Lord of the Karmic Fate

[You have... One minute to hide...]

The voice that reached the ears of everyone in the forest was deep and eerie, to the point where some of the people around Raven, mainly the younger ones, began to tremble from sheer terror. Some even took several steps backward, glancing left and right hurriedly to see from where the voice just came from.

Of course, some just stood still and had no change on their faces while there were even a few that looked annoyed and began to shout toward the sky.

"We have one minute to hide? Here? And where exactly? Behind a tree?"

"Yeah, stop fucking around and let us out! We already said we don't wanna take part in this shit, much less one that was meant for kids!"

"Hey! We are talking to you, bitch! Answer then!"

The shouts and yells of the three bulky men who were seemingly pretty close to each other, perhaps friends, quickly calmed the nerves of those that felt scared, and soon others began to join them and give voice to their complaints.

The ones that did not speak or shouted were only Raven and a few others.

"Quite amusing how human foolishness knows no boundaries, don't you think?"

While Raven was watching the people in front of him with a rather baffled expression, a guy with a slim build and almost fragile look appeared on his side.

His face was sunken, his eyes had dark circles below them as if he did not sleep properly for days now, and even his skin was pale with purplish veins visible everywhere, almost as if he was suffering from some kind of rare illness. Even his hair looked extraordinary, being misty gray which was the first time Raven to see.

With the fog and dark forest behind his back and with the moon's glow falling on his body, his silhouette looked rather blood-chilling, almost as if he was some kind of ghost or spirit that came to claim the lives of others.

However, despite having such an unusual appearance, Raven was not scared nor anxious but instead shocked; shocked because he failed to notice the moment that guy appeared on his side!

One had to know that although having terrible luck since his birth, he also had quite the strong senses ever since he knew himself which, naturally, only got sharper and sharper throughout his 20 years of life.

Just imagine living day by day in a way where even the seemingly most harmless object in your room, like a pen for instance, or the handle of your door, could become a weapon that can threaten your physical well-being thanks to your bad luck. Then you would definitely act and do everything with caution and watch out for every little thing that happened around you, right?

Hence why Raven felt secretly surprised how he didn't notice or at least hear this weak-looking guy's footsteps.

'How did he do it?' keeping his calm facade on his face, Raven pondered silently while having a hunch it had something to do with the guy's Artifact.

Though, it seemed his calm stare was ambiguous as the guy quickly showed a somewhat awkward smile and said, "Haha, don't misunderstand me, I do not wish to belittle them, it is just... funny."

"...Funny?" Raven raised a brow but soon the deep and eerie voice once again appeared throughout the forest, striking everyone with the uncontrollable urge to shiver!

[Only... Thirty seconds remain...]

Raven's face paled slightly as he realized he just wasted more than thirty precious seconds, hence wanting to tell the guy beside him that it was time for them to find a hiding place he turned his head to the side, only to see that at some point in time the guy had already vanished, almost as if he was not even there in the first place!

"A ghost..." Raven mumbled but soon shook his head to shake all the unnecessary thoughts out of his head before he hastily raised the small dice in front of his face.

"Just make sure I get something I can at least use a tiny bit." praying with a face filled with nothing but a plea, Raven didn't hesitate even for a second and threw the dice which not so surprisingly as all of its sides were the same, fell on a single star.

Whoosh!

With a gentle breeze that blew his ink-black hair scarcely upward, the small star on the dice lit up, and even before Raven could have blinked twice a small object appeared on the ground.

"This..." Raven's jaw opened slightly as he wished to say something, but found no words he could have spoken.

In front of him, a pair of small slippers rested on the ground. Both were made out of some sort of fluffy material that pretty much looked like animal fur. However, the weirdest thing about it was not that nor how one was black and the other one white, but the fact that both had bunny ears placed on their top and a bunny nose on the front!

There were even a pair of small eyes on both slippers, giving them an appearance as if they were rabbits!

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[Relic: Moon Rabbit Slippers]

• Grade: Mortal

• Form: Initial

• Description: Depending on the phases of the moon, either your speed increase or the amounts of times you can jump!

<Only usable when the moon is visible!>

<Cooldown: Can be activated for 50 Mystique Points for one hour!>

~~~

• Moon's Influence:

-> During New Moon: Your Speed increases by 10, your Dexterity increases by 8, your Constitution increases by 6, and your Strength increases by 4!

-> During Full Moon: Your jumping force becomes drastically stronger and your ability to jump after your first jump without touching solid surface increases by 1!

-> During other phases of the moon: One of your randomly chosen Traits increases by 3!

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Raven read the description of his relic silently and after a few seconds, he raised his head toward the sky, only to see that in the sky there was indeed a full moon.

'So I can jump one extra time in the air, huh? Well, it is better than nothing.' Raven tried to think positively as he quickly replaced his shoes with the slippers which surprisingly fit on his feet perfectly and despite looking rather ridiculous were extremely comfortable.

It was not an exaggeration to say he felt like he was standing on blocks of fluffy and bouncy clouds!

'Will this really work?' Raven wondered as he shook his leg left and right to see if the slippers would come off easily or not. But although they looked rather loose, they seemed to be glued to his leg so his fear didn't come true.

Then, with a gentle stomp on the ground he leaped toward the sky and once he was in mid-air stomped once again, surprisingly allowing him to jump one more time despite his feet kicking nothing but empty air!

He really was able to jump twice, allowing him to easily change directions in mid-air, just like in that old video game he played a few days ago, called Super Crash Brothers!

"Haha! It works! It really wor-"

Paff!

Just as Raven could have finished his sentence and enjoyed his moment as he truly was able to jump an extra time in empty air, the moment he descended and his toes touched the ground his ankle got twisted and he fell onto the earth head-first!

"Argh... Yeah... I forgot. My luck is still crap." pushing himself up from the ground with one hand while wiping the dirt away from his face, Raven showed a slightly angered face just before his eyes widened the very second he opened them.

[Vitality: 200 -> 192]

"Wha-?" Raven wished to say something when suddenly the cold and eerie voice once again talked.

[Three... Two... One... Ready or not... Here I come...]

Whoosh!

A strong gust of wind swept through the entire forest that blew Raven's sleeves and hair rather wildly while those that yelled until now became silent.

"So it has started..." Raven mumbled as he looked around with great vigilance, not knowing what to expect.

However, it was not even a second before he got his answer, and in a rather brutal way...

"Mark! Behind you!" among the three big men that started to shout, one with a bald head suddenly pointed behind his friend, his complexion rather pale.

And it was not only him but everyone else around him too! However, it was already too late for the guy name Mark to react not to mention turn around; with a large and gaping hole in his chest, his body uncontrollably fell forward onto the ground, no longer moving or breathing!

On the other hand, right behind him, a thing, a creature, one that was the furthest away from any known human appearance stood motionlessly, its blood-covered hand holding a throbbing heart which in the very next second was squeezed into meat paste!

The creature was terrifyingly tall, more than three meters. Its body was slim, limbs were inhumanly long, skin as white as snow, and a face that was without any orifice! It was also wearing a black suit with a white shirt below and a black tie around its neck that went all the way down to its chest area.

With the dense fog and dark forest around it, and the corpse before its feet, the creature looked insanely ghastly and creepy, to the point that one look at it was enough to make any living being's hair curl from pure horror!

Everyone stared at the creature and Marks' now lifeless body glued to their spots, terror-stricken, including Raven too. No one talked, moved, nor blinked, but silently stared at the creature.

It felt like time froze for that very moment while the air in the surrounding became heavy, causing breathing extremely hard and challenging.

This was especially true for those two big guys that stood the closest to the creature, one of them even trembling and pissing his pants from sheer terror!

'J-Just what the hell is that... thing?' Raven thought with tense muscles, but once he saw how the creature turned its head specifically toward his direction despite it having no eyes, his face lost all colors.

He knew way too well what was going to happen now.

"Oh, hell fucking no!" Raven shouted as he clearly understood he became the next target and without any hesitation spun around before pressing his feet firmly against the ground and dashed into the distance with record speed!

As for the creature and the people, like getting snapped out of their daze all of them began to move at once, the latter sprinting far away from their previous spots while the former began to chase after Raven with speed no slower than his!