The Meat Maggot dislodged itself from the headmistress and flailed backwards in an attempt to bite the human male that ambushed it by surprise, but Zack was just barely able to get out of the way. However, the monster’s teeth caught his elbow and left a long and shallow scratch.
It was not too bad of an injury, but it still stung with a numbing sensation like a bee had dragged its poison against his arm.
Zack grit his teeth, cursing that his base dexterity sat at a below average 4. If he was any slower, he would’ve been in a bit of trouble… actually, maybe not, because his Vitality was nicely leveled from his training earlier this week.
Mentally noting that he needed to train dexterity more, Zack plunged his spear into the Meat Maggot’s mouth, killing the level 1 monster finally.
Congratulations! You have slain a Meat Maggot.
You have defeated an enemy below your level. Experience has been distributed.
Meat Maggot has dropped the following loot.
A glob of insect wax.
1 iron coin.
Now that was a much more difficult level 1 enemy than the level 1 kobolds, he thought to himself.
It seems like species definitely plays a role in strength, so a level 1 goblin is not going to be the same as a level 1 wyvern, he thought to himself. I’d better not get too comfortable just because something’s level is low.
Catching his breath for a brief moment, Zack then rushed over to the headmistress, before his pace slowed when he saw the state that the woman was in. She had been maimed beyond recognition, her face bloodied and disfigured. Dead. Several spots on her body were missing, leaving behind a gorey mess.
Zack forced back the urge to retch, feeling intensely disturbed at the sight of another human’s dead body laying right in front of him.
She was just alive, too… I can’t believe that we can die just like that. Fuck, if I’m not careful that’s going to be me.
Barut’s death was one thing, but this was a human. Zack put a hand on his gut and lurched forward, feeling sick to the stomach. The stench of the dead Meat Maggot was unbearable as well. Not wanting to lose control and throw up, he began to take deep breaths, inhaling and exhaling like he learned in yoga. He felt it working.
After calming his nerves, Zack tried not to glance too much at the disfigured headmistress, focusing instead on the new item in his inventory. He received a somewhat nasty glob of insect wax which was probably some low-end monster material, if he had to guess. Maybe it’d have its uses later on. Zack decided not to touch it or remove it from his inventory just in case he’d need it later on.
Glancing back at the dead woman, he noticed a soft white glow around her body, the same kind that a video game would show around an unlooted chest.
…
“So you’re telling me the system considers you a lootable object after death, huh…” Zack said to no one in particular. “Now that’s just fucked up. I don’t know you, miss, but you deserve better than this…”
He lifted her coat over her face in a small gesture of respect, then sighed. What he was about to do was downright disrespectful, but he knew that looting corpses was something he’d eventually have to get used to in this game-like world where monsters existed and people were inevitably going to get killed by them.
Lifting his hand and pressing it against the white glow, a new prompt appeared in front of him.
[Body of a Female Human – Recently Deceased]
This lootable object contains…
A metal dagger.
An orange.
1 iron coin.
The metal dagger was her starting weapon item, but what was an orange doing in her inventory?
New Achievement!
You have looted the corpse of a fellow initiate. How resourceful of you! Your fellow initiates will drop their inventory of dungeon-related items, as well as some extra coins for your efforts. However, if you wish to take their socks or shoes or other non-dungeon related personal belongings, you must manually pry them off their dead body. Happy grave digging!
Reward: Nothing
“Uh… thanks?”
That did clear up the orange mystery. Since the orange was flagged as a dungeon related item, she must have received it as her unique item from Start Item Box III. Suddenly, he felt a lot more grateful to his past self for providing himself with something actually useful in that box instead of just a piece of fruit.
That woman probably had some cash on her too, right? Zack groaned, feeling internally conflicted. He really didn’t want to be that guy, but the money wasn’t going to do her any good now…
Eventually he decided to rummage her pockets briefly for a purse, which he found around her waist. He quietly took the few dollars that were in there and deposited them in his inventory, taking a brief look at her identification card. Her name was Abigail Smith, and she worked at a local middle school as the headmistress. Probably had a family too…
Suddenly, a robotic female voice spoke from the sky above directly into the minds of all the initiates.
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Public service announcement! The return fare for the subway back to your home world is ten iron coins. Do your best to collect them before the scenario ends, or you will not be allowed to return.
Zack quickly checked his inventory. He had eighteen iron coins before entering the scenario, and with the addition of the Meat Maggot kill and looting the headmistress’s body, he now had a flat twenty. That was enough to pay the return fare for two scenarios.
He couldn’t imagine how uncomfortable he would feel right now if he was a brand new initiate with zero iron coins to his name, forced into combat with monsters to be able to just barely afford the return fare home. What a stressful situation to be in.
His ruminations were cut short by a surprise.
“It’s nice to see another person here,” a smooth male voice said from behind him.
Zack whipped round, startled. Standing a few feet away from him was a pale, clean shaven cop in a police officer’s fancy navy hat and full uniform, with a brass badge on his chest and a duty rig around his waist outfitted with a stun gun and baton. He had short buzzed dark brown hair and brown eyes, with an ordinary, masculine face and pursed lips with a slight natural downturn, which disappeared when he began smiling at Zack.
The cop waved at Zack cheerfully, extending his hairy forearms as he walked towards the blood splattered scene of the woman and the dead meat maggot. “Law enforcement. It looks like we’ve had some trouble here. Mind filling me in?”
“She was attacked by that monster,” Zack replied after a moment’s hesitation.
Zack frowned. Why is this police officer so cheerful? he thought to himself. Something about the cop’s behavior felt unnatural, as he watched the cop bend down on one knee to inspect the woman with a practiced movement.
“Hm… that’s definitely a monster’s work,” the cop said, lifting the coat that Zack had respectfully placed over her face. “No way someone could tear half her face off like that. Nasty piece of work too.”
“She was dead in a minute,” Zack replied, although his brows were furrowed as he watched the officer examine the body.
The cop seemed awfully keen to examine the body, rummaging through her coat quickly and even flipping the woman’s corpse over to scrutinize it. He saw the purse, but tossed it to the side carelessly without checking it for identification. Then, he paused in mid air with a blank stare for a moment. When he began moving again, his interest was suddenly gone as he began to clean off the blood on hands onto the woman’s coat.
Zack’s eyes narrowed. I recognize that movement from a moment ago. That’s the same one I did when I checked her dropped items. So… he just checked her inventory, then lost interest when he saw it was empty.
It’s strange. He didn’t even look through her purse for her identification. I feel like he’s searching for something in particular, the way he was handling the body. And why the rush?
The cop stood up, taking a notepad out from his chest pocket and a pen.
“Nothing to see here, it seems. An ordinary civilian was killed by a monster,” he said, jotting down notes. “Looks like I’ll have to let you go,” he said with a wide toothy smile.
Zack was about to protest that he had nothing to do with causing her death when the cop laughed.
“I’m just playing with you, I knew you weren’t responsible for her death,” he said with a smile, walking over to him and patting Zack on the arm roughly. “Keep hanging in there kid. The name’s Gerald, or Officer Manson if you will.” He pointed at his name tag on his chest.
“Nice to meet you too,” Zack replied back at him cordially, but he still had a suspicion that the cop was hiding something.
“I’m going to head this way. Need to see if anyone else needs some help. That’s my duty after all,” he said again with an overly polite smile, pointing towards one direction. “If you want to tag along, you’re more than welcome to.”
Zack shook his head. “It’s alright. I need some space after seeing that happen in front of me,” he said, gesturing towards the gored woman who was now lying awkwardly sideways. “I’ll probably rest here for a bit and sort myself out.”
That was a lie. Zack had no intention of resting or staying there for too long.
Gerald Manson nodded. “Of course, suit yourself. I wish you the best of luck, and hope that we can get through this crazy situation together.” He tipped his hat and then began to walk off at a rushed pace while adjusting his belt, as if he was unable to spare another minute in the area.
As the officer left, Zack let out an exhalation. There was definitely something wrong with that guy, but he just couldn’t pinpoint what yet. Nothing he did made sense. However, that investigation into his suspicious behavior could wait.
For now, his focus had to be on two things.
One, he needed to figure out just what the hell was going on in this stone labyrinth, and see if he could find any clues on how to get out of there.
And two, of course… it was time to level up.
Zack opened the map function on his status screen, which immediately showed a maze with fog of war uncovered for the areas he had already been through. Looking at it from this perspective, it really looked like he was inside a dungeon in some kind of video game.
And where there were dungeons, there were monsters… He needed to explore a bit more to understand where exactly he was situated within this labyrinth, and to encounter some more monsters to grind on.
Heading in the opposite direction to the one the police officer took, Zack immediately encountered another Meat Maggot trailing across the grass. It saw him and began to chase, its body undulating forward grotesquely.
Unfortunately for the Meat Maggot, this was exactly what he was looking for. Summoning his spear, Zack paced forward in a fighter’s stance. The monster’s movements were erratic and unpredictable, but its body was so large that it formed a core weakness. Zack could poke at it from nearly any angle and not miss.
Congratulations! You have slain a Meat Maggot.
You have defeated an enemy below your level. Experience has been distributed.
Meat Maggot has dropped the following loot.
A glob of insect wax.
1 iron coin.
More insect wax. He’d hoped for something more exciting, but it was the same standard drop again. From what he remembered from the kobolds, monsters did have some kind of drop table where they could drop rare items on occasion.
Zack was busy looting the monster when a college aged girl with a drawn yew longbow emerged from around the corner, yelping in surprise at seeing Zack hunched over the vanquished enemy.
“Did you just kill that thing?” she asked, raising the bow at him before lowering it when she realized that he was another human. She had immaculately maintained straight hair with bangs and dangly star-shaped earrings.
“Yeah. Is this the first one you’ve seen?”
The girl shook her head. “No, I killed one as well, but I shot it with my bow. You just went up to it and killed it with your hands?” she asked in awe.
“Well,” Zack began, summoning the spear from his inventory. “I used this, so not exactly my hands…”
The girl tilted her head in interest, then took a step closer and looked Zack up and down, still not setting down her arrow which was still notched to the yew longbow. “I’m coming with you,” she said adamantly.
She took another quizzical look at him, then spoke again before Zack could respond. “By the way, what school do you go to?”
That was a pretty normal question to pose on any other day besides today.