Angie was driving the RV while Nate was looking at the dungeon he had created in South Korea. He had gotten extremely lucky with how he had set that one up, and it needed almost no maintenance. The reason he was looking at it currently was because some cultivators had attempted to enter it. They had lasted a few minutes before retreating in a damaged state.

  As a plus, it had generated enough energy that he could now upgrade the Dungeon Core with a level 2 version.

  Behind them, Lindsay was sitting at the table with Aura and her new weasel companion, who had accepted the name ‘Mika’ before they went to sleep the night before. At the moment, Aura was helping them study the companion bonding technique that Nate had passed to her.

  They had left the city behind about an hour earlier. During their meeting the night before, Shane -who had been speaking for all the professional hunter groups involved- had asked if they wanted to leave at the scheduled time or before.

  Nate and the girls had been fine with leaving sooner than the original time, as they had already decided they didn’t need as much time as they originally thought to finish their shopping.

  In the end, it came down to the Richlow Group and how quickly they could finish their own tasks. Which after seeing how quickly the others would be ready, they agreed to push everything to finish faster so they could get on the road a little sooner.

  All of that meant that they had left the city about two hours earlier than planned.

  “What are the odds that rookie of theirs tries something with us?” Angie asked as Nate finished inspecting the dungeon. He had also sent the order through to upgrade its Dungeon Core. They would need to work on designing the second level of the dungeon later.

  All throughout the planning meeting the night before, and then again, just before they had left, the boy had been constantly looking at both girls. Nate wouldn’t have described his gaze as particularly perverted or hungry, just uncomfortable. At the same time, it hadn’t been directed at him. Lindsay and Angie had already decided to avoid him as much as possible, even retreating into the dungeons if needed.

  He fully turned off the screen, noting the remaining time left on the slime dungeon before answering her. Only two days left. “I don’t know how to answer that. The group’s leader, Shane, seems to have things in control. However, as we experienced with Jace, some people just refuse to be controlled.”

  The steering wheel groaned under her hands as her grip tightened into a white-knuckle affair. “I won’t let something like that happen again, no matter what!” She growled angrily.

  “Neither will I,” He asserted. “All three of us are stronger than we were back then, and we have Aura, who is even stronger.”

  They had other options as well, if it truly came down to it. Everyone but him could escape into one of the dungeons, but he could always bring out the weapons his avatar used. It would suck, as the avatar could then no longer use them, but in a pinch. You did what you needed to survive.

  Unfortunately, the young man would have as many opportunities as he wanted to create a problem of some sort. The four hunter groups involved with protecting them, and hunting everything along the way, had partially agreed to the job due to the length involved. From Richmond, Virginia, they were being escorted all the way to Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. A trip of over two hundred and fifty miles. If you assumed they could make fifty miles a day, then it was a five-day trip at the minimum.

  However, the odds of that happening weren’t good. There had been days when Nate and the girls had been able to make that without a problem. More often than not though, they made less, or it involved him putting the RV in his storage to get around obstacles. Something that was no longer an option since they were part of a group.

  There was also the matter that the semis and trailers were less capable than the overlander rig they drove, which would slow them down. The biggest issue though, was what had led to them seeking protection in the first place. Animal and beast attacks. Everything from here on out was stronger than them, and each attack would slow them down for an hour or more. The bodies would need to be collected, the cores cut out, and the wounded taken care of.

  For the moment it had been easygoing, with each of the engagements thus far having been relatively small and quickly taken care of.

  No one expected that to last, but it also depended on how frisky everything was feeling in the area. On their way to the Grand Canyon, they had only encountered a couple of beasts or monsters attacking their RV. From the Grand Canyon to Richmond, that number had increased significantly, though they had also been going through heavily forested areas for much of that.

  Environmental factors like being inside the forest couldn’t be discounted, neither could the general strength of the monsters in the area. They were used to being on top of the food chain and had grown bold in their actions. Unlike where Nate and the girls were from, where the monsters were weak enough that years of the cultivators actively keeping them in line had begun to train them.

  This story originates from Royal Road. Ensure the author gets the support they deserve by reading it there.

  Since leaving the city of Richmond a couple of hours earlier, they had already been attacked three times. The professional hunting groups called them little more than skirmishes, -which for them was probably true- and they hadn’t even needed to stop for them.

  Angie suddenly grinned evilly. “You know what I just realized?” She asked with a quick glance at him. “We could quite literally get away with committing the perfect crime. Thanks to how capable our storages are, hiding a body wouldn’t even be an issue. Then later, the dungeon could take care of disposal for us.”

  Nate shook his head and began laughing. “You and Lindsay really scare me at times. I might have done something like that in the heat of the moment, but straight up thinking about it beforehand…” He chuckled and muttered softly to himself. “Hell hath no fury-”

  Angie looked over at him with narrowed eyes before snorting softly.

  As one of the more capable vehicles, they were near the front of the group being escorted. The larger semis and trailers were at the back of the line, while the smaller, faster SUVs and four-wheel-drive vehicles were near the front.

  Some of them had removable roofs where someone could stand up with their long-range weapon. A couple had gone even further and had fully removable cloth-style coverings that had been removed.

  It was interesting to see them enter into a conflict as there were mounting points on the roof of their vehicles for heavy weapons. Hot weapons like guns had been completely replaced by cold weapons like bows made from cultivating monsters that were hunted by expedition groups. In this case, the mounting points were used to mount heavy arbalest crossbows with ballista-sized bolts.

  Nate and the others had seen even larger versions of them used on the wall of their city during the attack before. This was their first time seeing a model this size though, as it was almost able to be carried by a person. If they were strong enough, the only limiting factor that would remain was its larger than normal size, which would make it hard to carry.

  Regardless, using those large, powerful bolts, combined with their skills and other weapons, allowed them to mow through anything they encountered with ease.

  “I wouldn’t mind getting a few of those and bringing them back to the city,” Nate muttered. “Mom and Dad would love it, I’m sure, plus with a few extras, the people back at home could begin reproducing them. I wonder why they haven’t started doing something of that size, anyway?”

  “Maybe the construction needs a part from a specific monster in this area?” Angie suggested with a shrug. “Either way, I can ask Shane later about buying some of them, either from them or from the store where they originally got them.”

  He nodded. “We’ll need to sell some herbs or healing pills to afford them, but I definitely think they are something we should bring back with us.”

  “Philly is a larger city,” Lindsay said, leaning over backward toward them. “I’m sure we can find pretty much anything we want there. The Richlow Group is hoping to snag a storage armband at an auction that will happen after we arrive.”

  Nate had known for a long time that storage devices existed, their city was just too small to have any, publicly that is. His mother now had one thanks to him, and it was possible that others in the city might as well.

  He twisted in his seat to look at her. “I didn’t hear anything about an auction. If that’s the case though, it’ll be a good chance to sell off a lot of the herbs all at once. We’ll also be able to hopefully get some good things while we’re there. Possibly, a storage armband or two of our own that we can bring back for our families.”

  “How many herbs have you managed to collect?” Angie asked, keeping her eyes on the road.

  Aura and he both snorted. “Don’t forget, I created the first dungeon at this point nearly, what nine, ten, months ago? Aura and I have been collecting them ever since. We’ve used and sold a little, and given a bunch to the community members for their different paths. But I still have heaps just sitting in my storage. Not all of them are healing herbs either. The dungeon seems to hand those out the most often, however, it isn’t the only herb by any shot.”

  Her fingers drummed against the steering wheel as she thought. “It’ll be my first time doing it with an auction house of this size. Working with auction houses is something that my parents taught me how to do.” She bit the corner of her lip nervously. “I went with my father to Kansas City, a couple of times when I was younger. That is where the closest auction house to us is, but it’s rather small, in my opinion.”

  “Looks like we have a plan for once we arrive at this new city, though I think it would be best if I attended in Nate’s chest.” Aura transmitted to them while flicking her four tails. The illusions she used merely hid them, nothing more. In an enclosed, cramped area with a lot of people, the odds of her secret being discovered went up considerably. “I am also worried about this rookie who has recently entered Shane’s team. He smells wrong.”

  “Smells wrong, how?” Lindsay asked, cuddling with Mika.

  The weasel had always been abnormally comfortable with Lindsay. However, since she had begun using the companion beast skill, the first of the associated effects had started to make themselves known.

  Even Nate was paying rapt attention to Aura. Meanwhile, Angie clearly wanted to as well, since her eyes kept flicking to the rearview mirror that she had adjusted just so she could look at the kitsune behind her.

  “I first noticed it last night, though I didn’t particularly think anything of it at the time. That is until I noticed it again when we met up earlier. That boy smells of blood, fresh blood at that. I can’t be sure about last night, as he had done a decent job of washing and cleaning up. What I smelled earlier though, that was definitely human blood.” Aura told them solemnly, her thoughts coming across clearly and with little associated imagery to cause interference.

  Angie groaned, letting out a short, nearly hysterical laugh. “Great, so not only is the guy, probably a pervert, but he is also a what? Murderer? Vigilante killer, psychopath? Do we know how strong he is at least?”

  “Not officially. My senses aren’t that strong,” Nate replied with a shake of his head. “But I’m guessing he’s probably stronger than all of us, other than Aura.”

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