章 20: Chapter 20 - Returning Home

All around Luke and I were the bodies of goblins, some with their neck pierced others with stab wounds in their chest. I plop down on the ground, exhausted from the battle while Luke leans against a tree.

"Luke, we did it. Good job!"

I look at Luke as congratulate him on the victory but he looks back at me and shakes his head.

"I'll talk to you in the morning. I'm going to rest here."

Luke slides his back down the tree and closes his eye once he is on the ground. I pick myself up and walk towards him sitting down next to Luke and closing my eyes as well. A wave of fatigue hits my body and the last thing I see is the silver moon in the sky before darkness.

I hear someone talking to me and feel my body shaking. I open my eyes to see Oscar. He had tears in his eyes and was desperately calling my name.

"Oscar...You are ok."

I had made Oscar stay at the encampment while Luke and I executed the plan. He was there to kill off any stray goblins as well as running back to the rest in case another group of goblins had split from the hobgoblin and attacked us. Looking at his body it seemed like he had encountered some goblins too. There were scratches and green blood splattered across his body and his wooden chest plate was missing.

"Ian are you ok? How is Luke? What happened here? What do we do now?"

Oscar bombards me with a series of questions but my head felt like a mess right now.

"Oscar, Oscar please can you quiet down for a bit. I'll answer your questions in a bit let me rest up."

I noticed the moon had barely moved since I last saw it before I collapsed from exhaustion which meant that Oscar had found me quite recently.

"No, no, no what if there are more monsters? We need to get out of here as soon as possible."

I had just realized what Oscar said was very reasonable. There was a chance that other monsters would appear. I slowly pull myself up with the help of Oscar and woke Luke up afterward. Luke's sleepy and exhausted face tried to fight the movement from the two of us but eventually, he calmed down. With Luke on his left and me on his right, Oscar held the two of us up while he slowly walked away from the scene of battle.

I don't know how long we were walking but it felt relaxing. The forest even though dark and mysterious had become more peaceful.

Oscar led us back to the rest of our people. I could hear Howard's loud voice as he runs towards us helping carry Luke, while I see Owen and Robin asking Oscar if he was ok. I sit down next to the gate and closed my eyes listening to the constant chatting between people as they ask about the goblins and our safety.

"Good job lad."

I barely open my eyes to see old man Hus next to me. He placed his hand on my shoulder and looked at me nodding his head slightly. I couldn't find the words to reply to him and only nodded my head back. I can feel the warmth from everyone around me and I smile looking at the scene. I lean my head back against the wall and fell asleep, this time I was undisturbed until I woke up naturally.

I woke up inside the mud house with Luke and Oscar next to me, the two of them still sleeping soundly. I get up slowly and walk outside I see the sun reaching the peak of the sky while the log-out message had just appeared. I go to sit down on a rock next to the fire and looked around me. I can see Robin and old man Hus making arrows, Lucina holding a basket woven from vines and leaves walking towards the forest, Howard and David standing near the gate looking ready to pounce on even the smallest threat. It feels like one whole big happy family and at that moment I thought of a name for this place but since the game was shutting down I decided to tell them next time I log back in.

...............…..

I open my eyes to my familiar ceiling and take off the VR helmet. I stretch my body more than normal since I felt a little more stiff and sore. Even though there is no damage on my body from the game I could still feel the places that got hit by goblins. After stretching I go on my morning jog. After a week of jogging around my block, I find myself less tired and out of breath by the time I was home. I have a quick breakfast of eggs and sausages go on my computer ready to see the posts on the forums. Instantly I am greeted by Elves_or_Nothin's red post.

"Second Event was HECTIC!" - Elves_or_Nothin

HELLO MY BEAUTIFUL ELF-LOVING FANS. It is I Elves_or_Nothin and in this post I will be talking about the second event. To give a rough recount of what has happened before the event. I was attacked by wolves in the first event and survived. Found a next place to settle down in the middle of the forest. Set up some simple forms of shelter and gathered food and water. My people made lots of traps through the immediate surroundings to catch food and deal with large predators but then the second event came. We were again attacked by wolves but this time they were accompanied by more kobolds. Now, these guys were scary! They had bows, spears and axes while my people were still using simple sticks and stones but luckily we were able to defend against them and the kobolds retreated. GO ME! The 'hunter' NPC suggested we chase them and obviously I accepted that proposal. We chased after them until we found their encampment. There were so many kobolds but the scariest one was this kobold with a hood over its head and a big staff. IT WAS A MAGE KOBOLD! Players we have confirmed MAGIC IS REAL! It chucked a big fireball towards us and all of us dodged it by the skin of our teeth. There was so much fighting but once again your boy survives and kills the kobold mage. However, after the battle, my people and I were very tired so we retreated back to our camp and rested before returning to the encampment the next morning. We got a TON of loot too. Some armor and basic weapons and wolf teeth but the best one was the staff.

[ Kobold Staff

Magic Attack: 5

Intellegence: 5

Mana Regenertation: 1 MP every 30 minutes

Skill: Fireball (Active) 5 MP

A wooden staff imbuded with a lesser fire spirit ]

THIS STAFF IS CRAZY!!!!!! After looting it was the end of the game. Most likely when we log back into the game there will be some sort of leaderboard hopefully, I am still in the top 10!

I read Elves_or_Nothin's post as well as a couple of others recounting about their event. I found out that most people only survived the event rather than destroy the encampment since destroying the encampment meant killing a boss-level monster. The loot Elves_or_Nothin received from the kobold mage made me curious about what my loot would be and I was excited for the rest of the day anticipating my return to the game.