Moving Forward

After a few minutes, Maxie had been carried to The Workshop, the main crafting area. There hadn't been any serious injuries before now, so the camp didn't have a designated medical space, and The Workshop seemed like the best option, if only because they could use the fabric gathered from the players as bandages.

"Alright, everyone out," Soze yelled as Maxie was being placed down, "I know you all want to know what happened, but everyone needs to rest. I'll explain everything later."

Fortunately, the crowd was willing to accept this after having seen Maxie's condition, and they quickly dispersed. Letting out a sigh of relief, Soze turned to go rest to go sit for a moment, but before he could he felt his legs give out from underneath him, his exhausted body finally giving in after an impossibly difficult day.

"Easy there man."

"Are you alright?"

Before he hit the ground, Yin and Loran appeared by his sides and began supporting him; Alexx and Yang also walked over. They had all been in the crowd and, having seen Soze's condition, wanted to make sure he was okay.

"I'm alright," Soze assured them, "I'm just tired."

"Bullshit."

"Yeah I'm gonna have to agree with Yang on this one," Loran said, "Alexx, you carry him, he's too small for us to hold up like this. We're going back to his shelter."

"Got it," the smaller man was quickly picked up in a princess carry, much to his protest.

"Guys I just need to rest a bit. Besides, I need to explain what happened soon."

"Soze, you can barely stand," Yin reminded him, "what you need to do now is recuperate."

"Yeah," Alexx agreed, "and can't one of the others explain that?"

"...They're in no state to be talking right now."

"Like hell they aren't."

"Yang," Soze said slowly, "they were friends with Maxie IRL."

"...Oh…"

The group continued walking in silence for a moment before Loran spoke up, "Alright, give me the important details, I'll give the announcement."

"You?" Yang joked. "I'm sorry, did you get a public speaking Skill recently?"

"It's okay Loran," Yin assured him, "I'll do it."

"Sh-shut up," he stuttered, blushing slightly, "whatever. Soze, give us the highlights."

"...Alright."

Soze explained that they had discovered the first large animal of the woods, a creature they had chosen to name the Spined Deer. It was similar to a real deer in many ways, but it was larger, over 5 feet tall at the shoulder, and possessed many sharp antlers all along its back and sides. According to Soze, they had discovered a herd of these deer and decided to follow them, after a little while another male deer appeared. There was only one male Spined Deer in the herd, going by the size of their antlers, and when the new one appeared the two quickly tried to intimidate each other before beginning to fight. The fight lasted a few minutes before the lone deer was driven off, now with some chipped spines and other injuries. There was some disagreement, but the party decided to follow the lone deer, hoping to take it down. Its injuries weren't too severe, but it had lost around a quarter of its HP so the fight didn't seem impossible, but they had no idea that it would be so aggressive. The moment they attacked the deer charged at them, using a Skill called [CHARGE] to almost immediately gore Maxie. The deer only tried to flee when it was nearly dead, until that point it fought like mad, charging at each of the players and sometimes flailing wildly, trying to slash at them with its spines.

"We were able to kill it," Soze said before chuckling, "Maxie was even the one to land the killing blow, but we couldn't take it back, we had to focus on her."

"Obviously," Loran shook his head, "that debuff she has is insane."

"Wait, debuff?" Yin asked.

"The system is representing that huge hole in her side as a 'Severe Wound' debuff," Loran said while making air quotes, "apparently she'll start losing HP if she so much as moves the wrong way."

"It's still better than the alternative," Soze said, "an injury like that should've already killed her."

"I guess our bodies are more durable now," Alexx shrugged.

"Mh… small miracles I guess," Soze yawned, "anyway, the reason I'm so beat is because I took over watching the entire perimeter on the way back. We had been walking for hours and I barely had any downtime. Just the thought of running into another of those things was making me twitchy, I couldn't calm down the entire way back."

"Alright, that should be enough," Yin said, "you rest now, I'll go tell the others."

"...Thanks guys."

"It's fine, now sleep."

~~~~~

After a little while, Yin went to one of the larger fire pits to make her announcement. The area got a lot of foot traffic so she hoped that by saying everything here it would spread to the rest of the camp. After explaining what she had been told she quickly became swarmed by players asking questions, and after some yelling from Yang they quieted down enough for Yin to tell them that Soze would answer any further questions once he was rested.

~~~~~

The next few days saw the mood of the camp take a nosedive. It wasn't that the players thought that the Spined Deer sounded too strong, even Soze agreed that they probably would have handled it better had they been better prepared. The problem was that this was just a deer; if the herbivores were this dangerous, how bad were the predators? Since an ambush on an injured deer had ended with one of the players nearly dead, almost everyone came to a silent agreement that the first players to discover, or be discovered, by the local predators was certain to experience casualties.

However, not everyone was so distraught by this. Until now, the only players that ever left the camp were the ones that used bows; meanwhile, there were plenty of players like Alexx and Yang that intended to use melee builds. They were utterly useless when hunting the small animals, and the discovery of a large beast that wouldn't immediately run away made many of them want to prove themselves. Less than a week after Maxie's party was wiped out, a new party with both melee and ranged players came back with not one, but two Spined Deer.

However, the biggest boost to everyone's morale came from Maxie, or rather her recovery. Everyone had been shaken partially because her injuries were just so gruesome looking, but just as Soze had noted she was surprisingly stable. After only two days of rest, her HP was already fully restored, the smaller injuries were all functionally gone, and the huge hole in her side had healed tremendously as well. Once players realized that they could recover even from the brink of death, their fears quickly diminished.

~~~~~

Loran was woken up by the morning sun shining through the branches of his shelter. Although he was still tired, he decided to get up anyway; a bed of leaves and grass wasn't comfortable enough to warrant sleeping in, and he wanted to eat before too many people woke up. After crawling out of the shelter, he stood up, stretched, and headed for The Kitchen while looking around.

It had been a week since Maxie's discovery of the Spined Deer, and in that time the camp had continued to grow dramatically. It finally seemed as if all the players in the area had found their way to the camp, capping out at a little over 150 people. The camp itself had also become far more imposing. The discovery of the Spined Deer made many players worry that the barrier of wooden spikes might not be strong enough and so that was further reinforced, now resembling a real wall more than a simple fence. Some of the less concerned players had chosen to improve their own living conditions and tore down their basic shelters for more intricate designs. Some had mud huts, others designed beds, one particularly ambitious player even tried to build a log cabin, although it wasn't well made and collapsed in a matter of hours. The continuous walking of the players had also created paths of flattened grass, while the places with the highest foot traffic became full-on dirt roads. Despite having only been in the area for less than a month, the players had practically created a village in the middle of nowhere.

Loran continued walking through the mostly silent village before arriving at The Kitchen. Because of how important their food supply was, there were always at least a few players awake and tending the area. Currently, The Kitchen is almost at full capacity, most of the players were tending to an assortment of meat skewers for the morning rush, while others were stragglers from the previous night, drying meat out for storage.

As Loran walked through, he quickly grabbed one of the skewers from one of the cooks. With The Kitchen being one of the few places he frequented, the cooks had since learned that Loran generally wasn't interested in talking and so they only exchanged a few quick pleasantries with the passing player. Taking a bite, Loran took a moment to enjoy the mixing flavors of the meat and wild vegetables.

Food had gotten dramatically better over the last few days. Some players had been experimenting with using foraged berries and plants, hoping to, "save everyone from the slow descent into madness that would come from eating the same thing every day."

As much as Loran was missing things like fast food, he had thought they were exaggerating, but after their first successful creation, he saw more than a few players tearing up while eating and she had to agree. 'It kind of tastes like that steak sauce I had a while back, maybe a little sweeter.' The sauce was named Blood-Berry Blend and was apparently made from a mix of mostly berries, some wild onions, and, rather disturbingly, Spined Deer blood. Pretty much everybody was put off by that, but after a few people tried it and said it tasted good the rest soon followed.

Loran made his way to the river while finishing his breakfast. Only the hunters that wanted to get an early start to the day we're waking up now, but even with so few people, the paths between The Kitchen and the river were too clogged for Lorans' tastes. Thankfully, they mostly kept to themselves, many were reveling in the afterglow of their most recent hunts. The few hunters that noticed Loran just greeted him with a nod before returning to their business. After making it to the river, drinking some of the crisp water, he splashed some on his face, hoping to wake himself up more. Wiping the water away, he opened his status menu, a morning habit of his.

[NAME]: Loran

[SPECIES]: Human

[LEVEL]: 9

[EXP]: 60/1000

[STATUS]

{HP}: 120/120

{SP}: 180/180

[END]: 15

[STR]: 10

[AGI]: 15

[DEX]: 17

[PER]: 19

[REMAINING ABILITY POINTS]: 3

[SKILLS]

[ANALYSE] Lv.10(Master)

(Active: Cost 5 SP) Allows the user to learn detailed information about a target.

[HUNTER] Lv.10

(Passive) Increase damage against beast targets by 30%.

[SP BOOSTER] Lv.4

(Passive) Decrease HP and increase SP by 20%.

[SPRINT] Lv.8

(Active: Cost 5 SP/sec) Increase movement speed by 80%.

[STALWART] Lv.10

(Passive) Reduce damage received by 10%.

After hearing about how Loran managed to create a new Skill, many of the players had been experimenting with the Pioneer System for weeks now. One important discovery was that players with Lv.10 Skills could spend Ability Points to teach those Skills to others. For example, players could spend almost an hour intensely analyzing random objects or they could just speak to Loran, who used 2 AP to 'master' [ANALYSE], and pay him 100 EXP. Needless to say, Loran was endlessly pestered by players who wanted to learn [ANALYSE] quickly. Other players that maxed out their starting Skills realized they could also do this and soon most players had several of the starting Skills, although the stat-boosting Skills like [MIGHTY] couldn't be taught or mastered for some reason.

As for actually creating new Skills, it wasn't as easy as Loran had made it seem. Although they knew that performing certain actions could generate Skills, it was hard to figure out exactly what actions qualified; those that tried couldn't tell if they were doing something wrong, if their stats weren't high enough, or if they just had to keep at it for long enough. A few players managed to get lucky though. The first were the players who got the [HUNTER] Skill from their daily hunting trips. Later, the [SP BOOSTER] Skill was discovered by a hunter who said the conditions were "to achieve a lifetime SP consumption of at least 500 and ten times greater than your lifetime HP loss." More recently, a few players dragged their unfortunate friend to the training area, and after several days of relentless beatings, managed to create the [HP BOOSTER] Skill. Apparently, they had come up with this idea from hearing about [SP BOOSTER] but were only willing to do it when they heard about Maxie and how resilient their bodies were. In the end, most players gave up on trying to actively create new Skills, choosing to either stumble across them or learn about them from others who were determined to keep trying.

"Feeling sleepy kiddo?"

Loran jumped slightly, turning to see Soze, only wearing his default gray pants, apparently deciding it was too early to get fully dressed. His eyes showed not the slightest sign of exhaustion. "How the actual hell are you never tired?" Loran asked in exasperation.

"Years of practice," Soze chuckled, "compared to some of the places I've slept, the dirt and grass here are soft as a mattress."

"Right right, you went camping in hell for fun," Loran said, rubbing his eyes.

Soze went silent for a moment, before muttering, "it usually wasn't hell."

"Whatever, so what's up?"

"Well, I know you kind of stopped hunting recently…"

"...Wasn't exactly feeling up to it, I mean have you?"

"People can't just eat air, someone had to do it," Soze shrugged, "but I get it. Anyway, I'm putting together my own party, you in?"

"Me?" Loran asked incredulously. "I'm the guy that spent the first two weeks going off on his own just to avoid dealing with other people, what makes you think I'd be okay with that?"

"That's kind of my point," Soze said, his gaze turning intense, "the simple fact is these woods are just too dangerous for solo hunting. I'm not going to turn a blind eye to you endangering yourself over a little anxiety."

"I don't know…" Soze certainly wasn't wrong, and Loran knew that but knowing it didn't make him any less apprehensive. Even if dealing with others was the less dangerous option, the constant stress was just too much for him, 'at least I know what to do when faced with a predator. Why can't social interactions come with walkthroughs?'

"It'll be fine," Soze said while giving Loran a firm smack on the back, "besides, you know these guys. Remember Alexx and the twins?"

Loran was mildly surprised, as well as relieved. Just like with Soze, the first few days where it was just the five of them made Loran far more comfortable around them. He hadn't considered hunting with them primarily because until recently, only players that could use a bow could hunt.

Despite the protests of others, Alexx was stubbornly building himself as a glass cannon, always having his strength as high as it could go. Because of this, he was basically incapable of using a bow with any amount of accuracy, and sometimes they would break in his hands; these days he just spent his days chopping down trees and helping build shelters.

As for the girls, Yin was easily the best archer in the village, her real-world training putting her well ahead of the other players that only learned from RPGs and archery simulators. Many of the hunting parties knew how skilled she was, and would want her, if not for Yang.

Yang was built to be a tank and wasn't stealthy in the slightest, she would always scare the small animals when the party got close. Yin was skilled enough to target the fleeing animals as long as she could still see them, but everyone else was basically useless. Others tried to get Yin to leave her sister in the village, but the two never left without the other. Yang was very protective of her sister, and Yin felt no reason to protest.

"Well, I guess if it's just the five of us I can give it a shot."

"That's the spirit," Soze said boisterously, giving Loran another firm smack on the back, "We're gonna meet up around noon at The Pit to talk strategy, First hunting trip should be tomorrow."

"Hold on, The Pit? The hell is that?"

"You know that place where Yin gave her announcement last week? Other people have started making announcements there and everyone just started calling it The Pit."

"...Sounds kind of stupid."

"Yeah well, take it up with literally everyone else in the village," Soze chuckled while walking off.

Letting out a soft sigh, Loran looked towards the rising sun, only just beginning to crest over the eastern mountains. 'Noon huh, guess I've got a couple of hours to kill.' Not having anything better to do, Loran went back to his shelter to grab his equipment, planning to then head out to the Training Field.