Chapter 31：The Pub (1/2)
Arthur wondered if he should knock the door, but the place was too ruined to be inhibited. The windows were broken and vegetation covered most of it. The contrast of what he had seen only a week ago and what he saw now gave him a feeling of melancholy. It was the feeling you get when you realize how much time can change things, for better or for worse.
The door creaked as Arthur opened it and he heard the familiar ring of the bell. As he looked inside, he confirmed that no one lived there. Dust filled the place and there were some bird's leftovers littering the tables, probably ones who entered through the broken windows.
Arthur walked to the counter that fronted the dining hall and his finger slide over it, making a line through the dust. Bottles of liquor and alcohol were safely bolted to the wall behind the counter and Arthur found most of them to be unharmed. As he wasn't a drinker, he left them at that and went toward the door next to the counter. As he got inside, he found himself in a kitchen. Most of the stored food has rotted by now and even the canned food was expired. As he opened the faucet, some water came out but it was yellow. After emptying what the pipes had left, the water stopped. Arthur expected this and simply sighed before leaving the kitchen, as the smell of rotten food was unbearable. He headed upstairs and found two doors in a hallway. One of them was a bathroom, the other one was a bedroom.
Arthur went into the bedroom and found a king-sized bed with a wardrobe inside, along with a storage room to the side. As he studied the bedroom, Arthur found that most things were here. Portraits, books, laptops, and other personal items were placed around the room. It felt heartbreaking that Joe didn't leave this place because he wanted to, but it was abandoned. He wondered what happened here.
As Arthur went into the storage room, he found it to be filled with armors and weapons. Most of them, just like his sword and armor, were of primitive grade. He didn't find anything of a higher quality for now, but he made a mental note to use some useable armor as his armor has been ruined.
Arthur left the pub for now and he found the wolf still there, waiting for him. He was reminded of Joe's mount that was also a wolf, only a much smaller one. He walked toward the wolf and he patted its fur. After all that happened, he trusted the wolf now. He knew animals weren't that shrewd that they could plot against you, and the wolf had more than one chance to kill him.
”Do you want to stay with me?” Arthur asked, not expecting an answer. The wolf looked at him for a while before he licked his hand with its giant tongue. Arthur laughed at this and shook his hand to get rid of the saliva. He didn't know if the wolf was agreeing, but he doubted it would leave his side any time soon. As he looked at the pub, Arthur found his next resting place.
***
Arthur spent the rest of the day cleaning the pub. First, he got rid of the rotten food in the kitchen. He then cleaned the tables of any bird leftovers He found some transparent plastics sheets in the kitchen and nailed them to the windows, closing them but still allowing light inside. He then started wiping every nook and cranny of the pub to get rid of the dust.
By the end of it, it was still one of the worse pubs to live in. However, it was a lot better than living in caves and whatsoever. He then took down the bell hanging by the door and started making an artifact. He used a primitive mana core to have the bell imprinted with the Detection-I rune. As he made it, he also tried to think of the condition: anytime a new lifeforce of primitive or above rank enters the detection range, this bell would ring.
It seems his ability was a lot more flexible than he thought, and the conditions were applied to the bell. Arthur felt excited by this as this meant he could make the artifacts work in specific conditions.
He hung the bell in the middle of the house and looked at it with pride. As he was thinking of how to test it, the rune glowed and the bell rang in front of his eyes. Arthur was stunned before he ran to the door. A giant wolf with a rabbit in its maw was sitting in front of the pub.
Arthur laughed at this as the wolf never brought anything but a rabbit, and he wondered if it thought Arthur only ate rabbits because of the first time they ate together.
After finding some skewers and two iron poles for the skewers to be placed upon, he took them out and had the rabbit skewered after cleaning it and skinning it. Although he never gutted or skinned a rabbit before, it was similar to a chicken and he worked his way around it. Arthur looked with expectation at the wolf who simply yawned and blew at the rabbit, roasting it.
***
The next five days were uneventful, except for Arthur's strength rising. After he changed his armor and used runes to strengthen it, he started his hunt again with the help of the giant wolf. After much thoughts, Arthur decided to call the wolf Kira. It was the name of a character he once read about in a comic, and the name sounded cool. There wasn't any deeper meaning to it, but Arthur thought that most names weren't those of a deeper meaning.
Kira and Arthur started their adventure of hunting primitive monsters of all kinds. As the forest Arthur lived next to was filled with unranked monsters, he had to go a bit deeper to find the primitive monsters. However, with Kira's speed, all he needed was a few minutes to get there.