When Anghit woke up, he was already tied up, unable to move except wriggle pathetically like the worm he was. No, that would be an insult to worms.
Drip, drip
Anghit was woken up by dripping water over his head, some entering his nose, and sometimes his eyes.
Drip, drop
A few drops of water might not have effect on their own, but if they hit continuously, in time, it could create irritating pain, part of which was psychological. As time passed, the body's sensitivity was enhanced, making it worse.
"Is it comfortable?" the woman asked, and his eyes widened, remembering the demon who rose from hell. He looked at her in terror, shivering like a pitiful quail.
At that instant, he was reminded of a few scenes in the past wherein he said those exact words to several women he tortured in the exact same way.
Anghit hadn't believed in ghosts before, so he was wanton in his killing. He had been doing so for years without repercussions, unabashedly playing God.
So when he really encountered an actual vengeful ghost, the thought alone made him want to pee his pants.
"P-Please let me go! I…I will d-do anything!" he yelled, gasping, feeling suffocated by the drops of water falling on his face.
Naia sneered and kicked him in disgust. Her kick wasn't weak. Her current physique was better now, with her regenerative passive restoring her health. At the same time, she vaguely felt that she was already a bit stronger than Nadia before she arrived.
Nadia was not too weak because she had been bullied a lot and had to undergo a lot of manual labor at home. It was also how she was able to fight back and even injure the old man. However, the current state of the body could definitely allow her to take on the same old man who killed her with much more ease.
Not to mention, she had mastered every part of the body needed to kill, and she knew which parts of the body were the weakest. This was not only because every child in her generation had been trained to defend themselves and to kill, but it was also because her abilities' effectiveness was more pronounced if she could target the enemy's weakness.
She stabbed the old man's hamstrings with the machete she found outside. It was used to cut grass or something, but she wouldn't be surprised if human blood was found there, too.
"AHHHHHHH!!" The man screamed like a pig being slaughtered. "HELP! HELPPPP!" followed by his muffled screams, the endless dripping of water making him feel even more suffocated.
Naia looked at him, eyes filled with mockery. "No matter how much you scream, no one will hear you," she said. "Isn't that why you chose this place?"
For the first time, the old man felt a deep, bone-deep terror. He really would die a horrible death today, won't he?
But…Naia was not in a hurry.
While the man was bleeding, while undergoing the water drop torture at the same time, Naia took over his phone and…surfed the internet.
She went to the most popular search engine these days, called Doogle, and searched "How to make a text-based message more attractive" using his phone.
What was she doing this for?
It was to warn people about the incoming apocalypse, of course.
She lacked too many resources, and she didn't have connections at all. So, after rummaging through Nadia's memories, she came up with this method.
Using the internet.
But just posting it on a random forum was not enough; she hoped to make it 'viral', as the kids these days say. So now she was searching for various 'marketing strategies' to get as many views as she could.
It mentioned how low people's attention spans were and how one had to hook people from the first 3 seconds.
"It says to cut down the paragraphs into one or two sentence bites, and then overlay the texts on simple, but addictive images.
"It works best when using passive, but interesting, videos like making food, folding origami, videos of someone eating, and the like…"
She blinked, lifting her head in a mix of confusion and interest. "That works?"
Anghit: "..." Anghit's eyes were twitching in anger and agony, and seeing her so lackadaisical was making it even worse!
With gritted teeth, he continued to beg the monster woman to show mercy. "Please! Let me go—" his voice stopped when Naia shoved some random rag into his mouth.
For the next hour, Naia focused on making 'marketing materials'. It went straight to the point. Telling them that there would be a large meteor shower, followed by the sequence of disasters, as well as what to expect when the aliens awaken.
She tried to use all her (or Nadia's) diction skills, but that was limited. Not to mention, making it too long would be counterproductive, so she couldn't add many details at all.
After this, she posted it on all the old man's social media accounts and made a few more accounts. She then used the old man's money to boost and increase the visibility to as many people as possible, all over the world.
She also set it to run for three whole months, aiming for at least a few hundred million impressions.
She used more than ten million danas for this, rivaling the ad budget of big companies (according to Doogle). She'd use the remaining for her shopping, after she figured out how to transfer digital money without it getting traced back to her.
She also sent more detailed essays to various emails associated with government agencies. As for whether it would get the attention of relevant people, she did not know. Just in case, she scheduled the email to be sent about a week later.
Anyway, she didn't know if this was enough, and she had no idea how many people this news would actually reach, but for now, this was all she could do. She had to focus on her own survival and the sustainability of it all.
At this, she turned to look at the pale old man whose face was dripping not only with water, but also with sweat, tears, and snot. She was not sure if she'd be able to use this old man's money anytime soon. If she couldn't make it untraceable, then she'd be limited to using it when the apocalypse was about to come.
In the meantime, she'd need cash and other things.
She casually pulled out the rag in his mouth. "You will give me everything you have," she said. All the hard cash, jewelry, gold, and so on," she said. "If you can't satisfy me—"
SLASH!
She cut his other hamstring.
"AHHH!!" the man screamed again, and she stepped back just in time to avoid getting splattered on by his saliva.
"I will stab you like this every minute," she said, threateningly poking his fat stomach with the machete.
"Now, speak," she said. "Where are your treasures?"