A new private message popped up:
"Thank you, Mr. DemonSlayer! I'll contact you as soon as I find something else valuable. But can you please give me some discounts next time? I'm just a fifteen-year-old girl living with my grandmother. Help us if you can!"
—MorganBlossom
Logan eyed the small vial on the trade screen. It contained a pale-blue liquid, which the system identified as Grade A Paralysis Poison. Without the system's prompt, the unlabeled bottle would have looked worthless.
He replied with a smirk:
"Cheer up, kid. I'm sure you'll manage. As an old customer, I'll give you a 0.5% discount on the same items I list publicly, plus the first chance to buy. Let me know if you get your hands on anything else that's good."
He privately thought, Little girl, make sure you survive. I haven't finished squeezing every valuable resource from you yet. As for genuinely helping anyone, Logan doubted he'd be that altruistic. In his mind, this was a dog-eat-dog world.
Another message alert blinked. This one was from TheBarbarianKing:
"Here are my terms. Keep the Frost Serpent Meat price exactly as you posted, and add 150 Floating Stones plus 15 pieces of Refined Iron. I know you have them."
Logan's face darkened. So TheBarbarianKing had been snooping and figured out roughly how many supplies he owned. Scowling, he typed back a single word:
"No."
Then he removed TheBarbarianKing from his friend list.
Some 34,000 miles away from Logan Isle, a large island sprawled across nearly 30,000 square meters. Two huts and a small patch of forest lined its terrain, and at the center stood a stone pillar about two meters tall. A scarred, middle-aged man with massive shoulders—wearing a coat of stitched-together beast hides—loitered near the pillar, surrounded by four other survivors: three women and one man, all of them standing with heads bowed. Their eyes brimmed with fear and hatred, though they hid it as best they could.
The scarred man pulled one of the prettiest women into his arms. The other three cowered, including a handsome, mixed-heritage man whose face was swollen almost beyond recognition. The man stared enviously at the woman being groped, while the other two women kept their eyes on the ground, torn between rage and terror.
The scarred brute spat on the ground. "That damned DemonSlayer dares to reject my offer. He deserves to die."
No sooner had he spoken than the half-breed man raised his head and toadied up to him. "Boss Leon, you're absolutely right! That fool has no idea how mighty you are. He'll end up dead for sure." As he spoke, he stole several quick glances at the trembling woman in Leon's arms.
Seeing only this single flattering comment, Leon Peak frowned at the two women who remained silent. He grabbed each of them by the chin, forcing them to look up. "Why aren't you two agreeing with me? Still mourning those worthless wretches we killed last week? Maybe I haven't whipped you hard enough—tonight, I'll remind you who's in charge."
Pain flickered in the women's eyes. They loathed Leon Peak for taking them captive, but they also cursed themselves for the reckless decisions that led here. Leon took perverse delight in their hatred.
Before this apocalyptic world, Leon had worked as a mercenary in an international crime group. The massive scar across his face was a souvenir from those days. When he first arrived in this realm, he was calmer and more ruthless than most. While everyone else was confused, frightened, or simply paralyzed by the sudden change, Leon spent half an hour testing the system, learning the rules, and fishing up treasure chests.
He'd been lucky enough to find a very rare item—a [Portable Coordinate Card]. Once he opened it, the card's three-hour timer began counting down. During that window, Leon could teleport up to two people, as long as the target location was within 10,000 miles from his island. No one else had seen or heard of such an item, so when he used it to lure unsuspecting survivors with false promises of safety, they believed him. Out of dozens who responded, only four had coordinates within range; the rest were simply too far.
Leon's killer instincts and towering strength easily overpowered the four that teleported in. As they realized too late that he had tricked them, he forced them under his control with violence and intimidation. Now, he was steadily turning them into a twisted kind of "family," bending them to his will.
He scowled at the stone pillar, as if imagining Logan Lane (a.k.a. DemonSlayer) on the other end of the chat. That man had dared to brush off his demands?
Leon Peak's knuckles cracked ominously. "Soon enough," he muttered, "I'll find a way to crush that arrogant bastard. Nobody says 'no' to me."
The bruised half-breed man nodded fervently, while the two trembling women looked away, silently praying for a miracle.