He struggled a little to fall asleep, but that was mostly due to overthinking about things. Once he managed to calm his mind he fell asleep almost instantly, his body worn with fatigue. The bed was surprisingly comfortable for being what it was, naturally, it couldn’t measure up to a real modern bed, but he’d take any comfort that he could.
Having undressed before he went to bed, feeling surprisingly safe in the cave, he decided to have a proper morning bath and ‘shower’ in the waterfall before he dried up and dressed. With the drying, as it had to happen passively, this took a short while. Showering in the waterfall worked surprisingly fine, though he was up to his waist in water at the time due to the depth of the pool it was still good. The water wasn’t exactly warm, but not cold either, it was fine, having been heated by the sun and sun-warmed rocks over time, it could be defined as pleasantly lunk warm.
Once he had dried enough to not have the clothing be problematic, he clothed and geared himself properly, still missing scabbards for his weapons, but since he never really grew tired using the Psyhands, it was fine in a way but there was something just pleasant having it strapped to your body, it felt more hands-free even though he had 24 hands to work with. Packing both water and food this time, he felt better and more ready for a day of stuff happening.
Pondering for a short moment, he wondered which way was to the ruins, he remembered seeing a few, but also seeing more camps, boulder mountains and pools... there was a lot of stuff around even though the island was massive. Deciding that it didn’t matter, he headed for the thing he remembered being somewhat this way.
Trekking through the jungle, fully kitted out with defences and boons, though missing a bunch of cheap daggers, felt great! The fear of getting blindsided by something random was dramatically lowered. Though he could still be blindsided and critted into oblivion, the fear of dying from a rogue claw was gone. He still proceeded carefully, listening for anything that sounded weird or out of place. Most creatures ran away as soon as he came into range of them, this was the same for what looked like mini-leopards and what he could best explain as a six-legged, scorpion-tailed T-rex the size of a housecat. He... had questions about that last one...
The trek was calm and nice, he didn't even need to defend himself this time. Though walking towards the ‘back’ of the island, compared to the main mountain not placed in the centre of the island, meant that he was walking away from the camp he fucked with yesterday. Which in one way was fine, he probably had to return there later, there were also other camps and things around so he might happen on one of those now that he had lost track of where he was. Always able to see the massive mountain he had a point of reference, but not a good one to know where he was on the floor.
He came to a clearing in the near distance, slowed down considerably and did his best to sneak closer. Through the trees, he could see a camp, or at least what remained of one. It seemed like it was left in a hurry, and lots of resources were left to fade on their own. Tents were torn, boxes shattered, clothing spread around and shredded, it just looked like a bunch of strong toddlers with weapons washed through the place. He was uncertain, places like these don’t feel logical that they’d be empty. Animals or something would move in.
Not many seconds later, he heard a familiar screech. A Goblin came out of one of the fallen tents with pants on his head and a single shoe. He laughed as he stumbled about ‘clothed’. Other Goblins looked at him and joined him in laughter. They were out of Sam’s reach, but since he only needed 12 hands to control his current arsenal, leaving 10 hands, or 5 Energy free for other things. He could use that energy to almost double his range, bringing the three Goblins within range.
Setting his target as one of the two who weren’t all dressed up, he sent his weapons out, slicing at him with all his speed.
[ Silent Killer activated. ]
[ Critical hit, double damage. ]
[ Critical hit, double damage. ]
[ Critical hit, double damage. ]
He was lucky today, three of his weapons landed a critical hit, one being the Moonblade. The Goblin fell immediately. The others, not able to see where the attacks came from, panicked and looked around, giving him a second chance for an attack.
[ Shadow Strike triggered, target is blind for 1 second. ]
The Goblin survived, but Sam could barely see his eyes losing focus, looking around like someone turned off the lights as he started panicking. However, it only lasted a second and allowed a second attack. It was already heavily damaged, barely standing from the first attack, he had zero chance in the second.
With two of his friends dead, the dressed-up Goblin panicked and tried to run away from the carnage. The one shoe only hampered him in the sense of speed, opening his back for the floating weapons. The first volley of attacks landed solid, with no triggers nor critical hits, leaving the Goblin alive but very hurt, it staggered away as the blades came back to finish the job.
[ Experience gained: +900. ]
Pulling his weapons back to the jungle, waiting to see if anyone reacted to this, he remained there for what felt like a minute or so, listening, waiting. Having heard nothing, not even far away movement, he decided to come out of hiding and have a look through the camp. His weapons were floating around him, ready to strike at a moment's notice, as he started by checking the closest tent.
Besides a few torn pieces of clothing, there was nothing in there. He harvested the Goblin’s Cores before continuing, netting him three. Continuing to check out the camp he couldn’t see other Goblins either, seems the ones he killed might be the only ones. Finding only things destroyed or smeared with enough shit that he don’t want to touch it even with the Psyhands, he didn’t see much of interest. The whole place, which seemed like it used to be a decent forest camp, with leather tents, fires, storage and workbenches, was now reduced to trash.
Continuing through the camp he overheard some excited and almost desperate-sounding Goblins. Sneaking towards the sounds he wondered what was going on. Moving behind a tent he saw two more, jumping and reacting to something, one picked up a rock and threw it at something, and the other stabbed something with his spear. Sam snuck over to another tent and as he rounded it he could see more.
The two were torturing some creature who was caught in a large, sturdy wooden cage. It was not unlike the one he was locked up in a few days ago, but he couldn’t see what it was, something furry, so some animal. Well, they were made of Experience, and Goblins were horrible existences anyway, being within range meant that he had extra energy to burn, which was going to go in their eyes.
The tried and true method of focusing Force Pulses into their eyes left them unguarded for his weapons, raking across their chest and back it didn’t take many seconds to kill them both.
[ Experience gained: +600. ]
Walking over he intended to get their cores before continuing, but now that he was closer he could see what they were attacking. The wooden sturdy cage, with smaller holes than the human-trapping one he was in before, had what looked like a humanoid fox girl inside. Her once russet fur was matted, clumped, pale and looked horrible. She was covered in various wounds, he could see blunt force trauma from the thrown rock, and a few wounds on her hands and legs from being stabbed by a dull spear. They didn’t look deep but probably still hurt, the Goblins probably wanted to eat her. She looked incredibly malnourished, barely awake and barely alive. She let out a weak whimper as she managed to barely open her eyes to look in Sam’s direction, her pink and purple eyes looked at him with only pain and barely any life left before her eyes closed.
Sam contemplated what to do, she was a beastfolk and would most likely die very soon, he could end her pain and collect the XP, or just leave and let nature handle it. The nicest thing would probably be to let her out of her misery, he didn’t have any healing potions or any training to help her. She’d be fucked anyway so might as well.
As he pulled in the Moonblade, he saw her force her eyes open and try to drag herself to face him, only barely managing to move herself. He was surprised she had that kind of energy left, but she proceeded to let out a whine followed by what sounded like words.
You could be reading stolen content. Head to the original site for the genuine story.
“Kirn... var...” The words sounded pained and desperate. “...Krarn.” She added before her eyes closed as she let out a weak whining sound.
This caught him off guard, she was... communicating with him? Was she asking him for help in whatever passes for a language in her mind? He was intrigued but at the same time wary. If he were to help her, would she turn on him later properly seeing that he’s a human?
The other beastfolk he had slaughtered in the Dungeons didn’t speak much, at least not towards him or Janik, he also couldn’t actively remember if he saw any talk between them. Was there a difference between the Beastfolk in the Dungeons compared to the outside? He had met Kobolds before, they were talking, and some even knew English. The Harpy and Kobold at the Brothel not only spoke English but were on Earth. Were they originally from a Dungeon or Aetheria?
So many questions he didn’t know the answer to. If there was a difference between Dungeon and non-Dungeon creatures, then this island wouldn’t be a Dungeon and more like any area of Aetheria.
But, if nothing else, he knew as an intimate fact that some beastfolk were friendly, though he didn’t know why there was a difference. He had read some information that a Beastmaster was involved in the Brothel, which would explain a few things there. They could tame monsters to fight for them, suppose he found a different way. But the Kobolds in the village in Aetheria, or the other ones on Earth working with TAC, there were a lot of them not bound to a Beastmaster, did they have some System contract like the Companion bond to Elara?
Sam wanted Janik here for several reasons, this just made him want him here even more. Having only been here for a few days the vacation feel he got last night was long gone.
His mind returned to the matter at hand, he crouched next to the caged dying creature and wondered what he should do with her. The part of him that originally wanted to just end her suffering was still thinking that, but other parts of him now saw her differently, she spoke to him, though somewhat mumbly due to weakness and pain, it sounded like actual words.
“Damn it.” Sam commented to himself. His internal conflict of paranoia and wanting to help were struggling, but it seemed that the wish to help or learn from her was higher. Worst-case scenario he could always just kill her later if it proved to be a necessity.
Opening the cage was not an issue, it had a similar locking mechanism to the one he was in before. As he pulled the door open, forcing its movement due to the lack of proper hinges, the Beastfolk didn’t move or react, she was breathing but that was about it. Taking a closer look at her before he went in he noted that she had two tails, the first time he had seen that.
He started by poking her, just to see if there was a reaction, his blade swarm was ready to go in case there was something, but wanting to make sure nothing was going to happen before he properly touched her he took his time. Poking, gently shaking and somewhat trying to wake her. Nothing worked, and the only thing he got from her was weak and pained grunts.
In the end, he picked her up, and she reacted to the act with pained whimpers but didn’t resist or do anything else. He was a bit surprised at how easy and hard it was at the same time to carry her. He didn’t know her exact weight but he remembered similar weights being a huge problem in his corner store time. That didn’t mean that he didn’t struggle at all at the moment, he was far from strong, but his Player boost served him well at the moment.
Setting back to his cave he took his time to make sure he didn’t slip or trip, though he took the more direct route to get back. Walking through the jungle he found that the animal life was more interested in him now than before. Before he was a single and healthy individual, now there was a wounded creature with him, probably sending off smells to their more sensitive noses. But to Sam’s luck, his way of combat had never needed his hands, so he was just as dangerous and ready to go as before. Even though he was being severely physically drained from carrying her through the jungle, the animals were scared off by Force Launching some random rocks or sticks in their direction. Needing several stops and breaks on the way, he took a lunch break on the way, sharing some of his fish with her. She was too weak to even open her eyes but he put it in her mouth, letting her take her time. Very, very small pieces, as well as a few drops of water at a time. He didn’t want her to choke after all the effort he was putting into getting her back. She ate and drank the minuscule amounts he gave her, although she probably used more energy to do that than she gained from it.
During his lunch break, the island’s weather decided to suddenly turn and open up a torrent of rain and wind. A rainstorm came from nowhere making visibility extremely low. He could still barely see the mountain as he neared it, so it wasn’t critical but it was annoying. Now, instead of just carrying the Beastfolk, he had to do it while drenched. The only good thing was that some of the grime and dirt were washed off her passively, which was probably good for her wounds.
The walk back took considerably longer than the walk to the camp he found her in. The many breaks probably didn’t help time, but they helped his stamina considerably. As he got back to the pool in front of his cave, he decided to sit her down in the stream leading out from it. It wasn’t in a comfortable temperature but as she had seemingly been locked up a long time, she was soiled in more ways than one. The rain had done a good job of getting this off her, and him, on the way, but it was still very much present. This forced him to get a little intimate in touching but he decided that the result was important enough to go ahead. It didn’t feel comfortable doing this without consent but it was a necessity.
In the end, he finally walked in behind the waterfall and placed her on his makeshift bed. She had been shivering for a while, which made a lot of sense as he was doing the same, even considering the heat he got from exertion he felt a bit cold in the wind when wet.
Spreading out his many hands, he started several things at once, the most important was to get a fire going. This was done in record time as he was getting used to cheating with his screw-machine spinning Psyhand, using his other hands he picked in some food and water, doing his best to feed her a tiny piece at a time. As the fire started properly and lit up he decided to have a look at her wounds and at least try to clean them.
Not having any wound dressing or any proper cleaning agents, he had a bowl of water and some moss... It was better than nothing but he didn’t expect this to go fine without infection. Checking her body for wounds he used the damp moss to try and at least rub anything he could out of the wounds. This re-opened some of them due to his inexperience but at least he got them ‘clean’. He checked her entire body, having to move her to the sides and almost flip her around to clean the wounds on her back. Her eyes vaguely opened and looked in his direction as he did this, he used her brief moment of mental presence to explain to her that he was cleaning her wounds. He also used this time to feed her little, small pieces like before, as well as give her water. It felt like better timing than when she was out cold.
A secondary effect of this was that he got a very good look at her. He was kind of surprised to notice that in addition to the russet fur, she had actual hair. Though lacking in lustre it seemed that it was strawberry blonde, having some hint of red or pink in it. It was long enough to reach past her shoulders being trimmed around her face. Her body was covered in fur, the russet red covering most of her, but from her cheekbones and down her face it was a creamy white. This white continued down her neck, chest, stomach and crotch, it continued on the inside of her thighs down to her feet. Her larger ears had a black line of fur along their edges, her eyes were as he saw earlier a purple/pink mix. Her tails looked large and fluffy, though still being wet and not maintained made them look somewhat scruffy, they had the same russet colour with white tips. He was fascinated by her hands, they had a human shape with fingers and everything, but there were still paw-pads, though not as large as on a dog they were still there. Her fingers ended up in sharp claws, he could see these being good for combat as well as things like climbing or taking down prey. Her digitigrade legs were kind of interesting, and her feet were more paw-like than human feet. All in all, she was pretty similar to what he’d expect a fox person to be, he was just a bit intrigued having inspected one this close. Though it was all done in the sense of cleaning her wound and gauging her status, it was hard to not take a peek at certain other areas as he did so.
In the end, he felt confident that he had done what he could. Not what was necessary, but what he could with his limited knowledge and extremely limited resources. The only thing he had enough of was the heat of the fire, food and water. So that’s what he was going to do for now, keep her warm and dry, letting her natural healing handle itself, and keeping her going with food and water.