Glacial Monopoly: My Gifts Return Hundredfold

Chapter 2: The Scent of Meat and Rust

The Flameless Ration Heater reached its peak temperature. The thick plastic pouch of the MRE swelled slightly, venting a steady stream of white steam into the freezing air.

For the first time in four months, the scent of hot, processed beef and rich, salty gravy filled Platform 3. In the sterilized, frozen wasteland, the smell was violently aggressive. It bypassed logic and slammed directly into the primitive core of the human brain.

Elena’s hands trembled so violently she could barely hold the plastic spoon. She scooped a chunk of steaming beef, blew on it with shaky breaths, and pressed it against Leo’s cracked lips.

The seven-year-old boy didn’t even chew. He just swallowed, his eyes rolling back in his head as the warm, dense calories hit his empty stomach.

Alex didn’t eat. He sat on an overturned plastic milk crate three feet away, his body perfectly still. His right hand rested casually on his thigh, inches from the worn leather sheath of his hunting knife. His eyes weren't on the food. They were tracking the deep, impenetrable shadows at the far end of the subway platform.

Heat travels fast in the cold. Scent travels faster.

From the darkness, the rustle of dirty sleeping bags breaking apart sounded like crushed dry leaves.

Three shadows detached themselves from the gloom.

Leading them was Griggs, a former mechanic who had survived the freeze by hoarding half-empty lighter fluid cans. Behind him were a nameless drifter and a skeletal woman missing half her teeth.

They didn't walk; they shuffled. Starvation had stripped away their humanity, leaving behind only dilated pupils and open, panting mouths. Their eyes were locked entirely on the olive-drab pouch in Elena’s hands.

"Meat," Griggs whispered. His voice was a wet, scraping rasp. A thick string of saliva froze against his filthy beard. "You're eating... meat."

Elena instinctively pulled the boy closer, shielding the MRE pouch with her own body.

"Back off, Griggs," Alex said. His voice was flat, carrying no anger, only a statement of fact.

Griggs took another step into the dim light of their campfire. He didn't even look at Alex. "We haven't eaten in four days, Ryder. You found a stash. You have to share. It's the rules."

"The old rules died when the sun went out," Alex replied. He didn't stand up. Standing up wasted calories. "This is my food. I gave it to the kid. Take one more step, and I'll open your throat."

The nameless drifter beside Griggs bared his teeth. He pulled a rusted, heavy steel pipe from his coat. "There's three of us. One of you. Give 'em up, or we crush your skull and take 'em."

It was simple math. The math of the apocalypse.

Griggs didn't wait to debate. Hunger made him desperate. He lunged forward, a jagged piece of thick, broken glass gripped tightly in his fist, aiming straight for Elena’s neck to get to the food.

He was fully committed, but starvation made him incredibly slow.

Alex finally moved.

He didn't draw his knife to slash. He simply pivoted on his heel, slipping effortlessly past Griggs's clumsy thrust. With surgical precision, Alex drove the heavy brass pommel of his sheathed hunting knife directly into the bridge of Griggs's nose.

The bone shattered with a sickening, wet crack.

Griggs dropped to the frozen concrete, screaming, clutching his face as dark, nearly black blood poured through his fingers, instantly steaming in the cold air.

The drifter swung the steel pipe at Alex’s head. Alex ducked under the heavy swing. In one fluid motion, he drew his blade and drove it three inches deep into the drifter's outer thigh—right into the thickest part of the vastus lateralis muscle, purposefully missing the femoral artery by a fraction of an inch.

Alex twisted the blade ninety degrees, destroying the muscle fibers, before ripping it out.

The drifter collapsed instantly, his leg useless, howling in pure agony. The steel pipe clattered uselessly across the frozen train tracks.

The skeletal woman, who had been lagging behind, froze in sheer terror. She looked at the two men writhing on the ground, then looked at the young man standing over them.

Alex calmly wiped the bloody blade on the drifter's coat. His breathing hadn't even elevated. He pointed the tip of the knife at the trembling woman.

"Drag them back to the dark," Alex commanded, his voice dead of all emotion. "If any of you cross the yellow warning line on the platform again, I will kill you and use your bodies as bait for the mutant hounds. Do you understand?"

The woman nodded frantically. She grabbed Griggs by the collar of his coat and began dragging his whimpering body backward, leaving a thick smear of steaming blood on the concrete.

Alex slid the knife back into its sheath and turned back to Elena.

She was staring at him, horrified by the brutal efficiency of the violence, but undeniably safe. She realized, in that moment, that Alex wasn't just another survivor. He was adapting to the ice faster than anyone else.

"Eat faster," Alex said, glancing up at the cracked concrete ceiling.

"Why?" Elena asked, forcing a spoonful of stew into her own mouth. The taste was overwhelming, bringing tears to her eyes.

"Because the smell is going up the ventilation shafts," Alex said grimly. "Griggs and his crew are just starving rats. But the real wolves are on the surface, and they have noses, too."

Alex reached into his boot and pulled out a secondary weapon—a rusted, chipped folding knife he had scavenged a month ago. The locking mechanism was loose, and the blade was dull. It was garbage, but it was a piece of metal with an edge.

He held it out to Elena.

"Take it," Alex said. "Keep it close to the boy. If anyone else crosses that yellow line while my back is turned, you put this in their neck."

Elena hesitated, then reached out and took the cold, rusted handle. "I... I've never stabbed anyone."

"You learn fast when you're hungry," Alex said.

The moment her fingers wrapped around the handle, Alex’s vision glitched again.

The sharp, electric blue text sliced through the dim lighting of the subway.

[ Gift Confirmed: Rusted Folding Knife (Durability 12%) → Elena Vance ] [ Multiplier Triggered: 50x (Rare) ] [ Reward: High-Carbon Steel Military Machetes x 50 ] Status: Deposited in Maintenance Locker 04.

Alex’s eyes narrowed. Fifty times. Not as high as the food, but the system clearly categorized weapons differently. A rusty folding knife turns into fifty military-grade machetes.

The tech tree of the apocalypse had just been unlocked.

He stood up and walked back to the rusted door of Locker 04. When he pulled it open, the smell of preserved food was replaced by the sharp, metallic tang of factory gun-oil and fresh polymer.

Stacked neatly on the floor were two heavy, sealed wooden crates. Alex used his hunting knife to pry the lid off the first one.

Inside, nestled in protective foam, lay rows of pristine, matte-black military machetes. Eighteen-inch blades forged from high-carbon steel, thick enough to chop through bone and concrete, fitted with ergonomic, shock-absorbing grips.

He grabbed five of them. They felt perfectly balanced. Lethal.

Alex walked back to the fire. He bypassed Elena and walked toward the three other survivors who had stayed out of Griggs's little rebellion. They were huddled together, watching Alex with a mix of awe and absolute terror.

Alex tossed three of the heavy machetes at their feet. The pristine steel clanged loudly against the floor.

"You three didn't attack me," Alex said coldly. "That means you're smart. Smart people get to eat." He pulled three more MRE bags from his coat and dropped them next to the blades.

The survivors stared at the food, then at the gleaming, impossible weapons.

"But in my camp, nobody eats for free," Alex continued, his voice ringing through the station. "Pick up the blades. Watch the tunnel entrances. The smell of this food just broadcasted our location to everything living in a three-mile radius. You want to stay warm? You hold the line."

The three survivors didn't hesitate. They lunged for the machetes, gripping the pristine weapons as if they were holy relics. In an instant, Alex had bought himself a militia.

He turned toward the collapsed escalator shaft that led to the surface. The wind was howling louder now.

Three miles above ground, the wind ripped across the frozen, shattered ruins of the city center.

A scout for the Iceborn Hunters paused in his tracks. He wore a thick parka and a mask stitched together from tanned human skin. He carried a customized, scoped hunting rifle.

He lifted his head, sniffing the biting, minus-sixty-degree wind.

Under the sharp scent of ozone and frost, there was something else. Something impossible.

Meat. Spices. Heat.

The scout's pale eyes widened. He tracked the scent, moving silently across the ice until he stood over a rusted subway grating. The warm, savory air was wafting directly up from the darkness below.

He tapped the radio secured to his chest rig.

"Base, this is Scout Three. I got a scent at Grid 04. Subway entrance," the scout whispered, a cruel smile forming under his skin mask. "I think we found a fat pig hiding in the tunnels. Moving in to secure the livestock."

He slung his rifle over his shoulder, drew a serrated combat knife, and quietly pried the grating open. He slipped into the dark, vertical maintenance shaft, anticipating the easy slaughter of weak, starving prey.

He dropped twenty feet, landing silently on the concrete of the mezzanine level.

He stood up in the pitch black, grinning.

Click.

A blinding beam of an LED flashlight snapped on, hitting the scout directly in the eyes.

He hissed, raising his arm to block the light, his vision instantly ruined.

"Livestock?" a cold voice echoed in the darkness.

Before the scout could raise his knife, he heard the simultaneous shwing of pristine steel being raised. As his eyes adjusted to the harsh light, the cruel smile vanished from his face.

He wasn't looking at starving prey.

He was surrounded by a wall of desperate survivors, their eyes burning with the calories of a hot meal, each holding a gleaming, matte-black military machete leveled directly at his throat.

Alex stepped out from behind the light, his own blade resting casually on his shoulder.

"Welcome to the butchery," Alex said.