Harvest

After getting the money in his account, Creed let out a sigh. Never could he predict that things would end up like this. The world of glitches was still unknown, so the military entertained the responsibility to nurture the soldiers and help them develop their instincts.

Every three months, there was a refill of cadets' gear stock. The military gave the cadets some selected resources essential for their survival, and the next month was the end of a quarter, so he had planned to return the beta-pill back to Jake next month. 

He did not like to under anyone's debt. However, he knew if he couldn't show a spare beta-pill to Jake, he would never take this one beta-pill back. And if Creed tried to be stubborn about it, in return Jake will pound him even more.

That was the kind of guy Jake was. Even though he was playful, he was strong and stubborn too.

With several thoughts clouding his mind, Creed reached home. He had no choice but to let it go for a while. He then decided to watch the lecture on Chakra Fundamentals he received from Jake.

The reason for his motivation was that even if he had not unlocked his root chakra, these lectures were a brilliant insight, nevertheless. Tang Lie was an indisputable genius, and his lectures were valuable to those who would want to get better.

The concept of Chakra existed from very ancient times, yet humanity has recently stepped into deeper insight related to chakra, all thanks to the appearance of glitches. Tang’s knowledge was profound and beneficial.

40 minutes later, he finished it with a smile on his face.

"To explain and break down such a complex process into such a simple phenomenon of a controlled chain reaction of life force." Creed murmured with a smile on his face. "This level of genius is indeed worth listening to!"

The next day he wired the required money to his mother’s account for new recruitments and equipment maintenance. Lastly, he went to the hospital to meet Hannah before going back to the glitch.

After teleporting back and registering his return to the camp, Creed went to the local marketplace inside the glitch.

Over the years the Cadets have developed a small marketplace to exchange or barter the stuff which they had no use of. The exchange was informal, and the exchanging party themselves were responsible for deciding its value and worth.

So even if one wanted to exchange or trade his organs for a pencil, it was possible here. Only a small agreement needed to be signed by both parties.

Creed had few things such as the beasts' hide, soul crystals on him, which he had gathered for an entire year after multiple scouting. He wanted to gain some more life-saving tools since he didn't have any beta-pill now.

He assumed if he could run away safely from the danger, that was the best-case scenario. 

He bought pulse bombs, energy, and stamina boosting pills. Furthermore, he wanted to hunt small beasts this time, so he went to a place called purple-bushes. A home for many tiny bug-beasts that can provide him root chakra saturation points.

Inside glitch, every beast and creature seem to have a natural affinity for the chakras even if they varied in shapes and size. Humans would take their life, which would transfer the chakra saturation points accumulated by the creature over his entire life. 

The chakra point gained by hunters after killing a beast might seem random, but it wasn’t. The most accepted hypothesis was that saturation points gained from any beast depended upon hunters’ Chakra to Beast saturation ratio.

Another fact was that a correlation existed between every element with each beast. Every beast used the above element like a weapon to attack or protect itself. So it was fairly obvious that they should take no beast lightly, since it was impossible to predict which beast was master of which element and with what degree of proficiency.

The first rule they taught to cadets was "Inside Glitch, Whatever CAN wrong, WILL go wrong!". 

To survive here, one needs flexibility to adapt to unexpected situations. Strange occurrences were fairly common and nobody had an adequate insight about what will happen next.

Taking everything into consideration, Creed made his way to purple-bushes. After reaching the bushes. Creed regulated his breathing and tried to mask his presence. An open, unknown presence could always aggravate any beast in its territory.

A horde of 'Purple-Mantis' lived inside the purple-bushes, and they were comparatively easy prey.

After searching for a while, he witnessed a Mantis chewing grass carelessly. 

"I found my first prey, and it's alone… lucky me."

"Their eyes can extract a gel that clears poison and can be a disinfectant if used with dilution," Creed pulled out his dagger." The eyes will sell for a lot. I just need to get a little close."

"Yeah, little guy, just keep chewing that grass," He inched closer as he licked his lips. "Don't look here, and it will be a swift death. I promise!".

He wanted to end the bug as fast as possible because they can call their horde with a screech. They mostly traveled in groups, but this one seemed to be an exception.

After coming close, Creed stabbed the dagger in its neck with full force. The mantis' head got decapitated before the mantis could even scream.

[Purple-Mantis Killed]

[Gained Saturation Point +0.1]

[Gained Soul Crystal +1 ]

A red glow enveloped his body and then disappeared the next moment, which made him refreshed.

"Sweet!! If only every kill could be as easy as this one!!" Creed collected his gains merrily. "One Soul crystal and my root saturation finally got increased by one point."

Then he moved onto his next target. He searched and killed some more low-level bugs. Which let him refill the crystal stock he used to buy the life-saving tools. He killed 4 creatures and earned 4 crystal and 0.6 saturation point in the entire day.

His chakra saturation ability was so low that even after he killed 10 beasts than he would gain only a single saturation point added to his total. This showed how difficult it was to gather saturation points for him.

Although he saw some other creature, he realized they were beyond his level, so he had no choice but to escape.

×××

Creed Gryffon [ Human ]

Life Span -  [ 100 Years ]

¤ Root Chakra -  [ 14+ ]

¤ Sacral Chakra - [ 0 ]

¤ Solar Plexus Chakra -  [ 0 ]

¤ Heart Chakra - [ 0 ]

¤ Throat Chakra - [ 0 ]

¤ Third Eye Chakra - [ 0 ]

¤ Crown Chakra -  [ 0 ]

¤ Element Affinity - Insufficient Points for manifestation

×××

"Today's harvest was better. Let's stop for now. I don't want to get deeper than I already am." he packed up 10 kg of beast bodies. "And I also have to carry these bodies before they rot."

After some years of research, people observed that these soul crystals were very useful items. These can be used as solar cells, ornament production, and even for medicinal purposes.

The soul crystals also had value in both markets and laboratories. Scientists researched them to explore more about the Akashik Glitches. Many people in the glitch only hunted small beasts because it was rather safe and steady money.

He packed all the dead bug's bodies into a bigger polyester backpack and went back to the camp-quarters. Although he had not fully opened his root chakra, he still had some points that made him comparatively tougher than average humans.

10-20 kg was not a huge deal. With over 14 points of saturation points, he had sufficient physical strength.

He went to his room and open the big freezer and put all the dead bugs inside. That would stop the bodies from rotting before he extracted the usable ingredients from them. He then opened his sling bag and put all the gray-colored crystal on his bed.

These soul crystals were the manifestation of the elemental affinity of beasts, the low-level beast in purple-bushes commonly had an affinity to Earth Elements. He had earned 4 gray-crystals from today's scouting.

"Ah, Shit... NOT again!" Creed's hair stood up as he noticed something frightening.

His hand was gleaming with a bright golden glow. The creepy ring was finally visible on his finger again, as if it came back from inside his body, looking like some holy artifact.

Creed freaked out as he didn't have a very optimistic opinion for the ring. He touched it and pulled it out of his hand and dragged himself away from it.

After leaving his hand, the golden glow of the ring vanished abruptly, turning back to looking like an ordinary ring. Creed waited for some time, however the ring made no further movements, letting him take a breather. 

The creepy thing was finally out of his body. He carefully took the ring and soul crystals and locked them all in a wooden box and went to sleep. It was already night, and he was tired from the hunt.

"Now the ring is finally out," Creed murmured within himself. "I can finally Sleep in peace."

After waking up the next morning, he followed his routine of workout and chakra reinforcement exercises. Everything was normal until he heard a faint cracking sound. At first, he ignored it, but soon the sound grew louder and louder.

He couldn't ignore it, so he checked his rooms and realized that the cracking sound was coming from the box in which he placed the ring and soul crystals.

The creepy cracking sound and the slight movement from the box made him almost jump; he realized that something was breaking the box from inside.

~CRUNCH CRUNCH~

"What the hell did that damn ring do now?" Creed was sweating bullets.

He picked up the dagger and pointed it towards the wooden box, which was on the verge of breaking apart. In a few second the box finally collapse with a small burst and something unusual finally appeared from inside.

"Oh Christ! Are tho—Are those eggs??"