Alpha Zero (Alpha LitRPG Book 1) by Arthur Stone (top 5 books to read TXT) 📕

I didn’t see the boats, either. There had been two in all: the small one had been regularly used for fishing, while the large one had been stored on the beach, overturned. Tracks of the vessel being dragged to the water were still clear on the beach.

So where were they now?

The missing boats weren’t in the channels hugging the island. Nor under the bluff on the right bank. It took quite a bit of head-swiveling as I traversed the beach to spot them. There, on my left, the two boats stood in a tiny bay, obscured by beds of short reeds, bows burrowed in the sand. I couldn’t spot anything else. No humans, no movement amid the reeds.

Recalling Beko’s words from earlier, I surmised that the boats had been utilized to transport folks to gather hornflower. And that the gatherers should be doing just that somewhere along the left bank. Same as my partner.

I didn’t know how to get there, but it wasn’t in my plans, anyway. Coming down the mountain had confirmed that my strength was returning, but it was too early to claim total victory over my illness. Instead, I should sit and rest while enjoying the sun and the fresh air, which should aid my recovery, and craft some tackle besides. The best I could hope for, after letting my feet rest, was to walk down to the end of the beach. The pebbles there were of the smaller, finer variety, and the water was almost entirely free of snags and large rocks. If I felt strong enough, I could even try and fish out a few smaller kote with minimal risk of stumbling onto a mature one.

I could go there now, actually. There, I could activate Fishing Instinct from time to time, while working on the tackle, and observe the lives of the river dwellers in precisely that location. It would be useful to confirm whether my conjectures were correct. Besides, the more I knew about Blackriver and its residents, the better.

* * *

I took my time crafting the first tackle. There was nothing to be gained by rushing—frail as I was, I needed to take it easy to avoid any setbacks in my recovery. So I worked on the tackle instead, chiseling the little jig and adorning it with filigree that would merit even grandpa’s approval. I could almost see the sparkling disk gyrating in the water, propeller-like, as I dragged it slowly across. The only thing it was missing was a treble hook. Guppy only had the basic single variety in stock, which resulted in too many missed bites. Good thing kote were a stubborn species. Once one set its sights on its prey, it didn’t let up until it was hooked.

The leisurely nature of the work allowed for distractions. I paused regularly, casting casual glances this way and that, occasionally activating the talent to note the creatures hiding below the water’s surface.

While I was polishing the tackle with small stones that crumbled under the thumb if you pressed too hard, something alien caught the corner of my eye.

I rose to get a better look. The visual was indeed unusual. Floating down Blackriver was a raft. A clumsy contraption of crags, flimsily held together with rope. Rising in the center was something resembling a soccer goal, each “goal post” held up by braces on either side. Or something else that served as structural support, for the crossbar was bearing a hefty load.

Two human bodies.

Already past its zenith, the sun perfectly illuminated every detail of the gruesome scene. Even as I wished that it didn’t.

The bodies looked to be in bad shape. All the signs pointed to posthumous torture or the kind of death you wouldn’t wish on your worst enemy. Fingers, ears and noses severed, eye-sockets empty and skulls bare, the skin missing from the heads and other body parts. Some spots had been flayed in large patches, others cut in narrow strips.

I had heard plenty of scary stories about the Wild Wood. Yet, aside from the momentous crossing that had taken place not even in the wood itself but at its border, nothing terrible had befallen me or anyone I knew. Life here, though not without its complications, simply wasn’t the nightmare that the folks outside advertised it to be.

At least that had been my thinking until I saw the raft and its passengers. A nightmare it was, indeed.

My nerves of steel kept me steady where others might have fainted at the ghastly sight. Instead, I focused on the raft’s movement, estimating its trajectory. The current should carry it down the right channel, no more than twenty yards from the beach. But it might as well be floating underneath the bluff all the way across—I wouldn’t have a shot at stopping it either way.

Yet, I had to try and stop it somehow. Ash would want to take a look at this spectacle, wicked and rare as it was. In all the days I had spent fishing in the river, I had never seen a craft crewed by disfigured corpses.

The were no boats on the beach, but even if there were, I couldn’t handle even a small one on my own. So I did the only thing I could do: I gunned toward the fort, waving my arms while hoping that the sudden physical exertion wouldn’t result in a setback. The bridge tower was always manned with a pair of guards that shouldn’t miss a solitary figure dashing frantically on an open beach.

I shouted, too. The day was practically windless, so they might actually hear me from here.

Was it my imagination or were they waving back at me? Indeed, they were.

I threw up my left hand overhead while pointing with the right to the boat, which had almost made it to the start of the beach. Assuming the guards on duty weren’t total