A Reward and A Despair

A square-shaped object that looked like a paper used in ancient times back on Earth was lying silently within the silver box...

'A skill parchment?' Jeremy thought in amazement.

Parchment was a runal-writing material made from specially prepared untanned skins of living things. The stronger the being was, the higher the quality of a parchment became.

As a result...

Supposed the Tutorial was akin to a helping hand for the transported people to adapt to the environment and the ways of living on Ortus easier. Then those various skills that everyone would be able to buy and receive from the 'shop' were something that was very necessary and could make the adaptation process even easier.

That's why the skills within the shop, even though they were expensive, were still considered one of the god-sent opportunities for the one who could afford to buy them.

Right now, one of those skills presented itself in front of Jeremy, for free at that...

Jeremy picked the skill parchment up from the box, then looked at the words written on the parchment.

At the top, 'Mana Affinity', was written there.

In the middle, it described the benefits of this skill, such as boosting the user's affinity with mana, causing them to feel the presence of mana easier, consequently leading the user into the path of a true mage, and so on...

At the bottom of the parchment, the sentence 'Tear it to learn the skill' was written there.

Unsurprisingly, the words on the parchment were written in Universal Language that would communicate and relay the exact meaning of the words into the brain of any reader.

'Such a pity, this thing might be akin to a mountain load of golds for others, but not me.'

Shaking his head lightly, Jeremy kept the parchment inside his right glove. Then he proceeded to keep the silver box, but soon, he realized that the space within his right glove was already almost at its maximum capacity.

Then he brought out the arrows he had picked up from disarming various traps along the way and also brought out the bronze sword he had used to fight a moment ago from his right glove.

Afterward, he started rearranging and counting every item inside his left glove, which was filled with various miscellaneous items.

When he finished calculating the pros and cons of those things, he decided to discard some excess items, such as food, water, and other big and heavy things, such as some wooden logs and stones from his left glove.

Well, Jeremy only kept those wooden logs and some stones to build a campfire and fill the empty space within his left glove, that's all...

After he finished rearranging his stuff and dumping the many unnecessary things, Jeremy proceeded to put the silver box, bronze sword, arrows, and the weapons of those hobgoblins inside his two gloves.

*Sigh*

'What a tedious job. This kind of thing is really not my stuff. I should find one or two maids to do the tidy job for me later.' Jeremy thought to himself tiredly while wiping the nonexistent sweat from his forehead.

Afterward, when he checked the chamber that there was nothing worth his attention anymore, Jeremy walked to pick up his spear that was still pinning the old Dokkaebi to the ground.

'Good sage, it is not blunted yet.'

With that thought in mind, Jeremy walked back with the spear in hand to the entrance's direction that now had no barrier to prevent him from escaping anymore.

'Halfway to go before exiting this place...'

Jeremy walked further and further away from the scene until his hooded figure completely disappeared from the final chamber...

...

With just 50 skeleton soldiers...

Even though the strength and speed of those boney skeletons were nowhere near them, humans, nevertheless, there were more than 50 of those things walking out from the left and right passageway, closing off all of the people's escaping routes from within the clearing.

Moreover, Eddie, Mitchell, and other people in the clearing didn't even have a proper weapon to fight those abominations.

At last, with the starting 10 SP given by the system, only around ten people had bought weapons, such as wooden swords, wooden spears, wooden beams, wooden poles, and wooden shields from the shop in the Survival Crystal.

At that moment, the best weapons they could afford were actually weapons made from woods with the starting price of at least 10 SP ranging to 20 or so SP. Even if they wanted to buy better weapons than the wooden ones, they still needed a whopping 21 SP even for a simple sharp kitchen knife...

As a result, only ten people decided to buy a wooden weapon...

As for why the other 38 people didn't buy any weapon to fight?

It's because...

Even after being convinced by Eddie, Mitchell, and some other people to buy at least the cheapest protective measure to defend themselves, still, an idea of spending their limited SP to buy a wooden weapon didn't even cross their minds.

Actually, it might indeed cross into the minds of some people, yet they chose to conserve their precious SP instead of spending them on something that might not be useful in the near future at all.

After all, those SP could be used to buy other useful things, such as food, water, and many other miscellaneous items from the shop.

Thus, what if they decided to spend all of their SP to buy the weapons, then nothing happened afterward; who could they blame then?

If they really spent their SP on something that might be useless, they could only wait for their starvation to come...

'Isn't it better to buy foods and water instead?', was the thought that resounded within many people's minds at the time.

In another case, if they somehow bought a wooden weapon each, would they be able to fight with those creatures described in the missions list?

How could they even fight with monsters when they had never killed a dog or a cat before in their short life?

They felt really afraid that they would have wasted their SP for nothing...

They also felt insecure about everything that might happen shortly...

So, they'd rather stick with the status quo in the hope that some miracles might happen...

Or at least, in the hope that nothing would happen to them...

However...

With those mindsets, they couldn't be more wrong yet again. Those mindsets signified that many of them still didn't realize that their old manner of lives had already come to an end since 3 hours ago.

When the countdown numbers that had been floating silently above the Survival Crystal had come to an end, they finally realized that they should have believed the words of that military guy and other few people whom had been trying to convince them for the past hour.

Because when the countdown timer hit zero, more than 50 spooky skeletons with a wisp of green fire burning in their sockets came out from the left and right passageway while each one of them was holding a long and thick bone in their hands, acting as a weapon.

The sight of an army of 50 scary skeletons was too creepy for most people here...

As a result of experiencing a horror movie's scene in real life for the first time, those people, whether they were chatting with others, sitting alone in contemplating about life, crying for someone they loved, begging for god's forgiveness, or getting excited because of some unknown reasons...

At this moment, all of them felt terrified to their cores with no distinction...

Someone shrieked, someone screamed, someone yelled, someone fainted, and someone even peed their own pants.

The situation got even more chaotic after they saw that those grotesque walking pieces of bones slowly made their way towards them.

Upon seeing that sight, Eddie was the first one to overcome his fear, and then he shouted aloud for everyone to run towards the Crystal to buy weapons to defend themselves as fast as possible.

When the people heard the muscular Eddie's voice, some of them finally snapped out of their fears, and then their survival instinct finally took control of their bodies instead.

So, they ran as fast as they could towards the Crystal to buy those supposed 'useless' weapons in the shop.

Still...

Many people couldn't overcome their own fears as they succumbed to the ground helplessly with shaking and trembling legs.

Those people included the two fainted people, a young petite girl with a 12-year-old look and a very old man and woman whose legs refused to move no matter what.

While some scared shitless people were trying their best to run, crawl, and wiggle to the Crystal as hard as they could for survival, yet those five people didn't even budge an inch from their positions...

With blue fire burning eerily within their eye sockets, small portions of skeleton soldiers walked slowly to the five people who were left behind. In contrast, another big portion went to the people, whom were struggling and pushing one another chaotically, trying to access the Survival Crystal.

Currently, Eddie stood with Mitchell nearby the Survival Crystal, spectating the sights around them nervously.

Then when Eddie saw that some people couldn't group up with them because their minds and legs gave out, Eddie suddenly spoke up...

"Ah, for fuck sake! Mitchell, you go bring that little girl here, and I will go to that fainted man."

Upon hearing Eddie's words, Mitchell got stupefied, "What the... Are you crazy or wha... Shit!!"

However, before Mitchell could even finish his sentence, Eddie was already several meters away from him, darting hurriedly to the fainted man.

"Come back right now, bastard! Don't play hero here; it isn't worth your own life!" Mitchell could only shout after the muscle-head military idiot, Eddie, helplessly.

Upon seeing that Eddie had launched off quickly to the second closest disabled person to them, Mitchell shook his head in resignation.

Afterward, he turned his head to the still crouching and crying little girl's direction and saw that she was pretty close to his current position.

'I might make it in time. Should I go?' With that thought in mind, Mitchell pondered to himself.

Upon turning his head briefly to see the two creepy skeletons with uncoordinated movements whom were making their way to the crying girl slowly, Mitchell got goosebumps all over his body, 'Ah shit, they look so spooky.'

However, when he saw that Eddie was still running at full speed to the rescue, he shook his head again while cursing Eddie out loud, "Damn you, Eddie!"

*Sigh*

After sighing to his fate, Mitchell sprinted towards the little girl...