Capítulo 8: [Main Scenario #1]

A beam of light entered my eyes leaving my face feeling warm the kind you'd like to be woken up by on a Sunday morning in a beach house at the beginning of a holiday season. Unfortunately for me, I didn't have the luxury of savoring this feeling, when was the last time I had felt this?

When was it that life started to feel dull, nostalgia was starting to kick in, back when I was a kid I felt this every day, when waking up wasn't just another day I somehow had to get through, when waking up was a gift. I took a moment to collect my thoughts, my body was still sore from the aftermath of the probability storm, those sparks were something else entirely, If I had to describe it, it was like being stabbed by a thousand needles in every part of your body but it didn't end there, it was like those needles were taken out and sent right back to stab my open wounds over and over again until I could no longer bear it.

There was a weird taste in my mouth, the taste of blood? I tried to bring my hand towards my face but was met with resistance, someone had tied my hands around the tree trunk and rather tightly if I may add. My wrists were red from the corroding with the rope also I felt kind of dizzy, what time was it? Oh my god, the scenario how much time was left?

I couldn't access the scenario window as my hands were tied, I tilted my head forward to check the clear token fully I had fully expecting it to be missing, taken by my captor but surprisingly it still hung from my belt loop. My sense of relief was short lived as it was soon replaced by dread. If my captor didn't want my token it meant that things were personal and it also meant that I was in deep trouble.

The sun rays gleaming from my face that felt good just a moment ago were starting to get too hot, I needed to make my escape before the sun rays became the boiling flames of hell.

"Finally awake are we? I almost concluded you had gone into a state of coma."

A rough but equally soothing feminine voice greeted me from behind I tried to rotate my head towards the direction of the voice but it's owner was out of my line of sight she was probably seated right behind me watching me or rather waiting for me to wake up.

"It's no use playing dead now, I know you're awake."

I wasn't playing dead.

"I'm not playing dead, you haven't left any room for me to move now have you?" I replied.

"You know I liked you better when you were asleep."

With this, she got up to her feet I could hear her slowly moving forward stepping on the rustling grass to my surprise the first thing she did was cut me loose. I was taken by surprise and jumped straight to my feet.

"Why bother tying me up if the first thing you're gonna do is cut me loose?"

"So that you can't pull a fast one on me, also there's not much you can do right now, in your current state if you decide to make a run for it you'd just collapse a kilometer away" she exclaimed calmly it was clear with the confidence in her voice that she was the one in charge here but I wasn't just gonna sit here and let her boss me around. I had let my inferiority complex take me quite a few times in the past and I had lived to regret every one of those moments I wasn't gonna let that happen here

"Fair enough" I replied.

"I'll give you one hour to prepare, after that only one of us is going to leave this place alive" she declared

"To be honest I wanted to deal with you as soon as I found you but killing you in your current state wouldn't do me any good hence the hour, drink a few glasses of water if you have to."

I expected this so her words flew inside my head from one ear and straight outside from the other. I opened the scenario window.

[Main Scenario #1 - Rough Diamond]

...

Time remaining - 3 days.

Damn, I had been out for 11 days. I needed to end this fast and start collecting tokens, it wasn't going to be easy, even if I made it out of here early all the easy targets would have already lost their token and if I were to evaluate myself I fell in the category of an easy target.

Anyway, where was my constellation backer? All this time he had been sprouting nonsense and the one time I actually needed him he was nowhere to be found. I looked at the heavens and found stars in the sky even though it was daytime but I could tell none of them were looking at me, there was one looking this way but I had a feeling it was the sponsor of that woman. If it was any of the four constellations following me I would have heard an indirect message by now.

Indomitable Champion of Conflict had mentioned something about using coins to increase my stats but I had yet to figure out how to use them. I needed to figure it out fast since I was about to fight in what i could only imagine was a battle to the death and I was practically parched but I wasn't hungry, odd, 11 days was a long time to go without food but I wasn't hungry I wonder why.

"Well you say that but it's not like there's a convenience store here where I can buy a few water bottles from," I said moving in the direction of the woman's voice when I finally caught a glimpse of her.

Her hair fell backward falling just short of her shoulders, in the sunlight anyone would mistake it as hazel but her hair was definitely black, her bangs falling forward stopped just above the eyes while some loose locks fell forward reaching her chin but most of her hair was tucked behind her ears, her dark eyes decorated her fair complexion like jewels buried in the snow, her nose fit perfectly between her eyes, she was dressed in a black hoodie, the undone chain added a touch of nonchalance to her otherwise put-together outfit why saw she dressed in a full black outfit in such heat? A sword hung from her belt which I could tell she was itching to use, tied to its scabbard were two clear tokens. She looked at me from the corner of her and said something but I couldn't catch it.

My thoughts were interrupted when a plastic water bottle hit me in the face cap first.

"Drink up consider it your final meal before you die"

This brat, she was getting too cocky I wanted to say a few things but held back. The pain from the bottle had brought me to my senses. Dammit where was this Prisoner of Paranoia if he didn't appear before the hour was up I was screwed.