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Chapter 5: Interesting Developments

  Even though I was outside for less than an hour, the sickly feeling brought upon by the bloody haze left me feeling uneasy. The prickling feeling on the back of my neck remained, and slaying a second demon wave brought no reprieve. I did feel a bit satiated, though.

  “Good job, everyone,” Lucas said while guiding everyone back inside.

  Alan stayed to collect the loot from the five demons, and while I wasn’t expecting much, since nothing was dropped by our first kill, I was pleasantly surprised with what he brought in. “One blue pair of boots and two skill books. There were some coins, as well.” He held out some dark and shiny coins in his hand.

  I was feeling good up until he mentioned the coins, my mind racing back to the secret shop and that harrowing adventure into our first dungeon. There was a bronze coin that looked incredibly similar to the currency we used before, and I wasn’t the only one who felt that way.

  “Let me see that,” Jessica quickly snatched it from his hand and looked at it much more closely.

  The unease on her face slowly disappeared, “It’s not the same.” Which got wondering looks from our new comrades, but the rest of us understood the importance of her statement. “It looks to just be plain copper, and this looks to be silver,” she said, handing it over to me to take a closer look.

  “Have they finally introduced an actual currency?” Lucas peered over my shoulder as I thumbed the metal coins.

  “It looks like it… but for what?” Surely that was the question on everyone’s minds. Currency wasn’t good for buying anything unless it had actual value: something only the creators of this entirely new world would be able to define. As far as I, and anyone else was aware, no such market existed now. The secret shops in our vicinity had long ago disappeared.

  Truthfully, we didn’t know what transpired while we were gone. “Was there any announcement before this event started taking place?” I looked to Rebekah.

  She paused for a moment to think and then gave a reassuring answer, “It’s been months since the last announcement.” Bethany and Nicole both agreed.

  I thumbed the coins one more time before flipping them back to Alan, “Hold onto them for now. They might well be important later.”

  He stored them away and then passed around the goods for everyone to see. The boots were first, and judging by their appearance, were meant for tanks anyway. It explained the reason his face was flushed with excitement.

  “I didn’t think I’d find any new gear that was an upgrade for a while,” Alan confessed. Despite ransacking the king’s coffers, Alan hadn’t managed to find a new pair of boots. Richard had, only because his stat allocation was a bit broader. His pair had WIS, which helped with his hybrid spell casting and was fine to replace a stat like STR.

  Richard finished taking a look and passed the boots back for Alan to equip. I glanced at the newcomers, who did not object. As much as I wanted to gear out our new comrades, gearing our own came first.

  “Once you start taking down demons on your own, the dropsyou receivewill be yoursto do with as you please,” I said to them.

  This story is posted elsewhere by the author. Help them out by reading the authentic version.

  Next were the skill books, which had less value for now, as everyone except myself were full on slots. My extra slot came on account of the fiend kill, and a second followed as soon as I reached level 30. With the demon waves providing such good EXP, that would be coming shortly.

  This seemed to be a very useful and even a high-level skill. Richard looked at it with hungry eyes, but on account of his not being level 30 for four more levels, which could take months, I looked towards our newcomers. “Nicole, Bethany, do either of you have an open skill slot?”

  It was clear that the skill was intended for a tank to use. I had my shield, but the skill would only scale as its weight and defense increased, which wasn’t something I intended to focus on as a caster.

  There was no response for a moment, until Rebekah nudged Nicole on the arm. She seemed to gain some courage after that, “Actually… I do.”

  I turned my gaze to my companions, whom seemed unfazed by my decision to pass it along to them.

  “… are you sure?” She seemed hesitant to take it from my hands. I didn’t want to drag this out, so I just let the book fall, which forced her to catch it.

  I turned my attention to the second book, and discovered that it was a skill no one could use currently.

  This seemed perfect for a mage, but Anna was our only one currently, and she was specializing in frost magic. Still I badly wanted to see what it would look like if used: ‘varying’ sounded promising and might include an effect with important situational value. “Store that one away as well.” I passed it back to Alan, there might also be an opportunity to trade it in the future.

  Only after the loot was distributed and we had held a short debrief on the demon fight did I have time to myself. The timer had begun again, and everyone was aware that we now had just over two weeks until the next wave would arrive.

  I opened Humble Abode and was happy to see it had leveled up four times, giving me four skill points to use. There were grayed out branches going in a dozen different directions, clearly all ways to upgrade our new home. My options were still limited, though.

  I needed to spend two more points in the size of the abode, and only then could I have the option of branching out four more times, leaving me two remaining skill points to advance along a branch. With how infrequent the waves happened, I shifted my focus away from the recovery options in what I considered the tier 1 skill tree.

  Oddly enough, the descriptions for these four abilities were minimal at best, and only with some inference could I figure out what they did. One of the four looked to be an improvement to the defense, a fortification if you will. Another seemed to encase the abode in a barrier, whether this was magical or just a physical wall I couldn’t tell and would have to skill it to know for sure.

  The third had a little man on it, and it seemed to summon a helper of some kind. The fourth looked to be a shop, but what it sold it didn’t say. More defense didn’t seem to be an issue right, and with two skill points left, I selected the little man and what appeared to be a shop front. Surely this related to the coins that had dropped?

  “Should we go check what it did?” I caught the attention of the five or six of us still in the living room.

  “You added new skills to the abode?” Jessica asked. I got up from the couch and beckoned them to follow me outside.

  “Wow.” Was the only thing I heard come out of anyone’s mouth.

  The abode was no longer a single building, but instead three buildings of similar size fanned out along the road. Behind the line of buildings was a small-looking shop, and in between the shop and our new buildings was a figure, an unmoving mannikin. Was it an NPC? And would the abode continue to grow into a full compound? And then what? A village? A city?

  “We might actually need walls soon…” I said.

  I had decided skipped over the flavor text the system had sent me when skilling them, focusing on the surprise, but now I caught up.

  “What is it?” Maria asked.

  “Things are starting to get really interesting.” I said.

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