Evolution Island: Kill to Survive

Ashenfort awaits

The Fast Travel orb teleported them to a clearing inside Elden Forest. They found themselves standing in front of a wooden cottage with a thatched roof, surrounded by a dull brown picket fence.

The cottage looked rather small from the outside, but when they set foot inside they were surprised by how spacious it was. There were two rooms inside, separated by a wooden wall. The larger of the two rooms contained 4 beds, an alchemy table and a cooking spit. At the foot of each bed there was a wooden chest with initials carved in bold on its lid. These were the personalised lockers where each of them could store their special items.

After taking a brief tour of the first room, Aaron unlocked the wooden door leading to the smaller room. This room didn’t have any windows and just a couple of wooden stools as the only furniture. What it did have were 8 weapon racks and 4 armour stands.

“We can just store our weapons and gear inside our personal chests. This is just useless,” Madeline observed.

Aaron had the same thought, but he felt there was more to these stands than just being display cases. He quickly took out his special chain whip—Kurosagi, and placed it inside a weapon rack. As soon as he closed the glass display case, the metal tip began glowing with a steely gray light.

“Was that supposed to happen?” Zach asked.

“I have no idea,” Aaron replied. “This is the first time I’ve used a weapon rack in this game.”

“And you decided to stick your best weapon in it. That’s just brilliant.”

“It stopped glowing,” Isabella said, pointing at the display case. The metal tip had indeed returned to its normal state.

As Aaron put his fingers on the glass to open the display case, a green light flashed on his Z-band.

 [*Weapon restoration complete*]

Aaron couldn’t hold his curiosity back any longer and slowly opened the glass case. He retrieved the weapon without any incident. The chain whip didn’t look any different from before. It was only when Aaron put it back in his inventory that he noticed what had changed. The weapon’s special talent had been restored!

“These are all charging stations for enchanted weapons. We can use the racks for restoring weapon talents,” Aaron announced.

“That means these armour stands must also have some purpose,” Madeline said.

To test out this theory, Madeline and Aaron took off their Enchanted Predator armour sets and placed them on the armour stands. Their Z-bands immediately displayed a notification.

[*Armour repair in progress*]

[Time remaining: 12 hours]

“Damn, this is pretty awesome!” Zach exclaimed. “This cottage is full of surprises.”

“Let’s not forget, we got access to it only because we went after the T-Rex. If the other team had defeated the last Zone Guardian, they’d be the ones inside,” Aaron replied.

The little cottage was essentially a small base for the players to recuperate and plan out their next quest. Since it was a safe zone, they could spend the night here without any worries and it even allowed them to fast forward time by using the beds. This was not much different than a guild house, except that it was a bit smaller and didn’t have any perimeter defences. Aaron wondered whether the other islands also had player bases on them. There were way too many questions on his mind, and the answers were far from his grasp.

Solaris was the only island they were familiar with, even with the changes Gilbert had introduced. All the other islands were completely unknown territory. Aaron and Madeline gathered around the supper table to discuss their next step, while Isabella busied herself with the alchemy table.

As much as Zach would have liked to be a part of this discussion, he knew he would most probably end up arguing with Madeline. So, he let Aaron handle her. In the meantime, Zach decided to try out a few of his special recipes. The garden behind the cottage had plenty of herbs and vegetables to cook some delicious meals. Without bothering the others, he quietly stepped outside the cottage to gather the necessary ingredients.

At the supper table, Aaron was poring over the fog-covered map of Ashenfort, trying to find out what little information he could. Apart from the suggested player level and a basic description of the island, nothing else was on display.

“It says here Ashenfort is a volcanic island with no human inhabitants. What do you make of that?” Aaron asked Madeline.

“If it’s a volcanic island, there’s bound to be magma pits and active volcanoes. The terrain is probably gonna be rocky and without any vegetation. The temperatures should be on the higher side.”

“What about the enemies?”

“Hard to know sitting here on Solaris, but I’m willing to bet there’ll be quite a few fire-based life-forms. Perhaps a few rock golems too.”

“Do you think it’s gonna be divided into zones like Solaris?”

“Ashenfort looks much smaller than Solaris on the map. I don’t think it will have 4 different zones and so many different biomes. But, I’m pretty sure there will be at least one Zone Guardian.”

“Yeah, that goes without saying,” Aaron nodded. Switching back to the detailed map of Solaris, he continued, “We have pretty much explored all the major locations here. But, there are a lot of unexplored caves, grottos and other places of interest.”

“Well, I’m not really playing for 100% game completion. We should just focus on our main objective—reaching Gilbert’s fortress and getting back to our own world.”

“I was just trying to say that we should tie up all loose ends before leaving for Ashenfort. We might not be able to return anytime soon.”

Madeline thought about Aaron’s suggestion for a few minutes, before giving her final reply. “There’s only one location I’m interested in—the Temple of Shadows. It’s got the best enchanted weapons on Solaris. If you want, we can check it out tomorrow.”

Aaron was about to suggest an early morning expedition into the Temple of Shadows, but a new announcement brought about a change of plans.

[*Team Merlin Alliance has reached Ashenfort*]

[*Sea-bridge will submerge in 16 hours*]

“That sums it up, I guess,” Aaron huffed, rolling his eyes. He stood up from the chair and set a timer on his stopwatch. “We leave as soon as our armour sets are repaired. I have to visit the Cayuga settlement before leaving for Ashenfort.”