DANGER ALERT!

Drake, completely unaware of the serious danger Zack was secretly planning, went back to enjoying his time at the circuit track. He decided to treat himself to a brand new sports car and had a blast.

"Excuse me, does Zack White come here often?" Drake casually inquired with the track staff.

"Yeah, he's a regular, sir," the staff replied apologetically. "We're really sorry about what happened. We never expected he'd take issue with someone else renting this place. You probably shouldn't come back here; it was our mistake trying to accommodate another customer."

"But he's not the owner, right? Shouldn't you report him for harassment?" Drake asked, sensing that this wasn't the first time Zack had caused trouble.

"We can't do that, sir." the staff leaned in closer to Drake and whispered, "He leads an organization. It's legitimate and registered, but it's actually a criminal organization."

"What?" Drake was taken aback.

"Please don't try to find out more, sir. Just leave this place and avoid encountering him again. You'll get into trouble," the staff warned.

Drake swallowed hard, finding it difficult to believe that Zack was actually someone very dangerous.

"Is his organization new?" he inquired, unable to contain his curiosity. The staff's brows furrowed as Drake persisted.

"Sir, don't underestimate them, even if they've only been around for a few months. They're a highly dangerous organization," she said in a hushed tone. "They're wealthy too, and they can influence everything with money, even authorities."

"Only a few months? Could this organization have emerged around four months ago?" Drake asked, causing the staff to confirm with a nod. Drake's forehead broke into a cold sweat as he began to connect Zack's shady organization to the time they had received the system.

"He really used the tribute system in a different way, didn't he? Isn't he concerned? Aren't we supposed to use this miracle for better things?" Drake mumbled to himself as he stared at the holographic screen that only he could see.

"Why on earth would he use the system to mess up his life like that?" he pondered.

In Drake's case, he was definitely using the system to improve his and his family's lives. He couldn't fathom just how extreme Zack's thinking was to form an organization with only a billion coins in his system.

"Am I supposed to take it to that extreme with my quintillions of coins too?" he continued talking to himself, causing the track staff to leave him alone.

Drake then pressed his system to explore it, as he had been doing whenever he had some free time.

"There are no instructions or warnings about the system's goals. It simply says to use the quintillion coins at my disposal. Is this why Zack interpreted it as a license to do bad things?" he mused while continuing to browse his system. Eventually, he gave up and decided it was time to return to his hotel.

In the hotel, the opulent lobby was vacant, except for the lone security guard at the front desk, who was engrossed in a newspaper. Drake exchanged a nod with the guard, silently acknowledging his presence, and headed for the elevator.

As the doors closed, he noticed a reflection in the polished metal. Someone was lurking in the lobby, shadowy and ominous. He couldn't make out the face, but their presence made Drake feel uneasy.

"Nah, I'm just overthinking," he muttered to himself. He patiently waited for the elevator to ascend, and nothing out of the ordinary occurred when he entered his hotel room.

"I've got a long day today," Drake said to himself as he prepared to take a bath. He had forgotten the unease he felt in the elevator and was now feeling safe and relieved inside his hotel room.

"A warm bath—something I couldn't afford before," he snorted. He adjusted the water to his liking, still finding it surreal to have such changes in his lifestyle.

However, he suddenly froze when he caught a glimpse of a reflection in the glass wall of the shower.

"Who's there?" he yelled, quickly turning toward the reflection, but there was no response. Drake turned off the shower, but he couldn't bring himself to step out of the glass shower enclosure to investigate. He was afraid of whatever or whoever might be waiting for him outside.

"Show yourself!" he yelled again, peering through the fogged glass walls. It was then that Drake regretted having such a spacious bathroom because he couldn't determine where the person might be hiding. He couldn't even make a dash for the bathroom door since it was so far away. He could only focus on his phone, which was just beside the shower's door, thinking of calling for help. But to do that, he needed to open the door.

"Am I just imagining things?" he mumbled to himself after standing frozen inside the shower for ten minutes.

Slowly, he took a step outside the shower, cautiously grabbing his phone and dialing the security number.

"Overthinking or not, I just want to feel safe," he mumbled to himself. He wanted security in his room, even if he wasn't sure if someone was actually lurking inside.

"Why are they taking so long to answer?" he impatiently said, even though the security number had only rung twice.

Drake's eyes were fixed on his phone, but his ears were on full alert. He jolted when he suddenly heard a slight movement behind the cabinet where the towels were stored.

"Is there someone there?" he asked, but he couldn't dare approach it. He cautiously stepped backward and turned his back to it only when he was about to turn the knob to exit the bathroom.

"Ack! Help!" Drake screamed.

He felt a sharp object piercing through his back, and he could sense his warm blood, though pain hadn't set in yet as terror overwhelmed him.

"Who are you? Ack!" he screamed even louder as another stab landed in his back. Drake attempted to turn towards his assailant to defend himself against the relentless stabbing, but before he could even see the face of the unknown man, the assailant slit his throat, preventing him from even screaming.

"What's going on?" he weakly thought, slumping face down on the floor while his blood painted the tiled surface.

“Who are you?" he muttered inaudibly, staring at his assailant’s shoes as they walked away from him. His vision was then overlapped by the tribute system's holographic screen, which displayed a message: "Warning: The user's health is low. Purchase a healing potion? 1 potion costs 50,000 coins."

Drake furrowed his brow as simple words became hard for him to understand due to the pain that was finally setting in all over his body.

"I... I can't move," he said inwardly, unable to press the screen to respond to the system.

It was a few seconds later that the message on the system changed: "Warning, the user's life is in danger. You only have ten seconds. Purchase a healing potion? 1 potion costs 50,000 coins."

"Ten seconds to what?" he wondered. "Am I going to die?" Panic gripped him as the countdown began without his permission.

"I don't want to die... my sister... she..." Drake desperately tried to move his hand so he could press the system screen.

Ten...

Nine...

Eight...

“I don’t want to die!”