The Gym

[Quest completed]

[10 exp received]

“Amazing performance! Did you all see that?!” Mr Root seemed to be ecstatic at Gary’s performance. “Last week he was laying on his arse, and now he put Blake on his back side instead.”

Honestly, even Gary was impressed with his own performance, something like that would have been impossible for him before. Although being able to follow Blake’s movements, he had always lacked the strength or speed to act on it, so this was a huge improvement.

“You're on the team and will be playing in the first match, broccoli head!’ Mr Root shouted as the field was being cleared up, as it was the end of practice for the day.

Gary, for a brief second having forgotten about what had happened to him, suddenly noticed that Blake was still on the ground and quickly came over, offering him a helping hand.

“I’m sorry about that! You’re not hurt or anything, are you?” Gary asked, worried that he might have scratched him or broken a few bones. He had yet to find out just how strong he was in comparison to a human, something that he had not taken into account in all his excitement.

“Don’t worry, I’m a lot better than you were yesterday.” Blake answered jokingly as he accepted Gary’s hand. He could see that Gary wasn’t paying attention to him directly, for his eyes were aimed right past him, toward the girls who were leaving the field.

‘Seems like Coach's method really got you motivated.’ Blake thought with a smile.

The others got to work clearing the rest of the field, putting away the cones and the balls that would be used for practice. Tom was one of these helpers and he was also the one to have stumbled upon the very ball that Gary had taken out of Blake’s hand.

Picking it up, he noticed that it was completely deflated and when turning it around he could see there was a large puncture wound. One could have still been a coincidence, but the football had five going into the ball as if someone had pierced it with their fingers.

‘First the desk in class and now the ball? Gary what the hell did you do? No, this isn’t a movie or some book. I’m sure there has to be a perfectly normal explanation for this... but then why did you ask me all those questions about werewolves earlier?’ At this moment, Tom was feeling more distant from his friend than ever, as the whole rugby team had congratulated him on his performance and welcomed him onto the team.

Walking back home, Gary had a huge smile on his face. It had been one horrible day followed by one of the best days of his life he mused, but soon he was reminded by the troubles he still had to face.

‘My heartbeat, it looks like the faster it gets, the more it affects my transformation. Shit, doesn’t that mean if I get too excited I might fully turn? How the hell would I explain suddenly growing fur or becoming larger? And what was that thing with the mark when I shook Kai’s hand earlier.’

Thinking about this, he opened up the system screen, and information about the mark was displayed.

[Bond Mark]

[A Bond Mark is a type of marking you can leave when you have made a sincere promise with another party. Those that are marked are given a unique scent, allowing the user to track down the Bond at any point in time. If the promise gets broken the marking will break as well.]

[Those with a Broken Mark will automatically become hunting targets.

Additional stats will be awarded if one manages to successfully hunt their target down!]

Gary grabbed the side of his head, cursing himself for not having taken advantage of the opportunity to mark Kai.

‘Wait is the mark invisible, or at least something only I can see? Wouldn’t that raise a ton of questions otherwise?’ Then he gulped as he thought about the second part. ‘Successfully hunt down a target… so does the system want me to kill them?’

Trying to forget about the negative side, Gary started to think about something more positive, and thought back to the game when he had snatched the ball from Blake.

‘The Quest gave me 10 Exp just for that alone, coupled with the 40 Exp I got for defeating those guys earlier means I’m halfway to a Level Up! Just what will happen once I reach 100 Exp? Will I just get stronger or perhaps I will gain an ability or a skill?’

Thinking about this, reminded Gary that he still had to try to complete the other Quests. One of them was eating 2kg of meat a day, and the other required him to join the gym. With the pre-payment from his old gang job he still had a wad of cash on him to go for the latter.

‘I guess it wouldn’t hurt to try it,’

He headed towards a high street gym and paid them the one day trial fee. He was ready to work out. There were a few people inside the gym that looked at him as he entered wearing his school clothes, making it clear to everybody inside that he had to be an amateur.

‘What am I meant to even start with, did the system just expect me to come in here and start lifting?’ With a confused look on his face, it wasn’t long until a friendly trainer approached him.

He had a giant smile on his face as he rubbed his hands together.

“This looks like your first time here. I’m a personal trainer, so if you need any help I will give you the first lesson for free.”

“It’s okay I-“

“No need to be so cautious, as I said the first lesson is completely free! Here let me guide you on how to use the equipment. You won’t believe how many gym users injure themselves because they do things wrong. So first of all, let’s weigh you and then we’ll look at your body fat percentage. With that data I’ll create a personal plan just for you.”

Not even letting Gary get a word in, he was soon tailored off to the weighing scale, and the personal trainer had him just where he wanted him.

‘These personal trainers... they’re worse than car salesmen! I just wanted to try to do my own thing and get out of here! What am I meant to do now?’ Gary thought, but caught up in the wind, at the end of the day the guy did say the first lesson was free.

After some measurements the trainer took him over to the bench press. He was quite the buff guy, nearly as muscular as his teacher Mr Root. Weight after weight was being put on either end, and soon the trainer was pushing away, while describing all the correct points.

‘Is this guy really trying to teach me, or does he just want to show off in front of a newbie?’

Finally, the trainer stopped and allowed Gary to try, while he went around the back of the rack to help him in case anything was to go wrong.

‘I’ve never even been to the gym before, how much weight can I lift?’

The trainer was looking at the weights on the bar that he still had, and also had his hands ready. He hadn’t even removed any of the weight he had originally put on the bars.

‘This kid, I can see he wasn’t impressed by my bulging hard muscles. I guess he’s never been to the gym before so he doesn't know how hard this is. When he tries to even lift the weight off the bar he’ll soon understand, and I'll be there to pick the weight off him when he does.’ The trainer thought.

Although it didn’t look like Gary had paid too close attention, he had actually remembered each of the points the trainer made, and was now copying his starting position, arching his back slightly. Gary had copied the trainer to the point where he almost looked like a replica.

‘Oh, this kid's form is pretty good.’ The trainer was surprised, wondering if Gary was just pretending to be new to this.

Then, when trying to push the weight of the rack slightly, Gary could feel it budge only slightly. He held his breath and began pushing and pushing.

‘It’s no use.’

[BPM 100]

[BPM 110]

[BPM 120]

[Your Strength is increasing]

Soon the bar was pushed off the rack, and lowered down to his chest. He then pushed it back up again. Placing it perfectly back completing one full rep.

Wiping the sweat from his head, Gary got off the bench.

“Did I do a good job?” Gary asked.

The man stood there stunned, and started to look around to see if anyone else had seen what he had just witnessed.

“This is a joke, right? One of those PouTube videos surely.” He laughed to himself, but when trying to lift the bar up, he could tell the weight was still there, no one had tampered with it.

‘The weight was at least 80kg, how was he able to push that much in one go?!’

[You’ve had your first taste of working out]

[I’ll let you off for now and allow you to complete the quest, but remember to workout daily, to get a body fit for a werewolf]

[Daily quest complete]

[10 Exp received]

‘Ah this is great, I thought I would have had to stay here all day, I’ll come back tomorrow.’ Gary was elated and ran off leaving his stunned trainer tthere.

Knowing that the system was giving him exp for completing all these quests, using the money he still had, Gary decided to stop off at the supermarket. Here he grabbed two kilograms of meat, piled up in his basket, and it was time for him to complete the second daily quest.

While walking though, he suddenly stopped.

‘No, I can’t just go and bring back the food! If I cook all of this and eat it in front of Mum, she’ll ask where I got the money to buy so much steak from, and they'll think I'm a monster for chugging down so much meat!’

Pulling the meat he had just bought out of the plastic back, Gary could see it through the cellophane plastic. The red blood that was dripping off the raw steak, the white marble areas. He never found raw meat apprising before but for some reason his mouth was just rolling at the site of it.

Looking around, he made sure no one was looking, and then stepped into an alleyway between two buildings. He soon found himself using his nail to pierce the plastic and the scent had immediately hit his nose.

There was no second guessing himself, as if he was being controlled by something, his hand grabbed onto the raw meat and he took a big chunk out of it. Soon he found himself golfing all the food, ripping it through it with his teeth with ease.

When all the meat was gone, once again the message had popped up.

[Daily quest complete]

[10 Exp received]

Naturally he wiped his mouth with the sleeves of his shirt which was now covered in blood.

‘What the hell am I? No regular Altered ever said that his instincts got the better of them. Oh God, I really am a monster!’ Gary lamented having accepted the job that day.

Now that he walked home, Gary was depressed as his head was filled with these types of negative thoughts, but when he entered his bad neighbourhood he was soon reminded of why he was doing what he was doing.

‘If this system is really like a game, then when I Level Up I should get stronger! Those Quests were daily so I should get them again tomorrow as well,’ he thought. ‘The problem is, meat isn’t cheap, yet neither is joining the gym and then I still want to help Mum and Amy. To do all this I’m still going to need money and lots of it, yet I can’t go back to my old part time job.’

Racking his head, thinking of anything he could do he regretfully decided to text one person.

[I can’t go back to the Underdogs, but I really need some cash ASAP! Do you have a way for me to make more? Maybe I can help you with something?]

The text message was sent to Kai. Even though the two of them had both belonged to the same gang, he had never seen the other boy work as a Transporter, not to mention his upperclassman was clearly a lot better off than he was, so Gary was willing to bet Kai was doing something else for the gang.

[No problem. Meet me at the school gate tonight, just make sure to come alone!]

*****

Top 25 golden ticket = 3 Chapters a day

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Editor: Devils_Advocate