Evolution Island: Kill to Survive

Just like a game

Normally, the dot beside the player's name turned gray when the player went offline and changed to green once they were back online. In case there was a loss of connectivity, the light turned red. However, a blinking green light was completely unusual. This wasn’t a standard indication and could only be interpreted as a glitch.

A part of Aaron felt that Zach was still inside the game. So, he took his chances with a communication request. The call would have been disconnected immediately if Zach was offline, but it went through just fine. Aaron held on to his hope by a thread and watched as the voice call line kept beeping. He expected to hear Zach’s voice on the other end at any moment, but the call went unanswered. After trying for the 13th time, he finally gave up. His heart still refused to believe that Zach was really gone and so he held on to that faint glimmer of hope.

Aaron went over all the possibilities in his head, one after the other, and finally he remembered a vital detail. Before embarking on this side quest, they had saved their game at the stone totem in Dewdale village. Since this was a game world and every mechanic worked just like it would in any survival game, there was no reason why the save feature wouldn’t work. If he could access the save menu and load the save file, there was a chance he could retrieve the game data and bring Zach back.

Clearing his head, Aaron focused on the current objective. Right now, he had to get back to Dewdale. In all this chaos, Aaron had completely forgotten about his other party members. Only now, he spotted Nashoba lying dead on the ground and the others critically injured.

“Hold on, you’ll make it.” Aaron walked up to where Mawanko and Kawasha were lying and took a good look at their wounds. They had been incapacitated but their HP hadn’t dropped to zero. Aaron accessed his special items from the inventory and selected the Golden Loot Chest.

“Open chest. Transfer items to the main inventory.”

[*Golden Loot Chest unlocked!*]

[50 HP Potions Acquired!]

[50 EP Potions Acquired!]

[40 Polished Throwing Knives Acquired!]

[30 Smoke Bombs Acquired!]

[20 Poison Flasks Acquired!]

[10 Restoration Potions Acquired!]

[Wizard’s Robes Acquired!]

[Olive Staff Acquired!]

[Boots of Haste Acquired!]

[Chilling Gloves Acquired!]

[Boxing Shoes Acquired!]

[Nimble Gloves Acquired!]

[Polished Naginata Acquired]

 [1 Rage Orb Acquired!]

[Z-band upgraded: Quick Scan feature unlocked!]

Completing the side quest earned Aaron almost two full equipment sets along with two powerful elite weapons. The loot was great, but Aaron didn’t even bother equipping the items. He stored them all in his inventory and only took out a couple of restoration potions. These were extremely rare potions which were capable of healing as well as removing basic status effects. Aaron helped Kawasha and Mawanko drink the potions and their injuries disappeared in a few seconds. The potion also cured their incapacitated status effect and restored their full HP.

As soon as Kawasha was able to move his limbs, he crawled back on his feet and ran up to his father’s body. Putting his ear on his chest, he listened for a heartbeat, but there was not even the faintest sign of life in his motionless corpse.

“He’s gone, there’s nothing we can do about it now,” Aaron said.

Kawasha got back up and turned to face Aaron with pleading eyes. “Please do something. Your friend knows magic. He can help.”

“My friend can’t bring back people from the dead. And even if he could, he’s not here, is he?”

“What happened?”

“That bastard killed him too,” Aaron replied, clenching his fist.

Neither Kawasha nor Mawanko pressed the matter further. They each had their own losses to deal with. The only consolation was that Nashoba had died fighting and helped rid the land of the Dark Orcs forever.

“He will be remembered as the bravest Cayuga chief,” Mawanko assured Kawasha, before slowly getting down on his knees and uttering a prayer for the chief. He then looked at Aaron and asked, “Where is your friend’s body?”

Aaron shook his head and turned away. “I don’t know,” he sighed. “Let’s just head back to the village.”

“We can’t go back through the tunnel,” Kawasha replied.

“I know. Just pick up your dad’s body and carry it to the chestnut tree.” Aaron didn’t wait for a response, but quietly headed in the direction of the tree.

When they had all gathered under the tree, the Cayuga women let out a collective gasp. Their hearts gave in as they laid their eyes on their chief’s body. He had rescued them all from this hellish place, but the price was too high.

“Alright, gather around me. Don’t stand too far or you’ll get left behind.” Aaron took out a fast travel orb from his inventory and glanced around to see if everyone was ready. He then opened his map and selected Dewdale village. “Use one fast travel orb. Location: Dewdale village.”

In an instant, the entire group was teleported right to the gates of Dewdale village. Everyone looked at him in surprise. Just a moment ago, they were in the Dark Orc camp and now they were back at their settlement. To the simple-minded tribals, this appeared to be some kind of magic and they became convinced that Aaron was either a God or some really powerful ancient spirit trapped in a human body.

When Kawasha had gotten over the initial shock of being teleported, he approached the settlement and shouted, “Open the gate! We have returned!”

Hearing Kawasha’s voice, a group of hunters came running and pushed open the wooden gate. Aaron let Kawasha and Mawanko handle the explanation and went right in without speaking to anyone. He made his way directly to the totem pole which served as the save point.

“Open Loading Menu!”

A single save file appeared on Aaron’s Z-band as it synchronised with the totem pole. Aaron knew loading a previous save point came with its own issues. Even if it worked, they would just come back to the time when they hadn’t even embarked on their journey. And that would mean they would have to repeat the side quest one more time. Going back in time by loading an old save file was quite a common thing for gamers, but the game had changed so much, Aaron wondered how this feature would work or if the file would even load. There was only one way to find out and so he selected the file and pressed the confirm option.