Chapter 8: The Others

Kennen and his teammates all sat on the stairs and rested.

"Let's theorize a bit." He said to the others, "How are we going to beat those orcs in the reception? They are very tough and strong."

"They are pretty dumb and slow if they're not charging straight." Evan said.

"Well, we can try what we did last time for the two orcs." Enzo proposed.

"Except the fact that it didn't work that well last time." Rafael retorted.

"We're stronger now."

"Barely. Frank is also down for this fight."

Kennen listened to them and also felt the doubt whether it was doable or not, or whether they should even risk it.

"We might attract the attention of the monsters outside if they start roaring in the reception." Rafael made another good point.

"I think we can bait them into coming here." Evan suggested.

"Can't we just wait a little bit for them to leave? Why risk it?" Amelia gave her opinion.

"I'll go to the first floor and see if there's any monster outside of the entrance." Kennen said before he went to the first floor and checked outside via the window.

The pack of monsters they saw when they just came seemed to have left.

Kennen went back to the stairs to relay the news.

"Let's just wait for now, we could use a little break. " Kennen also suggested in the end.

They used that to rehydrate and rest from the fatigue from the earlier fights.

30 minutes passed but the three orcs were still there.

"We can't keep waiting!" Evan said, "Believe me, we can do this, just bait them to come here and ambush them! Their neck is pretty soft, just one stab and they bleed to death in a few seconds."

Kennen also started to feel like giving this a try and it was relatively safer to fight them by leading them around the stairs but they weren't in optical form due to their still sore muscles and he wasn't sure they could run up the stairs again with orcs chasing them.

"I think we can give this a try, what about you guys?" Kennen asked the other member.

"I'm more accustomed to my bow now compared to yesterday so I believe it'll work out better this time." Enzo said.

"I still rather we wait but if you guys are in…" Rafael said hesitantly,

"I'm for waiting but if you guys insist, I'll try my best." Amelia said.

"Let's do it, I'll help." Frank spoke up.

"No, you're not. You can't even move without wincing so you stay on the bench." Kennen sternly said.

Kennen thought about how they were going to do it as attracting them to the stairs for wild goose chase while they wore them down with javelins and arrows seemed to be very tiring and not really effective.

Their ambush didn't have the lethality that an ambush should have.

"Alright, I have an idea." Kennen said.

First, Evan would make some noise by tapping the ground with his knife to attract ideally a single pig orc without showing himself to the pig orcs.

Thankfully, one of the closer pig orc was intrigued by the sound and also didn't call the attention of his brethren to the sound either.

Evan hid beside the entrance out of view as he laid in ambush and ready to strike the fatal blow.

Kennen and the rest hid behind the stairs and were ready to come the moment the orc stepped into the stairs, which the orc did after Evan tapped the wall with his knife a few more times.

They immediately came out with Rafael and Amelia immediately restricting the orc, they would usually layer their power for a longer stunning duration but they threw everything together this time along with the arrow and javelins.

Evan quickly followed with a quick couple stab to the orc's neck before the orc could even scream from being shot down.

The pig orc let go of his club as he covered his neck while gurgling on his blood.

Enzo shot another arrow to the orc's eye to speed up the process before the orc fell to the ground.

The fall wasn't very loud but it could be noticed in the deafining silence that was the hotel so Evan quickly peeked out his head sneakily to see if the other two pig orcs noticed.

They heard it as their heads turned toward their general direction but didn't care as they soon returned to gnawing on the corpses in the reception.

Evan motioned that everything was fine so Kennen and Rafael came to help him drag the corpse to the first floor. Since they intended on repeating the same process, having a corpse there would trigger the orcs reaction. It wasn't before taking the crystal first and that went to Evan.

With that done, Evan started to tap the wall with his knife again. It wasn't loud enough at first so he had to increase his strength but that in turn attracted the attention of the two orcs.

It would have been better if it was just one pig orc coming but they could also manage the two.

Everyone took their positions and waited for the orcs to come. The moment the first orc stepped in, they all acted as the pig orc shared the same fate as the earlier one with it bleeding himself out.

The pig orc right behind roared after realizing what was happening and pushed down the other orc to charge in with the club held high and ready to smash Evan.

However, he received an arrow to the face and javelins to the chest, which in turn reduced the power and precision of his swing, enabling Evan to bounce it off to his hardened left hand.

Then the binding and psych attack came to limit his movement and gave Evan the opportunity to finish him off with a knife to the neck.

The three pig orcs easily died just like that.

Kennen felt it was as if they were using some map glitch or exploit to hunt. He would've felt dirty after cheating like that if it was a normal game but since it wasn't, he only felt relief and a slight sense of accomplishment.

"Let's get the crystal and go back." Kennen said with a sigh of fatigue.

"Finally, I'm feeling kinda hungry." Enzo said as he rubbed his stomach.

Kennen got one of the two crystals while Amelia got the other one. Her contribution was more than enough to earn her a crystal there.

Now Kennen had absorbed six crystals in total. It would seem quite a lot but the increase in strength wasn't a lot.

They got Frank who stayed on the first floor while they fought and made their way out of the hotel.

Kennen and his friends looked at both sides of the road but it wasn't cars they were looking out for.

After making sure that it was safe, they crossed the streets and got into the hotel via the window like they left.

Waiting for them was Amelia's boyfriend and friend along with the couple of Jordan and Nina.

James and Brandi instantly went to Amelia to ask if she was fine.

"I'm fine guys, it was scary at times but I was never in actual danger." Amelia reassured them.

"How was it?" James asked.

Amelia gave them the shortened version of the events while Kennen helped Frank to sit on a chair.

"Do you feel better?" Kennen asked.

"Yeah… Just bruises…" Frank lifted his shirt and showed that a part of his stomach turned violet.

"Just take it easy for the day then." Kennen gave him a pat.

Kennen opened his bag and took out the four crystals wrapped in cloth, which got the attention of the couple who were talking to Evan and Rafael.

"Here's your crystals. One for each of you." Kennen said as he laid the crystals on the floor.

He also saw some people coming from the buffet hall, probably the other people from the hotel who finally got the guts to come down or more likely because they got hungry.

"Thanks man. I owe you one." Jordan said as he and his girlfriend reached for a stone each.

Then Amelia's friend also came over and took their share.

As they went through the process of absorption, the other people also came closer with a middle aged man at the helm of their group.

"What about us?" The middle aged man asked.

"I wasn't aware that you guys wanted stones." Kennen said, as he was a bit taken aback by the question.

"Of course we want it! Those are the stones that give power, right?" The middle aged man said as several people behind echoed in agreement but Kennen didn't like their tone, it wasn't because they asked for crystals but how they asked it.

"I thought you guys were fine staying holed up in your room." Rafael snickered.

"Shut up brat!" The middle aged man said.

"You guys just got lucky to have found stones!"

"Yeah, or you'll be just like us!"

"What's up with those green monsters with you?"

"Yeah, you're with them or what?"

"Monster lover!"

More people from their side bellowed.

It was the first time people noticed Kennen's summons and pointed it out to him. He finally realized that could freak people out, especially after the apocalypse where a bunch of monsters killed many people.

"I'm a tamer, those are like pets…" Kennen tried to explain so casual could understand but not that they cared as they continued to call them monster lovers.

"Hey, is this how you ask a favor from someone?" Evan irritably asked them.

"A favor? We aren't asking for a favor but telling you to not hoard everything and share some with the rest of us so we can get some powers too!"

"Yeah! That's your responsibility since you guys have powers!"

"You never heard of spider-man or what? With great power comes great responsibility!"

There were ten or so people and they were all in agreement.

"Damn, If the internet still worked right now, I would have filmed all you morons and posted it choosing beggars subreddit." Enzo said while making the filming gesture at them.

"Who did you call a moron, you little f*ck!"

"Don't look down on us just because you have powers!"

"Yeah, you don't want us coming at you."

The other party grew increasingly more aggressive and Kennen was also irritated by their entitled attitude.

"Oh? You want a fight mate?" Evan asked as he activated his hardening.

"Evan!" Frank yelled!

Evan retracted his power after seeing Frank glaring at and backed off with a humph.

"That was all we were able to spare this time but we will try to get you some crystals the next time we go out. As you can see, I'm injured. It's very dangerous outside and getting crystal is no easy matter so don't expect a lot." Frank tried to calm the situation.

"At least you know how to act." The middle aged man said, "That's all we wanted to hear, right guys?"

With that said, the other also backed out and they went to the buffet hall.

Kennen stayed silent through the whole dispute. He had the bad habit of saying what went through his head without thinking and that was generally some hurtful worse that would escalate the situation so he developed a new habit of thinking before he spoke.

He knew what he had to say to deescalate the situation but he didn't want to, those guys just rubbed him the wrong way.

"Why did you promise to help those assholes!?" Evan asked Frank when the other group left.

"Yeah, those guys were huge assholes, not worth it." Enzo was of the same mind.

"And what do you want us to do? Fight them? This isn't going to help any of us and we're not going to kill them or kick them out, it's better to give them crystals so they can be of help instead of leeching off us and eating the food for nothing."

"It's not like we're going to slave away and pay tax to them every time we go out. We'll just be giving them enough crystals so they can have a team and go fend for themselves, they'll be of some use. Also, it wouldn't be on us even if they died while hunting outside, at least we gave them a chance."

Frank explained his reasoning behind it and Kennen had to admit once again that Frank was the better person to deal with troublesome people. He had always been the guy who could keep it calm and see the bigger picture.

"You're right…" Evan admitted along with Enzo and Rafael.

Even Amelia and her friends as well as Jordan and Nina nodded at that.

"They were still quite amiable when I talked to them earlier." Jordan said.

"Who knows what gotten to them…" Nina continued.

"It's alright, let's get some food." Kennen said to them as he helped Frank to get into the buffet hall.

It was noon and he was starting to get hungry with all the fighting they did this morning. Moreover, they could also discuss the powers the other four received over the meal.

Those four would join them in their next hunt and it would be better if he had an idea of what they could do so they could come up with a better plan for how to handle the pig orcs.