Nick seeing as they know about him popped out of the machine gun stand, just standing beside it.

"So, the holo text is even visible through some materials."

"Not really it kinda just appeared above the car, also the blue dot on the map makes it obvious. It's a nice one you got there. Name's Mike. You?" He said as he waved, his other hand was still carrying a rifle.

"Nick, nice to meet you. As for the vehicle I indeed am quite satisfied with its beauty."

"Well, back to the topic at hand. We would like to join you."

"Why's that?"

"Well, mainly because we were given a task from the system to do so. Also, we were informed that to gain a higher rank one needs to make some feats."

"Is that true about the task?" Nick whispered.

[Yes, it's true. It was given to soldiers. You'd have received the same task If there was anyone of higher rank.]

"There isn't?" He continued whispering while the group looked around letting him do his thing.

[The original staff was killed. Although there were tutorial participants that gained higher ranks. They still are squad leaders until they get proper training. As they stand now, they have no means of handling all of the responsibility.]

Hearing that Nick returned his attention to the group. It consisted of three women and Mike. Other than one of the women everyone got a gun. They all carried daggers and some even swords, while Mike had a shield on his back. The woman or rather a girl without the gun also looked to be the most timid of the group, hiding behind everyone else. They all had casual clothes on with some blood stains.

"Is it just you or do you have anyone else with you."

"It's just us." Mike said.

"Alright do come in, then." Nick said as he unlocked the car and watched them coming in.

"Thank you for joining us." The woman without the gun said.

"It's okay."

Seeing the atmosphere turning silent and weird Mike said.

"This is Tami." Signalling with his hand at the shy one. Tami just waved her hand as a greeting

"That's Vanes or Vanessa. My girlfriend, we had the fortune of finding each other in the madness." Mike said as he held the hand of the brown-haired woman with glasses.

"So, she's keeping an eye on you. So, you don't go biting any tender meat." Nick said as he nudged Mike.

"Yeah, he's already an old dog. I alone am enough for him." Vanessa said and shook Nick's hand.

"You're pretty old yourself." Mike said and felt a sudden threat to his life.

"And this is-" before Mike could finish, he was cut off by the last member of the group.

"I can introduce myself. Nice to meet you I'm Nina." She said while looking with unkind eyes towards Mike.

"Yeah, nice to meet you guys."

"So, anyway what's the plan?" Nina said.

"I thought about riding through the city. Until I found enough supplies for the whole trip. As for what kind of situations we encounter on the road we still don't know so we can't really prepare for that."

"I mean that seems fair enough. We thought about the same thing. All though we did find some kind of grocery store down the road. We can hit that one." Mike said recounting the events.

"Seems good to me." Nick said and looked at the others for what they had to say.

"Before we head out let's at least once again go about our battle roles." Vanessa said.

"That for sure wouldn't hurt. I'm basically the tank if it comes down to it. I have [Tough Skin] as a skill it lessens the damage done to me and the pain." Mike said and tapped his shield on the back.

"I'm acting as the recon for the group. As for my skill it's [Eagle's eyes] it lets me see further." Nina said and leaned on her rifle.

"I don't see the point of you picking it in a Dungeon. And moreover, we have a map." Nick said.

"It's because the Dungeon I was thrown into was a one with sky islands."

"Oh, I see."

"As for me. I'm more of a general attacker for the team. I picked [First Strike] as my skill as it lets me do twice the damage on my first attack."

This tale has been pilfered from Royal Road. If found on Amazon, kindly file a report.

"That seems powerful."

"Yeah, it is, but not much if I can't hit the mark."

"And I guess I'm something of a medic for the team." Tami said reminding everyone of her existence.

"Okay. As for the plan of robbing the store if we drive there. The chaos soldiers will for sure start chasing us, the noise will attract them to us." Nick said while tapping his foot on the floor of the humvee.

"Then what do you suggest we do? Not resupply?" Nina said.

"I either suggest we go there by foot, but that would make it so we can't bring so much stuff. Or we drive there by the car and start looting everything in sight while Vanessa and Mike cover for us. What do you say?"

"Let's vote and see, what do you say, squad lead?" Vanessa said.

"Yeah, that's what I had in mind." Nick said.

"Okay, who votes for the first plan raise hands." Vanessa said while only Tami and Nick raised their hands. Seeing that Nick turned to them.

"Why's that?"

"I simply want to get out of here as fast as possible and if the supplies are not enough, we can hit more stores on the way." Mike said while the others seem to agree with what he said.

"Okay, then be it." Nick said and started the engine they moved on to the street where it was infested with the chaos soldiers. Nick drove not minding them getting them under his wheels as he treated them as random speed bumps.

They drove to the corner of the street, seeing a green neon sign that said opened on two hundred sixty-seven planets and still having the best vegetables. They parked it right at the front door.

"Vanessa, can you take hold of the machine gun? As for you Mike hop out and don't let the enemies get to close."

"On it."

"Tami, Nina you two come with me." Nick said as they all hopped out, except for Vanessa.

The tree of them moved into the store. Meanwhile the occasional gunshots sounded behind them.

Inside the store were some shop counters in the front while shelves upon shelves were behind them.

They moved through the shop as a group until they came across the first shelf with packaged foods. They had a whole section reserved just for that.

All the while they were keeping an eye on their maps for any kind of sign of a red dot appearing.

"Start grabbing the stuff here, I'll go into the middle of the shop. I should have a full map coverage of the shop that way." Hearing that they nodded their heads and started grabbing packages.

As Nick came into the middle of the store. He started checking his map seeing everything to be clear he started heading back. But as he was turning around a silhouette jumped right at him.

He had no chance to dodge and got tackled to the ground. The sole thing holding the silhouette back was the rifle between them.

Nick started pushing against the rifle trying to point its muzzle at the silhouette, yet it didn't budge. Just then it brought its mouth full of fangs down and a gunshots sounded out.

It roared in pain, before it turned around and one bullet trailed right through its head. Nick turned his head and saw Nina at the end of the aisle with packages strewn all over the ground.

"You can thank me later."

Hearing that Nick smiled relieved and got up from the ground. The first thing he did was checking the monster that attacked him. It was a dog like creature without eyes, fangs were sticking out from the horrendous looking mouth it got.

[ Chaos Stalker

Bronze

Weakness: light and fire element

It has an innate stealth capability that keeps active when it's looking for prey to kill. It uses its developed hearing as a means of tracking down enemies.]

"It's one ugly looking motherfucker."

"Yeah, but anyway we should move on. Can you guard us while we grab the stuff?"

"For sure."

Just then Tami rushed into the aisle with two rolling carts. " Guys we can use this to load in the goods!"

They started looting up while Nick made sure no enemy surprised them. Like this they made four trips in and out. Just as they were about to go for another one, they heard Nina say.

"I looked down the street a horde is coming from there. We have about five more minutes till they get here."

Nick calculated it a bit and seeing as it will be enough for them for only fifteen days said.

"Okay grab the things closest to us and get out of here."

They loaded up the car with everything they could. Just as the enemies were about minute away, they all slipped into the car.

Nick turned the key, but after a few puffs of smoke nothing happened. He tried again and again, but nothing was happening.

"Hey what's going on dude. Why isn't it starting?" Mike said from the back of the vehicle.

"If I knew I would fucking fix it!"

Just then Tami reached from the back of the vehicle and turned the key. It started like nothing. As it did Nick sped through the streets fleeing from the horde just mere seconds from making contact.

"How did you do that?"

"I spoke with Telno about what's the problem with the vehicle she said that it needs to be started using magic." Tami answered.

"Why didn't you tell us Telno?" Nick questioned under his breath.

[I just wanted to see you suffer a bit before telling you.]

"Real funny. By the way why didn't it need in the garage?"

[That's because mana starting is an emergency measure if it fails the ignition normal way. It's a built-in function of the military grade vehicles.]

"So, that's why it's such a quality. Because it's military grade that answers all of my questions."

He stopped whispering and turned to the others.

"Guys, is yours Telno such a bitch too?"

"Mine is really sweet to me." Tami said while everyone else glanced at her, not believing her.

[I adapt to everyone's personality to better fit with them Nick. I think I already told you that.]

"Yeah, yeah. By the way do you have a way so everyone at once can communicate you and not just in our minds?"

[Yeah, charge the radio with a steady stream of mana.]

He started doing so and on the radio a blue voice visualizer appeared.

[Now this should be better right?] She said speaking through the radio speakers.

"How come I still see and can communicate to you through my mind?" Mike asked.

[That's because I'm something akin to an AI. My whole body is whole planet Telno, called after me. Where I run all of the different threads of systems all at once.]

"So, where do you get the data from. About the creatures and different monsters?"

[That's where you all come in. By finding and fighting new monsters you allow others to get useful information that could save their lives. Of course, that functions in both ways you too get the information previously obtained.]

"Meaning that there's a chance we would be fighting some new monsters?" Nick asked.

[Precisely. It's often encountered in newly Assimilated planets.]

"That's one advantage down." Vanessa said and climbed down the machine gun, seeing no point in wasting any more ammo.

[Don't take it that hard. It's also an opportunity to gain rewards for finding their weaknesses and peculiarities.]

They drove off through the streets listening to Telno station, while looking for more supplies to hit on the way.