I only took about half an hour to get to the site, the blue arrow leading the way. While I kept my thermal vision on the whole time, it seemed to be unnecessary since we didn't run into any monsters along the way. Regardless, I had already learned my lesson about letting my guard down and I was determined not to make that same mistake again. The arrow led us to the entrance of a large valley, the side blocked off by the large mountains to both sides. At the far side of the valley against a sheer cliff face, there appeared to be a large wooden fort. There was a gate at the front that was wide open and the walls of the fort were easily 10 feet tall.

With some amount of hesitation, all three of us went into the valley with Akari leading the way. My thermal vision had already spotted some lifeforms in the fort and I was hoping that it would be the other three people from the lobby. I glanced over to Nick, deciding it was best to warn my companions. “There's someone in there, I can see their heat signatures.”

Nick eyed the wall suspiciously before shrugging his shoulders. “Maybe it's that Russian guy” he said, “or some of the other people that were in the lobby. I just don't think the tutorial masters would have set up an ambush. It just doesn't seem like them. Yeah, no, it just doesn’t feel like them.”

Aka nodded her head, having overheard everything. “I agree. So far they have been most honorable. Before every challenge there was always a warning and they have been honest with us so far. Whoever is in the fort is most likely not hostile as the quest said that it would be another three hours before the monster horde would attack and I don't think that there are enough people that could fit in the fort to be counted as a horde. Do you agree, Tony?” She asked as she glanced at me.

“Yeah,” I said. “I only see a few signatures, there's definitely not enough to be an entire horde of them. Still, I don't want to just rush in blindly.” Akari and Nick both nodded in agreement.

“I've definitely learned to be cautious,” Nick said. “I don't want to be killed for not taking it slow.” With that said, we headed into the valley. As we got closer to the fort, everyone could see movement on the fort’s walls though we were too far to make out what it was exactly. The first thing that I saw when we were close enough to make out details was Nikito’s crazy grin peeking over the walls.

He waved at us before cupping his hands around his mouth as he yelled at us. “There you are my comrades! I was getting worried about you all since it had been almost an hour since the last message. Thankfully it looks like you all made it here safely! Come on into the fort, we have much to discuss before the monster hordes get here!”

“Don’t mind if I do,” said Nick as he headed inside. Akari also followed him with me heading up the rear. The outside wasn’t much to look at to be honest, it was just the walls made up of roughly-cut trees and the gate was more of the same. The inside wasn’t very big and the three huts inside were just as rough looking as the ones from the beginning of the tutorial, though quite a bit bigger. Behind the wall was a walkway made-up of planks, creating a rampart that we could use when the monster hordes got there.

The stairs that led up to the rampart looked untrustworthy but Nikito came down the stairs seemingly without a care in the world. Following him was a woman with brown hair and bright green eyes along with a nervous looking man with glasses, red hair, and freckles. Nikito had a large shield on his left arm and an ax in his right, giving him the appearance of a crazy fearsome viking from days gone by. The woman had a large pistol and the man carried a large Machine gun. The large gun seemed incredibly out of place with the nervous looking boy but I didn’t say anything, the world was crazy enough as it was. A machine gun was honestly an asset since we’d probably have to face a large amount of monsters.

“Come comrades,” Nikito said with a grin. “The first rule of engagement with an unfamiliar ally is to communicate your strengths and weaknesses. We can use this hut over here to talk and make plans before the horde gets here.” With Nikito taking the lead, we all followed him inside. The inside of the house was stark, a large table with exactly 6 chairs set inside as the only decoration. Nikito paused once inside and then his ax and shield disappeared as he put them up into his inventory. I followed suit with my rifle and pistol vanishing as I sat down at the table. Once everyone was comfortable in a chair, Nikito started the impromptu meeting.

“So comrades, I spoke to most of you briefly at the beginning of the lobby but now it’s time for a more in-depth greeting. My name is Nickito, the class I chose is melee specialist and my ability is Charge, it lets me get in close by providing a boost of speed while forcing me to move in a straight line. My weapons are an axe, a shield, and a pistol.” He gestured towards the freckled kid on his left, “Go ahead then, introduce yourself.”

The kid startled as he was singled out. “Oh um, so I'm George and the class that I have is bastion. The ability I got was turret creation. All that means is that I can make a machine gun turret which anyone can use. I also got this shield that I can plant in the ground and expand to make a miniature wall with gun slots and this large machine gun that I can mount onto a tripod.” Nikito gave him a reassuring pat on the back and then looked at Akari.

She glanced around at the table before rising and giving a deep bow before introducing herself. “My name is Akari Tanako, firstborn daughter of Saburo Tanako. My class is raider which focuses on fast, precision strikes before getting out of trouble afterwards. My weapons are these two bladed gauntlets that I can throw the blades from and retract them back to me. As for my abilities, I have only one called fury of blows which lets me strike multiple times within a span of a few seconds though it does deplete my energy very quickly.” Recognizing that she was done, Nikito then nodded at me, prompting me to speak.

“My name is Tony Delgado, and my class is scout. As for my equipment I have thermal and night vision goggles along with a bolt-action rifle and pistol. My abilities aren't much though because I only got a reticle that helps me with my aim at longer range.”

“Don't worry my comrade,” Nikito said, “scouts are very important to any situation. Not only that but you appear to be able to strike out at very far distances which will be critical against these beasts. After all, both Akari and I classes aren’t very good until the beasts can fight back.”

Akari spoke up as well, “I know you don’t have any training so reticle must have really helped you out as you were able to support me back when I fought those two leopards. Don't dismiss your class because I believe that you will be critical to finishing the beasts before they get to us.” Among us all, I think Akari and Nikito were the most experienced at combat, so those two supporting me was a great relief. It settled some of the doubts I was having about myself. I mean, a rifle is great but when there's a machine gun or an assault rifle you just don't feel like firing one bullet is enough sometimes. Nikito pointed at Nick, causing him to smile.

“Well I don't mean to brag or anything,” Nick said with her impish grin. “But my class is skirmisher, a front liner meant to be up in the middle of everything while dealing some pain. I took an ability that helps me out when my guns overheat.” Nick paused as he noted the look of confusion on some of our faces, though I knew what he was talking about. “You do know that your guns can overheat right? Firing bullets takes energy instead of actual bullets, I think it's because you actually make the bullets which then requires energy or something like that. I'm not entirely sure. But anyways, if a gun fires for too long too fast the gun will overheat causing it to shut off until it cools down. I took an ability called venting that lets me put vents on my guns which lets it fire for longer and also recover from overheating faster. It only works on the guns I’m using though, otherwise I'd offer to put a vent on all of your guns. As for my weapons, I've got three grenades and an assault rifle, so I have a fair amount of firepower at my disposal.”

Everyone now looked at the quiet woman who refused to leave Nikito’s side. “Go on,'' he whispered quietly in encouragement. Taking a deep breath the woman started using sign language to talk to us. I wasn't sure how I was going to understand her but words started forming in my vision allowing me to see what she was trying to tell us, kind of like subtitles in a movie.

That was pretty amazing actually. I didn't know that the system did that though I looked around and wondered if the system was already translating things for us. It must've been already because I'm pretty sure that the Japanese woman would have been saying things in her own native tongue. Nikito I was sure was speaking Russian and I hadn't really questioned it to be honest but at least the system let us all talk together and understand each other. Shaking my head to clear my random thoughts, I read her words? Letters? I don't know what to call them I just know that this is what she said.

‘My name is Matilda and I chose to be a nurse no I mean doctor I mean medic. I have a small gun that shoots very fast and I have an ability that lets me heal and another ability that creates a shield above someone to protect them for a short time.’ As she was signing, Nikito was observing everyone else and whatever he was looking for didn't seem to appear because whenever she was done talking, or was it signing, Nikito stood up and addressed everyone.

“All right, I think it's best if we all go to the walls in order to see the situation first hand. As I'm sure you are all aware we have two hours and 52 minutes left as you can see from that timer in the lower right corner of your display. We need to come up with a game plan to face these monsters and because I was the greeter for the lobby I was also given some additional information about the test. These houses are what we need to protect. If the houses are destroyed then we will have lost the exercise but so long as one house remains we will have won. I also know roughly how long we have before the waves start along with the numbers and types of creatures the way for half.”

As he talked, Nikito made his way outside and up the ramparts, with everyone else following. “The first wave will have a hundred leopards, I'm sure you've all faced them before while getting your class. They are very fast, agile and most of all brutal, however these creatures are typically ambush creatures. They like to stalk their prey and not do a frontal assault on them, so I believe that we should be able to take them on easily so long as they don't get the drop on us. This fort will help out a lot with that because they'll be forced to come at us from only one direction. If we can get a chokepoint set up there in the front, then it will be a death zone for anyone to try to attack out in front.” I surveyed the land as he talked, easily envisioning the picture that Nikito was painting. Sheer cliff walls to both sides and behind us made it abundantly clear that no animal could easily clear the fifty-foot drop of rock walls that were almost complete verticals.

I honestly couldn’t have picked a better spot to set up a fort to defend from waves of enemies. Then again, this was the tutorial. It was supposed to be easy and so far it had been, once we were given the tools to defend ourselves. Animals simply couldn’t stand against modern firearms and technologically enhanced humans with skills. Nikito continued, interrupting my internal musings. “Now George, I know that you have a turret and that shield of yours. I think we need to put the shield in front of the gate to prop it up a little bit more because you said you could anchor it in the ground, correc?. George nodded as Nikito looked to him for confirmation. “Good, that should help us reinforce the gate, though the leopards can probably just leap right over it. I or Akari will use the turret that George will make and because everyone else already has a ranged weapon we're just going to try to kill whatever comes down the road.”

Seeing that everyone was nodding in agreement, Nikito continued on. “Nick, I'm going to need you to hold onto those grenades. If they start to get too close or if you see a group of them yell out the word grenade before throwing it. We don't want any surprises in the middle of this fight. Wave two is going to be fifty of those giant bears. I've already taken one on before and it was tough, just like all bears. I’m not too concerned about them though because they are very slow which will make them easy targets for long range attacks from the guns. What I'm really worried about is the last wave, all it tells me is that the third wave will have 1000 creatures and it does not tell me what kind of creatures they are. Has anyone faced any other type of creature than the bears or leopards?” Everyone shook their heads, causing Nikito to let out a groan. “That's what I was afraid of, we're going to have to go into this fight with almost no intelligence. Well, that's my plan at least for now. So will have everyone up there with a gun blasting away before those creatures can get close enough to maul us. If they do get close enough, Nick will chuck some grenades first and then if that isn't enough, Akari and I will engage in close combat outside of the fence while the rest of you stay up top here to protect us. Matilda, if it comes to close quarters then I need you to throw up a shield around us if it looks like we're gonna be in trouble. As for you Tony, I need you to try and take out the enemies on the edges. If we can drive them towards the middle of the canyon then it will be that much easier to kill them. Pick them off before they get into range of us and then try to finish off anything that's looking scary or wounded. Does anyone else have some suggestions?”

I was thoroughly impressed and I could tell everyone else was as well. Nikitio seemed to have everything in order with a clear-cut plan and ways for us to utilize our abilities while also trying to minimize the damage that would be done to us. It became pretty obvious who was in charge from that moment on, with his willingness to listen to us, his ability to take charge and plan definitely made him the leader that our group needed to keep us all together. Honestly, I was relieved that we had someone so competent. Knowing that over a hundred creatures would be attacking us was daunting but Nikito’s leadership was reassuring.

After a brief pause, Nikito nodded as he surveyed the landscape once more, seemingly reassuring himself of his plan. Turning to us, he flashed us a wide grin saying, “Since the planning is done, we need to take a break until the countdown finishes or we're going to be too tired and stressed to do any good. I'll stay out here for the moment and let you guys know if anything happens. For now, those two other huts have some beds “in there and I would recommend you guys get some shut eye or at the very least relax a little.

“You got it bro,” Nick responded. George just awkwardly shambled away towards one of the bedrooms while Matilda wrung her hands nervously as she watched everyone start to break up and go to different huts. I simply observed everyone not really sure what I wanted to do. I saw Matilda go after Nikito who was climbing the rampart after he grabbed a chair from the hut. Sitting down in the chair on the rampart, Nikito started humming the tune of a song I didn’t know. Matilda grabbed a chair and sat down next to him, not wanting to get too far away. I observe them for a few seconds, wondering what the story was between them, before heading into the hut on the far left.

Opening the door I saw three simple cots with George taking the one in the far side, his back turned to me as he fumbled with a pillow for a bit. I made my way to the middle cot, feeling the roughness of the cotton blanket. My skin itched from the touch but I could feel a weariness settle in as I sat down on the bed. I hadn’t realized how tired I was until I was finally given some time to relax. I futilely tried to get comfortable as the rough blanket dragged over my skin and something inside the pillow poked into my neck. I blinked a few times noting that my eyes were heavier and heavier. I still didn't seem physically fatigued and my body wasn’t sore. Yet I knew that I was falling asleep but it was so incredibly strange. The weariness wasn’t from my body but from my mind.

I laid there, looking up at the wooden logs of the hut as I slowly drifted off to sleep.