A war had started between two species, with none of them knowing anything of their opponent. Tommy party could be considered like a scouting team. The moment they met a lone monster, they decided to kill it. The two sides were considering each other like prey. They were in a world where only the strong could survive.

Roland looked calm, but he was happy. Even tough, he was not the one who killed the monster, he fought bravely against it. He remembered sooner during the day when these monsters attacked his school. He was terrified and at the sight of them, he found that his body was not obeying to him anymore. At that time the green monster grinned at him. Despite the lack of word and the language barrier, Roland knew that he was being mocked. The worst was that he could not do anything; he even fell on the ground and was seeing the monster getting closer to him. At that time when he tough that he was going to die, when he was seeing the big wooden club fall on him, a familiar figure of a young woman launched itself at the monster. She was his childhood friend. Getting in high school and having different center of interest they were progressively getting apart from each other. She was now critically injured, and without a medical intervention, she is going to die. It was the reason why Roland left; he hated himself for letting her get harmed, for the fact that he did not have the strength or the courage to avenge her at that time. But now seeing the corpse of the green monster, he was satisfied.

“I will kill all of them to the last!” he swore

On the other hand Miss Violet was contemplating over what happened. They were three against a single of these monster and they almost died. Tommy was not the only one to think that those monsters were from a larger group, her toughs were the same. Be it strength, be it familiarity with the forest they could not compare with these monster.

“I hope that the other team will be luckier and that everyone will come back safe and sound” she prayed.

At the same time Tommy was feeling the change in his body. Since the purple ‘crystal’ the size of a water drop had appeared on his arm, he could feel a strange current coursing through it. It seemed like the bones of this arm were being toughened while the muscles were being strengthened. When the current reached the shoulder joint, a significantly weakened part of it will circulate through the rest of the group.

When the group started to leave the place where the battle happened, his breathing was labored. His back was aching and he could feel a burning pen on his left shoulder.

At the beginning Tommy tough that he needed to close that injury only to find that it was healing at an inhuman speed.

One hour after the battle, they had traveled through the forest, in the periphery of the school. They saw many bizarre plants. They even saw one of them who had fruits, but without knowing if they were edible or not, neither of them wanted to it eat and Tommy decided to pick them before throwing them in his bag.

“Tommy, how do you feel?” Roland who was at the front suddenly asked the question he had in mind since a long time.

Tommy saw him gazing at his right arm that looked like it had a purple crystal embedded on it.

Understanding what he was talking about, Tommy tough for a while before talking.

“Better… I think. I have a feeling that I even my left arm will recover soon”

This answer shook up Miss Dianna of her confused state. She saw his arm in the infirmary after all. ‘Crippled’ was just a polite way to describe it. It was ‘crushed’ and ‘mangled’.

“It is that magical?” she could not help but exclaim.

“It is just a feeling, I am not sure yet. It feels like killing these monsters can increase our regeneration speed and our strength”

Saying this Tommy tightened his right hand into a fist and punched the trunk of an innocent three next to him. When he retracted his hand, a clear fist imprint was left on the trunk. The spectators’ jaws dropped.

“I also think that there is a reason if these monsters are so strong. I am still confused about something but I’m sure that if we continue to hunt these monsters, we will learn it sooner or later”

There was something else that Tommy did not say. Since this crystal appeared in his body, it felt that sooner or later, he will be able to use his power of dream master.

What was the ability of a dream master? It was to change his dream into reality. Even though Tommy had not reached this level; there were some basic spell that every dream master could use. They were powers in the domain of memory and mind.

They were also the only spell that he learned from the spiritual device. In other to learn anything more impactful, he needed to exchange realm energy. But even these spell could be lifesavers in this kind of situation.

“So this is realm energy?” Tommy sighed while thinking of the power he received from killing the monster. It seemed to be the way in which human in this world could become stronger. It was the reason why Tommy came in this world, to obtain enough realm energy in other not only to heal his body, but also to bind it with his spirit. The more realm energy he had the better it will be for him when he returned.

“I also need to establish a secure way in which I could obtain realm energy regularly in the future” Tommy decided.

His demonstration of power, although not glorious amazed the other two. What was the more convincing than comparing the state of a person we knew, before and after the experiment?

“It is possible that in the future we take turn, finishing them?” Roland seemed embarrassed by his own question.

‘I’m talking about it as if we are in a leveling game and I am afraid of skill steal happening’

He was not wrong. In this kind of environment, almost everyone would want to increase would want to get stronger in order to not remain a paper target. This strange power could increase an individual survivability while raising his importance to the team.

Tommy had already started to obtain this power and felt the change it brought to the body; so he felt particularly implicated by this question.

Although a part of him wanted to get stronger as fast as possible, he still felt that it will not be reasonable to be the only one to get stronger. After all he will still feel bad in the case that something happens to his teammate just because he greedily kept the prize alone. He kind of liked being with other. He felt less lonely.

“I also think that way. That everyone should have his turn killing one of these monsters. After all he will raise our team survivability” Tommy said in an understanding tone.

“If we proceed that way, I think that it will also help us understand these powers better” Miss Diane suddenly said attracting the attention of the other.

Most of the time, she did not talk. It was understandable after all. Who would want to attract the attention of whatever monster by making too much noise? She was always looking everywhere as if she thought that a predator will come down on them at any moment.

Seeing the curious gazes of the other, she continued:

“During the meeting with the principal, I saw the people who obtained this mysterious power. Every one of them, had strange things appeared on his body. Someone had reptile like scale on his arm, someone had metallic line appearing on his leg, and someone else even had a thing that looked like a little pebble appearing on his face. Now that I see the crystal mark on your arm, I think that there are some difference between the powers we obtain…” she explained patiently.

But even if those assumptions were true, they knew that they were not strong enough to decide who would kill the monster. It was already hard to finish them off.

After talking for a while, they decided that at first, the person who had the chance to kill the monster should just seize it. They will only take turn killing them if it was possible.

They walked for a while, still circling in a radius of six hundred meter from the school. The trees were so tall and adjoined that at it this distance it was impossible to see any of the batiment. At that time, they vaguely saw something moving in the wood. There were two pale green figures walking upright and they were still far away.

“Two of them… I think that we should retreat for a while” Roland said careful to not be too loud.

The other heard what he was saying, and started to retreat. The two monsters seemed to not see them, but the team was unsure after all they experienced how sinister these things were.

They were retreating when they saw a lone green monster with his head lowered looking at the ground, he seemed to be following their track.

At that moment he raised his head and their gaze met. Tommy felt like it was looking and him, more precisely at his right hand. They tough that he was going to attack as usual, but contrary to they expectation he started to scream. They were so surprised that they did not move. Soon they understood his intentions. In the direction, they were fleeing from, the two other monster from earlier appeared.

The monster seemed like they did not need to discuss anything and launched themselves at the human.

Tommy was getting goose bumps, they had just discussed how to split the kill and now there was not any need for it anymore.

Knowing that they needed to move fast Tommy cried to wake them out of their stupor.

“The two of you will attack the one in front first. I will distract the other two in the meantime” Tommy spoke loudly not minding if the enemy could hear him.

In a group fight like this, were death could happen anytime, the most important factor was not the individual strength, after all they were all considered as weakling in this forest. The most important thing was the coordination of the team, the second was the judgment of the situation and the third one was…..

Alternative title: whether to rely on luck