It wasn’t Freya but a woman who looked similar to her. However, her body was weak and frail. She was also wearing the cute clothes that Luna made for her. She looked on to everyone with sadness because she knew she would be useless to them.

> ( npc-maker)

***** NPC 5 Lily *****

Base Attribute: Desert Fox ( Extremely Weak base stat given)

Stats:

- Physical Power: 10

- Physical Speed: 10

- Physical Defense: 5

- Magical Power: 0

- Magical Speed: 0

- Magical Defense: 0

Resistances:

- Heat Resistance LVL 2

Skills: none

Karma: -100

Loyalty: 100%

***** End *****

> ( npc-maker)

“ Welcome Lily.”

“ Yooo Lily!”

“ Lily is my new Bestie. Stardust go find a new bestie.”

“ …” Remi did a little hand wave.

“ I….. hi everyone…” said Lily.

“ You must be hungry! Let’s jog back to the camp and enjoy a nice meal,” said Luna as she took her hand.

“... I’m afraid I’m not capable of running or jogging,” said Lily.

“ Oh no worries, let’s walk there together, shall we?” beamed Luna as she held hands with her and walked back to the camp.

After the two of them left, Marla glared at Stardust, “ you aren’t planning to get rid of her right? I’m strong enough to protect all of us.”

Remi also readied her hidden needles.

> (npc-maker)

“ I’m glad that you girls care about her a lot. Even if Lily is completely useless, she is still a precious NPC. She still has the potential to grow stronger and even if she can never have a strong physical body, maybe she can be talented in magic. Unfortunately, all NPC’s created with only animal biomass won’t be able to gain magical abilities at creation.”

They got together around the fire while Luna served everyone cooked rabbit meat on wooden skewers. A joyous time to celebrate the creation of their newest companion although Lily was quite reserved and shy throughout the whole ordeal. Luna was eye-ing Lily as her new bestie as she would most likely play a supportive role in the group like her. Marla wanted to help her get a stronger body by working out with her. Remi was making fake ambush attacks on Lily to see if she would react to anything but Lily never reacted to her assassination attempts and it was being thwarted off by Marla.

All of a sudden, Lily fell to the ground coughing out blood violently. Her body was getting very hot and feverish. Luna who was sitting beside her quickly ran to help her stabilize herself.

Stardust immediately ran forward to sacrifice the food biomass to heal her. A soft glowing blue light fell upon her and she returned to normal.

Everyone was worried about her and Lily said, “ master Stardust, it’s best to let me die and remain as an NPC core. I’m only going to drag down the party with my weak and frail body that can easily get sick.”

“ You better not kill my new bestie! We have enough resources to take care of her!” shouted Luna.

“ Please Luna… understand my wishes,” begged Lily.

“ Yeah! I’m strong enough to protect all of you!” said Marla.

“ We should respect her wishes,” said Remi as she prepared her poisonous needles to kill her.

“ I agreed with Remi,” said Stardust. “ This is Lily’s way of helping us survive in this desert.”

“ NO!” screamed Luna as she shielded Lily from Remi and Stardust.

“ Master Stardust, if you think Lily will become a hindrance to the party then beat me in a 1v1 first before you can kill her,” challenged Marla.

“ Normally I wouldn’t mind if any NPCs required more help,” said Stardust. “ Because I’m not a little pussy who can’t handle hardship. But this is different… if Lily wants to remain an NPC core to not drag us down, we must respect her wishes.”

The 4 of them wouldn’t change their mind about it and so Lily had no choice but to continue living. Throughout the day, Lily would fall sick and required Stardust to keep wasting biomass to heal her. She felt extremely guilty about how she was causing a huge rift in the party.

When night fell, Luna was keeping guard of Lily by sleeping together with her. But Lily couldn’t sleep and sneak out. She took a poisonous knife and before she could slit her throat, Marla stopped her from the shadows, “ Lily, what are you doing. It doesn’t matter if you need more biomass to get healed by master Stardust. I can keep hunting more and more animals for you.”

“ It’s a waste Marla… please be smarter about it. I can be revived when we are more established,” argued Lily.

“ No… we are powerful enough to support you. Please don’t worry about anything,” hugged Marla.

Remi and Stardust were also watching the two of them from the dimly lit camp. They wouldn’t have stopped Lily from killing herself if she wanted to.

The very next day Marla asked, “ yooooo Stardust, I will gather enough biomass for you to make another NPC so we have another helper!”

“ Ohhh yes! Please make another NPC!” beamed Luna. “ I need more besties.”

“ What if this new girl becomes useless like Lily?” dared Remi. “ Are you two going to say that we need to support her as well?”

“ Of course we will,” said Marla. “ We still have an excess of pelts and food here you know. Although we have to keep moving around because I keep eradicating all the local wildlife around us.”

“ Yeah and we can help Lily become strong enough,” agreed Luna.

“ Fine, I will do my best to survive then,” said Lily. “ I’m going to become the biggest hindrance in this party and you are going to like it.”

“ Cool, I fully support that Lily,” said Stardust.

“ Tough it out new girl,” said Remi.

Since their current area was running out of wildlife, they had to move to a new area. Stardust gave Lily a piggyback ride and she responded in giggles and held herself close to her master. As the party ran their way into a fresh area filled with desert rabbits, foxes and mice. They were still in the weaker zone as it was quite enormous. Luna’s incredible backpacks helped them carry off all of their needed tools and rations. Since Marla was their strongest member, she was carrying the heaviest backpack.

They set up camp and Marla began ravishing all the weak animals. Luna was busy cooking up a delicious meal. Remi was sleeping because she would rather be awake during the full hours of the night. Stardust was given the responsibility to take care of Lily because she insisted and she kept falling dangerously ill and his healing was needed. She would have died many times if Stardust didn't bring her condition back to a normal state. Even though she had the attributes of the desert fox to survive in the desert and drank blood to hydrate herself, she was still suffering from heatstroke when the desert got too hot.

As the day came close to an end, Marla’s rampage proved successful. She collected enough biomass to create 3 new NPCs. 100kg of mice, 100 kg of rabbit, and 100kg of foxes. Female clothes and shoes were added to the 3 piles.

“ Yoooo Stardust, let’s welcome more allies!”

“ More besties! They better be in the support class type,” said Luna.

( Remi) >

“ I hope they don’t mind a useless NPC like me,” said Lily in sadness.

Stardust smiled at his party members. They are 5 members strong right now and will become 8 members strong!

> ( Stardust)

He created the next 3 female NPCs in quick succession.

***** NPC 6 Flare Queen *****

Base Attribute: Desert Mouse ( Weak base stat given)

Stats:

- Physical Power: 80

- Physical Speed: 80

- Physical Defense: 80

- Magical Power: 0

- Magical Speed: 0

- Magical Defense: 0

Resistances:

- Heat Resistance LVL 4

Skills: none

Karma: -10

Loyalty: 1%

***** End *****

***** NPC 7 Rainbow *****

Base Attribute: Desert Rabbit ( Very Strong base stat given)

Stats:

- Physical Power: 150

- Physical Speed: 190

- Physical Defense: 140

- Magical Power: 0

- Magical Speed: 0

- Magical Defense: 30

Resistances:

- Heat Resistance LVL 6

Skills: none

Karma: 98

Loyalty: 99%

***** End *****

***** NPC 8 Violet*****

Base Attribute: Desert Fox ( Strong base stat given)

Stats:

- Physical Power: 160

- Physical Speed: 180

- Physical Defense: 150

- Magical Power: 0

- Magical Speed: 0

- Magical Defense: 30

Resistances:

- Heat Resistance LVL 6

Skills: none

Karma: 12

Loyalty: 70%

***** End *****

The 3 new girls observed their surroundings and the current members were welcoming them into the party. They all had a similar look to the NPCs created before with the same base biomaterials. A nice tanned skin, black or brown long hair, moderately sized chest on all of them. And they were all beauties in their own right.

“ My name shall now be Queen,” declared Flare. “ I will be the new party leader amongst you all and I expect everyone to obey me.”

Another NPC had named herself just like how Luna did.

“ Thank you for giving me life,” bowed Rainbow. “ I will do my best to prove myself useful for you Master Stardust.”

“ Let’s survive this desert and get a better life for each other,” beamed Violet.

> ( npc-maker)

They taught and trained the new NPCs over the next several days.

Rainbow was the most eager of the 3 and became another excellent fighter-class. Marla was super happy to have someone that was a front-liner fighter like herself. Rainbow expressed great interest in mastering as many things as possible and quickly became besties with Luna. She was more doting than everyone and cared for Lily the greatest as she loves to take care of her. Rainbow was trying to do everything all at once and ended up burning out until Stardust healed her and forced her to take a break.

Violet was more of a ranged fighter and played a more flexible role in the group. She will do things that are needed even if it’s an unsavory job like wiping Lily’s ass clean after she takes a shit. She was a very logical person and dislikes people doing detrimental things. She disliked Queen and Stardust as well for trying to enable her. Violet also became bestie with Luna as she did a lot of supportive stuff alongside her like skinning animals, making clothes, etc. Remi liked Violet the most out of everyone.

Queen was the laziest NPC of the group. She only does the absolute bare minimum amount of work and always complained about their shitty desert lifestyle. She hated being created at the wrong time but she was too prideful to become an NPC core to avoid her harsh reality. Every work that needed to be done was considered beneath her. Everyone hated Queen for being a huge slacker except Stardust. She always loved to tell the party that she prefers doing highly civilized things like ruling a nation with her self-proclaimed talent.

Remi was walking together with Violet in private.

“ Violet, do you think it’s worth assassinating Lily and Queen to boost the party’s survival chances?” asked Remi.

“ While that seems very practical, it would drag down the morale of the party too much, plummeting our survival chances as Marla and Rainbow would hate you and not cooperate as well,” replied Violet.

“ Hmm I don’t mind being the scapegoat if the party’s survival chances increase,” said Remi.

“ I would agree with you but… Marla and Rainbow are two of our best fighters and they both love Lily too much. Even though those two hated Queen as well, they would demand Stardust to revive her to ensure that Lily doesn’t think about becoming an NPC core as well…. Now if only… our stupid master Stardust makes a firm decision to get rid of Queen, we wouldn’t have a waste a space in our party. He alone can make Marla and Rainbow accept turning Queen into an NPC core,” said Violet.

“ Hmmm… Stardust is quite firm in letting Queen live and do as she pleases,” sighed Remi.

“ ...we will have to support the slacker and the useless person,” smiled Violet.

Meanwhile, Stardust and Queen were also having a private chat.

“ It sucks that the others don’t understand me,” said Queen. “ I’m not born to do manual labor, I was born to rule a nation. My special talent is in making the best policies to increase the power of my nation. You understand me, right Stardust?”

“ Yes I do. However, in our current circumstances, you must do the best you can to help everyone survive to further your ambition,” said Stardust.

“ Nah it’s better to let the others do it because they are very good at it.”

“ Then how about this… you can help keep an inventory of everything? Isn’t paperwork a required duty for someone to rule over a nation? Although we don’t have any paper or pen right now for you to write on…”

“ Yes!” beamed Queen. “ That’s what I shall do! I will show these bitches the power of paperwork. Administrative duties are what will help us survive this desert shithole. I guess I will try figuring out how to write effectively with the things we have here. Damn, I want to live in a luxurious castle rather than live the shitty desert life with these barbarians.”

> ( Stardust)

At the camp, Marla, Luna, Lily, and Rainbow were gathered together.

Lily declared, “ I plan to marry Stardust. Does anyone here want to marry him?”

Everyone gave a surprised reaction to that.

“ I wouldn’t mind being married to him,” smiled Rainbow.

“ Yoooooo I will support you two!” cheered Marla. “ Master Stardust would happily take more than 1 wife.

“ LILY! I think you’re rushing into things, and you too Rainbow!” chastised Luna. “ Survival comes first and you can worry about love when we are properly established. Also just because he created us, doesn’t mean we have to love him in that kind of way.”

“ I will love him,” affirmed Lily.

“ Well I’m super loyal to Stardust and I would do anything for him,” giggled Rainbow.

Marla laughed, “ hahahahahaha you hear that Luna?”

“ My besties just need a proper re-education,” smirked Luna.

They were all enjoying having the girls talk with each other and kept on talking about many other things. Like things they would like to do when they live in a proper city. Especially how each one of them would enjoy taking a nice bath to become clean.

The next day, Stardust had gathered the entire party together for a meeting.

“ I want to explain to you all about our current strategies and goal in surviving in this desert. Let’s start with the desert areas. There are 3 distinct areas that we discovered so far. I named them Desert Area 0, Desert Area 1, and Desert Area 2.

Desert Area 0 is all sand with nothing around.

Desert Area 1 is where we are currently. It has desert shrubs, cactuses, cactus monsters, weak desert mice, desert rabbits, and desert foxes.

Desert Area 2 is the place with the bigger bugs, desert rats, desert rabbits, desert foxes with the powerful desert tigers. The cactus monster is also at least 3 times bigger there and a strange-looking desert ape animal. Also, be careful of the stampede of giant centipedes as they are poisonous and 1 bite is enough to kill you.

Our goal is to be able to survive in Desert Area 2 to collect better resources. There are more things in that area with more different types of plants and rocks that can surely be useful. That area seems to be wetter and the chances of finding an oasis or having rainfall are higher. We could possibly finally drink water instead of blood.

I wanted to try out the bone-shield idea with Freya to kill the tigers but discarded it after losing her due to my reckless greed. We can still try it but perhaps the 4 fighting members can work together with Marla to fight against the desert tigers. The poisonous needles are quite the one-hit kill after all.”

Violet suggested, “ Master Stardust I propose for everyone to vote on turning Queen into an NPC core.”

“ Shut up bitch!” retaliated Queen. “ You will be thanking me when we become a small village and I will be handling the administrative tasks to ensure proper allocation of resources! So we don’t have an overproduction of 1 thing and an underproduction of another. Also, I’m quite sure I can make even more beneficial policies to help us thrive.”

“ That’s nice to know,” said Violet. “ Your administrative paperwork isn’t needed right now. Become an NPC core so we can revive you when the time is right for your talent.”

Queen charged at Violet with her fist, only to be held back by Marla.

Stardust was calming them down, “ Now now girls. Queen doesn’t want to become an NPC core, we should just let her be.”

“ If anything… it should be Lily that should be turned into an NPC core!” shouted Queen.

> ( Stardust)

The group devolved into arguments. Violet and Remi both wanted Queen to become an NPC core and they secretly wanted Lily to do so as well. Violet was doing it for practical reasons while Remi truly believed that Lily wanted to become an NPC core but her allies kept stopping her.

Lily was perfectly quiet in their heated discussion then she finally shouted out, “ ENOUGH EVERYONE!” that everyone became quiet again. “ I will gladly become an NPC core… at least Queen will be useful in the future and she can still do the bare minimum amount of work without being a resource drain like myself.”

Marla, Lily, and Rainbow rushed in to persuade her to live instead and were protecting Lily from the group.

Remi and Violet had Stardust’s back as they knew he would most likely respect Lily's decision and hopefully force everyone to listen to Lily. Even if Queen gets to live on, her resource usage was negligible, and they would at least get rid of the useless drain on the party.

Queen was hiding behind’s Stardust back as she knew he would protect her regardless of Violet and Remi’s intentions.

> ( Stardust)

“ I’m sorry Lily, but I want you to live,” said Stardust.

“ Master Stardust!” shouted Violet, “ If you want the party to survive in Desert Area 2. Then we can’t let Lily drag us down!”

“ I see… then I will live,” said Lily as her protectors let her walk towards Stardust for a hug.

“ Lily I was only doing this to help you but if you truly wanted to live then… I will support it ” said Remi.

Since everyone pretty much accepted Lily’s existence, Violet changed her mind instantly, “ alright we are taking care of Lily.”

Violet knew that it was pointless to force the issue as the damage to the party’s morale could be greater than supporting Lily. Violet was a rational girl, after all, she will do things that make the most sense in any situation, accounting for the emotional states of the others. She wanted to turn Queen into an NPC core but seeing that she wanted to do administrative tasks rather than slack off, she recalculated her worth and determined that it was beneficial enough for the group.

( Violet) >

The meeting began envied with a new determination. The morale of the party had greatly improved to new levels. Everyone saw Queen in a new light when she wanted to help do administrative tasks and were okay with her doing barely any manual tasks.

Stardust shared with them, all of his deadly encounters in Desert Area 2. With his knowledge and experiences, they all worked together as they crafted the perfect plan to survive Desert Area 2.

The party was 8 members strong.

The 4 fighter types and front-liners were Marla and Rainbow as the vanguard. Violet and Remi as the rearguard.

The 4 support types and back liners were Stardust, Luna, Queen, and Lily.

Stardust wanted to fight as a frontliner but they all argued that their healer had to stay safe and he had the power to create more NPCs and it was risky to lose him. And he was needed to heal the weak Lily and had to give her piggyback rides as they ran through the area.

Remi had the [ Crafting lvl 4] skill and was their group’s best weapon maker so she created everyone’s weapon. She also improved upon the bows to give them more power.

But before they all rushed into Desert Area 2. The 4 fighter types would be venturing in there first to see if they have what it takes to defeat their new enemies, while the rest stays in Desert Area 1.

They all rested their bodies for the night as tomorrow will be the day when the advance party will embark on their journey.

The offensive skills that the 4 fighters have are,

Vanguards,

Marla

- [ Fighter LVL 6]

- [ Melee Weapon Mastery LVL 5]

- [ Weapon Throw LVL 5]

- [ Focus LVL 4]

Rainbow

- [ Fighter LVL 2]

- [ Melee Weapon Mastery LVL 2]

- [ Weapon Throw LVL 2]

- [ Needle Shoot LVL 1]

- [ Basic Archery LVL 1]

- [ Focus LVL 1]

- [ Ambush LVL 1]

- [ Stealth LVL 1]

- [ Critical Strike LVL 1]

- [ Logical Reasoning Lvl 1]

Rearguards,

Remi

- [ Needle Shoot LVL 7]

- [ Ambush LVL 5]

- [ Focus LVL 3]

- [ Stealth LVL 2]

- [ Fighter LVL 1]

- [ Critical Strike LVL 1]

Violet

- [ Focus LVL 5]

- [ Needle Shoot LVL 4]

- [ Basic Archery LVL 4]

- [ Fighter LVL 2]

- [ Logical Reasoning Lvl 2]

[ Fighter] gives a boost to your fighting ability whether you use punches and kicks or melee weapons. The higher its level, the better you will become at fighting.

[ Focus] allows you to react faster and have less wasted movements.

[ Logical Reasoning Lvl 2] not an offensive skill but can be used to understand your opponent’s skills and tactics.

( Author’s note: All the skills should be pretty self-explanatory.)

Rainbow's offensive skills levels are low because she wanted to learn all the other non-offensive skills. She truly believed that she could master every single skill available. Everyone except Stardust gave her the advice to specialize in something as she could be wasting her potential but she refuses to! Only Stardust was perfectly okay with her trying to get as many LVL 1 skills as possible. Since Queen might somehow get skills relating to administration work... you can bet that Rainbow would love to learn those as well.