You can learn skills from another player or from instructional and educational materials such as books, magazines and the like. Keep an eye out for books as they may be vital for your survival. There's no such thing as too many skills.

- Other Useful Tips, Tip # 7.

----------------------------------------

Chapter 3: The Raid of Jollibee

“As to our food and water supplies,” Melissa cleared her throat as she handed Miguel an inventory list of their supplies. “Given that we eat three meals a day, we’ll have enough food and water to last for at least a week. We could stretch it for three to four more days if we only eat twice a day.”

Reading the inventory list, Miguel nodded as he tapped his chin with a finger, “This is good.”

“No, it’s not. That’s not enough,” Claire sighed, massaging her temple. “We need more supplies than that.”

“I know right? We should loot more supplies outside,” Eric suggested. “We can fight the goblins if needed.”

“I-I don’t really like fighting,” Dianne stuttered, looking nervous and unsure, “but I’ll do my best.”

“Don’t worry about that, Dianne,” Eric gently patted her back. “I’ll protect you.”

“We won’t let the monsters get close to you,” Claire nodded as she gave her a small smile. “We’ll make sure of that.”

“Idiots…” Miguel grumbled, then raised his voice slightly. “We’ll have to make do with these supplies. We will not fight any monsters, so don’t listen to these two, Dianne. We stay here and we wait,” Claire and Eric rolled their eyes and grumbled while Dianne let out a sigh of relief.

Miguel said to Melissa as he tapped on the piece of paper, “The thing I’m worried about is that most of our food are perishable. We don’t have a working fridge anymore, so they’ll spoil more quickly.”

“Oh, don’t worry about that,” Melissa said with a lopsided grin. “The food won’t spoil when it’s in the inventory.”

“Really?” Eric said, giving her an incredulous look. “How did you know about that?”

“I found out about it this morning,” Melissa explained. “Last night, when Dianne and I were counting our supplies, I put our left over pasta in my inventory. It was still warm, but I forgot about it when we went to sleep. When I checked my inventory, I took out the pasta, it’s still warm and fresh. It should already have a bad smell given I didn’t store it in the fridge.”

“Well, that’s good news,” Miguel said with a satisfied look on his features. “Although, we have to test it more that food doesn’t really spoil in the inventory. Just to be sure.”

“I know. That’s why I put in raw fish, meat and vegetables in my inventory. If those are still fresh and good, then I’m correct. I also put in a tube ice to see if the inventory can prevent it from melting.”

‘I’m starting to like this girl!’ Miguel thought as his lips broke into a grin. The woman was earning good points in his books. “Good. How about rice? How much do we have? I think rice can last for a few months.”

“Oh, I didn’t put it on the list, didn’t I?” Melissa said, scratching her head. “Well, we have one sack and a half.”

“So that would be at least two months’ worth of food,” Miguel stated based on his experience in their home. He and his sister consumes a sack of rice for a few months. “At least now we won’t worry about starving now. We just have to make sure our water lasts though. We can’t cook rice without water.”

“I expected this restaurant to have more food stored than this.” Claire furrowed her brows, looking at the inventory list. “I can’t believe we have so little.”

“My restaurant isn’t doing well, you see. We only have like three to four customers a day,” Melissa said matter-of-factly. “I can’t just go buy ingredients in bulk and store it. That’ll be costly and a waste of ingredients. I can go to the market every day to buy ingredients fresh.”

“Makes sense…” Eric shrugged. “So do we eat twice a day or three times a day?”

“Three times a day,” Melissa replied. “We’ll have ulam for at least a week. Well, if you’re okay with eating rice without ulam after a week, then our food will definitely last for two months.” [1]

“That or we can make rice gruel when we run out of ulam,” Claire shrugged, folding her arms. “Rice gruels are a lot better than eating plain rice.”

“We won’t have enough water to make rice gruels for two months,” Dianne said, shaking her head. “Water faucets don’t work anymore and we only have 10 five-gallon container of drinkable water. We do have some water stored in drums in the restroom, but it needs to be boiled.” [2]

“I keep telling you. This is a bad idea,” Eric shook his head as he sighed. “Look, Miguel. I agree that we should stay here in the restaurant, but don’t you think we should look for more supplies outside?”

“I have said this many times since yesterday, but we won’t take any risks unless it’s necessary,” Miguel shook his head.

“Fine,” Eric rolled his eyes. “But we should have a battle plan at least. There’s a high risk of those monsters getting in here, don’t you think?”

“We just talked about that earlier, didn’t we?” Miguel was starting to get pissed off at Eric’s constant whining. “If monsters get in here, we run. If we find a place to hide, then we hide. We don’t fight at all.”

“What if we get cornered? What then?” Claire argued. “I think it’s wise to prepare just in case. Besides, we already have a bow and a bunch of arrows and we haven’t picked our reward from the global quest yet.”

Miguel paused for a moment to think while stroking his beard. It’s true that it would be wise to prepare for a fight when they are left with no choice. After all, there is no such thing as being too prepared when it comes to life and death situations when it actually happens.

Miguel remembered Murphy’s Law: Anything that can go wrong will go wrong. Though they have the bows that they’ve got from the goblins, it won’t be enough to survive a fight against the monsters. None of them knew how to use bows effectively was a problem. Not having proper weapons was a problem either.

“How about weapons?”

“Actually, that’s one of the things I want to talk to you about…” Eric’s mood suddenly brightened at the topic. “There’s a lot of things here that we can use to make better weapons. I’m going to need your help.”

“I don’t think there’s anything I can do to help,” Miguel drawled.

Truth be told, he wasn’t sure if there was anything they could use in this place to make improvised weapons that were better than guns and explosives. Not that he knew how to make guns from a scratch, but he doubted that he could craft weapons from junk just like in some games.

How can he possibly make a Sledge Saw from a sledge hammer and a cement saw if he was already having a hard time repairing their leaky sink even with proper tools?

Miguel was smart, but he wasn’t that delusional. He was only too aware of things he doesn’t know.

“Nah, don’t worry about it. I just need a better assistant who doesn’t talk too much,” His statement earned a glare from Claire, but he ignored her, “Have you finished the miscellaneous quests?” Miguel shook his head, “then help me make some weapons. We can’t just use metal pipes to bash someone’s head and call it a day. I have better ideas.”

“Alright,” Miguel agreed. Maybe he could learn something from Eric. “Now that Claire mentioned it, maybe we should talk about what skill scrolls we should take.”

The quest that started a few minutes after the Merge was completed last night. They all received 5,000 GCs. A new blue screen also appeared that listed all the possible skill scroll reward. They only have a day to choose from the list or else the reward will be forfeited.

When Miguel drifted off to sleep for a bit, Eric took up his shift in keeping watch. A blue screen appeared that notified them that the Monster Hour quest was finished. He tried to wake Miguel up to help him pick a Skill Scroll as a reward. Seeing that his best friend was exhausted, he let Miguel get some more sleep and decided to bug him tomorrow.

You may only choose one (1) Skill Scroll as a reward: Fighting Style: Sword A fighting style using swords and other bladed weapons. Fighting Style: Spear A fighting style using a weapon that was developed since the dawn of mankind. Fighting Style: Archery A mixture of Earth and Midland techniques on using bows. Fighting Style: Blunt A fighting style that uses blunt weapons such as clubs, maces and staves. Mage Arts: Arcane A magic school that harnesses the power of the five elements to strike down foes. Mage Arts: Healing A magic school that uses mana to heal and mend wounds. Mage Arts: Illusion A magic school that uses mana to alter bodily sensation through the mind.

Looking at the list of rewards to choose, Miguel was slightly disappointed at the limited choices. All of them had the same list. He suspected that these skill scrolls contained only basic knowledge just enough for the SYSTEM to recognize it as a primary skill and not just a miscellaneous skill. Although there were skill scrolls about magic, Miguel already prepared himself for disappointment.

Coming to a realization, Miguel had a brilliant idea, “Now, the question is… If we read a skill scroll, can we reuse it to let others read it too?”

“Hmm. Interesting,” Eric’s lips curved into a grin at his best friend’s idea. “If that’s true, then we only need one of each of these scrolls. That way we can share skills right?”

“Yeah,” Miguel nodded. “That’s the idea.”

“But what if after we read the scroll, it disappears like how the goblin’s corpse disappeared when we looted it?” Claire argued. “What if we can only learn what we picked? What then?”

“We must choose carefully then,” Dianne suggested, which earned her surprised looks from Miguel and Eric. “We should choose the skills that fit with our stats,” her statement, then caught Claire and Melissa’s attention too, but Dianne ignored them and continued, “I’ve been thinking about it when I saw Claire’s notes. Eric has a high STR so he should go for a melee build, Claire can either go for a melee build or go for Illusion magic since it will match with her Seductress perk. Melissa should take archery while Miguel should definitely go for arcane magic since he has the highest INT and WIS. I can go for magic too, but we need a healer. I’ll take that role if that’s okay.”

Hearing what Dianne said, Miguel could not believe his ears. He looked at her with his mouth gaping like a goldfish, but Dianne waved him off, “What? I’m a gamer too. I play games with my phone.”

Miguel continued staring at her with an incredulous look, “Since when did mobile games have RPGs? No offense, Dianne, but what do you know about games exactly?” Eric nodded at the question as well.

Dianne was offended at the reaction of her two friends. Sure, she wasn’t a hardcore gamer like them, but that didn’t mean she wasn’t a gamer too! In fact, she played lots of mobile games!

“Since the invention of smart phones and WIFIs?” Dianne shrugged in reply as if it was the most obvious thing in the world. She then rolled her eyes in annoyance. “Just because I play mobile games doesn’t mean I don’t know anything about RPGs and stuff like that. I’m actually at max level in AdventureQuest 3D!”

Admittedly, Claire and Melissa were not familiar with RPG-type games. Claire only played Tetris and Candy Crush on Facebook whenever she wasn’t busy studying. Melissa, on the other hand, never played any video games, except for Super Mario Brothers back when she was a kid.

That was why it came to surprise when Dianne was indeed knowledgeable with MMORPGs. Miguel and Eric were her friends for a long-time and it was the first time they learned about this fact. While Eric was glad that they have at least one more in their team who was familiar with RPGs and Miguel, while intrigued, was not amused.

Miguel, being a follower of the glorious PC Master race, can barely tolerate Eric for owning the tools of the filthy console peasants, but to call the people who play mobile games as gamers? Preposterous! Dianne’s statement was a blasphemy in his ears.

Nevertheless, Miguel always had a soft spot for Dianne. He could never get angry with her, because she was special. He decided never to let his bigotry against non-PC scums get in the way with his relationship with her. Miguel let it slide for the moment and maybe when things go back to the way it was, he will convert Dianne and teach her the ways of Lord Gabe Newell the Almighty. ‘Heil Gaben!’ [3]

“I’m glad to know you’re a gamer too, Dianne,” Eric said with a huge grin, then turned to Miguel who was still gobsmacked. “I agree with you Dianne. It is a good advice.”

“Yeah, let’s go with that,” Miguel closed his jaw as he composed himself. ‘I was going to suggest the same thing anyway.’

“Wait a minute…” Claire narrowed her eyes as she voiced her objection. “Why should I take Illusion magic? I want Arcane magic!”

“Well, it’s not that you don’t have the stats for it but,” Eric scratched his head, trying to find words to explain it to Claire carefully as to not offend her. “I think it will benefit us as a team if Miguel has magic. He has a True-Born Mage perk that will make him effective as a mage. Dianne has a True-Born Mage perk too, so she’ll do good as a healer, in my opinion.”

Claire gritted her teeth as she stared daggers at Miguel, who was looking at her at the moment with an amused look in his face, “So why do I get a useless skill like Illusion?”

Claire was frustrated as she was always getting the short end of the stick whenever it was between Miguel and her. It was so unfair.

“I don’t think Illusion magic would be useless,” said Dianne, slightly shaking her head. “The reason why we wanted you to take that skill scroll is because we want someone in our team to be capable of a CC.”

“CC?” Melissa queried, raising a brow. “What’s that?”

“Crowd control,” This time it was Miguel who answered. He was getting more and more impressed as Dianne showed knowledge of gaming jargons. “It means the skills that restricts or reduces an enemy’s ability to fight.”

“That means if you use that skill, you can weaken an enemy to the point that it can be easily killed,” Dianne added.

Thinking that Miguel was manipulating her again, Claire shook her head in refusal. After all, Miguel had a tongue slip when told her last night that he has Manipulator perk. That or Miguel was using this moment as an opportunity to somehow get his revenge for beating him in their arm wrestling match. Miguel was petty that way. “I’m not taking that shit. Miguel can take that garbage skill.”

“Look Claire,” Dianne put her hand on her best friend’s shoulder. “You have to trust me on this one. Besides, if in case that Miguel’s idea of sharing skill scrolls is correct, then you can learn Arcane magic too.”

Claire paused for a moment as she thought about Dianne’s assurance. While she did not trust Miguel completely, Dianne had her full confidence. She just hoped that she was making the right decision of trusting Dianne and it wasn’t just Miguel manipulating her or manipulating Dianne to manipulate her. ‘Damn it! Now I’m getting more paranoid to him than the monsters!’ she thought.

“Fine,” Claire let out a deep sigh, deciding to give it a go. She snapped her head to Miguel with a glare while pointing a finger at him. “If this turns out to be a petty revenge for losing to arm wrestling to me last night. I swear to god… I’m going to tear you a new one!”

The others gave Miguel questioning looks. Eric asked in amusement, “Hahaha! Really? You lost to her in arm wrestling?”

Miguel gave them a dismissive wave while the three sniggered. He immediately spoke up to change the topic to save him from embarrassment, “Come on, let’s get our skill scrolls.”

The group then proceeded to claim their reward skill scrolls from the blue screen. As discussed earlier, Miguel took Mage Arts: Arcane, Claire took Mage Arts: Illusion and Dianne, Mage Arts: Healing. Eric took the Fighting Style: Spear because he wanted to have skills with weapons that have longer reach than swords and clubs. Lastly, Melissa took Fighting Style: Archery to supplement their long range attack capability as a team.

The Skill Scroll was a yellowish parchment paper rolled into a scroll with a red ribbon tying it up. Just as Miguel suspected, it was small and it probably contained instructions for a basic combat skill intended for survival rather than a full combat skill. However, the promise that it contained knowledge on how to do magic was promising.

The excitement that Miguel was feeling inside him was overwhelming. It felt like he was destined for something great and the scroll was the first step in his journey as a mage. Too bad it probably didn’t have instructions how to Avada Kedavra everything that gets in his way to greatness, but he was hopeful. A classic fireball spell or maybe an A-rank Ninjutsu like Rasengan.

‘Maybe I should’ve taken Mage Arts: Illusiom,’ Miguel thought, tapping his fingers against his chin. ‘What if that scroll has Kage Bunshin no Jutsu? Or maybe a cool Genjutsu?’

Before the five went on to their separate business to learn the content of their skill scrolls, Eric stopped them and told everybody that they forgot something important.

“What is it now?” Miguel scowled as he was interrupted.

“We have to form a party,” Eric replied. “That way we can use party communication system to speak with each other rather than speak normally when the monsters could hear us.”

“Yeah, I totally forgot about that…” Dianne said as she scratched her head shyly.

Miguel also forgot to check out the last two blue screens that he skipped last night from the help menu. While his INT definitely improved his memory, it didn’t matter when he’s exhausted. After all, everybody, even those with sharp memories, can still be a victim of carelessness and forgetfulness due to distractions.

Miguel opened the help menu again and opened ‘Party System’ to look into it.

Party System A party is a group of players adventuring together. While going solo on adventures are commendable and a player will not have any problems with loot sharing, adventuring with a party is more effective and efficient. Not only you'll have someone to watch your back, you'll have more chance of survival than being alone. Here are the general mechanics of the Party system: 1) To create a party, open 'Party Screen' and make sure that you are not a member of an existing party. When the SYSTEM detects that you are not a member of any party, you'll be asked if you want to create one. If you choose to create a party, you must first supply a party name and invite another player. Once the other player accepted the invite and the party name was established, the party will be created and you can invite more players. 2) By default, each member of the party will share EXP equally. To change the EXP sharing rate, there must be a unanimous decision among the party members for a change to occur. 3) You may have a minimum of 2 members and a maximum of 15 members in your party at a time. If there are only two of you in a party and one dies or leaves the party, then the party will be automatically disbanded. 4) There are two ways to disband a party, one is when there is only one member left or when there is a majority vote among the party members to disband. 5) To change the existing party name, one member must initiate a vote to change the party name and there must be a majority (80%) vote to approve the name change. 6) The party may also elect for the rules of automatic item sharing. Due to the nature of Earthland Online, only Game Credits may be subjected to the automatic item sharing. Again, the item sharing rates must be agreed upon unanimously by the members, or else, item sharing will be 'On Pick Up' mode by default. This means that anyone who looted the GC will only go the the player who picked it up. 7) A significant advantage of joining a party is the use of the Party Communications System. It is a wireless communication system where members of the party can communicate using only their thoughts. This however is limited to two kilometer radius. 8) As a general rule, any issues or desired changes within the party can be decided by a majority vote. For example, if one has nominated to expel another from the party, then the members must come to a majority vote to kick the party member in question.

While his friends talked about party name, Miguel concentrated on reading the guide. He learned that the Party Communication System will be, indeed, a useful tool in this RPG apocalypse. They would avoid unnecessary noise that would attract nearby monsters.

After Miguel finished reading the guide, he joined in with his friends on coming up with a party name, “How about we name the party, Orgy Party?”

“That’s a good one!” Eric snorted, earning the two guys a glare from the girls. Well, with the exception of Dianne, who was confused.

“What does that mean?” asked Dianne innocently. “What’s an orgy?”

Miguel and Eric both covered their mouths as they laughed, trying not to be too loud to be heard outside. Their antics only intensified Claire and Melissa’s glare, which had little to no effect.

“What’s an orgy?” Dianne repeated, raising a brow. Claire then whispered in Dianne’s ear to lessen her friend’s ignorance in sexual terms that a girl her age should’ve already known. As Dianne have caught the meaning of the word, her whole face up to the tip of her ears reddened in embarrassment, “N-no! That’s disgusting!”

Melissa rolled her eyes, shaking her head as she grumbled, “Jeez, how old are you?”

“Anyway, I thought of a better name for our party,” Miguel stated, but Claire nudged her with an elbow to convince him to take the matter seriously. “No, I’m not joking this time. Why don’t we name our party Boston Tea?”

Eric, Dianne and Melissa furrowed their eyebrows as they paused, trying to decipher its meaning. Seeing Miguel rolled his eyes, they misunderstood his gesture and they concentrated on thinking about the sexual meaning of Boston Tea. In reality, Miguel rolled his eyes because in his opinion, party names didn’t really matter and they were wasting time pondering on such a petty thing. Not that he wasn’t aware that he was also petty at times, but this was a huge waste of time and his friends would not settle on a random party name. They wanted it to be meaningful.

“What does that mean?” Melissa asked as she gave up on thinking about it. “Is this a green joke or am I missing something?”

“There’s nothing green about his suggestion,” said Claire. “He wants the name Boston Tea because the party will be called Boston Tea Party. It’s an event in American history when America was a colony of Great Britain. It’s a long and complicated story. Basically, the colonists destroyed shipments of tea by throwing it out on the sea in Boston because of some complications in taxation. The sea was like tea in color when that happened. One thing led to another and it blew up into a full revolutionary war.”

“Wow,” Miguel raised his brows in amusement. He knew that piece of American history was because of Assassin’s Creed 3. That game will make you love history – and the bloody bits of it. “I’m surprised you knew that.”

“I just read a lot,” Claire shrugged. “It’s a good name I’d say. I get the feeling like we’re the catalyst of change – like revolutionaries in this stupid game.”

“Alright, I agree with the name,” said Eric. “I couldn’t think of a better name anyway.”

As the rest of them agreed on the party name, Miguel opened his party screen and created the party with the proposed name.

“Invite Party: Eric Reyes, Claire Roque, Dianne Duria and…” Miguel stopped, then he turned to Melissa. “What’s your full name?”

Melissa mumbled something under her breath, but they didn’t catch it.

“What’s that?”

“Panis.” Melissa lowered her head as the others laughed at her surname. [4]

“Invite Party: Melissa…” Miguel paused for a second for a more dramatic effect before bursting out in laughter. “…Panis”

Melissa shook her head at their childishness as she accepted the party invite.

*DING!*

You created a party: Boston Tea Party

Eric Reyes joined the Boston Tea Party

Claire Roque joined the Boston Tea Party

Dianne Duria joined the Boston Tea Party

Melissa Panis joined the Boston Tea Party

When everybody was in the party, they quickly tested the Party Communications System like kids on Christmas day.

Miguel: Can anyone hear me?

Eric: Loud and clear.

Claire: I can hear you.

Melissa: Is that you, Eric?

Eric: Yup, it’s me.

Dianne: This is weird. I can hear you and it’s like I know who’s talking like… automatically. Weird.

Miguel: Well, we don’t know if we are actually hearing each other’s thoughts or this is just a fragment of my imagination.

Melissa: So… wait. How would I know this isn’t just my imagination too?

Well, it was their first time trying to communicate telepathically. They didn’t realize they were talking and looking at each other like in a normal conversation – except, they were talking with their minds.

Miguel: Simple. This situation calls for an experiment.

Dianne: How?

Miguel: Let me handle this. Claire, if you’re hearing this, please show us your tits… just for the sake experiment, of course.

“How about I show you my finger instead?” Claire flipped a finger with a wry smile curved on her lips. “Then I shove this far up your asshole as an experiment?”

“Oh?” Miguel showed her his signature smirk. “I didn’t know you’re into kinky stuff. Maybe later?”

The group burst out in laughter as if forgetting everything that has happened. Every problem and worries seemed to have vanished for a moment. It was said that in a middle of a crisis, laughter is the best medicine. While laughter did not do anything to change their hopeless situation, it did however help to start a bond among the Boston Tea Party.

Suddenly, their laughter was interrupted by a noise.

Hearing a strange noise outside the restaurant, they instantly fell into silence as they scrambled to find anything they could grab on as weapons. This time, though, Miguel grabbed his trusty Swiss knife from his pocket as he carefully lifted the curtain while the others hid in the corners. Eric, on the other hand, placed himself near the glass window beside Miguel, gripping the metal pipe so hard that his hands were turning white.

Lifting the curtain, Miguel took a peek outside and found a pack of goblins heading their way. He immediately closed the curtain as he felt his fear realized. They were going to be attacked!

Eric: What is it? Monsters?

Miguel: Yeah, goblins.

Claire: How many?

Miguel: At least a dozen.

Miguel found a little hole beneath the window sill and decided to take a peek. The goblin group was skulking about the streets when they heard a noise near the restaurant. Most of them had crude weapons like wooden clubs and metal pipes, while a few had bows and rusty daggers like the ones they looted yesterday. He realized that they have no chance of winning against these little green monsters. Miguel suspected that the goblins might have heard their laughter and that was why they were investigating the source of the noise.

Though an atheist, Miguel found himself praying to every god he knew for a drop of miracle.

As if the gods have heard his plea, the goblins shifted their attention towards the sound of a startled cat. As soon as the goblins went to chase the poor animal, Miguel breathed a sigh of relief.

“They’re gone,” said Miguel as the others relaxed at the news. “We should read the scrolls and learn whatever we can,” then he unrolled his scroll, skimming its contents, “I want to know your progress this night.”

----------------------------------------

The scroll reward from the SYSTEM was actually better than Miguel expected. Mage Arts: Arcane is a school of magic that is focused on combat and utility which meant that he really hit the jackpot in choosing the scroll. The scroll gave Miguel a crash course about magic.

Magic is the result of mana being used. Mana is a naturally occurring source of energy that can be found everywhere such as the air, water and living beings. However, the scroll did not provide much details on where mana came from and it formed a question in Miguel’s mind: Did mana existed on Earth before?

The scroll also provided instructions on how to sense and draw out the mana from one’s body which was a requirement before learning how to do magic. With meditation and a breathing exercise, one can gather mana and guide its flow throughout the body.

Learning this new information, Miguel relaxed himself as he closed his eyes and breathe deeply. The first thing he felt was a slight tingle throughout his body. While he couldn’t see or point out where the mana is coming from, he could feel a strange energy flowing through his body. It was like a network of flowing river inside him. The scroll mentioned that with practice and additional points to INT, one can be better in control and sensing the mana inside their body.

After familiarizing yourself with the mana inside the body, the next step was to draw out the mana by guiding the flow of energy. You can only guide the flow of mana rather than control it directly. This can be done by a basic exercise called pulsing.

Pulsing involves expelling out small amounts of mana from the body. One must be careful not to expel too much mana as you can easily get exhausted from it. The scroll instruction was to pulse continuously in a constant interval for until you feel drained.

After a few moments of rest to recover his lost mana points, Miguel moved on to the next exercise which involves another pulsing exercise, but this time, one must guide the flow of mana and expel it out only from a part of the body. This pulsing exercise can be done with any parts of the body, but the easiest was to do the pulsing with the extremities such as hands, feet and fingers.

In order to cast a spell successfully, you must follow the sequence of spell casting:

Step 1: Conception– In this step, you must clear your mind and focus on the desired result of the spell.

Step 2: Creation– This is when you must say the chant while also directing the flow of mana throughout your body. You may opt not to chant if you already mastered the spell. However, you may not skip this stage entirely. You must still direct the flow of mana or else the spell will fail.

Step 3: Release– In this step, you will feel warmer and feel an instinctive need for a release. This is the sign that the spell is ready and you must release the mana from your body by directing its flow outwards. The feeling comes from the build-up of mana inside the body. The final step is also the most dangerous because the caster may die or lose a limb if he fails to release the build-up of mana energy.

Reading the spell casting sequence, Miguel finally understood the reason why pulsing exercise was important. He could lose a hand if the mana build-up stayed too long. He imagined his hand exploding in a nasty way. That was why he did more pulsing exercise before moving on to actual spell casting.

“Damn it!”

Miguel’s concentration was interrupted when he heard Claire’s voice. When he opened his eyes, he found Claire and Dianne near him and sitting with crossed legs like him. Miguel watched in fascination as he watched his two friends who got the magic skill scrolls perform the mana exercise. He noticed that there were blueish gas radiating from Dianne. This must be what it looked like when doing the pulsing exercise. Clearly, Dianne was already on the second exercise. Miguel felt pride swell as he was already one step ahead of her.

On the other hand, Claire was cursing repeatedly with her eyes closed. Her face looked like she was having a constipation. Miguel found it amusing as he once again found another thing that he had an advantage against Claire. He could not help but laugh at his rival’s struggle.

Thankfully, they were in Melissa’s bedroom on the second floor and the monsters will not hear a thing. According to Melissa, the room was soundproofed because this was where she made her Autonomous sensory meridian response (ASMR) videos that she posted on YouTube for extra income. She had her main account where she posted cooking videos and ironically, her ASMR videos earn her more money.

Miguel scoffed that it was probably her good looks that earned her more views and subscribers. In any case, the group decided to move upstairs and stay in the soundproofed room during the day.

“This scroll is bullshit,” Miguel was shifted from his thoughts as he heard Claire said something other than fuck and damn for the last few hours. “What the hell does this ‘feel the flow of mana in your body’ even mean? This is bullshit! I’ve been doing this for hours, but I don’t feel anything!”

Miguel rolled his eyes, “Have you tried concentrating? It says here you need to clear your mind before trying this exercise.”

“But my mind is clear! This doesn’t make any sense at all!” Claire continued her rant. “How the fuck did you do it?”

“You should try calming down first, Claire,” said Dianne, her eyes still closed.

Claire whipped her head, “But I am calm!”

Miguel shook his head, “That’s not how a calmed person acts. Stop your whining and be patient. You’re not exactly showing your calmness, you know.”

Claire gritted her teeth, glaring at Miguel. She decided not to say anything, and continued meditating and do whatever the scroll instructed.

Miguel went back to reading his scroll. It said that once you are capable of directing the flow of mana from any part of your body, you may now attempt to cast spells. It was also recommended to continue doing the meditation, pulsing and flow exercises so that your spells would not waste too much mana when you cast them.

According to the scroll, you must chant the words to cast a spell. While chants are not necessarily required for casting spells, it helps the beginners for casting simple spells. It takes mastery and a lot of practice to cast spells non-verbally and without additional cost. The scroll elaborated that casting with no chants takes a lot of concentration. You need to level the spell to level 10 in order to cast non-verbally without much effort and additional MP cost.

Furthermore, the scroll strongly recommended not to experiment with the chants without reading the book, Arcane Spells for Dummies and Magical Laws and Theories for Dummies which was sold in a SYSTEM shop.

The scroll contained four basic spells: Conjure Water, Breeze, Ignite and Shock Bolt.

Conjure Water is a water type spell that summons water from an outside source, mostly from a nearby body of water or the vapors in the air. The mana cost depends on the volume of water and the quality summoned. If the quantity, quality or the source is not mentioned then by default, it will summon a liter of water from the nearby source as is. The chant was: “[Unit] of [Quality] water from [Source], Conjure Water.”

This spell was probably the most useful spell in Miguel’s opinion as it will solve their problems with lack of water. With this spell, they can now afford the pre-apocalypse luxuries such as flushing the toilet, washing their clothes and taking baths. Having dried blood all over your body and clothes wasn’t very enjoyable.

Breeze is a wind type spell that conjures a blow of wind. The wind force can be improved at the cost of more mana. Its chant: “Blow of wind, Breeze.” While the spell seemed useless, Miguel could think of many uses of this spell. It could improve the speed of a projectile such as an arrow and it can be used to deflect enemy’s arrows and make it miss. It is also a synergy to Ignite spell.

Ignite is a fire spell. It doesn’t summon fire balls or a flame thrower as it isn’t an offensive spell. It is more of a utility spell. It only summons a weak fire that was enough to light up a campfire or to light a cigarette. The scroll recommended not to use this spell in combat, but Miguel can see this spell’s potential along with the Breeze spell. It also has a short chant which was “Set aflame, Ignite.”

Shock Bolt was the only offensive spell in the scroll’s repertoire. Its main use was to stun the opponents similar to a stun gun. Miguel has decided to try the spell alongside with Conjure Water to see if the damage would improve.

Miguel closed his eyes in hard concentration. Clearing his mind, he focused on imagining electricity shooting out of his palm as he chanted slowly, “Shock the target.”

He directed the flow of mana towards his arm and into his palm. Afterwards, his hand felt warmer and felt the build-up of energy. He stretched his arm forward. He opened his eyes as the others watched him with curiosity, “Shock Bolt!”

A strange power flowed throughout Miguel’s body as a line of electricity shot forward from the palm of his right hand. The bolt of electricity hit the piece of cardboard that Miguel used as a target practice and left a scorch mark.

This book is hosted on another platform. Read the official version and support the author's work.

“Hn,” Miguel grunted and smirked with pride as his first attempt of casting magic was successful. He felt smug when he saw his friends’ jaws hanging. His grin grew wider when he saw the awed look from Claire’s expression. It wasn’t easy to impress his pretty face rival, so he winked at her, “Awesome, huh?”

When Claire saw him wink, she gritted her teeth in frustration and glared at him with intensity. She felt cheated and she regretted listening to him picking that damn illusion magic scroll. Suddenly, a great idea came to her. She stretched out her arm towards Miguel as she chanted, “Seek your desire, show them a dream of their paradise. Charm!”

Silence permeated the room as the spell failed to work.

Claire looked at Miguel with confusion, who in turn, gave her smug expression.

“That’s it?” Miguel snorted.

“Why isn’t it working?!” Claire threw the scroll at him in frustration, which Miguel answered with a chuckle. She looked ready to explode, but Dianne calmed her down and told her to be quiet.

“Were you successful in drawing out mana?” asked Miguel and Claire shook her head in the negative. “Then that’s why your spell didn’t work.”

Miguel then saw Claire scrunching her nose and forcefully trying to calm herself down. As much as he loved to jab Claire’s short temper, he needed her to learn faster as they would also depend on her on their group’s survival.

“You’re probably thinking too much,” Miguel said, looking at Claire with a serious expression. “Try to focus your mind on your breathing, then it will come to you. That’s what I did.”

“Alright,” Claire nodded, taking a deep breath, then closing her eyes in concentration.

Miguel looked around to see his teammates’ progress in learning the skill from their scrolls. Dianne was making a steady progress with her pulsing exercises while Eric was practicing the spear fighting stances. Melissa took a thick cardboard and drew black circles on it as target practice for archery. All in all, their group was doing a good job. It may take a few weeks before they were even ready for the real combat, but it was better than being sitting ducks and doing nothing.

Miguel brought his attention back into his arcane magic. One thing that Miguel could not understand in doing magic was the meaning and purpose of chants to invoke spells. Sure, even Harry Potter needs to say ‘Wingardium Leviosa’ to levitate objects, but as an avid reader of the series, Miguel could not remember why there was a need for ‘foolish wand waving or silly incantations’.

Miguel had imagined himself in Harry Potter’s shoes for a while. He remembered Hermoine saying that ‘It’s levi-O-sa. Not leviosar’. Miguel already knew that the spell will fail if the incantation was pronounced wrong, but then the important thing about Harry Potter spells was the intent of the caster. If he were Harry, he would’ve experimented with the spell using different languages, pronunciations and accents. The question was: ‘Is the same true in this RPG world?’

Even though the scroll warned him not to experiment with the chants of the spell, Miguel’s curiosity and love for testing the unknown won him over and cast the Shock Bolt spell with a different word in the chant.

Miguel took out his notebook with excitement as he listed his questions on his notebook:

Problem 1. Can you cast spells with a language other than English?

Problem 2. Can you cast spells with a different accent?

Problem 3. What will happen if you change a word in the chant of Shock Bolt spell?

These were the first three questions that formed in Miguel’s mind regarding chants. After listing the problems, he formed a hypothesis on each question:

Problem 1. Can you cast spells with a language other than English?

Hypothesis: Probably. Since the chants were in English, I will be successful with Filipino because it’s my mother tongue.

Problem 2. Can you cast spells with a different accent?

Hypothesis: Yes, as accents make no difference in the meaning of words.

Problem 3. What will happen if you change a word in the chant of Shock Bolt spell?

Hypothesis: Nothing will change as intent is more important than a simple change of wording.

After that, he designed experiments to test the hypotheses. One thing that made it hard was the designing of the test for the Problem 1. It was extremely hard to translate one language to another while creating a meaningful translation. For example, the word ‘shock’ particularly, the one that refers to ‘electric shock’ didn’t have a direct translation in Filipino language. He also couldn’t think of a translation for the word ‘target’.

The closest translation he could think of was the word ‘kuryente’ which meant ‘electricity’. He could translate the word into a verb, but it would sound really awkward. He could already feel the cringe, but for curiosity’s sake, Miguel was willing to try it.

Miguel cleared his throat as he chanted, “Kuryentehin ang target, Shock Bolt.”

His eyes widened, feeling the same strange power that flowed through his body. The electricity shot the cardboard and left another black scorch mark, “Huh, that actually worked.”

While the others were sniggering at the background, Miguel cast the Shock Bolt spell two more times using the translated chant to confirm his hypothesis. He found out that each cast of the spell cost around 20 MP. He also found out that whether the chant was in English or Filipino, the MP cost of Shock Bolt spell remained the same. While waiting for his MP to recover, Miguel went on to design the test for the second problem.

For the second test, Miguel will cast the spell in three accents for each of the two languages he knew. After he recovered his MP, Miguel cast the Shock Bolt spell two times in English using the American and British accent.

Although the spell was successful, the result was inconclusive. Miguel didn’t actually have American nor the British accent even though he tried his best to make a good impression of the accent. On the third try, however, Miguel cast the spell, again in English, but in an impression of a Japanese accent.

Miguel gulped and breathed deeply before casting the spell, “Shoku the tageto, Shoku Boruto!”

As cringe worthy as it was, surprisingly, the spell worked flawlessly. Miguel concluded that it was not the matter of how the chant was delivered, but the intent of the caster. Miguel cast the spell a few more times with the intention of increased output of the Shock Bolt and regardless of the accent or language, it really was the intent that influenced the spell.

However, even though Miguel already has conclusions for the first two questions, everything will change depending on the results of the testing of the third hypothesis.

“Shock a target, Shock Bolt!” said Miguel, changing the article word ‘the’ into ‘a’.

The line of electricity shot from his palm as the expected result. As the electricity was about to hit the cardboard, it curved to the left at the last second and hit Melissa’s cardboard target practice bull’s eye.

“What the hell!” Melissa snapped her head towards Miguel.

“Hey asshole, watch where you’re aiming!” shouted Claire.

Ignoring his friends’ rants, Miguel cast the spell two more times while using the modified chant. The second one hit his cardboard while the third one hit Melissa’s target practice again.

Miguel stroke his beard as he analyzed the results. The article word ‘the’ is used when to define a noun specific while ‘a’ is used to define a noun indefinite or refers to a general idea rather than a particular thing. In changing the article, instead of hitting Miguel’s cardboard practice, the Shock Bolt spell would hit either his or Melissa’s cardboard as Miguel considered the two as ‘Target’.

Miguel already had a prediction that this would happen and that was why, he already drilled into his mind that the target will only be limited between the two. If he didn’t, that would be dangerous as the spell could hit anything or anyone. It was probably the reason why experimenting with chants was dangerous.

After he cast Shock Bolt spell again and again on his target practice, he began to feel lightheaded and drained. He commanded the blue screen with his mind to show his current MP and his MP regeneration to check his suspicions. He suspected that the light-headedness and exhaustion might be a symptom of depletion of his MP bar.

MP: 2/140

MP/min.: 8.05

“Whew, that was exhausting than I thought,” Miguel muttered as wiped sweat from his brow.

It would take roughly 17 minutes for his MP to regenerate. While it seemed to be slow, it was twice the normal person’s MP regeneration. All because of his True-Born Mage perk. After resting for a few moments to recover, Miguel continued his experiments with the chants.

----------------------------------------

*DING!*

You have learned a skill!

Mage Arts: Arcane

You have learned new spells under Mage Arts: Arcane:

Shock Bolt

Breeze

Miguel grinned from ear to ear as he successfully learned a new skill. After the notification screen faded, he checked the details of his new skill. Apparently, all it took was to cast and understand the nature of at least two arcane spells.

Mage Arts: Arcane Skill Level: 1 Mastery: Beginner Description: A magic school that harnesses the power of the five elements: Fire, Wind, Earth, Water and Lightning to strike down foes. Skill Level Bonus: +5% Spell damage and effectiveness per Skill level. Mastery Bonus:

Beginner: N/A

Intermediate: Reduced MP consumption of Arcane spells by 30%.

Expert: +20% Spell damage and effectiveness.

Master: Able to cast any Arcane spells without chants regardless of spell level, +10 INT and WIS and unlocks Archon title.

Current Skill Level and Mastery Bonus: +5% Spell damage and effectiveness.

Shock Bolt Spell Type: Active Description: An offensive lightning spell designed to stun an enemy with a jolt of electricity. Chant: "Shock the target, Shock Bolt." Requirement(s): Must finish the required chant before use. Spell Level: 2/10 MP Cost: 20 MP per cast. Effect(s): +5% MATK of Lightning Damage per level, fixed 50% chance to stun targets with a 3% increase in stun chance per level. Current Effect(s): +10% MATK of Lightning Damage, 56% chance to stun targets.

Breeze Spell Type: Active (Channelling) Description: A wind type spell that conjures a blow of wind. Chant: "Blow of wind, Breeze." Requirement(s): Must finish the required chant before use. Spell Level: 1/10 MP Cost: 0.20 MP per second. Effect(s): -5% MP consumption per level. Current Effect(s): -5% MP consumption.

Miguel was overjoyed that he finally learned the skill after only a few hours. Well, the skill level was still low and he needed to grind. But at least, he can now monitor its progress.

Breeze, unlike the Shock Bolt spell, was relatively easy to learn. It was a wind spell that – well, it summons wind, albeit a very weak one. It was also a channelling spell which means that once the spell was activated, it will continue to drain MP until the caster stops the spell.

As Miguel looked at his notes, he noticed that he had more questions about magic than answers. He realized that he needed to do more tests with his newly gained skill, but he felt exhausted after studying the scroll and casting spells for seven hours straight.

“Miguel,” a voice called, coming from his back. Miguel turned around to see Eric carrying a bunch of PVC pipes and a tool box. “Stop whatever you’re doing and help me.”

“Can’t you just do it by yourself?” Miguel grunted. He was too drained to do anything right now. It was very tempting to have a short nap.

“You promised to help me,” Eric frowned.

“Fine,” Miguel sighed. “What are we making anyway?”

“Spears.”

Miguel couldn’t help but roll his eyes. Of course, it has to be a weapon for Eric’s own skills, “Alright, let’s do this.”

----------------------------------------

The next two days were uneventful as the group focused on two things, mainly: crafting weapons with whatever they had at the restaurant while accepting daily crafting quest to receive EXP and practicing the skills they’ve got from the scrolls.

Eric, with the help of Miguel, made two improvised spears using PVC pipes, kitchen knives, bolts and nuts. They’ve removed the handle from the kitchen knives by forcefully removing the bolts. They attached the knives to the PVC pipes and secured it with bolts and nuts.

The kitchen knives had +8 PATK and the PVC pipes had +4 PATK when used as a blunt weapon. Eric and Miguel expected that combining the two will result into a better weapon, but when they finished, the improvised spear only had +8 PATK.

Makeshift Spear

PATK: +8

Durability: 20/20

Weapon Type Bonus: Bladed I – Causes Mild Bleeding effect

Required STR: 6

Though it had the same PATK bonus as the kitchen knives, it was certainly an improvement since the weapons have longer reach. Eric and Miguel agreed that they should focus more on the safe side rather than the attack power of a weapon. After all, they would rather not get wounded by the goblin’s rusty weapons. That was if they were forced to fight.

The two best friends gave the second spear to Claire as she expressed her desire to fight in the close range. Eric shared his scroll that contained spear fighting style to Claire. The two bows were given to Dianne and Melissa as the two girls decided to stay at the back of the formation. While Dianne will act as their healer, Melissa will be supporting the group from the back with her bow and arrow.

As for Miguel, he opted to use a simple metal pipe. While a spear does indeed have the reach advantage, the weapon wasn’t suited for his fighting style. Fighting Style: Arnis requires a blunt or a bladed weapon in order to use it. They didn’t have a bolo which was a cutting tool similar to a machete, so Miguel didn’t have a choice but to use a metal pipe.

Metal Pipe

PATK: +8

Durability: 25/25

Weapon Type Bonus: Blunt I - Bypass 20% of PDEF

Required STR: 6

After they finished making weapons, Miguel told his best friend in details how it felt having a foreign object, particularly an arrow, lodged in his thigh.  Eric and Miguel decided to make improvised shields and armors.

Using stacks of phone books and other thick hardcover books, Eric and Miguel attached them to the jackets with duct tapes to make their makeshift body armor. Filling the stack of books with duct tapes was surprisingly effective and secured the books in place. Thankfully, they had enough books to make five body armors for all of them. Surprisingly, the makeshift body armor was durable, according to the blue screen. It was a bit heavy, but it will keep their vital organs from being pierced by sharp objects.

Makeshift Body Armor

PDEF: +15

Durability: 30/30

Required STR: 8

Next was the shields. While it was tempting to do stack another pile of books to make their shields, they didn’t have enough books and it would be too cumbersome to wield. Using wood pieces from the chairs, Eric and Miguel nailed them together to make the shields. They also attached rubber strips for the straps.

Makeshift Wooden Shield

PDEF: +12

Durability: 25/25

Required STR: 8

They made a total of five body armors, four wooden shields and a small shield for Melissa so she could still wield a shield without further hindering her aim with the bow.

As to the progress of their skills, Dianne learned to cast Healing Hands spell on the third day of their stay in the restaurant. It was the only spell that was written on her scroll. According to Dianne’s scroll, healing magic didn’t have too many spells and it relied more on the knowledge of the anatomy rather than the knowledge of magic itself. That was why it included basic anatomy knowledge and instructions how to heal wounds such as cuts and bruises.

Apparently, you do not need to wound yourself and heal it in order to level up the Healing Hands spell as Miguel originally thought. You also can gain skill EXP with the spell by studying anatomy.

Melissa and Eric were also successful in learning their respective fighting styles. Fighting Style: Spear and Fighting Style: Archery skill scrolls included how to use and fight with the weapons properly and it included simple exercises to enhance their skills with the weapons. Eric and Claire practiced Spear Thrust technique by thrusting their improvised spear repeatedly to level the technique. The two also sparred for three hours every morning to improve their proficiency with the weapon.

Meanwhile, Melissa practiced her shooting to improve her aim with the bow and arrow. She can hit the bullseye 3 out of 5 times. Not only that, she also increased her DEX by 1 by gaining a perk called Practiced Aim I. According to Miguel, Melissa’s skill in marksmanship wasn’t that impressive as the rest of the group thought.

Miguel mentioned that the goblins won’t wait for Melissa’s arrow like sitting ducks. Furthermore, the goblins were small target and they were quick on their feet. He suggested to practice on moving targets instead and the smaller the target, the better. That was why Eric hanged a piece of plywood on the ceiling with a rope as a target practice. Melissa would try to hit the plywood while it swings.

Claire was very frustrated as she already learned Fighting Style: Spear but she still couldn’t cast the spells in her skill scroll Mage Arts: Illusion. That was why she practiced and sparred with Eric at days while learning magic at night. She can already feel the flow of her mana inside her body and Miguel continued to give instructions on how to do the pulsing exercises to be able to cast spells.

As for Miguel, he was the first one to learn everything in the scroll and was now capable casting all four Arcane spells. It only took him only a day to learn everything in the scroll. Miguel suspected that it was the Quick Learner perk’s overpowered effect. He learned the last two spells from the scrolls: Conjure Water and Ignite, making a total number of four spells in his spell repertoire.

Conjure Water Spell Type: Active Description: A basic water type spell that summons water from an external source, mostly from a nearby body of water or the vapors in the air. MP consumption depends on the volume of water and the quality summoned. If the quantity, quality or the source is not mentioned then by default, it will summon a gallon of pure water from the nearby source. Chant: “[Unit] of [Quality] water from [Source], Conjure Water.” Requirement(s): Must finish the required chant before use and there must be a water source within 10 kilometer. Spell Level: 3/10 MP Cost: 5 MP per gallon + 0-8 MP per water quality rating. 0 MP for ultrapure, 4 MP for drinkable, 6 MP for good and 8 MP for poor. Effect(s): -5% MP consumption per level. Current Effect(s): -15% MP consumption per level.

Ignite Spell Type: Active Description: A basic fire spell that conjures small fire designed to light objects such as lamps and campfires. Chant: “Set aflame, Ignite.” Requirement(s): Must finish the required chant before use. Spell Level: 1/10 MP Cost: 10 MP per cast. Effect(s): -5% MP consumption per level. Current Effect(s): -5% MP consumption per level.

Ignite would seem to be good to use in combat as it was a fire type spell, but when combined with Breeze, it only summons a tiny flame and Breeze would immediately extinguish the flame. It was designed as a utility spell rather than for combat. Well, that was why the scroll included Shock Bolt spell and it was a combat spell.

At first glance, Conjure Water didn’t make any sense as to its MP consumption. Why would conjuring ultrapure water would cost no MP while poor quality water would cost more. When Miguel thought about it, it did make sense.

In his guess, Conjure Water spell only conjures water in its purest form. In order to conjure water with other particles such as sodium, microorganisms, dirt, etc., the spell will need to more mana to allow them to be conjured alongside with the water. Furthermore, water in its pure form isn’t conductive. You’ll need dissolved solids in the water to make it conductive to electricity, which gave Miguel an idea to make the Shock Bolt spell into an AOE (Area-of-effect) spell.

Miguel had nothing more to learn from the scroll, so he focused on levelling all of his spells as much as possible by using them for the group’s convenience, especially the Breeze spell to make Melissa’s room feel less stuffy and Conjure Water spell for their everyday needs.

Miguel didn’t mention it to the group that he was conjuring their water, including their drinking water from the sewers, septic tanks from nearby buildings and the remaining water from the water pipes. In his reasoning, the spell automatically filters the impurities from the water, so those waters were viable source.

One thing that Miguel noticed was that, levelling up skills and spells wasn’t easy as learning them even with his overpowered perk. Even with continued use throughout the day, Conjure Water was still at level 1.

At the moment, Miguel was filling up a plastic drum with ultrapure water by casting Conjure Water after he took a bath. He found out that ultrapure water was really, really good at cleaning things. They use it for washing dishes, clothes and of course, their bodies. It made the soap easier to form lather. It wasn’t good for drinking though, because it tasted literally nothing at all. You have drinking water for that anyway, which tasted like – water.

“Hey,” Miguel turned his head around as he heard Claire called him.

“What?”

“There’s something wrong with the water from your magic,” Claire stated as she leaned on the wall. “It makes the soap hard to rinse and my skin feels... slimy after taking a bath. Can’t you do something about it?”

“I can,” Miguel lazily replied as he finished filling the whole drum, “but it cost more mana. You’re just not used with soft water.”

“I don’t like it,” Claire said with a frown.

“Unfortunately for you, I do,” Miguel gave her a deadpanned look as he faced her.

Claire narrowed her eyes at him for a few seconds, but she let out an exasperated sigh as her expression softened, “We need to talk.”

“Go on. Talk,” Miguel shrugged, staring at Claire with a lazy expression.

“Look, please listen what I’m going to say before you react,” Claire said as she seemed to be hesitating. Miguel was expecting to hear a criticism from her or something, but he realized, why would she hesitate to criticize him?

“Alright,” Miguel nodded. “I promise whatever you say, I’ll listen before I react.”

“Good. That’s good,” Claire licked her lips nervously. “Listen – um. You know I work part-time at Jollibee as a crew, right?”

Jollibee is, or in this case after the apocalypse happened, was one of the largest fast food chain restaurants in the country. They served hamburgers, chicken, fries and other food that you’ll also find on the menu of its rival, McDonald’s.

Miguel learned a year ago that Claire worked part-time in a fast food restaurant and at the same time, she was a student. That was actually why Miguel had a deep respect for his rival. Claire could still find the energy to study and compete with him even if she was exhausted at work. But why would Claire suddenly open it up?

His nose scrunched as he asked, “So? What’s this about?”

“There’s a Jollibee just in front of this restaurant,” Claire simply answered. “I already talked with Eric about this and though he agreed with me, he told me to talk to you.”

“Oh,” Miguel raised his brow. “Let me guess. You want to loot the place?” she nodded in the affirmative, “like I said before, I don’t like needlessly risking our lives.”

“Well, yes, it would seem like we’re taking an unnecessary risk here, but think about it,” Claire argued. “There a treasure trove of food stuffs right on our doorstep and we’re just ignoring it. This is a good opportunity, you see. Besides, the food stuffs won’t last very long in the freezer.”

“My answer is still the same,” Miguel deadpanned.

“And yet, you agreed with Eric to get the gasoline in his car last night?” Claire rolled her eyes, folding her arms. “For what? To make molotovs? I never thought weapons were more important than food.”

To be honest, Miguel only agreed to help Eric get the gasoline out of his car because his best friend parked his car right outside the restaurant. The car was literally right out of their doorstep while Jollibee was located across the road in front of Melissa’s restaurant. Eric wouldn’t stop bugging Miguel about it all throughout yesterday, so in the end, Miguel gave in to his best friend’s request.

Besides, he agreed only because crafting Molotov cocktails would complete the daily quest.

“Come on, Miguel,” Claire pleaded. “It’ll be like a walk in the park.”

Miguel looked at Claire and he can already tell that she won’t take ‘no’ for an answer, “If it is a quest, then maybe…”

*DING!*

The Raid of Jollibee

One of the members of the Boston Tea Party suggested to loot the fast food restaurant for the foodstuffs as it won’t last for long.

Main Objective: Get the foodstuffs from Jollibee.

Side Objective 1: Get all the foodstuffs.

Side Objective 2: Finish the quest with no casualty.

Reward(s): EXP and 1,000 Game Credits + 500 Game Credits per Side Objective completed.

Requirement(s): None

“There you go,” Claire’s lips curved into a smile.

Before Miguel could reject the quest, Eric, Dianne and Melissa burst through the bathroom’s door, making Miguel jump out in surprise.

“There’s a quest!” Eric exclaimed with uncontained excitement. “Are we going to do this?”

“We were just talking about looting the food in Jollibee a few moments ago,” Dianne said, tapping her chin with a finger. “Weird.”

“We were talking about it too,” said Claire, pointing her finger at Miguel. “He said he’ll accept it if it’s a quest.”

“So we’ll really do it this time?” Eric shot his best friend with an incredulous look. “You really said that?”

“No,” Miguel shook his head. “I said I’ll consider it, but…”

“Look, if you don’t want to do this, you don’t have to join us,” Melissa cut him off as she shrugged. “You can just sit this one out.”

“Let me think for a second,” Miguel said as he sat on a chair.

He paused for a moment to think about the risk involved in the quest. First, there were monsters hungry for human flesh outside. Well, he wasn’t sure that there were goblins roaming the streets at night, but he believed that there were more dangerous monsters during the night as it was common in most MMOs he played.

During the last two days, they have been observing the goblins’ behavior. Miguel noticed that the goblin patrolled the streets in groups of three to twelve goblins with the exception of the largest group of at least a hundred goblins they saw yesterday. They assumed that it wasn’t a normal patrol group, but rather, a horde just passing through.

Horns would be sounded every sundown and the goblins would stop whatever they were doing and go in the direction of the sound. They would retreat to God-knows-somewhere. Although Miguel could hear multiple sounds of horns from every direction, he noticed that the closest to the restaurant was the same horn they hear every sundown. It meant that whoever was blowing that horn, it was close to the restaurant. Dangerously close.

That was why Eric came up with the idea of making Molotov cocktails. Miguel agreed into it because he was also afraid of facing an entire horde of little green flesh eaters. If ever they were to face them, at least they could try to intimidate them with small boom-booms of flaming bottles and hope to scare them away. Besides, gasoline still burned even after the apocalypse.

Also, due to this strange goblin behavior during sundown, the party was more active during the night than the day.

Second, assuming that the goblins were really gone during night time, the certainty of encountering an unknown monster lurking in the dark was almost one-hundred percent in Miguel’s overly paranoid mind. It wasn’t that he was afraid of the dark. No, he was afraid of the unknown. It was the thing that you didn’t see or know that will kill you.

Of course, Miguel could just be overreacting and maybe the quest will go on without a hitch, but that was like saying that nothing can ever go wrong. Especially in this post-apocalyptic monster world, anything can go wrong. Murphy’s Law was almost the same as the laws of physics. 

Third point was the cost-benefit analysis. Whenever Miguel had a difficult decision to make, he would always weigh the benefit over the cost. Is the benefit of having more food and supply outweighs the risk of going further out in the night?

The answer was simple. The food that will make them last for months was definitely worth it. It was almost a dream where he could spend the rest of his numbered life, eating nothing but french fries, fried chicken, hotdogs, burgers and sodas. Miguel’s only wish was that Jollibee also served pizza and his dream post-apocalyptic vacation would be complete.

On a serious note, the benefits alone trumped all the risks the party will be taking. With that in mind, Miguel had made his decision.

“Alright,” Miguel said, folding his arms. “Do we have a plan? We can’t just go in there without some sort of a plan.”

There was a pause.

“Actually, that’s why we came to you,” Eric stated, scratching his head. “I know you’ll come up with something like a plan.”

“Oh,” Miguel raised an eyebrow. As much as he wanted to let his friends do all the hard work, including the planning, Miguel was unofficially the leader of the group. “Claire, since you worked in Jollibee, do you know the layout of the place? Particularly, the one outside? If we’re going to loot the place, I want us to go in and out as fast as we can.”

“Hmm,” Claire’s brows furrowed as she scratched her chin. “As far as I know, all Jollibee outlets have standard layouts. They’re more or less the same. I’ve been inside of that particular outlet. Well, as a customer, but not as a crew.”

“Can you draw me the basic layout?”

“Sure.”

After Claire drew the store layout of Jollibee in a piece of paper, Miguel formulated a plan and discussed it with the rest of the group.

The plan was simple. Miguel, Eric and Claire will go out while Melissa and Dianne wait in the restaurant as lookouts and to open the door when the three were finished with the quest. Claire will be the one to lead the quest as she was the most knowledgeable of the place. 

They emptied out their inventories to make space for the food. Miguel suggested that if they were going to loot the place, then why not loot everything one time? They also brought a number of large empty cardboard boxes in case that the foodstuffs won’t stack in one inventory cell.

Just last night, all the party members were busy crafting Molotov cocktails after Eric and Miguel looted all the gasoline from Eric’s car. Apparently, Eric always made sure that his tank was full every week and he refuelled every Monday morning. Luckily, it was Monday when the apocalypse happened. They’ve got at least forty-eight liters of gasoline.

The only problem was the bottle containers for the Molotov cocktails. They only had twenty-four 500 ml. beer bottles and twelve 1,000 ml. soda bottles. After they’ve filled all the bottles, they’ve got less than twenty-four liters of gasoline left. Before they went out, Miguel did a final recap of the plan to the group. Eric passed on the Molotov cocktails to the group in case they encounter monsters.

“Ready?” Miguel asked as he turned to his friends. They silently nodded in reply. “Remember to stick to the plan and use the Party Comms to warn us, okay?”

Eric removed the nails from the door with a hammer, he signalled the group that it was ready. They wore their facemask to mask their nose with the putrid smell of rotting corpses.

Miguel: Let’s go.

Eric and Claire whipped out their spears from their inventory while Miguel took out his metal pipe. They did a last minute check on their makeshift armor and took out their wooden shields in case they were ambushed by goblins with bows and arrows.

Before setting out, Eric stuck out his head on the door, looking to his left and right. Luckily, it was the night of the full moon and they can see clearly in the night. After he confirmed that the streets were cleared of monsters, Eric gave the clear signal.

Crossing the street, Miguel, Eric and Claire went out and moved quickly towards the Jollibee building. The streets were littered with rotting and leftover corpses. Even wearing facemasks weren’t enough to block the smell. It almost made the three puke out their dinner, but Miguel reminded them to try not to look at the corpses and focus on the objective of the quest.

The trio did not use the main entrance of the fast food restaurant. Instead, Claire led them to the back door the restaurant used for delivery shipments. The steel door seemed to have been locked from the inside as it wouldn’t budge when Eric tried to open it.

Eric: It’s locked.

Claire: I’ll take care of it.

Claire shoved Eric and Miguel out of the way as she put down her spear and shield. She pulled a hairpin from her hair and a small tool with a ‘hook’ on the end from her wallet. After a few seconds of tinkering with the door lock, Claire opened the door and gestured for the two to follow her.

The two best friends stared blankly at each other as they watched their friend skilfully and successfully pick a lock. Miguel narrowed his eyes as he tried to process in his mind what he just witnessed. ‘Why would Claire know how to pick locks?’

Claire: What are you two waiting for? Come on, let’s go.

Eric and Miguel shrugged and followed her inside the building.

Miguel: It’s dark in here. I can’t see a thing.

Eric: Good thing I made torches.

Eric, looking smug and proud, pulled out three torches from his inventory and handed out the two to Miguel and Claire. He checked his pockets for something to light the torches, but he seemed to forget to bring it.

Eric: Damn it! I forgot to bring a lighter.

Miguel: I’ll take care of it.

“Set aflame,” Miguel muttered under his breath as he focused his mana on his torch. “Ignite.”

A small flame shot out from Miguel’s fingertips, making the makeshift torch burn brightly throughout the darkness. Earlier, Eric made three makeshift torches by wrapping thick cloth in a wood, and soaking it in gasoline. Eric and Claire lit theirs by touching their torches with Miguel’s.

Eric: Ah, how can I forget magic? Have I told you how convenient you are to have in our party, Miguel?

Miguel: You did. This will be the fourteenth time you said it.

Claire: You can suck each other’s cocks later. We don’t have all night.

Dianne: We can hear you from here, you know.

Claire: Whatever.

As the torch’s light illuminated the kitchen, the trio gasped in horror at the sight.

The whole room reeked of foul stench coming from the bloodied corpses of the fast food crews. The people were butchered like pigs. Just like the corpses they saw outside, there were signs that they were eaten by the goblins.

Dried blood and rotting viscera littered the walls and the tiled floors making their shoes stick with every step. Even the putrid smell permeating the room was worse than outside. The trio quickly bolted out of the kitchen through the back door entrance and puked out their meal in their stomachs.

“God that was horrible,” Eric panted as his eyes watered. “I don’t think I can eat meat after seeing that shit.”

“Unfortunately,” drawled a sickly Claire. “The foodstuffs we’re going to loot are mostly meat products. Beef patties and chicken.”

That statement made Eric vomit for the second time.

“Come on guys,” Miguel rubbed Eric’s back as he helped him get up. He picked up Eric’s torch from the ground and handed it to him. “Focus on the objective. The faster we get this done, the sooner we get back.”

The trio breathed deeply in unison as they braced their selves for the gruesome sight and entered the kitchen once again. Holding her breath, Claire led the group where the fast food restaurant kept their stock. There were lots of foodstuffs around the kitchen, but according to Claire, they were exposed outside for too long and probably not safe to eat. Besides, those foods were to be served to the customers before the apocalypse happened and they were probably contaminated.

Claire and Eric moved as fast they could and took all the boxes containing foodstuffs while Miguel stood on guard. They inspected the foodstuffs first before they store it in their inventory and fortunately, they were still good. There were boxes and plastic bags of potato fries, ground beef patties, fried chickens, hamburger buns, uncooked pasta, tomato sauce, hotdogs and other foodstuffs such as tomatoes and lettuces.

Eric found some sacks of rice, but he found it wet. At first, he thought it was water, but upon closer look and with the light from his torch, he found out that it was contaminated with blood. The blood came from the dismembered corpse beside the rice. It made him puke for the third time.

As Eric and Claire swept the place, Miguel looted mayonnaise, ketchup, grated cheese and other non-food stuffs he found in the kitchen.

“Why do you need so many cooking oil?” Eric asked as he saw his best friend storing large containers of cooking oil in his inventory.

“It’s for Melissa,” answered Miguel with a shrug. “She can’t cook everything we looted without cooking oil.”

“Oh,” Claire raised an eyebrow. “How about the gravy? What’s it for?”

“You’re seriously asking me what the gravy is for?” Miguel snorted. “I prefer to eat my fried chicken with gravy, thank you very much.”

Melissa: Guys! Come back here! Quick!

The trio looked at each other when they received Melissa’s message. Miguel’s heart almost skipped a beat because he instructed Melissa and Dianne to call them when something was happening or coming into the restaurant. Something like monsters.

Miguel: What’s the problem?

Dianne: Monsters!

Their eyes widened in shock and froze for a moment. The trio rushed towards the main entrance of the fast food restaurant as it was faster than to go to the back door and circle back towards Melissa’s restaurant.

The restaurant’s door was closed, but there was light coming from the windows. It meant that Melissa and Dianne probably saw the monster from the window. The trio froze when they saw a tall figure slowly walking towards the restaurant.

The monster had a humanoid appearance and walked upright, but what made it a monster was its ghoulish appearance. Standing for at least seven feet tall, it had a thin skeletal body similar to an emaciated human. It had unnaturally elongated arms and legs and razor sharp nails. Its body was devoid of any hair and its grayish skin was similar to corpse in an advanced stage of decomposition.

Night Ghoul Lvl. 25

Fortunately, it was moving at an extremely slow speed. Slow as it may be, it was still a high level monster which made Miguel worry.

Claire: What’re we gonna do?

Eric: I say we try to kill it. It’s moving really, really slow.

Miguel: No. We can’t risk it. It’s level 25 for a reason. We should divert its attention instead.

Eric: So we make a noise or something?

Miguel: Yes, that’s the idea.

Miguel picked up an empty can he saw on the ground and threw it in the opposite direction of the restaurant. As soon as the can hit the ground and made a clinking sound, the night ghoul ignored it and continued to move into the restaurant. Eric and Claire imitated him and threw rocks directly at the night ghoul and even dealt one point of damage, but the monster’s aggro didn’t budge a little.

-1 HP!

Claire: It didn’t work. Now what?

Miguel was cursing himself internally for agreeing with Claire on her plans to loot Jollibee for food. He gestured to the two to stop throwing things as it didn’t do anything to divert the monster’s attention.

He stopped for a moment to think while observing the monster. Clearly, the night ghoul didn’t care for sounds and it seemed to be going to the window instead of the door. Though it literally moved at a snail pace, something was attracting the monster.

Miguel: What did you two do to attract the monster?

Dianne: Why?

Miguel: Did you two do anything before you see the monster?

Dianne: We didn’t do anything! I swear!

Miguel: How about the curtains? Were you aware that it can see the light coming from the windows?

Melissa: Oh. Sorry about that.

Melissa closed the curtains and made sure that no light was coming out of the windows. As soon as she did, the night ghoul stopped on its tracks and froze like a statue.

Eric: It stopped! Nice one!

Claire: But how? All we did was closed the curtains. We even threw rocks at it and ignored us completely!

Eric: I don’t know.

Unfortunately for the party, a few seconds after the night ghoul stopped, it moved again, but this time, it was heading towards their direction.

“Shit!” Eric cursed loudly, forgetting the party’s rule about using Party Comms. “It’s coming for us!”

“No shit, Sherlock,” Claire said nervously as she turned her head to Miguel. “Any ideas?”

Miguel looked around him and noticed that Eric was still carrying his torch while he and Claire already extinguished theirs. After seeing that the night ghoul didn’t care about sounds or even the one who dealt damage on it, Miguel came up with a theory that the night ghoul was attracted to one thing.

“Eric, put out your…”

Before Miguel could instruct his best friend to put out his torch, Eric suddenly rushed towards the ghoul with his makeshift spear in hand and torch and shield in the other.

-9 HP!

The spear pierced the ghoul’s body from its back. Eric pulled out the spear quickly and the night ghoul’s stab wound bled with black colored blood. The night ghoul was dazed at the surprise attack and let out a snarl at Eric. Seeing an opportunity, Claire followed Eric’s attack with another stab on its torso.

-8 HP!

Eric and Claire backed off for a while when the ghoul let out a shrilling snarl. It was so loud that it can probably be heard from miles afar. Eric and Claire continued to stab the night ghoul with their spears while dodging its slow claw swipes. Thankfully, the night ghoul was also slow in its attack that it takes at least three seconds for the creature to swipe its clawed hand.

Miguel cleared his mind as he willed his mana to move throughout his body, “Shock the target, Shock Bolt!”

The electricity shot out from his hand and hit the night ghoul squarely on its chest. Though the damage was a bit lacking and weaker compared to his friends’ damage, the night ghoul shuddered as the electricity shocked its body. The night ghoul was left stunned at Miguel’s magic.

-5 HP!

Stunned!

When the word ‘stunned’ appeared over the night ghoul’s head, the icon that appeared next wasn’t like when he kicked the goblin on its head. The icon was a flashing yellow lightning symbol instead of stars circling above the head. The trio ganged on the helpless monster while Miguel peppered it with Shock Bolt.

Little did they know, the night ghoul’s ear-piercing scream was a call for help.

“Look!” Eric yelled as he pointed his finger. His eyes widened in fear.

When Miguel and Claire turned their heads around, they saw dozens of night ghouls coming towards their direction. Even though Eric’s torch was already gone, the night ghouls were still coming for them.

“Ahhhh!”

-44 HP!

[Makeshift Wooden Shield] is broken!

Bleeding!

Their attention was shifted to their teammate. Eric fell to the ground when the night ghoul swiped its clawed hand and broken through his shield like a hot knife on butter. Not only his shield was broken, Eric’s arm also suffered from the devastating attack and it was bleeding. Miguel and Claire nodded at each other, seemingly reading each other’s thoughts.

“Shock the target, Shock Bolt!”

-5 HP!

Stunned!

Miguel cast Shock Bolt on the night ghoul to distract it while Claire lunged her spear. She pushed the spear with all her strength to push the monster back as far away as possible. Afterwards, Claire immediately stored her spear and shield to her inventory and dragged Eric away and back into the restaurant.

“Oh my god!” Melissa yelled as she helped Claire drag Eric.

While Miguel was following Claire and Eric back to the restaurant, he took a bottle of Molotov Cocktail from his inventory and cast Ignite on the gasoline-soaked cloth, “Set aflame, Ignite!”

As soon as the cocktail was lit, Miguel threw the bottle with the full force of his arm to the night ghoul.

Burning!

A new icon appeared at the top of the monster: an orange flame icon. The foul creature shrieked in agony as the flames burned away its flesh. Though it seemed that the night ghoul wasn’t going to die anytime soon, it wasn’t Miguel’s intention to kill the monster with Molotov.

No. Miguel had another thing in his mind when he threw the flaming bottle.

Earlier, when Melissa closed the curtain to block off the candle light coming out of the windows, Miguel came up with a conclusion that it was not sound nor damage that attracted the night ghoul. It was fire. [5]

Due to the presence of other night ghouls, Miguel intended to use the Molotov to divert their attention to their burning kin.

Miguel quickly went back into the restaurant. He and Claire closed the door and nailed the wooden planks back to barricade the door. While Dianne was using her magic to heal Eric, Miguel and Claire took a look outside to see what happened at the burning creature.

The night ghoul was flailing throughout the streets far enough from the restaurant while its kin followed it like moths to the flame.

“It’s working,” Claire muttered, poking her elbow to her rival’s side. “Good thinking.”

“Thanks.”

It took a while for the fire to go out, but the night ghoul fell to the ground weakened. It still wasn’t dead even though it was badly burnt. The night ghouls eventually got near enough and did something that shocked Miguel and Claire.

“They’re attacking it,” Claire stated with disbelief in her tone.

Miguel did not say anything in reply and continued to watch the event unfold. After a few claw swipes, the night ghoul let out its final ear-piercing cry before finally dying. Afterwards, the group of night ghouls stood frozen like statues as they were again deprived of the light stimuli. Moving with urgency, Miguel closed the curtains while Claire secured the curtains with duct tapes to prevent it from opening accidentally. They were certain that they did not want another incident with night ghouls to happen again.

Level up!

“I levelled up,” said Claire.

Miguel suddenly remembered Eric. Though he and the rest of the party levelled up, Miguel ignored the blue screen as he worried for his friend’s condition. He snapped his head to his back and turned his attention to his injured friend. Eric was laid on the floor with his head resting on Melissa’s lap while Dianne was in the process of healing his wounds with magic.

“Mend the wound; Stop the bleeding, Healing Hands,” Dianne said as she cast Healing Hands spell. Her hands glowed with warm green light as she touched Eric’s wound.

“How is he?” Miguel asked, kneeling beside Eric.

“Whew,” Dianne deeply exhaled, wiping off the sweat from her brows. “I’m not done yet, but I already stopped the bleeding. See?” she removed the cloth covering Eric’s wound.

“Good job,” Miguel gave her a small smile. He felt like a huge chunk of his worry was gone. “Just continue whatever you’re doing.”

“Yeah,” Dianne replied with a tired smile. “I’m just resting for a bit to recover my mana.”

Miguel didn’t know shit about healing magic. He was seriously considering learning Mage Arts: Healing so they’ll have a backup healer. He wished that there was a medical encyclopedia conveniently lying around, so he and Dianne can grind the skill and spell level.

As he looked over his party members, he noticed the grim atmosphere and the signs of low morale. Of course, it was only natural since they were attacked by high level monsters and one of them was badly injured. Eric was still unconscious as he probably lost a lot of blood because of the incident.

Miguel internally cursed as they were still badly prepared despite of everything they’ve done. It was like the world itself was against them and it certainly felt like doing nothing was the safest option. Were they wrong when they took the risk in order to get more supplies?

Whatever the answer, Miguel felt like he failed as a leader and his plan for the worst wasn’t adequate. Just believing in Murphy’s law wasn’t enough. He realized that he needed to live by that code.

That night, the party did not find any sleep. All of them come to a realization, that they could die at any given moment. That the world, though similar to a game, was not a game at all.

That, and the danger was real.

----------------------------------------

----------------------------------------

[1] Cooked rice is the basis of almost every Filipino meal. The main dish that goes with rice is called Ulam. There is no direct one-word English translation for this word. Some would say that viand would be the closest translation, but it’s not.

[2] Tap water in the Philippines isn’t potable. While some buy drinkable water, most Filipinos who live in poverty boil tap water to make it drinkable. We also have a habit of storing water in water drums because of the unreliability of water services (Especially in the capital region). Sometimes, a week goes by without a drop of water from the faucets.

[3] Gabe Newell is the co-founder and president of Valve Corporation.

[4] Panis means spoiled (food) which was kind of ironic since Melissa was a good cook and her restaurant wasn’t doing well financially.

[5] Some of you would notice that it was full moon when the Night Ghoul attacked. Yes, I’m aware of that. We’ll learn more about Night Ghouls in the later chapters. It’ll be an important plot device.