The sound of rushed footsteps and breaking twigs echoed in the forest, scaring off any small animals nearby.
Until.
With an abrupt stop, Felix took cover from behind a large tree. His heart pounding in his chest like an overworked engine.
His new body wasn't at it's best at the moment, he was a year 13 old boy now. And a malnourished one at that.
" Huff, huff, huff... Inhale foooo." He tried to get his breathing in check.
" Sigh, I definitely need to bulk up this body of mine." Said Felix.
Once he got his breathing in check, he leaned slightly to see if he had any pursuers.
But all he saw was a smoke screen rising up in the sky where he had left from, specifically the body butchering facility.
" Haha, looks like they got my surprise. That will give me enough time to disappear in case they want to search for who fucked them that bad." And like that, Felix continued his track in the woods. To the thickest parts.
***
[ Pov ]: Filix
Finally after tracking for almost 15 minutes, I decided to take a break. Both to drink some water and get some food in my stomach.
" Hmmmtha, haaa... That hit the spot." I said to myself, water really hits different when you're parched.
" I got a map of the surroundings from that storage room, but I don't think It'll help much in this situation." I said, while looking at the environment I'm in. Trees and more trees.
" What I really need now is something like a crossbow or a suppressed gun." Part of it is that these woods have black bears, and I don't want to alert the cannibals of my location by using the guns they so generously gave me :).
And just like that a familiar chime sound rang inside my head, not just one. Two to be specific.
[ Ding ] [ cling ]
[ ( T ) You've eliminated a human ×5 earning +15 ( SM ) ]
[ ( SS ) You've eliminated a human ×5 earning +90 ( SP ) ]
(* Author note: the terms
( T ): Template. ( SM): Shadow Marks.
( SS ): Shop System. ( SP ): Shop points.
And if you want more info about them, check the auxiliary chapter before the first chapter. )
" Two separate notifications huh, the second one must be the Shop System I asked for. Took your time to show up, didn't ya?" I said with exasperation, used to the feeling of being the last to get anything in my last life.
" It said that I killed 5 humans, so those two women didn't make it out from the fire. Well, I didn't mean to spare their lives in the first place, just didn't want to get my hands dirty with too many lives this early on. It helped that I got Arthur bishop's template Active." I don't know what killing might do to my mentality, it might seem that I'm acting weak, it's just that I don't want to change to some psycho killer.
" Speaking of killing, it seems like it gave me points in both the template and shop. That's convenient." These two golden fingers will be my way to dominate in every field in this world.
After confirming my thoughts, i tried to check the Shop System out. " Okay, what do you have in store for me."
I mentally called out to the Shop, and it responded.
[ Grand Shop ]
• Purchase limit ( level 0 )
• Products
• Upgrade path :
- purchase limit.
- storage
• SP : 1090 ( 1000 initial credits +90 earned )
" Nice, so that Entity gave me some points to start out with. Now I'm not bothered that it didn't show up early." My mood did a complete 180 for the better, I mean who wouldn't be happy when getting free money.
' now, do I want to see what the shop has or ?' I thought to myself, my current predicament calls for immediate action.
" My priority is to get to a shelter or some cabin in these woods, I can always see what to buy when I'm in a safe place." I resolved my self for what I need to do henceforce and that is.
To survive.
***
[ Pov ] : third person
[ Time ] : 1:36 Pm
People were running around and calling out frantically to each other, trying to stop the fire that started out of nowhere.
" How did this happen?" Called out a man with short brown hair and a full beard.
" We don't know, what we know is that there were no sounds from the inside of anyone calling for help or struggling." A woman beside him said.
" At least that's what the ones guarding outside told us, they smelled smoke coming from the inside. They tried to rush in but it was too late by then." The woman confirmed what she knew about what happened.
" ... "
" They didn't see anyone going inside or outside of the building?" He asked with a Stern no nonsense tone.
" No they-" before she could say anything more, someone called.
" Sir, we just checked the back of the building. There are faint tracks leading to the woods." Said a bulky looking man with a scar on his lip.
" Hmm, good... Very good, so they think they can cause this mess and run away Scott free. Not in my watch." Said David with a cold tone of voice that brought chills to the woman standing beside him.
" I want 10 of our best trackers on this guy's tail... Now!!, let's see how far that rabbit is going to run off for." Commanded David to scar faced guy.
" Y- yes." Said the scar face, rushing back to do what he was ordered to.
" Once the fire stops see if you can salvage you know what ( corpses ), from inside. No waste like I always say." Called out David with his characteristic friendly smile.
" I'll see to it, sir." Said the woman.
" Hahaha, what an interesting fella. I'll make sure to play with you thoroughly." Thought David outloud, while looking at the crackling fire.
***
[ Time ] : 4:23 Pm
It took Felix some time to figure out how to work with the map, although he had knowledge/skills/etc of Arthur Bishop. He didn't instantaneously master everything this template had, it would take him time to make it his.
His new instincts told him he's being followed, so he used divergences and made fake resting spots with fire pits.
His true end goal is one of the deserted cabins along the shoreline of the resort.
It would give him a place to rest, and a base to defend in case he was still being followed.
And finally, all that effort gave it's result.
He was standing in front of a semi-broken cabin.
" Argh, finally. I don't think my legs can take much workout anymore." Said Felix while stumbling in cabin, but first making sure there aren't any infected or people inside.
Seeing that it was clear of the two, he found a couch and dropped on it like a sack of potatoes, completely exhausted.
" Haaaa, I'm beat."
' A snack would be awesome right now, unfortunately I'm not ready to sacrifice a precious purchase slot for some chips.' thought Felix.
(* Author note:
purchase slot:
He has 30 types of and 5 of the same that he can buy from the Shop per day.
So he can't just buy anything without thinking. )
" Let's just checkout the Shop for now." He said to himself, and thinking ' shop open'.
[ Grand Shop ]
• Purchase limit ( level 0 )
• Products
• Upgrade path :
- purchase limit.
- storage
• SP : 1090
" Hmm, I can see the upgrades later, for now ' products '." From there Felix commanded the shop mentally.
[ Grand Shop ]
• products:
- search: ...
Categories:
Weapons/ Materials/ Clothes/ Foods/etc
" Ohhh, it's interactive and with a search engine all. That being didn't cheap me out he gave the full package." Felix kept getting surprised more and more.
The Shop worked like Amazon, you'd put your purchases in a cart and when you are finished with browsing you pay for your stuff. Easy to use and definitely addictive.
°°°°°°°°°°°°°
Word count: 1320 words.
Thank you for reading.
To be continued.