I look at the gloves John hands me with a grin.

System Query: Walmart Employee of the Month, gloves

Can’t look stylish without the right accessory, and you can’t get better than these gloves. A perfect match to the rest of the ensemble. The Employee of the month gloves gives an extra five inventory slots. Add 10 points of strength if multiple pieces of Employee of the Month are equipped.

“Is it my imagination, or is the system getting snarky?” I ask. More inventory and more strength. That almost makes up for the blue and Walmart sun on them.

“Maybe it’s not liking how easily you go through its monsters?” Terry offers.

“It shouldn’t keep giving me things like these.” I put the gloves on and check my stats, as Terry calls them.

Attributes

Strength: 26

Dexterity: 10

Endurance: 18

Intelligence: 11

Charisma: 10

Aether: 14

Health: 18

Stats Pool

Hit Points: 159/180

Mana: 127/140

Will Power: 23/23

Stamina: 141/194

I don’t feel stronger, but when I check my inventory, instead of the five slots the gloves give me, I have… a seven by seven grid, then an extra five slots. How is that possible?

System Query: Inventory

To access the inventory, open the inventory tab and will the inventory grid up. The inventory is composed of wearable items(quantities variable) as well as the storage grid. The size of the grid is based on your strength and can be modified using items and magic.

Items within the grid have no weights and stack to fifty, so long as they are identical.

The size of the grid starts at 1, and increases by 1 for each full five points of strength beyond 5.

“What’s wrong?” John asks, concerned, and immediately I’m on the defensive as my willpower crawls down.

Don’t, my father warns.

“Have you looked at how the inventory works?”

“Of course.”

Of course, he did. He and Terry are savvy about these things. “I just did. The strength bonus on these just about doubled my inventory and stuff stacks in them.”

“Only if they’re the same. That open bottle of vitamin should be on its own.”

He’s right, and that makes me glance at the timer. Less than twenty minutes until the side effect hit. Time to meet with the others and leave.

“Okay, gather everything,” I instruct as I do the same. “Then we’re heading out.”

“Out there?” Steve asks, looking scared.

“It’s better than in here,” John answers. “The rest of the team’s gathering food, and outside we have close to a hundred people waiting for us.”

I stop in gathering bottles of vitamins. “How many?”

“I don’t have an exact count. But we’ve been gaining people constantly. Lots of them were hiding and hoping this would pass.”

I’d noticed a few, mainly the non-human ones, since they gathered at the front, away from the rest, but… okay, I purposely didn’t look at the rest as each time, I took a hit to my willpower.

We’re still at least four days away from Harrisonburg. How much larger will we be then? Hopefully, everyone ahead of us is already heading there.

You really think you’re that lucky? My father’s voice mocks me.

By the time I’m done collecting items, I have two full stacks of vitamin bottles and half of a third. I have jackets, pants, and a toy sword that looks sharp enough to cut steel.

System Query: Sword of Play

Please, let your child play with this. It’s perfectly safe.

Sword of play is a sword enhanced with sharpness buff, slicing (ah, see what I did) armor in half.

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Okay, the system is definitely showing its personality here. Wonder why it waited this long.

I offer the sword to Steve, who backs away from it, then, reluctantly, to Terry, who, far too gleeful about it, attaches the scabbard to his belt. I wonder if having him realize he could use weapons on top of his magic was a good idea.

I head for the storeroom’s exit, and Terry calls for Steve to come with us. He doesn’t sound enthusiastic but agrees.

Back in the hallway, I give the instructions. I’m under fifteen minutes until side-effects and it can’t be a good idea to have those hit in this place. “We’re done adventuring. We meet up with the others and leave. As John said, there’s people outside waiting for us.”

Oh, sure they are.

Of course, they are. I’d love nothing more than for them to have grown a spine and moved on without me, so they’re going to be waiting.

When Terry doesn’t protest, I lose willpower not questioning his motives. He was the one gun-ho about coming in here, after all. Now he just wants to leave?

Children are allowed to change their minds, comes the gentle reminder in my mother’s voice. How often had she told me that, when I stubbornly stuck to a stupid decision my father had talked me into. Because to change my mind would prove him right.

Sometimes her words worked.

My father’s voice doesn’t mock her as he’d do back when he was in our lives. In my head, there is an uneasy truce between the two of them, with my father doing the bulk of the talking, but letting her get in her wisdom.

What does it say about my subconscious that he gets to decide things most of the time still?

We’re halfway to the grocery section when the others become visible in the distance and I take another hit on my willpower as I force myself to continue advancing. When I make them out enough, I can tell who is whom. Terry’s off, running to his mother and hugging her.

They look in rough shape, but I see no significant injuries. Griff must have seen them, but even he looks to have been in fights.

“You guys look like shit,” John calls.

“You ain’t looking too hot either,” the orc replies. “Who’s the new guy? No one’s been added to the team.”

“Steve didn’t want to join,” Terry says. “Chuck found him hiding out in an office.”

“I wasn’t hiding,” Steve says defiantly. “I was in my office, waiting for this to pass.”

“How did you guys make out?” I ask. “We have tons of healing, but it comes with—”

“Side effects?” Elizabeth finished. “Vitamins?”

I nod.

“We came across some of those, too. Weren’t particularly useful considering our overall health.”

“We also came across these,” Griff says, looking me over, “and I think they are going to fit you fine.” A pair of blue pants appear in his hand as he offers them to me.

“You’re kidding.”

“Nope, saw they bind and that they’re part of a set, so we figured we’d wait until we have more pieces before deciding who puts them on. I guess you had enough to make the decision.”

“Something like that,” I answer, and lose more willpower as I don’t glare at John for getting me to put the vest on without having more information. I take them and look them over.

System Query: Walmart Employee of the Month, leggings

Stylish and practical, pants go with everything, especially the rest of the set. They add 10 to your endurance as well as an extra 100 to your stamina if multiple pieces of the Employee of the Month set are equipped. Add more pieces for additional effect.

I sigh. The effects are too good to simply throw away. I’m going to look like a Smurf, but I’m going to be a tough blue bastard.

I look around for a place that’ll give me privacy and the only possibilities are the rooms we passed without going in. Not going in one of those, so I put the pant in my inventory for when I won’t have to be around others to drop trau.

Then I have a thought. I can summon my bar without ‘taking it out’. Can I do the same with clothing? I will the pant on and I’m rewarded with a message.

System Query: Walmart Employee of the Month, Complete set

Hey, you’ve bound the whole thing. Congrats, that makes you the Employee of the Year.

Wear it all, and I’ll give you more bonuses.

What does an extra 20 to damage absorption, 20 extra armor, 20 strength, and 20 to your endurance sound like?

Come on, put everything on, you know you wanna.

Trust me, you’re going to need it.

“I was right,” Griff says, chuckling. “They do look good on you.”

“You want to see the bonus the whole thing gives me?” I smile as that wipes the smirk off his face, then lose a sliver of willpower as I stop myself from bragging. Already back down to below half, and I’m going to have to deal with people outside soon. “Come on, we need to get out. The masses are going to worry.”

The change within the store makes finding the right aisle harder, but once I see the exit, far in the distance, I start down it, alert for anything from the clothing section to my left, reaching out for me. I hope the grocery one’s been entirely cleared, but it would be just my luck to find out they’d missed something when it jumped out at me.

I only breathe easier once we’re past the grocery aisle and at the produce section. The exit is right there in front of us, no more than a hundred feet and we are—

There’s something in front of us.

“Greetings!” the…thing calls to us. “Welcome to Walmart, where you’re smashed down to match to the competition every day.”

“Someone didn’t read the script properly,” John mutters under his breath.

The thing is a caricature of every Walmart greeter I’ve come across, down to the enthusiasm. It’s intended to be an older person, but it’s thick, nearly obese, dressed in blue pants and vest that match mine. While the flesh moves as if it was normal, there’s a plastic sheen to it, and it’s wearing a bright red pointed hat I can’t place until a bunch of plastic gnomes spread out from behind it, each holding a small version of gardening tool.

I sigh.

I have the worse luck in the world.

Stop complaining, you get to hit something.

I summon the mask to my face. There’s at least that.

Griff snickers next to me and I glare at him.

Instead of hitting him. I run at the greeter. Summoning my bar to my hand. The hit I land is solid enough for the ‘skin’ dent and not reform. I’m sufficiently surprised I don’t move out of the way as it swipes at me, and I go flying, landing on an empty display in the bakery section.

I get to my feet. The hit only cost me a sliver of my hit points, so that message was right. I needed that boost the whole set gives me. I watch the army of gnome rush at me. They’re no more than a foot in height, but packed so tight I can’t count them. At least, I’m going to be able to make quick work of them.

The countdown reaches zero and the side-effect tag flashes red, then resets to four hours as a whole-body shudder drops me to a knee.

Side-effect time!

Let’s see. Strength cut in half.

Have fun.

I push to my feet again and grit my teeth. Before I can look at my stats to see what the result is, the gnomes are on me.

I sweep them out of my way, and they fly off further than I’d expect with half my strength, but they are replaced nearly as fast.

“Chuck!” Hanz calls. The Orc and Elizabeth are fighting the Greeter, but not making much headway. It seems immune to John’s bullets, and Terry can’t fire his magic without hitting the two close-quarter fighters.

“Trying to get there,” I reply, swinging the bar back and forth, and only making it a foot before more gnomes replace the ones that flew away.

Fuck this.

I look at Steve, cowering in the back, and snarl.

“Tag, you’re—”

Charlie. Her reproach is as gentle as it always was. It’s enough to make me realize what I almost did. Steve doesn’t deserve to be dumped in the middle of these gnomes. Maybe he’s a coward. Maybe he’s just so far out of his depth, he doesn’t know how to process it.

It still cost me half my willpower. He’s lucky this fighting replenished it.

The gnomes hammer at my legs, but they can’t get through my armor.

“Elizabeth,” I call. “Which of you or Hanz has to toughest skin?”

They don’t pause in pummeling.

“I do,” Hanz replied. “Orc skin’s the hardest thing around.”

“I hope so because you’re it.”

“What—”

I slam the end of my bar in the Greeter hard enough it staggers back. I swing the bar and Elizabeth yelps as I nearly hit her with it. It connects with its head and it almost loses its balance. I scream and hit it again and again. When it lands a punch. I’m sent flying back. But I’m on my feet again and running through the few gnomes there.

With a curse, Elizabeth drops in the middle of a swing and my bar hits the Greeter hard enough it shatters, leaving metal shrapnel in the side of its head.

It straightens and gives me a nasty smile, eying my broken bar. I drop it and summon my new bar. The one made of steel that the spider dropped on dying. Its smile vanishes.

“Bring it,” I tell it.

It does, and I rage on it.