Chapter 3 – Oil and lighter
Emrys cursed under his breath as he hid himself inside a ruined restaurant building — splintered stone and dust everywhere — more precisely in what looked like a kitchen.
In his right hand was a knife. The biggest and sharpest he could find for now.
Beside him lay a lighter. He stared at it for a moment, then picked it up and put it inside his pocket.
His body was drenched in the crimson blood of these red spawns, making him constantly want to empty out his stomach.
The stench felt like rotten eggs, but worse.
His chest was going up and down sporadically, his back leaned against a high platform that could hide him from these monsters.
In the beginning, he could still hear distant yelling and cries of humans being slaughtered and occasional fighting sounds. Now there was only a heavy silence that seemed to curtain the whole world.
A silence of death. A silence that threatened to choke the breath out of him.
"Ah fuck…" Emrys cursed once more, telling himself this was a nightmare, despite it not being one. At this point, he could no longer fool himself. Not with the pain and ache flooding his body.
'I need to enter the Tower.' Emrys thought, clenching his jaw. 'I cannot hide forever. If I stay here until the three days pass…'
Doubtlessly, he would die.
And no matter how much he hated this shitty life and sometimes even wished to die…being so close to death made him wish for nothing but to live.
But to do that, he needed to go out and search for one of these portals. In other words, he would encounter these red spawns and need to fight them to survive.
At these thoughts, fear began to slither inside him again, but Emrys kept it at bay with his coping words…
'Fear is poison.'
Looking at his hands strained with blood, he began to recall what had happened since the beginning.
Every time he killed those monsters, Emrys would receive a notification about his body being enhanced. With that, he sensed the immediate feeling of his body getting stronger.
He could not tell how much, but the enhancement was real.
He had tried to use his game knowledge to summon a status screen to see his stats. But the system told him to first enter the Tower and awaken to get access to it.
'They have made sure we have no other choice but to go to the Tower.' Emrys mused, breathing softly to calm his nerves.
He looked at the corner of his right eye.
[Remaining Time: 2 days 20 hours 16 minutes 7 seconds.]
The seconds were ticking away, and with them the minutes, then soon the hours and days.
Three days were nothing. They passed in a blink of an eye.
And if he had found himself in a place where the portals were far away, then he was fucked in every sense of the term.
He could not wait. He had to go now.
'It will be fine, Emrys. It will be fine. The monsters are easy to kill. Just like the {Mother} has said, they are unawakened. Their necks are easy to break.'
He repeated to himself, 'It will be—!'
CRACK—!
A soft crack, one that sounded like someone stepping on a rock and shattering it, boomed through the destroyed restaurant.
Emrys's heart was at his throat.
He remained completely still, afraid to make any kind of noise that would blow away his cover.
Low, deep, rumbling screeches began to crawl through the throats of the approaching red spawns. Above Emrys, on the right, there was a broken mirror.
He stared at it.
One, two…six. Six red spawns.
At that point, Emrys immediately realized the dreadfulness of the situation. In normal times, he would have been frozen with fear at the approach of six red spawns.
He was still very much afraid.
But he could still move.
The screeches began to come directly toward his spot, as if these monsters could somehow sense him.
Regaining his senses, Emrys crawled rapidly and went even deeper into the kitchen, where the utensils and materials lay, hoping to find something that could help him kill these monsters.
He was not confident enough to engage six of them alone. Not yet.
His crawling made scraping noises.
The screeches grew louder and the monsters started to jog toward him. However, with so many broken things barring their way, these dumb creatures took longer than necessary to pass through.
Biting his lip, Emrys moved deeper. His eyes immediately darted around erratically, looking for anything.
Something caught his attention.
He stood up, making the red spawns notice him with his tall stature. They growled, tongues out, drool dripping, red eyes blazing with irrational killing intent, as they ran toward him with their clubs ready to strike.
They tripped and toppled over each other, then rose again, continuing their relentless pursuit.
Emrys was already focused on something else. He looked at the electric hot plate with a frying pan on it. There was a bunch of French fries cooking in what smelled like olive oil.
The electric hot plate was still on, burning, albeit erratically.
At that instant, a ridiculous and dumb decision came to Emrys's mind.
He hesitated, but the approaching footsteps made him cast away all those useless doubts.
Already, two red spawns were close to him, about to attack. Emrys grabbed the frying pan, pivoted, and threw it at the red spawns when all of them were gathered.
A splashing and clattering sound echoed as the oil bathed the monsters, the frying pan falling to the ground.
The monsters shrieked and recoiled instinctively. But it was not the end.
Immediately after, Emrys took the lighter out of his pocket. He flicked it, and a thin orange flame appeared, burning softly, feebly.
He threw it toward the red spawns.
Not waiting to see the outcome, he turned, jumped over the counter, and ran with all his speed.
Behind him, the fire touched the oil on one of the red spawns.
And like oil on fire, everything ignited.
The red spawns shrieked and thrashed into one another, then into another…just like that…
All of them were wailing while burning to death.
Outside, Emrys was running for his life when a notification flashed in front of him.
[NEW ACHIEVEMENT! Witty Witty.]
[You killed six red spawns with nothing but your small wit and a damn lighter. From rock to fire. Man, you are evolving, aren't you? What's next? A nuke?]
[Rewards: Health Potion (Unranked) x2, Explosive Talisman Ball (Unranked) x2.]
— End of Chapter 3 —