They didn’t waste long debating.

  At first, the smarter move had seemed obvious—stay in town, gather information, secure lodging, think. Survive the first night without adding wilderness variables to the equation.

  Reality corrected that plan quickly.

  The inn required coin.

  They had none.

  Jen’s charm didn’t work. Negotiation didn’t work. Even Silas’ polite diplomacy bounced off the innkeeper’s flat stare.

  No coin. No room.

  Which meant one thing.

  They needed the quest. Hoping that those question marks in the quest window might give out coins.

  So the five of them left town.

  Larry proved unexpectedly useful. He showed the crude map to several cats along the main street, and the reaction shifted immediately when they could smell he was a fisherman. Whiskers twitched. Tails flicked approvingly. Directions came easily after that.

  Every cat knew the lake.

  But something was odd though. Even if Larry was a fisherman, he didn’t even start fishing yet in this world, but somehow these cats could smell it? It was either the class had a hidden perk or Larry’s hobby from back in the real world somehow lingered into here.

  The road out of town was hard-packed dirt, bordered by waist-high grass that swayed in the afternoon breeze. The air smelled cleaner here—less smoke, more earth and water.

  Arthur cleared his throat as they walked.

  “Let’s complete this before sundown,” he said firmly.

  Everyone looked at him.

  “Why?” Jen asked lightly, though her tone carried curiosity rather than concern.

  Arthur gulped a mouthful. Feeling the gaze on him. “Visibility drops. Risk increases. You get lost easier. Reaction time slows. And the biggest issue any nocturnal predators are actively hutning.”

  Practical. Measured.

  Tim added without looking at anyone, “And it’s not just beasts.”

  That made them glance at him.

  “Bad humans,” he continued. “Desperate ones. The kind who’d rather take what we have than earn it.”

  Silence followed that.

  The emotional tone shifted subtly—from inconvenience to awareness.

  They weren’t alone in this world.

  And not everyone would be friendly.

  The dirt road narrowed as they went deeper. Eventually, Larry raised a hand and pointed.

  “There.”

  A massive old tree loomed ahead, its trunk thick enough to hide a truck behind. Its roots broke through the earth like coiled serpents. According to the map, they were to pass it—then leave the path.

  Larry did so with visible excitement, stepping beyond the road into the grassplain with the eagerness of a man approaching his favorite dock at sunrise.

  Jen felt the same. Smiling with a little hum. She spun slowly once, taking in the vast grassplain before her.

  Tim’s reaction was the opposite.

  His dagger was already in his hand.

  His eyes moved constantly—left, right, treeline, shadows, movement patterns. He wasn’t sightseeing. He was calculating angles. Who knew what lurked under the tall grass of the grassplain.

  Arthur matched the energy. His sword remained sheathed, but his hand rested firmly on the hilt. Subconsciously, he positioned himself closer to the group’s center, adjusting pace so no one lagged too far behind.

  Protective.

  Structured.

  Prepared.

  Silas walked slightly behind Larry, not relaxed but not tense either. He scanned the surroundings at steady intervals.

  But part of his attention remained inward.

  The translucent system window hovered faintly in his vision.

  [Fireball Lv.1][Active]

  [Tier 1 Spell]

  [Description:

  Conjure a concentrated sphere of flame and launch it toward a target within sight. Upon impact, the fireball erupts in a burst of heat and force, scorching enemies and igniting flammable materials in the immediate area.]

  [Effects:

  Deals 12* Fire Damage

  High chance to apply Burn to flammable target]

  [Cost: 15 MP]

  [Cast Time: Depend on user’s literacy and fluency. On average 60 seconds.]

  Cliché or not, Silas chose Fireball.

  He used his single skill point without ceremony, watching the darkened node flare to life in his skill tree. It was the oldest trick in every fantasy story ever told—novels, films, games. When in doubt, throw fire.

  Safe gamble.

  Reliable archetype.

  Except for one problem.

  Cast Time: 1 Minute.

  Silas stared at the number.

  One minute wasn’t a spell.

  It was a countdown to his own funeral.

  In combat, sixty seconds was an eternity. Enough time for an enemy to close distance. Enough time to bleed out. Enough time to die twice over.

  The message was clear.

  End the fight in one blow.

  Or don’t start it at all.

  He understood the implications immediately. Back when he’d chosen Mage, the star ratings had told the story plainly—high damage, low defense, fragile survivability. A glass cannon without the cannon loaded yet.

  Mages weren’t meant to fight alone.

  They were meant to stand along with a team.

  Unless, of course, you were a certain purple mage with skeletons that followed every command.

  Silas exhaled slowly.

  Regret was useless currency.

  He would make it work.

  And pray the next level came quickly in case it turned out to be shit.

  “Wait.”

  Arthur’s voice cut through the breeze.

  All five of them stopped.

  They stood at the border where grassland surrendered to forest. Behind them, sunlight stretched wide and golden across open fields. Ahead, tall trees crowded together, their canopies weaving into a ceiling that swallowed light whole.

  The forest didn’t look welcoming.

  It looked watchful.

  “What’s wrong?” Silas asked.

  Arthur didn’t answer immediately. He studied the treeline, the long shadows pooling between trunks.

  “Guys,” he said carefully, “we’re about to walk into that.”

  Jen blinked. “Of course we are, you silly. The map says so. Right, Larry?”

  Larry nodded with mild uncertainty, clutching the crude drawing like it might revise itself.

  “Yes, I know the map says that,” Arthur replied, voice tightening. “But why are you all so calm about it?”

  Tim crossed his arms. “Get to the point.”

  Arthur gestured toward the forest. “We’re heading into a dark, unfamiliar woodland in a world we barely understand. There could be worse monsters than those sheep in the grassland. And we’re on a quest. In every game I’ve ever played, the ‘simple forest quest’ is never simple.”

  He wasn’t wrong.

  The emotional temperature shifted.

  From excitement.

  To calculation.

  This story originates from Royal Road. Ensure the author gets the support they deserve by reading it there.

  “Shouldn’t we be more prepared?” Arthur pressed.

  “Prepared how?” Tim asked flatly.

  Arthur hesitated, then pushed through. “Supplies. Extra food. Water. Maybe practice our skills first? We don’t even know how to use them properly. And we’re just… walking in?”

  Arthur had a point.

  Silas knew it.

  Preparation mattered. Discipline mattered. Walking blind into a forest in a world that handed out necromancers and teleporting rogues like candy was not the definition of strategic thinking.

  But he also knew his coworkers. They—

  Oh, hell.

  “Guys,” Silas said flatly, “Larry’s already in.”

  They all looked.

  “That idiot,” Tim muttered, and broke into a jog without waiting for consensus.

  “Come on!” Jen called brightly, as if this were a picnic. “We’ve got a quest to do!”

  She skipped after them.

  Skipped.

  Silas glanced at Arthur and gave him an apologetic grin. “Sorry about that. My coworkers aren’t exactly known for their tactical patience.”

  Then he stepped into the forest.

  He didn’t run. Running meant panic. Panic meant noise. Noise meant attention. He just keep up enough to see everyone within his line of sight.

  Behind him, Arthur stood frozen for one breath longer than the others. His rational mind clearly still wrestling with his survival instinct. While he also couldn’t brain how these people were behaving like this.

  Then he looked at the quest window again.

  Guard the Fisherman.

  Not optional.

  Arthur swallowed and sprinted in after them.

  The forest closed around them like a curtain.

  Light thinned. Air cooled. The ground softened beneath their boots. Leaves muffled their steps, which somehow made the silence louder.

  While trekking through the forest, Silas tried out his only spell.

  He focused on Fireball.

  The interface responded instantly.

  A new window appeared in front of him.

  But this time, it wasn’t English.

  The text was composed of sharp curves and angled strokes—symbols that didn’t belong to any Earth language he knew.

  Yet he understood them.

  Not fluently.

  But enough.

  He began to speak.

  The syllables felt foreign in his mouth, thick and deliberate. Each word required precision. As he pronounced them correctly, portions of the glowing script illuminated one by one.

  Activation through articulation.

  Not a button press.

  Not a thought.

  A spoken invocation.

  So this is how it works, he realized.

  Each correctly spoken segment lit up brighter, feeding into the forming spell matrix.

  It was less like gaming.

  More grounded reality.

  “This is tedious,” he muttered under his breath.

  A full minute of reciting under pressure? In combat? With something charging at him?

  Now the cast time made sense.

  Literacy. Fluency. Confidence.

  Magic wasn’t about mana alone.

  It was about command of language.

  He almost laughed.

  If a mute chose Mage… how would they cast?

  Would the system adapt? Would there be sign-based incantations? Or would they simply be locked out?

  The thought lingered—

  Until a scream tore through the forest.

  Silas’ head snapped up.

  He and Arthur ran toward the sound.

  Branches snapped underfoot. Leaves scattered. The forest no longer felt watchful.

  It felt alive.

  Ahead, Tim burst through the trees—running straight toward them.

  He didn’t slow.

  He didn’t explain.

  He ran past them without looking back.

  Jen stumbled after him, then stopped when she reached Silas and Arthur. Her face was flushed, eyes wide, breathing ragged.

  She was mumbling something under her breath.

  Panicking.

  “Help!” Larry’s voice cracked through the trees.

  Silas didn’t hesitate.

  He sprinted toward it.

  Arthur started after him—

  —but a hand grabbed his arm.

  Jen.

  She clung to him, fingers digging into his sleeve. “Don’t leave me,” she choked, tears spilling now. “Please don’t leave me!”

  Silas broke through the brush and saw it.

  Larry was on the ground.

  Something was on top of him.

  A massive rat—bloated and muscular, the size of a pitbull—snarling, yellow incisors snapping inches from Larry’s face.

  Larry had managed to wedge his fishing rod horizontally between them, arms shaking as he used it like a makeshift bar to keep the creature’s jaws from closing.

  The rod bowed under pressure.

  Larry wouldn’t hold long.

  “Shit,” Silas breathed.

  He reached for Fireball instinctively.

  The chant window snapped open before his eyes, glowing symbols waiting to be spoken.

  He’d memorized parts of it while walking. Repeated the sounds in his head. Prepared.

  Not enough.

  He began the incantation while running, syllables tumbling out in hurried precision. Letters flared green one by one.

  Closer.

  Closer.

  He yanked his wand free and pushed through the middle phrase—

  The script flashed—

  Then turned red.

  Failure.

  One mispronounced syllable.

  One rushed vowel.

  The spell collapsed.

  Damn it.

  He’d calculated the timing wrong. He’d assumed he could finish the cast just as he reached Larry.

  Assumptions got people killed.

  He didn’t have another minute.

  The rat snarled and shoved harder. Larry’s grip slipped.

  Silas didn’t think.

  He kicked.

  Hard.

  His boot slammed into the rat’s flank. The impact surprised even him. The creature yelped and flew sideways, skidding across leaves before scrambling back to its feet with terrifying speed.

  Up close, it was worse.

  Matted fur. Veins bulging beneath the skin. Eyes feral and bright with rage.

  It screeched at him and lunged.

  “Get up, Larry!” Silas barked. Stepping between them.

  “I’m trying!” Larry wheezed, struggling to his feet. His legs were shaking uncontrollably. The ambush had drained him; fear had turned muscle into water.

  Silas forced the chant again.

  Faster this time.

  Words spilling out sharper, breath tighter.

  Green.

  Green.

  Green—

  The rat leapt.

  The letters turned red again.

  Another failure.

  The spell unraveled mid-syllable.

  Silas didn’t stop to curse.

  He swung his wand like a baton at the incoming blur.

  But he was too late.

  The rat hit him like a sack of wet muscle and teeth. Its jaws clamped onto his chest.

  Silas screamed.

  White-hot pain tore through him as claws raked downward, shredding fabric, skin, dignity. The world shrank to fur, blood, and the sound of his own pulse hammering in his ears.

  For half a second, there was fear.

  Raw.

  Animal.

  Then something else surfaced.

  Anger.

  Cold. Focused. Merciless.

  His eyes, usually steady, flickered with something darker.

  The rat snarled, tightening its bite.

  Silas didn’t reach for magic.

  He reached for steel.

  His hand found the kitchen knife at his belt. He ripped it free and drove it forward with every ounce of strength he had.

  The blade punched into flesh.

  He stabbed again.

  And again.

  “Die!” he roared. Voice breaking through the trees.

  The creature shrieked, twisting to escape, but Silas grabbed it by the scruff of its thick neck and yanked it close. He kept stabbing—short, brutal thrusts fueled by adrenaline and fury.

  Hot blood splashed across his hands. His shirt. His face.

  The rat’s resistance faltered.

  Its squeals thinned.

  Then it went limp.

  Silas held it a second longer, as if daring it to move again.

  It didn’t.

  He released it.

  The carcass dropped heavily to the forest floor.

  Silas knelt on the ground.

  His breathing came in ragged pulls. His hands trembled violently now that the violence had stopped. The forest noise crept back in—leaves rustling, distant birds startled into flight.

  A blue window materialized before him.

  [You have level up.]

  He stared at it blankly.

  No triumph.

  No relief.

  Just acknowledgment.

  A few seconds later, it vanished.

  “Silas.”

  Arthur’s voice sounded distant.

  Silas turned.

  Arthur stood several feet away, sword in hand, though the tip wavered slightly. Jen clung to his back, fists twisted in his tunic, eyes wide and glassy with shock.

  Larry was still on the ground where he’d fallen. The easygoing fisherman looked pale now, breathing shallow, staring at Silas while trembling.

  Silas tried to stand.

  His legs buckled.

  He dropped back to one knee.

  “Shit,” he muttered.

  Only then did he notice.

  His knees were shaking uncontrollably.

  The adrenaline that had carried him through the fight was draining fast.

  And with it came awareness.

  He looked down.

  His left chest was soaked in red.

  “Fuck.”

  The rat had torn more than fabric. A bite mark gaped just below his collarbone, flesh ragged. Blood flowed steadily, darker now without the chaos to hide it.

  Strangely, it didn’t hurt yet.

  Shock was merciful like that.

  He stripped off his torn tunic and tried to rip the sleeve for bandaging. His hands slipped, clumsy and slick with blood.

  “Arthur,” he said through clenched teeth, “help me out here.”

  Arthur moved instantly. One clean slice of his sword separated the sleeve. Efficient. Controlled, despite the tremor in his grip.

  Silas pressed the cloth hard against the wound. Arthur wrapped the other strip tight across his chest, binding it firm enough to slow the bleeding.

  It hurt now.

  Dull. Deep. Real.

  “We need to get out of here,” Silas said.

  No one argued.

  They moved as a unit this time.

  No skipping.

  No wandering ahead.

  Arthur kept close. Tim nowhere in sight yet. Jen stayed glued behind the warrior. Larry walked slower, shaken into sobriety.

  They broke through the treeline back into the grassland.

  Sunlight hit them like a spotlight after a dark stage.

  Tim stood there waiting.

  Out in the open.

  Dagger in hand.

  Watching.

  He said nothing as they approached, his gaze flicking to Silas’ blood-soaked chest, then to the forest behind them.

  “Took you long enough,” Tim said.

  Silas let out a dry laugh, the kind that scraped on the way out. “I expected you to run,” he said. “Didn’t expect I’d feel this… disgusted when you did.”

  “Still don’t care,” Tim replied.

  Arthur bristled. “If you had helped, Silas wouldn’t—”

  A bloodstained hand settled on his shoulder.

  “It’s fine, Arthur.” Silas’ voice was steady now. Too steady. “He’s right about one thing. I underestimated this place. Those docile little lawnmower monsters out there?” He jerked his chin toward the grassland. “They made me forget the food chain has a top.”

  Jen swallowed. “So what do we do now?”

  Before anyone could answer, Tim’s voice cracked like a rifle shot.

  “What the hell, Larry?”

  They turned.

  Larry had Tim by the collar, fist knotted in cloth, dragging the taller man down to eye level. The easygoing fisherman was gone. In his place stood someone older. Harder. Eyes burning with fury.

  “You left me, you fucker!”

  Silas blinked.

  Well, that was new.

  Interesting.

  Tim didn’t panic. He didn’t flinch. “It was dangerous,” he said flatly. “Of course I left you.”

  The words were gasoline.

  Larry released one fist from Tim’s collar and drew it back, knuckles whitening, shoulder twisting for a punch that promised to break more than pride—

  —and froze.

  A thin line of silver kissed his throat.

  Tim’s dagger.

  Larry’s breath hitched as he felt the edge press lightly into skin. Not cutting.

  Yet.

  Tim sighed, almost bored. “Let go, old man. Before things get ugly.” His eyes cooled several degrees. “And trust me. I don’t want ugly.”

  The emotional tide shifted again.

  From anger.

  To danger.

  Larry’s grip loosened.

  He stepped back.

  The dagger stayed at his neck for one long, silent beat—long enough for everyone to understand the hierarchy forming in real time.

  Then Tim withdrew the blade and lifted both hands in mock surrender, retreating a few steps.

  “See? That wasn’t hard, was it?”

  “Fuck off,” Larry spat.

  Tim glanced at the endless stretch of grassland behind him. “Bit difficult at the moment.”

  “It’s simple, you idiot,” Larry shot back, chest heaving. “Turn around. Walk away.”

  “He can’t,” Silas said quietly.

  The argument stalled.

  All eyes shifted to him.

  “With that quest we picked up after the free meal,” he went on, voice steady despite the blood soaking through his bandage, “he can’t leave. Not unless he wants the entire cat clan hunting him down.”

  A beat of silence.

  The wind moved through the grass.

  Larry snorted. “Then he can go and let those cats kill him. Like I give a damn.”

  “Sorry, Larry,” Silas replied. “But right now? I’m on his side.”

  Larry stared at him. “What?”

  Silas held his gaze. “Because whether I like it or not, he’s the only one here I can rely on.”

  That landed.

  Arthur stiffened. Jen blinked. Tim expressionless.

  “What do you mean?” Arthur said.

  Silas didn’t soften it.

  “Jen’s screaming won’t kill anything,” he said bluntly. “Larry, you’re a fisherman. And Arthur—” he glanced at the sword in Arthur’s hand “—you froze when that rat was chewing on me.”

  Arthur’s jaw tightened. He looked down.

  Silas turned to Tim. “Which leaves you. You’re a coward, sure.” A small shrug. “But you’re an opportunist. And opportunists survive.”

  Tim tilted his head. “Flattery’s not your strong suit,” he said. “So cut to it.”

  Pain flared across Silas’ chest. He ignored it.

  “I’ll be bait,” he said.

  The words dropped heavy between them.

  “I draw it in. Keep it focused on me.” His eyes locked with Tim’s. “You deliver the killing blow.”

  Silence again.

  Tension climbed.

  Then Tim smiled.

  “Now that,” he said, twirling the dagger once before catching it clean, “sounds like a plan I can get behind.”

  Silas exhaled.

  He could train Arthur. Maybe even teach Jen how to cast something useful under pressure. But not by tomorrow evening. The quest deadline hung over them like a ticking clock.

  They didn’t have time for growth.

  They needed results.

  And Tim, for all his flaws, was sharp. Quick. Ruthless when it counted.

  For now, that was enough.

  Silas pressed a hand to his bandaged chest, feeling the dull throb settle into something manageable.

  Step one: survive.

  Step two: adapt.

  He looked toward the tree line where the shadows waited.

  But first—

  He needed to master Fireball.

  Because bait without teeth?

  Was just meat.