Forged By The Apocalypse - A LitRPG With Draconic Potential

Faction Quest Complete - Survive The Trial Wave - 428/428

The assault has been rebuffed and the people protected. Take the lessons learned from this dangerous event and use them to become stronger.

Reward: Passive income to Ascentown coffers +250 gold per day

Bonus 100% Completion Reward: Free new building purchase from Faction Menu

Bravado and gumption aside, the trial wave wasn’t easy. It took all of my skill, desperation and magical power to keep the swarm of monsters away from the Outpost. If I had Naea at my side, I wouldn’t have had a problem at all, but I was only one man. Powerful, but limited. It was for this reason exactly that things couldn’t stay how they were.

The first person who needed to change was me.

I had shirked responsibility. I had not made a wonderful impression with the leaders of Newtown by walking into their settlement and turning a man to paste, so I was going to leave the politics and background stuff to Tom. However, it was past time for me to make my presence truly known. The people who had flocked to the Outpost from Newtown hadn’t come to learn how to fight.

That didn’t matter. They would need to, regardless. I made it clear that my assistance would not be so prominent on following trial waves, or any other sudden dangers which might arise. I was not going to babysit the Outpost or its people forever, but I couldn’t pretend this isn't a problem I had created. At least partially.

I put the wave rewards to use quickly, along with money from my own coffers and the growing wealth of the town itself. I was disappointed to see that the town’s inventory was far less full than even my own, but I knew that would change in time. One way to speed up that process was to whip The Ascent into shape.

The training area I had purchased was perfect for that.

At a truly exorbitant two hundred thousand coins, even I couldn’t have hoped to afford this extremely interesting building. Luckily, the System couldn’t have known I would go for the most expensive and obvious option when it gave me the random reward… Could it?

With questions of predetermination and free will on my mind, I activated the magical array again, ignoring the moans from below. “You all said that you wanted to get stronger, didn’t you?” A tepid chorus of assent came back to me. “We can all just go and wait for the next trial wave if you want? Show me some excitement, people! Are you ready?”

“Yes!” Eighteen voices shouted at once. “We want to get stronger!” The mantra was simple, but hearing all of the would-be guild members yell together like a unit caused my blood to pump quicker. Tom, surprisingly, was doing a good job of guiding that energy from below. Out of everyone, he was the most disappointed in himself and his level of growth since the dungeon. While I had perhaps failed him by disappearing for a month, he faulted himself far more.

To Tom, the inability to raise a response other than “throw Grant at it” had bothered him. Given that it should always have been a valid option and that I was the one who disappeared for a month, he was being a little hard on himself. I didn’t discourage the desperate energy however. Things went well enough in the end, but it had been close.

I had only been away a month, and if I hadn’t returned when I did? Well, that’s why we were preparing now. It was the first day since the trial wave, but I wasn’t worried about the group’s energy dropping. If anything, my tough guy facade would break way earlier. Fortunately, I didn’t need to be the brutal taskmaster when someone else enjoyed it far more.

“ALRIGHT MAGGOTS, LINE UP!” Naea’s sharp voice was infused with mana and it immediately arrested attention. She and the trainees were in a large circular pit, while I watched on from in a viewing stand. The System blew me away with the natural appearance of such a strange addition to our little Outpost. Mostly fit into the ground, the wholly wooden structure looked like a natural amphitheatre with four large gates leading in.

The Danger Room, as it was being called, was like our own little colosseum. With a few interesting additions. Once all four gates were closed, the functions of the System-made space became active. By channelling mana, using some ingredients and spending some coins, it was possible to summon real monsters. I had tried it out alone with some of the snake skins I looted on the Everbloom Evergreen and handled the level twenty five versions the room created easily.

After confirming that whatever ingredients I used spat out a creature of the same type, it was time to sharpen the newbies up.

And I had the perfect enemies to do it.

I had to actively hide my glee when one of the new recruits stepped out of line and threw up his hands. I sized him up. Short brown hair, a nose that had been broken a few times before the System would let it heal perfectly and apparently, more muscles than brains. Probably killed a few monsters, but doesn’t even know how to use mana. “Why would we listen to this thing?” The idiot asks.

Naea shows him and everyone else exactly why.

In a literal flash, she became a bolt of lightning and shot to the other side of the arena. Before even the fastest could turn to find her, she began firing thick globules of web at their feet. Exploding like smoke grenades and then immediately hardening, she contained almost the entire group of nearly twenty in less than ten seconds. Only Tom and one other man were able to escape her quick onslaught.

“Yeah, you’re definitely going to need to do better than that. You better hope that these two can protect you while you get yourselves free…” Naea looked up to me, insectoid eyes attempting to look cute. Fluttering her eyelids, she asked me to start the first wave.

Are you nuts?

Grant, it’s just a few spiders. They’ll be fine, I’ve got Cleanse.

I stifled a chuckle and paid the cost of the training area. From above, I couldn’t suppress my shudder as the sound of clicking footfalls approached. Far too many feet. The panic down below was something to behold, but I remembered how I felt when those mandibles got close to my face. The spiders spawned here were only around level five, but that was still enough to be lethal.

Tom and the only other free fighter were doing well. For Tom it was simple enough, he just blasted anything that was dark, furry and moved with his Mana Bolts from afar. I nodded in agreement with his methods. Definitely the sensible way to deal with spiders. Of course, the amount of enemies combined with a large mass of allied force which he didn’t want to hit meant Tom required precision as well as endurance.

The other fighter was a new face to me, but was clearly the most capable of the bunch. He had no Dao, but from the way he moved that would only be a matter of time. The spear in his hand was ornate in that way only System-made items were, so it would be a quest or dungeon reward. I found myself wishing I could hear the stories of everyone that survived this long. Mine might be a little more dramatic than most, but all would be interesting.

I focused, as it was my mana controlling the creatures. I wasn’t actively commanding the spiders, but if I wanted more to spawn then I simply had to keep giving mana to the crystal at my side. Working as a mana syphon, there were multiple available to power the training. My pride and huge mana pool meant no one else was allowed to use it alongside me. With the System doing most of the heavy lifting, and the low levels of the creatures, the cost was only slightly more than my natural regeneration right now.

So we could go for quite a while.

———————————————

“Alright, see you all tomorrow then.” The pure wave of hate which was aimed at me from my words could have been a Dao attack. The whole group had gone up multiple levels as I increased the difficulty through the day, and this was a clear sign of that. I still raised an eyebrow and squashed their animosity with an actual Dao. Without opening my mouth, the roar of a dragon and the scream of a tempest was all that could be heard. “Oh? Did anyone have something to say?”

Idiot from earlier clearly hadn’t learned his lesson. “Just who the fuck died and made you king?” He strode forward, and everyone stepped back. I chuckled in his face, which of course made him even more irate. I did note that he seemed unaffected by my Dao at all. He hadn’t reacted to Naea, either.

“What’s your name?” I was going to make an example out of him, but there was clearly something interesting about him. Either he was completely deaf to Dao and mana, which would be a certain kind of tragic, or he was resilient in a way that even I wasn’t confident of.

“Ben,” he answered, sticking his chin out and curling a lip. Ben really didn’t like me. Or maybe Ben really didn’t like spiders, which would then translate to not liking me much.

“I don’t know how many people have died in the months since the System came to Earth, but I’d say that my place on the food chain is because of them.” I suppressed a flinch as a sharp memory jabbed me. Clive’s café. Blood on the walls. I closed my eyes and took a deep breath. “I’m king because I can do whatever I want and no one - no one - could stop me.”

“Pff”, he scoffed. I didn’t waste a moment and activated Retribution. I felt insulted enough for this situation to count. An invisible fist smashed Ben into the dirt and pushed him down. It shouldn’t hurt, but I didn’t mind if it did. It was mostly to show force, and Ben had happily volunteered.

“As I said, I shall see you all tomorrow.” I stepped over the groaning body, intentionally flexing my aura to let the less sensitive among them feel the power. “Let me explain something while I have you all here. For the most part, you are going to become the most important people in this town. We all know that things have changed, but none of you have seen the things that I have seen.”

To further illustrate my point, I had Naea attack me. She was more than happy. As I dodged her genuine attempt on my life, I continued talking. “Earth is the tiniest speck of dust you can imagine, and greedy monsters from your nightmares are waiting in the shadows to take everything you hold dear.” I managed to sound composed but Naea had gone extra hard, trying to make me look stupid, and I was nearly out of mana and breath at the same time.

“Naea will be taking over training for the next few days. Not only does she enjoy it more than me, she will push you harder than I did today. If any of you have an issue with that, and want to give up, leave now.” I released the pressure on Ben, even as I continued bouncing around the arena to avoid Naea. “I’m being genuine, I don’t want you if you can’t handle this and worse.”

“When will we know that we’re strong enough?” The man with the spear and the turban spoke. His deep voice was delightful to listen to but he had to shout to be heard over the thumping and crashing from the fairy and I.

“When you can land a single hit on me.” Naea and I stopped as one in front of the group. “One single attack, however you attack, and you pass. You can join The Ascent proper and become someone I actually care about. Until then, you’re deadweight for Naea to fuck with. Any questions?”

Shockingly, no one spoke up.