Kalli waited at the gate as she watched Bert and Kruger coming down the street with over a hundred people.

She could already hear the muttering behind her, about how they barely had enough food for themselves, and they couldn’t take in a hundred more who were unable to generate points to buy more, or fight the boars to get food.

They were trained to take over corporations, though. The concept of assistants, staff and employees was not lost on the students.

They just had to find a balance that would work for everyone, since they had to risk their lives for the System Points needed to support an employee. At least, if they were going to buy the supplies from Kalli’s store.

If they could get enough food supplies out of the dungeon, they could definitely hire someone.

Then, Bert and Kruger led the others into an apartment building near the gates.

That was a massive relief to everyone, and the concept of hiring them in exchange for protecting the building and keeping them fed began to look much more plausible than having them all live in the Academy itself.

They were far from short on space, but most of them still had high hopes that they could get more of the students back.

The luxury suites of the Academy were well suited to the title of "Hero", after all.

Kalli greeted the returning warriors, granting them their quest reward. Three returned students, with a Hard difficulty quest, was six points each. Most of the groups had gone out as teams of five, to maximize the number of points they would get.

But these two, confident in their new gear, had chosen to go out together.

"They’re forming teams for the dungeon now. If you would like to join a team, they will still need tanks. And it grants a lot of experience, plus there are supplies and the chance at Uncommon items from the boss," Kalli offered.

"We will head over after grabbing lunch. This is Amber, a Saint Class healer, then Beth and Jane, who are both Tinker Class repair specialists. They can fix items, and upgrade regular stuff to Common Grade items. The people in the apartment are their neighbours.

We promised to let them move in next door, and to watch over the outside of the building as well as we can from the walls.

The rest we can figure out later."

Kalli nodded and greeted the three new arrivals. They all blinked in shock as they were awarded two points a piece.

The System must have decided that convincing each other to come to the Academy counted as quest completion, Kalli surmised. There was no clear description of why they were awarded points, only that they were.

{New Quest Available} Tinker Class Quest: Repair 20 Common grade armour or weapon pieces. Reward 1 System Point.

Kalli shrugged, and activated the quest, paying the System Point for the new Easy Mode quest.

"Ooh, we get a Class Quest as soon as we get here? That is a huge win. We just need to fix stuff, and we can get a point. Twenty items each is a lot, but that can’t take more than a day or two, as long as there is damaged stuff."

Kalli smiled at Jane’s enthusiasm. There was no shortage of damaged gear, and forty items between the two of them wouldn’t even keep up with the amount of gear that got damaged every day.

The Tinkers were instantly popular, but Kalli noticed that Amber received a much less warm welcome, despite being a healer.

Her class was in demand, but it didn’t take a genius to realize that she was not one of the popular kids when she was at the Academy. That would change soon enough, but her first impression was that of an aloof and snobbish princess.

It didn’t take long before one of the teams came to invite her over, though.

"Would you like to join us in the Rat King Dungeon? It’s a level one event, and it grants rewards and supplies. We could use a healer, the group is still short on them."

"You want to risk your lives for money?" She asked disdainfully.

"No, for food and supplies. If you’d like to, you can donate your share. But you’re still level one, aren’t you? We’ve only got a week to make it to level two, or we lose everything."

That seemed to crack her composure, and Amber nodded stiffly.

"My healing skills are more than up to the task. If I can heal a group of civilians, I can surely heal a bunch of armoured thugs."

"And a mage, don’t forget that we’re bringing a mage," the warrior agreed with great pleasure.

Their team actually included two mages and a ranger, so there were only six warriors. But that was a good balance for the Rat King dungeon, from what the first group had told them.

The longer range of a mage or ranger was essential in a few spots to pull groups of rat demons by killing one of the patrolling scouts. That way, you only got the ones that saw the incident, not everything else that was in that room.

Controlling how much you had to fight at one time was the key to clearing out the tunnels safely, while blindly charging in could get you surrounded.

None of this group had any especially powerful skills or stats, so they had to do it carefully.

At least they did have a level two tank with them, who was more durable, and had an Uncommon Grade sword. They followed him into the dungeon, decisively going to take their fate into their own hands, while Kalli considered her next course of action.

"Beth, did the building you left the others in have running water?"

Beth shook her head. "Not exactly. But it’s got a storage cistern, the same as most buildings in town. Without city water pressure, they won’t have proper running water, but they have rainwater storage for the basic plumbing, and that tank was full.

Rainwater isn’t perfect, but there is solar on the roof, so they think they can get the water pump and purifier working once they check all the apartments to make sure that there are no faucets damaged or left on.

Until then, they’re filling jugs in the cistern."

Kalli nodded. "Before they put you to work fixing gear here, let’s head over. I will greet them and explain the situation. Then give them some basic supplies to keep them going. They likely didn’t have too much stockpiled."

Beth smiled. "There were a few who believed in a good pantry, but even that is nearly gone now. We started rationing right away."