The tent flap lifted again as a new and improved Jack stepped out. Smiling to himself in excitement, Jack decided that now would be the perfect time to explore. ‘I need to come up with a solution to my food problem. I don’t know if it was the gene pack or if I just need to eat more now. Heck, I don’t know many packs I should eat per meal and that was before using the gene pack.’

The smile on his face wilted at that thought. “I’m literally in a foreign world. How am I supposed to know what’s edible…” Grumbling audibly to himself, Jack decided to scout out his large rocky hill. “Micro mountain.” Jack said aloud. “That has a nice ring to it.” With a new name for his temporary home, Jack and his terrible naming sense took off to scout the other side of micro mountain.

Feeling better than ever, Jack started off at a light jog, gliding across the ground with little to no effort. He couldn’t stop smiling. “This is unreal!” Even the aches and pains he had this morning were gone. Along his path around micro mountain Jack easily maneuvered through the foliage, trees, and large rocks. Bobbing and weaving like a boxer to avoid low hanging branches and leaping over the rocks like they didn’t exist, he didn’t need to pause for a single instant.

‘That general had to be lying. There’s no way THIS fits within “normal human limits”’. Executing a perfect roundoff to clear a fallen tree, Jack landed with a simple superhero style landing. At this point, he realized he’d been slowly increasing the pace until he’d been at a near sprint. It was only a few minutes but sprinting for any amount of time should make someone moderately out of breath, but Jack was mostly fine. Sure, he was breathing more deeply than normal, but he could keep his breathing under control.

“That’s the broken tree from earlier… Did I run around the entire mountain?” Jack looked up at micro mountain and noticed familiar features. “This is insane.” Wide eyed, Jack started to realize the extent of his first evolution. Then he paused, something stood out to his improved vision. “Wait. Is that? NO WAY, are you kidding me?!”

Jack kicked himself mentally for being so blind. There, about sixty feet above his camp was a shadowy hole, a cave in the side of micro mountain. At this point he realized that in his excitement he forgot to pay attention for caves on his run around micro mountain.

At this moment a sobering feeling fell over Jack’s mind. ‘Why do I keep getting distracted? This is REAL’. Taking a deep breath, Jack took off up the mountain, completely ignoring the cave. ‘One thing at a time Jack. Let’s check it out later’.

Most of the time Jack didn’t need handholds as his speed gave him enough upward momentum to easily carry himself to the next foothold. He leapt his way up the mountain to get a good look at his surroundings. “Yeah, I’m pretty much superhuman now, but that doesn’t mean I can eat just anything.”

Stolen from Royal Road, this story should be reported if encountered on Amazon.

Reaching the top in record time, Jack stood at the peak of micro mountain and looked off into the distance. It appeared that his mountain was the tallest thing in the area for quite a distance. Almost immediately, Jack spotted what he’d been looking for. The bright sparkle of the sun reflecting from its flowing surface gave it away easily. “There it is. I think it’s time to do a little fishing.”

Jack chuckled “Well, not that I know how, but I’ll figure something out.”. Looking down, Jack groaned and felt his stomach do a flip. The trip down the rocky surface was much slower than the ascent up. ‘It’s all fun and games till you realize its one slip and you’re dead.’ Jack thought.

Perspiration dotted his forehead as his long-forgotten fear of heights made itself known in the worst way possible. The feeling of being invincible makes even the best forget that they’re still mortal.

At the bottom of micro mountain, Jack was just getting ready to head off towards the river he’d seen a little over ten minutes ago. “Hey, at least I can’t get lost. It’s hard to miss the enormous, jagged rock sticking out of the ground.” He muttered to himself.

The trip to the river was uneventful. ‘Pretty strange that there aren’t any living things other than plant life. It’s putting me a little on edge. I remember something about situations like this. If there’s an apex predator in the area all the wildlife tends to make itself scarce. If that’s the case, then where’s the predator?’ Jack wondered to himself.

He managed to reach the river in just under half an hour. Looking up, he noticed the position of the sun. He had maybe four to five hours before it started getting dark. It had been early morning before he’d taken the gene pack. ‘Evolutions take time. Noted.’ Jack nodded to himself and continued toward the edge of the river.

It was quickly apparent that the vacancy of the forest didn’t apply to the river. It was teeming with life. Fish ranging from the size of a football to even larger than himself inhabited the river. The river itself span over a hundred feet across.

“HOLY SHIT! They weren’t lying! These fish are huge!” Jack was both relieved and ecstatic! It was true that the conscripts weren’t the only experiments here. His food issue was easily solved with this.

Although he’d have to try the fish in small quantities to determine if they’re edible or not, he knew he didn’t have any other options. In this foreign environment he couldn’t test the fish on other creatures even if he could find them. They could have adapted to survive off those fish after all.

Jack pulled his survival knife from its sheath that was securely clipped to his cargo pants. He unscrewed the cap on the bottom and pocketed it. Jack knew that the handles of most survival knives were hollow. This allowed for things to be stored in there, but that’s not the main use of it. A stick could be carved to fit into the knife handle to create a makeshift spear. ‘Funny how watching those survival videos on the internet actually came in handy.’

A long twenty minutes of carving ensued. Eventually Jack got the straight, sturdy stick he’d found to just barely fit into the handle. This would ensure the knife fit snugly on the makeshift spear shaft. The shaft was about six feet in length. “Perfect” Jack smiled to himself marveling at his craftsmanship. He found a nice sized rock and banged the butt of the spear on it. This caused the top of the spear shaft to become even further wedged into the knife handle as the sudden stop caused the knife to be pulled further onto the spear shaft. “Time to start fishing.”