With the necessary negotiations done, he was once again on his way to the gatekeeper guy to finally leave the fort and go back to heroics. John even wrote and signed him a note that said that he was allowed to leave the fort as he pleased. A legitimate exit-pass. A bit too bureaucratic for his tastes, but it felt good since bureaucracy was on his side this time. It was time to grind. Nothing could stop him now.

  Nancy stopped him.

  She caught up to him before he even reached the gatekeeper guy, panting as she ran up. Honestly, he was a bit astounded at the speed with which the news traveled in the fort. He literally just finished talking to the maybe-dictators and went straight to the exit, and yet she already knew he was leaving? Well, there was a small window of time when John was writing up the note for him and Michael left the office, but the fact that Nancy was already here meant that the dude managed to find her and tell her about Dennis leaving in literally a minute, and that was impressive on its own. Did he run while searching for her? Dennis chuckled at the idea of Michael running around the fort. He seemed like an authoritatively sitting in a cushy office chair kind of guy, so the dissonance was funny.

  “And where–” she was trying to catch her breath as she spoke. “Do you think you are going?”

  “To grind more levels and save more people,” he replied simply. “Which to me sounds like a good thing, right? I really don’t get why so many people are against it. Are you also going to try to talk me out of it?”

  For some reason, he really didn’t want to smack her.

  And he kind of agreed that he wouldn’t do that anymore, though Dennis wasn’t sure how committed he was to that agreement. There was no designated handler yet to do the smacking for him, so it should be fine? Anyway, he didn’t care about breaking the deal that much, if the situation required it then he would deliver the smacking himself and just live outside the fort or something. They didn’t even have the internet, there wasn’t much tying him to the place.

  “In principle,” she said more calmly. “It’s a good thing.”

  “I know, right? But everyone is whining–”

  “In practice,” she continued, looking at him with patience. “I would really love to see you care a bit more about yourself, Dennis.”

  Huh?

  “Ignoring the things that I know you will ignore, so I won’t even mention them,” she said. “Do you know where exactly you are going?”

  “Outside?”

  “To kill more goblins and save more people, yes, but where? Do you know where we’ve seen more of the creatures? In what buildings do we suspect more survivors could be? Have you even looked at the map? Did you take provisions with you? Water? I don’t see you wearing any armor. I know that you know that we started to equip our parties with basic armor. So why didn’t you go and ask for it? You know we have bracers, right? Or do you want to block a rusty cleaver with your bare arm again? A leather vest can stop an arrow from puncturing your organs, Dennis, and we fucking have them! Do you have eyes on your back so you just don’t need them?! Are you just so fucking good that you can catch arrows from behind with your bare ass?!”

  While at the start of her speech Nancy was calm, she was basically shouting at him in the end. He could see tears in the corners of her eyes, and her lip was trembling. Dennis was a bit lost, not knowing what to do. Conversations like this one were always the most confusing, and he usually avoided them like a plague. Mostly they were just an indicator of another friendship ending, of people brooding at him after he inevitably failed at something that he couldn’t wrap his head around.

  Like, okay, yeah, getting some armor is a great idea, thank you, but why the fuck are you shouting?

  Also, he could kind of figure out how to catch an arrow with his buttcheeks if the angle was right. The idea made him chuckle.

  The sound made Nancy look like he slapped her. Oh dear.

  He should probably do what she says. That sometimes worked, and, well, getting some armor would be legitimately great as long as it didn’t impair his mobility.

  “I’ll go get the armor,” he told her. She kept looking at him silently. “And look at the map? And… those other things.” He just wanted to go out to kill some goblins, why did this turn into a whole thing? She was still staring at him. “Thank you?” Just throw shit at the wall until something sticks. Who exactly was he supposed to talk to in order to get the armor and other stuff? Ugh. Really, he would’ve preferred to go out without all that just because the hassle was exhausting. Now he had to talk to even more people. It wasn’t worth it. Could he just sneak out? He should’ve just snuck out from the start, the walls weren’t that high, he could’ve just jumped down from them. A good idea for later.

  Nancy closed her eyes and took a deep breath.

  “Come with me,” she said as she started walking. “We’ll get you the armor, and the intel. There will be a test.”

  Dennis groaned.

  / - /

  Okay, the people in the fort were doing way more stuff than he expected by just noticing things and extrapolating without asking. It still seemed mostly like a volunteer based work, and there were a lot of volunteers for everything since it kind of was a matter of life or death, but the point was that the work was actually organized. Probably by the maybe-dictators, to think about it. People were making a lot of stuff, not just nets, and he just didn’t bother to notice.

  Unauthorized content usage: if you discover this narrative on Amazon, report the violation.

  Case in point, they didn’t just ‘find’ the armor that he sometimes saw the raiding party wearing. They had a fucking armor-making industry. Dead goblins were an abundant resource–thank him very much–and quite a few of them wore very thick leather coverings to protect their vitals. While on its own it couldn’t be worn by anyone except maybe some kids, it didn’t mean that stopped determined people who wanted to do everything in their power to increase their chances of survival. The leather was collected, cleaned, and sorted. The raiding party was informed about the need for crafting instruments and materials, and they managed to deliver some. A bunch of people were figuring out how to create basic defensive equipment, like bracers or a leather cuirass. The things looked a bit hideous by Dennis’ standards, but were already usable. Enough to stop a glancing sword cut or an arrow, at least. In total, more than a dozen people were involved in creation of the equipment, and Dennis was a bit impressed as he saw it all.

  “Why don’t we just raid a police station and get some SWAT gear or something?” he asked Nancy while some girl was fiddling with the grieves so they would fit him better.

  “Too far away,” she said. “Not renewable. We don’t know how useful it would be, and there’s also a theory that with the System it’s possible to unlock crafting skills and create magic armor. A lot of small reasons, but primarily I’d say it’s because we use what we have available instead of risking lives for what could potentially be useful.”

  “I look silly,” he grumbled. “Like a Roman who’s too into patchwork.”

  “You look fine,” she said absentmindedly while pointing at some location on the map that she was holding. “What’s here?”

  “Sightings of giant monster wolves. Or like, not giant but just really big monster wolves? Shoulder height wolves. Gave Gary a scare.”

  She nodded, and pointed at a different location.

  “Old church that’s supposedly good for locking yourself in,” he said. “Potential gathering place for survivors.”

  “And why potential?” she asked.

  “Because we couldn’t check because there’s suspiciously too many goblins nearby, which is also a sign that there could be people inside. Can we stop? I remember literally everything you told me. Like, really literally. My memory is magic now. This is exhausting.”

  “What are you doing?” a childish voice asked directly from behind him.

  “Bah!” He jumped in place and nearly tripped as he fumbled trying to get his sword. Then he remembered that he gave it away so craft-people would make him a proper strap instead of the one he made out of tape.

  “I asked you to stop doing that, Lily.” Nancy looked like she was done with life, her face showing a combination of exhaustion and frustration. “Especially to people like Dennis. You scared him.”

  “She didn’t,” he lied.

  The girl giggled.

  “So,” she said. “What are you doing? Did they allow you to join the raiding party? Are you the party leader now? Can you take me with you? Larry says that only the party leader can decide who’s going to be in the party, and I keep asking him, and he says that I ‘don’t fit in their composition’ but I think he’s just lying, but if you’re the party leader now that means that you can decide and you’re way cooler than Larry and it also means that the party composition changed and that means I can come with you! Can I come with you?”

  Dennis didn’t know whether it was a blessing or a curse, but having a mind that bordered on superhuman allowed him to actually keep up with all the rattling of the overexited girl.

  “They… didn’t actually let me join the party?” he mused. “But I didn’t ask, but I’m pretty sure Michael won’t let me because he thinks I’m a danger to society or something like that. Not that I asked. Or wanted to be there.” Though now that he thought about it, it was pretty rude to label him as some ‘unstable killer’ just because he had good fighting instincts. Dennis was sure that he wouldn’t be doing any killing without any good reason, and stepping on his toes wouldn’t qualify. Michael was just a dick. “Anyway, they’ll just hold me back, so I’ll be going out solo–”

  “Alone?!”

  “Yes, that’s–”

  “But that’s not fair!” she shouted, pointing a finger at him. “Why does everyone tell me that I need a team and can’t go alone and you just… And they just let you!”

  Dennis was guessing that he stepped into some elaborate ruse to keep Lily away from raiding. It looked like they convinced her that going out solo was not an option and then kept denying her party requests with silly reasons like ‘team composition’ or other such nonsense. Which was fair, she was just a kid, and child soldiers were a big no-no. Especially if they were good. What were they going to do if she levels up too much and becomes too powerful to control? Children were stupid and unpredictable, so keeping them away from unfathomable power was just common sense.

  “It’s because you are a kid,” he told her the truth while adopting his mature voice that he used when talking down to children. “Too whiny and irresponsible. Your job is to go to school and do homework. Of course they’re not letting you out, going out is for adults.” He had to admit that keeping the smile off his face was a bit of a challenge. It was nice to be on the other side of this conversation, and he was understanding the adults in his life a bit better. The sweet taste of superiority was indeed addictive.

  “But– But. But you!” The accusatory finger pointed at his face harder.

  “Am a responsible adult,” he said smugly. “I even have an ID that proves it. I am even old enough to buy alcohol! You and I, we’re not the same.” He decided not to mention that he forgot his ID at home so he had no way to prove this. It was actually a good thing since the alcohol part was a lie. “Also, to be fair, I think they wanted me to stay but they can’t stop me.”

  “What do you mean?” Lily’s face rapidly changed expressions from fury to something more thoughtful as she focused on the last part of his explanation.

  “I think what he means is–” Nancy tried to steer the conversation.

  “Unstoppable power can’t be stopped!” Dennis shouted while excitedly raising his hands like some sort of cultist. “What can they do while I’m the strongest hero around?! I can do whatever the fuck I want! Like Homelander, but with good morals! Being stupidly strong is like being an adult but with even less responsibility! By responsibility in this context I mean the need to answer and face consequences for your actions.” Clarifying his intent was important. “They can’t ground you because you can fight your way out, and they can’t kick you out because you don’t really need them to live while they need you, and they can’t dock your paycheck because money doesn’t work anymore. Basically, the stronger you are the more you can get away with, and I’m the strongest. That’s, like, the theme of a good quarter of the comics. On one hand, power corrupts, on the other it's a great responsibility, but the point is the more you have it the more you can do whatever and no one would stop you. Just don’t be a villain, cuz they’re lame, and I would totally kick your ass.” He decided to omit the fact that in 1v1 Lily would probably stomp him. Stupid assassin build.

  “Uhuh…” she nodded slowly.

  “God damn it,” Nancy muttered. “Lily, we’re letting Dennis out not because he’s strong and we can’t stop him. There’s a dozen ways we can. His situation is just different than yours. He’s fast and good at not being hit, so it’s safer for him. You need a party to look out for you, your invisibility just doesn’t last long enough to be safe, and it won’t protect you if there’s nowhere to hide. Please don’t listen to him. I’ll talk to Larry and we’ll figure something out, okay?”

  “Uhuh…” Lily nodded the second time and smiled as she looked up at them. “Don’t worry,” she said. “I’ll be safe. I’m a very careful person.”

  That was a relief.