The path to Abraão was supposed to be something like a straight line. A simple coastal trek.
Instead, it had become a game of cat and mouse, played in a labyrinth of garbage.
"Let me guess…" Layla announced, her voice tight with processing strain. "Wrong route. Again."
Leon didn't bother to answer. He slammed his shoulder into a rusted sheet of corrugated metal, sliding down a muddy embankment to avoid the ridge line.
It was the fifth time they had been forced to change course, or maybe the sixth. The numbers were blurring, drowning in the sheer volume of threats appearing in their path.
The silence of the dead zones was slowly being replaced by a cacophony of chittering, stalking, and wet, heavy breathing. The island was teeming, and it felt less like a junkyard and more like a cage that was suddenly too small for everything inside it.
An hour ago, he had been forced to turn back when he saw the thing on the service road—a convulsing aberration of two bodies melted into one. it resembled a couple Leon barely recognized as the recent married couple of scavengers Ana and Ruan Torres.
A tragedy of flesh, like Layla named it, she said it looked like they were embracing each other while transforming, together until the very tragic end.
Then, thirty minutes later, the eastern trail was cut off by a lumbering giant, a mountain of muscle encased in chitinous armor that clicked rhythmically as it seemed to be patrolling the pathway.
Every time Leon tried to correct his course toward the docks, a Beast or a pack of them were there. It felt less like bad luck and more like he was being herded.
"They are pushing us inland," Leon whispered, wiping sweat and grime from his eyes. "Away from the coast."
"Territorial displacement," Layla noted. "The stronger mutations seem to be claiming the infrastructure. The roads, the buildings… maybe they have already learned that those are high-value nesting grounds and escape routes. To avoid them, we must traverse the zero-value zones."
"Zero-value zones," Leon muttered. "You mean the places where no scavenger would be dumb enough to go."
He pushed through a wall of dense, grey vines that smelled of sulfur and rot. The canopy above was so thick it blotted out the pale sun, leaving him in a twilight gloom. He had no idea where he was anymore. He was thoroughly, hopelessly lost.
ROOOOOAAAAARRR!
The sound tore through the air, vibrating in Leon's chest cavity. It was deep, wet, and terrifyingly close.
"Proximity alert!" Layla snapped. "Huge mass. Fifty meters. 2 o'clock."
Leon didn't think. He didn't look. He dove.
To his right, a cluster of rocks formed a narrow fissure, hidden behind a curtain of hanging moss. He scrambled through the gap, scraping his elbows, desperate to put solid stone between himself and the roar.
He tumbled out the other side—and stopped dead.
The sulfur smell was gone. The metallic taste in the air vanished…
He was in a small, sunken depression, a natural bowl shielded by high granite walls and ancient, undisturbed debris. But inside this bowl, the island's corruption hadn't touched a thing.
The grass was a vibrant, impossible emerald green. The air smelled of wet earth and rain. It was a pocket of silence, a verdant oasis hidden in the middle of hell.
"This..." Leon breathed, staying low to the ground. "This shouldn't exist."
"Radiation levels are negligible," Layla observed, sounding genuinely perplexed. "Something is filtering this environment. Or protecting it."
Leon crawled deeper into the vegetation, using the massive roots of a pristine tree as cover. Outside the bowl, the heavy thuds of the Beast's footsteps echoed against the stone, shaking dust from the rocks. It sniffed the air, growled, and then—mercifully—moved on, losing the scent in the sulfur clouds above.
Leon exhaled, his head resting against the cool, clean bark of the tree. It was then that he noticed he wasn't alone in that oasis.
In the very center of the clearing, rising from a mound of soil that appeared unnaturally dark and nutrient-rich, stood an entity that defied the surrounding greenery.
It was a kind of a dwarf tropical tree, barely reaching Leon's chest. Its bark was not brown or grey, but a void-like matte black, an obsidian singularity that seemed to drink the dim light rather than reflect it.
The leaves were unnerving—serrated, geometric triangles arranged in a Fibonacci spiral so precise it looked mathematically rendered rather than grown.
But it was the fruit that held his gaze. Hanging heavily from one of the main branches was a solitary crimson ovoid being. It was the size of a child's clenched fist, its skin parcially translucent and stretched tight over a network of glowing, bioluminescent veins.
It pulsed.
Thump-thump. Thump-thump.
It beat against the silence, a wet, rhythmic contraction like a heart suspended in the dark, pumping fluids that glowed with a faint, electric energy.
"Is that... breathing?" Leon whispered, stepping closer despite himself.
"Dunno…" Layla said, her voice echoing with sudden, clinical interest. "It looks like trying to exist as biological, yet the architecture seems entirely synthetic. It is a System manifestation for sure, can't be natural."
Leon glanced back at the ridge where the Beast had passed, listening to the fading tremors, then looked back at the pulsing fruit. Curiosity warred with caution.
He extended his right hand. The cable in his palm woke before he even commanded it, reacting to the proximity of such potent data. It uncoiled, slithering from his flesh like a dark serpent. The filaments fanned out, weaving a delicate, sensory web that wrapped around the pulsing fruit—terrified of bruising it, but desperate to taste its secrets.
The amber appraisal grid appeared, glowing softly in the twilight.
[ SURVIVAL ITEM IDENTIFIED: Adrenaline-bulb ]
[ RANK: Rare ]
[ TYPE: Consumable ]
[ EFFECT: If eaten, increases adrenaline levels without blurring senses. Short duration. ]
"Increases adrenaline? Rare?" Leon frowned, reading the simplistic text. "That's it? I can get adrenaline by just looking at those things outside."
"That is the surface-level definition," Layla corrected him. "The System limits it, forgot that? Do you want the real deal?"
"Always."
Layla was silent for a second, processing the raw data stream that the System hid from the visual interface. When she spoke, her voice was clinical, stripping away the game-like veneer.
"Adrenaline-bulb, what a creative name," she began. "It increases adrenaline levels with a biosynthetic compound similar to human adrenaline, but with a crucial molecular deviation."
She paused, highlighting the structure in his mind's eye.
"The compound is a biosynthetic neuromodulator designed to decouple physiological arousal from emotional threat perception."
"In my language, Layla," Leon hissed, glancing back at the ridge.
"It means it separates the body from the fear," she clarified. "It amplifies peripheral adrenergic signaling—enhancing strength, speed, and metabolic output—while selectively suppressing limbic activation in the brain."
Leon looked back at the fruit. "Suppressing limbic activation… what is it supposed to mean?"
"As a result," Layla interrupted his anxious gibberish, "adrenaline is elevated, but the neural circuits responsible for fear and anxiety remain functionally silent."
Leon swallowed hard.
"So," he whispered. "It makes you a monster. All the rage, none of the panic."
"It makes you a machine," Layla corrected. "Efficient. Cold. Fast. A human in a survival situation is usually hindered by their own terror. This thing removes the hindrance."
"A combat drug," Leon whispered. "Organic combat drugs. Hidden inside a fucking living mango"
"Technically, the phylogenetic structure shares more DNA with a pomegranate than a mango," Layla corrected, her voice buzzing with the thrill of the data. "But yes. A biological armory, grown from dirt."
"Short duration," he muttered, disappointed, recalling the text.
"You seem disappointed by the time limit," Layla noted, her voice echoing with a distinct lack of sympathy in his mind. "You shouldn't be. The 'short duration' is the only reason this item is a power-up and not a remarkably efficient poison."
"Think, Leon. This compound doesn't just add adrenaline; it suppresses the limbic system. The part of your brain that screams 'stop' when you are hurting yourself. Pain and fear are not just emotions; they are structural warnings."
"If this effect lasted for twenty minutes instead of four or five, you wouldn't just be fearless. You would be dead. Without those inhibitors, you would likely tear your muscles off the bone with your own strength or drive your heart rate into immediate cardiac arrest. The System allows you to redline your engine for a moment. Anything longer, and the engine explodes. Be grateful for the timer."
He carefully closed his fingers around the fruit. It felt warm, vibrating against his skin. With a gentle tug, he plucked it from the black branch.
The moment the fruit left the tree, the air in the oasis shimmered.
A new window snapped open in front of his eyes. It wasn't the amber text of his analysis, nor the urgent red of a warning. It was a deep, royal purple.
[ RULE N° 3 UNVEILED ]
"Well, well, well..." The clumsy male voice returned, echoing in Leon's mind with the crackle of a cheap microphone. He sounded like a game show host who had just won a bet. "Look at you! You actually wandered off the map without crying for your mother. I'm legally required to be impressed."
[ RULE N° 3 - COMFORT IS A CAGE FOR THE COWARD ]
"You know," the voice mused, dropping to a conspiratorial whisper, "Ninety percent of your species is currently huddled together on the main roads, basements and fortified buildings, holding hands and waiting for the government to save them. Spoiler alert: The government is currently on fire."
The voice let out a sharp, chaotic laugh.
"And do you know what those safe little sheep are finding on their nice, paved roads? Nothing! Absolutely nothing! Maybe a rusty can of beans if they're lucky. Boring! The System hates boring. It doesn't drop loot for people who are comfortable, Leon. It pays the ones who are willing to get their boots muddy and their heart rates high. Safety is poverty, kid. Now, enjoy your terrifyingly marvelous fruit!"
The chaotic laughter faded, but the purple window didn't close immediately.The joke was over; now came the fine print.
[ The chances of finding a system resource encounter are much higher the less Spared density on that region. ]
[ Encounters near high density of Spared, like bunkers, fortifications and roads are limited to Common-tier. ]
Leon read the words twice, the implications settling in his stomach heavier than the Adrenaline-bulb in his hand.
"Spared density," he muttered. "It's punishing us for grouping up."
"It is an anti-stagnation protocol," Layla observed, her voice cool and appreciative of the ruthless logic. "If twenty percent of humanity survived as 'Spared,' their natural instinct is to congregate. To rebuild walls. To create safety. If you go where the people are, you are almost guaranteed to remain weak or under others control."
A map appeared briefly in Leon's vision—a holographic overlay of the island. The roads and docks were rendered in dull, lifeless grey. But the deep, terrifying wilderness where he currently crouched was glowing with vibrant veins of gold.
Leon looked at the heat map still fading in his vision. The path to Abraão—the one he had desperately tried to reach—was a solid line of grey. It was kind of safe. And according to this, it was a dead end for anyone wanting to be more than just a survivor.
"Thiago used to say the best fish were always in the roughest water," Leon said, a dry smile touching his lips. "I guess the System agrees."
"The metaphor is crude, but the mathematical model holds up," Layla agreed. "If we return to the main road, we return to mediocrity, despite the presence of the Beasts."
The window dissolved.
Leon looked at the Adrenaline-bulb in his hand. He didn't eat it. Not yet. He carefully wrapped the pulsing fruit in a piece of cloth and stowed it in his pack, right next to the water filter, praying it wouldn't spoil right away.
"Comfort is a cage," Leon repeated, looking around the silent, clean oasis. "And we are definitely out of the cage."
"We are miles from the cage," Layla agreed.
"And if my obvious soeculations are correct, sticking to this 'uncomfortable' route is the only way you'll survive reaching the coast."
Leon nodded "Then let's stay lost."