As Max lay there on the ground, he was weighed down by a sense of heaviness. It was not just his low Stamina, but also the gravity of his situation. The fight was over and the victory was his. Yes, there was a sense of relief and joy, but he was also unsettled by the violence. He had just killed three creatures that were intelligent and sentient. He had even spoken to one of them, no matter how brief the exchange was.
‘Was it right for me to kill them? Sure they had trespassed on my ‘home’, but could I have talked to them first? But if I did, I would have lost my element of surprise.’
Max wasn’t sure what to think of his situation, did he do the right thing? He had prioritized his survival over everything else. He had even used Ma Erk as bait. In the end, things turned out fine, but what if the last wolf was much closer and the little wolf couldn’t make it back to the cave in time?
This was his second kill in this world, but thinking of the Hawk he knew that situation was different. That was completely in self-defense. The Hawk had attacked him out of nowhere and the only way for him to live was by defeating it which happened to be by killing it. Even though it was in self-defense, he still didn’t know how to feel about killing something with his bare hands. He was reminded of how his arm had sunk deep into the Hawk’s eyelids. The memory gave him shivers.
‘Am I just too soft? My mindset is still that of someone from the 21st century where safety is an expectation. But here, that is not the case. I wasn’t looking for trouble nor do I want trouble, but trouble found me.’
Letting out a sigh, Max had a feeling that this wasn’t going to be the last time he’d have this internal debate.
Patting the ground, he called out to the young wolf, “Come here.”
After a short moment of silence, the little guy slowly made his way over.
“Boss. Okay?” There was concern in Ma Erk’s question.
Max was a bit touched, they’ve only been together for a short time, but it seems that the little wolf had really taken him as the pack leader.
“I’ll be okay. I just need to rest for a bit”.
Ma Erk went up to his face and gave it a few licks and settled in the crook between his neck and uninjured shoulder. Max reached his hand up and idly scratched Ma Erk’s back. Just like that a human and wolf passed the night. Max would wake up every now and then to check on his HP. At first, it was slowly ticking up, but once his body had healed enough to remove the Bleeding status, his HP increased a lot faster.
…
Waking up the next morning, Max could feel the warmth coming from the little wolf on his shoulder. It was a nice feeling, not as nice as an actual bed with a pillow, but was still an improvement from the previous night. His other shoulder was almost as good as new after a night’s rest. There were a few blemishes in the shape of a bite mark, but that was the extent of what was left. The damage had been all regenerated along with his HP. This was the second time he had recovered from a life-threatening injury without medical intervention and he was amazed at this new body of his.
‘Do all cultivators heal this quickly or is this an effect of the system?’
Max was so tired from last night’s ordeal that he had completely forgotten to check on his notifications. For the most part, he already knew what they were going to say. With a small application of focus, his notifications appeared again in front of him.
Enemy killed. For killing an enemy above your cultivation, you gain additional experience.
+60 experience points
Level Up.
For leveling up, you gained the following:
+2 free stat points
The level up brought him to level five. While reviewing his character sheet, his cultivation had also progressed by 1. Max was more than halfway to both his next Level and Cultivation. Since he had his sheet already opened, he checked on his Weakened Body status. Before his fight with Rik-re, he noticed that his stats were a bit higher than what he expected.
Weakened Body - Your body is in a weakened state. All physical stats -2.
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‘That’s what I thought.’
After double-checking that his Weakened Body condition had indeed improved, Max refocused on his new notifications.
‘Hmm, 60 experience points? That was the same amount of points I got from killing the Hawk.’
From the corner of his eyes, he saw Rik-re. It was disturbing that he had fallen asleep next to the corpse. Max sat up which also roused Ma Erk from his sleep. Once he was a fair distance from Rik-re’s body he used Analyze.
Analyzing…
Ling Wolf, Rik-re
Status: Deceased
Cultivation: Body Tempering 5th Stage
‘5th Stage of Body Tempering hm. The same stage as the Hawk.’
Max used Analyze on the other two wolves in term.
Analyzing…
Ling Wolf, Dumb Lackey
Status: Deceased
Cultivation: Body Tempering 3rd Stage
Analyzing…
Ling Wolf, Ugly Lackey
Status: Deceased
Cultivation: Body Tempering 3rd Stage
This wasn’t a laughing matter, taking a life is serious, but he couldn’t help but let a smile tug at the corner of his lips when he saw the names that were assigned to the two wolves by Analyze.
‘Both 3rd Stage of Body Tempering and I got 30 experience points from both of them. Maybe it’s 10 points per cultivation level? If that’s true, it would be 50 experiences for the 5th Stage of Body Tempering assuming that it scales linearly.’
Max went back to the notifications for the two lackey kills, they didn’t mention anything about additional experience points since they were the same cultivation as Max.
‘If it is 50 experience points for 5th Stage of Body Tempering, then the 10 additional points I got was the bonus for the Cultivation difference. I think that’s sound reasoning, but I am going to need more data.’
Thinking through the whole experience breakdown, Max was also reminded of how his character sheet had glitched out right before his fight and when it was back to normal he had gained the Agility stat. What's more, he actually felt faster and lighter. Focusing on the stat, a new prompt appeared.
Agility - Your physical speed. Determines how quickly you can move your body.
*Calculation: 10x1.3=13
‘13 huh? At least it’s higher than Strength and Vitality… Ugh. These descriptions barely give any information.’
Sigh, ‘So many questions and not enough answers.’
Resigned to the fact that he wasn’t going to solve this one today, Max decided to get his day started.
“Ma Erk, time to get up.”
The young wolf was already starting to wake when the pack leader had gotten up, but now hearing the command, he immediately got up.
“Yes Boss. Ma Erk Up!”
“Good boy, let’s go, We have a lot to do today.”
Max made three trips in and out of the cave. Each time he brought out one of the Ling wolf’s bodies.
Lining them up in a row outside the cave, Max turned to Ma Erk and asked “What should we do with them?’
“Pack Leader decide!”
“Well, I want your input. They were part of your old pack.”
“Eat?”
That was an unexpected answer. But he did remember reading somewhere that while wolves won’t kill each other for food, they sometimes would eat the remains of other wolves if they were already dead.
‘Well, I was the one that asked him.’
Max wanted to confirm with the little wolf again.
“Ma Erk, are you sure it is okay for you to eat an old packmate?”
“Packmate? Ma Erk outsider. Boss, Ma Erk pack now.”
Hearing the young wolf's confirmation, Max didn’t have much of an argument against it. Max kept forgetting that this was the wilds. Animals and beasts didn’t have the same reservations as humans. Survival was the number one goal. He really needed to stop applying his modern-day standards here. Besides even back home, there were isolated tribes where cannibalism was a common practice. This was a whole new world, what did he know about the cultures and societal norms of this world.
‘Maybe cannibalism is a thing here… Man, I really hope that is not the case…’
Max got to work skinning and preparing the wolf's remains. While he did that, he had Ma Erk go down the cliff to collect firewood. He was starting to run low on dry wood and it was better to have extra fire-making materials than too little. The little guy would have a hard time getting the firewood up the path so instead, he had him gather them in a pile in the clearing.
Time slowly passed as the wolf corpse was prepped and Ma Erk collected firewood. Every now and then, Max would look out over the cliff and see the amazing view. Today, he had missed the sunrise and had gotten up in the late morning. Which just goes to show how exhausted his body and mind were after the fight.
Finally finishing the prep, he stood up. Over the course of the morning, he had only prepared the smallest of the three corpses. His prep was roughly divided the corpse into three sections. The pelt, the guts, and the meat. He didn’t know what to do with the pelt, he knew that there was a special process for treating them before they were usable, but he had no clue where to start. The guts, he left aside and was planning on burying it in a hole or something. He had heard once that carnivores' guts had toxins. Max wasn’t sure if that was true or not but he didn’t want to take the chance. And lastly, he was left with the parts of the meat that he was planning on cooking.
Down the cliff, in the clearing Ma Erk was still collecting firewood. The young wolf had done his job diligently, the pile was now even larger than Ma Erk himself.
“Good Job, boy.” After saying that, Max bent over and gave the little guy a few pats on the back.
It took two trips up the cliff to move all the firewood. He also took a third trip and collected some ripe berries.
Situating himself in the middle of the clearing, Max started making the fire.
“Boss. Ma Erk hungry. Ma Erk eat?”
“Oh yea. Sure, go ahead.”
Max was about to portion out a few cuts of meat, but Ma Erk had already dug into the guts. Seeing that, Max just shrugged and turned his attention back to the fire. If he was honest with himself, it was still off-putting to see a wolf eat another wolf's remains. But that did solve one of his problems.
All the meat was cooked. His reasoning was that it would all go bad without refrigeration so might as well cook it all. Max ate while he was cooking. He had roasted some of the berries and they were the best things he had since he got to this world. It tasted exactly like roasted tomatoes. It was just a welcome reprieve from all the meat he had been eating.
By the time he finished cooking, Max was fairly satisfied with himself. Surveying his work, Max estimated he had enough food to last at least five days now. Looking over at Ma Erk, it looks like a fourth of the guts was gone and the little guy was sleeping it off.