Below their vantage point, a gentle slope flowed downward, a meadow. Five hundred feet away was a fortress, a wooden palisade surrounded by a ditch, on top of an earthwork, nothing fancy. Inside the fortifications were huts and longhouses. The defenders—in the hundreds—fought against a team of six attackers.

  Wearing armor that made them look like a hybrid between Predator and medieval knights, the band of six kept advancing, turning the monsters into minced meat using machine guns, lasers, forcefields, lances, and shining swords, but also a way to fight that didn’t allow any opening.

  “How the hell did they get here?” Victoria hissed, clenching her teeth.

  “Sweet Saint Patrick, who are those?” Bree gasped. Her interjection made Grace take a personal note to ask Bree if she was Irish.

  “Intergalactic mercenaries,” Victoria said. “Former special forces, all of them, none lower than Legendary. This is worse than I thought.”

  “Do we retreat?” Bree asked.

  “Why don’t we ask the Tactician? Do we have a chance to take them on? Keep in mind we have only secondary heals.”

  Grace pondered whether to dare, trying to get things right in her mind. She surely missed Rowan, and she’d give a hand for him to be near. “We have all Rezzes, right?”

  “Yes,” Victoria said. “But if we attract the Warlord’s attention, those Rezzes ain’t worth diddly-squat.”

  Pausing again, Grace stared again at the battlefield. It wasn’t like she suddenly got smarter and more knowledgeable in warfare. Her new abilities were still crude, imperfect, and needed training. But one thing she could do was compare things to what she knew.

  The troops’ positioning was similar to an orchestra, with the conductor as the leader. In the goblins’ camp, a Shaman-like creature gave orders around and threw lightning and fireballs at the besiegers, surrounded and protected by Orcs and even larger monsters looking like Trolls.

  In the middle of the other group, there was a certain mercenary who was protected by the rest at all times. That was their leader, for sure.

  [Grace to Victoria]: Could you enter the Interdimensional Space and put some iron in someone’s body?

  [Victoria to Grace]: What?

  [Grace to Victoria]: You know, like Rowan. He goes into the fourth dimension, puts a prybar into someone’s body, and when it lets go, that person is killed.

  [Victoria to Grace]: What are you talking about? You can’t harm living creatures from space. The System prohibits it, there’s a code writing in the—

  [Grace to Victoria]: It’s how it works for Rowan. Never mind that. Our objective is not to get the core but to deny it to the mercenaries. Another of our teams can come later and claim it. Can you—

  [Victoria to Grace]: I could sneak up, re-enter our space, and take out the leader. It could be worth a shot. I’ll be dead as soon as I reappear, though. There’s a CD before you can return in the in-between.

  [Grace to Victoria]: Take down the main tank. It’s the next best target, and you can retreat.

  The Vampire nodded and produced a cigarette. “Follow Grace’s orders,” she said, lightened the smoke, and vanished.

  “Who among you has guns?” Grace asked.

  Bree showed her a forty-five caliber and Carla a scoped rifle. After struggling to find it, Grace followed her example and extracted her sniper rifle from the inventory.

  “As soon as Victoria makes her move, we shoot at that guy… gal, thing, whatever, in the center. Aim at the helmet, if possible.”

  “I wish a revolver could hit so far,” Bree shrugged.

  “Just try.”

  “What about us,” the Samurai asked.

  “Protect us as much as you can,” Grace said, hiding her fear, hoping her Rezz worked if things turned bad.

  Faster than anticipated, Victoria appeared beside the mercenary team, and the one in front waved his arms like a seagull its wings and collapsed, spraying blood from its neck. Victoria slid back on her forcefield, distancing herself. Two of them followed her, exchanging blows, but then returned to their position as Grace’s bullets hit their leader’s helm.

  The narrative has been stolen; if detected on Amazon, report the infringement.

  The blonde disappeared again, and the mercenaries changed their target and charged uphill very fast, some gliding above the ground. Projectiles started to mow the trees around. Carla vanished as a bullet hit her chest. Then, a cloud of arrows hit the mercenaries straight on. The monsters had noticed their intervention, understood the tactic, and were helping. All had shot at the same target, the mercenary leader; an arrow was stuck in its helm, deep in an eye socket.

  Yet the mercenaries kept coming, even the wounded leader, who was now shooting bursts of projectiles from their gun. Throwing herself down, Grace started to shoot blindly over her head, activating her Sure Body, Sure Mind perk. It worked; she could hear the impacts, but the aim was not great because of the awkward position. The mercenaries were now thirty feet away. Reluctantly, she prepared for the inevitable: to be killed and—if all went well—Rezzed.

  Bree erupted up, roaring, doubled in size, and dashed at the enemies. Two mercenaries standing in her path were thrown away like rag dolls while she kept going, soaking projectiles, and then she grabbed the third, the leader, slamming it into the ground, twisting the helmet to hit face down. The arrow went deeper, and the mercenary, as well as the Ranger, dissolved and disappeared.

  Out of bullets, Grace threw the rifle and searched her handgun, extricating a leather purse instead of it. Fuck! I must clean my inventory.

  A shadow, an armor, was above her, a bayonet made of light attached to the barrel. Instinctively, she swung her purse at the enemy, hitting it in the face. To her surprise, the mercenary let his rifle go, picking up the purse and throwing it behind.

  He thinks it’s a grenade…

  A blade pierced the mercenary shoulder, Victoria’s, coming from behind, and the Samurai beheaded the foe with a swing of his sword that went through the armor like through paper.

  “I sure could use a healing potion,” the Vampire mumbled, collapsing on the rusted leaves, heavily bleeding from the chest.

  Shit, Grace thought, emptying all her inventory and revealing anything but a healing potion. And she needed one too, she realized when she tried to stand up and fail. A deep wound in her calf bled profusely. There was an arrow there. Grimacing, she tried to pull it out but failed, inflicting herself more pain and bleeding.

  “Sorry, the spawn are terrible shooters,” a voice said. “Stay put, relax.”

  A huge hand slammed on Grace, pinning her to the ground, face down, and another hand did the same with the Samurai, ignoring the sword that went through its flesh and bones all through.

  “Relax, we’re friendly,” the voice repeated.

  “That is to be seen,” a deep voice grumbled.

  “I’ll heal the blonde first; she’s tethering on the brink here.” The Shaman, the village leader, had appeared nearby and was healing Victoria. As the blonde’s breath stabilized, he turned to Grace.

  “Ouch!” The arrow extraction had hurt, but the Healing was awesome, a flush of minty fresh energy flowing through her body.

  “Behave, or I’ll bump your heads together,” the giant restraining Grace and the Samurai said, letting them free. After pulling the sword from its hand, the monster offered it back, and the warrior sheathed it.

  Grace looked around. The Asian with the polearm was nowhere, so she supposed he was killed and teleported out for a Rezz at some point. The notification showed good news.

  Your Party has slain x3 Intergalactic Mercenaries, Lvl. 100. For killing foes of a vastly superior level and tier, you gained 1 AP/kill.

  You have defeated the Mercenary Team, Lvl. 100 6 AP awarded.

  You have leveled x 12. You have 19 free APs to allocate. 2 extra APs have been automatically distributed to CHA, INT, and DEX.

  She was now level seventy-three.

  “Your tag says Allinder. Are you related to the Rowan Allinder monster?”

  She stared at the Shaman for a second, then at Victoria, who shrugged, palms up. True, being a monster depends on each one’s point of view. “I’m Grace, Rowan’s wife,” she offered a handshake.

  The Shaman looked at it befuddled, but the giant nearby took Grace’s hand and smelled it. “See? Told you. The monsters have a matriarchy. The wife fights the important battles, and the husband takes care of the home chores and the small fish,” the Troll told the Shaman, who sulked.

  “How do you know about us?” Grace asked.

  “TV, of course,” the Troll said. “Your husband is infamous; every other talk show is about him.”

  “And you are?” Victoria asked, raising up with a little help from the Samurai.

  “Fenrri Gugvid, Ogre, at your service, and this is my husband, Snemc, the orc Shaman,” the woman answered. “Our clan has been sentenced to forced labor in the dungeons for various petty crimes.”

  So, Ogres, not Trolls. Whatever.

  A vision entered Grace's head. Ogres littering, goblins humping legs, and orcs getting involved in bar brawls. “What happened with the other mercenaries?”

  “They flew away when the horde attacked. Bloody jetpacks!” Victoria creased her nose. It might have been the displeasure at hearing the enemies had escaped or just a reaction to the hundreds of greenish creatures surrounding and staring at them from a safe distance.

  “You’re here for the core, right?” the Shaman asked.

  “We were, but didn’t know you were sentient. I… we believed this was a mini-dungeon,” Grace said.

  “No, it’s the real deal.”

  “I’m… we’re sorry for attacking your people… will they…”

  “Rezz? Some. Our facilities are limited. It was a big dungeon originally, but the Mana Leyline activating it is small. Let’s get to the point. Those guys will be back. Or someone else. Your faction looks reasonable. What about we surrender, and you transform the dungeon into a City Core? This place would do just fine. We’ll plead allegiance to you before the System,” the Shaman said. “Win-win.”

  “Will you allow safe passage for the neighboring Counties? We were hired to clear the road.” The two exchanged a few whispered words, then nodded. “I’ll have to go outside and call my husband. He’s the one who can use Cores.”

  “See? Matriarchy. The wife calls the husband for the menial work. The monsters have a more advanced civilization than we thought,” the Ogre concluded, to the visible distress of the Shaman.

  Thirty minutes later, after probably driving like mad and a couple of Joint Trip: Warps, Rowan arrived and took care of the core, which awarded the team a swooping plus ten APs to the party. After taking a System-enforced Oath, the Shaman offered them a village tour. It reeked of outhouses, but the overall vibe was cozy. Before they finished the tour, a group of tourists, nerds from the nearby campus, flooded the goblin fortress, taking selfies and buying trinkets. Advertising was something the monsters did well, apparently, and they didn’t tarry on humping on opportunities.