Jude put the bow down and went to his computer. It was a habit from the beta to analyze a problem as soon as he encountered it, and these days, anyone could learn many things from videos online. He had never been a bright student, but with the subtitles on, he could roughly understand what was being said.
"This is how you hold your posture."
The foreign man in the video stood with his legs open as wide as his shoulders. His arms were naturally stretched as he slowly lifted the bow. At least a thousand draws of practice were needed, he said, before anyone should nock an arrow.
Just as the man instructed, Jude lifted the bow a thousand times, until his body was bathed in sweat. When he played the video again, the man said it was time to practice lifting the bow while changing the direction of his legs. It was a good technique for quick aiming.
He imitated the man's movements with a straight face, and slowly he began to feel cramps in his muscles. When he looked at the clock on the wall, three hours had passed since he started. The apocalypse would not happen tomorrow, so he decided to call it a day. There were still twenty-six days left.
Jude fell onto the bed, and out of reflex, he almost closed his eyes. Then he jerked up, remembering that if he fell asleep now, he would wake with aching muscles, and he did not want to go to the hills in that condition.
He slung his backpack over his shoulders and put on everything he needed.
Jude had to do something about the imps if he wanted to store his supplies safely. Since he did not know how many of them were out there, this time he only wanted to look.
Jude used Random Teleportation and appeared beside the tree he had marked on the hills, and he was instantly greeted by a cold wind that crashed into his body.
For now, he set the distance at fifteen meters. The range of an imp's paralyzing dart was about ten meters, and the range of a bow clearly exceeded it by far, but since he was only a beginner, he set his range at the minimum.
He drew a target on a wooden board with his marker and hung it on a tree fifteen meters away.
Jude aimed carefully and let the string go. With a hiss, the arrow pierced the air and hit the board with a thud, and when he went to check, the arrowhead had dug deep into the tree.
He had not hit the circle, but since it was his first time shooting an arrow, he was satisfied with the result. His fingers hurt quite a bit when he drew the string, though the gloves he wore softened it slightly.
Jude shot a few more arrows. His accuracy did not go up in such a short time, but the trajectory itself was satisfactory. He was fairly sure that he would not miss an imp within fifteen meters.
He wrapped up his practice and searched his memory for the place where he had found the imp's droppings two days before.
When he finally found it, he did not want to get close, but he still needed the information. It looked like the droppings of a single imp.
He rummaged through it with a branch, trying to push down the acid rising in his stomach. It seemed the imp had eaten nothing but fruit, as if it did not have the strength to hunt.
"Did this guy get kicked out of his group?"
If his perception had been high enough, he would have seen its footprints right away. But since he was still no different from an ordinary person, he had no choice but to search for them.
After several minutes, he finally found the footprints. They led out into the dark trees.
Imps were crafty monsters who knew how to set a trap. If an opponent blindly followed the traces they left behind, he would soon be surrounded and brought down by their paralyzing darts.
However, he was alone on these hills. If he made a mistake, he would be the one killed.
Jude patted his cheek and followed the trail. He did not think he would be able to work comfortably until he had killed the lone imp. And if he met another monster or a carnivorous animal on the way, he would run at once. His rank on these hills was just that low.
As he walked carefully on, his surroundings grew visibly darker. Pushing all his senses to the limit, he checked around him constantly. Imps were very difficult to find in a forest because of their green skin, and they were already short, yet they walked with their bodies bent slightly forward.
The sound of flowing water grew louder and louder. It was a good sign, because when the apocalypse began, drinking water would be hard to find.
Marking the trees with his white marker as he went, he finally arrived near the valley, where the loud sound of the water rushing down echoed all around.
Jude lowered his body and hid behind a rock. He was out of breath because of his poor stamina.
Looking around, he finally found it.
The imp was drinking water with its back turned to him. The thick hair that grew from its green skin was a bizarre sight. Its limbs were scrawny, its lower body was covered with a piece of leather, and all it carried was an old pouch hanging from its waist.
Looking closely, its hair was gray, and there were deep wrinkles all over its body. When it moved its head slightly, its eyes were dry and weak. The imp had been kicked out of the group because it had grown too old, and it would not last long even if he left it alone.
"I'm sorry, but I'm going to kill you and turn your death into points."
If he could, he wanted to unlock the store before the zombie crisis broke out. His goal was a blackwood club, a weapon without any special options that was extremely sturdy.
Jude took an arrow from his bag, nocked it just as he had practiced, and drew the string. He aimed at the old imp's body. Normally he would have aimed for the head, but since it was so weak, an arrow to the body would be enough.