It was as Nick was about to leave the room he realised a major issue. He’d been jumped once on this floor already, now he was even further out than he had been at that time, and he was injured. Nick had a terrible feeling in his gut that today wasn’t going to be a good day for him. Nick couldn’t just stay in the room forever, his recovery from the skill had come to stop so he didn’t have much more healing to rely on. Nick was likely to be paying dearly for his reckless choice to run away and fight.

Nick took a deep breath and stepped out of the room. He checked the map and decided on the most direct pathway back to the dining room. He could try and stealth his way around on a longer route, but if he encountered another group he’d be screwed. Nick tried to take off in a jog but his lower back screamed in pain. He would have to walk all the way back, which could take up to half an hour. He really had royally stuffed up.

Nick checked his internal energy and realised he wouldn’t even have his trump card to fall back on. He’d used almost all of the energy on his ineffectual attack against the wasp. The energy was slowly trickling back into him from the ethereal rectangles, but it was a slow recovery. Nick sighed and set off, he’d made his bed and now had to sleep in it.

Nick crept from room to room, poking his head through doors and trying to avoid any large groups of people. He was still pretty far out from the congested areas so there weren’t any other groups around for a while. Nick's anxiety took a peak when he first encountered other people. It was a five-strong team, two people carrying bows and three with melee weapons of some form or another. Nick knew he was done for as soon as he saw the grin spreading across one of the melee fighter’s faces.

Nick made a quick value assessment. What would he lose if he just handed over everything? He had his own gear set, some spare leather gear, the bandits metal armour, a couple of weapons, the sticker he’d just gotten, and finally the hundreds of pills. Oh and the cool as hell magic bag holding all of it. It was a lot of stuff to lose honestly, but he could earn it all back as long as he lived through this. It was just his luck that the first group he ran into seemed to be pretty dodgy.

“Hello there, are we a friendly bunch?” It couldn’t hurt to be hopeful.

The grinning man approached Nick with his sword in hand, the grin only growing wider. He certainly didn’t look friendly. The rest of the team began to fan out around Nick. It wasn’t looking good.

“I’ll let you know, I’m the Scout. The rest of the team will be coming through that door shortly.” Nick casually gestured at the door he’d come through. “If I don’t come back through they’ll be charging in weapons drawn and ready to draw blood.”

Nick tried to deliver it as casually as possible. A solid bluff in his opinion. It seemed to work on some members of the team, they looked nervous. The grinning man wasn’t phased though.

“We’ll have to make this quick then.” His voice was deep.

Nick sighed. “I guess we will.”

Nick ignored his pain and sprang forward. The man seemed to have been expecting Nick to draw a weapon of some sort, he hadn’t expected Nick to just try and punch him. That’s exactly what Nick did, he threw a mighty right cross directly into the man’s jaw. The man’s head literally spun as he crashed to the floor, his jaw shattered at the point of impact. Well, that was one down. Nick looked at the other four members of the team, he really didn’t think he could take them. He really had been relying on the bluff here.

“He’s a Brawler or something!” One of the other melee fighters called out.

The group then all pulled out their weapons properly and moved to engage with him. The two archers were the problem. Both started firing their arrows at him and while Nick managed to dodge one, the other caught him square in the chest. It barely pierced through his leather armour and was stopped by the vest. Now that had been a lucky find. Nick gritted his teeth and charged towards the melee fighters, hoping that would stop the archers from being able to fire willy nilly at him. Nick could feel Brawler’s Constitution in full effect, the pain in his lower back had been reduced by a substantial amount. Goddamn he had some cool abilities.

Nick and the melee fighters clashed. They were both sword users, but they weren’t very good. They both threw lazy slashes that Nick could comfortably dodge, even without the use of his buff. Nick chose one of the fighters to focus on, picking the smaller of the two, he threw a quick jab into their chest. The fighter shrugged it off and slashed towards him, Nick took a step back to avoid it. That was his mistake, as soon as he’d stepped back he’d cleared himself from the two fighters. This let the archers get their shots in on him. They seemed to learn their lesson from the first shots and they aimed at his legs. Nick didn’t have any armour at all protecting his thighs and the arrows landed. One merely grazed his leg, leaving a nasty gash. The other landed cleanly, piercing deep into his leg. Nick let out a yell.

“Scumbag archers!” He used the yell to get his debuff skill in.

Nick knew he had to get close to the melee fights and stay in the pocket, or he’d be picked apart by the archers. Nick tried to charge forward and stumbled, his leg refusing to bear any weight. He barely managed to recover and turned it into a sloppy tackle of one the fighters. The fighter simply muscled Nick off and threw him down to the floor. That’s when things started to get hazy for Nick. The two melee fighters began to stomp on Nick with their boots. The fighter Nick had knocked out had gotten up at some point and joined in. The archers stayed ready for a response, while the three fighters brutalised Nick. After a good five minutes, Nick was barely breathing and the fighter’s breath ran ragged.

That’s when one of the doors to the room opened up and a new group came through. Nick’s eyes were practically swollen shut at this point but he could hear their reactions.

“What the hell is happening here?” A new voice called out.

“Nun uh yerr buserness.” Replied the no longer grinning man, through a very shattered jaw.

“Bandits huh?” The voice replied.

Then it all kicked off. Nick heard the clattering of metal on metal and then metal on flesh. There were yells and screams, which quickly turned into the sound of feet pounding across carpet and doors slamming. That’s when Nick’s skill kicked in and he started healing, keeping him just conscious enough to stay with it.

“Wanna chase? A new voice called out, this one feminine.

“Nah wouldn’t be worth the effort. Betts, heal this SOB.” A deeper voice replied.

Then Nick began to feel a new tingling sensation across his body. It took a good few minutes, but eventually Nick was able to move again.

“Jesus, this guy was practically dead. He must be a tank or something, he took more of a beating than anyone but Hardy could.” A gruff feminine voice spoke.

Nick sat up and took his surroundings in. The first thing he noticed were the bodies. An archer with an arrow through their neck and the grinning man. The man certainly wasn’t grinning now. He had a deep slash through his torso, his body still in a pool of his own blood. Nick had to look away, they had almost killed him but he still wasn’t comfortable with the fact they were dead. Nick instead looked at the team that had saved him. There were four of them, two melee, a ranged and an obvious healer.

One a tall, broad shouldered, man who held a large shield and wooden club, an odd weapon in Nick’s mind. Surely you could find anything better than that. This man was likely Hardy, who Nick pieced together was the team's tank. The next melee fighter was a titan, a giant man covered in bulging muscles. The man had to be at least six foot five, towering above everything in the room. He had heavy metal armour on and was wielding a sword so large that Nick doubted he’d be able to even lift it.

The other two members of the group were females, one holding a bow, the other a staff. The one holding the bow had long dark hair and piercing eyes that made Nick feel exposed when she looked at him. The Healer, Betts, was a rugged looking woman, with a face that looked weathered and experienced. Nick got the feeling that she knew how to use that staff to more than just heal.

“Thanks guys.” Nick coughed out.

Hardy walked over and helped Nick up to his feet. “All in a day's work. What are you doing this far out alone?”

“As a 2-2 at that.” The bow user added.

“Well, I uh, I, I can’t say I’ve got a good reason at all.”

This earned a laugh from Hardy. The giant man had been looking over Nick for a while before he spoke up. His deep voice felt like it struck deep into Nick.

“What’s your name lad?”

“Nick. How about you?”

The man nodded. “Thought so. You’ve got a fair bit of gear for a solo. It’s Frank. This is Hardy, Kitty and Betts.” The man introduced the team.

“Great to meet ya’ll. Thanks again for the save. What do you mean, thought so?” Nick asked. Though he had an inkling.

This time Hardy replied, a laugh coming out at the same time. “You’re a well known name in Parkland’s teams right now. A Latecomer who managed to beat Reggie’s team on his own floor. Hilarious stuff.”

Concern ran through Nick’s mind. Not that he was now a well known figure, no, the fact that Reggie had purposely made this whole situation come into place. What the hell had Reggie gained from making himself look weak to the other major faction of the Complex? Nick had no idea but it couldn’t have been anything good. Nick wasn’t in the state to be able to try and comprehend the wider complexities of the situation. Though he was sure Lily would love to try and piece this all together.

“Well, you all know my class then. Anything I can do to pay you back?”

Frank smiled. “We just aren’t the biggest fan of bandits lad. Though if you’re offering I’m sure no one here would say no to a free meal.”

Nick wouldn’t say no to that at all. So, after Kitty moved through and took all the gear from the bandits, the group moved back towards the kitchen. Hardy was very happy at the idea of a free meal. This made Nick wonder about the state of income in teams around this level, surely the couple of pills needed to buy a good meal wasn’t something that concerned the average team? Then Nick started crunching the numbers on how many pills a team could feasibly gain a day. The non-wave rooms gave out very few pills, the couple he’d done only gave about between five and ten pills, which was apparently the most common drop from chests. It was only the wave rooms that gave out really hefty amounts of pills. This led to Nick posing a question at the team.

“Say guys, what’s an average day of roaming look like for you guys?”

“Clear a handful of rooms, maybe get in a tussle or two over who actually made it to a room first.” Betts answered.

“How many rooms is a handful?” Nick asked.

“About five or six, maybe more on a really good day.” Betts replied.

“Yeah those good days are few and far between.” Kitty added.

“That’s not counting the days where one of us gets a bad injury or something.” Hardy chimed in as well.

“Ay, we’ll probably be clearing less for a while now though. With this war kicking off, all the teams that usually run the higher floors are going to be coming down here. Business is going to be tough for us 70s teams.” Frank sighed.

The group then broke off into everyone complaining about the war or just the general state of things in the hotel. Hardy was cracking jokes here and there, keeping everyone entertained. The atmosphere in the group was kept positive, even though the topic was a war making everyone's lives worse. Nick found himself engaged in the conversation and laughing along.

His last few interactions with teams, and him getting almost killed today solidified a goal in Nick’s mind. It was potentially the most important goal he could be working on right now. He really needed to get himself a good team.