Heading home, Lucas decided that he would spend his time getting ready for his date. Although he was a little embarrassed to admit it, Lucas realized that he had never actually been on a date before. He had never really interacted much with girls romantically until he had met Rose, but even then Lucas didn't really understand the fundamentals about liking someone.
'It's kind of a downer that my first date has to be with someone like Rose' thought Lucas as he arrived home and immediately headed straight to his bathroom for a shower 'But then again, who knows? Maybe there's a chance that she's different now that I've reincarnated'
However, Lucas didn't have much hope in the thought. After all as far as he had already seen, everything else from the current timeline had remained the same as in the past. The only exceptions were the changes he had personally made.
"Well, I guess there's really no point in me thinking about all this right now", said Lucas with a shrug of his shoulders.
DING!
[Chaos System: You have slain Rot Howlers ×6. Circling through possible energies for absorption…]
[Chaos System: Detected energies include;
-Soul essence ×6
-Killing intent ×3
-Corruption of the Damned ×6]
[Chaos System: Two of the detected energies are eligible for absorption. Would you like to refine and absorb the following;
-Yes?
-No?]
"This message again, huh?", Lucas murmured to himself as he looked at the system screen. His brows then furrowed in confusion as he asked, "Why am I only able to absorb two of the energies this time?"
DING!
[Chaos System: The power of corruption burns too strongly for the user's current body. Absorbing the Corruption of the Damned would erode the user's body completely beyond repair.]
DING!
[Chaos System: Hidden Quest has been triggered]
[Hidden Quest:
-Reach Level ten and absorb the Corruption of the Damned energies before attaining your first class.
Rewards: +1 Racial Skill]
At first Lucas felt disappointed at the fact that he couldn't absorb the new energy he had acquired. However that feeling soon vanished when he finished reading what the system had to offer. Lucas blinked several times in surprise as his mind slowly tried to process what he was reading.
"I never really thought I could receive quests from this weird system, much less hidden ones", said Lucas, "It does make me wonder though, about who created it and why it's so responsive to my random inquiries"
The idea that his system might actually be something alive kept nagging Lucas in the back of his mind, but he had no definite way to prove it. Regardless, he was very appreciative of the fact that it would allow him to get stronger, so he didn't really complain much.
Clicking yes on the screen in front of him, Lucas proceeded to absorb the energies of the beasts he had defeated. Surprisingly enough, the pain Lucas felt this time wasn't as intense as the first time and he was able to at least stay on his feet with only a few grunts of pain.
[Chaos System: Congratulations, you are now level three.
EXP required until next level up: 5/400]
"It doubled", said Lucas, noticing that the experience he now needed to level up was twice the previous one, "I guess that means there's no chance I'm getting to level ten until further into the awakening"
The number would only keep getting higher and higher, the more Lucas leveled up but he wasn't too worried. In the past, it had taken humanity two whole years before they'd managed to completely purge every hostile beast that the awakening had brought with it so a shortage of monsters for him to kill was simply impossible.
Putting those matters aside for now, Lucas went back to preparing for his date.
°°°
"You're late."
It was all that Rose could say as she glared at Lucas in displeasure and annoyance. For the past twenty minutes, she had been seated at one of the tables just outside the restaurant sipping some tea as she waited for Lucas. Rose had thought that the giddy and excited Lucas that she knew would already be there waiting for her.
However, it was the complete opposite as Lucas had even showed up late!
"Only just", said Lucas without much thought as he raised his watch to show her the time, "Look, it's only four minutes past 5pm"
"That's four minutes of my time wasted!", Rose snapped at him, "Don't waste any more of my time and sit down already, you're drawing attention"
'You're the one who just yelled at me though' thought Lucas as he took his seat. A waiter approached their table shortly afterwards and they both placed their orders.
As they waited patiently for their food, Lucas offered Rose a small smile and said, "You look good, Rose"
Rose was dressed in a beautiful silk pink dress with a fluffy white scarf wrapped loosely around her neck. Her hair was styled in a delicate cascade of blond curls that hang around her left shoulder.
"'Good'? You must be blind if you can't recognize absolute beauty when it's right in front of you", sneered Rose arrogantly as she didn't even look up from her phone while talking to Lucas.
'Still the same brat as ever' thought Lucas as he let out a sigh. Lucas wasn't too disappointed though as his expectations had never been that high to start with.
"Guess I made a mistake", said Lucas with his lips pressed together in a hard line.
"Don't be too hard on yourself, Lulu, it's not your fault that you can be a little dumb sometimes", said Rose in her attempt to console him.
However Lucas shook his head as he said, "I meant I made a mistake coming for our date"
"What?", asked Rose as she finally looked up at him in confusion, "Why are you sprouting nonsense all of a sudden?"
"Do you love me, Rose?" Lucas asked, placing his elbows on the table as he stared right into her eyes with a serious expression on his face, "Actually the better question would be, have you ever even felt anything for me?"
"Huh? I-I mean, o-of course I love you", Rose stammered, "Umm…w-whenever we're together, I get butterflies and dragonflies in my stomach and all that other lovey dovey stuff"
Rose blurted out some cheesy lines she thought she had heard one time from a romcom she had watched before but Lucas looked unimpressed.
"Technically, because you're the only person I have ever taken the chance to go out with, I don't really know the first thing about love", said Lucas, "However, even someone inexperienced like me can tell that you feel nothing romantically for me, Rose. Most likely, you're only putting up with me to use me because I'm part of the five families"
Rose eyes' widened in surprise, "How did you-?!"
"It doesn't take a genius to figure out something as simple as that", Lucas interjected with a nonchalant shrug, "Your father's in the military, so anyone would have expected something like this would happen"
"Listen, Lulu-", Rose tried to speak up but Lucas held up a hand to cut her off.
"I see now why most people say that love is blind", said Lucas with a light chuckle, "Because I was naive and too caught up in your beauty, I let you string me along. Treat me however you felt liked, whenever you felt like it. I lacked a little self respect for myself all because what I believed was love was actually just a toxic fling"
"W-wait a minute now!", said Rose in exasperation, "Lulu-"
"We're done here.", said Lucas, with a hint of finality in his tone, "This 'relationship' we had, it's over. I'd rather not associate myself with someone as uncaring and apathetic as you. By the way, I always hated that nickname"
"How dare you!" Rose screamed at the top of her voice, attracting a lot of looks from the other tables around them, "You think you have the right to dump me?! Me! Do you know who I am?!"
"A no-good bratty little bitch who's too in over her head", said Lucas with a small grin on his face as he raised his middle finger at her.
That seemed to drive Rose over the tipping point as she grabbed her cup of tea and chucked it at Lucas in a fit of rage. Of course, with Lucas' current stats dodging the cup was light work however what happened next left him stunned.
PANG!
Just a few inches away from Lucas face, the cup shattered and scatted everywhere. A shard of the cup managed to nick Lucas' eyelid, making him double over in pain. But that wasn't the end of it.
PTCH!
"AHHH!" Rose suddenly screeched in pain as she tumbled to the ground, clutching her leg to her chest, "My leg!"
Lucas clenched his teeth as he glanced at Rose with his good eye. She now had a bright crimson hole on her left thigh that kept leaking crimson onto the floor beneath her. Lucas' brain immediately processed what he was looking at and assessed the current situation accurately.
"Gun!", Lucas shouted, "Everybody get down!"
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Took a little while to write and edit this one but hope you enjoyed it :).
Oh! Quick shout out to Apannnn for being the second person to join the Chaos Community, we're waiting on the rest of y'all!