Chapter 3 - In Which There Is Some Bird Trouble_The Survival Plan (LitRPG)

The morning rays of sun peeked through the window and found me sleeping on the chair, the hatchet resting in my lap.

I couldn’t remember falling asleep. There wasn’t much opportunity or frankly will to sleep the past few weeks since Mom had died. My brain must have taken over from my fear and made me pass out before I could start hallucinating from sleep deprivation.

To be fair, I still wasn’t sure I wasn’t going insane. I spent most of the night pulling up my character sheet and dismissing it repeatedly until the words had burned into my retinas. When I wasn’t doing that, I was staring outside the window, hoping that nothing would stare back.

There wasn’t much activity around the cabin, at least none that I could see. I heard animal calls coming from the woods, but I wasn’t able to catch the sight of anything concerning. The night was moonless and dark, and I had no light, given that the power was out.

At some point last night I had accepted that whatever was happening was truly happening. It was just easier that way. If Mom could be dead from a random burst blood vessel in her brain, then the aliens could also do some fucky shit with Earth. Two plus two did, in fact, add up to five today.

I got up from my chair, my stiff muscles screaming in protest. Surviving the night was just the first step of the plan. The rest of the plan was just to survive point blank. Last night I felt that more nuance than that was too much to ask for at this stage. But now I had to figure out what the step after would be.

Some vague notions about getting to my car and driving to the city were bouncing in my head. Depending on what I found there, I’d make my next call. I couldn’t help but think that the rest of the world was in full panic mode, but I couldn’t know until I got there.

Feeling somewhat satisfied about my next steps, I gathered some of the stuff I had into the overnight bag I had brought. I didn’t even bother with having breakfast. The sooner I was out the door, the sooner I’d get to the car and get on my way. Something told me that speed would be of the essence.

I threw the backpack on and took a quick look around the cabin. I wasn’t sure when I was going to see this place again. But I didn’t have the time to be too sentimental.

Carefully, I unlocked the front door and opened it a quarter of the way through. I stuck my head outside. At first glance, the green in front of the cabin was as calm as ever. But upon further inspection, I noticed something very odd.

Bushes.

About halfway towards the woods, were three bushes that went up to my knees and glistened with morning dew and sickly yellow light. They were not there yesterday.

Well, I’m not going to go check them out. I thought to myself, even though my curiosity was piqued. This smelled of a trap. I wasn’t going to let myself get into a trap that easily.

The sight of my car 300 meters away caught my eye and pulled me back to the Plan.

The Plan was to survive.

I carefully closed the cabin door, locking it behind me. It took me a few seconds and I did it more out of habit than anything. There was no immediate danger that I could see. The path to the car was clear from both sides, and the woods only started after. I geared up and started sprinting.

Soon, the air in my lungs started to burn. I hadn’t run like that in years. The last fifty meters or so found me gasping for breath and skipping to the car. It was overall an abysmal display of my fitness.

Somehow, I managed to reach my car and unlock it. I quickly jumped inside, locking the door.

A notification sound distracted me and I pulled it up.

Skill Unlocked: Sprinting, level 1

Despite still not being sure how the skills were helping me, the notification cheered me up. I was making some progress.

Dismissing the System, I turned my attention to the task at hand. I turned the keys in the ignition and heard absolutely nothing. I tried again, and again, but the engine stayed silent.

“Fuck. “ I slammed my fists on the steering wheel in frustration.

A crow landed on the hood of the car. It stared right into my eyes, making me uneasy. Crows weren’t supposed to stare at you. Its eyes shone with a dim green light.

As I focused on it, a description appeared.

Crowling, level 1

The Universe’s scavengers, these little guys migrate to newly integrated worlds. They know there will be many fresh corpses to feast on. However, if they are starving, they won’t hesitate to attack. They are especially fond of freshly plucked eyeballs.

“Shoo!” I yelled.

The bird just stared at me. I knocked at the windshield, trying to make it go away. It cocked its head as if to say that’s all you got? Then it started pecking at the glass.

“Stop, you stupid bird!”

The crow was not to be scared away. After a few pecks, a small hairline crack appeared in the glass and it got bigger with every peck. I tried turning on the car again, but no dice.

Find this and other great novels on the author's preferred platform. Support original creators!

My mind was racing, trying to think of a way out.

The glass exploded in my face before I could come up with anything. I managed to shield my eyes just in time, but I felt the sting of the small cuts on the exposed skin. The crow’s sharp beak soon followed.

Screaming, I waved my hands, trying to hit it. It was relentless in its attack, so I kept my eyes firmly shut.

I managed to unbuckle the seatbelt, and patted on the car’s door with one hand, hitting the damned bird with the other. It evaded most of my attacks. Finally, I managed to open the door and promptly fell on the dirt floor. Somehow I grabbed the creature’s wing and snapped it with all that I had. It cawed in pain and I took the opportunity to grab its neck, ignoring the pain and the blood that was flowing down my face and hands.

Snap! The bird fell lifeless in my hands.

You defeated a Crowling level 1. 5 exp gained.

The notification spooked me and I dropped the now dead monster on the grass. Its body shimmered with the same green hue as the notification messages. This stopped me as my curiosity got the better of me. As soon as I focused on the green shimmer a text box appeared.

Loot? Yes/No

I mentally accepted the prompt and the green shimmer disappeared.

You gained 1x bird meat.

You gained 1x Universal Credit.

The items have been added to your inventory.

A sharp pain in my foot brought me back to the here and now. A creeping vine with very sharp-looking thorns had wrapped around my left leg. I screamed and started maniacally stepping on it with my free foot. The monstrous plant loosened its grip and started to retreat. I could have sworn that it let out a quiet pained Ow! When I hit it.

I wasted no time analyzing it. I quickly grabbed the overnight bag from my car and sprinted back to the cabin. I cursed myself for locking the doors less than 10 minutes ago. My bloodied hands were shaking as I fished out the key from my pocket.

Once inside the cabin, I put up my makeshift barricade to block the door once again. With that done, I let myself collapse on the floor. It seemed like I was doing a lot of floor collapsing lately.

“Well, there goes that plan.”

A hysterical giggle escaped my mouth and burst into laughter that I couldn’t push down. I forced myself to take a deep breath to clear my mind. It only sort of worked.

By the time I was calm enough to check my injuries, the scratches on my hands had stopped bleeding. I rolled up my sweatpants and saw that there were only tiny red dots where the vine squeezed my ankle. As I was looking at them, they disappeared right in front of my eyes.

“What the…”

The skin on my ankle was whole and smooth again. I made my way to the bathroom, as there was a small mirror there above the sink. I had to see what was the damage to my face.

Given the amount of blood that covered my sweater, it wasn’t that bad. The scratches were shallow and criss-crossed my cheeks and nose, but they had already scabbed over. I was lucky I didn’t lose an eye.

I admit I wasn’t an expert in wounds, but there was something fishy about this. I was pretty sure that I was supposed to be still bleeding. This whole thing had System bullshit written all over it.

I pulled up my character sheet in search of answers.

Name: Diana Mond

Age: 25

Class: N/A

Level: N/A, 5/100 exp.

Strength: 3

Constitution: 3

Intelligence: 4

Wisdom: 3

HP:23/30

Points to distribute: 0

That piece of shit bird cost me almost a third of my HP! I doubt that we were tete-a-tete, as it were, for more than 30 seconds. I wasn’t sure what would happen if I got down to 0 HP, but something told me that it wouldn’t be good. If I were to follow video game logic, which seemed like the most… Logical thing to do, I’d probably die.

I felt a headache coming up. This was all a bit too much.

Here I was, sitting on the floor of my mother’s cabin, after almost being scratched to death by an overgrown chicken.

Mom used to leave bird seeds on her balcony and they would sometimes leave behind bottle caps and other shiny treasures. She called them her caw-caws. She even used to baby-talk to them. I used to love crows because of her.

I pushed down the pang of loss that came from thinking about her. I had to focus on the now and here. I had to stick to step 1 of the Plan: Survive. Mom would want me to do that. She would want me to toughen up and work all of this out.

That damned bird had almost ended me. But at least I got something out of it.

“The loot!” I exclaimed to the empty cabin, and then immediately cursed myself for being an idiot. Being loud was one way to attract unwanted attention to myself. I had to learn to keep my mouth shut.

There were too many things I had to do.

When nothing came crashing through the cabin windows to gut me, I relaxed slightly and pulled up my inventory. Apart from the chocolate bar wrappers I put there the night before, there was also the Crowling meat I had looted from the bird’s corpse.

Without thinking, I willed it out of the inventory and found myself with a poultry fillet in my hand. I almost dropped it in surprise but managed to catch it before it splattered on the floor.

This inventory thing would definitely take some getting used to.

The meat was almost the size of a regular chicken breast that you could get from any supermarket. I wondered if it was poisonous, or if it would make me grow feathers or something if I ate it. I wasn’t going to exclude any possibility.

I focused on the fillet and a description box appeared.

Crowling meat (raw)

A protein-rich source of nourishment found across the Universe. Because of its bland taste, it’s nobody’s favourite. However, it keeps you fed, which is more than many could hope for.

I dismissed the prompt, and put the meat back into my inventory. I would be alright for food for a while, and I wasn’t sure I was ready to eat monster meat. Yet.

And with that thought, I went to fix myself some late breakfast.

----------------------------------------

Diana's CS: No change.