Chapter 5 - The Advance (1)

It's been multiple nights of sleep—maybe four or five, and we learned that monsters are pretty common, we can find a group of weak monsters in the distance after an hour of jogging, but most are too large.

Zion and I found a large blue-grey spider with rhino horns, but it wasn't as big as a rhino, it was smaller. So, we, like idiots, decided to take it on, for those sweet coins. Turns out we had to run a couple of miles, its shell was tough and thick, almost impenetrable. But running isn't as hard when we first ran away from the wolf, because of the extra stats. This time, the spider gave up after a while, unlike the vampiric wolf.

Though we haven't found any humans yet, after 3 or so nights, the bunny corpse that Zion put in my backpack was gone. We didn't see it happen, but it's likely that there's a despawn mechanism in this game.

It's a harmless fact until I thought about it more. How will I know if my family—my friend is alive or not, if I can't find their corpse? What if they died? Well, I wouldn't care that much, as long as my friend's alive. And, I actually hope my brother dies. The scum of the earth deserves to die.

After surviving in these barren lands so much, I feel as if I'm losing touch with reality, but Zion and the communication in the chat make it better.

I hear an ear-piercing screech, as I realize Zion's no longer beside me. He's in the distance, fighting some black figure. Running to catch up, I arrive, and I smell smoke. The smoke is coming from a humanoid beast, with fire flowing from its eyes.

The aura surrounding it is as astonishing as it is frightening. Frozen like ice, I'm about to pick up Zion and run for the horizon, but I can't. My body is stricken with fear, fear like no other. The beast locks eyes on me, eyes so strong that it can shatter. Shatter the ice I've been frozen in.

Not planning to die, I try to think of a plan, but my instincts tell me to run.

Not wasting a breath, I take out my hand and get ready to use my powers, I have been using this power at least once a day, practicing it, so the backlash could be minimal. Heart pumping so loud it could break my chest, I put intense focus on the creature, and my mind starts hurting, and then a quick strike of anger. Then I know the monster's already dead. The black figure shoots out a straight beam of lava from its eyes, and I hold out my hand in front of me, protecting myself. The moment the lava stream touches me, it combusts into flowers, that quickly decay into ash and petals, all the way to the hungry creature, who also shares the same fate, though much slower.

Right after that, I rush of drowsiness hits me. I'm so tired I can only think of one task, keep Zion safe. But he's already safe, so I know I can rest easy. My body's exhausted, torn, and dead, from just using my power one time, although this time I didn't instantly faint.

About to rest and regain energy, I see a speck of white in the distance, I knew I was done for. It was a rabbit, the first monster we defeated. Though, it's only one. One rabbit stopped me from resting, recovering. It was only one. That was a relief.

Then I remember studying late at night, 4 am in the morning still up working on a project that my group members helped little on. During that time, I felt like I had been dreaming. I didn't feel awake. I didn't get a good mark.

It seemed like an easy task, and with my stats, it would've been easier than the first time. That's what I thought anyway.

I was wrong.

In the grassy plains stretching out to the horizon, you could see two black figures. One looked small and was quick. The other was larger but slow. Incredibly slow.

That was me. Throwing a sloppy punch after a sword strike caught it off guard, the rabbit was underestimating me. It was probably shocked from the impact, so I threw another, and another, my muscles screaming. I had to let go of the sword, it was too heavy for me right now. Punch after punch my punches were slowly getting weaker and weaker, but I wasn't slowing down.

Then, it fell. Dead.

And I fell too, to catch my breath.

"Give me a break!" I said, directed at the rabbit's dead corpse.

Noticing how slow it was for my Vantablack powers to kill the fire-eyed monster, I definitely need to keep grinding stats, fast.

...

After some rest, I regained most of my energy, without sleeping and making us vulnerable. Glad I didn't need to faint every time I used my powers anymore. The first few times I used it on smaller animals I would always faint. Practice makes perfect.

"Ugh." It was coming from Zion.

He picks himself off the ground, pattering the dirt off his pants. "How long was I out for?"

"Just around 5 or 10 minutes," I say.

"I see. I was knocked out cold huh. Got hit straight in the solar plexus." Zion explains.

"And let me guess, you're probably craving some food." I roll my eyes. Though quickly, I still take notice of the surrounding plains, with some grass charred in the area where I fought the fire beam beast.

"Yeah, I am. Wait... How'd you know?"

"We both know you're a food addict already," I tell him.

"True, true."

...

After a slight rest, Zion and I get up to adventure again, hoping to only encounter easy-to-kill monsters, and even better, a welcoming civilization to answer the many questions we have.

It's a simple grind, but a vicious cycle, jogging, and jogging, then fighting and then jogging once again. With upgraded strength stats, the physical attributes were getting easier, but the toll mentally was still the same.

Too bad, because instead, we found a wooden structure, resembling a small hut, looking like it was made out of cascading overlapping sticks. Zion asks me if we should go in, and I say we should investigate first.

Looking around the small hut, there were no traps or suspicious things sticking out of the ordinary. Thinking that it is completely safe, I walk into the hut. But then, I hear an unfamiliar high-pitched voice yelling behind me.

"Hey!"