TWO HOURS FLEW BY practically unnoticed as Bask told his truly bizarre tale. As it came to its conclusion, I came back to the real world and looked at my clock.
Current time: 21:57.
“Only a halfling would do something so mean and dirty!” Yorka said.
“Amen,” I agreed, and looked at Bask in surprise. “Bask, you have real talent for storytelling. But I still don’t understand where the dead naked halfling got the bottle of nuclear orcs. The story was a good one, though.”
“Amen!” Yorka repeated after me, hooking her club back on her belt in relief. “Damn, my poor little arm... It’s killing me! Blow up and die!”
“You’ll get used to the club,” I promised, and looked back again. What could I say — I liked to be aware of my surroundings. Just liked to see what was around me.
I didn’t notice anything out of the ordinary — we were practically alone. Hallway 29 was full of nothing but the howling wind. Not a person in sight, other than us. No other patrols, either. The last four goblins had left an hour ago, and no one had replaced them. We didn’t see another patrol on the other end of our area at all. The wind blew some trash along the floor, and a lightbulb flickered in the distance.
Was it strange?
Not at all.
I had noticed a while ago that the evening end-of-work alarm served as another important signal to the populace. ‘It’s eight in the evening! Get out of the hallways, hurry to the clusters! Out of the darkness, into the light. And don’t roam the pathways until morning!’ It wasn’t an official order — not even a recommendation — but most people took it to mean the day was over and it was time to hunker down. Night was instinctively seen as dangerous here, just like it was at the dawn of human evolution when our ancestors hid around fires in caves, listening to the sounds coming from the dark jungle. Our ancestors knew terrible predators hunted at night, and it was the same situation here. Only worse.
Current time: 22:00.
I looked around the hallway, peered into the distance, and looked at Bask, whose ears were perked up. Nope. No one, nothing. No signs of the next patrol hurrying towards us a little late. No one to take over for us.
Current time: 22:01.
“Hmm…”
“Lazy goblins!” Yorka cursed. She stretched out a hand to straighten Bask’s shirt collar. “What are we gonna do, Elb?”
“The most important thing is that our job gets marked as complete,” I said calmly. “They won’t keep us here — Oh, there we go.”
The system marked our job as done. We each earned fifteen sol, and all it took was two hours of leisurely walking — which I considered a helpful light workout for all of us.
Balance: 30 sol.
It felt great to get all the money and not have anything taken out. The system was paying for our food and medicine today. Even the optional shots would be free. Bask was the only one who had to pay for his — apparently he needed heavier, more expensive drugs. I had to remember to transfer him twelve sol. The system would take fourteen total from me, and Bask would end up with ten. That percentage the system took really bit into the transfers... But I was happy with how much we had earned for such a short combat job.
Receive party combat jobs (compulsory)?
Yes / No.
The system was sneaky, springing this prompt on us so unexpectedly. It had only just dropped a fat stack of cash into our shaking hands, and now this question — ‘Want this to happen all the time?’
Who could say no?
I could. I decisively selected ‘No’, keeping in mind what Mads had told me, that the system would send me the prompt again and again like a little robotic bird mechanically pecking at my brain. The system needed fighters — dedicated fighters. I had seen proof of that myself when no one showed up to take over for us. There weren’t even enough fighters to send out consistent patrols. The Outskirts were just too big, with its hundreds of hallways and rooms.
