Chapter 97: Do You Know Temple?
Chapter 97: Do You Know Temple?
More heroes rushed out of the Academy as they realized what was going on, and Kalli’s attention was drawn by a whistle from the tower.
The soldier held up his rifle, and Kalli realized the issue.
He was low on ammunition, and she was on the battlefield.
"Anyone short on ammo? I’m headed back to the tower," she called.
"Toss me a case and I will split it with the others."
Kalli handed over the case on the way by and ran for the tower. The soldier stationed there was still firing, and the second was a mage, who was casting fireballs down into the Ogre ranks. But he had clearly been going heavy on the ammunition spend, and there were a half dozen or more empty magazines near his feet.
"Ammo run. Here’s a case for you."
"You’re a lifesaver. That laser rifle is a real beacon on the battlefield, I can see why Sanchez is using his regular rifle tonight."
Kalli laughed. "That it is. But it served the purpose, and I got some kills in on the Ogres, even if there wasn’t a quest for them. Now, if you’re good, I’ll go check on the refugees and see what we’ve got."
Who they were didn’t take much work to guess. The tractor had a "City of Gomand" logo on the side. But that didn’t really answer her questions, so Kalli made her way to one of the drivers.
"You got a moment? I’ve got questions before we start getting everyone settled."
The man nodded as he took a long drag on his cigarette.
"Yeah, this could take a minute or two for me to explain properly. But you should have a hero named Temple here, right? A Paladin, big blonde dude."
Kalli nodded.
"He put a protection spell on us when he told us all to evacuate. Only, once we started running, we could feel that the source of the spell vanished, then it started coming from this direction, so we decided to follow it.
Nobody really knew what was in this direction, but it’s a protective spell, so it might be leading us to the closest safe spot.
That was the logic at first, and then we started to see familiar faces rush out to meet us, and realized that the fallen heroes might actually be here.
That’s why I asked if you had seen Temple."
Kalli smiled, "He will be so stoked to find out that at least some of you survived. He thought that everything was likely to be lost when he couldn’t hold out any longer. But now that you’re here, he can finally start to relax and not feel like he failed in his duties."
The man nodded, then gave Kalli an uncomfortable look.
"About that. I know that times are tight, and it doesn’t look like your shelter has a lot of spare space for new arrivals. But perhaps outside in one of the surviving buildings? We’ll find a way to make it work, and we brought our own supplies.
What we could gather of them anyhow.
There might only be a tenth as many of us as there were, but it’s still a lot of people."
Kalli shook her head. "I have no problem with you setting up in one of the few surviving buildings outside. One of them is already mostly occupied. But we’re not actually short on supplies.
You see, we’ve got quests for monster meat and new forms of edible plants, plus some ability to gather essentials without looting buildings that no longer exist.
So, once we work out the budget, there should be no shortage of food for everyone.
Did you have any more of the heroes with you?
Temple said that some of the warriors escaped, but they were headed west, not east, the last time that we heard anything about them."
"Good riddance to them. They were nearly useless to begin with, and they bolted at the first signs of real trouble. If they had stayed with Temple and the others, we would have had a pretty good shot of driving off that invasion, at least for another day or two.
It might have saved thousands of lives.
But that’s all in the past now, we saved everyone that we could, and now we just want to meet up with our heroes again and find out what the plan is for the future.
I’m guessing that you’re one of the group that awakened here in the Capital, and this is your place. Everyone treats you like you’re in charge, anyhow."
Kalli laughed at the truck driver’s assumption.
"In a way, I suppose I am in charge here. But it’s a hero thing, to do with the abilities that I get to help keep a group alive. You see, I have the ability for heroes to trade rewards they get for supplies they need.
That’s a large part of why I’m confident that we can keep everyone alive and fed.
The rest is that there are actually a lot of wild edible plants in the area, they’re just not the ones that we’re used to, and they do tend to fight back when you try to harvest them.
We haven’t lost anyone to the plants yet, but there have been a couple of close calls."
The man thought that she was joking at first, but there was another group of heroes coming to check on the new arrivals, and they were nodding in agreement. The plants really were dangerous if you weren’t paying attention.
"Gather everyone from your group and head to the indoor basketball court. It’s the middle of the night, and I don’t want to wake everyone in the apartment block up to get things arranged. We only have power to one other building out there right now, and I’m not sure if it will take as many people as you’ve brought.
So, we might need to move you to one of the other buildings that survived, and hopefully not the abandoned shops, which are not set up for residences.
Though, one of them used to be a burger place, so they’ve likely got the best kitchen out of anywhere other than the Academy.
Fear not, we will make it all make sense in the morning, and we will have food and water brought while you wait. The facilities in the Academy are functional, but shower times are extremely limited.
Get fed, get some sleep, and I will see you all again in the morning.
Temple should be waiting for you in the arena by now."