Chapter 20: Green

Chapter 20: Chapter 20: Green

Blood, a scent Victor was already familiar with. His nose twitched at the sudden smell flooding his nostrils. At the same time, far from where he was, the sounds of what was likely a fight between one of the participants and something else could be heard.

Victor barricaded himself behind the bed and, as if he hadn’t already checked, inspected the magazine of his assault rifle. It was full.

After reinserting the magazine, Victor prepared to fire.

’They’re far away, but they sound so close! What the hell is out there?!’

A massive monster let out a gut-wrenching roar, as if a lion were being stabbed right in the throat. It sounded horrible, and listening to it hurt.

Victor trembled, waiting for anything to happen. Another explosion shook the ground with devastating force. The roars grew louder, and suddenly, a gunshot rang out. Victor’s eyes widened in disbelief.

’A gun... Another participant?’

He had suspected it from the beginning, but the unmistakable sound of a firearm confirmed everything he had been thinking. A participant was fighting out there! Were they winning? Or were they bleeding because they were losing?

A wave of questions overwhelmed Victor. He could hear every detail of the fight, but, foolishly, he wasn’t using his sense of smell to make the most of that information. Of course, he realized this, so he closed his eyes and concentrated.

’Gunpowder, blood, and sweat...’

Those scents mingled together, moving among the faint smells emanating from the other buildings. Whatever was causing all this had no scent at all, but its movements were slightly distorting the smells around it.

Another explosion. The ground shook, and Victor opened his eyes. He breathed heavily and then coughed. Focusing solely on those scents had made him inhale dust from the house.

’It’s moving away,’ he thought, getting to his feet.

He fought the urge to go and see what the hell was happening, but in situations like this, making sudden, stupid decisions meant death. Understanding that, Victor stayed behind the door.

’They’ve moved out of my range.’

He could still smell traces of the scents left behind by the battle, but whoever had left them had moved too far away for him to follow their trail. That disappointed him.

’Damn it...’

That battle had been far too intense.

’That person had enough power to cause so much chaos. It’s obvious they’re no rookie. If I run into them, they’ll probably be my enemy.’

Victor set the weapon on the table and sat down on the bed.

’And the worst part is that I was heading in that direction.’

To get out of this dark scenario, he would have to keep moving in a straight line. It was the simplest option he had, if not the only one. Now, those beings were occupying that area with their destructive battle.

’I could try going in another direction, but wouldn’t I be throwing away all my progress?’

He didn’t want to waste time going around the danger. Besides, his supplies weren’t infinite, and neither were the bullets in his magazine. He had 20 rounds loaded in the rifle and another 60 in the box and spare magazine.

And judging by how that battle had sounded, firearms didn’t seem to do much damage to monsters.

Victor was caught in a dilemma. What should he choose? Waste time? Risk his life?

’Wait...’

With his heart pounding a mile a minute and a grim smile on his face, Victor stood up and looked at the rifle on the table.

’Could I risk it?’

It was madness.

’Of course it’s madness.’

But there was a lot to gain.

’What if that participant died and left behind some juicy loot?’

Even if the participant was still alive, they were out there, alone and injured. Victor could scavenge whatever they had and take advantage of the situation. Survival of the fittest, after all, and cunning was also part of being fit enough to survive.

Victor picked up his weapon and lifted his bag, packed with all his belongings.

’If that’s the case, I really can’t let this opportunity slip away. If I could get my hands on the kind of firepower that person has, I’d somehow manage to deal with everything else.’

Come on, it wasn’t that complicated. No, it absolutely was. But that was the whole point! Lose or win, risk everything and gain everything. Wasn’t that how Victor had started this survival game in the first place?!

He couldn’t stray from his Path now. It was already too late to turn back. Even if death was lurking around him, all he had to do was be a Born Survivor, and everything would be fine.

He stood at the door. There wasn’t much left to think about. All he had to do was take one step outside, and this game would truly begin.

Yes, he was going to do it, even if he was nervous as hell.

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Run. Run like a freaking madman. The scents flooded his nostrils with an endless stream of information that he desperately forced himself to process. One house, two houses. More. More!

’This feels like military training.’

Except this time, he was running through the darkness to loot a potential corpse. That wasn’t morally right, but who cared about morality when your life was on the line?

Like a dog, he followed the scent of the battle. Once he arrived, where the smell of blood was strongest, he ran his hands over the surface of a broken wall.

’Someone crashed into this.’

The scent of blood continued deeper inside. Victor hurried after it, growing excited, but he failed to notice the sinister shadows moving through the mist, silently following him.

Farther ahead, after several minutes of nonstop running, Victor noticed that the blood trail led to one of the houses. He approached, looking in every direction and hoping nothing was watching him, then kicked the door open and entered with his rifle aimed forward.

However, he stopped dead when he saw her. There she lay, aiming a flashlight and a 9mm pistol at him, with a wound in her abdomen.

’She’s... green.’