Normally, Sandrine would wake up at 5am. But today at this time she was taking a shower to clean all the blood off her. She wasn't as tired as she thought she would be. A normal person should have been exhausted after an entire night fighting, but Sandrine was more or less alright. It was probably due to her high constitution stat that allowed her to recover her stamina easily. A five minute break was equivalent to a two hour power nap, giving her all the energy needed to go on.
She had never noticed before, but she had also never been locked in a fight for so long. Ultimately, there were still a lot of things she didn't know about the game and its mechanics.
"I thought by now I would have made some progress, but it's not that easy…"
Despite fighting all night, the results were underwhelming. Yes, she had gotten quite a lot of battle experience and had learned all the weak spots of the night monsters, which would be very useful if they got stronger during the new season but as for her control of her emotions…
"How can I not improve at all ?"
It was an exaggeration, she did improve a bit and didn't go bonkers as soon as she faced a corrupted creature. However at one point, because of her poor battle sense, she wasn't careful about her positioning and ended up isolated quite a few meters away from the safe zone, and with monsters having walked in between to encircle her. It could have been avoided with more experience and a good spatial awareness, but here she was.
Anyway, she wasn't that far away from the tent, she could have run towards it, even at the cost of a few injuries, and there also was Paquerette keeping an eye on her from the safe zone, so there was absolutely no reason to panic. But as usual, her breathing quickened, her eyes curved into crescents, and a disgusting smile bloomed on her face. She went crazy.
And what was the result of that ? Many injuries, much more than if she had charged into the encirclement to reach the tent, and Paquerette still had to come and save her.
Still, she killed half the night monsters in the encirclement, which wasn't bad. But at what cost ?
"Why do I have such a hard time staying sane ?"
This was definitely rooted in trauma, but without any memories, Sandrine couldn't even begin to solve the problem.
It was frustrating.
She watched the water falling down her body, slowly turning red. The bottom of the shower looked like a puddle of grenadine.
"Well, at least I can heal quickly…"
And her strength had finally gone up, she had gotten that last point she wanted ! Her stats were completely maxed out. This was good news.
She got out of the shower and dried her hair while she was reading the server chat. People were talking about the new season and panicking, wondering what would happen and if the game would be harder. If that was the case, it was certain that most wouldn't survive.
Two weeks ago, they were 10,000. Now there were only 4,000 left. All the others had died. That was a terrifying fact.
Sandrine also checked her private messages. There were a lot of friend requests, most were trying to negotiate the prices for the solar panels and chicken coops.
"As if I would agree… I need to make a living too !"
She laughed and checked on her crafting table. The autocraft had been running all night, so she picked up the items and fulfilled orders. Her stock of umbrellas and water purifiers was quite high now, she could afford to do something else.
"While the kids are having their breakfast, I should try to create blueprints for rain shoes and rain coats too, that would sell well… If the difficulty is going up, the rewards should too. The game is at least that fair. With more rewards, people will have more money to buy my stuff, hehe !"
She also had the blueprints for the portable stove that she couldn't use because it needed electricity, she could also sell those.
Anyway, she would be getting rich soon. And there wasn't as much of a stir as she thought. Sandrine was sure that she would be targeted because of her sales and her apparent wealth, but it wasn't that exaggerated. Maybe people had already accepted that she was rich because she was first in the welfare rankings.
As long as there weren't any magical items to target someone thanks to their username…
"I shouldn't jinx it. There are so many strange things like the duel card, who knows what more can appear ?"
She slapped herself to put her thoughts back in order and cleaned up camp, as 6am approached. She didn't immediately put away the outdoor tent however. If her predictions were correct, she needed it.
When 6am arrived, Sandrine's head suddenly seemed to fill with thousands of bees, the buzzing so loud she felt as if her brain would explode. Dozens of messages and notifications appeared in front of her eyes, with such density that she had a hard time seeing anything else. However, despite all of this, she didn't read any of them. Because instead of the blinding sudden day that would greet her every morning, Sandrine discovered a completely different landscape.
Instead of the eternally clear sky with an overhead light coming from nowhere, there were clouds churning like boiling water, mixes of gray and black intertwined, sometimes turned white and purple by thundering lightning that traversed this dark sea but never fell down. The clouds moved slowly, pushed by a mild wind.
A first drop of water fell, then another. Soon, a thick rain obscured the horizon, rendering the already somber world even darker yet.
The wind blew on Sandrine's body, pushing her hair on her face. There was a climate. There was wind and there was temperature. The air wasn't the degree 0 of everything, but a real manifestation of a weather phenomenon. She was in a world. A real world.
This degree of realism was overwhelming. Sandrine rubbed her arms to get rid of the goosebumps and cautiously extended a hand outside the tent. Rain fell on her fingers, not overly cold, but the wet spots receiving the caress of the wind felt chilly. At first, she didn't feel much of it. Then she felt a tingling sensation on her hand. Frowning, Sandrine opened her game screen, and her eyes widened after seeing her health value.
It was dropping.
Incredibly slowly, but it was dropping.
She quickly retracted her hand, startled, and wiped it off on her pants. After a few seconds her high recovery made her health rise again.
"That's messed up ! You mean to say that rain actually lowers health ? What about those without a roof ?"
Lots of players had vehicles such as electric bicycles or motorcycles, without a roof above their heads. Raincoats could protect them, but how long ?
At least, Sandrine had anticipated it and built her outdoor tent. Otherwise, she would be in danger too.
"Even if I cover myself as much as I can, rain will always find a way to hit me at least a little. Same for the rest of the gang, especially Paquerette. So we will need to stop regularly to recover under the tent… Days will become even harder now."
Just when she thought that she had somehow closed the gap between her and other players, the game laughed in her face. Paquerette had been keeping a good pace everyday, reaching the required mileage easily, but what would happen if they needed to stop regularly to recover ? This would be a catastrophe if the required mileage kept going up.
"Even if I get the barn, it won't solve the problem !"
The barn was a pocket dimension that Sandrine could rearrange how she wanted. It was freely accessible during night time, but during the day she could only access it for one hour total. This wouldn't protect her from the rain at all !
"What can I do… Should I create a kind of giant umbrella above Paquerette ? No, this is stupid, and the air resistance would lower our speed even more…"
In the end, there was nothing she could do.
"Whatever… Let's just start the day and try to survive."
Finally, Sandrine focused on the numerous messages.
[Players who didn't reach the required mileage will disappear]
[4,116 players enter the 15th day]
[Congratulations on entering the 15th day]
[The obstacle course event has concluded ! Rankings will be determined based on the mileage covered]
[Rankings :
1st : 84jojo84 - 314km
2nd : AlphaWolf - 215km
3rd : Jackalope65 - 214km
4th : AnaïsDu33 - 206km
5th : Destructor - 197km
6th : RollingRolling - 192km
7th : Croissaaant - 185km
8th : BratataCanon - 183km
9th : Gargantua - 179km
10th : BigBelly123 - 177km
[...]]
[You have ranked 1st in the obstacle course event, congratulations ! Rewards have been sent to your inbox]
[The newbie protection period has ended. All seasonal rankings have been closed]
[You have ranked 1st in the welfare rankings, congratulations ! Rewards have been sent to your inbox]
[The first season of Road Survival starts now and will last 14 days]
[Not enough players. Your server 12 will merge with server 7 and server 3. The name of the new server is : Server 3]
[Unlocking server rankings]
[As the first season starts, the protection ends. Please enjoy the full scope of the game and discover its secrets at your own pace. Cherish your life. Enjoy !]
[Required mileage for today : 100km]
[Time left for the 1st season : 14 days]
The number of messages was staggering. Sandrine really wanted to analyze everything right now, but she had no time. Since she needed to stop regularly and risked not completing her mileage, she had to go now.
Charge first, think later.
She made sure everyone had their raincoats on, including Paquerette and Gribouille, put the rain protection on the pheasants' cage, put on pet goggles on Paquerette and Gribouille, then climbed on and pressed the puppy against herself, using a piece of tarp to cover him. He had evolved and was big, but he was still her son.
Only then did she make the tent disappear and Paquerette jumped forward.
The rain made the vision narrower, it was hard to see what was in front of them. Thankfully, this seemed to be an adaptation period, the game didn't prepare any events today, it was just a regular road day.
Curiously, the pets' instincts seemed to still work even in these conditions. Sandrine couldn't see anything 100 meters ahead even with her aviator goggles on, but Paquerette could easily see the chests and help Sandrine take them in her inventory.
She was curious to know if the content of the chests had changed, but she couldn't take the time to open them while in the rain. She was all about efficiency. They needed to cover as much distance as possible.
While Paquerette was galloping, very steady thanks to the anti-slip pads on her horseshoes, Sandrine was fully focused, her eyes glued to her game panel. She had opened every pet's profile and her own, checking out the health values for every single one of them, ready to call for a break if any of them dropped too low.
It happened approximately three hours later. Sandrine was the first to have her health value drop to a dangerous level. It wasn't surprising, she had the lowest constitution except for the pheasants, but the birds were well protected in their cage.
When she felt faint, she immediately asked for a break and took out the outdoor tent, crouching on the ground as she was catching her breath.
It was a strange feeling, because technically she wasn't wounded, but the drop of her health value made her feel drained, as if she was poisoned, or someone was stealing her energy. It wasn't exactly pleasant.
"Three hours at a time… It's not too bad. I think we can still easily cover 200 to 300 km a day."
That was counting on Paquerette's evolution, she was very fast now. But this would also depend on how much time it would take them to recover each time. Sandrine didn't take any chances, she immediately put on her splinters to accelerate her recovery. She was the one whose health value would drop the fastest, but she was also the one who would recover the most easily.
"While we are waiting anyway, I should check out my rewards."
She still had all the chests and rewards from yesterday, plus the ones from this morning. That was a lot.
"The chests from the race are normal ones, a bit more filled than usual, but still containing things I don't need… There is a disgusting amount of fuel, though ! How many barrels are there ? 30 ? 40 ? That's at least 150L of fuel ! I'll just send everything to AlphaWolf. As for the rest, I have a lot of cans already and I won't eat all that bread."
She sent her friends what they might need, and put the rest on the trade tab.
"Talking about trading, let's sell all the umbrellas and water purifiers."
Three hours into the day, people probably already noticed that the rain made their health drop, it was the perfect moment to advertise her items.
"Anyway, there is the reward for the previous offroad event… Another stat increase pill ? Not bad ! And there is also a whole planting area. It's much larger than a single pot, I don't even know how many seeds you can plant here ! Also, a mikado game, that's great to play during the evening, that will give us something to do other than read children' s books."
She was going through everything she had received, and as usual there were a lot of things, so many that even the shelves in her inventory were starting to get full. She really needed the barn to use as a warehouse.
"The rewards for the obstacle course are also very sweet ! Another stat increase pill and a sausage machine ! It won't be useful for me, but AlphaWolf will love this instead of doing everything by hand."
After going through every reward, Sandrine's inventory showed more than 30,000 wood units ! She wasn't very far from the 50,000 needed for the barn anymore !
"The last thing is the welfare reward for the whole season. It's different from an event lasting a day, I'm sure I'll receive something awesome !"
As usual, as soon as she opened the reward, her eyes were attacked by a wall of text listing everything, including food, cans, jars, toiletries, pet products, planting products, miscellaneous stuff and blueprints… There were also several stat increase pills, a whole bunch of vehicle materials and vehicle cards, upgrade and duel cards, modules for a vehicle, rain equipment…
And amidst all of this, a reward so strange that Sandrine frowned.
[Fragment of mysterious book : Contains the secrets of ???. Helpful to understand ??? and its inhabitants]
In her hands, there was what seemed like a very old book, with a thick leather cover. However, the binding thread had snapped at some point, and she had only part of it, she had no idea where to find the rest. Her fingers caressed the dusty and stained leather, with an unreadable title. Finally, Sandrine opened it.