Lord of the Karmic Fate

Inside a dense forest where the trees were as tall as twenty-story houses and where thick fog ruled literally every crook and cranny, a young figure could be seen running between trees, continuously glancing behind his back with eyes seemingly filled with fear.

His dark and slightly messy hair danced wildly in the breeze as he ran, his skin for some unknown reason was paler than it should have been, and his feet were moving so fast and strong that they left deep footprints on the ground!

\'Yeah, of course, it starts to chase me out of everyone! Not those idiots the closest to it but me!\' running through the forest with speed so fast that it allowed him to pass two to three trees per second, something that in the past he could have never imagined achieving, Raven watched as behind him a tall creature with a grotesque appearance chased after him with a speed that was not slower than his!

As for the reason why he was not shocked to see that he was able to run just as fast as a professional athlete despite he was not one, was because of two reasons;

First of all, while surprised at first, he quickly realized it was because of his Avatar Trait called Speed. It seemed, that these Avatar Traits increased his overall physical strength depending on how many points he had for which Trait.

As for the second one, he simply had no time to feel startled by his increased speed as he, at this very moment, had a way greater problem to take care of than either feeling shock or surprise.

As a matter of fact, he also figured out quite a few interesting things just because he began to run, giving him a brief understanding of how this Avatar Status of his really worked.

First of all, his Vitality. When he fell onto the ground and sprained his ankle, while it was true he felt pain the moment he sprained his ankle, he was perfectly fine and could easily keep walking, even running as he did now, while only a few proportions of his Vitality got decreased.

Although he did not understand entirely how this Trait worked, it seemed in this Realm Game where he was temporarily trapped, his life was literally turned into a health bar, just like in video games. Depending on the amount of damage he took his Vitality will decrease by an equal amount.

Naturally, it was needless to as that if his Vitality reached 0, it was game over for him.

Secondly, his stamina. In the past, he went to gyms at least twice a week to make sure he would not get chunky, but despite that his staying power didn\'t become something outstanding, just only slightly above average.

But it seemed this changed also.

By adding points to one of his Avatar Traits that also included his stamina, probably his Constitution, he felt like if he got the chance now to be teleported back into the past he definitely would be able to keep running at least twice as long!

His body just brimmed with energy for some strange reason, which while was something good made Raven feel also scarcely weird.

Lastly, his unique Avatar Trait, Mystique. Although there was only a single number next to that Trait, a simple 2, after reading his Moon Rabbit Slippers\' description and learning how he was able to activate them, he realized the 2 units of Mystique were 200 Mystique Points just like how his 2 units of Vitality was 200 points of Vitality!

Of course, it could be also that he was entirely wrong and the answer was something completely different, but from the small amount of information he was given, that was the only logical he was able to come up with.

As for him to know if his guess was correct or not, Raven understood he first had to remain alive or else gaining answers from six feet underground will be pretty much impossible.

Running through the dense forest, Raven zigzagged between trees without slowing down when suddenly he realized that the Realm Game\'s description mentioned something about a time limit.

\'Now that I think about it, how can I check the remaining time?\' Raven pondered with a small frown, but soon the familiar magic panel appeared in front of his face with nothing but a simple row of text.

[58 minutes and 24 seconds remaining.]

"Huh?" Raven\'s eyes widened from pure shock once he saw the time limit, but unfortunately, just as he was about to react, his right foot got stuck under a protruding tree\'s root.

Paff!

Bam!

With a heavy sound as if someone just dropped a heavyweight onto solid ground, Raven\'s body crashed into the soil below and slid through it in a not-so-fascinating manner.

[Vitality: 192 -> 187]

"Ptui... Urgh... I only look away for a second and this happens. My luck can\'t be any worse, huh?" spitting out the dirt from his mouth together with some saliva, Raven pushed himself up from the ground and watched as his Vitality decreased once again.

However, he couldn\'t watch his decreasing health for a long while as a second after he was on his knees almost like getting poured down with freezing water, all the hair on his body stood upright and a cold shiver ran through his spine.

"Crap!" being familiar with this specific feeling, Raven didn\'t even hesitate for a second and threw himself to the side.

Swish!

Bam!

The ground split and cracks spread everywhere at the spot where Raven lay moments ago while a curtain of dense dust clouds rose toward the sky, obstructing vision in a twenty meters radius.

But soon, once the dust together with the shattered debris was blown away by a rather powerful gust of wind, the creature that chased after Raven revealed itself under the moon\'s silver light, his hand deeply buried into the ground!

\'...\'

The creature seeing it struck nothing pulled its bony fingers out from the ground and straightened its skinny silhouette, towering over three meters in height and standing in silence for seconds, unknown what it was trying to do.

Meanwhile, several hundreds of meters away from there, Raven ran through the forest like his life depended on it, occasionally changing directions in mid-air with the help of his Moon Rabbit Slippers to make sure if the creature tracked his footprints it will get lost or at least confused!

"That was close... Way too close..." mumbling under his breath with a somewhat pale face, Raven looked behind over his right shoulder and let out a sigh of relief. It seemed he was able to shake off the creature for the time being.

It seemed the intuition he had developed over the years, especially after almost getting hit by cars and even trains almost uncountable times, helped him survive that strike from the creature just in the last second.

\'For the Lord\'s blessing, that thing really went for my head without hesitation.\' Raven swallowed nervously as he imagined what could have happened if he didn\'t roll to the side just in time.

It seemed dodging really does save lives!

Of course, Raven knew this clearly didn\'t mean the danger ceased to exist nor did he believe for a single second that the creature gave up chasing after him. No, he was quite sure it was coming after him even at this very moment, hence why he was trying to create and leave behind fake tracks for it to follow so he could gain more time to think.

However, although he indeed succeeded in making a fool out of that creature as not even after twenty minutes was it able to catch up with him, there was something very crucial he happened to overlook ever since this weird death game called Realm Game has begun...

His stamina!

With a one-hour time limit, it was no wonder the Realm Game was called Hide or Die, something similar but entirely different from the ordinary hide and seek he used to play with his little sister during his childhood, as here the main objective was to hide and not to run!

Hence, after running at full speed without any rest for almost half an hour straight, it was no wonder that he all of a sudden started to feel how the muscles in his legs gradually started to become weak and how his breathing slowly but surely became faster and ragged.

Raven was pretty sure if it were not for that single point added to his Constitution, he would have long ago collapsed to the ground or at the very best would have been forced to stop to take a few minutes of rest.

"This won\'t do it. I need to think about something else." Raven mumbled under his rough breath and after making sure the creature was indeed not in his proximity he decided to slow down and examine his surroundings.

According to the description, this game was about hiding and remaining alive until the end of the time limit. However, no matter where Raven looked, the only thing he was able to see was trees with nothing else that could be used as a hiding spot.

There was not even a small pit on the ground where he could bury himself or a boulder that he could use as a cover much less a normal den!

Wait... If there are only trees present...

Suddenly, an idea that normally would have never appeared in his head emerged, bringing Raven to raise his head toward the sky where except for the full moon in its ample glory he could only see the naked crown of every tree.

"If somehow I could reach the top, I\'m sure that thing won\'t be able to catch me. But... how will I be able to get up there?" Raven pondered as he touched the tree\'s trunk, only to be surprised at just how smooth it was, almost as if he was touching near-perfect mirror instead of wood!

Then, as if he was enlightened all of a sudden, he looked at another tree which was the closest one to the one he was standing in front of, and mumbled, "Although it will be quite risky to do and hard to accomplish, with these slippers and increased Traits I think I can do it. Yeah, I should give it a try."