The next day Aiden and Victoria headed out towards the main building with a marker board. When they got there Alicia was hanging out the window waving at them. They both waved back then had a short conversation via marker board’s.

They found out that there were fourteen survivors on that floor that the others knew of, besides Alicia and Benjamin. The others didn’t know about any of the other floors but they did say the majority of the survivors headed towards the basement on the first day.

Alicia asked for help since they were stuck and out of food and water. Aiden agreed but said it may take more then a day to clear the building. Victoria then gave the idea that if they, Alicia or Benjamin had any credits they should buy a rope or two. They could then tie a garbage can to it and send it down where Aiden would load up some food and water bottles. So that’s exactly what they did.

Once that was done Aiden added Alicia and Benjamin back into their party and headed inside, Victoria now with her new class. She had been asked to choose two weapon proficiencies after selecting her class and chose spearmenship and archery since she was already familiar with both.

Battle Healer - (Uncommon)

Description: Battle Healer's are a warrior class proficient in two chosen forms of combat with the added knowledge to use healing magic’s. Battle Healers are valued highly in close quarter combat situations since they can defend themselves proficiently unlike most other healing classes. The downside to this is that their healing abilities aren’t as strong as a pure healer’s would be.

(+1 Agility +1 Strength +1 Intelligence +1 Wisdom per lvl)

Class Selection permanent Bonus: +1 Vitality +1 endurance +2 Strength +2 Agility +1 Dexterity +1 Skill +2 Intelligence +1 Wisdom

Spell gained at first level: Healing Wind

Healing Wind - lvl 1 (0%)

Summons a wind infused with healing Mana over a single target.

Range 15 feet. Cast time 2 seconds.

Effect: Restore 50 hp to a single target at the cost of 25 Mana.

The main building was twice the width of the building Aiden started in and contained four sectioned hallways on each floor. The building contained administrative offices, classrooms, bathrooms, workshops, science lab’s, closets, an infirmary, a large teachers lounge on the main floor with another smaller one on the third, two lecture halls, and a huge library taking up almost half of the second floor.

The ground floor where they entered contained administrative offices, one lecture hall a bathroom, the infirmary, and the large teachers lounge. Right now however everything was covered in blood and guts, and there were dozens of Undead and Mana Beasts roaming the halls.

Aiden and Victoria tried to keep the grimness of this place out of their mind’s as they added on to the gore by slaughtered their way through the place. It was especially hard on them both because a few of the Undead they had to kill were children. When they were done with the ground floor they were already emotionally drained.

“Come on Vicky, lets go. The faster we do this the faster we can get out of here. Plus I’m hoping we may still find some more survivors, but if we take too long there may be some that starve to death.” Victoria slid up off the wall she was leaning against dry heaving, she wiped her face on her sleeve and nodded.

Their next stop was the basement. They wanted to know if what Alicia said was true and if there were any survivors down there. They each took a night vision potion and went down. The basement had two large storage rooms, a boiler room and electrical room.

There weren’t any Undead when they got down there but the hallway had a dozen or so Mana Beast spawn roaming around. They were all lvl 10 or higher, Aiden and Victoria made quick work of them, felling half with arrows and dispatching the rest in melee combat.

They checked the electrical and boiler room’s first, they were empty except for a half dozen more Mana beasts. The next place they checked was one of the storage rooms. The place was nearly full with various materials, from extra desks and chairs to materials for the workshops. It was so cluttered that no one could feasibly hide in here, there were just two Mana beast inside which they killed and moved on.

When they approached the last storage room and their last hope for survivors the could hear a generator running on the other side but the door was locked. Aiden knocked and he received a response of ‘whose there’ from a deep male voice. Aiden smiled his spirits lifted instantly and replied “Were human! we took care of the monster’s down here so it’s safe now.” There was a second’s pause and the door opened revealing a man in a campus security uniform Aiden inspected him out of habit.

Bernard Smith

Race Human: Rank(f)

Level 5

Health: 80/80

Stamina: 70/70

Mana: 50/50

The man looked at them both then leaned out to look down the hallway, presumably checking that the monsters were indeed dead. He then leaned back and smiled congenially. “Well our savior’s come on in! thank god you came when you did! A few more day’s and we would be out of food!”

He waved them inside and Aiden and Victoria followed. As soon as they were inside some one closed the door behind them and Aiden had a gun pointed at his head from the left. “Drop your weapons” Bernard said with a sickly sweet smile from in front of them. He also had a pistol pointed at Aiden.

Aiden not being an idiot cursed in his head and took a quick look around. There were four people all pointing guns at them, with three being aimed at him. He scanned the others quickly noticing they were only at lvl 2 or 3. On the other side of the room in a corner there were about a dozen women and a few kids cowering next to some cabinets.

Some of the women looked beaten and had their clothes torn, they were also quite gaunt suggesting they hadn’t eaten in a while, even the kids. All of them looked terrified. Aiden immediately saw red and a look of cold fury came over his face that would chill any man to the bone.

He activated Rush Aura while raising his hand’s in the air pretending to surrender. When his left hand was facing Bernard and the two thugs in front of him he used Frost Wave engulfing all three of them in an icy blast causing them to scream out in surprise and pain. He felt a slight pain in his stomach but he ignored it.

With the same hand he used to cast his spell he grabbed the thugs arm that had a gun to his head pointing the gun away. A shot rang out as he spun around and cleaved off the man's hand at the elbow. Tossing the hand back towards him, Aiden continued with the spin and lunged toward Bernard impaling him on his sword, he then spun with him and kicked him at the third thug on the left bringing them both down.

Aiden stalked forward and stabbed the one that was knocked down in the chest. He then tossed his knife into the one missing a hand killing him as well. Behind him Victoria had already killed the last one, who had already been hit with Frost wave and was on the ground wailing. All of this took about 5 seconds from start to finish.

Aiden breathed a few times to calm himself down. Once he did he realized that he had just killed people. He froze trying to process that fact. He didn’t think that would ever be something he had to do and it made him feel sick, especially when he noticed he received essence for the kills.

‘Fuckers deserved it’ He told himself and breathed in deeply a few more times trying to clear his head. Aiden then looked over at Victoria who was shaking slightly and staring at the man she just killed. He went over to her and engulfed her in a hug, knowing exactly how she was feeling. He held her and rubbed circles on her back until she calmed down somewhat.

“Listen I’m going to need your help. Those women and kids have been through a lot and I don’t think I’m the right person to interact with them right now.” Aiden said trying to get her mind off of what she just did. Victoria looked up questioningly and pointed at her throat.

“I know you cant communicate with speech, but you don’t have to do you?” He smiled at her and handed her a notebook and pen. “Look they need to speak to a woman right now, Ok? I would just freak them out, especially since I’m even more cover with monster blood then you. I’m going to drag these bodies outside and burn them, then I’ll stand guard outside. Try and get them to come with us to our building. they can use some of the rooms next to ours for now.”

Victoria took a moment to compose herself biting her lip slightly, she looked over at the survivors then back at Aiden and finally nodded. She slowly began walking towards them while Aiden grabbed two of the goons throwing each over a shoulder and took them outside.

When he got outside however he though that burning them might not be such a good idea. Who knows what a large fire might attract. Instead he took them into the building with the cafeteria and left them inside one of the empty classroom.

If they turned into Undead they could easily deal with them then. Tho he wasn’t sure if they would since they weren’t killed by Mana beasts. After all, the four dead bodies they found in the Cafeteria building weren’t Undead and those were the ones killed by goblins. He took the chance to check his battle log and raised an eyebrow at what he saw.

Surprisingly, he took 10 damage in that fight. He suddenly remembered the slight stinging pain and guessed one of them must have got a shot off. He checked his armor and it was fine but he could feel a small bruise underneath it.

‘Unreal’ he mused ‘I got shot and it only did 10 damage, didn’t even scratch my armor. I wonder if it’s the system somehow making guns less effective?’ He didn’t know what to make of this new information or the system and its seemingly inconcievable functions really, so he classified it as irrelevant for now and moved on.

Aiden went down for the other two bodies. When he entered the room again he noticed some of the women were now standing, ushering the kids to do the same while Victoria was trying to console a few crying girls. Aiden sighed and went to pick up the other two bodies. He stopped however when he noticed a girl with torn up shirt barely covering her chest standing over Bernard’s corpse. With a look of anger on her face she was kicking him in the head repeatedly. ‘Cant be older then 15. Fucking bastards’ She stopped when she noticed him approaching.

“Hi” Aiden said lamely and coughed “You can borrow one of my sword if you want to poke him a bit as well.” ‘I’m a fucking idiot’ he thought and cringed internally. Tho the girl looked at him strangely for a few seconds then nodded slowly. ‘Crap, I hope Victoria wont chew me out over this later’ Aiden sighed but untied his old Short Sword from his belt and handed it to the girl. She took it cautiously and inspected it a bit. She tied it to the belt of her jean’s. Aiden pulled out one of his extra shirts from his inventory and handed it to her as well. “Here take this as well”

The girl hesitate a second then looked down and her chest and blushed. She caught the shirt Aiden tossed her and put it on. “Thanks” She said quietly. She then unsheathed the sword and without any warning and stabbed it into the groin of the corpse, once twice three times. She then let out a frustrated scream and a few curses in what he assumed was russian, startling a few of the women and kids making them look over.

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Victoria gave him a questioning look when she noticed the sword in the girls hand but that was it. Breathing deeply a few times. She looked at the bloody blade then wiped it off on a clean part of Bernard’s clothes and sheathed it. “Feeling better?” Aiden asked.

“Not really no... I wish I had done that when this piece of filth was still alive. Before he hurt some of the others.” She looked at Aiden and saw what he was thinking. “He didn’t do much to me... just tore at my shirt and got grabby. Trying to establish dominance or fear or whatever... probably. Some got it worse tho... He.. ra.. raped Maggie our PE teacher. Some of the others did the same to a few of the others as well. Bastards...” Aiden nodded and listened to her as she spoke. When she was done there were tears running down her cheeks but her eye’s showed determination. Aiden used identify on her.

Cassandra Sokolova

Race Human: Rank(f)

Mana essence: 0/100

Level 0

Negative status effect: Starving / -1 Vit -1 Str -1 Agi

Health: 40/50

Stamina: 50/50

Mana: 60/60

Defence: 5

Mana Defence: 6

'So she’s a chosen as well...' he mused. He then inspected every one still here. There were only two other chosen in the group, the PE teacher Maggie, that Cassandra spoke about and a slightly older girl, maybe 20 years old. Aiden turned back to Cassandra and noticed that she kept sneaking glances at him or more accurately his armor. Aiden smiled slightly.

“So... you wanna help watch my back while I dispose of this trash?” he said while kicking Bernard corpse lightly. She looked at him searchingly for a few moments then shrugged. “Sure, lead the way boss” Aiden had a bemused expresion for a moment about the boss thing but smiled and nodded. He grabbed the two remaining thugs and they went on their way.

Cassandra kept looking around with interest and vigilance while they trekked up the stairs and to where Aiden dumped the other two bodies. Before heading back he took her to the cafeteria and broke open the other two vending machines, letting Cassandra get something to eat and drink. He noticed she stuffed her pockets with granola bars and peanuts.

“There’s plenty of food for now. With the amount of people we’ve found so far there should be enough for over two months. I also noticed an abundance of animals in the forest around here, so we can hunt for meat. Some of the plants around are probably edible as well, if inspect works on them we might be able to get some fruits.” Cassandra nodded while hungrily devouring her second granola bar.

“You ever play any video games or read fantasy novels?” She looked at him blankly and blinked. “What I’m trying to ask is if you know about stats and all of this stuff.” She nodded her head “Sure, I used to play a lot of tabletop games with my friends. Why...?” Aiden cleared his throat and continued with his original thought.

“Well I was thinking that I could invite you to my party and you would gain a few free levels while Victoria and I clear out the rest of the main building. Although it wont be as much since there are already four of us in the party.”

Cassandra nodded and Aiden tried to add her to a party but it didn't seem to work he must of said something out loud because She chimed in with an explenation “If you already have a full party it wont work, you can only have four people in a party. Those assholes tried adding a fifth on the first day and it wouldn’t work.” Aiden thought about that for a moment and nodded in acceptance wondering why that was. ‘Fuck... but what about if hmm’ “Come on lets head back, the others should all be leaving by now.”

When they got back Victoria was just exiting the main building with a group of about 20 people in tow. She nodded towards Aiden and he and Cassandra followed after them. They got everyone situated on the second floor of their building in two rooms across from the teachers lounge. It wouldn’t be very comfortable but at least they were safe and had food and water for now. Aiden took three backpacks and made another trip to the Cafeteria getting some more provitions.

When everyone was sitting down and eating, Aiden cleared his throat and addressed the crowd. “Alright everyone, listen up. My name is Aiden and the lovely lady there handing out water bottles is Victoria. We have enough food for a few months and there is a river nearby that we could use for water."

"There are animals in the forest that we can hunt for more food, and there are seeds and things in the system shop we could use to start planting food if we need to. There are still some monsters left in the main building that need to be cleared out, which Victoria and I will be doing for the next day or two.”

“There is another group of people stuck up on the fourth floor so we will be making our way up there to get them out. You are free to stay here and can go anywhere in the building, although I caution you away from heading any lower then the first floor. We have cleared out all the monsters around that we could find but there might still be some lurking, so better safe then sorry."

"If you need anything ask me or Victoria, if we can help with anything we will, but for now we really need to get going. Hopefully in two or three day all the monsters on campus will be dead and we will be able to turn this place into a relatively safe place. Thank you for listening.”

The people all nodded hesitantly some warily, but their over all mood and situation was much improved from when they found them. Aiden motioned Victoria over and stepped outside the classroom. Victoria came out with a haggard looking woman and Cassandra in tow. Victoria came up and hugged him staying by his side while the woman came up more cautiously and introduced herself

“Hello I’m Margaret or Maggie whichever, I just wanted to say thank you for what you did. You saved all our lives. The food was running out and I can only imagine what those bastards would do once that happened.” Aiden nodded with a pained expression.

“Your welcome. Those kind of people sicken me. I just wish we came earlier, but we didn’t know there was anyone alive in there. We only found out today from Alicia and Benjamin, two of the people stuck on the fourth floor that there should be survivors in the basement.”

Maggie sighed “It was enough that you came at all, everyone had already lost hope. Even so at least half the people in that room will probably need therapy, which is impossible right now. Some of the women might even be pregnant with those bastards children. Myself included.” Cassandra went up and hugged Maggie tightly. Maggie smiled down at her softly.

“Anyway, taking care of those kids in there is what’s keeping most of the women going right now, so they should be fine as long as they have something to do, which is why I’m here. I want to come with you, to help fight the monsters.” “I want to come too” Cassandra added right after. “Cassie no, your too young” Maggie said.

“There’s no such thing as too young anymore, there’s only weak and strong, and I’m done being weak. Besides my Parents and little brother are somewhere in there, they might still be alive and I need to find them!” Cassandra said with a steely resolve. Maggie gritted her teeth with a pained expression but finally nodded. “Fine, we both want to come help.”

Aiden sighed and thought about it. ‘Some fighting experience in a relatively safe environment might help them in the long run, and we do need more fighters. Who knows what else the system will throw at us. Victoria and myself could probably keep them safe. There shouldn’t be anything too dangerous until the fourth floor. Oh what the hell why not its a brave new world and im not these peoples minder.’

“Do you know what your asking? There will be Undead or zombies if you prefer in there, some of them probably even people that you used to know. Can you deal with that?” They both swallowed heavily and looked a little paler but nodded.

“Alright fine, but you need to listen to me when we go in there, if you don’t follow my directions I’ll be bringing you back down immediately. This is going to be dangerous and anything one of you does might risk the rest of us. Is that clear?” He got two nods back.

“Good. First thing’s first, we need to get you each a weapon and train you up a bit. Do you two think you can handle a bow like this one?” Aiden said handing over his. Surprisingly Maggie and Cassandra had both handled bow’s before. Maggie took archery classes when she was younger and Cassandra went hunting with her dad and brother, and they had a range in their back yard.

Aiden bought 50 basic arrows and took them both outside where they took shots at one of the trees in the courtyard. When Aiden was sure they wouldn’t accidentally shoot him or Victoria while they were fighting he called a stop. Aiden and Victoria each bought an extra bow the same ones they were using and 50 more arrows of the better kind, and handed them to Maggie and Cassandra respectively. Aiden then disbanded his party and invited Maggie and Cassandra to the new one he formed, and asked Victoria to start her own, and invite Alicia and Benjamin.

With all that done Aiden took a look at the system clock. It was 4pm so they still had a few hours left of daylight. “Right. Lets go, we have enough time to try and clear out another floor today. You guys stay behind us and provide ranged support when you can. Oh and try not to shoot one of us.” He said with a smirk. ‘Although to think about it at lvl 0 they probably wouldn’t even be able to damage one of us unless they shot us in an exposed area. So basically my face neck and upper arms.’

While they headed for the main building. Cassandra tried to chat up Victoria. “So is Aiden your boyfriend?” Aiden coughed trying not to laugh at the red and panicked face of Victoria as she tried to sign a response. Maggie finally came to her rescue with an amused expression. “She cant talk sweetie so she cant answer you."

"As for your question I would say yes, and if not then she better get on it soon since there aren’t that many men around, especially of the decent sort.” Victoria only got redder and hurried her pace. Aiden looked back at Maggie with an exasperated expression. “Really?...” She just winked at him and chuckled along with Cassandra. Aiden sighed and kept quiet. Internally he was thankfull that the were both still well enough mentally to joke around.

Before they entered, Aiden explained to Maggie more about stats and what would be best to focus on for now. He told both of the new comers to distribute their stats primarily into physical stats for now, explaining his reasoning. For the next three hours they killed anything they found on the first floor, looking for any survivors along the way. They found another group of a half dozen starved people in one of the classrooms. They led them both out to join the rest of the survivors.

Maggie and Cassandra both had a tough time with the smells and the gore everywhere, and having to fight Undead children, but they grit their teeth and continued on anyway. They cleared out the entire floor just before sunset with Maggie and Cassandra gaining 4 levels each.

Aiden and Victoria shared all the Mana stones they earned on the first floor equally among Maggie and Cassandra (ignoring the protests from Maggie) leaving them each with 6,500 credits from clearing this floor. More then enough for the girls to buy some amenities for themselves and the others survivors. They separated at the entrance to Aiden and Victoria’s room (teachers lounge, second floor.) with Maggie dragging Cassie away with her to help buy some supplies for everyone from the shop.

The duo washed themselves and what they could from their gear and clothes in the bathroom with a few bottles of water, then changed into fresh clothes and sat down to eat something. “Well we found more survivors so that’s good.” Aiden said with a tired sigh as he leaned back on the couch.

Victoria nodded and wrote down. ‘Those poor people. How could anyone take advantage like that. Those men were worse then the monsters, two of them were security guards! they were supposed to protect this school! and to do those kind of things in front of children! Monsters!’

Aiden hugged her to himself and sighed “I know... Who knows what they were thinking maybe they though they wouldn’t survive and decided what the hell might as well. It’s inexcusable either way... How are you feeling about that anyway, about having to kill one of them I mean.” She just shrugged and hugged him back tighter.

“Yeah... I wish there was some other way, but in that situation it was either us or them, and I’m always going to choose us.” Pulling back a bit, Aiden looked down at Victoria “Your kind of the only thing keeping me sane right now you know. If I lost you... I don’t know, I’d probably just charge out into the forest and kill everything I come across till something finally ended me. I may act all brave and heroic but I’m just flying by the seat of my pants half the damn time.” Aiden said with a wink and a small chuckle. Victoria looked up at him with a water smile and signed ‘me too’.

Looking in to her eyes Aiden said “I’m going to kiss you right now, so stop me if you don’t want me to” He leaned forward and she didn’t stop him, just closed her eyes. It was a gentle kiss that turned needy and more passionate as time went on. They eventually fell asleep curled up together on the sofa, both feeling lighter then they had in days even with what they had gone through that day.

Status:

Aiden Winters: Age 22

Race Human: Rank(f)

War Ranger: lvl 3 - Mana essence: 2102/4000

Skills:

Battle Aura Lvl 1 (15%)

Class 2: None (Unlock at Class 1 lvl 25)

Health: 300/300

Stamina: 220/220

Mana: 160/160

Defense: 22(65)

Mana Defense: 16

Vitality - 25(30)

Endurance - 22

Strength - 28(33)

Agility - 28(33)

Dexterity - 20

Skill - 20

Intelligence - 16(20)

Wisdom - 16

System credits - 15,200

Victoria Leblanc: Age 21

Race Human: Rank(f)

Battle Healer: lvl 2 - Mana essence: 1589/3000

Spells:

Healing Wind lvl 1 (10%)

Class 2: None (Unlock at Class 1 lvl 25)

Health: 220/220

Stamina: 140/140

Mana: 170/170

Defense: 14(55)

Mana Defense: 17

Vitality - 17(22)

Endurance - 14

Strength - 19

Agility - 20

Dexterity - 16

Skill - 14

Intelligence - 14(19)

Wisdom - 13(18)

System credits - 27,195