7 days left of the tutorial
Tara was sprinting through the forest, she had been moving at speed for days, when the notification showed up she was at the edge of the tutorial which was almost a week's travel from where the arrival building was. But now that she was level 30 with an epic class and her body was level 1, she could get back in 4 days, three of which have already passed. The body upgrade had just happened and she was still getting used to it, she was stronger, quicker, more flexible, and more beautiful. Tara was too observant to not see how she would turn heads even in her combat uniform, she just had good genes, but she worked hard to not let it go to her head. Even before the military she would aim for an average guy because she never felt like the popular ones would see past her looks.
With the body upgrade though, it was different, her skin looked healthier, her face lost a little of its sharp edges becoming even more feminine. Her chest had grown a little bigger but was far more firm, same with her backside and legs. Actually, her whole body felt more firm, with more tight muscle but without losing her curves and smooth body lines. She cleaned herself right after the upgrade but hadn't cleaned herself since and she has been running for days at this point. She would only stop for a few hours at a time to rest and grab a nap. With branches and brush to go through at speed she was getting cut every minute or so but healing before the next cut. Her whole body was covered in blood and her armor repair was taking its time, she was less than a day out and she had three days until the system event started. She pulled up the message again to read it.
"Tutorial event: Monster horde, will begin in 3 days"
"Three monsters will spawn per person alive in this area at the start of the event"
"The monsters will spawn in random places outside of the arrival building area"
"The monsters will be frenzied and from level 10 to level 25"
"The monsters will move towards the nearest person and attack as soon as they spawn"
"This is a regular event that will happen every 12 days after the tutorial is complete."
Happy to see the timer was counting down, she was catching her breath and leaning against a tree when she heard someone approaching from further in the forest. They were still pretty far away but she needed information so kept playing at being exhausted and let them approach.
"Hey buddy, are you ok?" the stranger asked. He was an average looking man and when she focused on him it said he was level 18.
"Yeah, just need to catch my breath" Tara said while holding her side and acting like she was hiding an injury.
"You sure, you look like you just finished a hell of a fight." he said with a smile. Tara knew that this guy was a distraction and the ambush would come from another direction and probably from someone who was a higher level. But it was in her best interest to keep him talking.
"How is everyone handling the system event announcement? I've been in the forest and don't know what is happening." Tara said while playing up the injury, wincing and holding her side. She didn't need to sell it much, there was just so much blood and her armor was a wreck.
"It is not going well, most people are panicking or just giving up. Lots of fighting has started and a surprising number of people are just sitting down and waiting for their deaths. What do you think about all this young lady?" he said. He had been slowly walking forward for a while and he seemed to realize she was female about half way through his speech.
"I think strong people will do what they want, they might try to save the weak or use them as fodder. The weak will not have a choice, they will fall in line or die." Tara spoke darkly, picking up a very subtle presence from her right. Without looking she conjured a water golem on the spot where she sensed something. She didn't have it attack but nothing happened which meant that that direction was a decoy. However, it seemed that the guy she was talking to noticed, and stopped walking closer.
"So you are a 'Might makes right' kind of girl, I can respect that. But I wonder if you would still feel that way if you are one of the weak. I cannot see your information so you are stronger than me, but what about the strongest here. Will you follow their orders, let their might be your right?" he was pacing while talking now, not getting closer but making her look towards where she had sensed something.
"You think you know might, I'm sorry to disappoint you, but this place is the kiddy pool. I'll wait to judge strength after I survive this event and we are all back on the world." she said dismissively while stopping her act about being injured.
"So, you know someone you think is stronger than everyone here, someone in a different tutorial. No one can contact anyone outside of this place so you are guessing they are alive." he stopped pacing and pointed at her, "you have a servant class."
"I'm surprised you know about those," she said feigning surprise. She had already figured that this guy was a front for one of the stronger people here. He was too smart and far too confident in front of someone much higher level than him. If she had to guess, he was a servant class too. Servants could only be one step lower than their lord so this guy was probably uncommon with his lord being rare. Since she was epic now, Eli had to be higher than that and she didn't even know what that was called.
"No you're not," the man said. "You have already gathered that my lord is nearby and that you might not be stronger than him."
"True," she replied. "I know they are here and that they haven't attacked yet, but I don't know why you are confronting me like this. You should have tried to kill me or recruit me by now."
"Honestly, I'm not sure either," he said. "He usually attacks by now or comes out to talk. We have been approaching the strong as they come back to the camp area since the announcement. Like you said, kill or recruit."
"What prizes do I win if I join up?" Tara asked.
"Nothing," he replied with a chuckle. "You serve or you die, and since you already have a servant class, you can just get to know my lord and serve him."
"Actually," said another man who walked out from behind the tree she had been learning on. "We will be leaving her alone. Make sure the others know to leave her alone."
"This is a sharp change of direction," she said while keeping her body in a fighting stance. "Did I win you over with my sparkling personality?"
"First, let me introduce myself, I am Armand, and this is Matthew my servant. What is your name, young miss?
"You can call me Tara."
"Well, miss Tara, I apologize for holding you up. Please inform your lord after the tutorial that we kept things amicable. We do not want to start life in a new world with someone like them motivated against us."
She could now get a sense for him, his information was set to private but she did see he was level 33. He would be hard to kill but not impossible. He was a skilled fighter, probably military, or a martial artist of some kind, and he was a killer, she was sure they were killing strong people coming out of the woods. The problem was, she could not figure out why, there had to be a thousand of these tutorials going on in this phase to hold the world's population, probably more. What would killing strong people in our tutorial get him?
"You're going to kill all the weak and you want to get rid of who would stop you, or get them on board. You think this would make the hoard smaller, but I think you misread the system message." Tara said. She was hopefully trying to get him to see the flaw in his plan. He paused and was obviously rereading the message.
"So the thing is," he said, "it doesn't say either way, if the number of monsters has already been decided or it is decided when the event starts. My plan could work, but if i'm wrong, that's less people to fight the same number of monsters. I need to think about this."
"Then I will be on my way then" said Tara.
"That's fine," he said quickly, "just do not interfere, you may be able to fight me but I have this area's strongest on my side."
"And what should I pass on to my lord?" she asked.
"I'm sure I will not run into him, but you may tell him that I do not wish for conflict." he said with a crooked smile on his face.
There wasn't a reason to continue this charade so Tara moved on back to the camp area to find Stevens and get ready for the monsters.
*************
"Why be so nice to her sir?" Mat asked.
"A fight between her and me would be a coin flip." Armand said
"We have back-up and I was here." Mat said, clearly confused.
"She is a servant, and my equal, and she isn't even fully bonded yet. Her lord must be a true monster. She got a servant class and they aren't even in the same tutorial, that requires a bond beyond anything we have seen. The kind of bond that makes a very powerful man hunt down the man who killed his woman."
****************
Tara made it back to the camp and everything was in Chaos, people were running around panicking. It looked like some were trying to get into the buildings which already looked packed, and some were trying to get ready for the fight, clearing trees and dragging them around to try and set up fighting positions. The surprising thing was the variety of weapons people had so she went into one of the buildings and up to the weapon trade-in spot. Tara liked her shortsword but wanted to know if having a class would give her more options, and was surprised at what it showed.
"Your class works best with swords or axes, single handed, two-handed, or dual wielding."
Standing there thinking, someone tried to push past her to use the thing she was using and bounced off her. He gathered himself and called over two more guys and was talking to her, making threats. She ignored him and kept looking through the list of options, they tried pushing her again and could not move her, so one drew his longsword and made another threat. Tara was covered in dirt, sweat, grime, and dried blood, her armor had finished repairing but still looked ragged. She was still ignoring them while looking through the dual wield sword options, but she was frowning deeply while trying to make a decision. She remembered something about swords and axes from a documentary she saw about vikings, most used axes because it was cheaper. But the ones who used swords were feared since it meant wealth and skill, swords took more skill to use than axes because of the balance.
She switched to looking through dual axes and was about to make a selection when the one with the long sword poked her hard enough to draw blood. She removed her sword from inventory, and the three guys stepped back. Then Tara placed the sword in the return slot and two axes came out, they had short handles and sharp curved edges with a spike on the back end. Picking them up, she held one in each hand, looking at the edge, holding it between her and the guy who poked her.
"I need to take these for a spin, are you volunteering?" she said in a cold voice.