[You cleared the second wave! The next wave will arrive in 19 : 04 : 21]
Once the elites were dealt with, The rest of the wolves were cleaned up with relative ease. With the lack of any elites, the only advantage the wave had was their numbers, which proved to not be such a difficult thing for Reghan and Julie to take care of. A few blasts of Julie’s fireballs and the constant slicing of their heads from the front line pretty much secured our victory.
I stood amongst the groaning crowd gathered around Reghan. His eyes were drooped from the exhaustion, but still, he prioritized everyone’s condition before taking care of himself.
Julie was equally as tired too; She was seen laying on the podium behind us, where she had used the height advantage to cast her spells further to repel the wolves during the defense.
Now, I fully understood what they had to go through on the first wave.
“I didn’t know the defense took this much out of you.” Standing beside Reghan, I observed his tired eyes surveying the camp. “Regardless of the reasons, I’m sorry for not being here yesterday.”
My apology netted me a tiny smile which Reghan had to force out. “It’s… fine. You’re here today and that’s all that matters. Let’s just put the past behind us.”
He then extended me an apologetic look. “I was jealous of you, Zane. That’s one of the reasons why I didn’t push for you to stay then.” Following his gaze, I watched his eyes staring at the scene of destruction ahead of us. “And we ended up having to pay the price for that.”
While we were both still very different in nature, both our apologies seemed to have softened the wall between us. It was incredibly brave of him to be honest with his feelings, and frankly, I respected him a ton for being forthright with me.
The wooden walls that once stood tall were tattered into pieces; The wolves had gnawed and ripped the wooden structure with their magic bolts, or simply climbed over the walls if they had enough speed and strength to do so.
“Look at this… All of this mess! You should’ve just defended us from the outside!” An annoying voice was heard screaming from our backs, it was him again, but none of us had the energy to deal with his shit right now. “We could’ve died, you know?”
Reghan gave me a look; I winced when I saw his face were contorted with a deep, gnawing fury. He turned around, an-
“Shut the fuck up.”
Walking past Paul’s still figure, whose eyes were wide open from the sudden snap from Reghan, I couldn’t help but grin along the way. If I could, I would’ve given him a two thumbs up and cheering on him from the side.
“14 died today.”, Reghan spoke as we approached the podium. “14 too many. The ones who are capable of fighting are dwindling in numbers. At this rate, we won’t be able to use the same strategy we used today if the next batch of wolves came.”
Those deaths came from the initial Elite attacks. I wished I could help them out then, but the gate was also equally important on its own.
“Did you see them? Is that why you gave that warning?” Climbing the stairs with groan in each of our steps, We each glanced over Julie’s sprawling figure. It was obvious that she was equally if not more exhausted than the both of us combined.
“Yes and no. I saw how the darkness from the distance acted… strangely. It’s not something that I know how to explain, unfortunately.”
“We might need that kind of skill for tonight’s defense. The wolf mother will make her appearance today. God knows what that thing could do.”
The werewolves were enough of a surprise on their own, but then they just had to swarm us with their overwhelming numbers right after. Nobody knows what kind of shit the wolf mother can throw at us, and none of us expected that she’d be a walk in the park either.
“We’ll consolidate our defense on this spot tonight. We put men all around the gate, and have Julie and the other ranged fighters in the center. Then… We hope for the best.” Reghan’s plan was probably the best one anyone can draft at this moment. We weren’t exactly strapped with choices right now…
The darkness was about to end when the wave was over. Tiny rays of sunlight peered through the clouds above, revealing the scene of destruction and chaos that had transpired the night prior. We saw all the broken structures and walls in their clearest clarity, and I couldn’t help but feel sorry when I saw Reghan averting his gaze from the destroyed scene that he had tried so hard to build.
Julie had the same kind of look too, even when she wasn’t as attached to this place as he was.
“We have more than 18 hours. If we had nothing else to do, We could build another circle of walls around this gate and leave and opening right there. That way, the wave will be incentivized to go through a single spot, instead of everywhere else.” I pointed at the path that led to the previous wooden gate, which was burnt into pieces.
“That sounds good… Wait… What is that?”
Stolen from Royal Road, this story should be reported if encountered on Amazon.
In the sky, a strange object was seen tearing through the clouds, heading straight towards the front of the podium. I could barely make out its shape with the speed it was flying at, but upon another closer look, it had a similar shape to the obelisks that I’ve seen before.
It zoomed past the remains of our walls, catching the eyes of those who are busy cleaning up the carcasses of the wolves, then smashing the dirt floor right before the stage with a giant explosion, sending heaps of brown dirt into the air.
Everyone went on alert from the sudden assault, charging straight at the point of impact, only to find a single obelisk that size of an adult male sticking out from the ground underneath.
Julie snapped awake and had her spells ready, ready to strike at that thing at a moment’s notice. Reghan was calmer than the rest, perhaps too tired to even stay as alert as he usually was.
[Tutorial Pylon - Access to the system’s rudimentary shop interface. Only the elected leader of your current sector has the rights to delegate the right for other players to access the shop.]
[Please select your leader. The one with the most votes will be granted the administrator role. If the administrator dies, the role will be relegated to the next most chosen person on the list.]
Everyone’s eyes went wide, nobody foresaw any of this coming. Julie and I glared at each other for a short minute, before directing our gaze towards Reghan immediately after. It was obvious what was going on inside our minds.
Reghan was the one who was suited to the Leadership role the most, despite all the mistakes he’d made.
Noticing our stare, Reghan turned towards us with a questioning frown. It didn’t take long for him to understand what was happening.
“Me? Are you sure?” He asked, a slight grin appearing across his face.
I shrugged right as Julie spoke, “Not me for sure. I don’t like dealing with these people. You know how it is…”
“I remembered a certain someone berating me for letting those guys in here.” Smirking, Reghan’s eyes carefully studied the pylon, inspecting it for more details.
“Yeah… that’s right, and I’m still choosing you regardless. Well, unless you want this emo dude to lead us, which I think will be a massive mistake.” Her eyes darted at me as she spoke, “No offense, Zane.”
“None taken. I’m not good at leading others.” I said with a smile.
Reghan watched our interaction with a slight amusement. “I guess… I don’t have a choice, then. I hope the others felt the same way.”
The defense forced us to work together, perhaps against some of our best wishes. But I could see that we’d grown that tiny bit closer. We were not friends in any way or form yet, but what we have now is more than good enough.
[You elected Reghan Morris as your leader.]
Morris? That’s his last name?
The rest of the vanguard squad seemed to have chosen him too. You could make a case to elect Julie, but in terms of leading dozens of people and keeping up everyone’s morale, Reghan was just the better - no, the best person for that role.
It felt like Reghan’s leadership was secure.
[Everyone had selected their candidate.]
But we forgot about the sheer difference if the amount of those who had fought on the front lines and those who cowered behind them.
[Congratulations! Paul Holden! You have been chosen as the administrator!]
The eyes of everyone that were gathered near the stage was agape with shock. I completely discounted the fact that there are other possible candidates aside from Julie and Reghan.
But Paul? Why him? Nobody liked him before, so why choose him now?
Reghan couldn’t utter a single word. His eyes were locked on to the approaching figure from afar, of course, that idiot just had to make things even more difficult for us.
“Damn it…” A curse was let out from Julie’s lips. Her furious gaze were laid right on Paul’s grin, a slight killing intent visible from the way she gritted her teeth.
A difficult situation surfaced. If we want to switch the leadership role to Reghan, then Paul had to die. Honestly, it won’t be difficult to do that since he’s so much more weaker than us.
But… Do we have the capacity in our hearts to kill another human being?
“Paul…” Jumping off the podium, Reghan raced towards where Paul stood. “What the hell are you doing?”
“Me? I didn’t do anything… It’s just that most of us were tired of being forced to follow your orders, Reghan. We don’t want to fight, I think we’ve all made that clear...”
I couldn’t see Reghan’s expression from here, but I didn’t think I needed to see his face to understand what was going on in his head.
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Reghan was fuming - No, he was beyond furious. After all that he had done to make sure everyone was safe, now this fucker had to just saunter in and ruin it for everyone else.
And that monster was enabled by none other than himself. He was complacent enough to to let this guy run his mouth when he got here. He was complacent enough to let him moan and complain to the others.
He was complacent enough to let him speak his mind and spread his insecurities to those who didn’t have the balls to risk their lives and defend the gate with him. That all led to this moment where they simply chose him out of fear of having to rise up and fight.
Reghan and most of the others in the vanguard squad also took part in the building process, hell, with their generally higher levels, they were the ones who built the bulk of the defenses. So it wasn’t like the entire encampment was built from their own hands alone either. Now they claimed that they didn’t have to fight just because they took part in the building process?
No more of this. A part of Reghan’s subconscious had snapped when he saw Paul’s name on the system message. The darkness inside of his heart which had been piling up spilled over to his arms, as they reached for the sword that was holstered on his hips, wanting to just slice the grin off his god-damned face.
And well, he did just that. Reghan’s swing was quick and decisive. Nobody on the field expected this outcome as their faces went white when the system message showed up.
[Paul Holden has died. Switching the Administrator role to : Reghan Morris.]
So much for being the leader of humanity, Reghan mused to himself. It wasn’t an easy choice, but he had to cut off this parasite before it got even worse.
A parasite that he’d grown with his own two hands.
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