She thre the travel bag over her shoulder and found her suitcase. The handle was shattered and the case itself was cracked. But everything inside was still intact, or so she hoped. Now was not the time to examine it. Aside from finding safe shelter, she needed to plan on how to make her way to the edge of the Wild Lands near the town to move her supplies.
Wind blew dust in her eyes, causing her to wince and at the same time, reminding her of the need to find the goggles and scarf she had prepared.
[Ding! Warning: Strong winds and turbulence detected. Host should seek safety first.]
Zyra looked ahead, squinting her eyes so hard that she could barely see anything. Strong winds in the post apocalypse moved often, carrying whatever they picked up from where they passed. Sometimes, it was humans.
Every town had a weather measuring device that sent out warnings if it detected changes in the environment. Once the warning arrived, the corresponding shields would be activated, as long as energy stones were sufficient.
She didn’t have such a shield. Zyra knew she would be swept away. She could see it in the distance, the vertical twirling dark mass, turning every stone into a knife!
[The Host may choose to shelter within the beast domain and cure the allergic reaction to the masking spray by sleeping in the vitality cage. But the host is human, so she can only sleep in the cage for 7 hours.]
An image of the vitality cage appeared on the virtual screen. It looked like a dog cage, in the form of a cube with metal bars. There was a soft bed on the bottom, shaped like a dog bed!
Zyra snapped her teeth. "Excuse me? I am a Soul maiden and that is a dog cage and doggy bed!"
Beauty nodded solemnly, her pixelated face full of profound, artificial pity. [You are an ordinary human; all system privileges are reserved for beasts. Who told you to be human? ]
"You say that like it is my fault." Zyra choked on her breath, her chest tightening with indignation.
Fine. Don’t argue with a brainless machine, she told herself, doing some quick mental math. The desert windstorms usually lasted 8 hours, and even after they passed, danger followed as beasts came out to hunt. If she stayed in the beast domain for a day, she could maximize her survival chances. As for sleeping in the dog crate, nobody would ever know. "Anything else that I need to know about how this works?"
Suddenly, a crisp ding-dong echoed in her skull, and a glowing blue screen materialized before her.
[Host Status Panel]
Zyra Scorpion.
Half-life Beast: Green Horn Serpent.
Resonance Points: 5
Health: 80% (Warning: Severe allergic irritation)
Strength: Weak.
Agility: Weak.
Speed: Weak.
Command Aura: None.
Beast Bond: Initial Stage.
Skills: None.]
"I have skills!" She argued. "I am trained in close combat, shooting, archery."
[You couldn’t even fend off your snake if it attacked and poisoned you. Skills learned from humans are not considered.] Beauty replied with indignation.
Zyra looked at her 80% health bar and let out a long, miserable sigh. She rubbed her itching forehead. "I cannot take the itching anymore, Beauty. Take me to the beast domain." She would think about other things when she was safe. "Don’t forget my luggage."
A warm, golden light erupted from thin air, completely swallowing her whole, straight into the crate!
When Zyra opened her eyes, the agonizing burning in her skin instantly softened. She wasn’t on the dirty, terrifying forest floor anymore. She was laying on a soft bed, in a paradise that she could see through the cage.
The sky above was a soft, perpetual twilight, glowing with ribbons of violet and silver auroras. The air itself tasted sweet, thick with a rich, glowing mist that felt like pure energy soaking into her skin. A crystal-clear river wound through the landscape, its waters glowing with a faint, therapeutic blue light. Nearby, strange trees drooped with glowing, plump fruits that practically radiated vitality.... perfect food to nurture any creature.
A few meters away, on the soft, glowing moss of the riverbank, her little snake was curled up in a neat circle, snoring softly. The angry red marks on its tiny body from earlier had completely vanished just like her itching.
[This is the Beast Domain,] Beauty explained, sounding rather proud. [Here, the rich spiritual energy accelerates healing, enhances beast attributes, and relaxes the beast. Host should utilize this space to train, heal, and bond with her beasts.]
"Wow," Zyra murmured, her anger melting away as she stepped out of the cage to explore, despite the fact that the itching was not fully healed. But it was mild and ignorable. "Okay, it’s much better than what I thought."
[And it will get better as you bond with more beasts.]
She could not imagine how much better it could get compared to this. Zyra walked in circles, laughing loudly. After wandering around and satisfying her curiosity, the exhaustion finally hit her.
She felt disgusting, caked in sweat, dirt, and whatever chemical had been in that terrible spray bottle. Without shame, she threw her clothes off and jumped into the river for a bath.
After cleaning her body, she unzipped her travel bag, looking for a change of clothes. "Just a clean T-shirt and jeans," she muttered, digging through the pack. The standard Soul maiden white dresses would no longer work, going forward.
But as her hand brushed past the fabric, her fingers hit something stiff. The glove! Zyra’s breath hitched. She pulled it out.
She put the old piece of leather into the soft light of the beast domain. It looked completely ordinary.... honestly, it looked like garbage. The fact that her mother or father had hidden it in a vault only she knew about meant that it was important. It was probably the thing her uncle was looking for.
"Why was Uncle Job so interested in this thing? Mother left it for a reason but what?" The leather was deeply cracked, the seams were frayed and loose, and it looked exactly like the kind of worthless junk a merchant would throw into a bargain bin at a crowded market stall.
"I do not get what is special about it?" she whispered.
Driven by a sudden, intense curiosity, Zyra slipped her left hand inside. She pressed her fingers against the coarse, faded lining.
At first, nothing happened. It just felt like an old, poorly fitting glove, bigger than her hand. The thought that it belonged to a man crossed her mind. But then, a faint, rhythmic vibration thrummed against her palm. Thump. Thump. Thump. It felt exactly like a heartbeat, perfectly syncing with her own.
"Huh?" Zyra frowned, suddenly feeling uneasy. "Beauty, can you assess..."
Before she could finish, a loud snap echoed from the glove. The frayed seams suddenly shifted, weaving themselves back together at impossible speed. The leather contracted fitting her perfectly, as if it had been custom made for her.
"Wait, what’s happening?" Zyra gasped, pulling at the wrist of the glove with her right hand. It wouldn’t budge.
[Host, you seem to be in distress...]
The glove got tighter. And tighter. The leather seemed to sink directly into her skin, peeling it away, crushing her knuckles and squeezing her fingers together until the bones began to creak.
"Ah! Stop! Get off me!" Zyra screamed, a sharp, excruciating pain shooting up her arm. She fell on her back, desperately trying to tear the glove away, but it felt like it was fusing directly to her flesh. The agony was blinding, far worse than the burning spray from before.
Just as she thought her hand was going to be crushed into splinters, a sharp clack sounded from the back of the glove. A hidden, metallic compartment suddenly popped open, right over her knuckles!