Eldrian enjoyed the rest of the afternoon at Jen's. Eating together with her friends, after which they just hung out together in her room. Watching some series while talking about their studies.

When three o'clock rolled around Eldrian prepared to leave.

"Thanks for the dinner sis." Eldrian said as he gave Jen a hug.

"Anytime. Remember to study and work hard." She said, waving as Eldrian left.

...

Arriving back at his own place Eldrian filled a glass with some juice and started looking at the forums again, as was his usual routine. Looking over the ranking forum first, then shifting to the general forum.

Reading the title of the top post of the general forum, Eldrian's attention was piqued, *We demand an explanation* was the post's name.

Reading thought it Eldrian quickly realized that it was the same as most complaints which had been going about against Miracle Corp. This one just being much more organized, with the players having brought in actual lawyers.

Yet they had all been stonewalled at the start when Miracle Corp took out the contract which every player had singed. In which they had made sure to protect themselves thoroughly, giving the players and their lawyers a nice hurdle they had to first overcome. Seeing as everyone did sign the contract.

In this post these players called the other players to arms, asking for everyone to give their support to force the company into revealing the details on why the event had been so harsh. With the hope that they would be able to use this information to sue them for traumas gained in the game.

'Wonder how this is going to turn out.' Eldrian asked himself, turning to a comedy show to spend the last few minutes before he headed back into the game.

He liked the fact that the players were fighting against the developers, as the first event had certainly been a bit over the top. Yet he also felt that it was likely not the developer's plan.

In any case Eldrian didn't plan to get involved in this, feeling that he had more than enough to focus on already. His studies and the game kept him really busy.

Climbing into his pajamas he logged in.

Waking up Eldrian stood up, finding that he had seemingly never gone back to the commander's tent. He was currently lying on the same hill he recalled from his previous night in the game.

'This is getting confusing.' Eldrian told himself, thinking about he had two mornings every day. Luckily he didn't really have any nights IRL since he would log in before then. Yet he started feeling that his memories were getting blurry.

'Is this due to almost never sleeping?' He asked himself as he stood up and stretched. Next he glanced at his stats, seeing that they were still lowered. Looking at his debuffs he saw that he now had Total Fatigue level 3, causing his strength to be only 84 out of 105 and his stamina 74 SP.

'The recovery near the end is much smaller than at higher levels. Guess that's due to the exponential growth of fatigue.'

After sorting these things out and knowing where he stood Eldrian realized he would still not be able to train effectively. From yesterday he felt quite certain that each missing strength point led to an increase in stamina cost. If his strength was lower than the requirement that is. It also made wielding the weapon a little bit more difficult, but not insanely so.

'So I guess today I will only be able to do around 4 attacks with the spear.' Eldrian mumbled as he looked at the spear's statistics. He found that he could see the statistics of all the items in his slot inventory, not really being sure why.

But this allowed him to quickly look through them all, finding that his strength was only 4 short of the arming sword's requirements.

'Let's see if I was correct.' Thinking this Eldrian pulled the sword out of his inventory, finding it much easier to take it out after having practiced this action. While the shorter blade also made it faster than his spear.

Taking a few swings he found that he indeed only lost 5 stamina per attack.

'Does that mean I should keep a weapon with lower stats for when I am in such a weakened state?' Eldrian asked himself, starting his morning with some basic sword drills.

Not having a partner or dummy to train against did make it a less effective, but Eldrian focused more on stance and movement than the actual attacks during this practice.

Soon the sun started rising while Eldrian was still doing drills. As the sun rose the soldiers all started waking up, most of them starting a fire to either make some food or reheat what they had leftover from the previous night.

Smelling the tantalizing smells Eldrian decided to stop his training. Finding his stomach to be fighting against him as he tried to concentrate.

'Alright, let's go get something to eat.'

Heading to the commander's tent Eldrian saw that many of the NPCs from the night before were littering the ground. Taking care to not step on them, Eldrian headed to what was left of the beast they had spit during the night.

Not bothering to heat it Eldrian simply picked up a few cuts and ate them. Realizing that he had likely missed this yesterday as he couldn't remember having eaten something so delicious.

It was certainly better than most cooking Eldrian had enjoyed, yet he felt certain that it was because of the beast it came from, not due to the cooks. Enjoying the soft, tender meat Eldrian entered a trance. Ending up eating until he started feeling bloated.

"Dammit!" He cursed, finding that he was now in no condition to train anymore. His shout had luckily not woken anyone, leaving him relieved as he left the tent and started walking around.

Taking in the sights Eldrian realized that the town was actually pleasant to look at. It seemed to be intuned with nature, having a rural look.

Right in the center of the entire town area was the actual town buildings. This occupied quite a large space, between one and two kilometers. Surrounding this was a few grassland fields were the animals were being kept, thereafter a few cultivated farming lands with plants Eldrian didn't know. After this was the town's walls, stretching a long distance.

'I can see why they said it isn't really dependable.' Eldrian felt this would indeed be the case, seeing as the walls easily spread a distance of over 5 kilometers, maybe up to 10. He realized that there was indeed no way a small militia would be able to even patrol it effectively.

'Why did they make it so large?' He wondered, feeling that it was to keep their produce safe. Yet he felt a relatively high fence would have worked for that.

'Maybe it turns into a military camp when in war...' Eldrian thought, having indeed found the correct reason for the large space towns occupied.

Finishing his walk, Eldrian returned to the camp. Finding that most of the soldiers were up now, having already taken down their tents. Walking to the commander's tent, looking for Vivian, Eldrian saw that they were also taking it down.

'Guess we are going back now.' Eldrian mumbled, feeling that the walk back to the city was going to be crap.

'Maybe I can spice it up with some training routines?'

Arriving at the tent Eldrian found that Vivian wasn't present, nor was Old Sword. Not knowing what to do then, Eldrian simply waited until everyone started moving. Which ended up taking just over half an hour. During which he had become bored enough to start playing with the nearby tall grass.

Looking at the soldiers leaving the town Eldrian felt certain the return trip was likely going to take even longer. There were now over 50 carriages being pulled by cows and/or horses.

Seeing the carriages Eldrian felt they were going to stop often to fix a wheel or get it unstuck from mud or something similar. He felt this way since the carriages were clearly not meant for long tracks, probably normally only used by the townspeople when they harvested their farming lands. Which wasn't more than five kilometers from their homes.

Most of the carriages were also heavily loaded with the harvests from yesterday, a few others carrying injured and weakened people. Increasing the chances for what Eldrian expected was going to happen.

Naturally Eldrian had also set out when the soldiers had, not wanting to be left behind. He quickly caught up and just enjoyed a leisurely walk as the left the area of the town.

After around 10 minutes of walking Eldrian started becoming bored. Thus he decided to take out his new sword and continue his training.

He didn't do anything crazy, simply simulated that he was suddenly under attack. During which he would dive to the side in an act to save his life. Swiftly trying to defend himself and counterattack defensible on how he was imagining the situation.

He felt that it might be something he would need when going out and exploring, certain that ambushes would be a legitimate thing at that time.

During this he always had to keep his sword in hand, finding that he couldn't remove it from his inventory fast enough. 'I really need to get a scabbard for it, and practice quick drawing it.' He told himself after realizing this.

After his simulated fight he would have fallen a distance behind from the soldiers. But he would simply rest for a few minutes to gather his stamina and then sprint after them. Having to wait a few more minutes again before he could 'train' some more.

Continuing on in the manner Eldrian felt it was a good way to travel. Especially since he didn't have anything else he could be doing. Soon he became a spectacle to the soldiers. Some of them even slowing down to enjoy his act.

Eldrian pushed them from his mind after seeing their looks, not wanting to be distracted. In a way allowing him to also train his mental fortitude.

After an hour of doing this a few of the soldiers even broke rank to join him. Their commanders not really caring, since they felt the soldiers deserved some fun time. Yet none of them kept at it, only trying a max of three times before they became too tired to continue while also having to catch up with the rest of the army.

This turned their looks from those of amusement to looks of respect. Believing Eldrian was a hardworking and disciplined person, yet he was only playing around wanting to get time to move faster.

A few hours later they reached the halfway point. The entire army coming to a stop and resting. Recognizing the place they were at Eldrian smiled as he walked into the forest.