Things went from bad to downright worse....

After the geckos got slaughtered, I shifted around to thank my savior, turns out, it was a group raiders.

Raiders are hostile humans, lawless, drug-addled who roam the wastes looking to fuck up everything they encounter.

Raiders have no alliances with other factions and will attack everyone but other raiders or slavers.

They are rather cruel as places they inhabit filled with the mutilated bodies of anyone who comes across them.

Raiders have no alliances with other factions and will attack everyone but other raiders or slavers.

Depending on the raider gang, most raiders gang members are commonly poor equipped, with the majority of them being limited to low-level melee weapons such as knives or lead pipes. One or two in a group of 4-6 may carry a 10mm pistol or a varmint rifle.

And this is no exception either, the group who rescued me are 5 men with nothing that a varmint rifle and 10mm pistol among other crude melee weapons.

I guess I should look the good side, at least they weren't drug addict maniacs like Fiends, now that raider gang is a whole other deal.

Anyways, while laying on the ground, they gave me a good beat down, laughing at me for being defeat by geckos.

When I woke up I received a job, carry a heavy backpack with tools, drugs, parts for making tents and junk.

In a matter of hours, I became the group's mule.

At daylight, we do a LOT of walking. No idea of where I am on the map anymore.

At night I am to make the tents among all any heavy work or request, sometimes they smack me around for fun.

While they sleep one keeps watch on me and on any enemies. Of course, I sleep on the ground using my arms as pillows.

Right now I am on day three of being a mule, I have eaten nothing at all, only sips from my water bottle. My stomach is grumbling all the time.

During this time I come up with a few theories.

The world difficulty is in survival mode I can feel hunger, thirst, and sleep.

My injuries on my arms, foot, the bruises on my entire body haven't healed like in the game, in fact, they are getting worse.

I can use V.A.T.S. this gives me an absolute advantage against everyone! It's tricky to use but if I focus and concentrate in someone is possible.

Now, what is V.A.T.S.? Is the ability to shoot specific parts of anyone in a turn-based combat system in exchange of action points. Action points are like a stamina bar.

You can miss or do a critical, it all depends on your luck and probability percent on hitting that part.

And my final theory, the world recognizes me as a player but not as the main protagonist from the game, using V.A.T.S. is more than enough proof.

So far I haven't tried anything like escaping or trying to steal a gun since I was at gunpoint for the most of the time and I am outnumbered.

They lowed their guard as I practically obeyed every single demand, now they see me as a joke, a coward, an idiot. Which is perfect, they won't see it coming.

Today at night they are going to do drugs also knows as chems, in an abandoned car at morning so they will be busy.

Among the drugs or chems, there is one that is highly addictive, jet.

Jet is an addictive meta-amphetamine first synthesized by a child genius from Reno, now called New Reno.

It isn't hard to make jet, first, you extract the jet from brahmin dung fumes and administered it via an inhaler.

Whats a brahmin? A mutant cow with two heads. Don't ask.

"Radiation did it" is the answer to almost everything in this game...

Use it on yourself, will boost your Action Points by +15, as well as raising your maximum action points by the same amount for 4 minutes, and has a 20% chance of addiction.

Looking through the big bag I found food, one small piece of "meat" caught my attention, it's was a radscorpion poison gland.

If you encounter this story on Amazon, note that it's taken without permission from the author. Report it.

Whats a radscorpion? Large, mutated scorpions.

Maybe they hunted one down, ate it and took the gland to use it to coat their knives and stuff? Don't care.

With this, I could mess with their jet, they seem to be low level looking at their weapons and armor, poison from a radscorpion has to be lethal for them.

"OI! Mule boy! Keep up the pace!" yelled the main leader of this raider gang.

Ugh...not this again, for real, every single sentence the leader yells, no matter how stupid, get encouraged with more words from his followers.

"Yeah! You better move faster, those geckos, gonna get you again!" laughed raider number 2

We march in line alongside the road, the goal is to ambush caravans and travelers.

Thankfully we haven't encountered any. I wonder if there is karma here...

"Hey, Dec! I am already fucking tired of walking! Let's make a camp here on the side of the road" yelled Patt, he is at the bottom of the line keeping watch on me from time to time.

"Y-yeah, the s-sun is going down.....h.hey....about those c-chems." Stu scratched is neck as stuttered the last sentence.

Stu is one of the thinnest and frail people I ever saw, his eyes are dark, drug addiction must be killing him.

I am sure that if I wasn't in a bad shape I could mess him up, sadly that's not the case.

Now that we are gonna rest here, this is my chance!

"Alright alright, tch....bunch of bitches, mule boy make the tents already, the rest start securing the area, I want nobody to disturb us tonight" Dec

"Hahaha! Hurry up the geckos are behind you haha!" laughed raider number 2 with a dumb look on his face.

The group dispersed to all directions, I took out the backpack and dropped on to the ground. The dust and sand from the ground went to the air.

"M-my back...."

"Come on, work." Patt was casually sitting on a rock gazing the sun, he doesn't talk a lot, only to rest or to pee.

I rest my legs on my knees and took all the equipment from the bag.

Patt isn't looking at me so I'll make the change now.

The tent equipment is made out of junk and broken parts, so it takes me a while to join all the pieces together, that's why I can work properly now without being too suspicious.

I took the jet inhalers from a small leather bag and the poison gland from another pocket of the bigger bag.

In the game, you can craft a lot of things if have the skill level to do it.

I close my eyes, one jet inhaler is on my right hand while the poison gland is in the other.

In my mind, I get the image of the jet and its purpose.

Craft poisoned jet.

As I open my eyes, on my left hand the gland seemed to be a little squished.

On the right hand was the jet intact.

Hmm...I wonder...

"Hey, Patt...."

"What the fuck do you want?"

"I was wondering if you wanted this, I just found this under a rock over there" I pointed at some dry bushes.

"Oh give me that!" Patt stood up from the rock and snatched from my hand "Heh, I will start ahead of the guys" Patt suck the jet with his mouth and pressed the inhaler button.

I quickly saw how the reddish fumes disappeared from the vial containing jet.

"Ooooh...yeeah...that's it!" his eyes widened and his pupils dilated.

I walked towards the bag and go on working, I guess it didn't wor-

*thud*

Huh? I shifted around and saw Patt on the ground, he had dropped on his back.

"Argh...Blurp" saliva was spilling out of his mouth like a frenzied dog, his eyes were flaming.

I approached him, so it happened...

He is struggling to fight it off kicking the ground violently but he is fading away....his level is way too low...

I turned my head to my sides, around my surroundings.

It's time for me to leave.