Daily Quest Failed!

He threw away the bloody hoodie that he had and crept back into his apartment. His uncle was fast asleep and so was his auntie. Glad that things had cooled down between them, he tip-toed back to his room without awaking them.

To hide the bloody evidence, he just chucked his grey shirt under his bed, and went to sleep shortly after.

The following day was just a usual school day for him. He'd luckily had a sound sleep without any haunting nightmares, and his home was rather mellow after yesterday's conflict and tension.

Eating his auntie's delectable breakfast meals and being woken up to her warm, comforting atmosphere just made him relaxed and calm.

He walked with Enzo to school and his lessons were monotonous, as usual.

At lunchtime, however, he felt a strong hunger that he had never really felt before. Lycanos was scrawny by nature, and really didn't have a strong appetite.

However, today, he devoured his entire meal and felt particularly drawn to the battered fish that was being served out that day.

"What's going on with you? It's like you've turned into a dog." Enzo commented, watching him eat his food.

"Don't know. I didn't really eat much yesterday." Lycanos said, lifting a piece of fish to chomp down on it.

The students had to pay for their own meals, and Lycanos received payments from his auntie every fortnight or so to pay for these. However, seeing the few dollars that remained in his account, he couldn't resist.

Enzo watched him with confusion as he lifted up and had a smile of surprise.

Slamming a plate of three battered fish fillets down, he munched on them and finished them alarmingly quickly. After finishing, his eyes were glued to the remaining fish that was on Enzo's plate.

He could feel his mouth watering and he struggled to even stop his arms from reaching out to snatch it.

"Could I have that please? Pretty please?" He said quite quickly, making Enzo laugh.

"Sure." He replied, before seeing him snatch it before he even finished saying his one-word reply.

The school day came to an end and he returned home. Minutes after returning, he indulged in his usual night-long gaming sessions. With his headset on and his room dark, he played his favourite games for hours on end.

His eyes remained glued to the screen ahead of him and it seemed like he could've continued for days. Eating even into the later hours of the night, he felt no need to get good sleep for the following school day.

'I won't even pay attention anyway, it doesn't matter.'

23:58.

Somewhat fatigued now, he decided to put the game down to try and get some sleep. His eyes had gotten heavy and started uncontrollably shutting.

23:59.

Now laying his bed, he simply looked above to his ceiling. The thought of his dead mother continued to haunt his mind, and no matter how hard he tried he couldn't omit the memories from his mind.

The alcohol and weed he would purchase was for this very purpose. No matter how much he'd drink, no matter how many hits he would take, the thought would never leave his brain.

It would give him a split-second of relief, before the emotions crept back in once again.

00:00.

[Daily Quest Failed!]

[System Punishment Activated!]

"Huh? AARGH!!" Lycanos grunted, trying as hard as he could to contain his scream.

The feeling of being stabbed returned to him but it was now amplified by many times. He turned and grasped onto his bed sheets violently, gritting his teeth so hard that they started to grind at each other.

His entire body was burning up, and his abdomen felt like it was being impaled by a massive burning blade repeatedly.

'What is this?! I can't take this!!' Lycanos roared internally, hyperventilating.

He struggled to even catch his breath, and his face had totally gone red. Seconds later, he slowly rolled to fall off his bed, and he grasped his abdomen with immense force. Each second that passed felt like minutes to him.

He was truly in hell.

Soon enough, tears trickled down his face and he tried hard to suck in his cry to not wake up his auntie and uncle. Totally tensed up and distressed, the pain faded, and his limbs fell to his sides.

He remained flat on the floor like a dead body, unmoving.

However, he took in heavy breaths, blankly staring at the dark ceiling above him.

He hadn't received any injuries whatsoever, and just felt as he did minutes prior.

'What was that?! Is this what this system does to me if I don't do those damn quests?' He thought, slowly rising up.

All that was left was a slight tingling sensation in his body after feeling such intense pain then having it disappear so suddenly.

What he knew was that he was going to do his daily quests and do so every single day.

Struggling to think of what to say, he thought internally of opening the panels that he had seen hours prior. Just as he did, another notification popped up.

[~MENU~]

[Stats]

[Quests]

He was met with these two tabs, that he had already seen before. What he knew for sure was that this system was real. What he just felt was real, and he had received no injuries whatsoever.

'So, I'm an immortal werewolf? What does that even mean?' He wondered, entering his thoughts.

All of this was quite a lot for him, and he decided to just sleep while he could.

****

The following day, Lycanos headed to his school and was now invested in this system. The system intrigued him since it was so mystical and clearly supernatural. What had happened to him was not possible.

He had died, he was sure of it, but he returned with no injuries and now felt like eating the weight of an elephant in meat every time he'd have lunch.

The money that he was supposed to have another 9 days was only enough to feed him for the next 3 days or so. He still felt quite hungry, even after the numerous portions he'd had.

'Open menu!' He internally called out.

[~MENU~]

[Stats]

[Quests]

Opening the quests, he noticed the change to the information being shown to him.

[Daily]

[Eat 1lb of meat] [1/1]

[Run 10km in under 25 minutes] [0/1]

[Complete 200 pull ups] [0/1]

[Complete 250 push ups] [0/1]

[Weekly]

[Consume 250ml of human blood] [0/1]

[Active]

[N/A]

He'd eaten a pound of meat from the burgers that were being sold at his school, and all that was left was for him to complete the remaining quests.

There was no way he was going to try and complete these quests in a gym. From what he was guessing, he had received some physical enhancement in some way. It would be totally unfair for him to receive these quests if he couldn't do them, so they had to be possible.

However, doing 200 pull ups in a single workout session was practically unheard of, and also running 10 kilometres in under 25 minutes was nearly impossible, let alone rare.

He stepped out into the darkening streets of Kol Heights, where questionable, dangerous people would stroll past him.

He simply gave his surroundings a quick look, attempting to make a path around the neighbourhood that would be 10 kilometres in his mind.

*ring*

*ring*

He revealed his phone, and was surprised to see that there wasn't any vibration or notification on it. Looking around, a man more than 25 metres from him revealed his phone to accept a call.

He just chuckled and had a smile of awe.

'No way I just heard that right?' He wondered.

"Yeah, what's going on man? Yeah, man, I'm doing great."

Even from this distance, he could hear his conversation easily. He could even make out what the person on the phone was saying, even with the poor audio quality.

BEEP!

Hearing a car adjacent to him beep, the sound felt deafening to him. He fell into a crouch with his hands on his ears and hissed from the sudden pain he had felt.

A car rushed past another, leaving a cloud of dust and smoke across the road, and he shook his head violently.

'Woah. I can hear super far away too? I really am a werewolf!' He thought to himself, slightly excited.

'Maybe this isn't so bad after all!'

Using his phone to map out a route, he placed his hands on the ground and exploded off into his run. He managed to shoot off faster than he was able to sprint literally days ago, and felt like he was flying.

His legs just moved as he commanded them and didn't feel fatigued at all. The tens of metres turned into hundreds, and he continued powering on at a rapid pace. He covered amazing distance in each one of his strides, and felt on top of the moon.

"WOOHOO!!" He called out in his run, without a care for the reaction of those around him.

He ran with a smile across his face, and felt the will to push his body to the very maximum. Nearing 9 kilometres, there were only around 2 minutes left for him to complete this run in under 25 minutes and he exploded forward as fast as he could.

The last thing he wanted to do was experience that pain of failing his daily quest again, and his mind now had unwavering resolution. His eyes remained locked to the track ahead of him, and his body followed his command.

The pain was pushed to the back of his thoughts, and his unbreakable determination fuelled his every step.

Reaching the finish line, he fell onto a wall beside him and slid down it, hyperventilating. Even though his body had clearly improved in ability, he had limits.

It felt like he was suffocating, and his chest heaved in and out intensely. Soon enough, though, his mind calmed and so did his breathing.

That was one daily quest ticked off. The remaining ones were push ups and pull ups. To do these, he headed to the official park of Kol Heights.

This park was notorious for the stabbings and shootings that had taken place inside, but Lycanos wasn't very scared. This was the area that he had lived in for the past few years; it didn't scare him as much as it used to.

He was still smart enough to pretty much never enter the streets at night, but now he felt invincible.

'Who's gonna stop a werewolf? Will I even die if I get shot?' He wondered.

Thinking back to his title as immortal werewolf and his regeneration after his supposed death, the answer was likely to be no. That gave him a keen smile, and made him even more grateful for this system that he had somehow gained.

'Oh well. Better do these quests so I can head home before nightfall.' He told himself, dropping down onto his arms.

Unlike usual, he could barely feel the weight of his body as he kept his arms straight. With his legs fully outwards, he began his pushups. He completed them with explosive pace and couldn't stop himself from carrying on.

'80. 81. 82...'

Sweat soon trickled down his face, but he gritted his teeth together and pushed further.

He had felt the limit to his body in his 10 kilometre run and he knew he was no where near it.

The words that his uncle would say to him slipped into his mind as he continued. He felt like stopping. He felt like relaxing and staying lazy, but what if he could prove his uncle wrong?

What if he could prove Enzo wrong?

What if he could prove everyone wrong?

To do so, he had to carry on. He couldn't stop here!

He shouted as he did his push ups and found the energy to continue in every repetition. It felt like his chest and arms were being branded by a hot iron on every push, but he continued.

'Hello no-life! Are you gonna do anything of substance today, Lycanos? Probably not!'

"Nah, I'm not arsed." "Yeah, of course you aren't."

'249!' He shouted, before dropping down.

With his chest an inch from the floor, he roared and pushed up as hard as he possibly could. The veins in his neck and arms became large and throbbed in his movements. He became still for quite a few seconds but continued upwards to finally lock out his burning arms.

Instead of lowering himself to the ground, he flopped down and let his arms lay still on the grass beneath.

'One more to go.' He thought, struggling to catch his breath.

He lifted and there was a branch about 10 feet up from him. He wasn't athletic at all before this weird transformation of his and could barely reach 8 feet into the air. However, he took a step back then leapt forward before using his gained momentum to hurl himself upwards.

Easily reaching the branch, he latched onto it and managed to hold his entire weight with his grip strength. The branch was the perfect size and strength for his hand to wrap around, but also to not snap it off.

As soon as he landed, he began to repeatedly perform pull ups that he had never been able to do his entire life. With this amount of strength, it was exhilarating, and he couldn't help but shout in excitement once again.

He just started laughing, looking down to his newly powered body. He didn't seem to have any extra muscle mass but could output far more power than before.

His exercise was tough, but he used the same resolution that he had utilised throughout the day. The fatigue couldn't break him down, and he finished the 200 reps and just totally lost grip on the branch.

Falling from the ten-foot branch, he flailed around his arms in fear of the incoming impact from the drop, but the force was absorbed through his legs. The force felt heavy, but there wasn't any pain in his movements.

[Daily]

[Eat 1lb of meat] [1/1]

[Run 10km in under 25 minutes] [1/1]

[Complete 200 pull ups] [1/1]

[Complete 250 push ups] [1/1]

[Daily Quests Complete!]

[+2 XP]

Seeing this notification, it was almost the first major achievement he had to his name in the past decade. True progress.

He clenched his fist upon seeing this panel, with the breeze cooling down his hot body and making his black hair lightly flutter.

'I'm gonna use this power and prove everyone wrong. Nobody can stop me now.' The teen declares, glaring at this panel.

His life of procrastination and stagnation was no longer. He wasn't going to let it continue. Now, was time for improvement.

Time to triumph.