That night, the room was filled with activity as people chatted, checked their weapons, and prepared for the upcoming day. Ezra watched with a hint of amusement as some struggled with the simple fact that they didn’t have enough levels to really do anything. Despite the commotion, he managed to ignore it and sleep soundly through the night. He didn’t remember his dreams, but he remembered quiet. A gentle darkness covered and embraced him.
The next morning, they’d been shuffled out while still bleary-eyed. Synica stood in front of a tree, her sword’s sheath glimmering in the sunlight. Stip Idia smiled, his posture more relaxed as he slouched beside Synica.
“Firstly, I would like to thank all of you for agreeing to join us. Your courage is commendable, and you will be duly honored for your decision to join our battle.”
More than a few students smiled and nodded.
“However—“ Her crisp, clear voice broke through the speaking. “Let me make this clear: that was the easy part.”
Everyone stopped talking.
Ezra’s lips wavered as he suppressed a grin. Did they seriously think this would be a free joy ride? They were essentially joining another nation’s army. Did no one even realize that?
“It took over 20 years of constant training to reach the point that I am at today. Otherworlders have a significantly increased growth rate in addition to the usage of Spirit Weapons, so that makes things easier for all of you. Nonetheless, it will still be a long journey to reach a stage of true competence. With that in mind…”
She stopped and nodded at Idia, who stepped forward.
“The next two week’s training goals are simple,” Idia said. “To prepare you to face a level 20 boss monster as a group. It isn’t exceptionally dangerous, which is why the kingdom has deemed it a low-value target. This makes it the perfect training dummy for all of you.”
He adjusted his belt, causing his sheath to start unbuckling, and his sword fell to the ground in a heap. Nobody said a word. Idia deliberately leaned down, picked up his sheath off the ground, and attached his belt back on. He looked back at the group. Ezra snorted and covered his mouth. Idia shot him a glare, then looked back toward the group in general.
“In addition,” he said. “The trackers who found it have confirmed that it is in possession of a unique skill that will transfer upon its death. The details are unknown, but unique skills are almost always worth having. The one who manages to score the highest amount of damage to the boss monster will receive it. I would highly encourage all of you to train with that in mind.”
That seemed like a very bad way to foster camaraderie. Hmm, perhaps Otherworlders grew so strong that it wasn’t worth teaching them to fight as a unit? If Otherworlders tended to be even half as strong as Synica, then that might make sense.
Idia adjusted his belt, tightening it.
“Now then, this forest is well-known for being a safe place. Lots of enemies, but none of which should be strong enough to kill you. Commanding General Synica and I will monitor all of you and give you advice, but you will be expected to take charge in your own training.”
Pete raised his bow with one hand, while his other hand quivered. “Um, pardon?”
“Yes?” Idia said.
“I t-thought this would be more structured, I guess.”
“We tried that with the first few batches of Otherworlders,” Idia said. “What happened was that we slowed most of them down. The average Otherworlder seems to understand the System far better than most knights. Some reforms were made to the training regimen to allow Otherworlders to leverage their knowledge.”
Pete shut his mouth and nodded quickly.
“Very well then, start at your leisure,” Idia said.
Most people were staring at each other and scratching their heads.
Ezra began to walk off in a random direction.
“W-wait up!” a voice said.
Ezra swiveled around after a moment of hesitation.
Pete jogged up to him. He chuckled, looked away, and scratched his cheek.
“Hold on.” Pete’s gaze flickered toward Ezra. “I, uh, wanted to party up with you?”
“Is that a statement or a question?” Ezra said.
“Yes! Wait, I mean no! I mean—agh, you know what I mean!”
Ezra’s head turned down and he scanned Pete from head to toe.
“What are your abilities?” he said.
“Oh, I just have one. Aim. It powers up my arrow shots and gives me perfect accuracy.”
“Conventional, but useful. Early-game it’ll be especially helpful.”
Ezra would’ve preferred to just hog the XP for himself, frankly. As such, the right move was probably just to reject Pete.
He looked around the forest. Anything could’ve been hiding behind the trees. For a moment, he thought he saw a deer darting between the leaves.
His heart rate shot up and his blood chilled. Not again. He wouldn’t be caught off-guard. Never again, never again. Never again—
“Ezra?” Pete said.
Ezra didn’t move for a moment, then nodded.
“Yeah, fine. You can party up with me,” Ezra said.
At least he’d make good cannon fodder.
A blue box popped out of nowhere.
[Select your party name!]
Ezra shrugged and just typed in ‘Party1’.
[Party1 created!]
[Also, you’re super uncreative, I hope you know that.]
Ezra found his left eye twitching. Honestly, wasn’t the System supposed to just give him information and level him up? Why in the hell was it snarking off at him?
“Oh, so I just accept the party invite?” Pete said.
“What do you think?”
Pete winced, then nodded. “Yeah, you’re right.”
He raised a finger and clicked a button. At the top right of Ezra’s vision, Ezra’s face appeared in a small circular profile picture and Pete’s face appeared right under him.
Ezra rolled the needle between his fingers. With a whispered word, it disappeared and a warm sensation materialized to the right of his heart
“Right then. Let’s get going.”
They marched off together toward the middle of the forest.
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Sunlight streamed through the leaves while a breeze played amongst the branches. Wildflowers and plants dotted the ground, adding splashes of color and life to the bare soil. Ezra might’ve enjoyed it if not for the fact that they were out to kill monsters.
Pete’s body shook, he took a step out and turned from left to right at random. He gripped his bow hard, turning his hand pale white.
“Can you stop that?” Ezra said. “You’re making me nervous.”
Pete’s teeth chattered together.
“I c-can’t help it,” he said. “This place is terrifying!”
Ezra reached out and flicked Pete’s head, causing Pete to wince.
“Freaking out about it isn’t gonna help,” Ezra said.
“I know…”
“If you know, then stop it.”
In the distance, one could hear the birds chirping. Up above, they danced between the twigs, causing flickers of shadow to hit Ezra’s eyes.
“Curious creatures,” Ezra said. “They must’ve gotten used to the monsters in the area. I wonder how the birds have adapted to flying monsters.”
“Um, Ezra? What are you talking about?”
Ezra ran his hand through his hair. “Nothing. Keep walking.”
The conversation died down, both of them looking left and right with quick movements. Ezra found his heart beating unusually loud. Every couple of minutes, he thought he saw another deer, and his arms would seize up like an old piece of machinery. Thankfully, it turned out to be nothing each time.
“Wait, what’s that!?” Pete said.
Ezra’s head shot over in the direction Pete was looking.
At first glance, it appeared to be a wolf. But the more Ezra looked the more unnatural it appeared. The fur was a dingy black with red highlights while its shoulders were thick and massive and unnatural. Its body was long and elongated like it’d been stretched out by a machine. It growled at them.
Direwolf
Lv. 5
Ezra gripped his needle a little tighter. “Pete, soften it up with some arrow shots!”
“R-right!”
Pete drew back his bow. An arrow made of light appeared in his hand as he drew it back. Pete released the arrow and it hit the monster dead center.
87/110
“I hit it!” Pete said,
The health bar underneath the Direwolf dropped. The animal growled, barked at them, and rushed toward Pete. Pete screamed and dropped his bow.
“[Restrain]!”
Two yellow glowing threads burst out of the ground and wrapped around the animal, locking it in place.
Ezra dived forward and stabbed his needle into the creature’s chest.
86/100
Ezra pulled the needle away and jumped back. Of course, that wouldn’t be enough. No, he needed something else. His eyes scanned the ground.
He reached out for a stick and then slammed it onto the monster’s head.
[Canefighting leveled up!]
The yellow threads dissolved and Ezra leaped back just in time to dodge the jaws coming for his throat. Sweat dripped off of Ezra’s cheeks. Pete was saying something, but Ezra could’ve cared less. His eyes scanned his surroundings. There were sharp gravel bits in the ground.
“[Web Trap]!”
A loose conglomerate of sticky webs surrounded the monsters and closed in on them. The more the wolf tried to struggle, the more trapped it became.
Ezra grabbed a handful of the gravel, chucked it at the wolf, and it stuck to the sticky silk.
The wolf yelped and tried to escape, inadvertently scratching itself against the sharp rocks.
83/100
80/100
76/100
72/100
68/100
Ezra rushed in, swinging his stick two times against its head.
The wolf stopped moving and slumped to the ground.
Its body began to turn to dust, like what had happened with the deer. Unlike the deer, the dust was floating conspicuously in the air. Ezra barely had time to shout when the dust swooped toward his needle. It seemed to flow into the needle as if the metal was absorbing the creature’s essence. Another half of the dust went toward Pete, who yelped as it entered his weapon.
“What the heck was that!?” Pete shouted.
A small blue bar appeared underneath Ezra’s profile pic in the top right of his vision. The blue bar filled up, up, then—
You have leveled up!
Ezra half-expected a jingle of some sort for defeating the monster.
Nothing happened, of course.
“Damn, Final Fantasy lied to me,” Ezra muttered.
Pete was pale white and on the verge of throwing up. He pointed a shaking finger at Ezra.
“W-what the hell was that?” Pete said
“Huh?”
“You freaking murdered it!”
“Yeah, and?”
Pete fell over and fainted.
“Not again!” Ezra said.
----------------------------------------
You have leveled up!
You have leveled up!
Eventually, the afternoon began to fall. It was at about four o’clock that Ezra decided to call it a day. They’d gotten a good three more levels each. Not only that but [Restrain] had leveled up three times as well. Even [Canefighting] had gone up. Ezra was surprised that Synica hadn’t called them back ages ago.
Pete muttered to himself and looked down at the ground while Ezra led the way. Ezra wasn’t sure what Pete’s issue was, but he decided not to pay too much attention to him. They were at the location they’d started at. Most of the other classmates were sitting on the ground, messing with their System menus. On the other end of the clearing, Charles marched out, dignified and calm. Behind him, a handful of people were pale white and staring into the distance with horror.
Huh, those guys and Pete had the same reaction. What was up with that?
As soon as they were in the middle of the clearing, Pete fell to the ground in a heap.
“You’re insane,” Pete said. “Oh my goodness, you’re actually insane. Those poor wolves…”
“Honestly, it’s like you’ve never played an RPG in your life.”
Pete’s voice was muffled because his mouth was in the dirt. “Shut up.”
Ezra shrugged, then walked into the clearing. Yuki was sitting on the soil, her cheek resting in her palm while her staff leaned against her shoulder with her other arm wrapped around it.
“Has anyone seen Synica?” Ezra said.
Yuki looked up at him and lifted her head from her hand.
“Yeah, earlier at the start of the day,” Yuki said. “But around noon, she just vanished. I’ve been here for the past three hours.”
Ezra tapped his foot against the ground, then looked left and right.
“What the hell is that woman thinking?” Ezra said.
“Could be a test,” a new voice said.
Ezra almost jumped into the air, only suppressing it with a herculean surge of effort. He turned to face Dorian.
“Must you do that?” Ezra said.
“Do what?”
Ezra’s lips drew into a thin line. “Fine, whatever. What do you mean by a test?”
Dorian put one hand on her hip and used her other hand to point at Ezra.
“There’s been something off about this whole situation, hasn’t there?” Dorian said. “How little supervision we were given, how quickly we’ve moved to just killing monsters. If we’re actually supposed to be joining this country’s army, shouldn’t we be going through boot camp or something?”
“So, what’s your theory? I mean, you don’t think they’re planning to kill us off or something, do you?”
“Don’t joke about that!” Yuki said
Dorian let out a quick chuckle and shook her head, her ponytail flopping behind her.
“No, there’s no reason to do that,” Dorian said. “No, my theory is that this is actually an attempt to separate the wheat from the chaff early on. Get a good look at who operates best without authority and get some key insights into our personalities.”
Ezra glanced back in the direction they’d come from. They’d walked about two hours before arriving here. They could get back to the castle in two hours.
“So, let’s not disappoint our testers?” he said.
Dorian leaned in, a conspiratorial grin on her face.
“Exactly my thought,” she said.
She leaned back and then started walking away. Ezra shrugged, then followed behind her.
“W-wait!” a voice said.
“Hold on, where are you guys going!?” another voice said.
Pete dashed over to them and Yuki was right behind him.
“Are you guys planning to head back to the castle?” said Yuki. “What about Synica? Won’t she be mad?”
Dorian reached up and twirled a loose strand of hair around her finger. “You’re being silly. No, this is a test of some sort. We’ve got to get back on our own.”
“And you were just going to leave us all behind!?” Yuki said.
Dorian unwrapped the loose strand of hair, crossed her arms, and turned toward Yuki.
“I have no obligation to any of you. If that’s what I want to do, then I’ll do it.”
Yuki’s left eye twitched.
“Look, Yuki, you can come with us. Let’s just go,” Ezra said.
“But what about everyone else?” Yuki said. “They’re gonna get eaten or something!”
Ezra raised his eyes to the sky. After a moment, he turned it down and looked at Yuki.
“Are you serious right now? Are you really—?”
“Wait, you guys are heading back?”
It was someone Ezra didn’t know. Just some random classmate.
“They’re going back?” someone else said. “Well, screw it, I’ll join in too. I’m tired of sitting around here.”
Dorian took off her glasses and pinched the bridge of her nose.
“Or we could just bring everyone along,” she said. “Nice going, Ezra.”
“Yes, of course this is my fault. Makes perfect sense,” Ezra said.
Dorian slipped her glasses on, then shut her eyes and shook her head.
“Come on, let’s just get going,” she said.
The forest was quiet. Serene, even. One could’ve forgotten that it was the den of hundreds of monsters. Monsters that all these students had slain.
Ezra looked around. None of them looked like warriors. Perhaps they could be made into heroes, but he doubted it. They were just teenagers like him. And unlike him, he doubted they had a skill to take away their emotions at the right time and ensure that they were in tip-top shape.
A flicker of shadow in the trees.
Was it just his imagination?
His legs tensed up. His vision glanced from side to side.
Another flicker. Its eyes had been visible for a moment before it disappeared.
Ezra stopped. It wasn’t another Skinwalker. He was fairly sure of that. Or at least, it hadn’t taken the form of a deer like it did earlier.
It was probably nothing.
“Ezra?” Pete stopped as well. “What are you doing?”
Ezra looked around, his hand gripping tighter around his needle.
“It’s nothing. Let’s keep going.”
Pete’s eyebrows furrowed. “Well, if you’re sure.”
Ezra began walking.
Something leaped out and bit into a student with a crunch. A girl screamed at the top of her lungs.
Grimwolf - Lv. 13
Damn it.