Jordan’s heart skipped a beat as his mind raced. His Energy Pistol was still put away from when he had been holding onto the drone. But at the moment, he could almost feel the weight of it in his hand as he considered if he should pull the weapon out.
The next few seconds seemed to almost stretch into eternity. Made even worse by the silence as neither he nor the newcomer had moved or said anything since spotting each other. Jordan already knew that rather than some cosmic coincidence, there was only one reason why the other man had arrived. He had felt the pull toward here, same as him. However, that was exactly the problem.
The Quest should have let him know that this one was already claimed, right? Even if the System didn’t redirect you to the next nearest Mandate, it should have at least done that much, Jordan wondered. If he was right, then the man would have felt it, but then chose to keep coming this way anyway.
Yet even if things went awry, Jordan had a trump card in hand. The drone was maybe only a dozen or so feet away from him. Right now, it was just barely between the trees bordering the perimeter of the clearing. This meant that it was shadowed over, and the light coming from the guns in the same style as the Energy Pistol should have been incredibly hard to miss. Even if he hadn’t looked at it directly first, the guy definitely should have seen it by now.
Jordan went ahead and relayed a quick order to the large drone. If it came down to it, at least it-
“Hey! Jordan?! Right?!” the man apparently named Joey called. Finally breaking the awkward stretch of silence, he’d raised his voice to be clearly heard across more than a hundred feet separating the two of them.
“That’s right… Joey! First person I meet while wandering around, and their name also starts with J! Pretty fun coincidence, isn’t it?” Jordan called back, hoping to cool the tension a bit with his words.
“Yeah! Guess so! Listen, I’ll just cut to the chase since it’s getting cold as balls standing here! There are some people with me, waiting a little further back! We were following that Quest when it suddenly ended a bit ago! Decided to come look anyway, and you’re here! So I’m guessing you claimed that Mandate it was talking about!?” Joey inquired.
Well, no point in hiding it. Even if I tried to lie or deflect, it’d be obvious as Hell anyway, he thought to himself. Jordan squinted through the shadows to see if he could catch of the group. However, he couldn’t even get a good grasp of what the other man really looked like, much less catch the outlines of anyone even further back in the darkness.
“That was me, yep! Claimed it just a bit ago, and was just looking at the notifications I got for finishing the Quest!” Jordan began with what was technically the truth. “But do you wanna get closer and meet in the middle?! Who knows what creatures might be out there?! And us being this loud is probably just announcing that we’re here to anything that can hear us!”
“I think I’ll chance it! Because how the fuck are you already Level 4!?”
“Mostly the Quest! Gave me 2500 Experience as part of the reward!” Jordan truthfully informed.
“Is that so?! Then how come you’re all alone?! I have my reason for being solo right now; what’s yours!?” the other man asked. There was a not-so-subtle tone of accusation in his words. Which to be fair, if a stranger was both abnormally high Level and alone…
“My group was attacked by something called a Grass Panther! It snuck up on us in the field we started in! I only managed to survive because someone else had managed to hurt it! But by that point… it was too late,” Jordan’s voice dropped a bit as he finished. He wasn’t sure if that last part had actually been loud enough for the other guy to catch properly.
“So they’re dead?! I’m sorry to hear that; I really am! But you got to know how that sounds from my perspective!? Do you have any way to prove that’s actually what happened?! It might sound rude, but I’d rather not be too trusting of someone who’s double my Level! I got people relying on me, and we can’t be too careful when the word’s already gone crazy!” Joey further pushed.
Well that was a bit of a problem. In another world, Jordan’s go-to answer would have been that they could go over and check the bodies. Since the way they died would provide clear signs of being attacked by a large animal, not a person. Yet all that evidence had been erased the moment their corpses were turned into Advancement Crystals. As far as committing the perfect crime went, the System made it easy as pie.
For half a second, he considered bringing up the Mightiest Slayer leaderboard, but then quickly realized that would be an awful idea. First of all, it didn’t exactly prove much beyond the fact that he had only killed one person. Yet even that much couldn’t shown if they didn’t have access to the leaderboard in the first place, assuming that Joey was telling to truth about his people just waiting. Second of all, assuming they were unable to see it, wouldn’t that be suspicious as Hell?
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Yes, he had killed at least one person to gain access to a leaderboard that required killing other people. No, he totally pink swore both that it was only one, and that it’d been a mercy kill to give her a faster and more painless death. So he wasn’t actually a crazed murderer, unlike a bunch of other people higher up on the list. It wouldn’t make for a very good look, to put it as the understatement of the century.
“Honestly?! You’ll just have to take my word for it because that’s all I've got! But if you don’t want to trust me, that’s fine! Nothing says you have to stay here, and can’t just move on with your group! If you need it, there should be a source of fresh water not that far from here! I wanna say it’s something like five or so miles that way! I could be a bit off though, so you’ll need to look around for yourselves at that point!” Jordan pointed toward what he believed to be the approximate direction of the water his drone had scouted out.
The good thing about the Mandate being in a similar direction was that it also put him much closer to it. He was just estimating the distance, since that difference in in direction was still enough to throw it off a bit. Especially so in a world where it was hard to find reference points for things like the cardinal directions, since traditional methods didn’t matter much on another planet with its own everything from Earth.
The stranger named Joey had remained silent for the next few seconds. Likely thinking to himself, now that the helpful tip about the freshwater had been pointed out. He was probably wondering if Jordan was even telling the truth about that.
However, it wasn’t like he had much to gain about lying about such a thing. All it’d give him was a chance to leave the area, yet it wasn’t like anything stopped him from easily escaping now into such a dark forest. Which was a conclusion that the other man seemed to eventually agree with, as he then responded.
“Alright, I appreciate the tip! I’ll head back to the others now and tell them what you said! If you’re still here after we check it out, I might come back later to visit again! Just don’t take it the wrong way if we’d rather keep to ourselves, though!” On that note, the figure in the shadows had slowly started to back away.
As he did, Jordan raised an arm to wave him goodbye and get in one final word. His original intent was to just wish them goodbye and good luck. But at the very last second, he mentally smacked himself for not thinking to ask something else sooner that was far more important.
“Wait! Before you go! Is there anyone named Adam Wright or Leo Price in your group?! They’re good friends of mine, but we separated at the mall not long before the System grabbed us all! I’m hoping that maybe they got put into a close by group instead of mine, and that they’re doing okay!” Jordan called to the leaving the man.
The Rogue paused. After going further into the shadows, the movement of him turning back could be barely seen.
“Not that I’m aware of! But hey! If the water is where you say it is, maybe other groups will find it too! If we find your friends there, I’ll tell them about and point them your way!” He called back. And although his voice was a little more raised, his tone was now a degree less suspicious.
“I’d appreciate that!” Jordan replied with a wave. That marked the end of the encounter, as the stranger quickly disappeared entirely from his sight. It was only after he was sure that man was long gone that Jordan turned his attention back to the base building. Though just in case his own warning about something overhearing their loud conversation came true, he did take some precautions.
First he took the obvious step of drawing his Energy Pistol to keep it in hand again. After that, he adjusted his orders for the drone and had it begin a patrol. It just needed to circle the immediate area and desummon itself if it spotted a human, but for anything else, it was to just open fire and start blasting.
But now after that sudden interruption, finally, the moment had arrived.
The desired structure has been finalized!
Automatic construction will now begin!
Estimated time until completion: 30 minutes
With that prompt, all the other screens then disappeared. Both of the outlines also went away, but only in terms of their current visual representation. Jordan still had a distinct sense of where the line for the territory bordered, and felt that he could point out the exact spot for its location, down to the centimeter.
Starting from the top right of the ground, at least from where Jordan was standing, a concrete square then appeared. He didn't even get to see a process for its creation. That spot had just been dry leaves one second, and then concrete the next. Around 15 seconds later, another square appeared to its left. As Jordan just observed for the next minute, the floor of his new base continued to get built by just one piece at a time.
Well, I got half an hour to kill now. And I still need to get a drink, so I could make that the last goal for the night now that shelter has been officially secured. Then when I get back, I’ll make a fire and have some roasted Rabbit for dinner, Jordan thought to himself, deciding his next plan of action.
Now there was the chance that he might awkwardly encounter the other group on the way to the source of fresh water, since he’d just pointed them that way. But he didn’t think the chances of were very high in truth. Since if they were indeed a group like Joey had claimed and that hadn’t been a lie, then it would probably take them about two hours to reach it. Meanwhile, if his estimate of it being about five miles way was right, then the time it’d take him while riding his drone should be… seven to eight minutes.
Man, having an actual vehicle to ride was truly starting to feel kind of overpowered. For the time being, he would just get there and back. Then hopefully the other group would warm up to him, and willing to at least give him a chance. Jordan knew that he could use the company, compared to being all alone in his soon-to-be-built home.