Galactic Fist of Legend

by Scottie Futch

  Scott immediately entered the store. Unlike the house he stopped at before, the convenience store was unlocked. In fact, the front door was completely shattered.

  Inside he discovered that most of the shelves were empty or destroyed. Very little was left behind. The place had long since been looted clean. He was not surprised. If he considered the only other building that he saw during his road trip, he was not likely to find many supplies anywhere.

  After a thorough search, he managed to discover a can of beans and a twenty dollar bill. It was American currency. If nothing else, he now knew that the world he resided in currently did have an analog of America. It probably even was America. He had no idea if he would ever find use for the money, but the can of beans would soon awaken to a special sort of destiny.

  Most of what was left, he could not use. Moldy pseudo-meats and convenience store sandwiches that would have been dangerous to eat even if they had not been horribly destroyed by mold.

  The convenience store was a bust. It could not even be used as a place to rest for the night due to the lack of doors.

  Unfortunately, the restaurant did not prove to be much better. There was a freezer full of rotten meat, and a rotting fry cook in the kitchen, but otherwise there was nothing of use. Even the cutlery was gone. Once again, he found a few random bits of currency that he collected. It took up no real space, and he had a suspicion that he could test out later if he somehow managed to stay his execution in the morning.

  The house was much like the farmhouse from before. It did look a little sturdier, but it was still a wood building. The windows were smaller, and boarded up. At some point, someone tried to make a go of things by staying there. No one was there at the moment, however.

  Scott looked the place over and noted a few disconcerting signs that it was not a great choice for long term survival. The bullet holes in the bracing boards that protected the windows were one of the most telling among them. No one would fire out of a house through the boards they used to keep the dead at bay. Some asshole tried to shoot his way inside.

  Of course, asshole might be a strong term. For all he knew, the person on the outside was trying to reach someone who had been kidnapped by other assholes.

  The bullet holes told a story, but it was one he could not decipher. Scott discovered a ladder that someone decided was not worth looting, and used it to reach an upstairs window. The window was broken out some time before, but there was no way to know how long it had been.

  He made it into the house then began a thorough search. The likelihood of zombies infesting the place was low, since it was boarded up, but he could not be certain until he checked every nook and cranny.

  The window led to a bedroom. From the stuffed animals strewn about the place he decided that it was once a little girl's bedroom, or perhaps a college age girl who liked stuffed animals. He checked the closet, the drawers, and under the bed. There was no sign of a zombie in the room. It was time to move on.

  The hallway was strewn with bits of trash and debris. A disturbing trail of long dried blood smeared along the wall caught his attention, but otherwise he saw nothing that set him on edge.

  He checked the first door he came to, which was the bathroom. He felt sick at the sight of dried blood everywhere, but there was no sign of the one who did the bleeding. Someone had struck the bathroom mirror a while back as a single impact area could be seen. Signs of their rage were visible throughout the bathroom. The little country house saw many terrible things in recent days.

  The next room on the second floor was a laundry room. He found a few clothes too small to wear, and moved on. There was one more room, another bedroom. After a thorough search he found a few bits and pieces of clothing. He put on the flannel shirt that he found crumpled under the bed, but nothing else would fit.

  Downstairs was little better than upstairs. There were no zombies, but there were no left over supplies of any kind, either. He found a few broken plates and glasses, but nothing else of use. The place was picked clean, probably several times over.

  He hazarded the use of his voice for a moment. "You know, for a world supposedly designed just for me to explore until my death... This place seems awfully lived in..."

  There was no power, no running water. He did not expect either, but one or the other would have been nice. He checked the rest of the house one more time and discovered an attic on the second floor that he overlooked previously.

  "Not bad," he said in a low whistle as he took in the most beautiful site in the world, a makeshift camp. Until recently, someone did live here. There were a few candles, a book or two, a case of ramen noodles of all things, and several jugs of water.

  He eyed the food and water suspiciously. Why would anyone leave that behind? The books were understandable, but even the candles were unlikely to be abandoned.

  "No zombies in this house," he said quietly. He inspected the attic briefly then frowned. "No sign of forced entry or being attacked in this part of the house..."

  He rubbed his chin and considered the situation. The only options that made sense included the owner of this camp being taken once outside of this room, or the possibility that this little camp was made specifically for him. It was supposed to be a game world after all.

  Scott sat down on the stacked quilts he saw then sighed. What did he do now? It would be dark soon. He had supplies for the night, and a place to stay. What else could he do?

  He thought about it for a moment then grinned. The mission briefing claimed that he needed to secure a place to rest for the night. He should check the fortifications. But first he popped open a jug of water and had a refreshing luke warm drink. He used a little of it to tend to the cuts on his feet, and then bandaged them as well. In all honesty, he should have bandaged them earlier, but it felt pointless if he did not have a place to stay.

  After drinking his fill and cleaning his feet, he set about his work. He wrapped some of the bits of clothing he found around the flat end of his crowbar and used it as a makeshift hammer to beat a few of the boards back into place where they had come loose. The cloth muffled the sound a bit, though it did not alleviate it altogether.

  Furniture was moved as quietly as possible in order to block entrances, or to brace the window boards. The refrigerator was wedged in place between the backdoor and the short dividing wall that led into the kitchen. It would not open inward anymore, though the door itself might give out under a dedicated assault.

  Scott spent a little time breaking down the beds upstairs to get at their metal frames underneath. The bed frames were useful as a brace if nothing else. Had he nails and the desire, he might have been able to build cross bars over the doors with those frames as the cross brace. Instead, he combined them with other furniture to brace the front door and the larger windows.

  The sun started to set by the time that he pulled the ladder up and into the only legitimate exit from his fort. His last night was upon him. There was no way to know if he earned any EXP, or whatever the people running the game needed from him. All he knew was that he did what he could, with what he had.

  Scott finished the water in one of the water jugs then cut the top off. It was a common one gallon water jug found at any grocery store. Once the top was off he tossed two packs of ramen noodles inside and poured some more water in before setting it aside. It would probably be a cold soggy mess when he tried to eat it, but it was better than nothing.

  His knife found a new goal a moment later when he introduced his can of beans to its greater destiny. He stabbed at the lid until he broke through, then cut into the top of it until the lid was torn open. He ate the beans like a wild animal, recklessly and with little class. He tossed his head back and let them slide out of the can into his mouth.

  After he fished all of the beans out of the can with his finger, he sat back and allowed himself to rest. It was over. Everything was over. He did what he could.

  Scott rubbed his forehead a little. He had not so much as struck a single zo
mbie. How could he have done so? He was naked for most of the day, and unarmed almost as long. The only member of Homo Sapiens Mortis, or whatever they should be called, that he could have killed safely was the kid in the car seat.

  There was no guarantee that the poor little thing would not turn out to be juicy and splatter him with its diseased body fluids. One bite, scratch, or bit of gore splattered on his naked body could have infected him. It seemed like a stupid risk for no guarantee of reward. He could at least live till morning if he acted like someone with a modicum of common sense. The singing while riding a lawn mower did not count, as that bit of transportation provided his only salvation.

  Butt naked and unarmed, the only thing he could do at the time was run and keep running. He snatched up whatever items he could, and survived as long as he could by doing so. That was really all there was to the situation.

  The long night passed without incident. At one point Scott would have relished a zombie attack. Death by fighting on his own two feet would be better than acceptance of his coming execution. Yet, once he made his little fortress of solitude, he had been left alone by the world.

  Scott did not know when dawn actually occurred, but he did know that he was in the middle of taking a drink of water. He nearly choked on it when a voice spoke to him, not from the room, but inside his mind. It spoke in an annoyed tone of voice. "Congratulations on surviving the night."

  A semi-transparent door of light appeared before him. A bright red number sixty appeared then began to tick down. He did not need a prompt to tell him what it meant. He had sixty seconds to leave, or he would not be leaving.

  Uncertain whether or not he could take anything back, Scott snatched up as much of the stuff in the room as he could then ran through the door of light. He ran back to the safety of the room that he would probably die in shortly thereafter.

  Once he was through the door, it closed behind him and he was once again in his prison cell. In his arms he held two jugs of water, a crowbar, and a small assortment of items. Not long afterward, those items began to vibrate and then they dissipated into motes of light.

  Naked and his feet injured, he glared hatefully at the spectral image of his body that hovered nearby. It was the only thing in the room to glare at, after all. He needed to take his frustration out on something. A few minutes passed and a blue screen appeared before him.

  [Mission Result Overview]

  Once you have completed a mission, you will be judged according to the nature of the mission and your completion of it. Each completion score will be ranked from F- to SSS+. The better the score, the better the rewards. A score of F- will only occur if a mission has been failed completely.

  [—]

  [Mission Score]

  You have completed your first mission. Congratulations!

  [You Jerk!]

  Grade: A

  Base Reward: 10 EXP

  Grade Bonus: X4

  Total: 50 EXP

  Settings Bonus

  Pure Survival Route: You did not engage a single zombie in combat. You did loot and scavenge for as many useable items as you could find.

  Grade: A

  Route Bonus: 40 EXP

  Common Sense Bonus: Unlike a large number of your fellow Earthlings who received this specific introductory mission, you clearly understood that the farmhouse would be a trap and avoided falling into said trap. You found a mode of transportation and fled the horde.

  Grade: B

  Bonus: 20

  Entertainment Bonus

  You proved to be highly entertaining on at least one occasion. This reduces the annoyance of our people as they wait for your race to fail their challenges and become our property.

  Entertainment Grade: B

  Entertainment Bonus: 20

  Fan Following: You have acquired new fans. Once you have 100 fans, you will be granted a one percent bonus to all EXP earned. Each additional 100 fans will increase your EXP by one percent as well.

  Fans: (2)

  Total EXP Earned: 130

  [—]

  Scott stared at the screen for a moment while he tried to decipher what was going on. He expected to earn ten experience points at the most, yet the total was much higher. There was no previous mention of bonuses such as the ones shown.

  The blue screen disappeared. A digital clock appeared above his semi-transparent image. The hour was 22:31. He leaned forward to read the small print that appeared beneath it. There was a smaller running clock below that showed hours, minutes, and seconds. "One hour, twenty eight minutes, thirty-two seconds?"

  Did that mean that he would die at midnight? He checked the math in his head and that did seem like it would be midnight. A glance at the door and it revealed another clock. This one showed the exact same time as the amount of time under the clock over his image.

  He nodded slowly. There was no way to be certain, but it seemed possible that midnight was significant. The door timer probably related to when the door would open again. The clock above his head related to the current time, and how long he had left to live.

  Scott looked at his status then tried to figure out how to buy one more day. After a few moments of declaring random words, such as "Life span increase." He poked the image before him. A blue screen popped up.

  [Life Span]

  Your life span exists as a set number of days that you purchase. Once your time runs out, you will die. In order to increase your life span, you will need to purchase additional time. The cost is 100 EXP per day.

  How many days would you like to live?

  Increase Life Span: [-|+=0]

  [—]

  Scott tapped the plus sign and the zero changed to a one. The system asked him to confirm his desire to keep living, and assured him that it was alright if he wished to die. He released a deep sigh of relief as the clock added another twenty-four hours to his current lifespan. Oh the joy of it. He would live for another twenty-five hours. He glanced to the door. The time had only changed in regards to how long it had taken for him to make his purchase. It was not linked to his lifespan.

  For a moment he wanted to laugh and cry at the same time. He took another deep breath and allowed that moment to pass. He might not have amounted to much in his life, but he'd never been the sort of person to sit around and moan about it.

  Back on the lawn mower he decided that he wanted to live, even if he was going to die anyway. Laughing while using a lawn mower to escape a few hundred undead assholes was as close to living as it would get for him at that moment. Now that he narrowly avoided his untimely death, for a time at least, he needed to think about how to survive the next mission.

  "What can I do with thirty EXP?" he asked. The first thing he did was tap on a few of his attributes. It did not take long to discover how increasing stats worked. One point of EXP increased a single stat by 0.01 points. He did not know if that was good or bad. He did not spend any of his points before checking other things. He had too few to throw them away on the first thing that he saw.

  While he dicked around with the status screen, he inadvertently opened another menu. This one was related to items, powers, and feats.

  A long slow whistle echoed through the room as he took in the sight of it all. Items were separated into household goods, consumables, combat items, restoration, and luxuries.

  "Man all of this stuff is damned expensive," muttered Scott. The least expensive firearm was four hundred EXP, and the ammunition was sold at one round per point!

  Household goods turned out to be something interesting. He could use that section to expand and outfit his room. The cost for even the least expensive thing was hideously high, so he moved on.

  "Fifty points for a sports drink that heals minor wounds and restores stamina," mumbled Scott.

  The restoration section allowed him his first taste of something worth purchasing. "Sweet, I can heal my injuries for one point." He accepted restoration and noticed that his EXP dropped by one point.

  A sensation of warmth
rose up within him and a strange light flared outward from his body. His feet itched for a few seconds, but soon the cuts and bruises disappeared altogether.

  "Not bad!" he said while he wiggled his toes and reveled in the lack of pain in his feet. He felt better than he had in a while. He was still hungry, but at least he did not feel completely exhausted. Restoration would vary by the injuries that he had, but it did seem to be cost effective for minor ailments.

  The luxury section provided him with something that nearly made him cry. He could buy clothes, food, and water among other things. The prices even seemed reasonable!

  Scott quickly looked through the cheapest available items. He ended up purchasing a basic set of clothes that included a white cotton shirt, a pair of blue jeans, cotton socks, underwear, thin cotton gloves, and running shoes. Each item cost less than one EXP and when totaled he spent 2.6 EXP in order to clothe his glorious nakedness.

  The black backpack that he purchased set him back one entire EXP point, as did the lunch that he purchased. Scott splurged another fraction of an experience point to procure a leather jacket. Between the clothes, food, and restoration he spent five of his precious experience points. Those few lost points drastically improved his mood, however.

  Scott took a moment to eat his dinner, a sumptuous feast of fried chicken, mashed potatoes, and collard greens, then looked over to the door. There was something that he wanted to check before he spent any more points.

  He rose up and walked over to the door to inspect it. There had been no timer there before, but he noticed that when he poked things like his status menu he would receive more information.

  Scott poked the timer on the door. A blue screen popped up. It informed him of something interesting. He must take at least one mission every twenty-four hours, or he would receive a penalty that prevented him from taking any missions at all for one week. Once he took a mission and completed it successfully, he could undertake any available side missions to earn extra points before the next daily mission. There was only a single side mission listed.