The mana was like an incorporeal bluish-white maelstrom as it surged towards the 2 men, making their hair sway back and forth. Their aura seemed to increase and turn palpable while they were filled with a seemingly endless stream of energy. The rest of the men revealed looks of surprise and joy as they realized what was going on. Kel was the first to make a move as he lifted his spear and jumped at the sole enemy remaining.

“AHHHH” He stabbed out with his spear as a bright ray of energy left his spear tip, looking as though the spear magically elongated and was surging towards the kobold shaman.

The last remaining monster knew he had no chance of surviving this strike so his short and skinny lizard body started swelling up, as though he was intending to rupture his entire body and give up his life to take out all these humans. This was when Lard stepped forth and lifted his battered shield up high.

“You shall bring no harm foul creature… GUARDIANS EMBRACE!” a visible barrier materialized around Lard and then extended beyond just shielding him, covering every single one of them, including the captain too.

Though the captain would definitely come out unscathed from this attack, the defensive skill Lard used seemed to cover every friendly within range. Abel looked on in amazement as he knew this skill. He didn’t know how to use it but he had read many records pertaining to this specific skill, it was created by Bryen Stonebinder after all!

BOOOOOOOOOOM

The room started shaking but the men shielded behind Lard’s skill didn’t even feel the tremor, they only knew a massive explosion took place because they could see the air waves battering the rocky walls and the black-bloody mist the shaman had turned into. The explosion took out the couple of kobold warriors still clinging to their lives, bringing an end to this battle.

The blackish-bloody mist seemed sentient as it tried attacking the barrier but it was futile as the shield didn’t even budge. Eventually, the misty black blood seemingly ran out of energy as it fizzled out of existence. If it weren’t for the aftermath of this fatal attack then the kobold shaman would have left no traces of its existence.

‘It seems like Lard follows a similar path to old man Rye… what power… and this is only tier 1! I wonder how strong this skill would be if it was executed by the old man’

Abel had no doubt that he would be very much dead had Lard not protected him, while the rest of the men would have certainly gotten injured. He was getting pumped up seeing these 2 men advance, he couldn’t wait till he reached tier 1 himself. He was very curious about the advanced skills the hammer would unlock for him when he advanced, but it would all be in due time.

The first batch of players were edging closer to their first-tier advancement already and it could happen any day now. He took a look at his notifications and realized he was on the edge of leveling up again! This expedition was proving to be quite fruitful as he nearly leveled up twice while they were still on the first floor. Abel hoped he’d be at least level 15 by the time they finished, perhaps he would even reach a higher level than that with the quest rewards but that would also depend on his contributions.

“Well done men! Very well done!” Captain Carson said jovially, it was clear how ecstatic he was. Whether his words were that of the captain or a proud father, no one knew but himself. He continued and said “I hope the rest of you won’t let down your instructors and advance by the time you’re all done. Lard and Kell, you 2 will take a back seat in the upcoming battles. Only intervene when necessary. With the added pressure of having 2 less teammates, I’m sure it will push some of you into tier 1.”

“YES CAPTAIN!” The 2 men replied simultaneously. The rush and energy they felt from the advancement still pumped them up and they could probably go for another few battles right away.

“Congratulations Kel... Congratulations Lard…”

“Congrats…” The men started congratulating the duo on their advancement. They were now officially recognized soldiers, something they had worked years to achieve.

“You know, I expected Kell to advance quickly but you surprised us all Lard. How could your fat and lazy ass advance before me?!” Roy mentioned after his congratulations, finding it weird how Lard advanced so quickly.

“I need to advance quicker, the stronger I am the more money I could make…” Bruni said something everyone expected.

“Congratulations, you two deserve it.” Abel also congratulated them when his turn came, he could tell Lard truly deserved to advance.

The man might be lazy in everything else but when it came to battle, he would be the first one to step up and the last to stand down. It was obvious from how beat up he was looking before he advanced, his face had turned a shade of purple from the number of poisoned arrows he had gotten hit with while his dented shield had seen better days.

“Thank you Red Sky. You’re still quite weak but you’re not too bad yourself. Everyone once started off weak, even the gods. Just don’t give up and keep working hard, you might even surpass us one day.”

“Alright men, let’s clean up this place so we can pitch our tents. Remember to take all that nasty smelling meat and dump it into the central area along with any useless parts.” Kell clapped his hands and spurred the men into action. He then turned to Abel and directed him on what to do, “Red Sky, get started on dinner. If you need any more supplies then ask the captain. The meat the men hunted is in his spatial storage treasure alongside some rice and condiments.”

‘So I don’t have to use my supplies… why didn’t you mention it last time?!’ Abel didn’t voice his inner grumblings and simply nodded his head.

He guessed they hadn’t mention it earlier because the men were hazing him slightly. While he was accepted, that didn’t mean everyone approved of him. He hadn’t trained with the men or even talked much with them before the mission so a little test of some kind was understandable. When they saw him take out his own supplies without protest and then give it his all in each battle, even acting as their eyes in the cave then any scruples they had with carrying him disappeared.

This was one of the things that made Realm Quest so different from other games. It was sometimes scary how sentient, human-like and sapient the NPC’s were in this game. While smart AI’s had become something of a taboo to humanity after the Binary Eclipse, AI’s in general weren’t completely eradicated. Rule-Based systems that dealt with algorithms, speech-recognition and other such programs were still in use today.

These types of AI’s didn’t have any self-learning ability and would simply not work if they were taken out of the parameters in which they operated in. Not to mention the economical fallout from divesting entirely with any form of AI’s, it wasn’t required anyway so why should humans simply make more work for themselves?

Abel rid himself of these thoughts and got started with making a fire while the men were clearing the room of spoils and carcasses. He still had a lot of firewood and meat from the Coral Catacombs in his spacial bag. He figured he’d continue to use his own supplies just to add more variety to their meals.

He started seasoning the skewered meat and placed them on the side. After filling up the largest pot with some water, he added in some oil, salt and some shredded meat from what the men had hunted earlier. He was planning on making some meaty rice porridge to go with the grilled lobster and crab. He had gotten a large 50 kg bag of rice form the captain that gave him a smirk. While he was prepping the meal, he got a notification of a new message.

*Ding*

You have a new whisper!

‘Open’

“Red Sky! I finished from the training citadel. I also got my profession sorted out… Do you want to go leveling together?” The message came from Raven, the kid he had met a few days ago when he first arrived at Stormwatch.

‘I almost didn’t recognize him without the stutter, though he probably typed out the message instead of speaking it out loud.’ Abel humorously thought to himself, recalling the child-looking young man with a stutter that was lost in the city.

“Sorry Raven, I’m in the middle of a quest hours away from Stormwatch. Work hard in leveling up, if you can reach level 10 in a weeks’ time then I’ll take you to a special dungeon with some friends.”

After replying to his message, he carried on with his earlier task of cooking. He started wondering how Frankie and Melissa were doing. Were they still grinding away at the training citadel? He hadn’t logged off ever since he woke up after midnight. It was now probably 3 pm in Luminara as it approached evening in-game.

‘I’ll finish up this task and log off for a quick bite and a bathroom break...’ Just as he had this thought, the system pinged him telling him it would be best if he logged off.

He obviously couldn’t log off right now so he swiped away the notification and carried on with seasoning the skewers of seafood. The fire had started to blaze a while ago so he placed the pot of meat porridge in the middle but left enough space to cook the skewers of seafood. Once he got started, he didn’t take a break and would rotate the skewers every minute or so. The last thing he wanted was to ruin a batch that he’d only have to re-do. He also didn’t want to lose favorability with the soldiers either.

Although there was no saying if this relationship would bear any fruit in the future, it would be best if he could cultivate favorability anyway. He kept roasting one skewer after another and by the time the porridge was ready, he had cooked the rest of the crab and lobster meat he had on him.

“The food’s ready everyone. Come and get your share.” He made his way to the captain and mentioned his need to log out for a while. “Excuse me sir, I have to leave for around 15 minutes…”

“Oh, you need to tend to matters in your world?” The captain understood what Abel meant and gave him the go ahead “Go on young man. Make sure to leave enough time to take care of the repairs. Don’t forget your promise to the men.”

Abel nodded, not forgetting the need to apply Weapon Enhancement after he was done with repairing their equipment. He pulled up his Panel and chose to log out, leaving the rest of the men gawking at his disappearance. He didn’t waste any time back in his user home and chose to disconnect from the NeuroNex pod.

Whooooooosh

The cascading colors broke up and disappeared out of existence before he opened his eyes in the real world. The first feeling that came back to him was the backlog his gut was currently enduring.

‘Oh shit… I'm going to shit on myself!’ He hurried out of the pod and ran to the bathroom straight away. It looked like he might need more than 15 minutes before he could log back on.