I thought my peaceful days in the forest will go on but I guess this world is also big and this too is unavoidable. Problems occurred when you least expected it. I was out chopping wood just below the tree house one early morning. The surrounding area was filled with golden mist that drives away weaker predators that lurks in the forest thanks to the ability of the golden Kong. It was a young Fused Kong monster I called in the VR game I played back on earth that has the ability to use the skill of the first monster’s core it ate. In this world called Gaia, the Kong ate the heart of a mist monster we defeated with his mother at the cause of her life. Her son decided to stick around so I let him be and so 30 days passed by and his abilities developed like the mist monster. I decided to call him Kong or sometimes stupid Kong since it sometimes causes some trouble like stealing some meat and breaking some part of the tree house. Well, it was a nice distraction but my longing for my family and friends back home is still stronger than living here alone. I died due to Gad’s inevitable fate back on earth and as compensation, I got to continue living on this planet. From the start, I don’t like to live here but going to heaven will erase my precious memories. My memories are my treasures and those moments we have done even my counted years of living is so much fun and meaningful. I just don’t have the drive to live here without them without my first love… *CHOP*

On that day two people came out of the fog. Two people with the same appearance of a human. I don’t have the knowledge between races and their definition only their languages so I’m not sure if they are called humans. They seemed to badly wounded but even so, I approached them carefully. One was a girl with long green hair wearing white armor made of metal with a sword and shield full of wounds. She carries a little girl in a bloody hood. The girl in green hair can barely hold her consciousness as she tried to look at me. “p-please h-help…” She muttered before she passed out. “Hah.. Now, what should I do?”

That day I carried the two of them on the tree house. “Graauuu” Kong arrived just as I placed them in the bed. “Hey… go get some water. Take the pot and fill it near the river.” “Gruuh..” The stupid Kong just ignore my order and just went looking at the two people I put in the bed. [Inventory summon: iron war hammer] *Boom* *crash* So I summoned an iron war hammer and slammed the gorilla out of the house. “You dare ignore me Stupid Kong?!! Fine, I’ll do it myself just stay there and guard the house while I’m gone.”

‘Stupid Gorilla.’ Kong sleeps just near a tree from my house and summoned mists whenever he is around. I kinda ordered him that. It seems he is still tangible when the mist is around unlike the monster we fought became intangible when surrounded by its mist. The house was near a river and a few miles down is the lake and to the north was a waterfall. After I went and filled the pot with water since I don’t have any bucket, I went back to see how the gorilla doing. ‘Tsk.. he’s inside again’ I jump up to the house at least 300 feet above the ground. “The fuck are you doing?” This damn gorilla just stripped the young lady off her armor and clothes. “Inventory summon: Novice clothes” I summon my starting armor from back in the game. Well, it’s just a black t-shirt and brown leather pants. It seems there is no bra here as Kong took off the bandages covering her breast. Even her underwear is just a small version of shorts. ‘Now I’m looking at a full naked body of a young woman for the first time in real… Fuck it just stands up.’ “Hey, stupid Kong put this on her!!” I went down as soon as I throw the clothes on Kong’s face. Shit, why does my heart pound so fast it’s just a woman’s body… But man she has a muscular body and abs even with her thin body. The only thing that is soft is her boobs.’ “FUUUUUCK!!! Control yourself!!! I’ve seen more on the game so nothing to be flustered about.”

Kong took all her armors and weapons down and dropped them in front of me as I was sitting down on the ground. “Gruuu” He pointed at the house. I went and checked out inside the house and to my surprise he put the clothes correctly on the green haired girl. On her side, the little girl in a bloody hood was sitting on the bed awake. Her hood came down and revealed her short curly hair and chubby little face smeared with blood. ‘Please… Help… my child…’ “Who’s there??!!!” A voice echoed in my head. ‘Please… I… Beg.. you.. stranger… Help her..’ Another voice came out of nowhere. “This is?” I focused my dark energy stored in my body and activated [Spirit Eyes]. It was a skill from my dark spiritual energy that enables me to see souls and astral forms that can’t be seen by normal eyes. In the game ghosts or astral monsters that can’t be seen without the skills are harmless and only provide information or quest. It seems this world has this things too of course. ‘This girl is surrounded by many ghosts’ The skill activated and to my surprise, the girl was surrounded by at least a hundred ghost. ‘Should I try and absorbed them?’ ‘Oh.. Fearful being I beg you.. Have mercy and help us’ The ghost were afraid and are prostrating themselves to me. So the curse is still effective huh.. Let's ignore them for a while.

I walk towards the child that seems to be staring at me for a while now without saying a word nor showing any emotions. “Hey, little girl can you speak?” The girl continued looking at me without blinking and looked down as if she heard nothing. “Hey what’s the matter?” I began to feel irritated when I heard the ghost pleading and seems worried about the girl. ‘Aleiah? Why are you spacing out?’ ‘What’s wrong Aleiah?’ ‘Aleiah….’ The ghost was noisy but I can’t help it unless I decided to absorb them.

I took the pot with water and a piece of cloth and decided to clean her face. She reacted at the coldness of the water touching her skin. “Little girl, I don’t mean to scare you but it seems you just have been through something nasty.” I continued cleaning her but still, no sound came out then tears began falling in her eyes and made a small sound. “uuhh.. uuhh..” The ghosts became more worried and made some more noise so I decided to shut them up. [Soul penance] A skill that turns the surrounding weak astral monster into an orb of lights and if I touched them I can absorb their soul or their evil part of the soul as the game description implied. It seems it worked but I don’t want to absorb them now since I don’t know the effects here. “uhh… pa..pa..ma..ma” *sniff* *sniff* The girl continued crying as she tried to remember the things that happened. “Tsk…” I took the girl as I don’t know what is happening right now. The girl continued to cry as not minding me carrying her then all of the sudden hugged me tightly. “There.. there.. let’s go somewhere refreshing okay..”

Did you know this story is from Royal Road? Read the official version for free and support the author.

I jumped down the tree and went near a river bank where there is an area filled with beautiful wildflowers. *sniff* *sniff* The girl continued to cry all the way here but as soon as she saw the flowers she stopped crying and came down on the center of the field of flowers. She stared at them with her blanked face. I guess she has some good memories with flowers. “You liked it?” I went to her and asked but she only looked at me with a blank expression and looked again on the flowers. It seems she was traumatized by the events that happened to her. Judging by the number of ghosts that surrounds her I guess a village was attacked? Or massacred? Bandits or another kingdom way to make a slave? Well, that’s the most common plot in the game I have played.

I spent half of the day watching the child as she continues to stare until her stomach growled well mine growled first so sent Kong to bring some meat and woods. The other girl seemed to still be asleep otherwise Kong should have dragged her here too. I started cooking the meat while Kong seems to be playing with the girl making faces but the girl only stared at her. “Gruuu” Kong was tired jumping around and decides to stare with the girl. Then the girl moved her hands and touched Kong’s face as a tear drops on her face. Kong as if understand wiped her face gently with her hand and put a flower on her hair.

  “Hey Kong let’s eat take her here now!” I shouted as the meat is now ready. Well, I can only cook raw meat into barbeque with some herbs that I found that give some taste so I hope she can able to eat this hard meat. Kong took the girl gently in her shoulder and jumped at our location. I sliced the meat into smaller pieces and put them on a barbeque stick that I made and the rest was on the ground placed on a big leaf. I gave the girl the meat but she only stared on it but after some time she decides to take a bite slowly chewing her food until she finished and took another. “Your name is Aleiah right?” I spoke but there is no response to her. “You may be off with a bad journey at the start but if you ever get through with it, I’m sure you’ll grow up to be a great woman one day. The love and trust you made never forget them.” *chomp* At that time while cooking the food one of the ghost a male introduced himself as her father. I didn’t respond nor talked to him but he knew I can see them and hear them. He told me everything that happened and her importance. It seemed she was like a treasure that is worth giving their lives on. But seeing this view once in a while is not bad at all. Looking at Aleiah eating her meat while the villages ghost filled with joyous and tearful smiles on Aleiah. “Haaah… it reminds me more of our laughter all together my friends…” Out of nowhere, I blurted it out of my mouth.

“Graauuu?”[Kong]

“Nothing Stupid ape..”[Nil]

  It was afternoon when we went back as Kong carried Aleiah asleep on her arms. We put her on the bed together with the girl called Freja according to the ghost. Afterward, I went down to check my traps and continued dismantling the beasts that I have caught. It was already night when Aleiah woke up as she peed the bed. I hurried and change her clothes but she clings to her hood the moment I laid my hands on it. “It’s alright I’m not gonna take it. It must be important to you, right? Can you take it off? I’m sorry I don’t have any children’s clothing with me so I would like to ask you to use these animals fur for the night. I assure you they are very warm.” That time Aleiah wrapped herself with the bear type fur as I gave her another set of jerky meats and some fruits Kong picked. I took her dress and a small short and washed it on the river. My treehouse is filled with beast’s fur and piled them on the bed and the others in the other house I built further away from here. That’s the softest bed I have ever slept in and made me forget how hard the hospital bed is back on earth. Right now I took some of the pelts and slept outside on the ground. Well, it’s not raining so here will do.

  I woke up early in the morning and do my early exercise of chopping some wood and swinging swords. It was my daily routine when the time I am filled with food and lazed around in 5 days straight. I realized my body became slower and sluggish afterward. So I decided to do some exercise to prepare my body at all times because if I don’t keep myself healthy means that I am letting myself killed and so my memories will be erased at heaven. “Hmm?” That time after chopping my tenth wood I saw Aleiah looking down from the house. “Oh? wake up early? Err. Good morning?” I jumped focusing my energy on my legs and jumped a hundred feet or so up into the house. “…” Aleiah just looked at me then looked down on the floor. “I guess you still can hardly speak oh well. Hmm?” Then she pointed on the direction where we spent the day yesterday so. “Stupid Kong!! Wake up!! [inventory summon war hammer]” I throw the weapon on Kong as he sleeps just next to a tree. Realizing the incoming hammer he woke up and punched the weapon smashing it to pieces. “You’re improving Kong” “Grau! Grau! Grau!” He seemed angry. “Shut up! Take Aleiah here down to the flower field!” “Graauu!” After hearing what I said he puffed his chest and went with Aleiah on the flower field.

After sometime Kong went back to take some food. I was swinging my axe when I heard a Scream. It was the green haired girl and it seems she woke up. I went to check things out since that stupid Ape won’t shut up. As I went up and Kong went to see Aleiah the green haired girl suddenly looked at me as if she were terrified. Her eyes were full of fear and it seems she is getting hard to breathe and then I noticed my body the evil spirits are moving. “Shit… Stop looking!” I yelled as I summoned a cloak to cover my body. Cloak in the game is treated like a headgear so the curse didn’t burn it. One of my curses is that weaker people or people who have weak resistance are inflicted with fear when they are in my presence or when they look at my body. But then I wonder why Aleiah is okay when she looked at me? Is it because she is already in despair or was it because she was special? Well, I’m just curious so when things calmed down I told her that the little girl she was with was at the river and she jumped down and fell from the house as she rushed in.

I sent Kong to watch them over for a while then when they came back I was already swinging my sword as I noticed my body feels a little bit stronger even though I was a max level in the game. She then asked me if I could shelter them for a few days. Honestly, I thought they will be leaving now that she woke up. I then decided to lend them the tree house. She was very proud of herself as she keeps boasting about her position in the holy kingdom. “Well, I hope things will proceed smoothly and peacefully.”