After gathering everyone up—including Jimmy, who had an odd day off, they made their way outside the gates. Colt didn’t very much like how the guards noted them going with the healer…

  Day after day, he’d gotten more of a sense of how New Nashville worked.

  Colt burrowed in his coat as they walked, the morning chilly.

  Denny was amassing loyalty in his guards, who were also active outside of the wall and sent on expeditions. Out of curiosity, Colt tracked a couple of them and used his inspect every day. They gained a level—about a level, every day seemed to be the standard. Right now, most of them were in their mid-forties.

  About equal to him but lacking Edicts or too many advanced skills. It was one thing to just go and kill monsters and grind out stats and levels… But he sensed that training fundamentals would be the key to true power.

  “I’m not sure I like it here,” Jimmy said once they cleared the gate. Shaking a little bit from the cold. He was wearing a nice coat—something scavenged and sold for a lot of money in the market. Dungeon Dives got paid well. Healers got paid better. Denny wanted to keep them happy and plump, or so Jimmy said that the man said; they were the cornerstone of his village.

  “What do you mean?” Sarah asked as she trekked nearby.

  “Every day. So many are injured. Usually guards and sometimes the dungeon squads lose people often, too. People who couldn’t make it back in time. They’re pushing people hard. I can see it in their faces.”

  “City’s getting bigger, more monsters too,” Sarah replied.

  “Yeah, but where does it end?”

  “New Civilization?” Nick threw it out there. The guy had his hands ready to summon his bow at a second’s notice. But, it would be Nate who made the call on whether they should attack or not. The man led with a sole focus but didn’t quiet them down. So close to the stadium, there wasn’t a big risk of monsters. The guards patrolled here and kept it clean.

  “Do you think Denny is a good leader?” Colt asked.

  “Mhmm.” Nick scratched his head.

  “No,” Jimmy answered.

  “Uh—I wouldn’t go that far. I think he’s ambitious. I think it might be a time when we need ambition if we’re gonna pull ourselves together after a collapse. Heard some talk about sending a long-range expedition in the future. Trying to head to Memphis—or Atlanta. Figure out how other people are surviving. Dunno if it was someone else if there’d be that kind of coordination. Y’know?”

  “The cost is people. And I don’t think he cares much about them besides what they can do for him. They go on about us being the new America, but who here has voted for Denny? When will there be an election? We don’t hear about that at all.” Jimmy shot back.

  Nick went quiet at that, either because he didn’t want to argue over it or some part of him agreed. Colt listened with a rapt ear.

  New Nashville was like a base of operations. A stable shelf that let him rest his head and venture out of it to gain the strength he needed. It kept him and his allies safe. If it stopped being that, or if there was talk like this already going around… More likely than not, they’d see some future action to resolve these sentiments.

  Denny was either going to grab power or cede it. One, Colt thought, was far more likely than the other.

  Eventually, Nate killed the conversation, and they focused. Moving quietly through the forest streets of the city, mist was in the air, hanging thick like a blanket. It didn’t help the cold, but it did help the stealth. They used the visibility like a cloak, trailing through the deserted city like ghosts.

  Once, they saw a group of people picking through an apartment but strayed away, uncertain if they were with New Nashville, random stragglers—or some other group. Two days ago, New Nashville declared an increase of bandits and other violent gangs accumulating in the city. Whether or not that information was filtered through a lens wasn’t the point of this journey.

  They kept going until they found a small group of green-skinned monsters camping out in a house. The creatures had a single horn on their heads and a hunched posture. Fires were burning, and smoke was curling out of the broken windows of what had been a small apartment.

  Nate snuck close enough, then returned with their levels.

  “Thirties.” He said, keeping his voice low.

  Maybe around ten of them?

  “System calls them Horned-Goblins.” Nate went over more of more of the details from his Inspect. Nothing impressive. Colt rolled his shoulders as the military man went over the game plan.

  Love this novel? Read it on Royal Road to ensure the author gets credit.

  He and Sarah would take the lead. Colt was there to play front-line support, with Jimmy as a main focus, since the healer needed to be in combat to gain levels. Advancing his skills was easy, but to level, you needed to kill or participate in a kill; while they’d been grinding skills for the last week, too much of their party was under-leveled.

  That and Nate did make the point that gains and skills should be tested in live combat in a more controlled circumstance.

  The guy made a lot of great points. Colt was happy to have him. As was everyone else, he functioned as the spearhead and coordinator for their group, giving Colt the space and independence he wanted to concentrate on himself.

  With the plan man, Nate pulled the trigger.

  Colt watched them in action. Nate took the lead, the hammer in hand seeming to twist; spikes forming on the end of it. His muscles stood out, too—the veins pushed outward like the muscles beneath were metal. One of the horned goblins saw him and sprinted forward, only for Nate to backhand the creature and send it flying.

  Another jumped at him, but Sarah landed a kick as it flew. The monster bounced twice against the ground.

  Then Jimmy started to move.

  Colt followed behind, ducking as a blast of water came from Julia, then an arrow of light that split into three colors—green, blue, and the original white. Jimmy tore into the goblin on the ground as Nate punched another into submission. It was… Chaotic.

  He hung back—dispatching one of the horned goblins as it went for Jimmy’s back, but otherwise, he let himself relax and watched his group work. Water flew, arrows flew, goblins bled, and Jimmy screamed while bashing one of their faces in. There was a lot of room for improvement here.

  As he observed, a goblin tried to take him on.

  Colt used the opportunity to practice Phantom’s Gambit—dodging and distracting it as he let the swings, punches, and cuts of the goblin’s little glass knife slide through him. Slowly distracting it while Jimmy finished his enemy off. When Jimmy noticed what was going on, Colt gestured him over. It was a perfect target to take on, so the healer did, smashing a bat into the back of the green creature’s skull.

  When it was all said and done, they dispatched the group and got away with only a few bruises, which Jimmy tended to.

  ———

  *Phantom’s Gambit* (Basic) has gained a level!

  ———

  Colt took in the notification with a still silence. Julia and Sarah roamed the little tribal encampment, picking it apart for any loot.

  These types of monsters tended not to have anything. Dungeons, maybe, sometimes. Though he was curious about how and when quests appeared. After getting his knife—which turned out to be an uncommon weapon—he hadn’t encountered any other quests.

  When they were done looting, Nate gathered them all together.

  “What can we improve?” He asked.

  The group shared a look.

  Sarah scoffed as no one answered, her eyes piercing Colt. He gave a shrug. It was apparent what it was, but he didn’t want to be the one who said it. But if she was going to be like that.

  “Coordination. We’re attacking like we’re fighting in a bunch of little groups—our back line is flinging arrows and spells without warning. I had to dodge several balls of water.” Colt reported and folded his arms, looking at Julia.

  The girl was ignoring him, staring at three packs of ramen noodles looted from the goblin’s food reserves.

  “Hey I aimed my arrows around you.” Nick countered.

  “I had no idea where your arrows were going to be.” Sarah said, shaking her head, “I don’t know how you pick your targets.”

  “Whoever is sneaking up on you. Or y’know, is an open target.”

  They almost started going into it until Nate gave a small clap to draw everyone’s attention onto himself once more. The soldier cleared his throat.

  “We train together, we fight together. But we’ve got to learn how to do the second one without getting in one another’s way. When we get into our next battle—watch your allies. See how they fit into the picture, figure out their strengths, and then, from there, find the best way to slot your strengths in. We all have different skills and different powers.” Nate went over and then went even further—giving a breakdown of how he thought things could have been improved.

  After that, they wrapped up the fight and returned to the misty streets.

  Another group of monsters, these one red-furred creatures that resembled apes who had an odd ability to breathe fire. They were tougher to handle; Sarah couldn’t get close, but when Nate’s skin took that hardened form, he could withstand the burns and get in punches. They mostly had to rely on their ranged people to disable and take out the majority of them.

  Colt threw a couple of knives, killing where needed to keep his people safe, but he was working in reserve, flexing his strength only where needed.

  A backup plan as the rest of his group figured out where to work themselves into the fight and how best to work with one another.

  He knew that when push came to shove, he’d find his place with Sarah and Nate. They had already practiced with one another. And his build had the greatest flexibility.

  A couple more fights like that, and he saw another gain in skill.

  ———

  Olympic Mandate (Basic) has gained a level!

  ———

  By the fifth fight, his companions had gained their levels. He felt closer to his by a bit, but they were becoming harder to get to, especially with picking on targets in their mid-thirties. The sun started to go down, and Nate began to pick their way back to New Nashville.

  On the way, they saw a group of people on a rooftop, their eyes pointed at the stadium as they talked in whispers up above.

  Spies?

  Lost souls in the ruins of the city?

  “What do you think about getting to know the lay of the land,” Nate whispered as they observed the strangers. Their body language, the way they hid from any guards in New Nashville… Clearly outsiders. The rest of the group was conflicted… But… “You think we should?”

  Colt pondered it, then went with his gut, “Best to understand what we’re working with. They’re around our level. We have you and Nick, so I don’t think they’ll start trouble. Let’s figure out how people are coping, not filtered through the Mayor and his people.” Nate nodded. The answer he probably wanted.