The next morning Terry got the group up and moving just as the sun was starting to come up. He told them they could eat while walking so they could get started a bit earlier, even though Sam complained for almost twenty minutes after leaving the house about not having enough time to “wake up.”

The day was already starting to warm up even though the sun had barely gotten above the horizon though the only one to complain about that too was Sam. Off to their left in a field he saw a pack of six giant rat like creatures scampering along about a hundred yards from them. Indicating them to Izzy, he had her and Tamara go and take care of them while the others continued on at a slow pace.

The two women made quick work of the rats and soon joined the group again. He told them to go out and take care of any groups of monsters they saw and he would try and keep an eye out on them, in case they needed any help. He also had Bradley and Susan go with them after they saw what the women were doing and asked him if they could join in on the hunts.

So, the day went, the majority of the group walking while Izzy, Tamara, Susan and Bradley went off and took care of any groups of creatures they could find. The rest of the group weren’t too interested in leveling up or they didn’t have combat classes. Gantar and Tabitha were still busy chatting away and Katar walked beside Terry, keeping his head on a swivel.

It seemed to be early afternoon and the sun was on its way down to the horizon when Izzy and the others came back to the group.

“Having fun?” Terry asked as Izzy caught up to him and Katar.

“Yeah, man what a blast. I can’t believe this is what our life is like now. I really don’t actually miss the old world.”

“Ya, dis sure is fun.” Tamara chimed in as she was wiping her daggers off on a piece of cloth. “Dare’s a lot of creatures out beyond da trees and so we thought you and some of da others might like ta take a turn at hunting.”

“I was actually just thinking about that myself.” He turned to Katar and spoke to him. “You want to go out hunting for a while?”

“It would be nice to practice my skills and swordsmanship.”

“Can we come as well?” Gantar shouted as he ran forward and busted through the others, Tabitha following behind him but at a slower pace.

Katar looked back at the group of elves and motioned to them, the other man nodded. “Yes, that would be good. You could use the practice as well.”

Terry looked at them, “which reminds me, what class did you get Gantar?”

“I got Wind Walker!” he said excitedly as he jumped from foot to foot and danced around the small group. “It’s pretty cool. I can run faster than I used to and I even got a wind blade.”

“Wow that does sound cool. Maybe once you level up some you could fly.”

“You really think so?”

“I don’t see why not. And Wind walking is basically flying, right.”

The look on Gantar’s face was pure joy when he heard he might be able to fly. “Come on father, let’s get going.”

Gantar turned and started to rush off but Katar casually reached out and grabbed the back of his shirt stopping him in his tracks. “You know you mustn’t rush off like that. We will go when we have prepared and are in a group. I would hate to lose you as well my son.”

With a look of sadness Gantar turned back around and faced his father and Terry. “I’m sorry, I will learn from this experience and do better in the future.” Just after that his face lit back up and he asked “so then when can we go?”

Katar looked at Terry. Terry in turned looked at Izzy. “Think you can keep them on the road while we go hunt?”

“Ha, of course! Just don’t get lost.”

“I won’t.” he laughed at her joke and then turned to leave but then stopped and turned back. “Tabitha, would you like to join us? I know you’re a higher level but you’re welcome to if you’d like.”

She looked shocked but it soon faded away and she smiled and nodded. “Of course, I would love to join you.” With that she started to glow slightly and then shifted to her combat form.

Terry and the others took off after that and went into the woods in search of their first kill. He left his skeletons back with the larger group and told them to listen to Izzy if anything should happen while he was gone.

It didn’t take the four of them long to find a group of creatures. There were six of them circled around something on the ground. They looked like a wolf with the quills of a porcupine. Terry motioned for the others to stop and they watched as the wolfupines, as they seemed to be called from his inspection, dug around on the ground and snapped at each other. He could see something being eaten but couldn’t quite see what it was.

Terry pointed at Katar and Gantar and motioned for them to come up on the wolfupines’ right while he and Tabitha would circle around to their left. They were downwind from the creatures so they started circling around quietly. Within thirty seconds they were in position and Terry moved as close to the beasts as he could before jumping out from behind a tree and rushing towards them.

He had his sword up and ran to the nearest one and swung down cutting into its hind quarters with Tabitha right behind him and Katar and Gantar coming in from the other side. The wounded creature turned towards Terry and snapped at him but he got his sword up in front of him to block the attack and then kicked the beast in its chest knocking it back. He cast leechlife on the wounded beast and turned just in time to side step another one that lunged at him.

He cast firebolt at the new one and knocked it back. Looking around he saw each of the elves had one while Tabitha and he had two. The wounded one limped toward him and tried to snap at him again but there was little power behind it so he was able to side step that as well and then plunge his sword into its back and spear it to the ground. The other one he was fighting took the opportunity to rush him while his sword was still in the dead one.

He tried to pull his sword out put it wouldn’t budge so he released it and shoulder checked the incoming beast, knocking it on its ass. Not knowing if it would work he held out both hands and thought about casting firebolt from one and lightning bolt from the other. He felt a bit of pressure push against his mind but it soon let up and each spell flew from his hand and hit the target. The creature was taking burn damage and was stunned so he took aim again and duel cast once more, pushing the beast back further.

Now that he had a little more room he cast leech life on it and then cast duel firebolts, which actually formed into one bigger firebolt and smacked into the beast. It was covered in flames and he could smell hair burning as it howled, turned and tried to run but it only got a few steps before it slowed to a walk and then fell down, dead.

Looking around at the others he saw that both the elves had already dispatched their and were looting them. He looked over at Tabitha and saw her swing her arms in a downward stroke and smack the beast on the back. He heard a loud snap as her fists connected and the beast crumpled to the ground but it was still alive. She then put her foot on its head and was just about to stomp down on it.

“Wait.”

She looked at him and took her foot off. “Oh, I suppose you want to use it?”

“Yeah, if you don’t mind.”

She nodded and walked over to where the beast with his sword was and yanked it out. Walking back to the wounded beast she stabbed it through the heart and it quickly died. She left the sword in it before looting it and walking over to the other one she killed.

Terry looted his two wolfupines and got his sword back before going around and collecting the bodies, even the burnt one. He looked around the little clearing and saw the mass that they had been eating and walked over to it. It used to be an animal but he couldn’t identify it as it was chewed on too badly.

“Are you coming? Let’s go find the next group.” Gantar said and rushed off, followed by Katar and Tabitha.

He turned to move away with them but something stopped him. He turned back to the mass of meat and put his hand on it to put it in his inventory but he got a message:

You can’t put living things in the inventory

He read the message and looked at the mass again. It was clearly dead but the belly was large and barely chewed on. No, it couldn’t be, could it? He thought to himself as he knelt down and took out his sword and sliced open the belly. The meat easily split and he pulled apart the flaps and looked into the thing’s belly. There he saw a sac, he reached into the belly and gently pulled it out, little by little, before it popped out. He looked down at it, it was roughly oval shaped, opaque and about the size of a medium watermelon. It was still sticky and bloody from the innards of the mother, but he didn’t mind. What am I going to do with this? He thought as he looked around. Almost forgetting he had been wearing his backpack this whole time, he took it off and gently put the sac inside it. Zipping it up he put it back on and took off after the others.

“What took you so long?” Tabitha asked as Terry caught up to them.

“Uh, just had to take care of something. So, find another group yet?”

She looked at him briefly before replying, “No, nothing yet.”

They spent the rest of the day finding group after group of creatures and taking them out. Most weren’t too much of a challenge though there was one group that got a lucky shot in and almost took Gantar out, but he was able to use his superior speed to dodge the attack and Katar was there in an instant to take the offending creature out.

The sun was just above the horizon and sinking quickly when the four of them finally made it back to the group. They had a bit more to go before they would make it to a presumed spot where they could camp for the night.

“Fun wasn’t it?” Izzy said as Terry made it to the front.

“That it was.” He chuckled.

“You level up at all?”

“I’m not sure.” He said and got that far off look in his eyes as he pulled up his messages.

Congratulations, you have reached level 17!

Congratulations, you have reached level 18!

You have 16 unassigned stat points and 6 unassigned ability points.

Coming back, he said, “yeah I leveled up twice.”

“Nice, you guys must have found more than we did, I only leveled up once.”

“Well, if we keep doing this as we travel we should be able to get leveled up fairly quickly.”

As they walked he brought up his status and threw five points into constitution and strength and six into agility. Next, he brought up his abilities screen and looked at them trying to decide which ones he wanted to level up first. They each had good benefits as max level but he wasn’t sure which ones would be the best. After a few minutes of going back and forth he finally decided to put three points into Summon Bone Weapon and Leech Life, to max them out.

Closing out of his HUD, he looked around and saw that the sun was just almost completely behind the horizon. “You think we’ll make it to the spot before it becomes totally dark?”

“Yeah, we should it’s just up there.” She pointed up the road and sure enough there was the rest stop about three hundred yards away.

They made it to the rest just as the sun faded. It was like all the other rest stops they’d seen in their days. The building was brown brick with a foyer in front with some vending machines and pamphlets. Outside there was a little park area with a few trees and picnic tables and grills thrown about. He made his way into the building with Izzy and they checked the bathrooms, Izzy taking the women’s while he took the men’s. It was all quiet in the building, just the way he liked it.

The rest of the group followed in after they had gotten the all clear and of course Sam was the first one through the door and rushed into the women’s bathroom. Some of the elven women watched her go in and looked at each other before turning to Katar and asking him what that was about. He in turn asked Terry what was up with her and Terry explained, that those rooms were for doing your business in a semi private place.

“Hey, Izzy, want to take the ladies in and try and show them the restroom?”

“Yeah, sure. I doubt little miss princess would be of much help.” Izzy responded and motioned for the elven women to follow her in.

Terry had a couple of the other guys stand watch while he took the elf men in and showed them the restroom. After seeing the place Katar said they had had something similar where he was from, though it wasn’t as nice. Terry had to explain at that, that the rest stop bathroom wasn’t all that nice, though after thinking about it, it was definitely the nicest they’d seen since this whole thing started.

After they all got done, Terry went back out and let the other guys go and have a turn. There was even running water and they were able to wash up a bit, which felt really good after not having been able to do it for a while. He stood at the windows with his skeletons positioned around the foyer and doors and just watched the darkness. It felt like a totally different kind of darkness than before the Clarity happened. It felt more primal and dangerous. He was growing to love the feeling of it.

Izzy and the others came out after a while and she joined him and looked out into the darkness. “It’s different looking out there now, isn’t it?”

He just nodded.

“I’m glad there was some running water left, though Sam decided to stripe down and take a bath. It’s amazing how shame goes right out the window in the apocalypse.”

“Yeah, though I felt like doing the same.” Terry chuckled.

“Same, though we at least earned it. She hasn’t done anything but complain and whine, while we’ve been fighting monsters to help protect her bitch ass.”

“Yeah, but once she realizes that she’s weak she might change her attitude.”

“Ha, I doubt it. She seems the type to find someone stronger to protect her. And knowing her she would pick the biggest asshole she could find.”

Terry laughed at that, “Gee, thanks.”

Izzy looked at him and then it dawned on her what she had just said and she got embarrassed. “Ah, sorry, but you know what I meant.”

“I do and to be honest I’ll just be glad to get rid of her so she can be someone else’s problem.”

Izzy nodded at that, “I agree.”

The two of them jumped as they heard glass shatter and they spun around, drawing their weapons as they did before realizing that a couple of the guys had broken the glass on the vending machines to get at the stuff inside. A couple of the other guys were at the drink machines trying to pry them open.

“Geez. I guess that’s one bad thing about the apocalypse is that it makes you jumpy.” Izzy said as she sheathed her weapon.

“No kidding.” He sheathed his sword as well and turned back to the window and the darkness. “You should try and get some rest; it was a pretty active day today and we’ll want to be rested if we plan on continuing to hunt while we walk.”

“Yeah, you’re right. You going to go out and summon another skeleton?” She asked as she indicated the four remaining ones.

“Yeah I will but not until everyone else is asleep.”

She nodded at that and then made her way over to Tamara and the kids. Terry continued to look out into the darkness as he heard a screech some distance off. Turning back to the group he could just make out their figures and could see that most of them were already sleeping. Katar, Gantar and Tabitha were about the only ones who were still awake.

Katar walked up to Terry and stood beside him as they mulled over their thoughts. They stood there in silence a while as before Terry knew it, he couldn’t hear the whispered voices of Gantar and Tabitha.

“I will keep watch.” Katar whispered.

“Thanks, I’ll try and be quick.”

Katar nodded and Terry slinked over to the nearest door and quietly opened it before slipping out into the darkness. Turning to his left he made his way around the building and back to the park area. There was just enough moonlight for him to see around. He quickly took out a human body and dumped it on the ground. He targeted it but before he casted his ability he stopped, why not try a different skeleton?

Taking out one of the wolfupines body’s he dumped it on the ground and targeted it and cast his level two ability. The body spasmed and then stood up and started shaking like a dog does after they get out of water. Except that this dog just kept shaking and shaking and it seemed to get more violent as it went until finally the skin and meat flung off and revealed the bone white skeleton.

The whole process took less than two seconds but it seemed really brutal compared to the human process. He was also covered him blood and gore again but he now had a skeleton dog. Though in addition to the dog part it had the quills of a porcupine on its back and it was interesting to see them just kind of hanging there with no skin.

Wiping off what he could of the gore he put the human body back into his inventory and dumped out five kobold bodies. He dispelled his armor and then cast summon bone armor on one of the bodies and got it back. He then cast summon bone weapon on another one and got a new sword, while he cast it again and got a pair of daggers. Finally casting bone weapon on the last two to get some more arrows for Susan.

After he was done casting he picked up the piles of flesh and stored them. He was just about to turn and go back into the building when he remembered the sac he had gotten. Pulling his backpack off and setting it on the ground he opened it up and pulled the thing out. Setting it on the ground he looked at it. He still couldn’t see what was in it but in the darkness it seemed to almost pulse.

On a whim he pulled out one of the piles of human flesh and dumped it on the ground. Then he took the sac and placed it in the pile. After a few seconds the pile began to get smaller and smaller until it was all gone. After the pile was gone the sac seemed to pulse just a bit brighter. Taking out another pile he did the same thing and again the sac absorbed the pile right before his eyes.

Repeating the process, he used up all of the human piles of flesh that he had. After it absorbed the last pile it was now giving off quite a bit of dark red light. He figured he had come this far, why try and go all the way, so he started pulling out the kobold piles of flesh and setting the sac in them. After it absorbed the last kobold pile it was pulsing fairly fast and giving off a bright enough light that he could see about ten yards away. He looked around not really wanting to use the rancid piles and saw the shreds of flesh from the wolfupines skeleton and thought why not try.

He set the sac down on the ground where he could find the most shreds and watched as it slowly absorbed the shreds and blood from the area. Once it was done, the pulsing was almost constant and as he watched as it suddenly got a crack. That crack split into more cracks and before he knew it the whole sac was shattered. What he saw in its place took him a moment to comprehend, since the area had suddenly been plunged back into darkness.

Once his eyes readjusted he looked at the creature before him. It looked at him, their eyes locking and he could feel a connection with it. He could feel what it wanted and that it was at least semi intelligent. After a moment the connection was broken but he could still faintly feel it in the back of his mind. The creature moved closer to him and brushed up against his leg, like a cat would. He reached down and stroked it, feeling the leathery skin of a kobold but also small quills and fur like the wolfupine. It almost came up to his knee and was about two feet long with a tail.

After petting it for a bit he could feel that it was hungry so he pulled out some food from his inventory and held it out for it. It sniffed the offered food but then snorted and shook its head. Through the connection he knew that’s not the food it wanted. Putting it back he looked through his inventory to see what else he had that it might eat. He didn’t have anything in his normal inventory so he looked in his special one. He saw the bodies and thought maybe since it had absorbed the piles of flesh it would need meat. Though he didn’t have as many human bodies so he pulled out a kobold one and dumped it on the ground. The thing went up to it and sniffed it before chomping into it. It took the thing less than thirty seconds to devour the kobold and then it looked up at him, wanting another.

After dumping out four more kobold bodies the thing was finally satisfied and he led the thing back to the door and the building. He opened the door and let the creature go in first while he followed it in. He heard a growl soon after and looked up to see the creature with its quills up growling at Katar.

“No.” He said and tried to impress that Katar wasn’t an enemy.

It took the creature a few seconds to settle down and Terry went up to it and stroked its back. “Sorry about that it’s new.”

“I can see that. Interesting creature it is.” Katar said as his hand slid off his sword handle.

Turning back to the creature Terry impressed upon it that everyone in the building was friendly and that it shouldn’t hurt any of them. The creature sniffed and snorted as it walked back and forth in the front of the foyer. It came to rest by Terry’s feet and laid down before finally falling asleep.

“Where did you get such a creature?”

“The first group of beasts we came across was eating its mother. After we dispatched them I went to put the carcass in my inventory when it said I can’t put living things in there. After opening it up I found an egg like sac and put it in my backpack. Then tonight after I finished my summoning’s I put the sac into a pile of flesh and it absorbed it. After it had absorbed everything I had the sac cracked and out popped this thing.” He indicated the creature at his feet. “Then we made a connection and I fed it.”

“Hmm, interesting. It must have imprinted on you. A lot of new born animals do that with the first thing they see.”

“Ah, I’ve heard of that but never seen it.”

Katar nodded as he squatted down and looked at the creature. “It will be interesting to see what it grows into.”

Terry nodded and wondered as well. “You go ahead and get some sleep; I’ll watch the rest of the night.”

“Are you sure?”

“Yeah, I’m good.”

Katar stood up and nodded before heading over to his son and the other elves. Terry turned back to the windows and his eyes swept back and forth looking for any signs of trouble. The weight of the creature pressing against his foot.