"W-wait, are you Zeto?"
"Mmh? You know me?"
"W-Well, you've gotten pretty famous lately ... and then you got the first kill too, and now you're still in the top 3 ..."
The boy's eyes lit up.
"Y-you know, actually I respect you a lot ... someone like me is worth nothing in comparison."
He looked down.
"What do you mean?"
"You see ... I struggle to stay in the Laurel Tier, my power is useless in battle ... I am not made to be here ... now I only have 3 PF"
'Oh ...'
Going down to the Acacia Tier was very dangerous, those who went below -100 fame points were sent away from the Arena, and who knows where.
"Would you like to join forces for this event?"
"W-do you want to be alert with someone like me ?!"
"Why not ..."
Egil now seemed both happy and a little confused.
"Even if having allies in this event is risky, I think it is necessary to have them ... could you tell me what your power is?"
He seemed a little hesitant to answer, but eventually he did, which meant his situation was really precarious.
"My power ... is called "Strategic Chessboard", by activating it I can see the area around me simplified in a virtual checkerboard map that allows me to see the entities nearby, their strength, and their intentions towards me, see … "
He made a chessboard-map appear in front of him, with the area surrounding us, we were represented by chess pieces.
"For example, I am represented as a white king, because well, it's my power after all, while you are represented with a white rook, it means that you are very strong, and being "white" means that you have no bad intentions against me"
He then explained to me in detail the classifications of Strength and intentions.
The entities Strength was classified, from minor to major, as:
-Pawn;
-Knight;
-Bishop;
-Rook;
-Queen;
-White King: holder of the power.
While the intentions were represented as:
- Bad intentions towards the White King: Black Piece;
- Uncertain intentions towards the White King: Red Piece;
- Good intentions towards the White King: White Piece.
'But this power ... it's really fantastic ... in a game where trust is one of the most important things... and it also acts as a map… however in fact in a solo fight it is not very useful.'
"Really amazing ..."
"Are you serious…?"
"Yes, really, maybe with this power of yours we could do really well in this event."
I looked him in the face.
'But… could he have lied to me? ...'
He looked down shyly.
For the moment I dismissed that idea.
We later talked about how to deal with the event and agreed on a line to follow.
We both agreed on one thought: as the days went by, the difficulty of the event would certainly increase, and more high-level monsters would probably appear.
So we decided to obtain as many points as possible in the first few days and then from the third or fourth onwards we would have focused more on surviving than on hunting.
"Don't you have weapons with you?" I asked Egil
"I actually had a spear, but I threw it at a zombie ... and then I ran away..."
"And you killed him?"
"No, I missed it…" saying it he seemed really embarrassed
'Ah…'
It had already been three hours since the start of the event and I had accumulated 14pt, at that moment I was 3rd in the standings.
While Egil was at 6 pt.
"Well, are we going to hunt a little?"
He made a frightened face but then accepted my offer.
'I absolutely want to try to fight an armored zombie'
In the first few days, I absolutely wanted to be in the top 5 in the standings. This whole event would have been absolutely beneficial to my growth, I didn't have to be afraid to dare.
We met a group of 3 zombies just outside the building where we were.
Egil was trembling with fear.
"Quiet, and here..."
I gave him an iron bar that I found on the ground.
"I kill two, you try to kill the other."
"II don't know if ..." He took a deep breath "I'll try ..."
"Good, let's go"
"Yup"
I took a large enough rock and threw it at the head of one of the zombies.
"You take that!"
"O-Ok!"
The two zombies not hit by the boulder ran towards us and I launched toward one of them.
Meanwhile, Egil went towards the stricken and staggering one.
The zombie in front of me tried to bite my neck, I dodged him by twisting my torso and with a baseball player's stroke I cut off his head.
The other without hesitation threw himself towards me, this one seemed more athletic than the other and had pointed nails; he came close to hurting my left arm with his right hand, but I had already "seen" his move and so I managed to pull me away just enough.
Like a ferocious beast he flung himself towards me, I shot him down easily.
'it is much easier to fight with beings who do not think ...'
I looked at Egil's situation, he was on the ground with the zombie above him, the zombie wanted to bite the neck but Egil was able to defend himself by holding the iron bar between his neck and the zombie's mouth.
I ran towards him, but, before I could intervene, Egil managed to turn the zombie over, throwing him to the ground. Egil got up quickly and with all his strength thrust the iron bar into the zombie's head.
Egil won, however, he was seriously injured in the left shoulder.