The Northern Continent.

The liquid that trickled down his tongue had a slightly sweet taste, John would have found the sensation comfortable if he'd been able to appraise liquids to check if the drink would harm him.

The fluid reached the back of his throat and went down, no sour taste like an acid but rather sweet like the juice of a fruit.

John felt something solid slide accross his tongue and stopped drinking, he pulled the bottle away and reached into his mouth to grasp at the object.

In his hand John saw a small, red, slightly glistening gemstone. John hurriedly appraised the gem to see if it would give him information on the thing he had just drank.

"Lesser healing core? Sounds like that would make sense to be in a health potion at least..."

Smiling, John checked through the rest of the information leisurely.

"Edible? Now I know I have to..."

The gem itself tasted of very little to John, who pushed it into his mouth and swallowed it down.

The next minutes for John were spent patiently waiting, feeling his fatigue and minor wounds heal up visibly fast.

"This is amazing, beats all modern medicine back home."

The group that had suprised John seemed to watch him with curiosity.

The man that had greeted him spoke up again.

"Lad, did you just eat a potion core?"

The entire group laughed after the man's words, it occured to John that maybe his actions went against their common sense.

"Yeah, I've never had a potion before and didn't want to waste it."

Looking around the group led John's line of sight to a hooded figure hidden at the back of the group.

The man came up close to John and whispered.

"That one is an elf, we didn't really want them dying in the cold but I wouldn't get too close."

John had never been particularly political, but he figured that fear towards the person for being simply an elf was nothing more than baseless racism.

He walked up close to the person and offered his hand, what he hoped would still come accross as a respectful gesture in this worlds cutltures.

The elf seemed to be wearing a mask, but the confusion was apparent from their body language.

The elf spoke up.

"Humans don't trust me. What do you gain from this?"

John wanted an answer that showed he wasn't prejudiced against the elves.

"I don't care if you're an elf, good people can come from anywhere."

The elf seemed to relax from John's words and removed their mask.

John in his heart was expecting the typical trope of the secret beautiful girl popping up and falling in love with him, and although the elf was pretty and looked far more feminine that any human boy he could tell right away that he wasn't a girl.

I can't help it... I'm a teenage boy. I might as well befriend this elf properly at least.

John had been slightly disappointed but pushed those thoughts aside and greeted the elf regardless.

"My name is Kolir, I can detect the truth in your words and so will place my trust in your character."

The elf smiled and offered his own hand, which John shook.

"Thanks, can I just ask some questions about this area?"

Kolir seemed confused by John's words.

"How would you get here without knowing? Failed warp spell?"

The demon that had thrown John into this place had captured several students from his school, he knew there were others who were fine but the captured ones were probably in danger.

"Something like that, now where exactly am I?"

Kolir answered John like the question had an obvious answer.

"The northern continent, can't tell from the snow? This place is the domain of strong monsters and a lich king, the guy who killed and revived citizens of this town for his experiments."

John had a slight idea of what was going on but his thoughts were confirmed, necromancy seemed to be another school of magic.

Well this isn't great, I can't exactly leave all these people.

"Where is the closest city to this?"

Kolir thought for a moment before responding.

"Closest inhabitable city is Epsom, to the south. But this group won't make it there, monsters would rip us apart."

John thought about ways to take the mostly injured group of civilians through a horrific cold environment, he thought of nothing.

Whilst thinking, John could hear sounds of scratching gradually getting closer. The group seemed to hear it too as one of the men rushed to a window with a large axe, swinging it at an enemy John couldn't see.

The man stepped back as another undead climbed through the window, though this undead was covered in a layer of ice and the same crystals John had absorbed earlier.

"So this is what the necromancer was trying to make consistently I presume?"

John held little fear in his hard due to his encounter with the previous undead, he took out his axes and swung them at the creature.

A horrific metal clang resounded as the axes bounced off of the creatures crystal skin.

More people approached and struck at the creature, their weapons breaking on impact as they weren't forged as well as Johns.

The undead stumbled towards John first, aiming to gouge out his eyes with its claws.

John saw the creatures long arms and realised an enclosed space was a bad place to fight, tackling the creature through the window it came through and then hurrying to the exit.

"And I thought I was just gonna sit and buy skills with my new points..."

John opened the door to the outside of the building before checking the area beneath the window, the creature was stood there and began to approach John as it spotted him.

Feeling worried about getting hit, John decided to try and think of a way of hurting the creature. John knew that weapons and fists were going to be useless so he needed to find a way of at least incapacitating the creature.

Hold on, this might work!