Inside the rustic building, the old man was seated in the living room, a cigarette in his hand when he heard the knock.
"Looks like he’s back."
He stood up from the chair and using the wooden table before him crushed the cigarette. Then, he walked towards the door and opened it
"What is this?" The old man’s eyes widened in shock. "I thought I heard the sound of a knock?" He pushed his head outside and looked left, then right."Is someone playing with me? This late at night?"
The old man stood at the entrance of his house, and noticed. "Shops are closing, that means it’s past their stay time. So what’s keeping the lad outside? Did he get lost?"
He turned to the direction of the adventure hall, and stared into the distance, his hands folded.
Where are you kid?
***
Across a vast, desolate icy landscape stretching beneath a dark, churning sky, a solitary figure sat upon the snow.
"Where am I?" Derek wondered. At the same time, the crimson window appeared before him.
[Ding! You have failed to complete the Daily Quest! Penalty Quest Initiated!]
[Penalty Quest: Survival]
[Goal: Survive for the alotted amount of time.]
[Allotted Time: 3 hours]
[Time left: 2 hours, 59 minutes, 57 seconds]
"Damn. So this thing was actually serious?"
Derek stood up and dusted his butt. His eyes were fixed on the system window, then looking at his surroundings, he wondered.
"Does it want me to survive this place? In this snowy landscape?" Derek was puzzled for a moment, and didn’t know what exactly he was to survive against.
Then, at that moment, his body seemed to freeze. "The temperature here is very low. I’m gonna freeze to death."
The young man wrapped his hands around his body as he walked forward. He could feel through his sandals the cold from the snow beneath him.
"Let’s just move to keep the body working. At this rate I could actually die before the time runs out. Is this the quest?"
As if responding to his question, a strong wind suddenly blew, almost taking the young man along. Before him, the path ahead cleared, revealing a massive monstrous polar bear.
Standing a short distance away from him, the monstrous beast loomed in clear view, its massive, shaggy white frame quivering with fury as it exposed lethal fangs in a deafening roar.
The young man went into a daze as his hand slipped away from his body. His eyes shook as he stared at the mighty beast before him.
Then, without warning the monstrous beast dashed forward.
"Oh hell no!"
Seeing the monster running towards him, Derek turned around and began running as fast as he could.
"I am going to die, I am going to die..." the words spurt out of his mouth as his legs carried him as fast as it could.
This is not happening, this is not happening... Derek’s mind raced as he stared at the system hovering before him, his eyes on the remaining time he had... Two hours, fifty-four minutes and twelve seconds? I really am going to die.
While running, Derek glanced back over his shoulder to see the monster sprinting after him with all its might.
"This thing shouldn’t catch him."
There was a great distance between him and the monstrous beast. However, his legs were small compared to the massive limbs of the beast. It was only a matter of time.
With every step the monster took, the ground shook violently, nearly throwing the young man off balance.
With every violent shake, the young man felt as though the ground was going to split open and swallow him. Luckily, it wasn’t a frozen ground, but snow.
I need to figure out a way to shake it off my back and survive the next two hours. Running?... The thought of running for the next two hours nearly broke his spirit since it was almost impossible.
However, he didn’t give up. Thinking it through, Derek broke the straight line he was running and turned to his right. But that didn’t shake the beast off him. Instead, the move gave the beast more edge over distance.
As he turned to his right, the monster did the same as if thinking ahead. It had a little intelligence. The monster curved and shortened the distance between them, and because of its massive size, it was able to cover more ground.
Shit
Derek saw the monster catching up, and turned to his left. This also, like the previous, gave the monster more distance covered.
It seemed like the young man didn’t know what he was doing. However, that wasn’t the case. He had thought it through.
"Come on, keep following me." Derek had a determined expression, swinging his hands forcefully.
Currently, he wasn’t only trying to survive not getting eaten. But, was also fighting against the freezing temperature.
This snowy landscape had an extreme freezing temperature of -75.3°C or -103.54°F. It was nearly close to the lowest officially recorded temperature back on earth.
He kept running for what felt like more than an hour, with the monster relentless on his tail.
The young man glanced over his shoulders once more and saw the fangs of the beast out in thirst for blood. It was very close that he could almost see its towering shadow.
It’s time.
Derek looked straight ahead and pushed himself forward as much as he could. He figured the monster would do the same since it somewhat had intelligence. Then, in a split second, he made a small ninety degree turn to the right.
The monster saw this and tried to turn, but it was too close to execute such a tight turn at full speed. Unable to handle the sudden twist, its massive body lost traction and crashed heavily into the snow, sliding headfirst across the ground.
The side of Derek’s lips curled up to a smile, as he glanced over his shoulder. "Heh, It worked."
Not wasting much time, he pushed forward, sprinting faster than before, creating a great distance between him and the beast.
"I don’t think that would keep it for long. What’s more, it might even get furious. So, my best option is to keep a very large distance between us."
He stared at the system window before him and muttered. "An hour left to go."
Derek had covered a great distance between him and the monstrous beast. Actually, it was a very great distance, to the point that he didn’t feel like his neck was going to fall over anymore.
Realizing this, he glanced over his shoulders and didn’t see the beast, so he stopped running.
"Huff, Huff, Huff... I have been running for more than two hours." He bent down, his hands on his knees as he tried to catch his breath.
He had just run a massive distance and should have been dripping with sweat, but the freezing air wouldn’t allow it. Every drop that seeped from his skin froze instantly.
After catching his breath, he raised himself up, and looked towards the direction he came from.
"It looks like I completely shook it off. I can’t even see it anymore."
There was a small fog in the distance which made it nearly impossible to see all the way into the distance. But, the young man had already breathed a sigh of relief.
He fixed his eyes on the system window. "Fifteen more minutes. I can rest here until the time is over."
He sat on the cold ground to rest but didn’t take his eyes off the distance he had come from.
Derek had thought that by keeping his eyes fixed there, he would be alert if the beast was coming. But, little did he know of what was to come next.
At that moment, the ground began to shake violently. Derek scrambled to his feet, his eyes fixed on the distance as the tremors grew steadily stronger.
"Here it comes."
His eyes narrowed, scanning his surroundings. With every heartbeat, the thundering vibration grew louder, yet the monster was nowhere in sight.
Where is it?
Before he could register what was happening, the beast erupted from the snow behind him, bursting out from the underground with its razor-sharp fangs lunging straight for his neck.