The First Store System

As if Stuart was the last pillar holding the wall, after his elimination from the contest a flurry of high-profile eliminations occurred.

Lenna’s father was one of the eliminations, as he came across an enraged faction leader.

The man had decided to poach one of the intermediate Level 11 under the faction leader’s control. But his luck seemed to fail him as the person ratted Lenna’s father out instead of pondering over his offer.

It resulted in a one-sided battle between Lenna’s father and the faction leader. Lenna’s father was close to reaching late Level 11, while the faction leader was at peak Level 11.

The power gap between them was like heaven and earth, so it was like torture for Lenna’s father and a round of venting for the faction leader.

There were many Level 11 eliminations from the peak-level world in a span of a few seconds, breaking the hearts of quite a few attendees.

While there were eliminations, there were also new rising stars in the contest.

One such participant was Elena. She was one of the customers who had only become a regular of the store in the last year after attending the previous annual event.

Elena was a human belonging to Brinda’s grandfather’s native Kingdom. She didn’t belong to an affluent family, so it took some time for her to discover the store and then become a regular customer.

Elena was a peak Nascent Soul level cultivator when she had become a customer of the store. Now, she was an intermediate Void Forging level cultivator, only in the span of eight months. It wasn’t anything genius, but for Elena, who had reached Nascent Soul after crossing the century mark, it was unimaginable.

***

At first, Elena’s talent didn’t show even in the world inside the tower. Her fortune also seemed to act against her.

She had gotten caught by the head, which had resulted in a world of cruelty for her.

The torture of more than two decades finally ended with her release. It wasn’t due to someone’s help, but the village head died in the beast horde.

That beast horde had a few early Level 1 beasts in its ranks, so instead of the village head indulging in a massacre, the village head became the prey.

That beast horde killed the entire village. Elena’s luck seemed to work for the first time in her favor as when the beast horde was running amok inside the village and areas around it: she was lying in a steel cage, hidden in the head’s room.

Even though Elena was more than twenty years of age at that time, her body didn’t look like one. Her growth was slow since the village head never gave her enough to eat.

For the entire day, Elena didn’t even know about what had happened outside since the head had soundproofed the room. He liked to hear his prey’s scream, so the soundproofing around his room was a necessity.

Only on the second day, when her stomach started loudly demanding food from her, did she decide to take a peek outside.

She couldn’t even walk appropriately as her entire body was filled with numerous scars. Some were new, while some had become permanent; only a miracle could remove them.

Elena struggled to walk, but she persisted as the loud sound in her stomach forced her to continue.

When she reached the door, she found it to be locked from the outside. Since she couldn’t open it, she tried to hit it to make some sound for the people outside to hear it.

Her luck didn’t seem to favor her once again, as no one replied.

Since Elena was already hungry and she didn’t even have enough energy in the first place, she exhaustingly fell asleep on the ground.

She couldn’t sleep for long as her stomach only rumbled louder and louder, and hunger wasn’t going away on its own.

Elena attempted to disturb people on the outside once again, but she got the same result in the end.

Elena then began looking for something that could help her break the door.

The village head was early Level 1, so he was confident in stopping Elena if she wanted to escape. Since he thought like this, there was no lack of sharp items in the room.

As for Elena killing herself, the village head didn’t worry about it. Even though he had tortured Elena both mentally and physically, her will to survive was still strong enough.

Even when the village head was forcing himself on her, she would mumble her goal of revenge. The village head also liked this since it gave him a sense of thrill, which made him enjoy his moment with Elena even further.

Three days had passed in the blink of an eye.

The already weaker Elena turned even skinnier as she had nothing to eat in the last few days.

She was only sustaining herself on water, which was also coming to an end since the water jug was on the verge of becoming empty.

Her small efforts over these few days didn’t help her much as her strength wasn’t enough. Her rate of cutting the wood using the spearhead was less than the rate of her getting exhausted. So before she would make some progress, her body would give up on her, and she would have no choice other than to wait.

Time flew by, and two more days passed in the blink of an eye.

“Scree-“

The sound of the spearhead attempting to cut the wood came to a sudden halt as Elena felt the world around her darkening.

Before she could understand what was going on, she had already lost consciousness.

Even at that time, she wasn’t worried about her dying, but she would never be able to avenge her mom and the torture she had gone through these past decades.

While Elena was unconscious and taking the last of her breaths, the sound of hurried footsteps rang from the tiny hole Elena had made after her efforts these past few days.

“Are you sure you heard a sound?” A man asked as another member in his group had just heard a screeching sound.

“Why would I lie to you?” The man scoffed in response as he didn’t like his group member questioning him.

The group member didn’t speak anything in response but gestured to the man to go ahead.

The man nodded and punched the door while his group members got ready to attack at a moment of notice since none of them knew what would welcome them at the other side of the door.

The attack the group member hoped never came, but instead, an ugly stench attacked their nostrils.

Since Elena was in the closed room with no way to leave, she was doing her business in the room.

The group members couldn’t help but flinch as they all came from wealthy families, and this smell was too disgusting for them to exist.

The other group members had tightly grabbed their nose, but the man didn’t do things of such sort as his eyes fell on the naked girl lying in the room, with a spear lying not far from her.

The man didn’t know, but a feeling of appreciation for the girl appeared in his heart. He felt his heart skip a beat.

The girl didn’t look anything close to beauty with all these permanent and recent numerous scars spread across her body. But when the man studied the scene, he got his answer for feeling such.

The man had always liked strong people like his father. Even though the girl wasn’t physically strong, the man still admired her as he didn’t even believe his father to have a stronger mental tenacity than the girl.

The man then unconsciously took a step toward the girl, resulting in his group members screaming with disgust.

The man ignored his friends and continued. After reaching the girl, the man bent down and gently caressed her scarred face.

This moment was the change in destiny for Elena as when she woke up, she found herself in a luxurious room filled with a bunch of nutritious meals.

Elena had no idea where she was or how did she survive, but before knowing that she had an even more urgent task. She began gobbling up her food like a maniac.

“Haha, no need to eat so quickly. All of this is for you,” A voice filled with laughter rang in the room, but Elena had no interest in either the voice’s owner or its contents, so she continued gobbling up the food.

The man only smiled wryly and didn’t speak anymore. He only stood there and silently looked at the scar-faced girl gobbling up food,

After finishing the food on the table, she turned and looked at the source of the voice. She saw a man standing there looking at her with a gentle smile.

The next moment, a dumbfounded expression appeared on the man’s face as Elena asked for more food, even though her stomach looked like it would explode.

***

A/N: Sorry, there will only be one chapter today. I was traveling all day, so I am exhausted and could only write this one.

What do you think about the event? We will get our store assistant in the next few chapters. After that, there will be a considerable time skip. After that, it will be our time to start a new chapter for the store.