Chapter 27. Resolve I brought some stuff that would fill people up, mostly rice, salt, some vegetables, and meat. Enough for a day, that was all I could carry for now and some more people would need to accompany me later to get more food. "Hendry," I called out as he entered my vision. All eyes were on me, and the food in my hand. I did take my sweet time coming back, people were bound to get hungry with nothing to do. Phones did not have service and I doubted these people were going to train, or they even knew training your body helped. "Find someone who can cook, I couldn't bring back much with me. We'll need to go later to get some more." "We didn't find a place nearby that was open and had a storied building, but we found a park with a lot of people." "Hmm? So?" Hendry had a pale face, drained of blood. "All dead." The ground had been painted red. Broken body parts lay around, chewed, ripped apart, shredded, in every condition you could imagine. The tents that previously had to be white were now dyed red. Two of the six that had come to this site vomited while the others tried to hold it in. The place didn't make me feel weird, instead, it felt comfortable standing amidst all this blood and that thought itself made me sick. 'What am I? What have I become?' "Do we really need to stay here?" Underling B asked doing his best not to puke right then and there. "You all can go back, I'll be back in a minute." I needed time to figure out things, I was confused about myself. "He wants to stay here?" "Just leave him alone, weird people weird kinks." They whispered such things as they went to back the building we were currently using as a base. I could hear them but did not pay them attention as I was lost in thought. I stood there with my eyes closed, feeling the blood flowing in my veins. Both sets of them. I calmed down a little and looked around for the cause of this disaster. There were tracks of something being dragged away, but that too stopped after some time. The attackers were probably a trio of goblin chieftains, you could see arrows dug in some while others were sliced clean. I could be wrong but seeing only small goblins in the area was probably our best bet. 'Time to go back.' There wasn't much activity when I returned, the news had probably reached everyone. It was hard to believe that nearly twenty had been killed in the span of hours. This information was not easy to digest and people needed time. The building we had decided to stay in for the night was probably an office building of a small company, and luckily it had a small kitchen in it. I did not know if the gas worked or not, but starting a fire was an easy task. There was a small garden or something similar to it besides the building. I had to meditate and get my thoughts straight before moving on to something else. I sat near some plants and relaxed trying to enter my mind palace when there was disturbance nearby. A teenage boy, probably just turned eighteen or was just about to, showed up. "I have a request, please don't hurt me!" He shouted and raised his arms as he saw me look at him. "I don't eat people, nor do I like killing them," I said and continued after he started paying attention instead of closing his eyes. "So what is request let's hear it." "Please help me get stronger." He bowed, deep asking for my help. I was a little confused because I was stronger than any outside and probably the first person you'd ask but how did this one know that. I never fought after coming back. "Us Too!!!" Another shout came from behind the teenage boy. Two children about the same age as the one before, a little younger if you looked closely were rushing towards us. It was the girl who had shouted while the boy held her hand and tagged behind. "We too want to get stronger!" The girl said and the boy nodded. "Hmm. Names?" "Arthur." The first one said. A young adult, dark brown hair, a slightly built body probably just started going to the gym. Not someone you would pay attention to in a crowd. "I am Lucy and this is Luke, my brother." Twins, almost the same height, appeared to be sixteen years old or somewhere near that estimate. Both had black hair and were pretty cute. "So, Arthur, Luke, and Lucy, why do you want to become strong. Why did you come to me?" The first one to speak was Arthur, "In the tutorial, we were never mistreated but there was no respect either. We were treated as freeloaders, no one gave value to our opinions. I don't want that, and only people with strength have authority during such times." "My brother is physically weak and he gets sick frequently, I want to be strong so that no one bullies or badmouths him," Lucy said trying to appear all serious, which just made her look cuter. But you could see from her eyes that she was dead serious. "And my brother told me to asked for your help, he said you are the strongest one here." I glanced at Luke. "Mana," he said. "The strings of mana do not reject you, it flows and blends with your actions." My eyebrows rose, this was interesting because Luke could somehow see the mana that was in the air. "As for me, I saw you secretly helping them against the D-grade monster by throwing stones and saving them from death," Arthur said. He was probably the only one who noticed it, he either had good perception or just happened to be looking in my direction. "Is there anyone who has crossed level 15?" "No." I could teach them, they would probably rank amongst the strongest by the end of the year but, "I won't."