I

She was woken up just past dawn by Pedro. Their slot was around 11, and they had to leave two hours before that to get there on time.

“So where are you from?” Marie as the group walked through the woods towards the dungeon.

“California, you?” Eva answered.

“Georgia. Pedro’s from Chile, Jakov’s from Croatia, and Jia’s from China.”

“How’d you meet?”

“Over a pack of shadow wolves on the second day.”

Eva nodded, remembering the first monster wave.

“So, when did the whole alien business happen?” she asked.

It was Pedro who answered.

“Third day, they came to the town we just left and met with the leaders. The town was barely half-built and a deal was struck. We’d found the dungeon on the second day, and a couple fights broke out between people trying to use it, then those forseli fuckers came in and took a quarter of the day for themselves!”

He kicked the ground in anger, stubbing his toe and looking even more pissed.

“I see,” Eva said. “I found a dungeon with a friend of mine near where we were staying after hearing a rumor about it. A couple days later, I decided to move there so I could just hop in any time I wanted, but when I came out after a run, he was dead! Some really mental humans and landwalkers had raided the camp, taking a few people and killing the rest. But we had our revenge in the end.”

“Well, I hope you can help us with our alien invasion problem,” Marie said with a smile.

“Mhm.”

II

They continued to chat the time away. Soon enough, they arrived at the dungeon. There was a wall around the entrance, but the gate was open. Eva surmised it was used to defend against monster waves rather than to keep people out. Unlike the other two dungeons that had caves in cliffs as their entrances, this one’s entrance was a gap in a pile of rocks. She saw someone step up to it and then disappear as if they’d never been there!

“Ok,” Marie said. “I’m going to get us registered for a Basic▲ slot. Those are easier to come by, so I shouldn’t have a problem changing our reservation for today.”

Eva sat down on the ground against the wall and waited with the rest of the party. It only took about ten minutes, but Marie returned with good news. She’d also registered for Novice✦ for the next day. Most people were running Journeyman★, so that one would be more difficult to get. No one had completed Master✷, even in a party. Even Adept✶ only had a handful of teams that had finished it, fewer still with no casualties.

“We’re up next,” Marie announced ten minutes later. “Follow us in when we get the go ahead.”

Eva nodded.

Five minutes had elapsed when the others moved in front of her. She followed and selected Basic▲, the only choice she had.

The inside of the dungeon was very different from either of the times before. This time, it was an open area of forest with thick, impassable foliage surrounding a clearing. There were a couple paths veering off from the clearing towards other clearings. She couldn’t see them, but she knew that’s how it would go.

“You’re up, Eva. Show us what you got,” Marie encouraged. “If you need, we can keep a map for you.”

“Thanks. I’ve got a skill for that, so there’s no need unless you’re training Mapmaking.”

Eva chose one of the paths and followed it to the first clearing with monsters. She Observed★ the strangely flat monsters that kind of looked like cookies. They were Gingerbread Men, all level 4.

“Seriously?” she said to herself. “That’s what’s in this dungeon?”

“I had the same thought the first time,” Jakov agreed.

She shrugged and tossed a Fireball at them. The explosion killed two of the three. The third died from being Charged★ into with her shield.

Room after room, she took care of business, only pausing to pick up the loot. She didn’t clear the dungeon fully, rather opting to forego the miniscule experience for expedience. Once she saw the boss room—a house made of gingerbread—she knew just where the System had gotten this one.

Inside was exactly as she expected: a level 9 witch with a cauldron. Eva let the witch attack her a few times to see what special effect it had—tossing a potion at her feet that exploded—before lopping her head off and finishing the dungeon.

“So what’s the plan?” Eva asked as they exited the dungeon.

“We’ll grab lunch here,” Marie said, “fight the monster wave, and then go back to town. There’s nothing we had planned, so if there’s anything you want to do…?”

“Ok. I think I’m going to do some trading when we get back.”

“Sure. Jia, what do you want to eat today?”

“Hopefully Raul’s back today,” Jia answered. “He’s got the best food on offer near the dungeon, even if it is a little expensive.”

It turned out that ‘a little expensive’ was two Basic Shards▲ for the equivalent of a hamburger. Eva had to agree that it was expensive when the other food had been free or half the price for twice as much food. On the other hand, it was the best damn thing she’d eaten in at least the last decade!

She sat with her teammates as they went over the dungeon run after eating.

“You really tore through that dungeon like a knife through wet paper,” Pedro commented.

“Yeah,” Jakov added, “you had no hesitation and just took care of business!”

“I can see why you’re level 20 already,” Jia agreed.

“Thanks,” Eva blushed. “It does feel nice to have money again. Thanks for letting me keep the shards.”

“You did all the work,” Jakov said. “It wouldn’t be fair to us if we took them from you.”

The other party members started talking about other things, which gave Eva time to space relax before the monster wave would come in another half hour. She paid just enough attention to answer a few questions like what she did before the Tutorial—carefully leaving out the extra training—but was otherwise left alone.

III

As the time came closer, she prepared for the monster wave. The people that had come early enough to finish in time that they could comfortably reach the town before the wave came had already left. There were still people going into and out of the dungeon, and there were the people—mostly aliens at that point—who were there ahead of time since it took time to get to the dungeon from wherever they were, and no one wanted to miss the free experience.

Eva took her position in front of the gate. Sure, she could launch a few Fireballs✦ at whatever was coming, but hacking the army to pieces just felt better. There were a couple of others that decided to join her, but most kept to the walls if they could.

There are 17 days remaining

3789/10000 are still alive

New Quest: Defeat a monster wave. 0/432 killed

As with nearly every wave she’d been through, it took a minute or two for the first monsters to start appearing out of the woods. The monsters were dark-colored, shambling, and a strange agglomeration of flesh. She felt she lacked the right words to describe them. To sum it up in one word, they were creepy. Observe labeled them as Shambling Horrors, which fit perfectly fine with what she imagined they might be called. To Eva, they were just another thing added to the ‘kill with fire’ list.

She ignited a Fireball✦ and threw it at the nearest concentration of them. As soon as the Fireball✦ struck, there was a massive explosion! The monster she’d hit had exploded and so had several others nearby, all exploding one another. Seeing her success she emptied her mana to throw as many Fireballs✦ as quickly as she could, while the people on the walls launched their projectiles.

The danger of the exploding enemies kept anyone from approaching them without a ranged attack. Eva, on the other hand, knew she’d be ok even if it hurt a little bit—the monsters were only level 15, after all—and the other people had already taken care of more than half of the monsters thanks in part to their explosions chaining. Their barrage began to wane after only a minute and a half as they ran out of mana, stamina, and projectiles.

She saw an elite version with a couple arrows sticking out of it that looked pretty hurt. It was surrounded by many of the normal ones. That was a good target, Eva decided. She ran to get close before Charging★ into the group. She knew she had to be quick, so she Pierced★ the closest with her fire Infused shortsword before Dodging★ back and Charging★ away.

Eva was blasted to the ground by the explosion. She was winded and took a small amount of damage, but was otherwise alright. The elite no longer stood. It was then that she wanted to kick herself. She’d forgotten that Infuse Weapon★ worked with any weapon! She sheathed her sword and picked up a fist-size rock. She Infused★ it with fire and Threw it at the nearest shambling horror, which exploded on contact.

Now that she wasn’t being completely stupid, the cleanup was fairly easy. She had to run from them if they got close, but she was able to kite them and throw rocks—and other available improvised weaponry—to an explosive conclusion. When all was said and done, she’d gained a fair bit of experience thanks to the multiplier for being in the top four. There was no item given, which made her a little unhappy. She liked the free gifts the System gave her for doing well every day!

Eva sat down on a convenient rock and waited for her team to come get her. Several minutes passed while the people inside the walls shuffled out of the gate towards their homes. Eventually Marie and the others found her.

“Nice work,” she said. “Are you ok? You took a pretty big blast.”

“All good,” Eva responded. “We’re headed back now, right?”

“Yup. You ready?”

Eva nodded and followed them. They took a little longer on the way back since there was traffic on the path and they had to stop to let people pass every so often. It didn’t help that some groups in front of them were walking rather slowly.

IV

When she arrived back in the town, it was late afternoon. She went straight to the trading section to see what her options were. She wanted to get rid of the spell tome in exchange for some shards or potions if she could get them. She knew she’d have to shop around to get the best deal.

The trading area wasn’t overly large, with only five merchants hawking their wares. Two of them were human while the other three were forseli. She refused to do business with the aliens even though it looked like they had much more of the traffic between them than the humans did. She’d much rather give her own race her patronage after what the landwalkers had done. It just made sense.

The first merchant she came to had only one other customer, so she waited her turn. His stall had a few items, but they looked to be of rather poor quality. There were none of the potions she was looking for, either, unless he had them hidden somewhere else.

“How can I help you?” he asked when she stepped up to the stall.

“I was looking to buy some potions and sell an item,” she stated.

“I’m afraid I don’t have any potions. You’d have to ask one of the forseli merchants. They usually have that kind of thing. What was the item you were looking to sell?”

Eva pulled the tome from her bag and placed it on the stall.

“That’s an impressive find! What were you looking for it?”

“I’m not actually sure. I was going to see what a couple people would offer for it and take the best. The last thing I sold was nearly two weeks ago at the beginning of the Tutorial just because I didn’t want to lug the spear around everywhere when I use a sword. There weren’t many shards then so I got the best I could at the time.”

“I see. Well, I can offer you four Novice Shards✦ for it. I’m not really sure what I can sell it for, either.”

“Thank you.”

Eva stood in line at the other human merchant’s stall. This one looked a little better than the other; but still, the quality was lacking even if the selection was better. She repeated the same conversation with the woman but ended in a similar place only with the slightly better offer of one Journeyman Shard★. It just didn’t feel like a good deal.

She sighed. Just how badly did she want potions? She sighed again. The reality was that if she were going to conquer dungeons, she would need more mana and stamina potions, especially if she had to do anything reckless in the process. As much as she hated to admit it, she needed more potions just in case. Having to deal with these forseli now would be better than being dead later because she didn’t.

The first of the forseli she went to had much better, though less numerous, stock than the last human merchant. The line was a bit longer, but she reached the front after only a few minutes. The merchant looked like a dwarf right out of a novel—short, stocky, big beard, the whole nine yards—except with an extra set of arms.

“Whit kin ah dae fur ye?” the alien asked her in the thickest Scottish accent she’d ever heard.

“I, um,” she started.

“Oot wi' it lass. Ah haven't git a' day.”

“I want to sell a Tome of Fireball★ and buy some potions.”

“Nae tae shabby. Ah git potions. Whit ye keekin fur?”

“Stamina and mana.”

“A'richt. Here's whit ah will dae fur ye. Fur th' book, ah will gie ye four potions o' ilk. A'richt?”

“Ok? You’re a bit difficult to understand, but I think I’m ok with that.”

Eva passed the forseli her tome in exchange for four Stamina Potions★ and four Mana Potions★. Seeing the quality of the potions, she felt like it was a good trade for what she was after.

“So how are you able to talk to me? The landwalker assholes never said anything intelligible.”

“Tis a skill ah trained afore comin' 'ere. A' forseli wha travel git it.”

“Ok. Thanks.”

Eva turned to leave but saw something flash out of the corner of her eye. She twisted her head to get a better view, only to see the forseli she’d been trading with get pierced by a sword! She was shocked by the suddenness of it. The woman who’d done it was dressed similarly to the humans in the town, and she wore a white armband.

The woman pulled the blade out and stabbed again twice more before two guards tackled her and wrestled the sword from her.

“That’ll teach you, alien scum!” she spat.

The guards roped her hands and dragged her away. She looked proud of herself for what she did.

Eva stood while the alien fell to the ground and bled. None of the other bystanders rushed to help. Even the other merchants shrugged and went about their business. She turned to leave but caught something through the gurgling sounds of the dying merchant that froze her blood.

“Hulp me,” it said.

She stood rooted in place for almost a minute while the alien bled out. It wasn’t her problem, after all. She walked back towards the town square to catch up with her party.