Dios had spent a good few days at the farm with Ol'Coors, he had gained quite a good grasp of a few things within these days which made him quite excited for the days to come.
Ol'Coors originally didn't want Dios around but the young man did help out a lot. The creatures near the fences that usually came to bother them have long been killed and fed to the little pet that he was nurturing which still creeped the old man and everyone else out. He helped with some heavy lifting and was quite good with the animals especially the bulls as they became docile near him whenever he was around for some odd reason.
"I gained a good 50 coppers from Ol'Coors, it seems I should be on my way to the big city now" Dios muttered to himself as he wanted to explore more the of world.
He also gained the knowledge that magic was quite common around here, especially in the country of Lu as they trained many different types of powers such as hunters, adventurers, mages and warriors/knights.
This relieved him greatly as his powers didn't need to be hidden and he really wasn't one to want to play the pig to eat the tiger. He really couldn't care for such methods as it annoyed him in every fantasy book he read in the past and he really had a short temper since his rebirth into this world. It was almost as if his grievances from his past life wouldn't allow him to be low key but he had made a promise he wouldn't be stupid just because he didn't want to play meek.
With the few days of proper meals and peace, he had gotten a better feel for his techniques and even improved his [Steps of Darkness] to the small success realm at 25% progress. He had become almost a good 4 times faster than an average grown man. His strength was similarly a lot stronger but he knew that [Death Scripture] focused more on the integration and accumulation of immortal darkness energy to increase his speed, reflexes, and magic.
Dios surprisingly never tried getting close to Elia after the little incident, he told himself that making love and what not happen was too soon for his young self and he was sure to meet beauties in the future and he didn't like that she didn't like Little Death so she became excluded from his mind. Petty? Yes, but Little Death had much more value to him than anybody on the farm could ever.
"Little Death, come here," Dios called out.
A foot and a half long caterpillar with spikes and a blue sheen was seen crawling out of a crate filled with small reptiles, or whatever remained of them and crawled up Dios' shoulder while playfully wiggling.
"Hehe, aren't you the best, who's a good little mount. You are! hehe." He picked up the habit of giving Little Death puppy love, he never had a pet before and always wanted a dog and figured since little death was still a baby, he might as well spoil the little guy.
"Come on, let's go hunt something bigger today, maybe we can make a few coins of Ol'Coors before we head out." Dios declared as he shot out from his barn and headed towards the tranquil forest.
Little Death simply gripped tight with its many legs and made a small "wuuu" sound as to show his agreement on the matter.
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A few miles into the forest, a boar was grinding its tusks against stone as to sharpen them and was making sounds of snorting echo throughout its surroundings. The boar itself was quite big and didn't seem afraid of predators in the area as the forest was called tranquil for a reason, no scary beast appeared in its area as it wasn't very rich in resources for those apex predators.
Standing on a branch from a tree a few hundred meters away, Dios was crouching with Little Death on his shoulders while gazing intently at the boar. He almost let a drop of saliva fall from staring at the boar as the Dios of today, the boar was nothing but meat ready for roasting.
"Little Death, how does boar meet sound for today?" Dios asked while gently rubbing the chin of the caterpillar whose eyes seemed to close into slits while softly going "wuuuu".
"Hehe, thought so, you little glutton." Dios chuckled before silently dashing from branch to branch as he neared the boar who still had its guard down.
Dios was rushing quite fast yet only the sounds of wind rustling the leaves were heard as his control over his body had grown enough to almost muffle the sound of his movement entirely. His progress had scared quite a few farm hands when he had showed up behind them or next to them without a sound.
As he was rushing forward, he turned his right hand into a claw shape and started gathering some of the accumulated energy he had towards it. A thin film, of purple and black, appeared and slowly took on the shape of pointed claws on the tips of his fingertip as he was doing so. Dios had learned to manipulate a bit of the energy he accumulated from all the beasts and meditation he was doing and was finally able to make a small protective layer with claws on his hands. It wasn't really a technique but it allowed him to pierce through trees and fragment stones without pain or resistance which became really useful when killing.
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He progressively slowed as he closed in on the boar and just when he entered the ten-meter range of the boar, its ears twitched. The boar had felt something nearby and was turning its large body around but before it could even focus its eyes on the disturbance, a claw of purple and black stabbed right through its neck.
The boar squealed in pain and saw with its final breath a crouched young man wearing coarse farmers garments smiling devilishly at it.
Dios jumped back the moment he crushed the windpipe and the arteries in the boar and watched as it took its final stand and its eyes finally dimmed.
Dios stuck out a hand and whispered a few ritualistic words from the [Death Scripture] and a small black glow came out of the boar and entered his hands. The energy from common animals was minimal to his cultivation but Dios wasn't at the stage where he, even if he could, would kill wantonly just for a power increase.
Strapping the 50 kilos bleeding boar to his back, he made his return to the farm to try and sell off the animal to Ol'Coors which he knew loved boar meat.
Back on the farm, Ol'Coors was shoveling some manure from a cart onto a fresh plot when he noticed Dios running back with a giant boar strapped to his back. The smile on his face couldn't help but show how much the old farmer loved boar meat. He didn't even wait until the work was done before yelling at everyone to take a break.
"Dios, Oh Dios! Such a great kid, helping this old man out and even bringing us all some food in return for our hospitality!" Ol'Coors brimming with smiles said as he approached him.
"Cut the crap old man, you know damn well that I helped you out more than enough! Huh, trying to get me all compassionate now? Cough up the coins or I's keeping the whole thing to myself and Little Death!" Dios retorted while Little Death was excitedly yelling "Wuuu, Wuuuu!" with its upper body raise and its little chubby legs clapping together.
"Che! Stingy brat. Fine, I want at least half the meat and I'll buy the fur and tusk for a silver."
"Hehe, that's more like it Old man!" He swung the boar over in front of Ol'Coors who started ordering some farm hands to help him cut up the boar.
'Wouldn't have been so stingy if you hadn't started charging me rent after the second day, you shameless coot.' Dios thought before going near a rivulet to wash his hands and face.
The evening passed in peace, with everyone enjoying a nice portion of roasted boar meat glazed with almond honey that Elia had prepared earlier. Little Death was just as happy as well since it got a nice piece of thigh meat for itself.
Back in the barn that Dios was "renting", he sat down with his legs crossed in the lotus position while facing directly in front of him was Little Death.
"Buddy, we're leaving tomorrow and you got plenty fat and spoiled during these days. We're going to have to sign a [Demon Mount] pact if you are to continue with me, you know that right?" Dios said to Little Death as he took out a knife and cut his finger.
Little Death became very attached to Dios since it spent the last few days with Dios and he kept feeding him much more than its kind ever gets during their childhood. It didn't really know what Dios was saying but it got a general feel for his intentions as all animals do towards people. "Wuu" was all Little Death managed to say.
"Hehe, good, this may hurt a little but don't worry. We will be back to eating and playing like usual soon enough" Dios comforted Little Death as the scripture mentioned this technique was quite invasive on the chosen mount.
With the bleeding finger, Dios drew some strange symbols on his forearm and then drew some similar symbols onto Little Deaths body wherever there were no spikes.
"Here goes nothing" Dios muttered before starting to chant the words from the scripture. As he kept repeating the chant, a glow started to appear on the symbols on both his arms and the caterpillars and with the sound of the chant, they started to glow in a rhythmic beat that went along with the words.
Three blood strings appeared on the three symbols from Dios' forearm and connected themselves to Little Death who seemed a little freaked out but remained as it had trust in Dios.
The immortal darkness energy also flew along with the blood strings that came out of Dios' arm and looked like two different colored strings were twisted as they dug into the symbols on Little Death.
As the ceremony went on, both Dios and the caterpillar felt an intense ache traveling through the symbols and attacking their heads. The pain was incredibly deep as they fainted immediately while convulsing.
The caterpillar wriggled and a blueish liquid was dripping from its mouth and Dios was bleeding from his mouth as well.
The blood strings furiously entered Little Death as the intensity grew and only stopped once Dios' face became pale as snow from the blood loss. Little Death, on the other hand, had grown another foot long and the symbols on its body turned into blood red tribal-like tattoos than ran across its body.
No one noticed what had happened as everyone had retired for the day but the animals all shivered as the blood red and purple-black glow was emitted from the barn Dios was staying in bringing with it a dangerous feeling towards these sensitive animals.