"Lin Hao....I..."
Fu Mei walked over to Lin Hao, a sensitive look on her face. Lin Hao looked back at her, neither of the two knowing what to say.
There was an awkward tension in the air, their breakup having happened so soon before their transfer to this world.
Richie looked over at the two of them and began to walk away. "Oh is this a couple's thing? I'll just, move over here for a bit."
Richie awkwardly moved himself a distance from the two to give them privacy.
Lin Hao's guilt banged at him internally, what would he say? What could he say?
Apologies didn't make up for any of his mistakes. He just saved her life, but there was so much the two had to talk about.
"Fu Mei. You don't have to. We don't have to restart things so fast." Lin Hao didn't want to take advantage of Fu Mei like this.
He had been unreliable and a bastard for so long, it didn't feel right for her to develop feelings just because he saved her.
He needed to show that he was a man on his on two feet and could consistently be reliable.
"No Lin Hao... When I was breaking up with you I was just so overwhelmed." It was not a lie, Fu Mei often had to take care of her mother, and was stuck working such long hours in comparison to Lin Hao.
Her frustrations with him came from Lin Hao's unreliability. "I was so tired Lin Hao. I... I needed you, and you just kept messing up!"
"I know." Lin Hao knew how well he messed up, "I don't want to try again yet Fu Mei. Please. Let me show you I'm different." The pair had far bigger concerns than their relationship right now, but this would eat at Lin Hao if he didn't "resolve" it as best as possible for now.
"...Alright. I saw you just burn that...thing into pieces Lin Hao. Where do you think we even are?" Fu Mei said with a somber expression on her face.
"I don't know. I don't think I know anything about where we are or why we're here besides you.
I only know one thing, and that is we have to get out of the forest. Was that water shot earlier the power the cube gave you?"
Fu Mei clutched her arm, as if just thinking about it unnerved her.
"Yeah.. That Cube gave me some kind of water power. I didn't want to use it but... I couldn't watch that thing maul you."
Fu Mei was not a person who could hurt anyone or anything easily, even if it was in self defense.
"It's okay to be scared. Everyone else that came here is probably just as scared as you are about their new abilities."
Ordinary humans getting the sudden power to do all sorts of things and being thrust into a new world would make anyone afraid or hesitate. Lin Hao and Richie were anomalies to that.
"And we can't even go home for 100 days...! I don't know if I can take this!" Fu Mei seemed as if she was on the verge of tears, but Lin Hao knew they couldn't afford to stay here.
"Fu Mei listen. I'm gonna get us out of this. But right now we need to get out of this forest, okay?"
She nodded her head in understanding. "Ok Lin Hao..Lead the way then." There wasn't much to say, they couldn't risk another encounter with a savage beast like that bear.
Lin Hao walked back over to Richie.
"So worked out everything with your girlfriend?" Richie said with a goofy smile on his face, "It's... Getting there. Let's focus on getting out of here Richie, do that path-finding skill you have again."
Richie waved his hand in front of him to activate the skill, the golden path illuminating itself in front of him.
"Come on Fu Mei, we have to get out of here." Lin Hao called out to her, the woman moving over to join the two of them.
Her foot work was unnaturally fast, perhaps her specialty lied in dexterity similar to Lin Hao's?
She stayed quiet as she followed the two, all three of them carefully navigating the treacherous woods.
"Where does the trail lead you to Richie?" Lin Hao asked, Richie smiled at him eager to respond.
"Well I'm glad you asked. It leads me to the largest group of people within a 5 mile radius, but not just numbers. They have to be in a settlement or town or village, otherwise the skill ignores them."
Richard made a self satisfied look on his face from saying this.
"Wait. This forest has cultists, you do realize that right? What if it leads us to them." Lin Hao questioned, but Richie held his hands back nonchalantly.
"I wouldn't be worried about that. We just stopped a bear and managed to get stronger, if we run into cultists we can just wallop them the same way!"
To Richie, this was all like a game anyway. If they ran into those cultists, smacking or even killing them was no different than killing a video game character in his eyes.
Lin Hao sighed at Richies naivety, "Alright. But if you get us into trouble with this I'm leading."
"How would you lead us anywhere? Your just as lost as the rest of us Lin Hao, I at-least have a skill that points us somewhere."
It wasn't wrong for him to say that, Lin Hao barely had a sense of direction and no experience with navigating through the forests. "You think anyone else ended up in the same forest as us?"
"If they did, we would have heard them by now Lin Hao. Let's not forget your girlfriend screamed loud enough to attract anybody nearby."
Fu Mei shot Richie a dirty look, "What it's true! One of us has to be blunt and honest over here!" But she didn't say anything.
The fact that the three of them hadn't seen anyone else come running over was a good sign. Maybe there was nothing else to worry about in the forest for now.
"Richie, how far are we from this place?"
"It should be just a bit further, apparently we're close."
"L-Lin Hao!" Fu Mei shouted, Lin Hao and Richie turned around to see her pointing at something. It was a person's body nailed to a wooden pole.
Their arms had been twisted in a grotesque manner. Several gashing wounds all over the persons body.
Lin Hao shot Richie a look, "Are you really sure about this?"