A box? this can't be right.

  The huge vat, almost the size of a yellow school bus, was now sitting pretty on his open palm, it was now the size and shape of an engagement ring box. Nathan whistled at the sight, which caused most members of the squad to chuckle. He stared at the black box in awe, tuning out the chuckles of the squad members. The magic that had just played out in front of his eyes was mind-blowing, to say the least.

  "Hey Nate, do you want to move this along, or should we give you some time alone with the box?" Ruben asked, the Berserker grinning.

  Nathan rolled his eyes at the question, but he still didn't take them off the box. They'd gone through the motions of compressing and decompressing the box about three times and yet Nathan found it to believe how easy it was, all he had to do was run a finger at the particular rune and watch as the rune carried out its function.

  "Let him ogle Ruben; it's not like we have other things to do," Ciara huffed.

  Ah, shit.

  "My bad; you guys can go back to looting and piling up those corpses," Nathan said.

  It was his fault for holding them back because something so trivial; he had no idea how the tutorial worked, but if it had tossed out all the necessary information to those who attended, then it meant that what he was seeing wasn't anything special.

  "I didn't mean to say it like that ... I'm just having a terrible day," The mage muttered, eyes downcast.

  Aren't we all?

  He'd not bothered judging her, on account of the fact that she'd actually been right, plus her last statement had confirmed that she'd only said it because of how raw her nerves were, he looked at the teen who'd led a whole squad on her own, having to face the consequences of members dying on her watch without breaking, Nathan wondered how she'd pulled it off.

  "Erm, erm... A dollar for your thoughts Nate." Ruben said. " You just went from ogling the box to ogling Ciara, do you like her?"

  "I know it's an apocalypse and all but asking her out with a vat of food is just weird man… just saying.” Ruben added.

  "Ruben!!!"

  Members of the squad yelled at the still-grinning Berserker; the teens words had definitely hit a nerve, but Nathan just didn't know which one, for one he'd gone from being a hundred percent sure that he wasn't interested in the mage to becoming unsure when his face flushed red at the question by the Berserker.

  Ciara's face was still facing the floor, so he had no idea how the mage felt about the insinuation that Ruben was drumming up; luckily for Nathan, Pirlo came to his rescue, the wiry teen cuffing Ruben behind the head, while simultaneously nodding at Nathan who repaid the gesture.

  "What was that for?" Ruben cried out.

  "Stop butting into people's business; in fact just shut up… or if you like we could spar to see who's stronger," Pirlo offered, a nightmarish grin stretched across Rogue's face.

  Ruben audibly gulped at the Rogue's words, the Berserker making the mouth-zipping motion; no doubt the subtle threat by Pirlo had scared him into submission. Nathan had no idea what the Rogue's definition of sparring was, but he highly doubted that Ruben would come out of it unscathed — that was if he even survived the so-called spar.

  "Alright, you all heard Nathan; let's move out," Pirlo said, the rogue dragging Ruben out of the storage facility by the ear.

  In time the squad members made their way out of the temporary storage building with Ciara the last to exit the building; she'd avoided looking at Nathan the whole time. Nathan simply let out a breath he hadn't known he'd been holding back when she left, he knew he should have denied the accusation there and then, but he hadn't, for some reason, he'd been tongue-tied.

  "Moron," Nathan berated himself.

  Things would obviously become weird between him and the mage now just because the blabbermouth couldn't keep his mouth shut. Pirlo being the one to bail him out of the awkward situation was something that he hadn't expected, but at the moment he'd take all the help that the rogue would offer, and he'd really needed that one.

  "Okay, time to chuck these in my bag of holding."

  The effects of chucking the black boxes into his bag of holding had been one of the educational lectures he'd gotten after asking to be taught how to compress the vats. It had been a major sticking point in his mind, the possibility of taking all the food rations with him in his bag of holding.

  On a technical scale, Nathan didn't think it made any sense to put one magical storage space into another magical storage space; sure, the black box and the bag of holding weren't of the same make, but they were similar enough that he didn't think it should've been possible, but it was.

  It wasn't like Nathan really cared, for one he could easily chuck the rations by their packets into his bag of holding directly if there wasn't a way to do it with the compressed black box, and as it was, he didn't have to, so he simply scrapped that idea, and with a grin, he chucked the last of the black boxes into his bag of holding.

  Unauthorized tale usage: if you spot this story on Amazon, report the violation.

  "Winter's going to be niceeee," Nathan grinned.

  Welp, this place is done.

  Nathan stared at the empty storage facility; the place had been cleared out, becoming nothing more than an empty space. The calm and empty space made him realize something; the way the miners had been run made him feel like they were part of an army rather than just pure miners.

  Part of an army.

  He rolled the thought around in his mind; everything about their setup made him feel like these guys were not just miners; heck, the head of their settlement was called a commander. Then there was the portal which he'd destroyed, it'd definitely wasn't just for show; it had probably been used to cart away whatever they mined, bring in rations, and maybe even supply additional manpower. Whatever or whoever these guys worked for definitely wasn't broke, especially if their transportation was facilitated by the system. Heck, Nathan knew how much he'd spent since becoming a lord, but he was pretty sure it was a drop of water in the sea compared to whatever had been soent to bring and keep these guys here.

  "That's gotta cost a boatload of coins." Nathan said, rubbing his head sheepishly at the thought.

  He moved his head side to side; whatever they'd been mining definitely had to be worth atleast double or triple the expenditure, especially since they'd focused on mining; killing other humans seemed to be a side quest for them. He'd have a look at what was in the mine soon, but before that, he had another itch in his mind that he had to scratch before he'd get out of the storage building.

  "What were the miners doing with the demons?" Nathan muttered.

  He'd been way too busy slaying them to actually sit down and consider the situation then, but now that he was done with the whole battle, a picture had started to form in his mind, an incomplete one but definitely better than before he'd stepped into the settlement. Two things stood out to him the longer he considered the issue; the first was the fact that the alarm hadn't sounded before he'd killed the guards, which meant that the miners hadn't been fighting the demons before his arrival.

  The second was that the demons definitely hadn't been captured and bound by the miners, nope. The demons looked fresh, like they'd been getting a much-needed spa treatment, plus if the demons had actually been captured by the miners, Nathan didn't think he'd have been the first target; the miners would've been.

  Unless.

  "Oh yeah, I have a blood feud with a demon lord, Taloth," He whispered.

  Well had.

  The demon lord had died by his hands, literally. Besides that, the system had informed him when he'd eradicated the imps during his first days on the island that the demon lord who had sent them to earth had painted a target on Nathan's back and would definitely kill him the moment it saw him, and so it kind of made sense that it'd move the Berserker up the priority list. Plus, if Nathan had easily decimated the miners, then it definitely wouldn't be a problem for the demon lord; heck, the demon lord had almost killed him with less five strikes, which meant that the miners wouldn't last long if it had killed Nathan.

  Solid thinking.

  Well, reasonable thinking. Nathan ended up killing the demon lord due to the demon's poor distribution of its freel points and his choosing of the best place to strike. If he'd cut off one of the demon lord's hands, it would have just killed him with the other one; that was how close Nathan had been to death, but he'd survived, and the demon hadn't. For that, he was glad he stuck to his instincts and shared his points reasonably; no point in becoming a glass cannon.

  "Alright, what do you scavengers have here?"

  Walking out of the storage building, a few flakes of snow fell on him, but Nathan easily shrugged it off, he didn't feel cold; his constitution high enough to negate the effect of such mundane things.

  Looking around he spied the mine at the far corner of the settlement but decided to leave it for last; after all, it was the most interesting place, and he'd prefer to go in with the squad—who were all busy looting.

  Four buildings caught his eye; two looked like permanent structures, and the other two were temporary. He picked randomly, his thoughts choosing one of the temporary ones; with a destination in mind, his legs moved, carrying him into the first temporary building. The first thing that hit him was the stench, and while it was overpowering and very disturbing, Nathan didn't flinch.

  Glancing around the room, he confirmed his initial assessment of the building; it was the sleeping area. Weird-looking mats lined the hall, clothes strewn around, and weird items he couldn't be bothered to analyze. For Nathan, it didn't really matter; everything he'd seen had suggested that this building and all it contained was trash to him.

  On to the next.

  Is this how pirates feel? Nathan wondered as he exited the first temporary building, his feet already leading him to the next one. Just like pirates, he was going through the belongings of his fallen foe, deciding which was treasure or trash, and with a look of disgust, Nathan exited the second temporary building he'd just walked into; it was trash like the first one. It was their restroom, and while it had been l better maintained than the one belonging to the imps, it was still a restroom, a public one.

  Staying out a bit to let his nose get a little bit of good air before he dived into whatever the first permanent building had to offer him. After a few heartbeats, he reluctantly started walking towards the closest permanent building; it looked more like a warehouse of sorts, and sure enough, when he opened it, he saw discarded crates lying around, but what really grabbed his attention was the massive pile of glowing rocks.

  Nightlights.

  The system had given him a couple of those as dungeon rewards, and at the time Nathan had wondered what exactly he was supposed to use the items for. He stared at the mountain of glowing rocks for a moment before shaking his head and picking up the closest one.

  [ Tora Ore.

  This ore has been transformed into a vessel to hold Tora, the very power that makes up the Universe.

  ]

  It certainly seemed like a lot more than just a nightlight, but at the moment Nathan didn't have much to work with, so he chucked it back into the pile; he'd check out the last building and then gather up the squad to check this out. Already Nathan was starting to doubt he'd find anything truly spectacular when he walked into the second permanent building.

  It looked more like an executive office than anything else; there was a desk and a lovely wooden table that Nathan had no idea of the origins of, or what exact tree it had been carved out of. Various weapons decorated the wall, but what caught his attention was the chest at the corner of the room; it was locked and had an obvious keyhole, and Nathan was in possession of a key – which he'd looted from the Commander.

  He didn't even take a moment to think it through; he just rushed at the chest, taking out the key from his bag of holding in one swift motion. All day he'd been wishing for real loot, and it seemed like he might finally get his wish. He slotted the key, and it fit perfectly. With childlike anticipation Nathan turned it until he heard a soft click, and with a bated breath, he opened the chest.

  KABOOM!