AN: So, a lot of things happened.

Chapter 36.2: The Hope of Darkness

Seven sets of headlights speared through the darkness after midnight. The small convoy was heading away from the city center toward a small house on the outskirts of town. It was the third such trip that night alone, and would not be the last.

Scott led the convoy in the van they had appropriated long ago, while his road crew drove the other six vehicles. Each of them belonged to either a former employee of Archer's or a family member. There were two small cars, three mini-vans, and a heavy duty truck in motion on the road. Each vehicle had a pull trailer hooked to it that was appropriate for its hauling capacity.

It had been a pain in the ass to get them from the front of the store to the back of the store, but they had a lord of darkness with a particular capacity to make then undead flee in terror. It had taken a while, but they had managed to hand-pull all of the carts through the side gate and around to the back while Scott sent a few undead souls screaming back to the abyss.

They were occasionally forced to divert around wreckage in the road whenever they went back, but otherwise the missions to plunder Archers went well.

Once they were at Shara's house, they unloaded the vehicles, and then Scott and Ashton began the laborious process of carrying it to the main base through the transfer node.

"Bout time you pharmacy chicks did a little real work." said Eric. The pharmacy chicks in question were Sandra and Kenna. Erin was also there, but she was busy chatting with Mark.

Sandra smirked at him then shook her head. "Says the guy who used to sleep in the rafters above housewares instead of straightening the shelves."

Eric shrugged. "Hey, my breaks are my business."

She snorted at him then glanced over to Kenna. "You hearing this?"

Kenna nodded, then reached down and lightly stroked the ring on her finger. "Yeah."

"Still no word from him?" asked Eric, in a surprisingly humorless tone. He was a goofy sort of bastard, but he could be serious if the situation warranted it.

Kenna shook her head. "No. He couldn't call even if he wanted to at the moment."

The trio grew silent for a moment as the reality of the situation settled in once more. During their looting spree they had experienced a wonderfully freeing sensation. They had each been trapped and terrified for days, but now they could almost wander the world with impunity as long as they were with Scott or a member of his entourage.

While the second-stringers chatted, Scott and the aforementioned entourage continued to transfer supplies to the main base. They never drove there directly, as there was no need. If anyone discovered the mini-base at Shara's house, the worst that could happen was that they might find a method to circumvent the system protections and raid the place. Apparently, factions could do that if they committed to a siege.

"This is going a lot faster now that we have help." said Ashton as she pushed a shopping cart loaded down with canned goods over to the side of the building.

"Yeah, it really is." said Scott before calling out to a few other people. They were family members of his road crew, and his first new citizens. "Hey, no one else has a car right?"

Several people spoke up, but no one else had a vehicle. It was too much to hope for at the moment, anyway. Still, there was a lot of stuff to move out of the store. Seven regular vehicles and a few pull trailers had barely made a dent in the store's inventory. They would make a few more trips that night, but only that night. People were more active during the day and if someone had not noticed them yet, they probably would soon.

The current plan was to spend his days carting non-weapon items over to the sheriff and filling a few minor orders for people in other enclaves. The main deal with the police would be filled in another three days, but he would supply their apple juice and a few suits of armor before then in order to keep them from getting antsy. That would allow his crew to maximize the looting of the store prior to his taking out the zombies. There was no way he would allow the police take them out as the shambling idiots represented a lot of experience and souls for him. Currently, they also acted as a nice little insurance policy against other people looting the place as well.

During the first night of looting, when he had met up with Eric and Mark, he had hit upon a plan when they returned for another round. He now kept a dozen zombies in the store and spent a little time locking them up or tying down when they had returned earlier in the evening to begin their looting once more.

They were practically harmless to him, but they were a dire threat to normal looters. He used pet harnesses and camping straps for those that had not wandered too far from the back room, but the rest were herded into various places around the store such as the security office or the dressing rooms. Once they were done for the night he had set them all loose in the store. The next night when they returned, three more had spawned inside, but he had rounded them up along with the rest.

Scott considered the loot in the store as property of the community now, if anyone could get past the zombies they were welcome to the goods inside. That thought made him feel slightly mollified by the situation, and it also ensured that most of the stuff inside would go back to his growing community.

"Hey, Scott." called one of the men, Kenna's father. "The first floor is full."

"Right, start with the next building then, no need to dragon stuff upstairs." called back Scott.

The man waved back and said, "Alright!" then got back to work.

Scott glanced at him for a moment then nodded. He seemed like he could be cultivated. Most of the people who had been brought in when he'd gathered up the road crew seemed like they would work out. It was too bad, that there were not more fighters among them.

It was mostly the younger people who had focused on fighting skills early on since they had recognized the dream as some sort of game creation system. The older people had just picked skills that had sounded nice for the most part.

After the first night of looting Archers a lot of things had happened. Scott and crew had started a rapid-fire serious of events that had utilized both Earth and the dream world. They had drastically improved their lot in life through trade and transfer node creation.

Once the issues with Scott and the girls had been cleared up, and they had looted Archers again that night, their focus had shifted. A lot had taken place over the course of the next day, though nearly three days days had also passed in the dream world. Even more would happen tomorrow.

The gathered crowd drew back slightly as another newcomer popped up. This individual had an unmistakable presence due to his inhuman nature. "My lord, do you need a report?"

"Did anything happen, Daekwo?" Scott asked the tigerman. Daekwo was from an anthropomorphic race of people who had the upright nature of a human, but many of the features of a tiger. His mate, Shakiera looked far more human, as she was like Ashton. She had mostly the ears and tail of a tiger. Though, she also had formidable fangs, and claws that could gouge concrete.

The tigerman shook his massive feline head then lashed his tail. "Nothing too exciting. We spotted a few deer, and many scarvulf."

Scott nodded to his newest purchase. He had begun his plan to relocate people for fun and profit that he had considered recently. A few people out of the twenty or so individuals that his faction had purchased, opted to come to Earth permanently as it meant a new start on a new world. Their home world left a bad taste in their mouths. A few others were utilized as mobile bags as their primary work method. They were summoned all over the place to rapidly transport goods.

Trade between Earth and the dream world had only just begun. Shara had used her incredible speed to race around to various areas near the neighboring towns and created three more transfer nodes. Once that had happened it had been easy to sell off some of the items from Archers that were quite useful in a medieval world. People had gone crazy for various household supplies and thin but durable cooking knives.

The time difference between Earth and the dream allowed Shara, who could literally stay asleep as long as she liked when it mattered, to do a lot of the leg work for the less divine portion of the ever-growing Blackthorne faction. Though, since the dream body and Earth body could differ in location, a rapidly crafted method of moving goods was created.

That tactic had proven useful for everyone in the Blackthorne Faction who had access to the nodes as goods purchased could be rapidly transported to the castle, and to Earth, through the use of the slave labor that had been more than happy to sign on. The possibility of being set free with a small income when it happened was something most of them had not even dreamed of after becoming enslaved. At the rate they were being utilized, many of them would pay off their debt within less than a month and they would then be free.

In less than one Earth day, the faction had moved a lot of their redundant supplies and earned a small fortune in Jerin. A large chunk of that had been spent on hiring slave labor that hoped for the freedom promised to them, but the rest had been spent on the transfer nodes and various items from the dream world that could be used to make unique items on Earth.

Shara's absurd movement speed when running made it ridiculously easy to move goods as well, and Scott's ability to synergize items into better quality creations made it quite easy to get things rolling. However, while the red-headed goddess handled dream world commerce, she was not the only one who set up transfer nodes.

Scott and Ashton did the same. Scott had created a node in Argent by buying an old workshop on the outskirts of town. Normally a traveler could not buy property in that way, but the armor shop owner vouched for him and that had settled things.

Ashton arrived in the port city that her dream body had been sailing toward on the ship she had boarded earlier. Traveling there from Argent would have normally taken over a month of normal peasant walk style travel. However, since she was already there, she promptly used her sense of business acumen, her big sack of Jerin, and her femininity to coax the head of the chamber of commerce into allowing her to buy a small shack near the city wall.

Neither building was upscale in the slightest, but they did not need to be. In fact, Scott wanted the cheapest buildings they could acquire as they were only for the purpose of transferring around rapidly.

Each transfer node had cost a large amount of Jerin to build, but not as much as one might expect. Transfer nodes were apparently a common concept in the dream world, but those who had them charged a lot of money for transporting people around.

Scott had finally understood why he had seen so few people on the road to Argent during his earliest travels. Anyone with any sense who had to travel did so by caravan or transfer node. The end result of their efforts was that they had a dedicated trade route from Black Dragon Keep all the way to the sea. They were all more than a little tired after their constant efforts.

"No one was injured?" asked Scott.

The tigerman shook his head. "No, my lord. We successfully hunted the beasts. Currently my mate is preparing the meat."

Scott nodded. "Did you keep the greater portion for yourself?"

"As you requested." said the tigerman with a nod. It was hard to tell the expression on a tigerman's face, but there was an obvious light of gratitude in his eyes. His race needed to eat one-third of their body weight per day in meat in order to remain healthy. Scott had no idea where they packed all that meat away in their taut frames, but it was not really his business. Daekwo had already proven to be invaluable in keeping down the number of monsters roaming in the nearby woods and as an active guard.

The tigerman had only been on Earth for less than a day, but he had already taken to the field and woods like they were old friends. The humans in the faction were unsettled by his presence, but Scott had never heard of any ill-action between human and tigerman whenever he asked someone for a report. It was quite early, however. There was no way to know how well Daekwo and his mate would fit in on Earth.

"Ah, there is one thing." said Daekwo after a moment.

"Oh?" asked Scott.

"Smitty says that he would like more metal. He's used up all that you have supplied him."

Scott grinned. "Well, that's good news. I have to get back to moving these goods around, but if you see him before I do tell him that he'll have a lot of steel and a few other things coming his way tomorrow afternoon."

"He'll be glad to hear that." said Daekwo.

The tigerman looked to all of the people bustling about in their bid to pack and store goods. "I should help you, my lord."

"Didn't you hunt all day, Daekwo?" asked Scott. He rather liked the earnest tigerman. He had only been there a short time, but he had already tried to show his worth.

"Yes, lord. But—"

Scott cut him off. "Go home to your mate. I'm certain she misses you."

Daekwo nodded to him. "As you say, my lord."

The tigerman inclined his head once, slammed his palm into his fist, then turned and stalked back toward the apartment building where most of the new community lived. Scott had kept the apartment building that he personally lived in as a base of operations for his personnel. So far only his main group lived there, though others were free to visit up to the lounge. Any floor higher than that was for new government business.

Scott surveyed the area for a moment then gazed upon his people. Everyone was busy and obviously tired, but whenever he looked at them he began to feel the strangest stirring sensation inside. He watched as several of them laughed despite the heavy work. He could not put his finger on it, but whatever the sensation was... It made him incredibly hungry.