I opened the noodle and started eating what was inside.
"Oh, seems alright."
Now I gotta try a different noodle...
Noodle with the taste of rotten potatoes, let's eat that one.
I eat it.
"Uugh, nice, I'm full—well, almost full."
•Get out of here!•
Actually, I need more... Let's eat this... and this too.
•Too many thugs spreading around the city•
Damn...
I just realized I worked for so long, collected all those bottles—and ate everything in a few minutes...
Well, at least I don't feel hungry anymore.
Phew, damn... I'll have to collect bottles again.
I need a lot of bottles.
•Hey, punks, stop bothering people•
I started collecting bottles in forest.
•Bottles! Bring in your bottles!•
I urgently needed to collect bottles, because I still needed healing.
But actually... I thought about it and realized I wasn't that badly hurt, and I didn't really want to go to the hospital, because in my city, hospitals required a lot of money.
Now I'll gather the money.
Then I'll buy a baseball bat, and maybe a jacket too—just so I can defend my hideout somehow.
After all, I spent 20 years building my own hideout, and now some bums invaded it, beat me with advantage and unexpectedness , so to speak. I can't exactly lock up my hideout with a padlock or anything.
So I'll deal with them, but I still needed time...
Right now I only had a noodle that tasted like stinky meat, but whatever, it's fine.
•Keep working, keep working, I'm watching over this area•
For me, it was good enough.
Seems like the city ran out of bottles, and bottle collecting isn't a steady job—bottles eventually run out in the city.
•Bottles! Bring in your bottles!•
With those thoughts, I was gathering the last bottles, and just as I reached for the final one, suddenly someone else appeared in my line of sight—he also wanted to grab that bottle.
•We're working here•
But I was faster and took the bottle. Then I saw the person who tried to grab it.
•I see you, just ignore me•
He looked like a thug, and he ran off as soon as I took the bottle. Strange... those thugs again, bothering me.
After that, I walked past a tree and spotted a small bottle worth five rubles.
Wow, I was surprised.
And then I went on searching for more bottles, heading toward the place where the thugs used to sit and drink.
I looked over the steps but found neither thugs nor the bottles they drank from.
"Those bastards didn't even leave a single bottle for me."
•Bottle collecting? A fine profession•
•Hello there•
Alright then, I'll cross the road, there seem to be some dumpsters over there, maybe I'll find some bottles...
It was already night, and cold outside. I had no shelter. And I was still in damp clothes after the sewers.
•Do you have a license?•
I saw one dumpster, and whispered:
"This is insane," I whispered, once I realized I'd have to sleep in this dumpster.
Alright... first I'll lie down, get a bit more comfortable to stay warm, and sleep deeply...
After that, I fell into the calmest sleep, as if I were still back in my hideout.
•Show your papers•
•Who are these thugs?•
•Here you go•
•Ah, I see•
•Police•
•Very troublesome•
•Bottles! Bring in your bottles!•
•Alright, I'll throw him with a suplex in a sec•
And then, all through the night, around our homeless main character, voices echoed—conversations, actions, scenes unfolding.
And it all continued into the morning.