Despite the last cockatrice fleeing and Botnik’s cringey joke, Tyrone still let out a whoop as a notification popped into his sights and an upbeat fanfare sounded in his ears.

Tra-la-la! You have levelled up! All class attributes have been automatically set. You have 2 unassigned points to set. Use these points within 7 days, or they’ll be automatically assigned randomly.

It felt like lightning was rushing through his veins as the attribute boost hit him. As the energy energized him, he felt like he could lift a small car. Looking down at his arms he let out a soft whistle as the muscles in his forearms become more defined, flexing his fist he could feel that he was already reaching 'best shape in his life’ levels of strength. And I’m only level two? I really need to start grinding out some levels if I want to survive longer than a week.

It still nagged at Tyrone that he was locked off from accessing his class skills and spells though, even when he tried to look at them, they were blurred out so he couldn’t even read the descriptions. Tyrone looked over his status screen and couldn’t help but beam at the progress he was making.

Name: Tyrone Henderson.

Race: Human- African American.

Class: Songolian Spear bearer

Title: None

LVL: 2

Fame: 0

HP: 75%

MP: 100%

SP: 80%

Status: None.

Unused Attribute Points: 2

STR: 18

DEX: 12

AGI: 18

CON: 24

INT: 16

WIS: 15

CHA: 15

LUK: 10

Last time he’d raised his luck, thinking it’d help him with the journey, and then nearly immediately later he was ambushed.

“Not very lucky at all” Tyrone mused to himself.

Though when he really thought about it, was it lucky? Sure, he was ambushed, but he was lucky enough to spot it before they sprung out. Did the Luck attribute really help him there? What’s the difference between pure luck and just coincidence? Before he could work his brain into overdrive, he knew one thing for sure. During the fight he had missed quite a lot of swings with his weapon, that could just be because he wasn’t very familiar with it yet, but there was also a attribute that could easily help in that department. With a nod, he dumped both unused points into his dexterity attribute.

“Wouldn’t hurt to learn a ranged attack to better diversify in combat,” He muttered to himself as he knelt to check his still aching legs. “And a healing spell. Don’t happen to have any healing potions on you, Botnik?”

Leveling up did the mercy of healing him a bit, the sudden boost in power was a true boon. Sadly, it didn’t heal all of his wounds completely though. His legs had stopped bleeding, and the wounds were nearly closed up, but the pain was still there. The swipe at his mid-section one of the cockatrices managed to slice a shallow cut just above his bellybutton. A few more inches deep and he’d be holding his intestines in his hands.

“No potions, sorry bud.” Botnik’s face flipped into a frown. “But with all of these monster parts, if we locate a marketplace entrance, we’d have more than enough for quite a few potions and maybe a few cheap spells as well.”

Tyrone watched as Botnik extended its hose and proceeded to vacuum up the cockatrice bodies, A mirthless smile on his lips. “Yea, I’m never going to get used to seeing that.”

“Also, congratulations on leveling up!” Botnik chimed. “Don’t forget to check your new class skills and abilities.”

He nodded but first tended to his wounds as best he could, using one of the water bottles Jenny gave him to wash any grime from the cuts, the last thing he needed was an infection. He opened the status page again and checked for any new class abilities.

You have gained a new Class Skill! Soul Thrust! Info: You are now more familiar with your soul spear and feel confident enough to truly thrust ahead. With this skill strike with a mighty blow by tapping into the very wavelength of your soul! Cost: Moderate Stamina. Recast: 2 seconds. Current Level: 1.

You have gained a new Class Spell! Skirmish Litany! Info: Increases critical hit rate of self and nearby party members by 20%. Cost: Moderate Mana to use. Duration: 30 seconds. Recast: 200 seconds. Current Level: 1.

Curious on how this Soul Thrust skill was any different from any other normal thrust, Tyrone stepped in front of a pine tree beside the road to test it out. Activating the skill, his spear truly sparked to life as the dark electricity crackled around it as his arms acted as pistons as they lurched forward of their own vocation. A small crater the perfect width of his spear blade now existed where he thrusted at the tree, Tyrone blinked as the hole smoked as if the tree had been struck by lightning.

Puffing out a few breathes, he checked his stamina bar and saw that it had dropped by twenty percent. “So that’s what moderate mana means?”

Instinctually he knew that if he’d activated the skirmish litany spell to increase his critical hit chance, he would have brought the tree down entirely. “I suddenly feel like hunting down some more demonic turkeys.”

But instead of going on the hunt, he got back on the road and continued on the path to the gas station, hopefully it was still standing so that it could provide a moderately safe spot to hunker down for the night. Tyrone kept his head on a swivel for potential threats, the only things he spotted were a few deer-like creatures. They had the body of a deer, but their necks were unnaturally long, their heads were reptilian like, and their large slitted yellow eyes followed them as they passed by.

Finally, they crested the hill and could see the gas station in all its glory. Well, there wasn’t much glory to the station anymore. The windows were smashed, and even from a distance they could see that the store had been looted. What drew his attention was what appeared to be a small kiosk-like pop-up store beside the ruined gas station. It reminded him of a lemonade stand, but instead of lemonade the sign above said “open” in a soft neon blue. There was also a large glowing ring around the kiosk that extended about a couple dozen feet out, from the ring a transparent dome covered the area.

“Oh nice! It’s a Marketplace Node.” Botnik chimed. “A Marketplace Node is connected to the Labyrinth of Worlds mega store, and there you can purchase a wide variety of goods. There must be a large amount of people around this area for one to pop up here.”

With considerably more pep in his step, they made their way down the hill and towards the Node. Tyrone hesitated a moment before crossing the strange glowing ring on the ground but once he did, he relaxed as a notification appeared on his HUD.

You have entered a Safe Zone! In this area all forms of combat are restricted, if you do harm or take actions to harm another while in the Safe Zone you will be punished accordingly.

“Oy there!” The man behind the kiosk waved them over. “Welcome to my node, what can I help ya with?”

A short burly man, with a Scottish accent… hold on a sec. Tyrone’s eyes nearly launched from their sockets as he stared at the short man. It’s a damn dwarf! A real life dwarf!

“And no, before ya say it lad.” The man sighed. “I’m not a dwarf, you humans seem to have gotten your lore mixed up a bit. I’m a gnome, a hill gnome to be precise. See, no beard. The name’s Nurkle, pleasure to meet you.”

Tyrone frowned a bit as the man rubbed at his hairless round chin. Tyrone looked him over fully, taking in his stocky build, balding head of hair, soft brown eyes, and eyebrows so bushy they threatened to blind the man. The more Tyrone heard he speak, the more he realized Nurkle’s accent was more Irish than Scottish.

He sounded more like what you’d expect a leprechaun to sound like. He wore a set of brown overalls, with shining brass buckles, and a pale blue dress shirt that had a stylized cartoon garden gnome with a crown on its head and the words “we rule” in all capital letters underneath it.

Never realized how similar dwarves and gnomes were to each other. This guy must be five feet tall at least. I wonder if dwarves are taller. Tyrone had always thought a gnome would be Oompa Loompa sized. “Right, sorry about that. Nice to meet you, Nurkle. My name is Tyrone. Uh, what do you have for sale?”

“Depends.” A wide smile bloomed on Nurkle’s round face. “Are ya looking to protect yourself, or deal some damage? Take a gander.”

At that time a small gray screen popped up in Tyrone’s vision. It was a sorted list of all the wares he could buy, it was broken down into six tabs. A tab for weapons, spells, skills, tools, items, and a miscellaneous tab. The left side window showed his own inventory, the middle-displayed items that were being traded, and the right was the store window. Botnik chimed and suddenly there were a few more things in his inventory window, all the beast they’d looted.

Hoovering his attention over each item, he could easily view its price and info. Tyrone let out a low whistle as he noticed nearly every item in Nurkle’s’ inventory was leagues out of his price range, though with some fiddling with the tabs he was able to sort the cheapest items to the top of the lists.

Looking back at his inventory, Tyrone looked over the beast corpses. The two cyclops hounds, the alpha being worth a bit more, and the cockatrices were worth nearly double. With a nod, he moved each corpse over to the sell tab, confirming the trade he watched greedily as his wallet ticked up with credits.

“Oh! May I make some recommendations, boss man?” Botnik hoovered beside him

Tyrone grunted in affirmation. In all honesty, he had no real clue what he was going to buy. Some real armor would be nice. His security uniform was already in tatters thanks to the cockatrice battle.

“Far out! I think you were right on track selling the beast corpses, but we should have purchased the Butcher spell first. With that spell we could have dissected the bodies into usable parts. For instance, the eye of a Cyclops hound alpha would be worth quite a lot if it was removed. A lot of people use those for potions and the like. Same could be said for the feathers of a Plucky Cockatrice.”

Tyrone bit his tongue from lashing out at the drone. He was a bit peeved that the drone hadn’t said anything earlier, but marked it down as a learning moment and just nodded while trying to keep his eye from twitching.

“There’s also this,” Botnik said as he an item from the shop. “This item will greatly improve your wellbeing and health. No offense, but you humans are so filthy! Some of your DNA makeups are severely stunted and filled with misalignments that lead to genetic illnesses, cellular decay, tumorous growths, and even skeletal alteration. Like seriously, why do you humans have an appendix? It’s just a literal time bomb of pain. One would think you’d be intelligent enough to delete such errors within your DNA”

“That sounded pretty offensive…” Tyrone muttered as he looked over the pulled-up item.

Wuxia Cleansing Pill. Info: This pill is a historical alchemic breakthrough! Take one and it can not only cleanse your body of any impurities, but it can do so at a cellular level! To put it plainly, this pill will reform your body to a point where it advances to a state as if you’d grown in a perfect environment with nothing to stunt your growth. It has also been known to greatly improve mana flow! This may lead to bone realignment, DNA reconstruction, skin pore renewal, and can even cure back acne! Warning! Take only one pill, exceeding this will lead to excruciating expiration. On sale now!

“Holy shit!” Tyrone exclaimed as he read the items description. “That does a whole lot of good for such a low price, what’s the catch? There’s no way something like this doesn’t come with a huge disclaimer.”

“The catch,” Nurkle cut in. “is that it only works on humanoid beings, any other non-humanoid race who try to take the pill will experience a truly gruesome death or explosive diarrhea. So, seeing as this planet is populated only by humanoids, I thought I could make a real killing out here by putting it on sale!”

The gnome merchant laughed greedily then, tugging the straps of his overalls with his thumbs. With his rosy cheeks, Tyrone could easily picture him in someone’s front yard. All he was missing was the red pointy hat.

After setting the pill into their purchase list, Tyrone delved deeper into the shops' inventory for anything else he might need. Nearly all his credits later, he was finally satisfied will their haul and confirmed the purchase. A frown warped his face as he watched all his credits tally down, it only deepened after Nurkle offered them a room to stay the night in.

“Only a hundred credits and you’ll get a safe place to rest your head without having to worry about some beastie taking a nibble at ya.” No doubt seeing the incoming decline on Tyrone’s face, the gnome raised a hand. “Tall ya what, since you purchased so much, I’ll give ya a discount on the room. Toss me seventy creds and we’ll call it fair.”

A part of Tyrone wanted to haggle with the gnome, but a larger part was really starting to feel the adrenaline crash from the entire day. It amazed him that ever since waking with his head half caved in, he’d been in constant motion and fighting demonic dogs, spiders, and squaring up against a dragon like an idiot. In truth he was tired and more than ready to call it a day, so with a groan he nodded to Nurkle.

Confirming Tyrone’s purchase, the gnome slammed his small fist on a cartoonishly large green button that they had somehow not noticed beforehand. A door materialized out of thin air right beside the kiosk desk, Tyrone tried his best to not jump but he did flinch somewhat which set Nurkle to chuckling. At his glare the gnome just shrugged and gestured for him to enter the door, which just looked like an upright doorframe not connected to anything.

“Don’t worry lad, the room has all the essentials. A bed, a restroom, and a panel you can order food products from. At a price of course. A single occupant hotel room provided by the Marketplace itself.”

The door slid aside with a soft hiss and gave Tyrone a view of the small room. It was about the size of a large walk-in closet, just big enough for a twin-sized bed. Muttering a thanks and good night to Nurkle, he entered the room and crinkled his nose, the small space reeked like an over sterilized hospital room. The room was one singular color, white, from ceiling to tiled floor, even the bed sheets.

Blinking the spots from his eyes, Tyrone reassessed the room. Just to the side of the bed was a screen built into the wall, on the screen was a spinning assortment of eating utensils. So that’s the food panel, but what’s this? He turned to another door set across from the bed, with slight hesitation he placed his hand on the door and it slid aside to reveal a full bathroom. It was just as blinding white as the room, except for the full body mirror which reflected a weary and grimy man who looked to be on the very verge of a mental meltdown.

“Hello handsome.”

The rings under his eyes had darkened significantly, lips were chapped, beard was all out of shape, and his bald head was a scarred-up mess. Thanks to Sam, most of the wounds had been healed up but there were two large scars etched into his scalp that would probably never go away. There was one a few inches above his right ear about two inches long, and the other was on the left a few inches above his eyebrow, right where the brick had nearly caved in his skull, a prominent X shaped scar.

And then there was his new so-called gift from Xue-Xin, the geas marking took the delicate shape of an ornate black snowflake pattern. Thankfully it no longer caused any pain, but it did give him a truckload of paranoia Xue-Xin could be peaking in on him at any time. Would I even be able to tell when she spies on me? he thought to himself. And what about the teleporting to her location part? Would I get a warning or just suddenly be pulled to her?

Those thoughts were pushed aside as his muscles seemed to now deem it the opportune time to give in to fatigue. Turning to the shower he began to undress.

“Taking a shower, bud?” Botnik hoovered over to him. “I’ll set your new duds on the bed. You’re going to look awesome in this armor!”

Tyrone mumbled a reply as he got into the standing shower, or at least what he thought was a shower. Turns out it was a washing machine, a body washing machine. He blinked in confusion at the different washing options.

Would you like to purchase the: Refreshing Wash Cycle? Info: Just as the name implies this is a refreshing cleanse, it can easily wash away the grime from your skin and leave you feeling both clean and refreshed. Now with all new scentless cleaning solution! Cost: 5 Credits. FREE for a limited time!

Would you like to purchase the: Deep Cleanse Cycle? Info: A refreshing wash but goes a bit further into scrubbing you clean! Covered head to toe in the blood and grime of your enemies? Not a problem for this cycle! Now with the choice of scentless, lavender, or bubblegum cleaning solution! Cost: 10 Credits.

Would you like to purchase the: Deep Cleanse Plus Cycle? Info: Covered in not only the blood and grime of your enemies but also have a few wounds of your own? This cycle will have you back in tip top shape in minutes using the all new Hi-Potion Bodywash™! Not only will you heal, but you’ll step out smelling like a champion even if you were the one who lost the fight! Cost: 50 Credits.

Selecting the second option, a smile twitched onto his lips as he chose the lavender scent bodywash solution. When the water showered onto him from all angles Tyrone sighed, there was nothing better than a decent shower at the end of a long hard day, especially a day filled with fighting for your life. His relaxing moment was cut short once small robotic arms extended from the walls and started scrubbing him everywhere, in all of his nooks and crannies. Especially the cranny.