They Called Me Trash? Now I'll Hack Their World-Chapter 132: Blightbound Hound

I stepped away from the crowd, moving toward a quieter corner of the square near an old stone well, and opened my status window.

The familiar translucent interface materialized in my vision.

[STATUS]

Name: Jin Raith

Age: 17

Class: Debugger

Level: 17

EXP: 290/2,500

Rank: D

MC (Mana Capacity): 158/220

HP: 840/840

MP: 190/190

Stats:

STR: 30

VIT: 31

AGI: 26

INT: 75

WIS: 45

LUK: 19

Allocation Points: 0

Skills: Poison Resistance (69%), Social Engineering, Alchemy (Basic), Debug Vision, Iron Will (Passive), Light Orb, Mana Reservoir (Passive)

Combat: Unorthodox Fang (Proficiency: 69%)

I stared at the numbers, running calculations in my head.

Could I take them on?

Well, my stats were decent for D-rank.

I think probably better than average, actually, and especially my INT.

But the increased monster activity could mean anything from a few aggressive beasts I could handle to something genuinely dangerous. A full goblin war party. A dire wolf pack. Something worse?

Though I need EXP to level up, and this seemed to be a good opportunity.

I closed the status window with a thought and looked around the town square, taking in the scene properly.

Wagons weren’t going. Drivers were refusing even triple rates. Passengers were stranded, desperate but not desperate enough to walk into those woods alone.

That left one option.

I turned back to Agnes and Scarlet, who were waiting a few feet away, watching me with different expressions.

"We’re going on foot," I said, keeping my voice firm.

Scarlet’s eyes narrowed immediately beneath her hood.

"On foot?" Her voice dropped to a harsh whisper so nearby people wouldn’t hear. "Are you insane? Did you hit your head on the wagon ride?"

"Probably," I admitted. "But we don’t have much choice. Agnes’s mother is in Oakmere, she needs treatment. We need to get there."

I looked at Agnes, whose face had gone pale, the color draining from her cheeks.

"Young Master, maybe we should wait," she said quietly, her voice trembling slightly. "Until the roads are safe again. Until they clear out whatever’s out there—"

"How long will that take?" I interrupted gently, trying to keep my tone soft even as I pressed the point.

And it was a somewhat good opportunity for some leveling up, and I have Scarlet, who’s at level 28.

"A week? A month? Longer? And what happens to your mother’s condition in the meantime? You said the healer knows her case. That implies it’s serious."

She opened her mouth, then closed it, her hands twisting together anxiously in front of her. Her eyes dropped to the ground.

She knew I was right. I could see it in the slump of her shoulders, the way she bit her lip.

I softened my tone further, stepping closer.

"I’ll keep you both safe. I promise."

It was a bold promise. But I meant it.

"And if things get difficult, we’ll fall back. Okay."

Agnes looked up at me, fear and hope warring in her expression, hope that we could actually do this, fear of what might happen if we tried.

The silence stretched between us for several heartbeats.

Then she nodded slowly, the movement small but decisive.

"Okay. If you think we can make it..." Her voice was barely above a whisper. "If you really think so..."

"We can," I said with more confidence than I felt.

I adjusted my pack on my shoulder, checking that everything was secure, and started walking toward the western edge of town where the road continued into increasingly wild territory.

Scarlet growled low in her throat.

"This is the stupidest thing I’ve ever agreed to," she muttered, but she followed anyway.

Agnes fell into step beside me, her breathing a little faster than normal, her eyes scanning the horizon ahead where the forest waited.

We left Millhaven behind, following the dirt road that led westward toward the border territories and Thornwood Forest beyond.

The town faded behind us, the sounds of civilization growing distant and then disappearing entirely.

The landscape changed gradually as we walked, the transition subtle at first.

The open fields and gentle hills that surrounded Millhaven gave way to wilder, less cultivated land.

Vegetation grew denser, untamed.

After about an hour of walking, the terrain shifted again.

We’d entered what could only be described as the borderlands, the transitional zone between civilization and true wilderness.

Trees dotted the landscape but didn’t yet form a continuous canopy. Rocky outcroppings jutted from the earth at irregular intervals. The vegetation was thick enough to provide cover but sparse enough that we could still see the road stretching ahead.

This was the dangerous zone. Not quite forest, not quite open ground.

And I noticed the changes immediately.

Trees with deep claw marks gouged into their bark, the wood splintered and torn. The marks were high, at least seven or eight feet up the trunks.

Underbrush that had been trampled or crushed, leaving wide trails through what should have been impassable vegetation. Not the narrow paths deer would make, but broad swaths of destruction.

A fallen tree across our path showed bite marks the size of my head, the wood chewed through and then abandoned.

The air felt different here too.

Agnes moved closer to me, her shoulder almost brushing mine as we walked. Her breathing had quickened, and I could hear the slight tremor in each breath.

Scarlet had gone completely silent, which was somehow more unnerving than her usual complaints.

We continued for another two hours, the sun slowly descending toward the horizon, casting longer shadows across the broken terrain.

I kept glancing at Scarlet, noticing the way her ears would twitch and flatten, then prick forward again.

Scarlet’s ears suddenly flattened completely against her head.

"Stop," she hissed.

We froze immediately.

I held my breath, straining to hear whatever she’d detected.

Nothing. Just the wind rustling through sparse vegetation. A bird calling in the distance.

Then I caught it... a faint sound. Movement.

Something shifting position in the rocks to our right.

Scarlet’s entire body had gone rigid, every muscle coiled tight.

Then, in one fluid motion, she ripped off her cloak and lunged toward a cluster of boulders about twenty feet away.

Her claws extended with an audible snikt, gleaming in the fading sunlight. A guttural growl tore from her throat, primal and vicious.

And something erupted from behind the rocks.

It looked like a dog.

But its body was too long. Patchy fur covered scarred, diseased-looking skin.

Its eyes were milky white, completely blind, but its nose was working frantically.

A blightbound hound. Beasts that hunted by scent alone.

Scarlet hit it mid-leap, her claws sinking deep into its flank.

The creature yelped and tried to twist around to snap at her.

She was faster.

Her claws raked across its throat in a vicious arc, dark blood spraying across the rocks. The hound convulsed once, twice, then went still, its body crumpling to the ground.

Scarlet landed in a crouch, breathing hard, blood dripping from her fingers.

"There’s more," she snarled, her eyes scanning the rocks. "I can smell them..."

As if responding to her words, shapes emerged from the rocks on both sides of the road.

Four more blightbound hounds, their blind eyes fixed on nothing, but their noses tracking our scent with terrifying accuracy.

They were larger than the first one.

"Agnes, get behind me," I said sharply, pulling the knife from my boot.

The blade was simple, nothing special.

Agnes scrambled back, pressing herself against the rocky hillside, her face pale with terror.

I activated my debug vision.

The world shifted, overlays of information appearing across my field of view.

[Blightbound Hound - Level 12]

The same information appeared over each of the four hounds, their stats floating in my vision like transparent text.

I focused on the environment next, expanding my debug vision to analyze the terrain.

[Modify: Ground friction]

[0.65 → 0.05]

The lead hound charged, its powerful legs propelling it forward with terrifying speed.

The moment its paws hit the modified section, they shot out from under it.

The creature went down hard, its momentum carrying it forward in an uncontrolled slide that sent it crashing into the rocks with a sickening crunch.

Not dead, but stunned and disoriented.

The other three circled, more cautious now, their noses working to understand what had just happened.

I made another modification, this time on a rock formation above the rightmost hound.

The rocks shifted with a grinding sound, then tumbled down in a small avalanche.

The hound tried to dodge, but it was too slow. Several large stones caught it across the back and head, driving it to the ground with brutal force.

Scarlet moved to intercept the one coming from the left, her claws ready.

That left me with the one approaching from the right.

I gripped my knife tighter, falling into the stance.

The hound lunged, its jaws gaping wide, showing rows of diseased, broken teeth.

I waited until the last possible second, then dropped and rolled to the side.

Its momentum carried it past me, jaws snapping on empty air.

I came up in a crouch and drove my knife into its rear leg as it tried to turn, aiming for the joint I’d identified in my debug vision.

The blade sank deep, cutting through muscle and tendon.

The hound howled and collapsed on that side, its leg unable to support its weight.

I didn’t give it time to recover.

And lunged forward, grabbing a fistful of its matted fur, and dragged my knife across its throat in one smooth motion.

Hot blood poured over my hand, and the creature’s struggles weakened, then stopped.

[EXP +270]

I turned to check on Scarlet.

She’d already finished hers, standing over its corpse with blood splattered across her arms and face.

The first hound I’d tripped was struggling to its feet, shaking its head groggily.

I modified the ground beneath it again, this time creating a slight depression that threw off its balance, then rushed forward while it was off-balance.

My knife found its neck, and it went down without further resistance.

The one buried under rocks was still alive, whimpering and trying to drag itself free with its front legs.

Scarlet walked over and ended it with a swift slash across its throat.

Silence fell over the road, broken only by our heavy breathing and the wind whistling through the rocks.

Five dead blightbound hounds lay scattered around us, their blood soaking into the dry earth.

I wiped my blade clean on the nearest corpse’s fur.

Agnes was still pressed against the rocks, her hands covering her mouth, her eyes wide with shock.

"Are you okay?" I asked, sheathing my knife.

She nodded mutely, but I could see her hands trembling.

Scarlet picked up her discarded cloak and wrapped it back around herself, pulling the hood up to hide her features again.

"We need to move," she said, her voice rough. "The smell of blood will draw more."

She was right.

I helped Agnes to her feet, and we continued down the road, moving faster now, putting distance between ourselves and the carnage.

The sun was touching the horizon when we finally saw it in the distance.

Oakmere.

A small village surrounded by a wooden palisade, smoke rising from chimneys, the warm glow of lamplight visible through windows.

We’d made it.