Chương 45: People? (3)

(3) (3) For a long minute, Rowan sat in silence. He'd thought he'd had it bad—and he certainly did, at least when it came to how dangerous his situation was—but the people before him, he couldn't imagine how many friends someone would have to lose to be able to shrug off a death like this. Or, perhaps, they were all sociopaths, but from what he'd seen, he didn't think it was a viable theory. If he had to decide, he knew that, every single time, he would choose to be in his current situation over theirs.

Even though he'd nearly died so many times, he had genuinely enjoyed some of his time stuck in the caves, gaining power.

"Oh," He whispered, "I'm so sorry." Eren let out a little laugh, but there was no joy behind it.

"It's alright. You look like you've been through much worse." Rowan smiled in return.

"I doubt that." There were a few moments of nothing as he took a drink from his waterskin before the silence was broken by Cynthia.

"Why are you naked?" Nearly choking on his water, Rowan looked down at himself in alarm. As he stared at himself, wide-eyed, he heard Henry chuckling.

"Sorry about that. Cici here is very… blunt with her questions." But Rowan wasn't paying attention.

"Oh, fu—" He took a deep breath, calming himself. He didn't want to curse in front of Cynthia. He breathed in and out a few more times before trying to take a look at himself from the perspective of the party. The only things left on his body were his belt and the top foot or so of his pants, but even that was tattered. To make matters even worse, he was covered in dried blood and gore. Lots of it.

He'd done his best to clean himself up by scrubbing himself, but without being able to access more than a bit of water at a time, bathing was impossible. To anyone else, Rowan realized he must've looked like a crazy murderer or a living corpse.

"I'm sorry." He cringed, still looking at himself.

"I didn't realize I looked like this. I've just been stuck down here for so long…I must look crazy to you." It was a bit embarrassing to realize that it'd been so long since his last social interaction that he hadn't even considered his appearance. Still, they'd been in a life-or-death situation, so Rowan decided to just blame it on him being too focused on saving them.

"I've seen much worse, trust me," Henry said. Then, his expression turned to one of concern.

"But you said that you've been 'stuck down here'? You mean that you've been trapped in the caves?" Rowan nodded.

"For how long?"

"I'm not sure. I've been here since the start of the Tutorial. I'll be honest, you're the first human beings I've seen since the first day."" Seriously?" Eren interjected.

"You've been stuck here for the entire Tutorial? And you were saying that we had it worse?" She shook her head.

"How did you even survive?"

"Wow! You must be really strong!" Cynthia jumped in.

"What level are you?" Rowan glanced at her. She was young, but something about the way she was talking seemed off. After a second, he thought he understood what was happening. Cynthia was almost buttering him up to try to learn his level. But it didn't seem malicious. No, it was more like the little girl had latched onto it and truly wanted to know out of pure curiosity.

"Cynthia," Henry chided.

"Don't pry at his secrets." He turned back to Rowan.

"Sorry 'bout that. She has an odd obsession with people's levels. I think she just likes the numbers, you know?"

"It's alright," Rowan replied. Still, he didn't feel like it was the best idea to share his level, so he turned back to Eren, who'd asked a question he was actually willing to answer.

"I was lucky to survive," He said.

"There isn't much to it, really. I ended up in the caves pretty far from here, where the enemies weren't quite as strong. I had some lucky encounters, too. I almost died quite a few times, but I made it." After that, they sat in silence for a bit. As he rested, Rowan watched the group. So far, only four of them had spoken: Henry, Cynthia, Eren, and Lucas. The first three seemed friendly enough, while Lucas watched him… not with aggression, but not with friendliness, either.

The last two, however, had hardly spoken at all. They'd introduced themselves as Jeremy and Emma, but that was about it. Looking at their appearances, Rowan thought they were certainly siblings, maybe even fraternal twins. They both had jet black hair like Rowan's, except somehow even darker. And, despite their opposite genders, they had almost the exact same facial structure. The two of them watched him with distrust, sitting apart even from the rest of their group.

Find this and other great novels on the author's preferred platform. Support original creators! With a sigh, Rowan decided to check his status. He'd gained two levels from the fight with the bloodspawn earlier, one as the explosions went off, and the other as he cleaned up the survivors.

Name: Rowan Crowe Race: Human Class: Chained Lord (Inheritance) Level: 12 Stats: Strength: 17 Dexterity: 11 Toughness: 28 Vitality: 18 Mana: 17 Free Points: 2 Active Skills(2/10): Chain Manipulation lvl 11 Mana Manipulation lvl 18 Passive Skills(0/10): Quests: Defeat the Guardian of the Forest or Defeat the Leviathan (Layer Quest) Defeat 40 Enemies Defeat 10 Enemies Above Your Level Reach Level 20 System Credits: 135 Rowan smiled at his stats.

He'd gone from level 10 to level 12 just from taking down the bloodspawn that had been attacking the group. He'd never made so much progress before from a single battle. He would have to do that more. He shook his head. What was he saying? He would have to do more what? Confront massive swarms of enemies? It had been lucrative, sure, but not only were such large swarms of bloodspawn rare, but he'd also been lucky that there hadn't been any higher-level enemies in that horde.

Still, if an opportunity presented itself, he would take it. But until then, he wasn't going to be seeking out fights like that; they were just too risky. Turning his attention back to his stats, he considered where to put his free points. His contemplation didn't last long, though, as he remembered promising himself to alternate his free points between mana and dexterity so that his stats didn't get too unbalanced. He'd put his last free point into dexterity, but since he had two now, Rowan simply put one in each.

Next time he leveled up, the point would go to mana. Then, he began to check on his quests. Quest Received: Defeat 40 Enemies (39/40) Rewards: Rations 35 System Credits His eyes widened in delight. He'd been at 17/40 before, which meant that he'd defeated twenty-two bloodspawn in the last engagement. Even better, that meant he wouldn't have to worry as much about his food situation. Speaking of food, Rowan turned his attention back to the bag at his waist.

He was normally careful with it, trying not to jostle it and putting it down before fights. But in his haste to aid the party before him, he'd forgotten to set it down, and it seemed like almost half of his rations had fallen out at one point or another while he had been fighting. He might've worried more if he'd found out earlier, but with just a single enemy left to go before his next set of rations and, in turn, a new bag, he didn't care all that much.

After a moment of thought, Rowan grabbed the bag at his waist and set it on the floor before him, breaking the silence.

"Anyone hungry?" The others, who had all been lost in thought, jerked back to the present. They stared at the food for a bit longer before thanking him and each grabbing a few pieces of meat and fruit. All except for the siblings, who remained where they were, still watching him with untrusting eyes. Rowan shrugged before grabbing a fruit and tossing it into his mouth. It was their loss. After a minute of eating, Cynthia asked him a question, looking up at him with starry eyes.

"Do you have a class?" Henry, whom he still assumed to be her father, opened his mouth, presumably to chide her about delving into his 'secrets,' but Rowan waved him off. It was quite endearing, honestly, how she was still so innocent and childlike despite the horrors that it seemed their group had gone through. Either her group had done an impossibly good job of shielding her from reality, or it was something about Cynthia herself. Either way, he decided to answer.

"Yes, I have a class," He replied before looking at Henry.

"You all can ask whatever you want. I can't guarantee that I'll answer, but I won't be offended or anything. Speaking of, what's happening out on the surface? Are people really this secretive about everything?" Henry nodded.

"For the first few weeks, everyone—or, at least, everyone in the group we were in—shared everything we could figure out. Strength in numbers, y'know? But there are a lot of… eccentric characters here. Battle maniacs or people who are just plain evil. They never shared anything, and while most of them died early on, quite a few of them gained lots of power. They did things like you did against the bloodspawn.

"At some point, people started murdering one another even more than before. And with everyone around them being a possible threat, people stopped sharing. Most of the larger groups split up, and now, asking people you don't know about their abilities is just something you don't do," He shot a glare at Cynthia, who pointedly looked away.

"But Cici over here doesn't seem to really understand that. Although she has gotten better about it recently. Until now, at least." Rowan tilted his head.

"Until now?"

"We've gotten her to mostly clam up around strangers, so her being so open around someone new is strange. She must really like you." Rowan shrugged.

"Is she your daughter?" He asked. Henry frowned.

"No, actually. Most people assume that. Though at this point, I might as well be her dad, y'know? We found her just wandering around the Tutorial and took her in. I have no idea how she survived until we found her.

"I don't know if she has parents in the Tutorial or what, and she won't tell us how she ended up here. But she must be a fighter to have survived, eh?" He chuckled softly.

"We could probably pry for more info, but assuming she got forced here as I did, I don't want to risk bringing up any trauma she might have." It was a bit surprising how Henry had just dropped the bombshell that was how he had all gotten forced into Apocalypse Difficulty, just like Rowan had, but it made sense; he seemed pretty normal, not the type to choose Apocalypse. As Rowan opened his mouth to respond, Cynthia decided to speak.

"I didn't get forced here! I wanted to come here!"