Chapter 60

  The first few days of my travels went smoothly. I spent the days walking at a relatively casual pace, letting my Muns farm up here and there when the mood struck. I made sure, during those first few days, that I actually got one of each Mun for the area that I could find, that I promised I would keep, to build a ‘living’ collection of all the Mun evolution lines possible in Mutopia. Part of my, collect all the things mentality.

  Past that, I entertained myself slowly leveling my Muns, doing my best to watch their experience, so as not to let myself get carried away. I knew I’d be hitting a new biome soon, based on the information I’d gathered before leaving Silver Springs, and that meant new types of Muns. And new Muns, meant more to collect, which meant more battles, and I had a long journey before I would reach Glass City. The absolute last thing I wanted to do was hit max level on all my Muns, and then be stuck just… suffering.

  On the plus side, considering I was collecting all the Muns, it meant I did consistently have fodder I could throw out to siphon the experience share across Muns. Already, once all of my main Muns had reached level 21, I’d added in a Gem Bettle into the mix to level, along with my Glimmer-Ish. By the way the world sorted experience, the lions share went to the lowest leveled Mun, which meant Barkity was able to run around, one-shotting weak Muns, and the experience mostly funneled to those lower leveled Muns. Considering Barkity also took like three times the amount of experience to level… it was an especially efficient way to farm Mun Crystals without much worry.

  On the fifth day of my travels, most of my Muns were level 22 or past that, and all my spare Muns for this particular region were close to level 20… Minus the Glimmer-ish. Leveling that thing wasn’t a labor of love. Getting it to evolve into a Golden King would quite literally be a freaking act of divinity from the god of patience. My respect for Julius grew immensely as I used the Glimmer-ish to soak up experience. Even with Barkity out and about, the damned thing had fainted twice from random, unlucky attacks or double teams. Twice. Not a crazy number, sure… but…crazy it had happened more than once, considering it meant the enemy Muns had to survive the initial attack from Barkity, and then also ignore whatever random second Mun I had out, to reach, and hurt, the slippery little golden fish.

  By the sixth day, thankfully, I drew close to my first destination on the journey. I’d still not ventured off the trail, opting to stick close to the designated, official travel route. Even though it kept me in a lower leveled Mun zone, it gave me time to collect a large number of Mun Crystals, which would promptly be turned into Augmentation Crystals and Muney for supplies. The town I was approaching, which looked even smaller than Cogni had been, was about the halfway point between the savanna style biome around Silver Springs, and the desert that existed as the main area for Glass City.

  There was another town, about another week away, that would be my next stop before Glass City. Meaning, this stop, which I’d be reaching tonight, would be my main stop for stocking up for a week in the desert.

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  I had no idea what the desert would be like in Mutopia, but knew enough from back home to ensure I was properly prepared. And, thanks to the amazing Mun Crystal storage system, I had every intention of making sure I didn’t run short on any sorts of supplies. There was absolutely no reason, short of Muney, to not have supplies for every occasion on my travels. Especially not when the Mun Center crystals could act as a literal global shopping network, complete with instantaneous delivery. Amazon had nothing on this.

  I unsummoned my Muns as the town came into view. The buildings were built out of thin wooden sticks, with dried grass thatched together for their roofs. They were circular in nature, rather than square, and even from a distance it was clear the town didn’t get too many visitors. Even though it was on the main route. Was it because of the desert? Was it rare for people to walk between Glass City and Silver Springs? I had an inkling there were faster ways to travel across the world, though I’d not had the foresight to inquire about such things.

  Walking had its perks though, and I honestly didn’t mind. It kept me active, which was fantastic. My legs were already looking a helluva lot more toned than they had been in a while, and I was not about to complain about the fact I was pretty sure I’d lost a few pounds, not from lack of food, but simply from fitness. It wasn’t surprising either. Even though I’d worked out at home a few times a week, I spent a ton of time sedentary was well, playing VR games and surfing the web and essentially staying shut in, my party days a few years behind me already.

  Now though, waking up every day and walking through nature, enjoying the comforting breeze on my skin and the company of my Muns. A girl could get used to it. Granted, I had no doubt the novelty would wear off. Especially if the weather or biome was an uncomfortable one, or I needed to be somewhere quickly. I’d already been eying Barkity and Neal. If either of them was a little bigger… I’d probably give riding on their backs a try. Neal was a Zebra for crying out loud. That was like, horse adjacent.

  I pushed the sudden thought of getting Neal a lime-green saddle for when he evolved aside, as I reached the outer wall of the city. Much like Cogni’s, it wasn’t really much of a wall. Just wooden sticks bound together in a circular ring around the city, with the Mun Center clearly in the center. I knew it was more for appearances, to denote where the barrier for the town ended, but still, it was a laughable excuse.

  With a small chuckled towards the wall I followed the road directly into the town. It passed under an archway, attached to which was a wooden sign.

  Welcome to Grasslands.

  Oh yeah, ten points for naming convention… out of a hundred.

  Shaking my head at the weak excuse for a name, and knowing full well I had zero ground to stand on… given my Mun names, I smiled to myself as I looked around. My first destination was the Mun Center. I had a pocket full of Mun Crystals and an itch the Gatcha machine was going to fix. After, I’d look into finding lodging for the night, since the sun had already begun to set, casting brilliant hues of purples and reds across the sky.

  I made it ten feet into the town, before I heard something I had not expected to hear. My name. Being yelled. And not in a happy way.

  Can’t a girl catch a break?