The moment he got to the vending machine, he grabbed the two random boxes he wanted, quickly spending the money that was given to him by the Guardian of the Innocent, and then bought another red punch potion, plus another one that had an interesting name. 'Rabbit's Foot'. It was a bit of a gamble for Ashton. It might be something that boosts luck, which would be an incredible find in a place like this, or more likely, it would boost running- and jump-power.
Ashton gave the items to the backpacker and then-
[Contract | Backpacker - Level 3 -> Backpacker - Level 4]
"Okay, great," Ashton smiled, patting the spirit on the head before heading off. He was very happy about that level-up, but right now, he had way more on his mind. But instead of rushing back outside to see if he could deal with the Marked right away, Ashton needed to talk to those kids first.
He rushed up to their classroom, and the moment he pushed open the door, the kids ran up to him.
"Did you do it?!"
"How strong were they?"
"How many were there?"
"Was the lady from across the street really a witch?!"
They huddled around Ashton, practically pushing him out of the door. Poppy was clutching strands of his hair, both because she was scared to fall off with how fast Ashton was running around, and because she was worried because of all the sudden noise from the kids. And when things got too loud, before any of the kids could even notice, Poppy disappeared inside of Ashton's vessel, hiding out there for the first time.
"Hey, hey, calm down," Ashton laughed a bit, stepping into the classroom as he quickly answered the questions, "Yes, I got rid of the monsters. The goblins were pretty weak, though there were a lot, and the orcs were stronger but not too bad, except for their leader. You guys were spot on with their numbers, roughly 100 goblins and 8 orcs, including the leader. And the lady from across the street..."
He stopped for a moment. Ashton wasn't sure what he was supposed to say to them. Should he spare these kids just a little bit longer from the new reality of this world, or should he be honest? Though, before he could say anything, Millie spoke up.
"She died, right?" she asked, sitting cross-legged on one of the tables by the window. Her face was serious, like she was almost dreading the answer.
Ashton raised his brows surprised, and slowly nodded, "Yes. She was killed by the monsters that forced their way into her house." The room turned quiet a moment later, and Ashton took a deep breath, "I'm here because I wanted to thank you all. But I also wanted to tell you something. It's good that you're excited about all of this, but... it's not a game. You're going to be able to leave the school at some point, but you need to be careful. Don't run off on your own, listen to your teachers, and take care of each other. I know that you're having fun with all of this, and you guys are clever and brave and genuinely so, so bright in these dark times. And that shouldn't change. But when your teachers tell you to stay away from the windows? Don't run around to try and count the monsters."
The silence was almost suffocating. He sat down on a chair. It was far too small for him, but that was fine. The kids sat down on the ground around him, as Ashton did something gave them a small crash-course on the most important things they had to know about growing up in these times.
He answered all of the questions they had, tried to alleviate of the worries and fears that they were pushing down, and explained to them how they could help not just each other, but the other students that weren't dealing with this situation as well as they were.
He had told the teachers that it was their job to take care of these guys, but at the end of the day, Ashton was the world's foremost expert on what was going on right now. And since he had already gotten involved, Ashton felt like he couldn't just stop halfway through. Especially since he got help from these kids in particular.
Some of the kids started to cry a bit, though they were holding themselves together really well. For nine or ten year olds, these guys were insanely brave.
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"You all have a bright future ahead of you, no matter how horrible this world is becoming. I promise," Ashton explained, smiling. "If you keep at it, and if you learn to truly, truly understand this situation, you're going to be great."
Ashton stepped back outside. He had continued speaking to the kids a bit longer until they were okay. The teacher that was in the room almost seemed more emotional toward the end of that than the kids. But after a little while, he really had to get going, since he had little to no time to waste.
The Marked were dangerous, extremely dangerous. A lot of them were probably dead by now due to the changes in their behaviour after going down that different route.
You didn't just become a Marked because you killed someone. You became a Marked because you chose to kill humans rather than monsters, so the system, or rather the council, marked them as monsters. They basically switched to the other team.
This happened if you killed a vast amount of people, if you killed someone in a particularly gruesome manner, or if you chose an alternate route in particular quests. And well, anyone that chose to kill other people over some vicious, blood-thirsty goblins... you just were a monster yourself.
And with that came a few other side-effects. Like, for example, developing that murderous rage that monsters felt toward people. At least that was just temporary, like a momentary insanity as a punishment. Connected to the new questline of the Marked, they were supposed to kill more people to regain their sanity.
It was a bit weird, though, Ashton always thought that. Being forced to kill more people as a punishment for killing others in the first place? Or maybe it was just the council telling them, 'You want to kill? Okay, then go ahead.'
That second part was probably the most likely, though Ashton had no way of knowing their intentions were with specifics like this.
The only reason why he knew so much about the conditions to becoming a Marked was because the Summoner was the type of psychopath that became one for the crimes they committed against the people of their own world. They got bored of it pretty quickly and just started doing their own thing for a while, doing the bare minimum necessary to clear all the quests. They were never even really affected by that 'rage' either.
Most people would become mindless, rampaging fiends for a while, but the Summoner? They were a little more annoyable for a few hours, that was all. They also rejected most of the other changes they could potentially experience, since they said they were 'the only one allowed to determine this physical form'.
For now, Ashton was trying to figure out what routes the people here might be going down. It probably wouldn't be huge changes, since there were a lot of humanoid species here. People living in the wilderness would be changing a lot more, maybe even turning into something like werebeasts, but in cities it would probably just be minor physical alterations that would become a little stronger as they followed through with the Marked questline.
For a while, Ashton was strategizing while walking the school grounds one more time, to make sure that he didn't miss anything important. He properly said goodbye to the teachers, alleviated their concerns a bit more, and then made sure that Rory and James both knew where to go in case of an emergency - Calibur Games. Since Sam was there, that was going to be the best way to find him.
But there was something else.
James, the headmaster, led Ashton to the parking lot. Specifically, to a bicycle standing at the side of the parking lot.
"You see, I had been trying to stay in shape a bit more lately. My ex wife bought this for me, but I never used it when we were still together. Maybe that's why we split, actually," James laughed a bit. Ashton didn't quite get the joke. He knew it was supposed to be a joke, of course, he just didn't know how he should react and just stared at the man in front of him for a while. James cleared his throat. "Any... anyway, please, go ahead and take it. It might be a bit easier to get around town with this."
Ashton raised his brow. He had never actually thought about that, but it wasn't a bad idea. Taking a closer look, though it was a little scratched up, it seemed to have been mostly ignored by the monsters. The wheels were totally fine as well.
"I won't say no to that. Thank you," Ashton nodded, and quickly grabbed the bike by its seat and handlebar. "In that case, I'm going to head right out."
"Of course. Take care of yourself."
The headmaster made sure to properly see Ashton off as he climbed out over the rudimentary blockage in the front of the school.
Ashton set the bike down, and quickly adjusted the seat, before climbing on. Without even really looking back, he started speeding off past the massive pile of monster corpses.
It had been a while since he rode a bike, so Ashton felt a little awkward about it at first, but he soon got used to it again.
"Huh, I guess you really never forget how to ride a bike." Ashton laughed to himself, quickly turning around the corner. Of course, being on a bike had both benefits and drawbacks.
Obviously, you were a lot faster. And with Ashton's stats as well as Poppy's magic, it was possible for him to speed up to more than thirty miles per hour. If he really put his all into it, he could probably get up to thirty-five, but this was already way faster.
However, with how much shit there was on the road, it was hard to dodge past at times, and if there were any monsters, Ashton wasn't exactly in the best position to attack them. Then again, he could just swing his staff at them while driving past. That would definitely finish most monsters off. Ashton just had to make sure not to get thrown off or crash the bike right after.
Either way, Ashton managed to make his way back to Market Street relatively quickly. He hadn't encountered any Marked, but they probably wouldn't exactly lurk around the walls here.
Ashton stopped and knocked on the wall, "Yo, let me in, it's Ashton."
A few moments of confused scrambling later, someone yelled back from the other side, "Ashton? Who's Ashton?"
"The fuck do you mean, 'Who's Ashton'? The guy that helped you secure this whole street, so just open up and let me inside," he replied with a loud groan. "I'm here to take help out because of those guys running around with Monsters."
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