NOVEL NEXT B1 | Chapter 84 - Return
Alexia
After I make it back to the island across the bridge, I find Aidan quickly coming to greet me with a smile on his face just seconds later. And to my surprise, I also find William quietly working on building the base alongside the others, including Elizabeth’s fiancé. A base that has actually had quite a bit of work done since I left. Which should only have been a day or two ago.
Hard to keep track of time nowadays, so I’m not exactly sure.
“You’ve certainly gotten a lot of work done on the base since I left,” I mutter, making Aidan’s smile turn into a self-satisfied grin as he says, “One of the members of Elizabeth’s group got a skill that helps her shape stone and some metals, so we’ve been using it to speed up the progress on the base.”
I grin at that before looking over the base itself and saying, “It’s really starting to look good.”
And I mean that. The base now has a large stone wall spanning all the way around it with a length of a couple hundred meters from one side of the wall that I can currently see to the other, giving plenty of space in the base itself. Meanwhile there is a large opening where I’m assuming a gate will go leading into the center of the walls, which are made up of the repaired ruins from before.
I still wouldn’t call the buildings inside livable though, since the living spaces haven’t been repaired all the way yet and still have quite a few holes in them. So everyone still looks to be living inside of the wooden structures they built before I ever even got out of the dungeon.
Aidan and I continue walking further into the base, and the few people we pass by along the way nod their head with respect towards me, once again surprising me. Since it used to be fear. Even after they had calmed down a lot, there was still a small amount of fear in their gazes.
But now there’s just respect.
Well, except William. He’s obviously avoiding me.
I guess that makes sense though. I did kind of feed his points to Astrid without hesitation.
He’s probably not very happy about that.
We continue walking until we reach another open point on the wall facing directly towards the jungle. Except that this open point actually has some wood and stone structure partially built in it, making the start of a gate.
Makes sense that they’d be building the gate facing the jungle full of monsters before the one facing the bridge. More danger coming from that way.
Aidan and I pass through the unfinished gate and continue walking towards my own clearing.
“Has the hellfrost dragon returned?” I ask, glancing at Aidan as we walk. But he just shakes his head and says, “No, he hasn’t returned from whatever island he went to.”
“That’s good,” I respond before following it up with a short, “Do you think he came from this island?”
Aidan glances at me as he answers, “Yeah. Why?”
“Well, I realized that if he did come from our island, then that would mean there was another dungeon here,” I explain to him while ducking under a branch. “And if that’s the case…”
“You wouldn’t have to leave the island to find your last level capped monster and could just kill the one in the dungeon, and we would also get a second dungeon to train in ourselves,” he mutters, instantly understanding what I’m getting at. Then he looks ahead again without pausing in his step as he says, “Since the guy seemed more personally familiar with you, there’s a good chance he’s seen you before he saw Astrid. Which means he was probably on the island before the Tutorial even ended. And since he wasn’t in the top ten on the leaderboards, there’s a good chance he didn’t finish his dungeon until later on.”
Right.
“So he must’ve come from our island as well,” I say, grinning slightly at that conclusion.
While I could try teleporting to another island, it would be dangerous since I don’t know how much soul it would cost to do that and if I undershoot then it’ll be my death. I could also try waiting for another island to reach ours, but that would take a while and give the other level 100s a chance to pass me.
So there being a dungeon on this island is the best case scenario.
“I’ll go search for the dungeon after my soul recovers,” I tell Aidan, seemingly confusing him. Which reminds me that he still doesn’t know about my whole mana and health merging thing.
Then again, not like he needs to know. So I don’t bother explaining.
Instead I turn around and begin walking backwards with my hands held behind my back as I ask, “Until then, is there anything you need me to do for the base? I’d be happy to help if it isn’t anything very big and doesn’t require much soul.”
He blinks before smiling and answering, “There is, actually. Would you mind speaking with William for me?”
I frown at that request.
“Why?” I ask, tilting my head slightly as we enter my clearing and I turn around again to walk forwards instead of backwards. “He looked like he was behaving from what I saw back there.”
Aidan shakes his head with a sad smile on his face, “If only it were that simple.”
“Oh?” I utter while crossing my arms. “Explain please.”
He glances back at the base again before sighing and turning back to me as he says, “Let’s talk inside your portable home.”
I raise a brow at that but shrug anyways and summon my portable home at the very same spot I summoned it the last time. Then we both step inside where Aidan begins explaining what happened while I was away and the others were in the dungeon.