The group made it back to the road with the help of Spike and his nose, since it was still dark out but no one complained about it as they all just wanted to put the whole mess behind them. Terry didn’t even stop to decide which way to go, he turned left and started walking, the rest of the group following along. He led them for what he felt was a good distance away from the spot where they came out at. He stopped and looked around at where they were at. They were still in the middle of nowhere but there were deep ditches along the part of the road where they were at. He figured Spike and him would be able to watch out for anything, so he had the group go down into the ditch and try and get some sleep before the sun came back up.

He positioned himself on one end of the group and Spike on the other. They sat there and watched the group sleep as they kept an eye out for anything that might disturb them, but nothing came.

When the sun finally cracked the horizon, Spike got up and started to growl in the direction the group had come the night before. So, when Terry looked to see what he was growling about he was expecting to find Sam stumbling along trying to catch up to them. What he saw instead was a pair of women.

Standing up Terry moved up onto the road and down about fifty yards, so that they could see him before they got any further, so if they wanted to stop or turn back they could. Spike joined him as they waited for the pair to arrive.

“That’s far enough” He said when the two women got within ten yards of him. They stopped walking and looked at him. “If you’re just meaning to pass by, you’re welcome to it but if you try anything, you won’t like the outcome.”

They looked at each other and whispered something he couldn’t hear. Then the shorter of the two shouted back, “were you the one that took out that asshole with the long hair last night?”

Terry and Spike looked at each other then he looked back at them and said, “Yeah that was us.” He got ready to counter an attack or rush them but he saw them relax and exchange a few more words.

“We’d like to join your group, if you’d have us.”

He took a moment to think about it, then looked at Spike again and since he wasn’t growling he motioned for the women to come towards him.

The shorter one stepped forward eagerly while the taller one was a bit more hesitant but walked forward as well. They got to within ten feet of him and he could see they looked a bit worse for wear. Their clothes had multiple holes in them and they were dirty and he could even smell them from where he stood. Though he guessed he didn’t smell much better.

The shorter one he guessed as all of five feet with short dark brown hair and brown eyes, that looked like she just might be a bit crazy. The clothes they were wearing didn’t do much for their figures either but he could tell that she was most likely a member of the itty-bitty titty committee. Though with that along with her height he sure wasn’t going to say anything about it. The taller one on the other hand he guessed was about five-foot six with hair that hung down to her breasts in the front and was a dirty blonde color. She had gentle yet scared blue eyes that seemed to snap to every little noise around her. Her clothes were also loose fitting but she looked like the opposite of the other woman, in both height and chest area.

“So, what can I help you ladies with?”

They looked at each before the shorter one started, “We were in the cages that you and your people freed us from. We had been there for at least a week; they didn’t do anything to us except not give us enough food but they would take others and make them fight against some of those animals they had. We’re both fighters but we’ve been so weak that it didn’t really matter and the way you handled those guys back there we wanted to join you.”

“Well one of those people back there used to be part of our group and she betrayed us so you’ll have to excuse me if I don’t trust you right away.” At that they looked down trodden. “But… that doesn’t mean we won’t help you out, as long as you don’t betray us and help out where you can.”

They perked up at that, “you got it, we’ll work hard and fight with you and your group and even help take care of your puppy there.” The shorter one said and pointed at Spike.

“You might want to leave him alone, at least until he gets used to you…” He trailed off as Spike walked up to the women and sniffed them before rolling over and letting his tongue hang out.

The taller women bent over and rubbed his belly and scratched him. The shorter one looking up at Terry with a look.

“Traitor.” Terry mumbled under his breath. “Well anyways, I’m Terry.”

“I’m Edith.” The shorter woman said as she stuck out her hand. “And this is Jean” she pointed at the taller woman.

“Pleasure to meet you both. So, what classes did you get if you’re fighters?” He asked as he turned and started back to the group. Edith following him and Jean did as well but only after a few more belly scratches for Spike.

“I’m a fire elemental and Jean’s a wind elemental.”

He looked at them sideway, “elementals, really?”

“Yep! Though so far they are kind of limited but they’re still cool none the less.” Edith replied as she almost skipped along with Terry. “We didn’t get much time to level up before we got captured. What about you?”

“Oh, um… Look here’s the rest of the group.”

At that they got to the group who was just waking up. Izzy heard them coming and was already on her way up the bank to the road. “And this is Izzy. She’s like my second in command. Izzy this is Edith and Jean.”

“You sure it’s a good idea to take in more when we just had that issue with the other one?” Izzy asked as she crossed her arms over her chest and leaned to the side, like what are you thinking.

“No, not really but they seem a lot better than the other one already.”

Izzy looked both women up and down before scoffing and turning back around.

“I think that means she likes you. I suppose you guys are pretty hungry, huh?”

“Very, though we won’t be taking all your food, we just need a little to get our strength back.”

At that Tamara came over to them, “aye dat’s alright wit me, doe speakin of food, we’ll need ta stop and restock soon, we’re startin ta run low.”

He took out some food from his inventory and handed some to each of the women before moving off to find Izzy and plan out what they would do about the food situation.

“Hey Izzy, wait up.” He called after her as he jogged to catch up with her.

She turned toward him with a look that stopped him in his tracks.

“What?”

“What?! We just got rid of one backstabbing bitch and now you want to add two more people to the group?”

“I get what you’re saying, though I don’t believe they’re like Sam, plus Spike seems to like them and I’m trusting him on this one as well.”

“Spike likes them? But he licked Sam’s face the first morning, remember?”

“I suppose he did.” He put his hand on his chin and rubbed it as he thought about what to do. He also realized that he was starting to grow a bit of a beard. Shaking his head, “Look I think they’ll be good assets to the group as they both have combat classes and we both know that we could use a few more fighters.”

She bowed her head and nodded, “Yeah, you’re right. It just hurts being betrayed.”

“Oh, I know, but come on, if anyone was going to betray us, we both knew that it was going to be Sam.”

“That is true” she lifted her head and had a little grin on her face. “Plus, did you get a look at the one with the big tits? She looks tasty.”

He was shocked at what Izzy said at first but then thought about her and realized her and Tamara had gotten pretty close since they met. “Ha, that she is. Maybe you should take a run at her. You know, once you get over being betrayed.”

Slugging him on the shoulder she had a shameless smile on her face as she said, “Oh, I think I’m already over it.” And she moved off towards the two women and started chatting with Jean.

Well crap, there goes planning on getting more food. Looking around Terry spotted Tamara and Katar off to the side a way, so he made his way over to them.

“Hey guys, want to help me plan something to get more food?”

The two looked up at him as he made his way over.

“Um, sure. But doesn’t Izzy usually help ya out wit dat?” Tamara asked.

“She’s a little preoccupied.” He jerked his thumb over his shoulder at the trio of women.

He could see Tamara’s face scrunch up a bit before going back to normal. Hopefully they talked about something like this before hand, or maybe they’ll just have Jean join them. “Anyways, want to help?”

“It would be a pleasure to help plan out our next move.” Katar said and gently put his hand on Tamara’s shoulder. She jerked a bit but then came back to the little group.

“Oh, yeah. Let’s see what we got.”

Terry pulled out his map and laid it open for the three to checkout. “Okay, I think we’re about here” he pointed to where he believed they were. “I think the next place that would have enough food would probably be either here,” he pointed to a spot about a hundred miles North. “Or here,” he pointed to a spot a bit closer but off to the East off the highway a bit.

“It looks like they’re only about twenty miles apart. Maybe we could split up and search both places.”

“I don know, splittin’ up might not be da best.” She said and gestured around at the group. “We jus’ got outta one spot where dat didn’t work out.”

“I get what you’re saying but I think that now that we know about groups like that we should be able to handle things a bit better. We also have two more fighters to help out with things.”

She took a deep breath, “well what levels are they?”

“Um… I didn’t ask.” Terry had the decency to look sheepish.

“Hey Izzy.” Tamara shouted, “bring dem over here.”

Izzy turned from talking with Jean and motioned she had heard her. They spoke a moment before Izzy led the two women over to the trio. “Yeah, what’s up?”

“We were just talking and realized I didn’t ask them what levels they were.”

“Oh, well I’m a level nine.” Jean replied, looking embarrassed.

“I’m a level ten.” Edith exclaimed proudly.

“Wow, you guys are that high already?” Izzy asked and Edith puffed up her flat chest even more and glowed with pride.

“Yep. We would’ve been higher by now but we got captured. What about you guys?”

“I’m a level twelve.” Izzy said with a sidelong glance at Edith.

“level dirteen.” Tamara shrugged.

“I just reached level fourteen before the kidnapping disaster.” Katar said.

Terry quickly took a look at his messages and saw he had a few from before the incident. Opening them, they were:

Congratulations, you have reached level 19!

Congratulations, you have reached level 20!

Congratulations, you have reached level 21!

You have 24 unassigned Stat points and 9 unassigned ability points.

Closing out of his messages he came back to the group. “I’m currently a level 21. Probably should’ve looked at them before moving off to rescue you guys.”

“Eh, you did a good enough job.” Izzy ribbed him.

The rest of the group laughed at the joke.

“Anyways, we were talking about splitting up as there’s two spots that could have food up ahead.”

“Splitting up, is that really a good idea after the last time?” Izzy asked with a skeptical look on her face.

“Look, just because there was an incident doesn’t mean we should just stop doing what we’re doing. We still need to get stronger and we can’t do that by sticking together all the time.”

“I suppose you’re right. So, how are we going to split up?”

“Well there’s one spot about twenty miles from the other and a bit to the East, so I’m thinking having a small party go that way and the rest continue on to the other one. But, they’re both still about a hundred miles ahead of us.”

Izzy took the map and gave it a once over before nodding her head. “I agree that those are good spots but why only take a small group to the East one?”

“Well since it’s only twenty miles away from the other place, I thought a smaller group could make it there faster, maybe split off around here,” he pointed to the map, “then they could make their way there, as it would only take about six hours at a walk but if they jogged just under their stamina regen rate they could probably make it there in two, maybe less.”

“And then they could send a message to the others and they could turn about here and make their way over. But what if there’s food at both places? Then we would’ve just wasted time going over to that one.”

“Well what would you suggest then?”

“Why don’t we just go to the East one first and then we can turn and go to the other one. That way if there is food at the first place we can fill up there and if there isn’t we can make our way over to the other place. It’s not that much further anyways, right?”

“I think I have to agree with her. It does make more sense to do that than to split up. Plus, then we can still continue to hunt.”

Terry nodded his head, “Okay, I can agree with that as well. Next, now with two more people and Pope, we should think about splitting up into different teams for hunting.”

“Why would we do that?”

“Well, for one, the more people you have in a group the less experience each person gets. So, right now your group is splitting the experience five ways, add in one of them, and then it would be six ways.”

“Oh, that makes sense.”

“I’ll take Spike.”

“And me!” Edith almost shouted.

Terry sighed. “And her.”

“I call Jean.” Izzy said enthusiastically while raising her hand. “And Tamara.” She looked a bit sheepish as she added the other woman.

“Okay. I was thinking that Tabitha could go with Bradley and Susan, is that okay with you?” he turned to Katar.

“That will be fine. I will take Gantar and Pope.”

“Good. Two teams will go out in the morning, one to each side of the road and the other two will go out in the afternoon.”

The rest all nodded at that, even Edith and Jean.

“Now how about we get the rest of the group up and get to it. Who would like to go hunting first?”

“We’ll go opposite of you, at least.” Izzy commented. “That way one of us will be here most of the time.”

Terry looked to Katar. “How about you, when would you like to go?”

“We can stick with the afternoons, with you. Tabitha and the siblings can go in the morning.”

“Sounds like a plan, let’s get to it.”

They broke up and Katar and Tamara went to get the rest of the group while Izzy led Edith and Jean back over to the middle of the road to wait for the others.

Terry was just turning to head over when Susan approached him, looking nervous.

“Um, T…terry?”

“Yes, Susan?”

“C…could I have some more arrows?” she asked as she lowered her eyes and kicked something on the ground.

Terry chuckled, “of course you can. And you don’t have to be nervous about asking me.”

“I know, it’s just that you’re like the leader of this group and I’m, well I’m just me.”

He knelt down so he was eye level with her, “you’re not just you. You’re turning into an important part of this group.” He put his hand on her shoulder and smiled at her.

She smiled back but it was a nervous smile.

“Say, how’s it coming along with finding an animal companion?”

At the question her mood went from nervous to excited. “Oh, it’s great, there are so many animals out there and new ones too. I finally unlocked an ability that lets me have one but finding the right one is difficult.”

“Oh, why’s that?”

“Well it says that when I pick one we’ll bond and eventually be able to communicate through thoughts and it says to be careful what I pick as not all animals are friendly or loyal.”

“Hmm, that does make some sense. I’m sure you’ll find a great one.”

“Yeah, maybe one like Spike. How did you get him? One day he’s not there and the next he is?”

“Oh, well that first day we hunted we ran into some wolves that were eating something. After we finished the wolves off I checked the thing they were eating and found this sac thing in it and when I tried to put it in my inventory it said I couldn’t put living things in there. So, I took it and put it in my backpack. Then that night I found that the sac absorbed things, so I let it absorb a bunch of things and before I knew it, Spike was born. So, it might be helpful to always check your kills.”

She was wide eyed at the story and nodded as he ended it. “I’ll definitely start checking them better.”

He took out the arrows that he had and handed them to her. “Also, we’re going to be changing teams up a bit. You and Bradley will now be going with Tabitha to hunt, but still in the mornings.”

“That’s cool. I like her, she’s like my grandma.”

“Mine too.”

With that she turned away and went back to her brother and he saw her start chatting away, most likely about the team change. Looking around he noticed that everyone was up and moving about. “Okay, people, let’s get going.” He hollered and started walking down the road to their next destination.