Chapter 96: Day 219 – I Don’t Speak Spanish

Chapter 96: Day 219 – I Don’t Speak Spanish

The white bear sloth rushed at me. It felt like it was trying to drive nails into my head. Acid Shot. The monster melted away. I picked up the crystal, wondering how Ken was breaking them down. I had tried a couple of things, but they were remarkably resilient.

Naran came up behind with the cart and took the crystal from me. “Ah, so that is why you stopped.”

It was the morning of day 219, our third day out of Purgatory. We had only been traveling for a little while and I had come to a stop. Ahead of me the landscape changed from shadowlands to flowerlands, or flower fields.

The only other place I had seen flower fields was next to Truth. “Well, the city should be at the center of the zone, and there should be two dungeons as well.” I was speaking more to remind myself than to Naran. I was trying to think of anything else that might be relevant.

I advanced forwards. I hated new monsters. The most dangerous attack was the one I didn’t know about. That was when I spotted a group of people come over a nearby hill, killing blue beetles that rose up from under the flowers. The beetles were the same size as the venom flies. About the size of a person’s head.

I noted the people were wielding clubs. The beetles spit out a fluid, acid if I had to guess. The target would dodge while another one flanked the monster to hit it and kill it. It was impressive teamwork with how well they worked together.

I came to a stop where the flowers began. The people finally noticed me. There was shouting and pointing. They slowly made their way over killing the monsters while I waited. Time to stretch my non-existent diplomatic muscle.

They finally came to a stop in front of me. I spoke up first. “Hello. I am Champion Michael, from the city of Purgatory.”

“Hola no hablar. Español?” Oh no.

“Sorry. No Español. English?” I asked. They all shook their heads. I knew Naran didn’t speak any other languages. Well just great. Everything else I knew in Spanish, wasn’t very polite, so only good if I wanted to insult their mothers before killing them.

Think. Ah! “Jefe.” I pointed to myself. I then pointed behind them. “Jefe.” They began to talk in rapid fire Spanish, which I didn’t understand one bit. After a minute they stopped and gestured for us to follow them.

I followed them. “You think it is safe?” Naran asked.

“Yes, and they probably know better English than they are letting on. So don’t say anything.”

“Got it boss.” A fourth city, at -3, -1. They were packed in tight in the grid on the map. It made me wonder if there was a city to the East past the ants. The fights over monsters would quickly pick up as cities tried to push one another out over hunting areas.

Well time to see how much of a threat this new city would be. We reached the city at mid-day. There were guards at the gate. The hunting group pointed at us and spoke to the guards rapidly. Finally, one of them came forward to speak with me.

“Hello. Name Mateo. Forgive. English not good.”

“Hello. Jefe Michael. I speak to jefe here. Better English?” I asked. The guard winced.

“Very few people, if any English.”

“Jefe? Boss?” I asked.

“I will take you. Long walk.” I nodded at that. Naran and I followed Mateo through the city to their plaza. I paid careful attention to the route. Once there we were led to a building. There were more people, and several guards. I noted that there wasn’t a lot of trash or any screaming happening.

Both of those were good signs that this place was decently run. Several people were staring at us, but no one came up. Eventually Mateo came back out with three more people.

“Hello. My name is Luis. This is Juan, the leader of Esperanza. I will be translating. Short sentences please, I am not the best at translating a lot or quickly.” No mention about person number three, but probably an advisor or another key stakeholder in the city.

“We have beetles and cats around the city. Then there are bugs, moving trees, large rats, and giant bears in the areas beyond the grasslands and flowers. Any news from Earth, or a way to leave this place?”

“Nope. Better get settled in. The last Earth day you remember, September 1st?”

“Yes, same for you then.” I nodded at that, and Luis let out a sigh. “One moment.” He began translating again for the rest of his group. He then turned back to me. “It is a long walk to the locations. Do you want to rest here for the night?”

“No. Let me share something with you. They reset once every 10 days with the arrival. That is why I would like to clear them each twice. Then in 10 days you can do it yourselves. But we should get going. Night travel is a lot more dangerous.”

There was some more talk, but eventually Naran and I left, along with Luis, Juan, the third person, and three guards. I checked the layout of the packs and our cart appeared to be unmolested. “West first?” I asked.

“Cats are the easiest to kill. Just need to focus they are a bit tricky. You must camp outside the city, it is safe?”

“A bit, if you are careful and don’t move around. The monsters come back during the night.” That was obvious to anyone out grinding. The exact timing was something I didn’t plan on sharing. The trick of this entire conversation was to be polite and seem forthcoming, while not giving anything useful away.

The unfortunate fact was, the longer this city took to advance, the stronger position Purgatory would be in. With the hard limits on the number of monsters and skill points, specific groups would be losing out. This was a zero-sum game.

That meant there had to be winners and losers. It wasn’t possible to create a stable solution long term that didn’t result in suffering and death. This place was too small, and Earth was too big. The one question I had, was what day was it really?

It was day 219 for me, but was it really day 219? Esperanza here was only on day 80. What if another city was on day 500? How powerful would the people in that city be? I wasn’t afraid of someone catching up to me, but someone with a head start. That would be rough, very rough. I didn’t want to be put in a position of weakness again.

“How far is your city?” Luis asked. I held back a wince at the question. They wanted more information and to dig deeper. I had to be extra careful going forward. Time to launch plan B, for boisterous.

“A couple of days’ worth of travel to the East. Let me tell you about some of the interesting monsters I have seen. Blue slimes, well they are quite interesting. Their outer shell is a semi-solid, but it can leak a bit if struck. The key thing is to be careful...”

We kept walking and I kept talking about slimes.

“...in comparison to the brown slimes, you can see a positive correlation to the biome and the monster type. Still, I would be hesitant to call it a direct relationship, more casual if I had to guess. Similar to how shark attacks and ice cream consumption go up at the same time. There is a third underlying factor of summer. I suspect that might be the case here. By extrapolating the monster types I hope to...”

My improved stats allowed me to keep going and going.

“...the conjunction of the sun, with the horizon, doesn’t prove that it isn’t a light source. The physics of this place could be non-Euclidean in nature, leading to a weird topology. I hope to consult an expert on such matters but finding someone with a useful PhD is all down to luck. Still, I am hopeful, and it is something I ponder...”

I could tell they wanted to interrupt, but I didn’t stop.

“...the point distribution is decidedly unfair, but that just puts the prospective of further expansion into perspective. I have a small amount of hope that resources can be harvested in a sustainable manner, but the trees outside Purgatory are incredibly resilient to damage as is the rest of the terrain. Perhaps high-level skills or stats could make the difference when you factor in tool usage. Still, I am hesitant to concede that it is impossible to...”

Even my brain began to bleed and cry at this point.

“...astrology might be useful. While I have not observed any known constellations, I have been hoping to spot a difference or any type of clue in the stars. That is why celestial alignment is key to keep track of. I have not observed a moon, or the possibility of another planet, but without a telescope I hesitate to make any substantive claims...”

After an hour and a half, we reached the edge of the city.

“...that is why you need to consider math as a fundamental form of combat. By using statistical calculations of optimal distribution and tabulating the results across various areas. You can come to an actualization about the overall grind rate. Which is something I realized early on with the blue slimes and continue to use. I hope that helped explain things?”