"Hey Thalion, you have grown in power," Kai commented, stepping a bit closer.

"Dude, not only grown. Did you see how fast he is?" Sylas exclaimed loudly.

"Thank you very much. So, can I get a little tour of this giant fortress?" Thalion asked with a smile. It felt good reuniting, but he also felt that this might only be temporary. He needed to find new forms and travel to the mountain so he couldn't stay for too long.

To reconnect with people you had experienced so much with was very nice, but he already noticed that the desire to squeeze the maximum progress out of every hour was slowly decreasing. Maybe it was just in his head. Owning a room here, he could still go out and come back after a week of hunting.

"Sure, we have a lot of smiths, and your equipment looks pretty bad, my friend," Sylas announced, dragging him along.

"Those sword movements looked skilled. Did you train with the sword?" Kai asked while moving with Sylas and Thalion to the exit.

"Yeah, I got my hands on a scroll that taught me some forms," Thalion responded.

"At which attack form are you at the moment?" Kai asked, interested.

"I'm close to perfecting the third form," Thalion answered. "Where are you at the moment?"

"I've got some kind of teacher in a crystal who can talk with me, but to put it in forms, I'm close to finishing the fourth," Kai said with a smile. Yeah, no wonder that guy was better than him when it came to the sword, Thaloin thought.

"Okay, anyway," Sylas threw in while opening the gate, "welcome to our home. Over there are the smiths. Don't get irritated that there are only seven buildings. In every building are many forges and multiple smiths working."

"Yeah, I noticed already. This space alteration is so cool," Thalion replied. "So, what are the other buildings, and who lives in the big one in the middle?"

"We live there, of course. Kael does too. Before yesterday, it was just a big house where we held our meetings, but his patron has special buildings for his blessed ones, so we got this giant building that wasn't even much more expensive than the house before," Sylas concluded with a big smile.

"Over there are the alchemists. They can make potions and enchant matireals," Kai informed him.

"And we have tailors and enchanters, both placed in front of the smiths. The rest is living space, but now I want to introduce you to two of my new friends, and I swear you won't believe it," Sylas excitedly said while dashing toward the building in the middle.

"Okay," Thalion managed to get out while dashing after the mage, with Kai staying behind, smiling broadly.

They opened the door of the tall building where Sylas and the others lived. Both entered the massiv entrance hall, with statues of some ranger in a green-brown cloak and a bow on his back standing everywhere. The ceiling was over thirty meters high, with two big chandeliers hanging down.

Thalion even had to speed up because Sylas didn't even turn around as he rushed up the stairs. After a short sprint, they arrived at a big door over three meters tall with many decorations on it. Sylas was already about to open it when they finally caught up. There was a lot of noise coming from the room. Someone was definitely fighting, and a lot of water was involved, at least from the sound of it.

Sylas opened the door and stormed into the room, with Thalion and Kai right behind him. In the middle of another giant room, which was bigger than most houses on earth, two people were fighting: a woman with a snake staff and a boy in some kind of stone armor.

"Hey Thalion, meet my new friends, Jakob and Annie," Sylas introduced the two.

To say that Thalion was shocked was pretty accurate, as he stood frozen in the middle of the room.

Shit, this is bad, Thalion thought. On the way to the fortress, he'd decided that if he met Kael and the others, he would come clean and tell them about his true class. At some point, it would come out anyway, but he wasn't ready to do it now. So what should he do?

Luckily, Jakob took him out of the spotlight as he excitedly shouted, "Thalion, you made it! We were so worried that they got you."

"Yeah, it all worked out pretty well for me. I heard the alarms. What happened on your end that night?" Thalion said. His heart was racing, and somehow it empowered him. He felt stronger than ever. It had to be his passiv skill heart of the sanguine archon.

"Wait, you two know each other?" Sylas asked slowly, his eyes wide.

"Yeah, do you know the story we told you about breaking into the city of the blue robes?" Annie chipped in. "It was all his idea. Without him, we would never have reached this level of strength, and we managed to get revenge on many of the people who wronged us."

"Wow, that's so cool! Since I already know your story, Thalion, please tell me what you've been up to since we parted," Sylas eagerly asked. "And I want to know everything that happened in that city."

"Well, Kael already promised me some time to tell my story later, so I'll wait until then. Telling a story twice in a row sucks," Thalion answered, his heart still pounding.

"We have a meeting later this evening. You're, of course, invited. Afterward, we should all be free to talk," Kai calmly said, who now also arrived in the chamber.

"That sounds great," Thalion said, relieved to have more time to think it all over. "I'm going to check out the smiths. I've also acquired a skill for smithing."

"But first, I want to introduce you to my other new friends. You won't believe it. It's an orc and a young girl who were traveling together! They're even friends! I couldn't believe it myself, but the orc is actually a swell guy. His name is Kargul," Sylas concluded excitedly, almost jumping on the spot.

Thalion felt his heart hammering again. How was that possible? And why did it affect him so much? He had killed humans before without a second thought.

The story has been illicitly taken; should you find it on Amazon, report the infringement.

"That is truly something special," Thalion stammered, feeling all eyes on him. "I'm curious to hear their story tonight. See you later." With that, he quickly exited the room.

"Well, normally, he isn't like that," Jakob said with concern. "Do you think he got hit on the head?"

The others just shrugged, all with smiles on their faces.

"I'm really interested in what he's experienced," Kai said, watching the man who had once saved his life.

Thalion exited the home of his friends, sweat running down his forehead. "That was close," he thought. "But I managed it well. They didn't even notice anything was amiss. Good job, Thalion."

On to some smithing. He walked down the road to the first smithy, and when he entered the door, he had another shock. Inside, there were little streets with multiple smithies on either side. This is so cool, he thought.

He entered the first one, where an old man was hammering a sword. The smith probably didn't like it that much, according to the power in every swing. This is way too much force, Thalion thought, but the sword barely changed its shape, so maybe it wasn't too much? He wasn't sure anymore.

What is that sword made of? Thalion wondered. The old man was so focused on his work, and Thalion didn't want to disturb him, so he took a seat on one of the chairs in the corner and watched the smith at work.

He hadn't anticipated how long the smith would take to forge the sword... it took over four hours, and the meeting would soon start. The positive side was that Thalion had learned much just by watching the old man. The heat he used, the way he shaped the sword. It was the peak of smithing for Thalion.

He now realized many of the mistakes he had made back in the woods when he destroyed weapon after weapon. And leaving the technical aspect aside, the man had also infused mana into the sword while forging. Truly magnificent, Thalion thought while watching the smith.

The old man held the sword up in the air, inspecting his work. Then he noticed Thalion and screamed in shock, stumbling back.

"Who are you?" the old man asked Thalion, still in shock.

"I am Thalion. How did you do that? I've never seen anything like it," Thalion introduced himself with a light smile on his lips. He kind of thought that the smith had noticed him but didn't want to say anything because he was so caught up in his work.

"Ah, well, I just did what I learned from my class and the scroll," the old man mumbled.

"Can you show me how sometime? I also have a skill related to smithing," Thalion asked, hopeful.

"Sure, sure, but first I need to finish this beauty here," the man said, now smiling.

"Nice, see you later," Thalion said and left the smithy. This man was truly a genius. The ease with which he formed the blade was astonishing.

Thalion was looking forward to seeing the old man again. Now it was time to meet his friends, but he needed a moment to gather his thoughts. He sat down on one of the benches in front of a house, deep in thought.

He had already made the decision to tell them about his class, but now it was about how deep into the details he could go. It made no sense to lie to himself, but he had trust issues, even back on Earth. Relying on others made you vulnerable. As he reflected, he wasn't even sure what he feared so much. In the end, he did what he thought was right. In this new reality, wasn't it normal to be wary of everyone? The system even rewarded killing other humans by giving you their full credit score.

There he was again, grappling with trust issues. But at least they were reasonable to some degree.

With that, he made his way back to Kael and the others. He hoped he wasn’t late, but how could you be late when there were no clocks?

When he entered the large conference room at the top, over fifteen people, including everyone he had met earlier, even Evelyn and the Ork, were already in a heated discussion.

"We can't be allied with Steven! He will kill us!" Michael shouted in anger. "Didn't you see what he did to the people living in my base?"

"There is no way around it," Kai interjected in a calm voice. "The orders are from the gods themselves. They have invested heavily to give us a fighting chance against the undead."

"Hello, Thalion, you're a bit late," Kael greeted him. "Don't you have a notification crystal?"

"Uh, no. What is that?" Thalion said, feeling uncomfortable as all eyes turned to him.

"By the way, who is that guy, and why is he allowed to be here?" Michael exclaimed, clearly infuriated, as he recognized Thalion from the gate.

"This is Thalion. He helped us earlier and even saved our lives once. You should treat him with respect," Kai said calmly.

"The crystals are tools of communication. You can send telepathic messages, but they only work within these walls," Kael explained as no one else spoke, tossing one over to Thalion.

The crystal was black and round, no bigger than his fist, which was pretty large for a crystal.

"To a new point," the large man, likely a heavy warrior, said. "There’s still the umbral predator out there. If it’s strong enough to kill twenty of Steven’s men, we also need to worry."

"This is a lie!" Michael shouted. "How can you trust a man like Steven? He made that story up to lure us out."

"No, it's not," the man retorted. "Evelyn and Kargul also encountered it."

"Yes, and it is completely harmless to us. It killed Steven’s men and saved our lives. It can even talk, so I don't think it will be a problem at all," Evelyn said energetically.

"The umbral predator isn't the only one," the muscular man added. "There’s also a man in a black cloak and mask who killed over ten blue robes without a struggle and saved four of Steven’s men. We need to find that guy too."

"Yeah, sure, one against ten," Michael laughed mockingly at the man. "You really believe every fairy tale Steven tells you? And when that guy saved Steven's men, he’s definitely not on our side. We should be wary of him."

"Well, you don’t have to be. I’m right here," Thalion said, sensing the conversation heading in a dangerous direction. But this was something he could share with everyone in the room.

"Hahaha! You? Haha, that was a good one, mate. But we’re having a serious discussion here about our survival," Michael laughed, though the last part came out as a scream.

Thalion just shrugged his shoulders. "I don’t really care if you believe me."

"What? Seriously, throw that man out! He’s clearly making fun of us, not understanding the seriousness of the situation!" Michael shouted, his head turning red.

"What are you talking about? I just said I was the guy who killed the ten blue robes. How is that not serious?" Thalion said, amused. He was never easy to throw off, and this guy clearly had issues.

"Okay, enough," Kael said. "I believe Thalion if he says he killed those ten blue robes. Now, onto the other point about the umbral predator. What are our plans for that creature? We can’t let such a beast roam freely, killing our people. It’s already dangerous in the jungle without some apex hunter roaming the lands.“

Thalion watched as Michael's face turned bright red, looking as though he was about to explode, but he controlled himself and said nothing more. Thalion made a mental note to keep an eye on that man.

"There’s not much we can do," the muscular man said. "No one has encountered that beast. For now, I’d say we form larger hunting parties for more safety."

"As for the Umbral Predator," Thalion said after contemplating whether to speak, "I’ve also met it, and we had a short conversation. I don’t think it’s interested in killing more humans."

"Ah, you had a conversation with the umbral predator? Nice fantasies, mate," Michael scoffed, shaking his head.

"How did you meet, and what did you talk about?" Evelyn asked happily, while the Ork also leaned forward, clearly intrigued.

"It showed up after I killed some bull beetles, and we talked about fighting and which monsters are best for hunting," Thalion freestyled, hoping that it was good enough.

"When we met it, it was also super relaxed," Evelyn added, still cheerful.

"Which beasts does it like to smash the most?" the Ork asked in a deep rumbling voice.

"It said that big beasts are the best to kill because they provide the most food," Thalion answered, making up a believable story. It seemed to work as Kargul nodded in agreement.

"Anyway," the muscular man said, "I still think we should advise people not to go too far and to go out hunting in larger groups."

Most in the room nodded in agreement to that statement.

"Okay, then we’re finished for today. Good luck, everyone," Kael ended the gathering.

When the others had left and only Sylas, Jakob, Annie, Evelyn, Kargul, Kai, and Kael remained, Kael announced, "Okay, let’s go to my place. Time for some storytelling.”