"Well, let me give you a tour of the place and introduce you to the rest of the players," Starstrike offered. Between visiting various points of interest in the fort and meeting the other players, many of whom were too low level or too scared to fight - the number of combat-ready PCs, so to speak, was only a dozen, and that was including Rayne and company - Starstrike explained what she knew. "We've heard of these collars from your friends and from other cities, though we haven't seen any ourselves. Melangwi Outpost wasn't the only place to be attacked after a collared player opened the gates for the mobs. As for Port Lannis, well, you've seen the condition of the city walls - you hardly need to get the gates open to get in. As for the other cities, we've finally managed to established communication with most of them. The lucky ones just had monsters attack them, most of them repelled the initial wave and holed up like we have. The others... it seems there are a lot of assholes in this game who're taking advantage of the Change to carry out their most fucked-up fantasies. The largest cities are being fought over not between players and monsters, but between guilds of rapists and white knights while the average players struggle to survive. In that regard we're lucky, there's a large store of food and supplies in this fort and with our reduced numbers it's not going to run out anytime soon. Speaking of survival..."<br/><br/>Their last stop was the fort's smithy. A suspiciously young-looking girl who didn't quite look eighteen was clanging away with a blacksmith's hammer at the anvil, while a bearded man in a ranger hat looked on. "This is Rayne, and this is Sabrith," Starstrike introduced them. "Meet Lizzy, our blacksmith, and, ahem, Xx_Zombie_Survivor_xX, or Zombs as we call him, our resident crazy hermit survivalist. And leader."<br/><br/>"Considering the Change, I can't think of anything that would look better on a resume," Zombs had a laugh with Starstrike and offered his hand for a shake. "It's a pleasure to meet you ladies. As you can guess I usually stick to zombie games, but a friend dragged me over here to try this out. He's not here now, the lucky karma-dodging bastard. Now that you and your friends have arrived, we've finally got enough firepower to take some initiative. I have big plans - get some rest first, and leave anything you need fixed with Liz, she could use the practice."<br/><br/>"Hey!" Liz pouted, and swung her hammer at Zombs, who sidestepped it easily.<br/><br/>"Occupational safety, girl! Don't do that!" Zombs chuckled.