Twilight Era Calendar. Harvest Season. September the 3rd.

  “Today, captain invited us for another bootleg run. Said It’ll be another smooth trip like always.”

  “Those were unlucky words, but the pay was too much! My family has five mouths to feed, so…”

  September the 7th.

  “We set sail on the Mayflower! On the surface, we are an official merchant ship, but under… hehe.”

  Day 14th.

  “Everything was smooth-sailing like the captain said. If nothing goes wrong, we’ll be rich and back in a week!”

  Day 15th.

  “We encountered pirates enroute! To escape, the captain decided to cut through the dangerous waters that no sailor alive dared set foot in – the Sea of Everlasting Fog! Goddess of Storm, please bless us!”

  Day YY.

  “We actually passed through the Wrath of the Sea Goddess! But we shipwrecked and are now stranded on what appears to be a new continent! Is this a blessing or a curse? We don’t know. But we all kissed the golden sand and can’t wait to explore!”

  Day YY+1.

  “No supplies for ship repair was found, but today, we discovered… a pyramid! It was a tomb, with treasures in never-seen-before magical boxes! Inside, we actually found diamond! We’ve struck gold!”

  “Later, when we went back up, we learned the bones came alive upstairs, but the captain already dragged them out to roast in the sun. We found Fred’s body later. Whew, what a day!”

  Day YY+2.

  “Jeff disappeared when he went out to take a leak last night. The captain told us to stay in the tomb and we’ll be fine. Pooh! Only a landlubber can’t see the obvious!”

  Day YY+3.

  “We found and raided another tomb today! This time, we hauled the sleeping bones out and nothing bothered us after looting the chests! Easiest gold we’ve ever made! Unfortunately, still nothing to repair the ship.”

  Day YY+5.

  “Another two tombs taken down! We’ve set off to find others and realized there’s actually a lot of tombs here! Who are these tombs for? We don’t know. But the wealth inside are definitely for us! Once we return to mainland, we’ll live the life of the rich!”

  Day ZZ.

  “Tonight, the moon turned red… and a fog covered the world. The very same everlasting fog seen out in the sea! Even the pyramid wasn’t safe!”

  “Everybody felt jittery and I even felt... there was something staring at us! And it was right inside this pyramid!”

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  “Captain assure us it’ll be fine and told us to get some rest. But I secretly stayed awake. I hope my feeling is wrong...”

  Everything else beyond that looked like scribbles of a lunatic.

  In that mess, Yu Zhiye barely made out a bloody line: “Don’t look into its eyes! Don’t look!!!”

  The scribbles ended there. The fate of the diary owner was obvious.

  “Looks like this desert… isn’t as safe as it seems.”

  Yu Zhiye thought there was only those death angels to worry about, but now… it seems that was just the appetizer. The real danger has yet to come!

  At that time, it’s questionable if the store outside will still be a safe zone!

  “But that’s their problem. I just have to come hide in here once that fog hits. Hehe.”

  The future might turn out to be quite horrifying, but Yu Zhiye was ready to enjoy his slice of life.

  After keeping the tattered diary in his mostly-empty inventory, Yu Zhiye kicked the treasure chest’s lid shut, grabbed his dinner from the inventory chest, and turned to leave.

  Back in the store.

  As soon as Yu Zhiye arrived out front, he could already hear the other team bragging about their heroic might to no other than Miss Yoona.

  “...I went in there like a one-man army! Hurhur, no skeleton could get past me and any that tried got smashed into bone dust! Only thanks to my heroic sacrifice did Duri and them had time to pack up the loot!”

  “Bullshit! You’re making things up! Miss Yoona, don’t listen to this liar! Let me tell you! It was my unmatched boxing skills that led the team to success—!”

  “Madaraka! Baldie, you weren’t there with me! How do you know if I made things up or not?!”

  “Pooh! I’m not smart, but I definitely know your number of kills definitely didn’t exceed mine! Do you dare swear otherwise?”

  “You—!”

  “Hah! Thought so!”

  “Madaraka! Baldie, you picking a fight?!”

  “Aeeuuhh!? Who’s afraid of who?!”

  This pair always went by the same formula.

  On the other side, the think-tanks were initiating the timid loser using sweet words and drawing tempting pies.

  But no matter how convincing they sounded, poor emo-boy looked like he was about to be forced to sell himself into slavery.

  Sad. Nobody can save those who picked the wrong side.

  Yu Zhiye ignored the ruckus over there and went to join his own team.

  Jack greeted him: “Yo Steve, ya took a dump again?”

  “Naw.” Yu Zhiye shrugged and sat down. “I was shoveling the leftovers and tried putting them into the new box. Gotta keep the fertilizer fresh.”

  “?!!” Jack’s face went stiff.

  Even the apple-nomming Miss Highschooler froze and stared at Yu Zhiye like a he was some rare animal in a zoo.

  Jack was the first to recover. “Well, I’ll be damned. Hope that worked out well for ya.”

  “It did. You should give it a try.”

  Jack choked but soon broke out in laughter. “Bwahahaha! Aight, it’s dinner. Enough with the dirty jokes, Steve. How about we tell you all about our little adventure instead?”

  The Miss Highschooler statue came back to life and quickly volunteered to start. “Umu! Umu! Big brother, let this miss tell you how awesome she is! Fufufu~”

  “Bwahaha! Little miss was really fierce indeed!”

  Dinner started while a little missy cutely did pow-pows and wapows in the air like she was facing off against imaginary enemies...

  Besides them, Jack chimed in from time to time and this teahouse storyteller eventually took over when the little goblin got hungry.

  In this rundown, the details were more fleshed out and the important game mechanics got highlighted for Yu Zhiye.

  But such intel didn’t surprise Yu Zhiye much. What really frightened him was that the details matched with the diary...

  If there was even a sliver of hope before, now, he was almost certain the fog will come.

  Quite terrifying to think about, especially if this fear gets bottled up inside.

  How to make himself feel better? Share the fear. Let others worry about it!

  “Jack, take a look. I found this while fishing. See if it’ll be any help to your tomb raiding.”

  “Yeah?” Jack took the tattered diary pages and started skimming through them.

  The curious baby poked her head in to peek as well.

  Soon, those eyes of hers got brighter and brighter as if she was reading her favorite type of novel...

  But she deflated when she realized there’s no more.

  On the other hand, the scruffy-beard-scratching Jack frowned at the bloody scribbles.

  “Well, I’ll be damned. This game is looking more and more like a horror story.”