Chapter 15 : Baby first day on Dine
Quota 0/270 - Only 3 Days Left
5:00 AM
An alarm rang in a hotel room.
Victor struggled to get up. He didn't have much to pack, so he grabbed one of the empty bags the mysterious man had given him and stuffed the remaining 10 shovels into it.
He headed down to the restaurant. The man must have informed the reception about their departure time because a staff member was there preparing breakfast.
Victor approached the staff member with Olivia to ask :
"Good morning, could I have a coffee?
- Good morning sir and madam, what type of bean would you like for your coffee?
- Whatever you want.
Victor was unfamiliar with the different coffee beans.
- Very well sir, would you like your coffee regular, decaf, diluted, or American?
- Whatever you want, sir, I don't like coffee anyway."
The man showed no reaction to his response, but Olivia looked at Victor with confusion.
She whispered:
"Why would you get a coffee if you don't like it?"
Victor must have been still groggy because he replied strangely:
"Because I need to stay awake to avoid dozing off in front of a statue. They're apparently good at preventing people from meeting their quota, so I must remain alert to avoid having our items stolen."
Olivia didn't understand what he had just said, and Victor returned to the table with a coffee in hand.
Everyone had finished eating. They were just waiting for Victor to finish his coffee before they could leave, and he was taking forever.
'I hope the pay will reflect all the sacrifices I've made,' Victor thought, making a funny face after each sip of coffee.
Victor had no doubt that the coffee was excellent, but it still tasted like coffee.
He opened the bag at his feet to wait for the bitterness to pass.
Out of the ten remaining shovels, he took two to offer to Olivia and the mysterious man.
The man first examined the shovel with curiosity before realizing it was just a heavy shovel, weighing nearly 15 pounds. He placed it in his bag, which was already stuffed with items. Olivia thanked Victor and put hers in her bag next to a rocket launcher.
Victor finished his coffee, and they set off.
Shirley had chosen to use the same vehicle as yesterday for the entire mission.
Victor didn't quite understand her choice, but he couldn't deny feeling perfectly safe inside.
They reached their destination after a few minutes' drive. The roads were empty at this early hour, with the sun yet to rise over New York City.
Victor got out of the car with an empty bag slung over his shoulder and a shovel in one of his hands. The man had prohibited him from carrying the other shovels, so he left the rest of his gear inside the vehicle.
All the lights in the house were off and the chilly wind was sending shivers down one's spine.
The house door was locked, but the man pulled out tools from his bag to pick the lock.
After only a few seconds, the lock clicked open and he entered the house. Shirley followed him inside while Victor paused at the doorstep before turning his head towards the forest to his left.
Thoom - Thoom - Thoom
Victor thought he heard muffled sounds coming from the forest. After stopping to listen, he started feeling like someone was watching him through the thick vegetation.
'I must not be fully awake yet. I should have had a second coffee,' he thought as he finally entered the house.
Olivia followed after him a few seconds later. She approached the mysterious man who was waiting for them in the entrance hall.
"There's something outside in the forest."
The man pondered for a few seconds before replying.
"The Humvee should keep us safe from whatever's lurking outside."
He continued, addressing the entire group:
"Now that we have started the quota and are inside, we can speak freely. I've told you about the strange rules that exist here, and one is more restrictive than the others. You cannot talk about the inhabitants you meet in these places outside of these places. Now that we are inside, we can share what we have encountered during our first quota."
Shirley began:
"I completed my first quota on Experimentation. I encountered just one monster on the third day. It was a hairy spider several meters long and nearly a meter high. It was terrifying, but it didn't see me, so I managed to leave without much trouble. There were lots of spider webs around it, so I think we shouldn't have too much trouble spotting it and then choosing to either avoid it or kill it."
Olivia followed up:
"I don't think we can kill it as easily as that. I encountered one myself and it wouldn't die even after several magazines. I also saw a monster in the garden when I was about to leave. It looked like a dog but was the size of a grizzly and had a massive mouth. An interesting detail was that it had no eyes and didn't seem to be able to see me. I just waited until it was far enough away to shoot at it and see if my bullets had any effect. It was stunned for barely a second before running towards me. After playing with it for a few minutes, I can say with certainty it was blind but could locate me by the sound of my footsteps. If we encounter one in the coming days, be mindful of the noise you make."
The man briefly explained what he had seen:
"I saw a larva on the ceiling that seemed to be waiting for me to pass underneath. I think it attacks its victim by latching onto their head and suffocating them."
Before Victor shared what he had seen in that cursed house, he turned to Olivia and asked:
"Wait, so there were monsters trying to kill you on your first quota ?
- Yes.
- Uh... and there are monsters in this house?"
- Most likely."
Victor was shaken. He asked the voice in his head:
'Did the Coil-head and the Jester I met try to kill me?'
Of course, host ! People rarely complete their quota when they appear because they rarely leave the house alive !
'And we might encounter them today?'
Yes host ! There's a good chance that you'll run into one of the two either today or in the coming days !
Olivia patted him on the shoulder after seeing him being blanked out for several seconds.
"Is something wrong, Victor ?
- Everything's fine, don't worry about me."
He asked one last question to the voice in his head:
'What were the chances of encountering a Jester or a Coil-head during my first quota ?'
But host, the monsters you encounter are not determined by your quota but by the area you are in. Experimentation is somewhat of a zone for beginners, while Dine is meant for veterans and experts. The likelihood of a Coil-head or Jester being in Experimentation is virtually zero, so you've witnessed an extremely rare event ! Don't worry, host ! You'll find more monsters here but also more valuable items ! Good luck, host !
'Su
per'
Victor snapped out of his trance to share with the others what he had seen in his first days:
"The first day I saw nothing, a Coil-head on the second, and a Jester on the third."
"What are they?" asked the man.
"A Coil-head is a statue over two meters tall with nails covering its body and a spring for a neck. It must have been conceived by a modern artist running out of ideas because it's not very pretty. You just have to keep looking at it for it to remain still. I didn't see the Jester, but I heard it. The moment you hear the melody of a music box, you need to leave the house as fast as possible."
"Did you try to kill them?" the man inquired.
"I didn't attempt... but now I have a shovel ! We'll see if they still act tough when they see me approaching!"
The man stopped speaking, but Shirley asked one more question:
"How did you come up with those names ?
- I… listened to the voice in my head," Victor replied, slightly embarrassed by his answer.
The man checked his watch before signaling the others to start searching. They all headed in different directions, leaving Victor alone in the entrance hall.
They had agreed the night before on the areas each would search once inside. Victor was assigned the kitchen, the entrance hall, and the living room. He started with the kitchen, which had enough knives and forks for a large party of a hundred guests. Victor didn't even try to touch them, knowing he'd still be there the next day if he had to scan each one.
He began with the kitchen whisks.
No value
No value
No value
No value
'How many whisks are in this kitchen?' grumbled Victor, feeling his patience slowly fading.
No value
Whisk: x1 - value 18
'Finally!' Victor exclaimed inwardly upon finding the first valuable item.
And then a second later, he saw the value of the whisk:
'18?!! That's so bad !' he muttered in disappointment.
He had to stop scanning the other whisks when Olivia approached him carrying four items. One of them was a nearly meter-tall lamp that she was struggling to carry.
Victor looked at each item for several dozen seconds before delivering the verdict.
Lamp: x1 - value 67
Coffee cup: x1 - value 55
Ring: x1 - value 63
Perfume: x1 - value 74
"Each of these items should be worth around 70," he finally told Olivia after reading the scan results.
Olivia exclaimed in English:
"**That's big money !**"
She went to place the items in a bag at the entrance before going back to search.
The others weren't as lucky as she was. Shirley only found a duck worth a miserable 4, and the man came back with a hairbrush valued at 8.
Victor continued searching the kitchen.
No value
No value
No value
…
No value
This sentence was beginning to haunt his mind. The fridge was empty but not some cupboards. Sometimes he could find packets of pasta or jars of mustard. None of them had any value until he grabbed a certain jar.
Pickle jar: x1 - value 60
It was the last object in the kitchen, and Victor was glad to have found it.
He headed to the living room to begin searching there. The group was making good progress, but Victor was running out of time to search. He was the only one who could determine if an item was valuable, and his teammates were interrupting him every five minutes to check their items' worth.
8:00 AM
It had already been two hours since Victor started searching, and over an hour since he was in the living room. There were huge shelves with a staggering number of books he had to scan, and he was already getting tired. He felt even more depressed thinking about how none of the books that he had scanned had any value.
He came out of the living room disheartened. He had found only two items in the last hour: a remote control that turned on the living room lights valued at 20, and a candy lying on the coffee table for 6.
All his efforts hadn't earned nearly as much as two items Olivia had found in just a few minutes.
He finally returned to the entrance hall with his spirits at their lowest to find an intruder.
It was trying to open the bag Olivia had left at the front with its little paws. When Victor entered the room, it turned to look at him with its red, tearful eyes that seemed to be begging him for help.