LOSS System: Last Store Standing

Jack looked from the damp patch of sand to the Dustchucks’ thick front claws.

The idea still sounded ridiculous.

Then again, so did negotiating with oversized groundhogs over bread and potatoes.

He glanced upward, clearly speaking to the system. “You’re not gonna explain the mission, right? Fine. I’ll figure it out myself.”

The system did not respond.

“Yeah. Thought so.”

Jack went back to the storage room and turned off the faucet. Then he grabbed a few loaves of bread from the shelves and returned to the glass door.

Outside, the Dustchucks were still gnawing on potatoes. More than twenty gray, dusty giants were crouched in front of the convenience store, eating with unusual focus. Every now and then, one of them would look up at the glass door. When it saw Jack coming back with bread, it immediately stopped chewing.

The Dustchuck with the pale scratch marks was crouched at the front of the group.

Jack studied it through the glass for a moment, then raised the bread and tapped lightly on the door.

“Hey, boss.”

The Dustchuck raised its head, and Jack held up the bread. “Come here. Got some bread for you.”

For a moment, the Dustchuck only stared at him. Then it actually started toward the glass door.

Jack blinked. “Wait, that worked?”

He opened the door just long enough to toss a loaf of bread outside. The Dustchuck picked it up but didn’t eat. It stayed by the door, watching him.

Jack’s mind immediately jumped to the next possibility.

“Okay. If you can come over when I call you, then maybe we can talk.”

Even as he said it, Jack realized how ridiculous it sounded. He was trying to negotiate with an oversized groundhog. If someone had told him that yesterday, he would have called the cops.

Still, ridiculous or not, he pointed at the sand outside and drew a circle in the air.

“You guys. Help me. Dig a hole. Over there.”

As he spoke, he pressed his palm downward.

“Nothing huge. Nothing crazy. Just a small one.”

The Dustchuck held the bread in its mouth and quietly watched him.

Looking into those faintly glowing eyes, Jack suddenly felt like an idiot trying to give directions to a tourist who didn’t speak his language.

“Not getting it?”

Unwilling to give up, he crouched down and drew a circle on the floor with his finger, then made a digging motion.

“Here. Dig. Make a hole,” he said, holding his hands apart. “A small one. Not huge. About this big.”

The Dustchuck kept looking at him.

The whole scene was absurd no matter how he looked at it. Jack stared at it for a while. At last, he gave up and patted his own forehead.

“Alright. Guess I gave you guys way too much credit.” Jack sighed and waved the Dustchuck off. “Go on, then.”

“You’re animals, after all. Lining up, nodding, and shaking hands is already wild enough. I can’t expect you to actually understand me.”

The Dustchuck looked at Jack, then looked back at the group behind it. It did not immediately go back to eating. Instead, it stood there with the bread in its mouth.

The Dustchuck eventually turned and returned to the front of the group, still carrying the bread.

Jack was just about ready to give up when it let out a sharp squeak.

Every Dustchuck still eating potatoes stopped.

Jack stared.

Then several of them broke away from the group.

They left the potatoes behind and hurried to a spot nearby. A few lowered their heads and started digging, their front claws throwing sand to both sides.

One Dustchuck became two. Then three.

Soon, more of them joined in.

Jack stared through the glass.

“Holy crap. They actually got it?”

The Dustchuck with the pale scratch marks stayed off to the side, the loaf of bread still clamped in its mouth. With the others digging around it, it really did look like a construction supervisor.

Jack stared at the scene, barely holding back a laugh. “Fantastic!” He gave a small fist pump. “Dustchucks? Forget that. These are employee-chucks!”

Outside the door, the “employee-chucks” were digging with incredible enthusiasm.

The longer Jack watched, the more impressed he became. Potatoes suddenly felt a little cheap for actual labor.

“Alright. If you guys are gonna work this hard, I can’t be cheap.”

He turned and went upstairs, took a steak from the freezer, and quickly cut it into small pieces before putting them into a bag.

By the time he came back downstairs with the cut beef, the commotion outside had grown much louder. Sand was constantly being pushed to both sides. The Dustchucks were moving in and out one after another. Some were digging, some were pushing dirt, and a few were scraping at the edges.

For a minute, Jack was impressed.

Then he reached the glass door and saw what they were actually doing.

The small pit he had imagined was nowhere to be found. Instead, the Dustchucks were carving a deep hole into the sand, and it was still growing.

He had only wanted them to dig a small pit that could hold water. But these employee-chucks were acting like they had signed a contract for a major construction project.

At this rate, if they kept digging, there was going to be a small meteor crater in front of the convenience store.

Jack looked down at the bag of beef in his hand, then looked up at the group of highly motivated Dustchucks outside.

For a long moment, Jack had nothing to say.

“Yeah. Figures. I still have to do it myself.”

Jack opened the door and quickly walked outside with the beef. He dumped the bag of cut beef onto the ground, didn’t dare stay any longer than necessary, then turned and hurried back into the store.

As soon as the smell of meat spread, the Dustchucks’ movements clearly slowed. A few of them immediately raised their heads, their eyes locked straight on the pile of beef.

Jack quickly waved at the Dustchuck with the pale scratch marks.

“Hey. Come here. Yeah, you.”

The Dustchuck heard his voice and walked over.

Jack pointed at the hole, then quickly waved both hands.

“No more digging. Stop.”

As he spoke, he crossed his arms in front of himself, making a big X.

“No digging. Done. Understand?”

The Dustchuck looked from Jack to the hole, then back again, clearly not following.

Jack opened his mouth, then closed it.

Right. Explaining “project scope” to a giant desert rodent was probably asking too much.

He waved it off and pointed at the beef on the ground.

“Forget it. Just eat the meat.”

The Dustchuck looked at him for a while, as if it had finally given up trying to understand why he had suddenly stopped the project. Then it turned around and gave a short squeak.

The Dustchucks that had still been digging gradually stopped. A moment later, they all gathered around the beef.

Jack stood behind the door, watching the “employee-chucks” that had just been digging lower their heads and eat meat. He couldn’t help sighing again.

“Alright, fine.”

“Understanding ‘start work’ is already pretty damn impressive.”

Jack looked at the big, deep hole outside and let out a dry laugh.

“Looked great in my head. Total disaster in real life.”

The system’s voice rang out at once. “Human, most shortcuts do not work.”

Jack immediately frowned. “This was just one tiny miscalculation—”

“Mission countdown: six days and twenty-three hours.”

Jack: “…”

Before he could argue again, the Dustchucks outside suddenly stopped eating.

The one with the pale scratch marks lifted its head first. Its ears twitched, and the piece of beef in its mouth dropped onto the sand.

A second later, every Dustchuck went still.

Jack’s smile faded.

“…What now?”

From somewhere beyond the sand, a low growl rolled toward the convenience store.