Scavengers

The boy woke up to the sound of wind howling past the sparse forest, rays of sunlight peeking through the vail of thin clouds that covered the sky.

Unsurprisingly, there were no birds around the entire forest.

The boy sat up at the branch, carefully adjusting his waight so that he didn't fall down, then put his hands up and streched, suddenly, he felt his calf tighen.

"Uck!"

He promptly fell from the branch, landing on the dry leaves with multiple crunches. He then spent another 5 minutes trying to get his bag off the branch but then ultimately having to climb it.

Taking a small marble like ball with blue spots over it, the boy put it in his mouth then took two sips of water and let the ball desolve in his mouth before spitting the water out.

Hygiene is extremely important!

He stood up, brushed his pants and started walking towards south, his destination was the kingdoms capital, aiyota.

Now that silcia has been destroyed, as the messanger of royal family said, he needed a place to stay, and a place to live. He choose that place to be aiyota. because of a multitude of reasons, firstly even though it was the capital, not many people lived there as a tier 6 dungeon called 'the nullstar' had appeared a few decades ago and devoured 1/8 of the city.

The bustling city had then started losing its habitants as a lot of people seemed the area around such a dengerous dungeon to also be dengerous. Which was reasonable.

As a result, the housing prices plumetted highly, but then, because of the low price, many middle class or lower class people moved to aiyota, so the prices increased slightly. Currently, the prices were half the price it used to be before the dungeon appeared.

"..."

Nibbling on a loaf of brown bread, the boy looked around the sparse forest that was slowly growing denser. The bread had long gone stale, taking effort to even chew.

Crunch

A crunching sound came from a little distance away, causing the boy to flinch then immediately put the loaf of bread in the bad. He looked around but saw nothing but trees, the trees were spread unevenly so a lot of his vision was blocked after a bit of distance.

He heard another crunch, and then many more as whatever, or whoever, it was

Seemed to be approaching closer.

He grew tense, then, three people came to view, waking through the forest.

The first one was a tall guy with a muscular body, he had brown hair and brown eyes with a scar of his left jawline, he was wearing heavy leather armour and a metal hatched at his side. the hatchet somehow looked a little....off, like it wasn't exactly normal.

The second guy was a blonde guy, shorter then the first, and was lean yet well built, he had a slim face and a had a long sword to his side, he was also wearing heavy lether armour

The third guy was a scrany guy with black hair and black eyes, he was skinny, had common yellow and brown clothing and had a loaded bag on his back.

'Scavengers!'

It wasn't hard to recognise them because of their attire and simply the feeling they gave off.

They weren't some sort of organisation, more like a gang. They were a group of 400 or so awakened people who looted whatever was left after a battle, war, or anything that had been abandoned.

But that did not mean they wouldn't take things that hadn't been abandoned if given the chance.

The same moment the boy noticed them, they noticed him.

The boy tensed, then shifted his posture.

The brown haired guy looked at him, and his expression changed into something unknown before changing into some sort of misture of realisation and greed.

"Oy kid, give me a little look of what you have there?"

The brown haired guy said, his hand suddenly over his hatchet.

Before the brown haired guy finished his sentence, the boy was already running away, his feet pushing himself off the ground at stunning speed for anyone his size.

The brown haired guy looked a little suprised, then he grinned

"Kid's fast, huh"

"Leave it, hathor, it's not worth it"

"Bah, don't worry!, I won't kill him"

The blonde guy tried to stop the brown haired guy but he didn't listen and sprinted forward

"!"

The guy was extremely fast, too fast for any normal human, he was probably two to three times faster then normal humans.

Even though the boy was faster then most people his size, he was quickly caught up to in matter of minutes.

A kick landed on the back of the boy, sending face first on the ground.

"Hck!"

The smell of dirt and leaves entered his nose, his cheek bruised and his hand scratched a little.

He tried to stand up quickly but was picked up by the back of his head and bashed against a tree back, from which, his lether bag fell from his shoulder onto the leaf covered land.

The man pulled his head back and then slammed it against the bark once more before removing his hand from the back of his head letting him fall into the base of the tree, dazed and bleeding from the nose.

He simply kneeled there for a while, his head reeling from the pain, his vision blurry from the tears that had formed due to his nosebleed.

The man picked up the lether bag and then opened the lid, looked inside for a second or two then unceremoniously dumped all it's content on the ground.

There were 3 pieces of stale bread, a canister of water that broze when it hit the ground, a piece of dark brown shirt, pants, and undergarments, a worn out book, a cloth filled of those small marble like balls, a sharp knife, a two silver coins and 8 coppor coins, a circular peice of bronze and a thread and needle.

The man picked up the bronze peice of metal and looked at it, on it was something written in forelle:

Vale Noelle

23/11

No adress

Employ of gelbog corp

The man looked at it for a while before crumbling it in his hand and throwing it away, he then picked up the two silver and eight copper coins then examined them, then he tossed them up and down twice before looking at the boy at the ground.

"Tch, ray was right, going after you was a waste of time"

But by the time he finished his sentence, the boy, now named vale, had lunged upwards towards him with his hand ightened into a first.

His shoulder muscles tightened and his torso hurt a little from the sudden action, adrenaline rushing through his entire body.

"Plap"

But before his hand could reach the mans face, it was caught by the man, who looked at vale with a dengerous glint in his bronze eyes.

"Huek!"

A punch landed straight at vale's abdomen, and a spike of pain Peirced his entire abdomen, the taste of blood came to his tongue, unpleasant, unwelcomed.

As the man left his hand, he feels to his knees, a few drops of tears falling straight from his eyes to the ground, then being absorbed by it, the blood from his nose also covered his face a bit before he kneeled.

Cough! Cough!

It hurt a lot, the mans inhuman strength was not something he could take.

He kneeled still, shaking and trembling, his hand over his stomach and his other hand on the ground, supporting his kneeling body, then his blurry eyes caught something reflective.

A ray of sunlight had fell of something, reflecting the light on his face.

****

The man looked at the boy in distaste, his nose wrinkled slightly as he flailed his hand a bit.

The force that had hit his hand was...unusual, it wasn't anything he couldn't handle, but it was surprising that a boy his size could muster up this much strength.

It wasn't like a grain like him had, no, it was much weaker, but still somewhat stronger then avarage people.

'Thinking back at it... His running speed as also suprisingly fast'

The man thought, but then, his thoughts were stopped still.

The man had let his gaurd down somewhat when he saw the boy fell to his knees and unable to move, which was not something an awakened like him could afford to do.

And he paid the price for it.

He did not know how or what happened, but suddenly, a piercing pain had left him unable to react, after which, he unconsciously reached to his neck and felt something had been lodged in it. as the paralyzing pain sank in, he pulled the object by the part that was sticking out, causing more blood to flow out, he had a few blinking moments to take in what the object was before he was left vulnerable, filled with pain, trying to stopt he bleeding.

It was a sharp knife

***

As soon as the knife sunk in his throat, vale quickly jumped back a few steps to see the man fall to his knees and then folishly pull the knife out of his throat and stare at it for 2 seconds before it fell from his hand and he put both his hand on his throat, perhaps trying to stop the bleeding, perhaps s instinctual reaction to the pain.

vale looked around, trying to find something, and then ran straight at the man and kicked him on the face, pushing the back of his head to the ground before bashing it once more and stepping away.

Vale's body hurt from the bruises and impacts, but he still moved and picked up his dark brown leather bag and picked up all his stuff except the bloodied knife and then started running.

The other two scavengers are probably gone ahead, but there is still a chance they are still waiting for this man, the most choice would be to disappear.

Vale stopped, his feet sliding slightly across the ground displacing many leafs and a bit of dirt, he then Grit his teeth and ran back towards the man.

Avoiding looking at the man's bleeding throat, he tried to take the hatchet from his side, struggled for a while, then simply took the hatchet alongside the peice of leather holding it in.

His fingers were bloodied,there was swear forming at his temples, the adrenaline slowing down, his body hurt in many places, especially his abdomen which had took the full power blow of that monster of a man.

He then started running, as multiple waves of minor nausea came over him.