It was absolutely the right decision to get here first, and make a reservation for their village. The newcomers, including the people that came together with her friends, are now in some sort of waitlist as to where they should be placed. However, this development rather puts a damper to their backup plan of getting a common Residency. There won’t be enough spots for them if they decided to back out from being a Military Household.

Ah well, homelessness isn’t that big of a problem.

More than that, there’s unrest among the poor, the longtime residents of the Capital. They’re complaining about why are outsiders getting special treatment with the housing and livelihood opportunities. Nothing serious yet, just grumblings on the street.

Marcheline now theorizes that it’s some scheme of the Kingdom to gain loyalty from potential skill-holders. That they must be seeing that the value in their destitute residents have gone dry, compared to new blood.

Her and the Chief have been clued in on it when the priests suddenly recruited someone from the camp.

Marcheline and Bodil were out at that time, signing the conditional land rights and such—

So, as retold by their Eve:

There was an accident involving a metal pole, the one they use to roast large game. Someone placed it on a sloped table, then one thing led to another and a woman got her leg impaled.

The woman’s young son, whom Marcheline thinks subconsciously formed a party with his mother, automatically healed her wounds. With the metal bar still sticking through her leg.

They kept removing the metal, and the wound kept healing the entire (blessedly short) time they were removing it. It was a mess, but at least there were no lasting consequences. Just a slightly scarred mother and child. Allegedly, the woman even said that her constantly aching muscles were cured within half a day.

“My child, you are blessed by God!” one of the priests had said, and they arranged for the mother and her boy to join the Church. They were promised a lot of benefits, but the specifics were discussed within closed doors.

Her mind turns. There are many healers that don’t require Casters, those that don’t need to drain the SC Progress. But with Eve’s description, Marcheline suspects it’s that Purple hero, Solaire. Ahh, he was very, very annoying as an enemy in PvP.

The detail about healing “constantly aching muscles” though, it sticks out in particular. Marcheline is downright floored to know that Solaire’s abilities are not only effective in a battle, but could apparently treat chronic aches. She feels it’s a shame that she probably won’t have any opportunity to experiment with that ability.

In any case, it’s quite reassuring to have some hints about the reason for this unheard-of generosity from all the powers within the Capital. For now, she can only hope they could awaken fun bloodlines, form at least one good party, and level up safely.

[Marcheline: lvl2/???]. She sighs. The safest way to level up would be to help with the quests from the Military or the Adventurer’s guild. Killing Grey fodders barely increases her experience bar.

Soon, they would be able to move to the northwestern part of the Capital, and build their new life.

Just then, Marcheline feels a chill on the back of her neck. She slowly turns to her side. From her peripheral vision, there’s a huge guy doing some repairs to his tools. Next to him is his pre-teen daughter, staring at her again. Marcheline could sometimes catch this girl glaring at her.

This is far too much malice coming from such a young girl. Although…

Tragic stories come a dime a dozen from everyone around here. It would be stranger if they all came out mentally unscathed.

Marcheline hopes they could move soon.

That night, she fantasizes about ways to level up.

——-

It’s very quiet. The world is strangely still.

There’s a large rip on the tent. Marcheline isn’t worried though, she knows everyone should be… around…?

The light of the moon is a bit off, but for the life of her, she can’t recall how it’s supposed to be. There’s no sound, except for the creaking of trees in the distance. There’s a dullness to her senses.

Oh, it’s alright, she’s merely dreaming.

But this dream is creepy, it would be great if she could just wake up. She often could, once she realizes she’s dreaming. She just needs to will herself awake.

A blink, and the next time she wakes up, the rip on the old tent has been patched up, just as it looked earlier. She must’ve been thinking about that huge patch before she fell asleep. Her body still feels heavy, she can’t move at all. Ugh, goddamn sleep paralysis. She also doesn’t like hearing that wood-like creaking getting nearer.

Her brain halts. Marcheline is utterly displeased that for a moment, she thought she actually did wake up. Here, she’s looking at the large tent at a completely different angle now.

She would roll her eyes, but her vision doesn’t change.

It is a firmly held belief of hers that your dreams are completely your own. It is your own mind, your own thoughts, your own will. There is no hope for one who fears her own dreams.

So she navigates this world like a master in its own realm.

She falls. And the next things she sees are the rows and rows of tents. There’s no night watch, not even a fire. But the damn creaking of wood isn’t coming from the nearby woods.

She runs towards the nearest tent, opens it, sees nobody there. She blinks and two kids materialize, sleeping soundly. Yes, this is how it should be. The creaking sound, stop it.

Silence at last. Satisfied, she goes back to her own place. She appears on her own bed and closes her eyes.

Breathing in is good. She didn’t do that in her dreams. She looks around, and there’s a large rip on the tent. And there’s an unseen creaking on top of her.