It's been 100 years since I have come to this place. Now I face my last enemy. A dragon. Red adorning the magnificent walking inferno. Standing on its pair of wings and legs it stares at me. I remember the last time something looked me into the eye with this kind of confidence. "You shall not pass", shouting he gathered his magic. Unsheathing my sword I walked toward him fearless in my endeavor. "No offence but I need to slay you to get out of this place" I replied prepared for the greatest challenge of my life.
Not quite there yet but the feelings count right? And 2 legs! That's a drake though. How does it even talk? While swinging a fumer that I cannot grip properly I was thinking this and that.
My tiger claw was awesome. Even though the bones were big I could hold them pretty well if I used both my hands. It was a bit wobbly for one handed use but I had no complaints.
They are heavy but not unwieldy. That is good.
After practicing for a while I took my bone hammer on my shoulder and strode out from the cave.
I am going with strength build for now. I am confident that I can fight with another tiger if it shows up. Probably.
As skeptical as I was, opting for the opposite direction was my safest bate. Same strategy again, hug the right wall and move between cover. Thinking, it would be good if I could find the exit to this place. This place is not good for living. No food, no clothes, no humans either. Silence everywhere.
After walking for a long time I finally found a prey. A deer at that. Hmmmm hmmmmmmmmm! so if there is a deer then there must be a grassland, or not. The deer is eating the ground. Now I am curious. What kind of deer eats ground instead of grass. Leaving aside its food habit the deer is pretty. Huge antler on its head shining like it is made out of crystal.
Walking toward it very slowly as to not startle it the hunger churned in again. Halting on my track to suppress the feeling I noticed the ear of my prey twitch. I became anxious. If this one got away I didn't know when I would find the next one.
Waaa it's so pretty. I feel bad about killing you but I need your meat and skin.
Apologizing I took my bone hammer, arched my body for a full swing and threw it toward its hind legs. My goal was to break or atleast injure the deer's leg. So that even if it ran away the injury would slow it down giving me the opportunity to stalk it later.
My hammer hit its mark and I heard its leg snapping. Running out of my cover, I approached the deer from its side and punched it's face with all my might. With a 'crack' sound its lower jaw came loose. Dangling like a broken bridge after an earthquake. The deer groaned in pain.
Why would I do that? Because I wanted to. In a place with no check morals degrade rather fast. I am not a saint to begin with. The curiosity to find out what I am capable of. The fear of the unknown. I need to vent it somewhere.
Running back to my hammer, as I was getting ready for my finishing move something hit me from behind. It felt like someone lifted me up with a tree branch. Looking down I saw it was the deer.
Eh? A deer is fighting back?
That was surprising. Not impossible to believe though, I had seen a lot of unlikely animals fighting back. In the midst of my confusion it happened. Its antlers split apart and started spinning around its head. My eyes went wide.
"Magic?"
I could not help but make that remark. There is no law of physics that can explain this. As I wondered what it was the shards flew toward me. I jumped away from its trajectory but two still hit me. One in my left bicep and one in my belly. The pain forced me out of my elation back to reality.
Snapping out I removed the shards. They were icy cold. So the deer uses ice magic I noted in my mind. 'Good if I eat it's heart I can probably do that too.' A feeling of excitement grew in my heart again. I started running toward it in a zigzag line. Rolling out of the projectile or jumping was my best bet. After dodging a few times I closed in on the ice deer. Seeing its attack fail for the 3rd time it ran toward me. Probably trying to ram into me.
"Good"
I stopped in front of a pillar. The same tiger tactics. Suddenly the speed of the ice deer increased dramatically. Alarmed by this sudden development I jumped to the side and fell flat on the ground.
Woah I almost got my ass handed to me but the tactic worked.
It rammed it's head on the pillar and got stuck for a moment. That's all I needed. I swung my hammer with all the force I could master and crushed it's head.
"Wwwooooo"
Releasing a sigh of relief I sat down next to it.
"Ah I forgot to bring the spear."
And now I have to drag it back to the cave.
After resting for a few minutes and checking the surroundings for potential danger I found out that the deer wasn't in fact eating the ground. It was eating moss. I collected some moss. Now I just needed to find some wood or flint stones to make a small fire. After collecting some moss I started dragging the ice deer by its hind legs.
"It's heavy as fuck"
Slowly working through the same path I reached the cave entrance. The deer was too big to fit through the door. That was not surprising at all. I called it a deer but it was bigger than a moose. Bringing back my "knife" I started butchering it. This time it was a lot easier. I took out most of its hide cleanly. Cut apart the meat with my hammer spear combo and dumped the antler and guts with the tiger carcass.
Maybe this will attract a new tiger.
After butchering the ice deer I took its heart. It had the same collapsing shape like the tiger's one.
Do hearts collapse like this? Ehh new world new rules who cares. The deer attacking me after it got injured was surprising. Don't herbivores generally run away from an attacker?
Concluding my thoughts I ate the heart without hesitation. Now to see if the pain will start or not. A few minutes passed and I started to get angry for no reason. Then the intense pulse started.
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"It's starting!"
Though I said I don't want to feel the pain again thinking about becoming more powerful I could not stop myself. The pain started. This time no bone broke. It felt like I was injecting myself with something directly into my bones. I curled up, gritted my teeth and suffered through it like a man, chanting "this will make me powerful" "this will make me powerful".
Who am I kidding! it hurt like a bitch.
After that the muscles started their ritual. Numbness ensued. After a few moments everything stopped. The calming current through my body started to become violent. This was good. I could feel power coursing through me. I felt like I could punch a whole through the wall. So I did. I punched the wall hard, held my hand and sat down.
"Aaaaaaaaaaaaaaa … that hurts"
Fuck that feeling of invinsibility.
After settling down I started to check my body. My furs were softer than before, my legs felt stronger, no horn, no change in fur color, no wound either.
Woah, no wound! Wao the evolution have this kind of effect? Now that I think about it my legs were almost non existent back then.
"I am so stupid"
Well, better late than never. Now I know a way to heal myself. Though it's a bit painful. None the less it's a full heal. Full heals are good.
I did my full exercise routine I did before then ran around for a bit.
"I am getting a bit less fat I think"
My neck pain is gone. I feel light though there is still a bit fat around my belly. My muscles have grown quite a bit in just two days I think. I have worked out a bunch in these two days.
"Hehe, I will be a fit boy in a few days."
A rat started doing pushups in my belly too so it was time to eat. I took a piece of the ice deer meat and bit into it. Hunger makes most of the hesitation go away no matter how the food looks. As I bit into the meat, heaven exploded in my mouth. It was not that good but compared to the tigers meat this was heavenly. I ate and ate some more to forget the tiger's taste.
Herbivores are edible, noted.
The meal was satisfying. It was time to clean the hide and check the tiger skin. After cleaning the hide I checked the tiger skin. It dried up pretty well. A little too well in fact. You can probably use it as a frisbee.
So direct contact with the floor is a no. All right I have an idea.
This time I stacked the deer hide on top of the tiger skin. Kept the meat on top of a slice too or it will probably skip the dry aging part and become rock. Time to sleep.
My alarm woke me up. By alarm I mean a roar. 'Looks like the bait worked.' After a quick warm up I took my unga bunga hammer and went to check my next victim. After seeing the prey my face made a dirty grin. 'It's a tiger.' I needed a tiger for my next experiment. It ate the deer guts then went on to eat the tiger meat!
Is food that short in this place that they will eat anything? Leaving aside the cannibalism part' it tests horrible you know. How about hunting an ice deer yourself!
I slowly crept toward it. 'The meat's stench will mask my smell, this will be a good chance for me to get a clean hit.' I calculated. Coming roughly 10ft near the tiger I used the deer’s technique to suddenly accelerate.
I don't know how I can do it but I do not care about the process either. During practice I found out about it and I can put it to good use now. Surviving is all that matters for me.
Before the tiger could notice me I jumped up and hit its head with the bone hammer.
"Crack"
With a cracking sound the skull split and the tiger fell down.
One hit KO baby, awesome.
After a few spasm the tiger passed on.
Hunting is the way to go. I can not fight. I do not know how to fight. The past two fights were not in my favour. Both of them killed themselves. I cannot live long with that chance. What if next time the opponent gets that lucky break? I will die. So, I will hunt. Like a predator, lurking in the shadow and striking when I have the chance.
I brought my spear over, cut open the tiger's chest and took out the heart. This one looked a bit different. It was not collapsed. So my previous theory of anatomy about this world's creatures was wrong. I will need some more test subjects.
Perhaps the time of taking out the heart from the body has something to do with it. Or maybe it depends how much energy it spends before dying. Curious.
With a secondary goal in mind I ate that heart and went inside the cave.
"Come, pain. I am ready"
After a few moments of monotony anger started to boil inside me. And then the violent current started flowing through my vein. I braced myself but no pain came. Only, I felt gas leaking from every pore of my body like they show in those mecha animes. It was comfortable even. A few minutes passed, the pulse became even more violent and the feeling of invincibility came back. I did not punch anything this time. One was more than enough for me to understand that this was a fleeting moment. Any action taken in haste will turn into regret moments later.
"So eating the same species twice will not result in pain but will increase my power!"
I knew my power increased. I don't know how but I could feel it. It's like going to the gym for 2 years and feeling the growth in one go.
I have secured food and weapons. Now I need clothes. I hope the deer hide doesn't become like the tiger skin. After skinning the new tiger I put its hide under the deer hide just for good measures. I have nothing to do now. Do I go hunt! No, I have meat for a few days. Too much hunting can cause problems later. Let's exercise.
Thinking this I started doing my freehand routine. This is an unknown place. I kept myself reminding that. If I were to kill everything and fail to find an exit it would have been very troublesome. Exercising is a good way to pass time and vent frustrations. After completing that I felt sweaty but unsatisfied.
"I need some weight to lift."
I remembered the broken pillar from yesterday.
"That can work!"
But I was disappointed again. The pillar somehow mended itself back to its original shape. I thought of breaking it again but acted against it.
Who knows how it fixed itself? I don't wanna get wrapped up in a cosmological conspiracy. Next best thing will be practicing with my hammer and boxing. I know what to do.
A light bulb lit up over my head. I put the tiger carcass up against a wall and started punching it. Fast punch, slow punch, jabs. I attacked it with my claws too but that did not work as planned. They were pretty useless in attack. The separation of the human finger was to blame.
Practicing for a time my boxing skill went up. I could feel which kind of puch worked, which did not and such things. Now to practice with my unga bunga hammer. There was nothing much to practice with it though. I swang it around for a bit then started practicing swordplay with it.
A few hours passed. I thought. I didn't have a clock, the everlasting dusk of the dungeon didn't help. When I felt hungry I ate. When I felt thirsty I drank. And the rest of the time I checked the hides and worked out.
I can see my fat almost visibly melting. This is how fat should melt. Working out for months after months just to notice you have barely changed can go fuck its self with a fat dildo. I like this world hihi.
One the 3rd day when I checked the hides I found something pleasantly surprising. The deer hide was a little tough but it did not become sheet metal hard. 'I can wear it probably.' The new tiger hide on the other hand got splitted in 3 parts near the edges. When I pulled on one of the layers it started coming off. I pulled out both the outer and inner layers. They were very thin and easily teared apart during the pilling. But the inner layer was thicker and had a soft feeling of unprocessed lather. 'Bingo.'
" So that's how it's made! "
It is not made that way but I didn't know that yet, but this would work for now. I took my spear and started cutting the leather. I didn't have a swaging tool so I made a big strip of lather 3 ft wide and long enough to cover my knees from both front and back. Made hole in the middle to fit my head through it and small holes on the sides. Cutting some thin straps I tied them down on my sides then made a belt and secured the dress on my waist.
"Yahhoo, you have acquired leather common cloth."
"Ah, I forgot to check how the deer magic works!"