A Litrpg and Gamelit Harem Adventure Bundle: (4 Novels) Page 18

  Well, it was time to log out. I looked around me one last time. The game’s realism still impressed me. I had leveled up to level 13 due to killing the faceless man.

  Status

  Level: 13

  Name: Kratom

  Weapon: Parfait Bow

  HP: 630/650

  Magic: 90/ 120

  Attack: 160

  Special attack; Triple X, Time Paralysis, Fire Arrow

  Defense: 145

  Knowledge: 150

  Exp. To the next level: 934/ 1400

  Items; x1 Potion (40hp)

  Money; 2500 gold

  Nice. A new special attack. I had to try it, but for now, rest was all I needed. I was back in my home. I stretched my arms and grabbed my phone. The voices had finally stopped. I called all my friends and told them I was making dinner tonight. Demi was really glad I had kept my promise. My life had changed for the better. The game had made me change the way I viewed the world.

  I had always wanted to be a hero but for the wrong reasons. Now I knew how to be a good one. I felt ready to look for a new job.

  My real-life was just starting.

  Space harem

  Part 1

  Chapter I

  "Everyone here is running away from something, boy." The man behind the glass told me, his husky voice muffled, "Your name?"

  "Kane Drummond," I told him as I squeezed my backpack against my chest, fearing someone would pull it and start running away with it.

  I looked around at the tall, shiny buildings surrounding the New Andreas spaceport. It was my first time there. I had hitchhiked from a space garbage carrier after running away from home with just a backpack containing 3 bars of cereal, a bottle of natural orange juice, my great-grandfather's gold watch, a few coins, and my father's travel diary. I left the rest behind without a second thought. I couldn't take it anymore. It was not only the daily problems at home or working as a slave in the old mines but also the dream I had since I was a child of reaching new heights. I had read the diary dozens of times, perhaps even hundreds, and imagined the worlds my father had described in such detail and how fascinating they all were. The desire for adventure and the taste for danger were in my blood and I could not just ignore them.

  "What can you do?" The man asked me, also telling all those behind me to stop pushing, "One at a time." He shouted.

  "I worked in a mine. I can transport large and heavy quantities of different materials. Will that do?"

  "Hm, hm." The man answered me. He diverted the fringe covering his right eye and scratched the scar he had on his eyelid, the dry, red skin protruding from his pale-face, hiding it a few seconds later.

  "I put your name on the list. If any captain is interested, you will be contacted."

  "That's it?"

  "Yeah, and now get out of here. Can't you see there's a line behind you?" He said, green eyes wide open as he rubbed his cracked lips on each other.

  I thanked him and gave my place to the next one in line.

  I put the backpack on my back and wandered across the city's wide streets, dust flying and obscuring my long-distance vision, also covering the faces of the people who were now crossing my path. Most of them were older, taller, and had a turtleneck covering their faces up to their noses. Everything there was new to me.

  As soon as I reached the main streets, I was shocked. I had come from a planet inhabited by drunken miners, criminals who had no more than a knife in their pocket, and taverns who had no name. But there, there, everything was different. The bars had signs with letters of different colors indicating their names, the women wore ruffles and laces up to their knees and the men walked with their hands on each other's shoulders singing from door to door, wet lips, rosy cheeks, as well. While some people just roamed across the streets, others went to bars or the casino, and some stirred among the tents where weapons and items were being sold.

  Truth be told, part of me felt that the people there knew that I did not belong to that place. They looked at me with disdain and a couple of the men even spat on the ground as they looked me up and down. I ended up walking to the end of one of the main streets where a small bar caught my eye.

  Unlike the other bars, the walls there were harsh and stained by the time passage. There was no one at the entrance and the letters on the sign only blinked. Not to mention the ones that did not even work. It was the perfect place for me to rest while waiting for someone to call me. I mean, I was hoping someone would need a carrier, or I would have to sneak into a ship. And, let's be honest, most captains wouldn't be as kind as the old Albald of the transporter.

  I opened the door carefully so as not to make any noise, and yet the rusty hinges ravaged the floor. A thunderous noise that sparked all eyes to my tiny ass. Two men banged their full mugs on the table and turned to me. A woman in a corner lifted her pirate's hat and looked at me. The dimmed light did not let me see the color of her eyes, but they were as clear as daylight. I did not doubt that.

  "Close the door when you come in." A man behind the bar told me.

  He had a voice similar to wood scraping on the floor and conveyed chills only with a pitch-black look.

  So, I did it. Then, I sat on one of the swivel seats in front of the counter, and in less than a minute I had a drink in front of me. A thick white liquid serving as a base for a brown that swirled around the middle.

  "I didn't ask for anything," I told him, afraid it was a trap for tourists or rookies.

  "I know, but I can tell you need it." He answered and shoved the glass towards me.

  "How much is it? I don't have much money."

  "Don't worry, boy." He answered. He took a break and cleared his throat, "You're new around here, aren't you? You don't have the same blood-thirsty look on your face as those who stop here."

  For a moment, I thought of lying to him, but something told me that he knew the answer and just wanted me to confirm it, "Yes, I’m not from around. I'm looking for a ship to settle on."

  "Hm. I see. I give you the same advice I give to everyone who comes in here with no fixed destination. Keep your head down, don't get in trouble and if you’re lucky, you'll survive."

  "I don't want any trouble," I answered him.

  I was going to continue when three hooded men broke in, their eyes scrutinizing the whole room.

  Chapter II

  "Sometimes trouble comes to us." The man said, looking at the three muscle heads who were still at the entrance, "Are you in the right place?"

  One of them came up to the bar. I took the drink to my mouth and moistened my lips. It tasted sweet and, at the same time, as bitter as a lemon. I never tasted anything like it before.

  Even if I knew the danger I was in if one of them didn't go along with my face, I couldn't take my eyes off them. It was stronger than me.

  "Stay out of this. We just want Captain Amelia and we're leaving. There's no need to get hurt." The hooded man said to him, the light from the tavern striking on his wrinkled lips and his dark mustache.

  "I don't know who you're talking about," the bartender answered them without taking his eyes off the man while passing a white cloth through the inside of a glass.

  "We can do this the right way or the wrong way." The man continued, "We have orders to take her. Don't worry about it. They want her alive."

  "Look around. A bar in the middle of nowhere, almost empty. Why would a captain as recognized as she would be at this end of the world?"

  One of the men, the tallest, still at the entrance, walked up to the bartender and lifted him by the collar, "That's enough! We know she stops here. We're not gonna ask you again. Where's Captain Amelia?" he said, louder than the sound of the glass shattering on the floor, breaking into dozens of shrapnel.

  The bartender remained silent. His lips were so thin that seen from afar they could be confused with only the upper part. His hands were close to his body, but part of his arms was covered with his long black hair.

  "Thank you, Barn. I'll take care of it
from now on." The woman sitting at the table, in one of the farthest corners, said and got up, "You're looking for me, aren't you?" She asked them with a sarcastic sharp tongue and jokingly bowed.

  The woman walked until she was under the bar lamp. The long wine-colored wild hair matched with the brown mantle that covered her shoulders. She took off her hat and put it on the table behind her. It was the only table that had a vase of flowers, though they were already dry. Her blue eyes jumped between the three men before her.

  "Dante's looking for you. You know nobody gets away from him." The tallest man said and dropped the bartender, "You have to come with us."

  "If you know who I am, you know I've never been one to do what I'm supposed to do."

  "Then we’re going to have to take you by force.” He answered her.

  They began to draw closer to her, the three of them in a horizontal row, closing the space between them. Still, she didn't move. She didn't seem to be worried. Instead, they seemed to be doing what she expected them to do.

  The boy in the corner, perhaps the youngest and experiencing the pressure nerves, ran and tossed himself at her. She strayed from him, grabbed the vase, and hit him on the head while he slipped on the table. The vase broke, the earth getting in his black hair and the already yellow water rolling down his cheeks. The boy landed on the ground and no longer moved. The first man who had spoken followed. He also rushed up to her and was about to catch her if she had not removed her coat and thrown it over his face. She swerved and he had no time to stop before his head hit the wall. He passed out. Everything had happened in a matter of seconds.

  I had never met a woman like her before. Even in a risky situation, her breathing remained normal. Her face was serene, and she would go so far as to have a diabolical smile in the corner of her lips. She was... she was having fun.

  "You know he won't stop sending others after you, right? And you also know we can't give up... He won't accept failures." The only one of the three men still standing told her.

  "Hm, I'll deal with my problem. With yours, well, no one ordered you to work for him." Amelia answered him.

  Betrayed by her ego, she squatted to get her hat off the floor. Those distracting seconds were enough for the man to run towards her, with his shoulders and head forward, striking her right in the belly, knocking her down. She stood on the floor, clutching her stomach, moaning about the pain. She bit her lower lip until it bled out trying not to show that she was in pain.

  The man didn't care. He grabbed her hair and dragged her to the counter. Her body groveled across the dusty ground, leaving a trail of her silhouette behind. The other two men in the bar kept drinking like it was nothing to them. The bartender's eyes followed her body, but he didn't dare to interfere.

  As soon as her body crashed against the wood counter, the man tied her hands with black tape and warned her that if she tried to escape, he wouldn't be as sweet as the first time.

  "Give me something warm." He said, "Let's wait for the others to wake up. We have time."

  I could not let that happen. My father had taught me that if I'm going to get into trouble, at least I should do it for a good reason, and protecting someone sounds like one of the good ones to do it. I needed an object that I could use to knock down the man but other than the vase that she had already used there was nothing else there.

  Unless... Unless I used my glass. It was my best chance. I came up with a plan within seconds. I drank what was left of the drink in one sip. The liquid went down my mouth, burning my throat and warming my body, leaving me also more prone to do stupid shit.

  I picked one of the few coins I had in my pocket. Truth be told, I had never been so nervous before in my life. I had never risked it, either. I pretended I was going to put the coin on the counter and accidentally dropped it on the floor when I threw it close to him. I even made the whole thing of almost falling with it still between my fingers so he wouldn't suspect. I hid the empty glass behind my brown raincoat.

  "You should be careful, boy. Money here is not as abundant as it may seem." The man told me, glancing at me.

  For a moment I felt my whole body freezing, turning to stone and my feet being swallowed by quicksand. I dropped a short "thank you" without looking him in the eye.

  My mother used to tell me that I would get into trouble soon and I never doubted her. I just never thought I'd get into such an epic mess on my first day.

  I picked up the coin and stashed it in my pocket. An alcohol stain had left a mark on the fabric of my black pants. I tried to keep my breathing to a minimum and my steps slow, but not too slow for me to get caught as I moved closer. He sipped his beer shamelessly, the liquid flowing down his chin and falling into the brown mantle. At the back, above the neck and hidden among some hair tufts, there was a cicatrized symbol; a circle with a red line above it.

  The bartender realized what I was doing and made his best impression of being interested in what the tall man had to say. The captain's eyes were on the old wood counter. My heart was beating like never before; an earthquake splitting my body into the part where I couldn't wait to hit him and the part that whispered that I would be caught and punished. My panting breath reached the back of the man's head.

  "What are you doing?" The man asked as he turned around.

  I got scared and smashed the bottle in his head as fast as I could. The glass broke as soon as it touched him and he fell instantly to the ground, taking the chair with him. Blood flowed from his forehead and his eyes had closed. Oh, shit. Oh, shit. I was hoping I had not killed him. I touched the woman's shoulder and turned her to my side.

  She looked at me from head to toe, then focused on the man lying on the ground and finally on my fingers with bits of glass and blood still on the surface.

  "What the hell did you do?" She asked, and she seemed upset, "I had it all figured out."

  "I just saved you," I answered her by kneeling by her side and undoing the knot.

  "You just gave me one more problem, boy." She said, "Who's this?" she asked the bartender.

  "New here. He saved your life, Amelia."

  "What do you want in return?" She asked me, fixing her clothes and her hair.

  "Nothing, I didn't do it to get something in return." I said, "I just felt like I had to help. 3 to 1 is not fair. And my name is Kane, not boy"

  "Everybody wants something." She answered me as she walked up to her table to get her hat, “Kane, sure, whatever.”

  "If you insist. I could use a place on a ship. I don't think I want to be here when he wakes up. I'm good at carrying boxes and I can try to learn new things. I'll do whatever it takes."

  "Hm… I might have something. We better get going. I’ll charge a few favors and in half an hour you'll be wandering across space." She answered me and turned to the bartender, "Barn, are you gonna be okay?"

  "Don't worry. It's not my first rodeo. I've been doing this for 40 years." He answered her and in return received a tiny smile from her.

  Chapter III

  We traveled across the same street from where I had come until we reached the main alley. I had never seen such a crowded street, such tall buildings as those before my eyes, much fewer people dressed in such eccentric and colorful patterns.

  Amelia lowered her hat, covering one eye and part of her face. She was trying to hide who she was, but it did not seem to be working. People would glance at her and stray away from her path. What the hell had I gotten into?

  I wanted to ask her who she was and why they were afraid of her, but I didn't think she'd even answer me.

  I continued to follow her until we got to the end of the street and she stopped, looking both ways.

  "My memory is not the best. Let's go this way." She said and turned to the right, "As I recall, he's always in the same casino."

  "Him?"

  "Someone who owes me a favor. He has a decent ship and he's always open to new crew members."

  "And you don't?" I asked, treading carefully.

&nb
sp; "You like to ask a lot of questions, don't you?" She asked me, "But no. Not inclined to accept new people. I've got enough."

  "I understand... And who's Dante? I think I deserve to know what the hell I got myself into."

  "Maybe you'd rather not know, but I assume you'll insist on it anyway. Dante is one of the five warlords. Let's just say I was doing a job for him and I didn't finish it. The rest doesn't matter."

  "Won't they be looking for me?"

  "At most around here. As soon as you get on a ship, you'll be safe. As far as they're concerned, you were just a drunken boy who wanted to protect the damsel. However, I advise you not to set foot in here again. And enough with the questions."

  We walked along the wide street, rustic lamps flashing despite the building lights and the casino lasers pointing towards the entrances. Amelia had her hands in the pockets of her skirt and whistled a song that got stuck in my head.

  A few meters ahead a red sign marked the entrance to a casino - Linus Casino. We were about to enter when a growl from down the street caught our attention. We looked back at the same time. The three men from the bar, this time with the hood on their heads, shoving the people who were on their way onto the ground. It didn't matter if they were men or women. The murmurs rose and I could hear some people talking about the mark I had seen on their necks and saying that it was better to get away from there. Oh, crap. I had gotten involved in the worst kind of problem. I didn't even have a gun to defend myself. Worse, I had never touched a gun before, unless a metal stick counted.

  "That's really what I needed," Amelia said and yawned, "I thought they weren't going to wake up anytime soon."

  "What do we do now?" I asked her, watching as they moved closer.

  "What do you think? We must run. Just because I got lucky once doesn't mean I'm going to be once more." She said, "Hurry."