Dying a Dog's Death

"Paine! Get down and take out the trash bags! The garbage truck is here!" A woman's voice was heard outside the room.

Inside the room, a young man was watching the latest episode of One Piece and didn't seem to have any intention to answer nor do what the woman was telling him to do. Inside the screen, Zoro was fighting two of the Yonkous and was about to unleash a powerful sword attack when his door was forcefully opened.

'bam!'

"Monster girl, don't you know how to knock?!" The young man cringed when he saw a beautiful woman with long hair standing before his room after kicking his door.

'Smack!'

Paine held his hand after the woman hit him and glared at her.

"Who are you calling monster girl?! I told you to throw the trash! Go before the garbage truck leaves!" The woman kicked him. "And if you don't, I'll burn all your anime figurines and pillows like the last time!"

Recalling how this woman burned some of his favorite collections just because he stepped on her lipstick and the recent one where he forgot to take out the trashes, Paine had no choice but to give up on his fate.

He paused the TV and started to come out of his room to take out all the trash bags that was piled up in the kitchen.

Being the younger sibling between the two of them, Paine had to do all the chores inside the house while his older sister would always go out to have fun or make money for the two of them.

As a man, Paine was ashamed that his older sister was the one who had to earn money to pay their house bills and what they eat on their table, but as an Unawakened human, he couldn't find a good job that earns well enough to buy a pair of clothes and shoes.

If only he were also an Awakened human...

Paine sighed depressingly as he heads out of their small apartment. There was no point in thinking about these things again.

After taking his fourth awakened examination last month, Paine no longer has any expectations and hopes to awaken his powers. His age was nearing twenty, and Paine didn't have any chance to go to the Academy of Awakened next year since the Academy only accepted Awakened Humans before they reached the age of twenty.

Ever since Awakened Humans started to increase in numbers, the world's economy also began to go by their standards, rendering those who were still far from completely adapting to the New World useless and vulnerable.

And Paine was one of them.

While making his way towards the garbage truck, Paine noticed a group of people crowding the corner. But seeing that the garbage truck was about to leave, Paine didn't have the time to check what was going on from their side.

"Young boy, you should be glad we waited for you." The man assigned to collect the garbage took the trash bags from Paine.

Paine nodded his head and said, "Thank you, mister."

"Oh? Did your sister threaten you that she will burn your things again?" The man asked that made Pain look up at him in confusion.

How the hell did he know about that?

"How did you know?"

The man laughed and waved his hand, "It was your sister who told me. She was the one who took out the trash last time."

Paine nodded in understanding and turned around after the truck left.

However, when he saw the crowd was still there, he became curious about what was so interesting for them to gather around.

Walking slowly toward them, Paine didn't have to stand on the tip of his toes since he was naturally tall with his six feet two tall body.

He saw two women hollering at each other with curses and revealing shameful secrets they kept to each other.

"I didn't know you could be that slutty to seduce with my boyfriend!" The woman on the right accusingly pointed at the other woman.

The other woman scoffed, "Seduce him? With my face and body, do you think I need to seduce your boyfriend? He called me and invited me for a drink. The only thing I did was not refuse him."

The first woman dropped her jaw to the ground. She was extremely shocked at the second woman's words.

Paine drew his eyebrows together in distaste at the scene playing before his eyes. He thanked God that Kana, his older sister, was more like a monster than these two women quarreling outside the streets like cats.

He was also thankful that he was only attracted to anime characters and not real humans, successfully avoiding any stressful drama in his life.

As Paine was walking on the other side of the street and on his way back to his apartment, a dog barked at him.

Paine recognized the dog as one of the dogs Kana often feed outside. She told him one time that since the world has changed too much, these poor animals were left with nothing, and no one was willing to take care of them. And so, she wanted to help them and make them feel they belonged somewhere.

"Woof! Woof! Woof!" The dog continued to bark at Paine.

"Go away, doggy. I have nothing to feed you. Wait till my sister come down." Paine said to the dog and started to walk forward when a loud noise made him turn his head to the side to look in that direction.

'Screeeeeech!'

And at the same time, the loud noise continued as a black car lost control and speedily rushed towards where Paine and the dog were standing.

Seeing the car getting closer and closer to the point that even Paine could tell that he couldn't completely avoid it even if he jumped to the side, Paine froze and didn't know what to do.

"Woof!"

Paine looked at the dog, who was still barking at him and innocently wagging his tail as if a car was not heading towards them.

And in an impulse or whatever made Paine move, Paine jumped and pushed the dog away.

"Damn it!"

'Craaaassh!'

When people saw what happened, they couldn't stop the gasps that escaped from their mouths. They couldn't believe that someone tried to save a dog and die in its stead.

Even Paine couldn't believe what he had done. Was this what they called a dog's death? He wanted to laugh, but the excruciating pain he was feeling all over his body was too much for his normal body to take.

The world before him started to disappear in a curtain of darkness, taking away his senses.

'Ttiiriing!'

However, before Paine completely lost his senses, he heard a woman's voice in his ears.

[Congratulations!]

[You are eligible to become a Beast Tamer!]

[Initiation task: Collect the eggs of a chicken and raise them!]

[Rescued beasts: 0/10]

[Level: 01]