Sitting upon the make-shift carriage, Howard looked onwards at the beasts of burden pulling his and many others ahead.

Jade Ela’dree’s {Tamed} Dawn [Level 14]

Goldebeests, pulling half a dozen carriages made of worked wood and metal through the dry savannah grass, as about a hundred adventurers either rid them or walked with the convoy.

“How much further?” Howard asked the Elf at the head of his carriage.

“Bah, a little bit more, how many more times you gonna ask?” Jade snapped back at him, weary of his persistent musings.

Sighing at her tone and personality, Howard turned to glance back at what followed the convoy. Larger than any of the carriages, another followed suit with six Goldebeests pulling it as it held a large monster of a corpse upon itself.

Armoured with thick plates of almost metal-like hide, the monster had been a danger looming over their heads for a while now, and finally they had been mobilized to take it down.

“How many more of these will we have to take care of, is my question.” Mused Sting as he walked by Jade’s carriage, “That’s the fourth already.”

“Who knows, they give good materials though, can’t say I mind.” Chuckled Kendo coldly as he caught up with them.

Just then one of the other adventurers turned to them, “A hundred of us were sent to fight these…things…Each time, we lost more than 10 people!” the mage exclaimed.

“And each time we lose less and less, hell we only lost 12 this ti-” Kendo began to say as Sting suddenly elbowed him in the side.

“Do you have any sense of sensibility?” Sting whispered back as both he and Howard looked at the mage apologetically, who only groaned before turning away and continuing off.

Kendo glanced at the both of them, shrugging, “What’d I do?” he asked.

“More like what you said…” Sting groaned, holding his own face as he did.

Again, Howard sighed, then glancing back at the corpse he inspected it as Sting and Kendo bickered.

{Deceased} {Elite} Wicked of Blood [Level 25]

Still, these things don’t look like something you’d find around here.

Howard thought, then looking back at himself, at his hands as his shield made of the creature’s parts lay before himself. Howard gazed into his hands, one bare and the other surrounded by a gauntlet of similar make.

Looking away then from himself, he turned to Kendo and Sting, who as usual after finishing with their bickering the two brothers now moved on to joking about. Looking only a little alike, with Sting being the older brother, they had done their best to make their characters look different.

As Sting was a Human with short-cut ginger hair and blue eyes, Kendo was an Elf with long dark brown hair and greenish-brown eyes.

Having known both for a very long time, now as he looked at their status, something just looked off.

Sting {-AOD-} {The Stylish} [Level 19]

Kendo {-AOD-} {The Savage} [Level 20]

Angels of Death…Hah…Right.

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Realising what looked strange was the guild tag their status held, and then smiling with melancholy when he glanced at his own.

[21] Howard Clawfort - [M]Level:11 - [A]Level:5 - [C]Level:5

{ [Life]: 67/67 }

{ [Breath]: 387/387 }

{ [Arcana]: 80/80 }

{-SURGE-} {The Resilient}

“You know, it’s been a long time but, maybe…” Howard dragged on as Sting and Kendo then paused their joking around to turn to him.

“Maybe what?” Sting asked.

“Yeah, what’s up brotha?” Kendo added.

“Maybe we should revive the guild.” Howard tentatively mused, and the three of them briefly went silent.

“Ya know, I’m here too…” Jade then said with a cough.

Jade Ela’dree {-SURGE-} {The Unseen} [Level 16]

“Hahah…right, sorry.” Howard said after clearing his throat. Retrieving his shield he then hopped off the carriage to walk by the two brothers.

“Are you for real?” Kendo asked with wide eyes.

Howard nodded, “I know it’s been a while, but we cannot deny that sticking together is the best way to survive this shitfest.”

“True, whilst divided we can span our capabilities throughout the entire community, together we’re quite the tough egg to crack.” Sting mused.

“The current guilds are doing fine…but you saw how it is out there.” Howard then began as he gestured at the large monstrous corpse, “The monsters we’re already facing are brutal. Hundreds have died already for us all to just…get where we are, to the state that we are.” Returning to them then with stoic eyes. “What do you two think?”

“Well…I’ll be the one to say it I guess.” Kendo groaned, “The guilds here are holding us back man, yeah there I said it! They’re too scared and too cautious. Worse even are the non-combatants, those fuckers who’re too terrified to step foot outside the camp.”

Sting sighed, “Not to mention…can we even do this?...Without them?” he asked, his gaze rising to meet Howard’s.

“Without Hel?” Howard mused.

“Without Hel, and Jor.” Sting added, the both of them grimacing at the last name.

“We’d also have to get that moron of a woman Beatrice and the master of stubbornness Dhorn, in on this.” Kendo groaned, “Oh, and the lovebirds, where the fuck did Sin and Dark go?”

“No bloody clue.” Sting replied, glad of the change of subject.

“They both left in the direction that woman with the bear headed a few hours after we all gathered to move the opposite way.” Howard explained, “But if it’s just us three, with Beatrice and Dhorn, I think we’re good to go.”

“That makes five, maybe fit in…just one more?” Sting then mused with a smirk.

“Oh, and who might that be?” Kendo said jokingly, elbowing him once again.

“Oi oi, he’s just a friend!” Sting said with a chuckle.

“Uhuh, big bro here thinks he can hide shit from lil bro.” Kendo mused dramatically, “Can you believe this shit?”

Howard cleared his throat, “Anyway, yeah pass him by me and we can talk about it.” He told Sting who nodded back, “First though…Who should we start with?” he asked as the land before them suddenly turned into a descent.

Coming to a brief stop whilst the convoy moved onwards, Howard gazed at the valley before them. A river flowed through the crater-like terrain as all around it, having been rising higher and vaster with each passing day, was a town.

A town Howard had called home for the past three days it had been up, as previously it lay as only a meager camp, now they could properly call it as such.

“Still I have to say, whether we leave or stay…” Sting mused as he also gazed off at the buildings made of stone and wood, a make-shift wall of spiked tree trunks, gravel roads and even looming Gaizedons spread out through the town powering key craftsmanship areas with heat. “This place is something.”

Howard couldn’t agree more, as he watched thousands of players roam the streets below, using tamed Goldebeests as transportation and beasts of burden, outside the walls packs of tamed Gryphahs also guarded the town’s outskirts alongside their masters.

“Yeah, but I’m sure we’ll come by here again, someday.” Howard added.

“Mhm, good ole’ Camp Town,” Kendo then said as he watched a building suddenly collapse out of nowhere as at the same time, somewhere and somehow, an explosion of multicolored smoke occurred. “Yeah no, can’t say I’ll miss this shit hole.”

“Yeap.” Sting agreed.

“Nope.” Howard agreed.