Warning: Eplicit content
[Congratulations. You have successfully been granted a fifth Path!]
Fèi Míng came to consciousness sharply. The world outside his head was instant noise, groaning as he clutched his head. His vision doubled, trying to rise up from where he laid.
Suddenly, fists banged against his wooden door, the floorboards beneath him quaked with furious stomps outside, followed by shrieks ragged with spite.
"THAT'S WHERE THE THIEF WHO STOLE MY GOODS LIVES!" another voice bellowed. "CATCH HIM AND FUCKING BURN HIM!"
The wooden door burst off its hinges, and a large rough palm tossed the door aside.
Five grown men flooded the threshold. Fèi Míng squinted. His eyes adjusting to the exposed sunlight, taking in the men's appearance. 'Oh. It's the man I stole from.' he thought.
Two lunged straight for him, grabbing fistfuls of his hair and jaw, pinning his face up. Their murky breath fanned over his skin. Their grip was uncompromising, fingers dug into his flesh, leaving red marks.
Another large man, wider than the door frame, entered his tiny room. His jacket stitched with rough leather, boots caked in mud as he carried a chipped axe on his shoulder, the wood handle scarred by use. He grinned fast, into a cocky smug.
His palm struck Fei Ming's face.
Wham!
"You shitty sly fox think you can just rob me and get away with it? After everything I've done for your shitty family," he sneered. "Rex, hold his face so I carve him up and sell his meat to the Krats."
One of the men holding him — Rex, apparently — barked a laugh and tightened his grip under Fèi Míng's chin, forcing his neck to arch. The angle exposed the thin stretch of skin from jaw to throat.
Fèi Míng's eyes darted around them, looking for some sort of opening. Five men. Bad coordination. Poor distance discipline. One giant ego holding an axe.
'Perfect.'
The giant lifted the axe, about to swing—
Fèi Míng's stare locked on the axe.
The axe fell from the man's hand. The head of the weapon hit the ground.
BONG!
The wood beneath dented inward, grain splitting around the impact. The shock traveled up through the floor just as dust jittered off the beams above.
The large man's arms strained as he tried to haul it back up. His muscles quivered, veins bulging at his temples when he pulled.
But it didn't budge. Because it was suddenly too heavy, triple the weight of a dumbbell.
"The hell—!? Why can't I—" he grunted, winded with disbelief.
Fèi Míng extended a finger.
The axe dragged itself sideways across the ruined floor, carving a ditch in the floorboard as it lifted up and flew straight to Fèi Míng's hand.
The moment the handle met his palm, the weight nullified entirely. The wood creaked once in his grip.
"The hell?! You have a skill—!"
He swung.
Cutting Rex across the throat, the blade biting deep as dark red blood rushed out instantly, spraying forward in thick strings when Rex gagged. His mouth filling, body jolting.
His knees buckled, toppling to the ground.
Fei Ming turned, swinging the axe to the left.
It sliced the other man's head into half. The first half fell to the floor, and half his chopped brain slipped out, the eyes wriggled out of the skull behind Fei Ming's bed frame.
"…"
"AHHH!!!" The third large man shrieked, stepping back, but his boots slid in the blood that was pooling too fast under him.
He fell, dragging his butt across the pool of blood.
"N-no wonder your mother abandoned you at birth!" he screamed, frothing. "YOU FUCKING DEMON! How could you just kill someone like this?! I won't spare you this time!"
Fèi Míng sunk the axe downward through the large man's skull. "But…if I don't kill you, you fucking will."
The blade cleaved diagonally from crown to collar, until Fèi Míng took it upon himself and chopped the large man's head cleanly off his neck.
Weighing the axe with his palm, he flicked it, the blood splattering across his face.
'Ah. I never knew I could do something like this.'
Blood drenched the room in earnest, splattering the remaining survivors in hot flecks.
'It feels nice.'
Fèi Míng stared at the two remaining men outside his little 'apartment.'
One was foaming in the mouth, locked in shock. He scrambled up to his feet, screaming as he dragged his companion to flee.
"Th-there's an A-AWAKENER!!! " one of them screamed as they bolted.
"He killed them! HE KILLED REX! BLOOD — SO MUCH BLOOD!! HELP! HELP!!!"
Fèi Míng turned his head slightly toward the carnage, watching the steam lift off the blood-soaked wood, the bodies stilled into shapes that begged no encore.
He dropped the axe.
The wood cracked again when it landed. But unlike before, it was lightweight now. The wood floor was already ruined, so what was one more disappointment.
"I wasn't even given the time to enjoy the look on your faces," he sigh-groaned. "A waste of expressions."
He crouched, fingers brushing the blood warm on the floor. The texture was sticky where it mixed with dust, thin in places where it ran over grooves and cracks, thicker near the bodies where it pooled.
"And now a cleanup problem," he muttered evenly. "They found where I lived. How inconvenient."
Suddenly, his blue screen of the system flared into view above the carnage.
[Do you wish to absorb "Core"?]
'Oh.' His eyes widened a fraction, taking another look at the bodies. 'I almost forgot about this. I can absorb cores even out of the game arena.'
It would take about ten minutes until the towners arrived. Plenty of time for him to understand how his new Path worked.
Fèi Míng stared upward, jaw flexing once in annoyance at being interrupted mid-contemplation. But the offer was not to ignore.
"Yes."
In a flash, small round liquid light globed together above the bodies. The Cores condensed into smooth, round orbs of milk-white light. They floated upward sluggishly before turning and drifting toward his mouth.
He grabbed them between his thumb and index finger, popping the membrane with a pinch. 'Do I insert it in my chest?' The round light ball diffused, sliding off his chest as the light seeped outward.
'Or maybe not. Can I eat it like I did with the crazy god's eye?'
He lifted the shards of light to his lips. His tongue stretched out as he swallowed it, thin trails of the light leaked from the corners of his mouth, a pale whitish glimmer that dissipated before it reached his chin.
A thin pulse of warmth spread across the surface, then down his throat to his stomach. His tongue extended out slightly to taste the fading light at his lips.
"Delightful. It's sweet."
[Congratulations! Three Cores Has Been Fully Absorbed!]
[You're Half A Step Up The Ladder! Absorb More Cores To Reach The First Equivalent!]
'I have to learn what that means.'
He looked down at the gore he caused. "I better leave before the towners arrest me."
Looking down at his bloody hand, he smirked. "I thought winning two pathless skills would be a waste. I'm glad it wasn't."
[Skills: Weight Manipulation, Telekinesis.]
And then, he fled the town.
***
The next town came into view. Mixed with many people wearing brighter colors, the floors were tidier than where he came from. The streets, wider, and although some buildings were torn open with waste residues littered on the sides, it was better than his previous town where no one bothered to clean up anymore.
He slipped into a half burnt seven story building that looked empty enough for a fugitive to stay.
The air inside was cold. Floors dusty, and a bit musty. It was possible no one stayed here, given it was quiet and hollow, Fèi Míng thought.
Suddenly, he gasped. 'Unless this was a—'
Then the door vanished behind him.
"…Hm. I should've known better."
Light warped across the walls, bending into mismatched angles. The air thickened, tightening once around his chest, then releasing. The world folded inward in a swift shift, and his feet sank into the makeshift quicksand floor.
This was an entrance to a Game arena.
A Game realm.
That was fast.
Glancing around his new environment, he took a deep breath in.
The hollow building had now been replaced by what seemed to be a playground mimicking a distortion of Disneyland.
Looking forward, a carousel of jungle animals slowly turned on its own. None of the wooden animals had poles attached to them, yet they rose and fell, anyway.
He looked down. The floor was emitting heat, hot enough to cause his shoes to steam.
And, out of nowhere, something dropped behind him.
A wet plump! Soft, but heavy enough to bounce once and roll.
The object tapped his boot and stopped.
He looked down, slightly tilting his head.
A damp decapitated head.
It still looked fresh.
The blood still moved at the base of the neck, slow waves of red sliding outward. The skin around the torn edges was jagged, strings of muscle hanging loose.
One eyelid twitched from leftover nerve firing.
He crouched.
The face tilted slightly as the rolling stopped.
"Helena?"
Red hair, blue eyes… but from the blood, it was hard to tell if it belonged to hers. Although, really identical.
Her left eye was half-open, clouded but still reflecting a bit of the overhead light. Her hair stuck to her forehead, clotted in thicker patches at the back.
The warm metallic smell of blood clung in the air.
"I wonder how she died." He breathed out through his nose. "I never got to know what her skill was."
His thoughts were cut short by a thin hum, and a blue Runic board unfolded in front of him, symbols locking into place with abrupt clicks.
[Welcome, dear Player!]
The letters brightened sharply, casting a pale glow over Helena's open mouth.
[Although, There Has Been Quite A Little Issue with the Game, Come join in!]
A smear of blood from her neck sizzled on the hot floor, evaporating into a faint mist.
[Welcome to the Game: Carnival!]
[Make Sure To Keep Your Head On Your Neck!]
[Difficulty: S.]
[Current Players: 99.]
***
A poorly dressed man stumbled into a dimly lit room.
"First son! First son Lu Yuan! Your father! We found him dead in that thief's house!"
The words spilled out of him in a rush, breath uneven, feet scraping against polished stone as he dropped to one knee.
The room smelled of expensive incense, mixed with a thick waft of floral fragrance, heavy enough to cling to the back of the throat.
A faint red lantern light glowed dimly across the silk curtains.
On the wide bed at the center of the room, a man lay half-reclined among rumpled sheets.
Lu Yuan's fingers were still tangled in a naked woman's hair, her body stretched, hot, beneath him, skin flushed and marked with hickeys.
His mouth lingered at her exposed neck, thrusting hard into her hot, flushed body while his mouth sucked fresh hickeys along her neck.
Her moans spilled out raw, vibrating straight through his lips as her nails clawed burning trails down his back and her thighs trembled tight around his hips. "...nnggfgh—ah~!"
The poorly dressed messenger stared silently at them, stunned, however, used to it.
When Lu Yuan finally pulled back, his expression remained blank.
He shoved her aside with a careless push of his forearm.
"Speak properly," he ordered.
The woman gasped, rolling onto her side, catching herself against the mattress.
The poorly dressed man bowed lower, glancing at anywhere but the first son. His forehead nearly touched the floor. A desperate attempt to hide his sinful blush.
"Y-Your father was murdered."
Lu Yuan slowly rose from the bed.
His toned muscles flexed under his skin as he stood, tall and unashamed—he was fully naked.
The red light tracing clean lines over his chest and shoulders. He picked up a white towel from the edge of the bed and wrapped it around his lower half with one hand.
His hair was still damp from sweat, dark strands falling across his forehead in a way that looked effortless. A work of art carved by the goddess of beauty herself.
"Who," he asked, "did it?"
"Your cousi— ah— that thief, Fèi Míng," the man stammered quickly. "Their bodies were found in his house, my lord. He is nowhere to be seen. I—I was preparing to raise the alarm to the high-rank Krats to handle the situa—"
Lu Yuan laughed.
It was low and brief, vibrating through the room before cutting off just as suddenly.
"That leech finally died!" His voice was deep enough to rattle faintly against the walls. "Took that weak hag long enough. He kept pestering me about not being a high-rank Krat. Always splitting my profit into half."
He stepped back toward the bed, fingers catching the woman by the jaw and lifting her face toward him. She trembled, eyes unfocused when he leaned in.
He kissed her again, shoving his tongue down her mouth. Her nails scraped rough trails across his jaw, moaning in his grasp. "Joker—i've did as you told. Please, grant me my freedom," she rasped.
Then he grabbed her hair. "As you wish."
A short blade glinted in the red light. He slit her throat cleanly, the blood splattered in a mess, warm and soaking into the sheets.
Lu Yuan released her and let her fall.
"Do not report this to the high-rank Krats," he continued, wiping his fingers against the towel at his waist. "I'm a Sovereign Path Adept. I will handle it myself."
The kneeling man swallowed hard. "Great Lu Yuan… your father was granted a Dream. Would you like to invoke the interested Force tied to his death? They may—"
"Dispose of that," Lu Yuan cut in flatly. "It is RiaKai again. I have no intention of trading this feeling"—he glanced once at the corpse on his bed—"for a longer life. How else would I enjoy sex?"
He turned away, already losing interest.
"Pawn it off if you wish."
The man bowed until his spine curved. "Then… the thief? He's suspected to be a recent Awakener."
Lu Yuan's eyes sharpened. He effortlessly tossed on a white robe.
"Raise a bounty. I want both his eyes. And his head. Bring the body back intact enough to sell what remains. Don't inform the second son. The bastard douses himself in wine every time he hears about his little cousin."