Cast Out (Book 1 Done; Book 2 In-Progress)

Chapter 2

In a forest outside of a city, 3 people stood around the decomposing body of an ogre. They were all bent over with fatigue, the fight had almost killed them. What was infuriating though was the fact that they'd finally made it to the center of the forest, but this last battle had took everything they had. All their potions had been used, their best skills were now on their long cooldowns, and all of their mana and stamina had been depleted.

They all knew what this meant. They had to turn back.

One of the people finally caught his breath, and straightened. "Alright, that's it! We're switching to plan B."

Turning around, he started walking in the direction of the city. The 2 people that were with him gave each other a look, and followed him back.

The woman in leather armor scouted ahead to make sure that they wouldn't run into any more monsters, since she was able to [sneak] along and not get caught. Every now and then she would run into a monster, and she would have to double back to her party which followed her path, and they would make sure to give the creature a wide berth. It wasn't something that was easy to do, but it was something that got easier as they came closer to the edge of the forest. The farther away you were from the center of the forest, the weaker the monsters were.

When they finally emerged from the forest onto the grassy fields, the man in armor strode past them and led the way back towards the city from there.

With a hesitant look on her face, the woman in leather called out to the man in armor over their [party chat].

"Hey Zhang, are we really going to do this?"

Zhang stopped and turned his head to look at her. His cold steel glinted in the sun, and his helmet covered his cold, intimidating gaze. "Of course we're going to do this! Why the hell wouldn't we, Alexa?"

The rogue shivered on the inside. This might have been a game, but that didn't mean much when everything was so real. Even though pain was limited to only 40% of what you'd feel in real life, it was still there. Death was always terrifying too, and telling yourself that it was all a game didn't always help. Zhang could easily kill her if he set his mind to it.

"It just feels wrong. Why don't we just go through the forest ourselves? We're stronger than almost everything there anyway, and Misa can do crowd control for us. If we do it right, we don't need anyone else."

Alexa saw Misa walk past her and stand next to Zhang, which prompted Alexa to stare at the blonde mage.

"Hey, don't look at me. I'm with Zhang on this one. What if we go in there and another freakishly strong monster comes out? Those local events always pop out at the most random times when you're out there, and then we'd have to either fight or run. If we have to run, I'd want something between me and the thing chasing us!"

Zhang let out a smile that was too cold for words, and clasped his hands together. "Great! It's settled. We find someone to be our meat-shield, and ditch them if we have to."

Turning back towards the city, Zhang strode across the grassy field, Misa quickly following behind him.

Not wanting to be left behind, Alexa ran to catch up to them and ended up walking side-by-side with the person she'd hoped would've backed her up against Zhang.

***

After resupplying at the town, they headed back out onto the grassy plains outside. Monsters of all kinds were everywhere, and all sorts of people from different classes were teaming up to take them down. Some of them were strong enough to fight solo, but those people were few and rare out on the field. The whole scene reminded Alexa of her days back at the starter city Guardian. People would always be out scouring the area right outside the city for foxes and rabbits, the creatures that beginners would always be hunting.