He recollected himself before walking any further. While what was currently in front of him wasn’t enough to send shivers down his spine, if the outside of the village was already this vicious and senseless, then he could only guess what hid within the insides…

It was a few hundred metres forward that he got a close-up look of the average Haven villager. The man he saw had thin and wispy hairs on his head, almost as if a poor imitation of a mop. His cheekbones, and in fact all his bones, jutted out through his skin. He was lifeless in both spirit and mind, his eyes searching far and wide for a single stream of light.

While the man wasn’t stumbling, he wasn’t very far from that either. Even from a distance, Stanis could sense the smell coming from the man: a putrid stench that well encompassed the filthy hovel he lived in. However, despite all these concerning features, the most disturbing part instead had to do with what the man was saying.

It was completely incoherent, even to Stanis’s trained ears. But, even so, he could take a good guess at what the man was muttering from the tone he mumbled in and the pitch he groaned with.

As Stanis moved further and further into Haven, the more common the soulless zombies became. They roamed the streets with nothing on their mind but… Well, Stanis had no clue but he was sure it was something in between food and hope. In fact, he quickly realised that was it not for the fact that he wore simple, dirty clothes, they would have most likely swarmed him already with no remorse.

Either way, he was no saint and he had no charity for them and so he just kept walking. As the number of steps mounted, the scenery surrounding his walk began to change, rapidly. What had been dirty and squalid huts made out of rags and such soon became homes made out of coloured, oak wood. Clean, coloured, oak wood to add to that. Soon enough, Stanis wasn’t even sure of which one was worse: was it the weak, cattle-like humans who lived in poverty, or the well-dressed middle-class that lived in ignorance of the other, despite being just a few blocks off.

“Hol’ up,” shouted a man just within Stanis’s earshot. He walked around the corner of a building and came face to face with a white-washed wall. It looked to be made out of laid stone and was at least as tall as a man, if not a little taller. In front of him was a metal gate that passed through the wall, guarded by a company of soldiers.

The guards searched through everyone attempting to enter the inner-circle of the village. Their search method was extremely crude but also pragmatic, in most cases, anyway; the way they searched the girl just a few spots ahead of Stanis was borderline sexual assault, although no one, not even the girl, seemed to be very shocked or surprised.

The queue Stanis found himself in quickly wound itself towards the gate, its head being chopped off each time a search was complete. From what Stanis had seen so far, it seemed that everyone was allowed in the centre. In fact, it looked as if the guards were actually tax-collectors in disguise, sucking up the money of any who passed by.

“Hol’ up,” shouted the man again.

Stanis looked at the man who was about to search him and inwardly sighed. From the fact that the man had been shouting hold up the entire time and due to the man’s sluggish appearance, Stanis guessed that the man had some type of mental affliction.

The man rubbed his calloused hands all over Stanis, before giving up and letting him go.

Pleased by the lack of difficulty, Stanis smiled as he walked into the centre. If the buildings before had been middle-class, the ones he saw now were definitely upper class. They were built with thick slabs of stone and other materials of high demand.

The trip through the three sectors of the village felt surreal to Stanis. The way the segregation worked and how the classes had evolved, it all felt very clichéd to him, almost as if straight out of a book. And yet it was real, and to add to that, he couldn’t help but feel sympathetic to the village. Because, at the end of the day, despite being cruel and vicious, Haven was also the village that made the most sense to him. Of course it made perfect sense that the strongest also got the highest rewards and highest quality of life; if someone was unhappy about that, all they had to do was rise to power themselves.

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It wouldn’t be wrong to call Haven a village of natural order, a social structure made out of humanity’s basest of ideas. And who was he to complain, after all, he was one of the people who had benefited the most of such a system coming into play.

The stone buildings only got grander as he walked forwards, easily equalling and eventually besting the best buildings in Yora. In the distance, he could see a wide building standing arrogantly against its surroundings. It didn’t have an elegant design, nor did it have ornate decorations. Instead, in the midst of all the grandness that surrounded it, the plainly built, rectangular block of shaped stone stood high and tall.

Curious about the building, Stanis turned around and began heading towards it. Eventually, he was in front of the building, and a few seconds later, inside. He was instantly met with a scene of elegance. There was a receptionist area with several men and women dressed in richly-coloured clothing. One of the receptionist came to Stanis and brought him to a set of comfy seats.

“So, Sir, what would you like to do today?”

Confused and pleased, Stanis laughed at the way the man referred to him. Sir? He was a man currently wearing threaded, dirty clothes with messy hair splattered across his head. Of course, only Stanis found this funny as he was the only one who didn’t basely judge people by their mana-fluctuations, after all, everyone’s was low compared to his.

“What can I do?” asked Stanis, raising his eyebrow simultaneously.

“Register a class, leave something precious behind to our protection, commission a quest. Anything you’d like, sir!”

Stanis sat there rubbing his chin for a few seconds, recollecting himself all the while.

“I want to find a person. Pete… Umm, Pete something. Drunk, lanky, and pale,”

The receptionist cringed at the name but quickly recovered before he attracted too much attention.

“A simple task. Please follow me,” he said, before stepping outside.

Stanis followed him and quickly lost himself in the grand change of scenery. Clearly Pete had done well for himself if this was the type of area he was living in. It was, however, as Stanis set his eyes on Pete’s actual house that he backtracked his thoughts. The house itself was built well out of pricy materials but it was the mess it was in that concerned Stanis, after all, dirt and cobwebs seemed to be an integral part of Pete’ house…

“Inside here, sir,” said the receptionist.

Seeing as to how the receptionist seemed less-than-eager to go inside, Stanis bid his goodbye and walked in himself. The doors and gates were all left unlocked and so Stanis quickly made his way in.

The inside of the home was as well-furnished as the outside should have been. The furniture showed wealth and power, although all of them could have also been in better condition.

Stanis heard a mix of hiccupping and snoring coming from the distance. Using them as a flare signal, Stanis closed in on the spot until he found himself outside a certain room. The door was wide-open and inside was a certain Pete, lying atop several empty bottles.

“Pete?” Stanis said.

Pete awoke from his deep sleep and gave a filthy smile towards Stanis. He pushed himself up and knocked several bottles while at it.

“I hoped you would just leave after seeing the scene,” Pete said as he wiped the saliva off his chin and dirt off his clothes.

Stanis snorted in response. “So, what were you going to do in the village again?”

Pete broke out into laughter and wobbled across the room, picking up his armour which lay atop a table. “Drink a lot and wench hopefully. And when the monsters attack, run away towards your village,”

“Oh, I thought you were going to take control of Haven?”

Pete snorted this time. “Pfft, me? Fuck that, far too much work for what it’s worth?”

“Where are the other two?” Stanis asked.

“I got not a focking clue,” Pete answered while putting his chainmail armour on.

“Right, then, tell me how I can quickly take control of this village.” Stanis said. “Quickly,” he added after a second.

“I knew you were here for some shit like that,” Pete answered while walking towards Stanis. “Follow me, there’s some kind of thing happening in a few minutes. That’s where everyone will be, probably,”…