Peter could reliably move his fingers up and down by the end of the second day since waking up in the dingy back alley—a good sign, all things considered. As although the system’s ability to heal wounds and injuries was not limited by the wound’s severity (unless you were outright dead), the more severe the injury the longer it took the system to heal it. And Peter, well, he had a litany of impressive injuries under his belt.
Yet, partial digital function wasn’t the only thing he’d gained over the last two days.
You have gained the [F+] rank trait: Survivor
Description: By surviving an encounter with a foe with only 1 HP remaining, you have proven yourself to be a true survivor.
Effects: +1% HP regeneration when HP is less than half.
The Survivor trait was a pretty common trait among low-ranked adventurers as well as soldiers, and even more generally speaking many of the older slum rats he knew had it, or so Peter had heard them claim when he’d spoken to them about the system whilst they were sufficiently drunk out of their minds to mean that they wouldn’t remember the conversation the next day.
After all, it was considered extremely rude, not only in the slums but in society more generally, to inquire about another’s private status information, and Peter would have definitely got himself beat down super hard if any of the men he’d asked his questions too had remembered everything they’d confessed to him.
With some of the men having even outright confessed to him to having the ‘Murderer’ trait, a horrible and criminal trait that only got given to a person who’d intentionally killed over a dozen innocent people with their bare hands. Needless to say, after hearing such things he always did his best to avoid running into those people whenever possible – which wasn’t always the easiest thing to do in a slum.
By the morning of the next day, Peter began to realise that if he didn’t drink something liquid and quickly – his thirst would kill him off before his body could fully heal. However, it hadn’t rained in the last few days, and even if it had, Peter doubted that sticking his tongue out to catch rain on it or lapping rainwater off the gravel rocks on either side of his head would be enough to satiate his overwhelming thirst.
Peter ground his teeth together as he tried his best to move one of his arms in hopes of perhaps crawling towards a water source but although his arm raised up off the ground somewhat, the pain was beyond intolerable, causing him to instantly cease his efforts and lay completely still once again. Any attempt to move his legs would probably yield a similar outcome, so he didn’t event try, and instead Peter resigned himself to trying to call out for help.
This was an inherently risky course of action. As so far as Peter could tell, no one nearby had noticed him and if they had then they’d not made even the slightest effort to help him. That level of disinterest in a community indicated that he was in an area where if he called for help it was probably more likely that he would be beat up more and potentially killed for his trouble than him being given any material aid. But, at the end of the day, what other options did he have?
His throat was bruised, and speaking was thus painful, but he tried to pronounce a call for aid as loud as he could, “Help” he stuttered out after many minutes attempting to form words with his extremely uncooperative mouth and tongue.
Unsurprisingly, no one answered his barely audible call for help. So, he tried again – but his second call was hardly louder than the first and thus it yielded a similar result, i.e., nothing at all.
However, Peter didn’t relent, and by the time he had repeated his plea around a hundred times, his voice was just about at regular speaking volume. Yet, though he now was certain that people were around him and could probably hear him, no one came to his aid and so he just laid there – his throat unbearably dry.
By the time the sun set – his minimal energy had been fully expended, and Peter fell into a shallow, long, and unsatisfying slumber.
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When Peter awoke, he was not laid on his back in the middle of that dingy mouldy alley but on a crappy bed like structure. What kind of luxury accommodation was this? Had someone finally answered his call for assistance? But most importantly, why the hell was he no longer in any pain?
Instantly, Peter thought to check the progression of his bot upgrade as that would tell him how much time had passed. But, when the panel appeared in front of him, he was quite surprised to see that it was only the following morning.
Time remaining until task: [Idle Progression] -> [F+] rank is complete: 2 days, 22 hours, 4 minutes!
Stolen from its original source, this story is not meant to be on Amazon; report any sightings.
How could this be? He knew for certain that his healing speed was not this fast and that it should have taken another few days before he fully healed and yet as of right now, his body felt better in every respect than it had in years. Something wasn’t right.
“I see you finally decided to stop lazing on that bed, rat.” A gruff male voice spoke from behind him.
Peter’s head and body instantly rotated 180 degrees to face the man speaking to him, and when he did, his eyes were met with a truly intimidating sight as the man stood at over 7ft tall with bulging muscles that perfectly complemented the man’s all-around domineering look.
“You owe me a full silver for the healing potion I gave you; you know that rat?” The man said with no hint of mercy in his gruff and domineering voice.
‘Fuck!’ Peter cursed internally; it seemed his call for help may have gotten him the aid he wanted but it came at the cost of a debt that the man obviously knew he had no ability to pay.
The man’s nefarious intentions were as clear as day and Peter wouldn’t bother indulging the man’s selfless pretentions. He’d ask the man straight up what he wanted, and if what he wanted proved to be too much for Peter, then he guessed he’d just have to try his best to flee – though, judging by the man’s physique, that probably wouldn’t work out too well for him.
“What do you want?” Peter asked, coldly.
The man’s muscle-bound face contorted to form a grin, before he said in a severe voice, “You think you got some wits about you, don’t ya rat?”
He then gestured at a blade dangling at his waist and said, “But wits alone ain’t going to repay your full debt to me, you got that kid?”
Peter simply nodded, and the man’s smile grew wider, and he continued speaking.
“I’ll give you two options – because I’m kind like that. Firstly, you agree to enter into a slave contract for a period of about 3 months or so where I’ll give you to a friend of mine who’ll put you to work, and upon the contract’s conclusion you will probably have finished paying off your debts to me if you put in enough elbow grease and charm. If you know what I mean.”
“And my second option?” Peter asked, not at all up for effectively signing away any future he might have had just to repay this man for a potion he hadn’t asked to be used on him.
The man stroked his chin and then said, “Your second option is that you work for me, for no pay, for a period no shorter than 3 months, and by work for me, I mean being my baggage slave and cannon fodder in dungeons that I get assigned to clear by the guild. And once those three months are up, I’ll decide whether you’ve worked hard enough to cover the debt you owe me.”
“That’s not fair! The second option doesn’t even set a definitive end date to this arrangement!” Peter protested.
“Do you think you’re in a position to tell me about what’s fair and unfair rat?!” The man shouted back, quieting Peter’s pointless protests in an instant.
Peter didn’t like either option being presented to him, but he’d been effectively entrapped by this man into picking one. And, as he didn’t even want to imagine the kind of ‘work’ he’d be doing for this “friend”, Peter resigned himself to his fate and spoke up, “Fine. I pick to do the second option.”
The tall man clapped his hands together, and said, “Excellent choice, rat, I’ve been needing a baggage slave for a long while – I was sick and tired of hiring out those damn storage rings for an arm and a leg every time I needed to clear some dirt-poor dungeon. And now,” the man’s eyes turned cruel as he continued, “I don’t need no storage rings no more to carry around all my loot for me, as I have you.”
Peter could sense that beyond the surface-level cruelty of the man’s words, there was an unstated threat. If he didn’t do his job of carrying the loot properly and the man was “forced” to hire out storage rings to supplement him – the cost of hiring out said rings would be added onto Peter’s already existing debt.
Peter knew that the man had him exactly where he wanted him – powerless and dependent. After all, if Peter tried to run from this arrangement, the man was in his rights to go to the city guard and get them to hunt Peter down and arrest him – or worse. For it was clear that this man, regardless of his blatantly disgusting personality, was of a higher social class and that would be all that mattered to the guards who would be sent after him.
So, for now, Peter would have to play the role of this man’s baggage slave as best he could so as to avoid further indebting himself to the man and thus severing his chances of regaining his full freedom once the potion’s cost had finally been fully paid off.
The man got up and headed to walk out of the small room Peter was in, but he stopped before he left and said in a low voice that was full of an unfiltered murderous intent, “Tomorrow, the crack of dawn, the old graveyard dungeon. And” He paused, before he said with an almost primal animalistic growl, “Get the fuck off my bed and out of my house you filthy street gremlin.”
Peter, not needing to be told twice to get out of the way of the vile man, got up onto his two feet for the first time in a long while, wobbled a bit at first, and then made his best attempt to run as fast as he could out of the door on the opposite side of the building to the man.
As soon as he was out of the door, Peter didn’t stop running, and if anything, he sped up – he was in unfamiliar territory after all, and the beating he’d received taught him a valuable lesson about loitering in places where he didn’t belong.
And, judging by the relative quality of the housing he was running past being pretty good compared to the slums he was used to, he was in the upper-end district of the designated [Copper] class residential district of the city. So, getting caught in this area, even if he was technically a [Copper] class citizen, would not be good for his bodily health – a fact that sparked embers within him.
Right now, he was seeing the luxury that some people within his own social class lived in and he wondered why he had been denied such luxuries. He wanted them. No. He deserved them, and as surely as one second ticked over to the next, soon enough, he’d be able to claim everything that he was owed for himself through the sway of his own personal system’s power.