For a moment after reading the text, Alex was stupefied.
'Wait, what?'
He blinked a few times in disbelief and looked at the dead hound, which no longer had the six stars on its head. Then, he touched his chest where he could sense the soul card pulsing within him.
'Does this mean… I'm now seen as a divine creature of the sixth tier?'
A smile began to creep across Alex's face.
Although he didn't fully understand what this soul card was, he could grasp a bit of the implications from reading the text.
This wasn't what he had been expecting, but it was damn good, alright.
As long as he didn't go looking for trouble with creatures lower than him in this cursed mountain, even that monkey that had chased him before would have to avoid him now.
"Things have gotten a whole lot interesting."
It was then that the projection of the white card disappeared, and once again, Alex could see timer on the hilt of his dagger.
[22:15:23]
'There's still a lot of time left.'
Alex looked down from the dagger to his blood-stained clothes, and then a grimace flashed across his face.
'Ah… I look like a character from a low budget horror movie.'
Ignoring the sticky discomfort of the drying blood, he ran a hand through his short black hair and began walking away from the clearing. The area ended in a steep cliff, so he had to head back into the dense evergreen forest. He passed the mangled corpses that the hound had killed earlier, trying not to look at them for too long, and then began moving steadily toward the east.
For a long while, he was quite surprised to find that he was not encountering any creatures and the forest around him seemed unusually quiet.
'No encounters so far. Great. Let's keep it that way.'
As if he jinxed himself, at that moment, he suddenly heard a scream. It sounded human, and it came from somewhere in front of him.
Alex halted.
Then, he took a few cautious steps further and leaned against a tree. Since the ground began to slope down, he could see the scene clearly. A few hundred meters away, a four-armed ape creature was looming over a young man in his early twenties. The man was trembling on the ground, pointing a beautiful golden sword at the monster.
"Stay back!" He yelled. "Stay back, please!"
When the creature kept snarling and approaching him like a predator playing with its food, the man shouted again in even more desperate panic. "Help! Someone, please help me!"
As Alex watched the scene, all his attention was on the golden sword in the man's hand.
'Damn… that's one beautiful sword. Why couldn't I get something like that?' He felt a sharp pang of envy.
Compared to that beautiful golden blade, his own dagger felt even more like a common kitchen utensil. But then, he shook his head and gave a small, inward shrug.
'Actually, who am I kidding? I can't really complain about my luck. If anything, it's probably been a bit too good lately.'
Meanwhile, down the slope, the creature snarled and prepared to lunge, but then, as if sensing something, it suddenly halted and began sniffing the air.
In the next instant, it snapped its head towards where Alex was hiding, causing him to be startled.
'It can sense me?'
For a second, Alex instinctively considered bolting, but then, he decided not to move. The card had said that beasts of a lower rank than him wouldn't seek to kill if he didn't challenge them, and this was his chance to test that.
'Hey, carry on. Don't mind me. I'm just a passerby.'
To Alex's utter surprise, the five-star beast took a step back. Then it let out a loud, roar that sounded both threatened and furious, before turning around and bolting into the darkness like it had seen something scarier than a ghost.
'Huh?'
An expression of disbelief crossed Alex's face. Sure, he had expected that the creature would not attack him as the card had written. He just didn't expect that it would turn around and bolt off like that.
Well, that was a pretty great development.
Since the creature was gone, and he had confirmed that his presence alone was enough to keep him safe, he came out from behind the tree, tucked his dagger into his belt, and began walking on a bit more confidently.
It was really cold, so he rubbed his hands together and blew on them, before putting them in his pockets for a bit of warmth.
'Mmm… I wonder. What is the highest star? Are there creatures of the seventh, eighth, or ninth tier here? Or is six the highest?' He paused for a second at the thought. 'I really hope it is.'
Further down, the young man, who had just survived being killed, was still seated on the ground in a state of complete shock. When he heard Alex's footsteps approaching, he snapped out of it and whipped his head toward him.
At first, he flinched when he saw Alex's bloodied clothes, but slowly, in the midst of his panic, his expression began to change to one of pure relief. Then, he exhaled a long, shaky breath and exclaimed, "Finally, somebody who is alive!"
He quickly scrambled to his feet. After wobbling a bit, he tried to steady his shaky legs, then looked in the direction the creature had run. With a weak, nervous laugh, he added, "Ah… praise the Goddess of Fortune. After seeing dead people all this while, I thought I was going to be one of them."
He looked back at Alex, who had reached some meters from him. Then he scurried a few steps forward to keep pace, while still trembling. "I guess it's not my time to die yet, haha... Did you see that thing, friend? Damn, it was terrifying. I can't believe it just ran off on its own like that."
Alex finally halted and looked at the man but didn't say anything at first. Instead, he narrowed his eyes and studied him from head to toe.
The man looked innocent with short brown hair and beautiful brown eyes behind the glasses perched on his nose. He had freckles on his face and a refined jawline which made him look unusually handsome, almost like a high-end model.
It was the kind of face that belonged on a billboard, and it was for that very reason that Alex could recognize him.
'What is a celebrity doing in this hell?'
Indeed, the young man was a rising actor who had been plastered all over the city's advertisements lately.
Slowly, the handsome actor peered at Alex then his eyes widened as if he had just realized something. "Oh, it's you."
When Alex arched a brow questioningly, the man snapped his fingers three times in rapid succession and added. "Uhm… yeah. You are that Store Attendant, right? I know you."
'As if. You probably just my saw my uniform.' Alex thought, before replying expressionlessly, "Is that so?"
The actor nodded quickly, "Yes." Then he smiled in a way that seemed forced and pointed a knowing finger. "Uh… Alex! It's Alex, isn't it?"
'That reminds me, I need to take off this name tag.'
Alex nodded tentatively.
The actor's smile widened, making him look even more handsome. "See? I knew it was you. Don't take it the wrong way, but you… uh, you have a face that's quite hard to forget."
'Is that supposed to be a compliment?'
The actor's expression quickly became serious as he adjusted his glasses. He looked around anxiously, first in the direction the five-star creature had fled, and then back toward the trees.
He turned and took a step forward, gesturing with his head toward the path Alex had been taking. "By the way, friend, I think we need to get out of here and head down the mountain. I don't know why that creature suddenly left, but I have a feeling it might come back. Or worse, something even more terrifying might show up. It'd be better if we weren't around to find out."
Alex wanted to ask, "Who's 'we'?" but he decided against it. As the man began walking, Alex exhaled a breath of cold air and followed several meters behind him.