Unchosen Champion

Coop sat on the dunes, watching the golden sunset reflect on the calm waters around Ghost Reef. A great white heron was walking along the beach, and Coop admired its silhouette as the last of the light faded away. Earlier, one of the new foragers, an ape-like alien, waded out of the water and headed back inside the fort, but there had been no one else. The new residents were still making themselves comfortable inside their new home. Coop was alone, outside the safety of the walls.

Once night fell, the Ancient Prowlers finally joined him, so he started his hunt.

With his ethereal armor and his summoned glaive he casually dodged and defeated the aggressive monsters one after another. He didn’t take damage from their ambushes anymore. Coop’s Agility had risen beyond the Prowlers’ to the point that he didn’t need to dodge by guessing at what direction they would come from. Instead, he was able to wait for their attack to begin before he slid out of the way. It made the entire process of fighting pack after pack of Ancient Prowlers significantly smoother. He didn’t need breaks to allow the Vulnerable debuffs to expire and he was much slower to fatigue. He didn’t need to waste any movement getting out of the way or repositioning anymore.

Camila and Charlie joined him a few hours into his hunt. They killed a few of their own packs but mostly watched Coop as he drove his glaive through the air. He let them know he was going to pull an all-nighter in order to complete his quest before they left the next day. Camila said he was nuts and Charlie wished him luck before they hunted a few more packs and both retired for the night.

As Coop killed the Ancient Prowlers he wondered if there was anything the settlement could do to manipulate which monsters appeared within its territory. There was probably another expensive service he would need to invest in that would give him some influence over them. They hadn’t seen any elites inside the settlement’s territory since they had the small raid of Ancient Defenders. He thought it must be due to the expansion of the territory. The elites were pushed further away each time they upgraded the settlement.

Coop personally wanted to have access to more elites to fight. His experience with the zombies was that they were significantly more rewarding, but he didn’t want the settlement’s residents to be in even more danger than they already were.

It would be nice if they could set up designated areas for monsters to spawn. Coop could create various zones based on his own experience with each monster to guide others on a smoother path for progression. He didn’t want people wandering into the Primal Kites unprepared for their movement, or engaging with the Ancient Prowlers thinking they were weak just because they were right outside of the fort when they were actually fast, tricky, and aggressive.

As the city grew, he might need to set up a system with his army to warn residents of the dangers of each area. It was only a matter of time before new residents took professions that had them exploring the rest of the island chain. He’d have to discuss it with Arthur and Gideon when he got the chance. For now, he’d probably need to focus on conquering the entire territory himself. He hadn’t even finished with the main island yet. He knew at least two more monster types were waiting inside of the mangrove forest and the Primal Kites were just offshore.

Coop kept grinding, letting his thoughts wander to both the immediate and the long term tasks he wanted to work on. Halfway through the night he realized an audience had gathered on the ramparts. It seemed like the army of phantoms were already on a schedule with guards posted even in the middle of the night. Dozens of them were watching his grind session from the top of the walls.

He ignored them for the time being, preferring to make sure he would finish his quest before dawn came. He was making good time, steadily cleaving the monsters with his glaive, he had already defeated more than 4,000 of the Ancient Prowlers.

Eventually, he received a notification that his profession had leveled up to 32. He put his unallocated points into Mind and replaced his glaive with his sword and shield. He’d spend the last few hours of his grind using his close quarters mistjumps to fight the monsters, practicing his ethereal swordsmanship. It was the tactic he developed while fighting the agility based elite zombies to counter their speed and the Prowlers were a natural analog for the quick monsters. He could make some progress reducing the cost of his mistjumps by practicing with the ability and he wasn’t as worried about running out of mana thanks to his upgraded Reaper title. He would gain a bit of mana from every kill.

Coop had to admit, he was starting to have fun again. Grinding monsters was his own personal therapy. The giddiness he felt when successfully outmaneuvering the monsters was hard to deny. It was like a shot of happiness injected straight into his brain whenever he landed a combo or perfectly executed a strike. He strongly suspected that the reaction to proper technique was the result of his Haunted title, but he had no idea how to confirm it. Perhaps he would find the answers as he leveled up and received more skills.