I

She walked into the town and beelined for the firepit and the food that awaited her there. The aroma of the roasted meats and the vegetables they’d been able to find made her mouth water. Eva was given a wrap similar to what she’d had for dinner. She took a bite, letting the juices coat her mouth. The taste was different in a pleasant way. The cooks had used different spices and included some vegetables as well, so the texture had more going on too.

Eva took a seat nearby to two people with green armbands. One was a tall, young man with naturally blonde hair, the other was an average height, older woman with dark hair. From what she heard when she approached them, they were talking about the upcoming monster wave. She waited for them to finish their conversation before she spoke.

“Hello,” she said.

“Hi,” the woman answered.

“I’m Eva. I arrived here yesterday evening. I had a nice conversation with Jorge, but I had a couple of questions I thought about later. I was hoping you could help me?”

The woman nodded for her to continue.

“I’m looking for dungeons. Do you know of any?”

A flash of wariness passed over her face.

“We do have one that we share with the other towns,but I’m sorry to say that all of our slots are taken. Our town is small, afterall, so we only ended up with a smaller number of slots than the other two towns we share it with. Maybe if you go try one of them you’ll have better luck?”

Eva could read the subtext. She was new and unwelcome in whatever deal they had going on. Even if this town was a dud, like the woman said, the others might bear fruit. It would be good to know where they were.

“Where are the other towns?”

“The closest one is around 5 miles to the north west. The other is a little farther away towards the north east. I’d recommend the second one I mentioned. It’s the biggest town.”

Eva thanked the woman and pondered what she should do next. The monster wave was due in only a couple hours, so she figured she’d stick around to take care of that before moving on to the next town.

II

The town had its own way of handling the monster wave. As the time drew closer, many of the people she hadn’t seen started streaming back to the town from wherever they had been—the dungeon if Eva’s guess was right. They took up posts on the walls to kill whatever was coming from a distance. There were some melee fighters positioned behind the gate in case anything got through there. Other fighters were spread out along the walls to deal with anything smart enough to climb them.

Eva positioned herself up on one of the walls around fifteen minutes before the wave was due. She had enough Mana for quite a few Fireballs✦ without dipping into her mana potion reserve, which would be saved for more pressing circumstances. If that failed, she could always jump down and massacre the survivors.

Next to her on the wall were two men with bows and several quivers of arrows awaiting use. She Observed★ them. Both were level 13. Decent for the humans she’d seen, but nowhere near the peak she knew people were capable of if allowed to go ham in the dungeons like she had a few times already.

“Where’s your bow?” one of the men asked her.

“Don’t use one,” Eva replied.

“That sword won’t do you much good up here,” said the other with a chuckle.

She shrugged.The Fireballs✦ would do the talking for her when the time came.

There are 18 days remaining

3812/10000 are still alive

New Quest: Defeat a monster wave. 0/532 killed

A minute passed before the first monsters made their way into the clearing around the town. They were overly large chickens with red plumage around their heads making it look like their herds were on fire. As soon as she could see them, they began to race towards the town. Archers along the walls fired arrows into the tide of monsters coming. Eva readied her first Fireball✦, and threw it.

The burst was a little off from where she’d intended, but she got two kill notifications from it. As quickly as she could, she threw Fireball✦ after Fireball✦ at around half power into the mass of chickens. A minute later, she was dry on mana and fifty chickens were now extra crispy. She drew her sword and leapt from the wall to the ground. The fall knocked off a handful of HP, but she was otherwise uninjured.

Eva Charged towards the chickens, her sword blazing with Infused★ fire. She hacked and slashed through the monsters in front of her, bringing them down in one hit. The elites were not much more of a fight—barely two hits from her sword sent them to cluckin’ hell. With so few enemies, there were not many elites to fight. Before tackling the last one, she took the opportunity to Observe★ it. A level 14 Elite Cock-a-trice. She shook her head. The system had a strange sense of humor. It died quickly like all the others had.

Soon, the last of the cock-a-trices were dead and the system awarded her with first place and an item fell into her hands. She glanced at it before placing it into her backpack. It was another copy of the Tome of Fireball★. She had no use for it, so maybe she’d be able to trade it in the bigger town when she got there. She glanced back towards the town, shrugged, and walked in the direction she had been given by the woman earlier.

III

Three hours of bush whacking and being bush whacked in return, she saw the palisade of the larger town. It was of similar size to the village, but its defenses were better thought out. There were several people standing guard along the walls and in front of the gate.

A group of people came out from the gate and walked east along a path that had been flattened into the ground through repeated use. Ordinarily, this would not have been anything noteworthy, but Eva saw something amongst the group of humans. It looked like a short human with more hair, kind of like a dwarf. What really set it apart was that it had four arms!

Rage bubbled up from her gut. Why were these people working with aliens? They may not look like landwalkers, but they were invaders nonetheless, and Eva remembered what they’d done to her—to Hideki. She had half a mind to waltz over there and send the fucker to the afterlife, consequences be damned!

She sighed and took control of her feelings. Hideki’s passing was still raw, but she also had a goal she needed to work towards: controlling the dungeons. How could she get access to the dungeon if she went all Rambo on them? These humans hadn’t wronged her or others as far as she could tell, and starting a conflict just because she saw an invader or two wouldn’t sit right with her. The aliens would be fair game of course, but the humans were off limits until proven otherwise.

Eva decided not to delay any farther and walked to the gate. The guards there paid her little mind and waved her through. The inside of the town was similar to the first one she went to, only bigger. There was more space, more lean-tos—in groups around shared firepits—and a bigger square in the center filled with an assortment of people and a handful of invaders carrying on like there was no reason they shouldn’t be there.

She shook her head and looked for someone with an armband. There were a few there, most of them yellow but a few green and white ones mixed in. It took her a moment to remember which was which; but when she did, she decided to speak with a woman who was sitting down towards the edge of the square. She wore a yellow armband.

“Hello,” the woman said when she approached. “What can I do for you?”

“I was looking to run through the dungeon.”

“New, eh? I’m afraid that unless you join a group, there’s no room. Most of ‘em come back around dinner time so maybe ask around then?”

“Ok. By the way, what’s with the aliens?”

“The Forseli? They’re merchants. They’re here to make money, apparently.”

The woman shrugged and then continued.

“Do be aware that they only deal in shards, no bartering.”

“Thanks.”

Eva was disgusted by the apparent lack of wariness on the part of the humans. Didn’t they know what the invaders were there for? Only death awaited them if they let the aliens run free like that! She did her best to hide her emotions until she was away from the woman. The last thing she wanted to do was to jeopardize her chances at the dungeon. She went with the option the woman had presented and sat down to wait.

IV

A bit more than an hour later, there was a large influx of people. Some of them retired to their shelters, but most went to the communal firepits for food and company. Eva picked up some food after waiting in line. It was more simple than the herbed meat wrap, but it satisfied her hunger. She strolled through the groups of people, listening to the conversations while Observing★ their levels as she passed.

“... the Forseli bastards!” she heard someone say nearby.

She turned to find out who said that, only to see their companions telling them to keep it down. They were a foursome of three men and a woman. Their levels were all around 15, making them stronger than average. Intrigued, she approached them.

“Mind if I join?” she asked.

The woman motioned for her to sit.

“So you heard?” the woman asked her.

“Yeah. I’m not a fan of any of these aliens. Some landwalkers killed my friend!”

“Landwalkers, what are those?” one of the men asked.

“Think fish-face human. They started raiding us a couple of days after the Tutorial started. Didn’t stop until there was a huge fight. We won, but I left. I couldn’t stay there anymore. And to think there are more bastards like them?”

Eva slammed her hand into the ground.

“I feel your pain,” said another of the men. “When we were trying to run the dungeon today, those assholes took our scheduled slot because they said we missed our window by a minute. A minute!”

“Wait, they use your dungeon?”

“Yeah,” the woman answered. “They traded some knowledge about the Tutorial and stuff like that for a quarter of the slots. Made the leaders of the villages all sign a contract over it, too. Apparently those things are System enforceable.”

“I’m just so pissed!” the second man said. “I want to fuck ‘em up the way they fucked us, you know?”

Eva pondered her choices.

“I have a way,” she said.

“Really?”

“Yeah. See, I need to run that dungeon at Master✷ level for a System quest, which will give me control over the dungeon. I can then only allow humans to use it. Problem is, there are no slots available, or so I’ve been told several times. If you get me through to Master✷, I’ll take care of your alien problem.”

“O—”

“Can you give us a moment to think it over?” said the third man, giving a glare at the second man jumping the gun.

“Sure.”

Eva stood up and strolled around the town. Beyond the usual sleeping shelters and firepits, there was an area for trading, where most of the Forseli in the town were hawking their wares. A couple of humans bought and sold goods at their own stands, but most of the traffic seemed to go to the aliens’ stalls rather than the humans’.

After wandering around for twenty minutes, Eva made it back to the group and sat down.

“So, what’s the verdict?” she asked.

“You’re in,” the woman answered. “Let’s introduce ourselves. I’m Marie.”

“Pedro.” the second man said.

“Jakov.” the first man answered.

“Jia.” the third man stated.

“I’m Eva. Nice to meet you.”

“What’s your specialty?” Marie asked. “I’m a frontliner, spear and shield. Same for Jakov and Jia. Pedro’s an archer.”

“I’m mixed, I would say. I have ranged magic that is fairly potent, but usually I’ll Charge★ in and use my sword when they’re off balance or knocked down. I’d much rather Dodge★ than fight blow for blow.”

“I see. Since you have to do the Basic▲ tomorrow, we’ll let you show us what you do and we’ll figure it out from there.”

“Sounds good. Where’s a good place to sleep? I forgot to ask one of the people with armbands before.”

“Oh, you can come with us. There’s a fifth shelter that’s unused if you want it.”

“Thanks!”

Eva followed them after dinner to their camp. Jia lit a fire and retired for the night. Marie and Jakov argued about whose turn it was to clean out the latrine while Pedro whittled a figurine out of a log. From what she’d seen of them, they seemed nice enough. She didn’t get any bad vibes from any of them and figured that they’d be able to work together well enough. She yawned and decided to turn in.