The squelching sound of eighteen pairs of boots trudging through the mud echoed along the narrow dirt path leading out of the forest.
Even though Talia had ordered everyone to stay quiet and play the part of traumatized refugees, expecting eighteen gamers to march in perfect, disciplined silence was a lost cause. The formation was filled with constant whispering, hushed chatter, and endless grumbling.
"Dammit, Lars, did you mix tree bark into the fabric when you crafted these?" Nina complained, aggressively scratching the collar of her coarse, brown tunic. "I'm itching all over."
"Stop complaining and just treat it like a really immersive camping trip," Elise replied cheerfully, walking arm-in-arm with Mila.
As they navigated the muddy trail, Dane—the samurai now dressed like a destitute farmer—was walking near the back with Lars and Finn. Spotting a large, murky puddle ahead, a mischievous smirk crept onto his face. He pretended to trip over a rock, accurately kicking a massive splash of brown sludge straight ahead.
Splatter!
The thick mud plastered right against the back and hood of Silas, the undead mage who had been walking quietly minding his own business.
"Hey! What the hell is wrong with you?!" Silas jolted, spinning around. His outraged voice was muffled behind the crude, wooden mask Lars had hastily crafted to hide his skeletal Lich features.
"Oops, my bad, man. Slipped on a rock! Hahaha!" Dane laughed out loud without a single ounce of remorse. Lars joined in, his beard shaking with booming laughter, while Finn desperately tried to hold back his chuckles.
"You absolute bastards..." Silas ground his teeth. He tried to wipe the mud off his cloak with his sleeve, but it only smeared the dirt further, making him look a hundred times more pathetic and ragged than before.
As the group crested a low hill, Pinewood Village finally came into full view. It was surrounded by a low, log perimeter fence to keep wild beasts at bay. Standing guard at the entrance were three rugged village men, dressed in old animal pelts and gripping rusted iron-tipped spears and pitchforks.
The moment they spotted a massive group of eighteen strangers approaching, the villagers tensed up, raising their weapons in alarm.
"Halt right there! Who are you people?!" a middle-aged guard with a scruffy beard shouted.
Talia signaled the group to stop. She didn't step forward to negotiate herself. Instead, she shot a side-glance at a tall, broad-shouldered man in the formation.
"Thom... you're up," she whispered.
Thom gave a subtle nod. In the game, his main class was a heavy shield-bearing Tank. But in the real world, Thom was a top-tier corporate salesman—a man armed with elite persuasive skills who could sell ice to an eskimo.
Thom took a deep breath, shifting his entire persona in a fraction of a second. His proud, broad shoulders slumped. His sharp gaze softened into one of absolute exhaustion and despair. He stepped away from the group, walking forward alone with his empty hands raised to his chest.
"Please, kind sirs... lower your weapons," Thom pleaded, his deep voice trembling with realistic fatigue. "We mean no harm. We are but refugees... homeless wanderers from a land far away. War has erupted. The land is ablaze. We abandoned our homes, gathered whatever rags we had, and fled into the wilds. We've survived on roots and dew for days... until we finally saw the light of your village."
The guards frowned, exchanging uncertain glances. Thom's words sounded convincing, but as the scruffy guard looked past him at the group, his eyes widened with suspicion and dread.
"Hold on... Refugees?" The guard tightened his grip on his spear, pointing the rusty tip at the guild members. "What kind of insane village has this many freaks gathered together?! That's a dwarf... that's an elf... and that big guy with the tail is a half-dragon! You even have a beastman with you!"
The guard continued his scrutinizing sweep. Sera stood perfectly still. Thankfully, her True Vampire traits didn't look entirely inhuman besides her sickly pale skin. But the guard's spear quickly aimed at Silas, who was currently trembling (from sheer annoyance) nearby.
"And what about that guy?! Why is he wearing a wooden mask to hide his face? He's covering up bandit tattoos, isn't he?!"
The atmosphere instantly grew tense. Several guild members subtly moved their hands toward their invisible inventories, ready to summon their weapons. But Thom quickly raised his hands higher, drawing the guard's attention back to him. He let out a long, agonizing sigh, as if he carried the weight of the world on his shoulders.
"Good sirs... please, listen to me," Thom's voice cracked, dropping an octave deeper into sorrow. "We are not from the same village... We are the victims of a 'slave camp' and a 'prisoner caravan' rounded up by the warmongering armies."
The mention of a slave camp made the guards freeze. Thom didn't miss a beat.
"The dwarf, the elf, the beastmen... they were all captured from foreign lands to be sold in the underground black markets. As for us humans, we were just drafted farmers. Two nights ago, our prison camp was attacked. We took the chance, broke our cages, and fled into the forest together... In the face of death and suffering, race no longer mattered. We banded together just to survive."
Thom turned to look at the mud-covered Silas. He subtly wiped away a non-existent tear from his eye. "As for my poor, unfortunate brother there... he held the line so the rest of us could escape. But the guards splashed him with magical acid. His face was horribly disfigured. He wears the mask and wraps so he won't frighten people. Add the mud from our desperate escape, and... well, he looks like a monster."
Silas, suddenly dragged into playing the role of a facially deformed brother, twitched under his mask. But he played along, letting out a pitiful, hacking cough and hanging his head low to look as miserable as possible.
The three guards looked at each other. The deep paranoia in their eyes melted away, replaced by genuine pity. The story of escaped slaves, combined with Silas's mud-stained, pathetic appearance (thanks to Dane's prank), became the perfect alibi. Thom's lie was flawless.
"Escaped prisoners... You're lucky to be alive," the scruffy guard sighed, lowering his spear. "Alright... you can rest at the open clearing by the old mill at the edge of the village. The chief shouldn't mind if you just need some temporary shade. But don't try anything funny."
"Thank you... thank you so much, our generous saviors," Thom bowed deeply, before gesturing for the group to follow him inside.
Sera and the others walked through the wooden gates, collectively breathing a sigh of relief. Thom's ability to improvise and completely manipulate the narrative was terrifyingly perfect.
The village guards escorted the eighteen of them to a hardened dirt clearing next to a dilapidated windmill. The scent of wheat flour and dry hay filled the air. Shortly after, the Village Chief—a hunchbacked older man—came to inspect the 'escaped slaves' himself.
Though there was still a hint of caution in his eyes, seeing Silas's muddy state, their torn clothes, and Thom's incredibly humble demeanor made the Chief soften. He gave them permission to use the area as a temporary shelter, providing them with some old hay, scrap wood, a bucket of water, and a few loaves of rock-hard bread.
"Alright, act exhausted and help set up the camp," Talia whispered once the villagers were out of earshot. "Lars, keep your hands to yourself. No crafting skills. We build this bare-handed like normal humans."
"I know, I know. I'm not stupid," Lars grumbled, walking over to a massive discarded log.
With his Level 100 Strength stats, the massive log—which would normally require three fit men to carry—felt as light as a foam prop in the dwarf's hands. Lars almost tossed it over his shoulder with one hand, but catching Talia's icy glare, he quickly contorted his face into a grimace, panting loudly and making his legs shake as if he were carrying a crushing burden.
The rest of the guild followed suit. They put on an Oscar-worthy performance of being weak and frail while pitching the tarps and hammering the wooden stakes. Dane and Nina deliberately dropped their hammers; Elise pretended to trip over a rock. To any outsider, they looked exactly like a group of exhausted, pathetic refugees struggling to build a simple shelter.
Once the crude camp was set up and the sky darkened, the eighteen guild members gathered around a small campfire beneath the hay roof. Thom, who had just returned from distributing the hard bread (and subtly interrogating the locals), sat down next to Talia.
"What did you get, Thom?" Talia asked quietly.
"A lot, Boss," Thom smirked, the sharp glint of the salesman returning to his eyes. "The nearest major city is called Soltaris. It's a mid-sized, neutral trade hub. Not too strict on border control. The guards told me there's a village wood convoy heading there tomorrow morning to deliver supplies. I made a deal with them—we help carry the timber, and we get to hitch a ride on their carts. Plus, with the foreman vouching for us, we can bypass the strict background checks at the city gates."
"Excellent work," Talia nodded, her gaze sweeping over the guild members huddled around the fire. "Listen up, everyone. Our goal isn't to become beggars in the capital. If major guilds got dragged into this world too, they will undoubtedly try to seize power or build armies. We will fight them from the shadows. And to do that... we need eyes and ears in every single profession."
Talia picked up a twig and began drawing a simple diagram in the dirt.
"Once we reach Soltaris, we disperse to avoid suspicion and cast a wide intelligence net," she pointed the twig at Sera, Mila, and Elise. "Sera, you three are attractive and have high evasion. Go find work as tavern waitresses. There is no better place to extract secrets and rumors than from drunk men."
"Copy that, Boss. Right up my alley," Sera gave a playful wink. Mila nodded nervously, while Elise threw up a thumbs-up.
Talia turned to the larger men in the group. "Thom, Doran, Nolan, Dane... you guys have the build. Sign up as city guards or patrolmen. We need to know the military movements and secure all the entry and exit routes of the city."
"You got it. Time to slack off and eat on the government's dime," Dane chuckled.
"Lars and Nina," Talia pointed at the dwarf and the young alchemist. "You two will open a small shop. Lars as a blacksmith, Nina as an alchemist's assistant. Intentionally craft low-tier, garbage items to sell as a front so you aren't investigated, but quietly stockpile high-end materials to support us in emergencies."
"Pelyovin, get a job as a stable hand for the nobles or the city lord. We need to know which VIPs are traveling in and out. Elin, Bryn, Finn... you three will play the role of hunters and foragers. Patrol the outer walls and the deep forests. Keep an eye on any external threats."
Everyone nodded firmly. The assigned covers aligned perfectly with their classes and natural talents.
"As for the Adventurer's Guild, which will likely be a hotspot for any Isekai'd players..." Talia continued, "Bram, Lucian, Thrae. You have versatile close-combat skills. Blend in as instructors for novice adventurers or take low-rank quests. Keep an eye out for anyone using bizarre skills or trying to form a faction. As for me... I will apply as a Guild Receptionist to personally filter and intercept all quest intel."
Having distributed the front roles, Talia tossed the twig into the campfire. She turned her attention to the undead mage, who was still wearing his wooden mask and quietly wiping mud off his cloak.
"And finally... Silas."
Silas looked up through the eyeholes of his mask. "What's the word, Boss? Want me to go dig some graves?"
Talia's lips curled into a smirk. "Your job is the most important. Once we infiltrate the city, you will slip away quietly. As our 'Shadow Architect,' you will use your undead summons to secretly build an underground base outside the city walls, exactly according to the blueprints we used in the game. Make it impenetrable. If our infiltration fails, that base will be our only safe house."
Silas let out a low, raspy chuckle, his glowing eyes flickering beneath the wood. "You got it, Boss... I'll build a hellish fortress that'll make even the gods cry if they try to breach it."
With the master plan set, the atmosphere among the fake refugees shifted entirely. On the outside, they were wearing ragged clothes and chewing on stale bread in the freezing cold.
But in the eyes of all eighteen members... the flames of excitement burned brightly. The survival game—a war of information and espionage with their actual lives on the line—had officially begun!