I am awakened by the chatting of the three guys.

For some reason, the carriage door is open despite the lizard still moving. I am sure one of the three is responsible for that.

They are bundled together, getting a view of outside while talking bullshit.

"You think you can beat a vlandos in a fight with a knife?"

Merkerthy asks, "Would they be weaponless?"

"Yeah. They also can't make the first move."

Tom rubs his chin, thinking deeply. "Depends. Is it a chick or a dude?"

"What difference does it make?" Julun asks, confused.

Tom smiles like he is proud of a secret technique. "If it's a chick or a gay guy, all I gotta do is remove my shirt and start doing the Cha ma la dance and song. Gonna be singing like, 'She/he got my heart in her/his trap. I wanna break free. I wanna break free.' And they are going to love that. So while I am singing, I am going to be moving to them in a sexy way. And then I will make them fall in love with me. I will spend like three weeks love bombing them, then when they are asleep, I will slit their throat, or hope it can be slit."

Julun nods with a grin. "What if they kill you as soon as you start singing with your rusty ass voice?"

Merkerthy laughs. "I am trying to imagine him getting those giants to find him sexy. You might as well go all out and drop on your knees and ask them if they want a free sucky sucky at that point."

Julun shakes Merkerthy while laughing. "That reminds me. You ever seen that mag, Lost Fert Gets Seduced By Lost Vlandos Maiden?"

Merkerthy starts smiling without even hearing the joke. "Yeah yeah?"

Tom seems to know where the joke is heading and mutters, "Un-fucking-believable."

"You remember when he was on his knees, locked on her crutch like it was a sacred relic? Then she dropped her panties and the smell hit him so bad he started to have vivid memories of his ancestors going to war. That's gonna be Tom! He’s going to be running away, screaming, ‘abort mission! Abort… Quaa!" Julun falls to the side laughing, slapping the ground.

Merkerthy does the same thing. "I forgot about the PTSD thing. Holy..."

Reminds me of the random mean jokes me and my friends made back in high school on Earth.

I wipe the little saliva at the corners of my lips and dread how tired I feel. It really feels like I only got an hour or two of sleep.

Anyway, the silo is rising which means it’s morning. About five in the morning with how little light there is.

Natasha moves on the opposite side of the carriage to get a view outside of the carriage and gestures for me to follow her.

I do and ask, “W'happen?”

She points at the ruins of a former massive building in the distance, maybe a hundred meters or so. “You see it?”

“The ruins? Yeah. What about it?”

“It was a factory for ether batteries.”

“So an accident happened?”

“Monsters were attracted to all the ether. So… they ran out of their zone and trashed the place to absorb the sweet sweet nectar.”

“Damn. The Governing Trustees must have been fuming.”

The Governing Trustees are basically this world version of the ‘board of directors’.

“Probably. Anyway, I just thought you may have found it interesting.”

“It is.”

We are also passing by a village with around thirty small buildings, some of which have small gardens on their side or animals.

The carriage pace is broken and starts moving wildly.

A powerful voice bellows from ahead of us, “Run!”

What the hell is going on?

Suddenly the lizard cries out and a wild sound dominates it. A monster-like sound.

Claws tear through the front of the carriage and a red shark like a beast with six limbs stares at us.

Eyes of pure evil. Staring at our bodies like it's contemplating how it will make us suffer.

Bahmos backs up while trembling. “No fucking way…”

Its mouth opens wide, and heat vibrates the air around its jaw. Then Its eyes snap on Natasha.

It just stares.

Does it want to kill her first?

Unfortunately for it, it's met with a massive black war hammer to the face, jerking its head to the side with a growl.

A three-meter-tall crab made out of wood and grass grabs its neck with pincers.

“Kill it!” the war hammer-wielding man demands.

Everyone runs out of the carriage.

I pick up Ulah, and Natasha grabs Caren’s hand then quickly shifts her grip on it before using all of her back to drag him out.

The carriage tilts and bends as the weird shark monster struggles.

The shark monster stares at the adventurer with scorn before releasing a screech that creates a burning blinding light.

My eyes!

I nearly instinctive drop Ulah to cover my eyes.

The four guys scream in pain, but I hear nothing from Natasha.

The author's content has been appropriated; report any instances of this story on Amazon.

Then I hear the man again, and I recognize his voice.

“SHIT!”

It came from the war hammer guy. The voice was the same as the guy I met in the market yesterday.

I hear him cussing more, his voice filled with rage, “Come back! Come back and fight me!”

He continues screaming until his voice cracks. Then he mutters with contempt like he was betrayed, “What a coward…”

The same voice appears closer, “Give it an hour or two, it will clear out.”

“Holy shit, you are an adventurer?” Tom cries, rubbing his eyes.

“Yeah. Lucky you, right?”

Bahmos groans about his eyes.

I hear the vlandos speak again, in a surprised tone. “Oh, it’s you two. I didn’t expect to meet you so soon.” He shouts but in a different direction. “Jer-kal-thuli-mal, it’s the farmer girl!”

Natasha asks with passive aggression, “How do you know her?”

I try to reach for her hand to calm her. “I met them in the market square. That’s all.”

“Yeah, I bought some pink-terras from her and saw… um, that man on the floor.”

Then he says, “Don’t worry, we are adventures sent to dispatch the monster here, so you can relax a bit.”

I hold Ulah with one hand and hide behind Natasha.

“Damn, I guess I scared you…” the guy says.

No, I am hiding behind her so I can heal my eyes without alerting you.

I touch both my eyes with my glowing left hand and after a short while, the darkness disappears, and my regular vision returns.

Of course that will raise questions, but what the hell kind of conclusion would he come up with?

There exists no vlandos capable of using skills. Not even through the use of the system, which can offer all kinds of powers.

I am an exception. So unless he is senile, he would draw another conclusion to my eye's sudden recovery.

I walk out of Natasha’s protection and say while rubbing my eyes. “I think my eyes are getting a bit better…”

I see him in complete black iron armor and behind him is that massive tree-based giant crab monster which is standing completely still.

He ask, “You covered your eyes already…?”

“Yeah, I had closed my eyes and turned away from the flash in time.”

He slowly nods. “Quick. Anyway… how are you.”

The way he says that it’s like when a student is trying to distract a teacher.

But from what?

“Please… kill me.”

The adventurer cusses under his breath when I quickly and instinctively look behind him to see who it is.

The monster did all that…?

Corpses litter the ground.

Bodies torn apart, intestines hanging out from bellies. Bodies split into two and there are some 'bodyless' heads.

I anxiously swallow the saliva in my mouth.

There is the punchio guy(the one that gave me the knife) moving from corpse to corpse, covering them with a black blanket, taken from his air-water eclipse thing.

And…

My stomach feels unsettled… Oh god, why did I look at them

Everything I ate came up and I vomit on the road.

One of those being covered is a man burned to the skeleton, and under him, the road is black.

The Julioes woman, Jer-kal… Sorry, I can’t remember her full name. She is basically running to every maimed or hurt person.

A massive fairy-like monster is following her, healing them. The fairy monster which is my size, hand glows yellow and those with missing chunks of flesh have their flesh regenerated.

She… can heal. Which means… She can possibly heal Ulah.

And Caren.

The punchio guy shouts, “Jim, get your ass back to guarding!”

Jim, the guy who was conversing with me sighs. “Sorry to you all. But for—”

I ask him in a rush. “Can your friend heal my brother and father? They are sick, really really sick.”

“Oh. Um, yeah, once we are done here.”

I want to tell him its urgent. I believe it is, but… what’s here is more urgent.

Jer-kal stands up and says, “Lo’jul, this one just died on me.”

She then moves to another person who is mortally wounded. The punchio, Lu’jul moves over to the dead man and covers the body.

Lo’jul shakes his head and says, “This is going to be a lot of work for the clean up crew.”

Jer-kal is moving towards a man, who is bleeding heavily from his lower body.

His eyes are stuck on the sky. His face is stained with tears and it already seems like he is dead despite the movements of his chess and his slow eye blinks.

Jer-kal tells the man, “You will be okay in—”

“Kill me,” he says.

She doesn’t show much of a reaction. “Sorry, I can’t do that.”

He then says, “Just do it…”

She bites her lips and then says, “Give me a second.”

She taps a tiny pyramid communicator that’s near her ears. “Operator ‘Sharcoi’, answer.”

There is a delay before she talks again, “The monster victim here is a fifty to sixty-year-old human male. He is requesting assisted suicide due to the psychological harm caused by the monster’s assault. He is mortally wounded, but I can save him.”

She slowly nods. “Understood.”

She tells him, without emotions, inhuman-like, like a professional receptionist, “I am sorry, but I don’t have permission to assist with your suicide. However, an adventurer is on his way to erase your memories of what occurred today. You will forget it all.”

He says nothing, and the fairy instead sings an odd song which makes the man's eyes close, and then she heals him.

Jer-kal looks around, hearing more moans of pain.

Then she sees me. “What are you doing here?”

I guess she didn’t hear Jim.

I blink a couple of times, finding it hard to get my words across. “My… my…”

Damn it, Vernisha. Just say it!

But all I can think of is all the blood, pieces of fleshes, intestines.

Jim tells her, “Her family is sick apparently. I am guessing they were heading to Sundawn for professional care.”

“I will see what I can do.”

As soon as she starts moving towards me, an injured person shouts at her, “Where are you going? My leg is still fucked up.”

She tells him, “I will be with you very soon, sir.”

“What…? Then… Then at least make your monster heal us while you go talk to your friends!”

“That’s against protocols.”

“Oh shut the hell up! We are dying here! You get paid to help us! Our fucking tax money!” He points at his leg. “It’s broken, and you don’t want to help me?! You know what will happen to you once I report that to the adventurers guild?”

He breathes hard. “Jail. Fucking jail.”

Her hands clenches and behind the friendly expression she holds, hatred is boiling.

Jim walks over to her, and with his arm around her shoulder, he whispers something to her. However, she doesn’t react to it.

She is staring at the man, and he reacts to it.

“Look… I am speaking the truth. You are in Terrafall, and you work for our government, so you have to follow our rules. That’s just how it is.”

When in Rome, do as the Romans, huh?

Lo’jul tells him, “Do us a favor and shut up. You don’t like us, cool. We also don’t like you all, that’s understood. So just let us do our job. My friend here was just going to help someone who is just as much of an emergency as you all… But now you went and piss her off. You pissed off a julioes of all people.”

The man takes a deep breath. His eyes anxiously dart around before he says, “Okay okay, Sorry. I went over my head.”

Natasha mutters, “Good luck with that.”

I think she is referring to Jer-kel accepting apologies. There is a stereotype(or is it?) that Julioes don’t’t know forgiveness. They choose to ‘ignore’ hurt, if there is something to gain from doing so.

Whether that’s a biological thing or social engineering, I do not know. Or care.

She brushes Jim’s hand off and walks towards the man, who now is full of fear. In all fairness, she is massive, 6”9 and armored.

“Hey hey. Stop your friend!” he shouts.

She replies, “I am not going to kill you. Damn Prerfamaetgsquan.”

… What is that? Must be Juriop. Her home language.

Jim groans in disappointment. “You know the operator is going to write you up on that, right?”

“I will call him one in his face too.”

He makes multiple facial expressions as if to say, ‘Are you senile?’, but he gives up, like those in relationships who want to appease their angry partner. (‘What the… Yes dear, whatever you say…’)

Anyway, she heals the guy. Of course, he put some resistance up at first, thinking she was going to kill him.

And now… people are looking at her a bit weirdly. Anyway, she comes over to me.

She ask, “Him?” referring to Ulah who I currently am holding.

“Yes, please.”

Without a word from her, her fairy monster draws close to me, and then… nothing.

The fairy's fingers tense up and it begins groaning. So does Jer-kal, her eyes are wide like she is an incredible pain.

Natasha grabs me and pulls me away quickly.

Jer-kel kicks the monster and suddenly it turns into a white ‘mass' of light and gets absorbed into her shoes, or what's in her shoes.

She gasps and drops to her knees, face wet with sweat. “Fuck… me. I am tired.”

Jim comes over to her. “Take your rest. You did well.”

“I think you are going to need to carry me. My brain feels like it wants to split.”

“Yeah, I got you.” He picks her up on his back. “Lo, how many more minutes you got left in you?”

“Maybe thirty?” he says as he watches the Humanoid monster,(I assume it’s his) in the sky. The monster Has four faces, both facing a respective cardinal direction. Below his neck, it looks like he has a black religious habit on, but I think that’s part of its body because of the way it moves.

Jim then turns towards me, “Sorry, kid.”

My luck is bullshit.