I

Eva felt a modicum of relief that it was over, but her surroundings just creeped her out too much. She collected the rewards from the boss—shards—and exited the dungeon. There were around ten omyeskadi eating food nearby and a few others milling about. She took care of them before figuring out what she wanted to do next. She couldn’t sleep where she was, and it was still too dark for her to travel swiftly. She would just have to travel south slowly instead.

Eva slowly wandered through the night. With nowhere to be and nothing she actually needed to do on a timeline, she had the next week and a half to do as she pleased. Most of that time, she would commandeer one of her dungeons to run repeatedly. She considered using one of the enemy dungeons she’s conquered, but decided against that as she wanted a relatively safe place to resupply without having to travel half a day.

Of the options, the human dungeon was the worst choice since it was already being split with the forseli. The second option—the forseli dungeon—was a bad choice for a similar reason: it was already fully utilized. Ultimately, she decided to go back to the rabbit dungeon as that one would probably have enough room in the Master✷ difficulty version for her to run the dungeon at her pleasure.

Eva first stopped in the forseli town to let Sun know she’d completed her quest and that she would be leaving to the south. He wished her well and offered her a warm meal and a place to rest her head, which she gladly accepted.

Eva slept for a few hours before departing, leaving only a single monster for her to fight on her journey. Her mental map of the area was long gone, but she remembered some of the landmarks as she passed through and was able. Eventually, around early evening, she found herself at the gate of the human village near the rabbit dungeon.

The village was in much better shape than when Eva had left. The walls looked good, and the defense had been improved—with spike pits, more towers, and a sturdier gate being the most obvious additions. The inside was still a muddy mess, however. She decided to pick up some food to go—costing a handful of shards for a couple days’ worth—before turning around and leaving for the dungeon directly. She knew she could sleep in there safely if she needed to.

The dungeon’s defenses had likewise been improved in her absence. There was a large contingent of people who were running it in rotations, but not enough that would prevent her from soloing the Master✷ difficulty version as she had hoped. There was a little disagreement with the person managing the dungeon’s slots, which was cleared up with a gentle reminder that it was, in fact, her dungeon. With instructions to make room for her in the schedule as needed, Eva entered the dungeon to begin her training.

She did several runs a day, though she skipped the boss fight more often than not. It simply wasn’t worth it. Sure, there were some decent drops every so often—about 10% of the time, she found—but that didn’t outweigh the extra time and potions needed to handle the stupid ankle biter of a boss. She’d gain more shards and more experience just focusing on the minions instead.

Eva took time here and there to sate her curiosity around potion making. She didn’t try any of the alchemy stuff, but rather she wanted to see what sorts of interesting effects she could find when making them with shards. She found that once the type of potion was set, the effects were taken from a pool of options for that potion type. For example, a Health Potion✦ would have options that modified how quickly or how much health was gained, but it would not be able to cause damage to the drinker or be used to cause an explosion like other potion types could.

Even though Eva only participated in a few monster waves directly, just being inside the dungeon at the same time gave her a bit of free experience every day that she otherwise wouldn’t get. When she did join in, she took first place, though the actual rewards were not great. It was a good opportunity to empty her backpack of wooden projectiles and level her Throwing▲ skill.

When there were three days left in the Tutorial, Eva bumped up against the stat point cap for her tier. Not wanting the easy experience to go to waste, she threw herself at the dungeon for fifteen hours a day until she had enough to elevate herself to the next tier.

She felt pleased with her progress. There were several skills that had ranked up in the process, and she could immediately feel the difference in difficulty now that she was 4th tier. She did one final run and killed the boss with one Fireball★!

With only a couple hours to go before the Tutorial ended, Eva looked through the upgraded skills, gear, and her stat sheet.

Name: Eva Greene

Species: Human IV (Modified)

Class: Elemental Knight✷

Level: 30

Experience: 71

Health: 2755

Regen: 31.6/min

Stamina: 2513

Regen: 297/min

Mana: 3270

Regen: 297/min

Strength: 259

Cost: 252 Exp

Dexterity: 254

Cost: 252 Exp

Agility: 280.5

Cost: 252 Exp

Endurance: 258

Cost: 252 Exp

Wisdom: 261

Cost: 252 Exp

Acuity: 259

Cost: 252 Exp

Intelligence: 261

Cost: 252 Exp

Willpower: 270

Cost: 251 Exp

Vitality: 270

Cost: 251 Exp

Perception: 262

Cost: 251 Exp

Skills/Spells: Throwing✦: 2, Polearms▲: 6, Unarmed▲: 7, Swords★: 18, Shields★: 12, Charge★: 14, Infuse Weapon★: 17, Medium Armo★r: 7, Pierce★: 7, Air Resistance★: 3, Fire Resistance★: 4, Earth Resistance★: 2, Water Resistance★: 3, Dodge★: 12, Poison Resistance★: 9, Meditation★: 1, Observe★: 9, Human Language✹, First Aid▲: 4, Mapmaking★: 3, Fireball★: 17, Light Armor✦: 2, Sneaking✦: 1, Feint▲: 7, Blunt Weapons▲: 1, Block✦: 3

Titles: Tutorial Conqueror✹

Equipment: Shortsword✶, Shield✶, Magister's Emerald Ring✹, Boots of the Traveler✶, Shard Ring✹, Leather Armor★, Leather Leggings✶, Dungeoneer’s Backpack✹, Witch's Cauldron★, Chainmail Hauberk✶

Novice Throwing✦ Lv 2

Throwing damage increased by 12%

2% reduced effect of atmosphere

Journeyman Meditation★ Lv 1

28% increased recovery speed of health, stamina, and mana while meditating

Can move at 2% normal speed while meditating

Journeyman Mapmaking★ Lv 3

Remember all steps taken for at least 24 hours

Mental map maintained for 14 hours

Estimate distance between two points with an accuracy of no worse than 14%

Novice Sneaking✦ Lv 1

Dampens noise made by 12%

Reduces visual contrast by 2%

Novice Block✦ Lv 3

Blocked damage reduced by 13%

Gain 3 Health after blocking

Adept Shortword✶

Physical Damage increased by 20%

Elemental Damage increased by 10%

5% Physical Damage converted to Fire Damage

Self Repair

Adds 5-12 air damage to attacks

Adept Shield✶

Reflect 5% of Melee Damage to attacker

Self Repair

Endurance +7

Health +21

Acuity +8

Adept Boots of the Traveler✶

Agility +10%

Health +31

Stamina +18

10% of Physical Damage taken as Fire Damage

Movement Speed +10%

Adept Leather Leggings✶

Reflect 3% of Melee Damage to attacker

Agility +4

Health +10

Reduce Physical Damage taken by 5%

Stamina +23

Adept Chainmail Hauberk✶

Health +88

Intelligence +9

Wisdom +8

Self Repair

Perception +12

Elemental Knight✷ (31 points, Condensed)

30% increased elemental damage when using an elemental skill

2 increased effective level of elemental skills

1 increased effective level of auxiliary skills

10% increased Light Damage

20% increased Fire Damage

10% increased Air Damage

25 Mana

50 Health

25 Stamina

10% increased mana regeneration

10% increased health regeneration

10% increased stamina regeneration

20 Willpower

20 Vitality

10% more experience

Eva was pleased with her accomplishments in the Tutorial. In spite of losing a friend and all that followed, she was content in knowing that she’d done as well as she could have, all things considered. As much as she had resented Alexandra what felt like decades ago, she was thankful to have had the training. Without it, she probably would have died on the first day. As it was, there were just under 3,000 survivors, so maybe she would have lived a bit longer. The odds, however, would not have been on her side.

She shook her head and watched the countdown. She’d emptied her backpack of unneeded items while at the same time filling it with anything that might be useful when she arrived back on Earth. From what she’d learned, there would be a lot of changes; and she wanted to be prepared.

Quest Complete: You have survived

Reward: 500 experience and the Title Tutorial Survivor✦

The world around her faded to white.