“It’s still too early to use dynamite. If we use it already, later……”

She could hear the two people’s conversation. Anaïs, who was cowering without understanding the situation, was startled by the word ‘monster.’

Did monsters really exist? Ones you had to defeat or run away from? That’s why guns were needed! But what kind of monster was supposed to appear? Anaïs followed the two people out of the cabin to understand the situation.

Bang!

The moment she stepped out the door, a gunshot rang out. Had they shot the monster with the gun? Anaïs followed where the gun barrel was pointing with surprised eyes. But strangely, Mason’s gun barrel was pointing straight at Anaïs.

She had been shot. After realizing the fact, Anaïs couldn’t believe how dull she was. While she was standing blankly, her posture had already collapsed and she slid sideways. Her left leg, which had recognized the gunshot before her brain, couldn’t endure the pain.

“Why……?”

She was speechless and her voice didn’t come out properly. Judging by Mason’s expression, it was definitely not a mistake. He was very cold and calm, looking at Anaïs expressionlessly.

Anaïs thought Mason had suddenly gone crazy and tried to ask Harper for help.

“Sorry, Everhart. Let’s use you as bait.”

Harper shrugged her shoulders while holding a gun. Though her words sounded apologetic, judging by her smiling face, she didn’t seem particularly sorry.

Only then did Anaïs realize that the faint smoke rising from the gun barrel was from Harper’s side, not Mason’s. Harper had shot.

But why? Why did she shoot? What did she mean by bait?

White text gave an answer to Anaïs, whose head had gone completely white and rational thinking had become impossible.

The monster’s eyes have degenerated, but its sense of smell is sensitive.

Be especially careful as it reacts strongly to the smell of blood and pheromones.

“Let’s run away quickly, Mason. We’ve taken everything we need. Leave this woman here to die.”

Harper patted Mason’s shoulder and urged him.

“Wa, wait! Wait……!”

She shouted desperately, but they didn’t look back. Anaïs tried to chase after them to catch them as they moved away. But it was impossible to run with a leg that had started bleeding profusely.

When she staggered up and moved by supporting herself with her hands on the cabin, the bleeding seemed to get worse. Her brow furrowed naturally from the pain.

They disappeared beyond the invisible jungle. Anaïs, who had been chasing after them, lost strength in her legs and sat down on the ground. A thumping sound rang in her ears. She couldn’t tell if it was her heartbeat or the ‘monster’s’ footsteps.

Crack.

The moment she slowly turned her head at the sound of something breaking and confirmed it with her eyes, Anaïs’s complexion turned pale.

The monster had a total of 10 legs with the shape of a horse’s hooved legs, but the upper part looked like a deer with two heads. Its eyes seemed degenerated, deeply hollowed out so the eyeballs weren’t visible.

The monster, which had been moving its nose as if smelling something, stared at Anaïs. Its body, as large as the cabin, slowly moved toward her.

Run away from the monster or defeat them.

Red text kept flashing. Seeing it blink faster and faster, it seemed whoever was sending her this message also knew it was a critical situation.

Anaïs recalled her inventory to see what she had now. Rope, matches, and a sleeping bag. There had definitely been healing medicine and a gun among the supplies…….

“Ah.”

She had given all of that to Harper and Mason. All that remained from the ‘supplies’ were a few matches.

They had planned this from the beginning. The two people weren’t kind. They were con artists who had deceived her, who knew nothing and had drifted into the game, to get their hands on supplies. Anaïs realized this belatedly and wanted to cry.

“Grrrrrr……”

The monster, excited by the smell of blood, made a sound.

Anaïs snapped to attention. This wasn’t the time to be crying in despair. She tied her immobile leg with rope and dragged it to survive.

When she anxiously glanced back, the 10 legs weren’t well coordinated with each other and all tried to go forward first, getting tangled. It even fell down with a thump.

Perhaps it was annoyed that it couldn’t approach when prey was in front of it. The monster stretched out its arms and began breaking its own legs with snapping sounds. Judging by how it screamed each time it broke one, its intelligence didn’t seem very high.

The sound was so terrible. Anaïs felt like her insides were all freezing. She scolded herself to pull herself together and desperately ran away.

While panting and constantly looking back to see where the monster was, she failed to look ahead and collided with something. It was large and solid, but not as hard as a tree.

A person. A young man with black hair, tall height, and sharp features.

“That stupid thing is breaking its own legs again.”

The black-haired man clicked his tongue. He threw the square dynamite he had been holding under his arm toward the monster. Then he held a shotgun in his hands. After the clicking sound of loading, it really didn’t take even a few seconds until he fired the gun. He seemed very familiar with this kind of situation.

From the explosion that suddenly occurred behind her, Anaïs’s brown hair was instantly swept forward. Her body also swayed, so she instinctively grabbed and hung onto the clothes of the man she was meeting for the first time.

The man lowered his head and said something to her. Unfortunately, his voice couldn’t be heard well because of the explosion. She frowned and looked up at the man.

The monster has died.

Check the kill reward.

When the explosion was calming down, the red flashing text changed. The same message seemed to have come to the man too. He walked steadily toward where the explosion had occurred. He roughly shook off Anaïs’s hand that had been grabbing his clothes as if it were unpleasant.

The cold man kicked around the items scattered on the ground and gathered useful things. Anaïs blankly watched what he was doing.

Should she thank him for saving her? Or should she argue that shaking her off like something dirty was too rude? Or should she apologize for grabbing him carelessly? She was confused.

While she couldn’t decide how to act for the best, what came out of her mouth wasn’t a word of thanks.

“Pl, please save me……!”

It was begging. Begging for her life from a complete stranger. Anaïs felt like she had become the most pathetic woman in the world at that moment. Still, she had no choice but to say it. She had nowhere else to turn now.

She felt like she would go into shock soon from losing too much blood. Thinking she would die like this, she gathered courage again.

“By any chance, do, do you have any spare healing medicine? Because I got shot, my leg is now shot……”

Unlike her desperate feelings, her head was confused, and the words she spoke were even more jumbled. Tears welled up in her frustrated heart, and the man who had finished gathering everything he needed turned toward her.

“Are you Player A?”

It wasn’t a very kind question. He said it in a very villain-like tone, appropriate for asking while pointing a shotgun.

Depending on the answer, she would die. He would kill her without batting an eye. Anaïs intuited this. Her mouth went completely dry. The rope she had tied to move was digging into the wound area and hurting, and her head was dizzy. Terrified, she couldn’t readily answer.

She couldn’t shake the thought that she might have encountered someone even more frightening than the monster. While she was too terrified to readily answer, she suddenly realized that his face somehow looked familiar.

But she wouldn’t have been friends with such a scary man. Where exactly had she seen him? Was he one of the clients who came to see Mr. Fred? Or was he one of the guests of the neighbor who invited suspicious people to his house every weekend?

“I’m B.”

A small voice came out, terrified as if she wanted to crawl into any mouse hole. The man couldn’t hear her voice properly because it was too small, but he managed to understand the answer from her lip movements.

Player A Roderick requests to pair with you.

A moment later, new text blinked before Anaïs’s eyes.

Only after seeing the name Roderick did Anaïs realize why his face had felt so familiar.

The heir of the mafia family who disappeared. One of the adopted sons the mafia family that came to the office was looking for. The younger brother who had stood with a well-behaved appearance but glared at her through the photo as if he would kill her, Roderick Cortez.