I

Outside the gate she saw the still-smoking remains of the pyres. There were piles of landwalker corpses placed wherever was most convenient at the time. The smell was awful, and Eva cursed her enhanced senses as soon as it hit her. Holding her breath as much as possible, she spent about ten minutes orienting herself using the sun. Once she was sure of the direction, she set off to the north.

The terrain did not change much as she walked. It was mostly hilly, with many of the hills running parallel to the direction she traveled. The only real change she noticed was that the trees began to thin slightly as she followed the course of a stream through the valley between two large hills.

Four hours, and a single monster in a monster wave to defeat—it was level 20—she arrived at the terminus of the stream: a lake. An area on the other side of the lake had been cleared of trees and there was a walled settlement there. She could see humans fishing and bathing in the lake. She just hoped they’d be somewhat friendly when she approached.

Rather than swimming across, which would be a little silly, Eva took the long way around. It took almost two hours to see the first signs of human life: a tree stump. Soon after, the settlement itself came into view. It was small like the fort had been, holding maybe 500 people inside at most. Standing guard by the entrance were a small complement of guards. The walls held several more guards watching.

Eva waved to the guards by the gate as she approached. She Observed★ them. Their levels averaged to twelve.

“‘Evening gents,” she said.

“Whatcha want?” the one who looked to be in charge asked.

“Any place I can sleep for the night?”

“Yeah,” said one of the other guards, elbowing one of his friends. “In my bed!”

Two more of the guards chuckled before the leader glared at them. She guessed he’d seen her level.

“Knock it off, idiots,” he said to the laughing guards. “She could kick your sorry asses with one hand behind her back.”

He turned back to face her.

“Head on in. There should be an open tent or two. Just ask one of the guys with a green armband where you should go.”

“Thanks.”

Eva nodded towards the guards and walked through the open gate. Inside the walls, everything was more organized than the village had been. Shelters lined the walls with an open space in the center that supported the food and other social activities. She made her way towards the food with an eye to picking out one of the people the guard had directed her towards.

II

When she arrived in the center, she could smell some deliciously roasted meats and something that she’d missed: spices. Somehow they’d figured out how to get edible plants of some kind with an interesting odor. Eva’s mouth water at the mere thought of decently tasting food. She shook the thoughts from her head and walked up to the man she’d spotted that was wearing a green armband.

“Hello,” she said.

The man turned towards her and held up a hand as he quickly chewed and then swallowed, holding the rest of his dinner in one hand.

“A new face! Welcome to our home,” he said. “Who might you be?”

“I’m Eva. Guard said you could help with a place to sleep? And maybe some food too. What you have smells fantastic.”

“Well, Eva, I can help you with both of those things. My name is Jorge, one of the leaders here. Most of the others are out and about or sleeping already. You’ll be able to meet some more of them in the morning.”

Jorge seemed friendly enough, and she was curious enough to ask.

“Thanks! So how’d you end up with the armbands for leaders?”

“Well, there are two other towns nearby. One’s small like this place, but the other is three or four times bigger. After we met each other, we decided to work together. Each town has its own color for the leaders—green here, yellow for the big town, and white for the other small town.”

“That makes sense.”

“So why did you decide to come here?”

“One of my friends was killed, so I thought I’d feel better if I wasn’t in that place anymore. Things finally calmed down enough for me to leave so I did.”

“I see,” he said, taking a small bite from his food and then continuing after he’d swallowed. “I hope you don’t mind if I eat and talk. I haven’t had anything all day.”

“I don’t mind. Speaking of food, where can I get some and where can I sleep?”

“Ah yes, sorry. Talk with one of the cooks, they’ll give you a portion. As for shelter, any claimed spot will have a flag or piece of clothing hanging from it to signify that it is occupied. If you see one that doesn’t have something like that, feel free to crash there.”

Eva turned towards the firepit before Jorge continued.

“Oh, before you go, can I expect you to help with the town’s defense tomorrow?”

“I don’t see why not.”

“Alright. See you later.”

She strolled to the firepit and asked for some food. The meal she was given reminded her of a taco or gyro except that instead of the bread, it was some kind of leaf. She tried a small taste of the leaf after seeing other people eating them. It had a similar taste to mint. When mixed together with the flavors of the meat inside, it was the best food she’d tasted in a long time. The flavors really went well together, and the small meal was more filling than it had any right to be.

Eva chewed her food while she walked along the wall of lean-tos that were the shelter of the month. Most had some kind of cloth like Jorge had said, but she came to a string of four that didn’t. She tossed her backpack into one of them and fished out a piece of cloth from her belt. She used it to clean her hands and mouth before hanging it from her shelter.

The inside of the lean-to was very crude. The flood beneath it was not particularly level, though the leaves left there for warmth would do well enough for a few nights. She rustled her legs beneath the leaves and considered her next steps.

The first thing she needed to do was to see if they knew anything about the dungeons she would need to conquer. The second thing was to get a better lay of the land. She knew about this town, but there were two others involved. That complicated things. She’d have to go check those towns out as well, after she helped this town with its monster wave problem. She’d skipped that day’s wave at the village, which was a bit like skipping leg day—it left her weaker than she otherwise would have been. An extra level was an extra level, after all.

Eva sighed. She knew she should have asked more from Jorge. It was a bit late for that now, though. There’d be plenty of time to ask the leaders in the morning. Hopefully they’d be as nice as Jorge had been. It would make things a lot more pleasant than if she had to deal with a hard-ass military guy or something like that. Those guys took their ‘fun’ out of ‘funeral’.

She closed her eyes and pulled the leaves up to her chin. Though she had mostly said it to divert attention away from her real purpose, getting away from where Hideki had died really made her anxiety drop. She had other stresses—like sleeping in a new place—but they didn’t overcome the relief she felt. Sleep came without much fuss.

III

The sun rose long before Eva did. She yawned and stretched before brushing the leaves off of her clothes and standing up. She put on her backpack and tucked away her cloth inside her belt. She’d woken up a little earlier that morning than she had the day before, but it was still a little past breakfast time. She decided to wait for lunch before getting anything to eat. Her first mission, should she accept it, was to scout out the town now that there were people about.

The first thing she noticed was just how many people were absent compared to the number of occupied lean-tos when she’d gone to sleep. There were the usual guards and a couple people with green armbands walking around, but otherwise it felt like a ghost town!

To pass the time, Eva decided to go for a dip in the lake. With so many people around, it would be a lot safer than the last time she’d done that. When she approached the lake shore, she noticed that she wasn’t the only one to have the same thought. There were a handful of bathers and a smattering of fishermen enjoying the lake.

Eva disrobed and tied her bag to the branch of a tree, away from any wandering hands. First, she did her best to scrub her clothes free of the blood and muck that now stained them. She was only partly successful without any more soap. It had been destroyed alone with most of her belongings when she’d fought the shitty spiders. When she finished, she laid them out on some sunny rocks.

The cool water licked her skin as she stepped into the lake. Eva floated on her back and closed her eyes. The refreshing chill of the water lapped at her senses, pulling her deeper into relaxation. She let her mind wander back to when she was young. Her grandparents had a summer home in Maine where she went before her family moved out west when her dad got a job at some tech company. She remembered how she would relax in the lake nearby the house and swim with her brother and sisters. Her grandfather would make a really good lemonade that they would unwind while drinking after they were dry.

She frowned. Her brother was dead now—a victim of a car accident in his early twenties. Her younger sister had fallen for a man in a cult and had cut contact soon after. It had been almost a decade since they’d last spoken. Finally, her older sister was unhappily married but too stubborn to divorce her husband. That Eva had divorced hers after being unhappy for a couple years was something her sister seemingly resented. Their relationship had been strained ever since. That left her parents. As great as they were, they had their own lives and worries back on the east coast where they’d moved when their parents started having difficulties.

For as much as she was separated from her family, she realized that she missed them. She enjoyed her space, sure, but with monsters coming to the world, she couldn’t help but worry and hope they’d survive. She was also keenly aware that there was little she could do. With how many deaths there were in the Tutorial, wherever they were was probably pretty harsh as well; and since they were not physically next to her, they would have to survive on their own.

When Eva was comfortable enough with her thoughts, she moved on to the actual reason she went to the lake: to get cleaned up. She used sand she found in the cracks of the rocky beach where her clothes were drying to excise the dirt from her skin. Her hair was a different story. It was an oily, itchy mess that she couldn’t do much about. She could shave it off, sure, but she liked her hair enough to put up with the downsides of not having soap for a month in a dirty, outdoor environment. When the Tutorial was over, that would be the first thing she took care of!

Eva crouched in the lake with her head above the surface. She felt a little like a petulant child—her mind wanted to get out but her body refused the order. With a push from her willpower, she groaned and got out of the lake. Using her hands, she pushed off as much of the water from her skin as she could and sat on a large rock in the sun.

It didn’t take long for her body to dry. When it did, she scooped up her clothes and put them on, followed by the rest of her armor, weaponry, and backpack. She checked the Tutorial clock. It was almost noon time for her to grab lunch and see if she could find out anything about any nearby dungeons.