[A/N: I have spent the better part of eight hours writing this chapter, doing a bit of research, and for the life of me, this chapter does not feel right to me]
Sprinting down the beach and grabbing whatever rock, thatch, and wood she could, Harley was one of the first to have both a tool and a weapon: a Stone Pickaxe, which she used to obtain some flint from nearby boulders to make herself a Stone Axe, storing the Pickaxe in her inventory for the time being.
She saw many others along the beach, too, but she didn't focus on them; instead, she focused on searching for the Survivor Notes that would give her an EXP boost for a few hours while also harvesting whatever resources she could along with Narcoberries to make Narcotics to tip her arrows when she got to level 15 and could make bows.
She ran past multiple people who were fighting one another or the various aggressive Dinosaurs of the Island, even a few getting chased by a Spinosaurus in the distance, making Harley smile in amusement when one of them then got grabbed by a Kaprosuchus that came flying out from the water.
Harley could only shake her head at the stupidity of those people for rushing towards the swamp of all places, one of the most dangerous places to be outside of the mountains and the Redwoods, due to the swamp's many hazardous creatures, leeches, bugs, Giant snakes; titanoboas, and waist-level swamp water that prevented you from even seeing most of those dangerous till they were already upon you.
When the sun began to go down, Harley's level reached level 58, giving her access to simple firearms, metal tools, and various other useful Engrams. Already, the bitter chill of the Island began to seep into her bones through the thin leather clothes she stitched together from the hide of various dinosaurs. At the same time, she got to work on assembling a small thatch hut against the wall of a cliff, where she could get to work on cooking some meat and raw metal.
While the meat cooked in the fire and the raw metal in the Refining Forges, she made a simple mortar and pestle to grind a copious amount of Narcoberries into narcotics, which she used to start tipping her arrows. She wanted to start working on taming any Velociraptors she could find; with a pack of them, she could take on even larger dinosaurs, and if those dinosaurs had riders. Well, it would be a bad day for them, as Raptors could leap up onto larger dinosaurs and pull off any riders. She could even bleed a Rex to death if she got her hands on some good Raptors.
However, that was only considering if no one got their hands on guns by the end of the 'match.' If someone got their hands on even a Longkneck or Simple Pistol, they could take down a Raptor with a good and well-placed shot. Meanwhile, outside Harley's hut, over a dozen pillars of light beamed down from the sky above.
Those not bunkering down for the night swarmed these Supply drops like flies, only to find that the supply drops were a trap, as the more dangerous dinosaurs around the drops swarmed them too.
...
Come the morning, Harley was still wide awake, having worked all night making the tools she needed: arrows and narcotics. She even began work on making Flak, a metal armor that provided decent protection against the inhabitants of the Island but no real protection against the better firearms. However, it would hold well against simple pistols and Longkneck rifles.
While she went out hunting for Raptors to tame, she left the campfire and refining forges on to get as much charcoal as possible for Gunpowder. While she searched for raptors to tame, she occasionally came across the bodies of the other participants. They had nothing of worth on them, but one did have a metal sword and some leather armor. This unknown man seemed to have died from blood loss if the various wounds and lacerations across his body were any indication.
That's when she felt her implant buzz. Raising it to her eyes, a number flashed on the surface of the specimen implant.
[43/100 Remaining]
...
Meanwhile, in a different area of the island, a woman in leather was lying in wait upon a tree, with a bow and bola in hand.
Beneath her was a small man in cloth gathering some berries from a large bush. Knocking an arrow, she took a deep breath and took aim. Pulling back the arrow, she let it loose, and with a 'toonk,' the arrow flew through the air before it struck the man in the shoulder from behind, making them scream in pain.
Turning around to look at the woman with scarlet hair, the man screamed and shot to their feet, begging to flee from the woman.
Leaping off the tree, the woman chased after the bleeding man; swinging the bola in hand, she threw it as hard and fast as she could toward the man's legs, striking them head-on.
The bola wrapped around the man's legs as he fled, causing the man to fall and land on their face; before they could get further, the woman summoned a stone axe to her hand and swung down onto the man's skull.
[39/100 Remaining]
Examining her level, she noted that she had not even leveled up from killing the man, and the logs on her Specimen Implant showed that the man was only level 18.
Ivy sighed. Having temporarily lost her connection to Mother Nature, as was the case every time she entered the games, made her feel distressed until she adjusted to the loss of the connection. Something she was growing used to with how much she ventured into the worlds offered by the Cafe.
Ivy needed to win, and despite her loss of connection with the Green, she could feel its gaze more than ever.
Harley was likely somewhere else on the Island fighting to win, and as much as Ivy loved Harley and her friendship with Harley, she wouldn't hold back if Harley got in the way of her winning this tournament. However, if Ivy had to fight Harley, Ivy was confident she would lose in a straight-up fight against Harley.
Outside of the tournament, Ivy knew she could win thanks to her connection with the Green, but in the tournament where she did not have any assistance? She'd get sent to the floor. Not to add to the fact that Ivy was unfamiliar with the Island, Harley thrived on it and spent months exploring it outside the Tournament.
Scavenging whatever she could off the man's corpse, Ivy continued her hunt; she wanted to finish this tournament as fast as possible.
...
By the end of the first week on the Island, the storm had taken over the edges of the Island, forcing many to move further inland. The player count for the match had dropped down to only a dozen participants, and those who were remaining either had good equipment and skills or were over-relying on the use of their mounts and tames.
Yet, while many were roaming around or bunkering down in wait, a crazy man decided to start building a base at the center of the Island and tame as many Pteradons and other flight-capable dinosaurs as they could to form a sort of deadly flying swarm that could pick people off their mounts and drop from hundreds of feet in the air.
Those who wandered around, such as Harley and Ivy with their groups of tames, noticed the construction of the base, but by then, it was too late as the man had already set up a large stone wall that could withstand the damage many dinosaurs could do. Even when Harley tried to near the base, she was repelled by the crazy man who started firing upon her when she crept close enough, killing a few of her tames in the process.
Many of the participants had already hit level 100, but due to the difficulty in harvesting resources, especially oil and polymer, many of the advanced weapons available through Engrams were uncraftable, not including the need to make Gasoline, collect Obsidian, Crystals, and a bunch more, many of the Participants were limited to the loot they grabbed from the Supply Drops and whatever tools and flak armor they could make with a Smithy.
Not only were playing having to deal with that but with the growing storm, the Dinosaurs on the Island only became even more aggressive, with most of the passive dinosaurs even starting to fight back when provoked, meaning the Participants had to fight for every scrap of food for themselves and their mounts.
By the end of the second week, less than ten participants remained, and the Storm took half of the Island and as the Tournament neared its end, many began to wonder who would rise above and win.
Harley Quinn, the mad clown?
Poison Ivy, the overbearing Nature Activist of Gotham?
Crazy Steeve, the seemingly insane guy that decided to build an entire fucking base to bunker until the end in?
No one knew.