Chapter Seventy-Five.

(Zack)

"That's a Slime?" Braden asks.

"Yes," I roll my eyes. "It's a Level 1 Slime. The most basic of the basic. You should be able to kill it, since it only has 10 Health. Based on its Health and Mana, it shouldn't have more than a Willpower or two. You should have enough Mana to kill it, so long as all of your attacks hit."

"And if they don't?"

"Then you need to work on your aim."

He lets out a frustrated grunt, then summons a Wind Spike, managing to nail the Slime. It took out 2 Health, so the thing has 2 Willpower, probably. Braden hasn't managed to Level the Skill at all, but at least my training's yielded results for their stats.

I knew playing certain games with them, like Go Fish and marbles, would work. Just as long as we did a lot of it. Plus some chess. They're both bad at it.

I think it's funny that things unrelated to the actual effect from Intellect are able to increase it. Intellect is purely for magical power and how quickly one learns new Skills and spells, sort of like with video games back in reality.

I think Big S used mortals' terminology a bit too loosely there. It should've been Magic or something.

Speaking of Big S, he's still napping, apparently. He's really exhausted. I want to go on a murder spree and wipe out tons of monsters to help boost his recovery, but I've got two guys to take care of and no desire to bring them into Talorn.

Braden nails the Slime with another Wind Spike, and I'm about to say something about him being so slow, but catch myself.

I went into battle mindset, and had mentally sped myself up, making everything feel slower. He spent about two seconds between casts, which is decent. Returning my mental state to a normal speed, I watch as Braden carefully aims and strikes. Four seconds. A bit long. We'll need to work on his ability to quickly adjust his aim at a moving target.

He releases his fourth Wind Strike, which nails the thing, then adjusts his aim as it continues to bounce away. That strike misses.

"Now take your staff and go smack it," I tell him, and he stares at me with horror in his eyes. "What? Do it right in the center on the core. A good whack or two should kill it, it probably has no Endurance at all, or just a point. Might want to get a move on, though, before it gets to reinforcements."

Braden hesitates, then takes off, swinging his staff when he reaches the Slime. A second strike ends the thing, and he makes a horrified face as the slime oozes around. I giggle, leading Luca over to him.

"How come there aren't many monsters around here?" Braden asks as he wipes his staff off on the ground. "I heard that the fields are usually full of Slimes and Rats."

"I killed almost all of them," I answer, and he gives me an incredulous look. "What? It was just this field. Most people who work the fields to keep them at least relatively free of monsters for the weaker adventurers coming out to do some grinding while waiting for the big battle ignore this particular field."

"Why?" He asks. "And big battle?"

Oops.

"In a way, this field's claimed by me," I explain. "I tend to do some training out here, and… people generally don't like being around a Dark Knight who's training."

"Why?" He gives me a suspicious look.

"Cover your ears," I tell the twins. "And stand behind me. Keep an eye on the Slimes that are bouncing up and down."

They do as I instruct, and I take a deep breath, then let out a massive bellow with my Demonic Voice mixed with Roar of Darkness. All of the Slimes that were bouncing freeze up and drop to the ground, and I turn to the twins, both of whom are pale and stiff, their eyes wide with terror.

"Nathan, if you would?"

A moment later, the twins let out breaths of relief, then look around in confusion.

"He's hiding," I tell the twins. "You won't be able to see him due to an excellent concealment Skill. I had a feeling he had a Skill that could release you from the terror effects. You felt that? You were behind me when I did it, and several feet away."

And now that I notice it, they wet themselves. Crap.

"Let's head back into town," I tell them. "No one's in this part of it, so you won't be seen."

I bring the twins home, making sure no one sees us on the way, and they quickly move to the bath. As soon as they're naked, I take their clothes and make sure they have replacements, then I get to work washing them.

With the vast difference in power between my teammates, present and future, and myself, I should definitely hold back. A lot.

"Sorry," I tell the twins when they finish their bath. "I didn't… mean to do that to you. I didn't realize that would happen. I'd thought that maybe if you were a bit behind me and with your ears covered, it wouldn't be as bad."

"What was that?" Braden asks.

"The fuck you think?" I ask. "I told you what I was doing. It was me demonstrating part of why people leave that area alone. Being around a training Dark Knight isn't something people really want to be. My Skill set involves intimidation, leeching from others, and growing stronger the less Health I have and the angrier I am. Dark Knights usually only have teams consisting of Dark Knights and healers, and just getting a healer is rare enough, and stuff like that is why. One wrong thing, and we can accidentally cripple our own team.

"Now," I smile at them. "Let's head back to the field. Your Mana's back to full, so we can go back to getting you some Levels. It normally takes more than a year to reach Level 2 from where you are in theory, but I want to move that schedule up for you two. I think it's possible to go way faster. They say three months is one of the super-fast things. I say even that is too long for someone who does what's needed."

"What's this big battle?" He asks. "You you mentioned it earlier."

"Oh, that," I say. Why did he go back to that? That was said forever ago. "It's a giant battle that will involve a horde of more than a million monsters and a Dragon attacking Maelnor. We have a few months before it."

"And you think you can get us strong enough to work that?" He snorts. "What are you, delusional?"

"What are you, stupid?" I ask. "You and Luca are staying in the City during it. It's doubtful you'd be able to fight against it until you train in Talorn for awhile, but you'll need to be at least twice as strong as you are now for even its weakest monsters."

"Talorn?" He asks.

"A Fallen City at the north of the valley," I explain. "I've been training there this year. Was there when I got word that Luca was coming soon, actually."

Throwing a small tantrum, but they don't need to know that. If I can get them a little bit stronger for another week or two, I might pawn them off on the local guilds for their Classes for a week so I can return and do a bit more cleaning up there.

If I take out enough monsters, it'll start to be a safer place. I'll be able to take my team there and have them work on lone monsters that we track down. The only thing we have to worry about are the Fallen Adventurers, but I should be able to handle at least a few of them if I put on my good gear and take them on one-on-one, especially if I'm using the Demon Form. All I need to do is increase Demon Form's Level again and increase my Mana, and I should be fine against the weaker ones.

I'll probably contact the Fallen Hunters, too, and see if they'd be willing to help me out. I'd rather not, though, so I can Level my Subclass. If I stick to the ones nearest the City's entrance that I use, then it'll create a safe zone as long as Alexander doesn't interfere.

He's still out from my attack on him.

"Once you two are stronger," I continue what I was saying. "I'll take you there to train a little. It should help you with Experience, Braden. Since Luca's Class advances by using holy magic, it doesn't matter too much where he trains. Let's get going."

Braden huffs, but follows me, Luca clinging to the back of his tunic for the walk. We reach the fields and I point out another weak Slime for Braden to attack, then bite my arm and have Luca heal me while we're waiting.

"What if I get hurt?" Braden asks.

"I can use Heal, too," I say. "And mine's a lot more powerful than Luca's."

"But I thought you said that Dark Knights-"

"I'm an exception."

"Why are you different?"

"Because I am," I state. "Now attack the fucking slime, Braden. Or do you want to be weak forever, eternally unable to protect your brother?"

He glares at me, but attacks the Slime. Good. Train, Braden, so you can get stronger, too. I know that the big motivating factor for you is protecting Luca.

"And Luca," I say quietly. "Don't heal your brother if he gets hurt, use up all your Mana on me."

Luca starts getting upset.

"It'll help him build up Vitality so he can take more damage," I tell Luca. "Recovering Health on your own without magic or potions and stuff helps build Vitality faster. So does taking damage."

"THIS THING IS SHOOTING BACK!"

"You have a staff!" I exclaim. "Just block it with that! Or dodge! It's ten feet away, you should be able to move."

"But-" Braden protests as he moves to the side, narrowly avoiding another blast of water.

"No buts, Braden," I say. "Except the ones that are also called asses. How can you expect to get Experience if everything's easy? The difficulty you face does affect how much Experience you acquire. And it's good for your physical abilities as well, your actual skills."

Luca focuses on healing my arm, though I can tell he's distracted by his brother's fight with the Water Slime. I'm keeping an eye on Braden's Health, though, so he'll be fine. He only has 20 Health, while my Heal will restore more than 300. There's no way he'll die as long as I pay attention.

Heck, Luca's Heal would be enough if he's only halfway down. And in the absolute worst-case scenario, Nathan's still lurking around.

(Luca)

The scary guy isn't as mean as I thought he was. He's got a weird logic to stuff. I just wish he'd be nicer. Do we really need to get real experience right now? I'd rather curl up with a nice stuffed animal all day.

But Braden wants to train. I tried talking him out of it, saying that we could probably go somewhere else, and he rejected it, saying that he needed to be strong enough for both of us, and that meant training now.

I guess the scary guy really cares about us. I knew he'd left for around four hours last night, but I didn't realize he was cleaning the field here of monsters until he said that. That must have been a lot of work for him.

He scared me earlier, when he did that freaky roar. It didn't feel like something any human should be able to do. But he seemed genuinely upset that he scared us and that we wet ourselves. I'm so embarrassed just thinking about that. I couldn't help it, it just happened!

The scary guy suddenly puts a hand on my head, as if he knows what I'm thinking. His gaze is soft this time, then he glares at Braden and yells for him to stop fooling around and kill the Slime.

I watch my brother as he finishes off the Slime, then rests. The scary guy works him to the bone until lunch, making me heal him anytime my Mana has enough to do it. It's to increase my Wisdom and my Heal Level, he said.

Well, in addition to my Experience, but that's not really advancing much.

For lunch, he pulls sandwiches out of his Inventory. His Inventory's weird compared to ours, but he told Braden that it's because it's a special kind, when my brother asked.

After lunch, it's back to training again, then we return home for dinner. Braden and I take a bath together while the scary guy cooks, then we join him. It's turkey tonight. Yesterday was ham.

While we eat, the scary guy mutters something about increasing his Wisdom, then pulls out a funny-looking token. It's made of wood, I think. I can't get a good look at it. He taps it, then taps something in front of it, then again. He repeats that fourteen times, then nods, muttering something about needing to do some Mana training, himself.

After dinner, he plays marbles with us for a bit, then switches to cards. He's really good at cards, no matter what game it is we play. He's also really good at marbles, and doesn't play with Braden and me anymore, because it was pissing Braden off that he kept winning.

Now Braden's pissed that he won't play marbles with us while making us play. I think my brother's conflicted.

"Before we go to bed," the scary guy pulls out two pale orange disks. They look like food. "Try these. They're delicious, I promise."

"What are they?" Braden asks.

"Something I'm offering to you," the scary guy says. "And consider yourself lucky to get them, since they're expensive as fuck and out-of-season. It's called a Spook Treat. Now take it and enjoy it, because it's delicious as fuck."

Braden takes both of them and hands me one, before taking a bite of his own. His eyes widen, his face lighting up with how much he enjoys it. It must be really good. I take a bite of it, and realize why he liked it.

This is really good. It's the best thing I remember eating, and with how scarily good the scary guy's cooking is, that's good.