Kaden spent next months doing pretty much the same thing. Learning formations, hunting, cultivating and then repeat until rest was needed.
The change of temperature, as time passed, was ignored by Kaden. Nights were starting to get cold, but not for Kaden. He still felt always that comfortable warmth. He thought he would solve the problem, if his natural state was not enough at some point.
During this time he also ran into two dire beasts. He had to escape from the first one, a bear which looked similar to the Steelfur Bear he had seen, but was slightly different. It’s strength was pretty similar, though. Kaden was not a heavy weight like the bear so he assumed he would get smashed, if he didn’t run. It felt much stronger than Kaden anyway.
The second one he managed to kill. He suffered some injuries, but not major ones. It had been a snake. He was not sure, if it was poisonous, but its not like he allowed it to bite to begin with. It had managed to slam at him with its tail while Kaden had been holding it down by the head. Somehow Kaden felt that snakes specifically were easy prey.
Still, Kaden didn’t feel too happy about his victory despite the meat being relatively good. The core was roughly as big as his and when he ate it the effect was much smaller than what the cougar’s had been. It was almost not noticeable. He came to realize that he would need stronger cores than his own to gain much from them at all.
As for his studies, Kaden had managed to become quite proficient at making straight formation lines. He had managed to put some of them together, but he had not managed anything else than to make, whatever it was stuck on, explode. Anything more complex had eluded Kaden so far. It was much easier to draw lines than curves or other more interesting shapes that existed in formation diagrams Kaden had found. Not to mention as far as he could tell the tougher ones were even layered on top of each other. How was that supposed to work?
While he was trying to carefully carve a thin curved line, Kaden heard a sound. It came from deeper in the forest.
*grooonkkh*
He knew that sound. This had been within his expectations. The entire area probably belonged to the high beast boar he had ran into. The sound was a command roar. It seemed there was some amount of aura or similar magic effect tied to it. While he surely had never learned ‘boar language’, if such thing even existed, Kaden was able to tell deep within himself the intent and information carried in the command.
There was a need to obey this command. Kaden was a weaker creature and once the ruler of the area demanded something, he would either have to obey or challenge the command. Technically a third option did exist, fleeing. He was not sure how disobedience would become known, but he felt this surely would happen.
“High beasts sure are the rulers around here”, Kaden muttered and stood up. “They can just demand obedience and expect everyone to do their bidding.”
Kaden was not sure, if he liked the idea, but he was not done yet in the forest. Besides, the intent contained in the roar interested Kaden. It seemed some humans had stolen something that had supposedly belonged to the high beast boar. Whatever was taken needed to be returned.
“Truly, which idiot decided to steal from a high beast?” Kaden thought as he leaped and left his home cave.
General direction was included so he knew where to go. Kaden assumed the boar could not, for some reason, chase the thieves by itself. Perhaps some treasures? Kaden quickly shrugged away those ideas about any treasures. The thieves had not been able to do so, but Kaden was not going to become idiot due to greed.
The forest was in uproar once again. Could the high beast just roar something daily and force everyone in the surroundings drop whatever they were doing? Perhaps there were some limitations. Some form of respect? Kaden surely respected the boar. First of all, it could annihilate him, if it wanted to. Second, the boar had went along with his suggestion and killed a lot of people that just had to die. In fact, Kaden kind of felt like he owed the boar quite a bit.
As for where to look for the thieves. The direction suggested that everything had happened deeper inside the forest. Since they were humans, they should be running as fast as they could out of the forest before beasts tear them to shreds. This logic gave Kaden relatively good direction to look at.
After traveling a certain time, he did indeed find sings of combat. Despite the command, Kaden was not planning on commiting a suicide like he had seen many beasts do while under effect of similar commands. From the signs of fighting, there was not too extensive damage, so Kaden assumed there were no one at Formation stage.
This made Kaden think that perhaps these idiots just did not understand what they had done until it was too late. A few Channel Opening stage people going against a high beast?
He would only have to be careful so he should be able to run away in case of danger. Another high beast would not act on the boars call and dire beasts seemed to get along with each other, if they were following commands. Thats the way it had been before.
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Kaden had not been a hunter, but he could follow tracks. The escaping thieves did not have time to be careful so no tracks were hidden or otherwise muddled. He still heard sounds of beasts around him, but he figured most of them were not too intelligent. Kaden knew general direction and how to track. While beasts could often follow scent trail, fly or some other advantage, they were still going to be a bit behind.
“I wonder, if there are some rewards for all this”, Kaden thought to himself and followed the tracks. Due to his extremely good sight, it was effortless to find the tracks and follow them.
It took for a while for him to start hearing sounds and even talking. Kaden seemed to be much faster than the thieves. He could see them from far away so before acting he was going to observe for a moment.
He saw a group of three people. They seemed roughly equally powerful. Would he be able to defeat the three of them? Perhaps some planning was in order. Team of three Channel Opening stage hunters in Dashire could beat a dire beast reliably without fatalities, so Kaden needed to go smart about this. He could always wait for beasts to catch up and reap the rewards while everyone was occupied killing each other.
What did they even take? They seemed to be carrying some packs. Kaden had never heard or seen something like his storage pouch, but it was possible these people might have one or more too.
There were indeed some problems to solve.
There was no ambushing them. They were on full alert. It would be extremely difficult.
“Guess, its best to cheat a bit”, Kaden thought while thinking of a way to solve his problems. By cheat, he meant slight deception.
Kaden leaped out and aproached the escaping group. They noticed Kaden immediately, but looked slightly surprised to see someone like him suddenly appear in front of them. Kaden seemed too young and he was alone and wore ragged clothes with blood stains. They slightly lowered their swords.
“Who are you, kid?!” Said one of them. The one that had been at the front, likely the leader.
Kaden only gave a closer look at the group.
“Could this kid live here?” Said another. “Dirty and doesn’t speak. Though, I think he is barely at Channel Opening. I wonder how he survived this far before that.”
“Pure luck most likely, perhaps its someones bastard kid they left for the beasts to eat and got raised instead”, said the remaining person. “We can’t stop. Weird kid or not, we should continue.”
“Thats right, underestimate me. The plan worked. You let me close and you aren’t even attacking”, Kaden thought and then said. “Are you the people who stole from the high beast?”
They quickly turned to look at Kaden.
“Shit, I knew we shouldn’t have taken those herbs, it was too easy. A high beast...”, said one of them.
“Oh, herbs that the high beast had found and let grow? How interesting”, Kaden thought and then continued. These people blabbered everything he needed to know. “You idiots riled up all the beasts in the local area. Are you trying to die?”
“What is it to you kid?” Said the leader with slightly greedy grin. “From how you look, you live here, right? Not sure how human survives here, but you seem to know how things work here. You must know all nooks and crannies where to hide? How about you come with us, show us good paths and how to escape from the beasts and we let you live?”
The other two grinned and raised their weapons.
“Are you people from the Saint Empire?” Kaden asked as if he didn’t even notice the threat.
“Where else? Sacronan heretics can’t get here without tak...”, The leader started.
*SPLAK*
Without warning Kaden rammed his claws into the leader’s chest. He had just wanted to know who they were. They had not expected Kaden to be able to move like that. He was as fast as a dire beast and Channel Opening stage people usually needed weapons and preparations to fight one, if they wanted a sure victory. These people might have weapons, but surely not preparations.
This was the first chance for Kaden, after his rebirth, to kill people. Not that these idiots were really relevant targets, but since they had ended up before him in so covenient manner, he saw no reason not to kill them. Indeed, such targets could just die. They had no use to reach for greater goals.
He would show no mercy. Nor would he expect any. They were trash of Saint Empire. Letting them leave would be a liability too. They would tell people about him. Someone might become interested. They just needed to die.
Kaden had managed to lethally injure their leader, the strongest one before they could even fight back. His clawed hand dragged out portion of the leaders chest along with some organs and entrails. By the time Kaden let go and the man fell to the ground, he was already dead.
With core at maximum power, he leaped at the next closest target. His hair plume glowed as his claw filled with flame. There was only a feeble attempt of defense. They were still in surprised state. Kaden clawed at the man who raised his weapon to block. His claw struck on the sword and was blocked, but the flame was released in explosive manner and ignited the man hands, clothes, hair… basically most of his upper body.
The man screamed as he burned. Kaden took the chance to kick on his leg and with strength of his body, it was easy to shatter a bone. The man fell to the ground, still burning. Kaden was intending to finish him, but he suddenly felt pain on his side. The third person had struck him with a sword.
It did leave a wound, there was not getting around it, but dire beasts could easily take several of such wounds without difficulties. Human would suffer grievous wound, but not a dire beast.
This had surprised the third man so Kaden managed to kick him. Seemingly all air had been knocked out of the third man as he slammed against a tree.
“Gahha ahhh, what… what are you?!” He managed to croak.
“Think of me as your death”, Kaden only replied calmly. “You people don’t get to live, so I’m correcting that.”
The man got up and tried to run. Kaden ran after him and was much faster. The wound that he had received barely even bled. It would heal very soon. It was not even hindering him.
“No! Don’t kill me! I’ll give you all the herbs!” Shouted the man in terror. “Aah, I’ll give you everything I have. Here is all my money too!”
Kaden didn’t listen and leaped at the man. There was another attempt at defending, but with Kaden’s strength, he pushed those defenses aside and tore open the man’s throat. Kaden watched and let the man bleed to death and listened his pathetic gurgles.
It was finished. Last time he killed someone himself was during the battle. It had not even been a real fight. Now it had been and Kaden noticed he didn’t really feel much at all. Just some feeling of success that he killed some saints. It was probably fine. Why would he need to feel something about people who should die anyway.