As the explosion ripped through the air, a searing bright light engulfed the forest, causing Marty to clutch at his temple. Having just used his ability that morning, he realized that his intense sensitivity to light was the result of it.
He clenched his jaw as the blinding light seeped through his closed eyelids. It sent sharp pains through his head. It felt as though a million needles were pricking at his mind, making it nearly impossible to focus on anything.
Lilia, on the other hand, had both her hands covering her bleeding ears. She was lucky; she had two abilities: Super Hearing and Sonic Scream. But because of this, her ears were constantly sensitive to loud sounds. This time, the explosion had not only shattered her ears but also disrupted her sense of balance. If it wasn't for June lifting them up in the air, her knees would have long buckled.
As they hovered through the air, their hair and clothes thrashing from the series of ten massive explosions below them, Eli remained remarkably calm as he looked around to survey the situation.
On the ground, there were still a few hounds left that weren't caught in Xeno's explosion, looking up at them. He surmised they must move elsewhere. Engaging in a fight was the last thing they needed at the moment with most of them experiencing the recoil of their abilities.
He then looked around, searching for any possible landing spot, and that was when he spotted something unexpected. At the edge of the dense forest, a glimmer of light caught his attention: an outline of a shore not far off in the distance.
He was surprised, to say the least. He had anticipated seeing only weird-looking trees, so he turned to June and said to her, his voice cutting through the loud explosion below. "Look! There's a shore over there! It's quite open to see any surprise attack. You think that's a good landing spot?"
June nodded at him. She too had been looking for a good landing spot, having the urge to vomit from motion sickness, a recoil from using her ability too much. Not wasting any time, she brought them all to the shore.
As they landed, the explosion from where they came from had just started to subside, leaving behind a trail of dark smoke. The sight was both terrifying and mesmerizing.
Theo then began to heal them as much as possible after he put all his ten points to constitution. His healing abilities made him prone to illness and fatigue, so concentrating the points in constitution balanced it out.
"Shipwreck, huh?" muttered Linda.
An old, broken ship was on the shore. Its wood was old and worn from the sea, barnacles covered it, and its torn sails flapped in the wind. The front of the ship pointed towards the sea, and seagulls flew above it.
"Yeah, definitely a shipwreck," said Marty. Having taken away from the explosion, he found the light somewhat bearable, albeit he had to squint his eyes.
'I wish I brought sunglasses. I should only use precognition at night until I get one,' he noted to himself.
"Should we check it out?" Marty suggested. "By now we have three priorities: finding sources of clean water, securing a shelter, and gathering food. The wood on that ship would make for a good wall. What do you guys think?"
"I agree," said Xeno. "We have shovels, knives, and matches in our inventories. My system told me all of us are given these three on top of the things needed to gather the ingredients. That should help us."
"I volunteer for the shelter. I can bind things, you see," Linda stated.
***
"Why'd you do that?" asked the clown.
Dexter merely shrugged.
The shipwreck. It was supposed to be a hidden scenario, an oasis in the middle of a desert. There shouldn't be any danger in this place so long as the participants didn't trigger it.
"The Hounds of Tetano weren't supposed to be there either," Dexter replied. "A little reward for amusing me, I supposed."
"Hardly an amusement. That didn't even last one minute." The clown then shifted his gaze towards the silver-eyed doll that was still inside the box. "And what were you thinking when you sent that thing to me? What do you plan on doing?"
"Nothing," Dexter grumpily said.
"Is that so? Then can I keep this thing?"
"Do what you want."
And with that, the clown snapped his fingers, and the box disappeared, and so did he.
***
The night came, and the group sat huddled around the campfire for warmth. The strange, purple pig with three horns and a single eye hung above the fire, sizzling and popping as the fat dripped onto the hot coals. Eli had just used his ability to find food, and now they were roasting the peculiar creature.
The shelter was finished in no time, and as for the water, they had converted the seawater into drinkable water through a process called desalination. Marty found a cauldron in his inventory and, using this, they boiled the seawater and collected the steam. This idea was suggested by Linda. As a former web novel author, she knew quite a lot about random stuff, from murder methods and police procedures to medieval weaponry and herbal medicine.
As they ate their fill, they were suddenly overcome with extreme drowsiness and fell asleep. None of them reached the shelter they created. Little did they know that their sleep would soon be disrupted by drums and the sound of someone chopping. The first to wake up was Marty, and as he opened his eyes, he realized that something was terribly wrong.
Instead of the shore they had fallen asleep on, they were now surrounded by a group of cannibals, their mouths watering as they eyed them. "Um, guys? I think it's about time you wake up," he whispered to the others.
The leader of the cannibals, an intimidating-looking fellow with a bone through his nose, licked his lips and raised the staff made of human bones and announced in a loud voice. "Tonight, we are having a feast! Prepare the fire!"