Training Nights Begin

Just like the past three nights, I don't drink any alcohol at Daichi's residence bar, while he drinks as if there's no tomorrow. Yuki lives next door in similar large constructions, four or five stories high, typically small rooms for one or two people, not much space for a family room.

Living in a small flat with Daichi isn't as pleasant as it sounds, he tends to be almost naked every night. He usually forgets I'm here and I don't want to see that.

I drink almost a liter of water all the nights, it surprises me that alcohol is cheaper than water in this city. If we wanted to save, we could bring water from the lakes outside in large containers, but we don't have time for that, just a random thought.

I'm only at level eight and I've already broken two swords and bought three more with my own money, earned from these little pests. I can feel pain all over my body; I have a thousand small cuts that increase the pain.

As we finish dinner, we're interrupted by a small group of drunks.

“Hey, aren't you the guy from Claxtion today?”

“What's that?” This man seems even drunker than Daichi, barely able to stay upright.

“It's like a leaderboard or announcement board.” Yuki explains and takes another sip of her drink. “It seems you appeared today, Kai.”

“Yeah, it's you, the guy who killed four hundred thirty-four Mchafu today,” he grins strangely from ear to ear. “Congrats on killing level 1 monsters, bet that was a real tough fight, huh?” He bursts into laughter and walks away, others in the background hear him too.

I get up to confront him, but Daichi grabs the back of my shirt and pulls me back. I'm almost sitting in his lap. “Don't worry about what they say,” he mumbles, calm and confident. “They don't know anything.”

“You're too close…” I think he's holding me even tighter, giving me a hug; I can feel his warmth and his muscles. “You're squeezing me and you reek of alcohol!”

He looks at me very closely; even though he's completely drunk, I see kindness and confidence in his golden eyes. I manage to break free from his muscles and fix my clothes. “So, what is that? I am the only one who appears?”

Yuki chuckles lightly; I guess I always ask strange questions. “Of course not, Kai… It shows everyone who manages to kill different monsters on a daily basis. All the monsters in Empire Edealyon are included. People can also choose not to appear, if an achievement is recorded you won't know who did it.”

Daichi gets up and pulls my arm again; as if I were a doll. “You can check Claxtion here. Almost every bar has one,” he's answering my unformulated question. “You can also get a Loggex, where you can find all the news and communications and so on and so forth. It costs a lot of money, you'd need to kill around a million Mchafu to have that amount.”

I approach the device, place my hand for it to scan me and a blue window opens up, created by lights, similar to Minnex. There’s statistics of monsters, bosses, villages, towns, a map of the entire Empire. A sign of ‘restricted access’ appears in various things, but it doesn't bother me. I can check and edit my profile there too.

I go to what interests me; the monsters are at the lowest level and I see virtual cards of them. I select the Mchafu and find them. It seems that today I've killed most of these. By selecting it, I can see all the records and who killed more or less than me, from today, a year ago, or since the records began.

There's someone who killed over a million and their face doesn't appear.

“Incredible,” I say as Daichi nods and goes back to Yuki and I stay a bit longer examining this device before going to sleep. Although I'm not getting as tired as the previous days. I have energy now, it's time to train again.

I will wake up in the middle of the night.

It is easy to sleep a couple of hours and then go out again; the guards recognize me from coming and going so much. Or maybe they recognize me from Dai's laughter, which seems to reach half the world around us.

Before leaving I prepared things for making a fire. I won't be crazy enough to go completely in the dark. After leaving the Outskirts, I light a torch and start walking toward the respawn point, a bit further from where we go during the day; I don't want to worry or let them see the fires I'm about to light.

When the usual place is no longer in sight, I stop and set up several fires. As I'm about to light the third, there's already a Mchafu leaping towards me, an easy kill. I throw the torch at it and it catches fire; then I give it a swift death with my sword.

I finish setting up the third fire; the riskiest one, it’s the closest to the forest. I step back to the first fire and leave my backpack and my second weapon. Inside there are some potions and two extra swords; all the precautions to ensure my survival.

Several of these monsters come; I can hear their cries and footsteps. Even though my vision is limited and the night is cloudy, it's not too difficult to detect where they are, listening to their movements. I'm surprised at how I'm enduring a bit more each day.

I notice that I get tired more quickly, but I have to keep up the pace for several hours. My mind goes back to the man who killed over a million of these; I've only killed maybe a thousand. How many days was he training and killing ? And since when?

I will fight against the monsters until the first light of dawn and that's when I will retreat. The Mchafu don't appear as often when they notice I'm farther away from the forest, allowing me to rest a bit.I look at the trees ahead and some of their strange shadows, I wonder when I'll be ready to go inside and fight more powerful enemies.

But for now, I focus on the ones right in front of me. I won't lose sight of them and they won't even scratch me. I'll keep hearing the screams of the crazy Yuki in my head all night.

I smile and the nighttime fun begins.

After several hours, just when the sun is going to appear, I decide to go back home. I think I have three or four hours of sleep till Daichi or Yuki wakes up. Upon returning to the residence, I take a quick shower in the downstairs bathroom, so as not to wake Daichi up in our room. There are bathrooms outside for some of the rooms that don't have ones. Yuki sleeps peacefully and alone in a room twice the size of Daichi's, with a large bed; I envy her at this moment.

As soon as I lie down, I fall asleep instantly. Without any energy left but happy that I managed it and could handle it on my own at night against several of these… I think I killed over two hundred, but I stopped counting after fifty.

I have to kill many, so many more.

The fun is just beginning.