midflight. Before I can react, a form slowly appears as it becomes less and less translucent.

The man from before is here!

The faces of the guys who charged at me go pale. The faces of people who were preparing to charge go pale as well. Some even turn and try to run away, but they stop in place, as if frozen in time.

"Those who have defied the will of Eden shall be punished. For your repeated violence in this world, you shall be jailed for 24 hours. REPENT!" As he screams, lightning bolts strike down from the clear blue sky at the location of the offenders. Lightning bolts even hit people in the crowd that I didn't know would pose a threat.

'Perhaps they were mages preparing spells?'

"All who defy the will of Eden from here on out will be jailed for a week. Be warned."

After saying that, the form of the man disappears instantly. Thinking about the book, that was clearly one of Eden's guardians. The book says that they are infinitely powerful beings. But, reading and seeing are two different things. The guardian performed a multitude of actions that I don't understand. 'Did he ever really leave? Perhaps he made an illusion of himself leaving and stayed invisible this entire time?' There is no way to know. Then, his ability to jail multiple people showed that Eden is not a force to toy with.

The man with glasses speaks up, "Well then, we all know your decision. But everybody here wants you Serena. Anybody here is willing to give up a lot or even everything for you. Keep that in mind."

"Thank you very much," she responds while bowing.

"No problem. And by the way, my name is Chase," he replies.

I can already tell that I don't like Chase. An Information Specialist? More like Information Manipulator. There is no way he's not evil. He made five gold in a few hours which is an incomprehensible amount. I cleared an entire dungeon and only earned 30 coppers. It would not be a surprise if ripped off people for that money. As an Information Specialist, he must know far more than I or others think. 'I have to be careful.'

I am thinking about what will happen next, but events unfold naturally. People who were previously calling me an idiot and screaming have become extremely friendly.

"Friend! Your name was Jin, right? I'm a powerful warrior. How about you let me join your party?"

"Jin, I'm a Thief! I'll split loot 100 to zero in your favor. How about letting me join?"

"I'm a Hypnotist! Let me in and you can have my loot for the next ten years!"

"I'm a Time Mage. Let me in and you can have me as your slave."

Many different people present offers to me. While I'm not particularly opposed to more party members, I don't want anybody joining who only wants to be with Serena. Thus, I make an announcement, "Unfortunately our party is not accepting new members. Thank you for your interest but our party is full."

A simultaneous and unanimous boo rings out, but there is nothing that they can do. I grab Serena's hand and pull her with me out of the crowd.

"That bastard is trying to steal Serena!"

"Stop him!"

"Don't let him get away!"

But after seeing Eden's guardian twice now, people are actually moving out of the way to let us pass. A one week jail stay this close to the birth of the world is an extremely harsh penalty. One can expect to be majorly behind everybody if they are jailed.

I continue walking through the crowd and arrive at the Resurrection Stone. I look around and find another one in the distance. However, since Serena and I haven't visited another Resurrection Stone, we can't use its teleport. And with our food situation not being solved, the long trip would increase our fatigue greatly.

With those thoughts, I whisper something into Serena's ear.

"Haha, that's funny Jin. But we can't do that. It's wrong," Serena responds.

Getting lectured by a seven year old on morals is not what I expected. But, I should have known better. Angel-Cats are aligned to pure good. Asking her to ask for food and then run away with me would never work out. I want to lecture her on how the process is fine if they give the food willingly. But, I want to leave this crowd immediately, so I will need to buy food fairly. Chances are high that people will offer food when I bring up that we need food. However, the request will likely yield better results if Serena is the one asking, rather than the one that they hate.

I turn and look at the massive crowd of hopeful people following me and say, "Serena here is getting hungry. Can I buy some food from anybody?"

People quickly ruffle through bags, and they pull out all kinds of food items from their inventories. These items are getting shoved in our face with words like:

"If you join me you can have as much food as you want."

"I'm a farmer. I'll get you the best vegetables, meat, herbs and anything!"

I step back with Serena and say, "We have to buy the food. It's what Serena wants. You miss, right there," I say while pointing. "I'll buy all of the food you have on you for 30 copper coins."

"But you can have it for free!"

"I'm not taking the food so that you can join the party. We need to buy food legitimately. We don't want any debts."

"Well, if you put it like that, 30 coppers is fine."

There are many objections and alternate offers, but I settle my transaction with the lady I chose first. The food sold to us consists of raw potatoes, raw carrots and an unknown brown meat.

"Thanks a lot Miss," Serena says happily.

"You too. And my name is Marilynn. Please contact me if you ever need anything again!" She responds with a smile and wave.

After getting the food, I store it my inventory and I grab Serena's hand again. We try walking away, but the mob of people keeps following. At this rate, there is no way that we will ever get away from them. And, the people are clearly inclined to follow us all the way to the next Resurrection Stone. People would probably starve to death while following us if we go anywhere. Thus, I come up with a wonderful solution. I whispered into Serena's ear my plan.

"That sounds great! Let's do it!"

At that, Serena begins giggling and running to a nearby dungeon entrance with me. This dungeon is farther than the one that we used before. However, it is still very close. Not missing a beat, the mob follows us all the way to the dungeon entrance. I open up the dungeon start interface and create a level two dungeon. Without waiting for the dungeon to light up, I pull Serena's hand, and we jump into the entrance.

### Chapter 5: An Unexpected Change

We arrive in the dungeon's world and are surrounded by a variety of landscape features. If this world has to be described in one word, it would be lush. Previous worlds were plains. However, this world has mountains, forests, rivers, rocky shores, and more. Currently we're standing on the Return Pedestal that is slightly elevated above the ground. There is a small river flowing gently in front of us that appears to be knee deep. The river is cutting a path between two massive forests on each side. There is a spacious amount of distance between the river and the forests. The forests are very dense and dark and it's impossible to see very far into them. However, the ends of both sides of both forests can be clearly seen in the distance. To the far right where the rivers source must be are a large number of mountains many miles in the distances. Many miles to the left where the river is heading is a large brown clearing. However, from this distance, it's impossible to acquire more specific details about the clearing. In regards to life, there is none. The only sound in the area is the river, and each breath fills my nose with the delightful smell of the thick forests.

"This is too good to be true," I say under my breath. This area is so picturesque and pristine that it feels like a trap. I'm still a complete novice with dungeons and don't know what to expect at all. However, seeing such raw and untapped beauty feels suspicious. There are also no sounds of animals or other forms of life.

Without leaving the platform, I feel the ground around it. However, my actions were pointless. Serena raises her hands into the air while screaming "WOO!" and jumps off the platform while running toward the river.

"Serena! Come back! It could be a trap!" I shout.

"A trap? How could this be a trap?"

"Nothing has happened yet but we need to be careful. Just come back to here for now."

"Common Jin. You're being too stiff. There is no way this is a trap."

I can only freeze in place and wait. The truth of the matter is that dungeons are completely unknown places. A life or death situation can arise from anywhere. My first instinct is that monsters will come running out of the forests. However, thanks to Serena running around for a while, that fear is dispelled. Truthfully, Serena ignoring my command to come back bothers me immensely. As the party leader, it is my responsibility to control my party and keep it safe. But I can't force her to listen without the risk of losing favor. Knowing how much she is worth makes that idea stupid. In any case, I can only hope that nothing bad happens to us while trying to increase my influence over her. Our current relationship is complex, but it should improve over time.

"Alright Serena, I was being overly cautious. But I don't think that's a bad thing. I also don't think that it's a good idea to run into the unknown blindly. Please try to be wary in the future. I'm going to check our quests now so please don't run too far away or touch anything."

"Ok leader!" Serena says with a salute.

I concentrate my mind on the quest log and a FW pops up.

\---------------------------------------------

[Quest Log]

The town of Hamel has been plagued by undead for the past month. Help the town of Hamel survive waves of undead for three days.

Quests:

Survive Day 1: Incomplete

Survive Day 2: Incomplete

Survive Day 3: Incomplete

\---------------------------------------------

I think deeply for a moment and process the quest. The quest reveals the name of the town and the nature of the problem straight away. However, the quest doesn't reveal where the town is or the source of the problem. In fact, it seems somewhat strange that the quest doesn't ask to eliminate the source of the problem. Thus, two probable conclusions can be drawn. The most likely situation is that the source of the undead will be dealt with on day three. The last dungeon had a Slime King, so maybe there will be an Undead King. However, if something of that difficulty shows up again, it will be impossible. The other situation is that we don't need to deal with the source of the problem. However, there is too little information to make a proper assessment. Right now our best bet is to get to Hamel and acquire more details. Going through the forests is unreasonable and the mountain range looks challenging. Thus, the only way to go is to the clearing on the left. It seems that camping out near the Return Pedestal will be impossible for this quest.

"Hey Serena," I call out to her.

She replies with, "Yes?" On her arms are blue and red birds lined up as she holds her arms in the air. There are also yellow birds playing with her hair. However, as soon as she looks at me and responds, they fly away.

"It's time for us to go. Let's roll out."

"Alright! Where are we going?"

"We're following the quest log. We need to find Hamel and save it from undead."

"Undead," she responds with a very serious expression. Up until this point, her face had never displayed such an expression.

I curiously and gently probe, "Why are you wearing such a serious expression?"

"Am I?" Serena says in a surprised tone as her face returns to normal.

"Yes, you were. For a few seconds your face is serious and in deep thought."

"Ah, well, I don't know. For a moment I felt a lot of weird feelings, and had strange thoughts about the word undead. I can't really explain it well."

"Well, that's fine. I'm sure that you will figure things out over time." I decide to not probe any deeper. Her race is an Angel-Cat and she has a halo over her head. There is probably some connection between her pure good race and the generally evil undead. In any case, I imagine we're going to meet up with undead at some point, so this kind of situation should naturally resolve itself. There isn't a need to worry about it too much.

We walk for around 20 minutes until we reach the clearing. The clearing is actually a large brown field. There are divided sections with water channeling between them from the river. However, there is nothing growing on them. The river that we were following diverts sharply to the left before draining into a lake very far in the distance. Just past the fields is a town. Its stone walls have large holes in them and are clearly breaking down. Additionally, thanks to the forests ending, it is possible to see the position of the sun. The sun is positioned so that it's early morning or late afternoon. However, the world hasn't gotten any darker since we entered the dungeon, so it's probably morning. And, somebody in the town will probably know the exact time anyway.

Serena and I continue walking through the fields. As we move closer, the town's details become easier to discern. The town has a circular shape with a circular wall on its perimeter. The walls around the town are made of many small stones glued together with some unknown material. The walls are about twice as high as myself and easily five feet thick. However, it has many holes and cracks in it. There is even a gaping hole from the top to the bottom in a couple of spots that completely breach the security of the walls. A large area around the town's walls is cleared and there are forests, mountains and even a lake in the distance.

Next, strangely enough, the ground is covered in bones. All around the town and inside of the town are piles of bones. They all seem to be roughly the same size, but I can't tell where they came from. The entrance to the town has one door propped wide open, and there is an empty spot next to it where a wooden door appears to be missing. Since we came to the town through the fields, we arrive at its front entrance.

There are many buildings in the town, but I can't tell exactly how many there are from my location. The majority of the buildings are wooden one story houses with a garden and a porch. There are empty holes on the walls of many of the houses, whereas some have an olive green or black material over them. There is a road at the entrance of the town that leads to its center. At the town center is a building much bigger than all of the others, and, aside from the wooden roof, is made entirely of stone.

"Alright Serena. NOW is a good time to exercise caution."

"Yes. But isn't it strange? There is nobody around."

Indeed, what Serena said is true. The entire town is deserted. There is absolutely no noise.

"Yes, it's very strange. And there are all of these bones everywhere. That's why we need to move in slowly and inspect everything carefully. We can't blindly rush into here. We don't even know if this is Hamel. This town could be infested with undead."

"I agree. I think we should be careful, but we need to hurry. If there are undead in the town then there might be people that need rescued."

"Well, at least nobody is screaming. I doubt anybody is in any immediate trouble, but I agree that we should move quickly. Let's check a few of the surrounding houses while heading to the big building in the middle."

Serena nods and we put our backs to the wall at the right side of the town's entrance. Since the area around the town is clear, there was no way to hide when approaching. Thus, we previously walked toward the town's entrance boldly. However, we can hide behind buildings from now on. Also, our line of sight is blocked by houses so we needed to be as cautious, stealthy and fast as possible.

I listen for a while before waving at Serena to follow me. We enter the town and approach a house on the right. One of the windows is bare and I peak in. There is a relatively standard living room with a coach, table, shelves and other furnishings. We check inside of a few houses with open windows while moving as quickly and stealthily as possible. Thankfully, our equipment is made of cloth and is very light. All of the checked houses are empty on the first floor. And, based on the layout of various empty and broken houses, I'm able to infer that some houses have closed doors and covered windows for the bedrooms. While it is extremely tempting to check what is inside of the closed off bedrooms, it's impossible to tell what is inside. Overall, the risk isn't worth it so we skip them. We continue our walk until we reach the double doors of the large stone house in the center of the town.

"Hey! Who are you guys?" A voice rings out.

Panic. Fear. Uncertainty. Those three emotions immediately well up inside of me. I turn my head to the left and look at the source of the voice. A thin man in dirty and worn clothes is approaching us on a stone road nearby. He looks to be in his late forties and his low cut hair is starting to gray.

"Um, me? I'm just visiting."

The man looks at Serena and me with an expression that is more confused than angry.

"A visitor huh? Well that's surprising. What's your business?"

In that moment, my mind starts reeling. This is my first time interacting with somebody in a dungeon. A plethora of options circulate throughout my mind, but I decide that the best answer would be to tell the truth. This man is most likely a native of this town and is linked with my quest. I need information so why should I do anything else? "Well, the truth is that we heard about the undead and came to fight against them."

"YEAH!" Serena shouts in a pumped up voice.

"You came to fight the undead?" the man says with a trembling voice. "Does that mean... are you guys adventurers?"

"Well, I'm not sure if that's the correct term, but it sounds about right."

"Adventurers huh? Wow. Then the prophecy is true. You came! Quickly! You have to meet the mayor! Follow me!" the man says hurriedly.

And like that, the man rushes into the entrance of the stone building. We quickly follow behind him as he goes to a room off to the side. The inside of the town hall is wooden with a lobby and reception area. The reception area is a counter with a small opening to allow conversation with the person on the other side. However, there is nobody manning the counter at the moment.

"Marin! Martin! Martin!" he says while banging on the door.

A well-built man in his early thirties eventually opens the door while rubbing his eyes.

With a big yawn, he responds, "Yes. What could you possibly want this early-- Oh, it's you Randalf. What's wrong?"

"Adventurers! These two people are the adventurers from the prophecy!"

Immediately, the man named Marin straightens up and looks in our direction. He assesses Serena and me by looking us up and down, "Really? I don't believe it. They are so... plain."

"But the prophecy," the older man responds.

"Even so, just look at them. What can they do? We've been struggling for the last month with no success. Listen, we can deal with this after I rest. I'm going back to sleep."

"One second," I interrupt. "Your name is Martin right? I couldn't help but overhear you say 'What can they do?' Actually, we can do a lot."

"Yes, yes. I'm sure you can. I'll be honest. Your help is appreciated, but right now is a bad time for me. I'm going back to sleep. You can talk to Randalf, and I'm sure he will explain things to you."

With that, the man named Martin shuts his door.

"Well that was rude," Serena says.

"Please excuse the mayor. The attacks by the undead are relentless and occur at night. He has not slept for the last two days and I'm sure that the stress of our situation weighs heavily on his mind."

"It's fine, it's fine. So, Martin said your name is Randalf right? I figure we might as well introduce ourselves. My name is Jin and this here is Serena."

"A pleasure to meet you," Serena says with a light bow.

"Oh aren't you a sweetheart. It's rare to see such a sweet little girl like you. And you have a halo over your head? That's pretty interesting."

"It's because I'm an Angel-Cat!"

"Oh well isn't that sweet. Well, it's a pleasure to have such a beautiful young lady in our town."

*ERM ERM ERM*

I roughly clear my throat before saying, "Anyway, could you please explain the town's situation to me in detail?"

"Ah yes, yes. Well let's have a seat over there and talk this out."

Randalf points at a group of tables in the lobby, and we sit down.

"First, I apologize, but I can only provide you with water right now. Our food situation is bad, and nobody would approve of me giving food to outsiders."

"It's fine, don't worry about it," Serena says.

'What? No food? This old bastard.'

"Ah well aren't you sweet. Well then, make yourselves comfortable. This story will take a while to tell. A little over a month ago, undead began to appear at night. At first there were a few that only stood around the town at a distance. However, the number of undead that appeared grew each night. After a week, a ghostly green fog appeared and blew into the town. That was also when the undead began their advance onto the town. We were able to handle the undead easily near the beginning of the invasion. However, by the second week, we started to lose against the undead. This is because of the undead's attack pattern. The undead will attack us once before leaving us alone for one or two nights. However, that is only if they are victorious. If we manage to defeat every wave of undead in a single night, then they will certainly bring a more powerful force the next day. Two days ago, we barely managed to get a victory against the undead. However, the force they brought yesterday was much stronger than the ones before and easily defeated our fatigued defenders. The new undead have more attack, defense and aggression."

"Wow... that is really unfortunate to hear."

"Indeed. And the results are as you see. Our food situation is horrible since our fields have been trampled. Livestock was overkilled by townspeople for food and by the undead. Not to mention that most wild animals in the surrounding areas have run away already. The walls have been destroyed, and our town has been thrown into chaos."

Randalf pauses and takes a drink of water.

I then state, "Thank you for the information. You had mentioned something about a prophecy, so can you explain that?"

"Oh yes, of course. There is an oral tradition passed down through my bloodline that adventurers from a foreign land would one day come to save us from a terrible event. We, the townspeople, are not supposed to pry into where they come from or the methods that they use. Instead, we should only gratefully accept their help."

'Well, that's a convenient way to avoid having to explain that we can from an alternate dimension.'

"But the problem is that it has already been over a month since the invasion started. I tried to tell people to have hope in the prophecy but many people have lost their faith over time."

"That's only to be expected. Well, we're here to end the undead invasion regardless of how the people feel. But, before we can do anything, we need information. Will you help us?"

"For the adventurers from the prophecy? Of course. Ask anything."

"Thank you. I basically need information about the people living here and the undead attacks. The more details that you give me, the better."

"I'll be happy to answer that request. But, are you sure that you want Serena to hear our conversation? It will be gruesome."

"Sir, I can handle it. I genuinely want to help the town against the undead. Please speak your mind freely," Serena says with a serious expression.

'Is she really only seven years old? That was extremely well spoken.'

Randalf looks at me as if seeking confirmation, and I nod my head.

"Well then, let's start with the undead attacks. The undead attackers were initially skeletons. However, a few zombies began to appear during the second week. And, as I said before, they get stronger with each wave. The undead usually invade for 12 hours from 7:00 PM to 7:00 AM. During this time, they randomly invade in waves with a random amounts of undead.

Our first loss against the undead happened during the second week. At that time, the previous mayor Gedric was killed along with two other defenders. Without our leader, the command structure collapsed and morale dropped. Ten people total died on that night. In response, the men spent the next day creating holes under their houses, so that their families can hide at night. This idea was successful, but families were cramped, sad, lonely and bored for 12 hours. Thus, we created one large and comfortable bunker underneath the town hall for everybody to hide in.

Up to this point, the undead haven't destroyed any buildings looking for people. But that changed yesterday. The new undead have actively started attacking buildings. Once a structure loses enough durability, it is destroyed. That's what happened to the town's walls and now it's happening to buildings and doors. It's only a matter of time before the undead are able to find people. And who knows how much their capabilities will advance if we manage another victory?

Anyway, that should be enough about the undead. In regards to our people, there are currently 103 living townspeople. There are 43 men, 46 women and 14 children. Of those, 40 are fit to defend the town at night, and that includes Martin and me. We only have enough food left to feed everybody for one more day. The portions are small, and many people are expected to starve to death after three days. Well, of course some people have hidden food rations. But that's the rough estimate. And let's see, is there anything else?" Randalf says with a finger on his chin. "Well, I think that covers all of the main points. Anything else?"

"I have just two more questions. Do you know why the undead are attacking and have you guys tried moving?"

"We truly have no idea why this is happening. I wish I could say more, but everything in our town was going perfectly until the undead showed up. If you can find the source of the undead attacks, then that would probably help us end them. In regards to moving, unfortunately we do not know of any other civilizations. Many explorers have ventured far away in the past. However, none have ever found another civilization."

"Well that really sucks. I appreciate all of the information you have given me. Hm. I guess all I need now is some time to digest it all."

"You just got here so I can understand. I'll leave you be. If you need anything than let me know! I'll be out and about," Randalf replies with a smile. He stands up and heads out of the town hall.

"Serena, the town seems to be safe during the day, so you can go around and explore. However, do not leave the town no matter what! If you really want to leave then come get me first, and I will go with you."

"Hmph, I'll leave the town if you want. How come you always tell me what to do?"

"You don't get it. Serena. You're my party member. I really care about you. If you leave the town then I might not be able to help you. If I could have my way, I wouldn't let you leave at all. Hey, wha wha."

Serena's cheeks turn rosy and she pokes her thumbs together while looking down.

"OK!" she suddenly cheers and runs out the door.

"That child. In any case, I need to figure this dungeon out," I mumble to myself.

The quests are very straightforward, but there are still a few missing pieces to this puzzle. The biggest piece is the motivation for the undead attacks. Why would the undead begin their assault, and what do they stand to gain? Is there really some leader behind them or are they mindless? Next, it seems unlikely that skeletons and zombies caused the damage done to the walls. Unless I'm underestimating them, there has to be something else. And third, I'm really curious what kinds of technology, weapons and magic the townspeople use. Perhaps I can get some training or somebody can identify the items that I acquired from the last dungeon. However, everybody is asleep so that is all impossible at the moment.

... _In Another Place..._

"Ah, it's such a bright and lovely day today."

Serena smiles as she takes in a deep breath of air. A warm breeze blows through town and gently lifts up her hair. Even though the town is incredibly quiet, the atmosphere feels entirely peaceful. Serena has actually been very happy up to this point. She was born into a completely unknown place but was able to meet a nice man. While he did some actions that she didn't quite agree with and is too cautious, she is overall happy to have met somebody who genuinely cares about her.

Serena is a free spirited young girl with the properties of both a cat and angel. Her animalistic side automatically makes her a friend of nature, whereas her angelic side makes her the friend of all things good. Normally, small animals, birds and dogs have issues with anything relating to cats. However, her angelic nature's purity negates those issues entirely. This synergy exists because her race is significantly more biased toward the angel race. In a sense, her catlike qualities serve only to accent her angelic qualities. This is also why Serena's race is Angel-Cat instead of Cat-Angel.

Serena walks around the town while exploring for a while. Everybody is sleeping so there isn't any activity. However, she is still able to enjoy the fresh air and learn the layout of the town. The houses of the town are arranged in rings. The rings of houses alternate, and each ring is rotated half of the distance between any two houses. The closest ring to the center of the town has buildings that are crucial for the town's functions such as the Town Hall, Tavern, Hospital, and Multi-Purpose Workshop. The remaining outer rings contain all of the residential buildings. And, of course, the furthest ring is composed of the town walls themselves.

After exploring for a few hours Serena thinks to herself, 'Ah, what do I do? Everybody is sleeping so there is nothing to do. I'm getting bored.'

She then looks around and sees a tree surrounded by grass nearby. A yawn naturally escapes her mouth as she walks over to it. She gently lays down while murmuring, "I guess I'll take a quick nyaaaaaaaa-p."

... _In Another Place..._

Two hours have passed, and Jin wraps up his complex brainstorming session. This was the first time since he was born that he could relax and think freely. He was born on a resurrection stone and immediately rushed into a dungeon. After clearing the dungeon, he was mobbed by people and rushed into another dungeon. There were many topics that came into his mind, but food was the first one. He acquired some food from a trade, but it is just a bunch of raw ingredients. There are three carrots, two potatoes and a mystery meat. Split between two people, this will barely make a single meal. Serena's priorities and his will need to be focused solely on food in the future. While this world has living and breathing humans, at the end of the day, it's just a dungeon. Once a person clears a dungeon, it is destroyed. This means that the actions one performs, one's impact and even one's legacy are meaningless in the end. One option for Serena and me is to steal all of the townspeople's food and leave the dungeon without helping. However, the victory chest would likely be unsatisfying, and Serena would never approve of this course of action. In fact, she would definitely become outraged.

At an even more basic level, it's reasonable to question if completing the quest is even worth it. He was able to get an average victory chest from a dungeon that only took a few hours to complete. No matter how you look at it, three days is a really long time to be stuck in a dungeon. But, the advantages and disadvantages of a longer quest are unknown. Victory chest rewards should be balanced in theory, right? So, maybe a longer quest will be more rewarding? And, maybe the quests are misleading and they will actually be completely quickly? In any case, there is one advantage to a longer quest. The group looking for Serena outside of the dungeon will eventually disperse. Once the group disperses, Serena and Jin will be able to look for ways to identify items and maybe even recruit decent party members in peace.

Jin considered various variables and possibilities surrounding his past, current and future circumstances for two hours. In the end, there were too many possibilities and unknown variables to accurately account for everything. However, this brainstorming session gave him an opportunity to settle his mind and think about what to do clearly.

'My plan of action will be to play along with this dungeon. I'll complete the quests and train during downtime. While the food situation in this town is difficult, perhaps food will become available if I save the town from trouble. For the time being, Serena and I should rest. Since the undead attack at night we will need to be well rested to fight them at night.'

With those thoughts, Jin stands up and leaves to find Serena. He explores the town and learns its layout. After less than fifteen minutes, he finds Serena sleeping under a tree. Small rays of light are shining through the trees and branches as he sits down beside her. He closes his eyes, and quickly falls asleep as well.

... _Some Time Later..._

*poke*

"Tehehehehe"

*shuffle shuffle*

*poke*

"Tehehehehe"

*shuffle shuffle*

*poke poke poke poke poke*

'What is poking me,' Serena thinks to herself while slowly opening her eyes and yawning, "Aaahhhhuuuuuuuuuuugghhhh." Even though her eyes are open, her vision is dark and there is the feeling of a cloth material all over her face. She turns her head to the right and sees two legs reaching out. Further out, there are three people standing nearby with shocked expressions on their faces. She turns her head even further to the right while rolling her body to find a clearly panicked expression. That expression is worn by nobody other than Jin!

"Wha-wha-wha-what are you doing Serena?"

"Nya? I was sleeping," she says sleepily.

'Nya?' Jin thinks before shaking his slightly and responding. "Serena, you can't sleep here. You have to get off of me quickly!"

"What? But you're so comfy. I can't..." Serena responds grumpily before turning her head back around and grabbing Jin across the waist.

"I... I can explain." Jin says while looking at crowd. Before it was three adults, but now two more adults and seven children have arrived. While Serena can't grasp the situation, Jin can easily understand how the people see this scene. But before he can say anything else, a woman says, "Now now. There is no need to explain yourself lad. I see you and your little lady wanted to spend some time together. How cute!"

"But... But..."

Another man interrupts, "Hey man I feel ya. I met my wife when she was 12 and I was 25. Age can't stop love! Hahahahaha!"

There had been several times when Jin would feel that something is strangely off. However, after a few moments, the feeling would pass and no longer matter. For example, during his brainstorming session, he considered his origin. His origin is extremely important! How did he come to be? What created him? His interest in his origin took off at a rapid pace. However, before that interest could take off completely, it settled. The growing passion faded like a candle being blown out. His feelings toward origin became a matter of 'who cares?' This situation is the same.

At first, Jin was prepared to force Serena out of his lap and get up. The situation was being misunderstood too much! And, anybody would think that the situation is wrong and outrageous. Serena is only seven! Jin is a respectable person with strong morals who would never do anything questionable with a child. However, before his feelings could become strong, they faded. Now, all that is left are his strong feelings of embarrassment. He still wants to avoid the embarrassing situation at hand. But, how can he bear to do that? Serena is resting so peacefully with her cute face and warm body gently laying on him. In under five seconds, Jin's heartbeat quickens as he unconsciously starts to pets her head and his thoughts move to a different topic.

'Aren't these people supposed to be starving and suffering from an undead invasion? What is up with this good spirited atmosphere?' It became obvious that Martin and Randalf are being fed well after seeing the other townspeople. This is most likely because they are the biggest contributors to the defense of the town. However, the children and adults have thin skin and are clearly suffering from some degree of hunger.

"Hey Hey Hey! What's the crowd for? Don't you know we need to work on repairs?" A large voice cuts through the group of people.

"Oh. It's that couple from before. The mighty adventurers that are supposed to save us are laying down taking a nap. How sweet."

Jin considers himself a rather pleasant person but he is absolutely not going to put up with that. What's worse is that the person is the mayor that he had met earlier.

"You're one to talk. Weren't you just sleeping as well? Hypocrite."

"I need to rest so that I can defend the town unlike useless trash like you."

The crowd begins to grow larger with people gasping and saying to calm down.

"Oh? You sure have a big mouth to go along with your big head. Who taught you those words? Your daddy?"

At that moment something snaps within Martin.

"You worthless piece of shit. I will fucking destroy you right here."

The situation escalates far beyond anything that Jin expected within the span of only two lines. Martin takes out his sword and immediately begins charging. Jin takes out his staff and uses Lightning Enchant. 'I probably won't win in a straight up 1v1 but maybe my magic can turn the tides.'

"Mud Pool!"

A voice comes from the side. In an instant, the ground underneath Martin becomes less solid. This causes one of his feet to sink into the ground forcing him to trip.

"Enough you two. Martin, your bad attitude has gone too far. And you adventurer, you went too far as well. Both of you calm yourselves immediately. Our efforts must go toward repelling the undead!"

"He started it," I say angrily.

"Hmph," Martin responds while picking himself up. He then spits nearby before saying, "Alright everybody, back to work."

I look away from Martin and look at the man who stopped our fight. It is Randalf! He approaches me while saying a few words.

"I have to apologize for Martin's behavior. Since you're new here you probably don't understand the situation. The late mayor, Gedric, is Martin's father. The undead killed Gedric during a battle on the second week of the invasion. As I said before, the undead were not very threatening until the second week. He led two soldiers beyond the walls to investigate the gas and combat the undead. However, they were surrounded and completely caught off guard by the strength of the skeletons and zombies. In retrospect, people felt bad that they didn't urge him to stay within the walls. However, Gedric was a very successful man who commanded absolute respect from everybody. Not many people, myself included, felt that he could make a bad decision. It was a tragic loss. After his death, Martin took up the post of Mayor. He has a lot of vengeance against the undead but is trying his best to stay calm and save lives and our town."

"Ah, and I brought up his dad. I can see why he became so mad now."

"Indeed."

"Well, I won't apologize to somebody who starts trouble. But more importantly, what is that magic you just used?"

"Oh that? Well, it's a spell called Mud Pool. I'm an earth mage."

"Wow? You're an earth mage?"

Jin's mind starts reeling.

"If you're an Earth Mage then what can you do? Can't you use earth magic to repair the walls?"

"For the three hundred years of our civilizations existence, my bloodline has birthed one Earth Mage at a time. Supposedly, the walls were created by the first earth mage. I usually wake up a few times in the morning to repair the walls. That's why I was able to meet up with you early today. Then I repair the walls every couple of hours in the afternoon before conserving mana for battle."

"Wait, so doesn't that mean that if you don't have to fight the undead, you will be able to make much larger repairs?"

"That's true. I would be able to devote more mana to repairs."

"Then that sounds like the solution. Serena and I will defend against the undead so you will not have to spend your mana defending."

"That sounds nice but the situation isn't that simple. It would be nice if I could perform better repairs. But, that wouldn't change much at all. Realistically, we need many people repairing the wall nonstop with people to defending the walls. As the walls are repaired more, they are attacked more and need greater repairs. Of course, this comes with stalling off the undead. But, is it worth it? Probably not. We have limited food and have to balance out fatigue as well. We are all walking a very fine line of balance between wall repairs and defense. If we do too much work repairing then our work will be wasted inefficient."

"Man, you weren't joking. That really is a complex situation. But the solution remains simple. We just need to free up more people for repairs and defend the walls better right?"

"That would be nice, but the latest waves have given us almost no time for overnight repair work. Everybody is always stuck on defense. Before, we used rotating shifts so that everybody defended, repaired and slept. But, that doesn't work anymore. Having a shift with one or two people working at a time to repair all night would make a massive difference. The problem is, we're barely surviving as is. It's impossible for us to pull away people from defense to perform repairs"

"What if I told you that I can guarantee you that we can pull off people for repairs?"

"As the adventurers from the prophecy, I want to believe in you. But lives are on the line, so I can't rely on my personal opinion or the prophecy completely. I have to judge you for myself. As of right now, I'm not convinced that you two are strong enough to make a big enough difference."

"That's a reasonable assessment. But I don't think you should doubt me," I respond with a wink.

Randalf then raises an eyebrow and responds, "If you sincerely think you can change our situation with a plan or strategy, then I'm all ears. But I ask that you remember to consider everybody's lives above all else."

"Of course, of course. I know I'm new here but I've had a lot of time to think over everything. I really appreciate all of the information that you have shared with me. It sounds like the main problem with this battle is that the people are too weak and don't have enough sustenance. In that case, I have a few ideas that will completely turn the tide of this war."

"Oh? Is that so? Well then, I'm all ears."

"Alright then listen closely."

### Chapter 6: Defend

The sun is beginning to set on the horizon, while an orange shade covers the town of Hamel. The passing breeze from earlier in the day has long since ended. In its place, a stillness is present in the grass and trees of the surrounding region. The bunker under the town hall shields the breaths of children from the unknown. The front entrance of the town proudly displays a gathering of people; Serena, Randalf, Martin and Jin. Behind the town walls is a large number of townspeople hiding.

The sun crosses the horizon completely after several silent moments pass. Mere seconds pass before a ghastly green gas begins to envelop the area surrounding the town. As the sun sends its final farewell, the gas becomes thicker and encroaches upon the town. After five minutes, shadowy figures emerge from the gas and begin their approach.

*clack clack clack CREEEK clack rattle rattle CREEK*

"The skeletons have arrived!" Randalf shouts.

The shadowed figures move closer and closer until their forms can be distinguished. Three skeletons are approaching the town from the front entrance. They are 100 feet away and will arrive in around 30 seconds. They are a humanoid shape made out of bone. Some have the frame of a skinny child while others have the frame of a fat, tall man. None of them are wielding anything in their hands.

"So far nothing is out of the ordinary, right?" I ask Randalf.

"That's right. This is normal."

Randalf has described the basic attack pattern of the skeletons to me many times already. In the beginning, the skeletons were easy and beatable by everybody. However, everybody became weaker, while the skeletons grew stronger. Thus, they are currently very hard to beat. But, the real trouble with each battle is that the undead come in the form of non-stopping waves. While it's possible to defend against waves reasonably for the first few hours, fatigue and injuries accumulate to the point that nobody can defend. That's where Serena and I come in.

My Lightning Enchant will give us the damage to destroy waves of undead faster than ever. Next, Serena's healing magic will leverage the health disadvantage that the townspeople have from being in prolonged battles. However, our main concern is mana. Based on testing, it takes about 10 minutes to regenerate mana completely. During this downtime, we will switch out with other people and rest. If we sit down and rest then our mana regenerates at a slightly faster rate.

Randalf also has the same mana regeneration rate as Serena and I. Thus, one would think that he could repair the walls more frequently than he claims to currently be doing. However, he uses a method that makes frequent repairs unnecessary. He owns a necklace with a magical stone that absorbs and stores up to two hours of earth mana from his body. While this might seem overpowered, Randalf is only a beginner earth mage. The amount of earth mana gathered by the stone over two hours is only enough to use one or two intermediate level spells.

Before the wave, there was also the issue of my relationship with Martin. Martin said that he wasn't convinced that we can make a big difference and didn't trust outsiders. However, Randalf convinced him that our intentions are genuine. He mentioned the prophecy, explained our magical abilities, and said to at least give us a chance. It also helped that Martin has a massive hatred for the undead that he prioritizes over almost everything. In the end, Martin apologized to my face while telling me that we need to be united against the undead.

All of that brought us to this moment. The plan is to show off the effectiveness of the defense team with the adventurers from the prophecy. This should increase the morale of the townspeople causing them to work harder to repair the walls and fight. In fact, the townspeople acted cheerful and happy during the day. However, now that a battle is imminent, it is obvious to see the despair in the faces of everybody. The defenders were only acting happy and joyous during the day for the sake of their families.

The reason that morale is low is because of the various circumstances of the town. During the battle in the second week, many children and women lost their husbands. With the food situation being threatened, nobody wanted to adopt the children. At first they were being cared for at the town hall. But, they eventually disappeared. Those children were not the only people who have mysteriously disappeared. The harsh reality of the food situation has put the lives of everybody on the line. Serena even suggested that we give them our food. However, I convinced her to wait at least a day before we make any decisions that will kill us. At this rate, we will need a miracle to beat the third day. Even the thought of fighting for twelve hours right now seems like a ridiculous task. The chance that we will have to leave the dungeon before finishing all quests seems very high.

"They are close enough. Is everybody ready?" I shout.

Everybody responds in unison, "YES!"

"Then let's go! CHARGE!"

I pull my staff out from my inventory and cast Lightning Enchant on it. The top of the staff becomes covered in small amounts of lightning. Then, I cast Lightning Enchant on Martin's iron mallet. The iron mallet is a high quality blunt weapon that the defenders quickly created after seeing the ineffectiveness of their swords during the first battle. It's a two-handed weapon with a wooden shaft and a thick, wood and iron block on one end. The advantages of the mallet are that it has a medium range and hits very hard. However, it is heavy and increases fatigue quickly.

Then there is my Lightning Enchant spell. Lightning Enchant is a spell that consumes about 10% of my mana and lasts 30 seconds. It costs 20% of my mana per 30 seconds to maintain it on two targets. That's two minutes and 30 seconds without factoring in mana regeneration and three minutes with mana regeneration. The 30 seconds of bonus time is added because I regenerate 25% of my mana in the time span of 2:30 which equals 2.5 casts. Randalf's Mud Pool spell has a similar utilization rate because it is a beginner spell as well. Serena's Restore Life spell restores 5% of a targets life for 10% of her mana. That means that she can fully restore a person's health once every 20 minutes. The spell is clearly not designed to fully heal entire armies at once. However, with natural health regeneration and the time between waves, she should be able to satisfy our healing needs.

We, the major contributors, believe that the magic casters combination of magical abilities will create an insurmountable defense. For this first engagement, we will show off our abilities. After that, Randalf will primarily use his abilities to repair the walls with the townspeople and will only help in an emergency.

*BAP*

I slap a skeleton across the head with my staff causing its head to fly off. I then turn the staff horizontally and smash the bottom into its ribcage. The skeleton is knocked back but surprisingly doesn't fall over. And, unfortunately, those two actions have already worn me out. 'Like seriously, is my constitution equivalent to a Slime? Wait, my strength and constitution are only one! Maybe I am equal to a Slime!?' I step back for a moment and look at Martin.

His techniques is unrefined but his physique is clearly better than mine. He slams his hammer into a skeleton causing it to fall down. The surface area of the hammer contacting the skeleton's bones causes small bolts of lightning to surge over the skeleton's body. My staff has a similar effect, but it is significantly less flashy. While distracted, the third skeleton comes to my side and slashes me with its boney fingers.

*ZRRRRP*

The sleeve of my robe becomes torn and deep scratch marks appear on my arm. Before I can even react....

"Restore Life!"

Serena casts Restore Life and the wound is wrapped in a white light. The skin around and over the area of the wound regenerates under the glow of the light causing the wound to disappear. The entire process occurs before there is enough time for blood to drip. The scratch marks and wounds are completely healed as if the attack had never connected. But, what's more amazing is the fact that Serena cast her magic from the town's entrance. This highlighted the incredible utility of the spell.

"It's a shame that my robe was ripped. But, this is much more exciting than slimes," I say under my breath.

The skeletons move at a moderate speed. Also, my staff has a pretty nice range. So, I begin attacking the skeleton in front of me from before while walking backwards. This movement ensures that I am not hit while dealing damage. I continue to wildly strike at the skeleton with horizontal and vertical swings until it falls into a pile of bones. By the time that I finish the skeleton, Martin is working on the third one. After a few more seconds, it dies as well.

"Well that was anticlimactic. We killed those skeletons in less than ten seconds. Was that really it?"

"I must admit. That Lightning Enchant magic is better than I expected. I can kill a skeleton in two hits instead of three. Also, having a healer means that I can fight more aggressively and won't have to worry too much about others being hurt. But we can't get cocky. 30 skeletons at a time will become common later on. Additionally, they won't always come from the front of the town. That's why we usually end up forced into hiding before the full 12 hours pass."

"Don't worry, I won't get cocky," I say as I turn my head and look at Randalf. "So what do you think? Is this good enough for repairs?"

"I think that it is. Martin?"

"Yes, this is fine. I'm sure that the people will be motivated after seeing what we just accomplished." With that Martin turns his head and shouts to the people, "EVERYBODY! THE FIRST WAVE IS REPELLED! BEGIN REPAIRS AT ONCE!"

After he says that, the sound of hammers and saws begin at once. The walls are made of stone, but I decided that it would be better to establish a temporary defense with wood first. Most of the wood acquired came from the nearby forest, but there was also a lot acquired from unused houses. This town hasn't had a chance to make substantial repairs in a long time. Usually the undead destroy most of their progress which demoralizes workers and makes repairs feel pointless. This is, again, why morale needed to be raised. If a solid wood wall is established, then we will be able to manage battles better. We're also going to create three more town entrances spaced equidistantly from each other. This should hopefully attract and funnel enemies that would normally attack random segments of the wall. And, of course, these entrances will be heavily barricaded. With everybody repairing, we plan to finish the wooden construction by tonight. However, as time goes on, more and more people will need to be pulled for defense.

"The next wave is coming!" Serena shouts.

Approximately 10 minutes pass before three more skeletons come out of the gas. The fight against them is mundane. I cast two Lightning Enchants and we handle the skeletons the same as before. No, this time we killed them off faster. 12 minutes pass and a wave of four skeletons arrive. The fight isn't difficult as long as I keep a reasonable distance from the undead. In fact, the only difference between this fight and the last is that I had to refresh Lightning Enchant once. The third wave brings four skeletons and one zombie. Zombies move slowly, but Martin warned me beforehand that one hit is devastating. Its appearance is a walking green corpse in tattered clothing. We fight the skeletons normally while avoiding the zombie's attacks. The degree of difficulty is, again, not very high. But the zombie brings up an interesting question.

"I almost hate to ask, but is it possible to eat the zombie's meat?" I ask Martin.

"Unfortunately, it's inedible. A person tried it before and died within an hour. And the death isn't pretty."

"Noted. Also, do you have any idea where the zombie's corpses are coming from?"

"We have no idea. We have explored the nearby area during the day, but have never found anything."

"Well is there perhaps a cemetery somewhere near the town?"

"There are none. We cremate everybody when they die before the town's Earth Mage buries the ashes deep underground during the funeral."

"Darn, well a cemetery seemed like the obvious source for the invasion. Well, two more questions. How many waves do you guys fight a night? And are the waves always spaced out every 10 minutes or so?"

"The amount of waves is random but I would say to expect at least 50. In regards to wave spacing, they have always remained constant. It is good that they don't become faster because the waves will overlap from not being defeated fast enough. By the way, this is also one of the biggest issues with the later waves. Waves will stack on top of each other which leads to an inevitable defeat."

"50 waves? Ugh," I mumble to myself. This is more annoying than anything. The twelve hour battle is reinforced in my head. The sky hasn't even turned completely dark from the sunset. 'I miss those slimes.'

I spend the downtime in-between waves thinking about all of the different ways to manage the war. 'Can we build a moat? Maybe we can put in some traps. What if the whole town just moved underground and lived off of potatoes?' Those thoughts lead to a massive revelation that I hadn't even considered.

'Wait a fucking second.'

\---------------------------------------------

[Quest Log]

The town of Hamel has been plagued by undead for the past month. Help Hamel survive waves of undead for three days.

Quests:

Survive Day 1: Incomplete

Survive Day 2: Incomplete

Survive Day 3: Incomplete

\---------------------------------------------

I open and read the quest log and nowhere in it does it say to fight against the undead. In fact, it doesn't even say that the town needs to be repaired.

'Now that I think about it, what even qualifies as survival? If one person survives, does that count as the town surviving? How many people need to survive? If Serena gets pregnant from a townspeople, would that count? Ah crap, well she's too young for that. But, do the walls and buildings even need to be repaired? I had spent so much time thinking about how to play along with this scenario, by repairing the town and fighting undead, that I became narrow sighted. In fact, Randalf said they have a motherfucking bunker. A MOTHERFUCKING BUNKER.

I could just gather everybody into the bunker and survive all three days no problem. Why wouldn't they have just done that in the first place? Oh, probably because that doesn't fix the food situation and everybody wants revenge. I doubt it was even considered as an option. But, that seems like the best solution for the defense. How would I be able to convince people to enter the bunker? I also wonder, is it even possible to lose this quest as long as the bunker isn't breached? The women and children will survive regardless, right? Wait, Randalf said that the undead were really strong yesterday and have started destroying buildings to get to people. Perhaps that is a sign that the bunker will be attacked and isn't safe enough. That would make a lot of sense.

Well, let's assume that the bunker plan goes off without a hitch. What about food? We could maybe grow food underground? Fuck, our party only needs to live for three days so couldn't we even resort to cannibalism? But, there is no way that Serena would agree. And, now I'm thinking about those missing people, what if they were killed and eaten? Goddamn, this situation is complicated. Another wave is coming so I will talk to Serena afterwards.'

This next wave brings four skeletons and two zombies. While this wave seemed like it would be the hardest so far, it is actually the easiest. The two zombies escort one skeleton in front of the town's main entrance. Meanwhile, the other three skeletons show up at random spots around the town walls and siege. The people on repair duty have blunt tools as well and overwhelmed the skeletons 10 to one. Needless to say, it was a massacre.

After taking care of the wave, I pull Serena to the side, "Serena, we need to talk for a bit."

"Alright, sure."

Randalf and Martin look at us suspiciously, but I quickly say, "I just need to talk for a short while about something personal. No worries."

They both look at each other and shrug. Well, there isn't really anything they can say or do anyway.

"What is it Jin?"

I tell her about my thoughts on the food situation, the dungeon, and the quests. I tell her how what we're doing is a good way to rebuild the town. But, we will most likely starve to death or die from the war at this rate.

"I want to save all of the townspeople no matter what. This isn't like the slimes from before. These are real people with families, and I won't give up on them."

"Yeah, I figured you would say that. And, to be honest, I agree. I think that we will get larger rewards based on how many people survive each day."

"Oh good! I'm glad we agree! But I really want to make sure that the people don't die after we finish our quests. Is there anything we can do for them?"

"I understand your feelings Serena. I think that creating a long lasting solution for the townspeople would probably give an even better victory chest! But we might have to acknowledge that that is out of our capabilities. Ending the undead invasion and resolving the food problem are enormous tasks."

"True," Serena replies meekly.

"Also, I understand you don't want people to die. But, remember, as soon as we leave the dungeon it will be destroyed anyway. So you don't have to worry about the people here suffering anymore."

"Hmm... you're right again."

I then pound my fist into the palm of my hand while wearing the expression of a revelation on my face.

"I'll be honest. I'm really glad I got to talk with you. I had just come up with all of my ideas for how we can beat this dungeon before the last wave. Now that I have chatted with you, I'm extra motivated to save these people. I can satisfy your conditions and we will get a bigger victory chest. I have some plans to defend the town and deal with the food situation, so how about this. If my plans to defend the town and end the food problem work, then we'll try to end the war before we leave. Deal?"

"Deal!" Serena says gleefully.

"Alright then let's head back before the next wave starts."

I then walk over the Randalf and Martin who are having a conversation.

"Oh! Welcome back. Any good news?" Randalf says.

"Well, I hate to say it, but I think we're going about this all wrong. In fact, our current plan is bound for failure."

Both Martin and Randalf put on a look of disbelief.

"What could you possibly mean? We're doing well so far. The walls are getting repaired and the people have more morale then they have ever had before. What is wrong with that?" Martin responds angrily.

"Please calm down. Look, another wave is coming let's clear that and then I'll go into more detail."

A wave of five skeletons and two zombies appears. The skeletons appear at the front entrance, whereas the zombies are scattered. The strong hits of the zombies cause massive damage to the walls so Martin goes after them first. I stay around the entrance and lure the skeletons around. By attacking outside of their attack range, I manage to kill two without taking any damage before Martin returns. We finish the remaining three and continue our conversation.

"Please explain what you were saying before," Randalf states impatiently.

And with that I, go over all of my thoughts on the situation.

"Right now, everybody is using too much energy trying to perform and maintain repairs on the huge walls surrounding the town. At this rate, everybody will collapse from overwork and hunger. Even if the walls are repaired, there is almost no chance that we will be able to maintain them. Instead, we should change our approach. My suggestion is to shrink the size of the town. First, we need to defend everybody regardless of the time of day. To do this we'll upgrade the bunker to accommodate all of the townspeople and fortify it to defend against the attacks of the undead. This will reduce the amount of work and maintenance that people have to do and allow us to concentrate our defenses at one spot. Next, we need to deal with food. We can create a field above the bunker and surround it with walls. There is also the risky move of growing crops on top of the already existing walls. The undead only seem to care about destroying structures when they are in the way or they have nothing to do. So, there is a chance that crops grown up there will survive. No matter what, I think that that it's an investment worth the resource loss, even if it fails. Overall, I think this is our only realistic method for survival."

Martin hastily responds, "It's a really good idea but it's too late. I think we could get away with making a mini-town. But, even if we manage to create the small town, crops will take too long to grow. We will starve and die before they bear produce. You did bring up a good point about the repairs though. At this rate, nobody will last. Instead of wasting our time and energy on repairs and making the small town, perhaps we should make a last stand?"

I respond, "A last stand? What do you mean?"

"Look, I respect you as an adventurer from the prophecy. But your plan won't work. Instead of wasting our time repairing the walls or trying to use a plan we aren't sure can work, let's rally the defenders and charge into the gas. What do you say?"

"So you're willing to risk the future of the town on a plan that is even more uncertain than mine? What about the families that will be left behind if your plan fails?"

Martin then says while shaking his head, "They will die. Just like if your plan fails as well. I've heard your idea, and I reject it. I need to perform a patrol."

Martin then starts one of his normal patrols around the town walls to assess the state of affairs.

"And what do you think Randalf?"

"I had a feeling that this was coming and have thought about this long enough. It's a very tough decision to give up on our town and overturn Gedric's will to slay the undead. But, we can't afford any more luxuries. Damnit, if this town is to survive, we have no choice but to move forward. I believe that you are correct and will support you fully."

"I'm glad to hear that," I sigh in relief.

"But unfortunately, Martin is the mayor. Without Martin's support it will be hard to convince the rest of the townspeople to follow you. They will likely reject your idea and side with Martin."

"They might reject it right now but they won't in a few hours."

Randalf becomes puzzled and asks, "What do you mean?"

"One word... Fatigue. Do you hear that? The people are already getting tired."

What I said is true. The vibrant repair work that was ongoing before has become much less noisy. There are still hammer noises, saws, and other sounds from people working. However, there is a lack of vigor. This is to be expected though. The people quickly gained morale but it's obvious that an hour of boring hard labor would wear them down. Not to mention that they are working in a depressing town that is constantly being invaded by undead. In another hour or two, their morale will hit rock bottom. That will be the best time to convince them.

"Just give it another hour or two and I will gather everybody. Even if Martin doesn't support my cause, I'm sure the people will be happy to get a break."

"Well, I hope so. But what about food? You explained a risky plan, but do you have a safe plan as well?"

"Indeed, I do. But first, we're going to need to grow new plants. Are there any seeds around?"

"Of course! We have plenty of seeds for all types of crops. We just couldn't use them because the undead always trample them."

"Good. I'll explain the full plan to you later with everybody else since we have to fight this incoming wave of undead. But, don't worry, I think I've solved all of the problems."

"Alright then, I'll leave it to you."

Some time passes and we, the defenders, fight five more waves over the course of the next hour. During this time, the number of undead rises to ten per wave. According to Randalf, the undead wave size should max out near the 6th hour, so the amount of undead attacking will grow rapidly over the next four hours. Next, the skeleton to zombie ratio has stayed around one to three. This ratio should remain consistent for the rest of the night as well. The amount of damage to the walls has remained low thanks to Serena and I defending. Also, any time a person is injured, Serena will instantly cast Restore Life on them. People even come from different parts of the town to receive healing.

"I'm being healed by an angel!"

"Man I love prophecies."

"I hope my wife doesn't find out about this."

Many people are rejected due to not having injuries. However, thankfully, her mana has kept up with the real needs for healing thus far. In the future, Serena won't be able to keep up with those needs in the later waves when more undead arrive. And, if we can't clear out the waves fast enough, it won't be just her who can't keep up.

Now that another hour has passed, I put my plan into motion and act.

"Alright, that's the last undead for that wave. Good work everybody," Martin says.

"Same to you," I respond. After that I look straight into Martin's eyes and speak, "Martin. May I have a word with you?"

"Yes? What do you need?"

"It's about my plan from earlier. I want to switch our work from repairing the walls to fortifying the bunker and shrinking the town."

"No matter what you say, I won't agree."

"I figured you would say that. I have already factored in your lack of cooperation. You are now free to do whatever you want."

"I don't need you to tell me that. But, whatever. The matter is settled."

'Hehe, that's what you think'

I then turn abruptly and begin walking toward the middle of the town. After arriving in front of the town hall, I begin shouting.

"EVERYBODY PLEASE GATHER IN THE CENTER OF THE TOWN. I REPEAT, EVERYBODY REPAIRING, STOP WORK IMMEDIATELY AND GATHER!"

The voice shouting was none other than I, Jin! After a few moments, people come from the surrounding walls to the center of the town. Some people are wobbling and barely able to walk. The condition of the townspeople has fallen considerably by this point. Once everybody finishes gathering, I speak again.

"We don't have a lot of time before the next wave, so I will be brief. I wish to take command of the town as the mayor. Our current strategy will lead to everybody dying. I have plans to save everybody's lives. Are there any objections?"

There are many murmurs among the gathered crowd.

"Take over? But what about Martin?"

"He has plans to save everybody?"

"But, he's an outsider. Can we trust him?"

I then turn to Randalf and say, "If you would please."

Randalf then speaks loudly and clearly, "Everybody, what he says is true. He has thought long and hard about ways to save our town. His intentions are genuine and I support him fully. I ask that you at least hear him out as the adventurer from the prophecy."

"Randalf supports him?"

"Well, if Randalf says so I guess we can hear him out at least."

"Ahhh, I'm so tired. A break! I'll listen to anybody for a break!"

Martin then walks through the parting crowd while shouting, "People! People! Listen to me! The undead took the lives of your neighbors and the previous mayor. I've already heard this outsiders plan, and I can assure you that it won't work. He wants us to hide in the bunker like a bunch of cowards. After all that the undead have done, how can I or you do that? I will remain on the front lines. I will no longer be afraid and will advance into the green fog. But, what about you? Are you a coward? Will you remain behind cowering in fear while the undead slaughter you wife and children? Or will you come with me and risk it all for a chance at victory?"

The crowd of people then look around at each other and murmur before Serena speaks up.

"Everybody, please believe in us. I promise you that we only want to help." She then bows at the waist horizontally.

The people immediately stop clambering and run up to Serena, Randalf and me.

"You said you have a plan to save us right?"

"You can get us food?"

"You can save my wife and kids right? I don't care about myself just save them!"

Meanwhile, Martin looks on in disbelief. Randalf then walks over to Martin's side and speaks.

"Nobody can tell you how to live your life. But, I want you to know something because I am indebted to the late mayor. Your speech just now sounded a lot like something that he would say. I think you should value your life more."

With that, Randalf walks back to Jin without waiting for a reply.

"Everybody listen to me! The next wave will be coming soon so let's take care of it and then I will explain my plans. However, you don't need to repair the outer walls anymore. Just focus entirely on defense."

"Yeah!"

"Alright!"

"Yay!"

A variety of cheers rise and people start walking away from the town wall. The townspeople have gained a noticeable boost to morale, but they are not capable of expressing it by running.

The next wave of undead arrives and the townspeople defeat it easily. There are 40 defenders fighting 11 undead, so the ratio of undead to townspeople is one to four. The fight ends within three minutes due to high numbers and morale. The townspeople were definitely rushing so that they could return to the town square and hear my plan. After they return, I announce my plans. The town will create a small town on top of the bunker and plant crops there. We could then centralize our defenses at that one location and grow food.

A man shouts, "But won't it take time for the plants to grow? Will we be able to last that long?"

I then respond, "The brutal truth is that there may be sacrifices. But, if you want any chance of saving the lives of your families, then this is the only way. This will be the last ditch effort by the town to save the lives of as many people as possible. Many of you have stated that you are prepared to give your lives to save the lives of your wives and children. Were those empty words?"

"Hell no!"

"Bastard, who do you think I am?"

"I'll show you my determination!"

A hearty cheer that this town probably hadn't heard in weeks resounds. The people then start the task of building the mini-town. Since the bunker was built under the town hall, their first task is to remove it. The goal is to create an above ground field surrounded by walls, called the town's inner walls, and a trench or pit. The plans for the trench or pit aren't finalized, and diverting water to create a moat is a consideration. Regardless, the defense of the town will increase staggeringly as long as some defensive terrain is created.

Next, the outer walls surrounding the town will be modified to not block movement, and act as elevated farm land. The design is similar to a bridge going around the perimeter of the town supported by pillars. The inner walls and outer walls will then be connected together by elevated bridges. However, due to the risky nature of this plan, it has a low priority. For the time being, Randalf is using his earth magic to create holes at regular intervals in the outer wall. This is so that the undead will pass by without causing further destruction. His spell, Rock Slide, is a beginner level earth magic that breaks apart the structure of dirt and rock causing them to melt. Most of the beginner level earth spells only deform rock and earth. The movement of rock and earth using magic becomes common at the intermediate level.

During the construction and repair work, the undead continue to invade. After five hours, the waves of undead average 27 skeletons and nine zombies. The waves take nine minutes to complete on average, so downtime between waves has disappeared almost entirely. If not for our makeshift trenches and concentrated defense, we would have probably been overrun at this point. Most warriors fight two or three waves before rotating out. This ensures that there are always 26-30 people defending at any given time. For Serena and me, we cannot keep up in stamina or mana. Also, since we're both mages, we spend most of our time sitting down while the others fight. I cast my Lightning Enchant on the strongest warriors' swords as often as I can while Serena heals the most wounded. Additionally, we maintain a reserve of 20% of our mana pool in case of an emergency.

The fights continue for the rest of the night before ending. There were 58 waves in total and the final wave had 46 undead. The magic provided by Serena and me, along with the defensive fortifications, allowed us to win without losing a single life. Serena's Restore Life spell rose to T3 during wave 35 and my Lightning Enchant rose to T4 during wave 42. The construction of the fortress, as we named it, has made rapid progress. Thin wooden walls are partially constructed and a pit is being created. The progress was slow because the plan was proposed in the middle of the invasion, and the later waves didn't allow as much free time to perform construction. A pit was decided because the undead can be pushed into it. Additionally, the undead are mindless and will fall into the pit. This will create a situation where they can be attacked without being able to retaliate. Also, undead may even be left in the pit until the battle ends, and they will be killed off by sunlight. Overall, the pit provides many flexible defense strategies. A drawbridge is planned to control access over the pit, and there will be temporary hiding spots and secret passages for friendly units to use if they accidentally fall into it. We considered isolating the fortress entirely from the surrounding area, but determined that the undead may adapt to the situation. One adaption is that the pit will fill up with too many undead and overflow. Overflow is also why the moat idea was rejected. There were many disaster scenarios considered, and we decided to focus only on making defense as easy as possible, rather than forgoing defense altogether.

### Chapter 7: Day 2

'I better get an insane reward for all of this work,' Jin thinks to himself. Right now he's taking a bath in one of the abandoned houses in town. Even though he didn't do as much physical labor as the others, he reeks from being around thousands of different undead. Normally, non-defenders gather water for their relatives who are defenders after every battle. Then, families use bath time as an opportunity to bond with each other before going to sleep. While it may seem like the women and children sleep at night, this is not the case. Whether it's from fear of the undead, a desire to sleep as a family or simply the bunker being a noisy environment, all of the people in the bunker have adjusted their sleep schedules to sleeping in the morning.

"Please excuse the intrusion. I'm coming in."

"Wha-Wha-wha what?"

Before Jin has a chance to properly respond, the wooden door to the bathroom opens up, and Serena enters fully nude.

"Se-Se-Serena, what are you doing. Where are you clothes!?"

"It's bath time! Why would I wear clothes?" She responds innocently while walking over to the bath.

'Alright, calm down. She is only seven years old. She is obviously not up to anything lewd. She must be trying to bond with me like a family member.'

Jin scratches his head before responding, "Ehhh. Ok... fine. But don't you think its weird bathing with me? I mean we aren't really related."

She stops and thinks for a moment with her head tilted and a finger on her chin. After a moment, she says, "Nope! It's just a bath!"

'Damnit, she is too pure!' Jin says in his head while biting his bottom lip and clenching one fist. 'I'll just have to roll with it. This is totally fine. Yup. Totally fine.'

"Alright, fine, fine. Come into the bath quickly."

And like that, Serena joins the bath with Jin. They start off the bath by putting shampoo into each other's hair. The women and children who are non-combatants have plenty of free time every night. So, they are able to create an abundant amount of soap, blankets, clothes and other useful products. These items allow people to maintain a sense of normalcy in their lives. The soap is distributed in bars and the shampoo is distributed in small wooden cups.

After shampooing their hair, they stand up and wash themselves with soap. Jin averts his eyes from Serena who feels absolutely no shame standing up in front of him. Not that it matters, since he had already seen everything when she first came in.

"Can you wash my back?" Serena says while struggling to reach her wash cloth to her back.

"I guess it can't be helped."

I reach over and grab her wash cloth before we both sit down in the tub. That water is cold, but I didn't fill the bath with much. This is because I didn't want to waste any time. In fact, it's possible to light a fire underneath the tub to create hot water. But, Serena and I have just stayed up all night fighting and had to fetch our own water from the river. So, we want to go to sleep quickly. Or, at least I do.

"Alright, I'm done."

"Ok, now it's my turn!" Serena says while standing up, turning around and walking directly over top of me. I naturally avert my eyes once again.

"Alright, you're done too!"

After finishing, I drain the water out of the wooden tub and pour leftover buckets of water on ourselves. The soap and shampoo washes off easily thanks to their high quality.

We stand up and step out of the tub as Serena asks, "Can you dry me off please?"

At this point, nothing Serena says can surprise me anymore.

"Alright," I respond emotionlessly. I then use my towel to wipe her off. Once I finish, I wrap it around her and tuck it into itself tightly so that it can't fall.

"Now it's my turn to dry you off!" Serena says excitedly. I sit down on the floor and she begins to dry me off. Normally, sitting on a wooden floor is a bad idea. But, this house is abandoned, so who cares? She dries me off all over and finishes by saying, "all done! Now you're sparkly clean."

I stand up and she wraps the towel around my waist as I had done for her. Then, I walk out of the bathroom and put on a set of spare clothes. Currently, my clothes are being repaired and cleaned by the women. The women said that they will bring my clothes back early in the afternoon after they finish drying and everybody wakes up. So, I have to wait until then. Next, I go to the bedroom and lay on the bed with a yawn. Meanwhile, Serena also puts on spare clothes and jumps under the blankets with me. I consider saying something about males and females sleeping together, but my accumulated fatigue hits me all at once. I close my eyes and quickly fall asleep.

... _Some Time Later..._

I begin to slowly open my eyes. However, before my eyes can register my surroundings, my body does. Hair is in my face and there is a lump between my arms and legs. "Uwaaaaah," I grumble while my eyes open all the way and my senses collect themselves. I then look down and see my situation. Serena had managed to push herself directly next to me and is wrapped between my arms and legs.

By now, my feelings for Serena have become clear. Even with a raging case of morning wood, I'm not bothered by the situation. Maybe it's because of the bath and now sleeping together that Serena feels precious to me. She acts childish but has a strong personality. She acts morally and is determined to achieve goodness. Not to mention that she is supposedly a class and race combination that is super rare and useful. 'Serena is my valuable little sister that I must stay with and protect.'

I squeeze Serena tightly in my arms before whispering in her ear, "Serena, it's time to wake up. It's time to get up. Common, it's time to wake up. Open your eyes. Wakey wakey eggs and bakey. Rise and shine sunshine!" After a few more cheesy lines she opens her eyes.

"Good morning," Serena says in a sleepy voice.

"Good morning."

She then yawns as I try to let go of her. However, my attempt fails because she rolls over to face my chest, grabs my arms to stop me and says, "5 more minutes please."

'Your cuteness won't work on me. I already know your weakness.'

"Well, you can sleep for five more minutes. But, that could be the difference between life and death for the townspeople."

Serena's eyes instantly shoot open at my words and she pushes my arms away.

"I'm awake," she replies firmly. After a few moments her stomach grumbles.

"I'm hungry."

"Me too. I think it's time for us to eat the food we got before entering this dungeon. Are you fine with that?"

"I really want to give it to the townspeople. But you're right. We will starve at this rate. And if we starve we won't be able to save them. I'll eat."

I then pull out the food from before. We bought raw carrots, potatoes, and a strange chunk of meat. We can probably get away with eating the carrots raw. However, the potatoes will need cooked. Then there is the meat. The meat spoiled from sitting in my inventory for a day and is inedible. Realistically, the meat was always extremely questionable and may not have been safe to eat from the start. However, if it weren't spoiled, eating it now would certainly be worth the risk.

"Ahhhh! Our meat!" I say panicked.

"Noooo! The meat," Serena says weakly.

"It's fine. We can boil these vegetables to make them edible. But remember, we need to do this in secret. If the townspeople find out then they might think we have a lot of food and get mad."

With that, Serena and I boil the vegetables. First, I use the fire pit in the kitchen to create a fire. Many logs were removed from the fire pit to create a small fire that doesn't produce a lot of smoke. Second, I place a bucket of water over the fire pit in place of the massive iron pot. While the water heats up, I cut the skin off of the carrots and potatoes and dice them with a knife. When the fire starts boiling, I put the food in and let everything cook until becoming soft. Then I scoop everything out with a spoon and place the food on plates.

'I'm so glad that this town has iron technology and this house still has kitchenware.'

After eating the carrots and potatoes, Serena and I start our day. We go to the workshop that is being used by the men and women to perform production and repairs. After acquiring our clothes and changing, we split up. Serena leaves to explore, play with the other kids and do whatever else she normally does, while I go to the fortress. The time is currently 2:13 PM based off of what the women told me. Serena and I had managed to get a little over six hours of sleep, and now there are only five more hours until the next battle. This fact really hammers in the reality that battles eat up a lot of time.

I approach the fortress and speak to a familiar face, "Good afternoon Randalf. How are you?"

"Ah, Jin! I'm doing fine. How about yourself?"

"I'm doing well. How is the construction coming along?"

"The construction is coming along fantastically! But before I say any more, come here! You have to see this!"

So, before our conversation can advance any further, I follow Randalf into the fortress. We walk over a temporary dirt bridge and enter. We then walk between crop lines before stopping at one spot. Randalf then points down near his feet.

"Look at that."

"Oh my god. Wow! Really? Already?"

"Yup. This seedling is the first one to sprout above ground. Amazing right? At this rate, we might be able to provide enough food so that nobody dies."

"But how? Shouldn't it at least take a day before a sprout appears?"

Then a man wearing a straw hat comes over, "That's what you would think right? However, we have an advantage. The skeletons that have been slain provide a nearly endless amount of bonemeal."

"Bonemeal? What's that?" I say in a confused voice.

The man smirks, as if waiting for my question, and then responds, "Bonemeal is a product created by grinding up bones. We create bonemeal from the skeletons and mix it into the soul. We also sprinkle a little bit on top for good measure. But don't forget, we're pros at agriculture. Our land was already fertile and we have rivers nearby. All of those factors resulted in what you see before you." He was definitely praising everybody's work from the prideful way that he spoke.

"That's... that's incredible. I can almost not believe my eyes. Wow."

What he said about the bones is true. The skeletons fall into a pile of bones when defeated. This explains why there were so many bones when Serena and I entered the town. When the town loses against the undead, the undead will leave in the morning. This results in not many bones dropping on the ground. However, when the town wins, there is a tremendous amount of bones left littering the town from all of the slain skeletons. Of course, they are absorbed into the earth. But, this process takes several days. And, since the town has just survived a long overnight defense, the town is littered with bones. This results in an almost endless supply of bonemeal being available.

Randalf says, "Yup, it's crazy right? And, the timing couldn't be better! The public supply of food was completely eaten this morning. Some people may have hidden rations, but the public stockpile is gone. However, now there is real hope. When the battle ended, I used up a full charge of magic from my earth stone to form these fields. We expect the crops to yield produce after two days. If we can just hold out that long, then everybody will survive. Our town might have a future and it's all thanks to you. Thank you! Oh, I'm just so glad that I trusted in the prophecy. And, while I can't ask you about where you came from, I do want to say that I'm starting to think of you two as messengers sent from our god, Hamelton."

I decide to switch the topic without explicitly denying what he said, "In any case, it's good that the town is on track for a brighter future. Let's continue to focus no building up the fortress, growing crops and defending."

"I agree completely!"

While talking to Randalf, Martin walks over. He scratches his head and looks down to the side while saying, "Hey, Jin. I'm sorry about what I said during the battle. I know this is the second time I'm apologizing but I need to right my wrongs." He then looks me in the eyes. "I acknowledge you as the adventurers from the prophecy. I relinquish my right as mayor to you. I will lay down my life to serve you as you strive to save our town." Martin then bows down on his knees in front of me and places his sword horizontally in front of himself.

"There is really no need for all of that Martin. I'm just doing the best that I can to save the town."

"Thank you," he responds without getting up.

"Man, please just get up. I get it. I accept your apology. Let's just kick some undead ass ok?"

"With pleasure," he says with a mischievous grin while standing up.

And like that, the rest of the day passes by normally. Eventually, the sun reaches the horizon, and it casts the light from its orange yellow setting onto the town. The sound of hammers can be heard as people rush to perform the finishing touches on the fortress. The defense of the fortress is now top notch. The pits are finished, the drawbridge is done and the walls are complete. There are even barricades and fortifications on our side of the drawbridge that will allow us to attack the zombies without taking damage. All that is left is to reinforce the walls with stone. However, that task should be finished in only a few hours after the start of the battle. It is almost scary how much work 38 dedicated people can accomplish in less than five hours. It is not an exaggeration to say that if the battle today is as difficult as the one from yesterday, we will squash it easily.

"Everybody, get into your positions," I shout across the fortress.

People scramble to get behind barricades and defensive locations. The green fog appears and begins to creep through the town. The fog is very thick on the outskirts of the town and blocks vision above and around it. In contrast, the fog is very thin and sticks low to the ground near the town walls and inside of the town. Interestingly, this thin layer tends to accumulate in the pit around the fortress. This creates a spooky appearance where the pit is filled with swirling green gas and its bottom can't be seen. The green fog has a distinguished appearance because it is a lime green color that is brightly illuminated by an unknown light source. Even though it is night time, it looks like it is day time but we're under the shadow of some large object. These conditions make it very easy to see the direction and form of undead that are invading.

"First wave incoming at 12:00. Three skeletons." The person screaming out information is the lookout. Her job is to keep track of and announce details about the waves. She will record and announce the wave count, the direction of the incoming undead, the number of undead, the time between waves, how long the invasion has lasted and any other interesting or surprising battle information. The lookout position increases morale since people are no longer facing the unknown and can prepare for what is coming. This is one of the big changes to the town's defense that makes it feel much more professional. After six hours, she will switch shifts with another person in the bunker.

The three skeletons approach the fortress from 12:00. 12:00 indicates a straightforward approach into town from the town's original entrance. The entrance is now called the original entrance because Randalf has completed his task of creating eleven more entrances into the town. These entrances mimic the hours of a day and are evenly spaced from each other. The skeletons move closer to the pit and encounter the next technological improvement of Hamel.

"Spear throwers arm yourselves. Ready... Set... Fire!"

In response to my command, a barrage of spears is thrown at the skeletons. The new improvement of the fortress is the ability to use ranged attacks! The town not having ranged technology can only be explained by ignorance. Nobody had ever thought about creating a ranged weapon. At the time that Jin proposed the spear, everybody was shocked and amazed.

'I reason that this town not having ranged technology is a limitation of the dungeon's scenario that the dungeon's participants have to realize, evaluate and potentially correct.'

A lot of this reasoning tied into his decision to create the fortress, rather than to continue to defend the main town. A dungeon presents a scenario with imperfect buildings, technology, ideas, magic and other components. Successfully clearing a dungeon does not necessarily require one to fix all of the imperfections of the scenario. Instead, one has evaluate what needs to be fixed and then take actions that correct those issues. For ranged attacks, this limitation became obvious when he imagined people waiting one side of the pit for undead to enter melee range. Thus, over two hundred wood spears with sharpened iron tips were created. This sharpness remains effective against the undead because the sharpness is not two-dimensional and flat like a sword. Instead, the tip is three-dimensional and forms a cone. Thus, the undead take heavy damage from the spears.

The following waves can't even be classified as battles. They are more like one-sided massacres. The inclusion of ranged attacks, funneling enemies over a bridge, a pit that the mindless undead fall into and can be knocked into, a lookout and a lightning mage to enchant ranged and melee weapons is overwhelmingly effective. After 10 waves, not even one undead has managed to cross the bridge to enter melee combat range. The only real downside to this combat style is that Serena doesn't have anybody to heal.

"Jin, go out there and fight the zombies," Serena pouts.

"Sur-- Wait, what? Why?"

"I need something to heal. I don't want you to get all of the experience and stuff like last time. I'll get left behind!"

"Aren't you supposed to be an angel and good? So, why are you sending me out to get hurt."

"I will heal you so the damage won't matter. Just, go get hit a couple of times please. I know you can take it."

'Am I really about to do this?' I then look at Serena gripping her staff with both hands and displaying a resolved expression. 'I can't believe I am really going to do this.'

I previously decided that I would stay with Serena. So, it's important that she keep up with me in levels. In that case, it's not unreasonable to make sure that she gets chances to use her Restore Life spell.

"Wave 11 incoming. Four skeletons and one zombie from 1:00. Two skeletons and one zombie from 3:00. Five skeletons and one zombie from 8:00. Time between last wave, 9:38. Total time elapsed, one hour and 53 minutes."

I open up the top half of my robe and fold it around my waist. This leaves me topless. The idea is to prevent my robe from getting torn like last. I go to the 1:00 positon and fight the monsters at the 1:00 and 3:00 positions.

"Wow, look at that lad."

*whistling*

"What a man. Fighting for his woman."

"Truly an adventurer from the prophecies."

The men become remarkably impressed by my actions. I cast Lightning Enchant on my staff and try kiting the undead while fighting them. I thrust my staff horizontally at the skeletons in an attempt to inflict the maximum amount of damage. My technique has become refined after watching the hammers and spears decimate zombies for hours. I spend around two minutes fighting before I run out of breath. I take a moment to look at Serena's face and see that it is brimming with excitement and anticipation. Her body's expression reads, "Go on now! You can do it! I can't wait! Believe!"

'Well... here goes nothing'

I let a zombie attack me by lowering my staff and standing still. Its boney fingers easily penetrates my flesh and creates a rather deep wound.

"OUCH. SHIT."

"Restore Life! Restore Life! Restore Life!"

Serena shouts her healing spell three times and my wound disappears. It has to be said again how amazing Serena's heal spell is. It's ranged, heals a decent amount of health and the cooldown is purely based on her ability to activate the magic. So it can be cast many times in a second. The wound that was opened up disappeared before any blood could leak from it.

I was grazed slightly by the skeleton, "HOLY", "Restore Life!"

A zombie falls forward while clawing at my legs. "FUCKING HELL", "Restore Life!"

A skeleton approaches me from behind and scratches deeply into my back with both hands.

"Restore Life, Restore Life, Restore Life, Restore Life, Restore Life!"

After hearing the tenth Restore Life, I back off and run away from the skeletons over the bridge. They followed me only to be greeted by a barrage of spears.

Serena walks up to me and says with sparkly eyes, "Yay! Thank you Jin!"

_*pant*_ "Yeah." _*pant*_ "No problem." _*pant*_ "Anytime." _*pant*_

The night continues uneventfully with us slaying the waves of undead effortlessly. Well, effortlessly at least compared to how difficult yesterday was. The undead waves become larger and eventually are able to cross the drawbridge. But, we are able to handle them easily. There is one unexpected development that occurs while fighting. During wave 41, we realize that we can fragment a wave by lifting up the drawbridge. Consequently, the remaining undead will fall into the pit. However, our current pulley system is not strong enough to lift up the drawbridge if there are too many undead on top. If we have four strong draw bridges on the four sides of the fortress, future battles may become easier.

Aside from that, Serena's Restore Life spell rises to T4 on wave 43. Thankfully, the men were impressed by my brave fighting and joined me as well. This reduced the need for me to frequently get hit. After her Restore Life spell rose to T4, her Healing Mastery ability category rises to T3 shortly after. Later on, my Lightning Enchant spell rises as well to T5 during wave 54.

"Are we really going to win this easily?" Martin says while watching the 59th wave of undead fall.

"It's almost like a dream," Randalf says.

The time is nearing seven o'clock, the sun is rising over the horizon and the green fog is dissipating. The lookout shouts, "Battle Won! Good job all!" causing a wave of cheers to erupt from everybody.

### Chapter 8: Night 3

The rest of the time until the next battle passes by peacefully. The men and their families go about their usual routine of taking a bath together and then sleeping. I also take a bath with Serena and we sleep together once more. For the first time in a long time, the defenders of the town are able to wake up and relax without worrying about the next invasion. There isn't any beer or entertainment. But, just being able to lay down for a few more hours feels great. I made the decision to give everybody rest, because the fortress defenses had held up well last night, and the only things that need created and improved are the drawbridges. However, they aren't a priority and can be worked on during the early waves of the invasion. The stone reinforcements for the fortress walls were also completed overnight. I also factored in that this is the third day of the quest, so everybody will need to be ready for a boss or some other type of powerful undead.

Serena uses the down time to run around and do whatever she normally does. She is probably playing around with the children and tending to elderly people. For me, I spend time relaxing with some of the defenders and walking around. Most people are optimistic and speak positively about the future of the town. I also take the opportunity to inform them that tonight will likely be a harder wave. It is obvious that the townspeople want to know more details about how I could know that. However, I tell them that I can't answer that question and use the prophecy as an excuse. Thankfully, the townspeople easily accept my response due to my status as the mayor and adventurer from the prophecy.

While walking around town, an expected event occurred repeatedly. I am approached by several women! There were light requests like, "Hey there. I heard about your fighting last night. Let's go on a date sometime. How about it?" And, there were heavy requests like, "Oh mighty adventurer, savior of our people. It would be an honor to bear your children!" There are two women in particular, who are around my age and don't have children or a husband, who want to get married and have children immediately. In the end, I tell everybody to wait until the end of the invasion tonight before I make any decisions about romance. I don't flat out deny any of them for a variety of reasons. First, and most importantly, because I am male. It's simply a part of my nature to desire sex. Second, I'm getting horny. When I was born, my hunger, health and sex drive were in a decent condition. However, a little over two full days have passed since then and I'm getting hornier and hornier as time goes by. Third, even though I'm not sexually attracted to Serena, I have bathed with her naked twice now. And, the women that proposed dates and sex with me today are not bad looking at all. My imagination at the moment is running so wild that I want to find a private place and masturbate. In fact, I'd probably be masturbating right now if not for the very probable upcoming sex. The final reason is that the sex would be guilt free. My relationship with Serena will probably never be romantic, even when she is old enough to bear children. Plus, the dungeon will disappear after we leave anyway, so what harm will a bit of post-war victory sex cause? I conclude that there are exactly zero reasons to say no to getting laid.

Thus, the rest time ends and the time reaches 7:00. The sun emits its trademark orange glow. Women, children and even some men enter the bunker as the defenders take their positions. A green fog appears around the town walls and encroaches upon the town.

I then say, "Remember everybody. Do not get cocky. This is still a life or death situation, and the undead will likely be stronger today. But, even if you are tired, have hope. Our first harvest will arrive tomorrow. Then we will acquire another harvest every day after that. Nobody has starved to death yet or will starve as long as we maintain our defense. Know that your defense here will decide whether or not your families live or die. Are you prepared?"

"YES!"

"I SAID, ARE YOU READY?"

"HURRAAAAHHHHH!" A wild roar of screams bursts into the air.

"Good. The battle starts now."

It might seem like a waste of energy to have everybody scream out loud. However, it is a technique to improve morale and get everybody pumped up. Who doesn't becomes more motivated and hyped from a speech and battle roar? Also, there is a chance that any hidden medical issues that people are hiding will be revealed by not shouting. This is because most of the defenders would happily join this battle while missing a leg and an arm to protect their families. However, that person would obviously be restricted from joining the battle in that condition. Thus, the defenders are trying their hardest to act tough. There is a healer in the town who practices traditional medicine and performed medical evaluations. However, everybody is in poor shape and wants to hide their ailments, so it was quite difficult for her at the time to tell who had health issues and who didn't. In the end, two people with serious health issues have to stay in the bunker until they heal. Everybody else seems to only have minor health issues.

Serena walks up to me and tugs on my sleeve. I turn my head to look at Serena while responding instinctively, "Yes Serena? What's up?" My brain registers her appearance after I speak and realizes that she is looking down at the ground. She is also pulling down on the skirt part of her one piece dress.

"After the battle ends tonight, can we talk?"

"Why after? Can't we talk right now? The first few waves will probably be really easy."

She then shook her head. "No. Now is a bad time. Let's talk in the morning."

"Alright, if you say so. But if it's really important tell me immediately."

I am definitely worried about what she is going to say and wish that she would just say it now. But she very clearly rejected that idea, so I don't have any choice but to wait.

'Ahhh, why would she even ask me that? Does she just want to make me worry? She knows she is going to see me in the morning so why would she ask to talk to me in the morning right now? I don't understand the mind of kids. But, the first wave should be coming. I'm acting as the mayor and commander of the fortress. I need to stay composed for now and deal with that later.'

A few minutes pass before the lookout shouts, "First wave incoming at 11:00. Four skeletons."

Perhaps it's needless to say, but the first wave arrives and is speared to death instantly. The second wave bringing three skeletons and two zombies is immediately beat too. At this rate, the trend from last night seems like it will continue. The waves are being defeated promptly without showing any difference in strength from the previous nights. Or, at least, if there is a difference, it's so small and our power is so overwhelming that it's unnoticeable. All of the waves up to the 50th wave continue as expected. However, that's when the first big change occurs.

"Wave 51 incoming. 13 undead from 1:00. 12 from 6:00. 15 from 8:00. 13 from 11:00. Time between last wave, 5:03! Total time elapsed, 10 hours and two minutes."

'I knew it. I fucking knew it. I knew today wouldn't be easy. This is already a sign that some real shit is about to go down. We are almost done with wave 50, and now wave 51 is coming after only five minutes?'

"Everybody. It is like I said! This battle will become much more difficult in the upcoming two hours. However, today will be a decisive battle. A victory today will have a major impact that not even I can predict. But, we must bet our hopes on a victory ending the invasion indefinitely. If there was ever a time to put your life on the line and use every last bit of your energy, this is it. Lookout! Keep your eyes out for anything that looks like a leader or a boss. Defenders, conserve your strength and use the pit unreserved. Kill all of the undead!"

"HURAAH!" a cheer erupts.

The decisive battle against the undead has now entered full swing. All of the defenders on standby enter the battlefield.

I announce, "Stick to the strategy from before everybody. Don't do anything too fancy or crazy yet. As long as we have the pit, the undead can only get to us from across the bridge."

Of all of the defensive benefits that the fortress provides, the pit is the biggest one. The undead are very stupid and have only two goals, to get in range of us and attack. They don't have sophisticated pathing, and they only attempt to destroy anything in their way to reach their targets. This results in the undead regularly walking and falling into the pit while trying to reach us. The pit itself is ten feet deep and six feet wide. The normal formation of the defenders is to have everybody evenly split around the perimeter of the fortress. Additionally, there is the lookout and Martin whom roams around freely.

The current appearance of the fortress is as follows. There are four connected walls with a field in the center. The four walls each have an entrance in the center with walkways between all of the entrances. This creates a diamond shape with a plus in the middle. The inside of the fortress is filled with crops excluding the walkways and interior perimeter of the walls. Also, there is a waist-level wooden railing around all of the crops to prevent defenders from accidentally trampling them. The walls have slits in them at regular intervals that allow the defenders to attack undead from behind them. In the event that the security of the walls is breached, there are crops being grown underground in the expanded bunker as well as crops being grown on top of the walls. The finishing touch is the lookout tower, which is really just a skinny cylinder of stone with railing in the center of the fortress. Also, it may be obvious, but there is no roof. This multifunctional layout allows for crops to grow, reinforces food perseverance, improves the mobility of defenders and provides a defensive fortification all in one.

"Wave 52 incoming. Just one skeleton from 2:00. Time since last wave: 5:02 seconds. Wait no, another skeleton from 3:00. Two zombies from 11:00. EEK. There are also undead coming from behind. They are coming at us nonstop!"

"Alright lookout there is no need to announce waves. Just keep your eyes out for a boss."

"Yes sir!"

'It's nice that the undead still have to walk to the fortress, but it's unfortunate that they have begun to invade individually. If there are no breaks, then we will not get a chance to rest and retrieve thrown spears.'

Wave 51 is almost finished with about 10 undead left when wave 52 is announced. The defenders continue their strategy of hitting the undead as they come close to the pit and fall in. The average defender is able to kill a skeleton in three to four hits with a hammer or four to six hits with thrown spears. Since there are eight people on average on each side of the fortress and only two to three undead to fight, the remaining undead from wave 51 are mopped up extremely quickly.

"Peculiar target spotted at 12:00. I'm not sure what it is."

Wave 52 is only a few steps from us when the lookout makes her announcement. I'm currently stationed at the front entrance of the fortress so I can see the target as well. However, it is unfortunately stationary inside of the gas.

"Be ready everybody. That may be the boss! There are two hours before sunrise. Don't think you can go into hiding! Kill off the small fries and stay alert!"

The current appearance of the boss is indecipherable since it's veiled in gas. Meanwhile, the undead from wave 52 are still flooding in and need to be taken care of. The crack of hammers against bones is ringing out everywhere as defenders attack skeletons. There is the illuminated green fog rolling around in the pits and broken apart wooden houses everywhere. All in all, the spooky atmosphere is a perfect match for the ongoing battle.

"I'm going to do a perimeter check. Keep up the defense in the front everybody," Martin says as he leaves the front entrance of the fortress.

Five more minutes pass and the battle stays solidly in our favor. The threat of undead overflowing in the pits comes to pass. However, the undead are far less capable than I gave them credit for. I had expected that they would stack up on top of each other before climbing out of the pit. But instead, they fail to acquire a footing and become a tangled ball of bones. In fact, believing that they could climb out of the pit in the first place was an overestimation. The new risk is that the pit will be so filled with undead that the invading undead can just run over it. Also, since the undead are coming individually or in small groups, they are being overwhelmed by pure numbers. Here is an ultra-realistic explanation of how this plays out. Four skeletons will come from 4:00. When they get close to the fortress, they will be attacked by spears as they try to reach us. One or two will be lucky enough to survive that barrage of attacks without dying or getting knocked back and dying before reaching the pit and falling into it. That's when the undead are ruthlessly beaten to death by blunt weapons while helplessly walking into a wall in the direction of us defenders. The undead are so stupid that they don't even defend against the attacks slaughtering them from above. And, the victories are so one-sided that Serena and I never have to cast our spells.

"Lookout. Is there any interesting news? Is something happening that I can't see?"

"Nothing so far. The undead are still invading at a regular pace. The only change is that some groups of undead have had as many as five undead when they only had three at first."

"Alright, just keep an eye out."

The battle continues for another hour without any significant changes. The size of the groups of undead invaders increases to six maximum and there is a group of five skeletons and two zombie once. The defenders are still having no problems with the undead.

"THE BOSS! IT'S MOVING!"

The moment of truth has finally arrived. The shadow at the front of the town is finally coming forward. Its appearance becomes more and more distinguished as it moves closer. First, I notice that it is floating. And then, I can see that it is a black figure with green flames. When it reaches nearly half-way to the town, the invading undead stop their advance. The boss's appearance is an undead human male with gray flesh and a lean form. Flesh is missing in many areas exposing raw bone. His eye sockets in particular are empty, and the skin around them is non-existent as well. However, there is no blood, and his gray skin is a uniform color all around. He is wearing tattered black robes and has a tattered black cape to match. Also, there is a ball of green fire hovering in his right hand.

"I came to see why the invasion has been held up. I see now. You humans have created a formidable defense. But that all ends now. Summon Skeleton Guardian."

After finishing his line, bones from all around levitate and fly to a point in front of him. The bones merge into an illuminated white sphere. The white sphere of light quickly expands into the shape of a skeleton before dimming. The result of this process is that the surrounding bones from skeletons have fused into a Skeleton Guardian. However, this skeleton is three times as tall as the other skeletons that we have fought before. It is also wielding a massive, curved bone sword.

The green flame from the boss's hand then flies into the hollow rib cage of the skeleton. The fire surges inside the frame of the skeleton's body before disappearing. In its place, two green fires sit as eyes.

"How are we supposed to fight that?"

"What is that?"

"What do we do?"

The effects are immediate. Everybody is looking at the skeleton in horror. Morale plummets to rock bottom instantly. People had just fought for eleven hours and are now seeing this. Its legs can easily step over the pit. It has a bone sword with a curved blade that can easily cleave ten people in one swing. And, there is also the Mage that will probably cast supporting magic to make the fight even more difficult.

'Damnit, are we going to have to lose like we did to the Slime King? Was all of our work for naught? No, I won't go down without a fight. There is no way to get to the return pedestal, and hiding in the bunker isn't viable. If I'm going to die, I will die fighting.'

I then put forth my last ditch effort, "EVERYBODY. COME TO THE FRONT GATE NOW."

The Mage and the skeleton are approaching the fortress, but the distance that they have to cover is one quarter of the town. In comparison, the distance to the front of the fortress is much shorter for the defenders.

"The plan is simple. We can't hide. There is nowhere to run. If we're going to go down, then let's go down fighting. Let's have one last ditch effort to win this fight. Are you going to let your families die? Your children? The people you love? WHO IS READY TO PUT EVERYTHING ON THE LINE AND WIN?"

"I AM," everybody shouts.

I use all of the cards that I have to boost morale. If this attack fails, then there will be no recovery.

"Here is the plan. We walk up to it and attack. Simple. Many of you are going to die so accept that now. Try your best to avoid the sword so that you don't die. Don't even think of trying to deflect that blade unless there are ten of you in one spot. Randalf, you're in charge of sinking one of its legs in the ground with earth magic. You have a full charge right?"

"Yes."

"Good. Serena, go hide in the bunker. There is no need for you to die."

"No, I will join you."

"Alright, wait, what? No.. Just... UGH. Alright we don't have time to argue. HURRY! EVERYBODY ACROSS THE BRIDGE! GO! GO! GO!"

I tell everybody to charge across the bridge because we will not be able to surround the Skeleton Guardian at the fortress. In truth, the Skeleton Guardian is extremely close right now and we might not even make it across the bridge before it reaches us. But, we don't have any options.

While running across the bridge I cast my Lightning Enchant on as many people's weapon as possible. My Lightning Enchant doesn't have a cooldown and I can cast it rapidly as long as I have mana. I blow ten casts in less than three seconds and continue the charge. The skeleton had just arrived a few steps in front of the bridge by the time we cross. Again, the bridge is only six feet long, so all 38 defenders are able to get across very quickly.

"ATTACK ATTACK ATTACK!" I shout.

Five defenders in the front begin to scream and wind up their weapons for an attack.

" **AHHHHHHHGGGGG!"**

The skeleton emits a horribly deep moan as it winds its sword up for an attack. A noticeable feature about the Skeleton Guardian is that its movement and attacks are slow. It's not slow to the point that you could dodge the attack blindfolded, but the wind up motion for his sword swing takes at least three seconds.

I shout, "DODGE DODGE DOGE! DON'T DEFLECT! JUMP. DUCK. LAY DOWN. WHATEVER!"

Six men try to do a variety of actions but are still caught up in the attack. Four people are sliced in half at different locations by the horizontal swing. The two people who avoided the attack are lying flat on the ground. The skeleton winds his sword up for a new attack.

"Attack Up," the Mage in the back says.

'Really? More attack power? What the fuck!?'

By this point, most of the defenders have reached the skeleton. Everybody is rapidly attacking its legs and the lower parts of its thighs in an attempt to deal damage. During this time, the skeleton's windup has placed his sword above his head.

"Everybody step back! Mud Pool!"

*SWOOOSH*

*BOOM*

The sword that is wound up cleanly slices through the air and strikes the ground like a bomb. However, the attack misses the largest grouping of defenders and kills two people instead. The reason that the skeleton missed is because Mud Pool sunk its left leg into the ground. This caused the Skeleton Guardian to tilt and its right leg to bend. As the Skeleton Guardian lifts its sword from the ground, a massive imprint is revealed.

'If that hit straight on, everybody hit would have died.'

"Everybody focus on the non-sunk leg. It will be harder for him to attack you if you're there!"

By my order, everybody scrambles close to the leg and attacks. There are now 32 defenders swinging hammers like madmen. This results in cracks appearing after only a few seconds of pounding. Every hit causes more and more cracks to appear. Unable to keep up, the leg eventually shatters.

"Foolish mortals. Your efforts are futile. Bone Mending!"

The region of bone that was shattered starts to straighten out. The cracks that were present before fade. The area that was attacked undergoes a partial regeneration. However, the reason that it was a partial regeneration is because the defenders have never stopped attacking. Even though the area is healed, an area underneath it is breaking down. The feet are also breaking apart. Basically, the Bone Mending spell is healing damage done to the Skeleton Guardian. However, it's taking so much direct damage that the healing is being outpaced.

"Huh? What is this? My magic? Why didn't it work?"

Ignoring the Mage, I say, "Keep fighting everybody. Just a bit more!"

The leg that had taken a huge amount of damage shatters completely into fine pieces. This causes the rest of the skeletons body to fall down. With one leg already sunk halfway into the ground, the skeleton tilts even further. Using this opportunity, everybody charges up to it and finishes it off with an onslaught of attacks. One more person gets caught off guard by the sword and dies. However, everybody else lives. The fight with the Skeleton Guardian lasted less than 20 seconds, and seven people died in the process.

"My guardian! No! What did you do to my undead?"

"Everybody, it's time to kill the ringleader. CHARGE THE MAGE!"

The defenders aggressively charge the Mage.

"Bone Shield!"

The Mage casts his spell, but it is too late. Bones start to rise and fly toward him, but Martin has already reached him and is swinging his hammer. The hammer is swung horizontally and collides directly with the Mage's head. Even though the mage is floating, he isn't floating very high. Also, Martin is taller than the mage so the hammer makes a solid connection. However, what looked like a one shot kill, doesn't seem to have done anything.

"Hahahaha. You can't kill me. You aren't strong enough."

"Oh really? Let's see then."

Martin then attacks the mage continually. However, every time a hit connects, the impact is absorbed by the mage. The mage is flying and moves in such a way as to negate the impact of each hammer swing. He performs backflips, front flips and side twists.

"Do you see now? You can't win," the Mage says in a smug voice.

"It's too late. You've already lost," Martin replies.

"Huh? What do you mean?"

At that time, the defenders completely surround the Mage. This causes the Mage's jaw to drop. Literally. That's because this isn't a one layer shoulder to shoulder defense. The defenders are positioned in three thick rings. After making my announcement, I stopped the defenders from charging at the Mage. Thus, Martin was left attacking the Mage by himself. I gave the defenders the order to kill off the remaining undead in the nearby area. This process was fast because no new undead appeared from the fog when the Skeleton Guardian was summoned. Also, the undead from before the Skeleton Guardian was summoned, as if preprogrammed, charged the fortress while ignoring us entirely. This resulted in most of them falling into the pit. After the Mage's attention was dropped from us, and the undead were killed, we moved to surround the Mage quickly.

"Pin him down," I say.

The defenders move closer and reach their hands out in an attempt to latch onto the Mage.

"To be pushed this far. Phantasmal Transformation."

The body of the Mage quickly fades into a sky blue color and becomes translucent. This causes the hands of the defenders to pass through his body and collide with each other.

"ARRRRAAGGHHHHH!!! You damn humans. You win today but mark my words. In 100 years, I, Nezera, will regain my strength and return stronger than ever."

Nezera then turns and walks through defenders toward the town exit. His spell has made him intangible, so physical contact can't be made. However, casting the spell must have damaged his condition significantly since he is limping with one hand on his stomach. This limp is much slower than his previous hovering. Some of the defenders try to attack with their hammers but fail to do any damage. I was just going to follow him but a familiar voice starts to speak.

"Oh lost soul. You have been forsaken. Fret not and seek comfort in my warmth."

"Serena?" I say softly while looking at her.

"What... what is this?" Nezera says.

"I forgive you. In the name of all that is holy let your soul be redeemed by the graces of heaven. Amen."

At that moment, the body of Nezera sparkles lightly while fading away.

"What is going on? This warm feeling. What--"

Before Nezera can say anymore, his body fades away completely. All traces of his presence are erased completely. Everybody is left looking at the scene dumbfounded.

"Serena, what was that?" I ask while baffled.

"Heaven's Guidance."

Randalf approaches and asks, "You have an ability like that? Wow! How does it work?"

"It's an ability that lets me send the weakened souls of the dead to heaven."

I then ask, "What? You have an ability like that? How come you never said anything about it?"

"You never asked!" she responds while pouting.

'How am I supposed to ask about something I don't know about? And wait, didn't I ask about her stats before? What the fuck.'

Randalf says, "Well, in any case, that was good timing. Because of your ability, our town will never have to worry about undead invasions again! Everybody, the undead threat is gone for good!"

"Yaaaaaay!" the defenders cheer.

The defenders then start walking to the fortress. Some go to the bodies of the dead and close their eyes before rejoining the walk. It might seem like the people would celebrate excessively, but that is impossible. Everybody is still heavily fatigued from the fight with the undead.

The first defenders to arrive at the fortress walk to its inner front right corner. A man knocks on the trap door ten times before a woman opens it.

"We won. The invasions are over."

The woman's eyes open wide and tears emerge. She ducks back into the bunker for a moment before coming back and stepping out. Women and children follow her and walk out as well. The families rejoice at each reunion. However, there are some that don't experience that joy.

"Hubert? Hubert? Where is Hubert?"

The men turn their heads while clenching their hands into fists.

"Unfortunately, Hubert was killed in the fight against the undead," Martin says calmly.

The woman falls to her knees and starts crying on the spot. This happens to four other families due to the defenders that fell in the final fight. Meanwhile, everybody else rests before falling into their normal routines.

The defenders get up and scatter to different parts of the town. Simultaneously, the noncombatants grab carts and load them up with buckets. Then the noncombatants head to the river and gather water. This is, of course, for the post-battle baths. The destruction of houses by the undead ceased entirely when Serena and I arrived. Also, when using wood from the houses for construction, the bedrooms and bathrooms were left untouched. This means that most of the houses have intact bathrooms and bedrooms. The bathrooms have a toilet and a bath. The toilets are holes in the ground that lead to a sewer system, and the baths are large wooden basins. The technology is simple, but it works.

Seeing everybody walking off, I turn and head toward the house that Serena and I used yesterday. But, before I can even walk a few steps, I feel a hand grab my arms. I turn my head and look back.

"Jin. The bunker is empty now. Would you care to join me?"

This woman is the one who had lost her husband Hubert just moments ago. There is no child around, so she is likely childless. However, the more surprising thing is that there are six other women behind her.

"Um, ladies. What's going on?"

The second woman to approach me when I walked around the town yesterday comes forward and says, "Oh? Did you forget? You said you would respond to our requests once the invasion ended."

"That's true. I did say that. But right now you all look strangely united. It's a little... suspicious. How did that happen?"

A different woman steps forward, "Isn't it obvious? We've been crammed in that bunker every night. So, of course we know what's going on. We know what everybody is thinking and, after talking it out, we decided that we all want to bear your children. At first we wanted you to pick one of us, but that idea was thrown out. We can't selfishly monopolize the hero of our people. We must spread your genes into our town as much as possible. So, we decided to all be your wives and have your children."

A different and slightly older woman then steps forward, "Yes, there is nothing to worry about. We talked out everything and came to an agreement. There are private areas in the bunker already prepared. And we have already decided on an order. We'll take care of you one at a time, or in a group if you would prefer, before giving you time to rest."

'A perfect opportunity for fornication has appeared! Isn't this the dream of every man? A harem of women who are perfectly willing to give their bodies to you? A harem of women who respect you as a hero? I really want to accept this but Serena is literally right here! Wait, she's wearing an angry face and pouting. What the--'

Serena walks in front of me and stands with her arms stretched out. It is as if she is trying to protect me from an advancing threat.

"You can't have Jin. He's mine!"

'Yours? Since when?'

The women are completely unfazed. The second woman that I met yesterday who was speaking before continues, "Serena, was it? We understand that the relationship between you and Jin is very close. However, you are just a child and he is an adult. This is a decision that Jin needs to make for himself. For now, we will back off. Our only goal was to make our intentions clear. We will be around." She then winks at me before turning around and starting up a casual conversation with the other women.

'It's over huh? Well then, time to go.'

"Let's go Serena. Time for a bath."

"Haiii!"

I turn around and walk toward the house that I have been using regularly. However, there is the sound of footsteps behind me. I turn my head and see that the group of women is still casually conversing, while seemingly not paying attention to Serena and me. However, they had clearly followed us. I maintain my line of sight and walk forward to see that the women are indeed following us.

"Hey, ladies," I say.

"Yes hero?" They responds in a synchronized cutesy voice.

"I'm going to take a bath, sooooo..."

"Sooo....?"

"Sooooooooo, I'll be naked and would like to be alone if possible."

"Oh, then there is no need to worry. We're just helping you get the water. Right ladies?"

"Right right," they respond while giggling.

'I have a bad feeling about this.'

Thus, I go about my normal routine. I put empty buckets on a wooden pushing cart while the women eagerly help. To my surprise, they even gather additional buckets and carts from the workshop. And, when I start pulling the cart, they help as well. Serena is also helping but she is clearly trying too hard.

'Perhaps a competitive spirit has ignited in her. Well, at least everybody seems genuine.'

We reach the river and start filling the buckets. The buckets fill up in less than a ten seconds since there are nine people performing the task. Some of the surrounding men and women whistle while waving cheerfully in my direction. However, I do my best to ignore them. We then load the buckets back onto the cart, and pull the carts back into town. I head to my designated house, but the ladies stop me.

"You have done a lot for this town. Come this way. We have prepared a house for you."

They then lead me to a different house. This house is clearly one of the better houses. It's slightly larger and is in better shape. Additionally, the bathroom is improved, and the space for firewood underneath the bath is larger than normal. There is also a large basin next to the bathtub as well.

The women pour the collected water into the bathtub and the adjacent basin. Meanwhile, one of the women pulls a lever causing a fire to be started under the bath.

"Wow this looks awesome. Thanks ladies for everything. It really means a lot."

"Oh it's no problem, anytime."

There is a small awkward silence before I say, "Alrighty then. Well then. Time for my bath. I'll see you all later."

"Of course. Let's go ladies."

The women start to walk away while waving and saying their farewells. However, after a few moments they stop and look at Serena with a mischievous expression.

"Oh? Serena? Aren't you coming?"

"Ehhh? What? No, I am staying."

"You can't stay. Jin is taking his bath."

"What? So what?"

"You can't because he's a man and you're a girl. Now, now, don't worry about the details. He's tired from the long fight right? We have a nice bath for the women setup right over there. Common now, right this way."

The women forcibly drag Serena away by her hands.

"Hey, stop it. Jin! Jin!"

"Have a nice trip," I say morbidly.

'Women are terrifying.'

"Jin!" she says with a desperate voice.

I wait a while longer until the water reaches room temperature before entering the bath. Previously the water would only reach up to my knees when my legs are lain flat. But, thanks to the women, the water reaches the top of my chest. The water isn't too hot yet, but it is getting hotter.

'Ahhh, finally a moment to relax.'

A few moments pass before the door to the bathroom opens.

"Please excuse the interruption," she says while bowing.

The second woman that approached me yesterday and spoke with me earlier today enters the bathroom. She is completely naked and has a candle and cloth in her hands. She casually walks to the toilet and places the candle on its back rest. She then walks over to the window and attaches a cloth. This causes the entire room to darken and be lit only by candlelight. She then turns around and ties her hair above her head while bending over occasionally and flipping her hair. Finally, she turns back around and steps into the bath tub.

*BA-DOING*

My body reacted immediately. There was no way to defend against such a thorough attack. As soon as she walked in it was game over. Everything else was icing. I've been sex starved for the past three days and now this woman has appeared in front of me? She is already good looking but seems even more attractive right now. Maybe she put on makeup, or her beauty is an effect of the dim lightning? I can't really tell. Either way, I've become completely aroused and entranced.

"I'm glad that you like what you see," she says while sliding through the water. She then wraps her arms around my stomach, causing her breasts to press against me. With her body close, she initiates a kiss. The kiss starts off light but gradually intensifies. With each breath, she pushes her tongue deeper into my mouth while pressing against me tighter. Sometimes a trail of saliva is revealed before our mouths rejoin at a new angle. At this point, there is no going back. I wrap my arms around her and initiate my own style of playful kisses. Before long, the kisses become deeper and more passionate once again. After what feels like an eternity, she breaks away from a kiss and pushes her hair away from her face.

"Let's get cleaned up," she says with her face directly in front of me.

She then picks up the bar of soap and rubs it all over my body with a rag. She repeatedly passes over my crotch, but doesn't do anything too aggressive. The bath is now perfectly warm and the mood is great. I simply lay back, close my eyes and immerse myself in the pleasure. After a while, I realize that I don't even know her name. But I don't care. I'm in heaven.

Some time passes before she wipes my feet and stops. She takes the plug out of the bath tub and lets the water drain out. She then gathers water that was heated in the nearby basin into a bucket and pours it delicately over my body. After, she pats me dry with a towel. Throughout this entire process, I barely move. I only leaned forward slightly twice when she needed to rinse and dry my back. I give this service a rating of 11 out of 10.

"Head to the bedroom first. I'll finish up here and join you in a moment."

"Yes ma'am," I respond like a robot. I get up and walk straight to the bedroom. I don't even bother to put on clothes. I just go to the bed and lay down underneath the blankets. After a few moments, the woman enters the bedroom with a towel covering her body. She then picks up a nearby cloth and attaches it to the window. Next, she uses the candle from before to light candles spread around the room. After, she shuts the door and lets her towel drop. This reveals her fully nude body once again. Finally, she slowly crawls under the covers from the foot of the bed to my face. Without a word, she reengages in playful kissing and, well, the rest is history.

### Chapter 9: True Victory

I wake up with the woman that I had spent this morning with in my arms. I move some hair away from her face and kiss her on the lips before getting up.

'I guess I need to get another bath.'

I pull out casual clothes from a nearby dresser and put them on. Then, I head to the bathroom and gather buckets.

'I wonder what happened to Serena.'

I put the buckets on the wooden cart from yesterday and walk to the river. The town is silent so I must have woken up before everybody else. It's very likely that everybody is enjoying the fact that they will never have to fight undead waves again.

'It's not a bad idea to rest and relax.'

I fill my buckets up with water and return to the house. There is still wood from the fire last night but it's all damp. If I want a hot bath then I'd have to replace the wood. However, thankfully the river water is warm since it's the afternoon. I pour the water into the tub and take a quick bath. Afterward, I return to the bedroom and see the woman laying with her eyes open.

"I see you're awake."

"Good morning dear," she replies with a smile. She then rolls over playfully. "Do you want to go another round before you leave?"

"Ah, well, I'd love to. But, I just took a bath so I'd rather not."

Yes! This is the power that Jin didn't have before. The power to reject sex! Now that his desire is satisfied, he has regained some of his willpower.

"That's a shame," she says while pouting. "But I guess it is fine. You have to recharge for the other women I suppose," she says with laughing gently.

'Oh yeah. The other woman! I can't wait!'

At this point, Jin has already figured out what happened. Everything that happened since he met the women was planned out in advance. They used making the bath as an excuse to follow me. Then they led me to an already prepared house. Afterward, after failing to convince Serena to separate from me, they separated her by force. With me alone and in their territory, the women could easily fulfill their desires.

'This can work. I really want to leave since we beat the dungeon, but these guys have food! The crops should be harvestable starting today. If I wait a few days I could get a huge amount of food. Well then, it's settled. I'll stay for the food.'

"I look forward to it," I say with a smile. "By the way, I never did manage to get your name."

She then stands up and stretches while saying, "Marie."

'Marie huh'

"Just out of curiosity, are you the leader of the women?"

"I'm more like the leader of the group of women that wants to marry you."

"I hate to say it, but you know that I will have to leave one day right?"

"That's why we will try our best to make it so that you don't want to leave," she says while winking. "To be honest, nobody wants our saviors to leave. So our group has the support of everybody in the town. There are also men who want to marry Serena as well. They figure that if you stay then she will stay and they will get a chance."

"Hmm, well that makes sense. I guess we'll have to wait and see then," I say with a smile. "I'm heading out so I'll see you later."

"Oh you will," she says while blowing a kiss.

I walk out of the house and go to the fortress. It is the only real attraction in the town and is conveniently right in the center. I walk through the front entrance and look at the crops. They have made substantial progress. Two days ago there was only brown dirt with gray speckles from bonemeal. However, now lush plants have grown in rows and are bearing fruit. I have no idea what type of plants or fruit have grown. However, they look delicious. None of the plants have grown higher than one and a half feet. There is a plant with green, yellow and red circular fruit hanging heavily on the branches of one plant. I touch a red one and it feels firm yet soft. There is also a short plant with a yellow and star shaped fruit. There are vines where large round objects with white and green stripes are still growing.

"Oh hey! Jin! Good afternoon," the farmer from yesterday greets me.

"Good afternoon. I see the crops have made even more progress."

"Yes. The bonemeal has helped a lot more than expected. With this many crops, the food crisis is over."

"That's good to hear."

"I'm sure you are hungry so feel free to take a few pieces of fruit. But don't take too much please. Lots of the plants are not quite ready."

"Oh man, thank you so much."

I then grab the yellow star shaped fruit that intrigued me and get ready to eat it. However, before I can eat it, the man says, "Wait, you have to peel it like this." The man then peels the outer skin of the fruit revealing a soft white interior.

I engage in casual conversation with the farmer for a short duration while eating the fruit before heading out. I wanted to take more food, but I resisted the urge. The food will probably be distributed later anyway. After leaving the fortress, I relax in a broken down house nearby until more people wake up.

Half an hour passes before the town becomes lively. The townspeople go to the fortress and acquire food for the families. A few defenders decide to join me by grabbing chairs from nearby houses and we chat. Many of them praise me heavily and speak of my heroic deeds.

"JINNNNNNN!" The voice of a little girl can be heard screaming.

I stand up from my seat and look in the direction of the voice. Serena is running toward me with her arms outstretched. She runs straight into me and puts her hands around my waist while rubbing her face into my stomach. I put my hand on her head and ruffle her hair roughly.

"Good afternoon," I say in a soft, warm voice.

"I missed you," she says in a teary voice.

"It hasn't even been a day."

"It was still too long."

'It is a shame that we got separated but it couldn't be helped. I was ruthlessly tricked by the women.' I think to myself while grinning ear to ear.

"Come with me," Serena says while pulling on my hand.

"Huh, wait, wha-- "

Serena forcibly pulls me outside of one of the towns entrances. She takes a deep breath before facing me and asking, "Did you sleep with any of the women."

My face pales instantly.

"Woah woah woah woah woah. Let's slow down for a second here, ok? What would make you think that? Where is this even coming from," I try to ask casually.

"I was with you when the woman told you about their plans! Many of them want to have your children. The women took me away from you and trapped me in the bunker with them. Whenever I asked to get out or what was happening, they acted like nothing was happening. But I saw that one of the women was missing. So answer me. Did you sleep with anybody?"

At this point, I decide to spill the beans. There is almost no chance that I can keep this a secret. And why should I? Serena is just seven years old. She's like family. It doesn't matter.

"Alright, yes. I slept with the woman named Marie. I had a wonderful time with her."

Serena then freezes while looking at me. Her voice starts to become teary as she says, "Does that mean you don't love me?"

"What? Of course I love you. But, like a little sister. I'll just say it straight out. I'm a man. I need time with a woman every now and then. And you're only seven years old, so, you know, it kind of won't work between us."

"Seven?" she says with a truly confused look. She hurriedly corrects her expression and says, "What's wrong with being seven?"

"What's wrong with it?" Jin thinks about her age again like he did before. There is no particularly specific reason for why it feels wrong. It just does. There is a vague feeling that he should wait until she hits puberty, or just be older in general.

"I don't know. Like, it's hard to put into words. It just feels wrong. I mean you haven't even hit puberty! Until your body is ready to have kids at least, I don't think we can have a serious romantic relationship."

Serena turns around and says, "Give me a moment please," in a teary voice.

'Honestly, does she even like me that much? And, am I really having a discussion like this with a seven year old? I mean, she's only seven. SEVEN! Sheesh, is this really worth crying over?'

Serena is still facing away from me, but her arms move like she is wiping away tears. She turns around with clearly wiped tear marks and says, "In that case, let's get engaged right now."

"WHAT?" I shout out in surprise.

"Like I said, let's get engaged. I want to be mad you because you slept with Marie and because you did it before marriage. But I can't because we aren't in a relationship. The problem is that you think that I'm like a little sister. From now on I want you to see me as a woman."

"Engagement though? This won't work not just because you're like a little sister, but also because you're only seven..."

"I might be seven now but I will grow up eventually! I want to get engaged now so that I don't lose you to anybody else. Just wait for me to get bigger!"

'Her points make sense. But why would I accept? I'd have to wait many years before getting any sex from her when I have seven women ready to provide unlimited sex right now. I mean, in the future it is possible that sex will be hard to be hard to get. And it's possible that Serena will hate me if I say no. But am I really ready for such a big commitment? Is the commitment even worth it? Serena is serious and there is no way that I'm getting out of the situation without answering.'

"I need a moment to think this over carefully. This is a large decision so just wait please."

"Ok."

I sit down cross-legged and begin a brainstorming session. I deliberate on the situation heavily before finally replying, "I will do it under one condition."

Serena's eyes sparkle as she responds excitedly, "Yes?"

"From now on, we will always be together. At least until you get older, I want you to listen and follow what I say. I'm not saying that I want you to be my slave. But if I am being serious and make a big decision, then you must support me. And I don't mean this as a party leader, I mean this as your lover. What do you say?"

"Yes! Of course! I do I do I do!" Serena says while running into me and knocking me over. She then gives me a big dry kiss on my lips before standing up and raising her hands in the air with a "WOO!" In the end, I decided to value my relationship with Serena over whoring my body out to a bunch of random women. I don't have any strong romantic feelings for Serena, but I do care about her, want her to be happy and don't want to risk losing her. Next, this engagement is a really rushed decision on her part. When she is older, her feelings will probably change or she will find somebody else that she wants to marry. An engagement is the perfect excuse to make sure that she stays by my side until then. And, my one condition will make her easier to manage during this time.

Serena then grabs my hand and pulls me back into town. Her grin is massive as she parades me around. In the end, we walk back to the fortress.

Randalf greets with, "Ah Jin. Good afternoon."

"Good afternoon," Martin says.

We exchange pleasantries and discuss the future of the town.

"Also, today we will be leaving."

At first I was going to wait for more food to grow. But, after seeing how much food had grown, I decided against it. There is plenty of food, so I'm sure that the townspeople will spare some if I ask.

"We're leaving?" Serena says with a puzzled expression.

"Yes, we have tasks that need to be accomplished in other lands," I respond.

Martin interjects, "Really? So soon? Can't you at least stay until tomorrow? We're going to hold a funeral for the fallen, and the town would like to repay both of you."

"Yeah Jin. I want to stay for the funeral."

'Tsk, tsk child. I already know all of your weaknesses.'

A massive obnoxious smile appears on my face as I raise both of my arms into the air and laugh, "Muahahaha."

"Um, is everything ok Jin?" Randalf says.

"What? Oh yes. Anyway, one second."

I lean down and whisper into Serena's ear, "If we stay another day, the woman might separate us. And, who knows what they will do to me."

"I'm extremely sorry Randalf, but we have to leave immediately."

"What? So suddenly?" he responds.

"Yeah, that's too abrupt Serena. We can stay until tonight at least."

Serena sighs majorly and responds, "Fiiiiiiiiiiine, I guess we can stay until tonight then."

"So in the end, you really are leaving us?" Randalf says.

"Yes. It's unfortunate, but we have no choice. We will leave tonight."

"Wow. Tonight huh. Well, if there is anything that we can do for you, please ask. The town will do its best to fulfill any request," Marin replies.

'And here it is. The chance to make requests!'

There are only three things that I want from this town. Food, weapons, and Randalf's stone. However, I can't be too greedy. Randalf's stone is considered an artifact of the town and will not be easy to get. Its significance can't be underestimated! If I request Randalf's stone by itself then there is a chance that I can get it. However, if I request the stone and anything else, the people may reject my request. And the other thing is that the stone supposedly only works with earth magic. So, I'd probably end up selling it anyway since Serena and I can't use it. Overall, I decide that the risk is not worth it. We need food as soon as possible so I request food and weapons only.

"If it's food, then take as much as you want," Randalf says. "The food will keep growing and there will be plenty of food that is ripe by tomorrow. Please help yourself."

Martin speaks up, "And two staves? Interesting. Give us two hours. We will work diligently to create them for our saviors. Is that fine?"

"That sounds great," I respond cheerfully.

"Thank you Martin," Serena says with a bow.

Thus, Serena and I grab food from the fields. We fill up our inventories while eating food until we are full. There is much more food leftover after we finish those tasks. We then head out of the fortress after thanking Randalf. Martin had already left to presumably begin working on our requests. We walk around town while spending most of our time conversing with families and defenders. However, after a short while, a group of women appears in front of us.

One women steps forward and winks at me before saying, "Hello Jin. Have you been having fun?" I immediately recognize her as Marie.

"He has," Serena responds with a haughty smile.

"Oh really?" Marie responds with a challenging smile. It feels as though white and red sparks are colliding as the two girls stare at each other.

"In any case, Jin, we could use your help. There is a heavy wagon of clothes that needs moved. Can we count on you?"

This is obviously another scenario that the women created.

'Sheesh, how many of these did they think up? Well, they had a lot of free time in the bunker. I bet they have hundreds.'

They are no doubt planning to lead him somewhere private and separate Serena somehow.

"Unfortunately, Jin already has plans," Serena says.

"Plans? Surely they can wait for a moment while he helps us with our problem. It will only be a moment," Marie smirks.

"I'm sorry but I can't play along this time," I say firmly while looking straight into her eyes.

A few moments pass before Marie breaks out of my gaze. While looking to the side she says, "Are you sure that you won't regret this?"

"I won't," I reply firmly.

"Well then, you heard him ladies. The fun is over. I'm going to head to the bunker so I'll see you all later."

Marie then leaves and walks toward the fortress. The other women beg for me to sleep with them but Serena says triumphantly, "He can't because he is engaged to me!"

The women look surprised at first but quickly accept their defeat and walk away.

'It feels weird that nobody finds it strange that I am engaged to a seven year old. I guess what that farmer said is true. They really don't have an age limit on marriage here.'

I laugh a bit before heading back to the houses near the town center. A lot of chairs have been set up so I sit down. Serena follows suit by sitting on my lap.

'This is my space,' Serena thinks to herself.

We chat with a bunch of people and Serena makes sure to tell everybody about our engagement. Obviously a lot of people are excited about it. However, everybody is also sad that we are leaving. The people clearly indicate that they want to give us presents, but I inform them that we will be getting food and staves.

Time passes until the sun is close to setting. It must be around 6:00 now. Martin, Randalf, and all of the townspeople have gathered in the center of the town. Martin's voice then rings out.

"Everybody rise!"

The people who are sitting around in the town center immediately rise.

"Today, we celebrate our heroes, Jin and Serena. They came to our town and helped us to fight against the undead. Thanks to their help, the future of our town is secured. Not only did they stop the undead, but they also solved our food crisis. Let's give them a loud round of applause!"

The crowd then erupts into a roar of screams and cheers. People whistle, clap, stomp and make practically any noise their body can produce. Martin then waves his hands in front of himself after a few moments to indicate "settle down".

"As thanks to our heroes, we, the town of Hamel would like to present various presents to Jin and Serena."

Martin then motions to the side and seven woman walk forward. The first woman is holding two staves, the second has two iron hammers, a third and fourth are holding spears, a fifth has a case, and the sixth holds a bag.

"We present staves, robes, hammers, spears and Whooglue Seeds as gifts from the people."

The staves are the items that I looked forward to the most. Our current staves are long and thin cylinders made of unpolished, green-brown wood. In comparison, these staves are on an entirely different level. First, they are made entirely out of polished iron. Second, the appearances are outrageously appealing. My staff looks like two lightning bolts connected by a grip in the center. The lightning bolts sharply move down to the left or right, based on the way the staff is facing, before moving in the oppose direction. This zig-zag motion occurs twice for both of the bolts on the top and bottom. And, the tips of the staff are perfectly aligned. My staff is also short and has a grip in the middle that perfectly balances its weight around the center. While I can't rest my staff on the ground while standing still, it shouldn't matter. My staff is light so it will not cause fatigue.

In contrast, Serena's staff has a similar appearance to her last staff. However, there is a large angel with clasped hands as an ornament at the top. The angel has a circle around it, a halo and small rays of light. The workmanship of the angel is extremely high quality and distinguishes the staff greatly. The weight of her staff is greatly reduced in comparison to her last staff, and the length is as tall as she is.

These staves were made possible due to a couple of factors. The town has a moderate supply of iron leftover from before the undead war started. Initially, I wanted armor to be made for the war. But, the townspeople have no skills with making armor. Instead, the townspeople are only skilled at making weapons. When the townspeople were making the spears for ranged defense, I had also considered having staves made for Serena and myself. However, we rarely entered direct combat, so I decided against having them made.

Next, there are the hammers. The hammers are high quality like the one that Martin used. The other townspeople had maces and hammers as well. However, his has the highest workmanship and heaviest weight.

Third, there are the wooden cases. When I look at the case, the woman stretches her two arms out, kneels down and opens the case.

'That's... a little excessive.'

Inside are two luxurious robes laying on a beautiful, red fabric. My current robe is nothing more than a purple cloth barely thick enough to cover my skin. If you hold it up to a light source, then you would be able to see through it. However, these robes are much thicker. The appearance of the robes is comparable to that of bath robes. They are one piece outfits that require one to put one's arms through the sleeves. Then one folds the front parts over each other before wrapping a belt around the waist. Normally, it would make sense for the robe to rapidly and constantly fall apart when worn in such a state. For example, perhaps a sleeve would slide off when running. However, equipped outfits maintain their appearance unless a strong force alters them like ripping and tearing. The robes have two chest pockets, two waist pockets and a light trim along all of the edges. The yellow robe has a light yellow trim, whereas the other has a black trim to accent its primarily white color. It's obvious that the women of the town put a lot of work into the two pieces.

The 20 spears are being held by two different people. Two people are required to carry the spears because they are roughly two feet each. These spears are also some of the ones that were used in the invasion.

Last is the small light blue bag of Whooglue Seeds.

'What the hell are Whooglue Seeds?'

"Heroes, please receive your gifts."

Serena and I walk forward and accept the items. I take the lightning staff and yellow robes, while Serena takes the angel staff and white robes. The hammers and spears are split evenly between our inventories and I put the bag of seeds into mine. I also notice that there is also a smaller blue bag tied to it that contains bonemeal, presumably intended for use with the seeds. Getting swept up in the moment, I turn around and look toward the people, "Thank you everybody for your warmth and kindness. I will never forget the townspeople of the Hamel fortress. It is sad but as you know, we will be leaving now. Thank you all once again for your kindness."

"Thank you," Serena bows, and I join her as a rare exception.

"Heroes, we will never forget you. Everybody! Let us give one last cheer for the heroes who saved our town. HURRAH!"

"HURRAH!"

"HURRAH!"

"HURRAH!"

All of the people shout and make noise once again. Serena and I wave at everybody as we slowly move to the town's original main entrance at 12:00. The townspeople follow us all the way to the gate as we continue moving into the distance. We stop waving after crossing the fields and exiting their line of sight.

"Well, that was nice Serena, wasn't it?"

"That was the BEST!"

"Haha. I agree."

"I wish we could have stayed there longer."

"That would be nice wouldn't it? But we can't stay in one place for too long. The dungeon will eventually be destroyed so we shouldn't get too attached. We did our job and made everybody happy. That should be enough."

*MMMPH*

Serena nods while letting out a happy sound. We head back to the river that splits the forest. The sun is currently setting so it will be dark soon.

"Let's hurry. Even though there wasn't anything here before, this place gives me the creeps. And it will be night soon."

"Sure thing."

Thus, Serena and I run to the return pedestal. Well, we both become tired very fast and wind up walking swiftly. The walk takes about 30 minutes before we arrive at the return pedestal from before.

'Finally, we're done.'

I focus on leaving the dungeon and Serena and I are teleported to the victory room.

"Yay! The victory room! I can't wait to see what I get!"

"SAME!" I shout excitedly.

However, we have appeared inside of a small solid gray room. It looks like it is made of cement on all sides. There is also no explanation for why the light gray walls and the entire interior is lit. Before even taking a step or getting a chance to think deeply, a FW appears before Serena and myself.

\---------------------------------------------

[Intimacy Advancement!]

Congratulations, you are now eligible for an intimacy advancement with Serena. The factors that contributed to this growth are:

1.) Have been together since birth.

2.) Have cleared two dungeons together.

3.) Have acquired an exceptional degree of completion in a long dungeon.

4.) Have lived together by sharing a bath and sleeping with each other.

5.) Have spent a substantial amount of time unseparated.

6.) Have overcome a large relationship issue.

7.) Have pledged your love for each other.

**Racial Bonus:** Due to Serena being an Angel-Cat, you can advance to an even higher level of intimacy. However, be mindful that intimacy advancements are a long-term decision and that breaking a bond with an Angel-Cat is considered a crime against nature. Serena is immune to penalties from the Intimacy System, and breaking a bond with her will result in substantially greater penalties.

Would you like to advance to the Family level of intimacy?

[Yes] / [No]

**Note:** If you select no, then you will be given a chance to select a lower level of intimacy in descending order.

\---------------------------------------------

Jin reads the screen with a dumbfounded expression. He is getting a chance to increase his intimacy. But what the hell is intimacy? After thinking that, knowledge surges into his mind.

\---------------------------------------------

[Party 107: The Intimacy System]

Congratulations, you are now eligible to know about the Intimacy system. When two people clear certain conditions, they may become eligible for an increase in intimacy. Intimacy represents the strength of the bond between two people. Intimacy has eleven stages in total. There is the neutral state, five negative states and five positive states. They are:

**Neutral:** The default relationship between two people.

**Allies:** Will help the other person but only when they recoup benefits equal to or greater than the costs.

Penalty: Relationship set to Disliked. Unable to join a party for a week. 10% reduced effectiveness of all charisma based skills for a week.

**Friends:** Similar to ally but will not expect to recoup all costs. | Shared Rewards Level 1

Penalty: Relationship set to Hated. Unable to join a party for a month. 25% reduced effectiveness of all charisma based skills for a month.

**Close Friends:** Will help regardless of the costs. | Shared Rewards Level 2

Penalty: All of the above. Relationship set to Enemy. Destroy all held and inventory items. Destroy all gold. Lose half of your levels. 50% reduced effectiveness of all charisma based skills for a month.

**Family:** Description: The other person is like very close family. This stage of intimacy is called "Lovers" for married couples and only provides the additional benefit of formal recognition of the marriage between people in the Intimacy System. | Shared Rewards Level 3

Penalty: All of the above. Relationship is set at Mortal Enemy. Level reset to 1. 75% reduced effectiveness of all charisma based skills for a month. Given a Mark for one year. A Mark is a visual effect that brands you as something. The Mark of Betrayal has a negative impact on trust. The Mark of Hostility encourages hostility and rebellion.

**Soulbound:** Both people regard their party member as though they are themselves. This stage of intimacy is substantially more difficult to acquire than others.

The intimacy system provides two main features. They are the shared reward system and the trust system. The shared reward system provides shared rewards to intimate individuals who clear dungeons at the same time. Level 1 shares quest completions and failures and is always applied, even if one's partner isn't present at the time that one chooses to clear a dungeon. Level 2 includes level 1 and combines, averages and distributes Achievement Ratings earned. However, note that higher level individuals will receive a greater share of the distributed loot and character experience based on the level difference between the involved people. There is also a small bonus given to the quality of the chests contents. Level 3 includes level 2 and gives the ability to share inventories.

In the event that there are one or more groups of intimate individuals that overlap, such as one person that is close friends with two people that aren't close friends with each other, then the initial person's quest progress will be calculated by using a weighted system. This system will determine how much one contributed toward each quest while weighing their personal contributions much more heavily. In regards to Achievement Ratings, they will be evenly split with each close relation and then averaged with the close relations earned Achievement Ratings. These calculations allow groups of individuals to share quest progress and Achievement Ratings in a balanced manner.

The intimacy system is useful because it enforces trust between two individuals. A bond can only be broken legitimately after telling your partner that you want to break your bond and waiting a week. If the bond is broken before then, then a penalty will be imposed. Breaking a bond established through the intimacy system illegitimately imposes a massive penalty on the offender. A bond may be broken illegitimately by doing any action that betrays your relation, based on the severity of the betrayal in comparison to your established level of intimacy. Breaking a bond also creates a negative relationship state between the two. The offender will receive the negative relationship state while the victim will remain neutral. While in a negative relationship with another person, Eden will overlook revenge by the victim against the offender. Revenge will increase intimacy with the other person until it reaches the neutral state. Once neutral, any acts of revenge will be counted as a separate instance, and the victim would be the offender of a new crime and would lose intimacy with the victim. Higher levels of negative intimacy may provide the victim with tools to track and kill the offender.

\---------------------------------------------

'So it's like that. The information was there but I couldn't access it because the conditions weren't met. I know I said that I'd get engaged, but this is way more serious than I was thinking.'

Before Jin can think too hard, he hears Serena's voice.

"Well this is easy." Serena says while hitting the yes button on her screen.

"Eh? Are you sure about it Serena? You know what the system means right?"

She tilts her head, puts on a puzzled expression and responds, "It's so that we can get married right?"

Her brain has completely shut out all of the other information. In her head, all she cares about is getting married. The penalties might as well not even exist.

"Ahhh, damnit. Fine fine fine."

I hit the yes button on the screen. 'I have already committed to this and am not going to back out now.' Next, a new FW pops up.

"Congratulations. You two are now at the Family level of intimacy. You can advance to the lover's stage of intimacy by holding a wedding at any church."

Serena then shouts out "Yay!"

'All of her dreams are coming true, huh.'

The windows go away and we are instantly teleported to a new location.

'Now this is a victory room.'

The last victory room was completely bare. It had the chests, the pedestals and the portal. But, other than that, there was only the ground and sky expanding infinitely in all directions. But this time, there is an actual room! Well, something like a room. In fact, it's really just four gray walls with one of them acting as a roof. However, it's a lot closer to a room than last time! Inside is one chest, one pedestal, and the shimmering white portal. This portal is slightly more decorative and the frame twists in a few spots. There are also a variety of other items lining the walls of the victory room.

"LOOT!" Serena says while running to the chest. This time our names are both floating over the chest in gold letters. And, the best part is that the chest is a shiny light blue color with diamond trim.

"MITHRIL CHEST!" I shout.

I quickly run over to the chest as well. If I had -100 strength, I'd crawl to this chest. If it was placed over a bed of lava, I'd happily walk through it. Barefooted. Hell, I might even hum a tune. The only thing that stands even the smallest chance of stopping me would be breaking my recent intimacy bond with Serena. This chest represents three days of hardship. This chest represents all of our accumulated work.

After reaching the chest we both rip open the lid.

"HOLY!!!!"

"AHHH!!!"

We are both overwhelmed by the loot. It is so glorious that we have to cover our eyes with our hands. It is simply too much to behold. We can't tell what the items are or what they do, but it's obvious by looking at them that they are all of an amazing. They are just on a completely different level from the items we have acquired before.

I pick up an item and go nuts, "IT'S A FLAMING SWORD! SERENA LOOK! IT'S ACTUALLY ON FIRE!"

"LOOK AT THESE! THEY ARE WINGS! FREAKING WINGS!"

"OH MY FUCKGJI" My words get tangled in my mouth from slobber. I slurp it up and continue, "MAGIC BOOKS! SPELL BOOKS!"

"AN ORB! I DON'T KNOW WHAT IT DOES BUT LOOK AT IT! IT'S GOTTA DO SOMETHING CRAZY!"

I abnormally calm down and instantly collect myself. "

Serena," I say coolly and calmly while looking straight ahead.

"Y-y-yes Jin?" She responds nervously.

"It is time." I concentrate my mind and a FW pops up. "HOLY SWEET EDEN, THIS CAN'T BE REAL!"

\---------------------------------------------

[Character]

Jin the Lightning Elemental

Class: Lightning Caster

Level: 5

Health: [----------]

Lightning Mana: [----------]

Life Mana: [----------]

Strength: 5 / Intelligence: 44 / Wisdom: 43 / Agility: 4 / Constitution: 4 / Charisma: 1 / Luck: 0

Unallocated Stat Points: 9

\---------------------------------------------

[Proficiencies]

Unallocated Proficiency Points: 3

Ability Categories

[T3] Lightning Mastery

[T2] Leadership

[T2] Life Spell Mastery

[T2] Melee Staff Combat

Active Abilities

[T5] Lightning Enchant

[T2] Restore Life

\---------------------------------------------

"M-M-Me too!" Serena says while releasing her excitement.

\---------------------------------------------

[Character]

Serena the Angel-Cat

Class: Healer

Level: 5

Health: [----------]

Life Mana: [----------]

Strength: 5 / Intelligence: 25 / Wisdom: 42 / Agility: 18 / Constitution: 8 / Charisma: 1 / Luck: 1

Unallocated Stat Points: 12

\---------------------------------------------

[Proficiencies]

Unallocated Proficiency Points: 4

Ability Categories

[T3] Healing Mastery

[T2] Spirit Mastery

Active Abilities

[T4] Restore Life

[T2] Heaven's Guidance

\---------------------------------------------

There is simply too much to take in. Just imagine for a second that you have been stranded in a desert for the past week. You haven't eaten anything and have somehow managed to survive without dying from thirst. Then, it suddenly starts raining. After that, a cow walks past you and explodes into finely cooked steaks. Then you look up from the steaks and see that the rain has washed away a hill of sand in front of you thus revealing the deserts exit. Now, take that and throw a massive city at that desert's exit and you can relate to how this feels.

Magic items, spell books, a mysterious orb, an assortment of gear, potions, jewels, gems and more. The chest is loaded with a variety of items. Serena continues our playfully dramatic exchange with me for a while before calming down. I sit down on the floor and Serena sits down next to me.

"Serena?"

"Yes?"

"This is nice."

"Yes."

We sit in silence for a minute before I stand up again. Serena follows suit.

"Alright Serena. I really want to pick up this loot. But let's read the information panel first, ok?

"Ok!" she says cheerfully.

We walk up to the Information Pedestal and open it.

\---------------------------------------------

[Dungeon Report]

Your party entered a dungeon and went to the town of Hamel. The town of Hamel had been plagued by undead for over a month before your party showed up. Upon arrival, your party turned the situation around completely! Your party defended the town, ended the undead invasion at the source, and created a well defended and permanent food source. Those actions went far above and beyond the minimum requirements of the quests.

Quest Report:

Survive Day 1: Complete

Survive Day 2: Complete

Survive Day 3: Complete

Bonus Quests:

End the Undead Invasion: Complete

Create a Sustainable Food Source: Complete

General Achievements:

Saved the lives of everybody except seven.

Jin's Achievements:

Enchanted the weapons of fighters with Lightning Enchant many times.

Left behind an heir.

Serena's Achievements:

Healed the wounded many times.

Gave townspeople hope through positive conversations.

Influence on Dungeon:

Chaos Level: +8%

Dungeon Inhabitation Level: -80%

Technology Level: +7%

Agriculture: +Infinity

Achievement Rating: S

\---------------------------------------------

"These results aren't that bad, Right Serena?" I spoke those words to Serena, but her gaze if angrily fixed on one part of the FW.

"Alright Serena, I'm sorry. Ok? There, I said it. Can you please get over that now?"

Serena calmly walks over to the treasure chest and grabs the wings from before.

"I'll forgive you if you give me these wings."

'Damn.'

That short line is deceptively complex. The guide says that there is at least one super rare item in a mithril chest. Chances are very high that the wings are that item. There is no way to be certain other than my intuition. The wings don't look like they can support a person's weight, but they are wings. What else would they do? Unless they are just a decoration. In any case, it's best to assume that they provide flight, and nobody would doubt the usefulness of flight.

'Damnit, but I have no choice. I have no bargaining chips. This is the only way to get over the issue.'

"Fine, take the wings," I say sadly.

"Yay!" Serena says before equipping them. She equips the items by using the CSP method. The item disappears and then reappears equipped onto her. Equipment is amazing because it follows the rule of one size fits all. As long as an item is made into some form that fits a specific body part, it will stretch to fit anybody. I know this because of the time that we equipped spare clothes in Hamel. The clothes were not designed for us and there was no way that they would fit us in their unequipped state. However, when we equipped them, the spare clothes fit perfectly. Thus, Serena equips the wings and two wings appear on her back.

Each wing has a top and bottom section that forms their appearance. The top part of each wing starts off as two split edges that extend away from each other in a curved motion before curving back together at a point. This appearance is similar to a circle, but with more elongation on the sides and top. The bottom section has a similar appearance but is roughly half the size of the top section. The total length of the wings barely extends past her shoulders, and each wing is partially transparent. The colors of the wings are dark and can be compared to looking down upon a lake with a dark border and bottom that has had red, green and blue paint spread over top of it.

Next, Serena equips her white robe. It appears around her and replaces her one-piece dress. The robe matches her hair and skin, however the wings look completely out of place. At this point, her color scheme is completely thrown off.

Serena then concentrates hard on something to the point that she squints her eyes. After a moment, she says in a sad tone, "Awwww, I couldn't fly."

"There there. You couldn't fly but they are still pretty right? When we leave the dungeon we'll figure something out, ok?"

"Ok."

"Good. Then let's divvy up the rest of the loot and head out. I'm curious what the main world has been up to."

I turn back to the chest and crouch down. Serena also runs over and joins me.

"It's a shame but we'll probably have to get rid of some of the food that we acquired."

"Yeah."

I then start to go through the loot. As said before, there are a lot of good items. The chest is probably five feet wide and three feet long. Inside of the chest are walled off areas with different types of loot. For example, the jewels are all in one section while the swords are in another. I didn't look closely at the chest before, but I now see that it's quite organized. The wings were in their own separate spot in the top middle of the chest, and other high quality items like the flaming sword are around where it was. Something to note about the flaming sword is that the flames only appeared when I held the sword in my hand. Hopefully, it can be stored safely by not touching it directly. Hopefully. Closer to the front of the chest are separate spots for jewels, gems, potions and other small items. There are also stacks of gold in the top left corner taking up a decent chunk of space.

Even though there is a large variety of items in the chest, I go straight to the books. There is one book in a rare item spot and a stack of three books near the front of the chest. I pick up the rare book first. Its appearance isn't anything special, and it has a light blue hard cover covering its front and back. The title of the book is "Frost Tome" and I quickly skim its contents. It's a book with information about a few intermediate frost spells. While useless for my party, an intermediate Ice Mage would go nuts for this. I then read the titles of the other books.

Beginner Magic Spells, Beginner Weapon Skills, Beginner Production Techniques

I go through the magic spell book next and read its contents.

'Jackpot!'

The book is an encyclopedia of basic magic spells. This fulfills two of the three requirements to learn a spell as described in the Introductory Guide. And, since these spells are at the beginner tier, they should be easy to learn. Serena's mana type and mine will fulfill the third requirement. My knowledge on learning spells is fresh because of a test that I performed during the second day of the invasion.

... _A few days ago..._

'I have been watching Serena cast Restore Life for a while now, so I have a solid grasp of how the spell works. This should fulfill two of the three requirements. The only question now is whether or not I have life mana. Nothing has told me that I can use healing spells. But, nothing has said that I can't.'

A zombie approaches me as I stand still. I have already prepared to be hit by its attack by moving to the back of the fortress and separating from Serena. This is so that she can't heal me. Since I've been hit by the undead many times to train Serena's healing and have learned their movements, I should not take any serious damage. After a few seconds, the zombie reaches out and claws my shoulder.

'Alright, I've taken damage. Now to cast heal on myself.'

"Restore Life!"

A dim light illuminates my body as Restore Life takes effect.

"What? Is this it?"

I know that Serena's Restore Life spell heals roughly 5% of a person's health for 10% of her mana. But, after looking at my character screen, my version healed less than 1% of my health, if any at all, for 100% of my life mana. From this, I reason that my total life mana and healing spell effectiveness are very low. However, there are two pieces of good news from my experiment. The life mana bar that appeared in my character window means that I am compatible with life magic. And second, T2 Restore Life has appeared in my proficiencies FW.

... _Present time..._

At first, I thought that proficiency was the main deciding factor in spell effectiveness. But, I was wrong about that. I thought about the system again and remembered that proficiency is just a multiplier. A spell's base effectiveness and other attributes are determined by race, class and maybe some unknown factors. Thus, my proficiencies could be the same or even greater than Serena's. However, my abilities will be much weaker in comparison unless their tier is much higher.

Aside from the Restore Life test, I performed many other tests with magic. For example, I tried guessing magical spells to bypass the first and second requirements of learning spells. My main goal was to project a lightning bolt out of my hand. However, I had no success. Based on the Introductory Guide, what I was doing would probably be classified as free casting. However, I'm still a beginner at lightning magic, so it would have been impossible for me to succeed at my skill level.

But now we have a spell book! The Ice Tome recommends T10 Ice Mastery to use the spells reasonably since it's an intermedia spell tome. But this book is a beginner's guide so it requires nothing! Of course, there are no super powerful spells in here. But, there are so many spells listed that it is an extremely efficient way to learn about the many different magical branches.

"Serena, come look at this."

Serena stops rummaging around the chest and moves closer to me. Her eyes open wide when she reads its title.

"Is this a spell book?"

"Yup! We have a spell book!"

"AWESOME! Let's see what it says."

I turn the book to the healer section first, since healer comes before lightning alphabetically.

"Sweet! These spells are amazing!"

Restore Life, Restore Stamina, Feed, Cure Wounds, Restore Blood

There are five spells in the healer section of the book. I am disappointed by the count, but figure that it can't be helped. This book is only a beginner's guide. However, the quality of the spells is amazing! The Feed spell in particular reads:

" _Feed: This spell provides nutrition that satisfies hunger and stalls starvation. The more this spell is used between real meals, the less effective it becomes. Higher tiers provide more nutrition, stall hunger longer and offer the ability to manipulate taste. This spell requires life mana."_

Serena will become significantly more powerful when she learns all of these spells. And, since Serena already knows the Restore Life spell, a small FW appeared when she read about it. The FW said that she learned more about the spell, which is probably just a fancy way of saying that she earned proficiency.

"Can we check out the support section too? I can use those spells as well."

"Sure thing."

'I'll just read the lightning section later. It's not a big deal.'

Strength Up, Intelligence Up, Wisdom Up, Agility Up, Constitution Up, Charisma Up, Luck Up, Shield

"These spells seem really useful. Stat boosts will always be good," Serena says.

"I agree. I wish there was a shield spell or something to that effect. But, beggars can't be choosers."

We read that section for a few seconds before Serena says, "Alright, thank you for letting me go first. Now it's your turn."

This is the moment of truth. I can't help but wonder what kind of abilities I will receive. I turn to the lightning section and read the spells,

Electric Mark, Lightning Bolt.

"Only two spells. Ahhh, that's disappointing."

The electric mark spell creates a mark on an opponent that attracts lightning magic. Its use is to offset the terribly low accuracy of lightning magic. I know about the poor accuracy of lightning from the Introductory Guide. But, I have only been using Lightning Enchant so far. Thus, I haven't had a chance to see how bad it is first hand. However, since there is a spell completely devoted to accuracy, I can imagine that lightning is going to be a lot less accurate than I expect. The Lightning Bolt spell is described as a bolt of lightning being shot from one's hand or magical tool. Its usage and functions are extremely straightforward.

"It can't be helped though right? I mean, isn't lightning magic supposed to be really hard to control?"

"Yeah. Once I get stronger I'm sure the lightning spells will become incredibly strong. I just have to stay positive and wait."

I then put the book back in the chest.

"Alright then, let's share our inventories and start stuffing items in," Serena says while smiling happily.

'I am definitely getting bullied by Serena.'

The inventory share is a feature of the Friends level of intimacy. I wasn't going to take advantage of it unless she brought it up. In fact, I kind of don't want to use the feature. But, how can I refuse that smile? Just look at it!

We both concentrate our minds and a FW appears.

\---------------------------------------------

[Inventory Share]

Are you sure you would like to share inventories? This option can't be disabled unless your bond is broken or all items owned by one person are taken out. Poor item management may result in weakening your bond and a drop in intimacy.

[Yes] / [No] (Serena)

[Yes] / [No] (Jin)

\---------------------------------------------

Serena and I hit the yes buttons on the FW and the inventory share process begins. The way that inventories work is that every person gets a private space. It can be imagined as opening up a portal to another dimension on the wall of a box. The weight of an item doesn't seem to have any impact on the inventory's space. However, size does. The box is roughly 3x3x1 feet large which means that it is actually rather small. For example, the hammers that were gifted to us can only fit in our inventories when placed horizontally. Items can be put in, pulled out, equipped from and unequipped to the inventory instantly. The process of the inventories merging appears as two gray boxes appearing in front of us. The right wall of the left box disappears and the left wall of the right wall disappears. Then the boxes join together and vanish. It's amazing that the fruit filling up the boxes didn't spill out during this process.

When I open up my inventory again, it is now 4.5x4.5x1. I guess the boxes merging was just an illusion for show since the box isn't 6x3x1. In any case, the items that were inside didn't move and are still neatly lying flat. We also managed to get a bit of bonus space as well. We then start to take fruit out of our new combined inventory. Serena and I both open portals to the same inventory, so there are two hands pulling out fruit. We will still be able to take some fruit out with us. However, most of it will have to come out. That's when I have an idea.

"Give me one second Serena."

"Sure thing."

I take out the beginner's spell book and look for identification magic.

'Found it!'

The spell that I am looking for is in lore section. There are a few other spells related to information finding like a translation spell and a research spell.

" _Identify Item: This spell presents information about the current state of an item. Higher tiers increase the amount of information described. This spell is a general magic."_

I check my proficiencies to confirm that I have successful learned the spell. My proficiencies window states that I have [T2] Identify Item. Perfect! I then open up my character screen and pick up one of the lime green gems at the front of the chest.

"Identify Item!"

50% of my lightning mana is drained and a FW pops up.

\---------------------------------------------

[Item Information]

Lesser Wind Stone

\---------------------------------------------

"Um... is that it?"

I already know that a lack of specialization in a field can hinder me, but isn't this straight up unfair? I mean, at least I can read the name of items now. But I expected at least one or two other details.

"Serena. I can read the names of items."

"Really?! Awesome! Then what is the name of my wings?"

I cast Identify again on her wings by using my remaining mana.

\---------------------------------------------

[Item Information]

Fairy Wings

\---------------------------------------------

Serena looks at the window before giving me a hug and saying, "Ohhh! They are fairy wings! Thank you Jin!"

"You're welcome."

We spend five more minutes packing items into our inventory before I identify another item. I use the spell on the unknown red orb sitting in a rare section in the chest. This orb is a perfect sphere with a deep crimson color. Inside of it are many light red lines of energy moving around randomly. Its size is just big enough to fit comfortably in the palm of my hand. I cast Identify Item and a FW appears.

\---------------------------------------------

[Item Information]

(S) Inventory Expansion Orb

\---------------------------------------------

My jaw drops.

'An orb that increases the size of my inventory? Hell yes! Use! Activate! Consume!'

Jin thinks of different ways to activate it, but it doesn't matter. As soon as he said, 'Use,' a FW appears.

\---------------------------------------------

[Use Item]

Consume (S) Inventory Expansion Orb?

[Yes] / [No]

\---------------------------------------------

"Yes!"

The orb then glows gently before scattering into light. I open up the inventory and see that it is bigger! It is now 5x5x2 instead of 4.5x4.5x1. Some of the items that were stacked up before had rolled over to the side due to the new space. This was of course because time doesn't stop inside of the inventory.

'Isn't this a massive increase in volume?'

"Serena, look at the inventory really quick."

Serena stops looking at the gems in the chest and looks at our inventory.

"... It got bigger? How!?"

"Haha! You know that orb? It turned out that it is an Inventory Expansion Orb. I used it and it made the inventory bigger."

"Wow! Awesome!"

"We might be able to repack some of the fruit."

Serena smiles and nods before continuing her work of putting items into the inventory. Surprisingly, she has been placing all of the items carefully organized piles. I thought that she would just throw items in randomly, but she is very organized.

Another five minutes pass as we finish packing items from the victory room. We manage to pack a bunch of items from the chest and acquire 50 gold coins. I am extremely grateful that the coins are not very large and don't take up too much inventory space. There are weapons on the walls, but they are mostly rusty one-handed and two-handed weapons made of an unknown metal. They also all seem low quality and clunky so we decide not to grab any. There is a potion rack on a nearby shelf that has eight different colored potions. I identify one of them and learn that it is a Potion of Confusion. I still have potions from the last victory room, but they will have to wait for identification until a later date.

"Let's assign our stat and proficiency points and then leave."

"Alright!"

I evenly distribute my stat points into intelligence and wisdom which puts them at 49 each. Serena splits her 12 points between intelligence, wisdom and agility. I don't know why she is putting points into agility, but I can only guess that it has to do with the fact that she is a cat race. 'Perhaps I'll ask her about her stat allocations later.' In any case, this puts her at 29, 46 and 22 for those stats respectively.

I put my three proficiency points into lighting mastery which raises it to T10. Each proficiency point increased my Lightning Mastery proficiency significantly. This puts me at the intermediate tier for lightning magic. Serena puts her four points into Healing Mastery to reach T9.

"I'm finished," Serena says.

"Then let's roll out."

Serena grabs my hand as we walk to the portal. We have managed to acquire all of the items from the chest, the potions on the wall and keep the fruit from the dungeon. With the levels and items that we received, our dungeon completion can be classified as a true victory. Without looking back, we step through the portal and exit the victory room.

### Chapter 10: World Changes

We arrive at the dungeon entrance that we entered the dungeon from. The world has a yellow orange tint as though sunset is happening, so we can still make out a lot of our surroundings. Since the sun is starting to look like the moon, I can only assume that the sun will change directly into the moon. But, I have no idea how that process works.

In front of us is the resurrection stone from before. There is now a road from the Resurrection Stone that leads to a town. Well, with its size it's definitely worthy of a title better than town. This road has a side road that is connected to the dungeon's entrance that we are at. In the distance are smaller towns, but they are spaced miles apart from each other. The atmosphere is calm and silent and there is nobody around. However, I immediately have a flashback to when Serena and I were crowded by people and fled to the dungeon.

'How could I forget? I didn't even think about that at all.'

I had completely forgotten about the crowds from before. To be fair, it was a very short experience compared to the three day adventure that was just completed. But, a crowd could still have caused a lot of trouble.

'Well, if anything happens this time, I will take care of it. I can't run away forever.'

"Should we head to the town?" Serena asks while I am thinking.

"Yeah. We need to catch up on the latest news. And, we also need to do something with our items and take a break."

And like that, the trip is decided. Serena and I follow the road to the intersection that splits left and right before going right toward the town. We walk for approximately 10 minutes before reaching the town's entrance.

"Halt. What is your business?" a guard speaks.

"I just got back from a dungeon and I saw this town. I came to explore it with my fiancée."

"Your fiancée? Where is she?"

"Here!" Serena says while puffing up her chest and pointing at it with her thumb confidentially.

I slowly slide up next to the guard and whisper, "Look we're going to marry when she gets older. Please don't question it."

"Well, alright. The city of Jul is open to all. Just don't cause any trouble. You may enter."

"Thank you sir," Serena says with a light bow.

"Thanks," I reply.

We enter the city of Jul through the front entrance and walk around. Unlike Hamel, Jul is square shaped. The buildings are arranged in perfect rows with roads in-between. The layout leaves very little room for creative freedom. Also, there must be at least 200 different completed buildings filling up the city. All of the buildings are made of wood and the atmosphere is lively. Hundreds of people are moving about the city in dense crowds. Some of them are shouting at city squares about items they want to sell. Others are shouting about how they are looking for party members. There are also others doing construction work on buildings. However, there isn't that much free space remaining in the city, so the city will have to expand beyond its current walls soon. This expansion will have to be to the left, top or bottom of the city though since the right of the city is covered in fields.

After about five minutes of walking, I say, "It's really impressive that this massive city has managed to appear in three days."

"Yeah. There is so much to see. Where do we go first?"

"Well it's almost night time so let's find a place to sleep? I think I saw a sign for an inn a while back. If we can't find one then we can always ask a guard."

"Ok!" Serena says cheerfully.

We walk to a building located on the corner of the city's central square. Of all of the buildings in the city, this one is the biggest. And, even though the building is only two stories tall, it fills its corner space completely. It sits like a massive block.

"Welcome to the Jul Inn. How may I help you?"

"I'm wondering what services you offer and your prices."

"We offer meals and lodging. A room for the night is 10 silver and a standard meal is two silver. We also offer premium lodging for 50 silvers and a premium meal for five silvers. However, we don't serve anything alcoholic. If you want anything alcoholic, then you'll have to head to the tavern."

We had just spent three days living and sleeping in run down houses. We dealt with having almost no food to eat for three days and have been living off of fruit. Serena knows the feed spell, but we will still need solid food since its effectiveness decreases over time. Thus, there is only response.

"I'll take to premium lodging for two days and buy four premium meals. Actually, do you guys have breakfast? If so, then make that eight premium meals."

"We have breakfast. I will be happy to complete your order."

I pay the man one gold coin and he writes down notes on a FW behind the counter.

"Your payment has been accepted. Here are your eight meal tickets, the key to your room and 10 silver change. The dining hall is open for dinner from 5:00 PM to 10:59 PM. Breakfast is available from 6:00 AM to 10:59 AM. I will now lead you to your premium lodging. Right this way please."

'I LOVE THIS GUY!'

This guy doesn't show any interest in Serena's halo, and doesn't even ask about us getting only one room.

'Premium Service! Simply Wonderful!'

Serena and I follow him to the left of the Inn's entrance lobby. We then walk up two sets of stairs to reach the second floor. Next, we turn to the left and walk ten steps to the room next to the stairs.

"This is your room. Please enjoy your stay."

The man politely bows lightly at the waist with one hand folded in front. Serena also bows back before he walks back downstairs. I throw my key into the doorknob and open up the door to the room.

"Oh! It's so nice! It's so pretty!" She says before running and landing face down on the bed.

" **UFFF"**

She isn't lying. The color theme of the room is red and gold. The room has a nice cushioned bench under a window that looks right out into city. The bed has a massive and elaborate frame with thin translucent curtains draping to the ground. There is also a table with four chairs, a desk, two dressers and a walk-in closet. There is also an attached bathroom with a sink, bath and toilet. Awesomely enough, this city has running water! Turning the handle of the sink causes water to pour out and go down the drain! Hamel didn't have anything like this.

'We were just born three days ago and they have already managed to make all of this? And there is running water! It's even hot! This is incredible! How did they manage to do all of this? I will have to ask around. Maybe I should visit the tavern?'

In contrast, Serena doesn't seem to care too much about the details. She is just happy checking everything out.

I consider taking a bath but decide against it. I have already taken two baths today and a third would just be overkill.

'I'll get to take one in the morning so it's no problem.'

"Serena."

"Yes honey," she says with a giggle.

"You didn't take a bath today right? It's bath time."

"OH? We're going to take a bath together? Yay!"

"No no no no. Not we. You. After YOU get a bath, let's go eat dinner."

"I won't get in the bath unless you get in with me," she says while pouting and scrunching up her mouth to one side.

"Serena, please, be reasonable. I already took two baths today. A third is just overkill."

"I don't care," she responds while maintaining her pose.

And that's how I wound up in the bath with Serena.

'I really need to stop spoiling her. She's going to turn sour.'

We enter the bath and play around for a bit. Before I had felt uncomfortable around her nude, but I feel totally fine now. 'Maybe it's because I slept with Marie?' In any case, we have a splash fight, I dunk her upside down a few times and we even hold a competition to see who can hold their breath the longest underwater. Once finished, we quickly wash up with soap, while of course making sure that we scrub each other's back.

We step out of the bath and dry ourselves off. Then we put on the casual clothes that we accidentally looted from Hamel.

"I guess we forgot to give these back huh?" Serena says with a worried look.

"We saved their town and they gave us a bunch of extra stuff. I'm sure they won't mind."

"You're right," Serena responds with a smile.

We finish equipping the clothes before heading downstairs to the dining area. On the right of the entrance lobby is a hallway with the dining area on its left. We give our two tickets to the greeter and he leads us to a private room. The dining area has around 30 different tables and booths. Almost all of them are full of people. As we walk by, we attract the gaze of many people. In fact, there were people that looked at us when we were walking around the city, but I ignored them. Chances are high that Serena hasn't noticed any stares at all.

'I'm just glad I could get Serena to this inn before anything happened. If we had kept walking for even ten more minutes, who knows what would have happened.'

The private room is separated from the main dining area by a door. There is a table with a cushioned bench surrounding it. The bench is blocky U-shape, covered in cloth and is attached to the wall. This only leaves a little room on one side of the table where the room's entrance is.

The greeter gives us menus and says, "Your waiter will be with you in just a moment." He then leaves the room while closing the door. Serena and I spend ten seconds reading the menus before there is a knock on the door.

"Come in," Serena and I say.

The waiter comes in with two glasses of water and says, "Hello guests. My name is Louis. What may I get for you to drink?"

"I'll take apple juice."

"I want apple juice too!"

He then leaves the room. During this time, Serena and I read the menus. The menu has two main sections for standard and premium meals. The standard meals have eggs, mashed and boiled potatoes, baked chicken legs or thighs, cooked and uncooked fruits and veggies and more. However, the premium meals have fried chicken breasts, seasoned vegetables, chicken fingers, cheese products, ketchup and other high quality or difficult to produce items. The difference between the standard and premium meals makes the extra cost completely worth it. After a few more moments, the waiter responds with our drinks. He then requests our meal orders.

"I'll take the assorted chicken platter with fried potato strips and the roasted vegetable medley."

"Would you like ketchup with that?"

"Hell yeah!" I say enthusiastically.

The man smiles before turning to Serena and asking for her order. I feel a small sense of satisfaction that I have managed to make him to smile. The service that we've been provided so far has been 100% professional. While that is ideal, I wanted to confirm that they are actually humans. The smile was given because I switched from my extremely calm demeanor to a hyper one faster than he could react.

"I want what Jin ordered."

"Most certainly."

The waiter then gathers our menus and heads back out. Serena and I spend the down time casually conversing about our past experiences and about what we will do in the future. After 10 minutes, there is a knock on the door so I say, "Come in"

"Please excuse the interruption," our waiter says.

A second waiter enters with a tray and sets it down on the table. He leaves and a third man comes places food down as well. Our table is covered by the chicken platters, vegetables, friend potato strips and two dishes of ketchup. The chicken platters have roasted chicken, breaded fried chicken, chicken fingers and scrambled eggs. The waiters even bring extra napkins and drink refills.

"Is there anything else that you would like?" our waiter says.

"No. Everything looks excellent. Thank you very much,"

"Thank you Mr.," Serena chimes in.

"Well then. Bon appetite," he says before leaving the room.

"Wow! This is a lot of food!"

"Indeed. This sure as hell beats eating raw fruit."

"I agree!"

We begin to chow down on the food in front of us. Our hunger is quite strong, even though we had ate fruit earlier today. That's because of several reasons. First, we ate earlier in the afternoon, and it's probably around 10:00 PM now. Second, the soft fruit was tasty but fruit is light and can't give a feeling of fullness that meat does. Third, we were really hungry before we ate the fruit and couldn't satisfy our feeling of hunger entirely in one meal. So, we still have leftover feelings of hunger. Thus, our hunger is still stronger than ever. However, in the end, the food before us is way too much. I manage to eat half of my food, but Serena only eats one third of hers. During our meal, our waiter checked in on us twice to make sure that our meal was perfect. After sitting slouched back with our hands over our stomachs, there is a knock at the door and we let our waiter in.

"Hello guests. How was your meal?"

"Absolutely delicious," Serena responds.

"It was excellent."

"Would you like two carryout boxes? They cost one silver a piece and come prefilled with ice."

"That sounds interesting. How do they work?"

"They are made of high quality wood. Underneath the storage space is a smaller space lined with iron. Ice can be stored in that area to keep food inside of the basket chilled without leaking. Also, the basked is reusable, and ice can be replaced."

"We'll take two then."

I hand the waiter two silvers and he returns with the carryout boxes. After he leaves, we scoop up our food. Thanks to the ice, our food should be fine while sitting in our inventories. The only problem is that our meal tickets may go to waste. 'I didn't expect so much food. I need to check if these tickets have an expiration date.' After we finish packing our food into our inventory, we return to our room. For no particular reason, I left one silver on the table for the waiter. I don't know why I did it, but I felt like I should.

"UFF!" Serena says while plopping herself face down on the bed again. "I'm so happy!"

"Hehe, me too," I reply while sitting down next to Serena.

"What do we do now?"

I was hoping that maybe I could put Serena to sleep and sneak out to the tavern, but that will never work. Our sleep schedules are still completely inverted. It feels like early in the afternoon to me, and I'm sure Serena feels the same.

"Well... I actually don't know. We won't be able to sleep so what do we do? Should we explore the city again?"

"Yeah yeah! Let's go explore," she says excitedly.

So, we leave our room and head out of the inn. There is a much smaller amount of people moving around now. And, most of the races appear to be nocturnal. Directly in front of the inn's entrance is a man sitting on a city decoration. The decoration he's sitting on is just a raised square pool of water. But, the man himself has folded black wings, a completely dark outfit and a completely gray face. His expression gives off an aura of intimidation. Ignoring it, I walk up to him with Serena and say, "Hi there. Good evening."

"Good evening," Serena says with her usual light bow.

"Hi. Do you have any business with me?" the man responds in a guarded, deep and masculine voice.

"Nothing in particular. We're new to the city and can't sleep. So we're having a look around the city. If possible can we chat casually for a bit?"

His eyes open up wide and his deep, guarded voice relaxes into a normal tone, "Oh! You guys are visitors to the city? Well if it's like that then sure. What do you want to talk about?"

"I wanted to talk about this city. It's amazing isn't it? I mean, I was just born three days ago at the Resurrection Stone, and when I came back to the main world, this city had popped up from out of nowhere. I can't help but wonder how it was made."

The man scratches his head a bit before responding, "Well, if you don't know that, then there is a lot to explain. You said you were gone for three days. Were you perhaps in a dungeon?"

"Yup!" Serena says excitedly.

"Ah! So that explains it. Everything makes sense. Ok then, so you guys probably know very little." He then puts one finger to his chin and nods periodically with his eyes closed.

"Yeah, that's why we are hoping to learn about what is going on."

"Interesting. Well, would you like to chat somewhere else? I only come out here because I like the atmosphere."

"Sure thing, but where too?" I ask warily.

"Haha, there is no need to be defensive. We will go to the tavern of course! Where else could we have a light hearted discussion?" he says while laughing softly.

"Well in that case it's fine. But Serena can't come so won't that be a problem?"

"Oh no, don't worry about that. Since you're coming with me, nobody will say anything," he says while pointing a thumb at his chest like "I'm the man."

He then leads us into a large building by going to another city square. Several people look over and are visibly shocked before returning to their usual business. I normally attribute such reactions to Serena's halo, but I notice that their reactions are more exaggerated than normal.

"One private room please," he says to greeter at the counter.

"Most certainly," the man nervously responds. "Right this way please."

I want to ask about why everybody is acting so peculiar but decide to wait until we arrive at our destination. We are led to a private room and the man bends over completely at the waist.

"This is the room."

"Thank you thank you. Please bring a round of drinks," our guide says.

"Of course! With pleasure!"

We then sit down and the man moves straight to the point, "Alright, by now I'm sure you're wondering who I am, right?"

"Yes. Everybody seems quite scared of you."

"Haha, it's only natural. Well, I am the head of the night guard for the city. Let's see, you don't know anything so I will explain it from scratch. The city has a military, a guard, nobles, the vice-mayor and mayor."

Before he could go any further the man from before brings in three large mugs of beer. He places one in front of everybody present.

"Dude. What are you doing? She's seven! She can't drink alcohol," I say to the waiter.

"I-I-I, I'm sorry! I'll take this away right now."

Our guide then says, "Leave it. I will drink it."

He takes a drink from his beer and pulls the other one over before continuing, "Now then, where was I. Oh yeah, so in terms of rank, the military commander, head of the day guard and head of the night guard are just under the vice-mayor. This results in, as you have seen, being treated like a VIP. But, my race is more vampire than human, so people naturally fear me. Well, I also try to make it so that people fear me. I'm the head of the guard so isn't that my duty? Well, it's only been a couple of days, so I'm sure people will warm up to me eventually."

He then takes a huge swig of beer.

"Wait, you're the head of the night guard? Should you really be drinking right now?"

"It's fine. Even if I'm drunk, I can't lose to anything," he says cheerfully and confidently as though my complaint is a non-issue.

'I don't know how strong he is, but he's the head of the city's night guard. I can't take his words lightly. He's probably really strong.'

"Anyway, most of the people who enter a dungeon exit within one day max. Even two days is rare. But you said you were in for three days? I don't know whether you are lucky or not, but that's incredible."

I then think back to the intimacy screen and reply, "I'm not sure either to be honest. It was considered a long dungeon."

"A long dungeon huh. Well I would be lying if I said that I wasn't interested. Well, how about this. If you tell me your story, then I will answer any question that I can for you. It's a fair trade of information. Deal?"

"Deal."

There is no need to think about that the deal. He's the head of the guard so he will certainly know a lot about the city. I tell him about how our quest was to save the town of Hamel from the undead. I recount how we went into the town and struggled with starvation. I explain our defense on the first night and the fortress we made on the second night. Then, on the third day we won the war with the undead. We were rewarded by the people and went to the victory room. In the end, we earned a lot of items, learned some spells, returned to the main world and arrived in this city.

Throughout the story, the head of the guard listens while drinking beers. As the story goes on, his eyes become more and more teary. The story takes around 30 minutes to recite and there are now four wooden mugs of beer on the table. After I finish, there is a short pause and the man responds, "You have had it so hard. I really feel bad for you. The fact that you were separated from the main world has caused you to miss out on a lot."

"Yeah, it seems so," I respond.

"Ok, I will now complete my end of the bargain. Here are all of the things that I think you should know. Feel free to stop me at any time to ask questions."

"Ok."

"Your first problem is all of the unidentified information. In order to learn information about yourself, you will need an ability from the scan spell series."

"The scan spell series?"

"A spell series is just a fancy way of grouping all spells that do similar things. The scan series includes general magic spells that reveal information about living things. Its counterpart is the identify series of spells that only work on non-living things. The most basic spell in the scan series is the beginner spell Scan."

"Oh wow? There are spells like that? That's amazing!"

"Yup! Scan is very useful for finding out information about enemies as well. There are classes that specialize in leading parties and raids that can scan multiple allies and enemies at once. Magicians have even hypothesized that there are expert tier and higher spells in the scan spell series that refresh scans and keep them up to date in real time. Those assumptions are based on the known abilities of other already known spells."

"Man, that's neat. And to think I've been counting the bars of my health to find out how much health I've lost."

"You should be happy that you can do that. People like me with low intelligence only get a rating of low, medium or high. We assess our health by feeling alone."

'I guess I've been more fortunate than I thought.'

"Do you know where I can learn the scan spell?"

"I recommend that you find a mage who specializes in general magic. Jul's Mage Guild may be able to help you in this regard."

"Alright, I'll keep that in mind."

"After we finish talking here I can show you different locations around the city if you want. What do you say?"

"Yeah! That sounds awesome. What do you think Serena?"

"Of course!"

"Hahaha! Alright then that is settled. In any case, your next issue is the unidentified items. I recommend going to a magician's guild or merchant's guild to have your items identified. Since you want to learn scan, Jul's Mage Guild would be ideal. The mage guild guarantees high quality identification for a fair price. Then you can sell your items to one or more specialized guild or shop based on your preferences. There are also general shops that will buy everything at once if you don't want to make multiple stops. However, you won't get the most profit.

If you don't want to deal with shops, you can always haggle with players directly at the Trading Hall. This method is really popular since you can trade items for items instead of for currency, and because there isn't a lot of currency circulating at the moment. But, if you don't know what you are doing, you can get scammed or make bad deals and become bankrupt. I recommend that you don't trade any big items at first if you choose to haggle with others."

"Wow, services like that exist as well? Amazing."

"Sure thing. You already solved your food problem so you should that is fine. What other questions do you have?"

"Ah yes. Like I had said before, I am wondering about how the city works. It has only been three days, yet there is all of this now. How?"

"Oh yeah you did ask about that before. It's really simple actually. The city was built by our mayor who is a full Politician."

"Woah, a Politician?"

"Yeah. The Politician class has the ability to create settlements. The progression is settlement, village, town, city, metropolis, state, nation, kingdom and empire. A politician gains levels by improving their owned territory. The abilities of a politician are all aimed toward growing their territory. The most important one is the passive skill Attract Wanderers. All politicians have it from level one and it provides a constant chance that a person will be born on a Resurrection Stone and come to their territory. Wanderers may bring unique technologies, products, animals and more with them. The chance of a person appearing, the number of people that appear and the quality of what they bring is all based on the tier of Attract Wanderers. This ability creates the population of a territory and provides people to fill jobs. You might not believe it, but I think that I was born from the ability. I appeared on the stone and felt that I needed to come here and join the guard. After showing my skills, I was immediately promoted to the captain of the night guard! Hahaha!

The next ability of a Politician is Manage Land. Manage Land lets a Politician allocate the ownership of pieces of their territory to a person or entity. Ownership is an absolute protection in the main world that can't be breached. So, if you buy a house and have the territory assigned to you, then you can't lose it. However, when buying a house, you will usually have to sign a contract with a bunch of rules. Like, don't create a stinking swamp on your land plot. The contracts are usually fair and are designed to prevent trouble. And, breaking a contract may result in fines or the land being seized."

"If ownership can't be breached then what happens if the territory is destroyed? Can't wars happen?"

"Wars can happen but residential districts can't be effected. Another ability of a politician is Territory Management. This ability lets them manage their entire territories efficiently. All of the territory sizes from village and up require districts. A settlement doesn't need to be organized into districts, but it also can't have owned land. For villages and higher, buildings and development have to be performed in specific districts. Residential, agricultural and trade are types of districts. There are penalties from having too many districts and from not having enough. So, politicians have to balance everything out. Eh, this will get too complicated if I go into any more detail. Just know that the system is very safe and generous in the main world. Residential districts are protected by Eden, so they are mostly immune to war and crime. Security options in land management are magically enhanced by Eden, so even the most basic ones are foolproof. This makes it nearly impossible for anybody to destroy, steal from or hurt somebody inside of a house without getting caught and angering Eden. Issues with land management only become a big deal inside of dungeons. Without the protection of Eden, security features aren't magically enhanced and rely very heavily on ability tiers."

"Wow, that's incredible!"

"Yup! And the city's buildings have all been built by hired workers. The city gets a lot of traffic from people with different classes. Most of the non-combat classes try to increase their skill tiers and earn money before entering dungeons. This has resulted in a lot of people coming to the city to work. Architects come and use Manage Land and Build to create houses. Their materials are supplied by the Farmer, Plant Mage, Woodcutter and Merchant classes. Since most of these people have low abilities tiers, they have to use the T1 material wood to construct buildings. But, the good side of wood is that it's easy to use and makes fast buildings."

"Thanks again for the useful information. It all makes sense now. So, buildings huh... You mentioned houses right? Can I buy a house?"

"I want a house!" Serena interjects.

"Of course! In fact, Jul is selling houses right now. I'm sure you saw all of the construction workers when you entered the city. We're still growing quite a lot."

"I did. The city is quite massive."

"Hm, well, if you're interested then I can show you to the real estate office with my tour tonight. It won't open until morning, but you will know where to go."

"That sounds great."

I then take another swig from my mug. I had only managed to drink half of my mug of bear while the head of the guard is on his sixth.

"That reminds me. I never got your name."

"Oh, my name? Haha, that is right. Well, it's Bart. A pleasure to make your acquaintance."

"My name is Jin. The pleasure is mine," I reply.

"Serena is my name. It's a pleasure," Serena replies with a slight bow.

"Well then, how about we head out of here and start that tour. Unless you have more questions?"

"I can't think of any right now. You have been extremely helpful in ways that I never expected."

"Oh you flatter me. Well, in any case, let's head out."

We then walk up to the counter and Bert waves goodbye to the greeter.

I then ask him while heading out of the door, "Don't we have to pay?"

"Haha, there is no need to worry. The mayor pays for my beer tab out of his pocket. He's a really great guy."

"That does sound nice."

We are then escorted by Bert around the city. Some people look at Serena's halo before noticing Bert and looking away. Then they look back curiously and stare after we have passed. Bert explains the layout of the city in detail as we walk around. The western square is where the trade district is. The eastern square is where the residential district is. The middle square is the luxury district for entertainment, taverns and public announcements. The government district is to the north of the city and the production district is to the south. The agricultural district is on the east side of the city past the wall. Incidentally, we learned that we had entered Jul through its west gate earlier today. This let us gain our orientation in the main world. This city is situated east of the Resurrection Stone.

Bert is very helpful and shows us useful locations. He shows shops, guilds, the real estate office and more. While he is walking, members of the guard stop and salute him. I was a bit wary of him before, but know that his position is genuine after seeing the salutes. Near the end of the tour, he stops and says, "Well, this is the last spot that I wanted to show you."

"What is here?"

"Hahaha, this is my house! Isn't it nice?"

"Very!"

His house is indeed nice. He had guided us to the government district where his house is. High ranking members of the government can have protected residential buildings located in the government district. It's one of the very few exceptions to the territory management rules. The drawback is that the ruler of a territory can evict them from their residence. In the main world, a one month notice is required and evictions are unlikely as long as one fulfills their duties. However, in a dungeon, no notice is required, and one may be evicted at any time. Bert's house is three stories tall and has an extremely fancy design when compared to the rest of the houses in the village.

"Well then. This ends my tour. Feel free to come visit me anytime. You know where I live."

"Thanks again. I appreciate all of your help. Good night."

"Good night," Serena says with a light bow.

We then walk away from Bert while waving. After a few minutes, we have returned back to our room. Serena, for the third time, plops herself on the bed face down. Her voice is murmured as she says, "MMMMMM."

'I love this feeling!' she thinks to herself.

"Ok, I have no idea what time it is but we need to try to get back on a normal sleep schedule. It's bedtime!"

"Yay!"

Serena then begins to manually strip off her clothes.

"What are you doing? You can just equip your spare clothes."

She then looks around embarrassingly and says, "Oh yeah. Silly me." She then equips her casual clothes with a disappointed look.

'Was she trying to seduce me?'

In any case, we both lay down in bed. A few minutes pass before Serena falls asleep and wraps herself in my arms. It takes me 10 more minutes before I join her as well.

### Chapter 11: (S) Upgrade

I am the first to wake up in the morning. Even though Serena and I went to bed late, my body is still trained to wake up after six hours. I wake up Serena and we take a bath. While in the bath, I ask Serena, "So, Serena, today we need to deal with our items and then we can check out a house. What do you think?"

"That sounds awesome! We will need a house for when we get married. I am going to be a great wife!"

I blush slightly before responding, "Let's also try to find some party members while we're out too. Maybe we can find one or two other people to join. What do you think?"

"Noooo, I want to be with just you forever."

I really blush this time before responding, "Me too. But we're going to need help to clear the harder dungeons eventually."

Serena thinks for a while before responding, "Well, it's fine if they are all guys."

I end the discussion on that note. After the bath, we get dressed and eat our leftover dinner in our room. Once finished, we head downstairs and I ask about the premium meal tickets. A new man is at the counter and says, "They do not have a fixed expiration date. However, as the quality of our food increases and prices rise, expect them to expire." On that note, we head out of the inn and head toward the trade district. We arrive in front of a medium sized two-story building.

"Welcome to the Jul Mage Guild," a friendly lady greets us as we step inside. "How may I help you?"

"I'm wondering, what services does the guild provide, and how much do they cost?"

"We provide identification, coin alchemy, fortune telling and many other basic services for one silver each. There is a shop where we sell various products. Finally, we offer a guild membership for three gold per month."

"Could you tell me more about coin alchemy?"

"Coin alchemy is the spell series for converting coins into other types of coins. We can convert 100 copper coins into one silver, 100 silvers into one gold coin, 100 gold coins into one platinum coin and the reverse."

"That's pretty cool. Alright, and what does the guild membership do?"

"The guild membership provides a 3% discount on items purchased in the shop and access to our library. The library is still under construction and doesn't have many books, but it and the guild are growing quickly."

"Oh? Does that mean that you guys need books? What do you think of these?"

I pull out the four books that I received from the dungeon.

"Oh wow! Those are very nice books. Could you give me one second? I'm sure the Guild Master would be interested."

"Absolutely."

She turns around and runs to the back of the building. We're currently standing in a small lobby area at the front of the building. The shop is in front of us, so Serena and I split up and browse the store's wares. There aren't that many items overall. The items are wooden items like staves, rods and canes on wooden tables. They also have poor workmanship. In contrast, there are a few higher quality goods hanging on the wall behind the checkout counter to our right.

After a short while, the woman returns with an elderly man in a large light blue robe. He is wearing a large pointed blue hat with a massive circular brim.

"Hello visitors. I have heard that you may have books for sale," he replies.

"Yes. During my travels I came across four books."

I hand him the books. After reading their titles and checking their contents, he says, "These books are very nice. How much are you hoping to get for them?"

'Straight to haggling huh? But damn, I have no idea how much these books are worth. I am not a merchant!'

"I actually came here in the hopes of getting their price assessed along with many other items."

"Well that's fine. It looks like you aren't a merchant and are maybe new to trading, so I'd like to clear the air. It's common courtesy to let the seller set the initial price for a trade. I assure you that we only provide fair prices at this magic branch. It's the guild's policy and is guaranteed by the mayor."

'This mayor is rather influential.'

"Now, onto the books. Since you don't know their price then I will lead. Books are rare and are generally hoarded by people. That is because the knowledge that they provide has a permanent intrinsic value. This intermediate book is actually the first intermediate book that I've ever seen. I hate to say it, but I don't think that we have enough gold to buy them off of you for a fair price."

"Really? Well, that's a shame."

"But I don't want to give up on those books. Would you be interested in a different kind of deal?"

"A different deal? Sure, let's hear it."

"As you can see, the magic guild here is rather small. We have a nicely sized building but most of it is empty space. However! In the future we plan to fill up the space and provide many more services. If you invest those books into our guild, then I will give you the Founder rank. Founder rank will always be equal to the highest member rank of the guild. Right now it's only equal to a regular membership, but we plan to have second, third and maybe even higher ranked memberships in the future. Also, there are currently no other people at this rank."

'This is actually a really good deal right? I lose out on immediate money and maybe even a trade for a different item. However, I can get a permanently high rank in the magician's guild. I'd like to truly evaluate how much these books are worth, but I have no idea how long I can stall on this offer before somebody else takes it up. I can't hesitate.'

"I would really like to take advantage of this opportunity. But, to be honest I earned these books with the help of my fiancée. I'm certain that she will be angry at me if she gets left out."

The Guild Master chuckles a bit before saying, "My lad! You might have a future as a negotiator or a merchant! If you have a fiancée then it is no problem. She would probably make use of your rank by going through you anyway. Just bring her over to the shop with you and we can complete the deal."

"Ok."

I look over at Serena who is examining a gem by angling it against the light coming in from a window.

"Serena, come over here for a moment."

"Haiii!"

Serena then runs over and stops by jumping next to me with her hands flat at her sides.

"Here she is."

The Guild Master puts on a shocked expression before I move close to him and whisper, "Please don't question it. The marriage is far away."

"Oh, well if it's like that then it is fine. Ok then, here is the deal."

A FW pops up in front of both of us.

\---------------------------------------------

[Trade]

Trade your four books for the Founder rank in the magician's guild. Both Serena and you will receive this rank.

Confirm? [Yes] / [No]

\---------------------------------------------

I hit yes and the button turns green. The Guild Master then hit yes and the transaction completes. Next, one FW pops up for Serena, the Guild Master and me.

\---------------------------------------------

You are now a Founder in Jul's magician's guild.

\---------------------------------------------

You are now a Founder in Jul's magician's guild.

\---------------------------------------------

You have received four books.

\-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

We close the windows and look back at each other.

"Thank you so much for the deal. Is there anything else that I may help you with, um..."

"Jin. And my fiancée's name is Serena."

"Nice to meet you, Mr. Guild Master."

"Wow, so polite. Aren't you a cutey."

*cough cough cough*

"As you were saying, I need items identified and would like to learn the scan spell if possible."

"Ah yes. Well, since you're a Founder, we will identify your items for free. I had planned for the second membership tier to provide free identification, so you can have that benefit now. In regards to the scan spell, I know it. However, based on your appearance, you're likely heavily aligned toward lightning. The scan spell is in the research ability category and would take you at least a day to learn. The cost is one gold coin per day of training."

'Two gold coins per day? Ouch, that's expensive.'

"Alright, I'll keep what you said in mind about scan. I'd like to finish the rest of my business in the city before buying any lessons."

"That's fine. Also, don't worry about the price rising. When the guild gets bigger, I will hire apprentices. They will be able to teach the spell if I ever become too busy. In fact, if you're interested, how about you become an apprentice here?"

"Thank you for the offer. But, I will have to unfortunately decline."

"Ahhh, that's a shame. Well, it can't be helped. Let's take care of the identifications now. Come with me to the back of the store."

We follow the Guild Master through a hallway on the left side of the shop to a small room. There are four chairs and a wooden table placed in the middle.

"Alright, place the items that you want identified on the table and I'll go through them."

Serena and I summon items from our inventory one by one and place them down. The face of the Guild Master becomes visibly surprised when he sees the flaming sword. There are also many other goods that surprise him. We finish placing the items on the table as the Guild Master moves his hand toward an item.

"Oh, also, these wings need identified too," Serena says casually.

"The wings? Aren't they a part of your body?"

"Nope! They are an item."

The Guild Master becomes very shocked and immediately stands up. He walks over to the wings and says, "Identify."

A FW appears and he reads it.

\---------------------------------------------

[Item Information]

Sealed Fairy Wings

A magical seal hides this items power.

\---------------------------------------------

"A magical seal huh," the Guild Master says.

"A magical seal?"

"Seals are used to stop an item from leaking its magical power. Magical seals are usually placed on magical items to preserve their magical power."

"Wow. Then what do we do?"

"There are no worries. I only know a few intermediate spells. But, thankfully Unseal is one of them. May I unseal these wings? There is no additional cost. In fact, this will benefit me."

"Awesome! Please do!"

The Guild Master looks back at the wings. He extends both of his arms forward and closes his hands and eyes. Next, he opens his eyes wide while simultaneously revealing the flat palms of his hands and shouting, "Unseal!"

After his spell cast, the wings begin to glow brightly before becoming completely wrapped in a bright white light. After a few moments, the light disperses into tiny balls. In its place are the now unsealed wings. The dark tint that was on the wings before is gone and has become clear. Also, the dark green, blue, and red colors have all become bright and vibrant. The edges, borders and overall trim of the wings is now completely white. This white trim glows with a white light that illuminates slightly before dimming in a repeating sequence.

"Identify!"

\---------------------------------------------

[Item Information]

Legendary Fairy Queen Wings

Durability: 100/100 (Perfect)

Implicit Bonuses:

100% Better Relations with Fairies.

Grants use of [T2] Flight.

Magical Bonuses:

+5 Intelligence

+5 Wisdom

+20% Global Mana Regeneration Rate

+20 Global Mana Pool

+10% Effectiveness of Deception Abilities.

+2 to Tier of All Flight Abilities

Ability Detail:

[T2] Flight: This spell lets the wearer fly in the air. This ability functions as a general magic thanks to the properties of wings. Consumes 11 mana per second.

Auto Cast - Research Item:

These are the wings of a fairy queen that lived thousands of years ago. The wings were sealed to preserve their magic indefinitely.

\---------------------------------------------

"Sweet Eden!" the Guild Master says. After a short moment, he falls to his knees in awe with his mouth and eyes wide open.

'How shocking could that have been?'

I walk over to the FW as well and have the same reaction.

Serena follows suit, but instead reacts with, "Yay!!!!"

After a few moments, Lila comes to the back and sees us. She was worried from hearing the shouts and now she sees both of us on the floor in front of a FW with Serena cheering loudly! In a panic, she runs up the FW, reads it and has the same reaction. It takes a few moments before we regain our senses and stand back up.

"Wow. A legendary item. I have only heard about a few rare items, but not even an epic. And these wings are three tiers above that? Amazing. Where did you find them?" the Guild Master asks.

"It is a dungeon reward," Serena responds proudly while presenting a V shape with her fingers.

"Well, it's an amazing item. I would give you the entire Mage's Guild for those. But even that wouldn't be enough."

After we speak about how awesome the wings are, the Guild Master speaks up, "Well, I should have recovered enough mana from using Unseal to identify the rest of the gear. I'm glad I chose you to be a Founder. I can see that you have a bright future ahead of you."

"Thank you."

Now that his mana has regenerated, the Guild Master continues identifying the remaining items on the table. The flame sword gives these results:

\---------------------------------------------

[Item Information]

Unique Flaming Sword

Durability: 100/100 (Perfect)

Implicit Bonus:

+10 attack damage

Magical Bonuses:

+9 Strength

+3 Agility

[T3] Flaming

Item Abilities

Flaming (Passive): Adds 4-7 fire damage on strike. Flammable materials will be burned for 2 damage per second for 3 seconds.

Auto Cast - Research Item:

A high quality iron sword permanently enchanted with fire magic.

\---------------------------------------------

"A unique is also really good. This is my first time seeing one in person. I'm sure that people would murder others for this."

"Yup," I respond calmly.

I doubt anything would be able to surprise me after seeing the wings. Now that I think about it, the Ice Tome that I traded away would be valued close to an epic or unique item based on its position in the victory chest. I can now understand why the Guild Master created the Founder rank for me.

The results of the item identifications were as such. The best items are obviously the wings and flaming sword. Next, there are a few pieces of magic and rare equipment that provide minor stat boosts. However, they are made of metal and leather, so Serena and I don't want to use them. The five jewels consist of three garnets and two lesser wind stones. The garnets are grade one materials that don't do anything special. In contrast, the lesser wind stones are grade two since they provide small wind bonuses. An item like a lesser wind stone can be placed on a ring, tiara or other item to provide some wind related magical bonus. The items that we received from Hamel are all high durability and have decent implicit stats. However, they are all non-magical. The seeds don't reveal any information other than their name that we already knew. Fifth, there are the potions. The beneficial potions are two potions of healing that restore 20 health each, a potion of strength that buffs strength by two for an hour, and a potion of constitution that buffs constitution by one for an hour. The rest of the potions apply negative statuses or do damage. Finally, there are the items from the first dungeon. One interesting item that I earned is the Exploding Glyph. It's a one-time use item that does 30 fire damage in an area. It operates like a trap by detonating when there is movement near it after being placed. But, besides that item, everything else is bad.

With our items identified, Serena and I head to the guild's exit.

"Thank you very much for all of you help Guild Master," I say while leaving out of the door.

"Thank you grandpa," Serena says while waving.

"Don't forget to visit," the Grand Master and Lila reply in unison while waving back.

After stepping out we prepare to head in the direction of the Merchant's Guild.

"That was a nice experience," I say while looking at Serena.

"Yeah, that grandpa is very nice."

'I felt it is a bit weird that she has started calling him Grandpa, but thankfully the Guild Master doesn't seem to mind.'

As we take a few steps I notice my surroundings.

'OH SHIT!'

"Serena, unequip your wings," I say while trying to remain calm.

"Why?"

"Look around. Everybody is staring."

"Oh, you're right. Ok then."

She takes off her wings but the people don't stop staring. It was already too late. People start to walk over.

"Hello young lady. Would you happen to be an Angel-Cat Healer?"

'Oh man, is this really happening again?'

Up to this point, we had been able to avoid getting crowded. When we first arrived, we walked around the city for a bit, but we quickly went to an inn. It was also becoming dark out, so that may have helped hide us. At dinner, we had a private booth, and when we are outside with Bert, people would only stare. I'm grateful that people weren't waiting outside of the inn this morning, but many people definitely saw us walk to the Magician's guild. Right now is the first real opportunity that people have had to approach us since we entered this city.

'But I can't hide from this crowd forever. I have to handle this situation now.'

I prepare to speak up but am interrupted. Guards come from the side and create a circular wall around us. Their shiny, metal armor reflects brightly in the sunlight along with their shields and swords in hand. A single man is let through the perimeter of guard and approaches us. He isn't wielding any armor and instead is wearing a casual yellow, brown buttoned shirt with casual brown pants.

"Hello there, you must be Jin."

"Hello? Do I know you?"

The man grins before saying, "I'm the captain of the day guard, Fredrick. I've come to escort you."

"Escort me? But why? How? What is going on?"

He chuckles softly and says, "My good friend Bert informed me that this might happen so we took precautions. It is the duty of the guard to maintain order you see."

'Bert! He knew that this might happen? But how? I really can't underestimate these guys.'

"Anyway, leave it to me. I will take care of this crowd."

Fredrick turns to the crowd and as the guards part, he says, "By order of the guard. Disperse immediately."

The faces of the people in the crowd pale as they immediately scatter.

"Knights. Resume duties. Mark and Polo. Follow."

"SIR!" the guards respond and then bang their swords on their shields once in unison.

"Well then, if it's alright with you, may we follow you from behind? We won't interfere with your activities, we will simply prevent crowds from forming."

My eyes sparkle before the words slip out of my mouth, "My hero."

He laughs again, and we begin walking to the Merchant's Guild. Some people try to approach us, but quickly stop their advance after noticing the guards. When we arrive, Frederick says, "We'll wait out front. Please take your time." Thus, Serena and I enter.

"Welcome to the Jul Merchant's Guild. How may I help you?" a younger man says.

"Yes, I am wondering what services you offer and how much they cost?"

"We provide item identification, buy items and sell items. Of all the places in Jul, this is the best place to buy and sell goods! We also offer item transportation to nearby cities for a modest fee. If you need any other services, we are always open to negotiation."

"That sounds good, I'd like to sell items."

"Alright then, one moment."

The man goes to the back of the store and returns with a different man.

"Right this way please."

Serena and I split up at this point. She goes to check out the shop while I am guided to a room behind the back of the shop. This shop has way more items than the Mage's guild's shop. There are weapons, armors, staves, scrolls and many other quality goods on shelves, tables and displays. Also, the square holes in the walls and ceiling illuminate the high quality wood used to construct everything by letting in sunlight. The wood is polished and is a much lighter color than the dark, grainy and low quality wood that most other places have. The only other place that I've seen with such high quality wood is the inn's luxury room and Bert's house.

"Well then, please present your items."

I pull out all of my good except for the food and beneficial potions from my inventory. When I pull out the flaming sword, the merchants face instantly reveals interest. But, he quickly reobtains his stoic demeanor after a moment.

"I see that you have many quality goods. Please allow me one moment to determine their value."

He begins to identify the items. It is obvious that he is avoiding the flaming sword by identifying items near it. I can't help but smirk a little in response. In the end, he winds up identifying it last. Next, he opens up a FW and writes on it with one finger. After a while, he turns the FW to me and says, "I have tallied up the value of your items. Please tell me what you think."

The FW reads:

\---------------------------------------------

[Item Values]

Format = Name: Count / Price for one / Total

Garnets: 3/2s/6s

Lesser Wind Stones: 2/5s/10s

High Quality Iron Hammers: 2/2g/4g

Average Iron Sword: 1/40s/40s

Left Iron Boot: 1/20s/20s

Battle Standard: 1/10c/10c

Iron Tipped Spears: 50/5s/2.5g

Beginner Robes: 1/1c/1c

Beginner Staff: 2/1c/2c

Magic Iron Body Armor: 2/10g/20g

Rare Leather Body Armor: 1/2g/8g

Magic Pair of Gloves: 1/5g/5g

Potion of Confusion: 3/50s/1.5g

Potion of Poison: 3/50s/1.5g

Exploding Glyph: 1/2g/2g

Whooglue Seeds: 100/1c/100c

Unique Flaming Sword: 1/1g/1p

Total: 138 gold, 27 silver, and 3 coppers

\---------------------------------------------

'As expected of the Merchant's Guild. They have enough money to pay me the full value. But the price on these seeds seems too low.'

"Is price fairness guaranteed here like the Mage's Guild?"

"Yes. All of Jul's guilds are required to provide fair services to maintain support from the mayor."

"Alright, that's good. I'm curious, why are the seeds only worth 1c?"

"The seeds have been priced at 1c because they are unknown. Right now it's expected that Plant Mages will be able to help with identifying seeds. However, there is currently no known magic that can identify them at the moment. Thus, they were priced at the stand price for unknown goods, 1c."

'This guy was definitely not going to tell me all of that information without my asking. And if these seeds turn out to be some super godly item then I would be selling them for 1c? Fair prices my ass. That sounds like a scam.'

"I see. Well, I don't know what these items are worth exactly, but the prices seem fair. I'd like to sell off everything except for the seeds."

I consider haggling for a higher price on my flaming sword, but decide against it. I only have one charisma and no trade abilities. Besides, I'm getting a crap load of gold so five or 10 extra won't make a big difference.

"Ok, good."

Two FWs appear in front of us. I read over the contents of the FW again. There is a disclaimer at the bottom, "Please note that all sales are final and nonrefundable. This is because prices are based on the current economy and we don't want people to refund items due to price changes. This applies to both the buyer and the seller."

'Makes sense.'

We hit the yes buttons and the transaction completes. The Merchant gives me the coins as payment and says, "Thank you for the transaction."

"Same."

With the trade complete, both of us return to the shop.

"Is there anything that you are interested in buying?"

"No thank you. Though, just out of curiosity how much would a legendary item sell for?"

"Hm, well, prices depend greatly on the base item. But, for an average base item like an iron sword, I'd say 1,000 gold at least.

I need to make a few more stops before I buy anything else."

"Alright then, have a nice day. If you need anything else, feel free to ask Frank for assistance."

"Thank you once again."

The merchant then walks to the back of the store, and I hear muffled shouts of joy and amazement.

"Come on Serena, let's go."

"Hai!" she says while running up to me and grabbing my hand.

I step out and Bart waves at me with his two guards.

"We're going to head to the real estate office next."

"Ok. Hey, if it's possible, may I introduce you to somebody after you finish?"

"Sure, that's no problem. Who it is?"

"That will be a surprise," he says with a hearty laugh.

'An introduction to somebody huh? I wonder if it's the mayor. I really want to meet the mayor.'

With the conversation finished, we head to the residential district.

"Welcome to Residential District One's Real Estate Office. What can I do for you today?" a man says while getting up from behind a desk.

"Yes, I'm interested in buying a house. Can you give me some information?"

"Oh good! A potential home owner. I'd be more than happy to help you out. Please, have a seat. Would you like some water or a fruit juice?"

"I want orange juice!" Serena quickly says.

"Haha, no problem. And you sir?"

"I'll just take water."

We sit down at the table. This small one-story building has the man's office placed directly at the entrance. The room is reasonably sized and the man has a large desk toward the back. The wooden floor and desk are a deep brown color, and the walls are made of an unknown light gray material. To the left and right are closed doors that lead to separate rooms. To my right is a table with chairs, and on my left are two couches with a table. Serena sits down on the couches and I join her. The man then brings back the drinks and sets them in front of us.

"Well then. My name is Elie. Could you tell me what type of house you are looking to purchase and what your budget is?"

'I suddenly realize that I haven't consulted with Serena about the price of the house. She earned the gold too so I shouldn't use it unfairly.'

"Serena. We have around 190 gold. How much of it do you want to use on the house?"

Elie freezes in place while bringing his drink up to his lips. Serena puts a finger on her chin and thinks deeply.

"All of it!" while throwing her arms into the air. Elie drops the drink that he is holding and stares at us stupefied.

"Well you heard the lady. I want the best house that I can get for 175 gold," I say while saving a small amount of gold.

"O-O-One hundred and seventy-five gold? Is that correct sir?"

"Yes, is there a problem?"

"Not at all! Oh wow, this is exciting! It's a wonderful opportunity. To be honest, the housing market isn't very popular. Houses are expensive! And, there isn't a lot of currency in circulation. Most people come in here expecting to pay less than five gold coins, but the average house costs 10! With 175 gold, you can get a mansion with good options!"

"Woah, really? Isn't that too cheap? I mean, I sold a magic iron armor for 10 gold. You're saying that it was worth a house?"

"It was! The reason that houses are so cheap is because there is a surplus of labor and low quality wood."

"Hmmm, ok then. But, maybe we can scale it down a bit in size? I don't think I can take care of a mansion."

"That is no problem! There are options that you can use to take care of that."

I pause for a moment before responding, "I've heard that term a few times now, but what do you mean by options?"

"Oh pardon me. Allow me to explain. Options are features that you can get for your plot of land. Do you know about land management?"

"Yeah, I heard about that before. I also know about ownership too."

"Ok, good. That makes this easier. A house needs land, a building, furnishings and options. Options are a part of the land management system that some abilities can access. For example, Manage Land is the most common ability. A person in a construction field, most commonly an Architect, can enable options on land. For example, you can get a lawn that stays perfect. There are also the automatic repair, self-cleaning, food supplying, laundry, storage and security options that are quite popular. Options can be bought with FWs similarly to how merchants can buy items with FWs. In the land management FW, they spend gold to enable options when building or managing a plot of land."

"Woah woah woah, wait a second. Merchants can buy items with FWs?"

"Yeah. It's a great feature, but the prices scale with level, charisma and trade abilities. Unfortunately, there aren't any known merchants that get reasonable prices on anything other than low quality goods at the moment. In contrast, the prices for land management are fixed. But, you must raise construction related stats and abilities to enable better options."

"Wow. That's actually amazing."

"Yup! But, the best part about non-combat classes, like Architects, is that they need people to fund their projects. This is so that they can maximize their proficiency gains. The result is that service charges are always small, unless the person offers a unique or exceptionally high quality service. When you buy a house, the costs will mostly come from the fixed fees in the land management system. So, you can get a bunch of different options without worrying about service costs."

"Good. Every gold saved is important."

"Hahaha, agreed. Well, onto your house. I still need to know what type of house you have. Normally at this point I wind up arguing with a person over house price and quality. But, with 175 gold, we won't have to worry about that. I will mention one thing though since most people are intrigued by this fact when I bring it up. Architects have an ability called Remodel. They can magically switch out materials with it. So, you can buy a cheap house and get it remodeled later with better materials. Just keep that in mind for now. But anyway, moving on, every house needs land and a building as I said before. The furnishing and options are extras, but are practically essential if you don't want to live in a hollowed wooden cube. 175 gold gives you a lot of flexibility, so we have to start with how you want to distribute it into those areas."

"Alright, let me chat with Serena for a moment then."

"Sure thing. Then let me get you two refills. I will be right back."

Elie casually stands up from his seat and leaves to a back room. We haven't touched our drinks, but I respect that he is giving us privacy.

"Did you manage to catch all of that Serena?"

"Yes."

"What do you think?"

"Hmmm, I just want the house to be pretty. I don't care about anything else."

"Are you sure? You don't care if it's big or small or where it is at?"

"Nope! You can decide all of that."

"Awesome," I reply while rubbing her head to mess up her hair.

After a few moments Elie returns with new cups full of water and orange juice.

"Alright Elie, we've decided."

"Oh goodie!" he responds while clasping his hands.

"The house must be in a premium location and be stylish. Land size and options are secondary concerns."

"Alright, then take a look at this."

Suddenly, a FW appears in front of us with a map of the city. Elie walks over to the other side of the couch.

"If you look here, this is on the west side of the residential square. It's close to the center of the city, so it's considered premium land. The land itself costs 75 gold and will get you a medium-sized plot. Another 75 gold would go toward the actual house. 20 gold will be split between furnishings and options. And, five gold will be used to hire a skilled Architect. What do you think?"

"That sounds really good. What kind of options can we get for 10 gold?"

"To make my explanation simple, think about this. The average house goes for 10 gold and you're getting 10 gold worth of options. You're going to get practically every option available at that price. Of course, some options cost more as land sizes increase, but 10 gold is more than enough to cover all costs for a medium sized plot. Your house will have the death penalty set to none and your revival point set inside. You will also get a bonus to your healing when in your house. Additional storage space will be added. Automatic maintenance will be applied that will keep your house in new condition. For example, leaks will automatically repair, dust won't accumulate and wood won't rot. There are also more options that will get added but that's the general idea."

"Awesome. If I remember correctly, you mentioned a restocking food supply before correct? Will that be added?"

"Ahhhh, yeah. Well, unfortunately when I mentioned that I was bringing up all of the known options. One of my Architect acquaintances told me that she can see the option in her land management screen, but it's grayed out. It will require her to reach the intermediate level before she can add a restocking refrigerator. And even then, it will only supply low quality raw food."

"Crap, that's unfortunate. Forget about that for the time being then. I'll buy the house without it."

"Really? You're going to buy it?" Serena says while looking at me.

"Of course! It's fine isn't it?"

"Yes!"

The man responds, "Is there any specific design or layout that you want for your house? You can get up to three stories high and a basement or do something small with better quality furnishings and building materials. Maybe you want a lawn as well?"

"It just needs to be pretty and livable. One bedroom, one bathroom, a kitchen, a living room, a laundry room and a lawn. For everything else, as long as the Architect doesn't do anything crazy, he or she can do whatever they wants."

"Are you serious? To have creative freedom on a 175 gold house... people will actually fight for the right to build it."

Elie puts his hands on his head in disbelief as two FWs appear in front of us. They are the standard trade windows but mine has a Buyers Contract on it.

"Please read the contract before you accept," he says shocked as though he can't believe we will actually hit yes. In fact, he's starting to sweat a little bit.

'Jeez.'

I was warned about the contract beforehand so I am not surprised. I read through the terms and it seems reasonable.

"Oh, is there anything else I need to worry about? Like taxes or any other fees?"

"You may only have to pay a fee if you breach the terms of the contract. Other than that, there are no taxes or additional fees."

"Alright, cool."

I hit yes and a confirmation appears.

\---------------------------------------------

You have purchased a house for 175 gold.

**Additional Note:** Due to your purchase, you qualify to become a noble of Jul. You may request one private audience with the mayor to learn more details.

\---------------------------------------------

'Sweet! I will definitely take advantage of this.'

I close the FW and take out 175 gold.

"Here you go."

"Thank you."

"So about how long will it take for the house to be built?"

"It should take one day at most."

"A day? Isn't that too quick?"

"Oh no, that's painfully slow. Architects use magic to build houses so they are usually built in one to two hours. Most of the time spent building a house is spent designing, acquiring materials and regenerating mana. There are some architects that use physical strength to build, but they are remarkably less efficient than magic builders at the moment."

'I had only seen people doing physical construction when walking around the city. Who would have thought that Architects primarily use magic.'

"Anyway, since your house purchase is so advanced more time will be spent during all of the steps to build it. I can't say for sure how long it will take to finish, but I think one day is a good maximum time limit.

"As long as it's pretty, take as long as you!" Serena says while giving a thumbs up.

I then speak up, "Alright, everything makes sense to me. I guess all that is left is to wait for the house to finish. Thanks again for all of the information and the sale. I can't wait for it to finish."

"Me too!" Serena says.

"No. Trust me. It's my pleasure. That trade increased my Merchant ability category by four tiers. FOUR! It's at T10 now. This was like making 10 of my normal sales. This is amazing!"

"Wow that is impressive. Congratulations."

"Thank you. Stop by this place tomorrow and I'll have your house key. Of course, you're also welcome to visit the building site at any time. I take it that you know where it is?"

"Of course. There is no way that I would have bought the house without visiting the location if I didn't."

"True. Well then that's fine. If you ever need anything then don't hesitate to stop by. And, I don't mean that as an employee of Jul. I mean that on a personal level."

"Thanks. Then we'll be on our way. Goodbye."

"See ya," Serena chimes in.

"Farewell," Elie replies.

We step out of the door of the real estate office and Fredrick is still standing nearby.

"Yo!" he says with a wave.

"Yo," I respond.

"Are you all finished?"

"Yeah."

"Can you meet with my acquaintance now?"

"Well I don't mind. What do you think Serena?"

"Let's go!"

"Alright," I respond before looking at Fredrick. "You heard the woman, lead the way."

"Hahaha, good to hear. We're heading to the government district. Right this way."

And, with that, we follow Fredrick east to the luxury district. However, before we can make it through, the sky changes instantly. Thick, dark clouds appear as lightning bolts erupt in the distance.

*****

### Author's End Comments

So, the book ends here with a major cliffhanger. I actually love cliffhangers personally so why not use one? It's probably the only cheap writing trick that I approve of, muahaha.

Well, these are the end comments. I'm just going to throw out my thoughts here in a free, scrambled and truly open way. If any of this is weird, salty or too emotional in any way, then I did a good job.

Contact Information

First, the blog/website for all of my writing is <https://jimmyfruits.wordpress.com/>. I can be contacted anonymously, or publically, it's up to you! So, feel free to share any feedback that you may have there. Typos? Bad edits? Comments? Questions? Logical Inconsistencies? I'd love to hear from you!

Writing Style

As I said before, I watch anime, read manga, light novels, have read American fantasy, etc. You get the idea. A lot of my inspiration came from all of the things that I hate with those. For example, I HATE TELEPORTATION! Do you know how many anime from the Winter 2015 season use cheap teleportation? Too many. Like, I was enjoying Divine Gate and then they throw that shit at me and I'm like 'I can't watch this anymore' (and I still haven't and don't plan to). Also, illogical uses of time and people doing stupid stuff piss me off to no end. Like, I guarantee you 100% in any other story the defenders in the second dungeon would have stopped attacking. 100%.

So yeah. Anyway, my writing style is particularly straightforward. I primarily use a first-person present tense narrative to describe events as they occur. I use third-person in a few spots as well when I think it fits and I do it experimentally a couple of times (like the Martin 'fight'). I tried to keep the vocabulary of the text at a reasonably high level and use varied words.

I wanted the world to be very logical and have small themes from Japanese media. I didn't go overkill, and actually removed some in this volume (volume 2 will be unrestrained though). This is the 'introductory' book so I tried to keep it reasonably sane and not go too crazy with anything.

Writing Style Pt. 2

One of the biggest challenges with my work was to ensure that it was filled with rich explanations and detail, but without feeling excessive. A large lesson that I learned from Creative Writing was to show, rather than say. For example, I have the following lines in the story:

"I want to save all of the townspeople no matter what. This isn't like the slimes from before. These are real people with families, and I won't give up on them."

"Yeah, I figured you would say that. And, to be honest, I agree. I think that we will get larger rewards based on how many people survive each day."

These lines are good enough by themselves, but at the time I considered adding, "The difference between their two opinions has become plain as day!" But, I decided that that is hand holding and isn't needed. I mean, sure, occasional details and explanations are fine. But so many stories will go overboard and turn that one sentence into a five page backstory on how each character embodies their different character traits. And, do you know what I call that? Filler. Moderation is fine but too many stories go way overboard in this area.

Book Layout

The book can be considered to have four arcs. There is the Introductory, First Dungeon, Second Dungeon and Town Visit arcs. The Town Visit arc is obviously unfinished, but I plan to end it shortly at the start of the next volume (2 chapters max).

This book was an adventure to write. I initially wrote the first two arcs and had a partially completed introductory guide that I couldn't figure out where to place. After fumbling around with how to place it (in the middle of the chapter, the beginning or at the end and/or with an author note to reference it for many of those locations), I decided to just give it its own chapter. Once I finished the First Dungeon arc, I used 'free writing' to write everything in the last two arcs (chapters 5+). I still remember that the book was 58k words when I finished it at that time. Now it is at 70k.

Editing

Once I finished writing the book, I began the most time-consuming process ever. EDITING. I have spent nearly 3-4x as much time editing this story as I did writing it. Insane right? I knew I'd have to do some work, but I underestimated myself. I wrote this entire story in past tense initially and changed most of into present tense. The amount of work I did her cannot be understated. All I can say is that I love and hate ctrl+f. It helped me a lot, but I accidentally replaced every 'was' in the book with is and couldn't revert the change. So I had to go back and check every 'is' in the book to make sure it was in the right tense.

Next, I went on an adventure to relearn most of the basic grammar rules of English to make sure that I implemented them consistently. Do you know what an oxford comma is? Ellipsis (and not '...')? Introductory Clauses? I had to go back to the basics of basics. All I can say is that English would be a lot easier without commas.

I have reread the story about four times in total, but there may be errors that slipped in. I won't make excuses. I've already read the book many times and I think it's good enough to not warrant a full reread 3 or 4 more times to make it perfect. I'm overall very satisfied. If you find/found any typos/logical errors/inconsistencies, then please share them with me!

Logic & Consistency

There is a lot of information control in the story. There are many actions taken by characters that are 'hints' into the persona of characters. There are really obvious words omitted because characters don't know things. But there are also some less obvious cases. For example, I use, "These entrances mimic the hours of a day and are evenly spaced from each other," instead of "These entrances mimic the hours of a watch/clock." There are other more and less obvious cases scattered in the story, but I can't really go over them because they will spoil future volumes. The story is meant to have some level of depth. If somebody rereads it one day, they might be able to pick up on something that they missed before. I'm no Shakespeare, but I wanted to give my story at least some degree of complexity.

Regarding the wings, I'd like to justify them from a balance perspective in case anybody is thinking 'aren't they too good?' Normally a mithril chest provides 1 super rare item, and there would be 2 mithril chests for 2 people. However, since there is only one chest, there is one 'super duper' (yes, I just used duper) rare item. Thus, they got a very insane reward for S-clearing a LONG dungeon, and having two chests merged. The loot was never revised much during the editing process. The only change that comes to mind was making the sword a unique instead of epic. However, that was just to make the price make sense when I edited the prices a lot.

Fun Stuff / Misc.

Next, let's go over things I really liked in my story. First, I really enjoyed using female characters instead of an all male cast. Too many stories make characters all men or all women. You need a mix! ("cool story bro"... yea I know). Second, I really enjoyed explaining things as they are, rather than by using comparisons. I know that using 'like' and 'as' to describe things is easy and makes explanations easier. But, I really enjoyed the challenge of describing things as they are. For example, Serena's wings were initially described as "like butterfly wings"... but I changed that description entirely (Because butterfly wings don't exist in FWO!). I don't know if my description was good enough for people to figure out what they are supposed to look like, and I'm sure there are cases where my descriptions may be difficult to comprehend, but I'm hopeful that people understood most of them. In any case, this is my first work and I will only get better over time. Third, I also really liked using Serena's perspective once in the second dungeon. Since this volume is the "introductory" volume, I didn't switch perspectives much. But, I intend to do a lot more with this later.

Second Book Plans

The main plot of the story will be introduced in the second book. I will also wrap up loose ends. I knew very early on that my full 'creative desire' for this series would not be satisfied unless I wrote two books. So, yeah, the second book is a must.

I kept this first book mild and straightforward. Ok, mild is a damn large understatement. I intend to make everything crazier and more exciting in the next volume. Jin's personality was hinted at a few times and I want to expand upon that with so much more. And the plot... OH GOD THE PLOT! It will be... madness.

If there is no interest in this series after the second book, I'll probably stop and write some other stuff. Like an R-rated Loli Harem, muahaha. Might not be able to share that one though.

End

Anyway, writing this book taught me a lot about formal English rules and helped me establish my own writing style. I think that there are many things that I could do to improve this book still. For example, I can improve word usage by varying commonly repeated phrases and improving descriptions even further. I could also hunt for ways to make the book less 'obvious' and 'hand-holdy' if you will, but within reason and not with the sole purpose of making the book more complex for no reason. However, I have to cut off the editing process at some point. And thank EDEN that I'm done with editing for now. In any case, the second volume will hopefully be created a lot faster since I have a formal mastery of English and my writing style is refined. I have reached the Expert tier of writing (T35). Muahahah.

I hope that all of the readers who finish this book enjoy it.
Bonus Section

If you're somehow crazy enough to have read this far, then I have five bonus questions/riddles for your amusement.

**1. Piss Easy:** What objects were missing from the houses in the story?

**2. Think for a second:** What item would 9 out of 10 other VRMMO stories have used in the second dungeon arc?

**3. Is it easy or hard? Well, at least there are only two possible answers!:** Is Serena 7?

**4. Good luck:** A Master enters the second dungeon instead of the beginner's Jin and Serena. Which class, ability or theme would allow him to clear the dungeon the fastest? (The answer accepted here is flexible, but there is only on definitive theme that your answer must fall under.)

**5. You lose aka God Mode aka T100:** Who is the person that Serena and Jin are meeting and what is his position?

So, yeah. You will also have to use your brain quite a bit. And, obviously, only somebody who has read the story will be able to answer these questions (looking at you Mr. Skipped-To-The-End!)... and that last question... well, it's obviously not even fair! Good luck! The answers to these questions and their explanation will be in the next volume with more questions!
