"Well then, let's get this show on the road!"

"We should really prioritize getting food compared to leveling up, you know," Faith said.

"Don't get me wrong, I also want to get stronger, but I also want to eat," Nickoli added sheepishly.

"Yeah, I know. I mean, don't get me wrong, I'm also pretty hungry. Actually, now that I think about it, when was the last time I ate?" I pondered to myself.

Now thinking about it, I haven't eaten since yesterday at school. Well, I wouldn't really call it yesterday, considering I was transported here when it was late in the evening. Then, it was around mid-day, and after doing a bunch of stuff I'm not exactly sure about, to be honest.

This does beg the question of how much different time is here compared to my world. The last thing I want is to return home only to find out that a few seconds have passed. Actually, this also makes me wonder how we're supposed to return home. When I was reading about the waves, I don't exactly remember it mentioning anything about how to return home.

It would suck if I were trapped here forever. Adding that to the fact that everyone seems to hate us, I wouldn't really like living a life in the shadows. Thinking about it all, I'm still surprised at how well I'm taking being transported to another world.

I guess consuming all that anime and manga really does numb your head to it. Seeing anime about how the protagonist gets summoned as a hero to be praised and have 10 wives... I might as well stop thinking about it. Lowering my mood anymore will just make me want to give up.

"Uh, Alex, are you done reminiscing on your life story?" Faith asked me mockingly.

"Yeah, I'm done. Anyway, back to the topic at hand. What animal, or in this case, monster, has actual meat?" I asked both of them.

"I'm not really sure. Definitely not the Ilumi, as they just fall apart when they die. And I'm pretty certain you can't eat the little remains either," Nickoli responded.

"I don't know, maybe you can," Faith said while squinting at her fingers, crushing a bit of Ilumi remains that I defeated earlier.

"Oh shoot, this reminds me. Faith, did you get the medical equipment? I'm pretty sure that's all we'll have for now, so I don't want to waste it," I said with a tone of panic.

"Relax," she said, turning around and pointing at the plane latched to her back. "I just put it in the gem, like you did to bring them over."

"Oh yeah, speaking of which, how well did the healing potion or whatever work?"

"It actually worked pretty well. Besides the interesting taste, it seems to have magically healed my wounds to a good extent," she said, revealing her bandaged arm from her cloak. "I bandaged the few remaining injuries I had, but the pain has mostly subsided to the point where it doesn't bother me anymore."

Looking at her health bar on the top right of the view, she seems to be speaking the truth as most of her health seems to have recovered.

"Well, that's great to hear. Let's just hope no Ilumi jumps you again and takes you out of commission," I said with a chuckle.

"Listen, it's a one-time thing. I was only caught off guard by it. In my defense, I expected it to just be some weird-looking thing that I could absorb, not, you know, a monster," she said, annoyed at my earlier statement.

"Fair, I guess. I mean, considering the nature of these 'healing potions,' you could probably heal any injury with them. It would make hospitals practically unnecessary. But then again, I'm not exactly sure if these are rare or not, so who knows," I said with a shrug.

"True. I say we should probably save using them unless we desperately need them. I'm not even sure if they provide instantaneous healing or if they take time, so I don't want to assume they can be used for combat," Faith agreed with a nod.

"Well, just keep the medical equipment in your gem... storage? I'm not even sure myself. We can use them when needed. Actually, let's first—Nevermind, let's just discuss while we walk," I said while signaling for them to follow me.

"Uh, sure. What were you about to say?" Faith asked me questionably while walking alongside me.

"So, did you guys actually read through what your power-up method was and how to use them?"

"No, I only checked to make sure you were not trying to make an excuse," Nickoli said.

"I see... Anyways, you should really check up on how to use them while we are walking, since the difference is already showing. Like before, I had to shoot the small Ilumi multiple times, but now I only have to do it once or twice," I said while inspecting my legendary weapon.

"I might as well check mine if it really powers you up that much," Faith said as she began to interact with what I assumed to be her menu.

Anyway, back to my weapon. I still don't know how this supposed gun is a submachine gun. It seems more like a pistol that you can just hold down the trigger to fire instead. I mean, I guess it can be classified as one. I'm not really sure myself, but whatever. Let's just hope this is the only instance of this happening. I had all that buildup only to get this thing.

"Reading mine, it says something about an encyclopedia of monsters that I can fill by completing a drop list of sorts to unlock bonuses," Faith said while rubbing her chin.

"Mine says something about energy boost. I'm not exactly sure what it means from the description. The only real thing I understand is something about drawing energy from around the weapon and using it to boost my power," Nickoli said while squinting at what I also assumed to be his menu while he was riding his tankette.

I still wonder if he will unlock any actual tanks and not just small mini versions. I don't want it to turn out for him to be the Tankette hero or something like that.

"I see. I guess we can just learn as we go. Be sure to keep an eye out, though. While we may get a little stronger, I don't exactly want to take my chances fighting the guard people again," I said while looking around cautiously.

"Agreed. One of them gave me a nasty cut earlier, and while I do want to get some revenge, I can see how badly they beat us, and I think it's best for us to get a little stronger," Faith said with a grunt.

"Likewise," Nickoli agreed.

We continued walking, fighting some Ilumi variations here and there. Unlike when we first arrived, we had an easier time dispatching them than before. However, along with this, we came across another discovery.

It turns out that as long as you are partied up, you will gain EXP along with the rest of the group. This is actually pretty helpful, as then we will all gain EXP across the board together. Though considering how I'm a couple of levels ahead of them already, then it helps them more than me.

Nickoli is still level 4, while Faith surprisingly jumped to level 6, even though I'm pretty sure she was only level 2. I guess since we were partied up with Tibus, she was able to gain some levels from the ore viper.

Speaking of the ore viper, we did come across a couple that we easily dispatched. Most seemed to just stick to hiding and then pouncing on us when we got too close. However, it was really hard for them to do that as I would just hold down the trigger of my gun and force them to either attack or run away.

Considering that if they tried to run, Nickoli would just shoot once in their direction and they would die, presumably from the explosion. And if they attempted to jump at us, Faith and I would easily dispose of them. Any Ilumi we came across was also easily killed, as they no longer needed multiple hits to defeat. It became more of a few seconds before a whole group was killed.

We also came across some new interesting monsters. There was this one monster that was round and had a mouth that opened up, which it used to attack. It was called a Tac and only seemed to come in orange and purple variations.

We were actually almost caught off guard, as they seemed to have what looked like a stem at the top of their heads, giving them the impression of fruit. However, once we got close, they began to move, which I guess was a method to attract prey to kill. Luckily, we were able to pull away Faith's hand before it pounced and almost bit it clean off.

Turns out the other fruit nearby were also these Tacs, as they seemed to grow pupils and began moving. We were able to easily dispose of them, as they needed to roll over to us before they could even have the chance to attack, to begin with.

They seemed to revert back to what looked like normal fruit once they were killed. They did not give much EXP, but we decided to absorb the fruit to unlock new weapon forms.

Tac Pistol Lv 1

Abilities Locked Equip Bonus: Fruit Quality Up

Weapon Mastery: 0

[O]

Orange Tac Pistol

Abilities Locked Equip Bonus: Basic Smoothie Recipes

Weapon Mastery: 0

[O]

Purple Tac Pistol

Abilities Locked Equip Bonus: Fruit Preparation Up

Weapon Mastery: 0

[O]

"Okay, now this is interesting—smoothie recipes and fruit quality improvements?" I said while looking at my gun.

My gun had transformed into the Tac Pistol. It was the normal starting pistol with some design changes, making it look lumpier as well as giving it a different color depending on which form I changed it to.

Either way, I wasn't exactly planning to use these weapon forms as they didn't unlock any power-related improvements. But seriously, smoothies? What the hell does the weapon want me to do with smoothies? Start a smoothie shop?

"What the-" I heard Nickoli say questionably as he looked at what I assumed to be his menu.

Both Faith and Nickoli also seemed confused as they inspected their respective weapons. I could assume that they had also gained the smoothie-making abilities I had. However, the fruit preparation ability gave me an idea.

I began to inspect the remains of the Tac. These Tacs were fruit monsters; maybe they became edible after defeating them. I mean, while I had doubts before, considering how I'm tempted to eat grass like dogs sometimes, I would rather take my chances with the fruit, to be honest.

"Hey, guys, do you think we should eat these things or..." I said, turning around while holding the fruit remains of one.

I turned around to see both Faith and Nickoli shoving the few remaining fruit body remains into their mouths.

"I guess you're one step ahead of me. Does it taste bad or anything?" I said with a sigh as I facepalmed.

"Nmoph," Nickoli muffled with a mouthful of food.

"What?"

"Mwph," Faith also muffled from the food.

"Don't eat with food in your mouths. It increases your chances of choking, and it also decreases your ability to be heard. Finish chewing before speaking, please," I said matter-of-factly.

They began to try to forcibly chew the food in their mouths, but bits and pieces of juice squirted out, and some remains fell out. Nickoli even spat out a little of the food into his hand so he could chew better. Okay, this was getting disgusting.

"Chew with your mouth closed as well! I don't want to hear your struggling, my goodness," I said before turning around.

I might as well try to eat it. Well, they had only left behind one piece, so there really isn't much left. I took a big bite out of the orange Tac. It had the shape of an apple but was more circular and slightly smaller. It felt kind of weird eating something that had been alive just a bit ago, but I imagined this could be how cow farmers feel back in my world.

It tasted... weird, that was really the only way to put it. It tasted like a pineapple but not exactly like it. It had a hint of something else, but I couldn't quite put my finger on it. I mean, either way, it didn't really taste that good; it was really sour. I wasn't sure if the fruit was naturally like that or if there was something else to it. Actually, this reminds me, I can try something.

I switched my weapon to the Tac Pistol again. It had fruit quality improvements, so maybe it would make the fruit taste better. I took another bite, and this time the fruit felt fresher, almost sweeter too. I mean, it was still sour, but it was more bearable. Well, it's not like I would have stopped either way—I was really hungry.

The fruit was small enough for me to eat in a couple of small bites. It didn't fully satisfy my hunger, but it helped a little. Let's just hope it wasn't poisoned or anything; that would be horrible considering we all ate them.

I quickly finished the second one in a couple of bites as well. Unlike the two of them, I made sure not to waste any. Once I finished, I turned around, hoping to see them no longer choking on their fruit.

"Well, are you guys done shoving your faces full of fruit?" I asked both of them annoyed.

"Yeah... sorry, I guess the hunger finally got to us, and we just couldn't resist," Nickoli said sheepishly.

"Well, whatever, at least you have something in your stomachs. The issue now is that I barely have any food left to eat," I said with an annoyed sigh.

"Listen, we'll get more Tac monster fruit to eat, okay? It shouldn't be that hard to find them," Faith reassured.

"I guess. Also, before I forget, using the Tac variant of your weapon forms will actually make the fruit taste better. I'm not really sure how it works, but it just does. So next time, equip it to enhance the taste," I explained to both of them while showing them my Tac weapon form.

"Alright, and this reminds me, what exactly does it mean when it says 'abilities unlocked' in the weapon form name? I'm not sure, so I'm asking if you know," Faith asked while she looked at her menu.

"Oh, right. So basically, when you unlock a new weapon form, the abilities are initially locked. To unlock them, you just have to keep the weapon equipped for a certain period of time. Once unlocked, the bonus it provides becomes permanent, even when you're not using the weapon," I explained to her while playing around with my weapon.

"I didn't quite understand what you said," Faith interrupted.

I gave an exasperated sigh before explaining again, "When you get a new form, it has locked abilities. After using it for a while, they become unlocked. Once unlocked, the bonus it provides is permanent."

"I see," Faith said while rubbing her chin.

"Don't tell me you need me to explain it again?"

"No, no, it's alright, I get it."

Actually, this reminds me, does that mean the blue pistol I was using before is finally unlocked?

Small Blue Pistol Lv 1

Abilities Unlocked Equip Bonus: +2 Attack

Mastery Level: 8

[O]

Well, that was surprisingly fast. I only had it equipped until I got the submachine gun, well, more of a machine pistol but still. I'm fairly certain the submachine gun isn't unlocked either, though it never hurts to check.

Ore Viper Body Submachine Gun Lv 6

Abilities Locked Equip Bonus: +3 Agility

Mastery Level: 0

[O]

Well, I'm not that surprised since I didn't use it for that long. It might be that the better the equip bonus, the longer it takes to unlock. Though I'm not sure, as I would need multiple weapons to test it out. Whatever we figure out, we'll do so when we get there. I'll just continue using it for now.

"Alright, well, I can hold off on food for a bit since it's not my top priority right now. My main focus is to get you guys stronger, as I don't want to get beat up by those guard guys again," I said to both Faith and Nickoli.

Actually, now that I think about it, their armor was really the main thing that made them tough. While my bullets only left a burn mark at most on the armor, I bet if I could hit them in their unarmored sections, I might actually hurt them.

That was our main disadvantage when fighting them. One hit from them would result in a deep, bleeding cut, while our attacks seemed to do little to nothing. Maybe I should have grabbed some armor when I was running through town. Eh, I'm not even sure if I would have had enough time.

Either way, I really should find something else to change into. My school clothes are getting dirtier by the hour, with small holes and a big cut in the center from Tibus's sword. Well, we can't even go to any town, even if we wanted to, considering their hatred for the weapons we have.

I mean, if we are the heroes, then why don't they treat us like it? Do the inhabitants of this world not even know about the looming disaster in the form of the waves? Then again, I don't even know what the waves are, but if they're as bad as they sound, then I can assume the worst.

Okay, I'm getting sidetracked. What we need is to level up and get new weapon forms. Along with that, we need armor or protective gear to ensure that not every single hit results in a critical injury. I can safely assume that the cloak Faith has and the ragged clothing that Nickoli is wearing do little to help them against attacks.

"Are you done scheming your usual plans, Alex?" Faith chuckled to herself in a mocking tone.

"Yeah, yeah, don't worry. I was just lost in my thoughts again," I replied. "I can figure out the things I was thinking about later. Let's just focus on leveling up for now."

"If you say so."

We continued traversing the forest in random directions without much guidance. We come across Ilumi quite often now. I'm not sure why they sort of disappeared a while ago, but I won't complain since EXP is EXP.

We did stumble across more Tacs like before, but they were easily killed since we knew their fruit disguise was just a facade. They didn't give much EXP like the Ilumi, but then again, I might just be comparing it to the large Ore Viper a little too much. The disappointment in EXP, however, didn't stop me from eating them afterward.

Since we all gained EXP due to the party mechanic, everyone was able to earn EXP across the board. It was a significant improvement compared to when we first started without it, and it relied on who landed the final hit on the monster to gain EXP. Either way, we all gained decent amounts of EXP, although not as much since each monster gave us a small amount. But it does add up after a while.

Not much else changed for us for the next couple of days. It was just a cycle of going out of the mound, killing monsters, eating the Tac remains for food, and going back and then sleeping. Not much changed as after a while most of the monsters that were threatening us did little to nothing to us after a while.

We did come across some monsters that were not fruit-related, unlike the Tacs from earlier. They were cone-shaped, in contrast to the round Tacs and pyramid-like Ilumi. I guess this world really likes geometry. They were called Konus.

They attacked by launching themselves and attempting to impale us with the pointy end of their tips. So far, we've only encountered white Konus. They also shattered upon defeat, similar to the Ilumi. I'm not sure if they are related or something. However, these guys were larger, about the size of a large trashcan.

What was interesting was that their tips seemed to glow a little before they threw themselves at us. I'm not sure if that was them charging up or something, but it looked pretty cool.

They didn't pose much of a threat. To be honest, they seemed easier to fight compared to the Ilumi. Then again, it could be because we've grown stronger to the point where they can't do much. I will admit they do launch themselves pretty fast. But anyways, I don't care as long as we defeat them.

As before, we absorbed the remaining bits so we could unlock new forms.

Konus Pistol LV 1

Abilities Locked Equip Bonus: +2 Agility

Weapon Mastery: 0

[O]

White Konus Pistol LV 1

Abilities Locked Equip Bonus: +1 Agility

Weapon Mastery: 0

[O]

Well, all they gave were agility bonuses, and my submachine gun had a better version of it. So I saw little to no point in swapping to it. However, I did switch to my small red pistol as the submachine gun finally unlocked its perks.

I'm still not exactly sure what agility does. Well, I know it involves movement, so maybe it's just speed. I mean, I don't feel faster, but maybe I am. I'm not sure myself, but any buff is good as long as it has a plus sign, so it's fine by me.

"Can we take a break? I'm really starting to get overheated," Faith pleaded as she walked.

"Sure, I guess. It's already later than noon. We can take a break," I said as I walked over to a big tree and sat against it.

Nickoli and Faith followed suit, each finding a place to sit down and engage in their own activities. I figured I might as well take the time to check our progress. We had made some insane headway, leveling up quite a lot and still having a good chunk of the day left.

Surprisingly, I had reached level 21. I hadn't paid much attention to the levels as we encountered groups of weak monsters every minute or so. Faith and Nickoli had also made significant progress, with Faith reaching level 20 and Nickoli reaching level 19.

They had also unlocked a couple of weapon forms and took my advice to unlock their abilities as well. Surprisingly, there were no skills or anything of that nature, but we weren't in a rush to acquire any yet.

I had used the EXP to level up my gun quite a bit too. Let me quickly check the weapon form.

Ore Viper Body Sub Machine Gun Lv 20

Abilities Unlocked Equip Bonus: +3 Agility

Mastery Level: 44

[O]

Yeah, I might have poured all my EXP into that one weapon. Is it smart? No. Do I care? No. I should probably save up some points just in case I unlock a cool weapon form I want to use. The Viper Core weapon or whatever will be unlocked soon, so it wouldn't hurt to have some points in reserve, I guess.

Speaking of vipers, we did come across a few, although not many. I'm not exactly sure if they are rare or something, but for me, EXP is EXP, so I couldn't care less. It's similar to how I now see the fruit monsters as food. Sure, they may have a bullet hole or two, but they're still good with my tac pistol equipped.

I should probably not indulge in those fruits as much as the other two do. I don't want to end up barfing them up mid-battle, after all. Well, that, and it would probably feel weird having them slosh around inside me. But I don't want to think about it right now.

Either way, I can safely assume that if we encounter those dumb guards again, we won't get our butts kicked like before. I'm tempted to go back to the village and give them a piece of my mind, but I'm fairly certain we are lost, so I can't do that, can I?

Maybe there's a mini-map feature somewhere in the menu that I can activate. This world already feels like a video game, so I would expect something like that. I'm not sure if there's a settings button anywhere, though. It wouldn't hurt to look.

Lost in my own thoughts, I was flipping through my menu. There wasn't anything in the settings, only information about different features that didn't seem important to me, at least for now. As I was combing through, I heard a snap behind me.

"What was that?" I asked, looking questioningly at Faith and Nickoli.

I couldn't get a good angle to see behind the tree I was leaning against since, you know, I was sitting against it. They both shrugged their shoulders and went back to doing whatever they were doing.

I just took it as some wind or something. If it was an Ilumi or whatever, I'm pretty sure at our level it wouldn't pose much of a threat. I went back to scrolling through my menu, searching for the fabled settings or map button.

Then I heard a crack and a snap. What's next, a pop? I wasn't sure if it was just the wind breaking some branches or something else. But I figured I might as well check if it was going to keep making annoying sounds and bothering me.

I got up and unholstered my abomination of a submachine gun. I aimed it forward and began to slowly walk around the tree. However, just as I started, there was a thunderous amount of snapping and breaking.

In a rush, I moved quickly to see what the hell was going on. That's when the tree broke in half. I wasn't even sure how—it just seemed like a big green object smashed through and shattered its body. Luckily, both Faith and Nickoli were on the grass a bit away, so when the top half of the tree slammed down, it didn't affect them.

But I did notice a large number of tree fragments lodged into Nickoli's tank. The big green object eventually came to a stop, seemingly lodged into the ground. As it came into view, it turned out to be a massive Konus, almost the size of a tree.

"What the hell is that?!" I heard Nickoli scream out in panic.

"A giant Konus, apparently. I think you can assume what it was trying to do!" I yelled back, slightly startled.

"Well, then let's show this geometric asshole not to mess with us," Faith remarked as she grabbed the plane off her back.

She was using the equivalent of my ore viper body submachine gun. It looked exactly the same as the base Bi-plane, with some sections being rocky or sandy and adorned with snake decorations. Nickoli was also using the same equivalent, with the tankette resembling an Italian L3 tank, if anything.

I initiated the attack by shooting a frenzy of bullets before pausing to readjust my aim. I had used this weapon for a while, but the recoil was still horrendous. I mean, whose idea was it to make a pistol rapid-fire?

Faith continued the assault by firing a number of pellets. Well, I hadn't quite figured out what they were, but I'd call them pellets for now. They actually seemed to leave a mark on the enemy, unlike before when they were merely annoying.

The giant Konus was finally starting to dislodge itself from the ground. Its tip began to glow, which I assumed meant it was charging up.

Seeing this, Nickoli began to fire his tankette cannon at the giant.

"Okay, this thing must be really tanky considering how many hits it's taking from all of us," I said in between shooting bursts of bullets.

"OH SHIT, NICKOLI, WATCH OUT!"

I only saw the giant thing throw itself at Nickoli's tank, but it clearly landed its hit as his tankette went barreling into a tree.

"Why you little—" I could hear Faith angrily say before she began running towards the giant.

What is she planning on doing, punching it or something?! Okay, we have to finish this thing off now before Faith gets sent packing.

"Alright, that's enough messing around. Let's just finish this thing an—"

EXP +150

"Oh, it's dead."

"Yeah, I guess it just died," Faith said while standing on top of its shattered remains.

"I guess it did... Oh yeah, Nickoli! Shit, we need to check up on him!" I said as I began running to where he was launched.

I ran over and flipped his flipped-over tankette. I opened the hatch at the top and took a peek inside.

"Hey Nickoli, you alright?"

"Yeah, I'm fine... My head hurts though, so there's that. I'm okayish," he responded, clearly dazed.

"Alright, if you say so. Faith has medical equipment if you need some, so just ask her for it if you need anything."

"Roger that," Nickoli said while holding his head, with a little blood dripping down.

I pulled my head out to see Faith standing next to me. I almost stumbled into her, but she was able to move out of the way before I did.

"Oh, my bad, sorry. Anyways, I'm pretty sure you can hear how Nickoli sounded, so just double-check that he's alright."

Faith nodded as she also peered inside his tankette. I decided to walk over to the remains of the giant Konus instead. Let's see if I can get a cool new weapon form from this monstrosity. I scooped up some of its green bits and began absorbing them into my gem, which transformed before long.

Green Konus Anti-Armor Rifle Lv 1

Abilities Locked Equip Bonus: +5 Attack

Special Equip Effect: Defense Piercing Rounds (Weak)

Weapon Mastery: 0

[O]

Okay, now that's new. Special equip effect? Not sure what this is, to be honest. Judging from the name, however, it seems to ignore or pierce defense in some kind of way. Is this meant to counter high-defense players? Correction—people in this case.

This can actually be pretty useful depending on the circumstances, though I will probably need to experiment a little to see exactly what it entails. Anyways, on a completely different note, I just leveled up to 22, so that is nice. I can also actually swap to my new weapon immediately, unlike the viper core weapon.

Switching to it, the weapon form seemed to expand mid-morph as it took the shape of a long rifle. It was legit just green, I'm not even joking. It was just moss green, as if someone went to a weapon shop and wrapped it in moss green color. Eh, it could be worse, to be honest. It could be bright green, which would really hurt my eyes.

"I KNEW I HEARD SOMETHING OVER HERE!"

I quickly turned my head to see three more soldier-looking dudes staring at us. Well, they resembled knights, if anything, but still, they looked official. Judging by their demeanor, I can guess the reason why they are here.

"This is the end of the line for you criminals," one of them said as they stepped up.

"Why can't I ever catch a break?"

End of Chapter 5

[New World Info]

[Weapon Form Ability Unlock]

Unlocking the abilities of a weapon form to become universal and permanent requires the user to use the said weapon for a period of time. The time needed to unlock depends on the abilities that said weapon will unlock, so a starter weapon will unlock faster than a level 100 requirement weapon.

Authors Notes:
Hello everyone I hope you enjoyed this chapter. This chapter was mostly filled with Alex and Co farming for levels and gaining new weapon forms. Now leveled up, maybe this time the encounter with the guards will go differently? Be sure to come back next week to find out!