Departure

Apollo's current troops were limited to only 10 members.

Because Apollo had upgraded his Barracks, this was already twice the number he started out, but it was still far from satisfactory in Apollo's point of view.

While Apollo did want to expand his troops even more, the lack of material to make SoW's was the biggest problem he was currently facing.

After the Tutorial was over, a lot of recipes that were easy before were revised to require rare materials like mandrake's roots, to make plant girls, and crystals cores, in many SoW's case.

Mandrakes could be found in the forest. They were hard to find, impossible to cultivate, but at least they were still there, and at the point Apollo's team had already found a dozen of them.

The main problem were the crystal cores, which Apollo had no idea on where to find. He tried looking for them inside the cave Daisy found before, but nothing like them appeared after having entirely combed the cave while searching for it. He also tried fabricating them in the factory, but there was no such recipe, so it was impossible to make them, at least for now.

Honestly he had no idea on how to solve this problem, but maybe this outing could give him some new ideas on how to proceed.

Apollo stood in front of the 10 girls and made a roll call to ensure none was missing.

"Daisy!"

"Sir!"

"Paula!"

"Yes..."

"Bea!"

"Here!"

"Iris!"

"Hellooo~"

"Ivy!"

"Hi hiii~!"

One by one the veteran soldiers answered the call, but Apollo didn't stop there, calling each one of the new soldiers after them.

"May!"

"Here!"

"Mika!"

"Yes, sir!"

"Sora!"

"Present!"

"Jun!"

"I'm ready!"

"Kiki!"

"..."

"Kiki!"

"...what?"

(Why is there a slow one on each batch? Before it was Paula, this time it's Kiki... I need to make sure they never end up together or they will skip work and go sleep somewhere!)

"All right girls, attention! Today's mission is to take down the enemy base and free the servants from the enemy commander! To do so we will need to destroy the enemy's HQ, enemy's Lab, and their commander's bracer, all while ensuring no causalities happen on both sides! While I'm not sure if that will be enough since awaking you requires registering the Master's DNA, at least doing so will prevent further victims from being born!"

"To minimize the chances of accidents, all weapons with cutting edge will be excluded from this mission! This means no swords, axes or lances will be used, only clubs, staffs and hammers! Please also take note that the hammers will be used strictly against buildings! I don't want to see any crushed head during our trip there! Understood?"

""Sir, yes, sir!""

"Now, Leilani should have already prepared all the weapons you will need. Go equip yourselves and come back here! If you require anything else, come talk to me as soon as possible! You have 5 minutes! Go!"

""Sir, yes, sir!""

The ten girls turned around and ran inside the factory to grab the weapons they needed.

5 minutes later, every girl was equipped and ready to depart.

"Master, I brought the rations you will need for the trip."

Lumina, one of the maids under Rose, appeared behind Apollo giving him a fright. She was carrying a bag twice her size, filled with food, water and other supplies.

"Oh! Thank you....hmm..."

"Lumina. My name is Lumina, Master."

"Right! Thank you, Lumina."

"I'm happy to serve! I will work harder so that master remembers me!"

(That's not exactly the problem. The problem is that you all look the same to me...)

"All right girls, one more thing! Lumina will be joining us during this mission, but she will not participate in the combat! Her sole role is to manage our supplies and ensure we don't end up hungry and lost in the middle of the trip. Please take care of her."

""Sir, yes, sir!""

"Great! Then, now that everything is ready, let's depart! Daisy, lead the way!"

"Yes, sir!"

-

Two days ago. One day after the Tutorial had ended.

"Haaa~ This is so boring..."

"Get used to this! Nothing crazy should happen anytime soon..."

In the 5th monitoring station, the busy time was finally over and now all that was left was the routine monitoring over the Players who were left.

Now that the battle was over, each player was excited slowly expanding their own base but, from the point of view of the observation team, such sight was not fun at all.

Suddenly, one of the guys shouted out loud, attracting the attention of everybody in the room.

"Hey! Look! Another one stole the boars' eggs!"

"He is the fifth one to do that! I can understand the others who did it before the tutorial battle, but... Don't this guy have any sense of danger!? After that battle he should understand that those boars are not an easy target that he can mess around with!"

"Well, look at the bright side! At least he gets to entertain us as his base get destroyed. Different from the tutorial, it's a hundred instead of a dozen that will attack him now. I wonder how long he will last!"

"Hey newbie! Send out a message to the rescue team! Tell them they should have work soon, so they should start preparing!"

"Sure."

"So, anyone wants to bet how long this one will last?"

"Hmm, 2 days! His base looks quite big, so he even if he retreats time and time again, should be able to survive for a while!"

"I bet on less than 5 hours. If I remember it right, this guy is one of those who barely survived the tutorial. He was lucky to unlock the rangers right from the start, but that may be why he underestimated the importance of normal soldiers, thinking rangers were enough. I'm actually surprised he was able to recover so much in a single day."

"Eh? That's news to me! Then I want to change my bet to a single day!"

"Too late, I have already registered! Take responsibility for your own words!"

"Damn, you are merciless! Let the man change his bet this once! All right, my turn, I will bet 7 hours!"

"If nobody else is against it, I will make this exception. Anyone? ... All right! Registered! Anyone else? Newbie, what about you?"

"Eh!? Me!? I don't even know how this game of yours work! When does the timer stops?"

"When the HQ is destroyed or the player is rescued. Whichever happens first."

"Then I bet he will somehow survive. Despite me thinking that most of his base will end up destroyed in the process, I still have a feeling he will survive this ordeal."

"Eh? Why do you think so?"

"Because that guy is a coward, that's why."

"Hey newbie, are you crazy? How does being a coward will help him in this situation!?"

"Just wait and you will see!"

...

Two days later.

"Newbie, you were right!"

"Coward? More like crazy! I still can't believe he did that!"

"Yeah! Making that poor servant act as bait to divide the herd in two, then detonating his own buildings to kill all the attacking boars at once! I don't know if I should call this guy a genius or an idiot! The only thing I'm sure is that he is quite crazy!"

"Even if he won the battle, he destroyed his own future! Without servants and buildings, how is he going to survive now?"

"Wrong! He did preserve his HQ and a few lab and factory SoW's, so he should be able to slowly build it all over again as long as he has enough time."

"Extra SoW's? Where did he get the crystal cores?"

"He extracted them from the buildings before commanding the activation of the self-destruct mechanism."

"....Well played! I never expected that!"

"As long as he survives, it seems like we will have another good contender for the second place."

"Second place? Why not first place?"

"Do you really think that our Boss will lose to anybody? Those guys are playing blind while he knows every detail of the game! It's just too unfair!"

"That's only for now. As long as they keep playing, they will have a lot of chances to figure it out. The longer they stay in the game, the better will be their mastery over it, and as long as they master it, winning becomes a possibility."

"You are being too optimistic. Boss has the maps of each battleground. He knows where all the resources are located. How are they going to compete against that? Even if he says he is playing by the rules, it's like he is the only one with a map hack and full technology available from the start!"

"Well, I will still be cheering for a dark horse to win. It will be more fun like that!"

"Hahahaha! That's one bet you are not going to win!"