Epoch: A Berserker's Rise

Chapter 31: IRL (1)

[Edea Jungle] was bordering [Serpentine Lake], so Adam didn't have to walk for a long time to reach it.

Even though it would only take a few hours to complete his missions here, Adam decided to stay here for the rest of the day.

This was because this was the best area for him to grind, the monsters above level 20 would be too strong for him to really grind, Adam would be able to kill in them in a duel, but he would lose a lot of HP and thus waste money on potions. And if several of them came at him, he might even get killed.

And so, Adam really spent the rest of the afternoon in that area. In the middle of the jungle a young berserker could be seen, surrounded by dead tigers. That was Adam.

He was looking at the system's clock, and noticed that it was almost 8 pm in the real world, so he decided to go back to the city, with two assassin's heads in his bag. He had no choice but to kill them, they had attacked him when he was battling Level 20 Elite monsters. Once back in Ember he got all his rewards and logged out.

With today's grind, he had already reached level 14, a great result for one day of grind. Right now, only the elite players had reached Level 10 or above, and fewer had reached the cities. Although Adam could continue playing, he still had a real life.

Even during those two years of hard work, he had spent some time with his friends. Of course it was limited because of his goal, but he hadn't severed all ties with his friends.

When Adam logged off, he heard sounds coming from the kitchen. This was quite surprising since his parents normally worked quite late.

Adam got up and stretched a little before heading out.

The house his family lived in was a small one, there was one room for Adam, another for his parents, a bathroom and a living room/ kitchen. When Adam's brother was home he would share a room with Adam, but lately he was spending more and more time at the hospital. Although no one admitted it, they knew that his time was getting shorter and shorter and that if he didn't get his surgery, it would soon be too late to do anything.

In the past, thinking about his brother would depress Adam, but today it only hardened his resolve. No matter what, he would earn his hundred grand.

As Adam left his room he was greeted by a familiar sight. His mother was cooking while humming a special song she used to use as a lullaby when he was a child.

Meanwhile, his father was reading the newspapers, sitting in front of the TV. They both turned their head seeing Adam come in and smiled.

The two of them had actually met in their working place, they both worked for a famous restaurant. Adam's mother, Elizabeth, was quite the beautiful woman despite her age so one would tend to think she would work as a waitress or a hostess, but she was actually one of the cooks.

As for his father, many people could guess his job in the restaurant after seeing his build. Jean was a tall and buff man, much like Adam, and so he worked as a doorman. His job was more than welcoming clients and leading them to their seats though, if anyone were to cause trouble in the restaurant, they would have to face him.

Unfortunately, although the restaurant they worked in was relatively famous, it wasn't famous to the point of allowing a doorman and a sub cook to gather 100 000 dollars.

Actually, Elizabeth had been vying for the head chef job for quite some time now, but she remained unsuccessful until now.

Anyway, as he saw Adam Jean immediately asked "Son, finally out of the machine. So, how was it?"

Adam grinned and said "Good, very good." He stopped there though, he didn't say he actually had a good shot at achieving his goal. After all, if he were to fail, then having given them hope would be worse, and he didn't know if they would be able to support it.

Adam began setting the table as he asked "How come the two of you are here so soon?"

Adam saw his father smirk and say "There was an incident today but I'm sure your mother will explain better than me."

Adam turned to his mother who said "Today an important client came to the restaurant, I heard he was an important French guy, he asked for a 'Steak au Poivre'. Because of who that was, that pig of a chef was asked to cook it on his own, the boss didn't want any of us 'assistants' to mess up the steak!"

Adam naturally understood that the 'pig of a chef' was actually the head chef, she called him like that because his laughter sounded strangely similar to a pig's snort, something Adam himself had witnessed but he was going off track.

His mother continued with a laugh "The boss was all smile, and so were we! Can you imagine that pig's face though? For all those years he has been claiming our work as his, painting himself as a 'Grand Chef'."

Jean intervened "Honey, he isn't that useless, he does know how to cook or he wouldn't get his job in the first place."

Elizabeth grunted while cutting vegetables "Well obviously he never learned how to cook a steak! I'll admit, the sauce was quite good, but his steak! Haha, his steak was fucking overcooked!"

Elizabeth was cackling madly while Adam and Jean were looking at each other with a small smile. She truly hated that guy, he was taking her hard work as his after all. Although, the story sounded a little suspicious, no matter how incompetent the chef was, overcooking a steak was a mistake only a beginner would do, someone probably did something to the stove or something. Well it wasn't their problem.

But there was also something deeper behind the cackling and the small smiles. They all knew that this was much more important than just a job, a few years ago she actually didn't give a damn about him taking her achievements as his, but since Matt's situation became more and more critical, they were in dire need of money, and that job was one such opportunity. It may not allow her to get all the money, but it would sure make the process easier.

Tragedy could really change people. Had it been in the past, she would have never laughed at someone else mistake, even if that someone had done her wrong, but with one of her sons' life on the line, it truly did change her.

And the same could be said for both Jean and Adam. When Adam was young, his parents had often taught him to be the better one, not to lower himself to the ones who couldn't control their anger.

But Adam had noticed that in the past few years, his father had become more irritable toward outsiders, maybe even colder. He had seen his father almost beat up people a few time weren't it for his mother defusing the situation.

And the same could be said for him. Although Adam's fusion with Old Adam's soul had changed him somewhat, his main personality was still him. Hadn't it been for his brother's condition, he probably would have never done something like breaking someone's arms and teeth like he did to one of his assassins.

Even before his soul's fusion, he had been in quite a few fights himself, and drinking with his friends never helped. He had been blacklisted from a few bars already.

Those changes weren't reversible, even if he could save his brother, he knew their life would be changed for the rest of their life, maybe his parents and himself would become less aggressive in the future, but it would still be there, somewhere, and if someone were to push the wrong buttons, their inner, violent side would surge out.