The moment Arya saw the new message window appear on the small translucent screen hovering before her, she froze mid-air.
[Vines +20]
[Arya's Shop has been activated.]
A surprised breath escaped her lips. So the strange "shop" that mysterious man mentioned yesterday was real after all. A soft chime followed, and a compact grid of ten empty slots appeared—her newly unlocked storage warehouse.
Ten slots weren't much compared to what she used to carry back on Earth, but in this forest filled with unpredictable dangers and limited space, even ten was a blessing. Anything was better than having her supplies piled in the cramped room she called her temporary home.
To test it, Arya uncapped a half-empty mineral water bottle and tapped its image on the small screen. Instantly, the bottle blinked out of existence and reappeared in one of the storage slots. Retrieval was just as fast. She only had to tap again and the bottle popped right back into her hand.
"Convenient," she murmured.
Once her curiosity about the storage function settled, Arya opened her personal status panel, wanting to confirm something that had nagged at her since the previous night. Her expression soon soured.
Twenty points of Magic Power were missing.
"That's… way too expensive," Arya muttered with a grimace. "I can't afford that at all."
Which meant—no wasting magic until absolutely necessary. She had to find treasure chests if she wanted to live more comfortably.
With this decision, Arya stepped outside her shelter, stretched her sore limbs, and launched herself into the air.
Searching for treasure chests in daylight proved far more difficult than she expected. At night, the faint glimmer they emitted made them stand out between the trees. But now, under the bright morning sun, the forest was flooded with natural light, disguising anything that wasn't obviously out of place.
Bored, Arya absentmindedly ate a sausage while she slowly scanned the ground below. When she finished, she instinctively moved to toss the casing aside—then paused.
Her surroundings were too beautiful for litter. Even if she was stuck in a strange, dangerous world, she didn't want to contaminate such a pristine forest. She tucked the sausage casing into the pocket of her worn patient gown.
Speaking of clothes… her patient gown had seen better days. She had been lucky enough to draw a dress from a treasure chest yesterday, but since she hadn't bathed in several days, she simply couldn't bring herself to change into it while feeling grimy. Besides, the patient gown was already dirty—getting it dirtier wouldn't make a difference.
Arya flew for nearly half an hour without spotting a single treasure chest. But she didn't return empty-handed. During her flight, she constantly monitored her Magic Power. And she noticed something important:
Her Magic Power had not moved from 60. Not a single point up or down.
A theory formed.
Maybe… my Magic Power recovers at exactly one point per minute.
If that was true, then as long as it didn't hit zero, she could continue flying indefinitely. That revelation lifted her spirits considerably, freeing her from the constant fear of falling mid-flight.
"Alright," she whispered, "I can explore a little more boldly."
Her gaze soon caught something unusual in an open area ahead—a massive cluster of vines wrapped around the base of a tree, forming a strange dome-like structure.
It looked suspiciously like someone had built a tent—or a crude shelter—beneath the vines.
Could it be another person's Shelter?
The forest teemed with life, but she had heard that certain people could upgrade their Shelter simply by collecting vines. That thought made her cautious.
She circled the vine-covered mound for more than ten minutes, searching for any signs of movement, noise, or hidden entrances. When she confirmed there were no signs of recent activity, she landed lightly and pulled the vines aside.
A collapsed wooden house lay underneath.
Inside, everything was in ruins. Tables, chairs, bookshelves—everything had rotted and fallen long ago. Moss, weeds, and even small clusters of tiny mushrooms grew over what had once been furniture. The air was thick with damp earth and the smell of decay.
Still, Arya didn't give up. Something so well-hidden wouldn't be abandoned without good reason. Maybe—hopefully—there was a treasure chest buried somewhere in the rubble.
She rummaged through every intact section of the structure. She lifted old cabinets with all her strength, poking through dust and tangled roots.
No treasure chest.
But she did find something else.
A notebook.
Palm-sized, with a cracked brown beast-hide cover. On it, in unfamiliar script, were the words:
[Albert's Alchemy Handbook]
Arya blinked. The notebook felt strangely intact—almost untouched by time—unlike the furniture around it. A faint hum of Magic Power pulsed from the pages.
Is it magic keeping it preserved? Arya wondered. Her senses for magical fluctuations were still weak, but even she could feel something from the book.
When she flipped it open, she was even more stunned.
She could read it.
The script wasn't any language from Earth, yet her mind naturally understood every word. It had to be a language of this world—something the World's Voice had granted her comprehension for.
"Lucky find," Arya whispered, slipping the notebook into her pocket.
After confirming the abandoned shelter held nothing else, she resumed her search for treasure chests.
By noon, Arya's efforts were rewarded. She found two treasure chests, both identical in size to the one she discovered the previous night.
The first contained:
A 500 ml bottle of tea
A 500 g coconut bread
A fresh apple
A clean towel
The second contained:
A 500 ml can of Snowball Beer
A packet of Kangshuai Fu instant noodles
A wooden bowl about twenty centimeters wide and ten centimeters tall
The variety impressed her. Someone—or something—had designed these chests with the intention of helping newcomers survive. Each chest had at least one drink, one or two food items, and one daily necessity. Practical and considerate.
Arya gathered a few sturdy vines and tied the two treasure chests together. She lifted them carefully.
Earlier in the morning, she had tested her strength while flying. As long as the total weight did not exceed her own—around 50 kilograms—she could lift and fly with the load. Two treasure chests weren't light, but they were manageable.
She rose with them, planning to bring them back home for storage. Her empty Shelter desperately needed practical containers.
As she soared above the trees, two men gathering supplies below spotted a flicker of shadow passing overhead.
"Huh? Did you see something fly past just now?" one of them asked, squinting upward.
The man with glasses chopping wood ignored him. "Stop slacking. Magic Power or no Magic Power, we have to gather materials fast. Who knows if this place will suddenly attack us? I don't trust that seven-day 'novice protection period.'"
"No, really, I saw something," the first man insisted. "A shadow."
The bespectacled man finally lowered his longsword and looked seriously at his companion. "You're sure?"
"Yes."
"In that case, we're not staying here. Let's move south."
He hoisted the longsword awkwardly, along with the wood he'd chopped, and hurried away with a nervous glance at the sky. "If I knew this would happen, I'd have traded the sword for an axe. A longsword is terrible for chopping wood…"
The other man sighed and followed.
Up in the sky, Arya noticed them looking but didn't bother descending. She had passed many people this morning—some gathering with Magic Power, others using crude tools. All of them were desperate to collect as much as they could.
Their lives had nothing to do with her. She had only one goal: survive. And later, if fate allowed, find the people who had harmed her back on Earth—and ensure they regretted it for the rest of their lives.
Back in her Shelter, Arya finally allowed herself to relax. She drank some water, consolidated all her supplies into a single treasure chest, and nibbled on coconut bread while opening the chat.
As usual, the world channel was flooded with messages scrolling too quickly to read. Mostly complaints, arguments, bragging, or pointless chatter.
However, the regional chat was lively and filled with much more valuable information—tips, observations, warnings, and speculations about the surrounding environment.
Arya leaned back, quietly absorbing every piece of useful information she could.
Surviving here required knowledge—and she intended to gather as much of it as possible.