The next day before they headed out again they each purchased some equipment for themselves from the shop since most of what they were wearing was battered and or didn’t provide much protection. Aiden purchased a new bow, knife, grieves, boots, gloves, pants, helmet, and some better arrows.
He also bought three pairs of ordinary clothes to wear for 600 credits per set (Socks, pants, undergarments, and shirts). They were medieval in design but didn’t itch and were comfortable enough. Aiden also purchased a bar of soap and a tooth brush. He spent a total of 8,800 Credits, leaving him with 14,950.
Victoria purchased for herself a lightweight hardened corset to go under her Jerkin for support and extra defense. A new Bow and arrows, boots, gloves, vambraces, grieves, and a new spear. She also bought three sets of clothes as well as hygiene products. (Who knew the system sold these kinds of things as well, Lucky!) She spent a total of 9,000 Credits leaving her with 15,560.
Aiden’s Equipment:
Weapons:
Bastard Sword of Striking - (Uncommon) / Quality (Very Good) / Damage Physical: 38-43 +5 Str (when carried or equipped)
Short Sword - (Common) / Quality (Good) / Damage Physical: 25-30
Hunters Bow - (Common) / Quality (Good) / Damage Physical: 26-32 - cost 800
Iron tipped arrow x27 - (Common) / Quality (Average) / +1 damage
Hunters Arrow x25 - (Common) / Quality (Good) / +3 damage - cost 500
Hunters Knife - (Common) / Quality (Very Good) / Damage Physical: 20-25 - cost 1,050
Armor:
Warriors Dark leather Armor - (Uncommon) / Quality (Very Good) / +10 def + 5 Vit
Dark Leather Greaves - (Common) / Quality (Good) / +5 def - cost 1100
Leather Vambraces - (Common) / Quality (Good) / +4 def
Dark Leather gloves - (Common) / Quality (Good) / +3 def - cost 500
Studded Dark Leather Breeches - (Common) / Quality (Good) / +4 def - cost 750
Dark Leather Helm - (Common) / Quality (Good) / +5 def - cost 950
Dark Leather Boots - (Common) / Quality (Good) / +4 def - cost 850
Accessories:
Ring of Agility - (Uncommon) / Quality (Very Good) / +5 Agi
Active Skill: Rush Aura - Doubles the wearers movement speed for 10 seconds at the cost of 50 Mana, 10 minute cool down. (Channel Mana into the ring to activate effect).
Victoria’s Equipment:
Weapons:
Hunters Spear - (Common) / Quality (Good) / Damage Physical: 25-30 - cost 800
Hunters Bow - (Common) / Quality (Good) / Damage Physical: 26-32 - cost 800
Iron tipped arrow x19 (Common) / Quality (Average) / +1 damage
Hunters Arrow x25 - (Common) / Quality (Good) / +3 damage - cost 500
Armor:
Leather Jerkin - (Common) / Quality (Good) / +5 def
Padded Dark Leather Corset - (Common) / Quality (Good) / + 3 def - cost 900
Studded Dark Leather Leggings - (Common) / Quality (Very Good) / + 6 def
Dark Leather Helm - (Common) / Quality (Good) / +5 def - cost 950
Dark Leather Boots - (Common) / Quality (Good) / +4 def - cost 850
Dark Leather Grieves - (Common) / Quality (Good) / +5 def - cost 900
Dark Leather Vambraces - (Common) / Quality (Good) / +5 def - cost 900
Dark Leather gloves - (Common) / Quality (Good) / +3 def - cost 700
Accessories:
Elven Ring of Healing - (Rare) / Quality (Superior) / +5 Vit +5 Int +5 Wis
Active Skill: Healing touch (Restores 100 Health and cleanses poison and disease upon contact, at the cost of 50 Mana. 25 minute cool down. Channel Mana into the ring to activate effect)
Uses: (5 per day) 5/5
It seemed to Aiden that pretty much everything of common rank was in the price range of 5,000 or below and anything after that got exponentially more expensive. For example you could buy a common ranked piece of leather chest armor for anywhere between 1,000 - 5,000 credits depending on the quality, where as an uncommon equivalent would be 5,000 - 45,000.
The warriors armor he was now wearing could be bought for 15,800 credits in the shop. There were also better version of it available all the way up to 'Flawless' Quality. If he wanted to fully equip himself with basic uncommon rank gear he would need to spend upward of 100,000 credits.
The cost was even higher for accessories. Most accessories of any use were priced at 10k+ for uncommon with the common ones not really worth it. Then there was the rare stuff which was a whole other animal. The Elven Ring of Healing Victoria now wore for example, went for a whopping 185,000 credits. Aiden figured they really must have lucked out on that drop.
Right now he was eyeing a Ring he wanted to purchase but if he did he would be out of money, and he wasn’t sure if he should buy it. It was a low tier spell ring that would be useful for crowd control and some extra damage. Gritting his teeth he purchased it for 14,500 credits leaving him with nothing left. ‘Fuck it! It’s Magic! It’ll be worth it!’ The ring plopped into his inventory so he immediately pulled it out and put it on his left hand.
Ring of Frost - (Uncommon) / Quality (Good) / + 4 Int
Active Spell: Frost Wave - Unleashes a wave of Frost in a 60 degree cone in the direction you point the ring hand. Range 10 feet. Cost 50 Mana. Cool down 10 minutes.
Effect: Deal 45-50 Ice damage and slows targets for 3 seconds within the cone of effect. (Channel Mana into the ring to activate effect)
Victoria watched Aiden from the couch as she ate a granola bar. He had a goofy grin on his face as he inspected a ring he just put on his finger. Then she watched as he grimaced and let out a whining sound and mumbled something. Victoria tossed an empty water bottle at him. When he turned around she raised her eye brow questioningly.
“I forgot to buy a shield again and now I’m completely broke” The sad and depressed look on him sent her into a fit of silent giggles. She brought up the shop window and checked out what kind of shields there were. She figured he would probably want something small that wouldn’t get in the way and that he didn’t have to hold all the time.
She found one that was strapped onto the forearm with three leather straps keeping it in place. It was the type of shield for fighters that rarely use shield’s and want their hands free for other things. The picture in the shop made it look big enough to block a blow in an emergency but small enough to leave the hand free to wield a weapon, or in her case hold her spear with two hands. She though it was good so she bought two of them, one for Aiden and one for herself for a total of 1800 credits.
Studded Leather Targe - (Common) / Quality (Good) / def +5
Aiden beamed at her in thanks and gave her a quick kiss on the cheek. They both then geared up and headed towards the first floor, into one of the classrooms facing the courtyard. Aiden looked around, there were close to 100 Undead wandering around out there still, with the occasional Mana beast tearing into one or vice versa.
It was quite weird actually as the beasts seemed to be mostly keeping their distance from the undead where as before they were constantly attacking each other. Aiden wondered if the corruption in the undead had reached a point where the beasts recognized them as friendlies. He inspected a few of them but none were higher then lvl 8. With the gear they now wore they could chew on them the entire day and not deal a single point of damage, probably.
He wondered how that worked exactly. ‘If I let one of those things chew on my face would their teeth just not penetrate? Or do unprotected areas not benefit from a defense bonus? That seems more likely, I’ll have to see how it works soon, better let a weak enemy injure me now than a stronger one later. Sigh... this whole stat’s thing is weird.’
Aiden looked over at Victoria. “Ready for some target practice?” He said with a wink. He opened up two windows side by side and they both took out their new bows and started shooting at the Undead, using the crappy arrows they still had left over. They fell easily with one or two shots.
Aiden noticed that his aim was better then before, and attributed it to the basic supplemental knowledge he gained from his new class. They killed 19 Undead before they ran out of the old arrows. Victoria bought another 50 iron tipped arrows and they continued to shoot until they ran out again killing another 21 Undead.
“Alright that thinned their numbers enough, lets go ahead and get down there.” They went downstairs and outside through the main doors and worked their way through the remainder of the Undead. Aiden tested his theory from earlier by taking off one of his gloves and letting one of the Undead bite at his hand. “Ow Fuck! Bad! Idea!” It hurt and he took a clean 12 hp with only the bodies natural armor from the Endurance stat being used to block the damage.
‘Well at least that answers that question. Don’t get hit in an unarmored spot. Although my 20 endurance still helps a lot, if my endurance was 12 points higher there wouldn’t have be any damage from that, probably something to test later.’ He put his glove back on and they finished off what was left of the Undead they could see in the courtyard.
Aiden went over to the gate to the campus making sure it was locked. Once he did he looked out beyond the gate. The Vegetation continued to grow at a slowed pace in the last 4 days. What was left of roads and sidewalks had trees, grass, shrubbery and various other plants and flowers growing out of it.
Only around 500 feet from the gate in each direction still remained mostly untouched by nature. He could hear the lake he saw forming on the first day from the roof, off in the distance. He looked around a bit enjoying the view. It was a breathtaking and peaceful sight. If it wasn’t for the monsters he would say he found paradise.
He could see movement off in the woods and a few seconds later a heard of deer emerged from the forest. These deer were twice the size of ordinary ones however. He cast a quick inspect on one letting them know they had levels but they didn’t look or seem like they were monsters just normal animals but much bigger. 'If they don’t turn into Mana when they die they should be edible. I’ll have to test it out later. This could solve our food problems in the short term.’
This story has been stolen from Royal Road. If you read it on Amazon, please report it
They continued to circle the entire gated perimeter picking out any stray Undead and Mana beast’s they found. They were looking for any gaps in the fence where monsters could get through. They eyed the buildings wearily as they passed them, there was no signs of life of any kind that they could see making them seem creepy.
They didn’t find any gaps or holes in the fence so they figured the campus was secure from outside against anything that couldn’t fly. The fence was 15-18 feet tall and spiked at the top so it would be hard for anything to climb or jump over. The parking lot had a lot of mana beasts populating it but it was fenced off from the main campus so they left that area alone for now.
When they were finally done killing, both Aiden and Victoria gained a level. Victoria chose to wait till tonight to choose her class so they continued on towards the entrance to the building that the goblins had gone into. When Aiden was just about to open the door he heard a whispered shout coming from the main building.
He quickly looked up and there on the fourth floor was a woman and a man waving them over. ‘Survivors!’ Aiden and Victoria jogged up towards the main building. When they got there the people upstairs had written down a message on a marker board and were angling it towards them. Aiden read their message while inspecting them.
Alicia Spencer
Race Human: Rank(f)
Level 4
Health: 90/90
Stamina: 70/70
Mana: 60/60
Benjamin Stone
Race Human: Rank(f)
Level 4
Health: 100/100
Stamina: 80/80
Mana: 60/60
The message read ‘Don’t go in there! its dangerous! We saw four people go in yesterday and none survived! One of them come out screaming only to be chased down by those green things and killed! They dragged his body back inside.’
Aident didn’t know what to say to that, sure it was probably dangerous but they needed to be dealt with and quick. He looked to Victoria and she gave him a steely nod back. Smiling slightly back at her Aiden waved off the two in the window and flashed them a thumbs up while he and Victoria headed back towards the entrance.
Suddenly Aiden stopped and his face lit up with a mischievous expression. He turned around and looked up towards the two people and sent them both a Party invite. A few seconds later they both accepted. So Aiden shot them both another thumbs up and went on his way.
He removed his sword from his back and made sure the straps on his shield were secure, then pulled open one of the doors. Victoria with a notched arrow peeked inside and shook her head. Aiden nodded and they went in.
While Victoria stood guard in the hallway Aiden checked each door in the two rooms in the lobby. One was a coat room and the other a small office, they were both empty. Moving on they entered the big doors leading into the hallway that ran through the entirety of the building.
On the left there was a chained door that he knew lead to the basement. On the right was the long stretch of darkened hallway, where they could see goblins milling around inspecting and poking at things and trying to open up lockers. Aiden sprinted to the other side of the hallway and crouched behind a row of lockers while Victoria did the same on her side.
Aiden watching them for a minute he banged his sword against the locker a few times attracting the attention of a few of the closer goblins that garbled something to each other in what was presumably their language and 3 of them came over to investigate. When they were 15 feet away two of them got an arrow to the face and fell down dead.
Aiden after dropping his bow quickly charged the last one and impaled it through the throat, silencing and killing it in one go. They both quickly looted the bodies making them disappear without too much blood being left behind on the floor. Their crude weapons and clothing remained however so they were forced to take them and carry them back to the lobby.
He curiously inspected one of the small swords the creatures carried and as he figured it was a crappy poor condition sword that did 13-17 damage, nothing they needed to worry about really. The goblins were levels 6 and 7, and when inspected, identified as goblin scouts. They continued with this tactic twice killing 7 more goblins. However the others had wised up it seemed as they made some more noises in their language and left the hallway heading upstairs.
This hallway contained 3 large doors on one side and 10 smaller ones on the other. The smaller doors lead to various classrooms and the other 3 doors lead to the cafeteria, the gymnasium and the pool. They cleared out the classrooms first killing two more stray goblins. Then they moved onto the cafeteria.
Aiden peeked through the glass windows into the cafeteria, inside were around 30 goblins. Some were eating various foods while a few were cooking meat in a pot they had set up over a fire they had started with wood from some chairs and tables. Aiden didn't want to think about where that meat had come from. Most of them however were just lazying around doing nothing.
Aiden inspected the three inside that looked larger. They identified as goblin warriors and they were each lvl 10 with their highest stat being strength at 18. Not that dangerous with only three of them. Aiden decided this was the perfect place to try out his new ring. He asked Victoria to bang on the door a few times and stand back which she did.
A few seconds later a swarm of goblins were trying to push through the doors. Victoria shot the first one that came out in the head and then Aiden used Frost wave on the entrance. An icy force clammed into the group of 15 goblins turning them into shivering popsicles and dealing each of them 45-50 damage.
Not wasting any time Aiden used his other ring to activate rush aura and charged into the mass of goblins hacking away at them so fast none of them had time to react. When the 10 seconds of the skill were up Aiden stood in a mess of goblin bodies. Those goblins still in the cafeteria were backing up in fear until the three big ones came out to the front and gave the order to charge doing so themselves.
When the first warrior was just about to head through, Victoria kicked the door closed in its face sending it sprawling to the ground. Aiden snickered and they both booked it 50 feet down the hall and drew their bows. What followed was a crap shoot.
Aiden and Victoria put arrow after arrow in to the pursuing goblins all the way out into the courtyard of the campus. Once they were outside there were only 6 goblin scouts and the three warriors left. Victoria continued to take potshots at the scouts while kiting them, whilst Aiden stored his bow and activated Battle Aura (his body started to emanate a slight bluish glow) He raised his sword slightly and charged the three warriors.
Two of them took overhand swings at him when he came in their range. Aiden halted and jumped back slightly, causing them to miss and their swords to impact the ground. Aiden rushed back in quickly and chopped one of the warriors arm’s off causing it to drop its weapon and hold its stump screaming in pain. The third warrior was charging him from the left with a wild swing while the other stabbed towards him from the front.
Aiden knocked the stabbing ones blade up with his own then spun around and crouched under the other warriors wild swing while cleaving the third warrior's leg off at the knee. He jumped back, quickly dodging another stab from the second warrior then charged past it cleaving its head off as he went. He ran up to the first warrior still holding its stump and pierced it in the throat while it was backing up. He then went over to finish off the last one that was trying to crawl away.
Victoria had already taken care of the remaining scouts and was walking towards him. Aiden gave her a little wave. And they went on to loot all the corpses. During his looting Aiden noticed the woman from before slapping the man in the arm and pointing down at him and Victoria. He chuckled and gave them another thumbs up.
This time the woman returned it with a bright smile, jumping around excitedly. ‘All that free essence their getting must be great’ Aiden thought amusedly. Aiden already gained a level from all the goblins He and Victoria had killed. ‘Lets hope it will help them survive at least another day. We won't be clearing the main building at least until tomorrow.’
The fearsome duo went on to inspect the cafeteria and adjacent kitchen killing three more goblins scouts they found hiding there. A lot of the food was already rotten but there was still plenty of dried and canned goods, enough for at least 2 months for the two of them alone. They also found flour rice and pasta so they knew they were set for a while. They even found two vending machines with snacks and one with Ramen! They broke open the one with ramen and each took 20 of the cups and stacked them in their inventories with fond smiles.
They also found 12 packages of bottled water each one containing 24 bottles, as well as a few gallon ones. Each of them put a crate in their respective inventories. As for the rest of the food, right now they didn’t have anywhere to put it nor the time to take it back to the other building so they left it there for now.
In the freezer they found what remained of what they assumed were the four people that Alicia and Benjamin told them about. The sight was sickening and they quickly backed out of there. Thankfully all of them looked like they were men, so hopefully there wasn’t anyone for the goblins to breed with. If they were lucky then they hadn’t gotten their hands on any women yet. If that was the case they should have already wiped out more then half of the goblins here.
Next they checked out the gymnasium and the pool, killing 7 more goblins. The pool was more blood then water now and they found nothing of interest in the gymnasium. The staircase leading up to the second floor was empty so they cautiously went up. On this floor there were a few classrooms and three workshops, as well as another teachers lounge. They worked their way forward efficiently clearing room after room.
In one of them they found what seemed to be the leader of the goblins, a lvl 15 elite warrior. The fight was anticlimactic, with the leader and the two 2 warriors in the room going down in less then a minute.
Victoria put an arrow in the leaders eye while Aiden ran up and stuck his sword in the other one. They then killed off the two warriors and went back to finish off the blinded leader. He dropped a common belt for Aiden to use which granted +3 Defense. It wasn't much but it would help.
The rest of the floor was equally easy. The entire second floor took them around two hours to clear. When they were done it was already getting dark so they left any further exploring for another day. On the way back Aiden waved to the two people still watching from the window who he noticed were now lvl 6 and removed them from the party.
All told they killed a total of 81 goblins, 86 Undead and 12 Mana beasts. ‘Not bad for a day’s work.’ During that entire day the only injury sustained by either of them was when Aiden let himself get bit by one of the Undead. They were both extremely happy that they found and conquered that dungeon, making everything out here far easier than it would have otherwise been. The tired duo went up to their room and got ready for bed.
Meanwhile on the fourth floor of the main building Alicia was talking to Benjamin about what they saw. “So what do you think? Will they be coming here to kill all the monsters as well?” Benjamin just shrugged his shoulders. “I mean did you see that! That guy Aiden just tore through those things like butter! And the girl too I don’t think she missed once! She looked so cool! And their stats! How did they get them so high! That guy even had a class already! The highest lvl we’ve seen so far was that asshole Bernard and we are both stronger now then he was.”
Benjamin shook his head, sighed and said. “I have no Idea. I hope they come here tho. Even with the two levels, we each gained from being in their party it would take us days to clear out this entire building, not to mention whats waiting for us out there. We also don’t have that long.” Benjamin nodded to the corner of the room where there was a group of kids and a few adults huddled in the corner.
“Were almost out of food and only have 3 bottles of water left. We only have 300 credits between us, that wont be enough for even the two of us to survive long. If it wasn’t for that thing guarding the stairs we could probably go down to the third floor and look for more supplies but there’s no way we can take that thing on even now with our higher levels.”
Alicia nodded sadly and said “Do you think those two could do it?” Benjamin shrugged “I’m not sure. I can’t even read any information about that thing. All we know is that its lvl 20, everything else is just question marks. We are gonna have to warn them before they head in here, if they do. Their probably our only chance...”