Hazel and Astrid resumed their trek through the desolate streets of Portland/Mossley. And the more they walked around the area; the more Hazel noticed the glaring changes in her hometown aside from the various and giant cracks spiderwebbing across the streets along with the leaning or somewhat destroyed buildings at every turn.

  Several more medieval buildings from Mossley town peppered across the streets of Portland along with the familiar dirt and cobblestone paths mixed in with the smooth concrete street of her home. The mixture of the three paths made it both difficult and concerning to navigate around.

  It was concerning to Hazel due to the structural integrity of the very ground they were walking on. After seeing so many massive cracks in the stone and dirt meshed street, Hazel feared that they would step on a weak piece of the road, resulting in it collapsing and having both Hazel and Astrid falling in it.

  While she was certain that both of them could easily get out of the hole, it was the falling in part that made her worry. So, every so often, Hazel would occasionally look down at the ground, making sure that there were no weak spots for her to accidentally step on. The last thing she needed was falling into a hole and ending up in the sewers.

  It would make the situation even worse if her dress was stained from the disgusting waste surging below them. She wasn’t much of a dress gal when it came to clothing, but she would be damned to let her arcane dress get sullied by the fecal waste propagating in the sewers.

  “I see you’ve grown used to walking while having that blindfold on,” Astrid noted, sparing a glance at Hazel as she casually walked beside her despite her eyes being covered.

  “Yeah, that’s thanks to the Astral Eyes spell. You can’t see it, but it’s currently floating right in front of my head, acting as my eyes.”

  At first, Hazel found it a bit difficult to walk around while using her Astral Eyes, unable to adapt to the peculiar hand-eye coordination. However, that soon changed as she consistently moved around with the spell.

  Not only that but due to how high Hazel’s mana capacity was due to both her Evil Eyes and her Witch class, she could keep her spell active for as long as she wished since it didn’t drain a lot of her mana.

  Speaking of her Evil Eyes, while they proved to be a hassle since Hazel couldn’t turn them off, it was still an ancient power she received from that mystery tablet. And like it or not, she was curious about how it essentially worked.

  Right now, she was capable of instilling fear into her enemies and, unfortunately, allies by just looking at them. But as she continued to use this ability, she would likely be able to obtain more features, thus making her much more powerful and dangerous.

  So, to do that, she would need to use them. Which meant she needed to find some enemies to test her eyes on. Hopefully, they would come across some soon, so Hazel could try some experiments with her Evil Eyes.

  “What are these large things scattered along the streets?” Astrid asked, staring at the dozens of abandoned cars blanketing the place.

  “Oh, right,” Hazel said. “Since you’re not from Earth, you don’t know what a Car is.”

  “A car?” The dark elf questioned, leaning her head to the side curiously.

  “Think of it like a wagon or carriage, but completely made of metal and can be driven without horses and can drive super-fast. .”

  Astrid’s eyes widened upon hearing this. “There were such vehicles in your world?”

  Hazel snickered at her partner’s reaction, clearly enjoying it. “Yeah. Some vehicles let us fly in the sky and navigate through large bodies of water with ease. Our world is very technologically advanced thanks to the wonders of science.”

  Although Hazel was more fascinated with magic and the like, it wasn’t like she didn’t appreciate the achievements that science had gifted her and the rest of Earth. It was thanks to science that they had better medicine, transportation, and best of all, entertainment.

  She knew better than to take what was given to her with the help of science for granted. But at the same time, she always wished magic existed in her world. If it did, there was no doubt that Earth would be even more advanced and prosperous.

  Sadly, that never happened. At least not until around a month ago when some mysterious entity called the System appeared and decided to integrate their world into the greater universe or whatever they called it.

  “If that’s the case, then why aren’t we using one of these cars to move around this place?”

  Upon Astrid’s valid point, Hazel took a moment to ponder, seriously contemplating over it.

  Unauthorized duplication: this narrative has been taken without consent. Report sightings.

  “Well, for one thing, there are too many cars lying about on the street. Attempting to drive through all of that would honestly be a waste of time. There’s also the fact that our current location has a lot of cracked roads and such, making it even more dangerous for us to try and drive our way through this place.”

  While the idea of driving around sounded like a solid plan, there were a few glaring issues revolving around the concept. It wasn’t just the roads or the numerous cars in their way but also the fact that vehicles might not even be able to turn on.

  Hazel had no clue as to what happened during the System Integration. For all she knew, all of the cars were likely turned off due to some EMP-like wave from the system. Plus, even if that wasn’t the case, with how wrecked everything was, it would be difficult to search for an actual working and functional car.

  And neither of them wanted to waste their time searching for one when walking around was, ironically enough, much faster.

  Hopefully, the cars around them were still operational so when the time came, they could use them when traveling around. Until then, traversing on foot was the best call at the moment.

  The player duo stumbled across a couple of shops while walking down the extremely damaged street. Unlike the Fractured Dungeons, the food and supplies here were still more or less valuable. Especially the food.

  Thanks to the wonders of science from Hazel’s world, they possessed something called Preserved food, which allowed edible items to last a lot longer than they typically should. Even if it’s been nearly thirty days since everything went to hell, the food around them should still be consumable for them.

  One of the stores they ran into was the Whole Foods Market, a good place where all kinds of edible food could be found from across the globe. Hazel and Astrid stood before the market, taking a long look at the building.

  “This is what you call a grocery store?” Astrid questioned, suspiciously staring at the market building.

  Hazel nodded. “Yep. This is one of the few stores within Portland you can go to and buy all kinds of food products from fruits, vegetables, meat, dairy, and more.”

  The Whole Foods Market was one of Hazel’s favorite places to go to and buy her groceries. Even her mother would occasionally come by here to get some items. That’s how popular it was to the Thatcher’s.

  “Alright, so we should go in then...” Astrid concluded, taking a couple of steps forward before being stopped by Hazel who placed her hand in front of the dark elf.

  “Not until I get a peek inside with Astral Eyes,” She advised. “Since we have something to use as surveillance, then we should take advantage of it.”

  Astrid didn’t argue with Hazel’s reasoning and simply backed away to let the Witch do her thing. Giving her an appreciative nod, Hazel then flew her Astral Eye into the market building. The invisible eye went through the sliding door, which was currently broken with shards of glass scattered along the ground.

  Taking a look inside, it was completely dark, with very little light from the outside to provide enough illumination for Hazel to get a proper look around the building. From what she could see, the entire market shop was ransacked like an angry mob rushed in and took everything.

  There were various foods like apples, bananas, cereal boxes, and more laid out on the store floor. Hazel even spotted a couple of broken jars of pickles nearby. The pickle juice was already dried out, telling her that it’s been a while since they were broken.

  Considering how damaged everything was, Hazel was a bit afraid that there would be nothing left for them to take. As she fretted over this problem, her Astral Eye caught some blur past it, blitzing toward another aisle.

  Hazel, not wanting to lose the blur, followed it, phasing through shelves and the like since her Astral Eye was no different than a ghost that could pass through anything it wished. It didn’t take long before she finally caught the blur from before, only to see something rather interesting.

  Huddled together were small humanoid monsters. They were about Hazel’s height but instead of possessing green skin, they had brown fur with black spots peppering across their bodies along with long furry appendages sticking out their rears. They were tails.

  Just then, one of the humanoid creatures raised their heads, revealing the face of what appeared to be some kind of animal. Like a Hyena. From the snout to the piss-color eyes staring into space, Hazel couldn’t help but think that it was a hyena monster. As she continued to stare at the creature, the one that revealed itself started munching on a piece of meat that had several mold spots on it. The humanoid hyena opened its mouth, revealing jagged sharp teeth that could easily tear into flesh, and pierced the slightly rotten meat, taking a bite before chewing and swallowing the piece.

  Out of Curiosity, Hazel tried to Identify them while using Astral Eyes.

  [Danak, Class: Warrior, Level 12]

  It was another player. A rather stronger player compared to the Orcs from before. Though, it was still nearly ten levels too low for them, so they weren’t considered much of a threat.

  After observing the creatures for a little longer, Hazel mentally commanded her Astral Eye to leave the building. Once out, it floated back over to the player pair where they were patiently waiting.

  “Well, that was something...”

  “What?” Astrid asked.

  “Well, there were these humanoid hyenae...people? They were huddled together while eating the food left on the ground.”

  The dark elf’s eyes widened. “You saw Gnolls?”

  “Is that what they're called?”

  “Yes. Gnolls are very devious and hostile creatures that attack in groups. My tribe had to exterminate a small breeding ground of Gnolls because their presence was causing trouble for us.”

  While Hazel recognized the name Gnolls from certain RPG games, she didn’t know much about them. She did remember that her brother, Damien, deeply hated them because he almost always died to them. The amount of detailed swearing that came out of that child’s mouth never ceased to amaze her.

  Aside from that, since these Gnolls were clearly dangerous...it should be fine for them to get rid of them, right?

  Hazel’s lips curled into a small yet malicious smile at the opportunity presented to her. It looked like she found her little test subjects, after all.