Jack successfully scavenged enough supplies from the industrial park to restock, narrowly avoiding a confrontation with a group of starving survivors. The experience of navigating the Resource Lockout and the tension of the scavenger hunt triggered a system notification.
[LEVEL UP! Jack Wilder has reached Level 3.]
[HUNTER'S EDGE: New Skill Unlocked: Optimized Scavenging (Salvage Score).]
The system granted Jack a new layer of perception. Now, when he looked at a piece of wreckage or a discarded item, the Hunter's Edge provided an instant Salvage Score—a quantifiable assessment of its usefulness, repairability, and value.
This new ability was tested almost immediately. While driving through a remote desert highway, the ground ahead began to shift. The Highway Nexus triggered a localized Asphalt Rot, the road dissolving into corrosive sludge. Jack's eyes darted to the terrain. The system highlighted a specific section of cracked asphalt with a high Salvage Score. He realized it was a perfect makeshift ramp. Jack hit the gas, using his enhanced instincts and the truck's momentum to launch over the rot, the corrosive fumes stinging his eyes. He had survived another engineered disaster, his skills growing with every test the Nexus threw at him.