“Um, hi everyone, I'm Pamela Stillwater. Call me Pam. Here's the story of my group:

“I am—I was—a shift supervisor at Bradley Supermarket in East Stonehill. Corporate told us to stay open even for the apocalypse.” There were some mutterings in the audience. “Yeah, yeah, but we're a supermarket. Even in the apocalypse people need food. Honestly I expected more panic buying than we got.

“When the two hour warning hit, the store got a lot of customers coming in for last minute purchases, like you get before a snowstorm. I told my people that anyone who wanted to go home could, but most of them stayed. We bought some items from the store so we could claim them, or got things from our cars, and hoped for the best. When the timer ran out, a bunch of people were still waiting in line. The power cut out immediately.

“It was like every work nightmare I've ever had. Land crabs in the seafood section, goblins in the candy aisle, imps—God damn those imps, they got half the customers. Right after I clobber a couple of goblins to death, the System offers me warrior class and I take it, and I get better at bashing things. All of us who fought and survived gained a level. The System wants me to do something but I don't have time to figure it out so I just told it, 'Make me stronger.'

“Meanwhile I'm thinking about all the food that's going to spoil with the power out, and how to get people somewhere safe. So I keep asking the System how to make a Safe Zone. It doesn't start answering me until I'm a warrior, and then it keeps saying I don't have enough wood. But later when I'm standing in the dairy section it changes its mind and says I don't have enough metal. So I go walking back and forth and find one spot where it says I have enough of everything, but I still can't make a Safe Zone because it has to be clear of monsters first.

“Those damned imps. It took us forever to kill them all. If Eddie hadn't been with us and Oscar hadn't gotten that Mana Dart scroll we'd probably still be trying. Eddie's fast ball saved our lives. He got the pitcher class. But even when we cleared the store, that still wasn't enough. There were monsters in the woods in back of the store too. So a lot of us went out to clear the woods, and we got ambushed by a bunch of hobgoblins. We lost half of our best people in that fight, including Eddie. But we got the bastards.

“Finally, I created the Safe Zone, and, well, you guys probably know what that looks like. I figured out pretty quick we could upgrade it with more tokens, and some people gave me theirs so we could get power, and everything came back on. So we've had running water and power from day one.” There were a few impressed whistles at that.

“For a few days, things weren't so bad. No showers but we did have bathrooms in the back. We had plenty to eat and the walls mostly kept the monsters out. Imps and stirges were still a problem for a while, until I figured out we could build a gargoyle guardian with another two tokens. Some of us went out to bring stone in, and some wood so we could build things, and to look for survivors. But one whole group never came back, so as soon as we had enough stone we stopped going out, and the gargoyle protected us when we wanted to get some air.

“We didn't have much to do. I started turning off the gargoyle for short periods so I could get a few monsters in, killed what I could and then turned the gargoyle back on to save my butt when I got in over my head. Got myself most of the way through third level that way.

“We also played around with the auctions in the Shop a lot. We made a little money selling things we didn't need, and bought some books, trying to learn about the System. We got the announcement of rare spawns a couple of days ago, but we just had to hope that 'Safe Zone' really meant safe.

“We were wrong.

“Late this morning, we came under a heavy attack. There were eight of these things like woolly mammoths but with a single fat horn, hammering away at the wall. I didn't think we had anything to worry about, because I didn't believe an elephant could knock down a solid stone wall. These elephant things cheated, though. They had some magic attack when they roared, and each roar cracked the stone some more.

“We did what we could; Oscar just kept shooting his Mana Dart over and over until it leveled, and kept at it until heleveled, as often as he could, but he was barely hurting one of them faster than it healed. None of us had any way to attack them without going outside the walls and getting trampled. It took them a couple of hours, but they broke through.

“A few people tried to run out the gate and get away, but...they died pretty quickly. I figured it would be better to stay in the building, because even if they wrecked it that would still give us things to hide under and behind, you know? Plus our Engineer was still trying to make spears and caltrops out of shelving and so forth and I didn't want to take away his tools.

“Two of them broke in through one wall of the building—I don't know why they didn't just smash through the glass when it was right there, but anyway—then they started breaking things and working their way towards us. They did get hurt some by the traps but not nearly enough to kill one. I realized we were running out of time and it would be better to make a stand. Maybe, just maybe, if we all dogpiled on one of them we could kill it and maybe make the others hesitate or something? It was all we had left to try.

“Well, with two of them inside the building, they were going to kill us all pretty quick if we let them coordinate, so I tried to stall one of them while everybody else attacked the other. I know I can't kill it, I just want to keep it busy as long as possible.” Pam's voice got a bit quieter for a moment. “And I just know I'm about to die, and I am proud of every single second I slow this thing down, so I keep at it.”

Karl swallowed and blinked rapidly. He knew exactly what that felt like. His opinion of Pam went up another couple of notches.

“And then Evan says he saw a phoenix fly past the windows, and it's attacking the mammoths.”

Karl's gaze shifted to Tabitha, who ducked a little and turned redder than usual. A few people in the audience started laughing and applauding as she shyly raised a hand. “Go Tabitha!” someone called.

“Well, that's what it looked like!” a man, presumably Evan, protested.

“I didn't have time to look,” Pam continued. “I keep fighting, and a minute later, Jo of Arc here appears next to me and descends on my opponent like the wrath of God, and she screams, 'Light the firewood!' like she wants me to burn her at the stake or something and I think I'm losing my mind until she says quietly, 'the things I do for Ding-Dongs.'”

Amid the laughter, Jo shouted out, “Hey! I would never say that! It was Ho-Hos! Big difference!” which caused an even bigger roar of laughter. Tabitha turned so red Karl wondered if she was triggering a spell.

“Sorry, Ho-Hos. Anyway, I yell at Clark to go start a fire with the firewood any way he can, and Jo tells me to go help my people with the other one. And together, we actually manage to take it down. I think every single one of us leveled from that. I tell the System to make me stronger, and we go join Jo with hers.

“Then she yells at me, 'Want a short sword?' and when I say yes she throws me her sword and pulls out another one. So I tell the System, 'Make me good at this!' and I drop my baseball bat and catch the sword and suddenly I feel dizzy but I know how to use it and I start whaling on the mammoth. Sharp edges are so nice!

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“Then she says, 'Take care of this' –like she wants me to stir a soup or something! And she leaves us and runs outside. Eventually we take out the second one, barely, and when we come outside, the other six mammoths are gone and there's this big pile of ash. And I'm like, 'Holy shit she vaporized them!'”

“Okay, okay, let me fill in a few blanks here,” Jo demanded with a grin, standing up next to Pam. “Here's our version of today.” Pam stepped back to let her speak.

“Tabby and I want a day off after everything we've been doing, so we go back to my house to pick out stuff we want to save. That doesn't take too long, and so instead of heading right back, we decide to see if we can make it all the way to the Bradley Supermarket six miles south. Tabby's on her red bike and I'm jogging. It's mostly a boring trip. Anything that doesn't run away we barbecue.”

Tabitha pointed at herself.

“Yeah, yeah,” Jo answered, “they know how we work.

“So as you can guess, when we got there, we found a little Safe Zone wall surrounding the supermarket and parking lot and some of the woods in back. But there's a big hole in it, and when we peek inside, we see six woolly mammoth spawns. We couldn't see the other two that were in the actual building from there. I don't think they were rare, but they were definitely on the high end of uncommon. So this doesn't look like a fight we can win. With a few more of the A-list, we could, but not with just the two of us against six. But then Tabby heard yelling and fighting. I didn't, but her hearing is better than mine.

“So I think we're going to retreat, but I make the mistake of taking my eyes off of my partner for two seconds. Tabby jumps through the hole in the wall, summons her bike again, and starts pedaling like mad towards one of the mammoths.

“But it's even worse than that. At the last second, she swerves to pass between two of the mammoths, and sets off her flamethrower hands on both of them as she zips by. And then she heads for another two and does it again. I have a quick heart attack and then start running after her.

“She looks back at me and points at the supermarket. I realize I'm not going to catch her while she's doing... “ Karl could see her struggle for a word and give up. “...Pink Elephants on Parade or whatever. So I head in to see what's got her bothered. I see the firewood piled up in front, like supermarkets always have around here, and I think I see where she's going with this. But I don't have anything to light a fire with, because why would I?” Jo said exasperatedly, gesturing at Tabitha. Tabitha just stared back at her for a couple of seconds. “Fine. I will from now on.” Karl did his best to hide his grin.

“Anyway, I go in through the front and the automatic doors work. The lights are on. It's like somebody forgot to tell the store there was an apocalypse. And the shelves are full of food. I'd think I'm dreaming except for being terrified for Tabby out there. But all is not awesome because there are two more of these hairy bastards inside wrecking the place. I see a bunch of low levels trying to hurt one of them, and the Amazon over here tanking the second one by herself.

“The 'phoenix' that Evan saw was Tabby, with her red hair, in her red robe, on her red bike, pedaling like a damn fool at high speed while sending flames shooting out of her hands in both directions. If you have never seen a pyromancer and only get a glimpse, I can totally see how you'd think 'phoenix on a strafing run.'

“Anyway, I yell for somebody to start the firewood burning and start hitting the one Pam is tanking. It's tough, but I've fought worse... Just, you know, not when I was the highest level person in the fight. But hey, I just leveled so it'll be fine, right? I'm sixth now, just one level behind Sir Karl and Terry. Still, I'm starting to panic about the woodpile by the time Pam yells and Clark finally runs out there to start the fire.

“So I have to remind myself every three seconds that I can't keep up with Tabby right now and I have to trust her, and focus on the fact that this stupid hairy elephant is the first obstacle between me and getting back to helping her. I take my frustration out on it, crit a couple of times in a row, and send Pam to help her people with the other one. I'm probably not good enough to take it down by myself, but I can keep it busy for quite a while.

“So then Team Pam takes down the other one and I swear I almost could hear the dings of all of them leveling at once. Like, they all got inches taller or something. They all come to help with mine, so since I whittled it down some I leave them to it so I can finally go see what my partner is up to.

“I run out the door, and Tabby zips past me saying, 'Now.' Which is Tabby-speak for, 'Hi, my darling helpful Jo, thank you very much for getting the firewood burning. Now, would you protect me pretty please from the six giant monsters I've enraged while I go cast my spell for a bit?'” Tabitha's response was to point at her nose with one hand and at Jo with the other.

“The one good thing is that they can't all attack her at once because they're too damn big and she's too small. At most, two of them will be trying to kill her at any given moment.

“She's led them around the parking lot a while and got enough of a lead on the closest ones that I have just time to get there. She bikes up, vanishes her bike, and starts casting her 'Ring of Fire' spell. For those who don't know, it lets her suck all the energy out of a regular fire—like, all at once.” Tabitha waggled one hand and Jo nodded. “Okay, in a minute or so. So she casts and with one hand she sucks the flames in and with the other hand she send them out so they go in a big circle and come back to the woodpile or whatever.”

Jo paused for a moment as if reliving a memory, then visibly shook it off. “Anyway, I know she needs a few seconds to get it going, and it's my job to buy her that time. I manage to block the first two attacks—”

“How?” someone demanded.

“It's a protector thing. For a little while I can be really, really good at blocking attacks aimed at Tabitha. This time I think it was... slash along the trunk so it flinched, and stabbing the bottom of its foot so it had to shift position.” Jo made small motions with her body as if she were almost going to do it again. “Yeah, I think that's what it was. It's not as good as Sir Karl's Guardian Angel spell, but I'm almost that good and I can do it more than once.

“Anyway, never mind the details. I only have to block those two attacks, because the first mammoth gets in the way of the second one, and then Tabby's got her spell up and running. So we try a presence attack.”

“A what?” Karl asked.

“We try to scare them off. So Tabitha and I both yell 'HORDESLAYER!' while she's got this twenty foot hoop of fire going and I'm holding up my sword. It doesn't always make them run but it usually makes them think about it. Sadly, mammoth number two isn't running away. On the plus side, I've killed its...um...its mo...it's going slow. And the first one is still in range too. So Tabitha does her thing.

“She waves her arms around.” Jo gave an energetic but chaotic wave of her arms as if to demonstrate and Tabitha jammed her hands on her hips. “And the ring of fire tips over and goes FWOOSH all over both of them. And the thing about woolly mammoths is...they're woolly. They burn really well. They probably would face down a hand held torch or whatever, but Tabby's Ring of Fire? That's like getting dropped in the middle of a bonfire and held there.

“So both of them scream in pain and start running away, I guess to find the nearest pond or marsh and dive in. And Tabby moves the ring a little towards the next closest one, and right then one of its brothers gives a death scream from inside the store, and the other four decide to go follow their friends for the moment.

“So no, she didn't vaporize six of them. Tabby's good, but she's not that good,” Jo explained. Tabitha coughed. “Yet,” Jo added.

So it's not just little monsters that can run, Karl mused. That's important. Maybe these ones were smart enough to know better instead of blindly attacking. Karl's interface blinked and the notification popped up because he wasn't in combat:

System message: You've discovered an important fact about the System.

Strong self-preservation instincts can sometimes override System directives towards aggression for a limited time. Larger or more advanced creatures are more likely to have brief behaviors contrary to System directives. Experience +200

Karl blinked, then thought that over. And you are very large and advanced, System.

System message: You've discovered an important fact about the System.

Information on this topic is not available.