A young boy with his fragile skeletal wrist reached out to the old dusty cup to drink the last drinkable water from it, even though the water in the cup was brownish and nothing at all like clean water.
The last bit of water. Just a little further from his lips.
Death! It was like death screaming, laughing in his presence, begging for a hug. His eyes met with the fierce crimson eyes of a beast.
The abyssal beast's eyes looked at him like it was in a fierce beast competition with him.
He knew that even a blink of an eye would lead him to his death, so he didn't dare move or take a breath.
The twitch of an eye could lead him into trouble. The abyssal beast doesn't harm anything inanimate because it only goes for walking prey that it can chase.
Clink! Unexpectedly the crappy cup from the boy's hand fell, causing loud noise in the room, and at that moment of shock, the boy's eye twitched.
The boy's heart beat rapidly after the incident. His fate was already decided.
The abyssal beast's crimson eyes disappeared from the hole in the wall, and soon the ground started vibrating.
The boy's feet became unstable, and he fell. He took a big gulp of his saliva.
He knew what was happening. The shaking was caused by the abyssal beast, and it plans to rip the shabby house apart to chase its prey.
He had been discovered; the boy tried to stabilize his feet getting off from the flow, and hurriedly he looked for some sharp object.
Anything sharp could save his life: a kitchen knife, a rusty broken mirror, a fork.
Kitchen items scattered on the ground as the boy rampaged for something sharp.
Finally, he beamed like a rainbow when a knife from a corner below the kitchen board got to his hand.
The abyssal beast terror fell more on the fragile house, and the foundation of the house, brick, by brick crumbled to the ground.
The crumbling of the house was going to kill him anyway, but the boy did not wait for death, instead, he swiftly ran with his short feet to the door, escaping the crumbling house.
All doors for survival were closed; the abyssal beast was outside, but the house was crumbling at the same time, and either way, he was going to die. But the boy wasn't a coward to wait for a simple death. If not, what was the point of him getting the rusty kitchen knife in his hand? He would have used that time to flee to nowhere he knew he could not survive.
The house crumbled, finally, and dust filled everywhere, making the air pungent, unfit for anyone to take a nice breath.
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The boy coughed, struggling to breathe. The abyssal beast was now in his eyes, a beast ten thousand feet taller than him.
The creature, like Satan or Grim Reaper, comes to take his soul away.
The foul beast, with its large body, red flesh bulking out of it, and its skin nothing like skin but mixed with its flesh that seems rotten.
The word beauty was nothing related to the beast; only the tiny string of hair in its body and set of sharp white teeth could be called the beauty features of the beast.
Although it was a distorted creature, slightly laughable to look at, it did not stop it from being a fierce creature. The abyssal beast lunged its feet towards the boy, as he was too tiny for it to use its claw effectively.
The boy saw the monster's feet coming at him, and at that moment he leaped like lightning, escaping any of the monster's attacks that came towards him.
Left and right. Repeatedly the monster attacked, and the boy was like a tiny ball of light playing with a beast.
The boy seemed to be working very hard to survive, and he seemed to have gotten the beast right where he had wanted.
With the beast distracted, focusing on smashing him. The boy with a speed of flash aimed the kitchen knife at the eyes of the monster.
It was a very clear hit. The kitchen knife pierced the right eye of the beast, causing a perilous cry to escape the beast's oddly shaped mouth.
The boy's lips twitched something close to a smile—his plan had worked.
But it was peaceful before the chaos. The abyssal beast that had just gotten its eye that contained all its powers pierced. Gathered its strength and whipped its tail towards the boy, catching the boy off guard and sending him flying towards the tall old pillars.
The boy greased his brow.
I hate what is going on now. This was a disgrace to a warrior like me. A proud cultivator defeated by a beast that is not even at level one stage of power. Very laughable.
While the boy was staring at the erratic dark sky, thinking twice about life, a familiar voice rang in his mind, and his vision blurred. When his eyes refocused, a familiar holographic display flashed in front of him. The words “mission accomplished” flashed boldly, followed by a stream of data:
MISSION: Defeat the abyssal beast and survive it.
STATUS: completed.
REWARDS: +20 EXP + 2% level 0 ultimate essence collection master cultivator (still locked until essence is collected)
OBJECT: Collect the essence of the abyssal beast.
The boy wanted to roll his eyes, seeing the system bar that had popped up in his mind.
I almost got killed just from drinking water. Can this alien in my head do anything worse? It took all my powers, and now I can do nothing. I never knew the abyssal beast would be part of the mission; I might have been a goner if I hadn't pushed myself to the limit of killing that loathsome beast.
The boy had all the right to say anything he wanted in his heart. Because the system, which seemed to be his enemy and helper at the same time, couldn't read his thoughts, and so he got his free will to curse all he wanted.
Before the boy could further catch his breath, the system voice chimed in his head again.
[SYSTEM NOTIFICATION: SIGNS OF LIFE FOUND!
Eradicate the abyssal beast
WAIT TILL FURTHER NOTICE FOR YOUR GAINS !!]
The system appeared panicked this time around, and the boy panicked too because he had drained the last bit of strength to fight the abyssal beast.
Why does the system always push me into death traps?
Maybe I should just get the essence from the beast while it is still alive.
His train of thought was going in another direction that he did not know. If the system could read his thoughts, it would have warned him to stop his dangerous string of thoughts.
“System, do I have to go and fight that monster all over again, or is there a shortcut? Can I extract its essence while it's still alive?”
Lucky for the boy, he decided to ask the system before he took any action.
[SYSTEM: well done. Now you are one wrong move away from becoming the beast's dinner. ]
The boy wanted to be shrugged, but he couldn't. He had no strength left.
He checked his status bar, a green holographic screen:
[STATUS BAR]
POWER: -6
AGILITY -78
WILLPOWER: -0]
I'm too tired to fight that beast again. Is there an easier way?
Like that, his enthusiasm dropped, just like his willpower.
It was time to perform the unpleasant task of extracting the beast's essence –its energy ball, to be precise.