News of the Doctor

The two hours of travel came and went. During that time, I helped Punisher do a little bit of hunting to earn some experience. We never stopped traveling, but we took a few shots and cuts here and there when we came across a monster that was over level 10.

We ignored the weaker monsters, or packs of monsters, for the sake of saving time. By the time we got to the mountain, Punisher had reached level 3. I was still only level 8, but that was because I had a much larger experience total to make up for than Punisher did.

"Hey, we're finally back! I can see the clearing that you made when we were trying to set up a camp before."

I started to slow as we reached the clearing because I started to feel the presence of people in the area. I extended my arm to stop Punisher and raised my finger to my lip, motioning for Punisher to stay silent.

"Alorae, up ahead in the clearing," I whispered. "Let's find out why they're here."

Punisher nodded and pulled out his gun, readying himself. I signaled for him to stay put, and vanished into the canopy above. I didn't have any stealth skills yet, aside from the basic energy and aura concealing, so the best I could do was rely on my mind stat to be high enough to see and hear what I needed from a distance.

I would have to observe from high up in the trees because getting too close would allow a higher-level Alorae to notice me. Another problem was that all the trees were cleared by me several days ago, so I was limited to observing from the edge of the campsite. Fortunately, my mind stat is 115 right now, which probably puts me in the top 100 with the highest mind stats among players right now.

The only ones with higher mind stats than I had at the moment would be Alorae mages. Most magic users invest a majority of their stat points into their mind stat to boost their magical offensive and defensive spells and abilities.

It also wasn't too uncommon to find an Alorae assassin who had a high mind stat. The Alorae Shadow Council could potentially have members with a higher mind stat than I had. In addition to offensive and defensive spells and abilities, the mind stat helps one see, avoid, and plan better in combat.

My own investment in the mind stat was purely for the ability to act and react in combat better. I refuse to have my head cut off again without being able to at least see the attack coming. In the past, my mind stat was under 100, so I struggled with combat against monsters and players that had agility stats above 150.

I looked down from the trees and began to observe the camp the Alorae had set up in the clearing. I was still wrestling with the thought that I had been unconscious for three days and had lost a lot of momentum because of that, but there was only so much I could do about that.

Below me, I counted a total of 25 Alorae warriors. From their energies and auras, I could determine that 20 of them were warriors around levels 8 to 10, and the rest were mages around levels 12 to 15, with one of them being an absolute anomaly. The last mage had to have been over level 20.

"Holy shit," I quietly muttered to myself. "How the fuck did these guys farm so many levels in only a few days? These fucking machines... They're all going to reach the soft level cap soon."

It was a good thing that I didn't get any closer, because the higher-level mage would have noticed me even though I was concealing my energy. I concentrated on listening to try and gather any pertinent information from the warriors below me.

Two warriors, both well on in their years but still in peak fighting condition, were off on their own near the edge of the campsite to the east. I made my way towards them, perching myself in a tree above them so I could hear their conversation.

One soldier, who appeared to be a swordsman, spoke first. "How much longer do we have to do this for? I want to get back to leveling."

The other soldier, who was a spearman, turned to face the other. "I think we have another four hours, then we change shifts with Doja's squad."

The swordsman yawned as they leaned against a tree. "It's a good thing that Gillion met that human doctor in the woods. It's odd that they would offer us such an exploit."

The spearman nodded. "It is a good thing."

"I can't believe Gillion didn't capture that human. I heard it was because the man was some kind of illusionist."

The spearman's face looked a bit distressed as he turned to the swordsman. "You weren't there when Gillion met the human doctor, were you?"

The swordsman shook his head. "No, I wasn't. But you were, right? What actually happened?"

"Gillion tried to kill the human at first, but was quickly suppressed. The man wasn't all that imposing at first, but he had strange abilities."

The swordsman raised an eyebrow, looking very interested. "Strange how? That human must have been some kind of trickster. I can't imagine a human capable of suppressing Gillion; he is one of the few mages that the elders rely on."

The spearman looked to the ground as he shared his story. "Gillion found the human at the site where it was determined that the Verdant Leviathan was slain. Gillion was looking for anything that we could use to track the human, Ronan Wilde."

"What was the human doctor there for?"

"We don't know. He was just there, so Gillion attacked him with his shadow magic, but nothing Gillion cast was effective. The human could stop every attack that Gillion threw at him. He had four soldiers with him, myself included. We charged at the human, but none of us could even reach him."

The swordsman laughed. "Then it must have been some kind of trick! There's not a player in this world that could handle Gillion and four of our best soldiers."

"You don't understand. It was as if the entire forest was bending to his will. Monsters flocked to fight by his side and swarmed us to protect him."

It just had to be related to that no good asshole, Doctor Victor Trauss... Humanity had a number of geniuses who were able to adapt to the Five Seasons very well. They led humanity through our darkest times and faced numerous threats that the average player could never defeat. The doctor was not among the geniuses. He was beyond them; he was a monster.