The team that had come with Reggie looked like a bunch of shopkeepers organized by the local thug, but Kalli wasn’t too worried. With Sanchez standing right there, nobody would try anything.

She shook hands with everyone, and they received a common grade loot box.

They had clearly never seen such a thing before, as they all managed to be shocked by its appearance, and would have dropped them if the boxes didn’t just hover where you had last put them.

This group didn’t get weapons or gear, they all received cases of unflavoured nutrient bars and tools.

It seemed like an odd thing, but they were happy about it, so Kalli didn’t argue.

"Nice, a thousand nutrition bars will spread well through the building. They might not be great, but I saw a dead boar out there, and we will drag that back if it’s still there when we return."

Kalli nodded. "You’ll want to be quick, or the rats will steal the corpse and split it up."

"Oh, right. We all have a point. What can we get for five points?"

"Depends on what you want. Five cases of military rations, some common grade weapons, a couple of pieces of armour. Tell me what you’re short on, and I will see if we can get it."

The five of them turned to huddle with their heads together, whispering low. Then they nodded.

"Can you get us crossbows?"

Kalli nodded. "I can. Same as you’d find at the hunting equipment store. The crossbow bolts are separate. But I can get you three bows and two hundred bolts for five points."

The team looked overjoyed, and then frowned.

"How do we do that?"

Kalli focused on trading the items to the group.

One by one, they added their newly gained point to the trade, and when they reached five points, it completed, creating the items in their hands.

"There you go, gentlemen. Good luck, and stay safe on the way home. Your people will be waiting for you to come back with the supplies."

With their new weapons and cases of nutrient bars in hand, the men looked more confident, but as soon as they were gone, Sanchez came over to talk to Kalli.

"This is going to become a problem. Men like that, as soon as they see an opening, they will be trouble. I know the sort, they won’t want to do the hard work, they’d rather hang around and try to rob people leaving with loot."

Kalli sighed. "We need more reliable people all around. But the System is telling everyone that I can trade goods with them, and as sketchy as they are, they’re likely still keeping a whole building full of people alive."

"You have a point. Just be careful telling them about higher powered weapons, or we might find ourselves under siege."

Kalli nodded. "Most of what I have for sale now is just basic items. I need a lot more people to do quests before I can upgrade to start getting options for items of higher quality."

"What does that even mean?"

"I think it means weapons that do more damage, perhaps make the user stronger? I don’t know what it does for everything, it won’t tell me until I unlock it. But it’s an option."

{Quest Complete} 3 System Points awarded (-1 System Point for quest issuance)

{Total System Points} 286

Kalli noticed that there were more completions rolling in every few minutes. Five more teams since the group with the berserker had come to trade, and the completion activated as soon as their members got near her.

It was just rat demons, and they were surely only in a limited portion of the city, so everyone doing the quest should be somewhere nearby. That made her wonder how many awakened residents had survived, and how many of the students lived in the area.

If they were still nearby and gathering back into teams, the Academy might actually be able to regain some of its intended strength.

The System must have given them all powers for a reason, and it wasn’t to spread out through the city.

The teams began to gather near the Academy, all of them waiting for some sign. The gates were cracked open, they were not locked out. But they were obviously waiting for something.

Kalli went to the gates and waved out at the mostly hidden shapes near the buildings down the street.

"The Academy is still under student control, it’s not a boss fight!" She tried.

One of the groups laughed, and a boy with a bulletproof vest over a student uniform stood, with a group of students behind him.

"Fine, if you say that it’s not a boss fight to claim the reward, we’re in."

Kalli remained by the gate, hoping that others would see that it was safe enough to come in. They didn’t want to open the gates too wide, in case someone had brought rat demons behind them, but someone did open one side fully so that they could walk in three wide.

"Oh, Student Council President. I should have known that he wouldn’t abandon the Academy in its time of need. If we had known that you were here, we would have come back sooner."

Kalli laughed as she was forgotten, though she was the quest completion point.

"Shake hands with the Coordinator. It will give you a prize for completing the quest.

Apparently, the System has chosen her as its regional representative, and we all have to find her when we want to complete quests," President Niall explained.

"Oh, is that how it works? So, she’s like the class representative for the System? Or perhaps our Guidance Counsellor?

Whatever. Are the rewards good?"

Kalli laughed. "Some of them are spectacular, all of them will save your life in an emergency of some sort. Come get your rewards, just a handshake will do." 𝕗𝐫𝐞𝕖𝕨𝐞𝗯𝚗𝕠𝘃𝐞𝚕.𝐜𝗼𝚖

While Kalli shook hands with the newly arrived students, the other teams hiding in the buildings began to enter, and every one of them was student aged, even if most of them weren’t in school uniforms.

They had all thought of various places that they wanted to go when the world was ending, but now that they had seen the quests, they were willing to come back to the Academy and join the team here.

With nearly everyone they saw possessing powers, they didn’t have to worry about being on alert all the time, or fighting along when things went wrong.

And today, that was all they really wanted.